“I expect we are,” Peter said, his lean face solemn. “The glory of France.”
“In which case, I may have an anomaly, too,” Jon went on. “I noticed it in passing, but it never seemed significant. But now, I wonder.”
“What is it?” Marty said.
“A castle,” Jon told him. “It’s a burnt-red colorprobably constructed with some kind of red stone. I saw an oil painting of it when I was in General La Porte’s Paris mansion. Then I saw a photograph of it, this time in his office at NATO. It’s obviously important to him. So important he likes to keep a likeness nearby.”
Marty hurried to his bed and grabbed his laptop. “Let’s see if I can find it, and find if Emile was right about le general’s financial health.”
Randi looked at Peter. “What was the meeting aboard the De Gaulle about? That could also tell us a lot.”
“Should find out, don’t you think?” Peter said, heading to the door. “Would you be so kind, Randi, as to brace Langley for anything new? And, Jon, why don’t you do likewise with your people?”
As Marty logged onto the Internet using the room’s only line, the three rushed out to find telephones.
In Dr. Cameron’s office, Jon dialed Fred Klein’s secure scrambled line.
“You’ve found Emile Chambord and his damnable machine?” Klein asked without preamble.
“I wish. Tell me more about Captain Darius Bonnard and General La Porte. What exactly is the nature of their relationship?”
“It’s long. Ongoing. Just as I described.”
“Is there any indication that Captain Bonnard may have co-opted General La Porte? That Bonnard may be the power behind the general?”
Klein paused, thinking about the question. “The general saved Bonnard’s life in Desert Storm when Bonnard was still whatever they call a top sergeant. Bonnard owes the general everything. I told you that before.”
“What haven’t you told me about them?”
There was a thoughtful pause, and Klein added details.
As Jon listened, the situation began to make more sense. Finally Klein finished.
“What’s going on, Jon? Dammit, time’s closing in on us. I can feel it like a noose. What’s this sudden interest in Bonnard’s connection to General La Porte? Have you found out something I don’t know? Are you planning something? I hope to hell you are.”
Smith told him about the second prototype.
“What! A second molecular computer?” Klein raged. “Why didn’t you kill Chambord when you had the chance?”
The tension was getting to Jon, too. He snapped back, “Dammit, no one guessed about a second prototype. I figured I could save Chambord so he could go on working for the good of everyone. I made a judgment call, and with what we knew, I thought it was the right one. I had no idea it was all a charade to keep us from knowing Chambord was running the show, and neither did you.”
Klein calmed down. “All right, what’s done is done. Now we’ve got to get that second DNA machine. If you have an idea where it is and have a plan, I want to know.”
“I don’t have a plan, and I don’t know where exactly the damn thing is except that it’s in France somewhere. If there’s a strike, it’s going to be soon. Warn the president. Believe me, I’ll be in touch the instant I have something concrete.”
Jon broke the connection and sprinted back to Marty’s room.
In the office of the hospital’s accountant, Peter was exasperated as he tried to maintain his grip on his stilted German. “General Bittrich, you do not understand! This is”
“I understand that MI6 wants information I don’t have, Herr Howell.”
“General, I know you were at the meeting on the De Gaulle. I also know that one of our generals who died a few days ago, Sir Arnold Moore, was with you. What you may not know is his death was no accident. Someone meant to kill him. And now I believe that the same person means to use a DNA computer to render the U.S. defenseless and then attack. It’s urgent you tell me what General La Porte’s secret meeting was about.”
There was silence. “So Moore was murdered?”
“A bomb. He was on his way to fill in our PM about something vital he learned at the meeting. That’s what we need to hear from you. What did General Moore learn? What was so devastating that his jet was bombed to stop him from relaying it?”
“You’re certain of the bomb?”
“Yes. We have the jet’s fuselage. It has been tested. There is no doubt.”
There was a long, anxious pause.
At last, Otto Bittrich said, “Very well.” He spoke carefully, making certain each word carried the proper weight. “The French general, La Porte, wants a totally integrated European army independent of, and at least equal to, America’s. NATO’s inadequate for his purposes. So is the EU’s small rapid deployment force. Me envisions a truly United Europe Europa. A continental world power to eventually surpass the United States. He’s adamant that the United States’s hegemony must be stopped. He argues that Europe is already positioned to become a contending superpower. If we don’t take this place of prominence that’s rightfully ours, he claims we’ll end up as just another U.S. dependenta large and favored colony at best, but ultimately still slaves to America’s interests.”
“Are you saying he wants to go to war against America?”
“He claims we’re already at war with the United States in many, many ways.”
“What do you say, General?”
Again Bittrich paused. “There’s much I agree with in his ideas, Herr Howell.”
Peter heard a faint hesitation. “I hear a but, sir. What did General Moore want to tell my prime minister?”
Bittrich was silent again. “I believe he suspected that General La Porte was planning to prove his point that we must not depend on America by showing the Americans unable to defend themselves.”
“How?” Peter asked. He listened to the answer with growing alarm.
Downstairs in the same public phone booth she had used earlier, Randi slammed down the receiver. She was angry and worried. Langley had nothing new about General La Porte or Captain Bonnard. As she hurried through the lobby and back upstairs, she hoped the others had done better. When she reached Marty’s room, Jon was standing sentry at the only window, watching the street, while Marty was still sitting on his bed, working at his laptop.
“Nada,”
she told them and closed the door behind her. “Langley was no damn help.” “I got something useful,” Jon said from the window. “General La Porte saved Captain Bonnard’s life in Desert Storm. As a result, Bonnard’s utterly loyal and exhibits an exaggerated sense of the general’s greatness.” Again he gazed at the street. For a moment, he thought he saw a figure moving furtively a block away. “Bonnard will do anything anything the general asks, and then be panting for the next opportunity to please him.” He looked into the distance for the figure. Heor shehad disappeared. He studied the traffic and few pedestrians closer to the private hospital.
“My, my. Such largesse.” Marty looked up from his computer screen. “Okay, the answer is that General La Porte and his family are worth hundreds of millions, if you figure it in U.S. dollars. Altogether, approaching a half-billion dollars.”
Jon exhaled. “A fellow could put together a nice little terrorist assault with that.”
“Oh yes,” Marty agreed. “General La Porte fits our profile perfectly, and the more I think about it, the more I remember how Emile had begun talking on and on about France. That it didn’t get the respect it deserved. What a magnificent history it had, and its future could be even greater than the past if the proper people were put in charge. Every once in a while, he’d forget I’m American and say something particularly irritating about us. I remember once when he was talking about what a fine leader General La Porte was, really too big for his current position. He said it was disgusting that the great General La Porte had to work under an American.”
“Yes,” Jon told him. “That would be General Carlos Henze. He’s NATO’s Supreme Allied Commander.”
“That sounds right. But it didn’t matter that it was General Henze. The point was, he’s American. See? My anomaly explains a lot. It’s obvious now that Emile took the print of Napoleon with him because it’s his inspirationFrance will rise again.”
“You found those financial details online?” Randi wondered.
“Easy as cracking an egg,” Marty assured her. “It was a simple matter to determine his bankFrench, of course. Then I tweaked some software programs I’m familiar with. With them souped up, I broke through the firewall and did a fast hit-and-run and escaped with quite a few records.”
“What about the red castle?” Jon asked.
Marty was stricken. “Forgot. La Porte was so fascinating. I’ll do it now.”