The Mark of the Assassin

team at noon. A half hour
    later, as he was boarding his private jet, a series of explosions ripped
    through the building, and the grand villa on the St. Maarten
    mountainside burned rapidly to the ground.
    CHAPTER 13.
    Breles, France.
    HE HAD TAKEN THE NAME Jean-Paul Delaroche, but in the village they
    called him Le Solitaire. No one could quite remember exactly when he had
    arrived and settled himself in the stubby stone bunker of a cottage,
    clinging to a rocky point overlooking the English Channel. Monsieur
    Didier, the crimson-faced owner of the general store, believed it was
    the wind that had driven him mad. On the loner's isolated point, the
    wind was as powerful as it was incessant. It rattled the heavy windows
    of the cottage day and night and methodically ripped tiles from the
    roof. After big storms, passersby would glimpse Le Solitaire restlessly
    contemplating the damage. "Like Rommel inspecting his precious Atlantic
    Wall," Didier would whisper with a contemptuous smirk over cognac at the
    caf& Was he a writer? Was he a revolutionary?
    Was he an art thief or a fallen priest? Mademoiselle Plauche from the
    charcuterie believed him to be the last surviving member of the
    megalithic race of people who lived in Brittany thousands of years
    before the Celts. Why else would he spend his days in communion with the
    ancient stones? Why else would he sit for hours and stare at the sea
    beating itself against the rocks? Why else would he call himself
    Delaroche? He has been here before, she would conclude, knife hovering
    above a wheel of Camembert. He is thinking about how things used to be.
    The men were jealous of him. The older ones were jealous of the
    beautiful women who came to the cottage one by one, stayed for a time,
    and then quietly left. The boys were jealous of the custom-built Italian
    racing bike that he rode like a demon each morning along the narrow back
    roads of the Finistere. The women, even the young girls and the old
    women, thought he was beautiful--the short-cropped hair flecked with
    gray, the white skin, the eyes of brilliant blue, the straight nose that
    might have been chiseled by Michelangelo. He was not a tall man, well
    under six feet, but he carried himself like one as he moved about the
    village each afternoon, doing his marketing. At the boulangerie,
    Mademoiselle Tre-vaunce sought vainly to engage him in conversation each
    time he came into the shop, but he would just smile and politely select
    his bread and croissants. At the wine shop he was regarded as a
    knowledgeable but frugal customer. When Monsieur Rodin would suggest a
    more expensive bottle, he would raise his eyebrows to show it was beyond
    his reach and carefully hand it back. At the outdoor market he would
    choose his vegetables, meat, and seafood with the fussiness of the chefs
    from the restaurants and resorts. Some days he would bring his current
    woman--always an outsider, never a local Breton girl--some days he would
    come alone. Some days he would be invited to join the men who passed the
    afternoon with red wine, goat cheese, and cards. But the loner would
    always gesture helplessly toward his watch--as if he had pressing
    matters elsewhere--and pile his things into his battered tan Mercedes
    station wagon for the journey back to his bunker by the sea. As if time
    matters in Breles, Didier would say, lips pulled down in his customary
    smirk. It is the wind, he would add. The wind has made him mad.
    THE NOVEMBER MORNING was clear and bright, wind gusting from the sea, as
    Delaroche cycled along the narrow coast road. He was riding west from
    Brest toward the Pointe-de-Saint-Mathieu. He wore snug fleece pants over
    his cycling britches and a turtleneck sweater beneath a neon-green
    anoraktight enough to avoid flapping in the wind, loose enough to
    conceal the bulky Glock 9mm automatic beneath his left armpit. Despite
    the layers of clothing, the salt-scented air cut through him like a
    knife. Delaroche put his head down and pedaled hard down to the point.
    The road flattened out for a time as he passed the crumbled,
    wind-battered ruins of a sixth-century Benedictine monastery. Then he
    rode north for several miles into a stiff wind from the sea, the road
    rising and falling rhythmically beneath him. The lightweight Italian
    bike handled the challenging terrain and conditions well. A steep hill
    stood before him. He changed gears and pedaled faster. He breasted the
    hill and entered the fishing village of