Moscow Rules (26 page)

then he was wrestling with weightier matters. By paying two and a half million dollars for a painting she

knew to be a worthless forgery, Elena had clearly shown herself to be receptive to a second approach.

Which was why Adrian Carter boarded his Gulfstream jet and came to London.

“Sounds as if you had an interesting afternoon in the Cotswolds, Gabriel. I’m only sorry I wasn’t

there to see it. How did Sarah hold up when confronted with the monster in the flesh?”

“As one would expect. Sarah is very talented.”

They were seated together on Gabriel’s bench in St. James’s Park. Carter wore the traveling attire of

the American businessman: blue blazer, blue button-down, tan chinos. His oxblood penny loafers were

dull for want of polish. He needed a shave.

“How do you think Elena was able to tell the painting wasn’t real?”

“She owns several other Cassatts, which means she spends a great deal of time around them. She

knows how they look, but, perhaps more important, how they
feel.
After enough time, one develops an

instinct about these things, a certain sense of touch. Elena’s instincts must have told her that the painting

was a forgery.”

“But did her instincts also tell her that Sarah Crawford was a forgery as well?”

“Without question.”

“Where’s the painting now?”

“Still at Havermore. Elena’s shippers are coming to collect it. She told Alistair Leach she intends to

hang it in the children’s room at Villa Soleil.”

A group of Croatian schoolgirls approached the bench and, in halting English, asked for directions to

Buckingham Palace. Carter pointed absently toward the west. When the girls were gone, he and Gabriel

rose in unison and set out along the Horse Guards Road.

“I take it Saint-Tropez is now in your travel plans as well?”

“It’s not what it once was, Adrian, but it’s still the only place to be in August.”

“You can’t set up shop there without first getting your ticket punched by the French services. And,

knowing the French, they’re going to want in on the fun. They’re understandably angry with Ivan. His

weapons have spread a great deal of death and destruction in parts of Africa where the
Tricolore
used to

fly and where the French still wield considerable influence.”

“They can’t have in, Adrian. The circle of knowledge is already too wide on this operation for my

comfort. And if it widens again, the chances of Ivan and the FSB getting wind of it increase substantially.”

“We’re back on speaking terms with the French, and your friend the president would like to keep it

that way. Which means that you’re not to take any action on French soil that might bring yet another euro

shit storm down upon our heads. We have to go on the record with the French, just the way we did with

Graham Seymour and the Brits. Who knows? Perhaps something good might come of it. A new golden age

in Franco-Israeli relations.”

“Let’s not get carried away,” Gabriel said. “The French aren’t likely to be pleased with my terms.”

“Let’s hear them.”

“Unlike the Brits, the French will be granted no formal role. In fact, it is my wish that they do nothing

more than stay out of the way. That means shutting down any surveillance operations they might be running

on Ivan. Saint-Tropez is a village, which means we’re going to be working in close proximity to Ivan and

his security gorillas. If they see a bunch of French agents, alarm bells will go off.”

“What do you need from us?”

“Continued coverage of all of Ivan’s communications. Make sure someone is sitting on the account

twenty-four hours a day-someone who can actually speak Russian. If Ivan calls Arkady Medvedev and

tells him to put a watch on Elena’s tail, I would obviously need to know. And if Elena makes a

reservation for lunch or dinner, I would need to know about that, too.”

“Message received. What else?”

“I’m thinking about giving Sarah Crawford a Russian-American boyfriend. I can do Russian-Israeli

on short notice, but not Russian-American. ” Gabriel handed Carter an envelope. “He’ll need a full set of

identification, of course, but he’ll also need a cover story that can stand up to the scrutiny of Ivan and his

security service.”

They came to Great George Street. Carter paused in front of a newsstand and frowned at the morning

papers. Osama bin Laden had released a new videotape, warning of a coming wave of attacks against the

Crusaders and the Jews. It might have been dismissed by the professionals of Western intelligence as yet

another empty threat had the statement not contained four critical words: the arrows of Allah.

“He’s promising the autumn is going to be bloody,” Carter said. “The fact that he was specific about

the timing is noteworthy in itself. It’s almost as if he’s telling us there’s nothing we can do to stop it. On

deep background, we’re telling the media that we see nothing new or unusual in the tape. Privately, we’re

shitting bricks. The system is blinking red again, Gabriel. They’re overdue for another attack against an

American target, and we know they want to hit us again before the president leaves office. Expert opinion

is convinced this plot may be the one. All of which means you have a limited amount of time.”

“How limited?”

“End of August, I’d say. Then we raise the terror warning to red and go on war footing.”

“The moment you do, we lose any chance of getting to Elena.”

“Better to lose Elena than live through another 9/11. Or
worse.”

They were walking toward the river along Great George Street. Gabriel looked to his right and saw

the North Tower of Westminster Abbey aglow in the bright sunshine. The Caravaggio image flashed in his

memory again: the man with a gun in hand, firing bullets into the face of a fallen terrorist. Carter had been

standing a few yards away that morning, but now his thoughts were clearly focused on the unpleasant

meeting he was about to conduct on the other side of the English Channel.

“You know, Gabriel, you get the easy job. All you have to do is convince Elena to betray her

husband. I have to go hat in hand to the Frogs and beg them to give you and your team the run of the

Riviera.”

“Be charming, Adrian. I hear the French like that.”

“Care to join me for the negotiations?”

“I’m not sure that’s a wise idea. We have a somewhat testy relationship. ”

“So I’ve heard.” Carter was silent for a moment. “Is there any chance of amending your demands to

allow the French some sort of operational role?”

“None.”

“You have to give them
something,
Gabriel. They’re not going to agree otherwise.”

“Tell them they can cook for us. That’s the one thing they do well.”

“Be reasonable.”

Gabriel stopped walking. “Tell them that if we manage to block Ivan’s sale, we’ll be happy to make

sure all the credit goes to the French president and his intelligence services.”

"You know something?” Carter said. “That might actually work.”

The conference convened in Paris two days later, at a gated government guesthouse off the Avenue

Victor Hugo. Carter had pleaded with the French to keep the guest list short. They had not. The chief of

the DST, the French internal security service, was there, along with his counterpart from the more

glamorous DGSE, the French foreign intelligence service. There was a senior man from the Police

Nationale and his overlord from the Ministry of the Interior. There was a mysterious figure from military

intelligence and, in a troubling sign that politics might play a role in French decision making, there was

the president’s national security adviser, who had to be dragged to the gathering against his will from his

château in the Loire Valley. And then there were the nameless bureaucrats, functionaries, factotums, note-

takers, and food tasters who came and went with hushed abandon. Each one, Carter knew, represented a

potential leak. He recalled Gabriel’s warnings about an ever-widening circle of knowledge and

wondered how long they had until Ivan learned of the plot against him.

The setting was intensely formal, the furnishings preposterously French. The talks themselves were

conducted in a vast mirrored dining room, at a table the size of an aircraft carrier. Carter sat alone on one

flank, behind a little brass nameplate that read THOMAS APPLEBY, FEDERAL BUREAU OF

INVESTIGATION-a mere formality since he was known to the French and was held by them in

considerable regard despite the many sins of his service. The opening notes were cordial, as Carter

anticipated they would be. He raised a glass of rather good French wine to the renewal of Franco-

American cooperation. He endured a rather tedious briefing about what Paris knew of Ivan’s activities in

the former French colonies of sub-Saharan Africa. And he suffered through a rather odious lecture by the

national security adviser over the failure of Washington to do anything about Ivan until now. He was

tempted to lash back-tempted to chastise his newfound allies for pouring their own weapons into the most

combustible corners of the planet-but he knew discretion was the better part of valor. And so he nodded

at the appropriate times and conceded the appropriate points, all the while waiting for his opportunity to

seize the initiative.

It came after dinner, when they retired to the cool of the garden for coffee and the inevitable

cigarette. There were moments at any such gathering when the participants ceased to be citizens of their

own land and instead banded together as only brothers of the secret world can do. This, Carter knew, was

one of those moments. And so with only the faint murmur of distant traffic to disturb the stately silence, he

quietly placed Gabriel’s demands before them-though Gabriel’s name, like Ivan’s and Elena’s, was not

uttered in the insecurity of the open air. The French were appalled, of course, and insulted, which is the

role the French play best. Carter cajoled and Carter pleaded. Carter flattered and Carter appealed to their

better angels. And last, Carter played Gabriel’s trump card. It worked, just as Gabriel had known it

would, and by dawn they had a draft agreement ready for signature. They called it the Treaty of Paris.

Adrian Carter would later think of it as one of his finest hours.

36 SAINT-TROPEZ, FRANCE

The village of Saint-Tropez lies at the far western end of the Côte d’Azur, at the base of the French

département
known as the Var. It was nothing but a sleepy fishing port when, in 1956, it was the setting

for a film called
And God Created Woman,
starring Brigitte Bardot. Nearly overnight, Saint-Tropez

became one of the most popular resorts in the world, an exclusive playground for the fashionable, the

elite, and other assorted euro millionaires. Though it had fallen from grace in the eighties and nineties, it

had seen a revival of late. The actors and rock stars had returned, along with the models and the rich

playboys who pursued them. Even Bardot herself had started coming back again. Much to the horror of the

French and longtime habitués, it had also been discovered by newly rich invaders from the East: the

Russians.

The town itself is surprisingly small. Its two primary features are the Old Port, which in summer is

filled with luxury yachts instead of fishing boats, and the Place Carnot, a large, dusty esplanade that once

each week hosts a bustling outdoor market and where local men still pass summer days playing
pétanque

and drinking pastis. The streets betweenthe port and the square are little more than medieval

passageways. In the height of summer, they are jammed with tourists and pedestrians, which makes

driving in the
centre ville
of Saint-Tropez nearly impossible. Just outside the town center lies a labyrinth

of towering hedgerows and narrow lanes, leading to some of the world’s most popular beaches and

expensive homes.

In the hills above the coast are a number of
villages perchés,
where it is almost possible to imagine

Saint-Tropez does not exist. One such village is Gassin. Small and quaint, it is known mainly for its

ancient windmills-the Moulins de Paillas-and for its stunning views of the distant sea. A mile or so

beyond the windmills is an old stone farm-house with pale blue shutters and a large swimming pool. The

local rental agency described it as a steal at thirty thousand euros a week; a man with a German passport

and money to burn took it for the remainder of the summer. He then informed the agent he wanted no

cooks, no maid service, no gardeners, and no interruptions of any kind. He claimed to be a filmmaker at

work on an important project. When the agent asked the man what type of film it would be, he mumbled

something about a period piece and showed the agent to the door.

The other members of the filmmaker’s “crew” trickled into the villa like scouts returning to base

after a long time behind enemy lines. They traveled under false names and with false passports in their

pockets, but all had one thing in common. They had sailed under Gabriel’s star before and leapt at the