4EVER GRIMLY EASED himself into the marble tub, drawn and waiting for him in his apartment overlooking the river Spree. As he leaned back against the warm white Carrera, he cursed himself for taking a hit with the fiasco at the Adlon. Sure, it could’ve been him with his hand stuck on the door handle, frying like a pigeon on a live wire, but that was why he never took side jobs on his own. Death was the ultimate game of bait and switch. Which was why he was still alive. But today had been most unsatisfactory. He never should have subcontracted the hit, but he hadn’t expected an out-of-work journalist to come up with anything that elegant. Now it was a black mark on him, not Maguire.
He was 4EVER. He fucking knew better.
Checking the news feed on his device, he tapped in the queries about the accident at the Adlon, wiping the steam off the screen with a pristine white towel. 4EVER draped the towel on the tub wall behind him, taking a pen from the tub-side table, and began his report to Vanderloos.
Tarnhelm didn’t believe in inter-office memos when the dirty work had to be performed. One Time Pad, OTP all the way. It was their key to success. No email to trace, no memos left in a file for the authorities to find. Ever. And with it, the absolute secrecy that made them the top of the food chain in security service. Of course, they always required an outline of everything that went wrong or right. Then the recipient would read it, absorb it, and watch the document burn. There was no hacking that system.
4EVER made sure of it now, stating in his memo to Vanderloos that Farnsworth was a clean agent as far as Interpol and the authorities were concerned. That meant: no fingerprints on file, no DNA on file, no mug shots. Anywhere. Farnsworth’s body would go to the unidentified remains department at the morgue until they were compelled to give him an anonymous burial as a homeless indigent. For anyone who knew Farnsworth in another capacity, Vanderloos would instruct the PD arm of Tarnhelm to concoct an artful story about his untimely end or disappearance. A swaggering, entitled asshole like Farnsworth was easy to get rid of—his failed attempt at Everest—just like him!—without oxygen!—and he’s still lying up there! Or—his heroic—and losing—battle to sail the cross sea at Tierra Del Fuego alone. The PD stood for the Pollution Department. On paper, it specialized in environmental cleanup of wars and other disasters. But on the inside, everyone knew it stood for Plausible Deniability. They cleaned up all right. We are the Dustbin of the World. The entire incident would be just that—a curiosity—with all parties silent and blessedly uncurious.
He rubbed his jaw, still tight with anger over the botched assignment. It was unlike him. With every word he wrote, he made clear that Maguire was getting no more chances. Still, it wasn’t good for him. The way the current left Farnsworth, it had skittered across the carpet in a haze of static. 4EVER’d been actually paralyzed for a moment, and it took all his strength to get out of there. Now as he wrote in his memo, he mentioned that Maguire had either been the luckiest man in the world to have his lock short out on him, or he was much more wily than they first believed.
A knock came at the door.
“Who is it?” 4EVER snapped, irritated that his housemaid would interrupt him.
“Sir. Monsieur Portier’s asked for you.”
The voice was familiar. The door opened. 4EVER’s eyes narrowed in recognition at who stepped into the bathroom.
“What are you doing here?” he said, shock on his face.
“We’ve heard you and Mr. Vanderloos have been driving outside your lane,” was all the figure said before a black-clad assassin drove a dagger below 4EVER’s left clavicle.
Blood oozed into the bathwater, the smell of iron mixing with the pungent smell of bath salt. 4EVER slumped to the right over the beautifully draped towel. With the table next to him, his writings in one hand, and the pen languishing on the floor by the black man’s outstretched fingers, the scene looked strangely familiar.
“Another one for the PD,” the assassin said to his companion, matter-of-factly. He stepped to the tub and placed the end of a silencer against 4EVER’s temple. But he was stopped from pulling the trigger by his boss.
“Don’t ruin the tableau. It’s The Death of Marat. Don’t you see?”
“The death of who?”
“The Death of Marat. The painting by Jacques-Louis David. ‘N’ayant pu me corrompre ils m’ont assassin—Unable to corrupt me, they murdered me.’”
“You’ve got to be shitting me. He was not corrupted?” the second said, gesturing to 4EVER’s artfully collapsed body.
Quoting a speech, the first figure said, “‘Like Jesus, Marat loved ardently the people, and only them. Like Jesus, Marat hated kings, nobles, priests, rogues, and, like Jesus, he never stopped fighting against these plagues of the people.’”
There was a strange momentary silence while the two of them looked down at 4EVER.
“Where the hell’s that from? He’s no fucking Jesus.”
“It was Marat’s eulogy,” the first said simply. “Given by the Marquis de Sade.”
Stag couldn’t get his mind off of her. She followed him into his dreams that night. A rare occurrence. Usually Stag’s nights consisted of nightmares of Holly. Her desperate pleas torturing him as he watched her die in that pool of arterial blood and, lastly, the stench of excrement. But when he woke the next morning, he realized he’d dreamed of Red Riding Hood. And the strangest moment of all was when he realized that he—not Portier—was the Big Bad Wolf.
The edition of Mein Kampf was next to him in his bunk in the hostel. He’d gone back there after several subway switches and a long walk through the dark Tiergarten. Another night and he was still breathing. Today was the day to go to the Bundesarchiv. He rose. It was time to carpe diem. There was one thing he wanted to look into before he left Berlin.
“I can get your information,” Angelika Aradi said into the LCD screen to Portier. “But you have to give him room. I know the Tarnhelm board has the urge to strong-arm him, but I’m telling you, that won’t get you what you need. We’ll just end up killing him and lose the opportunity forever.” She frowned. “What’s the time frame?”
“The corrosion rate of aluminum is eighty years, solder far, far less,” he said acidly. “There’s your time frame.”
Portier looked at her through the screen. “May I inquire about darling Genevieve?”
The question hung in the air for a moment.
“Vieve is very well, thank you,” Angelika answered, her voice scrubbed of emotion.
“Did she start school this year?”
“Kindergarten.”
“Kindergarten! What a charming age. I suppose there were days you never thought she would make it to kindergarten. The leukemia is undetectable, is it?”
“Yes,” she breathed, running her hand through her hair. “I will never be able to thank you enough.”
“I’ve always thought Switzerland had the best doctors. Imagine my surprise when I found that clinic in Norway. Absolutely the best. It was worth any expense.”
“It cost you millions. You’ll forever have my gratitude.” She kept her expression implacable.
“I would like more, my angel. I was never able to have children. And now …” His voice wandered off.
“I don’t think an angel is what you want.”
“Then be my devil. You already are.”
“I’m indebted to you. I always will be.”
“You’re the woman I need. The one to cure me of my afflictions. I’m sick of shallow, stupid beauty. I need mental stimulation … as well as physical to heal me. You could give me both.”
“You know I will do whatever you ask.” Again, her voice was meticulously wiped clean.
“Ah, but always there’s work to be done. And you are the very best I have.”
“Yes.”
“I can’t give you very much time.”
“I can be quick.”
“Then be quick. I have better things I’d like you to be doing.”
“I shall do my best.”
“I know you will. You always have.”
She hit the disconnect. Her screen went blank.
She stood and went to the window. Her room across from the Adlon looked right out over Brandenburg Gate and the Quadriga. In the distance, the horses pounded forward with the conundrum of frozen perpetual motion. “Victory” held her laurel wreath aloft for all to see.
Peace was upon them.
For now.