Numbered Account

Then, for reasons Nick couldn't quite explain, he turned to take a final look back into the pastry shop. Perhaps he'd wanted to savor the feeling of safety the shop had provided. Or, less sentimentally, and as he would prefer to believe, he had actually felt someone's eyes upon him. But look back he did. There at the opposite entryway stood a middle-aged man of olive complexion and salt-and-pepper goatee, wrapped in a houndstooth cape. He wore an Austrian mountain guide's hat, rugged green with a sandy brush extending from its brim. The hat rose like an incomplete mountain, a shallow cleft interrupting its summit. The caped shoulders were rounded.

Nick had found his Klansman.

The man stared intently in his direction for several moments. When he realized that his subject was returning his gaze, his mouth turned upward in an insolent smile. His eyes narrowed, then he rushed from the store. The bastard was letting him know he'd been following him.

Nick remained where he was for perhaps five seconds. The realization had left him too shocked to move. Moments passed. Bewilderment was replaced by anger. Furious, he raced out the nearest exit to confront his stalker.

The Paradeplatz was jammed with hundreds of people. Nick dashed into a multitude of shoppers, commuters, and tourists. He darted through the crowd, raising himself on his tiptoes to see the people ahead. The evening gloom, the snow and mist, made it impossible to separate one group from the next. Still, he searched for the creased hat, the Holmesian cape. He circled the square twice, looking everywhere for the little man. He had to know why he was being followed. Was the man in the cape just some middle-aged freak with nothing better to do, or had someone put him up to it?

Fifteen minutes later, he decided that further search was futile. His stalker had vanished. Just as bad, sometime during his search, he'd dropped the box of pastries. Nick returned to the Bahnhofstrasse and continued south toward the lake. He noted that the crowds had thinned. Few stores were open. Every tenth step he turned and checked for the presence of his gentlemanly escort. The street was empty. Only the trail of his own footprints in the powdery snow followed him.

Nick heard the whine of an engine approaching behind him. This part of the Bahnhofstrasse was reserved for trams. Automobile traffic was limited to several blocks going north and south. He checked over his shoulder and confirmed the presence of a late-model Mercedes saloon car: black with smoked windows and consular plates. It appeared to have come from the Paradeplatz. The car gunned its motor and pulled up alongside him. The passenger window lowered and an ungoverned head of brown hair popped out.

"Mr. Nicholas Neumann," called Sterling Thorne. "You're an American, correct?"

Nick took a step back from the automobile. Wasn't he popular tonight? "Yes, I am. Swiss and American."

"We've been interested in meeting with you for a few weeks now. Did you know that you're the only American working at the United Swiss Bank?"

"I don't know all the members of the bank," answered Nick.

"Take my word for it," Thorne suggested affably. "You're flying solo." He was wrapped in a suede jacket, collar turned down to expose a lamb's wool lining. His eyes were ringed with dark circles, his cheeks sunken, pocked with a hundred pinpricks.

"How do you like working in that nest of vipers?" he asked. "I mean being an American and all."

"We're a pretty benign group. Hardly vipers." Nick matched Thorne's cordial tone, wondering where this was leading, sure it was nowhere he wanted to go.

"Well, I will agree that you fellas don't look like much, but looks can be deceiving, can they not, Mr. Neumann?"

Nick leaned down to look into the car. One look at Thorne brought back his aversion to agents of the United States government. He thought of the man in the cape with the mountain guide's hat- his stalker. He couldn't link the dignified clothing, the European headgear, the overall refined bearing with Sterling Thorne. The two were oil and water. "What can I do for you? It's snowing. I have a dinner appointment. Mind if we get to the point?"

Thorne stared straight ahead and shook his head. He chuckled in disbelief as if to say "How about that boy's manners?" "Bear with me, Nick. I think it would behoove you to listen to what a representative of Uncle Sam has to say. As I recall, we did pay your salary a few years back."

"All right. But make it brief."

"We've been keeping an eye on that bank for some time now."

"I thought you were looking at all the banks."