David Lindsey - The Face of the Assassin

Bern couldn’t believe what he was hearing. The dismay must have showed on his face. Mondragon expanded.

“We need to convince Baida that Jude is still alive,” Mondragon said. “Jude needs to be seen. He and Baida had established a relationship. Jude had accomplished an astonishing thing, convincing Baida to reveal himself to him. But more than that, he had convinced Baida to trust him-at a certain level, of course, not unreservedly, not wholly, but at least enough to engage in an enterprise with him. We need to keep that connection alive.”

“That’s impossible,” Bern said. “It’s… it wouldn’t work for ten minutes.”

“It would.”

“It couldn’t.”

“Why?”

“How could it, for Christ’s sake?”

“Several answers. One: the sheer improbability of it. Who would believe, at first blush, that a man who looks like Jude, talks like Jude, acts like Jude, has the same artistic talents as Jude-and, God, even has the same DNA as Jude-who would believe that he would not be Jude? The absurdity of such a thing provides us with our greatest advantage.”

“At first blush?”

“Yes! That’s the second answer: You will not be in a situation in which you will have to portray Jude in the sense that you will have to live as Jude, interact with others as Jude. No, we simply want you to present the physical Jude to observers. You need to be seen as Jude, and little more. It is not necessary that you be Jude for an extended length of time.”

“What’s the objective? Exactly.”

“For now, just reestablish contact with him. Help us buy time.”

“You’re right about one thing,” Bern said, feeling more agitation than he was showing. “It’s an absurd idea.”

“No,” Mondragon insisted. “It isn’t.”

But Bern didn’t want to have anything to do with this. Why hadn’t an official officer of the CIA come to him to make this plea? Why this roundabout way of getting word to him that Mondragon was legitimate? He didn’t care whose asset Mondragon was; he knew that the further you got from the official business of anything, the closer you got to the kinds of things that never saw the light of day. He didn’t want to have anything to do with that kind of darkness.

He looked at the elegantly dressed Mondragon, this man decapitated by a shadow, and he saw the epitome of menace. This was the other side of the looking glass, but instead of encountering the Queen’s nonsense, he was looking at the devil’s creep show.

“There’s got to be a better way,” Bern said.

“No. This is the best way. It’s… an unbelievable opportunity. Jude had an identical twin! And the CIA had the good sense to keep it a secret from the very moment they discovered it. Even from Jude himself.”

Bern mentally lunged at this revealing slip.

“He didn’t know?”

Mondragon tried to cover his hesitation by responding in a slow, calmer voice. “That’s what it says in the piece of the file they gave me. He didn’t know.”

“‘Piece’ of the file.”

“This is the CIA, Paul. ‘Need to know’ is a mantra with these people. Everyone accepts it.”

“How the hell did he not know?”

Silence. This time, Bern sensed the stark eyeballs staring back at him from the impenetrable shadow. He felt another change in the energy in this room of faces, and he didn’t like what he felt.

“Look,” Bern said, and he sat forward in his armchair, “this isn’t for me. You’re going to have to find another way to do your business.”

“You need to reconsider, Paul.”

“No, I don’t. I’m not Jude. Nobody’s paying me to do this shit.”

“Oh, if money is a factor-”

“No. It’s not. I wouldn’t do it for any amount of money. I appreciate the fact that this guy’s a terrorist and needs to be stopped, but you’re talking about something that requires special training, special skills. And I don’t have either of those.”

“Your face,” Mondragon said. “Your DNA. These are the things that no other man on earth can bring to us. How much more specialized could you be?”

Bern was shaking his head. “This is CIA business, for Christ’s sake. This is way past dicey. This feels suicidal, and I don’t want any part of it.”

He stood.

“Just a minute, Paul,” Mondragon said with chilling equanimity. The young woman appeared, handed a folder to him, then waited. “I have another file,” he said.

Bern hesitated.

“Sit down,” Mondragon said politely. “Please.”

Bern remained standing.

Mondragon opened the file folder. “This pertains to Dana and Philip Lau,” Mondragon said. “And their daughter, Alice.”

Bern must have been expected to respond at that moment, because Mondragon paused, as if waiting for a reply. But Bern was struck speechless. He was afraid. He didn’t know why yet, but he knew instinctively that he should be. He sat down.

“Here’s the way it will work,” Mondragon said. “During Alice’s visits to you, she often swims. She changes clothes in the lower bedroom of your home, the one nearest to the terrace door that leads down to the cove. Alice is a healthy young girl with a vivid imagination. She… fantasizes and sometimes she… caresses and

… gratifies herself in that bedroom when she changes clothes. The pictures we have are very clear… and explicit.”

Bern was paralyzed. Mondragon went on.

“Over the years, Jude had occasional disciplinary problems. A couple of years ago, he had a mistress. As insurance for us, she was able to collect a quantity of semen for our safekeeping. That semen, of course, shares your identical DNA.

“You will remember that a few weeks ago, Alice misplaced a swimsuit. Her mother was frustrated, but she has lost them before. They bought another. Never gave it another thought.”

Bern’s ears were ringing, his mind frozen.

“These are the components that comprise the story of the end of your life, Paul,” Mondragon said, and then he fell silent, letting it soak in.

Bern reeled, his mind flickered, and his thoughts lurched into the past, into the imagined future, into a nightmare.

“Something like this,” Mondragon went on, “has no satisfactory resolution. It isn’t possible. Statutory rape, and the death of a disturbed girl’s innocence. Devastated parents. The betrayal and destruction of a long and close friendship. The end of your anonymity and reputation. Our people are very good, and the evidence would be incontrovertible.

“But even if, somehow by some miracle, you were able to escape the facts,” Mondragon elaborated, “the media coverage and the imagination of the public would condemn you. Maybe his lawyers got him off, they would say, but we know that he did something terrible to that poor girl.” Mondragon sat perfectly still. “The birth of suspicion, Paul, leaves an indelible stain. Nothing cleans it.”

Silence.

Mondragon held out the folder. “Would you like to see the pictures of Alice?”

The young woman took the folder from Mondragon and handed it to Bern, then disappeared.

Bern had to look. At least he had to identify Alice. He would be an idiot if he simply took Mondragon’s word for something like this.

With unsteady hands, he slid the photos out of the envelope and looked. They were of Alice, of course.

They were stills from a video recording. Video. The sons of bitches.

He couldn’t look at more than a couple of them, and then he dropped the envelope and the pictures on the floor beside his chair.

“Jesus Christ,” he said, and he leaned forward, his elbows on his knees, and buried his face in his hands. Mondragon cruelly remained silent, and Bern felt as if he had fallen into hell.

Finally, Mondragon spoke.