The Red Cell

by André Le Gallo

  McCabe got back in, and Vanness drove away. When they were back on the highway, Vanness lit a cigarette and Steve followed suit. He understood the wisdom of the decision, but he was reluctant to distance himself from Kella. What if they moved her during the night? Shouldn’t they jump on this opportunity, odds or no odds? His thoughts were interrupted when his cell began ringing.

  It was Nigel Barnes, his father’s friend. “I’m sure you do not remember me. You were just a small boy. My wife and I had dinner at your house on the northern edge of Tehran. Anyway, your father gave me your number. He would not say anything, of course. But I spoke to Kate also, and she told me about your father’s diagnosis. I am very sorry.”

  “Yes, my father said you would call. I’m in the middle of something. I wonder if we could talk later.”

  “It will only take a minute. I have vital information for your government. And I thought your father would be the best one to handle it. However, I fully understand he cannot travel to Europe. He told me of your position, and I think you will know what to do with it.”

  “I am now in Brussels and I cannot travel. I understand you’re in France. So I wonder if you could come here.”

  “I’m calling from Beaune. My wife and I had been looking forward to a trip to the Burgundy wine region, and that’s where we are now. We could get to Brussels in a matter of hours, and we could finish our wine tasting tour on the way back home. I’ll call you and we will have a chin wag. Good luck with whatever you’re doing.”

  Vanness let them off in front of Kristen’s building when he received a phone call and motioned for Steve to wait. “The general has gone back to the same building where he spent the night last night,” Vanness said. “If only we knew which apartment he was visiting, we would have him.”

  Having a sudden brainstorm, Steve told him to park the car and come upstairs. As soon as he reached the apartment, he called, “Kristen. Are you here?”

  She came walking out of the kitchen wearing slacks and a sweater and eating a carrot stick. “I’m here. I’m here. What is it?”

  “Where is Dalton staying?”

  Colonel Vanness walked in as she answered, “Rue Victor Hugo, the address is 222, third floor. Why?”

  “Does that sound familiar?” Steve asked Vanness.

  “Yes, that’s the address of the building where Yosemani spent the last two nights.”

  Sensing they had just heard information that could be a game-changer, McCabe and Hunter simultaneously looked up from the dining room table where they each had begun taking their weapons apart to clean them. “Well, that gives us another choice, right?” Hunter said.

  “I’m not sure. Just who’s in cahoots with whom?”

  “What about the unthinkable?” Kristen asked.

  “You mean…?” said McCabe.

  “What, that V.A. Dalton, the president’s trusted adviser, is sleeping with the enemy?” Steve said, completing the thought.

  “Does that make any sense?” McCabe asked.

  “I don’t know,” Steve said. “But until it does, we’re sticking with plan A.”

  21. Svetlana’s House

  The next day, McCabe, wearing a chauffeur’s cap, and Kristen pulled up in the sort-of limo and stopped in front of Svetlana and Karim’s house. A round faced man in his fifties wearing a black leather jacket was sitting on the steps, looking bored and smoking a cigarette, but he stood when Kristen got out of the car. She glanced down the street to confirm Hunter had parked about three houses away and walked up the steps, where the man seemed undecided whether to stop her.

  “Who are you?” He asked in French.

  “I’m a friend of Svetlana’s.”

  He allowed her to ring the bell and Svetlana emerged in a blue and white warm up outfit and wearing new running shoes. “Oh, I did not expect you. I thought you had a conflict,” she said.

  “I do. My conflict is I was invited this morning to preview an Iranian movie, and it occurred to me on the way that Karim might enjoy it. Is he here?”

  “Kristen, wait,” Svetlana said as she zipped up her jacket. “I have heard about you American women. We just met and you are already trying to steal my boyfriend.” She smiled uncertainly.

  Kristen laughed. “A date! You think this is a date! No, no, no. This is purely professional. Frankly, I really need him. I don’t know very much about the movie, but I think it’s going to be in Farsi. I’ll even pay him a translator fee.” She hoped her nervousness was not showing and Svetlana could not hear the loud thumping of her heart.

  “Okay, let me see if I can motivate him.” Svetlana said. She smiled and disappeared into the house.

  She returned with Karim a few minutes later. He asked, “Iranian movie? I had not heard about it. How long is it going to be?” Reacting to Kristen’s questioning glance at the man standing beside them, Karim added, “Oh, Gaspard is my bodyguard. I saw my father yesterday, and he insisted I needed a bodyguard.” Rolling his eyes to the sky, he added, “I did not have a choice. So what is this about a movie?”

  “This morning I received a phone call inviting me to a special preview. I’m going to be paid for it, so I splurged and I hired a car and driver,” she smiled alluringly, as she pointed to the vehicle parked at the curb. “That’s all I know, but I suspect it’s going to be in Farsi. So, I was hoping you could come with me.”

  “Well, I don’t know,” Karim said, looking back at the house as if he were involved in another project.

  “Come on,” Kristen said as she took him by the arm. “It’s going to be fun. And it’s probably not going to be more than a couple hours.” She surprised herself at the way she sounded, because inside she felt as wound up as a spring.

  While this conversation was taking place, Kristen’s impression that Gaspard did not speak English was confirmed when Karim explained the situation to him in basic French. Kristen’s French was not much better, but she understood Gaspard wanted to accompany Karim. She glanced toward Hunter’s car and wondered if the situation was going to be resolved by talk or by force.

  “Oh, let him stay here,” Kristen told Karim. “For one thing, he won’t be able to get into the theatre.”

  “I’m going to go run and let you decide what you’re going to do,” Svetlana said, as she started to jog away from them. Then she stopped and turned back. Speaking English, she said, “Why don’t you take him with you? I bet he would not mind waiting for you in a bar somewhere.”

  Karim nodded and motioned for Gaspard to accompany them.

  When the three of them got in the car, Kristen sat in the front with McCabe and let the two men sit in the back. Behind the glass partition separating the passengers from the driver, Kristen quickly explained the situation to McCabe and told him to head for the nearest bar. He pulled in front of a café in the middle of the city. He got out and opened the door for Gaspard.

  “Svetlana suggested, and I agree, that Gaspard should wait for us here. We’ll be about an hour,” McCabe said leaning down to see both Karim and Gaspard.

  After Karim and Gaspard exchanged a few words in French, Karim said, “He says his job is to stay with me.”

  Kristen stepped out of the car and said, “Tell him,” she told Karim, “that he will not be allowed in to the theatre. It’s by invitation only. This is by far the best place to wait. The alternative is to wait outside the theatre where there are no places to sit. Besides, it looks like rain. This does not look to me to be a bad place to spend an hour.”

  After a few more words between Gaspard and Karim, the bodyguard stepped out of the car and, looking uncertain, directed his steps toward the entrance, as he glanced at his watch. Kristen got back in the car and McCabe quickly returned behind the wheel, locked all the doors, and headed for Waterloo.

  22. Iranian Safe House, Charleroi

  Hatred. Kella had never felt such an extreme hatred since her parents had been killed by the Malian Army during the Tuareg rebellion in the southern Sahara where she was born, the child of tri
bal royalty. However, the hatred had been diluted by confusion and lack of understanding for what had happened. A couple of years in a Catholic orphanage in Timbuktu had eventually erased her hostility. There was no such dilution now.

  Shackled to a radiator by day and to a bed at night, her mind had transferred her focus from the men who had caused her to lose her child to the man who was behind her kidnapping, Yosemani, famously ruthless and responsible for killing hundreds of people. She assumed he would eventually appear to take part in the interrogation and she constantly rehearsed her part of the confrontation. She knew she would have little chance to actually hurt him physically, but she kept looking around the room for some sort of weapon. She tried to imagine the blood pattern against the wallpaper if she somehow could get a shot at him. Neither of the two guards usually carried a weapon, but she had to stay alert.

  The green wallpaper was punctuated about every 12 inches, with red crested songbirds, sixteen across and twelve up, a total of a hundred ninety-two. She absentmindedly counted them, as her mind feverishly reviewed the events of the last couple of days and rehearsed her words and actions for future opportunities to get free.

  The first two days of interrogation had been rough physically, but her guards were not very skilled. Her free hand felt the bruises over her body. Her every move caused pain. The black and blue marks would eventually go away, but her child could never be revived. She seethed with anger. She strongly believed sticking to her Jane Mercier cover was her only defense. She used the constantly rising frustration of the two Iranian guards as a measure of her success. But for the most part, she was now left alone for most of the day. The guards had obviously received a change of orders. She started wondering whether she was being readied for another phase. Could they be planning to exfiltrate her to another country? To Iran? Was Steve working with the Belgian police, who obviously had the resources, or was he only using the station assets?

  Although she realized philosophizing about the big picture was useless, she also blamed Washington, which did not understand Iran was fighting a war, a covert war, but a war nevertheless, with the Great Satan, the United States. Just as several administrations had not understood until 9/11 that radical Islam, al Qaeda in the vanguard, was at war with America. She was just a pawn, and Yosemani would not hesitate to kill her if it was expedient.

  She had tried to purge all illogical thoughts from her mind during her time at the Ecole Nationale d’Administration, France’s most prestigious gateway to the ministerships and to the country’s most influential boardrooms. After graduation, she had felt she was the proud owner of a Cartesian mind, “I think therefore I am.” But now she was rediscovering hatred, and the man behind the death of her unborn child had removed her from Descartes’ faithful followers. But was hatred after what Yosemani had done so illogical? As time passed, her initial orderly thinking disappeared and her visceral feelings needed no logical foundations.

  She was fairly certain her child would have been a girl. She would have named her Jacqueline. She loved the sound of that name or, perhaps, Alexandra, after her stepmother. It sounded distinguished. Would Steve have agreed to raise their child in France? Her pregnancy was so recent she had not had time to broach the subject with him. She had mentally decorated and furnished Jacqueline’s room during her imprisonment. She had also bought the perfect wardrobe for her baby after diligent shopping at Nordstrom’s, Macy’s, and the Galleries Lafayette.

  Her wedding was now scheduled almost a week away. Was her stepmother making the necessary arrangements? What about the wedding dress? She had found exactly what she was looking for during her last day of shopping on the Avenue Louise and had told the store she would be back for it the next day. She could see the wedding dinner and her grand-père’s overly formal and flowery toast, a menu of French cuisine Steve would probably not appreciate, and dancing to a combination of French and American music. Alexandra, her step-mother, was very traditional and would probably arrange for the church service to be in Latin. But would Steve get her out of here in time? Would she still be alive in one week?

  Her hand rested on her stomach. She thought of the specific blows that might have caused the death of her baby. Her eyes burned with fire, and she looked forward to getting taking her revenge.

  23. Avenue Wellington

  Karim smiled to himself, as he saw Gaspard take a seat at the outdoor café, looking satisfied at the prospect of spending an hour savoring Belgium’s most famous export, but also somewhat lost. Karim only knew Gaspard’s previous job had been as a night security guard at one of the Solvay Chemical plants. His days as a policeman in The Hague were long past.

  He saw Kristen was on her cell and assumed she was calling the theatre. He wondered also why she was still sitting in the front with the driver. He had vaguely heard the doors locking but had not paid particular attention to the sound. He noticed it was starting to drizzle; Svetlana was going to get wet during her run. His antennas alerted him when he noticed the car was heading south away from the city center. He waited another couple of kilometers and then he tapped on the separation to get Kristen’s attention.

  Kristen looked back at him and motioned to McCabe, who pulled over. They had reached a road that led to the Forêt de Soignes, Belgium’s famous Sonian Forest, which had relatively little traffic at that time of day. McCabe opened the partition and turned around to face Karim. “Karim, there is no movie today,” he said. “Your father the general kidnapped one of our friends for no reason at all, and you are going to help us set her free. This is not a movie; this is not a student prank. If you do as I say, you will help to save the life of our friend. And if you do as I say this could be over today.”

  First Karim was shocked at the turn of events. Then confused. Then angry, first at Svetlana and then at these two Americans who were upsetting his life, who were reflecting their country’s bullying policies. But most of all at himself because, subconsciously, he knew something like this would happen sooner or later. He had pushed his father’s official functions to the back of his mind, hoping and trusting he could get a degree and go back to Iran to live a normal life despite his father’s activities. But when he had been assigned a bodyguard the day before, he realized he should have asked a lot more questions. He also should have not been so pliant to Svetlana’s ideas, but she had never gotten him in trouble before. Her friend Kristen had been so friendly, and smart, for an American girl. She was also pretty, but he had been naïve to trust her. The chauffeur had taken off his cap and looked very serious. Karim believed him that this was not a joke. And now he knew that noise meant the doors were locked. He looked first to Kristen and then to the chauffeur, trying to understand his situation. What exactly did they want him to do?

  “Who are you? If you know who my father is then you know you are in danger.”

  “Listen Karim,” Kristen said. “I am sorry, but our friend’s life is in danger. I think what happened is your father made a mistake and kidnapped the wrong person. You can make everything alright. What you can do…?”

  “What you will do,” McCabe said, “is call your father right now and tell him exactly what we tell you, no more no less, and in English. Are you ready?”

  Karim again looked at the two Americans and, after a brief glance outside through the windows wet with rain, said, “Go to hell.”

  “You think you have a choice,” McCabe said. “You don’t. If you refuse, we can easily capture your father, in which case it is also the end of life as you know it, or we can skip the preliminaries and kill him. This is not Iran. He has no protection here. If you don’t give damn about your father, there’s always Svetlana. You see, we have more options than you do.”

  “Don’t harm Svetlana. Keep her out of this. She has nothing to do with whatever my father did.”

  “Okay, get your cell out. Tell him you are being held and your safety depends on the safety of the woman he kidnapped a few days ago. Her name is Jane Mercier. Tell your father she must call your numb
er as soon as possible. Once that happens, we will give him instructions about when and where he needs to release her—and then we will let you go. Now, do it.”

  Karim dialed the Iranian embassy instead, confident the receptionist, who knew him, would help. He yelled, “Get the police, Maryam! This is Karim.”

  Before he could say any more, McCabe reached back and seized his wrist with one hand and his phone with the other. “That’s a mistake,” he growled as he put the car in gear and drove to the other side of the forest where he parked again. “Karim, I have fought your militias in both Iraq and Afghanistan. I don’t know how many men I have killed. As far as I’m concerned, this is the same war, just a different battlefield. Your people don’t care about human life and that’s just how I feel about you. I’m finished playing nice. Are you ready to do what I tell you?”

  Karim nodded.

  ***

  A TV repair truck drove by the safe house and parked close to Avenue Wellington twenty minutes after Kristen’s call to Steve. A few minutes later, two cars passed Rue Murat and parked about fifty yards apart on Avenue Wellington, pointing toward the highway’s on-ramp toward Brussels.

  “We have spoken to Kella,” McCabe told Steve over the phone. “She’s hurt but alive. But the general is trying to play games. No surprise there, right? He said he would release his captive only after we brought his son to the Iranian Embassy. Anyway, we had that conversation and he now agrees, since he’s spoken to his son and we’ve spoken to Kella—and each is relatively safe, we can proceed with the exchange. He wants it in front of the Iranian Embassy, and I insisted on a more public venue, the middle of the Grande Place.”

  “So what’s the bottom line?” Steve asked.

  “Obviously, he’s not a happy camper. He threatened to huff and puff and blow our house down. He even mentioned your name. He said in time he’s going to get you, one way or another. I told him I never heard of you.”