The Mark of the Assassin (21 page)

Authors: Daniel Silva

Tags: #Mystery, #Thriller, #Suspense

BOOK: The Mark of the Assassin

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When she was eighteen, Astrid returned to Germany to attend university in Munich and immediately became involved in leftist politics. She believed Nazis were still running Germany. She believed the Americans were occupiers. She believed industrialists had enslaved workers. She imagined what her grandfather, the great Kurt Vogel, would have done. He would join the resistance, of course.

In 1979 she gave up her studies at the university and joined the Red Army Faction. The leaders said she would have to give up her real name and choose a nom de guerre. She chose Anna Steiner and vanished into the world of terrorism.

She was living on a houseboat on the Prinsengracht. At three o’clock in the afternoon she walked out of the bookstore, freed her bicycle from the rack, and set out across the square.

Delaroche signaled the waiter for a check.

She walked for a time, pushing the bike, obviously in no hurry. Delaroche trailed softly after her. She had changed little in the years since he had seen her last. She was tall and vaguely awkward, with beautiful but graceless legs and long hands that seemed forever in search of a comfortable resting place. Her face was from another time and place: luminous white skin, broad cheekbones, a large nose, eyes the color of mountain lake water. Her hair always changed with her mood and her politics, but now, in early middle age, it had returned to its natural state: long, blond, held back by a plain black clasp.

He followed her north along the Keizersgracht. She crossed the canal at Reestraat, then headed north again along the Prinsengracht. She passed into the shadow of the Westerkerk, the site of Rembrandt’s unmarked grave. Delaroche increased his pace, closing the distance between them. Hearing his footfalls, she spun quickly, hand reaching inside her handbag, alarm on her face.

Delaroche took her gently by the arm.

“It’s only me, Astrid. Don’t be afraid.”

Krista
was forty-five feet long with a wheelhouse aft, a slender prow, and a fresh coat of green and white paint. It was tied up next to a boxy barge, and to get aboard Astrid and Delaroche had to scamper across the neighbor’s aft deck. The inside was clean and surprisingly large, complete with a galley kitchen, a salon, and a bedroom in the prow. The weak light of late afternoon trickled through a pair of skylights and a row of port-holes along the gunwale.

Delaroche sat in the salon, watching Astrid as she busied herself with coffee in the galley. They spoke Dutch, for she was passing herself off as a divorcée from Rotterdam and didn’t want the neighbors to hear her chattering in German. Like all Amsterdammers, she was obsessive about her bicycle. She had lost four to thieves since settling in the city. She told Delaroche about the day she was strolling along the Singel and came upon a man selling used bicycles. Among the stock Astrid spotted one of her missing bikes. She told the man it was hers and demanded he give it back. He said she was crazy. She looked beneath the seat and found the name tag she had placed there. He said she was a liar. She grabbed hold of the bicycle and announced she was taking it back. He tried to stop her. She lashed sideways with an elbow, breaking his larynx, and then shattered his jaw with a vicious roundhouse kick. She picked up the bike and strolled away to a chorus of cheers, the heroine of every Amsterdammer who had ever lost a bike to the black market.

She carried the coffee to the salon and sat down across from Delaroche. She removed the clasp from her hair and allowed it to fall about her shoulders. She was a stunningly attractive woman who had learned to conceal her beauty in order to blend into her surroundings. For a moment he enjoyed just looking at her.

“So what brings you to Amsterdam, Jean-Paul? Business or pleasure?”

“You, Astrid. I need your help.”

She shook her head slowly and lit a cigarette. Delaroche anticipated she might be unwilling to work with him. She had killed often, and she had paid a very high price—a life spent underground on the run from every secret service and police force in the West. She was more settled than she had ever been, and now Delaroche was asking her to undo it all.

“I’ve been out of the game for a long time, Jean-Paul. I’m tired of killing. I don’t enjoy it like you do.”

“I don’t enjoy it. I do it because I’m paid money, and it’s all I know how to do. You were very good at it once.”

“I did it because I believed in something. There’s a difference. And look at what it’s gotten me,” she said, gesturing at her surroundings. “Oh, I suppose it could be worse. I could be in Damascus. Jesus, that was awful.”

Delaroche had heard she’d spent two years hiding in Syria, courtesy of Hafiz al-Assad and his intelligence service, and another two years in Libya as the guest of Mu’ammar Gadhafi.

“I’m offering you a way out, a chance to put it all behind you, and enough money to live comfortably somewhere quiet for the rest of your life. Do you want to hear more?”

She crushed out her cigarette and immediately lit another. “Damn you.”

He rose and said, “I’ll take that as a yes.”

“How many people are we going to kill?”

“I’ll be back in a half hour.”

He went back to his hotel, packed, and checked out. Thirty minutes later he was climbing down the companionway of the
Krista,
clutching his small overnight bag and a nylon case holding his laptop computer. They sat in the salon again, Delaroche hunched over his computer, Astrid perched atop an ottoman. Delaroche went through the targets one by one. Astrid sat still as a statue, legs folded beneath her, one long hand cupping her chin, another holding a cigarette. She said nothing, asked no questions, for like Delaroche she had the gift of a flawless memory.

“If you help me, I will pay you one million dollars,” Delaroche said, at the conclusion of the briefing. “And I will help you settle somewhere safe and a little more pleasant than Damascus.”

“Who’s the contractor?”

“I don’t know.”

She raised an eyebrow. “That’s not like you, Jean-Paul. They must be paying you a great deal of money.” She drew on the cigarette and blew a slender stream of smoke at the ceiling. “Take me to dinner. I’m hungry.”

They had been lovers once, a long time ago, when Delaroche assisted the Red Army Faction with a particularly difficult assassination. They went back to the
Krista
after dining in a small French restaurant overlooking the Herengracht. Delaroche lay on the bed. Astrid sat down next to him and silently undressed.

It had been many months since she had brought a man to her bed, and she took him very quickly the first time. Then she lit candles, and they smoked cigarettes and drank wine as rain rattled on the skylight above their bodies. She made love to him a second time very slowly, drawing his body into her long arms and legs, touching him as though he were made of crystal. Astrid liked to be on top. Astrid liked to be in control. Astrid trusted no one, especially her lovers. For a long time, she lay pressed against his body, kissing his mouth, staring into his eyes. Then she rose onto her knees, legs straddling his body, and it was as if Delaroche was no longer there. She toyed with her hair, she stroked the nipples of her small, upturned breasts. Then her eyes closed, and her head rolled back. She pleaded with him to come inside her. When he did she convulsed several times, then fell forward onto his chest, her body damp with sweat.

After a moment, she rolled onto her back and watched rain running over the skylight.

“Promise me one thing, Jean-Paul Delaroche,” she said. “Promise me you won’t kill me when you’re finished with me.”

“I promise I won’t kill you.”

She rose onto her elbow, looked into his eyes, and kissed his mouth.

“Have you seen Arbatov lately?”

“Yes, in Roscoff a few days ago.”

“How is he?” she asked.

“Same as ever,” Delaroche said.

WASHINGTON, D.C.

Elizabeth Osbourne waited on the corner of 34th and M streets, jogging in place, blowing on her hands against the cold morning air. She looked at her watch. Susanna was five minutes late. She had many faults, but tardiness was not one of them. She walked across the street to a pay phone and punched in Susanna’s home number. The answering machine picked up.

“Susanna, it’s Elizabeth. Pick up if you’re there. I’m waiting for you on the corner. I’ll give you a few more minutes, then I have to get going. I’ll try you at work.”

She dialed Susanna’s desk at the
Post.
Her voice mail picked up.

Elizabeth hung up without leaving a message.

She looked up 34th Street but saw no sign of Susanna or Carson.

She called home and checked her machine to see if Susanna had left a message there. The answering machine told her she had one message. She punched the access code, but it was only Max telling her a lunch meeting had been canceled.

She hung up, thinking, Dammit, where the hell is she?

She thought of the phone call from Susanna last night. She was about to break a big story about Mitchell Elliott and Samuel Braxton. Maybe she was on the phone, working the story. Maybe she was talking to her editors.

She turned and jogged up 34th Street. At Volta Place she turned right and then made another right into Pomander Walk. She bounded up the steps to Susanna’s house and rang the bell.

There was no answer.

She hammered on the wooden door with the side of her fist. Again, there was no answer and no sound from within the house. Carson was ever vigilant; he usually started barking
before
Elizabeth knocked on the door. If the dog were inside he’d be barking his head off.

She turned around and saw lights burning inside Harry Scanlon’s house. She crossed the walkway and knocked on the door. Scanlon answered in his bathrobe.

“I’m sorry to bother you, Harry, but Susanna and I were supposed to go for a run, and she stood me up. It’s just not like her. I’m worried. Do you still have her key?”

“Sure, hang on a sec.”

Scanlon disappeared into the house and came back a moment later with a single key.

“I’ll give you a hand,” he said.

They went back to Susanna’s front door. Scanlon shoved the key into the lock and pushed open the door.

Elizabeth called out, “Susanna!”

There was no answer.

She looked around the living room and the kitchen. Everything seemed normal. She started up the stairs, calling Susanna’s name, Scanlon behind her.

When she reached the landing she saw the dog.

“Oh, God! Susanna! Susanna!”

She stepped over the body of the dog and looked in the bathroom. The white tile floor was covered with glass where a beer bottle had fallen and shattered. Elizabeth walked a few more steps down the hall and looked into the study.

She turned away and screamed.

Elizabeth sat on the front steps of Harry Scanlon’s house, a woolen blanket wrapped around her shoulders. A half dozen Metropolitan Police cruisers, red and blue lights flashing, choked Volta Place. The crime scene truck had arrived, and the technicians were poring over the inside of Susanna’s house. She tried to call Michael, but he had not answered his phone. She left an emergency message with the operator and Harry Scanlon’s number.

She thought, Dammit, Michael, I need you.

Elizabeth pulled the blanket about her tightly, but the shaking wouldn’t stop. She closed her eyes, but she saw Susanna’s shattered body sprawled on the floor, and she saw the blood.
God, so much blood!
She realized someone was calling her name. She opened her eyes and saw a tall fair-skinned African-American with striking green eyes standing before her. His police shield hung from the pocket of his blue double-breasted suit coat.

“Mrs. Osbourne, I’m Detective Richardson, Homicide. I understand you discovered the body.”

“Yes, I did.”

“What time?”

“Between seven-fifteen and seven-twenty, I believe.”

“You knew the victim?”

Elizabeth thought,
The victim.
Susanna had already been robbed of her name. Now she was just
the victim.

“We were best friends, Detective. I’ve known her for twenty years. We were supposed to go running this morning. When she didn’t show up, I came looking for her. I got the key from the neighbor and went inside.”

“Anything look out of the ordinary to you?”

“Except for her body, no.”

“I’m sorry, Mrs. Osbourne. Where did she work?”

“She was a reporter for the
Washington Post.
”

“I thought the name sounded familiar. Worked at the White House for a while, right? Used to be on the round-table show on TV.”

Elizabeth nodded.

“This may sound like a strange question, but do you know anyone that would want to kill her?”