The Janson Directive - By Robert Ludlum Page 0,206

'peacemaker' - "

"It was originally a 60 Minutes segment that dubbed him that, and it stuck. For good reason. The peacemaker established a foundation with offices in nearly every regional capital in the world."

"And his incredible humanitarian assistance?"

"Isn't this country the best? And isn't it messed up that no matter how much good we do, so many people around the world hate our guts? Yes, it meant offering balm to the world's trouble spots. Look, the World Bank is a lender of last resort. This guy's a lender of first resort. Which ensured that he would have enormous influence with governments the world over. Peter Novak: your roving ambassador for peace and stability."

"Oil on troubled waters."

"Expensive oil, make no mistake. But 'Novak' could mediate, resolve conflicts that we could never - openly - go near. He's been able to deal effectively and confidentially with regimes that consider us the Great Satan. He has been a one-man foreign policy. And what made him so goddamn effective is precisely the fact that he appears to have no connection to us."

Janson's mind whirled, buzzed, filled with the echoes of voices - confiding, cautioning, threatening. Nikos Andros: You Americans have never been able to wrap your minds around anti-Americanism. You so want to be loved that you cannot understand why there is so little love for you. A man wears big boots and wonders why the ants beneath his feet fear and hate him. Angus Fielding: The one thing that you Americans have never quite grasped is how very deep anti-Americanism goes ... The Serbian with gold-rimmed glasses: You Americans always want things that arent on the menu, don't you? You can never have enough choices. A Hungarian barkeep with a lethal pastime: You Americans complain about drug traffickers in Asia, and meanwhile you flood the world with the electronic equivalent ... Everywhere you go, you find your own spoor. The slime of the serpent is over all.

A cacophony resolved itself into a single refrain, another kind of plain-chant.

You Americans.

You Americans.

You Americans.

You Americans.

Janson suppressed a shiver. "But who is - was - Peter Novak?" he asked.

"It was kind of like the Six Million Dollar Man - 'Gentlemen, we can rebuild him, we have the technology. We have the capability to make him better than he was before. Better. Stronger. Faster.' " He broke off. "Well, richer, anyway. Fact is, three agents were assigned to the part. They were all similar-looking to begin with, very close to one another in build and height. And then surgery made them damned near identical. All sorts of computerized micrometers were used - an exhaustive procedure. But we had to have replicas in place: given our investment, we couldn't afford to have our guy hit by a bus, or drop dead from a stroke. Three seemed like good odds."

Janson looked at Collins strangely. "Who would ever agree to do such a thing? To allow his entire identity to be wiped out, to become dead to everyone he ever knew, his very countenance transformed ... "

"Someone who had no choice," Collins replied cryptically.

Janson felt a gorge of anger. He knew Collins's sangfroid was all on the surface, but the heartlessness of the man's reasoning summed everything up: the damnable arrogance of the planners. The damn strategic elites with their neatly trimmed cuticles and their blithe certainty that what worked on the page would work in the real world. They saw the globe as a chessboard, were oblivious to the fact that people made of flesh and blood would suffer the consequences of their grand schemes. He could hardly stand to look at the bureaucrat before him, and his eyes drifted toward the glittering bay, toward the fishing boat that had moved into view, safely beyond the security zone that began half a mile from the shore, marked off by warning buoys. "Someone who had no choice?" He shook his head. "You mean the way I had no choice when you set me up to be killed."

"That again." Collins rolled his eyes. "Like I said, calling off the termination order would have raised too many questions. The cowboys at the CIA got credible reports that Novak had been killed and that you had something to do with it. Cons Ops got hold of the same info. The last thing any of us at Mobius wanted bruited about, but you play the cards you're dealt. At the time, I did what I thought was best." The words were mere words, expressing neither