Читать книгу The Other Woman - Daniel Silva - Страница 17

Chiara rarely watched television in the evening. Raised in the cloistered world of Venice’s Jewish ghetto, educated at the University of Padua, she regarded herself as an ancient woman and was disdainful of modern distractions such as smartphones, social media, and fiber-optic television systems that delivered one thousand high-definition channels of largely unwatchable fare. Usually, Gabriel arrived home to find her engrossed in some weighty historical tract—she was commencing work on a PhD in the history of the Roman Empire when she was recruited by the Office—or in one of the serious literary novels she received by post from a bookseller on the Via Condotti in Rome. Lately, she had started reading pulp spy novels as well. They provided her with a connection, however tenuous and improbable, to the life she had gladly given up to become a mother.

On that evening, however, Gabriel arrived at his heavily guarded apartment in the Nachlaot neighborhood of Jerusalem to find his wife glaring at one of the American cable news networks. A reporter was recounting, with obvious skepticism, Israel’s stated contention that it had had nothing to do with the events in Vienna. The chief of Israel’s secret intelligence service, he intoned, had just departed Kaplan Street. According to one of the prime minister’s national security aides, who wished to remain anonymous, the meeting had gone as well as could be expected.

“Is any of it true?” asked Chiara.

“I had a meeting with the prime minister. That’s about the extent of it.”

“It didn’t go well?”

“He didn’t offer me Chinese food. I took it as a bad sign.”

Chiara aimed the remote at the screen and pressed the power button. She wore a pair of stretch jeans that flattered her long slender legs, and a sweater the color of clotted cream, upon which her dark hair, with its shimmering auburn and chestnut highlights, tumbled riotously. Her eyes were the color of caramel and flecked with gold. At present, they were appraising Gabriel with thinly veiled pity. He could only imagine how he looked to her. The stress of the field had always been unkind to his appearance. His first operation, Wrath of God, had left him with gray hair at the age of twenty-five. He had gone swiftly downhill after that.

“Where are the children?” he asked.

“Out with friends. They told us not to wait up.” She raised an eyebrow provocatively. “We have the place all to ourselves. Perhaps you’d like to drag me to bed and have your way with me.”

Gabriel was sorely tempted; it had been a long time since Gabriel had made love with his beautiful young wife. There was no time for it. Chiara had two children to raise, and Gabriel a country to protect. They saw one another for a few minutes each morning and, if they were lucky, for an hour or so in the evening when Gabriel returned from work. He had use of an Office safe flat in Tel Aviv for those nights when events didn’t permit him to make the long drive to Jerusalem. He hated it, the flat. It reminded him of what his life had been like before Chiara. The Office had brought them together. And now it was conspiring to keep them apart.

“Do you think it’s possible,” he asked, “that the children slipped back into the apartment without your knowing it?”

“Anything’s possible. Why don’t you check?”

Gabriel moved silently to the door of the children’s room and entered. Before departing for Vienna, he had traded out their cribs for a pair of junior beds, which meant they were free to move nocturnally about the apartment at will. For now, though, they were sleeping soundly beneath a mural of Titianesque clouds that Gabriel had painted after a blood-soaked confrontation with the Russian secret service.

He leaned down and kissed Raphael’s forehead. The child’s face, lit by a shaft of light from the half-open door, looked shockingly like Gabriel’s. He had even been cursed with Gabriel’s green eyes. Irene, however, looked more like Gabriel’s mother, for whom she was named. Chiara was the forgotten ingredient of the children’s genetic recipe. Time would change that, thought Gabriel. A beauty like Chiara’s could not be suppressed forever.

“Is that you, Abba?”

It was Irene. Raphael could sleep through a bomb blast, but Irene, like Gabriel, was easily woken. He thought she had the makings of a perfect spy.

“Yes, sweetheart,” he whispered. “It’s me.”

“Stay for a while.”

Gabriel sat down at the edge of her bed.

“Pat my back,” she commanded, and he laid his hand gently on the warm fabric of her pajamas. “Did you have a good trip?”

“No,” he answered honestly.

“I saw you on television.”

“Did you?”

“You looked very serious.”

“Where did you learn a word like that?”

“Like what?”

“Serious.”

“From Mama.”

Such was the language of the Allon household. The children referred to Gabriel as “Abba,” the Hebrew world for father, but Chiara they called only “Mama.” They were learning Hebrew and Italian simultaneously, along with German. As a result, they spoke a language only their parents could possibly comprehend.

“Where did you go, Abba?”

“Nowhere interesting.”

“You always say that.”

“Do I?”

“Yes.”

The children had only the vaguest sense of what their father did for a living. They knew that his picture sometimes appeared on television, that he was recognized in public places, and that he was surrounded constantly by men with guns. So were they.

“Did you take good care of your mother while I was gone?”

“I tried, but she was sad.”

“Was she? Why?”

“Something she saw on television.”

“Be a good girl and go back to sleep.”

“Can I sleep with you and Mama?”

“Absolutely not.”

His tone was stern. Even so, Irene giggled. This was the one place where no one followed his orders. He patted the child’s back for another minute more, until her breathing grew deep and regular. Then he lifted himself cautiously from the edge of the bed and moved toward the door.

“Abba?”

“Yes, my love?”

“Can I have one last kiss?”

He kissed her more times than he could possibly count. He kissed her until, happily, she begged him to leave.

Entering the kitchen, Gabriel found a stockpot of water bubbling on the stovetop and Chiara working a lump of Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese over the surface of a grater. She did so deftly and seemingly without effort, the way she did most things, including caring for the children. When she had produced the allotted amount, she traded the lump of Parmigiano-Reggiano for Pecorino and grated that, too. Gabriel quickly surveyed the other ingredients arrayed on the counter. Butter, olive oil, a tall pepper grinder: the makings of cacio e pepe. The simple Roman pasta dish was one of his favorites, especially the way Chiara prepared it.

“You know,” he said, watching her work, “there’s a very nice man in the Mahane Yehuda Market who will do that for you.”

“Or maybe I should just buy it in a jar at the supermarket.” She shook her head reproachfully. “The cheese has to be grated to the proper consistency. Otherwise, the results will be disastrous.”

He frowned at the small television at the end of the counter. “Just like Vienna.”

Chiara plucked a strand of spaghetti from the pot and after testing it poured the rest through a colander. Next she tossed it with melted butter, olive oil, the grated cheeses, and a few ounces of pasta water, and seasoned the dish with enough pepper to give it a bit of bite. They ate together at the little café table in the kitchen, the baby monitor between them, the television playing silently. Gabriel declined Chiara’s offer of Tuscan red wine; only heaven knew what the night might bring. She poured a small glass for herself and listened intently to his description of the events in Vienna.

“What happens now?” she asked.

“We undertake a rapid but unsparing review to determine where the leak occurred.”

“Who knew the address of the safe flat?”

“Eli, Mikhail, the Neviot officers, the deskman from Housekeeping who rented it, and six field security men, including my bodyguards. And Uzi, of course.”

“You didn’t mention the British.”

“Didn’t I?”

“Surely, you have a suspect.”

“I wouldn’t want to prejudice the investigation in any way.”

“You’ve been spending too much time with the prime minister.”

“It’s one of the hazards of my new job.”

Chiara’s gaze wandered to the television. “Forgive me for what I’m about to say, but Uzi must be secretly enjoying this. Kirov was recruited on his watch. And now he’s dead.”

“Uzi has been nothing but supportive.”

“He has no choice. But try to imagine how this looks from his point of view. He ran the Office competently for six years. Not brilliantly,” she added, “but competently. And for his reward, he was pushed out in favor of you.”

A silence fell between them. There was only the rhythmic breathing of the children on the monitor.

“You were adorable with Irene,” said Chiara at last. “She was so excited you were coming home that she refused to go to sleep. I must say, Raphael deals with your absences rather well. He’s a stoic young boy, just like his father must have been. But Irene misses you terribly when you’re away.” She paused, then added, “Almost as much as I do.”

“If this affair turns into a full-fledged scandal, you might be seeing much more of me.”

“Nothing would make us happier. But the prime minister would never dare fire the great Gabriel Allon. You’re the most popular figure in the country.”

“Second,” said Gabriel. “That actress is much more popular than I am.”

“Don’t believe those polls, they’re never right.” Chiara smiled. “You know, Gabriel, there are worse things than being fired.”

“Like what?”

“Having your brains blown out by a Russian assassin.” She raised her wineglass to her lips. “Are you sure you won’t have a little? It’s really quite good.”