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For a second nothing happened. Then Chabrol's body went rigid and he began to tremble. The drug paralysed him, then stopped his heart. Max held him, supporting his bulk.

In Chabrol's eyes he saw the man's confusion, hatred, fear laid bare. Not much affected Max any more, but it still touched him to watch someone die. It was as though their final spark jumped across his emotional void and fleetingly ignited the vestigial embers of his own humanity. The instant Chabrol's pupils dilated, Max released a deep sigh.

After he had laid Chabrol's body on the floor he left the cottage. On the beach he glanced at the global positioning system strapped to his wrist and confirmed the whereabouts of the yacht. Then he put on his fins and mask, and disappeared into the Caribbean, cutting through the water with slow, powerful strokes.

It took fifteen minutes to return to the yacht. He pulled himself up the ladder and rolled on to the deck, stripped off his wetsuit and stood naked in the warm night breeze. He stretched his muscles, taut after the swim, and checked his watch. He had been gone fifty-seven minutes. He opened the fridge in the galley, drank a small bottle of Evian and studied himself in the mirror. He remembered his first kill, staring afterwards at his reflection, searching for some change in his face. He hadn't found one then and he couldn't see one now. For an instant, though, a different pair of blue eyes stared out of the mirror. His mother's. He blinked and the image vanished.

He descended to the main cabin. Delphine lay asleep in bed, her face framed by ash-blonde hair, the sheet revealing more of her naked form than it concealed. He was still pumped with adrenaline, and the sight aroused him. He pulled up the sheet and slipped in beside her. She stirred and reached for him. 'Been up, Max?'

'Just to get a drink.'

Her hand brushed his groin and she opened her eyes. 'You have been up.'

He smiled. 'Must be the warm night air.'

'Really?' She was stroking him now. 'Nothing to do with me?'

'Never even crossed my mind. You're far too much of a lady.'

She straddled him. 'Oh, yeah?'

He smiled. Delphine was the daughter of Henri Chevalier, the head of one of Geneva's oldest and most respected independent banks. 'I might have misjudged you.'

As he entered her, she gasped. 'I love you, Max.'

The pleasure pulsed through him, but he frowned.

'I love you, Max,' she said again.

He rolled her on to her back and responded to the rhythm of her body. Her declaration elicited only regret. Why, when it was going so well, did they always have to fall in love with him?

FOUR DAYS LATER: 9 AUGUST

TODAY SHOULD HAVE BEEN A PROUD CELEBRATION BUT AS HELMUT Kappel stared through the tinted, soundproofed windows of his study and watched his guests on the lawn he felt only impotent rage.

Schloss Kappel was an austere stone mansion set in twenty acres of grounds south of Zurich. A large marquee stood between the crenellated towers and a band played on a floating island in the lake. Etched against the blue sky, white banners proclaimed: Kappel Privatbank -- 200 Jahre Jubildum.

He had invited every major client, the legitimate who brought respectability, and the criminal who brought profit -- although in his experience the only real distinction between them lay in how long each had possessed their wealth. A few were famous. His third wife, Eva, was talking to the fashion designer Odin. The flamboyant Norwegian's distinctive strawberry-blond hair hung down to his shoulders and he wore the trademark furs and leathers that had made his Viking style so popular. Helmut had once thought his wife decorative, but she no longer pleased him. She hadn't borne him an heir -- both his first and second wives had managed that.

Behind them a minor member of the Monegasque royal family was deep in conversation with a Swiss investor. Don Marco Trapani, one of Kappel Privatbank's long-standing clients, was speaking with Joachim, Helmut's younger son, and a large man he didn't recognize. He remembered then that Trapani had wanted to introduce his cousin, a scientist, to the bank. Helmut looked at the man's ill-fitting suit and frowned. By the lake, his elder son, Max, was holding court. He looked tanned and confident after his productive Caribbean vacation, Delphine Chevalier at his side. They made a pleasing couple.

Helmut shifted focus to his reflection in the window and brushed back his white hair till every strand was in place. He never tired of admiring himself: he looked good for a sixty-five-year-old. He was over six feet tall and lean, with an erect Prussian bearing. He wore a dark suit, a pale blue shirt, which matched his eyes, and a bright silk cravat that covered the purple scar tissue where a tumour had been removed from his throat. The disease had reminded him that time wouldn't wait for him to fulfil his destiny. Despite the doctors' advice, though, he had made only one concession to the cancer: he occasionally substituted cigars for his beloved handmade cigarettes.

Today he took another black Sobranie cigarette from the silver box in the top drawer of his desk, placed the gold filter in his mouth and lit it.

His brother cleared his throat. T told you it was pointless holding such an extravagant celebration. Not only does it draw attention to us, it costs us money we can ill afford.'

Helmut didn't respond. His brother's caution had its place but Klaus had no sense of occasion. T can't believe that not one of them is coming,' he said. The surgery made it impossible for him to speak in anything louder than a rasping whisper.

His brother tugged at his beard. 'Hudsucker, Corbasson, Lysenko and Nadolny have all declined the invitation.-'

'You think they really will close their accounts?'

Klaus shrugged. 'Apparently we're no longer respectable enough for their aspirations.'

Helmut ground his teeth.

Klaus continued, 'They are our biggest clients, Helmut. Not one is worth less than a billion dollars. This won't be like losing the others. If they all leave at the same time and withdraw their funds, it could be critical. Particularly with Comvec draining our resources.'

Comvec was Kappel Privatbank's wholly owned biotech consultancy, set up by Joachim to service the swell of small genetic-engineering and gene-therapy start-ups seeking technical, regulatory, legal and commercial advice before launching on the market.

Comvec's potential for reducing the Kappels' dependence on its banking interests was huge, but so far the venture had cost the bank money. 'How critical would it be if all four clients pulled out?'

'We should survive. Just.'

Helmut looked up at the past leaders of the Kappel dynasty, whose portraits lined the walls of his study and the hall outside. All were male and sported the family's trademark pale blue eyes and shock of white-blond hair. All had expanded the business during their leadership, leaving it stronger. 'Survival isn't good enough.'

'But we have to face facts, Helmut. In the last decade the number of independent private banks in Switzerland has fallen by forty per cent. The country's secrecy laws may still be strong, but the new anti-terrorism measures mean that the Federal Banking Commission's regulations are tighter than ever. It's become increasingly perilous for us to launder suspect money, and banks in the Caymans can provide those services cheaper. More and more clients are turning to the bigger banks. Our reserves are at an all-time low and the economy is in recession. If we lose our four biggest clients we'll be forced to liquefy investments at the bottom of the market. We'll be fortunate to survive.'

Helmut paced the room. 'Do you think I don't know that, Klaus? We made the bastards rich. When they came to us they had nothing. How dare they tell us they need a more respectable bank? They were grateful for our skills when we pushed them up the greasy pole. So what if Warren Hudsucker's become a US senator. I don't care if he's the Queen of England. We made him.'

'I know,' Klaus said soothingly. 'We could wind up Comvec. You know what Max thinks of Joachim's brainchild, and he's got a point. It's haemorrhaging millions of Swiss francs each year with no realistic prospect of a return for at least five years.'

Helmut shook his head. 'Now isn't the time to kill Comvec, not when Joachim's just had a breakthrough.' Klaus was loyal and he managed the bank's administrative affairs with meticulous care, but he had no courage or vision. 'As for our errant clients, in the old days I'd have ordered Stein and his men to punish them, but until we find a way to shore up the bank we need their business. Look at the figures, Klaus. Offer them the most favourable rates we can afford. Call it a loyalty bonus. Just make sure they understand it's more attractive to stay than to leave -- at least in the short term.'

Again he looked up at the portraits lining the wall and wondered what they would have done. Inevitably his eyes settled on the painting opposite his desk of Dieter Kappel, who had saved the family two hundred years ago.

The four original Kappel brothers had been mercenaries who had taken their name from the Swiss village of Ebnat-Kappel in the German-speaking canton of Graubiinden. In the mid-seventeenth century, after moving south to fight for the warring Italian states, they had settled in Florence where they embarked on a more lucrative career as paid assassins. Specializing in 'natural' kills, using discreet poisons, they passed down their skills to the only people they could trust: their family. As the Kappel family's reputation grew, so did their fees and influence. Their descendants had served popes and kings.

At the dawn of the nineteenth century, though, a powerful Florentine count had avoided paying for their services by attempting to have them arrested for the assassination he had authorized. The Kappels' poison had made him convulse so violently that his spine broke before he died -- and they had to flee Italy. Dieter Kappel had led the family back to Switzerland when it was becoming the world centre for private banking.

With the family's accumulated funds, the Kappel Privatbank was established in Zurich in 1804. It found a profitable niche safeguarding the ill-gotten gains of those wary of the scrutiny of conventional banks. The bank paid them low interest rates for this privilege, then lent their money to smaller clients at much higher interest.

Dieter Kappel ensured the family never forgot its core skills: he believed it was far easier to make a financial killing if you could make a real one. The bank began to invest in clients whose businesses had only one or two key rivals. Then, without the clients'

knowledge, the Kappels would ensure that the rivals met with unfortunate accidents. Some clients suspected that the Kappels were responsible for their subsequent good fortune, but Dieter Kappel made it policy never to confirm this, let alone charge for it. The Kappels' reward came from the clients' success: their wealth fed the bank's. And, with time, Kappel Privatbank grew in status and respectability. During the Second World War, when clients sought to protect their wealth in neutral Swit2erland, its growth surged. It also became the bank of choice for leading Mafia families, and extended its influence to the lucrative American market. A cadre of professional employees handled a wide range of day-today services, including private and institutional asset management, financial analysis, securities brokerage, administration of deposits, business consultancy and accounting assistance. It remained small and secretive, controlled by the family.

But now Kappel Privatbank was in decline for the first time in its history. Helmut knew they couldn't go back to being paid assassins. There was too little money in it. Professionals from the old Eastern Europe and the Russian Mafia killed for next to nothing. Clients no longer demanded finesse, just results.

like his ancestor Dieter, Helmut had to take the business to another level. With Comvec he hoped that the promised biotech boom would prove to be the new market within which the family could exploit its unique range of skills -- an offshoot had already yielded a covert dividend by developing a new generation of un-detectable poisons. But his cancer had warned him that if he wanted to secure the family's future before he died, the business had to evolve faster.

'What's the latest on Banque Chevalier of Geneva?' Klaus asked.

Helmut spotted Henri Chevalier by the lake, and Delphine was still with Max, talking to a Japanese client. 'Chevalier's keen. He still believes that the only way to keep out the American conglomerates is to merge with a small private bank like ours. But I won't merge unless I can guarantee we'll be in control.' Helmut watched Delphine Chevalier gaze adoringly at his elder son and a thin smile curled his lips. He took a long drag on his cigarette and whispered. 'Klaus, please tell Max I need to see him.'

EVEN AS MAX ENTERED THE STUDY HELMUT KAPPEL FOUND HIMSELF glancing through the window at his younger son, who was talking with Trapani and Trapani's cousin. Joachim wore a formal suit with a bright bow-tie. He was full of ideas and enthusiasm and he was committed to realizing Helmut's vision of taking the family into new areas. Joachim was not as commercially astute as Max but he was competitive, studious and desperate for his father's approval. He had a Ph. D. in biochemistry and, as well as running the bank's offshoot, Comvec, he continued the family's proud tradition of creating new and ever subtler methods of traceless assassination. Apart from his circular rimless glasses, he looked uncannily like Kappel's younger self.

Max had inherited more of his American mother's genes. His eyes were a warmer blue, his skin more tanned than those of a typical Kappel. He was taller, athletic and more socially confident than his half-sibling. Clients loved him. Helmut took particular pride in his elder son because, despite his mother's contaminating influence, he had personally moulded him into the man he was.