Perfect Hatred

by Leighton Gage

  “What kind of stick?”

  “Threatening phone calls from a thug of Jamil’s, a man named Kassim. Not many are able to resist. Those that do suffer … accidents.”

  “You have children?”

  “Two, both girls, so they’re safe. The mullah doesn’t take girls, considers them lesser creatures. How do you want to handle this interrogation?”

  “It’s not an interrogation. Not yet. Think of it as an interview.”

  “All right. An interview. What, exactly, do you want me to do?”

  “Does the mullah speak Portuguese?”

  “If he does,” Ragab said, “and I’m not even sure about that, he sure as hell won’t speak it with you guys. He’ll act like he doesn’t understand a goddamned word of what you’re saying. Conversing in the languages of the crusaders is beneath him.”

  “Like that, eh?

  “Yes. Like that.”

  “Then translate, that’s all, just translate. Don’t editorialize.”

  “You got it,” Ragab said.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  AL-FULAN’S AUTO DEALERSHIP OCCUPIED a full block in the heart of downtown Ciudad del Este. Neon signs and logotypes of famous European brands hung in the windows. A fortune in luxury vehicles sparkled on the showroom floor.

  But no one was inspecting the cars. The front door was locked, and when Silva and Danusa rang the bell, they were admitted by an armed guard. Security cameras were mounted on the ceiling. The door was of bulletproof glass, the show windows divided into panes. Silva had no doubt they were bulletproof as well.

  “Uneasy lies the head …” he said.

  “Shakespeare?” Danusa said. “You continue to amaze me, Chief Inspector.”

  “I’m not just a pretty face.”

  “And now you’re sounding like Arnaldo.”

  Before Silva could respond, a slim young man, twenty-something, emerged from a door. He was wearing a well-tailored suit and a Versace tie.

  “I’m Uzair,” he said to Silva in poorly-pronounced Portuguese while pointedly ignoring Danusa, “Please, come with me.”

  “And what, Uzair, do you do for Señor Al-Fulan?” Danusa shot back in fluent Spanish.

  He hesitated before answering. “I’m his secretary.”

  “Really? A male secretary in Paraguay? That’s a first for me. Your boss doesn’t believe in hiring females?”

  Uzair’s response was a sniff.

  Two men holding Heckler and Koch MP5s were standing in the corridor that led to Al-Fulan’s office. One of them slung his weapon onto his shoulder and checked their documents.

  It was only after they’d surrendered their weapons and passed through a metal detector, that Danusa and Silva were admitted to the great man’s presence.

  Al-Fulan snorted in disgust when he caught sight of the pendant around Danusa’s neck.

  “The Jewess will wait outside,” he said to Uzair. “Not in the showroom, on the street.”

  “If the Jewess leaves,” Danusa said, “we both leave.”

  “So leave.”

  “Nice try,” she said, “but we know you got your marching orders from Chaparro. You’re obligated to see us, so back off.”

  Al-Fulan blanched. “You should be whipped for speaking to a man like that.”

  “I’d rip off the balls of any man who tried it,” she said.

  Uzair’s mouth was agape. No one ever addressed his boss in such a fashion. No one. Much less a woman.

  “Close your mouth, you idiot,” Al-Fulan said, “and get Kassim.” Then, to Danusa: “Neither Chaparro nor anyone else tells me what to do. I don’t take orders. I give them.”

  “You don’t take orders? Don’t make me laugh. You refused to see us. Then we dropped one little word with Chaparro, and the next thing you know”—she held out her hands, palms upward—“here we are. Doesn’t that make you Chaparro’s bitch?”

  Even Silva thought she might have gone too far with that one. Al-Fulan’s face turned purple. He had to take a few calming breaths before he could reply.

  “Ask what you came to ask and get out,” he managed to say at last.

  The door opened. A man with a nose like the beak of a hawk walked across the room and took up a position about a meter behind Al-Fulan’s chair.

  Danusa waited, but no introduction was forthcoming, so she asked, “Were you involved in a car-smuggling scheme with Plínio Saldana?”

  The newcomer said something to Al-Fulan in Arabic. Al-Fulan replied in the same language, then reverted to Spanish.

  “I had no business dealings of any nature whatsoever with Plínio Saldana.”

  “Were you involved in his murder?”

  “Your question is stupid. What do I care about some Brazilian politician? How could it possibly benefit me to be involved in the murder of one?”

  “Perhaps because the two of you had a falling-out?”

  “I’ve already told you. I had no dealings with Plínio Saldana. But let’s suppose, just for a moment, that I did.”

  “I’m supposing,” she said.

  “It’s likely he was going to be elected governor of the Brazilian state just across the river. A partnership with such a man would have opened no end of opportunities. We could have made millions together. So would I kill him? No, I certainly would not. As I said, your question is stupid.”

  “How about the bombings in São Paulo and Buenos Aires? Did you have any role in those?”

  “I deny taking part in any bombings.”

  “Do you condemn them?”

  “Not at all. They were done for legitimate political ends.”

  “How could you possibly know that? Up to now, no one has taken credit.”

  “That statement, too, is stupid. An American consulate? And a Jewish temple? They were actions clearly directed against the two powers colluding to commit injustice in Palestine. What else could it be other than an action carried out by a Muslim freedom fighters’ organization?”

  “So you believe,” she said, “that the lives of innocent women and children should be sacrificed to political ends?”

  “I do.”

  “I think that’s the first honest answer you’ve given us since we came in here.”

  “I’m finding this conversation boring. I’ve said all I intend to say. Why don’t you two leave?”

  Danusa looked at Silva.

  “Why don’t we?” he said.

  OUTSIDE, WALKING toward the taxi they’d kept waiting, Silva asked, “What went on between that thug, Kassim, and his boss?”

  “Kassim called me a Zionist whore.”

  “Did he now?”

  “He did. And Al-Fulan called you a pig fucker.”

  “A pig fucker, eh?”

  “That’s a loose translation.”

  “Anything else?”

  “He made some kind of a reference to the ‘other one,’ but I didn’t catch it.”

  Silva stopped walking, and took her by the arm. She turned to face him.

  “As soon as we get back to the hotel,” he said, “call Luis Chagas. Ask him if he has a photo of that man Kassim. If he doesn’t, ask him to send someone over here to take one. Clandestinely.”

  “And, once we’ve got it?”

  “Email it to Mara in São Paulo. Have her compare it with the images she received from Curitiba.”

  “What images?”

  “She’ll know what I’m talking about.”

  “But I don’t. And I’d like to.”

  “There’s a video recording of everyone who got off the elevators on Nestor’s floor the night he was killed. One face couldn’t be identified.”

  “And you think it might belong to this guy, Kassim?”

  “I hope so.”

  “What if it does?”

  “We do nothing. Not yet. Al-Fulan is the big fish. Let’s give him a bit more rope.”

  “ALLAHU AKBAR,” Mullah Asim said.

  Hector was familiar with the takbir. He didn’t wait for Ragab to interpr
et it for him.

  “Tell him to stop spouting platitudes and answer my question,” he said.

  Ragab put Hector’s statement into Arabic and rendered the reply in Portuguese: “I have forgotten the question.”

  They’d been sitting in mullah Asim’s office for a quarter of an hour. Everything he’d said had been evasive, but the visit hadn’t been entirely useless. The walls told their own story.

  One was decorated with photos showing events, often multiple photos of the same event. Another bore photos of people.

  The events included, but weren’t limited to, aircraft striking the World Trade Center in New York, the carnage at Atocha Station in Madrid, the mayhem caused by British Muslims in the London Underground, the damage to the USS Cole in the harbor of Aden, and the attacks on the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. Some were clipped from newspapers, others from magazines. There were even a few that looked like they’d been printed from negatives. All had two things in common: destruction and death.

  The people were Osama bin Laden, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Abu Nidal, Ayman Al-Zawahiri, Mohammad Atta and a succession of young men and women, mostly standing in front of green banners with inscriptions in Arabic.

  “Ask him what he took off those walls while he kept us waiting.”

  Hector’s query was purely provocative. He knew he wasn’t going to get a straight answer.

  Ragab translated the mullah’s reply: “He says the walls are the same now as they were when you had the discourtesy to appear without an appointment. And why should you think differently?”

  “Because there’s a hook for another photo there, and two more over there. Salem Nabulsi, maybe? And the bombings in São Paulo and Buenos Aires?”

  “He says he does not know the name Salem Nabulsi. And he has no photos of the bombings in São Paulo or Buenos Aires.”

  “Tell him Salem Nabulsi was one of his students, and we know it.”

  “He says he has many students. He does not always recall their names.”

  “Show him the photo.”

  Ragab showed Asim the photo they’d brought. The mullah gave it a cursory glance, and looked at his tea. Served by a young man of about twelve who’d come and gone, it had been standing on his desk for the last ten minutes, but he hadn’t yet touched it. In addition to tea, the glass contained crushed mint leaves. Their smell perfumed the room.

  “He says he doesn’t recall ever having seen the young man in the photo. He also says he’s busy. You should stop wasting his time and discuss these matters with his secretary.”

  “Tell him,” Hector said, “that I prefer to discuss them with him.”

  The mullah picked up his tea, said something, and took a sip, watching for Hector’s reaction over the rim of his glass.

  “In ten minutes,” Ragab translated, “it will be time for his prayers.”

  “Which still gives us ten minutes,” Hector said. “How many students has he got over the age of fifteen? Ask him that.”

  The mullah shook his head and gave a terse reply to the question.

  “He says he doesn’t remember,” Ragab said.

  Arnaldo had yet to contribute to the interview in any way. Now, he did. “Tell him he’s a lying sack of shit.”

  The pupils in the mullah’s dark eyes dilated in anger.

  Ragab grinned and started to translate what Arnaldo had said. The mullah interrupted him with the wave of an imperious hand.

  “Get out,” he said, in excellent Portuguese.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  WHEN SILVA GOT BACK to his hotel, the Chief of Ciudad del Este’s National Police was waiting in the bar.

  Chaparro had chosen to leave his uniform in Paraguay. He was wearing a dark blue sports jacket, an expensive one by the look of it, and an open-necked dress shirt without a tie.

  “If I’ve kept you waiting,” Silva said, “I’m sorry.”

  Chaparro waved off the apology. “I came early,” he said. “I like this place. Champagne?” Chaparro’s flute was half full, the one on Silva’s side of the table still empty. The wine was a non-vintage Krug. “I should, perhaps, point out you’ll be paying for the bottle. I put it on your bill.”

  “In that case …” Silva said and signaled the waiter.

  When the man had poured and left, Chaparro saluted with his glass. Silva followed suit and took an appreciative sip.

  “The container of C4,” Chaparro said, “arrived in our country on the nineteenth of July last year. It was shipped, in its entirety, to an army depot in Concepción. Do you know Concepción?”

  “No.”

  “Quite a nice little place, really. Except in summer. From mid-December right up to the end of March it’s far too hot.”

  “Where is it?”

  “On the Paraguay River, about three hundred kilometers north of the capital.”

  “Who’s in command of the depot?”

  “A colonel by the name of Suarez. He’s young, only twenty-seven years old, but destined for great things. He has a brilliant future ahead of him.”

  “Twenty-seven and already a colonel?”

  “Indeed. Impressive is it not?”

  “And he’s the one who sold the stuff?”

  Chaparro shook his head. “Of course not,” he said. “Did you not hear me refer to his brilliant future? Colonel Suarez is the son-in-law of one of our most senior generals.”

  “And, therefore, clearly innocent of any wrongdoing?”

  “Mario, Mario, do I detect sarcasm in your tone?”

  “Who’s going to take the rap?”

  “The guilty party is a supply sergeant.”

  “Arrested?”

  “Killed. This afternoon. In an attempt to escape.”

  “I see. And he was, I suppose, the sole perpetrator?”

  Chaparro held his glass up to the light and studied the bubbles. “How prescient of you,” he said.

  “Matias, I hope you’ve got more for me than that.”

  “I do. Before the supply sergeant made a break for freedom, he dictated a full confession.”

  “And signed it, of course.”

  “Of course. And it is available for inspection by your government.” Chaparro took another sip and emitted a contented sigh.

  “What, precisely, did he confess to?” Silva asked.

  “Firstly, that he sold only three drums. We have since verified that every other drum in the shipment is accounted for.”

  “How reassuring.”

  “Isn’t it? And now that the perpetrator is no longer in a position to do further damage, there’s no possibility of the terrorists being able to get their hands on any more of the stuff.”

  “None whatsoever?”

  “None whatsoever.”

  “Thank you. I’ll include that in my report.”

  “How much of the explosive do you believe to have been used in the bombings?”

  “No more than forty kilos.”

  Chaparro frowned and scratched his chin. “So they have at least thirty-five left,” he said. “Not good.”

  “Not good at all,” Silva said.

  Chaparro drained his glass. The waiter hastened to fill it. He topped up Silva’s at the same time. Again, Silva waited until he was gone. Then he said, “Now the important question: To whom did your wayward supply sergeant sell those drums?”

  Chaparro took a pack of Dunhills out of his pocket, lit one with his black and gold Dupont lighter, and expelled a jet of smoke before he replied. “All three drums were sold to a fellow who fits the description of a man who works for Jamil Al-Fulan. His name is Kassim Hamawi.”

  “Bingo,” Silva said.

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  DONATO AND VIRGILIO RETURNED to the hacienda at 4:30 P.M. and reported that Roque, in a rented car, was already on his way to the Hotel das Cataratas.

  Donato, like a child with a new toy, was excited about the firearms they’d purchased.

  “Taurus M975s, Senhor. Brand new. Never fired. All with silenc
ers and seventeen-round magazines.”

  There is no weapon more suited to silent killing than the M975, a pistol especially developed for the Brazilian army’s elite jungle fighting unit. When used with their 14-centimeter-long suppressors, the noise they make is negligible. Rounds fired in Silva’s room might not be totally inaudible to his neighbors on either side, but it was unlikely they’d be identified as pistol shots.

  “Don’t fall in love with them,” Muniz said, “because, just as soon as we’re finished with them all four are going right to the bottom of the river. Go fill the tank for the outboard motor and hook the boat’s trailer to the blue pickup. We’ll leave in two hours.”

  Just before noon, he’d taken the same truck and gone down to the river to scout the departure location. It was, in every way, ideal.

  The nearest house was two kilometers away. There was a stand of trees behind which they could park, and a beach of sandy soil where the riverbank shelved gradually into the water. The boat would have to be carried through some dense brush, but the capangas were strong men. And the motor could be unshipped and carried separately.

  Other than the prospect of getting into the boat, there was only one thing that made Muniz uneasy: the Devil’s Throat.

  That fearful chasm, where half the river’s flow disappeared over a precipice more than 80 meters high, was less than a kilometer away. Clouds of swirling mist hung above it; a hellish roar emanated out of it and, every now and then, a helicopter, coming from the direction of the Hotel das Cataratas, dipped into it. The passengers were tourists, plunging, for a full thirty seconds or so, into an abyss where they were surrounded, on three sides, by thousands of tons of falling water.

  It was not Muniz’s idea of fun, nor was a voyage, however short, on what most people would have regarded as a relatively placid river.

  And yet, as he stood there on the margin of the stream, reviewing his plans for a final time, he sensed his powerful fear of the upcoming embarkation being tempered by something far more agreeable: a sharp sense of anticipation.

  In just a few hours, he’d be looking into Silva’s face, savoring the terror that would be written there when he came to realize what awaited him. Then he’d kill him. And, once it was done, who would dare, ever again, to threaten Orlando Muniz? The prospect of a long prison term would be forever lifted from his shoulders, and he would have proven himself, once again, a figure that rose above the constraints that governed ordinary men.