“Then what happens?”
“You cut off the head.”
“What does that mean?”
“I suppose that depends entirely on the circumstances.”
“Don’t bullshit me, Gabriel.”
“It could mean the arrest of important members of the network, Zoe. Or it could mean something more definitive.”
“Definitive? What an elegant euphemism.”
Gabriel paused before the statue of Shakespeare but said nothing.
“I won’t be a party to a killing, Gabriel.”
“Would you rather be a party to another massacre like the one in Covent Garden?”
“That’s beneath even you, my love.”
With a dip of his head, Gabriel conceded the point. Then he took Zoe by the elbow and led her down the walkway.
“You’re forgetting one important thing,” she said. “I agreed to work with you and your friends on the Iran case, but that doesn’t mean I’ve forsaken my values. At my core, I remain a rather orthodox left-wing journalist. As such, I believe it is essential that we combat global terrorism in ways that don’t compromise our basic principles.”
“That sort of pithy comment sounds wonderful from the safety of a television studio, but I’m afraid it doesn’t work that way in the real world.” Gabriel paused, then added, “You do remember the real world, don’t you, Zoe?”
“You still haven’t explained what any of this has to do with me.”
“We would like you to make an introduction. All you have to do is start the conversation. Then you recede quietly into the background, never to be seen again.”
“Hopefully with my head still attached.” She was joking, but only a little. “Is it anyone I know?”
Gabriel waited for a pair of lovers to pass before speaking the name. Zoe stopped walking and raised an eyebrow.
“Are you serious?”
“You know better than to ask a question like that, Zoe.”
“She’s one of the richest women in the world.”
“That’s the point.”
“She also happens to be notoriously press shy.”
“She has good reason to be.”
Zoe started walking again. “I remember the night her father was killed in Cannes,” she said. “According to the press accounts, she was at his side when he was gunned down. The witnesses say she held him as he was dying. Apparently, it was bloody awful.”
“So I’ve heard.” Gabriel glanced over his shoulder and saw Eli Lavon walking a few paces behind, a Moleskine notebook under his right arm, looking like a poet in search of inspiration. “Did you ever look into it?”
“Cannes?” Zoe narrowed her eyes. “I scratched around the edges.”
“And?”
“I was never able to come up with anything firm enough to take to print. The running theory in London financial circles was that he was killed as a result of some kind of internal Saudi feud. Apparently, there was a prince involved, a low-level member of the royal family who’d had several run-ins with European police and hotel staff.” She looked at Gabriel. “I suppose you’re going to tell me there was more to the story.”
“There are things I can tell you, Zoe, and things I cannot. It’s for your own protection.”
“Just like last time?”
Gabriel nodded. “Just like last time.”
A few paces ahead, Chiara sat alone on a bench. Zoe managed not to look at her as they passed. They walked a little farther, to the Wisteria Pergola, and huddled beneath the latticework. As the rain started up again, Gabriel explained exactly what he needed Zoe to do.
“What happens if she gets angry and decides to tell my bosses I’m working on behalf of Israeli intelligence?”
“She has far too much to lose to pull a stunt like that. Besides, who would ever believe such a wild accusation? Zoe Reed is one of the world’s most respected journalists.”
“There’s a certain Swiss businessman who might not agree with that statement.”
“He’s the least of our worries.”
Zoe lapsed into a thoughtful silence, which was interrupted by the pinging of her BlackBerry. She fished it from her handbag, then stared at the screen in silence, her face distraught. A few seconds later, Gabriel’s own BlackBerry vibrated in his coat pocket. He managed to keep a blank expression on his face as he read it.
“Looks like it wasn’t harmless chatter after all,” he said. “Do you still think we should fight these monsters in ways that don’t compromise your core values? Or would you like to return briefly to the real world and help us save innocent lives?”
“There’s no guarantee she’ll even take my call.”
“She will,” Gabriel said. “Everyone does.”
He asked for Zoe’s BlackBerry. Two minutes later, after downloading a file from a Web site claiming to offer discount travel to the Holy Land, he returned it.
“Conduct all your negotiations using this device. If there’s something you need to say to us directly, just say it near the phone. We’ll be listening all the time.”
“Just like last time?”
Gabriel nodded. “Just like last time.”
Zoe slipped the BlackBerry into her handbag and rose. Gabriel watched as she walked away, followed by Lavon and Chiara. He sat alone for several minutes, reading the first news bulletins. It appeared as though Rashid and Malik had just taken another step closer to America.
Ashes, ashes, we all fall down.
THE OLD COMPLACENCY HAD RETURNED to Madrid, but this was to be expected. It had been seven years since the deadly train bombings, and memories of that terrible morning had long since faded. Spain had responded to the massacre of its citizens by withdrawing its troops from Iraq and launching what it described as “an alliance of civilizations” with the Islamic world. Such action, said the political commentators, had succeeded in redirecting Muslim rage from Spain to America, where it rightly belonged. Submission to the wishes of al-Qaeda would protect Spain from another attack. Or so they thought.
The bomb exploded at 9:12 p.m., at the intersection of two busy streets near Puerta del Sol. It had been assembled at a rented garage in an industrial quarter south of the city and concealed in a Peugeot van. Owing to its ingenious construction, the initial force of the blast was directed leftward into a restaurant popular with Spanish governing elites. There would be no firsthand account of precisely what occurred inside, for no one lived to describe it. Had there been a survivor, he would have recounted a brief but terrible instant of airborne bodies adrift in a lethal cloud of glass, cutlery, ceramic, and blood. Then the entire building collapsed, entombing the dead and dying together beneath a mountain of shattered masonry.
The damage was greater than even the terrorist had hoped. Façades were ripped from apartment buildings for an entire block, exposing lives that, until a few seconds earlier, had been proceeding peacefully. Several nearby shops and cafés suffered damage and casualties while the small trees lining the street were shorn of their leaves or uprooted entirely. There were no visible remnants of the Peugeot van, only a large crater in the street where it once had been. For the first twenty-four hours of the