Actually, Yusef, you were telling him to make certain we aren’t being followed, but let’s not get hung up on the details.

On the seat between them lay a small suitcase. Yusef had taken her to her flat and helped her pack. “There won’t be time to go to baggage claim,” he had said. “If you need more clothing you’ll be given money to buy more clothing.” He had watched her pack carefully, inspecting each item she placed in the bag. “How should I dress?” she had asked sarcastically. “Warm climate or cold? Are we going to Norway or New Zealand? Sweden or Swaziland? What’s the dress code? Formal or casual?”

She lit a cigarette. Yusef took one out too and held out his hand for Jacqueline’s lighter. She gave it to him and watched him light his cigarette. He was about to hand it back when something made him stop and inspect the lighter more carefully.

Jacqueline felt as if she had forgotten how to breathe.

“This is very nice.” He turned it over and read the inscription. “ ”To Dominique, with affection and fond memories.‘ Where did you get this cigarette lighter?“

“I’ve had it for about a hundred years.”

“Answer my question.”

“It was a gift from a man. A man who didn’t send me off with a complete stranger.”

“He must have been very kind, this man. Why have I never seen this?”

“You haven’t seen a lot of things. That doesn’t mean anything.”

“Should I be jealous?”

“Look at the date, you idiot.”

“ ”June nineteen ninety-five,“ ” he recited. “Is this man still in the picture?”

“If he was, I wouldn’t be with you.”

“When was the last time you saw him?”

“June nineteen ninety-five, with affection and fond memories.”

“He must have been very important to you. Otherwise, you wouldn’t have kept his lighter.”

“It’s not his lighter, it’s my lighter. And I kept it because it’s a good lighter.”

She thought: Gabriel was right. He suspects something. I’m going to die. He’s going to kill me tonight. She looked out her window and wondered whether the Cromwell Road on a wet winter’s night was going to be her last snapshot of the world. She should have written a letter to her mother and locked it in a safety deposit box. She wondered how Shamron would break it to her. Would he explain that she had been working for the Office? Or would they cover up her death in some other way? Would she have to read about it in the newspapers? Jacqueline Delacroix, the Marseilles schoolgirl who rose to the peak of European modeling before a precipitous decline, died under mysterious circumstances… She wondered if the journalists she had treated with such contempt while she was alive would rise up en masse and savage her in death. At least Rémy would write well of her. They had always been cordial. Maybe she could get something nice out of Jacques. Perhaps even Gilles-No, wait. Remember the party in Milan, the argument over the coke. Christ, Gilles was going to rip her to shreds.

Yusef handed her the lighter. She dropped it back into her purse. The silence was appalling. She wanted to keep him talking; somehow talking made her feel safe, even if it was lies. “You never answered my question,” she said.

“Which question is that? You’ve had so many tonight.”

“When this is all over, am I going to see you again?”

“That’s entirely up to you.”

“And you’re still not answering my question.”

“I always answer your questions.”

“Do you? If you’d told me the truth in the beginning, I doubt I’d be flying off with a complete stranger in the morning.”

“I had to keep some things from you. And what about you, Dominique? Have you been completely honest with me? Have you told me everything about yourself?”

“Everything of consequence.”

“That’s a very convenient answer. You use it very effectively when you want to avoid talking anymore.”

“It also happens to be the truth. Answer my question. Am I ever going to see you again?”

“I certainly hope so.”

“You’re full of shit, Yusef.”

“And you’re very tired. Close your eyes. Get some rest.”

She leaned her head against the window. “Where are we going?”

“Someplace safe.”

“Yes, you’ve told me that, but how about telling me where?”

“You’ll see it when we arrive.”

“Why would we need someplace safe? What’s wrong with your flat? What’s wrong with my flat?”

“This place belongs to a friend of mine. It’s close to Heathrow.”

“Is your friend going to be there?”

“No.”

“Are you going to stay the night?”

“Of course. And in the morning I’ll fly with you to Paris.”

“And after that?”

“After that you’ll be in the company of our Palestinian official, and your journey will begin. I wish I could be in your shoes. It would be such an honor to be with this man on this trip. You have no idea how lucky you are, Dominique.”

“What’s his name, this great man? Maybe I know him.”

“I doubt you know him, but I still can’t tell you his name. You will refer to him only by his cover name.”

“And that is?”

“Lucien. Lucien Daveau.”

“Lucien,” she said softly. “I’ve always liked the name Lucien. Where are we going, Yusef?”

“Close your eyes. It won’t be long now.”

Shamron answered the telephone in the listening post before it could ring a second time. He listened without speaking, then gently replaced the receiver as if he had just been informed of the death of an old adversary. “It looks as though they’ve settled for the night,” he said.

“Where?”

“A council estate in Hounslow near the airport.”

“And the team?”

“In place, well hidden. They’ll spend the night with her.”

“I’d feel better if I were there.”

“You have a long day ahead of you tomorrow. I suggest you get a few hours’ sleep.”

But Gabriel went into the bedroom and returned a moment later, jacket on, nylon rucksack over his shoulder.

Shamron said, “Where are you going?”

“I need to take care of something personal.”

“Where are you going? When will you be back?”

But Gabriel walked out without another word and followed the stairs down to the street. As he walked past the front of the building, he thought he saw Shamron eyeing him through a slit in the blinds. And as he moved closer to the Edgware Road, he had the uncomfortable feeling that Shamron had one of his teams watching him too.

THIRTY-FOUR

Hounslow, England

The Toyota dropped them and then sped away. A car park bathed in yellow sodium light, a colony of stout redbrick council flats that looked like an industrial complex fallen on hard times. Jacqueline offered to carry her own bag, but Yusef wouldn’t hear of it. He took her hand and led her across the car park, then across a common strewn with crushed beer cans and bits of broken toys. A red wagon with no front wheels. A headless baby with no clothing. A plastic pistol. Gabriel’s pistol, thought Jacqueline, remembering the night in the hills of Provence, when he had tested her ability to shoot. Seemed like ages ago. A lifetime ago. A cat spit at them from the shadows. Jacqueline grabbed Yusef’s elbow and nearly screamed. Then a dog began to bark, and the cat scampered along the sidewalk and slithered beneath a fence.

“This is lovely, Yusef. Why didn’t you tell me you kept a place in the country?”

“Please don’t talk until we’re inside.”

He led her into a stairwell. Dead leaves and old newspaper in the corners, lime green walls, yellow light fixture overhead. The collision of color made them both look nauseated. They climbed two flights, then passed through a connecting door and walked the length of a long corridor. A cacophony of disharmonious sounds greeted them. A child screaming for its mother. A couple quarreling in Caribbean-accented English. A crackling radio blaring a play on the BBC, Tom Stoppard’s The Real Thing. Yusef stopped in front of a doorway with the number 23 mounted below a security peephole. He unlocked the door, led her inside, switched on a small parchment-shaded lamp.