by Tom Turner
“So, you’re saying he was going to sell it to some rich South American?” Crawford said, thinking maybe Jabbah Al-Jabbah’s theory had some merit after all.
Johnson was nodding. “Specifically, some drug lord down there,” he said. “You know, the Colombian equivalent of El Chapo or somebody.”
“So is that what happened?”
“No. Way I heard it, Amir started thinking about it and figured he’d be in deep shit if he ever pissed off his uncle,” Johnson said. “You know, kill the golden goose. Plus, his uncle is, s’posedly, a dude you really, really do not want to go sideways on.”
“Why do you say that?” Crawford asked. “What’s the word on him?”
“I never met the dude,” Johnson said. “But story is just don’t fuck with Uncle Jabbo.”
Which was Crawford’s sense, too. “So Amir killed the idea of stealing one of his uncle’s cars, then what happened?”
Johnson noisily slurped the rest of his root beer, then looked up. “Well, this is just Mengele coming up with theories, right?”
“Yeah, go on.”
Johnson had ketchup on his lower lip and root-beer foam on his upper. He was hard to look at but Crawford forced himself to anyway.
“So Lonnie gets into the uncle’s garage ‘cause Amir told him how, then he just waits around ‘til Amir shows up—”
“Yeah?”
“Then he pops Amir and steals the Ferrari.”
“But why’d he pop Amir?” Crawford asked.
“’Cause he figured if Amir’s alive, you guys might put the pressure on him. You know, do what you do, stick him in a little room, act like you’re his buddy, get him a Coke, then get him to spill his guts.”
Crawford had to hand it to Johnson—that was pretty much the drill.
Mengele shrugged. “If Amir’s not around, there’s no way to finger Lonnie. Simple as that.”
“Know where I can find Lonnie?”
“Like I said, he manages a body shop over in Lake Worth,” Mengele said. “On Route 1 just before you get to 10th Street. Right side.”
Crawford nodded and thanked Mengele.
It was a theory, and it certainly could have happened that way, but he wasn’t yet sold.
Ott was clearly excited when he saw Crawford come into the bullpen area and walk toward his office.
“Charlie—” he said, waving Crawford over.
Crawford stopped and walked into Ott’s cubicle. “Got something, bro?”
“Bet your ass I do,” Ott said. “Sit down and listen up.”
Apparently, Ott had spent the morning logging onto some obscure web sites only he seemed to know about. Crawford knew this because he’d had trouble in the past getting Ott to divulge their names. Almost like they were his own personal snitches. Looking at his notes every so often, Ott told Crawford what he had found out about Jabbah Al-Jabbah. To start with, Jabbah was fifty-eight years old and was born in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
“Know who else was born in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, and would have been fifty-eight years old today?” Ott asked.
Crawford shrugged.
“Here’s your clue,” Ott said. “He’d be fifty-eight if he wasn’t killed five years ago.”
Crawford thought for a second. “Bin Laden?”
Ott smiled, nodded and kept going. Turned out that Bin Laden’s family had close business and social ties to Al-Jabbah’s family and they both went to the same elite secular equivalent of high school. Bin Laden from 1968 to 1976 and Al-Jabbah from 1970 to 1976.
Then, Ott said, they went their separate ways and there was no trace of any communication or contact between the two until 1997. At that point, the CIA discovered that Al-Jabbah—living in Florida—sent a $20,000 check to Mullah Mohammad Omar, allegedly in support of a madrassah associated with him.
Crawford asked him what a madrassah was and Ott explained that it was a school where boys and young men got Muslim religious training.
Mullah Omar was an ally of Bin Laden, and it was suspected, though never proven, that the money from Al-Jabbah helped finance the bombing of U.S. embassies in two East African cities, Dar es Salaam and Nairobi. Additionally, it was thought that some of that money might have gone toward the intended sinking of a U.S. destroyer in Yemen by an explosive-filled skiff that rammed into it.
Ott delivered the information matter-of-factly but authoritatively.
“Good job, man,” Crawford said, when Ott was done. “You did that like some C.I.A. black-op bad-ass delivering a briefing.”
“Why, thanks, Charlie,” Ott said. “But I got a lot more digging to do.”
“I’d say it’s time we have another conversation with Al-Jabbah,” Crawford said.
“And while we’re at it, have one with his ex-wife too,” Ott said.
Crawford cocked his head. “Didn’t know about her,” he said.
“Yeah, lives in a big condo on the ocean.”
“Got a number?”
Ott nodded and gave him Fadiyah Al-Jabbah’s number. Then Crawford told him about what Mengele Johnson had told him about Al-Jabbah: how he was a man even a sinister neo-Nazi didn’t want to fuck with. After that, he proceeded to fill in Ott on what Algernon Poole had told him about the man in the double-breasted blue blazer, whose name, depending on who you listened to was either Bob or John.
At the end of Crawford’s monologue, Ott put his feet up on his desk and leaned back. “Well, old buddy, I’d say we have two serious persons of interest.”
Twenty-Three
Bill was considered the best waiter at Marbella in Boca Raton. By far. He was forty-one, tall—six-three or so—and had wavy hair that women always complimented him on. He was also entirely reliable—his boss could never remember him taking a sick day—and Bill made the dinner specials at Marbella sound like they were going to be the best meals you’d ever eat. He had an actor’s cadence in his delivery and diners hung on his every perfectly-articulated word. Bill also had the stamina of an iron-man competitor and routinely did lunch and dinner shifts on his feet from twelve noon until ten o’clock at night, with a little breather in between from two thirty to four. During that time, he read books. Tom Wolfe and J.D. Salinger seemed to be two of his favorites.
The manager of Marbella, Don Clingerman, was a huge fan of Bill’s because there was no doubt in his mind that he contributed directly to the restaurant’s bottom line. Clingerman knew that because when patrons called up to make lunch or dinner reservations they would often ask to be seated at a table where Bill was the waiter. That was particularly true of single women and especially older ones. Clingerman had, in fact, heard it through the grapevine that Bill had been seen out on dates with certain older single women patrons. A movie here, an out-of-town restaurant there. But Bill appeared to be very discreet and his actions on the side never got in the way of his being a wait-staff rock star.
Unlike what Clingerman suspected—that Bill was having sex with some of the older women patrons—Bill had, in fact, a strict no-sex policy. Or maybe it was that he just didn’t have much of a libido. In any case, he was—to use an old-fashioned phrase—strictly a “walker.” Meaning he took money from them for essentially being an escort. And he also never crossed the line and went out with married women. In addition to non-sexual gigolo duty, Bill had a quite active social life, but one that he wasn’t keen on people knowing about.
Another iron-clad rule Bill had was never to talk about himself. To the contrary, he prided himself on being an accomplished listener. He had a standard line: ‘I know all about myself, and it’s a pretty dull story, so tell me about you.’ And whoever it was that he was with would be off and running.
One time, though, he violated that rule. Normally, he was a moderate drinker—two drinks, then he’d switch over to water. But a year and a half ago he had made an exception. And lived to regret it.
It was his fortieth birthday and he felt like whooping it up a little. What the hell, he figured, he was somewhere around the halfway mark in life
and might as well celebrate it. He had ordered a bottle of champagne and not just any champagne, but Dom Perignon 1990. He paid dearly for it, too, even though he got a discount because he was, after all, Bill-the-best-waiter-in-Boca-Raton. The bubbly got him talking and damned if he and his date for the night, Maureen—whose last name he had long since forgotten—didn’t end up having two bottles.
They were talking about where each of them was originally from, since native-born Floridians were something of a rarity.
“So when you say ‘up north,’” Maureen said, “that’s a big area; where specifically?”
“A little town in New Hampshire you’ve never heard of.”
Maureen perked up. “I went to summer camp in New Hampshire—where?”
“Place called Jaffrey, more cows than people.”
He actually had grown up in Bennington, Vermont.
“I’ve heard of it, southern part of the state, right?”
Bill smiled, nodded then finished off what was left in his champagne glass.
They were at a place called Oscars in West Palm Beach, twenty-five miles up the road from Boca Raton. Bill had silently critiqued their waiter and found him wanting in several categories: One, he brought them Perrier when Bill asked specifically for Pellegrino. Two, he stacked their plates when he cleared the table. And three, the most egregious sin, he referred to notes when telling them what the specials were. That was so bush league.
They were off in a corner, just dark enough for Bill’s liking, and it had gotten late—there were just two tables of diners left.
“So keep going,” Maureen said, “tell me what it was like growing up in quaint little Jaffrey?”
“Boring and way too much snow,” Bill said. “I couldn’t wait to get out of there.”
“So you went through high school there?” Maureen asked.
“No, actually, I went away to school,” he said, almost apologetically, “a boarding school.”
“Oh,” Maureen said, clearly more than a little surprised, “a rich kid.”
Bill chuckled. “Well, for a while anyway.”
“What do you mean?” Maureen asked, taking a dainty sip of her Dom.
“What happened was, my parents took me out after my junior year,” Bill said, refilling his glass. “My father had…what you would call, a business reversal or two.”
“I’m sorry to hear that,” Maureen said, then another dainty sip.
“Yeah, well, it happens,” Bill refilled Maureen’s glass.
“What was the name of the school?” Maureen asked.
“It was called St. Paul’s, up in Kan-kud.”
“Kan-kud?”
“That’s how New Hampshire people pronounce it,” Bill said. “It’s actually Concord, capital of the Granite State, in fact.”
He really had gone to a boarding school, but one called Choate.
Then Maureen asked him a few more questions and Bill told her about his father’s furniture manufacturing company going under because China came along and started making stuff for half of what United States companies could make it for. He told her about going back to high school in Jaffrey and not really fitting in. How there was no money to send Bill and his sister to the kind of colleges they were expecting to go to. About going to Rindge Community College and flunking out because all he did was sit around and drink Schlitz beer all day long.
Substitute Bennington for Jaffrey and Community College of Vermont in Montpelier for Rindge CC and it was all true.
What he didn’t tell her, and never would tell anyone, even if he had five more bottles of Dom ’90, was about the incident. The thing that had happened in 1985 that caused him to hastily pack up his Plymouth Valiant in the middle of the night and simply drive, with no destination in mind. The thing that had gotten him to change his name and never speak to his parents or sister again.
He realized he didn’t have much more to say to Maureen, nor she to him. He figured it was about time to pack it in, get his $200 from her and give her a quick, passionless good-night kiss.
“Well, looks like they’re about to give us the ol’ last-call-for-alcohol,” he said. “By the way, I love that dress.”
Bill was also an all-star flatterer.
Maureen looked down at the flowery number she had on. “Oh, thanks,” she said. “It’s a Lilly.”
“I figured,” said Bill.
She must have felt that she should return the compliment. “Last time you wore that same jacket. I have to say, Bill, there’s nothing more sexy than a man in a double-breasted blue blazer.”
Twenty-Four
Crawford called Jabbah Al-Jabbah and asked to meet with him later in the day. Al-Jabbah was irritated and asked what hadn’t they covered in their first two meetings. Crawford said he just needed a clarification or two and Al-Jabbah said, “Well, ask me right now and I’ll clarify.” Crawford said he preferred his interviews be in person and, after a long dramatic sigh, Al-Jabbah said he had a golf game that afternoon but would meet him—briefly—after that. They agreed to meet at the Royal & Alien at five.
In the meantime, Ott would dig around some more and see what else he could find out about Al-Jabbah.
At 4:40, Crawford swung by Ott’s cubicle. Ott was on his computer and his printer seemed to be spewing out page after page, based on its overflowing tray.
Ott was so tuned in to what he was reading on his computer that he didn’t hear Crawford approach.
“Got something good there, fat boy?” Crawford asked.
“You wouldn’t believe this shit,” Ott said, not looking up. “How ‘bout a tie-in between Jabbah Al-Jabbah and one of the 9/11 guys.”
“You’re kidding,” Crawford said, hunching down to read what was on Ott’s screen.
“Be easier if I just summarize it for you,” Ott said, grabbing the pages out of his printer tray.
When Jabbah Al-Jabbah first moved to America, Ott explained, he had ended up in Sarasota, Florida, after having been a principal in a firm in the United Arab Emirates that helped multinational companies establish businesses in the Middle East. He also was a cousin of Khalid A. Nasser, CEO of Aramco, the trillion-dollar Saudi Arabian oil company. Al-Jabbah’s next door neighbors in Phoenicia, a prestigious gated-community in Sarasota, was the Ghazani family. Two days before 9/11, the Ghazani family—all nine members—suddenly disappeared from their house in the middle of the night. They left half their possessions there and never returned. Six weeks after 9/11, based on a tip that twenty-one-year-old Abdul Ghazani was taking flying lessons at Huffman Aviation in Venice, where several of the 9/11 pilots had learned to fly, FBI agents stepped in and investigated.
What they found, on the Phoenicia’s digital automobile scan system, were at least two license plates registered to Mohammad Atta and Ziad Jarrah, two 9/11 terrorists. The two had, allegedly, visited the Ghazani house several times in the month leading up to the attacks. Atta had piloted one of the planes that flew into the World Trade Center and Jarrah had crashed landed near Shanksville, Pennsylvania. The men had purportedly identified themselves to Phoenicia security guards by their real names when they first drove in.
“You’re gonna ask if I found any definitive connection between the 9/11 guys and Al-Jabbah. Well, the answer is no, but, I mean, it’s way too coincidental that two families from Saudi Arabia just happen to end up next-door neighbors.”
Crawford nodded. “Yeah, and Atta and Jarrah spent time at the neighbor’s house,” he said. “It would be nice if we could come up with a direct link between Al-Jabbah and them. I mean, like Al-Jabbah paying for their flying lessons or something.”
“Yeah, but if the FBI didn’t, I wouldn’t be real optimistic we’re gonna,” Ott said, putting the pages down on his desk.
“Which brings up another point,” Crawford said. “We’ve got to assume that Al-Jabbah is on the FBI watch list because of this and the Mullah Omar and Bin Laden connection.”
“I know,” said Ott. “And with all their resources, they m
ust either think he’s clean or they don’t have enough on him.”
Crawford looked at his watch. “Well, we’re gonna be face-to-face with the man in fifteen minutes,” he said. “Guess we’ll see what he’s got to say.”
Crawford finally figured out who Jabbah Al-Jabbah reminded him of. A guy who he’d seen on ESPN playing Texas Hold ‘em on the cable TV show, “World Series of Poker.” The guy was Chinese or Korean and Crawford couldn’t remember his name, but for a solid hour, or however long the show lasted, his expression never changed. Impassive was the word for it. Whether he had just made or lost two-hundred thousand on a hand, his expression always stayed the same. It turned into a joke, the other players trying to make him smile or frown…something…anything. But his expression never changed. Then, about a year later, Crawford tuned into another poker show and there he was again. Long hair and a wispy mustache now, but the same flat expression.
Crawford and Al-Jabbah were sitting in the same room and in the same chairs at the Royal & Alien as they had been in last time. Except now it was a triangle, with Ott facing both Al-Jabbah and Crawford. On the ride over Crawford and Ott had agreed to initially go back to the premise that Amir Al-Jabbah had been shot during the commission of a car robbery in Al-Jabbah’s garage then see where it went from there.
“That’s exactly what I told you,” Al-Jabbah responded, “when we were in the garage right after Amir was killed.”
“I know you did,” Crawford said, “and now we have a possible suspect.”
“Who?” Al-Jabbah asked.
“A man named Lonnie Bates,” Crawford said, looking closely to see if Al-Jabbah reacted to the name.
Just like the veteran poker player, he didn’t.
“Who is he?” Al-Jabbah asked.
Crawford glanced away, then his eyes came back to Al-Jabbah. “You remember last time I told you about a group called Rockwell Forever that Amir was a member of?”