"Academicians aren't very competent when it comes to practical matters. just make sure our associates in Bonn get the information."
"Yes .. . yes, of course, Paris. Oh, my God!"
Moreau hung up the phone and leaned back in his chair.
Things-things-were going his way. They might not be the best, but they were better than anyone else's. If he lost, he and his wife could always retire comfortably somewhere outside of France. On the other hand, he could also be executed by a firing squad. C'est la vie.
It was early evening, the setting sun filtered through the windows of Karin de Vries's apartment on the rue Madeleine.
"I went to my flat this afternoon," said Drew, sitting in the armchair, talking to Karin, across on the couch.
"Of course, I had a marine on either side of me-sworn to secrecy by Witkowski, who could send them back to boot camp-and they kept their hands on their bolstered weapons, but still it felt good to be able to walk in the street, you know what I mean?"
"I do, indeed, but I worry about misplaced confidence. Suppose there are others we don't know about?"
"Hell, we know about one, Reynolds, in Communications. I'm told he fled like a rat into the sewers, probably living on a Nazi pension in the Mediterranean, if they didn't decide to shoot him first."
"If he's in the Mediterranean, I suspect his body is several hundred feet below on the ocean's bottom."
"Actually, it's a sea."
"I don't think the definition would matter to him."
Chapter Eighteen
Silence. Finally, Drew spoke.
"Where are we, lady?"
"What do you mean?"
"What do I have to do, go by the numbers?"
"What numbers?"
"Like "One, two, three, four, what the hell am I marching for?"
You've been hiding me all night and all day, but I can't get near you."
"What are you talking about, Drew?"
"Christ, I'm not even sure how to put it.. .. I never thought I'd think it, not really, and certainly not say it to someone who may be keeping me from being killed, a subordinate who has an apartment I could never afford."
"Please be clearer."
"How can I? I always thought I'd march to my brother's drum; he was so right, so perfect. Then I heard him in that booth before he was killed-you know what I mean-crying out how much he loved you, adored you-"
"Stop it, Drew," said De Vries sharply.
"Are you saying you're imitating your brother in his delusions?"
"No, I'm not," said Latham calmly, quietly, his eyes locked with hers.
"His delusions are not my feelings, Karin. I've grown out of that syndrome; it never did me much good anyway. You came into his life first, mine years later, and the equation, no matter how similar, is worlds apart. I'm not Harry, I could never be him, but I'm me, and I've never known anyone like you.. .. How's that for some kind of declaration?"
"Extremely touching, my dear."
"There's that 'my dear' again. Meaning nothing."
"Don't belittle it, Drew. I have to get rid of my ghosts, and when I do, it would be nice to think that you might be there for me.
Perhaps I could become attached to you, for you have qualities I so admire, but a relationship is a remote and distant thing to me now.
The past has to be put to rest. Can you understand that?"
"Whether I do or I don't, I'll do my goddamnedest to make it happen."
The post-noonday crowds filled the street, the office buildings severely depleted as hordes of employees rushed to their favorite cafes and restaurants for luncheon engagements. The Parisian lunch was more than a meal; as often as not, it was a minor event, and God help the employer who expected his hired hands, particularly his manicured executives, to return on time, most especially during the summer weeks.
Which is why Dr. Gerhardt Kroeger was becoming more and more agitated, continuously jostled as he was by the departing crowds while he stood holding the folded newspaper in front of his face, his eyes on the entrance of the [email protected] Bureau's building oh his left. He could not afford to miss the figure of Claude Moreau. Time was of the essence, not an hour to be wasted. His creation, Harry Latham, had entered the countdown; he had, at maximum, two days, forty-eight hours, and even this was imprecise.
And what added to the surgeon's near-unbearable stress was a detail he had not described to his superiors in the Briiderschaft:
Prior to a subject's brain finally rejecting the implant, virtually exploding, the area