The Black Widow (Gabriel Allon #16) - Daniel Silva Page 0,78

orderly desk, while in an adjacent office a sharp-suited man glared at his computer as though it were an uncooperative witness. Two men waited in a glass-enclosed conference room. One smoked a pipe and wore a crumpled blazer. The other was Gabriel.

“Leila,” he said formally. “So nice to see you again. You’re looking well. A bit tired, but well.”

“It was a long night.”

“For all of us. We were relieved when we saw that motorbike pull up outside your apartment building.” Gabriel moved slowly from behind the table. “I trust your meeting with Jalal went well.”

“It did.”

“He has plans for you?”

“I think he does.”

“Because of his security precautions, we weren’t able to record the conversation. It is important you tell us everything he said last night, exactly the way he said it. Can you do that, Leila?”

She nodded.

“Good,” said Gabriel, smiling for the first time. “Please have a seat and start from the beginning. What were the first words out of his mouth when he met you outside the pharmacy? Did he speak during the drive? Where did he take you? What was his route? Tell us everything you can. No detail is too small.”

She lowered herself into her assigned seat, adjusted her hijab, and began to speak. After a moment or two, Gabriel reached across the table and placed a restraining hand upon hers.

“Did I do something wrong?” she asked.

“You’re doing beautifully, Leila. But please start again from the beginning. And this time,” he added, “it would be helpful if you spoke French instead of Arabic.”

It was at this point that they were confronted with their first serious operational dilemma—for within the walls of the ancient cathedral of Senlis, Jalal Nasser, Saladin’s man in Western Europe, had told his potential recruit that more attacks were coming, sooner rather than later. Paul Rousseau declared that they were compelled to inform his minister of the developments, and perhaps even the British. The goal of the operation, he said, had been to roll up the network. Working with MI5, they could arrest Jalal Nasser, interrogate him, learn his future plans, and scoop up his operatives.

“Call it a day?” asked Gabriel. “Job well done?”

“It happens to be true.”

“And what if Nasser doesn’t crack under the friendly interrogation he’ll receive in London? What if he doesn’t reveal his plans or the names of his operatives? What if there are parallel networks and cells, so that if one goes down the others survive?” He paused, then added, “And what about Saladin?”

Rousseau conceded the point. But on the question of bringing the threat to the attention of higher authority—namely, his chief and his minister—he was unyielding. And so it was that Gabriel Allon, the man who had operated on French soil with impunity and had left a trail of dead bodies stretching from Paris to Marseilles, entered the Interior Ministry at half past ten that evening, with Alpha Group’s chief at his side. The minister was waiting in his ornate office, along with the chief of the DGSI and Alain Lambert, the minister’s aide-de-camp, note taker, food taster, and general factotum. Lambert had come from a dinner party; the minister, from his bed. He shook Gabriel’s hand as if he feared catching something. Lambert avoided Gabriel’s eye.

“How serious is the threat of another attack?” the minister asked when Rousseau had completed his briefing.

“As serious as it gets,” answered the Alpha Group chief.

“Will the next attack come in France?”

“We cannot say.”

“What can you say?”

“Our agent has been recruited and invited to travel to Syria for training.”

“Our agent?” The minister shook his head. “No, Paul, she is not our agent.” He pointed to Gabriel and said, “She is his.”

A silence fell over the room.

“Is she still willing to go through with it?” the minister asked after a moment.

“She is.”

“And you, Monsieur Allon? Are you still willing to send her?”

“The best way to learn the time and place of the next attack is to insert an agent directly into the operation itself.”

“I take it your answer is yes, then?”

Gabriel nodded gravely. The minister made a show of thought.

“How comprehensive is your surveillance of this man Nasser?” he asked.

“Physical and electronic.”

“But he uses encrypted communications?”

“Correct.”

“So he could issue an attack order and we would be completely in the dark.”

“Conceivably,” said Gabriel carefully.

“And the British? They are unaware of his activities?”

“It appears so.”

“Far be it from me to tell you how to do your job, Monsieur Allon, but if I had an agent who was about to go into Syria, I wouldn’t