Gabriel Allon: Prince of Fire, the Messenger, the Secret Servant

by Daniel Silva

  There was another storm raging, one that went largely unnoticed by the global media and a human rights community seemingly obsessed with the alleged misdeeds of Gabriel and his team. On the other side of Israel’s western border, in Egypt, the regime of Hosni Mubarak was dealing with a Sword of Allah–inspired insurrection the way it had dealt with every Islamic challenge in the past—with overwhelming force and ruthless brutality. The Office had picked up reports of street battles between the army and Islamists from the Nile Delta to Upper Egypt. There were also reports of massacres, summary executions, widespread use of torture, and a concentration camp in the Western Desert where thousands of radicals were being held without charge. A hastily prepared Office estimate had concluded that Mubarak would likely survive the challenge and that, for the moment at least, Israel would not be confronted with an Islamic republic on its western flank. But at what cost? Repression breeds radicals, said the estimate, and radicals commit acts of terror.

  By the middle of January, Gabriel was strong enough to leave his bed. The doctor came round again and, after poking and prodding at his neck, decided it had healed sufficiently to remove the brace. Eager to shut out the unpleasant events swirling around him, he focused solely on plans for the wedding. He sat for hours with Chiara in the living room, leafing through glossy bridal magazines and engaged in deep and meaningful discussions about matters such as food and flowers. They chose a date in mid-May and prepared a provisional guest list, which included seven hundred names. After two hours of hard bargaining, they managed to pare only twenty of them. A week later, when the bruising in his face finally dissipated to an acceptable level, they ventured out into Jerusalem together to inspect hotel ballrooms and other potential sites for the ceremony and reception. The special events coordinator at the King David Hotel, after inquiring about the size of the guest list, jokingly insisted they consider holding the wedding at Teddy Kollek Stadium instead, a suggestion Chiara did not find at all amusing. She sulked during the short drive back to Narkiss Street.

  “Maybe this is a mistake,” said Gabriel carefully.

  “Here we go again,” she replied.

  “Not the wedding—only the size of the wedding. Maybe we should have something small and private. Family and friends. Real friends.”

  She exhaled heavily. “Nothing would make me happier.”

  By early February he felt a strong desire to work. He left Narkiss Street at ten o’clock one morning and drove up to the Israel Museum to see if there was anything lying about that might occupy his time. After a brief meeting with the head of the European paintings division, he left with a lovely panel by Rembrandt, appropriately called St. Peter in Prison. The panel was structurally sound and required only a clean coat of varnish and a bit of inpainting. He set up shop in the spare bedroom of the apartment, but Chiara complained about the stench of his solvents and pleaded with him to move his operations to a proper studio. He found one, in the artists’ colony overlooking the Valley of Hinnom, and began working there the following week.

  With the arrival of the Rembrandt, his days finally acquired something of a routine. He would arrive at the studio early and work until midday; then, after taking a break for a leisurely lunch with Chiara, he would return to the studio and work until the light was no good. Once or twice a week, he would cut his afternoon session short and drive across Jerusalem to the Mount Herzl Psychiatric Hospital to spend time with Leah. It had been many months since he had seen her last, and the first three times he appeared she did not recognize him. On his fourth visit she greeted him by name and lifted her cheek to him to be kissed. He wheeled her into the garden and together they sat beneath an olive tree—the same olive tree he had seen in his dreams while in the hands of the Sword of Allah. She placed her hand against his face. Her skin was scarred by fire and cold to the touch.

  “You’ve been fighting again,” she said.

  He nodded his head slowly.

  “Black September?” she asked.

  “That was a long time ago, Leah. They don’t exist anymore.”

  She looked at his hands. They were smudged with pigment.

  “You’re painting again?”

  “Restoring.”

  “Can you work on me when you’re finished?”

  A tear spilled onto his cheek. She brushed it away and looked again at his hands.

  “Why aren’t you wearing a wedding ring?”

  “We’re not married yet.”

  “Second thoughts?”

  “No, Leah—no second thoughts.”

  “Then what are you waiting for?” She looked away suddenly and the light went out of her eyes. “Look at the snow, Gabriel. Isn’t it beautiful?”

  He stood and wheeled her back into the hospital.

  61

  JERUSALEM

  He drove back to Narkiss Street through a cloudburst and entered his apartment to find the table set for four and the air scented with roasted chicken and Gilah Shamron’s famous eggplant with Moroccan spice. A small, thin woman with sad eyes and unruly gray hair, she was seated on the couch next to Chiara looking at photographs of wedding dresses. When Gabriel kissed her cheek it smelled of lilac and was smooth as silk.

  “Where’s Ari?” he asked.

  She pointed to the balcony. “Tell him not to smoke so much, Gabriel. You’re the only one he listens to.”

  “You must have me confused with someone else, Gilah. Your husband has a well-honed ability to hear only what he wants to hear, and the last person he listens to is me.”

  “That’s not what Ari says. He told me about your terrible quarrel in London. He said he didn’t even try to talk you out of delivering the money because he knew you had your mind made up.”

  “I would have been wise to take his advice.”

  “But then the American girl would be dead.” She shook her head. “No, Gabriel, you did the right thing, no matter what they’re saying about you now in London and Amsterdam. When the storm is over, they’ll come to their senses and thank you.”

  “I’m sure you’re right, Gilah.”

  “Go sit with him. I think he’s a little depressed. It’s not easy to grow old.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  He poured himself a glass of red wine and carried it out onto the balcony. Shamron was seated in a wrought-iron chair beneath the stripped awning, watching rainwater dripping from the leaves of the eucalyptus tree. Gabriel plucked the cigarette from his fingertips and tossed it over the balustrade onto the wet sidewalk.

  “It’s against the law in this country to litter,” Shamron said. “Where have you been?”

  “You tell me.”

  “Are you suggesting that I’m having you followed?”

  “I’m not suggesting anything. I know you’re having me followed. Therefore it is merely a statement of fact.”

  “Just because you’re home doesn’t mean you’re safe. You have far too many enemies to wander around without bodyguards—and far too many enemies to be working in plain view in an artist’s studio overlooking the walls of the Old City.”

  “Chiara wouldn’t let me work in the apartment.” Gabriel sat down in the chair next to Shamron. “Are you angry because I’m working in a studio near the Old City, or are you angry because I’m working and it’s not for you?”

  Shamron pointedly lit another cigarette but said nothing.

  “The restoration helps, Ari. It always helps. It makes me forget.”

  “Forget what?”

  “Killing three men in Hyde Park. Killing a man on the lawn of Westminster. Killing Ishaq in a field in Essex. Shall I go on?”

  “That won’t be necessary,” said Shamron. “And when this Rembrandt is finished? What then?”

  “I’m lucky to be alive, Ari. I hurt everywhere. Let me heal. Let me enjoy life for a few days before you begin hounding me about coming back to the Office.”

  Shamron smoked his cigarette and watched the rain in silence. Devoutly secular, he marked the passage of time not by t
he Jewish festivals but by the rhythms of the land—the day the rains came, the day the wildflowers exploded in the Galilee, the day in early autumn when the cool winds returned. To Gabriel, he seemed to be wondering how many more such cycles he would be witnessing.

  “Our ambassador in London received a rather humorous letter from the British Home Office this morning,” he said.

  “Let me guess,” said Gabriel. “They would like me to testify before the commission of inquiry into the kidnapping and recovery of Elizabeth Halton.”

  Shamron nodded. “We’ve made it very clear to the British that they will have to conduct their formal inquiry without our cooperation. There will be no replays of your testimony before Congress after the affair at the Vatican. The only way you’re going to set foot in England is to collect your knighthood.” Shamron smiled to himself. “Can you imagine?”

  “East London would burn,” said Gabriel. “But what about our relationships with MI5 and MI6? Won’t they go into the deep freeze if I refuse to cooperate in the inquiry?”

  “Quite the opposite, actually. We’ve been in contact with the heads of both services in recent days, and they’ve made it clear that the last thing they want is for you to testify. Graham Seymour sends his best, by the way.”

  “There’s another good reason for me to stay away from London,” Gabriel said. “If I agree to testify, the inquiry will naturally focus on us and the sins of the Israelis. If I stay away, it might just force them to confront the real problem.”

  “Which is?”

  “Londonistan,” said Gabriel. “They have allowed their capital to become a breeding ground, a spiritual mecca, and a safe haven for Islamic terrorists of every stripe. And it’s a threat to us all.”

  Shamron nodded his head in agreement, then looked at Gabriel. “So what else have you been doing besides cleaning this Rembrandt and spending time on Mount Herzl with Leah?”

  “I see your little surveillance men give you detailed watch reports.”

  “As they were instructed to do,” said Shamron. “How is she?”

  “She’s lucid at times,” Gabriel said. “Very lucid. Sometimes she sees things more clearly than I do. She always did.”

  “Please tell me you’re not planning to get cold feet again.”

  “Quite the opposite. Didn’t your watchers tell you about my search for a site for the ceremony?”

  “They did, actually. I took the liberty of asking Shabak to draw up a contingency security plan for a public wedding of such proportions. I’m afraid the requirements will be such that it will not seem much like a wedding at all.” He crushed out his cigarette slowly. “Will you take some advice from an old man?”

  “I’d like nothing more.”

  “Perhaps you and Chiara should consider something smaller and more intimate.”

  “We already have.”

  “Do you have a date in mind?”

  Gabriel told him.

  “May? Why are you waiting until May? Did you learn nothing from this affair? Life is precious, Gabriel, and terribly short. I may not even be alive in May.”

  “I’m afraid you’ll just have to hang in there, Ari. Chiara needs time to plan the reception. We can’t do it any sooner.”

  “Plan? What plan? You and I could do it in an afternoon.”

  “Weddings aren’t operations, Ari.”

  “Whoever said that?”

  “Chiara.”

  “Of course weddings are operations.” He brought his fist down on the arm of the chair. “Chiara has had to put up with considerable dithering and nonsense on your part. If I were you, I’d plan the wedding myself and surprise her.”

  “She’s an Italian Jew, Ari. She has something of a temper and doesn’t like surprises.”

  “All women like surprises, you dolt.”

  Gabriel had to admit he liked the idea. “I’ll need help,” he said.

  “So we’ll get you some help.”

  “Where?”

  Shamron smiled. “Silly boy.”

  They were the dark side of a dark service, the ones who did the jobs no one else wanted, or dared, to do. But never before in the storied history of Special Ops had they ever planned a wedding, at least not a real one.

  They gathered the following morning in Room 456C, Gabriel’s subterranean lair at King Saul Boulevard: Yaakov and Yossi, Dina and Rimona, Mordecai and Oded, Mikhail and Eli Lavon. Gabriel walked to the front of the room and tacked a photograph of Chiara to his bulletin board. “Ten days from now, I am going to marry this woman,” he said. “The wedding must be everything she wants and she must not know or suspect a thing. We must work quickly and we will make no mistakes.”

  Like all good operations it started with intelligence gathering. They scoured her bridal magazines for telltale markings and interrogated Gabriel carefully about everything she had ever said to him. Alarmed by the poor quality of his answers, Dina and Rimona scheduled a crash luncheon meeting with Chiara the following afternoon at a trendy Tel Aviv restaurant. They returned to King Saul Boulevard slightly drunk but armed with all the information they needed to proceed.

  The following morning Gabriel and Chiara were awakened at Narkiss Street by an officer from Personnel who informed Chiara that she was alarmingly overdue for a complete physical. There was an opening that morning, said the man from Personnel. Could she come to King Saul Boulevard immediately? Having nothing better to do that day, she complied with the request and by ten o’clock was being subjected to rather close scrutiny by two Office-affiliated physicians—one of whom was not a physician at all but a tailor from Identity. He was less interested in matters such as blood pressure and heart rate and more concerned with the length of her arms and legs and the size of her waist and bust. Later that afternoon he slipped down to Room 456C to ask Gabriel whether he was to leave room in the garment for a weapon. Gabriel said that would not be necessary.

  With three days remaining, everything was in place with one notable exception: Chiara herself. For this phase of the operation Gabriel drafted none other than Gilah Shamron, who telephoned Chiara later that evening and asked whether they could come to Tiberias for a surprise birthday party for Shamron that Saturday. She agreed to Gilah’s request without even bothering to check with Gabriel and told him about their plans for the weekend that night over dinner.

  “How old is he going to be?” she asked.

  “It’s a carefully guarded state secret, but rumor has it he fought in the rebellion against Roman rule.”

  “Did you know his birthday was in March?”

  “Oh, yes, of course,” he said hastily.

  It was in late August, actually, and the last person who had tried to throw Shamron a surprise party still walked with a limp. But Chiara didn’t know that. Chiara didn’t know anything.

  It had rained steadily all week, a contingency for which they had not planned, but by midmorning Saturday the sun was shining brightly and the newly washed air was scented with stone pine and jasmine and eucalyptus. They slept late and ate a leisurely breakfast on the balcony, then packed a few things into an overnight bag and set out for the Galilee.

  Gabriel drove down the Bab al-Wad to the Coastal Plain, then north to the Valley of Jezreel. They stopped there for a few minutes to collect Eli Lavon from the dig atop Tel Megiddo, then continued on to Tiberias. Shamron’s honey-colored villa was just a few miles north of the city, on a ledge overlooking the Sea of Galilee. Two dozen cars lined the steep drive, and in the forecourt was a large American Suburban with diplomatic license plates. Adrian Carter and Sarah Bancroft were standing at the balustrade of Shamron’s terrace, chatting with Uzi Navot and Bella.

  “Gilah never told me Carter was coming,” Chiara said.

  “She must have forgotten to mention it.”

  “How do you forget to mention that the deputy director of the CIA is coming all the way from Washington? And what is Sarah doing here?”

  “Gilah’s old, Chiara. Give her a break.”

  Gabriel
climbed out before she could pose another question, then retrieved the overnight bag from the trunk and led her up the steps. Gilah was standing in the entrance hall as they came inside. The large rooms had been emptied of their furniture and several round tables put in their place. Chiara stared at the place settings and the flower arrangements, then walked past Gilah and stepped on the terrace, where a hundred white chairs stood in neat rows around a chuppah hung with flowers. She spun round, mouth open, and looked at Gabriel.

  “What’s going on here?”

  Gabriel held up the overnight bag and said, “I’m going to take this up to our room.”

  “Gabriel Allon, come back here.”

  She followed quickly after him and chased him down the corridor to their room. As she stepped inside, she saw the dress laid out on the bed.

  “My God, Gabriel, what have you done?”

  “Made amends for all my mistakes, I hope.”

  She threw her arms around him and kissed him, then ran a hand through her hair.

  “It’s a mess. What am I going to do?”

  “We brought a hair stylist from Tel Aviv. A very good one.”

  “What about my family?”

  He looked at his watch. “We flew them out of Venice aboard a charter. They landed at Ben-Gurion twenty minutes ago. We’re bringing them up here by helicopter.”

  “And the rings?”

  He pulled a small jewelry box from his coat pocket and opened it.

  “They’re beautiful,” she said. “You thought of everything.”

  “Weddings are operations.”

  “No, they’re not, you dolt.” She slapped his arm playfully. “What time is the ceremony?”

  “Whenever you want it to be.”

  “What time is sundown?”

  “Five-oh-eight.”

  “We’ll start at five-oh-nine.” She kissed him again. “And don’t be late.”