Robert Ludlum - Aquatain Progression.txt
Page 75
minute later he saw Val's cab take the correct right
turn over a canal. There were two cars behind her;
he concentrated on their shapes and sizes; instead of
following, he continued straight ahead, pressing
down on the accelerator, using an alternate route on
the bare chance that he himself had been picked up
by a hunter from Aqui
482 ROBERT LUDLUM
taine.Three minutes later, after two right turns and
a left, he entered the Museumplein. The taxi was
directly ahead, the two other automobiles no longer
in sight. His strategy was working. The possibility
that Val's phone was being tapped was real Rene's
had been, and his death was the result so in Val's
case he assumed the worst. If it was relayed that the
Charpentier woman was heading over to the
American consulate to pick up a business
acquaintance, one Joel Converse would be ruled
out. The consulate was no place for the fugitive
assassin; he would not go near it. He was a killer of
Americans.
The taxi pulled into the curb in front of 19
Museumplein, the stone building that was the
consulate. Converse remained a half-block behind,
waiting again, watching again. Several cars went by,
none stopping or even slowing down. A lone cyclist
pedaled down the street, an old man who braked
and turned around and disappeared in the opposite
direction. The tactic had worked. 'al was alone in
the cab thirty yards away and no one had followed
her from the Amstel. He could make his final move
to her, his hand under his coat, gripping the gun
with the perforated silencer attached to the barrel.
He got out of the car and walked up the
pavement, his gait slow, casual, a man taking a
summer night's stroll in the square. There were
perhaps a dozen people couples mainly also
walking, strolling in both directions. He studied
them as a frenzied but rigid cat studies the new
mounds of mole holes in a field; no one in the
street had the slightest interest in the stationary taxi.
He approached the rear door and knocked once on
the window. She rolled it down.
They stared at each other for a brief moment,
then Val brought her hand to her lips, stifling a
gasp. "Oh, my Cod," she whispered.
"Pay him and walk back to a grey car about two
hundred feet behind us. The last three numbers on
the license are one three, six. I'll be there in a few
minutes." He tipped his hat, as if he had just
answered a question from a bewildered tourist, and
proceeded down the pavement. Forty feet past the
taxi, at the end of the block, he turned and crossed
the square reaching the other side with his head
angled to the left, a pedestrian watching for traffic;
in reality he was apprehensively watching a lone
woman make her way down the sidewalk toward an
automobile. He went swiftly into the shadows of a
doorway and stood there watching, breathing
erratically,
THE AQUITAINE PROGRESSION 483
peering into every pocket of darkness along the
opposite pavement. Nothing. No one. He walked out
of the doorway, suppressing a maddening desire to
run, and ambled casually down the block until he was
directly across from the rented car. Again he paused,
now lighting a cigarette, the flame cupped in his
hand, again waiting, watching.... No one. He threw
the cigarette to the curb and, unable to contain
himself any longer, ran across the street, opened the
door and climbed in behind the wheel.
She was inches from him, her long, dark hair
framing her face in the dim light, that lovely face
taut, filled now with anxiety, her wide eyes burning
into his.
"Why, Val? Why did you do it?" he asked, a cry in
the question.
"I didn't have a choice," she answered quietly,
enigmahcally. "Drive away from here, please."
28
They drove for several minutes. Neither of them
spoke. Joel was concentrating on the streets, knowing
the turns he wanted to make knowing, too, he
wanted to shout. It was all he could do to control
himself, to keep from stopping the car and grabbing
her, demanding to know why she had done what she
did, furiously replying to whatever she said that she
was a goddamnedfool! Why had she come back into
his life? He was death! . . . Above all, he wanted to
hold her in his arms his face against hers, and thank
her and tell her how sorry he was for so much, for
now.
"Do you know where you're going?" asked Val,
breaking the silence.
"I've had the car since six o'clock. A map of the
city came with it and I've spent the hme driving
around, learning what I thought I had to learn."
"Yes, you'd do that. You were always methodical. '
'I thought I should, " he said defensively. "I
followed you from the hotel just in case anybody else
did. Also I'm better off in a car than on the streets."
484 ROBERT LUDLUM
"I wasn't insulting you."
Converse glanced at her; she was studying him,
her eyes roving over his face in the erratic
progressions of light and shadow. "Sorry. I guess I'm
a little sensitive these days. Can't imagine why."
"Neither can 1. You're only wanted on two
continents and in some eight countries. They say
you're the most talented assassin since that maniac
they call Carlos."
"Do I have to tell you it's all a lie? All a huge lie
with a very clear motive purpose is better."
"No," replied Vulerie simply. "You don't have to
tell me that because I know it. But you've got to tell
me everything else. Everything"
He looked at her again, searching her eyes in the
flashes of light, trying to penetrate, trying to peel
away the layers of clouded glass that hi id her
thoughts, her reasons. Once he had been able to do
that, in love and in anger. He could not do it now;
what she felt was too deep inside her, but it was not
love, he knew that. It was something else, and the
lawyer in him was cautious, oblique. "What made
you think l d see you on television? I almost missed
you."
"I didn't think about television, I was counting
on the newspapers. I knew my face would be on the
front pages all over Europe. I assumed your memory
was not so dulled that you wouldn't recognise me,
and reporters always pick up on hotels or
addresses it lends authenticity."
"I can't read anything but English."
"Your memory is dulled. I made three trips with
you to Europe, two to Geneva and one to Paris.
You wouldn't have coffee in the morning unless the
Herald Tribune was on the room-service table. Even
when we went skiing in Chamonix from
Geneva you made an awful fuss until the waiter
brought the Tribune."
"You were in the Tribune?"
"Class acts aside, it's their kind of story. With all
the details. I assumed you'd pick one up and realize
what I was doing."
"Because we were strangers and hadn't seen each
other in years, and, of course, you couldn't speak
German or French or anything else."
"Yes. It was an acceptable explanation for those
who knew I did. A cover, I guess. A lot of people
who speak several languages do it all the time. It's
common practice; it cuts con
THE AQUITAINE PROGRESSION 485
versations short or at least keeps them to basic
statements, and you always know if you're
misquoted."
"I forgot, that's your business in a way."
'It's not where the idea came from. It came from
Roger."
"Dad?"
"Yes. He flew in from Hong Kong a few days ago
and some hungry clerk alerted the newspapers that
he was on the flight. When he got into Kennedy it
was a media blitz. He hadn't read a newspaper or
listened to a radio or seen a television screen in two
days. He was in a panic and called me. I simply
made sure the wire services in West Berlin knew I
was flying in."
"How is Dad? He can't handle this."
"He's handling it. So's your sister less so than
your father, but her husband stepped into the breach
and took over. He's a better man than you thought,
Converse."
"What's happening to them? How are they taking it?"
"Confused, angry, bewildered. They've changed
their telephone numbers. They speak through
attorneys supporting you, incidentally. You may not
realize it but they love you very much, although I'm
not sure you gave them much reason to."
"I think we're closer to home," said Joel quietly,
as they approached the Schellingwouder Brug. "Our
once and former home." They entered the dark span
of the bridge, diaphanous lights above, speckled dots
far below on the water. Valerie did not respond to
his statement; it was not like her to avoid a
provocation. He could not stand it. "Why, Val?" he
cried, "I asked you before, and I have to know! Why
did you fly over?"
"I'm sorry, I was thinking," she said, her eyes
leaving his face, staring straight ahead through the
windshield. "I guess it's better I say it now while
you're driving and I don't have to look at you. You
look awful, you're a mess, and your face tells me
what you've gone through, and I don't want to look
at you."
"I'm hurt," said Converse gently, trying genuinely
to lessen the impact of his appearance. "Helen
Gurley Brown called and wants me for
Cosmopolitan's centerfold."
"Stop that! It's not remotely funny and you know
it worse, you don't even feel like saying it!"
"I retreat. There were times when you never did
read me right."
486 ROBERT LUDLUM
"I always read you right, Joel!" Valerie continued
to focus on the road and the beams of the
headlights; she did not move her head. "Don't play
the serious fool any longer. We haven't time for
that; we haven't time for your flip remarks. It was
always a little sad to watch you put people off who
really wanted to talk to you, but it's finished now."
'Glad to hear it. Then talk! Why the hell did you
walk into this?"
Their eyes met in anger, in abrupt recognition,
in a love once remembered, perhaps. She turned
away as Converse steered the car into the right exit
off the bridge, then peeled into the road that ran
along the coastline.
"All right," said Valerie, hesitant but in complete
control. "I'll spell it out as best I can. I say 'as best
I can' because I'm not entirely sure there are too
many complications to be absolutely sure.... You
may be a rotten husband and careless beyond
stoning where another person's feelings are con-
cerned, but you're not what they say you are. You
didn't kill those men."
"I know that. You said you knew it, too. Why
did you come over here?"
"Because I had tO,-' said Val, her voice firm,
still staring straight ahead. "The other night after
the news your picture was on every channel, so
different from what it was years ago I walked
along the beach and thought about- you. They
weren't pleasant thoughts, but they were honest
ones.... You put me through my own personal hell,
Joel. You were driven by terrible things in your
past, and I tried to understand because I knew what
had happened to you. But you never tried to
understand me. 1, too, had things I wanted to do,
but they faded, they weren't important.... Okay, I
thought. Someday it'll pass and the nightmares will
go away for him and he'll stop and look at me and
say, 'Hey, you're you. 'Well, the nightmares went
away and it never happened."
' 1 concede my adversary's logic," said Converse
painfully. 41 still don't understand."
61 needed you, Joel, but you couldn't respond.
You were amusing as hell, even when I knew you
didn't feel like it, and you were terrific in bed, but
your only real concerns were for you, always you."
"Conceded again, learned counselor. Arld?''
' I remembered something I said to myself that
afternoon when you left the apartment, said it
silently as I watched you
THE AQUITAINE PROGRESSION 487
leave. I promised myself that if ever a person I was
close to needed me as much as I needed you then, I
wouldn't walk away. Call it the one moral
commitment I've ever made in my life. Only the
irony is that that person turned out to be you. You're
not a madman and you're not a killer, but someone
wants the world to think you are. And whoever it is
has done it very well. Even your friends who've
known you for years believe what's being said about
you. I don't and I can't walk away."
"Oh Christ, Val "
'No strings, Converse. No playing an old sweet
song and hopping into bed. That's out. I came here
to help you, not console you. And over here I can.
My roots go back several generabons. They may be
withering underground but they were the
underground undergrounds and they're willing to
help. For once you need me, and that's a twist, isn't
it, friend?"
' A veritable twist," saidJoel, understanding her
last statement but little else, speeding down the coast
road toward the deserted fields. "Only a few
minutes," he added. "I can't be seen in the city and
neither can you and you not a chance with me."
"I wouldn't worry so much. We're being watched
by friends."
"What? What 'friends'?"
"Keep your eyes on the road. There were people
in front of the Amstel, didn't you see them?"
/>
"I suppose so. No one got in a car and went after
you."
"Why should they? There were others on the
streets and over the canals to the consulate "
"What the hell are you talking about?"
"And an old man on a bicycle in the Museumplein."
"I saw him Was he . . . ?"
"Later," said Valerie, shifting the large cloth bag
at her feet into another position and stretching her
long legs. "They may follow us out here but they'll
stay out of sight."
"Who are you, lady?"
"The niece of Hermione Geyner, my mother's
sister. You never knew my father, of course, but if
you had he would have regaled you with tales of
Mom during the war, but he would have choked at
the mention of my aunt. Even according to the
French she went too far. The Dutch and German
undergrounds worked together. I'll tell you all about
it later."
"You'll tell me later? Following us?"
488 ROBERT LUDLUM
"You're new at this. You won't see them."
"Shit!"
"That's expressive."
"All right, all right! . . . What about Dad?"
"He's weathering it. He's staying at my place."
"Cape Ann?"
"Yes. "
"I sent the envelope there! The 'sketches' I
mentioned on the phone. It's i verything! Everything
about what's happened. It names the names, gives
the reasons. Everything!"
"I left three days ago. It hadn't arrived by then.