Star Chamber Brotherhood (16 page)

Over lunch in the museum cafe, the two men talked about their lives, local events, the prospects for this year’s Red Sox squad, and the occasional good-looking woman who passed by, as bachelors of all ages tend to do when their girlfriends are out of earshot.

After lunch, they walked down Land Avenue to the Charles River Reservation and continued along the river toward the Longfellow Bridge. After a while, they stopped to watch a barge pass carrying materials for the new levees being built further upriver. The water level was higher than Werner had ever seen it.

When they were alone, Werner asked whether Sam had been able to turn up any new leads on the Internet concerning his daughter’s whereabouts.
 

“Not since we talked last,” the younger man replied. “First of all, it’s not easy to get time on the Internet at my office. And when I do, I have to be really careful to have a good reason for anything I do that’s not job-related just in case somebody asks about it later. You see, all our Internet use is electronically logged to make sure people don’t give away MIT’s secrets or that kind of thing.”

“Or get access to information ordinary people aren’t supposed to know about,” Werner added.

“That, too, I suppose,” Tucker replied. “Though you’d be surprised at how much is already out there once you look around. All the foreign newspapers and magazines and scientific journals, for instance. Man, there’s an awful lot happening in India and Brazil and the U.K. that we never even hear about in our press. It’s like we’ve morphed into the old Soviet Union while Brazil and India and places like that have turned into the new U.S. That ain’t pretty if you’re a scientist and the other guys are leaving you in the dust every time you think you have a great new research idea.”

“So what do you think, Sam?” Werner persisted. “Is there anyplace you haven’t looked yet where you think there might be a chance of picking something up on Marie?”

“Well, your timing is excellent. I just learned some new hacks that promise to open up entirely new vistas for my illicit career on the Internet. Apparently, a lot of our computer science guys have been doing some phenomenal hacking for years, right under the noses of the Thought Police,” Sam smiled sheepishly. “I guess I’m always the last to know because they all think I’m such a square. But a couple of my students have taken pity on me and are showing me the ropes. It’s truly awesome what they can get away with.”

A moment later a team of runners from the Harvard track team passed by, prompting the two men to move along. A few minutes later Werner asked Sam how his engineering work was coming along. At the time Werner had set up the lunch date, Sam had been discouraged about his prospects for promotion within the Electrical Engineering Department, and particularly about his inability to gain an assignment in the MIT institute doing plasma physics research.

“I don’t even know why they bother keeping me around sometimes,” Tucker complained. “Apart from teaching undergraduates and junior grad students, they don’t give me any assignments at all. And the powers that be have made it clear that I’m definitely not on the fast track for a promotion. I mean, when I signed on to stay here for post-grad work, my thesis advisor virtually promised me a slot in the Plasma Science Center. Now nobody over there will even talk to me.”

“Why do you suppose that is?” Werner inquired, puzzled at Sam’s change of fortune.

Sam Tucker rolled his eyes.

“You know what happened, Frank. Dad got arrested. Somehow, though, it didn’t seem to be a problem until they did the background check for my security clearance to work on classified projects. But since Dad’s name popped up in the background investigation, the Institute doesn’t quite know what to do with me any more.”

“Demoted to the zombie, crew, eh? Any chance of breaking the curse and getting back on the A-team?” Werner inquired.

“I used to think so,” Tucker replied. “Once upon a time I was one of the department’s rising postgrads and viewed as having some talent in the field. And it didn’t hurt that they were able to count me as a member of a ‘protected class’ for diversity purposes. On the other hand, I never joined the Party, I belong to a church, and I went to Andover on a scholarship.”

“I would think that Andover would make you a charter member of the old boys’ club. What’s not to like about that?”
 

“The Moneymen Purge,” Tucker answered. “After that, anyone who’d gone to Exeter, Andover, Groton, or Choate might as well have been a child molester. And once the Administration learned that Dad’s forwarding address was a corrective labor camp, I think they decided pretty quick that I wasn’t their guy.”

“So where do you go from here?” Werner inquired.

“Over the winter I put out some feelers. And last week I got a call from West Virginia University. No, it’s not in the same league as MIT, but they do have a pretty good plasma physics program and they’re willing to let me work in it. So I’d still be a post-doctoral fellow with teaching duties, but I’d be valued and I’d be able to work on what interests me. As for swapping Cambridge for Morgantown, West Virginia, I don’t have a clue what it will be like. But I think I’m going to tell them yes.”

Werner gave Sam a hearty slap on the back and congratulated him but at the same time felt his own heart sink at the unexpected news. He would miss his young friend in more ways than one.

“How do you feel about it, Sam? Is this what your heart is telling you to do?” he probed.

“I think so,” Tucker replied.

“When might you be leaving?”
 

“Not before the end of the semester. I’ll probably move down there in June so I’ll have time to settle in before the fall semester begins.”

“That’s good,” Werner replied, “Because there’s something else I want to talk to you about. You see, I need your help on a project that’s likely to be over by the end of May, but it may require fifty to a hundred hours of concentrated work before then. There’s no pay, no recognition, and it carries some serious risk. So it’s something you’ll need to consider very carefully. But I think you will consider it, because it involves your father…in a way.”

Sam Tucker stopped walking and examined Werner carefully before looking out over the Charles River Basin and the buildings of Cambridge.
 

“Until now, Frank, you’ve always said that you’ve heard of my dad, or knew him from a distance, but you’ve never said that you were close to him. So, tell me: just how well did you know my father and how were you connected?”
 

This was the question that Frank Werner had dreaded. There could be no doubt that Sam Tucker idolized his father, having absorbed his love and protection well into young adulthood, only to lose him before he was old enough to know his hidden side.
 

Even Sam’s uncle Jonah, having learned at last of Uriah’s fall from grace. could not bring himself to believe it.
 

Until those final days at Kamas, virtually everyone who knew Uriah Tucker saw him as a giant, a hero, a candidate for sainthood, which is how Werner liked to recall him whenever his memory allowed him to put aside recollections of those days. For Uriah had indeed been a fine man before he became corrupted.

Werner resolved anew not to say anything to son or brother about Uriah Tucker’s end. It would be wrong to ruin a man’s reputation in the minds of those who loved him most by revealing to them the desperate acts of a short but terrible season. And in Uriah’s defense, the pressures he had been under were immense. But what hope could exist of ever redeeming Uriah’s sins if neither son nor brother knew of them? How could either of them repudiate the weakness and error in Uriah that had permitted them to live unmolested lives, yet at the same time had enabled Fred Rocco and his lieutenants to compromise Uriah’s integrity and turn him by degrees into the villain who betrayed hundreds of his fellow prisoners?
 

Werner did not know the answer. So he lied.

“I felt like I knew your father because, when we were in camp together, I was once assigned to work on a project with him. In fact, it was a project much like the one I will be asking you to join. But before the project could be carried out, I was arrested and thrown into solitary and the opportunity didn’t come up again.”

Werner continued, glancing to either side from time to time to make sure that no one could overhear.

“Your father spent most of his life helping and defending ordinary people against the tyrannical power of the Unionist Party. He was not a violent man and I don’t know if he ever used a gun or a bomb. But he worked with men who did, and sometimes his own actions led to violent results as well. The point is, your father knew that his cause would probably not succeed without violence—”

Sam Tucker interrupted.

“If you’re asking whether I’m willing to help you against the Unionists, Frank, I’m already there. Don’t forget, I’ve been with the Railroad since I was in middle school. But if your aim is to overthrow the current regime, you’re a bit late. That’s what Civil War II was all about and our side lost. Most of those who’ve ever raised their hands against the Party are dead or in the camps. What could you or I or any team of us do that would make any difference?”

“We could make a very important difference to a particular group of men and, by extension, to men in similar circumstances across the country,” Werner continued. “We could dispense a meaningful dose of justice to those men and offer hope and encouragement to others that they can do the same for themselves.”

“All right, Frank,” Sam interrupted again. “I think I’m with you, but I don’t have a lot of time before I’m expected back at the office. So I need you to tell me what the mission is and what you want me to do. Can you just, well, lay it out?”

“Okay, here it is,” Werner answered uneasily, checking that they were still far enough from anyone not to be overheard. “Our mission is to carry out a death sentence against the ex-warden of a Corrective Labor Camp in Kamas, Utah, for crushing a rebellion there in 2024. I took part in that rebellion and can testify that the warden has the blood of thousands of prisoners on his hands, including your father’s.”
 

Werner glanced at Sam, checking his reaction. There was none.
 

“Your primary role on the team will be target research: to help us track the target, detect his vulnerabilities and provide whatever information the team may need to penetrate his security and execute him and then withdraw without incident. Unless there’s an emergency, you will not be called upon to carry out the execution itself. Others with the appropriate skills will do that. But the risk to you will be the same as the risk to the rest of us. Anybody who’s caught will be charged with seeking to overthrow the government by force and hanged. Or worse. So, there you have it,” Werner concluded. “Are you with us?”

Sam Tucker paused deliberately, then he looked Werner straight in the eye.

“It may seem odd, Frank, but for several days I’ve had a strange sense that I might be chosen for some sort of special task,” Sam replied with unexpected composure. “I’ve prayed about it and I decided that, if I was called upon and it seemed right, my answer would be yes. Now, if you’ll tell me exactly what you want, I’m ready to start this afternoon.”

****

Werner and Tucker finished their conversation and made their way in relative silence back to Land Avenue. They were about to part when Sam Tucker suddenly stopped and seized Warner’s elbow.

“Do you realize what day it is today?” he asked excitedly.

Werner drew a blank.

“Think of the most famous events in Boston’s history,” Sam prompted.

“Boston Tea Party?” Werner guessed. “Paul Revere’s Ride?”
 

“No, but you’re getting warm,” Tucker replied. “Try again.”

“Lexington and Concord? Shot heard ‘round the world?”

“Bingo! In Boston we celebrate it as Patriots’ Day, which comes on the third Monday in April. And that’s today,” Tucker pointed out. “Did you ever watch the reenactment at the Concord North Bridge?”

“Several times when my girls were in school,” Werner replied. “Do they still do it?”

“Sadly, no,” Sam answered. “They stopped about five years ago. No more Revolutionary War reenactments. No more statues of Founding Fathers. No more brass plaques or anything like that.”

“They may hope we’ll forget,” Werner allowed. “But we won’t. Not people from around here, anyway. Not till the Unionists are long gone.”

“Amen to that,” Sam affirmed and was quickly gone.

Chapter 10

Wednesday, April 18, 2029

Boston

At half past four Werner bought a jumbo iced tea at the coffee shop opposite the rear of the FEMA Building and carried it to a window stool looking south across Purchase Street, just west of the garage exit. From his jacket pocket he removed a paperback novel and pretended to read it while watching for patterns in the traffic leaving the underground garage. Traffic was still light but, as five o’clock approached, the first cars to leave were the electric minicars of the government middle managers and the Ford and Nissan sedans of senior federal officials. The vintage European and Japanese makes driven by tenants of the commercial floors would not emerge for at least another hour.

It was just after five when Werner noticed a polished maroon Ford Galaxy sedan exit the garage to make the right turn onto Purchase Street. He could not see the driver through the car’s tinted glass but was close enough to recognize the GSA license plate number as that of the car Rocco had been driving for the past several days.