The Shroud of Heaven (39 page)

He lingered in the shadows of alley a moment, searching for signs of a second trailing vehicle. Typically, intelligence and police agencies trying to maintain contact with a mobile suspect would employ as many as four different automobiles in constant radio contact, to avoid the kind of amateurish mistakes that had alerted Kismet to the presence of the tail. But with no other vehicles in evidence, he rose from his hiding place and moved in the same direction the other cars had gone.

The street opened onto the Rue de Rivoli, which ran along the northern edge of the Jardin des Tuileries. The extensive garden was just a part of the large city park which included such famous Parisian landmarks as the Arc de Triomphe and the Musée du Louvre. Traffic on the boulevard was constant and steady; if there was a backup surveillance vehicle, it had already moved on. This revelation prompted Kismet to eschew his stated plan to use the transit system in favor of a more straightforward means of transportation. He flagged down a passing taxi and in flawless French, gave the driver Chiron’s address.

The building, located on an insignificant thoroughfare which connected the Rue de Richelieu and the Rue St. Roch, was just as Kismet remembered. No lights burned on the top floor of the three-story house, the floor where Pierre and Collette Chiron had lived most of their married life together in a two-bedroom apartment. Kismet had once asked why the aging couple had not retired to the country, and sensed in the answer that he had unwittingly aggravated an old wound. It had always been their intention to leave the urban environment in order to raise their children, and since fate had not deigned to grant them that fondest wish, there had been no reason to leave. Shaking off the bittersweet memory, Kismet scanned the area looking for anything out of place, then moved inside.

The interior of the apartment building was quiet. A single incandescent bulb depending from the ceiling of each landing provided the only illumination and the only evidence that the structure was in fact occupied at all. Kismet saw no indication that anyone was in the building as he crept up the stairs to Chiron’s threshold.

With a grimace, he unleashed a kick to a point above the latching mechanism. The door burst inward with a noise that seemed, in the stillness, like a gunshot, but if anyone on the second floor heard, they elected not to investigate. He quickly moved inside and closed the door. After a moment of fumbled searching, he found the light switch. Even before his eyes could adjust, he knew something was wrong.

There were four of them, all dressed in black, looking very much like they had in the laboratory complex. Their guns were the same also, and without exception, were fixed on him. “Damn.”

Rebecca Gault stalked forward, her gun sight never wavering. “Kismet? You’re the last person I expected to see here.”

Her incredulity caught him off guard.
If they’re not waiting for me…
?

“I might say the same thing,” he said, hiding his surprise. He looked past the barrel of the Steyr TMP 9 mm in her hands and stared directly into her eyes. The irises were a remarkable shade of green, something he had failed to notice during their previous encounters. “I’m afraid you have me at a disadvantage.”

She didn’t respond, and he took a moment to glance at the dour expressions of her comrades before continuing. “You’ve seen me naked.”

Rebecca’s stony mask did not slip, but when one of her men made a rude comment in their shared tongue, she silenced him with a look as lethal as a guillotine. When her gaze returned to Kismet, he saw a glimmer of humor in her eyes. “That was professional. I was your doctor.”

“You’re no doctor. The real Dr. Gault is still in Switzerland.”

“That may be true, but I am nevertheless a physician, Monsieur Kismet.” The gun came up again. “Where’s Chiron?”

“What makes you think I would know? He left us to die in that hole. That was the plan all along, wasn’t it, Doc? No witnesses?” He took her silence as confirmation, and it occurred to him that the death warrant was probably still in effect. Working up his best poker face, he continued. “Well I’ve got news for you. I’ve already told the UN and the US State department. When the sun rises tomorrow, the whole world is going to know about your dirty deals with Saddam Hussein.”

Rebecca’s nostrils flared angrily, but she surprised him by lowering her gun again. “I’m afraid that’s the least of my worries right now.”

Suddenly he understood. “Pierre double-crossed you too, didn’t he?”

“If you know where he is, Monsieur Kismet…” Her tone was more pleading than demanding, and that was sufficiently out of character for her that Kismet felt a whisper of uneasiness.

“What’s really going on here? What’s Pierre done that has you so freaked out?”

She glanced at her comrades as if uncertain what she should say in front of them, then stepped closer to him. “Seven hours ago, Pierre Chiron visited an IAEA facility in Geneva. A nuclear storage facility. After he left, a routine inspection revealed that a small amount of weapon’s grade plutonium was missing.”

“He just walked in and took nuclear fuel?”

“His credentials allow him to conduct research. He’s been there before on several occasions.” She tilted her head to look up at him, to hold his gaze with her own. “He took something from the cave. He claimed it was a relic from an ancient civilization. It was the price of his cooperation. Do you know what is was?”

“Relic?” Had Pierre actually found the Staff of Moses? But then why would he need… “Plutonium. How much?”

“Enough. Six kilograms. Among other things, the facility was storing the cores from decommissioned Soviet SS-18s.”

“Did you count the detonators before you blew up that weapons lab?”

“Of course. I checked their serial numbers. All three detonators were accounted for.”

Kismet shook his head with a grimace. “There was another detonator. One the Iraqis were building based on the same design.”

“I didn’t see it.”

“Of course not. Pierre had it wrapped up in a courier bag. You helped him get it out of there. And now he can arm it.”

He could tell from her expression that she already knew this to be true. “You have known him longer than anyone. What will he do with it? Sell it?”

“That doesn’t sound like Pierre.” As soon as he said it, he realized the flaw in her statement. Though he had been acquainted with Chiron for nearly a decade, it was now very apparent that he really didn’t know the man at all. “He’s obviously been planning this for a while.”

Rebecca nodded. “He approached the Directorate almost eight months ago.”

“But he couldn’t have known that our search would turn up the lab.” Kismet was thinking aloud now, rather than responding to the intelligence agent’s comments. He closed his eyes, trying to remember what had been said during the survey of the Esagilia. He remembered only his incredulity at Chiron’s wild theories about Moses and Solomon.
But he was so sincere. If he wanted to dupe me, why would he have concocted such a wild story
? “Maybe there’s something here that could tell us. Have you searched the place?”

“We made a cursory search of his papers. If he has a safe, we have not located it.”

He pushed past her, heedless of the machine pistols still trained on him, and moved through the familiar environs of Chiron’s flat. Little had changed since his last visit, but here too he saw the careful orderliness that had distinguished the Frenchman’s office at the UNESCO headquarters. Chiron had squared everything away as if closing shop for the last time. With the decision to embark into the wilderness, he had left his old life behind forever.

Rebecca was right behind him as he entered Chiron’s library. The area had always been the old man’s second office, and in addition to the wealth of published knowledge lining the bookshelves, he had a personal computer equipped with a high-speed Internet connection, which at present was displaying a screen saver program with a slide show of famous paintings.

“Do you know his password?” Rebecca asked as he sat down in front of the keyboard.

He shook his head, but nevertheless tapped the spacebar to banish the screen saver and bring up the security prompt. He stared at it thoughtfully, his fingers hovering above the keys.

Rebecca took out a cell phone. “I’ll send for a computer expert. We should be able to break this—”

Kismet tapped out eight letters: C-O-L-L-E-T-T-E. The password window vanished to be replaced by a graphic desktop display featuring Picasso’s
Fall of Icarus
. It was, he knew, one of the large murals adorning Building Three of the Fontenoy campus. Rebecca fell silent at his shoulder and continued watching as he began randomly opening files and exploring Chiron’s history of browsing the World Wide Web. A file folder titled “Geomancy” caught his eye.

“What is that?” she asked as the hard drive began whirring to locate the relevant data.

“Earth magic. It’s the belief that the planet itself has power which can be tapped for…well, whatever a person wants, I suppose. The Chinese still practice a form of it today: Feng Shui. It was the driving force behind most Pagan religions as well, Wicca, Druidism, and so forth.” He trailed off as the cathode ray tube began displaying lines of text. The folder marked “Geomancy” was a journal of Chiron’s musings and revelations on the subject.

Before attempting to decipher and digest the information, Kismet checked his watch. Almost twenty minutes had elapsed since his separation from Marie and Buttrick. It was almost time to make contact. Then the irony of his situation hit home. He had left them in order to throw off pursuit, and in so doing had walked right into the web of the woman he most believed to be his enemy, only to forge a tacit truce in pursuit of a greater need.

But who had been following them?

“You know,” he said, half turning to Rebecca. “There is something you could do for me.”

***

With Marie’s guidance, Buttrick expertly navigated the boulevards of Paris, running a gauntlet of traffic signals and fearless French drivers from one end of the city to the other. The sedan pursuing them made a valiant effort to keep up, but without even trying, Buttrick managed to lose them somewhere along the way. After another five minutes of observing the flow of traffic around them, Marie confirmed that they had lost their shadow. A few minutes after that, they pulled over in front of her apartment building.

The excitement of the chase was like a tonic to the Army officer. He had no idea who their pursuer had been and didn’t really care. It had been enough for him to have an opponent against whom to pit his talent and wit. The company wasn’t too bad either.

Marie had opened up more and more during their ride together, and when she finally guided him into her tastefully decorated flat, it felt as natural as a visit to an old friend. She directed him to a seat at the breakfast bar and began preparing a light snack for them to share.

“How long have you known him?” she inquired, taking a seat beside him.

“You mean Nick? We’ve only just met.”

She raised an eyebrow in obvious surprise. “I had no idea. You two seem to have a genuine rapport.”

“Well, you should have seen us earlier,” he answered with a grin. “How about you?”

Marie touched her fingers to her chest in a quizzical gesture. “Me? I too have only known Nick a short time. In fact, I had only just met him at the airport when we came under attack.”

It was Buttrick’s turn for surprise. “I just assumed that since you both work for… You are a… I mean, together, right?”

She gave a coquettish smile. “Nick is very brave and charismatic. Given the circumstances, I suppose it was inevitable that we would…” She shook her head as if trying to dismiss a bothersome notion. “Who can say what the future holds? Nick will return to New York, I will stay here.”

For some reason, Buttrick was suddenly in a very good mood, but before he could respond, Marie let her smile slip and put on a serious mask. “There is one thing that has troubled me. Nick told me that, when he was attacked that day at the museum, the assassin indicated he was under orders not to kill him. He was specifically told not to be the cause of Kismet’s death. How can that be?”

The mere mention of the museum incident had instantly soured Buttrick’s euphoria, but it took a moment for the precipitation from that dark cloud to actually soak in. “Hold on. Are you suggesting they were in cahoots?”

“No,” she answered, earnestly. “I don’t see how that could be possible. I mean if that were true, why would Nick reveal what was said? There has to be another explanation. There’s something about Nick that makes him very important to his enemies. I thought you might have some insight to that.”

“Do you think it could have something to do with his military service?” Wheels began turning in his head. He checked his watch. “It’s still afternoon in Washington. I know someone who might be able to help. Can I use your phone?”

***

Although vehicle traffic to the area was restricted, Chiron managed to thread the minibus through the barricades and drove right to the edge of the structure he thought of only as “
le observatoire
”. Despite the lateness of the hour, the area was crowded with tourists and it took a few moments for park security personnel and the gendarmes to reach him. As they got close, they wisely assumed defensive positions and those few equipped with handguns covered one of their comrades who cautiously approached him. Chiron rolled down his window.

“Monsieur, you must get out of the vehicle.”

Chiron did not attempt subterfuge. He slowly raised his hands, openly displaying the remote. “This is the trigger for a very large explosive device. If I let go, it will detonate.”

The gendarme blanched, but did not retreat. Chiron could almost see the wheels turning in his head—the blank look as he searched his memory to find the correct response for the scenario. The paralysis was contagious. Chiron knew that if he did not keep moving, if he got stalled here on the ground, it would all be for naught.

“Young man!” he snapped. “You are wasting time and endangering lives. It is not your job to negotiate with me. Evacuate the area, or the blood of all these people will be on your hands.”