"Michael, it makes no difference whether you knew or didn't. You had no right to execute a woman. You had no right to steal her child. Not even if she were the mistress of an enemy officer. You murdered a woman, Michael, and you need to pay for that."

"What about all I did? In the Irgun, in the War of Independence—does that count for nothing?"

"It counts for a hell of a lot. But it doesn't change the fact that you murdered a woman."

He was silent for a long moment. "You can't prove any of this," he said at length.

"No," I admitted. "I can't. I want you to come with me to the police station and sign a confession."

He shook his head. "They'll hang me."

"They won't. You'll spend some time in jail, but they won't execute you."

"I don't want to be locked up."

"It won't be pleasant, but there are worse places," I said. "You'll survive. You'll have access to books and a radio. You'll get adequate food and a proper bed. And you'll have something even more important."

"What is that?"

"A chance for atonement. A chance to come clean and ease the guilt that's eating you. And it is eating you, isn't it, Michael? A part of you wanted to be found out. Otherwise, you wouldn't have stepped in when Alon Davidson jumped me. You weren't on your way to work that night. I talked to your supervisor. You'd taken that night off, and the one before that as well. You were following me, weren't you?"

"Yes."

"Since the first time we met?"

"Yes," he said again.

"Were you still following me last Thursday?" I asked, referencing the day I'd killed the assassin Strauss had sent after me.

"No. I stopped after Davidson attacked you. You believed my lie that I just happened to be there at the right place at the right time. If you saw me again, you'd know I was tailing you."

So Michael had not seen Yossi Cohen follow me down to the beach. He did not witness my taking Cohen at gunpoint into the shed and emerging from there alone.

"Michael," I said, "if you don't come with me to the station, I will tell the police everything I know. It won't be enough for a conviction. It may not even be enough for an arrest. But it will pique their interest. They'll have their eye on you. You won't be able to visit your son's grave ever again."

His lips curled into a bitter smile. "That's an empty threat, Adam. After all, if I'm locked up in a cell, I won't be visiting his grave either."

"No," I said. "But I will."

He stared at me without saying a word.