Simon retreated a step.
“Yes,” Goran continued. “He knows Ratka very well. Ivan is from Srebrenica. You know it? When he was a boy, Ratka visited his town. It was during the civil war. Ratka is a Serb. Ivan and me, we are Croats. Ivan’s father was Muslim, his mother Orthodox Church. Back then, no one cared about religion. Ratka came with his soldiers and took over the town. He built a camp outside—a concentration camp—and rounded up all the men and boys. Took them there. Also, Ivan’s father and three brothers. Ivan was too small, just three years old. Anyway, Ratka, he cared about religion. He didn’t like Muslims. He and his Silver Tigers…they killed all the men and boys. He made them dig their graves, then shot them. Five thousand. More, maybe. Yes, we know Ratka very well.”
Dragan listened intently, eyes shifting among Goran and Ivan and Simon, as if analyzing where he stood, calculating the probabilities of his next move. Simon didn’t think his mathematical skills were going to be of much assistance.
“He’s your friend, eh?” asked Ivan. “A close friend.”
“I mean…we are working on something together,” said Dragan. “I’m not sure he’s really a friend. More of an associate.”
Ivan looked at Goran. “Friend, associate, whatever of Ratka wants to give us car he doesn’t own. Asks us to work for Ratka. Be lieutenant. What do you say, Goran? You want to work for Ratka?”
Goran shook his head. “No, thank you, Ivan.”
“Me neither.” Ivan turned back to Dragan. “You going to see him soon?”
“Possibly.”
“Yes or no? After all, you have to give him message about your friend, Riske.”
“I believe so,” said Dragan, haltingly.
“Good. Because I have message for you to give Ratka. ‘Fuck you.’”
Two stiff fingers to the chest emphasized the final words. Dragan backed up a step. “I’ll tell him.”
“I want to make sure he gets the message.”
“I promise.”
“What do you think, Goran…you think he tell Ratka ‘Fuck you’ from us, from Goran and Ivan?”
Goran shook his head. “No chance.”
“Me neither. I think better we send message ourselves.”
“I’ll tell him,” Dragan insisted. “You can believe me.”
Ivan was holding a pistol in his right hand. A nickel-plated .45. He raised it. “What you going to tell him?”
“‘Fuck you,’” said Dragan.
“What?”
“‘Fuck you.’” Louder this time. Dragan was red in the face.
Ivan lowered the gun. “Good. I think he gets it.”
Dragan nodded earnestly as Ivan looked at Goran.
A moment later, Ivan raised the pistol and emptied the clip into Dov Dragan, the final shot sending the Israeli over the precipice. Ivan wiped off the pistol with his shirttail and threw it over the cliff. “That was for my papa,” he said, walking past Simon.
“Him…the driver…bad guy?” asked Goran.
“Very.”
Goran put his hand on Simon’s shoulder. “I’m sorry, but we have to take the Ferrari. Martin Harriri owed us a lot of money. He gave us the car as payment. That’s why you saw us the other day. We didn’t know you were one of us.”
Simon didn’t think it necessary to tell him that he’d been out of that side of the game for twenty years.
Goran looked at the Bugatti. “You don’t have a car anymore. You want that one? I don’t know what to do with it.”
“Sure,” said Simon. “Give me a hand?”
“Ivan, come here!” shouted Goran. “We gotta move this car back on the road.”
Chapter 71
The Luftschutzbunker was located on the farthest corner of the first underground floor, just off the Chesa Madrun’s parking garage. A two-foot-thick vault door governed entry and exit. Inside were two rooms: a bedroom with bunk beds, a couch, a television, and all the usual necessities, and a workroom housing auxiliary power units as well as the water and power hookups for the chalet.
At exactly ten a.m., two men—both compact, dark-haired, and possessed of serious intent—entered the shelter, carrying with them a set of blueprints for the Chesa Madrun, as well as a canvas satchel holding a less prosaic item: a two-kilogram brick of Semtex plastic explosive.
Both men were veterans of the Serbian Armed Forces. Unlike Ratka and his paramilitary brigade, the Silver Tigers, they had served in official units. One was a trained civil engineer who had spent his time in the army building barracks, shoring up bridges, and, most important, demolishing them. The other was a commando who had served with distinction in the army’s elite counterterrorist units. Between the two of them, they could blow up any structure conceived and/or built by man.
“The problem,” the civil engineer was saying as he examined the pipe bringing natural gas to the heating unit, “is that if we blow the main here, the force of the blast will be largely contained belowground.”
“So cut the line and let gas leak throughout the house.”
“A place this size? It will take hours—a day, even. The risk is that it might go off on its own before we’re ready.”
“Then we have no choice,” said the commando. “We use the plastique.”
“Any halfway decent investigator will find residue,” said the engineer. “Not to mention evidence of detonators.”
“What’s to investigate?” asked the commando. “A gas leak blows a chalet to kingdom come. There are such explosions every day.”
“Not this chalet. Besides, this is Switzerland. They investigate a blown automobile tire. And don’t forget…there will be victims.”
“And so?”
“It can be done,” said the engineer. “It’s a question of placing the plastique in the correct place where it and the detonators will likely be incinerated.”
“Where pockets of gas will accumulate,” added the commando.
“Precisely. At those points, the amount of explosive left over will be minute and nearly impossible to find.”
The engineer spread a copy of the chalet’s blueprints on a table and in rapid succession banged his finger on spots at every corner of the structure. “Here, here, here, and here.” He looked to his colleague. “Are we agreed?”
The commando nodded. “Agreed.”
“Let’s get to it, then,” said the engineer.
He rolled up the blueprints and put them under his arm. “When we are finished,” he said, “there won’t be a stick or stone of this entire place left standing. Pity, actually.”
Chapter 72
Simon drove east on the coast highway past Menton, San Remo, and San Lorenzo al Mare, one town melting into the next, all silent and sullen beneath the pewter sky. Apart from cosmetic damage to the driver’s side of the car, the Bugatti had not suffered from its collision. Simon drove as fast as conditions allowed, dodging in and out of traffic, the speedometer yo-yoing between 250 kilometers per hour and the legal limit of 120. If he had passed a police car, he hadn’t seen it. Should a blue and white strobe appear in his rearview, his strategy was to drive faster. Once an outlaw, always an outlaw.
He experienced the first slowdown in Savona, and he cursed the city’s favorite son, Christopher Columbus. A prayer to the seaman did no good. The three lanes of traffic moved in unison well below the speed limit. Simon was just one more car in a sea of metal and exhaust.
Salvation came at the town of Voltri as he left the coastal road and headed inland on the A26, passing beneath a sign for Alessandria and Milano. In minutes, he was traversing the fertile Piedmont countryside, three lanes of wide-open highway, the rolling hills and fields of saffron but blurs of green and yellow at near three hundred kilometers per hour.
At the two-hour mark, traffic picked up as he approached Milan, the industrial capital of the north, a city of three million whose suburbs stretched for miles in every direction. Factories and warehouses and quarries lined the motorway. It was a barren, unloved landscape made mor
e unpalatable by the unceasing curtain of rain.
Simon fought to keep from imagining the worst. Dragan’s recounting of the plans to kill Vika and her son played over and over as Simon racked his brain about whom he might call for help. The answer came back the same every time. There was no one. It was up to Simon and Simon alone.
And then, finally, he was free of the metropolitan sprawl. The highway turned north. The weather worsened, cloud and mist sitting low on the ground, rain turning to sleet. He was swallowed by an endless tunnel and spat out in the lake district, long home to Italy’s wealthiest families. Lake Como, slate gray and forbidding, lay along the left side of the road, his brooding companion for the final stretch to the Swiss border. He paid no attention to the string of palazzi and lakeside villas decorating the shoreline.
For an hour he made good time, growing to respect the Bugatti more than he would have liked, its narrow bucket seats and strangely small pedals, more suited to Dov Dragan than to himself. The road was slick; spray from vehicles soaked Simon’s windscreen, leaving him essentially blind for seconds at a time. He gave all his attention to the band of asphalt before him, forbidding himself from slowing. Somewhere inside him he heard a clock ticking, and its relentless rhythm became his own.
An incoming call broke his trance. He recognized the number as belonging to Roger Jenkins at MI5. “Talk to me.”
“We’ve got your friend on the radar.”
“In Switzerland?”
“Why, yes, did you speak with her? Near the town of Pontresina. Her coordinates put her inside a chalet, actually more of a hunting lodge. No other structures within a few kilometers.”
“Can you get me a picture?”
“As a matter of fact, I already checked. I’ll send it straightaway.”
“Thank you, Roger,” said Simon. “I need one more thing. I don’t have time to explain. Can you track another number?”
“You’re pushing it. We do keep records, you know. This will have to be all.”
Simon read off a number with a London area code.
A pause, then an explosion. “Do you know whose number that is?” demanded Jenkins. Then, calmer: “Of course you do. It belongs to Toby Stonewood, the Duke of Suffolk.”
“You don’t say.”
“This isn’t some sort of love triangle, is it?” asked Jenkins. “We don’t do that kind of thing. MI5 isn’t The Sun.”
“Why are you asking?”
“Because Toby Stonewood, or whoever is holding that phone right now, is at precisely the same location as the woman you’re concerned about.”
Just then, Simon spotted a tall red flag snapping to attention in the near distance. He ended the call and slid past the Swiss border control with a show of his passport.
Rising in front of him, dark and never more forbidding, the Alps beckoned.
Something was up.
Robby could tell by the voices outside the library and the footsteps tramping up and down the hall. He felt the floor shudder and knew that meant the door to the underground garage was opening and closing. Someone had arrived. The house grew quiet again. He put his ear to the door. He heard something slam, then nothing. The silence was worse than the burst of activity.
Robby remembered Elisabeth telling him that they were bringing his mother to be with him. He didn’t know how to feel. More than anything he wanted to see her, but more than anything he didn’t. He couldn’t bear to think that he’d failed to warn her. If she was really here, it was his fault. What more could he have done?
A man’s voice echoed down the hall. Robby tucked in his shirt and brushed his hair with his fingers. Then he went to the bookshelf and selected a title at random. He took the book and sat down at the desk. He opened it and pretended to read.
The door opened and his mother stepped into the library. Robby struggled to keep his head down, eyes on the page.
“Fritz,” she said, crossing the room. “Oh Fritz, I’m sorry.”
Robby looked up, then calmly rose and came around the desk. He allowed himself to be hugged, and even put his arms around his mother and hugged her back.
“Are you all right?” she asked, clasping his arms. “What happened to your hand? Is that a cut? And your face…Your eye is swollen.”
“Don’t worry,” he said, his voice steady, much too confident given the circumstances. A man’s voice, she realized. “I’m fine.” Then he put his mouth to her ear and whispered, “I’m going to get us out of here.”
Chapter 73
The Chesa Madrun appeared slowly out of the snow and cloud, a hulking timbered giant with sharp eaves and sloping roofs, girdled by a gray stone retaining wall and dominated by a square tower, darker than the rest, rising from its center, a picture window at the top like an all-seeing eye. The Brothers Grimm had left the Black Forest and come south to the Swiss Alps.
Simon Riske ran down the hillside behind the lodge, his loafers punching holes in the snow. A navy parka and a watch cap, both purchased at a roadside store, shielded him from the elements but stopped short of keeping him warm. It had been a two-kilometer sprint from the car. Somewhere along the line, he’d lost all feeling in his feet. With difficulty, he slowed, grabbing on to a tree trunk to halt his descent. He closed his eyes, needing time to regain his breath, then edged close to the forest line.
The snow was falling harder at altitude. Though it was barely two, the day was colored a dark dishwater gray. Nary a breath disturbed the boughs. A trail of snow fell onto his shoulder. He glanced up to see a black squirrel dash across a branch.
Simon broke from the forest and ran to the rear of the house. He had only scant knowledge of its layout. An Internet search had turned up several articles about the Swiss mountain retreat. A piece from an old architecture journal offered photographs of the interior, as well as of the facade and summer garden. An article from Blick, the Swiss daily tabloid, showcased a party thrown at the Chesa Madrun to celebrate the marriage of Lord Toby Stonewood and Princess Stefanie and included color photographs of the happy couple taken inside the house. It wasn’t much, but Simon had some idea what to expect once he got inside.
He reached the back terrace. All the windows were shuttered, the rollladen lowered and in place. A stout door was locked. Simon put his ear to the frame and caught a raised voice. He pulled his set of picks from his pocket. His hands were shaking from the cold. The lock was brand-new and beyond his skills. There was a picnic table with an umbrella, lowered and protected by a canvas cover, poking through its middle. He freed the umbrella and held it under his arm like a knight preparing to joust. He took a bold step, then rethought his actions.
The fact was, he didn’t know how many people were inside. Regardless of the number, they would be armed. He wasn’t. Making matters more difficult, he had no idea if Vika’s son was also inside. He laid the umbrella on the terrace.
There had to be another way in.
“Everything’s wired,” said the engineer. “She’s ready to blow.”
“How long?” asked Ratka.
“An hour after we rupture the gas line, then…” The engineer made the sign of an explosion with his hands.
Ratka stood in the great hall at the front of the house. The room was two stories at least, a fireplace big enough to drive a tank through, lots of old furniture. A wild boar’s head was mounted above the fireplace—the biggest, meanest, hairiest boar Ratka had ever seen, with tusks like a Saracen’s battle swords. A stag’s head hung from another wall, eighteen points. And facing it, a majestic hawk in flight, wings spread, talons curled to grasp its prey. In the dim light, the animals looked more alive than dead, waiting to spring from the walls and exact their revenge.
Ratka took in his surroundings. He’d never set foot in such a place. His presence stirred a sense of destiny deep inside him. He was here for a reason. He was meant to retake his place atop the Belgrade business world. Once there, he intended to stay. A man with a billion euros did not go to prison.
And yet it wa
sn’t done yet, he warned himself. His mind went back to the Serbian Cup, the final penalty kick. An hour earlier, he’d received an anguished call from Le Juste. Somehow Riske had managed to escape custody. Le Juste mentioned a botched suicide, breaking out of a hospital, then a sighting of Riske at the time trial being held high on the mountain. Le Juste was speaking too quickly for Ratka to make sense of it all. In the end, the only thing that mattered was that Riske was running free.
Possessed of a new urgency, Ratka instructed the engineer to cut the gas lines immediately.
“Best if you kill them first,” said the engineer. “Take them downstairs. Shut them in the bunker. Ten minutes, fifteen tops, is enough. Like sticking your head in an oven. Afterward, you put on the mask, put the bodies where you want. Ground floor is best. You want we can get them now.”
“No,” said Ratka. “I need to have a talk with the lady first. Face-to-face.” He had unfinished business with the princess.
“Take this.” The engineer handed him a metal box the size and shape of a pack of cigarettes. It was an electronic detonator. “Turn it on. Wait for the green light. Hit the red button. All fuses are set to the same frequency. When they receive the signal, they will simultaneously ignite the blasting caps and detonate the charges. Remember: wait one hour. By that time, there will be enough gas inside the house to provoke a large explosion. Afterward, the gas will continue to flow, sparking a conflagration. I’d suggest getting as far away as possible. There will be debris as well as a significant shock wave.”
“I fought in the war, too,” said Ratka. “Remember?” He slipped the detonator into his pocket. “Cut the gas lines. Then get out of here.”
Toby Stonewood dumped the contents of the satchel onto the bed. He separated the cash from the checks in two piles. He looked upon the money contentedly, picking up his tumbler of gin and enjoying a celebratory swallow. He sat down and counted it all. The cash came to eight hundred thousand euros, the checks to nineteen million. They were two hundred thousand short. He looked at some of the artwork on the walls. Dramatic pastorals of windblown lakes and violent thunderstorms. One was a Caspar David Friedrich. That one alone should cover the difference. Pity about the rest of the furnishings in the lodge, but it couldn’t be helped.
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