The Brotherhood of the Rose (30 page)

Continuing down the aisle, she made sure everybody's seatbelt was fastened. After asking a woman to slide her bulky purse into the space beneath the forward seat, she scanned the passengers. No one was smoking. The seats were locked in their upright position, the food trays folded up and secured. She nodded to another stewardess and walked toward the front, where she turned to survey the passengers again. As much as she could determine, none of them reacted strangely to her. No eyes tensed when she looked at them. No passenger avoided her gaze. Of course, a well-trained operative wouldn't have made those mistakes. All the same, she went through the formality-to fail to do it would have been her own mistake.

She knocked on the cockpit door and opened it. "Anybody up here want some coffee?"

The pilot turned. "No, thanks. The ground crew loaded the baggage. We're cleared to taxi."

"How's the weather look?"

"Couldn't be better. Blue skies all the way," Saul answered beside her. He and Chrislooking handsome in their pilots' uniforms -carried documents authorizing them to be supervisors on this flight. They sat at the rear of the cockpit, watching the crew, who had no reason to doubt they were what they claimed. With Erika, they'd boarded early, via the private stairs to the service entrance in the passenger tunnel, avoiding surveillance in the terminal. Their credentials had been beautifully forged. Again the Israeli embassy's Misha Pletz had worked his magic.

As the jet backed from the boarding platform, Erika returned to the passengers, double-checking for signs of recognition in anyone's eyes. A man seemed captivated by her figure. A woman looked apprehensive about the takeoff. Passing them, she decided they were nothing to worry about, though now that the jet was in motion it didn't matter if a hit team had come on board. El A] excelled in security precautions. Three of the passengers-at the front, the middle, and rear-were plainclothes airline guards. Beyond the windows, two heavy cars abruptly appeared, flanking the jet, as it left the terminal toward the runway. In the cars, she noticed large grim men licensed to carry the automatic weapons they held out of sight- standard protection for this airline so often victimized by terrorists. When the plane touched down in London, two more cars would appear and escort the jet to the terminal. Inside the airport, the El At section would be discreetly but effectively guarded. Under these conditions, a hit team foolish enough to move against Erika, Saul, and Chris would have to be suicidal.

Her sense of relief passed quickly. As she made sure the food lockers in back were securely locked, she remembered with dismay that she'd have to pass out cocktails and meals, mothering the passengers through the flight&. the senior attendant picked up a microphone. "Good evening." Static crackled. "Welcome to El At's Flight 755 to-- London. Despite the blue sky forecast, gray drizzly clouds hung over the city. Though burdened by her duties during the flight, Erika had, nonetheless found time to consider the implications of what she'd learned.

The story Chris and Saul had told her about the Franklin School for Boys disturbed her. She herself had been raised on an Israeli kibbutz and as a consequence had been conditioned as well. But though like them she was skilled as a soldier and an operative, she sensed a difference.

Granted, she'd been separated from her mother and father and raised by foster parents. Still, the entire community had given her love. Every Israeli was a member of her family. In a country so often attacked that many children lost both their natural and foster parents, grief became bearable if the nation as a whole was the ultimate parent.

But Saul and Chris had been shown no love except by Eliot, a love that had been a lie. Instead of the healthy atmosphere of a kibbutz, they'd endured an austere youth of rigid discipline and deprivation-not for the sake of their country, but instead for the secret motives of the man who claimed to be their benefactor. What kind of mind could have imagined such a plan?

Twisted. Perverted. Like Saul and Chris, she'd been trained to kill. But she did it for her country, for the survival of her people, and with sadness, grieving for her enemy, whereas Saul and Chris had been purged of distracting emotion, denied their dignity, made into robots at Eliot's command. No noble principle justified what had been done to them.

Now their conditioning had failed. Though Erika enjoyed being reunited with them-especially Saul, for whom an affection she'd thought was dead had been revived as strongly as ever-her principal objective had to be idealistic: to help her country, to repair the damage Eliot had done to Israel when he'd made it seem responsible for killing the president's friend. Saul and Chris, though, had a different motive. Personal, and under the circumstances ironic, because emotional. They'd reached the limit of a lifetime's abuse. They'd been betrayed.

Now they wanted revenge.

At the London airport, the three of them passed through a private customs area set aside for airline personnel. The escorts Pletz had arranged to meet them waited inconspicuously on the other side. Avoiding the busy passenger section of the terminal, they left through a rear exit reserved for airport employees, their escorts first checking outside, then forming a phalanx through which Erika, Chris, and Saul stepped out to a bulletproof car. They drove past an airport guard at an open metal gate, then merged with the noisy London-bound traffic.

Chris set his watch for the English time zone. The morning sky was bleak. As dampness crept over him, he glanced out the back and frowned. "We're being followed."

"That blue car a hundred yards back?" the driver asked. He studied his rearview mirror, seeing Chris nod. "It's one of ours. But there's something else bothers me."

"What's that?"

"The orders we got. From Misha in Washington."

"What's the problem?"

"I don't get it. We're supposed to make sure you arrive okay, but then we're supposed to scram. It makes no sense. Whatever you're up to, even you three have to need backup. There's got to be a mistake."

"No, that's what we asked for."

"But--"

"That's how we want it," Saul said.

The driver shrugged. "You're the customer. I was told to get you a flat that's safe. The equipment you wanted's in the trunk. They call that a boot over here. I'll never get used to the way these people talk."

Pretending to settle in, they stopped unpacking their bags the moment the escorts left. Saul glanced at Chris. On signal, they scanned the room. The place was small, more homey than rented rooms in Americadoilies, lace curtains, flowers in a vase. Like the car, it smelled of dampness. Though the escorts had vouched for the safety of the place, Saul didn't know if he could trust them. On the one hand, he saw no reason not to. On the other, too many people had become involved, too many chances for further betrayal.

As if they heard his suspicions, Chris and Erika nodded. Since the room might be bugged, they didn't say a word but quickly changed from their uniforms. The men paid no more attention to Erika's nakedness then she did to theirs. In nondescript street clothes, they took apart, tested, and reassembled the weapons the escorts had given them. The other equipment they'd requested functioned perfectly. Leaving nothing behind, they crept down the musty back stairs of the rooming house. In the rear, they crossed a mews toward a maze of alleys, using complex evasion procedures to lose a tail in the London rain. Not even Misha Pletz knew why they'd come to England. Now on their own, they'd become invisible again, their destination undetectable.

Except, Saul thought uneasily. One other person knew the man who'd supplied the address and description of their target. Strict security would have required silencing Hardy to protect themselves. But how could I justify it? Saul asked himself. Hardy helped. I like the sonofabitch too much.

All the same, he kept repeating. Loose ends bothered him.

They were waiting, and he hadn't thought to take even such an elementary precaution as avoiding his apartment. Of course he'd been drinking heavily, the familiar excuse. Not only had it clouded his judgment. It also had stunned his reflexes, so when he staggered into his apartment and turned to lock the door, he didn't move fast enough from the footsteps charging toward him. Maybe sober he could have yanked the door back open and rushed down the hall, but as adrenaline hit the alcohol in his stomach and made him want to throw up, the man who'd been hiding in the closet twisted his arm, slamming him hard against the wall, spreading his legs in a frisk position.

The second man, darting from the bathroom, pawed along his body, checking his buttocks and privates. "Snub-nosed diirtyeight. Right ankle," he told his partner, pocketing the weapon. "Sofa," the partner told Hardy. "Lawn chair," Hardy told him. "What the-?" "You guys practice hard enough, you'll soon get up to verbs."

"Just do what the hell you're told."

Hardy's forehead throbbed from its impact against the wall. He sat. His heart skipped a beat, but his mind stayed surprisingly calm, no doubt the effect of a day spent at the corner bar. Indeed since Saul had left, he'd been drinking harder than ever. Despite his determination never to let his drunkenness make him undignified, he'd let his pants become wrinkled, his shoes scuffed. Though he'd begged to go along, Saul had refused. "You've helped enough." But Hardy had understood. He thinks I'm too old. He figures he can't depend on a... Lush? Hardy had stupefied himself to forget that Saul now did what he himself-if he'd had any guts-should have done years ago. The two men were in their early thirties. Hardy smelled their sick-sweet aftershave. He glanced at their all-American anonymous features. Short neat hair and Brooks Brothers suits. He recognized them. Not that he'd seen them before, but in his prime he'd often used their counterparts.

GS-7s. The agency's drones. Their rank made him angry, aggravated by his drunkenness, telling him he wasn't considered dangerous enough for a shakedown by a first-class team. They represented contempt.

He seethed but didn't show it, bourbon making him brave. "Well, now that we're nice and comfy--.' "Shut your fucking mouth," the first man said. "I told you."

"What?"

"You'd get up to verbs." The two drones glanced at each other. "Make the call," the first one said. The second picked up the phone, and even through a blur, Hardy noticed he touched eleven digits. "What? Long distance? I hope to God it's collect."

"I'm gonna love this," the second one said and spoke to the phone. "We've got him. No, it was easy. Sure." He stared at Hardy. "Guess what?" He grinned. "It's for you."

Reluctant, Hardy took the phone. Though he knew what was coming, he pretended he didn't. "Hello?"

The voice from the other end was as dry as chalk, as crisp as dead leaves-brittle, ancient, without a soul. "I trust my associates treated you well."

"Who-?" "Come now. Phlegm obscured the voice. "No need for games."

"I said-"

"Very well. I feel like being amused. I'll play along."

Hardy fumed when he heard the name. "I hoped I'd never hear from you again, you bloodsucker."

"Name-calling?" Eliot clicked his tongue. "What happened to your manners?"

"I lost them with my job, you jack-off."

"Not at my age." Eliot laughed. "I believe you may have had some visitors."

"You mean apart from Tweedledum and Tweedledee here?

Visitors? Who the hell would want to visit me?"

"Two very naughty children."

"The son and the daughter I'll admit to won't even talk to me. "I'm referring to Saul and Chris, of course."

"Refer all you want. Whatever this is about, I haven't seen them. Even if I had, I'd never tell you."

"That's the problem, isn't it?"

"No, something else is. What's gone wrong?' "That's very good. Answer a question with a question. It helps to avoid mistakes."

"It gives me a pain. I'm hanging up."

"No, wait. I'm not sure what they told you. They're in trouble."

"They told me nothing. They weren't here. For God sake, I'm trying to enjoy my retirement. Take your drones. Stay out of my life."

"You don't understand. It's Chris. He violated the sanction. Saul's helping him escape."

"So the first thing they do is come to me? Oh, sure. For what? A lot of good I'd be. Against the Russians? Bullshit."

Hardy winced. "Perhaps you're right. May I speak to one of my associates, please?"

Hardy felt too sick to answer. He handed the phone to number one. "What is it? Yes, sir, I understand." He gave the phone back to Hardy. "You make a mistake," Eliot said. "Don't rub it in. I know."

"I have to admit you were doing -quite well before that. Especially considering you're out of practice."

"Instinct."

"Habit's more reliable. Really, the Russians. Why did you have to mention them? I hoped you'd be a better opponent."

"Sorry to disappoint you."

"You wouldn't have mentioned the Russians unless you knew they claimed the violation. Apart from our differences, I was right to have you fired. Sloppy tradecraft. When you're interrogated, you ought to know you never volunteer information, no matter how seemingly irrelevant."

"I don't need a lecture, for Christ's sake. How'd you know they'd come to me?"

"I didn't. Actually-no offense-I thought of you only this morning. After I'd tried all their other contacts. You were my last resort."