Gabriel Allon 01 - The Kill Artist

by Daniel Silva

“Dank u.”

  The girl stepped aside so Tariq could pass. She closed the door to keep out the cold and waited with one hand on the latch for Tariq to place the box on a table in the entrance hall and leave. He set down the package and drew the Makarov while turning around. This time the silencer was screwed into place.

  The girl opened her mouth to scream. Tariq shot her twice in the throat.

  He dragged the body out of the entrance hall and used a towel from the bathroom to wipe up the trail of blood. Then he sat in the darkened dining room and waited for David and Cynthia Morgenthau to come home.

  20

  PARIS

  Shamron summoned Gabriel to the Tuileries Gardens the following morning for a crash meeting. Gabriel found him seated on a bench next to a gravel footpath, surrounded by a gang of pigeons. He wore a slate-gray silk scarf around his neck with the ends tucked neatly beneath the lapels of his black overcoat so that his bald head seemed to be mounted atop a pedestal. He stood up, removed a black leather glove from his right hand, and stuck it out like a trench knife. Gabriel found his palm unusually warm and damp. Shamron blew into the throat of the glove and quickly put it back on. He was not accustomed to cold climates, and Paris in winter depressed him.

  They walked quickly, not like two men talking in a park but like two men going somewhere in a hurry—along the footpaths of the Tuileries, across the windswept Place de la Concorde. Dead leaves rattled at their feet as they marched along the tree-lined sidewalk next to the Champs-Élysées.

  “We received a report this morning from a sayan in the Dutch security service,” Shamron said. “It was Tariq who killed David Morgenthau and his wife in Amsterdam.”

  “How can they be so certain?”

  “They’re not certain, but I am. The Amsterdam police discovered a dead girl on a houseboat in the Amstel. She had overdosed on heroin. Her brother was dead too.”

  “Heroin?”

  “A single bullet through the eye.”

  “What happened?”

  “According to the girl’s neighbors, an Arab woman moved into the houseboat a couple of weeks ago. She left a couple of days ago and a man took her place. A Frenchman who called himself Paul.”

  “So Tariq sent an agent to Amsterdam ahead of time to secure safe lodging and a girl for cover.”

  “And when he was finished with her, he fed her enough heroin to kill a camel. The police say the girl had a history of drug use and prostitution. Obviously, he thought he could make it look like an accidental overdose.”

  “How did the brother end up dead?”

  “The houseboat is registered in his name. According to the police, he’s been working in Rotterdam on a construction project. Maybe he appeared on the scene unannounced while Tariq was killing his sister.”

  “Makes sense.”

  “Actually, there’s evidence to support that theory. A couple of the neighbors heard the gunshot. If Tariq had been planning to kill the brother, he would have used a quieter method of execution. Maybe he was surprised.”

  “Have they compared the slug from the brother with the slugs taken from the Morgenthaus and the maid?”

  “It’s a perfect match. Same gun killed all four people.”

  A young Swedish couple was posing for a photograph. Gabriel and Shamron turned abruptly and walked the other way.

  Gabriel said, “Any other news?”

  “I want you to watch your step in London. A man from Langley paid a courtesy call on me last week. The Americans have been told by their sources that Tariq was involved in Paris. They want him arrested and prosecuted in the United States.”

  “The last thing we need now is to be tripping over the CIA.”

  “It gets worse, I’m afraid. The man from Langley also dropped a not-so-subtle warning about the pitfalls of operating in certain countries without permission.”

  “Do they know anything?”

  “I doubt it, but I wouldn’t rule it out completely.”

  “I was hoping that my return to the Office wouldn’t land me in a British jail.”

  “It won’t as long as you stay disciplined.”

  “Thanks for the vote of confidence.”

  “Did you find her?” Shamron asked, changing the subject.

  Gabriel nodded.

  “And she’s willing to do it?”

  “It took me a while to convince her, but she agreed.”

  “Why are all my children so reluctant to come home again? Was I such an errant father?”

  “Just an overly demanding one.”

  Gabriel stopped in front of a café on the Champs-Élysées. Jacqueline was seated in the window, wearing large sunglasses and reading a magazine. She glanced up as they approached, then turned her gaze to her magazine once more.

  Shamron said, “It’s nice to see you two working together again. Just don’t break her heart this time. She’s a good girl.”

  “I know.”

  “You’ll need a cover job for her in London. I know someone who’s looking for a secretary.”

  “I’m one step ahead of you.”

  Shamron smiled and walked away. He melted into the crowds along the Champs-Élysées and a moment later was gone.

  Julian Isherwood made his way across the wet bricks of Mason’s Yard. It was three-thirty, and he was just returning to the gallery from lunch. He was drunk. He hadn’t noticed that he was drunk until he stepped out the door of Green’s and took a few deep breaths of the freezing, damp air. The oxygen had resuscitated his brain, and his brain had alerted his body that once again he had poured too much wine into it. His lunch mate had been the tubby Oliver Dimbleby, and once again the topic of conversation had been Oliver’s proposal to buy out Isherwood Fine Arts. This time Isherwood had managed to maintain his composure and discuss the situation somewhat rationally—though not without the assistance of two bottles of superb Sancerre. When one is discussing the dismemberment of one’s business—one’s very soul, he thought—one is allowed to dull the pain with good French wine.

  He pulled his coat up around his ears. A blast of wet wind poured through the passageway from Duke Street. Isherwood found himself caught in a whirlpool of dead leaves and wet rubbish. He stumbled forward a few steps, hands shielding his face, until the maelstrom spun itself out. For Christ’s sake! Dreadful climate. Positively Siberian. He considered slipping into the pub for something to warm his bones but thought better of it. He’d done enough damage for one afternoon.

  He used his key to unlock the door on the ground floor, slowly climbed the stairs, thinking he really should do something about the carpet. On the landing was the entrance to a small travel agency. The walls were hung with posters of fiercely tanned amazons frolicking half naked in the sun. Perhaps this is the best thing for me, he thought, staring at a topless girl lying facedown in perfect white sand. Perhaps I should get out while I still have a few decent years left in me. Flee London, go someplace warm, lick my wounds.

  He shoved the key into the lock, pushed back the door, removed his coat, and hung it on the hook in the anteroom. Then he stepped into his office and flipped the light switch.

  “Hello, Julian.”

  Isherwood spun around and found himself face-to-face with Gabriel Allon. “You! How the bloody hell did you get in here?”

  “Do you really want to know?”

  “I suppose not,” said Isherwood. “What in God’s name are you doing here? And where have you been?”

  “I need a favor.”

  “You need a favor! You need a favor—from me! You ran out on me in the middle of a job. You left my Vecellio in a Cornish cottage with no security.”

  “Sometimes the best place to hide a priceless Vecellio is the last place anyone would think to look for it. If I had wanted to help myself to the contents of your vault downstairs, I could have done it quite easily.”

  “That’s because you’re a freak of nature!”

  “There’s no need to get personal, Julian.”

  “Oh, real
ly. How’s this for personal?” He picked up a coffee mug from his desk and threw it directly at Gabriel’s head.

  Gabriel could see that Isherwood had been drinking, so he pulled him back outside to sober him. They circled the footpaths of Green Park until Isherwood grew tired and settled himself on a bench. Gabriel sat next to him and waited for a couple to pass by before he started to speak again.

  “Can she type?” Isherwood said. “Does she know how to answer the telephone? How to take a message?”

  “I don’t think she’s done an honest day’s work her entire life.”

  “Oh, how perfect. Absolutely stupendous.”

  “She’s a smart girl. I’m sure she’ll be able to help out around the office.”

  “That’s comforting. Am I allowed to ask why I’m supposed to hire this woman?”

  “Julian, please.”

  “Julian, please. Julian, mind your own business. Julian, shut up and do as we tell you. It’s always the same with you people. And all the while my business is going straight to hell. Oliver’s made me an offer. I’m going to take him up on it.”

  “Oliver doesn’t seem like your type.”

  “Beggars can’t be choosers. I wouldn’t be in this position if you hadn’t run out on me.”

  “I didn’t run out on you.”

  “What do you call it, Gabriel?”

  “It’s just something I need to do. It’s just like the old days.”

  “In the old days that was part of the arrangement going in. But these aren’t the old days. This is business—straight fucking business, Gabriel—and you’ve given me the right royal shaft. What am I supposed to do about the Vecellio while you’re playing games with Ari?”

  “Wait for me,” Gabriel said. “This will be over soon, and I’ll work day and night on it until it’s finished.”

  “I don’t want a crash job. I brought it to you because I knew you would take your time and do it right. If I wanted a crash job, I could have hired a hack to do it for a third of what I’m paying you.”

  “Give me some time. Keep your buyer at bay, and whatever you do, don’t sell out to Oliver Dimbleby. You’ll never forgive yourself.”

  Isherwood looked at his watch and stood up. “I have an appointment. Someone who actually wants to buy a picture.” He turned and started to walk away; then he stopped and said, “By the way, you left a brokenhearted little boy behind in Cornwall.”

  “Peel,” Gabriel said distantly.

  “It’s funny, Gabriel, but I never had you figured for the type that would hurt a child. Tell your girl to be at the gallery at nine o’clock tomorrow morning. And tell her not to be late.”

  “She’ll be there.”

  “What am I to call this secretary you’re sending me?”

  “You may call her Dominique.”

  “Good-looking?” Isherwood said, regaining a bit of his old humor.

  “Not bad.”

  21

  MAIDA VALE, LONDON

  Gabriel carried the suitcases in while Jacqueline surveyed her new home, a cramped bed-sit flat with a single window overlooking an inner courtyard. A foldout couch, a club chair of cracked leather, a small writing desk. Next to the window was a flaking radiator and next to the radiator a door leading to a kitchen scarcely larger than the galley on Gabriel’s ketch. Jacqueline went into the kitchen and began opening and closing cabinets, sadly, as if each was more repulsive than the last.

  “I had the bodel do a bit of shopping for you.”

  “Couldn’t you have found something a little bit nicer?”

  “Dominique Bonard is a girl from Paris who came to London in search of work. I didn’t think a three-bedroom maisonette in Mayfair was appropriate.”

  “Is that where you’re staying?”

  “Not exactly.”

  “Stay for a few minutes. I find the thought of being alone here depressing.”

  “A few.”

  She filled the kettle with water, placed it on the stove, and switched on the burner. Gabriel found tea bags and a box of shelf milk. She prepared two mugs of tea and carried them into the sitting room. Gabriel was on the couch. Jacqueline removed her shoes and sat across from him, knees beneath her chin. “When do we start?”

  “Tomorrow night. If that doesn’t work, we’ll try the next night.”

  She lit a cigarette, threw back her head, blew smoke at the ceiling. Then she looked at Gabriel and narrowed her eyes. “Do you remember that night in Tunis?”

  “Which night?”

  “The night of the operation.”

  “Of course I remember it.”

  “I remember it as though it were yesterday.” She closed her eyes. “I especially remember the trip across the water back to the boat. I was so excited I couldn’t feel my body. I was flying. We had actually done it. We had walked right into that bastard’s house in the middle of a PLO compound and taken him out. I wanted to scream with joy. But I’ll never forget the look on your face. You were haunted. It was as if the dead men were sitting next to you in the boat.”

  “Very few people understand what it’s like to shoot a man at close range. Even fewer know what it’s like to place a gun against the side of his head and pull the trigger. Killing on the secret battlefield is different from killing a man on the Golan or Sinai, even when it’s a murderous bastard like Abu Jihad.”

  “I understand that now. I felt like such a fool when we got back to Tel Aviv. I acted like you had just scored the winning goal, and all the while you were dying inside. I hope you can forgive me.”

  “You don’t need to apologize.”

  “But what I don’t understand is how Shamron enticed you back after all these years.”

  “It has nothing to do with Shamron. It’s about Tariq.”

  “What about Tariq?”

  Gabriel sat silently for a moment, then stood and walked to the window. In the courtyard a trio of boys kicked a ball in amber lamplight, old newspaper floating above them in the wet wind like cinder.

  “Tariq’s older brother, Mahmoud, was a member of Black September. Ari Shamron tracked him to Cologne, and he sent me to finish him off. I slipped into his flat while he was sleeping and pointed a gun at his face. Then I woke him up so that he wouldn’t die a peaceful death. I shot him in both eyes. Seventeen years later Tariq took his revenge by blowing up my wife and son right before my eyes.”

  Jacqueline covered her mouth with her hands. Gabriel was still staring out the window, but she could tell it was Vienna that he saw now and not the boys playing in the courtyard.

  “For a long time I thought Tariq had made a mistake,” Gabriel said. “But he never makes mistakes like that. He’s careful, deliberate. He’s the perfect predator. He went after my family for a reason. He went after them to punish me for killing his brother. He knew it would be worse than death.” He turned to face her. “From one professional to another, it was an exquisite piece of work.”

  “And now you’re going to kill him in return?”

  He looked away and said nothing.

  “I always blamed myself for what happened in Vienna,” Jacqueline said. “If we hadn’t—”

  “It wasn’t your fault,” Gabriel said, cutting her off. “It was my fault, not yours. I should have known better. I behaved foolishly. But it’s over now.”

  The coldness of his voice felt like a knife in her chest. She took a long time crushing out her cigarette, then looked up at him. “Why did you tell Leah about us?”

  He stood in the window for a moment, saying nothing. Jacqueline feared she had taken it too far. She tried to think of some way to defuse the situation and change the subject, but she desperately wanted to know the answer. If Gabriel hadn’t confessed the affair, Leah and Dani would never have been with him on assignment in Vienna.

  “I told her because I didn’t want to lie to her. My entire life was a lie. Shamron had convinced me I was perfect, but I wasn’t perfect. For the first time in my life I had behaved with a bit of human frailty and w
eakness. I suppose I needed to share it with her. I suppose I needed someone to forgive me.”

  He picked up his coat. His face was twisted. He was angry, not with her but with himself. “You have a long day ahead of you tomorrow.” His voice was all business now. “Get settled and try to get some rest. Julian’s expecting you at nine o’clock.”

  And then he went out.

  For a few minutes she was distracted by the ritual of unpacking. Then the pain crept up on her, like the delayed sting of a slap. She collapsed onto the couch and began to cry. She lit another cigarette and looked around at the dreary little flat. What in the hell am I doing here? She had agreed to come back for one reason—because she thought she could make Gabriel love her—but he had dismissed their affair in Tunis as a moment of weakness. Still, why had he come back after all these years to kill Tariq? Was it simply revenge? An eye for an eye? No, she thought—Gabriel’s motives ran far deeper and were more complex than pure revenge. Perhaps he needed to kill Tariq in order to forgive himself for what happened to Leah and finally move on with his life. But will he ever be able to forgive me? Perhaps the only way to earn his forgiveness was to help him kill Tariq. And the only way I can help him kill Tariq is to make another man fall for me and take him to bed. She closed her eyes and thought of Yusef al-Tawfiki.

  Gabriel had left his car on the Ashworth Road. He made a show of dropping his keys on the curb and groping in the darkness as if he were trying to find them. In reality he was searching the undercarriage of the car, looking for something that shouldn’t be there—a mass, a loose wire. The car looked clean, so he climbed in, started the motor, drove in circles for a half hour through Maida Vale and Notting Hill, making certain he was not being followed.

  He was annoyed with himself. He had been taught—first by his father, then by Ari Shamron—that men who could not keep secrets were weak and inferior. His father had survived Auschwitz but refused ever to speak of it. He struck Gabriel only once—when Gabriel demanded that his father tell him what had happened at the camp. If it hadn’t been for the numbers tattooed on his right forearm, Gabriel might never have known that his father had suffered.