Not bad, considering the stuff came out of the ground for free. Poppy plants hardly even needed watering. As every Afghan farmer knew, they were tougher than food crops like wheat.
Stan treated Miller as a conduit to Amadullah, nothing more. Miller didn’t know the names of the soldiers who picked up the stuff, though he had figured out that they had to be part of the Stryker brigade in eastern Kandahar and Zabul province. He knew that Stan was moving it to Germany, but he wasn’t sure how. Still, Miller couldn’t complain. He was making more money than he ever had. Stan paid him twenty-five hundred dollars a kilo. A quarter million dollars so far, for a few days of work. He was wondering whether the call at Heathrow hadn’t been a lucky break after all.
Then Stan called with a new request.
“You need to see our friend. Now.”
“I’m in London.”
“I don’t care. Get over there. E-mail me after you set the meet and I’ll tell you what I need.”
Stan’s tone brooked no argument. Miller hung up and booked his flights to Quetta and reached out to the Thuwanis. Fortunately, the successful deals had bought him goodwill. By the time he reached Quetta, Amadullah agreed to a meeting. Miller e-mailed Stan with the news.
Stan’s response came a few hours later. After he read it, Miller wanted to disappear. Until now, he’d convinced himself that Stan might be making these deals as part of a larger CIA mission he couldn’t see. Maybe they were connected to a trade with the Thuwanis to get Mullah Omar.
But now Stan wanted Miller to tell Amadullah that a Special Forces squad was going to raid a farm in Kandahar province where two of Amadullah’s nephews were hiding. Miller was no lawyer, but he figured that giving the enemy advance warning about an attack spelled treason. He wrote back, one word: Can’t.
His phone rang ten minutes later. “What’s the problem?”
“People get executed for this kinda thing.”
“You’re only seeing a piece of this. Trust me. It’s all right.”
“What about the guys going in? It all right with them?”
“It is.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“Too late for that.”
“I do this and I’m done.”
A sigh on the other end of the line. “Daood. This isn’t some movie where you do one last deal and then get out. Let me know when you’ve set the meet.” Click.
Miller wished he could see a way out. But he didn’t.
NOW HE SAT in the backseat of a Toyota Crown wedged between two stinking Pashtuns. He wore Hugo Boss cologne and a black cashmere sweater and two-hundred-and-fifty-dollar Diesel jeans. He was pissed off and in no mood to wear local threads. He wasn’t pretending to be one of them today. Anyway, they knew he wasn’t. Though they trusted him enough not to handcuff or blindfold him.
The road ran northeast out of Quetta toward Peshawar. After an hour, the Toyota pulled into a garage. The men led Miller down a spiral staircase and into a concrete tunnel so low that Miller had to duck his head. The tunnel opened into another garage, this one empty except for a Pakistani police van. One of the Thuwanis put on a police uniform. The others piled in the back with Miller.
The van’s cargo compartment had no windows, so Miller couldn’t see where they were headed. His companions talked of people he didn’t know, villages he’d never seen. They made no effort to include him in their conversation and he didn’t press.
Finally the van stopped. The back door opened. “Stay,” the men said to Miller. They stepped out. A minute later, to Miller’s surprise, Amadullah lumbered in. The door shut and the van rolled off.
“What is it you needed to tell me?”
Miller explained the raid. Amadullah rubbed his big brown hands down the sides of his face, like a primitive sculpture come to life. “When does this happen?” he asked when Miller finished.
“In the next few days. I can’t be sure exactly. But you should tell your nephews to leave. Or be ready to fight if they stay.”
Amadullah stroked his beard. Long, careful strokes, as if he were petting an ornery dog. The van drove slowly now, on rutted roads. “Why do you tell me this?”
“I do what I’m told. Stan said it would be valuable to you.”
“What does he want in return?”
“Nothing.”
“He tells me about an American operation and asks for nothing.”
Stan had once used the word cutout to describe Miller’s role in this operation. For the first time, Miller really understood what Stan meant. He was as disposable as construction paper that little kids used in art class. He wondered which parts of him would get cut out if Amadullah lost his temper.
“That’s what he says.”
“Does he think I’m a fool?”
“I do what I’m told,” Miller said again.
“Then I want to talk to him directly. Maybe he should come to Quetta. Tell him I promise he’ll be safe.” Amadullah smiled, but his eyes stayed cold.
“He said you would say that. He said he wants to talk to you, too. Give him a phone number and he’ll call you.”
Amadullah yelled, “Stop!” to the front of the van. He leaned over, latched a thick brown hand around Miller’s neck. “I give you my mobile and a missile blows up my house. Give me his phone number.”
“I don’t have it.” Amadullah’s rough fingers tightened around Miller’s neck. Miller smelled sweet tobacco and something else, a heavy perfume. “I swear to Allah.”
“If you’re smart you won’t mention Allah again. How do you reach him without his mobile?”
“We e-mail. When he wants to talk to me, he calls me. I’ve never called him.”
“Give me the e-mail address.”
Miller croaked out Stan’s address. He decided afterward that Stan had expected him to give up the e-mail all along — and had simply wanted to provoke Amadullah by telling Miller to ask for Amadullah’s phone number. Stan was a perverse dude. Without ever having met him, Miller was certain of that.
A FEW MINUTES LATER, the van stopped. Amadullah kicked Miller out. Literally. He put his big Pashtun sandals in Miller’s rear end and shoved him onto the road. Miller found himself outside a sweetshop in some lousy Paki village in Balochistan. He couldn’t even guess how far he was from Quetta, or how long he would need to get home.
Even so, he’d delivered the message, as he’d been told. He could add treason to his list of crimes. But he was still alive. For now.
10
ISLAMABAD, PAKISTAN
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia had deep connections to the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. Hundreds of thousands of Pakistani men worked in Saudi Arabia. Hundreds of thousands more visited Mecca every year for the Hajj, the sacred pilgrimage that all Muslims are supposed to perform at least once. Saudi charities built religious schools and mosques across Pakistan to spread Wahhabism, the conservative version of Islam practiced in the kingdom.
The Saudi embassy in Pakistan reflected the importance of the relationship. Set inside Islamabad’s diplomatic quarter, not far from the American embassy compound, the embassy was a handsome beige building, wide and solid. The kingdom’s green-and-white flag flapped from a half dozen poles around a fountain in the driveway. Hidden behind the embassy, a figure-eight-shaped pool allowed diplomats and their families to relax during Islamabad’s scorching summers.
To maintain security, the embassy had only two entrances. A small back gate was open only to employees and diplomats. Everyone else came through a guardhouse beside the front gate. The embassy opened to visitors at noon, but the line for entry formed hours before. Saudis were not known for their work ethic, and the kingdom’s bureaucracy meant that visas could require several visits. Now, at 11:30 a.m., six men stood outside the gatehouse, waiting for its windowless front door to open.
Wells was first in line. Patient and quiet. He wore a white dishdasha and ghutra—the long gown and headdress favored by Saudi men. The men around him, all Pakistani, chattered about how long
they’d been waiting, about the earthquake that had ripped through Kashmir a week before, about whether Kuwaitis or Saudis were more likely to beat their servants. Life’s white noise. Wells had nothing to say, and said nothing.
A few minutes after noon, the guardhouse door opened. A Saudi soldier motioned Wells inside. He passed through an X-ray machine and down a corridor that ended in a steel door and Plexiglas window. A Saudi man in a suit sat behind the glass.
“Salaam aleikum. My name is Jalal Haq.” The alias tasted unfamiliar on Wells’s tongue.
“Aleikum salaam. Your business, please?”
“I’m here to see Mr. Naiz.”
“You will look up to the camera, please.” A security camera was mounted over the door. The security didn’t surprise Wells. Al-Qaeda hated Saudi Arabia as much as the United States.
Finally, the door clicked open. Inside, Wells found an office with cheap plastic chairs and a scratched wooden coffee table. The only reading material consisted of in-flight magazines from Saudi Arabian Airlines. The Saudis obviously preferred that visitors not be too comfortable. A narrow window at the back of the room offered a view of the fountain and the main embassy buildings.
A few minutes later, a black Land Rover with smoked-glass windows and diplomatic plates came down the drive and stopped outside the guardhouse. A tall Saudi in a tailored blue suit stepped out and walked into the office.
“Salaam aleikum, Mr. Haq. I’m Saeed Naiz. Please come with me.”
Wells followed Naiz to the Land Rover. A minute later, they’d left the embassy and were rolling through the manicured streets of the diplomatic quarter. They passed the military checkpoint that split the district from the rest of Islamabad. Finally, Naiz parked alongside a newly built two-story strip mall that included a bridal store and a flower shop. If the signs had been in English, the place could have passed for Los Angeles.
“I’m honored to meet you, Mr. Haq. I thought it best we speak outside the embassy. In the back, those are yours.” A briefcase and suitcase sat side by side in the backseat.
The briefcase was buttery black leather, slightly nicked. Inside, Wells found two envelopes. The first contained a Saudi passport and identification card, both in the name of Jalal Haq, both with Wells’s photograph. The second, a platinum AmEx card and two rubber bands of cash, ten thousand dollars in hundred-dollar bills, and twenty-five hundred in Saudi riyals. A BlackBerry. And a Quran, its green cover embossed with gold filigree.
“It was all the money I could get on such short notice. I hope it’s enough.”
“If it’s not, I’m doing something wrong.” Wells thumbed through the passport and found a proper Pakistani entry stamp. “It’s real?”
“It’s in our system. You could fly to Riyadh with it, no problem.” Naiz sounded almost offended.
“I hear Riyadh is nice this time of year.”
“Yes. The summer heat is done and it’s pleasant. Have you ever been?”
“Only Jeddah.” Wells looked over his identification card. It said he lived in Umm Khutut. “And where is Umm Khutut?”
“The northern Najd, the high desert. You’re the first son of the fourth wife of a tribal leader there.”
“First son, fourth wife. And my father, he’ll vouch for the story?” Though the odds that anyone would ask were extraordinarily slim. The men Wells planned to meet didn’t have spies inside Saudi Arabia.
“Of course.”
“Thank you for all this.”
“There’s no need to thank me. I have a guess who you are,” the Saudi said, switching to English.
Wells didn’t bite. “Tell me something,” he said, staying with Arabic. “Do I sound Saudi?”
“Maybe to these Pakistani peasants. Not to me.”
Not the answer I hoped to hear, Wells thought.
“I have my own question. You’re going into the mountains?”
“Balochistan.” Balochistan was a Pakistani province that stretched for hundreds of miles along the Afghan border. Its biggest city, Quetta, was just 125 miles southeast of Kandahar.
“And, I am imagining now, you will tell the men you meet there that you are a wealthy Saudi and want to donate money to a good cause?” The cause being jihad.
“Something like that.”
“I won’t ask why you’re doing this, but is there someone in particular you want to meet? You understand, sometimes our charitable organizations ask me about aid recipients. Will the Americans mind if they give to this village or that madrassa? Will they wind up on any unpleasant lists that will make it hard for them to put their children in school in New York?”
“Are those donors hoping you’ll say yes or no?”
“Depends on the donor.”
Wells wondered whether getting Naiz’s advice was worth the risk of the potential double cross, and decided it was. “I’m looking for a man called Amadullah Thuwani. He’s the leader of a Pashtun tribe that lives on both sides of the border. He’s hiding near a town called Muslim Bagh. Maybe a hundred kilometers northeast of Quetta.”
“The Thuwanis, yes. They’re definitely on the American lists, not that you need me to tell you.”
“Has any donor ever asked about Amadullah?” Wells couldn’t afford to meet real Saudis on this trip. They would almost surely see through his con.
“No.” Naiz reached for the suitcase. “I’ll show you the clothes and shoes I brought. They’re authentic.”
“I trust you.” Wells didn’t plan to wear the clothes. No Saudi in Balochistan would advertise his presence so overtly. But they’d aid his cover if the Thuwanis checked his bags. “Thank you for all this.”
“One more thing.” Naiz opened his jacket, revealing a shoulder holster. “I have one for you if you like.”
“I’m hoping these men will be happy to see me. And even happier to see my money.”
“Go with God, then. When you come back to Islamabad, look me up.”
“I’ll do that, inshallah.”
WELLS HAD CONSIDERED several disguises to approach the Thuwanis. He could have gone in as a would-be jihadi from Lebanon hoping to join the fight in Afghanistan. Or a drug trafficker from London looking for new sources. He even wondered whether the tribe would accept an overture from an American reporter or photographer.
But those covers felt wrong. The Thuwanis were part of the Taliban, but they didn’t train foreign fighters, at least as far as the agency could tell. They were already selling all the heroin they could produce. And as for going in as a journalist… Wells could hardly trust the Thuwanis to keep their promises of safe passage. They’d kidnap him, and after they squeezed as much ransom as they could out of him, they’d make a souvenir of his head.
So Wells decided to present himself as a wealthy Saudi eager to support the Taliban. The Saudis had financed jihad for a generation, through the same charities that built schools and mosques. They bought weapons and gave money to the families of suicide bombers, so-called martyrdom payments.
Of course, Wells would have a tough time asking about heroin trafficking if he came in as a Saudi financier. But meeting the Thuwanis would give him a fix on where they lived — and get him cell phone numbers and e-mail addresses for the NSA to trace.
After his mission the previous year, Wells knew he could count on the Saudis for help. He called Amadullah’s half brother, Prince Miteb. The explanation took a few minutes, since Miteb was nearly ninety and half deaf, but eventually the prince understood. “It will be done.” Miteb coughed into the phone, the gasps of a man whose heart was nearly finished pumping. “Mr. John, if you have any other favors, I suggest you ask them now. I don’t expect to be alive much longer.”
“I pray you’re wrong.” And not just for you. For your country.
“Save your prayers for something else.” The sharpness in Miteb’s tone reminded Wells of Amadullah.
The next day, Wells was told to report to the embassy in Islamabad. Now he had his cover, and it was as real as could be. But having the right
passport didn’t guarantee that Wells would convince Thuwanis to open their not-entirely-friendly arms to him. Wells was one-quarter Lebanese. He could pass for Jordanian or even Syrian. But most Saudis were a shade darker than he was, and — as Naiz had told him — his Arabic couldn’t fool a native Saudi. Wells didn’t doubt the Thuwanis had seen their share of Arab jihadis over the years. Wells would have to keep his story simple and tight and hope that greed blinded Amadullah.
The hard work was just beginning.
AT THE ISLAMABAD AIRPORT, Wells rented a 4Runner. He wanted to come across as wealthy, not gaudy. If he seemed too rich, the Thuwanis would suspect a trap, or simply fleece him. He headed to the highway that ran west toward Peshawar and called Shafer with the BlackBerry Naiz had given him.
“Nine-six-five area code,” Shafer said when he picked up. “I see the Saudis came through.”
“It’s nice to have friends.”
“Any idea how long you’ll be gone?”
“A week or two at most. More than that and you should send a search party.”
“Put your face on a goat milk carton.”
Wells laughed. “Did you tell Duto where I was going?” To make sure the mole couldn’t alert the Thuwanis he was coming, Wells had lied about his plans, claiming that he was going to Moscow to follow a lead.
“No. But he’s wondering. He reminded me that his trip with the congressman is only three weeks out. Did you want me to?”
“Let him wonder.”
Wells hung up, called Anne. “You may not hear from me for a couple days. I’m going into the hills.”
“The hills? Sounds relaxing.”
“Like a spa.”
“Next time you go on vacation, I’m coming.” She sounded resigned rather than angry. Resigned was worse.
“It’s a deal.”
“You’re lucky to have me.”
“Don’t I know it,” Wells said.
“I’m not sure.”
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