60. Supposition
Travers decided to play it cool, and see if the girl would incriminate herself before he even began his questioning. Some of the agents these days were so stupid, and Buffy Summers looked like she’d fit right in with the blonde and brainless set. He really must pay more attention to recruitment.
“Ah, Ms. Summers. I am so glad that you could come and see me today, since this is not your normal day to be with us. I understand that you have been investigating a certain William Thorndale. I’d like to know how your investigation is going.”
Annoyed, Buffy snapped back at the pompous supervisor. She really didn’t want to be thinking about any of this right now. She had planned to take a few days off and spend them with Dawn. “Not to be rude, Mr. Travers, but I’ve already filed all my reports with my supervisor. Is there any special reason why you need to speak to me about the case?”
“Actually, yes there is. And I have seen all of your official reports. What I’d like to know is your unofficial report. For example, is the investigation worthwhile, or do you feel that it is a waste of government time and resources? I’d like to have your assessment, your feelings as it were. Also, if there are any details, anything that you may have left out of your report – I need to know that as well.”
Buffy’s heart started beating harder. “Does that mean you are considering dropping the case entirely? Has Spike been cleared?”
“Spike? Not ‘Mr. Thorndale?’ Not even ‘William’? Tell me, is that the way you think of him, Ms. Summers?’”
Buffy blushed, but didn’t answer, so Travers continued.
“I know that agents, especially female agents, sometimes feel that it is a useful tactic to be, how should I put this delicately…umm… intimate with their target. They feel it makes them seem more trustworthy, and puts the target in a state of mind where he is likely to reveal things that he might not otherwise. Tell me, Ms. Summers, are you that type of agent? Is that why you refer to him as “Spike?” Because you have been… close?”
Blushing, Buffy could barely get the words out. “No, Mr. Travers. But…it’s not like that. I mean, we were friends. I thought we were friends.”
“Friends? With a suspect? That’s quite frowned upon, you know.”
“I’m new to all this undercover stuff. Plus, he found me out – I got caught snooping through his things and he figured out who I worked for, well, sort of. Surely you already know all this, Mr. Travers, if you’ve read the reports.” This was getting worse and worse. She was not about to start discussing her private life with this old geezer.
“Of course I do, my dear. Like I said, I just want to get a sense of your relationship with the man. As you said, you were friends. Meaning that you are not anymore?”
“No,” she whispered. “No, we’re not friends any more. Something happened and I …Well, that is to say I still think that he’s innocent of everything he’s been accused of, but, no, we’re not friends anymore.”
“I see. We’ll come back to that in a moment. Is there anything going on in your personal life that you feel I should be aware of?”
“What do you mean, my personal life? I don’t think that’s any of your business.” Alarms were starting to go off in her head. This whole interview was strange, everything seemed off.
“But it is, if it impacts on your work or calls into question your integrity. Now answer the question Ms. Summers.”
Standing, Buffy confronted Travers directly. “What is all this? Why am I being questioned? I’ve done nothing wrong.”
Laying his cards on the table, Quentin admitted, “That is what we are trying to ascertain. Quite frankly, things don’t look too good for you right now. In fact they look very bad indeed, so I suggest that you start telling me what I want to hear, or you may find, young lady, that you are the one being brought up on charges.”
“Charges? What am I accused of? I have a right to know.”
“Nothing as of yet. I’m waiting to see what you have to say before I decide whether or not to suspend you and order an internal investigation. So tell me again, before I have to draw my own conclusions. What is your relationship with the suspect, William Thorndale?”
“Fine,” she grumbled. “What do you want to know?”
“Why don’t you start at the beginning and continue until the present day.”
“But you know all this!” she protested.
“Indulge me. Please. From the beginning.”
“Fine. We met before he came under suspicion. That’s how I got assigned to the case in the first place. You must know I usually work in the office – I’d never done undercover work before, had no desire to really. My specialty is in art and art history. What with all the rash of recent forgeries and thefts, never mind trying to trace ownership of famous works that were stolen my the Nazi’s and that are only now emerging, well, it’s been busy.”
“And were you happy in that line of work? You didn’t yearn for something a little more, exciting, perhaps.”
“No. I was quite content. But after I met Thorndale, everything changed.”
“You started to fall in love with him, is that what you mean? A young impressionable girl like you spending time with a handsome and rich bachelor like Thorndale. I’m not surprised. You thought maybe becoming Mrs. Thorndale would be the better job, is that it?”
“What? No. It’s complicated. Like I said, we were friends. But it was hard, because he was still a suspect, and sometimes I’d be worried that maybe he really was a bad man and that he was just pretending to be nice.”
“And did you in fact find that that was the case?”
“He…it was frustrating, for both of us. He…I…that is to say, when I went over to his house last week, I think he put something in my drink.” Travers continued to look at her with disdain, “Yes? Go on.”
“I think he put something in my drink. I don’t know what. Ketamine, GHB, something that shouldn’t have been there. There was a white residue on the glass in the morning.”
“In the morning? As in you were there all night?”
“Yes. I was there all night. But, it wasn’t my choice. I was drugged.”
“I see. And tell me what happened next. You do know that whatever the outcome of our little chat, this will be part of your permanent record. Not only did you allow it to happen in the first place, but then you deliberately left out any mention of this incident in your formal reports. So I need you to be very honest with me, Ms. Summers. Your job is at stake here – perhaps more.”
Swallowing hard, Buffy struggled to continue. “In the morning, I was upset. I left in a hurry, and I ran into Agent Finn. He saw that I was upset and made me go see Dr. Burkle. They can both confirm everything I’ve said, if you don’t believe me.”
“Of course. Both Finn and Burkle filed the necessary paperwork describing the encounter.”
Buffy winced. Of course they would. What had she been thinking? Everything she did with Thorndale was part of the investigation, or at least that was the way Travers was likely to view it.
“What I am wondering,” Travers continued, “is why you didn’t? And, if as you claim, Mr. Thorndale drugged you, why did you not even pursue the option of pressing charges? Ms. Burkle suggested that you seek legal council, did she not?”
“Yes. But – I wasn’t sure. I didn’t want to… There was no proof.”
“No,” Travers sighed. “No proof at all. Do you want to know what Ms. Burkle’s report found? Nothing! No bruises, no evidence of a struggle…”
“But I told you, he put something in my drink…”
“Did he? She did a blood test. Negative. The drugs you described would have still been in your system, Ms. Summers. There was nothing. Not even an elevated alcohol level.”
As Travers began shouting, Buffy started trembling. This wasn’t happening. It wasn’t.
“Do you want to know what I think? I think you and Thorndale have been intimate from the very beginning. That the two of you have been plotting something together, and that this was all some elaborate scheme to cover your tracks should you in fact ever come under investigation. You’d be able to cry ‘rape’ and everyone would come to your defense. Well, it’s not going to happen that way, Ms. Summers. If you were going to claim foul play you should at least have tried to make it look convincing. A few rope marks around the wrist for example might have added an air of realism to the proceeding. Or a few bruises, at least. Something other than this lame cry of “he put something in my drink.” Really, Ms. Summers, how stupid do you think we are?”
“What makes you say that? You have no proof! Nothing. At the very worst, it is my word against yours.”
“Not entirely, Ms. Summers. I have in my possession a recording of what went on in Thorndale’s bedroom that night. Would you like to see it, Ms. Summers?”
As Buffy blanched Travers pressed on. “My senior staff and I have already viewed it, and we’ve come to the same conclusion. No date rape drug in history could have produced the effects that we saw on that tape. No, Ms. Summers, you were a very willing participant of the evening’s activities. Actually the instigator as it was. Being so quiet and, I never would have guessed that you had more than a bit of the dominatrix in you. It was quite a show you put on. But it was not, by any stretch of the imagination, rape.
“Do you know how I see events, Ms. Summers? Let me tell you. You are friends with William Thorndale, and somehow get yourself assigned to his case. While pretending to collect evidence against him, you in fact warn him about possible angles of investigation. We even have one such conversation on tape. When certain evidence comes to light that you are not able to suppress, you help him to broker a deal with the Agency, even somehow bribe or sabotage the polygraph so that he is able to pass the lie detector test. Then, when Agent Finn finally does come up with some solid evidence against him, you again try to broker a deal for him with your supervisor. When all goes as expected, and Mr. Thorndale is released, he rewards you with a payment of nearly one half million dollars. Tell me, Ms. Summers, what do you think of my scenario?”
“It was a painting,” she whispered, although she knew that Travers wasn’t really listening. “He bought one of my mother’s paintings, through a broker in New York.”
“Yes. And no doubt you thought you were being clever, didn’t you? But a man doesn’t pay a half million dollars for a painting generously valued at only one fifth of that. The most expensive of your mother’s paintings sold for far less than that, and it was a far larger and more significant piece than the little portrait Thorndale bought. Oh yes, I know a bit about Art myself, Ms. Summers.”
Not much, Buffy thought inconsequentially, if he somehow thought that the a larger painting was automatically “more significant” and therefore worth more. There wasn’t going to be any good way to explain to Travers that the painting had had personal significance to them both, and that was why she had sold it so dear. She hadn’t really wanted to sell it at all. Now she wished that she hadn’t. It just made Travers accusations seem that much more plausible.
“Consider yourself under suspension, Ms. Summers. At the conclusion of the internal investigation you will find out if you’ve merely been fired, or, as I rather suspect, criminal charges will be filed. I think you’ll find that we don’t treat traitors, gently, Ms. Summers. Not in this day and age. Oh, and I wouldn’t try to cross any state boundaries if I were you. No doubt you’ll be hearing from us shortly. Should you at any point in time change your mind and decide that you are willing to cooperate with the investigation, please be sure to let me know. You may go. Security will escort you downstairs.”
“I…Don’t I get to say goodbye to my friends? Get my personal things?”
“I rather think not. As of now, all your personal effects are part of the internal investigation. Good day Ms. Summers.”
Lydia watched in cool satisfaction as the coy Ms. Summers was escorted out of the office. She didn’t approve of anyone getting too close to the subject of an investigation, and if the rumors she had heard were true, well, she deserved whatever she got.
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