by John Weisman
“The truth?”
“That Arafat has never stopped employing terror.” Shahristani sipped Evian. “PLO emissaries travel with immunity. How do you think Arafat ships the millions he’s skimmed from the Palestinian aid packages? He used the PA’s diplomatic pouch. Now Imad Mugniyah and Tariq Ben Said need those same diplomatic pouches to move their supplies around Europe—even into America.”
“And the Gaza hits?”
Shahristani frowned. “I don’t understand.”
“Motive?”
“I’m not sure,” Shahristani said, far too quickly. “Imad Mugniyah’s presence in Gaza was close-hold. He had his own security—his Hezbollah guards from Lebanon, and two men from Seppah.”
Shahram had changed the subject. It was classic tradecraft, indicating reticence, or deception. Tom decided to press the issue. “Motive, Shahram…”
Shahristani lit another cigarette, took a long drag, and let his silence do the talking.
Tom tried another tack. “So, we knew nothing?”
“Nothing. You were blind.” Shahristani shook his head. “And so were the Israelis—until it was far too late.”
“What do you mean?”
“Twice in the last three months, the Israelis uncovered Ben Said’s untraceable explosives. But they didn’t realize the implications.”
“What? How?”
“This past August, there was an explosion in a second-story room at the Nablus Road Hotel in East Jerusalem. When the authorities arrived they found a tourist—a German citizen of Arabic descent named Heinrich Azouz—who’d blown both arms and a good part of his face off. Obviously, Azouz had been building a bomb and he’d set off the explosives by accident. Shin Bet checked Azouz’s records. He’d traveled from Frankfurt the previous day on Lufthansa. Shin Bet assumed—incorrectly—that he’d been supplied with explosives domestically. When the Shin Bet lab did its forensics on the residue, they identified it as Semtex—assumed it was from the Fatah stocks. Ben Said’s formula prints just like Semtex. It employs virtually identical tagants. So that’s what they saw: Semtex. Just like the stuff the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades uses. They never did any follow-up analysis. Never sent the explosives to their security people. Never reverse-engineered the explosives and put samples through any of their detection devices.”
“But?”
The Iranian paid no attention to Tom’s interruption. “Last month, a French citizen named Malik Suleiman, whose papers identified him as the London correspondent for a Paris-based Arab literary magazine, suicide-bombed a Tel Aviv nightclub. When the Israelis checked, they discovered that the magazine Suleiman worked for existed only on paper. There was a phone number, and a letter-drop address. But no offices—and more to the point, no magazines. Suleiman was traveling with a British woman named Dianne Lamb. Lamb was in the nightclub’s lavatory when Suleiman blew himself up. Shin Bet learned they were involved romantically and believed he’d had second thoughts about killing her. Since both of them had just visited the West Bank—Ramallah, to be exact—the Israelis assumed Suleiman received the explosives there, because once again the residue printed as Semtex. Shin Bet was wrong. Suleiman, too, was using Ben Said’s materials. In fact, the woman had unknowingly carried them all the way from Heathrow concealed in a portable radio—something the Israelis finally realized only after they’d fully interrogated Lamb.” Shahram’s eyes flashed behind his glasses. “These were disposables, Thomas. Azouz, Suleiman, Lamb—all of them.”
Instinctively, Tom understood. Ben Said had been probing his adversaries’ weaknesses. The KGB had done the same thing during the Cold War. They’d send a disposable and see how far he got. Then they’d make adjustments and send another. Then a third and fourth, if necessary. The Sovs were never worried about losing people. Christ, they’d lost tens of millions during wars and purges. What were the lives of a few dozen agents? And now, it seemed, al-Qa’ida had adopted the tactic, too. Just like the Soviets, al-Qa’ida didn’t worry about losing agents.
Now Tom saw the Gaza bombing in a new light: it wasn’t an operation in and of itself. It was a penetration exercise: Ben Said had been testing the limits. Seeing how far he could go before being discovered. Watching what the Israelis did—how they reacted. If bells and whistles had gone off, he’d have known they’d discovered his new plastique formula.
But there had been neither bell nor whistle. In fact, Tom had called 4627’s Tel Aviv office the minute he’d heard the radio bulletin about the Gaza bombing. Reuven Ayalon, the retired Mossad combatant who ran the one-man 4627 base out of his house in Herzlyia, had trolled his sources. Thirteen hours later, he’d telephoned Tom to report that despite Palestinian attempts to pollute the Gaza crime scene, Shin Bet had managed to obtain a trace amount of residue from the explosive that had blown up the embassy Suburban. The sample had printed as Semtex.
But there had to be more. If the two incidents had indeed been penetration exercises, what was Ben Said trying to penetrate? Israeli security? Possibly. But al-Qa’ida might just as easily have larger targets in mind. Western Europe. The United States.
“You know why?” Shahram asked.
“Why what?”
“Why Ben Said was in Israel.”
“Of course I do. He was testing to see how far he could go before his weapons were discovered.”
“You are wrong.”
“No, I’m not.”
“You are thinking too logically, Thomas.” Shahram slipped into French. “Ben Said was using Israel as a testing ground to perfect weapons that would be used this winter against the West. Against America. Against Britain. Against France.”
“Impossible.” Tom was incredulous.
“Not impossible. Just as Hitler once tested his war-making capabilities in Spain, so was”—Shahristani looked around then continued in a whisper—“Ben Said using Israel as a laboratory for clandestine weapons of mass destruction that will be targeted at the West.”
“Why in heaven’s name would he do that?”
“Because he could, Tom. Because what makes headlines in Paris or London gets hardly a mention if it carries a Tel Aviv dateline.”
“That’s awfully far-fetched, Shahram.”
“Perhaps.” The Iranian went back to Arabic. “But there you have it.” He sipped water. “More to the point, you have Imad Mugniyah and Tariq Ben Said in the same photograph. That is something, Tom. That is something.”
Well, Shahram was right about that. If, that is. If the information was good—if it was twenty-four-karat stuff. Even the prospect set Tom’s pulse throbbing. Quickly, he took a gulp of wine to mask his excitement. “Shahram, how long have you had this information confirmed?”
“Six days.”
Jeezus, that was an eternity. “Why didn’t you call me immediately?”
“Because,” Shahristani said, “I wanted to verify things to my own satisfaction before I wasted anyone’s time.”
“And did you?”
The Iranian’s face was oblique. “I am satisfied with what I know.”
Tom had one final base to cover. “Did you contact our embassy?”
The Iranian nodded.
“When?”
“A short while after I’d confirmed my information.”
He was being evasive. He was trying to deflect. Tom wondered why. “I need specifics, Shahram.”
Shahristani paused. He scanned the mirror behind Tom. “I phoned.”
“When?”
“Yesterday morning.”
“Reaction?”
Shahristani fell silent as a salad was placed in front of him. He glanced at Tom to make sure the American had concealed the photographs, which he already had.
When the waiter withdrew, Tom repeated the question. In response, Shahristani merely shrugged. Tom pressed him. “You gave no specifics?”
“You know how careful I am on the telephone, Thomas.”
Shahram was both prudent and circumspect on the telephone. Tom tapped his shirt pocket where he’d
slipped the photos. “Who has seen these photos, Shahram?”
“Not so many people.” Shahristani read the expression on Tom’s face. “You and I, Tom, and the people who first passed the information on to me.”
“And whomever you talked to at the embassy.”
Shahristani shrugged. “I never got past your former employer’s gate-keeper.”
“Who was?”
The Iranian shrugged the question off. “Still, I can see why Langley would be…reticent. Langley completely bungled all the preinvasion intelligence on Iraq. Ever since, it has badly misjudged the situation on the ground there. Then there’s the global war on terror. CIA’s operational resources are stretched thinner than a crêpe. Don’t you think Tehran and al-Qa’ida understand that if there’s a major terror campaign this winter, there’s a good chance Langley will implode under the operational stress?”
Tom Stafford’s expression never changed. But Shahram was practicing tradecraft again. Shifting the subject. He was evading, deflecting, sidestepping. It was a common technique when agents didn’t want to fabricate outright, but were reluctant to continue about a specific matter. Shahram was a canny individual. He’d shifted subjects by telling the truth: CIA had long suffered operational stress fractures. In its present state, Langley was incapable of fighting the multifronted war it was being asked—no, ordered—to fight.
The Iranian leaned forward. “The doves have taken over CIA’s analytic side. They’re all globalists these days—Europhiles. The last thing anyone at CIA wants to know is that Tehran—which Langley’s National Intelligence Estimates have long maintained wants a dialogue with the West—is about to ally itself with an assassin working for al-Qa’ida.”
Shahristani took his fork, stabbed at the salad, and waved the forkful of greens in Tom’s direction. “But that’s what’s happened. Gaza was a joint Seppah–al-Qa’ida job. Imad Mugniyah and Tariq Ben Said are working together, and CIA covers its eyes and plugs its ears. Full stop, Thomas. End of story.”
Tom wasn’t about to let Shahram off the hook. “The embassy, Shahram. What happened when you called the embassy?”
“Imad Mugniyah and Tariq Ben Said in the same photograph, Tom.” The Iranian filled his mouth, chewed, swallowed, then laid the fork tines-down on the rim of his plate. “I see your face. You know I’m right.”
2:12 P.M. “Let’s walk the lunch off.” Shahram shrugged into his overcoat, draped the long scarf around his neck in the European fashion, and pulled on his gloves while Tom said his good-byes to Monsieur Marie and Jeff then grabbed his own coat from the antique rack next to the front window.
The two men emerged through the narrow glass-paned door into a gray Paris afternoon. Tom glanced up at fast-moving slate-colored clouds that threatened rain and hunched his shoulders against the bone-chilling wind. Shahram didn’t seem to notice. He gave an offhand wave to the two DST agents sitting in a haze of cigarette smoke inside a silver Peugeot parked across the street.
“You have your shadows with you today.”
“They were waiting for me at the airport this morning.”
“Oh? Any reason?” Tom remembered the urgency in Shahram’s tone the previous night. And at lunch, his demeanor had been both intense and unsettled, anomalous behavior for the Iranian.
Once again, Shahristani deflected the question. “Henri and Jean-Claude. Good kids. Henri’s the one behind the wheel. He has twins.”
Tom caught a quick glimpse of the pair. They were kids, too—twentysomethings who wore mustaches so they’d look older—dressed in the wide-lapel, double-breasted retro chalk-stripe suits that were just now coming back into fashion. A couple of baby-faced gumshoes trying to look like Humphrey Bogart in The Maltese Falcon.
But they were no doubt well trained. DST’s Paris agents were some of the best operators in the world when it came to surveillance. In fact, CIA insisted that case officers heading for Paris take the denied-area-operations course—the same six-week course designed for spooks going to Moscow and Beijing. That was because DST was better equipped, more sophisticated, and much more highly motivated than the Soviets or the Chinese had ever been.
“Come.” Shahram put his right arm through Tom’s left and steered the younger man by the elbow along the busy sidewalk toward the Place des Ternes. Shahram pointed past the garish facade and rolled-up red awning of Hippopotamus, a branch of the American cum Parisian steak-and-frites chain that sat on the far side of the Faubourg du St. Honoré. “We’ll walk as far as Étoile. We’ll take our lives in our hands and cross above ground, then go down Victor Hugo as far as Boutique 22. I will buy you a cigar and myself a carton of cigarettes. Then I will go straight home for a nap and you will be free to write your report.”
Tom’s mind was racing. He didn’t want a cigar or a twenty-minute stroll. He wanted to go straight back to the five-story, nineteenth-century town house at 223 rue du Faubourg St. Honoré that was 4627’s European headquarters, scan the picture Shahram had given him into the computer, and start the process of verifying the Iranian’s claims. If Shahram’s information proved valid, Tom wanted to move the information about Imad Mugniyah and Tariq Ben Said right now. And the explosives. Air France flights to Tel Aviv were subject to extraordinary security measures. If Ben Said’s new formula for plastique could escape detection at de Gaulle, it truly was invisible.
The threat was unprecedented. In the 1990s, Ramzi Yousef, who’d been responsible for the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, had devised a plan to blow up a dozen American airliners at the same time. If Ben Said’s plastique was undetectable, al-Qa’ida could bring down God knows how many flights simultaneously.
Tom said, “Hold on just a sec, Shahram.” He reached into his pocket, took the cell phone, and punched a number into it. “Tony, it’s Tom. Where are you?” He paused. “Can you get away? Meet me back in the office in”—he looked over at Shahristani and shrugged—“fifteen minutes. It’s critical.”
Shahristani said, “Half an hour, Tom—we must walk farther.”
Tom didn’t want any delay. Because what he’d just learned was more than critical. It was personal. Personal, because Tom felt he owed something to Jim McGee. Jim McGee, the disposable who’d volunteered to put his butt on the line without backup and paid the price. McGee’s murder deserved to be avenged—and in a timely fashion.
He looked into the Iranian’s sad eyes and sighed. This was Shahram, and certain…proprieties had to be observed. It was all about tradition, and respect. So he said, “I’ll see you in half an hour, Tony,” shut the phone down, slipped it back into his coat, and allowed himself to be guided by the older man.
They marched in slow, deliberate lockstep toward the square. As the two of them ambled past the entrance to the huge Brasserie Lorraine, which took up most of the northeastern side of the irregularly shaped place, Tom suddenly caught the scent of the sea wafting past his nose. He glanced over at the brasserie. Crates filled with oysters, shrimp, crabs, and lobsters all packed in ice and cradled by seaweed were piled against the restaurant’s wall. One of the brasserie’s countermen was shucking large, green-tinged Marennes and placing them on a three-tiered server.
Shahram gestured with his head toward the stacks of shellfish. “The best oysters in Paris, Thomas. Have you ever eaten here?”
“Twice. The food was okay.”
“‘Okay,’ he says.” Shahram laughed and tweaked Tom’s elbow, pulling himself closer to avoid a pair of overeager tourists weighed down by video cameras and carrying huge, partially unfolded Michelin maps. “You are preoccupied, dear boy.”
Tom grunted. His attention was focused on the steel-and-glass display cases that held Belons, Marennes, and Creuses arranged artfully by size and displayed on shaved ice. You could order them by the piece or by la douzaine and eat them on the spot. They were delicious.
Suddenly, from somewhere behind him, Tom heard shouting.
Instinctively, he turned toward the sound. “What the—”
The Irani
an’s grip on his elbow tightened. Shahram pushed him rudely, almost knocking him to the ground.
Tom staggered, but caught his balance. Shahram fell up against him. The Iranian uttered a huge wheeze and gasped, “Tho-mas?”
As Tom reacted, the old man’s knees went out from under him and he sagged to the ground.
“Shahram?” Tom tried to catch his friend under his arms. But Shahram was already deadweight.
It was a goddamn heart attack. Shahram slipped to the sidewalk. He collapsed face forward. Tom tried to roll him onto his back, but couldn’t. He screamed, “Somebody get a doctor, a doctor—quickly!”
Tom lifted Shahram’s head. He saw that the Iranian’s eyes had rolled back. He reached around, unbuttoned Shahram’s coat, and loosened the scarf. “C’mon, c’mon—a doctor!”
He felt Shahram’s neck, but sensed no pulse. He pressed his cheek against Shahram’s chest to listen for a heartbeat. Nothing. He was about to start CPR when suddenly an arm was thrown around his neck, he was yanked backward, wrestled across the sidewalk, spun rudely onto all fours, and kicked in the ribs hard enough to lift him clear off the pavement.
He landed badly, his trouser knees shredding on the rough concrete. He tried to claw his way back to Shahram, but got a chop to the throat and an elbow to the side of his head for his troubles.
Tom saw stars. Everything went out of focus. He fought the pain, struggled to his feet, half collapsed, then regained his balance. He tried to scream that Shahram had suffered a heart attack, but all that came out of his throat was a gurgle.
He saw he’d been attacked by one of Shahram’s DST shadows. The youngster was already on his knees, unbuttoning Shahram’s jacket and shirt. But when he looked down, all he said was, “Merde.”
Where was the other agent? As Tom looked around in panic, he saw the second DST man, a gun in one hand, a radio in the other, dashing across the boulevard, heading north, toward Avenue de Wagram.
And then he saw the dark stain spreading onto Shahram’s shirt. The DST agent moved the Iranian’s left arm upward, and Tom saw where he’d been wounded—shot or stabbed just under the armpit.
