The Doomsday Conspiracy

“I’m terribly sorry,” Robert apologized. He leaned over and straightened the man’s jacket for him.

“No problem,” Cowan said.

Robert turned and walked into the public men’s room down the hall, the stranger’s passport in his pocket. He looked around to make sure he was alone, then went into one of the booths. He took out the razor blade and bottle of glue he had stolen from Ricco. Very carefully, he slit the top of the plastic and removed Cowan’s photograph. Next, he inserted the picture of himself that Ricco had taken. He glued the top of the plastic slot closed, and examined his handiwork. Perfect. He was now Henry Cowan. Five minutes later, he was out in the Via Veneto, getting into a taxi. “Leonardo da Vinci.”

It was twelve thirty when Robert arrived at the airport. He stood outside, looking for anything unusual. On the surface, everything appeared to be normal. No police cars, no suspicious-looking men. Robert entered the terminal, and stopped just inside the door. There were various airline counters scattered around the large terminal. There seemed to be no one loitering or hiding behind posts. He stayed where he was, wary. He could not explain it, even to himself, but somehow, everything seemed too normal.

Across the room was an Air France counter. You are on Air France flight 312 to Paris. It leaves at one a.m. Robert walked past the counter and approached a woman in uniform behind the Alitalia counter. “Good evening.”

“Good evening. Can I help you, signore?”

“Yes,” Robert said. “Would you please page Commander Robert Bellamy to come to the courtesy telephone?”

“Certainly,” she said. She picked up a microphone.

A few feet away, a fat middle-aged woman was checking a number of suitcases, heatedly arguing with an airline attendant about overweight fees. “In America, they never charged me for overweight.”

“I’m sorry, madam. But if you wish all these bags to go on, you must pay for excess baggage.”

Robert moved closer. He heard the attendant’s voice over the loudspeaker. “Will Commander Robert Bellamy please come to the white courtesy telephone. Commander Robert Bellamy, please come to the white courtesy telephone.” The announcement echoed throughout the airport.

A man holding a carry-on bag was walking past Robert. “Excuse me …” Robert said.

The man turned. “Yes?”

“I hear my wife paging me but …” he indicated the woman’s bags, “I can’t leave my luggage.” He pulled out a ten-dollar bill and handed it to the man. “Would you please go over to that white telephone and tell her I’ll pick her up at our hotel in an hour? I’d really appreciate it.”

The man looked at the ten-dollar bill in his hand. “Sure.”

Robert watched him walk over to the courtesy telephone and pick it up. He held the receiver to his ear and said, “Hello … hello …?”

The next moment, four large men in black suits appeared from nowhere and closed in, pinning the hapless man to the wall.

“Hey! What is this?”

“Let’s do this quietly,” one of the men said.

“What do you think you’re doing? Get your hands off me!”

“Don’t make a fuss, Commander. There’s no point …”

“Commander? You’ve got the wrong man! My name is Melvyn Davis. I’m from Omaha!”

“Let’s not play games.”

“Wait a minute! I’ve been set up. The man you want is over there!” He pointed to where Robert had been standing.

There was no one there.

Outside the terminal, an airport bus was getting ready to depart. Robert boarded it, mingling with the other passengers. He sat at the back of the bus, concentrating on his next move

He was desperate to talk to Admiral Whittaker, to try to get answers about what was going on, to learn who was responsible for killing innocent people because they had witnessed something they were not supposed to have seen. Was it General Hilliard? Dustin Thornton? Or Thornton’s father-in-law, Willard Stone, the man of mystery? Could he be involved in this in some way? Was it Edward Sanders, the Director of NSA? Did it go as high as the President? Robert needed answers.

The bus trip into Rome took an hour. When the bus stopped in front of the Eden Hotel, Robert disembarked.

I’ve got to get out of the country, Robert thought. There was only one man in Rome he could trust. Colonel Francesco Cesar, head of SIFAR, the Italian Secret Service. He was going to be Robert’s escape from Italy.

Colonel Cesar was working late. Messages had been flashing back and forth among foreign security agencies, and they all involved Commander Robert Bellamy. Colonel Cesar had worked with Robert in the past and he was very fond of him. Cesar sighed as he looked at the latest message in front of him. Terminate. And as he was reading it, his secretary came into the office.

“Commander Bellamy is on line one for you.”

Colonel Cesar stared at her. “Bellamy? Himself? Never mind.” He waited until the secretary left the room, then snatched up the telephone.

“Robert?”

“Ciao, Francesco. What the hell is going on?”

“You tell me, amico. I’ve been getting all kinds of urgent communiques about you. What have you done?”

“It’s a long story,” Robert said. “And I haven’t time. What have you heard?”

“That you’ve gone private. That you’ve been turned, and are singing like a canary.”

“What?”

“I heard you’ve made a deal with the Chinese and …”