The night of the explosion, a black van was seen parked behind the Pasteur annex on the rue des Volontaires. Just minutes before the explosion, it left the area. You know Chambord had a research assistant?'
'Yes. Last I heard, the French authorities were looking for him. He's been found?'
'Dead. Suicide. He killed himself last night in a miserable little hotel outside Bordeaux. He'd been vacationing in a village on the coast, painting the fishermen, of all fool things. According to one of the kid's Paris friends, Chambord had told him he was working too hard, take a vacation, and that's his idea of fun. These French. So what was he doing in a fleabag on the wrong side of the Garonne?'
'They're sure it was suicide?'
'So they say. The CIA tells me the owner of the fleabag remembers the assistant was carrying a briefcase when he checked in. He noticed, because it's more luggage than most of his so-called guests have. You know what I mean it's that kind of 'hotel.' The deal was that the assistant was alone, no girlfriend, no boyfriend. And if he did have a briefcase, it's missing now.'
'You figure the bombers hit again, made the murder look like a suicide, and then took the briefcase and whatever was in it.'
Henze jumped up, paced, and marched back to his favorite post at the window. 'Thinking about it is, the president tells me, your job. But I will say the CIA is of the opinion the suicide has a rank odor, even though the Sret seems satisfied.'
Smith pondered. 'The research assistant would've known Chambord's progress, but that alone wouldn't necessarily have been enough reason to kill him. After Chambord's death, and the rumors of success, we'd have to act as if Chambord built a working molecular machine anyway. So I'd say there had to be more reason. Most likely, the briefcase, as you suspect. The assistant's notes maybe Chambord's own notes something inside that they considered dangerous or critical.'
'Yeah,' Henze growled, and turned to give Smith a baleful stare. 'So, because Diego Garcia happened, it looks like the bombers have the data for whatever Chambord created, which you think's an honest-to-God working molecular supercomputer'
'A prototype,' Smith corrected.
'What does that mean?'
'It's probably bulky, not easily portable. Glass and tubes and connections. Not yet the sleek commercial models we'll see in the future.'
The general frowned. 'The important question is, will it do the job?'
'With a competent operator, it sure looks like it.'
'Then what's the difference? They have this damn thing, and we have bubkes. Now, ain't that a kick in the eye.'
'Yessir. In fact, I'd say that was a serious mule kick.'
Henze nodded soberly. 'So get it out of my eye, Colonel.'
'I'll do my best, General.'
'Do better. I'm going to have my Deputy Commander at NATO that's General La Porte to you get in touch. He's a Frenchman. Their military is naturally concerned. Since this is their country, the White House wants to keep them feeling happy, but not give them any more than we absolutely have to, understand? La Porte has already been sniffing around about you and Dr. Zellerbach. I get the impression he senses he's being left out of the loop everywhere that's the French again. I told him you're here as a friend of Dr. Zellerbach, but I can see he's skeptical. He's heard about that little fracas at the Pompidou Hospital, so be prepared for a bunch of personal questions, but stick to your story.' Henze crossed to the door, opened it, and held out his hand. 'Keep in touch. Whatever you need, call. Sergeant Matthias over there will walk you out.'
Smith shook the iron hand. Out in the corridor, the short, stocky sergeant was not happy to leave his post. He opened his mouth to argue with the general a career master sergeant, for sure but caught his boss's eye and thought better of it.
Without a word, he escorted Smith down the stairs and past the concierge, who was smoking a Gitane behind her counter. As Smith passed, he spotted the butt of a 9mm pistol in the waistband of her skirt. Someone was taking no chances with the security around General Carlos Henze, U.S.A.
The sergeant stopped at the door, watching until Smith walked safely across the courtyard, through the archway that led to the street, and on out to the sidewalk. Smith paused beside a tree and gazed all around at the thick traffic, the few pedestrians and his heart seemed to stop. He whirled.
He had caught a glimpse of a face in the backseat of a taxi as it turned from the street to the courtyard. Chilled, Smith counted to five and slipped back around to where he could get a view of the pension's entrance through bushes.
Although the fellow wore a hat, Smith had recognized the dark features, the thick mustache, and now he recognized the lean figure as well. It was the fake orderly who had gone to the hospital to kill Marty. The same man who had knocked Smith unconscious. He had just reached the pension's door. The same door through which Smith had left. The sergeant was still standing there. He stepped politely aside to let the killer enter. An utter professional, the sergeant looked protectively around, stepped back, and closed the door.
Chapter Seven
A heavy spring twilight settled like a darkening blanket on Seine-St-Denis on the north side of Paris, beyond the boulevard Peripherique. Smith paid his taxi driver and got out, smelling the metallic odor of ozone. The warm air was close, almost stifling with humidity, threatening rain.
Pausing on the sidewalk, he jammed his hands into his trench-coat pockets and studied a narrow, three- story beige brick apartment building. This was the address Mike Kerns had given him for Therese Chambord. The place was quaint, picturesque, with a peaked roof and decorative stonework, and it stood in a row of similar structures that had probably been constructed in the late fifties or early sixties. Her building appeared to be divided into three apartments, one to a floor. There were lights on in windows in each story.
He turned and surveyed the street, where cars were parked with two wheels up on the curbs in the French way. A sporty Ford cruised past, its headlights shooting funnels of white light into the dusk. The block was short, porch lights and street lamps glowed, and at the end, near an elevated rail service, rose an ultramodern, eight-story hotel of poured concrete, also painted beige, perhaps to blend in with the lower apartment buildings.
Wary, Smith turned on his heel and walked to the hotel. He stood in the lobby a half hour, cautiously watching through the glass walls, but no one followed him onto the street or into the hotel. No one went into or left Therese Chambord's building either.
He searched through the hotel until he found a service entrance that opened onto a cross street. He slipped out and hurried to the corner. Peering around, he saw no sign of surveillance at the lobby entrance or anywhere else in the neighborhood near Therese Chambord's apartment. There were few, if any, places to hide, except for the cars parked on both sides. But all appeared empty. With a nod to himself, he moved briskly-back to Mile. Chambord's address, still surveying all around.
In the recessed entryway, there was a white calling card with her name engraved on it, slid into the address slot for the third floor. He rang her bell and announced his name and purpose.
He rode the elevator up, and when it opened, she was standing in her open doorway, dressed in a slim white evening suit, a high-necked, off-white silk blouse, and high-heeled, ivory pumps. It was as if she were an Andy Warhol painting, white on white, with a violent and focusing touch of blood red in a pair of long, dangling earrings and again at her full lips. Then there was the contrast of her hair, satin black, suspended in an ebony cloud above her shoulders, theatrical and appealing. She was an actress all right. Still, her dramatic flair could also be the simple reflex of talent and experience.
A large black handbag hung over her left shoulder as if she were about to go out. He walked toward her.
She spoke flawless English, no trace of an accent. 'I don't know what I can tell you about my father, or that poor man in the hospital they say might've been in his lab with him when when the bomb exploded, Mr.Smith, is it?'
