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  Crane asked, "When did you become involved in--"

  He raised a hand, silencing him. "We'll discuss serious matters when we're in the limo. It's debugged and the windows are treated so no demodulating devices can read our voices. You look surprised I know about such things." He shrugged. "It's the world we live in, lad. Pity, isn't it?" Then he beamed. "But it does make for good business."

  "Certainly for what I understand is your business." Crane kept his tone neutral.

  The older man inclined his head. "As you say."

  The elevator door slid open, revealing a traditional cement-floor cellar with trash bins and laundry and boiler rooms. To the right was a wide expanse of stalls walled with wire fencing, each gated, combination locks dangling. Storage of some kind. As Crane studied the area, trying to see more than cardboard boxes, a powerful car engine purred to life.

  From the shadows emerged a long Mercedes limousine. It cruised toward them, its polished black surface gleaming in the florescent lighting like freshly spilled ink.

  "Our chariot," the Scorpion explained.

  While the chauffeur remained behind the steering wheel, two of the guards opened the rear doors then stepped back, standing at attention. Crane walked around to the other side and slid in, joining his host.

  The car smelled of new leather and lemon wax. The driver wore a traditional mufti-brown uniform and flat cap with a stiff brim. From what Crane could see, he looked old--he had thin white hair and the skin on the back of his neck was pale and wrinkled. Covering his hands were short calfskin driving gloves that revealed a copper bracelet on his right wrist.

  The bracelet caught Crane's attention. Some kind of words edged it. Even at this distance he could see the letters looked exotic, which of course was always intriguing. The bracelet must be very old, he decided, since the copper was such a rich color. In fact, it seemed to shimmer as if from some deep inner fire. The bracelet was a stunning bauble--that was why it had attracted his eye, and that was all there was to it.

  Crane put on his seatbelt. The doors closed, and they were alone.

  "Proceed."

  The driver looked into the rearview mirror and nodded, acknowledging the order. Then he rolled the limo toward a driveway that rose up to street level and the stars.

  Crane watched as his host settled back against the leather and said, "Before I answer your questions, you must answer mine. Tell me how you came to be interested in me. Start at the beginning."

  It was a strange question, but it was possible the Scorpion did not know the whole story. "I was doing research for an article when I ran across something that had nothing to do with it, but I was intrigued. It was an anomaly."

  "Go on."

  "The anomaly was three brilliant young foreign students at Cambridge--an Indian, a Pakistani and a Kashmiri--who graduated with first-class honors in 1988. They were close friends. All were born poor, but their educational expenses in England, which began when they were ten years old, were paid for. Then when they left Cambridge, they started different businesses, again completely funded. Each was quickly successful. But the Indian died in New Delhi within five years, drowned in a flood, and the one in Pakistan died ten years later, poisoned by bad well water. And the third one, the Kashmiri--Devras Sikari--is still alive, but he's sold his company and is living in the bush as some sort of combination warlord and would-be saint. The whole situation seemed to beg to be looked into. So that's what I did. I discovered the three hadn't known each other before England, all were Hindu and none had ever named their sponsor. The one clue I turned up about that subject was in an obscure Hindu journal. In it, Sikari is quoted as saying that the benefactor was 'holy, but of this world.'"

  "Yes, I've heard parts of that. Do continue."

  Crane allowed himself a brief smile. "Sikari's quote was tantalizing. Why would a benefactor want to hide his generosity? After all, he educated three impoverished children and his story might inspire others to be equally generous." Unless the person wasn't altruistic at all, he thought to himself. Unless he had a far different--and far less admirable--motive. "I was finally able to track down the name of the company that paid their expenses. It was a front, leading to more front companies. But one thing was constant. Their security was provided by BlueWatch Global Services."

  Headquartered in Dubai, BlueWatch was the real deal, a private security and private investigation agency with a special division servicing very deep-pocket clients. "Naturally I asked for an interview with the president and board chair, Mr. Francis Xavier Kimball."

  From everything he could tell, Kimball did not exist. Still, Crane was not ready to point that out, at least not yet, because it was his probe into Kimball's identity that had ignited the Scorpion's emails that had ended with the invitation to meet. He had never heard of the Scorpion, but one of his sources who was well connected in the underworld of international crime had described him as rich, dangerous, of unknown name and origin, and never seen. Shortly after that, Reuters's IT security team reported to Crane that the Scorpion's emails had been routed through multiple countries, including China and Russia, and their signals were untraceable.

  As he finished speaking, Pierre Crane looked out, realizing they were long past Les Bosquets. They appeared to be in a lovely residential section of outer Paris where swaying trees, autumn flowers, and luxuriant moonlit lawns showed on both sides of the car. High hedges and pastel-painted walls appeared, lining it. The occasional driveway was sealed by ornate gates that were really high-security barricades.

  "Where are we?" Crane asked.

  "Nowhere in particular. It doesn't matter really, does it now? In fact, I don't know either. We're simply being driven. The point was for you and me to have a quiet, uninterrupted conversation. And that we're having indeed. You've just related an entertaining tale, Mr. Crane." He dusted an imaginary annoyance from the sleeve of his superb suit. "And what do you plan to do with it?"

  "I'd like to write a story about the brilliant young Kashmiri who turned his back on the West and became an independence fighter. The benefactor who funded his education and was then betrayed when Sikari returned to Kashmir is part of that story. The name 'the Scorpion' came up in several conversations. So, will you confirm that you are the benefactor? The Good Samaritan who was betrayed?"

  "There are occasions when it's far better for everyone to remain anonymous," the man replied. "Besides, as you said yourself, with two of the men dead and the third likely gone mad, I hardly think anyone would want to take credit for the experiment."

  "The 'experiment'? That's even more intriguing. What did you hope to accomplish?"

  "No, no. I wasn't the one. If I were, and I didn't want you to know, I'd simply dodge your questions. I had nothing to do with any of it." He held up a manicured hand. "Please, let me finish. At the same time, I'd like to know more, too."

  "Why?"

  "A man can't have too much knowledge. If I give you the address of a place where you're likely to uncover new information, will you promise to let me know in detail what you discover?"

  Crane was surprised. He had expected the Scorpion to try to stop him, and any help he got from the mysterious rich man would have to be wormed--or tricked--out of him.

  "Why don't you go yourself?" Crane demanded.

  Again there was a twinkle in the older man's blue eyes. "Through you, I will. It is, shall we say, more discreet this way. From everything my people tell me, you're a man of your word. What's your answer?"

  "All right, I'll give you a report. After that, I make no promises."

  "Be very careful when you go there. There's a man who's pursuing Sikari. He's former U.S. Army, in fact former military intelligence. Well-trained and ruthless." He slipped his hand inside his suit jacket and brought out a color photograph. "This is him. His name is Harold Middleton. Be cautious of him at all times."

  Crane glanced at the photo, but when he looked up he stopped listening. He was riveted by the scene on the other side of the car window--anot
her black limo had appeared and was running without lights next to them on the cramped, two-lane residential road. It was keeping perfect and very dangerous pace, its front fenders aligned with their limo's front fenders. Cold moonlight reflected off the darkened side windows. He could see no one inside. His lungs tightened.

  The chauffeur spoke. "I've been watching it." Crane liked the sound of him--there was authority in the voice, a man who knew how to get things done.

  The chauffeur floored the gas pedal. The limo's tires spun and screeched, and the acceleration threw them deep into their seats.

  As they left the other limo sucking their exhaust, the chauffeur commanded, "Get out the weapons."

  Crane saw his host jab a button on his plush armrest. A door dropped open behind the driver's seat. He pulled out an MP5 submachine gun and quickly slid it over the seat to the chauffeur. Then he grabbed the other gun for himself and rested it gingerly on his lap.

  "It's Jana," the driver said angrily. "I could see her through the windshield. How did she find us?"

  "How should I know?"

  "It's your job, dammit! You've screwed up!"

  Crane was stunned. The chauffeur was questioning the Scorpion. He was giving the Scorpion orders. He was telling him he had failed. And the Scorpion was doing nothing to take back control.

  As the limo raced onward, Crane noticed that the window between the front and rear seats had remained open the whole time. The chauffeur had heard everything. Crane thought back quickly, remembering when he saw the man in the tenement foyer and asked whether he was the Scorpion. 'You're a smart lad,' he'd said, and that was all he'd said, which was no answer at all. He had dodged the question.

  Crane felt his heart pound. The disguise of chauffeur was perfect to conceal the Scorpion's legendary secret identity while carrying out business. There was only one answer that made sense--the chauffeur was the boss. Could the chauffeur be the real Scorpion?

  The second limo pulled up again and the window on the front passenger side rolled down. Crane looked inside. He caught a gauzy image of the driver--a beautiful woman with long lustrous dark hair dancing in the slipstream. Her left hand was on the wheel. Her right, out of view.

  She glanced at Crane and he felt a shiver--from her beauty and from what he saw as a fanatic's fire in her eyes. Captivating, terrifying. Then she lost all interest in him and instead focused on the other two men in the vehicle. Something about her gaze as she looked at the driver registered disappointment. She hesitated only a moment then lifted a machine pistol. Perhaps an Uzi, perhaps a Mac-10. As Crane gasped and cringed, a firestorm sprouted from the muzzle and, like amplified hail, the bullets slammed in the windows, flicking loudly but ineffectively off the armored sheet metal and bulletproof glass. Dismay spread on Jana's face and she wrenched the wheel to the right, forcing their limo into a grassy shoulder, where it bounced to a halt.

  Jana's vehicle vanished into a cloud of dust.

  "How did she find us?" the driver snapped.

  "Followed him?" The man in the backseat glanced at Crane, who noticed that he held his pistol firmly in a steady hand. He wondered if he was about to die.

  The driver spun around and snapped, "You can never underestimate anyone in this. Never."

  The man beside him said, "What do we do about him?"

  The driver considered. "Mr. Crane, there's a train station at the end of that road there. You see it?"

  "Yes."

  "You can get a train that will take you back to Paris. I'm afraid we have other concerns."

  "Yes, of course."

  "Follow the London lead. But be careful. Whatever you do, be careful."

  Crane climbed out of the limo, which rocked out of the soft shoulder and made a U turn, the opposite of the direction Jana had sped in.

  The reporter, now shaking and breathless from the incident, began hiking toward the road. His reporter's instinct gave him an important message: The woman had been intent on killing the Scorpion but the frown of disappointment when she saw the men in the limo told him that neither man was, in fact, that reclusive character.

  Anyone with common sense would walk away from this story. It was beyond dangerous, but somewhere deep inside him he, the Crane, loved that. He was ugly, but his mind and spirit were beautiful. His curiosity was inflamed, and like a lover in the first fiery flush of requitement, he would see himself skinned and beheaded before he would let go of this amazing story.

  He pulled out his cell and ran down the street. In the distance, police sirens screamed. He ignored them. His mind was on London and what he would find there.

  3

  DAVID HEWSON

  Felicia Kaminski was playing Bach--Partita number two in D minor, the Chaconne, some of the most difficult solo violin music ever written--when the man with the gun burst through the door.

  There was a woman behind the frantic, worried figure moving forcefully into the front room of the little terraced cottage on London's Lamb's Conduit Street. She was tall and elegant, with long dark hair and something that looked like a machine pistol--Kaminski wished weapons were not so familiar--extended in her right hand.

  The young Polish musician placed her Bela Szepessy fiddle and bow on the antique walnut table by the window and said, "Harold. Leonora. So nice to see you again. How is the music business these days? Slow or fast? Looking at you at this moment it is difficult for me to judge. Are you here for my debut at the Wigmore Hall? If so . . . " She placed a slender finger, the nail trimmed down to the quick, on her cheek. "I have some sartorial issues, I must say."

  "Oh crap." Middleton put away the weapon and Leonora Tesla followed suit, if a little more slowly. He slapped his forehead theatrically. "I'm sorry, Felicia. We saw there was someone inside. I forgot you had the keys."

  "They shoot burglars in London, Harold? Such a beautiful little house. You don't remember who you lend it to?"

  Middleton glanced at the woman with him. "I said Felicia was welcome to use the place. For her . . . " He stumbled over the details.

  " . . . for my debut at the Wigmore Hall," Felicia repeated, picking up the fiddle and showing it to them. "I thought you wanted to see me play this. It cost you a lot of money."

  Harold Middleton--she refused to shorten his first name since she wasn't, Felicia wished to say, a colleague--had proved a good friend of sorts. He saved her life on more than one occasion when she was enmeshed in the deadly game of terror and crime that should have ended in a massacre at the James Madison Recital Hall in Washington, D.C., while she performed as the principal soloist for a newly unearthed work by Chopin.

  There had been many more favors in the intervening two years. Over that time she ceased to be an impoverished young Polish emigre, without friends at first, without parents, and had began slowly to adjust to the life of a professional musician, taking the first steps on the international orchestral ladder, occasionally and only when absolutely necessary, using Harold Middleton's many connections. She was grateful. She was also intensely aware that a part of his generosity stemmed from some private, inward guilt for introducing her to the dark and violent world to which he had now returned, one a million miles away from the music which he truly loved.

  "I will see you play," Middleton insisted.

  "We both will, Felicia," Leonora Tesla added.

  Middleton winced when he failed to remember the date of the recital.

  "Tonight," she interrupted with a scowl. "Seven o'clock. I texted you. I emailed . . . "

  "I'm sorry. Give me time, please. Life's a little . . . "--he exchanged looks with his colleague--" . . . hectic right now."

  Middleton strode over to the tall wardrobe in the living room, a hulking, ugly piece of furniture--the only out-of-place item in the room and one hidden in shadow so that it couldn't be seen from the long double window that gave out onto the street. The cottage was in a narrow Georgian lane in a backwater of Bloomsbury, walking distance from the West End and the concert hall where she was due that afternoon for a
final rehearsal. It was a quiet, discreetly wealthy part of central London away from the crowds and the tourists, a village almost.

  When he threw open the wardrobe's doors, Felicia found herself looking at the object she had found there when she was poking around the place two days before, after arriving from New York--a black, heavy-duty metal security cabinet with a rotary combination lock, like that of an old-fashioned safe. Middleton dialed the numbers then pulled on the handle to open the door. Felicia caught her breath, though in truth she knew she shouldn't have been surprised. A small armory--pistols, rifles, boxes of ammunitions, other items she didn't recognize--was neatly lined up inside.

  Leonora Tesla put down her shoulder bag, joined him and starting picking at the hardware. Middleton had brought two grey hold-alls for their booty. The two of them looked like a couple in a fancy chocolate store, trying to decide what delicacies to take away with them.

  "So the Volunteers are back in business," Felicia said.

  "Supply and demand, kid," Tesla replied, taking down what looked like a pack of small metal balls. Grenades of some kind maybe. "Be grateful you're in a nicer business."

  Middleton and Tesla were so utterly absorbed Felicia didn't feel too bad about poking around at something else while they were so preoccupied.

  After a minute, she said, "I am grateful. Yet still, in your new job, you find time to buy nice jewelry. Nora, is this for you?"

  They stopped packing weaponry into the soft grey cases and turned to look. In her delicate pale fingers, Felicia held the glittering object that had caught her attention as Leonora Tesla placed her bag on a chair by the dining table, the top half open. The article was enclosed in a transparent plastic evidence packet and tagged with a NATO label bearing the previous day's date, and what sounded like a French name. It occurred to Felicia that they must have been in a hurry indeed if they sought weapons before delivering what must, she imagined, have been something of importance.

  "You know, when we first got to know one another I don't recall you being in the habit of going through people's things," Middleton told her.

  "I got older, Harold. Quickly. You remember? With the company you introduced me to it seemed to make sense. What is this?"