questions he would have asked flooded his thoughts, swelling and multiplying into an explosion of curiosity. And regret, regret that this extraordinary experience of having had a brother, of having been a twin, was completely beyond his reach by the time that he realized that it had even been a part of his life in the first place.
Bern had always had the reputation of being something of a loner, and now this vague sense of isolation that he had lived with, and which he had simply accepted as being his own peculiar kind of individuality, was cast in an entirely different light. There was no way that he could have known that somehow, in some tragic and inexplicable way, he had been robbed, almost from the beginning, of his second self.
“Mr. Bern.” Mondragon’s voice had a sterner tone now, which caught Bern’s attention. “Paul,” he said then, seeking to redefine their relationship. Then he paused to spritz his face and eyes. When the sparkling mist settled out of the slanting light, Bern felt a change in the tension in the room.
“As you must surely see by now,” Mondragon continued, “you are in a unique position. All the more so when you consider your situation from the point of view of your brother and his role in the unfolding events in Mexico. And more to the point, what was left undone when he was killed.”
Mondragon paused and slowly, calmly clasped his hands together in his lap. It seemed a gesture at once careful and preparatory.
“Whether he was present or not, we don’t know,” Mondragon said, “but we are sure that Ghazi Baida was responsible for Jude’s death.”
He raised a hand; the mist flew through the light.
“I will tell you something, Paul, a critical truth about hunting men. War has a thousand faces. Behind the public face of war, behind the florid rhetoric of politicians who whip up the public will to move armies and navies in pursuit of other men, the truth is that a man like Ghazi Baida is eventually brought to ground because another man possesses a relentless desire to see him brought to ground. It has always come down to the fearful, sweaty efforts of one man against another man. It has always been, and always will be, personal.”
He paused, and when he spoke again, his voice carried forcefully from the shadow and the faceless head, driven by more than breath and discipline.
“Surely you see where this is going,” he said. “We need your help, the kind of help that only you can give us. We want to use your face to find Ghazi Baida. All you have to do is cooperate with our people, who will guide you. You will not be asked to be a soldier or an assassin. You will not be asked to perform heroic and fearsome feats. Just lend us Jude’s face and body. Help us finish what he began.”
Bern couldn’t believe what he was hearing. The dismay must have showed on his face. Mondragon expanded.
“We need to convince Baida that Jude is still alive,” Mondragon said. “Jude needs to be seen. He and Baida had established a relationship. Jude had accomplished an astonishing thing, convincing Baida to reveal himself to him. But more than that, he had convinced Baida to trust him-at a certain level, of course, not unreservedly, not wholly, but at least enough to engage in an enterprise with him. We need to keep that connection alive.”
“That’s impossible,” Bern said. “It’s… it wouldn’t work for ten minutes.”
“It would.”
“It couldn’t.”
“Why?”
“How could it, for Christ’s sake?”
“Several answers. One: the sheer improbability of it. Who would believe, at first blush, that a man who looks like Jude, talks like Jude, acts like Jude, has the same artistic talents as Jude-and, God, even has the same DNA as Jude-who would believe that he would not be Jude? The absurdity of such a thing provides us with our greatest advantage.”
“At first blush?”
“Yes! That’s the second answer: You will not be in a situation in which you will have to portray Jude in the sense that you will have to live as Jude, interact with others as Jude. No, we simply want you to present the physical Jude to observers. You need to be seen as Jude, and little more. It is not necessary that you be Jude for an extended length of time.”
“What’s the objective? Exactly.”
“For now, just reestablish contact with him. Help us buy time.”
“You’re right about one thing,” Bern said, feeling more agitation than he was showing. “It’s an absurd idea.”
“No,” Mondragon insisted. “It isn’t.”
But Bern didn’t want to have anything to do with this. Why hadn’t an official officer of the CIA come to him to make this plea? Why this roundabout way of getting word to him that Mondragon was legitimate? He didn’t care whose asset Mondragon was; he knew that the further you got from the official business of anything, the closer you got to the kinds of things that never saw the light of day. He didn’t want to have anything to do with that kind of darkness.
He looked at the elegantly dressed Mondragon, this man decapitated by a shadow, and he saw the epitome of menace. This was the other side of the looking glass, but instead of encountering the Queen’s nonsense, he was looking at the devil’s creep show.
“There’s got to be a better way,” Bern said.
“No. This is the best way. It’s… an unbelievable opportunity. Jude had an identical twin! And the CIA had the good sense to keep it a secret from the very moment they discovered it. Even from Jude himself.”
Bern mentally lunged at this revealing slip.
“He didn’t know?”
Mondragon tried to cover his hesitation by responding in a slow, calmer voice. “That’s what it says in the piece of the file they gave me. He didn’t know.”
“‘Piece’ of the file.”
“This is the CIA, Paul. ‘Need to know’ is a mantra with these people. Everyone accepts it.”
“How the hell did he not know?”
Silence. This time, Bern sensed the stark eyeballs staring back at him from the impenetrable shadow. He felt another change in the energy in this room of faces, and he didn’t like what he felt.
“Look,” Bern said, and he sat forward in his armchair, “this isn’t for me. You’re going to have to find another way to do your business.”
“You need to reconsider, Paul.”
“No, I don’t. I’m not Jude. Nobody’s paying me to do this shit.”
“Oh, if money is a factor-”
“No. It’s not. I wouldn’t do it for any amount of money. I appreciate the fact that this guy’s a terrorist and needs to be stopped, but you’re talking about something that requires special training, special skills. And I don’t have either of those.”
“Your face,” Mondragon said. “Your DNA. These are the things that no other man on earth can bring to us. How much more specialized could you be?”
Bern was shaking his head. “This is CIA business, for Christ’s sake. This is way past dicey. This feels suicidal, and I don’t want any part of it.”
He stood.
“Just a minute, Paul,” Mondragon said with chilling equanimity. The young woman appeared, handed a folder to him, then waited. “I have another file,” he said.
Bern hesitated.
“Sit down,” Mondragon said politely. “Please.”
Bern remained standing.
Mondragon opened the file folder. “This pertains to Dana and Philip Lau,” Mondragon said. “And their daughter, Alice.”
Bern must have been expected to respond at that moment, because Mondragon paused, as if waiting for a reply. But Bern was struck speechless. He was afraid. He didn’t know why yet, but he knew instinctively that he should be. He sat down.
“Here’s the way it will work,” Mondragon said. “During Alice’s visits to you, she often swims. She changes clothes in the lower bedroom of your home, the one nearest to the terrace door that leads down to the cove. Alice
