The Rembrandt Affair

added or subtracted. It meant that whenever Martin opened a document, Gabriel's team opened it, too. They even instructed the computer to transmit video from its built-in camera in thirty-minute loops. Most of the video was silent and black. But for an hour or so each day, whenever Martin was at task, he seemed to be peering directly into the Highgate safe house, watching Gabriel's team as it rummaged through the secrets of his life.

The contents of Martin's computer were encrypted, but the barriers quickly crumbled under the assault led by the two MIT-educated geniuses from Technical. Once they had penetrated the outer walls, the computer quickly belched forth thousands of documents that laid bare the inner workings of the Landesmann empire. Though the information was potentially worth millions to Martin's many competitors, it had little value to Gabriel, for it provided no additional intelligence on GVI's links to Keppler Werk GmbH or precisely what Keppler was secretly selling to the Iranians. Gabriel had learned from experience not to focus on what was visible in a computer's memory but on what was no longer there—the temporary files that floated like ghosts across the hard drive, the discarded documents that had lived there briefly before being tossed into the trash. Files are never truly deleted from a computer. Like radioactive waste, they can live on forever. Gabriel directed the technicians to focus their efforts on Martin's recycle bin, especially on a ghost folder lurking there that had been impervious to all attempts at retrieval.

Gabriel's team did not toil in isolation. Indeed, because Masterpiece was an international endeavor, dissemination of its hard-earned product was international as well. The Americans received a feed over a secure link from Highgate to Grosvenor Square, while the British, after much internal bickering, decided that MI6 was the logical first recipient since Iran was its responsibility. Graham Seymour managed to retain overall operational ascendancy, however, and Thames House remained the nightly meeting point for the principals. The atmosphere remained largely collegial, despite the fact each side brought to the table different assumptions about Iranian intentions, different styles of analysis, and different national priorities. For the Americans and the British, a nuclear Iran represented a regional challenge; for Israel, an existential threat. Gabriel didn't dwell on such issues at the conference table. But then he didn't need to.

His final stop at Thames House each night was the windowless cell of Nigel Whitcombe, who been handed control of the Zoe Reed watch. Despite the potential hazards involved in surveilling a British journalist, Whitcombe accepted the assignment without reservation. Like nearly everyone involved in Masterpiece, he had developed a bit of a schoolboy crush on Zoe and relished the opportunity to admire her for a few more days, even if from afar. The daily watch reports revealed no transgressions on her part and no evidence that she had broken discipline in any way. Each time Martin made contact with her, she duly reported it. She even forwarded to MI5 a brief message he had left on her home machine.

'What did it say?' asked Gabriel.

'The usual. I so enjoyed our time together, darling. Can't wait to see you in Geneva next week, darling. Something about a dress. I didn't understand that part.' Whitcombe straightened the papers on his little headmasterly desk. 'At some point, we're going to decide whether she has to attend Martin's little soiree or whether she should come down with a sudden case of swine flu instead.'

'I'm aware of that, Nigel.'

'May I offer an opinion?'

'If you must.'

'Swine flu.'

'And what if her absence makes Martin suspicious?'

'Better a suspicious Martin Landesmann than a dead British investigative reporter. That might not be good for my career.'

It was nearly midnight by the time Gabriel returned to the Highgate safe house. He found his team hard at work and an intriguing message from King Saul Boulevard waiting in his encrypted in-box. It seemed an old acquaintance from Paris wanted a word. Reading the message a second time, Gabriel ordered himself to be calm. Yes, it was possible this was what they were looking for, but it was probably nothing. A mistake, he thought. A waste of time when he had none to spare. But it was also possible he had just been granted the first piece of good fortune since Julian Isherwood had appeared on the cliffs of Cornwall to ask him to find a missing portrait by Rembrandt. Someone would have to check it out. But given the demands of Operation Masterpiece, it would have to be someone other than Gabriel. All of which explains why Eli Lavon, surveillance artist, archaeologist, and tracker of missing Holocaust assets, returned to Paris early the next morning. And why, shortly after one that afternoon, he was walking along the rue des Rosiers, twenty paces behind a memory militant named Hannah Weinberg.

54 THE MARAIS, PARIS

She rounded the corner into rue Pavee and disappeared into the apartment house at No. 24. Lavon walked the length of the street twice, searching for evidence of surveillance, before presenting himself at the doorway. The directory identified the resident of apartment 4B as MME. BERTRAND. Lavon pressed the call button and peered benignly into the security camera.

'Oui?'

'I'm here to see Madame Weinberg, please.'

A silence, then, 'Who are you, monsieur?'

'My name is Eli Lavon. I'm—'

'I know who you are, Monsieur Lavon. Just a moment.'

The entry buzzer moaned. Lavon crossed the damp interior courtyard, entered the foyer, and headed up the stairs. Waiting on the fourth-floor landing, arms folded, was Hannah Weinberg. She admitted Lavon into her apartment and quietly closed the door. Then she smiled and formally extended her hand.

'It is an honor to meet you, Monsieur Lavon. As you might expect, you have many admirers at the Weinberg Center.'

'The honor is mine,' Lavon said humbly. 'I've been watching you from a distance. Your center is doing marvelous work here in Paris. Under increasingly difficult conditions, I might add.'

'We do what we can, but I'm afraid it's probably not enough.' A sadness crept into her gaze. 'I'm so sorry about what happened in Vienna, Monsieur Lavon. The bombing affected all of us very deeply.'

'These are emotional issues,' Lavon said.

'On both sides.' She managed a smile. 'I was just making some coffee.'

'I'd love some.'

She led Lavon into the sitting room and disappeared into the kitchen. Lavon looked around at the stately old furnishings. He had worked on the operation that had drawn Hannah Weinberg into the gravitational pull of the Office and knew her family history well. He also knew that in a room located at the end of the hall hung a painting by Vincent van Gogh called Marguerite Gachet at Her Dressing Table. The blood-soaked operation involving the little-known work was one of many Gabriel Allon productions Lavon had tried hard to forget. He tamped down the memory now as Hannah Weinberg returned carrying two cups of cafe au lait. She handed one to Lavon and sat.

'I assume this isn't a courtesy call, Monsieur Lavon.'

'No, Madame Weinberg.'

'You're here because of the documents?'

Lavon nodded and sipped his coffee.

'I didn't realize you were connected to...' Her voice trailed off.

'To what?' Lavon asked.

'Israeli intelligence,' she said sotto voce.

'Me? Do I really look cut out for that sort of work?'

She examined him carefully. 'I suppose not.'

'After the bombing in Vienna, I returned to my first love, which is archaeology. I'm on the faculty of Hebrew