Ishmael Covenant

by Terry Brennan

  With a national election scheduled for August, Kashani was steering a delicate course between this existing secular democracy and a growing Islamic activism in his people.

  While President Kashani was encumbered by Turkey’s delicate balancing act on the international scene and the crucial upcoming election, it was Prime Minister Eroglu who was assigned by Kashani the vital task of thwarting the rebirth of Persia—the ancient empire where what is now Iran and Iraq marched under the same flag. A reborn alliance of Iran and Iraq, a new Persia, would be a direct threat to Kashani’s dream of a new Ottoman Empire. Both the Ottomans and the Persians would covet the same territory: all of the Middle East, land each empire had once ruled.

  Noah Webster not only found himself in collusion with an agent of a foreign power, but also financially and politically supported in that collusion by a shadow cabinet of bankers and power brokers. If this scheme were to be uncovered …

  So who knew? That was a good question. Noah Webster’s future and freedom may depend upon the answer. Carson wasn’t sure if her answer was entirely accurate. But it was the only answer she could give him and remain this close to real power.

  “Three—you and I, and Eroglu.”

  “Are you sure?” Webster stood up from his chair, leaned his knuckles on top of his desk, and glared at his chief of staff. “Cleveland told Mullaney that somebody must have had inside information on the fact that Kashani’s plans and location had changed. Morningstar brought it up at the debrief. You know that nugget will get back to Kashani … that he’s probably been betrayed by someone in his inner circle. When the Turks start looking for the traitor, what will they find? Are our conversations with Eroglu secure? Any disclosure at this point would destroy us. And Cleveland is no fool. What else might he know? If he were to suspect …”

  Carson didn’t flinch. She kept her eyes fixed on Webster. “Our conversations with Prime Minister Eroglu are secure. Nobody knows about them except you and me … and whomever you may have informed.”

  Webster held her gaze so long, Carson felt her concentration waver. Then he turned and faced the windows behind his desk. “And Cleveland has no suspicions?”

  “I can’t speak as to what is in Ambassador Cleveland’s thinking.”

  “No.” Webster’s word hung suspended in silence. “No, you can’t, can you.”

  Webster stood silently at the window, his hands clasped behind his back, rocking gently on the balls of his feet.

  “You and I are risking everything, Nora,” said Webster. “But if we succeed, our country will avoid a disastrous mistake, our world will be safer, and the peace of our nation more secure. Then my friends become your friends. And where I go, you go. And we could go a long way.”

  She knew the dream in Webster’s mind. It was nearly palpable as he gazed down on Washington’s beauty. Carson understood and shared that longing.

  Webster turned away from the windows. With a crisp, determined gait, he stepped up to his desk. “So … two things. First, just as a precaution, you will get rid of Joseph Atticus Cleveland and you will get rid of him now. I want him sent to Mongolia if possible.”

  Nora Carson fumed on the inside at the self-centered arrogance of Noah Webster. How had she come to sell her soul to this man? Ordering her to have Joseph Atticus Cleveland relieved of his duties after thirty years of exemplary service? And facing a deadlocked Senate with a huge backlog of waiting appointments? There was no way to engineer Cleveland’s demise. But there was a solution.

  “Mongolia is filled. Cleveland is too senior for that post anyway. But remember, Harley Carnes is planning to …”

  “Yes,” snapped Webster. “That’s perfect. Tell Harley he’s getting an early vacation. Israel is even in Cleveland’s area of expertise, and we already have somebody on the ground in Tel Aviv who can keep an eye on him. But we need to get this appointment fast-tracked and past the backlog.”

  Her high heels making her ankles ache, Carson shifted her portfolio binder from one hand to the other, but Webster didn’t get the hint. Arrogant … “Shouldn’t be a problem,” said Carson. “The Senate always acts quickly on Israel, and Cleveland is respected on both sides of the aisle. We can make it a package deal … put the president’s crony Dyson in Azerbaijan and transfer Bruce Brown to Turkey. He’s a protégé of Basil Thornwood,” Carson said, mentioning the cochair of the Foreign Relations Committee.

  Webster tilted his head to the right and gave Carson a quizzical look. “Well done, Carson. You’re even beginning to think like me. We’ll get Thornwood to run the idea up the pole to the White House tomorrow. He’ll be thrilled with the idea and so should the president. How long do you think it will take? I want to make the announcement and get Cleveland packing for Israel. I want him out of Turkey as soon as possible, and I don’t want to see his face for the next hundred years.”

  “Hyperbole for dinner? You should—”

  “And tell Cleveland that if he doesn’t remain a team player, then we will send him to Mongolia.”

  “That won’t scare him. Cleveland’s been around too long, and he’s nearly earned career ambassador rank. He knows the rules. He should—”

  Webster pounded his right fist on the padded top of his desk chair. The veins in his neck twitched and tightened, and his voice carried the threat of damnation. “Then tell him something that will scare him. Tell him we’ll make sure he’s disgraced and dismissed from the service. That we will revoke his pension and that we’ll send that wise-mouth daughter of his to jail for tax evasion.”

  “We can’t do that.” Carson shifted her weight and smoothed down her dark blue business suit. “That would be illegal. We can’t touch his pension.”

  Leaning forward, Webster looked like a predator. “We can do anything we want, Nora. Who will stop us, Congress? Those fools can’t even tie their own shoes. We can always throw some outlandish plan at Congress and get their brains freaked out for months while we do what we want to do.” Webster’s left hand gripped the top of the chair as if he was strangling an intruder and he thrust his right index finger in the direction of Carson’s forehead. “Tell him … shake him to his soul.”

  Nora Carson knew it was her soul that was being shaken. Another flicker of doubt ignited for a moment.

  “And Nora … the second thing … we need a diversion. Something to keep prying eyes away from our involvement with the prime minister. So I want you to keep alive the story that there was a massive security failure at the embassy in Ankara … a failure of responsibility. Saturday, leak that to the press so it hits the Sunday papers and talk shows. And then we throw Morningstar to the dogs. Which reminds me. Send Mullaney to Israel with Cleveland. Mullaney knows too much and too many people. So get him out of here too. Send them both to the desert.”

  There was a smile on Noah Webster’s face that chilled Nora Carson to the marrow.

  Washington, DC

  April 25, 12:22 a.m.

  A town house in Georgetown was the stereotype for the Washington powerful. Noah Webster didn’t care about stereotypes. He loved his nineteenth-century brick town house more than he cared for most people. It was a perfect blend of character, elegance, and peace—three personality traits he envied, but knew he didn’t possess. So the house was his alter ego, his perfect mate.

  Deputy Secretary of State Webster wandered into his library, filled with leather-bound books he would never read, a goblet of California cabernet in one hand and an encrypted satellite phone in the other. It was critical his conversations with Turkish prime minister Arslan Eroglu remain short and private.

  “Good morning, Noah. I’ve—”

  “Tell me you didn’t have anything to do with it,” snapped Webster. Normally he was fascinated by Eroglu’s British-tinted accent. It had character. But not this morning. Now it was just annoying affectation. “Tell me you wouldn’t—”

  “Please, Noah, allow me to begin by apologizing for the near disaster of two days ago. I was quite relieved to hear that neither t
he ambassador nor his staff were injured in any way.”

  Webster gripped a tenuous leash on his rising fury, shaking his head at Eroglu’s empty apology.

  “The president’s chauffer, Arslan? Are you kidding? You should have come up with a better story,” Webster said, not bothering to temper the rebuke in his voice. “The people over here aren’t stupid. Deluded, perhaps, but it wouldn’t take long to pierce that threadbare excuse if someone were to test it out. We can’t afford this, Arslan. The attack on the consulate was foolhardy. And dangerous. How could you—”

  “Mr. Secretary.” Now Eroglu’s voice had an edge. “You may lose your position and your ambition if our secret were known. But I would most certainly lose my life.”

  Take a breath. Stay in control.

  “I must confess,” said Eroglu, his words once more draped with silk and lace, “I firmly believe our future would be more secure with Kashani out of the picture. But I was not the orchestrator of the attack on the embassy. At least … not intentionally.”

  Webster’s mind parsed the meaning between the words at the speed of an atom in a giant collider. He was sure Eroglu had his own agenda, but this … “You have another scheme in the works, don’t you? That could prove to be a deadly risk for both of us.”

  “Perhaps you don’t understand the Eastern mind as fully as you believe,” said Eroglu. “Our logic is often labyrinthine; our plans often inscrutable. But … I am certain you also have in place what you call a Plan B, yes? You see, I’ve been involved in an ongoing dialogue with some our army’s key generals, men who are devoted to the secular democracy and the memory of Ataturk. Just in case. I’m sure you understand. I was speaking to one of these generals and may have mentioned the president’s change in plans. I’m afraid that general misconstrued my intentions, took advantage of the information, and was a trifle imprudent in his response.”

  Imprudent? Fear and insecurity mocked Webster’s choice of coconspirator. But that decision was long past. So Webster wrestled his doubts into submission and hunted for a solution.

  “I had a suspicion your hands were dirty when I heard that lame story about the driver,” said Webster, determined to keep the responsibility squarely on Eroglu’s shoulders. “So now that you’ve lit this match, how do you plan to keep it from igniting our destruction?”

  “Well …” Eroglu’s voice was as slippery as black ice on a February morning. “Following this fiasco, I took some extraordinary measures to ensure our security continues. I have had the driver arrested on suspicion of treason. And the general has taken, shall we say, an early retirement. A permanent retirement. His body will never be found. You would be unwise, Noah, to underestimate my devotion to our plans and my determination that they remain secret.”

  Webster pulled in a long, cleansing breath. He lifted the goblet, swirled the wine, and drank in its aroma. Good. The hook remains deeply set.

  “How it happened is no longer germane,” Eroglu continued. “I have done what was necessary to return the cloak of darkness to our efforts.”

  The wine was excellent. It had character. But first, he needed to turn this conversation back to business—his business. He needed to impress Eroglu with the depth of his inside knowledge, particularly knowledge of what was happening in Iraq, under Eroglu’s nose. “Al-Bayati will win the upcoming election in Iraq, with the help of his Shia brothers from Iran,” said Webster. “He will appoint Al-Qahtani to his cabinet.”

  Like a boxer landing a powerful blow to the midsection, Webster heard an abrupt intake of breath through the receiver. It was a well-timed and well-placed shot.

  “That will bring the Badr organization into power,” said Eroglu. “And it will be a significant impediment to our plans.”

  Once known as the Badr Brigades, Al-Qahtani’s Shiite Militia—forefront in the rebellion against the Sunni-led Iraqi government in the years following Saddam Hussein’s overthrow—was a decade later the only effective Iraqi military force arrayed against ISIS and the only remaining defender of Baghdad. A double-edged sword, since the Shia Badr organization was financed and directed by Shia elements in Iran and more loyal to its religious brotherhood than to the unstable and unreliable government of Iraq.

  Webster’s thoughts drifted to the geopolitical quagmire of the Middle East. So much was happening, so quickly, it was easy to overlook the basic drivers of the region’s politics and conflicts: that the people of this desolate land—Jews, Arabs, Persians, and Turks—had been at war with each other for most of the last fourteen centuries. Out of the Muslim faith of Islam was born a fundamental fracture, the schism in the middle of the seventh century that created the Sunni and Shia factions of Islam. Their hatred and distrust of each other enflamed a conflict that remained unquenched. Arabs, Turks, and Persians—Muslims all, but implacable enemies who each dreamed of restoring an ancient empire. And all three harbored a merciless hatred of the Zionist invaders of Israel. Now the madmen of ISIS had inserted an unprecedented chaos into the region. Someone needed to impose order. Webster believed he was the answer.

  “Once inside the Iraqi government, it won’t take long for Al-Qahtani and his organization to increase their influence,” said Eroglu. “He will insert his Shia supporters into every level of government.”

  “And Al-Qahtani is being hailed by Shia and Sunni alike,” said Webster, “as the savior of the Iraqi people from the onslaught of ISIS. The intertwining of Iraq and Iran is occurring much more quickly than we had anticipated, Arslan. Once Iran signs a final nuclear agreement with America and its allies, possibly sometime next year, a Persian confederation won’t be far behind.”

  Webster eased himself into the plush pleasure of a wingback chair, his feet feeling the heat from his gas fireplace. He sipped on the cabernet and allowed the silence to stretch into discomfort for Eroglu. He relented. “What’s happening with the Kurds?”

  “President Kashani is dragging his feet on allowing the Kurdish rebels to truck their purloined Iraqi oil through Turkey to the coast.” Eroglu paused. “We need the Kurds, Noah. ISIS is preparing for another offensive this summer. Despite my president’s fear of the Kurds and their Peshmerga militia, currently the KRG are the only reliable ground fighters opposing ISIS except for Al-Qahtani’s Shia soldiers. And your president continues his misguided support for this agreement with Iran.”

  Webster sighed. It was true. President Lamont Boylan saw a nuclear deal with Iran as a legacy maker. His California peace-and-love, surfer-boy persona might win votes, but it was a tragic foreign policy. “One would think that Russian tanks in the Ukraine and the Russian annexation of Crimea would knock some good sense into Boylan’s head,” Webster said. “But I don’t see it happening. It’s up to us, Arslan. Arm the Kurds. Arm ISIS. Arm the goats of the Anbar if necessary, but we need to keep Syria and Iraq in crisis. I’ll continue to sabotage the talks with Iran.”

  “Noah.” Eroglu’s voice held an edge of urgent insistence. “We must destroy even the idea of a new Persia. Our president Kashani is an Islamist radical. He will continue to push Turkey into the camp of the jihadists. But the future of my nation is with NATO, with the West. That is our only hope. Somehow, you and I must stop that agreement. A nuclear-armed Iran is unthinkable.”

  Unthinkable, yes. But possible. So in Webster’s assessment of the Middle East, a strong Turkey, even a resurgent Ottoman empire, was one of the few viable options to thwart the malevolent intentions of a Shia-led coalition of Iraq and Iran, potentially a new Persia.

  “Keep stirring chaos into Syria and Iraq, Arslan. That’s phase one. And open the door for the Kurds to get some oil revenue. A Kurdish state is phase two. One step at a time. We can still slay the Persian beast before it unleashes its wrath upon the earth. But we need to stay the course. We’ll speak again soon.”

  The cabernet was rich and crimson as it eddied around the inside of the goblet. If only the stakes weren’t so high, I’d get out now. But Webster knew that was not true. It would take character to turn his
back on selfish ambition. And the only character in this room was on the inside surface of the crystal goblet in his hand.

  Washington, DC

  April 25, 8:14 a.m.

  Secretary of State Evan Townsend stretched. His day was only two hours old, and he was already exhausted. Thus far, the fallout from the Ankara attack had been minimal. Perhaps he would catch a break with this one. He swept his eyes around the conference table, the morning huddle with his deputy secretaries nearly complete.

  “Anything else?”

  Noah Webster caught his attention from the other side of the table.

  “Yes, sir. I was thinking …”

  Great. The last thing I need is Webster thinking.

  “Harley Carnes has been asking to be relieved for months and—”

  “Yes, and the Senate’s backed up, and we haven’t found a suitable replacement, and … yes?” A breath of regret floated through Townsend for his rudeness, but it didn’t last. Noah Webster had been dumped into his office because of strong-arming by then senator Seneca Markham. Townsend didn’t want him then, and he didn’t want him now. He needed diplomats, not water boys for powerful politicians pulling in one more favor. Take a breath. Get through this meeting.

  Noah Webster was staring bullets at Townsend, his mouth still half open.

  “I’m sorry, Noah … not getting enough sleep. What’s your point?”

  Webster set his chin, clearly not satisfied with the secretary’s apology. He tapped the papers in his hands on top of the table. “A suggestion, Mr. Secretary. We need a seasoned hand in Israel. Why not move Bruce Brown to Turkey—he’s a protégé of Senator Thornwood, which would help move things along. And then move the president’s friend Warren Dyson into Azerbaijan. That would free up Joseph Atticus Cleveland for Israel. Cleveland is well liked and well respected across party lines, and he’s got the maturity and experience to handle the Israelis.”

  It was a good idea. Still, Townsend was no political neophyte. There was some benefit here for Webster. He couldn’t see it, but he knew it was there. Well, it was out on the table now.