A Gentleman's Game

20

Yemen-San'a', Taj Sheba Hotel 8 September 2059 Local (GMT+3.00) Chace returned to her room to find that the maid service had been and gone. She checked her tells on the bedpost and on her luggage, saw that both were still in place, and only then stowed her purchases in the closet. She put the Walther beneath one of the pillows on the king-size bed, grinning at the cliche, then took off her long skirt and draped it over the back of the desk chair.

She'd purchased two liters of water in the suq before returning, and a can of Canada Dry Ginger Ale, and spent the rest of the afternoon working her way through them and her second-to-last pack of Silk Cut, watching the television. The Taj Sheba had a satellite link, and the channel selection was good. She caught up on the news with CNN, then switched to Al-Jazeera, trying to follow their broadcast. When she'd had enough, she surfed until hitting one of the few Yemeni stations, which was showing a local boxing exhibition. The audience at the event was enthusiastic, men and women.

At seven she turned off the television and got back into her skirt but decided she would forgo the head scarf. Again hiding the Walther beneath her shirt, she headed down to one of the Taj Sheba's two restaurants for dinner, the cafelike Bilquis, where they were offering, bizarrely, an Italian-food theme night. Chace took a seat away from the entrance and the kitchen, where her back was covered by the wall and that allowed her a view of the room.

She ate a passable mushroom risotto, thinking that, if anyone asked, she could claim to be comparing it to the one they served back home at the Trattoria del Gesumin in Como. Music from the Bilquis's companion restaurant, the Golden Oasis, was just audible through the walls, the band playing a mix of Mediterranean traditional and pop.

Chace was on to the coffee when her shadow from earlier in the day entered and was seated at a table three up from her, along the same wall. She didn't make him as the tail until he'd put his order in with the waitress, who was one of the only non-Europeans she had seen going uncovered. No balta, no veil, just a long black skirt and an off-white top, hair drawn tightly into a bun behind her head. When the man returned his menu to the waitress, the sleeve of his shirt crept past his wrist, showed his watch face out, and Chace remembered and gave him a second look.

Definitely Mediterranean, but now in more European dress, casual but nice. A rather plain face, and his beard and mustache were thinner than Chace had thought at first, and neatly kept. She watched as a glass of Coke, no ice, was delivered to his table, and when the man raised it to drink, he inclined his head toward her in a mock toast.

Chace grinned, put out her cigarette, and finished the rest of her much-too-sweet coffee. She signed the bill Adriana Maribino, separated her copy from the original, folded it down twice, and then pinned it against her palm with her thumb. She rose, thanking the waitress as she began clearing the table and, when she passed her shadow, dragged her hand along the edge of his table, leaving the copy behind.

Then she went to her room and waited. • He took thirty-seven minutes, and when he knocked on the door, Chace repeated the same process for letting him inside as she had with Hewitt, with a minor variation. This time, as soon as he entered, she quickly stepped from the bathroom and jammed the suppressor, now securely affixed to the barrel of the Walther, against the side of the man's neck while kicking the room door closed with one foot.

Gun still in place, she pushed him against the wall, then held him there as she threw the locks again.

"You dropped your receipt," he said. He said it in English, and his accent was American. He raised his right hand slowly, showing Chace the flimsy sheet pinched between his index and middle fingers.

"Grazie," she said. "Who the fuck are you?"

"Simon Yosef. We have a mutual friend."

"I have lots of friends."

"This one lives in Tel Aviv."

Chace moved directly behind him, pressing her left thigh between his legs, forcing his stance wider. She moved the barrel of the gun from the side of his neck to the base of his skull, then reached around his front and began running her hand through his clothes, over and then inside his shirt, then around his waistband, then into his pants. She found a billfold, a pack of Camels, and a green plastic lighter. All three were tossed to the floor. She moved the search lower, up one leg to the crotch, then down again. On his left leg she found a snub revolver in an ankle holster, and she took that as well.

When she was done, she stepped back, pulling the Walther away from his neck.

"Have a seat," Chace said.

Yosef turned into the room, moving for the chair at the desk. "May I smoke?"

"Go ahead."

He picked up the pack and the lighter but left the billfold on the floor. While he was lighting up, Chace opened the cylinder on the snub and dumped its bullets onto the bed. She ignored the billfold. If it was anything like her own wallet, it was one grand lie anyway.

Yosef smoked from the corner of his mouth, looking her over. His expression seemed to say that he would have done the same thing to her had their positions been reversed, and Chace took that, more than anything else, as proof that he was who he claimed he was.

"I made you in the Suq al-Milh," Chace said.

"I hoped you would. I didn't want to alarm you."

"How'd you pick me up?"

"I was told that you would be either French or Italian, with one of the groups. It didn't take long to find out where you were staying."

Chace considered, then made the Walther in her hand safe and set it on the edge of the bed.

"Make it fast," she said.

"They will be meeting tomorrow," Yosef answered. "El-Sayd should arrive in San'a' by morning. Our assessment is that he will want to limit his exposure as much as possible, so he'll press to meet Faud at some point during the day, then depart for Cairo by evening. I've been told that our assessment and yours are in agreement."

Her eyebrows arched. "You don't know my assessment."

"No, I don't. I am only relaying to you what I was asked to relay."

"I see. And that's all? You're all finished now?"

"I'm to offer you support, if you require it. Backup, nothing else."

"I don't need it. I don't want it. And if I see you anywhere-and I mean anywhere-tomorrow, the whole thing's off. I don't want you compromising me. And you can tell your people that, too."

Yosef exhaled another stream of smoke, watched it fold and curl, then met Chace's gaze and nodded, once. He rose, scooping the billfold and replacing it, then indicating the revolver on the bed.

"May I?"

"Well, I sure as hell don't want it," Chace said.

He picked the cartridges up, dropped them into his pocket, then took the revolver and secured it back at his ankle. Then he motioned to the Walther. "Little."

"It doesn't take much."

"No," Yosef agreed, heading for the door. "No, it doesn't."