Agent Counter-Agent (13 page)

I stood across from the open doors, as I'd been instructed to do. Across the hall there were four guards on duty, the same ones who'd been there that morning. They knew me, so I wouldn't have any difficulty getting past them. Just two more minutes to go. An aide came down the corridor and showed his credentials. The guards let him into the room. There were security people all over the place, moving around in the corridor and standing inside the conference room.

I looked up and down the corridor. I was in a lot of pain. The tension and the pressure in my head were mounting rapidly as the minutes passed. I knew the pain wouldn't go away till I'd destroyed my enemies. Yet I had an awful feeling that somehow this was all wrong. It was a gut feeling, a vague, nagging sensation that seemed to come from a hidden corner of my brain. It didn't make sense — any more than anything else that had happened in the past few days. But whatever the feeling was, it was beginning to tug at my conscience even as the urgency of my mission was overwhelming me. I felt as if there were a terrible struggle going on inside my head, and it just might drive me crazy if it didn't stop soon.

I was beginning to wonder if my contact had been detained. But then I saw him — a dark-haired Venezuelan in a conservative navy-blue suit and red tie, coming down the corridor toward me. He looked like an ordinary member of the palace staff, but he was wearing the white carnation in his lapel and carrying the carafe.

My heart pounded wildly against my ribs. In a minute he was beside me, handing me the carafe. "Señor Carter, the conference director asked me to bring fresh drinking water to the conference room during the noon recess." He spoke very loudly, so that anyone around us could hear him. "Since you have special clearance, would you mind terribly taking it in for me?"

"Oh, all right. I'll take it," I said condescendingly.

"Gracias,"
he said. Then, in a harsh whisper,
"Viva la revolución!"

The man walked quickly back down the corridor. I stood there with the carafe in my hands, overwhelmed by terrible doubts and confusion. I had to take the device into the room. It was too late to think of the other feelings. The most important thing in the world, in my life, was to carry that carafe into the conference room and put it on the table.

I went to the doorway.

"Hello, Carter," the CIA man there said. "What do you have there?"

"It seems the conference director wants fresh water on the conference table," I said casually. "And I'm the errand boy."

The CIA agent looked at the carafe. A Secret Service man grinned at me, then also took a look at the carafe. They seemed satisfied. The Venezuelan policemen nodded for me to go ahead and take the carafe into the room.

I carried the carafe inside. Another Secret Service man eyed me as I took the almost empty carafe from the table and replaced it with the one I'd carried in.

"What's all this about?" he asked.

I grinned at him. "You wouldn't want the conference members to have to drink stale water, would you?"

He looked at the carafe and at me, then grinned back. "Glad to see they're making constructive use of you AXE people."

"Very funny," I said.

I picked up the old carafe and propped it under my arm, then glanced back at the one I'd just placed at the center of the conference table. And I heard the words echoing in my brain:

I turned and left the room.

Outside, I stopped beside the security guards. "I wonder what I'm supposed to do with this?" I said to them, feigning impatience.

"There's a service closet just down the corridor," one of the Venezuelans said.

"Maybe you could sweep the floor while you're at it, Carter," the CIA man at the door laughed. "There's probably a broom in the service closet" He grinned widely.

"What is this. The CIA Comedy Hour?" I asked sourly, as if their jokes bothered me. I couldn't have cared less what they said or did, just as long as they didn't suspect that the biggest security break in years had just been pulled off right under their noses.

I carried the old carafe down the corridor to the closet. Aides and officials were beginning to drift back into the conference room. I looked at my watch and found that it was already quarter past one. The stars of the show, the Venezuelan President and the American Vice-President, would be arriving in a few minutes. And before long the afternoon session would be getting underway. And nobody inside the conference room would suspect that the remainder of his life could be measured in minutes.

Everything was going according to plan.

After I'd disposed of the carafe, I drifted back down to the conference room. I was just in time to see the Venezuelan President and the American Vice-President coming down the corridor together, the Americans hand resting on the Venezuelan's shoulder. They were flanked by Secret Service agents. As I saw them disappear into the conference room, I was overcome by hatred and revulsion.

Inside, photographers were getting some last-minute shots before the conference resumed. It was rumored that some important economic agreements had been reached during the morning session. Undoubtedly they involved financial aid to the Venezuelan regime in return for permission to install American military bases. Without my intervention, this monstrous tyranny would go on forever.

I had just taken up my position across from the still-opened doors when suddenly the chief of the Venezuelan Security Police appeared beside me. This time his face was somber.

"Mr. Carter, one of your NSA agents just reported to me that you spent a few minutes in the conference room."

I felt a prickling sensation at the back of my neck. The pressure rose again in my head, making my temples throb horribly.

"Yes, sir," I said. My mind raced ahead. Maybe they'd checked and found that the conference director hadn't ordered the fresh water. Or a cautious agent might have found the device by just inspecting the carafe. They might already have removed the device from the room.

"Did everything appear normal to you?" he asked.

The tightening in my chest relaxed a little. "Yes. Everything seemed all right."

"Fine. Would you mind coming with me for just a moment? I would like you to look at this revised list of people with security clearance. It will not take long."

I felt it would be all right to deviate from my instructions to this extent. The conference room doors weren't even closed yet. Anyway, I didn't see how I could refuse. When the chief of the Venezuelan Security Police asked you to do something, you did it. I followed him into the security annex not far from the conference room. A Venezuelan policeman was there when we entered, but he walked out immediately, leaving me alone with the man I hated almost as much as the men I was about to destroy.

"This is the list." Just a quick perusal will suffice to…"

The phone on his desk rang. He went to answer it while I studied the list, trying hard to gain control of my emotions.

His face brightened. "Ah, señor Hawk!"

I felt a steel vise closing on my chest.

The Venezuelan's face changed. "What!"

There was little doubt of it. Hawk had somehow gotten loose and was now calling from another part of the palace, not trusting himself to get here in time. He had figured out that I was going to pull something during the noon recess, which was just ending.

"I can't believe it!" the Venezuelan was saying. I reached for the Luger and moved up behind him. "But señor Carter is here with…"

He turned toward me just as I smashed the handle of the Luger down against the side of his head. He fell heavily to the floor and lay there unconscious. The telephone receiver dangled beside the desk. I could hear Hawk's voice from the other end.

"Hello? What happened? Are you there?"

I stepped over the inert body and replaced the receiver in its cradle. I went to the door and looked up and down the corridor. There was no one around. I stepped out into the corridor, closing the door quickly behind me. Hopefully, nobody would go into the security annex for a while.

I walked back to the conference room just as they were closing the doors. In minutes the conference would resume, and the lethal device would be activated. I stood across the corridor, tense and acutely aware of the terrible pressure. It would soon disappear — after the device had done its work. A Secret Service agent emerged from the conference room and nodded to the guards outside. He walked over to me.

"Hello, Carter," he said in a friendly voice.

I nodded.

"Well, they're under way in there. I'll be glad when all this is over."

"Me too," I said.

I wanted him to leave, to let me just stand there and wait it out alone. The signal would come soon, and I would know it was all over. Somebody might stagger out of the room to get help, maybe a security man stationed right at the door. But neither the Venezuelan President nor the American Vice-President would make it — nobody at the table would survive.

"Everything seems quiet," the man said. "A little too quiet for my taste. I have this strange feeling. Do you have it?"

"Not today," I said. "I was really worried when I first got here, though."

"Well, I have it. Right at the back of my neck. But things look all right."

"Yes, I'm sure we'll have an uneventful afternoon," I said.

"Well, I guess I'd better go check with the Security Police. See you later, Carter."

"Right," I said.

He started down the hall toward the security annex. Tiny beads of perspiration popped out on my upper lip. If he found the chief of Venezuelan security lying there unconscious, he'd probably try to stop the conference, and that would ruin everything. I wondered if I should go after him. But I had a strong feeling that I had to stay right where I was. Orders were orders. An NSA man came down the corridor from the opposite direction and stopped to talk with the Secret Service agent. I'd gotten a short reprieve. I let out a shaky breath and looked across to the conference room doors. Inside, the afternoon session was getting under way. Any minute the device would be activated.

Suddenly there was a loud, shrill sound over the building. It was the high-pitched scream of jets flying over the palace to salute the Caracas Conference. The sound pierced my eardrums, and something strange started happening inside me.

A jumble of scenes, words, and mental pictures crashed into my consciousness. I saw myself, with a gun, the Luger. I saw strange cities and an apartment that had to be in America. Everything crowded in on me, churning in my brain and making me feel sick and dizzy.

Something deep inside me seemed to force me to get to a window, so I could hear the sound again. But a strong sense of duty held me back. They'd ordered me to remain outside the conference room. In spite of those orders, I had to get to a window, and slowly, awkwardly, I walked down the corridor to an alcove where I knew I'd find one. I hesitated once and almost turned back to my post outside the conference room but then went on to the window. I shoved it open just as the jets were heading back for a second sweep over the palace.

At first, as they came toward the palace, I didn't hear anything. But then, when they were almost directly overhead, I heard the loud, high-pitched scream of their engines. It dissipated into a roar as they flashed over the building, gleaming in the sunlight.

This time the sound of the jets really jolted me. It was like a tremendous shock wave passing through my entire body. Suddenly I heard Tanya's beautiful voice:

The sound of the jets was still vibrating inside my head. And I heard another piercing sound in my head, almost like the one the jets had just made.

Suddenly truth crashed in on me from every direction. I looked around me, dazed and horribly confused. What the hell was going on? Why had I been posing as a revolutionary named Chávez. I knew I was Nick Carter, that I worked for AXE and I was here to… Suddenly I remembered my fight with Vincent and Hawk, and… Christ!

The jets were gone. I leaned weakly against the window ledge. What the hell was this all about? Why had I assumed the identity of a Venezuelan I'd never even heard of before? What had made me fight with Hawk and Vincent, when they were just trying to… take me off the assignment. The carafe! I'd taken a carafe into the conference room just a few minutes ago, and I'd known it contained a device that would kill everyone in the room.

It was all coming back fast. I hadn't just been posing — I'd really believed I was a man named Chávez. Everything I'd done during the past two days had been for the purpose of assassinating the President of Venezuela and the Vice-President of the United States — the two men I'd been sent to Caracas to protect! I couldn't remember anything before that, but last night I'd met Ilse Hoffmann again and I'd called her Tanya, a Russian name. And she'd known about my deadly mission.

Yes, that was it! I couldn't remember anything that had happened to me between the time I'd gone to her apartment, several days ago, and the time I'd come back believing I was Rafael Chávez. But something was coming back to me about that evening in her apartment. I remembered a feeling of dizziness and nausea. I'd tried to get away, but two men had stopped me. I must have been drugged. And they'd done something to me to make me act the way I had ever since. That was the humiliation they had spoken of in the message. Somehow they were using me to assassinate the conference dignitaries. And «they» were the KGB. Tanya had admitted it. I remembered explaining my disappearance to Hawk, but that was the story they'd told me to give him. I had no memory at all of those two days I was gone, and that was undoubtedly the way they wanted it. That must have been when they'd conditioned me to assume the identity of Rafael Chávez.