swer me, Doe. 11

  "It had no name. A number, that's all. A number

  picked at random so it didn't mean anything and it

  could never mean anything. Triple Five."

  "Neat," he acknowledged. "The numeral prefix used

  in all Hollywood movies because the five-five-five isn't

  used anywhere." He had a sudden hunch. "You're trained

  in weapons, aren't you?"

  "Yes. "

  "I'm getting the strangest feeling your past is some-

  how interconnected with mine."

  She waited. He was moving perfectly. Precisely the

  way her father had predicted,

  "Well, you're not volunteering much. Then give

  me just one name that fits, Weinstein, and I'll do the

  rest."

  "Call for the chopper, Stavers," she said, shivering anew. "I'm not joking. I don't know how you two lunatics handle all this cold but I'm starting to gel, into

  serious trouble just standing here."

  He turned to Marden and nodded. Marden pressed a

  button on a belt transmitter. A yellow light glowed.

  "They've got it. "

  Stavers had already dismissed the helicopter that in

  moments would be on its way to pick them up. He

  studied Weinstein anew. "The name, Doc."

  "You're not going to like it, Doug."

  "Why?"

  "Memories, Knife to the heart. That sort of thing."

  A premonition swept through him. He pushed it

  n6di, -Tbi- nni-m- -

  108

  Mar-tin Caidin

  "Stan Horvath."

  He swore softly to himself A flood of emotions raced

  and pounded across his face. She saw surprise, the rush

  f memory, and pain.

  "I'm sorry," she said quietly.

  "What the hell for?" he half-shouted. "Stan Horvath

  was a professional killer, Like myself, like Skip, So

  what?"

  "He trained me.

  So he trained you. So fucking what?"

  hate this," she murmured.

  "why?" he demanded.

  "You sent Jack North to Israel to meet with Stan

  Horvath." She saw his eyes widen and she knew Stavers

  was anticipating, even dreading, what she knew. Worse,

  what she might say. "You wanted Horvath to lead you

  and your group to Patschke in the high Ecuador coun-

  try. Not to lead you there personally, but to pinpoint

  the mountain fortress of Patschke."

  "A lot of people know that, Weinstein," he said,

  glowering, his eyes like red coals,

  "Jack North was Tracy's father." She took a deep

  breath, hoping the old and terrible wound had been

  healed enough for Stavers to keep a tight grip on

  himself.

  "You loved Tracy. She loved you. Total, complete,

  perfect love. She burned to death on an airport runway

  in Philadelphia, You were the only survivor of the

  crash. Part of you died in that fire."

  Marden knew of the pain Doug Stavers bad gone

  through for so long. He knew how much Stavers had

  loved Tracy, and-

  "Let ine kill the bitch," Marden snarled. He could

  think only of the pain she had brought to Stavers. Kill

  the bitch and I end all this shit.

  "Shut the hell up," Stavers said through gritted teeth

  to Marden, then turned back to Weinstein. For a long

  and anguished moment he studied this incredible woman,

  shivering in the cold, master of more knowledge of

  Doug Stavers than any other person in the world. She

  knew inside hirn@

  DARK MESSIAH 109

  s for you, Doc."

  ,I've got a thousand question

  "I know that."

  "You'll answer them." 't think to

  "I'll even tell you the questions you won

  ask. "

  "Do you love me, Weinstein?"

  "Do I answer in triplicate? Press hard with the pen to

  make clean copies?"

  serious.

  'So am I," she retorted.

  Answer me, straig t. Do you love me?"

  nh

  "Yes."

  "Why. P11

  "I was trained, psychologically prepared, emotional

  lly

  controlled to love you. What you are, and that damned

  stoneyou wear, and what we've already been through,

  the jaws of death and all that, yes, I love you."

  He smiled; his teeth barely showed. "Do I love you,

  Weinstein?"

  "No."

  The smile became a grin. She shut it off with an

  almost audible bang.

  "But you will"' she added,

  He started to laugh, shut it off as quickly as the

  unbidden mirth started. She was crazy! And yet ...

  "You have ;always believed you would never love

  anyone, again, after Tracy," Rebecca Weinstein told

  h in ven

  i' slowly, carefully. when that splendid, su-

  perb woman got to you.

  He felt a chill run through hirn; not a sliver of the

  cold about them, but an icicle frorn the past. "You

  know?"

  "She did everything she could to kill you. That was

  her sole purpos@ in life. She was of the holy of the

  holies. One of the Six Hundred. The blessed of the

  Vatican. She tried to kill you again and again, she

  caused the death of Tracy North, and she came to you

  as a virgin. Rosa Montini of the famil of the popes. A

  ly

  direct family member of Joseph Montini . Pope Pius.

  And his brother, Senato Lodovici Montini, a great and

  c@npfny 411nrnp Ilnzn kinnfini rlp.,qMv lipqij-

  110

  Martin Caidin

  tiful, magnificent, virginal. Yet she gave herself to you.

  You overcame the blessings of God Himself You over-

  came her sworn duty in life. You made love to her."

  Weinstein skipped a heartbeat. "Did you know her

  body lies in holy state in the catacombs of the Vatican?

  Of course, they did great plastic surgery on her face

  after," another heartbeat pause, "she was hurled from

  that helicopter in India."

  "Good God, what the hell don't you know!"

  "It's not that difficult, Doug. My father was a close

  friend of Cardinal Butto Giovanni, and he was chosen

  by the Pope to create and to guide the Six Hundred in

  their search for the object you now wear." She showed

  a brief, wan smile as she brought up old memories.

  " But not even they knew what it truly was. Is," she

  ammended. She sighed. "To the Vatican, what you

  wear was the adanws, the holiest of holies. To the

  Vatican, the stone appeared two thousand years ago,

  simultaneously with the birth of Christ. They called it

  the Star of Bethlehem." She shook her head. "But

  that's a mix, confused and fantasizing; it had nothing to

  do with Bethlehem, which in itself is an allegory."

  She looked back in the direction of Indian's Bluff,

  shuffling from one foot to the other, wrapping her arms

  about herself to stave off the cold. "Where the hell is

  that chopper?" she hissed.

  It's on the wav," Stavers said unnecessarilv. "The

  cold getting to your brain, Weinstein

  "Oh, God. Up yours, " she threw back at him, pleased

  with her sudden descent to gutter wording. "No; it ,s

  just going into deep freeze.- She flashed a shivering

  smile. "But don't count me out yet, Stavers, All right,

  I'll give this thing a quick wrap. The Vatican believed,

  believes, the stone is a diamond. Born in the fires of

  atmospheric entry to the earth. Fifty to eighty thousand

  miles an hour. That's enough heat and pressure to

  create a diamond from meteoric material. It doesn't

  matter," she waved a hand to dismiss that issue. "What

  does matter is what they believe, and the fact that the

  stone, or diamond, or whatever they wish to call it,

  does have an incredible effect on nermlp Pv@,,

  DARK MFSSIA11 III

  within the effective reach, the range of field, of the

  object. Put sirnply, and you already know this, the

  Manturu tribe, in the midst of savage tribal wars, raids

  and jealousies, lived without war for some two thousand

  years. That is powerful medicine, my friend. So power-

  ful the Vatican would do just about anything to get that

  object."

  She laughed, another sudden quiet offering of inner

  mirth. "But why am I telling you what you already

  know? You fought the Israelis, and the Americans, and

  the Vatican, and the Russians, from Berlin to South

  America and India and-" She shook her head and

  lapsed into silence, an unspoken passing of the ex-

  change to Stavers.

  He walked closer to her, so close they stood face to

  face, the condensation vapor from their breath mingling

  in a single cloud. "You know all these things," he said,

  quietly and directly, "yet you tease me, 11

  "I am not teasing," she answered immediately.

  "Then you are so clever as to be phenomenal," he

  countered.

  "True; I am," she told him, without a trace of ego.

  "But you already know that." 11

  "You said you were trained for," he smiled , this

  moment.

  "Yes. "

  "By whom?"

  "My father, or, by people under his supervision."

  She could also feel his mind speeding into new

  thoughts, wheelim4 freely to concepts he'd let lie for too

  long. The question's came faster, sharper-edge'.

  "How many languages do you speak, Weinstein""

  "Twenty-four. -

  Stavers blinked; that for him, in this context.. was a

  monumental expression, a startling reaction to what

  he'd heard. He nodded slightly to his own thoughts,

  "Religions; how well do you know them

  She smiled, only a quirky lifting of one corner of her

  mouth. The expression hurt her teeth from the cold. "I

  could be a priest in almost any of the major religions,

  @-d +@" fi@c-,c -z rn@4nv in thp minor IpqvnPq_"

  112

  Martin Caidin

  "To say nothing of the weirdos," he appended.

  "They are all weirdos," she said to refine their mu-

  tual definition.

  "Who's your father, Weinstein?"

  "rake away the W in the family name," she said,

  ever so softly.

  "Abraham Einstein?"

  "You'll never know how desperately I wanted you to

  say that name without my verbalizing it first."

  "Direct cousins," he added, his acknowledgement of

  the family of pure genius unhidden in his expression.

  11 it's starting to come together, Rebecca. Piece by

  little piece. You play a mean jigsaw puzzle, lady."

  "God, don't stop now," she almost begged him.

  "Your father trained you for me?"

  She shook her head. "No. For what you wear on your

  body. For what must be placed surgically within you.

  For what was so incredibly beyond any monetary or

  other value that tens of thousands of people have al-

  ready died for it. My father said-we'll call it the stone

  for the rnoment-that it would finally become the pos-

  session of a single individual who would rise through,

  ter me use his own words, a torment of combat, terror,

  horror, death and emotional pain. That is where I've

  been directed almost all my life."

  "Why?"

  "Because my father, and myself, are the only two

  persons who have ever known what you have in that

  harness, Doug. And my father is dead."

  "I have a hunch it wasn't of natural causes.-

  "The Vatican."

  I thought he was fiiends with the big-cheese cardinal?"

  "Friendship has nothing to do with the higher aims of

  the church. "

  She heard the distant chopping sounds of helicopter

  blades.

  "You're convinced, strangely so, that I'll submit to

  this surgery you keep going back to. The stone, uh, the

  diamond, inside me."

  "Yes. Yes, you will do just that."

  "After you tell me whv'@'-

  DARK MESSIAH

  tell you. I'll show you.

  113

  Then you'll

  "I'll never

  understand - "

  "When? where?" er glinted in the low sun as it

  "Soon." The helicopt

  approached, the blades flat-blatting in the heavy cold

  air'. 'Weinstein, I have another question for you."

  "One of many"' she smiled.

  "This one stands alone," he told her, and she waited

  for his words.

  -Would you kill me if it were necessary? If you

  believed it were necessary?"

  She held his eyes. "TNO."

  "could " He stopped his words, eyes widening as to him. "Could you kill me. P11

  the new thought came

  Her smile was everything; warm, deep, honest, sim-

  ple and vastly complex. "No, Doug," she said, touching

  his arm. "Don, t you understand yet? The program@ The

  way I've been programmed. if ever I tried to kill you I

  would suffer a lethal stroke immediately. Surgical im-

  plant. A truly brilliant accomplishment. The rnan who

  did the surgery believed the precaution was necessary.

  "Damn, you're mixing me up again, Weinstein! Who

  did that kind of surgery!"

  "Abraharn Einstein."

  "Your father?" GO

  "Yes. Does that rernove some 01 your concernr

  on, Doug. Swallow the lies, eat the Jairy tales. one day

  you'll really know but not yet.

  He chnelded; a grisly and dam4erous cousin to a

  laugh. "Only if all this wild stuff you've been telling me

  is true.

  She watched the heiicopter touch down and a door

  open, She started for the warnith of the cabin, then

  stopped. "It's not that complicated, Doug. If I am lying,

  then you'll kill me. And I have absolutely no fear of

  that." She motioned toward the waiting machine. "Now,

  can we please go? IT need to thaw out before I'm

  ready. "

  They started together for the belicoptey, Her words

  .- :,_, -n_ , f- - @+ P_1,--'J"

  _. _A I-.'- -A, V,

  114 Martin Caidin

  She looked up at him as she placed her arm through

  his. "Sometimes, even the best and the brightest are

  very dumb," she said. "For you to make love to me, of

  course.

  Chapter 9

  Even the gladiators must practice. Not just any com-

  batant for the arena. All of them. Keep the killing juices

  going. The muscles limber and snap-powerful. The

  bloodlust free and yet controlled.

  And there are many, many different arenas, and they

  do not look the same, yet they all serve the same

  purpose.

  For a man to test himself.

  Doug Stavers left the helicopter on its landing plat-

  form beneath Indian's Bluff. The hydraulic piston 10XV-

  ered them slowly and the earth sealed above them and

  they were lost to the outside world, Marden eased his

  heavv bulk from the machine first; that was habit and

  praciice. He stood to the side, first scanning everyone

  and everything about him, Stavers emerged, his face its

  usual unreadable granite, Rebecca Weinstein held out

  her hand, ready for Stavers to take it in his. She felt

  stupid as he walked away from the landing platform

  without a single word or even a glance in her direction.

  They walked together down a long corridor, stavers

  and Marden, the untouchables. Alone, and yet their

  movernent monitored by the concealed television scan-

  ners of Templin's security system. Stavers kept his gaze

  directly before them as their boots thudded into the

  plastimetal beneath their stride. "Get the wolves. Two

  of them . Bay Six."

  Marden nodded. "As you say. I'll be there with you."

  "No weapons," Stavers instructed.

  "Of course. No guns. lust the knife."

  116

  Martin Caidin

  "No weapons. No knives." He offered a wan smile to

  Marden. "Just you. And," he said sharply, unusually so

  in speaking to Marden, "no interference."

  Skip Marden had his answer ready for that, but he

  kept his silence. When Stavers was in this mood, and

  that bitch doctor had put him into one hell of a mood,

  you just did not mess with the man.

  They separated as Stavers went into a locker room.

  He threw off his cold-weather garments, stripped him-

  self naked. He looked toward the entrance to Bay Six,

  stopped and looked up to where he knew a scanner held

  him in view. "You on, At?" he spoke to empty space.

  "Yes, sir. "

  "Kill all other surveillance but your own unit. Here,

  and , Bay Six. No interference from you."

  11 Yes, sir. " Templin's voice was flat, mechanical, obe-

  dient. It wasn't the first time he'd seen Doug Stavers

  naked except for the steel harness, and he wasn't being

  paid to ask questions when he knew the answers were

  none of his affair.

  Stavers; turned into the doorway to Bay Six, hesitated

  for the door to slide open, and walked inside. The door

 

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