by Larry Bond
“Why not?”
The man shook his head.
“Women?” suggested Fouad. He knew, or thought he knew, the answer, but guessing it would raise too many suspicions.
“No.”
Fouad gave his best puzzled stare.
“Foreigners,” said the man finally.
“Americans?”
The man turned pale. “What would an American be doing here?”
“You said foreigners, not Jews!”
“Iraqi criminals,” whispered the man. “A smuggler, I think, with bodyguards. Not Syrians. The man paid with gold chains.”
~ * ~
R
ankin could see the civilian terminal building from a small rise on the road about a half mile from the fence. He stopped there, pretending to work on his hike as he eyed the two soldiers in front of the building. They were older men, career guys who probably viewed the posting as semiretirement.
One cupped his hands to light a cigarette. It wouldn’t be hard to take them, Rankin realized; the trick would be dealing with the other twenty guys who would come after them.
Unnecessary planning, he hoped.
Thera and Fouad had taken only their phones with them, reasoning that the radios would be hard to explain if they were searched. Rankin had suggested hiding them in Thera’s “package,” but she pointed out that they would set off a metal detector. It was an obvious mistake, and he wished he hadn’t made the suggestion; it made him look like a fool.
Worse would have been her not questioning it.
Thera came out of the terminal door, followed by Fouad and another man. One of the guards came over.
Were they under arrest?
Rankin reached around to his pack, then saw that the other man who’d come out had gone to the soldier to bum a cigarette. He swung the pack back and gunned the bike to life. He rode down to the gate, passed by, and turned down a street across from the airport fence, riding up a short distance to a cluster of buildings where they had left the other bike. He parked next to it, debating whether to go into the store and get something to drink. He could see from the street that it had a Western-style beverage case, the sort of help-yourself arrangement that would minimize the amount of Arabic he would have to speak.
His Arabic wasn’t that bad.
He went in and bought an Arab cola, a precise knockoff of Coke except for the Arabic script. He paid with a ten-pound note that brought some change. He pointed to his mouth and groaned “toothache” when the proprietor tried to start a conversation. The man nodded sympathetically and advised him on a number of cures, all available at the store. Rankin simply shook his head patted his pocket, as if he had aspirin there. It was an old trick but an easy one, and when he left, the store owner had the impression they had had a long conversation.
Outside, he sipped the soda, the best thing he’d tasted in days.
After two gulps, a soldier appeared on the road. The man stared at the bikes as he approached; Rankin watched the man from the corner of his eyes.
“What business do you have here?” asked the soldier, walking up to him.
“Me?” asked Rankin in Arabic.
The soldier thought he was being disrespectful and asked again, this time in an even more demanding tone.
“No business,” said Rankin. The words were right and even the accent was fine, but he didn’t say it quickly enough, and the soldier’s suspicions had already been aroused. The Syrian began to swing his gun up to challenge him; Rankin flew forward, throwing his forearm into the soldier’s chin so hard that the man’s teeth nearly severed his tongue as his head snapped back. Rankin rode him to the ground and knocked him unconscious with two hard snaps to the head.
As quick as he was, Rankin hadn’t been quite fast enough; two of the man’s companions turned the corner of the fence nearby. They were talking to each other, arguing over soccer; it took them a second or more to see the two men sprawled on the road nearby.
It was too late for them by then. Rankin grabbed the soldier’s gun, leveling it against his stomach and thumbing down the selector to automatic fire without conscious thought. As he pulled the trigger he realized he might have chosen to run instead. If they’d been a little farther away or if he’d had another moment or two to think, he might have made that choice, but you didn’t survive in wartime by second-guessing your instincts. By the time he dismissed the idea the men were already dead.
Rankin jumped on his motorcycle, pulling it backward away from the curb before starting it. He started down the road toward the airport. Thera turned the corner, running toward him.
“On! Get on!” he said, pulling up.
“What’s going on?”
“Come on.”
“We can’t leave Fouad.”
“I’m not. Get on.”
Thera had to hike her long dress to her waist before she could do so; they lost a few more seconds before Rankin could spin back toward the other motorcycle. Rankin let her off, retrieved his Uzi from the top of his pack, then sped back toward Fouad, just turning the corner, face flush and chest heaving. Rankin pushed him down as if swatting a fly, then emptied the Uzi at the two soldiers who’d come out from the gate to see what the gunfire was about. Both men hit the dirt, but from this distance, a little better than a hundred yards, it was impossible to tell if he’d put them down or they’d simply taken cover.
“Up! Up!” he yelled to Fouad, reaching down for him. “Up! Let’s go! Come on!”
Fouad got his hands beneath his chest and pushed forward, more a beached whale looking for the water than an intelligence agent trying to escape. Rankin grabbed him and pulled him onboard, nearly losing his gun as he started moving again. Shots whizzed by before he turned the corner.
“Come on!” yelled Thera, who was waiting. “Let’s go!”
“That way,” said Rankin, pointing ahead. “Head for the highway!”
~ * ~
19
TRIPOLI
“Hey, beautiful. This towel taken?”
Kel looked up from her blanket on the beach below the Hotel Cairo, which was next to the Medici. Ferguson had left her there before swimming out to meet with Corrine.
“Bob, back already?”
“I told you, everybody calls me Ferg.” He grabbed his towel, giving the beach a quick glance while drying his hair.
“Still no one watching us,” said Kel.
“Syrians must be busy.” Ferguson plopped down next to her. “Thanks for hiring the girls. They did a good job. All locals?”
“All locals.” She leaned her arms back, stretched in the sand. “Now it’s time for you to pay up.”
“A hundred Euros apiece wasn’t enough?”
“I was talking about me,” she said, craning her head back for a kiss.
~ * ~
20
EASTERN SYRIA
Rankin and Thera stopped their bikes in a grove of trees overlooking the river about fifty miles from the airport. As far as Rankin could tell, they hadn’t been followed, but he was sure they would be.
Corrigan cursed when he heard what had happened. For once, Rankin didn’t snap back and tell him to screw himself.
“We’re going to get back on Route 4 and ride up near Aj’aber,” Rankin told him. “At that point we’ll cut south into the desert. Fouad knows a couple of good places for pickups. We should be OK until nightfall.”
“The Syrians are going to go ape.”
Rankin said nothing. He was about to kill the connection when Corrigan told him that Ferguson wanted to talk to him.
“When?”
“I think he can talk now. Hold on. I’ll find out.”
Rankin’s shoulders sagged as he waited, partly from fatigue and partly because he knew he hadn’t had a particularly good run the last few days.
“Hey, Skippy,” said Ferguson. “How do you like the bikes?”
“They’re all right.”
“Tell me about the jewels Khazaal had.”
R
ankin told him the little that he knew, then gave him the information that Thera and Fouad had found out at the airport.
“It’s a logical place,” said Ferguson. “How are you doing?”
Rankin told Ferguson what had happened.
“Yeah, Corrigan mentioned something along those lines. Sucks,” said Ferguson. “I’m going to have Corrigan figure out how to get you guys over here after you bug out. Take Guns, too. In the meantime, let me talk to Fouad.”
Rankin passed the phone over to the Iraqi. Fouad blinked into the sun, which had fallen halfway down the sky.
“Khazaal went west,” Fouad told him.
“So I heard. Why would he do that?”
“I have no answer for you.”
“Why would he go to Latakia you think? Buy weapons?”
“It would he logical.”
“It’s either that or gamble. I don’t figure him for that. If he was going to sell the jewels, he would have gone to Cairo, don’t you think?”
“A good bet.”
“Who would he know up there in Latakia?”
“We have people in Damascus,” said Fouad. “Perhaps you could speak to them.”
“There’s a waste of time. Why would the resistance need to buy weapons?”
“Perhaps they aren’t buying weapons but services. Or maybe he is escaping: from Latakia he could go to Turkey.” The more Fouad thought about this, the more he thought it must be the answer. The insurgency was doomed, and Khazaal, not being a stupid man, would try to get out while it was still possible.
“If he was going to Turkey, it would have been easier to get out through the Kurdish area,” said Ferguson.
“Not for him.”
“Point taken.”
Fouad didn’t understand the expression, but he assumed it meant that Ferguson agreed with him.
“How’s Rankin treating you?” asked Ferg.
“Very well.” When Thera had begun running at the first crack of gunfire, Fouad had assumed the worst: that the Americans were abandoning him. He was ashamed now.
“He can be tough on Iraqis.”
“Yes,” said Fouad. “But I am tough on Americans as well.”
“Fair enough. See you guys when you get here.”
~ * ~
21
TRIPOLI
THAT EVENING ...
Corrine went through the motions of the tour, admiring the equipment she was shown, nodding appropriately, and twice taking notes. Her hosts were very cordial and accommodating, traditional Arabs who did not let political or even religious differences disturb the mandate to be gracious hosts. They staged an elaborate dinner with enough food for an army; Corrine thought to herself that she would not fit into the bathing suit she had bought earlier in the day without considerable exercise. As the dinner wound down, she managed to ask her hosts for their opinion about a new peace plan for a Palestinian homeland without offending them. They were vaguely hopeful, but perhaps that too was due to politeness.
Her car was escorted back to the hotel by four police vehicles. It presented the illusion of safety while creating an obvious target for anyone who hated the regime as well as the U.S. Still, by the time she got into the hotel Corrine could almost believe that the media had overhyped the hatred Arabs felt toward Americans; her experience here had been as pleasant as any she had had in Europe or Asia.
Once again she waited in the reception area as her room was checked; once again she examined the illustrated manuscript pages. Gazing at them through the glass, she noticed a man approaching the reservations desk who looked vaguely familiar. She stared for a moment, unable to place him, and then, as he turned and met her gaze, she realized it was the man she had seen in the Mossad building.
She turned her head away, pretending not to notice, feigning absorption in the art.
The man came over to her.
“Ms. Alston?”
Corrine hesitated for a split second before turning around. Her escorts were right at his side bristling, ready to intervene. A few feet behind them, the Lebanese police too were ready.
“Yes?” she said.
“You don’t remember me, do you?” said the man, bowing his head slightly in greeting.
“I’m afraid not.” It was the safest thing to say.
“I was with the delegation to the UN two years ago. I had the great privilege of presenting the Pan-Arab view on the injustices faced by the Palestinian people.”
“Yes, I’m sure,” she said, emphasizing the noncommittal tone.
“You did not treat us well.” The man wagged his finger at her. “You personally, of course, were very gracious, but your employers—” He stumbled over the word, as if choosing one that would be neutral. “I was glad to see a new president elected, with better ideas toward the Arab view, I trust.”
The Lebanese security people, who had begun by looking suspiciously at the man, now turned those same glares toward Corrine.
“I’m afraid I’ve totally forgotten your name,” she said.
“I am Fazel al-Qiam. I no longer have my government post,” said Aaron Ravid. He’d come to Lebanon en route to Syria, renewing his contacts and gathering information.
The American had clearly recognized him from Tel Aviv and wasn’t practiced enough to hide her expression, which was sure to be seen by the Syrian and Lebanese agents watching the lobby. So he’d done the only thing he could do, approach her and try to cover it.
Was it a coincidence that she was here, an accident of luck? Or was the Mossad somehow using her?
It must be an accident, but he would put nothing past Tischler.
Corrine, not thinking, extended her hand to shake. Ravid reacted as a conservative Arab might, frowning and smiling nervously but hesitating to shake. Realizing the faux pas, she quickly dropped her hand.
“Excuse me. I beg your pardon,” she said.
“Apologies are not necessary for such a gracious and beautiful woman. I am in private life now, a simple man.”
“Well, it was nice to see you again.” Corrine started to turn away.
“You didn’t answer my question. Does the new president understand the needs of the Palestinian people?”
“I think the president wishes to understand all of the complicated needs of the people in the Middle East,” she said. “I would hope, strongly hope, that better arrangements can be made to our mutual benefit. I am here to help report on a trade agreement. I have found my hosts gracious and wonderful. Candidly, I don’t think there are friendlier people in the world.”
“We could do much trade with America if our rights are respected. Of course, that is tantamount. For too long the Arab people have not been accorded the proper respect. You are happy to take our oil, but do you treat us with the consideration equal partners are due? Sadly, you do not. Our civilization is many times older than yours, but we are treated like the little brother.” Ravid smiled, as if stopping himself from the rest of the rant. “I apologize. You, Ms. Alston, are certainly not personally responsible for this. You have been honorable and respectful, even though I see you disagree with me.”
“I don’t disagree. I—” She stopped herself midsentence. “I may disagree on some points but not on the whole. Some day, at your leisure, I hope, we may discuss them.”
“With the grace of God, we shall.”
~ * ~
U
pstairs in her suite, one of the marines found a brochure of tourist spots stuck under the door as they entered. Corrine took it from him before he could toss it in the garbage.
Convinced it was Ferguson’s message on what time to meet, she thumbed through the English section several times without finding any clue, much less a note or directions. Out of desperation she looked in the directory for jazz clubs. There was only one: the Blu Note, in an older part of town. She didn’t see a clue there either, until she realized that the digits for the acts had been carefully erased or changed, until the only ones that were legible were all the same: 1.
&
nbsp; ~ * ~
22
TRIPOLI
THAT NIGHT . . .
Pleasant though it was, Ferguson’s personal-information sharing with Kel yielded no useful knowledge about any Islamic militant meeting in Tripoli and nothing but generic warnings about cells that were operating in the city. As a courtesy, he waited until she was out of sight to scan his room and suitcase, removing not one, not two, but three bugs and a tracking device. You couldn’t blame a girl for trying.