Fellowship of Fear (28 page)

The crouching men turned toward the shouted command, craning their necks to see through the vines. John held his fire and watched. The terrace was silent and breathless once again. The sound of a heavy truck shifting gears was somehow carried up from the Rheingoldstrasse along the Rhine, faint and strangely mundane. People on the terrace began to sit up or get tentatively to their knees. Janet pulled her face away from Gideon’s body and started to rise. He put his hand on her arm to check her, and they both watched, leaning on their elbows.

The crouching men finally saw the ones at the stone fence and fired, once each, before the men began firing back. The sounds were flat and unimpressive on the open hillside, like the tiny explosions of penny firecrackers. But Gideon could see how the powerful repercussions jerked the hands of the men at the stone fence as if they were puppets with strings around their wrists. Only their hands moved. They didn’t duck or flinch or shift their positions. They remained, each on one knee, straight-backed and impassive, firing slowing and steadily.

The blond, beefy man with the book was hit first. He stood up suddenly, almost angrily, his back slightly arched, and flung the book over his shoulder. Then he seemed to leap backwards off his feet, landing flatly on his back. He twitched and began to rise, getting as far as his knees and waving his gun drunkenly, but facing the wrong direction. He put a hand on a vine support to steady himself, then twitched wildly one more time and fell forward into the row of vines. There he lay still, his upper body supported and shaded by the trellis, his knees and feet on the ground. Gideon saw the gun slide gently from his fingers and knew he was dead.

The bald man, who had seemed momentarily benumbed by the sight of his partner dangling from the vines, now shook himself, snatched up the book, and began to sidle rapidly between two planted rows, scrambling along in the dirt on his hands and knees, his fat thighs pumping. The vines gave him little protection, Gideon saw; when he came to the end of the row, he’d be completely in the open. Gideon wished he would surrender. His naked skull looked vulnerable and pink; it would stand up to bullets about as well as a soft-boiled egg.

The three men at the stone fence did not encourage him to give up. They had given him his chance; the choice was his. Dispassionately, they swung their weapons slowly to the right, following him. At the end of the row of vines, the bald man gathered himself. His intention was obvious. He would fire a few quick shots to cover himself, then dash across the ten feet of open space to the start of the next row. But what then?
Give up,
Gideon urged silently.
Throw the gun down.
The man propped himself up like a racer, ready to make his run.

"Give up! Surrender!" Gideon was startled by his own hoarse shout, and strangely embarrassed, as if he had made some ill-bred noise. On the terrace, faces turned reproachfully toward him. Bruce Danzig, huddling under a table a few feet away, threw him a disgusted glance. He half-expected to be hushed by the others.

Angrily he shouted again: "Surrender, damn you! They’ll kill you!"

The bald man paid no attention. He scrambled across the open space, firing a nervous shot as he ran. The men at the fence swiveled in calm unison, and their guns jerked at the same time, ending with little flourishes, as if they were a formal firing squad.

Nevertheless, the bald man made it across the open ground to the cover of the vines. He ran a few feet into the rows, then sat down with his back against a support post. Gideon saw him take a deep breath and let his chin sink to his chest as if he were quietly weeping.

Thank God, he thought, he’s had enough. He relaxed his tense shoulders and heaved a sigh of relief. At the same time, he was uncomfortably aware of a small dark part of him that was disappointed, that would have liked to see the thing carried out to its bloody end.

As he shook his head to clear the thought away, he saw the men at the fence rise and walk confidently forward, their guns held loosely. Puzzled, Gideon looked at the fat bald man. He had not moved, was not moving, was not looking at them. He still sat slumped against the post, his head drooping dispiritedly. The book lay open on his lap as if he were reading it.

And in the middle of his chest, just below his chin, a red flower of blood bloomed rapidly over his sky-blue shirt.

   EVEN less coherent than usual, Dr. Rufus was the picture of consternation. And yet there was something about the agitated features, the contorted expression, that didn’t quite fit, something that bothered Gideon, worried him. But he couldn’t put his finger on what it was. He leaned forward and watched intently as the chancellor dabbed at his neck with a sodden handkerchief and babbled on.

He had already been babbling for some time. As soon as the shooting had stopped, one of the NSD agents had run up to the terrace—he was surprisingly young, seen up close—and brusquely herded the USOC group into the interior of the wine restaurant, there seating them at several long tables. In a strong Scottish accent, he had flung terse, excited questions at them: Had anyone recognized the two men? Were they already on the terrace when the group arrived? Who saw them first? What were they doing? Did they talk to anyone?

The responses had been listless and uninformative, and the agent, still flushed and edgy from the killings, quickly became hostile. Dr. Rufus, as protector of his brood, had sprung up and begun to prattle. But what
was
it about him…?

"…and when I saw that he had a gun," he was saying, "or rather that
they
had guns…why, I…I was so startled I couldn’t believe my eyes…in a place like this…I still can’t believe it, just can’t believe it…."

"I want to know exactly how he got his hands on the book," the agent said, looking at the floor.

"The book, yes, the book!" Dr. Rufus said. "Why ever would he steal a book? Why, he just ran right up to the table and…and…"

It came to Gideon at last, with a shock that made him blink. He stared at Dr. Rufus for another few seconds, then leaped suddenly to his feet. The chancellor stopped in mid-exclamation; his eyes riveted on Gideon’s face. The others looked up to see what had cut off the reassuring, familiar river of words.

Gideon pointed a shaky finger at Dr. Rufus and spoke, his voice choked.

"It’s you, isn’t it? You’re the one."

Every sound in the room stopped. There was a strained hush, an electric stupefaction. It seemed to Gideon they were all caught in a flash photograph; the only movement was the trembling of his finger, the only noise the pounding in his ears.

"The spy, the mole, whatever they call you," he said. "The USOC spy. The traitor."

Outraged noises burst from half the throats in the room. Eric Bozzini jumped up angrily, Janet turned an appalled face toward Gideon. John looked as if someone had hit him on the head with a mallet.

Gideon’s confidence wavered. He shouldn’t have been so impulsive; he should have waited, checked out his ideas, talked to John. His finger was still leveled dramatically at Dr. Rufus’s nose. A little shamefacedly, he dropped his hand to his side.

Dr. Rufus finally found his voice. "Gideon…my dear boy, I know you don’t really mean…I hardly know what to say…" His palms were lifted, his eyebrows raised in astonishment.

Gideon looked at him a little longer. "No, it’s you all right," he said.

Another hostile roar came from the faculty. Bruce Danzig bobbed up from his chair and rapped his fist delicately on the table. "Damn you, Gideon!" he shouted, every vowel and consonant meticulously wrought.

The agent strode to the center of the room. "That’s enough now," he said. "Everyone sit down." The authority of sudden death still cloaked him. Everybody sat.

The agent looked at Gideon with dull eyes. "Now," he said. "Just you."

Gideon spoke directly to the agent, working hard to keep his voice steady. "It’s Dr. Rufus who’s working for the KGB, who had that information put in my book, who arranged those two—"

It was too much for Danzig. He was on his feet again, his little breast heaving like a bird’s. "You idiot, you don’t know what you’re talking about—"

Gideon cut him off. With his heart in his mouth, he took a gamble. "Bruce, you said there was a rush request on the Weidenreich book. Who was asking for it?"

"Well…" Danzig darted a sudden look at Dr. Rufus.

Gideon pressed him. "It was Dr. Rufus, wasn’t it?"

Danzig spoke carefully. "Well, it was the chancellor’s
office
. But that happens all the time. His secretary—"

Gideon pushed on. "And before I left for Torrejon, Dr. Rufus sent me to the library. He said you were holding some books for me. Where’d you get them? Who suggested the titles?"

Danzig stammered wordlessly, but his confused glance at Dr. Rufus was answer enough. He sat down slowly, blinking.

"That’s an awful lot of interest in my books," Gideon said, talking more to himself than Danzig. "And I remember something else. I wasn’t planning on taking any books with me to Sigonella either. But he pressed me—remember, Bruce?—he told me what a fine library you had, how you’d be hurt if I didn’t take any. And he made sure he knew just which books I did take…"

He had been dreading looking at Dr. Rufus. Now he turned to him. "…didn’t you?" he asked quietly.

A look at the chancellor drained the belligerence from Gideon as if someone had pulled out a plug. Dr. Rufus was staring at him, trembling all over and blowing his lips in and out like a hooked fish on a pier. He looked about as much like a spy as Santa Claus did. Gideon’s heart went out to him. He had liked Dr. Rufus, really liked him. He still did.

"I think we three should have a private little talk," the agent said without expression. He made a curt hand motion to Dr. Rufus, a wordless "Get up, you." Better than words, it summarized the sudden, awful role transformation that had come to the chancellor of United States Overseas College. It saddened Gideon to see him obey the rude gesture.

They walked toward a small private room. The agent pointedly waited for Dr. Rufus to precede him, even giving the shambling, red-faced figure a casual, gratuitous nudge.

Gideon followed, his feelings turbulent and paradoxical. He, who had just publicly denounced and humiliated Dr. Rufus, burned with rage at the agent’s supererogatory disrespect. And he, who had been so vilely betrayed; why should he feel like the betrayer?

   "SO it was the books," Janet said, looking out the car window at the dark, nearly deserted
autobahn
.

"Yes," said Gideon, "both times. They’d pick out some wide-eyed kid and tell him he was serving his country by stealing something from the computer room or the control room and sticking it in one of my books. A patriotic act. Apparently Dr. Rufus was a pretty convincing
Times
reporter."

"Yeah, sure," said John, "with some money thrown in in case the kid wasn’t a true-blue patriot."

Janet frowned. "But do you mean that Dr. Rufus flew down to Sigonella and Torrejon himself, and then flew right back?"

"Sure," John said, "no problem there."

Marti shook her head. "Now wait a minute, you guys. Gideon, what made them think you wouldn’t find it when you read the book?"

"That’s why they had to know the exact books I had with me. They put the information in them on Thursday night both times, after I’d had my final class, and they picked a book I wouldn’t need for my next course, assuming that I wouldn’t be reading it."

A car zoomed out of the night, passed them, and disappeared in seconds, going at least a hundred miles an hour. "God, these German drivers," John said.

"I still don’t get it," Marti said.

"I had the Weidenreich with me for the course in Torrejon. My next class, in Izmir, deals with Upper Paleolithic population distributions, so naturally I wouldn’t be expected to be reading a book on
Homo erectus javanensis
."

"Naturally," John said. "Any fool could see that. I’m surprised at you, Marti."

"Rat piddle," she said. "How could they be sure you wouldn’t want to read it anyway?"

"Obviously, they couldn’t," Janet said. "In fact, that’s just what happened this time. You kept the book, and they came after it."

"Boy, did they," Gideon said with a sigh. He was very tired. The agent had made him wait, alone, until Delvaux had arrived by helicopter about 9:00 p.m. Three hours of questions and putting the pieces together had followed. Then, at midnight, Gideon had been offered a ride back to

Heidelberg in the helicopter with Delvaux. He had declined, unable to face the prospect of having Dr. Rufus as a handcuffed fellow passenger, and had started the drive back with the others at a little before one in the morning. For a while they had talked excitedly, but then their fatigue had caught up with them as they headed south from Frankfurt, and they sat without speaking for many minutes at a time.

Once Gideon was awakened from a doze to hear John ask quietly, "Did Delvaux tell you how the NSD guys got here so fast? Were they following you?"

Janet’s hand, lying in his own, jumped; Gideon knew she had been asleep too. "No," he said, "they didn’t know where to find me. They were following Bruce. Delvaux thought maybe he was their man."

"Because of the books. Yeah," John said.

Gideon gently pulled Janet’s head to his shoulder and sat, comfortable and warm, watching the dark flat landscape go by.

A little later it was Janet who stirred and sat up. "Wait a minute," she said. "Dr. Rufus
warned
you, remember? And he tried to stop them, and took a pretty good crack in the face. Was that an act?"

"He said he didn’t know there’d be guns, and he was afraid we’d be hurt. I believe him, you know; but I think Delvaux thinks it was just an act."

Marti spoke quietly: "What’d he do it for, money?"

Gideon nodded, then realized she couldn’t see him in the dark. "Yes," he said, "so he says."

At about 2:30 a.m., famished, they stopped at an automated roadside AAFES canteen for sandwiches and milk. Their first bites revived them, and they began talking again.