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  That motion was passed, 7-0.

  Having disposed of the Mother Abagail business for the time being, the committee then moved on to the question of the dark man himself at Nick's request. He proposed that we send three volunteers west to join the dark man's people, the purpose being to gain intelligence about what's really going on over there.

  Sue Stern immediately volunteered. After some hot discussion of that, Glen Bateman was recognized by Stu and put this motion on the floor: Resolved, that no one from our ad hoc committee or from the permanent committee be eligible to volunteer for this reconnaissance. Sue Stern wanted to know why not.

  Glen: "Everyone respects your honest desire to help, Susan, but the fact is, we simply don't know if the people we send will ever come back, or when, or in what shape. In the meantime, we have the not-so-inconsiderable job of getting things in Boulder back on a paying basis, if you'll pardon the slang. If you go, we'll have to fill your seat with someone new who would have to be briefed on the ground we've already covered. I just don't think we can afford all that lost time."

  Sue: "I suppose you're right... or at least being sensible ... but I do wonder sometimes if those two things are always the same. Or even usually the same. What you're really saying is that we can't send anyone from the committee because we're all so fucking inexpendable. So we just ... just ... I don't know..."

  Stu: "Lay back in the buckwheat?"

  Sue: "Yes. Thank you. That's just what I mean. We lay back in the buckwheat and send somebody over there, maybe to get crucified on a telephone pole, maybe something even worse."

  Ralph: "What the hell could be worse?"

  Sue: "I don't know, but if anyone does know, it will be Flagg. I just hate it."

  Glen: "You may hate it, but you've stated our position very succinctly. We're politicians here. The first politicians of the new age. We just have to hope that our cause is more just than some of the causes for which politicians have sent people into life-or-death situations before this."

  Sue: "I never thought I'd be a politician."

  Larry: "Welcome to the club."

  Glen's motion that no one from the ad hoc committee should be one of the scouts was carried--gloomily--by a 7-0 vote. Fran Goldsmith then asked Nick what sort of qualifications we should look for in prospective undercover agents, and what we should expect them to find out.

  Nick: "We won't know what there is to be learned until they come back. If they do come back. The point is, we have absolutely no idea what he's up to over there. We're more or less like fishermen using human bait."

  Stu said he thought the committee should pick the people it wanted to ask, and there was general agreement on this. By committee vote, most of the discussion from this point on has been transcribed into these excerpts verbatim from the audio tapes. It seemed important to have a permanent record of our deliberations on the matter of the scouts (or spies), because it turned out to be so delicate and so troubling.

  Larry: "I've got a name I'd like to put into nomination, if I could. I suppose it'll sound off the wall to those of you who don't know him, but it might be a really good idea. I'd like to send Judge Farris."

  Sue: "What, that old man? Larry, you must be nuts!"

  Larry: "He's the sharpest old guy I've ever met. He's only seventy, for the record. Ronald Reagan was serving as President at an older age than that."

  Fran: "That's not what I'd call a very strong recommendation."

  Larry: "But he's hale and hearty. And I think the dark man might not suspect we'd send an old crock like Farris to spy on him ... and we have to take his suspicions into account, you know. He's got to be looking for a move like this, and I wouldn't be entirely surprised if he had border guards checking people coming in over there against a potential 'spy profile.' And--this will sound brutal, I know, especially to Fran --but if we lose him, we haven't lost somebody with fifty good years in front of him."

  Fran: "You're right. It sounds brutal."

  Larry: "All I want to add is that I know the Judge would say okay. He really wants to help. And I really think he could carry it off."

  Glen: "A point well taken. What does anybody else think?"

  Ralph: "I'll go either way, because I don't know the gentleman. But I don't think we should throw the guy out just because he's old. After all, look who's in charge of this place--an old lady who's well over a hundred."

  Glen: "Another point well taken."

  Stu: "You sound like a tennis ref, baldy."

  Sue: "Listen, Larry. What if he fools the dark man and then drops dead of a heart attack while he's busting his hump to get back here?"

  Stu: "That could happen to just about anyone. Or an accident."

  Sue: "I agree ... but with an old man, the odds go way up."

  Larry: "That's true, but you don't know the Judge, Sue. If you did, you'd see that the advantages outweigh the disadvantages. He's really smart. Defense rests."

  Stu: "I think Larry's right. It's the sort of thing Flagg might not expect. I second the motion. Those in favor?"

  Committee voted aye, 7--0.

  Sue: "Well, I went along with yours, Larry--maybe you'll go along with mine."

  Larry: "Yeah, this is politics, all right. [General laughter.] Who is it?"

  Sue: "Dayna."

  Ralph: "Dayna who?"

  Sue: "Dayna Jurgens. She's got more guts than any woman I ever knew. Of course, I know she isn't seventy, but I think if we put the idea to her, she'd go along."

  Fran: "Yes--if we really have to do this, I think she'd be good. I second the nomination."

  Stu: "Okay--it's been moved and seconded that we ask Dayna Jurgens along for the ride. Those in favor?"

  Committee voted aye, 7-0.

  Glen: "Okay--who's number three?"

  Nick (read by Ralph): "If Fran disliked Larry's, I'm afraid she's really going to dislike mine. I nominate--"

  Ralph: "Nick, you're crazy! You don't mean it!"

  Stu: "Come on, Ralph, just read it."

  Ralph: "Well ... it says here he wants to nominate ... Tom Cullen."

  Uproar from the committee.

  Stu: "Okay. Nick has the floor. He's been writin like a bastard, so you better read it, Ralph."

  Nick: "First of all, I know Tom just as well as Larry knows the Judge, and probably better. He loves Mother Abagail. He'd do anything for her, including roasting over a slow fire. I really mean that--no hype. He'd set himself on fire for her, if she asked him to."

  Fran: "Oh, Nick, nobody's arguing that, but Tom is--"

  Stu: "Let it go, Fran--Nick's got the floor."

  Nick: "My second point is the same one Larry made about the Judge. The Adversary is not going to expect us to send a retarded person as a spy. Your combined reactions to the idea are maybe the best argument in favor of the idea.

  "My third--and last--point is that, while Tom may be retarded, he is not a halfwit. He saved my life once when a tornado came, and he reacted much faster than anyone else I know would have done. Tom is childish, but even a child can learn to do certain things if he is drilled and taught and then drilled some more. I see no problem at all in giving Tom a very simple story to memorize. In the end, they'll likely assume that we sent him away because--"

  Sue: "Because we didn't want him polluting our gene-pool? Say, that's good."

  Nick: "--because he is retarded. He can even say he's mad at the people who sent him away and would like to get back at them. The one imperative which would have to be drilled into him would be to never change his story, no matter what."

  Fran: "Oh, no, I can't believe--"

  Stu: "Come on, Nick has the floor. Let's keep it orderly."

  Fran: "Yes--I'm sorry."

  Nick: "Some of you may feel that, because Tom is retarded, it would be easier to shake him from his story than it would be someone with a wider intelligence, but--"

  Larry: "Yeah."

  Nick: "--but actually, the reverse is true. If I tell Tom he simply must stick to the story I g
ive him, stick to it no matter what, he will. A so-called normal person could only stand up to so many hours of water torture or so many electric shocks or splinters under the fingernails--"

  Fran: "It wouldn't come to that, would it? Would it? I mean, nobody really thinks it would come to that, do they?"

  Nick: "--before saying, 'Okay, I give up. I'll tell you what I know.' Tom simply won't do that. If he goes over his story enough times, he won't just have it by heart; he'll come to almost believe it is true. Nobody will be able to shake him on it. I just want to make it clear that I think, in a number of ways, Tom's retardation is actually a plus in a mission like this. 'Mission' sounds like a pretentious word, but that's just what it is."

  Stu: "Is that it, Ralph?"

  Ralph: "There's a little more."

  Sue: "If he actually starts to live his cover story, Nick, how in the hell will he know when it's time to come back?"

  Ralph: "Pardon me, ma'am, but it looks like that's what some of this is about."

  Sue: "Oh."

  Nick (read by Ralph): "Tom can be given a post-hypnotic suggestion before we send him out. Again, this is not just blue-skying; when I had this idea, I asked Stan Nogotny if he would try to hypnotize Tom. Stan used to do it as a parlor trick at parties sometimes, I heard him say. Well, Stan didn't think it would work ... but Tom went under in about six seconds."

  Stu: "I'll be. Ole Stan knows how to do that, huh?"

  Nick: "The reason I thought Tom might be ultra-susceptible dates back to when I met him in Oklahoma. He's apparently developed the knack, over a long period of years, of hypnotizing himself to a degree. It helps him make connections. He couldn't understand what I was up to on the day I met him--why I didn't talk to him or answer any of his questions. I kept putting my hand on my mouth and then my throat to show I was mute, but he didn't get it at all. Then, all at once, he just turned off. I can't explain it any better than that. He became perfectly still. His eyes went far away. Then he came out of it, exactly the way a subject comes out of it when the hypnotist tells him it's time to wake up. And he knew. Just like that. He went into himself and came up with the answer."

  Glen: "That's really amazing."

  Stu: "It sure is."

  Nick: "I had Stan give him a post-hypnotic suggestion when we tried this, about five days ago now. The suggestion was that when Stan said, 'I sure would like to see an elephant,' Tom would feel a great urge to go into the corner and stand on his head. Stan sprang it on him about half an hour after he woke Tom up, and Tom hustled right over into the corner and stood on his head. All the toys and marbles fell out of his pants pockets. Then he sat down and grinned at us and said, 'Now I wonder why Tom Cullen went and did that?' "

  Glen: "I can just hear him, too."

  Nick: "Anyway, all this elaborate hypnosis stuff is just an introduction to two very simple points. One, we can plant a post-hypnotic suggestion that Tom return at a certain time. The obvious way would be to do this by the moon. The full moon. Two, by putting him into deep hypnosis when he gets back, we'd get almost perfect recall of everything he saw."

  Ralph: "That's the end of what Nick's got written down. Wow."

  Larry: "It sounds like that old movie The Manchurian Candidate to me."

  Stu: "What?"

  Larry: "Nothing."

  Sue: "I have a question, Nick. Would you also program Tom--I guess that's the right word--not to give out any information about what we're doing?"

  Glen: "Nick, let me answer that, and if your reasoning is different, just shake your head. I would say that Tom doesn't need to be programmed at all. Let him spill anything and everything he knows about us. We're keeping our business as it relates to Flagg in camera anyway, and we're not doing much else that he couldn't guess on his own ... even if his crystal ball is on the blink."

  Nick: "Exactly."

  Glen: "Okay--I'm going to second Nick's motion right on the spot. I think we have everything to win and nothing to lose. It's a tremendously daring and original idea."

  Stu: "It's been moved and seconded. We can have a little further discussion if you want, but only a little. We'll be here all night, if we don't look lively. Is there any further discussion?"

  Fran: "You bet there is. You said we have everything to win and nothing to lose, Glen. Well, what about Tom? What about our own goddam souls? Maybe it doesn't bother you guys to think about people sticking ... things ... under Tom's fingernails and giving him electric shocks, but it bothers me. How can you be so cold-blooded? And Nick, hypnotizing him so he'd behave like a ... a chicken with its head stuck in a bag! You ought to be ashamed! I thought he was your friend!"

  Stu: "Fran--

  Fran: "No, I'm going to have my say. I won't wash my hands of the committee or even walk off in a huff if I'm voted down, but I'm going to have my say. Do you really want to take that sweet, foggy boy and turn him into a human U-2 plane? Don't any of you understand that's the same as starting all the old shit over again? Can't you see that? What do we do if they kill him, Nick? What do we do if they kill all of them? Breed up some new bugs? An improved version of Captain Trips?"

  There was a pause here while Nick wrote out a response.

  Nick (read by Ralph): "The things Fran has brought up have affected me pretty deeply, but I stand by my nomination. No, I don't feel good about standing Tom on his head, and I don't feel good about sending him into a situation where he might be tortured and then killed. I'll only point out again that he would be doing it for Mother Abagail, and her ideas, and her God, not for us. I also truly believe that we have to use any means at our disposal to end the threat this being poses. He's crucifying people over there. I'm sure of that from my dreams, and I know some of you others have had that dream, too. Mother Abagail has had it herself. And I know that Flagg is evil. If anyone works up a new strain of Captain Trips, Frannie, it will be him, to use on us. I'd like to stop him while we still can."

  Fran: "Those things are all true, Nick. I can't argue them. I know he's bad. For all I know, he may be Satan's Imp, as Mother Abagail says. But we're putting our hand to the same switch in order to stop him. Remember Animal Farm? 'They looked from the pigs to the men, and could not tell the difference.' I guess what I really want to hear you say --even if it's Ralph who reads it--is that if we do have to pull that switch in order to stop him ... if we do ... that we'll be able to let go once it's over. Can you say that?"

  Nick: "Not for sure, I guess. Not for sure."

  Fran: "Then I vote no. If we must send people into the West, let's at least send people who know what they are in for."

  Stu: "Anyone else?"

  Sue: "I'm against it, too, but for more practical reasons. If we go on the way we're headed, we're going to end up with an old man and a feeb. Pardon the expression, I like him too, but that's what he is. I'm against it, and now I'll shut up."

  Glen: "Call the question, Stu."

  Stu: "Okay. Let's go around the table. I vote aye. Frannie?"

  Fran: "Nay."

  Stu: "Glen?"

  Glen: "Aye."

  Stu: "Suze?"

  Sue: "Nay."

  Stu: "Nick?"

  Nick: "Aye."

  Stu: "Ralph?"

  Ralph: "Well--I don't like it that much either, but if Nick's for it, I got to go along. Aye."

  Stu: "Larry?"

  Larry: "Want me to be frank? I think the idea sucks so bad I feel like a pay toilet. This is the kind of stuff you get when you're at the top, I guess. Neat fucking place to be. I vote aye."

  Stu: "Motion's carried, 5-2."

  Fran: "Stu?"

  Stu: "Yes?"

  Fran: "I'd like to change my vote. If we're really going to put Tom into it, we better do it together. I'm sorry I made such a fuss, Nick. I know it hurts you--I can see it on your face. It's so crazy! Why did any of this have to happen? It sure isn't like being on the sorority prom committee, I'll tell you that. Frannie votes aye."

  Sue: "Me too, then. United front. Nixon Stands Firm, Says I Am Not
a Crook. Aye."

  Stu: "Amended vote is 7-0. Here's a hanky, Fran. And I'd like the record to show that I love you."

  Larry: "On that note, I think we should adjourn."

  Sue: "I second that emotion."

  Stu: "It has been moved and seconded by Zippy and Zippy's mom that we adjourn. Those in favor, raise your hands. Those opposed, be prepared to get a can of beer dumped on your head."

  The vote to adjourn was 7-0.

  "Coming to bed, Stu?"

  "Yeah. Is it late?"

  "Almost midnight. Late enough."

  Stu came in from the balcony. He was wearing jockey shorts and nothing else; their whiteness was nearly dazzling against his tanned skin. Frannie, propped up in bed with a Coleman gas lantern on the night table next to her, found herself amazed again by the confident depth of her love for him.

  "Thinking about the meeting?"

  "Yes. I was." He poured himself a glass of water from the pitcher on the night table and grimaced at the flat, boiled taste.

  "I thought you made a wonderful moderator. Glen asked you if you'd do it at the public meeting, didn't he? Is it bothering you? Did you decline?"

  "No, I said I would. I guess I can do that. I was thinking about sending those three across the mountains. It's a dirty business, sending out spies. You were right, Frannie. Only trouble is, Nick was right, too. In a case like that, what you gonna do?"

  "Vote your conscience and then get the best night's sleep you can, I guess." She reached out to touch the Coleman lamp switch. "Ready for the light?"

  "Yeah." She put it out and he swung into bed beside her. "Good night, Frannie," he said. "I love you."

  She lay looking at the ceiling. She had made her peace with Tom Cullen ... but that smudged chocolate thumbprint stayed on her mind.

  Every dog has its day, Fran.

  Maybe I ought to tell Stu right now, she thought. But if there was a problem, it was her problem. She would just have to wait ... watch ... and see if anything happened.

  It was a long time before she slept.

  CHAPTER 52

  In the early hours of the morning, Mother Abagail lay sleepless in her bed. She was trying to pray.

  She got up without making a light and knelt down in her white cotton nightgown. She pressed her forehead to her Bible, which was open to the Acts of the Apostles. The conversion of dour old Saul on the Damascus road. He had been blinded by the light, and on the Damascus road the scales had fallen from his eyes. Acts was the last book in the Bible where doctrine was backed up by miracles, and what were miracles but the divine hand of God at work upon the earth?