Conspiracy Theory(133)
“He was an analyst with a specialty in subversive groups.”
“Oh, marvelous. Subversive groups. You know how I feel about the FBI and their subversive groups. They thought Martin Luther King was the head of a subversive group.”
“Yes, I know, I agree with you. Henry Barden would agree with you. That’s why he ended up quitting. However, he does know a lot about how to analyze and investigate nut groups, real ones. And I see him on and off since we’ve both been retired. And he’s here and is willing to help and probably spent last night drowned in America on Alert paper, so would you like to talk to him or do you want to wait in the car while I do?”
Jackman got out. Gregor got out too, and as he did he saw the door of the small town house open and Henry Barden, short and round and cheery-faced, step out.
“How does a retired FBI agent afford a place like this in Rittenhouse Square?” Jackman asked.
“Family money,” Gregor said. Then he sprinted a little to get to Henry in the doorway.
“Gregor,” Henry said. “Good to see you. This must be your Mr. Jackman. I’d be dead under the paper, except that Cameron agreed to help me out. You’ve met Cameron, haven’t you, Gregor? He came to pick me up that time we went to lunch near Independence Hall.”
“I’ve met Cameron,” Gregor said.
A young man appeared behind Henry Barden in the doorway, tall and elegant and aristocratic in the extreme, like one of those pictures of the moles in MI-5 at the end of the Kim Philby affair. Henry Barden smiled. “Mr. Jackman, this is Cameron Reed, my partner. Mr. Jackman is commissioner of police for the city of Philadelphia.”
“How do you do,” Cameron said. He did not have a British accent.
“Come in, both of you,” Henry Barden said. “This really has been very interesting, Gregor. I’ve got to thank you for sending it my way. I don’t know if Gregor told you, Mr. Jackman, but since my retirement, I’ve made something of a hobby of collecting the really far-out conspiracy groups. I probably know more about most of them than the federal government does. It makes me nervous sometimes. Some of them are very paranoid.”
“Some of them are very violent,” Cameron said.
“Yes, yes. I know. Some of them are violent. But most of them aren’t. Most of them are just confused, I guess. And fearful. And addicted to magical thinking. Why do you think that is, that so many people are addicted to magical thinking?”
“Because so many people find life hard,” Cameron said, “and can’t see any way out of their difficulties.”
“He’s a novelist,” Henry said. “A published one.”
“That’s just to indicate that I’m not some pathetic case he picked up and decided to call his protégé,” Cameron said.
They had been proceeding into the town house all this time, down a long narrow hall next to a steep flight of steps, to the kitchen at the back. Gregor stepped into the kitchen and saw that the large table at its center was full of papers. Some of them were copies of The Harridan Report. Gregor was impressed that Henry had been able to get so many on such short notice. Some of them were printed pages of what looked like something Henry had done himself on the computer.
“Sit down, sit down,” Henry said. “I’ll make coffee. Let me make a little room here. You asked me when it started, and what it’s been doing, and I think I can give you a timetable.”
“Good,” Gregor said. He found a chair and sat down. There was no debris on the chairs. Jackman found a chair and sat down too.
Henry did something to the large coffeemaker. Then he came to the table and sat down himself. “Now,” he said. “The first you see of Michael Harridan was two and a half years ago, almost exactly. That’s when the Web site went up, and two weeks later, I found the first notice I could find of The Harridan Report going out in the mail. In case you want to know, there’s no mention of Harridan before that in any of the other groups. Which is very unusual. In fact, it’s nearly unheard of. Most of these guys belong to one or the other of the established groups before they set out on their own. It’s a classic case of progressive delusion, for some of them—”
“Only some?” Jackman said. “What about the rest?”
Henry Barden smiled faintly. “For a small segment of the population, it’s simple fraud. There’s a fair amount of money to be made at this stuff. Oh, you won’t get as rich as Bill Gates, or rich at all in any serious sense, but you can do fairly well in an upper-middle-class sort of way if you’re good at spinning the theories and good at organization and willing to work hard. I do want to emphasize, though, that the out-and-out frauds are few and far between. For one thing, it’s very difficult to commit to the time and energy you need to run an organization like this if you don’t really believe in what you’re doing. For another thing, it’s fairly difficult for most people to spin the theories in a convincing way if they don’t believe them. There are, of course, other people.”