Counterplay

by Robert K. Tanenbaum

  The tall Russian picked up a sheet of paper from the desk and handed it to Karp, who gave it to Marlene. It was a fuzzy photograph of a young, dark-haired woman walking down a sidewalk, looking back over her shoulder. Marlene noted the large mole on her cheek.

  “That is the only known photograph of Azzam, whose real name is Nathalie Habibi. It was taken accidentally in 1999 by a tourist as Azzam walked away from an Israeli shopping mall. Moments later, a suicide bomber blew himself up inside the mall, killing thirteen people, including a new mother with an infant. As you may already know, she was also behind the seizing of hostages at a musical theater in Moscow that ended with more than one hundred deaths, as well as the slaughter of more than three hundred innocent people, mostly children, at a school in Beslan. In both instances, the theater and the school, nearly all the terrorists were killed along with their victims, but Azzam always walked away unscathed and undetected by authorities even though the scenes were cordoned off.”

  Marlene frowned. “You’re saying the Russian government allowed her to escape to fight again another day. And that means they’re allowing terrorists to murder their own people.”

  “Exactly,” Yvgeny said, “though it should come as no surprise. We Russians have always been good at killing our own people. Stalin killed millions more than Hitler ever dreamed of.”

  “But all those children,” Marlene said.

  Yvgeny nodded sadly. “Yes, I know. It is a cold thing to contemplate. But you also have to understand that after all this time, Western journalists were beginning to actually look into complaints by the main nationalist party about Russian atrocities, including the bombardment of noncombatant towns and cities, and examples of ethnic cleansing—sometimes the population of entire villages wiped out—by the OSNAZ. The press was beginning to lend a sympathetic ear to the cries for independence and human rights abuses. A few brave journalists were even writing stories about the corruption and organized crime that dominates the Chechen puppet government. But then Beslan happened and good-bye sympathetic press. Despite denials by the main body of Chechen nationalists that they were involved at all, the Russian government went to great lengths to link Chechen nationalism to Islamic extremism for the massacre; for all intents and purposes, they were one and the same. Of course, any mention of a connection to Islamic terrorists to the Western press sets off their alarm bells. The Chechen nationalists went from being called freedom fighters to Islamic terrorists, thugs, and murderers.”

  “Which brings us to why Azzam is in the United States helping Kane,” Karp said.

  “Yes, my impatient cousin, forgive the lengthy discourse,” Yvgeny said. “As effective as Beslan was at discrediting the nationalist movement, it wasn’t enough. It was too far away and would be soon forgotten in the United States. They needed something here, something so horrific and international that any sympathy for an independent Chechnya would evaporate forever.”

  “So what do you think they are going to do?” Karp asked.

  Yvgeny paused and looked at the fire. “We are concerned that it has something to do with the Russian president’s speech to the United Nations in September. He is supposed to talk about the situation in Chechnya and the continued Russian presence there.”

  “But I thought you said the Russian government was in on this,” Marlene said. “Are they willing to assassinate Putin, not to mention blowing up the United Nations?”

  Yvgeny shrugged. “In some ways it does not make sense. You’ll remember that Putin is an ex-colonel in the KGB, the secret police that is now the Federal Security Service, which runs OSNAZ. It was our feeling at first glance that this conspiracy against the Chechen nationalists might go to the very top of Russian government and that he might be involved. After all, a leopard does not change its spots and this leopard was under pressure to withdraw from Chechnya both at home and abroad.

  “It is no secret that the Russian people’s support for the war in Chechnya was waning; mothers were tired of their sons coming home in body bags. After Beslan public opinion in support of the war soared, as did Putin’s approval rating for his promises to root out terrorism, which by the way was met with great enthusiasm at the White House and Ten Downing Street. There has been a lot of discussion on the internet as to whether the terror bombings in Moscow and the massacre at Beslan were actually tailor-made for our president and his government.”

  “So we’re barking up the wrong tree on that one?” Karp asked.

  “Barking up trees?”

  “An expression meaning ‘concentrating on the wrong possibility,’ ” Marlene said. “In other words, Putin wouldn’t be a target.”

  “Ah, thank you for the explanation, but no, not necessarily,” Yvgeny said. “Assassination is a time-honored tradition in Russia, especially among its secret police agencies going back to the tsars. There are plenty of powerful people in Russia who would not shed any tears over the death of Vladimir Putin—some find him too weak, some find him too strong…sort of like your fairy tale of Goldie and the Three Bears. It would certainly mean all-out war in Chechnya, perhaps the use of nuclear weapons, to destroy the nationalist movement and complete the permanent absorption of Chechnya into the Russian federation. There would be no one left who opposed it. His death would serve that purpose.”

  “But if Azzam and al Qaeda have this working agreement with the Russian government,” Marlene said, “that means the Russians were involved with the escape plot too…and the murder of those children and police officers.”

  Yvgeny hung his head. “I am ashamed to say it, but yes, I think it is possible.”

  “I still don’t understand what this has to do with Kane,” said Karp, who was wishing he had not had the last cognac. “Maybe it’s the liquor, but I seem to be the only one who doesn’t get where he comes in.”

  Yvgeny smiled. “No, cousin, the liquor I’m sure has us all well grease—”

  “Lubricated—” Karp said.

  “Well lubricated, then. But we are all in the dark on that question. It may be that Azzam and al Qaeda need his connections with the New York Police Department, which provides security for big events at the UN. He also had a lot of nefarious dealings with some of these rogue governments, so who knows which ones might be willing to listen to him and his schemes. But it could be as simple as his banking connections, too. Something big like this will cost a lot of money, preferably untraceable cash, and it’s a lot harder to move cash around without getting noticed than it was before 9/11.” He laughed. “I can tell you that from personal experience…. We have little to go on at this moment…just rumors being passed to us by associates in Moscow and in Chechnya…but an attack on Putin, real or not, makes sense. Azzam was sent to Chechnya to help destroy the nationalist movement—our spies know that much—and this would be the coup de grâce for that mission.”

  “So what does that leave us with?” Marlene asked.

  No one answered right away. Instead, everyone was tuned in to their thoughts and the crackling of the burning logs.

  Inside one of the logs, boiling sap built up pressure until the wood exploded with a shower of sparks and a sound like a gunshot. The hosts and their visitors all jumped, then laughed in embarrassment at their discomfiture.

  “What does that leave us with, my dear Marlene?” Vladimir Karchovski chuckled. “Why, the most Russian of all stories…a dark mystery full of intrigue and danger. I bet if you look outside that window, the snow will be falling in the moonlight and somewhere in the distance wolves will be howling.”

  Marlene shivered at the thought. “Can I have another cognac, please?”

  11

  May

  SOMEBODY WAS TALKING ABOUT THE WAR IN IRAQ. WHETHER establishing a democracy was worth the deaths of two thousand American soldiers.

  “Terrorists need sympathetic governments…they need access to banks, a place where they can recruit, train and operate freely…”

  “There’s no proof Saddam had any connection to terrorists, any mor
e than he had WMD…”

  “He allowed al-Zarqawi, who had an international warrant out for his arrest in connection with 9/11, to be treated in a hospital in Baghdad after he was wounded in Afghanistan, and then continue to operate in Iraq. He should have been turned over to the World Court for trial…”

  “So all these deaths because one terrorist wasn’t apprehended?”

  “How about over twenty-seven hundred deaths in the World Trade Center…and how many the next time? We had to fight these guys somewhere, might as well be Iraq…”

  Karp hardly followed the conversation; his mind was elsewhere. It was seven o’clock, Monday morning. One hour before his weekly meeting, but first he’d wanted to meet with his “inner council,” those he trusted most in his office, to update them on Fey’s murder and what little there was on efforts to recapture Kane. The group—consisting of Murrow, Newbury, Kipman, Guma, and his wife, Marlene—were still getting settled, getting their coffees, and debating Iraq.

  Karp’s eyes strayed to the plastic bag on his desk. On the outside of the otherwise plain container was an FBI evidence label marked Timothy Fey, 04/26/05, Encinitas, CA and some other coded case number. Inside was what appeared to be an ordinary set of dark amber-colored rosary beads, though he knew that they’d been re-strung on high-tensile wire strong enough to cut off a man’s air supply. The gold pendant depicting St. Patrick’s Cathedral glinted in the early morning sun that peered over his shoulder.

  He’d seen similar rosaries—even had two locked away in the evidence vault. They’d been labeled in a similar fashion, just the New York DAO’s version with the victims’ names, that of two young boys, and the date they’d been found. Only the location was different; the other rosaries had come from Central Park graves.

  The two rosaries in the DAO vault had been the calling card of the child killer priest Hans Lichner, who’d tossed them in the shallow graves of his victims. It was how they’d eventually tied together the apparently unrelated rape and murder of Indian boys in Taos, New Mexico, to Andrew Kane and his schemes in New York City.

  Karp smiled grimly recalling an argument he’d had with his daughter, Lucy, over Lichner’s intent. He’d called Lucy after Fey’s murder to warn her that the stakes had gone up and to ask her to reconsider having federal agents with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security watching out for her.

  Lucy’s reply had been half-angry and half-frightened. Oh puleeze, like you didn’t know there’s been a couple of square-jawed fed types hanging around here for a week, trying to play tourist—very stiff tourists—who just happen to turn up wherever I go with Ned. One even showed up at the cabin where Ned stays in on the ranch, pretending to be lost when it was obvious he just wanted to get a look around. Some others have been following John Jojola around, too, but he’s been making a game out of ditching them.

  Still, Lucy hesitated. But I guess if they can stay at a distance, I’ll have to accept it. I’d hate to have something happen to Ned because Kane was after me.

  It’s just until we catch him, Karp had replied. It had been some time since they’d had a good father-daughter conversation, so he’d happily stayed on the telephone when the conversation turned to philosophy as it applied to Hans Lichner and the rosary beads. His daughter, who liked to believe that within every human being there was some goodness, some spark of the divine that binds us all to a loving and forgiving God, argued that it was that spark that caused Lichner to expose himself. Maybe, he wanted to get caught. Maybe that spark worked subconsciously to try to stop the demon in him from hurting any more children; maybe, it even acted in Lichner to lead you to uncover the real Andrew Kane.

  Why in such an oblique way? Karp had replied leaning back in his chair and putting his size fourteens up on the desk. Why not just write it out? Why take a chance that your dim old dad wouldn’t be able to decipher the message? He enjoyed verbally sparring with his insightful daughter; she could hold her own in any debate, even if he found her reliance on the existence of angels and demons to explain human behavior long on emotion but short on facts.

  Maybe the demon wouldn’t let him, she’d replied slowly. Maybe he had to sort of “sneak” it out.

  Secrets from the devil? I didn’t think that was possible, Karp had teased and been rewarded with a Bronx cheer over the phone. Um…I don’t think your rebuttal would hold up in court.

  Well, you can just keep those blinders on, buddy, and refuse to see that there’s more to the rather unusual series of events that have followed this family like a plague of locusts than mere chance, Lucy scolded. Hell, call us the Koincidence—spelled with a K—Karps. Or accept that we’ve been selected to play a large, uncomfortable, and maybe even fatal role in a bigger plan that is unfolding all around us.

  I see, “All the world’s a stage…And all the men and women merely players,” Karp said.

  Yes, that’s sort of it. “They have their exits and their entrances; And one man in his time plays many parts,” Lucy said, shooting the Shakespeare right back at him.

  Perhaps, Karp laughed. But I believe that for the most part—with some weight given to behavior caused by nature or nurture—a man chooses the parts he plays. It’s the basis of the legal system’s insanity rulings. People choose to do good things, and other people, at least those who are not legally insane, CHOOSE to do bad things. I don’t discount at all the existence of God, some sort of creative, even moral force in the universe. Nor do I discount the truth that “Bad things happen to good people” for no explicable reason, and we can call that evil, if you like—the sort of evil that tortured and killed my mother with cancer. But I think the vast majority of evil in this world is committed by people who think it’s okay to hurt other people. The worst of them we call sociopaths, men like Andrew Kane, who certainly recognize that there is a difference between right and wrong; they just choose to ignore it for their own gratification, whether it’s rape, murder, or all of the above. Kane chose the role he is playing, which makes him guilty, not insane.

  In a limited sense, yes, Lucy replied, determined to match him monologue for monologue. But just because people choose a role for whatever reason—money, power, whatever else turns Mr. Kane on—it doesn’t necessarily mean they understand how their part will play out in the end. Judas chose to betray Jesus, but did he know that by doing so he caused the most far-reaching social and spiritual revolution ever? But let’s say you’re right…maybe there’s no demon that possessed Hans Lichner and there never was that spark inside of him. That it’s all bullshit. Maybe he chose to play the part of a monster who did that to little boys…but when he threw the rosaries into the grave, was he choosing to be the instrument for justice that brought down his master, Andrew Kane? Because that’s what happened. Or maybe there was something left of the divine in him that made him do it in order to alter the role his conscious mind, or the demon, chose?

  Or maybe it was just a part of his personality disorder, Karp countered. Maybe it just fed his ego to say, “I did what I wanted, and I want you to know it was me and not some other brute. And I’m leaving this clue because you’re too stupid and weak to catch me anyway.”…And by the way, you just contradicted yourself.

  How’s that? Lucy replied, a little testily he noticed.

  You said that this “spark of the divine” in him CHOSE to assume a different role for good, Karp said. But earlier, you were arguing that it’s all some sort of enormous play that’s already been written, that we’ve already been cast, and we’re just playing out our parts…no choice in the matter.

  No contradiction. You’re just not giving God enough credit to anticipate where free will would take us, Lucy said smugly. He works in mysterious ways, you know.

  Lucy had ended the debate with a parting shot at his “advanced age” from the As You Like It soliloquy they’d been tossing back and forth. I guess Old Bill knew what he was saying when he wrote, the “Last scene of all, That ends this strange eventful history, Is second childishness and mere oblivion. San
s teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.” Sound familiar, old man? Oops, Ned’s here, gotta go, love you, Daddy.

  Karp picked up the evidence bag containing the rosary beads. He’d handled a lot of murder weapons in his career—axes, guns, daggers, golf clubs, an oil-soaked rag that had been stuffed down a bookie’s throat suffocating him and then lit on fire…you name it, it had been used to commit homicide. But there was something about the rosary beads, perhaps the horrible irony that caused the skin on his hand to crawl as he put the bag back down.

  Jaxon had been livid when he returned from California. Only a few people were supposed to know Fey was there, he sputtered in Karp’s office. Even the warden only knew that the old man was under the Witness Protection Program. Other than that, a couple of people in my agency knew—but not Grover, who would have been the logical choice for traitor. So that leaves me with another mole and very few people I can trust.

  What about the Homeland Security guys? Karp asked. Did any of them know?

  Jaxon looked like he was going to say something and then thought better of it. I don’t really know what they know, he said. They’re worse than the CIA with the “need-to-know” stuff. I don’t even know what kind of access they have to FBI files—some of this stuff is being handled at the very top, director to director, and us low-level flunkies are not privy to those conversations…. But I’d say no simply because they didn’t get into this until after Kane’s escape and the connection to Samira Azzam was made…. And considering Grover was one of mine, it would be pretty ballsy of me to point the finger at some other agency.

  Hoping it would lift Jaxon’s spirits, Karp presented him with a copy of the photograph of Samira Azzam given to him the night before by his uncle. Apparently, the Israelis can vouch for its authenticity, he said.