False Impression

When Tina stepped out of the elevator, she spotted Leapman leaving her office. She slipped into the washroom, her heart beating frantically as she considered the consequences. Did he now know that she could overhear every phone conversation Fenston had, while at the same time being able to watch everything that was going on in the chairman’s office? But worse, had he found out that she had been e-mailing confidential documents to herself for the past year? Tina tried to remain calm as she stepped back into the corridor and walked slowly toward her office. One thing she was certain about, there would be no clue that Leapman had even entered the room.

She sat at her desk and flicked on the screen. She felt ill. Leapman was in the chairman’s office, talking to Fenston. The chairman was listening intently.

Jack watched as Anna kissed the driver on the cheek and couldn’t forget that this was the same man who had extracted twenty dollars from him—a sum that wouldn’t be appearing on his expense sheet. He thought about the fact that the two of them had stayed awake all night while she had slept. If he’d dozed off, even for a moment, Jack feared that Crew Cut would have moved in and stolen the crate, although he hadn’t spotted her since she boarded the plane for London. He wondered where she was now. Not far away, he suspected. As each hour had passed, Jack became more aware that he wasn’t just dealing with a taxi driver, but someone willing to risk his life for the girl, perhaps without even knowing the significance of what was in that crate. There had to be a reason.

Jack knew it would be a waste of time to try and bribe the taxi driver, as he had already discovered to his own cost, but the cargo manager had beckoned him into his private office and even printed out the relevant page of the manifest. The crate was booked on the next flight to London. Already loaded on board, he assured him. Not a bad investment for fifty dollars, even if he couldn’t read the signature. But would she be on the same flight? Jack remained puzzled. If the Van Gogh was in the red box on its way back to London, what was in the box that Petrescu had taken to Japan and delivered to Nakamura’s office? He had no choice but to wait and see if she boarded the same plane.

Sergei watched as Anna walked toward the airport entrance, p

ulling her suitcase. He would call Anton later, to let him know he had delivered her safely. Anna turned to wave, so he didn’t notice a customer climb into the back of the car, until he heard the door close. He glanced up at his rearview mirror.

“Where to, madam?” he asked.

“The old airport,” she said.

“I didn’t realize it was still in service,” he ventured, but she didn’t reply. Some customers don’t.

When they reached the second traffic island, Sergei took the next exit. He checked once again in the mirror. There was something familiar about her—had she been in the back of his cab before? At the crossroads, Sergei turned left onto the old airport road. It was deserted. He’d been right, nothing had flown out of there since Ceausescu had attempted to escape in November 1989. He glanced up at the mirror again, while trying to maintain a steady speed, and suddenly it all came back to him. He now remembered exactly where he’d last seen her. The hair had been longer, and blonde, and although it was over a decade ago, those eyes hadn’t changed—eyes that registered nothing when she killed, eyes that bore into you when you died.

His platoon had been surrounded on the border with Bulgaria. They were quickly rounded up and marched to the nearest prisoner-of-war camp. He could still hear the cries of his young volunteers, some of whom had only just left school. And then, once they had told her everything they knew, or nothing at all, she would slit their throats while staring into their eyes. Once she was certain they were dead, with one more sweeping movement of her knife she would hack off the head, then dump it in the middle of an overcrowded cell. Even the most hardened of her henchmen had to avert their eyes.

Before leaving, she would spend a little time looking around at those who had survived. Each night she left with the same parting words, “I still haven’t decided which one of you will be next.”

Three of his men had survived, and only because a new set of prisoners, with more up-to-date information, had recently been captured. But for thirty-seven sleepless nights, Colonel Sergei Slatinaru could only wonder when it would be his turn. Her last victim had been Anna’s father, one of the bravest men he’d ever known, who, if he had to die, deserved to go to his grave fighting the enemy—not at the hands of a butcher.

When they were finally repatriated, one of his first duties as commanding officer was to tell Anna’s mother how Captain Petrescu had been killed. He lied, assuring her that her husband died bravely on the battlefield. Why should he pass his nightmare on to her? And then Anton phoned to say he’d had a call from Captain Petrescu’s daughter; she was coming to Bucharest, and would he . . . someone else he didn’t pass his secret on to.

Once the hostilities had ceased, rumor concerning Krantz was rife. She was in jail, she had escaped to America, she’d been killed. He prayed that she was still alive, as he wanted to be the one to kill her. But he feared that she would never show her face in Romania again, because so many former comrades would recognize her and line up for the privilege of cutting her throat. But why had she returned? What could possibly be in that crate to make her take such a risk?

Sergei slowed down when he reached a barren stretch of land, where the runway had once been but was now covered in weeds and potholes. He kept one hand on the wheel, while the other moved slowly down his left side and reached underneath the seat for a gun he hadn’t used since Ceausescu had been executed.

“Where do you want me to drop you, madam?” he asked, as if they were in the middle of a busy street. He placed his fingers around the handle of the gun. She didn’t reply. His eyes glanced up into the rearview mirror, realizing that any sudden movement would alert her. Not only did she have the advantage of being behind him, but she was now watching his every move. He knew one of them would be dead in the next sixty seconds.

Sergei placed his index finger round the trigger, eased the gun from under his seat and began to raise his arm slowly, inch by inch. He was about to hit the brakes when a hand grabbed his hair and jerked back his head in one sharp movement. His foot came off the accelerator and the car slowed to a halt in the middle of the runway. He raised the gun another inch.

“Where is the girl going?” she demanded, pulling his head even farther back so that she could look into his eyes.

“What girl?” he managed to say as he felt the knife touch his skin just below the Adam’s apple.

“Don’t play games with me, old man. The girl you dropped at the airport.”

“She didn’t say.” Another inch.

“She didn’t say, even though you drove her everywhere? Where?” she shouted, the edge of the blade now piercing the skin.

One more inch.

“I’ll give you one last chance,” she screamed as the blade broke the skin and warm blood began to trickle down his neck. “Where—was—she—going?” Krantz demanded.

“I don’t know,” Sergei screamed, as he raised the gun, pointed it toward her head, and pulled the trigger.

The bullet ripped into Krantz’s shoulder and threw her backward, but she never let go of his hair. Sergei pulled the trigger again, but there was a full second between the two shots. Just long enough for her to slit his throat in a single movement.

Sergei’s last memory before he died was staring into those cold, gray eyes.

39

LEAPMAN WASN’T ASLEEP when his phone rang. But then he rarely slept, although he knew there was only one person who would consider calling him at such an ungodly hour.