“It puts everything in a different light, doesn’t it?”

That event, occurring long before either of them had entered their respective academies, was the stuff of legend in Scandinavian law enforcement. In the summer of 1973, Israel was hunting Ali Hassan Salameh, leader of the group responsible for the previous year’s Munich Massacre. Thinking they’d found their man, a Mossad team was dispatched to the village of Lillehammer, Norway, to assassinate Salameh, but mistakenly murdered an innocent Moroccan waiter as he walked home from a theater with his pregnant wife. The next day, two members of the assassination squad were arrested, and soon the entire team was in custody, later to be put on trial. It was the blackest of days for Mossad, and a debacle that exposed Israel’s brazen will to operate in Europe as never before imagined.

“It’s been a long time,” Almgren said. “Perhaps the new administration in Tel Aviv is too young to remember.”

“Or perhaps Israel is desperate.”

“In what way?”

Sanderson shook his head. “I don’t know. I’m trying to work that out.”

“They always have a list of extremists they’re after—Hamas or Hezbollah. Maybe one of them turned up here.”

“No. That’s not it.”

“How do you know?”

“The first shooting. All the witnesses said it was a case of one versus three. The man who is now in the hospital was by himself. He shot the man who died, and was exchanging fire with the other two on the street.”

“And he’s the one who was spouting Hebrew? So then we have the reverse—one of Israel’s enemies tracked this man here. Perhaps he’s a Mossad operative or an Israeli general. Even a politician.”

Again Sanderson shook his head. “That’s not it either. The two who escaped that first incident were gunned down yesterday. We now have identity documents from all four. They’re good quality forgeries…” he hesitated, “but nearly identical. The same manufacture.”

Almgren thought about it. “Yes, I see what you mean.”

The young waitress dropped a plate on the table that held a massive burger with jalapeños and pepperoni spilling from under the bun.

“Good God,” Sanderson said. “Just looking at it gives me acid reflux.”

“You don’t have acid reflux. You just need more sex.” Almgren, relishing her cast-iron constitution, dug into the burger with gusto. With a partially full mouth, she said, “This man in a coma—maybe he was a rogue of some kind. The others could have been sent here to eliminate him.”

Sanderson took a handful of chips from her plate. “Possibly. But I still don’t understand where the girl comes in. There’s nothing sordid in her background, yet this Israeli was talking to her in the café for at least ten minutes. Witnesses said the two of them seemed tense but familiar.”

“What else then?”