to project an aura of overwhelming force.
As he had thought, Deschesnes was alone. The winter sunlight was beaming through the large window opposite the door and casting a silvery glow onto a sparsely furnished living room. There was a bookshelf with a few books, a coffee table covered with newspapers, typescripts, and magazines. It had been an advantage before that the whole room was visible from the street; now it was a disadvantage.
"Bedroom?" Ambler asked.
Deschesnes jerked his head to the left toward a doorway and Ambler marched him across to it.
"You're alone?" Ambler asked as he scanned the bedroom.
Deschesnes nodded. He was telling the truth.
The man before Ambler was large framed but soft, with the expanding girth of too many expensive meals, too little exercise. Fen-ton's workup had described a man who was truly a force for evil in the world.
Takecare of Benoit and you'll be the equivalent of a made man. Then we'll talk.
If Fenton was correct, the UN dignitary deserved death, and by arranging that death Ambler could infiltrate into the very heart of Fenton's enterprise. He would obtain the knowledge he sought. He would learn who he really was-and was not.
The bedroom had opaque roller shades, and Ambler, keeping the physicist within his sights, pulled the blinds down. He sat on the arm of a sofa by the window, piled up untidily with clothes. "Sit," he said, pointing the gun at the bed. Then he sat still for a moment, staring intently at Deschesnes.
With slow movements, the Frenchman withdrew his billfold from his pocket.
"Put that away," Ambler said.
Deschesnes froze, his fear compounded with confusion.
"I'm told your English is pretty good," Ambler went on, "but if you don't understand anything I say, just tell me."
"Why are you here?" These were Deschesnes' first words.
"Didn't you know this day would come?" Ambler said quietly.
"I see," Deschesnes said. A sorrowful look came over him. He sat down as if winded. "Then you are Gilbert. It's funny, but I always assumed you were French. She never told me you were not. Not that we ever talked about you. I do know that she loves you, that she has always loved you. Joelle, she was always up-front about this. What we have-what we have is a different thing. It is not serieuse.
I don't expect you to excuse or forgive, but I must tell you-"
"Monsieur Deschesnes," Ambler broke in, "I have no connection to Joelle. This has nothing to do with your personal life."
"But then-"
"It has everything to do with your professional life. Your covert professional life. Those are the true liaisons dangereuses.
I refer to your connections with those whose hearts are set on nuclear weaponry. Those you are too eager to please."
A look of pure bewilderment appeared on Deschesnes' face-the kind of bewilderment it was extremely difficult to fake. Was it that his English was limited? It seemed utterly fluent, but perhaps his comprehension was imperfect.
"Je voudrais connaitre votre role dans la proliferation nucleaire," Ambler said, enunciating clearly.
Deschesnes replied in English. "My role in nuclear proliferation is a matter of public record. I have spent a career working against it."
He broke off, suddenly wary. "A ruffian invades a residence of mine and holds me at gunpoint, and I am supposed to talk about my vocation? Who sent you? What in God's name is this about?"
"Call it a performance review. Speak to the point or you'll never speak again. No games. No second-guessing."
Deschesnes' eyes narrowed. "Did Actions des Francais send you?" he asked, referring to the organization of antinuclear activists. "Do you people realize how incredibly counterproductive this is-acting as if I am the enemy?"
"Speak to the point," Ambler barked. "Tell me about your meeting with Dr. Abdullah Alamoudi in Geneva last spring."
The UN eminence looked bewildered. "What are you talking about?"
"I'm asking the questions here, goddammit. Are you pretending you don't know who Dr. Alamoudi is?"
"Certainly I know who he is," the Frenchman returned, with wounded dignity. "You refer to a Libyan physicist who is on our watchlist. We believe him to be involved in a secret weapons programs involving various Arab League nations."
"Then why would the director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency be meeting with such a person?"
"Why indeed?" Deschesnes spluttered. "Alamoudi would no more be caught in the same room as me than a mouse would curl up with a cat." Ambler detected no trace of deception.
"And how do you explain your trip to Harare last year?"
"I cannot," the UN eminence said simply.
"Now we're getting somewhere."
"Because I have never been