Gabriel Allon: The Black Widow Part 5

"It's a special occasion."

"My last restoration."

"For a while, I suppose. But you can always restore paintings after you retire as chief."

"I'll be too old to hold a brush."

Gabriel poked the tines of his fork into the veal, and it fell from the thick bone. He prepared his first bite carefully, an equal amount of meat and risotto drenched in the rich marrowy juice, and slipped it reverently into his mouth.

"How is it?"

"I'll tell you after I regain consciousness."

The candlelight was dancing in Chiara's eyes. They were the color of caramel and flecked with honey, a combination that Gabriel had never been able to reproduce on canvas. He prepared another bite of the risotto and veal but was distracted by an image on the television. Rioting had erupted in several Parisian banlieues after the arrest of several men on terrorism-related charges, none in direct connection with the attack on the Weinberg Center.

"ISIS must be enjoying this," said Gabriel.

"The rioting?"

"It doesn't look like rioting to me. It looks like . . ."

"What, darling?"

"An intifada."

Chiara switched off the television and turned up the volume on the baby monitor. Designed by the Office's Technology department, it had a heavily encrypted signal so that Israel's enemies could not eavesdrop on the domestic life of its spy chief. For the moment it emitted only a low electrical hum.

"So what are you going to do?" she asked.

"I'm going to eat every bite of this delicious food. And then I'm going to soak up every last drop of juice in that pot."

"I was talking about Paris."

"Obviously, we have two choices."

"You have two choices, darling. I have two children."

Gabriel laid down his fork and stared levelly at his beautiful young wife. "Either way," he said after a conciliatory silence, "my paternity leave is over. I can a.s.sume my duties as chief, or I can work with the French."

"And thus take possession of a van Gogh painting worth at least a hundred million dollars."

"There is that," said Gabriel, picking up his fork again.

"Why do you suppose she decided to leave it to you?"

"Because she knew I would never do anything foolish with it."

"Like what?"

"Put it up for sale."

Chiara made a face.

"Don't even think about it."

"One can dream, can't one?"

"Only about os...o...b..co and risotto."

Rising, Gabriel went to the counter and helped himself to another portion. Then he doused both rice and meat in juice, until his plate was in jeopardy of br.i.m.m.i.n.g over. Behind his back, Chiara hissed in disapproval.

"There's one more," he said, gesturing toward the ca.s.serole.

"I still have five kilos to lose."

"I like you the way you are."

"Spoken like a true Italian husband."

"I'm not Italian."

"What language are you speaking to me right now?"

"It's the food talking."

Gabriel sat down again and laid siege to the veal. From the monitor came the short cry of a child. Chiara c.o.c.ked a vigilant ear toward the device and listened intently, as if to the footsteps of an intruder. Then, after a satisfactory interlude of silence, she relaxed again.

"So you intend to take the case-is that what you're saying?"

"I'm inclined to," answered Gabriel judiciously.

Chiara shook her head slowly.

"What have I done now?"

"You'll do anything to avoid taking over the Office, won't you?"

"Not anything."

"Running an operation isn't exactly a nine-to-five job."

"Neither is running the Office."

"But the Office is in Tel Aviv. The operation is in Paris."

"Paris is a four-hour flight."

"Four and a half," she corrected him.

"Besides," Gabriel plowed on, "just because the operation starts in Paris, that doesn't mean it will end there."

"Where will it end?"

Gabriel tilted his head to the left.

"In Mrs. Lieberman's apartment?"

"Syria."

"Ever been?"

"Only to Majdal Shams."

"That doesn't count."

Majdal Shams was a Druze town in the Golan Heights. Along its northern edge was a fence topped by swirls of razor wire, and beyond the fence was Syria. Jabhat al-Nusra, an al-Qaeda affiliate, controlled the territory along the border, but a two-hour car ride to the northeast was ISIS and the caliphate. Gabriel wondered how the American president would feel if ISIS were two hours from Indiana.

"I thought," said Chiara, "that we were going to stay out of the Syrian civil war. I thought we were going to sit by and do nothing while all our enemies killed each other."

"The next chief of the Office feels that policy would be unwise in the long term."

"Does he?"

"Have you ever heard of a man named Arnold Toynbee?"

"I have a master's degree in history. Toynbee was a British historian and economist, one of the giants of his day."

"And Toynbee," said Gabriel, "believed there were two great pivot points in the world that influenced events far beyond their borders. One was the Oxus-Jaxartes Basin in modern-day Pakistan and Afghanistan, or Af-Pak as our friends in America are fond of calling it."

"And the other?"

Again, Gabriel tilted his head to the left. "We hoped the problems of Syria would remain in Syria, but I'm afraid hope is not an acceptable strategy when it comes to national security. While we've been twiddling our thumbs, ISIS has been developing a sophisticated terror network with the ability to strike in the heart of the West. Maybe it's led by a man who calls himself Saladin. Maybe it's someone else. Either way, I'm going to tear the network to pieces, hopefully before they can strike again."

Chiara started to respond but was interrupted by the cry of an infant. It was Irene; her two-note wail was as familiar to Gabriel as the sound of a French siren on a wet Paris night. He started to rise but Chiara was on her feet first.

"Finish your dinner," she said. "I hear the food in Paris is terrible."

Gabriel heard her voice next over the monitor, speaking soothingly in Italian to an infant who was no longer crying. Alone, he switched on the television and finished his supper while, four and a half hours to the northwest by airplane, Paris burned.

For thirty minutes she did not return. Gabriel saw to the dishes and wiped down the kitchen counters, thoroughly, so that Chiara would not feel it necessary to reprise his efforts, which was usually the case. He added coffee and water to the automatic maker and then stole softly down the hall to the master bedroom. There he found his wife and daughter, Chiara supine atop the bed, Irene p.r.o.ne across her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, both sleeping soundly.

Gabriel stood in the doorway, his shoulder leaning against the woodwork, and allowed his eyes to travel slowly across the walls of the room. They were hung with paintings-three paintings by Gabriel's grandfather, the only three he had been able to track down, and several more by his mother. There was also a large portrait of a young man with prematurely gray temples and a gaunt, weary face haunted by the shadow of death. One day, thought Gabriel, his children would ask him about the troubled young man depicted in the portrait, and about the woman who had painted it. It was not a conversation he was looking forward to. Already, he feared their reaction. Would they pity him? Would they fear him? Would they think him a monster, a murderer? It was no matter; he had to tell them. It was better to hear the unhappy details of such a life from the lips of the man who had led it rather than from someone else. Mothers often portrayed fathers in too flattering a light. Obituaries rarely told the whole story, especially when their subjects led cla.s.sified lives.

Gabriel lifted his daughter from Chiara's breast and carried her into the nursery. He placed her gently in her crib, covered her with a blanket, and stood over her for a moment until he was sure she was settled. Finally, he returned to the master bedroom. Chiara was still sleeping soundly, watched over by the brooding young man in the portrait. It's not me, he would tell his children. It's just someone I had to become. I am not a monster or a murderer. You exist in this place, you sleep peacefully in this land tonight, because of people like me.

9.

THE MARAIS, PARIS.

AT TWENTY MINUTES PAST TEN the following morning, Christian Bouchard was standing in the arrivals hall of Charles de Gaulle, a tan raincoat over his crisp suit, a paper sign in his hand. The sign read SMITH. Even Bouchard found it less than convincing. He was watching the conveyor belt of humanity flowing into the hall from pa.s.sport control-the international peddlers of goods and services, the seekers of asylum and employment, the tourists who had come to see a country that no longer existed. It was the job of the DGSI to sift through this daily deluge, identify the potential terrorists and agents of foreign intelligence, and monitor their movements until they left French soil. It was a near-impossible task. But for men such as Christian Bouchard, it meant there was no shortage of work or opportunities for career advancement. For better or worse, security was one of the few growth industries in France.

Just then, Bouchard's mobile vibrated in his coat pocket. It was a text message stating that the reason for his visit to Charles de Gaulle had just been admitted into France on an Israeli pa.s.sport bearing the name Gideon Argov. Two minutes later Bouchard spotted the selfsame Monsieur Argov, black leather jacket, black nylon overnight bag, adrift on the current of arriving pa.s.sengers. Bouchard had seen him in surveillance photographs-there was that famous shot taken in the Gare de Lyon a few seconds before the explosion-but never had he seen the legend in the flesh. Bouchard had to admit he was sorely disappointed. The Israeli was five foot nothing and maybe, maybe, a hundred and fifty pounds. Still, there was a predatory swiftness in his gait and a slight outward bend to his legs that suggested speed and agility in his youth, which, thought Bouchard with misplaced arrogance, was quite some time ago.

Two paces behind him was a much younger man of nearly identical height and weight: dark hair, dark skin, the alert dark eyes of a Jew whose ancestors had lived in Arab lands. An employee of the Israeli Emba.s.sy was there to greet them, and together the three men-legend, bodyguard, and emba.s.sy functionary-filed outside to a waiting car. It headed directly into the center of Paris, followed by a second car in which Bouchard was the only pa.s.senger. He had antic.i.p.ated his quarry would proceed directly to Madame Weinberg's apartment on the rue Pavee, where Paul Rousseau was at that moment waiting. Instead, the legend made a stop on the rue des Rosiers. At the far western end of the street was a barricade. Behind it were the ruins of the Weinberg Center.

By Bouchard's wrist.w.a.tch, the Israeli remained at the barricade for three minutes. Then he headed eastward along the street, trailed by his bodyguard. After a few paces he paused in a shop window, a crude but effective touch of tradecraft that compelled Bouchard, who was discreetly following, to seek shelter in the boutique opposite. Instantly, a cloying saleswoman accosted him, and by the time he'd managed to extricate himself, the Israeli and his bodyguard had vanished. Bouchard stood frozen for a moment, staring up the length of the street. Then he wheeled round and saw the Israeli standing behind him, one hand pressed to his chin, head tilted to one side.

"Where's your sign?" he asked finally in French.

"My what?"

"Your sign. The one you were holding at the airport." The green eyes probed. "You must be Christian Bouchard."

"And you must be-"

"I must be," he interrupted with the terseness of a nail gun. "And I was a.s.sured there would be no surveillance."

"I wasn't watching you."

"Then what were you doing?"

"Rousseau asked me to make sure you arrived safely."

"You're here to protect me-is that what you're saying?"

Bouchard was silent.

"Allow me to make one thing clear from the outset," said the legend. "I don't need protection."

They walked side by side along the pavement, Bouchard in his smart suit and raincoat, Gabriel in his leather jacket and his grief, until they arrived at the entrance of the apartment house at Number 24. When Bouchard opened the outer door, he inadvertently opened a door in Gabriel's memory, too. It was ten years ago, early evening, a light rain falling like tears from the sky. Gabriel had come to Paris because he needed a van Gogh as bait in order to insert an agent into the entourage of Zizi al-Bakari, and he had heard from an old friend in London, a wildly eccentric art dealer named Julian Isherwood, that Hannah Weinberg was in possession of one. He had approached her without introduction on the very spot where he and Christian Bouchard stood now. She was holding an umbrella in one hand and with the other was stretching a key toward the lock. "I'm sorry to disappoint you," she had lied with admirable composure, "but I don't have a van Gogh. If you'd like to see some paintings by Vincent, I suggest you visit the Musee d'Orsay."

The memory dissipated. Gabriel followed Bouchard across an internal courtyard, into a foyer, and up a flight of carpeted stairs. On the fourth floor, nickeled light leaked weakly through a soiled window, illuminating two stately mahogany doors facing each other like duelists across the chessboard floor of the landing. The door on the right was absent a nameplate. Bouchard unlocked it and, stepping to one side, motioned for Gabriel to enter.

He paused in the formal entrance hall and surveyed his surroundings, as if for the first time. The room was decorated precisely as it had been on the morning of Jeudi Noir: stately brocaded furniture, heavy velvet curtains, an ormolu clock, still ticking away five minutes slow on the mantel. Again, the door to Gabriel's memory opened, and he glimpsed Hannah seated on the couch in a rather dowdy woolen skirt and thick sweater. She had just handed him a bottle of Sancerre and was watching intently as he removed the cork-watching his hands, he remembered, the hands of the avenger. "I'm very good at keeping secrets," she was saying. "Tell me why you want my van Gogh, Monsieur Allon. Perhaps we can reach some accommodation."

From the adjoining library there came the faint rustle of paper, like the turning of a page. Gabriel peered inside and saw a rumpled figure standing before a bookcase, a large leather-bound volume in his hand. "Dumas," the figure said without looking up. "And quite valuable."