“I want to talk to the big man.”
“Should we go upstairs and find him?”
“I’m sorry. I want to talk to the big man.”
“Let’s go, Gerhardt. Come, take my hand. Let me help you.”
42
GABRIEL WORE NEATLY PRESSED khaki trousers and a soft beige sweater that fit him smartly through the waist and shoulders. Everything about his appearance said comfort and satisfaction, the precise image he wished to convey. Eli Lavon shepherded Peterson into the room and pushed him into a hard, straight-backed chair. Peterson sat like a man before a firing squad, his gaze fixed on the wall.
Lavon showed himself out. Gabriel remained seated, eyes down. He was never one to celebrate victories. He knew better than most that in the business of intelligence, victories are often transitory. Occasionally, with time, they didn’t seem like victories at all. Still, he took a moment to relish the fine circular quality of the affair. Not long ago, Gabriel had been the one in custody and Peterson had been asking the questions-Peterson of the fitted gray suit and polished Swiss arrogance. Now he sat before Gabriel shivering in his underwear.
A white Formica table separated them, bare except for a manila file folder and Gabriel’s mug of steaming coffee. Like Peterson’s cell in the basement, the room had terra-cotta floors and stucco walls. The blinds were drawn. Windblown rain beat a meddlesome rhythm against the glass. Gabriel regarded Peterson with an expression of distaste and fell into a speculative silence.
“You won’t get away with this.”
It was Peterson who broke the silence. He had spoken in English but Gabriel immediately switched to German; the carefully pronounced and grammatically correct High German of his mother. He wished to point out the laxity of Peterson’s Schwyzerdütch. To emphasize Peterson’s Swissness. To isolate him.
“Get away with what, Gerhardt?”
“Kidnapping me, you fucking bastard!”
“But we already did get away with it.”
“There were security cameras in the garage of my apartment house. That trick with your whore was recorded on videotape. The Zurich police probably have it already.”
Gabriel smiled calmly. “We took care of the security cameras, just like you took care of the security cameras at Rolfe’s villa the night you murdered him and stole his paintings.”
“What are you ranting about?”
“The paintings in Rolfe’s secret collection. The paintings he received during the war for services rendered to the SS. The paintings he wanted to return.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I don’t know anything about a secret collection, and I certainly had nothing to do with the murder of Augustus Rolfe! No one would ever believe I had anything to do with his death.”
“You killed Augustus Rolfe. Then you killed Werner Müller in Paris. Then Emil Jacobi in Lyons. You tried to kill me in Zurich. You sent a man to kill Anna Rolfe in Venice. That makes me angry, Gerhardt.”
“You’re deranged!”
Gabriel could see that Peterson’s manufactured defiance was slowly beginning to weaken.
“You’ve been away from work for a long time. Your superiors would like to talk to you too. They can’t find you either. Needless to say, your wife would like to know where the hell you are too. She’s worried sick.”
“My God, what have you done? What on earth have you done?”
Peterson seemed incapable of sitting still now. He was rocking in his chair and shivering. Gabriel sipped his coffee and pulled a face as though it were too hot. Then he lifted the cover on the manila file and began removing photographs. He took them out one at a time and had a brief look for himself before sliding them across the tabletop so Peterson could see.
“She takes a nice picture, don’t you think, Gerhardt? My, my, you seem to be enjoying yourself there. And look at this one. I’d hate to have to explain that one to Mrs. Peterson. And the press. And your minister in Bern.”
“You’re nothing but a blackmailer! No one will believe those photographs are real. They’ll see them for what they are: a cheap smear by a cheap blackmailer. But then blackmail and murder are the currency of your service, aren’t they? It’s what you’re good at.”
Gabriel left the photographs on the table in plain sight. Peterson made a valiant effort not to look at them.
“So that’s the story you tell your wife and your superiors? That you’re an innocent victim of blackmail? That you were kidnapped by Israeli intelligence and drugged? Do you know what your superiors will ask you? They’ll say: ‘Why would Israeli intelligence single you out for such treatment, Gerhardt? What have you done that would make them act like this?’ And you’ll have to come up with an answer.”
“That won’t be a problem.”
“Are you certain about that? It may not be so easy, given the fact that some of the most reputable news organizations in the world will be uncovering interesting bits and pieces of the story on a daily basis. It will be like water torture, pardon the comparison. You may survive it, but your career will be ruined. Your dreams of becoming chief of the Federal Police will remain just that: a dream. Politics will be closed off to you. Business as well. Do you think your friends in the banks will come to your assistance? No, I doubt it, since you’ll have nothing to offer them. Imagine, no job, no pension, no financial support from your friends.”
Gabriel paused in order to lift the cover on the file folder and remove a half-dozen more photographs: surveillance shots of Peterson’s wife and children. Deliberately he placed them next to the pictures of Peterson and the girl.
“Who will take care of your wife? Who will take care of your children? Who will pay the rent on that nice flat of yours on the Zürichsee? Who will make the payments on that big Mercedes? It’s not a very pleasant picture, but it doesn’t have to be that way. I don’t like murderers, Gerhardt, especially when they kill for a bank, but I’m offering you a way out. I suggest that you take it before it’s too late.”
“What do you want from me?”
“You’re going to work for me now.”
“That’s impossible!”
“You’re going to help me get Rolfe’s paintings back.” Gabriel hesitated, waiting for Peterson to deny knowledge of any paintings, but this time he said nothing. “We’ll handle it quietly, the Swiss way. Then you’re going to help me get back other things. You’re going to help me clean up the mess of Swiss history. Together, Gerhardt, we can move mountains.”
“And if I refuse?”
“You can go back downstairs with my friend and think about it for a while. Then we’ll talk again.”
“Take those damned pictures away!”
“Give me an answer and I’ll take them away.”
“What you don’t understand is that either way I’ll be destroyed. It’s just a question of which poison I choose to drink.” Peterson’s chin fell to his chest, his eyes closed. “I’m thirsty.”
“Answer my questions, and I’ll get you something to drink.”
IN the corridor outside the room, Eli Lavon sat on the cold floor, his back to the wall, his eyes closed. Only his right hand betrayed his emotions. It was squeezing his cigarette lighter. Though he lived in Vienna, the sound of German shouted in anger still made the back of his neck burn.
The fissures had appeared, but Peterson had not yet cracked. Lavon could tell he was close. The drugs, the water, the pictures with the girl. The fear of what waited around the next bend in the road. It was building in him. Eli Lavon hoped it happened soon.