The Brotherhood of the Rose

Brotherhood Of The Rose

David Morrell

*

PROLOGUE:

THE ABELARD SANCTION

REFUGE

Paris. September 1118.

Peter Abelard, handsome canon of the church of Notre Dame, seduced his attractive student, Heloise. Fulbert, her uncle, enraged by her pregnancy, craved revenge. In the early hours of a Sunday morning, three assassins hired by Fulbert attacked Abelard on his way to mass, castrated him, and left him to die from his wounds. He lived but, fearing further reprisals, sought protection. First, he ran to the monastery of Saint Denis near Paris. There, while recovering from his injuries, he learned that political elements desperate for Fulbert's approval were conspiring once more against him. For a second time, he took flight-to Quincey, near Nogent, where he founded a safe house that he named "The Paraclete," the Comforter, in honor of the Holy Ghost.

And finally found sanctuary.

SAFE HOUSES/ GROUND RULES Paris. September 1938.

On Sunday, the twenty-eighth, 8douard Daladier, minister of defense for France, broadcast the following radio announcement to the French people: Early this afternoon I received an invitation from the German government to meet with Chancellor Hitler, Mr. Mussolini, and Mr. Neville Chamberlain in Munich. I have accepted the invitation.

The next afternoon, while the Munich meeting was taking place, a pharmacist in the service of the Gestapo recorded in his logbook that the last of the five black 1938 Mercedes had passed the checkpoint at his corner drugstore and had arrived before the innocuous-looking stone facade of 36 Bergener Strasse in Berlin. In each case, a powerfully built plainclothed driver stepped out of the car, surveyed the pedestrians on the busy street without seeming to do so, and opened a passenger door from which the only occupant, a well-dressed elderly man, emerged. As soon as the driver had escorted his passenger safely through the thick wooden door of the three-story residence, he proceeded to a warehouse three blocks away to wait for further instructions.

The last gentleman to arrive left his hat and overcoat with a sentry behind an enclosed metal desk in an alcove to the right of the door. For reasons of tact, he wasn't searched, but he was asked to surrender his briefcase. He wouldn't need it, after all. No notes would be permitted.

The sentry examined the man's credentials, then pushed a button beside the Luger beneath his desk. At once, a second Gestapo agent appeared from an office behind the visitor to escort him to a room at the end of the hall - The visitor entered. Remaining behind, the agent shut the door.

The visitor's name was John "Tex" Anton. He was fifty-five, tall, ruggedly handsome, with a salt-and-pepper mustache. Prepared for the business at hand, he sat in the one remaining empty captain's chair and nodded to the four men who'd arrived before him. He did not need to be introduced; he knew them already. Their names were Wilhelm Smeltzer, Anton Girard, Percival Landish, and Vladimir Lazensokov. They were the directors of espionage for Germany, France, England, and the Soviet Union. Anton himself represented America's State Department.

Except for the captain's chairs and the ashtray beneath each of them, the room was totally barren. No other furniture, no paintings, no bookshelves, no drapes, no rug, no chandelier. The starkness of the room had been arranged by Smeltzer to assure these men that no microphones had been hidden. "Gentlemen," Smeltzer said, "the adjacent rooms are empty."

"Munich," Landish said.

Smeltzer laughed. "For an Englishman, you come to the point abruptly."

"Why do you laugh?" Girard asked Smeltzer. "We all know that at this moment Hitter is demanding that my country and England no longer guarantee the protection of Czechoslovakia, Poland, and Austria." He spoke English for the benefit of the American.

Avoiding the question, Smeltzer lit a cigarette. "Does Hitler intend to invade Czechoslovakia?" Lazensokov asked.

Smeltzer shrugged, exhaling smoke. "I've asked you here so that, as members of the same professional community, we can prepare for any contingency."

Tex Anton frowned. Smeltzer continued. "We don't respect each other's ideologies, but in one way we're all alike. We enjoy the complexities of our profession. they nodded. "You have a new complication to propose?" the Russian asked. "Why don't you boys say what the hell you're thinkin'?" Tex Auton drawled.

The others chuckled. "Directness would ruin half the enjoyment," Girard told Anton. He turned to Smeltzer, waiting. "No matter what the outcome of the impending war," Smeltzer said, "we must guarantee to each other that our representatives will have the opportunity for protection."

"Impossible," the Russian said. "What kind of protection?" the Frenchman asked. "Do you mean money?" the Texan added. "Unstable. It has to be gold or diamonds," the Englishman said.

The German nodded. "And more precisely, secure places in which to keep them. The proven banks in Geneva, Lisbon, and Mexico City, for example."

"Gold." The Russian sneered. "And what do you propose we do with this capitalist commodity?"

"Establish a system of safe houses," Smeltzer replied.. "But what's so new about that? We already have 'em," Tex Auton said.

The others ignored him. "And rest homes as well, I presume?" Girard told Smeltzer. "I take that for granted," the German said. "For the benefit of my American friend, let me explain. Each of our networks already has its own safe houses, that is true. Secure locations where its operatives can go for protection, say, or debriefing or to interrogate an informer. But while each network tries to keep these locations a secret, eventually the other networks find out where they are, so the places aren't truly safe. Though armed men guard them, a larger opposing force could seize any house and kill whoever had sought protection there."

Tex Auton shrugged. "The risk is unavoidable."

"I wonder," the German continued. "What I propose is something new-an extension of the concept, a refinement of it. Under extreme circumstances, any operative from any of our networks would be given a chance for asylum in carefully chosen cities around the 'world. I suggest Buenos Aires, Potsdam, Lisbon, and Oslo. We all have business there."

"Alexandria," the Englishman suggested. "That's acceptable."

"Montreal," the Frenchman said. "If the war doesn't turn out to my benefit, I might be living there."

"Now wait a minute," Tex Auton said. "Do you expect me to believe that, if a war is going' on, one of your boys, won't kill one of my boys in these places?"

"As long as the opposing operatives remain inside," the German said. "in our profession, we all know the dangers and the pressures. I'll admit that even Germans sometimes need to rest."

"And calm the nerves and heal the wounds," the Frenchman said. "We owe it to ourselves," the Englishman said. "And if an operative wants to retire from his network completely, he'd have the chance to go from a safe house to a rest home and enjoy the same immunity for the rest of his life. With a portion of the gold or the diamonds as a retirement fund."

"As a reward for faithful service," the German said. "And an enticement to new recruits."

"If events proceed as I foresee," the Frenchman said, "we may all need enticements. "And if events proceed as I expect," the German said, "I'll have all the enticements I need. Nonetheless I'm a prudent man. Are we all agreed?"

"What guarantees do we have that our men won't be killed in these safe houses?" the Englishman said. "The word of fellow professionals."

"And the penalties?"

"Absolute."

"Agreed," the Englishman said.

The American and the Russian were silent. "Do I sense reluctance from our newer nations?" the German said. "I agree in principle, and I'll attempt to appropriate funds," the Russian said, "but I can't promise Stalin's cooperation. He'd never submit to shielding foreign operatives on Soviet soil."

"But you promise never to harm an enemy operative as long as he's in a designated safe house."

Reluctantly the Russian nodded. "And Mr. Auton?"

"Well, I'll go along. I'll kick in some money, but I don't want-any of these places on American territory."

"Then with these compromises, we agree?"

The others nodded. "We'll need a code word for this arrangement," Landish said. "I recommend hospice," Smeltzer said. "Unthinkable," the Englishman replied. "Half of our hospitals are called hospices."

"Then I recommend this alternative," the Frenchman said. "We are all learned men. I'm sure you recall the story of my countryman from the Dark Ages: Peter Abelard."

"Who?" Tex Auton said.

Girard explained. "So he went to a church and was given protection?" Auton said. "Sanctuary."

"We'll call it a sanction, Smeltzer said. "The Abelard sanction."

Two days later, Wednesday, October 1, Daladier, France's minister of defense, flew back from the meeting with Hitler in Munich to his home in Paris.

His plane landed at Le Bourget Airport. As he stepped outside, he was greeted by surging crowds who shouted, "Long live France! Long live England! Long live peace!"

Waving flags and flowers, the crowds broke through the sturdy police barricades. Reporters rushed up the aluminum gangplank to greet the returning minister of defense.

Daladier stood dumfounded. Turning to Foucault of the Reuters News Service, he muttered, "Long live peace? Don't they understand what Hitler plans to do? The stupid bastards."

Paris. 5 P.m., Sunday, September 3, 1939. An announcer had just come on the radio, interrupting the Michelin Tbeater to say, "France is officially at war with Germany."

The radio went silent. In Buenos Aires, Potsdam, Lisbon, Oslo, Alexandria, and Montreal, the international safe houses of the world's great espionage networks were established. By 1941, these networks would include Japan, and by 1953, mainland China.

And sanctuary was formed.

*

*

Book One

SANCTUARY

A MAN OF HABIT Vail, Colorado. The snow fell harder, blinding Saul. He skied through deepening powder, veering sharply back and forth down the slope. Everything-the sky, the air, and the ground-turned white. His vision shortened till he saw no more than a swirl before his face. He swooped through chaos.

He might hit an unseen tree or plummet off a hidden cliff. He didn't care. He felt exhilarated. As wind raged at his cheeks, he grinned. He christied left, then right. Sensing the slope ease off, he streaked across a straightaway.

The next slope would be steeper. In the white-out, he pushed at his poles to gain more speed. His stomach burned. He loved it. Vacuum. Nothing to his back or front. Past and future had no meaning. Only now-and it was wonderful.

A dark shape loomed before him. Jerking sideways, Saul dug in the edge of his skis to stop himself. His pulse roared in his head. The shape zoomed past from right to left in front of him, vanishing in the snow.

Saul gaped through his goggles, hearing a scream despite the wind. He snowplowed frowning toward it.

Shadows gathered in the storm. A line of trees. A moan. He found the skier sprawled against a tree trunk. There were bloodstains in the snow. Beneath his mask, Saul bit his lip. He crouched and saw the crimson seeping from the skier's forehead, and the grotesque angle of one leg.

A man. Thick beard. Large chest.

Saul couldn't go for help-in the chaos of the storm, he might not be able to find this place again. Worse, even if he did manage to bring back help, the man might freeze to death by then.

One chance. He didn't bother attending to the head wound or the broken leg. No use, no time. He took off his skis, removed the skis from the injured man, rushed toward a pine tree, and snapped off a thickly needled bough.

Spreading the bough beside the man, he eased him onto it, careful to let the good leg cushion the broken one. He gripped the end of the bough and stooped, walking backward, pulling. The snow stung harder, cold gnawing through his ski gloves. He kept tugging, inching down.

The man groaned as Saul shifted him over a bump, the snow enshrouding them. The man writhed, almost slipping off the bough.

Saul hurried to reposition him, tensing when he suddenly felt a hand behind him clutch his shoulder.