Enemy of My Enemy

by Allan Topol

  When she saw that he wasn't undressing, she said, "Let's go. Speed it up. I don't have much time. I have to be back for my next shift."

  Without responding, Moreau reached into his pocket and extracted the bag of white powder. Her eyes bulged. Her whole body began trembling.

  He opened the plastic bag and held it up to her nose so she could smell it. Perspiration dotted her forehead.

  "Let's do some business," he said.

  "All I have is the hundred you just gave me. You can have that back, and I'll do whatever you want." She was pleading with him. "You don't have to use a condom. You can come in my mouth."

  He looked at her with contempt. He hated junkies.

  "Or anywhere else... I'll do Greek."

  "I want information," he said. "You give me what I want and the whole package is yours."

  She eyed him suspiciously. "You didn't come here to fuck me, did you?"

  What he wanted to say was, "There's no way I'd put my cock into that sewer," but instead he said, "Let's talk first, Francoise Colbert. Later we'll fuck."

  At the sound of the name she had been given at birth, she looked at him in stunned disbelief. She hadn't used that name in years. She had legally changed it shortly after coming to Montreal, hoping to start a new life. Suddenly a light went off for her. "You're a cop. Aren't you?"

  "Not exactly," he said.

  "The accent is from Paris. I had trouble picking it up. Now I know."

  He nodded.

  "You bastard."

  He looked at her with indifference and stuffed the plastic bag back in his pocket. "If you don't want to talk, that's okay with me." He turned toward the door.

  "Don't go," she begged, desperate for the white powder.

  She grabbed a threadbare blue terry-cloth bathrobe from the sofa and pointed to a table in the living room. He sat down across from her with the plastic bag on the table in front of him. Let her look at it, he thought.

  "How do you know my name?" she asked.

  He shook his head. "I ask the questions."

  "What do you want to know?"

  "In 1981 you were seeing an engineer from Lyons by the name of Jean Pierre. Weren't you?"

  She was shaking. It had been more than twenty years, and she had heard nothing. She and Jack had been so young. She was certain it was ancient history. Now this man came out of nowhere.

  "Maybe I was, and maybe I wasn't," she said in a hostile voice.

  As he studied her face, he knew that she was the woman he had been looking for all these years.

  "Why do you care?" she asked.

  He ignored her question. "Did you know that valuable French government secrets were given to the Israelis by Jean Pierre each time he came to Paris to meet you?"

  She looked down at her veiny hands without responding.

  "You can help yourself," he said, trying to gain her confidence. "Tell me what you know, and I won't charge you with being part of the conspiracy."

  When she still didn't answer, he said, "What's the matter? The sisters taught you not to lie at Sacred Heart?" He smiled broadly. "That's rich."

  "Go fuck yourself," she said.

  "They also taught you not to use foul language."

  "What do you want?" she said, now concluding that her chances of getting any of the white power were between slim and none.

  "The name of the Israeli agent who put you up to it, how the operation worked, and how much he paid you. Let's start with the name."

  "He never told me," she said.

  Her answer was truthful. When she had first met Jack Cole, he called himself Gregory Walsh. She had fallen in love with him, and not just because of the money he was giving her. He had been so idealistic and so mysterious about his life. Once, after they had made love and he had fallen asleep, she had rifled through his wallet and found the French driver's license in the name of Jack Cole. She had laughed to herself. He was so new at what he was doing that he had kept his identity with him. She never told him about it. A month later, when he had asked her help with Jean Pierre, she had done it to please him because she loved him. She hoped he would marry her.

  And there was something else. She was an innocent in those days, a holdover from the youth culture of the seventies, a believer in the dream of world peace along with free love. Jack had a dynamic personality. He was inspiring. When he explained to her that the point of this operation was to block the proliferation of nuclear weapons, she was enthusiastic. Then there was the sense of danger. It was the most thrilling thing she had ever done. The excitement was intoxicating. In bed with Jean Pierre, she went through the motions each time while Jack copied documents in the next room. The next night she and Jack made passionate love, intoxicated by "her role in history," as Jack explained it.

  Once the operation was over, she knew that Jack would never marry her. But he was wonderful and concerned about her. He gave her all of the papers she needed to resettle in Montreal under a false name, and enough money to last for ten years. He had been good to her. She had loved him. She couldn't betray him.

  "You're lying," Moreau said sharply.

  "I don't lie. He never told me his name."

  Moreau extracted a picture from his wallet: a five-by-seven black-and-white. It was an older version of Jack.

  "Is this the man?"

  She didn't respond.

  "How did the operation work?"

  She stared at the ceiling with a sullen expression on her face. This cop was like a hungry dog with a bone. He'd never let go. She was in deep trouble.

  "Suit yourself," Moreau said in a hard, cold voice. "I'm taking you back to Paris with me. I think you'll talk there."

  She knew exactly what he had in mind. When he got her to France they'd put her in a prison cell and withhold the heroin until they broke her and she talked.

  They'd force her to testify against Jack. Afterward they'd put her in jail for life for her role in the operation. Never mind what this bastard said now.

  A great wave of depression enveloped her. She was disgusted with herself, with what she had become. She remembered those days of glory. She knew what she had to do.

  "I kept a notebook," she said, sounding reluctant, "the whole time of the operation. It lays out all of the details. Exactly what you want. I thought I might need it one day to save myself."

  Moreau was elated. This was what he had hoped for. "That day has come. If the notebook's as good as you say, you could escape with your freedom."

  She nodded.

  "Where's the notebook?"

  She pointed to the bedroom. "In the dresser. Third drawer down on the right. Under my lingerie."

  "Get it," he ordered.

  She gave him the finger. "Do it yourself. I'm not your slave."

  Thinking about the notebook, Moreau was too excited to argue with her. "Don't move, bitch," he barked. "I'll be right back."

  She watched him jump up and run into the bedroom. Then she crossed herself for lying, took a deep breath, slipped off her robe, and ran toward the door leading to the balcony.

  As she hoisted herself up onto the waist-high, ice-cold wrought-iron railing, finally she felt joy. At least this way she would be saving Jack. Without her testimony, this prick of a detective would never have a case against him. That was why he was practically wetting his pants at the thought of the notebook.

  Long before this French detective had arrived, the reality of her situation was smacking her in the face every day. She had squandered her life, which had turned to shit. By doing this now for Jack, she would at least be doing something useful with what meager little she had left. Salvation for Jack. Redemption for herself.

  The railing was cold on her bare feet. Using what little strength she had, she willed herself to stand up. For an instant she was precariously perched, her arms spread out for balance. Then she closed her eyes and leaped into the void. "I love you, Jack Cole," she cried out. "I love you."

  In the bedroom Moreau cursed as he searched frantically th
rough the drawer, tossing her smelly lingerie to the floor. There was no notebook here. He raced back into the living room. Then he stopped in his tracks and gaped at the open door to the patio. By the time he reached the railing, she was already splattered on the street below.

  Furious at himself for leaving her alone, Moreau left the building quickly through the rear, before anyone could see him. Disheartened, he gained no solace from the fact that she had confirmed what he had deduced from reexamining the transcript of Jean Pierre's interrogation. He needed a live witness to testify against Jack Cole.

  On the cab ride to the airport, Moreau became even more determined. If he couldn't charge Jack Cole with this crime, he'd redouble his efforts to charge him with another. Meantime, he had distributed Jack Cole's name and picture to passport control at all the French airports. It had been given to gendarmes who patrolled the Paris train stations, and it was pasted on bulletin boards there. Monique, Cole's secretary, had said he was out of the country. Sooner or later he'd come back to Paris. Then they'd nab him.

  Chapter 12

  Sam's eyes swung from Ann, seated on one side of the living room, to Sarah seated on the other. These two are so much alike that it's scary, he decided.

  "Looky here," he said. "You have to eat. I'm taking the two of you out to dinner."

  Ann raised her hand. "Leave us be. You go out yourself. We'll be all right."

  Still frantic with worry about Bobby, but feeling better to be away from Terry, Sarah overruled her daughter. "He's right, Ann. We're not doing a thing for Bobby by starving ourselves. We need our strength to cope."

  Ann smoothed down the side of her hair and gave a deep sigh. "Getting the two of you together may have been a mistake on my part."

  Sam booked a table at The Square on Bruton Street off Berkeley Square, a restaurant at which he had clout because he frequently brought U.S. clients there. What he liked about it for this evening wasn't only the superb French cuisine and professional service, but the comfortable ambience of the high-ceilinged, wood-paneled modern room. The decibel level was low, and the tables were widely spaced.

  Initially, when Sam had heard that Sarah was coming to London to stay with Ann in her flat, he was fearful that his effort to bring Ann out of the deep depression that had engulfed her was doomed to failure. He was pleasantly surprised to hear Sarah asking Ann about the status of the research in her postgraduate study at the University of London on the causes of the decline of British influence in the Middle East in the twentieth century. The relationship between mother and daughter intrigued him. Ann, who had always clashed with her father, had fought with her mother as a child as well, because she saw her mother as the agent who willingly implemented her father's arbitrary demands. Late in her teens she began to see her mother as a victim of her father, just as she and Robert were. With that reassessment, a close bond between mother and daughter developed. In Ann's mind, they were coconspirators with a common enemy. Sam had first seen the two of them together when he and Ann were already dating, and Sarah had come alone to visit her daughter. "Of course, I won't tell your father that you're seeing him," Sarah had said.

  "If I thought you would, I would have never have told you," Ann had replied.

  Under the overhead lights of The Square, Sam was struck by how wan and pale Ann was. When he had first met her, she had her mother's good looks, the soft brown eyes that sparkled, the wide smile, the wavy brown hair. Now for both of them all of those were eclipsed by a tightly closed mouth, a long face, and bloodshot eyes. Anxiety about her brother had taken its toll on Ann as well as Sarah.

  During cocktails Sam tried to steer the conversation to topics other than Robert, including Ann's work at the university, his own law practice, and the London theater. By the time their first course arrived, a fabulous foie gras with rhubarb that all three had ordered, Ann had turned the conversation back to her brother. "What's so frustrating is the helplessness of it all. There has to be something else we can do for Robert. Somebody we can talk to."

  Sarah shook her head in disbelief. Ann's speech was one she had heard frequently from Terry before he decided that they should go to Washington. Trying to help her daughter cope, she said, "Believe me, honey, we tried everyone back home. Your father and I have met twice with the president himself and three times with Jimmy Grange, his close adviser."

  Ann rolled her eyes. "Father probably pissed off everyone so badly they won't lift a finger."

  Sarah smiled despite herself. "That's true. There was some of that."

  Ann's face lit up. She turned to Sam. "Hey, I've got an idea. Your law firm has an international practice. There must be one of your clients who does business in Turkey."

  "I've already made those calls," Sam replied, sounding sympathetic. "I came up empty."

  "We're not thinking creatively enough," Ann insisted.

  A waiter clad in a black jacket was clearing their first courses.

  "There must be something you can do," Ann pleaded in a way that tore at Sam's heart.

  He paused to sip some wine. He loved her so much and wanted her to know he had done everything he could. He realized that telling her about his trip to Tel Aviv meant walking into a minefield, but he had to do it.

  Sam sighed. "I even went to Israel to talk to my brother, Jack, in the hope that he might know somebody there who could help."

  Sarah, who had been slumped in her chair, shot to a straight position, her back rigid, her facial muscles tense. "What did he say?" she asked before Ann could respond.

  Sam didn't want to tell them the truth. "There's nothing he can do. He said he was sorry."

  Sarah snapped at Sam. "He wasn't sorry at all. You were nice to try that approach, but I could have told you that Jack will never lift a finger to help."

  Sam felt the need to defend his brother. "I'm sure if he could—"

  Sarah cut him off with a short, sardonic laugh. "Ha! C'mon, I know Jack a lot better than you do. In everything he did, he played to win. Losing was something he would never accept. So the idea of him helping Terry McCallister's son is preposterous."

  Sarah's tone upset Ann even more. "Mom, what's wrong? What exactly was the deal with you and Father and Jack?"

  Sam was fidgeting in his chair. Though he had always wanted to know the details of what had happened between Sarah and Jack, he was now sorry he had opened this can of worms. Miraculously, a waiter arrived with their main courses on a tray under metal domes. As another waiter removed the dishes from the tray and placed them on the table, turbot for Ann and Sarah, roast squab for Sam, he tried to change the subject. "What I like about this restaurant is—"

  Ann cut him off. "What exactly was the deal with you and Father and Jack, Mother?" she repeated.

  "He was the boy next door," Sarah said, trying to recover and brush her off. "We dated in high school. We both went to Michigan together. Freshman year I met your Dad. Jack moved to Israel. End of story."

  Ann was smart and knew her mother too well to believe that was all there was. "C'mon. The details."

  Ann didn't make a move to lift her fork. Sarah took a deep breath. They were both weakened emotionally. "Leave it alone, Ann."

  "I want to know."

  Sam's eyes moved from one to the other, as if he were watching a Ping-Pong match.

  "This isn't the time."

  "I want to know now. I need to know."

  Sarah didn't have the strength to resist Ann's demand. She knew that her daughter wouldn't give up until she was satisfied. In desperation, she looked at Sam for help, but he knew how strong-willed Ann could be. He wasn't about to try to block her in her current state.

  With a sigh, Sarah yielded and began talking in a slow, halting voice. "From the time we moved in next door to the Coles, Jack and I were inseparable. He was not only the first boy I ever dated and kissed, he was the only boy until I got to Michigan."

  She turned to Sam. "I'm sure that you don't remember, because you were only three at the time, but I went with my parent
s to Israel with your family for Jack's bar mitzvah. He and I slipped out of the hotel at night and explored the city. It was a marvelous time to be in Israel in 1969, two years after the 'sixty-seven war. Euphoria was the mood. Peace seemed likely. Everything was possible. Jack fell in love with the place. He wanted us to move there after high school, go to Hebrew University and spend the rest of our lives in Israel."

  "You were only thirteen at the time," Ann said.

  "I know, but we assumed, both of us, that we would get married one day. Although I have to admit I was less than enthused about the living-in-Israel part. So we compromised. First we'd go to college in the United States. After graduation we'd get married, try Israel for a year, and see if we liked it."

  Ann was surprised. "You were so young. How could you be talking about marriage with any man?"

  Sarah took a bite of her fish, remembering how magical their relationship had been in high school—the high school prom at Senn, where she had been selected prom queen and Jack was class president. Ah, the promise of youth.

  "It was a different time, Ann. We were in love. The sexual revolution was just starting. Your generation knows a great deal more about sex then we did. A lot less about love."

  "So then what happened to this great love affair?" Ann asked. She and Sam were staring at Sarah, who needed a good slug of wine before she could continue.

  "In the fall of 'seventy-one, we went off to the University of Michigan together, Jack and I. We both enrolled in the R.C., a small liberal-arts college within the university made up mostly of liberals, which we were, and intellectuals, which we wanted to be. In the first couple months I met Terry and got caught up in the radical politics of that time. I became an officer in the new left student movement. We were activists. Our focus was not only on the campus, where students wanted a greater say in running the university, but on national issues. The goal was to avoid the 1968 debacle of Humphrey and move the Democratic party to the left at the 'seventy-two convention in Miami Beach."