By now Ollie thought that hitting on Lena was a bad idea and was quite sure that his cover was blown. However, he knew that in the waiting room they were probably being monitored by a video camera so he started chatting with Lena as if he did not have a worry in the world. Lena was a bit uptight but he managed to allay her concerns talking about the places they would see and the things that they would do in Israel. They were speaking in Swedish, of course, but Ollie was sure that their conversation was translated and understood. After about 10 minutes a grim looking man entered the room with their passports in his hand. He said that Lena could leave the room and handed over her passport. She was hesitant about leaving Ollie but he told her everything was in order and asked her to tell the tour group leader that he had been detained for questioning by Israeli authorities. The supervisor asked him in English what he had said to Lena and Ollie translated what he had just said. The supervisor enquired about Ollie's travels, based on the entry and exit stamps in his passport, and as he had prepared for this in advance he supplied details of his former trips. This seemed to satisfy the supervisor so he told Ollie he was also free to go and gave him his passport. As Ollie was about to leave the room the man said in Arabic "Salaam Aleika" and Ollie caught himself at the last moment before automatically replying "Aleika as-salaam" and instead said that he did not understand. The man smiled and let him go to collect his luggage. By the time Ollie picked up his small suitcase the whole group was waiting to board the bus that was to take them to their hotel in Tel Aviv. After the group checked in to a large hotel on the beach front they were to meet in the lobby and go to old Jaffa for a taste of the lively city's nightlife. Ollie and Lena were in adjoining rooms but intended to spend the time together. This part of the tour was to give them a taste of modern Israel — there were no holy places in Tel Aviv — only a bustling city that never stopped.
The supervisor, who was a senior officer in the Israeli Security Agency, smiled to himself and called his boss at the ISA telling him that he was sure that the man travelling with the passport of Hugo Elias Jacobsson was the person they were waiting for, that they knew as Ollie. He said that while he had Ollie's passport in his hand he had managed to insert a microchip beacon that would enable the ISA to trace Ollie, or more accurately Ollie's passport, even from a distance of 500 meters. The information was passed on to the head of the ISA and to Mossad headquarters, and "Hugo" was placed under close surveillance. The instructions given by the head of Mossad were to find the improvised nuclear device and disarm it and "Hugo" was to be followed but not to be arrested until they were sure that he would lead them to the device. The ISA had the schedule of the tour group so two agents were posted in the lobby of the hotel in Tel Aviv with orders to follow "Hugo" if he departed from the group.
David received the information with mixed feelings. He was glad that the mysterious blond man he had been trying to catch was within the grasp of Israeli security agents but was worried that this "Hugo", whom he preferred to call Ollie as this was the name of the person he had been chasing, would manage to evade his "baby sitters" and get hold of the device. He already knew that Ollie was exceptionally cunning and ruthless and feared that he may have contacts with local Arab extremists in Israel or the Palestinian Authority that would assist him if he tried to go underground. He was especially concerned that if the device was detonated in a populated center in Israel the collateral damage would be intolerable for such a small country. David presented his uneasiness to Shimony, the Deputy Director of Mossad, but was told that the best ISA agents were on the case and that a blond man like Ollie would stand out among the Israelis. He also said that without knowledge of Hebrew or Arabic Ollie would find it difficult to get around unnoticed. David said that he wasn't sure that Ollie did not speak Arabic as no one knew where he had spent the time between disappearing in Uppsala until he re-emerged in Stockholm several years later. David asked for permission to share the information about Ollie's presence in Israel with the members of the international task force and was instructed to wait until they determined what Ollie was up to. Shimony said that he worried that Ollie would somehow become aware of the fact that his cover was blown and take evasive action if he noted that he was being followed. Furthermore, he said, if all the extra security measures deployed in the major European cities because of the "dirty bomb" threat were suddenly removed that too might alert Ollie. David was not pleased with this decision but knew that he had to obey, so he asked when the international task force could be informed about Ollie's whereabouts and Shimony told him that would be only after the device and Ollie were seized.
Professor Matias Antonio Modena had quietly returned to Spain after leaving Padova in May, and rented a small apartment in Girona under an assumed name. He now called himself Santiago Guaman and posed as a retired university professor who was writing a fictional thriller. Ironically, the apartment was in an old section of the town in a narrow street near the Museum of Jewish History. He had no idea that Ollie had taken charge of the device and had made shipping arrangements to transport it to Israel. He was concerned that he had not received any word from Andreas or Ollie and that the media was not full of the reports he had expected of policy changes toward "unwanted elements" or the revival of separatist movements all over Europe. He began to worry and wanted to contact Delgado through the local branch of the Catalan separatist movement but was afraid that his true identity would be uncovered and that would compromise the whole plan. So he decided to call the only person he trusted, his former graduate student and sometime lover, Ramona, and ask her to come to Girona to meet him. He was not sure how she would react as he had severed all contact with her for almost a whole year when he left Barcelona and moved to Padova.
Ramona was surprised to hear from the professor after all this time and was relieved when he told her that he was well as she feared that his health could be affected by his quite careless handling of radioactive materials. She did not acknowledge to David that she and the professor were ever more than a student and a mentor, but did not deny it. She greatly respected Modena for his intellect, intelligence and dedication to Catalan independence and that made up for the considerable difference in age between them. She admitted to herself that the sex with him was not all that exciting for her but patiently accepted his attempts to please her physically as well as intellectually. She readily agreed to meet him in Girona and they arranged to have dinner in a small restaurant near the famous cathedral.
When she entered the restaurant she was taken aback by the professor's appearance. He had lost several kilograms and looked quite emaciated and at least ten years older than she had remembered him. She refrained from making a comment on his looks and kissed him on both cheeks as he rose to greet her. They sat down and Modena gently held her hand and caressed it while she smiled at him. Without being asked he told her that he had fulfilled his life's ambition and proved that a fissionable material could be produced without a neutron source or nuclear reactor. He boasted that soon the whole world would recognize his genius and that the Nobel Prize was as good as his as he had succeeded in fulfilling the alchemists' dream of transmutation of a low value material into a precious commodity. Ramona was in a state of shock upon hearing this and was speechless for several minutes. The professor did not even notice her expression and continued to boast about his scientific achievement. By the time he had finished his self aggrandizement she found enough courage to ask him how he would prove that he had made uranium-233 by his innovative method. The professor said that he could provide a sample of the material for analysis to satisfy the skeptics, and then looked at her and enigmatically added that the further proof would become evident when the cause of independent Catalonia would be advanced thanks to his work. Ramona asked him what he meant by this comment but he said that they should eat their dinner and talk about other things. They had a couple of drinks after dinner and the professor shyly invited her to spend the night in his apartment rather than drive back to Barcelona. She felt sorry for the professor and pitied him in his present state and she also wanted to learn more about the meaning of his last statement so she agreed. She had to support him up the stairs to his apartment as the last drinks had taken their toll on him. She undressed him and put him in bed and lay next to him and gently caressed him until he fell asleep. He murmured something unintelligible in his sleep and all she could make out were the words "free Catalunya", "not detonate", "Doctor Jay" and "Andreas". In the morning the professor was deeply embarrassed to find himself in bed listening to Ramona singing to herself while making coffee in the apartment's little kitchenette. When she saw that he was awake she smiled and offered him freshly brewed coffee. They set their coffee mugs on a small breakfast table on the balcony overlooking the narrow street and the professor bashfully asked her if he they done anything the previous night. Ramona smiled and answered that he had fallen asleep as soon as his head hit the pillow and that he mumbled some incoherent things in his sleep that she did not understand. Professor Modena said that his sleep had been full of strange disturbances lately and that he had no idea what he said or if the words had any meaning. Ramona realized that now, completely in control of his senses, he would not be as forthcoming as he had been the night before. When he asked her about the separatist movement she told him that she had not been in contact with the movement since he had left as she was afraid that she would be interrogated about his disappearance. She also told him that she had had to switch her research topic to a new supervisor. Both of them became aware of the fact that their relationship had changed and would not be as close as it was before his departure so when Ramona said she had to return to Barcelona he stood up and kissed her cheeks and offered his hand for a farewell shake.