The Paris Option - Страница 19

He waited, hoping the name of the city would elicit a response. But Marty's face remained listless.

Smith continued, "And you've been working at the Pasteur."

For the first time, he saw Marty rouse. It was almost as if a wave of energy passed through him when he heard the word Pasteur. His eyelids fluttered.

"I'll bet you wonder why I know all this," Smith continued, hope growing inside him. "The daughter of Emile Chambord"

Marty's chin quivered at the mention of the scientist's name.

"told me you arrived unannounced at her father's lab. Just walked right in and volunteered to help."

Marty's lips seemed to shape a word.

Excited, Smith leaned close. "What is it, Marty? I know you want to tell me something. It's about the Pasteur and Dr. Chambord, isn't it? Try, Marty. Try. Tell me what happened. Tell me about the DNA computer. You can do it!"

Marty's mouth opened and closed. His chubby face flushed. He was struggling to assemble thoughts and words, the effort straining his whole body. Smith had seen this in other coma victims. Sometimes they awoke quickly, all their faculties intact; other times it was a rebuilding process. For some, it was slow, for others, faster, much as if they were retraining a muscle that had been weakened by lack of use.

Just then, Marty gave Smith's hand a squeeze. But before Smith could squeeze back, Marty went limp, his face exhausted. It was all over in seconds, the struggle valiant but apparently too overwhelming for the injured man. Smith silently cursed the bomber, cursed whoever was behind all the violence. Then, as he sat there holding Marty's hand, he resumed talking again. The antiseptic quiet of the room was broken only by his low voice and the inhuman clicks and whirs of machines, the blinking and flashing of LEDs and gauges. He continued on, working the key words into his conversation: Emile Chambord. The Pasteur Institute.

A woman spoke behind him. "M. Smith?"

He turned. "Oui?"

It was the nurse from the ICU front desk, and she held out a plain but expensive white envelope. "This is for you. It arrived not long ago, but I've been so busy I forgot you were here. I'm sorry. If I'd remembered, you could've spoken to the messenger yourself. Apparently, whoever wrote you has no idea where you're staying."

Smith thanked her and took the envelope. As she returned to the front desk, he tore it open. The message was simple and to the point:

...

Lt. Col. Dr. Smith,

General the Count Roland la Porte will be at his Paris home this morning. He requests you report to him at your convenience. Please call me at the following telephone number to name the hour you will arrive. I will give you directions to the general's home.

Captain Darius Bonnard

Aide-de-Camp to the General

Smith remembered that General Henze had told him to expect an invitation to talk with the French general. This polite summons must be it. From what Henze had said, it sounded as if General La Porte was in the loop with the local police and the Deuxième Bureau about both the bombing and Emile Chambord. With luck, he might be able to throw more light on Dr. Chambord and the elusive DNA computer.

A large part of the grandeur of Paris arose from its magnificent private residences, many of which were tucked on side streets under branching trees near the boulevard Haussmann. One of those fine houses, it turned out, belonged to General Roland la Porte. Built of gray stone, it was five stories tall, fronted by a baronial columned entrance, and surrounded by balustrades and fine decorative stonework. It looked as if it had been built in the 1800s, during the sweeping imperial reconstruction of Paris by Baron Georges-Eugène Haussmann. In those days, it would have been called a town mansion.

Jon Smith used the old-fashioned knocker. The door was heavy and carved, the brass fittings gleaming.

The man who answered the door wore a paratrooper's uniform with the rank of captain and the insignia of the French general staff. He decided in crisp English, "You must be Lieutenant Colonel Jonathan Smith. You've made good time. Please come in." Short, blond, and compact, he stood aside and gestured Smith to enter. "I'm Darius Bonnard." He was all business, definitely military style.

"Thank you, Captain Bonnard. I guessed as much." As instructed, he had called ahead, and Bonnard gave him directions.

"The general's taking his coffee now. He's asked that you join him."

The captain led him through a spacious entry foyer, where a graceful staircase curved upward to the second and third floors. They passed through a European-style doorway that had no frame and was wallpapered in the same French fleur-de-lis pattern as the grand entry. The room Smith entered was large, with a high ceiling on which were painted life-sized nymphs and cherubs on a pale blue background. There were gilded cornices, handsome moldings and wainscoting, and slender, delicate Louis Quatorze furniture. The place looked more like a ballroom than a coffee room.

A hulking man was sitting by the window, sunbeams dancing above his head. Nodding Smith to a simple straight chair with a brocaded seat, he said in good but accented English, "Sit over there, if you will, Colonel Smith. How do you take coffee?"

"Cream, no sugar, sir, thank you."

General the Count Roland la Porte wore an expensive business suit that would have been large on a defensive end in the NFL, but it fit him perfectly. Besides his great girth, he had a regal bearing, dark, thick hair worn as long and straight as that of a young Napoleon at the siege of Toulon, and a broad Breton face with piercing blue eyes. The eyes were remarkable, as immobile as a shark's. Altogether, his presence was formidable.

"My pleasure," he said, smoothly polite. His oversized hands dwarfed the sterling coffee service as he poured and handed a bone-china cup to Smith.

"Thank you, General." Smith took it and said shamelessly, "It's a privilege to meet one of the heroes of Desert Storm. Your flanking maneuver with the French Fourth Dragoons was bold. Without it, the allies never would've been able to secure the left flank." Smith silently thanked Fred Klein for the thorough briefing he had received before he flew out of Colorado, because while he was in Iraq patching up the wounded on all sides, he had never heard of La Porte, who had been a lieutenant colonel back in those days.

The general asked, "You were there, Colonel?"

"Yessir. With a surgical unit."

"Ah, of course." La Porte smiled at a memory. "Our tanks had not been camouflaged for the western Iraqi desert, so we French stood out like polar bears. But the Dragoons and I held our ground, ate the sand, as we say in the Legion, and turned out to be most lucky." He studied Smith. "But you understand all that, don't you? In fact, you have had combat experience, yes? Line command also, I think."

So La Porte had his people looking into him, as General Henze had warned. "Only briefly, yes. Why do you ask?"

The general's unblinking blue eyes fixed him like a butterfly on a pin and then retreated, still unblinking, but with a small smile. "Forgive me. It's an old soldier's vanity. I pride myself on my judgment of people. I guessed your training and experience from your carriage, your movements, your eyes, and your action at the Pompidou Hospital yesterday." La Porte's unmoving gaze peeled layers from his skin. "Few would have your unusual combination of medical and scientific expertise, and the skills and daring of a soldier."

"You're far too kind, General." Also too nosy, but then, as General Henze had said, La Porte was suspicious that something was up, and he had the interests of his country to protect.

"Now to something far more important. Has there been any change in your friend's condition at the hospital?"

"Not so far, General."

"And what is your honest prognosis?"

"As a friend or as a doctor?"

A tiny furrow of annoyance appeared between the general's hard eyes. He did not like fencing or hair-splitting. "As a friend and as a doctor."

"As a doctor, I'd say that his coma indicates his prognosis must be considered guarded. As a friend, I know he will recover soon."

"Your sentiments as a friend are, I'm sure, shared by all. But I fear it's your medical opinion we value most. And that doesn't give me confidence we can rely on Dr. Zellerbach to help us with information about Dr. Chambord."

"I think that's wise," Smith agreed regretfully. "Tell me, is there any news about Dr. Chambord? I checked the newspaper as I rode over in the taxi, but it said that as of last night, there were no new facts."

The general grimaced. "Unfortunately, they have found a part of his body, alas." He sighed. "I understand there was an arm with an attached hand. The hand wore a ring his colleagues sadly identified, and the fingerprints have been confirmed as a match with those on file at the Pasteur. That won't be in the newspapers for a few days. The officials are still investigating, and they're keeping as much to themselves as they can for now. They hope to find the perpetrators without giving away everything. I'd appreciate your keeping that information to yourself."

"Of course." Smith contemplated the sad confirmation that Emile Chambord was indeed dead. What a pity. Despite every sign to the contrary, he had held out hope that the great scientist had survived.