The English Assassin

by Daniel Silva

A white Formica table separated them, bare except for a manila file folder and Gabriel’s mug of steaming coffee. Like Peterson’s cell in the basement, the room had terra-cotta floors and stucco walls. The blinds were drawn. Windblown rain beat a meddlesome rhythm against the glass. Gabriel regarded Peterson with an expression of distaste and fell into a speculative silence.

  “You won’t get away with this.”

  It was Peterson who broke the silence. He had spoken in English but Gabriel immediately switched to German; the carefully pronounced and grammatically correct High German of his mother. He wished to point out the laxity of Peterson’sSchwyzerdütch. To emphasize Peterson’sSwissness. To isolate him.

  “Get away with what, Gerhardt?”

  “Kidnapping me, you fucking bastard!”

  “But we already did get away with it.”

  “There were security cameras in the garage of my apartment house. That trick with your whore was recorded on videotape. The Zurich police probably have it already.”

  Gabriel smiled calmly. “We took care of the security cameras, just like you took care of the security cameras at Rolfe’s villa the night you murdered him and stole his paintings.”

  “What are you ranting about?”

  “The paintings in Rolfe’s secret collection. The paintings he received during the war for services rendered to the SS. The paintings he wanted to return.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I don’t know anything about a secret collection, and I certainly had nothing to do with the murder of Augustus Rolfe! No one would ever believe I had anything to do with his death.”

  “You killed Augustus Rolfe. Then you killed Werner Müller in Paris. Then Emil Jacobi in Lyons. You tried to kill me in Zurich. You sent a man to kill Anna Rolfe in Venice. That makes me angry, Gerhardt.”

  “You’re deranged!”

  Gabriel could see that Peterson’s manufactured defiance was slowly beginning to weaken.

  “You’ve been away from work for a long time. Your superiors would like to talk to you too. They can’t find you either. Needless to say, your wife would like to know where the hell you are too. She’s worried sick.”

  “My God, what have you done? What onearth have you done?”

  Peterson seemed incapable of sitting still now. He was rocking in his chair and shivering. Gabriel sipped his coffee and pulled a face as though it were too hot. Then he lifted the cover on the manila file and began removing photographs. He took them out one at a time and had a brief look for himself before sliding them across the tabletop so Peterson could see.

  “She takes a nice picture, don’t you think, Gerhardt? My, my, you seem to be enjoying yourself there. And look at this one. I’d hate to have to explain that one to Mrs. Peterson.And the press.And your minister in Bern.”

  “You’re nothing but a blackmailer! No one will believe those photographs are real. They’ll see them for what they are: a cheap smear by a cheap blackmailer. But then blackmail and murder are the currency of your service, aren’t they? It’s what you’re good at.”

  Gabriel left the photographs on the table in plain sight. Peterson made a valiant effort not to look at them.

  “So that’s the story you tell your wife and your superiors? That you’re an innocent victim of blackmail? That you were kidnapped by Israeli intelligence and drugged? Do you know what your superiors will ask you? They’ll say: ‘Why would Israeli intelligence single you out for such treatment, Gerhardt? What have you done that would make them act like this?’ And you’ll have to come up with an answer.”

  “That won’t be a problem.”

  “Are you certain about that? It may not be so easy, given the fact that some of the most reputable news organizations in the world will be uncovering interesting bits and pieces of the story on a daily basis. It will be like water torture, pardon the comparison. You may survive it, but your career will be ruined. Your dreams of becoming chief of the Federal Police will remain just that: a dream. Politics will be closed off to you. Business as well. Do you think your friends in the banks will come to your assistance? No, I doubt it, since you’ll have nothing to offer them. Imagine, no job, no pension, no financial support from your friends.”

  Gabriel paused in order to lift the cover on the file folder and remove a half-dozen more photographs: surveillance shots of Peterson’s wife and children. Deliberately he placed them next to the pictures of Peterson and the girl.

  “Who will take care of your wife? Who will take care of your children? Who will pay the rent on that nice flat of yours on the Zürichsee? Who will make the payments on that big Mercedes? It’s not a very pleasant picture, but it doesn’t have to be that way. I don’t like murderers, Gerhardt, especially when they kill for a bank, but I’m offering you a way out. I suggest that you take it before it’s too late.”

  “What do you want from me?”

  “You’re going to work for me now.”

  “That’s impossible!”

  “You’re going to help me get Rolfe’s paintings back.” Gabriel hesitated, waiting for Peterson to deny knowledge of any paintings, but this time he said nothing. “We’ll handle it quietly, theSwiss way. Then you’re going to help me get back other things. You’re going to help me clean up the mess of Swiss history. Together, Gerhardt, we can move mountains.”

  “And if I refuse?”

  “You can go back downstairs with my friend and think about it for a while. Then we’ll talk again.”

  “Take those damned pictures away!”

  “Give me an answer and I’ll take them away.”

  “What you don’t understand is that either way I’ll be destroyed. It’s just a question of which poison I choose to drink.” Peterson’s chin fell to his chest, his eyes closed. “I’m thirsty.”

  “Answer my questions, and I’ll get you something to drink.”

  INthe corridor outside the room, Eli Lavon sat on the cold floor, his back to the wall, his eyes closed. Only his right hand betrayed his emotions. It was squeezing his cigarette lighter. Though he lived in Vienna, the sound of German shouted in anger still made the back of his neck burn.

  The fissures had appeared, but Peterson had not yet cracked. Lavon could tell he was close. The drugs, the water, the pictures with the girl. The fear of what waited around the next bend in the road. It was building in him. Eli Lavon hoped it happened soon.

  He had never seen Gabriel like this. Never seen him angry. Never heard him raise his voice. Something about the affair had torn open all the old wounds. Leah. Tariq. Shamron. Even his parents. Gabriel was a man on a very short fuse.

  Let it go, Herr Peterson,thought Lavon.Tell him everything he wants to know. Do exactly what he says. Because if you don’t, I fear my good friend Gabriel is going to take you into the mountains and start shooting. And that’s not going to be good for anybody. Not you. And especially not Gabriel. Lavon didn’t care about Peterson. It was Gabriel he loved. He didn’t want more blood on the hands of Gabriel Allon.

  So no one was more relieved than Lavon when the shouting finally stopped. Then came the thumping—Gabriel pounding on the wall with one of his wounded hands. Still seated on the floor, Lavon reached up and opened the door a few inches. Gabriel spoke to him in Hebrew. The language had never sounded so sweet to Lavon, though he was quite sure it had the opposite effect on Gerhardt Peterson. “Bring him some clothes, Eli. And some food. Herr Peterson is cold and hungry. Herr Peterson would like to tell us a few things.”

  THEblue track suit was a fashion tragedy, intentionally so. The top was too large, the legs of the trousers too short. Gerhardt Peterson looked like a man in the clutches of a midlife crisis who digs out a pair of ancient togs for a life-threatening jog in the park. The food was not much better: a lump of coarse bread, a bowl of clear soup. Oded brought a pitcher of ice water. He made a point of spilling a few drops on Peterson’s hand, a reminder of what lay ahead if Peterson didn’t start talking. Gabriel ate nothing. He had no intention of sharing a meal wi
th Gerhardt Peterson. The Swiss ate steadily but slowly, as though he wished to postpone the inevitable. Gabriel let him take his time. Peterson finished the soup and polished the bowl with the heel of his bread.

  “Where are we, by the way?”

  “Tibet.”

  “This is my first trip to Tibet.” Peterson managed a wounded smile. When Gabriel refused to play along, the smile quickly faded. “I’d like a cigarette.”

  “You can’t have one.”

  “Why not?”

  “I don’t like smoke.”

  Peterson pushed away his empty soup bowl.

  HADGabriel Allon not become an assassin, he would have made a perfect interrogator. He was a natural listener: a man who spoke only when necessary; who had no need to hear the sound of his own voice. Like a deerstalker, he was also graced with an unnatural stillness. He never touched his hair or his face, never gestured with his hands or shifted in his chair. It was this very stillness, coupled with his silence and immutable patience, which made him such a frightening opponent over a bare table. Though even Gabriel was surprised at Gerhardt Peterson’s sudden willingness to talk.

  “How did I know about Rolfe’s collection?” Peterson asked, repeating Gabriel’s first question. “There is precious little that takes place in Zurich that I don’t know about. Zurich is the largest city in Switzerland, but it is still a small place. We have our hooks in deep: banking, business, the foreign workers, the media.”

  Gabriel didn’t want Peterson to build confidence by rambling on about his professional achievements, so he quickly cut him off. “That’s all very interesting, but how did you find out about Rolfe?”

  “Rolfe was a sick old man—everybody on the Bahnhofstrasse and the Paradeplatz knew that. Everyone knew he didn’t have long to live. Then the rumors start to fly. Rolfe is losing his mind. Rolfe wants to set things right before he meets the big banker in the sky. Rolfe wants to talk. Augustus Rolfe was a banker in Zurich for a very long time. When a man like him wants to talk, it can only come to no good.”

  “So you put him under surveillance.”

  Peterson nodded.

  “Since when is it a crime in Switzerland to talk?”

  “It’s not a crime, but it’s definitely frowned upon—especially if it exposes less-than-flattering elements of our past to the rest of the world. We Swiss don’t like to discuss unpleasant family matters in front of foreigners.”

  “Did your superiors know you’d placed Rolfe under watch? Did your minister in Bern?”

  “The Rolfe affair really wasn’t an official matter.”

  And then Gabriel remembered Rolfe’s letter:There are people in Switzerland who want the past to remain exactly where it is—entombed in the bank vaults of the Bahnhofstrasse—and they will stop at nothing to achieve that end.

  “If it wasn’t an official matter, then on whose behalf were you following Rolfe?”

  Peterson hesitated for a moment; Gabriel feared he might stop talking. Then he said: “They call themselves the Council of Rütli.”

  “Tell me about them.”

  “Get me more of that vile soup, and I’ll tell you anything you want to know.”

  Gabriel decided to allow him this one victory. He raised his hand and beat his palm on the wall three times. Oded poked his head in the door as if he smelled smoke. Gabriel murmured a few words to him in Hebrew. Oded reacted by pulling his lips into a remorseful frown.

  “And bread,” said Peterson as Oded was leaving. “I’d like some more of that bread with my soup.”

  Oded looked to Gabriel for instruction.

  “Bring him some fucking bread.”

  THIStime they took no break for food, so Peterson was forced to deliver his lecture on the Council of Rütli with a spoon in one hand and a lump of bread in the other. He spoke for ten minutes without interruption, pausing only to slurp his soup or tear off another mouthful of bread. The history of the Council, its goals and objectives, the power of its membership—all of these topics he covered in substantial detail. When he had finished, Gabriel asked: “Are you a member?”

  This question seemed to amuse him. “Me? A schoolteacher’s son from Bernese Oberland”—he touched his bread to his breast for emphasis—“a member of the Council of Rütli? No, I’m not a member of the Council, I’m just one of their faithful servants. That’s what all of us are in Switzerland—servants. Servants to the foreigners who come here to deposit their money in our banks. Servants to the ruling oligarchy.Servants. ”

  “What service do you provide?”

  “Security and intelligence.”

  “And what do you receive in return?”

  “Money and career support.”

  “So you told the Council about the things you’d heard about Rolfe?”

  “That’s right. And the Council told me the kinds of things he was hiding.”

  “A collection of paintings that he’d been given by the Nazis for banking services rendered during the war.”

  Peterson inclined his head a fraction of an inch. “Herr Rolfe was concealing valuable objects and a controversial story, a terrible set of circumstances from the Council’s point of view.”

  “So what does the Council instruct you to do?”

  “To tighten the watch around him. To make certain Herr Rolfe doesn’t do anything rash in his final days. But there are disturbing signs. A visitor to Rolfe’s bank—a man from an international Jewish agency who is active in the question of the dormant Holocaust accounts.”

  The casualness with which Peterson made this reference set Gabriel’s teeth on edge.

  “Then we intercept a series of faxes. It seems that Rolfe is making arrangements to hire an art restorer. I ask myself a simple question: Why is a dying man wasting time restoring his paintings? It’s been my experience that the dying usually leave details like that to their survivors.”

  “You suspect Rolfe is planning to hand over the paintings?”

  “Or worse.”

  “What could be worse?”

  “A public confession of his dealings with high-ranking Nazis and officers of German intelligence. Can you imagine the spectacle such an admission would create? It would sweep the country like a storm. It would make the controversy of the dormant accounts look like a mild dustup.”

  “Is that all the Council was afraid of?”

  “Isn’t that enough?”

  But Gabriel was listening not to Gerhardt Peterson but to Augustus Rolfe:Once, I considered these men my friends—another of my many mistakes.

  “They were afraid that Augustus Rolfe was going to reveal the existence of the Council. He knew about the Council, because he was a member, wasn’t he?”

  “Rolfe? He wasn’t just a member of the Council. He was a charter member.”

  “So you went to see him?”

  “I tell him that I’ve heard things—nothing specific, mind you, very subtle. Rolfe is old, but he still has an agile mind, and he knows exactly what I’m trying to tell him. He’s a Swiss banker, for Christ’s sake. He knows how to have two conversations at the same time. When I leave, I’m convinced the Council has big problems.”

  “So what do you do?”

  “Resort to Plan B.”

  “And that is?”

  “Steal the fucking paintings. No paintings, no story.”

  PETERSONrefused to continue without a cigarette, and reluctantly Gabriel agreed. Once more he beat his palm against the wall, and once more Oded jutted his head through the open door. He gave Peterson a cigarette from his own pack. When he struck the hammer of his lighter, Peterson flinched so violently he nearly fell from his chair. Oded laughed helplessly all the way to the door. Peterson drew at the cigarette gingerly, as though he feared it might explode, and every few seconds Gabriel lifted his arm to bat away the smoke.

  “Tell me about Werner Müller,” Gabriel said.

  “He was the key to everything. If we were going to get at Rolfe’s secret collection, we needed Müller’s help. Müller
was the one who designed the security system. So I had my men dig up as much dirt on Müller as we could find. Müller didn’t have clean hands, either. None of us really does, do we?” When Gabriel said nothing, Peterson continued. “I went to Paris to have a chat with Müller. Needless to say, he agreed to work for our cause.”

  Peterson smoked the cigarette nearly to the filter, then morosely crushed it out in his empty soup bowl.

  “The job was set for the next night. Rolfe was planning to go to Geneva and spend the night at his apartment there. The art restorer was scheduled to arrive the next morning. The team broke into the villa, and Müller guided them down to the viewing chamber.”

  “Were you part of the team?”

  “No, my job was to make sure the Zurich police didn’t show up in the middle of it, nothing more.”

  “Go on.”

  “Müller disarms the security system and shuts down the cameras. Then they go inside the vault, and guess what they find?”

  “Augustus Rolfe.”

  “In the flesh. Three o’clock in the morning, and the old man is sitting there with his fucking paintings. Müller panics. The burglars are strangers to Rolfe, but the old man and Müller are in business together. If the old man goes to the police, it’s Müller who’ll take the fall. He grabs a gun from one of the Council’s men, marches the old man upstairs to the drawing room, and puts a bullet in his brain.”

  “Six hours later, I show up.”

  Peterson nodded. “Rolfe’s body gave us an opportunity to test the veracity of the art restorer. If the art restorer discovers the body and telephones the police, chances are he’s just an art restorer. If he finds the body and tries to leave town—”

  Peterson held up his hands as if to say no other explanation was necessary.

  “So you arrange to have me arrested.”

  “That’s right.”

  “What about the first detective who interrogated me?”

  “Baer? Baer knew nothing. To Baer you were just a suspect in the murder of a Swiss banker.”

  “Why bother to arrest me? Why not just let me go?”