down on a sofa, and looked at Fitzduane thoughtfully. He uncapped a bottle of Gurten and drank from it, then wiped his mouth with his hand. He stood up and stretched like an animal. He was in superb physical condition. He looked at Paulus, then at Fitzduane, then at the packing case. 'Beware of Greeks bearing gifts.'
Paulus flinched, almost imperceptibly, but Balac noticed the reaction. 'So, friend Paulus, you've sold me out. Thirty pieces of silver, thirty little boys, what was the price?'
Paulus stood there pale-faced and trembling. Balac walked toward him and stopped just in front of him. He looked into Paulus's eyes, holding his gaze even while he spoke. 'Pietro,' he said to one of the Lestoni brothers, 'check out that packing case.'
Pietro slung his submachine gun and walked across to the packing case. He opened the viewing doors. The Picasso in all its arcane beauty was exposed.
'There's a picture inside – kind of peculiar,' said Pietro. 'Looks like a load of crap.'
Balac hadn't relaxed his gaze. 'So,' he said to Paulus, 'you have brought me a Picasso. The surprise must lie elsewhere. Keep looking,' he said to Pietro. 'Check out the back as well as the front.'
The remaining blood drained from Paulus's face. His eyes still fixed on the art dealer, Balac nodded several times.
Pietro produced a knife and started prying boards away from the front of the packing case around the picture. 'Nothing here,' he said after a couple of minutes. Splintered wood littered the floor.'
'Look at the back,' said Balac.
The packing case was heavy. It was positioned precisely against the wall, as Paulus had instructed, and Pietro had some difficulty in working it away. He contented himself with moving one side out far enough so that he could prize away a plank. The space was confined, but after a few seconds the nails at the edge were loosened and the plank pulled away. The planks were spaced at close intervals to support an inner casing of thin plywood. Pietro smashed through the plywood with his knife. He ripped away the piece at the corner.
His eyes bulged as the business end of the shaped charge was revealed. 'There's something here, some kind of explosive, I guess.' He tried to wriggle back, but his coat was caught on a protruding nail at the back of the packing case.
Balac leaned forward and kissed Paulus hard on the lips. He pulled back and embraced Paulus with his left arm. 'I'm sorry. No more little boys.' He thrust his right hand forward. Paulus arched his body and gasped in agony. As Balac stepped back, the handle of a knife could be seen protruding from the wound. Blood spurted, and Paulus collapsed writhing on the ground.
Balac turned to face Fitzduane, the knife in his hand. Bloody though it was, Fitzduane recognized the short, broad-bladed design. It was a reproduction scua – a Celtic sacrificial knife.
'See if you can find the detonator,' Balac ordered Pietro, who was still struggling to free himself. 'Give him a hand,' he said to Angelo.
Despite the distractions, Julius's gun hadn't wavered off Fitzduane for a second. The Irishman felt sick at what had happened to Paulus. Now that same knife was coming toward him, and he had only seconds to make his move – but if he did, he would die. At that range the two-barreled shotgun would blow his head off. The bulletproof vest might protect his torso, but even that depended on the ammunition Julius was using.
Balac stopped some three paces away. 'It's going to be worse for you, Hugo,' he said. 'It's going to hurt more than you can imagine, and there's going to be no relief except death. How does it feel to knew that it's over?' His eyes were shining. A drop of blood fell from the knife and splashed to the floor.
Angelo screamed something in Italian. There was desperation in his voice. Julius's gaze still didn't waver. The twin barrels of the shotgun were pointed at Fitzduane.
'Julius!' shouted Balac.
Paulus von Beck had somehow risen to his knees. Blood was pouring from his groin. ' Sempach, Sempaaach! ' he shouted, and the automatic he held in both hands flamed, blowing a neat round hole through Julius Lestoni's head. His brains spattered over the wall.
Fitzduane watched the twin muzzles of the shotgun slip away from his line of sight. He didn't wait. He closed his eyes and, pressing the firing button, blew the shaped charge. Prepared though he was, the noise was shattering. Three stun grenades went off in a ripple effect, the blast completely drowning the crack of the shaped charge and filling the room with searing light of igniting magnesium. Fitzduane's eyelids went white. There was a roaring in his ears, and he had to fight to avoid being completely disoriented. He shook his head dazedly and opened his eyes.
Pietro had been half behind the packing case when the charge went off. He had been surgically cut in two from the top of his head to the upper thigh of his right leg. The right-hand side of his body had disappeared in the rubble behind the packing case. The left-hand side still stood propped against the wall. Fitzduane's SIG automatic lay on the ground where it had fallen from Julius's belt as he collapsed. He leaped forward and grabbed it. Balac seemed to have vanished.
The shaped charge, moved away from its correct positioning against the wall and diluted by Pietro's body, had been only partially successful. One side and the top of a door-shaped aperture had been cut out of the wall, but the remaining vertical had been only half cut through, and rubble blocked the way.
Fitzduane caught a brief glimpse of Angelo Lestoni through the smoke and dust. He fired. Automatic fire scythed through the air in return. He crawled along the ground. Further bursts cut through the air above him. He could see Angelo's legs. He fired again.
The external wall of the studio seemed to implode. The noise was overwhelming – a growling metallic shrieking mixed with the crash of falling masonry and the rattle of gunfire. The muzzle of a huge machine gun poked into the room, spitting tracers. The bullets found Angelo Lestoni, who was lifted off the ground and thrown against the floor, a broken mess.
Fitzduane caught a brief glimpse of Balac at the end of the studio and fired twice rapidly.
The tank, rumbling farther forward, blocked his view. There was a string of sharp explosions as prepositioned Claymore antipersonnel mines detonated uselessly, their normally lethal ball-bearing missiles smashing harmlessly against the tank's armor.
The end of the studio erupted in a sea of flame. Members of the assault unit grabbed Fitzduane and hurried him out of the building and into a waiting ambulance. Paulus, paramedics working on him furiously, lay in the other bunk.
He heard noises, more explosions, and the sound of heavy gunfire. He felt a pinprick on his arm and a brief glimpse of a man in a white coat standing over him and the Bear behind him wearing some kind of helmet.
And then there was nothing.
Book Three
The Killing
'The Irish are loose, untamable, superstitious, execrable, whiskey swilling, frank, amorous, ireful, and gloating in war.'
– Giraldus Cambrensis (of Wales), thirteenth century
23
Unwisely – but thinking his stay in Switzerland would be a matter of weeks rather than a couple of months – he had left the Land Rover in the Long Stay Car Park of Dublin Airport. Somewhat to his surprise it was still there on his return, though sticky with a thick deposit of unburned aviation fuel mixed with Dublin grime.
He reached out his hand to open the befouled door with reluctance. A sudden gust of chill north wind angled the rain into his face, drenching his shirt. He suppressed his squeamishness and yanked the door open, threw in his bags, and climbed into the vehicle. A rush of wet cold located around his right foot informed him he had just stepped in a puddle. He slammed the door shut, and the wind and rain were excluded from his cold, damp aluminum and glass box.
A rat biting at his nerve endings inside his skull reminded him that he had a hangover. God damn the Swiss and their going-away parties.
Why the hell did he have to live in such a miserable, wet, wind-swept place as Ireland? It was May, and he
