Robert Ludlum - Aquatain Progression.txt

by The Aquitaine Progression [lit]

  Everywhere, whatever our commitments, we cringed!

  He brought dishonoron the most honorable

  profession in this world. Let me tell you, monsieur,

  it is not I who will be out, it is he!"

  "Abrahms said you were a sexual

  embarrassment," con .inued Converse, as though

  Bertholdier's response was irrelevant. "That was the

  phrase he used, 'a sexual embarrassment. He

  mentioned the fact that there was a record one he

  obtained, in fact that spelled out a string of rapes,

  female and male, that were covered up by the

  French Army because you were damned good at

  what you did. But then he asked the question. Could

  a bisexual opportunist, one who ravaged women at

  will and who sodomised young men and boys, who

  corrupted the word 'interrogations' as well as whole

  sections of the officer corps, be truly considered the

  French leader of code-name Aquitaine. He also said

  you wanted too many controls cantered in your own

  government. But by the time there were such

  controls, you'd be gone."

  "Gone?" cried the Frenchman, his eyes once more

  on fire as they had been weeks ago in Paris, his

  whole body trembling with rage. "Convicted by a

  barbarian, a smelly, uneducated Jew?"

  "Van Headmer didn't go that far. He said you

  were simply too vulnerable "

  "Forget Van Headmer!" roared Bertholdier. "He's

  a fossil! He was courted solely on the basis that he

  might deliver raw materials. He's of no

  consequence."

  "I didn't think he was," agreed Joel truthfully.

  654 ROBERT LUDLUM

  'But the strutting, foul-mouthed Israeli thinks

  he can move against me? Let me tell you, I have

  been threatened before by a great man and

  nothing ever came of those threats because, as you

  put it, I was 'damned good' at what I did. I still am!

  And there is another record, one of outstanding and

  brilliant service, that dwarfs any compilation of

  filthy rumors and barracks gossip. My record is

  unmatched by any in code-name Aquitaine, and that

  includes the legless egomaniac in San Francisco. He

  believes it was all his idea! Preposterous! I refined it!

  He merely gave it a name based on a far-fetched

  reading of history."

  "He also got the ball started by exporting one

  hell of a lot of hardware," interrupted Converse.

  ' Because it was there! And there were profits to

  be made!" The general paused, leaning forward in

  the chair. "I will be frank with you. As with any elite

  corps of leadership, one man rises above the others

  by the sheer strength of his character and his mind.

  Beside me the others all others pale into

  mediocrity. Delavane is a deformed, hysterical

  caricature. Leifhelm is a Nazi, and Abrahms is a

  bombastic polarizer; alone he could set off waves of

  anti-Semitism, the worst sort of symbol of

  leadership. When the tribunals rise out of the

  confusion and the panic, they will look to me. I

  shall be the true leader of code-name Aquitaine."

  Joel got out of the chair and walked back to the

  window, staring out at the mountain fields, feeling

  the soft breezes on his face. "This examination is

  finished, General," he said.

  As if on cue the door opened, and a former

  sergeant major in the French Army based in Algiers

  stood there waiting to escort the bewildered legend

  of France out of the room.

  Chaim Abrahms sprang out of the brocaded

  chair, his barrel chest straining the seams of his

  black safari jacket. "He said those things about me?

  About himself?"

  "I told you before we got into any of this to use

  the phone," said Converse, sitting across from the

  Israeli, a pistol on a table beside his chair. "Don't

  take my word for it. I've heard it said you've got

  good gut instincts. Call Bertholdier. You don t have

  to say where you are as a matter of fact, I'd put a

  bullet in your head if you tried. Just tell him one of

  Leifhelm's guards, a man you bought to keep his

  eyes open for you because of a certain innate

  mistrust you have of Germans, told you that he,

  Bertholdier, came to see me alone on two

  THE AQUITAINE PROGRESSION 655

  separate occasions. Since I haven't been found, you

  want to know why. It'll work. You'll hear enough to

  know whether I'm telling you the truth or not."

  Abrahms stared down at Joel. 'But why do you

  tell me this truth? If it is the truth. Why do you

  abduct me to tell me these things. Why?"

  "I thought I made that clear. My money's running

  out, and although I'm not wild about lox or kreplach,

  I'd be better off living in Israel under a protective

  cover than being hunted and ultimately killed

  running around Europe. You can do that for me, but

  I know I've got to deliver something to you first. I'm

  delivering it now. Bertholdier intends to take over

  what he calls code-name Aquitaine. He said you're

  a foul-mouthed Jew, a destructive symbol, you'll

  have to go. He said the same about Leifhelm; the

  specter of a Nazi couldn't be tolerated and Van

  Headmer was a 'fossil' that was the word, 'fossil.''

  "I can hear him," said Abrahms softly, his hands

  clasped behind his back, pacing toward the window.

  "Are you sure our military boulevardier with the

  cock of steel did not say 'smelly Jew'? I've heard our

  French hero use such words always, of course,

  apologising to me, saying I was exempt."

  "He used them."

  "But why? Why would he say such things to you?

  I don't deny his logic, for Christ's sake. Leifhelm will

  be shot once controls are established. A l~lazi

  running the goddamned German government?

  Absurd! Even Delavane understands this, he will be

  eliminated. And poor old Van Headmer is a relic we

  all know that. Still, there is gold in South Africa. He

  could deliver it. But why you? Why would

  Bertholdier come to you?"

  "Ask him yourself. There's the phone. Use it."

  The Israeli stood motionless, his narrow eyes

  encased in swells of flesh riveted on Converse. ' 1

  will," he said quietly emphatically. "You are far too

  clever, Mr. Lawyer. The fire inside you remains in

  your head it has not reached your stomach. You

  think too much. You say you were manipulated? I

  say you manipulate." Abrahms turned and strode like

  a bulky Coriolanus to the phone. He stood for a

  moment squinting, remembering, then picked up the

  phone and dialed the series of numbers long ago

  committed to memory.

  Joel remained in the chair, every muscle in his

  body taut, his throat suddenly dry. Slowly he inched

  his hand over the

  656 ROBERT LUDLUM

  arm of the chair nearer the pistol. In seconds he

  might have to use it, his strategy his only

  strategy blown apart by a phone call he had n
ever

  thought would be made. What was wrong with him?

  Where were his vaunted examining tactics taking him?

  Had he forgotten whom he was dealing with?

  "Code Isaiah, ' said Abrahms into the phone, his

  angry eyes again staring across the room at

  Converse. "Patch me through to Verdun-sur-Meuse.

  (prickly!" The Israeli's massive chest heaved with

  every breath, but it was the only part of his stocky

  frame that moved. He spoke again, furiously. "Yes,

  code Isaiah! I have no time to waste! Reach Ver-

  dun-sur-Meuse! Now!" Abrahms eyes grew wide as

  he listened. He looked briefly away from Converse,

  then snapped his head back toward him, his eyes

  filled with loathing. "Repeat that!" he shouted. And

  then he slammed the telephone down with such

  force the desk shook. "Liar!" he screamed.

  "You mean me?" asked Joel, his hand inches

  from the gun.

  "They say he disappeared! They cannot find him!"

  "And?" Converse's throat was now a vacuum. He

  had lost.

  "He lies! The cock of steel is no more than a

  whining coward! He's hiding he avoids me! He will

  not face me!"

  Joel swallowed repeatedly as he moved his hand

  away from the weapon. "Force the issue," he said,

  somehow managing to keep the tremor out of his

  voice. "Trace him down. Call LeifLelm, Van

  Headmer. Say it's imperative you reach

  Bertholdier."

  "Stop it! And let him know I know? He had to

  give you a reason! Why did he come to see you in

  the first place?"

  ' I wanted to wait until you'd spoken to him,"

  said Converse, crossing his legs and picking up a

  pack of cigarettes next to the pistol. "He might have

  told you himself then again, he might not. He has

  this idea that I was sent out by Delavane to test all

  of you. To see who might betray him. '

  "Betray him? Betray the legless one? How?

  Why? And if our French peacock believed that,

  again why would he say these things to you?"

  "I'm an attorney. I provoked him. Once he

  understood how I felt about Delavane, what that

  bastard did to me, he knew I couldn't possibly have

  anything to do with him. His defences were down;

  the rest was easy. And as he talked I saw

  THE AQUITAINE PROGRESSION 657

  a way to save my own life.' Joel struck a match,

  lighting a cigarette. "By reaching you," he added.

  "At the end you bank on the morality of a Jew,

  then? His acknowledgment of a debt.'

  "In part, yes, but not entirely, General. I know

  something about Leifhelm, about the way he's

  maneuvered through the years. He'd have me shot,

  then send his men after the rest of you, leaving

  himself in the number one position."

  "That's exactly what he'd do," agreed the Israeli.

  "And I didn't think Van Headmer had any real

  authority north of Pretoria."

  "Right again," said Abrahms, walking back toward

  Converse. "So the hellhound created in Southeast

  Asia is a survivor."

  "Let's be more specific," countered Joel. "I was

  sent out by people I don't know who abandoned me

  without raising the slightest question as to my guilt

  or innocence. For all I know, they joined in the hunt

  to kill me to save their own lives. Given these

  conditions I intend to survive."

  "What about the woman? Your woman?"

  "She goes with me." Converse put down the

  cigarette and picked up the gun. "What's your

  answer? I can kill you now, or leave that to

  Bertholdier, or Leifhelm, if he kills the Frenchman

  first. Or I can bank on your morality, your ac-

  knowledgment of a debt. What's it going to be?"

  "Put away the gun," said Chaim Abrahms. "You

  have the word of a sabre."

  "What'll you do?" asked Joel, placing the weapon

  back on the table.

  "Do?" shouted the Israeli in a sudden burst of

  anger. "What I've always intended to do! You think

  I give a horse's fart for this abstraction, this

  Aquitaine's infrastructure? Do you think I care one

  whit for titles or labels or chains of command? Let

  them have it all! I only care that it works, and for it

  to work respectability must come out of the chaos

  along with strength. Bertholdier was right. I am too

  divisive a figure as well as a Jew to be so visible

  on the Euro-American scene. So I will be

  invisible except in Eretz Yisrael, where my word will

  be the law of this new order. 1, myself, will help the

  French bull get whatever medals he wants. I will not

  fight him, I will control him."

  "How?"

  "Because I can destroy his respectability."

  658 R08ERT LUDLUM

  Converse sat forward, suppressing his

  astonishment. "His sex life? Those buried scandals?"

  "My God, no, you imbecile! You kick a man

  below his belt in public you ask for trouble. Half the

  people cry 'Foul,'thinking it could happen to them,

  and the other half applaud his courage to indulge

  himself which they would very much like to do."

  "Then how, General? How can you do this,

  destroy his respectability?"

  Abrahms sat down again in the brocaded chair

  his thick body squeezed dangerously between the

  delicately carved mahogany arms. "By exposing the

  role he played in 'code-name Aquitaine.' The roles

  we all played in this extraordinary adventure that

  forced the civilized world to summon us and the

  strengths of our professional leadership. It's entirely

  possible that all free Europe will turn to Bertholdier

  as France nearly turned to him after De Gaulle. But

  one must understand a man like Bertholdier. He

  doesn't merely seek power, he seeks the glory of

  power the trappings, the adulation, the mysticism.

  He would rather give up certain intrinsic authority

  than lose any part of the glory. Me? I don't give a

  shit about the glory. All I want is the power to get

  what I need what I command. For the kingdom of

  Israel and its imprimatur in all of the Middle East."

  'You expose him, you expose yourself. How can

  you win that way?"

  "Because he'll blink first. He'll think of the glory

  and submit. He'll do as I say, give me what I want."

  "I think he'll have you shot."

  "Not when he's told that if I die several hundred

  documents will be released describing every meeting

  we attended, every decision we made. Everything is

  scrupulously detailed, I assure you."

  "You intended this from the beginning?"

  "From the beginning."

  "You play rough."

  "I'm a sabre. I play for the advantage without

  it we would have been massacred decades ago."

  "Among these documents is there a list of

  everyone in Aquitaine?"

  "No. It has never been my intention to

  jeopardise the movement. Call it whatever name you

  will, I believe truly in the concept. There mus
t be a

  unified, international mili

  THE AQUITAINE PROGRESSION 659

  tary-industrial complex. The world will not stay sane

  without it.'

  'But there is such a list.

  "In a machine, a computer, but it must be

  programmed correctly, the proper codes used.'

  "Could you do it?

  "Not without help.

  "What about Delavane?'

  'You have certain perceptions yourself, said the

  Israeli, nodding. "What about him?

  Again Joel had to control his astonishment. The

  computer codes that released the master list of

  Aquitaine were with Delavane. At least the key

  symbols were. The remainder were provided by the

  four leaders across the Atlantic. Converse shrugged.

  "You haven t really mentioned him. You've talked

  about Bertholdier, about the elimination of Leifhelm,

  and the impotence of Van Headmer, who could,

  however, bring in raw materials "

  "I said 'gold,'" corrected Abrahms.

  "Bertholdier said 'raw materiels.' But what about

  George Marcus Delavane?"

  "Marcus is finished," said the Israeli flatly. "He

  was coddled we all coddled him because he

  brought us the concept and he worked his end in the

  United States. We have equipment and materiel all

  over Europe, to say nothing of the contraband we've

  shipped to insurgents, just to keep them occupied. '

  "Clarification," interrupted Joel. " 'Occupied'

  means killing?"

  "All is killing. Disingenuous philosophers

  notwithstanding, the ends do justify the means. Ask