The Phoenix Affair

by Paul Clark

  *****

  Henri Broussard gazed across his large office at the eighteenth century paintings on the gilt wall opposite his desk. As he’d really already known, it had been a CIA operation. The Egyptian called Salah had been a peace offering of sorts, as had Kisani in all likelihood, and the wounded assassin who’d since died of his injuries just after identifying his associates. And of course, someone named “Ibrahim,” whereabouts unknown for now. He took a final look at the binder in front of him that was still open to the page holding a facsimile of Mr. Paul Cameron’s passport. The broad smile and piercing blue eyes, slightly lined at the corners, stared back at him out of a ruggedly angular and very American face.

  XIX. Saudi Arabia/Jordan/Langley

  The city of Taif sits high in the mountains of western Arabia, about forty kilometers to the southeast of and nearly five thousand feet above the holy city of Mecca. For centuries it has been the summer playground of kings; in the mountains it is cool, green, and comfortable even when the temperature in the lowlands and across the central plateau reaches over 130 degrees Fahrenheit. The city is not large by Western standards, but it is busy, particularly in summer, when the Royal Court moves there from Riyadh to escape the heat. There is a flourishing souq or “market” district dealing in all kinds of gold jewelry, carpets, incense and sandalwood, baskets from Asir to the South, other traditional crafts, as well as consumer goods and electronics from all over the world.

  It is not uncommon to pass a small stall in the souq and to see a Pakistani shopkeeper sitting on a stool, sipping scalding-hot tea flavored with sugar and mint, watching a plasma-screen television or surfing the internet while he waits for his next customer. Many of these customers will be American or British expatriates or other Westerners, all of whom live and work in Taif either for the government, the Royal Saudi Air Force, or any number of large commercial conglomerates doing business in the Kingdom. Over the course of more than half a century since about 1950, this has been completely normal. The expats are the grease that makes Saudi “industry” run, and they become rich on their generous salaries, immersed in the exotic culture, charmed by the hospitality and generosity of their Arab hosts.

  Khalid al-Shahrani checked his watch again, four-fifteen on Thursday afternoon, and sipped a cold Pepsi with ice as he surveyed the souq from his small table in the corner restaurant. It was a beautiful weekend, the sky above a clear, stark blue, and the temperature in the mid-60s Fahrenheit: it was almost too cool for his tastes. The foot traffic, as it always did, confirmed his belief in his cause. European men in blue jeans and polo shirts, accompanied by their women who generally wore black abaya but without covering their hair or faces, dominated the scene. True Arabs were perhaps only one quarter of the people he could see. Another quarter were the laborers and shopkeepers from Pakistan, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, India, and Egypt. The rest were Westerners, blond haired, often blue eyed, tall, shameless, and too proud. It took an effort to prevent himself from becoming enraged. He reminded himself that he had been more successful than he’d hoped.

  His drive from Riyadh had been pleasant, if long, but his work had gone very well. Over the last two days he’d finished the buying of his tickets, and through a network of go-betweens and websites the word had gone out: prepare to move. By tomorrow at the time of the weekly Friday noon prayers every one of his men would have transport arranged, and by the next day they would begin to move West, into the heart of the Enemy’s homeland. After long thought, he’d decided that the best place for him to be in the next few months was Sudan. Accordingly, he had a ticket to Khartoum via Jeddah and Cairo on reserve, departing on Tuesday. A wave of pleasure warmed him at this thought. In the Sudan, slavery was still very much alive, and as he would be received in a manner befitting a high-ranking member of the Brotherhood, he expected that there would be a nearly endless supply of young and nubile women from which he would have his pick. Beyond this, Sudan was not his favorite place to be, but this compensation would make the other discomforts bearable. He smiled and sipped the Pepsi, then tore off a chunk of the flat bread, dipping it in the spicy babaganush before taking a mammoth bite and focusing again on his lingering problem.

  He was still working out what to do about the General and his family. On the one hand he was tempted to let that whole situation pass, such was his confidence in the plan to move his men quickly. After all, once they were gone, there was little damage the General or the troublesome nephew could do. But yesterday Mohammed had telephoned from al-Khobar to relate his discovery of the al-Auda family’s move to their compound in al-Ha’il. This bothered Khalid, not so much because he cared one way or the other for that northern oasis town, regardless of its reputation for scholarship of the Q’uran and the Hadith, but rather because of the timing of the movement the family had made. The flight from Dhahran, timed as it had been, and just a day before he would have killed them all easily, was unsettling. It made this General seem much more dangerous, less predictable, more resourceful, in a way determined, than Khalid had expected. It was in a way proof that the man was thinking, planning, playing the game of strategy against an enemy Khalid would have hoped he neither knew nor suspected.

  Even this, ordinarily, would not have worried him excessively. But last night as he checked his email for the final time of the evening, he was referred to a website, from there to another, and finally to a message and a photograph that was most unsettling. The photograph was of the General, at the Saudi embassy in London. He should have been dead in Paris four nights ago, but instead Ibrahim was somewhere in Germany and still incommunicado, and the General was in London. Why? And how? It was the resourcefulness of this move, and the unpredictability of it, coupled with the prescience of the family’s move from Dhahran, that bothered him. Together these things bespoke a man who was not to be trifled with, not to be underestimated. He appeared determined to survive. More than that, Khalid had the creeping feeling that the man himself believed he was on the offensive, the hunter rather than the hunted. That would never do.

  Last, there had been disturbing traffic on the usual websites throughout the day today. Brothers were not checking in as planned across a wide swath of England, queries went unanswered, expected intelligence on the movements of the second Enemy had not arrived. Something was wrong there, and his superiors in Pakistan had asked for his opinion, clearly concerned that some disease from Paris had spread to London. Khalid had searched for news media reports of a major counter-terrorist operation to arrest the Brothers, but the major outlets were silent; there was nothing. And yet there was the General, yesterday morning according to what he’d been told, in London, followed by a silence that was too much like that which had accompanied the known catastrophe to Ibrahim’s network in Paris.

  Taken together, Khalid concluded, these were ominous signs indeed. As he reached this conclusion, he also decided that he would have to do something about the General after all. The man was too dangerous, and the way to reach him was through his family at al-Ha’il, especially the nephew. That one must absolutely be liquidated before he could pass on any names, or descriptions of faces, of those men who were now so crucial to Khalid’s great plan. After thinking about this for a few minutes more, and finishing the bread and Pepsi, he made ready to leave. Sunset was a little over two hours away, and with it would come maghrib the evening prayer that would close everything. He needed an internet café, and quickly.

  His walk was slowed by the foot traffic, which annoyed him. At one point he had to wait stationary while a large British family stood motionless across the entire, narrow street while the man haggled with an Afghan shop worker over a small brass coffee pot. It took ten minutes to reach his car, it would take another fifteen to drive across town to the computer souq where the internet café’s were clustered. Once he was moving he thumbed the speed dial on his phone, and waited for the reply.

  “Nam?” came the answer of Mohammed’s voice from the ot
her side of the Arabian Peninsula.

  “Marhaba, ya Muhammed, hello Mohammed,” Khalid replied. “It’s Khalid your friend. And how is your weekend coming along?”

  For his part Mohammed was less than pleased to hear from his friend again so soon. His cell phone was starting to make him nervous; he, too had been surfing the internet today and had noted the alarming silence from London. But his duty to the Brothers was his duty, and he replied, “Khalid, how good to hear from you again so soon. Where are you today, my friend?”

  “Never mind that, Mohammed. Listen, I think my brother, by the grace of God, should have a birthday party after all, you know the one we planned for several days ago? But he and his family are at their compound in the North, as we discussed yesterday. I would like you to go and make my respects, and I’ll send gifts for you to present.”

  Mohammed thought about this and didn’t like it. He still had the five other men, including the twins, but he had never seen the al-Auda family compound. He knew of their wealth, however, from general talk throughout his youth. The compound would almost certainly be relatively large, there might be many people there, and they would resist any attempt to take the nephew. He said, “Khalid, what kinds of gifts will you send? It will be a, uhm, rich party with many people attending. We will need a suitably large group to greet them properly.”

  “Yes, I have thought of that Mohammed, that is exactly what I have in mind. I have thought to have some people meet you at al-Buraydah with the gifts. I think perhaps something like twenty-five would do. What do you think?”

  Mohammed whistled almost aloud. “Khalid, I should think that would do, if God wills it. Are their gifts to be, err, so heavy?” He was trying to ask about weapons, but could not be explicit over this cursed phone.

  But Khalid was nothing if not astute. “Yes, Mohammed, the gifts are very heavy, but also I want my brother to be impressed by my respect for him. Now, when do you think would be a good time, so that we may set the meeting at Buraydah and from there you can lead the party onward? For my part, I will need two or three days for organization, inshallah.”

  “As God wills, Khalid, in two or three days I could be there, and I will come with a few friends also.”

  “Good, very good Mohammed. Let us say then that you will meet, as God wills, at Buraydah on the afternoon of al-Ahad, Sunday. I will telephone my brother and tell him that you will call for the surprise party that evening. Is it agreed?”

  “Yes, Khalid, bismallah, in the Name of God, it is agreed. And I will lead the party myself, for the respect of your esteemed brother.”

  “Excellent, then, so be it. Peace be with you, my friend,” and without waiting for a reply, Khalid hung up. In five more minutes he parked the car and walked two blocks to an internet café he had not used on this trip, ordered tea, and began to work his computer. He had people to notify, pieces to move on the game board, weapons and equipment to organize. He worked steadily until the tenor voice summoned him to prayer two hours later. Before he logged off and paid his bill, he made a new reservation for his flight to Khartoum, but for Monday morning instead of Tuesday.