So yes, plenty to dislike here, Boris thought, as he instructed his taxi driver to drop him along the Briennerstrasse, at the beginning of the Kunstareal, Munich’s art district. From there, he walked briskly to the Neue Pinakothek, the museum concentrating on European art of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Inside, he stopped at the information booth for a map, and then made his way to the gallery that housed Francisco de Goya’s Plucked Turkey. Not a major work, Boris thought as he approached it.

A group stood contemplating the painting as a guide went through her spiel. Boris, standing to one side, waited in vain for her to mention whether or not Plucked Turkey had been one of the paintings stolen by the Nazis. His mind clicked over his responsibilities. Before leaving Moscow he had issued orders to Anton Fedarovich and left the day-to-day running of FSB-2 to him. But by definition that had to be temporary, since Boris was still in the process of shaping the organization to his desires and hadn’t yet weeded out all the dead potatoes. From the outset he’d given himself five days at most to deal with Cherkesov’s assignment. He could not count on FSB-2 being run properly without him longer than that.

Eventually, the group moved on, leaving in its wake a man who remained contemplating the Goya. He seemed unremarkable in every way: medium height, middle-aged, salt-and-pepper hair with a bald spot on his crown. His hands were plunged deep into the pockets of his overcoat. His shoulders were slightly hunched, as if they were supporting an invisible weight.

“Good morning,” Boris said in passable German as he came up beside the man. “Our cousin regrets he could not come in person.” This contact was one of thousands cultivated over the decades by Ivan Volkin. As such, he was unimpeachable.

“How is the old gentleman?” the man said in passable Russian.

“Feisty as ever.”

The coded exchange having been made, the two men strolled together through the gallery, stopping at each painting in turn.

“How can I help?” the man said softly.

His name was Wagner, most likely a field moniker. That was fine by Boris; he felt no need to know Wagner’s real name. Ivan had vouched for him—that was enough.

“I’m looking for connections,” Boris said.

A faint smile crossed Wagner’s lips. “Everyone who comes to me is looking for connections.”

They had moved on and were now in front of Friedrich Wilhelm von Schadow’s The Holy Family Beneath the Portico, in Boris’s view a thoroughly reprehensible subject, like all religious themes, though he could appreciate the clarity of the artist’s style.

“Involving Viktor Cherkesov?”

For a time, Wagner did nothing but stare intently at the painting. “Von Schadow was a soldier first,” he said at last. “Then he found God, went to Rome, and became one of the leaders of the so-called Nazarene Movement, dedicated to bringing true spirituality to Christian art.”

“I couldn’t care less,” Boris said.

“I’m sure.”

Wagner said this in a way that made Karpov feel like a philistine.

“As to Cherkesov,” Boris pressed.

Wagner moved them on. He let out a sigh. “What, specifically, do you want to know?”

“He was just in Munich. Why was he here?”

“He went to the Mosque,” Wagner said. “That’s all I know.”

Boris hid his consternation. “I need more than that,” he said evenly.

“The secrets of the Mosque are closely guarded.”

“I understand that.” What Boris couldn’t understand was what possible business Cherkesov’s new master might have with the Mosque. Viktor seemed about the last person to be sending into that particular snake pit. Cherkesov hated Muslims even more than Germans. He spent most of his time in FSB-2 hunting down ethnic Chechen Muslim terrorists.

“It’s exceedingly dangerous to poke into the Mosque’s business.”

“I know that, too.” Boris was well aware that the Mosque in Munich was ground zero for many of the Muslim extremist terrorist groups the world over. The Mosque indoctrinated disaffected young men and women, fired their hopelessness, channeled their frustration into anger. Then it trained them into cadres, armed them, and funded their subsequent flares of violence.

Wagner thought a moment. “There is someone who might be able to help you.” He bit his lip. “His name is Hermann Bolger. He’s a watchmaker. He also watches the goings-on at the Mosque.” His lips curled into a smile. “Amusing, no?”

“No,” Boris said flatly. “Where can I find Herr Bolger?”

Wagner told him the address and Boris committed it to memory. They visited two more paintings for show. Immediately thereafter, Wagner left. Boris consulted his map, wandering through the remainder of the galleries for the next twenty minutes.

Then he went in search of Hermann Bolger.

The rain fell like shouted words, like commands to the troops, with the fatal crash of ancient armies locked in hand-to-hand combat. Bourne stood beside a vaulting pine, its black branches swept by the wind, battered by the rain.

From this vantage point, he witnessed the explosion rip the jeep apart, the pieces crashing down, in flames for only seconds before the torrent doused them. Twisted junk fountained in all directions, two parts landing within three feet of where he hid: the blackened steering wheel and Suarez’s head, stinking, still smoking as if fresh from a barbecue pit. Suarez’s lips, nose, and ears had been burned away. The remains of his eyes were smoking as if he were a creature from hell.

Bourne, seeing Vegas clomp down the front steps of his house, stepped back within the dense shadow of the looming pine. From this distance, he looked like he was wearing old-fashioned hobnailed boots. Bourne noted the shotgun he carried, but that was hardly his most dangerous aspect. Vegas’s eyes were like living coals. His bloody-minded demeanor reminded Bourne of a grizzly he had observed in Montana protecting her cubs from a marauding mountain lion. He wondered whom Vegas was protecting himself and Rosie from. This electronic setup must have been weeks in the making; it certainly wasn’t meant for Bourne.

Who then?

You’re out of your mind,” Suarez had said when Bourne had stopped the jeep a thousand yards from Vegas’s house. “I’m not doing that.”

“It’s the only way you’re going to get some medical help,” Bourne had replied.

“Once you get out, what’s to stop me turning the jeep around and getting the hell out of here?”

“The only way out is back down the mountain,” Bourne said. The rain was so torrential it felt like being inside a waterfall. “You’ll be driving with one hand. You’re welcome to kill yourself any way you want.”

Suarez had delivered a murderous glare, but a moment later he just looked glum. “What evil moon was I born under to have crossed paths with you?”

Bourne opened the door and a roar like the end of the world rushed into the jeep. “Just stick to the plan and everything will be fine. You make the direct approach. Vegas knows you. I’ll come around from the rear. Are we clear?”

Suarez nodded resignedly. “My hand is killing me. I can’t feel the fingers you broke.”

“You’re lucky,” Bourne said. “Imagine how much worse the pain would be if you did.”

Slipping out of the jeep, he was completely drenched in seconds. He watched Suarez slide awkwardly over behind the wheel and move off down the road toward the house.

Bourne had seen the first of the infrared camera posts and had immediately stopped the jeep, though he hadn’t told Suarez why. It was disguised as a mile marker. He recognized the equipment because he’d come across the same scenario in a villa in the mountains of Romania several years ago. The system was highly sophisticated, state-of-the-art, but in the end Bourne had defeated it and gained access to the villa. Even if Suarez had noticed the mile marker, Bourne doubted he’d know what he was looking at.