But the words that came over the line so astonished her:
“La résidence du Général Villiers. Bonjour? … Allô? Allô?”
For a moment Marie was unable to speak. She simply stared at the telephone. “Je m’excuse,” she whispered. “Une erreur.” She hung up.
“What’s the matter?” asked Bourne, opening the glass door. “What happened? Who was it?”
“It doesn’t make sense,” she said. “I just reached the house of one of the most respected and powerful men in France.”
24
“André François Villiers,” repeated Marie, lighting a cigarette. They had returned to their room at the Terrasse to sort things out, to absorb the astonishing information. “Graduate of Saint-Cyr, hero of the Second World War, a legend in the Resistance, and, until his break over Algeria, De Gaulle’s heir-apparent. Jason, to connect such a man with Carlos is simply unbelievable.”
“The connection’s there. Believe it.”
“It’s almost too difficult. Villiers is old-line honor-of-France, a family traced back to the seventeenth century. Today he’s one of the ranking deputies in the National Assembly—politically to the right of Charlemagne, to be sure—but very much a law-and-order army man. It’s like linking Douglas MacArthur to a Mafia hit man. It doesn’t make sense.”
“Then let’s look for some. What was the break with De Gaulle?”
“Algeria. In the early sixties, Villiers was part of the OAS—one of the Algerian colonels under Salan. They opposed the Evian agreements that gave independence to Algeria, believing it rightfully belonged to France.”
“ ‘The mad colonels of Algiers,’ ” said Bourne, as with so many words and phrases, not knowing where they came from or why he said them.
“That means something to you?”
“It must, but I don’t know what it is.”
“Think,” said Marie. “Why should the ‘mad colonels’ strike a chord with you? What’s the first thing that comes to your mind? Quickly!”
Jason looked at her helplessly, then the words came. “Bombings … infiltrations. Provocateurs. You study them; you study the mechanisms.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know.”
“Are decisions based on what you learn?”
“I guess so.”
“What kind of decisions? You decide what?”
“Disruptions.”
“What does that mean to you? Disruptions.”
“I don’t know! I can’t think!”
“All right … all right. We’ll go back to it some other time.”
“There isn’t time. Let’s get back to Villiers. After Algeria, what?”
“There was a reconciliation of sorts with De Gaulle; Villiers was never directly implicated in the terrorism, and his military record demanded it. He returned to France—was welcomed, really—a fighter for a lost but respected cause. He resumed his command, rising to the rank of general,. before going into politics.”
“He’s a working politician, then?”
“More a spokesman. An elder statesman. He’s still an entrenched militarist, still fumes over France’s reduced military stature.”
“Howard Leland,” said Jason. “There’s your connection to Carlos.”
“How? Why?”
“Leland was assassinated because he interfered with the Quai D’Orsay’s arms buildups and exports. We don’t need anything more.”
“It seems incredible, a man like that …” Marie’s voice trailed off; she was struck by recollection. “His son was murdered It was a political thing, about five or six years ago.”
“Tell me.”
“His car was blown up on the rue du Bac. It was in all the papers everywhere. He was the working politician, like his father a conservative, opposing the socialists and Communists at every turn. He was a young member of parliament, an obstructionist where government expenditures were concerned, but actually quite popular. He was a charming aristocrat.”
“Who killed him?”
“The speculation was Communist fanatics. He’d managed to block some legislation or other favorable to the extreme left wing. After he was murdered, the ranks fell apart and the legislation passed. Many think that’s why Villiers left the army and stood for the National Assembly. That’s what’s so improbable, so contradictory. After all, his son was assassinated; you’d think the last person on earth he’d want to have anything to do with was a professional assassin.”
“There’s also something else. You said he was welcomed back to Paris because he was never directly implicated in the terrorism.”
“If he was,” interrupted Marie, “it was buried. They’re more tolerant of passionate causes over here where country and the bed are concerned. And he was a legitimate hero, don’t forget that.”
“But once a terrorist, always a terrorist, don’t you forget that.”
“I can’t agree. People change.”
“Not about some things. No terrorist ever forgets how effective he’s been, he lives on it.”
“How would you know that?”
“I’m not sure I want to ask myself right now.”
“Then don’t.”
“But I am sure about Villiers. Pm going to reach him.” Bourne crossed to the bedside table and picked up the telephone book. “Let’s see if he’s listed or if that number’s private. I’ll need his address.”
“You won’t get near him. If he’s Carlos’ connection, he’ll be guarded. They’ll kill you on sight; they have your photograph, remember?”
“It won’t help them. I won’t be what they’re looking for. Here it is. Villiers, A. F. Parc Monceau.”
“I still can’t believe it. Just knowing whom she was calling must have put the Lavier woman in shock.”
“Or frightened her to the point where she’d do anything.”
“Doesn’t it strike you as odd that she’d be given that number?”
“Not under the circumstances. Carlos wants his drones to know he isn’t kidding. He wants Cain.”
Marie stood up. “Jason? What’s a ‘drone’?”
Bourne looked up at her. “I don’t know … Someone who works blind for somebody else.”
“Blind? Not seeing?”
“Not knowing. Thinking he’s doing one thing when he’s really doing something else.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Let’s say I tell you to watch for a car at a certain street corner. The car never shows up, but the fact that you’re there tells someone else who’s watching for you that something else has happened.”
“Arithmetically, an untraceable message.”
“Yes, I guess so.”
“That’s what happened in Zurich. Walther Apfel was a drone. He released that story about the theft not knowing what he was really saying.”
“Which was?”
“It’s a good guess that you were being told to reach someone you know very well.”
“Treadstone Seventy-One,” said Jason. “We’re back to Villiers. Carlos found me in Zurich through the Gemeinschaft. That means he had to know about Treadstone; it’s a good chance that Villiers does too. If he doesn’t, there may be a way of getting him to find out for us.”
“How?”
“His name. If he’s everything you say he is, he thinks pretty highly of it. The honor-of-France coupled with a pig like Carlos might have an effect. I’ll threaten to go to the police, to the papers.”
“He’d simply deny it. He’d say it’s outrageous.”
“Let him. It isn’t. That was his number in Lavier’s office. Besides, any retraction will be on the same page as his obituary.”
“You still have to get to him.”
“I will. I’m part chameleon, remember?”
The tree-lined street in Parc Monceau seemed familiar somehow, but not in the sense that he had walked it before. Instead, it was the atmosphere. Two rows of well-kept stone houses, doors and windows glistening, hardware shining, staircases washed clean, the lighted rooms beyond filled with hanging plants. It was a monied street in a wealthy section of the city, and he knew he had been exposed to one like it before, and that exposure had meant something.
It was 7:35 in the evening, the March night cold, the sky clear, and the chameleon dressed for the occasion. Bourne’s blond hair was covered by a cap, his neck concealed beneath the collar of a jacket that spelled out the name of a messenger service across his back. Slung over his shoulder was a canvas strap attached to a nearly empty satchel; it was the end of this particular messenger’s run. He had two or three stops to make, perhaps four or five, if he thought they were necessary; he would know momentarily. The envelopes were not really envelopes at all, but brochures advertising the pleasures of the Bateaux Mouche, picked up from a hotel lobby. He would select at random several houses near General Villiers’ residence and deposit the brochures in mail slots. His eyes would record everything they saw, one thing sought above everything else. What kind of security arrangements did Villiers have? Who guarded the general and how many were there?
And because he had been convinced he would find either men in cars or other men walking their posts, he was startled to realize there was no one. André François Villiers, militarist, spokesman for his cause, and the prime connection to Carlos, had no external security arrangements whatsoever. If he was protected, that protection was solely within the house. Considering the enormity of his crime, Villiers was either arrogant to the point of carelessness or a damn fool.
Jason climbed the steps of an adjacent residence, Villiers! door no more than twenty feet away. He deposited the brochure in the slot, glancing up at the windows of Villiers’ house, looking for a face, a figure. There was no one.