The Plot

by Irving Wallace

Fear stabbed through her chest. In her desperate anxiety not to mention Doyle, she had blundered. She had spoken only of evenings spent with women, and it was unnatural. She must conjure up a male name quickly, a name not involved in her work.

  Matt Brennan. She had just left Matt Brennan at Fouquet’s.

  “I don’t care to see any men, Niki, not when I have you to wait for every evening,” she said. “I’ve had a few casual dates, that’s true, because it’s uncomfortable for a woman to go out anywhere decent to dine alone. Let me see. Oh, yes. Someone at our Embassy introduced me to an American who’s here from Italy on business. We got to talking about Paris, and I mentioned I’d never been on a bateau-mouche, so this fellow insisted we have dinner on one of the boats. In fact, last night. God, it was dull. This fellow used to be a diplomat, and even though he’s in business now, he still likes to think he’s a hot-shot international expert. Full of crackpot theories. Like one he’s worked out since coming here and listening to gossip—he’s one of those guys who pick up more dirt than a vacuum cleaner—and he’s obsessed with the notion that your delegation and the Chinese are only pretending to be enemies, that you’re secretly friends, and that neither Russia nor China intends to honor the Summit treaty. Isn’t that a laugh? Now you know what a poor working girl goes through to have a date.”

  Rostov was amused, but interested. “That is the wildest nonsense I have heard yet, and believe me, I hear the wild ones.” He paused. “Your businessman friend, the one who stuck that in your ear—what is his name?”

  “Brennan, I think. Yes, Brennan.”

  Rostov appeared surprised. “Matthew Brennan?”

  That instant, when Rostov uttered the full name with such familiarity, Hazel had total recall. She had been going on compulsively, her mind devoted to camouflaging her relationship with Doyle, quite forgetful of Rostov’s past and her own, but now came total recall. Rostov after Zurich and before Siberia, mentioning the name in anger.

  She felt sickened by regret over her stupidity. If only she had thought of another name. But merely two had come to mind—Doyle, who was tabu, and Brennan, whom she had also just seen and whom she had considered inconsequential. It had been a mistake to speak of him, a minor mistake, and she was determined to turn it to her advantage by demolishing Brennan completely.

  ‘That’s right, Matthew Brennan,” she repeated innocently. “He got into some political trouble—” she stopped, touched his sleeve. “Niki, didn’t you meet him once?”

  Rostov made a face. “Unfortunately, to my bad luck, yes. It was not for much time, but in the Switzerland conference.

  I think I spoke to you of it, but that was long ago. Brennan was the American in charge of the other demented one, Professor Varney. Brennan was a bad baby-sitter, as you call them. That was when Varney ran away, and this naive Brennan got in trouble and got us all in hot water… So he is here and you have seen him?”

  “A thundering bore. But one never knows beforehand. A single girl has to take pot luck.”

  “My tragic milochka. It is my fault that I cannot give you more time… So Brennan, the philosopher, the capitalist provocateur, he says we are intriguing with the Chinese and will not honor the Summit? Where did he become inspired by such a fanciful idea?”

  “Rumor, Niki. People with time on their hands collect rumors.”

  “What did you say when he told you?”

  “I told him he was nuts. Just like that.”

  Rostov threw back his head and laughed uproariously. “Good girl, good girl, just like my little milochka… I am surprised such a one would show his face when his fellow Americans are here now.”

  “I think his behavior is routine for exiles. They brood about persecution until they become complete paranoids. Their only hobby is trying to envision how they can right the wrongs of humanity. I had the impression he’s come here to lobby for himself. Since everyone refuses to listen, he’s trying to play diplomat without portfolio, to show how patriotic and valuable he is. He’s a sad nut, but harmless. America is full of them. We once had a man, in San Francisco, I think, who declared himself the Emperor of the United States and Mexico. He was pathetic. So everyone humored him.”

  Rostov nodded with understanding. “Lunacy is universal. We have our share in Russia. Empress Anna Ivanovna married one of her ministers to the most ugly woman in the kingdom, and built a bedroom of ice for their honeymoon. Ivan the Terrible with his personal bodyguard of German war prisoners dressed in monks’ robes. Queen Catherine who always kept her hairdresser in a cell so he would not gossip about her wigs. Catherine who paid her physician fifty thousand dollars for one smallpox inoculation and had fifteen thousand dresses in her closets. This I call lunacy, too. But any nation can afford a little lunacy in its leaders. After all, it is possible sometimes they have method in their madness.

  They pretend lunacy to attract lunatics for their purposes. Your President, for example—” Rostov was thoughtful now. “It is not unknown in America, or other nations, to create traitors falsely, and banish them, so they will be accepted by the enemy and become useful undercover agents. Perhaps Brennan is an instrument of your CIA?”

  “Oh, Niki, my God, are you serious? Brennan? He’s weak-kneed, a lightweight. Above all, he’s a fool.”

  Even as she uttered the last word, she recalled her interview with Superintendent Quarolli, of the French Sécurité Présidentielle, and the quotation his grandfather had given him from the Holy Bible. She remembered exactly: “Every fool will be meddling.”

  Momentarily, she sobered, but then she recollected something else, an exchange between Doyle and Brennan at Fouquet’s before they had broken up.

  “Yes, I had thought him foolish and childish from the first,” Rostov was saying. “You are right about Brennan. Kakoy durak—a fool.”

  “I’m positive of it,” Hazel said. “No government agency would employ anyone who goes around blabbing such crazy things in public. He’s on his own, trying to give himself importance. Something else just came to mind that proves it Niki, not only is he, alone, trying to prove that he knows more about Russia and China than delegates who really know, but he’s running around Paris looking for spies.”

  “Spies?” said Rostov incredulously.

  “Sure. Brennan said something about having investigated a bookstore in the Rue de Seine which he thought was a Communist drop, a place for Communist spies to drop off or pick up their precious secrets. He didn’t go into it, and I didn’t have the patience to listen to him, even if he’d wanted to. But that should convince you, Niki, that he’s no more than a kid playing cops and robbers. He has no man’s work to do, so he does this. Anyway, so much for my marvelous dates.”

  Rostov placed an arm around her, and they began to move away from the monkey pit.

  “My poor heart,” he said. “You will forgive me?”

  “I always forgive you,” she said. “I know your life, and I know mine. I settled for that long ago, didn’t I? I’m not complaining.” She considered his rugged features, and she smiled. “No more dates with any more men. Just you. I’ll wait for you tomorrow night. Don’t disappoint me, dearest.”

  “I will not disappoint you.” He was studying his watch. “And now I had better not disappoint the Premier. It is almost two o’clock. I must not be late. I must go to help save the world.”

  “Well, leave some of yourself to help save Hazel,” she said. Hazel Doyle, she had almost said.

  They parted at the miniature Eiffel Tower.

  “Tomorrow night, milochka’ he said.

  “Yes,” she said.

  She watched him stride hurriedly past the train entrance toward the outer gate of the Jardin d’Acclimatation.

  After a while, she walked slowly to the little train. She knew that she would never ride it into the past again. After tomorrow, there would be only the future. She wondered why she was not happier.

  WHEN MATT BRENNAN rushed out of the Hotel California, it was already sixteen minutes to five o’c
lock. Since he had only sixteen minutes before the five o’clock appointment in the Bois de Boulogne, he did not want to risk being late by waiting to catch a taxicab cruising through the Rue de Berri. It was a one-way street, and the taxi would be forced to carry him the long route around. It would be faster to hasten directly to the Champs-Élysées and commandeer a vehicle there.

  All but running, he reached the Champs-Élysées. Two taxis were parked behind the light post in the center, both pointed toward the Arc de Triomphe and the Bois de Boulogne beyond. Without waiting for the signal to change, Brennan dodged through the traffic. He arrived at the first taxi just as a Chinese couple were entering it. Dismay turning-into agitation, he looked toward the second taxi. No one was near it, and the LIBRA flag was still up.

  Hastily, he commandeered the remaining vehicle. “Bois de Boulogne,” he ordered. He opened the rear door of the ancient Renault and stepped inside. As the sleepy, mustached driver sat up, Brennan enunciated carefully but with urgency. “Route de la Muette and Chemin de Ceinture du Lac on the eastern side. Near the boule courts on the lake. Almost across from the Chalet des lies. That’s the restaurant on one of the islands in the lake. Do you understand?”

  “0ui,” grunted the driver, turning the ignition key.

  The moment that the taxi edged into the traffic of the Champs-Élysées and shook forward into second gear, Matt Brennan sat back in his seat, still winded but exulting in the imminent fulfillment of his desperate search.

  This was his most exciting time in Paris, the most alive time he had known in four dead years.

  The ride to his destination would take ten to fifteen minutes at the most. At the end of it waited Nikolai Rostov.

  As the taxi rattled forward, speeding, slowing, speeding again, Brennan extracted the English briar pipe from the pocket of his sport jacket, then found his tinted sunglasses, opened them, and slipped them on. Behind the glasses, eyes closed, he tried to recapture the electrifying experience of the telephone call.

  He had been resting, fully clothed, on the brass bed in his hotel suite. He had been exhausted by the meeting with Earnshaw, the session with Hazel Smith in Fouquet’s, the long walk afterward. Since Lisa was still out, he had wanted a short nap in order to be in peak condition for the dinner to which Herb Neely had invited Lisa and,him this evening.

  He had been lying there, stretched out on the bed, thinking of his success with Earnshaw, speculating on the chances of Earnshaw’s success with the President or whomever else he might see. He had tried to imagine what it would be like to come face to face with Nikolai Rostov at last. He had felt wonderfully, tiredly optimistic, and had twice begun to doze off, and had begun to doze off once more when the piercing sound of the telephone had almost split his eardrums.

  Sitting up, eyes heavy, fumbling for the receiver, he had made out the hour and minute hands of his traveling clock. It had been twenty-five minutes after four.

  The caller would be Lisa, he had thought, or maybe Neely, or possibly, possibly Earnshaw with some news.

  The voice on the other end had been female but it was not Lisa’s voice or the voice of anyone he knew. The voice had been softly modulated, slightly British in accent, and its owner was extremely terse.

  “Mr. Matthew Brennan, if you please.”

  “This is Mr. Brennan.”

  “Mr. Brennan. I suggest you listen carefully. Do not interrupt. Do not make inquiries. Merely note what I am about to say. I am calling on the instruction of Minister Nikolai Rostov. Do you have a pencil and paper? You may reply. Do you have a pencil and paper?”

  “Yes—yes—”

  “Minister Rostov is aware that you have been attempting to make contact with him for several days. He did not feel it beneficial to either of you to respond to your messages. However, no more than an hour ago, an important American interceded on your behalf. Minister Rostov was convinced that it would not be improper to meet with you briefly. I have been advised to inform you that Minister Rostov has agreed to see you, on the terms and conditions he finds it necessary to impose.”

  “Of course. Anything—”

  “Minister Rostov cannot see you publicly or officially. He will be pleased to meet you for a discussion in privacy. Mr. Brennan, make note of these directions. You will wear a sport jacket and slacks. You will wear dark sunglasses. You will smoke your pipe. You will take a public conveyance to the Bois de Boulogne. There is an artificial lake, Lac Inférieur, with two small islands in its center. You will take the thoroughfare along that lake, the eastern side of the Chemin de Ceinture du Lac, to the intersection of the Route de la Muette. There you will leave your vehicle, cross over to the wooded park along the lake, and make your way to the boule courts opposite the restaurant Chalet des Des, which is located upon the island in the lake. You will arrive there no later than five o’clock. You will stand among the trees beside the boule courts, and watch any game then in progress. A gentleman holding two boule balls, one in each hand, will approach you, and he will say, ‘Would you like to join us in the game?’ You will nod, follow him to a parked motorcar, enter the rear of it. There Minister Rostov will be waiting to speak to you. Is that understood, Mr. Brennan?”

  “Yes, but—”

  “Five o’clock, Mr. Brennan. Good day.”

  There had been a metallic click. There had been a humming silence. There had been the ceaseless thumping of his heart.

  He had hung up, still in the aftermath of shock, and at last he had stared down at his scribbled notes. The Bois. Five o’clock. Minister Rostov. It was real.

  Before coming off the bed, he had considered the possibility that this was a practical joke. All of the obvious trademarks derivative of thriller and espionage fiction had just occurred—the anonymous call from a female, the complex instructions for reaching a rendezvous point, the orders that he dress and deport himself after a given fashion, the immediacy and secrecy of the meeting. Sifting this through his pragmatical mind, Brennan had been uncertain.

  But then, swinging off the bed, Brennan had arrived at another view of the call. He had recollected his years of treating with Russians throughout the world, before Zurich, at Zurich, and had remembered specific encounters with Communist diplomats and the Russian KGB, and had recalled how often he had thought that the inventions of storytellers were pallid compared to the potential of suspenseful intrigue he had detected in the real thing. The behavior of Soviet Russian Government representatives, at least as he had experienced it, had always been melodramatic, devious, stealthy, the complexity of it forever exceeding the alarms of fiction. In dealing with the Soviets, it was not that Life imitated Art, but that Life was an exaggeration of Art. Because of this knowledge, Brennan had been able to accept the telephone call from one of Rostov’s secretaries as perfectly normal.

  Changing into sport jacket and slacks, he had decided the possibility of its being a practical joke was remote. Only a handful of persons, this week, had known the purpose of his visit to Paris. He had tried to enumerate, to himself, the exact number of persons aware of his quest for Rostov: Lisa Collins, the Neelys, Doyle, a nameless concierge and members of the staff of the Hotel Quai d’Orsay, Earnshaw, Wiggins, Isenberg, perhaps a few others, perhaps even a Chinese journalist named Ma Ming (although this would have been about Varney). Brennan had been unable to imagine any one of these as concerned enough, or sadistic enough, to stage so elaborate a practical joke. The possibility of a joke made no sense, and so he had put it from his mind.

  It was real, that phone call, the promise of a clandestine confrontation with Rostov. He had felt it in his bones, and that had more reason than logic.

  Having completed his dressing, he had remembered the disembodied feminine voice explaining to him that an “important American interceded” on his behalf, persuading Rostov to see him finally. He had tried to imagine who this American might have been. Neely or Wiggins? Unlikely, unless they had spoken of his problem to the Secretary of State, who had then been moved to act. Isenberg might h
ave mentioned Brennan to some American delegate who, in turn, had gone to Rostov. Or perhaps there had been no important American at all, and Rostov had invented one merely to explain his sudden change of heart after so much elusiveness. Or maybe Doyle had somehow—but then, thinking of Doyle, Brennan remembered former President Earnshaw and his promise of this morning. Suddenly, it had been clear to him. Earnshaw had acted on his behalf.

  Although time was running short, Brennan had been sufficiently consumed by curiosity to telephone Earnshaw. Instead of Earnshaw, it had been Carol who answered the phone. No, she had said, her uncle was not in. If it was urgent—well, she was not sure where he could be reached, but he had gone off at noon for a luncheon at the United States Ambassador’s residence. “Nothing at all that urgent,” Brennan had said. “When your uncle returns, just give him this message from me. Tell him, ‘Brennan says thanks.’ He’ll understand.” Hanging up, he had felt reassured. If Earnshaw had been with the Ambassador since noon, he had undoubtedly made a successful plea for Brennan during that time.

  About to leave his rooms, Brennan had realized that he was without his sunglasses and pipe. He had found the glasses on the bedroom table, and then he had gone through his larger suitcase to find the worn briar pipe. Thus equipped, he had hastily sought a taxi that would take him to the fateful reunion with Rostov.

  Now the taxi jarred to a halt, pitching Brennan forward. Regaining his balance, he looked out the windows of the Renault and was dismayed. His vehicle was in the center of a sea of automobiles, and high to his left loomed one section of the arch of the Arc de Triomphe. Ahead, blocking the way from the Avenue des Champs-Élysées to the Avenue de la Grande Armée, were three cars grotesquely accordioned. Tow trucks and police were arriving, but the collision had brought all traffic to a complete standstill.

  Frantically, Brennan checked the time. It was eight minutes before five o’clock. And in the Bois de Boulogne, at five o’clock sharp, Nikolai Rostov would be waiting.