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.
Of course it was unbelievably humble of Miki to say such a thing, and no one in the Ministry of Tourism and Films would have permitted such an insult to Praha, but Miki knew his audience and knew just what to say. They laughed, they tittered, they accepted his gracious humility. They were rich people who did not notice the servants who removed the dishes but would certainly notice the servants who didn’t.
Of course, Miki always thought, I am your servant, your pet, your little monkey, your pimp, and your slave. Of course, I am whatever is useful to you.
The marvelous thing was that he never showed contempt, even in private moments. He watched, he saw everything, he knew secrets contained in secrets, and that was enough satisfaction for him.
And it would be enough tonight to know that in less than an hour, Miki would disappear from the face of the earth and that would frighten some people almost to death.
Nearly one hundred yards north of the city hall was a three-story building attached to a four-story structure next door. The façade of the building carried a date in ornate stone script: 1706. In three centuries of life, it had been many things, including a nineteenth-century version of a French-speaking Hellfire Club. During the Nazi occupation, the building had slipped into the hands of collaborators and was used as a club and whorehouse by German staff officers. Now it was simply a tavern that opened each evening at six and closed each morning at dawn. It was a place for men who made contacts. Many of the men were important.
The first floor held the narrow bar and a couple of tables, and Philip, the manager, worked the place. The second floor also held tables but was empty. The third floor was a large, empty room and a man stood there by the single narrow window.
Devereaux looked down at the square. He was barely visible at the window. He was dressed in black — black raincoat, black trousers, black turtleneck sweater. He wore a navy-blue watch cap on his head. Even the pistol in his belt was fashioned of dark steel and did not reflect the light.
Devereaux listened to the steps on the stairs and counted them. He had counted all the stairs in the narrow building and examined the garage beneath the first floor, and even then he had not been satisfied with the arrangement. He was the reluctant agent of R Section and he had been with Section too long to trust what Hanley said or even what Hanley implied by saying nothing.
The door opened and light burst into the room. Then it closed again.
Philip said, “Everything is set. He made the signal.”
Devereaux did not speak. The train had been set up without him. He was the conductor because he was the man from R Section and that made him in charge. But Devereaux felt out of control. His status in R Section had evolved in the last couple of years and it was something he could live with: He was the outside man, kept on payroll and maintained in the records but only called in when the problem required a solution out of channels. That’s the way Hanley put it in bureaucratese: out of channels. But what was so special about conducting a defector to the American side? Why involve him? Hanley had not answered and Devereaux had known from that moment in the cathedral at Chartres that the matter was more important than it seemed.
“Did the driver show up?”
“He’s in the cellar garage, everything is ready. The passenger should disappear in the next fifteen minutes.”
Devereaux frowned in the darkness. Everything like clockwork. As though none of it was real. He had worked with independent contractors before and he never trusted any of them.
“Don’t be nervous,” Philip said and almost giggled. He was young with a pointed nose designed for a thinner man set between two fat cheeks. He annoyed Devereaux and knew it.
“We could have handled this ourselves, you know,” Philip went on. “We do lots of work for lots of people. We’ve done work for the CIA.”
“You talk too much,” Devereaux said.
“Just so you understand we know what we’re doing, we do lots of work for lots of people. I don’t know if you’ve done this kind of thing, but it’s a piece of cake once our passenger makes his departure. It’s all up to him, you see. He’s got to make the first move, you might say.”
“You still talk too much,” Devereaux said.
Philip wiped at his lips and tried a smile. He wanted to push it in a little more. “You don’t speak French very well, you know that? I mean, from your accent, you could tell you were an American.”
“Or just an ordinary Belgique trying to pass for a Norman,” Devereaux said. It was a nasty French slur.
Philip flushed then. “Next time, I hope they send someone else.”
Devereaux turned. He stared at the square. He was tired of Philip and the waiting. It was always a matter of waiting, even when you didn’t know if anything at all would happen.
“You didn’t have to be unfriendly. In the beginning, I mean,” Philip went on. “You don’t like homosexuals, is that it?”
Devereaux saw the moon on the square. It was a lovely square and a little sad in the moonlight.
“You didn’t have to be unfriendly.”
But Devereaux was watching now. There. Across the square. The man in the raincoat was walking very slowly, as though he were out for an evening’s stroll. The square was empty because of the rain. Suddenly, a car flashed its high beams on the square and came around the corner from the direction of the Amigo Hotel. The lights picked up the pedestrian.
Devereaux removed the pistol from his belt. It was the weapon he had insisted on, a modified version of the Colt Python .357 with a skeleton handle and other alterations to lighten the weight. The ordinary Python was over three pounds but his version was less than two pounds. He had lost a little accuracy in making the conversions, but the reliability of the revolver and the devastating stopping power of the ammunition were what he wanted. All the people in hardware at Section insisted he should use a lighter, more sophisticated weapon, like the new Italian.9-millimeter automatic. He thought they were wrong.
The car’s headlights swept the pedestrian but he did not turn to look at the lights. The car squealed around the square and the walking man was left in the dim light of lampposts again. He had a lot of guts, Devereaux thought. Or maybe it was all just theatrical to him, maybe he knew how to make entrances and exits.
And disappearances.
“He’s here,” Devereaux said as the man approached the building. Philip pulled at his long nose, turned, opened the door, and started down the stairs.
Devereaux swept the square with the barrel of his gun. No one. The center of Brussels was all baroque emptiness. It began to rain again, softly as it always rains in Belgium, and the rain polished the cobblestones beneath the lamp lights.
The door opened on the third floor.
Miki blinked, stepped into the dark room. Philip was behind him. They couldn’t see the third man.
Devereaux, in darkness, said, “Leave the door open, Philip. I want his pockets turned inside out.”
“Who the hell are you?” said Miki.
“The Man,” Devereaux said. He held the pistol. In the light now, they could see the pistol.
Miki turned out his pockets. He had a wad of mixed Belgian francs and Czech kovnas and a gold box of cigarettes with a matching lighter.
“Spread your legs, Miki, on the floor please. Hands above your head.”
Miki stared at the darkness. He could begin to see the shape of the man who held the gun. He got down on the dusty floor and spread his legs and put his hands above his head.
“This isn’t necessary,” Miki said.
Devereaux stepped out from the shadows and pressed the pistol against Miki’s ear. He started with each arm from the wrist down to the shoulder. He felt along the leather jacket. He patted down the length of each leg from crotch to ankle.