by Larry Bond
She waited until she could hear the footsteps approaching the door to drop the primed bomb in her hand — it was a smoke grenade — and tossed a pin flash-bang on the ground before running to catch up with the others.
13
TRIPOLI
THAT EVENING…
As the name suggested, Il Medici had an Italian motif, with buff marble statues and a massive fountain that greeted visitors as they entered the hotel’s main hall. The hotel had been built only the year before on land that had once been a dumping ground for cars and trucks. The city fathers hoped Il Medici would entourage a new era in tourism, drawing visitors from Europe as well as northern Lebanon and southern Syria. Perhaps it would someday; for now, though, only a quarter of its rooms were occupied and its spacious casino and clubs were at best half full.
The casino had, however, become the locus of choice for entrepreneurs in the import-export trade or, more precisely, the specific subset of that trade dealing with hashish and similar items. This made it a convenient place for Ferguson to stay, and after buying some cheap luggage and clothes in the bazaar in town, he went over to the hotel and checked in. Room secured, bugs located — one in the bedroom beneath the desk where the phone was and another in the bathroom — he sauntered down to the casino, wandering past the roulette wheel and casting an eye toward the card tables. There were several bars. The one he found at the back of the casino clearly catered to the intended clientele; bored Europeans attracted by the cut rate prices, high payoff rates on the machines, and vaguely dangerous atmosphere. There were Greeks and Turks, along with a number of Frenchmen, a few of whom looked to have been here since the occupation. Attractive women in tight-fitting two-piece rayon dresses that exposed their midriffs hovered nearby, smiling fitfully.
Ferg circled the bar, then sidled up near the waiter station and ordered a German beer, Einbecker. He started to pay with a Lebanese note but caught the frown of the bartender. Smiling, Ferg slid a ten-Euro note on the bar and ignored the change. He walked to a table near the side, sipping the beer and watching the crowd.
“You are alone?” asked one of the young women, leaning toward him.
“Sit,” he invited her.
“You buy drink?”
“Sit,” said Ferguson, gesturing.
The woman glanced over her shoulder, though Ferg knew that her employer would not be in the casino. The glance was meant to imply that she had protection if he didn’t play by the rules. Unfortunately for her sake, this wasn’t true; if he took advantage of her services without paying, there was a fifty-fifty chance her boss would come for him. But there was a hundred-percent chance she would be punished and that a beating would be only the beginning. The woman would not be in a position to complain; she was likely to be Palestinian, not Lebanese, and had less standing with police than even a foreign spy.
Ferguson reached into his pocket and pulled out a wad of bills, American this time. He peeled off two hundreds and a fifty, understanding that the woman would be able to give her boss the fifty and keep the rest. He folded them individually between his fingers and laid his fist on the table, poking the fifty up with his thumb.
“What are you drinking?” he asked.
“Ginger ale,” said the woman.
Watered-down ginger ale was the most expensive item on the menu here, one reason the hovering women in rayon were tolerated.
“Get one,” he told her.
The woman looked over toward the bar and nodded.
“I’m looking for where the Russian hangs out,” said Ferguson, letting the fifty-dollar bill fall to the table.
The woman shook her head as if she didn’t understand. Ferguson repeated the question in Arabic, and this time added that he was looking for men “who buy and sell,” the euphemism of choice the year before, though he wasn’t sure now if he was out of date, as it tended to change. “The Russian is the one I want.”
The woman looked over her shoulder, then reached for the bill. He let her take it.
“He’s not here,” she said.
“Downstairs?”
Ferg slid one of the hundred-dollar bills out so that it appeared between the fingers of his fist. “Where can I find him?”
“I — “
He slid the bill out a little farther. Another of the women who had been standing nearby saw it and stepped over to see what was going on. This convinced the woman already at the table to become more cooperative.
“I hear at the Krehml,” she said, reaching for the money. “Krehml” meant “Kremlin,” a very nice club at the other end of town. It wasn’t the right answer, but her willingness to guess was all Ferguson wanted for now.
“Show me where it is,” he told her.
The woman blanched. The other stepped forward.
“Both of you can show me,” said Ferguson, rising. He pushed his thumb into his fist, demonstrating that there were two bills there, then put the money into his pocket. He dropped another fifty Euros on the table to cover the ginger ale. The women were trading glares behind him, following. When he reached the roulette table he stopped and turned to them.
“Red or black?” he asked.
They looked at each other. He gestured at the game. “Red or black?”
One said red; the other, black.
“Decide. Agree on one,” said Ferguson. He stepped over to the cashier and exchanged the two thousand Euros for chips. When he returned, they had agreed on black.
“Black?”
The women nodded.
Black came up.
“Dresses,” he said, dropping the chips into their hands. “Go exchange those. Then we get a car.”
The women looked at him incredulously.
“You have to look a little stylish around town, no?”
Despite the fact that it was now past nine p.m., the concierge had no trouble accommodating him. A Mercedes appeared outside the hotel within a few minutes of Ferguson’s request. Had he bothered to scan for a bug, he was sure he would find at least one, and it was a good bet that the driver was on the police payroll. But this was a necessary part of doing business, and something that could be worked to his advantage if required.
The port area of the city had a small row of boutiques on the road from the hotel; one happened to belong to a friend of a friend of the concierge, who knew he would be open late. (He also knew he would receive a cut of the profit if the rich foreign customer was as indulgent toward women as he seemed.)
For nearly two hours, the women tried on clothes while Ferguson passed judgment on their choices — no fool, he claimed to like everything — and sipped the complimentary champagne brought over by the owner. One of the women called herself Kel and the other, Aress. Not even Ferg could have guessed how close these were to their real names. Their winnings didn’t cover what they selected, but Ferg made up the difference, with a generous tip on the side for the salesclerk’s patience and the owner’s champagne, not to mention the lateness of the hour.
He checked his watch. Seeing that it was not yet midnight, he told the driver to go over to the Simon, a restaurant at the top of one of the residential towers near the water. They had dinner — Ferg offered to include the driver, which was expected, but the man turned him down, also expected — and by the time the Mercedes pulled up at the Krehml it was after two.
“You know what? Let’s hop down the street to La Citadelle,” he said. “Just for the hell of it.”
The driver, who probably was expecting this, nodded. Kel pulled back. She’d been the second one to join him at the casino.
“I thought you wanted fun,” she said.
“There’s fun there.”
“Very dangerous there,” she said in English.
“Some people like danger. It’s good for the heart.”
She made a face, but she was too comfortable in the dress to back out now.
La Citadelle had a weapons detector at the front door; knowing this, Ferguson had taken only the big Glock with him. He surrendered
it with the proper amount of decorum and was admitted with a nod. A swing band with a slight Middle Eastern accent played inside to a rather noisy crowd. Ferguson guided the women down to the floor that overlooked the terrace. Aress picked up the beat as they walked, but Kel remained apprehensive, glancing around at the crowd, which included a fair amount of the world’s seamier characters. Ferguson smiled at the faces that turned to meet his, then slid into a chair near the window, ordering a bottle of champagne to keep with the theme of the evening. He let the two women drink and leaned back, gazing pensively at the ceiling as if contemplating the cost of the gold-and-jewel-encrusted border. In reality, he was examining the reflections of the people in the dark glass. He didn’t see who he was looking for, but that didn’t matter; he would eventually come to him.
First, though, there were diversions: a short, portly Lebanese man with a buzz cut and several gold chains approached the table, took a few steps past, then pretended to suddenly remember that he had seen Ferguson’s face before.
“Not my Irish friend,” said the man.
“Sarkis! How are you?” said Ferguson, getting up, his English suddenly rich with the sound of Dublin. They exchanged kisses, each feigning happiness at seeing each other. “Sit and have a drink.”
“No, no, no, thank you anyway.”
“Come on now. An Irish whiskey with an Irishman.”
Sarkis glanced at the girls but resisted temptation.
“What brings you to town?”
“Why does anyone come to town?”
Sarkis nodded grimly He was not a dealer — on the contrary, his job was to stop trafficking — but he received several times more money each month from the local dealers than he did from the government.
“I am interested in finding Romanski,” said Ferguson.
Sarkis made a face. “Romanski finds you, if he wants to.”
“I’ll mention you sent your regards when I see him,” said Ferguson.
* * *
Ferguson stopped at two more clubs, flashing money and making himself generally visible, without finding Romanski or even anyone as interesting as Sarkis. The scene here was still pretty much as it had been a year before: an easy place to buy drugs wholesale if you knew whom you were dealing with, an even easier place to get killed if you didn’t.
Ferguson called the Cube from the men’s room of a jazz lounge called Blu Note. The place, owned by a French couple, was a relatively quiet bar rarely frequented by dealers or government officials.
“Where have you been, Ferg? Boss lady wants to talk to you. She’s freaking.”
“Corrine? Don’t worry about her. What’s up with Rankin and Thera?”
Lauren told him that they hadn’t had anything interesting when they last checked in, then went back to berating him about Corrine. “She’s on her way to see you.”
“What?”
“She’s really mad that you blew her off. She’s flying into Tripoli tomorrow. She says either you find her or she finds you. She’s going to be at the Medici.”
“Aw, come on.”
“She’s pissed, Ferg. I keep telling you. You can’t just blow her off.”
“Tell her that I’ll contact her. Remind her I’m a member of the IRA, right?”
“She knows you’re undercover.”
“And tell her this isn’t the Yale Drama Club.”
“I don’t think you’re being fair.”
“You’re right. She wouldn’t have passed the auditions.”
Ferg snapped off the phone. When he got back, Kel and Aress were slumped in the booth. Aress had fallen asleep; Kel looked at him through slit eyes.
“Who are you?” she said, speaking in Arabic. “What are you doing here?”
“Just a traveler.”
“Who do you work for?”
“Time for bed. Come on.”
He slid his arm under Aress and got her to her feet. A woman played a piano nearby, working the keys slowly as she moved through a bluesy version of a Cole Porter song. She glanced at Ferg and he smiled at her, admiring the way she flipped her shoulder-length hair as she turned back to her keyboard.
Ferg found the driver napping in the car. He woke him up, and they started back to the hotel.
“Where are we going now?” Kel asked.
“I’m going to my hotel and sleep,” he told her cheerfully. “You can go anywhere you want.”
“And her?”
“She can have my couch.” Aress was too far gone to leave anywhere.
“You don’t want both of us?”
“I don’t even want one of you. Nothing personal.”
“What do you want?”
“Usually what I can’t have.”
14
EASTERN SYRIA
“They didn’t like you in there,” Thera said to Fouad when they stopped outside of town.
“No. They were Kurds.”
“Iraqi Kurds?”
“Kurds believe they belong to their own country. They were our enemy. They are our enemy now.”
“They’re part of your government.”
“I don’t expect Americans to understand,” he told her.
Rankin, who’d doubled back to see if they’d been followed, finally caught up.
“We’re clear,” he told them. “What was the business about the jewels?” he asked Fouad.
“He cannot carry money, so he carries jewelry, probably things stolen or hidden during the regime.”
Fouad explained to Rankin about the airplane. As in most places in Syria, even scheduled flights tended to be sporadic there, but it might be possible for Khazaal to rent a plane, especially if he had enough jewels.
“If he wanted to take an airplane, where would he be going?” asked Thera.
Fouad shrugged. “Somewhere in Syria, but from there, who knows? There is a plane every week to Damascus, but it is suspended every so often for different reasons. Sometimes security, sometimes one of the dictators has a notion of something. It is hard to say where he would go.”
“But he’s out of here?” said Rankin.
“That much I would believe. Nassad would not lie about that.”
“Right,” said Rankin.
Fouad stared at him but said nothing.
“Push on or call for pickup?” asked Thera.
“We should go to the airport,” said Fouad.
“How far is Mansura?” Rankin asked.
“A little more than a hundred kilometers up this highway. Two hours. We can rest outside of town and go in during the afternoon.”
“Yeah, he’s right. Let’s go. We can always get picked up.” He kick-started the bike, revved the motor, then started down the road.
15
TRIPOLI
THE NEXT DAY…
Kel decided she would stay in his room as well. Ferguson ended up giving the women the bed and sleeping in the bathtub, not because he was chivalrous by nature but because it was the only room in the suite that he could lock. He woke around ten in the morning to the sound of furious banging, punctuated by a teary whimper.
“I have to pee,” said Aress outside the door.
“Can’t you find a cup or something?” he asked.
“Please?”
He got up out of the tub and unlocked the door. Aress glanced at his pistol but was in too dire shape to say anything or even pause. Kel lay sprawled on the bed, one of her breasts exposed. She opened her eyes and blinked at him.
“One of your boobs is showing,” he said, gesturing with his Clock. She pulled the sheet up. He went to the telephone and ordered two pots of coffee from room service. Kel watched him as he looked around the room. He had scanned it before turning in, wanting to know if anyone — Romanski he hoped — had gone to the trouble of adding their own bugs. They hadn’t, and no one had come in during the night. (He’d attached small detectors near the door and window, which would have sounded an alert if they had.)
“There’s aspirin in the medicine cabinet,” he told Aress in Ara
bic.
She looked at him, nodded, then went back and got it.
“What are you going to do with us?” Kel asked in English.
“Get you some breakfast. Show you the sights.”
“That’s all?”
Someone kicked at the door, much harder than a room-service waiter would have dared. Ferguson reached into his pocket and tossed Kel a hand grenade. Her eyes nearly bolted from her head.
“Hold on to that.”
“Where’s the pin?”
“Lost it. Peel off the tape and hold down the trigger, preferably not in that order. Once you let go, you have about four seconds. Maybe three. Throw it and duck. By the way, in here wouldn’t be a good place to throw it.”
Whoever was outside kicked again, the door shaking.
“Open the door, would you?” Ferguson told Aress.
She went and unlocked it. As soon as she turned the handle, it flew open. Two men in Western business suits pushed her aside, standing in the doorway with Steyr AUG/HBARs, light machine-gun versions of the Steyr AUG assault rifle, packed with forty-two-shot boxes. Behind them came a tall, mustachioed man in Arab dress. His squared-off jaw, bald head, and regal gait made him look like Caesar of Arabia, a description he would have encouraged.
“You’re up early, Romanski,” said Ferguson, who had zeroed the big Glock at his face. “Then again, you took your time getting to me. I was starting to think I might actually have to pay for the room.”
“Ferguson. Always with a joke.” Romanski’s English was perfect; he had spent nearly a decade in New York as a young KGB man before going to the Middle East. “But you point a pistol at me? My men could cut you in half with their guns.”
“Not before you got a third eye.”
“They are very fast.”
Romanski glanced toward the bed, where he saw Kel holding the grenade. “What is this?”
“An assistant,” said Ferguson.
“A common whore.”
“It’s not smart to insult people who are holding grenades,” said Ferguson. “Especially when they don’t have pins in them.”
