Daniel Silva - Portrait of a Spy

Nadia gave the faintest trace of a smile. “Maybe we should drink some of the wine I brought. I’ve always found that a good bottle of Latour can take the edge off even the most unpleasant conversation.”

NADIA WATCHED GABRIEL’S HANDS CAREFULLY as he uncorked the wine. He poured out two glasses, keeping one for himself and handing the other to her.

“None for Max?”

“Max doesn’t drink.”

“Max is an Islamic fundamentalist?”

“Max is a teetotaler.”

Gabriel raised his glass a fraction of an inch in salutation. Nadia declined to reciprocate. She placed the wineglass on the table with what seemed to Gabriel to be inordinate care.

“There were a number of questions about my father’s death that I was never able to answer,” she said after a prolonged silence. “I need you to answer them now.”

“I’m limited in what I can say.”

“I would advise you to rethink that position. Otherwise—”

“What is it you wish to know, Nadia?”

“Was he targeted for assassination from the beginning?”

“Quite the opposite.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means that the Americans made it abundantly clear that your father was far too important to be treated like a normal terrorist. He wasn’t a member of the royal family, but he was the next best thing—a descendant of an old-line merchant family from the Nejd who claimed blood ties to none other than Muhammad Abdul Wahhab himself.”

“And that made him untouchable in the eyes of the Americans?”

“‘Radioactive’ was the word they used.”

“So what happened?”

“Sarah happened.”

“They hurt her?”

“They almost killed her.”

Nadia was silent for a moment. “How did you get her back?”

“We fight on a secret battlefield, but we consider ourselves soldiers, and we never leave one of our own in the hands of our enemies.”

“How noble of you.”

“You may not always agree with our goals and methods, Nadia, but we do try to operate by a certain code. Occasionally, our enemies do as well. But not your father. Your father played by his own rules. Zizi’s rules.”

“And for that he was killed on a crowded street in Cannes.”

“Would you have preferred London? Or Geneva? Or Riyadh?”

“I would have preferred not to have watched my father being gunned down in cold blood.”

“We would have preferred the same thing. Unfortunately, we had no other choice.”

A heavy silence fell over the room. Nadia stared directly into Gabriel’s face. There was no anger in her eyes, only the faintest trace of sadness.

“You still haven’t told me your name,” she said finally. “That’s hardly the foundation of a strong and trusting partnership.”

“I believe you already know my name, Nadia.”

“I do,” she said after a moment. “And if the terrorists and their supporters in the House of Saud ever learn that I am working with Gabriel Allon, the very same man who killed my father, they will declare me an apostate. Then, at the first opportunity, they will slit my throat.” She paused, then added, “Not your throat, Mr. Allon. Mine.”

“We are well aware of the danger involved in what we are asking of you, and we will do everything within our power to ensure your safety. Each step of your journey will be as carefully planned and executed as this meeting.”

“But that’s not what I’m asking, Mr. Allon. I need to know whether you will protect me.”

“You have my word,” he replied without hesitation.

“The word of a man who killed my father.”

“I’m afraid there’s nothing I can do to change the past.”

“No,” she said, “only the future.”

She looked at Eli Lavon, who was doing an admirable job of concealing his displeasure over what had just transpired, then gazed out the windows overlooking the terraced garden.

“We have a few more minutes of daylight,” she said finally. “Why don’t we take a walk, Mr. Allon? There’s one more thing I need to tell you.”

They set out along a gravel footpath between columns of swaying cypress pines. Nadia walked at Gabriel’s right shoulder. At first, she seemed wary of getting too close, but as they moved deeper into the garden, Lavon noticed her hand resting discreetly on Gabriel’s elbow. She paused once, as if compelled to do so by the gravity of her words, and a second time at the edge of the dormant fountain at the center of the garden. There she sat for several minutes, trailing her hand, childlike, across the surface of the water, as the last light retreated from the sky. After that, they were largely lost to Lavon. He saw Gabriel place his hand briefly along Nadia’s cheek, then nothing more until they came walking up the footpath toward the house again with Nadia clinging to Gabriel’s elbow for support.

Upon their return to the drawing room, Gabriel summoned the rest of the team, and the party resumed. At Gabriel’s insistence, they spoke of anything but their shared past and their uncertain future. For now, there was no global war on terror, no new network that needed dismantling, no cause for concern whatsoever. There was only good wine, good conversation, and a group of good friends who were not really friends at all. Nadia, like Gabriel, remained largely a passive observer of the feigned bonhomie. Still posed for her portrait, her eyes moved slowly from face to face, as though they were pieces of a puzzle she was trying to assemble in her mind. Occasionally, her gaze would settle on Gabriel’s hands. He made no attempt to conceal them, for there was now nothing left to hide. It was clear to Lavon and the rest of the team that Gabriel no longer harbored any doubts about Nadia’s intentions. Like lovers, they had consecrated their bond with the sharing of secrets.

It was a few minutes after seven when Gabriel gave the signal that the party was at an end. Rising to her feet, Nadia seemed suddenly light-headed. She bade them all good night; then, with Zoe at her side, she headed across the darkened forecourt to her car where Rafiq al-Kamal, guardian of her father, was waiting to reclaim her. During the drive back to Paris, she once again spoke without pause, this time about her new friends, Thomas and Jenny Fowler. Gabriel monitored the conversation by way of Zoe’s BlackBerry. The next morning, he watched the winking icon as it moved from the Place de la Concorde to Charles de Gaulle Airport. While waiting for her flight, Zoe phoned her producer in New York to say that, at least for now, the al-Bakari exclusive was off. Then, in a sultry whisper, she said to Gabriel, “Time to say good-bye, darling. Don’t hesitate to call if you need anything else.” Gabriel waited until Zoe was safely on board the aircraft before disabling the software on her phone. The light flashed three more times. Then she vanished from the screen.

THE OPERATION BEGAN IN EARNEST at 10:15 the following morning, when Nadia al-Bakari, heiress, activist, and agent of Israeli intelligence, informed her senior staff that she intended to form a partnership with Thomas Fowler Associates, a small but highly successful private equity firm based in London. That afternoon, accompanied only by her security detail, she traveled by car to Mr. Fowler’s private home north of Paris for the first round of direct negotiations. Later, she would characterize the talks as productive and intense, both of which happened to be true.

She came the next day, and the day after as well. For reasons Gabriel did not share with the others, he dispensed with much of the usual training and focused mainly on Nadia’s cover story. Learning it was not difficult, for it corresponded largely to the facts. “It’s your story,” said Gabriel, “with only the slightest reordering of the salient details. It’s a story of murder, vengeance, and hatred as old as the Middle East. From now on, Nadia al-Bakari is no longer part of the solution. Nadia is just like her father. She’s part of the problem. She’s the reason why the Arabs will never be able to escape their history.”