The Machiavelli Covenant by Allan Folsom Page B

How did you even get my name?"
    "I'm a writer and photojournalist doing a photo-essay book on the clergy that minister to prominent politicians. Reverend Beck is one of them. It's why I was with him when he visited the hospital and why I came to theservice today. Reverend Beck is pastor of the church where the Parsons family were members. He knew you had been keeping vigil over Mrs. Parsons. He was curious about you and asked one of the nurses. I was there when he learned who you were and that you were a close friend of hers."
    Marten squinted in the glare of the afternoon light. "Just what is it you want?"
    Demi took a step closer. She was on edge and anticipatory, even more than she had been when she approached him inside the church. "She knew she was dying."
    "Yes." Marten had no idea where she was going with her questioning or why she had sought him out.
    "You and she must have talked."
    "A little."
    "And under the circumstances she might have told you things she would not have told others."
    "Maybe."
    Suddenly Marten was on his guard. Who was she and what was she trying to find out? What Caroline knew or had suspected about Dr. Stephenson and what had been done to her? Or what she felt had happened to her husband and son? Maybe even about the white-haired man, Merriman Foxx, if he was indeed the person Caroline had been referring to.
    "Just exactly what is it you want to know?" he said flatly.
    "Did she mention—?" Demi Picard hesitated.
    Just then Marten saw a dark gray Ford turn the far corner in the parking lot and come toward them. He looked back to Demi. "Did she mention what?"
    "The"—she hesitated—"witches."
    "Witches?"
    "Yes."

    The Ford was closer now and slowing. Marten swore to himself. He knew the car and the two people in it, and the way it was slowing told him they had no intention of driving past. Quickly his eyes went to Demi. "Witches?" he pressed her. "What are you talking about?"
    Then the Ford was there, pulling up and stopping, its doors opening. Detective Herbert got out from behind the wheel, Monroe from the front passenger seat.
    Demi glanced at the police. "I have to go, I'm sorry," she said abruptly, then turned and walked quickly back toward the church.
    Marten took a breath, then looked at the detectives and tried to smile. "What can I do for you?"
    "This." Monroe snapped a handcuff over one wrist and then the other.
    "For what?" Marten was outraged.
    Herbert started him toward the car. "We let you attend Mrs. Parsons's service. That's the only favor you get."
    "What the hell does that mean?"
    "It means we're going for a little ride."
    "A ride where?"
    "You'll find out."

21

    • BRITISH AIRWAYS FLIGHT 0224, WASHINGTON,
DULLES, TO HEATHROW, LONDON, 6:50 P.M.

    Marten watched the hardscape and parkland of Washington dissolve to a twilight sky as the plane banked steeply and headed out over the Atlantic. Handcuffs gone, he was crammed into a window seat of three-across seatingin a sold-out coach section and arm to elbow with his two companions, a just-married, hand-holding, cooing couple who hadn't taken their eyes off each other since they'd buckled in. And who, he guessed, weighed somewhere in the neighborhood of three hundred pounds each.
    There had been a standby line of at least twenty, but intrepid detectives Herbert and Monroe had found a seat for him anyway. Their entire MO had been quick and slick. Stopping by his hotel, letting him collect his personal belongings, then whisking him to Dulles International with barely a dozen words said between them. The few they used had been simple and succinct. No interpretation needed. "Get out of Washington and stay out."
    They had waited with him at the British Airways gate right up until boarding time and then put him on the plane themselves just to make sure he didn't decide to get off and venture back into their fair city at the last minute. The procedure wasn't unusual; cops did it all the time to get rid of people they couldn't charge