LITMIR.BIZ

       5

       FLORIDSDORF, VIENNA

      The Passat sedan was equipped with Volkswagen’s newest version of all-wheel drive. A right turn at one hundred kilometers per hour on fresh snow, however, was far beyond its abilities. The rear tires lost traction, and for an instant Mikhail feared they were about to spin out of control. Then, somehow, the tires regained their grip on the pavement, and the car, with one last spasm of fishtailing, righted itself.

      Mikhail lightened his hold on the armrest. “Have much experience driving in winter conditions?”

      “A great deal,” replied Keller calmly. “You?”

      “I grew up in Moscow.”

      “You left when you were a kid.”

      “I was sixteen, actually.”

      “Did your family own a car?”

      “In Moscow? Of course not. We rode the Metro like everyone else.”

      “So you never actually drove a car in Russia in winter.”

      Mikhail did not dispute Keller’s observation. They were back on the Taborstrasse, flashing past an industrial park and warehouse complex, about a hundred meters behind the motorcycle. Mikhail was reasonably acquainted with Vienna’s geography. He judged, correctly, that they were heading in an easterly direction. There was a border to the east. He reckoned they would need one soon.

      The bike’s brake light flared red.

      “He’s turning,” said Mikhail.

      “I see him.”

      The bike made a left and briefly disappeared from sight. Keller approached the corner without slowing. An ugly Viennese streetscape flowed sideways across the windscreen for several seconds before he was able to bring the car under control again. The motorcycle was now at least two hundred meters ahead.

      “He’s good,” said Keller.

      “You should see the way he handles a gun.”

      “I did.”

      “Thanks for the help.”

      “What was I supposed to do? Distract him?”

      Before them rose the Millennial Tower, a fifty-one-floor office-and-residential building standing on the western bank of the Danube. Keller’s speed approached a hundred and fifty as they crossed the river, and still the bike was slipping away. Mikhail wondered how long it would take the Bundespolizei to notice them. About as long, he reckoned, as it would take to pull a passport from the pocket of a dead Russian courier.

      The bike disappeared around another corner. By the time Keller negotiated the same turn, the taillight was a prick of red in the night.

      “We’re losing him.”

      Keller pressed his foot to the floor and kept it there. Just then, Mikhail’s mobile pulsed. He took his eyes from the taillight long enough to read the message.

      “What is it?” asked Keller.

      “Gabriel wants an update.” Mikhail typed a brief response and looked up again. “Shit,” he said softly.

      The taillight was gone.

      It was Alois Graf, a pensioner and quiet supporter of an Austrian far-right party—not that that had anything to do with what transpired—who was ultimately to blame. Recently a widower, Graf had been having trouble sleeping of late. In fact, he could not remember the last time he had managed more than two or three hours since the death of his beloved Trudi. The same was true of Shultzie, his nine-year-old dachshund. Actually, the little beast was not really his, it was Trudi’s. Shultzie had never much cared for Graf, or Graf for Shultzie. And now they were cellmates, sleepless and depressed, comrades in grief.

      The dog was well trained in the etiquette of elimination, and reasonably considerate of others. Lately, however, it had been having urges at the damnedest times. Graf was considerate, too, and he never protested when Shultzie came to him in the small hours with that desperate look in his resentful little eyes.

      On that night, the summons occurred at 12:25 a.m., according to the clock on Graf’s bedside table. Shultzie’s favorite spot was the little patch of grass adjacent to the American fast-food restaurant on the Brünnerstrasse. This pleased Graf. He thought the restaurant, if you could call it that, an eyesore. But then again, Graf had never been fond of Americans. He was old enough to remember Vienna after the war, when it was a divided city of spies and misery. Graf had preferred the British to the Americans. The British, at least, were possessed of a certain low cunning.

      To reach Shultzie’s little promised land required crossing the Brünnerstrasse itself. Graf, a former schoolmaster, looked right and left before stepping from the curb. It was then he saw the single headlamp of a motorcycle approaching from the direction of the city center. He paused with indecision. The bike was a long way off; there was no sound. Surely, he could reach the opposite side with time to spare. Nevertheless, he gave Shultzie’s leash a little jerk, lest the dog loiter in the middle of the street, as he was fond of doing.

      Halfway across the road, Graf cast another glance toward the motorcycle. In a matter of three or four seconds, it had covered a great deal of ground. It was traveling at an extremely high rate of speed, a fact evidenced by the high, tight note of the engine, which Graf could now hear quite clearly. Shultzie could hear it, too. The dog stood still as a statue, and no amount of tugging on Graf’s part could compel him to move.

      “Komm, Shultzie! Mach schnell!”

      Nothing. It was as if the creature were frozen to the asphalt.

      The bike was approximately a hundred meters away, about the length of the sporting field at Graf’s old school. He reached down and snatched the dog, but it was too late; the bike was upon them. It veered suddenly, passing so close to Graf’s back it seemed to pluck at the fabric of his overcoat. An instant later he heard the terrible metallic crunch of the collision and saw a figure in black soaring through the air. He might have thought the man capable of flight, he flew so far. But the next sound, the sound of his body smacking the pavement, put that lie to rest.

      He somersaulted over and over again for several more meters, horribly, until finally he came to rest. Graf considered going to check on him, if only to confirm the obvious, but another vehicle, a car, was approaching at high speed from the same direction. With Shultzie in his arms, Graf stepped quickly from the

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