Portrait of a Spy by Daniel Silva Page A

that two SO19 officers had been dispatched to Covent Garden but said they had no choice under existing policy but to hold their fire. As for reports of a weapon being drawn, police had questioned the man involved and determined it was not a gun but a camera. For reasons of privacy, the man’s identity would not be revealed. The press appeared to accept the Met’s version of events, as did the civil libertarians, who applauded the restraint shown by the police even if it had meant the loss of eighteen innocent lives.
    Gabriel switched off the television as Chiara entered the kitchen. She immediately opened a window to drive out the stench of the ox bile and vinegar and berated Gabriel for fouling her favorite stainless steel saucepan. Gabriel only smiled and dipped the tip of his forefinger into the mixture. It was now cool enough to use. With Chiara peering over his shoulder, he applied the glue evenly over the yellowed varnish and adhered several rectangles of tissue paper to the surface. Titian’s handiwork was now invisible and would remain so for the next several days, until the relining was complete.
    Gabriel could do no more work that morning except to check on the painting periodically to make certain the glue was drying properly. He sat in the covered gazebo overlooking the sea, a notebook computer on his lap, and scoured the Internet for more information about the three bombings. He was tempted to check in with King Saul Boulevard but thought better of it. He had neglected to inform Tel Aviv of his brush with terror in Covent Garden, and to do so now would only give his former colleagues an excuse to intrude on his life. Gabriel had learned from experience it was best to treat the Office like a jilted lover. Contact had to be kept to a minimum and was best conducted in public places where a messy scene would be inappropriate.
    Shortly before noon, the last remnants of a midnight gale passed over Gunwalloe Cove, leaving in its wake a clear sky of crystalline blue. After making one final check of the painting, Gabriel pulled on an anorak and a pair of hiking boots and headed out for his daily march along the cliffs. The previous afternoon he had trooped north along the Coastal Path to Praa Sands. Now he mounted the small rise behind the cottage and headed south toward Lizard Point.
    It did not take long for the magic of the Cornish coast to chase away the memories of the dead and wounded in Covent Garden. Indeed, by the time Gabriel had reached the fringes of Mullion Golf Club, the last terrible image was safely concealed beneath a layer of obliterating paint. As he pressed farther south, past the rocky outcropping of the Polurrian Cliffs, he thought only of the work to be done on the Titian. Tomorrow he would carefully remove the painting from its stretcher and then adhere the weakened canvas to a swath of fresh Italian linen, pressing it firmly into place with a heavy tailoring iron. Next came the longest and most arduous phase of the restoration—removing the cracked and yellowed varnish and retouching those portions of the painting lost to time and stress. While some restorers tended to be aggressive in their retouching, Gabriel was known throughout the art world for the lightness of his touch and his uncanny ability to mimic the brushstrokes of the Old Masters. He believed it was the duty of a restorer to come and go without being seen, leaving no evidence of his presence other than a painting returned to its original glory.
    By the time Gabriel reached the northern end of Kynance Cove, a line of dark clouds had obscured the sun, and the sea wind had turned markedly colder. A keen observer of Cornwall’s capricious weather, he could see that the “bright interval,” as British meteorologists liked to call periods of sunshine, was about to come to an abrupt end. He paused for a moment, debating where to take shelter. To the east, across a patchwork-quilt landscape, was Lizard village. Directly ahead was the