"I'm just puzzled as to why he didn't kill you," Mongoose said. "I find that very interesting. It was an ideal situation for a temporal disruption. All Freytag had to do was kill Buckingham and then take care of you. He could have killed D'Artagnan, too. That would have been one hell of a mess to straighten out."
"So why didn't he do it?" Finn said. "Not that I'm complaining."
"Good question. It would seem to suggest that they want Buckingham, D'Artagnan, and even the two of you alive."
"That doesn't make any sense," said Lucas.
"Perhaps it does, if the man who's giving the orders is who I think it is. This game is getting very interesting."
Simon Hawke
The Timekeeper Conspiracy
"Game?" said Finn.
"Oh, it would be a game to him," said Mongoose. "That would be his style."
"Sounds very melodramatic," Lucas said. "Do we get a name? A description, maybe?"
Mongoose smiled. His old woman's disguise was complete right down to the rotting teeth.
"His name is Adrian Taylor. I'm afraid we don't have a description on him. He's a cut above your average terrorist."
"What does that mean?" Finn said.
"It means that he's very good at what he does," the agent said. "Taylor's a mental case, a psychopath, completely unpredictable. But he's also a pro, which makes matters worse because he's capable of a deadly, systematic rationality. He can keep it on a rein and let it all loose when it suits him."
"Sounds like you know the fellow," Lucas said.
Mongoose nodded. "Our paths have crossed before. He's not like the others. I suppose it's possible that he believes all that fanatic bullshit the Timekeepers spout, but I doubt that that's what drives him. This one's in it for the money. And because he likes to hang it right out over the edge."
"Sorta reminds you of someone we know, doesn't he?" said Finn.
"He's worked with Freytag before," the agent continued, ignoring Delaney's jibe. "I tailed Freytag to the Rue Vaugirard and then I lost him. I don't think he knew that he was being followed, he was just being very careful."
"Which raises another question," Lucas said. "If they know we're onto them and they've got a chronoplate, why don't they simply abandon their plan to create a disruption here and clock out to another period? Our chances of latching onto them again would be practically nil."
"You don't know Taylor," Mongoose said. "He's not a quitter and he won't be intimidated. That's what I'm counting on. He knows that as long as we don't know where that plate is, he's got an edge and he'll hold off using it until the last possible moment."
"Then this should interest you," said Lucas. "Finn and I think we know where that chronoplate is. We followed an old man and a young woman from the Luxembourg to a house on the Rue St. Honore. The old man had a laser. He-"
"That would be Jack Bennett," Mongoose said. "Alias Dr. Jacques Benoit. He's the underground link to the terrorists."
"You knew!"
"Of course I knew. What do you think I've been doing all this time, sitting on my hands?"
"But if you knew about Bennett, why didn't you let us in on it?" Lucas said.
Delaney snorted. "Silly question. There was no need for us to know. Right, Mata Hari?"
"For a guy who had a knife at his throat a couple of minutes ago, you're pretty cocky," Mongoose said.
"What's he talking about?" said Lucas.
"His bedside manner," Finn said. "Do you mind if I asked another silly question? If you knew about Bennett, why didn't you move in?"
"Because he doesn't have the chronoplate. The Timekeepers would never sit still for that. He might have given them access to it initially, but he's not part of their inner circle. Taylor will have taken it away from him."