At three a.m. it finally came. He padded over to open the door and the man slipped inside, dressed now in casual shirt and slacks, eyes strained behind round, wire-rimmed glasses. He opened his mouth as if to speak and Akil said, "Softly. We don't want to wake the neighbors." He went to the bathroom and turned on the water in the sink. He motioned the man to stand close to him near the television, which was still on, a low susurration of background noise, it and the water enough to mask their conversation if anyone was listening. "What kept you?"
"I met someone who knew me. He was with a group and they wanted to go to dinner." He grimaced. "I couldn't get out of it." He hesitated, looking at Akil. "I thought you would prefer to wait, rather than have me call."
Akil nodded. "You were correct." He sat in the chair and motioned the man to sit on the foot of the bed. He hitched the chair forward until their knees touched and leaned forward, speaking in English. The other man listened intently, asking only the occasional question.
When Akil was done he sat back, watching.
The other man had folded his arms across his chest and was frowning at Pamela Sue Anderson running down the beach. "Is something wrong? Do you dislike the plan?"
The other man looked up. "No, I-" He caught Akil's glance and stopped the word in mid-utterance. "It is ambitious, but the target is worthy of any effort. The impact of its destruction will be a humiliating blow from which the Americans will not soon recover."
Akil noted the use of "the Americans." Disassociation in a traitor was usual and expected. Still, no reason not to test him. He said in a neutral tone, "There are those who would say it does not leave enough bodies on the ground."
The other was too intelligent to be drawn. "What do you say?"
Akil allowed his lip to curl. "I have believed for a long time now that our strategy has been flawed. Bodies are easily buried and soon forgotten. The psychological impact of the destruction of a national icon will be much more lasting."
Tentatively, the other man said, "And 9/11? That had no lasting impact?"
Akil shrugged. "It led eventually to the greatest recruiting tool we have ever had, the invasion of Iraq. But do you see the West withdrawing? Do you see other countries insisting on that withdrawal? I do not."
The other took a deep breath and let it out slowly, elbows clasped on his knees, hands knotted in front of him.
"But still you are troubled," Akil said. "Do you find the plan ill-conceived?"
The other man feared Akil and the question enough to give it serious thought. "No," he said. "It is simple, it takes advantage of common practices and occurrences in the region, and of existing personnel and equipment in the area. Properly executed, nothing will look out of the ordinary until the very last moment, and by then it will be too late."
"What, then?"
He hesitated. "I am only one man, one of a crew of many men. And women. If somehow they managed to stop me, if I fail, the responsibility will be mine."
Akil smiled. "You will not fail."
The man looked at him, wanting more.
"And Allah will reward you in paradise."
He looked less than convinced. Ah, a realist.
"It is good that you worry," Akil said, rising to his feet. The other man rose as well. "Not to worry would be a sin of pride, of overconfidence. If you fear that you will fail, you will work that much harder to succeed."
Akil walked him to the door. The other man paused. "Yes?" Akil said, making him ask for it.
"When am I to be paid? I wouldn't ask, but I have debts, and a family-"
"I understand," Akil said soothingly, hiding his contempt. "Check your account. You will see that half the payment was deposited today, as we agreed. The other half the day after."
"And no one will know? No one will know it was me?"
"No one," Akil said, with such certainty that the other was appeased, at least until he was out of Akil's reassuring presence.
"Will I see you again before the day?"
"You will not," Akil said gently, allowing a moment for that fact to sink in. When the other man left this room he would be truly alone, until the day. AMI smiled. "But check your email. I will write. You will not be entirely abandoned, brother."
The other man looked alarmed. "Everyone's email is filtered through intelligence. It may be seen by eyes other than my own."
"Almost certainly," AMI said. "I will be discreet. But when I write, you will know it is me."
They embraced and kissed, embraced again, and AMI felt the other man's shoulders shudder. "Be brave, brother. You will not fail me." He allowed his voice to rise just a little, as if he were taking an oath. As if he were prophesying. "We will triumph. Our brothers and sisters, our mothers and fathers, our families and our friends will look on what we have done and be proud, and in the end, Islam and the will of God will triumph over the West."
He shook the man's shoulders once, gently.
"Inshallah."
"coast guard," the immigration agent said in acknowledgment and approval at JFK.
"Semper Paratus," AMI said.
The agent smiled.
This identity was the best so far. Everyone loved the Coast Guard.
"Where have you been?"
" Turkey. Istanbul." As if the agent couldn't see that from the visa on the passport.
She was heavy and black, a middle-aged woman in a well-fitting and well-cared-for uniform, her badge and her shoes both shiny. Her expression was friendly and her voice a pleasant surprise, a low contralto. So many Americans found it necessary to shout, as if to make sure no one overlooked their presence. "Business or pleasure?"
The question was rote and the agent's interest appeared casual so he allowed himself a small joke. "In Istanbul? Always pleasure," he said. "But business got me there. A conference. IMO."
"IMO?"
"International Maritime Organization. The Coast Guard is the U.S. 's representative to the IMO."
"Ah." The agent handed back his passport and sketched a salute. He smiled and returned it with a crisp, military gesture.
He maintained that military posture all the way through the airport. Taking a series of cabs and trains, doubling back once just in case, because he was always more aware of the shape of his features and of the color of his skin in the United States, he ended at Grand Central Station, where he went into the men's room a Coast Guard officer and came out a civilian dressed in Dockers and a Gap T-shirt under a sports jacket, no tie, and deck shoes, no socks. The uniform, stripped of any identifying marks and stuffed into a plastic bag, was dropped in an alley, where, if the lurking shadows at the end of it were any indication, it would be on sale on Canal Street within the hour.
He stayed the night in a Holiday Inn in Manhattan, in the middle of a convention of high school women's soccer teams, not one of whom slept that night. Neither did he, and he was less polite than he might have been to the bank clerk the next morning when he showed his Luther King identification for the last time. The lock box contained two passports, one Canadian, one Costa Rican, and a tattered black-and-white photograph. He took all three and returned the empty box to the attendant. He'd had this lock box for long enough. He'd wait a few months and then close the account via email, leaving nothing behind that might lead even the most able bloodhound to sniff out a trail to him.
At the Fifth Avenue branch of his Bahamian bank, he transferred funds to two already existing accounts, one in Florida and one in Haiti. He ate a late breakfast at the Carnegie Deli-he was not at all reluctant to admit that one of the things the Americans did better than anyone, along with beds and showers, was breakfast-and walked down Seventh Avenue to a cybercafé, where he paid for an hour's time on a computer with Internet access. He created a Yahoo! email account-he had used Hotmail in Istanbul and Earthlink in York, he liked to spread his Internet presence around-and sent a dozen messages. There were two immediate replies, one from Yussuf. All members of the cell, traveling separately as ordered, had arrived safely at the ca
mp. Yussuf reported no undue interest in any of them or in the camp.
He had expected nothing less but it was still good to know. Leaving the cafe he took a bus to Ground Zero to pay his respects. The hole in the ground was filled with heavy equipment moving mounds of dirt. There were barriers shielding some of the work from view. He'd read somewhere that the construction workers had found more remains recently. Good for another headline, he supposed, and therefore useful in continuing to make the existence of their enemies felt.
He blended easily into the crowds of people, many with tear-stained faces, moving slowly past the wall of photographs, reading the epitaphs of the victims pictured there.
He had other faces in his mind, of course, faces that were not represented here. Not victims, never victims. Soldiers, they were. Soldiers in a glorious army, an army of virtue and right, or so his leader would say. He smiled a little, intercepted an incredulous look, and remade his expression into something appropriately mournful.
Afterward he did some shopping, enough to fill the carry-on suitcase he also bought, because nowadays people who traveled without luggage were automatically suspect, especially in America, and that evening paid a scalper $750 for a seventh-row center seat to Jersey Boys, which he enjoyed immensely.
The next morning he took the Air Train to Newark International, where he boarded a flight for Chicago, where he changed airlines and flew to Seattle, where he changed airlines again and flew to Mexico City.
From Mexico City he flew to Port-au-Prince.
11
WASHINGTON, D.C., DECEMBER 2007
The phone rang. It was Hugh Rincon. "Isa's in the U.S. "
Patrick straightened in his chair so fast he propelled himself away from his desk and bounced off the windowsill. "How do you know?"
"He was spotted by an immigration agent in JFK."
"He was spotted by Immigration in JFK?" Chisum said, his voice rising. "And I'm hearing about this from you instead of our own people, why?"
"You came to me," Rincon said, and left it at that. To his credit he didn't sound one bit smug.
"Wait a minute, you said they spotted him. They didn't grab him up?"
"The agent told her supervisor she thought this guy was worth a look. The supervisor disagreed."
Patrick digested this. At last he said, without much hope, "Did they at least follow him? Find out where he was headed?"
Rincon's silence was answer enough.
Chisum rubbed a hand over a suddenly aching head. "Anything else?"
"He entered the country under the name of Adam Bayzani. He was wearing a U.S. Coast Guard officer's uniform. The agent asked him where he'd been and he said Istanbul for a conference." Rincon took a deep breath. "There is more. Patrick, Sara just got back from an IMO conference on marine safety in Istanbul. You're not going to believe this, but she thinks she rode down in the elevator with this guy."
"What?"
Rincon repeated himself.
Patrick's first instinct was to scoff. Outside of Dickens this much coincidence was highly suspect. On second thought, he knew enough about Sara Lange to know that she was nobody's fool. Neither was Hugh Rincon. "All right," he said cautiously. "How'd he feel to her?"
"Bent," Rincon said bluntly. "The first information Coasties exchange after names is duty stations. She said this Bayzani said he was posted to District Seventeen, and then when she said she was from Alaska he shut down completely. For the rest of the conference whenever she saw him he was going in the opposite direction at flank speed. Her words."
"She make contact again?"
"She tried. She left a message on his voice mail to join her for drinks the last day. She never heard back from him. The whole thing felt wrong to her, so she told me about it when she got back, and then she checked the Coast Guard personnel list."
"And?"
"And there was an Adam Bayzani, all right."
"Was?"
"Was. She emailed him, and when he didn't email back, she emailed his CO."
"And?"
"And Adam Bayzani was in fact a commander, and he was in fact assigned to District Seventeen. The problem is, he's dead."
Chisum sat up straight. "When?"
"His body was found the week before the IMO conference started in Istanbul."
"Murdered?" Chisum said, sure of it.
"No. Died in his sleep, according to the police report."
"When and where?"
"Lanzarote."
"Where's that?"
" Canary Islands."
"What the hell was he doing in the Canary Islands?"
"Working on his tan. Lanzarote's a vacation destination for Europeans."
"He was on leave?"
"Yes. His boss said he was stopping off for a week in advance of the IMO conference."
"He alone?"
"He rented his car alone and he checked into his hotel alone."
"But?"
"But his boss said that Bayzani acted like he would be meeting someone."
"He say who?"
"No. His boss said he seemed happy lately. Evidently a pretty morose guy at the best of times. No girlfriends, kept his private life private, nobody he worked with had ever been to his apartment. His boss thought he might be gay."
"Really." Patrick digested this in silence for a moment. "Was there an autopsy?"
"No."
"Why not?"
"When a tourist dies, the local authorities get the body out of there as fast as they can. Tourism is pretty much their living. Anyway, I'm not sure they even have an ME."
"Can we ask for an autopsy?"
"The body is on its way home to his family in Los Angeles."
"All right, I know people in L.A.," Chisum said, cradling the phone between his shoulder and his ear so he could access the directory on his computer to look up names of helpful colleagues in L.A. "Any footprints on Bayzani's service record?"
"None that I can find, outside of his heritage. His family is fourth-generation American. He does have a Jordanian great-grandfather. His grandfather served in the Eighty-second Airborne during World War II. His mother was a Navy nurse in Vietnam. He was a Coast Guard Academy grad himself. They're all as American as apple pie, no red flags anywhere." Crap.
"Now for the good news."
Patrick perked up. "There's good news? Did the son of a bitch finally get on a phone?"
"Not that good, but almost. He had to have a passport to get into the country, and passports have to have photos."
"We've finally got a photo?" Patrick said, disbelieving. "A current photo?"
"Okay, don't start hyperventilating, it's doctored, our resident geek tells me some kind of computer overlay program where they alter the original photo to resemble the current holder without looking like it's been got at by a kindergartner with a crayon. There is a general ethnic similarity between Isa and Bayzani, probably one of the reasons Isa picked him, and the photograph's a little blurry, but it's the best we've had so far."
"You're sure it's him? This isn't an 'all Islamic terrorists look alike to me' kind of thing?"
"As sure as I can be," Rincon said, not taking offense. "As I don't have to tell you, the photos we've got of him aren't good, but I was pretty sure from the get-go this was the same guy." He hesitated. "Patrick."
"What?"
Rincon spoke, sounding as if he were choosing his words very carefully. "There was an-incident involving maritime shipping two years ago."
"I know," Patrick said. He'd looked up the case file after he'd called Hugh for help on Isa.
"Yeah, I know you do, and I know you know that I'd like to stay out of jail for violating state secrets. Kind of a personal quirk. The only point I'm making is, I think attacks by air are pretty much over. I think the terrorism community is moving on to attacks on maritime targets, in particular busy ports."
"We've been talking about that ourselves."
"Not enough," Rincon said tersely. "Not nearly enough, Patrick."
"Forward me what you've got," Patrick said.
"Will do." Rincon hung up.
Melanie brought him the fax from Hugh just as Chisum was sitting back from issuing an all-agencies alert as to Isa's probable presence inside U.S. borders. The phone began ringing as he spread the pages across his desk. "Get that, will you, Melanie, thanks. And I'm not in for the rest of the afternoon."
"Yes, Mr. Chisum." She was curious but too well-trained to ask, and he watched her walk out the door with his usual attentive wistfulness. He shook his head and pulled out his Isa file to compare the photographs. The ones in Iraq were group shots, taken from a distance. Everyone was burnoosed and bearded. Isa's head was circled, and in another print blown up. The quality of the print was atrocious, and what resemblance there was between it and the clean-shaven, smiling face in the passport photo was minimal at best. The group photo was more about personality than likeness. He was standing a pace in the rear behind Zarqawi, looking solemn, even a little studious, his hands folded, his lean figure a study in stillness.
The two photos Rincon had been working from were only marginally better. One was a black-and-white head shot taken with a long lens, picking Isa's face out of a crowded Baghdad street. He was seated at an outdoor cafe, drinking something from a tiny cup, facing someone with his back to the camera. Isa's face was seen over the second man's shoulder, looking straight into the camera lens. The resolution was grainy and his expression couldn't be made out, but there Patrick nevertheless got a clear impression of vigilance, as if Isa were always alive to his surroundings, might even be somehow aware that his photograph was being taken at that very moment.
The third photograph was another group shot, this time a posed shot of a Zarqawi grip-and-grin with bin Laden. The accompanying caption read " Peshawar, Pakistan?" Neither man looked overcome by joy at the encounter, but by the date on the photo, this was right after the hotel bombings in Jordan, and at that time no one in Arab leadership, legitimate government or terrorist, was pleased with Zarqawi.
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