"You refer to my own secret, not so? The reason why I take the risks I do to destroy the fanatical German wherever I can find him."
"Yes, I do."
"Very well. You won't be in a position to spread the information, thus harming my family, so why not? .. . I had a sister, Marie, quite a bit younger than I, and as our father had died, she looked upon me as taking his place, and certainly I adored her. She was so alive, so filled with the innocence of blossoming youth, and to add to that crown of spring flowers, she was a dancer-perhaps not a prima ballerina, but certainly an accomplished member of the corps de ballet. However, during the angriest years of the Cold War, solely to avenge themselves on me, the East German Stasi destroyed that glorious child. They kidnapped her and rapidly turned her into a drug addict, forcing her into prostitution to support her induced habit. She collapsed and died on the Unter den Linden at the age of twenty-six, begging for food or money, as she could no longer sell her body.. .. That is my secret, Karin. It's not very pretty, is it?"
"It's horrible," said De Vries.
"And you were helpless to do anything about it, about her?"
"I did not know. Our mother had passed away, and I was in deep cover in the Mediterranean sector for thirteen months.
"When I returned to Paris, I found in my long suspended mail four photographs, courtesy of the East Berlin Polizel, by way of the Stasi. They showed what was left in death of my child sister."
"I could cry, and I mean that, Claude, I'm not merely saying it.
"I'm sure you do, my dear, for you have an equally agonizing story to tell, is it not so?"
"How did you find out?"
"I'll explain later. First, I must ask you again. When will you tell our American friend? Or don't you intend to do so?"
"I can't right now-"
"Then you are merely using him," interrupted Moreau.
"Yes, I am," exclaimed De Vries.
"That's the way it started but not the way it's turned out. Think what you will of me, but I do love him-I've come to love him. It's a far greater shock to me than anyone else. He has so many qualities of the Freddie I married-too many, in fact, and that frightens me. He's warm and searching and angry; he's a good man who's trying to find his focus, or his compass, or whatever you want to call it. He's as lost as we all are, but he's determined to find answers. Freddie was like that at the beginning. Before he changed and became an obsessed animal."
"We both heard Drew several minutes ago talking about Courtland. I was appalled at his coldness. Is this the Freddie syndrome?"
"No, not at all. Drew is becoming the brother he's impersonating. He has to be Harry."
"Then how far down the road does he become Freddie?
The animal?"
"He can't, he can't. He's too decent for that."
"Then tell him the truth."
"What is truth?"
"Start with honesty, Karin."
"What's honest any longer?"
"Your husband's alive. Frederik de Vries is alive, but nobody knows where he is or who he is."
The Deuxieme escort consisted of the driver of reckless abandon, Franqois, and two guards whose names were spoken so rapidly that Latham dubbed them "Monsieur Frick" and "Monsieur Frack."
"Are your daughters speaking to you, Franqois?" asked Drew from the backseat as he and Monsieur Frack flanked Karin.
"Not a word," replied the driver.
"My wife was quite harsh with them, explaining that they should respect their father."
"Did it do any good?"
"None. They marched to their room and closed the door, on which they hung a sign reading Private."
"Is this something I should know about?" said De Vries.
"Only the obvious conclusion that children of the female species can be notoriously cruel to their saintly fathers," answered Latham.
"I think I'll let that pass."
Twenty minutes later they arrived at the Deuxi&me Bureau, a nondescript stone building with an underground parking area that was entered only after the scrutiny of armed guards. Frick and Frack took Drew and Karin up in a steel-encased electronic elevator that required an inordinately long series of codes to operate. They reached the fifth floor and were escorted to Moreau's office, less of an office actually than a large living room, the venetian blinds half closed. What comforts existed were shockingly intruded upon by an array of computers and various other high-tech equipment.