A Hard Act To Follow Read online

  One night, a pair of goons on the agency payroll had busted into my apartment, pulled me out of the arms of a pretty girl, and spirited me off to a tractor-trailer which served as his mobile field office.

  He then asked me to infiltrate a brothel at Hamburg, Germany, under the pretext of conducting a sexual study for the Thaddeus X. Coxe foundation. If I said no, I might have been prosecuted for statutory rape, fornication, adultery, Mann Act violations and sundry other sex crimes connected with my research projects. Also income tax evasion, stemming from certain discrepancies in the bookkeeping system of the League for Sexual Dynamics.

  So, reluctantly, I became a Thaddeus X. Coxe-man—and an American agent. My mission was to get information on a quartet of neo-Nazi nuts who were plotting to lure the United States into nuclear war with Russia and China.

  I wasn’t too happy about the job, but I did it—and if I must say so myself, I did it pretty well. Several months and several thousand bullets after I had come on the scene, the plot had been foiled and the plotters were all dead or behind bars. That, I had assumed, was the last I would see of Walrus-moustache.

  But there he was again.

  “Well,” I sighed wearily, “what is it this time? More nasty Nazis threatening the world?”

  “Not quite. But something equally sinister.” He fished a tiny pillcase out of his shirt pocket and handed me a bullet-shaped blue capsule. “Here,” he said. Give this to your girlfriend. It’ll send her on a trip she’ll really enjoy. By the time she comes back, you and I will have discussed all our business and I’ll be on my way back to Washington.”

  I examined the capsule. “What is it? LSD?”

  “Something similar. It’s called LSP—‘P’ as in ‘Pronto!’ It works faster than LSD, and its effects are shorter-lived but far more intense.” He gestured impatiently. “Now hurry up and give it to her. There’s no time to waste.”

  I didn’t argue. It would have been futile. What do you say to a guy who has enough on you to put behind bars for the rest of your life? You say “yes,” that’s what you say. Walrus-moustache and I both knew it.

  Beneath me, Lola was stirring slightly. I put the capsule between my lips, then kissed her open mouth. “Turn-on time, honey,” I said. Obediently she took the capsule and swallowed it.

  “Now watch,” Walrus-moustache told me. “In seconds your shock-stricken princess is going to become one of the most sexually aroused girls you’ve ever seen.”

  As if on cue, Lola sprung vigorously into action. Her arms clasped my back, and her calves locked around the underside of my knees. Her hips darted back and forth like a pair of well-oiled pistons.

  “Oh, wow!” she moaned. “Wow, wow, wow, wow, wow!!!”

  Then it was over. Panting like a dog on a hot summer day, she lay limply beneath me. I felt like I had just run the three-minute mile.

  “Well, so much for that,” Walrus-moustache observed nonchalantly. He sat on the edge of the bed. “Now to get down to business.”

  “Is she asleep?”

  “Not exactly, but she’s so wrapped up in her thoughts that she won’t pay the slightest attention to what we’re saying. In fact, when she comes down off her trip, she won’t even remember I was here. All she’ll know is that she just made love like she’s never made love before.”

  “She knew that the first time I made love to her.”

  “Well, now she’ll know it even better. You may have a hard time getting rid of her. She’ll probably chase you all over the Village hoping for another date.”

  “That LSP must be quite a pill.”

  “It is. Like they say, groovier living through chemistry.” He permitted himself a small smile. “But,” he added quickly, “I didn’t come here to help in your conquests. We’ve got work to do. Mix me a drink. It’s been a long night, and I need one.”

  Frankly, I needed one too. Slipping on a bathrobe, I made my way to the kitchen and poured two Scotches—his on the rocks mine with soda. “Okay,” I said, “what’re we up to this time?”

  He stared pensively at his glass. His tightened, and beneath, his ludicrous toupee I could see lines of worry etched across his forehead. “Damon,” he replied softly after a moment “we’re in trouble. Our beloved country—your country and mine—is presently facing one of the gravest crises in its two-hundred-year history. Unless we act quickly, and wisely, we may lose the cherished freedoms we have come to regard as our natural birthright.”

  I chuckled in spite of myself. The sight of a sixty-year-old man dressed like a hippie and mouthing patriotic speeches was more than I could take with a straight face. “You sound like a re-run of one of those World War II movies starring John Wayne,” I told him.

  His frown made it clear that he didn’t appreciate my sense of humor. “Don’t underestimate the seriousness of the situation,” he said somberly. “If we can’t get to the bottom of this thing soon, the entire Free World may fall into the hands of the enemy.”

  “Which enemy? Russia? Red China? North Vietnam? Or do we have one I haven’t heard of yet?”

  “We don’t know. We suspect Red China, but we aren’t sure. In fact, we aren’t sure of anything—except the way they plan to take over our government.”

  “And how might that be?”

  He lowered his voice to a near-whisper. “A coup, Damon. Can you believe that? A coup?”

  “A coup d’etat? A forceful military seizure?”

  “Precisely.”

  “By the Red Chinese?”

  “By the hippies—with Red Chinese backing.”

  I stared at him incredulously. “You’ve got to be kidding.”

  “I wish I were.”

  “But how could they pull it off? The United States isn’t a little banana republic with four or five men at the seat of power. We’ve got fifty autonomous states and the biggest federal bureaucracy in the history of the world. Lately our lawfully elected representatives have had trouble keeping things under control. How could a band of insurgents—hippies, at that—hope to manage it?”

  “Maybe they couldn’t. But in a way, they’ll succeed even if they fail. Does that sound confusing?”

  “Very.”

  “Then perhaps I should start at the beginning.”

  “By all means do.”

  He took a long swallow of Scotch and drummed idly on the glass with his fingertips. “Some months ago, we began receiving reports from one of our agents in Hong Kong that the Red Chinese were planning to infiltrate the hippie movement. We were told that Mao’s intelligence people had placed unlimited funds at the disposal of the would-be infiltrators and that Operation Hippie had been given priority over all other espionage projects. No one seemed to know why the hippies suddenly had become so interesting to the Chinese. But our agent swore that the sources of information were unimpeachable. So we followed up on the lead. We had several of our best people mingle in with the hippies and find out everything they could.”

  “What did they find out?”

  “Not much. So far as we could discern, the affairs of the hippies were moving along quite normally. There were pot parties, LSD trips, antiwar demonstrations and free-love communes—in short, everything The Establishment frowns on. But nothing in the least bit suggestive of a Chinese infiltration. Finally we pulled our people off the job.”

  “Then all hell broke loose.”

  “How did you know?”

  “That’s the way it always happens in spy movies.”

  “Ah, yes. Art invariably mimics reality. Anyway, about a week after our people left the scene, a young man sought treatment at a San Francisco public health clinic while suffering the ill effects of a bad LSD trip. Under the care of a physician from the Department of Health, Education and Welfare, whose report found its way to our files, the fellow spoke of a plot called “The Big Freak-Out.” According to him, a group of hippies was conspiring to take over the United States by polluting the water supply of Washington, D.C., with a heavy concentration of LSD. Presumably
the conspirators believed that the entire city—including the President, the Congress and the Cabinet—would go off on a twenty-four-hour acid trip. Then while everyone was freaked-out the coup would take place. One of the hippies would declare himself President, others would take over the Cabinet positions and still others would occupy the lower rungs on the administrative ladder. In short, the entire executive branch of government would be under the control of the conspirators.”

  “Incredible!”

  “We thought so too. In fact, we had all but dismissed the whole thing as a wild acid-head’s dream. Then, a few days later, another bad-trip hippie sought treatment at a clinic in New York. He told substantially the same story. A few days after that, a third hippie described the very same plot at a clinic in Chicago. Three bad-trip hippies in three different cities, all telling the same tale. Rather disconcerting, don’t you think?”

  “Maybe the whole thing was a hoax, like that banana business. Remember, the hippies had the whole country convinced that banana peels were hallucinogenic before the F.D.A. exploded the myth.”

  “Possible, but unlikely. First of all, the three hippies were in the advanced stages of a drug-induced psychosis. To have told a calculated lie while in that condition would have been next to impossible. Secondly, the F.B.I. has all but ruled out collusion. Our people ordered a full-scale investigation and there wasn’t a shred of evidence that any of the three hippies knew either of the other two. Third, and most significant, all three are now dead. The San Francisco fellow was killed in San Francisco, the New York fellow in New York and the Chicago fellow in St. Louis—all within a few days of each other. In every case, death was the result of garroting—or more precisely, strangulation with a strand of piano wire. Incidentally, garroting is one of the favorite murder methods of Red Chinese agents.”

  “But if the three hippies didn’t know each other, how could they have been working together? And if they weren’t working together. Why were they killed?”

  “Elementary, my dear Damon. All three could have been underlings in the conspiracy, none known to the other two, yet all known to parties higher up in the hierarchy. Recent developments argue very strongly in favor of that possibility.”

  “What recent developments?”

  “Since the third fellow was killed, there have been four other piano wire strangulations that we know about—two in New York, one in San Francisco and one in Miami. All took place in the same week. The victims in each case were hippies, and three of the four had visited public health clinics for treatment of a bad trip shortly before their deaths.”

  “Did they say anything about The Big Freak-Out?”

  “No. But, don’t you see, they could have. It all fits into place.”

  “I don’t follow you.”

  “Well, let’s presume for a moment that there is a plot to overthrow the government—a vast and insidious conspiracy involving a sizable number of hippies in half a dozen different cities. Suddenly one of the hippies takes a bad trip and seeks treatment at a public health clinic. No one knows what he said while he was there. But everyone knows what he could have said. So the higher-ups decide that he can’t be trusted in the future, because he obviously can’t hold his acid. They kill him. Then another hippie takes a bad trip and visits a clinic, and he’s killed too. Then a third, then a fourth, and so on. By this time, word has spread that it’s very dangerous for a conspirator to visit a public health clinic. So the visits stop, and so do the killings. It all adds up, doesn’t it?”

  “Yes, assuming there actually is a plot. I’m not convinced that there is.”

  “Then consider the alternatives. Suppose there isn’t a plot. That leaves us with the question of how three bad-trip hippies could have told the same story at three public health clinics in three different cities—three hippies who didn’t know each other and who were too far flipped-out to tell a calculated lie. Coincidence? Unlikely. A hoax? We’ve already ruled that out. What other possibilities are there?”

  “I can’t think of any,” I admitted.

  “Next, there’s the question of why these three hippies, and the four who didn’t talk, were all killed—and all with the same style murder weapon. Coincidence? Impossible.”

  “Maybe it was the Mafia. They’ve been trafficking in LSD lately. Suppose the seven murdered guys had bought their acid from Mafia sources and were killed so they couldn’t identify their suppliers?”

  “Conceivable, but unlikely. For one thing, the Mafia doesn’t go in for garroting. For another, if they rubbed out every guy they supplied who had a bad trip and visited a public health clinic, they’d have to kill a lot mom than just seven men.” He shook his head sadly. “No, Damon, it isn’t the Mafia. And since it obviously isn’t coincidence, the possibilities are narrowed down to one: a Chinese-sponsored Big Freak-Out”

  “You argue a good case,” I granted. “Still, I’m skeptical. First of all, I can’t see how Chinamen could infiltrate a Caucasian group without giving themselves away. The racial differences are pretty obvious, aren’t they? Secondly, I don’t like this business about the garrote. If the Chinese Reds actually are behind a plot to overthrow our government, they’ll want to keep their participation as secret as possible. So why kill seven men with a murder weapon that focuses suspicion directly on them?”

  He smiled faintly. “Both objections are valid, Damon. In fact, I’ve pondered them myself long before our meeting tonight. As to the first, we can only assume that the Chinese are using Caucasian operatives—perhaps Americans who are taking orders from a Chinese source, or maybe Europeans or Latins who’re working in the same manner. As to the second, your guess is as good as mine. Maybe the Chinaman in charge of the operation is too stupid to realize that we’d associate garroting with the Chinese. Or maybe he’s playing a game of counterpsychology—using a weapon which is obviously Chinese so we’ll assume that the plotters actually represent another nation which wants to cast suspicion on the Chinese. Whatever the case, the evidence now at hand points very definitely toward Chinese involvement.”

  “By ‘evidence’ I take it you mean that report from your agent in Hong Kong.”

  “That’s part of it, but there’s more. For example, during recent months there’s been a slackening off of Chinese spy activity all over the globe. That could mean that Mao’s espionage people have suddenly been put on an austerity program, or it could mean that China’s previous expansionist policies are being revised. But it could also mean that funds and personnel are being diverted from conventional spy areas to unconventional spy areas—like The Big Freak-Out. Also, the American underground newspapers—those kooky weeklies and bi-weeklies that circulate among hippies in most of the big cities—have been running a lot of articles lately which are highly sympathetic to Mao, to other Chinese leaders, and to the Chinese way of life in general. This could be just an extension of the leftist and pro-mystic line these papers have always followed. Or it could mean that Mao’s public relations people are paving the way for a more overt hippie-commie alliance. Over the past few months we’ve had nearly a dozen similar indications that the Chinese and the hippies are walking hand in hand. No one indication is a conclusive link but put them all together and they’re pretty persuasive.”

  He drained his drink and handed me the glass for a refill. I poured us each a stiff one.

  “All right,” I said once we were re-situated, “let’s say the Chinese are behind the plot Didn’t you agree earlier that the chances of a successful coup are next to nil?”

  “No. I agreed that the hippies might not be able to run the country once they seized power. I never said they wouldn’t be able to seize it.”

  “But how? We’ve got a Secret Service and an enormous standing army. Then there’s the FBI, the Washington police force, the National Guard, the Army Reserve and——”

  “And every last man-jack of them drinks water.”

  “Oh, yeah,” I remembered. “That’s where the LSD comes in.”

  “Ex
actly.” He took a healthy slug of Scotch, then toyed with the ice cubes in his glass. “LSD is one of the most perfect chemical compounds ever synthesized. It’s colorless, odorless and tasteless. When dissolved in water or some other liquid, it can’t be detected except by laboratory analysis involving the most sophisticated equipment. Two hundred and fifty micrograms are enough to make a person hallucinate. One milligram can send the most jaded acid-head on a trip to end all trips. And one kilogram could turn on the whole city of Washington, D.C., and all its suburbs.”

  I whistled under my breath.

  “Of course,” he added quickly, “the plan isn’t without certain bug. For one thing, the hippies will have to put enough LSD into the Potomac River to insure that everyone in Washington consumes at least a threshold dose. That means computing the total amount of water which flows in one day and the total amount actually consumed by the people, either through drinking or absorption into cooked foods. Also they’ll have to come up with some sort of additive to insure that the LSD won’t be vitiated between the time it’s put into the river and the time the water reaches the people’s homes. But the first problem can be solved by simple mathematics and the second by chemistry. Our laboratory people have solved them both, and since the hippies had a head start on us, it’s safe to assume that they’ve solved them too—or soon will.”

  “Is it also safe to assume that once the LSD has been put into the Potomac there’s no way to foil the plot?”

  “There’s no way. Our people presently are trying to develop an antidote which would render the drug impotent, but so far they haven’t come up with anything. Moreover, even if we had an antidote, it would be useless unless we knew precisely when the river would be polluted.” The furrows in his brow deepened. “So, as things now stand, we’re pretty much at the mercy of the hippies. Somewhere between twenty-four and forty-eight hours after they pollute the Potomac, the entire city will be freaked out. And when that happens—well, I shudder to think of the consequences.”