The Parsifal Mosaic (36 page)

In a way, so had Michael, but his initial work had been cerebral. He had retrieved his clothes from a Métro locker, purchased basic toiletries, a note pad and a ball-point pen, and taken a room at a cheap hotel around the corner from La Couronne Nouvelle. He reasoned that if the wounded
VKR officer raised help, he would not think to send his killers down the street for the target. Havelock had shaved and bathed, and now lay on the decrepit bed, his body resting but not his mind. He had gone back in time, disciplining his memory, recalling every moment he and Jenna had shared in Paris. He had approached the exercise academically, as a graduate student might doggedly follow a single development chronologically through a chaotic period in history. He and Jenna, Jenna and he; where they had gone, what they had seen, whom they had spoken with, all in order of sequence. Each place and scene had a location and a reason for their being there; finally, each face that had any meaning had a name, or if not a specific name, the identity of someone who knew him or her.

After two hours and forty minutes of probing, he had sat up, reached for the note pad and pen he had placed on a bedside chair, and had begun his list. A half hour later it was complete—as complete as his memory permitted—and he had relaxed, back on the bed, knowing that the much needed sleep would come. He knew also that the clock in his mind would awaken him when daylight ended. It did. And minutes later he was out in the streets, going from one telephone booth to another, one café with a TÉLÉPHONE sign in the window to the next, each instrument six blocks away from the last.

He began the conversations quickly but casually, and kept his ears primed to pick up any telltale signs of alarm in the responses. In each case his approach was the same; he was to have met Jenna that noon at the Meurice bar, each having flown into Paris from a different city, but his plane had been hours late. And since Jenna had mentioned the person’s name frequently—fondness implied—Michael wondered if she had called him or her, perhaps looking for an afternoon companion in a city she barely knew.

Most were mildly surprised to hear from Havelock, especially so casually, and even more surprised that Jenna Karas would have remembered their names, much less having recalled them with affection; they were by and large only brief acquaintances. However, in no instance was there the slightest hesitation other than the normal caution required when confronted with the unexpected. Eighteen names. Nothing. Where had she gone? What was she doing? She
could not go underground in Paris, not without his finding her; she had to know that.
Christ, where are you?

He reached the Rue Ravignan and began the steep ascent up the Montmartre hill, passing the dark old houses that were once the homes of legends, and emerging on the small square that was the Place Clément, he started down the Rue Norvins. The street was crowded, the revels of would-be Bohemians fueled by the genuine residents who dressed their roles and later went home to count their profits. The alley Gravet had described was just before the narrow Rue des Saules; he could see the break in the row of ancient buildings up ahead and walked faster.

The old brick alleyway was dark and empty. The ersatz Bohemians knew there were limits to their pretense that they belonged in Montmartre; a mugging on the sacred hill of martyrs was little different from a taped iron pipe in Soho or the East village. Havelock went inside, his right hand instinctively edging toward the break in his jacket and belt where the magnum was awkwardly in place. Gravet was late, a discourtesy the critic himself found abhorrent. What had happened?

Michael found a shadowed doorway in the dimly lit thoroughfare; he leaned against the brick frame, took out a cigarette and struck a match. As he cupped the flame his mind leaped back to the Palatine, to a book of matches and a man who had tried to save his life, not take it. A dying man who had died only moments later, knowing there was betrayal at the highest levels of his government.

There was a sudden commotion out on the Rue Norvins, a brief flare-up of tempers as two men collided. Then a tall, slender man stood momentarily erect, and let forth a stream of invective in French. His much younger, stockier adversary made a sullen comment about the man’s ancestry and moved along. The injured party smoothed his lapels, turned to his left and entered the alley. Gravet had arrived, not without his customary
élan
.

“
Merde!
” the critic spat out, seeing Havelock walk out of the shadows into the dim light. “It’s those filthy, ragged field jackets they wear! You just know they dribble when they eat and their teeth are yellow. God knows when they last bathed or spoke civilly. Sorry to be late.”

“It’s only a few minutes. I just got here.”

“I’m late. I intended to be in the Rue Norvins a half hour ago to make sure you weren’t followed.”

“I wasn’t.”

“Yes, you’d know that, wouldn’t you?”

“I’d know. What kept you?”

“A young man I’ve cultivated who works in the catacombs of the Quai d’Orsay.”

“You’re honest.”

“And you misinterpret.” Gravet moved to the wall, turning his head back and forth, looking at both entrances of the alley; he was satisfied. “Since you called after your business at the Couronne Nouvelle—a call, incidentally, I wasn’t sure you’d ever make—I’ve been in touch with every conceivable contact who might know something about a lone woman in Paris looking for sanctuary, or papers, or secret transportation, and no one could help. It was really quite illogical; after all, there are only so many sources of illegal machinations, and precious few I’m not aware of. I even checked the Italian districts, thinking her escorts from Col des Moulinets might have provided her with a name or two. Nothing.… Then it occurred to me.
Illegal
efforts? Perhaps I was searching in the wrong areas. Perhaps, instead, such a woman might seek more legitimate assistance, without necessarily detailing her illegitimate reasons. After all, she was an experienced field operative. She had to know—or know of—certain personnel in allied governments if only through you.”

“The Quai d’Orsay.”

“
Naturellement
. But the undersides, the catacombs, where distinctly unpublicized conveniences had to exist for you.”

“If they did, I’m not aware of them. I crossed paths with a number of people in the ministries but I never heard of the catacombs.”

“London’s Foreign Office calls them Clearing Centres. Your own State Department refers to them less subtly. Division of Diplomatic Transfers.”

“Immunity,” said Havelock. “Did you find something?”

“My young friend spent the last several hours tracing it down. I told him the timing was advantageously narrow. If anything happened, it could only have happened today. So he returned to his little cave after the dinner hour on some pretext or other and riffled through the day’s security duplicates.
He thinks he may have found it, but he can’t be certain and neither can I. However, you might be able to make the connection.”

“What is it?”

“At ten-forty-five this morning there was a memorandum from the Ministère des Affaires Etrangères ordering up an open identity. Subject: white female, early thirties, languages: Slavic, Russian, Serbo-Croatian, cover name and statistics requested immediately. Now, I realize there are dozens—”

“What section at the ministry?” interrupted Havelock.

“Four. Section Four.”

“Régine Broussac,” said Havelock. “Madame Règine Broussac. First Assistant Deputy, Section Four.”

“That’s the connection. It’s the name and signature on the request.”

“She’s twenty-ninth on my list, twenty-ninth out of thirty-one. We saw her—
I
saw her—for less than a minute on the street almost a year ago.
I
barely introduced Jenna. It doesn’t make sense; she hardly knows her,
doesn’t
know her.”

“Were the circumstances of your seeing her a year ago no-table?”

“I suppose so. One of their people was a double agent at the French embassy in Bonn; he made periodic flights to the East by way of Luckenwalde. We found him on the wrong side of Berlin. At a meeting of the
Geheimdienst
.”

“The Moscow puppet’s offspring of the S.S. I’d say quite notable.” Gravet paused, unfolding his hands. “This Broussac. She’s an older woman, isn’t she? Years ago a heroine of the Résistance?”

“She and her husband, yes. He was taken by the Gestapo; what they found of him wasn’t pleasant.”

“But she carried on.”

“Yes.”

“Did you, perhaps, tell any of this to your friend?”

Havelock thought back as he drew on the cigarette, then dropped it, crushing it underfoot “Probably. Régine’s not always easy to take; she can be abrupt, caustic, some call her a bitch, but she’s not She
had
to be tough.”

“Then let me ask you another question, the answer to which I’m vaguely familiar with, but it’s based merely on rumor; nothing I’ve read that pretended to be official.” The
critic folded his hands again. “What prompted your friend to do what she did, to live the sort of life she led with you, and obviously before you?”

“1968,” replied Havelock flatly.

“The Warsaw-bloc invasion?”

“The
cěrńý den
of August. The black days. Her parents had died, and she was living in Ostrava with her two older brothers, one married. Both were Dubček activists, the younger a student, the older an engineer who was forbidden any meaningful work by the Novotný regime. When the tanks rolled in, the younger brother was killed in the streets, the older one rounded up by advance Soviet troops for ‘interrogation.’ He was crippled for life—arms and legs—totally helpless. He blew his brains out and his wife disappeared. Jenna traveled to Prague, where no one knew her, and went underground. She knew whom to reach, what she wanted to do.”

Gravet nodded; his face looked drawn even in the dim light. “The people who do what you do, quietly, so efficiently, you all have different stories, yet common themes run through them. Violence, pain … loss. And genuine revenge.”

“What did you expect? Only ideologues can afford to shout; we’ve generally got other things on our minds. It’s why we’re sent in first. It doesn’t take much to make us efficient.”

“Or to recognize one another, I imagine.”

“Under certain circumstances, yes. We don’t make too much of it. What’s your point?”

“The Broussac woman. Your friend from the Costa Brava would remember her. A husband, brothers, pain, loss … a woman alone. Such a woman would remember another woman who carried on.”

“She obviously did, I just wouldn’t have thought so.” Havelock nodded silently. “You’re right,” he said quietly. “Thanks for giving it perspective. Of course she would.”

“Be careful, Michael.”

“Of what?”

“Genuine revenge. There has to be a
sympathie
between them. She could turn you over to your own, trap you.”

“I’ll be careful; so will she. What else can you tell me about the memorandum? Was a destination mentioned?”

“No, she could be going anywhere. That will be set at Affaires Etrangères and kept quiet.”

“What about her cover? A name?”

“That was processed and beyond my young friend’s eyes, at least this evening. Perhaps tomorrow he can pry into files that are locked tonight.”

“Too late. You said the memorandum asked for an immediate response. That passport’s been mocked up and issued. She’s on her way out of France. I have to move quickly.”

“What’s one day? Twelve hours from now perhaps we can find a name. You call the airlines on an emergency basis and they check their manifests. You’ll know where she’s gone.”

“But not how.”

“Je ne comprends pas.”

“Broussac. It she’s done this much for Jenna, she’ll do more. She wouldn’t leave her on her own at an airport somewhere. Arrangements were made. I have to know what they are.”

“And you think she’ll tell you?”

“She has to.” Havelock buttoned his loose-fitting jacket and pulled the lapels up around his neck. The alley was a tunnel for the damp breezes from below, and there was a chill. “One way or the other, she has to tell me. Thanks, Gravet, I owe you.”

“Yes, you do.”

“I’ll see Broussac tonight and leave in the morning … one way or the other. But before I go, there’s a bank here in Paris where I’ve got a safety deposit box; I’ll clean it out and leave an envelope for you at the vault cage. Call it part payment It’s the Banque Germaine on the Avenue George Cinq.”

“You’re most considerate, but is it wise? In all modesty, I’m something of a public figure and must be careful in my associations. Someone there might know you.”

“Not by any name you’ve ever heard of.”

“Then what name shall I use?”

“None. Just say the ‘gentleman from Texas’; he’s left an envelope for you. If it makes you feel any better, say you’ve never met me. I’m negotiating a painting for an anonymous buyer in Houston.”

“And if there are complications?”

“There won’t be. You know where I’m going tonight, and, by extension, tomorrow.”

“At the last, we’re professionals, aren’t we, Michael?”

“I wouldn’t have it any other way. It’s cleaner.” Havelock extended his hand. “Thanks again. You know the help you’ve been. I won’t belabor it.”

“You can forget about the envelope, if you like,” said Gravet, shaking hands, studying Michael’s face in the shadows. “You may need the money, and my expenses were minimal. I can always collect on your next trip to Paris.”

“Don’t change the rules, we’ve lived too long by them. But I appreciate the vote of confidence.”

“You were always civilized, and I don’t understand any of this business. Why her? Why you?”

“I wish to God I knew.”

“That’s the key, isn’t it? Something you do know.”

“If it is, I haven’t the vaguest idea what it could be. Good-bye, Gravet.”

“
Non, au revoir
. I really don’t want the envelope,
Mikhail
. Come back to Paris. You owe me.” The distinguished critic turned and disappeared up the alley.

There was no point in being evasive with Régine Broussac; she would sense the evasion instantly, the coincidence of timing being too unbelievable. On the other hand, to give her the advantage of naming the rendezvous was equally foolish; she would stake out the area with personnel the Quai d’Orsay had no idea were on its payroll. Broussac was tough, knowing when and when not to involve her government, and depending upon what Jenna had told her, she might consider any dealings with an unbalanced retired American field officer more suited to treatment by unofficial methods. There were no checks and balances in those methods; they were dangerous because there was no line of responsibility, only diverted monies that no one cared to acknowledge. Drones by any other names or payments were first cousins to the practitioners of violence—whether employed by Rome in Col des Moulinets or by a VKR officer in a cheap hotel on the Rue Etienne. All were essentially lethal, it was merely a question of degree, and all should be avoided unless one was the employer. Havelock understood; he had to get Broussac alone, and to do that, he had to convince her that he was not
dangerous—to her—and might have information that could be extraordinarily valuable.