Lie down with lions - Ken Follett [101]
Ellis said: “Do you seriously think Masud’s regime would be worse than that of the Russians?”
Jane thought for a moment. “I don’t know. The only thing that’s certain is that Masud’s regime will be an Afghan tyranny instead of a Russian tyranny. And it’s not worth killing people to exchange a local dictator for a foreigner.”
“The Afghans seem to think it is.”
“Most of them have never been asked.”
“I think it’s obvious. However, I don’t normally do this sort of work anyway. Usually I’m more of a detective type.”
This was something about which Jane had been curious for a year. “What exactly was your mission in Paris?”
“When I spied on all our friends?” He smiled thinly. “Didn’t Jean-Pierre tell you?”
“He said he didn’t really know.”
“Perhaps he didn’t. I was hunting terrorists.”
“Among our friends?”
“That’s where they are usually to be found—among dissidents, dropouts and criminals.”
“Was Rahmi Coskun a terrorist?” Jean-Pierre had said that Rahmi got arrested because of Ellis.
“Yes. He was responsible for the Turkish Airlines firebombing in the Avenue Félix Faure.”
“Rahmi? How do you know?”
“He told me. And when I had him arrested he was planning another bombing.”
“He told you that, too?”
“He asked me to help him with the bomb.”
“My God.” Handsome Rahmi, with the smoldering eyes and passionate hatred of his wretched country’s government . . .
Ellis had not finished. “Remember Pepe Gozzi?”
Jane frowned. “Do you mean the funny little Corsican who had a Rolls-Royce?”
“Yes. He supplied guns and explosives to every nutcase in Paris. He’d sell to anyone who could afford his prices, but he specialized in ‘political’ customers.”
Jane was flabbergasted. She had assumed that Pepe was somewhat disreputable, purely on the grounds that he was both rich and Corsican; but she had supposed that at worst he was involved in some everyday crime such as smuggling or dope dealing. To think that he sold guns to murderers! Jane was beginning to feel as if she had been living in a dream, while intrigue and violence went on in the real world all around her. Am I so naïve? she thought.
Ellis plowed on. “I also pulled in a Russian who had financed a lot of assassinations and kidnappings. Then Pepe was interrogated and spilled the beans on half the terrorists in Europe.”
“That’s what you were doing, all the time we were lovers,” Jane said dreamily. She recalled the parties, the rock concerts, the demonstrations, the political arguments in cafés, the endless bottles of vin rouge ordinaire in attic studios. . . . Since their breakup she had assumed vaguely that he had been writing little reports on all the radicals, saying who was influential, who was extreme, who had money, who had the largest following among students, who had Communist Party connections, and so on. It was hard now to accept the idea that he had been after real criminals, and that he had actually found some among their friends. “I can’t believe it,” she said in amazement.
“It was a great triumph, if you want to know the truth.”
“You probably shouldn’t be telling me.”
“I shouldn’t. But when I’ve lied to you in the past, I have regretted doing so—to put it mildly.”
Jane felt awkward and did not know what to say. She shifted Chantal to her left breast, then, catching Ellis’s eye, covered her right breast with her shirt. The conversation was becoming uncomfortably personal, but she was intensely curious to know more. She could see now how he justified himself—although she did not agree with his reasoning—but still she wondered about his motivation. If I don’t find out now, she thought, I may never get another chance. She said: “I don’t understand what makes a man decide to spend his life doing this sort of thing.”