Chapter 23 - The Essentials

“I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.”

Henry David Thoreau

January 26

 I’m sitting on top of a mesa to the north of Baranca Mesa where Len’s house is. I can see his house through the binoculars from here. It’s 11:00 o’clock on a warm bright clear morning. I walked here from Len’s house by the trails that he hiked as a child.

 I have been tracking Len’s life for 30 years. His was the very first case I was assigned in the nuclear arena. I was asked at that time to determine whether his father, Thomas Mahoney a nuclear engineer, had been passing on highly classified nuclear information to his son. The original seed of doubt came from a science fair project for which Len had won national recognition during his Senior year in High School. Len had created a computer model in 1970 using FORTRAN and finite element analysis to simulate a controlled nuclear explosion in the center of a hurricane. The computer simulation was the first simulation to incorporate a yet unknown field called fuzzy logic and neural networks. Most importantly, Len described a containment system for the explosion that directed discrete amounts of energy from the nuclear blast into specific directions. His system was an almost exact description of a highly secret nuclear weapons containment system being fabricated by the United States Military. It was the CIA’s belief that his father must have given him the information.

 It turned out that his father hadn’t passed on any information. Len had conceived of the ideas on his own. Incredibly, he had also developed the math and computer language derivatives necessary to successfully finish his project.

 It is a practice of the CIA to assign any person that has come under scrutiny to an agent and have that individual tracked throughout their lifetime. It was my involvement with Len and his chosen field of Nuclear Physics that propelled me into being in charge of all nuclear terrorist activity for the CIA.

 In all these years, the two most salient features of Len’s personality profile that have struck me are his extreme genius and his pursuit of kindness. He is a gentle, well meaning individual. I came to Los Alamos because Len is the absolute last name on the list of individuals and groups who have potential for building nuclear weapons. My initial inquiries into Len’s activities in the two weeks since the explosion forced me to drop all other activities and fly here. Len has been missing with his best friend Jack Cransten since the day of the explosion. Upon arriving in Los Alamos early this morning I immediately went to his home address. No one was there. I called his wife at her father’s house. She met me at her house in Los Alamos an hour later. Maria Mahoney looked like the world had fallen in on her. I introduced myself and told her that because of her husband’s high profile in nuclear physics we were worried about the possibility of him having been kidnapped. I could tell that she was normally a very beautiful women. The news I delivered made her already worn appearance deepen as she slumped further into her chair.

 She said, “Madre de Dios, my world is falling apart. What can I do to help you find my husband, Mr. Felenstein?”

 I told her that it would help to understand and know her husband as well as possible. If she had anything like diaries or journals that he kept it would be very helpful.

 Maria went out of the room for a couple of minutes and came back with twelve 9 by 12 black bound books.”

 “These are my husband’s journals. He has been keeping a journal in one form or another since he was 8 years old. I hope I’m doing the right thing by giving these to you. I am afraid for him, Mr. Felenstein. Please find him.”

 “I’ll try Mrs. Mahoney. I’ve go to go now.”

 That was our whole conversation. From there I went to the Labs and obtained any notebooks and engineering books he had been working on. The Lab had put out an internal bulletin on Leonard but had tried to avoid any interference by outside investigation resources. They were apologetic but begged me to understand the sensitive nature of his absence.

 I took the books back to my hotel room and began to read through his journals. The first chapter spoke of this mesa where I’m now sitting. I’ve always believed that the best way to understand what is going on in someone’s life is to think as much like the person as you possibly can. That’s why I’ve carried the twelve journals in a backpack up here on this snow covered mesa. I want to know who Leonard Mahoney was and is.