home. the stranger might well have lived on indefinitely as courmayeur's very own international man of mystery, had he not walked into that grocery store one night and struck up a conversation with a woman behind the register. that is where our story takes another fateful turn because it was in that moment that the rich american proceeded to make a mistake that has proved the undoing of men ever since adam accepted that apple from eve. the man who called himself mark stern was about to fall in love. for more than two years, mark weinberger walked the streets of europe safe in the anonymity of crowds. according to "vanity fair" writer buzz bissinger, he cut away people from the past, anyone who knew his name with the cool detachment of a surgeon.