The Janson Directive - By Robert Ludlum Page 0,150

support. My job's pretty much just to keep watch. Things get a little out of hand, though. The guy slips the net. He's got a whole mess of microfiche on him, we know, so we definitely don't want him to escape. Somehow he slipped the lobby cordon, and he's racing down the street to his car. If he gets in the car, he's gone, because we don't have vehicular coverage. Nobody expected him to get that far, see. So I request permission to blow the handle off the car door. Slow him down. Operation manager says no - they think it's too dangerous, that I'll hit the subject, risk an international incident. Shit, the manager's covering his ass. I know what I can hit. The risk's zero. Manager doesn't know me, and he's saying, Hold fire. Stand down. Red light. Desist. "

"You squeeze off a shot anyway."

"Pop in a steel-jacketed round, blast off the door handle. Now he can't get into the car, and he's scared shitless to boot, I mean he just freezes, saying his prayers to the Chairman, and our guys end up hauling him off. Fellow has beaucoup microfiche on him, technical specs on every kind of telecom device you could name."

"So you save the day."

"And get shit-canned for my troubles. 'Acting in contravention of orders,' that kind of bullshit. Sixty-day suspension followed by disciplinary proceedings. Except these spooks swoop in and say they like my style, and how'd I like a life of travel and adventure."

"I think I've got the general idea," Janson said, and he did. In all likelihood, he knew from his own experience as a recruiter, the Consular Operations team first checked out her scores and field reports. Those had to have been startlingly impressive, for Cons Ops had a generally low estimation of the Feds. Once she was identified as a serious talent, someone in Cons Ops probably pulled strings with a contact at the Bureau and arranged for her suspension - simply to facilitate the transfer. If Cons Ops wanted her, they would get her. Hence they'd take steps to ensure that their offer of employment was accepted with alacrity. The scenario Jessica Kincaid had described sounded accurate, but incomplete.

"That's not all," she said, a little shyly. "I went through heavy-duty training when I joined up Cons Ops, and everyone in my class had to prepare a history paper on something or somebody."

"Ah, yes, the Spy Bio paper. And who'd you pick for Spy Bio - Mata Hari?"

"Nope. A legendary field officer by the name of Paul Janson. Did a whole analysis of his techniques and tactics."

"You're kidding." Janson built a fire in the stone fireplace, stacking the logs and crumpling sections of the Italian newspapers beneath them. The dry logs caught on quickly and burned with a steady flame.

"You're an impressive guy, what can I say? But I also identified certain mistakes you were liable to make. A certain ... weakness." Her eyes were playful, but her voice was not.

Janson took a long sip of the hot, strong Java. "Shortly before Rick Frazier's 1986 match with Michael Spinks, Frazier's coach announced to the boxing world that he'd identified a 'weakness' in Spinks's position. There was a lot of discussion and speculation at the time. Then Rick Frazier got into the ring. Two rounds later, he was knocked out." He smiled. "Now, what were you saying about this weakness?"

The ends of Jessica Kincaid's mouth turned down. "That's why they chose me, you know. I mean, for the hit."

"Because you were a veritable Paul Janson scholar. Someone who'd know my moves better than anybody. Yes, I can see that logic. I can see an operations director thinking he was pretty clever to come up with it."

"For sure. The idea of staking out Grigori Berman's place - that was mine. I was sure we'd catch up with you in Amsterdam, too. Lot of people were guessing you'd be lighting out for the U.S. of A. Not me."

"No, not you, with your graduate-equivalency degree in Janson Studies."

She fell silent, staring into the lees of her mug. "There's one question I've been meaning to ask you."

"Have at it."

"Just something I've always wondered about. In 1990, you had a drop on Jamal Nadu, big-deal terrorist mastermind. Reliable intelligence accounts, from sources you cultivated, identified an urban safe house he was using in Amman, and the car he was going to be transported in. A raggedy, funky ol' beggar approaches the car, gets shooed away, falls to