me your wallet.’
‘It’s in my jacket. Like my phone.’
Stephanie pressed the Smith & Wesson to the same patch of skin. ‘Then be very careful.’
He retrieved it – Dunhill, black leather with gold corners – and passed it back. On his Platinum Amex the name read Robert R. Newman. He had two printed cards, one professional, one personal, which included an address on quai d’Orléans, Île Saint-Louis. The other card carried a name she didn’t recognize with an address at La Défense.
‘What’s Solaris?’
‘A company. I work for them.’
‘An oil company?’
‘Sometimes.’
‘We’re going to your place. I need somewhere to think.’
Quai d’Orléans, Île Saint-Louis, half-past-ten. They found a space close to his building. People passed by, heading home from the restaurants along rue Saint-Louis en Île.
Inside the Audi, Stephanie spoke softly. ‘I don’t want to have to do it. But if you make me, I will. Understand?’
Newman nodded.
‘If we meet anybody you know, play it straight. I’m just a date.’
They got out. Newman carried Leonid Golitsyn’s attaché case and she clutched the Smith & Wesson which was in the pocket of her overcoat.
They reached the entrance to the building. He pressed the four-digit code – 2071 – and they stepped into a large hall, sparsely furnished. They took the cage-lift to the fifth floor. The entrance to Newman’s apartment was a tall set of double-doors that opened into a hall with a smooth limestone floor. On the walls were gilt-framed canvases; flat Flemish landscapes beneath brooding pewter skies, moody portraits of prosperous traders, pale aristocratic women. There were Casablanca lilies in a tall, tapering, octagonal vase, their scent filling the hall.
Stephanie glanced at the flowers, then at Newman who understood. ‘Yvette,’ he said. ‘She looks after the place. She’s not a live-in. She comes daily during the week.’
‘Does she have her own key?’
‘Yes.’
‘If you like her, remind me to get you to call her in the morning.’
At gun-point Newman led her through the apartment; two bedrooms, each with its own bathroom, a large sitting-room, a modest dining-room, a generous kitchen, a utility room and a study. The sitting-room and dining-room were at the front of the apartment, French windows opening on to a balcony that offered a truly spectacular view of Notre Dame on Île de la Cité.
‘Nice place. Business must be good.’
They returned to the utility room. Stephanie made him open both cupboards; vacuum-cleaner, ironing board, a mop in a bucket, brooms, brushes, rags and cloths, cleaning products. She grabbed the coiled washing line from the worktop. On a shelf was a wooden box with household tools, including a roll of black tape, which she also took. Back in the sitting-room, she drew the curtains and dragged a chair to the centre of the floor.
‘Take off your jacket and tie.’
He did, unfastening the top two buttons of his shirt and rolling up his sleeves.
‘What happened to your wrists?’
Around each of them was a bracelet of livid purple scar tissue. She hadn’t noticed them before. He didn’t answer, glaring at her instead, his silence heavy with contempt.
‘Do what I say and I won’t hurt you. Now sit down.’
She bound his wrists with the washing line, securing them behind the back of the chair. Then she taped one ankle to a chair-leg.
‘Don’t make any noise.’
She left him and returned to the kitchen. It was a bachelor’s kitchen, no question: a central island with a slate top; two chopping boards of seasoned wood, both barely scratched; a knife-block containing a set of pristine Sabatier blades. In the fridge were two bottles of Veuve Clicquot, some San Pellegrino, a bottle of Montagny, ground coffee and orange juice. No food.
His suits were hanging in a wardrobe in the bedroom, all tailored. But in another cupboard another Robert Newman existed; denim jeans, scuffed and frayed, T-shirts that had lost their shape and colour, exercise clothing, old trainers.
On the bedside table was a Bang & Olufsen phone, a bottle of Nurofen and a copy of What Went Wrong? by Bernard Lewis. On the other table was a single gold earring. Stephanie picked it up. It curled like a small shell.
In the bathroom, Newman’s things were fanned out across more limestone. But in the cupboard behind the mirror Stephanie found eye-liner and a small bottle of Chanel No.5, half-empty. In the second bedroom, further evidence; a plum silk dress on a hanger, a couple of jerseys, a pair of black Calvin Klein jeans, some flimsy underwear, two shirts, a pair of silver Prada trainers.
She returned to the sitting-room. ‘Who’s the woman?’
‘What woman?’
‘The woman who leaves Chanel No.5 in your bathroom.’ She showed him the earring. ‘This woman.’
‘That could be mine.’
‘Trust me, I’m not in the mood.’
‘It’s none of your goddamn business.’
‘Sure about that?’
‘She’s history.’
‘If she shows up here, she will be.’
‘It’s been over for a while.’
‘It was on your bedside table.’
‘I’m the sentimental type.’
‘Her stuff is still here.’
She saw that he was extremely nervous – the sweat, the shivers – but he was determined to maintain the façade. The pretence was all he had to cling to. ‘You should see what I left at her place.’
There was no answer to that; Stephanie had left pieces of herself everywhere.
There was a large Loewe widescreen TV in the corner of the sitting-room. Stephanie sat on a sofa arm and flicked through channels; France 3, Canal+, France 2, pausing during a news bulletin on TF1. Continued analysis of the bomb in Sentier, riots in Caracas, an oil spill off the coast of Normandy. Then they were watching a female journalist with a red scarf around her throat. She was in rue de Berri, the Lancaster just discernible in the background, beyond the entrance to the Berri-Washington car-park.
The studio anchor was asking a question. The reporter nodded then said, ‘The police will say only that Russian art-dealer Leonid Golitsyn and another unidentified man have been shot dead in what looks like a planned execution.’
‘Have
