Dalton shook his head.

"Not at the time. If I lost that fight, was he gonna give me me a break?" a break?"

Naumann shrugged, running a hand across the flat of his stomach, stroking the cashmere in an idle way.

"Maybe it didn't bug you then then. Seems to be bugging you now now. If you were okay with it, you'd have lit up these mooks ten minutes ago-"

"These mooks a special case, are they? Massacre of the innocents? Calling for divine intervention?"

Naumann looked over at the men again, considering.

"Nah, I've read their files. They're rotten rotters through and through. World is a better place, you cap them off. If they live through this, so I hear, they go on to perform pernicious prodigies of predaceous persiflage-"

"What the hell is 'persiflage'?"

"Hey, I'm freewheeling here. Point is, instead of capping them off, you're standing around blowing the gaff with a dead man. Think about it."

"For chrissakes, Porter-"

Naumann lifted his hands, palms out, smiled gently at him.

"All I'm saying, Micah . . . All I'm saying is, it's your call. See you."

And he was gone. Dalton stood blinking at the couch for a while and then turned around and looked down at the prisoners, both of whom were staring up at him, their expressions a mixture of dread and puzzlement.

"How about you two? Anything to add?"

It seemed, from their continued silence, that they did not.

Dalton stared at them for a while, then tucked the Beretta away and left the galley. He found Levka up in the pilot cabin, listening to very loud music and staring fixedly out at the Bosphorus. They were within a half mile of the Bosphorus Bridge and even at that distance the air was full of the roar and rumble and clang of the traffic streaming across it. Levka sat up straighter, offered Dalton one of his own Sobranies.

Dalton took it, lit up, and stood for a moment watching the river traffic churning and chugging all around them, the tree-filled eastern shoreline gliding by on their starboard side, the little island with the Maiden's Tower on it slipping sternward.

The Subito Subito's long, sleek bow rose and fell gracefully on the crosscutting chop. Sunlight sparkled on the blue water. Gulls and terns and herons and pelicans wheeled and shrieked in the chilly air. The stench and burn of diesel fuel thickened as they got closer to the smoky haze drifting down from the bridge deck.

"You hear from Mandy yet?" he asked.

"Yes, boss. She have house all ready. Maybe half mile up from Sumahan Hotel. Big white house with pillars all along the dock, she says. Red-tiled roof. Green awnings. She say we can't miss it."

"Got a boathouse big enough for this barge?"

"Boss, is no barge, is like swan. Best boat in whole world!"

"I apologize. Big enough, anyway?"

"Yes, sir, sixty feet. Has big electric door comes down."

Dalton nodded, thinking about the two men down in the galley.

Levka seemed to follow his thoughts.

"So, what to do with Kissmyass and Numbnuts, yes?"

Dalton said nothing, looking out at the hills on the western shore, at a pale blue glimmer of glass far to the north.

"Look," said Levka, a bit nervously, "no offense, I can . . . take care of this . . . for you."

Dalton looked at him and came to a decision.

"This Dizayn Tower, it's right by that Diamond up there, isn't it?"

"Yes, boss."

"There's a wharf just ahead here, on the port side. See it?"

Levka shaded his eyes from the glare off the water, squinted.

"Yes, by Dolmabahce Palace."

"Put me ashore there."

Levka looked uneasy.

"You gonna go to Dizayn Tower all by yourself?"

"Yes. I want you to take the boat up to wherever Mandy is, get it out of sight for a while, and go over this boat, see if you can find anything on it that connects to the night this Lujac was supposed to have died. I don't know what it might be, but Mandy's done that kind of thing before."

"We wait there for you?"

"No. I don't know what I'm gonna find at this building. Maybe nothing. But Kissmyass had a bar bill on him from the Double Eagle. You know it?"

"Yes. Is wharf bar in Kerch. Uncle Gavel and me, we drink there."

"And Kerch is where you ran into the Gray Man."

"So we going to Kerch?"

"Yes, but not by chopper. It's not safe to go back there. The Turks will have found it by now-"

"Is true, boss. On radio just now, they saying no chopper found off Bandirma. Big search now for UN Blackhawk stolen from Santorini."

"Yeah? Well, that settles it. We'll take the boat."

"Boss, is five hundred miles across Black Sea to Kerch! Also icy cold as trout nipples. Lots of open water too. No place to hide."

"No help for it. Have the boat stocked and fueled and ready to go by midafternoon. I'll call you and tell you where to pick me up."

"And if no call?"

"Then Miss Pownall's in charge. You're working for her. Do whatever she tells you. And you keep her safe, Levka. Keep her safe safe. You follow?"

Levka met his eyes, held his look without wavering.

"I follow. I keep her safe no matter what. Word of soldier. How about those guys down there?"

Dalton turned and squared up with him.

"You see that little island back there?" he asked, pointing at the Maiden's Tower, its lights beginning to glow against the twilit coast behind it. Levka nodded, looking puzzled.

"Sure. Nothing there but old tower. Nobody goes there in winter. All shut down."

"After you drop me off, take them back down there, uncuff them and drop them off. As they are, butt naked. No papers, no ID, no cash. Turks aren't going to like a couple of naked Russians flitting about one of their tourist sites. It'll take them a week to sort it all out. By then, we'll be long gone."

Levka shook his head, looked uneasy.

"This will be problem, boss. If they talk good, be back in business pretty quick. Know all about us. Should do the smart thing."

"I didn't shoot you. Was that a smart thing?"

Levka took that in.

"No. You not shoot Levka. Maybe we gonna hire these guys too?"

Dalton shook his head.

"No. But I'm not gonna kill them either."

Levka said nothing and had an odd look in his eyes.

"Know what, Levka?"

"Yes, boss," he said, not making eye contact.

"Maybe we better drop these guys off first first and then you put me on shore, okay?" and then you put me on shore, okay?"

Levka looked hurt.

"You do not trust Levka?"

"I do not trust Levka not to tip these boys over the side as soon as I'm off the boat."

Levka looked over at Dalton, gave him a sudden smile.

"Okeydokey, boss. No offense taken."

SANTORINI, THE AEGEAN SEA.

SANTORINI FIELD.

Until he actually met her, Captain Sofouli had not been very happy about having an American official, especially a female female American official, dropped smack into the middle of the worst professional embarrassment he'd had since Costa-Gavras had based a character in American official, dropped smack into the middle of the worst professional embarrassment he'd had since Costa-Gavras had based a character in Z Z on him. But when Nikki Turrin had climbed down the ladder of the Hellenic Air Force Super Puma that had brought her from Athens to Santorini and he had gotten a look at her in the cold light of the winter sun, he had a change of heart. on him. But when Nikki Turrin had climbed down the ladder of the Hellenic Air Force Super Puma that had brought her from Athens to Santorini and he had gotten a look at her in the cold light of the winter sun, he had a change of heart.

He had been expecting an angular and bloodless young careerist such as he had seen on American newsreels, striding purposefully down the corridors of power in D.C. in pencil skirts and blouses, firing along on sensible heels, their faces as sharp as Chippewa hatchets. This was not at all what stepped out of the hatchway of the Super Puma.

Sofouli watched with profound masculine appreciation as a supple and shapely young auburn-haired woman wearing a long tan trench coat over a navy skirt, a crisp white blouse, and outrageous blue high heels, emerged from the chopper, assisted by two very attentive young flyers, who escorted her down the steps and walked on either side of her across the windswept tarmac, reluctantly surrendering Miss Nikki Turrin, of the American NSA, to the care of Captain Sofouli, Prefect of Tourist Police, Santorini Division, with crisp salutes.

Nikki, shaking Sofouli's hand, liked what she saw: a large, weather-beaten older man, trim in a black police uniform, with deep creases around his eyes and mouth, intelligent black eyes with a blue spark deep inside them, and salt-and-pepper mustache setting off strong white teeth, as he smiled down at her and offered his hand, which was strong yet gentle.

"I am Captain Sofouli. Welcome to Santorini, Miss Turrin."

"Thank you," said Nikki, pausing to take in the shimmering plain of the Aegean stretched out below the cliffs, dazzling in the setting sun, and the jagged rocks of the islands across the lagoon.

Sofouli turned and indicated the jumble of white buildings scattered across the clifftops to the west, pointing to a low, white Art Deco hotel a few miles distant.

"That is the Porto Fira Suites. We found the body on the rocks below it. Would you like to see the room they stayed in?"

"Yes, I would."

She ended up in Sofouli's black Benz, the middle car in a convoy that followed the switchback highway as it climbed up toward the western edge of the caldera wall. As they bounced over the rocky terrain, Sofouli, sitting beside Nikki and enjoying her scent immensely, managed to stay professional, filling her in on what had taken place so far.

"It seems that one of my men, a Sergeant Keraklis, was corrupt. I make no excuse for myself. I made the mistake of thinking myself in an easy posting, and I have paid for my lack of attention. The man in the water-you may see the body if you wish, although I do not recommend it-was a man named Gavel Kuldic. He was identified by Interpol as a Croatian criminal, born in Legrad, near the Hungarian border. There was another man with him, named Dobri Levka, also from Legrad. They were what you could call 'soldiers of fortune, ' I guess, taking whatever work they could find. For reasons I do not yet know, my sergeant-"

"Keraklis?"

"Yes, Zeno Keraklis. For some reason, he brought these men to my island, telling me they were cousins. To my shame, I did not check this. The night in question, after my interview with the two Americans . . . I am right that they were with your Central Intelligence Agency?"

"I can't confirm that at all, Captain Sofouli. Our two agencies are not on good terms with each other lately-"

"Yet here you are, from the National Security Agency yourself. You will admit that there is a connection at least with American intelligence. I was a part of that world myself, Miss Turrin, many years ago. I know how these things work. I know you would not be here at all if this did not touch upon American interests at the highest level. Please do not . . . condescend."

Nikki considered the man for a while, thinking this through.

"Okay, I won't condescend. Personally, I think these two individuals, whose names I cannot confirm-"

"Certainly not Pearson, at least."

"Yes, certainly not Pearson. I think they were acting as private citizens-they showed you no official ID, never implied that they were American intelligence officers?"

Sofouli nodded.

"I think-my Agency thinks-that they were acting as private citizens, and that they were trying to confirm the death of a man named Kirik Lujac and that you confirmed this for them. Is that correct?"

Sofouli looked out the window for a time. They were rolling down the main street of Fira now, the convoy making a left turn toward the Porto Fira Suites, far out on a promontory overlooking the Aegean.

"I think first we will look at the evidence and then we will talk. Come, let me show you the room where they stayed."