Daniel Silva - Portrait of a Spy

“Here we are,” sang the Filipina. “We have you in a one-bedroom deluxe suite on the twenty-ninth floor, for three nights. Is that correct, Mr. Colvin?”

“If you wouldn’t mind,” he said, lowering the mobile phone, “I’m looking for something on the fourteenth floor.”

“The twenty-ninth is considered more desirable.”

“My wife and I spent our honeymoon on the fourteenth. We’d like to stay there again. For sentimental reasons,” he added. “Surely you understand.”

She didn’t. The Filipina worked twelve-hour shifts and shared a one-room apartment in Deira with eight other girls. Her love life consisted of fending off drunken gropers and rapists who assumed, wrongly, that she moonlighted in Dubai’s thriving sex trade. She clicked a few keys on her computer terminal and gave a plastic smile.

“Actually,” she said, “we do have a number of rooms available on the fourteenth floor. Do you recall the room where you and your wife stayed on your honeymoon?”

“I believe it was 1437,” he said.

She appeared crestfallen. “Unfortunately, that room is currently occupied, Mr. Colvin. However, the suite next to it is available, as is the one directly across the hall.”

“I’ll take the one across the hall, please.”

“It’s a bit more expensive.”

“No problem,” said the Russian.

“I’ll need to see your wife’s passport.”

“She’s joining me tomorrow.”

“Please ask her to stop by when she arrives.”

“First thing,” he assured her.

“Do you require assistance with your luggage?”

“I can manage, thanks.”

She gave him a pair of electronic room keys and pointed him toward the appropriate elevator. As promised, his room was directly across the hall from 1437. Entering, he immediately switched on the Do Not Disturb light and double-locked the door. Then he opened his suitcase. Inside were a few articles of clothing that stank of chickpeas and cumin. There was also a Beretta 9mm, a Glock .45, two hypodermic needles, two vials of suxamethonium chloride, a notebook computer, and an adjustable high-resolution snake camera. He mounted the camera to the bottom of the door and connected its wiring to the computer. After adjusting the angle of the view, he filled the hypodermic needles with suxamethonium chloride and the guns with bullets. Then he settled in before the computer and waited.

For the next forty-five minutes, he was treated to a view of the Burj Al Arab not seen on its Web site or in its glossy brochures. Frantic room service waiters. Weary chambermaids. An Ethiopian nanny holding the hand of a hysterical child. An Australian businessman walking arm in arm with a Ukrainian prostitute. Finally, at ten sharp, he saw a beautiful Arab woman stepping from Room 1437 with a vigilant bodyguard at her back. When the woman and bodyguard were gone, a broad-shouldered man leaned out the doorway and looked both ways along the corridor. White kandoura and ghutra . Tinted eyeglasses rimmed in gold. A neatly trimmed beard with flecks of gray around the chin. The Russian picked up the Glock, the man-stopper, and quietly chambered a round.

THE DETAILS OF NADIA AL-BAKARI’S departure from the Burj Al Arab were handled not by Gabriel and his team but by Mansur, the chief of AAB’s travel department. There were no belongings for her to collect, because Mansur had seen to them personally. Nor were there any bills to pay, because they had already been forwarded to AAB headquarters in Paris. All Nadia had to do was make her way to the Burj’s circular drive, where her car waited just outside the front entrance. After climbing into the backseat, she asked her driver and Rafiq al-Kamal to give her a moment of privacy. Alone, she dialed a number that had been stored in the memory of her BlackBerry. Gabriel answered immediately in Arabic.

“Tell me what he looked like.”

“White kandoura . White ghutra . Tinted eyeglasses with gold rims. A neatly trimmed beard with a bit of gray.”

“You did well, Nadia. Go to the airport. Go home.”

“Wait!” she snapped. “There’s something else I need to tell you.”

Though Nadia did not know it, Gabriel was seated in the lobby, looking like a man who had come to Dubai for work rather than pleasure, which was indeed the case. On the table before him was a notebook computer. Attached to his ear was a hands-free mobile phone that doubled as a secure radio. He used it to alert his far-flung team that the operation had just hit its first snag.

Nadia tapped her BlackBerry on the window and signaled that she was ready to leave. A few seconds later, as they were speeding over the causeway separating the Burj from the mainland, Rafiq al-Kamal asked, “Is there anything I need to know?”

“That meeting never happened.”

“What meeting?” asked the bodyguard.

Nadia managed a smile. “Tell Mansur we’re on our way to the airport. Tell him to move up our departure slot if he can. I’d like to get back to Paris at a reasonable hour.”

Al-Kamal pulled out his phone and dialed.

“Maybe Allah really is on his side after all,” said Adrian Carter. He was staring in disbelief at Gabriel’s latest transmission from Dubai. It said that Malik al-Zubair, master of terror, was about to walk out of the Burj Al Arab surrounded by four carbon copies.

“I’m afraid God has very little to do with this,” said Navot. “Malik has been matching wits against the best intelligence services in the world for years. He knows how the game is played.”

Navot looked at Shamron, who was twirling his old Zippo lighter nervously between his fingers.

Two turns to the right, two turns to the left.

“We have four vehicles outside that hotel,” Navot said. “Under our operating rules, that’s enough to follow one car—two at most. If five similarly dressed men get into five different cars . . .” His voice trailed off. “We might want to start thinking about getting them out of there, boss.”

“We’ve gone to a great deal of effort to put a team on the ground in Dubai tonight, Uzi. The least we can do is let them stick around long enough to try to have a look at Malik’s face.” He glanced at the row of clocks glowing along one of Rashidistan’s walls and asked, “What is the status of Nadia’s airplane?”

“Fueled and ready for takeoff. The rest of her staff is boarding now.”

“And where is the star of the show at this moment?”

“Heading northeast on Sheikh Zayed Road at forty-six miles per hour.”

“May I see her?”

Carter snatched up a phone. A few seconds later, a winking red light appeared on one of the wall monitors, moving northeast across the grid of Dubai city. Shamron twirled his lighter anxiously as he watched its steady progress.

Two turns to the right, two turns to the left . . .

The first Range Rover eased into the drive of the Burj Al Arab two minutes after Nadia’s departure. A second appeared soon after, followed by a Mercedes GL and a pair of Denalis. Gabriel keyed into his secure radio, but Mikhail was on the air first.

“They’re leaving the room,” he said.

Gabriel didn’t have to ask how many. The answer was outside in the drive. Five SUVs for five men. Gabriel had to establish which of the five was Malik before any of the men set foot outside the hotel. And there was only one way to do it. He gave the order.

“There are five of them and one of me,” Mikhail replied.

“The longer you talk, the greater the chances we’ll lose him.”

Mikhail keyed out without another word. Gabriel glanced down at his laptop to check Nadia’s location.

She was halfway to the airport.