powered computers and high-resolution video monitors. It was a studio
rented from a multimedia production company that did duplication,
restoration, and editing of video for surveillance firms and
corporations.
One of the group, a white-haired, scrawny man in shirtsleeves who looked
a great deal older than his forty-six years, took a videocassette from a
D-2 composite digital-format videotape recorder and placed it in one of
the video slots in a Quantel Sapphire video-imaging computer. He had
just finished making a digital copy of the surveillance tape he’d been
given. Now, using this British-made video-imaging computer that had
originally been developed for the Home Office, Britain’s MI-5, he was
going to magnify the image.
The white-haired man, who worked in silence, had been one of the top
video-enhancement specialists in the Home Office until he was lured away
by a private London security firm at double his old salary. These two
gentlemen in the room with him had hired him, through the security firm,
to do a quick job in Zurich. He had no idea who they were. All he knew
was that they were paying him a generous bonus. They had flown him from
London to Zurich business class.
Now the two mysterious men sat off by themselves, talking. They could
have been international businessmen from any country in the world,
although in fact they were speaking Dutch, which the video expert
understood reasonably well.
On the other side of the room, the white-haired technician stared at the
computer screen. At the bottom it said CAM 2, along with the date and
the time, which flashed by in fractions of a second. He called out to
his clients: “All right, now tell me what you’d like done. You want the
bloke electronically compared against a photo you’ve got?”
“No,” replied the first Dutchman. “We know who it is. We want to see
what he’s reading.”
“I should have figured,” the technician groaned. “Good God, that piece
of paper he’s holding is in shadow.”
“How’s the quality of the tape?” the second man asked.
“Not bad,” the tech said. “Two frames a second, which is standard. A
lot of these banks use the most god-awful equipment, but fortunately
this bank used a high-performance, high-res camera. I mean, I can’t say
the camera was positioned terribly well, but that’s not uncommon
either.”
The second businessman asked, “So you can zoom in on whatever he’s
holding?”
“Sure. The software on this Quantel compensates for all the usual
problems you get from digital enlargement the blockiness and all that.
That’s not the problem. The damned thing’s in shadow.”
“Well, you’re supposed to be the best,” the first man said sourly.
“You’re certainly the most expensive.”
“I know, I know,” the tech said. “All true. Well, I can bring up the
contrast.” He clicked on a pull-down menu that listed “Crisp,” “Zoom,”
“Colouring,” and “Contrast.” By clicking on the ” + ” key he lightened
the shadow until the paper the man in the bank vault was looking at was
almost readable, then enhanced the resolution by clicking another
number. He tinkered with the contrast some more, then clicked “crisp”
to sharpen the image further.
“Good,” he said at last.
“Can you see what he’s reading?” the second man asked.
“Actually, it’s a photograph.”
“A photograph?”
“Right. An old one. A group shot. Lots of conservatively dressed men.
Looks like a bunch of businessmen. A couple of German officers, too.
Yes, a group shot. Mountains in the background ”
“Can you make out their faces?”
“If you give me … just… ah, here we are.” He zoomed in on the
photograph until it took up the entire screen. ” “Zurich, 1945,” it
says here. The “Sig’ something … ?”
The second man glanced at the first. “Good heavens.” He approached the
computer monitor.
The tech said, “Sigma AG?”
The second man muttered to the first, “He’s on to it.”
“As I thought,” the first said.
“All right,” said the second man to the technician. “I want you to
print out a copy of that. I also want the best head shot of this fellow
you can get.”
“Make fifty copies,” put in the first man, rising from his chair.
The second man crossed the room to talk to his colleague. “Put out the
word,” he said quietly. “Our precautions have been inadequate. The
American has become a serious threat.”
Washington, D.C.
Anna Navarro hunched forward in her chair. Alan Bartlett’s office was
as immaculate as ever, the man’s expression every bit as opaque.
“I’ve tracked Robert Mailhot’s money transfers from the Nova Scotia
National Bank back to an account in the Caymans, and there, I’m afraid,
I’ve hit a dead end,” Anna said. “The one source we’ve got there
confirms that the account shows recent activity involving one of
Prosperi’s funds, too. But there, as I say, the money trail goes cold.
It’s one thing to learn where the money ends up. It’s another to learn
who put the money there in the first place. Should we start working
through regular channels?”
“Out of the question,” Bartlett said, a little peevish. “It would
compromise the security of the entire operation. That means anyone with
an interest in stopping the investigation can do so easily. It also
means endangering the lives of others, people who may still be targets.”
“I understand,” Anna said. “But I don’t want a repeat of Asuncion,
either. That’s the price you pay for going through back-channels. Who
ever’s behind this, this–for want of a better word, this
conspiracy-obviously had enough influence to stop us.”
“Granted. But once we raise this thing to an A-II level, a sanctioned
investigation, it’s like taking out an ad in The New York Times, telling
the subjects of our inquiries what we’re up to. We can’t assume there
aren’t people in the intelligence community working both sides on this
matter.”
“An A-II is still highly privileged. I don’t agree–”
“No, you wouldn’t,” he said freezingly. “Perhaps I was wrong–perhaps
you really are a loyal bureaucrat at heart.”
She ignored his barb. “I’ve been involved in many international
investigations, including homicide investigations, that have been kept
quiet. Particularly when we think someone in the government might be
implicated. In El Salvador, when government officials had Americans
killed to cover up ”
“As you know, I’m intimately acquainted with your previous exploits,
Agent Navarro,” Bartlett said impatiently. “You’re speaking of one
foreign government. I’m speaking of half a dozen or more. There’s a
difference.”
“You say there’s been a victim in Oslo now?”
“That’s our latest intelligence, yes.”
“Then we have the Attorney General’s office make a high-level,
confidential appeal to the Office of the Norwegian State Prosecutor,
requesting absolute secrecy.”
“No. The risks of a direct appeal to the Norwegian authorities are far
too great.”
“Then I want the list. Not the list of corpses. I want the names of
people with Sigma clearance files. Your ‘hot list.” ”
“That’s impossible.”
“I see I only get ’em when they’re dead. Well, in that case, I want off
this job.”
He hesitated. “Don’t play games, Ms. Navarro. You’ve been assigned.”
Bartlett’s carefully cultivated air of solicitude and noblesse had
evaporated. Now Anna caught a glimpse of the steel that had placed
Bartlett at the helm of one of the government’s most powerful
investigative units. “It’s really not up to you.”
“I can get sick, suddenly become unable to perform my job. Be unable to
travel.”
“You wouldn’t do that.”
“No, not if you gave me the hot list.”
“I told you. It’s impossible. This operation must abide by certain
rules. If those rules sometimes amount to constraints, you must accept
them as the parameters of your inquiry.”
“Look,” she said, “thirteen of the old men on your Sigma list are now
dead under ‘questionable circumstances,” let’s just say. Three remain
alive, right?”
“To the best of our knowledge.”
“Then let me put it to you this way. Once one of these guys dies, is
killed, whatever we can’t pay the body a visit without some kind of
official government cooperation, on whatever level. Right? But if we
get to one of them before he’s killed… Listen, I realize I’m supposed
to be investigating dead people, not live ones. But if we consider them
potential witnesses, put them under twenty-four-hour surveillance
discreetly, of course….”
Bartlett stared at her, conflicting imperatives evidently playing across
his face. Now he walked to a floor safe taller than he was, opened it,
and pulled out a folder. He handed her a sheet of paper stamped secret,
noforn, and no contract Those classifications stipulated that, in
addition to high-level secrecy constraints, it was under no
circumstances releasable to foreign nationals or contract employees.
“The list,” he said quietly.
She quickly read down the columns of information aliases, real names,
names of any living relatives, and the numbers of the corresponding
files. Three old men remained alive. Countries of origin: Portugal,
Italy, Switzerland.
“No addresses?” she said.