Portrait of a Spy

“Maybe you should keep it after the operation, too. I think it makes you look . . .” Her voice trailed off.

“Don’t say it, Chiara.”

“I was going to say distinguished.”

“That’s like calling a woman elegant.”

“What’s wrong with that?”

“You’ll understand when people start saying you look elegant.”

“It won’t be so bad.”

“It will never happen, Chiara. You’re beautiful and you’ll always be beautiful. And if I keep this beard after the operation, people will start to mistake you for my daughter.”

“Now you’re being unreasonable.”

“It is biologically possible.”

“What is?”

“For you to be my daughter.”

“I’ve never actually thought about it that way.”

“Don’t,” he said.

She laughed quietly and then said nothing more.

“What are you thinking about now?” Gabriel asked.

“What might have happened if you hadn’t noticed that boy with the bomb under his jacket walking along Wellington Street. We would have been sitting down to lunch when the bomb exploded. It would have been a tragedy, of course, but our lives would have gone on as normal, just like everyone else’s.”

“Maybe this is normal for us, Chiara.”

“Normal couples don’t make love in safe houses.”

“Actually, I’ve always enjoyed making love to you in safe houses.”

“I fell in love with you in a safe house.”

“Which one?”

“Rome,” she said. “That little flat off the Via Veneto where I took you after the Polizia di Stato tried to kill you in that dreadful pensione near the train station.”

“The Abruzzi,” Gabriel said heavily. “What a pit.”

“But the safe flat was lovely.”

“You barely knew me.”

“I knew you very well, actually.”

“You made me fettuccini with mushrooms.”

“I only make my fettuccini with mushrooms for people I love.”

“Make me some now.”

“You have some work to do first.”

Chiara flipped a switch on the wall above the bed. A tiny halogen reading lamp burned laserlike into Gabriel’s eye.

“Must you?” he asked, squinting.

“Sit up.”

She took a file folder from the bedside table and handed it to him. Gabriel lifted the cover and for the first time saw the face of Samir Abbas. It was angular, bespectacled, and lightly bearded, with thoughtful brown eyes and a deeply receded hairline. At the time the photo was snapped, he had been walking along a street in a residential section of Zurich. He was wearing a gray suit, the uniform of a Swiss banker, and a silver necktie. His briefcase looked expensive, as did his shoes. His overcoat was unbuttoned and his hands were gloveless. He was talking on a mobile phone. Judging by the shape of his mouth, it appeared to Gabriel he was speaking German.

“Here’s the man who’s going to help you buy a terror group,” Chiara said. “Samir Abbas, born in Amman in 1967, educated at the London School of Economics, and hired by TransArabian Bank in 1998.”

“Where does he live?”

“Up in Hottingen, near the university. If the weather is good, he walks to work, for the sake of his waistline. If it’s bad, he takes the streetcar from Römerhof down to the financial district.”

“Which one?”

“The Number Eight, of course. What else would he take?”

Chiara smiled. Her knowledge of European public transit, like Gabriel’s, was encyclopedic.

“Where’s his flat?”

“At Carmenstrasse Four. It’s a small postwar building with a stucco exterior, six flats in all.”

“Wife?”

“Take a look at the next picture.”

It showed a woman walking along the same street. She was wearing Western clothing except for a hijab that framed a childlike face. Holding her left hand was a boy of perhaps four. Holding her right was a girl who looked to be eight or nine.

“Her name is Johara, which means ‘jewel’ in Arabic. She works part-time as a teacher at an Islamic community center on the west side of the city. The older child attends classes there. The boy is in the day-care facility. Both children speak fluent Swiss German, but Johara is much more comfortable in Arabic.”

“Does Samir go to a mosque?”

“He prays in the apartment. The children like American cartoons, much to their father’s dismay. No music allowed, though. Music is strictly forbidden.”

“Does she know about Samir’s charitable endeavors?”

“Since they use the same computer, it would be hard to miss.”

“Where is it?”

“In the living room. We popped it the day after we arrived. It’s giving us fairly decent audio and visual coverage. We’re also reading his e-mail and monitoring his browsing. Your friend Samir enjoys his jihadi porn.”

“What about his mobile?”

“That took a bit of doing, but we got that, too.” Chiara pointed to the photograph of Samir. “He carries it in the right pocket of his overcoat. We got it on the streetcar while he was on his way to work.”

“We?”

“Yaakov handled the bump, Oded picked his pocket, and Mordecai did the technical stuff. He popped it while Samir was reading the newspaper. The whole thing took two minutes.”

“Why didn’t anyone tell me about this?”

“We didn’t want to bother you.”

“Is there anything else you neglected to tell me?”

“Just one thing,” Chiara said.

“What’s that?”

“We’re being watched.”

“By the Swiss?”

“No, not the Swiss.”

“Who then?”

“Three guesses. First two don’t count.”

Gabriel snatched up his secure BlackBerry and started typing.

Chapter 36 Lake Zurich

IT TOOK THE BETTER PART of forty-eight hours for Adrian Carter to find his way to Zurich. He met Gabriel in the late afternoon on the prow of a ferry bound for the suburb of Rapperswil. He wore a tan mackintosh coat and carried a copy of the Neue Zürcher Zeitung beneath his arm. The newsprint was wet with snow.

“I’m surprised you’re not wearing your Agency credentials,” Gabriel said.