“HEU?”
“Weapons-grade uranium.”
“That’s it? Forty pounds? But that’s—that’s the size of a child.”
“Well, that’s not counting the explosives, the electronics, the casing, what have you. But no, it needn’t be large. And then you pop it inside a lead bag and you can move it wherever you want, no worries.”
“It can’t be that easy. I mean, hasn’t Iran been trying to build nukes for ages? And they haven’t managed, and they’ve got a whole country working on it?”
Tusk summoned his patience visibly. “You miss the point, my dear. Pakistan already has nuclear weapons. You’re just talking about plucking one off the shelf. Anyway, Iran—well, the whole analogy just doesn’t work. Iran is trying to build a nuclear program. If you’re a terrorist, you don’t need a program, you just want one bomb. It doesn’t have to be reliable, does it? Even if it fizzles and doesn’t work that well, you’ve still succeeded at producing a complete fucking catastrophe.”
I considered this. Then I jumped.
A large, gray cat had sprung onto Tusk’s lap.
“There’s a good boy. How’s my baby?” Tusk stroked its ears and it began to purr.
“A cat?” I asked stupidly.
Tusk went on fluffing its fur.
“You—you bring your cat to work?”
“Oh, no. He lives here. One of the milder eccentricities around here, believe me.”
He patted his leg. “Here, Philby.” The cat stretched, gave a long yawn, and curled itself around his ankles.
“Where were we? Nearly done?” Tusk checked his watch. “Yes. Nearly done.”
I searched my mind for what else to ask. There was so much I wanted to know; very little that he was likely to comment on.
“Targets,” I blurted. “If there really were a bomb inside that crate . . . If terrorists had managed to steal one and get it into the US . . . What would they use it on?”
“You can’t possibly believe I’m going to answer that.”
“An alert went out this morning from NCTC. Calling for increased vigilance and random searches of fruit trucks. There must have been some intelligence that led them to do that. What was it?”
He raised his eyebrows. “Really? You’re really thinking I might answer that?”
“Listen,” I said, trying not to yell. “I get it. You’re the CIA. And this is all very sensitive and top secret and hush-hush. But if you guys think there’s even a remote possibility that somebody has smuggled a nuclear bomb into the country, don’t you have some responsibility to inform the public?”
“Inform the public? That’s your job, not mine.”
“You’re not exactly making it easy.”
“No. But then I help run the clandestine service. Clan-des-tine. You do see the difficulty? Trust me, Alexandra. There are very good reasons why I can’t answer your entirely reasonable questions. Now, let me give you this.”
He peeled a Post-it note off the table in front of us. On it he wrote a number.
“My personal mobile number. I am not in the habit of giving it out. Please don’t do anything foolish like entering it into your newspaper contacts database.”
I shook my head.
“Good. Perhaps we can be of use to each other at some future date. I’ll see you out.”
He stood and walked me out of the conference room and around the corner, until we could glimpse the uniformed guard at the main desk. Then he waved at the guard, pointed at me, and indicated that I was to be seen out.
“Lovely to meet you, Alexandra. Best of luck.”
“Thank you,” I said stiffly, and shook his hand.
As he moved away, he spoke again in a quiet voice. “If you were a terrorist and you had just one—you’re not going to waste it, are you?”
I spun to look at him but he was already headed for the turnstiles. He scanned his badge and disappeared into the building without looking back.
The cat followed him.
43
Shaukat Malik was lounging on the bed at the Marriott when his phone chirped to announce the arrival of a new text message.
Odd. Communications were supposed to have gone dark.
Malik pressed mute on the TV remote. He had been watching a cooking show, homemade lamb meatballs in three easy steps.
The message made the hairs on his neck prickle:
Status change. New date. We go TOMORROW, July 2. Stand by.
But this made no sense. The date had been agreed on weeks ago. Why move it up? Malik sank back onto his pillow, confused.
Perhaps someone important had changed his travel schedule.
Or perhaps the plan had always included shifting the date at the last moment. To keep people off guard. To make sure that any leaks or betrayals would give away only outdated information.
Malik did not know how many people knew details of the operation. He did not know, for example, how many people had received the text he just had. He assumed the circle to be small, for obvious security reasons. But even Malik knew only fragments. The precise delivery mechanism had been kept from him. As had the identities of the men funding the operation. They were rich. They must be. But where they lived, and what drove them to want to dictate history in this way—such was not for him to know. This was the way the network operated. Everything was compartmentalized. You were provided the information you needed to accomplish your specific task, and only that.
Malik read the message over again, as if he could discern a hidden meaning from the sparse words. Well. Whatever the reason, if the date was now tomorrow, it was time for him to move on.
His part was done. The video was uploaded, ready for release. He had always planned to leave the night before. He had not signed up to be a martyr.
Malik pulled his suitcase from the closet and threw it on the bed. There wasn’t much to pack. Clothes, sandals, his toothbrush. From the windowsill, he gently lifted the souvenirs he had purchased. Tiny white plastic models of the Capitol, the White House, and the Washington Monument. He had arranged this last one in the window so that it lined up perfectly with the real Washington Monument, just visible outside across the Potomac. The vendor had tried to sell him the Pentagon and the Supreme Court too; he wondered whether he should go back. No, probably impossible to find the man again. And he had gotten the best ones: the Capitol in particular had a paper American flag attached to its miniature dome that appealed to him enormously. He rolled them all up inside a pair of pajamas and tucked them into his case.
The phone chirped again as he stood taking a last look around the room.
This message, clearly, was intended for him alone:
One more task for you. Stand by. Details tomorrow.
Shaukat stared at the phone in his hand. Details tomorrow? But tomorrow was . . . He began to pace nervously. What could it be? What was left to be done?
AT THAT MOMENT LUCIEN SLY was also nervously pacing.
To be precise, he was carving laps around an office conference table, pausing every so often to pound the table in frustration. Outside the windows a steady rain beat down, pricking the gray surface of the Thames River.
Lucien had been summoned to Vauxhall Cross, MI6’s fortresslike headquarters in London, as it became clear the situation was deteriorating from merely bad to outright awful.
Yesterday had brought two pieces of surreal news: first, that Nadeem Siddiqui had been reported dead. Lucien was staggered. And then, even as he raced down the M11 motorway from Cambridge to London, his bosses had called to report an even more bizarre development. An Irish tourist had been murdered on a British Airways flight to Washington. On Alex’s British Airways flight to Washington.
He had managed to catch her on the phone earlier today. An awkward conversation, with Lucien unable to share what he knew and forced to feign surprise at Alex’s breathless updates. He needed to warn her; she seemed still not to grasp that she was in real danger. But when he urged her to take greater security precautions, she h
ad laughed him off. Of course she would. She knew him only as a rich university student with a taste for the ladies. It was unbearable.
And that was all before the latest twist. The most surreal news yet had arrived today. The MI6 head of station in Islamabad had sent a cable, relaying that a security team at Nadeem Siddiqui’s lab had searched his desk. What they had found was chilling. Maps, diagrams, photographs.
MI6’s leaders were still trying to digest the new information. For now, it would not be shared with any foreign liaison partners, not even the CIA. Lucien was among the small number of people who’d been briefed. He had sat through the meeting feeling increasingly sick. Alex James had come up several times by name; Lucien’s report on her was included among the PowerPoints.
Holy mother of God. Lucien whacked the conference table again and then raked his hands through his hair. He was caught.
He could not tell Alex he worked for MI6.
He could not tell MI6 he was sleeping with Alex.
Meanwhile dark forces appeared to be in motion, and he had no clue how to stop them.
Lucien had longed for action. This was not what he’d had in mind.
44
After my encounter with Edmund Tusk, I took a taxi straight to the Chronicle’s Washington office.
The next few hours were a blur.
Elias had convinced someone at the FBI to pass him a copy of the memo that went out this morning. It didn’t say much more than Galloni had already told me, but with my being up against so many unknowns, it was comforting to have a physical document in hand.
Meanwhile Hyde had apparently spent the day alternating between shouting at the Chronicle’s in-house lawyers up in Boston, and shouting at the national security adviser’s staff. The former were balking at giving us the green light to publish anything at all; the latter were balking at giving us a quote on the record. Both sides calmed down around 5:00 p.m., when General Carspecken consented to our using one of the more innocuous quotes from this morning’s meeting—the one about everything being under control—on condition that we attribute it to an unnamed “senior administration official.”
It wasn’t much, but it was enough for Elias and me to sit down at adjoining desks and hammer out a story that began like this:
WASHINGTON—They say they don’t know exactly what they’re looking for.
But police and other law enforcement officials up and down the East Coast stepped up security measures Thursday, in the wake of an urgent memo issued by the National Counterterrorism Center here in Washington.
The memo—a copy of which was obtained by the Chronicle—urges extra vigilance at border crossings into the country. It also calls for food-delivery trucks to be stopped and searched. Administration officials declined to comment on whether information about a specific threat had prompted the memo.
“My understanding is [the situation] is under control,” a senior administration official told the Chronicle. . . .
It was tricky when we knew so much more than we were able to say.
The word nuclear, for example, didn’t appear until the very bottom of the article:
The possibility of produce deliveries as a security concern was raised at a recent conference organized by the Department of Homeland Security.
Officials described how nuclear sensors installed at major ports and airports are designed to detect radioactive material. But certain cargoes—including bananas—are rarely stopped. The potassium in bananas routinely sets off the sensors, according to one former official from the Los Alamos National Laboratory.
As a result, he added, “They just wave them right through.”
“Good,” said Hyde, when we finally leaned back from our keyboards. He had been standing behind me, reading along over my shoulder and making suggestions as we typed.
“Not great, but good. At least we’ll have put a marker down on the story. Now, why don’t you two go get some rest? We’ll reconvene here in the morning and figure out our next line of attack.”
I stretched my arms above my head and nodded. I needed to do another emergency shopping expedition so I would have something to wear tomorrow. My plan was to force Elias to accompany me. He wasn’t obvious bodyguard material, but he was better than nothing.
It was after 9:00 p.m. when we trudged up the hill again toward Dumbarton Street. I felt bone weary and I was lugging two shopping bags. I’d grabbed the first dress that fit, a silky wrap with a caramel-and-ivory swirl pattern. Also a buttery-tan pair of Tod’s ballet flats: after marching around all day in high heels, my toes were screaming for mercy.
Back at his place Elias produced a well-thumbed pile of take-out menus.
“Your call, Ginger. Thai or Mexican? I think the Mexican place might deliver faster.”
I kicked my Manolos off beside the door and plopped down beside him on the futon.
“I don’t know. I don’t think I can face a burrito. Any chance we could just throw together something here? I feel like I haven’t eaten anything besides plane food and takeout in weeks.”
I got up and rummaged around the kitchen. The refrigerator held slim pickings, but I found half a loaf of bread, a dozen eggs, and a few wilting vegetables.
“Tell me you have butter and salt somewhere, and I can whip us up an omelet,” I called through.
“Sure. Breakfast for dinner. Love it,” he yelled back.
A few minutes later I was cracking eggs into a bowl. Elias found a frying pan for me, then settled on a stool and launched into an impersonation of a constipated-looking Jill outside the White House this morning.
“ ‘Carry this back for me, will you, Elias, you ignorant twit?’ ” he mimicked. “I nearly gagged when she handed me that grotty mug.” He wrinkled his nose. “Did you see there were teeth marks on top, where she’d gnawed the lid?”
“Eww. What a cow. But you should have seen her once we got inside. Barely said a word. Hyde, though, he was great. He— Ouch!”
I’d been trying to chop a tomato and the dull knife nicked my finger.
“Oh, here—use the tomato knife.” Elias reached into a drawer. “So what did Hyde do? I think he and Carspecken have a long history—”
“Did you say this is a tomato knife?” I interrupted, studying the oddly shaped utensil he had placed in my hand. “As in, a knife specifically designed for cutting tomatoes?”
“Yep. It’s awesome.”
“Wow. I don’t know many bachelors who can boast of owning their very own tomato knife.”
He shrugged. “My mom gave it to me. It’s kind of a family inside joke. We exchange crazy kitchen gadgets as stocking stuffers for Christmas.”
My eyes lit up. “What else do you have?”
“Let’s see . . . a mango pitter . . . a tortilla press . . . Don’t think I’ve ever used that one. Poultry shears, obviously . . .”
“You have poultry shears? I don’t even know what that—”
“Doesn’t everyone? Did I mention my reversible meat tenderizer?”
I started to giggle.
He opened a drawer and began pulling things out. “There’s an egg cuber here, but that was a given. An olive-wood lobster mallet, my personal favorite. A lemon reamer . . . Nah, too pedestrian. Aha. Here we go. The pièce de résistance.”
He held up what looked like a deep-sea-diver’s mask.
“What’s that?”
“Onion goggles, mais bien sûr.”
I laughed until tears rolled down my cheeks.
“Personally, I still think the spring-loaded ravioli stamp I gave my sister last year wins for sheer usefulness.”
I kept laughing and crying until suddenly the tears falling were real tears. I realized I was weeping.
“Alex?”
“Sorry,” I sobbed. “I’m—I’m just exhausted. I guess this story is getting to me.”
“Oh,” he said awkwardly. “I guess having someone attempt to murder you would do that.”
“Yeah, there’s that. And I keep feeling lik
e there is something . . . terrible going on, and all we’ve managed to do is nibble around the edges.”
“We just have to keep nibbling tomorrow.”
I sniffled.
“We’ll get there, don’t worry. And at least your love life is looking up, right?” he asked.
“What?”
“ ‘Good morning, luscious legs’?”
I felt my cheeks flush red. “He’s not a boyfriend or anything. Actually, he’s . . .” A cackle escaped me. I couldn’t help it. “Actually he’s more like Petronella’s boyfriend.”
Elias looked lost. “Petronella? Petronella Black? I thought Thom Carlyle was her boyfriend.”
“Things got a little complicated. Make that very complicated.” I started laughing again through the tears.
Elias stared at me as if I might be unhinged.
I reached for a wad of paper towels. I blew my nose, wiped my eyes, and tried to think of a way to change the subject. “So. A spring-loaded ravioli stamp?”
For the next hour we sat in his little kitchen, eating eggs and burned toast and comparing silly family holiday rituals. Elias’s were far more entertaining than mine, although he did seem to enjoy my account of the Christmas when my father ignited his own eyebrows while attempting to make mulled wine.
It was nearly midnight before we slid the dishes into the sink and said good-night. I think Elias was trying to avoid the lumpy futon couch as long as possible. And I . . . I felt happy just to sit with a friend and talk about something trivial. I didn’t even mind being sober. Anything to postpone thinking about all the questions rattling around my head. I knew that later I would lie awake, worrying about Thom Carlyle and Nadeem Siddiqui and Lucien Sly. About my daughter. About how to put things right.
45
FRIDAY, JULY 2
I had a terrible night.
I tossed and turned and imagined that every creak and whisper of the old house above us was the footfall of someone coming to kill me.
Anonymous Sources Page 20
