13
BEN-GURION AIRPORT: 10:47 P.M., THURSDAY
The VIP reception room was empty when Gabriel arrived at Ben-Gurion Airport later that same evening. He walked the long white corridor alone and stepped into the frigid night air. Shamron’s armored limousine was idling in the traffic circle, cigarette smoke wafting through the half-open rear window. Parked behind it was a second car filled with absurdly young security men, a new addition to his detail since the attempt on his life. Shamron had spent his old age surrounded by children with guns. Gabriel feared it would be his fate, too.
He climbed into the back of the limousine and closed the door. Shamron regarded him silently, then lifted a liver-spotted hand and gestured to his driver to move. A moment later, as they were speeding into the Judean Hills toward Jerusalem, he placed a stack of Israeli newspapers in Gabriel’s lap: Haaretz, Maariv, Yediot Aharonot, the Jerusalem Post. Gabriel’s photograph appeared on the front page of each.
“I send you to Amsterdam for a few days of quiet reading and this is what you bring me? You know, Gabriel, there are easier ways of getting out of dinner with the prime minister.”
“I was actually looking forward to it.”
Shamron gave him a dubious look. “At least the tone of the articles is positive—not like the drubbing we usually endure when our agents are exposed in the field. Once again you’re a national hero. Haaretz has dubbed you ‘Israel’s not-so-secret super-agent.’ That’s my favorite.”
“I’m glad you find this all so entertaining.”
“I don’t find it the least bit entertaining,” Shamron said. “We took the extraordinary step of sending you to London to make certain that the British understood the seriousness of our warning. They chose to ignore it, and the result was a holocaust in the Underground and the daughter of the American ambassador in the hands of Islamic terrorists.”
“Not to mention six dead American diplomats and security men.”
“Yes, everyone seems to have forgotten them.” Shamron ignited another cigarette. “How did you know they were going to hit in Hyde Park?”
“I didn’t know. It was just a theory that unfortunately turned out to be correct.”
“And what led you to this theory?”
Gabriel told him about the image on the legal pad he’d taken from Samir al-Masri’s apartment in Amsterdam. Shamron smiled. He regarded Gabriel’s flawless memory as one of his finest achievements. Gabriel had come to him with the mechanism in place, but it was Shamron who taught him how to use it.
“So you warned them not once but twice,” Shamron pointed out. “It’s no wonder the British were behaving like such jackasses during the negotiations for your release. I got the distinct impression that they were using your arrest and incarceration as a means of bringing pressure to bear against us.”
“For what purpose?”
“So that your testimony at the inevitable public inquiry into the attacks doesn’t reflect the true nature of your two conversations with Graham Seymour.”
“Seymour’s covering his ass?”
“He’s entered the final lap of a long and distinguished career. He can almost see his country house and his knighthood and comfortable seat on the board of a respectable financial house in the City. He doesn’t want some gunslinging Israeli to trip him up as he nears the finish line.”
“The last thing I’m going to do is fall on my sword to protect Graham Seymour’s reputation and retirement.”
“No, but you’re not going to go out of your way to embarrass him either. We’ll need to concoct some subtle variation on the truth that protects both your reputation and his.” Shamron smiled; concocting subtle variations on the truth was one of his favorite pastimes. “Burning Graham Seymour serves no useful purpose. You’re going to need him, and his friends, in your next life.”
“And what life is that?”
Shamron scrutinized Gabriel through a cloud of cigarette smoke. “Being deliberately obtuse serves no useful purpose either, Gabriel. You know very well what we have in store for you. The time has come for you to lead. The keys to the throne room are within your grasp.”
“Perhaps, Ari, but there’s only one problem. I don’t want them. I have other things I want to do with the rest of my life.”
“I’m afraid it’s time for you to put away childish things.”
“You’re referring to restoration?”
“I am.”
“You didn’t consider it a childish thing when you were using it as cover to conceal an assassin.”
“Restoration served both our needs for a long time,” Shamron said, “but its season has faded.”
They passed the charred hulk of an armored personnel carrier, a remnant of the fierce fighting that took place in the Bab al-Wad during Israel’s War of Independence.
“I’ve been in the Cabinet Room in times of crisis,” Gabriel said. “I’ve seen our leaders tear each other to shreds. It’s not the way I want to spend the next ten years. Besides, when all those former generals look at me, they’re just going to see a boy with a gun.”
“You’re not a boy any longer. You are approaching the age when men in government reach the summit of their careers. You’ll just reach yours a little sooner than most. You were always a bit of a wunderkind.”
Gabriel held up the copy of Haaretz. “And what about this?”
“The scandals?” Shamron shrugged. “A career free of scandal is not a proper career at all. For the most part, your scandals have earned you valuable allies in Washington and the Vatican.”
“They’ve earned me enemies, too.”
“They would be your enemies regardless of your actions. And they’ll be your enemies long after your body is placed next to Dani’s on the Mount of Olives.” Shamron crushed out his cigarette. “Don’t worry, Gabriel, this is not something that’s going to happen overnight. Amos’s death will be a slow one, and only a handful of people will even know the patient is terminal.”
“How long?”
“A year,” Shamron said. “Perhaps eighteen months at the most. Plenty of time for you to repair a few more paintings for your friend in Rome.”
“There’s no way you’ll be able to keep it a secret for a year, Ari. You always said that the worst place to try to keep a secret is inside an intelligence service.”
“At the moment only three people are privy to it—you, me, and the prime minister.”
“And Uzi.”
“I needed to bring Uzi into the picture,” Shamron said. “Uzi serves as my eyes inside the Office.”
“Maybe that’s why you want me there.”
Shamron smiled. “No, Gabriel, I want you there so I can close my eyes.”
“You’re not thinking of dying, are you, Ari?”
“I’d just like to take a short nap.”
Gabriel turned and peered out the rear window of the limousine. The chase car was following closely behind them. He looked at Shamron and asked whether there had been any news from London about Elizabeth Halton.
“Still nothing from her captors,” Shamron said. “And nothing from the British, at least nothing they’re willing to say in public. But it is possible that we might be coming into some useful intelligence.”
“From where?”
“Egypt,” said Shamron. “Our most important asset inside the SSI sent us a signal early this morning that he had something for us.”
The full name of the SSI was the General Directorate of State Security Investigations, a polite way of saying the Egyptian secret police.
“Who is he?” Gabriel asked.
“Wazir al-Zayyat, chief of the Department for Combatting Religious Activity. Wazir has one of the toughest jobs in the Middle East: making certain Egypt’s homegrown Islamic extremists don’t bring down the regime. Egypt is the spiritual heartland of Islamic fundamentalism, and of course the Egyptian Islamists are a major component of al-Qaeda. Wazir knows more about the state of the global jihadist movement than anyone in the world. He keeps us apprised of the stability of the Mubarak regime and passes along any intelligence that suggests Egyptian terrorists are targeting us.”
“What does he have for us?”
“We won’t know until we sit down with him,” Shamron said. “We meet with him outside the country.”
“Where?”
“Cyprus.”
“Who’s his case officer?”
“Shimon Pazner.”
Pazner was the chief of station in Rome, which doubled as the headquarters for Office operations throughout the Mediterranean.
“When is Pazner going to Cyprus?”
“He leaves in the morning.”
“Tell him to stay put in Rome.”
“Why would I do that?”
“Because I’m going to Cyprus to meet with the Egyptian.”
Shamron greeted Gabriel’s declaration with an obstinate silence. “Your involvement in this affair is officially over,” he said finally. “This is an American and British problem now. We have enough of our own to worry about.”
Gabriel pushed back. “I was there when it happened, Ari. I want us to do anything we can to find her.”
“And we will. Shimon Pazner has been handling Wazir for three years now. He’s more than capable of going to Cyprus and conducting a crash debriefing.”
“I’m sure he is, but I’m going to go to Cyprus for him.”
Shamron’s old stainless steel lighter flared in the darkness. “You’re not the Memuneh yet, my son. Besides, have you forgotten that your picture is in all the newspapers?”
“I’m not going behind the Iron Curtain, Ari.”
Shamron touched his cigarette to the flame and extinguished it with a flick of his sturdy wrist. “You use my own words against me,” he said. “Go ahead, Gabriel, go to Cyprus tomorrow. Just make sure Identity does something about that face of yours. You made yourself another enemy with your actions in Hyde Park.”
“Graham Seymour said the same thing.”
“Well,” Shamron said reflectively, “at least he was right about something.”
When Gabriel entered his apartment twenty minutes later, he found lights burning in the sitting room and a faint trace of vanilla on the air. He tossed his bag onto the new couch and walked into the bedroom. Chiara was perched at the end of the bed, scrutinizing her toes with considerable interest. Her body was wrapped in bath towels, and her skin was very dark from the sun. She looked up at Gabriel and smiled. It was as if it had been several minutes since they had seen each other last and not several weeks.
“You’re here,” she said in mock surprise.
“Shamron didn’t mention that I was coming home tonight?”
“He may have.”
Gabriel walked over and removed the towel from her hair. Heavy and wet, it tumbled riotously onto her dark shoulders. She lifted her face to be kissed and loosened the towel around her body. Maybe Shamron was right, Gabriel thought as she pulled him onto the bed. Maybe he would let Pazner go to Cyprus to meet with the Egyptian after all.