Tag Archives: espionage

A PILE OF BOOKS

Posted on by

0

Having a neglected pile of books to read, I wondered how to get through them. Each appeared interesting. They came cheaply, purchased one at a time but most all at once. Libraries have shelves of donated books they want to pass on. Likewise there were grocery bags of books costing one dollar at the bag sales at library book sales – the first time in history books were cheaper than the shopping bags they were carried away in.

So how did each book of the pile read? Perhaps I was correct in stacking the books:

John LeCarre, A Small Town in Germany. At the beginning he insists on long descriptions of the town. How does the scenery advance the espionage story?

2. John Dos Passos, Big Money. The author tried to tell how people made their way in careers in an advancing economy while presenting the worst dialogue – non-directional, cumbersome and unrelated to the story. I give it 170 pages.

3. Anson’s Voyage Around the World 1740-1744. The Introduction was of interest, filled with appalling facts: Ships left England with mostly old men who were sick. About 950 mens set off from England and by the South Atlantic 370 men were left. Not all of the 370 were fit for duty aboard the ships. However, the diary is written in an eighteenth century fashion by more than one author, each writing formally and stiltedly.
I’ve read of similar journeys. I don’t have to struggle through Anson’s. I passed on the diary.

4. Thurber and White, Is Sex Necessary? This text was likely enlivening in 1929. Now it is dated.

5. George Kennen, The Decline of Bismarck’s European Order and The Fateful Alliance. Each book appeared unread when purchased. I’ve read about each subject in excellent academic produced histories. How did old George do? He is pompous and verbose. His English is truly bloated. Sentences are unnecessarily long and convoluted.

6. Norman Thrower, Maps and Civilization. This is another academic book written in the vernacular of its subject matter. Small print. It appeared involved and complicated, requiring looking up words in dictionaries. Disclosures about maps and civilization shall remain hidden.

7. H.G. Wells, Journalism and Prophecy, is disappointing. I am not fan of the author’s science fiction work. I do not hold him in awe. Meetings with Hitler, Stalin and Lenin reveal H.G. Wells was completely uninformed and ignorant. In articles that should be written as essays, H.G. writes in the narrative. It is the best illustration about the folly and fallaciousness in the use of the pronoun, I – except for the Tweeting I abilities of Don Trump.

8. Chapelle, The American Sailing Navy, describes sailing ships used in eighteenth century wars and commerce. There is much about ship and sail design and the history of ships. There is little about the functional fighting qualities of each ship. I gave the book about 320 pages. From the number of American ships captured or sunk, i am surprised there was any early Navy at all!
Unless one is intensely interested in sailing ships and their design and builders – minute and large changes – this is not a book for the average reader.

9. Tate, Stonewall Jackson. This appears one of the lovingly biographies written by a Southerner during the 1920s. It is about a revered Southern Civil War general. Every word is a compliment. I recognized it as such and passed.

10. Leonard Arrington, Great Basin Kingdom, a small print book telling of the establishment of the Mormon Church in and around Utah. It looked unopened and unread when I picked it up. Perhaps I am lazy, wanting nothing physically challenging to read. The small print covering the pages was daunting. I put it down.

AVOID: A MOST WANTED MAN

Posted on by

0

An experienced German espionage agent [Philip Seymour Hoffman] trusts his superiors, internal German police and American espionage agents. He tries to conduct a successful espionage operation but in the end everyone he contacts is arrested.

From the beginning a wary German agent [Hoffman] lets his guard down. He is open, revealing everything. The denouement shows Hoffman telling of his plans, including the transfer of money to characters in an office building and how everyone involved with leave. What is annoying is the absence of spyycraft. Most of the people Hoffman meets leave by the front door, together.

More shocking is Hoffman is on the street and does not notice surveillance, or the people ready to make arrests.

If one is a wary spy, supposedly throughout the story, he must be wary at the end. People assembled in the office ought to leave individually by various exits – racing from the garage on a motorcycle, crawling three blocks through air conditioning vents or jumping off the roof and sailing along in a hang glider – that sort of thing, those sorts of thing. None of these happen. Spy Hoffman is surprised and enfeebled. He reveals he is unfit for the espionage business.

Thereupon, other than seeing Hoffman in his last movie, this is a film to avoid.

TINKER, TAILOR, SOLDIER, SPY – THE HONOURABLE SCHOOL BOY – SMILEY’S PEOPLE

Posted on by

0

I read these three John La Carre′ novels in one volume, 950 pages. They are also known as the Karla novels. Tinker, Tailor and Smiley’s People were well represented in their BBC productions, 1979 and 1982. The novels give the remaining 10-15 percent of each story. I recommend reading each.

The Honourable School Boy is the middle volume of the trilogy, and it tells what happened to British Intelligence after Tinker, Tailor: George Smiley’s stewardship of the Circus plus a successful mission. I like George Smiley; I liked reading it. There is spy craft on each page – plotting, method and engaging. They suggest espionage as it is, not the hyped swirl Hollywood crap – James Bond to gadget-thriller of the month from one studio or another. 

In the end of Smiley’s People there is character development (realization), mostly by the reader. George Smiley appreciates his marriage to the always unfaithful Ann has been ruinous to him personally and professionally. Because of her others have taken advantage of him. This realization nags him through the novel and arrives in his consciousness late. Any human being would wonder about such a marriage, and how it was fitting into life or changing it. George Smiley is sentimental and weak, and weakness is an admission most of us do not like to make, especially at the end of a career, near the end of life.

The writing in these three novels is laced with Britishisms that keep the reader going: “barking mad,” “authority without responsibility.” There are others, but I cannot forget a paraphrase of President Lyndon Baines Johnson’s statement about J. Eager Hoover: I’d rather have him in my tent pissing out, than outside pissing in. 

WHY SPY?

Posted on by

0

America has a right to listen to Angela Merkel, and must do so for its own interests and for the interests of Europe. This opening sentence comes as a reply to a blog, my comment, a reply, my reply (incomplete).

The first observation is Angela Merkel looks completely Prussian. She never smiles; she is incapable of it. She sneers, but she hasn’t sneered for ten days.

What could dear sweet Angela Merkel, what could the Europeans be talking about that would interest Americans and make our decisions and lives better (and their lives better) if we knew what they were saying?

The Germans and their economy has benefitted more than any other country from the existence of the Euro, the Euro Zone and the European Community. Year 2010 intensified the Euro crisis in the PIGS: Portugal, Ireland, Italy, Greece, Spain. The European Community tried to resolve all the problems themselves. They could not. The United States of America got involved with support, advice and lots of money, before 2010 and during those years.

The biggest obstacles to the European effective action were the Germans led by sweet Angela and to a lesser extent the French. The Germans wanted to pay no money to any other nation for any purpose whatsoever. Yet the Germans were benefitting the most because the Euro-zone existed.

What was at stake? If Europe went into a deep rescission and possibly a Depression – lack of confidence, no economic activity, no way forward – the American economy would follow as well as the remainder of the world. Furthermore, all the nations of Europe as well as the USA know how the Germans react to end Depressions.

Listening into sweet Angela allowed the United States of America to advise, to cajole and to convince the European Community to go forward. We countered, blocked or tempered German and French arguments and proposals for inactivity, for conditional loans and for harsh policies that could never be implemented, that would prolong the Euro-crisis and that would end in Depression. Finally, the Germans had to put up much more money and agree to terms they did not like.

Amazingly, today, Halloween Week, 2013, France is protesting American actions and acting as the German lap-dogs. Meanwhile, in that country there have been protests and talk about France leaving the Euro currency, and resuming the French Franc [like the British have maintained the pound to good effect]. The French should reject the Euro. The French had beautiful banknotes, much better than the dour austere paper from the European Community. The French may not other choice but to leave. Requirements from the German-led European Community are onerous and detrimental to current conditions in the French economy. The French do not have the flexibility to react to local conditions to improve their economy and the lives of the French people.

Sour-puss, bad sport Angela wants payback because the Americans knew how to overcome German resistance. Current conditions now allow Germany to continue to screw all the other countries of the European community, just like it was doing before the Euro-crisis. Obama’s reaction to European protests should be to tell Angela and the other protesting clowns to cram it. The United States was correct. The Germans were wrong. Most of the European Community has an improving economy.

But Obama is weak and forgetful. He acts like someone wanting to be the popular Student Body President of his high school. This was a success of his administration. He is now willing to give all the credit to the Germans, apologize and promise, so he can call that Kraut, “Sweet Angela,” and Merkel can give her Prussian sneer again.

 

TIDBITS of Movies

Posted on by

0

Having read and previously posted (two weeks ago) about John LeCarre’s early novels, Call of the Dead and A Murder of Quality, I got the movies. The movie title of Call of the Dead is A Deadly Affair(James Mason). My advice: Stick with the novels.

“A Murder of Quality,” scripted by LeCarre is best but lacks the adult setting, subtle politics and society of adults. Set around a boy’s boarding school there are too many classroom scenes which convey little but expose a youthful Christian Bales as one of the boys to a grand future in the medium.

“A Deadly Affair” is Le Carre’s first George Smiley novel. It is necessary to know the novel to follow the movie. In the book not much time is devoted to George’s marriage to Ann and its dissolution, it is a big part of the movie. It seems Ann is played by a foreign actress (wrong – it is Harriet Anderson) who does not well represent Ann’s character in the book: a woman of means from gentry or nobility. There are senseless arguments between husband and wife. Indeed when husband and wife appear on the screen together, there is ridiculous bongo music. Throughout much of the music is not suited to espionage/murder, but more geared toward “The Thomas Crown Affair.” Much of the politics and pettiness in the Intelligence Community is overlooked or ignored. The script does not build to the end, but to save itself, the script slows and seems written from one chapter of the novel before going off on the screenwriter’s whim.

EXTRA. I was an extra in the now filming Helen Hunt/Robert Downey Jr. movie. I know I won’t be invited to the wrap party, but they’ll always remember me. When Helen and Robert are sitting on the park bench, I’m in the background waving at the camera.

“The Swiss Family Robinson” – When I was young, I saw this movie multiple times in movie theaters. I also read the book. I visited the tree house at Disneyland. John Mills is in it. James MacArthur, Danno of “Hawaii 50,” is in it. The guy who played and was “The Shaggy Dog” was in it, as the second son. For a scene he was wearing a Yippie Hat, something Abbie Hoffman might wear. This is very advant-garde for a Disney movie. The bad guy pirate in it was Colonel Saito in “Bridge on the River Kwai.” He wears a necklace that has torquoise. At the end there are lots of pirates to kill, as many as 150,  more than there are on Wall Street, especially after the second wave, 50 or so brigands hit the beach, off-loading from a small Chinese junk. MY CONCLUSION – This movie sucks.

“The Court Jester.” I saw this movie in Yosemite Valley at the movie theater that was there before it burned down. I remembered little about the plot, but I remember that the movie was very funny. I laughed very hard throughout. I liked Danny Kaye thereafter until I lost track of him.

Match the rhyme:       Flagon – Palace

                                     Vessel – Dragon

                                     Chalice – Pessel

Perhaps it is fond memories, but “The Court Jester” holds up. I recommend it.

I’ve read and recommend Film in the Third Reich, David Stewart Hull. In this short history Hull tells about a 1934 German movie, “Gold.” It is science fiction. In it is depicted an atomic reactor, used in an alchemy process to turn lead into gold. Hull writes,

“When the film was reviewed by an Allied censorship board after the war, the viewers wondered whether the German scientists had invented an atomic reactor long before they were supposed to have done so. An effort was made to seize every known print, and the film was put under a restricted category. It is even reported, on reliable authority, that a copy was flown to the United States to be viewed by atomic scientists to see if the machines could actually perform….” (p. 57, UC Press, 1969)

BRAVO! The film maker had his triumph – imagination over reality!  

 

 

LUST CAUTION

Posted on by

0

Movie – Ang Lee, Director; Tang Wei, Actress

This two and one-half hour movie was on a DVD for sale at BigLots, $3.00. English subtitles, Chinese language film shot in China.

This movie is worth seeing. It drives to its denouement, set up well and can reached by acting. The story is about a novice spy (Tang Wei) enlisted to set up a Chinese man  who is collaborating with the Japanese during the occupation of China during World War Two. The sets, costumes and art direction are excellent. The novice is part of a cell, the politically leaning of which is not entirely clear except every person detests the Japanese.

The first attempt to set up the collaborator fails. He moves from Hong Kong to Shanghai. the novice returns to her family in Shanghai and lives simply while attending classes. She is recruited by a member of her former Hong Kong cell to approach the collaborator again. She is controlled her handler, who is more senior and experienced in spy craft. He dismisses her inexperience and asks her to do too much.

Tang Wei plays the novice very well in her relations with the collaborator. She mixes the emotions of her first long romance [with any man] with the desire to arrange the collaborator’s killing. Toward the end she is unhinged when she demonstrates her unsettled mind – job and love. It is never stated, but the collaborator suspects the novice of being part of the Resistance.

She fulfills the plan to get the collaborator in a place where he can be killed. But in offering her a ring, the collaborator shows love and care. The ring is on her finger. She wants nothing bad to happen to him; her emotions run against the mission. She warns him, indirectly. He avoids assassination. She has signed her own death warrant along with arrests and death of everyone in her cell.

Only an actress like Tang Wei can pull off the non-verbal communications to tell this story on film.

JUNKETS

Posted on by

0

Junkets, Michael Ulin Edwards, $.99 iBookstore

I’m amused by anyone exorcised by Ed Snowdon, prime moron proven traitor, who downloaded crap from the National Security Agency. Everyone reading this post should comment, “You’re a nut,” if you do NOT believe that when you download anything from the National Security Agency, you don’t also download a bunch of stuff the NSA wants on your computer or in your storage systems.

Those readers who would never download anything from the NSA because you don’t want to invite the NSA into your life, signal your agreement by liking this post.

It is likely, probable, a certainty that when Snowdon removed stuff, he took a few things the NSA didn’t want to share with the world; he took a a lot of stuff the world already knows; and he took a bunch of stuff that the NSA wants people and countries to put into their storage systems and computers.

JUNKETS is about the next American intelligence mission, to one of the two targets: China. A middle aged woman on a tour is the operative. The first chapter follows. The remainder at 41,500 words are on the iBookstore for 99 cents, under my name, Michael Ulin Edwards.

CHAPTER 1

Gladys Goode was happy the garbage man had come early. It was noon on her walk to the street. Usually she had to drag the trash container up her long, unpaved drive in the evening. June 2013, no mud, she would get gravel delivered and spread before the fall rains.

She pulled the can toward her, and it slumped right and fell. She stepped around and looked at the rear – a wheel had fallen off. With a foot she moved the container a few feet. There was no wheel.

“They took the damned wheel with the garbage!” she yelled and kicked the container. It moved some but didn’t roll. She kicked it again, again, and again!

She looked across the street, and those neighbors‘ container was fine.

Mine was all right when I wheeled it out, she thought. He wheeled his lame-ass can over and stole mine. He – his whole family was disgusting and despicable. He had had a large boulder on his undeveloped side lot, and always during high water and drenching rains, water rolled off his property onto the street and took out the front of Gladys‘ yard. She had asked politely and offered to make improvements. NO. Secretly, she got tests and solutions, drilled holes and filled them and cracks in the imposing boulder. After the next storm and water, big rocks from the boulder, cracked off and rolled down the street smacking cars, lamp posts and mail boxes. Those neighbors filed claims, all within the last year, and the neighbor across the street had more than a foot of topsoil covering his front yard.

Gladys believed that guy hated her but had no reason to. She had done her work quietly. Now he had traded his defective container for hers.

To feel better she looked uphill at the neighbor’s side lot where the rocks and earth had moved and spread. Coming over the crest was a car, a late model American SUV. She recognized the vehicle for what it was – two men.

She glowered and stared.
The car stopped.
“That’s Gladys Goode,” said the middle-aged man in the passenger seat. His nickname was Honcho except to Gladys. He had been around – around the block, around town, around country, around the world. “Don’t think she’s been drinking. Looks pretty good.”

“What’s she doing?” asked the young driver, Ashton, two years out of the Ivy League, from a wealthy family who always considered Bill Donovan an honorary member. He was green so asked, “Why is she staring at us?”

“She knows I’m in the car, or someone more senior. She waiting for me to flinch.”

The driver looked at his supervisor. He didn’t know much. He had been moved to personal development testing – already he had identified five employees with Jason Bourne tendencies. Now he was on a road trip, chauffeur into the sticks.

He took his foot off the brake.
“Stop!” the older man ordered. “She can’t win this easily.”
“She doesn’t look that tough. I can talk to her,” the novice advanced.

“She’ll only talk to me or someone higher. And never underestimate her intelligence or adaptability. ” He looked ahead. “I’ve known her 23 years. She is a cat now – sit, be patient, relax, watch our gas gauge go lower.”

“How does she know how much gas we have?” the apprentice asked looking at the gauge near empty.

“We drove from Washington. It’s noon. She knows how much fuel the tank holds, the mileage we get and the time. We didn’t stop for gas. She also knows I have to take a leak.”

“I also suppose she doesn’t want to talk to us,” the young man said.
“Certainly, but don’t be offended by anything she says.”
The boy looked at Honcho – chief, supervisor, boss. It was supposed to be a privilege to drive him into the wilds, but the kid didn’t know which state he was in. Honcho had been known to drop personnel off at no where, completely forlorn to find their own way home. So Ashton would do everything he was told.

He interpreted a hand gesture – roll ahead, and releasing the brake, drove the car down the hill.

Gladys Goode watched it come like she would stop it on her own. But it stopped, and Honcho got out.

“Hello, Gladys. Hello, hello, hello.”
“There’s a urinal in the public park down the street, Bosco.”
“I’m very happy to see you’re so well.”
“I don’t want you taking a whiz anywhere near my property. It will confuse the dogs.”

“How long’s it been? Five years?”
The assistant got out, and Gladys looked at him disgusted. She asked, “Which shit-for-brains Ivy did you pull him out of?” She peered at Honcho, “I left because too many Ivys were coming in – they’re so innocent and incredulous. I bet that little girl, smiley-face, tiny-voice, big- busted wench has been promoted!”

“When’s the last time you had a vacation?” Honcho asked.

“I don’t consider seventeen days getting back here, using every chance to rinse my clothes because I had to leave my luggage, a vacation!” she looked and shook a finger at Mr. Ivy. “You fly a 1950s vintage Beechcraft across the Gulf of Guinea and have a good time.”

“Why don’t we talk inside?” Honcho suggested.
“Have Ivy bring up my trash container.”
“Mr. Ashton is my assistant…”
“I’m demanding because I can, Bosco!” she spit a response and stepped toward the car.

Her eyes left his and looked behind him.
Ashton turned and saw the neighbor’s trash container, and the neighbor and kids were driving from their driveway. As they passed, they looked at the people on the street, and their expressions changed.

Ashton looked at Gladys and saw the meanest countenance he had seen on any human being. It was scary.

Gladys noticed him and walked up her drive. Honcho accompanied her. She asked, “Why did you hire him? He’s too pretty to be of use to anyone.”

Out of earshot Honcho said, “We’re looking for someone to be a high school biology teacher, from the Mid-West.”

Her house was functional and looked lived in without dirt or dust. The front porch shaded a wide picture window. The wall underneath, inside, was taken up by a couch and a chair. The wall opposite supported a humongous TV purchased the month before. At the end of the room were two rocking chairs and foot stools with a lamp between them. Opposite them was small wall with paintings hiding the hallway between the kitchen and the bathroom, now in use.

Gladys turned on the TV news, muted. She waited sat in a rocker, no cushions, wooden flat slats giving an instant back massage with rocking. She shut her eyes to feign dosing.

Honcho came from the bathroom, and noticed the TV. He didn’t want to sit on the couch, and not in the other rocker. The easy chair was too small for him, but he headed to it. He said, “You’ve made this home very comfortable.”

“I turned on the TV to see what was happening worldwide to cause you to come see me.”

“There’s no crisis. I’m visiting an old friend.”
“Let me get this out. Those clowns running the show are incapable and incompetent! Let’s have more revelations, more screws loose, operate by trusting, be completely naive and promote unsupervised innocents. I thought the previous administration was bad. Who do I berate most, because it needs doing: Moron One! Idiot Two! Jackass Three! Asshole Four! Why would I want to work for you again? I’ve seen your beaming mouth and blinding teeth. I have a big screen TV. Football season’s about to start.”

“You’ve never been a fan.”
“It’s in the package.”
“We’re paying: Your pension gets a thousand-dollar a month boost.”
“No taxes?”
“Everything you’ve ever done has been done in war, so no. And your neighbor doesn’t have to know about your tests and analysis of their boulder and your purchase of various acids.”

“Too cheap.”

He noticed on the floor under a small table a plastic box filled with books – software, programming, were words in the titles.

“Are you studying for a new career?”

“That deluded sap who stole all that NSA data. First, most of it is nothing – email addresses and telephone numbers. Trolling for words, phrases, and once anyone realizes its insignificance, he’s toast. I can buy more complete information from Google, Facebook and Link-in as well as get the buying habits for any American from Amazon, Yahoo, the credit card companies, box stores, the local grocery store, pharmacy, art and auto supply shops and nursery companies. What’s that fool thinking?”

“Every American has a right to privacy, except every commercial transaction tells the political parties how you’re going to vote. And he’s now committed treason! No one, our side or theirs, will ever trust him. He’ll end up in a village of peons, probably an elementary school teacher, or he’ll be stuck checking the sewers and flood control channels for the remainder of his life in the middle of Asia, living under repressive regimes until he’s ninety! Howdy-doody to the rest of the world. That kid saw too many Jason Bourne movies! He even gave information to The Guardian newspaper!”

Ashton stood in the kitchen, looking into the living room.

“Ivy, the toilet is to your right, down the hall. Lift the seat! That kid is so innocent, he’s committed every bone-headed mistake.” She looked at Honcho who was non-committal. “Unless he’s a plant.”

“I don’t know,” Honcho responded.
“Or a dupe.”
Honcho shrugged.
“Otherwise, this kid’s experience has been seen and told, and is what every American should have learned from the after-traitor troubles of Benedict Arnold.”

“Other than the TV and your course work, what’s life like here?”
“Killing neighbor’s pets, shooting at the cops every so often. We have a lot of fun. My pharmacist knows me.”

“Other than pay, what do you want?”
“Details – itinerary, how long, whom I’ll see, whom I’ll be with. It’s been twelve years, and the body doesn’t respond as well as it did once.”

Honcho grimaced. He knew her recent medical check up was sterling. “Is much changed since your Peace Corp experience in 1976?”

“When my parents thought the university was making me a revolutionary, a feminist, a liberationist, a communist and a drug addict?”

Ashton came into the room and stood.
Gladys spoke to him: “I told my parents I wanted to be an anarchist, another “ist” noun, whether Communist or Christ. So the Corp sent me to Bolivia. I found a boy, sex and no love; we never married. It was convenience. I wasn’t a college grad, but had an ear for music and words in language and could remember a lot. So Ivy, are you shocked at the casual way I entered the rat race?”

Ashton hesitated. He didn’t expect to be addressed or to hear her history. She wasn’t the sort the agency was made of today.

“So what did you do?” Gladys demanded of him.

“I considered the neighbor’s barrel, but they had seen me. There was a telephone number on each container, so I called about getting a new container. I figured they owned each one. They said it would take two weeks, so I got emotional and said how you hurt yourself trying to move it without a wheel. You had fallen down. I didn’t know your name but I told them I was married to your niece, and everyone was at the hospital but me. I had the undesirable assignment of calling about the defective container. So they said they’d get a new container to you in two days.”

Gladys looked at Honcho and said, “That’s a good lie.”
“We’d like the up-front expense to be the same, but we can pad the pension.”
“Is that going to be paid at all, in full?” she coughed disregarding that flummery.
“Your articles about local plants have been fascinating.”
“If we can come to larger terms, and I like it, I may do it. Do you boys want something to drink, or eat? Save your per diem for something special.”

“She a sleeper?” Ashton said driving from Gladys house.

“The best agent I’ve ever worked with. Has always known how everything works. And she’ll know what we’re asking her to do. She reads a lot – has a huge library in the back rooms. That’s her family and company, knowledge. There are no kids, but a sibling sister with brats.”

Trying to get the true message Ashton looked at the road.

“You notice how she dropped in, ‘I want a dog.?’” Honcho asked. “That’s the way to say, ‘NO,’ to me. Old people with dogs never go anywhere.”

“She really doesn’t want a dog? But I asked, ‘Which breed?’”

“Not the first person to be confused. I’ve had conversations with her since the beginning, and I thought she was tizzy, but she knew what was happening – the goals and approximately how to do it.”

“Is that why she was talking about buying the contents of storage bins and ebaying everything?”

“That may have been an entrée to learn about the assignment, but I haven’t figured that out. I mostly never do, but I know she understands and will act independently and appropriately.”

Ashton looked over, so long that Honcho pointed to the road.

“Let me explain. I complained to her once about roundabout, beating around the bush, never-getting-to-the-point conversations. She likes those. There are no specific instructions. And what’s going to happen if anyone ever interrogates her? Nobody has told her anything. She works on her own doing a specific job. It’s part of who she is: Gladys.”

“Gladys?”

“She brought in a book with definitions of names, and Gladys is is from the Welsh, ‘of unknown origin, of uncertain derivation.’”

“She likes to be in and solve puzzles?” Ashton asked.

“A whiz at crosswords. Never get into a contest with her. She’ll take all your money; she didn’t leave me with carfare. And that’s why she’ll do this. You see the way she was kicking the can? The puzzle solving in her neighborhood disappeared with the boulder.”

Michael Ulin Edwards, 99 cents, iBookstore