“Maybe a lot, or maybe a lot of nothing. Hard to say. The thing of it is, the information they’ve pieced together in their database may or may not refer to a single individual. The current stuff, from the past ten years or so, is probably accurate—most of it anyway. But before that—earlier than ten years ago—it gets shakier. Also more bizarre.”

Gurney wondered how much more bizarre it could get than hammering nails into someone’s head.

Hardwick explained. “The guy in Ankara decided to talk to me on the phone rather than create an e-mail trail, so I took notes. What he gave me amounts to two little stories. Depending on how you look at them, they can seem very connected, or maybe not connected at all. The stories go backwards in time, starting with the material assembled in the last decade or so on the assassin who goes by the name Petros Panikos. You ready for this?”

“All ears, Jack.”

“The Panikos name, used as a primary search link, led back to an event that occurred twenty-five years ago in the village of Lykonos in southern Greece. There was a Panikos family there that owned a gift shop. There were four sons in the family, the youngest of whom was believed to have been adopted. The gift shop, along with the family home, was destroyed by a fire that killed both parents and three of the sons. The fourth son, the adopted one, disappeared. Arson was suspected but never proved. No formal birth certificate or adoption papers were ever found for the missing son. The family was very private, had no close relatives, and there was even some disagreement in the village about the missing son’s name. But—get this—the two possible names mentioned were Pero and Petros.”

“How old was he?”

“No one could say for sure. According to the old arson investigation file, his age at the time was estimated to be anywhere from twelve to sixteen.”

“No information on his birth name or where he came from originally?”

“Nothing official. However, in the arson investigation file there’s a statement from a priest in the village who thought the boy came from a Bulgarian orphanage.”

“What made him think that?”

“There’s no indication in the file that anyone bothered to ask. But the priest did give the name of the orphanage.”

Gurney let out a short laugh. It had nothing to do with humor. If he had to explain it, he probably would have called it an overflow of energy. There was something about the tracking process, the movement from one bit of information to another, the steps across the stream, that charged the circuits of his brain. “And I’m guessing that the trail to the orphanage takes us to another relevant event?”

“Well, actually, it takes us to a bleak communist-era orphanage for which there are no extant records. Wanna guess why?”

“Another arson?”