“And how do you know that you’re mad?”
“To begin with,” said the Cat, “a dog’s not mad. You grant that?”
“I suppose so,” said Alice.
“Well, then,” the Cat went on, “you see, a dog growls when it’s angry, and wags its tail when it’s pleased. Now I growl when I’m pleased, and wag my tail when I’m angry. Therefore I’m mad.”
“I call it purring, not growling,” said Alice.
“Call it what you like.”
Jean Bonaparte gazed out over the Parisian skyline, admiring the baroque and elegant play of shadow among which innumerable lights twinkled and glimmered warmly like the wind-whipped embers of a thousand fires. That mischievous wind! The same wind that flowed sedately among the vast spiderweb of steel that came together into the Eiffel tower; that blew demurely across the sweat-dappled backs of every young lover of the summer night; that with not so much as a whisper curled past every den of sin and iniquity in the depths of the cityscape—that same wind, upon reaching Jean’s perch upon the balcony of his nondescript room in the Hotel Abbatial Saint Germain, curled and swirled mischievously with wild abandon, dancing to some invisible tune. If the wind that hurtled past him played a song, Jean imagined that it would be Danse Macabre—Charles-Camille Saint-Saëns at his best, reminding the world with the tumble and roll of one violin that, ultimately—everyone dies.
Zig, zig, zig, Death in cadence,
Striking a tomb with his heel,
Death at midnight plays a dance-tune,
Zig, zig, zag, on his violin.
Jean flicked his lighter yet again in a hopeful gesture, then sighed deeply and shook his head. His mournful brown eyes were cast downwards, considering the cigarette he held with a light grip between two fingers. The wind, alas, allowed him no vices this night; he was stripped of his pretensions, naked to the world as what he was.
Behind him in his suite, a clock ticked rhythmically. Delicate shadows that would have sent Leonardo da Vinci into cardiac arrest swept across the shape that dominated the bed, as still as a statue—and with much the same expression of vague puzzlement as that statue Jean had so recently seen in a museum—“The Dying Gaul” it was called. He had not, at the time, appreciated the irony of introducing an ancient and venerable statue to an animate individual soon to be transformed into a new one, another work of art cast into history. After the poison had taken affect and the face had stiffened into that eerily familiar expression, he had. Jean did not laugh much, but a quiet smile of incalculable humor had crossed his lips when he made the connection.
The statue in the bed had recently been occupied and animated by “Rutger Karlsson,” a rather unfortunate diplomat on his holidays. The man had apparently occupied a fairly insignificant clerical and accounting post. Jean had sighed when he looked into the man; the Kremlin was becoming radically less efficient in their choices of disguise. After so many years running down the rabbit-hole, Jean’s eyes had to be physically restrained from rolling with contempt whenever he even thought the words “minor clerical post.” Such a statement tended to attract attention from those who knew the language spoken past the looking-glass.
“Rutger” had been well-trained, but he had ached—and not all the women in Paris could ever assuage that. Jean allowed that he had possibly just been trying to use what he believed Jean’s sexual preferences to be to gain information. Jean, alas, had simply been better at such a clichéd game of cat and tiger. The poison in the wine really had been remarkably effective, and no awkward fumbling had even been necessary. As skilled as Jean was, he did not quite think he could have faked pleasure at the act. Everyone, he reflected, had their weakness—his was not wine, song, or even nicotine (a vice, he maintained, was not necessarily the same as an Achille’s heel). It had been—and he had decided, never again would be—women.
He flicked the cigarette away in a practiced motion, flexed his lean frame in a gesture almost identical to the contortions performed by the common housecat, and stalked back inside, closing the sliding door soundlessly. His feet glided across the carpet; when not in disguise, he habitually walked by placing his toes against the ground first and curling down to the heel—properly done, it was one of the quietest ways of walking. He arrived at his desk, sat, and began to write.
My Dear Maria,
Paris, as you have heard, is a beautiful city—and all that I have seen corroborates this fact. I have perused every cathedral, museum, and work of architecture even a country could have to offer, it seems—and yet I am constantly amazed by new things, discoveries that thrill each and every fiber of my being to see—except one. The heart-string.
I find that I cannot fully enjoy the beauties of any land without you by my side, and that with you—ah! With you—even the most arduous or harsh landscapes make no mark upon the joy I feel. As this state of affairs has become unendurable, I ask leave to visit you. I know you understand what I intimate—your recent letters from the United States show me a glimpse of the pain you feel, just as I do.
I will be on flight 213 from France, my darling. Be waiting for me; I cannot survive in a foreign and strange land without your laughter, your smile, your love.
Be well.
Sincerely, Inigo Velazquez, your loving servant.
He looked over the letter and chuckled softly. Ah! Just as he had decided the excise the stain upon his reputation of that botched Hapsburg affair—thrown into the pit by the machinations of one single exotic and Machiavellian lady—he found that the next contact, the next contract, involved yet another of the breed—this time, according to “Karlsson’s” information, an agent of the Cuban regime (with close ties to the Kremlin) who he had begun to win over even before the German’s temptation and destruction. He had, previously, been content to leave her intact and unsuspecting–after all, by this point she was a known quantity. However, poor “Rutger” had supplied some fascinating tidbits; one of these being that “Maria” was in possession of several extraordinarily valuable blueprints, and was prepared to pass them on to her handlers the very next month. “Karlsson” had even had a vague idea of the content of these blueprints–designs for high-powered automated weapons systems. The nearness of the date and the importance of the blueprints meant that “Maria” would have to be stopped as quickly and efficiently as possible.
Jean slid one drawer of the desk out, and almost reflexively gave a short caress to the darkly elegant and metallic object that resided there. He did not, as a rule, kill a great deal. “Karlsson” had died because he was one of the few–the very few–who knew anything about the plans and “Maria’s” possession of them, outside of the agent herself, and presumably her immediate superiors. However, her handlers probably did not know anything but the sketchiest of information as of yet.
Jean chuckled a little to himself. Oh yes, they would receive their blueprints…would they be precisely the same as the designs “Maria” had managed to acquire? Perhaps, or perhaps not. But those shadowy individuals would indeed receive something for their trouble.
He shook his head at the strange world he lived in—the sheer absurdity! The razor’s edge that placed him on the side of the capitalists in this filthy war? Not even money—the Russians simply had so little…light. They did not know how to dance; no respect for art at all. Jean was a fox, at heart—the KGB managed only to be as cunning as the grey-flanked wolves that sped across the tundra. But a wolf could be hunted quite easily, once you knew its patterns.
Jean’s incisors showed briefly as he smiled, with infinite relish.
Your bad luck, Mademoiselle “Maria,” he thought, to be in my way when I have so recently been humbled…ah Maria! Mercy between spies is for another time, Ma Belle…for now, Death plays the madcap, marvelous tune. Time to avenge myself for Hapsburg.
Outside, the goblin-wind keened louder as slender hands folded the portent-filled letter.
Zig, zig, zag. You can see in the crowd
The king dancing among the peasants.
But hist! All of a sudden, they leave the dance,
They push forward, they fly; the cock has crowed.
Oh what a beautiful night for the poor world!
Long live death and equality!
//Props to Hain for the images!!//
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