Daniel Silva - The English Spy

“You’ll stay for lunch,” the don was saying.

“Thank you, Don Orsati,” Keller said formally, “but I wouldn’t want to impose.”

“You? Impose?” The Corsican waved his hand dismissively.

“I’m tired,” said Keller. “It was a rough crossing.”

“You didn’t sleep on the ferry?”

“Evidently,” said Keller, “you haven’t been on a ferry recently.”

It was true. Anton Orsati rarely ventured beyond the well-guarded walls of his estate. The world came to him with its problems, and he made them go away—for a substantial fee, of course. He picked up a thick manila envelope and placed it in front of Keller.

“What’s that?”

“Consider it a Christmas bonus.”

“It’s October.”

The don shrugged. Keller lifted the flap of the envelope and peered inside. It was packed with bundles of hundred-euro notes. He lowered the flap and pushed the envelope toward the center of the table.

“Here on Corsica,” the don said with a frown, “it is impolite to refuse a gift.”

“The gift isn’t necessary.”

“Take it, Christopher. You’ve earned it.”

“You’ve made me rich, Don Orsati, richer than I ever dreamed possible.”

“But?”

Keller sat silently.

“A closed mouth catches neither flies nor food,” said the don, quoting from his seemingly bottomless supply of Corsican proverbs.

“Your point?”

“Speak, Christopher. Tell me what’s bothering you.”

Keller was staring at the money, consciously avoiding the don’s gaze.

“Are you bored with your work?”

“It’s not that.”

“Maybe you should take a break. You could focus your energies on the legitimate side of the business. There’s plenty of money to be made there.”

“Olive oil isn’t the answer, Don Orsati.”

“So there is a problem.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“You didn’t have to.” The don regarded Keller carefully. “When you pull a tooth, Christopher, it will stop hurting.”

“Unless you have a bad dentist.”

“The only thing worse than a bad dentist is a bad companion.”

“It is better to be alone,” said Keller philosophically, “than to have bad companions.”

The don smiled. “You might have been born an Englishman, Christopher, but you have the soul of a Corsican.”

Keller stood. The don pushed the envelope across the tabletop.

“Are you sure you won’t stay for lunch?”

“I have plans.”

“Whatever they are,” the don said, “they’ll have to wait.”

“Why?”

“You have a visitor.”

Keller didn’t have to ask the visitor’s name. There were only a handful of people in the world who knew he was still alive, and only one who would dare to call on him unannounced.

“When did he arrive?”

“Last night,” answered the don.

“What does he want?”

“He wasn’t at liberty to say.” The don scrutinized Keller with the watchful eyes of a canine. “Is it my imagination,” he asked finally, “or has your mood suddenly improved?”

Keller departed without answering. Don Orsati watched him go. Then he looked down at the tabletop and swore softly. The Englishman had forgotten to take the envelope.

CHRISTOPHER KELLER HAD ALWAYS TAKEN great care with his money. By his own calculation he had earned more than $20 million working for Don Anton Orsati and, through prudent investing, had made himself vastly wealthy. The bulk of his fortune was held by banks in Geneva and Zurich, but there were also accounts in Monaco, Liechtenstein, Brussels, Hong Kong, and the Cayman Islands. He even kept a small amount of money at a reputable bank in London. His British account manager believed him to be a reclusive resident of Corsica who, like Don Orsati, left the island infrequently. The government of France was of the same opinion. Keller paid taxes on his legitimate investment earnings and on the respectable salary he earned from the Orsati Olive Oil Company, where he served as director of central European sales. He voted in French elections, donated to French charities, rooted for French sports teams, and, on occasion, had been forced to utilize the services of the French national health care authority. He had never been charged with a crime of any sort, a noteworthy achievement for a man of the south, and his driving record was impeccable. All in all, with one significant exception, Christopher Keller was a model citizen.

An expert skier and climber, he had been quietly shopping for a chalet in the French Alps for some time. At present, he maintained a single residence, a villa of modest proportions located one valley over from the valley of the Orsatis. It had exterior walls of tawny brown, a red tile roof, a large blue swimming pool, and a wide terrace that received the sun in the morning and in the afternoon was shaded by pine. Inside, its large rooms were comfortably decorated in rustic furnishings covered in white, beige, and faded yellows. There were many shelves filled with serious books—Keller had briefly studied military history at Cambridge and was a voracious reader of politics and contemporary issues—and upon the walls hung a modest collection of modern and Impressionist paintings. The most valuable work was a small landscape by Monet, which Keller, through an intermediary, had acquired from Christie’s auction house in Paris. Standing before it now, one hand resting on his chin, his head tilted to one side, was Gabriel. He licked the tip of his forefinger, rubbed it over the surface, and shook his head slowly.

“What’s wrong?” asked the Englishman.

“It’s covered in surface grime. You really should let me clean it for you. It will only take—”

“I like it the way it is.”

Gabriel wiped his forefinger on the front of his jeans and turned to face Keller. The Englishman was ten years younger than Gabriel, four inches taller, and thirty pounds heavier, especially through the shoulders and arms, where he carried a lethal quantity of finely sculpted power and mass. His short hair was bleached blond from the sea; his skin was very dark from the sun. He had bright blue eyes, square cheekbones, and a thick chin with a chisel notch in the center of it. His mouth seemed permanently fixed in a mocking smile. Keller was a man without allegiance, without fear, and without morals, except when it came to matters of friendship and love. He had lived life on his own terms, and somehow he had won.

“I thought you were supposed to be in Rome,” he said.

“I was,” answered Gabriel. “But Graham Seymour dropped into town. He had something he wanted to show me.”

“What was it?”

“A photograph of a man walking through Heathrow Airport.”

Keller’s half-smile evaporated, his blue eyes narrowed. “How much does he know?”

“Everything, Christopher.”

“Am I in danger?”

“That depends.”

“On what?”

“On whether you agree to do a job for him.”

“What does he want?”

Gabriel smiled. “What you do best.”

Outside, the sun still held dominion over Keller’s terrace. They sat in a pair of comfortable garden chairs, a small wrought-iron table between them. On it lay Graham Seymour’s thick file on the professional exploits of one Eamon Quinn. Keller had yet to open it or even look at it. He was listening spellbound to Gabriel’s account of Quinn’s role in the murder of the princess.

When Gabriel finished, Keller held up the photograph of his recent passage through Heathrow Airport. “You gave me your word,” he said. “You swore that you would never tell Graham that we were working together.”