“Would you excuse me?” she said, hearing her phone ring.
“Certainly,” Janson said. As she hastened to her telephone, he scanned the papers that lay neatly stacked on Novak’s desk and credenza. They were from the usual assortment of great and good institutions, with a heavy representation of Dutch ministries. One item of correspondence, however, caused a memory to clang distantly, hazily—a freighter just out of view in foggy weather. Not the brief, innocuous message, but the letterhead. UNITECH LTD. The company name meant something to him—but did it mean something to Paul Janson, corporate security consultant, or to Paul Janson, quondam Consular Operations agent? He wasn’t yet sure.
“Minister Kubelik?” A woman’s voice.
“Yes?” Janson looked up to see a tall blond woman smiling at him.
“I’m Peter Novak’s wife. I’d like to welcome you here on his behalf. Our executive director is still in a meeting with Holland’s ambassador to the United Nations. It won’t be long at all.” She spoke with a neutral American accent.
The woman was beautiful in the Grace Kelly mode, at once voluptuous and patrician. Her frosted, wet-looking lipstick seemed less than businesslike, but it suited her, as did the chartreuse suit that hugged her contours a little more snugly than was strictly necessary.
This was not a woman in mourning. She could not have known. She did not know. Yet how could that be?
Janson strode up to her and bowed slightly. Would a Czech diplomat kiss her hand? He decided that a handshake would suffice. But he could not take his eyes off her. Something about her was familiar. Hauntingly so. The blue-green Côte d’Azur eyes, those long, elegant fingers …
Had he seen her before recently? He racked his brain. Where? In Greece? England? Had it been a fleeting glimpse, enough to register on the subconscious mind only? It was maddening.
“You’re American?” Janson said.
She shrugged. “I’m from a lot of places,” she said. “Like Peter.”
“And how is the great man?” There was a catch in his voice as he asked.
“Always the same,” she replied, after a pause. “Thank you for asking, Dr. Kubelik.” Her gaze was almost playful—verging, he could have sworn, on the flirtatious. No doubt this was simply the way that certain women were trained to make conversation with international eminences.
Janson nodded. “As we Czechs like to say, ‘To be the same is better than to be worse.’ A certain peasant realism there, I think.”
“Come,” she said. “I’ll take you upstairs to the conference room.”
The second floor was less palatial, more intimate; the ceilings were ten feet high, not fifteen, and the decor was much less fustian. The conference room faced the canal, and the late-morning sun slanted through a multipaned picture window, casting golden parallelograms on the polished long teak table. As Janson entered, he was greeted by a man of slightly less than average height with neatly combed gray hair.
“I’m Dr. Tilsen,” the man said. “My in-house title is executive director for Europe. A bit misleading, no?” He laughed a tidy, dry laugh. “Our Europe program— that would be more accurate.”
“You’ll be safe with Dr. Tilsen,” Susanna Novak said. “A lot safer with him than with me,” she added, leaving it up to her visitor whether to read a double entendre in her remark.
Janson sat down opposite the pale-faced administrator. What to discuss with him?
“I expect you know why I wanted to make contact with you,” he began.
“Well, I think so,” Dr. Tilsen said. “Over the years, the Czech government has been very supportive of some of our efforts, and less so of others. We understand that our objectives will not always mesh with those of any particular government.”
“Quite so,” Janson said. “Quite so. But I have begun to wonder whether my predecessors have been too hasty in their judgments. Perhaps a more harmonious relationship might be possible.”
“That would be most pleasing to contemplate,” Dr. Tilsen said.
“Of course, if you provide me with a tour d’horizon of your projects in our country, I would be able to make the case more effectively with my colleagues and associates. Really, I’m here to listen.”
“Then I shall oblige you, and speak to those very points,” Dr. Tilsen said. He smiled, tentatively. Talking was his stock in trade, and for the next thirty minutes, Tilsen did what he did best, describing a battery of initiatives and programs and projects. After a few minutes, the words seemed to form a verbal curtain, woven from the opaque nomenclature and slogans favored by professional idealists: nongovernmental organizations … reinvigorating the institutions of deliberative democracy … a commitment to promoting the values, institutions, and practices of an open and democratic society … His accounts were detailed and prolix, and Janson found his eyes beginning to glaze. With a tight, fixed smile, he nodded at intervals, but his mind wandered. Was Peter Novak’s wife among the conspirators? Had she herself engineered the death of her husband? The prospect seemed inconceivable, and yet what could explain her conduct?
And what of this Dr. Tilsen? He seemed earnest, unimaginative, and well meaning, if more than a little self-important. Could such a man be part of a nefarious conspiracy to destroy the most important agent of progress the fragile world had? He watched the man talk, watched the small, eroded, coffee-stained teeth, the pleased look with which he punctuated his monologue, the way he had of nodding approvingly at his own points. Was this the face of evil? It seemed hard to believe.
A knock at the door. The petite redhead from downstairs.
“I’m terribly sorry, Dr. Tilsen. There’s a call from the prime minister’s office.”
“Ah,” Dr. Tilsen said. “You will kindly excuse me.”
“But of course,” said Janson.
Left to himself, he examined the relatively spare furnishings of the room, and then he walked over to the window, looking at the busy canal below him.
A feeling of cold ran down his spine, as if it had been stroked with a shard of ice.
Why? Something in his field of vision—once again, an anomaly he responded to instinctively before he could rationally analyze or describe it.
What?
Oh Jesus! Behind the bell-shaped gable of the house opposite, there was the shadow of a man crouched upon the tightly imbricated slate tiles. A familiar error: the sun changes position, and shadows appear where there had been no shadows, betraying the hidden observer—or sniper. Which? The glint of sun from the glass of a scope did not settle the question.
His eyes now scrutinized the eaves and attic windows of the house for anomalies. There—a small section of a large double-hung window had been cleaned, by someone who wanted to be able to see out of it more clearly.
The hoist beam in front of him: something was odd about it as well. A moment later, he realized what. It was no hoist beam—the beam had been replaced by the barrel of a rifle.
Or was his overheated imagination conjuring things into existence, seeing threats in shadows, the way children turned their bedposts into the talons of a monster? The bruise on the side of his head throbbed painfully. Was he jumping at ghosts?
Then one of the small square panes exploded, and he heard the harsh splitting of wood as a bullet buried itself somewhere in the parquet floor. Another pane exploded, and then another, shooting splinters of glass through the air, showering the conference table.
Jagged cracks appeared in the plaster of the wall opposite the window. Another pane exploded, another bullet shattered the plaster, this one cracking inches above his head. He sank to the floor, and began to roll toward the door.
Gunshots without shots: they had come from a silenced rifle. He should have been used to it by now.
Then a loud gun blast came from outdoors, an odd counterpoint to the silenced firing. Other sounds ensued: The screeching of tires. The noise of a car door opening and closing.
And from elsewhere in the mansion, panicked screams.
Madness!
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A quiet fusillade was loosed, as deadly projectiles snapped through the air, some hitting glass, some traveling uninterrupted through already broken panes. They buried themselves in the walls, ceilings, floors. They pinged off the brass chandelier, ricocheted in unpredictable ways.
The throbbing of his temple had grown so forceful that it required a conscious exertion simply to focus his eyes.
Think! He had to think! Something had changed. What made sense of the assault, the contrast in weaponry and approach?
Two teams were attacking. Two teams that were not coordinated.
Mrs. Novak must have reported him. Yes, he was certain of it now. She had been on to him the whole time, playing along, playing him. Hence the mischievous look. She was one of Them.
The only place of refuge from the fusillade was deep in the mansion, in one of the inner chambers: yet surely they were counting on him seeking it out, which meant that this refuge was the most dangerous place he could be.
He phoned Barry on his Ericsson.
Cooper was uncharacteristically flustered. “Jeepers, Paul! What the hell’s going on? It’s like the Battle of Midway out here.”
“Can you make visual on anyone?”
“Um, you mean, can I see ’em? A glimpse, once in a while. There’s a couple of them in military drab. They look mean. The arms-are-for-hugging message hasn’t reached these guys, Paul.”
“Listen, Barry, we specified that the limo have bulletproof windows when we ordered it. You’ll be safest there. But be ready to haul ass at my signal.”
Now Janson bolted for the door and raced down the stairs to the first floor. When he reached the landing, he saw the security guard unholster his weapon and approach the front window. Then the gun clattered to the floor.
The guard’s mouth sprang open, and a circle of red formed about his left eyebrow. Blood spewed out in a pulsing rush that rolled over the unblinking eye. And all the while, the man stood, upright, as if transmuted into a statue. Slowly, as if in some danse macabre, the man’s legs started to twitch, then give way, and he toppled onto the ancient Chinese carpet. Janson rushed over and retrieved the man’s gun, a Glock pistol.
“Minister Kubelik,” the red-haired receptionist cried out. “We’ve all been ordered to the rear annex. I can’t explain what’s happening but …” She trailed off, stunned and perplexed at the sight of a high government minister in a controlled firing roll.
The roll got him across the hallway and near the front door while remaining within two feet of the ground. It was faster than a crawl, and speed was now of the essence. “Toss me my hat.”
“What?”
“Toss me the goddamn hat,” Janson yelled. More quietly: “You’ll find it’s about a meter from your left hand. Throw it to me.”
The terrified receptionist did so, as one obeys a dangerous madman, and fled to the rear annex.
The small square in the double-hung window that was cleaner than the rest of it: a sniper would be there.
He had to use the thick wooden door as a movable shield. He jumped up, turned the knob, and opened it a crack.
Two thuds: bullets that dug into the thick wood. Bullets that would have struck him had he continued out the door.
The door was now ajar, just eighteen inches, but it should suffice for a well-targeted shot. That grimeless, sparkling square of glass—with luck, he could hit it from here, even with a mere handgun.
His enemies would be scoped; he would not be. But scopes had their limitations, too. The greater the magnification, the more restricted the field of vision. And it took perhaps ten or twenty seconds to reposition the scope and adjust its optics when the target position changed abruptly.
He crawled to where the security guard lay slain on a pale blue carpet now darkening with his blood, and dragged the body toward the foyer, knowing that he would be shielded by the four-foot wall of brick beneath the window. He pulled out a handkerchief and hurriedly wiped the blood from the man’s face. He draped his suit jacket on the man’s upper body and jammed his felt-brimmed hat on the corpse’s head. Firmly grasping the hair on the nape, he positioned the head precisely. In a darting gesture, he pushed the head toward the gap left by the cracked-open door, and swiveled it, emulating the movements of a man cautiously craning to see.
The head would be glimpsed fleetingly, in profile, and from a distance.
A pair of sickening spits confirmed his worst suspicions. The dead man’s head absorbed heavy-caliber bullets from two different directions.
Another second or so would pass before the bolt-action rifles would permit a second tap. Now Janson sprang up, to his full height. The snipers’ scopes would be trained on the spot where the guard’s head had appeared. Janson would expose himself several feet higher. He had to make his sighting and shoot nearly instantaneously.
Time turned to syrup.
He peered out, identified the small, gleaming square of glass, and squeezed out a burst of three shots into it. With luck, he would at least damage the sniper’s equipment. The gun bucked in his hand as it sent out its blast, and Janson retreated behind the heavy door. A guttural spray of curses was audible through the broken glass, telling him that he had scored some kind of hit.
One perch may have been deactivated. But how many more remained? He studied the two additional bullet wounds on the guard’s head. One projectile had traveled from a steep downward trajectory, evidently from the house opposite. The other, which entered high on a cheek, came at a sharp angle, indicating a sniper from a neighbor to the right.
He could have Cooper pull up in the armored limo, but just the few feet of exposure would, with an active sniper in the vicinity, prove deadly. At least one person would have his rifle aimed directly on the stoop.
Janson heaved the corpse upward in a vaulting movement across the main front room, and studied the reaction.
An unsilenced blast shattered what remained of the window, followed by a cluster of spits, shots that were sound-suppressed but no less deadly. How many? How many guns were trained on this house; how many riflemen were awaiting a clean shot? At least five, and the real number could be much higher.
Oh, dear God. An all-out assault on Peter Novak’s headquarters was in progress. Had he brought this about by his presence? It strained belief, but then little made sense any longer.
All he was certain of was that he had to get out of the house and that he could not use the doors. He charged up the stairs. Another flight up, narrower, brought him to the third floor, where he found himself looking at a closed door. Was there time? He had to check it out—had to make time. He tried the handle; it was locked. Janson broke it open with a forceful kick and found himself in a private office.
A desk. A credenza, stacked with cardboard mailers from the ultra-secure, ultra-expensive express-delivery service Caslon Couriers. Beside it, a black metal filing cabinet. Locked, too, but easily forced. Inside was an array of reports about nongovernmental organizations and lending libraries in Slovenia and Romania. And correspondence from Unitech Ltd., content seemingly unexceptionable. Unitech: yes, it meant something—but he had no time to think now. Survival was his one goal, and his thoughts had to be directed toward that singular imperative. It had been a thirty-second detour; now he charged up the two remaining flights and clambered up a crude wooden ladder that led to the loft, beneath the roof. It was stifling there, but under the rafters there had to be an opening to a part of the roof that would be hidden by the gables. It was his only chance. A minute later, he had found it and arrived stumbling on the roof. It was steeper than he expected, and he clung to the nearby chimney, as if it were a great tree offering protection in the jungle. It was, of course, nothing of the kind. He scanned the adjoining rooftops, looking for his executioners.
Being at roof level would take him out of range of most of their fixed positions.
But not all.
Perched on a higher rooftop, diagonally opposite to his right, he could make out the deadly brunette from Reg
ent’s Park. There she had narrowly missed him from an enormous distance. Now she was a hundred feet away. She could not fail to hit her target. She had not missed when she hit the grotesque puppet he had made of the dead security guard, for he knew now that the diagonal shot was hers.
He turned his head and saw, to his dismay, that there was another rifleman on the adjoining roof, just thirty-five feet to his left.
The rifleman had heard his feet scrambling on the slate roof and was now swiveling his weapon toward him.
Alerted by the drab-suited rifleman, the deadly brunette raised her scope to roof level. His bruised temple flared once again, with almost incapacitating pain.
He was pinned between two sharpshooters, with only a handgun for protection. He saw the woman squinting through her scope, saw the utter blackness of the rifle’s bore hole. He was staring at his own death.
It was a shot she could not miss.
Chapter Twenty
He forced himself to focus on the countenance of his executioner: he would look death in the face.
What he saw was a play of confusion on her face as she swiveled her rifle a few degrees to the left and squeezed off a shot.
The rifleman on the next roof over arced his back and tumbled off the roof like a falling gargoyle.
What the hell was going on?
The noisy chatter of a nearby automatic weapon immediately followed—aimed not at him but at her. A piece of the ornate cornice behind which she was stationed broke off, leaving a cloud of dust.
Was somebody rescuing him, saving him from the Regent’s Park executioner?
He tried to puzzle out the complex geometry. Two teams, as he supposed. One using American-issue sniper equipment, the sniper team from Consular Operations. And the other? An odd assortment of weaponry. Irregulars. Hirelings. To judge from the fabric and hardware, Eastern Europeans.
In whose employ?
The enemy of my enemy is my friend. If the old saw was true in this case, he was far from friendless. But was it true?