He raced to the low fence, and leaped over it into the neighbor’s yard,
which was roughly the same size as Rossignol’s, though not as ornately
landscaped. He was taking an enormous chance of being spotted by anyone
in the neighbor’s house, but no one called out to him, there were no
shouts, and he kept running, around the far side of the house and out to
Hauserstrasse. A hundred feet or so down the street was the Rover. He
ran to it, leaped in, and keyed the ignition. It roared to life.
He made a quick U-turn and then drove down the steep street,
deliberately slowing his pace to that of a local driving to work.
Someone had just tried to call Rossignol. Someone calling from a place
whose telephone number began 431.
The digits tumbled around in his brain until something clicked.
Vienna, Austria.
The call had come from Vienna. These men have successors, heirs, Liesl
had said. One of them, Mercandetti had told him, resided in Vienna: the
son of the monster Gerhard Lenz. With Rossignol dead, it was as logical
a lead to follow as any. Not a certainty far from a certainty but at
least a possibility. A possible lead when there was a paucity of leads.
In a few minutes he had arrived in the heart of the city, near the
Bahnhofplatz, where Jimmy Cavanaugh had tried to kill him. Where it had
all begun.
He had to get on the next train to Vienna.
The Austrian Alps
There was a soft knock on the door, and the old man called out
irritably, “Yes?”
A physician in a white coat entered, a short, rotund man with round
shoulders and a potbelly.
“How is everything, sir?” the physician asked. “How is your suite?”
“You call this a suite?” Patient Eighteen asked. He lay atop the
narrow single bed, fully dressed in his rumpled three-piece suit. “It’s
a god damned monk’s cell.”
Indeed, the room was simply furnished, with only a chair, a desk, a
reading lamp, and a television set. The stone floor was bare.
The physician smiled wanly. “I am Dr. Lofquist,” he said, sitting in
the chair beside the bed. “I would like to welcome you, but I must also
warn you. This will be a very rigorous and difficult ten days. You will
be put through the most extensive physical and mental tests you have
ever had.”
Patient Eighteen did not bother to sit up. “Why the hell the mental?”
“Because, you see, not everyone is eligible.”
“What happens if you think I’m crazy?”
“Anyone not invited to join is sent home with our regrets.”
The patient said nothing.
“Perhaps you should take a rest, sir. This afternoon will be tiring.
There will be a CAT scan, a chest X-ray, then a series of cognitive
tests. And, of course, a standard test for depression.
“I’m not depressed,” the patient snapped.
The doctor ignored him. “Tonight you will be required to fast, so that
we may accurately measure plasma cholesterol, triglycerides,
lipoproteins, and so on.”
“Fast? You mean starve? I’m not starving myself!” “Sir,” the doctor
said, rising, “you are free to go any time you wish. If you stay, and
if you are invited to join us, you will find the procedure to be lengthy
and quite painful, I must be honest. But it will be like nothing you
have ever experienced in your long life. Ever. This I promise you.”
Kesting did not conceal his surprise when Anna returned several hours
later with an address; and in truth Anna shared a measure of that
surprise. She had done what she’d determined to do, and it had worked.
After a few readings of the Rossignol file, she had come up with one
name that could be of help: that of a Zurich civil servant named Daniel
Taine. The name recurred in several different contexts, and further
inquiries had confirmed her intuition. Gaston Rossignol had been
Taine’s first employer, and, it appeared, something of a mentor. In the
seventies, Taine and Rossignol were partners in a limited liability
venture involving high-yield Eurobonds. Rossignol had sponsored Taine’s
application to the Kifkintler Society, a men’s club whose membership
included many of Zurich’s most powerful citizens. Now Taine, having
made his small fortune, served in various honorific capacities in the
canton. He was someone with precisely the sort of access and resources
to ensure that his old mentor’s plans ran smoothly.
Anna had dropped in on Taine at his home unannounced, identified
herself, and laid her cards on the table. Her message was simple.
Gaston Rossignol was in serious, imminent danger.
Taine was visibly rattled, but closemouthed, as she expected. “I cannot
help you. He has moved. No one can say where, and it is no one’s
concern.”
“Except the killers?”
“Even if there are such assassins,” Taine spoke with a display of
skepticism, but he acceded too readily to her stipulation, “who’s to say
they can find him if you cannot. Your own resources are obviously
considerable.”
“I have reason to believe they’ve already made headway.”
A sharp glance: “Really? And why is that?”
Anna shook her head. “There are certain matters I can only discuss with
Gaston Rossignol himself.”
“And why do you suppose anyone would want to kill him? He is among the
most admired of Zurichers.”
“Which explains why he’s living in hiding.”
“What nonsense you speak,” Taine said, after a beat.
Anna stared at him levelly for few moments. Then she handed him a card
with her name on it, and her numbers at the Office of Special
Investigations. “I will return in an hour. I have reason to think your
own
resources are pretty considerable. Check me out. Satisfy yourself as
to my bona fides. Do whatever will help you to see that I am who I say
I am, and that I’m representing myself accurately.”
“How can I, a mere Swiss citizen …”
“You have ways, Mr. Taine. And if you don’t, your friend does. I’m
quite sure you’ll want to help your friend. I think we understand each
other.”
Two hours later, Anna Navarro paid a call to Taine at his place of work.
The ministry of economic affairs was located in a marble building
constructed in the familiar late-nineteenth-century Beaux Arts style.
Taine’s own office was large, sunny, and book-lined. She was ushered in
to him immediately upon her arrival; the dark-paneled door closed
discreetly behind her.
Taine sat quietly behind his hurled walnut desk. “This was not my
decision,” he stressed. “This is Monsieur Rossignol’s decision. I do
not support it.”
“You checked me out.”
“You have been checked out,” Taine replied carefully, hewing to the
passive voice. He returned her card to her. “Good-bye, Ms. Navarro.”
The address was penciled in small print, in a blank space to the left of
her name.
Her first call was to Bartlett, updating him as to her progress. “You
never cease to amaze me, Ms. Navarro,” he’d replied, a surprising note
of genuine warmth in his voice.
As she and Resting drove to the Hottingen address, he said, “Your
request for surveillance was approved this morning. Several unmarked
police cars shall be engaged for the purpose.”
“And his telephone.”
“Yes, we can have a tap in place within hours. An officer at the
Kantonspohzei will be assigned to listen in at the Mutterhaus.”
“The Mutterhaus?”
“Police headquarters. The Mother House, we call it.”
They headed steadily uphill on Hottingerstrasse. The houses became
larger and nicer, the trees denser. Finally they came to Hauserstrasse,
and pulled into the driveway of a low-slung brownstone house set in the
middle of a nicely landscaped yard. She noticed there were no unmarked
police cruisers anywhere nearby.
“This is the correct address,” Resting said.
She nodded. Another Swiss banker, she thought, with a big house and a
nice yard.
They got out and walked to the front door. Resting rang the bell. “You
do not mind, I hope, if I lead the interview.”
“Not at all,” Anna replied. Whatever “international cooperation” meant
on paper, that was the protocol and they both knew it.
After waiting a few minutes, Resting rang again. “He is an old man, and
for some years he has been wheekhair-bound. It must take him time to
move around his house.”
After a few minutes more, Resting said, “I cannot imagine he goes out
very much at his age.” He rang again.
/ knew this was too easy, Anna thought. What a botch.
“He may be ill,” Resting said. Uneasily he turned the doorknob but the
door was locked. Together, they walked around to the back door; it
opened readily. He called into the house, “Dr. Rossignol, it is
Resting from the Public Prosecutor’s office.” The “Dr.” seemed purely
an honorific.
Silence.
“Dr. Rossignol!”
Resting stepped into the house, Anna following. The lights were on, and
she could hear classical music.
“Dr. Rossignol?” Resting said more loudly. He ventured forward into