somehow managing to keep the tremor out of his
voice. “Trace him down. Call LeifLelm, Van
Headmer. Say it’s imperative you reach
Bertholdier.”
“Stop it! And let him know I know? He had to
give you a reason! Why did he come to see you in
the first place?”
‘ I wanted to wait until you’d spoken to him,”
said Converse, crossing his legs and picking up a
pack of cigarettes next to the pistol. “He might have
told you himself then again, he might not. He has
this idea that I was sent out by Delavane to test all
of you. To see who might betray him. ‘
“Betray him? Betray the legless one? How?
Why? And if our French peacock believed that,
again why would he say these things to you?”
“I’m an attorney. I provoked him. Once he
understood how I felt about Delavane, what that
bastard did to me, he knew I couldn’t possibly have
anything to do with him. His defences were down;
the rest was easy. And as he talked I saw
THE AQUITAINE PROGRESSION 657
a way to save my own life.’ Joel struck a match,
lighting a cigarette. “By reaching you,” he added.
“At the end you bank on the morality of a Jew,
then? His acknowledgment of a debt.’
“In part, yes, but not entirely, General. I know
something about Leifhelm, about the way he’s
maneuvered through the years. He’d have me shot,
then send his men after the rest of you, leaving
himself in the number one position.”
“That’s exactly what he’d do,” agreed the Israeli.
“And I didn’t think Van Headmer had any real
authority north of Pretoria.”
“Right again,” said Abrahms, walking back toward
Converse. “So the hellhound created in Southeast
Asia is a survivor.”
“Let’s be more specific,” countered Joel. “I was
sent out by people I don’t know who abandoned me
without raising the slightest question as to my guilt
or innocence. For all I know, they joined in the hunt
to kill me to save their own lives. Given these
conditions I intend to survive.”
“What about the woman? Your woman?”
“She goes with me.” Converse put down the
cigarette and picked up the gun. “What’s your
answer? I can kill you now, or leave that to
Bertholdier, or Leifhelm, if he kills the Frenchman
first. Or I can bank on your morality, your ac-
knowledgment of a debt. What’s it going to be?”
“Put away the gun,” said Chaim Abrahms. “You
have the word of a sabre.”
“What’ll you do?” asked Joel, placing the weapon
back on the table.
“Do?” shouted the Israeli in a sudden burst of
anger. “What I’ve always intended to do! You think
I give a horse’s fart for this abstraction, this
Aquitaine’s infrastructure? Do you think I care one
whit for titles or labels or chains of command? Let
them have it all! I only care that it works, and for it
to work respectability must come out of the chaos
along with strength. Bertholdier was right. I am too
divisive a figure as well as a Jew to be so visible
on the Euro-American scene. So I will be
invisible except in Eretz Yisrael, where my word will
be the law of this new order. 1, myself, will help the
French bull get whatever medals he wants. I will not
fight him, I will control him.”
“How?”
“Because I can destroy his respectability.”
658 R08ERT LUDLUM
Converse sat forward, suppressing his
astonishment. “His sex life? Those buried scandals?”
“My God, no, you imbecile! You kick a man
below his belt in public you ask for trouble. Half the
people cry ‘Foul,’thinking it could happen to them,
and the other half applaud his courage to indulge
himself which they would very much like to do.”
“Then how, General? How can you do this,
destroy his respectability?”
Abrahms sat down again in the brocaded chair
his thick body squeezed dangerously between the
delicately carved mahogany arms. “By exposing the
role he played in ‘code-name Aquitaine.’ The roles
we all played in this extraordinary adventure that
forced the civilized world to summon us and the
strengths of our professional leadership. It’s entirely
possible that all free Europe will turn to Bertholdier
as France nearly turned to him after De Gaulle. But
one must understand a man like Bertholdier. He
doesn’t merely seek power, he seeks the glory of
power the trappings, the adulation, the mysticism.
He would rather give up certain intrinsic authority
than lose any part of the glory. Me? I don’t give a
shit about the glory. All I want is the power to get
what I need what I command. For the kingdom of
Israel and its imprimatur in all of the Middle East.”
‘You expose him, you expose yourself. How can
you win that way?”
“Because he’ll blink first. He’ll think of the glory
and submit. He’ll do as I say, give me what I want.”
“I think he’ll have you shot.”
“Not when he’s told that if I die several hundred
documents will be released describing every meeting
we attended, every decision we made. Everything is
scrupulously detailed, I assure you.”
“You intended this from the beginning?”
“From the beginning.”
“You play rough.”
“I’m a sabre. I play for the advantage without
it we would have been massacred decades ago.”
“Among these documents is there a list of
everyone in Aquitaine?”
“No. It has never been my intention to
jeopardise the movement. Call it whatever name you
will, I believe truly in the concept. There must be a
unified, international mili
THE AQUITAINE PROGRESSION 659
tary-industrial complex. The world will not stay sane
without it.’
‘But there is such a list.
“In a machine, a computer, but it must be
programmed correctly, the proper codes used.’
“Could you do it?
“Not without help.
“What about Delavane?’
‘You have certain perceptions yourself, said the
Israeli, nodding. “What about him?
Again Joel had to control his astonishment. The
computer codes that released the master list of
Aquitaine were with Delavane. At least the key
symbols were. The remainder were provided by the
four leaders across the Atlantic. Converse shrugged.
“You haven t really mentioned him. You’ve talked
about Bertholdier, about the elimination of Leifhelm,
and the impotence of Van Headmer, who could,
however, bring in raw materials ”
“I said ‘gold,'” corrected Abrahms.
“Bertholdier said ‘raw materiels.’ But what about
George Marcus Delavane?”
“Marcus is finished,” said the Israeli flatly. “He
was coddled we all coddled him because he
brought us the concept and he worked his end in the
United States. We have equipment and materiel all
over Europe, to say nothing of the contraband we’ve
shipped to insurgents, just to keep them occupied. ‘
“Clarification,” interrupted Joel. ” ‘Occupied’
means killing?”
“All is killing. Disingenuous philosophers
notwithstanding, the ends do justify the means. Ask
a man hunted by killers if he will jump into human
excrement to conceal himself.”
“I’ve asked him,” said Converse. “I’m he,
remember? What about Delavane?”
“He’s a madman, a maniac. Have you ever heard
his voice? He speaks like a man with his testicles in
a vise. They cut off his legs, you know, amputated
only months ago for diabetes. The great general
felled from an excess of sugar! He’s tried to keep it
a secret. He sees no one and no longer goes to his
impressive office filled with photographs and flags
and a thousand decorations. He operates out of his
home, where the servants come only when he’s
hidden in a darkened bedroom. How he wished it
could have been a mortar shell or a
660 ROBERT LUDLUM
bayonet charge, but no. Only sugar. He’s become
worse, a raving fool, but even fools can have flashes of
brilliance. He had it once.”
“What about him?”
“We have a man with him, an aide with the rank of
colonel. When everything begins, when our commands
are in place, the colonel will do as instructed. Marcus
will be shot for the good of his own concept.”
It was Joel’s turn to get out of his chair. Once
again he walked to the cathedral window across the
room and felt the cool mountain breezes on his face.
“This examination is finished, General,’ he said.
“What?” roared Abrahms. “You want your life. /
want guarantees!”
“Finished, ‘ repeated Converse as the door opened
and a captain m the Israeli Army walked inside, his
gun levered at Chaim Abrahms.
“There will be no discussion between us, Herr Con-
verse,” said Erich LeifLelm, standing by the door of the
study. The doctor from Bonn had just left.the room.
“You have your prisoner. Execute him. Over many
years and in many ways
I have been waiting for this moment. In truth, I’m weary
of the morbidity.”
“Are you telling me you want to die?” asked Joel,
standing by the table with the pistol on top.
“No one wants to die, least of all a soldier in the