THE PARSIFAL MOSAIC

BY

ROBERT LUDLUM

 Bantam Books by Robert Ludlum
 Ask your book seller for the books you have missed

 THE AQUITAINE PROGRESSION
 THE BOURNE IDENTITY
 THE CHANCELLOR MANUSCRIPT
 THE HOLCROFT COVENANT
 THE MATARESE CIRCLE
 THE OSTERMAN WEEKEND
 THE PARSIFAL MOSAIC
 THE ROAD TO GANDOLFO
 THE SCARLATTI INHERITANCE

BANTAM BOOKS
TORONTO- NEWYORK - LA)NDON -SYDNEY* AUCKLANI)
 A Bantam Book / published by arrangement with
          the Author

        PRINTING HISTORY
Random House edition fublished March 1982
A Selection of iterary Guild
Bantam Export edition / April 1982
Bantam edition / March 1983
12 printings through June 1985

All rights reserved.
Copyright 0 1982 by Robert Ludlum.
Cover art copyright (D 1983 by Mara McAlfee.
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        ISBN Oj553-25270-4

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     H21 20 19 18 17 16 15 14 13
 For Dolores and Charles Ryducha, two of the finest people I have ever
 knownfrom a grateful brother Na zdrowiel
               THE
 PARSIFAL
    MOSAIC
 BOOK
 - ONE,
 1

 The cold rays of the moon streaked down from the night sky and bounced off
 the rolling surf ' which burst into suspen ed sprays of white where isolated
 waves crashed into the rocks of the shoreline. The stretch of beach between
 the towering boulders of the Costa Brava was the execution ground. It had to
 be. May God damn this goddamned world-it had to bel
  He could see her now. And hear her through the sounds of the sea and the
  breaking surf. She was running wildly, screaming hysterically: "Pro boha
  iiv6hol ProN Co to d6WI Pfestafil ProN ProN
  Her blond hair was caught in the moonlight, her racing silhouette given
  substance by the beam of a powerful flashlight fifty yards behind her. She
  fell; the gap closed and a staccato burst of gunfire abruptly, insolently
  split the night air, bullets exploding the sand and the wild grass all
  around her. She would be dead in a matter of seconds.
 His love would be gone.

 They were high on the hill overlooking the Moldau, the boats on the -river
 plowing the waters north and south, their wakes furrows. The curling sinoke
 from the factories below diffused in the bright afternoon sky, obscuring the
 mountains in the distance, and Michael watched, wondering # the
                                  8
 4RoBERT LUDLUM

 winds above Prague would come along and blow th.6 smoke away so the
 mountains could be seen again. His head was on Jenna's lap, his long legs
 stretched out, touching the wicker basket she had packed with sandwiches and
 iced wine. She sat on the grass, her back against the smooth bark of a birch
 tree, she stroked his hair, her fingers circling his face, gently outlining
 his lips and cheekbones.
 'Mikhail, my darling, I was thinking. Those tweed jackets
 and dark trousers you wear, and that very proper English which must come
 from your very proper university, will never remove the Havlibek from
 Havelock."
  "I don't think they were meant to. One~'s a uniform of sods, and the other
  you kind of learn in self-defense." He smiled, touching her hand. "Besides,
  that university was a long time ago."
  "So much was a long time ago, wasWt it? Right down there."
 "It happened."
 'You were there, my poor darling."
 'It's history. I survived.'
 "Many did not."

 The blond woman rose, spinning in the sand, pulling at the wild grass,
 plunging to her right, for several seconds eluding the beam of light. She
 beaded toward the dirt road above the beach, staying in darkness, crouching,
 lunging, using the cover of night and the patches of tall grass to conceal
 her body.
  It would not do her any good, thought the tall man in the black sweater at
  his post between two trees above the road, above the terrible violence that
  was taking place below, above the panicked woman who would be dead in
  moments. He bad looked down at her once before, not so very long ago. She
  had not been panicked then; she had been magnificent.

 He folded the curtain back slowly, carefully in the dark office, his back
 pressed against the wall, his face inching toward the window. He could see
 her below, crossing the floodlit courtyard, the tattoo of her high heels
 against the cobblestones echoing martially up between the surrounding
 buildings. The guards were recessed in shadows--outlines of sullen mario-
                    THE PARSIFAL MOSAIC5

 nettes in their Soviet-style uniforms. Heads turned, signifying
 appreciative glances directed at the figure striding confi-
 ='y to7h ;dstttiron gate in the center of the iron fence
   ngcompound that was the core of Prague's
 secret police. The thoughts behind the glances were clear:
 this was no mere secretary working overtime, this was a pnv
 ileged kurva who took dictation on a commissar`8 couch till all
 hours of the night.
  But others, too, were watching-from other darkened windows. One break in
  her confident stride, one instant of hesitation, and a phone would be
  picked up and orders of detention issued to the gate. Embarrassments, of
  course, were to be avoided where commissars were concerned, but not if
  there appeared to be substance behind suspicions. Everything was
  appearance.
 There was no break, no hesitation. She was carrying it ofiF
  . carrying it outl They had done itt Suddenly he felt a folt Of pain in his
  chest, he knew what it was. Fear. Pure, raw, sickening fear. He was
  remembering-memories within memories. As he watched her his mind went back
  to a city In rubble, to the terrible sounds of mass execution. Lidice. And
  a child-one of many children-scurrying through the billowIng gray smoke of
  burning debris, carrying messages and pockets full of plastic explosives.
  One break, one hesitation, then ... history.
  She reached the gate. An obsequious guard was permitted to leer. She was
  magnificent. God, he loved hert

 She had reached the shoulder of the road, legs and arms working furiously,
 digging into the sand and the dirt, clawing for survival. With no wild grass
 to conceal her, she would be seen; the beam of light would find her, and the
 end would come quickly.
  He watched, suspending emotion, erasing pain, a human litmus accepting
  impressions without comment. He had toprofessionally. He had learned the
  truth, the stretch of beach on the Costa Brava w confirmation of her guilt,
  proof of her crimes. The hysterical woman below was a killer, an agent for
  the infamous Voennaya Kontra Razvedka, the savage branch Qf the Soviet KGB
  that spawned terrorism everywhere. That was the truth; it was undeniable.
  He had seen it all, talked with Washington from Madrid. The rendezvous
 6ROBERT LUDLUM

 that night had been ordered by Moscow, the purpose being the delivery by VKR
 Field Officer Jenna Karas of a schedule of assassinations to a faction of
 the Baader-Meinhof at an isolated beach called Montebello, north of the town
 of Blanes. That was the truth.
  It did not set him free. Instead, it bound him to another truth, an
  obligation of his profession. Those who betrayed the living and brokered
  death had to die. No matter who, no matter ... Michael Havelock had made
  the decision, and it was irrevocable. He had set the last phase of the trap
  himself, for the death of the woman who briefly bad given him more
  happiness than tiny other person on earth. His love was a killer; to permit
  her to live would mean the killing of hundreds, perhaps thousands.
  What Moscow did not know was that Langley had broken the VKR codes. He
  himself had sent the last transmission to a boat a half-mfle off the Costa
  Brava shoreline. KGB confirmation. Officer contact compromised by U.S.
  Intelligence. Schedules false. Eliminate. The codes were among the most
  unbreakable; they would guarantee elimination.
  . She was rising now. Her slender body rose above the shoulder of sand and
  dirt. It was going to happen! The woman about to die was his love: they had
  held each other and there had been quiet talk of a lifetime together, of
  children, of peace and the splendid comfort of being one-together. Once he
  had believed it all, but it was not to be.

 They were in bed, her head on his chest, her soft blond hair falling across
 her face. He brushed it aside, lifting up the strands that concealed her
 eyes, and laughed.
  You~re hiding," he said.
  "It seem we're always hiding," she replied, smiling sadly. 'Except when we
  wish to he seen by people who should see us. We do nothing that we simply
  want to. Everything is calculated, Mikhail. Regimented. We live in a
  movable prison."
 "It hasret been that long, and it won't last forever."
  'I suppose not. One day they'll find they doret need us, don!t want us any
  longer, perhaps. Will they let us go, do you thinkP Or will we disappear?*
  "Washington's not Prague. Or Moscow. We'll walk out of our movable prison,
  me with a gold watch, you with some kind of sileW decoration with your
  papers "
                   THE PARSIFAL MOSAIC7

  "Are you sure? We know a great deal. Too much, perhaps."
  Our protection lies in what we do know. What I know. They'll always wonder:
  Did he unite it down somewhereP Take care, watch him, be good to him ...
  les not unusual, really. We'll walk out."
  'Always protection," she said, tracing his eyebrows. "You never forget, do
  youP The early days, the terrible days."
 'History. Irue forgottm'
 ~What will we do?"
 'Live. I love you."
  Do you think we'll have children? Watch them going off to school, hold
  them, scold them. Go to hockey-ball games."
  "Footballor baseball . Not hockey-ball. Yes, I hope 80 .
 'What will you do, Mikhail?"
  "Teach, I suppose. At a college somewhere. rve a couple of starched degrees
  that say rm qualified. Well be happy, I know that. Fm counting on it."
 ~What will you teach?"
  He looked at her, touching her face, then his eyes wan dered up to the
  shabby ceiling in the -run-down hotel room.
 History," he said. And then he reached for her, taking her in his arms.

 The beam of light swung across the darkness. It caught her, a bird on fire,
 trying to rise, trapped by the light that was her darkness. The gunshots
 followed-terrorists' gunfire for a terrorist. The woman arched backward, the
 first bullets penetrating the base of her spine, her blond hair cascading
 behind her. Three shots then came separately, with finality-a marksmaes eye
 delivering a marksman's score; they entered the back of her neck'and her
 skull, propelling her forward over the mound of dirt and sand, her fingers
 clawing the earth, her blood-streaked face mercifully concealed. A final
 spasm,and all movement stopped.
  His love was dead-for some part of love was a part of whatever they were.
  He had done what he had to do, just as she bad done the same. Each was
  right, each wrong, ultimately so terribly wrong. He closed his eyes,
  feeling the unwanted dampness.
 Why did it have to be? We are fools. Worse, we are stu- 8            RoBLmT LuDLUM

 pid. We do not talk; we die. So men with fluld tongues and facile minds can
 tell us what is right and wrong-geopolitically, you understand, which means
 that whatever they say is beyond our puerile understanding.

 What will you do, MikhailP
 Teach, I suppose. At a college somewhere
 What will you teach?
 History ...
  It was all history now. Remembrances of things too painful. Let it be cold
  history, as the early days were history. They cannot be a part of me any
  longer. She cannot be a part of me, it she ever was, even in her pretense.
  Yet I will keep a promise, not to her but to myself. I am finished. I will
  disappear into another lite, a new lite. I will go somewhere, teach
  somewhere. Illuminate the lessons of futility.

 He heard the voices and opened his eyes. Below, the killers of the
 Baader-Meinhof had reached the condemned woman, sprawled out in death,
 clutching the ground that was her execution place-geopolitically
 preordained. Had she really been so magnificent a liar? Yes, she had been,
 for he had seen the truth. Even in her eyes he had seen it.
  The two executioners bent down to grab the corpse and drag it away-her once
  graceful body to be consigned to fire or chained for the deep. He would not
  interfere; the evidence had to be felt, touched, reflected upon later when
  the trap was revealed, another lesson taught. Futility-geopolitically
  required.
  A gust of wind suddenly whipped across the open beach-, the killers braced
  themselves, their feet slipping in the sand. The man on the left raised his
  right hand in an unsuccessful attempt to keep the visored fishing cap on
  his head; it blew away, rolling toward the dune that was the shoulder of
  the road. He released his hold on the corpse and ran after it Havelock
  watched as the man came closer. There was something about him- About the
  face? No, it was the hair, seen clearly in the moonlight. It was wavy and
  dark, but not completely dark; there was a streak of white above his
  forehead, a sudden intrusion that was startling. He had seen that head of
  hair, seen that face somewhere before. But where? There were so many
  memories. Files analyzed, photographs
                  THE PARsiFAL MosAic9

 studied-contracts, sources, enemies. Where was this man from? KGB? The
 dreaded Voennaya? A splinter faction paid by Moscow when not drawing
 contingency funds from a CIA station chief in Usbon?
  It did not matter. The deadly puppets and the vulnerable pawns no longer
  concerned Michael Havelock-or Mikhail Havlf&-k, for that matter. He would
  route a cable to Washington through the embassy in Madrid in the morning.
  He was finished, he had nothing more to give. Whatever his superiors wanted
  in the way of debriefing he would permit. Even going to a clinic; he simply
  did not care. But they would have no more of his life.
  That was history. It had ended on an isolated beach called Montebello on
  the Costa Brava.
 2

 Time was the true narcotic for pain. Either the pain disappeared when it ran
 its course or a person learned to live with it. Havelock understood this '
 knowing that at this moment in time something of both was applicable. The
 pain had not disappeared but there was less of it; there were periods when
 the memories were dulled, the sear tissue sensitive only when prodded. And
 traveling helped; be had forgotten what it was like to cope with the
 compleidties facing the tourist.
  "If youT note' sir, it's printed here on your ticket. 'Subject to, change
  without notice.'
 "Where?"
 "Down here."
 "I can't read it'
 "I can."
 "You've memorized it."
 "I'M familiar with it sir."
  And the imn-dgration lines. Followed by customs inspections. The
  Intolerable preceded by the impossible; men and women who countered their
  own boredom by slamming rubber stamps and savagely attacking defenseless
  zippers whose manufacturers believed in planned obsolescence.
  There was no question about it, he was spoiled. His previous life bad had
  its difficulties and its risks. but they had not included the perils that
  confronted the iWeier at every turn.
                                 10
                  THE PAMMAL MOSAIC11

 In his past life, on the other band, whenever be got to where be was going,
 there was the movable Prison- No, not exactly. There were appointments to
 keep, sources to contact, informers to pay. Too often at night, in shadows,
 far away from geeing or being seen.
  Now there was none of that. There ha(Wt been for nearly eight weeks. He
  walked in daylight, as he was walking now down the Damrak in Amsterdam
  toward the American Express office. He wondered if the cable would be
  there. If it was, it would signify the beginning of something. A concrete
  beginning. A job.
  Employment. Strange how the unexpected was so often connected to the
  routine. It bad been three months since that night on the Costa Brava, two
  months and five days since the end of big debriefing and formal separation
  from the government. He had come up to Washington from the clinic in Vir-
  ginia where he had spent twelve days in therapy- (Whatever they had
  expected to find wasn't there; he could have told them that. He didn't care
  anymore; couldn't they understand?) He had emerged from the doors of the
  State Department at four o'clock in the afternoon a free man-also an
  unemployed, unpensioned citizen with certain resources hardly of the
  magnitude to be considered an annuity. It bad occurred to him as he stood
  there on the pavement that afternoon that sometime in the future a job had
  to be found, a job where he could illuminate the lessons of-The lessons.
  But not for a while; for a while he would do the minimum required of a
  functioning human being.
  He would travel, revisit all those places be bad never really visited-in
  the sunlight. He would read-reread, actually~ not codes and schedules and
  dossiers but all those books he had not read since graduate school. If he
  was going to illuminate anything for anybody, he had to relearn so much
  that he had forgotten.
  But if there was one thing on his mind at four o'clock that afternoon, it
  was a fine dinner. After twelve days in therapy, with various chemicals and
  a restricted diet, be had ached at the thought of a good meal. He had been
  about to head back to his hotel for a shower and a change of clothes when
  an accommodating taxi drove clown C Street, the sun bouncing off its
  windows and obscuring any occupants. It stopped at the curb in front of
  him-at the behest of big signal, Michael
 12RoBEIRT LuoLum

 had assumed. higtead, a passenger carrying an attach16 case stepped out
 quickly, a harried man late for an appointment, fumbling for his billfold.
 At first neither Havelock nor the passenger recognized each other; Michaels
 thoughts were on a restaurant, the othees on paying the driver.
  "Havelock?" the passenger inquired suddenly, adjusting his glasses. "It is
  you, iset it, Michael?"
 "Harry? Harry Lewis?"
 'You!ve got it. How are you, MR.?"
  Lewis was one of the few people he ever saw-and he rarely saw Harry-who
  called him by his initials. It was a minor legacy from graduate school,
  where he and Lewis bad been classmates at Princeton. Michael bad gone into
  government, Lewis into academia. Dr. Harry Lewis was chairman of the
  political science department at a small, prestigious university in New
  England, traveling down to D.C. now and then for consultation chores at
  State. They bad run into each other several times when both were in
  Washington.
 "Fine. Still picking up per diems, Harry?"
  "A lot fewer than before. Someone taught you people how to read evaluation
  reports from our more esoteric graduate schools."
  "Good Christ, rm being replaced by a beard in blue jeans with funny
  cigarettes."
  The bespectacled professor was stunned. "Yoifre kidding. You're out? I
  thought you were in for lifel"
  "The opposite, Harry. Life began between five and seven minutes ago when I
  wrote out my final signature. And in a couple of hours rm going to be faced
  with the first dinner check in years I can't take out of contingency
  funds."
 "What are you going to do, Michael?"
 "No thoughts. Don't want any for a while."
  The academician paused, taking his change from the ta3d driver, then spoke
  rapidly. "Listen, rm late for upstairs, but rm hi town overnight. Since rm
  on per diem, let me pay for the dinner. Where are you staying? I may have
  an idea."
  No government per them in the civilized world could have paid for the
  dinner that night two months and five days ago, but Harry Lewis did have an
  idea. They had been friends once; they became friends again, and Havelock
  found it easier to talk with a person who was at least vaguely aware of the
  work he had done for the government rather than
                  THE PARsiFAL MosAic13

 with someone who knew nothing about it. It wag always diff1cult to explain
 that something could not be explained; Lewis understood. One thing led to
 another, which in turn led to Harrys idea.
  "Have you ever given any thought to getting back to a campus?"
 Michael smiled. "How would 'constantly' soundp"
  "I know, I know," Lewis pressed, inferring sarcasm. "You fellows-'spooks,'
  I assume, is the term-get all kinds of offers from the multinationals at
  damn good money, I'm aware of that. But, M.H., you were one of the best.
  Your dissertation was picked up by a dozen university presses; you even had
  your own seminars. Your academic record coupled with your years at
  State-most of which I realize you can't go into speciflcally~could make you
  very attractive to a university administration. Wre always saying, 'Lees
  find someone whos been there, not just a theoretician.' Damn it, Michael,
  I think yoere it. Now, I know the moneys not--"
  "Harry, you misunderstood. I meant it. I constantly think about getting
  back."
  It was Harry Lewis's tam to smile. "Then Ive got another idea."
  A week later Havelock bad flown to Boston and driven from there to the
  brick-and-ivy-and-white-birch campus on the outskirts of Concord, New
  Hampshire. He spent four days with Harry Lewis and his wife, wandering
  around, attending various lectures and seminars, and meeting those of the
  faculty and administration whose support Harry thought might be helpful.
  Michael's opinions had been sought "casually' over coffee, drinks and
  dinners; men and women had looked at him as if they considered him a
  promising candidate. Lewis had done his missionary work well At the end of
  the fourth day Harry announced at lunch:
  Mey like youl"
 "Why not?' his wife said. "He's damned likable."
  "They're quite excited, actually. Ifs what I said the other day, M.H.
  You~ve been there. Sixteen years with the State Department kind of makes
  you special."
 "And?'
  "There!s the annual administration-trustees conference coming up in eight
  weeks. Thafs when the supply-and-de-
   14            ROBERT LuDLum

 mand quotients are studied. Horseflesh. I think youll be offered a job.
 Where can I reach you?'
 "IT be traveling. ru call you."
  He had called Harry from London two days ago. The conference was still in
  progress, but Lewis thought there would be an answer momentarily.
  "Cable me AX, Amsterdam," Michael had said. "And thanks, Harry."
  He saw the glass doors of the American Express office swing open just
  ahead. A couple emerged, the man awkwardly balancing the shoulder straps of
  two cameras while counting money. Havelock stopped, wondering for a moment
  if he really wanted to go inside. If the cable was there, it would contain
  either a rejection or an offer. If a rejection, he would simply go on
  wandering-and there was a certain comfort in that; the floating passivity
  of not planning had become something of value to him. If an offer, what
  then? Was he ready for it? Was he prepared to make a decision? Not the kind
  of decision one made in the field, where it had to be instinctive if . one
  was to survive, but, rather, a decision to commit oneself. Was he capable
  of a commitment? Where were yesterday's commitments?
  He took a deep breath, consciously putting one foot in front of the other,
  and approached the glass doors.

 POSITION AVAIL"LE VISITING PROFESSOR OF GOVERNMENT FOR PERIOD OF TWO YEARS.
 ASSOCIATE STATUS PENDING MUTUAL ACCEPTANCE AT THE END OF THIS TIME. INITIAL
 SALARY TWENTY-SEVEN-FIVE. WILL NEED YOUR REPLY WITHIN TEN DAYS. DON'T KEEP
 ME HOLDING MY BREATEL
 EVER, HARRY.

  Michael folded the cable and put It in his jacket pocket; he did not go
  back to the counter to write out his own cable to Harry Lewis, Concord, New
  Hampshire, U.S.A. It would come later. It was enough for the moment to be
  wanted, to know there was a beginning. It would take several days to absorb
  the knowledge of his own legitimacy, perhaps several days thereafter to
  come to grips with it. For in the legitimacy was the possibility of
  commitment; there was no real beginning without it.
 He walked out onto the Damrak, breathing the cold air of
                  THE PARSIFAL MOSAIC15

 Amsterdam, feeling the damp chill floating up from the canal. The sun was
 setting; briefly blocked by a low-flying cloud, it reemerged, an orange
 globe hurling its rays through the intercepting vapors. It reminded Havelock
 of an ocean dawn on the coast of Spain-on the Costa Brava. He had stayed
 there all night that night, until the sun had forced itself up over the
 horizon, firing the mists above the water. He had gone down to the shoulder
 of the road, to the sand and the dirt....
 Stopf Don't think about it. That was another life.
  Two months and five days ago by sheer chance Harry Lewis had stepped out of
  a taid and started to change the world for an old friend. Now, two months
  and five days later, that change was there to be taken. He would take it,
  Michael knew, but something was missing: change should be shared, and there
  was no one to share it with, no one to say, What will you teach?

 The tuxedoed waiter at the Dikker en Thijs ground the lip of the flaming
 brandy glass into the silver receptacle of sugar; the ingredients would
 follow for caf6 jamique. It was a ridiculous indulgence, and probably a
 waste of very good liqueur, but Harry Lewis had insisted they each have one
 that night in Washington. He would tell. Harry that he bad repeated the
 ritual in Amsterdam, although he probably wouldn7t have if he had realized
 bow bright the damn flames were and the degree of attention they would draw
 to his table.
  'Mank you, Harry," he said silently once the waiter had left, raising his
  glass inches off the table to his invisible companion. It was better, after
  all, not to be completely alone.
  He could both feel the approaching presence of a man and see an enlarging
  darkness in the comer of his eye. A figure dressed in a conservative
  pinstriped suit was threading his way through the shadows and the
  candlelight toward the booth. Havelock angled the glass and raised his eyes
  to the face. The man's name was George; he was the CIA station chief in
  Amsterdam. They had worked together before, not always pleasantly but
  professionally.
  'Mat's one way to announce your arrival here," said the intelligence
  officer, glancing at the waiter's tray table, the silver sugar bowl still
  on It. "May I sit downr
 "My pleasure. How are you, Georger
 16ROBERT LUDLUM

  "I've been better," said the CIA man, sliding across the seat opposite
  Michael.
 "Sorry to bear that. Care for a drink?-
 "That depends."
 "On what?"
 "Whether I'll stay long enough."
  "Aren1 we cryptic," said Havelock. "But then you're probably still
  working."
 "I wasn't aware the hours were that clear-cut"
 "No, I guess they're not. Am I the reason, George?"
  "At the moment, maybe," said the CIA man. Trn surprised to see you here. I
  heard you retired."
  You heard correctly.-
 "Then why are you here?"
  "Why not? I'm traveling. I like Amsterdam. You could say rm spending a lot
  of accumulated severancepay visiting all those places I rarely got to see
  in the daytime.
 "I could say it, but that doesn't mean I believe it"
 "Believe, George. It!s the truth."
  "No screen?" asked the intelligence officer, his eyes leveled at Michael.
  "I can find out, you know."
  "None at all. Im out, finished, temporarily unemployed. If you check,
  that's what you'll learn, but I don't think you have to waste channel time
  to Langley. I'm sure the centrex codes have been altered where I was
  concerned, all sources and informers in Amsterdam alerted as to my status.
  I'm offlimits, George. Anyone dealing with me is asking for a short term on
  the payroll and quite possibly an obscure funeraL"
 'rhose are the surface facts," agreed the CIA man.
  'Ileyre the only facts. Don't bother looking for anything else; you won't
  find it."
  "All right, say I believe you. You're traveling, spending your severance
  pay." The agent paused as he leaned forward. "Ies going to run out"
 "What is?"
 "The severance pay.
  "Inevitably. At which time I expect I'll find gainful employment. As a
  matter of fact, this aftemoon-2p
 "Why wait? I might be able to help you there."
 "No, you can't, George. I haven't anything to sell."
  "Sure, you do. Expertise. A consultanes fee paid out of contingency. No
  name, no records, untraceable."
                  TnE PARsxFAL MosAic17

 "If you're running a test, you're doing it badly."
  "No test. I'm willing to pay in order to look better than I am. I woulddt
  admit that if I were testing you."
  "You might, but yoed be a damn fool. Ies third-rate entrapment; ies so
  awkward you!ve probably done it for real. None of us want those contingency
  funds scrutinized too carefully, do we?"
  "I may not be in your league, but rm not third-rate. I need help. We need
  help."
 "Thafs better. You're appealing to my ego. Much better."
  "How about it, Michael. The KGVs an over The Hague. We don't know who
  they've bought or how far up they go. NATO's compromised."
  "We're all compromised, George, and I can!t help. Because I doet think it
  makes any difference. We get to square five, pushing them back to four, so
  they jump over us to seven. Then we buy our way to eight; they block us at
  nine, and no one reaches square ten. Everyone nods pensively and starts all
  over again. In the meantime we lament our losses and extol the body count,
  never admitting that it doeset make any difference."
  "Thaes a crock of shitl Wre not going to be buried by anyow.
  "Yes, we are, George. All of us. By 'children yet unborn and unbegot.'
  Unless they're smarter than we are, which may very well be the case.
  Christ, I hope so."
 "What the bell are you talking about?"
 " 'The purple atomic testament of bleeding war:
 "Whatt"
 "History, George. Let!s have that drink."
  "No, thanks." The CIA station chief slid back across the seat. "And I think
  yoxeve had enough," he added, standing UP.
 "Not yet."
  "Go to bell, Havelock." The intelligence officer started to tam away.
 "George."
 "What?"
  "You missed. I was about to say something about this afternoon, but you
  diddt let me finish."
 "So what?"
 18RoBEIRT LuiDLum

  "So you knew what it was I was going to tell you. When did you intercept
  the cable? Around noon?"
 "Go to hell."
  Michael watched as the CIA man returned to his table across the room. He
  had been dining alone, but Havelock knew he was not alone. Within three
  minutes the judgment was confirmed. George signed his check-bad form-and
  walked rapidly through the entrance arch into the lobby. Forty-five seconds
  later a youngish man from a table on the right side of the room got up to
  leave, leading a bewildered lady by the elbow. A minute passed, and two men
  who had been in a booth on the left side rose as one and started for the
  arch. Through the candlelight, Michael focused on the plates in the booth.
  Both were piled with food. Bad form.
  They had been following him, watching him, employing intercepts. Why? Why
  couldn7t they leave him alone?
 So much for Amsterdam

 The noonday sun in Paris was a blinding yellow, its quivering rays bouncing
 off the river Seine below the bridge. Havelock reached the midpoint of the
 Pont Royal, his small hotel only blocks away on the Rue du Bac, the route he
 followed being the most logical one from the Louvre. He knew it was
 important not to deviate, not to let whoever it was behind hixn think he
 suspected his or her presence. He had spotted the taxi, the same taxi, as it
 made two swift turns in tr~C to keep him in sight. Whoever was directing the
 driver was good; the tald had stopped for less than two or three seconds at
 a comer, and then bad sped away in the opposite direction. Which meant that
 whoever was following him was now on foot on the crowded bridge. If contact
 was the objective, crowds were helpful, and a bridge even more so. People
 stopped on bridges over the Seine simply to stare absently down at the
 water; they had been doing so for centuries. Conversations could be had
 unobtrusively. If contact was the objective, and not surveillance alone.
  Michael stopped, leaned against the cbest-bigb stone wall that served as a
  railing, and lighted a cigarette, his eyes on a bateau mouche about to pass
  under the bridge. That is to say, if anyone was watching him, it would seem
  as if he were looking at the tourist boat, waving casually at the
  passengers below. But he was not; pretending to shield his eyes from
                  THE PARS17AL MOSAIC19

 the sun, be concentrated on the tall figure approaching on his right.
  He could distinguish the gray homburg, the velvet-collared overcoat, and
  the glistening black patent-leather shoes; they were enough. The man was
  the essence of Parisian wealth and elegance, traveling all over Europe and
  gracing the salons of the rich. His name was Gravet, and he was considered
  the most knowledgeable critic of classical art in Paris-which meant the
  Continent-and only those who had to know knew be also sold far more than
  his critical expertise. He stopped at the railing seven feet to the right
  of Havelock and adjusted his velvet collar; he spoke just loud enough to be
  beard. "I thought it was you. rve been followIng you since the Rue
  Bernard."
 "I know. What do you want?"
  "ne question is, What do you want? Why are you In Paris? We were given to
  understand you were no longer active. Quite frankly, you were to be
  avoided."
 "And reported immediately if I made contact, right?"
 "Naturally."
  "But you're reversing the process. You!ve approached me. That!s a little
  foolish, isn't it?-
  "A minor risk worth taking," said Gravet, standing erect and glancing
  about. "We go back a long time, Michael. I don't for a moment believe
  you~re in Paris for your cultural rebirth."
 "Neither do 1. Who said I was?"
  'You were at the Louvre for exactly twenty-seven minutes. Too short a time
  to absorb anything, and too long to relieve yourself. But quite plausible
  for meeting someone inside a dark, crowded exhibit-say, at the far end of
  the third floor."
 Havelock began to laugh. "Listen, Gravet-"
 "Don't look at me, pleasel Keep your eyes on the water."
  "I went to the Roman collection on the mezzanine. It was filled. with a
  tour from Provence, so I left."
  "You were always quick, I admired you for it. And now this ominous alarm:
  'Hes no longer active. Avoid him."'
 "It happens to be true."
  "Whatever this new cover of yours," continued Gravet quickly, dusting the
  elbows of his coat, "for it to be so radical can only mean yoiere among
  very distinguished company.
 20RoBLRT LUDLUM

 I'm also a broker with a wide range of information. The more distinguished
 my clients I the better I like it."
 "Sorry, I'm not buying. Avoid me."
  "Don't be preposterous. You don't know what I have to offer. Incredible
  things are happening everywhere. Allies become enemies, enemies allies. The
  Persian Gulf is on fire and all Africa moves in contradictory circles; the
  Warsaw bloc has lacerations you know nothing about, and Washington pursues
  a dozen counterproductive strategies matched only b~ the unbelievable
  stupidity of the Soviets. I could give you cl apter and verse on their
  recent follies. Don't dismiss me, Michael. Pay me. You'll climb even
  higher."
 ~ "Why should I want to climb higher when Ive climbed out?"
  "Again preposterous. You're a relatively young man; they wouldn't let you
  go."
  "They can watch me, but they can~t hold me. All I had to do was give up a
  pension somewhere down the road."
  "Too simple. You all have bank accounts in remote but accessible places,
  everyone knows that. Diverted contingency funds, covert payments made to
  nonexistent sources, fees for sudden departures or suddenly required
  papers. You had your retirement covered by the time you were thirty-five."
  "You're exaggerating both my talents and my financial security," said
  Havelock, smiling.
  "Or perhaps a rather lengthy document," the Frenchman went on, as though
  Michael had not interrupted, "detailing certain covert
  procedures-solutions, you might say-tbat must, perforce, describe specific
  events and personnel. Placed beyond reach of those most interested."
 Havelock stopped smiling, but Gravet persisted:
 aturally, that's not financial security, but it adds to a sense
 well-being, doesn't it?"
  "You're wasting your time, Irm not in the market. If you've got something
  of value, you'll get your price. You know whom to deal with."
  "They're frightened second-raters. None of them has your direct avenues to
  the-centers of determination, shall we say."
 "I don't have them anymore."
  "I don't believe you. You're the only man here in Europe who talks directly
  with Anthony Matthias."
 "Leave him out of it. And for your information, I haven't
                  THE PAILSWAL MOSAIC21

 spoken with him in months." Suddenly Havelock stood up and turned openly to
 the Frenchman. "Let!s find a taid and go to the embassy. I know some people
 over there. IT introduce you to a first-level attacb6 and tell him yotfre
 selling but I don't have either the resources or the interest to get in-
 volved. Okay?'
  "You know I can't do thatl And, please---" Gravet did not have to finish
  the request.
  "All right, all right." Michael returned to the wan with the river below.
  "Then give me a number or a place of contacL in phone it in and you can
  listen."
 "Why are you doing this? Why the charade?'
  Because it's not a charade. As you said, we go back a long time. I'll do
  you the favor and maybe you'll be convinced. Maybe you'll convince others,
  if they ask. Even if they don't ask. How about it?'
 . The Frenchman turned his head while leaning over the wall and stared at
 Havelock. "No, thank you, Michael. As with all manner of Satans, better a
 second-rater rve dealt with than one I haven7t. For what Ws worth , I think
 I believe you. You would not reveal a source like me, even to a first-level
 attacb6. rm down too deep, too respectable; you might need me. Yes, I do
 believe you."
 "Make my life easier. Doet keep it a secret."
  "What about your opposite numbers in the KGB? Win they be convinced?"
  "rm sure of it. Their moles probably got word to Dzerzhinsky Square before
  I signed the separation papers."
 "They'll suspect a ploy."
  "All the more reason to leave me alone. Why bite into poisoned bait?"
 "They have chemicals. You all have chemicals."
  "I can't tell them anything they don't know, and what I do know has already
  been changed. That's the funny thing: my enemies have nothing to fear from
  me. The few names they might learn aren't worth the price. There'd be
  reprisals."
  "Yoteve inflicted a great many wounds. Theres pride, vengeance; it's the
  human condition."
  "Not applicable. In those areas we're even, and again rm not worth it
  because there's no practical result. Nobody kills unless there's a reason.
  None of us wants to be responsible for the fallout. Crazy, isn't it? Almost
  Victorian. When we're
 22             ROBEnT LuDLum

 finished, we're out. Maybe we'll all get together in a large black strategy
 room in hell and have a few drinks, but while we're here, we're out. That's
 the irony, the futility, Gravet. When we're out we don't care anymore. We
 don't have any reason to hate. Or to kill."
  "Nicely phrased, my friend. Yotfve obviously thought about these things."
 "rve had a lot of time recently."
  "And there are those who are extremely interested in your recent
  observations, your conclusions-your role in life, as it were. But then, les
  to be expected. They're such a manicdepressive people. Morose, then
  jubilant; filled with violence one minute, songs of the earth and sadness
  the next. And often quite paranoid; the darker aspects of classicism, I
  think. The slashing diagonals of Delacroix in a multiracial national
  psyche, so far-reaching, so contradictory. So suspicious-so Soviet."
  Havelock stopped breathing; he returned Gravees stare. "Why did you do it?'
  "There was no harm. Had I learned otherwise, who knows what I would have
  told them? But since I do believe you, I explain why I had to test you."
 "Moscow thinks I'm still in?"
  "I shall render the judgment that you are not. Whether they accept it or
  not is another matter."
  "Why won't they?" asked Havelock, his eyes on the water below.
  "I have no idea. I shall miss you, Michael. You were always civilized.
  Difficult but civilized. Then again, you're not a native-born American, are
  you? Yo&re really European."
 "rm American," said Havelock quietly. "Really."
  "Yoeve done well by America, I'll say that. If you change your mind-or it's
  changed for you-get in touch with me. We can always do business."
 "It's not likely, but thanks."
 "That's not an outright rejection, either.'
 "rm being polite."
  'Civilized. Au revoir, Mikhail.... I prefer the name you were born with."
  Havelock turned his head slowly and watched Gravet walk with studied grace
  down the pavement of the Pont Royal
                  THE PARSIFAL MOSAIC23

 toward the entrance of the bridge. The Frenchman had accepted a blind
 interrogation from people he found loathsome; be must have been paid very
 well. But why?
  The CIA was in Amsterdam and the CIA did not believe him. The KGB was in
  Paris and the KGB did not believe him, either. why?
  So much for Paris. How far would they go to keep him under a microscope?

 The Arethusa Delphi was one of those small hotels near the Syntagma Square
 in Athens that never let the traveler forget he is in Greece. The rooms were
 white on white on shimmering white. Walls, furniture and space-dividing
 ornamental beads were relieved only by garish plastio-framed oil paintings
 depicting the antiquities: temples, agoras and oracles romanticized by
 postcard artists. Each room had a pair of narrow double doors that opened
 onto a miniature balcony~-large enough for two small chairs and a
 Lilliputian tabl&-on which guests could have black morning coffee.
 Throughout the lobby and in the elevators one never escaped the rhythmic
 pounding of Greek folk music, strings and cymbals at prestissinto greco.
  Havelock led the olive-skinned woman out of the elevator, and as the doors
  closed, both stood for a moment in mock anticipation. The music was gone;
  they sighed in relief.
  Lorba took a break." Michael gestured to the left toward his room.
  "The rest of the world must think we are nervous wrecks," said the woman,
  laughing, touching her dark hair and smoothing out the long white dress
  that complemented her Skin and accentuated her breasts and tapered body.
  Her English was heavily accented, cultivated on those Mediterranean islands
  that are the playgrounds of the Mediterranean rich. She was a high-priced
  courtesan whose favors were sought after by the princes of commerce and
  inheritance, a good-natured whore with a decent wit and a quick laugh, a
  woman who knew her time of pleasure- ing was limited. "You rescued me, .
  she said , squeezing giv' g '
                       Havelocles arm as they walked down the corridor.
 "I kidnapped you."
 'Often interchangeable terms," she replied, laughing again.
 It had been a little of both. Michael had run across a man
 24ROBE]RT LuDLum

 on the Marathonos with whom he had worked in the Thermaikos sector five
 years ago. A dinner party was being held that night at a caf6 on Syntagma
 Square; since it was convenient, Havelock accepted the invitation. The woman
 was there, the escort of a considerably older, boorish businessman. The ouzo
 and the prestissimo greco bad done its damage. Havelock and the woman had
 been seated next to each other; legs and hands touched, they exchanged
 looks: comparisons were obvious. Michael and the island courtesan had
 slipped away.
  "I think I'm going to face an angry Athenian tomorrow," said Havelock,
  opening the door of his room, leading the woman inside.
  "Don't be silly," she protested. "He's not a gentleman. Hes from Epidaurus;
  there are no gentlemen in Epidaurus. He's an aging bull of a peasant who
  made money under the colonels. One of the nastier consequences of their
  regime."
  "When in Athens," said Michael, going to the bureau where there was a
  bottle of prized Scotch and glasses, "stay away from Epidaurians." He
  poured drinks.
 "Have you been to Athens often?"
 "A few times."
 "What did you do? What line of work?"
  "I bought things. Sold things." Havelock carried the drinks back across the
  room. What he saw was what he wanted to see, although he had not expected
  to see it so quickly. The woman had removed her thin silk cape and draped
  it on a chair. She then proceeded to unbutton her gown from the top, the
  swelling of her breasts provocative, inviting.
  "You didn't buy me," she said, taking the drink with her free hand. "I came
  of my own free will. Etharbtou, Michael Havelock. Do I say your name
  right?"
 "Very nicely."
  She touched his glass with hers, the sound gentle as she stepped closer.
  She reached up and placed her fingers on his lips, then his cheek, and
  finally around the back of his neck, drawing his face to hers. They kissed,
  her -lips parting, the soft swollen flesh and moisture of her mouth
  arousing him; she pressed her body against his, pulling his left hand to
  the breast beneath her half-open gown. She leaned back, breathing deeply.
 'Where Is your bathroom? I'll get into somethlng-lem*
                  THE PARSTFAL MOSAIC25

 "Over there."
  "Why don~t you? Get into something less, that is. Well meet at the bed. I'm
  really rather anxious. Yoere very, very attractive, and rm-very anxious."
  She picked up her cape from the chair and walked casually, sensually toward
  the door beyond the bed. She went inside, glancing back over her shoulder,
  her eyes telling him things that probably were not true, but were
  nevertheless exciting for the night. The practiced whore, whatever her rea-
  sons were, would perform, and he wanted, needed, the release of that
  performance.
  Michael stripped himself down to his shorts ' carried his drink to the bed,
  and tore away the spread and the blanket. He climbed under the sheet and
  reached for a cigarette, turning his body away from the wall.
 "Dobriy oyehchyer, priyatel."
  At the sound of the deep male voice, Havelock spun around on the bed,
  instinctively reaching for a weapon-a weapon that was not there. Standing
  in the frame of the bathroom door was a balding man whose face Michael
  recognized from dozens of photographs going back years. He was from Moscow,
  one of the most powerful men in the Soviet KGB. In his hand was a gun, a
  large, black Graz-Burya auto-
 matic. There was a click; the hammer snapped into firing position.
 3

 "You may leave now," said the Russian to the woman concealed behind him. She
 slid past, glancing at Havelock, then rushed to the door and let herself
 out.
  OYou!re Rostov. Pyotr Rostov. Director of External Strato. gies. KGB.
  Moscow."
  "Your face and name are also known to me. And your dossier."
  "You went to a lot of trouble, priyatel," said Michael, using the Russian
  word for friend, its meaning, however, denied by his cold delivery. He
  shook his head, trying to clear it of a sickening mist, the effect of the
  ouzo and Scotch. "You could have stopped me on the street and invited me
  for a drink. You wouldn't have learned any more or any less, and very
  little thaes valuable. Unless this is a kazn gailah.7
 "No execution, Havlf&k."
 mHavelock."
 "Son of Havlf6ek.w
 'Yoed do well not to remind me."
  "Me gun is in my hand, not yours." Rostov eased the hammer of his automatic
  back into its recess, the weapon still leveled at Micbaers head. "But
  that's in the distant past and has no connection with me. Your recent
  activities, however, are very much my concern. Our concern, if you wilL"
 'nen your moles areet earnmg their money
                                 26
                  TIM PAWWAL MOSAJC27

  "They file reports with irritating frequency, if Only to justify it. But
  are they accurate?"
 "if they told you I was finished, they were accurate.
  " Tinished? A word with such finality, yet subject to interpretation, no?
  Finished with what? Finished with one phase, on to another?"
  Finished with anything that might concern you."
  "out of sanction?' asked the KGB officer, rounding the border of the
  doorframe and leaning against the wall, his Graz-Burya steady, leveled now
  at Havelocles throat. "No longer employed by your government in any
  official capacity? VS difficult to accept. it must have been a blow to your
  dear friend Anthony Matthias."
  Michael studied the Russian~s face, lowering his eyes to the huge gun aimed
  at him. "A Frenchman mentioned Matthias the other day. Ill. tell you what
  I told him, although I don't know why I should. You paid him to bring up
  Matdd&s namc"
  "Gravet? He despises us. Hes civilized toward us only when he!s walldLng
  through the galleries of the Kremlin or the Hermitage in Leningrad. He
  might tell us anything."
 'TAy did you use him, then?'
  "Because hes fond of you. It's far easier to spot a lie when the liar is
  referring to someone he likes.7
 "Then you believed him."
  'Or you convinced him and. our people had no choice. Tell me. How did the
  brilliant and charismatic American Secretary of State react to his krafayes
  resignation?"
  "I have no idea but I assume be understood. It!s exactly what I told
  ~i;vi~. I haven!t: seen Matthias or spoken to him in months. He's got
  enough problems; theres no reason why those of an old student should be
  added."
  "But you were far more than a student. His family knew your family in
  Prague. You became what you are---"
 ~Were," interrupted Havelock
 '~-because of Anton Matthias~*
 "It was a long time ago."
  Rostov was silent; he lowered his weapon slightly, then spoke. "Very well,
  a long time ago. What about now? No one!s irreplaceable, but you7re a
  valuable man. Knowledgeable, productive."
 28            RoBERT LuDLum

  "Value and productivity are generally associated with oommitment. I doet
  have it anymore. Lefs say I lost it."
  "Am I to infer you could be tempted?" The KGB man lowered the weapon
  further. "In the direction of another commitment?"
  "You know better than that. Outside of personal revulsions that go back a
  couple of decades, we've got a mole or two in the Dzerzhinsky. rve no
  intention of being marked 'beyond salvage.'.
  "A hypocritical term. Ithnplies compassion on the part of your
  executioners."
 "It says it."
  "Not well." Rostov raised his automatic, thrusting it forward slowly. 'Ve
  have no such problems with verbal rationales. A traitor is a traitor. I
  could take you in, you know."
  "Not easily." Michael remained still, his eyes locked with the Russiaes.
  "There are corridors and elevators, lobbies to pass through and streets to
  cross; there's risk. You could lose. Everything. Because I have nothing to
  lose but a cell at the Lubyanka."
 "A room, not a cell. Were not barbarians."
  "Sorry. A room. The same kind of room we have reserved in Virginia for
  someone like you-and we're both wasting money. When people like you and me
  get out with our heads still on, everything7s altered. The Amytals and the
  Pentothals are invitations to traps."
 "There are still the molm"
  "I don't know who they are any more than you did when you were in the
  field-for those same reasons, those same rooms. None of us do on either
  side. We only know the current codes, words that take us where we have to
  go. Whatever ones I had are meaningless now."
  In all sincerity are you trying to convince me a man of your experience is
  of no value to us?"
  "I dicWt say that" Interrupted Havelock. "rin simply suggesting that you
  weigh the risks. Also something else, which,
           off with reasonable success two years ago. =Yo'kY:umVVf yours who
           was finished, ready for a farm in crasnov. we got him out through
           Riga into Finland and flew him to a room in Fairfax, Virginia. He
           was injected with everything from scopolamine to triple Amytal,
           and we learned a lot. Strategies were aborted,.whole networks
           re-
                             THE PARSIVAL MOSAIC29

 structured, confusion the order of the day. Then we learned something else:
 everything he told us was a he. His head was programmed like a computer
 disk; valuable men became useless, time was lost. Say you got me to the
 Lubyanka-which I doet think you could-how do you know I'm not our answer to
 what you did to us?"
  "Because you would not expose the possibility." Rostov pulled the gun back,
  but did not lower it.
  "Really? It strikes me as a pretty good blanket. I mean, you'd never know,
  would you? On the other hand, we've developed a serum-which I know nothing
  about except that it's injected at the base of the skull-that voids the
  programming. Something to do with neutralizing the lobus occipitalis,
  whatever the hell that is. From here on we can make a determination."
 "Such an admission astonishes me."
  "Why should it? Maybe I'm just saving our respective directors a lot of
  aggravation; that could be my objective. Or maybe none of ies true; maybe
  there is no serum, no protection, and rm making it all up. Thaes also a
  possibility."
  The Russian smiled. "Khvadd You are outl You amuse us both with logic that
  could serve you. You7re on your way to that farm in your own Grasnov."
  "rhaes what Ive been trying to tell you. Am I worth the risk?"
  'Lees find out." Suddenly the Russian flipped his automatic, barrel up; he
  slapped it back in the palm of his hand and threw it to Havelock on the
  bed. Michael caught the weapon in midair.
 "What am I supposed to do with this?"
 'What do you want to do with it?"
  "Nothing. Assuming the first three shells are rubber capsules filled with
  dy% rd only-soil your clothes." Havelock pressed the magazine release; the
  clip dropped to the bed. oles not a very good test, anyway. Say the firing
  pin works and this thing makes any noise at all, twenty khrwchei could
  break in here and blow me out of the park.'
  "The firing pin works and there's no one outside in the hallway. The
  Arethusa Delphi is very much in Washington's camp; it's watched and Im not
  so foolish as to parade our personnel. I think you know that. It's why
  yotfte here."
 'What are you trying to prove?"
 30ROBERT LuDLum

  The Russian smiled again and shrugged. "rm not really sure. A brief
  something in the eyes, perhaps. When a m&s under a hostile gun and that gun
  is suddenly his, there is an instant compulsion to elin-dnate the prior
  threat-assuming the hostility is returned. It's in the eyes; no amount of
  control can disguise it-if the enmity is active."
 "What was in my eyes?"
 "Absolute indifference. Weariness, If you will."
  "rm not sure you're right, but I admire your courage. les more than rve got
  The firing pin really works?"
 "Yes.00

 "No capsules?"
  The Russian shook his head, his expression conveying quiet amusement. "No
  bullets. That is to say, no powder in the shells." Rostov raised his left
  hand and, with his right, pulled back the sleeve of his overcoat. Strapped
  to the flat of his wrist, extending up toward his elbow, was a thin barrel,
  the trigger mechanism apparently activated by the bending of his arm.
  'Snotvomoye.' he said, touching the taut, springlike wires. "What you call
  narcotic darts. You would have slept peacefully for the better part of
  tomorrow while a doctor insisted that your odd fever be studied at the
  hospital. We'd have gotten you out, flown you up to Salonika and over the
  Dardanelles into Sevastopol." The Russian unsnapped a strap above his wrist
  and removed the weapon.
  Havelock studied the KGB man, not a little perplexed. 'You really could
  have taken me."
  "Until the attempt is made, one never knows. I might have missed the first
  shot, and you're younger, stronger than 1; you could have attacked, broken
  my neck. But the odds were on my side."
 "rd say completely. Why didnt you play them?"
  'Because you're right. We doift want you. The risks are too great-not those
  you spoke of, but others. I simply bad to know the truth and rm now
  convinced. You are no longer in the service of your government."
 "What risks?"
  'ney're unknown to us, but they are them. Anything you can't understand in
  this business is a risk, but I doet have to tell you that."
  'rell me 8omething. I tust got a pardon; rd like to know why.*
                  THE pApsIFAL MoSAJC31

  -17ery well." The Soviet intelligence officer hesitated; he walked
  aimlessly toward the double doors that led to the miniature balcony and
  opened one several inches. Then he closed it and turned to Havelock. "I
  should tell you first that rm not here on orders from Dzerzhinsky Square or
  even with its blessings. To be frank, my aging supeW~rs in the KGB believe
  Im in Athens on an unrelated matter. You can either accept that or not."
  "Give me a reason to or not. Someone must know. You fedratele don't do
  anything solo."
  "Specifically, two others. A close associate in Moscow and a dedicated
  man-a mole, to be sure-out of Washington.'
 "You mean Lanjfty?'
  The Russian shook his heaa.He replied softly, "The White Hous&"
  ,,rm impressed. So two ranking kontrolyorya of the KGB and a Soviet mole
  within walking distance of the Oval Office decide they want to talk to me,
  but they don't want to take me. They can fly me into Sevastopol and from
  there to a room at the Lubyanka, where any talking we did would be far more
  productive-from their point of view-but they woet do that. Instead, the
  spokesman for these three-a man I know only from photographs and by
  reputation-tells me there are risks associated with me that be can't define
  but knows that they exist, and because of them rrn given the option of
  talking or not-about what I haven't the vaguest idea. Is that a fair
  readingr
  "You have the Slavic propensity for going right to the core of a subject."
  "I doet see! any ancestral connection. les common sense. You spoke, I
  listened; thaf7s what you said-or,what yoere about to say. Basic logic."
  Rostov stepped away from the balcony doors, his exp~ges pensive. "I'm
  afraid thafs the one factor thafs miss-
 . ste logic."
 "Now were talking about something elm"
 "Yes, we are."
 "What?'
 'You. The Costa Brava."
  Havelock paused. The anger was in his eyes, but it was controlled. "Go on."
 "The woman. She!s why you retired, isn't sher
 32            ROBERT LUDLUM

  "This conversation is terminated," said Havelock abruptly. "Get out of
  here."
  "Please." The Russian raised both hands, a gesture of truce, perhaps a
  plea. "I think you should listen to me."
  "I don~t think so. There's nothing you could say that would remotely
  interest me. The Voennaya is to be congratulated; it was a hell of a job.
  They won, she won. And then she lost. It's finished, and there's nothing
  further to say about it.
 "There is."
 "Not to me."
  "The VKR are maniacs," said the Russian quietly, urgently. "I don't have to
  tell you that. You and I are enemies, and neither would pretend otherwise,
  but we acknowledge certain rules between us. We!re not salivating dogs,
  we're professionals. There's a fundamental respect each has for the other,
  perhaps grounded in fear, although not necessarily. Grant me that,
  priyatel."
  Their eyes were level, penetrating. Havelock nodded. "I know you from the
  files, just as you know me. You weren1 part of it."
  "Wasted death is still death, still a waste. Unnecessary and provocative
  death a very dangerous waste. It can be hurled back tenfold in fury at the
  instigator."
  "Tell that to the Voennaya. There was no waste as far as they were
  concerned. Only necessity."
  "Butchersl" snapped Rostov, his voice guttural. "Who can tell them
  anything? They're descendants of the old OGPU slaughterhouses, inheritors
  of the mad assassin Yagoda. They're also up to their throats in paranoid
  fantasies going back half a century when Yagoda gunned down the quieter,
  more reasonable men, hating their lack of fanaticism, equating that lack
  with treason against the revolution. Do you knoto the VKR?"
  Enough so as to stand far back and hope to hell you can control it."
  "I wish I could answer confidently in the affirmative. It's as if a band of
  your screaming rigbt-wing zealots had been given official status as a
  subdivision of the Central Intelligence Agency."
  "We have checks and balances-sometimes. If such a subdivision came to
  be-and it could-it would be continuously
                  TEM PARSWAL Mo&uc33

 scrutinized, openly criticized. Funds would be watched
 closely, methods studied; ultimately the group would be
 thrown out. 11                activi-
  yoeve had your lapses. Your various un-American ties committees, Your
  McCarthys, the Huston Plans, Purges in the irresponsible press. Careers
  have been destroyed, lives degraded. Yes, you!ve had your share of
  lapses.-
  ,.Always short-lived. We have no gulags, no 'rehabilitatior~ Programs in a
  Lubyanka, And that irresponsible Press has a way of becoming responsible
  now and then. It threw out a regime of arrogant hot shots. The Yemlin!s
  wilder ones stay In place.0
"We both have our lapses, then. But w6,re so much Young
 er. youth is allowed mistakes-"'to compare
  ~~ there!s nothing," interrupted Michael, with the VKrs pantinyatchik
  operation. That wouldn't be tolerated or funded by the worst Congress or
  administration in history."
  Another paranoid fantasyl" cried the KGB officer, adding derisively, "The
  paminvatchikil Even the word is a corruption, meaninglessl A discredited
  strategy mounted decades agol you can't honestly believe it still
  flourishes."
  "Perhaps less than the Voennaya does. obviously more than you do-if you!re
  not lying."
  "Oh, come, Havelocki Russian infants sent to the United States, growing up
  with old-line no doubt pathetically senile, Marxists so as to become
  entre;&d Soviet agents? Insanityl
              h [)gically unsound-if not disas
 Be reasonable. les PSYC 01      ed
 trous-to say nothing of certain inevitable comparisons. W- -
 lost the majority to blue jeans, rock music and fast automO
 biles. We'd be idiots."
  Now YoI;re lying. They exist. you know it and we know it."
  Rostov shrugged. "A question of numbers, then. And value I might add. How
  many can be left? Fifty, a hundred, two ~undred at the outside? Sad,
  amateurishlY conspiratorial creatures wandering around a few cities,
  meeting in cellars to exchange nonsense, uncertain of their own values, the
  very reasons for being where they are. Very little credence Is given these
  so-called travelers take my word for it."
 "But you haveet pulled th;;~ out:,
 "Where would we put them? Few even speak the Russian
 34RoBEnT LUDLUM

 language, theyre a large embarrassment. Attrition, priyaK thaes the answer.
 And dismissing them with hp service, as you Americans say."
 "The Voennaya doesn7t dismiss them."
  "I told you, the men of the VKR pursue misguided fantasies."
  "I wonder if you believe that," said Michael, studying the Russian. "Not
  all those families were pathetic and senile, not all the travelers
  amateurs."
  "If there is cun-ently--or in the recent past-any movement of consequence
  on the part of the paminyatchiki, we are not aware of it," said Rostov
  firmly.
  "And if there is and yoere not aware of it, that would he something of
  consequence, wouldn1 it?"
  The Russian stood motionless; he spoke, his voice low and pensive. 'Me VKR
  is incredibly secretive. It would be something of consequence."
  "Then maybe Ive given you something to think about. Call it a parting gift
  from a retired enemy."
  "I look for no such gifts," said Rostov coldly. 'Iley're as gratuitous as
  your presence here in Athens."
  "Since you don't approve, go back to Moscow and fight your own fights. Your
  infrastructure doesn't concern me any longer. And unless you've got another
  comic-book weapon up your other sleeve. I suggest you leave."
  "Thaes just it, pyehshkah. Yes, pyehshkah. Pawn'. It Is as you say-an
  infrastructure. Separate sections, indeed, but one entity. There is Rrst
  the KGB; all else follows. A man-or a woman-may gravitate to the Voennaya,
  may even excel in its deepest operations, but flrst he or she must have
  sprung from the KGB. At the very minimum there has to be a Dzerzhinsky
  dossier somewhere. With foreign recruits ies, as you would say, a double
  imperative. Internal protection, of course.
  Havelock sat forward on the bed, confusion joining the anger in his eyes.
  "Say what you're trying to say and say it quickly. Theres a smell about
  you, priyatelf"
  "I suspect there is about all of us, Mikhail Havlf6ek. Our nostrils never
  quite adjust, do they? Perversely, they become sensitive-to variations of
  that basic odor. Like animale
 "Say it"
                  TnE PAwrFAL MosAic35

  "nere is no listing for a jenna Karasova or the Anglicized Karas in any
  branch or division of the KGB."
  Havelock stared at the Russian, then suddenly he spun off the bed, gripping
  the sheet and whipping it into the air, obscuring the Russian~s vision. He
  lunged forward, hammering Rostov against the wall beyond the balcony doors.
  He twisted the KGB man clockwise by the wrist and smashed his head into the
  frame of a cheap oil painting as he whipped his right arm around Rostov's
  neck in a hammerlock. "I could kill you for that," he whispered,
  breathless, the muscles of his jaw pulsating against Rostov's bald head.
  "You said I might break your neck. I could do it right nowl",
  "YOU could,- said the Russian, choking. "And you'abe cut down. Either in
  this room or on the street outside."
 "I thought you didn't have anyone in the hotell"
  "I lied. There are three men, two dressed as waiters clown the hallway by
  the elevators, one inside the staircase. Theres no final protection for you
  here in Athens. My people are out there-on the street as well-every doorway
  covered. My instructions are clear: I'm to emerge from. a specific e3it at
  a specific time. Any deviations from either will result in your death. The
  room will be stormed; the cordon around the Arethusa is unbreakable. I'm
  not an idioL"
  "Maybe not, but as you said, you!re an animdl" He roleased the Russian and
  hurled him across the room. "Go back to Moscow and tell them the baies too
  obvious, the stench too rottenl I'm not taking it, pliyatel. Get out of
  herel"
  "No bait," protested Rostov, regaining his balance and holding his throat.
  "Your own argument: what could you really tell us that would be worth the
  risks, or the reprisals, perhaps? Or the uncertainties? Yoere finished.
  Without programming, you could lead us into a hundred traps-a theory that
  has crossed our minds, incidentally. You talk freely and we act on what you
  say, but what you tell us is no longer op~-erative. Through you we go after
  strategies-not simple codes and ciphers, but supposedly long-term vital
  strategies-that Washington has aborted without telling you. In the process
  we reveal our personnel. Surely you!re aware of this. You talk of logic?
  Heed your own words."
  Havelock stared at the Soviet officer, his breathing audible, anger and
  bewilderment compounding the emotional strain. Even the shadow of a
  possibility that an error had been
 36            R013FRT LuDLum

 made at Costa Brava was more than he could face. But there was no error. A
 Baader-Meinhof defector had set off the reveahng chain of events. The
 evidence had been sent to Madrid, and he had pored over it, sifting every
 fragment for a shred to the contrary. There was nothing; there was every-
 thing. Even Anthony Matthias-Anton Matthias, friend, mentor, surrogate
 father-had demanded indepth verification; it had been returned: Positive.
  "Nol The proof was therel She was therel I saw for myselff I said I had to
  see for myself and they agreedl"
 "'They"? Who is'they?"
  'You know as well as I dol Men like youl The inside shell-strategistsl You
  didn't look hard enough. You~re wrongl"
  The Russian moved his bead slowly in circles, his left band massaging his
  throat; he spoke softly. "I won~t deny that the possibility exists-as I
  said, the VK-R is maniacally secretive, especially in Moscow-but that
  possibility is remote.... We were astonished. An unusually productive decoy
  conduit is led into a terrorist trap by her own people, who then proceed to
  bold the KGB responsible for her death by claiming she was one of us. The
  result of this manipulation is the neuterIng of the woman's constant
  companion, her lover, a deepcover, multilingual field agent of exceptional
  talent. Disillusion and disgust overwhelm him; he takes himself out. We are
  amazed; we search the dossier vaults, including the most Inaccessible. She
  is nowhere. jenna Karas-Karasova-was never a part of us." Rostov paused,
  his eyes conveying his awareness: Michael Havelock was a dangerously
  provoked panther about to spring, about to strike. The Russian continued,
  his voice flat: "We are grateful; we profit by your elimination, but we ask
  ourselves why? Why was this done? Is it a trick? If so, for what purpose?
  Who gains? On the surface we do, but again, why? How?"
  "Ask the VKRI" shouted Michael contemptuously. "They didn't plan it this
  way, but thaes the way it happened. I'm the bonusl Ask theml"
  "We did," said the Russian. "A section director, saner than most, who,
  because of his relative sanity, is frightened of his peers. He told us that
  be personally was not familiar with the Karas woman or the specifics at
  Costa Brava, but since the field personnel raised no questions, he assumed
  no questions
                  Trm PAnsiFAL Mosmc37

 should be raised. As be pointed out, the results were favorable: two condors
 shot down, both talented, one exceptional. The Voennaya was pleased to take
 credit."
  'Vby sbouldn't they? I was out, and she could be justified. A sacrifice by
  any name is still the same. It's expendable for a purpose. He said it; he
  acknowledged it."
  "He did not acknowledge it and be was saying something quite different. I
  told you, he's a frightened man. Only my rank persuaded him to go as far as
  he did."
 "Yoere reaching."
  "I listened. As you listened to me a few moments ago. He was telling us
  that he hadn't the vaguest idea what had happened or why."
  "He personally didn't know," said Havelock angrily. "The people in the
  field knew. She knewl"
  "A tenuous rationalization. His office is responsible for all activities in
  the southwest Mediterranean sector. The territory includes the Costa Brava.
  An emergency rendezvous--especfally one ostensibly involving the
  Baader-Meinbof-would certainly be cleared by him." Rostov paused briefly,
  then added quietly, "Under normal circumstances."
 "A not so tenuous rationalization?" asked Michael.
  "I leave myself the narrowest margin for error. An extremely remote
  possibility."
  "Ies the one I acceptl" Havelock shouted again, suddenly disturbed at his
  own outburst.
 "You want to accept it. Perhaps you have to."
  'rhe VKR more often than not gets its orderg direc4ly from the policy rooms
  of the Kremlin. It's no secret. If you~re not lying, you were passed over."
  "To besure, and the thought frightens me more than I can tell you. But as
  much as rm forced to acknowledge your professional accomplishments,
  priyatel, I do not think the policy makers in the Kremlin are concerned
  with the likes of you and me. They have more weighty matters, global
  matters. And, to the point, they have no expertise where we~re concerned."
  "They do with Baader-Meinbofl And the PLO, and the Brigate Rosse, and a
  couple of dozen 'red armies' blowing things up all over the goddamn placel
  Thaes policyl"
 "Only for maniacs."
 "Which is exactly what were talking aboutl Maniacsl"
 38ROBERT LuDLum

 Michael paused, the obvious striking him. "We broke the VKR codes. They were
 authentic; I've seen too many variations not to know. I set up the contact.
 She responded. I sent the final transmission to the men in the boat
 offshore. They respondedl Explain thatl"
 "I can't."
 "Then get outl"
  The KGB officer looked at his watch. "I must, in any event. Time is up."
 "Yes, it is."
 "We're at an impasse," said the Russian.
 "rin not"
  "No, I don't think you are, and that compounds the risk about you. You know
  what you know and I know what I know. Impasse, whether you like it or not."
 "Your time's up, remember?"
  "I'm not forgetting. I don't care to be caught in the cross fire. III leave
  now." Rostov went to the door and turned, his hand on the knob. "Several
  minutes ago you said the bait was too obvious, the stench too rotten. Tell
  that to Washington, priyatel. We're not taking it either."
 "Get outi"
  The door closed, and Havelock stood motionless for nearly a minute,
  picturing the Russian's eyes. They had held too much truth in them. Over
  the years Michael bad learned to discern the truth, especially in his
  enemies. Rostov had not been lying; he bad spoken the truth as be believed
  it to be. Which meant that this powerful strategist for the KGB was being
  manipulated by his own people in Moscow. Pyotr Rostov was a blind probe-an
  influential intelligence officer sent out with information be is convinced
  his superiors do not have in order to make contact with the enemy and turn
  an American agent, recruiting him for the Soviets. The higher up the
  officer, the more credible his story-as long as he spoke the truth as he
  saw it, truth that was perceived as such by his enemy.
  Michael walked to the bedside table, where be bad left the glass of whisky
  a half hour ago. He picked it up, drained the Scotch, and looked down at
  the bed. He smiled to himself, thinking bow the evening had veered from
  where it bad been heading thirty minutes ago. The whore had performed, but
  not in any way he ndght have expected. The sensuous
                  THE PArtsiFAL Mosmc39

 courtesan from the playgrounds of the rich bad been a setup. When were the
 setups going to stop? Amsterdam. Paris. Athens.
  Perhaps they would not stop until he did. Perhaps as long as he kept moving
  the would-be trappers would keep moving with him, watching him, comering
  him, waiting for him to commit whatever crimes their imaginations led them
  to believe he would commit. It was in the movement itself that they found
  the ominous substance for their suspicions. No man wandered aimlessly after
  a lifetime of wandering under orders. If he kept it up, it had to mean he
  was following other orders, different orders; otherwise he'd stay put.
  Somewhere.
  Perhaps it was time he stopped. Maybe his odyssey of recovery bad about run
  its course; there was a cable to be sent, a commitment to be made. A
  beginning. A nearly forgotten friend bad become a friend again, and that
  man had offered him a new life, where the old life could be buried, where
  there were roots to cultivate, relationships to create, things to teach.
 What tviU you teach, MikhailP
 Leave me alonel You are no part of me-you never werel
  He would send the cable to Harry Lewis in the morning, then rent a car and
  drive northwest to the ferry for the Adriatic port of K6rkira, where he
  would catch the boat to Brindisi in Italy. He had done it before under God
  knows what name or with what objective. He would do it now as Michael
  Havelock, visiting professor of government. From Brindisi he would take the
  circuitous train routes across Italy into Rome, a city he enjoyed
  immensely. He would stay in Rome for a week or two; it would be the last
  stop on his odyssey, the place where be would put to rest all thoughts of
  a life that was over.
  There were things to do in Concord, New Hampshire, U.S.A. He would assume
  his duties as visiting professor in something less than three months; in
  the meantime there were practicalities to be dealt with: lectures to be
  sketched out under the guidance of knowledgeable associates; curricula to
  study and evaluate, determining where his contributions might best be
  directed. A short visit, perhaps, with Matthias, who would certainly have
  insights to offer. No matter how pressed for time, Matthias would take the
  time, be-
   40ROBERT LUDLUM

 cause, above all men, Anton would be happiest for him: his old student had
 returned to the campus. It was where it had all begun.
  So many things to do.
  He needed a place to live: a house, furniture, pots and pans and books, a
  chair to sit in, a bed to sleep in. Choices. He had not thought about such
  things ever before. He thought about them now and felt the excitement
  growing inside him.
  He went to the bureau, uncapped the Scotch and poured himself a drink.
  "Pfiteli," be said softly, for no particular reason, as be looked at his
  face in the mirror. Suddenly he stared at his eyes and, in terror, slammed
  the glass down with such force that it shattered; blood spread slowly over
  his hand. His eyes would not let him gol And he understood. Had his own
  eyes seen the truth that night on the Costa Brava?
  "Stop id" he screamed, whether silently or out loud, he could not tell.
  "Ies overl"

 Dr. Harry Lewis sat at his desk in his book-lined study, the cablegram in
 his hand. He listened for the sound of his wife~s voice. It came.
  "See you later, dear," she called from the hallway beyond. The front door
  opened and closed. She was out of the house.
  Lewis picked up his telephone and dialed the area code 202. Washington,
  D.C. The seven digits that followed had been committed to memory, never
  written down. Nor would they be recorded on a bill, having bypassed the
  computers electronically.
 "Yes?" asked the male voice on the other end of the line.
 "Bfrchtree," said Harry.
 "Go ahead, Bircbtree. You're being taped."
 "He's accepted. The cable came from Athens."
 "Is there any change in dates?"
 "No. He'll be here a month before the trimester itarts.-
 "Did he say where he was going from Athens?"
 "No."
 "We'll watch the airports. Thank you, Birchtree."

 The Rome Havelock had come to visit was not the Rome In which he cared to
 stay. Strikes were everywhere, the chaos
                  THE PA:asxFAL MosAic41

 compounded by volatile Italian tempers that erupted on every street comer,
 every picket line, in the parks and around the fountains. Mail had been
 strewn in gutters, adding to the uncollected garbage; taxis were
 scarce-practically nonexistent-and most of the restaurants had been closed
 because of the lack of deliveries. The poliziotti, having taken sufficient
 abuse, were on a work stoppage, snarling further the normal insanity of
 Romes traffic, and since the telephones were part of the government's postal
 service, they functioned on a level below normal, which made them damn near
 impossible. The city was full of a kind of hysteria, which was aggravated by
 yet another stem papal decree-from a foreigner, a polaccolthat was at odds
 with every progressive step since Vatican 11. Giovanni Ventitreesimol Dove
 seiP
  It was his second night, and Michael had left his pengone on the Via Due
  Macelli over two hours before, walking nearly the mile to the Via Flaminia
  Vecchia in hopes of finding a favorite restaurant open. It was not, and no
  amount of patience brought forth a taxi to bring him back to the Spanish
  Steps.
  Reaching the north end of the Via Veneto, he was heading toward the side
  street that would elin-dnate the crowds in the gaudy carnival that was the
  Veneto when he saw it-a poster in the lighted window of a travel agency
  proclaiming the glories of Venice.
  Why not? Why the hell not? The floating passivity of not planning included
  sudden changes in plans. He looked at his watch; it was barely
  eight-thirty, probably too late to get out to the airport and chance a
  reservation on a plane, but if he remembered correctly-and he did-the
  trains kept running until midnight out of Rome. Why not a train? The lazy,
  circuitous trip from Brindisi by rail, passing through countrysides that
  bad not changed in centuries, had been startlingly beautiful. He could pack
  his single suitcase in minutes, walk to the train station in twenty. Surely
  the money he was willing to pay would get him accommodations; if not, he
  could always return to the Via Due Macelli. He had paid for a week in
  advance.
  Forty-five minutes later Havelock passed through the huge portals of the
  massive Ostia Railroad station, built by Mussolini in the halcyon days of
  trumpets and dnuns and marching boots and trains that ran on time.
 42            ROBERT LuDLum

  Italian was not Michael's best language, but he could read It well enough:
  Biglietto per Venezia. Prima classe. The line was short and his luck held.
  The famed Freccia della Laguna was leaving in eight minutes, and if the
  signore wished to pay the premium scale, he could have the finest
  accommodations by way of his own compartment. He so wished, and as the
  clerk stamped his ornate ticket, be was told that the Freccia was leaving
  from binario trentasei, a dual platform several football fields away from
  the counter.
 "Fate presto, signorel Non perdete tempol Fate in ftettal"
  Michael walked rapidly into the mass of rushing humanity, threading his way
  as fast as possible toward dual Track 36. As usual-as be recalled from
  memories past-the giant dome was filled with crowds. Screeching arrivals
  and wailing departures were joined in counterpoint; screamed epithets
  punctuated the deafening roar, because the porters, too, were obviously on
  strike. It took nearly five hectic minutes to shoulder his way through the
  huge stone arch and emerge on the double-track platform. It was, if
  possible, more chaotic than the station itself. A crowded train had arrived
  from the north as the Freccia della Laguna was about to depart. Freight
  dollies collided with hordes of embarking and disembarking passengers. It
  was a scene from a lower circle of Dante, screaming pandemonium.
  Suddenly, across the platform, through the milling crowds, he caught sigbt
  of the back of a wornan~s head, the brim of a soft hat shadowing her face.
  She was stepping out of the incoming train from the north, and had turned
  to talk to a conductor. It had happened before: the same color or cut of
  the hair, the shape of a neck. A scarf, or a hat or a raincoat like those
  she bad wom. It bad happened before. Too often.
  Then the woman turned; pain seared Havelock's eyes and temples and surged
  downward-hot knives stabbing his cbest. The face across the platform, seen
  sporadically through the weaving, colliding crowds, was no illusion. It was
  she.
  Their eyes locked. Hers widened in raw fear; her face froze. Then she
  whipped her head away and plunged into the crowds in front of her.
  Michael pressed his eyelids shut, then opened them, trying to rid himself
  of the pain and the shock and the sudden trembling that immobilized him. He
  dropped his suitcase; he had to move, rtm, race after this living corpse
  from the Costa
                  THE PARsYFAL MosAic43

 Braval She was alivel This woman he had loved, this apparition who had
 betrayed that love and had died for it, was alivel
  Like a crazed animal, he parted the bodies in his path, screaming her name,
  ordering ber'to stop, commanding the crowds to stop her. He raced up the
  ramp and through the massive stone archway cblivious to the shrieking,
  furious passengers he pummeled and left in his wake, unaware of the slaps
  and punches and body blocks burled at him, unconscious of the hands that
  ripped his clothing.
 She was nowhere to be seen in the station crowds.
 What in the name of God had happened?
 Jenna Karas was alivel
 4

 With the terrifying impact of a bolt of lightning the sight of jenna Karas
 had thrown him back into the shadow world he had left behind. She was alivel
 He had to keep moving; he had to find her. He ran blindly through the
 crowds, separating arms and gesturing hands and protesting shoulders. First
 to one exit, then to another, and a third and a fourth. He stopped to
 question what few police he found, picking the words from a blurred Italian
 lexicon somewhere in his mind. He shouted her description, ending each
 distorted phrase with "Aiutol'~-only to be met with shrugs and looks of
 disapproval.
  He kept running. A staircase-a door-an elevator. He thrust 2,000 lire on a
  woman heading into the ladies' room; 5,000 to a freight hand. He pleaded
  with three conductors leaving the station carrying satchels, which meant
  they were going home.
 Nothing. She was nowbere.
  Havelock leaned over a trash can, the sweat rolling down his face and neck,
  his hands scraped and bleeding. He thought for a moment that he would vomit
  into the garbage; he had passed over the edge of hysteria. He bad to pull
  himself back; he had to get hold of himself. And. the only way to do so was
  to keep moving, slower and slower, but to keep
                                 44
                  Tim PARsrFAL MosAic45

 moving, let the pounding in his chest decelerate, find a part of his mind so
 he could think. He vaguely remembered his suitcase; the possibility that it
 was still there was remote, but looking for it was something to do. He
 started back through the crowds, body aching, perceptions numbed, buffeted
 by the gesticulating bordes around him, as if be were in a dark tunnel
 filled with shadows and swirling winds. He had no idea how long it took for
 him to pass through the arch and walk down the ramp to the near-deserted
 platform. The Freccid had left, and the clean-up crews were invading the
 cars of the stationary train from the north-the train that had carried Jenna
 Karas.
  I There it was, crushed but still intact, straps broken, clothes
  protruding, yet oddly whole. His suitcase was wedged in the narrow space
  between the edge of the platform and the filthy, flat side of the third
  car. He knelt down and pulled it out of its jammed recess, sliding up first
  one side and then the other as the leather squeaked abrasively. The
  suitcase was suddenly freed; be lost his balance and fell on the concrete,
  still holding on to the half-destroyed handle. A man in overalls pushing a
  wide broom approached. Michael got to his feet awkwardly, aware that the
  maintenance crewman had stopped, his broom motionless, his eyes conveying
  both amusement and disgust. The man thought be was drunk.
  The handle broke; held by a single clasp, the suitcase abruptly tilted
  downward. Havelock yanked it up and clutched it in his arms; he started
  down the platform toward the ramp, knowing his walk was trancelike.
  How many minutes later, or which particular exit he used, he would never
  know, but he was out on the street, the suitcase held against his chest,
  walking unsteadily past a row of lighted storefronts. He was conscious of
  the fact that people kept glancing at him, at his tom clothes and the
  crushed suitcase, its contents spilling out. The swirling mists were
  beginning to break up, the cold night air diffusing them. He bad to find
  his sanity by concentrating on the little things: he would wash his face,
  change his clothes, have a cigarette, replace the suitcase.
  F. MARTn-MLLI Valigeria. The neon letters glowed impressively in deep red
  above the wide storefront window filled with accessories for the traveler.
  It was one of those shops near the Ostia Station that cater to the wealthy
  foreigner and
 46            RoBERT LuDLum

 the self-indulgent Italian. The merchandise was expensive replicas of
 ordinary objects turned into luxuries by way of sterling silver and polished
 brass.
  Havelock stood for a moment, breathing deeply, holding on to the suitcase
  as if it were somehow an object that would carry him, a plank in a wild
  sea-without it he would drown. He walked inside; mercifully, it was near
  closing time, and the shop was devoid of customers.
  The manager emerged from behind the middle counter, looking alarmed. He
  hesitated, then stepped back as if to retreat quickly. Havelock spoke
  rapidly in barely passable Italian. "I was caught in an insane crowd on the
  platform. rm afraid I fell. I'll need to buy a few things-a number of
  things, actually. I'm expected at the Hassler fairly soon."
  At the mention of Romes most exclusive hotel, the manager at once turned
  sympathetic, even brotherly.
  'Animalir he exclaimed, gesturing to his God. "How perfectly dreadful for
  you, signorel Here, let me help you-7
  "I'll need a new piece of luggage. Soft, very good leather, if yDu have
  it."
 "Naturalmente."
  "I realize its an imposition, but could I possibly wash up somewhere? I'd
  bate to greet the Contessa the way I look now.
  "This way, signorel A thousand apologiesl I speak for all Romel This way-"
  While Michael washed and changed clothes in the back room, be focused his
  thougbts-as they came to him-on the brief visits he and Jenna Karas bad
  made to Rome. There had been two. On the first they bad passed through for
  a single night; the second was much longer, very official-three or four
  days, if he remembered correctly. They had been awaiting orders from
  Washington, having traveled as a YugDslav couple through the Balkan
  countries in order to gather information on the sudden expansion in border
  defenses. There had been a man, an army intelligence officer not easily
  forgotten; he had been Havelocles D.C. conduit What made the man memorable
  was his cover; be was posing as the only first-level black attach6 at the
  embassy.
  Their first conference had not been without humor-black humor. Michael and
  Jenna were to meet the attach6 at an out-of-the-way restaurant west of the
  Palatine. They had
                  THE PAmsiFAL MosAic47

 waited in the crowded stand-up bar, preferring that the conduit select- a
 table, and were oblivious to the tall black soldier ordering a vodka martini
 on their right. After several minutes the man smiled and said, "I'm jes'
 Rastus in the catasta di legna, Massa Havelock. Do you think we niight sit
 down?"
  His name was Lawrence Brown. Lieutenant Colonel Lawrence B. Brown-the
  middle initial was for his real name, Baylor.
  "So help me God," the colonel had told them over afterdinner drinks that
  night, "the fellows in G-two felt there was more 'concrete
  association~-thaes what they called it-by using Brown in the cover. It went
  under the heading of 'psy-acceptance,' can you believe it? Hell, I suppose
  it's better than Attach6 Coffee-Face."
  Baylor was a man he could talk to . . . if Baylor would agree to talk to
  him. And where? It would not be anywhere near the embassy; the United
  States government had several terrible things to explain to a retired field
  agent
  It took over twenty minutes on the manager's phonewhile the manager
  repacked Michaers clothing in an outrageously priced new suitcase-before
  Havelock reached the embassy switchboard. Senior Attach6 Brown was cur-
  rently attending a reception on the first floor.
  'rell him its urgent," said Michael. "My name is Baylor."
  Lawrence Baylor was reluctant to the point of turning Havelock down.
  Anything a retired intelligence officer had to say would best be said at
  the embassy. For any number of reasons.
  'Suppose I told you I just came out of retirement. I may not be on your
  payroll-or anyone else's-but I'm very much back in. I'd suggest you don't
  blow this, Colonel."
  'Mere's a caf6 on the Via Pancra2io, La Ruota del Pavone. Do you know it?"
 -ni find it."
 "Forty-five minutes."
 "III be there. Waiting."

 Havelock watched from a table In the darkest corner of the caf6 as the army
 officer ordered a carafe of wine from the bar and began walking across the
 dimly lit room. Bayloes
 48            RoBERT LuDLum

 mahogany face was taut, stem; be was not comfortable, and when he reached
 the table, be did not offer his hand. He sat down opposite Michael, exhaled
 slowly, and attempted a grim smile.
 "Nice to see you," he said with little conviction.
 'Thank you."
  'And unless you've got something to say we want to hear, yo-dre putting me
  in a pretty rough spot, buddy. I hope you know that."
  "I've got something that'll blow your mind," said Havelock, his voice
  involuntarily a whisper. The trembling had returned; he gripped his wrist
  to control it. "Ies blown mine."
  The colonel studied Michael, his eyes dropping to Havelocles hands. "You're
  stretched, I can see that. What is it?"
 "She's alive. I saw herl"
  Baylor was silent, immobile. His eyes roamed Miebaers face, noting the
  marks of recent scrapes and bruises on Havelodes skin. It was obvious that
  be had made the connection. "Are you referring to the Costa Brava?" he
  asked flnally.
  "You know damn well I aml" said Michael angrily. "My abrupt retirement and
  the circumstances thereof have been flashed to every goddamned station and
  post we've got. les why you just said what you did. 'Beware the screwed-up
  talent,' Washington tells you. 'He might do anything, say any.. thing,
  think be has scores to settle.'"
 "It's happened."
  "Nat to me. I don't have any scores to think about because rm not
  interested in the ballgame. rm rational. I saw what I saw. And she saw met
  She acknowledged met She ranl"
  "Emotional stress is first cousin to hysteria," said the colonel quietly.
  "A man can see a lot of things that aren't there in that condition. And you
  bad a jolt."
  "Past tense, not currently applicable. I was out. I accepted the fact and
  the reasons-"
  "Come on, buddy," insisted the soldier. "You doet throw away sixteen years
  of involvement"
 01 did."
  "You were bere in Rome with her. Memories get activated, twisted. As I
  said, it happens."
 "Again, negative. Nothing was activated, nothing twisted.

 "You even called me,' Interrupted Baylor sharply. "Ile
                  THE PAPMFAL MOSAjc49

 three of us spent a couple of evenings together. A few drhiks, a few laughs.
 Association; you reached me."
  'Ilere was no one else. My cover was D-squared: you were my only contact
  here in Romel I can walk into the embassy now, I couldn't then."
 'Men lees go," said the colonel quickly.
  'No wayl Besides, thaes not the point. You are. You fielded orders to me
  from Washington seven months ago, and now yoere going to send an emergency
  flag back to those same people. Tell them what rve told you, what I saw.
  You haven!t got a choice."
  "I've got an opinion. rm relaying what a former talent said while in a
  state of extreme anxiety."
  "Finel Goodl Then try this. Five days ago in Athens I nearly killed a man
  we both know from the Dzerzhinsky files for telling me Costa Brava wasn't
  a Soviet exercise. That she wasn't any part of the KGB, much less the VKR.
  I didn't kill him because I thought it was a probe, a blind probe-that man
  was telling the mah, as he knew the truth. I sent a message back to Moscow.
  The bait was too obvious, the smell too rotten."
  "I suppose that was charitable of you, considering your recorV
  "Oh, no, the charity started with him. You see, be could have taken me. I
  could have found myself in Sevastopol on my way to Dzerzhinsky Square
  without even knowing rd left Athens."
 "He was that good? That well connected?"
  "So much so, he was self-effacing. But be didn't take me. I wasn't booked
  on the Dardanelles airlift. He didjA want me.0
 "Why not?"
  'Because he was convinced I was the bait. Pretty fair irony, isn't it?
  There was no room at the Lubyanka. I was turned out. Instead, be gave me
  his own message for Washington: Dzerzbinsky wouldn't touch me." Havelock
  paused. "And now this."
  The colonel narrowed his e-yes pensively, and, with both hands, turned his
  glass on the table. "I don't have your expertise, but say you actually did
  see what you say you saw."
 "I did. Accept it."
 "No concessions, but say it's possible. It could still be a
 50            ROBERT LUDLUM

 lure. They've got you under a glass, know your plans, your itinerary. Their
 computers pick up a woman reasonably similar in appearance, and with a
 little cosmetic surgery they've got a double sufficient for short distances.
 'Beware the screwed-up talent.' You never know when he thinks he has I
 scores to settle.' Especially if he's given some time to stew, to get worked
 up."
  "What I saw was in her eyesl But even if you won't accept that, there's
  something else; it voids the strategy, and every point can be checked. Two
  hours ago I diddt know I'd be inside that station; ten minutes before I saw
  her I didn't know I'd be on that platform, and neither could anyone else.
  I came here yesterday and took a room in a pensione on the Due Macelli for
  a week, paid in advance. At eight-thirty tonight I saw a poster in a window
  and decided to go to Venice. I didn't speak to anyone." Michael reached
  into his pocket, took out his ticket for the Freccia deUa Uguna and placed
  it in front of Lawrence Baylor. "The Freccia was scheduled to leave at
  nine-thirty-five. The time of purchase is stamped across the top of this.
  Read itl"
  '11wenty-one, twenty-seven," said the army officer, reading. "Twenty-seven
  past nine. Eight minutes before the brain left
  "All veriGable. Now look at me and tell me I'm lying. And while yodre at
  it, explain how that setup could have been mounted given the time span and
  the fact that she was on an incoming traint-
 "I cant. If she-"
  "She was talking to a conductor seconds before she got off. rm sure I can
  find him."
  Baylor was silent again; he stared at Havelock, then spoke softly. "Don't
  bother. I'll send the flag." He paused, adding, "Along with qualified
  support. Whatever you saw, you!re not lying. Where can I reach you?"
 "Sorry. IT reach you."
 "They'll want to talk to you, probably in a hurry.'"
 M be in touch."
 "Why the static?"
 "Something Rostov said in Athens."
  "Rostov? Pyotr Rostov?" The colonel's eyes widened. 'You don't go much
  higher in the Dzerzhinsky."
  Theres higher.-                  TnE PAnsrFAL MosAic51

 "Hell do. What did he say? What did he tell you?"
  "That our nostrils never quite adjust. Instead, they develop a kind of
  sensitivity-to variations of the basic rotten smell. Like animals."
 "I expected something less abstract:' said Baylor, annoyed.
  "Really? From where I stand, it sounds concrete as bell. The Costa Brava
  trap was engineered in Washington, the evidence compiled by the inner shell
  in one of those white, sterile offices on the top floor of State."
 "I understood you were in control," interrupted Baylor.
 "The last phase. I insisted on it."
 "Then you-"
  "I acted on everything that was given to me. And now I want to know why it
  was given to me. Why I saw what I did tonight."
 "If you saw-2'
 "Shes alive. I want to know wbyl Howl"
 "I still don't understand."
  "Costa Brava was meant for me. Someone wanted me out. Not dead, but out.
  Comfortably removed from those temptations that often afflict men like me."
  "Scores to settle?" asked the colonel. "The Agee syndrome? The Snepp
  complex? I di(Wt know you were infected."
  "rve had my quota of shocks, my share of questions. Someone wanted those
  questions buried and she went along. Why?"
  "Two assumptions I'm not willing to concede are facts. And if you intend to
  bare a few shocks not in the national interest, I imagine-and I'm speaking
  hypothetically in the extreme, of course-there are other methods of ...
  burying them."
 "Dispatch? Call me dead?"
  "I didn't say we'd kill you. We don't live in that kind of country." The
  colonel paused, then added, "On the other hand, why not?"
  "For the same reason others haven't met with odd accidents that prearranged
  pathologists n-dght label something else. Self-protection is ingrained in
  our job, brother. Ies another syndrome; it's called the Nuremberg. Those
  shocks, instead of being buried, might surface. Sealed depositions to be
  opened by unnamed attorneys in the event of questionable et ceteras."
 52            RoBzRT Luixum

 "Jesm, you said that? You went that far?"
  "Strangely enough, I never did. Not seriously. I simply got angry. The rest
  was assumed."
 "What kind of world do you people live in?"
  "The same one you do-only, we've been around a little longer, a little
  deeper. And that's why I won't tell you where you can reach me. My nostrils
  have picked up a sickening odor from the Potomac." Havelock leaned forward,
  his voice harsh, low, nearly a whisper again. "I know that girl. For her to
  do what she did, something had to have been done to her, held over her.
  Something obscene. I want to know what it was and why."
  "Assuming-2' Baylor began slowly, 'assuming you're right, and I don't for
  an instant concede that you are, what makes you think they'll tell you?"
  "It was all so sudden," said Michael, leaning back, his body rigid, his
  voice now floating as if in a painful dream. "It was a Tuesday and we were
  in Barcelona. We'd been there for a week; something was going to happen in
  the sector, thaes all Washington told us. Then word came from Madrid: a
  Four Zero communication had been flown in by courier, contents restricted
  to the embassy, Eyes Only. Mine only. There's no Cons Op station in Madrid,
  no one cleared to relay the information, so I flew in Wednesday morning,
  signed for that goddamned steel container, and opened it in a room guarded
  by three marines. Everything was there, everything she'd done, all the
  information she'd transmitted-information she could have gotten only from
  me. The trap was theze, too, myself in control if I so wished-and I so
  wished. They knew it was the only way I'd be convinced. On Friday I was
  back in Barcelona, and by Sunday it was over . . . and I was convinced.
  Five days and the walls came tumbling down. No trumpets, just flashlights
  and screams and loud ugly noises intruding on the surf. Five days ... so
  sudden, so swift, everything at a crescendo. It was the only way it could
  have been done."
  'You havenI answered my question," Baylor interrupted quietly. "If you~re
  right, what makes you think they'll tell you?"
  Havelock leveled his eyes at the soldier. "Because they're afraid. It comes
  down to the why. The questions, the shocks; which one was it?"
                  THE PARSTFAL MOSAIC53

 "What are you talking about?"
  'Me decision to remove me wasnt made gradually, Colonel. Something
  triggered it. They don't force a man out the way I was forced out because
  of accumulated differences. Talent's expensive; proven field talent too
  difficult to replace. Accommodations can be made, explanations offered,
  agreements reached. All these are tried before they let the talent go. But
  no one tried with me."
  "Can you be more specific?" the officer pressed, again annoyed.
  "I wish I could be. It's something I know, or they think I know. Something
  I could have written down. And ies a bomb."
  "Do you?' Baylor asked coldly, professionally. "Have such a piece of
  information?'
  "I'll find it", replied Havelock, suddenly pushing back his chair, prepared
  to leave. "You tell them that. Just as I'll find her, tell them that, too.
  It won't be easy because shcN not with them anymore. She got away; shes
  gone under. I also saw that in her eyes. But IT find her." -
  "Maybe-" Baylor said urgently, "maybe if everything you say proves out,
  they'd be willing to help."
  ney'd better be," said Michael getting to his feet, and looking down at the
  soldier-conduit. "I'll need all the help I can get. In the meantime I want
  this whole goddamned thing spelled out-chapter and verse, to quote an old
  source of mine. Because if it isn't, Im going to start telling tales out
  of school. When' and from where none of you will know, but the words will
  be there loud and clear. And somewhere among them will be that bomb.'
 "Don't do anything stupidl"
  "Don't mistake me, I don't want to. But what was done to her, to me-to
  us-just wasn1 fair, Colonel. rm back in. Solo. n1 be in touch."
  Havelock turned and walked swiftly out of the cafk into the Via Pancra~zio.

 He reached the Via Galvani on his way back to the railroad station, where he
 had deposited his newly acquired suitcase in a coin locker. Suddenly the
 painful irony struck him. it had been a suitcase in a coin locker at an
 airport in Bar-
  54            ROBERT LUDLUM

 celona that had condemned Jenna Karas. The defector from the
 Baader-Meinhof-in exchange for the quiet cancellation of a death sentence
 pronounced in absentia-had led them to it. The German terrorist bad told
 Madrid that das Frdulein Karas kept secret, updated field records within her
 reach at all times. It was a Voennaya custom dictated by the strange
 relationship the violent and clandestine branch of Soviet inteffigence had
 with the rest of the KGB. Certain field personnel on long-range deep-cover
 operations bad access to their own files in the event that their superiors
 in Moscow suddenly were not accessible. Self-protection sometimes assumed
 odd forms; no one had questioned it
 No one had questioned. Not even he.
  Someone makes contact with her and gives her a key, stating a location. A
  room or a locker, even a bank. The material is there, including new
  objectives as they are developed.
  A man had stopped her one afternoon two days before Michael left for
  Madrid. In a caf6 on the Paseo Isabel. A drunk. He had shaken her hand,
  then kissed it. Four days later Michael had found a key in Jenna's purse.
  On Sunday, two days later, she was dead.
  There had been a key, but whose key was it? He had seen photocopies
  verified by Langley of every item in that suitcase. But whose suitcase was
  it? If not hers, how did three sets of fingerprints confirmed to be hers
  get inside? And if the prints were hers, why did she permit it?
  What had they done to her? What had they done to a blond woman on the Costa
  Brava who had screamed in Czech and whose spine and neck and head had been
  pierced with bullets? What kind of people were they who could put human
  beings on strings and blow them up as calmly as one might explode
  mannequins in a horror show? That woman bad died; he had seen too much
  death to be mistaken. It was no charade, as the elegant Gravet might have
  put it.
  Yet it was all a charade. They were all puppets. But on what stage and for
  whose benefit were they performing?
  He hurried faster on the Via Galvani; the Via della Mamorata was in sight.
  He was only blocks now from the massive railroad station; be would begin
  there. At least, he had an idea; whether it made sense or not the next half
  hour would tell.
 He passed a garishly lighted newsstand where tabloids
                  THE PARsiFAL MosAic55

 competed with glossy magazines. Capped teeth and outsized breasts battled
 for attention with mutilated bodies and graphic descriptions of rape and
 mayhem. And then he saw the famous face staring up at him from the cover of
 the International edition of Time. The clear eyes behind the hornrimmed
 glasses shone as they always did, full of high Intelligence-cold at first
 glance, yet somehow warmer the longer one looked at them, softened, perhaps
 by an understanding few on this earth possessed. There he was, the high
 cheekbones and the aquiline nose, the generous lips from which such
 extraordinary words poured forth.
  'A man for all seasons, all peoples." That was the simple caption beneath
  the photograph. No name, no title; none was necessary. The world knew the
  American Secretary of State, heard his reasoned, deliberate voice and
  understood. This was a man for all; be transcended borders and languages
  and national insanities. There were those who believed-and Michael was one
  of them-that either the world would listen to Anthony Matthias or it would
  be blown to hell in a mushroom cloud.
  Anton Matthias. Friend, mentor, surrogate father. Where Costa Brava was
  concerned, he, too, had been a puppet. Who would dareP
  As Havelock put several lira notes down on the counter and picked up the
  magazine, he remembered vividly the handwritten note Anton had insisted the
  strategists in Washington include with the Four Zero file flown to Madrid.
  From their few brief conversations in Georgetown, Matthias had grasped the
  depth of his feelings for the woman assigned to him for the past eight
  months. At last, perhaps, he was ready to get out and find the peace that
  had eluded him all these years. The statesman bad made gentle fun of the
  situation; when a fellow Czech past forty and in Michaers line of work
  decided to concentrate on one woman, Slavic tradition and contemporary
  fiction suffered irreparable blows.
 But there had been no such levity in Matthias's note.

   mfif mil~ synu
    The attached pains my heart as it will yours. You who suffered so much
    in the early days, and have given of yourself so brilliantly and
    selflessly to our adopted country in these later ones, must again know
    pain. I have demanded
 50ROBERT LUDLUM

   and received a complete verification of these findings. IF you wish to
   remove yourself from the scene, you may, of course, do so. Do not feel
   bound by the attached recommendations. There is only so much a nation can
   ask, and you have Fiven with honor and more- Perhaps now the angers we
   Spoke of ago, the fivies that propelled you into this terfible life,
   subsided, perrm ng you to return to another world that needs the labors
   of your mind. I pray so.
                             Tvk,
                             Anton M.

  Havelock forced the note from his mind; it served only to aggravate the
  incomprehensible. Verification: Positive. He opened the magazine to the
  article on Matthias. There was nothing new, merely a recap of his more
  recent accomplishments in the area of arms negotiations. It ended with the
  observation that the Secretary of State was off for a well-deserved
  vacation at an unnamed location. Michael smiled; he knew where it was. A
  cabin in the Shenandoah Valley. It was entirely possible that before the
  night was over he would use a dozen codes to reach that mountain cabin. But
  not until he found out what had happened. For Anton Matthias had been
  touched by it too.
  The crowds inside the giant dome of the Ostia had thinned out, the last of
  the trains leaving Rome having departedor being about to depart. Havelock
  pulled his suitcase from the locker and looked around for a sign; it had to
  be somewhere. It could well be a waste of time, but he did not think so; at
  least it was a place to start. He had told the intelligence officer-attach6
  in the caf6 on the Via Pancrazio: "She was talking to a conductor seconds
  before she got off. rm sure I can find him."
  Michael reasoned that someone running did not casually strike up a
  conversation with a conductor for the sake of conviviality; too much was on
  that someone's mind. And in every city there were those sections where men
  and women who wished to disappear could do so, where cash was the only
  currency, mouths were kept shut, and hotel registries rarely reflected
  accurate identities. Jenna Karas might know the names of districts, even
  streets, but she did not-had not known-Rome itself. A city on strike might
  just possibly convince someone running that it was urgent to ask a question
  or a direction of someone who might have the answer.
                  TnE PABsiFAL MosAic57

 There was the sign on the wall, an arrow pointing to the office complex:
 AMMUMTRATORE DELLA STAZON-E.
  Thirty-five minutes later, having convinced a night manager that it was
  imperative and in both his and the conductoes financial interest that the
  conductor be found, he had the address of the man assigned to cars tre,
  quattro, and cinque for the incoming train on binario trentasei at
  eight-thirty that evening. As the rail system was government service, a
  photograph was attached to the employment sheet. It was the same man he had
  seen talking to jenna Karas. Among his qualifications was a proficiency in
  English. LiveUb pritnario.
  He climbed the worn stone steps of the apartment building to the fifth
  floor, found the name "Mascolo" on the door and knocked. The red-faced
  conductor was dressed in loose trousers held up by wide suspenders over an
  undershirt His breath reeked of cheap wine, and his eyes were not entirely
  focused. Havelock took a 10,0004ire note from his pocket.
  "Who can remember one passenger among thousands?" protested the man, seated
  opposite Michael at the kitchen table.
  .rm sure you can," said Havelock, removing another bill. "Think. She was
  probably one of the last people you spoke to on that train. Slender, medium
  height, a wide-brimmed hat-you were in the vestibule."
  "Sil Naturalmente. Una beUa ragazzal I rememberl" The conductor took the
  money and drank some wine; he belched and continued. "She asked me if I
  knew where she could make connections for Civitavecchia.-
 "Civitaveechia? That's a town north of here, isn't itr
 "Si. A seaport on the Tyrrhenian."
 "Did you know?"
  'There are very few trains between Rome and Civitavecchia, signore, and
  certainly not at that hour. It is at best a stop for freight, not
  passengers."
 "What did you tell her?"
  "Just that. She appeared reasonably well dressed, so I suggested she
  negotiate a taxi for a flat rate. if she could find one. Rome is a
  manicomiol"
  Havelock nodded thanks, placed another bill on the table and went to the
  door. He glanced at his watch, it was twenty past one in the morning.
  Civitavecchia. A seaport on
 58            ROBERT LUDLUM

 the Tyrrhenian. Ships heading out to sea on a given day fnvariably left
 with the early light. At dawn.
  He had roughly three hours to reach Civitavecchia, search the waterfront,
  find a pier, find a ship-find an unlisted passenger.
 S
 He raced out of the marble lobby of the hotel in Bernint Circle and rushed
 blindly up through the winding streets until he reached the Via Veneto. The
 desk clerk at the hotel had not been able to help him but not for lack of
 trying; spurred by the thick folds of lire, he futilely punched the
 telephone bar and screamed numbers at the sleepy switchboard operator. The
 night clerles contacts were limited; he could not raise a rented car.
  Havelock stopped for breath, studying the lights on the Veneto. The hour
  was too late for the full array, but several caf6s and the Excelsior Hotel
  were illuminated. Someone had to help him-he bad to get to Civitavecchial
  He had to find her. He could not lose her. Not again, not ever againl He
  had to reach her and hold her and tell her that terrible things had been
  done to them tell her over and over again until she saw the truth in his
  e~es and heard that truth in his voice; and saw the love he felt so deeply,
  and understood the unendurable guilt that never left him-for he had killed
  that love.
  He began running again, first into the Excelsior, where no amount of money
  interested an arrogant clerk.
 "Yoieve got to help mel"
  "You are not even a guest, signore," said the man, glancing to his lefL
                                 59
 60            RoBEnT LUDLUM

  Slowly Michael angled his head. Across the lobby two policemen were
  watching the scene. They conferred; obviously, the night operation at the
  Excelsior was under open official scrutiny. Peddlers of capsules and pills,
  white powder and syringes, were working the world-famous boulevard. One of
  the uniformed men stepped forward. Havelock turned and walked rapidly to
  the entrance, once again running into the half-deserted street, toward the
  nearest profusion of light.
  The tired maitre & of the Caf6 de Paris told him he was a capo zuccone. Who
  would have an automobile to rent to a stranger at this hour? The American
  manager of a third-rate version of a Third Avenue bar told him to "pound
  sand."
  Again the winding streets, again the sweat drenching his hairline, rolling
  down his cheeks. The Hassler-the Villa Medicil He had used the name of the
  elegant hotel in the luggage shop by the Ostia...
  The night concierge at the Hassler's Villa Medici was accustomed to the
  vagaries of Rome's wealthiest hotel guests. Arrangements were made for
  Michael to rent a Fiat, one of the Hassler's staff vehicles. The price was
  exorbitant, but with it came a map of Rome and its environs, the most
  direct route to Civitavecchia marked in red.
  He reached the port city at three-fifteen and by threeforty-five he had
  driven up and down the waterfront, studying it until be decided where to
  park the car and start his search for Jenna Karas.
  It was a section common to most waterfronts where the floodlights washing
  the piers remained on all night and activity never stopped; where groupings
  of dockworkers and deckhands mingled like slow-moving automatons,
  crisscrossing each other-men and machinery meshed in volatile con-
  flict-loading the cargo holds and preparing the massive boilers and
  outdated engines of the larger vessels soon to head out into deep water.
  Where caf6s and coffeehouses fined the mist-laden alleys, punctuated by the
  diffused light of the streetlamps-places of refuge serving the harshest
  whisky and the most glutinous food.
  To the north and south were the smaller piers, halyards and masts swaying
  in silhouette against the moonlight; filthy marinas for the fishing boats
  and the trawlers that ventured no more than forty kilometers out to those
  watery places that decades of experience and tradition told the captains
  were
                  THE PARsriFAL MosAic61

 where the catches were most plentiful. These piers did not begin to stir
 until the early light was closer, faint sprays of yellowish white inching
 their way over the southwest horizon, pushing the night sky upward. Only
 then did groaning, dull-eyed men walk down the wooden planks toward oily
 gunwales and the interminable, blinding day ahead. Jenna Karas would not be
 in these places where the boats cast off at dawn only to return home when
 the sun went down. She would be somewhere in that complex of larger piers,
 where ships looked to the tides and the charts and sailed to other ports,
 other countries.
  She was somewhere in this stretch of the waterfront where swirling pockets
  of mist rolled off the sea and across the docks, through intersecting pools
  of floodlights and the hammering tattoo of nocturnal labors. She would be
  hidden-not visible to those who should not see her: controllori of the
  piers, paid by the state and the shipping companies to be on the lookout
  for material and human contraband. Keep her out of sight; the moment will
  come when she can be taken on board, after a capo operaio has inspected a
  hold and signed the papers that state the ship in question is free to de-
  part, free from the taint of transgressing the laws of land and sea. Then
  she can walk swiftly out of the shadows and down a pier, controllori and
  opeM themselves out of sight, their duties finished.
 Which pier? Which ship? Where are you, lentO
  There were three freighters, all medium tonnage, berthed alongside each
  other at three of the four major cargo clocks. The fourth housed two
  smaller vessels-barge class-with conveyor equipment and thick piping
  machinery transporting and pumping bulk cargo up into the open holds. She
  would be taken aboard one of the freighters; the immediate thing to learn
  was the departure time of each.
  He parked the Fiat on a side street that intersected the viale fronting the
  four piers. He walked across the wide avenue, dodging several vans and
  trucks, to the first pier on the left, to the gate manned by a uniformed
  guard, a civil servant of questionable civility. He was unpleasant, and the
  nuisance of having to piece together Havelock's barely fluent Italian added
  to his hostility.
  "What do you want to know for?" asked the guard, filling the doorway of the
  gatehouse. "What's it to your
 62ROBERT LUDLUM

  "rm trying to find someone who may have booked passage," said Michael,
  hoping the words he used were close enough to his meaning.
  "Passaggio? Biglietto? Who buys a ticket on a Portuguese freighter?-
  Havelock saw his opening; he leaned closer, glancing about as he spoke.
  "This is the ship, then. Forgive my poor use of your language, Signor
  Controllore. It's unforgivable. Actually, Im with the embassy of Portugal
  in Rome. In my way an-inspector, as you are. We were told there may be
  certain irregularities with this vessel. Any cooperation from you could be
  duly conveyed to your superiors."
  The human ego when tied to opportunity was not affected by the lowliness of
  a civil service rating. The hostile guard was abruptly pleasant, moving
  aside to admit the straniero importante.
  "Scusatemi, signorel I did not understand. We who patrol those holes of
  corruption must cooperate with one another, noP And, in truth, a word to my
  superiors-in Rome, of course."
 "Of course. Not here."
  "Of course. Not here. 71ey are brutes down here. Come in, come in. It must
  be chilly for you."
  The Miguel CrW6v!w was scheduled to leave port at 5:00 A.M. Its captain was
  a man named Aliandro, who had been in the wheelhouse of the CrW6vtlo for
  the past twelve years, a skipper who knew every island, every shoal in the
  western Mediterranean, it was said.
  The two other freighters were of Italian registry. Ile guards at the gates
  were wearily cooperative, perfectly willing to give whatever information
  the oddly spoken foreigner requested. What be wished to know he could read
  in any newspaper under Navi Informazione-Civitavecchia, the pages of which
  were usually torn out and tacked to the walls of the various caf6s around
  the waterfront. They helped when crewmen got drunk and forgot their
  schedules.
  The Isola cFElba was leaving at flve-thirty, the Santa Teresa twenty
  minutes later, at five-fifty.
  Havelock started to walk away from the third gate. He looked at his watch;
  it was eight minutes past four. So little time.
 Jennal Where are youP
                  Tim PARsrFAL MosAic63

  He heard the sound of a bell behind him. It was sudden, abrasive, eeboing
  in its own vibrations, an outside bell meant to be heard above the shouts
  and machinery of the piers. Alarmed, he tamed quickly. The guard had
  stepped inside the glass cubicle that was his gatebouse and was answering
  the telephone. The verbal flow of attentive Sis emphasized the fact that
  whoever was on the other end of the line was issuing orders that were to be
  thoroughly understood.
  Telephones and guards at checkpoints were sources of concern to Michael.
  For a moment he was not sure whether or not to run. The answer was given
  instantly. The guard hung up the phone and stuck his head out the door.
  'Youl You want to know so much about this stinking tub, here's something
  elsel The Teresa stays put. She doesn't sail until six godforsaken trucks
  get here from Torino, which could be eight hours from now. The unions will
  make those bastards pay, let me tell youl Then they'll fine the crew for
  being drunkl They're all bastardsl"
  The Teresa was out of the running, for a while at least. He could
  concentrate on the Elba and the Crist6vdo. If jenna was to be smuggled
  aboard the Teresa, he had hours, but not if it was one of the other two. If
  either was the case, he still had only minutes. He had to spend them wisely
  but swiftly, wasting as few as possible. There was no time for the subtle-
  ties of move and countermove, for circling the grounds of inquiry and
  selecting targets cautiously, being aware of whoever, might be watching
  him. There was time only for money~if takers could be found. And force---if
  those same takers tripped themselves on lies that meant they knew the
  truth.
  Havelock walked quickly back to the second gate, where the Isola crElba was
  berthed, altering his story only slightly for the weary guard. He wished to
  speak to a few of the vessers crew, those who might be on shore awaiting
  the ship's call. Would the cooperative civil servant, having shaken a hand
  with several thousand lire folded in the palm, know which of the waterfront
  caf6s were favored by the Elba's crew?
  "They stick together, no, signore? When fights break out, seamen want their
  friends around, even those they hate on board. Try Il Pinguino. Or perhaps
  La Carrozza di Mare.
 64            ROBERT LuDLum

 The whisky's cheaper at the first, but the food makes one vomit. ies better
 at La Carrozza."
  The once hostile, now obsequious guard at the gate of the CrW6vao was more
  than cooperative; he was effusively friendly.
  "There is a caf6 on the Via Maggio where, it is said, many things pass
  hands."
 "Would the CrW&do's men be there?"
  "Some, perhaps. The Portuguese do not mix well, of course. No one trusts
  them-Not you, signorel I refer only to the garbage of the sea. The same
  everywhere. Not you, may God forgive mel"
 "The name, please?"
 "11 Tritone."
  It took less than twelve minutes to disqualify 11 Trftone. Michael walked
  through the heavy doors, beneath the crude bas-relief of a naked creature
  half man and half fish, into the raucous squalor of the waterfront bar. The
  smoke was thick, the stench of- stale whisky thicker. Men shouted between
  the tables; others lurched, and not a few had collapsed, their heads
  resting on folded arms, small pools of alcohol surrounding hands and
  nostrils and bearded cheeks.
  Havelock chose the oldest-looking man behind the bar and approached him
  first. "Are there any here from the Ctlst6vdo?"
  Portoghese?-
 "Sr
 "A few-over there, I think."
  Michael looked through the smoke and the weaving bodies to a table across
  the room. There were four men. "What about the Isola dElba?" he asked,
  turning back to the bartender.
  "Porcil" replied the man. "Pigsl They come in here, I throw them outl
  Scuml"
  "They must be something," said Havelock, scanning the Tritone's -clientele,
  his throat trembling at the thought of jenna among such men.
  "You want crew from the Elba, go to 11 Pinguino. Over there, they don't
  care."
  Michael took out a 10,000-lire note, and placed it in front of the
  bartender. "Do you speak Portuguese? Enough to be understood?"
                  THE PAItSrFAL MOSAIC65

  "Down here, if one cares to make a living one must be understood in half a
  dozen tongues." The man slipped the money into his apron pocket, adding,
  "They no doubt speak Italian, probably better than you, signore. So let us
  speak in English. What do you wish me to do?"
  "Tberes an empty table back there," said Havelock, reheved, changing
  languages, and gesturing with his bead toward the left rear comer of the
  caf6. 'I'm going over and sit down. You go to those men and tell them I
  want to see them-one at a time. If you think they won't understand me, come
  over with each and be my interpreter."
  Interprete?-
 "U"
 'Bene."
  One by one the four Portuguese sailors came to the table, each bewildered,
  two proficient in Italian, one in English, one needing the services of the
  interprete. To each, Michael said the same words:
  "I'm looking for a woman. ies aminormatter, nothing to be concerned about;
  call it an affair of the heart. Shes an impetuous woman; we've all known
  them, haven't we? But now she may have gone too far for her own good. I'm
  told she has a friend on the CrWvdo. She may have been around the pier,
  asking questions, looking for transport. Shes an attractive woman, average
  height, blond hair, probably wearing a raincoat and a wide-brimmed hat.
  Have you seen anyone like that? If you have, there could be a lot more
  money in your pocket than there is now."
  And with each man be gave an explanation for his summons that the sailor
  could take back to his companions, along with 5,000 lire: "Whatever you
  tell me remains between us. For my good more than yours. When you go back
  to your table, you can say the same thing Im telling everyone. I want rough
  sex with someone leaving Civitavecchia, but Im not going to take it from
  any son of a bitch who won't leave his papers down at a hotel desk.
  Released by me. Got it?'
  Only with the third man did the bartender, who insisted on being present at
  each interview, caution Havelock flrmly. "This one will leave his papers at
  a desk," he said.
 'Then be's not my type."
 oBener
 66            RoBERT LuDLum

 "Prego.
  Nothing. No such woman had been seen or heard of on the CrW6vdo pier. The
  four Portuguese crewmen resumed their drinking.
  Havelock thanked the perplexed older man beside him, and pressed another
  bill into his apron pocket. "Which way to 11 Pinguino?" he asked.
 "The Elba crew?" Thaes right.-
  "ni gowith you," said the bartender, removing his apron and the money in
  its pocket.
  Iny?"
  "You sound like a decent man. Also stupid. You walk into 11 Pinguino asking
  questions, your money's for everyone. All it takes is one sailor with a
  quiet knife.*
 "I can take care of myself."
  ~You are not only stupid, you are very stupid. I own 11 Tritone, they
  respect me at II Pinguino. You'll be safer with me. You pass money too
  quickly."
 "rm in a hurry."
  "Prestol Lees get on with it. It's a bad morning here. Not like the old
  days when men knew that half a chestful was enough. You taste it in your
  throat, you know. These assholes mix up comfort with wanting no memory.
  Vienif'
  The caf6 five blocks away brought back memories, remernbrances of a life he
  had thought was over-he had been in too many such places in that other
  life. If Il Tritone catered to the garbage of humanity, 11 Pinguino took
  the dregs and considered it clientela scelta. The smoke was thicker, the
  shouting louder; men did not lurch, they lunged at nothing and everything,
  intent only on the violence in their minds. These were men who found
  amusement in the sudden exposure of anothers weakness or a semblance of
  weaknesswhich they construed as an absence of manhood-and then attacked.
  They had nothing else. They challenged the shadows of their own deepest
  fears.
  The owner of 11 Tritone was greeted by his counterpart within seconds of
  ushering Havelock through the door. The Pinguino's proprietario matched his
  establishment, having few teeth and arms that hung like huge, hairy
  cheeses. He was not as large as Michael's newfound friend, but there was
                  THE PmisrFAL MosAic67

 a sense of violence about him that made one think of a boar that could be
 quickly stirred to anger.
  The greetings between the two men were spoken rapidly, perfunctorily. But
  there was respect, as Il Tritone's owner had said there would be, and the
  arrangements were made swiftly, with a minimum of explanation.
  'Ile American looks for a woman. It is a inalinteso, and not our business,"
  said the owner of 11 Trftone. "She may be sailing with the Elba, and one of
  these thieves may have seen her. He's willing to pay,"
  "He'd better hurry," replied the sullen boar. "The oilers left an hour ago;
  they're sweating piss-green by now. The second mate will be here any minute
  to gather up the rest of the deck."
 "How many are there?"
 "Eight, ten, who knows? I count lire, not faces."
  "Have one of your people go around and ask quietly, find them, and tell me
  who they are. Clear a table for my companion. III bring each one to him."
  "You give orders , as though the Pinguino were the Tri
 tone."
  "Because I would accord you the same courtesy, even as my tongue thickened
  as yours does now. One never knows. You could need my help tomorrow....
  Each pig from the Elba is worth ten thousand lire to you."
  'Bene." The Pinguino's owner walked away toward the bar.
  "Do not give these men any excuse for talking to you as you did the
  Fortoghese,- said Michael's companion. "For them it was good thinking, but
  not for these. There~s no time, and in their drunkenness they could find
  the wrong meaning. Bottles are broken easily in here."
  'Men what am I going to say? I've got to separate them, give each a reason
  for talking to me alone. I caet go up to all of them at once. One may know
  something, but he's not going to tell me in front of the others."
  'Agreed. So tell each you trust only him. The others-you were told-are not
  to be trusted. You spoke with them only for appearance, because your
  business concerns the Elba. It will be enough."
 "I'm a stranger. Who would tell me something like that?"
 "A man who knows his clientele-the one you paid. The
 68RoBLmT LunLum

 owner of Il Pinguino." The owner of Il Tritone grinned. "By the time they
 reach port again, he'll be covered with stink HeT need the carabinieA every
 night."
  Separately, warily, in varying phases of stupor, the remainIng crew of the
  Elba sat down and listened to Havelock's increasingly fluent Italian as he
  repeated the same question. And with each he studied the man's face, the
  eyes, looking for a reaction, a glint of recognition, a brief straying of
  a glance that covered a lie. With the sixth man he thought he found it; it
  was in the lips-a sudden stretching unrelated to the sagging muscle tone
  induced by whisky, and in the clouded eyes, dulled further by an
  instinctive desire not to listen. The man knew something.
  "You~ve seen her, haveWt you?" said Michael, losing control, speaking in
  English.
  "Ascoka~" interrupted the owner of 11 Tritone. "In italimio, *twe.w
  "Sorry." Havelock repeated the question, which was more an accusation, in
  Italian.
  The sailor responded with a shrug, shifted his position, and started to get
  up. Michael reached over quickly and clamped his hand on the seaman's arm.
  The response was now ugly; the sailor squinted his rheumy, red-veined eyes,
  his mouth like that of an angry dog, lips parted, stained yellow teeth
  showing. In seconds he would lunge-41runkenly, to be sure, but
  nevertheless, attack was imminent
        ordered the owner of Il Tritone, then spoke rapidly under his breath
        in English. "Show him money. Quicklyl This pig will grab your throat,
        and they'll be all over us and you will learn nothing. You are right.
        He's seen her."
  Havelock released the man7s arm, reached into his pocket and took out the
  thick pack of awkwardly small lire notes. He separated two bills and placed
  them in front of the sailor; they totaled 40,000 lire, a day's pay on board
  ship.
  "As you can see," he said in Italian, "there7s more here. You can't take it
  from me, but I can give it to you. On the other hand, you can walk away and
  not tell me anything." Michael paused, leaned back in the chair, staring at
  the man, his expression hostile. "But I can make trouble for you. And I
  will."
 "In che modoil' The crewman was as angry as he was bo.
                  THE PAmiFAL MosAic69

 wildered, his eyes darting between Havelock's face, the money, and the owner
 of Il Tritone, who sat impassively, his rigid posture showing that he was
 aware of the danger in Michaers tactic.
  "How?' Havelock leaned forward, his fingers pulling the lire toward him, as
  though retrieving two vital cards in a game of baccarat. "I'll go over to
  the Elba and find your captain. Whatever I say to him about you hes not
  going to like.-
  "Che cosa? What? . . . What can you say to him in riguardo a me that he
  would credere?" The sailoes sudden use of English words was unexpected. He
  turned to the owner of 11 Tritone. "Perhaps this pig will grab your throat,
  old man. I need no help from others. For you or this ricco americano." The
  man unzipped his coarse wool jacket; the handle of a knife protruded from
  a scabbard strapped to his belt; his head swayed from the effects of the
  whisky. A very thin line was about to be crossed.
  Abruptly, Michael settled back in his chair and laughed quietly. It was a
  genuine laugh, in no way hostile or challenging, further confusing the
  seaman. "Benel" said Michael, suddenly leaning forward again, removing two
  more 5,000lire notes from the loose packet of bills. "I wanted to find out
  If you had balls, and you told me. Goodl A man without balls doesn't know
  what he sees. He makes things up because he!s afraid, or because he sees
  money." Havelock gripped the man7s hand at the wrist, forcing the palm
  open. It was a strong if friendly grip, indicating a strength the sailor
  had to acknowledge. "Herel Fifty thousand lire. There!s no quarrel between
  us. Where did you see her?"
  The abrupt changes of mood were beyond the man's comprehension. He was
  reluctant to forgo the challenge, but the combination of the money, the
  grip and the infectious laugh made him retreat. "Are you ... go to my
  captain?" be asked in English, eyes swimn-dng.
  'What for? You just told me. It has nothing to do with him. Why bring that
  farabutto into it? Let him earn his own money. Where did you see herr
  "On the street. Ragazza bionda. Bella. Cappello a larga tesa.-
  "Blond, attractive . . . wide hatl Where? Who was she with? A mate, a shies
  officer? Un ufficialer
 70ROBERT Lurmum

 "Not the Elba. The next ship. Nave tnercantile~'
  "There are only two. The Crist6vdo and the Teresa. Which one?"
  The man glanced around, head bobbing, eyes only half focused. "She was
  talking to two men ... one a capitano."
 "Mich one?"
  "A de-stra," whispered the sailor, pulling the back of his hand across his
  wet lips.
  "On the right?" asked Michael quickly. "The Santa Tet%esa?"
  The seaman now rubbed his chin and blinked; he was afraid, his eyes
  suddenly focused to the left of the table. He shrugged, crushing the money
  in his right hand, as he pushed back his chair. 'Non so niente. Una puttana
  del capitano .
  "Mercantile italiano?" pressed Havelock. "The Italian freighter? The Santa
  Teresa?"
  The sailor stood up, his face white. "S1 Nol Destra ... sinistral" The
  man~s eyes were now riveted somewhere across the room; Michael angled his
  head unobtrusively. Three men at a table against the wall were watching the
  crewman from the Elba. "Il capitano. Un marinaio superiorel 11 migUorel"
  cried the seaman hoarsely. "I know nothing else, signorel" He lurched away,
  shouldering a path through the bodies gathered at the bar toward the alley
  door.
  "You play dangerously," commented the owner of 11 Tritone. "It could have
  gone either way."
  "With a mule-drunk or otherwise-nothing's ever replaced the carrot and the
  whip," said Havelock, his bead still tamed slightly, his concentration
  still on the three men at the table across the room.
  "You could have had blood on your stomach and have learned nothing at all."
 "But I did learn something."
  "Not a great deal. A freighter on the right, on the left VVUch?"
 "He said on the right first."
 "Coming off the pier, or going on to it?"
  "From his immediate point of view. Going on. Destra. The Santa Teresa.
  Shell be put on board the Teresa, which means I have time to find her
  before she's given the signal. Shes somewhere within sight of the docl-c"
                  THE PAns17AL MosAic71

  'I'm not so sure," said Il Tritone's owner, shaking his head. "Our mule was
  specific. The captain was un maiinaio superfore. MigUore. The best, a great
  seaman. The captain of the Teresa is a tired merchantman. He never sails
  past Marseilles."
  "Who are those men at the table over therer asked Michael, his question
  barely audible through the din. "Don!t turn your head, just shift your
  eyes. Who are they?"
 "I do not know them by name."
 "What does that mean?'
 'Itallano," said the owner of Il Tritone, his voice flat.
  "The Santa Teresa," said Havelock, removing a number of bills and putting
  the rest of the money back into his pocket. "You've been a great help," he
  said. "I owe the proprietario. The rest is for you."
 Grazie." "Prego.
  'I will see you down the alley to the waterfront. I still do not like it.
  We don't know those men are from the Teresa. Something is not in
  equilibrio."
 "The percentages say otherwise. It's the Teresa. Lees go."
  Outside the noisy caf6 the narrow thoroughfare was comparatively silent;
  naked light bulbs shone weakly, enveloped in mist above intermittent
  doorways, and cenbuies-old smooth cobblestones muffled the sound of
  footsteps. At the end of the alley the wide avenue that fronted the piers
  could be seen in the glow of the streetlamps; until one reached it the
  alley itself was a gauntlet of shadows. One walked cautiously, alert to the
  spaces of black silence.
  "Eccol" whispered the Italian, his eyes up ahead. "Someone's in that
  doorway. On the left Do you have a weaponr
 "No. I haven~t had tim&--."
  "Then quicklyl" The owner of Il Tritone suddenly broke Into a run, passing
  the doorway as a figure lurched out-a stocky man with arms raised, hands
  poised for interception. But there was no gun in those hands, no weapon but
  the thick hands themselves.
  Havelock took several rapid strides toward the prowler, then spun into the
  shadows on the opposite side of the alley. The man lunged; Michael spun
  around again and, grabbing his assailanes coat, hammered his right foot up
  into the maiYs midsection. He pivoted a third time, now yanking the
 72            ROBERT LUDLUM

 man off the ground, and hurled him into the wall. As the man fell, Havelock
 sprang downward, his left knee sinking into the man's stomach, his right
 hand gripping the face and clawing at the eyes.
  'Bastal For favorl Se Deus quiserl" choked the prowler, holding his groin,
  saliva dribbling from his mouth. The language was Portuguese, the man one
  of the crew of the CrW6vdo. Michael yanked him up against the wall, into
  the dim light, he was the seaman who had spoken a few words of English at
  the table in 11 Tritone.
  "If you~re going into theft with assault and battery, yoere not doing it
  very wellf"
  "No, senborl I wish only to talk, but I cannot be seent You pay me, IT tell
  you things, but not where I can be seen with youl"
 "Go on."
 "You payl"
  Havelock clamped the sailor's neck against the brick with his forearm,
  reached into his pocket and took out his money. Shoving his knee into the
  man's ehest and freeing his hand, he removed two bills. "Twenty thousand
  lire," he said. "Talkl"
 "Ies worth more. Much more, senhorl You will see."
  'I can take it back if ies not... Thirty thousand, that's it. Go onl"
  "The woman goes aboard the Crw6vao . . . sete seven minuto-9 before we
  sail. It is arranged. She comes out the east warehouse door. She is guarded
  now; you cannot reach her. But she must walk forty meters to the cargo
  boarding plank."
  Michael released him and added another note to the three in the seamares
  hand. "Get out of here," he said. "I never saw you."
  "You must wvar to it, senhorl" cried the man, scrambling to his feet.
 "Sworn. Now get out."
  Suddenly voices were beard at the end of the alley; two men came running
  out of the light.
  'Americarwl Americanot" It was the owner of Il Tritone; he had returned
  with help. As the Portuguese started to race away they grabbed him.
 "Let him gol" yelled Havelock. "Ies all rightl Let him gol"
                  THn PARsrFAL MosAic73

  Sixty seconds later Michael explained to the owner of 11 Tritone. "It's not
  the Teresa. It's the Cris*do."
  "ieswhat was missingl' cried the Italian. "The knowledgeable capitano, the
  great seaman. It was there and I did not see it. Aliandro. jogo Aliandrol
  The finest captain in the Mediterranean. He could work his ship into any
  dangerous coastline, dropping off cargo wherever he wished, wherever the
  rocks and shoals called for no observers on shore. You have found your
  woman, signore."

 He crouched in the shadows of a stationary crane, the open spaces of the
 machinery allowing him unobstructed sight lines. The freightees cargo had
 been loaded; the teams of stevedores dispersed, swearing as they went their
 various ways across the wide avenue and down the narrow alleys into caf6s.
 Except for the four-man cast-off crew the pier was deserted, and even those
 men were barely visible, standing motionless by the huge pilings, two men to
 a line, fore and aft.
  A hundred yards behind him was the entrance gate, the obsequious guard
  inside his glass booth, his figure a gray sflhouette in the rolling
  early-morning fog. Diagonally to the left in front of the crane some
  eighty-odd feet away was the ribbed, weather-beaten gangplank that went up
  to the CrW6vdo's forward deck. It was the last physical connection to the
  ship to be hauled on board before the giant hawsers were slipped off the
  pilings, freeing the behemoth for the open water.
  On the right, no more than sixty feet from the crane, was the door to the
  piees warehouse office; it was locked, and all lights were off inside. And
  beyond that door was jenna Karas, a fugitive from her own and others'
  betrayal-his love, who had turned on that love for reasons only she could
  tell him. . . . In moments now, the door would open and she would have to
  walk from that door to the gangplank, then up the cracked wooden causeway
  to the deck. Once on board, she would be free; giant lines would be thrown
  over the pier, whistles would blow, and the gangplank would be whipped in
  the air, sucked up on deck and stowed. But until then she was not free; she
  was human contraband in open transit, crossing territory where no one would
  dare protect her. Inside the warehouse office she could be protected; an
 74            RoBERT LUDLUM

 intruder breaking in could be shot for the act Itself. But not in the open;
 men would not risk being caught smuggling human flesh on board ships. The
 prison sentences were long; a few thousand lire was not worth that risk.
  A hundred and forty-odd feet, then, was the span she bad to cross in order
  to disappear. Again. Not in death, but in an enigma.
  Michael looked at his watch; it was four-fifty-two, the second hand
  approaching the minute mark-seven minutes before the CrW6vdo was scheduled
  to blare its bass-toned departure signal, followed by sharper, higher
  sounds that warned all vessels of its imminent thrust out of its secure
  haven, the rules of the sea instantly in force. High up on the deck, fore
  and midships, a few men wandered aimlessly, pinpointed by the erratic glow
  of their cigarettes. Except for those on the rope winches and the gangplank
  detail, there was nothing for them to do but smoke and drink coffee and
  hope their beads would clear without excessive pain. From inside the
  massive black hull, the muffled roar of the turbines was heard; behind the
  fires the coarse muted meshing of giant gear wheels signified the
  approad~[ng command to engage the mammoth screws in third-torque speed.
  Oily, dark waters churned around the curve of the CrW6vdo's stem.
  The warehouse door opened, and Havelock felt a massive jolt in his chest as
  the blond woman stepped out of the darkness into the lesser darkness of the
  swirling mists and shadows. The living corpse from the Costa Brava entered
  the wall-less tunnel that would take her aboard the Crist6vao, lead her to
  an unknown coastline in an unknown country, and escape. From him. Why?
  The hammering in his chest was intolerable, the pain in his eyes
  excruciating; he had to endure both for seconds longer. Once jenna reached
  the midpoint of the pier, in sight of the gate, and the guard and the
  alarms he could raise, Michael would intercept her. Not an instant sooner.
 She was therel Now.
  He lunged from behind thecrane and raced forward, not caring about the
  sound of his footsteps, intent only on reaching her.
 "Jennal For God's sake, jennal"
  He grabbed her shoulders; the woman spun around in terror.
                  THE PAnswAL MosAic75

  His breath exploded from his throat. The face that was turned up to him was
  an old face, an ugly face, the pockmarked face of a waterfront whore. The
  eyes that stared at him were the wide, dark eyes of a rodent, outlined with
  thick, running borders of cheap mascara; the lips were blood-red and
  cracked, the teeth stained and chipped.
  "Who are you?" His scream was the scream of a madman. "Liarl Liarl Why are
  you lyingl Why are you herel Why aren't you herel Liarl"
  Mists not of the sea blurred his mind, crosscurrents of Insanity. He was
  beyond reason, knowing only that his hands had become claws, then
  fists-scraping, hammering-kiU the rodent, kill the impostor/ Kill, kiUI
  Other screams, other shouts, commands and countercommands filled the
  roaring caverns of his consciousness. There was no beginning, no end, only
  a furious core of frenzy.
  Then he felt blows, but did not feel pain. Men were all around him, then
  above him; fists and heavy boots struck him. Repeatedly. Everywhere.
 And then the darkness came. And silence.

 Above the pier, on the second floor of the warehouse office, a figure stood
 at the window looking down at the scene of violence below. She breathed
 deeply, her fingers stretched across her lips, tears welling in her clear
 brown eyes. Absently jenna Karas pulled her band away from her face and
 pressed it against the side of her head, against the long blond hair that
 fell beneath the wide-brimmed bat.
  "Why did you do it, Mikhail?" she whispered softly to herself. "Why do you
  want to kill me?"
 b

 He opened his eyes, aware of the sickening stench of cheap whisky, feeling
 the dampness about his chest and throat-his shirt, jacket and trousers had
 been drenched. In front of him were gradations of darkness, shadows of gray
 and black interrupted by tiny, dancing specks of light that bobbed and
 weaved in the farthest darkness. There was dull pain everywhere, centered in
 his stomach, rising through his neck to his head, which felt swollen and
 numb. He had been beaten severely and dragged to the end of the pier-the far
 right end, beyond the warehouse, if his blurred orientation was anywhere
 near accurate-and left to regain consciousness, or, conceivably, to roll
 over the edge to a watery death.
  But he had not been IdIled; that told him something. Slowly he moved his
  right hand to his left wrist; his watch was there. He stretched his legs
  and reached into his pocket; his money, too, was intact. He had not been
  robbed; that told him something else.
  He had spoken with too many men, and too many others had seen him in those
  strange conversations. They bad been his protection. Murder was murder, and
  regardless of what 11 Tritones owner bad said, a "quiet knife" on the
  waterfront was a subject for investigation, as was assault and robbery when
  the victim was a wealthy foreigner. No one wanted too
 any questions asked on the piers; cool heads had ordered
                                 76
                  THE PARsrFAL MosAjc77

 him left as he was, which meant they had been paid to implement other
 orders, higher orders. Otherwise something would have been stolen-a watch,
 a few thousand lire; this was the waterfront.
  Nothing. An inquisitive, wealthy foreigner had gone berserk, attacking a
  blond whore on the pier, and men bad protected her. No investigation was
  called for, as long as the i1cco americano inaledetto had his property
  intact, if not his senses.
  A setup. A professionally executed snare, the trappers exonerated once the
  trap had sprung shut. The whole night, the morning, had been a setupl He
  rolled over to his left; the southeast ocean was a line of fire beyond the
  horizon. Dawn had come, and the Crkt6vgo was one of a dozen small sfl-
  houettes on the water, obscure shapes diffusedly defined by the blinking
  lights, signals to other silhouettes.
  Slowly Havelock got to his knees, pressing them against the wet planks
  beneath him, pushing himself up painfully with his hands. Once on his feet
  he tamed around, again slowly, testing his legs and ankles, moving his
  shoulders, arching his neck, then his back. There was nothing broken, but
  the machine was badly bruised; it would not respond to quick commands, and
  he hoped he would not have to issue any.
  The guard. Had the ego-stroked civil servant been part of the act? Had he
  been told to confront the foreigner with hostility at flrst, then turn to
  obsequiousness, thus palling the mark in for the trap? it was effective
  strategy; be should have seen through it. Neither of the other two guards
  bad been difficult, each perfectly willing to tell him whatever he wanted
  to know, the man at the gate of the Teresds pier even going so far as to
  inform. him of the freighter's delayed schedule.
  The owner of Il Tritone? The sailor from the CrW6vrw in a narrow, dark
  alley? Were they, too, part of it? Had the coincidence of logical
  progression led him to those men on the waterfront who had been waiting for
  him? Yet, bow could they have been waiting? Four hours ago Civitavecchia
  was a vaguely remembered name on a map; it bad held no meanIng for him.
  'Mere bad been no reason for him to come to Civitavecchia, no way for an
  unknown message to be telegraphed. Yet it had been; he had to accept that
  without
 78            ROBERT LUDLUM

 knowing how or why. There was so much beyond his understanding, a maddening
 mosaic with too many pieces missing.
  Anything you can't understand in this business is a risk but I dWt have to
  teU you that. Rostov. Athens.
  A decoy-a blond, pockmarked wbore-had been paraded through the predawn mist
  to pull him out and force him to act. But why? What had they expected him
  to do? He had made it plain what he intended to do. So what was learned,
  what clarified? What was the point? Was she trying to kill him? Was that
  what Costa Brava was all about?
  lenna, why are you doing this? What happened to youP TO Us?
  He walked unsteadily, stopping to brace his legs as his balance went out of
  control. Reaching the edge of the warehouse, be propelled himself along the
  wall past darkened windows and the huge loading doors until be came to the
  comer of the building. Beyond was the deserted pier, the wash of
  intersecting floodlights swollen with pockets of rolling fog. He peered
  around the steel molding, squinting to focus on the glass cubicle that was
  the guard's post. As before, the flgure inside was barely visible, but he
  was there; Michael could see the stationary glow of a cigarette in the
  center of the middle pane.
  The glow moved to the right, the guard bad gotten off his stool and was
  sliding the door of the booth open. A second figure could be seen walking
  through the mist from the wide avenue fronting the row of piers. He was a
  medium-sized man In an overcoat, wearing a hat, the brim angled as a
  stroller's might be on the Via Veneto. The clothes were not the clothes of
  the waterfront; they belonged in the city streets. The man approached the
  glass booth, stopped by the door, and spoke with the guard. Both then
  looked toward the end of the pier, at the warehouse; the guard gestured and
  Michael knew they were talking about him. The man nodded, turned and raised
  his hand; within seconds his summons was obeyed. Two other men came mto
  view, both large, both wearing clothes more suited to the waterfront than
  those of the man who commanded them.
  Havelock leaned his head against the edge of steel, a deep, despairing
  sense of fudW mingling with his pain. Exhaustkm ovexwhelmed him. He was no
  match for such men; he
                  THE PAmiFAL MosAic79

 could barely raise his arms, nor his feet. Since he had no other weapons, it
 meant he had no weapons at all.
  Where was JennaP Had she gone aboard the CrW6v& after the decoy had
  fulfilled its function? It was a logical-No, it wasn~tl The commotion would
  have centered too much attention on the freighter and would have roused
  unfriendly or unpaid officials too easily. The ship itself had been a
  decoy, the blond whore the lure. jenna was boarding one of the other twol
  Michael turned away from the wall and hobbled across the wet planks toward
  the edge of the pier. He wiped his eyes, staring through the heavy mist.
  Involuntarily he gasped, the pain in his stomach was so acute. The Elba was
  gonel He had been pulled to the wrong pier, duped into an uncontrollable
  situation while jerma went on board the Elba. Was the captain of the Elba,
  like the skipper of the Crist6vdo, a master navigator? Would he-could
  he-maneuver his awkward ship close enough to an unpatrolled shoreline so
  that a small boat might ferry his contraband to a beach?
  One man had the answer. A man in an overcoat and an angled hat, clothes wom
  on the waterfront by someone who did not haul and fork-lift but, instead,
  bought and sold. That man would know; he had negotiated jenna's passage.
  Havelock lurched back to the comer of the warehouse wall. He had to reach
  that man; he had to get by two others coming for him. If only he had a
  weapon, any kind of weapon. He looked around in the faintly lessening
  darkness. Nothing. Not even a loose board or a slat from a broken crate.
  Ile water. The drop was long, but be could manage it. If he could get to
  the far end of the pier before he was seen, it would be presumed he bad
  plunged over while unconscious. How many seconds did he have? He inched his
  face to the edge and peered around the molding into the wash of the
  floodlights, prepared to push himself away and rim.
  He did not run. The two men were no longer walking toward him. They had
  stopped, both standing motionless inside the fenced gate. Why? Why was he
  being left where he was without further interferenceP
  Suddenly, from out of the impenetrable mist several piers away came an
  ear-shattering screech of a ship's klaxon. Then another, followed by a
  prolonged bass chord that vibrated
 8 0            ROBERT LUDLUM

 throughout the harbor. It was the Santa Teresal It was his answerl The two
 men bad been summoned not to punish him
 further, but to restrict him to the first pier. There was no delayed
 schedule for the Teresa; that, too, was part of the setup. She was sailing
 on time, and Jenna was on board. As the ship's clock ran down, there was
 only one thing left for the negotiator to do: keep the disabled hunter in
 place.
  Fiercely be told himself he had to get to that pier, stop her, stop the
  freighter from casting off, for once the giant d
 in,                     bing he cou
 1                         ed     e ~ in ~ re a n ar into onea
           0                 p ' gsw s ot
  s w re slipp               ffS e wo 'd di appe
 do, no               y to rea h h Ia
 dze                     ed tI thlI ft , not for
 0                          corth(Zn 0 anon
  t ny I tries, a hundr ci e _nng e
 -no an s nger,~ out her h   t w t t go
    a                    w w . ~g
  e hed e hat blan 'i Is mean ow m e be ba~. He could only estimate There had
  been two blasts from the Crist6vidlo; ments later the blond decoy had
  emerged from the shadows of the warehouse door. Seven minutes. Yet there
  bad been no bass chord following the high-pitched whistles. Did its absence
  signify less time or more? He probed his memory, racing over scores of
  assignments that bad taken him to waterfronts everywhere.
  He remembered; more accurately, he thought he remembered as a blurred
  recent memory struggled to surface. The high-pitched shrieks were for ships
  in the distance, the vibrating lower tones for those nearer by-a rule of
  thumb for the sea, and the docks. And while he was being beaten, the outer
  vibrations of a low, grinding chord had fused with his Own screams of
  protest and fury. The bass-toned whistle had followed shortly after the
  shrieks-prelude to imminent departure. Seven minutes-less one, more likely
  two, perhaps three.
  He had only minutes. Six, fIve-four, no more than that. The Teresa's pier
  was several hundred yards away; in his condition it would take at least two
  minutes to get there, and that would happen only if he could get past the
  two jacketed men who had been called to stop him. Four minutes at the
  outside, two minimum. Jesusl HowP He looked around again, trying to control
  his panic, aware that every second reduced his chances.
  A stocky black object was silhouetted between two pilings ten yards away;
  be had not noticed it before because it was a stationary part of the dock.
  He studied it now. It was a
                  THE PARSWAL MOSAIC81

 barrel, an ordinary barrel, undoubtedly punctured during loading or
 unloading procedures, and now used as a receptacle for coffee cups, trash,
 predawn fires; they were on piers everywhere. He ran to it, gripped it,
 rocked it. It swung free; be lowered it to its side and rolled it back
 toward the wall. Time elapsed: thirty, perhaps forty seconds. Time
 remaining: between one and a half and three-plus minutes. The tactic that
 came into focus was a desperate one, but it was the only one that was
 possible. He could not get past those men unless they came to him, unless
 the fog and the translucent, brightening darkness worked for him and against
 them. There was no time to think about the guard and the man in the
 overcoat.
  He crouched in the shadows, against the wall, both bands on the sides of
  the ffithy barrel. He took a deep breath and screamed as loud as be could,
  knowing the scream would echo throughout the deserted pier.
 "Aiutol Prestol Sanguinol Muoiol"
  He stopped, listening. In the distance be beard the shouts; they were
  questions, then commands. He screamed again: "Aiutol"
 Silence.
 Then racing footsteps. Nearer ... drawing nearer.
  Nowl He shoved the barrel with all the strength be could muster. It clanked
  as it rolled laterally over the planks, through the fog, toward the edge of
  the pier.
  The two men rounded the corner of the warehouse in the misty light; the
  barrel reached the edge of the dock. It struck one of the pilings. Ob,
  Chiistl Then it spun and plunged over. The sound of the splash below was
  loud; the two men shouted at each other and raced to the edge.
 Nowl
  Havelock rose to his feet and ran out of the shadows, his bands extended,
  shoulders and arms battering rams. He forced his unsteady legs to respond,
  each racing step painful but calculated, sure. He made contact. First the
  man on the right, pummeling him with both outstretched bands; then the
  Italian on his left, crashing his shoulder into the small of the man's
  back.
  A deafening blast from the Teresds funnels covered the screams of the two
  men as they plummeted into the water below. Michael swung to his left and
  hobbled back toward
 82            RoBERT LUDLUM

 the corner of the warehouse; be would go out onto the deserted pier and face
 the once obsequious guard and the elegantly dressed man. Time elapsed:
 another minute. Less than three remained at most
  He ran unsteadily out onto the vast expanse of the pier with its fog-Iaden
  pools of floodlights and immobile machinery. Pitching his voice at the edge
  of hysteria, be shouted in broken Italian: "Help mel Help theml It's crazyl
  rm hurt. Two men came to help me. As they drew near there were gunshotsl
  Three gunshots! From the next pier. I could hardly bear them because of the
  freighter, but I did hear theml Gunshotsf Quicklyl They're wounded. One
  dead, I thinkl Ob, Christ, hurryl"
  The exchange between the two men was verbal chaos. As Havelock staggered
  erratically toward the gate he could see that the guard's automatic was
  drawn, but it was not the same guard; be was shorter, stockier, older. The
  guard's broad face was full of resentment, in contrast to that of the
  civilian-in his mid-thirties, tanned, suave-which was cold and without
  expression. The man in the overcoat was orderIng the guard to investigate;
  the guard was shouting that he would not leave his post, not for 20,000
  lirel The capo regime could look into his own garbage; he was no frightened
  bainbino of the docks. The capo could buy a few hours of his time, his
  disappearance, but not morel
 A setup. From the beginning, a charade.
 "Andate voi stessil" yelled the guard.
  Swearing, the civilian started toward the warehouse and broke into a run,
  the abruptly slowing his pace he cautiously approached the comer of the
  building.
  The guard was now in front of the glass booth, his gun leveled at Michael.
  "Youl Walk to the fence," he shouted in Italian. "Raise your hands above
  you and grab the wire as high as you canl Do not turn aroundl IT fire into
  your bead ff you dol"
  Barply two minutes left; ff it was going to work, it would happen now.
  .0b, lesusl" Havelock screamed as he gripped his cbest and fell.
  The guard rushed forward; Michael remained motionless in a fetal position,
  dead weight on the damp, hard surface.
                  Trm PARsrFAL Mosmc83

 "Get upl" commanded the uniformed man. "Get to your feed"
  The guard reached down and grabbed Havelock's shoulder. It was the movement
  Michael bad been waiting for. He spun off the ground, clasping the weapon
  above his head, and gripped the wrist at his shoulder, wrenching it
  clockwise as he rose and hammering his knee into the falling guard's
  throat. The gun barrel was in his hand; be swung it down, crashing it into
  the base of the Italian's skull. The man collapsed. Havelock dragged him
  into the shadows of the booth, then raced out of the open gate, jamming the
  weapon into his jacket pocket.
  A prolonged, belching sound came from the distance, followed by four
  hysterically pitched screeches. The Teresa was about to slip away from its
  berthl Michael felt a sickening sense of futility sweeping over him as he
  ran breathlessly down the wide avenue, his legs barely able to carry him,
  his feet swerving, slapping the pavement. When he reached the Teresds pier,
  the guard-the same guard-was inside his glass booth, once again on the
  telephone, nodding his outsized head, his dull eyes accepting other lies.
  There was now a chain stretched across the open gateonly an official
  hindrance, not a prohibition. Havelock grabbed the hook and yanked it out
  of its cemented base; the chain curled snakelike into the air and clattered
  to the ground.
 "Che cosa? Fermatil"
  Michael raced-his legs in agony-down the long stretch of the pier, through
  the circular pools of floodlights, past immobile machinery, toward the
  freighter outlined in the swirling mists at the end of the dock. His right
  leg collapsed; his hands broke the fall but not the impact, his right
  shoulder sliding across the moist surface. He grabbed his leg, forcing
  himself up, and propelled himself along the planks until he could work up
  the momentum to run again.
  Gasping for air as he ran, he finally reached the end of the pier.
  The futility was complete: the freighter Santa Teresa was floating thirty
  feet beyond the pilings; the giant hawsers slithered over the dark waters
  as they were hauled in by men who looked down at him through the shadows.
 "Jennal" he screamed. "Jennal lennar
 84ROBERT LUDLUM

  He fell to the wet wood of the pier, arms and legs throbbing, chest in
  spasms, his head splitting as if cracked open with an ax. He ... had ...
  lost her. . . . A small boat could drop her off at any of a thousand
  unpatrolled stretches of coastline in the Mediterranean; she was gone. The
  only person on earth he cared about was gone forever. Nothing was his, and
  he was nothing.
  He heard the shouts behind him, then the hammering of racing feet. And as
  he heard the sounds he was reminded of other sounds, other feet another
  pier. From where the CrWotto had sailedl
  There was a man in an overcoat who bad ordered other men to come after him;
  they, too, had run across a deserted pier through shimmering pools of
  floodlights and the mist. if he could find that manl If he found him he
  would peel the suntanned flesh from the face until he was told what be had
  to know.
  He got to his feet and began limping rapidly toward the guard who was
  running at him, weapon extended.
 OPertnati! Alza le manil"
  'Un errorel" Havelock shouted back, his voice both aggressive and
  apologetic; he had to get by the man, not be detained. He took several
  bills from his pocket, holding them in front of him so they could be seen
  in the spill of the floodlights. "What can I tell you?" he continued in
  Italian. "I made a mistake-which beneflts you, doeset it? You and L we
  spoke before, remember?" He pressed the money into the guar(rs hand while
  slapping him on the back. "Come on, put that thing away. I'm your friend,
  remember? What harm is there? Except rm a little poorer and you're a little
  richer. Also, rve had too much wine."
  "I thought it was youl" said the guard grudgingly, taking the bills and
  ramming them into his pocket, his eyes darting about. 'You're crazy in the
  headl You could have been shot. For what?"
 "You told me the Teresa waset sailing for hours."
  "Ies what I was toldl Theyre bastards, all bastardsl They're crazy toot
  They don't know what they're doing."
  "They know exactly what they're doing," said Michael quietly. "I've got to
  get along now. Thanks for your help.- Before the angry guard could answer,
  Havelock started forward
                  TnE PARsYFAL MosAic85

 rapidly, wincing in pain as he tried to control his throbbing legs and
 aching chest. For GocFs sake, hurryl
  He reached the stretch of fence that enclosed the CrW6vdo's pier, his hand
  now in his pocket, grateful for the weapon. The unconscious guard was still
  on the ground in the lower shadows of the glass booth. He had neither moved
  nor been moved in the five minutes, perhaps six, that he had lain there.
  Was the man in the overcoat still on the pier? The odds favored it; logic
  dictated that he would have looked for the guard because he did not see him
  in the booth and, when he found him, would have questioned the fallen man.
  In doing so, some part of the unconscious body would have been moved; it
  had not been.
  But why would the capo reginte remain on the pier for so long? The answer
  came from the sea through the fog and the wind. Shouts, questions, followed
  by commands and further questions. The man in the overcoat was still on the
  pier, his gorillas screaming from the waters below.
  Michael clenched his teeth, forcing the pain from his mind. He slid along
  the side wall of the warehouse, past the door from which the blond decoy
  had emerged, to the comer of the building. The morning light was growing
  brighter, the mists rising, the absence of the freighter permitting the
  early rays of the sun to spread over the dock. In the distance, on the
  water, another ship was steaming slowly toward the barbor of Civitavecchia;
  it might well be heading for the berth recently vacated by the Crist&(Io.
  If so, there was very little time remaining before the shape-up crews
  arrived. He bad to move swiftly, act effectively, and he was not at all
  sure he was capable of doing either.
  A stretch of unpatrolled coastline. Did the man only yards away from him
  now know which? He must find out. He had to be capable.
  He rounded the corner, holding the weapon against the cloth of his jacket.
  He could not use it, he understood that; it would serve no purpose because
  it would only eliminate his source and draw attention to the pier. But the
  threat had to be conveyed as genuine, his anger had to seem desperate. He
  was capable of that.
  He stared through the rising mist. The man in the overcoat was at the edge
  of the dock, excitedly barking instructions in a low voice; lie, too, was
  obviously afraid of drawing atten-
   86            ROBERT LuDLum

 tion from stray crewmen who might be loitering on the adjacent pier. The
 effect was comic. From what Michael could gather, one of the men below was
 hanging on to a piling strut, reluctant to let go because he apparently
 couldn't swim. The negotiator was ordering the second man to support his
 companion and the man was apparently refusing, concerned that he might be
 pulled under by his incompetent associate.
  "Don't talk anymorel" Havelock said sharply in Italian, the words clear if
  not precise, his voice commanding though not loud.
  The startled man spun around, his right hand reaching under his overcoat.
  "If I see a gun," continued Michael, moving closer, "youll be dead and in
  the water before you can raise it. Move away from there. Walk toward me.
  Now to your left. Over to the wall. Movel Don't stopl"
  The man lurched forward. "I could have had you killed, signore. I did not.
  Surely, that is worth something to you."
 "It is-obviously. I thank you."
  "Nor was anything on your person taken, I assume you are aware of that. My
  orders were clear."
 "I'm aware. Now tell me why. On both counts~"
 "I am neither a killer nor a thief, signore."
  "Not good enough. Raise your handsl Lean against the wall and spread your
  legsl" The Italian complied; it was not the first time such orders had been
  given him. Havelock came up behind him, kicking the man's right calf as he
  whipped his hand around the capo regime's waist, pulling the gun from the
  Italian~s belt. He glanced at it, impressed. The weapon was a Spanish
  automatic, a Llama .38 caliber, with grip and manual safeties. A quality
  gun, undoubtedly less expensive on the waterfront. He shoved it into his
  own belt. "Tell me about the girl. Quicklyl"
 "I was paid. What more can I tell you?"
  "A great deal." Michael reached up and grabbed the man!s left hand; it was
  soft. The negotiator was not a violent man, the term capo regime, which the
  guard had used, was misapplied. This Italian was no part of the Mafia; a
  mafioso at his age would have come up through violent ranks and would not
  have soft hands.
 A sudden cacophony of ship's whistles erupted from the
                  THE PARSIFAL MOSAIC87

 harbor. They were joined by panicked shouts from the lone man in the
 slapping waters below the pier. Taking advantage of the sounds, Michael
 rammed the pistol into the negotiatoes kidney. The man screamed. Then
 Havelock crashed the handle into the side of the Italian's neck and there
 was another scream, which was followed by a series of whimpering pleas.
 "Signore . . . signorel You are American; we speak Americanl Do not do this
 to mel I saved your life-my word on itl"
  'Well get to that. The gir1l Tell me about the girll Quicklyl"
  "I do favors around the docks. Everyone knows thatl She needed a favor. She
  paidl"
 "To get out of Italy?"
 "What else?"
  "She paid for a lot more than thatl How many did you pay? For the setup."
 "Che cosa tnwl direP Set ... up?"
  "That show you put onl The pig who walked out of that door over therel"
  Havelock gripped the Italian by the shoulder and spun him around, slamming
  him back into the wall. "Right around that comer," he added, gesturing.
  "What was that all about? Tell mel She paid for that, too. Why?"
 I "As you say, signore. She paid. Spiegazioni . explanations . . . were not
 required."
  Michael jammed the barrel of the pistol deep into the man's stomach. "Not
  good enough. Tell mel"
  "She said she had to know," the negotiator spat out, doubling over.
  "Know what?" Havelock slapped the man7s hat off and, grabbing him by the
  hair, crashed his head into the wall. "Know what?"
 "What you would dol"
 "How did she know rd follow her here?"
 "She did notl" Then why?-
  "She said you might do Sol You were ... ingegnoso ... a resourceful man.
  You7ve hunted other men; you have means at your disposal. Contacts,
  sources."
  "Thaes too loosel How?' Michael bunched the Italian's hair in his fist,
  pulling it half out of its roots.
 "Signore ... she said she spoke to three drivers on the pi- 88            RoBERT LuDLum

 aftafomm before she found a taxi to take her to Civitaveochial She was
 afraidl"
  It made sense. It had not occurred to him to look for a taxi ramp at the
  Ostia; taxis were not in oversupply in Rome. In truth, he had simply not
  been thinking; he had been bent only on moving.
  "Per tavorel Aiutol Mio Diol- The screams came from the water below.
  The ships in the harbor were beginning to fill the air with whistles and
  vapor. There was so little time left; soon the crews would come, men and
  machinery crawling all over the pier. He had to learn exactly what the
  negotiator had sold; he gripped the man's throat with his left hand.
 "She's on the Teresa, isn't she?"
 "Sir
  Havelock recalled the words of 11 Tritone's owner: the Teresa sailed to
  Marseilles. "How is she to be taken off the ship?"
  The Italian did not answer; Michael plunged his fingers deeper into the
  man7s throat, choking him. He went on: "Understand me, and understand me
  well. If you don~t tell me, I'll kill you now. And if you lie, and she gets
  past me in Marseilles, ni comeback for you. She was right, Im resourceful
  and I've hunted a great many men. III find you."
  The negotiator went into a spasm, his mouth gaping as he tried to speak.
  Havelock reduced the pressure on the man's neck. The Italian coughed
  violently, grabbing his throat, and said, '"What's it to me, anyway, so III
  tell you. I don~t want afflizione with the likes of you, sfgnorel I should
  have known better. I should have listened betterl"
 "Go on."
  "Not Marseilles. San Remo. The Teresa stops at San Remo. How or where she
  is to be brought ashore, I do not knowmy word on itl She buys her way to
  Paris. She's to be taken across the border at Col des Moulinets. When, I do
  not know-my wordl From there to Paris. I swear on the blood of Christl"
  The negotiator did not have to swear he was telling the truth; his
  terrified eyes proved it. He was being honest out of fear, extraordinary
  fear. What had jenna told him? Why hadn't the man ordered him killed? Also,
  why had nothing been stolen? Michael released his grip on the Italian's
  neck.
                  THE PAnsrFAL MosAic89

  He spoke quietly. "You said you could have had me killed, but you didn't.
  Now tell me why."
  "No, signore, I will not say it," whispered the man. "In the name of God,
  you'll never see me againl I say nothing, know nothingl"
  Havelock raised the pistol slowly, resting the point of the barrel on the
  man~s left eye. "Say it," he said.
  "Signore, I have a small, profitable business here, but I have never
  once--never-involved myself with political activitiesl Or anything remotely
  connected to such things. I swear on the tears of the Madonnal I thought
  she was lying, appealing to me with liesl I never once believed herl"
  "But I wasn't killed, nothing on my person taken, I think you said."
  Michael paused, then shouted as he jammed the barrel into the Italian~s
  eye. "Why?"
  The man screamed, spitting out the words. "She said you were an American
  working with the comunistil With the Soviets. I did not believe herl I know
  nothing of such thingsl But caution would naturally call for-caution. In
  Civitavecchia we are outside of such wars. They are too ... internazionali
  for people like us who make our few unimportant lire on the docks. These
  things mean nothing to us-my word on itl We wish no trouble from you, any
  of youl . . . Signore, you can understand. You attacked a woman-a puttana,
  to be certain, but a woman-on the pier. Men stopped you, pulled you away,
  but when I saw, I stopped theml I told them we should be cautious. We had
  to think. . :'
  The frightened man continued to babble, but Havelock was not listening.
  What he had heard stunned him beyond anything he imagined he might hear. An
  American working with the Soviets. Jenna had said this? It was insanel
  Had she tried to appeal to the man with a lie, only to instill a very real
  fear in the small-time operator after the fact, after the trap? The Italian
  had not equivocated; he had repeated her story out of fear. He had not
  lied.
  Did she believe it? Was that what he bad seen in her eyes on the platform
  at the Ostia station? Did she really believe it-just as he had believed
  beyond any doubt in his mind that she was a deep-cover officer for the
  Voennaya?
  Oh, ChrW1 Each turned against the other with the same maneuverl Had the
  evidence against him been as airtight as the evidence against her? It had
  to have been; that was also
 90            RoBEnT LuDLux

 in her eyes. Fear, hurt . . . pain. There was no one she could trust, not
 now, not for a while, perhaps not ever. She could only run-as he had kept
 running. Godl What had they dm?
 Why?
  She was on her way to Paris. He would find her in Paris. Or fly to San Remo
  or Col des Moulinets and intercept her at one or the other. He had the
  advantage of fast transport; she was on an old freighter plodding across
  the water and he would be flying. He had time.
  He would use that time. There was an intelligence oflicer at the embassy in
  Rome who was about to know the depth of his anger. Lieutenant Colonel
  Lawrence Baylor Brown was going to supply answers or all the expos6s of,
  Washington's clandestine activities would be seen as mere footnotes com-
  pared with what he would reveal: the incompetences, the illegalities, the
  miscalculations and errors costing the lives of thousands the world over
  every year.
  He would start with a black diplomat in Rome who funneled secret orders to
  American agents throughout Italy and the western Mediterranean.
  'Capisce? You do understand, signore?" The Italian was pleading, buying
  time, his eyes glancing furtively to the right. Across on the second pier
  three men were walking through the early light toward the far pilings; two
  blasts of a ship's whistle told why. The freighter steaming into port was
  to be tied up at the Elbds berth. In moments additional crews would arrive.
  "We are cautious . . . naturalmente, but we know nothing of such thingsl We
  are men of the docks, nothing more."
  "I understand," said Michael, touching the man's shoulder and turning him
  around. "Walk to the edge," be ordered quietly.
 "Signore, pleasel I beg youl"
 "Just do as I say. Now."
  "I swear on the patron saint of mercy Himselfl On the blood of Christ, on
  the tears of the Holy Motherl" The Italfan was weeping, his voice rising.
  "I am an insignificant merchant, signorel I know nothingl Say nothingf"
  As they reached the edge of the pier~ Havelock said, "Jump," and pushed the
  negotiator over the side.
                  THE PmisiFAL Mosmc91

  "Mio Diol Aiutol" screamed the henchman below as his employer joined him in
  the water.
  Michael turned and hobbled back to the comer of the warehouse wall. The
  dock was still deserted, but the guard was beginning to move, shaking his
  head, trying to pull himself up in the shadows of the booth. Havelock
  slapped open the cylinder of the pistol and shook the bullets out of their
  tracks; they clattered onto the dock. He hurried toward the gate, and when
  he reached the door of the glass booth, he threw the weapon inside. He ran
  as fast as he was capable of running through the gate, toward the rented
  car.
 Rome. There would be answers in Rome.
 7
 The four men around the table in the white-walled room on the third floor of
 the State Department building were youngish by upper-echelon Washington
 standards. Their ages ranged from the mid-thirties to the late forties, but
 their lined faces and hollow look made them old beyond their years. The work
 they did led to sleepless nights and prolonged periods of anxiety, made
 worse by their insular life: none of them could discuss the crises they
 faced in that room with anyone outside it. These were the strategists of
 covert operations, the air traffic controllers of clandestine activities;
 roving condors could be shot down on their slightest miscalculation. Others
 above them might request the broad objectives; others below might design the
 specific assignments. But only these men were aware of every conceivable
 variation, every likely consequence of a given operation; they were the
 clearinghouse. Each was a specialist, each an authority. Only they could
 give the final nod for the condors to fly.
  Yet they had no radar grids or circling antennae to aid them; they had only
  the projections of human behavior to guide them. They had to examine
  actions and reactions, not simply those of the enemy but those of their own
  people in the field as well. Evaluation was a never-ending struggle, which
  was rarely resolved to everyone's satisfaction. The
                                 92
                  THE PAWIFAL MOSAIC93

 "what if" probabilities were geometrically compounded with each new twist of
 events, each human reaction to abruptly altered circumstances. They were
 psychoanalysts in an endless labyrinth of abnormality, their patients the
 products of that disorder. They were specialists in a macabre way of life
 where the truth was usually a lie and lies too often were the only means of
 survival. Stress was the factor that frightened them most, for under maximum
 or prolonged stress both one!s enemies and one~s own people saw things and
 did things they might not do otherwise. The totally unpredictable added to
 the abnormal became dangerous territory.
  This was the conclusion the four men had reached regarding the crisis late
  that night. Lieutenant Colonel Lawrence Baylor Brown in Rome had sent his
  cable on priority cipher; its contents required the opening of a dead Me so
  that each strategist could study the facts.
  They were beyond dispute. The events at that isolated beach on the Costa
  Brava had been verified by two on-site confirmations, one of them Foreign
  Service Officer Havelock himself, the other a man unknown to Havelock named
  Steven MacKenzie, one of the most experienced undercover operatives working
  in Europe for the Central Intelligence Agency. He had risked his life to
  bring back proof: torn garments stained with blood. Everything had been
  microscopically examined, the results positive: jenna Karas. The reasons
  for a backup confirmation had not been made explicit, nor was that
  necessary. The relationship between Havelock and the Karas woman was known
  to those who had to know; a man under maximum stress might fall apart, be
  incapable of carrying out what had to be done. Washington had to know.
  Agent MacKenzie had been positioned two hundred feet north of Havelock; his
  view was clear, his confirmation absolute, his proof incontrovertible. The
  Karas woman had been killed that night. The fact that Steven MacKenzie had
  died of a heart seizure three weeks after he returned from Barcelona, while
  sailing in Chesapeake Bay, in no way diminished his contribution. The
  doctor who had been suram ned by the Coast Guard patrol was a well-es-
  tablished physician on the Eastern Shore, a surgeon named Randolph with
  impeccable credentials. A thorough postmor-
   9 4           ROBERT LTJDLUM

 tem. was conclusive: MacKenzie's death was from natural causes.
  Beyond Costa Brava itself, the evidence against Jenna Karas had been
  subjected to the most exhaustive scrutiny. Secretary of State Anthony
  Matthias had demanded it, and the strategists knew why. There was another
  relationship to take into consideration: one that had existed between Mat-
  thias and Michael Havelock for nearly twenty years since student had met
  teacher in the graduate program at Princeton University. Fellow Czechs by
  birth, one had established himself as perhaps the most brilliant
  geopolitical mind in the academic world, while the other, a young, haunted
  expatriate, was desperately searching for his own identity. The differences
  were considerable, but the friendship was strong.
  Anton Matthias had come to America over forty years ago, the son of a
  prominent doctor from Prague who had hurried his family out of
  Czechoslovakia under the shadow of the Nazis and was welcomed by the
  medical community. Havelock's immigration, on the other hand, was managed
  covertly as a joint exercise of American and British intelligence; his
  origins were obscured, initially for the chfl&s own safety. And where
  MatthiaYs meteoric rise in government was sparked by a succession of
  influential political figures who openly sought his counsel and publicly
  extolled his brilliance, the much younger man from Prague proceeded to
  establish his own worth through clandestine accomplishments that would
  never see the light of day. Yet in spite of the dissimilarities of age and
  reputation, intellect and temperament, there existed a bond between them,
  held firm by the elder, never taken advantage of by the younger.
  Those who confirmed the evidence against the Karas woman understood that
  there was no room for error, just as the strategists understood now that
  the cable from Rome had to be studied carefully, handled delicately. Above
  all, for the time being, it had to be kept from Anthony Matthias. For
  though the media had announced that the Secretary of State was off on a
  weIl-deserved holiday, the truth was something else. Matthias was ill-some,
  in whispers, said gravely ill-and although he was in constant touch with
  State through his subordinates, be had not been in Washington for nearly
  five weeks. Even those perceptive men and women of the press corps who
  suspected another explanation beneath the vaca-
                    THE PARsrFAL Mosmc95

 tion ploy said nothing and printed nothing. No one really wanted to think
 about it; the world could not afford it.
  And Rome could not become an additional burden for Anthony Matthias.
  "He7s hallucinating, of course," said the balding man named Miller, putting
  his copy of the cable down on, the table in front of him. Paul Miller,
  M.D., was a psychiatrist, an authority on diagnosing erratic behavior.
  "Is there anything in his record that might have warned us?" asked a
  red-haired, stocky man in a rumpled suit and an open collar, his tie
  unknotted. His name was Ogilvie; he was a former field agent.
  "Nothing you would have read," replied Daniel Stem, the strategist on
  Miller's left. His title was Director of Consular Operations, which was a
  euphemism for section chief of State's clandestine activities.
  "Why not?" asked the fourth strategist, a conservatively dressed man who
  might have stepped out of an advertisement in the WaU Street Jourml for
  IBM. He was seated next to Ogilvie. His name was Dawson; he was an attorney
  and a specialist in international law. He pressed his point. "Are you
  saying there were-are-omissions in his service file?"
  "Yes. A security holdover from years ago. No one ever bothered to reassess,
  so the Me remained incomplete. But the answer to Ogilvie's question might
  be found there. The warning we missed."
  "How so?" asked Miller, peering over his glasses, his fingers spread across
  his balding hairline.
 "He could be finally burned out. Over the edge."
  "What do you mean?" Ogilvie leaned forward, his expression none too
  pleasant. 'Tvaluation depends on available data, goddamn it."
 . "I don~t think anyone thought it was necessary. His record's superior.
 Except for an outburst or two, he's been extremely productive, reasonable
 under very adverse conditions.-
  "Only, now hes seeing dead people in railroad stations," Interrupted
  Dawson. -Wby?"
 "Do you know Havelock?" asked Stem.
  "Only from a field personnel interview," answered the attorney. "Eight or
  nine months ago; he flew back for it. He seemed efficient."
 "He was," agreed the director of Cons Op. "Efficient, pro- 96ROBFJtT LTJDLUrM

 ductive, reasonable-very tough, very cold, very bright. But then he was
 trained at an early age under rather extraordinary circumstances. Maybe
 that's what we should have looked at." Stem paused, picked up a large manila
 envelope, and removed a red-bordered file folder, sliding it out carefully.
 "Here's the complete background dossier on Havelock. What we had before was
 basic and acceptable. A graduate student from Princeton with a Ph.D. in
 European history and a minor in Slavic languages. Home: Greenwich,
 Connecticut. A war orphan brought over from England and adopted by a couple
 named Webster, both cleared. What we all looked at, of course, was the
 recommendation from Matthias, someone even then to be reckoned with. And
 what the recruiters here at State saw sixteen years ago was fairly obvious.
 A highly Intelligent Ph.D. from Princeton willing to work for bureaucratic
 spit, even willing to perfect his linguistic dialects and go into deep-cover
 work. But that wasn't necessary-the language part. Czech was his native
 tongue; he knew it better than we thought he did. Thairs what's here; ies
 the rest of his story and could be the reason for the breakdown were
 witnessing now."
  'Ibaes a hell of a leap backward," said Ogilvie. "Can you sketch it for us?
  I donI like surprises; retired paranoids we don!t need.*
  Apparently, weve got one," Interjected Miller, picking up the cable. "ff
  Baylor's judgment means anything---r
  It does,- Stern broke in. -He's one of the best we've got In Europe."
  Still, he's Pentagon," added Dawson. "Judgment's not a strong point."
  'It is with him," corrected the Cons Op director. "He!s black and had to be
  good."
  "As I was about to say," continued Miller, "Baylor includes a strong
  recommendation that we take Havelock seriously. He saw what he saw."
  'Which is impossible," said Ogilvie. "Which means we~ve got a whacko.
  What's in there, DanP"
  'An ugly early life," replied Stem, lifting the cover of the file and
  turning several pages. "We knew be was Czech, but thaes all we knew. There
  were several thousand Czechoslovakian refugees in England during the war,
  and that was the explanation given for his being there. But It
                  THE PAnsnrAL MosAic97

 wasn7t true. There were two stories: one real, the other a cover. He wasn't
 in England during the war, nor were his parents. He spent those years in and
 around Prague. It was a long nightmare and very real for him. It started
 when he was old enough to know it, see it. Unfortunately, we can't get in-
 side his head, and that could be vital now." The director tamed to Miller.
 'Youll have to advise us here, Paul. He could be extremely dangerous."
  "Then you'd better clarify," said the doctor. "How far back do we go? And
  why?"
  "Lees take the 'why first," said Stem, removing a number of pages from the
  dossier. "He's lived with the specter of betrayal since be was a child.
  There was a period during adolescence and early adulthood-the high school
  and college years-when the pressures were absent, but the memories must
  have been pretty horrible for him. Then for the next sixteen years-these
  past sixteen years-he's been back in that some kind of world. Perhaps Vs
  seen too many ghosts."
 "Be specific, Daniel," pressed the psychiatrist.
  'To do that," said the director, his eyes scanning the top page in his
  hand, "we have to go back to June of 1942, the war in Czechoslovakia. You
  see, his name isn't Havelock, Ws Havlf6ek. Mikhail Havlf6ek. He was born in
  Prague sometime in the middle thirties, the exact date unknown. All the
  records were destroyed by the Gestapo."
  'GestapoP" The attorney, Dawson, leaned back in his chair. 'June, 1942 ...
  came up in e Nu emberg trials."
  "It was a sizable item on the Nt rembrerg agenda," agreed
 Stem. "On May twenty-seventh Reinhard Heydrich, known
 as der Henker-the hangman-of Prague, was killed by Czech
 partisans. They were led by a professor who'd been dismissed
 from Karlova University and who worked with British intellf
 gence. His name was Havlf6ek and he lived with his wife and
 son in a village roughly eight miles outside of Prague where
 he organized the partisan cells. The village was I.Adice."
  "Oh, Christ," said Miller, slowly dropping the cable from Rome on the
  table.
  "He wasn't noticeably in evidence," commented Stem dryly as be shifted the
  pages in his hand. "Afraid that he might have been seen at the site of
  Heydrich's assassination, Havlf6ek stayed away from his house for nearly
  two weeks, living In the cellars at the university. He hadZt been spotted,
 98RoBERT LuoLum

 but someone else from Lidice bad been; the price was set for Heydrich's
 death: execution for all adult males; for the women, conscription-slave
 labor for the factories, the more presentable sent to the officers' barracks
 to be Feldhurem The children . . . they would simply 'disappear.'
 Jugendmftlichkeiten. The adaptable would be adopted, the rest gassed in
 mobile vans."
 "Efficient bastards, wereet they?" said Ogilvie.
  "The orders from Berlin were kept quiet until the morning of June tenth,
  the day of the mass executions," continued Stem, reading. "It was also the
  day Havh6ek was heading home. When the word went out-the proclamations were
  nailed to telephone poles and broadcast over the radio-the partisans
  stopped him from going back. They locked him up, sedated him with drugs;
  they knew there was nothing he could do, and he was too valuable. Finally,
  he was told the worst. His wife had been sent to the whore camps-it was
  later learned that she killed herself the first night, taking a Wehrinacht
  officer with her-and his son was nowhere to be found."
  "But he hadn't, obviously, been taken with the other children," said
  Dawson.
  "No. He'd been chasing rabbits, and he came back in time to see the
  roundups, the executions, the corpses thrown in ditches. He went into
  shock, fled into the woods and, for weeks, lived like an animal. The
  stories began spreading through the countryside: a child was seen running
  in the forest, footprints found near barns, leading back into the woods.
  The father heard them and knew; he had told his son that If the Germans
  ever came for him, he was to escape into the forests. It took over a month,
  but HavIi6ek tracked the boy. He had been hiding in caves and trees,
  terrified to show himself, eating whatever he could steal and scratch from
  the ground, the nightmare of the massacre never leaving him."
  "A lovely childhood," said the psychiatrist, making a note on a pad.
  "It was only the beginning." The director of Cons Op reached for another
  page in the dossier. "Havlf6ek and his son remained in the Prague-Boleslav
  sector and the underground war accelerated, with the father as the partisan
  leader. A few months later the boy became one of the youngest recruits in
  the Mtski BrigAda, the Children's Brigade.
                   THE PARSWAL MOSAIC99

 They were used as couriers, as often as not, carrying nitroglycerin and
 plastic explosives as messages. One misstep, one search, one soldier hungry
 for a small boy, and it was over."
  "His father let him?" asked Miller incredulously.
  "He couldn1 stop him. The boy found out what they'd done to his mother. For
  three years he lived that lovely childhood. It was uncanny, macabre. During
  those nights when his father was around, he was taught his lessons like any
  other school kid. Then during the days, in the woods and the fields, others
  taught him how to run and hide, how to lie. How to kill."
  That was the training you mentioned, wasn't it?" said Ogfivie quietly.
  'Yes. He knew what it was like to take lives, see friends' lives taken,
  before be was ten years old. Grisly."
  "Indelible," added the pyschiattist. "Explosives planted almost forty years
  ago."
  "Could the Costa Brava have triggered them forty years later?" asked the
  lawyer, looking at the doctor.
  "It could. Tbere're a couple of dozen blood-red images floating around,
  some pretty grim symbols. I'd have to know a hell of a lot more." Miller
  turned to Stem, pencil poised above his pad. "What happened to him then?"
  "To all of them," said Stern. "Peace finally came-I should say the formal
  war was over-but there was no peace in Prague. The Soviets had their own
  plans, and another kind of madness took over. IMe elder Havlf6ek was
  visibly pohtical, jealous of the freedom he and the partisans had fought
  for. He found himself in another war, as covert as before and just as
  brutal. With the Russians." The director tamed to another page. "For him It
  ended on March tenth, 1948, with the assassination of Jan Masaryk and the
  collapse of the Sochil Democrats."
 "In what sense?"
  "He disappeared. Shipped to a gulag in Siberia or to a nearer grave. His
  political friends were quick; the Czechs share a proverb with the Russians:
  *Me playful cub is tornorrov/s wolf.' They bid young Havlf6ek and reached
  British M.I.6. Someone~s conscience was stirred; the boy was smuggled out
  of the country, and taken to England."
  "I'liat proverb about the cub turning into tomorrov/s wolf," interjected
  Ogilvie. "Proved out didn't it?"
 100            RoBERT Lurmum

 "In ways the Soviets could never envisiom'
  "How did the Websters flt in?" asked Miller. "They were his sponsors over
  here, obviously, but the boy was in England."
  "It was chance, actually. Webster had been a reserve colonel in the war,
  attached to Supreme Command Central. In '48 he was in London on business,
  his wife with him, and one night at dinner with wartime friends they heard
  about the young Czech brought out of Prague, living at an orphanage in
  Kent. One thing led to another-the Websters had no children, and God knows
  the boys story was intriguing, if not incredible-so the two of them drove
  down to Kent and interviewed him. That's the word here. 'Interviewed! Cold,
  isn't it?"
 "They obviously weren't."
  "No, they weren't. Webster went to work. Papers were mocked up, laws bent,
  and a very disturbed child flown over here with a new identity. Havlf6ek
  was fortunate; he went from an English orphanage to a comfortable home in
  a wellto-do American suburb, including one of the better prep schools and
  Princeton University."
 "And a new name," said Dawson.
  Daniel Stem smiled. "As long as a cover was deemed necessary, our reserve
  colonel and his lady apparently felt Anglicization was called for in
  Greenwich. We all have our foibles."
 "Why not their name?'
  "The boy wouldn't go that far. As I said before, the memories had to be
  there. indelibly, as Paul put it."
 "Are the Websters still alive?"
  "No. They'd be almost a hundred if they were. They both died in the early
  sMes when Havelock was at Princeton."
 "Where be met Matthias?" asked Ogilvie.
  "Yes," answered the director of Cons Op. "That softened
 the blow. Matthias took an interest in him, not only because
 of HavelocYs work but, perhaps more important, because his
 family had known the Havli6eks in Prague. They were all
 par' of ecommunity until the Germans blew it
 apart 4s-for all intents and purposes-buried
 the survvo
 "Did Matthias know the full story?"
 All of it," replied Stern.
                 THE PATtsrFAL MosAic101

  "That letter in the Costa Brava Me makes more sense now," said the lawyer.
  "The note Matthias sent to Havelock."
  "He wanted it included," explained Stem, "so there'd be no misunderstanding
  on our part. If Havelock opted for immediate withdrawal, we were to permit
  it."
  "I know," continued Dawson, "but I assumed when Matthias made a reference
  to bow much Havelock bad suffered in . . . 'the early days,' I think he
  wrote, he meant simply losing both parents in the war. Nothing like this."
  "Now you know. We know." Stem again turned to the psychiatrist. "Any
  guidance, Paul?"
  "The obvious," said Miller. "Bring him in. Promise him anything, but bring
  him in. And we can't afford any accidents. Get him here alive.-
  "I agree that's the optimum," interrupted the red-haired Ogilvie, "but I
  can't see it ruling out every option."
  "You'd better," said the doctor. "You even said it yourself. Paranoid.
  Whacko. Costa Brava was intensely personal to Havelock. It could very well
  have set off those explosives planted thirty years ago. A part of him is
  back there protectIng himself, building a web of defenses against
  persecution, against attack. He's running through the woods after having
  witnessed the executions of Lidice; he's 'With the Children's Brigade,
  nitroglycerin strapped to his body."
  "Ies what Baylor mentions in his cable." Dawson picked it up. "Here it is.
  'Sealed depositions,' 'tales out of school.' He could do it all."
  "He could do anything," continued the psychiatrist. "There are no
  behavioral rules. Once he's hallucinated, he can slip back and forth
  between fantasy and reality, each phase serving the dual objectives of
  convincing himself of the persecution and at the same time ridding himself
  of it."
 "What about Rostov in AthensP" asked Stem.
  "We don't know that there was any Rostov in Athens," Miller said. "It could
  be part of the fantasy, retroactively recalling a man in the street who
  looked like him. We do know the Karas woman was KGB. Why would a man like
  Rostov suddenly appear and deny it?"
  Ogilvie leaned forward. "Baylor says Havelock called it a blind probe.
  Rostov could have taken him, gotten him out of Greece."
 "Then why dWt he?" asked Miller. "Come on, Red, you
 102            ROBERT LuDLum

 were in the fleld for ten years. Blind probe or no blind probe, if you were
 Rostov and knowing what you knew was back at the Lubyanka, wouldn't you have
 taken Havelock under the circumstances described in that cable?"
  Ogilvie paused, staring at the psychiatrist. "Yes," be said finally.
  "Because I could always let him go-if I wanted tobefore anyone knew I'd
  taken him."
  "Exactly. It's inconsistent. Was it Rostov in Athens, or anywhere else? Or
  was our patient fantasizing, building his own case for persecution and
  subsequent defenses?'
  "From what this Colonel Baylor says, he was damned convincing," interjected
  the lawyer, Dawson.
  "A hallucinating schizophrenic-if that's what he is--can be extraordinarily
  convincing because be believes totally what be's saying."
 "But you can't be sure, Paul," insisted Daniel Stem.
  "No, I can't be. But we're sure of one thing-two things, actually. The
  Karas woman was KGB and she was killed on that beach on the Costa Brava.
  The evidence was irrefutable for the first, and we have two on-site
  confirmations for the second, including one from Havelock himself." The
  psychiatrist looked at the faces of the three men. "Thaes all I can base a
  diagnosis on; that and this new information on one Mikhail Havlf6ek. rm in
  no position to do anything else. You asked for guidance, not absolutes."
  " Tromise him anything . . " repeated Ogilvie. "Like that goddamned
  commercial."
  "But bring him in," completed Miller. "And just as fast as you can. Get him
  into a clinic, under therapy, but find out what he's done and where he's
  left those defense mechanisms of his. The 'sealed depositions' and 'tales
  out of school.' "
  "I don't have to remind anyone here," interrupted Dawson quietly. "Havelock
  knows a great deal that could be extremely damaging if revealed. The damage
  would be as extensive to our own credibility-here and abroad-as from
  anything the Soviets might learn. Frankly, more so. Ciphers, informers,
  sources-all these can be changed, the networks warned. We can't go back and
  rewrite certain incidents where intelligence treaties were violated, the
  laws of a host country broken by our people."
  "To say nothing of the domestic restrictions placed on us aver here," added
  Stem. "I know you included tha% I just
                  Tim PARsiFAL Mosmc103

 want to emphasize it. Havelock knows about them; he's negotiated a number of
 exchanges as a result of them."
  "Whatever we've done was justified," said Ogilvie curtly. "If anyone wants
  proof, there's a couple of hundred files that show what we've
  accomplished."
  "And a few thousand that don't," objected the attorney. "Besides, there's
  also the Constitution. I'm speaking adversarfly, of course."
  "Horsesbiti" Ogilvie shot back. "By the time we get court orders and
  warrants, some poor son of a bitch over here has a wife or a father shipped
  to one of those gulags over there, when someone like Havelock could have
  made a deal. If we could have placed a tap on time, assigned surveillance,
  and found out what was going on."
  "It's a gray area, Red," explained Dawson, not unsympathetically. "When is
  homicide justified, really justified? On balance, there are those who would
  say our accomplishments don't justify our failures."
  "One man crossing a checkpoint to our side justifies them." Ogilvie's eyes
  were cold. "One family taken out of a camp in Magya-Orszag or Krakow or
  Dannenwalde or Liberec justifies them. Because that's where they are,
  Counselor, and they shouldn't be there. Who the bell gets hurt, -really
  hurt? A few screaming freaks with political hatchets and outsized egos.
  ThWre not worth it."
 "The law says they are. The Constitution says they are."
  'Men fuck the law, and lees put a couple of holes in the Constitution. I'm
  sick to death of its being used by loudmouthed, busby-haired smartasses who
  mount any cause they can think of just to tie our bands and draw attention
  to themselves. I've seen those rehabilitation camps, Mr. Lawyer. rve been
  there."
  "Which is why yoere valuable here," interposed Stem quickly, putting out
  the fire. "Each of us has a value, even when he renders judgments he'd
  rather not. I think the point Dawson's making is that this is no time for
  a Senate inquiry, or the hanging judges of a congressional oversight
  committee. They could tie our bands far more effectively than any mob from
  the aging radical-chic or the wheat-germ-and-granola crowd."
  "Or," said Dawson, glancing at Ogilvie, his look conveying a mutuality of
  understanding, "representatives of a half a
 104            RommT LunLum

 dozen governments showing up at our embassies and telling us to shut down
 certain operations. You~ve been there, too, Red. I don't think you want
 that."
  "Our patient can make it happen,0 Interjected Miller. "And very probably
  will unless we reach him in time. The longer his hallucinations are allowed
  to continue without medical attention, the farther he'll slip into fantasy,
  the rate of acceleration growing faster. The persecutions win multiply
  until they become unbearable to him and he thinks be has to strike
  out-strike back. With his own attacks. Theyre his defense mechanisms."
  "What form might they take, Paul?" asked the director of Cons Op.
  "Any of several," replied the psychiatrist. "The extreme would be his
  making contact with men hiA known-or known of-in foreign intelligence
  circles, and offering to deliver classified information. That could be the
  root fantasy of the Rostov 'encounter.' Or he could write letters-with
  copies to us-or send cables-easily intercepted by us-that hint at past
  activities we can't afford to have scrutinized. Whatever he does, hell be
  extremely cautious, secretive, the reality of his own expertise protecting
  his manipulative fantasies. You said it, Daniel; he could be dangerous. He
  is dangerous."
  "'Offering to deliver: " said the attorney, repeating MilleA phrase.
  "Hinting ... not delivering, not giving outright?'
  "Not at first. He'll try to force us-blackmail us-into telling him what he
  wants to hear. That the Karas woman is alive, that there was a conspiracy
  to retire him."
  "Neither of which we can do convincingly because there!s not a damn thing
  we can offer him as proof," said Ogilvie. "Nothing he'll accept. Hes a
  field man. Whatever we send him he'll filter, chew it around for accuracy,
  and spit it back in the horseshit pile. So what do we tell him?"
  "Don't teU him anything' " answered Miller. "You promise
 to tell him. Put it any way you like. The informatiods too
 classified to send by courier, too dangerous to be permitted
 outside these rooms. Play his game, suck him in. Remember,
 he desperately wants-needs, if you like-his primary halluci
 nation confirmed. He saw a dead woman; he has to believe
 that. And the confirmation's over here; it could be irresistible
 to him."
 "Sorry, Headman." The. red-haired former field agent
                  THE PAR9WAL M09AIC105

 raised his hands, palms up. "He won't buy it, not that way. His-what did you
 call it? his 'reaht,/ part?-would reject it. Thaes buying a code in a box of
 Cracker Jacks. It just doesn't happen. Hell want something stronger, much
 strongen"
 "Matthias?" asked Dawson quietly.
 "Optimum," agreed the psychiatrist.
  "Not yet," said Stem. "Not until we have no other choice. The quiet word is
  that he!s aware of his failing condition; he's conserving his strength for
  SALT Three. We =1 lay this on him now.
 "We may have to," insisted Dawson.
  'Ve may, then again we may not." The director turned to Ogilvie. "Why does
  Havelock have to buy anything concrete, Red?"
 "So we can get close enough to grab him."
  "Couldn~t a sequence be designed-say, one piece of Information leading to
  another, each more vital than the lastso as to draw him in, suck him in, as
  Paul says? He caiA get the last unless he shows up?'
 "A treasure huntr asked Ogilvie, laughing.
 "That!s what Vs on'" said Miller quietly.
  "The answer's no." The red-haired man leaned forward, his elbows on the
  table. "A sequence operation depends on credibility; the better the field
  man, the firmer the credibility. Ws also a very delicate exercise. The
  subject, if he's someone like Havelock, will use decoys, blind
  intermediaries. Hell reverse the process by programming his decoys with
  information of their own, give his intermediaries questions they want
  answered on the spot; he'll suck you in. He won't expect perfect answers;
  Vd be suspicious as hell if he got them, but he!ll want what we used to
  call a 'stomach consensus! Ws not something you can write down on paper and
  analyze; it's a gut feeling for believability. There aren't that many good
  men who could fool Havelock in sequence. one substantial misstep and he
  closes the book and walks away."
 "And sets off the explosions," said Miller.
 "I see," said Stem.
  And it was clear that the men around that table did see. It was one of
  those moments when the unkempt, irascible Ogilvie confirmed his value, as
  he did so frequently. He had been out in that labyrinth called the "field,"
  and his summations had a peculiar eloquence and sagacity.
 106ROBERT Luixum

  'Mere is a way, however," continued the former agent. "rm not sure there's
  any other."
 "What is it?" asked the director of Cons Op.
 #Ve."
 "Out of the question."
  '11iink about it," said Ogilvie quickly. "I'm the credibility. Havelock
  knows me-more important, he knows I sit at this table. To him Im one of
  them, a balf-assed strategist who may not . know what he's asking for, but
  sure as hell knows why. And with me there!s a difference; a few of them out
  there might even count on it. Ive been where they've been. None of the rest
  of you have. Outside of Matthias, if theres anyone he'll listen to, anyone
  he'll meet with, ies me."
  "rin sorry, Red. Even if I agreed with you, and I think I do, I can~t
  permit It. You know the rules. Once you step inside this room, you never go
  out in the field again."
 "That rule was made in this room. Vs not Holy Writ."
  "It was made for a very good reason," said the attorney. 'Me same reason
  our houses are watched around the clock, our cars followed, our regular
  telephones tapped with our consent. If any of us was taken by interested
  parties, from Moscow to Peking to the Persian Gulf, the consequences would
  be beyond recall."
  "No disrespect, Counselor, but those safeguards were designed for people
  like you and the Headman here. Even Daniel. rm a little different. They
  wouldn't try to take me because they know they'd wind up with nothing."
  "No one doubts your capabilities," countered Dawson. "But I submit-"
  "It hasn't anything to do with capabilities," interrupted Ogilvie, raising
  his hand to the lapel of his wom tweed jacket; he tamed up the Rap toward
  the lawyer next to him. "L,ook closely, Counselor. There's a slight bulge
  an inch from the tip here.-
  Dawson~s eyes dropped to the fabric, his expression noncommittal.
  -Cyanide?-
 "Thaes right."
 "Sometimes, Red, I find you hard to believe.*
  "Don't mistake me," said Ogilvie simply. "I don't ever want to use this-or
  the others I've got conveniently placed. rm no macho freak trying to shock
  you. I don~t hold my arm over a fire to show how brave I am any more than
  I
                 THE PAWWAL MOSATC 107

 want to kill someone or 'have him try to kill me. rve got these pills
 because I'm a coward, Mr. Lawyer. You say were being watched, guarded
 twenty-four hours a day. That's terriflc, but I think yoere overreacting to
 something that doeset exist. I don't think there is a Me on you in
 Dzerzhinsky Square; at least not on you or the doctor here. Im sure there's
 one on Stem, but grabbing him is like codes in Cracker jacks, or us going in
 and grabbing someone like Rostov. It doeset happen. But there's a Me on
 me-you can bet your legal ass on that-and Im not retired. What I know is
 still very operative, more so ever since I stepped inside this room. That's
 why rve got these little bastards. I know bow I'd go in and bow I'd come
 out, and they know I know. Strangely enough, these pills are my protection.
 They know I've got them and they know I'd use them. Because Im a coward."
  "And yoeve just spelled out the reasons why you can't go into the field,"
  said the director of Consular Operations.
  "Have I? Then either you didn't listen or you should be fired for
  incompetence. For not taking into account what I did* spell. out. What do
  you want, Teacher? A note from my doctor? Excusing me from all activityr
  The strategists glanced briefly at each other, looking uncomfortable. "Come
  on, Red, cut it out," said Stem. 'Ibaes not called for."
  'Yes, it is, Dan. Ies the sort of thing you consider when making a
  decision. We all know about it, we just doet talk about it, and I suppose
  thaes another kind of consideration. How long have I got? Three months,
  maybe four? les why rm here, and that was an intelligent decision."
 "It was hardly the sole reason," offered Dawson softly.
  "If it didn't weigh heavily in my favor, it should have, Counselor. You
  should always pick someone from the field whose longevity~or lack of it-can
  be counted on." Ogilvie tamed to the balding Miller. "Our doctor knows,
  don7t you, Paul?"
 "I'm not your doctor, Red," said the psychiatrist quietly.
  "You don't have to be; you~ve read the reports. In five weeks or so the
  pain will start getting worse .,. . then worse after that. I won't feel it,
  of course, because by then III be moved to a bospital room where injections
  will keep it under control, and all those phony cheerful voices will tell
  me rm
 108            ROBERT LUDLUM

 actually getting better. Until I can't focus, or hear them, and then they
 don't have to say anything." The former field man leaned back in his chair,
 looking now at Stern. "We!ve got here what our learned attorney might call
 a confluence of beneficial prerogatives. 'Chances are that the Soviets won1
 touch me, but if they tried, nothing's lost for me, you can be goddamned
 sure of that. And I'm the only one around who can pull Havelock out in the
 open, far enough so we can take him."
  Stem's gaze was steady on the red-haired man who was dying. "You're
  persuasive," he said.
  "I'm not only persuasive, Im right." Suddenly Ogilvie pushed his chair back
  and stood up. "rm so right rm going home to pack and grab a cab to Andrews.
  Get me on a military transport to Italy; theres no point in advertising the
  trip on a commercial flight. Those KGB turkeys know every passport, every
  cover I've ever used, and theWs no time to be inventive. Route me through
  Brussels into the base at Palombara. Then cable Baylor to expect me... Call
  me Apache."
 "Apache?" asked Dawson.
 'Darnn good trackers."
  "Assuming Havelock will meet with you," said the psychiahist, "what'll you
  say to him?"
  "Not a hell of a lot. Once hes an arm~s length away he's mine."
  "He's experienced, Red," said Stem, studying Ogilvie's face. "He may not be
  all there, but he's tough."
  "IT have equipment," replied the dying man, heading for the door. "And I'm
  experienced, too, which is why Im a coward. I don't go near anything I
  can't walk away from. Mostly." Ogilvie opened the door and left without
  another word. The exit was clean, swift, the sound of the closing door
  final.
 'We won't see him again," said Miller.
 "I know," said Stem. "So does he."
 "Do you think he'll reach Havelock?" asked Dawson.
  "rin sure of it," replied the director of Cons Op. "Hell take him, turn him
  over to Baylor and a couple of resident physicians we've got in Rome, then
  he'll disappear. He told us. He's not going into that hospital room and all
  those lying voices. He'll go his own way."
 "Ws entitled to that," said the psychiatrist.
                . THE PARSIFAL MOSAIC109

  "I suppose so," agreed the lawyer without conviction, turning to Stem. "As
  Red might say, 'No disrespect,' but I wish to Cod we could be certain about
  Havelock. He's got to be immobilized. We could be hauled in by authorities
  all over Europe, fuel for the fanatics of every persuasion. Embassies could
  be burned to the ground, networks scattered, time lost, hostages taken,
  and-don~t fool yourself-a great many people killed. All because one man
  fell,off balance. We've seen it happen with far less provocation than
  Havelock could provide."
  "That's why Im so sure Ogilvie will bring him in," said Stem. "Im not in
  Paurs line of work, but I think I know what's going through Red's mind.
  He's offended, deeply offended. He's watched friends die in the field-from
  Africa to Istanbul-unable to do anything because of his cover. He saw a
  wife and three children leave him because of his job; he hasn't seen his
  kids in five years. Now he's got to live with what he's got-die from what
  he's got. All things considered, if he stays on track, what gives Havelock
  the right, the privilege, to go over the edge? Our Apaches on his last
  hunt, setting his last trap. Hell see it through because be!s angry."
  'That and one other thing," said the psychiatrist. "Theres nothing else
  left for him. Ies his final justification."
 "For what?" asked the lawyer.
  "The pain, " answered Miller. "His and Havelocles. You see, he respe~ted
  him once. He cant forget that."
 8

 The -unmarked jet swept down from the skies forty miles due north of the
 airport of Palombara Sabina. It bad flown from Brussels, avoiding all
 military and commercial air routes, and soaring over the Alps east of the
 Lepontine sector; its altitude was so great and its descent so rapid that
 the probability of observation was practically nonexistent. Its blip on
 defense radar screens was prearranged: it would appear and disappear without
 comment, without investigation. And when it landed at Palombara, it would
 bring in a man who bad been taken on board secretly at three o'clock in the
 morning, Brussels time. A man without a conventional name, referred to only
 as the Apache. This man, as with many like him, could not risk the
 formalities of identifleation at immigration desks or border checkpoints.
 Appearances might be altered and names changed, but other men watched such
 places, knowing what to look for, their minds trained to react like memory
 banks; too often they were successful. For the Apache-as for many like
 him-the current means of travel was more the norm than otherwise.
  The engines were cut back as the pilot-traffied in carrier landings-guided
  his aircraft over the forests in the stretched-out, low approach to the
  field. It was a mile-long black strip cut out of the woods, with
  maintenance hangars and traffic towers set back and camouflaged, odd yet
  barely
                                110
                 THE PARSWAL MOSAICill

 visible intrusions on the countryside. The plane touched down, and the young
 pilot tamed in his seat as the reverse thrust of the jets echoed throughout
 the small cabin. He raised his voice to be heard, addressing the red-haired
 middle-aged man behind him.
  "Here we are, Indian. You can take out your bow and arrows.
  "Funny boy," said Ogilvie, releasing the clamp that held the strap across
  his chest. He looked at his watch. "What!S the time here? I'm still on a
  Washington clock.'
  "Oh-five-fifty-seven; you've lost six hours. You're working on midnight,
  but here ies morning. if yoere expected at the office, I hope you got some
  sleep."
 "Enough. Is transport arranged?"
 "Right to the big chiefs wigwam on the Via Vittorio."
 "Very cute. The embassy?"
  "That's right. Yatere a special package. Delivery guaranteed straight from
  Brussels."
 "That's wrong. The embassy's out."
 "We've got our orders."
 "Im issuing new ones."

 Ogilvie walked into the small office reserved for men like himself in the
 maintenance building of the unmapped airfield. It was a room devoid of
 windows, with only basic furniture; there were two telephones, both routed
 perpetually through electronic scrambler systems. The outside corridor that
 led to the office was guarded by three men dressed innocuously in overalls.
 Under the bulging fabric, however, each carried a weapon, and should any
 unidentified persons interfere with the incoming passenger or the presence
 of a camera even be suspected, the weapons would be bared, used instantly if
 necessary. These accommodations were the result of extraordinary conferences
 between unknown men of both governments whose concerns transcended the
 stated limits of covert cooperation; quite simply, they were necessary.
  Governments everywhere were being threatened from without and within, from
  fanatics of the left and the right committed solely to the destruction of
  the status quo. Fanaticism fed upon itself, upon sensationalism, upon the
  spectacular interruption of normal activity; clandestine access had to be
  given those who fought the extremists in any form. It was
 112            ROBERT LunLum

 presumed that those who passed through Palombara were such fighters, and the
 current passenger knew beyond any doubt that be was one. Unless he brought
 in a rogue agent, a dangerous paranoid whose mind held the secret histories
 of a thousand untold intelligence operations going back sixteen years, that
 man could destroy alliances and networks throughout Europe. Sources would
 disappear, potential sources evaporate. Michael Havelock had to be found and
 taken; no terrorist could inflict greater damage.
  Ogilvie walked to the desk, sat down, and picked up the telephone on his
  left; it was black, signifying domestic use. He dialed the number be had
  committed to memory, and twelve seconds later the sleepy voice of
  Lieutenant Colonel Lawrence Baylor Brown was on the line.
 "Brown. What is it?"
 "Baylor Brown?"
 "Apache?"
 "Yes. rm at Palombara. Have you heard anything?"
  "Not a word. rve got tracers out all over Rome; there's not a line on him."
 "You've got what?"
  "Tracers. Every source we can pay or who owes us a favor-"
  "Goddamn it ' call them offl What the hell do you think you're doing?"
 . Hey, easy, buddy. I don't think we're going to get along."
  "And I don't give a duck's fuck whether we do or notl You're not dealing
  with a G-two crossword puzzle; he's a snake, buddy. You let him find out
  you're going after him, he figures you've broken the rules. And he will
  find out; tbaes when he bites. Jesus, you think he's never been traced be-
  fore?"
  "You think I don't know my tracers?" countered Baylor angrily, defensively.
 "I think we'd better talk."
 "Come on in, then," said the colonel.
  "Tbaes another thing," replied Ogilvie. "The embassys out..
 "Why?"
  'Among other things, he could be in a window across the street."
 "W"
                 THE PARSIFAL MOSAIC113

  'He knows I'd never show up in-territory. KGB cameras operate around the
  clock, aimed at every entrance."
  "He doesn't even know you~re coming," protested Baylor. "Or who you are."
 "He will when you tell him."
 "A name, please?" said the army officer testily. "Apache'll do for now."
 'nat'll mean something to him?" "it win."
 'It doesn~t to me."
 "ies not supposed to."
 "Were definitely not going to get along." "Sorry about that."
 "Since you won't come in, where do we meet?" 'The Borghese. in the gardens.
 III find you."
 "That'll he easier than my finding you."
 'You~re wrong, Baylor."
 "About that?"
  'No. I think we will get along." Ogilvie paused briefly. "Make it two hours
  from now. Our target may try to reach you by then."
 "Two hours."
 "And, Baylor?" "What?"
 "Call off those duck-fucking tracers, buddy~"

 The month of March was not kind to the Borghese. The chill of the Roman
 winter, mild as the winter was, still lingered, inhibiting the budding of
 flowers and the full explosion of the gardens that in spring and summer
 formed rows and circles of dazzling colors. The myriad paths that led
 through the tall pines toward the great museum seemed just a little dirty,
 the green of the pine trees tired, dormant. Even the benches that lined the
 narrow foot roads were layered with dust. A transparent fihn bad descended
 over the park that was the Villa Borgbese; it would disappear with the April
 rains, but for now the lifelessness of March remained.
  Ogilvie stood by the thick trunk of an oak tree on the border of the
  gardens behind the museum. It was too early for any but a few students and
  fewer tourists; a scattering of these strolled along the paths waiting for
  the guards to open the doors that led to the Casino Borghese's treasures.
  The
 114            ROBERT LUDLUM

 former fleld man, now in the fleld again, looked at his watch, wrinkles of
 annoyance spreading across his deeply lined face. It was nearly twenty
 minutes to nine; the army intelligence officer was over a half hour late.
 Ogilvie's irritation was directed as much at himself as toward Baylor. In
 his haste to veto his going to the embassy as well as making it clear that
 he was the control and no one else, he had chosen a poor rendezvous and he
 knew it. So would the colonel, if he thought about it; perhaps he had,
 perhaps that was why he was late. The Borghese at this hour was too quiet,
 too remote, with far too many shadowed recesses from which those who might
 follow either of them could observe their every move, every word, visually
 and electronically. Ogilvie silently swore at himself; it was no way to
 initiate his authority. The attach6-conduit had probably taken a circuitous,
 ebange-ofvehicle route, employing frequency scanners in hopes of exposing
 and thus losing presumed surveillance. KGB cameras were trained on the
 embassy; the colonel had been put in a difficult situation thanks to an
 abrasive source from Washington enigmatically called Apache. A cover from
 the back of a cereal box.
  The enigma was there, but not the foolishness, not the cereal box. Seven
  years ago in Istanbul two undercover field men, code names Apache and
  Navajo, nearly lost their lives trying to prevent a KGB assassination on
  the Mesrutiyet. They had failed, and in the process Navajo had been cor-
  nered on the deserted Ataturk at four o'clock in the morning, KGB killer
  teams at both entrances. It was a total-loss situation until Apache sped
  across the bridge in a stolen car, screeching to a stop by the pedestrian
  alley, shouting at his associate to climb in or get his bead blown off.
  Ogilvie had then raced through a fusillade of gunfire, receiving a graze
  wound at his temple and two bullets in his right hand while breaking
  through the thunderous early-morning barricade. The man called Navajo seven
  years ago would not readily
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                 THE PAmwAL MosAic 115

 tree trunk and the foliage, the army officer gestured toward the south
 garden, at the rear entrance of the stone museum. About forty yards away a
 man in a dark suit was glancing about, his expression indecisive, as he
 moved first in one direction, then in another, unable to choose a path. In
 the distance there were three rapid blasts of a high-pitched automobile bom,
 followed by the gunning of an engine. Startled, the man stopped, then broke
 into a run toward the direction of the intruding sounds and disappeared
 beyond the east wall of the Borghese.
  'T'his is one dumb location," said the colonel, checking his watch.
 "That horn was yoursP" asked Ogilvie.
  "Ies parked by the Veneto gates. It was near enough to be heard; that was
  all that mattered."
  "Sorry," said the former field man quietly. "Ies been a long time. I donI
  usually make mistakes like this. The Borghese was always crowded."
 "No sweat. And rm not sure it was a mistake."
 "Let the needle out. Don't stick me with kindness."
  'You're not reading me. Your feelings aren't any concern of mine. rve never
  been put under KGB surveillance beforenot that I know of. Why now?"
  Ogilvie smiled; he was the control, after all. "You put out the tracers. I
  think I mentioned that."
  The black officer was silent, his dark eyes aware. "Then rm finished in
  Rome," he said finally.
 "Maybe."
 'No maybe. I'm finished, anyway. It's why irm late."
  "He reached you." The red-haired agent made the statement softly.
  'With full artillery and rm the first wholl be exposed. He picked up the
  Karas womads trail and followed her to the port of Civitavecchia, where she
  got out. He won't say how or on what ship. It was a trap; he waded through
  and reversed it, targeting the man responsible-a small-time operator on the
  docks. Havelock broke him, and what he learnedwhat he thinks he leamed-has
  tamed him into a stockpile of nitro."
 "What is itr
  "Double programming. Same tactic supposedly employed with him. She was
  sandbagged against him by us."
 116            RoBERT LuDLum

 "HowP"
  "By someone convincing her he'd gone over to the Soviets, that he was going
  to kill her."
 "rhaes a crock of shit."
  Tin only repeating what he said-what he was told. All things considered,
  ies not without logic. It would explain a lot. The KGB's got some pretty
  fair actors; they could have put on a performance for her. It's sound
  strategy. Ws out and she's running. A productive team neutralized."
  "I mean the whole thing's a crock of shit," countered Ogilvie. "Tbere is no
  jenna Karas; she died on a beach called Montebello on the Costa Brava. And
  she was KGB-a deepcover VKR field officer. No n-dstakes were made, but even
  that doesn't matter now. The main point is sb6s dead."
  "He doesn't believe it, when you talk to him you may not, either. rm not
  sure I do."
  "Havelock believes what he wants to believe, what he has to believe. rve
  heard the medical terms, and reduced to our language, Vs gone over the
  edge. He crosses back and forth between what is and what isnt, but
  fundamentally he!s gone.
 "He's damned convincing."
  "Because he's not lying. That's part of it. He saw what he saw."
 "That's what be says."
  "But he couldn't have; that's also part of it. His vision's distorted. When
  he goes over, he doesnI see with his eyes, only his head, and that's
  damaged."
 '-You~re convincing too."
  "Because rm not lying and my head's not damaged." Ogilvie reached into his
  pocket for a pack of cigarettes. He extracted one and lit it with an old,
  tarnished Zippo purchased a quarter of a century ago. Those are the facts,
  Colonel. You can fIll in the blank spaces, but the bottom line's fimL
  Havelock's got to be taken."
  'rhat wonI be so easy. He may be running around in his own foggy tunnels,
  but Vs not an amateur. He may not know where he's going, but he's survived
  in the field for sixteen years. He's smart, defensive."
  "We're aware of that. Ies the reality part. You told him I was here, didn't
  you?"
                 THE PARSTFAL MOSMC117

  'I told him a man named Apache was here." The army officer paused.
 "Well?"
  He didn't like it. Why you?-
 "Why not me?"
 "I doet know. Maybe he doesn't like you."
 "He owes me."
 "Maybe that's your answer."
 "What are you, a psychologist? Or a lawyerr
  "A little of both," said the colonel. "Constantly. Aren't You?"
  "Right now rm just annoyed. What the bell are you driving at?"
  "Havelocles reaction to you was very quick, very vocal. So they sent the
  Gunslinger,' he said. Is that your other name?'
 "Kid stuff. A bad joke."
  "He didn't sound amused. He's going to call at noon with Instructions for
  you."
 "At the embassy?"
  "No. Im to take a room at the Excelsior. You're to be there with me; you're
  to get on the phone."
 "Son of a bitchl" Ogilvie sucked breath through his teeth.
 "That's a problem?"
  "He knows where I am but I don't know where he is. He can watch me but I
  can7t watch him."
  "What difference does it make? He's obviously willing to meet you. In order
  to take him, you've got to meet with him."
  "Yoere the new boy on the block, Colonel, no offense intended. He's forcing
  my hand at the top."
 'How so?"
  "III need two men-Italians, preferably, as Inconspicuous as possible-to
  follow me when I leave the hotel."
  Why?-
  "Because be could take me," said the former field man reflectively. "From
  behind. On any crowded sidewalk. There isn!t a jump be doesn't know... A
  man collapses In the street, a friend helps him to a nearby car. Both
  Americans, nothing out of the ordinary."
  "That presumes I won't be with you. Still, rm the conduit. I could make a
  case for my being there."
 118            ROBErm Lumum

  'Deflnitely the new bay; bed bead for Cairo. And if you tried to keep me In
  sight, I have an idea he'd spot you. No--2*
  "Offense intended.... There are drawbacks.... I'll get you your cover." The
  offleer paused again, then continued, "But not two men. I think a couple
  would be better~"
 "Thaesgood. You~ve got possibilities, Colonel."
  "rve also got a recommendation to make that I'll deny if les ever ascribed
  to me. And considering that sobriquet Gunslinger, I don't think Id have any
  difficulty saying I heard it from you.
 "I can't wait to bear it myself."
  "Irm responsible for a large territory in this area of operations. The work
  I do for the Pentagon and State gets cornpounded; iesunavoidable. I need a
  favor, or someone needs one from us, so the circle quietly grows bigger,
  even if weve never met each other.*
  "I hate to repeat myself," interrupted Ogilvie, "but what the hell are you
  driving at nowP"
  "I have a lot of friends out there. Men and women who trust me, trust my
  office. If I have to go, Id like the office to remain intact, of course,
  but there's something more basic. I don't want those friends-known and
  unknown-to get hurt, and Havelock could hurt them. He~s worked Italy, the
  Adriatic, the Ligurian-from Trieste across the borders, along the northern
  coast all the way to Gibraltar. He could provoke reprisals. I don't think
  one messed-up retired field man is worth it."
 "Neither do V
 'flen take him out. Don't Just take him, take him ouC"
 "You could have heard that from me."
 "Do I hear it nowP"
  The man from Washington was silent for a moment; then he replied, -No."
 "Why notP"
  'Because the act could bring about the consequences you don~t want."
 "Impossible. He basnt had time."
  "You don~t know that. If this thing's been growing since Costa Brava, there
  I s no way to tell what deposits he's made or where he's made them. He
  could have left documents in half a dozen countries with specific
  instructions to release them if scheduled contacts are missed. During the
  last six
                 THE PARSEFAL MOSAIC119

 weeks be's been in London, Amsterdam, Paris, Athens and Rome. Why? Why those
 places? With the whole world to choose from, and with money in his pocket,
 he returns to the cities where he operated extensively under cover. It could
 be a pattern."
 "Or coincidence. He knew them. He was out; he felt safe."
 "Maybe, maybe not."
  "I donI follow the logic. If you simply take him, he still won't make those
  contacts."
 "There are ways.'
  'Me clinics, I assume. Laboratories where doctors inject serums that loosen
  tongues and minds?"
 "That!s right."
  'And I think you!re wrong. I don't know whether he saw the Karas woman or
  not, but whatever be saw-whatever happened-happened during the past
  twenty-four hours. He hasn't had time to do a goddonned thing. He may tell
  you he has, but he haset."
 "Is that an opinion, or are you clairvoyant?-
 
  "Neither. Ies fact. I listened to a man in shock. A man who!d just gone
  through a mind-blowing experience-his phrase, incidentally. It wasn't the
  result of a festering mental aberration; it had just happened. When you
  talk about what he could have done, the deposits he could have made, you're
  using the words I gave you because they're the words be said to me. He was
  speculating an what he inight do, not what he did. There's a hell of
  difference, Mr. Strategist."
 "And because of it you want him dead?"
 'I want a lot of other people to live."
 "So do we. Thaes why rm here."
  "So you can bring him back alive," said Baylor sardonically. "Just like
  Frank Buck."
 ~Ihat'll do."
 "No, it wont. Suppose you n-Ass? Suppose he gets away?"
 "It wodt happen."
 "Opinion or clairvoyance?"
 "Fact."
  "No way. Ies conjecture, a probability factor I don't want to count on."
  "You don~t have a choice, soldier. The chain of command has spoken."
 "Then let me spell it out foj~.you, civilian. Don't talk to me
 120            RoBERT LUDLUM

 about chains of command. Ive worked my black ass off In this white mart's
 army-white at the top, black at the bottom-until they had to make me a vital
 cog in the big white wheel. Now you come along with your secret-agent act,
 and a code name right out of-"
 "The back of a cereal box?" interjected Ogilvie.
  'You got it A cereal box. No name I can point tD, no Identification I can
  bargain with to get me off the hook, just a balloon from a comic strip. And
  if you do miss, and Havelock does get away, I'm on the firing line-as the
  target. Coffee-Face blew it; his network's comprontised. Take him out of
  the big white wheel."
  'You hypocritical bastard," said the man from Washington In disgust. "The
  only thing youre interested in saving is your own skin."
  "For a lot of reasons too benigri for you to understand. There're going to
  be more like me, not less.... Wherever you go in this town, I'm not far
  behind. You take him your way, that's fine with me. Ill get'you back to
  Palombara and strap the two of you into a jet myself with a letter of
  recommendation written in classical Latin. But if you can7t hack it, and he
  breaks, he goes down my way."
  "That doesn't sound like the man who believed his story, who pleaded his
  case."
  "I didn't plead his case, I reported it. And it doesnt make any difference
  whether I believe him or not. He's an active, dangerous threat to me and my
  function here in Rome and a large part of the network I've cultivated on
  the orders of my government and at the expense of the American taxpayer."
  The colonel stopped; he smiled. '71tats all I have to know to pull a
  trigger."
 "You could go far."
  I intend to, Ive got points to make."
  Ogilvie stepped away from the tree; he looked past the bordering foliage at
  the dormant gardens beyond. He spoke quietly, his voice flat, noncommittal.
  "I could lose you, you know. Kill you, if I had to."
  "Right on," agreed the officer. "So IT forget about the Excelsior. You take
  a room in my name and when the call comes from Havelock, you pretend to be
  me. He expects me to be there, confirm your presence; he knows I've got a
  stake