The Messenger

1.

IT WAS ALI MASSOUDI who unwittingly roused Gabriel Allon from his brief and restless retirement: Massoudi, the great Europhile intellectual and freethinker, who, in a moment of blind panic, forgot that the English drive on the left side of the road.

The backdrop for his demise was a rain-swept October evening in Bloomsbury. The occasion was the final session of the first annual Policy Forum for Peace and Security in Palestine, Iraq, and Beyond. The conference had been launched early that morning amid great hope and fanfare, but by day’s end it had taken on the quality of a traveling production of a mediocre play. Even the demonstrators who came in hope of sharing some of the flickering spotlight seemed to realize they were reading from the same tired script. The American president was burned in effigy at ten. The Israeli prime minister was put to the purifying flame at eleven. At lunchtime, amid a deluge that briefly turned Russell Square into a pond, there had been a folly having something to do with the rights of women in Saudi Arabia. At eight-thirty, as the gavel came down on the final panel, the two dozen stoics who had stayed to the end filed numbly toward the exits. Organizers of the affair detected little appetite for a return engagement next autumn.

A stagehand stole forward and removed a placard from the rostrum that read: GAZA IS LIBERATED-WHAT NOW? The first panelist on his feet was Sayyid of the London School of Economics, defender of the suicide bombers, apologist for al-Qaeda. Next was the austere Chamberlain of Cambridge, who spoke of Palestine and the Jews as though they were still the quandary of gray-suited men from the Foreign Office. Throughout the discussion the aging Chamberlain had served as a sort of Separation Fence between the incendiary Sayyid and a poor soul from the Israeli embassy named Rachel who had drawn hoots and whistles of disapproval each time she’d opened her mouth. Chamberlain tried to play the role of peacekeeper now as Sayyid pursued Rachel to the door with taunts that her days as a colonizer were drawing to an end.

Ali Massoudi, graduate professor of global governance and social theory at the University of Bremen, was the last to rise. Hardly surprising, his jealous colleagues might have said, for among the incestuous world of Middle Eastern studies, Massoudi had the reputation of one who never willingly relinquished a stage. Palestinian by birth, Jordanian by passport, and European by upbringing and education, Professor Massoudi appeared to all the world like a man of moderation. The shining future of Arabia, they called him. The very face of progress. He was known to be distrustful of religion in general and militant Islam in particular. In newspaper editorials, in lecture halls, and on television, he could always be counted on to lament the dysfunction of the Arab world. Its failure to properly educate its people. Its tendency to blame the Americans and the Zionists for all its ailments. His last book had amounted to a clarion call for an Islamic Reformation. The jihadists had denounced him as a heretic. The moderates had proclaimed he had the courage of Martin Luther. That afternoon he had argued, much to Sayyid’s dismay, that the ball was now squarely in the Palestinian court. Until the Palestinians part company with the culture of terror, Massoudi had said, the Israelis could never be expected to cede an inch of the West Bank. Nor should they. Sacrilege, Sayyid had cried. Apostasy.

Professor Massoudi was tall, a bit over six feet in height, and far too good-looking for a man who worked in close proximity to impressionable young women. His hair was dark and curly, his cheekbones wide and strong, and his square chin had a deep notch in the center. The eyes were brown and deeply set and lent his face an air of profound and reassuring intelligence. Dressed as he was now, in a cashmere sport jacket and cream-colored rollneck sweater, he seemed the very archetype of the European intellectual. It was an image he worked hard to convey. Naturally deliberate of movement, he packed his papers and pens methodically into his well-traveled briefcase, then descended the steps from the stage and headed up the center aisle toward the exit.

Several members of the audience were loitering in the foyer. Standing to one side, a stormy island in an otherwise tranquil sea, was the girl. She wore faded jeans, a leather jacket, and a checkered Palestinian kaffiyeh round her neck. Her black hair shone like a raven’s wing. Her eyes were nearly black, too, but shone with something else. Her name was Hamida al-Tatari. A refugee, she had said. Born in Amman, raised in Hamburg, now a citizen of Canada residing in North London. Massoudi had met her that afternoon at a reception in the student union. Over coffee she had fervently accused him of insufficient outrage over the crimes of the Americans and Jews. Massoudi had liked what he had seen. They were planning to have drinks that evening at the wine bar next to the theater in Sloane Square. His intentions weren’t romantic. It wasn’t Hamida’s body he wanted. It was her zeal and her clean face. Her perfect English and Canadian passport.

She gave him a furtive glance as he crossed the foyer but made no attempt to speak to him. Keep your distance after the symposium, he had instructed her that afternoon. A man in my position has to be careful about who he’s seen with. Outside he sheltered for a moment beneath the portico and gazed at the traffic moving sluggishly along the wet street. He felt someone brush against his elbow, then watched as Hamida plunged wordlessly into the cloudburst. He waited until she was gone, then hung his briefcase from his shoulder and set out in the opposite direction, toward his hotel in Russell Square.

The change came over him-the same change that always occurred whenever he moved from one life to the other. The quickening of the pulse, the sharpening of the senses, the sudden fondness for small details. Such as the balding young man, walking toward him beneath the shelter of an umbrella, whose gaze seemed to linger on Massoudi’s face an instant too long. Or the newsagent who stared brazenly into Massoudi’s eyes as he purchased a copy of the Evening Standard. Or the taxi driver who watched him, thirty seconds later, as he dropped the same newspaper into a rubbish bin in Upper Woburn Place.

A London bus overtook him. As it churned slowly past, Massoudi peered through the fogged windows and saw a dozen tired-looking faces, nearly all of them black or brown. The new Londoners, he thought, and for a moment the professor of global governance and social theory wrestled with the implications of this. How many secretly sympathized with his cause? How many would sign on the dotted line if he laid before them a contract of death?

In the wake of the bus, on the opposite pavement, was a single pedestrian: oilskin raincoat, stubby ponytail, two straight lines for eyebrows. Massoudi recognized him instantly. The young man had been at the conference-same row as Hamida but on the opposite side of the auditorium. He’d been sitting in the same seat earlier that morning, when Massoudi had been the lone dissenting voice during a panel discussion on the virtue of barring Israeli academics from European shores.

Massoudi lowered his gaze and kept walking, while his left hand went involuntarily to the shoulder strap of his briefcase. Was he being followed? If so, by whom? MI5 was the most likely explanation. The most likely, he reminded himself, but not the only one. Perhaps the German BND had followed him to London from Bremen. Or perhaps he was under CIA surveillance.

But it was the fourth possibility that made Massoudi’s heart bang suddenly against his rib cage. What if the man was not English, or German, or American at all? What if he worked for an intelligence service that showed little compunction about liquidating its enemies, even on the streets of foreign capitals. An intelligence service with a history of using women as bait. He thought of what Hamida had said to him that afternoon.

“I grew up in Toronto, mostly.”

“And before that?”

“ Amman when I was very young. Then a year in Hamburg. I’m a Palestinian, Professor. My home is a suitcase.”

Massoudi made a sudden turn off Woburn Place, into the tangle of side streets of St. Pancras. After a few paces he slowed and looked over his shoulder. The man in the oilskin coat had crossed the street and was following after him.

HE QUICKENED his pace, made a series of turns, left and right. Here a row of mews houses, here a block of flats, here an empty square littered with dead leaves. Massoudi saw little of it. He was trying to keep his orientation. He knew London ’s main thoroughfares well enough, but the backstreets were a mystery to him. He threw all tradecraft to the wind and made regular glances over his shoulder. Each glance seemed to find the man a pace or two closer.

He came to an intersection, looked left, and saw traffic rushing along the Euston Road. On the opposite side, he knew, lay King’s Cross and St. Pancras stations. He turned in that direction, then, a few seconds later, glanced over his shoulder. The man had rounded the corner and was coming after him.

He began to run. He had never been much of an athlete, and years of academic pursuits had robbed his body of fitness. The weight of the laptop computer in his briefcase was like an anchor. With each stride the case banged against his hip. He secured it with his elbow and held the strap with his other hand, but this gave his stride an awkward galloping rhythm that slowed him even more. He considered jettisoning it but clung to it instead. In the wrong hands the laptop was a treasure trove of information. Personnel, surveillance photographs, communications links, bank accounts…

He stumbled to a stop at the Euston Road. Glancing over his shoulder, he saw his pursuer still plodding methodically toward him, hands in his pockets, eyes down. He looked to his left, saw empty asphalt, and stepped off the curb.

The groan of the lorry horn was the last sound Ali Massoudi ever heard. At impact the briefcase broke free of him. It took flight, turned over several times as it hovered above the road, then landed on the street with a solid thud. The man in the oilskin raincoat barely had to break stride as he bent down and snared it by the strap. He slipped it neatly over his shoulder, crossed the Euston Road, and followed the evening commuters into King’s Cross.

2.

THE BRIEFCASE HAD REACHED Paris by dawn, and by eleven it was being carried into an anonymous-looking office block on King Saul Boulevard in Tel Aviv. There the professor’s personal effects were hastily inspected, while the hard drive of his laptop computer was subjected to a sustained assault by a team of technical wizards. By three that afternoon the first packet of intelligence had been forwarded to the Prime Minister’s Office in Jerusalem, and by five a manila file folder containing the most alarming material was in the back of an armored Peugeot limousine heading toward Narkiss Street, a quiet leafy lane not far from the Ben Yehuda Mall.

The car stopped in front of the small apartment house at Number 16. Ari Shamron, the twice former chief of the Israeli secret service, now special adviser to the prime minister on all matters dealing with security and intelligence, emerged from the backseat. Rami, the black-eyed chief of his personal security detail, moved silently at his heels. Shamron had made countless enemies during his long and turbulent career, and because of Israel ’s tangled demographics, many were uncomfortably close. Shamron, even when he was inside his fortresslike villa in Tiberias, was surrounded always by bodyguards.

He paused for a moment on the garden walkway and looked up. It was a dowdy little building of Jerusalem limestone, three floors in height, with a large eucalyptus tree in front that cast a pleasant shadow over the front balconies. The limbs of the tree were swaying in the first cool wind of autumn, and from the open window on the third floor came the sharp odor of paint thinner.

Shamron, as he entered the foyer, glanced at the mailbox for apartment number three and saw it was absent a nameplate. He mounted the stairs and tramped slowly upward. He was short of stature and was dressed, as usual, in khaki trousers and a scuffed leather jacket with a tear in the right breast. His face was full of cracks and fissures, and his remaining fringe of gray hair was cropped so short as to be nearly invisible. His hands were leathery and liver-spotted and seemed to have been borrowed from a man twice his size. In one was the file.

The door was ajar when he arrived on the third-floor landing. He placed his fingers against it and gently pushed. The flat he entered had once been meticulously decorated by a beautiful Italian-Jewish woman of impeccable taste. Now the furniture, like the beautiful Italian woman, was gone, and the flat had been turned into an artist’s studio. Not an artist, Shamron had to remind himself. Gabriel Allon was a restorer-one of the three or four most sought-after restorers in the world. He was standing now before an enormous canvas depicting a man surrounded by large predatory cats. Shamron settled himself quietly on a paint-smudged stool and watched him work for a few moments. He had always been mystified by Gabriel’s ability to imitate the brushstrokes of the Old Masters. To Shamron it was something of a parlor trick, just another of Gabriel’s gifts to be utilized, like his languages or his ability to get a Beretta off his hip and into firing position in the time it takes most men to clap their hands.

“It certainly looks better than when it first arrived,” Shamron said, “but I still don’t know why anyone would want to hang it in his home.”

“It won’t end up in a private home,” Gabriel said, his brush to the canvas. “This is a museum piece.”

“Who painted it?” Shamron asked abruptly, as though inquiring about the perpetrator of a bombing.

“Bohnams auction house in London thought it was Erasmus Quellinus,” Gabriel said. “Quellinus might have laid the foundations, but it’s clear to me that Rubens finished it for him.” He moved his hand over the large canvas. “His brushstrokes are everywhere.”

“What difference does it make?”

“About ten million pounds,” Gabriel said. “Julian is going to do very nicely with this one.”

Julian Isherwood was a London art dealer and sometime secret servant of Israeli intelligence. The service had a long name that had very little to do with the true nature of its work. Men like Shamron and Gabriel referred to it as the Office and nothing more.

“I hope Julian is giving you fair compensation.”

“My restoration fee, plus a small commission on the sale.”

“What’s the total?”

Gabriel tapped his brush against his palette and resumed working.

“We need to talk,” Shamron said.

“So talk.”

“I’m not going to talk to your back.” Gabriel turned and peered at Shamron once more through the lenses of his magnifying visor. “And I’m not going to talk to you while you’re wearing those things. You look like something from my nightmares.”

Gabriel reluctantly set his palette on the worktable and removed his magnifying visor, revealing a pair of eyes that were a shocking shade of emerald green. He was below average in height and had the spare physique of a cyclist. His face was high at the forehead and narrow at the chin, and he had a long bony nose that looked as though it had been carved from wood. His hair was cropped short and shot with gray at the temples. It was because of Shamron that Gabriel was an art restorer and not one of the finest painters of his generation-and why his temples had turned gray virtually overnight when he was in his early twenties. Shamron had been the intelligence officer chosen by Golda Meir to hunt down and assassinate the perpetrators of the 1972 Munich Massacre, and a promising young art student named Gabriel Allon had been his primary gunman.

He spent a few moments cleaning his palette and brushes, then went into the kitchen. Shamron sat down at the small table and waited for Gabriel to turn his back before hurriedly lighting one of his foul-smelling Turkish cigarettes. Gabriel, hearing the familiar click-click of Shamron’s old Zippo lighter, pointed toward the Rubens in exasperation, but Shamron made a dismissive gesture and defiantly raised the cigarette to his lips. A comfortable silence settled between them while Gabriel poured bottled water into the teakettle and spooned coffee into the French press. Shamron was content to listen to the wind moving in the eucalyptus trees outside in the garden. Devoutly secular, he marked the passage of time not by the Jewish festivals but by the rhythms of the land-the day the rains came, the day the wildflowers exploded in the Galilee, the day the cool winds returned. Gabriel could read his thoughts. Another autumn, and we’re still here. The covenant had not been revoked.

“The prime minister wants an answer.” Shamron’s gaze still was focused on the tangled little garden. “He’s a patient man, but he won’t wait forever.”

“I told you that I’d give him an answer when I was finished with the painting.”

Shamron looked at Gabriel. “Does your arrogance know no bounds? The prime minister of the State of Israel wants you to be chief of Special Operations, and you put him off over some five-hundred-year-old piece of canvas.”

“Four hundred.”

Gabriel carried the coffee to the table and poured two cups. Shamron scooped sugar into his and gave it a single violent stir.

“You said yourself the painting is nearly finished. What is your answer going to be?”

“I haven’t decided.”

“May I offer you a piece of helpful advice?”

“And if I don’t want your advice?”

“I’d give it to you anyway.” Shamron squeezed the life out of his cigarette butt. “You should accept the prime minister’s offer before he makes it to someone else.”

“Nothing would make me happier.”

“Really? And what will you do with yourself?” Greeted by silence, Shamron pressed on. “Allow me to paint a picture for you, Gabriel. I’ll do the best I can. I’m not gifted like you. I don’t come from a great German-Jewish intellectual family. I’m just a poor Polish Jew whose father sold pots from the back of a handcart.”

Shamron’s murderous Polish accent had grown thicker. Gabriel couldn’t help but smile. He knew that whenever Shamron played the downtrodden Jew from Lvov, something entertaining was certain to follow.

“You have nowhere else to go, Gabriel. You said it yourself when we offered you the job the first time. What will you do when you’re finished with this Rubens of yours? Do you have any more work lined up?” Shamron’s pause was theatrical in nature, for he knew the answer was no. “You can’t go back to Europe until you’re officially cleared in the bombing of the Gare de Lyon. Julian might send you another painting, but eventually that will end, too, because the packing and shipping costs will cut into his already-tenuous bottom line. Do you see my point, Gabriel?”

“I see it very clearly. You’re trying to use my unfortunate situation as a means of blackmailing me into taking Operations.”

“Blackmail? No, Gabriel. I know the meaning of blackmail, and God knows I’ve been known to use it when it suits my needs. But this is not blackmail. I’m trying to help you.”

“Help?”

“Tell me something, Gabriel: What do you plan to do for money?”

“I have money.”

“Enough to live like a hermit, but not enough to live.” Shamron lapsed into a momentary silence and listened to the wind. “It’s quiet now, isn’t it? Tranquil almost. It’s tempting to think it can go on like this forever. But it can’t. We gave them Gaza without demanding anything in return, and they repaid us by freely electing Hamas to be their rulers. Next they’ll want the West Bank, and if we don’t surrender it in short order, there’s going to be another round of bloodletting, much worse than even the second intifada. Trust me, Gabriel, one day soon it will all start up again. And not just here. Everywhere. Do you think they’re sitting on their hands doing nothing? Of course not. They’re planning the next campaign. They’re talking to Osama and his friends, too. We now know for a fact that the Palestinian Authority has been thoroughly penetrated by al-Qaeda and its affiliates. We also know that they are planning major attacks against Israel and Israeli targets abroad in the very near future. The Office also believes the prime minister has been targeted for assassination, along with senior advisers.”

“You included?”

“Of course,” Shamron said. “I am, after all, the prime minister’s special adviser on all matters dealing with security and terrorism. My death would be a tremendous symbolic victory for them.”

He looked out the window again at the wind moving in the trees. “It’s ironic, isn’t it? This place was supposed to be our sanctuary. Now, in an odd way, it’s left us more vulnerable than ever. Nearly half the world’s Jews live in this tiny strip of land. One small nuclear device, that’s all it would take. The Americans could survive one. The Russians might barely notice it. But us? A bomb in Tel Aviv would kill a quarter of the country’s population-maybe more.”

“And you need me to prevent this apocalypse? I thought the Office was in good hands these days.”

“Things are definitely better now that Lev has been shown the door. Amos is an extraordinarily competent leader and administrator, but sometimes I think he has a bit too much of the soldier in him.”

“He was chief of both the Sayeret Matkal and Aman. What did you expect?”

“We knew what we were getting with Amos, but the prime minister and I are now concerned that he’s trying to turn King Saul Boulevard into an outpost of the IDF. We want the Office to retain its original character.”

“Insanity?”

“Boldness,” countered Shamron. “Audacity. I just wish Amos would think a little less like a battlefield commander and a little more like…” His voice trailed off while he searched for the right word. When he found it, he rubbed his first two fingers against his thumb and said, “Like an artist. I need someone by his side who thinks more like Caravaggio.”

“Caravaggio was a madman.”

“Exactly.”

Shamron started to light another cigarette, but this time Gabriel managed to stay his hand before he’d struck his lighter. Shamron looked at him, his eyes suddenly serious.

“We need you now, Gabriel. Two hours ago the chief of Special Operations handed Amos his letter of resignation.”

“Why?”

“ London.” Shamron looked down at his captured hand. “May I have that back?”

Gabriel let go of the thick wrist. Shamron rolled the unlit cigarette between his thumb and forefinger.

“What happened in London?” Gabriel asked.

“I’m afraid we had a bit of a mishap there last night.”

“A mishap? When the Office has a mishap, someone usually ends up dead.”

Shamron nodded in agreement. “Well, at least there’s something to be said for consistency.”

“DOES THE NAME Ali Massoudi mean anything to you?”

“He’s professor of something or other at a university in Germany,” Gabriel replied. “Likes to play the role of an iconoclast and a reformer. I actually met him once.”

Shamron’s eyebrows went up in surprise. “Really? Where?”

“He came to Venice a couple of years ago for a big Middle East symposium. As part of their stipend the participants got a guided tour of the city. One of their stops was the Church of San Zaccaria, where I was restoring the Bellini altarpiece.”

For several years Gabriel had lived and worked in Venice under the name Mario Delvecchio. Six months earlier he had been forced to flee the city after being discovered there by a Palestinian masterterrorist named Khaled al-Khalifa. The affair had ended at the Gare de Lyon, and in the aftermath Gabriel’s name and secret past had been splashed across the French and European press, including an exposé in The Sunday Times that referred to him as “ Israel ’s Angel of Death.” He was still wanted for questioning by the Paris police, and a Palestinian civil rights group had filed a lawsuit in London alleging war crimes.

“And you actually met Massoudi?” Shamron asked incredulously. “You shook his hand?”

“As Mario Delvecchio, of course.”

“I suppose you didn’t realize that you were shaking hands with a terrorist.”

Shamron stuck the end of the cigarette between his lips and struck his Zippo. This time Gabriel didn’t intervene.

“Three months ago we got a tip from a friend at the Jordanian GID that Professor Ali Massoudi, that great moderate and reformer, was actually a talent scout for al-Qaeda. According to the Jordanians, he was looking for recruits to attack Israeli and Jewish targets in Europe. Peace conferences and anti-Israel demonstrations were his favorite hunting grounds. We weren’t surprised by that part. We’ve known for some time that the peace conferences have become a meeting place for al-Qaeda operatives and European extremists of both the left-wing and right-wing variety. We decided it would be wise to put Professor Massoudi under watch. We got to the telephone in his apartment in Bremen, but the yield was disappointing, to put it mildly. He was very good on the phone. Then about a month ago, London Station chipped in with a timely piece of information. It seems the Cultural section of the London embassy had been asked to provide a warm body for something called the Policy Forum for Peace and Security in Palestine, Iraq, and Beyond. When Cultural asked for a list of the other participants, guess whose name appeared on it?”

“Professor Ali Massoudi.”

“Cultural agreed to send a representative to the conference, and Special Ops set its sights on Massoudi.”

“What kind of operation was it?”

“Simple,” Shamron said. “Catch him in the act. Compromise him. Threaten him. Turn him around. Can you imagine? An agent inside the al-Qaeda personnel department? With Massoudi’s help we could have rolled up their European networks.”

“So what happened?”

“We put a girl on his plate. She called herself Hamida al-Tatari. Her real name is Aviva and she’s from Ramat Gan, but that’s neither here nor there. She met Massoudi at a reception. Massoudi was intrigued and agreed to meet her again later that evening for a more lengthy discussion of the current state of the world. We followed Massoudi after the last session of the conference, but Massoudi apparently spotted the watcher and started to run. He looked the wrong way while crossing the Euston Road and stepped in front of a delivery truck.”

Gabriel winced.

“Fortunately we didn’t come away completely empty-handed,” Shamron said. “The watcher made off with Massoudi’s briefcase. Among other things it contained a laptop computer. It seems Professor Ali Massoudi was more than just a talent spotter.”

Shamron placed the file folder in front of Gabriel and, with a terse nod of his head, instructed Gabriel to open the cover. Inside he found a stack of surveillance photographs: St. Peter’s Square from a dozen different angles; the façade and interior of the Basilica; Swiss Guards standing watch at the Arch of Bells. It was clear the photos had not been taken by an ordinary tourist, because the cameraman had been far less interested in the visual aesthetics of the Vatican than the security measures surrounding it. There were several snapshots of the barricades along the western edge of the square and the metal detectors along Bernini’s Colonnade-and several more of the Vigilanza and Carabinieri who patrolled the square during large gatherings, including close-ups of their side arms. The final three photographs showed Pope Paul VII greeting a crowd in St. Peter’s Square in his glass-enclosed popemobile. The camera lens had been focused not on the Holy Father but on the plainclothes Swiss Guards walking at his side.

Gabriel viewed the photos a second time. Based on the quality of the light and the clothing worn by the crowds of pilgrims, it appeared that they had been taken on at least three separate occasions. Repeated photographic surveillance of the same target, he knew, was a hallmark of a serious al-Qaeda operation. He closed the file and held it out to Shamron, but Shamron wouldn’t accept it. Gabriel regarded the old man’s face with the same intensity he’d studied the photographs. He could tell there was more bad news to come.

“Technical found something else on Massoudi’s computer,” Shamron said. “Instructions for accessing a numbered bank account in Zurich-an account we’ve known about for some time, because it’s received regular infusions of money from something called the Committee to Liberate al-Quds.”

Al-Quds was the Arabic name for Jerusalem.

“Who’s behind it?” Gabriel asked.

“ Saudi Arabia,” said Shamron. “To be more specific, the interior minister of Saudi Arabia, Prince Nabil.”

Inside the Office, Nabil was routinely referred to as the Prince of Darkness for his hatred of Israel and the United States and his support of Islamic militancy around the globe.

“Nabil created the committee at the height of the second intifada,” Shamron continued. “He raises the money himself and personally oversees the distribution. We believe he has a hundred million dollars at his disposal, and he’s funneling it to some of the most violent terror groups in the world, including elements of al-Qaeda.”

“Who’s giving Nabil the money?”

“Unlike the other Saudi charities, the Committee for the Liberation of al-Quds has a very small donor base. We think Nabil raises the money from a handful of Saudi multimillionaires.”

Shamron peered into his coffee for a moment. “Charity,” he said, his tone disdainful. “A lovely word, isn’t it? But Saudi charity has always been a two-edged sword. The Muslim World League, the International Islamic Relief Organization, the al-Haramayn Islamic Foundation, the Benevolence International Foundation-they are to Saudi Arabia what the Comintern was to the old Soviet Union. A means of propagating the faith. Islam. And not just any form of Islam. Saudi Arabia ’s puritanical brand of Islam. Wahhabism. The charities build mosques and Islamic centers around the world and madrassas that churn out the Wahhabi militants of tomorrow. And they also give money directly to the terrorists, including our friends in Hamas. The engines of America run on Saudi oil, but the networks of global Islamic terrorism run largely on Saudi money.”

“Charity is the third pillar of Islam,” Gabriel said. “Zakat.”

“And a noble quality,” Shamron said, “except when the zakat ends up in the hands of murderers.”

“Do you think Ali Massoudi was connected to the Saudis by more than money?”

“We may never know because the great professor is no longer with us. But whomever he was working for clearly has his sights set on the Vatican -and someone needs to tell them.”

“I suspect you have someone in mind for the job.”

“Consider it your first assignment as chief of Special Ops,” Shamron said. “The prime minister wants you to step into the breach. Immediately.”

“And Amos?”

“Amos has another name in mind, but the prime minister and I have made it clear to him who we want in the job.”

“My own record is hardly free of scandal, and unfortunately the world now knows about it.”

“The Gare de Lyon affair?” Shamron shrugged. “You were lured into it by a clever opponent. Besides, I’ve always believed that a career free of controversy is not a proper career at all. The prime minister shares that view.”

“Maybe that’s because he’s been involved in a few scandals of his own.” Gabriel exhaled heavily and looked down at the photographs once more. “There are risks to sending me to Rome. If the French find out I’m on Italian soil-”

“There’s no need for you to go to Rome,” Shamron said, cutting him off. “ Rome is coming to you.”

“Donati?”

Shamron nodded.

“How much did you tell him?”

“Enough for him to ask Alitalia if he could borrow a plane for a few hours,” Shamron said. “He’ll be here first thing in the morning. Show him the photographs. Tell him as much as you need to in order to impress upon him that we think the threat is credible.”

“And if he asks for help?”

Shamron shrugged. “Give him whatever he needs.”

3.

MONSIGNOR LUIGI DONATI, private secretary to His Holiness Pope Paul VII, was waiting for Gabriel in the lobby of the King David Hotel at eleven the following morning. He was tall and lean and handsome as an Italian movie idol. The cut of his black clerical suit and Roman collar suggested that the monsignor, while chaste, was not without personal vanity-as did the expensive Swiss watch on his wrist and the gold fountain pen lodged in his breast pocket. His dark eyes radiated a fierce and uncompromising intelligence, while the stubborn set of his jaw revealed that he was a dangerous man to cross. The Vatican press corps had described him as a clerical Rasputin, the power behind the papal throne. His enemies within the Roman Curia often referred to Donati as “the Black Pope,” an unflattering reference to his Jesuit past.

It had been three years since their first meeting. Gabriel had been investigating the murder of an Israeli scholar living in Munich, a former Office agent named Benjamin Stern. The trail of clues had led Gabriel to the Vatican and into Donati’s capable hands, and together they had destroyed a grave threat to the papacy. A year later Donati had helped Gabriel find evidence in a Church archive that allowed him to identify and capture Erich Radek, a Nazi war criminal living in Vienna. But the bond between Gabriel and Donati extended far beyond two men. Donati’s master, Pope Paul VII, was closer to Israel than any of his predecessors and had taken monumental steps to improve relations between Catholics and Jews. Keeping him alive was one of Shamron’s highest priorities.

When Donati spotted Gabriel coming across the lobby, he smiled warmly and extended a long, dark hand. “It’s good to see you, my friend. I only wish the circumstances were different.”

“Have you checked into your room?”

Donati held up the key.

“Let’s go upstairs. There’s something you need to see.”

They walked to the elevators and entered a waiting carriage. Gabriel knew, even before Donati reached out for the panel of call buttons, that he would press the one for the sixth floor-just as he knew that the key in Donati’s hand opened the door to Room 616. The spacious suite overlooking the Old City walls was permanently reserved for Office use. Along with the usual luxury amenities, it contained a built-in audio recording system, which could be engaged by a tiny switch concealed beneath the bathroom sink. Gabriel made certain the system was turned off before showing the photographs to Donati. The priest’s face showed no emotion as he regarded each image carefully, but a moment later, as he stood at the window gazing out toward the Dome of the Rock sparkling in the distance, Gabriel noticed the muscles of his jaw alternatively clenching and unclenching with stress.

“We’ve been through this many times before, Gabriel-the Millennium, the Jubilee, nearly every Christmas and Easter. Sometimes the warnings are delivered to us by the Italian security services, and sometimes they come from our friends in the Central Intelligence Agency. Each time, we respond by clamping down on security, until the threat is deemed to have subsided. Thus far, nothing has materialized. The Basilica is still standing. And so, too, I’m pleased to say, is the Holy Father.”

“Just because they haven’t succeeded doesn’t mean they aren’t trying, Luigi. The Wahhabi-inspired terrorists of al-Qaeda and its affiliates regard everyone who doesn’t adhere to its brand of Islam as kafur and mushrikun, worthy only of death. Kafur are infidels, and mushrikun are polytheists. They regard even Sunni and Shiite Muslims as mushrikun, but to their way of thinking, there’s no bigger symbol of polytheism than the Vatican and the Holy Father.”

“I understand all that, but as you say at your Passover seder, why is this night different from all other nights?”

“You’re asking me why you should take this threat seriously?”

“Precisely.”

“Because of the messenger,” Gabriel said. “The man on whose computer we found these photographs.”

“Who is he?”

“I’m afraid I can’t tell you that.”

Donati turned slowly away from the window and regarded Gabriel imperiously. “I’ve laid bare some of the darkest secrets of the Roman Catholic Church to you. The least you can do in return is tell me where you got the photographs.”

Gabriel hesitated. “Are you familiar with the name Ali Massoudi?’

“Professor Ali Massoudi?” Donati’s expression darkened. “Wasn’t he killed in London a couple of nights ago?”

“He wasn’t killed,” Gabriel said. “He died in an accident.”

“Dear God, please tell me you didn’t push him in front of that truck, Gabriel.”

“Save your sorrow for someone worthy of it. We know Massoudi was a terrorist recruiter. And based on what we found on his laptop, he might have been a planner as well.”

“Too bad he’s dead. We could have put him on the rack and tortured him until he told us what we wanted to hear.” Donati looked down at his hands. “Forgive my sarcastic tone, Gabriel, but I’m not a great supporter of this war on terror we’re engaged in. Nor for that matter is the Holy Father.”

Donati looked out the window once again, at the walls of the Old City. “Ironic, isn’t it? My first visit to this holy city of yours, and this is the reason for it.”

“You’ve really never been?”

Donati slowly shook his head.

“Care to have a look at where it all started?”

Donati smiled. “Actually, I’d like nothing better.”

THEY CROSSED the Valley of Hinnom and labored up the slope of the hill to the eastern wall of the Old City. The footpath at the base of the wall was in shadow. They followed it southward, toward the Church of the Dormition, then rounded the corner and slipped through the Zion Gate. On the Jewish Quarter Road, Donati produced a slip of paper from the pocket of his clerical suit. “The Holy Father would like me to leave this in the Western Wall.”

They followed a cluster of haredim down Tif’eret Yisra’el. Donati, in his black clothing, looked as though he might be part of the group. At the end of the street they descended the wide stone steps that led to the plaza in front of the wall. A long line stretched from the security kiosk. Gabriel, after murmuring something to a female border police officer, led Donati around the metal detectors and into the square.

“Don’t you do anything like a normal person?”

“You go ahead,” Gabriel said. “I’ll wait here.”

Donati turned and inadvertently headed toward the women’s side of the wall. Gabriel, with a discreet cluck of his tongue, guided him to the portion reserved for men. Donati selected a kippah from the public basket and placed it precariously atop his head. He stood before the wall a moment in silent prayer, then slipped the small scroll of paper into a crevice in the tan Herodian stone.

“What did it say?” Gabriel asked, when Donati returned.

“It was a plea for peace.”

“You should have left it up there,” Gabriel said, pointing in the direction of the Al-Aqsa mosque.

“You’ve changed,” Donati said. “The man I met three years ago would never have said that.”

“We’ve all changed, Luigi. There’s not much of a peace camp in this country anymore, only a security camp. Arafat didn’t count on that when he unleashed the suicide bombers.”

“Arafat is gone now.”

“Yes, but the damage he left behind will take at least a generation to repair.” He shrugged. “Who knows? Maybe the wounds of the second intifada will never heal.”

“And so the killing will go on? Surely you can’t contemplate a future like that.”

“Of course we can, Luigi. That’s the way it’s always been in this place.”

They left the Jewish Quarter and walked to the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. Gabriel waited in the courtyard while Donati, after fending off a freelance Palestinian tour guide, went inside. He returned ten minutes later. “It’s dark,” he said. “And a little disappointing, to be honest with you.”

“I’m afraid that’s what everyone says.”

They left the courtyard and walked in the Via Dolorosa. A group of American pilgrims, led by a brown-cassocked monk clutching a red helium balloon, hustled toward them from the opposite direction. Donati watched the spectacle with a bemused expression on his face.

“Do you still believe?” Gabriel asked suddenly.

Donati took a moment before answering. “As I’m sure you’ve guessed by now, my personal faith is something of a complex matter. But I do believe in the power of the Roman Catholic Church to be a force for good in a world filled with evil. And I believe in this Pope.”

“So you’re a faithless man at the side of a man of great faith.”

“Well put,” Donati said. “And what about you? Do you still believe? Did you ever?”

Gabriel stopped walking. “The Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amalekites, the Moabites-they’re all gone. But for some reason we’re still here. Was it because God made a covenant with Abraham four thousand years ago? Who’s to say?”

“‘I will bless you greatly and make your descendants as numerous as the stars of heaven and the sands of the seashore,’” Donati said, quoting the twenty-second chapter of Genesis.

“‘And your descendants shall come to possess the gates of your enemies,’” Gabriel said, finishing the passage for him. “And now my enemy wants those gates back, and he’s willing to do anything, including sacrifice his own son, to get them back.”

Donati smiled at Gabriel’s clever interpretation of Scripture. “We’re not so different, you and I. We’ve both given our lives over to higher powers. For me, it’s the Church. For you, it’s your people.” He paused. “And the land.”

They walked farther along the Via Dolorosa, into the Muslim Quarter. When the street was enveloped in shadow, Gabriel pushed his sunglasses onto his forehead. Palestinian shopkeepers eyed him curiously from their crowded stalls.

“Is it all right for you to be here?”

“We’ll be fine.”

“I take it you’re armed.”

Gabriel allowed his silence to serve as an answer. As they walked on Donati’s gaze was on the cobblestones, and his dark brow was furrowed in concentration.

“If I know Ali Massoudi is dead, is it safe to assume his comrades know he’s dead, too?”

“Of course.”

“Do they also know his computer contained those photographs? And that it fell into your hands?”

“It’s possible.”

“Might that encourage them to accelerate their plans?”

“Or it might cause them to postpone the operation until you and the Italians let your guard down again.”

They passed through Damascus Gate. Gabriel lowered his sunglasses as they entered the crowded, cacophonous market square beyond the walls.

“There’s something you should know about those photos,” Donati said. “They were all taken during the Holy Father’s general audience, when he greets pilgrims from around the world in St. Peter’s Square.”

Gabriel stopped walking and gazed at the golden Dome of the Rock, floating above the stone walls. “The general audience takes place on Wednesdays, does it not?”

“That’s correct.”

Gabriel looked at Donati and said, “Today is Tuesday.”

Donati looked at his wristwatch. “Will you give me a ride back to the airport? If we hurry, we can be in Rome in time for supper.”

“We?”

“We’ll stop at your apartment on the way out of town so you can pack a bag,” Donati said. “It’s been stormy in Rome. Make sure you pack a raincoat.”

He would have to bring more than a raincoat, Gabriel thought as he led Donati through the crowded market. He was going to need a false passport, too.

4.

IT WAS A RATHER ordinary office for so powerful a man. The Oriental carpet was faded and timeworn, and the curtains were heavy and drab. As Gabriel and Donati entered the room, the small figure in white seated behind the large austere desk was gazing intently at the screen of a television. A scene of violence played there: fire and smoke, bloodstained survivors pulling at their hair and weeping over the tattered bodies of the dead. Pope Paul VII, Bishop of Rome, Pontifex Maximus, successor to St. Peter, pressed the Power button on his remote control, and the image turned to black. “Gabriel,” he said. “It’s so good to see you again.”

The Pope rose slowly to his feet and extended a small hand-not with the fisherman’s ring facing upward, the way he did toward most people, but with the palm sideways. The grip was still strong, and the eyes that gazed fondly up at Gabriel were still vibrant and clear. Gabriel had forgotten how diminutive Pietro Lucchesi really was. He thought of the afternoon Lucchesi had emerged from the conclave, an elfin figure, swimming in the hastily prepared cassock and barely visible over the balustrade of the Basilica’s great loggia. A commentator for Italian television had proclaimed him Pietro the Improbable. Cardinal Marco Brindisi, the reactionary secretary of state who had assumed he would be the one to emerge from the conclave dressed in white, had acidly referred to Lucchesi as “Pope Accidental I.”

For Gabriel, though, it was another image of Pietro Lucchesi that he would always think of first, the sight of him standing on the bimah of the Great Synagogue of Rome, speaking words no pope had ever spoken before. “For these sins, and others soon to be revealed, we offer our confession, and we beg your forgiveness. There are no words to describe the depth of our grief. In your hour of greatest need, when the forces of Nazi Germany pulled you from your houses in the very streets surrounding this synagogue, you cried out for help, but your pleas were met by silence. And so today, as I plead for forgiveness, I will do it in the same manner. In silence…”

The Pope retook his seat and looked at the television screen, as if the images of distant mayhem could still be seen there. “I warned him not to do it, but he didn’t listen to me. Now he intends to come to Europe to mend fences with his former allies. I wish him well, but I think his chances for success are slim.”

Gabriel looked to Donati for an explanation.

“The White House informed us last night that the president will be coming here early next year for a tour of European capitals. The president’s men are hoping to project a warmer, less confrontational image and repair some of the damage over the decision to go to war in Iraq.”

“A war I steadfastly opposed,” the Pope said.

“Is he coming to the Vatican?” Gabriel asked.

“He’s coming to Rome -that much we know. The White House hasn’t told us yet whether the president would like an audience with the Holy Father. We fully expect that a request will be arriving soon.”

“He wouldn’t dream of coming to Rome without dropping by the Vatican,” the Pope said. “Conservative Catholics are an important part of his constituency. He’ll want a nice photo opportunity and some kind words from me. He’ll get his photo. As for the kind words…” The Pope’s voice trailed off. “I’m afraid he’ll have to look elsewhere for those.”

Donati motioned for Gabriel to sit, then settled himself in the chair next to him. “The president is a man who appreciates straight talk, as our American friends like to say. He’ll listen to what you have to say, Holiness.”

“He should have listened to me the first time. I made it very clear to him when he came to the Vatican before the war that I believed he was embarking on a disastrous path. I told him that war was not justified because there was no true imminent threat to America and her allies. I told him that he had not exhausted every last avenue to avert conflict and that the United Nations, not the United States, was the proper authority for dealing with this problem. But I reserved most of my passion for my final argument against the war. I told the president that America would win a quick battlefield victory. ‘You are powerful,’ I said, ‘and your enemy is weak.’ But I also predicted that for years after the war America would face a violent insurgency. I warned him that in trying to solve one crisis with violence, he would only create another more dangerous crisis. That war would be seen by the Muslim world as a new Crusade by white Christians. That terrorism could not be defeated by more terrorism but only through social and economic justice.”

The Pope, having finished his homily, looked at his small audience for reaction. His eyes moved back and forth several times before settling on Gabriel’s face. “Something tells me you wish to take issue with something I’ve said.”

“You are a man of great eloquence, Holiness.”

“You are among family, Gabriel. Speak your mind.”

“The forces of radical Islam have declared war on us- America, the West, Christianity, Israel. Under God’s law and the laws of man, we have the right, indeed the moral duty, to resist.”

“Resist the terrorists with justice and opportunity rather than violence and bloodshed. When statesmen resort to violence, it is humanity that suffers.”

“You seem to believe that the problem of terrorism and radical Islam can be swept away if they were more like us-that if poverty, illiteracy, and tyranny weren’t so prevalent in the Muslim world, there would be no young men willing to sacrifice their lives in order to maim and kill others. But they’ve seen the way we live, and they want nothing of it. They’ve seen our democracy, and they reject it. They view democracy as a religion that runs counter to the central tenets of Islam, and therefore they will resist it with a sacred rage. How do we deliver justice and prosperity to these men of Islam who believe only in death?”

“It certainly cannot be imposed on them by the barrel of a white man’s gun.”

“I agree, Holiness. Only when Islam reforms itself will there be social justice and true prosperity within the Arab world. But in the meantime we cannot sit idly by and do nothing while the jihadists plot our destruction. That, Holiness, is immoral, too.”

The Pope rose from his desk and pushed open the large window overlooking St. Peter’s Square. Night had fallen. Rome stirred beneath his feet.

“I was right about the war, Gabriel, and I’m right about the future that awaits us all-Muslim, Christian, and Jew-if we do not choose another path. But who’s going to listen to me? I’m just an old man in a cassock who lives in a gilded cage. Even my own parishioners don’t listen to me anymore. In Europe we are living as if God does not exist. Anti-Americanism is our only religion now.” He turned and looked at Gabriel. “And anti-Semitism.”

Gabriel was silent. The Pope said, “Luigi tells me you’ve uncovered evidence of a plot against my life. Another plot,” he added with a sad smile.

“I’m afraid so, Holiness.”

“Isn’t it ironic? I’m the one who tried to prevent the war in Iraq. I’m the one who has tried to build a bridge between Christians and Muslims, and yet I’m the one they want to kill.” The Pope looked out his window. “Perhaps I was mistaken. Perhaps they don’t want a bridge after all.”

MOST EVENINGS Pope Paul VII and Monsignor Donati dined alone in the private papal apartments with one or two invited guests for company. Donati tended to keep the mood deliberately light and relaxed, and talk of work was generally restricted to the sort of Curial gossip that the Pope secretly loved. On that evening, however, the atmosphere in the papal dining room was decidedly different. The hastily assembled guest list consisted not of old friends but of men responsible for protecting the pontiff’s life: Colonel Karl Brunner, commandant of the Pontifical Swiss Guard, General Carlo Marchese of the Carabinieri, and Martino Bellano, deputy chief of the Italian security service.

Gabriel passed around the photographs and briefed them in his Venetian-accented Italian. His presentation was more sanitized than the one he had given Donati in Jerusalem that morning, and the name Ali Massoudi was not spoken. Still, his tone left little doubt that Israeli intelligence regarded the threat as credible and that steps needed to be taken to safeguard the pontiff and the territory of the Holy See. When he finished speaking, the faces of the security men were somber, but there was no visible sense of panic. They had been through this many times, and together they had put in place automatic procedures for elevating the security around the Vatican and the Holy Father when it was deemed necessary. Gabriel listened while the three men reviewed those procedures now. During a pause in their conversation, he carefully cleared his throat.

“You wish to suggest something?” Donati asked.

“Perhaps it might be wise to move tomorrow’s ceremony indoors-to the Papal Audience Chamber.”

“The Holy Father is announcing the beatification of a Portuguese nun tomorrow,” Donati said. “We’re expecting several thousand Portuguese pilgrims, along with the usual crowds. If we move the audience into the chamber, many of those will have to be turned away.”

“Better to turn away a few pilgrims than expose the Holy Father unnecessarily.”

The Pope looked at Gabriel. “Do you have specific credible evidence that the terrorists intend to strike tomorrow?”

“No, Holiness. Operational intelligence of that nature is very difficult to come by.”

“If we move the audience into the chamber, and turn away good people, then the terrorists have won, have they not?”

“Sometimes it is better to give an opponent a small victory than suffer a devastating defeat yourself.”

“Your people are famous for living their lives normally in the face of terrorist threats.”

“We still take sensible precautions,” Gabriel said. “For example, one cannot enter most public places in my country without being searched.”

“So search the pilgrims and take other sensible precautions,” the Pope replied, “but I’ll be in St. Peter’s Square tomorrow afternoon, where I belong. And it’s your job to make certain nothing happens.”

IT WAS JUST after ten o’clock when Donati escorted Gabriel down the flight of steps that led from the Apostolic Palace to the Via Belvedere. A light mist was falling; Gabriel zipped his jacket and hitched his overnight bag over his shoulder. Donati, coatless, seemed not to notice the weather. His eyes remained on the paving stones as they walked past the Vatican central post office toward St. Anne’s Gate.

“Are you sure I can’t offer you a lift?”

“Until this morning, I thought I might never be allowed to set foot here again. I think I’ll use the opportunity to take a walk.”

“If the Italian police arrest you before you reach your flat, tell them to give me a call. His Holiness will vouch for your fine character.” They walked in silence for a moment. “Why don’t you come back for good?”

“To Italy? I’m afraid Shamron has other plans for me.”

“We miss you,” Donati said. “So does Tiepolo.”

Francesco Tiepolo, a friend of the Pope and Donati, owned the most successful restoration firm in the Veneto. Gabriel had restored two of Bellini’s greatest altarpieces for him. Nearly two, he thought. Tiepolo had had to finish Bellini’s San Giovanni Crisostomo altarpiece after Gabriel’s flight from Venice.

“Something tells me Tiepolo will survive without me.”

“And Chiara?”

Gabriel, with his moody silence, made it clear he had no desire to discuss with the Pope’s private secretary the state of his tangled love life. Donati adroitly changed the subject.

“I’m sorry if you felt the Holy Father was putting you on the spot. I’m afraid he’s lost much of his old forbearance. It happens to all of them a few years into their papacy. When one is regarded as the Vicar of Christ, it’s difficult not to become the slightest bit overbearing.”

“He’s still the gentle soul I met three years ago, Luigi. Just a bit older.”

“He wasn’t a young man when he got the job. The cardinals wanted a caretaker Pope, someone to keep the throne of St. Peter warm while the reformers and the reactionaries sorted out their differences. My master never had any intention of being a mere caretaker, as you well know. He has much work to do before he dies-things that aren’t necessarily going to make the reactionaries happy. Obviously, I don’t want his papacy cut short.”

“Nor do I.”

“Which is why you’re the perfect man to be at his side tomorrow during the general audience.”

“The Swiss Guard and their helpers from the Carabinieri are more than capable of looking after your master.”

“They’re very good, but they’ve never experienced an actual terrorist attack.”

“Few people have,” Gabriel said. “And usually they don’t live to tell about it.”

Donati looked at Gabriel. “You have,” he said. “You’ve seen the terrorists up close. And you’ve seen the look in a man’s eyes as he was about to press the button on his detonator.”

They stopped a few yards from St. Anne’s Gate. On the left was the round, butter-colored Church of St. Anne, parish church of Vatican City; to their right the entrance to the Swiss Guards barracks. One of the guards stood watch just inside the gate, dressed in his simple blue night uniform.

“What do you want me to do, Luigi?”

“I leave that in your capable hands. Make a general nuisance of yourself. If you see a problem, address it.”

“On whose authority?”

“Mine,” Donati said resolutely. He reached into the pocket of his cassock and produced a laminated card, which he handed to Gabriel. It was a Vatican ID badge with Security Office markings. “It will get you anywhere in the Vatican -except for the Secret Archives, of course. I’m afraid we can’t have you rummaging around in there.”

“I already have,” said Gabriel, then he dropped the badge into his coat pocket and slipped into the street. Donati waited at St. Anne’s Gate until Gabriel had disappeared into the darkness, then he turned and headed back to the palace. And though he would not realize it until later, he was murmuring the words of the Hail Mary.

GABRIEL CROSSED the Tiber over the Ponte Umberto. On the opposite embankment he turned left and made his way to the Piazza di Spagna. The square was deserted, and the Spanish Steps shone in the lamplight like polished wood. On the twenty-eighth step sat a girl. Her hair was similar to Chiara’s, and for a moment Gabriel thought it might actually be her. But as he climbed higher he saw it was only Nurit, a surly courier from Rome Station. She gave him a key to the safe flat and, in Hebrew, told him that behind the tins of soup in the pantry he would find a loaded Beretta and a spare clip of ammunition.

He hiked up the rest of the steps to the Church of the Trinità dei Monti. The apartment house was not fifty yards from the church, on the Via Gregoriana. It had two bedrooms and a small terrace. Gabriel retrieved the Beretta from the pantry, then went into the larger of the two bedrooms. The telephone, like all safe-flat telephones, had no ringer, only a red light to indicate incoming calls. Gabriel, lying in bed in the clothes he’d donned to meet the prime minister, picked up the receiver and dialed a number in Venice. A woman’s voice answered. “What is it?” she asked in Italian. Then, receiving no answer, she muttered a curse and slammed down the phone-hard enough so that Gabriel jerked the receiver away from his ear before replacing it gently in the cradle.

He removed his clothing and pillowed his head, but as he was sliding toward sleep the room was suddenly illuminated by a flash of lightning. Instinctively he began to count to calculate the proximity of the strike. He saw a skinny black-haired boy with eyes as green as emeralds chasing lightning in the hills above Nazareth. The thunderclap exploded before he reached the count of four. It shook the building.

More strikes followed in quick succession, and rain hammered against the bedroom window. Gabriel tried to sleep but could not. He switched on the bedside lamp, opened the file containing the photographs taken from Ali Massoudi’s computer, and worked his way through them slowly, committing each image to memory. An hour later he switched off the light and, in his mind, flipped through the images once more. Lightning flashed over the bell towers of the church. Gabriel closed his eyes and counted.

5.

BY SUNRISE THE RAIN was gone. Gabriel left the safe flat early and headed back to the Vatican through the empty streets. As he crossed the river, dusty pink light lay on the umbrella pine atop the Janiculum Hill, but St. Peter’s Square was in shadow and lamps still burned in the Colonnade. A café was open not far from the entrance of the Vatican Press Office. Gabriel drank two cups of cappuccino at a sidewalk table and read the morning newspapers. None of the major Rome dailies seemed to know that the Pope’s private secretary had made a brief visit to Jerusalem yesterday-or that last night the Vatican and Italian security chiefs had gathered in the papal dining room to discuss a terrorist threat against the Holy Father’s life.

By eight o’clock, preparations were under way in St. Peter’s Square for the general audience. Vatican work crews were erecting folding chairs and temporary metal dividers in the esplanade in front of the Basilica, and security personnel were placing magnetometers along the Colonnade. Gabriel left the café and stood along the steel barricade separating the territory of the Holy See from Italian soil. He acted in a deliberately tense and agitated manner, made several glances at his wristwatch, and paid particular attention to the operation of the magnetometers. In short, he engaged in all the behaviors that the Carabinieri and Vigilanza, the Vatican police force, should have been looking for. It took ten minutes for a uniformed carabiniere to approach him and ask for identification. Gabriel, in perfect Italian, informed the officer that he was attached to the Vatican Security Office.

“My apologies,” the carabiniere said, and moved off.

“Wait,” Gabriel said.

The carabiniere stopped and turned around.

“Aren’t you going to ask to see my identification?”

The carabiniere held out his hand. He gave the ID badge a bored glance, then handed it back.

“Don’t trust anyone,” Gabriel said. “Ask for identification, and if it doesn’t look right, call your superior.”

Gabriel turned and walked over to St. Anne’s Gate, where a flock of nuns in gray habits was being admitted simply by saying “Annona,” the name of the Vatican supermarket. He tried the same tactic and, like the nuns, was waved onto Vatican territory. Just inside the gate he withdrew his Vatican ID badge and chastised the Swiss Guard in the Berlin-accented German he had acquired from his mother. Then he went back into the street. A moment later there came an elderly priest with very white hair who informed the Swiss Guard he was going to the Vatican pharmacy. The Guard detained the priest at the gate until he could produce ID from the pocket of his cassock.

Gabriel decided to check security at the other main entrance of the Vatican, the Arch of Bells. He arrived five minutes later, just in time to see a Curial cardinal and his two aides passing through the arch without so much as a glance from the Swiss Guard standing at attention near his weather shelter. Gabriel held his badge in front of the Guard’s eyes.

“Why didn’t you ask that cardinal for some identification?”

“His red hat and pectoral cross are his identification.”

“Not today,” Gabriel said. “Check everyone’s ID.”

He turned and walked along the outer edge of the Colonnade, pondering the scenes he had just witnessed. St. Peter’s Square, for all its vastness, was largely secure. But if there was a chink in the Vatican ’s armor, it was the relatively large number of people who were allowed free movement behind the square. He thought of the photographs on Ali Massoudi’s computer and wondered whether the terrorists had discovered the very same thing.

HE CROSSED the square to the Bronze Doors. There were no magic words to gain admittance to what was essentially the front door of the Apostolic Palace. Gabriel’s badge was examined outside by a Swiss Guard in full dress uniform and a second time inside the foyer by a Guard in plain clothes. His Security Office clearance allowed him to enter the palace without signing in at the Permissions Desk, but he was required to surrender his firearm, which he did with a certain reluctance.

The marble steps of the Scala Regia rose before him, shimmering in the glow of the vast iron lamps. Gabriel climbed them to the Cortile di San Damaso and crossed the courtyard to the other side, where a waiting elevator bore him upward to the third floor. He paused briefly in the loggia to admire the Raphael fresco, then hurried along the wide corridor to the papal apartments. Donati, wearing a cassock with a magenta sash, was seated behind the desk in his small office adjacent to the Pope’s. Gabriel slipped inside and closed the door.

“How many people work inside the Vatican?” Donati said, repeating Gabriel’s question. “About half.”

Gabriel frowned.

“Forgive me,” Donati said. “It’s an old Vatican joke. The answer is about twelve hundred. That includes the priests and prelates who work in the Secretariat of State and the various congregations and councils, along with their lay support staff. Then there are the laypeople who make the place run: the tour guides, the street sweepers, the maintenance people and gardeners, the clerks in places like the post office, the pharmacy, and the supermarket. And then there’s the security staff, of course.”

Gabriel held up his Vatican ID badge. “And they all get one of these?”

“Not everyone can get into the Apostolic Palace, but they all have credentials that get them beyond the public sections of the Vatican.”

“You mean the square and the Basilica?”

“Correct.”

“What kind of background check do you perform on them?”

“I take it you’re not referring to the cardinals, bishops, monsignori, and priests.”

“We’ll leave them aside.” Gabriel frowned, then added, “For now.”

“Jobs at the Vatican are highly coveted. The salaries aren’t terribly high, but all our employees have shopping privileges at the pharmacy and the supermarket. The prices are subsidized and much lower than those at Italian markets. The same is true for the prices at our gas station. Aside from that, the hours are reasonable, vacations are long, and the fringe benefits are quite good.”

“What about a background check for the people who get those jobs?”

“The jobs are so coveted-and there are so few of them-that they almost always go to someone with a family connection, so the background check is fairly cursory.”

“I was afraid of that,” Gabriel said. “And what about people like me? People with temporary credentials?”

“You’re asking how many?” Donati shrugged. “At any given time, I’d say there are several hundred people with temporary access to the Vatican.”

“How does the system work?”

“They’re usually assigned to one of the various pontifical councils or commissions as support staff or professional consultants. The prefect or an undersecretary vouch for the character of the individual, and the Vatican Security Office issues the badges.”

“Does the Security Office keep all the paperwork?”

“Of course.”

Gabriel lifted the receiver of the telephone and held it out to Donati.

TWENTY MINUTES ELAPSED before Donati’s phone rang again. He listened in silence, then replaced the receiver and looked at Gabriel, who was standing in the window overlooking the square, watching the crowds streaming into the square.

“They’re starting to pull the paperwork now.”

“Starting?”

“It required authorization from the chief. He was in a meeting. They’ll be ready for you in fifteen minutes.”

Gabriel looked at his wristwatch. It was nearly ten-thirty.

“Move it indoors,” he said.

“The Holy Father won’t hear of it.” Donati joined Gabriel at the window. “Besides, it’s too late. The guests have started to arrive.”

THEY SETTLED HIM in a tiny cell with a sooty window overlooking the Belvedere Courtyard and gave him a boyish-looking ex-carabiniere named Luca Angelli to fetch the files. He limited his search to laypersons only. Even Gabriel, a man of boundless suspicion, could not imagine a scenario under which a Catholic priest could be recruited, knowingly or unwittingly, to the cause of al-Qaeda. He also struck from his list members of the Swiss Guard and Vigilanza. The ranks of the Vigilanza were filled largely by former officers of the Carabinieri and Polizia di Stato. As for the Swiss Guard, they were drawn exclusively from Catholic families in Switzerland and most came from the German- and French-speaking cantons in the mountainous heart of the country, hardly a stronghold of Islamic extremism.

He started with the lay employees of the Vatican city-state itself. To limit the parameters of his search he reviewed only the files of those who had been hired in the previous five years. That alone took him nearly thirty minutes. When he was finished he set aside a half dozen files for further evaluation-a clerk in the Vatican pharmacy, a gardener, two stock boys in the Annona, a janitor in the Vatican museum, and a woman who worked in one of the Vatican gift shops-and gave the rest back to Angelli.

The next files to arrive were for the lay employees attached to various congregations of the Roman Curia. The congregations were the approximate equivalent of government ministries and dealt with central areas of Church governance, such as doctrine, faith, the clergy, saints, and Catholic education. Each congregation was led by a cardinal, and each cardinal had several bishops and monsignori beneath him. Gabriel reviewed the files for the clerical and support staff of each of the nine congregations and, finding nothing of interest, gave them back to Angelli.

“What’s left?”

“The pontifical commissions and councils,” said Angelli. “And the other offices.”

“Other offices?”

“The Administration of the Patrimony of the Holy See, the Prefecture of the Economic Affairs of the Holy See-”

“I get it,” Gabriel said. “How many files?”

Angelli held up his hands to indicate that the pile was well over a foot high. Gabriel looked at his watch: 11:20 …

“Bring them.”

ANGELLI STARTED WITH the pontifical commissions. Gabriel pulled two more files for further review, a consultant to the Commission for Sacred Archaeology, and an Argentine scholar attached to the Pontifical Commission for Latin America. He gave the rest back to Angelli and looked at his watch: 11:45 … He’d promised Donati that he would stand guard over the Pope in the square during the general audience at noon. He had time for only a few more files.

“Skip the financial departments,” Gabriel said. “Bring me the files for the pontifical councils.”

Angelli returned a moment later with a six-inch stack of manila folders. Gabriel reviewed them in the order Angelli handed them over. The Pontifical Council for the Laity…The Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity…The Pontifical Council for the Family…The Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace…The Pontifical Council for the Pastoral Care of Migrants and Itinerant People…The Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts…

The Pontifical Council for Inter-religious Dialogue…

Gabriel held up his hand. He had found what he was looking for.

HE READ FOR a moment, then looked up sharply. “Does this man really have access to the Vatican?”

Angelli bent his thin body at the waist and peered over Gabriel’s shoulder. “Professor Ibrahim el-Banna? He’s been here for more than a year now.”

“Doing what?”

“He’s a member of a special commission searching for ways to improve relations between the Christian and Islamic worlds. There are twelve members in all, an ecumenical team of six Christian scholars and six Muslim scholars representing the various Islamic sects and schools of Islamic law. Ibrahim el-Banna is a professor of Islamic jurisprudence at Al-Azhar University in Cairo. He’s also among the most respected scholars of the Hanafi school of Islamic law in the world. Hanafi is predominant among-”

“Sunni Muslims,” Gabriel said, pointedly finishing Angelli’s sentence for him. “Don’t you know that Al-Azhar is a hotbed of Islamic militancy? It’s been thoroughly penetrated by the forces of al-Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood.”

“It is also one of the oldest and most prestigious schools of Islamic theology and law in the world. Professor el-Banna was chosen for the position because of his moderate views. He’s met several times with the Holy Father himself. On two occasions they were alone together.”

“Where does the commission meet?”

“Professor el-Banna has an office in a building near the Piazza Santa Marta, not far from the Arch of Bells.”

Gabriel looked at his watch: 11:55… There was no way to talk to Donati. He would be downstairs with the Pope by now, preparing to enter the square. He thought of the instructions he’d given him the previous night in the Via Belvedere. Make a general nuisance of yourself. If you see a problem, address it. He got to his feet and looked at Angelli.

“I’d like to have a word with the imam.”

Angelli hesitated. “The initiative is very important to the Holy Father. If you level an accusation against Professor el-Banna without just cause, he will take great offense and the commission’s work will be placed in jeopardy.”

“Better an irate imam than a dead Pope. What’s the quickest way to the Piazza Santa Marta?”

“We’ll take the shortcut,” Angelli said. “Through the Basilica.”

THEY SLIPPED THROUGH the passage from the Scala Regia into the Chapel of the Blessed Sacrament, then hurried diagonally across the vast nave. Beneath the Monument to Alexander VII was a doorway leading into the Piazza Santa Marta. As they stepped outside into the bright sunlight, a roar of wild applause rose from St. Peter’s Square. The Pope had arrived for the General Audience. Angelli led Gabriel across the small piazza and into a gloomy-looking Baroque office building. In the lobby a nun sat motionless behind a reception table. She gave Gabriel and Angelli a disapproving look as they burst inside.

“Ibrahim el-Banna,” said Luca Angelli without elaboration.

The nun blinked twice rapidly. “Room four-twelve.”

They mounted the stairs, Angelli leading the way, Gabriel at his heels. When another swell of applause rose from the square, Gabriel gave Angelli a jab in the kidneys, and the Vatican security man began taking the steps two at a time. When they arrived at Room 412 they found the door was closed. Gabriel reached for the latch, but Angelli stayed his hand and knocked firmly but politely.

“Professor el-Banna? Professor el-Banna? Are you there?”

Greeted by silence, Gabriel pushed Angelli aside and examined the ancient lock. With the slender metal pick in his wallet he could have coaxed it open in a matter of seconds, but another roar of approval from the square reminded him there wasn’t time. He seized hold of the latch with both hands and drove his shoulder into the door. It held fast. He threw his body against the door a second time, then a third. On the fourth attempt, Angelli joined him. The wood of the doorjamb splintered, and they tumbled inside.

The room was empty. Not just empty, thought Gabriel. Abandoned. There were no books or files, no pens or loose papers. Just a single lettersized envelope, positioned in the precise center of the desk. Angelli reached for the light switch, but Gabriel shouted at him not to touch it, then pushed the Italian back into the corridor. He drew a pen from his coat pocket and used it as a probe to examine the density of the envelope’s contents. When he was reasonably certain it contained nothing but paper, he picked it up and carefully lifted the flap. Inside was a single sheet, folded in thirds. Handwritten, Arabic script:

We declare war on you, the Crusaders, with the destruction of your infidel temple to polytheism and the death of your so-called Supreme Pontiff, this man in white who you treat as though he were a god. This is your punishment for the sins of Iraq, Abu Ghraib, and Guantánamo Bay. The attacks will continue until the land of Iraq is no longer in American bondage and Palestine has been liberated from the clutches of the Jews. We are the Brotherhood of Allah. There is no God but Allah, and all praise to him.

Gabriel ran down the stairs, Angelli at his back.

6.

IN NOMINE PATRIS ET Filii et Spiritus Sancti.”

The Pope’s voice, amplified by the Vatican public address system, resounded across St. Peter’s Square and down the length of the Via della Conciliazione.

Twenty thousand voices replied: “Amen.”

Gabriel and Luca Angelli sprinted across the Piazza Santa Marta, then along the exterior wall of the Basilica. Before reaching the Arch of Bells, Angelli turned to the right and entered the Permissions Office, the main security checkpoint for most visitors to the Vatican. If Ibrahim el-Banna had cleared anyone else into the Vatican, the paperwork would exist there. Gabriel kept going toward the Arch of Bells. The Swiss Guard on duty there, startled by the sight of a man running toward him, lowered his halberd defensively as Gabriel approached. He raised it again when he saw Gabriel waving his Security Office ID badge.

“Give me your sidearm,” Gabriel ordered.

“Sir?”

“Give me your gun!” Gabriel shouted at the Guard in German.

The Guard reached inside his multicolored Renaissance tunic and came out with a very modern SIG-Sauer 9mm, just as Luca Angelli emerged through the archway.

“El-Banna cleared a delegation of three German priests into the Vatican at eleven-thirty.”

“They’re not priests, Luca. They’re shaheeds. Martyrs.” Gabriel looked at the crowd gathered in the square. “And I doubt they’re inside the Vatican any longer. They’re probably out there now, armed with explosives and only God knows what else.”

“Why did they come through the Arch of Bells into the Vatican?”

“To get their bombs, of course.” It was the chink in the Vatican ’s security armor. The terrorists had discovered it through repeated surveillance and had used the Holy Father’s initiative of peace to exploit it. “El-Banna probably smuggled the bombs inside over time and stored them in his office. The shaheeds collected them after clearing security at the Permissions Office, then made their way into the square by some route without metal detectors.”

“The Basilica,” said Angelli. “They could have entered the Basilica from the side and come out through one of the front doors. We could have passed them a few moments ago, and we never would have known it.”

Gabriel and Angelli vaulted the wooden fencing separating the Arch of Bells entrance area from the rest of the square and mounted the dais. Their sudden movement sent a murmur through the audience. Donati was standing behind the Pope. Gabriel went quietly to his side and handed him the note he’d taken from el-Banna’s office.

“They’re here.”

Donati looked down, saw the Arabic script, then looked up at Gabriel again.

“We found that in Ibrahim el-Banna’s office. It says they’re going to destroy the Basilica. It says they’re going to kill the Holy Father. We have to get him off the dais. Now, Luigi.”

Donati looked out at the multitude in the square: Catholic pilgrims and dignitaries from around the globe, schoolchildren in white, groups of sick and elderly come to the get the pontiff’s blessing. The Pope was seated in a scarlet ceremonial throne. In the tradition he’d inherited from his predecessor, he was greeting the pilgrims in their native languages, moving rapidly from one to the next.

“And what about the pilgrims?” Donati asked. “How do we protect them?”

“It may be too late for them. Some of them, at least. If we try to warn them, there’ll be panic. Get the Holy Father out of the square as quickly and quietly as possible. Then we’ll start moving the pilgrims out.”

Colonel Brunner, the Swiss Guard commandant, joined them on the dais. Like the rest of the Pope’s personal security detail, he was dressed in a dark business suit and wore an earpiece. When Donati explained the situation, Brunner’s face drained of color.

“We’ll take him through the Basilica.”

“And if they’ve concealed bombs in there?” Gabriel asked.

Brunner opened his mouth to reply, but his words were swept away by a searing blast wave. The sound came a millisecond later, a deafening thunderclap made more intense by the vast echo chamber of St. Peter’s Square. Gabriel was blown from the dais-a scrap of paper on a gale-force wind. His body took flight and turned over at least once. Then he landed hard on the steps of the Basilica and blacked out.

WHEN HE opened his eyes he saw Christ’s Apostles peering down at him from their perch atop the façade. He did not know how long he had been unconscious. A few seconds, perhaps, but not longer. He sat up, ears ringing, and looked around. To his right were the Curial prelates who had been on the dais with the Pope. They appeared shocked and tousled but largely unhurt. To his left lay Donati and next to Donati was Karl Brunner. The commandant’s eyes were closed, and he was bleeding heavily from a wound at the back of his head.

Gabriel got to his feet and looked around.

Where was the Pope?

Ibrahim el-Banna had cleared three priests into the Vatican.

Gabriel suspected there were two more blasts to come.

He found the SIG-Sauer he’d taken from the Swiss Guard and shouted at the prelates to stay down. Then, as he climbed back onto the dais to look for Lucchesi, the second bomb exploded.

Another wave of searing heat and wind.

Another thunderclap.

Gabriel was hurled backward. This time he came to rest atop Donati.

He got to his feet again. He wasn’t able to reach the dais before the third bomb detonated.

When the thunderclap finally died out, he mounted the platform and looked out at the devastation. The shaheeds had distributed themselves evenly throughout the crowd near the front of the dais: one near the Bronze Doors, the second in the center of the square, and the third close to the Arch of Bells. All that remained of them were three plumes of black smoke rising toward the cloudless pale-blue sky. On the spots where the bombers had been standing, the paving stones were blackened by fire, drenched in blood, and littered with human limbs and tissue. Farther away from the blast points, it was possible to imagine that the tattered corpses had moments before been human beings. The folding chairs that Gabriel had watched being put into place earlier that morning had been tossed about like playing cards, and everywhere there were shoes. How many dead? Hundreds, he thought. But his concern at that moment was not with the dead but with the Holy Father.

We declare war on you, the Crusaders, with the destruction of your infidel temple to polytheism…

The attack, Gabriel knew, was not yet finished.

And then, through the screen of black smoke, he saw the next phase unfolding. A delivery van had stopped just beyond the barricade at the far end of the square. The rear cargo doors were open and three men were scrambling out. Each one had a shoulder-launched missile.

IT WAS THEN that Gabriel saw the throne on which the Pope had been seated. It had been blown sideways by the force of the first blast and had come to rest upside down on the steps of the Basilica. Poking from beneath it was a small hand with a gold ring…and the skirt of a white cassock stained in blood.

Gabriel looked at Donati. “They’ve got missiles, Luigi! Get everyone away from the Basilica!”

Gabriel leaped from the dais and lifted the throne. The Pope’s eyes were closed, and he was bleeding from several small cuts. As Gabriel reached down and cradled the Pope in his arms, he heard the distinctive whoosh of an approaching RPG-7. He turned his head, long enough to glimpse the missile streaking over the square toward the Basilica. An instant later the warhead struck Michelangelo’s dome and exploded in a shower of fire, glass, and stone.

Gabriel sheltered the Pope from the falling debris, then lifted him and started running toward the Bronze Doors. Before they could reach the shelter of the Colonnade, the second missile came streaking across the square. It struck the façade of the Basilica, just beneath the balustrade on the Loggia of the Blessings.

Gabriel lost his balance and fell to the paving stones. He lifted his head and saw the third missile on its way. It was coming in lower than the others and heading directly toward the dais. In the instant before it struck, Gabriel glimpsed a nightmarish image: Luigi Donati trying desperately to move the Curial cardinals and prelates to safety. Gabriel stayed on the ground and covered the Pope’s body with his own as another shower of wreckage rained down upon them.

“Is it you, Gabriel?” the Pope asked, eyes still closed.

“Yes, Holiness.”

“Is it over?”

Three bombs, three missiles-symbolic of the Holy Trinity, Gabriel reckoned. A calculated insult to the mushrikun.

“Yes, Holiness. I believe it’s over.”

“Where’s Luigi?”

Gabriel looked toward the burning remains of the dais and saw Donati stagger out of the smoke, the body of a dead cardinal in his arms.

“He’s alive, Holiness.”

The Pope closed his eyes and whispered, “Thank God.”

Gabriel felt a hand grasp his shoulder. He turned around and saw a quartet of men in blue suits, guns drawn. “Let go of him,” one of the men shouted. “We’ll take him from here.”

Gabriel looked at the man for a moment, then slowly shook his head. “I’ve got him,” he said, then he stood up and carried the Pope into the Apostolic Palace, surrounded by Swiss Guards.

THE APARTMENT HOUSE stood in a cobbled vicolo near the Church of Santa Maria in Trastevere. Four floors in height, its faded tan exterior was hung with power and telephone lines and contained several large patches of exposed brickwork. On the ground floor was a small motorcycle repair shop that spilled into the street. To the right of the shop was a doorway leading to the flats above. Ibrahim el-Banna had the key in his pocket.

The attack had commenced five minutes after el-Banna’s departure from the Vatican. On the Borgo Santo Spirito he had taken advantage of the panic to carefully remove his kufi and hang a large wooden cross round his neck. From there he had walked to the Janiculum Park and from the park down the hill to Trastevere. On the Via della Paglia a distraught woman had asked el-Banna for his blessing. He had bestowed it, imitating the words and gestures he’d seen at the Vatican, then immediately asked Allah to forgive his blasphemy.

Now, safely inside the apartment house, he removed the offensive cross from his neck and mounted the dimly lit stairs. He had been ordered to come here by the Saudi who had conceived and planned the attack-the Saudi he knew only as Khalil. It was to be the first stop on a secret journey out of Europe and back to the Muslim world. He had hoped to return to his native Egypt, but Khalil had convinced him that he would never be safe there. The American lackey Mubarak will hand you over to the infidels in the blink of an eye, Khalil had said. There’s only one place on Earth where the infidels can’t get you.

That place was Saudi Arabia, land of the Prophet, birthplace of Wahhabi Islam. Ibrahim el-Banna had been promised a new identity, a teaching position at the prestigious University of Medina, and a bank account with a half million dollars. The sanctuary was a reward from Prince Nabil, the Saudi interior minister. The money was a gift from the Saudi billionaire who had financed the operation.

And so the Muslim cleric who climbed the steps of the Roman apartment house was a contented man. He had just helped carry off one of the most important acts of jihad in the long, glorious history of Islam. And now he was setting out for a new life in Saudi Arabia, where his words and beliefs could help inspire the next generation of Islamic warriors. Only Paradise would be sweeter.

He reached the third-floor landing and went to the door of apartment 3A. When he inserted the key into the lock he felt a slight electric shock in his fingers. When he turned it, the door exploded. And then he felt nothing at all.

AT THAT same moment, in the section of Washington known as Foggy Bottom, a woman woke from a nightmare. It was filled with the same imagery she saw every morning at this time. A flight attendant with her throat slashed. A handsome young passenger making one final phone call. An inferno. She rolled over and looked at the clock on her nightstand. It was six-thirty. She picked up the remote control, aimed it at her television, and pressed the power button. God no, she thought when she saw the Basilica in flames. Not again.

7.

GABRIEL REMAINED AT THE safe flat near the Church of the Trinità dei Monti for the next week. There were moments when it seemed as though none of it had really happened. But then he would wander out to the balcony and see the dome of the Basilica looming over the rooftops of the city, shattered and blackened by fire, as if God, in a moment of disapproval or carelessness, had reached down and destroyed the handiwork of his children. Gabriel, the restorer, wished it was only a painting-an abraded canvas that he might heal with a bottle of linseed oil and a bit of pigment.

The death toll climbed with each passing day. By the end of Wednesday-Black Wednesday, as Rome ’s newspapers christened it-the number of dead stood at six hundred. By Thursday it was six hundred fifty, and by the weekend it had exceeded seven hundred. Colonel Karl Brunner of the Pontifical Swiss Guards was among the dead. So was Luca Angelli, who clung to life for three days in the Gemelli Clinic before being removed from life support. The Pope administered Last Rites and remained at Angelli’s side until he died. The Roman Curia suffered terrible losses. Four cardinals were among the dead, along with eight Curial bishops, and three monsignori. Their funerals had to be conducted in the Basilica of Saint John Lateran, because two days after the attack an international team of structural engineers concluded the Basilica was unsafe to enter. Rome ’s largest newspaper, La Repubblica, reported the news by printing a full-page photograph of the ruined dome, headlined with a single word: CONDEMNED.

The government of Israel had no official standing in the investigation, but Gabriel, with his proximity to Donati and the Pope, quickly came to know as much about the attack as any intelligence officer in the world. He gathered most of his intelligence at the Pope’s dinner table, where he sat each evening with the men leading the investigation: General Marchese of the Carabinieri and Martino Bellano of the Italian security service. For the most part they spoke freely in front of Gabriel, and anything they withheld was dutifully passed along to him by Donati. Gabriel in turn forwarded all his information to King Saul Boulevard, which explained why Shamron was in no hurry to see him leave Rome.

Within forty-eight hours of the attack the Italians had managed to identify all those involved. The missile strike had been carried out by a four-man team. The driver of the van was of Tunisian origin. The three men who fired the RPG-7s were of Jordanian nationality and were veterans of the insurgency in Iraq. All four were killed in a volley of Carabinieri gunfire seconds after launching their weapons. As for the three men who had posed as German priests, only one was actually German, a young engineering student from Hamburg named Manfred Zeigler. The second was a Dutchman from Rotterdam, and the third was a Flemish-speaking Belgian from Antwerp. All three were Muslim converts, and all had taken part in anti-American and anti-Israeli demonstrations. Gabriel, though he had no proof of it, suspected they had been recruited by Professor Ali Massoudi.

Using closed-circuit surveillance video and eyewitness accounts, the Vatican and Italian authorities were able to retrace the last moments of the bombers’ lives. After being admitted into the Vatican by an adetto at the Permissions Office, the three men had made their way to Ibrahim el-Banna’s office near the Piazza Santa Marta. Upon leaving each was carrying a large briefcase. As Angelli had suspected, the three men had then slipped into the Basilica through a side entrance. They made their way into St. Peter’s Square, fittingly enough, through the Door of Death. The door, like the other four leading from the Basilica into the square, should have been locked. By the end of the first week the Vatican police still had not determined why it wasn’t.

The body of Ibrahim el-Banna was identified three days after it was pulled from the rubble of the apartment house in Trastevere. For the time being his true affiliation remained a matter of speculation. Who were the Brotherhood of Allah? Were they an al-Qaeda offshoot or simply al-Qaeda by another name? And who had planned and financed so elaborate an operation? One thing was immediately clear. The attack on the home of Christendom had reignited the fires of the global jihadist movement. Wild street celebrations erupted in Tehran, Cairo, Beirut, and the Palestinian territories, while intelligence analysts from Washington to London to Tel Aviv immediately detected a sharp spike in activity and recruitment.

On the following Wednesday, the one-week anniversary of the attack, Shamron decided it was time for Gabriel to come home. As he was packing his bag in the safe flat, the red light on the telephone flashed to indicate an incoming call. He raised the receiver and heard Donati’s voice.

“The Holy Father would like a word with you in private.”

“When?”

“This afternoon before you leave for the airport.”

“A word about what?”

“You are a member of a very small club, Gabriel Allon.”

“Which club is that?”

“Men who would dare to ask a question such as that.”

“Where and when?” Gabriel asked, his tone conciliatory.

Donati gave him the information. Gabriel hung up the phone and finished packing.

GABRIEL CLEARED a Carabinieri checkpoint at the edge of the Colonnade and made his way across St. Peter’s Square through the dying twilight. It was still closed to the public. The forensic crews had completed their gruesome task, but the opaque barriers that had been erected around the three blast sites remained in place. An enormous white tarpaulin hung from the façade of the Basilica, concealing the damage beneath the Loggia of the Blessings. It bore the image of a dove and a single word: PEACE.

He passed through the Arch of Bells and made his way along the left flank of the Basilica. The side entrances were closed and barricaded, and Vigilanza officers stood watch at each one. In the Vatican Gardens it was possible to imagine that nothing had happened-possible, thought Gabriel, until one looked at the ruined dome, which was lit now by a dusty sienna sunset. The Pope was waiting near the House of the Gardener. He greeted Gabriel warmly and together they set out toward the distant corner of the Vatican. A dozen Swiss Guards in plainclothes drifted alongside them amid the stone pines, their long shadows thin upon the grass.

“Luigi and I have pleaded with the Swiss Guard to reduce the size of their detail,” the Pope said. “For the moment it is nonnegotiable. They’re a bit jumpy-for understandable reasons. Not since the Sack of Rome has a Swiss Guard commander died defending the Vatican from enemy attack.”

They walked on in silence for a moment. “So this is my fate, Gabriel? To be forever surrounded by men with radios and guns? How can I communicate with my flock? How can I give comfort to the sick and the afflicted if I am cut off from them by a phalanx of bodyguards?”

Gabriel had no good answer.

“It will never be the same, will it, Gabriel?”

“No, Holiness, I’m afraid it will not.”

“Did they mean to kill me?”

“Without a doubt.”

“Will they try again?”

“Once they set their sights on a target, they usually don’t stop until they succeed. But in this case, they managed to kill seven hundred pilgrims and several cardinals and bishops-not to mention the commandant of the Swiss Guard. They also managed to inflict severe physical damage to the Basilica itself. In my opinion, they will regard their historical account as settled.”

“They may not have succeeded in killing me, but they have succeeded in making me a prisoner of the Vatican.” The Pope stopped and looked at the ruined dome. “My cage isn’t so gilded anymore. It took more than a century to build and a few seconds to destroy.”

“It’s not destroyed, Holiness. The dome can be restored.”

“That remains to be seen,” the Pope said with uncharacteristic gloominess. “The engineers and architects aren’t so sure it can be done. It might have to be brought down and rebuilt entirely. And the baldacchino suffered severe damage when the debris rained down upon it. This is not something that can simply be replaced, but then you know that better than most.”

Gabriel snuck a glance at his wristwatch. He would have to be leaving for the airport soon, or he would miss his flight. He wondered why the Pope had asked him here. Surely it wasn’t to discuss the restoration of the Basilica. The Pope turned and started walking again. They were heading toward St. John’s Tower, at the southwest corner of the Vatican.

“There’s only one reason why I’m not dead now,” the Pope said. “And that’s because of you, Gabriel. In all the sorrow and confusion of this terrible week, I haven’t had a chance to properly thank you. I’m doing so now. I only wish I could do so in public.”

Gabriel’s role in the affair had been carefully guarded from the media. So far, against all the odds, it had remained a secret.

“And I only wish I’d discovered Ibrahim el-Banna sooner,” Gabriel said. “Seven hundred people might still be alive.”

“You did everything that could have been done.”

“Perhaps, Holiness, but it still wasn’t enough.”

They arrived at the Vatican wall. The Pope mounted a stone staircase and climbed upward, Gabriel following silently after him. They stood at the parapet and looked out over Rome. Lights were coming on all over the city. Gabriel glanced over his shoulder and saw the Swiss Guards stirring nervously beneath them. He gave them a reassuring hand gesture and looked at the Pope, who was peering downward at the cars racing along the Viale Vaticano.

“Luigi tells me a promotion awaits you in Tel Aviv.” He had to raise his voice over the din of the traffic. “Is this a promotion you sought for yourself, or is this the work of Shamron?”

“Some have greatness thrust upon them, Holiness.”

The Pope smiled, the first Gabriel had seen on his face since his arrival in Rome. “May I give you a small piece of advice?”

Gabriel nodded.

“Use your power wisely. Even though you will find yourself in a position to punish your enemies, use your power to pursue peace at every turn. Seek justice rather than vengeance.”

Gabriel was tempted to remind the Pope that he was only a secret servant of the State, that decisions of war and peace were in the hands of men far more powerful than he. Instead he assured the Pope that he would take his advice to heart.

“Will you search for the men who attacked the Vatican?”

“It’s not our fight-not yet, at least.”

“Something tells me it will be soon.”

The Pope was watching the traffic below him with a childlike fascination.

“It was my idea to put the dove of peace on the shroud covering the façade of the Basilica. I’m sure you find the sentiment hopelessly naïve. You probably consider me naïve as well.”

“I wouldn’t want to live in this world without men such as you, Holiness.”

Gabriel made no attempt to hide the next glance at his watch.

“Your plane awaits you?” the Pope asked.

“Yes, Holiness.”

“Come,” he said. “I’ll see you out.”

Gabriel started toward the steps, but the Pope remained at the parapet. “Francesco Tiepolo called me this morning from Venice. He sends his regards.” He turned and looked at Gabriel. “So does Chiara.”

Gabriel was silent.

“She says she wants to see you before you go home to Israel. She was wondering whether you might stop in Venice on your way out of the country.” The Pope took Gabriel by the elbow and, smiling, led him down the steps. “I realize I have very little experience when it comes to matters of the heart, but will you allow an old man to give you one more piece of advice?”

8.

IT WAS A SMALL terra-cotta church, built for a poor parish in the sestiere of Cannaregio. The plot of land had been too cramped for a proper church square, and so the main entrance opened directly onto the busy Salizzada San Giovanni Crisostomo. Gabriel had once carried a key to the church in his pocket. Now he entered like an ordinary tourist and paused for a moment in the vestibule, waiting for his eyes to adjust to the dim light while a breath of cool air, scented with candle wax and incense, brushed against his cheek. He thought of the last time he had set foot in the church. It was the night Shamron had come to Venice to tell Gabriel that he had been discovered by his enemies and that it was time for him to come home again. There’ll be no trace of you here, Shamron had said. It will be as though you never existed.

He crossed the intimate nave to the Chapel of St. Jerome on the right side of the church. The altarpiece was concealed by heavy shadow. Gabriel dropped a coin into the light meter, and the lamps flickered into life, illuminating the last great work by Giovanni Bellini. He stood for a moment, right hand pressed to his chin, head tilted slightly to one side, examining the painting in raked lighting. Francesco Tiepolo had done a fine job finishing it for him. Indeed it was nearly impossible for Gabriel to tell where his inpainting left off and Tiepolo’s began. Hardly surprising, he thought. They had both served their apprenticeships with the master Venetian restorer Umberto Conti.

The meter ran out, and the lights switched off automatically, plunging the painting into darkness again. Gabriel went back into the street and made his way westward across Cannaregio until he came to an iron bridge, the only one in all of Venice. In the Middle Ages there had been a gate in the center of the bridge, and at night a Christian watchman had stood guard so that those imprisoned on the other side could not escape. He crossed the bridge and entered a darkened sottoportego. At the end of the passageway, a broad square opened before him, the Campo del Ghetto Nuovo, center of the ancient ghetto of Venice. More than five thousand Jews had once lived in the ghetto. Now it was home to only twenty of the city’s four hundred Jews, and most of those were elderly who resided in the Casa di Riposo Israelitica.

He crossed the campo and stopped at Number 2899. A small brass plaque read COMUNITÀ EBRAICA DI VENEZIA-Jewish Community of Venice. He pressed the bell and quickly turned his back to the security camera over the doorway. After a long silence a woman’s voice, familiar to him, crackled over the intercom. “Turn around,” she said. “Let me have a look at your face.”

HE WAITED WHERE she had told him to wait, on a wooden bench in a sunlit corner of the campo, near a memorial for the Venetian Jews who were rounded up in December 1943 and sent to their deaths at Auschwitz. Ten minutes elapsed, then ten minutes more. When finally she emerged from the office she took her time crossing the square, then stopped several feet away from him, as though she were afraid to come any closer. Gabriel, still seated, pushed his sunglasses onto his forehead and regarded her in the dazzling autumn light. She wore faded blue jeans, snug around her long thighs and flared at the bottom, and a pair of high-heeled suede boots. Her white blouse was tailored in such a way that it left no doubt about the generous figure beneath it. Her riotous auburn hair was held back by a chocolate-colored satin ribbon, and a silk scarf was wound round her neck. Her olive skin was very dark. Gabriel suspected she’d been to the sun recently. Her eyes, wide and Oriental in shape, were the color of caramel and flecked with gold. They tended to change color with her mood. The last time Gabriel had seen Chiara’s eyes they were nearly black with anger and streaked with mascara. She folded her arms defensively beneath her breasts and asked what he was doing in Venice.

“Hello, Chiara. Don’t you look lovely.”

The breeze took her hair and blew a few strands across her face. She brushed it away with her left hand. It was absent the diamond engagement ring Gabriel had given her. There were other rings on her fingers now and a new gold watch on her wrist. Gabriel wondered if they were gifts from someone else.

“I haven’t heard from you since I left Jerusalem,” Chiara said in the deliberately even tone she used whenever she was trying to keep her emotions in check. “It’s been months. Now you show up here without warning and expect me to greet you with my arms open and a smile on my face?”

“Without warning? I came here because you asked me to come.”

“Me? What on earth are you talking about?”

Gabriel searched her eyes. He could tell she was not dissembling. “Forgive me,” he said. “It seems I was brought here under false pretenses.”

She toyed with the ends of her scarf, clearly enjoying his discomfort. “Brought here by whom?”

Donati and Tiepolo, reckoned Gabriel. Maybe even His Holiness himself. He stood abruptly. “It doesn’t matter,” he said. “I’m sorry, Chiara. It was nice to see you again.”

He turned and started to walk away, but she seized his arm.

“Wait,” she said. “Stay for a moment.”

“Are you going to be civil?”

“Civility is for divorced couples with children.”

Gabriel sat down again, but Chiara remained standing. A man in dark glasses and a tan blazer emerged from the sottoportego. He looked admiringly at Chiara, then crossed the campo and disappeared over the bridge that led to the pair of old Sephardic synagogues at the southern end of the ghetto. Chiara watched the man go, then tilted her head and scrutinized Gabriel’s appearance.

“Has anyone ever told you that you bear more than a passing resemblance to the man who saved the Pope?”

“He’s an Italian,” Gabriel said. “Didn’t you read about him in the newspapers?”

She ignored him. “When I saw the footage on television, I thought I was hallucinating. I knew it was you. That night, after things calmed down, I checked in with Rome. Shimon told me you’d been at the Vatican.”

A sudden movement in the campo caused her to turn her head. She watched as a man with a salt-and-pepper beard and a fedora hurried toward the entrance of the community center. It was her father, the chief rabbi of Venice. She raised the toe of her right boot and balanced her weight on the heel. Gabriel knew the gesture well. It meant something provocative was coming.

“Why are you here, Gabriel Allon?”

“I was told you wanted to see me.”

“And so you came? Just like that?”

“Just like that.”

The corners of her lips started to curl into a smile.

“What’s so funny?” he asked.

“Poor Gabriel. You’re still in love with me, aren’t you?”

“I always was.”

“Just not enough to marry me?”

“Can we do this in private?”

“Not for a while. I need to keep an eye on the office. My other job,” she said in a tone of mock conspiracy.

“Please give Rabbi Zolli my regards.”

“I’m not sure that’s such a good idea. Rabbi Zolli is still furious with you.”

She dug a key from her pocket and tossed it to him. He looked at it for a long moment. Even after months of separation it was difficult for Gabriel to imagine Chiara leading a life of her own.

“In case you’re wondering, I live there alone. It’s more than you have a right to know, but it’s the truth. Make yourself comfortable. Get some rest. You look like hell.”

“Full of compliments today, aren’t we?” He slipped the key into his pocket. “What’s the address?”

“You know, for a spy, you’re a terrible liar.”

“What are you talking about?”

“You know my address, Gabriel. You got it from Operations, the same place you got my telephone number.”

She leaned down and kissed his cheek. When her hair fell across his face, he closed his eyes and inhaled the scent of vanilla.

HER BUILDING WAS on the other side of the Grand Canal in Santa Croce, in a small enclosed corte with but one passage in and out. Gabriel, as he slipped into her apartment, had the sensation of walking into his own past. The sitting room seemed posed for a magazine photo shoot. Even her old magazines and newspapers appeared to have been arranged by a fanatic in pursuit of visual perfection. He walked over to an end table and browsed the framed photographs: Chiara and her parents; Chiara and an older brother who lived in Padua; Chiara with a friend on the shore of the Sea of Galilee. It was during that trip, when she was just twenty-five, that she’d come to the attention of an Office talent scout. Six months later, after being vetted and trained, she was sent back to Europe as a bat leveyha, a female escort officer. There were no photographs of Chiara with Gabriel, for none existed.

He went to the window and looked out. Thirty feet below, the oily green waters of the Rio del Megio flowed sluggishly by. A clothing line stretched to the building opposite. Shirts and trousers hung drunkenly in the sunlight, and at the other end of the line an old woman sat in an open window with her fleshy arm draped over the sill. She seemed surprised to see Gabriel. He held up the key and said he was Chiara’s friend from Milan.

He lowered the blinds and went into the kitchen. In the sink was a half-drunk bowl of milky coffee and a crust of buttered toast. Chiara, fastidious in all other things, always left her breakfast dishes in the sink until the end of the day. Gabriel, in an act of domestic pettiness, left them where they stood and went into her bedroom.

He tossed his bag onto the unmade bed and, resisting the temptation to search her closet and drawers, went into the bathroom and turned on the shower. He opened the medicine chest, looking for razors or cologne or any other evidence of a man. There were two things he’d never seen before: a bottle of sleeping tablets and a bottle of antidepressants. He returned them to the precise position in which he’d found them. Chiara, like Gabriel, had been trained to notice even the subtlest of changes.

He stripped off his clothes and tossed them into the hallway, then spent a long time standing beneath the shower. When he was finished he wrapped a towel around his waist and padded into the bedroom. The duvet smelled of Chiara’s body. When he placed his head atop her pillow the bells of Santa Croce tolled midday. He closed his eyes and plunged into a dreamless sleep.

HE WOKE IN late afternoon to the sound of a key being pushed into the lock, followed by the clatter of Chiara’s boot heels in the entrance hall. She didn’t bother calling out that she was home. She knew he came awake at the slightest sound or movement. When she entered the bedroom she was singing softly to herself, a silly Italian pop song she knew he loathed.

She sat on the edge of the bed, close enough so that her hip pressed against his thigh. He opened his eyes and watched her remove her boots and wriggle out of her jeans. She pressed her palm against his chest. When he pulled the ribbon from her hair, auburn curls tumbled about her face and shoulders. She repeated the question she had posed to him in the ghetto: Why are you here, Gabriel Allon?

“I was wondering whether we might try this again,” Gabriel said.

“I don’t need to try it. I tried it once, and I liked it very much.”

He unwound the silk scarf from her throat and slowly loosened the buttons of her blouse. Chiara leaned down and kissed his mouth. It was like being kissed by Raphael’s Alba Madonna.

“If you hurt me again, I’ll hate you forever.”

“I won’t hurt you.”

“I never stopped dreaming of you.”

“Good dreams?”

“No,” she said. “I dreamt only of your death.”

THE ONLY TRACE of Gabriel in the apartment was an old sketchpad. He turned to a fresh page and regarded Chiara with a professional dispassion. She was seated at the end of the couch, with her long legs folded beneath her and her body wrapped in a silk bedsheet. Her face was turned toward the window and lit by the setting sun. Gabriel was relieved to see the first lines around Chiara’s eyes. He always feared she was far too young for him and that one day, when he was old, she would leave him for another man. He tugged at the bedsheet, exposing her breast. She held his gaze for a moment, then closed her eyes.

“You’re lucky I was here,” she said. “I might have been away on assignment.”

She was a talker. Gabriel had learned long ago it was pointless to ask her to remain silent while posing for him.

“You haven’t worked since that job in Switzerland.”

“How do you know about that operation?”

Gabriel gave her an inscrutable glance over the top of his sketchpad and reminded her not to move.

“So much for the concept of need to know. It seems you can walk into Operations any time you feel like it and find out what I’m doing.” She started to turn her head, but Gabriel stilled her with a sharp tsk-tsk. “But I shouldn’t be surprised. Have they given you the directorate yet?”

“Which directorate is that?” Gabriel said, being deliberately obtuse.

“Special Operations.”

Gabriel confessed that the post had been offered and accepted.

“So you’re my boss now,” she pointed out. “I suppose we just violated about a half dozen different Office edicts about fraternization between senior officers and staff.”

“At least,” said Gabriel. “But my promotion isn’t official yet.”

“Oh, thank goodness. I wouldn’t want the great Gabriel to get into any sort of trouble because of his sex life. How much longer are we allowed to plunder each other’s bodies before we run into trouble with Personnel?”

“As long as we like. We’ll just have to go on the record with them at some point.”

“And what about God, Gabriel? Will you go on the record with God this time?” There was silence, except for the scratching of a charcoal pencil across paper. She changed the subject. “How much do you know about what I was doing in Switzerland?”

“I know that you went to Zermatt to seduce a Swiss arms merchant who was about to make a deal with someone who didn’t have our best interests at heart. King Saul Boulevard wanted to know when the shipment was leaving and where it was bound.”

After a long silence he asked her whether she had slept with the Swiss.

“It wasn’t that kind of operation. I was working with another agent. I just kept the arms dealer entertained in the bar while the other agent broke into his room and stole the contents of his computer. Besides, you know that a bat leveyha isn’t supposed to be used for sex. We hire professionals for that sort of thing.”

“Not always.”

“I could never use my body like that. I’m a religious girl.” She smiled at him mischievously. “We got it, by the way. The boat had a mysterious accident near the coast of Crete. The weapons are now on the bottom of the sea.”

“I know,” Gabriel said. “Close your eyes again.”

“Make me,” she said, then she smiled and did what he wanted. “Aren’t you going to ask me whether I was with anyone while we were apart?”

“It’s none of my business.”

“But you must be curious. I can only imagine what you did to my apartment when you walked through the door.”

“If you’re suggesting I searched your things, I didn’t.”

“Oh, please.”

“Why can’t you sleep?”

“Do you really want me to answer that?”

He made no reply.

“There was no one else, Gabriel, but then you knew that, didn’t you? How could there be?” She gave him a bittersweet smile. “They never tell you that when they ask you to join their exclusive club. They never tell you how the lies begin to add up, or that you’ll never truly be comfortable around people who aren’t members. Is that the only reason why you fell in love with me, Gabriel? Because I was Office?”

“I liked your fettuccini and mushrooms. You make the best fettuccini and mushrooms in all of Venice.”

“And what about you? Were you with any other women while I was gone?”

“I spent all my time with a very large canvas.”

“Oh, yes, I forgot about your affliction. You can’t make love to a woman unless she knows you’ve killed on behalf of your country. I’m sure you could have found someone suitable at King Saul Boulevard if you’d set your mind to it. Every woman in the Office lusts after you.”

“You’re talking too much. I’ll never finish this if you keep talking.”

“I’m hungry. You shouldn’t have mentioned food. How’s Leah, by the way?”

Gabriel stopped sketching and glared at Chiara over the top of the sketchpad, as if to tell her he did not appreciate the rather cavalier juxta-position of food and his wife.

“I’m sorry,” Chiara said. “How is she?”

Gabriel heard himself say that Leah was doing well, that two or three days a week he drove up to the psychiatric hospital atop Mount Herzl to spend a few minutes with her. But as he told her these things his mind was elsewhere; on a tiny street in Vienna not far from the Judenplatz; on the car bomb that killed his son and the inferno that destroyed Leah’s body and stole her memory. For thirteen years she had been silent in his presence. Now, for brief periods, she spoke to him. Recently, in the garden of the hospital, she had posed to him the same question Chiara had a moment earlier: Were there other women while I was gone? He had answered her truthfully.

“Did you love this girl, Gabriel?”

“I loved her, but I gave her up for you.”

“Why on earth would you do that, my love? Look at me. There’s nothing left of me. Nothing but a memory.”

Chiara had lapsed into silence. The light on her face was fading slowly from coral-red to gray. The plump woman appeared in the window opposite and began reeling in her laundry. Chiara lifted the sheet to her throat.

“What are you doing?”

“I don’t want Signora Lorenzetto to see me naked.”

Gabriel, in pulling the sheet down to its original position, left a smudge of charcoal on her breast.

“I suppose I have to move back to Jerusalem,” she said. “Unless you feel like telling Shamron that you can’t take over Special Ops because you’re coming back to Venice.”

“It’s tempting,” Gabriel said.

“Tempting, but not possible. You’re a loyal soldier, Gabriel. You always do what you’re told. You always did.” She brushed the charcoal from her breast. “At least I won’t have to decorate the apartment.”

Gabriel’s eyes remained downward toward the sketchpad. Chiara studied his expression, then asked, “Gabriel, what have you done to the apartment?”

“I’m afraid I needed a place to work.”

“So you just moved some things around?”

“You know, I’m getting hungry, too.”

“Gabriel Allon, is there anything left?”

“It’s warm tonight,” he said. “Let’s take the boat out to Murano and have fish.”

9.

IT WAS EIGHT O’CLOCK the following evening when Gabriel returned to Narkiss Street. Shamron’s car was parked at the curb and Rami, his bodyguard, was standing watch in the walkway outside Number 16. Upstairs Gabriel found all the lights on and Shamron drinking coffee at the kitchen table.

“How did you get in?”

“In case you’ve forgotten, this used to be an Office safe flat. There’s a key in Housekeeping.”

“Yes, but I changed the locks over the summer.”

“Really?”

“I guess I’ll have to change them again.”

“Don’t bother.”

Gabriel pushed open the window to vent the smoke from the room. Six cigarette butts lay like spent bullets in one of Gabriel’s saucers. Shamron had been here for some time.

“How was Venice?” Shamron asked.

“ Venice was lovely, but the next time you break into my flat, please have the courtesy to not smoke.” Gabriel picked up the saucer by the edge and poured the cigarette butts into the garbage. “What’s so urgent it couldn’t wait till the morning?”

“Another Saudi link to the attack on the Vatican.”

Gabriel looked up at Shamron. “What is it?”

“Ibrahim el-Banna.”

“The Egyptian cleric? Why am I not surprised.”

Gabriel sat down at the table.

“Two nights ago our station chief in Cairo held a secret meeting with one of our top sources inside the Egyptian Mukhabarat. It seems Professor Ibrahim el-Banna had a well-established militant pedigree, long before he went to the Vatican. His older brother was a member of the Muslim Brotherhood and was a close associate of Ayman al-Zawahiri, the number-two man in al-Qaeda. A nephew went to Iraq to fight the Americans and was killed in the siege of Fallujah. Apparently tapes of the imam’s sermons are required listening among Egyptian Islamic militants.”

“Too bad our friend in the Mukhabarat didn’t tell the Vatican the truth about el-Banna. Seven hundred people might be alive-and the Dome of the Basilica might not have a hole in it.”

“The Egyptians knew something else about Professor el-Banna,” Shamron said. “Throughout much of the eighties and nineties, when the problem of Islamic fundamentalism was exploding in Egypt, Professor el-Banna received regular cash payments and instructions from a Saudi who posed as an official of the International Islamic Relief Organization, one of the main Saudi charities. This man called himself Khalil, but Egyptian intelligence knew his real name: Ahmed bin Shafiq. What makes this even more interesting is bin Shafiq’s occupation at that time.”

“He was GID,” said Gabriel.

“Exactly.”

The GID, or General Intelligence Department, was the name of the Saudi intelligence service.

“What do we know about him?”

“Until four years ago, bin Shafiq was chief of a clandestine GID unit code-named Group 205, which was responsible for establishing and maintaining links between Saudi Arabia and Islamic militant groups around the Middle East. Egypt was one of Group 205’s top priorities, along with Afghanistan, of course.”

“What’s the significance of the number?”

“It was the extension of bin Shafiq’s office in GID Headquarters.”

“What happened four years ago?”

“Bin Shafiq and his operatives were funneling matériel and money to the terrorists of Hamas and Islamic Jihad. A Palestinian informant told us about the operation, and we told the Americans. The American president showed our evidence to the king and brought pressure on him to shut down Group 205. That was six months after 9/11, and the king had no choice but to accede to the president’s wishes, much to the dismay of bin Shafiq and other hardliners inside the kingdom. Group 205 was terminated, and bin Shafiq was run out of the GID.”

“Has he gone over to the other side of the street?”

“Are you asking whether he’s a terrorist? The answer is, we don’t know. What we do know is that Islamic militancy is in his blood. His grandfather was a commander of the Ikhwan, the Islamic movement created by Ibn Saud at the turn of the nineteenth century in the Najd.”

Gabriel knew the Ikhwan well. In many respects they were the prototype and spiritual precursor of today’s Islamic militant groups.

“Where else did bin Shafiq operate when he was with Group 205?”

“ Afghanistan, Pakistan, Jordan, Lebanon, Algeria. We even suspect he’s been in the West Bank.”

“So it’s possible we’re dealing with someone who has terrorist contacts ranging from al-Qaeda to Hamas to the Muslim Brotherhood of Egypt. If bin Shafiq has gone over to the other side, he’s the nightmare scenario. The perfect terrorist mastermind.”

“We found another interesting tidbit in our own files,” Shamron said. “About two years ago we were receiving reports of a Saudi trolling the camps of southern Lebanon looking for experienced fighters. According to the reports, this Saudi called himself Khalil.”

“The same name bin Shafiq used in Cairo.”

“Unfortunately, we didn’t pursue it. Frankly, if we chased down every moneyed Saudi who was trying to raise an army to wage jihad, we wouldn’t get much else done. Hindsight, as they say, is twenty-twenty.”

“How much more do we have on bin Shafiq?”

“Precious little, I’m afraid.”

“What about a photograph?”

Shamron shook his head. “As you might expect, he’s somewhat camera shy.”

“We need to share, Ari. The Italians need to know that there may be a Saudi connection. So do the Americans.”

“I know.” Shamron’s tone was gloomy. The idea of sharing a hard-won piece of intelligence was heresy to him, especially if nothing was to be gained in return. “It used to be blue and white,” he said, referencing the national colors of Israel. “That was our motto. Our belief system. We did things ourselves. We didn’t ask others for help, and we didn’t help others with problems of their own making.”

“The world has changed, Ari.”

“Perhaps it’s a world I’m not cut out for. When we were fighting the PLO or Black September, it was simple Newtonian physics. Hit them here, squeeze them there. Watch them, listen to them, identify the members of their organization, eliminate their leadership. Now we’re fighting a movement-a cancer that has metastasized to every vital organ of the body. It’s like trying to capture fog in a glass. The old rules don’t apply. Blue and white isn’t enough. I can tell you one thing, though. This isn’t going to go down well in Washington. The Saudis have many friends there.”

“Money will do that,” Gabriel said. “But the Americans need to know the truth about their best friend in the Arab world.”

“They know the truth. They just don’t want to face it. The Americans know that in many ways the Saudis are the wellspring of Islamic terrorism, that the Saudis planted the seeds, watered them with petrodollars, and fertilized them with Wahhabi hatred and propaganda. The Americans seem content to live with this, as if Saudi-inspired terrorism is just a small surcharge on every tank of gasoline. What they don’t understand is that terrorism can never be defeated unless they go after the source: Riyadh and the al-Saud.”

“All the more reason to share with them intelligence linking the GID and the al-Saud to the attack on the Vatican.”

“I’m glad you think so, because you’ve been nominated to go to Washington to brief them on what we know.”

“When do I leave?”

“Tomorrow morning.”

Shamron looked absently out the window and for the second time asked Gabriel about his trip to Venice.

“I was lured there under false pretenses,” Gabriel said. “But I’m glad I went.”

“Who did the luring?”

Gabriel told him. The smile that appeared on Shamron’s face made Gabriel wonder whether he was involved in the operation as well.

“Is she coming here?”

“We spent a single day together,” Gabriel said. “We weren’t able to make any plans.”

“I’m not sure I believe that,” Shamron said warily. “Surely you’re not contemplating a return to Venice. Have you forgotten you’ve made a commitment to take over Special Ops.”

“No, I haven’t forgotten.”

“By the way, your appointment will be made official when you return from Washington.”

“I’m counting the hours.”

Shamron looked around the apartment. “Did you confess to Chiara that you gave away all her furniture?”

“She knows I had to make some changes to accommodate my studio.”

“She’s not going to be happy,” Shamron said. “I’d give anything to see Chiara’s face when she walks in here for the first time.”

SHAMRON STAYED FOR another hour, debriefing Gabriel about the attack on the Vatican. At nine-fifteen Gabriel walked him down to the car, then stood in the street for a moment and watched the taillights disappear around the corner. He went back upstairs and put the kitchen in order, then shut out the lights and went into his bedroom. Just then the apartment block shook with the clap of a thunderous explosion. Like all Israelis, he had become adept at estimating the casualty toll of suicide bombs by counting the sirens. The more sirens, the more ambulances. The more ambulances, the more dead and wounded. He heard a single siren, then another, then a third. Not too large, he thought. He switched on the television and waited for the first bulletin, but fifteen minutes after the explosion there was still no word. In frustration he picked up the phone and dialed Shamron’s car. There was no answer.