About Face (short story)
Written by Josh Samuels
Based on an original idea & sponsored by Drew McGhie
The architecture of the human face is an artistic triumph of nature. The canvas is small, but the palette of expression, of texture, crevice, and line, is endlessly varied. These thoughts crossed the old man’s mind as he watched a swarm of school children flow past him. It was morning Wednesday at the International Spy Museum; peak time for school groups, young families, and, like him, old men on vacation keen to avoid the weekend crowd. He put in his hearing aids and mounted wire frame glasses on the bridge of his nose as he entered the building.
Decades had passed since he’d been in this part of the world. Like everywhere, it had gone through enormous change since 1989 but still retained an essential character that wafted up between cracks in the pavement. The structure that housed the museum was an concrete box, formerly monument to progress, now gutted, and refitted with a modern facade, to showcase the world of clandestine service. At least what the government allowed you to see. New things merely reflected the changes that society was going through, he thought as he looked around at the CCTV cameras in the lobby.
It was strange to think the espionage service he worked for would have killed to get their hands on the items now openly on display for field trips, pregnant mothers, and tourists. It used to be considered a major failure if the public were aware they’d come into contact with the tools of spycraft. Now it was considered a major tourist attraction. Cameras in fountain pens, code breaking machines, and pistols disguised as lipstick all on display for consumer coin.
But money couldn’t buy what this old spy was hunting. He had heard it was here. Something he hadn’t seen in 30 years. Something beyond the currency that any government in the world could fix a value on: a living tribute to his greatest professional failure. Declan Mantel had never returned from what should have been a routine live drop, a covert handoff orchestrated in plain sight, and the old man had blamed himself and his work. Mantel’s disappearance had become like the character of the murdered King’s Ghost in Hamlet, a haunting presence throughout his career motivating him to find answers.
The Asian fellow behind him gave encouraging cough to motivate the old man to keep the line moving. He was obviously in more of a hurry. The old man took his ticket and credit card back from the young female clerk whose yellow lanyard read ‘Anya’.
The muscles around his lips tightened. What appeared as a slight smile to the young female clerk was privately a grimace to himself. Perhaps this was a bad idea. Going into the spy museum in the country of a former enemy power wasn’t the brightest idea. Under a UN agreement former members of any clandestine agencies are forbidden to enter countries they had operated in. His presence alone was an international felony and buying a ticket to the spy museum an additional international misdemeanor. He hesitated before going in. Then strode through into the museum. He looked up into the CCTV cameras as he entered.
As the old man wandered the black painted walls he it struck him how strange it was to see now on display all the tools of spycraft that he had worked with for years. All the items were outmoded and set off a geyser of nostalgia within him. It was discovering a box of full of LEGO, View-Master reels, or Fisher Price barnyard set in the attic but being unable to touch it.
He pushed the feeling aside and carried on into the Cold War section. It was here. The museum map was conveniently in several languages, and he moved steadily into an area translated as ‘Spies In Our Midst.’ Here was testaments to black bag blunders, blown covers, and botched operations. Times when the contingency plan needed a contingency. Artifacts of exposure. And here among the relics of failure he found it. The mask he made for Declan Mantel that had been discarded when the operation was aborted.
He sat down on a bench directly in front of the display case. He had heard the mask had been picked up by the rival agency. Now here it was in a spotlight, center stage, the crown of Prince Hamlet’s father now worn by another man. A testament to his failure as a costume maker to suspend the disbelief of his target audience, the enemy surveillance unit.
The last time he’d seen the disguise was when he fit it to Mantel’s visage. He and his partner had worked on it tirelessly and considered it to be their best work to date. If it couldn’t fool the surveillance, nothing could. He had wanted to adjust the hairline, but Declan had stopped him. “I’ll be fine,” he said. Arrogant words from an overly self-assured agent, but the words hung heavy as the old master of disguise looked on.
“I told you I’d be fine, Paul.”
The voice was like a lit cigar through birthday balloon.
“Paul Capelli, as I live and breathe,” Mantel said as he rested gracefully next to the old man. Declan was smiling as he unscrewed a thermos top and poured coffee into it. Food and drink weren’t allowed in the museum, but the old man noticed the yellow lanyard around Mantel’s neck signalling that he worked there.
It was unmistakably Declan Mantel. The years had done their work on him but the face was Declan’s without question. He never forgot face, real or fake.
The old man suppressed his natural instinct to look behind him. The roots of his training gripped deep soil. If you ever suspect that you’ve been made or your cover is blown, never look around. The quickest way to confirm the suspicions of a surveillance team were furtive glances. Both men sat. Stared forward at the mask. Neither looked around.
“Chief of Disguise for the-”
“-How!” the old man interrupted. “How-”
“Our facial recognition software picked you up immediately. It’s state of the art, comes from the Germans.” Mantel said with a smile. “Plus you paid with a credit card Paul. Schoolboy error.” Declan tapped his temple.
“No. How, are you-”
“Alive? Been that way for a long time. In fact ever since you last saw me.” Declan smirked, but his glee wasn’t contagious. “Ugh, yes. I am alive. And so are you. And, yes, it’s nice to see you too; you’re looking…” Declan eyed the glasses, hearing aids, and what he thought were dentures, “…good too…?”
The blood ran cold in the old man’s veins, it slowed to the pace on a minute hand.
“Come to see it?” Declan asked, indicating towards the mask.
“What are you doing here?”
“I work here. Well, did work here. Today’s my last day. I am- was- the department’s liaison to the museum. The job’s a partly ceremonial. But hey, you gotta stay busy. You know a lot of us old spooks don’t last long after retirement. Eighteen months to two years is what I hear. But, you know, it’s hard to et official figures.” Declan sipped at his coffee. “Hey how’s your old partner, um, Ted. Ted Kakusu?”
“Dead.”
“Sorry to hear that. I liked Ted. He designed that tie pin there for me.” Mantel’s finger searched the glass display for the silver accessory with a tiny microphone embedded in it. “Oh wait, no, they moved it. I’m not sure where though.” he said absentmindedly sipping at his black beverage. “Hey maybe I should ask someone who works here-”
“-Cut it Dec. You defected, right? The mission abort was a smoke screen. You ditched the mask in front of Jackson so he could see you, but couldn’t pick it up. Then what? A waiting van? A handler to spirit you away.”
“Damn you’re good Paul.” Mantel said with mock admiration. Then in a hushed tone, “You figured it out.”
“Figured out that you’re a traitor.”
“Oh don’t give me that sickle and hammer, stars and stripes B.S. It wasn’t about that.”
“What then?” the former chief of disguise asked.
“You of all people should know. You were the best at what you did. Your masks were works of art. They belonged in a museum.”
“They are.”
“My point exactly. You completely fooled everyone with your work. And so did I. Where was there for me to go? Put me out to pasture behind a desk? I’m a field agent,” Declan said.
“So, what? You defected because you were bored?”
Mantel’s lack of humility hadn’t been dulled by time. The sharp edges may have been sanded off his face but his arrogance was still pointed.
“I expected more from you Capelli. Kakusu, he saw everything in black and white…” Mantel sipped at his coffee with irritation. “It wasn’t about queen and country, it was about the lion, the witch and the wardrobe. When you get a taste of fieldwork it’s tough to come back to the boring side of the cupboard. At least by going over to the other side there were fresh challenges.”
“Everyone thought you were dead. I blamed myself, I blamed the mask for getting you made.” The old man hadn’t expected to get this angry today. “We heard rumors you were alive-”
“-I spread those.” Declan admitted.
This genuinely surprised the old man.
“Yeah, all those unconfirmed sightings by unreliable sources. I planted all of ’em. If there’s one thing you can count on in this trade, a real spook doesn’t believe in ghost stories.”
“So it’s just some game? What about all the agents who died because of you.”
Mantel pouted in the old man’s direction.
“What about your wife?” the old man said.
“She wanted a divorce anyway. I can’t imagine why…”
“And your kids.”
“That I do feel bad about.” Mantel was contemplative. For the first time since he sat down he didn’t have a glib response. “I had a few more. But…yeah…” Declan shrugged and looked towards Paul Capelli as if to say what are you gonna do?
The two old men sat in silence for a minute as a group of school children came through the exhibit. They were loud, pointing at things as children do. Half invested in what was on offer and half in their own private kid world of status, emotion, and relationships..
Both men sat staring at each other, studying the contours of each other’s faces as the children swarmed around them.
The teacher called out and the crowd passed on. Only one other guy remained in the area. It was the coughing gentleman from the museum entrance.
“You know that mask is why I quit working in disguise.”
“Why? You were the best.”
“That’s why I had to come here today. Because I needed to see my greatest failure first hand. But that’s what pushed me to work harder to figure out why it didn’t work. You could never admit failure. Things just came too easy for you,” the old man said.
“You think I had it easy. Having to adjust to a new world, a new life? You don’t know what the hell you’re talking about. I was the best and I stayed the best. I ran circles round you people and you never knew.”
“And it must have burned you up, not being able to rub our silly little noses in it. Having to keep that secret all these years.”
“Don’t be a sore loser,” Declan chastised.
“You’re right, I was a loser. I lost you. But I figured out the most vulnerable part of the system. The human component. That’s the frailty. It’s why I got into software. I knew that if I could misdirect the detection systems before it even began then we had a much better chance at fooling the human wiring. Get the system to drop it’s guard and then the mask can really do it’s work. But it was only by failing that I could grow past my narrow perspective on what it meant to have a disguise.”
“This is a really great story, but I’ve got some work to finish up,” Declan downed the last of his coffee and screwed the top back on the thermos.
“For whatever it’s worth. I’m sorry I got you killed.”
“Don’t be too hard on yourself Paul.” Mantel said dismissively, getting ready to leave.
“I don’t.” A voice said from behind him. It pierced Declan Mantel’s thoughts like a lit cigar through birthday balloon. It was unmistakably the voice of Paul Capelli. Even though Capelli sat before him.
Ted Kakusu sat down on the other side of Declan.
“I get it you’re not actually dead. Got me. Good one guys,” Declan laughed, but the glee was absent from his snicker. It dawned on him what was happening: they were wearing masks of each other. Declan suppressed his desire to look around.
“Like ‘I’ was saying, I had to get into software to short circuit the system before it began,” the real Paul Capelli said from beneath his Ted mask. He too was wearing glasses and hearing aids.
“We finally are able to disrupt facial recognition software.” Ted said from beneath the Paul mask. Declan looked at the hearing aid and the glasses.
Paul coughed into his hand, “And voice imitation,” he said switching into Ted’s voice. The dentures, thought Declan, and the cough was the toggle. Mantel’s mind became foggy with rage.
“Lies. You’d never reveal this. Unless-” The blood ran cold in Declan’s veins, it slowed to the pace of an hour hand.
“-Call it a professional courtesy,” said Paul. “You helped us. We’re just returning the favor.”
“It’s been great catching up gang, let’s do it again in another 30 years.” Mantel stood up but was unsteady on his feet. The two agents guided their old colleague gently back down to the stone bench. He looked to the coffee, Paul, or Ted, or whoever was whom, must have slipped something in it when he wasn’t looking. The noisy children swarming around them were the cover.
Drinking from something you’ve lost sight of…schoolboy error.
Roy tapped his temple.
Ted’s voice cut through Mantel’s muddled thoughts: “When we figured out you were alive we knew we had to test the prototype of facial blocking tech on you. If it could lull you of all people into a false sense of security, through disrupting your facial recognition software, then the masks could do their job more easily .
“Disguise the disguise,” Paul said.
“Plus you wouldn’t be looking for any inconsistencies in the voice imitator.”
“Not that there were any.”
“You’re too kind.” Ted smiled.
Declan tried to free his arms from his old colleagues’ grasp. All he succeeded in doing was knocking his thermos to the floor.
But the sound of metal on granite couldn’t be heard over the sounds of electronic whooping and children yelling echoed through the stone structure. Someone set off fire the alarm.
“That’s our cue.” said one old masters of disguise. Declan couldn’t make out whom. His vision was blurring. Sound and vision, merged as his senses became lost behind a deep fog of prickeld skin, sweat and nausea. The blood ran colder in Declan’s veins, it slowed beyond the pace of an hour hand, then stopped completely.
Paul and Ted strode back to the entrance of the museum. They pulled their masks off and tossed them into garbage cans. If found they’d make great additions to the permanent collection.
They kept their glasses and hearing aids scrambling the signals of the CCTV cameras as they left.
Later that day a young police constable and homicide detective looked over the dead body found at the Spy Museum. The young constable held a file as the detective looked over the shoulders of a forensics officer doing a once over on the body.
“So is he an employee or not?” the detective asked.
“Sort of,” the constable answered. “This was his last day.”
“Some retirement party.” The detective paced around. He really wanted a cigarette. He missed the good old days of smoking indoors.
“It says he was the ‘Authenticity Liaison’?” The young constable flipped pages in dossier.
“That means he used to work for one of the security services. They try to put these guys out to pasture in gimmicky roles once they leave the service. Most of these types drop dead after they retire. My cousin’s dad worked in the government, he said these guys rarely make it 18 months. Heart attack, embolism, stroke; pick your poison.”
“Don’t you think it’s a little bit odd that he died during a fire alarm. I mean he was a spy.”
“And what? Someone planned an elaborate ruse to settle a score with some old spook for a transgression he committed years ago?”
“Maybe?” said the young Constable.
“I say we take this on face value.”
© Josh Samuels & Drew McGhie
