The Almighty

by Irving Wallace

  "Okay," she said bravely, going to the bed, sitting. "But let me start first, then it'll be your turn."

  He stared at her blearily, shook his head. "No," he said. "My turn first. My turn's more important. About us."

  She raised her eyes to meet his, at once curious, wondering, waiting.

  "About us," he repeated. "Never made a pass at you. Wanted to every time. Never did. Explain—lemme explain."

  "You don't have to, Nick."

  "Have to, because." His speech was cottony. He was making an effort to pull himself together, be articulate. "Been a bachelor. Fell hard for a young woman, six, seven years ago. Was afraid to get involved, so close, but she loved me as much, I believed, I thought. We got married. Right after, found out she was pregnant by another guy, another guy she really loved, but he wouldn't make it legal so she faked it with me to get married. I wanted to kill myself or her. I wanted to."

  She took his hands. "I'm sorry, Nick."

  "Old story, old hat. But never did it, never killed anyone. Just divorced her, left her. Vowed never to trust another woman, never to let myself be hurt. Meant loneliness, frustration, started drinking, never stopped drinking. Good company. Course had one-night stands all the time, fucking, no commitment, never trusted another one again. Never fell in love, till I met you."

  She felt her heart hammering.

  "Was afraid to fall for you," he was saying. "Afraid to trust any woman who meant so much—"

  "I mean so much to you?"

  "What the hell, I'm in love with you, Vicky, and not holding back."

  "Oh, Nick." She was on her feet over him, almost moved to tears. She sought his lips and kissed him and kissed him. "I've been so in love with you from the start."

  His arms came heavily around her, pulling her down to his lap, kissing her back. "Vicky, come to bed with me."

  She felt him hardening beneath her, and heat pervaded her from cheeks and breasts to the inside of her thighs. She caught her breath, tried to be flippant. "I—I thought you'd never ask."

  He started to bring her down on the bed with him. "Now, darling."

  She squirmed free. "Yes, now," she said huskily. She came to her feet. "Let me go into the bathroom first. I'll only be a minute."

  Barefoot, she hastened to his bathroom, closed herself in. Divesting herself of the bathrobe, hanging it up on his hook, she reached down and pulled up her silk nightgown, drawing it up over her breasts and her head. She was flushed, throbbing with excitement. He loved her. He wanted her. They would never be apart again.

  She looked into his mirror over the sink. She wished that she had her makeup, her lotions, her perfume. But never mind. Her reflection told her what he would see, and what he would see was a flawless naked young woman in full blossom of love, from hardened nipples to moist vagina.

  He would enjoy her. And she wanted him.

  Not another second of their togetherness to lose.

  She left the bathroom, turning down the light, went in measured step around the corner and, in her nudity, entered the bedroom as unself-consciously as possible.

  He was waiting for her on the bed, she could see.

  She advanced to the side of the bed, arms limply at her sides, breasts rising and falling.

  She could see him fully now. He was lying on his side, still in his jock shorts, his head deep in a pillow. His eyes were shut. He was snoring lightly. He was sound asleep.

  He had passed out completely.

  Glaring down at him, she remained transfixed, wanting to cry, and wanting to laugh.

  Considering his inert figure, she tried to assess his earlier confession. Uninhibited, had he truly spilled out his love for her, or had he been merely plain stupid drunk and capable of saying anything?

  The answer?

  She'd once, as a youngster with her father, attended a movie festival of silent films, clips of silent day Saturday serials. They always left you hanging at the end of an episode. To be continued, they said.

  She smiled ruefully to herself.

  To be continued, she told herself.

  She turned away, walked back into the bathroom, retrieved her nightgown and bathrobe, and dragged them behind her through his bedroom, across the living room, and into her bedroom.

  If she was not fulfilled, she was at least sleepy at last.

  As for the rest? To be continued.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  At ten-thirty in the morning, Victoria Weston came down to the lobby of the Plaza Athénée Hotel, took her reserved copy of the day's International Herald Tribune from a concierge, and sank deep into an easy chair at the far side of the room. Partially hidden by the newspaper held open in front of her, she kept an eye on guests entering the main lobby from the elevators in the inner lobby beyond. She recalled that Nick had mentioned he would be leaving the hotel for Charles de Gaulle Airport at eleven o'clock in the morning, and she was determined to catch him before he departed.

  When she had awakened earlier, she had thrown on a robe and crossed the sitting room to his bedroom door. She had knocked loudly several times, but there had been no reply. Tentatively she had opened the door and called out to him, but still there was no response. She had gone inside. He was neither in the bedroom nor beyond the open bathroom door. She spotted his packed bag, typewriter, trench coat on an armchair. So he was away somewhere, but he had not yet left for the airport. After that she had hastily dressed, taken the elevator downstairs, and tried both bars, but no Nick. In the court restaurant, picking a table near the entrance, keeping a watch on the inner lobby, she had gulped down a quick breakfast. Still no sign of Nick. This meant he was out on some private business, like seeing Sid Lukas or maybe saying good-bye to a girl friend in the area. She knew he could return to the hotel through some other entrance, possibly the Relais Plaza bar, but he could not leave the hotel without paying his bill. Realizing this, she had planted herself in the corner of the main lobby.

  Absently scanning the paper as she waited, her thoughts were really on last night, on last night's fiasco, and Nick's unexpected profession of love for her. He had been terribly drunk, she knew, and babbling anything, maybe even insincerities. At the same time, he might have known what he was saying and meant every word of it. She could not be sure, but once she had a chance to speak with him and hear him out, she would know one way or the other.

  Victoria had reached the editorial page of the Herald Tribune, observing also that her wristwatch was at nine minutes to eleven, when she saw him striding into the lobby, preceded by a bellboy gripping his heavy suitcase and his portable typewriter. The bellboy continued straight to the revolving door leading to the Mercedes sedan waiting on the narrow pavement between the sidewalk and the Avenue Montaigne. Nick had detoured to the concierge's counter. Victoria saw him handing out some francs, obviously a tip, kept him in view as he moved along to the cashier's counter, where he was signing his bill.

  Now, tugging on the trench coat he had been carrying, he headed for the revolving door. He looked well-groomed, casual but neat in his beige sports jacket and slacks, and the picture of sobriety. He was inside the revolving door and outside on the sidewalk, when Victoria leaped to her feet. Casting aside her newspaper, she hurried across the lobby in pursuit.

  The chauffeur had already left a group of his colleagues to hold the rear door of the Mercedes open for Nick, and Nick had already tipped the bellboy and the doorman and entered the back of the car when Victoria reached it, nodded to the chauffeur, and ducked inside.

  Wedging into the back seat between Nick and the window, Victoria settled in and offered up a winning smile. "Mind having company on the way to the airport?"

  Surprised, Ramsey made more room for her. "I'm delighted," he said. "But how did you know when I was leaving?"

  "I'm psychic," she said. She waited for the chauffeur to start the car and drive it away, turning right to head for the autoroute and the airport, before elaborating. "No," she said, "we talked last night and you mentioned when you were
leaving." She paused. "Don't you remember?"

  His expression was honestly bewildered. "We talked last night? After I knew when I was leaving? I remember seeing the night concierge and—" He faltered. "—and then I came up and went to sleep."

  "We talked in between," she said adamantly.

  Ramsey shrugged. "I guess maybe we did." He tried to smile. "I guess maybe I had a drink too many."

  "I guess maybe you did," she said, also trying to smile, but her lips hurt and her heart sank.

  He was a total blank. He had been blind drunk. His memory apparatus had been fogged in.

  The shortest love affair, non-love affair, in history, she thought miserably. It would be hopeless to remind him. It would be embarrassing, too, because maybe the sober Nick Ramsey, the real person, entertained no such romantic feelings toward her.

  To hell with it, she decided. There was nothing more she could do but absorb her loss.

  "I really needed to talk to you, Nick, before you left. I tried several times, you know. Even last night at dinner."

  "At dinner?" He showed a glimmer of remembrance. "Yes, after the Carlos episode, before Armstead called to transfer me. I guess I was still shaken up by Carlos."

  "Whatever," she said. "But you have been putting me off."

  "I'm sorry."

  "I thought this was a good opportunity to discuss it."

  "Go ahead."

  She twisted toward him. "Nick, something strange has been going on, and it niggles at me. I want to get to the bottom of it. I very much need your good judgment."

  "All right. Let's hear. What's so strange?"

  "The wave of terrorism going on since we've been in Europe."

  "Vicky, there's been terrorism over here for years."

  "Not like this," she insisted. "Not so much, not so bunched together, one incident after another. Not so spectacular, either. These have involved only big names—king of Spain, secretary-general of the UN, prime minister of Israel. And important artifacts stolen—the Dead Sea scrolls. That's not how it used to happen."

  "What are you leading up to?"

  "Well, Carlos and his gang have been blamed for every one of these acts, even supplying weapons for the ETA operation in Spain. You were with Carlos yesterday. You heard him deny taking part in any of them."

  "I'd hardly consider Carlos a reliable source on what he did or did not do."

  "Do you think Carlos was telling you the truth?"

  "I honestly don't know."

  "I don't know either, but let me tell you what I think. I think Carlos told you the truth. I don't think he had anything to do with the terrorist acts that have been happening right under our noses."

  "What makes you so sure of that?"

  "Simply by reviewing what has been happening."

  Victoria launched into a point-by-point recounting of the recent kidnappings, robbery, killing. "I agree with Carlos," she concluded. "Not one of them his style. Not the operations. Not the ransoms. All this is not Carlos. It's someone else, someone else who is doing it."

  Ramsey stared thoughtfully out the car window at the passing suburban landscape. "If not Carlos, who?"

  "I don't know," said Victoria helplessly. "I thought maybe you would have some ideas."

  "There are a hundred splinter terrorist groups around," said Ramsey, "some large, some small. It could be any one of them, even a number of them."

  "It's the same group all the time," said Victoria without equivocation.

  "What makes you so positive?"

  "Bradshaw, Mark Bradshaw," Victoria said simply. "He's the common denominator. Whenever something's happened, he's been there."

  "So have you or I, almost every time."

  "But he's been there first. He gets it to the Record first. It doesn't make sense. How does he know that secret terrorist acts are going on before anyone else?"

  "Intuition, I guess," said Ramsey.

  "It has to be more than intuition," said Victoria. "I'm suggesting that Mark Bradshaw has some connection with the gang of terrorists pulling off these acts. He may know someone in the gang. Again, he may actually be part of the gang."

  "Aren't you being fanciful, Vicky? The guy's just a reporter working for Armstead, the way we are."

  Victoria fixed her gaze on Ramsey. "Prove it," she said.

  "What?"

  "That Mark Bradshaw is a reporter on the New York Record."

  Ramsey frowned. "What's to prove? I'm not naïve, but like one famous American, I believe what I read. And I read Mark Bradshaw's by-line in the paper. That's for real."

  "That's a line of type, Nick. That's not a person."

  "I've never known a by-line that did not represent a person or persons."

  Victoria would not let go. "If Mark Bradshaw is a person, where is he? Who is he? Have you met anyone who has met him, seen him? Everyone on every paper is asking questions about Mark Bradshaw. So far, no answers. Well, I say he's the key to what's going on, to who is pulling off all these terrorist acts. I say find Mark Bradshaw, and you find out the truth about what's going on that's so suspicious."

  "Vicky, maybe there's nothing going on that's so suspicious."

  "I choose to think there is. I thought you might agree with me. Anyway, you're leaving, and I'm staying here. I'm to do the Lourdes background job, and I'll do it. But I'm also going after Mark Bradshaw. I'm determined to find out who he is. I hope you agree with me."

  Ramsey fell silent. He stared reflectively once more out of the car window. At the turnoff to Charles de Gaulle Airport he lit a cigarette and let down the car window a few inches.

  Not until the Mercedes drew up to the curb under the airport overhang, and the chauffeur left his seat to remove the bag and typewriter from the trunk, did Ramsey speak. He covered Victoria's hand briefly. "I agree," he said. "You do what you can to track down Bradshaw. If you find yourself getting nowhere, I suggest you try the personnel director at the Record—Katherine Crowe. You met Mrs. Crowe the day you came to work. Anyway, she's an old friend of mine. You can talk to her on a confidential basis. If you need further research on Bradshaw, use someone on the outside—it's always better to work with someone outside the office, especially on a matter like this—get hold of Howie Dittman on the New York Telegraph. He moonlights as a researcher. He'll do anything for me and he's a whiz."

  "One second," said Victoria. She had her notepad on her knee. "Howie Dittman," she repeated, writing. "New York Telegraph." She looked up. "You're sure you won't regret getting involved, Nick?"

  "Never mind. Do as I say." He reached for the handle of the car door. "You know, there was something I meant to tell you last night—but, well, it can wait. We'll be together again one day soon."

  "Oh, I hope so, Nick." Impulsively she leaned over and kissed him.

  "You go on," he said. Stepping out of the car, he turned back. "Just watch where you're going, and always look behind you. Remember that."

  "I'll remember."

  "If you need me, you know where I am."

  "Yes, Nick."

  He picked up his suitcase and his typewriter and headed into the airport terminal.

  At the Plaza Athénée once more, Victoria occupied herself by checking out of the suite and transferring her effects to a single room on the same floor. Once settled, she ordered salad and quiche from room service. Having finished lunch, she was tempted to undertake the hunt for Mark Bradshaw, wherever it might lead her, but she knew that she dared not divert herself with that yet.

  Armstead had given her a definite assignment, and her immediate job was to deliver it. The Pope was leaving the Vatican to visit the miracle site of Lourdes—His Holiness would be there in four days—and Victoria was expected to research and write a feature story on what the Pope would see. She had been ordered to file it with McAllister late the following afternoon.

  She tried to figure out where to start her research, and finally decided to start in the obvious place. She would go to the Paris bureau of the Record and search thro
ugh its reference files for clippings on Lourdes. This would give her sufficient background to know what she was doing, and perhaps provide a lead or two to sources that might offer some firsthand copy.

  It was a short walk to the building on the Rue la Boëtie, a block from the Champs-Elysées. She took the rickety elevator up to the second floor, entered the Record bureau, greeted the two French girls at work in the main office, and put her head in on Sid Lukas, the myopic bureau chief, who was editing some dispatch at his desk in his tiny cubicle of an office.

  "Hi, Sid," Victoria called out. "Mind if I rummage through your reference files? Doing a backgrounder on Lourdes."

  "Make yourself at home. Doubt if you'll find much of use."

  "We'll see."

  She backtracked to the main office and the long row of green metal reference files, and when she found the manila folder bearing the word LOURDES she pulled the folder and took it to an empty table. It was, as Lukas had warned her, an unpromising ifie as to bulk. Seated, she removed the two dozen clippings and carbons of filed stories, spread them out, sorted them into categories, and dipped into her purse for notepad and pen.

  She began to read the clippings and carbons with care, occasionally making notes. First the historical basis for the fame of Lourdes. The fame of the small town had its birth on February 11, 1858. A simple fourteen-year-old native of the town, Bernadette Soubirous, a onetime shepherdess, a mediocre student at a parochial school, a girl who had long suffered from asthma, had gone to the outskirts of the town with her sister and a friend to gather firewood. Trailing behind the other two, about to cross the mill canal near a grotto, Bernadette heard a distant murmur which she thought was a gust of wind. Later, she would recall the moment. "I lost all power of speech and thought when, turning my head to the grotto, I saw at one of the openings of the rock a rosebush, one only, moving as if it were very windy. Almost at the same time there came out of the interior of the grotto a golden-colored cloud, and soon after a Lady, young and beautiful, exceedingly beautiful, the like of whom I had never seen, came and placed herself at the entrance of the opening above the rosebush."