The Plot

by Irving Wallace

  “Not on your life,” said Hazel. “I asked it. I get to keep the answer.”

  “Well,” said Neely, turning around and gesturing toward four trucks backed into a semicircle around two ordinary glass-paned doors, “you see those trucks? They brought in the food and the cases of wine, brandy, and so forth. There’s another truck rolling in now. Guess they must be running out of drinks. Anyway, all that stuff is moved through a passage into a small enclosed but roofless courtyard called the Cour des Cerfs. A temporary roof has been thrown over it, and a kitchen installed for tonight’s affair. Six chefs and two pastry cooks borrowed from the Élysée palace have been preparing the dinner. Then there are two portable staircases leading straight up to the Hall of Mirrors. Actually, the traffic is one-way. Workmen use one staircase to go up, and the other to come down.”

  “Herb, those stairs don’t go right smack into the Hall of Mirrors, do they?” Brennan asked.

  “Lord, no. The men carrying the food upstairs pass through several rooms to the King’s Bedroom, where there’s a big buffet, and all the trays, dishes, glassware. From there the maître d’hôtel directs the waiters out into the Hall of Mirrors.”

  “What happens after dinner?” Hazel wanted to know.

  Neely turned back to her. “It’s in your program. Miss Smith. At nine-thirty the toasts are finished, the dinner ended. Everyone waits for the leaders to leave. They just retire to the room behind them, the King’s Council Chamber, for coffee, which the waiters are serving from the next door King’s Bedroom. Meanwhile, the rest of the guests go on through the King’s apartments, through the lobby of the Chapel, to the Opera, to wait for the Big Five.”

  Listening, Brennan knew that he had everything he wanted. From his position in back of Neely, he signaled Hazel frantically, pointing a finger to his wristwatch.

  Hazel did not seem to notice, as she scribbled her notes for a half minute more, but then she glanced at her wristwatch and looked up innocently. “Mr. Neely, forgive me for interrupting, but do you know what time it is? Dinner is going to be over in eight minutes, and your briefing—”

  Neely peered at his own heavy watch again. “By God, you’re right.” He whirled around. “Matt, I’ve got to run. What are you going to do now?”

  “I think I’ll just take off for Paris. I can use some sleep.”

  “Would you like to hear the briefing?”

  “I’m too tired, Herb, but thanks. I’ll go.”

  Neely was reluctant to part from him. “Matt, about the other matter, I’m awfully sorry. I’m sure you understand.”

  “Don’t give it another thought. Talk to you tomorrow.”

  Neely left hurriedly, striding fast toward the press tent.

  Hazel lingered a moment, eyeing Brennan. “Are you going back to Paris?”

  “I’m going for broke, Hazel.”

  “Good luck.”

  She was gone, and he stood alone in the middle of the vast cobblestone courtyard.

  From the other side of the equestrian statue he heard voices speaking in French.

  “Continue straight ahead to the Queen’s Staircase,” a pure French voice was saying. “Show the guards your invitation. One of them will take you straight up to the Hall of Mirrors, Monsieur Novik.”

  “Thank you,” said a Russian-accented voice.

  Brennan peered around the base of the statue. The two men were parting. The slender French official was returning to the entrance gate. The corpulent figure of Igor Novik, of Pravda, was moving hastily toward the inner court and the doorway that would take him up into the Palace of Versailles.

  With incredulity, Brennan watched the receding figure of Novik. A journalist going up to the sacrosanct state dinner, when Neely had insisted that no member of the press would be permitted inside the Hall of Mirrors tonight. Yet, there was Novik. And there was a possible explanation. A simple one, to wit: Novik was not a journalist after all.

  Brennan knew that he could tarry no longer. If true explanations were to be found, they might be found only within the palace walls.

  Quickly extracting the map of Versailles Palace once more, Brennan reviewed the markings, decided on the most logical one, and gazed past the statue at the delivery trucks backed up to the two service entrances.

  He returned the map to his pocket, continuing to stare at the trucks.

  The air was warm and humid, and perspiration covered his forehead. He found a handkerchief and mopped his face. It felt better, but it hadn’t helped the mounting hammering inside his chest. Through narrow eyes he observed more than a dozen laborers lifting cartons and boxes, hoisting them to their shoulders, and weaving into the nearest service entrance. Then he saw two of them wiping their brows with their sleeves, say something to one another, before quickly divesting themselves of their blue-gray laborers’ jackets and throwing them alongside the end truck.

  From where he stood, in the shadow of the King Louis XIV statue, Brennan scouted the immediate area. The closest police were gathered deep in the Marble Court, most of them beside the Queen’s Staircase entrance, either swapping stories or listening to the organ music drifting down from above. Brennan doubted that he was clearly visible to them, or that they were any longer attentive to him.

  It was a chance. He would have to take it.

  He undid his tie, pulled it off, and stuffed it into his suit-coat pocket. He opened his collar. He removed his wallet, purposely dropped it and knelt to retrieve it, digging his knees hard into the cobblestones to soil them, and pushing both hands across the stones and the crevices between them. He smeared his grimy hands across his face and white shirt, picked up his wallet, and shoved it into his back pocket. He rose slowly.

  In a single motion he had divested himself of his coat. He folded it twice, glanced into the Marble Court once more, and, reassured, dropped his bundle at the base of the statue. He rolled up one shirt-sleeve, then the other.

  The time. One final glimpse of the time. Six minutes.

  He could hear his heart beat, and hated its cowardly fear.

  Swiftly, purposefully, he started across the cobblestones toward the end truck. The driver’s cab was empty. He hastened alongside the large van, stopped at the discarded cotton workmen’s jackets on the ground—there was a pile of them by now—and he snatched one up. He held it against him. Too small. He tried another. Too small. But the third one looked right. It was dirty, patched, but looked as if it would fit. He pulled it on. A size too large, but it would do, it would have to do.

  He could hear the French workmen behind the truck, grunting, grumbling, coming, going.

  The next step was, for Brennan, the longest of all. He must take it, before he lost his nerve, and he must behave as if he belonged here. He took the step.

  Boldly, he came around the truck, skirting the laborers still unloading it, and hustled into line behind three sweaty sturdy workmen. One bent down, lifted his wooden box, heaved it on his shoulder, and staggered toward the service doorway. The next one followed. And the next one. And it was Brennan’s turn. He reached for the carton of cognac, took a good hold, praying for enough muscle and for every disc in his spine, and he lifted. It was heavy, but not as heavy as he had expected. He raised it higher and settled it on his right shoulder as others lined up behind him. He moved unsteadily to the doorway and went on through it.

  Weighed down by his burden, Brennan stumbled along a dim passageway, entered a large empty hall, followed those ahead of him until he had crossed it. Another doorway, and he emerged into the covered courtyard, the Cour des Cerfs, a kitchen crowded with chefs and their assistants bustling and gesticulating among their ovens and cooking counters, half hidden by steam vapors.

  Brennan’s eyes smarted. The workmen who had preceded him were now slogging toward a steep wooden staircase. Balancing his cumbrous box of cognac, he plunged after them.

  He began to ascend the staircase. His shoulder ached, his strained spine burned with pain, and his knees threatened to buckle. Higher and higher
he climbed, driven upward by one obsession, that of reaching the Council Chamber and getting his scribbled warning to Earnshaw before it was too late.

  The top of the staircase came into view, and at the same time, on either side of the landing above, a pair of tall, impassive, uniformed security police came into view, both scrutinizing each laborer and his cargo, as he passed between them.

  This was unexpected. Brennan tried to swallow, and failed. His mouth was parched and his lungs dry. He wondered if the DST alarm had gone out and if the police were on the lookout for him. He could only hope that they were posted routinely to examine every workman delivering refreshments to the second floor. He wondered if their shrewd eyes would instantly detect that he was not a workman at all.

  There was a delay, and he wavered on the fifth step from the top, feeling trapped. His brain sought an excuse, and sorted out one of an earlier fantasy. If he were detained, questioned, his American accent would give him away immediately. He would have to brazen it out. He would laugh, brandish his Embassy press pass, and reveal that he was only an impetuous, enterprising American journalist trying to get a jump on his colleagues by this effort to obtain an eyewitness, firsthand account of the fabulous state dinner from behind the scenes. If the security police had been conditioned by enough American films, they might laugh, too, and send him back downstairs. More likely, they would take a dim view of his alibi, and bully him off for interrogation, at which time his true identity would be revealed. A scandal would be unavoidable, and punishment inevitable. At least, he reminded himself wryly, the Bastille and the dank cells of Devil’s Island were no more. But somehow, as he resumed climbing, the rationalization did not make him happier.

  He attained the top of the stairs, distorting his features as if rebuking the burden on his shoulders, and he moved under full focus of the eyes of the French security police. They inspected him, their gaze lifted to his carton, their gaze dropped to those behind him climbing up from below.

  Perspiring profusely, but breathing easier, Brennan resumed his march. He turned into the temporary enclosed balcony behind the Cabinet du Conseil, tottered around a jog to the doorway where a fretful mustached Frenchman in dinner jacket impatiently directed him through the Cabinet du Conseil into the Chambre de Louis XIV.

  Although Neely had explained that the King’s Bedroom had been converted into a serving pantry for tonight, the sight Brennan beheld surprised him.

  The last time he had visited this central state bedchamber had been on a tour when Ted was a boy. Its lonely splendor had made a deep impression. There had been an engraved gold balustrade, and in the alcove behind the low railing had stood the royal bed, its crimson canopy embroidered with 130 pounds of gold thread, and above it a vast classic mural. There had been paintings everywhere, and across the room a bust of the Sun King on the mantel over the fireplace.

  But now the lonely room was a madhouse of humanity, with workmen streaming in to deposit their boxes, waiters and servants rushing in and out of the open paneled doors to the adjoining Cabinet du Conseil that provided the best entry to the Hall of Mirrors. All that remained of the past was the gold balustrade and the fireplace. The royal bed was gone. The mural was covered by a brocade drape bearing a design of golden columns. The bust of the Sun King had been removed. Throughout the bedroom were tables heaped with cheese trays, coffee makers, pastries, silverware, and china.

  Brennan stood uncertainly with a group of other workmen, the carton of bottles still balanced on his right shoulder, waiting for instructions and considering what to do after he was freed of his burden. At once, his attention, along with that of the others, was drawn to the squat, quick-tempered maître d’hotel, who had come storming into the bedroom, coattails flapping furiously.

  The maître d’hotel was elbowing his way to the center of the room. With one hand at his mouth, he bawled out in French, “The champagne—where is the champagne and the cognac? There is only another minute. Who has the champagne and the cognac?” Brennan saw four or five workmen raise their hands, and he lifted his own tentatively.

  The maître d’hotel was advancing, scowling at the laborers. “All of you with the cognac and champagne”—he jerked a thumb over his shoulder—“into the Cabinet du Conseil with you, and make haste. But no noise, you hear? Silently, silently. Set down your boxes behind the screen next to the Treaty desk.”

  He examined the crew hastily. He poked a finger at the sinewy short Frenchman beside Brennan, then at Brennan himself. “You two, you look half respectable, not like complete pigs. You two stay behind the screen in there and unpack the bottles. Take care. No noise. Unpack the bottles, dust them off, set them on the table next to the stemware. Then leave, come right back in here. But silently. If the Chiefs of State enter the chamber before you are finished, cease work at once, fall back out of sight at once, against the wall, behind the screen, and no sound from you. Now hurry!”

  Brennan hastened after his partner and the other three workmen.

  As he trudged through the doorway into the Council Chamber, he could hear the maître d’hotel giving more commands. “You—you waiters—what are you doing here? No dawdling. Only a minute before the President and Chiefs appear for their coffee and drinks. Back into the Cabinet du Conseil. And caution. When the doors from the Galerie des Glaces open fully, you will stand stiffly and respectfully at attention in the rows with the other waiters. Once the President and leaders and their aides are inside, you will attend to your duties as instructed. Off with you. Swiftly!”

  Carrying his carton of cognac, Brennan returned to the Cabinet du Conseil. Here there was order and quiet. Before the three windows that looked down on the marble courtyard, two dozen waiters in black ties and tailcoats stood at rigid attention, facing the mirror and rococo clock over the fireplace and the doors to the Hall of Mirrors.

  Brennan passed before the waiters toward the long table of brilliant Lalique glassware and gleaming bottles of liqueurs, brandies, champagne. A few feet from it, a lavishly decorated screen partially hid the blue velvet rope that guarded the Versailles Treaty desk, a Louis XV mahogany desk inlaid with brown leather, resting on feet shaped like bronze claws.

  Brennan waited nervously while the three workmen ahead lowered their cartons behind the screen and quickly departed. Then, with his shorter companion, Brennan moved behind the screen. While his companion, kneeling, opened the cartons and handed up the bottles, Brennan took a linen cloth and dusted them and placed them carefully on the table. He tried to read his wristwatch, and as best he could make out, it was nine thirty-five.

  His eyes hypnotized by the doors across the chamber, he was conscious that more waiters were scrambling into position to his left. He could feel the warning note addressed to Earnshaw in his trouser pocket, and he was confident that he could manage its delivery. The honored guests would soon come in for their after-dinner drinks. They would circulate, talk. And if Earnshaw was among them, Brennan would start to return to the adjacent royal bedroom, bump into Earnshaw, and slip the note into his hand.

  The wait was unbearable. Tension gripped him, closed on him like an Iron Maiden. His breathing had become an audible rasp.

  Suddenly, the opposite doors were flung open, and two bewigged servants, in the costumes of eighteenth-century courtiers, held them back.

  Brennan stood stone-still.

  A rectangle of the Hall of Mirrors was exposed to his view. The backs of the world’s leaders, a Premier, a Prime Minister, a President, a Chairman, a President, their coattails dropping down the sides of their gilt chairs, were visible. The table itself, pyramids of lights, low vases spilling out bright flowers, sparkling service, glass reflecting the grandeur of the painted ceiling. And beyond, niches between the windows bearing antique statues, candelabra with bulbs flickering like candles, distant fountains dancing to light.

  The President of France, heir to the Sun King’s glory, was rising, nodding to the British Prime Minister and to Chairman Kuo Shu-tung, of China, who were als
o rising. The American President and Premier Talansky, of the Soviet Union, were coming to their feet, Talansky signaling someone out of sight, beckoning for that person to join him.

  Instantly, the entrance to the Council Chamber was filled with French security police, followed by the personal bodyguards, Chinese, British, Russian, American, of the Chiefs of State, all of them blocking their leaders from sight.

  Mesmerized by the scene, Brennan felt a tug at his sleeve. The laborer kneeling beside him was trying to give him another bottle. Brennan rejected it with a gesture, pointed off, and brought his finger to his lips. The laborer nodded, and froze.

  Brennan jerked his head back toward the entrance, to find the police and bodyguards forming two lines with a center path for their leaders to enter through. And then Brennan gasped and recoiled.

  Nikolai Rostov had come quickly past the guards, into the salon, and taken a place at one end of the line.

  Immediately, Brennan dropped his head low and stepped sideways, so that he was partially shielded by the screen. From under his eyebrows he looked up again.

  The President of France, austere, grave, engaged in conversation with Chairman Kuo Shu-tung and the British Prime Minister, was entering the Council Chamber. He gestured toward the fireplace, and led his companions there to continue the conversation.

  Suddenly, Brennan’s eyes widened.

  Another familiar figure, dumpy, grinning, a hobgoblin, had entered the room. Ma Ming, one hand thrust in his trouser pocket, was making his way, as unobtrusively as possible, in the direction of the fireplace. Slowly, he sidled up behind Chairman Kuo Shu-tung and the British Prime . halt.

  Bewildered and suspicious, Brennan shifted his attention from Ma Ming to Nikolai Rostov, who was anxiously staring at the empty doorway, and then to the doorway itself, that moment filled by robust swaggering Premier Talansky, his arms linked through the arms of the American President on one side of him and Emmett Earnshaw on the. other side.

  The Russian Premier was tipsy and jovial. As he led the American President and Earnshaw across the room, the President half smiling, Earnshaw grinning, Talansky’s resonant voice boomed out: “I repeat my toast, my dear friends. From the Summit we shall proclaim our skies open to all, our cities, our countryside open, and together we sentence to death the nuclear Lucifer! Come, tonight we drink to international friendship and peace on this earth forever!”