The Parsifal Mosaic

by Robert Ludlum

  “Who’s the cowboy?”

  As if to punctuate his threat, the officer shoved Michael back into the wall. “Stay there,” he commanded, and left the room.

  Thirty seconds later the door was opened again, and President Charles Berquist walked in. In his hand were the thirteen carbons of Havelock’s indictment. The President stopped, and looked at Michael. He raised the yellow pages.

  “This is an extraordinary document, Mr. Havelock.”

  “It’s the truth.”

  “I believe you. I find a great part of it beneath contempt, of course, but then, I tell myself that a man with your record would not cavalierly cause the exposure and death of so many. That, basically, this is a threat—an irresistible threat—to make yourself heard.”

  “Then you’d be telling yourself another lie,” said Michael, motionless against the wall. “I was placed ‘beyond salvage.’ Why should I concern myself with anyone?”

  “Because you’re an intelligent man who knows there have to be explanations.”

  “Lies, you mean?”

  “Some are lies and they will remain lies for the good of this country.”

  Havelock paused, studying the hard Scandinavian face of the President, the steady eyes that were somehow a hunter’s eyes. “Matthias?”

  “Yes.”

  “How long do you think you can bury him here?”

  “For as long as we possibly can.”

  “He needs help.”

  “So do we. He had to be stopped.”

  “What have you done to him?”

  “I was only part of it, Havelock. So were you. We all were. We made him an emperor when there were no personal empires to be allocated by divine right, much less ours. We made him a god when we didn’t own the heavens. There’s only so much the mind can absorb and act upon when elevated to such heights in these very complicated times. He was forced to exist in the perpetual illusion of being unique, above all other men. We asked too much. He went mad. His mind—that extraordinary instrument—snapped, and when it could no longer control itself, it sought control elsewhere. To compensate, perhaps, to convince himself that he was what we said he was, although a part of him told him he wasn’t. Not any longer.”

  “What do you mean ‘sought control elsewhere’? How could he do that?”

  “By committing this nation to a series of obligations that were, to say the least, unacceptable. Try to understand, he had feet of quicksilver, not of clay, like you and me. Yes, even me, the President of the United States, some say the most powerful man in the world. It’s not true. I’m bound by the body politic, subject to the goddamn polls, guided by the so-called principles of a political ideology, with my head on a congressional chopping block. Checks and balances, Mr. Havelock. But not him. We made him a superstar; he was bound to nothing, accountable to no one. His word was law, all other judgments were subordinate to his brilliance. And then there was his charm, I might add.”

  “Generalities,” said Michael. “Abstractions.”

  “Lies?” asked Berquist.

  “I don’t know. What are the specifics?”

  “I’m going to show you. And if after what you’ve seen, you still feel compelled to carry out your threat, let it be on your head, not mine.”

  “I don’t have a head. I’m ‘beyond salvage.’ ”

  “I told you, I’ve read these pages. All of them. The order’s been rescinded. You have the word of the President of the United States.”

  “Why should I accept it?”

  “If I were you, I probably wouldn’t. I’m simply telling you. There are many lies and there will continue to be lies, but that’s not one of them.… I’ll have the handcuffs removed.”

  The scene in the large, dark, windowless room was an unearthly depiction of a science-fiction nightmare. There were a dozen television screens mounted in a row on the wall, monitors that recorded and taped the activities seen by the various cameras. Below the screens was an enormous console manned by four technicians; several white-jacketed doctors entered, watching a scene or scanning tapes, writing notes, leaving quickly or conferring with colleagues. And the object of the whole sophisticated operation was to record and analyze every movement made and every word spoken by Anthony Matthias.

  His face and body were projected on seven screens at once, and under each monitor was a green digital readout showing the exact hour and minute of the filming; the screen on the far left was marked Current. The day was an illusion for Matthias, starting with morning coffee in the garden identical with his own in Georgetown.

  “Before he wakes, he’s given two injections,” said the President, sitting next to Havelock at a second, smaller console at the rear wall. “One’s a muscle relaxant that reduces physical and mental tensions; the other, a stimulant that accelerates the heart, pumping blood, without interfering with the first narcotic. Don’t ask me the medical terms, I don’t know them; I just know it works. He’s free to associate with a degree of simulated confidence—in a way, a replica of his former self.”

  “Then his day begins? His … simulated day?”

  “Exactly. Read the monitors from right to left. His day starts with breakfast in the garden. He’s brought intelligence reports and newspapers corresponding to the dates of whatever issue is being probed. Then in the next screen you see him walking out of his ‘home’ and down his steps with an aide who’s talking to him, refining the options of the problem, building up the case, whatever it is. Everything, by the way, is taken from his logs; that remains constant throughout ‘the day.’ ” Berquist paused, and gestured at the third monitor from the right. “There you see him in his limousine, the aide still talking, bringing his focus back. He’s driven around for a while, then gradually brought in sight of places that are familiar to him, the Jefferson Memorial, the monument, certain streets, past the South Portico—the sequence is irrelevant.”

  “But they’re not whole,” insisted Michael. “They’re fragments!”

  “He doesn’t see that; he sees only the impressions. But even if he did see that they are fragments, as you call them, or miniatures of the existing places, the doctors tell me his mind would reject that and accept the reality of the impressions. Just as he refused to accept his own deterioration, and kept pressing for wider and wider responsibilities, until he simply reached out and took them.… Watch the fourth screen. He’s getting out at the State Department, going inside, and telling his aide something; it will be studied. In the fifth, you can see him walking into his office—the same in every respect as his own on the eighth floor—and immediately scanning the cables and reading the day’s appointments, again identical with those that were there at the time. The sixth shows him taking a series of phone calls, the same calls he had taken before. Often his responses are meaningless, a part of him rejecting a voice, or a lack of authentic repartee, but other times what we learn is mind-blowing.… He’s been here nearly six weeks, and there are times when we think we’ve only scratched the surface. We’re only beginning to learn the extent of his massive excesses.”

  “You mean the things he’s done?” asked Havelock, recoiling from the frightening turn of events.

  Berquist looked at Michael in the glow of the console and the flickering light emanating from the screens across the room. “Yes, Mr. Havelock, the—‘things’—he’s done. If ever a man in the history of representative government exceeded the authority of his office, Anthony Matthias is that man. There were no limits to what he promised—what he guaranteed— in the name of the United States government. Take today. A policy was set and in the process of being implemented, but it did not suit the Secretary of State at this particular moment of irrationality, so he altered it … Watch the seventh screen, the one marked Current. Listen. He’s at his desk, and in his mind he’s back about five months, when a bipartisan decision had been made to close an embassy in a new African country slaughtering its citizens with mass hangings and death squads, revolting the civilized world. The aide is explaining.�
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  Mr. Secretary, the President and the Joint Chiefs, as well as the Senate, have gone on record as opposing any further contact at this time …

  Then we won’t tell them, will we? Antediluvian reactions cannot be a keystone of a coherent foreign policy. I shall make contact myself and present a cohesive and judicious plan. Arms and well-sweetened butter are international lubricants, and we shall provide them.

  Michael was stunned. “He said that? He did that?”

  “He’s reliving it now” replied Berquist. “In a few minutes he’ll place a call to the mission in Geneva, and another unbelievable commitment will be made.… This, however, is only a minor example, one they’re working on this morning. Actually, as outrageous as it is, it’s insignificant compared with so many others. So many—so dangerous—so incredible.”

  “Dangerous?”

  “One voice overriding all others, entering unthinkable negotiations, processing agreements contrary to everything this nation supposedly stands for—agreements that would make an outraged Congress impeach me for even considering. But even that fact—and it is a fact—is insignificant. We can’t let the world know what he’s done. We’d be humiliated, a giant on its knees, begging forgiveness, and if it was not forthcoming there would be guns and bombs. You see, he’s put it all in writing.”

  “Could he do that?”

  “Not constitutionally, no. But he was the superstar. The uncrowned king of the republic had spoken, a god had given his word. Who questions kings or gods? The mere existence of such documents is the most fertile grounds on earth for international extortion. If we can’t quietly invalidate those negotiations—diplomatically void them by anticipated congressional rejection—they will be exposed. If they are, every treaty, every agreement we’ve concluded during the past decade—all the sensitive alliances we’re currently negotiating everywhere in the world—will be called into question. This country’s foreign policy will collapse; we’d never be trusted again. And when a nation such as ours has no foreign policy, Mr. Havelock, it has war.”

  Michael leaned over the console, staring at the Current screen, and brought his hand to his forehead; he felt the beads of perspiration. “He’s gone this far?”

  “Beyond. Remember, he’s been Secretary of State for nearly six years, and before he took office his influence was significant, perhaps too much so, in the two previous administrations. He was nothing short of an ambassador-plenipotentiary for both, roaming the globe, cementing his power bases.”

  “But they were for good, not this!”

  “They were, and no one knew it better than I did. I’m the one who convinced him that he should chuck the consulting business and take over. I said the world needed his imprimatur, the time was right. You see, I appealed to his ego; all great men have outrageous egos. De Gaulle was right: the man of destiny knows it before anybody else. What he doesn’t know is the limit of his capabilities. God knows Matthias didn’t.”

  “You said it a few minutes ago, Mr. President. We made him a god. We asked too much of him.” Havelock shook his head slowly, overwhelmed.

  “Just hold it there,” answered Berquist, his voice cold, his eyes penetrating in the incandescent reflections of light. “I said it by way of an oversimplified explanation. No one makes a man a god unless that man wants to be one. And, Christ-on-a-raft, Matthias has been looking for that divine appointment all his life! He’s been tasting the holy water for years—in his mind, bathing in it.… You know what someone called him the other day? A hustling Socrates on the Potomac, and that’s exactly what he was. A hustler, Mr. Havelock. A grade-A, high-IQ, brilliant opportunist. A man with extraordinarily persuasive words, capable of first-rate global diplomacy—the best we could field—as long as he was the eye of the worldwide hurricane. He could be magnificent and, as I also said, no one knew it better than I did and I used him. But for all of that, he was a hustler. He never stopped pushing the omniscient Anthony Matthias.”

  “And knowing this,” said Michael, refusing to permit Berquist’s stare to cower him, “you still used him. You pushed him as much as he pushed himself. You appealed to a ‘man of destiny,’ wasn’t that it?”

  The President lowered his eyes to the dials on the console. “Yes,” he said softly. “Until he blew apart. Because I was watching a performance, not the man, and I was blinded. I didn’t see what was really happening.”

  “Jesus!” exclaimed Havelock, his whisper a cry. “If’s all so hard to believe!”

  “On that assumption,” interrupted Berquist, regaining his composure, “I’ve had several tapes prepared for you. They’re reenactments of actual conversations that took place during his final months in office. The psychiatrists tell me they’re valid, and the papers we’ve unearthed bear them out. Put on the earphones and “I’ll press the appropriate buttons.… The images will appear on the last monitor on the right.”

  What took place on that screen during the next twelve minutes was a portrait of a man Havelock did not know. The tapes showed Matthias at emotional extremes as he was psychologically stimulated by the combined effects of the chemicals and the visual trappings, and prodded by aides using his own words. He was screaming one moment, weeping the next, cajoling a diplomat over the phone with charm and flat-tery—and brilliant humility—then condemning the man as a fool and a moron once the conversation was finished. Above all were the lies, where once there bad been essential truth. The telephone was his instrument; his resonant voice with its European cadence, the organ.

  “This first,” said Berquist, angrily stabbing a button, “is his response to me when I had just told him I wanted a reassessment of foreign aid in San Miguel.”

  Your policy is firm, Mr. President, a clear call for decency and human rights. I applaud you, sir. Goodbye.… Idiot! Imbecile! One does not have to endorse a brother, one must merely accept geopolitical realities! Get me General Sandoza on the line. Set up a very private appointment with his ambassador. The colonels will understand we back them!

  “This little number followed a joint House and Senate resolution, which I thoroughly endorsed, to withhold diplomatic recognition …”

  You understand, Mr. Prime Minister, that our existing accords in your part of the world prohibit what you suggest, but you should know that I am in agreement with you. I’m meeting with the President … no, no, I assure you he will have an open mind … and I have already convinced the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. A treaty between our two countries is desirable progress, and should it be in contradistinction to prior agreements … well, enlightened self-interest was the essence of Bismarck’s reign.

  “I can’t believe this,” said Havelock, mesmerized.

  “Neither did I, but it’s true.” The President pushed a third button. “We’re now in the Persian Gulf …”

  You are, of course, speaking unofficially, not as your country’s Minister of Finance but as a friend, and what you are seeking are additional guarantees of eight hundred and fifty million for your current fiscal year, and one billion two hundred million for the next.… Contrary to what you may believe, my good friend, they are entirely plausible figures. I say this confidentially, but our territorial strategies are not what they appear. I shall prepare, again on a confidential basis, a memorandum of intent.

  “Now we’re in the Balkans, a Soviet satellite, loyal to Moscow, and at our throats.… Insanity!”

  Mr. Premier, the restrictions on arms sales to your nation, if they cannot be lifted outright, will be overlooked. I find specific and considerable advantages in our cooperating with you. “Equipment” can and will be funneled through certain North African regimes considered to be in our adversary’s camp but with whom I’ve met—shall we say ex-et non-offi-cio-recently and frequently. Confidentially, a new geopolitical axis is being formed …

  “Being formed!” exploded Berquist. “Suicide! Here’s a coup in the Yemens. Instability on course, wholesale blood-shed guaranteed!”

  The emerging of a gre
at new independent nation, Sirach Bal Shazar, though slow to gain the recognition you deserve, will have the quiet support of this administration. We recognize the necessity of dealing firmly and realistically with internal subversion. You may be assured that the funds you ask for will be allocated. Three hundred million once transferred will indicate to the legislative branch of our govern-ment the faith we place in you.

  “Finally,” said the President, touching a last button, his whisper strained, his lined face looking exhausted, “the new madman of Africa.”

  To speak frankly and in the utmost confidence, Major General Halafi, we approve of your proposed incursion north into the Straits. Our so-called allies there have been weak and ineffectual, but, naturally, our disassociation must, because of the current treaties, be gradual. The educating process is always difficult, the reeducating of the entrenched unfortunately a maddening chess game, fortunately played by those of us who understand. You shall have your weapons. Salaam, my warrior friend.

  What Michael had watched and listened to was paralyzing. Alliances not in the interests of the United States had been tacitly formed or half formed, and treaties proposed or negotiated that were in violation of existing treaties; guarantees of billions had been made that Congress would never tolerate and the American taxpayer would never accept; mili-tary obligations had been assumed that were immoral in concept, crossing the bounds of national honor, and irrationally provocative. It was a portrait of a brilliant mind that had fragmented itself in a profusion of global commitments, each a lethal missile.

  Michael slowly recovered from his state of shock. Suddenly the gap came into focus; it had to be filled, explained. Havelock took off the earphones and turned to the President. “Costa Brava,” he whispered harshly. “Why? Why ‘beyond salvage’?”