Who Bought the Bullets

By Jeffry Weiss

A professor of Constitutional Law at Georgetown University, Patrick Henry, enlists ten of his students in a project to solve a fifty-seven year-old crime: who killed John F. Kennedy. 

 

In order to solve the mystery, they must break into the National Archives Building and steal the remaining files on the assassination. 

 

The U.S. Senate Oversight Committee has called for the last of the files on the Kennedy assassination.  The CIA must get those files before they fall into the hands of the Senate.  If they can't, then the crimes committed by the agency, both before, during and after the assassination, will come to light.  Lives will be ruined beyond repair.  People will go to prison, jobs and careers up in smoke.  And so the CIA's motivation in getting those files could not be any higher.

 

Patrick and his students are being sought by the people they robbed of a half million dollars.  That money needed to pay for the tunnel diggers to get into the National Archives Building.  What they thought to be a low risk crime turned out to be a business owned by the local Mafia. 

 

With the help of four Mexicans - who had dug hundred-foot long tunnels under the U.S. / Mexican border - Patrick and his team of students dig their way into the National Archives and come away with the files, only minutes before the CIA enters the building.

 

Yet things quickly degrade from theft to murder.  Patrick is forced to kill to protect their identity and their plan, then continue murdering in order to remain free.

 

This while Washington Star Daily reporters Colin North and Annie Adelson with the Washington Daily News, are investigating a series of recent murders which seems to filter back to a small group of men inside the CIA, led by Deputy Director Sam Michelson.  With the help of police Inspector, Sean Cassidy, and rogue FBI agent, Kevin McDonald, Colin and Annie close in on the group who in turn closes in on him.

 

One man, Colin North, rises to the challenge: protect the Constitution and the rule of law, even if it means risking his life.  The other, Professor Patrick Henry, degrades from a man who teaches the law to breaking the law and rationalizing acts of murder.

 

The small group inside the CIA now knows of Colin North's intention to reveal all the CIA secrets - extra-judicial killings, coups d' etad, regime change and torture - in a special edition of the Washington Daily News.  If that happens, Sam Michelson and his aides will be tried for treason and a list of crimes too long to enumerate.

 

Patrick and his students sift through the stolen material and, with help from a man who was in Dealey Plaza on November 22nd, 1963, finally learn who killed Kennedy.  But will they be able to turn the files over to the newspapers before they are found.

 

The mystery solved, Patrick goes to the Washington Daily News to present the evidence.  However, one block from those offices, Patrick is shot and killed.  A man following Patrick, with the hands of a magician, picks up the files without missing a beat and leaves a handgun and a note making it clear that Patrick was despondent and committed suicide.  The secret is safe once again.

 

 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jeffry Weiss
• Release date: Nov 10, 2021
• ISBN: 9798201742102

Jeffry Weiss

BIOGRAPHY Mr. Weiss attended Central High School, at the time recognized as the top High School academically in the U.S.  He then attended Drexel University where he gained a BS in History, Temple University where he earned an MA in Economics and the University of Pennsylvania where he received an MA in International Affairs.  Those studies provided him with unique insights in the realm of foreign policy, military capabilities, détente, and trade. He has been a writer for forty plus years and has penned hundreds of articles on social, political, and economic issues.  He has written position papers for the Carter and Clinton Administrations and his work on social issues has received recognition directly from the office of the President of México.  He speaks regularly with Noam Chomsky on political, economic, cultural, and military issues. Mr. Weiss writes political, military, economic and scientific thrillers.  There are now twelve books in the Paul Decker series.  All his stories come right off the front pages of the major magazines and newspapers but none of his plots has ever found their way into novel before.  His characters are ones readers can relate to: flawed, not superheroes.  His stories do not require a leap of faith or use deus ex machina. Finally, he has written a stage play, “Einstein at the Guten Zeiten (good times) Beer Garden, and an urban horror novel: “The Art of Theft”, a modern day version of “The Picture of Dorian Grey” by Oscar Wilde.

Book preview

Good question: Who Killed JFK?

Better Question: Who didn’t kill JFK?

That little Kennedy, he thought he was a God.

Allen Dulles, March, 1965

PARTICIPANTS

Law Professors:

Dr. Patrick William Henry

Dr. Daniel Glenshaw

––––––––

Students:

Sharon Ridell

William Douglas

Vance Hollister

Michelle Ramsey

Rebecca Montgomery

Devon Anderson

Marian Hall

Kyle Norris

Ashley Davidson

Nathan Crosby

––––––––

Mexican tunnel diggers:

Francisco, engineer

Raul

Duarte

Emilio

CIA:

Director Vincent Tennant

Assistant Director Sam Michelson

Agent Marty Kowalski

Agent Walter Lasky

Agent Don Hightower

Washington D.C. police:

Inspector Sean Cassidy

Captain Danny Stillwater

Washington Daily News:

Ed Dorsey, editor-in-chief

Frank Azar, managing editor

Colin North, senior reporter

Annie Adelson, reporter

Grant Dixon, National Editor

Matthew Winter, Foreign Desk

Meg Olson, Colin’s assistant

Derrick Landon, Photographer

Harry Winston, layout manager

Howard Lancaster, cub reporter

Ben Webster, head of security

––––––––

U.S. Senate Oversight Committee:

Senator Gaylord Claymore, Chairman

Lawyer for the People:

Terrance Porter

––––––––

Assistant Attorney General:

Lawrence Bailey

––––––––

FBI agent:

Kevin McDonald

––––––––

Whistleblowers:

Norman DeWitt

Stanley Abrams

Harry Monroe

Laura Summerville

Peter Coventry

Jules Rosen

Martin Prescott

––––––––

Milestone Printers:

Quincy Risner, owner

E-Z Pay Day Loans:

Tony Acaro, owner

Albert, muscle

Mike, muscle

Don, muscle

––––––––

General Contractor:

Bill Stoneman

TIME LINE

Texas.  November 22nd, 1963

11:20 a.m. 

Air Force One, with the presidential couple aboard, departs Carswell Air Force Base in Fort Worth for the short flight to Dallas.

11:38 a.m.

Air Force One lands at Love Field, Dallas, Texas

11:45 a.m.

Oswald asks a School Book employee why big crowds are gathered outside.  The employee says, The president is visiting Dallas today.  Oswald responds, Oh, I see.

11:46 a.m.

The Kennedys greet the crowds.  Over 2,500 people turn out to see the president and first lady at Love Field Airport.

12:21 p.m.

The presidential limousine turns off Harwood onto Main Street in downtown Dallas.

12:27 p.m. 

Lee Harvey Oswald is seen in the second floor lunch room, standing next to a phone, drinking a Coke.

12:27 p.m.

Large crowds line Main Street in downtown Dallas near the Adolphus Hotel.  Over 150,000 people line the ten mile motorcade route.

12:28 p.m.

Due to a last minute change, the motorcade turns north on Houston Street, travels one block to where it makes a one-hundred twenty degree left hand turn onto Elm Street, forcing the motorcade to slow down to five miles per hour.  The motorcade proceeds southwest on Elm, still traveling less than ten miles per hour.

12:30 p.m.

President Kennedy and Governor Connally are shot in Dallas' Dealey Plaza.  The Presidential Limousine stops when the first shot is fired, in direct contradiction to the policy of the secret service, which is to immediately speed up and leave the parade route when any loud sound is heard.

12:30.10 p.m.

After the final shot is fired, the presidential limousine races up Stemmons Freeway to Parkland Memorial Hospital.

12:30.30 p.m.

School Book building employee Miss Victoria Adams walks down the stairs at approximately 30 seconds after the last shot is fired.  She sees no one going up or coming down.  She sees Lee Harvey Oswald in the lunchroom next to the phone.

12:31.15 p.m.

Officer Marion Baker is the first officer in the School Book Building.  With building superintendent Roy Truly leading the way, the two men reach the second floor.  There they see Oswald standing near a coke machine in the building’s lunchroom.  Baker estimates this is between seventy-five and ninety seconds after the last shot was fired.  Both Truly and Baker state that Oswald is relaxed and not breathing hard. 

12:32 p.m.

Mrs. Elizabeth Reid, who works on the second floor of the School Book Building, sees Oswald drinking a Coke. 

12:33 p.m.

Lee Harvey Oswald heads down the stairwell to leave the Texas School Book Depository Building.  He is stopped by Officer Roger Craig who sticks his gun in Oswald’s belly.  Only when the officer is told Oswald is an employee does Craig let him go.  Craig rushes up to the 6th floor.  He passes no one on the stairs.

12.34 p.m.

The first news wire service announcement of the shooting is broadcast (UPI).

12:36 p.m.

The presidential limousine arrives at Parkland Hospital.

12:40 p.m.

The CBS network interrupts TV soap opera, 'As the World Turns' and Walter Cronkite announces the president has been shot.

12:45 p.m.

FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover calls President Kennedy's brother, Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy to tell him his brother has been shot.

12:45 p.m.

Police broadcast the first description of the suspect.  "The suspect from Elm and Houston is reported to be an unknown white male, about thirty, thinning blonde hair, slender build, five feet ten inches tall, armed with what is thought to be a 30-30 rifle.  This, while every witness states that the person, or persons, they saw in the 6th floor window of the School Book Building was dark complected, with thick black hair, medium build, making them think the men were Cuban or Mexican. 

12:50 p.m.

The jet carrying members of the President's Cabinet to Japan turns back to the U.S.

12:58 p.m.

Father Oscar Huber arrives at Parkland Hospital.

12:58 p.m.

Oswald returns to his room at 1026 North Beckley Avenue in Oak Cliff to retrieve his pistol, then leaves minutes later to wait at a bus stop.

1:00 p.m.

Doctors pronounce President Kennedy dead while a crowd gathers outside the hospital.

1:03 p.m.

An informal roll call of the Texas School Book Depository's employees is taken.

1:07 p.m.

News of the shooting causes the New York Stock Exchange to halt trading after an $11 million flood of sell orders.

1:10 p.m.

Dallas police find empty rifle shells at the sixth floor window of the Texas School Book Depository.  Conveniently making it easier for the police to conclude that three shots were fired from the 6th floor.

1:12 p.m.

Police officer J.D. Tippit is shot and killed at the corner of 10th Street and Patton Avenue in the Oak Cliff section of Dallas. 

1:12 p.m.

Managers at the Texas Theater, Butch Burroughs and Jack Davis, observe Oswald inside the theater between 1:10 p.m. and 1:15 p.m.  The distance between 10th and Patton (where Tippit is shot) and the Texas Theater is seven tenths of a mile.  It takes 12 minutes to walk that distance at a brisk pace, making it impossible for Oswald to have killed Tippit.

1:22 p.m.

Dallas officers find a rifle hidden in the northwest section of the Texas School Book Depository’s sixth floor.  The rifle is identified as a German Mauser by deputy sheriff Seymour Weitzman, the weapons expert for the Dallas Police Department.

1:30 p.m.

UPI identifies Father Oscar Huber and reports he has 'administered the last sacrament of the Church to the President.

1:33 p.m.

News wire services announce President Kennedy's death.

1:33 p.m.

Vice President Lyndon Johnson boards Air Force One at Love Field.

1:50 p.m.

Oswald is arrested after a struggle in the Texas Theatre in Oak Cliff.

1:55 p.m.

Police Officer Gene Boone finds an Italian Mannlicher-Carcano rifle on the 6th floor of the School Book Depository building.

2:00 p.m.

Parkland Hospital employee Darryl Tomlinson finds the pristine bullet on a stretcher in the hallway.  This is the bullet that supposedly went through Kennedy’s back, made a sharp right, then left turn, hit Governor Connolly in the back, goes through his ribs, wrist and thigh.  Contrary to popular thought, the bullet is not in pristine condition and shows substantial deformation.

3:30 p.m.

Police interrogate Buell Frazier, a nineteen year old School Book employee who drove Oswald to work that day.  When questioned, he claimed that Oswald did not bring a rifle, or any gun, with him that day, or any day.  Frazier is threatened he will be charged as an accomplice to the murder of President Kennedy if he does not change his testimony.  He refuses.

4:00 p.m.

Dallas police officers interview Oswald's wife Marina and search her residence in Irving.  Oswald was never asked if he was married.  He lived by himself.  No one could have possibly known about, or tracked down Marina, unless the investigation had started days or weeks before the shooting.

4:30 p.m. 

Within 4 hours of the shooting, J. Edgar Hoover announces that Lee Harvey Oswald killed the president and that there is no conspiracy, this before any investigation is conducted and in spite of Oswald’s denying he shot the president.

7:10 p.m.

Lee Harvey Oswald is charged with the murder of Officer J.D. Tippit, even though Tippit is shot with an automatic and Oswald only has a revolver.

1:30 a.m. November 23rd, 1963

Oswald is charged with the murder of President Kennedy.

4.00 a.m.

Oswald is identified as the owner of the rifle found in the Texas School Book Building, which by this time has been switched from the German Mauser to an Italian Mannlicher-Carcano Rifle: a bolt-action gun with a busted scope.

11:21 a.m.

Jack Ruby shoots Lee Harvey Oswald in the basement of the Dallas Police Headquarters.  Ruby is immediately taken into custody.

11:46 p.m. 

There is an unexplained twenty minute delay between the shooting and the ambulance picking Oswald up at the police station and transporting him to the hospital.

1:07 p.m.

Oswald dies of the gunshot wound after surgery at Parkland Hospital.

January, 1964

Two members of the Warren Commission, Gerald Ford and Earl Warren, go to Dallas to interview Jack Ruby.  Ruby begs the two men to take him to Washington where he promises to tell all.  He says his life is in danger if he remains in Dallas.  Warren and Ford turn down his offer.

December, 1966

Ruby is granted a new trial.

January 3, 1967

Suspiciously, Ruby dies of lung cancer less than a month later.  He has never smoked in his life.  The CIA’s MKUltra director, Sidney Gottlieb, has been running the program for over a decade, experimenting with mind control drugs and undetectable poisons and nuclear medicines that induce strokes, cancer, and death, and make it seem like natural causes.

CHAPTER ONE

Theodore Roosevelt Park.  Washington, D.C.  Morning.

The Nation’s Capital had barely woken up when, at 6:00 a.m., a dog-walker came upon an unconscious man in track clothes lying on the multi-use path in the park.

Wearing an almost new jogging outfit and expensive running shoes, he could have been in a fashion commercial, were it not for the fact he was dead.

With arms and legs akimbo, it looked as though someone had taken the trouble to have the deceased pose for them.

By 6:30 a.m., national park police had been notified and were at the scene.  They were quickly followed by detectives and the coroner’s office. 

The cops were big-bellied men in ill-fitting suits, scuffed shoes and haphazard ties.

There were deep cheek jowls and unshaven faces all succumbing to the force of gravity, nails bitten and dirty, fingers as thick as sausages.

One of the detectives tapped the man’s shoes with his foot, hoping the guy would get up, run a little further, then collapse and die in some other police district.

One cop said to the other, I think this is your precinct, Dennis.

No way, Hank.  That tree marks the dividing line between the 9th and the 21st division.

I think one of his arms is laying in the 9th, Hank argued.

It comes down to percentages, Dennis insisted.  I think you’ve got seventy percent of his torso in the 21st.

If you guys are done arguing, the coroner began, I’d like to get going here before my Egg McMuffin goes cold.  And you know how shitty that fast-food tastes when cold.

Another man walked up to join those already on the scene.  He had a digital recorder in one hand and a camera slung over his shoulder.

Several of the men present knew the man.  Knew he was a top-flight reporter.  One held a grudge.

Who the fucked rattled your cage? Hank asked the newcomer.

Somebody didn’t get their cup of coffee this morning, the reporter gave as good as he got.

Hank grabbed his crotch.  I got your coffee right here.

Hey, hey, Dennis said, stepping in between the two.  Colin’s one of the good guys.  Lay off, will ya?

I know you, North.  You’re the guy who sent some of my colleagues off to prison.

Oh, you mean the cops who were robbing appliance stores?  The business owners were smart enough to take off the doors and carry them home every night.  So your friends left a note that said, ‘Bring back the doors or we’ll burn your store down.’  Are those the guys you’re talking about?

You don’t know how things work on the street, Hank snickered.  Cops don’t get paid enough to buy a home, raise a family.  They’re just supplementing their income. 

How about we get back to the business at hand, Dennis suggested. 

Colin was all too happy to oblige, dismissing the confrontation as mere shop talk.  What do we have here, Dennis? he asked.

Jogger, Dennis replied, nodding to the body.  Died about an hour ago.

Guy looks pretty fit to me, Colin made mention.

Waiting for the coroner to pronounce the cause of death, Dennis explained.  Right now it’s 50-50 between natural causes and homicide.

The men stood around, hands in their pockets, collars turned up, stamping their feet.

You never know, Hank began.  The guy might be better off dead.  Maybe he lost his job, his house.  Maybe his wife left him.

When you die you don’t go to a better place, Dennis countered.  Death isn’t better than life.  The better place is where you’re not dead.  Heaven isn’t in the clouds; it’s the air in your lungs.

All the men nodded in agreement with the pronouncement.

Dennis smiled at Colin, returning to the matter at hand.  How is it you get to the scene of a crime before any of your brethren?

I raise carrier pigeons, equip them with GPS and cameras, then direct them to the action with my police Bearcat scanner.  No news, no food.  I give them plenty of incentive.

Funny man, Hank said, giving Colin grudging respect.

A stray dog wandered over.  It sniffed the ground a few feet from the body, moving a little closer to the corpse with each pass.

When it reached the deceased’s head, Hank wound up his foot, ready to kick the dog into oblivion.

Colin stepped in between the cop and the dog and swung his foot under Hank’s leg, causing him to fall on his ass, knocking the wind out of him.

As soon as he recovered, he went for his gun, ready to shoot Colin, or the dog, or both.

Before he had a chance to fire, Kenny kicked the gun out of his hand.

The dog was so frightened it peed itself

Colin took a leash out of his coat pocket and slipped it gently around the dog’s neck, then petted the pooch’s back until it calmed down.

But Hank hadn’t.  You got lucky that time, North.  Next time, it’ll be just you and me and we’ll settle the score once and for all.

What are you going to do with that mutt now that you saved its life? Kenny asked.

I’ll take it to the Humane Society.  They’ll clean him up, give him his shots, then put him up for adoption.

Yeah, Hank began, but if they’re not adopted in ninety days, they’ll put ‘em down.  So he’s only getting a temporary reprieve.  Hank pointed a rude finger at the dog.  He’d be better off if you didn’t get his hopes up.

If they do have to put him down, they’ll do it painlessly and with dignity, Colin countered.

"They’d be better off puttin’ you down," Hank suggested cordially.

What’s with you and the mutts? Kenny asked Colin.

I’ve got a soft spot for strays.  I was once one myself.

If you people are done dealing with that dog, the coroner began, maybe we can wrap this up before lunch time...seeing as I haven’t had my breakfast yet.

Sorry, Nate, Kenny replied. 

The coroner took out a small voice recorder.  A brief analysis of the body indicates the victim has been dead less than an hour.  A superficial examination finds no stab wounds or bullet holes.  I’m putting my money on natural causes.  Most likely a heart attack.

Had they investigated further, they would have found that the deceased was in excellent health: a vegetarian, dedicated runner with no drug history.

All those gathered let out a sigh of relief.  No one would be inundated with the paperwork generated by a killing.

And unless a very thorough autopsy took place, no one would find the Gelsemium elegans, the most deadly flowering plant in China, in the victim’s body.

According to local legend, the indigenous plant was so fast-acting that even Shennong, a Chinese deity famous for his knowledge of herbal remedies and cures for all poisons, died after ingesting it and before he could reach into his medicine bag.

It was known to destroy the neurons in the body’s spinal cord, leaving victims breathless and in enormous pain.  It would damage a number of internal organs and cause paralysis and death within minutes.

Any I.D.? Colin asked, ready to mark it down in his small note book.

No papers on the body, Dennis replied.  But that’s not unusual.  People out for a jog rarely carry I.D., just leave it in their vehicle.

Hold on, Colin said, bending down to take a closer look at the body.  I think I know this guy.  A colleague of mine.

In this case, the man was identifiable.  He was a reporter whose work had graced the front pages of the major newspapers and magazines in the city for a decade or more.

The man once told Colin that in protecting the rights of the disadvantaged, the dispossessed, or uncovering the dirt on corrupt politicians, dishonest corporations, and deceptive banks, one would be protected from the slings and arrows of the guilty.

Maybe he didn’t know he might just be digging his own grave in the process.

Whatever Norman DeWitt had been in life, he was now just a statistic.

CHAPTER TWO

The National Archives, Washington, D.C.

The National Archives Building was located north of the National Mall at 700 Pennsylvania Avenue, Northwest, Washington, D.C.  The Rotunda entrance was on Constitution Avenue.

The building held the original copies of the three formative documents of the United States and its government: the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights.

The building also housed the Articles of Confederation, the Louisiana Purchase Treaty, the Emancipation Proclamation, and an original version of the 1297 Magna Carta confirmed by Edward I.

After numerous fires destroyed other important papers in the 17th and 18th century, when the documents were housed in temporary locations, Congress finally approved construction of a dedicated building in 1926.

Ground was broken for the National Archives on September 5, 1931.  By the time President Herbert Hoover laid the cornerstone of the building in February 1933, significant problems had arisen.  Because the massive structure was to be constructed above an underground stream, the Tiber Creek, 8,575 pylons had to be driven into the unstable soil, before pouring a huge concrete bowl as a foundation.  Another difficulty arose over the choice of building materials.  Ultimately, as in the other Federal Triangle buildings, limestone was used for the exterior superstructure and granite for the base.

The Archives held ten billion pages of textual records, twelve million maps, charts, and architectural and engineering drawings, twenty-five million still photographs and graphics, twenty-four million aerial photographs, 300,000 reels of motion picture film, 400,000 video and sound recordings, and 133 terabytes of electronic data.

However, for some, below ground was far more interesting than the area open to the public.

The records room in the basement of the archives was a cavernous space, the size of three football fields.

There, were kept materials marked as classified, or top secret.  In fact, it would take an order of the courts, congress or the president to access files in the restricted space.  And even then, only documents specified by the order would be available to the person making the request.

Boxes were stacked on shelves reaching sixteen feet in height, accessible only by forklift.

Upon closer inspection, an old man could be seen struggling to push a mobile rack, filled with files, down a narrow aisle. 

His footsteps and the squeaking wheels of the rack echoed off concrete floors and walls of the otherwise silent vastness.

Some of those papers held the transcripts of every congressional session since the revolutionary war, and the testimony of all witnesses brought before that august body.

There were dossiers on presidents starting with Washington in 1789 to Donald Trump in 2020.

But it was the records of the spy agencies - beginning with the OSS, which ran from 1942 until 1946, when the CIA was established – that were sealed and deemed the most interesting...and the most damning.

They had gathered dust during the years they’d been stored.  Moved only when more space was needed, relegating the records to a more distant spot in the expansive basement. 

But what, in fact, they hid were the criminal acts of elected officials, civilian appointees, the military and CIA: coups d’etat, murders, assassinations, training death squads, crimes against humanity, the aiding and abetting of the drug trade.

No one in the spy agencies, or those involved in the conspiracies, wanted those files to ever be accessed.  And so they got the civilian government to invoke the National Securities Act, leading those men to believe that under such a classification, they would remain off limits forever.  And if they ever did get reclassified, it would be a long enough period of time for the value and the importance to be so diminished, no one would even care about acts that had tortured the Constitution and strangled the Bill of Rights.

However those individuals vastly underestimated the interests of the people who wanted to know the real killers of their beloved president, John Fitzgerald Kennedy, and gain some form of justice and closure.

Now, under enormous public pressure, the U.S. Senate made the call to the records room: prepare the enumerated files for delivery to the Senate in thirty days time.

When, and if, that information surfaced, careers would be destroyed, people imprisoned, lives ruined beyond repair. 

CHAPTER THREE

Georgetown University.  School of Law.  2000 H St. NW, Washington, D.C.

It was autumn and the leaves would soon be turning from green to an artist’s pallet of colors.

An air of anticipation hovered over the campus.  It was the energy brought by new students chasing their dreams, as their predecessors had done starting one-hundred and fifty-five years before.

The offices in the stately old building housing the law professors overlooked the college grounds which encompassed forty-three acres.  There was also an undeveloped four acre ecological preserve, the University’s Botanical Garden, and a recreation center.

The office of Law Professor Patrick Henry was crammed with history books, framed pictures and memorabilia from different countries and different ages.

The old books gave off a sweet musky smell due to materials like cellulose from wood pulp reacting with light, heat and humidity.  As the books got older, the smell of vanillin increased, which enabled experts to date when the book was made.

The professor walked over to the bookshelf, momentarily forgot what he came for, then nodded to himself and slid out a volume on World War One.

Perusing the tome, time passed at a different rate.  History proceeded at a slower pace than that of modern man in his haste for immediate and irrefutable answers.

Patrick got what he needed out of the book, smiled, set it back on the shelf, then walked out of the office and shut the door behind him.

Lecture Hall.  Law Building.  Georgetown University.  

It was the first day of class.  Students filed in cautiously, as if treading on hallowed ground, intimidated by the history of the oldest law school in America and the great men who had long ago walked those halls.  The fear of demanding professors and challenging curriculum cautioned them, suppressing their hubris.

Written on the blackboard at the front of the room, it said, Conspiracies 101, rather than what they expected to see: American Constitutional Law.

The students chose their places carefully, some taking seats in the back where they were less likely to be called upon.  Others, more confident, took seats at the front of the amphitheater-style lecture hall.

Dress varied from those in suit and tie, seemingly prepared to argue a case in court, to others in worn jeans and old, familiar sweaters.

The students sat for, what seemed to them, an inordinate amount of time.  Some checked their watches, others glanced at the clock on the wall.

A buzz began to wind its way through the room, whispered conversations as to what to do if a professor didn’t show up.

Some were ready to leave, others deciding if they should choose one of their own to navigate through the initial course material.

But then the door at the front of the room opened and Professor Patrick Henry entered.

He was far from what they expected.  He looked to be in his early forties, but moved like a much younger man, like a stalking lion on the Serengeti plains.  A face with hard lines and sharp features, with aquiline nose, wide, thin lips, blue eyes and dusty brown, somewhat disheveled, hair on top, flowing over his collar in back.

Patrick was far too good-looking for a man who worked in close proximity to impressionable young women.

He was just under six feet tall with a trim body.  He eschewed suit and tie for neutral color cargo pants, form-fitting gray sweater and Dockers.

Patrick walked from one side of the stage to the other in order to make eye contact with as many of the students as possible. 

He had a charming smile, and when he spoke, one could discern some street smarts in his background.  It made whatever he said more interesting and authoritative, a man who had lived the principles of law, not just articulated them.

Yet there was an intensity about him, a man who had much to accomplish and running out of time to do so.

Some of the women in the class literally swooned watching the young professor.

Welcome to Conspiracies 101, ladies and gentlemen.

A student raised her hand.

She was young and pretty, too pretty to be in a cut-throat profession like law where the sharks ate the minnows for breakfast every day.

Yes, Miss...?

Rebecca, sir.  Rebecca Montgomery.

She smiled so sweetly that Patrick asked himself if she was really that nice, or if her posturing was just for him.

Her poorly hidden intent was noticed by others in the class, especially a young man whose glare gravitated between Rebecca and Professor Henry.

What is your question, Miss Montgomery?  You seem somewhat confused.

The syllabus said this course is the study of the American Constitution.

Or lack thereof, the professor sniped.

But conspiracies? Rebecca said, wanting clarity.

That is exactly what we shall be unraveling.

A young man, not waiting to be recognized, stood.

Mister...?

Norris, sir.   Kyle Norris.

"And your question is...?

How do we reconcile the two, professor?

The constitution has been chipped away, by men and institutions that have their own agendas which often conflict with those of the American people, for at least the past one-hundred years. What we have today is a document in name only.  The sole common threads over that period of time are the conspiracies that have been played out by small groups of men to further their own ambitions, create a new world in their own image and expand their business or power into every country which has something they want or need.  Professor Henry spoke quickly, a tough man to keep up with, a challenge for students used to a more scholarly pace.