by Daniel Silva
“You’re suggesting they were watching the watchers?”
“Exactly.”
“But how did they know we were going to be there?”
“Ostrovsky’s probably been under watch in Moscow for months. When he came to Rome, he made contact with our embassy on an insecure line. Someone from the other side picked up the call, either here in Rome or from a listening post in Moscow. The assassin is a real pro. He knew we wouldn’t go near Ostrovsky without sending him on a surveillance detection run. And he did what real pros are trained to do. He ignored the target and watched us instead.”
“But how did he get to the Vatican ten minutes before Ostrovsky?”
“He must have been following me. I missed him, Eli. It’s my fault Ostrovsky died a miserable death on the floor of the Basilica.”
“It makes sense, but it’s not something your average run-of-the-mill Russian gangster could pull off.”
“We’re not dealing with gangsters. These are professionals.”
Lavon handed the photographs back to Gabriel. “Whatever it was Boris intended to tell you, it must have been important. Someone needs to find out who this man is and whom he’s working for.”
“Yes, someone should.”
“I could be wrong, Gabriel, but I think King Saul Boulevard already has a candidate in mind for the job.”
Lavon handed him a slip of paper.
“What’s this?”
“A message from Shamron.”
“What does it say?”
“It says your honeymoon is now officially over.”
10
BEN-GURION AIRPORT, ISRAEL
There is a VIP reception room at Ben-Gurion Airport that few people know and where even fewer have set foot. Reached by an unmarked door near passport control, it has walls of Jerusalem limestone, furnishings of black leather, and a permanent odor of burnt coffee and male tension. When Gabriel entered the room the following evening, he found it occupied by a single man. He had settled himself at the edge of his chair, with his legs slightly splayed and his large hands resting atop an olive-wood cane, like a traveler on a rail platform resigned to a long wait. He was dressed, as always, in a pair of pressed khaki trousers and a white oxford cloth shirt with the sleeves rolled up to the elbows. His head was bullet-shaped and bald, except for a monkish fringe of white hair. His ugly wire-framed spectacles magnified a pair of blue eyes that were no longer clear.
“How long have you been sitting there?” Gabriel asked.
“Since the day you returned to Italy,” replied Ari Shamron.
Gabriel regarded him carefully.
“Why are you looking at me like that?”
“I’m just wondering why you’re not smoking.”
“Gilah told me I have to quit—or else.”
“That’s never stopped you before.”
“This time she means it.”
Gabriel kissed Shamron on the top of the head. “Why didn’t you just let someone from Transport pick me up?”
“I was in the neighborhood.”
“You live in Tiberias! You’re retired now, Ari. You should be spending time with Gilah to make up for all those years when you were never around.”
“I’m never going to retire!” Shamron thumped the arm of his chair for emphasis. “As for Gilah, she was the one who suggested I come here to wait for you. She told me to get out of the house for a few hours. She said I was underfoot.”
Shamron closed his hooded eyes for a moment and gave a ghost of a smile. His loved ones, like his power and influence, had slowly slipped through his fingers. His son was a brigadier general in the IDF’s Northern Command and used almost any excuse to avoid spending time with his famous father, as did his daughter, who had finally returned to Israel after spending years abroad. Only Gilah, his long-suffering wife, remained faithfully by his side, but now that Shamron had no formal role in the affairs of state, even Gilah, a woman of infinite patience, found his constant presence a burden. His real family were men like Gabriel, Navot, and Lavon—men whom he had recruited and trained, men who operated by a creed, even spoke a language, written by him. They were the secret guardians of the State, and Ari Shamron was their overbearing, tyrannical father.
“I made a foolish wager a long time ago,” Shamron said. “I devoted my life to building and protecting this country and I assumed that my wife and children would forgive my sins of absence and neglect. I was wrong, of course.”
“And now you want to inflict the same outcome on my life.”
“You’re referring to the fact I’ve interrupted your honeymoon?”
“I am.”
“Your wife is still on the Office payroll. She understands the demands of your work. Besides, you’ve been gone for over a month.”
“We agreed my stay in Italy would be indefinite.”
“We agreed to no such thing, Gabriel. You issued a demand and at the time I was in no position to turn it down—not after what you’d just gone through in London.” Shamron squeezed his deeply lined face into a heavy frown. “Do you know what I did for my honeymoon?”
“Of course I know what you did for your honeymoon. The whole country knows what you did for your honeymoon.”
Shamron smiled. It was an exaggeration, of course, but only a slight one. Within the corridors and conference rooms of the Israeli intelligence and security services, Ari Shamron was a legend. He had penetrated the courts of kings, stolen the secrets of tyrants, and killed the enemies of Israel, sometimes with his bare hands. His crowning achievement had come on a rainy night in May 1960, in a squalid suburb north of Buenos Aires, when he had leapt from the back of a car and seized Adolf Eichmann, architect of the Holocaust. Even now, Shamron could not go out in public in Israel without being approached by aging survivors who simply wanted to touch the hands that had clamped around the neck of the monster.
“Gilah and I were married in April of ’forty-seven, at the height of the War of Independence. I put my foot on a glass, our friends and family shouted ‘Mazel tov,’ then I kissed my new wife and went back to join my Palmach unit.”
“They were different times, Ari.”
“Not so different. We were fighting for survival then and we fight for survival now.” Shamron scrutinized Gabriel for a long moment through his spectacles. “But you already know that, don’t you, Gabriel? That explains why you simply didn’t ignore my message and return to your villa in Umbria.”
“I should have ignored your original summons. Then I wouldn’t be back here.” He made a show of looking around the dreary furnishings. “Back in this room.”
“I wasn’t the one who summoned you. Boris Ostrovsky did. Then he had the terrible misfortune of dying in your arms. And now you’re going to find out who killed him and why. Under the circumstances, it is the least you can do for him.”
Gabriel glanced at his wristwatch. “Did Eli make it in all right?”
They had traveled on separate planes and by different routes. Lavon had taken the direct flight from Fiumicino to Ben-Gurion; Gabriel had flown first to Frankfurt, where he had spent three hours waiting for a connecting flight. He had put the time to good use by walking several miles through Frankfurt’s endless terminals, searching his tail for Russian assassins.
“Eli’s already inside King Saul Boulevard undergoing a rather unpleasant debriefing. When they’re finished with him, they’d like a crack at you as well. As you might expect, Amos is unhappy about the way things turned out in Rome. Given his precarious position, he wants to make certain that you’re the one who gets the blame rather than him.”
Amos Sharret was the director of the Office. Like nearly everyone else at the top of Israel’s security and military establishment, he had come under intense criticism for his performance during the most recent war in Lebanon and was now hanging on to the reins of power by his fingernails. Shamron and his allies in the Prime Minister’s Office were quietly trying to pry them loose.
“Someone should tell Amos that I�
��m not interested in his job.”
“He wouldn’t believe it. Amos sees enemies everywhere. It’s a professionalaffliction.” Shamron inched toward the edge of his chair and used his cane to leverage himself upright. “Come,” he said. “I’ll take you home.”
An armored Peugeot limousine was waiting outside in the secure VIP parking area. They climbed into the back and headed toward the Judean Hills.
“There were developments in Rome this evening after you boarded your flight in Frankfurt. The Italian Ministry of Justice sent a letter to the Vatican, formally requesting permission to take over the investigation into Ostrovsky’s death. I don’t suppose I have to tell you how the Vatican responded.”
“Donati agreed immediately.”
“Actually, it was the Vatican secretary of state who issued the formal response, but I’m sure your friend the monsignor was whispering into his ear. The Italian police have taken possession of Ostrovsky’s body and removed all his luggage and personal effects from his room at the Excelsior. Hazmat teams are now searching the hotel for evidence of poisons and other toxins. As for the Basilica, it’s been cordoned off and is being treated as a crime scene. The Ministry of Justice has asked all those who witnessed the death to come forward immediately. I suppose that would include you.” Shamron scrutinized Gabriel for a moment. “It seems to me your position vis-à-vis Boris Ostrovsky is somewhat tenuous at the moment.”
“Donati has promised to keep my name out of it.”
“God knows the Vatican is good at keeping secrets, but surely there are others there who know about your connection to this affair. If one of them wants to embarrass Donati—or us, for that matter—all they have to do is make a quiet phone call to the Polizia di Stato.”
“Boris Ostrovsky was killed by a professional Russian assassin in St. Peter’s Square.” Gabriel removed a manila folder from the side flap of his bag and handed it to Shamron. “And these pictures prove it.”
Shamron switched on his overhead reading light and examined the photos. “It’s a brazen act, even by Russian standards. Ostrovsky must have known something very important for them to resort to this.”
“I take it you have a theory?”
“Unfortunately, we do.” Shamron slipped the photos back into the file folder and switched off the lamp. “Our good friends in the Kremlin have been selling sophisticated weapons systems to the rogue regimes of the Middle East at an unprecedented rate. The mullahs of Iran are one of their best customers, but they’ve also been selling antiaircraft and antitank systems to their old friends in Damascus. We’ve been picking up reports that the Syrians and the Kremlin are about to close a major deal involving an advanced Russian missile known as the Iskander. It’s a road-mobile weapon with a range of one hundred seventy miles, which means Tel Aviv would be well within Syria’s range. I don’t need to explain the ramifications of that to you.”
“It would alter the strategic balance in the Middle East overnight.”
Shamron nodded his head slowly. “And unfortunately, given the track record of the Kremlin, it’s only one of many unsettling possibilities. The entire region is bristling with rumors of some kind of new deal somewhere. We’ve been hammering away at the issue for months. So far, we’ve been unable to come up with anything we can take to the prime minister. I’m afraid he’s beginning to get annoyed.”
“It’s part of his job description.”
“And mine.” Shamron smiled humorlessly. “All of this goes to explain why we were so interested in having you meet with Boris Ostrovsky in the first place. And why we would now like you to travel to Russia to find out what he intended to say to you.”
“Me? I’ve never set foot in Russia. I don’t know the terrain. I don’t even speak the language.”
“You have something more important than local knowledge and language.”
“What’s that?”
“A name and a face that the extremely nervous staff of Moscovsky Gazeta will recognize.”
“Chances are, the Russian security services will recognize it, too.”
“We have a plan for that,” Shamron said.
The Old Man smiled. He had a plan for everything.
11
JERUSALEM
There were security agents at either end of Narkiss Street, a quiet, leafy lane in the heart of Jerusalem, and another standing watch outside the entrance of the dowdy little limestone apartment house at Number 16. Gabriel, as he crossed the tiny foyer with Shamron at his heels, didn’t bother checking the postbox. He never received mail, and the name on the box was false. As far as the bureaucracy of the State of Israel was concerned, Gabriel Allon did not exist. He was no one, he lived nowhere. He was the eternal wandering Jew.
Uzi Navot was seated on the living-room couch in Gabriel’s apartment, with his feet propped on the coffee table and an Israeli diplomatic passport wedged between the first two fingers of his right hand. He adopted an expression of bored indifference as he handed it over for inspection. Gabriel opened the cover and looked at the photograph. It showed a silver-haired man with a neat gray beard and round eyeglasses. The silver hair was the handiwork of a stylist who worked for Identity. The gray beard, unfortunately, was his own.
“Who’s Natan Golani?”
“A midlevel functionary in the Ministry of Culture. He specializes in building artistic bridges between Israel and the rest of the world: peace through art, dance, music, and other pointless endeavors. I’m told Natan is rather handy with a paintbrush himself.”
“Has he ever been to Russia?”
“No, but he’s about to.” Navot removed his feet from the coffee table and sat up. “Six days from now, the deputy minister is scheduled to travel from Jerusalem to Russia for an official visit. We’ve prevailed upon him to become ill at the last moment.”
“And Natan Golani will go in his place?”
“Provided the Russians agree to grant him a visa. The ministry anticipates no problems on that front.”
“What’s the purpose of his trip?”
Navot reached into his stainless steel attaché case and removed a glossy magazine-sized brochure. He held it aloft for Gabriel to see the cover, then dropped it on the coffee table. Gabriel’s eyes focused on a single word: UNESCO.
“Perhaps it escaped your notice, but the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, better known as UNESCO, has declared this ‘the decade for the promotion of a culture of peace and nonviolence for the children of the world.’ ”
“You’re right, Uzi. Somehow I missed that.”
“In furtherance of that noble goal, it holds a conference each year to assess progress and discuss new initiatives. This year’s conference will be held at the Marble Palace in St. Petersburg.”
“How many days of this nonsense do I have to sit through?”
“Three,” said Navot. “Your speech is scheduled for day two of the conference. Your remarks will focus on a groundbreaking new program we’ve instituted to improve cultural ties between Israelis and our Arab neighbors. You will be roundly criticized and, in all likelihood, denounced as an oppressor and an occupier. Many of those in attendance will not hear your remarks, however, because, as is customary,they will walk out of the hall en masse as you mount the rostrum.”
“It’s better that way, Uzi. I’ve never really enjoyed speaking to large crowds. What happens next?”
“At the conclusion of the conference, our ambassador to Russia, who happens to be an old friend of yours, will invite you to visit Moscow. If you are fortunate enough to survive the Aeroflot flight, you will check into the Savoy Hotel and sample the cultural delights of the capital. The true purpose of your visit, however, will be to establish contact with one Olga Sukhova. She’s one of Russia’s best-known and most controversial investigative journalists. She’s also the acting editor in chief of Moskovsky Gazeta. If there’s anyone at the Gazeta who knows why Boris Ostrovsky went to Rome, it’s Olga.”