The English Assassin

32

ON THE EVE of the Second World War, General Henri Guisan, the commander in chief of Switzerland ’s armed forces, announced a desperate plan to deal with an invasion by the overwhelmingly superior forces of Nazi Germany. If the Germans come, Guisan said, the Swiss Army would withdraw to the natural fortress of the Alpine Redoubt and blow up the tunnels. And there they would fight, in the deep valleys and on the high mountain ice fields, to the last man. It had not come to that, of course. Hitler realized early in the war that a neutral Switzerland would be more valuable to him than a Switzerland in chains and under occupation. Still, the general’s heroic strategy for dealing with the threat of invasion lives on in the imagination of the Swiss.

Indeed, it was on Gerhardt Peterson’s mind the following afternoon as he skirted Lucerne and the Alps loomed before him, shrouded in cloud. Peterson could feel his heart beat faster as he pressed the accelerator and his big Mercedes roared up the first mountain pass. Peterson came from Inner Switzerland, and he could trace his lineage back to the tribesmen of the Forest Cantons. He took a certain comfort in the knowledge that people with his blood had roamed these mountain valleys at the same time a young man called Jesus of Nazareth was stirring up trouble at the other end of the Roman Empire. He became uneasy whenever he ventured too far from the security of his Alpine Redoubt. He remembered an official visit to Russia he had made a few years earlier. The limitless quality of the countryside had played havoc with his senses. In his Moscow hotel room, he had suffered his first and only bout of insomnia. When he returned home, he went straight to his country house and spent a day hiking along the mountain trails above Lake Lucerne. That night he slept.

But his sudden trip into the Alps that afternoon had nothing to do with pleasure. It had been precipitated by two pieces of bad news. The first was the discovery of an abandoned Audi A8 on a road near the town of Bargen, a few miles from the German border. A check of the registration revealed that the car had been rented the previous evening in Zurich by Anna Rolfe. The second was a report from an informant on the Bahnhofstrasse. The affair was spinning out of control; Peterson could feel it slipping away.

It began to snow, big downy flakes that turned the afternoon to white. Peterson switched on his amber fog lamps and kept his foot down. One hour later, he was rolling through the town of Stans. By the time he reached the gates of the Gessler estate, three inches of new snow covered the ground.

As he slipped the car into park, a pair of Gessler’s security men appeared, dressed in dark-blue ski jackets and woolen caps. A moment later, the formalities of identification and scrutiny behind him, Peterson was rolling up the drive toward Gessler’s chateau. There, another man waited, tossing bits of raw meat to a ravenous Alsatian bitch.

ON the shores of Lake Lucerne, not far from Otto Gessler’s mountain home, is the legendary birthplace of the Swiss Confederation. In 1291, the leaders of the three so-called Forest Cantons-Uri, Schwyz, and Unterwalden-are said to have gathered in the Rütli Meadow and formed a defensive alliance against anyone who “may plot evil against their persons or goods.” The event is sacred to the Swiss. A mural of the Rütli Meadow adorns the wall of the Swiss National Council chamber, and each August the meeting on the meadow is remembered with a national day of celebration.

Seven hundred years later, a similar defensive alliance was formed by a group of the country’s richest and most powerful private bankers and industrialists. In 1291, the enemy had been an outsider: the Holy Roman Emperor Rudolf I of the Hapsburg dynasty, who was trying to assert his feudal rights in Switzerland. Today, once again, the enemies were outsiders, but now they were scattered and more numerous. They were the Jews who were trying to pry open the bank vaults of Switzerland to look for money and whatever else they could lay their hands on. They were the governments demanding that Switzerland pay billions of dollars for accepting Nazi gold during the Second World War. And the journalists and historians who were trying to paint the Swiss as willing allies of Germany -Hitler’s money men and arms suppliers who prolonged the war at the cost of millions of lives. And the reformers inside Switzerland who were demanding an end to the sacred laws of banking secrecy.

This new alliance took its inspiration from the fiercely independent forest dwellers who gathered along Lake Lucerne in 1291. Like their ancestors, they swore to fight anyone who “may plot evil against their persons or goods.” They saw the events raging beyond their Alpine Redoubt as a gathering storm that could wipe away the institutions that had given Switzerland, a tiny, landlocked country with few natural resources, the second-highest standard of living in the world. They called themselves the Council of Rütli, and their leader was Otto Gessler.

PETERSON had expected to be shown, as usual, to Otto Gessler’s makeshift television studio. Instead, the guard escorted him along a lamplit footpath to a single-level wing of the chateau. Passing through an unusually heavy set of French doors, Peterson was greeted by a sweltering tropical heat and an opaque cloud of vapor that reeked of chlorine. Ornate lamps glowed through the mist like storm lanterns, and turquoise water made wavelike patterns on the soaring open-beamed ceiling. The room was quiet except for the ripple of Otto Gessler’s laborious crawl. Peterson removed his overcoat and scarf and waited for Gessler to complete his lap. The snow that had collected on his leather city loafers quickly melted, soaking his socks.

“Gerhardt?” A pause for air, another stroke. “Is that you?”

“Yes, Herr Gessler.”

“I hope-the snow-didn’t make-your drive-too difficult.”

“Not at all, Herr Gessler.”

Peterson hoped the old man would take a break; otherwise they were going to be at it all night. A bodyguard appeared at the edge of the pool, then receded behind a veil of mist.

“You wished to speak to me about the Rolfe case, Gerhardt?”

“Yes, Herr Gessler. I’m afraid we may have a problem.”

“I’m listening.”

For the next ten minutes, Peterson brought Gessler up to date on the case. Gessler swam while Peterson spoke. Splash, silence, splash, silence…

“What conclusion do you draw from these developments?”

“That they know more about what happened to Augustus Rolfe and the collection than we would wish.”

“An obstinate people, don’t you agree, Gerhardt?”

“The Jews?”

“Never can seem to leave well enough alone. Always looking for trouble. I won’t be beaten by them, Gerhardt.”

“No, of course not, Herr Gessler.”

Through the curtain of mist, Peterson glimpsed Gessler rising slowly up the steps of the shallow end of the pool; a pale figure, shockingly frail. A bodyguard covered his shoulders in a toweling robe. Then the curtain of mist closed once more, and Gessler was gone.

“She needs to be eliminated,” came the dry, disembodied voice. “So does the Israeli.”

Peterson frowned. “There will be consequences. Anna Rolfe is a national treasure. If she is murdered so soon after her father, there are bound to be uncomfortable questions, especially in the press.”

“You may rest assured that there will be no outpouring of national grief if Anna Rolfe is killed. She refuses even to live in Switzerland, and she’s almost done herself in any number of times. And as for the press, they can ask all the questions they want. Without facts, their stories will read like conspiratorial gossip. I only care whether the authorities ask questions. And that’s what we pay you for, Gerhardt-to make certain the authorities don’t ask questions.”

“I should also warn you that the Israeli secret service does not play by the usual rules. If we target one of their agents for assassination, they’ll come after us.”

“I’m not afraid of the Jews, Gerhardt, and you shouldn’t be, either. Contact Anton Orsati right away. I’ll move some additional funds into your operational account, as well as something extra into your personal account. Consider it an incentive to make certain that this affair is resolved quickly and quietly.”

“That’s not necessary, Herr Gessler.”

“I know it’s not necessary, but you’ve earned it.”

Peterson hastily changed the subject. He didn’t like to think about the money too much. It made him feel like a whore. “I really should be getting back to Zurich, Herr Gessler. The weather.”

“You’re welcome to spend the night here.”

“No, I really should be getting back.”

“Suit yourself, Gerhardt.”

“May I ask you a question, Herr Gessler?”

“Certainly.”

“Did you know Herr Rolfe?”

“Yes, I knew him well. He and I were quite close once. In fact, I was there the morning his wife committed suicide. She dug her own grave and shot herself. It was young Anna who discovered the body. A terrible thing. Herr Rolfe’s death was unfortunate but necessary. It wasn’t personal, it was business. You do understand the difference, don’t you, Gerhardt?”

33

JULIA NISHERWOOD was seated at his desk, leafing through a stack of paperwork, when he heard the sound of a delivery truck rumbling across the bricks of Mason’s Yard. He walked to his window and peered out. A man in blue coveralls was climbing out the front passenger side and making his way to the door. A moment later came the howl of the buzzer.

“Irina? Did you schedule any deliveries for today?”

“No, Mr. Isherwood.”

Oh, Christ, thought Isherwood. Not again.

“Irina?”

“Yes, Mr. Isherwood?”

“I’m feeling a bit hungry, petal. Would you be a love and bring me a panini from that marvelous shop in Piccadilly?”

“I’d like nothing better, Mr. Isherwood. May I perform any other meaningless and degrading tasks for you?”

“No need to be snotty, Irina. Cuppa tea as well. And take your time.”

THERE was something about the man in blue coveralls that reminded Isherwood of the fellow who had searched his house for termites. He wore rubber-soled shoes and worked with the quiet efficiency of a night nurse. In one hand was a device about the size of a cigar box with meters and dials; in the other was a long wand, like a flyswatter. He began in the basement storerooms, then moved to Irina’s office, then Isherwood’s, then the exposition room. Lastly, he tore apart the telephones, the computers, and the fax machine. After forty-five minutes, he returned to Isherwood’s office and laid two tiny objects on the desk.

“You had bugs,” he said. “Now they’re dead.”

“Who in God’s name put them in here?”

“That’s not my job. I’m just the exterminator.” He smiled. “There’s someone downstairs who’d like a word with you.”

Isherwood led the way through the cluttered storerooms to the loading bay. He opened the outer door, and the delivery truck pulled inside.

“Close the door,” said the man in the blue coveralls.

Isherwood did as he was told. The man opened the back door of the truck and a cloud of dense smoke billowed forth. Crouched in the back, a picture of misery, was Ari Shamron.

THE man in the Rover sedan had moved from Jermyn Street to King Street, which was still well within the one-mile range of the transmitters he had placed in the gallery, but it had been some time since he had heard any sound at all. Indeed, the last thing he had monitored was the art dealer asking his secretary to get him lunch. It had struck him as odd, since the dealer had eaten lunch out every day since the man had been watching him. So odd, in fact, that he had made a notation of the time in his logbook. Forty-five minutes after that, a burst of raw static came over his car radio. Someone had just found his transmitters. He swore softly and quickly started the car. As he drove away, he picked up his mobile phone and dialed Zurich.

THE Hoek van Holland-to-Harwich ferry was delayed several hours by heavy weather in the North Sea, and so it was late afternoon by the time Gabriel and Anna Rolfe pulled into Mason’s Yard. Gabriel gave two short blasts of the horn, and the door of the loading bay slowly rose. Once inside, he shut down the engine and waited for the door to close again before getting out of the car. He removed the large safe-deposit box from the backseat and led Anna through the storeroom to the lift. Isherwood was waiting there.

“You must be Anna Rolfe! It is an honor to meet you, truly. I had the distinct privilege of seeing you perform an evening of Mendelssohn once. It was a deeply moving experience.”

“You’re very kind.”

“Won’t you please come inside?”

“Thank you.”

“Is he here yet?” Gabriel asked.

“Upstairs in the exposition room.”

“Let’s go.”

“What’s in the box?”

“In a minute, Julian.”

Shamron stood in the center of the room, smoking his vile Turkish cigarettes, completely oblivious to the Old Masters canvases surrounding him. Gabriel could see that the old man was wrestling with his memory. A year earlier, in this very room, they had set in motion the final stage of an operation that ended in the death of Tariq al-Hourani. When he saw Anna Rolfe enter the room, his face brightened, and he shook her hand warmly.

Gabriel placed the safe-deposit box on the floor and lifted the lid. Then he removed the first painting, unwrapped it, and laid it on the floor.

“My God,” Isherwood whispered. “A Monet landscape.”

Anna smiled. “Wait, it gets better.”

Gabriel removed the next canvas, a van Gogh self-portrait, and laid it next to the Monet.

“Oh, good heavens,” murmured Isherwood.

Then came the Degas, then the Bonnard, then the Cézanne and the Renoir, and on it went until the sixteen canvases stretched the length of the gallery. Isherwood sat down on the divan, pressed his palms against his temples, and wept.

Shamron said, “Well, that’s quite an entrance. The floor is yours, Gabriel.”

ANNA had heard it all during the drive from Zurich to the German border, so she stepped away and consoled Isherwood while he gazed at the paintings. Gabriel covered everything he had learned about Augustus Rolfe and his collection, concluding with the letter Rolfe had left in the safe-deposit box in Zurich. Then he told Shamron his plan for recovering the rest of Rolfe’s collection: the twenty works that were stolen from the vault at his villa in Zurich. When Gabriel finished, Shamron crushed out his cigarette and slowly shook his head.

“It’s an interesting idea, Gabriel, but it has one fatal flaw. The prime minister will never approve it. In case you haven’t noticed, we’re in a virtual war with the Palestinians now. The prime minister will never approve an operation like this in order to recover a few paintings.”

“It’s more than a few paintings. Rolfe is hinting at the existence of an organization of Swiss bankers and businessmen who would do anything to protect the old order. And we certainly have the evidence to suggest they exist, including three dead bodies: Rolfe, Müller, and Emil Jacobi. And they tried to kill me.”

“The situation is too explosive. Our fickle friends here in Europe are angry enough at us right now. We don’t need to pour gasoline on the flames with this kind of operation. I’m sorry, Gabriel, but I won’t approve it, and I won’t waste the prime minister’s time by asking him.”

Anna had left Isherwood’s side in order to listen to the debate between Gabriel and Shamron. “I think there’s a rather simple solution to the problem, Mr. Shamron,” she said.

Shamron twisted his bald head around to look at Anna, amused that the Swiss violinist would dare to venture an opinion on the course of an Israeli intelligence operation.

“What’s that?”

“Don’t tell the prime minister.”

Shamron threw back his head and laughed, and Gabriel joined him. When the laughter died away, there was a moment of silence, broken by Julian Isherwood.

“Dear God, I don’t believe it!”

He was holding the Renoir, a portrait of a young girl with a bouquet of flowers. He was turning it over in his hands, looking at the painting, then the back of the canvas.

Gabriel said, “What is it, Julian?”

Isherwood held the Renoir so that Gabriel and the others could see the image. “The Germans were meticulous record-keepers. Every painting they took was sorted, catalogued and marked-swastika, serial number, initials of the collector or dealer from whom it was confiscated.”

He turned the canvas over to reveal the back. “Someone tried to remove the markings from this one, but they didn’t do a terribly good job of it. Look closely at the bottom left corner. There’s the remnants of the swastika, there’s the serial number, and there are the initials of the original owner:SI. ”

“Who’s SI?” Anna asked.

“SI is Samuel Isakowitz, my father.” Isherwood’s voice choked with tears. “This painting was taken from my father’s gallery on the rue de la Boétie in Paris by the Nazis in June of 1940.”

“You’re certain?” Anna asked.

“I’d stake my life on it.”

“Then please accept it, along with the deepest apologies of the Rolfe family.” Then she kissed his cheek and said, “I’m so sorry, Mr. Isherwood.”

Shamron looked at Gabriel. “Why don’t you walk me through it one more time.”

THEY went downstairs to Isherwood’s office. Gabriel sat behind Isherwood’s desk, but Shamron prowled the room as he listened to Gabriel’s plan again.

“And what shall I tell the prime minister?”

“Listen to Anna. Tell him nothing.”

“And if it blows up in my face?”

“It won’t.”

“Things like this always blow up in my face, Gabriel, and I have the scars to prove it. So do you. Tell me something. Is it my imagination, or is there a little more spring in your step tonight?”

“You want to ask me a question?”

“I don’t wish to sound indelicate.”

“That’s never stopped you before.”

“Are you and this woman more than just accomplices in the search for her father’s killer?” When silence greeted his question, Shamron smiled and shook his head. “Do you remember what you said to me about Anna Rolfe on the Piazza Navona?”

“I told you that, given a choice, we would never use a woman like her.”

“And now you want to involve her more deeply?”

“She can handle it.”

“I have no doubts about her, but can you handle it, Gabriel?”

“I wouldn’t suggest it if I felt otherwise.”

“Two weeks ago, I had to beg you to look into Rolfe’s death. Now you want to wage war against Switzerland.”

“Rolfe wanted those paintings to come to us. Someone took them, and now I want them back.”

“But your motivation goes beyond the paintings, Gabriel. I turned you into a killer, but in your heart, you’re the restorer. I think you’re doing this because you want to restore Anna Rolfe. If that’s the case, then the next logical question is this: Why does he want to restore Anna Rolfe? And there’s only one logical answer. He has feelings for the woman.” Shamron hesitated. “And that’s the best news I’ve heard in a very long time.”

“I care for her.”

“If you care for her, you’ll convince her to cancel her appearance in Venice.”

“She won’t cancel.”

“If that’s the case, then perhaps we can use it to our advantage.”

“How so?”

“I’ve always found deception and misdirection to be useful tactics in a situation like this. Let her give her concert. Just make certain your friend Keller doesn’t make the recital a truly unforgettable experience.”

“Now, that’s the Ari Shamron I know and love. Use one of the world’s finest musicians as a diversion.”

“We play the cards we’re dealt.”

“I’m going to be with her in Venice. I want someone I can trust to handle the Zurich end of things.”

“Who?”

“Eli Lavon.”

“My God, a reunion of the Class of ’72! If I were a few years younger, I’d join you.”

“Let’s not get carried away. Oded and Mordecai did well in Paris. I want them too.”

“I see something of myself in Oded.” Shamron held up his stubby bricklayer’s hands. “He has a very powerful grip. If he gets hold of this man, he won’t get away.”

34

EVA HAD INSISTED on the expensive flat overlooking the Zürichsee, despite the fact that it was beyond the reach of Gerhardt Peterson’s government salary. For the first ten years of their marriage, they’d made up the shortfall by dipping into her inheritance. Now that money was gone, and it had fallen upon Gerhardt to keep her in the style to which she felt entitled.

The flat was dark when he finally arrived home. As Peterson stepped through the doorway, Eva’s amiable Rottweiler charged him in the pitch dark and drove his rocklike head into Peterson’s kneecap.

“Down, Schultzie! That’s enough, boy. Down! Damn you, Schultzie!”

He fumbled along the wall and switched on the light. The dog was licking his suede shoe.

“All right, Schultzie. Go away, please. That’s quite enough.”

The dog trotted off, claws clicking on the marble.

Peterson limped into the bedroom, rubbing his knee. Eva was sitting up in bed with a hardcover novel open on her lap. An American police drama played silently on the television. She wore a chiffon-colored dressing gown. Her hair was freshly coiffed, and there was a gold bracelet on her left wrist that Peterson didn’t recognize. The money Eva spent on the surface of the Bahnhofstrasse rivaled the funds buried beneath it.

“What’s wrong with your knee?”

“Your dog attacked me.”

“He didn’t attack you. He adores you.”

“He’s too affectionate.”

“He’s a man, like you. He wants your approval. If you’d just give him a little attention now and again, he wouldn’t be so exuberant when you come home.”

“Is that what his therapist told you?”

“It’s common sense, darling.”

“I never wanted the damned dog. He’s too big for this flat.”

“He makes me feel safe when you’re away.”

“This place is like a fortress. No one can get in here. And the only person Schultzie ever attacks is me.”

Eva licked the tip of her forefinger and turned the page of her novel, ending the discussion. On the television, the American detectives were breaking down the door of a flat in a poor tenement. As they burst into the room, a pair of suspects opened fire with automatic weapons. The policemen fired back, killing the suspects. Such violence, thought Peterson. He rarely carried a gun and had never fired one in the line of duty.

“How was Bern?”

Peterson had lied to her to cover up his visit to see Otto Gessler. He sat on the edge of the bed and removed his shoes.

“ Bern was Bern.”

“That’s nice.”

“What are you reading?”

“I don’t know. A story about a man and a woman.”

He wondered why she bothered. “How are the girls?”

“They’re fine.”

“And Stefan?”

“He made me promise that you would come into his room and kiss him good night.”

“I don’t want to wake him.”

“You won’t wake him. Just go in and kiss his head.”

“If I don’t wake him, what difference will it make? In the morning, I’ll tell him that I kissed him while he was asleep, and he’ll be none the wiser.”

Eva closed her book and looked at him for the first time since he had entered the room. “You look terrible, Gerhardt. You must be famished. Go make yourself something to eat.”

He padded into the kitchen. Go make yourself something to eat. He couldn’t remember the last time Eva had offered to fix him a meal. He had expected that once the sexual intimacy was gone between them, other things would rise in its place, like the pleasure of sharing a home-cooked meal. But not with Eva. First she’d chained the door to her body; then to her affections. Peterson was an island in his own home.

He opened the refrigerator and picked through a desert of half-empty takeaway containers for something that hadn’t spoiled or grown a beard of mold. In one grease-spotted carton, he struck gold: a little mound of noodle and bacon raclette. On the bottom shelf, hidden behind a container of green ricotta cheese, lay two eggs. He scrambled them and heated the raclette in the microwave. Then he poured himself a very large glass of red wine and walked back into the bedroom. Eva was buffing her toenails.

He divided his food carefully, so that with each bite of egg he would have an accompanying scoop of raclette. Eva found this habit annoying, which partially explained why he did it. On the television there was more mayhem. Friends of the slain criminals had now avenged their comrades’ death by killing the police detectives. More evidence of Herr Gessler’s theory of life’s circular quality.

“Stefan has a soccer match tomorrow.” She blew on her toes. “He’d like you to come.”

“I can’t. Something’s come up at the office.”

“He’s going to be disappointed.”

“I’m afraid it can’t be helped.”

“What’s so important at the office that you can’t go see your son’s soccer game? Besides, nothing important ever happens in this country.”

I have to arrange the murder of Anna Rolfe, he thought. He wondered how she would react if he said it aloud. He considered saying it, just to test her-to see whether she ever listened to a word he said.

Eva finished her toes and returned to her novel. Peterson placed his empty plate and cutlery on the night table and switched off the light. A moment later, Schultzie smashed head-first through the door and began lapping the bits of egg and grease from Eva’s precious hand-painted china. Peterson closed his eyes. Eva licked the tip of her index finger and turned another page.

“How was Bern?” she asked.

35

NEWS OF THE ENGLISHMAN’S dark mood spread rapidly round the little valley. On market day he moved through the village square in silence, joylessly selecting his olives and his cheeses. Evenings he sat with the old ones, but he avoided conversation and refused to be baited into a game of boule, even when his honor was called into question. So preoccupied was the Englishman that he seemed not to notice the boys on their skateboards.

His driving was dramatically worse. He was seen tearing along the valley road in his battered jeep at unprecedented speeds. Once, he was forced to swerve to avoid the wretched goat of Don Casabianca and ended up in a ditch at the side of the road. At that point Anton Orsati intervened. He told the Englishman about an infamous feud that had taken place between two rival clans over the accidental death of a hunting dog. Four people died before peace was finally made-two at the hands of Orsati taddunaghiu. It had happened a hundred years ago, but Orsati stressed that the lessons were still relevant today. His skilled use of Corsican history worked to perfection, as he knew it would. The next morning, the Englishman presented Casabianca with a large ham and apologized for frightening his goat. After that his driving was noticeably slower.

Still, something was clearly wrong. A few of the men from the square were so concerned that they paid a visit to the signadora. “He hasn’t been here in some time. But when he does come, you can be sure I won’t reveal his secrets to you jackasses. This house is like a confessional. Go, now!” And she chased them away with the business end of a stick broom.

Only Don Orsati knew the source of the Englishman’s black mood. It was the assignment in Lyons; the Swiss professor called Emil Jacobi. Something about the killing had left a tear in the Englishman’s conscience. Don Orsati offered to get the Englishman a girl-a lovely Italian girl he had met in San Remo -but the Englishman refused.

Three days after the Englishman’s return from Lyons, Don Orsati invited him to dinner. They ate in a restaurant near the square and afterward walked arm in arm through the narrow streets of the dark town. Twice, villagers appeared out of the gloom, and twice they quickly turned in the opposite direction. Everyone knew that when Don Orsati was speaking privately with the Englishman it was best to walk away. It was then that Don Orsati told him about the assignment in Venice.

“If you want me to send one of the other boys-”

“No,” the Englishman said quickly. “I’ll do it.”

“You’re sure?”

“Yes.”

“I hoped you’d say that. None of the others are truly capable of a job like this. Besides, I think you’ll enjoy the assignment. There’s a long tradition of our work in Venice. I’m sure you’ll find the setting rather inspiring.”

“I’m sure you’re right.”

“There’s a friend of mine there called Rossetti. He’ll give you all the help you require.”

“You have the dossiers?”

Only a man as powerful as Anton Orsati could leave the dossiers for two people he planned to murder on the front seat of a car, but such was the nature of life in the Corsican village. The Englishman read them by lamplight in the square. When he opened the second file, a look of recognition flashed through his eyes that even Orsati was able to detect.

“Is there something wrong?”

“I know this man-from another life.”

“Is that a problem?”

He closed the file. “Not at all.”

THE Englishman stayed up late, listening to the audiotape he had taken from the professor’s apartment in Lyons. Then he read the stack of clippings and obituaries he had collected by trolling newspaper websites on the Internet, followed by the dossiers Anton Orsati had just given him. He slept for a few hours; then, before dawn the next morning, he placed a small overnight bag in the back of his jeep and drove into the village.

He parked in a narrow street near the church and walked to the house where the signadora lived. When he knocked softly on the door, she pushed open the shutters in the second-floor window and peered down at him like a gargoyle.

“I had a feeling it was you. The scirocco is blowing. It brings dust and evil spirits.”

“Which one am I?”

“I can see the occhju from here. Wait there, my child. I’ll just be a moment.”

The Englishman smoked a cigarette while he waited for the old woman to dress and come downstairs. She answered the door in a widow’s plain black frock and pulled him inside by the wrist, as though she feared there were wild animals about. They sat on opposite sides of the rough wooden table. He finished his cigarette while the old women tended to her oil and water.

“Three drops, though I’m certain I already know the answer.”

He dipped his finger into the oil and allowed three drops to fall into the water. When the oil shattered, the old woman embarked on her familiar routine of blessings and prayers. When he repeated the test, the oil coalesced into a single ball, floating on the surface of the water. This pleased the old woman.

“That’s a neat trick you’ve got there,” said the Englishman.

“It’s not a trick. You of all people should know that.”

“I meant no disrespect.”

“I know. Even though you are not a Corsican by birth, you have the soul of a Corsican. You are a true believer. Do you wish to have something to drink before you go? Some wine, perhaps?”

“It’s six o’clock in the morning.”

The old woman tilted her head, as if to say, So what.

“You should be at home in bed,” she said. Then she added: “With a woman. And not the whores that Don Orsati brings you. A real woman who will give you children and see to your clothes.”

“The women of Don Orsati are the only ones who will have me.”

“You think a decent woman wouldn’t have you because you are a taddunaghiu? ”

The Englishman folded his arms.

“I want to tell you a story.”

He opened his mouth to object, but the old woman was on her feet before he could utter a sound and shuffling into the kitchen for the wine. The bottle was dark green and had no label. Her hand shook as she poured out two glasses.

“My husband was very good with his hands,” the signadora said. “He was a cobbler and a mason. He used to work sometimes for Don Tomasi in the next valley. Have you heard of the Tomasi clan?”

The Englishman nodded and sipped his wine. They were still notorious troublemakers.

“Don Tomasi hired my husband to build a new wall around his garden. It was a thing of beauty, I assure you, but Don Tomasi said it was flawed and refused to pay my husband for his work. They quarreled violently, and the don ordered a pair of his gunmen to drag my husband off his property. It’s still there, by the way.”

“The wall around the garden?”

“Indeed!” The old woman drank some wine and gathered herself for the rest of the story. “My husband was a good worker, but he was a gentle man. An agnello. Do you know this term?”

“A lamb.”

The signadora nodded. “He was not the kind of man to fight with his fists or a knife. Word of his treatment at the hands of Don Tomasi spread through the village. My husband became a laughingstock. Two nights after the incident he was baited into a fight in the square. He suffered a stab wound in his abdomen and died.”

Something flashed behind the old woman’s eyes. Anger. Hatred.

“Clearly, blood vengeance was required,” she said calmly. “But who? The oaf who murdered my husband in the square? He was not the one who was truly responsible for his death. It was Don Tomasi who had blood on his hands. But how was I supposed to kill Don Tomasi? He lived in a large house on the top of a hill, surrounded by vicious dogs and armed men. There was no way for me to kill him! So I went to see Anton Orsati’s father, and I hired a taddunaghiu to do the deed for me. It cost me every bit of money I had, but it was worth it. The taddunaghiu slipped through Don Tomasi’s defenses and slit his throat while he slept-killed him like the pig that he was. Justice was done.”

She reached across the table and laid her palm on the back of his hand.

“Sometimes, Christopher, a taddunaghiu can do good things. Sometimes, he can right a terrible wrong. Sometimes, he can dispense justice as well as vengeance. Remember the things I’ve told you.”

“I will,” he said.

He gave her a thick roll of money. Without looking at it, the old woman said, “It’s too much. It’s always too much.”

“You give me peace. Peace is priceless.”

He stood up to leave, but she grabbed his wrist with surprising strength. “Sit with me while I drink my wine. I still miss my husband, you know. Even after all these years.”

And so he sat there, watching the candlelight flickering in the creases of her face, while she finished the last of the wine. Then her eyes closed and her chin fell forward onto her chest.

The Englishman carried her upstairs and laid her gently in her bed. She awoke briefly. Her hand reached up, and she fingered the talisman hanging from his neck: the red coral hand. Then she touched his face and drifted back to sleep.

He went downstairs and climbed into his jeep, then drove to Calvi and boarded the first ferry for Marseille. There, he collected a car Orsati had left for him near the waterfront and set out for Venice.

36

THE ITALIAN PRESS had come alive. There was an avalanche of speculation about which pieces Anna Rolfe would perform. Would she attempt her signature piece, Giuseppe Tartini’s demonic sonata, “The Devil’s Trill?” Surely, the music writers speculated, Miss Rolfe would not try such a difficult composition after being away from the stage for so long.

There were appeals to move the recital to a larger venue. It was scheduled to take place in the upper hall of the Scuola Grande di San Rocco, a room which seated only six hundred, and competition for tickets had deteriorated into something of a scrum among the Venetian well-to-do. Zaccaria Cordoni, the promoter, refused to consider moving the recital, though in an effort to preserve his good standing in Venice he adroitly laid blame at the feet of Anna Rolfe. Miss Rolfe had requested a small venue, he said, and he was a mere prisoner to the demands of the artist. A magazine with Socialist leanings printed a hysterical editorial arguing that once again music had been hijacked by the moneyed classes. It called for demonstrations outside the San Rocco on the night of the concert. Fiona Richardson, Anna Rolfe’s agent and manager, released a statement in London promising that Miss Rolfe’s considerable appearance fee would be donated to the preservation of the scuola and its magnificent artwork. All of Venice breathed a sigh of relief over the gesture, and the controversy receded as gently as the evening tide.

There was also speculation about where Anna Rolfe would stay in Venice. The Gazzettino reported that the Hotel Monaco, the Grand Canal, and the Gritti Palace were locked in a titanic struggle to attract her, while the Nuova Venezia suggested that Miss Rolfe would avoid the distractions of a hotel by accepting an invitation to stay at a privately owned palazzo. As it turned out, neither newspaper was correct, because at midday on a rainy Friday, the day before the performance, Anna and Gabriel arrived by water taxi at the private dock of the Luna Hotel Baglioni, a quiet establishment on the Calle dell’Ascencione, not far from the tourist mayhem of the Piazza San Marco.

Anna appeared briefly at the front desk and was greeted by the hotel’s shining senior staff. She introduced Gabriel as Monsieur Michel Dumont, her friend and personal assistant. As if to reinforce this image, Gabriel made a point of carrying two violins into the lobby. In French-accented English, he reiterated Miss Rolfe’s desire for complete privacy. The chief concierge, a polished man called Signore Brunetti, assured him that Miss Rolfe’s presence in the hotel would be the most closely guarded secret in Venice. Gabriel thanked him warmly and signed the registry.

“Miss Rolfe will be staying in the Giorgione suite on the fifth floor. It’s one of our finest rooms. Your room is right next door. I trust these arrangements are satisfactory?”

“Yes, thank you.”

“Allow me to personally escort you and Miss Rolfe to your suite.”

“That won’t be necessary.”

“Do you require help with your luggage, Monsieur Dumont?”

“No, I can manage, thank you.”

“As you wish,” said Signore Brunetti, and sadly the concierge surrendered the keys.

IN a quiet backwater of the sestieri of Santa Marco stands the tiny establishment of Rossetti amp; Rossetti Fine Jewelry, specializing in antique and one-of-a-kind pieces. Like most Venetian shopkeepers, Signore Rossetti closes his business at one o’clock each afternoon for lunch and reopens at four in time for the evening trade. Well aware of this fact, the Englishman pressed the security buzzer at five minutes till one and waited for Rossetti to open the door.

It was a small shop, no larger than the kitchen in the Englishman’s Corsican villa. Passing through the doorway, he was immediately confronted by a horseshoe-shaped glass display counter. When the door closed behind him and the dead bolt snapped into place, the Englishman had the sensation of being imprisoned in a crystal vault. He unbuttoned his macintosh and placed his briefcase on the scuffed wood floor.

Signore Aldo Rossetti stood motionless as a footman behind the counter, dressed in a neatly pressed double-breasted suit and a banker’s somber tie. A pair of gold-rimmed reading glasses clung to the tip of his regal nose. Behind him was a tall case of deeply varnished wood with shallow drawers and small brass knobs. Judging from Rossetti’s uncompromising stance, the case might have contained secret documents he was sworn to protect at all costs. The deep silence of the room was broken only by the ticking of an antique clock. Rossetti shook the Englishman’s hand sadly, as though his visitor had come to confess unforgivable sins.

“I was about to leave for lunch,” Rossetti said, and at that moment, as if to accentuate his point, the antique clock on the wall behind him tolled one o’clock.

“This won’t take long. I’m here to collect the signet ring for Signore Bull.”

“The signet?”

“Yes, that’s right.”

“For Signore Bull?”

“I believe he told you that I was coming.”

Rossetti tilted his head backward and peered at the Englishman as though he were an item of questionable value and provenance. Satisfied, he lowered his head and came round from behind the counter to change the sign in the window from OPEN to CLOSED.

UPSTAIRS was a small private office. Rossetti settled himself behind the desk and invited the Englishman to sit in the little armchair next to the window.

“I received a call a short time ago from a porter at the Luna Hotel Baglioni,” Rossetti said. “The violinist and a friend have just checked in. Do you know the Baglioni?”

The Englishman shook his head.

Like most Venetians, Rossetti kept a map of the city within easy reach, if only to give assistance to a foreign tourist hopelessly lost in its labyrinthine alleys. Rossetti’s looked as though it had been purchased during the rule of the last doge-a dog-eared, tattered affair, with Scotch tape along the splitting seams, so old it had lost all color. He spread it across his desk, smoothing it with both hands, as though it showed the location of buried treasure.

“The Luna Hotel Baglioni is here”-a tap on the map with the tip of his delicate forefinger-“on the Calle dell’Ascencione, a few steps from the San Marco vaporetto stop. The Calle dell’Ascencione is very narrow, no bigger than this street. There’s a private dock in the Rio della Zecca. It will be impossible for you to watch the front and the back of the hotel on your own.”

The Englishman leaned over the map for a closer look. “You have a suggestion?”

“Perhaps I can use my resources to keep watch on the violinist. If she moves, I can alert you.”

“You have someone inside the hotel?”

Rossetti lifted an eyebrow and dipped his head, a neutral gesture, neither in the affirmative or the negative, which said he wished to discuss the matter no further.

“I assume there will be an additional fee for this service?”

“For Don Orsati? It will be my pleasure.”

“Tell me how it would work.”

“There are places you can wait around the hotel without drawing attention to yourself. The Piazza San Marco, of course. The cafés along the Calle Marzo. The Fontamenta delle Farine overlooking the canal.” Rossetti noted each location with an amiable tap on the map. “I assume you have a mobile telephone?”

The Englishman tapped his coat pocket.

“Give me the number and stay close to the hotel. When they move, someone will telephone you.”

He was reluctant to enter into a partnership with Rossetti, but unfortunately the Italian was correct. There was no way he could watch the hotel on his own. He recited his telephone number, and Rossetti jotted it down.

“Of course, there is a chance the violinist will remain in her hotel until the performance at the San Rocco,” said Rossetti. “If that’s the case, you’ll have no choice but to carry out your assignment then.”

“You have a ticket?”

Rossetti removed the ticket from his top drawer and placed it carefully on the desktop. Then, using the thumb and forefinger of each hand, he slid it gently forward. The Englishman picked up the ticket and turned it over in his hands. Rossetti looked out his window while his customer inspected the merchandise, confident he would find it satisfactory.

“It’s real? Not a forgery?”

“Oh, yes, quite real, I assure you. And quite difficult to come by. In fact, I was tempted to keep it for myself. You see, I’ve always been a fan of Miss Rolfe. Such passion. Such a pity she has to-” Rossetti cut himself off. “Do you know the San Rocco?”

The Englishman pocketed the ticket and shook his head. Rossetti turned his attention back to his map. “The Scuola Grande di San Rocco is located here, across the Grand Canal in the sestieri of San Polo and Santa Croce, just to the south of the Frari church. San Rocco was the patron saint of contagious diseases, and the scuola was originally built as a charitable institution for the sick. The construction was financed by donations from wealthy Venetians who believed they could avoid the Black Death by giving money to the scuola. ”

If the assassin found this piece of Venetian history the slightest bit interesting, he gave no sign of it. Undeterred, the little Italian jeweler made a church steeple of his fingers and carried on with his lecture.

“The scuola has two primary levels, the ground-floor hall and the upper hall. In 1564, Tintoretto was commissioned to decorate the walls and the ceilings of the buildings. It took him twenty-three years to complete his task.” He paused for a moment to consider this fact, then added: “Can you imagine a man of such patience? I would hate to match wits with such a man.”

“Where will the concert be? In the ground-floor hall or the upper hall?”

“The upper hall, of course. It’s reached by a wide marble staircase designed and built by Scarpagnino. The walls there are decorated with paintings of the Black Death. It’s quite moving.”

“And if I’m forced to carry out the assignment inside the upper hall?”

Rossetti pressed his church steeple to his lips and whispered a silent petition. “If you have no other choice, then you will have no trouble making your way down the staircase and out the front entrance. From there you can vanish into the alleys of San Polo, and no one will find you.” He paused a moment, then said: “But as a Venetian, I implore you to find some other way. It would be a tragedy if you damaged one of the Tintorettos.”

“Tell me about the area around the San Rocco.”

“The church and the scuola share a small square. Behind them is a canal, the Rio della Frescada, which gives access to both structures. There are only two ways for Miss Rolfe to reach the San Rocco on the night of the concert, on foot or by water taxi. If she walks, she will be exposed for long periods of time. She will also have to cross the Grand Canal at some point, either by vaporetto or traghetto. ”

“Could she cross by bridge?”

Rossetti considered this question carefully. “I suppose she could cross the Rialto Bridge or the Academia Bridge, but it would add a great deal of distance to her journey. If I were a gambling man, I would wager that Miss Rolfe will take a water taxi from the dock of the hotel directly to the San Rocco.”

“And if she does?”

“The Rio della Frescada is a very narrow canal. There are four bridges between the entrance on the Grand Canal and the landing for the San Rocco. You will have ample opportunity there. As the Americans like to say, it will be like shooting fish in a barrel.”

The Englishman cast the Italian a dismissive look that said no job could be so crudely described, especially when the target was under professional protection.

“Don Orsati said you would require weaponry. A handgun and perhaps something with a little more firepower in the event things don’t go as planned.”

Rossetti stood and shuffled across the floor toward an ancient strongbox. He worked the tumbler, then pulled open the heavy doors. He removed an attaché case, placed it on the desk, and sat down again. Opening the case, he removed two weapons, each bound in felt rags, and placed them on the desk. He unwrapped the first and handed it over: a Tanfolglio S Model nine-millimeter with a jet-black barrel and walnut grip. It smelled of clean gun oil. The assassin pulled the slide, felt the weight and balance of the weapon, and peered down the barrel through the sights.

“It has a fifteen-shot magazine, and the longer barrel makes it very accurate,” Rossetti said. “Your seat for the concert is in the second-to-last row. I’m afraid it’s the best I could do. But even from there, a man of your training should have no trouble making the shot with the Tanfolglio.”

“I’ll take it. And an extra magazine.”

“Of course.”

“And the second gun?”

Rossetti unwrapped it and handed it to the assassin. It was an Austrian-made tactical machine pistol. The Englishman picked up the weapon and looked it over carefully.

“I specifically asked for a Heckler and Koch MP-Five,” the Englishman said.

“Yes, I know, but I couldn’t secure one on such short notice. I’m sure you’ll find the Steyr-Mannlicher to your liking. It’s lightweight and easy to conceal. Besides, itis a last resort.”

“I suppose it will have to do.”

“You have a special affection for the Heckler and Koch?”

The Englishman did. It was the weapon he had used when he was in the SAS, but he wasn’t about to share that piece of information with Rossetti. He wrapped both weapons in their original cloth covers and placed them carefully in his briefcase, along with the extra magazines and boxes of ammunition.

“Will you require anything else?”

When the assassin shook his head, Rossetti took his pencil to a small scratch pad and began calculating the tab: weapons, ticket for the performance, personal services. Arriving at a total in lira, he slid it across the desk for the assassin to see. The assassin looked at the bill, then at Rossetti.

“Do you mind if I pay in dollars?”

Rossetti smiled and converted the lira sum into dollars, using that day’s exchange rate. The Englishman counted out the sum in crisp fifty-dollar bills and added five hundred dollars in gratuity. Signore Rossetti shrugged his shoulder, as if to say a gratuity was not necessary, but the assassin insisted and Rossetti slipped the money discreetly into his pocket.

Downstairs, Rossetti and the Englishman walked out together, Rossetti locking the door behind them. A torrent of rain greeted them, great curtains of water that pounded the little alley and ran toward the storm drains like a swollen mountain stream. The Italian had pulled on a pair of knee-length rubber boots; the Englishman was reduced to hopping and skipping through the puddles in his suede loafers. This amused the Venetian jeweler.

“Your first time in Venice?”

“Yes, I’m afraid so.”

“It’s been like this every day for a week, and still the tourists come. We need them-God knows, I’d have no business without them-but sometimes even I tire of their presence.”

At a vaporetto stop, they shook hands.

“I have to say that I find this a most distasteful business, but I suppose you must do what you are paid to do. A violinist”-he raised his hands in a thoroughly Italian gesture-“A violinist can be replaced. But the Tintorettos… the Tintorettos are irreplaceable. Please, I will never forgive myself if I played any role in their destruction.”

“I assure you, Signore Rossetti, that I will make every effort to avoid damaging them.”

The Italian smiled. “I trust that you will. Besides, can you imagine the curse that would befall a man who put a bullet hole through the Savior or the Virgin?”

The little jeweler made the sign of the cross, then turned and melted into the alley.

37

GABRIEL’S TEAM gathered that afternoon in the sitting room of Anna Rolfe’s hotel suite. They had come to Venice by different routes, with the passports of different countries and with different cover stories. In keeping with Office doctrine, they all posed as couples. The operation had been conceived and set into motion so hastily that it had never been given a proper code name. Anna’s hotel room was called the Giorgione Suite, and from that moment on Gabriel’s Venetian field unit took the name as their own.

There were Shimon and Ilana. Playing the parts of French newlyweds, they had driven to Venice from the Cote d’Azur. They were dark-eyed and olive-skinned, equal in height and nearly equal in physical beauty. They had trained together at the Academy, and their relationship was strained when Ilana bested Shimon on the shooting range and broke his collarbone during a session on the foam-rubber mats in the gymnasium.

There were Yitzhak and Moshe. In an accommodation to the realities of relationships in the modern world, they posed as a gay couple from Notting Hill, even though both were quite the other thing, Yitzhak aggressively so.

There was Deborah from the Ottawa station. Gabriel had worked with her on the Tariq operation and was so impressed with her performance that he had insisted she be a part of the Venice team. Shamron had balked at first, but when Gabriel refused to back down, he put her on the next plane from Ottawa and concocted a compelling lie for her section chief.

Seated next to her on the sofa, his leg hanging suggestively over the armrest, was Jonathan. Taciturn and bored, he had the air of a man kept waiting in a doctor’s office for a routine physical he did not need. He was a younger version of Gabriel-Gabriel before Vienna perhaps. “He takes his killing seriously,” Shamron had said. “But he’s no gunslinger. He has a conscience, like you. When it’s over, and everyone’s safe, he’ll find a nice quiet toilet where he can throw up his guts.” Gabriel found this element of Jonathan’s character reassuring, as Shamron knew he would.

The session lasted one hour and fifteen minutes, though why Gabriel made a note of this fact he did not know. He had chosen to conduct that day’s run in Castello, the sestiere which lay just to the east of the Basilica San Marco and the Doge’s Palace. He had lived in Castello when he was serving his apprenticeship and knew the tangled streets well. Using a hotel pencil as a pointer, he plotted his route and choreographed the movements of the team.

To cover the sound of his instructions, he played a recording of German dances by Mozart. This seemed to darken Jonathan’s mood. Jonathan reviled all things German. Indeed, the only people he hated more than the Germans were the Swiss. During the war, his grandfather had tried to preserve his money and heirlooms by entrusting them to a Swiss banker. Fifty years later, Jonathan had tried to gain access to the account but was told by an officious clerk that the bank first required proof that Jonathan’s grandfather was indeed dead. Jonathan explained that his grandfather had been murdered at Treblinka-with gas manufactured by a Swiss chemical company, he had been tempted to say-and that the Nazis, while sticklers for paperwork, had not been thoughtful enough to provide a death certificate. Sorry, the clerk had said. No death certificate, no money.

When Gabriel finished his instructions, he opened a large stainless-steel suitcase and gave a secure cell phone and a nine-millimeter Beretta to each member of the team. When the guns were out of sight again, he walked upstairs, collected Anna from the bedroom, and brought her down to meet Team Giorgione for the first time. Shimon and Ilana stood and applauded quietly. Slipping into character, Yitzhak and Moshe commented on the cut of her fashionable leather boots. Deborah eyed her jealously. Only Jonathan seemed to have no interest in her, but Jonathan was to be forgiven, for by then he had eyes only for the assassin known as the Englishman.

TEN minutes later, Gabriel and Anna were walking along the Calle dell’Ascencione. The other members of the team had gone before them and taken up their positions-Jonathan to the San Marco vaporetto stop, Shimon and Ilana to look at shoes in the shop windows of the Calle Frezzeria, Yitzhak and Moshe to a table at Caffé Quadri in the Piazza San Marco. Deborah, the baby of the group, was given the unenviable assignment of feeding cracked corn to the pigeons in the shadow of the campanile tower. With admirable forbearance, she allowed the beasts to climb onto her shoulders and roost in her hair. She even found a handsome carabiniere to take her photograph with the disposable camera she’d purchased from a kiosk in the center of the square.

As Gabriel and Anna entered the piazza, a thin rain was falling, like mist from a room vaporizer. The forecast called for more heavy weather in the next two days, and there were fears of a severe acqua alta. Work crews were erecting a network of elevated duckboards, so that the tourist trade could continue when the lagoon tide turned San Marco into a shallow lake.

Anna wore a car-length quilted jacket, chunky enough to conceal the Kevlar vest beneath. Her hood was up, and she wore sunglasses in spite of the sunless afternoon sky. Gabriel was vaguely aware of Jonathan at his heels, a tourist guidebook open in his palms, his eyes flickering about the square. He glanced to his left and saw Shimon and Ilana strolling beneath the arcade. Hundreds of café tables receded into the distance like the ranks of an army on parade. The basilica floated before them, the great domes etched against the leaden sky.

Anna threaded her arm through Gabriel’s. It was a wholly spontaneous gesture, neither too intimate nor too detached. They might have been friends or professional colleagues; they might have just completed the act of love. No one would have been able to tell how she felt by the way she touched him. Only Gabriel could, and that was only because he could feel a slight tremor in her body and the powerful fingers of her left hand digging into the tendons of his arm.

They took a table at Caffé Florian beneath the shelter of the arcade. A quartet played Vivaldi rather poorly, which drove Anna to distraction. Shimon and Ilana had walked the length of the square and were pretending to gaze upon the lions in the Piazzetta dei Leoncini. Yitzhak and Moshe remained at their table on the opposite side of the piazza, while Deborah continued to be mauled by the pigeons. Jonathan sat down a few feet from Gabriel.

Anna ordered the coffees. Gabriel pulled out his telephone and checked in with each component of his team, beginning with Yitzhak and ending with a distraught Deborah. Then he pocketed the phone, caught Jonathan’s eye, and shook his head once.

They remained in place while Anna finished her coffee. Then Gabriel asked for the check, a signal to the rest of the team that the second act was about to begin. Jonathan did the same. Even though he was on Shamron’s expense account, his face revealed his disgust at the outrageous sum they were asking for a cappuccino and a bottle of mineral water.

Five minutes later, Team Giorgione was drifting in formation over the Ponte della Paglia into the sestiere of Castello-first Shimon and Ilana, then Yitzhak and Moshe, then Gabriel and Anna. Jonathan hovered a few feet from Gabriel’s back, though by now he had put away his tourist guide and had his fingers wrapped tightly around the butt of his Beretta.

AND forty yards behind them all was the Englishman. Two questions played in his thoughts. Why was the girl who had been feeding the pigeons in San Marco now walking five paces behind Gabriel Allon? And why was the man who had been seated near Allon at Caffé Florian walking five paces ahead of her?

The Englishman was well-versed in the art of countersurveillance. Anna Rolfe was under the protection of a skilled and professional service. But then that’s the way Allon would play it. The Englishman had studied at his feet; knew the way he thought. The Gabriel Allon that the Englishman met in Tel Aviv would never go out for a stroll without a purpose, and the purpose of this one was to expose the Englishman.

On the Riva degli Schiavoni, the Englishman bought a postcard from a tourist kiosk and watched Allon and Anna Rolfe disappear into the streets of Castello. Then he turned in the other direction and spent the next two hours walking slowly back to his hotel.

VENICE is a city where the usual rules of street surveillance and countersurveillance do not apply. It is a virtuoso piece requiring a virtuoso’s sure hand. There are no motorcars, no buses or streetcars. There are few places to establish a worthwhile fixed post. There are streets that lead to nowhere-into a canal or an enclosed courtyard with no means of escape. It is a city where the man being pursued holds all the advantages.

They were very good, Team Giorgione. They had been trained by the surveillance artists of the Office, and they had honed their skills on the streets of Europe and the Middle East. They communicated silently, drifting in and out of Gabriel’s orbit, appearing and reappearing from different directions. Only Jonathan remained constantly in the same position, five paces from Gabriel’s back, like a satellite in stationary orbit.

They moved north through a series of church squares, until finally they settled in a small café on the edge of the broad Campo Santa Maria della Formosa. Gabriel and Anna took a table, while Jonathan remained standing at the bar with a group of men. Through the windows, Gabriel caught momentary glimpses of the team: Shimon and Ilana buying gelato from a vendor at the center of the square. Yitzhak and Moshe admiring the plain exterior of the church of the Santa Maria Formosa. And Deborah, in a flash of her old spirit, playing football with a group of Italian schoolboys.

This time it was Jonathan who checked in with the team members by secure cell phone. When he was finished, he turned toward Gabriel and mouthed two words: She’s clean.

LATE that evening, when Team Giorgione had finished its debriefing and its members had decamped back to their hotel rooms, Gabriel lingered in the half-light of the sitting room, staring at the photographs of Christopher Keller. Upstairs, in the bedroom, Anna’s violin fell silent. Gabriel listened as she placed it back in its case and snapped the latches. A moment later, she descended the staircase. Gabriel gathered up the photographs and slipped them into a file folder. Anna sat down and lit a cigarette.

Gabriel said, “Are you going to try it?”

“ ‘The Devil’s Trill’?”

“Yes.”

“I haven’t decided yet.”

“What will you do if you think you can’t pull it off?”

“I’ll substitute a series of unaccompanied sonatas by Bach. They’re quite beautiful, but they’re not the ‘Trill.’ The critics will wonder why I chose not to play it. They’ll speculate that I returned too quickly. It will be great fun.”

“Whatever you decide to play, it’s going to be marvelous.”

Her gaze fell upon the manila folder on the coffee table.

“Why did you do that?”

“Do what?”

“Why did you hide the photographs of him when I came into the room? Why don’t you want me to see him?”

“You worry about ‘The Devil’s Trill,’ and I’ll worry about the man with the gun.”

“Tell me about him.”

“There are some things you don’t need to know.”

“He may very well try to kill me tomorrow night. I have a right to know something about him.”

Gabriel could not argue with this, and so he told her everything he knew.

“Is he really out there?”

“We have to assume he is.”

“Rather interesting, don’t you think?”

“What’s that?”

“He can change his voice and appearance at will and he vanished amid fire and blood in the desert of Iraq. He sounds like the Devil to me.”

“He is a devil.”

“So, I’ll play his sonata for him. Then you can send him back to Hell.”

38

LATE THE FOLLOWING afternoon, the Englishman drifted along Calle della Passion, the soaring Gothic campanile of the Frari church rising ahead of him. He sliced through a knot of tourists, adroitly shifting the position of his head to avoid their umbrellas, which bobbed like jellyfish adrift on the tide. In the square was a café. He ordered coffee and spread his guidebooks and maps over the little table. If anyone was watching, they would assume he was just another tourist, which was fine with the Englishman.

He had been working since early that morning. Shortly after breakfast, he had set out from his hotel in Santa Croce, maps and guidebooks in hand, and spent several hours wandering San Marco and San Polo, memorizing their streets and bridges and squares-the way he’d done before, in another lifetime, in West Belfast. He’d paid particular attention to the streets and canals around the Frari church and the Scuola Grande di San Rocco-had played a game with himself, wandering in circles in San Polo until, quite intentionally, he would find himself lost. Then he would navigate his way back to the Frari church, testing himself on the street names as he went. Inside the scuola, he spent a few minutes in the ground-floor hall, pretending to gaze upon the massive Tintorettos, but in reality he was more interested in the relationship of the main entrance to the staircase. Then he went upstairs and stood in the upper hall, locating the approximate position on the floor where he expected to find himself seated during the recital. Rossetti had been right; even from the back of the room, it would be no problem for a professional to kill the violinist with the Tanfolglio.

He looked at his watch: a few minutes after five o’clock. The recital was scheduled to begin at eight-thirty. He had one final piece of business to conduct before then. He paid his check and walked through the gathering darkness toward the Grand Canal. Along the way he stopped in a men’s shop and purchased a new jacket, a quilted black nylon coat with a corduroy collar. The style was quite fashionable in Venice that season; he had seen dozens of coats just like it during the day.

He crossed the Grand Canal by traghetto and made his way to Signore Rossetti’s store in San Marco. The little jeweler was standing behind his counter, preparing to close up shop for the night. Once again the Englishman followed him up the groaning staircase to his office.

“I need a boat.”

“That will be no problem. When would you like it?”

“Right away.”

The jeweler stroked the side of his cheek. “There’s a young man I know. His name is Angelo. He owns a water taxi. Very careful, very dependable.”

“He’s not the kind to ask uncomfortable questions?”

“Not at all. He’s performed jobs like this before.”

“Can you reach him on short notice?”

“I think so, yes. What sort of arrangement do you require?”

“I’d like him to be waiting on the Rio di San Polo, near the Museo Goldoni.”

“I see. That should not be a problem, though there will be an extra charge for night service. It’s customary in Venice. One moment, please. Let me see if I can reach him.”

Rossetti found the man’s name in his telephone book and dialed his number. After a brief conversation, the deal was done. Angelo would be at the Museo Goldoni in fifteen minutes and he would wait there.

“Perhaps it would be easier if you paid me,” Rossetti said. “I’ll look after the boy’s interests.”

Once again the transaction was carried out in dollars after Rossetti worked out the sum on his pad of scratch paper. The Englishman saw himself out and walked to a restaurant on the Calle della Verona, where he dined simply on vegetable soup and fettuccine with cream and mushrooms. It was not the happy din of the little restaurant that filled his ears during the meal, but the memory of the conversation he had heard on the tape he had taken from Emil Jacobi-the conversation between the Swiss professor and Gabriel Allon about the sins of a man named Augustus Rolfe. The father of the woman he had been hired to kill.

A few moments later, when ordering his espresso, he asked the waiter for a piece of paper. He wrote a few words on it, then slipped it into his pocket. After supper he walked to the Grand Canal and boarded a traghetto that would take him to the San Rocco.

THE explosion of lightning shattered the studied calm of the lobby of the Luna Hotel Baglioni. The lights dimmed, braced themselves, then flickered back to life. Signore Brunetti, the head concierge, clasped his hands and murmured a prayer of thanks.

Gabriel led Anna across the lobby to the dock. Jonathan walked a step ahead of them. Deborah was a step behind, the Guarneri in one hand, the Stradivarius in the other. Signore Brunetti lifted his hand in farewell and wished her the very best of luck. The rest of the staff broke into circumspect applause. Anna smiled and pulled her hood over her head.

Three water taxis waited at the dock, engines idling, dark varnished prows shimmering in the rain and lights. Jonathan went first, followed by Gabriel. Looking to his right, he saw Moshe and Yitzhak standing atop the footbridge at the entrance of the Grand Canal. Moshe was looking in the other direction, eyes fastened on the crowd at the San Marco vaporetto stop.

Gabriel turned and motioned for Anna to step outside. He handed her off to the driver of the second water taxi, then followed her into the cabin. Jonathan and Deborah climbed aboard the first taxi. Moshe and Yitzhak stayed on the bridge until the taxis passed beneath it. Then they descended the steps and boarded the final boat.

Gabriel glanced at his watch: seven-thirty.

THE Grand Canal curves lazily through the heart of Venice, like a child’s reversed S, in the bed of an ancient river. On Gabriel’s instruction, the taxis kept to the center, following its long, gentle sweep around the edge of San Marco.

Gabriel stayed inside the cabin with Anna, the curtains drawn, the lights doused. In the first taxi, Jonathan stood at the prow next to the driver, eyes on the move. In the third, Yitzhak and Moshe did the same thing. All three were thoroughly soaked ten minutes later when the taxis turned into the Rio della Frescada.

This was the portion of the journey that worried Gabriel the most. The narrow canal would force the taxis to slow dramatically, and there were four bridges between the Grand Canal and the San Rocco. It was the perfect spot for an assassination.

Gabriel pulled out his telephone and dialed Jonathan. Anna squeezed his hand.

ZACCARIA Cordoni was pacing the ground-floor hall of the Scuola Grande di San Rocco, dressed in a black suit and his trademark maroon silk scarf, an unlit cigarette between his fingers. Fiona Richardson, Anna’s manager, was at his side.

“Where is she?” Cordoni asked.

“She’s on her way.”

“You’re sure?”

“She called me before she left the hotel.”

“She’s not going to back out, is she, Fiona?”

“She’s coming.”

“Because if she backs out on me, I’ll see to it that she never performs in Italy again.”

“She’ll be here, Zaccaria.”

Just then Anna entered the room, surrounded by Gabriel’s team.

“Anna! Darling!” breathed Cordoni. “You look absolutely delicious this evening. Is there anything else we can do for you to make tonight a smashing success?”

“I’d like to see the upper hall before the audience arrives.”

Cordoni held out his hand gallantly.

“Right this way.”

ANNA had performed at the San Rocco twice before, but in keeping with her pre-performance ritual she slowly toured the venue to make certain everything was to her liking-the placement of the stage and the piano, the arrangement of the seats, the lighting. Gabriel did the same, but for a very different reason.

When the inspection was complete, Cordoni led her through a doorway behind the stage into a large gallery with dark wood floors and tapestries on the walls. Adjacent to that room was a small parlor that would serve as Anna’s dressing room. A security man from the scuola stood guard at the door. He wore a burgundy-colored blazer.

“I’ve printed two programs for this evening’s performance,” Cordoni said carefully. “One with ‘The Devil’s Trill’ and one without it. The doors will be opening in five minutes.”

Anna looked at Gabriel, then at Fiona Richardson. “I’m not sure an evening in Venice would be complete without Tartini. Hand out the program with ‘The Devil’s Trill.’ ”

“You’re sure, Anna?” asked Fiona.

“Positive.”

“As you wish,” said Zaccaria Cordoni.

WHEN Cordoni and Fiona Richardson were gone, Anna removed her coat and opened the case containing the Guarneri. When Gabriel sat down, Anna looked at him, hands on her hips.

“What do you think you’re doing?”

“I’m going to stay here with you.”

“No, you’re not. I need to be alone before a performance. I can’t have you here distracting me.”

“I’m afraid you’re going to have to make an exception tonight.”

“Tell me something, Gabriel. If you were restoring one of those Tintorettos out there, would you like me standing over your shoulder watching?”

“I see your point.”

“Good-now get out of here.”

ANNA had been given a gift: the ability to block out all distraction; the strength to create an impenetrable bubble of silence around herself, to enclose herself in a cocoon. She had discovered this gift the morning of her mother’s suicide. A simple scale-G Minor played over two octaves, the ascent, the descent-was enough to send her through a mystical porthole to another time and place. Unfortunately, her ability to create this perfectly ordered place of silence did not extend beyond the violin, and God knows almost everything else in her life had been chaos.

She had known musicians who had come to loathe their instruments. Anna had never done that. Her violin was the anchor which prevented her from drifting into the rocks-a lifeline which pulled her to safety each time she was in danger of drowning. When she was holding her violin, only good things happened. It was when she let go that things spun out of control.

It did not come automatically, this mystical bubble. It had to be summoned. She hung her coat over the back of a baroque chair and crushed out her cigarette. She removed her wristwatch and dropped it into her handbag. She had no need for time now-she would create her own moment in time, a moment that would exist only once and would never be duplicated.

She had decided to use the Guarneri tonight. It seemed only fitting, since the instrument had probably been assembled two hundred years earlier in a workshop not far from where she was sitting now. She opened the case and ran her forefinger down the length of the instrument: the head, the fingerboard, the bridge, the body. She was a lady, this Guarneri of Anna’s. Dignified and graceful, no flaws or failings, no scars.

She removed the violin from its case and placed it against her neck, so that the button pressed against the familiar spot a few inches above the base of her shoulder. Her dress was strapless; she didn’t like anything between her body and her instrument. At first the violin felt cool against her skin, but soon the heat of her body suffused its wood. She placed the bow on the G string and pulled. The violin responded with a thick, resonant tone. Her tone. Anna Rolfe’s tone. The door to her mystical place was now open.

She permitted herself to look once at her hand. The scars were so ugly. She wished there was something she could do to hide them. Then she pushed the thought from her mind. Her hand did not play the violin; it was her head that played. Her fingers would obey her brain.

She switched off the lights and closed her eyes, then laid the bow across the strings and pulled slowly, coaxing sound from the violin. She executed no scales, performed no exercises, played no portion of the compositions she would perform that evening. There was nothing she could do now to prepare further. The pieces were so imbedded in her cells that she would play them not from memory but from instinct. Now she simply drew sound from the violin and allowed the sound to flow through her body. It’s just you and me, fiddle, she thought. Just you and me.

She could hear the murmur of a conversation beyond her closed door. She threw a switch in her mind, and it was gone. Through the walls seeped the low din of the upper hall beginning to fill with members of the audience. She threw the switch, and it too was gone.

It’s just you and me, fiddle. Just you and me…

She thought of the man in Gabriel’s photographs, the assassin known as the Englishman. It had been a long time since she had been able to put her trust in a man. She supposed her father’s betrayal-the lies he had told her about the reasons for her mother’s suicide-had spoiled her for all men. But tonight she would place her life in the hands of Gabriel Allon. Her father had set in motion a plan to try to atone for terrible sins he had committed. He was murdered before he was able to finish what he started. Gabriel would have to finish it for him. And Anna would help him the only way she knew how-by playing her violin. Beautifully.

The bubble began to close around her, to enfold her. There was no assassin, no photograph of her father with Adolf Hitler, no Gabriel Allon. Just her and the violin.

There was a faint tapping at the door. Instantly, Anna’s bow stopped.

“Five minutes, Miss Rolfe.”

“Thank you.”

The bow slid along the string once more. The sound flowed through her body. The violin turned to fire against her skin. The bubble closed around her. She was lost. Soon the door was open and she was floating toward the upper hall. As she entered the room she assumed there was applause-she knew this only from experience, not from any information she was receiving from her senses. She could not see the audience, nor could she hear it.

She dipped her head and waited an instant before lifting the violin above her shoulder and pressing it to her neck. Then she laid the bow on the strings, hesitated, and began to play.

GABRIEL established his watch post beneath Tintoretto’s Temptation of Christ. Slowly, his eyes swept the room. Person by person, face by face, he searched the chamber for the man in the photograph. If the assassin was there, Gabriel did not see him.

He checked the disposition of his team. Yitzhak stood directly across the hall from Gabriel. A few feet away, at the top of the staircase, stood Moshe. Shimon and Ilana roamed the back of the hall, and a few feet to Gabriel’s right was Jonathan, arms folded, chin on his chest, his dark gaze up.

For a moment he allowed himself to look at Anna. She performed “The Devil’s Trill” unaccompanied, as Tartini had intended. The first movement was spellbinding-the floating and distant snatches of simple melody, the hints of Baroque ornamentation; the repeated intrusion of the unsettling double-stop of E-flat and G. The Devil’s chord.

Anna played with her eyes closed, her body swaying slightly, as if she were physically drawing sound from her instrument. She was no more than ten feet away from him, but for now Gabriel knew she was lost to him. She belonged to the music now, and whatever bond that had existed between them was broken.

He watched her now as an admirer-and vaguely, he thought, as a restorer. He had helped her to discover the truth about her father and to come to terms with her family’s past. The damage was still there, he thought, but it was concealed, invisible to the naked eye, like in a perfect restoration.

She executed the treacherous chromatic descent at the end of the first movement. Pausing for a moment, she began the second movement. Mischievous and faster-paced, it was full of demanding string crossings that required her hand to move repeatedly from the first position to the fifth and from the E string to the G. Eighteen minutes later, when the third movement dissolved into a final arpeggiated G-minor chord, the audience exploded into applause.

Anna lowered the violin and drew several deep breaths. Only then did she open her eyes. She acknowledged the applause with a slight bow. If she ever looked at Gabriel, he did not know it, because by then he had turned his back to her and was scanning the room, looking for a man with a gun.

39

A STEADY RAIN was falling on the Campo San Rocco. The miserable weather did nothing to dampen the spirits of the large crowd that lingered there after the recital, hoping for one last glimpse of Anna Rolfe. The atmosphere was electrically charged. After performing “The Devil’s Trill,” Anna had been joined onstage by her longtime accompanist, Nadine Rosenberg, for Brahms’s Sonata No. 1 for Violin and Piano in D Minor and Pablo Sarasate’s Zigeunerweisen. The evening’s final piece, Paganini’s demonic solo Caprice No. 24, had brought the audience to its feet.

Anna Rolfe was unaware of the crowd outside. At that moment she was standing in the gallery behind the stage with Zaccaria Cordoni and Fiona Richardson. Fiona was conducting an animated conversation in German on her mobile telephone. Anna was smoking a much-deserved Gitane, trying to come down off the high of the performance. She was still holding the violin. The old Guarneri had been good to her tonight. She wanted it near her a little longer.

Gabriel was standing a few feet away, watching her carefully. Anna caught his eye briefly and smiled. She mouthed the words thank you and discreetly blew him a kiss. Fiona ended her conversation and slipped the telephone into her pocketbook.

“Word travels fast, my dear. You’re going to have a busy winter. Paris, Brussels, Stockholm, and Berlin. And that’s just the first week.”

“I’m not sure I’m really ready to get back on the merry-go-round again, Fiona.”

Zaccaria Cordoni laid a hand on her shoulder. “If I may be presumptuous, you are definitely ready. Your performance tonight was inspired. You played like a woman possessed.”

“Maybe I am possessed,” she said mischievously.

Fiona smiled and glanced toward Gabriel. “You want to tell us about your mysterious Frenchman-the handsome Monsieur Dumont?”

“Actually, what I’d like to do is spend a few minutes alone.”

She walked across the room and took Gabriel’s hand. Fiona and Cordoni watched them walk down the corridor to the dressing room. Fiona frowned.

“Whoever Monsieur Dumont is, I hope he doesn’t break her heart like the others. She’s like fine crystal: beautiful but easily broken. And if that bastard breaks her, I’ll kill him.”

ANNA closed the door of her dressing room and collapsed into Gabriel’s arms.

“You were amazing tonight.”

“I couldn’t have done it without you.”

“I just watched over you to make sure nothing happened. You’re the one who made magic.”

“I wish we could celebrate.”

“You’re getting on a plane out of here. And I have a job to do.”

“Was he here tonight?”

“The assassin?”

She nodded, her head pressed against his chest.

“I don’t know, Anna.”

She sat down, suddenly exhausted. On the coffee table in front of her was the case for the Guarneri. She undid the latches and lifted the lid. Inside was a single sheet of paper, folded in half, with Anna written on it.

She looked up at Gabriel. “Did you leave this for me?”

“Leave what?”

“This note in my violin case. It wasn’t here when I left the room to go onstage.”

She reached into the case and picked it up. When she did, an object slipped out. It was a narrow length of leather, and hanging from the end of it was a piece of red coral, shaped like a hand.

GABRIEL reached into the case and removed the pendant, his heart pounding against his ribs. “What does the note say?”

“ ‘You need this more than I do. Tell Gabriel he owes me one. With compliments.’ ”

Drawing his Beretta, he opened the door to the dressing room and looked out. Zaccaria Cordoni spotted him and hurried down the corridor to see what was the matter. Gabriel slipped the Beretta back into his pocket.

“Where’s the man who was outside this door before the recital?”

“What man?”

“The security guard in the burgundy-colored jacket. Where is he now?”

“I have no idea. Why?”

“Because someone came into this room while Anna was onstage.”

“Was any harm done?”

“He left a note.” Gabriel held up the coral charm. “And this.”

“May I see that?”

Gabriel handed the necklace to Cordoni, who turned it over in his hand and smiled.

“You know what that is?”

“Yes, I think I do. It’s harmless.”

“What is it?”

“A long time ago, we Cordonis used to be Corsicans. My great-grandfather came to Italy and started the Venetian branch of the family, but I still have distant relatives living in a valley on the southern end of the island.”

“What does that have to do with the pendant?”

“It’s a talisman, a Corsican good-luck charm. Corsican men wear them. They believe it wards off the evil eye-the occhju, as Corsicans refer to it.” Cordoni handed it back to Gabriel. “Like I said, it’s harmless. Someone was just giving Miss Rolfe a gift.”

“I wish it was that simple.” Gabriel slipped the talisman into his pocket next to the Beretta, then looked at Cordoni. “Where’s the man who was standing outside this door?”

THE Englishman spotted the water taxi bobbing in the Rio di San Polo beneath the shelter of a footbridge. Rossetti’s man sat behind the wheel wearing a hooded anorak. The Englishman boarded the taxi and ducked into the cabin.

Rossetti’s man opened the throttle. The boat grumbled and shuddered, then got under way. A moment later, they were cruising along the Grand Canal at speed. The Englishman rubbed a clear spot in the condensation and looked out at the passing scenery for a few moments. Then he drew the curtains.

He pulled off the black quilted jacket, then removed the burgundy blazer and rolled it into a ball. Ten minutes later, he opened the cabin window and cast the blazer upon the black water of the lagoon.

He stretched out on the bench seat, thinking of the story he would concoct for Anton Orsati. He reached up to his throat for his talisman. He felt naked without it. In the morning, when he was back on Corsica, he would visit the old signadora and she would give him a new one.

40

GERHARDT PETERSON’S OFFICE was in darkness except for the small halogen lamp that cast a disk of light over his desk. He had stayed late because he had been expecting a telephone call. He was not sure who would place the call-perhaps the Venice municipal police; perhaps the carabiniere -but he had been quite certain it would come. Sorry to bother you so late, Herr Peterson, but I’m afraid there’s been a terrible tragedy in Venice tonight concerning the violinist Anna Rolfe…

Peterson looked up from his files. Across the room, a television flickered silently. The late national newscast was nearly over. The important stories from Bern and Zurich had been covered, and the program had deteriorated into the mindless features and lighter fare that Peterson usually ignored. Tonight, though, he turned up the volume. As expected, there was a story about Anna Rolfe’s triumphant return to the stage that evening in Venice.

When it was over, Peterson switched off the television and locked his files away in his personal safe. Perhaps Anton Orsati’s assassin had been unable to carry out his assignment because Anna Rolfe was too heavily protected. Perhaps he’d gotten cold feet. Or perhaps they were dead and the bodies simply hadn’t been discovered yet. His instincts told him that this was not the case; that something had gone wrong in Venice. In the morning, he would contact Orsati through the usual channels and find out what had happened.

He slipped some papers into his briefcase, extinguished the desk lamp, and went out. Peterson’s seniority permitted him to park his Mercedes in the cobblestone courtyard instead of the distant staff lot adjacent to the rail yard. He had instructed the security staff to keep a special watch on his car. He had not told them why.

He drove south along the Sihl River. The streets were nearly deserted: here a lone taxi; here a trio of guest workers waiting for a streetcar to take them back to their crowded flats in Aussersihl or the Industrie-Quartier. It was the responsibility of Peterson’s staff to make certain they didn’t make trouble there. No plots against the despot back home. No protests against the Swiss government. Just do your job, collect your check, and keep your mouth shut. Peterson considered the guest workers a necessary evil. The economy couldn’t survive without them, but it sometimes seemed the Swiss were outnumbered in Zurich by the damned Portuguese and Pakistanis.

He glanced again into his rearview mirror. It seemed he was not being tailed, though he could not be certain. He knew how to follow a man, but his training in the detection and evasion of surveillance had been rudimentary.

He drove through the streets of Wiedikon for twenty minutes, then over to the Zürichsee to the garage of his apartment house. After passing through the metal security gate, he waited just on the other side to make certain no one came after him on foot. Down the twisting passage he drove to his reserved parking space. His flat number, 6C, was stenciled onto the wall. He pulled into the space and shut down the lights, then the motor. And there he sat for a long moment, hands choking the wheel, heart beating a little too quickly for a man of his age. A very large drink was in order.

He walked slowly across the garage, suddenly bone-weary. He passed through a doorway and entered the vestibule where a lift would carry him up to his flat. Standing before the closed stainless-steel doors, head craning to watch the progress of the glowing floor numbers, was a woman.

She pressed the call button several times and cursed loudly. Then, taking note of Peterson’s presence, she turned and smiled apologetically. “I’m sorry, but I’ve been waiting for the damned lift for five minutes. I think there must be something wrong with the fucking thing.”

Perfect Züridütsch, thought Peterson. She was no foreigner. Peterson quickly assessed her with his practiced eye. She was dark-haired and pale-skinned, a combination that he had always found terribly attractive. She wore a pair of blue jeans that accentuated her long legs. Beneath her leather jacket was a black blouse, unbuttoned just enough to reveal the lace of her brassiere. Attractive, fine-boned, but not the kind of beauty that would turn heads on the Bahnhofstrasse. Young but not inappropriately so. Early thirties. Thirty-five at the outside.

She seemed to sense Peterson’s careful appraisal, because she held his gaze with a pair of mischievous gray eyes. It had been six months since his last affair, and it was time for another. His last mistress had been the wife of a distant colleague, a man from the fraud division. Peterson had managed it well. It had been rewarding and pleasant for a time, and when it was time for it to end, it dissolved without rancor or remorse.

He managed a smile in spite of his fatigue. “I’m sure it’ll be along in a moment.”

“I don’t think so. I think we’re going to be trapped here all night.”

The suggestiveness of her remark could not be missed. Peterson decided to play along to see how far it would go. “Do you live in this building?”

“Boyfriend.”

“Surely your boyfriend will send help eventually, don’t you think?”

“He’s in Geneva tonight. I’m just staying at his flat.”

He wondered who her boyfriend was and which flat she was staying in. He allowed himself to picture a brief and all-too-hurried sexual encounter. Then his fatigue crept up on him and chased away all thoughts of conquest. This time it was Peterson who pressed the call button and Peterson who muttered a curse.

“It’s never going to come.” She pulled a pack of cigarettes from her coat pocket. Removing one, she placed it between her lips and flicked her lighter. When no flame appeared, she flicked it several more times, then said, “Shit. I guess this isn’t my night.”

“Here, let me.” Peterson’s lighter expelled a tongue of blue and yellow flame. He held it in place and allowed the woman to take it as she saw fit. As she inserted the end of her cigarette into the fire, her fingers lightly caressed the back of his hand. It was a deliberately intimate gesture, one that sent a charge of current up the length of his arm.

So powerful was the effect of her touch that Peterson failed to notice that she had raised her cigarette lighter very close to his face. Then she squeezed the hammer, and a cloud of sweet-smelling chemical filled his lungs. His head snapped back and he stared at the woman, eyes wide, barely comprehending. She tossed her cigarette to the floor and pulled a gun from her handbag.

The gun wasn’t necessary, because the chemical had its intended effect. Peterson’s legs turned to water, the room started to spin, and he could feel the floor rushing up to embrace him. He feared he was going to strike his head, but before his legs buckled completely, a man appeared in the vestibule and Peterson folded into his arms.

Peterson had a glimpse of his savior’s face as he was dragged from the vestibule and hurled into the back of a paneled van. It was rabbinical and studious and strangely gentle. Peterson tried to thank him, but when he opened his mouth to speak he blacked out.

41

GERHARDT PETERSON FELT as though he were rising from the depths of an Alpine lake. Upward he came, through layers of consciousness, pockets of warm water and cold, until his face broke the surface and he filled his lungs with air.

He found himself not in the Alpine lake of his dreams but in a cold cellar with a terra-cotta floor and rough whitewashed stucco walls. Above his head was a small window, set in an alcove at ground level, and through it streamed a weak sienna light. For a moment he struggled to orient himself in time and space. Then he remembered the dark-haired woman at the elevator; the ruse with the cigarette; her hand touching his as she sprayed a sedative into his face. He felt suddenly embarrassed. How could he have been so weak? So vulnerable? What signals had he given off that made them come after him with a woman?

The throbbing pain in Peterson’s head was uncharted territory, something between trauma and a torrential hangover. His mouth seemed filled with sand, and he was violently thirsty. He was stripped to his briefs, bound by packing tape at the ankles and wrists, his bare back propped against the wall. The fragile appearance of his own body shocked him. His pale hairless legs stretched before him, toes pointed inward, like the legs of a dying man. A layer of flab hung over the waistband of his briefs. He was painfully cold.

They had permitted him to retain his watch, but the crystal was smashed and it no longer kept time. He studied the light leaking through his window and decided it was the light of sunset. He worked out the time, though even this simple problem caused his head to pound. They had taken him shortly before midnight. He guessed it was now five or six in the afternoon of the following day. Eighteen hours. Had he been unconscious for eighteen hours? That would explain his thirst and the unbearable stiffness in his back and joints.

He wondered where they had taken him. The quality of light and air was no longer Swiss. For a moment he feared they had spirited him to Israel. No, he’d be in a proper cell in Israel, not a cellar. He was still close to Switzerland. France, maybe. Perhaps Italy. The Jews liked the south of Europe. They blended in well.

There was another scent that took him a few moments to place: incense and sandalwood, a woman’s fragrance. And then he remembered: outside the elevator in Zurich; the hand of the woman who had sedated him. But why was her scent on him? He looked down at the skin covering his rib cage and saw four red lines: scratches. His underwear was stained, and there was a cracking stickiness at his crotch. What had they done to him? Eighteen hours, powerful drugs…

Peterson fell sideways and his cheek struck the cold terra-cotta floor. He retched. Nothing came up, but his nausea was intense. He was sickened by his own weakness. He felt suddenly like a rich man who gets into trouble in a poor neighborhood. All his money, all his culture and superiority-his Swissness -meant nothing now. He was beyond the protective walls of his Alpine Redoubt. He was in the hands of people who played the game by very different rules.

He heard footsteps on the staircase. A man entered, small and dark, with a quickness that suggested hidden strength. He seemed annoyed that Peterson had regained consciousness. In his hand was a silver pail. He lifted it with both hands and showered Peterson with ice-cold water.

The pain was intense, and Peterson screamed in spite of himself. The little man knelt beside him and rammed a hypodermic needle into Peterson’s thigh, so deep it seemed to strike bone, and once more Peterson slid benevolently below the surface of his lake.

WHEN Gerhardt Peterson was a boy, he had heard a story about some Jews who had come to his family’s village during the war. Now, in his drug-induced coma, he dreamed of the Jews again. According to the story, a family of Jews, two adults and three children, had crossed into Switzerland from unoccupied France. A farmer took pity on them and gave them shelter in a tiny outbuilding on his property. An officer from the cantonal police learned there were Jews hiding in the village but agreed to keep their presence a secret. But someone in the village contacted the federal police, who descended on the farm the next day and took the Jews into custody. It was the policy of the government to expel illegal immigrants back into the country from which they had made their unlawful border crossing. These Jews had crossed into Switzerland from the unoccupied south of France, but they were taken to the border of occupied France and driven into the waiting arms of a German patrol. The Jews were arrested, placed on a train to Auschwitz, and gassed.

At first, Gerhardt Peterson had refused to believe the story. In school he had been taught that Switzerland, a neutral country during the war, had opened its borders to refugees and to wounded soldiers-that it been Europe ’s Sister of Mercy, a motherly bosom in the heart of a continent in turmoil. He went to his father and asked him whether the story about the Jews was true. At first his father refused to discuss it. But when young Gerhardt persisted, his father relented. Yes, he said, the story was true.

“Why does no one talk about it?”

“Why should we talk about it? It’s in the past. Nothing can be done to change it.”

“But they were killed. They died because of someone in this village.”

“They were here illegally. They came without permission. And besides, Gerhardt, we didn’t kill them. It was the Nazis who murdered them. Not us!”

“But Papa-”

“Enough, Gerhardt! You asked me if it was true, and I gave you an answer. You are never to discuss it again.”

“Why, Papa?”

His father did not answer him. But even then Gerhardt Peterson knew the answer. He was not to discuss the matter further because in Switzerland, one doesn’t discuss unpleasant matters from the past.

PETERSON awoke to another pail of icy water. He opened his eyes and was immediately blinded by a searing white light. Squinting, he saw two figures standing over him, the little troll-like man with the bucket, and the kinder-looking soul who had carried him to the van in Zurich after he had been drugged by the woman.

“Wake up!”

The troll threw more freezing water onto Peterson. His neck jerked violently, and he cracked his head against the wall. He lay on the floor, drenched, shivering.

The troll tromped up the stairs. The meeker one squatted on his haunches and looked at him sadly. Peterson, slipping back into unconsciousness, confused reality with his dreams. To Peterson the little man was the Jew from his village whose family had been expelled to France.

“I’m sorry,” groaned Peterson, his jaw trembling with cold.

“Yes, I know,” said the man. “I know you’re sorry.”

Peterson began to cough, a retching cough that filled his mouth with phlegm and fluid.

“You’re going to see the big man now, Gerhardt. This will only hurt a little, but it will clear your head.” Another injection; this time in the arm, delivered with clinical precision. “You mustn’t have a foggy head when you talk to the big man, Gerhardt. Are you feeling better? Are the cobwebs beginning to clear?”

“Yes, I think so.”

“That’s good. You mustn’t have cobwebs in your head when you talk to the big man. He wants to know everything that you know. He needs you sharp as a tack.”

“I’m thirsty.”

“I don’t doubt it. You’ve been a very busy boy the past few days. A very naughty boy too. I’m sure the big man will give you something to drink if you cooperate with him. If you don’t”-he shrugged his shoulder and stuck out his lower lip-“then it’s back down here, and this time my friend will use more than a little bit of water.”

“I’m cold.”

“I can imagine.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Yes, I know you’re sorry. If you apologize to the big man and tell him everything you know, then he’ll get you something to drink and some warm clothes.”

“I want to talk to him.”

“Who do you want to talk to?”

“I want to talk to the big man.”

“Should we go upstairs and find him?”

“I’m sorry. I want to talk to the big man.”

“Let’s go, Gerhardt. Come, take my hand. Let me help you.”

42

GABRIEL WORE NEATLY PRESSED khaki trousers and a soft beige sweater that fit him smartly through the waist and shoulders. Everything about his appearance said comfort and satisfaction, the precise image he wished to convey. Eli Lavon shepherded Peterson into the room and pushed him into a hard, straight-backed chair. Peterson sat like a man before a firing squad, his gaze fixed on the wall.

Lavon showed himself out. Gabriel remained seated, eyes down. He was never one to celebrate victories. He knew better than most that in the business of intelligence, victories are often transitory. Occasionally, with time, they didn’t seem like victories at all. Still, he took a moment to relish the fine circular quality of the affair. Not long ago, Gabriel had been the one in custody and Peterson had been asking the questions-Peterson of the fitted gray suit and polished Swiss arrogance. Now he sat before Gabriel shivering in his underwear.

A white Formica table separated them, bare except for a manila file folder and Gabriel’s mug of steaming coffee. Like Peterson’s cell in the basement, the room had terra-cotta floors and stucco walls. The blinds were drawn. Windblown rain beat a meddlesome rhythm against the glass. Gabriel regarded Peterson with an expression of distaste and fell into a speculative silence.

“You won’t get away with this.”

It was Peterson who broke the silence. He had spoken in English but Gabriel immediately switched to German; the carefully pronounced and grammatically correct High German of his mother. He wished to point out the laxity of Peterson’s Schwyzerdütch. To emphasize Peterson’s Swissness. To isolate him.

“Get away with what, Gerhardt?”

“Kidnapping me, you fucking bastard!”

“But we already did get away with it.”

“There were security cameras in the garage of my apartment house. That trick with your whore was recorded on videotape. The Zurich police probably have it already.”

Gabriel smiled calmly. “We took care of the security cameras, just like you took care of the security cameras at Rolfe’s villa the night you murdered him and stole his paintings.”

“What are you ranting about?”

“The paintings in Rolfe’s secret collection. The paintings he received during the war for services rendered to the SS. The paintings he wanted to return.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I don’t know anything about a secret collection, and I certainly had nothing to do with the murder of Augustus Rolfe! No one would ever believe I had anything to do with his death.”

“You killed Augustus Rolfe. Then you killed Werner Müller in Paris. Then Emil Jacobi in Lyons. You tried to kill me in Zurich. You sent a man to kill Anna Rolfe in Venice. That makes me angry, Gerhardt.”

“You’re deranged!”

Gabriel could see that Peterson’s manufactured defiance was slowly beginning to weaken.

“You’ve been away from work for a long time. Your superiors would like to talk to you too. They can’t find you either. Needless to say, your wife would like to know where the hell you are too. She’s worried sick.”

“My God, what have you done? What on earth have you done?”

Peterson seemed incapable of sitting still now. He was rocking in his chair and shivering. Gabriel sipped his coffee and pulled a face as though it were too hot. Then he lifted the cover on the manila file and began removing photographs. He took them out one at a time and had a brief look for himself before sliding them across the tabletop so Peterson could see.

“She takes a nice picture, don’t you think, Gerhardt? My, my, you seem to be enjoying yourself there. And look at this one. I’d hate to have to explain that one to Mrs. Peterson. And the press. And your minister in Bern.”

“You’re nothing but a blackmailer! No one will believe those photographs are real. They’ll see them for what they are: a cheap smear by a cheap blackmailer. But then blackmail and murder are the currency of your service, aren’t they? It’s what you’re good at.”

Gabriel left the photographs on the table in plain sight. Peterson made a valiant effort not to look at them.

“So that’s the story you tell your wife and your superiors? That you’re an innocent victim of blackmail? That you were kidnapped by Israeli intelligence and drugged? Do you know what your superiors will ask you? They’ll say: ‘Why would Israeli intelligence single you out for such treatment, Gerhardt? What have you done that would make them act like this?’ And you’ll have to come up with an answer.”

“That won’t be a problem.”

“Are you certain about that? It may not be so easy, given the fact that some of the most reputable news organizations in the world will be uncovering interesting bits and pieces of the story on a daily basis. It will be like water torture, pardon the comparison. You may survive it, but your career will be ruined. Your dreams of becoming chief of the Federal Police will remain just that: a dream. Politics will be closed off to you. Business as well. Do you think your friends in the banks will come to your assistance? No, I doubt it, since you’ll have nothing to offer them. Imagine, no job, no pension, no financial support from your friends.”

Gabriel paused in order to lift the cover on the file folder and remove a half-dozen more photographs: surveillance shots of Peterson’s wife and children. Deliberately he placed them next to the pictures of Peterson and the girl.

“Who will take care of your wife? Who will take care of your children? Who will pay the rent on that nice flat of yours on the Zürichsee? Who will make the payments on that big Mercedes? It’s not a very pleasant picture, but it doesn’t have to be that way. I don’t like murderers, Gerhardt, especially when they kill for a bank, but I’m offering you a way out. I suggest that you take it before it’s too late.”

“What do you want from me?”

“You’re going to work for me now.”

“That’s impossible!”

“You’re going to help me get Rolfe’s paintings back.” Gabriel hesitated, waiting for Peterson to deny knowledge of any paintings, but this time he said nothing. “We’ll handle it quietly, the Swiss way. Then you’re going to help me get back other things. You’re going to help me clean up the mess of Swiss history. Together, Gerhardt, we can move mountains.”

“And if I refuse?”

“You can go back downstairs with my friend and think about it for a while. Then we’ll talk again.”

“Take those damned pictures away!”

“Give me an answer and I’ll take them away.”

“What you don’t understand is that either way I’ll be destroyed. It’s just a question of which poison I choose to drink.” Peterson’s chin fell to his chest, his eyes closed. “I’m thirsty.”

“Answer my questions, and I’ll get you something to drink.”

IN the corridor outside the room, Eli Lavon sat on the cold floor, his back to the wall, his eyes closed. Only his right hand betrayed his emotions. It was squeezing his cigarette lighter. Though he lived in Vienna, the sound of German shouted in anger still made the back of his neck burn.

The fissures had appeared, but Peterson had not yet cracked. Lavon could tell he was close. The drugs, the water, the pictures with the girl. The fear of what waited around the next bend in the road. It was building in him. Eli Lavon hoped it happened soon.

He had never seen Gabriel like this. Never seen him angry. Never heard him raise his voice. Something about the affair had torn open all the old wounds. Leah. Tariq. Shamron. Even his parents. Gabriel was a man on a very short fuse.

Let it go, Herr Peterson, thought Lavon. Tell him everything he wants to know. Do exactly what he says. Because if you don’t, I fear my good friend Gabriel is going to take you into the mountains and start shooting. And that’s not going to be good for anybody. Not you. And especially not Gabriel. Lavon didn’t care about Peterson. It was Gabriel he loved. He didn’t want more blood on the hands of Gabriel Allon.

So no one was more relieved than Lavon when the shouting finally stopped. Then came the thumping-Gabriel pounding on the wall with one of his wounded hands. Still seated on the floor, Lavon reached up and opened the door a few inches. Gabriel spoke to him in Hebrew. The language had never sounded so sweet to Lavon, though he was quite sure it had the opposite effect on Gerhardt Peterson. “Bring him some clothes, Eli. And some food. Herr Peterson is cold and hungry. Herr Peterson would like to tell us a few things.”

THE blue track suit was a fashion tragedy, intentionally so. The top was too large, the legs of the trousers too short. Gerhardt Peterson looked like a man in the clutches of a midlife crisis who digs out a pair of ancient togs for a life-threatening jog in the park. The food was not much better: a lump of coarse bread, a bowl of clear soup. Oded brought a pitcher of ice water. He made a point of spilling a few drops on Peterson’s hand, a reminder of what lay ahead if Peterson didn’t start talking. Gabriel ate nothing. He had no intention of sharing a meal with Gerhardt Peterson. The Swiss ate steadily but slowly, as though he wished to postpone the inevitable. Gabriel let him take his time. Peterson finished the soup and polished the bowl with the heel of his bread.

“Where are we, by the way?”

“ Tibet.”

“This is my first trip to Tibet.” Peterson managed a wounded smile. When Gabriel refused to play along, the smile quickly faded. “I’d like a cigarette.”

“You can’t have one.”

“Why not?”

“I don’t like smoke.”

Peterson pushed away his empty soup bowl.

HAD Gabriel Allon not become an assassin, he would have made a perfect interrogator. He was a natural listener: a man who spoke only when necessary; who had no need to hear the sound of his own voice. Like a deerstalker, he was also graced with an unnatural stillness. He never touched his hair or his face, never gestured with his hands or shifted in his chair. It was this very stillness, coupled with his silence and immutable patience, which made him such a frightening opponent over a bare table. Though even Gabriel was surprised at Gerhardt Peterson’s sudden willingness to talk.

“How did I know about Rolfe’s collection?” Peterson asked, repeating Gabriel’s first question. “There is precious little that takes place in Zurich that I don’t know about. Zurich is the largest city in Switzerland, but it is still a small place. We have our hooks in deep: banking, business, the foreign workers, the media.”

Gabriel didn’t want Peterson to build confidence by rambling on about his professional achievements, so he quickly cut him off. “That’s all very interesting, but how did you find out about Rolfe?”

“Rolfe was a sick old man-everybody on the Bahnhofstrasse and the Paradeplatz knew that. Everyone knew he didn’t have long to live. Then the rumors start to fly. Rolfe is losing his mind. Rolfe wants to set things right before he meets the big banker in the sky. Rolfe wants to talk. Augustus Rolfe was a banker in Zurich for a very long time. When a man like him wants to talk, it can only come to no good.”

“So you put him under surveillance.”

Peterson nodded.

“Since when is it a crime in Switzerland to talk?”

“It’s not a crime, but it’s definitely frowned upon-especially if it exposes less-than-flattering elements of our past to the rest of the world. We Swiss don’t like to discuss unpleasant family matters in front of foreigners.”

“Did your superiors know you’d placed Rolfe under watch? Did your minister in Bern?”

“The Rolfe affair really wasn’t an official matter.”

And then Gabriel remembered Rolfe’s letter: There are people in Switzerland who want the past to remain exactly where it is-entombed in the bank vaults of the Bahnhofstrasse-and they will stop at nothing to achieve that end.

“If it wasn’t an official matter, then on whose behalf were you following Rolfe?”

Peterson hesitated for a moment; Gabriel feared he might stop talking. Then he said: “They call themselves the Council of Rütli.”

“Tell me about them.”

“Get me more of that vile soup, and I’ll tell you anything you want to know.”

Gabriel decided to allow him this one victory. He raised his hand and beat his palm on the wall three times. Oded poked his head in the door as if he smelled smoke. Gabriel murmured a few words to him in Hebrew. Oded reacted by pulling his lips into a remorseful frown.

“And bread,” said Peterson as Oded was leaving. “I’d like some more of that bread with my soup.”

Oded looked to Gabriel for instruction.

“Bring him some fucking bread.”

THIS time they took no break for food, so Peterson was forced to deliver his lecture on the Council of Rütli with a spoon in one hand and a lump of bread in the other. He spoke for ten minutes without interruption, pausing only to slurp his soup or tear off another mouthful of bread. The history of the Council, its goals and objectives, the power of its membership-all of these topics he covered in substantial detail. When he had finished, Gabriel asked: “Are you a member?”

This question seemed to amuse him. “Me? A schoolteacher’s son from Bernese Oberland”-he touched his bread to his breast for emphasis-“a member of the Council of Rütli? No, I’m not a member of the Council, I’m just one of their faithful servants. That’s what all of us are in Switzerland -servants. Servants to the foreigners who come here to deposit their money in our banks. Servants to the ruling oligarchy. Servants. ”

“What service do you provide?”

“Security and intelligence.”

“And what do you receive in return?”

“Money and career support.”

“So you told the Council about the things you’d heard about Rolfe?”

“That’s right. And the Council told me the kinds of things he was hiding.”

“A collection of paintings that he’d been given by the Nazis for banking services rendered during the war.”

Peterson inclined his head a fraction of an inch. “Herr Rolfe was concealing valuable objects and a controversial story, a terrible set of circumstances from the Council’s point of view.”

“So what does the Council instruct you to do?”

“To tighten the watch around him. To make certain Herr Rolfe doesn’t do anything rash in his final days. But there are disturbing signs. A visitor to Rolfe’s bank-a man from an international Jewish agency who is active in the question of the dormant Holocaust accounts.”

The casualness with which Peterson made this reference set Gabriel’s teeth on edge.

“Then we intercept a series of faxes. It seems that Rolfe is making arrangements to hire an art restorer. I ask myself a simple question: Why is a dying man wasting time restoring his paintings? It’s been my experience that the dying usually leave details like that to their survivors.”

“You suspect Rolfe is planning to hand over the paintings?”

“Or worse.”

“What could be worse?”

“A public confession of his dealings with high-ranking Nazis and officers of German intelligence. Can you imagine the spectacle such an admission would create? It would sweep the country like a storm. It would make the controversy of the dormant accounts look like a mild dustup.”

“Is that all the Council was afraid of?”

“Isn’t that enough?”

But Gabriel was listening not to Gerhardt Peterson but to Augustus Rolfe:Once, I considered these men my friends-another of my many mistakes.

“They were afraid that Augustus Rolfe was going to reveal the existence of the Council. He knew about the Council, because he was a member, wasn’t he?”

“Rolfe? He wasn’t just a member of the Council. He was a charter member.”

“So you went to see him?”

“I tell him that I’ve heard things-nothing specific, mind you, very subtle. Rolfe is old, but he still has an agile mind, and he knows exactly what I’m trying to tell him. He’s a Swiss banker, for Christ’s sake. He knows how to have two conversations at the same time. When I leave, I’m convinced the Council has big problems.”

“So what do you do?”

“Resort to Plan B.”

“And that is?”

“Steal the fucking paintings. No paintings, no story.”

PETERSON refused to continue without a cigarette, and reluctantly Gabriel agreed. Once more he beat his palm against the wall, and once more Oded jutted his head through the open door. He gave Peterson a cigarette from his own pack. When he struck the hammer of his lighter, Peterson flinched so violently he nearly fell from his chair. Oded laughed helplessly all the way to the door. Peterson drew at the cigarette gingerly, as though he feared it might explode, and every few seconds Gabriel lifted his arm to bat away the smoke.

“Tell me about Werner Müller,” Gabriel said.

“He was the key to everything. If we were going to get at Rolfe’s secret collection, we needed Müller’s help. Müller was the one who designed the security system. So I had my men dig up as much dirt on Müller as we could find. Müller didn’t have clean hands, either. None of us really does, do we?” When Gabriel said nothing, Peterson continued. “I went to Paris to have a chat with Müller. Needless to say, he agreed to work for our cause.”

Peterson smoked the cigarette nearly to the filter, then morosely crushed it out in his empty soup bowl.

“The job was set for the next night. Rolfe was planning to go to Geneva and spend the night at his apartment there. The art restorer was scheduled to arrive the next morning. The team broke into the villa, and Müller guided them down to the viewing chamber.”

“Were you part of the team?”

“No, my job was to make sure the Zurich police didn’t show up in the middle of it, nothing more.”

“Go on.”

“Müller disarms the security system and shuts down the cameras. Then they go inside the vault, and guess what they find?”

“Augustus Rolfe.”

“In the flesh. Three o’clock in the morning, and the old man is sitting there with his fucking paintings. Müller panics. The burglars are strangers to Rolfe, but the old man and Müller are in business together. If the old man goes to the police, it’s Müller who’ll take the fall. He grabs a gun from one of the Council’s men, marches the old man upstairs to the drawing room, and puts a bullet in his brain.”

“Six hours later, I show up.”

Peterson nodded. “Rolfe’s body gave us an opportunity to test the veracity of the art restorer. If the art restorer discovers the body and telephones the police, chances are he’s just an art restorer. If he finds the body and tries to leave town-”

Peterson held up his hands as if to say no other explanation was necessary.

“So you arrange to have me arrested.”

“That’s right.”

“What about the first detective who interrogated me?”

“Baer? Baer knew nothing. To Baer you were just a suspect in the murder of a Swiss banker.”

“Why bother to arrest me? Why not just let me go?”

“I wanted to scare the shit out of you and make you think twice about ever coming back.”

“But it didn’t stop there.”

Peterson shook his head. “No, unfortunately, it was just the beginning.”

GABRIEL knew most of the rest, because he had lived through it. Peterson’s rapid-fire account served only to reinforce his existing beliefs or to fill in gaps.

Just as Peterson suspected, Anna Rolfe does not report the theft of her father’s secret collection. Peterson immediately places her under surveillance. The job is handled by assets connected to the Council of Rütli and Swiss security-service officers loyal to Peterson. Peterson knew that Gabriel went to Portugal a week after Rolfe’s funeral to see Anna Rolfe, and he knew that they traveled to Zurich together and visited the Rolfe villa.

From that moment on, Gabriel is under surveillance: Rome, Paris, London, Lyons. The Council retains the services of a professional assassin. In Paris, he kills Müller and destroys his gallery. In Lyons, he kills Emil Jacobi.

“Who were the men waiting for me that night at Rolfe’s villa?” Gabriel asked.

“They worked for the Council. We hired a professional to handle things outside our borders.” Peterson paused. “You killed them both, by the way. It was a very impressive performance. And then we lost track of you for thirty-six hours.”

Vienna, thought Gabriel. His meeting with Lavon. His confrontation with Anna about her father’s past. Just as Gabriel had suspected, Peterson picks up their trail the next day on the Bahnhofstrasse. After discovering Anna Rolfe’s car abandoned at the German border, the Council presses the panic button. Gabriel Allon and Anna Rolfe are to be hunted down and murdered by the professional at the first opportunity. It was supposed to happen in Venice…

PETERSON’S head slumped toward the tabletop as the effects of the stimulants subsided. Peterson needed sleep-natural sleep, not the kind that came from a syringe. Gabriel had only one question left, and he needed an answer before Peterson could be carried off and handcuffed to a bed. By the time he asked it, Peterson had made a pillow of his hands and was resting, facedown, on the table. “The paintings,” Gabriel repeated softly. “Where are the paintings?” Peterson managed only two words before he slid into unconsciousness.

Otto Gessler.

43

ONLY GERHARDT PETERSON slept that night. Eli Lavon awakened his girl in Vienna and dispatched her on a 2A.M. run to his office in the Jewish Quarter to scour his dusty archives. One hour later, the results of her search rattled off the fax machine, so meager they could have been written on the back of a Viennese postcard. Research Section in Tel Aviv contributed its own slender and thoroughly unhelpful volume, while Oded roamed the dubious corners of the Internet in a search for cybergossip.

Otto Gessler was a ghost. A rumor. Finding the truth about him, said Lavon, was like trying to catch fog in a bottle. His age was anyone’s guess. His date of birth was unknown, as was the place. There were no photographs. He lived nowhere and everywhere, had no parents and no children. “He’ll probably never die,” Lavon said, rubbing his eyes with bewilderment. “One day, when his time comes, he’s just going to disappear.”

Of Gessler’s business affairs, little was known and much was suspected. He was thought to have a controlling interest in a number of private banks, trust companies, and industrial concerns. Which private banks, which trust companies, and which industrial concerns no one knew, because Otto Gessler operated only through front companies and corporate cutouts. When Otto Gessler did a deal, he left no physical evidence-no fingerprints, no footprints, no DNA-and his books were sealed tighter than a sarcophagus.

Over the years, his name had cropped up in connection with a number of money-laundering and trading scandals. He was rumored to have cornered commodities markets, sold guns and butter to dictators in violation of international sanctions, turned drug profits into respectable real-estate holdings. But the leather glove of law enforcement had never touched Otto Gessler. Thanks to a legion of lawyers spread from New York to London to Zurich, Otto Gessler had paid not one centime in fines and served not one day in jail.

Oded did discover one interesting anecdote buried in a highly speculative American magazine profile. Several years after the war, Gessler acquired a company which had manufactured arms for the Wehrmacht. In a warehouse outside Lucerne, he had discovered five thousand artillery pieces that had been stranded in Switzerland after the collapse of the Third Reich. Unwilling to allow unsold inventory to remain on his books, Gessler went in search of a buyer. He found one in a rebellious corner of Asia. The Nazi artillery pieces helped topple a colonial ruler, and Gessler earned twice the profit the guns would have fetched in Berlin.

As the sun rose over the row of cypress trees bordering the garden, Lavon unearthed one redeeming trait about Otto Gessler. It was suspected that each year Gessler gave millions of dollars to fund medical research.

“Which disease?” asked Gabriel.

“Greed?” suggested Oded, but Lavon shook his head in wonder. “It doesn’t say. The old bastard gives away millions of dollars a year, and he conceals even that. Otto Gessler is a secret. Otto Gessler is Switzerland incarnate.”

GERHARDT Peterson slept until ten o’clock. Gabriel permitted him to bathe and groom at his leisure and to dress in the clothes he had been wearing at the time of his disappearance, now cleaned and pressed by Eli Lavon. Gabriel thought the cold mountain air would be good for Peterson’s appearance, so after breakfast they walked the grounds. The Swiss was a head taller and better dressed than his companions, which made him appear as though he was a landowner issuing instructions to a group of day laborers.

Peterson tried to fill in some of the bare canvas of their portrait of Otto Gessler, though it quickly became clear he knew little more than they did. He gave them the precise location of his mountain villa, the details of the security, and the circumstances of their conversations.

“So you’ve never actually seen his face?” asked Oded.

Peterson shook his head and looked away. He had never forgiven Oded for the ice-water showers in the cellar and refused to look at him now.

“You’re going to take me to him,” Gabriel said. “You’re going to help me get the paintings back.”

Peterson smiled; the cold, bloodless smile Gabriel had seen in the holding cell in Zurich after his arrest. “Otto Gessler’s villa is like a fortress. You can’t walk in there and threaten him.”

“I’m not planning to threaten.”

“What do you have in mind?”

“I want to offer him a business deal. It’s the only language he speaks. Gessler will return the paintings in exchange for a substantial finder’s fee and an assurance from me that his role in this affair will never come to light.”

“Otto Gessler makes a habit of only dealing from a position of strength. He can’t be bullied, and the last thing he needs is more money. If you try this, you’ll walk out of there empty-handed, if you walk out at all.”

“Either way, I’ll walk out.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure of that.”

“I’ll walk out because it’s your responsibility to make sure nothing happens to me. We know where you live, we know where your children go to school, and we always know where to find you.”

Again, Peterson’s arrogant smile flashed across his lips.

“I wouldn’t think a man with your past would threaten another man’s family. But I suppose desperate times call for desperate measures. Isn’t that how the saying goes? Let’s get this over with, shall we? I want to get out of this fucking place.”

Peterson turned and started up the hill toward the villa, Oded silently at his heels. Eli Lavon laid a small hand on Gabriel’s shoulder. “Maybe he’s right. Maybe you shouldn’t go in.”

“He’ll get me out. Besides, at this point, Gessler gains nothing from killing me.”

“Like the man says: Desperate times call for desperate measures. Let’s go home.”

“I don’t want them to win, Eli.”

“People like Otto Gessler always win. Besides, where the hell are you planning on getting the money to buy back the paintings from him? Shamron? I can’t wait to see the look on the old man’s face when you file your expense report for this one!”

“I’m not getting the money from Shamron. I’m getting it from the man who stole the paintings in the first place.”

“Augustus Rolfe?”

“Of course.”

“Atonement, yes?”

“Sometimes, Eli, forgiveness comes at a heavy price.”

IT was midday before they left. Peterson seemed annoyed to find his Mercedes parked in the gravel forecourt next to the Volkswagen van they’d thrown him into after his kidnapping. He climbed into the front passenger seat and reluctantly allowed Oded to cuff his wrist to the armrest on the door. Gabriel got behind the wheel and gunned the engine a little too aggressively for Peterson’s taste. Oded sprawled in the backseat, his feet on the tan leather and a Beretta on his lap.

The Swiss border lay only fifteen miles from the villa. Gabriel led the way in the Mercedes, followed by Eli Lavon in the van. It was a quiet crossing; the wearied border guard waved them across after a cursory inspection of their passports. Gabriel had briefly removed Peterson’s handcuffs, but a mile past the border he pulled off the road and chained him to the door again.

From there it was northwest to Davos; then up to Reichenau; then west, into the heart of Inner Switzerland. In the Grimselpass it began to snow. Gabriel eased off the throttle so Lavon could keep pace in his clunky Volkswagen van.

Peterson grew more restless as they drove farther north. He gave Gabriel directions as though he were leading him to a buried body. When he asked for the handcuffs to be removed, Gabriel refused.

“You’re lovers?” Peterson asked.

“Oded? He’s cute, but I’m afraid he’s not my type.”

“I meant Anna Rolfe.”

“I know what you meant. I thought a touch of humor might help to defuse the situation. Otherwise, I might be tempted to strike you very hard in the face.”

“Of course you’re lovers. Why else would you be involved in this affair? She’s had many lovers. I’m certain you won’t be the last. If you’d like to see her file, I’d be happy to show it to you-as a professional courtesy, of course.”

“Do you do anything for principle, Gerhardt, or do you do things only for money? For example, why do you work for the Council of Rütli? Do you do it only for the money, or do you do it because you believe in what they’re doing?”

“Both.”

“Oh, really. Which principle compels you to work for Otto Gessler?”

“I work for Otto Gessler because I’m sick of watching my country being dragged through the mud by a bunch of damned foreigners over something that happened before I was born.”

“Your country turned looted Nazi gold into hard currency. It turned the dental gold and wedding rings of the Jewish people into hard currency. Thousands of terrified Jews placed their life savings in your banks on the way to the death chambers of Auschwitz and Sobibor, and then those same banks kept the money instead of handing it over to their rightful heirs.”

“What does this have to do with me? Sixty years! This happened sixty years ago! Why can’t we move on from this? Why must you turn my country into an international pariah over the actions of a few greedy bankers six decades ago?”

“Because you have to admit wrongdoing. And then you have to make amends.”

“Money? Yes? You want money? You criticize the Swiss for our supposed greed, but all you want from us is money, as if a few dollars will help right all the wrongs of the past.”

“It’s not your money. It helped to turn this landlocked little amusement park of a country into one of the richest in the world, but it’s not your money.”

In the heat of the argument, Gabriel had been driving too fast, and Lavon had fallen several hundred yards behind. Gabriel slowed down so Lavon could close the gap. He was angry with himself. The last thing he wanted now was to debate the morality of Swiss history with Gerhardt Peterson.

“There’s one more thing I need to know before we talk to Gessler.”

“You want to know how I knew about your connection to the Hamidi assassination.”

“Yes.”

“A few years ago-eight or nine, I can’t remember exactly-a Palestinian with a questionable past wished to acquire a residence visa that would allow him to live temporarily in Geneva. In exchange for the visa, and a guarantee from us that his presence in Switzerland would not be revealed to the State of Israel, this Palestinian offered to tell us the name of the Israeli who killed Hamidi.”

“What was the Palestinian’s name?” Gabriel asked, though he didn’t need to wait for Peterson’s answer. He knew. He supposed he’d known it all along.

“His name was Tariq al-Hourani. He’s the one who placed the bomb under your wife’s car in Vienna, yes? He’s the one who destroyed your family.”

FIVE miles from Otto Gessler’s villa, at the edge of a dense pine forest, Gabriel pulled to the side of the road and got out. It was late afternoon, light fading fast, temperature somewhere around twenty degrees. A mountain peak loomed above them, wearing a beard of cloud. Which was it? The Eiger? The Jungfrau? The Mönch? He didn’t really care. He simply wanted to get this over with and get out of this country and never set foot in it again. As he stalked around the car, through six inches of wet snow, an image appeared in his mind: Tariq telling Peterson about the bombing in Vienna. It was all he could do not to pull Peterson from the car and beat him senseless. At that moment, he wasn’t sure who he hated more-Tariq or Peterson.

Gabriel unlocked the handcuffs and made Peterson crawl over the shifter to get behind the wheel. Oded got out and joined Eli Lavon in the van. Gabriel took Peterson’s spot in the front passenger seat and, with a jab of the Beretta to the ribs, spurred him into motion.

Darkness descended over the valley. Peterson drove with both hands on the wheel, and Gabriel kept the Beretta in plain sight. Two miles from Gessler’s villa, Lavon slowed and pulled to the side of the road. Gabriel twisted round and looked through the rear window as the headlights died. They were alone now.

“Tell me one more time,” Gabriel said, breaking the silence.

“We’ve gone over this a dozen times,” Peterson objected.

“I don’t care. I want to hear you say it one more time.”

“Your name is Herr Meyer.”

“What do I do?”

“You work with me-in the Division of Analysis and Protection.”

“Why are you bringing me to the villa?”

“Because you have important information about the activities of the meddlesome Jew named Gabriel Allon. I wanted Herr Gessler to hear this news directly from the source.”

“And what am I going to do if you deviate from the script in any way?”

“I’m not going to say it again.”

“Say it!”

“Fuck you.”

Gabriel wagged the Beretta at him before slipping it into the waistband of his trousers. “I’ll put a bullet in your brain. And the guard’s. That’s what I’ll do.”

“I’m sure you will,” Peterson said. “It’s the one thing I know you’re good at.”

A mile farther on was an unmarked private road. Peterson downshifted and took the turn expertly at considerable speed, the centrifugal force pressing Gabriel against the door. For an instant he feared Peterson was up to something, but then they slowed and glided along the narrow road, trees sweeping past Gabriel’s window.

At the end of the road was a gate of iron and stone that looked as though it could withstand an assault by an armored personnel carrier. As they approached, a security man stepped into the lights and waved his arms for them to stop. He wore a bulky blue coat that failed to conceal the fact that he was well armed. There was snow in his cap.

Peterson lowered his window. “My name is Gerhardt Peterson. I’m here to see Herr Gessler. I’m afraid it’s an emergency.”

“Gerhardt Peterson?”

“Yes, that’s right.”

“And who is that man?”

“He’s a colleague of mine. His name is Herr Meyer. I can vouch for him.”

The guard murmured a few inaudible words into the mouthpiece. A moment later the gate opened, and he stepped out of their path and waved them through.

Peterson drove at a jogging pace. Gabriel looked out his window: arc lights in the trees, another blue-coated guard, this one being yanked through the forest by an Alsatian on a lead. My God, he thought. The place looks like the Führerbunker. Add some razor wire and a minefield, and the picture would be complete.

Ahead of them, the trees broke and the lights of the villa appeared, softened by a bridal veil of the drifting snow. Another guard stepped into their path. This one made no attempt to hide the compact submachine gun hanging from his shoulder. Once again Peterson lowered the window, and the guard put his big face inside the car.

“Good evening, Herr Peterson. Herr Gessler is making his way to the pool house now. He’ll see you there.”

“Fine.”

“Are you armed, Herr Peterson?”

Peterson shook his head. The guard looked at Gabriel. “And what about you, Herr Meyer. Are you carrying a gun this evening?”

“Nein.”

“Come with me.”

A STRING of tiny lamps, mounted on posts no higher than a man’s knee, marked the course of the footpath. The snow was deeper here than on the valley floor-a foot or more had fallen-and every fourth lamp or so was buried beneath a tiny drift.

Peterson walked at Gabriel’s side. The guard who had met them at the top of the drive now led the way. At some point another had come up behind them. Gabriel could feel the warm breath of an Alsatian on the back of his knee. When the dog nuzzled his hand, the guard jerked the lead. The animal growled in response; a low, deep-throated growl that made the air around it vibrate. Nice dog, thought Gabriel. Let’s not do anything to upset the fucking dog.

The pool house appeared before them, long and low, ornate globe lamps glowing through the rising mist. There were guards inside; Gabriel could just make them out through the fogged windows. One of them appeared to be leading a tiny robed figure.

And then Gabriel felt a searing pain in his right kidney. His back arched, his face tilted upward, and for an instant he saw the stiletto tips of the pine trees stretching toward the heavens, and in his agony the heavens were a van Gogh riot of color and motion and light. Then the second blow fell, this one at the back of his head. The heavens turned to black, and he collapsed, facedown, in the snow.

44

G BRIEL OPENED ONE EYE, then, slowly, the other. He might as well have kept them closed, because the darkness was perfect. Absolute black, he thought. Theoretical black.

It was bitterly cold, the floor rough concrete, the air heavy with sulphur and damp. His hands were cuffed behind him with his palms pointed out, so that the muscles of his shoulders burned with lactic acid. He tried to imagine the contorted position of his body and limbs: right cheek and right shoulder pressed against the concrete; left shoulder in the air; pelvis twisted; legs knotted. He thought of art school-the way the teachers used to twist the limbs of the models to expose muscle and sinew and form. Perhaps he was just a model for some Swiss Expressionist painting. Man in a Torture Chamber -artist unknown.

He closed his eyes and tried to right himself, but the slightest contraction of his back muscles set his right kidney on fire. Grunting, he fought through the pain, and managed to set himself upright. He leaned his head against the wall and winced. The second blow had left a knot the size of an egg at the back of his head.

He dragged his fingertips over the wall: bare rock; granite, he supposed. Wet and slick with moss. A cave? A grotto of some sort? Or just another vault? The Swiss and their damned vaults. He wondered if they would leave him here forever, like a gold bar or a Burgundian armchair.

The silence, like the darkness, was complete. Nothing from above or below. No voices, no barking dogs, no wind or weather; just a silence which sang in his ear like a tuning fork.

He wondered how Peterson had done it. How had he signaled the guard that Gabriel was an intruder? A code word at the gate? A missing password? And what of Oded and Eli Lavon? Were they still sitting in the front seat of the Volkswagen van, or were they in the same position as Gabriel-or worse? He thought of Lavon’s warning in the garden of the villa in Italy: People like Otto Gessler always win.

Somewhere the seal of a tightly closed door was broken, and Gabriel could hear the footsteps of several people. A pair of flashlights burst on, and the beams played about until they found his face. Gabriel squeezed his eyes shut and tried to turn his head from the light, but the twisting of his neck caused his head wound to pound.

“Put him on his feet.”

Peterson’s voice: firm, authoritative, Peterson in his element.

Two pairs of hands grabbed his arms and pulled. The pain was intense-Gabriel feared his shoulder joints were about to pop out of their sockets. Peterson drew back his fist and buried it in Gabriel’s abdomen. His knees buckled, and he doubled over. Then Peterson’s knee rose into his face. The guards released him, and he collapsed into the same contorted position in which he’d awakened.

Man in a Torture Chamber by Otto Gessler.

THEY worked as a team, one to hold him, the other to hit him. They worked efficiently and steadily but without joy and without enthusiasm. They had been given a job-to leave every muscle in his body bruised and every spot on his face bleeding-and they carried out their assignment in a thoroughly professional and bureaucratic manner. Every few minutes they would leave to smoke. Gabriel knew this because he could smell the fresh tobacco on them when they came back. He tried to hate them, these blue-coated warriors for the Bank of Gessler, but could not. It was Peterson whom he hated.

After an hour or so Peterson returned.

“Where are the paintings you took from Rolfe’s safe-deposit box in Zurich?”

“What paintings?”

“Where is Anna Rolfe?”

“Who?”

“Hit him some more. See if that helps his memory.”

And on it went, for how long Gabriel did not know. He didn’t know whether it was night or day-whether he had been here an hour or a week. He kept time by the rhythm of their punches and the clocklike regularity of Peterson’s appearances.

“Where are the paintings you took from Rolfe’s safe-deposit box in Zurich?”

“What paintings?”

“Where is Anna Rolfe?”

“Who?”

“All right, see if he can handle a little more. Don’t kill him.”

Another beating. It seemed shorter in duration, though Gabriel could not be sure, because he was in and out of consciousness.

“Where are the paintings?”

“What… paintings?”

“Where is Anna Rolfe?”

“Who?”

“Keep going.”

Another knifelike blow to his right kidney. Another iron fist to his face. Another boot to his groin.

“Where are the paintings?”

Silence…

“Where is Anna Rolfe?”

Silence…

“He’s done for now. Let him lie there.”

HE searched the rooms of his memory for a quiet place to rest. Behind too many doors he discovered blood and fire and could find no peace. He held his son, he made love to his wife. The room where he found her nude body was their bedroom in Vienna, and the encounter he relived was their last. He wandered through paintings he had restored-through oil and pigment and deserts of bare canvas-until he arrived on a terrace, a terrace above a sea of gold leaf and apricot, bathed in the sienna light of sunset and the liquid music of a violin.

TWO guards came in. Gabriel assumed it was time for another beating. Instead, they carefully unlocked the handcuffs and spent the next ten minutes cleaning and bandaging his wounds. They worked with the tenderness of morticians dressing a dead man. Through swollen eyes, Gabriel watched the water in the basin turn pink, then crimson, with his blood.

“Swallow these pills.”

“Cyanide?”

“For the pain. You’ll feel a little better. Trust us.”

Gabriel did as he was told, swallowing the tablets with some difficulty. They allowed him to sit for a few minutes. Before long the throbbing in his head and limbs began to subside. He knew it was not gone-only a short postponement.

“Ready to get on your feet?”

“That depends on where you’re taking me.”

“Come on, let us help you.”

They each grasped him gingerly by an arm and lifted.

“Can you stand up? Can you walk?”

He put his right foot forward, but the deep contusions in his thigh muscles made his leg collapse. They managed to catch him before he could hit the floor again and for some reason found great humor in this.

“Take it slowly. Little steps for a little man.”

“Where are we going?”

“It’s a surprise. It won’t hurt, though. We promise.”

They led him through the door. Outside, a corridor stretched before him like a tunnel, long and white, with a marble floor and an arched ceiling. The air smelled of chlorine. They must have been close to Gessler’s swimming pool.

They started walking. For the first few yards Gabriel needed every bit of their support, but gradually, as the drugs circulated through his body and he became used to being vertical, he was able to move at a laborious shuffle without aid-a patient taking a first postoperative stroll through a hospital ward.

At the end of the corridor was a double door, and beyond the doorway a circular room, about twenty feet across, with a high-domed ceiling. Standing in the center of the room was a small, elderly man dressed in a white robe, his face concealed by a pair of very large sunglasses. He held out a spindly, purple-veined hand as Gabriel approached. Gabriel left it hovering there.

“Hello, Mr. Allon. I’m so glad we could finally meet. I’m Otto Gessler. Come with me, please. There are a few things that I think you might enjoy seeing.”

Behind him, another double doorway opened, slowly and silently, as though on well-oiled automatic hinges. As Gabriel started forward, Gessler reached out and laid his bony hand on Gabriel’s forearm.

It was then that Gabriel realized Otto Gessler was blind.

45

BEFORE THEM LAY a cavernous statuary hall with an arched ceiling reminiscent of the Musée d’Orsay. The light streaming through the overhead glass was man-made. On each side of the hall were a dozen passageways leading to rooms hung with countless paintings. There were no labels, but Gabriel’s trained eye discerned that each had its own mission: fifteenth-century Italian; seventeenth-century Dutch and Flemish; nineteenth-century French. And on it went, gallery after gallery, a private museum filled with Europe ’s lost masters. The effect was overwhelming, though obviously not to Gessler-Gessler could see none of it.

“I’m sorry about the treatment you had to endure at the hands of my men, but I’m afraid you have only yourself to blame. You were very foolish to come here.”

He had a reedy voice, dry and thin as parchment. The hand on Gabriel’s forearm was weightless, like a breath of warm air.

“Now I know why you were so anxious to silence Augustus Rolfe. How many do you have?”

“To be honest, even I don’t know anymore.”

They passed the door to another room: fifteenth-century Spanish. A blue-coated security man paced lazily back and forth, like a museum guard.

“And you can’t see any of it?”

“No, I’m afraid I can’t.”

“Why keep them?”

“I think of myself rather like an impotent man. Just because I am unable to lie with my wife does not mean that I am willing to give her body to others.”

“So you’re married?”

“An admirable attempt, Mr. Allon, but in Switzerland the right to privacy is very sacred. You might say that I’ve taken it somewhat to the extreme, but it’s how I’ve chosen to live my life.”

“Have you always been blind?”

“You ask too many questions.”

“I came to offer you a proposition for ending this affair, but I can see now that you would never agree to it. You are the Hermann Göring of the twenty-first century. Your greed knows no bounds.”

“Yes, but unlike Herr Göring, whom I knew well, I am not guilty of looting.”

“What would you call this?”

“I’m a collector. It’s a very special collection, a very private one, but a collection nonetheless.”

“I’m not the only one who knows about this. Anna Rolfe knows, and so does my service. You can kill me, but eventually, someone is going to find out what you have buried up here.”

Gessler laughed, a dry, humorless laugh.

“Mr. Allon, no one is ever going to find out what’s in this room. We Swiss take our privacy rights very seriously. No one will ever be able to open these doors without my consent. But just to make certain of that fact, I’ve taken an additional step. Using a little-known loophole in Swiss law, I declared this entire property a private bank. These rooms are part of that bank-vaults, if you will. The property contained in them is therefore covered by the banking secrecy laws of Switzerland, and under no circumstance can I ever be forced to open them or reveal their contents.”

“And this pleases you?”

“Indeed,” he said without reservation. “Even if I was forced to open these rooms, I could be prosecuted for no wrongdoing. You see, each of these objects was acquired legally under Swiss law, and morally under the laws of God and nature. Even if someone could prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that a work in my collection had been stolen from their ancestor by the Germans, they would have to reimburse me at fair market value. Obviously, the cost of repatriation would be astonishing. You and your friends in Tel Aviv can screech as much as you like, but I will never be forced to open the steel doors that lead to these rooms.”

“You’re a son of a bitch, Gessler.”

“Ah, now you resort to curses and foul language. You blame the Swiss for this situation, but we are not to blame. The Germans started the war. We had the good sense to stay on the sidelines, and for this you wish to punish us.”

“You didn’t sit on the sidelines. You collaborated with Adolf Hitler! You gave him guns and you gave him money. You were his servants. You’re all just servants.”

“Yes, we did reap a financial reward for our neutrality, but why do you raise this now? After the war, we settled with the Allies and all was forgiven, because the West needed our money to help rebuild Europe. Then came the Cold War, and the West needed us again. Now, the Cold War is over, and everyone from both sides of the Iron Curtain is beating down the Swiss door with their cap in hand. Everyone wants an apology. Everyone wants money. But someday, you’re going to need us again. It’s always been that way. The German princes and the French kings, the Arab sheiks and the American tax evaders, the drug lords and the arms merchants. My God, even your intelligence agency utilizes our services when it needs them. You yourself have been a frequent client of Credit Suisse over the years. So please, Mr. Allon-please climb down off your moral high horse for a moment and be reasonable.”

“You’re a thief, Gessler. A common criminal.”

“A thief? No, Mr. Allon, I’ve stolen nothing. I’ve acquired, through smart business tactics, a magnificent private collection of art along with staggering personal wealth. But I am not a thief. And what about you and your people? You bleat about the supposed crimes of the Swiss, but you founded your state on land stolen from others. Paintings, furniture, jewelry-these are just objects, which are easily replaced. Land, however, is an entirely different matter. Land is forever. No, Mr. Allon, I’m not a thief. I’m a winner, just like you and your people.”

“Go to hell, Gessler.”

“I am a Calvinist, Mr. Allon. We Calvinists believe that wealth on earth is granted to those who will be admitted to the Kingdom of Heaven. If the wealth in these rooms is any clue, I will be going in the opposite direction of Hell. The nature of your next life, I’m afraid, is somewhat less certain. You can make your remaining time on earth less unpleasant if you answer one simple question. Where are the paintings you removed from Augustus Rolfe’s safe-deposit box?”

“What paintings?”

“Those paintings belong to me. I can produce a document that declares Rolfe turned them over to me shortly before his death. I am the rightful owner of those paintings, and I want them back.”

“May I see the document, please?”

“Where are those paintings!”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Gessler released Gabriel’s arm. “Someone take him, please.”

46

THE DRUGS WORE OFF, as Gabriel knew they would, and the pain returned stronger than before, as if it had used the respite to gather itself for a final assault. Every nerve in his body seemed to be transmitting charges of pain simultaneously. It overwhelmed his brain and he began to shiver-a violent, uncontrollable shiver that made his body hurt even more. He needed to be sick but prayed he wouldn’t. He knew the contraction of vomiting would inflict a new round of exquisite suffering.

Once again he searched for a safe place for his thoughts to alight, but now the memory of Otto Gessler and his collection kept intruding. Gessler in his robe and sunglasses; room after room filled with pillaged Nazi art. He wondered whether it had really been true or just a side effect of the drugs they had made him take. No, he thought. It is true. It was all there, gathered in one place, just beyond his reach. Just beyond the world’s reach.

The door opened and his body tensed. Who was it? Gessler’s henchmen come to kill him? Gessler himself, come to show him another room filled with lost masters? But as his chamber filled with light, he realized it was neither Gessler or his thugs.

It was Gerhardt Peterson.

“CAN you stand up?”

“No.”

Peterson crouched before him. He lit a cigarette, took a long time looking at Gabriel’s face. He seemed saddened by what he saw there.

“It’s important that you try to stand up.”

“Why?”

“Because they’re coming to kill you soon.”

“What are they waiting for?”

“Darkness.”

“Why do they need darkness?”

“They’re going to take your body up to the glacier field and drop it down a crevasse.”

“That’s comforting. I thought they’d just stuff me into a strongbox and deposit me in one of Gessler’s numbered accounts.”

“They considered that.” A mirthless chuckle. “I told you not to come here. You can’t beat him, I told you. You should’ve listened to me.”

“You’re always right, Gerhardt. You were right about everything.”

“No, not everything.”

He reached into his coat pocket and produced Gabriel’s Beretta. He placed it in the palm of his hand and held it toward Gabriel like an offertory.

“What’s that for?”

“Take it.” He wagged the gun a little. “Go on, take it.”

“Why?”

“Because you’re going to need it. Without it you have absolutely no chance of getting out of this place alive. With it, given your condition, I rate your chances at only one in three. Worth a try, though, don’t you agree? Take the gun, Gabriel.”

The gun was warm from Peterson’s hand. The walnut grip, the trigger, the barrel-it was the first comforting object he had touched since he’d come to this place.

“I’m sorry you were beaten. It wasn’t my choice. Sometimes, an agent in place must do regrettable things to prove his bona fides to the people he’s deceiving.”

“If memory serves, the first two blows were yours.”

“I’ve never struck another man before. It probably hurt me more than it hurt you. Besides, I needed time.”

“Time for what?”

“To make the arrangements to get you out of here.”

Gabriel released the magazine into his palm and made certain the gun was loaded and not just another of Peterson’s deceptions.

“I understand Gessler has quite a collection,” said Peterson.

“You’ve never seen it?”

“No, I’ve never been invited.”

“Is it true? Is this place really a bank? No one can ever get inside?”

“Gabriel, this entire country is a bank.” Again Peterson reached into his pocket, and this time he produced a half-dozen tablets. “Here, take these. Something for the pain and a stimulant. You’re going to need it.”

Gabriel swallowed the pills in one gulp, then rammed the magazine into the butt. “What kind of arrangements have you made?”

“I found your two friends. They were holed up in a guest house in the village. They’ll be waiting at the bottom of the mountain, at the edge of Gessler’s property, near the spot where we left them yesterday.”

Yesterday? Had it only been one day? It seemed more like a year. A lifetime.

“There’s a single guard outside this door. You’ll have to take care of him first. Quietly. Can you manage that? Are you strong enough?”

“I’ll be fine.”

“Follow the corridor to the right. At the end you’ll find a flight of stairs and at the top of the stairs a doorway. That will put you outside, on the grounds. From there you just have to make your way down the slope of the mountain to your friends.”

Through the guards and the Alsatians, thought Gabriel.

“Leave Switzerland the way we came in yesterday. I’ll make sure the crossing is clear.”

“What will happen to you?”

“I’ll tell them that I came to see you one last time to try to convince you to tell me where the paintings were hidden. I’ll tell them that you overpowered me and escaped.”

“Will they believe you?”

“They might, or then again they may drop me into that crevasse that they’d reserved for you.”

“Come with me.”

“My wife, my children.” Then he added: “My country.”

“Why are you doing this? Why not let them kill me and be done with it?”

And then Peterson told him the story of what had happened in his village during the war-the story of the Jews who had crossed into Switzerland from France in search of refuge only to be expelled across the border into the arms of the Gestapo.

“After my father’s death, I was going through some of the papers in his study, trying to put his affairs in order. I found a letter. It was from the federal police. A commendation. Do you know what the commendation was for? It was my father who had reported the presence of the Jews in our village. It was because of my father that they were sent back to the Germans and murdered. I don’t want any more Jewish blood on the hands of this family. I want you to leave this place alive.”

“When the storm hits, it might be unpleasant for you.”

“Storms have a way of punching themselves out against the mountain ranges of this country. They say that up on the Jungfrau the wind blows two hundred miles per hour. But the storms never seem to have much strength left when they reach Bern and Zurich. Here, let me help you up.”

Peterson pulled him to his feet.

“One in three?”

“If you’re lucky.”

Gabriel stood just inside the door. Peterson beat his fist on it twice. A moment later the bolts slid away, the door opened, and the guard entered the room. Gabriel stepped in front of him and, using every last bit of strength he could summon, rammed the barrel of the Beretta through the guard’s left temple.

PETERSON felt the neck for a pulse. “Very impressive, Gabriel. Take his coat.”

“It has blood on it.”

“Do as I say. It will make them hesitate before shooting you, and you’ll need it for protection against the cold. Take his submachine gun too-just in case you need something more powerful than your Beretta.”

Peterson helped Gabriel remove the dead man’s jacket. He wiped the excess blood onto the floor and pulled it on. He hung the machine gun over his shoulder. The Beretta he kept in his right hand.

“Now me,” said Peterson. “Something convincing but not quite as irrevocable.”

Before Peterson could brace himself for the pain, Gabriel struck him with the butt of the Beretta high on the cheekbone, splitting flesh. Peterson momentarily lost his balance but stayed upright. He touched the wound with his fingertips, then looked at the blood.

“The blood of atonement, yes?”

“Something like that.”

“Go.”

47

THE COLD THAT GREETED Gabriel as he stepped through the doorway at the top of the stairs was like another blow to the face. It was late afternoon, nightfall fast approaching, wind singing in the pines. His hands began to burn with the cold. He should have taken the dead man’s gloves.

He looked up and picked out the peak of the Jungfrau. A few brushstrokes of pale pink light lay high on its face, but the rest of the massif was blue and gray and entirely forbidding. They say that up on the Jungfrau the wind blows two hundred miles per hour.

The doorway was concrete and steel, like the entrance to a secret military bunker. Gabriel wondered how many were scattered around Gessler’s estate, and what other wonders could be discovered by someone with access to them. He pushed those thoughts from his mind for now and concentrated on orienting himself. He was not fifty yards from the pool house, on the back side, a few yards from the trees.

… make your way down the slope of the mountain…

He walked across the open ground, through knee-deep snow, and entered the trees. Somewhere a dog began to bark. The hounds of Gessler. He wondered how long it would be before another guard came to the cell and discovered the body. And how long Peterson could keep up the ruse that he’d been assaulted by a man who’d been beaten half to death.

It was dark in the trees, and as he groped his way forward, he thought of the night he’d crept through Rolfe’s villa in Zurich and discovered the photographs hidden in the false desk drawer.

Herr Hitler, I’d like you to meet Herr Rolfe. Herr Rolfe has agreed to do a few favors for us. Herr Rolfe is a collector, like you, mein Führer.

There was one advantage to the cold: after a few moments he could no longer feel his face. Here the snow was a few inches less deep, but each step was a new adventure: an outcropping of rock; a fallen tree limb; a hole left by some burrowing animal. Four times he lost his balance and fell, and each time it was harder to get up than the last. But he did get up, and he kept walking, down the fall line of the slope, down to the spot where Oded and Eli waited.

Gabriel came upon a small clearing where a guard stood watch. The guard was twenty yards away, his back slightly turned, so that Gabriel saw him in semi-profile. He didn’t trust himself to make the shot from that distance-not with his concussions and his swollen eyes and frozen hands-so he kept moving forward, hoping the dark would conceal his ragged appearance just long enough.

He managed a few steps before one of his footfalls snapped a tree limb. The guard pivoted and looked at Gabriel, uncertain what to do next. Gabriel kept moving forward, calmly and steadily, as though he were the next shift coming on duty. When he was three feet away he pulled the Beretta from his pocket and pointed it at the guard’s chest. The round exited the man’s back in a cloud of blood and tissue and polyester gossamer.

The gunshot echoed up the mountainside. Immediately a dog began to bark; then another; then a third. Lights came on up at the villa. Beyond the clearing was a narrow track, just wide enough for a small vehicle. Gabriel tried to run but could not. His muscles had neither the strength nor the coordination required to run down the slope of a snow-covered mountain. So he walked and barely managed that.

Ahead of him he sensed that the contour of the land was beginning to flatten out, as if Gessler’s mountain was meeting the valley floor. And then he saw the lights of the Volkswagen and two figures-mere shadows, Lavon and Oded, stomping their feet against the cold.

Keep moving! Walk!

From behind, he heard a dog bark, followed by the voice of a man. “Halt, you! Halt before I shoot!”

Judging from the volume, they were very close; thirty yards, no more. He looked down the mountain. Oded and Lavon had heard it too, because they were now scrambling up the road to meet him.

Gabriel kept walking.

“Halt, I say! Halt now, or I’ll shoot!”

He heard a rumble and turned around in time to see the Alsatian, released from the restraint of its lead, charging toward him like an avalanche. Behind the dog was the guard, a submachine gun in his hands.

Gabriel hesitated a fraction of a second. Who first? Dog or man? Man had a gun, dog had jaws that could break his back. As the dog leapt through the air toward him, he raised the Beretta one-handed and fired past the beast toward his master. The shot struck him in the center of his chest and he collapsed onto the track.

Then the dog drove his head into Gabriel’s chest and knocked him to the ground. As he hit the frozen track, his right hand slammed to the ground and the Beretta fell from his grasp.

The dog went immediately for Gabriel’s throat. He raised his left arm over his face, and it took that instead. Gabriel screamed as the teeth tore through the protective layer of the jacket and imbedded themselves in the flesh of his forearm. The dog was snarling, thrashing his giant head about, trying to move his arm away so it could be rewarded with the soft flesh of his throat. Frantically, he beat the snowy ground with his right hand, searching for the lost Beretta.

The dog bit down harder, breaking bone.

Gabriel screamed in agony. The pain was more intense than anything Gessler’s thugs had inflicted on him. One last time he swept the ground with his hand. This time he found the grip of the Beretta.

With a vicious twist of its massive neck, the dog forced Gabriel’s arm to the side and lunged for his throat. Gabriel pressed the barrel of the gun against the dog’s ribs and fired three shots into its heart.

Gabriel pushed the dog away and got to his feet. There were shouts coming from the direction of the villa, and Gessler’s dogs were baying. He started walking. The left sleeve of his jacket was in tatters and blood was streaming over his hand. After a moment he saw Eli Lavon running up the track to him, and he collapsed in his arms.

“Keep walking, Gabriel. Can you walk?”

“I can walk.”

“Oded, get ahold of him. My God, what have they done to you, Gabriel? What have they done?”

“I can walk, Eli. Let me walk.”