Chapter 114: Assignment Houston

Friday, June 11, 1971

The tour bus pulled to a stop in front of the new Marriott Hotel. Anna and Penny asked us to wait while they checked out the lay of the land. On the way downtown from Southern Pacific’s Englewood yard, Anna and Penny had gone into great detail on what they expected me to do. So while they scouted, I began to scope out the people nearby.

As they had suspected, there were two groups of protesters. One was protesting the war in Vietnam. There were about fifty people in all, kids mostly. The guys all seemed to have long hair with beards or lamb chop sideburns that I had forgotten about being so popular. The girls all seemed to be wearing granny dresses, or gingham skirts and boots, or tie-dyed shirts and dresses. Overall, they looked dirty and frazzled. They marched in ambiguous patterns on the sidewalk, carrying placards and signs denouncing the war.

A blue haze hung over the group, and I could smell the pot from our coach after a while. I scanned them, but found nothing threatening as far as the banquet tonight. Although I did spot two undercover narcs in the group who happened to be armed, there was no other serious firepower, or the inclination to use it.

The other group was more interesting, only in that they were cleaner, more organized, and mostly women. They were marching for women’s rights, and they chanted and sometimes sang as they marched in an orderly pattern in an area the Houston police had cordoned off for them. The police department had made sure the two groups were well separated and as far from the entrance, and the press, as possible. I studied them for a moment to see if I could find evidence of any planned ‘bra-burning’, however, it was a peaceful group, seeking publicity, not notoriety. And no one planned to remove their bra, much less burn it.

Darn it! I chuckled when I realized that the predominant discussions centered around how the women had to leave soon to pick up their kids at Little League games, or what they were fixing for supper.

The protesters out of the way, I turned my focus to the group surrounding the entrance. Mostly press, and police, who were maintaining a high visibility for the event. There was also a growing group of onlookers, hoping to spot a famous personality, along with a dozen or so autograph seekers.

I scanned this last group carefully, and was surprised that there were in fact, two very unhappy fans. One had the appearance of a homeless man, but something didn’t feel quite right. I scanned him at depth and discovered he was an FBI Agent, forced into an undercover role he did not cherish.

The other one was a twenty-year-old African-American Vietnam veteran from the Sunny Side neighborhood in South Houston, whose face had been horribly mangled by Napalm-B while serving in Vietnam last year. His mind appeared to have been mangled as well. As he stood to the rear of the onlookers and surveyed the scene, I scanned him.

It was a hard scan for me to deal with because the pain that racked his frail body was so intense. His mind was barely functioning from the combination of pain medications and prolonged periods of dealing with the pain. At first, all I could find was that tonight he would get relief from the excruciating pain and the horrible memories of friends that didn’t survive. That tonight, the evil monster that created the abomination called napalm, was attending a dinner at the hotel. I finally figured out that he blamed the manufacturer of the Napalm-B, Dow Chemical Company, for his misery. And it appeared that some bigwig from The Dow Chemical Company’s Freeport site, which is the largest integrated chemical manufacturing complex in the Western Hemisphere, would be in attendance tonight.

Suddenly, I finally got through all the pain to discover that Corporal Samuel Neffler was wearing a whole jacket full of explosives!

“Oh, Crap!” I thought.

Explosives filled every conceivable pocket of his field jacket. Except for the one with the detonator that he kept fingering nervously as he looked through the crowd for his target. I immediately connected with Anna and Penny.

“Ladies, I’ve found something,” I told them. “But before I identify him, I want you to assure me that he will get the help he needs. He’s a vet, and he’s almost out of his head with pain from injuries he suffered in Vietnam. You can’t let the Sheriff have him, he needs to get to a hospital, okay?”

“I don’t know,” Penny said. “This is the local’s jurisdiction.”

“What’s going on, Michael?” Anna asked calmly.

I replayed all that I had gleaned from my scan for them. Penny gasped at the pain, and Anna shuddered.

“Keep a sharp eye on him, Michael. He’s dangerous, and those explosives he’s wearing could hurt or kill a lot of people. I’ll call Daddy,” Anna decided. “You stay where you are.”

“Don’t bother, I’ve got him,” I told her as I connected the General to us. The General was pleased that I had already spotted trouble, but he became disturbed when I relayed the details.

“We need to disable him before he hurts himself and a bunch of innocent people. I’ll take care of the details. The Army’s Burn Center is at Brooke Army Medical Center at Fort Sam Houston near San Antonio. They are the very best,” he told us. “Hang on while I make the arrangements.”

“As soon as you have the ambulance on the way, I’ll take care of disabling him gently,” I told them.

There was a flurry of activity as the General picked up the phone and began giving orders.

“Anna, I want you to take this one,” he instructed. “Does the FBI have a munitions expert there with you?”

“Let me check,” said Penny as she hurried over to the AIC.

“Michael, do you have any idea what kind of detonator he’s carrying?” the General asked.

“Sorry. That’s a little outta my area of expertise,” I told him.

“That’s okay, son. I just hope it’s not a dead man’s switch,” he said tiredly.

I cocked my head as I gave Anna a questioning look.

“A dead man’s switch is designed to activate the explosives if the wearer were to be disabled or killed. Usually by letting go of a button he is manually holding down,” Anna explained.

I had no idea if tapping his motor cortex would still allow him to release the button, so I scanned him again, looking for anything I could find in his memories about detonators. Finally, I discovered that he had opted for a timer because his pain caused him to lose control of his motor skills sometimes. It was set for ten seconds, and awaited only a conscious flip of a switch.

“It’s a timer, I think. It’s set for ten seconds and is located in his right jacket pocket,” I thought to everyone.

Penny had returned with a man she introduced as Hector. Asking him to wait, she stepped back on the tour bus to confer with Anna.

“Good job, son. Did everybody get that?” the General said.

When they acknowledged they had, the General continued.

“Okay, Anna. The helicopter is standing by and an ambulance is on its way. I want you to ride with him and make sure everything is handled right at B.A.M.C. Dr. Sanchez is expecting you. You met him once, several years ago. So you should recognize him when you see him.”

Then to me he asked, “Michael, are you sure you can handle him?”

“It’s done,” I said as I tweaked his motor cortex. I pointed to the young vet, but the people around him cried out as he collapsed.

“C’mon,” Anna said to Hector, as she headed towards the fallen vet. “Penny, you stay with Michael. I’ll be back when I can.”

“Let me know when you want me to let him up,” I told her.

There was a momentary flurry of excitement as Anna and Hector secured the detonator. The Police tried to keep everyone back, but the reporters were practically standing beside him, and it didn’t take but a moment to realize that they had come close to dying, and that their coverage of tonight’s event had just jumped to page one!

A few minutes after the ambulance pulled out, everything seemed to settle down. Nevertheless, I could sense the buzz coming from the reporters surrounding the entrance. I realized that they were actually interviewing each other about how close they had all come to being blown up tonight. A little later, we were led through the small throng of press who were still excitedly discussing the explosives and paid little attention to the group of well-dressed students. No one said a word to us.

Once inside the ballroom I quickly scanned for any danger. Finding none, I relaxed a little, reminding myself to keep my guard up. There were about thirty tables, most of them empty or only half full, I noted as they led us to our reserved table up front. I looked at my watch and it was time for the banquet to start. If this was all that was showing up, they probably wasted their money renting this big room.

“When do we eat?” I asked Penny as they seated the four of us at an empty table at the front of the room. “I’m starving!”

“You’re always starving!” Adriana’s thought was coupled with giggles from the other girls. My sister and I, along with Mikeya and Penny were at the guest of honor’s table in front of the stage.

Amy, Vickie, Adriana, Ileana, Deedee, Abby, Jessica, Karla, Kip, and Tommy filled a table nearer the back of the room. Vickie had them all connected to us, and I could tell they were having a blast already. There’s just something about getting all dressed up and going out that makes teenaged girls happy, and this group was ecstatic. Nicky looked longingly back towards them so many times, I finally told her, “Nicky, you don’t have to sit here. If you can find someone who’ll swap seats with you, you can sit back there with them.”

“C’mon,” Penny said to Nicky, as she led her back to the other table. A few minutes later, I felt kisses on each ear, as they giggled. Then Ileana and Abby slipped into the seats vacated by Nicky and Penny.

“I thought you were supposed to stay with me?” I thought to Penny as she moved into the seat next to Kip.

“Your Chief of Security made an executive decision. After I saw how you handled yourself with the situation outside, I realized you don’t need me sitting in your lap to protect you. With your talents, if you remain vigilant, you’ll see and handle most situations before anyone else would even be aware of them. So, just relax and enjoy yourself. I can do what you need from here, and that way you can have both of your brides with you,” Penny explained.

“Thank you,” I told her simply. I appreciated her recognition of my abilities, but even more, I was glad that she was adapting to her new job with common sense. The girls all chattered gaily, but basically ignored me as they knew I was busy scanning the now steadily arriving guests. There was no danger that I could detect, but I was surprised at the number of men, and a few women who were carrying pistols.

When I commented on it to Penny, she simply said, “You’re in Texas, Michael!”

The other thing I noted was the number of men wearing boots and cowboy hats with their tuxedos. I recalled how comfortable the cowboy boots I had owned in my last life had been, and made a mental note to see if I could find a Tony Lama store tomorrow, and order me a couple of pairs of custom-fitted boots. Heck, I might even order me a Stetson to wear, too!

It was some thirty minutes later by my watch, but generally on schedule for society functions I would later learn, when the guest of honor was led in, escorted by a set of beautiful identical twins.

Roberto Rossellini was sixty-five years old and smiled to the scattered applause that greeted him as he entered. The son of a wealthy Roman architect, he began his film career at the age of twenty-two when Vittorio Mussolini, the Italian dictator’s movie-executive son and family friend, invited young Rossellini to become a professional filmmaker. His first assignment was to direct a documentary about an Italian hospital ship, which he expanded into a fictional feature, ‘La Nava Bianca’, completed in 1940 and released the following year to much acclaim.

As Italy entered the war, Rossellini walked a thin line, acting as technical director for fascist-commissioned films, while secretly shooting documentary footage of anti-Mussolini resistance fighters.

It was his neorealist feature, ‘Open City’ (1945) which garnered him international fame and an invitation from Hollywood producer David O. Selznick to direct a project with his up-and-coming new actress Ingrid Bergman. However, it would be almost three years before they finally met.

In 1948, Rossellini received a letter:

Dear Mr. Rossellini,

I saw your films Open City and Paisan, and enjoyed them very much. If you need a Swedish actress who speaks English very well, who has not forgotten her German, who is not very understandable in French, and who in Italian knows only “ti amo”, I am ready to come and make a film with you.

Ingrid Bergman

With this letter began one of the best-known love stories in film history, with Bergman and Rossellini both at the peak of their careers. Their first collaboration was ‘Stromboli terra di Dio’ (1950). Filmed on the island of Stromboli, whose volcano quite conveniently erupted during filming, they fell in love and began an affair that caused a great scandal in some countries, since both Bergman and Rossellini were married to other people at the time. The scandal intensified when Bergman became pregnant with Roberto Ingmar Rossellini. They eventually married and had two more children, twins Isabella and Ingrid.

I stood as they approached. The Rossellini’s were escorted by John and Dominique de Menil, the local Houston couple who had been the driving force behind Rice University’s new media center. I shook hands with the de Menils, introducing myself simply as Michael. I offered my hand to Rossellini; however, he ignored it without being too rude. I was to find out later he was fighting a cold and did not want to spread it around. As he pulled out a chair for his daughter, I quickly reached for the empty chair beside me, holding it for the other Rossellini twin. It was Ingrid, I discovered when I scanned.

He then introduced himself to the table, before sitting, but neither of his daughters. I recognized immediately that John de Menil was a class guy because he remained standing, waiting for me to introduce the young girls with me. Since everyone was being formal, I decided to have a little fun.

“May I present,” I said formally, “my wife, Crown Princess Mikeya, of the island nation of Tapato. And my other wife, Princess Ileana. And my soon to be fiancée, I hope ... Miss Atabei Maria Stéphanie Montclair, of Louisiana.”

“Your Highnesses, Miss Montclair,” I said to the girls, “May I present ... the Baron and Baroness de Menil.”

As I said before, the de Menils were class. John simply bowed slightly from the waist, saying, “Your Highnesses,” while Mrs. de Menil stood and curtsied formally. You could tell that they were surprised, as they had not been forewarned that they would be seated with royalty, but they were not unaccustomed to it. I could tell that Dominique was wondering how I knew of their titles, as they rarely used them in America, and probably had not used them at all in many years.

I continued the introductions.

“And may I present, Mr. Roberto Rossellini, and his daughters, Ingrid and Isabella.”

The twins’ look of surprise at all the titles was interesting. Having grown up in privileged circles in both Rome and Paris, titles were not all that unusual. However, they did not think they would find them in the American West. I think they were actually expecting to see cowboys and Indians. Both of the twins nodded their greetings, shyly.

Once the de Menils were seated, an unseen signal started the attendants serving dinner. One of the advantages of being at the main table was that we were served first. And while my stomach appreciated that, I wondered just how much of a little donation this meal would cost me.

“After what we spent this afternoon, hopefully, there’s enough of your allowance left over,” Adriana quipped.