CHAPTER XXI
Coverly had not seen Cameron again. He killed some days at his desk, revising his commencement address about the jewelry of heaven. He was ordered, one morning, to report to security. He guessed that he would be charged with the loss of the briefcase and wondered if he would be arrested. Coverly was one of those men who labor under a preternaturally large sense of guilt that, like some enormous bruise, concealed by his clothing, could be carried painlessly until it was touched; but once it was touched it would threaten to unnerve him with its pain. He was a model of provincial virtues—truthful, punctual, cleanly and courageous—but once he was accused of wrongdoing by some powerful arm of society his self-esteem collapsed in a heap. Yes, yes, he was a sinner. It was he who had butchered the ambassador, hocked the jewelry and sold the blueprints to the enemy. He approached the security offices feeling deeply guilty. There was a long corridor painted buttercup yellow and eight or ten men and women were ahead of him. It seemed like a doctor’s or a dentist’s anteroom, a consular anteroom, a courthouse corridor, an employment office; it seemed, this scene for waiting, to be an astonishingly large part of the world. One by one the other men and women were called by name and let in at a door at the end of the yellow corridor. None of them returned so there must have been another way out but their disappearance seemed to Coverly ominous. Finally his name was called and a pretty secretary, her face composed in a censorious scowl, ushered him into a large office that looked like an old-fashioned courtroom. There was an elevated bench behind which sat a colonel and two men in civilian clothes. A recording clerk sat below the bench. On the left was an American flag in a standard. The flag was heavy silk with a gold fringe and would never have left its stand, not even for a fine parade in auspicious weather.
“Coverly Wapshot?” the colonel asked.
“Yes, sir.”
“Could I please have your security card?”
“Yes, sir.” Coverly passed over his security card.
“You know a Miss Honora Wapshot of Boag Street, St. Botolphs?”
“It’s Boat Street, sir.”
“You know this lady?”
“Yes, sir, I’ve known her all my life. She’s my cousin.”
“Why didn’t you report to this office the fact of her criminal indictment?”
“Her what?” What could she have done? Arson? Been caught shoplifting at the five-and-dime? Bought a car and run it into a crowd? “I don’t know anything about her criminal indictment,” Coverly said. “She’s been writing me about a holly tree that grows behind her house. It has some kind of rust and she wants it sprayed. That’s all I know about her. Could you tell me what she was charged with?”
“No. I can tell you that your security clearance has been suspended.”
“But, Colonel, I don’t understand any of this. She’s an old lady and I can’t be held responsible for what she does. Is there any appeal, is there any way I can appeal this?”
“You can appeal through Cameron’s office.”
“But I can’t go anywhere, sir, without a security clearance. I can’t even go to the men’s room.”
The clerk filled out a slip that looked like a fishing license and passed it to Coverly. It was, he read, a limited security clearance with a ten-day expiration. He thanked the clerk and went out a side door as another suspect was let in.
Coverly went at once to Cameron’s office, where the receptionist said that the old man was out of town and would be gone at least two weeks. Coverly then asked to see Brunner, the scientist who had lunched with him in Atlantic City, and the girl cleared him through to Brunner’s office. Brunner wore the cashmere pullover of his caste and sat in front of a colored writing board covered with equations and a note saying: “Buy sneakers.” There was a wax rose in a vase on his desk. Coverly told Brunner his problems and Brunner listened to him sympathetically. “You never see any classified material, do you?” he asked. “It’s the kind of thing the old man likes to fight. Last year they fired a janitor in the computation center because it appears that his mother worked briefly as a prostitute during the Second World War.” He excused himself and returned with another member of the team. Cameron was in Washington and was going from there to New Delhi. The two scientists suggested that Coverly go down to Washington and catch the old man there. “He seems to like you,” Brunner said, “and if you spoke with him, he could at least extend your temporary clearance until he returns. He’s up for a Congressional hearing at ten tomorrow morning. It’s in Room 763.” Brunner wrote the number down and passed it to Coverly. “If you get there early perhaps you could speak to him before he goes on. I don’t think there’ll be many spectators. This is the seventeenth time he’s been grilled this year and there has been a certain loss of interest.”