“Da!” Berman said. “Amsterdam transfer code—it cycles through too many times to be accident. Your fairy godmother uses an Amsterdam bank.”

“Can you tell which one?”

“Baked Alaska is what you are,” Berman said reprovingly. “Give him inch, he take isle! Impossible to get specific account unless … Nyet, impossible.”

“Unless what?”

“Private key?” Berman cringed as if he expected to be slapped for even saying those words. “Use digits like sardine key, scroll open can. Twist, twist, twist. Very powerful.” Moving funds in or out of the account required a private key, an authorizing sequence of digits known only to the account holder; the key would not appear in any transmission. This separate, ultra-secure digital pathway protected both the customer and the bank.

“You really expect me to entrust you with the private-key sequence?”

“Nyet,” he said, shrugging.

“Can I trust you with it?”

A booming laugh. “Nyet! What do you take me for! Girl Scout? Private key must be kept private, from everyone. Hence name. All men mortal. Grigori more mortal than most.” He looked up at Janson. “Please, keep key to self.” It was an entreaty.

Janson was silent for a while. Berman liked to say he could resist everything except temptation. To provide him with the private key would present him with a tremendous temptation indeed: he could siphon off its contents with a few keystrokes. Yet at what cost? Berman loved his life here; he knew that to make an enemy of Janson would jeopardize everything he had, and was. No threats were necessary to underscore the risks. Didn’t this explain the real source of his reluctance ? He didn’t want the key because he knew he could not allow himself to give in to temptation—and wanted to avoid the anguish of waking up the next day and knowing he had left a sizable pile of money on the table.

Now Janson recited a fifteen-digit string and watched Berman type the sequence. The Russian’s face was sickly and tense; he was obviously wrestling with himself. Within moments, however, he had succeeded in establishing connections to dozens of financial institutions, burrowing from within the Bank of Mont Verde mainframe to retrieve the digital signatures that uniquely identified the counterparty to every transaction.

Several minutes elapsed, the silence disturbed only by the soft clicking of keys and the quiet drone of the fans. Then Berman stood up. “Da!” he said. “ING. Which stands for International Netherlands Group Bank. Which you perhaps once knew as Nederlandsche Middenstandsbank.”

“What can you tell me about it?”

“Beautiful new central office in Amsterdam. So energy-efficient, nobody can bear to work there. Second-largest bank in country. And Amsterdam women—the most beautiful women in the whole world.”

“Grigori,” Janson began.