Pashtun

by Ron Lealos

  “Didn’t know Rangers took orders off the Internet. Finnen may look stupid,” I nodded toward a grinning Finnen, “but I’m not.”

  “Whoa, brother,” Washington said, shaking his head. Drops of blood flew off, staining the tan mud walls with red spots. “The email came from spookville. You’re gonna ask how I knew. If you put that pistol away, I’ll tell ya.”

  The .22 easily went under my fatigue top.

  “Okay,” I said. “We’re listening.”

  “I’m sure you boys’ve been to Camp Perry,” Washington said. Camp Perry was a CIA training center in the Virginia woods outside Langley. “I was invited there myself for some short-term clandestine ed-u-cation beyond what the Army was givin’. There were even some spooks from the German BND there. With this latest cooperative spirit in Afghanistan, the brass thought some of us should bond. I was given a cipher there that read, if I ever heard or saw the word zoetrope, I should follow any orders that were included.”

  “And you didn’t ask anyone about it?”

  “Fuck that. I was nervous enough, being in the dark kingdom. I was more worried it was some sort of cult test and wondered if I would pass the initiation with my balls still hangin’ low. Didn’t drink anything but bottled water I took in with me, afraid somebody would put LSD in my glass and become another lab rat for you spooks.”

  The story was infamous. In search of truth serum—or TD, truth drug—my namesake for the day, Wild Bill Donovan, had piggy-backed research that came out of Nazi concentration camps. He said development was of the greatest importance to national security. The Company had tried many combinations in the quest for an easily administered chemical interrogator including mescaline, heroin, and cocaine. Nothing in the 1950s worked as well as LSD, but the aftereffects and hallucinations sometimes left the receivers in padded rooms. Ken Kesey had been part of one of these experiments while a grad student at Stanford. He found a better use for it. Parties.

  The ants were expanding their sphere of influence. I flicked one off my knee.

  “Keep goin’,” I said. “At least this fairy tale is interesting.”

  “My throat’s dry as Mother Theresa’s crack,” he said. “And it seems like some’a the blood from what’s left of my ear got in my mouth. How ’bout that water?”

  Finnen got a bottle out of his pack and walked over to Washington.

  “Here,” he said, unscrewing the cap and pouring a small amount into Washington’s mouth. “But no more Catholic cracks. You don’t want to offend He That Is. The punishment could be as eternal as the Irish love of a fallin’ down drunk.”

  Some of the water spilled out the side of Washington’s lips, and he licked it with his tongue, sighing.

  “Didn’t think much of the message at the time,” Washington said. “After I’d been in Korengal a while, I got transferred here. Not something that happens often. Grunts usually stay in one place in this rock pile ’til they go home unless they’re injured severely. Or killed. When I got the email, mentioning “zoetrope,” I figured out why I was reassigned. I was being drafted onto the spook team.” Washington stopped and nodded to Finnen for more water.

  If Washington’s story was true, it was headed in a direction Finnen and I might not want to hear. Or be safe knowing. I looked up at the ceiling and watched a spider make his way slowly toward the corner.

  “Go on,” I said.

  Washington finished his drink and looked at me.

  “I read the email,” Washington said. “Went to the drop-off point, and the message told me to go to another area on the base and pick up a pack hidden behind a couple of dead trucks. I was not to open it. The next morning, a Humvee would be waiting for me at the motor pool. I was supposed to deliver the pack to a man in Jalalabad. Close to here, by the way. That was the first time.”

  “But you didn’t follow orders,” I said. “You opened the pack.”

  Washington chuckled.

  “Wouldn’t you?” Washington asked. “Coulda been some kinda IED. I wanted to know something about what was goin’ down. But it was just greenbacks. Hundred dollar bills. Lots of ’em. All in those cute little wrappers you white folk see at the bank.”

  “How many times did you make deliveries?” I asked

  “Twice with the money.”

  “Did you meet anyone when you dropped off the cash?”

  “There wasn’t any in-tro-duc-tions, ya know what I mean. Just a hand-off to a different Abdul every time in a different location.”

  “And you didn’t have any idea what it was about?”

  “Not for a while. I’d read my email and follow orders. Till things changed.”

  “How so?”

  “By then, I was gettin’ jumpy and suspicious. Bein’ somebody’s boy and not knowin’ what I was mixed up in. They sent me to make a pick-up, not a drop-off.” Washington tried to move his arms. “Say, now that we’s all buddies and I’m spillin’ my guts, could you take these cuffs off? My arms’re gettin’ numb. And heavy. You can still shoot me, but there’s no use me dyin’ like this.”

  Finnen and I exchanged glances. I nodded.

  “Okay,” Finnen said. “But we’ll have you sit on the floor with your back against the wall. And we’ll both have pistols trained on your head. Don’t do anything silly.”

  “I promise,” Washington said.

  After Finnen had cut the handcuffs and guided Washington to a seat in the dirt with the barrel of his Hush Puppy, he went to his chair again. The prisoner’s back was pressed to the wall. I stood and stepped closer, still out of range for a foot strike. There was no way Washington could get up and reach either of us before his head was in pieces.

  “Comfortable?” I asked.

  “Just like a sunny day at the beach in my chaise lounge,” Washington said.

  “So now you’re no longer a delivery boy.”

  “Nope. Moved up. I was told to go into the foothills of the mountains with an empty 6x6. Make a pick-up and deliver it to where they’re workin’ on the pipeline south and west of here.”

  “Which mountains? If you haven’t noticed, we’re surrounded.”

  “The White Mountains. Sometimes they’re called the Spin Mountains. Full of caves and bunkers. Opium fields lower down. Supposedly home of Bin Laden. Those mountains.”

  Parts of his story were coming together and feeding the paranoia that was growing in my stomach. I leaned against the wall.

  “And Thorsten went with you?”

  “Yeah, the dumbfuck.”

  “And you were picking up heroin and taking it for shipment by people on the pipeline?”

  “You got it.”

  “From Sheik Wahidi?”

  “Didn’t get no names, but I heard whispers. That’s the one I heard.”

  “And you never gave it a thought? Just bought and put into the market tons of heroin? You didn’t wonder if it was wrong?”

  “Look, spook. I believed I was doin’ exactly as ordered. I was told never to speak to anyone about what I was doin’. I didn’t even know it was about dope ’til I drove to the mountains. I only did it once. Then, I quit openin’ my emails. About a week ago.”

  “You didn’t think about going to your commanding officer?”

  Washington laughed.

  “And be ambushed by a couple’a dudes like you? Or gain a new hole in my head in the middle’a the night? I know enough there’s no runnin’ from the Company if there’s a contract out. Unless your name is Osama. I decided to lay low. Ya know, do my job pacifyin’ the natives. At least ’til somebody showed up asking why I couldn’t read no more. Somebody just like you, Donovan, or whatever the fuck your name is.”

  This was turning into something way beyond a clusterfuck. Washington, if I believed him, was no rogue. He had done pretty much what I would have. And Dunne wouldn’t have sent Finnen and me out unless nobody at his level knew either. All of it was based on whether Washington was trustworthy. I looked at Finnen.

  “We need to talk,” I said. “
Cuff his hands and feet,” I said, pointing the Hush Puppy at Washington.

  Finnen smiled and walked to his pack. He looked like he was enjoying the theatre and not surprised by the melodrama. Over beers, a seemingly endless amount, Finnen had told me how much he loved and hated the intrigues of the game we played. How you never quite knew what the real reasons were. It always seemed we “live in a land of broken mirrors,” he often said. Now, Finnen claimed he was just being a “good lad. Followin’ orders and doin’ the devil’s biddin’.”

  “Lucky I came prepared,” Finnen said, taking out a few more sets of the plastic handcuffs. This time, he directed Washington to a water pipe that ran from the ceiling to the wall. He bound Washington’s hands behind his back to the pipe and then cuffed the man’s feet. Double knots.

  “Take your time, guys,” Washington said. “I don’t have plans for the evening.”

  Next to the desk, a door led to another small, windowless room. Finnen followed me into the darkness and struck a match. A kerosene lamp hung from the rafters. He pulled up the glass and lit the mantel. I shut the door.

  “Not what you were expectin’, eh Morgan?” Finnen said. “It’s all folly. Gotta have a sense of humor.”

  “There’s only one question,” I said. “Make that two. Do we believe him? Or do we kill him?”

  “I think there might be details he’s leavin’ out, but the thread feels exactly like the Company’s pulling the strings. We’ve both been up to our tits in tricks like this. Why would you be surprised? Does the sheer audacity of the evil shock you?”

  “I thought this was fairly straightforward. A bad seed buying dope from the Taliban. A simple little conspiracy like so many others. Capitalism at its sinful best. But the Company throws a wicked curve ball. Again.”

  Finnen just shook his head, smiling.

  “Oh, Morgan, my lad,” he said. “When will you take your thumb out of your mouth?”

  “You suspected? You didn’t even know why we were going on this op.”

  “Tis easier to be deceived by your wife than your friend. At least you know him. And I’ve never been married. Certainly not to the Company. I go into these things with my eyes open and my brain closed tight as Margaret O’Halloran’s legs. You think people like you and me could ever understand the working of the black fairies in Langley? At the end of the day, I just collect my chit and pray we’re on the side of St. Patrick.”

  “I suppose it takes a certain level of naïveté to sneak up and fire a silencer into somebody sleeping in his bed. But I thought it was for the good of the masses, not advancement of some shady plot. So you think we oughta just let Washington walk?”

  “More than that. I think we should recruit him. Let him lead us to Wahidi. And wherever else the stench takes us. I don’t believe Dunne knows anything.” He turned away and watched the shadows from the burning kerosene obscure everything in the room. Even the truth. “It’s miles above Dunne, so we’ll have to come up with a good story. I’m in if you are, Morgan.”

  “I agree. I still don’t completely trust Washington, but I didn’t get the sense he was lying. We’ll go back in and make him a friend for life. There’re still some questions I want to ask. Dunne’s no icon of virtue either, so we might be runnin’ naked for awhile.”

  Back in the other room, Washington’s head was slumped to his chest. He looked up when we came through the door.

  “You fellas solve any of your issues?” he asked. “Is it a bullet to the head or a free pass?”

  Finnen walked toward Washington, Ka-Bar in his hand. The black Ranger started to wriggle, trying to get as far away as possible. He put an inch more between himself and the blade.

  “Whoa,” Washington said. “Not a fucking knife. Shoot me.”

  “Don’t get your knickers twisted,” Finnen said. “I’m cuttin’ you free. You’re being invited to join the posse.”

  Finnen sliced through the handcuffs and helped Washington to his feet, leading him to the chair and handing him a fresh bottle of Dasani. Lemon flavored.

  From my chair, I kept the .22 pointed at Washington. He might’ve harbored some lingering resentment against me for slicing him in the thigh and shooting his ear nearly off. I couldn’t figure why, but I still aimed at a spot just above the middle of his eyebrows.

  “We’d like a few more details,” I said. “I don’t think you’ve told us the whole story, but my sense is you’ve given us the broad strokes. You do know what you’re mixed up in means you’re an unallowable and deniable risk. If it wasn’t for the timing of my interview with Chinar, the next Company man you saw wouldn’t be asking questions.”

  Washington finished the bottle of water in one long pull and stared at me with something less than love. Not hate, either. He was a hard man, and a few little wounds were a minor distraction.

  “Does this mean I’m an honorary white boy?” he asked. “Gee, that’d be swell.”

  Finnen was at the desk, sipping his own Dasani.

  “Can’t go that far, Washington,” he said. “Not unless you change your name. Never heard of no white Washingtons since the Prez. How ’bout McGuire? A good Irish name.”

  Maybe premature, but I put the .22 in my lap.

  “Let’s start with the emails,” I said. “Do you remember the addresses they came from?”

  Washington rubbed his temples.

  “You got any aspirin?” he asked. “For some reason, I have a headache and my thigh is throbbing. Maybe a Band-aid, too.”

  Finnen stood and went to his pack.

  “I always carry one’a these,” he said, holding up a first-aid kit. He took out a packet of aspirins, a tube of wound-care ointment, and a sterile wrap.

  In a few minutes, he finished his nurse duties. “There we are. Fit as an Irish fiddle. Now, you’re ready to dance a reel.”

  “About those addresses,” I said.

  “After the first one, they came from different Yahoo accounts,” Washington said. “They all had ‘zoetrope’ in the subject line. I’m no computer geek, but I think you can send those messages from most anywhere.”

  “You don’t recall the first address?” I asked.

  “No. Just that it looked like it came from a DOD site.”

  If I enlisted the Company, it wouldn’t matter how secure the sender felt; it would only matter how quick he was. Under the Directorate of Science and Technology, the Company nerds could hack into or trace any computer anywhere in the world. They could launch emails from the Pope’s private electronic address. Or the President’s. They could retrieve any email ever written no matter how long ago it was sent. Electronic information, just like energy, never leaves the universe. If you had the money, time, and brains, every byte in the ether world was accessible. The Company had all three. Within seconds of a tap on the send icon, the Firm would know exactly where that computer was located. Still, it might not help. From my college computer classes, I knew Yahoo addresses and messages could be traced. Getting to the location if the user was changing his position would take too long. All the sender had to do was go to any Kinko’s or library, establish an account, log in, and send Washington a message with “zoetrope” in the subject line. Even the DOD address would be relatively worthless now, since there were thousands of DOD user names. But I wasn’t about to openly take advantage of the Company resources. Not until I knew more.

  The smoke from the lantern was getting thicker by the minute, only a small metal vent in the ceiling allowing the fumes to escape. I rubbed my nose to try to clear some of the bitter smell.

  “The computer angle is a dead end for us,” I said. “You better start checking your email again, Washington.”

  “Yes, sir,” he said. He looked like he was about to give me a mock salute. He just grinned, savoring his death-row midnight reprieve.

  “I think we eliminated the prime money handler when we aced Chinar,” I said. “He’ll be replaced if this operation is going to continue. I think it will. Too much to gain, even though I can�
�t see what it is right now from the Company’s side and if they’re involved. I’m more interested in Wahidi. He’s the key. Did you go through the poppy fields? See the refinery?”

  “Yes,” Washington said. He sat back and began to talk.

  The scenes he described were known, but not many outsiders had been allowed to view the Afghan heroin industry in person. Even the New York Times had written that this year’s crop numbers were a new record, resulting in an industry worth more than $150 billion. Much of that going to the Taliban.

  “We drove through a poppy field on the way to the pick-up, and I was given a lecture by one of the few in the tribe who spoke English,” Washington said. “His name was Mihad. He was proud and jazzed to show an infidel what his clan was growin’. It was the first time I knew what I had been buyin’ back in Jalalabad. Thorsten was with me on the tour, and his eyes were poppin’ out of his skull.”

  The way Washington described it, the land in Afghanistan’s southeast was relatively flat, below the towering mountains further toward Pakistan. The area had been under a six-year drought. Opium took little water, much less than other crops. Besides, the harvest produced an immense amount of income and poppy growth was encouraged, if not demanded, by local tribal warlords.

  Leaving a river valley and climbing into the rolling hills, Washington viewed fields of white, dotted with red and purple: poppy plants in bloom. His guide explained poppy seeds could be found in any of the thousands of bazaars around the country. The growth occurred in two cycles per year in the lower elevations, and one where the weather was more severe. Crops are planted in March and the harvest began three to four months later. The second planting in July was never as productive as the first, since the late-season yield was more prone to disease and weather extremes.

  “It was a sea of white, wavin’ in the breeze,” Washington said. “Broken up by a few skinny trees and paths. Men were in the fields, milkin’ the plants, protected by guards with AKs and RPGs.”

  I knew poppy plants sprout in fifteen days, and the job is to keep the seedlings from being smothered by weeds. If there’s not a storm or disease to slow them, the plants blossom in three months. Inside the bloom, a green seed pouch grows the opium resin. When the pouch gets nearly as big as a baseball, a serrated six-tooth trowel, a ghoza, is used to make an incision. The cutting is done in the morning, and the pouch is allowed to leak throughout the day. The sticky white milk turns brown and is collected in the evening and formed into a ball for drying. Each pod can be bled six or seven times before the next planting. The pouch seeds are left to dry and become the source of the new crop. Mothers also use the seeds to get their children to nap, brewing a tea that allows work in the fields to be undisturbed.