«Would you like a cigarette?»

«No, thank you.»

«Mind if I smoke, then?»

«Not at all.»

Blade reached into the breast pocket of his coat for a gold-plated cigarette case and extracted a Benson ith his other hand he reached for the cigarette lighter and shoved it in. As he did so, he also gave it a small twist to the left. With that twist, a solid-state circuit was completed, and the car's electronic tracer went on. Then he lit the cigarette, shoved the lighter back into its socket, and put the car in motion.

By the CMG's odometer, the four miles Elizabeth had mentioned were more like six. They were well out into the southwest corner of London before they stopped. For the last half of the trip they had followed a zigzag course, turning at irregular intervals down dark side streets. It was a course that made no sense at all, unless Elizabeth was trying to shake off any car that might be trailing them. Several times Blade caught her looking intently into the sideview mirror. If Elizabeth was an agent for the opposition, she was a remarkably clumsy one. Or she was a highly skilled agent pretending to be clumsy to catch him off guard. That had happened before. In fact, Blade himself had done it more than once.

Eventually Elizabeth gestured to the middle one of a trio of Victorian townhouses. Once they had been the modestly luxurious residences of city merchants or bankers; now they had fallen, if not exactly on evil days, at least on less prosperous ones. Blade could see peeling paint, unwashed windows, and untended front lawns under the dim streetlamps.

In fact, the lamplight was so dim that Blade was fully alert as they climbed out of the car. The half-dark street and the totally dark alleys could easily hide enough men to ambush a platoon. But they reached the door, climbed the stairs, and entered Elizabeth's third-floor flat without incident. The name on the flat's door was Elizabeth Hruska. A good enough Czech name.