Page 95 of Portrait of an Unknown Woman

“A bit like a leaky faucet.”

“What about the five million I slipped you under the table on the Artemisia deal?”

“Are you referring to the newly discovered painting that I sold for a record price to a Swiss venture capitalist, only to find myself embroiled in a scandal involving the finances of the Russian president?”

“But it was great fun, wasn’t it?”

“I enjoyed the five million. The rest of it I could have lived without.”

“Fiddlesticks, Oliver. There’s nothing you love more than being the center of attention. Especially when beautiful women are involved.” Sarah paused. “Spanish women, in particular.”

“Wherever did you hear a thing like that?”

“I happen to know that you’ve been carrying a secret torch for Penélope Cruz for years.”

“Nicky,” murmured Oliver.

“It was Jeremy who told me.”

Oliver regarded Sarah for a moment. “Why do I get the feeling I’m being recruited for something?”

“Perhaps because you are.”

“Is it naughty?”

“Extremely.”

“In that case,” said Oliver, “I’m all ears.”

“Not here.”

“My place or yours?”

Sarah smiled. “Mine, Ollie.”

They slipped out of Wiltons unnoticed and walked along Duke Street to the passageway that led to Mason’s Yard. Isherwood Fine Arts was located in the northeast corner of the quadrangle, in three floors of a sagging warehouse once owned by Fortnum & Mason. Parked outside was a silver Bentley Continental. Its gleaming hood was warm to Oliver’s touch.

“Isn’t this your husband’s car?” he asked, but Sarah only smiled and unlocked the gallery’s door.

Inside, they climbed a flight of carpeted stairs, then rode the cramped lift to Julian’s upper exhibition room. In the half-light Oliver could make out two silhouetted figures. One was contemplatingBaptism of Christby Paris Bordone. The other was contemplating Oliver. He wore a dark single-breasted suit, Savile Row, perhaps Richard Anderson. His hair was sun-bleached. His eyes were bright blue.

“Hullo, Oliver,” he drawled. Then, almost as an afterthought, he added, “I’m Peter Marlowe.”

“The hit man?”

“Former hit man,” he said with an ironic smile. “I’m a wildly successful business consultant now. That’s why I drive a Bentley and have a wife who looks like Sarah.”

“I never laid so much as a finger on her.”

“Of course you didn’t.”

He placed a hand on Oliver’s shoulder and guided him toward the Bordone. The man standing before the canvas turned slowly. His green eyes seemed to glow in the faint light.

“Mario Delvecchio!” exclaimed Oliver. “As I live and breathe! Oris it Gabriel Allon? I often can’t tell them apart.” Receiving no answer, he looked at the man he knew as Peter Marlowe, then at Sarah. At least, he thought that was her name. At that moment he wasn’t certain of the ground beneath his feet. “The retired chief of Israeli intelligence, a former hit man, and a beautiful American woman who may or may not have worked for the CIA. What could you possibly want with tubby Oliver Dimbleby?”

It was the retired Israeli spymaster who answered. “Your bottomless reservoir of charm, your ability to talk your way out of almost anything, and your reputation for cutting the occasional corner.”

“Me?” Oliver feigned righteous indignation. “I resent the implication. And if it’s a dirty dealer you want, Roddy Hutchinson is most definitely your man.”