Alan E. Nourse & J. A. Meyer (34 page)

Braelow
spread his hands. "There isn't any way
but a court fight," he said. "She's deliberately turning this into a
dirty mess. It's impossible . . ."

It
was the wrong thing to say. "I said I wanted the boy back," Bahr
grated. "Set up any kind of case you have to, but get him back."

"You mean you'd let it
go into court?"

"My
God, are you deaf? No common, low-grade whore is going to . . ." Bahr
broke off, incoherent. "You heard what I said. Now you
do
it!"

Braelow
and his staff mounted the case.

Julian Bahr tried every conceivable device to
keep the affair out of the courts, but after the kidnapping failed it was
evident that he was not going to succeed. Libby would not meet with him or his
attorneys directly. She left all
negotations
in the
hands of her counsel, who were, collectively, the best legal firm in Canada.
With no other alternative at his disposal, Bahr bent every effort toward a
quick, quiet settlement before a Canadian judge, confident that BURINF could do
a neat job of coverup for him on the American side.

Consequently,
he received a bad jolt when he walked into the courtroom with
Braelow
at his elbow, and found himself facing a battery
of 3-V cameras and microphones, with the press-box packed with the most
eloquent journalists on five continents waiting patiently for the fun to begin.

He
caught
Braelow's
arm. "What are those cameras
doing in here?" he whispered furiously. "Those newsmen . . . This is
my
fight, my personal, private fight."

"You
don't have anything personal or private
any more
,"
Braelow
told him coldly. "You might as well get
that through your head. We're on thin ice out here, and it's out of our
control. The cameras were the judge's option, and he insisted on having them
here so there wouldn't be any kickback later."

"All
right, then, get my men to work jamming any broadcast," Bahr said.

"They've tried it
already, and they can't. Radio Budapest is getting through, and so are half a
dozen other foreign nets."
Braelow
shrugged.
"According to Intelligence, most of the population is following the news,
one way or another."

Bahr cursed. "How is
this thing going to go?"

"Maybe
not too bad,"
Braelow
said. "In fact, I
don't see how we can miss. We have evidence of immoral
conduct,
the men involved will give us perfect testimony if we need it."

"They'd better."

"And
we have a terrific edge on the support aspect. The woman's job here will hardly
clothe and feed the child, much less educate him. That's plainly one of our
best cards."

"You
play the cards, don't bother me with them," Bahr said tightly. "Just
so we win."

"Relax,"
Braelow
said.

"But those damned
cameras—"

"You've
always liked cameras,"
Braelow
said. "Cool
off. We're going to win this."

In another room in the courthouse, Libby
turned to Harvey Alexander, her face drawn of color, lips trembling. "I'm
afraid," she said. "I don't know if I can face him."

"Well,"
Alexander said, "this is a fine time to tell me." He put his hand on
her shoulder. Her whole body was shaking. "Look," he said, more
kindly. "We've led him down the garden path, so far. The minute he sees me
out there, he'll
know
that something fishy is
going on. He won't be worrying about you then. I'll be doing the court
fighting, and either you have confidence in me, or you don't. . . ."

"It
isn't that," Libby said miserably. "It's the whole idea. The thing
we're going to do to him. It's a brutal thing to do."

"I know it."

"And it's a
lie . .
."

Alexander
shrugged. "I wouldn't do it if I knew any other way to make him break. But
it doesn't matter now whether we like it or not. I've shown you the BRINT
reports."

"I know, I know," Libby said.
"I know we have to get

Julian out now.
But what if you do knock him down? What will it do to him? He hits
bottom when things go against him and
hell
fight. But
if he's really finished,
hell just go
to pieces. That
happened after his court-martial. He turned into
a
drunk." She looked helplessly at Alexander. "I hate him,
believe me I hate him. But what will happen to him? And what if it doesn't
work? What if we're wrong?"

"If
it doesn't work, we've got nothing to lose anyway," Alexander said
wearily. "He'll expand into Canada, and then Europe, and nothing
you nor
I can do then will make the slightest difference. We
have to get him now, before he's entrenched so
diat
he can never be shaken loose. Look, Libby, you're the one who has to decide.
You've got to have die strength and will to do it, or we're through."

She
was silent for so long, and looked so frightened and uncertain that suddenly he
was frightened himself. Maybe he had given her too much rope, but he knew that
at the heart of it she
had
to make up her own mind.

Watching
her, he thought with a sudden pang of BJ, and wondered if he would ever see her
again. He knew from
a
BRINT
checkthrough
that she was alive, under constant DIA surveillance ever since he had slipped
the hounds that night at Wildwood. Now he realized what drew him to Libby: she
was so much, very much like BJ, and he wondered if BJ would have the strength
to do what he was asking Libby to do now.

"We
got Tim out of the Playschool and into Canada like clockwork," he said,
trying to sound confident. "BRINT folded up the kidnapping attempt
without a hitch. So far we've blocked him at every turn. You must have known
what you were doing then; now we've reached the critical point. Are you going
to throw up your hands and give up now, just because Bahr may call you a
couple of dirty names in public?"

"It's not that. I
don't want Tim hurt."

"Don't
duck the issue. You either want to fight Bahr, for what he's done to you and
the things you believe in, or you want to give up, let him take you like he's
always taken

»

you
.

Libby flushed, and her eyes
blazed with anger.

"No," she said.
"
Hell
never
do
that
again. I'll fight him."

A
clerk opened the door, and nodded to them. Alexander squeezed her hand, and she
stepped to the door. A moment later they were walking down the hall and into
the courtroom.

There
was a hushed murmur across the room as she appeared, and the cameras of two
continents swung toward her as she walked toward the long table near the front
of the room. She saw Bahr's eyes meet hers, contemptuously, and then widen. His
face turned a sudden angry red and he almost leaped to his feet when he saw
that her counsel for the trial was a lean, bronzed Harvey Alexander, in the uniform
of a General in U.S. Army Intelligence, complete with combat braid and
decorations.

Alexander took the opening advantage by
putting Bahr on the defensive about the kidnapping.

First
he asked Bahr's attorney a few routine questions about why Bahr wanted the
adoption, for which very reasonable and logical answers were presented. Then
Alexander said, "And what was Mr. Bahr's reaction to the attempted
kidnapping of Miss Allison's child?"

The
attorney turned to Bahr, who indicated that he would answer without taking the
witness chair. "I was naturally concerned," Bahr said, "and I
would like to add that I am exceedingly grateful to the Canadian authorities,
who were alert enough to prevent what might have been an anxious
...
or even tragic . . . incident."

"Can
you think of any reason why someone should have wanted to carry out this
kidnapping, Mr. Bahr?" Alexander asked, persistently ignoring Bahr'*title.

"I
cannot, unless they knew he was my son and intended to bilk me for ransom.
Certainly a ransom attempt would have been aimed at me," he added,
"because Miss Allison has no money at all."

"Then
someone must have been aware of your earlier attempt to negotiate with Miss
Allison?"

Bahr reddened. "That's possible. It was
a domestic
matter,
I made no attempt at secrecy."

Alexander's
voice was smooth. "Then possibly some over-zealous people attempted the
kidnapping, thinking they were acting in your interests."

"I
think not," Bahr said sharply. "My people know I don't operate that
way . . . and they are completely loyal."

Alexander
let that remark sink home; then he thrust the knife. "In that case, I'm
sure you can explain,"
he
said, "why every
member of the kidnapping group was an agent in the New York division of your
own DIA."

During the recess Bahr had a background check
run on Alexander, on a crash priority, intent on discrediting him as an
imposter. Alexander was a passed-over major in the Army, a deserter, and wanted
by the DIA for stability check and alien contact. A General! Bahr snorted.

The background check altered his plans. The
Army records were complete and perfect. Alexander, they said, had been on
special CI assignment since the Wildwood raid; his promotion had been
reconsidered, and he had been spot-promoted to General after directing a raid
on Chinese Intelligence headquarters in Hong Kong two weeks before when an
attempt had been made to blow up the White Sands rocket installation. Bahr
remembered seeing the report on that raid, carried out with terrific daring and
precision in Hong Kong and well publicized. He had even commended it publicly
himself, though the names of the participants had not been noted. Bahr did not
like it. It put Alexander in too strong a position, a military hero.

The
escape from Kelley was no help, since Alexander had been registered there under
a John Smith label, for Bahr's convenience. As far as the records were
concerned, the incident had never happened, and Alexander was legally
scot-free. The recess was short, but by the time he went back into court Bahr
was certain that some forgery and conniving had been carried out with the Army
files. He smelled a rat, but he didn't know what to do about it at that time.

After the recess, the unpleasantness of the
opening session intensified. Bahr presented his claims for the boy. Alexander
parried every inference against Libby's character and qualifications, but felt
that he was losing ground nevertheless. Bahr's confidence was returning; he
nodded to his counsel, and they began the long string of male witnesses
testifying to Libby's immoral conduct during the past weeks. Alexander appeared
confused as the picture developed inexorably. Finally, as though at a loss, he
put Libby herself on the stand.

She
tensed herself for the ordeal, to do what she had to do. "I could deny
what these men have been saying, but I can't see what difference their
testimony could make in this matter anyway," she said sharply. "When
DEPCO was closed down my apartment was looted, my bank account frozen, and I
was turned out on the street and hustled around by the police for vagrancy. My
education kept me out of low-skill jobs, and my red security card, a present
from Mr. Bahr, kept me out of highly skilled jobs. When the currency was
changed . . . well, show me one person in Federation America who didn't go
through hell during that changeover. . . ."

She
saw Bahr's face go red with anger, saw him lean over to whisper to
Braelow
, saw the camera eyes watching her from four angles
across the room, and she went on. Her voice was low before; now she raised it
so it carried clearly across the courtroom. "But we're not talking about
me, we're talking about this man's claim on my son, and there's one thing I'd
like to make clear, and it just makes me furious. I've been insulted, and
attacked, and my private life has been put under the spotlight, all on the
strength of sanctimonious claims that Julian Bahr wants to do the right thing
by his son and take him away
ffgjn
my evil influence.
Well, I would like to ask Mr. Bahr if he has one shred of proof, even a single
scrap of
paper, that
will prove that he is the father
of my child."