Gabriel tapped the screen of the laptop.
“He can’t actually hear you, you know.”
“Are you sure he’s alive?”
“He’s scared to death. He hasn’t moved a muscle in five minutes.”
“What’s he so afraid of?”
“He’s Russian,” said Lavon, as if that fact alone were explanation enough.
Gabriel studied Heathcliff as though he were a figure in a painting. His real name was Konstantin Kirov, and he was one of the Office’s most valuable sources. Only a small portion of Kirov’s intelligence had concerned Israel’s security directly, but the enormous surplus had paid dividends in London and Langley, where the directors of MI6 and the CIA eagerly feasted on each batch of secrets that spilled from the Russian’s attaché case. The Anglo-Americans had not dined for free. Both services had helped to foot the bill for the operation, and the British, after much inter-service arm-twisting, had agreed to grant Kirov sanctuary in the United Kingdom.
The first face the Russian would see after defecting, however, would be the face of Gabriel Allon. Gabriel’s history with the Russian intelligence service and the men in the Kremlin was long and blood-soaked. For that reason he wanted to personally conduct Kirov’s initial debriefing. Specifically, he wanted to know exactly what Kirov had discovered, and why he suddenly needed to defect. Then Gabriel would place the Russian in the hands of MI6’s Head of Station in Vienna. Gabriel was more than happy to let the British have him. Blown agents were invariably a headache, especially blown Russian agents.
At last, Kirov stirred.
“That’s a relief,” said Gabriel.
The image on the screen deteriorated into digital tile for a few seconds before returning to normal.
“It’s been like that all evening,” explained Lavon. “The team must have put the transmitter on top of some interference.”
“When did they go into the room?”
“About an hour before Heathcliff arrived. When we hacked into the hotel’s security system, we took a detour into reservations and grabbed his room number. Getting into the room itself was no problem.”
The wizards in the Office’s Technology department had developed a magic cardkey capable of opening any electronic hotel room door in the world. The first swipe stole the code. The second opened the lock.
“When did the interference start?”
“As soon as he entered the room.”
“Did anyone follow him from the airport to the hotel?”
Lavon shook his head.
“Any suspicious names on the hotel registry?”
“Most of the guests are attending the conference. The Eastern European Society of Civil Engineers,” Lavon explained. “It’s a real nerds’ ball. Lots of guys with pocket protectors.”
“You used to be one of those guys, Eli.”
“Still am.” The shot turned to a mosaic again. “Damn,” said Lavon softly.
“Has the team checked out the connection?”
“Twice.”
“And?”
“There’s no one else on the line. And even if there was, the signal is so encrypted it would take a couple of supercomputers a month to reassemble the pieces.” The shot stabilized. “That’s more like it.”
“Let me see the lobby.”
Lavon tapped the keyboard of another computer, and a shot of the lobby appeared. It was a sea of ill-fitting clothing, name tags, and receding hairlines. Gabriel scanned the faces, looking for one that appeared to be out of place. He found four—two male, two female. Using the hotel’s cameras, Lavon captured still images of each and forwarded them to Tel Aviv. On the screen of the adjacent laptop, Konstantin Kirov was checking his phone.
“How long do you intend to make him wait?” asked Lavon.
