Path of the Assassin

CHAPTER 55

At three o’clock the next afternoon, the Linee Lauro ferry sailed into Naples’s harbor and docked at the Stazione Marittima opposite the Piazza Municipo. Harvath and Meg were among the first passengers to disembark.

Outside the terminal they quickly hailed a taxi. Harvath gave the driver the name of the Hotel Santa Lucia, and the cab swung out of the port and headed southwest beneath the shadow of the enormous Castel Nuovo.

Like many international port cities, Naples had more than its fair share of crime. Tourists found themselves preyed upon by everyone from strung-out drug addicts who reached into car windows at stoplights to steal watches and purses, to unscrupulous restaurateurs who mercilessly padded dinner bills. Most of the city’s neighborhoods were shabby and run-down, with laundry hanging from every balcony, window, and dingy alleyway. Pollution, poverty, and chaos held sway over the entire city.

One of Naples’s few redeeming areas was the neighborhood fronting the small fisherman’s marina of Santa Lucia. When the taxi stopped at 46 Via Partenope, Harvath paid the driver with the few remaining Euros he had been given at the embassy in Tunisia, and he and Meg pushed through the revolving door into the lobby of the grand hotel.

Harvath steered Meg toward the lobby bar and told her to order sandwiches while he picked up something from the front desk. He gave the concierge his name, and she disappeared into the office, returning moments later with a large, padded manila envelope. Taped to the envelope was a confirmation form for a private water taxi to the island of Capri with a company called Taxi Del Mare. Harvath thanked the concierge and silently said a thank-you to Gary Lawlor. Lawlor had dispatched an agent from the FBI’s legal attaché office at the U.S. Embassy in Rome with exactly what he needed. Judging by the heft of the envelope, it was all there.

Harvath made his way to the men’s room and, once he was sure he was alone, entered the last stall and locked the door. He tore open the top of the envelope and removed a smaller envelope filled with European currency. He broke the stack of bills into small piles and slid them into various pockets. Then he removed a blue black nine-millimeter Browning Hi-Power pistol with two extra clips of ammunition and a small holster. He clipped the Browning to the inside of his waistband at the small of his back, covered it with his shirt and left the men’s room.

The Bay of Naples was known for its often roiling seas, and today was no exception. The sleek, sunburst yellow Taxi Del Mare yacht pounded over the crest of each wave, slamming down into the troughs on the other side. Sea spray covered the boat, along with its crew and two passengers. Though it was a perfectly sunny late afternoon, the captain kept the windshield wipers at full speed as sheets of warm water blasted over the bow and splashed down the wide expanse of deck.

Harvath was in his element. He had always loved the water. He watched the city of Naples recede into the distance and then looked off to the east, where he watched Mount Vesuvius, towering high above Pompeii, grow smaller and smaller. Off the port bow was Sorrento and dead ahead, the island of Capri.

The six-mile trip from Naples had taken nearly forty-five minutes. As the boat pulled into Capri’s Marina Grande, the first mate hopped onto the pier with a long white line in each hand. Once the lines were secure, he ran off in search of a taxicab for his passengers.

Harvath helped Meg onto the pier and then stood next to her, to experience his first glimpse of Capri. The water of the harbor was a deep azure blue, punctuated by rows of brightly colored fishing boats. Short green trees clung tightly to the island’s rocky limestone cliffs, which rose in two distinct peaks marking the tiny towns of Capri and Anacapri.

The first mate quickly returned with one of Capri’s signature taxis — a convertible minivan. It drove up a long and winding switchback along which throngs of tourists slowly made their way downhill to the marina to catch the last ferry of the evening.

When they arrived at the four-star Hotel Capri, Meg went up to the room to freshen up while Harvath convinced the manager to allow him a few minutes on the hotel’s computer to check his e-mail. Alone in the manager’s office, Harvath logged on to the seemingly innocuous web site of an Israeli drywall manufacturer. Having been instructed by Schoen on how to navigate the site, he quickly found what he was looking for. Buried several layers down and accessible only by clicking on sections of seemingly random web images, Harvath found the surveillance photos taken by Schoen’s associates in Marbella of Marcel Hamdi and his two-hundred-fifty-foot Feadship yacht, the Belle Étoile. It was just as Schoen had described it. Something that big would not be hard to spot, even off Capri.

But there had been no sign of any yacht as large as the Belle Étoile in the Marina Grande. From what the captain of the Taxi Del Mare said, the big boats preferred the privacy and exclusivity of the Marina Piccola, on the other side of the island. Harvath had shared Schoen’s description of the Belle Étoile with the captain, who had picked up passengers from the Marina Piccola earlier that afternoon, but he replied he had not seen a vessel of that size anywhere around Capri that day. Maybe, thought Harvath, they had finally arrived somewhere first. Or maybe they were on a wild-goose chase.

He logged off the manager’s computer and went upstairs to the room. Large French windows gave onto an incredible view of the sea, with Sorrento off in the distance. A light breeze stirred the curtains and cooled the room. The sun was starting to set, and Harvath was anxious to get moving. He was about to knock on the bathroom door when Meg stepped out. She was still wearing the same clothes she had had on since boarding the ferry in Tunisia, but even wrinkled and two days old, they couldn’t diminish how beautiful she was.

“We’ve got a lot of work to do,” he said as he squeezed past her into the bathroom to examine his tired face in the mirror. He splashed cold water on his face and ran his fingers through his short brown hair.

“Where do you want to start?” asked Meg as she crossed to the minibar and retrieved a bottle of mineral water.

“Even though the captain said he hadn’t seen Hamdi’s yacht on the Marina Piccola side of the island, I want to give it a shot, especially since that’s where the picture you saw of Adara was taken,” said Harvath as he came out of the bathroom. “There are some brochures and tourist maps in the lobby. We’ll get somebody behind the desk to help mark all the spots that sell Caprissimo perfume.”

“And then?”

“And then we’ll go to each one and inquire as to whether or not they are familiar with our little friend.”

“We’ll also need a pair of binoculars if we’re going looking for that yacht, but there’ll be a shop with them every fifteen feet. What we really need is some new clothes. I’m not wearing these another day,” said Meg as she pulled her shirt away from her body. “If we’re going to go around asking questions about the well-heeled Adara Nidal, we’d better look like we belong here. The last thing we want is for her to see us coming.”

Meg Cassidy had no idea how right she really was.