“Really, and were they happy when you failed with Mrs. Thatcher?”

“Just a tryout, that, just a perhaps. I’ve promised them an alternative target. You know how this game works.”

“I certainly do, and one thing I do know is that the IRA doesn’t pay for hits. Never has.”

“Who said I was working for the IRA?” Dillon grinned. “Plenty of other people with enough reason to hit the Brits these days.”

Brosnan saw it then, or thought he did. “Baghdad?”

“Sorry, Martin, you can go to your Maker puzzling over that one for all eternity.”

Brosnan said, “Just indulge me. A big hit for Saddam. I mean, the war stinks. He needs something badly.”

“Christ, you always did run on.”

“President Bush stays back in Washington, so that leaves the Brits. You fail on the best known woman in the world, so what’s next? The Prime Minister?”

“Where you’re going it doesn’t matter, son.”

“But I’m right, aren’t I?”

“Damn you, Brosnan, you always were the clever bastard!” Dillon exploded angrily.

“You’ll never get away with it,” Brosnan said.

“You think so? I’ll just have to prove you wrong, then.”

“As I said, you must be losing your touch, Sean. This bungled attempt to get Mrs. Thatcher. Reminds me of a job dear old Frank Barry pulled back in seventy-nine when he tried to hit the British Foreign Secretary, Lord Carrington, when he was passing through Saint-Étienne. I’m rather surprised you used the same ground plan, but then you always did think Barry was special, didn’t you?”

“He was the best.”

“And at the end of things, very dead,” Brosnan said.

“Yes, well, whoever got him must have given it to him in the back,” Dillon said.

“Not true,” Brosnan told him. “We were face-to-face as I recall.”

“You killed Frank Barry?” Dillon whispered.

“Well, somebody had to,” Brosnan said. “It’s what usually happens to mad dogs. I was working for Ferguson, by the way.”

“You bastard.” Dillon raised the Walther, took careful aim and the door opened and Anne-Marie walked in with the shopping bags.

Dillon swung toward her. Brosnan called, “Look out!” and went down and Dillon fired twice at the sofa.

Anne-Marie screamed, not in terror, but in fury, dropped her bags and rushed at him. Dillon tried to fend her off, staggered back through the French windows. Inside, Brosnan crawled toward the table and reached for the drawer. Anne-Marie scratched at Dillon’s face. He cursed, pushing her away from him. She fell against the balustrade and went over backwards.

Brosnan had the drawer open now, knocked the lamp on the table sideways, plunging the room into darkness, and reached for the Browning. Dillon fired three times very fast and ducked for the door. Brosnan fired twice, too late. The door banged. He got to his feet, ran to the terrace and looked over. Anne-Marie lay on the pavement below. He turned and ran through the drawing room into the hall, got the door open and went downstairs two at a time. It was snowing when he went out on the steps. Of Dillon there was no sign, but the night porter was kneeling beside Anne-Marie.

He looked up. “There was a man, Professor, with a gun. He ran across the road.”

“Never mind.” Brosnan sat down and cradled her in his arms. “An ambulance, and hurry.”

The snow was falling quite fast now. He held her close and waited.

Ferguson, Mary and Max Hernu were having a thoroughly enjoyable time in the magnificent dining room at the Ritz. They were already on their second bottle of Louis Roederer Crystal champagne and the brigadier was in excellent form.

“Who was it who said that when a man tires of champagne, he’s tired of life?” he demanded.

“He must certainly have been a Frenchman,” Hernu told him.

“Very probably, but I think the time has come when we should toast the provider of this feast.” He raised his glass. “To you, Mary, my love.”

She was about to respond when she saw, in the mirror on the wall, Inspector Savary at the entrance speaking to the headwaiter. “I think you’re being paged, Colonel,” she told Hernu.

He glanced round. “What’s happened now?” He got up, threaded his way through the tables and approached Savary. They talked for a few moments, glancing toward the table.

Mary said, “I don’t know about you, sir, but I get a bad feeling.”

Before he could reply, Hernu came back to them, his face grave. “I’m afraid I’ve got some rather ugly news.”

“Dillon?” Ferguson asked.

“He paid a call on Brosnan a short while ago.”

“What happened?” Ferguson demanded. “Is Brosnan all right?”

“Oh, yes. There was some gun play. Dillon got away.” He sighed heavily. “But Mademoiselle Audin is at the Hôpital St-Louis. From what Savary tells me, it doesn’t look good.”

Brosnan was in the waiting room on the second floor when they arrived, pacing up and down smoking a cigarette. His eyes were wild, such a rage there as Mary Tanner had never seen.

She was the first to reach him. “I’m so sorry.”

Ferguson said, “What happened?”

Briefly, coldly, Brosnan told them. As he finished, a tall, graying man in surgeon’s robes came in. Brosnan turned to him quickly. “How is she, Henri?” He said to the others, “Professor Henri Dubois, a colleague of mine at the Sorbonne.”

“Not good, my friend,” Dubois told him. “The injuries to the left leg and spine are bad enough, but even more worrying is the skull fracture. They’re just preparing her for surgery now. I’ll operate straight away.”

He went out. Hernu put an arm around Brosnan’s shoulders. “Let’s go and get some coffee, my friend. I think it’s going to be a long night.”

“But I only drink tea,” Brosnan said, his face bone white, his eyes dark. “Never could stomach coffee. Isn’t that the funniest thing you ever heard?”

There was a small café for visitors on the ground floor. Not many customers at that time of night. Savary had gone off to handle the police side of the business; the others sat at a table in the corner.

Ferguson said, “I know you’ve got other things on your mind, but is there anything you can tell us? Anything he said to you?”

“Oh, yes-plenty. He’s working for somebody and definitely not the IRA. He’s being paid for this one and from the way he boasted, it’s big money.”

“Any idea who?”

“When I suggested Saddam Hussein he got angry. My guess is you wouldn’t have to look much further. An interesting point. He knew about all of you.”

“All of us?” Hernu said. “You’re sure?”

“Oh, yes, he boasted about that.” He turned to Ferguson. “Even knew about you and Captain Tanner being in town to pump me for information, that’s how he put it. He said he had the right friends.” He frowned, trying to remember the phrase exactly. “The kind of people who can access anything.”

“Did he, indeed.” Ferguson glanced at Hernu. “Rather worrying, that.”

“And you’ve got another problem. He spoke of the Thatcher affair as being just a tryout, that he had an alternative target.”

“Go on,” Ferguson said.

“I managed to get him to lose his temper by needling him about what a botch-up the Valenton thing was. I think you’ll find he intends to have a crack at the British Prime Minister.”

Mary said, “Are you certain?”

“Oh, yes.” He nodded. “I baited him about that, told him he’d never get away with it. He lost his temper. Said he’d just have to prove me wrong.”

Ferguson looked at Hernu and sighed. “So now we know. I’d better go along to the Embassy and alert all our people in London.”

“I’ll do the same here,” Hernu said. “After all, he has to leave the country some time. We’ll alert all airports and ferries. The usual thing, but discreetly, of course.”

They got up and Brosnan said, “You’re wasting your time. You won’t get him, not in any usual way. You don’t even know what you’re looking for.”