And they had money from oil, from kidnap ransoms, from selling looted antiquities, from robbing banks, and from milking the unfortunate blessed residents of their caliphate, who paid taxes on property and income and everything else. ISIS cops collected fines for speeding and driving with broken taillights. It all went into the coffers.

But what to do with the money? They may have been insane, but they weren’t stupid, so they wanted to invest. Do what the Westerners did, make money with money. And Stavro was happy to help.

For his standard 5 percent.

Now, since the computer game had gone silent, he was waiting. That was the backup plan—wait. He took day trips on lake boats; he found cruising relaxing. In a restaurant in the trendy Carouge neighborhood, he sat by himself and tried their special dish—shrimp in white chocolate curry sauce. They certainly hadn’t had that in Albania. Which, he concluded, was no great loss. On a walk one day, he passed the Islamic Center of Geneva, a simple white house with green painted trim (and, this being Switzerland, no minaret). He didn’t go in. Nor did he notice the old Peugeot with the darkened windows parked across the street.

Mohammed

MOHAMMED

“Is this the best car you have? Don’t you have a better car?” said the man in the passenger seat. “You think this is a disguise? This is not a good disguise. Such a car stands out in Geneva. You should have a Lexus at least.”

“Shut up,” said Frank, leaning forward against the steering wheel. “What time is this mullah supposed to get here?”

“Soon. The class he teaches starts in twenty minutes.”

Across the street, a few men filtered into the Islamic center. Immigrant workers and cleaners. Students from the university. Low-level staffers at the Arab diplomatic missions. No mullah.

“Tell me,” said Frank, “does the term Lake City mean anything to you?”

The man shrugged. “This is a city. It has a lake.”

“Did anything special happen around here on Wednesday?”

The man thought. “I ate barbecue chicken. Very good.”

The informant was in his thirties and stocky and usually hungry, and his name was Mohammed. Of course. Frank had read somewhere that the five most common first names of cab drivers in New York City were Mohammed spelled five different ways.

“Tell me about the mullah,” Frank said. “What does he teach?”

“The Principles of Fiqh.”

“Fick?”

“Feck.”

“Which is?”

“Islamic law.”

“And you’ve been in the class?”

“No. I only heard. He is talking about jihad.”

“And people are liking it?”

“Yes, of course. Do you want me to go?”

A taxi pulled up across the street, and a pudgy middle-aged man with an untrimmed beard got out. Frank could see stains on his cream-colored thobe.

“That’s him,” said Mohammed.