SLEEP NO MORE
247
mation it would not have been so surprising, but what they imparted
to me was an identical kind of ignorance. There was never anyone
in authority available; they probably had no jurisdiction over the zone
in
which I lived; they were pretty sure they had never heard of
Miss Caruso, and, besides, even though they did not know exactly
what they were doing at the moment, it was strictly confidential.
My own stupidity, of course, contributed to the general confusion,
since I could not remember the name of the man who presented him–
self to me as an agent of Intelligence; but I was able to describe
~s
appearance and I did know the nature of
his
mission.
Finally, after forcing my way by means of countless phone calls
through a maze of switchboards and Secretaries, I found myself talk–
ing to a Colonel McCallister, who was at least willing
to
assume that
my experience fell into the domain of
his
responsibility.
"Who are you?" he asked.
"Just a private citizen. I would like to check on an Intelligence
Agent who came to see me the other day. He acted rather strangely
and I am a little disturbed. .I should imagine, however, that you
would be even more interested than I am in getting to the bottom of
the whole thing."
I recited my story once more, down to the last detail. To avoid
boring
him,
I made sure to point out the many contradictions in
the behavior of the agent, which now loomed even larger than they
did at the time, especially the fact that he never followed up the
clues I had given
him.
"Yes," he said, "it does sound peculiar. What was his name?"
"I'm sorry I did not catch it. It was something like George
Wilson."
"We have no agent with a name anything like that," he said,
as
he apparently thumbed quickly through a list at
his
side.
"Are you investigating a Miss Caruso?"
"No. I'm pretty sure not. I would have heard of it
if
we were.
Could you describe the credentials he showed you?"
I began to describe the blurred image of the card as carefully
as
I could.
He interrupted me. "The credentials seem phony," he said.
"None of our agencies use cards of that type."
"Then the man is an impostor."
