The Infant of Prague
- Автор: Granger Bill
- Серия: November Man #8
- Год: 1987
- Язык: французский
- Год: Warner
- ISBN: 0446347809
- Жанр: Триллеры
Электронная книга - «The Infant of Prague». Краткое содержание книги:
For in a humble Chicago parish church, the sacred statue of the Infant of Prague is found weeping real tears. A visiting Czech child star actress, transfigured by the wondrous event, declares, on live television, her intent to remain in American in the name of Christ and freedom.
Only an operative as cynical and seasoned as the November Man can sense the sinister link between two dramatic, yet apparently unrelated defections. A miracle has plunged him into a vast global adventure. And it will take a miracle to get him through it alive.
The defection of a highly visible Czech sparks an international crisis, and the November Man is caught in the middle.
“Perhaps I’ll have a dry martini,” Anton said suddenly. Anything to stop this torrent of words, images, clichés. What was Willis saying?
Willis signaled the reluctant waiter. The martini arrived in a large, wet glass. Anton burned his tongue on the gin and was grateful.
“We go through this the regular way, it might take months, Tony. What I am saying, what I am authorized to say, is that if you people come up with some idea, our people will be willing to help to implement it. To facilitate Anna’s return.”
Anton blinked. He almost thought he understood. He said nothing.
“Come on, Tone, loosen up,” Willis said, his face flushed. He had the remains of a second martini in front of him and had signaled for a third. “You got Anna’s mama. I can arrange that she can be alone with her, put the old home ties screws to her, you know, make her homesick. We can’t fix the judge we got, but maybe we can get this transferred to a friendlier jurisdiction. You know the way it works.”
Anton nodded because Willis wanted him to.
“Or maybe you people have got your own scenario.”
Cernan had warned him about that. Meet with them if they want, Cernan had said. Avoid scenarios. Avoid apparent agreement. Do not argue, do not disagree, do not agree. Do nothing until we find out who is behind Anna’s defection. But Cernan was not in Chicago. Cernan was not going to be sent to Addis Ababa. Huss was certain it would be Addis Ababa.
“What can be done?” Anton Huss said.
Willis smiled. It was what he wanted. That and the third martini the waiter was bringing over to table five.
“Why is she in Brussels?” Hanley asked.
David Mason stood by the side of his bed in the Amigo Hotel behind city hall and stared at the picture on the wall. He was naked except for the large bath towel wrapped around his middle. Rita Macklin was in the adjoining single room. They had been in Brussels four hours.
“Because she wants to find Devereaux,” David Mason said.
“You told her too much.”
“I told her a little.”
“You told her too much.”
“She guessed a lot of it. Devereaux told her before he went to Brussels.”
“He would never have done that.”
David said nothing. They let the lie alone with their silences. There was no point in Hanley reprimanding him. Hanley knew the way it was with Eurodesk. Eurodesk had its nose out of joint and still didn’t know about Miki and why Section wanted him. Eurodesk was looking for a missing agent presumed dead; in fact, he was dead as far as Eurodesk was concerned. Devereaux was out of channels. Fine. Let him stay out of channels.
“She’s a journalist, David.” Hanley said the word as a pejorative. “She really can’t be trusted. If she had her way, she’d blow Section open. She really can’t be trusted at all.”
“I don’t trust her,” David said. He saw her in his mind’s eye. They had flown from Geneva together. She was pretty, prettier than he expected. She was young. Her face was open and her eyes were bright green. She was really lovely, David had thought on the plane, and the thought mixed with pity for her because she loved Devereaux.
“What is she going to do in Brussels?”
“If I don’t trust her, then she doesn’t trust me,” David said. “She said she had friends here. Probably other journalists.” He knew the word made Hanley uncomfortable. “You can’t lock her up or have her arrested, Mr. Hanley. So the next best thing is to watch her.”
He saw Hanley’s face in the silence. He was considering that.
“We haven’t got a flutter from Eurodesk yet,” Hanley admitted.
David said nothing.
“One way or the other,” Hanley said. “Nothing from across the wall, either. No one has Devereaux and his body can’t be found.”
“And Miki?”
“Miki is in the same sad state. The other side is pulling its hair out.”
“What do you think I should do?”
Hanley said, “You should have been in Lausanne, helping her buy widow’s clothes. You should have been finding his life-insurance policy in a lockbox. You should not be with that woman in Brussels. She is a danger, Mason, to you and to Section.”
“And herself?”
“I don’t care about herself. Survival of Section, Mason. It’s the thing you have to keep in mind all the time. What we do is for Section, not for some goddamn newspaper writer.”
“If he’s dead, she wants to know it,” David said.
“Yes.”
Another silence between them.
“Yes,” Hanley repeated. “We all want to know it.”
12
Colonel Ready smiled down at Devereaux and went to the small window and sat on the ledge. They could hear the rain on the pane and on the roof. Devereaux sat still on the broken chair with his arms manacled behind his back.
“I was the last person you ever wanted to see again,” Ready said. He grinned at that but it was not pleasant. He had red hair with more gray in it than when Devereaux had last seen him three years before.
A big Belgian was in the room as well. It was the one who had tied the bandana around Devereaux’s swollen leg and who had clipped Devereaux with the pistol in the cellar.
“Do you want to know all about it, Devereaux? About how I got away? I could tell you a lot of stories. You cut my leg and you thought they’d catch up with me but I got away. I still got my limp. I appreciate that reminder, Devereaux, it keeps me going. If I get lazy or comfortable in a situation, I can still limp away because I remember the souvenir you gave me.”
“Good,” Devereaux said. He didn’t smile but his voice was easy and flat. “I hoped it would be permanent. It’s better than just a scar. And you’ve got a scar already.”
Colonel Ready touched his cheek and grinned. The scar went from the corner of his mouth to his ear. His face was always grinning and he might have looked boyish except for the scar and the deep blue eyes. His eyes were as hard as his words.
“I had some errands to do, I had to go to Brussels, I told this idiot here to keep an eye on you, I didn’t tell him to put you in the cellar, you might have died in the cellar. He’s an idiot, what can I tell you. I didn’t want you to die. But he wanted to go off whoring and it was easier to put you in the cellar than to keep an eye on you.” He said it all in a measured way, giving the words no special inflection.
“I should have just killed you. The way Rita said,” Devereaux said. “I should have just killed you, but it didn’t seem like it was enough, just to kill you.”
“But you should have,” Ready agreed.
“How did you shake the wet contract?”
“You set me up as ‘November,’ so I set up another poor fool as ‘November.’ His name was Lars. He bought it from a Russian hitter on the Finlandia. The case on ‘November’ is closed as far as the Russians are concerned. They got their man.”
Devereaux did not speak. Ready had changed. The eyes showed the pain. There must be pain all the time. Devereaux had cut him across the Achilles tendon and left him there, writhing on the floor of the little house above the town of St. Michel.
They were in Nam originally, that was where they met. Ready was working for DIA and moonlighting on the side for himself. He ran dope in Nam and women and he probably shipped intelligence both ways. Devereaux kept running across him. They circled each other in Nam like knife fighters. Then Devereaux was suddenly shipped home and they would never have seen each other again except that Ready came looking for him in Switzerland that time. Ready had a scam going — he always had a scam — and this one involved a whole overpopulated and wretchedly poor Caribbean island named St. Michel. Ready had used Devereaux, leveraged him out of hiding, and then had used Rita Macklin.