Blood from his nose covered Seth’s face and neck and matted his hair as he stumbled amid the panicked mob fleeing the berserk high-rise crane, which wobbled and twisted as the boom accelerated like a wounded carnival ride. Steel support cables parted then like cannon shots. Seth watched in horror as the vertical support column buckled. Then he sprinted into the night.

TWENTY-SIX

Behind the Eden au Lac, a red panel ambulance with white crosses on its sides and doors drew up to the service entrance. In the vehicle’s backseat, KGB Colonel Molotov sat somberly and for the hundredth time cursed the bad luck that had resulted in his drawing this assignment. The woman had escaped. He had been put on notice by his superiors that any further failure would not be tolerated. He was to recapture the woman, at any cost, and her husband as well. The only bit of luck he had had was the telephone call intercepted by their agent in Paris, which told them that the woman’s husband was in Zurich. He looked at his watch: his other team should have captured him by now. Molotov knew that his slate would be wiped clean if he could just get his hands on the painting. And that was what he intended to do.

Molotov took another look at his copy of Seth’s passport photo, then whispered to the two men in the front seat and the man sitting beside him. “You’re ambulance attendants. Remember that. And remember too that we want Mr. and Mrs. Ridgeway alive. Wound them if you must, but don’t kill them. They have something that we need.”

In her room, Zoe hung up the telephone. “I don’t understand. Where could he be?” She looked at Stratton and Cartiere as she walked back to the table in the sitting room. “I’ve called his room a thousand times. We’ve left messages on the door, in his mailbox… and still nothing.” She stared disconsolately at her feet. “Where could he be?”

The remains of a rack of lamb rested on the table. Zoe sat down and stared morosely out the window. It was ironic, she thought. Here she was again in the real world, the world she had longed for all these months, and still there was something missing, something that made the world real for her. She realized then how much of her existence was defined by her relationship with Seth. Until they were reunited, she would continue to feel that she had not returned to the person she had otice been.

Cartiere broke into the flow of her thoughts. “I’m sure he’ll call soon. Maybe he’s Christmas shopping.” It was the longest sentence she had heard from him since they had met.

Zoe tried to force a smile. “I hope you’re right.” Her voice was so quiet the two men had to lean over to catch her words. “Of course. It’s Christmas.” She looked at each man in turn and then directed her gaze inward.