"Is the motive known?" Littel asked.

"We're tracking that down. We'll know something soon."

"Natalie Golden and Greg Saunders," Littel said to the room. "I want you to find out everything about them, from where they were born to who they hung out with. The smallest detail is important. Get working on it."

A group left the room to follow up on the order.

"Barnes, what else do you have for me?"

"There's been an explosion this afternoon here in London."

"In . . ." Littel consulted his notes on the table. "Redcliff Gardens. We're current on that."

"Okay. The explosion was of criminal origin and resulted in a death and an injury."

A certain uneasiness filled the room.

"We're already trying to question the injured party."

"And the death?"

"An agent of the RSS, a certain Nestov."

"Nestov?" Colonel Stuart Garrison exclaimed. "This was why he wasn't answering his phone." The colonel looked pale.

"Whose house was it? What was he doing there?"

Barnes didn't answer. A murmur rose in the room.

"Silence," Littel said. "Barnes, are you there?"

"I am."

"Then do me the favor of answering. What was he doing in the house?"

Barnes again showed no sign of answering. When that happened, it could only mean one thing. Littel understood and picked up the receiver of the phone while disconnecting the loudspeaker.

"Okay, Barnes, now it's just you and me."

It was clear the other listeners didn't like the idea of being excluded from the conversation. It meant greater secrecy, increasing their curiosity.

Littel listened attentively to what Barnes was telling him. His face began to change from perturbed and dark to an expression of irritation and unease.

The others noticed this change of mood and felt even more frustrated.

"Is this the president's position?"

Hearing Washington mentioned, everyone perked up his ears in vain. They continued hearing the same thing: nothing.

Seconds later Littel put down the receiver and disconnected the call. They could see a couple of drops of sweat running down his face. And it wasn't the fault of the air-conditioning. Something was bothering Littel, and if something worried him, it would soon worry everyone.

He drummed his fingers on the table for a few minutes, making the others, who kept silent in frustration, very nervous.

"Wake up the subdirector," he ordered at last. "And get a plane ready."

37.

This isn't very clear," Staughton protested from the pa.s.senger seat as Thompson got to the end of Montpelier Street and turned left toward Brompton Road.

"That's how the services function. If everything were clear, we wouldn't have a job."

"That's for sure," Staughton admitted. Uncomfortable, he took a deep breath. "But someone could be wrong."

"No, they couldn't."

"No?"

"No," Thompson repeated. "They're working with us. We work with them as long as it's in our mutual interest. We understand that, and they do, too."

"Yes, but according to the president."

"The president acts according to the interests of the United States of America. That's all he has to be concerned about. And according to those interests he swore to defend, he helps whoever can give him the most."

"It doesn't seem right," Staughton confessed.

"You're still a beginner in operational work in the field, so let me give you some advice. There are Americans, that's us, and the others. Don't ever get too friendly with the others because the day will come when they're our enemies. Do you understand?"

"It's still not right."

"Forget about being right. The world is not fair. Take my advice, and you'll never have a problem when the pieces change sides. Precisely because they're the 'others' "-he made quotation marks with his fingers-"they're mere accessories and the first to go when things change."

"I understand."

The two men continued the trip in silence. Staughton took in the moral lesson given by his colleague, who should be his friend, given the hours they spent working together every day. Maybe they were friends without knowing it, ready to give their life for the other one if the need should arise. It was curious how they spent nights together, traveling, on surveillance, listening, but continued to be strangers, perhaps because each one erected a wall that prevented any closeness. One of the things this profession had taught them and they never forgot was, contrary to war, in which your life is entrusted to the man next to you, here no one trusted anyone. Even your own shadow wouldn't hesitate to inform against you.

"Let's get back to Sarah Monteiro and Jack Payne. Don't you remember anything?" Staughton asked.

"You ought to remember something yourself. Or did that blow you received in Saint Patrick's leave you with amnesia?" His irritation was obvious. It wasn't something he liked to remember.

"I'm not proud of it, I agree. n.o.body likes to end up out cold." He pointed at Thompson. "But I wasn't the only one. I won't mention any names, but I take note." He smiled, trying to break the bad mood the memory created. "On the other hand, I'm glad things turned out the way they did."

"The way they did? Why?" Thompson even took his eyes off the road to look at his partner, amazed to hear this stupidity.

"Because we would have had to justify three or four unnecessary deaths. Both sides reached an agreement by talking, and no one died," he concluded.

Thompson looked at him without knowing what to say, at least until he recovered his reason, and his irritation.

"They reached an agreement through blackmail. Keep quiet or we'll publicize this Keep quiet or we'll publicize this. And I should remember that the author of this blackmail died f.u.c.king in a bathroom in Amsterdam, next to your colleague, who was guilty of nothing and probably didn't know what she'd done. And they did it in front of him." He spat with anger.

"And now someone who has nothing to do with this s.h.i.t has decided to even the score. And Uncle Sam-"

"Leave Uncle Sam out of it," Thompson interrupted. "Uncle Sam always knows what he's doing even if it doesn't look like it. Let's stop making him always the reason."

Staughton shut up. It wasn't worth arguing. Thompson was an agent with the vices of working in the field, in multifaceted operations, used to a.s.suming personalities that had nothing to do with his ident.i.ty. A true spy, a chameleon of a thousand and one colors, capable of convincing his mother, if she were still alive, that he was her husband.

Staughton was a very different case. Recruited by the information section for electronic surveillance, he had always operated inside. With a mouse and a telephone there was no adversary to confront. Operations took on an air of fantasy when everything was done with eyes on a monitor that determined the results, like a computer game that paid a real salary at the end of each week. Now, since he'd been with Geoffrey Barnes in the field, he understood that the shapes on the screen signify real places and the color points show flesh-and-bone people, like himself and Thompson, who was driving in a bad mood by his side. The mission accomplished described only one of the parts. There was always someone who lost, and usually much more than he expected.

Thompson accelerated, a reflection of his irritation, entering Fulham Road a little faster than the speed limit; there were no policemen around. He turned off rapidly to the right and drove faster. Staughton breathed heavily. He knew that any moment the hospital would come in sight on the left.

A mile and a half later the hospital appeared, as antic.i.p.ated. Chelsea and Westminster Hospital, two ambulances parked in front with no one around, except a Mercedes van parked on the street with the lights on and engine running. Thompson turned around completely to pull up behind it.

"Look there." He pointed toward the entrance.

Staughton was also looking. A woman he immediately recognized was leaving the hospital with an older blond man and a young man dressed in pajamas.

Thompson stopped the car and got out, gun in hand.

"Sarah Monteiro," he called in a loud, commanding voice, pointing the gun at her. "Don't move."

Staughton got out of the car, confused, but without taking his gun out. His partner had the situation under control and was more used to pointing guns at people and even . . . shooting them without hesitation or conscience.

Sarah and the others obeyed promptly and even raised their hands, as film directors require, without receiving the order.

Thompson smiled, seeing the scene unfold under his direction, and looked at Staughton confidently, like a teacher showing his willing student the art of apprehending one or more individuals. But his expression changed as soon as he turned his eyes toward his partner and saw a red dot moving up his chest toward his head.

"What?" Staughton wanted to know. "What's going on?" Fear made his voice tremble.

"Don't move," Thompson ordered, looking across the street, the probable location of the shooter. Several buildings with the lights out made it practically impossible to tell.

Thompson pointed the gun at the three people with no sign of putting it down, while he watched the buildings in front, visibly uncomfortable.

"Sarah Monteiro," he shouted. "Get over here."

He could use her as a shield, getting an advantage over the shooter, whose ident.i.ty he thought about. It could only be Jack Payne, the so-called Rafael Santini.

Sarah walked toward Thompson, step by step, without haste. This was not in her plans. Everything had seemed solved by the elimination of Templar and James. A noise in the window of the driver's-side door on Thompson's car broke it into pieces and made Sarah cry out and hit the ground. Thompson shook the pieces of what used to be the window off his jacket and ran to reach Sarah, his last chance, fifteen yards away, lying on the ground, easy, easy. The asphalt jumped twice near his feet. Two shots, without doubt, that made him stop and get the message: I don't want to kill you, but if I have to I don't want to kill you, but if I have to . . . He dropped his gun and put his hands behind his head without anyone's ordering it. He had lost. In that moment he saw Rafael come out of the house in front and cross the street with a gun pointed at him. . . . He dropped his gun and put his hands behind his head without anyone's ordering it. He had lost. In that moment he saw Rafael come out of the house in front and cross the street with a gun pointed at him.

"Make your colleague lay down his gun," Rafael ordered.

Hearing him, Sarah got up and looked at him with luminous eyes. A year later, another encounter in the same circ.u.mstances. Couldn't they meet another way? More normally. A dinner, a date at the movies, a cup of coffee?

"Do what he tells you," Thompson told Staughton in the same firm voice as always. This clearly wasn't the first time he'd found himself with a gun aimed at him. A warrior's occupational hazard, Staughton thought with respect, while he tossed his gun away from him. If they knew him well, they'd know he'd never shoot at anyone.

Rafael crossed the street without taking his eyes off the two men. He never relaxed or even glanced at Sarah, who already knew how he operated. All business. There's no diversion in the life of Rafael Santini, a sometime double agent for P2 who used the name Jack Payne.

When he got near Thompson, Rafael arched his lips in a sarcastic smile.

"How's Geoffrey Barnes?"

Neither agent answered, naturally. Thompson met Rafael's look, while Staughton lowered his eyes to avoid calling undesirable attention to himself. On the computer everything was much easier.

"Give him my best, friends," he said in a neutral tone. Of course, they'd never pa.s.s on that message, but Staughton was pleased to know that Rafael wasn't going to harm them.

"You're totally crazy," Phelps protested. "Gun out, shooting at people? You're completely possessed. My G.o.d, where are we? And who are these men?" He pointed at Staughton and Thompson, who looked at him fascinated.

"My beloved Phelps," Rafael called. "Help our two new friends into the van. It'll be a little crowded, but where there's a will . . . And don't say anything else."

Phelps was fuming, but Sarah's hand on his brought him back to earth. Immediately Simon and the woman walked to the van, where they'd have to squeeze three into a seat for one. Anything can be done with the grace of G.o.d.

Rafael, ever on guard, picked up the guns thrown on the ground, unloaded them skillfully, and let them fall, keeping the clips for future use.

"We'll see each other again," Rafael informed them as he walked to the van. "So long."

Before getting into the van, he pressed a pen that sent a beam of red light into Thompson's eyes. Not everything is as it appears. Then he took off as fast as possible.

The two men remained behind, confused, seeing the van leave down Fulham Road in the direction of Fulham Broadway. Their reaction came afterward when Thompson opened the door.

"Let's go."

"Where?"

"After them. Where do you think they went?"

The two men got in the car and took off in the same direction, or, at least, that was their intention. Thompson felt something wrong and slammed on the brakes. He poked his head outside and saw what he hadn't noticed previously: two of the tires were flat. Rafael must have shot them out.

"What's the problem?" Staughton asked.

"Flat tires," Thompson explained, getting out of the car.

"He is," Staughton exclaimed with a sigh.

"He's what?" Thompson was not joking.

"He is good," Staughton said admiringly.

Just as Thompson was about to express his anger, a London cab stopped next to the car. A young man got out with a disdainful look.

"What happened here?" he asked rudely.

"Keep going," Thompson answered impolitely. "This is none of your business."

A sarcastic, annoying smile appeared on the man's face.