Agents of Treachery

by Otto Penzler (ed)

  Sam’s face gave no sign either way.

  “Post-traumatic stress disorder. That’s what’s going on here, you know. It’s a sickness.”

  Sam blinked slowly at him.

  “I won’t insist on the therapist—not yet—but I am insisting on the vacation. Aren’t you supposed to go car racing next week?”

  “Cross-country rally.”

  “Good. Write up a report on the fiasco and then take three weeks.”

  Sam was already on his feet, nodding.

  “Keep safe,” Randall told him, “and do consider the therapist. Voluntarily. I’ll not lose you.”

  But Sam was already out the door.

  * * * *

  There had been an unexpected storm along the south side of snowcapped Mount Kenya that morning, and so by noon he was soaked with mud, and by late afternoon it had dried to a crust, turning his clothes into a lizard skin of hard scales. But he went on. His empty passenger seat set him apart from most of the Europeans and Americans taking part in the rally, and when asked, he told them his partner had dropped out because of business obligations, an excuse they all understood.

  At the end of each day, they drank together in tents set up by their Kenyan hosts. The Italians were loud, the French condescending, the Brits sneering, the Americans annoyingly boisterous. A hive of multinational caricatures bound together by speed and beer, business and tall tales about women they’d had. These things were, he reflected, the lifeblood of Western masculinity.

  It was Friday, two days before the end of the race, when through his exhausted eyes and muddy goggles he saw Benjamin Muoki standing among the T-shirted organizers wearing a suit, one hand on his hip, and no expression on his face. In his other hand was a bottle of Tusker lager. Sam pulled up amid the other drivers’ shouts and hoots, flipped up his goggles, and nodded at Benjamin, who took the cue and wandered away from the camp. Sam checked his time, rinsed off, and changed into shorts, a blue cotton button-up, and leather sandals from his waterproof bag. By then, Benjamin was a silhouette against a backdrop of fading mountains. Sam had to run to catch up with him.

  “Here,” Benjamin said, holding out his beer. “You need it more than I do.”

  They shared the bottle in silence, walking slowly, until Benjamin remembered and said, “You’re nearly the last one in.”

  “The rain does it to me.”

  “I’ll pray for clear skies.”

  “The sun is even worse.”

  Having known each other for three years, the men used the exchange of pass phrases not to recognize each other, but to signal if one or the other was compromised. “But really,” said Benjamin, “are you driving well?”

  “I’m surviving.”

  “It’s a difficult course.”

  They paused and looked back at the bustling activity of the camp. Lights flickered on to hold back the encroaching dark. A dusty wind came at them, raising little tornadoes, then died down. “Did you receive the instructions?” Sam asked.

  “I’m here, aren’t I?”

  “I mean the rest of it.”

  “Yes.”

  “And?”

  “What would you like me to say? That I think it’s dangerous? I’ve said that about too many of your plans to keep on with it.”

  “But do you see any obvious flaws?”

  “Just that you’ll end up dead.”

  Sam didn’t answer; he was too tired to lie convincingly.

  Benjamin looked into his face. “A life for a life? It’s a lot to pay.”

  “More than one life, we hope.”

  “We,” Benjamin said quietly. “I had a talk with your fat attaché. I don’t think he knows the first thing about this.”

  Sam felt his expression betraying too much. “You told him?”

  “No, Sam. I felt around some. I’m good at that.”

  “Good.”

  “It’s not on the books, is it?”

  “It’s above his clearance,” Sam lied, but it was an easy lie. “The computer finished?”

  “By Monday.”

  “I’ll be back next Wednesday.”

  “So I’ll give it to you then.”

  “Not me. You’ll give it to someone else.”

  A light seemed to go on in Benjamin’s always-astute eyes. “Someone even more foolish than you?”

  “I’ll let you know. You’ll give it to him, but you won’t say a thing about it. You’re a good enough liar for that, aren’t you?”

  Benjamin’s expression faltered. “This is a very stupid man?”

  “A nervous man. Just give him the case. He knows what to do with it.”

  “He knows he’ll die?”

  “You’re full of questions, Benjamin. We’re paying you well enough, aren’t we?”

  “You have always paid well, Sam.”

  * * * *

  On Monday, as he sat across from Paul Fisher in the Aeroport International de Genève, he wondered why he was pushing it so far. Was he pushing it too far? He hadn’t seen Paul since that bar in Rome, and now that they were face-to-face again the prospect of killing him here, now, seemed much more inviting. Easier. More wholesome.

  But he’d begun to fall in love with the balance of his plan. One bomb would take out not only the man indirectly responsible for Saïd’s gruesome murder, but also the man who had worked the blade through the muscles and bone. Now it was just a matter of persuasion. So after the invention of the technology that would wash bank accounts clean, he assured Paul that he wouldn’t be alone—Sam would be there, right by his side, to authorize the transfer with his index finger. That seemed to calm him. Then he told Paul what they both knew, that he wasn’t cut out for this kind of work and never had been. “Consider this a chance to redeem yourself,” Sam said, and it felt as if, through lies, he had cut to a deeper truth than he ever could have come upon honestly.

  His love of the plan kept him moving forward even when, on Wednesday, Saïd’s murderer told him his real name and the name of his employer. Sam had put too much work into the plan to let it fall apart now, so he improvised. He absorbed this discovery into his tale, and even encouraged Nabil to murder Paul. He admitted the issue was personal. It was reckless, yes, but his sense of the rightness and beauty of his plan had made him delirious.

  Yet it was too late. He realized his mistake only when they plucked him off the street and drove him out of town to that finely appointed house. Even then, however, he clung to hope. They still wanted the money, and if necessary he would type in the code himself. He would prefer if Paul were beside him to accept the blast as well, but he would make do with what was possible.

  What he never expected was the politician sitting with a scotch in the living room, the fat one with the round eyes that stared in horror as he was dragged in. Their eyes met, but neither said a thing. Surprise kept them both mute. His captors dragged him to the basement and locked the door, and Sam settled at the table, thinking through the implications of Daniel Kwambai working with Aslim Taslam.

  As if he’d read Sam’s mind, some ten minutes later Kwambai opened the door and stepped inside wearing a wrinkled linen jacket stretched on one side by something heavy in the pocket. He closed the door and stared at Sam. “What are you doing here?” came his falsetto whisper.

  “You’re playing both sides, Daniel. Aren’t you?”

  Kwambai shook his head and took a seat across from him. “Don’t judge me, Sam. You’re not in a position.”

  “We don’t pay you enough?”

  “No one pays enough. You know that. But maybe after this money you’re bringing I’ll be able to quit playing any sides at all. If the money’s legitimate. Is it?”

  “Sure it is. Is the information going to be legitimate?”

  “They don’t tell me much, but no, I don’t think so.”

  Sam feigned disappointment. “You going to help me get out of here, then?”

  “Not before the money’s transferred.”

  “And then?”

&nb
sp; Kwambai didn’t answer. He seemed to be thinking of something, while Sam was thinking about the bulge in Kwambai’s pocket.

  “Well?”

  “I’m considering a lot of things,” said Kwambai. “For instance, how you would stand up to Nabil’s interrogation.”

  “No better or worse than most men, probably.”

  “And I’m wondering what you’d say.”

  “About you?” Sam shook his head. “I don’t think you have to worry about that. If he doesn’t follow that line of questioning, there’ll be no reason to answer.”

  A sad smile crossed Kwambai’s face. “And if he just asks for a reason to end the pain?”

  Sam knew what he was getting at, but things had become confused enough by this point that he couldn’t be sure how he wanted to answer. The obvious thing to say was that he’d protect Kwambai’s relationship with the Company to his dying breath, but no one would believe that, least of all him. The truth was that he recognized that sad look on the politician’s face. It was the same expression Kwambai had given just before accepting that initial deal, a year ago, to make contact with the Somali extremists who’d been doing business in Kenya. The look signified that, while he could hardly admit it to himself, Kwambai had already made up his mind.

  So he repeated the lie he had used to encourage the coward Paul Fisher: “You still need me. For the transfer.” He raised his hands and tickled the air with his fingers. “My prints.”

  But nothing changed in Kwambai’s face.

  “Take it out, then,” said Sam.

  “What?”

  “The gun. Take it out and do what you have to do. I personally don’t think you can. Not here in your own house. Not with your own hands. And how would you explain it to Nabil? He wants me. Like you, he wants the money. He—” Sam stopped himself because he recognized that he was rambling. Panic was starting to overcome him.

  Dutifully, though, Kwambai removed a revolver from his pocket and placed it on the table, pointing it at Sam much the way Sam had pointed the Beretta at Paul Fisher. Unlike the Beretta, this was an old gun, a World War II model Colt .45. Kwambai’s eyes were red around the edges. “I like you, Sam. I really do.”

  “But not that much.”

  “No,” Kwambai said as he lifted the pistol and shot three times before he could think through what he was doing.

  * * * *

  BENJAMIN

  Benjamin had lived most of his life making snap decisions and only afterward deciding whether or not they’d been correct. Intuition had been his primary guide. Even the occasional services he performed for the Americans and the Brits had begun that way. So all afternoon, as he tracked down a friend who would be willing to drive Paul Fisher to the border, he had wrestled with it, weighing Fisher’s life against the comforts of his family. If the Americans cut him off, George would probably not get to football camp this year; Elinah’s confirmation party would be more modest than planned; and Murugi, his long-suffering yet intractable wife, would start questioning the shift in the monthly budget. Was one stranger’s life worth it?

  It wasn’t until the trip back to the hotel in his friend’s Toyota pickup that he really convinced himself that he’d done right. We’re all employed by someone, he told himself philosophically, but in the end it’s self-employment that motivates us. The sentence charmed him, provoking a mysterious, proud smile on his lips, and that only made it more disappointing when he arrived at the hotel and learned that it had all been for nothing.

  His first clue was Chief Japhet Obure in the lobby, talking with the hotel manager and the bartender. The local police chief rolled his eyes at the sight of Benjamin. “Kidnapped American, and then you appear, Ben. Why am I not surprised?”

  “You know me, Japhi. I can smell scandal a mile away.”

  Benjamin’s disappointment was breathtakingly vast, bigger than he would have imagined. He hadn’t known Paul Fisher. Had he liked him? Not really. He had liked Sam, but not the feeble man who affected coldness to overcome an obvious cowardice. And it wasn’t as if Paul Fisher had been an innocent; none of the connected Americans who wandered into his country were. But his disappearance hurt just the same.

  “Looks like he hadn’t even unpacked,” Japhet said once they were both in his room.

  Benjamin, by the door, watched the chief touch the wrinkled bedspread and the dusty bedside table. But what the chief didn’t notice was the empty space, just beside the luggage stand, where the briefcase had been. As Japhet opened closets and drawers, Benjamin watched over his shoulder, but the all-important case wasn’t there. Why hadn’t Benjamin taken it with him when he’d left?

  He knew the answer, but it was so banal as to be embarrassing. He, like anyone, didn’t want to run around town carrying a bomb.

  Once everything had been brushed for prints, a long line of witnesses interviewed, and darkness had fallen, Chief Obure invited him out for a drink. Benjamin called Murugi and told her he’d be late. “Because of the kidnapped American?” It was already making the news.

  By nine he and Japhet were sitting at a sidewalk café, drinking cold bottles of Tusker and eyeing a trio of twelve-year-old boys across the road sucking on plastic bags of glue.

  “Breaks my heart to see that,” said Japhet.

  “Then you should be dead sixty times over by now,” Benjamin answered as his cell phone rang a monotone sound. Simultaneously, Japhet’s played a recent disco hit.

  A house northeast of the city, not so far from the United Nations compound in Runda Estate, had been demolished by an explosion. Benjamin knew the house, and back when Daniel Kwambai had still been in the government’s favor he’d even visited it. Still, the fact that the bomb had ended up in one of Kwambai’s houses was a surprise.

  “Time for a field trip,” Japhet said when they’d both hung up.

  It took them forty minutes to reach Runda Estate and head farther north, where they followed the tower of smoke down to the inferno on the hill. The firefighters had left to collect more water, and Pili, one of Benjamin’s assistants, was standing in the long front yard, staring at the flames. He was soaked through with sweat.

  “The explosion came from inside. That’s what the fire chief says.”

  “What else would they expect?” asked Japhet.

  Since his boss didn’t reply, Pili said, “Car bomb.”

  “Right, right.”

  Both Pili and Japhet watched as Benjamin approached the burning house on his own. He stopped where the temperature rose dramatically, then began to perspire visibly, his shirt blackening down the center and spreading outward.

  From behind, he heard Japhet’s voice: “What’re you thinking, Ben?”

  “Just that it’s beautiful,” he answered, because that was true. Flames did not sit still. They buckled and wove and snapped and rose so that you could never hold their true form. Perhaps they had no true form. Wood popped and something deep inside the inferno exploded.

  “Do you know what’s going on here, Ben?”

  The wailing fire truck was returning, full of water. Farther out, headlights moved down the long road toward them. That would be absolutely everyone—government representatives, religious leaders, the Americans, the United Nations, the press.

  He took Japhet’s arm and walked him toward his car. “Come on. I’ll buy you a drink wherever you like.”

  “A rare and wonderful offer,” Japhet said. “You steal something?”

  “I’ve earned every cent I have,” he answered, twirling keys around his finger. “I just feel like forgetting.”

  “This?”

  “If I forget it, maybe it’ll just go away,” Benjamin said, smiling pleasantly as he got in and started the car. In no time at all, they had passed the incoming traffic and made it over the hills and back into the city. It was as if the burning house had never been. Despite the sweltering heat, Benjamin had even stopped sweating.

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  * * * *

 

  Otto Penzler (ed), Agents of Treachery