The Fallen Angel

response. Neither did Shamron or Navot.
    “We have a highly capable tactical police unit that is more than up to a job like this.”
    “Einsatzkommando Cobra,” Shamron interjected. “Better known as EKO Cobra.”
    Kessler nodded. “They’ve trained for just this kind of scenario.”
    “With all due respect, Herr Kessler, when was the last time a member of EKO Cobra shot a living, breathing terrorist through the brain stem so he couldn’t detonate his bomb with a dying twitch of his fingers?”
    Kessler was silent.
    “I thought so,” Shamron said. “Do you happen to recall when EKO Cobra was formed, Herr Kessler?”
    “It was shortly after the Munich Olympics massacre.”
    “That’s correct,” Shamron said. “And I was there that night, Herr Kessler. We begged the Germans to let us handle the rescue operation at Fürstenfeldbruck Air Base, but they refused. I had to listen to the screams of my people as they were being butchered. It was . . .” Shamron’s voice trailed off, as though he were searching for the appropriate word. Finally, he said, “It was unbelievable.”
    “The people who will enter that synagogue tonight are Austrian citizens.”
    “That’s true,” Shamron said. “But they’re also Jews, which means that we are their guardians. And we’re going to make sure they come out of that synagogue alive.”

34
     
    VIENNA
     
    A FTER THAT, THE DEBATE ENDED, and the two sides settled down to the business of hammering out an operational accord. Within a few minutes, they had the broad outlines of an agreement. Gabriel and Mikhail would see to the takedown; EKO Cobra, the surveillance. At Kessler’s insistence, the Austrians reserved the right to move against the terrorists at any point prior to their arrival in the Jewish Quarter if the opportunity presented itself. Otherwise, they were to give the Hezbollah team a wide berth—or, as Shamron put it, they were to quietly escort them to death’s door. Gabriel made the Austrians’ job easier by telling Kessler the exact route the terrorists would take to the synagogue, including the streetcars they would use. Kessler was clearly impressed. He suggested a café on the Rotenturmstrasse that Gabriel could use as a staging post. Gabriel smiled and said he would use the one next door instead.
    “Why?”
    “Better view.”
    “When exactly was the last time you were in Vienna?”
    “It slips my mind.”
    Which left only the rules of engagement. On this point, there was no room for debate. Gabriel and Mikhail were to take no lethal action until the terrorists drew their guns—and if they killed unarmed men, they would be prosecuted to the full extent of Austrian law, and any other law Kessler could think of. Gabriel agreed to the provision and even signed his name to a hastily drafted document. After adding his own signature to the agreement, Kessler handed over several miniature radios preset to the frequency the EKO Cobra teams would be using that night.
    “Weapons?” asked Kessler.
    “It’s a little too early in the day for me,” said Gabriel.
    Kessler frowned. “Your intelligence is very precise,” he said. “Let us hope it is also accurate.”
    “It usually is. That’s how we’ve managed to survive in a very dangerous neighborhood.”
    “Are you ever going to tell me your source?”
    “It would only complicate matters.”
    “I don’t suppose this has anything to do with that missing Iranian diplomat.”
    “What missing diplomat?”
    By then, it was approaching noon. Shamron gave Gabriel a cardkey to a hotel room in the Innere Stadt and told him to get a few hours of rest. Gabriel wanted to survey the battlefield in daylight first, so he set out on foot along the Kärntnerstrasse, trailed not so discreetly by a pair of oafs from Kessler’s service. In the Stephansplatz, large crowds wandered a Lenten street fête. Gabriel briefly considered entering the cathedral to see an altarpiece he had once restored. Instead, he sliced his way through the colorful stalls and made his way to the Jewish Quarter.
    Before the Second World War, the tangle of narrow streets and alleys had been the center of one of the most vibrant and remarkable Jewish communities in the world. At its height it numbered 192,000 people, but by November 1942 only 7,000 remained, the rest having fled or been murdered in the extermination camps of Nazi Germany. But the Holocaust was not the first destruction of Vienna’s Jews. In 1421, the entire