“This way, Mr. Dillon.”
Marie de Brissac, at her easel, turned. She hesitated, paintbrush in hand, and Aaron said, “I’ve brought you some company. I’ll bring breakfast in a moment.” The door closed and the key turned.
“Sean Dillon.” He held out his hand. “Countess, is it?”
“Never mind that. Marie will do – Marie de Brissac. Did you have a bad time?”
“A bad night, certainly. I’ll pinch one of those cigarettes if you don’t mind.”
“Of course not.”
He lit one and blew out a plume of smoke. “Do you by any chance know where we are?”
“I haven’t the slightest idea. And you?”
“I’m afraid not. Last I recall, I was in a fishing port called Salinas in Sicily. I know by my watch that I was at least twelve hours at sea, but I was unconscious most of the time.”
“The same with me. I was in Corfu when they kidnapped me. A plane ride was mentioned and then a needle in the arm, and I knew nothing until I woke up here.”
“But what in the hell is it all about?” Dillon asked, and the door opened and Braun, not Aaron, came in with a tray.
“Good morning, Mr. Dillon – Countess.” He put the tray down. “Scrambled eggs, toast, marmalade, and English breakfast tea. Much better for you than coffee. I’ll be back.”
He went out and Dillon said, “I don’t know about you, but I’m starving. Let’s eat it while it’s hot.”
“I agree,” she said.
They sat on either side of the table and talked as they ate. Dillon said, “So we don’t know where we are. Could be Italy or Greece, maybe even Turkey or Crete. Egypt would be a possibility.”
“A wide choice, but who are you, Mr. Dillon, and why are you here?”
“I work for a branch of British intelligence. I was in Sicily to arrest in a highly illegal manner a much-wanted Arab terrorist. My partner was with me, Chief Inspector Hannah Bernstein of Special Branch at Scotland Yard. The whole thing turned out to be a setup. They took me but left Hannah to report back to my boss, Brigadier Ferguson. What about you?”
“I was on a painting holiday in northeast Corfu on the coast, and on my own because I prefer it that way at the moment.”
“You’re French,” Dillon said.
“That’s right. I was painting at the beach when the one called David, David Braun, appeared, with another called Moshe. They packed up my clothes, and picked me up with no explanation. The rest you know.”
“There’s got to be a reason,” Dillon said. “I mean, what’s special about you? Tell me about yourself.”
“Well, my father was General Comte Jean de Brissac, and a war hero. He’s been dead for some years. My mother died a year ago and I still haven’t got over that. It means I am now Comtesse de Brissac. The title goes that way. From my mother or my father.”
“But nobody would snatch you for that reason,” Dillon told her.
“I am also wealthy. Perhaps they want a ransom.”
“That could have made sense, except that it doesn’t explain why they’ve snatched me.” He poured some more tea. “Look, from what this character Judas said to me, they’re some sort of Jewish extremist group.”
“Which makes it even more absurd. I have no Jewish connections.” She frowned. “Our family lawyer in Paris, Michael Rocard, is Jewish, but what’s that got to do with anything? He’s been a lawyer to the de Brissacs for at least thirty years. The cottage I rented in Corfu is his.”
“Is there anything else?” Dillon demanded. “Anything in your life? Come on, girl.”
“Not that I can think of.” But there was a great reluctance there and he seized on it at once.
“Come on, the truth.”
So she sighed and sat back. And she told him.
Dillon was stunned. He walked to the table by the window and helped himself to one of her cigarettes. “Jake Cazalet. That’s got to be the reason.”
“But why?”
He sat on the edge of the table as he talked to her. “Just listen and you’ll see the connection.” And he told her all about Sicily and the people who were killed there, then about Judas and the Maccabees, and finally about the Nemesis plan.
When he was finished, she could only shake her head, her turn to be stunned. “I can’t believe it,” she said. “It’s so awful. All that death, and on such a grand scale.”
“Personally, I believe Judas is barking mad, but then many extremists are.”
“But they’re Jewish. You don’t-”
“You don’t expect Jews to be terrorists? And who was it assassinated Prime Minister Rabin? All it takes is one small, hard, dedicated group. Take Ireland. More than twenty-five years of the bomb and the bullet, thousands killed, hundreds of thousands wounded, sometimes crippled for life, yet at no time has there been more than three hundred and fifty active members of the IRA. The majority of the Irish people hate the violence and condemn it.”
She frowned. “You’re well informed.”
There was a question there, and he replied to it. “I’m from Belfast originally. When I was nineteen, I was a young actor in London. My father went home on a visit, got caught in an exchange of fire on a Belfast street, and died from British Army bullets.”
She said, “And you joined the IRA?”
“The kind of thing you’d do at nineteen. Yes, Countess, I became a gunman for the glorious cause, and once you put your foot on that road there’s no turning back.”
“But you changed. I mean, you work for British intelligence and this Brigadier Ferguson.”
“I didn’t have much choice. I had the prospect of a Serb firing squad in Bosnia in front of me or accepting Ferguson’s offer to go and work for him.”
“Doing the same sort of things you’d been doing,” she said shrewdly.
“Exactly, though usually on the side of the right.”
“I see.”
She was very calm, very still, and Dillon said, “I never believed in the bombs, Countess, and for what it’s worth – in Sicily? I’d have shot Hakim and his men, but not the old couple and the girl.”
“Yes, I think I believe you.”
He smiled then, that special Dillon smile, warm and immensely charming, changing his personality completely.
“You better had, Countess, because I’m the only friend you’ve got here.”
“I believe you, so give me one of those cigarettes and tell me what you think we should do.”
“I wish I knew.” He gave her a light from his old Zippo. “Interestingly enough, Judas didn’t say a word about you being Cazalet’s daughter, but he obviously knows.”
“Then why didn’t he tell you?”
“Oh, I think he enjoys playing games, like the cellar and the well last night. I think he wanted me to find out for myself.”
She nodded. “So he intends to use me as a bargaining counter to persuade my father to sign this order? This total destruction of three countries?”
“That’s about it.”
She shook her head. “Jake Cazalet is a good man, Mr. Dillon. I can’t believe he would sign such an agreement, no matter what the threat.”
“Normally I’d agree.” Dillon got up and walked to the window. “But with you, he obviously feels he has something out of the ordinary. A piece of leverage like no other.” He turned. “Tell me about it. Tell me about him and your mother. Anything and everything. It could help. There might be something there.”
“I don’t know if I can.” She frowned. “My mother told me how it happened, pieced it together over the years, and it was no sordid affair – anything but.” She laughed bravely, but her voice shook. “Rather tragic, really.”
“Nothing better to do, girl dear. Just tell me while we have the time. They could come for me at any minute.”
“Well, it started in Vietnam a long time ago,” she said. “My age actually, so that means it was twenty-eight years…”
EASTERN MEDITERRANEAN