George Chesbro: Dark Chant In A Crimson Key

For the first time since we had sat down at the table, Duane Insolers looked directly at the man whose life had become so inextricably, and ambiguously, bound up with his own. "Jesus Christ, Sinclair. You really are a goddamn patriot."

"And you're a fool, Duane," Sinclair replied easily, without rancor. "I don't think you quite understand. In the end, I did not release the materials I had, or tell what I knew, because the resulting disruption, bitterness, recriminations, and internal dissent would have pleased, and served the interests of, the group whose leader had concocted the plan in the first place-Black Flame. They have always been my real enemies, and I saw no reason to amuse them at the expense of the United States."

"I don't think the CIA would be very impressed with your explanation, Sinclair, and I know they wouldn't believe you've destroyed the Cooked Goose documents. They believe you're hanging on to them to use to bargain for your freedom if and when you're ever caught."

"Chant doesn't care what the CIA believes, Duane," Jan said sharply. "And he doesn't have to explain himself to them or to you. You talk like somebody who's hunting him."

There was a strained silence. Finally, Veil said, "I'd very much like to hear the rest of it, Sinclair."

The man sitting at the head of the table thought about it. Then he looked at Jan, smiled, threw back his head, and laughed. It was a deep, rich, pleasing sound. "The rest of it? Well, the bottom line was that I was suddenly unemployed, and my future job prospects looked rather grim. I was a military deserter, hunted by CIA assassins, as well as far more dangerous assassins from Black Flame. I decided it was time for a career change. I'd had superb training as both a ninja warrior and a military officer, but what was I going to do with it? I suppose I could have found work as a mercenary, but I was pretty certain I wouldn't much care for the kinds of assignments I'd be offered, and that line of work could leave me dangerously exposed to both Black Flame and the CIA. So I decided to go into business for myself as a kind of self-employed mercenary, selecting my own targets. I set up a one-man shop."

Harper said, "More like a one-man army."

Sinclair smiled at Harper, shrugged. "Any man's effectiveness is enhanced by good training and careful planning. The reputation for violence grew out of the nature of the business I'd gone into; I was dealing, for the most part, with extremely violent opponents, and extremely violent means had to be used in order to get their attention. It was good business practice. Also, this reputation for ruthlessness and violence, which I wanted, was helped along by the various outfits that were hunting me, because it also served their purposes. I wanted my targets to fear me, because it made them easier to manipulate, and the men hunting me found it convenient to have me portrayed in the media as a mad-dog killer. But, despite all that, I've still managed to make a few friends, like Duane here, along the way. And, perhaps, the other people at this table."

"I'm flattered that you should think of me as a friend, Sinclair," Insolers said in a somewhat absent tone.

Sinclair nodded in Insolers' direction, turned back to Veil. "During the course of an operation in Seattle, I learned that Black Flame was still very actively hunting me. That served to put me even more on my guard in the following years."

I asked, "When you mounted your operation against Neuberger, did you know that Cornucopia was a Black Flame front?"

"No," Sinclair replied, his tone suddenly revealing a trace of regret, and perhaps bitterness. "If I had, I never would have involved a friend of mine from Interpol by the name of Bo Wahlstrom. At the time, I knew only that Cornucopia laundered money for some big international crime organization, which could have been one of many; it was information I'd picked up as a result of something else I was doing. Ten million dollars, incidentally, was the approximate amount of that week's criminal proceeds, with the rest legitimate funds earmarked for various legitimate projects, so it was ten million I took. After I'd gotten what I wanted, I turned the information and documents I'd obtained over to Bo, as I'd done in similar situations over the years, for appropriate action by Interpol."

"I don't think it was your turning the information over to him that got your friend killed," I said. "It was his crooked partner. I'm almost certain it was the partner who somehow left Bo Wahlstrom exposed when he got hold of the file and tried to use it to blackmail Neuberger. Neuberger thought he was going to straighten everything out by sending me over here as a stalking horse to flush out the amateurs, kill them, and get the file back. But it was too late. The way the partner handled things must have tipped off Black Flame to precisely what was going on, and they were already in the game."

Sinclair said, "Yes. And so was I, because the way Bo was killed told me that Black Flame was involved in a big way. Now I had to take steps to attack as well as defend, because they were too close to home, and there was more than one of them. I decided to kill as many members of Black Flame as I could while I had the chance."

Veil asked, "You felt that with so many of them here, they were overexposed and vulnerable?"

Sinclair nodded. "I hoped so. But I have a lot of enemies besides Black Flame, and there were a lot of people coming to Switzerland because they thought I had tripped up and was vulnerable. I needed to gauge the situation, to try to estimate just how many Black Flame personnel I might be up against and who the other players might be. I needed time to watch and plan, while at the same time staying as close to the action as possible."

"Aha," I said with a wry smile. "This sounds like my entrance line in your play."

Again, Sinclair nodded. "I might have approached Duane, since he was already on the scene, but I wasn't sure what assignment he was supposed to be carrying out, and I didn't want to compromise him. Also, I doubted he would have any information I could use.

"Then another friend at Interpol informed me that no less a personage than Dr. Robert Frederickson, Mongo the Magnificent, was coming to Zurich, supposedly to get a progress report to send back to Neuberger. Well, that certainly didn't scan. I didn't know about the blackmail business at this time, but Mongo's imminent arrival told me Neuberger was up to something that could severely complicate matters, and I wanted to find out exactly what it was. That's when I decided to appoint myself as Mongo's chauffeur. It was a way of getting close to the action to see how events would play out. Black Flame was running amok, butchering everybody in sight, and I wasn't sure why at first. Then I realized it was an attempt to discredit me among the people who really knew me. That wasn't going to work, but it wouldn't stop Black Flame from trying, and that meant a lot more innocent people were going to die. I didn't want Mongo to be one of them, because by this time I felt responsible for him. I realized blackmail, or some other crazy business with outsiders, was involved when Black Flame attacked Mongo and the man who approached him at the hotel. I figured they would come at Mongo again, and I made it a point to always stay close. But then they passed up a number of opportunities to attack Mongo while he was driving all around the countryside trying to check up on me, and I realized they were leaving him alone for the time being-probably in the hope that he might lead them to me. Then Garth and Veil arrived on the scene and decided to fire me, which made it a bit tougher to act as Mongo's bodyguard. But I still tried to stay as close as possible."

I asked, "What would you have done if I'd checked with Hyatt Pomeroy here in the local Cornucopia office to see if he'd really sent you, or if I'd even mentioned your name to him?"