Harold Smith knew he was onto something when a computer check of the Beasley credit-card airline-flights purchases started concentrating in three states, Florida, California and Louisiana.
The first two he understood. Beasley employees. But there was no Beasley theme park in Louisiana. No corporate office, and no discernible connection to the Sam Beasley Corporation.
They were all going to London. Why were they going to London? It was not to catch connecting flights to Paris and thus Euro Beasley, Smith deduced.
First, no record of a massive block purchase of such connecting flights was showing up in any of the airline-reservations nets.
Secondly American citizens were being pointedly kept out of France as "undesirable aliens."
In fact, as Smith worked his keyboard, a bulletin told of the American ambassador to France being declared persona non grata and sent home for "conduct incompatible with his station."
This was diplomatic jargon used to describe illegal espionage activity. It was absurd. The US. ambassador had nothing to do with this matter-whatever it was.
Smith returned to his task.
Beasley employees were evacuating to France with the speed and single-minded fervor of lemmings seeking the water. Why?
"They can't be going to London," he murmured. "That would make no sense."
Then the truth struck Smith with the force of a blow.
Americans were persona non grata in France. But British citizens were still welcome-or as welcome as the French made any non-French-speaking people feel welcome.
Smith brought up a detailed map of the British Isles. He shrank it so the English Channel came into view, along with the northern coast of France.
Gatwick to de Gaulle or Orly was a matter of an hour's flying time. But any American attempting to land at either airport would certainly be intercepted by French customs. Even in overwhelming numbers, they could not get very far.
Smith considered the channel. Taking a ferry or landing craft was a possibility. But a sea invasion, even a small one, had a limited operational viability.
Frowning, he tapped a key that converted all English words and place-names to French in the wink of an eye.
The channel became La Manche, which was French for "the sleeve," and was the name the French had given what the rest of the world called the English Channel. There was nothing else provocative or helpful.
Smith was about to log off when his gaze alighted on an unfamiliar landmark that lay across the channel.
It was a red line.
And it had a label: Le Transmanche.
His weary gray eyes froze. Was there something he had missed before? Smith tapped the key that restored the English tags.
And on the map where Le Transmanche had been, appeared a new word. A word Smith instantly recognized. A word that made the skin prickle and crawl along the bumps of his spine.
The word was Chunnel.
BECAUSE THEY worm no uniforms, they were not considered an army. An army comes wearing uniforms, bearing arms and marching to the threatening roll of drums.
The combined California Summer Vacation Musketeers, Florida Sunshine Guerrillas and Louisiana Costume Zouaves arrived in London, England, carrying American passports, their uniforms discreetly tucked away in their luggage.
And so they were considered tourists not soldiers.
When they showed up, in groups of two and three at London's Waterloo International railway station, they were carrying forged Canadian passports. They boarded the high-speed Eurostar trains as FrenchCanadian tourists and kept to themselves as the train rattled over the old track to Folkestone at a decorous eighty miles per hour because the brand of Louisiana Creole they spoke wouldn't exactly cut it in Paris.
Upon entering the special rapid track of the English Channel Tunnel they sped up to 186 miles per hour.
The combined forces kept their tongues still, although their hearts lifted with each mile that raced by.
French customs could be forgiven for not sounding the alarm. Who would expect an invasion force arriving by Le Transmanche, as the French called the Chunnel? It was the British who for centuries had resisted the link to Europe. It was they who feared invasion from the Continent, not the other way around.
Their passports were in order, their uniforms were neatly folded, blue and gray cottons nestled deep under their very British tweeds and linens.
And by the time they left Coquelles Terminal in Calais, bound for Paris, there was no stopping them.
For they bore no weapons recognizable as such.
And while it was unusual to bring personal universal TV remote-control units into a foreign country, it was not illegal.
AT FIRST Marc Moise welcomed the promotion to task force group leader.
"You will lead the Louisiana Costume Zouaves," he was told by no less than Bob Beasley himself. They were in a conference room in Sam Beasley World's underground Utiliduck, in Florida.
"Lead them where?"
And when Bob Beasley told him that the objective was to retake Euro Beasley to keep special technology out of French hands, Marc Moise swallowed very, very hard and said, "That sounds dangerous."
"It's for the good of the company."
"I understand that," said Marc hesitantly. "But-"
Then Bob Beasley fixed him with his crinkled father-figure eyes and whispered, "Uncle Sam asked for you by name. He said, 'I want Moose to spearhead this operation.'"
Chapter 27
Dominique Parillaud felt proud. Remy Renard, director of the DGSE, had convened a high-level meeting of the directorate's Planning, Forecasting and Evaluation Group and had invited her.
"We would appreciate your input," he had said, then catching himself, corrected, "Your thoughts, Agent Arlequin."
"But of course."
Now in the somber room whose high windows were heavily curtained to keep out the incessant clangor of Parisian traffic and to foil observers, they sat about the long oak table on which the detached eye of Uncle Sam Beasley lay. It was still attached to the penlike activator DGSE technicians had hastily devised to enable it into a weapon.
"The heart of the device is a prism," a DGSE technician was saying. "As you know, white light passing through a prism has the property of scattering into rainbow hues. This orb emits light according to cybernetique command impulses, delivering the desired supercolor."
"Excellent summary," said the DGSE chief. "Now, of what use can this tool be to French national security."
"Our agents, equipped with such devices, would be impossible to foil in the field," said Lamont Mont grande, head of the political police known as the Renseignements Generaux, who had been invited as a courtesy.