“Comes the revolution,” I told them, “I’m going to get me a place like that. Maybe even that one.”
We amused ourselves by trying to estimate what Isolde paid every month to keep the place afloat. If Marie Antoinette only knew!
I was going to have to go in there and bug the joint, so I was trying to figure out how to minimize the risk of being caught and get the bugs into locations where we might actually hear something useful. We didn’t have a blueprint of the interior, with the bedrooms and offices— if there were offices — marked, so I was going to have to sniff around some when I got in, which meant I needed some time in the place.
A call from Jake Grafton set the date. “The Petrou family bank is hosting a dinner this coming Thursday for the officers of all the Petrou banking enterprises.” He told me the name of the hotel where the dinner would be held. “There will be a cocktail party prior to that,” Grafton said. “According to our sources, all three of the Petrous will be there.”
“Someone’s been pumping the secretaries.”
“I think so.”
“How come I don’t get jobs like that?”
“I’m getting some pressure on this, so we need to make something happen.”
I wasn’t sure exactly what he meant by that, but I had a fair idea. “Okay,” I said slowly.
“You got the hardware you need?”
“Yes, sir. We helped ourselves from the attic in Kensington.”
“Keep me advised, Tommy,” Jake Grafton said.
“Yes, sir.”
There I was, yessiring Grafton like I was a boot seaman. There is something about the guy that causes that reaction in me. I fight it, but every now and then I can’t help myself.
After I hung up I spent a tough five minutes sharpening a wit, then issued orders to my two troops. They were unhappy, of course, but it has been my experience that my many bosses don’t lose sleep worrying about the state of my morale, so I didn’t worry about theirs. If they got too blue, they could write a letter home to Mom.
Marisa Petrou was across the street from the ministry when her husband, Jean, came out of the building a little after twelve with several colleagues, on their way to lunch. On Monday and Tuesday he had lunched with colleagues at a nearby cafe, which was apparently their usual haunt. To prevent him from recognizing her in the event he should glance her way, she was wearing a wig, a scarf, dark glasses and a long coat she had purchased Monday morning.
Wednesday, however, he came out alone and turned right on the sidewalk instead of left, toward the cafe. She followed along at a discreet distance, just keeping him in sight.
Her searches of his bedroom and office at the chateau had turned up nothing suspicious. Not that she really expected to find anything, but one never knew. Jean was not organized. When he met people, he habitually wrote their telephone numbers on matchbooks, which he snagged whenever he saw one because he couldn’t remember to carry his lighter. She had seen him do it often. Yet she found no matchbooks at the chateau with telephone numbers. His computer was benign. She had checked the numbers on his cell phone while he was in the shower; she knew most of them. She had called the others on a pay telephone and had recognized none of the voices.
Still, the worm of suspicion was gnawing mercilessly at her, so she was following him.
Marrying Jean had been a huge mistake. She had known it within weeks after the ceremony, a civil one, naturally. The best part of the marriage was Isolde, who had accepted her daughter-in-law as if she were her natural child. For a woman who had never known a mother, it was a wonderful experience. They talked and talked about every subject under the sun.
Why Isolde had the misfortune to have an ineffectual son like Jean was one of life’s mysteries.
Jean stood at the curb, obviously looking for a taxi. Marisa felt a moment of panic. She turned and had the good luck to get the first empty one that passed. She had the driver wait while she fiddled with her purse. When a cab stopped for Jean, she pointed at it. “Follow that taxi, please.” She handed the driver a twenty-euro note. He shrugged and put his car in motion.
Relieved, she settled back in the seat.
Jean’s taxi crossed the Seine and entered the Left Bank area. Marisa’s driver almost missed the light, but he managed to keep the other car in sight. When Jean’s taxi stopped in front of a cafe, she ordered her driver to pull over and handed him another twenty-euro note, then bailed out.
Jean looked up and down the sidewalk, saw Marisa and apparently didn’t recognize her, glanced at his watch, then entered the cafe. Marisa lit a cigarette and began window-shopping.
Seven minutes later she saw a reflection of a figure she recognized in the window of the shop she was facing. He was wearing an expensive homburg and a fine wool coat. His tie and white shirt were just visible under his chin. He walked quickly.
Her back was to him. He walked purposefully, a man with a destination and an appointment, and turned into the cafe that Jean had entered.
Abu Qasim!
On Thursday morning I managed to be riding by the gate when the guard opened the door of the guard shack and headed for the personnel door in the fence. Speedo was watching the drone video and helped me with the timing. When the guard disappeared up the path, I hopped out of the car with my backpack and went over to the guard shack. Yep, the door was locked.
If the routine held, I had about ten minutes before the day guard arrived. I wanted to be inside the grounds by then.
The four Dobermans on the grounds of the Petrou chateau dictated the time of my entry. The security types took care of the dogs, which spent the night outside roaming the grounds doing doggie things and looking for something to kill. Every morning the security man going off duty would rattle the dog dishes and the Dobermans would come at a dead run. He put them in a dog run, fed and watered them and left them there. With the dogs put away, the main gate could be opened and closed when people wanted to come and go. The residents of the chateau, the hired help and the various tradesmen could walk to their vehicles or stroll the grounds without risking a dog attack.
When the Dobermans weren’t on duty, security cameras were used to guard against intruders. Day and night, the guards spent their time, when they weren’t taking care of the dogs or making rounds, in a small building that was actually outside the main gate. That was, I suspected, the location of the video monitors. The guards gained entry to the grounds via a personnel door in the fence so they wouldn’t have to open and close the main gate, thereby risking letting a dog loose upon the countryside.
I had studied the photos I had made of the lock on the personnel gate, clicking them off with a telephoto lens as we cruised by in a car. It was a simple keyed lock. Diem went into Paris and visited a couple of stores that carried that brand. He bought one, and I worked on it with the picks back at the inn while Speedo and Diem did the watching. The lock on the security shack was pretty run-of-the-mill. I didn’t know what kinds of locks were on the doors of the chateau, or on the interior doors, in the event I found one locked, but I had my usual assortment of picks and files.
Now, as I stood in front of the door on the guard shack, the chips were down. I managed to pick it and get inside within a minute, which was better than I expected. There were three monitors mounted so the guy at the desk could watch them. I traced the coaxial cables back to a computer, which routed the various feeds to the monitors, probably on a program that the guard could select at the keyboard on his desk. The feeds were also recorded digitally on some kind of continuous loop arrangement.
I found the power wire to the computer and unplugged it from a backup battery that supplied power when the grid shut down, plugged it into a box that I had brought and taped the box under the table the computer rested on. The power wire from the box I ran to the battery and plugged in.
“It’s hooked up,” I said into my headset. “The computer is booting up again.”
“Okay.” Per Diem’s voice.
A couple of cars went by on the street.
I glanced outside at every car. If the day guard arrived while I was in the shack, I was going to have to go through him to get out, and if that happened, we could kiss the day’s program good-bye. And, of course, my next entry attempt here would be exponentially more difficult.
When the computer had managed to reboot itself and the video was again on the monitors, I said into my
