The general felt a delicious shiver travel down the length of his spine, lodge itself like a heated arrow between his thighs. Reaching out, he opened the door. Lena writhed on the bed, naked. He heard the door close behind him. Without thinking, he undressed himself, then he stepped out of the puddle of his clothes, took Kiki’s hand, padded over to the bed. He knelt on it, she let go of his hand, and he fell on Lena.
He felt Kiki’s hands on his shoulders, and, groaning, he lost himself within Lena’s lush body. The pleasure built along with the anticipation of Kiki’s long, lithe body pressed against his glistening back.
It took him some time to become aware that the quick flashes of light weren’t a result of the quickened firing of nerve endings behind his eyes. Drugged with sex and desire, he was slow to turn his head directly into another battery of flashes. Even then, negative images dancing behind his retinas, his fogged brain couldn’t quite piece together what was happening, and his body continued to move rhythmically against Lena’s pliant flesh.
Then the camera flashed again, he belatedly raised his hand to shield his eyes, and there was stark reality staring him in the face. Kiki, still dressed, continued to take shots of him and Lena.
“Smile, General,” she said in that sensual, honeyed voice. “There’s nothing else you can do.”
I’ve got too much anger inside me,” Petra said. “It’s like one of those flesh-eating diseases you read about.”
“Dachau is toxic for you, so is Munich now,” Bourne said. “You’ve got to go away.”
She moved to the left-hand lane of the autobahn, put on some real speed. They were on their way back to Munich in the car Pelz’s nephew had bought for him under the nephew’s name. The police might still be looking for both of them, but their only lead was Petra’s Munich apartment, and neither of them had any intention of going anywhere near it. As long as she didn’t get out of the car, Bourne felt it was relatively safe for her to drive him back into the city.
“Where would I go?” she said.
“Leave Germany altogether.”
She laughed, but it wasn’t a pleasant sound. “Turn tail and run, you mean.”
“Why would you see it that way?”
“Because I’m German; because I belong here.”
“The Munich police are looking for you,” he said.
“And if they find me, then I’ll do my time for killing your friend.” She flashed her headlights so a slower car could get out of her way. “Meanwhile I have money. I can live.”
“But what will you do?”
She gave him a lopsided smile. “I’m going to take care of Virgil. He needs drying out; he needs a friend.” Nearing the city, she changed lanes so she could exit when she needed to. “The cops won’t find me,” she said with an odd kind of certainty, “because I’m taking him far away from here. Virgil and me, we’ll be two outlaws learning a whole new way of life.”
Egon Kirsch lived in the northern district of Schwabing, known as the young intellectual quarter because of the mass of university students that flooded its streets, cafés, and bars.
As they came abreast of Schwabing’s main plaza, Petra pulled over. “When I was younger I used to hang out here with my friends. We were all militants, then, agitating for change, and we felt connected to this place because it was from here that the Freiheitsaktion Bayer, one of the most famed resistance groups, commandeered Radio Munich near the end of the war. They broadcast messages to the populace to seize and arrest all local Nazi leaders, and to signal their rejection of the regime by waving white sheets out of their windows—an action that was punishable by death, by the way. And they managed to save a large number of civilian lives as the American army swept in.”
“At last we find something in Munich that even you can be proud of,” Bourne said.
“I suppose so.” Petra laughed, almost sadly. “But I among all of my friends was the only one who stayed a revolutionary. The others are corporate functionaries or Hausfraus now. They lead sad, gray lives. I see them sometimes, trudging to and from work. I walk by them; they don’t even look up. In the end, they all disappointed me.”
Kirsch’s apartment was on the top floor of a beautiful house of stone-colored stucco, arched windows, and a terra-cotta tile roof. Between two of his windows was a niche holding a stone statue of the Virgin Mary cradling the baby Jesus.
Petra pulled into the curb in front of the building. “I wish you well, American,” she said, deliberately using Virgil Pelz’s phrasing. “Thank you… for everything.”
“You may not believe it, but we helped each other,” Bourne said as he got out of the car. “Good luck, Petra.”
When she’d driven off, he turned, went up the steps to the building, and used the code Kirsch had given him to open the front door. The interior was neat and spotlessly clean. The wood-paneled hallway gleamed with a recent waxing. Bourne climbed the carved wooden staircase to the top floor. Using Kirsch’s key, he let himself in. Though the apartment itself was light and airy, with many windows overlooking the street, it was steeped in a deep silence, as if it existed on the bottom of the sea. There was no TV, no computer. Bookcases lined one entire wall of the living room, holding volumes by Nietzsche, Kant, Descartes, Heidegger, Leibniz, and Machiavelli. There were also books by many of the great mathematicians, biographers, fiction writers, and economists. The other walls were covered with Kirsch’s framed and matted line drawings, so detailed and intricate that at first glance they seemed to be architectural plans, but then suddenly they came into focus and Bourne realized the drawings were abstracts. Like all good art, they seemed to move back and forth from reality to an imagined dream world where anything was possible.
After taking a brief tour of all the rooms, he settled down in a chair behind Kirsch’s desk. He thought long and hard about the professor. Was he Dominic Specter, the nemesis of the Black Legion, as he claimed to be, or was he, in fact, Asher Sever, the leader of the Black Legion? If he was Sever, he’d staged the attack on himself—an elaborate scheme that had cost a number of lives. Could the professor be guilty of such an irrational act? If he was the leader of the Black Legion, certainly. The second question Bourne had been asking himself was why the professor would entrust the stolen plans to Pyotr’s thoroughly undependable network. But there was another enigma: If the professor was Sever, why was he so anxious to get those plans? Wouldn’t he already have them? These two questions went around and around in Bourne’s head without producing a satisfactory solution. Nothing about the situation he found himself in appeared to make sense, which meant that a vital part of the picture was missing. And yet he had the nagging suspicion that, like Egon Kirsch’s drawings, he was being shown two separate realities—if only he could decipher which was real and which one was false.
At length, he turned his mind to something that had been bothering him ever since the incident at the Egyptian Museum. He knew that Franz Jens had been the only one to follow him into the museum, so how on earth did Arkadin know where he was? Arkadin had to have been the one to kill Jens. He also must have given the order to kill Egon Kirsch, but, again, how did he know where Kirsch was?
The answers to both questions were firmly rooted in time and place. He hadn’t been tailed to the museum, then…. As a chill spread through him, Bourne went very still. With no physical tail, there had to be an electronic tail somewhere on his person. But how had it been put there? Someone could have brushed up against him in the airport. He rose, slowly undressed. As he did so, he went through every item of clothing, looking for an electronic tag. Finding nothing, he dressed, sat again in the chair, deep in thought.
With his eidetic memory, he went through every step of his journey from Moscow to Munich. When he recalled the German Immigration officer, he realized that his passport had been out of his possession for close to half a minute. Taking it out of his breast pocket, he began to leaf through it, checking each page both by sight and by touch. On the inside of the back cover, stuck in the fold of
the binding, he found the tiny transmitter.
Thirty-Seven
HOW WONDERFUL it is to breathe the goodnight air,” Veronica Hart said as she stood on the pavement just outside the Pentagon.
“Diesel fumes and all,” Stu Gold said.
“I knew LaValle’s charges wouldn’t stick,” she said as they crossed to his car. “They’re patently trumped up.”
“I wouldn’t begin celebrating just yet,” the attorney said. “LaValle’s put me on notice that he’s going to take those surveillance photos of you and Bourne to the president tomorrow for an executive order to have you removed.”
“Come on, Stu, those were private conversations between Martin Lindros and a civilian, Moira Trevor. There’s nothing in them. LaValle’s banking on hot air.”
“He’s got the secretary of defense,” Gold said. “Under the circumstances that alone is enough to make trouble for you.”
The wind was whipping up and Hart caught her hair, pushed it off her face. “Coming into CI and marching me out in cuffs… LaValle made a big mistake grandstanding like that.” She turned, looked back at the headquarters of the NSA in which she’d been incarcerated for three hours until the moment Gold showed up with his order from a federal judge for her temporary release. “He’ll pay for humiliating me.”
“Veronica, don’t do anything rash.” Gold opened the car door, ushered her inside. “Knowing LaValle as I do it’s more than likely that he wants you to go off half-cocked. That’s how fatal mistakes are made.”
He went around the front of the car, got behind the wheel, and they drove off.
“We can’t let him get away with this, Stu. Unless we stop him he’s going to hijack CI right out from under us.” She watched the Virginia night turn into the district night as they crossed the Arlington Memorial Bridge. The Lincoln Memorial rose up before them. “I made a pledge when I signed on.”
“Like all DCIs.”
“No, I’m talking about a personal pledge.” She very much wanted to see Lincoln sitting on his chair, contemplating all the unknowns that lay before every human being. She asked Gold to make a stop there. “I never told anyone this, Stu, but the day I officially became DCI I went to the Old Man’s grave. Have you ever been to the Arlington National Cemetery? It’s a sobering place, but in its own way a joyous place as well. So many heroes, so much courage, the bedrock of our freedom, Stu, every one of us.”
They’d come to the memorial. They both got out, walked up to the majestic floodlit granite statue, stood gazing up into Lincoln’s stern, wise face. Someone had left a bouquet of flowers at his feet, withered heads nodding in the wind.
“I stayed at the Old Man’s grave for a long time,” Hart continued in a faraway voice. “I swear I could feel him, I swear I felt something stir against me, then inside me.” Her gaze swung around to fix on the attorney. “There’s a long, exemplary legacy at CI, Stu. I swore then, and I’m swearing now, that I won’t let anything or anyone damage that legacy.” She took a breath. “So whatever it takes.”
Gold returned her stare without flinching. “Do you know what you’re asking?”
“Yes, I believe I do.”
At last, he said, “All right, Veronica, it’s your call. Whatever it takes.”
Feeling invigorated and invulnerable after his workout, Rodney Feir met General Kendall in the champagne room, reserved for those VIPs who had consummated the evening’s pleasures and wanted to linger, with or without their girls. Of course time spent in there was far more expensive with the girls than without.
The champagne room was decorated like a Middle Eastern pasha’s den. The two men lazed on voluminous pillows while being served the bubbly of their choice. This was where Feir planned to hand over the intel on Typhon’s field agents. But first he wanted to luxuriate in the pure pleasure provided in the back rooms of The Glass Slipper. After all, the moment he set foot outside, the real world would come crashing in on him with all its annoyances, petty humiliations, drudgery, and the piquancy of fear that preceded every move he made to advance LaValle’s position vis-à-vis CI.
Kendall, his cell phone at his right hand, sat rather stiffly, as befitted a military man. Feir thought he must be slightly uncomfortable in such lush surroundings. The men chatted for a time, sipping their champagne, exchanging theories about steroids and baseball, about the chances of the Redskins making the play-offs next year, the gyrations of the stock market, anything but politics.
After a time, when the bottle of champagne was nearly exhausted, Kendall looked at his watch. “What d’you have for me?”
This was the moment Feir had been keenly anticipating. He couldn’t wait to see the look on the general’s face when he caught a glimpse of the intel. Reaching into the pocket in the lining of his coat, he brought out the packet. A low-tech hard copy was the safest way to smuggle data out of the CI building, since security systems were in place to monitor the comings and goings of any device with a hard drive large enough to hold substantial data files.
A smile broke out across Feir’s face. “The whole enchilada. Every last detail on the Typhon agents across the globe.” He held up the packet. “Now let’s talk about what I get in return.”
“What do you want?” Kendall said without much enthusiasm. “A higher grade? More control?”
“I want respect,” Feir said. “I want LaValle to respect me the way you do.”
A curious smile curled the general’s lips. “I can’t speak for Luther, but I’ll see what I can do.”
As he leaned forward to take the intel, Feir was wondering why he was so solemn—no, worse than solemn, he was downright glum. Feir was on the point of asking him about it when a tall, elegant black woman began snapping a series of photos.
“What the hell?” he said, through the blinding string of flashes.
When his vision cleared, he saw Soraya Moore standing beside them. She had the packet of intel in her hand.
“This isn’t a good night for you, Rodney.” She picked up the general’s cell phone, thumbed it on, and there was the conversation between the general and Feir recorded and regurgitated so everyone could hear his treachery for themselves. “No, I would have to say that all things considered it’s the end of the line.”
I’m not afraid to die,” Devra said, “if that’s what you’re worried about.”
“I’m not worried,” Arkadin said. “What makes you think I’m worried?”
She bit into the chocolate ice cream he’d bought her. “You’ve got that deep vertical indentation between your eyes.”
She wanted ice cream even though it was the middle of winter. Maybe it was the chocolate she wanted, he thought. Not that it mattered; pleasing her in little ways was strangely satisfying—as if in pleasing her he was also pleasing himself, although that seemed like an impossibility to him.
“I’m not worried,” he said. “I’m thoroughly pissed off.”
“Because your boss told you to stay away from Bourne.”
“I’m not going to stay away from Bourne.”
“You’ll piss off your boss.”
“There comes a time,” Arkadin said, walking faster.
They were in the center of Munich; he wanted to be in a central location when Icoupov told him where he was meeting Bourne in order to get there as quickly as possible.
“I’m not afraid to die,” Devra repeated. “The only thing is, though, what do you do when you no longer have memories?”
Arkadin shot her a look. “What?”
“When you look at a dead person what do you see?” She took another bite of ice cream between her teeth, leaving little indentations in what was left of the scoop. “Nothing, right? Not a damn thing. Life has flown the coop, and with it all the memories that have been built up over the years.” She looked at him. “At that moment, you cease to be human, so what are you?”
“Who gives a shit?” Arkadin said. “It’ll be a fucking relief to be without memories.”
Soraya presented herself at t
he NSA safe house just before 10 AM, so that by the time she cleared the various levels of security, she was being ushered into the Library precisely on time.
“Breakfast, madam?” Willard asked as he escorted her across the plush carpet.
“I believe I will, today,” she said. “A fines herbes omelet would be nice. Do you have a baguette?”
“We do, indeed, madam.”
“Fine.” She shifted the evidence damning General Kendall from one hand to the other. “And a pot of Ceylon tea, Willard. Thank you.”
She walked the rest of the way to where Luther LaValle sat, drinking his morning cup of coffee. He stared out the window, casting a jaundiced eye on the early spring. It was so warm the fireplace held only cold, white ash.
He did not turn when she sat down. She placed the evidence file on her lap, then said without preamble, “I’ve come to take Tyrone home.”
LaValle ignored her. “There’s nothing on your Black Legion; there’s no unusual terrorist activities inside the US. We’ve come up blank.”
“Did you hear what I said? I’ve come for Tyrone.”
“That’s not going to happen,” LaValle said.
Soraya brought out Kendall’s cell phone, played back the conversation he’d had with Rodney Feir in the champagne room of The Glass Slipper.
“Every last detail on the Typhon agents across the globe,” came Feir’s voice. “Now let’s talk about what I get in return.”
General Kendall: “What do you want? A higher grade? More control?”
Feir: “I want respect. I want LaValle to respect me the way you do.”
“Who cares?” LaValle’s head swung around. His eyes were dark and glassy. “That’s Feir’s problem, not mine.”
“Maybe so.” Soraya slid the file across the table toward him. “However, this is very much your problem.”
LaValle stared at her for a moment. His eyes were now full of venom. Without lowering his gaze, he reached out, flipped open the file. There he saw photo after photo of General Kendall, naked as sin, caught in the midst of having intercourse with a young black woman.