The Secret Servant (Gabriel Allon #7)(101)

They passed through the thin shadows beneath the trees where Carter and Halton had been standing a few seconds earlier. When they emerged again into the sunlight, they saw Elizabeth and her escorts for the first time, moving deliberately along the sidewalk close to the northern fa?ade of the Abbey. Her eyes were concealed behind a large pair of movie-starlet sunglasses, and her hands were in her coat pockets. A shaheed was holding each arm. Their free hands were shoved into the outward-facing pockets of their heavy jackets.

“They’ve got their fingers on the detonator switches, Mikhail. You see it?”

“I see it.”

“Do you see the people behind them? When we start shooting, you can’t miss.”

“I won’t miss.”

“You have your cigarettes?”

“I’m ready.”

“Keep walking.”

Two hundred worshippers were still standing outside the North Tower, waiting patiently to be admitted. Gabriel put a hand on Mikhail’s elbow and nudged him along the fringes of the crowd, onto the intersecting walkway. Elizabeth and the terrorists were directly in front of them, forty yards away and closing fast. One second, thought Gabriel. One second.





Cain’s fingers were digging into her upper arm and his hand was shaking with fear. She wondered why they had decided to release her in a crowded public place like Westminster Abbey. Then Cain murmured something to Abel in Arabic that made her feel as though a stone had been laid over her heart and Elizabeth realized that she had been brought to this place not to be freed but to be executed.

She glanced from one terrorist to the other. The heavy coats, the look of death in their eyes, the trembling hands…They were going to die here, too, she thought. They were shaheeds wrapped in suicide belts. And in a few seconds she would be a shaheed, too.

She looked toward the crowd of people gathered outside the Abbey’s North Tower. They were the real targets. Elizabeth had been kidnapped in a bloodbath and it appeared they planned to execute her in one as well. She couldn’t allow more innocent blood to be shed because of her. She had to do something to save as many lives as she could.

“Look down,” Cain snapped.

No, Elizabeth thought. I will not look down. I will not submit.

And then she saw him…

The angular man of medium height with wraparound sunglasses and ash-colored temples. The man walking along the edge of the crowd with a younger pale man at his side. It was the same man who had tried to save her in Hyde Park—she was sure of it. And he was going to try to save her again now.

But how could he possibly do it?

Cain and Abel had their hands in their pockets. It would only take them an instant to hit their detonators. It was an instant Elizabeth had to take from the terrorists and give to the two men advancing toward her—the two men who had just stopped walking and were in the process of lighting cigarettes. I will not submit, she thought. Then she drove the toe of her left foot into her right heel and felt herself falling to the pavement.





Cain caught her, a single reflexive act of kindness that would cost him his life. When she was upright again, she saw the two men draw their guns like twin flashes of lightning and start shooting. Cain’s face disappeared behind a blossom of blood and brain tissue, while Abel’s green eyes simultaneously exploded inside their sockets. The gunmen streaked past her in a blur, guns in their outstretched hands, as if they were chasing after their own bullets. Cain fell to the ground first, and the man with gray temples leaped onto his chest and fired several more rounds into his head, as though he were trying to shoot him into the ground. Then he tore Cain’s hand from his coat pocket and yelled at Elizabeth to run away. Model prisoner to the end, she sprinted across the lawn of the Abbey toward Victoria Street, where the distinguished-looking man with the fedora hat was suddenly standing with his arms open to receive her. She hurled herself against his chest and wept uncontrollably. “It’s all right, Elizabeth,” said Robert Halton. “I’ve got you now. You’re safe, my love.”





PART FIVE


A WEDDING BY THE LAKE



60




JERUSALEM



Two homecomings of note occurred the day after Christmas. The first had for its backdrop Andrews Air Force Base outside Washington and was broadcast live around the world. A president was in attendance, as was his entire national security team and most of the Congress. A Marine band played; a country-music star sang a patriotic song. Speeches were made about American determination and resolve. Praise was heaped upon the men and women of American and British intelligence who had made this day possible. No mention was made of ransom or negotiation and the name Israel was not uttered. Elizabeth Halton, still traumatized by her captivity and the circumstances of her rescue, attempted to address the crowd, but managed only a few words before breaking down. She was immediately placed aboard a waiting helicopter and flown under heavy guard to a secret location to begin her recovery.

The second homecoming took place at Ben-Gurion Airport and, by coincidence, occurred at precisely the same moment. There were no politicians in attendance and no television cameras present to record the event for posterity. No patriotic music was performed, no speeches were made; indeed, there was no official reception of any kind. As far as the State of Israel was concerned, the twenty-six men and women aboard the arriving charter from London did not exist. They were nonpersons. Ghosts. Lies. They disembarked in darkness and, despite the lateness of the hour, were shuttled immediately to an anonymous office block in Tel Aviv’s King Saul Boulevard, where they endured the first of what would be many debriefings. There was nothing pro forma about these sessions; they knew that once the celebrations had ended the questions would begin. A storm was coming. Shelters would have to be hastily constructed. Provisions set aside. Cover stories made straight.