Robert Ludlum - Aquatain Progression.txt
Page 32
married to a girl who spoke fluent French and
German, and even she gave up. I don't have the ear,
I guess."
"Who did 'they' refer to?" asked Connal, barely
listening to Converse's explanation. "The embassy
men?"
Joel hesitated. "A little wider, I'm afraid," he
said, choosing his words carefully. "You'll have to
know but not now, not yet. Later."
"Why later? Why not now?"
"Because it wouldn't do you a damned bit of
good, and it might raise questions you wouldn't want
raised under, shall we say, adverse circumstances."
"That's elliptical."
'fit certainly is. '
"Is that it? Is that all you'll say?"
"No. There's one other thing. I want my briefcase."
Fitzpatrick had assured him that the switchboard
of Das Rektorat was capable of handling telephone
calls in English as well as at least six other
languages, including Arabic and he should have no
qualms about placing a call to Lawrence Talbot in
New York.
"Christ, where are you, Joel?" Talbot shouted
into the phone.
"Amsterdam," replied Converse, not wanting to
say Bonn and having had the presence of mind to
make the call station-to-station. "I want to know
what happened to Judge Anstett, Larry. Can you tell
me anything?"
"I want to know what's happened to you! Rene
called last night...."
"Mattilon?"
"You told him you were flying to London."
"I changed my mind."
"What the hell ha opened ? The police were with
him; he had no choice. He had to tell them who you
were." Talbot suddenly paused, then spoke in a
calmer voice, a false voice. "Are you all right, Joel?
Is there something you want to tell me, something
bothering you?"
THE AQUITAINE PROGRESSION 203
"Something bothering me?"
' Listen to me, Joel. We all know what you went
through, and we admire you, respect you. You're the
finest we've got in the international division "
"I'm the only one you've got," Converse broke in,
trying to think, trying to buy time as well as
information. "What did Rene say? Why did he call
you?"
'You sound like your old self, fella."
"I am my old self, Larry. What did Rene call you
about? Why were the police with him?" Joel could
feel the slippage; he was entering another sphere and
he knew it, accepted it. The lies would follow, guile
joining deceit, because time and freedom of
movement were paramount. He had to stay free;
there was so much to do, so little time.
"He called me back after the police left to fill me
in incidentally, they were from the Surete. As he
understood it, the driver of a limousine was assaulted
outside the George Cinq's service entrance "
"The driver of a limousine?" interrupted
Converse involuntarily. "They said he was a
chauffeur?"
"From one of those high-priced services that ferry
around people who make odd stops at odd hours.
Very posh and very confidential. Apparently the
fellow was pretty well smashed up and they say you
did it. No one knows why, but you were identified
and they say the man may not live."
"Larry, this is preposterousI" objected Joel, his
protestation accompanied by feigned outrage. "Yes,
I was there in the area but it had nothing to do
with me! Two hotheads got into a fight, and since I
couldn't stop them, I wasn't going to get my head
handed to me. I got out of there, and before I found
a taxi I yelled at the doorman to call for help. The
last thing I saw he was blowing his whistle and
running toward the alley."
"You weren't even involved, then," said Talbot.
The statement was a lawyer's positive fact.
"Of course not! Why would I be?"
"That's what we couldn't understand. It didn't
make sense."
"It doesn't make sense. I'll call Rene and fly back
to Paris, if I have to."
"Yes, do that," agreed Talbot haltingly. "I should
tell you I may have aggravated the situation."
"You? How?"
204 ROBERT LUDIUM
"I told Mattilon that perhaps you were . . . well,
not yourself. When I spoke with you in Geneva, you
sounded awful, Joel. Just plain awful."
'Good God, how did you think I'd feel? A man
I was negotiating with dies in front of me bleeding
from a dozen bullet wounds. How would you feel?"
"I understand," said the lawyer in New York,
"but then Rene thought he saw something in
you heard something that disturbed him, too."
"Oh, come on, will you people get off it!"
Converse's thoughts raced; every word he spoke had
to be credible, his now diminished "outrage" rooted
in believability. '`Mathlon saw me after I'd been
flying in and out of airports for damn near fourteen
hours. Christ, I was exhausted!"
"Joel?" Talbot began, obviously not quite ready
to get off it. "Why did you tell Rene you were in
Paris for the firm?"
Converse paused, not for lack of a response but
for effect. He was ready for the question; he had
been ready when he first approached Mattilon. "A
white lie, Larry, and no harm to anyone. I wanted
some information, and it seemed the best way to get
it."
"About this Bertholdier? He's the general, isn't he?"
"He turned out to be the wrong source. I told
Rene as much, and he couldn't agree with me
more." Joel lightened his tone of voice. "Also it
would have appeared strange if I'd said I was in
Paris for somebody else, wouldn't it? I don't think
it would have done the firm any good. Rumors and
speculahon run rampant down our corridors; you
told me that once."
"Yes, and it's true. You did the right thing....
Damn it Joel, why the hell did you leave the hotel
the way you did? From the basement, or wherever
it was."
It was the moment for expressing with total
conviction a small inconsequential untruth that if
not carried off would lead to the larger, far more
dangerous lie. Connal Fitzpatrick could do it well,
reflected Converse. The Navy lawyer had not
learned to fear the small things; he did not know
they were spoors that could lead one back to a rat
cage in the Mekong River.
"Bubba, my friend and sole support," said Joel,
as cavalierly as he could muster. "I owe you many
things, but not the intimacies of my private life."
"The what of your what?"
"I am approaching middle age at least it's not far
THE AQUITAINE PROGRESSION 205
off and I have no matrimonial encumbrances or
guilt about fidelity."
"You were avoiding a woman?"
"Fortunately for the firm, not a man."
"Jee-sus! I m so well into middle age I don't
thi
nk about those things. Sorry, young fella."
"Young and not so young, Larry."
"We were all off base then. You'd better call
Rene right away and get this thing cleared up. I can't
tell you how relieved I am."
"You can tell me about Anstett. That's why I called
you."
"Of course." Talbot lowered his voice. "A terrible
thing, a tragedy. What did the papers over there
say?"
Converse was caught; he had not anticipated the
quesbon. "Very little," he replied, trying to remember
what Fitzpatrick had told him. "Just that he was shot
and apparently nothing was taken from his
apartment."
"That's right. Naturally, the first thing Nathan
and I thought of was you, and whatever the hell
you're involved with, but that wasn't the case. It was
a Mafia vendetta, pure and simple. You know how
rough Anstett was on appeals from those people;
he'd throw them out as fast as he'd call their at-
torneys a disgrace to the profession."
"It was a confirmed Mafia killing?"
"It will be, and that's straight from O'Neil down
at the commissioner's office. They know their man,
he's an execuboner for the Delvecchio family and
last month Anstett threw the key away on
Delvecchio's oldest son. He's in for twelve years with
no appeals left; the Supreme Court won't touch
him."
"They know the man?"
"It's only a matter of picking him up."
"How come it's so clear-cut?" asked Joe, confused.
"The usual way," said Talbot. "An informer who
needs a favor. And since everything's happened so
fast and so quietly, it's assumed that the ballistics will
prove out."
"So fast? So quietly?"
"The infommer reached the police first thing this
moming. A special unit was dispatched and only they
know the man's identity. They figure the gun will
skill be in his possession. He'll be picked up anytime
now; he lives in Syosset."
Something was wrong, thought Converse. There
was an inconsistency, but he could not spot the flaw.
Then it came
206 ROBERT LUDLUM
to him. "Larry, if everything's so quiet, how do you
know about it?"
"I was afraid you'd ask that," said Talbot
uneasily. "I might as well tell you; it'll probably be in
the newspaper follow-ups anyway. O'Neil's keeping
me posted; call it courtesy, and also because I'm
nervous."
"Why?"
"Except for the man who killed him, I was the
last person to see Anstett alive."
"Your"
"Yes. After Rene's second call I decided to
phone the judge, after conferring with Nathan, of
course. When I finally reached Anstett, I said I had
to see him. He wasn't happy about it but I was
adamant. I explained that it concerned you. All I
knew was that you were in terrible trouble and
something had to be done. I went over to his
apartment on Central Park South and we talked. I
told him what had happened and how frightened I
was for you, frankly letting hi[n know that I held
him responsible. He didn't say much, but I think he
was frightened, too. He said he'd get in touch with
me in the morning. I left, and according to the
coroner's report, he was killed approximately three
hours later."
Joel's breath was short, his head splitting. His
concentration was absolute. "Let me get this straight,
Larry. You went over to Anstett's apartment after
Rene's call his second call. After he told the Surete
who I was."
"That's right."
"How long was it?"
"How long was what?"
"Before you left for Anstett's. After you spoke
with Mattilon."
"Well, let me see. Naturally, I wanted to talk to
Nathan first, but he was out to dinner, so I waited.
Incidentally, he concurred and offered to join me "
"How long, Larry?"
"An hour and a half, two hours at the outside."
Two hours plus three hours totaled five hours.
More than enough ti1ne for the killer puppets to be put
in place. Converse did not know how it had been
done, only that it had been done. Things had
suddenly erupted in Paris, and in New York an
agitated Lawrence Talbot had been followed to an
apartment on Central Park South, where someone,
somewhere, recognized a name and a man and the
part he had
THE AQUITAINE PROGRESSION 207
played against Aquitaine. Were it otherwise, Talbot
would be the corpse, not Lucas Anstett. All the rest
was a smoke screen behind which the disciples of
George Marcus Delavane manipulated the puppets.
"~and the courts owed so much to him, the
country owed so much." Talbot was speaking, butJoel
could no longer listen.
"I have to go, Larry," he said, hanging up.
The killing was obscene. That it was carried out
so quickly, so efficiently and with such precise
deception was as frightening as anything Converse
could imagine.
Joseph Joey the Nice) Albanese drove his
Pontiac down the quiet, tree-lined street in Syosset,
Long Island, waving to a couple in a front yard. The
husband was trimming a hedge under his wife's
guidance. They stopped what they were doing, smiled
and waved back. Very nice. His neighbors liked him,
thought Joey. They considered him a sweet guy and
very generous, what with letting the kids use his pool
and serving their parents only the best booze when
they dropped over and the biggest steaks money
could buy when he had weekend barbecues which
he did often, rotating the neighbors so no one should
feel left out.
He was a sweet guy, mused Joey. He was always
pleasant and never raised his voice in anger to
anyone, offering only a glad hand, a nice word and
a happy smile to everybody, no matter how lousy he
really felt. That was it, goddamn it! thought Joey.
Irra fuckin' gardless of how upset he was, he
never let it show! Joey the Nice was what they called
him and they were right. Sometimes he figured he
had to be some kind of saint may Jesus Christ
forgive him for having such thoughts. He had just
waved to neighbors, but in truth he felt like smashing
his fist through the windshield and shoving the glass
down their throats.
It wasn't them, it was last night that did it! A
crazy night, a crazy hit, everything crazy! And that
Rumba they brought in from the West Coast, the
one they called Major, he was the nuttiest fruitcake
of them all! And a sadist to boot, the way he beat
the shit out of that old man and the crazy questions
he asked, and shouting all the time. Tutti pazzi!
One minute he's playing cards in the Bronx, and
the next the phone is ringing. Get down to
Manhattan fast! A bad heat is needed attualm
ente!
So he goes and what does he find? It's
208 ROBERT LUDEUM
that iron-balled judge, the one who closed the steel
doors on Delvecchio's boy! What craziness! They'll
trace it back to the old man for sure. He'll know
such a~izione from the cops and the courts he'll be
lucky to own a small whorehouse in Paler mo if he
ever got back.
Then maybe just maybe thought Joey at the
time, there was a turning muscle in the organisation.
Old Delvecchio was losing his grip; just maybe it was
being called for, this ap?izione that surely would
follow. And possibly just possibly Joey himself
was being tested. Maybe he was too nice, too soave,
to put the bad heat on someone like the old judge
who gave them all such a hard time. Well, he wasn't.
No sirree, the nice stopped with the handle of a
gun. It was his job, his profession. The Lord Jesus
decided who should live and who should die, only
He spoke through mortal men on earth who told
people like Joey whom to hit. There was no moral
dilemma for Joey the Nice. It was important,
however, that the orders always come from a man
with respect; that was necessary.
They did last night; the order came from a man
with great respect. Although Joey did not know him
personally, he had heard for years about the