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fitted with a Ruston 12RK diesel engine stolen from a Royal Navy River Class Patrol Vessel, that might be very fast indeed. Finally, should a police launch attempt to come close, there was a point-defense weapon system based on the famous Goalkeeper technology developed by the Dutch, with autocannon and advanced radar concealed beneath false panels on the foredeck. This was capable of firing seventy rounds per second at a distance of up to 1500 meters. If necessary, Scorpia was both willing and able to start a small war in the heart of Paris.
    The ship was called Le Débiteur, which might be translated as “someone who leaves without paying their debts.” Such people used to be called fly-by-nights.
    As Grendel had argued, there would be something very calming about discussing business while cruising past some of the most beautiful buildings in Europe, particularly when the business was as dangerous as theirs.
    Sabotage. Corruption. Intelligence. And assassination. These were the four activities that had given Scorpia its name. It was actually here in Paris that it had been formed, a collection of intelligence agents from around the world who had seen that their services might no longer be needed after the end of the Cold War and who had decided to go into business for themselves. It had been a wise move. Secret agents are generally very badly paid. For example, the head of MI5 in England receives only two hundred thousand a year—a tiny amount compared with any investment banker. Every member of Scorpia had multiplied his annual income by a factor of ten. And none of them paid any tax.
    There were now twelve of them and they were all men. There had once been a woman on the executive committee, but she had been killed in London and had never been replaced. Altogether, six of them had died—one from natural causes. The current chief executive was Zeljan Kurst, sitting at one end of the table in a charcoal gray suit, white shirt, and black tie. As he had explained in London, Scorpia had recently taken on four new recruits—although they had been forced to look outside the intelligence community. There was a ginger-haired Irishman who called himself Seamus and had been with the IRA. A pair of twin brothers had been brought in from the Italian mafia. And finally there was Razim.
    Scorpia was on the way up. That was the message they wanted to make clear to the world. They were taking back the control they should never have lost.
    The twelve executives arrived individually and at five-minute intervals, some in chauffeured cars, some on foot, one even on a bicycle. Only Giovanni and Eduardo Grimaldi, the twins, arrived together, but then, in twenty-five years they had never spent a minute apart. At exactly three o’clock, the deckhands lifted the anchor. The captain pushed forward on the throttle and Le Débiteur slipped out onto the river, beginning its journey east toward the Eiffel Tower and Notre Dame.
    Zeljan Kurst waited until they were on their way before he spoke. He didn’t greet anyone by name. Such matters were a waste of words. Nor did he offer anyone a drink, not even a glass of water. None of these people trusted each other, so they would only have refused it anyway. If he had any recollection of his narrow escape in London, he didn’t show it. His eyes were heavy. He almost looked bored.
    “Good day to you, gentlemen,” he began. As usual, the English language sounded peculiarly ugly coming out of his lips, but it had long since been agreed that English was the only language they would speak. “We have come together today to agree upon our tactics for an operation that we have called Horseman and that will earn us the sum of forty million dollars when it is successfully completed. As you all know, I have given the management of this business to Mr. Razim.”
    Kurst glanced sideways. As he had expected, there was a brief flash of anger in the single eye of the Israeli agent, Levi Kroll. This was the third