The Accident Man:A Novel

45

Papin stood at the foot of the steps in front of the ancient cathedral. It was four minutes past five. No one had arrived. Or perhaps they had. Perhaps he’d been set up and they were watching him now, waiting to see where he went next, trying to get their hands on the goods for free.
He gazed across the square. He didn’t see the man with the shaven head, holding a metal briefcase, walk out of the cathedral’s main door and head down toward him. He didn’t know the man was there until he felt the crushing weight of a hand on his shoulder and heard a voice behind him growl, “Charlie sends regards,” in a Russian accent that made it sound like,“Chully syends rigards.”
Papin gave a twitch of surprise and turned around to face his contact. He had been expecting an Englishman, or perhaps a Swiss, at any rate someone with whom he could conduct business in a civilized fashion. But this Russian just stood there, massive and brutish, gazing at Papin with blank implacability.
A few seconds passed in silence, then the Russian said, “Okay, wrong man,” and took a step back up the steps.
“No! No! Right man!” Papin exclaimed, suddenly panicked. “I hope Charlie is well!”
Grigori Kursk looked at him, shook his head, spat on the ground, then grunted, “Yeah, is better now.”
Papin glanced down at the case. “Do you have the money?”
Kursk gave a single nod.
“Give me the first installment.”
“Don’t understand.”
“The money, two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Give it to me.”
“Not here. Everyone see. In car. We go to car.”
Kursk walked away. Papin waited a couple of seconds, then followed him over to a black BMW parked on the uphill side of the square. There were three men inside, crammed into the backseat.
“I said no backup. Just me and you. No one else,” Papin insisted.
Kursk opened the passenger door. “In!” he commanded.
The Frenchman knew that it had all gone wrong. There would be no money in the case. The only issue now was his own survival. If he tried to run, he had no doubt the Russian would follow him and kill him. But he still had the information they needed. As long as he could keep it from them, that would be his edge.
Kursk glared at him. “Okay. Now where to go?”
Papin said nothing.
Kursk kept his left hand draped on the wheel. But the right reached out, gripped Papin around the neck, and started squeezing. Papin writhed in his seat, trying to escape the Russian’s grasp. But it made no difference. He could not break free and the effort just made him suffocate even faster. Surely the man had to stop. Surely he wouldn’t kill him now. Papin was desperate for breath, the blood pounding in his ears, his eyes popping, vision blurring. Still the fist closed around his neck. He could feel his vocal cards being crushed by the pressure. When his resistance finally gave way, he could only croak, “Okay . . . okay . . . I’ll tell you.”
At last the hand relaxed. Papin’s chest heaved as he dragged air into his lungs, each breath burning like poison gas as it passed through his ravaged throat. “Go to the end of the road, turn right.” He gestured feebly to show what he meant. Kursk started the car and began to drive.
They turned right across a small square and weaved their way along a series of narrow, intersecting cobblestoned streets. Finally, Papin pointed to the side of the road. There was a parking space. “Pull up behind that red car,” he said. The BMW came to a halt alongside the curb.
Papin turned his head toward Kursk. The Russian regarded him with the cloudy, dead-fish stare of a man incapable of remorse.
“Across the road,” Papin said. “You see the alley? It’s through there. He has the top apartment.”
“Are they in apartment?”
“No.”
“They come back?”
“Yes, I think so. Tonight, maybe.”
“Is only one way in?”
“I think so.”
Papin slumped back in his seat. The exhaustion that had weighed on him all day seemed to be dragging him down, robbing him of any energy or will. When Kursk reached out again, both hands this time, Pierre Papin hardly moved a muscle as his life ebbed away.
When it was over, Kursk got out of the car. He stood on the cobblestones, leaning on the BMW as he lit a cigarette and looked up and down the street. It was deserted. He gazed up at the buildings around him. There were no faces at any windows, no sign that he was being observed, just some kids playing in front of a café down the street.
He knocked on the rear window and waited as it rolled down.
“Okay,” he said to the men in the backseat. “Time you did some work.”
In the passenger seat of a car parked at the end of the little side street, a man was looking through the hefty telephoto lens of a high-res digital camera. His finger was pressed to the shutter. The camera was on a sports setting, the shutter whirring, firing off several shots a second. Next to him a woman spoke into a mobile phone. “Two of them have crossed the street. They’re going up to an apartment building. I think they just forced the front door. I can see the Frenchman in the front seat of the car, but he’s not moving. I’m pretty sure they’ve killed him.”
Grantham sighed. “That stupid, greedy bastard. Well, he can’t say he wasn’t told.”
“What do you want us to do, sir?”
“Nothing. Just keep watching. We offered Papin our help, and he wouldn’t take it. That’s his problem. Our priority remains what it always was. We keep watching.”
“Yes, sir. I understand.”
“Good. Keep me informed of any further developments.”
“Absolutely.”
Jennifer Stock hung up and put the phone back in her handbag.
“Just spoken to the boss,” she said to the photographer. “He says forget the Frenchman. Get those shots through to London. Then carry on as you were. Wait and watch.”
Stock wriggled in discomfort. It was hot inside the car. Her blouse and skirt were getting creased against the seat. She cursed under her breath. If she’d known she was going to spend half the day on a stakeout, she’d have worn a T-shirt and trousers.



46

Magnus Leclerc did check on the Panamanian Mercantile Registry, on which all offshore companies had to be registered. Sure enough, Topograficas SA was there, as were three nominated directors, none of whom was Mr. Vandervart. That was no surprise: Why have a Panamanian company at all if not to be invisible? Nor were there any published accounts. There wouldn’t be: The lack of any requirement to keep books or records of any kind was another advantage of Panamanian corporate law. So he knew no more than he had known before, but then, he hadn’t expected to. It was hardly unusual for his clients to wish to cover their tracks, and the possibility of wasting an hour in a bar seemed a small price to pay for the chance of landing a nine-figure account.
He arrived at the Hotel Beau-Rivage shortly after six, asked for Vandervart at the reception desk, and was informed by the receptionist that his host apologized profusely but he was tied up in a meeting and would be a few minutes late. In the meantime, if monsieur would care to make his way just across the atrium to the bar, M. Vandervart would join him there soon.
It was a perfect example of an upmarket European watering hole: ornate plasterwork on the walls, gathered green silk blinds over the windows, reproduction antique chairs grouped around white-clothed tables. Leclerc walked to the bar and ordered a vodka martini from the gray-haired man behind the counter. He collected his drink and walked across to a corner table. The only other customers were an elderly American couple. The man was already ordering his second bourbon: His wife was pursing her lips. It looked like the start of a long night of marital hell.
He knew all about that. Leclerc took a sip of his martini and contemplated the ritual display of martyrdom and resentment that awaited him when he got home. Marthe would depict herself as shattered after her long day of doing precisely nothing apart from playing tennis, spending his money, and undertaking the minimal amount of child care required by two independent-minded teenagers. He had warned her he might be home late and told her not to worry about his supper, but that wouldn’t count for much. She’d make a point of wearing the most shapeless, unappealing tracksuit she could find. She’d sigh theatrically, roll her eyes, and tell him the food was ruined. She’d . . .
Mon Dieu!
A woman had just walked into the bar. She was tall with a beautiful face framed in a brunette bob. She was wearing a softly cut white blouse over a tight dark blue skirt. Her long legs were tanned. Her high heels exactly matched her skirt, as did her elegant little shoulderbag. She looked absolutely respectable yet totally desirable. Leclerc spotted the ancient American ogling the girl as she cast her eyes around the bar, evidently looking for someone. The American’s wife hissed and slapped the back of a mottled, ring-burdened hand across the sleeve of his jacket, redirecting his attention back to her.
Leclerc winced in sympathy at the old boy’s suffering, and it was then that the brunette caught his eye. Her face suddenly lit up with a smile, letting him know she’d recognized him and that nothing at all could have made her happier. She walked across to him and stopped beside his table.
“Monsieur Leclerc?” She held out elegant fingers whose smooth, unblemished skin was a delightful contrast to the gnarled claw of the old harridan, who was now casting poisonous looks in their direction. “I’m Natasha St. Clair, Mr. Vandervart’s assistant. He’s still tied up, I’m afraid.”
“Enchanté, mademoiselle,” replied Leclerc. “I am Magnus Leclerc. But please, Natasha, call me Magnus. Can I persuade you to join me, while we wait for monsieur Vandervart?”
“Are you sure? I mean, if you think it’s all right. . . .”
“But of course, I insist.”
“Thank you, that would be very nice. I just hope I haven’t intruded on you.”
She blushed a little as she sat down opposite him, smoothing her skirt over her perfect thighs. She then gave a regretful little shake of her head and a frown of concern.
“You know, Mr. Vandervart is a wonderful man, but I really think he should take it easier. It’s not my place to say anything, of course, but men like him work too hard. Of course, they want to do the best for their families, but sometimes they should think more about themselves. Don’t you agree?”
Magnus Leclerc would happily have agreed with any proposal the girl cared to put to him. “Absolutely,” he said, with an enthusiastic nod.
The girl smiled, as if grateful for his approval. She placed her elbows on the table and leaned forward slightly, letting her scent waft across the table and accidentally giving Leclerc the tiniest glimpse of cleavage as her breasts were squeezed between her upper arms.
“Mmm,” she purred, “that martini looks so tempting. It’s very naughty of me to have a drink while I’m still supposed to be working, but could you get one for me too? Is that all right?”
“But of course, I’d be delighted,” said the banker.
As he got up from the table and walked toward the bar, he realized that his pulse was racing. He ordered a drink and adjusted his tie in the mirror behind the bar. When the martini was ready, the barman raised an eyebrow in a gesture of wry acknowledgment, one man to another. Leclerc smiled back, gave the barman a friendly slap on the arm, and left him a ten franc tip. Then he turned around and carried the drink back to the girl.
She didn’t like to admit it, but Alix was enjoying herself. She’d felt the eyes following her as she crossed the foyer—the lust of the bellhop and the concierge; the envy of the plain receptionist; the considered, competitive assessment of the pretty one. When she walked into the bar, she’d had to suppress a smile at the comic spat between the old man and his wife. Then she’d watched the banker trying not to gawk at her like a goggle-eyed sixteen-year-old virgin, and she’d known this was going to be easy.
From then on, she’d worked by the manual: the smile, the eye contact, the gestures that would both arouse a man’s interest and signal her availability, the conversational gambits that ended in a question, inviting the man to agree. Ask any top-class pickup artist: If you start the other person saying yes, they don’t stop, all the way to the bedroom.
She’d been tempted to see if she could work her magic without any chemical assistance, but seducing Leclerc was just a means to an end. They had to get him talking as well.So when he went up to the bar, she’d reached into her bag and taken out her cigarettes and lighter. Anyone watching would have seen that. They wouldn’t have noticed the little capsule she palmed, nor seen her snap it in two and deposit its contents into Leclerc’s glass as she reached across and idly toyed with the olive on its black plastic stick.
The powder settled on the surface of the martini, but disappeared with a couple of stirs of the stick. Leclerc returned to the table to find Alix looking up at him with a guilty look on her face, saying, “Oops! You caught me! I was just about to steal your olive. I’m sorry. I can’t resist them!”
He tried to give her his smoothest smile. “Well, here’s one of your very own.”
Alix took the olive from the glass Leclerc had placed in front of her and slipped it into her mouth, between her glossy red lips. “Mmm, delicious!” she said, then playfully ran her tongue along her upper lip. She told herself to stop fooling around. If she were too obvious, too easy, Leclerc might get suspicious. Time to be a bit more respectable.
She looked at him slightly wide-eyed, like an eager, respectful pupil sitting at her favorite professor’s feet. “I’ve always been fascinated by Swiss banks. They sound so powerful and mysterious. You must tell me all about your work. I’d really like to know.”
The bartender’s name was Marcel. He’d spent more than thirty years serving drinks, watching the games that play out when men, women, and alcohol collide. He thought of himself as a connoisseur of the art of seduction. So the moment the girl stepped into his domain, then shone her smile at the man in the corner, Marcel’s interest was piqued.
He was reasonably certain that this was some kind of con. The man was a mark and she was playing him. After the second martini, she’d discreetly switched to sparkling water, but the man had stayed with his liquor. Marcel chuckled to himself and looked forward to the evening’s entertainment.
The bar was beginning to fill up now. A group of businessmen had come in, each in turn checking out the brunette and smirking to one another as they ordered their drinks. Then a bizarre figure strode up and perched on one of the long-legged chairs by the glossy wooden countertop. He was almost two meters tall, dressed in battered, patched jeans and a T-shirt printed in lurid shades of yellow and purple. He had hair like a black man, except it was a pale, sandy color, and his eyes were Nordic blue.
Marcel sighed, sadly, bemoaning the loss of proper standards. Nowadays it was impossible to tell the difference between the beggars and the millionaires. A man in tratty denims could be a rock star, an actor, or one of those American computer tycoons people kept talking about. Maybe he was the hippie son of a wealthy family. When he ordered a Heineken, he gave the number of a junior suite. His watch was a Breitling Navitimer—an expensive chronograph, but also a serious, functional one. He had good manners too. Businessmen tended to place their orders brusquely, without a please or a thank you. But this white Rastaman took the trouble to converse a little in a calm, easygoing voice. He showed respect for Marcel’s job and his dignity. Maybe the clothes could be forgiven.
“Would you like some matches, monsieur?” Marcel said, nodding at the Camel cigarettes on the counter, next to the beer glass.
The man smiled. “No thank you, I’m trying to give them up. Keeping them there is like a test. If I can have a couple of beers without smoking a cigarette, I’ll know I’m getting somewhere.”
He glanced across to the corner of the room, turned back to Marcel, and said, “Have you seen the couple in the corner? She just stroked his face. Then he took her hand and kissed it. Isn’t love great?”
Marcel winked. “L’amour, toujours l’amour . . .”
In the earpiece hidden beneath his dreadlocks, Thor Larsson could hear Carver’s voice. “Yeah, I saw it. It’s almost scary how good she is at this.”
Inside the Camel pack there was a miniature video camera pointing through a pin-size aperture, with a signal transmitter linked to a video monitor and recorder in Carver’s room. A microphone and an audio transmitter were hidden in Alix’s bag. Everything she and the banker did, every word they said, was all going down on tape.
“I wonder what she’s like in bed,” mused Larsson, apparently for the bartender’s benefit.
Carver laughed. “Well don’t expect me to tell you.”
“If only I could hear what they’re talking about.”
“Don’t worry. I’m getting the audio feed from Alix, clear as a bell.”
“Could you get me another beer, please? And some nuts, if you’ve got them. I think I’ll stick around.”



47

Grigori Kursk was a patient man. He’d learned that lesson in Afghanistan. Too many of his comrades had rushed into combat, hoping to overwhelm the mujahidin guerrillas with sheer weight of firepower, only to be outsmarted, ambushed, and sent straight to hell. Kursk could wait for hours, days, as long as it took to make the other man move first and expose his position. Only then would he strike.
So he did not care whether it took Carver all night or all week to return to his apartment. He would be ready for him whenever he came.
The two men he’d sent up to the apartment had reported that the door was steel-framed and secured with deadbolts to the top and bottom as well as the side. The hinges were reinforced. The only way to force entry would be with a bomb or a bazooka. Kursk himself had examined the windows through his binoculars. The glass was extra thick, almost certainly bulletproof.
It was no more than he had expected. Carver was no fool: He was bound to take precautions against men just like himself. In the meantime, Kursk needed to take some safety measures of his own. A call to Moscow gave him the contact number he needed, a Swiss-registered mobile.
“I work for Yuri,” he said. “I need to dispose of a car, a BMW 750. It has something in it. That has to go too, you understand? . . . I’ll send a man with the car. Also, I want a van, like a phone company or a delivery van, something like that. My guy will pick it up. Twenty minutes. You’d better have what we need. You don’t want Yuri to hear you let me down.”
Kursk sent Dimitrov away with the car. Papin was still in the passenger seat, kept upright by a tightly strapped seat belt. Now Kursk was alone in the street. It was quiet, respectable, a place where he stuck out like a bear in a china shop. He needed to escape the prying eyes that lurked behind all those flower baskets and net curtains. A sign caught his eye a little way up the road: Malone’s Irish Pub. Perfect.
He took his beer and a whisky chaser to a seat by the window where he had an unobstructed view down the street. No one could get in or out of Carver’s building without him seeing. Kursk savored his drink and looked around the pub. He’d known places just like this in Moscow. He guessed there were a million like it, all around the world. But it was okay. Compared to some of the places he’d sat and waited, this one was a palace.
Jennifer Stock had left the car and gone for a little walk, looking in shop windows, stopping for an early evening cup of coffee, and spotting Kursk and all three of his men. There were, she reflected, tremendous advantages to being female, if only because the instinctive male refusal to take one seriously was impervious to any amount of supposed sexual equality. You could wander up and down and they just thought you were a silly woman who had no sense of direction or couldn’t decide where to go. You could poke your nose into nooks and crannies and they just put it down to feminine curiosity.
It was far easier to talk to people too. The nicest man could arouse a certain amount of suspicion or even fear when he approached a stranger. Children were taught to shy away from men they did not know. But anyone of any age or gender would talk to a woman. In fact, it was the big-eyed, tousle-haired son of the local café owner who’d told her all about the Frenchman who’d been asking his papa questions that morning, and the funny men in baggy coats who’d got out of the big black car.
“Oh yes, I saw them,” she said, ruffling the little boy’s hair. “They were funny, weren’t they?”
It was while she was sitting in the café, drinking her double espresso, that Stock took the call from London. It was Bill Selsey.
“Hi, Jen, just got a hit on that BMW with the Italian plates you were asking about. Turns out it’s registered to a company called Pelicce Marinovski. They supposedly import furs from Russia.”
“Really? The men in that car didn’t look much like furriers.”
“Yes, well, Pelicce whatever-it-is doesn’t look much like a legitimate import-export company, either. Can’t find any proper accounts anywhere, no premises, no evidence of any sales.”
Stock frowned. “Is this some sort of front for the Russian mafia?”
“Possibly, so be careful, all right? These are not nice people to do business with.”
“My orders are to watch from a distance and not to interfere. That’s what I intend to do.”
“Good girl, that’s the spirit.”



48

Magnus Leclerc felt suffused by warmth. For some reason, the bar had become much hotter. He’d taken off his jacket and tie, but he was still sweating like a pig. He hoped Natasha hadn’t noticed. Aaaah, Natasha! She was amazing. She understood him. It was incredible. He’d hardly known her for an hour, but already he felt this amazing connection to her, a profound empathy, as though she could see right into his soul, and he into hers.
He’d told her about Marthe, the bitch, how hurt he was by her constant bickering, her petty criticisms, and her rejection of his sexual needs. He’d been afraid Natasha would laugh at him. But she didn’t. She sympathized. This beautiful girl took his hand in hers. Then, very gently, she ran her perfect fingers down his cheek. Leclerc almost cried at her consoling gesture. It had been so long since he’d felt that kind of comfort.
So long too since he’d been this turned on. Maybe that was why he felt so hot—he was burning with lust. He wanted to screw her so badly. He gazed at her, mentally stripping away her clothes, speculating on the body beneath. For a second, he didn’t even realize she was talking to him.
“Sorry,” he said, “did you say something, chérie?”
“I was just saying that maybe we should try to find Mr. Vandervart. I don’t know what’s happened to him. I think he must still be up in his suite. Do you think we should go upstairs?”
Leclerc gave a pathetically grateful smile. “Upstairs? Oh yes, I think that’s where we should go.”
When he stood up, he was uncomfortably aware that the floor wasn’t quite as steady as he would have liked. Natasha skipped to his side, picked up his discarded coat and tie, and took his arm in hers, helping him find his balance as he walked out of the bar. He couldn’t work it out. He’d only had, what, four martinis, maybe five? He shouldn’t be affected like this. Then he felt her hip against his and the soft weight of her breast as it brushed against his arm, and a big, happy grin crossed Magnus Leclerc’s face. He didn’t care how drunk he was. He felt absolutely great.
Alix led the molten, drooling banker down the corridor and up to the door of the suite. She knocked, pressed her ear to the door, then turned to Leclerc. “He doesn’t seem to be there. I’m sure he won’t be long. We could wait in my suite if you like. I’m just next door.”
Not giving him a chance to reply, she stepped up to the next door, inserted her key, and let them in. “This isn’t very cozy, I’m afraid,” she said, leading him past the formal, stiff backed antique furniture in the living room through to the bedroom with its king-size bed, covered in a sky blue quilt. Directly opposite the bed was a cabinet containing a TV set. It was a no smoking room, but someone had left a pack of cigarettes in an ashtray next to the TV.
“This is a bit more comfortable,” said Alix, putting down her handbag on a bedside table. “Why don’t you take it easy? Sit down on the bed and I’ll fix you a drink from the minibar. Another martini?”
“No,” he said, grabbing her arm. “Don’t worry about drinks. Stay with me here.”
He patted the bed beside him. Alix sat down. She let him run a hand up her thigh, stopping him only when he tried to reach beneath her skirt. “Hold on,” she said, running her other hand playfully through his hair. “What would Marthe think if she could see us now?”
“Oh, screw Marthe!” said Leclerc. Then he burst out giggling. “No, on second thought, I’d much rather screw you!”
He dived at Alix, grabbing her shoulders and trying to force her flat on the bed. She laughed and squirmed out from under him.
“Not so fast,” she said. “If you want to have me, you must do exactly as I say.”
“Anything!” Leclerc leered.
“Stand up, opposite me.”
He obeyed at once.
“Remove your shirt.”
Again, he did as he was told.
“Now take off your trousers and then stand perfectly still.”
When he had finished, he watched open-mouthed as Alix undid the buttons of her blouse, discarding it in a flutter of creamy silk. She unzipped her skirt and let it slide to the floor before stepping out of the ring of crumpled fabric.
Alix was wearing white lace lingerie that accentuated the lithe, athletic curves of her body. She still had her high heels on.
Opposite her, Leclerc was in a pair of baggy jockey shorts, their waistband lost in his doughy flesh. He was still wearing his gray woolen socks.
“Lie on the bed, right back against the headboard,” she told him
Leclerc scuttled backward, fell on the bed, and propped himself up against the pillows.
“Soon, very soon, you will have your way with me. But first I am going to have my way with you. Stay there, don’t move a muscle, and don’t say a word!”
Alix strode around the bed to a chest of drawers. She bent down to open a drawer, making Leclerc groan with pleasure at the view, and pulled out three long, narrow, black silk scarves.
“What . . . ?” Leclerc began.
“Shhhh . . .”
She walked back to the bed, laid the scarves along the bedspread, and knelt astride Leclerc’s chest. Then she reached for his right wrist, expertly knotted one end of the first scarf around it, and tied the other end to the top of the bedpost. Leclerc now had one arm dangling helplessly in midair, but he seemed less concerned by that than his desperate attempts to get his face up to Alix’s breasts as she leaned across him. She ignored him, wordlessly grabbing his other wrist and repeating the procedure with the second scarf.
When both arms were secure, she leaned back and ran a hand through Leclerc’s chest hair, idly toying with his nipples as she said, “Do I look good to you?”
“Oh God, yes,” he groaned.
“Then take a good long look and remember what you see. Because now you see me and now”—she picked up the final scarf and whipped it around the banker’s head, covering his eyes—”you don’t. You’re helpless now, at my mercy. So I ask myself, what am I going to do?”
She placed her forefinger against his lips, teasing him as he desperately tried to suck it. Then she lay flat on top of him and started wriggling downward, down and down until her head was directly above his underpants.
“Mmmm, what have we here?” she said.
She raised herself up onto her haunches again and started to pull the underpants down from his waist.
“Please, please!” he moaned, trying to lift his ass off the bed to make the job easier.
Alix bent forward over Leclerc, lower and lower, till her head was only millimeters above him and . . .
“Thank you, Miss St. Clair, that will be all,” a harsh, guttural Afrikaans voice said.
Alix climbed off the bed and glared furiously at Carver. “You took your time!” she mouthed at him.
“I’m sorry,” he mouthed back, holding his hands out, palms down in the universal gesture of contrition.
“Who are you? What’s happening?” squealed Leclerc, writhing on the bed.
Carver slapped him once, very hard, on the side of the face.
“Shut up, Mr. Leclerc,” Carver snapped. “If you value your life and your reputation, shut up and listen. Here, let me help you.”
Carver pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and shoved it in the other man’s mouth, gagging him. He took the belt from the trousers lying on the floor and tied it tight around Leclerc’s ankles, rendering him entirely helpless.
“My name is Dirk Vandervart. I am about to ask you a series of simple questions, and you are going to give me honest answers. There are two reasons why you are going to do this. The first is that we have been following your evening with Miss St. Clair. In fact, we have recorded all the most interesting moments on tape. I don’t think your wife would like to hear all the things you said about her, do you? Particularly when she watches you seducing a young woman and letting her tie you to her bed. Wouldn’t reflect well on you, your marriage, or your bank, eh? Right, then, refuse to talk, attempt to mislead us, or reveal anything of what happened in this room this evening, and those tapes will be made very, very public.
“The other reason why you will talk is simple: I will cause you very great pain if you do not. Please be in no doubt about this, Mr. Leclerc. For example . . .”
Carver took hold of Leclerc’s left hand and started bending back the little finger. Leclerc shook his head from side to side.
“Hurts, doesn’t it? If I keep going, just a little bit more, the bone will snap like a twig. Then the finger will swell like a sausage grilling on a braai. Ach, man, let me tell you, that hurts so much, you’ll wish I’d just cut it right off.”
Leclerc’s whole body was jerking now as if jolted by electric shocks. Carver appeared not to notice and just kept talking.
“And once I’ve done one finger, I’ll do all the rest as well. And your toes. And you don’t even want to think about the rest of your body. So, would you like to talk?”
Leclerc nodded frantically.
“Very sensible decision. Here, let’s make you a little bit more comfortable. Perhaps you could help me, Miss St. Clair?”
Together, they dragged Leclerc up so that his back was resting against the headboard. Alix leaned forward and murmured in his ear. “I’m sorry, Magnus. Just tell Mr. Vandervart exactly what he wants, and you can go home to Marthe. You love her really, don’t you, Magnus?”
Another desperate nod.
“Okay, then.” Alix pulled the gag from his mouth.
Carver spoke, still in character. “I want to know about one of the accounts you control. It’s number 4443717168.”
“But I control hundreds of accounts. How can I remember them all?” Leclerc’s blindfolded head turned from side to side in supplication.
“You’ll remember this one. On Saturday morning, you acknowledged receipt of 1.5 million U.S. dollars into the account and sent a fax to that effect to the account holder. But by Sunday afternoon, you’d made the money disappear. How did you do that? And who gave you the orders? Because I don’t think you’d steal all that money for yourself. . . .”
“No! No!”
“So what happened?”
“I can’t tell you. I can’t! They’d kill me!” His voice was high-pitched, begging for an understanding he knew he would never receive.
“Who are ‘they,’ Magnus?”
“I can’t tell you!”
“Because they’d kill you.”
“Yes!”
“What makes you think that I won’t kill you first? Open your mouth.”
Carver reached around to the small of his back and pulled his SIG-Sauer from the waistband. He jammed the silencer between Leclerc’s teeth.
“Can you guess what that is? Correct, it’s a nine millimeter pistol. Believe me, I won’t hesitate to pull the trigger. It’s what I do. But I can do something else too. I can keep secrets. And no one will ever know anything about this evening, ever, if you just tell me what happened to that account.”
“Nothing happened.”
Carver slapped Leclerc a second time. “I thought we had an understanding here.”
Leclerc moaned. “No, really, nothing happened. No money ever went into that account. None came out. The receipt for the deposit was a fake.”
“So who gave the orders for it to be issued?”
“I can’t tell you. . . . I can’t!”
Carver sighed. He stuffed the gag back into Leclerc’s mouth, then picked up his hand again. “This little piggy went to market,” he said, giving the index finger a sudden, sharp tug. He moved along the hand. “This little piggy stayed at home. This little piggy had roast beef. And this little piggy . . .”
There was a muffled howl behind the handkerchief. Carver held Leclerc’s little finger for a few seconds longer, forcing it back, letting the pain intensify, then took out the handkerchief.
“Did you want to say something? Or do you want me to prove how serious I am?”
“No, please, I beg you. . . .”
“Then tell me. The orders—where did they come from?”
“From Malgrave and Company. That’s a bank in London.”
“Who sent them? I need a name.”
“I do not know, but I think they must have come from the very top, from someone with great influence. It could not have happened unless my own company’s president had agreed.”
“So, who runs Malgrave and Company? Who’s the boss?”
Leclerc attempted a pained smile. “You don’t need me to tell you that. It’s a family company. The current chairman is Lord Crispin Malgrave.”
“Thank you, Mr. Leclerc. You’ve been very helpful. You’ll be out of here in a moment. Tomorrow morning you will receive an e-mail. Photographs will be attached to it—stills from our videotapes. I hope they will serve as reminders to you to keep quiet. I would not wish any further unpleasantness.
“Now, Miss St. Clair, perhaps you would be so good as to get dressed again and help me tidy up this room.”
Carver turned toward the pack of cigarettes, with its hidden camera, and delivered a message to Thor Larsson, watching the monitor in the other suite.
“You can pack up and get out of there too.”



49

Alix stood in the shower trying to scrub away the memory of Leclerc’s hands on her body. The hotel provided two plastic bottles of mint-flavored mouthwash. She used them both. They had not even kissed, let alone had sex, but still she felt defiled. By the time she walked back into the bedroom, Carver was silently packing away the video gear. Leclerc was sitting on the side of the bed, slumped and deflated.
Alix collected her own possessions, then helped Carver as he untied and dressed Leclerc, though the blindfold stayed on. The banker was led out into the corridor, down the emergency staircase, and out through a door at the rear of the building. Thor Larsson was waiting to greet them in his battered Volvo.
“Got everything?” asked Carver, still maintaining Vandervart’s accent.
“Sure,” said Larsson. “And don’t worry. The sound and picture quality is superb.”
Ten minutes later, Leclerc was bundled from the car in a quiet side street. By the time he’d untied the blindfold, the Volvo had rounded a corner and was out of sight.
Larsson dropped Carver and Alix on the Pont des Bergues, leaving them to walk up to the Old Town while he returned to his own apartment. Within minutes of getting there, he’d gone online, and started hacking into the hotel mainframe. He wanted to erase any sign of their presence. It took half an hour and all of Larsson’s expertice, but finally, it was as if Mr. Vandervart, Miss St. Clair, and Mr. Sjoberg had never reserved a room or crossed the threshold of the building.
As they walked back across the river, arm in arm, Alix asked Carver, “Would you really have hurt Leclerc?”
“If I had to. If that was the only way of making him talk.”
“It’s scary seeing you like that. It seems so natural to you.”
“Not really. I was just getting the job done. And if you think I’m a natural, you should see yourself. I was pretty freaked-out sitting in front of the video watching you and him. Made me wonder what someone would think watching us.”
They were on the far bank of the river now, walking for a while in companionable silence, still carrying the overnight bags they’d taken to the hotel in their spare hands. Then Carver spoke again.
“Why did you really go to Paris?”
There was no aggression in his voice, none of the menace he’d directed at Leclerc. He was asking a straight question, just as if he were curious.
“It was like I told you,” Alix replied, just as straightforwardly. “Kursk wanted a woman to help him on a job, and he was willing to pay ten thousand dollars.”
“But there’s no doctor, is there, no respectable fiancé?”
Alix opened her mouth to speak, then seemed to think better of it. She sighed and looked away.
Carver’s voice hardened a fraction. “No, and I don’t see you working at a hotel reception desk, either. People like you and me don’t hold down normal jobs. We’ve been out of that world too long. So, what have you really been doing?”
Alix pulled her arm away and stopped walking. “For God’s sake, isn’t it obvious? The same thing I always did. My clients were Russian, very rich, very powerful. Sometimes I was more like a girlfriend, staying with the same man for months at a time.”
Carver wanted to stop. He knew there was nothing to be gained by digging deeper. But he couldn’t help himself. “Like that guy in the club, with the two blonds?” he added, and now there was an edge to the question.
Alix looked at him with the sort of acid contempt he had not seen since that first night in Paris. “Yes, like Platon. Before those girls it was me sitting next to him in clubs, laughing at his jokes, letting his hands grab my tits, going down on him, f*cking him. Okay? Are you satisfied now? Or would you like me to be humiliated a little more?”
“No, I get the picture.”
“Do you? Do you understand what it is to be a woman in Moscow today? There is no law, no security. The choice is not between a good life or a bad one, it is between surviving or dying. I did what it took to, as you say, get the job done. Then Kursk came to me, talking about a job in Paris, saying he needed a woman. I thought maybe there was a chance to escape and start again, a new life.”
“Why didn’t you tell me this before?”
There was real pain on her face now, anger giving way to resignation. “How could I tell you the whole truth? I invented my respectable lover and my respectable job because I hoped maybe you would respect me a bit more. But I lied. I am not respectable. Are you happy now?”
Carver took her shoulders in his hands. “Alix, I don’t give a damn whether you’re ‘respectable.’ Of all the people in the world, I’ve got the least right to judge you. I just want to know what’s true.”
She looked up at him. “Does it matter? Can it ever be any different than this, between you and me?”
They were all talked out now, nothing left to say as they walked up the hill, lost in their own thoughts.
From the Swisscom van, Girgori Kursk saw them come up the final block. Alexandra Petrova wore a brown wig and clothes he’d never seen on her before, but it made no difference. He’d seen her in so many wigs, so many disguises, he could see right past them, recognize her purely from the set of her body and the way she walked.
He smiled when he saw the man next to her. The Englishman had hurt Kursk’s body and his pride alike. He had let himself get suckered into a high-explosive trap, and though he hadn’t let a hint of discomfort or vulnerability show to his men, every breath he took sent a sharp pain stabbing into his cracked and bruised ribs. Now he was going to enjoy his revenge.
He called Dimitrov, who’d taken his place in the Irish pub, and the two other men he’d left near Carver’s apartment. His message was the same. “They’re here. Be ready for action. And remember, we take them both alive.”


50

A door opened a fraction, throwing a sliver of blue white neon light across the charcoal gray cobblestones.
“Psst! Pablo! Come inside!”
Carver was dragged from his introspection like a man being woken from a deep sleep. He looked around and saw the source of the voice.
“Not tonight, Freddy. Sorry, mate, we’re not in the mood.”
“Just come inside. This is serious!”
The urgency in Freddy’s voice made Carver stop. He glanced at Alix but saw no response from her, one way or the other. “What is it?”
They walked past several outside tables into the little, low-ceilinged café. There was one other person in the place, an old man hunched over a bowl of minestrone. Carver nodded in his direction: “Bonsoir, Karl, ?a va?” The old man grunted a noncommittal reply and returned to his soup. “He’s in here every evening, last customer of the night, always a bowl of minestrone,” said Carver, though Alix wasn’t paying any attention.
He turned back to Freddy. “What’s the problem?”
Freddy gave the serving counter a flick with the cloth he kept tucked into his white apron. “No problem, not yet. But later, I don’t know. There are people looking for you, Pablo. First a Frenchman: He came here this morning saying he was working for the federal interior ministry. Obviously a lie. He was a cop of some kind, I’m sure. Then an Englishwoman, very polite, charming, but asking questions.”
“Describe her.”
“Typical English, you know. Not so chic, not elegant, but quite attractive.”
“Hair? Clothes?”
“Er, let me see. . . .” Freddy frowned. “Okay, she had pale brown hair, like a mouse. And she was wearing a skirt with some kind of pattern on it, flowers maybe.”
Carver nodded. “She’s sitting about fifty meters back down the road in a blue Opel Vectra. There’s a man with her. When we walked by she grabbed his hand and looked in his eyes, pretending to be lovers. What did she want to know?”
“She spoke to Jean-Louis when my back was turned. He told her about the other men too.”
“What other men?”
“I don’t know. I did not see them. But Jean-Louis saw some men get out of a black car this afternoon. Then the car went away, but not all of the men were in it. They may still be around.”
“How many men were there?”
“I don’t know. Wait a moment.” He walked to one side of the room, opened a door, and poked his head through. “Jean-Louis!”
A child’s voice came from an upstairs room. “Oui, Papa?”
“Come here, son.”
There was a scurrying of footsteps down a staircase, then a small bundle of energy rocketed into the room, saw Carver, and shrieked, “Pablo!”
His father glowered at him, trying to look stern. “Tell Monsieur Pablo what you saw this afternoon. You know, the funny men.”
“The ones the English lady asked me about?”
“Yes, them.”
“There were three of them, or maybe four. They looked funny. They had big coats on, even though it was nice and warm outside.”
Carver got down on his haunches to look Jean-Louis in the eye. “Could you see if they were carrying anything under their coats?”
“No, they were all buttoned up. They must have been boiling.”
“Yes, they must. But thank you, that’s very useful. Now, did you see where they went?”
The child nodded. “Some went toward your house. But some didn’t. I don’t know what happened to them. I had to come in because Maman said it was time for my dinner.”
“Well, don’t you worry. You did very well. I think you could become a famous detective one day. Don’t you agree, Freddy?”
Freddy looked shocked. “My son? A flic? That’s not funny, Pablo.” He crossed himself in mock horror, then turned to his son. “Okay, now, back up to bed. Come on, up you go. I’ll be up soon to read you a story. Go!”
Carver watched the boy scamper from the room, then turned back to Freddy.
“There’s a Swisscom van up the street, on the other side of the road. How long has that been here?”
Freddy gave an exasperated sigh. “Merde! How would I know that? Truly, Pablo, you are no better than a cop yourself.”
“I’m sorry, but this could be important. Just try to remember back earlier in the day, when you went out to serve people at the tables. Was the van there this morning? Were there telephone engineers doing work anywhere?”
Freddy thought for a moment, his eyes closed. “No, there was no van there, no engineers. It must have arrived late in the day.”
“So either there’s been some last-minute phone crisis, or it’s got nothing to do with Swisscom. We’ve got to assume it’s the latter. So now we’ve got the Frenchman, the Englishwoman and her pal in the car, and a gang of men in big coats who used to have a black car that’s now disappeared, and a van’s arrived. And it doesn’t look like any of them have got anything to do with the others. Jesus . . .”
Alix looked at him. “So now what?”
“You stay here while I go and work out what the bloody hell’s going on.”
“Oh, you’re going to leave me, the helpless woman?”
“No, I just don’t want to fight anyone else if I’m busy fighting with you at the same time. That would be a distraction. I’m going to find out who’s out there, deal with them, then we can carry on with whatever it is we’re doing. If that’s what you want.”
Freddy rolled his eyes and left the room. “I’ll just go and, er, finish cleaning up the kitchen,” he said over his departing shoulder.
Carver and Alix glowered at each other for a moment, neither wanting to give way. Then she gave a quick shrug of concession. “Go. Freddy can look after me.”
Carver said nothing, just looked at her. Then he turned and walked toward the kitchen.
“Hey, Freddy!” he called out. “Is there a back way out of this place?”