The Kill Artist Read online

  “Half a loaf is better than nothing.”

  “I respectfully disagree.”

  A highway sign floated out of the swirling snow. The border was three miles ahead.

  Jacqueline said, “Where are you taking me?”

  “To the other side.”

  “So how do you intend to get me across the border without a passport?”

  “We’ve made other arrangements.”

  “Other arrangements? What kind of other arrangements?”

  “I have another passport for you. A Canadian passport.”

  “How did you get a Canadian passport?”

  Another sign: the border was now two miles ahead.

  “It’s not yours, of course.”

  “Hold on a minute! Yusef promised you wouldn’t ask me to do anything illegal.”

  “You’re not doing anything illegal. It’s an open border, and the passport is perfectly valid.”

  “It might be valid, but it’s not mine!”

  “It doesn’t matter if it’s not yours. No one’s going to question you.”

  “I’m not going to enter the United States on a false passport! Stop the car! I want out!”

  “If I let you out here you’ll freeze to death before you ever reach safety.”

  “Then drop me somewhere! Just let me out!”

  “Dominique, this is why we brought you from London: to help me get across this border.”

  “You lied to me! You and Yusef!”

  “Yes, we found it necessary to mislead you slightly.”

  “Slightly!”

  “But none of that matters now. What matters is that I need to get across this border, and I need your help.”

  The border was now a mile away. Ahead she could see the bright white lights of the crossing. She wondered what to do. She supposed she could simply tell him no. Then what would he do? Turn around, kill her, dump her body into the snow, and cross the border on his own. She considered deceiving him: saying yes and then alerting the officer at the crossing point. But Tariq would just kill her and the border patrolman. There would be an investigation, the Office’s role in the affair would come to light. It would be an embarrassing fiasco for Ari Shamron. She had only one option. Play the game a little longer and find some way to alert Gabriel.

  She said, “Let me see the passport.”

  He handed it to her.

  She opened it and looked at the name: Hélène Sarrault. Then she looked at the photograph: Leila. The likeness was vague but convincing.

  “You’ll do it?”

  Jacqueline said, “Keep driving.”

  He entered the plaza at the border crossing and braked to a halt. A border patrolman stepped out of his booth and said, “Good evening. Where are you headed this evening?”

  Tariq said, “Burlington.”

  “Business or pleasure?”

  “My sister is ill, I’m afraid.”

  “Sorry to hear that. How long are you planning to stay?”

  “One day, two at the most.”

  “Passports, please.”

  Tariq handed them across. The officer opened them and examined the photographs and the names. Then he looked into the car and glanced at each of their faces.

  He closed the passports and handed them back. “Have a pleasant stay. And drive carefully. Weather report says there’s a big storm coming in later tonight.”

  Tariq took the passports, dropped the car into gear, and drove slowly across the border into Vermont. He placed the passports in his pocket and a moment later, when they were well clear of the border, he removed a Makarov pistol and placed the barrel against the side of her head.

  FORTY-ONE

  Washington, D.C.

  Yasir Arafat sat behind the desk in the presidential suite at the Madison Hotel, making his way through a stack of paperwork, listening to the late-evening traffic hissing along the damp pavement of Fifteenth Street. He paused for a moment, popped a Tunisian date into his mouth, then swallowed a few spoonfuls of yogurt. He was fastidious about his diet, did not smoke or consume alcohol, and never drank coffee. It had helped him survive a demanding revolutionary lifestyle that might have destroyed other men.

  Because he was expecting no more visitors that evening, he had changed out of his uniform into a blue tracksuit. His bald head was bare, and as usual he had several days’ growth on his pouchy face. He wore reading glasses, which magnified his froglike eyes. His thick lower lip jutted out, giving him the appearance of a child on the verge of tears.

  He possessed a near-photographic memory for written material and faces, which allowed him to work through the stack of documents quickly, pausing now and then to scribble notes in the margins of memoranda or sign his name. He was now in charge of the Gaza Strip and a large portion of the West Bank, a development that had seemed impossible only a few years earlier. His Palestinian Authority was responsible for the mundane details of ordinary governance, like trash collection and schools. It was a far cry from the old days, when he had been the world’s most famous guerrilla.

  He set aside the remainder of his work and opened a document bound in a leather cover. It was a copy of the interim agreement he was to sign the following day at the United Nations in New York. The agreement was yet another incremental step toward the fulfillment of his life’s work: the establishment of a Palestinian state. It was much less than he had wanted when he set out on this path—back then he had dreamed of the destruction of Israel—but it was the best he was going to get. There were some within the movement who wished him failure, some who even wished him death. The rejectionists, the dreamers. If they’d had their way, the Palestinians would be forever condemned to the refugee camps of the diaspora.

  An aide knocked on the door. Arafat looked up as he entered the room. “Sorry to disturb you, Abu Amar, but the president is on the phone.”

  Arafat smiled. This too would have been impossible only a few years earlier. “What does he want so late at night?”

  “He says his wife is out of town and he’s bored. He wants to know whether you would be willing to come to the White House and keep him company.”

  “Now?”

  “Yes, now.”

  “To do what?”

  The aide shrugged. “Talk, I suppose.”

  “Tell him I’ll be there in ten minutes.”

  Arafat stood up, removed his tracksuit, and dressed in his usual plain khaki uniform and traditional Palestinian headdress. He wore the black-and-white kaffiyeh of the peasant with the front shaped to a point to symbolize the map of Palestine. The aide reappeared with an overcoat and draped it over Arafat’s shoulders. Together they stepped into the hall and were immediately surrounded by a group of security men. Some were members of his personal bodyguard, the rest were officers of the U.S. Diplomatic Security Service. They moved down the corridor, Arafat in the center of the party, and stepped into a private elevator, which whisked them downward to the garage. There Arafat slipped into the back of a limousine. A moment later his motorcade was speeding south on Fifteenth Street toward the White House.

  Arafat looked out his window. A bit like the old days, this late-night dash through wet streets—like the days when he never spent two nights in a row in the same bed. Sometimes he even switched residences in the middle of the night when his well-tuned instincts sensed trouble. He avoided public places—never ate in restaurants, never went to the cinema or the theater. His skin turned blotchy from lack of sun. His survival skills had thwarted hundreds of attempts on his life by the Israelis and his enemies within the movement. Some had not been so lucky. He thought of his old friend and second in command, Abu Jihad. He had led the war effort in the Occupied Territories; helped to organize the intifada. And for that the Israelis had murdered him in his villa in Tunis. Arafat knew that without Abu Jihad he would not be where he was today: driving across Washington for a secret meeting with the American president. It was a shame his old friend was not here to see this.

  The motorcade passed thro
ugh the barricade on Pennsylvania Avenue and entered the White House grounds. A moment later Arafat’s car stopped beneath the shelter of the North Portico.

  A Marine guard stepped forward and opened the door. “Good evening, Mr. Arafat. Right this way, please.”

  President James Beckwith was waiting in the drawing room of the residence in the Executive Mansion. He looked as though he had just stepped off the deck of his sailboat. He wore a pair of wrinkled khaki trousers and a crewneck pullover sweater. He was a tall man with a full head of silver hair and a genteel manner. His permanently tanned face projected youth and exuberance, despite the fact that he was nearly seventy years old.

  They sat in front of the fire, Beckwith nursing a glass of whiskey, Arafat sipping tea sweetened with honey. When Beckwith had been in the Senate he had been one of Israel’s staunchest allies and led the opposition to U.S. recognition of the PLO—indeed, he had regularly referred to Arafat and the PLO as “bloodthirsty terrorists.” Now the two men were close allies in the quest for peace in the Middle East. Each needed the help of the other to succeed. Arafat needed Beckwith to press the Israelis to make concessions at the negotiating table. Beckwith needed Arafat to keep the radicals and fundamentalists in line so the talks could continue.

  After an hour Beckwith raised the murders of Ambassador Eliyahu and David Morgenthau. “My CIA director tells me your old friend Tariq was probably behind both attacks, but they have no proof.”

  Arafat smiled. “I’ve never doubted for a moment that it was Tariq. But if your CIA thinks they’re going to find proof of this, I’m afraid they’re sadly mistaken. Tariq doesn’t operate that way.”

  “If he continues to kill Jews, it’s going to make it more difficult to keep moving toward a final settlement.”

  “Forgive my bluntness, Mr. President, but Tariq is only a factor if you and the Israelis allow him to be a factor. He does not act on my behalf. He does not operate from territory controlled by the Palestinian Authority. He does not speak for those Palestinians who want peace.”

  “All true, but isn’t there anything you can do to dissuade him?”

  “Tariq?” Arafat shook his head slowly. “We were close friends once. He was one of my finest intelligence officers. But he left me over the decision to renounce terrorism and begin peace talks. We haven’t spoken in years.”

  “Perhaps he might listen to you now.”

  “I’m afraid Tariq listens to no voice but his own. He’s a man haunted by demons.”

  “All of us are, especially when you reach my age.”

  “And mine,” said Arafat. “But I’m afraid Tariq is haunted by a different kind of demon. You see, he’s a young man who’s dying, and he wants to settle accounts before he leaves.”

  Beckwith raised his eyebrows in surprise. “Dying?”

  “According to my sources he has a severe brain tumor.”

  “Do the Israelis know this?”

  “Yes,” Arafat said. “I’ve told them myself.”

  “Who?”

  “Their chief of intelligence, Ari Shamron.”

  “I wonder why their chief of intelligence neglected to share this piece of information with the Central Intelligence Agency.”

  Arafat laughed. “I suppose you’ve never met Ari Shamron. He’s crafty and a warrior from the old school. Shamron makes a habit of never letting the left hand know what the right is doing. Do you know the motto of the Israeli secret service?”

  “I’m afraid I don’t.”

  “ ”By way of deception, thou shalt do war.“ Ari Shamron lives by those words.”

  “You think Shamron might be playing some game?”

  “Anything’s possible when it comes to Shamron. You see, there are some people inside the Israeli secret service who want Tariq dead, whatever the political costs. But there are others, I’m afraid, who would like to see him succeed.”

  “Into which category does Shamron fall?”

  Arafat frowned. “I wish I knew.”

  Shortly before midnight the president walked Arafat down to his waiting car. They were a mismatched pair, the tall, patrician president and the little revolutionary in his olive drab and flowing kaffiyeh.

  Beckwith said, “I understand you’re attending a reception at the home of Douglas Cannon after the signing ceremony tomorrow. Douglas and I are good friends.”

  “He and I are friends as well. He saw the justness of the Palestinian cause long before most American politicians. It took a great amount of courage, considering the fact that he was a senator from New York, where the Jewish lobby is so powerful.”

  “Douglas always stood his ground and let the political chips fall where they might. That’s what set him apart from most of the politicians in this damned town. Please give him my warmest regards when you see him.”

  “I will indeed.”

  They shook hands formally beneath the North Portico; then Arafat turned and walked toward his limousine.

  “And do me one other favor, Mr. Arafat.”

  The Palestinian turned around and raised one eyebrow. “What’s that?”

  “Watch your back.”

  “Always,” said Arafat. Then he climbed into the back of his car and disappeared from sight.

  FORTY-TWO

  Burlington, Vermont

  “Your name is not Dominique Bonard, and you don’t work for an art gallery in London. You work for Israeli intelligence. And we left Montreal the way we did because your friend Gabriel Allon was coming to kill me.”

  Jacqueline’s mouth went dry. She felt as though her throat might close up. She remembered what Gabriel had told her in London: Dominique Bonard has nothing to fear from this man. If he pushes, push back.

  “What the hell are you talking about? I don’t know anyone named Gabriel Allon! Stop this fucking car! Where the fuck do you think you’re taking me! What’s wrong with you?”

  He hit her in the side of the head with the gun: a short, brutal blow that instantly brought tears to her eyes. She reached up, touched her scalp, found blood. “You bastard!”

  He ignored her. “Your name is not Dominique Bonard, and you don’t work for an art gallery in London. You work for Ari Shamron. You’re an Israeli agent. You’re working with Gabriel Allon. That was Gabriel Allon who was crossing the street toward us in Montreal. He was coming to kill me.”

  “I wish you would just shut up about all this shit! I don’t know what you’re talking about! I don’t know anyone named Gabriel, and I don’t know anyone named Ari Shamron.”

  He hit her again, another blow that seemed to come out of nowhere. It landed in precisely the same spot. The pain was so intense that in spite of every effort she began to cry. “I’m telling you the truth!”

  Another blow: harder.

  “My name is Dominique Bonard! I work for—”

  Another blow: harder still. She felt as though she was going to lose consciousness.

  “You bastard,” she said, weeping. She pressed her fingers against the wound. “Where are you taking me? What are you going to do to me?”

  Once again he ignored her. If he was trying to drive her mad, it was working. When he spoke there was an edge of pity to his voice, as if he felt sorry for her. She knew what he was trying to do. He was trying to tear down the last of her resistance, to make her believe she had been betrayed and was completely alone.

  “You went to Tunis with Gabriel Allon and posed as his lover while he planned the murder of Abu Jihad.”

  “I’ve never been to Tunis in my life, let alone with someone named Gabriel Allon!”

  He lifted the gun to hit her again, but this time she saw the blow coming and raised her hands in defense. “Please,” she cried. “Don’t hit me again.”

  He lowered the gun. Even he seemed to have no stomach for it.

  “He’s aged a bit since I saw him last. I suppose he has a right, considering everything he’s been through.”

  Jacqueline felt her will to resist crumble. The reality of intelligence wor
k set in. Before it had been an adventure, something she did to make herself feel that she was more than just a face and a body. But this was the true nature of Ari Shamron’s secret war. It was dirty and violent, and now she was caught in the middle of it. She had to think of some way to gain control of the situation. Perhaps she could discover his plans. Maybe she could find some way to warn Gabriel and Shamron. Maybe I can find some way to survive.

  “They’ll come for you,” she said. “Half the police in Canada and America are probably looking for us right now. You’ll never get to New York.”

  “Actually, I doubt anyone’s looking for us but your friends Gabriel Allon and Shamron. I suspect they can’t ask the Canadians for help, because the Canadians and Americans probably don’t know they’re here. If they found out now, it could prove very embarrassing to your service.”

  He reached into his pocket and handed her a handkerchief for her head. “By the way, we knew you were working for the Office the moment you walked into Yusef’s life.”

  “How?”

  “Do you really want to know this?”

  “Yes.”

  “All right, but first you have to answer a few questions for me. Are you really French?”

  So, she thought, he doesn’t know everything. She said, “Yes, I’m French.”

  “Are you also Jewish?”

  “Yes.”

  “Is Dominique Bonard your true name?”

  “No.”

  “What is your real name?”

  She thought: What is my real name? Am I really Jacqueline Delacroix? No, that was just the name Marcel Lambert gave to a pretty young girl from Marseilles. If I’m going to die, I’m going to die with the name I was born with.

  “My name is Sarah,” she said. “Sarah Halévy.”

  “Such a beautiful name. Well, Sarah Halévy, I suppose you’re entitled to know how you ended up in a mess like this.” He looked at her to see her reaction, but she stared back at him with icy hostility. “By the way, if you wish, you may call me Tariq.”