The Kill Artist

Gabriel Allon 1 - The Kill Artist by Daniel Silva
    Author's Note
    The Kill Artist is a work of fiction and should be construed as nothing but. All characters, locales, and incidents portrayed in the novel are products of the author's imagination or have been used fictitiously. Any resemblance to any person, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. However, in order to add verisimilitude to the story and the characters, I have drawn from real episodes in the secret war between Israeli intelligence and the Palestinian guerrillas. For example, the 1988 assassination of PLO commando leader Abu Jihad happened much as it is portrayed, with minor modifications. Francesco Vecellio is a real Italian old master painter-indeed, he was the lesser-known brother of Titian-but The Adoration of the Shepherds portrayed in the novel is fictitious. Sadly, the London art gallery portrayed in The Kill Artist does not exist and neither does its owner.
    PROLOGUE
    Vienna: January 1991
    The restorer raised his magnifying visor and switched off the bank of fluorescent lights. He waited for his eyes to adjust to the murkiness of evening in the cathedral; then he inspected a tiny portion of the painting just below an arrow wound on the leg of Saint Stephen. Over the centuries the paint had worn completely down to the canvas. The restorer had so carefully repaired the damage that without the use of specialized equipment it was now quite impossible to tell his work from the original, which meant he had done his job very well indeed.
    The restorer crouched on the work platform, wiped his brushes and palette, and packed away his paints into a flat rectangular case of polished wood. Nightfall had blackened the soaring stained-glass windows of the cathedral; a blanket of new snow had muffled the usual hum of the Vienna evening rush. So quiet was the Stephansdom that the restorer would scarcely have been surprised to see a medieval sexton scurrying across the nave by torchlight.
    He climbed off the high scaffolding with the agility of a house cat and dropped silently onto the stone floor of the chapel. A knot of tourists had been watching him work for several minutes. As a rule the restorer did not like spectators-indeed, some days he shrouded the platform in a gray tarpaulin. Tonight's crowd dispersed as he pulled on a reefer coat and woolen watch cap. Softly, he bid them buona sera, instinctively recording each face in his mind, as permanently as if they were rendered with oil on canvas.
    An attractive German girl tried to engage him in conversation. She spoke to him in poor Italian. In rapid, Berlin-accented German-his mother had lived in Charlottenburg before the war-the restorer said he was late for an appointment and could not talk now. German girls made him uneasy. Reflexively his eyes wandered over her-across her large, rounded breasts, up and down her long legs. She mistook his attention for flirting, tilted her head, smiled at him through a lock of flaxen hair, suggested a coffee in the café across the square. The restorer apologized and said he had to leave. "Besides," he said, looking up at the soaring nave, "this is Stephansdom, Fraülein. Not a pickup bar."
    A moment later he passed through the entrance of the cathedral and struck out across the Stephansplatz. He was of medium height, well below six feet. His black hair was shot with gray at the temples. His nose was rather long and angular, with sharp edges across the bridge that left the suggestion it had been carved from wood. Full lips, cleft chin, cheekbones broad and square. There was a hint of the Russian steppes in his eyes-almond shaped, unnaturally green, very quick. His vision was perfect, despite the demanding nature of his work. He had a confident walk, not an arrogant swagger or a march but a crisp, purposeful stride that seemed to propel him effortlessly across the snowbound square. The box containing his paints and brushes was under his left arm, resting on the metal object that he wore, habitually, on his left hip.
    He walked along the Rotenturmstrasse, a broad pedestrian mall lined with bright shops and cafés, pausing before shop windows, peering at sparkling Mont Blanc pens and Rolex watches, even though he had no need for such things. He stopped at a snow-covered sausage stand, purchased a käsewurst, dropped it into a rubbish bin a hundred yards away without taking a bite. He entered a telephone booth, slipped a schilling into the coin slot, punched a random