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over in the twentieth arrondissement; that was about as far west as you could possibly go and still be in the City of Lights. It is not the kind of neighborhood in which you’d expect to locate an urbane Foreign Minister. The suave and expensively tailored St. Martin had never been to La Piscine.
    Nonetheless, they had both been ordered to the sumptuous offices on the Quai d’Orsay by the President of France himself. And the current resident of the Elysée Palace was due there in the next few minutes.
    St. Martin, who had spent the night at the apartment of one of the most beautiful actresses in France, was a great deal more irritated by the intrusion into his life than Savary.
     
    Both men were around the same age, fiftyish, but the Secret Service chief was a lifelong career officer in undercover operations. For him the call in the middle of the night was routine. No matter the time, he was instantly operational, and he had been for ten years responsible for the planning of black operations conducted on behalf of the government of France, using both military forces and civilian agents.
    A lithe, fit, and slightly morose man, Savary had even taken part personally in various French adventures. He would, as ever, admit nothing, but he was reputed to have been operational in the attack and subsequent sinking of the Greenpeace freighter in Auckland Harbor, New Zealand, in July 1985. Interference with the Pacific nuclear tests conducted by France?
    NON! JAMAIS! was Savary’s view of that.
    “Would you like to remove your raincoat?” asked the Foreign Minister. “Since we are shortly to be in the presence of our President.”
    Savary, without a word, took the coat off and slung it over the back of a near-priceless Louis Quinze chair, owned originally by the Duchess of Bourbon, the King’s sister, for whom the massive next-door Palais Bourbon had been built. Stormed and captured by the mob during the Revolution, today the former private residence served as the French Parliament, but retained its original name, Bourbon. It was a reminder of the blistering pace in opulence that those old French aristos had set for the Saudi royal family to emulate.
    St. Martin stared at the spy’s raincoat over the back of the late King’s chair, and…well, winced.
    He pressed a small bell for the butler to bring them some coffee, but his prime purpose was to get rid of the garment owned by Jean-Claude Raincoat or whatever his damned name was . St. Martin had always harbored a sneaking regard for the Bourbons and their excellent taste.
    “I don’t suppose you have the slightest idea what this is all about?” he said.
    “Absolutely none,” replied the intelligence chief. “I just received a phone call from the Palais Elysée and was told that the President wished to see me in your office at five-fifteen A.M. Here I am, n’est-ce pas? ”
    “My summons was exactly the same. My mobile phone rang at one-thirty A.M . God knows what this is all about.”
    “Maybe le Président is about to declare war?”
    “Not, I hope, on the United States.”
    Savary smiled for the first time. But just then their coffee arrived, for three, as requested. St. Martin had the butler pour just two cups and asked him to hang Savary’s raincoat in the hall closet.
    Almost immediately a phone rang on his enormous desk and a voice announced that the presidential car had arrived at the portals of the Foreign Office. Pierre St. Martin poured the third cup of coffee himself.
    Three minutes later he was most surprised to see that the President was entirely alone: no secretary, no aides, no officials. He closed the door himself and said quietly, “Pierre, Gaston, thank you for coming so early. Would you please ensure that our discussion is conducted entirely in secret. Perhaps a guard outside the door.”
    St. Martin made a short phone call, handed the President a cup of coffee, and motioned for everyone to be seated, the President on a fine drawing room upright