Goodbye California - Alistair [99]
‘A couple of devoted agents who think their boss is past it. Quite right too.’ He tapped a sheaf of papers in front of him. ‘Up all night – the devoted agents, I mean – collecting snippets of this and that. Some possibly useful information, some dead ends. What did you think of friend Morro’s demonstration?’
‘Impressive. What do you have?’
Dunne sighed. ‘The niceties of salon conversation, Sergeant Ryder, are not for all. Report from Daimler, remember him?’
‘Security chief in the AEC reactor plant in Illinois?’
‘Yes. Nothing wrong with your memory.’
‘Even less with Jeff’s. I’ve just been reading some notes he typed out. Well?’
‘He says that Carlton did associate with some far-out group. As I said, we preferred to have one of our boys do the direct legwork. Interviewed Carlton’s landlady’s son. He wasn’t very forthcoming – he’d only attended two or three meetings then gave it up. Couldn’t stand the mumbo-jumbo, he said.’
‘What were they called?’
‘The Damascene Disciples. Nothing known of them. Never registered as a church or religious organization. Disbanded after six months.’
‘They had a religion? I mean, they preached, they had a message?’
‘They didn’t preach. They had a message, all right. They advocated the eternal damnation of all Christians, Jews, Buddhists, Shintoists – in fact, as far as I can make out, everybody who wasn’t a Damascene.’
‘Nothing original about that. Were the Muslims on their list, do you know?’
Dunne looked at a list. ‘Oddly enough, no. Why?’
‘Curiosity. Could this landlady’s son recognize any of them?’
‘That would have been difficult. The Damascenes wore cloaks, masks, and those pixie witches’ hats affected by the Ku-Klux Klan. Only this lot were dressed in black.’
‘Something in common, all the same – as I recall it the Ku-Klux Klan weren’t all that devoted to Jews, Catholics and negroes. Anyway, no possible means of identification?’
‘None. Except that this lad told our agent that one of them was the biggest man he had ever seen, a giant, maybe six-eight, and shoulders like a cart-horse.’
‘This person didn’t note anything peculiar about any of their voices?’
‘This person, according to our agent, just escaped being classified as a moron.’
‘But Carlton was no moron. Interesting, isn’t it? What word about Morro?’
‘Well, his accent. We’ve now had reports from – what shall we call them? – linguistic experts throughout the State. Thirty-eight so far, and more coming in every minute. All of them willing to stake their reputations etc., etc. Point is, no less than twenty-eight plump for a south-east Asian origin.’
‘Do they, indeed? Any attempt to pin-point the exact source?’
‘That’s as far as they will go.’
‘Again, still interesting. Interpol?’
‘Nothing.’
‘You have a list of all the places they’ve contacted?’ Dunne looked at Leroy, who nodded. ‘The Philippines, for instance?’
Leroy consulted a list. ‘No.’
‘Try Manila. Ask them to try around the Cotabato area in Mindanao.’
‘The what in what?’
‘Mindanao is the large southern island in the Philippines. Cotabato is a seaside town. Manila may not be too interested in what goes on in Cotabato – it’s at least five hundred and fifty miles away as the crow flies, maybe a thousand by road and ferry. Try, anyway.’
‘I see.’ Dunne paused. ‘You know something that we don’t know?’
‘No. Chances are I’m making a complete fool of myself, just a wild guess based upon ludicrous improbability and I’d rather not make an utter clown of myself. LeWinter?’
‘Two things. The first one is extraordinarily odd. You will recall that in his telephone notebook he’d listed the numbers of all kinds of people with whom – outside his court cases, of course – LeWinter would not be expected to be on either social or professional terms. Engineers, drillers, oil-rig men. There