The Aquaintaine Progession

by Ludlum, Robert

  “So did I,” said the civilian quietly.

  “We were wrong.”

  “I know that. It’s why I’m here.”

  Metcalf drank, holding the cold glass against hiswarm cheek. “I keep thinking about what Sam saidto me. “There’s got to be a fist,’ he said. ”A masterlist of everyone in this Aquitaine.’ He ruled out allthe obvious places not in a vault, not onpaper probably electronically programmed, flashedon with codes, as his aerial tactics were frequentlyflashed on a screen inside a jet’s cockpit. Someplaceno one would ever think of, away from anythingofficial or tied in with anyone remotely military. "Alist. There has to be a listI’ he kept saying. For apilot, he had a hell of an imagination. I guess it’swhy he was so good at that tactical stuff at fortythousand feet in the air. Come out of the sun wherethey don’t expect you,

  or from a dark horizon where the radar can’t pickyou up. He knew it all. He was a tactical genius.”

  As Metcalf talked, Stone leaned forward in thechair looking intently at the Air Force officer andabsorbing every word he spoke.

  "Scharhorn,” he said, barely above a whisper.“It’s Sashay horn!”

  The twin-engined Riems 408 circled the privateairfield at Saint-Gervais, fifteen miles east ofChamonix, the amber lights of the two runwaysthrowing an orange glow up into the lower nightsky. Inside, Prudhomme checked the strap of hisseat belt as the pilot on his left received clearanceto make his final approach to the north-south strip.

  Mon Dieu, what an incredible day! thought theman from the Surete as he glanced at his right handunder the spill of the panel lights. The dark bruiseson his fingers were at least less noticeable than theblood that had covered his entire hand only hoursago. His would-be executioner had not evenbothered to conceal his assignment, such was hisarrogance bred undoubtedly in the Legionetrangere! And the sentence of death had beendelivered right inside the car at the far end of theparking area in the Bois de Boulogne! The man hadcalled him at the office and, in truth, it had enteredPrudhomme’s mind that this man might call him,and so it was less a surprise than it could havebeen and certainly gave him cause to be prepared.The man had asked his recent superior to meet himat the Bois, in the parking lot he had startlingnews. He would be driving his official Peugeot, andsince he could not leave his radio phone, would theinspector mind joining him. Of course not.

  But there had been no startling news. Onlyquestions, asked very arrogantly.

  “Why did you do what you did this morning?”

  “Shave? Go to the toilet? Eat breakfast? Kissmy wife good-bye? What are you talking about?”

  “You know what I refer to! Earlier! The man onthe Boulevard Raspail. You crashed into his car,stopping him. You threw narcotics inside. Youarrested him falselyI”

  “I didn’t approve of what he was doing. Anymore than I approve of this conversation.”Prudhomme had awkwardly reached for the handleof the door with his left hand, his right having otherbusiness.

  “Stopl” his former subordinate had shouted,grabbing his shoulder. “You were protecting thewoman!”

  "Read my report. Let me go.”

  “I’ll let you go to hell! I’m going to kill you,meddler! Insignificant bureaucrat!”

  The former subordinate had yanked a gun fromhis jacket holster but he was too late. Prudhommehad fired twice the small weapon he gripped underhis coat. Unfortunately, it was small caliber and theex-colonel of the Legion was a very large man; hehad lunged at Prudhomme inside the automobile.However, the veteran of the Resistance had goneback to an old wartime habit just in case: along thelapels of his coat was threaded a long wire a wirewith two braided loops at each end. He had whippedit out, and looping it over his would-be executioner’shead with his wrists crossed, he violently yanked ittaut until the flesh burst around the throat and blooddrenched Prudhomme’s hands.

  “We’re cleared for landing, Inspector,’ said thepilot, grinning. “I swear to Christ no one wouldbelieve this! Of course I have no intention of sayinga thing, I swear on my mother’s grave!”

  “She’s probably drinking brandy in Montmartre atthis moment,” interjected Prudhomme dryly. "Saynothing, and you may have another six months flyingin your foolish tobacco from Malta.”

  “Nothing else! Never anything else, Inspector. Iam a father!”

  “You are to be commended. Six months and thenget out, do you understand?”

  “On my father’s grave, I swear!”

  “He’s very much alive and in jail he’ll be out insixty days. Tell him to stop his presses. Governmentrelief checks really. “

  Joel and Valerie listened in silence as the manfrom the SOrete told his story. He was finished now;there was nothing left to say. Interpol had beencompromised, the arrondissement police manipulated,the Surete itself corrupted, and official governmentcommuniques issued on the basis of lies all lies.Why?

  “I’ll tell you because I want your help muchmore help,” said Converse, getting out of the chairand going to the

  desk, where the typewritten pages of his affidavitwere in the center of the green blotter. “Better, youcan read it yourself but I’m afraid you’ll have toread it here. In the morning I’ll have copies made;until then I don’t want it to leave this room. By theway, Val got you a reservation, a single don’t askme how, but a clerk downstairs will have a newwardrobe if not a new house by tomorrow.”

  “Merci, madame.”

  “The name is French,” added Joel.

  “Yes.”

  “No, I mean the name is French.”

  “Out. “

  “No, what I mean is “

  “Pardon, monsieur, ” interrupted Valerie. “Lenom sur le registry est “Monsieur French, ” mais“French, ” comme en anglais French. A rthur French.“

  “But I will have to sign, talk. Surely they will know.”

  “You sign nothing and you say nothing,” saidVal, taking a key off the bedside table and handingit to Prudhomme.

  The room is paid for three days, to be precise.After that before, if possible, if you agree tohelp the three of us will be someplace else.”

  “Formidable. I must read.”

  “Mon ami mon epoux est an avocat exceptionnel.“

  "ye com prends. “

  “There are some forty pages here,” saidConverse, bringing the papers to Prudhomme. “Toabsorb it will take you at least an hour. We’ll godownstairs and grab a bite to eat and leave youalone.”

  “Bien. There is much I wish to learn.”

  “What about you?” asked Joel, standing over theFrenchman. “I mean now. They’ll find that body inthe car.”

  “Most certainly,” agreed Prudhomme. “I left itwhere it was along with that pig from the Legion.But for the Surete there will be no connection tome.”

  “Fingerprints? The fact that you were away fromyour

  “Another old habit from the war,” said the manfrom the Silrete, reaching into his pocket. He pulledout a pair of extremely thin rubberisedgloves surgical gloves cut off at the wrist. “Iwashed these out at the Bois. The German occu-pation forces had all our fingerprints in a thousandfiles. There was no point in asking for our ownexecutions. As for my ab

  settee at my desk, it is quite simple. I explained to anassistant that I would be m Calais for several days ona contraband investigation and would call in. Myyears permit a certain latitude and Hexibility.”

  “That’s the Surete, not the others. Not where theLegionnaire came from.”

  “I am aware of that, monsieur. So I must becareful. It vill not be the first time.”

  “Enjoy your reading,” said Converse, nodding atVal to join him. “If you want anything, call roomservice.”

  “Bon appetrt,” said Prudhomme.

  Chaim Abrahms lifted the stiffening wrist of hisdead wife’s hand, the weapon gripped fiercely in herwhite fingers, and angled the gun toward her chest,into the bloody cavern between her breasts.

  The wide, brown eyes would not stay closed.They stared up at him, accusing accusing!

  “What
do you want from me!” he screamed. " I have seen the dead. I have lived with the dead! Leaveme be, woman. You couldn’t understand!”

  Yet she had, for so many years. She had cookedthe meat the desert chicken and the lamb, caughtin the outlying marshes and fed the units of theIrgun and the Haganah, never questioning deaththen. Fighting for a hope, a simple hope that was thebeginning of a dream. The land was theirs, rightfully,Biblically, logically theirs! They had fought and theyhad won! Two thousand years of being out-casts despised, reviled, and spat upon by thealmighty Gentiles until the tribes were burned andgassed and told to eliminate themselves from theface of the earth and yet they had survived. Nowthe tribes were strong. They were the conquerors, notthe conquered.

  “It’s what we fought for! What we prayed for!Why do you insult me with your eyes!” ChaimAbrahms roared as he pressed his forehead againstthe dead flesh of his wife’s face.

  Hitabdut was among the most heinous crimescommitted against the laws of the Talmud. It wasebudeatzmo, the taking of one’s own life against thewishes of Almighty God, in whose image man wascreated. A Jew who consigned his or her earthlybeing to hitabdut was denied burial in the Hebrewcemetery. It would be so for Chaim Abrahm’s wife,the most devout human being he had ever known.

  “ I have to do it!” he screamed, raising his eyesin supplication. ” It is for the best, can t youunderstand ?”

  Prudhomme poured himself a cup of coffee andreturned to his chair. Valerie sat opposite him asConverse stood by the window looking over at theman from the Surete, listening.

  “I cannot think of any other questions,” said theFrenchman, his intensely troubled eyes dartingabout, his lined face looking wearier than before.“Although it’s possible I’m still too deep in shock tothink at all. To say it’s incredible serves no purpose;also it would not be true. It’s all too credible. Theworld is so frightened it cries out for stability, for aplace to hide, for protection from the skies, fromthe streets, from each other. I believe the time hascome when it will settle for sheer, absolute strength,no matter the cost.”

  “The operative word is “absolute,’ ” said Joel, “asin controls and power. A confederation of militarygovernments fueling one another, interlockingpolicies and altering the laws all in the name ofstability and anyone who disagrees with them isdeclared unstable and silenced. And if too manydisagree, the chaos erupts again stability wins,Aquitaine wins. All they need is that initial wave ofterror, a tidal wave of killing and confusion. ”Keyfigures’ were the words they used. “Accumulation’ .. . ”rapid accelerahon’ chaos. Powerful men cutdown as riots break out in half a dozen capitals andthe generals march in with their commanders.That’s the scenario, right from their own words.”

  “That also is the problem, monsieur. They areonly words, but they are words you can pass alongto very few people, for they could be the wrongpeople. You could move up this countdown, as youcall it, trigger this holocaust yourself.”

  “The countdown’s running out, make nomistake,” Converse broke in. “But there is a way.“accumulation’ end ”rapid acceleration’can be usedin another manner, and you’re right it’s only withwords accumulated words, accelerated words. Ican’t come out, not yet. I can’t show myself. There’sno protection any court or government agency orthe police could provide that would stop them fromkilling me, and then, once I’m dead, callingwhatever I said the ravings of a psychopath. Don’tmisunderstand me, I have no death wish, but mydeath in itself isn’t important. What is important isthat the truth goes down with me, because I’m theonly one who’s talked

  directly to Delavane’s four caesars over here, andprobably the fifth, the Englishman.”

  “And these declaration"these affidavits you speakof can change that?”

  “They can turn things around, maybe just enough.”

  “Why?”

  “Because that’s a real world out there, a practical,complicated world that has to be penetrated as fastas possible people have to be reached who can betrusted, who can do something. Quickly. It’s what Iwanted to do a couple of weeks ago, but I was goingabout it the wrong way. I wanted to get everything Iknew to someone I knew. Nathan Simon, the bestattorney I’ve ever met. I wrote it all out twice notrealizing that I was only tying his hands, probablykilling him.” Joel stepped away from the window, alawyer in summation. “Whom could he go to withoutme, without the presence of an obviously sane manand not simply the words of a ”psychopathic killer’?And if I did come out, as he would have rightfullyinsisted, we’re both dead. Then Val told me aboutthe man in New York who reached her on the phoneand the other who chased her down the street and Iguessed right. Those aren’t the methods of peoplewho want to kill you; they don’t announcethemselves. They were the men in Washington whohad sent me out and were now trying to makecontact with me. Then she described her meetingwith Sam Abbott and his mentioning this Metcalf, aman he trusted and who had to be some kind of veryimportant person for him to tell the story to. Finally,there was you in Paris what you said, what you did,and how you offered to help, using the same code asRene Mattilon the Tatiana family. Tatiana, a nameor a word I think means trust, even among sharks.”

  “You are right, monsieur.”

  “That’s when it all came together for me. If Icould somehow establish lines of communication andreach all of you, there was a way. You people knewthe truth some of you knew all of it; others, likeyourself, knew only fragments, but regardless, youunderstood the immensity, the reality of the generalsand their Aquitaine and what they could do, whatthey’re doing. Even you, Prudhomme. What did yousay? Interpol is compromised, the policemanipulated, the Surete corrupted official reportsall lies. Added to these, Anstett in New York,Peregrine, the commander of NATO, Mattilon,Beale, Sam Abbott . . . Connal Fitzpatrick the onlyquestion

  mark and God knows how many others. All dead.The generals are marching forget theories, they’rekilling! . . . If I could convince all of you to write outaffidavits have depositions taken and get them toNathan Simon, he’d have the ammunition he needs.I fed legal mumbo jumbo to Stone in New York;some of it applies, most of it doesn’t, but he’ll dohis part and force the others to join him he has nochoice. The main point, the only point, is to get thismaterial to Simon. Once he has written testimony,a series of events and observations all sworn to betrue by diverse men of experience, he has a case.Believe me, he’ll treat them like the plans of aneutron bomb. He’ll have it all tomorrow, and he’llreach the right people if he has to walk into theOval Office which he could do, but may notchoose to. ” Joel paused and looked hard at theman from the Surete; he nodded at the pages of hisown affidavit on the table beside the Frenchman.“I’ve made arrangements for that to be flown toNew York tomorrow. I’d like one from you.”

  “Certainly you may have it. But can you trust thecouri

  “The world could blow apart and she’d still besitting in her house in the mountains and not knowit. Or care. How’s your English?”

  “Adequate, I believe. We’ve talked for severalhours.”

  “I mean written English. It’d save time if youwrote it out tonight.”

  “My spelling is probably no better than yours isin French.”

  “Make that English,” said Valerie. “I’ll straightenit out and if you’re not sure of something, write it inFrench.”

  “That would help. I must write it tonight?”

  “The secretary will be here first thing in themorning,” explained Converse. "She’ll type it up.She’s the one taking the Hight from Geneva to NewYork tomorrow afternoon.”

  “She agreed to do this?”

  “She agreed to accept a large donation to anature organizahon that apparently runs her life.”

  “Very convenient.”

  “There’s something else,” said Joel, sitting on anarm of Valerie’s chair and leaning forward. “Youknow the truth now, and beyond the material thathas to reach Simon, there’s one last thing I have todo. I’ve got a lot of money and a banker inMykonos who’ll confirm I have access to a greatdeal />
  more but you’ve read all that. With hme to find thepersonnel and the equipment I might be able to pullit off myself, but we don’t have the time. I need yourhelp, I need the resources you have.”

  “For what, monsieur?”

  “The final depositions. The last part of thetestimony. I want to kidnap three men.”

  I, Peter Charles Stone, ageffty-eight, a residentofWashington, D.C, was employed by the CentralIntelligence Agency for twenty-nine years, during whichtime l attained the rank of station chief in variousEuropean posts and ultimately Second Director ofClandestine Operations, Langley, Virginia. My record ison file at the Central Intelligence Agency and may beobtained pursuant to the regulations governingsuchprocedures. Sinceseparation from the CIA, I haveworked asa consultantand anaIystfor numerousintelligence departments, the specif as therein withheldfrom this statement pending government clearancesshould they be deemed pertinent to this document.

  On or about last March 15, I was contacted byCaptain Andrew Packard, United StatesArmy, whoasked if he might come to my apartment to discuss aconk dential matter. When he arrived, he stated at theoutset that he was speaking for a small group of menfrom both the military services and the StateDepartment, the number and identities of which hewould not divulge. He statedfurther that they soughtprofessional consultation from an experiencedintelligence officer no longer associated (permanently)with any branch of the intelligence community. Ile saidhe had certain funds available he believed would beadequate and would I be interested. It should be notedhere that Captain Packard and his associates had madea thorough if not exhaustive search of mybackground warts and alcohol and all, as is said….