Brotherhood of the Rose

by David Morrell

  The common denominator. Eliot. The implication was unthinkable. Eliot-Saul's foster father-had put out a contract on him?

  No! Saul pulled down his turtleneck sweater and stepped from the car, tugging on his sportcoat. Five o'clock-the eastern sky was turning gray.

  He left the trailer court, walking in pain along the highway. At the truck stop, he waited in the shadow of a semi till its driver left the restaurant.

  The driver stiffened when he saw him. "Fifty bucks for a ride," Saul said, "Against the rules. You see that sign? No passengers. I'd lose my job."

  "A hundred."

  "So you mug me when you get the chance. Or your buddies hijack the truck,"

  "Two hundred."

  The driver pointed. "Blood on your clothes. You've been in a fight, or you're wanted by the cops."

  "I cut myself shaving. Three."

  "No way. I've got a wife and kids."

  "Four. That's my limit."

  "Not enough."

  "I'll wait for another driver." Saul walked toward a different truck. "Hey, buddy."

  Saul turned.

  "That kind of money, you must really need to get out of town."

  "My father's sick."

  The driver laughed. "And so's my bank account. I hoped you'd offer five."

  "Don't have it."

  "Ever seen Atlanta?"

  "No," Saul lied. "You're going to." The driver held out his hand. "The money?"

  "Half now. "Fair enough. In case you get any funny ideas, I'd better warn you. I was in the marines. I know karate."

  "Really," Saul said. "Assume the position while I search you. I'd better not find a gun or a knife."

  Saul had thrown away the silencer and put the small Beretta in his underwear, against his crotch. The gun felt uncomfortable, but he knew only naked body searches were accurate, The driver would frisk the contours of Saul's body-the arms, up the legs, and along the spine. But Saul was doubtful the driver would feel his privates or reach inside his underwear, If the driver did... "All you'll find is four hundred dollars," Saul told him. "In Atlanta, if the cops come looking for me, I'll know who to blame. I'll phone your boss and tell him about our arrangement. It'll be a comfort to me to know you lost your job."

  "Is that any way to talk to a pal?" The driver grinned. As Saul expected, the frisk was amateurish.

  Through the gleaming day, as the truck roared down the highway, he pretended to sleep as he brooded over what had happened. Eliot, he kept thinking. Something was horribly wrong. But he couldn't keep running. He couldn't hide forever.

  Why does Eliot want to kill me? Why the Mossad? This much was sure-he needed help. But who to trust? The sun glared through the windshield. Clutching his chest, he sweated, feverish, thinking of Chris. His foster brother. Remus.

  Church OF THE MOON

  Among the surge of Orientals on noisy, acrid Silom Road, the tall Caucasian somehow avoided attention. He moved with purpose, smoothly, steadily, blending with the rhythm of the crowd. As soon as someone sensed him, the man was already gone. An untrained observer could not have guessed his nationality. French perhaps, or English. Maybe German. His hair was brown, but whether dark or light was hard to say. His eyes were brown, yet blue and green. His face was oval yet rectangular. He wasn't thin but wasn't heavy either. Ordinary jacket; shirt and pants of neutral color. In his thirties, maybe older, maybe younger. Without scars or facial hair. Unusual in only one respect-he seemed to be invisible.

  In fact, he was an American. Though he traveled under many identities, his real name was Chris Kilmoonie. He was thirty-six. His scars had been disguised by plastic surgery. Indeed, his face had been reconstructed several times. He'd cut the labels from his clothes. He'd stitched the equivalent of five thousand dollars in large bills of various currencies beneath the lining of his jacket. The rest of his fifteenthousand-dollar emergency fund had been converted into gold and gems-an eighteen-karat Rolex watch, for example, and a precious necklace-which he wore out of sight. He had to be able to move from country to country as quickly as possible, freed from dependence on banks. He didn't worry that a thief who suspected his wealth would try to take it from him. Beneath his jacket, behind the belt at his spine, he carried a Mauser HSC, 7.65-mm automatic pistol. But more than the weapon, Chris's eyes discouraged confrontation. Deep within them, past their shifting colors, lurked a warning confidence that made a stranger want to keep his distance.

  Halfway down the street, Chris paused among bambooawninged stalls where vendors shouted to be heard above one another, waving elaborate kites, silk scarves, and teak statuettes. Ignoring a pushcart salesman who offered him a piece of roasted monkey, he glanced beyond the cacophonous rush of bicycles and mopeds toward a thin, peaked, two-story church, enmeshed with vines, between the Oriental Hotel and a mission. From this angle, he saw the rectory, a two-story bungalow attached to the rear of the church. Beyond it he saw the graveyard and the pepper garden that sloped down to the muddy, crocodile-infested river. In the distance, rice paddies merged with the jungle. What interested him most, though, was the six-foot stained glass window beneath the church's peak. He knew that years before, a one-foot slice of glass had been broken during a storm. Because this parish in Sawang Kaniwat, old town, Bangkok, was poor, the slice-which resembled a crescent moon-had been replaced by a cheap piece of galvanized steel. The crescent, stark beneath the peak, accounted for the nickname: Church of the Moon.

  Chris also knew that, at the request of the Russian KGB, the church had been converted into an Abelard-sanctioned safe house in 1959, available for use by operatives from any agency, no matter their differences in politics. As he waited for a break in traffic, then crossed the street, he took for granted that agents from various intelligence networks watched from nearby buildings. They didn't matter. Within the church and the surrounding area, he was guaranteed immunity.

  He opened a listing wooden gate and walked along a soggy gravel path beside the church. In back, the blare of the street was muffled. He tugged his shirt away from his sweaty chest, the temperature ninety-five, the humidity smothering. Though the rains weren't due for another month, thick black clouds loomed over the jungle.

  He walked up the creaky unpainted steps and knocked on the rectory door. An Oriental servant answered. Speaking Thai, Chris asked to see the priest. A minute passed. The old priest came and studied him.

  Phonetically, Chris said, "Eye bain Thai, this phrase is an expletive, referring to a dirty or large monkey. It can also mean guerrilla. It was all Chris had to say to gain asylum here.

  The priest stepped back and nodded. Chris went in, squinting while his eyes adjusted to the shadows in the hallway. He smelled pepper. "You speak- "English," Chris replied. "Are you familiar with our arrangements?"

  "Yes, I've been here once before."

  "I don't recall."

  "In 1965."

  "I still don't-2' "I looked different then. My face was crushed."

  The old priest hesitated. "Ruptured appendix? Fractured spine?"

  Chris nodded. "I remember now," the old priest said. "Your agency should be complimented. Its surgeons were meticulous."

  Chris waited. "But you're not here to recall old times," the priest continued. "My office is more convenient for conversation." Turning left, he entered a room.

  Chrisfollowed him. He'd read the old man's file and knew that Father Gabriel Janin was seventy-two. His white whisker stubble matched the bristle of his close-cropped hair. Emaciated, stooped and wrinkled, the priest wore muddy canvas shoes and dingy pants below a shapeless mildewed surplice. Both his age and slovenly appearance were misleading. From 1929 to 1934, he'd been a member of the French Foreign Legion. Bored by the challenge he'd met and exceeded, he'd entered the Cistercian Order of monks at Citeaux in 1935. Four years later, he'd left the order and, during the war years, trained to become a missionary priest. After the war, he'd been transferred to Saigon. In 1954, he'd been transferred again, this time to Bangkok. In 1959, he'd been bla
ckmailed by the KGB, because of his preference for young Thai girls, to be the house keeper for this internationally sanctioned safe house. Chris was well aware that, to protect his guests, the priest would kill.

  The office was narrow, cluttered, musty. The priest shut the door. "Would you like some refreshment? Tea perhaps, or-?" Chris shook his head. The priest spread his hands. He sat with a desk between them. A bird sang in the pepper garden. :"How may I help you?" "Father---' Chris's voice was hushed as if he were going to confession, I'll need you to tell me the name of a dentist who'll extract teeth and stay quiet about it."

  Father Janin looked troubled. :"What's the matter?" "Your fine organization -should not need this information," the old priest said. "It has dentists of its own."

  "I need the name of yours."

  The priest leaned forward, frowning. "Why does this concern you?

  Why come here? Forgive my bluntness. Has this dentist wronged someone or destroyed the cover of someone? Are you returning a favor by removing him?"

  "No favor," Chris assured him. "My employers worry about information leaks in our network. Sometimes we have to go outside our sources."

  Father Janin considered. He kept frowning as he nodded. "Understandable. But all the same..." He tapped his fingers on his desk. "When you make inquiries, my cryptonym is Remus."

  The priest stopped tapping his fingers. "In that case, if you'll stay the night, I'll try to have your answer by the morning." That's not soon enough, Chris thought.

  In the dining room, he sat at a table eating chicken and noodles laced with hot peppers, as the Thais preferred it. His eyes watered; his nostrils flared. He drank warm Coke, glancing out the window toward the back. The clouds had reached the city, rain falling densely, like molten lead. He couldn't see the crosses in the graveyard.

  Father Janin's reluctance disturbed him. He was sure that at this moment the priest was making phone calls, investigating his background. the phone, of course, would not be bugged. Neither would the safe house. The place was neutral territory. Anyone who violated its sanctity would be exiled from his network, hunted by the world's intelligence community, and executed.

  All the same, Chris felt troubled. As soon as the agency learned he was here, the local bureau chief would wonder why. He'd contact his superior. Since cryptonyms gained their significance from their first two lettersam, for example, referred to Cuba; thus AMALGAM would be the cryptonym for an operation in that country-the bureau chief's superior would check the first two letters in Chris's cryptonym REMUS and learn that RE meant Chris was answerable only to headquarters in Langley, Virginia, and in particular to Eliot. Soon Eliot would be informed that Chris had arrived unexpectedly at the Bangkok safe house. Eliot, of course, would be puzzled since he hadn't directed Chris to come here.

  That was the problem. Chris didn't want Eliot to follow his movements. Given what Chris intended to do, he didn't want Eliot to know the consequences, didn't want Eliot to grieve or feel embarrassed.

  He tried not to show impatience. At the earliest opportunity, he'd go to the priest and get the dentist's name.

  Preoccupied, he-turned from the dismal rain beyond the window. Wiping his sweat-blurred eyes, he gaped in disbelief at a man whom he had last seen seventeen years ago.

  The man, a Chinese, had entered the dining room. Slender, round-faced, genteel, he wore an impeccable khaki suit, the jacket of which was buttoned to his collar in the Mao style. His youthful face and his thick black hair belied his sixty-two years.

  The man's name was Chin Ken Chan. I.Q.: one hundred and eighty. Multilingual in Russian, French, and English in addition to Chinese. Chris knew his background. Chan had received his formal education from Dame Sahara Day-Wisdom, O.B.E., at Merton College, Oxford University, from 1939 till the war had ended. During that time, he'd been influenced by the Communist members of clubs at both Oxford and Cambridge, easily recruited by the mole Guy Burgess to help Mao after the war. Because Chan was a homosexual, he'd never risen higher than the rank of colonel in the intelligence arena of China. But he was a valuable idealist in the Maoist cause and, despite his effete appearance, one of its finest killers, particularly with the garotte.

  Chan glanced dismissively at Chris and walked toward another table. He sat primly, reaching between the buttons of his jacket to pull out his own set of chopsticks.Chris chewed and swallowed, hiding his surprise. "The Snow Leopard."

  Chan raised his head. "Does the Snow Leopard miss Deep Snow?" Chan nodded impassively. "It's been thirteen years since we've had Deep Snow in the Orient."

  "I was thinking of seventeen years ago. I believe it snowed then in Laos."

  Chan smiled politely. "There were only two Americans in the snow that year. I recall they were brothers-but not by birth."

  "And this one is eternally grateful to you."

  "Chris?" Chan said.

  Chris nodded, throat tight. "Good to see you, Chan." His heart raced as he grinned and stood. They crossed the room and embraced.

  Father Janin felt apprehensive. As soon as a servant had taken the American to the dining room, he grabbed the phone on his desk and dialed quickly. "Remus," he said.

  He hung up, gulped a glass of brandy, frowned, and waited. Coincidences bothered him. Two days ago, he'd given sanctuary to a Russian, Joseph Malenov, the director of the KGB's opium traffic into Southeast Asia. Malenov had stayed in his room, where, by agreement, the priest supplied him daily with 300 milligrams of the suppressant Dilantin to try to calm his outbursts of rage and hypertension. The treatment was working.

  Yesterday, the priest had given sanctuary to a Chinese Communist operative, Col. Chin Ken Chan. Informants had told the priest that Chan was here to meet the Russian and perhaps become a double agent for the KGB- Such arrangements were not unusual. In an Abelard safe house, opposing operatives frequently took advantage of neutral territory to transact business, sometimes defecting. But the priest was not convinced of Chan's motivation. He knew that the Chinese Communists opposed Russia's opium smuggling into Southeast Asia, partly because they resented Soviet interference in the region, partly as well because they felt that opium undermined the character of the area. It made no sense that Chan, who for years had been sabotaging Russia's opium shipments, would defect to the.very man who directed the smuggling.

  Now, today, the American had arrived. His request for a dentist who would extract teeth and stay quiet about it could have only one purpose-to prevent someone's body from being identified. But whose? The Russian's?

  His thoughts were interrupted when the phone rang. The priest picked up the receiver and listened. In a minute, he set it down, twice as puzzled. REMUS, he'd learned, was the cryptonym for Christopher Patrick Kilmoonic, one-time lieutenant in the American Special Forces, who in 1965 had worked in conjunction with the CIA in an operation called Deep Snow, the purpose of which was to destroy the flow of Russian opium. In 1966, Kilmoonie had resigned from the military and joined the CIA. In 1976, he'd entered a Cistercian monastery. In 1982, he'd rejoined the CIA. The combination of religion and politics seemed unusual, but Father Janin could empathize since he himself had combined them. Still, what troubled him was that all three men were connected in different ways with the opium' traffic.

  And one other connection. When the American had mentioned that in 1965 he'd come here with a crushed face, ruptured appendix, and fractured spine, the priest had remembered the American's escort-the same Chinese now in this buildingchin Ken Chan.

  Coincidences bothered him.

  Chris stood on the rectory's porch as rain drummed on the corrigated metal roof. He still couldn't see the graveyard. Next to him, Chan leaned on the railing, facing outward. Though the safe house wasn't bugged, they used the noise from the rain to prevent their conversation from being overheard. They'd chosen a windowless corner. "Two things," Chan said.

  Chris waited. "You must leave here quickly. Joseph Malenov is -in a room upstairs," Chan said.

  Chris understood. In their professio
n, what was said was seldom what was meant. Discretion was the rule. For Chan to speak even this directly was unusual. Chris quickly made the connection, filling the gaps between Chan's statements.

  He was shocked. The basis of their way of life was adherence to strict codes, the most extreme of which was the sanctity of an Abelard safe house.

  Chan intended to commit the cardinal sin. "It's never been done," Chris said. "Not true. While you were in the monastery-"

  "You've been keeping tabs on me."

  "I saved your life. I'm responsible for you. During your stay in the monastery, the code was broken twice. In Ferlach, Austria. Then again in Montreal."

  Chris felt a chill. Chan's gaze never wavered. "Then the world's gone crazy," Chris said. "Isn't that why you left it? Because the monastery offered a code with honor?"