Numbered Account

Nick walked to the dresser where he kept his shirts and sweaters, and opened the bottom drawer. He reached beneath a sweatshirt and feeling the comforting heft of his side arm, allowed himself to relax a little. He had brought his service-issue Colt Commander with him from New York. It had been easy enough. He'd disassembled it and stashed its components in the corners of his suitcase to smuggle it through airport security. The bullets he'd purchased in Zurich. He pulled the holster from the drawer and tossed it onto the bed, then sat down next to it. Drawing the pistol, he checked to see if a round was still chambered. He drew back the slide and peered into the firing breech. The brass jacket of a.45-caliber hollow point smiled back at him. He released the slide and guided his finger inside the trigger guard. His thumb fell to the safety. It was off. Nick stood abruptly. Through habit long ingrained, he kept his pistol "cocked and locked." Hammer back, safety on. He brushed his finger up and down against the safety, seeing if the pinion had loosened, allowing the safety to move to the off position of its own accord. But the switch was firm. Only an intentional flick downward would disarm the safety.

Nick replaced the pistol in its holster, stuck it back in the bottom drawer, then moved to the doorway. He tried to visualize the motions of the person who had been inside his apartment. He could see a phantomlike shape moving from one side of the room to the other. Who had sent him? Thorne and his friends in the U.S. government? Or was it someone from the bank? Maeder or Schweitzer or one of their underlings assigned to check up on the new man from America? Nick crossed the room and sat on his bed. A picture of the green mountain guide's hat and the spare, olive-skinned man wearing it came to him. Had his stalker been the one who'd broken into his apartment?

Nick had no answer to any of his questions. He shuddered as a profound sense of insecurity overcame him. He felt an irrational need to check on the few treasured items he had brought with him from the States. He knew everything would be in its place, but he needed to see them and to touch them. They were the outermost extremities of his own self, and he had to be sure they had not been violated.

Nick hurried into the bathroom and picked up his shaving kit. He unzipped it and looked inside. A small blue box with the words Tiffany & Co. embossed on its lid occupied one corner. He removed the box and opened it. A chamois pouch of the same robin's egg blue rested on a bed of puffed cotton. He picked up the pouch and turned it upside down. A sterling silver Swiss army knife fell into his palm. Engraved on it were the words "Love Forever, Anna." Her good-bye present, delivered on Christmas Eve. Under the bed of cotton, folded into a tight square, was the letter that had accompanied it. He unfolded the letter and read.

My dearest Nicholas,

The holiday season finds me thinking more and more about all that we had together and all that we could have had. I can't imagine that you're no longer a part of my life. I can only hope that your heart doesn't feel as empty as mine. I remember when I first saw you dashing across Harvard Yard. You looked so funny with that patch of hair on top of your head, walking everywhere as if you were in a race. I was even a little scared of you the first time you spoke to me in front of Dr. Galbraith's econ class. Did you know that? Your beautiful eyes were so serious and your arms were wrapped so tightly around your books I thought you'd crush them. I guess you were nervous, too.

Nick, know that I never stop wondering how it would have been if I went with you to Switzerland. I know you've convinced yourself I didn't go only because of my career but there was so much more than that. Friends, family, lifelong aspirations. Most of all, though, there was YOU. Our relationship ended when you came back from your mother's funeral. You weren't the same anymore. I'd spent a year prying you out of your cocoon, making you open up and talk to me like a normal human being. Teaching you to trust me! Convincing you that not every woman was like your mother. (I'm sorry if that still hurts.) I remember seeing you sitting with Daddy at my birthday party in June, you two big lugs drinking beers and swapping stories like old buddies. We loved you, Nick. All of us. When you came back after Thanksgiving, you'd changed. You didn't smile anymore. You retreated into your own little world. Back to being a stupid soldier on a stupid mission that will never change anything about today and tomorrow and what we could have had. We could never have a future together until you stopped living in the past. I am sorry for what happened to your father, but that's over and done. You've got me going on this all over again. You do that to me, Nicholas Neumann.

Anyway… I saw this in Tiffany and thought of you.

Love forever,

Anna