Stone had thought, but had instantly changed his
mind. Who could be less suspect?
The fourth surprise came at the Manchester
airport. An ebullient, middle-aged redheaded man
had greeted him as though they were long-lost
fraternity brothers from some Midwestern university
in the late thirties, when such fraternal ties were
deemed far deeper than blood. He was effusive to
the point where Stone was not only embarrassed by
the display of camaraderie but seriously concerned
that unwarranted attention would be drawn to them.
But once in the parking lot, the redhead had
suddenly slammed him into the doorframe of the
car and shoved the barrel of a gun into the back of
his neck while the man's free hand stabbed his
clothes for a weapon.
THE AQUITAINE PROGRESSION 641
"I wouldn't take the risk of going through metal
detectors with a gun, damn it!" protested the ex-CIA
agent.
"Just making sure, spook. I've dealt with you
assholes, you think you're something else. Me, I was
Federal."
"Which explains a great deal, ' said Stone, meaning
it.
"You drive.
"Is that a question or an order?"
"An order. All spooks drive," replied the redhead.
Surprise number five came in the car as Stone
took the sudden turns commanded by the redheaded
man, who casually replaced the gun in his jacket
holster.
"Sorry about the horseshit," he had said in a voice
far less hostile than it had been in the parking lot,
but nowhere near the false ebullience in the
terminal. "I had to be careful, piss you off, see where
you stood, you know what I mean? And I was never
Federal I hated those turkeys. They always wanted
you to know they were better than you were just be-
cause they came from D.C. I was a cop in Cleveland,
name's Gary Frazier. How are you?"
"Somewhat more comfortable," Stone had said.
"Where are we going?"
"Sorry, pal. If he wants you to know, he'll tell you."
Surprise number six awaited Stone when he
drove the car up through the New Hampshire hills to
an isolated house of wood and glass, surrounded by
forests, the structure an inverted V, two narrowing
stories looking out in all directions on woods and
water. Nathan Simon had walked down the stone
steps from the front door.
"You've brought it?" he asked.
"Here it is," said Stone, handing the attache case
to the lawyer through the open window. "Where are
we? Who are you seeing?"
"It's an unlisted residence, but if everything is in
order we'll call you. There are guest quarters
attached to the boathouse down at the lake. Why not
freshen up after your trip? The driver will point the
way. If we need you for anything we'll ring you on
the phone. It's a separate number from the house, so
just pick it up."
And now Peter Stone was walking down the wide
dirt path that led to the boathouse by the lake,
aware that eyes were following him. Surprise number
six: be had no idea where he was and Simon wasn't
going to tell him unless "everything was in order,"
whatever that meant.
642 ROBERT LUDLUM
The guest quarters alluded to by the attorney
was a three-room cottage on the edge of the lake
with an entrance to the adjacent boathouse, in
which was berthed a small sleek motorboat and a
nondescript catamaran that looked more like a raft
with two canvas seats and fishing equipment for
drift trawling. Stone wandered about trying to find
some clue as to the owner's identity but there was
nothing. Even the names on the boats were
meaningless, but not lacking in humor.The
cumbersome, raftlike sail was named Hawk while
the aggressive-looking little speedboat was Dove.
The former deep-cover intelligence officer sat
on the porch and looked out at the peaceful waters
of the lake and the rolling, darkening green hills of
New Hampshire. Everything was peaceful. Even the
cries of the loons seemed to proclaim the
permanence of tranquility in this special place. But
Stone's insides were not peaceful; his stomach
churned and he remembered what Johnny Reb used
to say in the field. "Trust the stomach, Brer Rabbit,
trust the bile. They never lie." He wondered what
the Rebel was doing, what he was learning.
The phone inside the cottage rang, accompanied
by a strident, unnerving clanging of the porch bell.
As if jolted by an electric prod, Stone sprang from
the chair, swung back the door and walked rapidly
across the room to the telephone.
"Come up to the house, please," said Nathan
Simon, adding, "If you were out on the porch, I
apologise for not telling you about that damned
bell."
"I accept your apology. I was."
"It's for guests who expect calls and may be out
in one of the boats."
"The loons are quiet. I'll be right there."
Stone walked up the dirt path and saw the
lawyer standing by a screen door that was the
lake-side entrance to the house; it was on a patio
reached by curving brick steps. He started climbing,
prepared for surprise number seven.
Supreme Court Justice Andrew Wellfleet, his
thinning unkempt white hair falling in strands over
his wide forehead, sat behind the large desk in his
library. Converse's thick affidavit was in front of
hirn, and a floor lamp on his left threw light on the
pages. It was several moments before he looked up
and removed his steel-rimmed glasses. His eyes
were stern and disapproving, matching the
nickname given him over two decades ago when he
was summoned to the Court. "Iras
THE AQUITAINE PROGRESSION 643
cibleAndy" was the sobriquet the clerks had given
him, but no one ever questioned his awesome
intelligence, his fairness or his devotion to the law.
All things considered, surprise number seven was as
welcome a shock as Stone could imagine.
"Have you read this?' asked Wellfleet, offering
neither his hand nor a chair.
"Yes, sir," replied Stone. "On the plane. It's
essentially what he told me over the phone, in far
greater detail, of course. The affidavit from the
Frenchman, Prudhomme, was a bonus. It tells us how
they operate how they re capable
of operating."
"And what in hell did you think you were going to
do with all of this?" The elderly justice waved his
hand over the desk, on which were scattered the
other, affidavits. "Petition the courts here and in
Europe to please, if they'd be so kind, to issue
injunctions restricting the activities of all military per-
sonnel above a certain rank on the conceivable
possibility that they may be part of this?"
mind. But I did think that once we had Converse's
own words along with what we knew they'd be
sufficient to reach the right people in the highest
places who could do something. Obviously, Converse
thought the same thing insofar as he called in Mr.
Simon, and if you'll forgive me, Mr. Justice, you're
reading it all now."
"It isn't enough," said the Supreme Court justice.
"And damn the courts, I shouldn't have to tell you
that, Mr. Former CIA Man. You need names, a lot
more names, not just five generals, three of whom are
retired and one of them, the so-called instigator, a
man who had an operation several months ago that
left him without legs."
"Delavane?" asked Simon, stepping away from the
window.
"That's right," said Wellfleet. "Kind of pathetic,
huh? Not exactly the picture of a very imposing
threat, is he?"
"It could drive him into being an extraordinary
threat."
"I'm not denying that, Nate. I'm just looking at the
collection you've got here. Abrahms? As anyone
worth his kosher salt in Israel will tell you, he's a
strutting, bombastic hothead a brilliant soldier but
with ten screws loose. Besides his only real concerns
are for Israel. Van Headmer? He's a relic of the
nineteenth century, pretty fast with a hangman's
644 ROBERT LUDLUM
rope but his voice doesn't mean doodlly-shit outside
of South Africa."
"Mr. Justice," said Stone, speaking more firmly
than he had before, 'are you implying that we're
wrong? Because if you are, there are other
names and I don't just mean a couple of attaches
at the embassy in Bonn names of men who have
been killed because they tried to find answers."
"You weren't listening!" snapped Wellfleet. "I
just told Nate I wasn't denying anything. How in
hell could I? Forty-five million in untraceable, illegal
exports! An apparatus that can shape the news
media here and in Europe, that can corrupt
government agencies, and as Nate here puts it
'create a psychopathic assassin' so they can find you,
or make you back down.. Oh, no, mister, I'm not
saying you're wrong. I'm saying you better damn
well do what I'm told you're pretty good at, and
you'd better do it quickly. Haul in this Washburn
and any others you can find in Bonn; pick a cross
section of those people at State and the Pentagon
and fill 'em full of dope or whatever the hell you
use and get names! And if you ever mention that I
suggested such wanton measures that violate our
most sacred human rights, I'll say you're full of shit.
Talk to Nate here. You don't have time for niceties
mister."
"We don't have the resources, either," said
Stone. "As I explained to Mr. Simon, there are a
few friends I can call upon for information but
nothing like what you suggest like what you didn't
suggest. I simply don't have the leverage, the men
or the equipment. I'm not even employed by the
government any longer."
"I can help you there." Wellfleet made a note.
"You'll get whatever you need."
"There's the other problem," continued Stone.
"No matter how careful we are, we'd send out
alarms. These people are believers, notjust mindless
extremists. They're orchestrated; they have lines of
fullbacks and know exactly what they're doing. It's
a progression, a logical capitalising on sequences
until we're all forced to accept them or accept the
unacceptable, the continuation of violence, of
wholesale rioting, of the killing."
"Very nice, mister. And what are you going to do?
Noth
"Of course not. Rightly or wrongly, I believed
Converse when he told me that with our
affidavits with all the evi
THE AQUITAINE PROGRESSION 645
dencewe provided him Mr. Simon could reach
people we couldn't reach. Why shouldn't I have
believed him? It was an extension of my own
thinking without a Nathan Simon but with Converse
himself. Only, my way would take longer. The
precautions would be far more elaborate, but it could
be done. We'd reach the right people and start the
counterattack."
'Who'd you have in mind?" asked Wellfleet sharply.
' The President first, obviously. Then, because
we're dealing with half a dozen other countries, the
Secretary of State. A maximum-security screening
process would be set up immediately one
undoubtedly using those chemicals you didn't speak
of until we had unblemished personnel, men and
women we were certain beyond doubt had no
connections to this Aquitaine. We create cells,
command posts here and abroad. Incidentally, there's
a man who can help us immeasurably in this, a man
named Belamy in Britain's M.1.6. I've worked with
him and he's the best knows the best and he's
done this sort of thing before. Once our cells are in
place and in deep cover, we then pull in Washburn
and at least two others we know of by description in
Bonn. Prudhomme can furnish us with the names of
those in the Surete who approve transfers, and who
furnished evidence against Converse when it didn't
exist. And as you know from my own affidavit, we've
got the island of Scharhdrn under surveillance
now we think it's a nerve confer or a
communications relay. With the proper equipment
we could tap in. The whole point is we widen the
circles of information. Once you know a strategy, you
can mount a counterstrategy without setting off
alarms." Stone paused and looked at both men. "Mr.
Justice, Mr. Simon. I was station chief in five vital
posts in Great Britain and the Continent. I know it
can be done."
"I don't doubt you," said Nathan Simon. "How
long would it take?"
"If Justice Wellfleet can get me the cooperation
and the equipment I need, with the people I
select here and abroad Derek Belamy and I can
mount a crash program. We'd be operational in eight
to ten days."
Simon looked at the Supreme Court justice then
back at Stone. "We don't have eight or ten days," he
said. "We have three less than three days now."
Peter Stone stared at the tall, portly attorney with
the
646 ROBERT LUDLUM
sad, penetrating eyes. He could feel the blood
draining from his face.
The cry of the cat was muted in fury. General
Ceorge Marcus Delavane slowly replaced the
telephone on the console. His half-body was
propped into the wheelchair, his waist strapped to
the steel poles, his arms as heavy as his breath was
short, the veins in his neck distended. He brought
his hands together, entwining his fingers and
pressing the knuckles ag
ainst each other until the
surrounding flesh was white. He raised his large
head, his cold, angry eyes narrowing as he looked
up at the uniformed aide standing in front of the
desk.
"They've disappeared," he said, his high-pitched
voice icily controlled. "Leifhelm was taken from a
restaurant in Bonn. They say there was an
ambulance that raced away, no one knows where.
Abrahms'guards were drugged. Others took their
places. He was driven offin his own staffcar, picked
up in front of a synagogue. Bertholdier did not
come down from his apartment on the Montaigne,
so the driver went up to discreetly remind him of
the time. The woman was bound naked on the bed,
the word 'whore' written in lipstick across her
breasts. She said two men took him away at
gunpoint. There was talk of a plane, she said."
"What about Van Headmer?" asked the aide.
"Nothing. Our charming and oblivious Afrikaner
dines at the Johannesburg Military Club and says he
will put himself under extra guard. He's not part of
the orbit; he's too far away to matter."
"What do you mean, General? What happened?"
"What happened? This Converse happened! We
created our own most accomplished enemy,
Colonel and I can't say we weren't warned. Chaim
said it, our man in the Mossad made it clear. The
North Vietnamese created a hellhound the
Mossad's words and we created a monster. He
should have been killed in Paris, certainly in Bonn."
"You couldn t have ordered it then," said the
aide, shaking his head. "You had to know where he
came from, and if you couldn't find out, you had to
isolate him, make him what was it.P_a pariah, so
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