Wednesday 7:33 A.M.
_
_"You're lucky I love this spot," Vance said, gazing out over the city.
"Nothing else on the planet could have got me up this early in the
morning."
"It's the one place I thought I could persuade you to meet me." The
bearded man sighed, his dark eyes grim. The accent was Russian, the
English flawless. "I have a problem, a very big problem."
"The Cold War's over, Alex, or maybe you hadn't heard." He strolled on,
tugging his trench coat tighter. "What have we got left to talk about?"
"Please. We both did what we had to."
"I still do. Life's too short for anything else." He turned back. "Now
how about telling me what's on your mind."
Vance was firm-muscled and lean, with the leathery skin of a man who
drank his tequila straight and preferred spending his days in the sun,
two habits that also had bestowed a network of threadlike smile lines
at the corners of his sea-blue eyes. Aleksei Ilyich Novosty had phoned
him at the Athenaeum Inter-Continental half an hour earlier, begging to
meet him, saying it was of the utmost importance. A cab was downstairs.
The driver had taken him to the old flea market at Monastiraki Square,
where Alex's own black limo waited. But now Novosty was playing games,
and the days for KGB games were supposed to be in the distant past.
What did the man want?
"My friend, give me a moment. . . ." Novosty wiped his brow, manicured
nails glistening, then looked up and pointed. "By the way, I've always
believed that one is the most exquisite female in the world. That one
there. What do you think?"
"Sexy, plenty of style." Vance swept his eyes over the figure, loving
how the cloth was shaped by her breast, the vague hint of thigh as one
leg brushed against the gauze of her tunic. "But the lady next to her's
a looker too. Always seemed a tough call."
Above them, the stone caryatids smiled down, their pale faces timeless
and ethereal. They were Greek statues that served as columns for the
south porch of the Erechtheum, the Ionic temple standing across from
the Doric Parthenon. Down below the steep north wall of the Acropolis,
the dark-glazed rooftops of Athens, city of Pericles, droused mutely in
the early haze.
"Yes, perhaps you're right." Novosty brushed awkwardly at his patchy
stubble, searching for an opening. He knew Vance never made the first
move, always waited for the other side to show its cards. "Michael, I
... is it true you occasionally still take an assignment? I mean,
outside the usual work for ARM. I made some inquiries in Geneva last
week. The word is--"
"Hang on. I think you're getting your team colors mixed. I work for the
other side, remember?" He stooped and picked up a handful of the grainy
red soil at their feet, massaging it in his fingers and wondering why
it had taken him so long to get back here, to Greece. This was where he
belonged. This was the place, the ancient people, he still dreamed
about. But could he fit in again after so many years away? Yes, he'd
make it work.
Michael Vance, Jr., had the sangfroid of one who moved easily among the
decision-makers of two continents. He was to the manner born--Yale--and
he'd long since concluded it was the way man was meant to live. In
years past he'd been a field archaeologist, and a good one; then he'd
had a brief consulting stint for the CIA. These days, he lived at the
Nassau Yacht Club marina, where he moored his restored forty-four-foot
Bristol racing yacht, the Ulysses, headquarters for his three-boat
charter operation. He was mortgaged to the hilt, but he didn't really
care. When things got tight, he could always take on a quick money job
for the Association of Retired Mercenaries, ARM.
"The situation is not necessarily what you're thinking," Novosty
pressed. "So perhaps you would consider--"
"Whatever it is, the answer's still no. The next three weeks are going
to be spent working on a tan."
Why tell Alex the facts? Today he was in Athens for only a few hours, a
stopover on the way to Crete. He glanced at his watch--an old Eterna
Chronomatic, the 1946 classic he loved--and calculated that the flight
for Iraklion left in less than four hours. This time tomorrow morning
he would be looking in on the crew from the University of Stuttgart's
dig for the German Historical Society, part of the restoration of a
Minoan palace near Crete's southern shore. Novosty and all he stood for
were the last thing he needed right now.
"Then at least let's have coffee," the Russian said finally, pointing.
"I brought some. There in the bag."
Vance needed it, to cut his hangover. Without a word he turned to the
marble steps, pried open the white paper, and reached in.
"Plastic." Dismay filled his voice as he lifted out one of the smooth
Styrofoam cups and examined it, like an insect. "This nails it. Game
over. Our side won all the chips. Now even Greek coffee comes American
style." He frowned as he pried the white lid from the cup. "What's
left?"
"It's everywhere. Perhaps they'll wrap these statues in cellophane
next, who knows."
"I fear the worst." He took a sip, relishing the first hit of the dawn.
It was dark and sweet, the real thing despite the container.
"Michael, please . . . at least hear me out." He reached for a
cigarette, extracting it filter-first from his trench coat.
"I have a serious personal problem, and I don't know where else to
turn."
Could it be true? Vance examined him more closely. The beard wasn't the
only change. The left side of his gray coat bulged as he searched for
his lighter. Alex had never bothered to carry his own protection. At
least never before.
He knew Alex Novosty was part of KGB's T-Directorate, Russia's special
organization for high-tech theft. In the old days he operated out of
Sophia, arranging the laundering of underground Soviet funds by
mingling them with the flight capital and drug money that made its way
between Turkey's Ziraat Bank, the Vatican's Istituto per le Opere di
Religione, and Geneva no-questions fronts with names like the Banco di
Roma per la Svizzera.
The truth was, Michael Vance, Jr., and Aleksei Ilyich Novosty had, over
the years, often traveled the same paths. They used the same
organizations and contacts--Novosty to conceal illicit monies, Vance to
expose them.
"You know, I always enjoyed our games." Novosty looked out over Athens,
his voice trailing off. "But, as you say, that was the old days. The
world's changed. Now perhaps we can just be two professionals. Do some
business."
He seated himself on a block of marble, still slightly moist with
morning dew, and withdrew a wrinkled clipping. It was from The Times of
London. "Here, read this, please."
Vance glanced down at it, then realized he had already read it on the
Reuters satellite news service. He had looked it over, stored it in his
news-update computer file, and promptly forgotten about it.