Castro Directive by Stephen Mertz Page A

following, but he couldn't pinpoint the car. Now there was nowhere to hide; but neither was there anyone behind him. He pulled into a parking lot, locked his door, and walked over to a grassy mall with brick buildings on either side. A typical campus layout, except there was no ivy creeping up the walls, and there were far too few trees.
    He was several minutes early and slowly ambled across the mall among the students. He thought a moment about his own college days and realized that most of these kids weren't even alive then; all the social upheavals of that time were just history to them.
    When he found the building where the Psychology Department was housed, he walked past the elevator, climbed the stairs to the third floor, and found himself in the rear of the department. He moved along a hallway, past several offices, until he came to one with Redington's name on the wall. The door was partially open, and he saw a man seated behind a desk. He was looking for something on a bookshelf and his back was to Pierce. He had snow-white hair tied in a short ponytail that fell over his collar.
    He tapped on the door; the man turned, looked up over his half-moon glasses. He appeared to be in his late sixties or early seventies. "Dr. Redington?"
    He scowled at Pierce. "Didn't you talk to the receptionist?"
    "No, I came in the back way," he said hesitantly.
    "So you did. Well, don't just stand there. Come on in."
    He stepped into the office. "My name's Nicholas Pierce."
    "Of course it is. It's right here. Pierce. Eleven o'clock. You were referred by whom?"
    "Elise Simms."
    "Is this for hypnosis?"
    "Hypnosis, no. It's about the missing skull."
    Redington frowned at him. "Oh, yes. Sit down, Pierce. You're the investigator. Elise—er, Dr. Simms sends students to me for hypnosis to improve their study habits. About this time—near finals—I get a flood of them."
    "I see." He took a seat across from Redington. The office was cramped, but the chair was comfortable. The walls were lined with books, except for the wall behind the desk; that was covered with diplomas. Among them was a framed poster of a man holding a baby above his head. Near the bottom, a caption read: "The mythic journey begins here. For instructions, look within."
    The desk was crowded with books,   papers, files. To one side, amid the disarray, was a thermos, and next to it something round and clear that was partially covered by a psychology journal.
    Redington saw his glance and lifted the magazine. Below it was a gleaming skull the size of his fist, a shrunken version of the one stolen from Loften's office.
    "It's a glass paperweight, a trinket. Nothing like the one you saw."
    "Mind if I take a look at it?"
    "Be my guest."
    He turned it over in his hand. "Dr. Simms played me the tape of your telephone conversation with Paul Loften."
    Redington stared at him impassively, so Pierce continued. "It sounded as if you knew Paul Loften fairly well."
    "I knew him for several years. I've lectured a couple of times at the Beach Museum on the crystal skull."
    "Why would a psychology professor lecture about a crystal skull?"
    Redington smiled and reached for the thermos. "I'm interested not so much in the object itself as in what it represents." He removed the cup from the thermos, unscrewed the top, and poured himself a cup of steamy hot water. "You see, the relationship between myths and the collective unconscious is what intrigues me."
    Pierce expected Redington to open a desk drawer and take out a jar of instant coffee. Instead, he sipped the hot water.
    "There's a coffee machine in the hail if you'd like some."
    "I'm fine. Thanks." Pierce set down the glass skull.
    "Do you know about the legend?"
    Pierce shook his head. "I'd like to hear about it, though." Redington removed his glasses, which were attached to a black elastic band, and they fell against his chest. "If I tell you about it, you'll have to promise me that you'll take what I say as being neither true nor false.