Deadline Yemen

by Peggy Hanson

  Once outside the vehicle, we stayed in shadows. We were in the middle of something big. I didn’t know what, or how Halima’s brother, Ali, was involved. At least, it appeared he was not a suicide bomber about to detonate. That knowledge must be balm to Halima’s fearful heart.

  A few other vehicles—buses and trucks and SUVs—were lined up outside the Howtah walls. Drivers stood around, smoking and fahdaling, but they stayed near the lights.

  Ahmad touched my arm to say goodbye and pointed firmly to the hotel. He and Richard dropped to hands and knees and crawled toward desert brush growing nearby. We saw them no longer. Our designated role was clearly to serve by waiting. The usual female role.

  Like that was going to happen. They couldn’t have thought for one minute it would work. All their strategizing centered on the mystery mission, in any case.

  “Let’s get back in the car,” I whispered to Halima. Crouching down in the dark, we’d hardly be seen. The driver, no expression on his face, stood near the SUV, not gathering with the men clustered around the lights. He must have known the man who died at our feet in Shibam. The man named Mohammad. He must be very trusted, indeed, to be in the midst of this mission.

  Staying low in the back seat, Halima and I peered out. For a while, nothing happened, and I had the leisure to think of events in Shibam. Had I killed Larry? What had been his role in capturing Richard and Ahmad and their faithful Kamal? Had he had a role in killing my shadow, Mohammad?

  Larry. Hadn’t he been near one of the trucks parked by us earlier in the day? I’d have to get out of the SUV to check whether the truck, one filled with honey barrels, was still around. Yet such a move could be fatal. There was a growing air of danger around the oasis.

  “I have to find Ali.” Halima’s purpose never wavered.

  “Yes, of course we do.” That was my whole purpose in coming to Yemen. To help Halima find—and save—her brother.

  Only later had it changed to save not just him, but whoever he might intend to kill.

  CHAPTER 127

  From Rada’ an ancient caravan track heads eastward, skirting the Ramlat Sab’atayn. Eventually, after several camel days, it reaches the desert fort of al ’Abr, a frontier garrison in British days and a major source of fresh water from which caravan trails radiate in all directions.

  Sarah Searight, Yemen: Land and People

  “Do you have any idea why Ali isn’t with Richard and Ahmad?” I asked. We had to formulate a plan.

  “My uncle in Sa’da said the word ferengi, foreigner. That is all I know.”

  “And you’re sure he was coming to the Hadhramaut…”

  “Yes. I know he came. Relatives here saw him.”

  “…And then they lost him.” I hoped I didn’t sound dismissive of any of the al Shems.

  Ferengi reminded me about something Jason Roberts had told me at the Embassy in Sana’a—just a few days ago, though it seemed years: The U.S. Congressional delegation. Coming to the Wadi Hadhramaut. Coming undoubtedly to see historic Shibam and Seiyun. I’d forgotten all about trying to interview them!

  They would of course stay in the Howtah. A lot of people stayed here, close to the Presidential palace in Seiyun. I’d seen ministers and sheikhs and guards at breakfast. And all well-heeled foreigners stayed in this oasis.

  I suddenly understood. The American officials would arrive here after dining with the President at his palace. They must be due tonight. Thus the sense of urgency and the deadline.

  I hoped Richard and Ahmad were trying to save rather than kill them. “The American delegation arrives tonight. Somebody must be plotting to kill them.” The words escaped my mouth before I realized I’d said them.

  “Not Ali!” Halima’s protest caused the driver to look our way.

  “No, no, Halima. I am sure Ali is not doing that. And Richard and Ahmad are trying to stop an attack. They must be. Ali must be helping them.”

  If this wasn’t true, a divine providence would forgive me the lie.

  CHAPTER 128

  “Let us be honest; most of us rather like our cats to have a streak of wickedness.”

  Beverly Nichols, The Quotable Cat

  A car drove up and discharged someone in front of the Howtah. A woman with an imperious manner. In a flowing caftan.

  Alex Metzger! She swirled into the hotel, leaving a stir among the drivers outside the gates.

  What on earth was Alex doing here? I poked Halima. She shrugged her shoulders.

  The drivers in the car park, including ours, now, played a game of backgammon under the main light at the big gate.

  “Perhaps it’s a good time for us to move?” We had to leave our hiding place. We opened the car door quietly and slid to the ground, closing it gently behind us.

  Where to go from here? No one was on this side of the dirt parking lot, so we straightened our baltos and burqas and walked as though we were village women passing by.

  I was going to miss this handy disguise when I returned to Washington. I tripped on a stone and could barely see where to step next. Well, there were aspects of the burqa I definitely wouldn’t miss!

  We headed in the direction the men had taken. Bushes, rocks, a little moonlight from over the mesas. We hugged the mud brick wall and turned the corner. Here, it was much darker, but a small group of men stood near the wall.

  Halima and I touched each other’s trembling hands briefly before walking toward the men. A sisterly pat. Comforting. Neither of us said a word.

  As we approached the group, a couple of voices stood out. Everyone was speaking Arabic, but not all the men had the guttural sounds down pat.

  Here we go again. We’ve found them.

  But then I stopped in my tracks. Tom. Tom Reilly’s voice. Good. Our team was growing in numbers. Because Tom was with Yemeni men, I didn’t say a word. In any case, we couldn’t act out of character for women dressed in baltos.

  I slowed my steps, though, and Halima matched my pace. She must be listening for someone else. Ali, her brother. Ali, the rebel who might not be quite as rebellious as we’d thought.

  My heart pounded so hard it hurt. I could only imagine how Halima’s felt.

  CHAPTER 129

  “‘So the angels prostrated themselves before Adam—all except Iblis, who was to fall—and events took their turn until Adam was expelled from the Garden, and God began to test Man with trials, as you know.’”

  Tim Mackintosh-Smith, Yemen, Travels in Dictionary Land

  Halima and I made our way around the next corner of the wall. We were now behind the hotel. There was only a small gate here. It was locked.

  We leaned against the beautifully-formed mud brick wall, beside a straggly tamarisk tree, exhausted but wide awake. Waiting for the next shoe to drop. Time stood still. Sounds were magnified.

  The moon had risen to just over the mesas on both sides of the broad wadi, lending an aura that dimmed the stars. A faint metallic click. Was someone coming out the locked back door? The gardener, perhaps. Someone with a key.

  I pulled Halima down with me behind the lower branches of a small palm.

  The figure emerging from the door was ghostlike, in flowing garments. Alex Metzger was sneaking out of the back gate of the Howtah. She passed so close we smelled her perfume. We didn’t breathe.

  It had only been half an hour since Alex entered the hotel. Where was she going? With Richard and Ahmad lurking somewhere in the bushes, Tom Reilly consorting with a group of secretive men, Halima and me making our way along the wall, and now Alex, all we needed outside these walls was Joshua playing his trumpet.

  The moon must wonder what play was being enacted in its tenuous light.

  Alex turned and headed in the direction where we’d seen Tom and his group. I grabbed Halima’s hand and we crept along behind her.

  Rounding the corner, I took a deep breath. A vehicle was parked there. A small truck. It had not been there before.

  CHAPTER 130

  O, o my aching heart,

 
; Were I to say that I would hold my tongue, my reason would fly away.

  Traditional Yemeni poetry translated by Steven C. Caton, “Peaks of Yemen I Summon”

  The truck shone in the starlight as if it had just been washed.

  “Stop.” My whisper was in Halima’s ear.

  Had the occupants seen us? There was no sign of movement in the truck. It was loaded heavily, hanging low to the ground at the back.

  This looked similar to the vehicle I’d seen Larry and his co-hort near earlier today. But that one wasn’t clean then. And it had been parked on the other side of the hotel, not this side, near the entrance from the main road. It had been loaded with barrels of something—maybe honey, since that was the main export from the Hadhramaut these days.

  A figure appeared near the rear of the truck. A glint of moonlight briefly lit his face—a young face—as he bent, reaching under the chassis.

  Halima saw the figure, too. “Ali?” she gasped, almost inaudibly. “Oh, no. No.”

  Halima pulled away, heading toward the truck. Fast. Heedless. Reckless as one becomes when trying to rescue a person one loves very much.

  “No, Halima! Wait!” My voice echoed uselessly in the desert air.

  CHAPTER 131

  O intermediaries, your order has guided me to the right path.

  I will not give in to fear, no, nor submit to the greed of the opponent.

  Traditional Yemeni poetry translated by Steven C. Caton, “Peaks of Yemen I Summon”

  The peaceful night exploded. Gunfire. From the other side of the hotel. Bam! Bam bam! Bam bam phlooh!

  Impossible to tell what the bullets hit. Dirt wall? Hotel? Bodies?

  Answering shots came as fast as the initial volley. In concert with the bullets came a swarm of people. From left, from right, from inside the hotel walls.

  Two figures ran toward me. Ahmad. Richard. “Get down, get down! And for God’s sake, get away from that truck!”

  Moonlight glinted on metal carried by the running figures. Like everyone else, they were armed.

  From around the corner at the back of the hotel erupted a group of men.

  More shots rang out. The hordes converging on the center splayed out again. Everyone lunged toward protective bushes.

  Richard grabbed me and threw me to the ground. We fell together into a small gully.

  Headlights—a line of them—approached the hotel from the main road to Seiyun. Slowly, ponderously, the caravan came, lights wavering over the bumps. Governmental pomp. The U.S. Congressmen being escorted back to the hotel.

  Could they not see the spurts of gunfire?

  We were about fifty yards from the road. The honey truck still sat in its place.

  Ali had disappeared. Ahmad lay near me on the ground, Richard on the other side. Halima was a few feet ahead of us, lying where she had dropped when the shooting started.

  Now, she rose to head toward the truck. The last place her brother had been seen.

  “Get her!” I screamed.

  CHAPTER 132

  The hardships of time have left my heart numb.

  Where can I get another heart in this lifetime?

  Traditional Yemeni poetry translated by Steven C. Caton, “Peaks of Yemen I Summon”

  All hell broke loose behind us. A ghostly figure in a flowing caftan rose up like Medusa, screaming. “You bastard, Reilly! You killed her!” A series of shots rang out, their target was somewhere in the clump of men.

  In the moonlight, three figures toppled.

  From the direction of the group, more shots rang out, zinging into the ground just behind us. Richard, who had stood up to grasp Halima, jerked back and made a strange sound.

  He hit the ground, gun hanging limply from his hand.

  I grabbed the gun.

  Ahmad called to Halima in Arabic. “Ali is not there. Come back! Now!” As he ran in her direction, he said, “The truck will explode. Cover your ears.”

  The Congressional caravan came closer, closer. I understood the plot. The truck was a bomb. This would create an incident which could harm Yemeni-American relations, already strained by the 1991 war in Iraq, when Yemen took the side of Saddam Hussein. Islamist extremists would declare victory over the hated United States.

  It could also kill some of us on the scene. A lot of us.

  Halima continued to crawl in the direction of the truck. No time to think. No waiting for the optimal moment. Holding my breath and praying, I fired directly at the barrels in the back of the truck. Once, twice, three times the gun went off. Someone shot at me from behind.

  But my third shot hit its mark. With a gathering roar, the honey truck exploded, throwing thick, viscous material over the entire area.

  The smell was a mix of cordite and honey.

  CHAPTER 133

  “You must go,” said she. “You and I must part.”

  Jane Austen, Emma

  The explosion deafened, blinded, numbed me.

  I dripped with sweet stuff mixed with shards of glass and metal. A dreadful burning smell suffused the area—a mix of rubber, oil, petroleum, and something worse. Flesh? Ali… Terrible thought. Halima? A sharp pang penetrated the numbness.

  The world stood still for a few minutes. I lifted my head. To my right, Richard lay still. He’d been shot. Another pang.

  On my left, Ahmad stirred. Along the road, the caravan of official cars had stopped, and men ran from it shouting. The honey truck continued to burn, red-orange flames reflecting on the mud walls of the hotel, bodies strewn about, the end of all peacefulness.

  In exquisite pain, I rose to my feet, favoring my sprained ankle. “Halima? Halima!” I had to find her, learn what had happened after my rash behavior.

  “Elizabeth, I’m here.” The gentle tones contrasted sharply with the rough shouts of the soldiers and guards.

  A couple men walked to where the voice had come from, leaned over. It was the longest minute of my life.

  CHAPTER 134

  In tribal law…it is the custom for powerful sheikhs to protect fugitives who seek refuge from the wrath of their pursuers, with the understanding that they either help to negotiate a settlement between the two parties or expose themselves to the wrath of the opponent.

  Steven C. Caton, “Peaks of Yemen I Summon”

  “She’ll be all right. Just shocked.” Jason Roberts’ diplomatic voice also cut across the din as he rose from where Halima lay. He hurried over to me. My burqa had slipped off my face. “Ms. Darcy? Elizabeth? Are you okay?”

  “Yes. I am fine.” My voice sounded strange in my ears. “Please check this man. Mr. Queens. He was shot.”

  Roberts shouted for a Yemeni doctor. They’d probably been part of the Congressional delegation’s entourage. Made sense.

  My hands, checking Richard’s pulse, were gently removed, and someone helped me sit down.

  After the doctor checked for vital signs, he looked up. “He is alive. But he needs help. We must get him to hotel!” Two soldiers came with a stretcher and removed Richard, running with him in the moonlight.

  I would follow. But my first duty was clear. Jason Roberts took my arm and helped me limp over to Halima. I held her to me as tears streamed down her face. “Ali. Ali.”

  “Ali is safe.” Ahmad’s cool tones, Arabic rising out of the night, might have been uttered in a mufraj, not a scene of chaos. “He was not in the truck when it exploded.”

  “Oh, hamdililah, praise be to Allah! Ali, Ali.” Halima knelt with her head in her hands. Ahmad stood near her, protective as a male family member should be. He, too, bowed his head.

  The half moon over the mesas silvered the scene. The faint moonlight was checkered with emergency lights and beams from flashlights.

  I needed to check on Richard. I gingerly tested my ankle. It hurt, but would hold, so I ripped off the balto. Despite that precaution, I tripped over two inert bodies, one of which had a blond ponytail. I didn’t stop to check who they were. Help was at hand, if help could still be received. And gi
ven the ponytail, perhaps I wasn’t a murderer, after all. Someone else had killed or wounded Larry.

  In the back lobby of the Howtah, a makeshift operating room had been set up. Because I was a foreign woman, no one questioned my right to enter the area.

  Richard lay on a pallet, pale, and unconscious. Medics worked on his bleeding arm. The blood wasn’t spurting.

  CHAPTER 135

  He who comes intending to reproach every [wrongdoer] is welcome;

  Otherwise, he can continue on his way.

  Traditional Yemeni poetry translated by Steven C. Caton, “Peaks of Yemen I Summon”

  As I leaned over Richard, he opened his eyes and grinned. “At least I’m not tied up.”

  A wave of relief flooded me.

  “No. Maybe you should be. I don’t know how you get into so much trouble.” Tubes and needles were scattered helter-skelter in the room. Security people were everywhere.

  Several bodies lay on other pallets. Beneath the sheet covering one, a piece of red caftan drooped forlornly. I went over to the pallet, although I knew what I would find. Alex and her imperious ways had determined their own fate. She would have been glad that her face was not disfigured. The bullets had hit her chest.

  More people were brought in on stretchers by military men in fatigues. One I recognized. Tom Reilly.

  “Is he dead?” The doctor and a couple of male nurses who had materialized from somewhere—probably part of the president’s retinue—seemed in charge here.

  “Oh, yes. He’s dead.” It was not the doctor, but Ahmad who answered me, fury in his eyes.

  “Alex?”

  “Yes, Alexandra Metzger killed him. He deserved it. Good riddance.”

  So his anger was not at Tom’s killer, but at Tom.

  Ahmad continued. “That man led many young Yemenis astray. He pretended to be a Muslim. A radical Muslim, like that imam in Sa’da. He just wanted cold, hard cash. He and Petrovich were in it together. He has been playing both sides for a long time. Good riddance, I say.”