Bride of a Bygone War (Beriut Trilogy 2)

by Fleming, Preston

  “I’m sorry,” Lorraine replied with the proper note of sympathy. “Do you miss her?”

  “Oh, once in a great while, I suppose. Not as often as I expected.”

  “Are you still in love with her?”

  Prosser looked up at the loose mess of hair spilling over Lorraine’s shoulders and then noticed a spark of anticipation in her eyes. “To be perfectly honest, I don’t think I ever was. No, I just married her.”

  Lorraine bent over him and placed her palm flat against his cheek. He put his own hand over hers, hodling it there for a long moment before reaching down to tug on the belt that held the terry robe around her waist. It fell open, revealing the glowing whiteness of her thighs and the outlines of her small, conical breasts. She shrugged her shoulders and let the robe slide down her back and onto the floor.

  * * *

  The sun lit up the borders of the heavy curtains like the corona of an eclipsed sun. When the alarm buzzer sounded, Prosser sat bolt upright and shielded his face from the band of blinding light where the curtains failed to reach the floor. Without opening his eyes, he managed to find the clock and turn off the rasping buzz with a deft tap of his fingers.

  “Good morning,” Lorraine greeted him huskily. She rolled onto her back and rubbed her eyes with the heels of her slender hands.

  “Sorry about the alarm. It has a nasty bark, but I need it to cut through the morning haze sometimes. Did you sleep well?”

  “Beautifully,” she replied. “And you?”

  “Never better. I guess I was more tired than I realized. Listen, Lorraine, I’m sorry about—”

  “Don’t say it. There’s no need to be sorry. All I wanted was someone to hold me and listen, and you were wonderful.”

  “It’s kind of you to say that. But I don’t generally have this sort of problem, so I don’t know exactly what to say. Maybe it takes a while before the subconscious realizes that a divorce decree is intended to set you free again.”

  Lorraine looked at him as if she were trying to read his mind. “If it’s Walter you’re thinking about, don’t give it another thought. As I said before, Walter can be thoroughly unreliable. I’ve had to learn not to depend on him when I feel the need to be close to someone. It’s not that I don’t love him, because I believe I do, but I also believe a woman is capable of loving more than one man. And right now, Conrad, I find myself growing rather fond of you.”

  She pulled herself on top of him and sat with her ivory thighs astride his waist, twisting the curly hairs on his stomach around her fingertips. “Why don’t you leave me a message at the Riviera this afternoon and let me know if you’ll be free tonight. Or tomorrow night, for that matter. I’m not going anywhere for a while. Heavens, for all I know, there may not even be a Walter Lukash.”

  Chapter 4

  Prosser switched on the car radio as he entered the refuse-strewn wasteland opposite the Saint Simon bathing beach, three kilometers south of the city. He turned up the volume and listened carefully for the tone that announced the beginning of the eight o’clock news. The morning broadcasts always carried a complete listing of the hot spots that Beirut’s morning commuters should avoid if they wished to escape sniping, shelling, kidnapping, car bombs, and other local hazards.

  According to Radio Liban, the unofficial casualty figures from last night’s battle were two Phalangist fighters dead and five wounded, and from the National Movement, four fighters dead and eight wounded. The civilian totals would be higher, the announcer predicted, but those numbers would not be available for another twenty-four hours. Meanwhile, civil defense workers were laboring around the clock to collect the remains of the noncombatants who had cowered in cellars and windowless interior rooms until shell, rocket, or bullet had found them.

  With new cease-fire talks not having yet begun, both the port and Sodeco crossings remained closed to morning commuters. Since Prosser knew this generally created mile-long backups at the National Museum checkpoint, he opted for the more distant but less frequented Galerie Semaan crossing, located six or seven kilometers southeast of the city. After a mere twenty-minute delay in the slums of Shiyah before reaching the Syrian checkpoint, he found the crossing open for business and was soon across the Beirut River moving north toward suburban Sinn el Fil, in Christian East Beirut.

  Five years of civil war had stripped away more than a few layers of civilization from Lebanese society, among them the enforcement of speed limits and traffic regulations. The cardinal rule of the road was to trust one’s horn, floor the accelerator, and yield only to superior mass. Prosser merged aggressively into the Sinn el Fil traffic circle and peeled off to the right toward Jdeidé and the coastal autostrade.

  A few moments later he found himself amid a barren tract on the outskirts of suburban East Beirut that was neither agricultural, residential, nor industrial, yet possessed the least attractive features of all three. Half-built warehouses abandoned at the outbreak of hostilities and shabby stone farmhouses with haphazardly tended truck gardens dotted the low hills, each surrounded by rusting carcasses of dead Fiats and Peugeots.

  Prosser drove on, reaching the coastal suburb of Jdeidé with half an hour to spare. Instead of continuing north along the Mediterranean, he passed through the tidy bedroom community that occupied the thin wedge of fertile land between the coastal autostrade and the foothills of the Sannine Range, then started up the narrow mountain road toward Ain Saadé and the summer resorts of Beït Meri and Broummana. After only five minutes of climbing, the humid coastal air became drier and took on a perceptible chill.

  Halfway to Ain Saadé, Prosser steered the Renault off the road at the crest of a hill overlooking the commercial port and parked on the gravel shoulder. Directly below him was St. Georges Bay and the southern terminus of the autostrade, while to the north lay the prosperous seaside suburbs of Jall ed Dib and Antélias. Barely visible in the haze beyond them lay the thriving harbor town of Jounié. Prosser turned his eyes west, where a huddled mass of whitewashed houses clung to the steep slopes of Jebel Achrafiyé, just east of the Green Line separating East and West Beirut, their red tile roofs blazing in the brilliant rays of the morning sun. As many times as he had looked out over the city from this or one of the other hills above Jdeidé, he never ceased to marvel at the rugged beauty of the land and its wondrous faculty for concealing the wounds inflicted by five years of armed conflict.

  Having nearly squandered his half-hour head start, Prosser retreated to the coast, keeping a vigilant eye open for any clues that he might be under surveillance. He picked up the autostrade at Jdeidé, rode it for just under five minutes, and exited to the north at Antélias. Reasonably certain by now that he had not been followed, he backed into a parking space two blocks south of his Lebanese agent’s twelve-story apartment block.

  The time was ten minutes after nine, and any residents of the building who held down jobs would already be on their way to work. Prosser entered through the rear door. The concierge’s chair on the opposite side of the lobby was unoccupied, as were both elevators. He entered the elevator to the left, rode to the tenth floor, and then walked down two flights of stairs to César Khalifé’s eight-floor apartment to throw off anyone who might have seen him enter.

  He rang the bell and a melodic young voice called out something unintelligible. Then footsteps rapped a hasty beat across the hardwood floor. The door opened and a slender, dark-eyed woman in her late twenties stood before him, dressed modestly in a charcoal wool skirt and a white silk blouse, a leather art portfolio slung over her shoulder.

  Prosser had seen César’s daughter only once before. As he recalled, her long chestnut hair had been gathered behind her neck with a brightly colored silk scarf, as it was now. And, as before, her erect carriage and uplifted chin conveyed an air of aloofness tinged with disdain, as if she knew what he was about and wanted no part of it.

  “Sabah al-khayr, Muna,” he began. “Is your father at home?”

  “Sabah an-nour,” she replied with studi
ed politeness. “Entrez, s’il vous plait.” Her smile was businesslike and devoid of any spark of interest in him or the work that had brought him there. “My father is expecting you and will join you in a moment. Would you like some coffee or some mint tea?” she continued in French.

  “No, thank you. I’ve already had some this morning. Besides, you look as though you’re on your way out.” He spoke in English because he knew her English was at least as good as, if not better than, his French or Arabic.

  A wry smile formed at the corners of her mouth and her aloof expression softened. Beneath Muna’s businesslike façade was a woman of considerable allure, Prosser thought. He wished he could see more of her, but could not imagine how it could be done as long as her father remained an agent of Beirut Station.

  “Oui, c’est ça,” she replied with a careless shrug. “Au revoir, monsieur.”

  Before he could tell her to call him by his first name, Muna Khalifé was past him and on her way to the lobby.

  Prosser looked around the room. The decor was typical of the Levantine merchant class—Louis of Lebanon, as he had once heard Muriel Benson call it—a profusion of oriental rugs, ornate woodwork, gold leaf, and red velvet along with an untidy collection of souvenir knickknacks from France, Switzerland, Japan, and North America, balanced by the melancholy of painted icons of the Maronite Catholic Church. The decor showed the influence of César’s late wife—nothing had been moved or replaced since her death two years before, when a car bomb exploded outside the bakery where she had gone to buy bread.

  “Bonjour, bonjour, mon ami,” came an unexpectedly jolly voice in the corridor. Prosser caught sight of a short, barrel-chested man with a florid complexion and shiny gray hair combed back in marcelled waves. He seemed the picture of the Levantine merchant in his raw silk suit, tailored white shirt worn unbuttoned to the breastbone, and wraparound Alain Delon sunglasses worn on top of his head.

  According to César’s file at Headquarters, before the outbreak of civil war in 1975, César had been a reasonably prosperous importer of electric appliances, owning a showroom and warehouse off rue Weygand in the heart of the old commercial district. The building had been gutted by fire in the first week of the war and now stood near the center of the no-man’s-land separating East and West Beirut. Because César’s wealth had been almost completely tied up in his building and inventory, the loss of merchandise and real estate had forced him to liquidate all of his other investments and even to sell his ancestral mountain villa near Beït Meri to pay his creditors. Having managed to retain little more than his Mercedes and his furniture, César moved his wife and daughter into a high-rise apartment in Antélias on the strength of a mortgage to his sister and brother-in-law.

  With the loss of his business, César threw himself into the war effort with abandon, commanding a battery of Chamounist artillery in the hills around Beït Meri from May of 1975 until the autumn of the following year, when the arrival of Syrian tanks brought temporary peace to Lebanon and gave the Christian alliance between the Chamounist National Liberal Party and the more powerful Phalange Party sufficient time to unravel. By the end of October, César had found it impossible to work with his Phalange counterparts, who baited and harassed the Chamounist NLP officers at every opportunity. He resigned his commission, went back to being a rank-and-file member of the NLP’s political organization, and set about rebuilding his electrical goods business.

  Around the same time, Prosser recalled from the file, César had found an occasion to visit the American embassy’s consular section, where he met a mid-level consular officer named Edwin Pirelli. During the winter of 1976–1977, César had spent many evenings at Pirelli’s apartment pouring out his bitterness toward the Phalangists and their relentless drive for political dominance over the Lebanese Christian community. Pirelli was nothing if not a patient listener, and his penetrating questions also displayed an astute grasp of Lebanese history and politics, which further endeared him to the merchant-warrior.

  From time to time, Pirelli pressed César to back up his opinions with facts that Pirelli could cite to his superiors at the American embassy to show that he had his finger on the pulse of Lebanon’s political life. Before long, César found himself canvassing his friends and relatives regularly about their views on specific political issues and cultivating those of his acquaintances who held positions in the Phalange Party or militia.

  One evening, after a particularly enjoyable meal at Pépé’s, a celebrated fish restaurant overlooking the Roman Harbor at Byblos, César confided to Pirelli his recent difficulties in holding on to his most lucrative distributorship, that of a French kitchen appliance manufacturer. Owing to his distressed financial circumstances, he was no longer able to carry the manufacturer’s full line of products or to keep ample levels of inventory in stock, nor could he adequately promote the products that were coming under intense competitive pressure from the Japanese. As a result, the manufacturer threatened to take away César’s exclusive franchise for Lebanon—or, at the very least, to divide it between two or more regional distributors. César had tried to procure a loan to support an increased level of business, but the interest rates the local banks were charging were nothing less than extortionate. After servicing the debt, he would have been left with little or nothing with which to support himself and his daughter.

  Pirelli had asked what rate the banks were charging and how much money César would need to maintain his current living standard in the event that he committed himself to a loan on the banks’ terms. César named a figure and Pirelli nodded once. A moment of silence followed, and then Pirelli offered to pay César a handsome salary for doing nothing more than continuing his political reporting. A smile of happy disbelief spread slowly across César’s face. He agreed at once and ordered two glasses of the bar’s best Armagnac to seal the bargain. Within a few months, César became one of the station’s most productive reporting agents in East Beirut.

  Prosser, whom César knew under the alias of Charles, was the third Agency case officer to handle him since his recruitment. Now he took a seat on the sofa and waited while the affable Lebanese laid a manila envelope between them.

  “Yesterday I received the reports from both Jubran and Salim,” César said. “There is much to tell you, Charles. Shall we go to my study?”

  “No, let’s stay here. If anybody comes to the door, I’ll wait in the kitchen until you can get rid of them.”

  It was a beautiful morning, with the sky the deepest, clearest cobalt blue Prosser had ever seen. The study, he knew very well, was an airless, windowless cell. Under the circumstances, he saw no need to be overly meticulous about security.

  “As you wish, mon ami,” César replied “Shall we begin with Jubran, then? It is all written in his report, of course, but if you wish I can make a précis for you until you have time to translate it properly.”

  “Please do,” Prosser answered, drawing a checkbook-size notepad and a ballpoint pen from his shirt pocket.

  César recited the highlights of Jubran’s report. For the most part, it discussed the talks held aboard an Israeli gunboat three days before between the deputy director of the Mossad and the chief of Phalange intelligence. According to Jubran, a distant cousin of César who worked as a Phalange political organizer in the mountainous Metn district, the main item on the agenda had been the reconfiguration of Israeli military and intelligence assistance to the Phalange in exchange for the promise of American aid. The Lebanese wanted the Israelis to maintain current aid levels; the Israelis argued for cutbacks in areas where the Phalange could expect American aid. So much for the secrecy of the Agency’s newest liaison relationship, Prosser thought as he listened to the report.

  A second topic discussed aboard the gunboat was said to be a Phalange proposal for destabilizing the Syrian regime by delivering communications equipment and technical advice to the Muslim Brotherhood and other internal opponents of the Damascus regime. “If we want a war with Syria, we would prefer to
launch it ourselves,” the Mossad official had replied icily. He cautioned his Lebanese counterpart that if the Phalangists nonetheless mounted such a campaign on their own, the Damascus regime could be expected to respond with overwhelming force against Lebanese Christian population centers, most likely even worse than the summer-long shelling of densely populated Achrafiyé in 1978.

  Finally César recited the main points of recent reporting from Salim, a major in the Phalange-dominated Lebanese Forces artillery, which laid out the order of battle of Lebanese Forces artillery units in the Kasrawan and Metn. When he had finished, he shuffled the papers into a neat pile and returned them to the manila envelope. “Now I will bring our coffee. After, I shall have a story to tell you.”

  “Would you like me to help you in the kitchen?” Prosser offered.

  “No, no, no, the coffee is all prepared. Please, relax.”

  César disappeared into the hallway and returned promptly with a well-worn silver-plated tray and two demitasse cups filled to the brim with thick, cloyingly sweet Arab coffee. He placed the cups on the edge of the table in front of them and pushed the tray to the side. “Let me start by asking you a question, Charles. Has Edouard ever talked to you about how he and I began our work together?”

  “I seem to recall that you and Ed met in our embassy’s consular section during the Events, when Ed was a visa officer. Is that correct, or do I have things mixed up?” Prosser recalled that “Edouard” had been the alias Pirelli used with César.

  César ignored Prosser’s question and posed another of his own. “And do you know the reason why I visited your consulate?”

  “For a visa, I would expect. Why else would anyone who isn’t an American citizen bother to stand in those outrageous queues for the privilege of talking to rude people hiding behind bulletproof windows?”