11 Queen’s Gate Terrace

11 Queen's Gate Terrace

By the time Gabriel left the café with Emanuel Cohen's phone in his pocket it was too late to make the last Eurostar back

to London, so he slept for a few hours at a dreary hotel near the Gare du Nord and was on the morning's first train. He rang

Sarah Bancroft as he was approaching St. Pancras. Her voice, when at last she answered the phone, was heavy with sleep.

"Do you know what day this is?"

"I believe it's Saturday. Hold on, let me check."

"Asshole," she whispered, and rang off.

Gabriel redialed.

"What is it now?" she asked.

"I require the metal object, approximately two pounds in weight, that I left at your gallery yesterday afternoon."

"The Beretta nine-millimeter?"

"Yes, that's the one."

"It's resting on my bedside table."

"Mind if I drop by and collect it?"

"Since when do you ask before making entry into my abode?"

"It's the new me."

"I was quite fond of the old you."

Gabriel's train arrived at half past eight. He traveled by Tube from King's Cross to Gloucester Road, then made the short

walk to Sarah's maisonette in Queen's Gate Terrace. She was drinking coffee at the kitchen island, dressed in stretch jeans

and a Harvard pullover. Her blond hair was wound into an untidy top knot. The condition of her blue eyes was indicative of

a late night.

"I foolishly agreed to have dinner with Julian and Oliver," she explained while massaging her right temple.

"Why?"

"Because it was a Friday, and I didn't want to spend it searching for something to watch on Netflix."

"Where's your husband?"

"Vanished to parts unknown. Haven't heard from him in days." She looked down at the Beretta, which was lying on the countertop.

"Most men bring a girl flowers. But not Gabriel Allon."

He slipped the gun into the waistband of his trousers at the small of his back.

"Feel better?"

"Much."

Sarah yawned elaborately, then asked, "How was Paris?"

"Quite interesting. But if I had known about your dinner plans, I would have taken you with me."

"You brought me something expensive, I hope."

Gabriel placed the iPhone on the countertop.

"Since you don't use an Apple device, I'll assume that isn't yours."

"It belonged to a Parisian physician named Emanuel Cohen."

"Belonged?"

"Dr. Cohen fell down the steps of the rue Chappe in Montmartre two nights ago. The French police believe it was an accident, which wasn't the case."

"Says who?"

"Amadou Kamara. He sells counterfeit handbags on the streets of Paris for Papa Diallo. Amadou saw someone push Dr. Cohen down

the steps."

"How did you get his phone?"

"I bought it from Papa Diallo. He made a special price for me. A thousand euros. That was in addition to the five hundred

I gave Amadou for two fake handbags."

"How shrewd of you." Sarah drank some of her coffee. "I'm sure there's a perfectly reasonable explanation for all this."

"Untitled portrait of a woman in the surrealist style, oil on canvas, ninety-four by sixty-six centimeters."

"Picasso?"

Gabriel nodded.

"There are several untitled portraits, if memory serves."

"That's correct. And one of them belonged to Cohen's grandfather, a man named Bernard Lévy. He foolishly entrusted it to his

lawyer during the Occupation."

"And the lawyer undoubtedly sold it."

"But of course."

"Should I assume that Dr. Cohen was looking for this painting at the time of his death?"

"Actually, he was convinced he'd found it."

"Where?"

"An art gallery in the Geneva Freeport. He asked the world's leading expert on the wartime French art market, a woman named

Naomi Wallach, to prove that it was his grandfather's Picasso."

"Isn't Naomi Wallach working for the Louvre now?"

"Which is why she told Cohen she couldn't take the case. She did, however, suggest an alternative."

"Not Charlotte Blake?"

Gabriel nodded.

"But she was murdered by the Chopper."

"She was murdered with a hatchet," said Gabriel. "Whether it was wielded by the Chopper is unclear. In fact, there are inconsistencies

with the previous killings."

"Do you think she was murdered because of the Picasso?"

"I do now."

"Any suspects?"

"A person of interest."

"The Geneva art dealer?"

Gabriel nodded.

"Which is why you paid a thousand euros for a stolen iPhone."

"And five hundred euros for two fake handbags."

Sarah rubbed her swollen eyes. "You're right. I really should have come with you to Paris."

***

During a recent and wholly unplanned visit to Tel Aviv, Gabriel's old service had issued him a new laptop computer containing

the latest version of Proteus, the world's most formidable cell phone hacking malware. Ordinarily, Proteus attacked its target

remotely over the owner's preferred cellular network. But because Gabriel had the target phone in his possession, it was as

simple as connecting the device to his laptop. Proteus instantly seized control of the phone's operating system and, with

a click of Gabriel's trackpad, began exporting every bit of data stored in its memory.

The process took several minutes, leaving Sarah sufficient time to undo the damage of the previous evening's ill-considered outing with Julian and Oliver Dimbleby. When she returned to the kitchen, she was wearing black trousers and a black cashmere pullover. Gabriel handed her a thumb drive, and she inserted it into her computer.

"Where should we begin?"

"The end," said Gabriel, and opened a directory of every voice call the device had initiated or received. The last entry was

an incoming call, the call Dr. Cohen had received as he was approaching the summit of the rue Chappe.

"Perhaps we should dial it," suggested Sarah.

"What good would that do?"

"The owner might answer."

"And what exactly would we say to him? Besides, when was the last time you answered a call from a number you didn't recognize?"

"Just yesterday. I enjoy torturing the person at the other end."

"You must have a lot of time on your hands."

"I manage an Old Master art gallery, darling."

Gabriel turned his attention to the geolocation data that Proteus had extracted from Dr. Cohen's phone. It allowed him to

track Cohen's every move, including a visit he had made to Geneva six months before his death. He had traveled from Paris

by train, arriving at the Gare Cornavin at half past one. The taxi ride to the Ports Francs et Entrep?ts de Genève, otherwise

known as the Geneva Freeport, was sixteen minutes in duration. He made a single telephone call along the way.

"It's a Geneva number," said Gabriel. "I'm betting it's the gallery."

He copied the number into his search engine and added the words art and Geneva . There were more than six million results, but only the first seven were relevant. They were for an art gallery based in

the Freeport called Galerie Edmond Ricard SA.

"Monsieur Ricard is a major player at the Freeport," said Sarah. "And slippery as an eel, or so they say."

"You've never done business with him?"

"Not me. But we know someone who probably has."

"Call him. See if he's free."

Sarah took up her phone and dialed. "Hello, Nicky. I know it's a Saturday, but I was wondering if you had a spare minute or

two... A boozy lunch at Claridge's? What a marvelous idea. How does one o'clock sound to you?"

Sarah rang off. "We're on," she said.

"I gathered that."

She checked the time. "We have two and a half hours to kill before lunch. What shall we do?"

"How about a nice long walk in Hyde Park? It will do wonders for your hangover."

"Yes," said Sarah, rising. "Just in time for my next one."