The Matarese Countdown

by Robert Ludlum

  A nineteen-year-old law student at the University of Utrecht had his name legally changed, or more precisely, altered, his true last name eliminated. From that date forward he was known as Jan van der Meer, no longer Jan van der Meer Matareisen.

  Matareisen.

  Dutch for Matarese.

  The final piece of the maddening puzzle was in place.

  Julian Guiderone registered under the name of Paravacini at London's Inn on the Park hotel. The better establishments knew the House of Paravacini to be among the wealthiest dynasties in Italy and worthy of their finest efforts. To fulfill the objective of his visit to Englandsimply put, the death of Brandon Alan Scofield, a.k.a. Beowulf Agate-Julian had to unearth the whereabouts of the Matarese's man in London, one Leonard Fredericks. Apparently, as their mole in Langley phrased it, "It's as though he's disappeared."

  However, someone like Fredericks did not just disappear. He might create irrefutable explanations for temporary absences, but he would never vanish. Notwithstanding harsher realities, like his own execution, he was extraordinarily well paid for his services and, like many of his subterranean colleagues, maintained a covert lifestyle that might be the envy of a Saudi prince. Guiderone did not confine himself solely to Matarese conduits, though; he had his own sources and resources. One of these was Leonard Fredericks's wife, trapped in a dreadful marriage from which there was no escape. In the event she was being watched, they agreed to meet in the Islamic exhibition room at the Victoria and Albert Museum, the subject an established interest of hers.

  "You know perfectly well that Leonard rarely tells me the details of his trips," said the matronly Marcia Fredericks as they sat on a marble bench in the museum. The exhibition room was half-filled with students and tourists, and Julian's eyes were on the entrance archway; he was prepared to get up and leave the woman at the first inkling of surveillance.

  "I presume he flew over to his Paris fleshpots, listed, of course, as some trumped-up economic study."

  "Did he say when he was coming back?"

  "Oh, he was quite specific-tomorrow, to be exact. As usual, I'm on call, which was why he was specific. I'm cooking a roast for a couple from the office."

  "Considering the state of your wedded non-bliss, I'd say you were very kind."

  "I'm very curious. He's been sleeping with the wife for the last two years."

  "He does have nerve, doesn't he?"

  "That he does, dearie. If a woman's breath can fog a mirror, he'll nail her."

  "Listen to me, Marcia," said Guiderone.

  "I have to see Leonard, but he mustn't know that we met or that I'm even here in London."

  "He won't hear it from me."

  "Good. I'm staying at the Inn on the Park, under the name of Paravacini-" "Yes, you've used that before," interrupted Mrs. Fredericks.

  "It's convenient. The family's prominent, and they are friends.

  When Leonard returns, does he call you before coming home?"

  "Of course. To give me orders."

  "Reach me as soon as he does. He still drives from the office or the airport?"

  "Naturally. He may find that he has detours to make, the horny bastard."

  "I'll intercept him after your call. He may be late for dinner."

  Marcia Fredericks turned slightly and looked imploringly at Julian.

  "When can I get out, Mr. G.? I have no life. I'm in a preconceived hell!"

  "You know the rules. Never.. .. I'll amend that-certainly not now."

  "But I don't know the rules! I just know there are rules because Leonard says there are, but I don't know what they are or why."

  "You certainly understand that they're related to the excessive money your husband brings home-" "Doesn't do a bloody thing for me!" interrupted the wife.

  "And I haven't the foggiest what he does to earn it."

  Guiderone returned Marcia's gaze, their eyes locked.

  "No, I'm sure you don't, my dear," he said softly.

  "Hang in a while longer.

  Frequently things have a way of righting themselves. You'll do as I ask?"

  "The Inn on the Park. Paravacini."

  It was early evening on the outskirts of London; the street lamps in this residential section had been recently turned on. The row of neat, pleasant upper-middle-class homes was progressively distinguished by the succession of inside lights filling the windows. Darkness comes quickly in these quasi-suburban areas as the sun disappears rapidly, the close proximity of the houses prohibiting the dying rays from flooding the streets.

  On this particular street a nondescript gray sedan was parked at the curb across from Leonard Fredericks's home. Inside, Julian Guiderone sat behind the wheel smoking a cigarette, his left arm slung over the passenger seat, his eyes on the rearview mirror. There they were. The headlights of a slowly moving car angling to the right, sliding into the opposing curb. Leonard Fredericks.

  On the oft-confirmed premise that a startled man was verbally careless, Julian turned on the ignition and, timing his move with precision, swung the wheel, lurching the gray sedan directly into the path of the approaching vehicle. Slamming to a stop inches from the car's bonnet, the tires screeching, Guiderone sat immobile, waiting for the reaction. It came instantly as Fredericks leaped out of the driver's side, yelling.

  "What the bloody hell do you think you're doing?" he roared.

  "I think the question should be reversed, Leonard," replied Julian calmly, getting out of the gray car and staring at the Matarese's man-in London

  "What the bloody hell have you done?"

  "Mr. Guiderone? .. . Julian? .. . What in heaven's name are you doing here?"

  "To repeat, what have you done wherever you were, Leonard? No one's been able to find you; you've answered no sterile calls or coded messages. As Eagle put it, it's as though you had disappeared. That's all very disconcerting."

  "Good God, certainly you don't have to be told!"

  "Told what?"

  "It's why I went on a short holiday .. . until things were clarified."

  "Told what, Leonard?" asked Guiderone sharply.

  "Amsterdam's off-limits! Jordan passed the word to me-from you."

  "From me? ..."

  "Of course. He said you'd particularly appreciate my perceptions.

  He as much as admitted that he was your messenger."

  "He did?"

  "Certainly. He knew everything. The K-Gracht, Atlantic Crown, Swanson and Schwartz, even that talkative attorney, Stuart Nichols, as well as Wahlburg and Jamieson Fowler. He knew everything!"

  "Calm down, Leonard.. .. Now this Jordan-" "The American banker, Julian," interrupted the near-panicked Fredericks.

  "Andrew Jordan. Naturally, I checked his cover out; it was authentic, although, as you know, the complaint he filed with our office wasn't really. And I did as you told me-through Jordan, I explained to the Americans that they were to stay away from Amsterdam."

  "Your sources?"

  "Anonymous, precisely as you instructed."

  "This Andrew Jordan, Leonard, would you describe him to me?"

  "Describe him to you?" Fredericks was stunned, slipping over the edge.

  "Not to worry," reassured Guiderone.

  "I just want to know if he did what I asked him to do, to change his appearance. After all, I was sending him into the enemy camp."

  "Well, he was older than me, about your age, I'd judge. And yes, there was something odd about him. His clothes were a touch too casual for a prominent banker, if you know what I mean. But then, as you say, he was in the enemy camp-" "The pig of the world!" spat out the son of the Shepherd Boy under his breath, his suspicion confirmed, his fury absolute.

  "I beg your pardon?" "Never mind.. .. Now, as to the business Amsterdam demanded of you-before it was 'off-limits'-namely, the killing of the American, Brandon Scofield. Did you make any progress?"

  "Scant," answered Leonard Fredericks.

  "He's beyond reach. The word is that he and his wife are under guar
d at one of the better hotels, the sort that cooperates with Mi-Five. Way beyond reach, I'm afraid."

  "Beyond reach?" said Julian, his voice ice-cold.

  "You idiot, you were with him for the better part of an hour! Who the hell do you think Andrew Jordan was?"

  "That's impossible, Mr. Guiderone! He knew about the fireworks, the Mediterranean fireworks."

  "Did he know, or did you tell him?"

  "Well, it was mutually understood-" "Get in my car, Leonard, we've other things to discuss."

  "I really can't, Julian. Marcia and I are having company. She's cooked a roast-" "Dinner can wait. Our business can't."

  Leonard Fredericks did not return for dinner. When Mrs. Fredericks decided that the meal could no longer be postponed, she and her guests sat down to an excellent roast. What was even more to Marcia's liking, she received a telephone call. Taking it in the parlor, she heard these words.

  "I'm afraid your husband has been unavoidably detained, my dear.

  Since his assignment is apparently confidential, there's no way to determine where or for how long he'll be gone. In the meantime, you've been cleared to have access to his accounts. Instructions will follow. . You're free, Marcia."

  "I'll never forget you."

  "Wrong, my dear. You must forget me. Completely."

  Cameron Pryce lurched up from the bed at the harsh sound of the Blakes Hotel phone. He reached over for it on the bedside table, but not before Leslie Montrose sat up.

  "It's two o'clock in the morning," she mumbled, yawning.

  "This better be important."

  "I'll find out.. .. Hello?"

  "Sorry to disturb you, Cam, but I want to keep you up to speed," said Geoffrey Waters.

  "Race ahead. What's happened?" asked Pryce anxiously.

  "You know that we placed total surveillance on the Fredericks fellow-" "Leonard Fredericks," interrupted Cameron, "the Matarese contact."

  "Exactly. Our lads followed him to Paris, where he engaged in activities best left to the Kama-sutra, but otherwise nonproductive."

  "You called to tell me that?"

  "Hardly. The Paris unit phoned our man at Heathrow with his return flight this evening. The lad picked him up heading for his car and promptly lost him in that damned airport traffic. After driving all over the place checking the exit roads, he finally drove to Fredericks's house. His car was there but he wasn't."

  "Was he sure of that?"

  "Most definitely. To begin with, Mrs. Fredericks was genuinely stunned at the sight of her husband's car, then she asked our man in.

  He met a couple from the Foreign Office who told him Fredericks never showed, and there was an empty place setting to confirm it."

  "Could the FO people be a setup, a mislead?"

  "Highly unlikely, we checked them out. They're young and ambitious, not the sort to trifle in those ways, especially not when we're on the scene. We gather the wife's a bit of a flirt, but that's not an offense these days."

  "Never has been.. .. You can kiss our contact good-bye, Geof, another Gerald Henshaw. He had dangerous pastimes and the Matarese plays hardball, as in rolled rocks."

  "That's pretty much the conclusion I've reached. I'm sealing off his office; we'll tear it apart."

  "Have a good time and keep me up to speed."

  "How's Leslie?"

  "She's an animal, what can I tell you?"

  "Oh, shut up," said Leslie, falling back into the pillow.

  When Julian Guiderone walked into the Savoy Court off the Strand, toward the hotel's cul-de-sac entrance, it was eight-twenty in the evening. The wide London street teemed with pedestrians and traffic in combat, the court itself was jammed with taxis, limousines, Jaguars, and two Rolls-Royces. The Savoy Theatre, the original home of Gilbert and Sullivan's DOyly Carte company, was flashing the marquee's lights, signifying that its newest production was approaching curtain time. Theatergoers tapped pipes against heels, crushed out cigarettes, and piled through the brass-framed doors. It was a typical night in busy London town.

  Julian had been conferring with his sources, basically a disparate group of elderly men and women who had fallen upon hard times and whom he had befriended over his years in the U.K. He called them his small army of observers; none were really sure why they were looking for whatever it was he instructed them to look for, but they were grateful to do it, as he doled out generous bonuses and, frequently, new clothes to replace tattered ones. Apparel was important to this group; it was a remembrance of things past, such as proper employment and self-worth-dignity.

  The son of the Shepherd Boy had studied the list of prominent hotels that had records of working with the British authorities; none could really be excluded. So Julian had his small army mill about all of them, looking for an individual or individuals who came around regularly at certain times, and might not appear to be guests, tourists, or part of the staff. Ever anxious to please their mysterious benefactor, the observers relayed numerous "observations," but one in particular caught Guiderone's attention.

  A late-middle-aged woman, seen inside the Savoy hotel dressed in the uniform of a senior member of the staff, left every evening between a quarter to seven and eight o'clock, hardly a precise schedule for a working woman. Then, too, every time she emerged she was in an upscale outfit and was met by a waiting taxi in the Strand, not a bus or a spouse's very ordinary vehicle. And not the pattern of a working woman, but easily that of an MI-5 plant.

  Julian's plan was laborious and time-consuming; it did not matter, he was after the pig of the world. He would go from floor to floor constantly looking for the unusual; it would be there in one manifestation or another. It had to be.

  He found the aberration on the Thames side of the third floor.

  Whereas floor stewards scurried to various doors with trays and room service tables, there were more stewards strolling around without trays or tables, their apparent concentration on a single door. Guiderone understood. The pig of the world and his sow wife!

  His slight limp intensified by his anxiety, the son of the Shepherd Boy quickly gathered his thoughts, forming a strategy. He had to isolate that door, isolate those inside. He had stayed frequently at the Savoy and remembered the room-service routine. In addition to the service elevators descending to the massive kitchens below, each floor had a good-sized pantry where tea, coffee, hors d'oeuvres, and sandwiches could be prepared for quick deliveries. Casually, although now furious at his pronounced limp, Julian followed a tray-carrying steward and found the location of the Thames-side third-floor pantry. He then remained in the wide carpeted hallway, strolling about as if lost, and counted what he presumed to be the real floor stewards and those who were not.

  They were equally divided: three and three, three who delivered, three who merely walked-patrolled, to be more precise. His strategy was evolving, and it would begin in the pantry. He returned to it, waited for a steward to emerge with a tray, and slipped inside. The third-floor kitchen was empty; it would not remain so for long. He checked several doors leading to various dry and fresh foodstuffs, and lastly a toilet. He locked himself in, switched on the light, and withdrew a .32-caliber pistol from his vest pocket and a silencer from his trousers. He attached the cylinder and waited until he heard the hallway door open and close. He stepped out, confronting a startled steward who dropped a silver tray on a counter. Guiderone fired his weapon, the muted spit killing the man. Rapidly, he dragged the body into the toilet and firmly closed the door.

  Within moments a second steward arrived, this a strapping young man. At the sight of Julian's weapon, he lunged at the Matarese, hurling an ice bucket at Guiderone's head. It was too late. Two silenced shells sent two bullets into the steward's upper chest and throat, and the son of the Shepherd Boy pulled his second kill into the small lavatory.

  The third victim mercifully never knew what happened. A gaunt elderly steward backed a room-service table into the pantry. Julian fired; the old man fell over the table, dead. Soon three corpses wer
e layered on the toilet floor, their shining red blood flowing over the white tiles, and Guiderone prepared for his next encounters, three final steps to the pig who had turned his dreams into a lifelong nightmare.

  He limped out into the corridor, turned the corner, and saw the first of the MI-5 guards standing by the elevator within sight of the pig's door. Assuming an air of bewilderment, Julian approached the man, pushed the elevator button, and spoke.

  "I'm afraid I'm totally confused," he said, half pleading.

  "I can't find Suite Eight-Zero-Seven."

  "You won't on this floor, sir. This is the third floor."

  "Really? Age dulls the eyesight as well as everything else. I could have sworn I pressed eight."

  "No problem, sir, could happen to anybody." The elevator door opened.

  "Young man, would you mind pressing number eight for me?"

  "Not at all, sir." The guard walked into the elevator and pressed the button. As he did so, Guiderone raised his silenced pistol and pulled the trigger. The elevator door closed, the lift ascending to the eighth floor.

  At that moment, a second guard appeared from around the corner of the hallway. It was obvious that he was looking for someone, concerned that he could not spot him. Julian limped toward him.

  "Excuse me, young fellow, but I'm not sure what to do. There was quite a scuffle here a moment ago. I was talking to a man there by the elevator, someone about your age, when suddenly the doors opened and two other men grabbed him and pulled him inside. He yelled and struggled but to no avail-they were savages. They took him downstairs-" "Rafe!" roared the second MI-5 patrol as another guard appeared from behind one of the glass doors that intermittently divided the corridors.

  "Reach Downey, code red. Interdiction! Cover while I go after Joseph. I'll use the stairs! Send backup; surround the hotel!"

  The third MI-5 officer reached into his belt for his intercom. He was not in time. Guiderone rushed forward, his concealed weapon pulled from under his jacket. He slammed his body into the astonished guard, simultaneously firing, the muted spit further silenced by the man's flesh. The agent fell; the son of the Shepherd Boy instantly bent down and rifled the guard's pockets, knowing what he would find. The key for the suite of the pig of the world!