by Ian Hamilton
Ava wasn’t sure she believed him but let it go. “You fall into it. I mean, there aren’t any university accounting courses that specialize in debt collection…Although, now that I think about it, maybe there should be.”
“How old are you?”
“Why do you ask that?”
“Curiosity, nothing more.”
“I’m thirty-six.”
“And how much are you worth?”
“What does that matter?”
“I’m forty-eight and I think I have a net worth of about five hundred thousand dollars.”
“You should have chosen a different profession if you wanted big money,” Ava said.
“But was it always about the money for you?”
“It was never all, or always, about the money. My partner wouldn’t take on clients unless he believed they had been abused or misused. The money was almost incidental to making things right.” She smiled. “Mind you, it didn’t hurt that some of the amounts involved were large.”
“Who was your partner?”
“I called him Uncle — everyone called him Uncle. He was already in his seventies, or maybe even eighties, when we started working together. He became like a grandfather to me.”
“What happened if you and Uncle failed?”
“We ate all the costs and we had unhappy clients.”
“Was that often?”
“Seldom. So seldom that I can think of only two cases.”
“What were they?”
She turned and looked across the aisle at him. “I don’t want to talk about them. And I actually don’t want to talk about me anymore,” she said. “But I would like to know what happened to you in Thailand.”
“Did Ryan mention that?”
“He did.”
“I screwed up,” he said with a shrug. “I trusted some people who I shouldn’t have and it turned out to be a disaster. If Brad Harrison and I didn’t have a history, it could have ended my career. Instead I was sent to a place where I would be less visible. What’s crazy is that if this thing explodes, especially with Tom Allison in the mix, I’ll be more visible than ever.”
“The setback in Thailand doesn’t seem to have made you particularly cautious.”
“I only know one way to do this job — full speed ahead. I’m not much good at covering my ass. And I suspect that my lack of paranoia — or, more positively, my tendency to trust my judgement of people’s character — is going to get me in trouble again.”
“My partner was like that, and it was an attitude I adopted,” Ava said, surprised at Dulles’s candour. “It actually ran contrary to my training, and maybe even to my nature, but I came to embrace it.”
“So here we are, you trusting me and me trusting you and the two of us surrounded by a whole bunch of people who are dying to fuck us over.”
“Well, the good news is, if they don’t do it by the end of today, they might not get another opportunity,” she said.
He flashed a hint of a smile, turned away, and looked out the window. Ava suspected he’d had enough conversation, and she felt the same way. She pushed her seat back, closed her eyes, and tried to force herself to sleep again, even though she wasn’t tired.
The flight took just under two hours, and it was late afternoon when the pilot announced they were starting their approach into Bongao. A few minutes later Ava saw the runway, and in the distance the terminal. They landed with a thump, and after the plane came to a quick stop, it did a sharp turn to the right and parked short of the building. The pilot poked his head through the cockpit door. “We’re letting you out here. We’re told there are some cars waiting for you.”
“Can we leave our bags on the plane?” Ava said. “I’m tired of lugging mine around.”
“No problem,” he said.
When the plane door opened, Ava saw Wahab standing at the bottom of the steps, next to a tall, thickset man in a blue shirt with braid on the shoulders. Behind them, about twenty metres away, were two black Jeeps, each with a man in an identical blue shirt standing by the driver’s-side doors.
“Ava, this is Captain Reyes,” Wahab said when she was halfway down the steps.
“I can’t thank you enough for your help,” she said, extending her hand when she reached them.
“The captain is a good friend to me, Juhar, and the Brotherhood,” Wahab said. “And you should know that I told him the truth about our reason for wanting to get into the college.”
“He knows about the imam?”
“He does, and about the training we think has been going on there, although I didn’t get into numbers.”
“And Captain, you’re content just to help us? You don’t feel a need to investigate yourself?”
“Until there’s a crime committed, he’ll leave that to us and your American friend, who I also told him about,” Wahab said.
“I’m proud to be of whatever assistance I can,” Reyes said.
“Getting us into that college might be sufficient,” Dulles said from behind Ava.
She stepped to one side so the three men could see each other. Wahab eyed Dulles warily, and to Ava it seemed that the police captain became more restrained.
“This is Alasdair Dulles,” she said. “He’s with the CIA, and his contacts overseas have helped confirm just about everything Ben and Alcem told us.”
“You’re alone?” Captain Reyes said.
“Yes, for now,” Dulles said.
“I’m not accustomed to seeing American operatives in this region without an entourage of Philippine security personnel.”
“Ava asked us to keep them in the dark until we felt secure about our facts. We’ve done that out of respect for her and for the promise she made to the Brotherhood,” Dulles said, looking at Wahab. “I assume you’re Wahab?”
“Yes.”
“I’m pleased to meet you. I want to say right away that I think the way you’ve handled this entire situation has been beyond reproach. No matter how it ends, you and the Brotherhood deserve our thanks.” The two men shook hands, and Ava could see Wahab starting to relax.
“It’s going to be dark soon,” Captain Reyes said. “Perhaps we should be on our way to the college.”
“We’re in your hands,” Ava said.
The captain led the way to the Jeeps. As they approached, the two men at the cars stood to attention and saluted. “Wahab and I will lead in one car,” Reyes said to Ava and Dulles. “You follow in the other.”
“That was a nice bit of politics with Wahab,” Ava said as she and Dulles climbed into the back of their Jeep.
“I meant it,” he said.
The cars left the airport and followed the same route through the city that Ava had taken on her first trip to Bongao — a trip that seemed an eternity ago. They even followed the roadway that would take them to Maria’s Restaurant, but they made a left turn before they got to it. The road had changed from asphalt to dirt, and there were nothing but trees on either side.
“It’s isolated enough,” Dulles murmured.
The road narrowed to a track, and as the Jeeps negotiated a long, slow bend, Ava saw Zakat College gradually emerge. “There it is,” she said.
The lead Jeep stopped in front of the closed gate. Two security guards left a booth and walked tentatively towards it. Both of them were young and wore badly-fitting uniforms. They were obviously local, and they looked uncomfortable when Captain Reyes stepped out of the car and strode over to confront them. “Open the gate,” he shouted.
The guards looked at each other, nodded, and then opened it. The others exited the vehicles and the captain led them past the gate towards the main door. It was opened by another security guard. He blinked when he saw the captain and quickly stepped aside.
“I know all these men,” Reyes said. “I’m glad they have jobs, but they’re hardly quali
fied to be security guards.”
They walked into a large circular foyer. Straight ahead, two double doors lay open, and beyond them Ava saw a plainly decorated room with an empty elevated platform at its centre. She could imagine Imam Tariq al-Bashir sitting cross-legged on it while he preached. There were students sitting on the floor around the platform with books in their hands that she assumed were Korans. Several heads turned in her direction but then just as quickly returned to their books. Were they expecting us? she wondered.
She remembered from Ben and Alcem’s description that the imam’s room was in the wing to their left. “I think we should be looking over there,” she said, and headed in that direction, the others quickly trailing behind her.
She reached a long corridor that was lined with closed doors. “This is where the imam and his staff lived. If the doors are locked, can we break through them?” she asked.
“Nothing we’re doing here is precisely legal,” the captain said. “I don’t care what you do.”
Dulles walked with her to the first door on the right. He turned the handle and they entered a room that had a single bed, a closet, a small dresser, and a wooden desk and chair. Ava opened the dresser while Dulles looked in the desk. They found nothing. The closet was just as bare.
With Wahab and the captain watching, Ava and Dulles went back and forth along the corridor and into three more rooms. Each was as sparsely furnished and had no indication of ever being occupied. Near the middle of the corridor they entered what seemed to be a communal bathroom. It smelled of bleach. “This has been scrubbed down,” Dulles said.
Next to the bathroom was a kitchen with a double sink, cupboards, a stove, a microwave, a fridge, and a long dining table with eight chairs. The fridge was empty and had been cleaned. The sink and counters were spotless. The cupboards had also been emptied. Dulles walked to a door leading to a room next to the kitchen and opened it.
“The recreation room,” Ava said, looking over his shoulder. She saw a sofa, easy chairs, a television, and a computer work station without a computer.
“They’ve taken just about everything,” Wahab said.
“At least everything that would help us identify them,” Dulles said.
At the end of the corridor they encountered a locked room. Ava looked questioningly at the captain. He nodded, stepped forward, and with three kicks forced it open. It was a larger bedroom than the others. It had the same kind of bed and dresser but its own sofa, easy chair, television, and work station — again with no computer. Ava opened a closed door off to one side into a small bathroom that reeked of bleach.
Back in the corridor, all that was left to open was a rear door that appeared to lead outside the building. Ava opened it, expecting to see open space. Instead she saw what looked like a garage that was big enough to hold about eight cars. Ava couldn’t remember seeing it when they had driven by a few days before. The space was empty except for a line of metal bins set on the ground against the far wall, and rows of racks above the bins that she guessed were used for hanging tools, or maybe guns.
“They could have loaded their cars and the van in here, and no one would have seen them or heard them,” Dulles said.
They walked to the bins and opened them. One contained bulletproof vests, another was full of shell casings, and two had rolls of wire that Wahab said was used for detonating bombs.
The garage had a dirt floor, and there were tire marks that led to and from a set of tall double doors. As Ava walked towards the garage doors, she saw some marks that didn’t look like they had been left by a car or a van. “They had a tractor or some piece of heavy equipment in here,” she said.
“Where is it now?” Wahab said.
Dulles opened the garage doors and they stepped outside. The change in the light almost blinded them, as the sun was hovering just above the horizon.
“There’s the machine,” Wahab said, pointing to the left. It was parked about twenty metres from them, its bright orange paint shimmering in the sun.
“That’s not a tractor, it’s an earthmover,” Captain Reyes said. He walked around the vehicle, inspecting it.
“What do you expect to find?” Ava asked.
“Nothing. I’m just wondering why this machine is here.”
Ava looked towards the back of the property, where stands of trees encircled a bare patch of land. “If they’ve been doing any digging, they were probably doing it over there,” she said.
She began to walk towards the area and the others joined her. The grounds were surrounded by a fence that was about three metres high and, like the fence at the front entrance, topped by razor wire. Inside the fenceline were rows of trees that had broad leaves and branches that extended up and away from the trunk like the sticks of a hand-held fan. Ava imagined that anyone standing outside the fence wouldn’t be able to see in. The growth was so thick that she guessed the trees would also muffle sound.
“What kind of trees are those?” she asked.
“Traveller’s palms,” Wahab said.
It took them a few minutes to reach the back of the property, and by that time the sun was on the horizon.
“Someone has been digging here,” Captain Reyes said, kicking at some loose golden brown soil with the tip of his shoe.
“We were told they tested bombs and gave lessons on how to use weapons back here,” Ava said. “Those trees would have hidden them and reduced the noise.”
“This is where they might have deposited the bomb fragments, shells, and other debris,” Dulles said.
The captain kicked at the soil again, then took a few steps towards the middle of the patch of ground and did the same. “There’s nothing readily visible. We could do a bit of digging but it’s going to be dark soon, and with no moon tonight, it will be pitch black back here. I’ve got some flashlights and shovels in our Jeeps. What do you think, should I get them?”
“We’re here now, so you might as well,” Dulles said.
“I’ll go with you,” Wahab said.
The captain and Wahab left, leaving Ava and Dulles staring blankly at the ground. “I was hoping we’d find something,” he said.
“I know,” she said, sharing his disappointment.
His phone rang. In the silent open space the ring was almost deafening. Dulles answered, listened for several minutes, and then began to smile. “Call me the moment you’ve finished your first round with him,” he said.
“What was that about?” Ava asked.
“It was Delvano. They’ve got Fileeb al-Touma, a.k.a. Obeidat.”
She drew a deep breath. “Thank god we’ve finally caught a break.”
“They caught him at the Beirut airport. He was trying to catch a flight to Paris using another set of false documents, but Lebanese security had alerted the airport police and Immigration.”
“Where is he now?”
“He’s still at the airport. He’ll be transferred to a security detail in a few hours, and then Delvano can have a go at him.”
“That’s fantastic.”
“Well, it’s a start.”
Ava heard the sound of a car and looked towards the building. One of the Jeeps turned the corner by the garage and started towards them. A moment later, Wahab and the captain climbed out. Reyes took two shovels from the back seat.
“We’ll have light for a bit longer, but I’ve got flashlights if we need them, and I figured we could use the Jeep’s headlights as well,” Reyes said.
“I’ll take one of those,” Dulles said, holding out his hand for a shovel.
He and Reyes walked to the middle of the patch of bare ground. They turned their backs to each other and started to dig in opposite directions. The soil was loose and came away easily. They dug for several minutes, going down about a foot and gradually moving farther away from each other. The captain was the first to stop. “I’ve found what looks li
ke a shell casing,” he said, bending over to retrieve it and then placing it to one side.
Then Dulles found a casing, and he put it next to the captain’s. Soon there was a small pile of them, and pieces of what looked like shrapnel. They continued digging, moving towards the outer edges of the patch. Both men were sweating, their shirts wet across their backs and at the armpits. Ava figured they had ten to fifteen minutes of daylight left.
The soil was denser the closer they got to the outer edges, and it took more effort to drive the shovels into the ground. They unearthed more shell casings and metal fragments.
Then suddenly Dulles stopped. He stood still for a few seconds before slowly reaching down. He pulled out something black; from the distance Ava thought it was a strip of leather. Dulles brushed dirt from it and said something to the captain, and the two of them walked over to where Ava and Wahab were standing.
As he drew near, Ava saw that he had a wallet in his hand. When the four of them were together, Dulles handed the wallet to Captain Reyes. He opened it and took out what looked like a driver’s licence.
“This seems to belong to Boutros Hadad, age twenty-two, from Birmingham in the U.K.,” he said.
( 36 )
No one spoke. Ava didn’t want to guess what the others were thinking. Her own imagination had taken her to a dark conclusion that she didn’t want to voice.
Wahab was the first to speak. “Maybe the wallet fell out of his pocket during one of their exercises,” he said.
“I guess that’s possible,” Reyes said hesitantly.
“We have to do more digging,” Dulles said to the captain. “Are you okay with that?”
Reyes nodded. “Yes, but not with these shovels. Let’s see if we can get that earthmover started.”
They all got into the Jeep and drove back to the college in an uncomfortable silence. Reyes didn’t find a key in the earthmover, and a quick search of the garage and al-Bashir’s room failed to locate it. “One of the officers who drove us here can jump-start anything,” Reyes said. “I’ll get him.”
The last vestige of the day’s sun was peering over the horizon. When Reyes returned a few minutes later with the officer, they were in darkness. Reyes and Wahab turned on the flashlights and illuminated the earthmover’s doorless cab. The officer climbed in and motioned for them to come closer as he lay on the floor. He unscrewed a plate below the steering wheel, spent about a minute checking wires, undid two from their connections, and then tied them together. He put his hand on the wheel and pulled himself up onto the driver’s seat.