He didn’t like this. He wasn’t in control. His life depended on his being in control, all the time and every
time. After several minutes of silently sipping on his soda, he ventured, “Okay, Virginia. What’s the problem?”
“Problem? Why should I have a problem? I meet you several months ago in Georgia. I practically throw myself at you, something I’ve never had to do to a man before, I might add. You drop off the face of the earth. Even CID doesn’t know who you are or where you are. Then you drop in out of the blue at my sister’s house, using a different name, of course.
“You sit there and run yourself down about not being a military person and practically telling those people back there that you are a draft dodger and a coward. I was embarrassed for you. And you acting as though I don’t even exist. You don’t say one word to me, all the way to my motel. You don’t want to come in and talk, you want to go home or wherever you hide and hide some more. What problem would I have with all that?” she ended in a huff, visibly fuming.
Sighing heavily, but deeply disturbed that this woman was embarrassed for him, he responded, “What did you expect? I tried to tell you in Georgia that I don’t exist. Don’t you see? I can’t exist? It doesn’t matter what people think of me.”
“Well, it matters to me and no, I don’t see that, not at all. What I see is a man sitting across from me who
knows my sister and her husband. Who takes my nephew hunting and goes to the same church as they do. Just an ordinary man, who lives and exists right here in central Illinois.”
Calmly, he responded, “No. You see the shadow of a man. An illusion. One that I created. One that I could destroy in less time than it would take you to fly back to Georgia.” Motioning toward the phone by the bed, he continued, “I could pick up that phone over there or any phone anywhere, anytime and in a matter of hours Evan Lansing would have ceased to exist. There would be no record of him anywhere. No records at the church, no records at the bank, not even a record that I ever bought a hunting license. It’s that simple and just that easy.”
“You can’t erase the memories of the people who’ve known you. You can’t do that with that telephone,” she almost whimpered.
Frowning, he responded, “True, but I can erase any shred of proof of my existence and without evidence of my existence, I remain what I’ve always been—a figment of someone’s imagination. A man without substance and without form. Just a memory that will soon fade.”
“How could you do that? What kind of man can just disappear, without consideration for the feelings of those he has left behind? Destroying any trace of himself, except in their minds? That’s cruel.”
“It’s necessary,” he responded, without emotion, rolling his glass between his hands.
“Necessary to whom, to what?” she asked in exasperation.
“Necessary to my life, to my work, and to my country.”
“But don’t you care about the people you have left behind in so many other lives?”
“Well, I won’t say I don’t care. I will say that I can’t care.”
“How many lives have there been?”
“I can’t tell you that.”
“You mean you won’t tell me.”
“No, I mean I can’t tell you, because I don’t remember. There have been too many and I’ve suppressed their memory. I’ve had to. I can’t carry all of those memories around in my head and stay sane.”
“Evan...if that’s your name.”
“It’s my name. For now, in this place.”
“Well, I had a talk with agent Shenky after you disappeared in Georgia.”
He frowned and said, wondering, “Oh.”
“Yes. He told me some things. Some things I couldn’t repeat and haven’t repeated and would never repeat, things that he was really only guessing about, but things that might endanger you, he thought. He was trying to ease my pain.”
He frowned in puzzlement over that statement.
She stared at him for a few seconds and continued, “Yes. My pain.”
“Shenky talks too much for a CID agent. He’s lousy undercover,” he responded flatly.
“You would say that. Anyway, he said he thought you were one of the men who are ‘outside’, he called them ‘outside men’ and I thought he was crazy. He said you lived outside the law, the regulations, and normal command authority. Are there really such men and are you one of them?”
“One of them, no,” he responded evenly.
“But you have to be! Everything he said makes sense to me now, you are an ‘outside man’. Don’t lie to me, Evan. You can lie to the world if you want to, but don’t lie to me,” she said, tears forming in her eyes.
He hesitated, contemplating and wondering why this woman who had so much to offer to a man would insist on wasting her time with the likes of him. He was touched by her devotion and her tears came close to melting his stone heart.
Finally he responded, “I’m not one of the ‘outside men’—I am the ‘outside man’. There aren’t any more. I’m the only one there is or ever has been, so far as I know. I’m not part of CID or CIA or anything else. I am what I am, no more and no less. There’s no one else who does what I do and exists as I do.
“Yes, I live outside. No laws, regulations, or command authority have control over my actions, in any direct manner. I live on the edge of society, touching it in my work, when I need to, but I’m not a part of it and never can be. You see, I’m just a shadow that passes through different places at different times. One day I exist and the next day I don’t. I exist when and how it suits my purpose to exist. When the job is done, I cease to be and only vague memories remain, in my mind and the minds of those I briefly touched.”
Virginia stared at him in silence for a few minutes and then said more than asked, “No name—just a number I suppose. Don’t all you secret agents have numbers?”
Smiling now for the first time and studying her pretty face as she dabbed her eyes with a tissue, he replied, “I don’t even have a number. Just a code name. My real name is gone. Oh, it exists somewhere. Believe it or not, there are still records of my real name, some place. Once I was a real person. I was born, I went to school, and I died. I doubt there are many who would know me now, even if they saw
me.”
“You are the man I treated in Vietnam, aren’t you?” she now asked, meekly.
“Not really. That man is dead. What you see is the same body, the same scars, but the man you knew is dead. Even I don’t know him anymore or what brought him to this place and this life. I have vague memories of horrible things in Vietnam, men dying terrible deaths in a remote part of the jungle and a deep sense of guilt and duty on account of it, but nothing more.”
Virginia got up and went to get more ice, but her mind hadn’t left him or what he had said. Her heart went out to him, she didn’t understand the concept of a man being dead and unknown even to himself, unable or unwilling to remember things too horrible to contemplate. She had seen others in Vietnam who acted
similarly, but not to the extreme this man took it. She continued to think, Those others were clearly mentally ill, but this man is not, he has learned to deal with his past or bury it. Back from getting more ice, which she really hadn’t needed, but had needed the break, she sat down, reaching out and gently covering his left hand with her right hand she said quietly, “But not buried. That’s what you meant that night in my apartment, isn’t it? You told me that the man I knew in Vietnam was in an unmarked grave. That’s what you meant, wasn’t it?” Without waiting for a reply, she went on, “I asked Shenky what kind of man lived like you do. You know what he said? He said, ‘a good man, a patriot above all else, one who gives his life for his country, but is never buried. A man who walks on the edge of an unmarked grave’.”
time. After several minutes of silently sipping on his soda, he ventured, “Okay, Virginia. What’s the problem?”
“Problem? Why should I have a problem? I meet you several months ago in Georgia. I practically throw myself at you, something I’ve never had to do to a man before, I might add. You drop off the face of the earth. Even CID doesn’t know who you are or where you are. Then you drop in out of the blue at my sister’s house, using a different name, of course.
“You sit there and run yourself down about not being a military person and practically telling those people back there that you are a draft dodger and a coward. I was embarrassed for you. And you acting as though I don’t even exist. You don’t say one word to me, all the way to my motel. You don’t want to come in and talk, you want to go home or wherever you hide and hide some more. What problem would I have with all that?” she ended in a huff, visibly fuming.
Sighing heavily, but deeply disturbed that this woman was embarrassed for him, he responded, “What did you expect? I tried to tell you in Georgia that I don’t exist. Don’t you see? I can’t exist? It doesn’t matter what people think of me.”
“Well, it matters to me and no, I don’t see that, not at all. What I see is a man sitting across from me who
knows my sister and her husband. Who takes my nephew hunting and goes to the same church as they do. Just an ordinary man, who lives and exists right here in central Illinois.”
Calmly, he responded, “No. You see the shadow of a man. An illusion. One that I created. One that I could destroy in less time than it would take you to fly back to Georgia.” Motioning toward the phone by the bed, he continued, “I could pick up that phone over there or any phone anywhere, anytime and in a matter of hours Evan Lansing would have ceased to exist. There would be no record of him anywhere. No records at the church, no records at the bank, not even a record that I ever bought a hunting license. It’s that simple and just that easy.”
“You can’t erase the memories of the people who’ve known you. You can’t do that with that telephone,” she almost whimpered.
Frowning, he responded, “True, but I can erase any shred of proof of my existence and without evidence of my existence, I remain what I’ve always been—a figment of someone’s imagination. A man without substance and without form. Just a memory that will soon fade.”
“How could you do that? What kind of man can just disappear, without consideration for the feelings of those he has left behind? Destroying any trace of himself, except in their minds? That’s cruel.”
“It’s necessary,” he responded, without emotion, rolling his glass between his hands.
“Necessary to whom, to what?” she asked in exasperation.
“Necessary to my life, to my work, and to my country.”
“But don’t you care about the people you have left behind in so many other lives?”
“Well, I won’t say I don’t care. I will say that I can’t care.”
“How many lives have there been?”
“I can’t tell you that.”
“You mean you won’t tell me.”
“No, I mean I can’t tell you, because I don’t remember. There have been too many and I’ve suppressed their memory. I’ve had to. I can’t carry all of those memories around in my head and stay sane.”
“Evan...if that’s your name.”
“It’s my name. For now, in this place.”
“Well, I had a talk with agent Shenky after you disappeared in Georgia.”
He frowned and said, wondering, “Oh.”
“Yes. He told me some things. Some things I couldn’t repeat and haven’t repeated and would never repeat, things that he was really only guessing about, but things that might endanger you, he thought. He was trying to ease my pain.”
He frowned in puzzlement over that statement.
She stared at him for a few seconds and continued, “Yes. My pain.”
“Shenky talks too much for a CID agent. He’s lousy undercover,” he responded flatly.
“You would say that. Anyway, he said he thought you were one of the men who are ‘outside’, he called them ‘outside men’ and I thought he was crazy. He said you lived outside the law, the regulations, and normal command authority. Are there really such men and are you one of them?”
“One of them, no,” he responded evenly.
“But you have to be! Everything he said makes sense to me now, you are an ‘outside man’. Don’t lie to me, Evan. You can lie to the world if you want to, but don’t lie to me,” she said, tears forming in her eyes.
He hesitated, contemplating and wondering why this woman who had so much to offer to a man would insist on wasting her time with the likes of him. He was touched by her devotion and her tears came close to melting his stone heart.
Finally he responded, “I’m not one of the ‘outside men’—I am the ‘outside man’. There aren’t any more. I’m the only one there is or ever has been, so far as I know. I’m not part of CID or CIA or anything else. I am what I am, no more and no less. There’s no one else who does what I do and exists as I do.
“Yes, I live outside. No laws, regulations, or command authority have control over my actions, in any direct manner. I live on the edge of society, touching it in my work, when I need to, but I’m not a part of it and never can be. You see, I’m just a shadow that passes through different places at different times. One day I exist and the next day I don’t. I exist when and how it suits my purpose to exist. When the job is done, I cease to be and only vague memories remain, in my mind and the minds of those I briefly touched.”
Virginia stared at him in silence for a few minutes and then said more than asked, “No name—just a number I suppose. Don’t all you secret agents have numbers?”
Smiling now for the first time and studying her pretty face as she dabbed her eyes with a tissue, he replied, “I don’t even have a number. Just a code name. My real name is gone. Oh, it exists somewhere. Believe it or not, there are still records of my real name, some place. Once I was a real person. I was born, I went to school, and I died. I doubt there are many who would know me now, even if they saw
me.”
“You are the man I treated in Vietnam, aren’t you?” she now asked, meekly.
“Not really. That man is dead. What you see is the same body, the same scars, but the man you knew is dead. Even I don’t know him anymore or what brought him to this place and this life. I have vague memories of horrible things in Vietnam, men dying terrible deaths in a remote part of the jungle and a deep sense of guilt and duty on account of it, but nothing more.”
Virginia got up and went to get more ice, but her mind hadn’t left him or what he had said. Her heart went out to him, she didn’t understand the concept of a man being dead and unknown even to himself, unable or unwilling to remember things too horrible to contemplate. She had seen others in Vietnam who acted
similarly, but not to the extreme this man took it. She continued to think, Those others were clearly mentally ill, but this man is not, he has learned to deal with his past or bury it. Back from getting more ice, which she really hadn’t needed, but had needed the break, she sat down, reaching out and gently covering his left hand with her right hand she said quietly, “But not buried. That’s what you meant that night in my apartment, isn’t it? You told me that the man I knew in Vietnam was in an unmarked grave. That’s what you meant, wasn’t it?” Without waiting for a reply, she went on, “I asked Shenky what kind of man lived like you do. You know what he said? He said, ‘a good man, a patriot above all else, one who gives his life for his country, but is never buried. A man who walks on the edge of an unmarked grave’.”
