Stone sat down and played a few chords, then struck individual keys high and low. “Very nice. Needs a tuning.”

“That can be done immediately.”

They walked back into the first room, and Stone picked a few objets d’art and a pair of mahogany wastebaskets.

“I think that will do,” Stone said. “I’ll need your eye to style the room, too, and I’ll need you to take away what’s there. You can sell it or junk it.”

“Where is all this going?”

“Couple of hundred yards down the street, there are a pair of oak doors guarding a mews. In the mews house, please.”

He looked at his watch. He gave her the street number. “How long?”

“By four o’clock,” she said.

“How much for everything?” he asked.

She sat down at a desk and began flicking through her notes, tapping numbers into a computer. “I’ll give you a bulk discount,” she said, and named a number.

“Done,” he said.

“Shall I call the piano tuner?”

“Please.” He gave her his business card and wrote down his cell number. “I’ll be waiting,” he said.

“Not for long,” she replied, accepting his AmEx card.

47

Stone stood in the mews and shook Chey Stefan’s hand. “I want to thank you for doing such a beautiful job, and for doing it so quickly.”

“It was my pleasure,” Chey said, “and I thank you for your business.” She got into the moving van containing the former living room furnishings and drove away. The guards closed the big doors behind her.

Stone walked into his new living room and looked around. The furniture, the pictures, the books, and the fresh flowers Chey had brought as a gift made the place feel as if he had always lived there. He sat down at the newly tuned Bechstein grand and began to play an old Irving Berlin song, “All Alone,” that he particularly loved.

“Freeze,” someone behind him said.

He froze. Someone had got past the guards.

“Who are you,” she asked, “and what have you done with Stone Barrington?”

Stone turned slowly to find Holly in a firing stance, a handgun held in front of her with both hands. “Welcome home,” he said.

Holly lowered the gun slowly. “What the hell is going on here? This place is completely different from the one I left this morning.”

“Nicer, isn’t it?”

She looked around. “Well, yes, it’s a lot nicer.”

“I just rearranged the furniture.”

“You did a lot more than that. There wasn’t a grand piano in this room when I left.”

“By rearranged, I meant that I moved the old furniture out and the new furniture in.”

Holly came and sat next to him on the piano bench. “Another thing,” she said, “how did you learn to play the piano in a single day?”

“I told you, I’ve always played,” he said, “just not for a long time. I got out of the habit.”

“Well, it’s a very nice habit.”

“It’s your fault that I bought the piano. You said I should play to keep my fingers in shape for other work.”

She laughed. “I did say that, didn’t I?”

Stone flexed his fingers. “Ready for duty.”

“I want a drink first,” she said. “I’ll fix one for you, too.”

She went to the wet bar, made a martini, and brought it back with a bourbon for Stone. “Play,” she said.

Stone played “The Way You Look Tonight.”

“That’s my favorite song,” she said. “How’d you know?”

“I just knew.”

They sipped their drinks and Stone played some more. The tunes kept flooding back.

“That was lovely,” she said, when he paused. “But stop for a minute while I ruin the mood.”

“What’s wrong?”

“Rick has had word that Majorov’s people think you may still be alive and are scouring the city for you. He wants me to move you to the country right now. I have a car waiting.”

“Just a minute,” Stone said. He produced his new iPhone and looked for Lance Cabot’s number, then dialed it.”

“What strange person is calling on one of my phones?” Lance asked.

“It’s Stone. My old phone died.”

“It must have drowned, from what I hear.”

“Your information is good.”

“Why have you honored me with this call, Stone? I have people in my office.”

“I’ll be brief: You know the little mews house I’m sequestered in?”

“I do, and it’s not so little.”

“I want to buy it from you.”

“What?”

“Come on, Lance, how much do you want for it?”

“It’s owned by the same Agency foundation that sold you your cousin Dick Stone’s house.”

“And you are the chairman of its board, authorized to act for it, as I recall. You did that when I bought the Maine house.”

“That’s true, I suppose.”

“Come on, Lance, I’ll let you make a small profit on the place, so you’ll look good for the board. How much did you pay?”

“It was some time ago: a million four, I think. Euros.”

“I’ll give you a million five, and I’ll bet it was dollars.”

“No, it was euros, I’m sure. A million six, and it’s yours. Euros.”

“Oh, all right, done, but fully furnished.”

“Anything that’s there. There’s a car, too, in the garage.”

“So that’s what’s under the sheet.”

“It’s an old Mercedes, I believe. The Paris station keeps it running.”

“I’ll have my office send you a check made out to the foundation and a sales contract, probably tomorrow or the next day.”

“Done, then. It’s yours from this moment on.”

“Nice doing business with you, Lance.” Stone hung up.

Holly was staring at him agape. “Did you really just do that?”

“You know, when I inherited Arrington’s fortune, I was very uncomfortable with the idea of spending any of it.”

“But you got over it,” Holly pointed out.

“The great thing about being filthy rich is that you can make snap judgments and write a check. Speaking of that, excuse me.” He called home.

“The Barrington Practice,” Joan said.

“You’re supposed to say, ‘Woodman & Weld,’” Stone pointed out.

“I forgot. You okay?”

“Never better. Listen, I just bought a little mews house in Paris.”

“Ooh! Can I come for a visit?”

“Later. Call Herbie Fisher and have him find an attorney at W&W’s Paris office and have him write a sales contract and do whatever they do in France, like a title search. The seller is the same foundation that sold me the Maine house.” He gave her the street address of the mews house. “When he’s drawn it, have him FedEx it to Lance Cabot at the CIA, and you send him a cashier’s check for a million, six hundred thousand euros, in dollars. I’d like Lance to have it all the day after tomorrow. They can e-mail the contract to you, and you can send it all together.”

“Consider it done,” Joan said.

“I miss you terribly,” he replied, and hung up before she could reply. “There,” he said to Holly.

“That was breathtaking,” she said, draining her martini glass. “Now, how are your fingers feeling?” she asked.

“Rejuvenated.”

“Then come with me,” she said, taking his hand.

48

Stone lay with his head cradled in Holly’s breasts. “That was wonderful,” he said.

“I’m impressed with the current condition of your fingers,” she said. “Maybe you don’t need to play the piano after all. How on earth could you just stop doing that?”

“I played in a jazz group in college, but I had to quit when I started law school—there just wasn’t time. Then years passed without a piano, and when I finally got one for the New York house, I was too busy to play.”

“Okay, I’ll buy that. Now it’s time for us to get out of here.”

“I’m not going anywhere,” Stone said. “This house is now my home in Paris, and I’m not moving out to avoid Yevgeny Majorov. In fact, I don’t want to avoid Yevgeny Majorov, I want to kill him.”

“I’m entirely in sympathy with that desire, nevertheless, we have to think about your safety, as well as his demise. Leave that to Rick and his boys.”