"In Leviticus, a few male Levites, the sons of Levi, later as they grew in numbers, the heirs of Aaron, were made the high priests of the Temple of Jerusalem, the seat of power. As in all such power centers, there was corruption-minimal by later standards, I might add-but nevertheless corruption by those who wanted to change the rigid system-frequently justified, I might also add. Ultimately, according to legend alluded to in Numbers or Deuteronomy, a zealot became the leader of the Jerusalem temple until he was exposed as a traitor and no son of Aaron."
"Thanks for the lesson, preacher," said Cameron, h
is words strained, "but what the hell does it all mean?"
"It means," answered Scofield, his fury just below the surface, "that Deputy Director Shields isn't sure he can trust me."
"What?" Pryce turned angrily to Shields's liaison.
"You see, youngster," continued Bray, "in Squinty's biblical imagination this compound here is the Chesapeake Temple, and contrary to what you two assholes think, neither of you has the authority of a neutered fly over this operation. Only I have. That's my deal with Shields-check it out, Mr. Denny."
"I've been apprised of your agreement, Mr. Scofield, and it's hardly my place to interfere."
"Naturally not. You're Frankie-boy's lackey and I'll bet my left ball you're in contact with your 'camouflaged armed personnel' just in case I decide to take a powder and blow this joint with my wife!"
"What are you saying, Bray?" pressed Antonia.
"And I'll bet my right ball," continued Scofield without stopping, "that the gate has instructions to reach you instantly if I go through it, which I'm entitled to do because I am the absolute authority here."
"You're not making sense, my dear-" "The hell I'm not! The L-Factor, the Leviticus horse shit. I'm the high priest of the temple who may just be a rat. Isn't that so, analyst?"
"There were other considerations," replied Denny quietly.
"If there were, why weren't we-why wasn't I told about your unit out there? It's priority that I be informed at the outset just in case decisions have to be made that I wouldn't allow you to make! .. . Oh, no, this is one of Squinty's reverse tricks, goddamn it!"
"There was the possibility of a sudden, massive assault on the compound-" "And two or three 'armed personnel' were going to stop it?" broke in a furious Beowulf Agate.
"Jesus on a surfboard, what do you take me for?"
"I can't answer that, sir. I merely follow orders."
"You know, son, that's the second time I've heard that within the past thirty hours, and I'll tell you what I told that son of a bitch who became some shark's antipasto. I don't buy it!"
"Hey, slow down, Bray," said Pryce.
"Maybe Frank was right about the second part. An assault, I mean."
"It doesn't wash, kid. If he really felt that way there'd be a small brigade out there and I'd be the first to know about it. No, Squinty was waiting for me to make my unpredictable move. Christ, he's a fucking genius!"
"You were about to make what unpredictable move?" cried Cameron.
"I really don't understand, my darling-" "In this high-tech age there's no way to communicate with anyone in here by wire or radio, much less telephone, because everyone goes through a detector. The only way is personal contact, secret contact.
After that mess with the bastard who killed the guards and tried to waste me-thank you for cutting him in half, Cam-I came to the same conclusion you did. I was waiting for Toni to fall asleep and then I was going out myself, my way, which wasn't through the gate or in a goddamned vehicle. I would have been far more successful."
"He's done it before, gentlemen," said Antonia, now squeezing her husband's arm.
"In Europe, when we were running for our lives, I'd wake up in the morning and find Brandon and Taleniekov having coffee.
The problem that terrified us-the man or the men who had us in their gun sights-were no longer a threat. That's all they'd say about it, nothing more."
"You equate that sort of thing with what happened last night?"
Pryce asked Scofield.
"In a way, of course," agreed the retired intelligence officer.
"Only Frank got my objectives backward. I wasn't going out to make a secret accommodation with the Matarese, who, as I told Squinty, offered me millions to disappear, I was going to kill the bastards. Or, if I'd had the patience, to take the fuckers alive."
"Then why did you just call him a genius?" asked an angry, perplexed Cameron.
"Because, given like circumstances, I'd do one or the other. Frank always covers his bases."
"But to consider you a turncoat, a traitor," exclaimed Pryce, "that's enough to make you want to put him in a box!"
"No, no, never," said Scofield.
"When he gets here at noon, I'll surely tell him off, but nothing more."
"Why not?"
"Let me take you back about thirty years. I was undercover in Prague and my control was a man I considered really brilliant, the best, most elusive deep-contact to Moscow ever on our side. I was scheduled to meet him on the banks of the Moldau River one night, when minutes before I left my flat, an urgent message came from Washington, from Langley-from Frank Shields. I decoded it, and it said, "Send a decoy, not ours but some drug pusher. Stay above on the perimeter." .. .
That cocaine salesman was riddled with bullets meant for me. Frank Shields had led my control into a reverse trap that exposed him. My brilliant contact was a butcher from the KGB."
"So now he's pulling the same trap on you," said Pryce.
"Can you accept that?"
"Why not? All his bases are covered, and he could have been right.
All I got from my years of service to my government was a bonus to buy a boat and a pension. The Matarese offer might have tempted me."
"But he knows you!"
"Nobody knows anybody but himself or herself, Cam. We can get under the skin maybe, but we can't penetrate the mind, or the multiple alternatives it might choose to take. How do you know who I really am, or who Toni is?"
"For God's sake, we've talked for hours, about so many things. I trust you!"
"You're young, my new friend. But beware, trust is built on optimism, it's a series of shadows. You can't give them three dimensions, no matter how hard you try."
"You've got to start somewhere," said Pryce, his eyes locked with Scofield's.
"This Leviticus nonsense, this high priest who may be a rat-what the hell does it all add up to?"
"Welcome to our world, Cameron. You may think that you've been there, but you've just begun your descent into our hell. It's not a hell our pristine Mr. Denny knows, because he, like Squinty, sits behind a desk with all those computers and makes abstract decisions.
Sometimes they're right, often they're wrong, but what their computers can't animate are human confrontations. In the end, machines can't talk to machines."
"I believe we've covered this before," said Pryce.
"I'm talking about last night, a night I'll never forget. Where are we?"
"Well, I guess that the first lesson is that it's not linear-nothing's in a straight line. The second is that it's got to be geometric-the lines flare out in all directions and you have to narrow down the possibilities."
"I'm talking about last night-this morning!"
"Oh, that. I can't tell you. Squinty will be here in an hour or so and we'll ask him."
"I can tell you," said the liaison, Denny.
"Director Shields is secretly transferring the entire compound to an estate in North Carolina."
"That is the one thing he will not do!" exclaimed Scofield.
"But, sir, we've been discovered here-" "You're goddamned right, and i wish we could publicize it in all the newspapers-no, that's probably wrong, let it remain classified. All those who shouldn't know will find out."
"Really, sir, the deputy insists that we start packing-" "Then send the deputy to me and I'll countermand his orders! What you idiots don't know is that the bees fly to the honey pot. It's an old Corsican expression."
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
(Front Page)
THREE WORLD-CLASS BANKS
FORM ALLIANCE
NEW YORK, OCT. 1. As further proof of the new trans nationalization of financial institutions, three of the world's largest banks have, for all intents and purposes, merged. They are the equally well-known Universal Merchants in New York, Los Angeles's Bank of the Pacific, and Madrid's Banco Iberico, the wealthiest institution in Spain and Portugal with vast interests in the Mediterranean.
Using a complex agenda of interna
tional laws, they have structured a lateral order of responsibilities to maximize the productivity in their respective centers of influence. The newest technologies that permit instant global communications, prominent among them financial transactions, will create a whole new system of banking, "factually a near renaissance," according to Benjamin Wahlburg, well-known banker, an elder statesman of the financial world, and spokesman for the new conglomerate to be known as Universal Pacific Iberia.
"We are approaching the era of a cash less society, saving billions upon billions the world over," continued Mr. Wahlburg, "when corporate and individual assets will be confirmed by plastic cards, their numbers altered over millions of airwaves, purchases and debits paid electronically. We of Universal Pacific Iberia intend to be at the forefront of this exhilarating economic renaissance and we are investing considerable resources into seeing it develop."
It has been estimated that with the thousands of branches owned by UPI, the new financial conglomerate will be a major lending institution throughout the United States, the Pacific Rim, Southern Europe, and the Mediterranean, from Gibraltar to Istanbul.
What concerns some observers of the international marketplace is the question of controls. When reached by telephone, Mr.
Wahlburg stated, "Controls will be intrinsic to the evolution. No responsible economist or banker could think other The descending helicopter yackety-yacked its way into the Chesapeake compound's circled touchdown. Deputy Director Frank Shields, his creased, narrow eyes practically shut tight repelling the sunlight, emerged from the glistening white metal door only to be verbally assaulted by Brandon Scofield, Cameron Pryce at his side. Fortunately, much of the former intelligence officer's shouting was obscured by the whirling rotor blades, and by the time the two men walked away from the overpowering sound to join Pryce, Scofield was partially out of breath.
"Since you figured out what I was doing, why did it surprise you, much less make you angry?" asked the abused deputy director.
"That's the dumbest damn question you've ever asked, Squinty!"
roared Scofield.
"Why?"
"Stop repeating yourself!"
"Hey, you're the one who practices that habit, Brandon, not me.
And look at it this way. As you obviously understood that I might employ the L-Factor and you passed-you're clean and I don't have to wonder if I missed something."