Jack walked quickly away from the storage facility, towards his Towne Car,
still shaken by the encounter with Vaughn and Sydney. As always, he
approached the door with caution, alert to signs of intrusion or meddling.
There were none. He opened the door and sank into the driver's seat. He
looked at the clock, 11:59, 27 minutes since he had left the car. He
checked the onboard message system. No activity. He punched an address into
the GPS, a route appeared instantly. It was only then that he allowed the
explosive scene on Île Mariette to replay in his mind, with the strains of
Irina's last words ringing in his ears.
He could not quite believe that Irina had given her daughter the computer codes that were the key to locating and destroying all of the Alliance cells, nor could he completely discredit it. Such a database existed within SD-6. He had been privileged with at least that much information as a high- ranking officer in SD-6. What would Irina's endgame possibly be in this scenario? Was she actually trying to bring down the Alliance as she had told her daughter?
He put his head on the steering wheel, sickened by a deluge of memories. Theirs had been a marriage of companionable silence, subtle glances, and enigmatic smiles. He'd thought that words were not needed between them. They spoke in a coded language of literary allusions from a half a dozen languages. He thought they shared this secret language, but that had all been a carefully constructed illusion. They hadn't spoken the same language at all.
He closed his eyes. He could see her coming down the stone steps of the Swedish embassy on M Street, moving with a dancer's grace, dressed in a vermillion red sun dress, carrying a champagne flute in each hand. Jack kept his eyes on Kharkov, a Russian diplomat said to be a rising star of the KGB, amused that majority of the other young men at the party quickly positioned themselves to get the very best view of her descent. He glanced back to see the show and realized with a tinge of horror that she was walking towards him, her eyes never leaving his face.
"Come, gaze with me upon this dome of many coloured glass and see his mother's pride, his father's joy, unto whom duty whispers low: 'thou must!' and who replies 'I can!' " she recited while still a few feet away in a voice which cut through the idle chatter flowing around them. Her dark eyes were full of wry humor seeming to invite his admiring gaze.
"--yon clean upstanding well dressed boy that with his peers full oft hath quaffed the wine of life and found it sweet--"she continued, handing him one of the flutes. "A tear within his stern blue eye, upon his firm white lips a smile, one thought alone: to do or die for God for country and for Yale," she mocked.
"Or, in my case, Harvard," Jack interjected.
"No matter. 'Above his blond determined head, the sacred flag of truth unfurled in the bright heyday of his youth the upper class American, unsullied stands before the world," she continued, her eyes half closed, raising her glass, as if in salute.
She took a step closer, and Jack could smell her perfume, a heady scent of bergamot, lemon, and patchouli accented with vanilla, sandalwood and musk, which he would later come to know as Shalimar, her signature fragrance.
"With manly heart and conscience free," she whispered, leaning in still closer until her mouth touched his ear, "upon the front steps of her home by the high-minded, pure young girl--much kissed."
She drew back slowly, clearly enjoying the effect.
"e.e. cummings," she explained, answering the question, which had not yet even remotely crossed his mind.
Finally, recovering his composure, Jack quirked his eyebrows and inclined his head, as if making a slight bow. "Droll and ironic look at blind patriotism and self-satisfaction, but why direct it at me?"
"Looking at you made me think the lines might not be as satirical as they seem," she said, a smile playing on her lips.
"I take it that you are not a student of politics?"
"Call me a student of human nature."
"Does it take a particular form?"
"American literature,"Laura said. "I am finishing up my master's. And you?"
"State department," he replied blandly.
"That seems to be the standard answer this evening," Laura replied. "You haven't touched your wine."
"I don't drink," Jack said, and when she looked at him inquiringly, he added, "I never have."
"A boy scout and an ascetic," Laura observed. "I'll have to revise the previous lines about quaffing life. I suggest you at least taste it. I think you'll find it sweet."
Jack raised his glass to her and, reeling from the effects of something more heady than champagne, drank it to the dregs.
A few minutes later his steps echoed down the long, dimly lit corridor of the NSA sub-basement as he approached the guard standing beside the security door. Not wasting words on pleasantries, he showed the guard his security clearance. The guard gave a curt nod and invited him to place his palm on the security sensor. The metallic doors slid apart with a barely audible hiss, and Jack entered the cold blue steel lab in which Irina Derevko was being autopsied.
The pungent scent of ammonia made his nostrils flare. His eyes flicked around the room, taking in the lab equipment, the metal gurneys, and the sterilized lab instruments. The single living occupant in the room, a middle-aged man of slight build and pale complexion with a thatch of thick black hair on his head that stuck up like the bristles, was peering into a microscope. Noticing Jack, he straightened up, replaced the wire-rimmed glasses that habitually perched on his nose, and crossed the room to greet him, his hand outstretched.
"Agent Bristow," he said quickly. "My name is Frank Legrare. The deputy director said you'd be coming for the results. I needn't tell you that the tests required for this sort of identification are both complex and time consuming, and frankly, often inconclusive, but I believe you'll be very pleased with the results. There is no doubt that the woman described in Rambaldi's prophecy is Irina Derevko. Please, if you'll just step this way," Legrare said motioning to a series of microscopes against the wall.
"Rambaldi's manuscript declared that the woman in the prophecy would have three distinguishing characteristics--"Dr. Legrare continued, nervousness giving way to excitement at his discoveries.
"Increased number of platelets, an enlarged heart, and certain DNA markers, yes, I know," Jack replied. "Go on."
"If you look at Slide A, you'll see the typical number of platelets found in a healthy woman of this age. Now look at Slide B. See the difference? Increased platelet levels usually means the body is fighting a disease, but from what we can tell, these platelet levels, although abnormally high for the general population, were normal for the individual in question, suggesting increased ability to fight off infection and heal minor injuries."
Jack glanced at the slides evincing no surprise.
"Now, if you come over here to the computer screen, you'll see a model of Derevko's DNA." Dr. Legrare clicked the mouse, illuminating a host of different points along the entwined helix. "The possibility of someone from the general population having two or three of these markers is quite high, considering that all humans share more than 99.9% of their DNA. The probability of having all forty-seven is well-nigh impossible. Derevko's DNA matched all of Rambaldi's specification to a T. However, we aren't even close to mapping out what kind of impact each of these markers might have on the physical, intellectual and emotional capacities of a specific individual. If Rambaldi knew, he was centuries ahead of our genetic research."
He glanced at Jack, almost shyly, eager to share his enthusiasm with someone, but hesitant should he be rebuffed. "The opportunity to use the most advanced technologies at our disposal to probe into the mind of a savant, such as Rambaldi, to understand genetics in the way he perceived it over five centuries ago--well, for a man, like myself, it is almost--dare I say?--a holy, perhaps even a sacramental, endeavor."
Jack nodded gravely and followed Legrare through another set of metallic doors into an adjoining room and ignoring the gurney covered by a green sheet which lay to his left, he walked quickly toward a scale suspended from the ceiling. He reached into the metal bowl and removed something with his gloved hands.
"This is Derevko's heart," Legrare said, holding it up for Jack to inspect. "Nearly one-and-a-half-times the size of a normal heart for a women of this age and weight. Notice the striations on the outer walls," he said pointing with a latex –covered finger to the right ventricle, "as you can see—Agent Bristow, are you alright?"
Jack swayed on his feet, his gorge rising. He staggered over to one of the shiny metallic basins and braced himself as wave upon wave of nausea crested over him. He broke out in a sweat and stood shaking willing the attack to pass.
Dr. Legrare hovered over him, wringing his hands. "Terribly sorry. We seldom get visitors down here. I forget sometimes. Can I get you a glass of water?"
Jack mopped his brow with a handkerchief and turned to face the doctor once more, his complexion ashy gray. "What else did you find during the autopsy?"
"For a women of 51, she was in remarkably fit condition," Dr. Legrare resuming his litany. "Indicators suggested that she carried multiple pregnancies to term, delivering one through C-section. No sign of broken bones or significant injuries, just the bullet wound which caused her demise.
"One more thing," he added rifling through the sheaf of papers clipped to the board. "A point of interest. Any issue would likely share many of the same Rambaldi-relevant genetic traits, but the file makes no mention of them. Do you know if Irina Derevko was survived by any children?"
"A daughter, and apparently, a son," Jack replied tersely. "I'd like to see the body."
"I'm not sure that is a good idea--that is, I mean to say--" Legrare stuttered.
"Don't trouble yourself on my account, doctor. Something I ate disagreed with me," Jack stated dismissively.
Legrare passed a physician's practiced eye over Jack, and read determination in his face and resolve in his stance. "We've finished the autopsy. You'll find a cross-like incision along the sternum and across the chest and the internal organs have been removed, but the rest of the body is intact."
He pulled back the sheet and said over his shoulder, "If you have any questions, I'll be in the outer office."
Cold white light spilled over the table. It was Laura--not Irina Derevko-- Jack saw before him. Older, with a few more lines etched around her mouth and at the corners of her eyes, but the same woman he had met on the stone balustrade so many years ago. The same expressive eyebrows, the same straight, aquiline nose, the same full mouth. He half expected her to open her eyes, confident that if she did so, the same doe-eyes she shared with their daughter would gaze back at him, alight with tenderness, anger, passion, humor.
All the emotions which accompanied the news of his wife's death so many years ago, engulfed him once more, and he shuddered.
"How did we come to this? Laura--luve"
He gently pulled the cover over her and walked back through the sealed door directly to Dr. Legrare's office.
"Was anything found on the body?" he asked curtly.
"Some personal effects. Would you like to see them?"
Dr. Legrare patted his pockets and then pulled a small plastic bag from his left breast pocket and emptied the contents onto Jack's palm: a pair of diamond earrings and a small, highly burnished wedding band.
Jack rolled the diamond earrings with a finger tip. Laura had said her mother had given them to her the day she graduated from college, and he wondered now if that, too, had been a lie. He picked up the wedding band in his left hand, almost gingerly, as if the gold might melt in his grasp. He held the ring up to the buzzing florescent light and gazed at the inscription inside, worn, but still visible after all this time:
JDB 6/19/73 my luve is a red, red, rose.
For almost thirty years, despite deceits too numerous to catalogue, she had kept her wedding ring. Jack's brow furrowed.
His mind flashed back to his daughter's retelling of her last moments with her mother. Irina had given her a message—"Tell him...you must tell him...love..."
Luve.
The only endearment he had used throughout their marriage, taken from the title of Burns' immortal poem, which he had had inscribed in the ring he now held in his hands.
"You must tell him...luve."
Could he trust this woman? She who had betrayed him, abandoned their daughter and sacrificed countless lives to serve her cause, when Sydney's life hung in the balance? Had love won out in her death?
A mist formed over Jack's eyes so that the ring seemed to dance before his eyes, as he repeated under his breath, "unto whom duty whispers low: 'thou must!' and who replies 'I can!'"
"Did you find something significant?" Dr. Legrare inquired, watching him curiously, pulling absentmindedly on his ear.
Jack paused close to Dr. Legrare and taking in a deep breath said, "You've been very helpful. Thank you."
He shook the doctor's chill hand and stepped through the doors. Stony faced, he ignored the security guard's nod, and proceeded down the hall, pulling out his cell phone.
"Get me Devlin. Tell him to relay the codes to Dixon and order the strike."
He could not quite believe that Irina had given her daughter the computer codes that were the key to locating and destroying all of the Alliance cells, nor could he completely discredit it. Such a database existed within SD-6. He had been privileged with at least that much information as a high- ranking officer in SD-6. What would Irina's endgame possibly be in this scenario? Was she actually trying to bring down the Alliance as she had told her daughter?
He put his head on the steering wheel, sickened by a deluge of memories. Theirs had been a marriage of companionable silence, subtle glances, and enigmatic smiles. He'd thought that words were not needed between them. They spoke in a coded language of literary allusions from a half a dozen languages. He thought they shared this secret language, but that had all been a carefully constructed illusion. They hadn't spoken the same language at all.
He closed his eyes. He could see her coming down the stone steps of the Swedish embassy on M Street, moving with a dancer's grace, dressed in a vermillion red sun dress, carrying a champagne flute in each hand. Jack kept his eyes on Kharkov, a Russian diplomat said to be a rising star of the KGB, amused that majority of the other young men at the party quickly positioned themselves to get the very best view of her descent. He glanced back to see the show and realized with a tinge of horror that she was walking towards him, her eyes never leaving his face.
"Come, gaze with me upon this dome of many coloured glass and see his mother's pride, his father's joy, unto whom duty whispers low: 'thou must!' and who replies 'I can!' " she recited while still a few feet away in a voice which cut through the idle chatter flowing around them. Her dark eyes were full of wry humor seeming to invite his admiring gaze.
"--yon clean upstanding well dressed boy that with his peers full oft hath quaffed the wine of life and found it sweet--"she continued, handing him one of the flutes. "A tear within his stern blue eye, upon his firm white lips a smile, one thought alone: to do or die for God for country and for Yale," she mocked.
"Or, in my case, Harvard," Jack interjected.
"No matter. 'Above his blond determined head, the sacred flag of truth unfurled in the bright heyday of his youth the upper class American, unsullied stands before the world," she continued, her eyes half closed, raising her glass, as if in salute.
She took a step closer, and Jack could smell her perfume, a heady scent of bergamot, lemon, and patchouli accented with vanilla, sandalwood and musk, which he would later come to know as Shalimar, her signature fragrance.
"With manly heart and conscience free," she whispered, leaning in still closer until her mouth touched his ear, "upon the front steps of her home by the high-minded, pure young girl--much kissed."
She drew back slowly, clearly enjoying the effect.
"e.e. cummings," she explained, answering the question, which had not yet even remotely crossed his mind.
Finally, recovering his composure, Jack quirked his eyebrows and inclined his head, as if making a slight bow. "Droll and ironic look at blind patriotism and self-satisfaction, but why direct it at me?"
"Looking at you made me think the lines might not be as satirical as they seem," she said, a smile playing on her lips.
"I take it that you are not a student of politics?"
"Call me a student of human nature."
"Does it take a particular form?"
"American literature,"Laura said. "I am finishing up my master's. And you?"
"State department," he replied blandly.
"That seems to be the standard answer this evening," Laura replied. "You haven't touched your wine."
"I don't drink," Jack said, and when she looked at him inquiringly, he added, "I never have."
"A boy scout and an ascetic," Laura observed. "I'll have to revise the previous lines about quaffing life. I suggest you at least taste it. I think you'll find it sweet."
Jack raised his glass to her and, reeling from the effects of something more heady than champagne, drank it to the dregs.
A few minutes later his steps echoed down the long, dimly lit corridor of the NSA sub-basement as he approached the guard standing beside the security door. Not wasting words on pleasantries, he showed the guard his security clearance. The guard gave a curt nod and invited him to place his palm on the security sensor. The metallic doors slid apart with a barely audible hiss, and Jack entered the cold blue steel lab in which Irina Derevko was being autopsied.
The pungent scent of ammonia made his nostrils flare. His eyes flicked around the room, taking in the lab equipment, the metal gurneys, and the sterilized lab instruments. The single living occupant in the room, a middle-aged man of slight build and pale complexion with a thatch of thick black hair on his head that stuck up like the bristles, was peering into a microscope. Noticing Jack, he straightened up, replaced the wire-rimmed glasses that habitually perched on his nose, and crossed the room to greet him, his hand outstretched.
"Agent Bristow," he said quickly. "My name is Frank Legrare. The deputy director said you'd be coming for the results. I needn't tell you that the tests required for this sort of identification are both complex and time consuming, and frankly, often inconclusive, but I believe you'll be very pleased with the results. There is no doubt that the woman described in Rambaldi's prophecy is Irina Derevko. Please, if you'll just step this way," Legrare said motioning to a series of microscopes against the wall.
"Rambaldi's manuscript declared that the woman in the prophecy would have three distinguishing characteristics--"Dr. Legrare continued, nervousness giving way to excitement at his discoveries.
"Increased number of platelets, an enlarged heart, and certain DNA markers, yes, I know," Jack replied. "Go on."
"If you look at Slide A, you'll see the typical number of platelets found in a healthy woman of this age. Now look at Slide B. See the difference? Increased platelet levels usually means the body is fighting a disease, but from what we can tell, these platelet levels, although abnormally high for the general population, were normal for the individual in question, suggesting increased ability to fight off infection and heal minor injuries."
Jack glanced at the slides evincing no surprise.
"Now, if you come over here to the computer screen, you'll see a model of Derevko's DNA." Dr. Legrare clicked the mouse, illuminating a host of different points along the entwined helix. "The possibility of someone from the general population having two or three of these markers is quite high, considering that all humans share more than 99.9% of their DNA. The probability of having all forty-seven is well-nigh impossible. Derevko's DNA matched all of Rambaldi's specification to a T. However, we aren't even close to mapping out what kind of impact each of these markers might have on the physical, intellectual and emotional capacities of a specific individual. If Rambaldi knew, he was centuries ahead of our genetic research."
He glanced at Jack, almost shyly, eager to share his enthusiasm with someone, but hesitant should he be rebuffed. "The opportunity to use the most advanced technologies at our disposal to probe into the mind of a savant, such as Rambaldi, to understand genetics in the way he perceived it over five centuries ago--well, for a man, like myself, it is almost--dare I say?--a holy, perhaps even a sacramental, endeavor."
Jack nodded gravely and followed Legrare through another set of metallic doors into an adjoining room and ignoring the gurney covered by a green sheet which lay to his left, he walked quickly toward a scale suspended from the ceiling. He reached into the metal bowl and removed something with his gloved hands.
"This is Derevko's heart," Legrare said, holding it up for Jack to inspect. "Nearly one-and-a-half-times the size of a normal heart for a women of this age and weight. Notice the striations on the outer walls," he said pointing with a latex –covered finger to the right ventricle, "as you can see—Agent Bristow, are you alright?"
Jack swayed on his feet, his gorge rising. He staggered over to one of the shiny metallic basins and braced himself as wave upon wave of nausea crested over him. He broke out in a sweat and stood shaking willing the attack to pass.
Dr. Legrare hovered over him, wringing his hands. "Terribly sorry. We seldom get visitors down here. I forget sometimes. Can I get you a glass of water?"
Jack mopped his brow with a handkerchief and turned to face the doctor once more, his complexion ashy gray. "What else did you find during the autopsy?"
"For a women of 51, she was in remarkably fit condition," Dr. Legrare resuming his litany. "Indicators suggested that she carried multiple pregnancies to term, delivering one through C-section. No sign of broken bones or significant injuries, just the bullet wound which caused her demise.
"One more thing," he added rifling through the sheaf of papers clipped to the board. "A point of interest. Any issue would likely share many of the same Rambaldi-relevant genetic traits, but the file makes no mention of them. Do you know if Irina Derevko was survived by any children?"
"A daughter, and apparently, a son," Jack replied tersely. "I'd like to see the body."
"I'm not sure that is a good idea--that is, I mean to say--" Legrare stuttered.
"Don't trouble yourself on my account, doctor. Something I ate disagreed with me," Jack stated dismissively.
Legrare passed a physician's practiced eye over Jack, and read determination in his face and resolve in his stance. "We've finished the autopsy. You'll find a cross-like incision along the sternum and across the chest and the internal organs have been removed, but the rest of the body is intact."
He pulled back the sheet and said over his shoulder, "If you have any questions, I'll be in the outer office."
Cold white light spilled over the table. It was Laura--not Irina Derevko-- Jack saw before him. Older, with a few more lines etched around her mouth and at the corners of her eyes, but the same woman he had met on the stone balustrade so many years ago. The same expressive eyebrows, the same straight, aquiline nose, the same full mouth. He half expected her to open her eyes, confident that if she did so, the same doe-eyes she shared with their daughter would gaze back at him, alight with tenderness, anger, passion, humor.
All the emotions which accompanied the news of his wife's death so many years ago, engulfed him once more, and he shuddered.
"How did we come to this? Laura--luve"
He gently pulled the cover over her and walked back through the sealed door directly to Dr. Legrare's office.
"Was anything found on the body?" he asked curtly.
"Some personal effects. Would you like to see them?"
Dr. Legrare patted his pockets and then pulled a small plastic bag from his left breast pocket and emptied the contents onto Jack's palm: a pair of diamond earrings and a small, highly burnished wedding band.
Jack rolled the diamond earrings with a finger tip. Laura had said her mother had given them to her the day she graduated from college, and he wondered now if that, too, had been a lie. He picked up the wedding band in his left hand, almost gingerly, as if the gold might melt in his grasp. He held the ring up to the buzzing florescent light and gazed at the inscription inside, worn, but still visible after all this time:
JDB 6/19/73 my luve is a red, red, rose.
For almost thirty years, despite deceits too numerous to catalogue, she had kept her wedding ring. Jack's brow furrowed.
His mind flashed back to his daughter's retelling of her last moments with her mother. Irina had given her a message—"Tell him...you must tell him...love..."
Luve.
The only endearment he had used throughout their marriage, taken from the title of Burns' immortal poem, which he had had inscribed in the ring he now held in his hands.
"You must tell him...luve."
Could he trust this woman? She who had betrayed him, abandoned their daughter and sacrificed countless lives to serve her cause, when Sydney's life hung in the balance? Had love won out in her death?
A mist formed over Jack's eyes so that the ring seemed to dance before his eyes, as he repeated under his breath, "unto whom duty whispers low: 'thou must!' and who replies 'I can!'"
"Did you find something significant?" Dr. Legrare inquired, watching him curiously, pulling absentmindedly on his ear.
Jack paused close to Dr. Legrare and taking in a deep breath said, "You've been very helpful. Thank you."
He shook the doctor's chill hand and stepped through the doors. Stony faced, he ignored the security guard's nod, and proceeded down the hall, pulling out his cell phone.
"Get me Devlin. Tell him to relay the codes to Dixon and order the strike."