Robert Ludlum - Aquatain Progression.txt

by The Aquitaine Progression [lit]

666 ROBERT LUDLUM

  codes without his primary set, but in truth a

  pre-coded combination of two sequences doubled

  will do it."

  'That's ingenious,' said Converse. Do the others

  know?"

  'Only my trusted French comrade," answered

  the German coldly. "The prince of traitors,

  Bertholdier. But, naturally, I never gave him the

  accurate combination, and an inaccurate insertion

  would erase everything."

  "That was a winner thinking." Joel nodded

  approvingly, then frowned with concern. "What

  would happen, though, if your center was

  assaulted?"

  "Like Hitler's plans for the bunker, it would go

  up in flames. There are explosives everywhere."

  "I see."

  "But since you speak of winners, and in my

  judgment such men are prophets," continued

  Leifhelm, leaning forward in the chair, his eyes

  widening with enthusiasm, "let me tell you about the

  isle of Scharhorn. Years ago, in 1945, out of the

  ashes of defeat, it was to be the site of the most

  incredible creation designed by true believers the

  world has ever known, only to be aborted by

  cowards and traitors. It was called Operation

  Sonnenkinder the children of the sun infants

  biologically selected and sent out all over the world

  to people waiting for them, prepared to guide them

  through their lives to positions of power and wealth.

  As adults, the Sonnenkinder were to have but one

  mission across the globe. The rising of the Fourth

  Reich! You see now the symbolic choice of

  Scharhorn? From this inner complex of Aquitaine

  will come forth the new order! We will have done it!"

  ' Stow it," said Converse, getting out of the chair

  and walking away from Erich Leifhelm. The

  examination s finished."

  'What?"

  'You heard me, get out of here. You make me

  sick. 'The door opened, and the young doctor from

  Bonn came in, his eyes on the once celebrated field

  marshal. Strip him,' ordered Converse. "Search him.

  Joel entered the dimly lit room where Valerie

  and the Surete s Prudhomme flanked a man behind

  a video camera mounted on a tripod. The thick lens

  of the camera was inserted in the wall and ten feet

  away was a television monitor,

  THE AQUITAINE PROGRESSION 667

  which showed only the deserted study, with the

  brocaded wing chair in the center of the screen.

  "Everything go all right?" he asked.

  "Beautifully," said Valerie. "The operator didn't

  understand a word, but he claimed the lighting was

  exquisite. Au bel nature!, he called it. He can make

  as many copies as you like; they'll take about

  thirty-five minutes each."

  "Ten and the original print will be enough," said

  Converse, looking at his watch, then at Prudhomme

  as Val spoke quietly in French to the cameraman.

  "You can take the first copy and skill make the five

  o'clock flight to Washington."

  "With the greatest of enthusiasm, my friend. I

  assume one of these prints will be for Paris."

  "And every other head of government along with

  our affidavits. You'll bring back copies of the

  depositions Simon took in New York?"

  "I'll go make arrangements," said Prudhomme. "It

  is best my name does not appear on the passenger

  manifest." He turned and left the room, followed by

  the cameraman, who headed for his duplicating

  equipment down the hall.

  Valerie went to Joel, and taking his face in both

  her hands, she kissed him lightly on the lips. "For a

  few minutes in their you had me in knots. I didn't

  think you were going to make it."

  "Neither did 1."

  "But you did. That was some display, mister. I'm

  so very proud of you, my darling."

  ' A lot of lawyerstll cringe. It was the worst sort

  of entrapment. As an old, bewildering, but very

  bright law professor of mine would have put it, they

  were admissions elicited on the basis of false

  statements, those same admissions forming the basis

  of further entrapment."

  "Stow it, Converse. Let's go for a walk. We used

  to walk a lot, and I'd like to get back in the habit.

  It's not much fun alone."

  Joel took her in his arms. They kissed, gently at

  first, feeling the warmth and the comfort that had

  come back to them. He pulled his head away, his

  hands sliding to her shoulders, and looked into her

  wide, vibrant eyes. "Will you marry me, Mrs.

  Converse?" he said.

  "Good Lord, again? Well, why not? As you said

  once before, I wouldn't even have to change the

  initials on my lingerie.

  668 ROBERT LUDLUM

  "You never had initials on it."

  "You found that out long before you made the

  remark."

  "I didn't want you to think I stared."

  "Yes, my darling, I'll marry you. But first we

  have things to do. Even before our walk."

  "I know. Peter Stone by way of the Tabana family

  in Charlotte, North Carolina. He did terrible things

  to me, but strange as it seems, I think I like him."

  "I don't," said Valerie firmly. "I want to kill him."

  40

  It was the end of the second day in the

  countdown of three. The worldwide demonstrations

  against nuclear war were only ten hours away, to

  start at the first light halfway across the world. The

  killings would begin, setting the chaos in mobon.

  The group of eighteen men and five women sat

  scattered about in the dark projection room in the

  underground strategy complex of the White House.

  Each had a small writing tray attached to his seat

  with a yellow pad lighted by a Tensor lamp. On the

  screen was flashed in thirty-second intervals one face

  after another, each with a number in the upper

  right-hand corner. The instructions had been terse, in

  the language best understood by these people, and

  delivered by Peter Stone who had selected them.

  Study the faces, make no audible comments, and mark

  down by number any you recognise, bearing in mind

  terminal operations. At the end of the series the lights

  will be turned on and we'll talk. And, if need be, run

  the series again and again until we come up with

  something Remember, we believe these men are killers.

  Concentrate on that.

  They were told nothing else. Except M.1.6's

  Derek Belamy, who had arrived within a half-hour of

  the extraordinary session, looking haggard from his

  obviously exhausting journey. When Derek walked

  through the door, Peter had pulled him aside and

  each gripped the other's arms. Stone was never so

  happy or so relieved in his life to see any man.

  Whatever

  THE AQUITAINE PROGRESSION 669

  he might have missed, or could miss, Belamy would

  find it. The British agent had a tenth sense above

  anyone else's sixth, including Peter's, which, ofr />
  course, was denied modestly by Derek.

  "I need you, old friend,' said Peter. "I need you

  badly."

  "It's why I'm here, old friend," replied Belamy

  warmly. Can you tell me anything?"

  "There's no time now, but I can give you a name.

  Delavane.

  "Mad Marcus?"

  "The same. It's his crisis and it's real."

  "The bastard!" whispered the Englishman.

  "There's no one I'd rather see at the end of a

  barbed-wire rope. Talk to you later, Peter. You've

  got your socialising do. Incidentally, from what I can

  see, you've got the best here tonight."

  "The best, Derek. We can't afford any less."

  Beyond the American military personnel who had

  initially approached Stone, as well as Colonel Alan

  Metcalf, Nathan Simon, Justice Andrew Wellfleet

  and the Secretary of State, the remaining audience

  was composed of the most experienced and secure

  intelligence officers Peter Stone had known in a

  lifetime of clandestine operations. They had been

  flown over by military transport from France, Creat

  Britain, West Germany, Israel, Spain and the

  Netherlands. Among them were, besides the

  extraordinary Derek Belamy, Frangois Villard, chief

  of France's highly secretive Organisation Etrangere;

  Yosef Behrens, the Mossad's leading authority on

  terrorism; Pablo Amandarez, Madrid's specialist in

  KCB Mediterranean penetrations, and Hans

  Vonmeer of the Netherlands' secret state police. The

  others, including the women, were equally respected

  in the caverns of deep-cover, beyond-salvage

  operations. They knew by name, face or reputahon

  the legions of killers for hire, killers by order, and

  killers by reason of ideology. Above all, each was

  trusted, each a man or woman Stone had worked

  withi collectively they were the elite of the shadow

  world.

  A face! He knew the face! It stayed on the screen

  and he wrote on his pad: "Dobbins. Number 57.

  Cecil or Cyril Dobbins. British Army. Transferred to

  British Intelligence. Personal aide to . . . Derek

  Belamy!"

  Stone looked over at his friend across the aisle,

  fully expecting him to be writing on his yellow pad.

  Instead, the Englishman frowned and sat motionless

  in his chair, his pencil

  670 ROBERT LUDLUIU

  poised above the paper. The next face appeared on

  the screen. And the next, and the next, until the

  series was over. The lights came on, and the first

  person to speak was the Mossad's Yosef Behrens.

  "Number seventeen is an artillery officer in the IDF

  recently transferred to the Security Branch, Jeru-

  salem. His name is Arnold."

  "Number thirty-eight," said Francois Villard, ' is

  a colonel in the French Army attached to the guard

  of Invalides. It is the face; the name I do not

  recall."

  'Number twenty-six," said the man from Bonn,

  "is Oberleutnant Ernst Muller of the Federal

  Republic's Luftwaffe. He is a highly skilled pilot

  frequently assigned to fly ministers of state to

  conferences both within and without West

  Cermany."

  "Number forty-four," said a dark-skinned woman

  with a pronounced Hispanic accent, "has no such

  credentials as your candidates. He is a drug dealer,

  suspected of many killings and operates out of Iviza.

  He was once a paratrooper. Name Orejo."

  "Son of a gun, I just don't believe it!" said the

  young lieutenant William Landis, the computer

  expert from the Pentagon. "I know number fifty-one,

  I'm almost positive! He's one of the adjutants in

  Middle East procurements. I've seen him a lot but

  I don't know his name."

  Six other men and two women volunteered

  twelve additional identities and positions as

  everyone in the room silently looked for an

  emerging pattern. There was a preponderance of

  military personnel, and the umbrella of the rest was

  puzzling. In the main they were ex-combat soldiers

  from high-casualty outfits who had drifted into

  crime largely violent crime, the sort of men Peter

  Stone knew the generals of Aquitaine considered

  human garbage.

  Finally Derek Belamy spoke in his hard, clipped

  distant voice. "There are four or five faces I

  associate with dossiers but I'm not making

  connections." He looked over at Stone. 'You'll run

  them again, won't you, old boy?"

  "Of course, Derek," replied the former station

  chief in London. Stone, who had said nothing, rose

  from his chair and addressed the gathering.

  "Everything you've given us will be fed immediately

  into computers, and we'll see if we come up with

  any correlations. And to repeat what I said

  previously, I want to thank you all and apologise

  again for not giving you the explanations you

  deserve, not only for your help but for the trouble

  we've caused you. Speaking personally, my conso

  THE AQUITAINE PROGRESSION 671

  ration is that you've all been here before and I know

  you understand. We'll break for fifteen minutes and

  start again. There are coffee and sandwiches in the

  next room.' Stone nodded his thanks once more and

  started for the door. Derek Belamy intercepted him

  in the aisle.

  "Peter, I'm dreadfully sorry it took me so long to

  get back to you. Truth is, the office had a devil of a

  time tracking me down. I was visiting friends in

  Scotland."

  "I thought you might be in Northern Ireland. It's

  a hell of a mess, isn't it?"

  "You were always better than you thought you

  were. I was in Belfast, of course. But right now I

  promise to do better I'm sure I will but the fact

  is I'm bushed, it was a perfectly terrible trip and, of

  course, no sleep whatsoever. All those faces began to

  look alike I either knew them all or I didn't know

  a damned one!"

  "Running them again will help," said Stone.

  "Quite so," agreed Belamy. "And Peter, whatever

  this tangle is with that maniac, Delavane, I couldn't

  have been more delighted to see you in the control

  chair. We were all told you were out, rather firmly

  out."

  "I'm back in. Very firmly."

  "I can see that, chap. That is your Secretary of

  State in the back row, isn't it?"

  "Yes, it is."

  "Congratulations, old boy. Well, off for coffee,

  black and hot. See you in a few minutes."

  "Across the aisle, old friend."

  Stone walked out the door and turned right in

  the white corridor. He could feel the rapid

  acceleration of his heartbeat it was a cousin to

  Johnny Reb's claims of a churning stomach and an

  acid taste in his mouth bile, the Rebel called it. He

  had to get to a telephone quickly. Converse's courier,

  the Surete's Prudhomme, would be arriving within

  the hour; a Secret Service escort was waiting for
him

  at Dulles Airport with instructions to bring him

  directly to the White House. But it was not the

  Frenchman who concerned Stone now, it was Con-

  verse himself. He had to reach him before the

  session began again. He had to!

  When the lawyer had contacted him through the

  Tatiana relay, Peter had been astonished by the

  sheer audacity of what Converse had done.

  Kidnapping the three generals video-taping the

  interrogations or the "oral examina

  672 ROBERT IUDLUM

  lions" or whatever the legal terminology was, it was

  insanel The only thing more insane was the fact that

  he had carried it off thanks obviously to the

  resources of a very determined, very angry man from

  the Surete. The computer was in Scharhorn, the

  master list of Aquitaine buried somewhere in its in-

  tricate mechanism, only to be erased by inaccurate

  codes, the complex itself mined with explosives.

  Jesus!

  And now the final insanity. The man no one

  could find, the source so deeply shrouded they

  frequently doubted his existence despite the fact that

  all logic insisted he was there. There had to be

  Aquitaine's man in England, for there could be no

  Aquitaine without the British. Further, Stone knew

  he was the conduit, the primary communicator

  between Palo Alto and the generals overseas, for

  constant screenings of Delavane's telephone charges

  showed repeated calls to a number in the Hebrides,

  and such a relay device was all too familiar to the

  former intelligence agent. The calls disappeared at