My Novel that I cannot get published

I have written a Novel. It is called LIAR. It is copyrighted. Here is chapter One. Please provide feedback.

(c) 1997, 2005

Chapter 1--ALBANY

He was the ultimate Liar. And he wanted out.


The dull light coming in through the window throbbed in his mind like a ballpeen hammer being smashed directly into his nerve endings. Dull splitting pain crashed in, rocking all his senses. Last night had been a hell of a night, he thought. One for the books. He only remembered having five or six beers. Remembered. That was the key word. He had trouble remembering. He always had trouble remembering. Quite often, he would have to remember to substitute the word ‘pitchers’ for ‘beers’, the former more adequately describing his current malaise.

He was out with his friends Bill Williams, often called "William B" after a famous disc jockey, Davey McCoy, a childhood friend of his, and Steve Winterbottom, a friend of Davey’s, whom he had befriended in college. The four of them had attended the State University of New York at Albany, otherwise known as SUNYA, SUNY at Albany, and, by the potheads on campus, as Hot Fuckin’ SUNYA, with all due respects to Jorma Kaukonnen. His name was Sammy. Sammy Johnston. He was 23 years old, had dark hair, medium build, and a ruddy complexion. As of this moment, he was unshaven with about three days worth of stubble covering his face..

They were at their old college hangout-Ratner’s Bar and Grill- where the beer was cheap and the atmosphere was fine, the perfect combination. Sammy realized that the last time they were there together was twelve months ago, in May of 1981, right before they graduated from the State University. They were sitting at the bar instead of at the many tables and booths that peppered the joint.

"What’ll it be", the bartender asked. He was a diminutive man, who walked with his arms flailing at his sides while he kept his shoulders hunched. His eyes were the tiny slits of a gila monster that he used to eye you suspiciously if he felt you were too drunk to drive home. He was Ratner. Luckily, in college, they didn’t get the stare as they all lived within walking distance of the bar. If you were a regular, while he would look at you through the slits, he would serve you anyway, drunk or not. Therefore, it was more than a minor miracle that Ratner was able to keep his place open despite serving drunks and, of course, minors. There had to be some laws violated but Ratner still managed to stay open and had spent forty of his sixty-two years running this place. Oh, he had his share of lawsuits under New York’s Dram Shop law but the law firm retained by his insurance company was always able to dig up some dirt on the plaintiff which would invariably result in a verdict in the barkeep’s favor. Lately, the lawsuits were more infrequent which was the old man’s way of saying "Don’t Fuck with Ratner." The bar was an Albany fixture, having been open for 75 years. First, Ratner’s father ran it, opening the bar right before America’s involvement in World War I. The old man pretended to be a cripple and was passed over during the conscription process. When the old man died in 1942, Ratner took it over and had been running it ever since. Ratner had been running the place so long that even the aged customers who patronized the place when his old man ran it could only remember what the old man looked like because of the oil painting hanging above the Seagram’s.

The bar itself was like any bar you might find in Albany. Dimly lit, with pictures on the wall, the bar seemed as if it had been around, not for decades, but for centuries. Despite the "no-smoking" sign hanging over the bar the room was smoke-filled, yet Ratner did not seem to care. Looking around the room, you might expect to find the majority of the patrons to be in their sixties and seventies, and ten years ago that would have been the case. But around the mid seventies more college graduates found the place and frequented it. Ratner didn’t mind the graduates; it was the undergrads he didn’t like. If they came in, Ratner would serve them but berate them while they were there, assuring that they wouldn’t come back. The only ones who seemed to enjoy Ratner’s abuse was Sammy Johnston and his three friends. Whenever Ratner started on one of his tirades, Sammy and his friends would join in loudly, berating both themselves and the old man in the process and leaving Ratner merely to scratch his head in befuddlement. When Ratner saw that he couldn’t get rd of these four college students, he accepted them and they became part of the regular clientele. And they acted the part as well. The usual suspects were a large, extended family. When the regulars entered the bar, greetings were offered back and forth, individually and to the group. And all the regulars were on a first named basis. Even Ratner had his own pet name for Sammy Johnston and his friends.

"What’ll it be, assholes?" repeated Ratner while waiting for the unvarying answer.

"Miller Beer" came the voices in unison. When two pitchers were brought and the beers were poured, Sammy spoke. "you know, the past few months have been pretty hairy. Down in Washington, they have me doing this minor undercover work in addition to my research duties. All I would do was research at other government agencies but use an assumed identity and a cover story in order to ferret out corrupt employees. But it was getting crazy. I was Thomas Eldridge, Luther Henderson, William Rodgers. I gained their confidence and then turned them in." This was a serious breach of the confidentiality that his job required but, in all honesty, no one paid Sammy much attention. In addition, he felt secure as he was not revealing the true nature of his job over the past several months. Between his low mumbling and the fact that he was virtually now an outsider because he was the only one who didn’t live in Albany, the others were more intent on discussing issues of job and women.
"I’ll pick up your tab now, if you’re not going to drink seriously," Ratner intoned. "Otherwise, I can go through your wallets later when you’re lying on the floor."

"Serious drinking only" proclaimed Davey. "We’re celebrating the return of the prodigal son from Washington, D.C. Go through our wallets later. And bring us two more pitchers. On that note, I gotta pee." He stood up. He was six feet three inches tall and, although he had been a college football favorite only two years ago, he had started to lose his muscular physique in favor of a rubbery paunch that extended from his lower chest to his belt line. It was getting bigger with each passing month, but Davey didn’t care. It was his usual shanty Irish bullshit. He figured that the only way he’d get his name in the Guinness Book of World Records was to be the fattest man someday. He didn’t want to exercise. He didn’t want to work, although he wanted a cushy job. He just didn’t care.

The others were of identical, almost brotherly, builds between five foot six and five foot ten in height, and between one hundred sixty and one hundred seventy each. Steve and Sammy had black hair while Willy B had blonde hair. For a long time, Steve and Sammy were always thought to be brothers. They felt a particular kinship with each other and had shared many secrets that were not revealed to Willy B or Davey. Steve always joked about carrying these secrets to his grave.

He didn’t know how soon that would be, though.

October, 1981
Sammy wanted out. He had, in fact, sent a letter to the head of the Company that he wanted out of field investigations in the hopes that he could be switched to a desk job. The past six months had been hell on him. His prime responsibility was to spy on other government employees and other public officials in order to expose security risks. He was the Company’s secret weapon given his talent and was recruited prior to graduating from college. He was so much a secret weapon that his direct superior, the Chief himself, a man named Henry Richardson, decided to meet with Sammy because of the letter. Richardson, a native of Texas, was 58 years old, had gray hair, small eyes that were difficult to read, and unusually large shoulders. Today, he was wearing a blue suit, white shirt and solid navy tie. "So you want out?" he asked in his southern Texas drawl that made him sound a little like Strother Martin in Cool Hand Luke telling everyone that they had a failure to communicate.
"Not totally" replied Sammy. "I just want a different assignment. I love working here. It’s the particular targets that bother me. While I realize that I’m serving the greater good, my conscience is telling me otherwise and I’m getting an ulcer."

"Don’t wrestle with your conscience, Sammy," Richardson counseled. "It’s wrong. Your actions have resulted in the removal of fifteen people in the last six months. These people posed a threat to our government. They were security risks that our ordinary security channels could not detect. And your name has not been connected with any of the people so there should be no fear of any sort of retribution. You’re well protected." Richardson eyed the young man before him, knowing that he had to use every card in his hand to impress this man of the gravity of his action.

"I don’t have a fear of retribution. What I have a fear of is that I’ve followed orders and have implicated people in activities that many other people are engaged in, yet we’ve only targeted a select few. Why?"

"These people are enemies."

"What! Are you crazy? I’m sorry, sir but they are public servants, like you and me. You may not like their political views, but ‘enemies’? Jesus Christ."

Richardson’s mood grew dark. "You watch your tone with me young man. First, they are not public servants like you and I. They have been demonstrated to be a risk to this country and, therefore, they must be prosecuted."
"Who says they’re a risk?"

"People much higher than you or I will ever be."

"Who"

"I’m sorry, that’s classified." When Sammy threatened to quit, Richardson just laughed it off by saying that "you’re the best liar we’ve ever had. No one has ever come close to accomplishing what you have. Do you think we’d be willing to let you go?" And with a furrow of his brow, Richardson became serious and said, "you’re never going to leave us. We need you too much."

Sammy reacted to this with fear, although he did not let it show on his face. The hidden meaning was obvious., but he couldn’t face up to it. He was an asset to the Company and if he would not making noise, he would simply disappear. He pleaded with Richardson, but the latter would not budge. He thought to himself "had I known, I would never had have joined the Company." Like most of the other Liars, he started in the "mailroom" intercepting and reading intelligence data from all over the world, but his superiors quickly realized his capabilities and assigned him to field work with lightning fast speed. Only one other person had ever been put into field work with such speed. Richardson was his corporate mentor and obviously felt betrayed by the request for transfer.

That was seven months ago. Richardson had died soon after their conversation, very quietly. The reported cause of death was heart attack, but no one really believed that theory. Rather, there were some unconfirmed rumors that Richardson was slipped a dose of potassium into his bloodstream and he was simply removed. By whom, he did not know, but it could just as easily have been him. He did not know what he would have done had he been given the order but he was thankful he did not have to deal with that issue. The new Chief’s name was George Connolly. In him, Sammy saw his ticket out. Connolly was 50 years old, but looked ten years younger, had sandy brown hair and rugged face that made him look as though he worked on a farm somewhere in Montana for years. Of course, the only farm he worked on for the past 30 years was the Company itself. Connolly was another Liar in the Company and had been involved with field work for the majority of his tenure with the Company, only supervising other Liars for the past five years. However, during his entire tenure with the Company he reported directly to the Director of the CIA. In fact, Sammy was the only Liar that did not report to a supervisor but directly to the Chief, first Richardson and now, Connolly. With Sammy’s reputation firmly entrenched as the stuff of legends, Connolly was glad to be working with him. Sammy’s thoughts were, indeed, likewise, hoping he could manipulate Connolly into giving him a less stressful assignment.

Sammy had several meetings with Connolly shortly after the new Chief was installed but never had the nerve to bring up the issue of quitting. When he did, in November, Connolly’s reaction was quite different than Richardson’s. "We wouldn’t want you to leave immediately. That would leave us in a hole. To tell the truth, I don’t want you to leave at all, given your track record; however, from what I’ve seen in the past thirty years, I can understand your anxiety. I won’t stop you and I won’t threaten you. All I ask is that you finish up the last few jobs we have planned for you while we look for a new recruit to fill your spot. That should take about six or seven months and your then free to go."

"What if I want out, immediately?" asked Sammy.

"Then you can leave. But think of the position that would leave us in. You know that it takes us between one and two years to plan a removal and all removals are scheduled based upon what we know of the person’s daily habits. All available Liars are scheduled for the next eight months. Your leaving now would leave us in a major lurch and you would lose a lot of friends and possibly make enemies. We all like you and we’d like to keep it that way. Now, c’mon, put in the next six to seven months tops and then you can leave. Who knows? You might even change your mind."

"You might even change your mind"

Now, as he was sitting here in Ratner’s, seven months later those words rang in his ears over and over like some Gregorian chant, toneless and steady. But he would not, and could not, change his mind. In fact, he was attempting to bring on his departure by confessing to his friends but no one was listening. His job as a Liar had followed him into his personal life. He had told lies about everything else before his friends called him on the carpet for it, these three the only ones being ‘friends’ and everyone else being acquaintances, which explained their hasty departure from his life, so when he wanted to purge himself of his sins by confessing his deepest and darkest secrets, none of the three that maintained contact with him truly believed. After all, he had told them since he graduated college that he was a government research assistant so when he started into his 007 exploits, his friends thought the beer was bringing out his prevarications. Who would even think that such an organization existed? C’mon, they all thought. An organization called The Company, part of the CIA, whose charter prohibited domestic operations, hired him, a twenty three year old, to carry out prohibited domestic activities. And what about the fact that congressional oversight committees had never been able to uncover the Company’s existence. So, understandably, his friends looked at him like he was crazy, drunk or both. The fact was during the past seven months he had attempted to escape the Company’s clutches but no matter how hard he tried, Connolly held onto him with iron claws.

But, tomorrow, he would start his escape.

Through the course of the evening the four buddies consumed ten pitchers of beer. Sammy loosened up considerably and joined in with his friends’ merriment. When he noticed that he was slurring his words, Sammy said "I think it’s time to stop. We’re gonna regret it in the morning."

"Bullshit," Davey cried. His hands shot up and he looked as though he was signaling a touchdown; however, the momentum of his arms made him fall backwards off his barstool onto the floor. Davey was so drunk he felt nothing and had a look on his face that seemed to say ‘how did I get here?’ Naturally, as naturally as things come to four young men in their respective drunken stupors, they thought this was one of the funniest things we had seen in a long time and laughed till their sides hurt. All the while old man Ratner was shaking his head and muttering the word ‘assholes’ under his breath. Thank god for some constants in life.

Sammy, Bill and Steve jumped off their barstools by this time and helped Davey up. Steve had the bright idea to take the money out of Davey’s wallet as he wouldn’t remember him doing so and think he lost it. He would take no offense even if he did realized what happened because this was a ritual that the four buddies carried out on the drunkest one, whom was usually Davey McCoy. "Ratner, here’s your money, with a tip sufficient to gain us entrance back in here the next time we decide to visit your shithole of an establishment that we nevertheless think of as our home away from home." He threw down three twenty dollar bills and assisted Sammy and Bill, who looked as though they might be losing the battle to keep Davey up. As they walked out of the door, Ratner smiled and thought to himself that those are the type of guys to whom he’d like to sell his bar. He wanted to retire to Florida and since his daughter, a successful trial attorney in Miami, said that she would buy her dad a home down there, he just thought that he would broach the subject with these guys the next time they walked in the door. That didn’t prevent him from muttering "assholes" as they left.

They took Davey to his apartment on Morris Street, a few blocks away. Normally, it was an easy walk, but Davey’s deadweight bulk made it difficult to maneuver. Luckily, there were three to move him. They woke up Davey’s landlord, Joseph Simowitz, a man of 29 with the disposition of a man of 69, to let them into Davey’s apartment as Davey forgot his keys. The man muttered something under his breath as he got his set of master keys and let them into the apartment. Davey had lived in this building since his sophomore year at college. While he originally lived on the second floor, in his senior year an apartment became vacant on the first floor and, while the same size as his previous apartment, he took it for nights such as this when he would lack the stamina to make it up the stairs. Simowitz opened the door and the three carried in the body. Mercifully, they left Davey on his bed snoring loudly and didn’t even bother undressing him.

Steve and Willy B shared a house on Quail Street together so after saying their mutual good-byes the two staggered one way and Sammy headed the other way. Sammy had no problem getting to his apartment house on Willet Street. He was tired and drunk, but he was pretty level-headed. His drunk routine was for his friends benefit. He never really got passing out drunk, but he sometimes had difficulty remembering the next day. That came from his job, where he was conditioned to maintain his composure no matter what the adverse conditions may be; however, he lived on the fourth floor and didn’t think he’d be able to make the climb he was so tired. The elevator was out of order and just last week an elderly lady died climbing to her third floor apartment. That was last week and the landlord was already sued for not keeping the elevator in good working order.
Sammy didn’t like the landlord. He was an Indian who settled in Albany, went to the University, ran a convenience store and then, with his profits, bought the apartment building and did as few things as possible. As Sammy climbed the stairs, he thought that maybe he should drop dead and cause the landlord some more grief. He laughed out loud when he realized that his work problems would be cured as well. After having difficulty putting the key in the lock, he opened the door and entered his apartment.

His studio apartment was barely furnished. All he kept in the apartment was a bed, which was dressed up like a sofa during the day, a table, which he ate at and threw his wallet and change on at night, a recliner, a TV stand with a television on it and a fairly new invention called a Videocassette Recorder. He had no need to keep a lot of belongings there as he was gone a majority of the time. In fact, his cover as a research assistant was perfect. He walked through the dark apartment not turning on the lights and knocked the television over. The picture tube imploded on impact with the parquet floor. "Shit" he muttered, not fully realizing what he had done. In the morning he would bemoan the fact that he had lost one of his "two best friends", the other being the videocassette recorder. However, as tired as he was, he went straight to the bathroom and took four aspirin to help his headache. He had really started to eat a lot of aspirin and knew it was chewing holes in his stomach, but he didn’t really care. He went to his bed and pulled off the sheets. He laid down in his clothes and right before he drifted off to sleep he remembered that tomorrow he would receive his last assignment. Despite that thought, he slept fitlessly.

He stirred uneasily when the light filtered through the blinds and woke him up. He remembered that it was the day to get the last job and he wondered what the target would be. A defense contractor? A congressman? A senator? At least, he had been given easy non-dangerous targets. The hardest part was getting involved with the people he knew. Perhaps his biggest weakness, he knew was the fact that he actually liked the people he had to kill. They were good people, but he had a job to do and he was sure that there were reasons for him to do what he had to do. Surely, few of the marines at Wake Island did not question their orders in that battle. But he hoped that the feelings would be the same for him, but they were not. Why?, he thought. Simple, his mind answered, because the Marines at Wake Island and Iwo Jima and wherever else did not know their victims. What bothered him was that he didn’t mind that he killed but that he killed people he knew and liked. And that conundrum, that eternal question for him, would send him to hell with all the evil that walked the earth, he was sure of it.

Lies. Everyone told lies and he was no different. And they all believed him because he had an honest face. As happens with lies, they spill over into his personal life and control over one’s destiny is lost. His lies became more and more outlandish until his acquaintances told him to fuck off and had nothing further to do with him. Everyone had deserted him because of his lies. All he had were Willy B, Steve and Davey. They stayed with him because they saw some goodness in him, although thinking to himself right now he didn’t know what that was. His parents could not cut their familial ties with him, but expressed their displeasure with him every time they saw him. He wondered how it all began.

He stared at the wall for what seemed like an hour, but which was only five minutes. He closed his eyes in order to get more sleep as he would need a clear head to operate. He knew that for sure. He thought of Patty, a college girlfriend, and the good times they had. Thinking of any college girlfriend usually made him drift off to sleep easily and contentedly.

At that moment, the phone rang.