"Thank you," Marco said, still attached to her. He pushed the doorbell and waited as Mr. Coletta ducked back in the elevator and left them. She pulled away and said, "This is fine, Marco. I can manage from here. My mother is house-sitting today."

He was hoping for an invitation inside, but he was in no position to push on. The episode had run its course as far as he was concerned, and he had learned much more than he could have expected. He smiled, released her arm, and was about to say goodbye when a lock clicked loudly from inside. She turned toward the door, and in doing so put pressure on her wounded ankle. It buckled again, causing her to gasp and reach for him.

The door opened just as Francesca fainted.

Her mother was Signora Altonelli, a seventyish lady who spoke no English and for the first few hectic minutes thought Marco had somehow harmed her daughter. His bumbling Italian proved inadequate, especially under the pressure of the moment. He carried Francesca to the sofa, raised her feet, and conveyed the concept of "Ghiaccio, ghiaccio." Ice, get some ice. She reluctantly backed away, then disappeared into the kitchen.

Francesca was stirring by the time her mother returned with a wet washcloth and a small plastic bag of ice.

"You fainted," Marco said, hovering over her. She clutched his hand and looked about wildly.

"Chi e?" her mother said suspiciously. Who's he?

"Un amico." A friend. He patted her face with the washcloth and she rallied quickly. In some of the fastest Italian he had yet to experience, she explained to her mother what had happened. The machine - gun bursts back and forth made him dizzy as he tried to pick off an occasional word, then he simply gave up. Suddenly, Signora Altoneili smiled and patted him on the shoulder with great approval. Good boy.

When she disappeared, Francesca said, "She's gone to make coffee."

"Great." He had pulled a stool next to the sofa, and he sat close by, waiting. "We need to get some ice on this thing," he said.

"Yes, we should."

They both looked at her boots. "Will you take them off?" she asked.

"Sure." He unzipped the right boot and removed it as though that foot had been injured too. He went even slower with the left one. Every little movement caused pain, and at one point he said, "Would you prefer to do it?"

"No, please, go ahead." The zipper stopped almost exactly at the ankle. The swelling made it difficult to ease the boot off. After a few long minutes of delicate wiggling, while the patient suffered with clenched teeth, the boot was off.

She was wearing black stockings. Marco studied them, then announced, ''These have to come off."

"Yes, they do." Her mother returned and fired off something in Italian. "Why don't you wait in the kitchen?" Francesca said to Marco.

The kitchen was small but impeccably put together, very modern with chrome and glass and not a square inch of wasted space. A high - tech coffeepot gurgled on a counter. The walls above a small breakfast nook were covered in bright abstract art. He waited and listened to both of them chatter at once.

They got the stockings off without further injury. When Marco returned to the living room, Signora Altoneili was arranging the ice around the left ankle.

"She says it's not broken," Francesca said to him. "She worked in a hospital for many years."

"Does she live in Bologna?"

"Imola, a few miles away."

He knew exactly where it was, on the map anyway. "I guess I should be going now," he said, not really wanting to go but suddenly feeling like a trespasser.

"I think you need some coffee," Francesca said. Her mother darted away, back into the kitchen.

"I feel like I'm intruding," he said.

"No, please, after all you've done today, it's the least I can do."

Her mother was back, with a glass of water and two pills. Francesca gulped it all down and propped her head up on some pillows. She exchanged short sentences with her mother, then looked at him and said, "She has a chocolate torta in the refrigerator. Would you like some?"

"Yes, thank you."

And her mother was off again, humming now and quite pleased that she had someone to care for and someone to feed. Marco resumed his place on the stool. "Does it hurt?"

"Yes, it does," she said, smiling. "I cannot lie. It hurts."

He could think of no appropriate response, so he ventured back to common ground. "It all happened so fast," he said. They spent a few minutes rehashing the fall. Then they were silent. She closed her eyes and appeared to be napping. Marco crossed his arms over his chest and stared at a huge, very odd painting that covered almost an entire wall.

The building was ancient, but from the inside Francesca and her husband had fought back as determined modernists. The furniture was low, sleek black leather with bright steel frames, very minimalist. The walls were covered with baffling contemporary art.

"We can't tell Luigi about this," she whispered.

"Why not?"

She hesitated, then let it go. "He is paying me two hundred euros a week to tutor you, Marco, and he his complaining about the price. We've argued. He has threatened to find someone else. Frankly, I need the money. I'm getting one or two jobs a week now; it's still the slow season. Things will pick up in a month when the tourists come south, but right now I'm not earning much."

The stoic facade was long gone. He couldn't believe that she was allowing herself to be so vulnerable. The lady was frightened, and he would break his neck to help her.

She continued: "I'm sure he will terminate my services if I skip a few days."

"Well, you're about to skip a few days." He glanced at the ice wrapped around her ankle.

"Can we keep it quiet? I should be able to move around soon, don't you think?"

"We can try to keep it quiet, but Luigi has a way of knowing things. He follows me closely. I'll call in sick tomorrow, then we'll figure out something the next day. Maybe we could study here."

"No. My husband is here."

Marco couldn't help but glance over his shoulder. "Here?"

"He's in the bedroom, very ill."

"What's-"

"Cancer. The last stages. My mother sits with him when I'm working. A hospice nurse comes in each afternoon to medicate him."

"I'm sorry."

"So am I."

"Don't worry about Luigi. I'll tell him I'm thrilled with your teaching style, and that I will refuse to work with anyone else."

"That would be a lie, wouldn't it?"

"Sort of."

Signora Altonelli was back with a tray of torta and espresso. She placed it on a bright red coffee table in the middle of the room and began slicing. Francesca took the coffee but didn't feel like eating. Marco ate as slowly as humanly possible and sipped from his small cup as if it might be his last. When Signora Altonelli insisted on another slice, and a refill, he grudgingly accepted.

Marco stayed about an hour. Riding down in the elevator, he realized that Giovanni Ferro had not made a sound.

Red Chinas principal intelligence agency, the Ministry of State Security, or MSS, used small, highly trained units to carry out assassinations around the world, in much the same manner as the Russians, Israelis, British, and Americans.

One notable difference, though, was that the Chinese had come to rely upon one unit in particular. Instead of spreading the dirty work around like other countries, the MSS turned first to a young man the CIA and Mossad had been watching with great admiration for several years. His name was Sammy Tin, the product of two Red Chinese diplomats who were rumored to have been selected by the MSS to marry and reproduce. If ever an agent were perfectly cloned, it was Sammy Tin. Born in New York City and raised in the suburbs around D.C., he'd been educated by private tutors who bombarded him with foreign languages from the time he left diapers. He entered the University of Maryland at the age of sixteen, left it with two degrees at the age of twenty-one, then studied engineering in Hamburg, Germany. Somewhere along the way he picked up bomb-making as a hobby. Explosives became his passion, with an emphasis on controlled explosions from odd packages-envelopes, paper cups, Ball-point pens, cigarette packages. He was an expert marksman, but guns were simple and bored him. The Tin Man loved his bombs.

He then studied chemistry under an assumed name in Tokyo, and there he mastered the art and science of killing with poisons. By the time he was twenty-four he had a dozen different names, about that many languages, and crossed borders with a vast array of passports and disguises. He could convince any customs agent anywhere that he was Japanese, Korean, or Taiwanese.

To round out his education, he spent a grueling year in training with an elite Chinese army unit. He learned to camp, cook over a fire, cross raging rivers, survive in the ocean, and live in the wilderness for days. When he was twenty-six, the MSS decided the boy had studied enough. It was time to start killing.

As far as Langley could tell, he began notching his astounding body count with the murders of three Red Chinese scientists who'd gotten too cozy with the Russians. He got them over dinner at a restaurant in Moscow. While their bodyguards waited outside, one got his throat slit in the men's room while he finished up at the urinal. It took an hour to find his body, crammed in a rather small garbage can. The second made the mistake of worrying about the first. He went to the men's room, where the Tin Man was waiting, dressed as a janitor. They found him with his head stuffed down the toilet, which had been clogged and was backing up. The third died seconds later at the table, where he was sitting alone and becoming very worried about his two missing colleagues. A man in a waiter's jacket hurried by, and without slowing thrust a poison dart into the back of his neck.

As killings go, it was all quite sloppy. Too much blood, too many witnesses. Escape was dicey, but the Tin Man got a break and managed to dash through the busy kitchen unnoticed. He was on the loose and sprinting through a back alley by the time the bodyguards were summoned. He ducked into the dark city, caught a cab, and twenty minutes later entered the Chinese embassy. The next day he was in Beijing, quietly celebrating his first success.

The audacity of the attack shocked the intelligence world. Rival agencies scrambled to find out who did it. It ran so contrary to how the Chinese normally eliminated their enemies. They were famous for their patience, the discipline to wait and wait until the timing was perfect. They would chase until their prey simply gave up. Or they would ditch one plan and go to the next, carefully waiting for their opportunity.

When it happened again a few months later in Berlin, the Tin Man's legend was born. A French executive had handed over some bogus high-tech secrets dealing with mobile radar. He got flung from the balcony of a fourteenth-floor hotel room, and when he landed beside the pool it upset quite a few sunbathers. Again, the killing was much too visible.

In London, the Tin Man blew a mans head off with a cell phone. A defector in New York's Chinatown lost most of his face when a cigarette exploded. Sammy Tin was soon getting credit for most of the more dramatic intelligence killings in that underworld. The legend grew rapidly. Though he kept four or five trusted members in his unit, he often worked alone. He lost a man in Singapore when their target suddenly emerged with some friends, all with guns. It was a rare failure, and the lesson from it was to stay lean, strike fast, and don't keep too many people on the payroll.

As he matured, the hits became less dramatic, less violent, and much easier to conceal. He was now thirty-three, and without a doubt the most feared agent in the world. The CIA spent a fortune trying to track his movements. They knew he was in Beijing, hanging around his luxurious apartment. When he left, they tracked him to Hong Kong. Interpol was alerted when he boarded a nonstop flight to London, where he changed passports and at the last moment boarded an Alitalia flight to Milan.

Interpol could only watch. Sammy Tin often traveled with diplomatic cover. He was no criminal; he was an agent, a diplomat, a businessman, a professor, anything he needed to be.

A car was waiting for him at Milan's Malpensa airport, and he vanished into the city. As far as the CIA could tell, it had been four and a half years since the Tin Man had set foot in Italy.

Mr. Elya certainly looked the part of a wealthy Saudi businessman, though his heavy wool suit was almost black, a little too dark for Bologna, and its pinstripes were much too thick for anything designed in Italy. And his shirt was pink, with a glistening white collar, not a bad combo, but, well, it was still pink. Through the collar was a gold bar, also too thick, that pushed the knot of the tie up tightly for the choking look, and at each end of the bar was a diamond. Mr. Elya was into diamonds-a large one on each hand, dozens of smaller ones clustered in his Rolex, a couple more in the gold cuffs of his shirt. The shoes appeared to Stefano to be Italian, brand new, brown, but much too light to go with the suit.

As a whole, the package simply wasn't working. It was trying mightily, though. Stefano had time to analyze his client while they rode in virtual silence from the airport, where Mr. Elya and his assistant had arrived by private jet, to the center of Bologna. They were in the rear of a black Mercedes, one of Mr. Elya's conditions, with a driver who was silent in the front seat along with the assistant, who evidently spoke only Arabic. Mr. Elya's English was passable, quick bursts of it, usually followed with something in Arabic to the assistant, who felt compelled to write down everything his master said.

After ten minutes in the car with them, Stefano was already hoping they would finish well before lunch.

The first apartment he showed them was near the university, where Mr. Elya's son would soon arrive to study medicine. Four rooms on the second floor, no elevator, solid old building, nicely furnished, certainly luxurious for any student-1,800 euros a month, one year's lease, utilities extra. Mr. Elya did nothing but frown, as if his spoiled son would require something much nicer. The assistant frowned too. They frowned all the way down the stairs, into the car, and said nothing as the driver hurried to the second stop.

It was on Via Remorsella, one block west of Via Fondazza. The flat was slightly larger than the first, had a kitchen the size of a broom closet, was badly furnished, had no view whatsoever, was twenty minutes away from the university, cost 2,600 euros a month, and even had a strange odor to it. The frowning stopped, they liked the place. "This will be fine," Mr. Elya said, and Stefano breathed a sigh of relief. With a bit of luck, he wouldn't have to entertain them over lunch. And he'd just earned a nice commission.

They hurried over to the office of Stefano's company, where paperwork was produced at a record pace. Mr. Elya was a busy man with an urgent meeting in Rome, and if the rental couldn't be completed right then, on the spot, then forget everything!

The black Mercedes sped them back to the airport, where a rat tied and exhausted Stefano said thanks and farewell and hurried away as quickly as possible. Mr. Elya and his assistant walked across the tarmac to his jet and disappeared inside. The door closed.

The jet didn't move. Inside, Mr. Elya and his assistant had ditched their business garb and were dressed casually. They huddled with three other members of their team. After waiting for about an hour, they finally left the jet, hauled their substantial baggage to the private terminal, then into waiting vans.

Luigi had become suspicious of the navy blue Silvio bag. Marco never left it in his apartment. It was never out of his sight. He carried it everywhere, strapped over his shoulder and tucked tightly under his right arm as if it contained gold.

What could he possibly possess now that required such protection? He rarely carried his study materials anywhere. If he and Ermanno studied inside, they did so in Marco's apartment. If they studied outside, it was all conversation and no books were used.

Whitaker in Milano was suspicious too, especially since Marco had been spotted in an Internet cafe near the university. He sent an agent named Krater to Bologna to help Zellman and Luigi keep a closer eye on Marco and his troublesome bag. With the noose tightening and fireworks expected, Whitaker was asking Langley for even more muscle on the streets.

But Langley was in chaos. Teddy's departure, though certainly not unexpected, had turned the place upside down. The shock waves from Lucat's sacking were still being felt. The President was threatening a major overhaul, and the deputy directors and high-level administrators were spending more time protecting their butts than watching their operations.

It was Krater who got the radio message from Luigi that Marco was drifting toward Piazza Maggiore, probably in search of his late - afternoon coffee. Krater spotted him as he strode across the square, dark blue bag under his right arm, looking very much like a local. After studying a rather thick file on Joel Backman, it was nice to finally lay eyes on him. If the poor guy only knew.

But Marco wasn't thirsty, not yet anyway. He passed the cafes and shops, then suddenly, after a furtive glance, stepped into Albergo Nettuno, a fifty-room boutique hotel just off the piazza. Krater radioed Zellman and Luigi, who was particularly puzzled because Marco had no reason whatsoever to be entering a hotel. Krater waited five minutes, then walked into the small lobby, absorbing everything he saw. To his right was a lobby area with some chairs and a few travel magazines strewn over a wide coffee table. To his left was a small empty phone room with its door open, then another room that was not empty. Marco sat there, alone, hunched over the small table under the wall-mounted phone, his blue bag open. He was too busy to see Krater walk by.

"May I help you, sir?" the clerk said from the front desk.

"Yes, thanks, I wanted to inquire about a room," Krater said in Italian.

"For when?1'

"Tonight."

"I'm sorry, but we have no vacancies."

Krater picked up a brochure at the desk. "You're always full," he said with a smile. "Its a popular place." ''Yes, it is. Perhaps another time."

"Do you by chance have Internet access?"

"Of course."

"Wireless?"

"Yes, the first hotel in the city."

He backed away and said, "Thanks. I'll try again another time." '"Yes, please."

He passed the phone room on the way out. Marco had not looked up.

With both thumbs he was typing his text and hoping he would not be asked to leave by the clerk at the front desk. The wireless access was something the Nettuno advertised, but only for its guests. The coffee shops, libraries, and one of the bookstores offered it free to anyone who ventured in, but not the hotels.

His e-mail read:

Grinch: I once dealt with a banker in Zurich, name of Mike/ Van Thiessen, at Rhineland Bank, on Bahnhofstrasse, downtown Zurich. See if you can determine if he's still there. If not, who took his place? Do not leave a trail! Marco He pushed Send, and once again prayed that he'd done things right. He quickly turned off the Ankyo 850 and tucked it away in his bag. As he left, he nodded at the clerk, who was on the phone.

Two minutes after Krater came out of the hotel, Marco made his exit. They watched him from three different points, then followed him as he mixed easily with the late-afternoon rush of people leaving work. Zellman circled back, entered the Nettuno, went to the second phone room on the left, and sat in the seat where Marco had been less than twenty minutes earlier. The clerk, puzzled now, pretended to be busy behind his desk.

An hour later, they met in a bar and retraced his movements. The conclusion was obvious, but still hard to swallow-since Marco had not used the phone, he was freeloading on the hotel's wireless Internet access. There was no other reason to randomly enter the hotel lobby, sit in a phone room for less than ten minutes, then abruptly leave. But how could he do it? He had no laptop, no cell phone other than the one Luigi had loaned him, an outdated device that would only work in the city and could in no way be upgraded to go online. Had he obtained some high-tech gadget? He had no money.

Theft was a possibility.

They kicked around various scenarios. Zellman left to e-mail the disturbing news to Whitaker. Krater was dispatched to begin window shopping for an identical blue Silvio bag.

Luigi was left to contemplate dinner.

His thoughts were interrupted by a call from Marco himself. He was in his apartment, not feeling too well, his stomach had been jumpy all afternoon. He'd canceled his lesson with Francesca, and now he was begging off dinner.

If Dan Sandberg's phone rang before 6:oo a.m., the news was never good. He was a night owl, a nocturnal creature who often slept until it was time to have breakfast and lunch together. Everyone who knew him also knew that it was pointless to phone early.

It was a colleague at the Post. "You got scooped, buddy," he announced gravely.

"What?" Sandberg snapped.

"The Times just wiped your nose for you."

"Who?"

"Backman."

"What?"

"Go see for yourself."

Sandberg ran to the den of his messy apartment and attacked his desk computer. He found the story, written by Heath Frick, a hated rival at The New York Times. The front-page headline read fbi pardon

PROBE SEARCHES FOR JOEL BACKMAN.

Citing a host of unnamed sources, Frick reported that the FBI's cash-for-pardon investigation had intensified and was expanding to include specific individuals who were granted reprieves by former president Arthur Morgan. Duke Mongo was named as a "person of in terest,' a euphemism often tossed about when the authorities wanted to taint a person they were unable to formally indict. Mongo, though, was hospitalized and rumored to be gasping for his last breath.

The probe was now focusing its attention on Joel Backman, whose eleventh-hour pardon had shocked and outraged many, according to Frick's gratuitous analysis. Backman's mysterious disappearance had only fueled the speculation that he'd bought himself a pardon and fled to avoid the obvious questions. Old rumors were still out there, Frick reminded everyone, and various unnamed and supposedly trustworthy sources hinted that the theory about Backman burying a fortune had not been officially laid to rest.

"What garbage!" Sandberg snarled as he scrolled down the screen. He knew the facts better than anyone. This crap could not be substantiated. Backman had not paid for a pardon.

No one even remotely connected with the former president would say a word. For now, the probe was just a probe, with no formal investigation under way, but the heavy federal artillery was not far away. An eager US. attorney was clamoring to get started. He didn't have his grand jury yet, but his office was sitting on go, waiting on word from the Justice Department.

Frick wrapped it all up with two paragraphs about Backman, historical rehash that the paper had run before.

"Just filler!" Sandberg fumed.

The President read it too but had a different reaction. He made some notes and saved them until seven-thirty, when Susan Penn, his interim director of the CIA, arrived for the morning briefing. The PDB-president's daily briefing-had historically been handled by the director himself, always in the Oval Office and normally the first item of the day's business. But Teddy Maynard and his rotten health had changed the routine, and for the past ten years the briefings had been done by someone else. Now traditions were being honored again.

An eight - to ten-page summary of intelligence matters was placed on the President's desk precisely at 7:00 a.m. After almost two months in office, he had developed the habit of reading every word of it. He found it fascinating. His predecessor had once boasted that he read hardly anything-books, newspapers, magazines. Certainly not legislation, policies, treaties, or daily briefings. He'd often had trouble reading his own speeches. Things were much different now.

Susan Penn was driven in an armored car from her Georgetown home to the White House, where she arrived each morning at 7:15. Along the way she read the daily summary, which was prepared by the CIA. On page four that morning was an item about Joel Backman. He was attracting the attention of some very dangerous people, perhaps even Sammy Tin.

The President greeted her warmly and had coffee waiting by the sofa. They were alone, as always, and they went right to work.

"You've seen The New York Times this morning?" he asked.

"Yes."

"What are the chances that Backman paid for a pardon?"

"Very slim. As I've explained before, he had no idea one was in the works. He didn't have time to arrange things. Plus, we're quite confident he didn't have the money."

"Then why was Backman pardoned?'

Susan Penn's loyalty to Teddy Maynard was fast becoming history. Teddy was gone, and would soon be dead, but she, at the age of forty-four, had a career left. Perhaps a long one. She and the President were working well together. He seemed in no hurry to appoint his new director.

"Frankly, Teddy wanted him dead."

"Why? What is your recollection of why Mr. Maynard wanted him dead?"

"It's a long story-"

"No, it's not."

"We don't know everything."

"You know enough. Tell me what you know."

She tossed her copy of the summary on the sofa and took a deep breath. "Backman and Jacy Hubbard got in way over their heads. They had this software, JAM, that their clients had stupidly brought to the United States, to their office, looking for a fortune."

"These clients were the young Pakistanis, right?"

"Yes, and they're all dead."

"Do you know who killed them?"

"No."

"Do you know who killed Jacy Hubbard?"

"No."

The President stood with his coffee and walked to his desk. He sat on the edge and glared across the room at her. "I find it hard to believe that we don't know these tilings."

"Frankly, so do I. And it's not because we haven't tried. It's one reason Teddy worked so hard to get Backman pardoned. Sure, he wanted him dead, just on general principle-the two have a history and Teddy has always considered Backman to be a traitor. But he also felt strongly that Backman's murder might tell us something."

"What?"

"Depends on who kills him. If the Russians do it, then we can believe the satellite system belonged to the Russians. Same for the Chinese. If the Israelis kill him, then there's a good chance Backman and Hubbard tried to sell their product to the Saudis. If the Saudis get to him, then we can believe that Backman double-crossed them. We're almost certain that the Saudis thought they had a deal."

"But Backman screwed them?"

"Maybe not. We think Hubbard his death changed everything. Backman packed his bags and ran away to prison. All deals were off."

The President walked back to the coffee table and refilled his cup. He sat across from her and shook his head. "You expect me to believe that three young Pakistani hackers tapped into a satellite system so sophisticated that we didn't even know about it?"

"Yes. They were brilliant, but they also got lucky. Then they not only hacked their way in, but they wrote some amazing programs that manipulated it."

"And that's JAM?"

"That's what they called it."

"Has anybody ever seen the software?"

"The Saudis. That's how we know that it not only exists but probably works as well as advertised."

"Where is the software now?"

"No one knows, except, maybe, Backman himself."

A long pause as the President sipped his lukewarm coffee. Then he rested his elbows on his knees and said, "What's best for us, Susan? What's in our best interests?"

She didn't hesitate. "To follow Teddy's plan. Backman will be eliminated. The software hasn't been seen in six years, so it's probably gone too. The satellite system is up there, but whoever owns it can't play with it."

Another sip, another pause. The President shook his head and said, "So be it."

Neal Backman didn't read The New York Times, but he did a quick search each morning for his father's name. When he ran across Frick's story, he attached it to an e-mail and sent it with the morning message from Jerry's Java.

At his desk, he read the story again, and relived the old rumors of how much money the broker had buried while the firm was collapsing. He'd never asked his father the question point-blank, because he knew he would not get a straight answer. Over the years, though, he had come to accept the common belief that Joel Backman was as broke as most convicted felons.

Then why did he have the nagging feeling that the cash-for - pardon scheme could be true? Because if anyone buried so deep in a federal prison could pull off such a miracle, it was his father. But how did he get to Bologna, Italy? And why? Who was after him?

The questions were piling up, the answers more elusive than ever.

As he sipped his double mocha and stared at his locked office door, he once again asked himself the great question: How does one go about locating a certain Swiss banker without the use of phones, faxes, regular mail, or email?

He'd figure it out. He just needed time.

The Times story was read by Efraim as he rode the train from Florence to Bologna. A call from Tel Aviv had alerted him, and he found it online. Amos was four seats behind him, also reading it on his laptop.

Ran* and Shaul would arrive early the next morning, Rafi on a flight from Milan, Shaul on a train from Rome. The four Italian - speaking members of the kidon were already in Bologna, hurriedly putting together the two safe houses they would need for the project.

The preliminary plan was to grab Backman under the darkened porticoes along Via Fondazza or another suitable side street, preferably early in the morning or after dark. They would sedate him, shove him in a van, take him to a safe house, and wait for the drugs to wear off. They would interrogate him, eventually kill him with poison, and drive his body two hours north to Lake Garda where he'd be fed to the fish.

The plan was rough and fraught with pitfalls, but the green light had been given. There was no turning back. Now that Backman was getting so much attention, they had to strike quickly.

The race was also fueled by the fact that the Mossad had good reason to believe that Sammy Tin was either in Bologna, or somewhere close.

The nearest restaurant to her apartment was a lovely old trattoria called Nino's. She knew the place well and had known the two sons of old Nino for many years. She explained her predicament, and when she arrived both of them were waiting and practically carried her inside. They took her cane, her bag, her coat, and walked her slowly to their favorite table, which they'd moved closer to the fireplace. They brought her coffee and water, and offered anything else she could possibly want. It was mid-afternoon, the lunch crowd was gone. Francesca and her student had Nino's to themselves.

When Marco arrived a few minutes later, the two brothers greeted him like family. "La professoressa la sta aspettando," one of them said. The teacher is waiting.

The fall on the gravel at San Luca and the sprained ankle had transformed her. Gone was the frosty indifference. Gone was the sadness, at least for now. She smiled when she saw him, even reached up, grabbed his hand, and pulled him close so they could blow air kisses at both cheeks, a custom Marco had been observing for two months but had yet to engage in. This was, after all, his first female acquaintance in Italy. She waved him to the chair directly across from her. The brothers swarmed around, taking his coat, asking him about coffee, anxious to see what an Italian lesson would look and sound like.

"How's your foot?" Marco asked, and made the mistake of doing so in English. She put her finger to her lips, shook her head, and said, "Non inglese, Marco. Solamente Italiano."

He frowned and said, "I was afraid of that."

Her foot was very sore. She had kept it on ice while she was read ing or watching television, and the swelling had gone down. The walk to the restaurant had been slow, but it was important to move about. At her mothers insistence, she was using a cane. She found it both useful and embarrassing.

More coffee and water arrived, and when the brothers were convinced that things were perfect with their dear friend Francesca and her Canadian student, they reluctantly retreated to the front of the restaurant.

"How is your mother?" he asked in Italian.

Very well, very tired. She has been sitting with Giovanni for a month now, and it's taking a toll.

So, thought Marco, Giovanni is now available for discussion. How is he?

Inoperable brain cancer, she said, and it took a few tries to get the translation right. He has been suffering for almost a year, and the end is quite close. He is unconscious. It's a pity.

What was his profession, what did he do?

He taught medieval history at the university for many years. They met there-she was a student, he was her professor. At the time he was married to a woman he disliked immensely. They had two sons. She and her professor fell in love and began an affair which lasted almost ten years before he divorced his wife and married Francesca.

Children? No, she said with sadness. Giovanni had two, he didn't want any more. She had regrets, many regrets.

The feeling was clear that the marriage had not been a happy one. Wait till we get around to mine, thought Marco.

It didn't take long. "Tell me all about you," she said. "Speak slowly. I want the accents to be as good as possible."

"I'm just a Canadian businessman," Marco began in Italian.

"No, really. What's your real name?"

"No."

"What is it?"

"For now it's Marco. I have a long history, Francesca, and I can't talk about it."

"Very well, do you have children?"

Ah, yes. For a long time he talked about his three children-their names, ages, occupations, residences, spouses, children. He added some fiction to move along his narrative, and he pulled off a small mir acle by making the family sound remotely normal. Francesca listened intently, waiting to pounce on any wayward pronunciation or improperly conjugated verb. One of Nino's boys brought some chocolates and lingered long enough to say, with a huge smile, "Park molto bene, signore." You speak very well, sir.

She began to fidget after an hour and Marco could tell she was uncomfortable. He finally convinced her to leave, and with great pleasure he walked her back down Via Minzoni, her right hand tightly fixed to his left elbow while her left hand worked the cane. They walked as slowly as possible. She dreaded the return to her apartment, to the deathwatch, the vigil. He wanted to walk for miles, to cling to her touch, to feel the hand of someone who needed him.

At her apartment they traded farewell kisses and made arrangements to meet at Nino's tomorrow, same time, same table.

Jacy Hubbard spent almost twenty-five years in Washington; a quarter of a century of major-league hell-raising with an astounding string of disposable women. The last had been Mae Szun, a beauty almost six feet tall with perfect features, deadly black eyes, and a husky voice that had no trouble at all getting Jacy out of a bar and into a car. After an hour of rough sex, she had delivered him to Sammy Tin, who finished him off and left him at his brother's grave.

When sex was needed to set up a kill, Sammy preferred Mae Szun. She was a fine MSS agent in her own right, but the legs and face added a dimension that had proved deadly on at least three occasions. He summoned her to Bologna, not to seduce but to hold hands with another agent and pretend to be happily married tourists. Seduction, though, was always a possibility. Especially with Backman. Poor guy had just spent six years locked up, away from women.

Mae spotted Marco as he moved in a crowd down Strada Maggiore, headed in the general direction of Via Fondazza. With amazing agility, she picked up her pace, pulled out a cell phone, and managed to gain ground on him while still looking like a bored window shopper.

Then he was gone. He suddenly took a left, turned down a narrow alley, Via Begatto, and headed north, away from Via Fondazza. By the time she made the turn, he was out of sight.

Spring was finally arriving in Bologna. The last flurries of snow had fallen. The temperature had approached fifty degrees the day before, and when Marco stepped outside before dawn he thought about swapping his parka for one of the other jackets. He took a few steps under the dark portico, let the temperature sink in, then decided it was still chilly enough to keep the parka. He'd return in a couple of hours and he could switch then if he wanted. He crammed his hands in his pockets and took off on the morning hike.

He could think of nothing but the Times story. To see his name plastered across the front page brought back painful memories, and that was unsettling enough. But to be accused of bribing the President was actionable at law, and in another life he would have started the day by shotgunning lawsuits at everyone involved. He would have owned The New York Times.

But what kept him awake were the questions. What would the attention mean for him now? Would Luigi snatch him again and run away?

And the most important: Was he in more danger today than yesterday?

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