by D. E. Daum
“Shouldn’t we be talking to Saleem?”
Jane gritted her teeth. “We should, but I’m so fucking mad, I want to calm down first. Do you have any ideas?”
“I think for starters we need to see how this plays in the Middle East. Maybe things are not as bad as you suspect. If they are, he could always talk to the leaders of the various organizations and downplay what he said as lip service to Western interests and a bone to the masses.”
“You’re a pretty smart beauty queen. Kelly has himself quite a package. So, do you have any ideas about the Nazis? He was supposed to coordinate their future terrorist actions, and then he goes on worldwide TV and says killing is a no-no! In this case, I’m not as concerned about the Middle East as I am Munich! Our hardened killer turned out to be the Flying Fucking Nun.”
“That is a problem, but I’ve been thinking. I’m sure they don’t like Muslims. They’re using them, because they’re not strong enough to do these things themselves yet. If they become stronger and no longer need the Muslim organizations, they’re going to be a bigger threat than the Muslims.”
“I agree, Mariam. What do you suggest?”
“Deal with them now.”
“Again, I agree with you. Kelly, Haman, let’s go to the conference room.”
Chapter 12
Adlerhorst, Germany
Valerie had been called back to Germany from the Philippines, where she’d been negotiating some more mischief against Western interests with yet another terrorist group. There were so many with new ones sprouting up all the time, especially after the U.S. and Britain had carelessly invaded Iraq.
Valerie had seen Rudolf Eckert’s large pretentious office numerous times. It was located in Building Three of the cluster of seven buildings behind the Ziegenberg Castle, at the former Nazi Adlerhorst complex in Bavaria. As Valerie entered the twenty-by-twenty foot office, she looked around at the familiar masculine color schemes accented with Teutonic antiques and Nazi photos, flags, and memorabilia. She glanced right, then left, and noticed that something had been added. A medieval suit of armor with spear now guarded each side of the door.
She advanced and once more took the measure of the man she once adored, but for whom she now felt nothing but disdain. “Yes, Rudolf, as you requested, I have returned. You wish to see me?”
“I do, Erica. Have you seen this speech your Arab friend, Saleem Rhamsy, gave in London the other night?”
“No, I’m sorry; I’ve been busy, as you know. I didn’t know he had made a speech. What was it about?”
He had a smug ‘knew it all along’ look on his face. “It seems our Arab revolutionary is in reality, a pacifist. Let me show you. Have a seat.”
The portly Eckert, who was pushing fifty if he wasn’t past it, aimed a remote control at a video recorder, and shortly Saleem appeared, giving an impassioned speech to his people. Eckert handed Valerie a translated transcript so she could follow.
When it was over, Rudolf smiled as if he was pleased at this turn of events. “So, Erica, what do you think of our terrorist leader now?”
Valerie had to be careful here. If he knew she had been intimate with Saleem, things could get difficult. “I had no idea. He had me fooled.”
“Ya, me too. It is a good thing we invited him here so we could question him in privacy. Perhaps, he was in league with that Peabody fellow.”
“I don’t think so. We suspected Peabody way before Rhamsy moved to England, plus he never mentioned Rhamsy during our interrogation. What did you do with his body, by the way?” asked Erica.
“We thought it best to return it to his flat in London. It will appear that he died of a massive heart attack,” replied Rudolf.
“I assume your questioning left no telltale marks on his person then?”
“That is correct. Do you think your Mr. Rhamsy will still be coming?”
“I wouldn’t, would you?” replied Erica.
“No, I’m sure you’re right. Perhaps we should provide him with an invitation he can’t refuse.”
Chapter 13
London
“Saleem, Saleem, wake up. Wake up! You have a call from your office,” said Mariam, excitedly.
“But Mare, it’s Sunday morning. No one should even be at the office.”
“Yes, I know, but he says it’s an emergency. It’s someone at the office named Boyd.”
“Boyd? He’s our contract resident computer guru. I wonder what the problem is? I guess I better talk to him.”
“Hello. Yes, Boyd. Is that right? Can you fix it? Do whatever you have to do. We must accommodate the traffic, no matter what.”
Kelly hung up, looking bewildered. Mariam was waiting for him to tell her the side of the conversation she hadn’t heard. Beaming, Kelly grabbed Mariam and hugged her. He held her for a few moments, then said, “We’ve got to get the Sunday paper and turn on the TV. We need to go to the office later where we can monitor the Arab networks as well. I’ve got to see what’s going on, Mare. It seems my speech has set off a groundswell of support. Boyd said our website has gotten so many hits since yesterday that it froze up. He says we missed a lot, but from what he can count, we’ve had some sixty thousand hits in the last fourteen hours. That’s phenomenal, almost five thousand hits an hour, and the hits are lasting about twenty-two minutes each, on average.”
“Why that’s wonderful! Let’s celebrate before we get the paper and go to the office, my stallion.” Mariam, with a mischievous smile on her face, reached into Kelly’s pajamas and grabbed his sex. Kelly mumbled something about having plenty of time and setting priorities.
When they turned on the TV, BBC was running a news article about the speech and the reaction worldwide. The reaction from non-Muslims was almost unanimous in support, which was not surprising, but the news from Muslims was almost as good. It seems that of those who saw the speech or heard reports of the speech, some seventy-five percent felt it was a positive development for their religion and way of life. Kelly was ecstatic. He dragged Mariam and Haman down to the office, picking up the London Times on the way. After asking Haman to wait in the lobby, Kelly turned on Al Arabiya. They were rerunning his speech in its entirety.
Boyd was working on the website, He got it up and running again, but it quickly went down again because of the demand. Boyd said the demand was outstripping its ability. He suggested diverting some of the traffic to another website, but no other website was set up to handle the traffic. As an option, he suggested they limit the incoming hits and busy out the others until the next day when he could pick up and install additional capacity.
When the rerun of the speech was finished, they had a roundtable of clerics, politicians, newsmen, and learned men to discuss the merits of Kelly’s speech. Not surprisingly, they were not as enthusiastic about the speech. One cleric said, “Anybody can say he talked to Allah, but where’s the proof?” to which Another of the panel responded, “I don’t remember that the Prophet Mohammed was required to supply proof of his conversations with Allah.”
Kelly’s right arm shot up in the air. He said, “Good for you. You got him.”
Boyd came in again and said that the website was holding its own now. They were now at one hundred three thousand hits, adding about four thousand an hour.
Kelly sent him home, turned to Mariam and said, “Are you ready to go, sweetheart? I feel like celebrating again.”
Mare got that smile on her face and said, “You know what? I have never seen the apartments upstairs, close and personal.”
How could he refuse?
* * * *
The next day at the office, the website had had a whopping one hundred sixty-five thousand hits and Boyd hadn’t yet installed the additional capacity. Good news indeed, but the news was about to turn.
Kelly was pleased with the reaction to his speech, and his mood reflected it. The intercom rang, “Yes, Jane, baby, or is that Baby Jane?”
She whispered, “You’re not supposed to call me Jane. I’m Rayya, remember?
”
“Of course. Yes, Rayya, What is it?”
“You have a call from a Darius Jones of Scotland Yard.”
“Thank you, sweetheart, You may put the call through. Good morning, this is Saleem Rhamsy, may I help you?”
“Yes, Mr. Rhamsy, I’m sorry to bother you, but something rather dreadful has come up. It seems your employee, Eldon Peabody, has died of what appears to be a heart attack.”
“Oh no! That is terrible. He had taken a leave of absence and had yet to return. Why are the police involved if it was a heart attack?”
“Let’s just say there are some suspicious circumstances. May I come to see you? I’m in your neighborhood.”
“Certainly, I’ll have my secretary show you in.”
* * * *
“Darius Jones, Mr. Rhamsy. Sorry to be meeting under such circumstances, but it’s my job. May I sit down?”
Kelly sensed that this man had a keen intelligence. Otherwise, he was average in appearance and a little overweight. “Sorry, of course, be seated. May I get you something? Coffee, tea, soda?”
“Do you happen to have a diet soda?” He patted his stomach with his left hand. “Trying to lose a couple pounds, you know.”
“Of course. I’ll have Rayya bring you one”
“Rayya, that’s her name is it?”
“Yes, lovely girl.”
“Yes, she is. She was even lovelier the last time I saw her, but this Rayya seems to be a different woman. You want to tell me why I get that feeling?” Darius demanded.
Kelly played it neutral. “Whatever do you mean, Mr. Jones?”
A tinge of anger flashed in Jones’s eyes. He was losing patience. “Mr. Rhamsy, there are a lot of suspicious events happening, and I want some answers. First, two employees of this organization have had heart attacks within four weeks. Then, when I was here the first time, I interviewed a young lady named Rayya. This time when I came here, a woman named Rayya ushered me in, only this Rayya is not the same Rayya as the first one. Sure, she is made to look like her, but it’s not her, What have you done with Rayya, and who is this imposter?”
Jane had fooled Valerie, but a detective who had seen Rayya once four weeks ago wasn’t fooled. What was he going to do? Kelly picked up the phone, dialed Jane, and spoke softly, “Hello, Rayya, I’ve got Mr. Jones with me who says he met you here four weeks ago, when Ali Kaba was found, but he says it wasn’t you.”
“Oh, shit, give me thirty minutes, I’ll get Rayya.”
“OK, I’ll answer his other questions until then.”
His stomach was churning and his pulse rate spiking, Kelly tried to appear calm as he set down the handset and turned to the inspector. “Mr. Jones, I’m afraid you’re going to have to wait a few minutes for Rayya to get back, she had an errand to run. In the meantime, you have other questions?”
“I think we’re past that. I would like to question you further at the police station. You can accompany me, or I can send for uniforms to bring you in.”
Kelly suddenly felt cornered. “My good man, I can assure you that is not necessary. She will be back in twenty minutes.”
Kelly’s phone rang and he grabbed it, like seizing a lifeline to postpone this awkward confrontation. It was Rayya, the real Rayya. “Put Mr. Jones on.” Kelly handed the phone to Jones.
Jones said, “Yes, I understand. OK, we’ll be here.” He looked at Kelly and said, “Why didn’t you tell me that Rayya’s sister was pretending to be her? They do look a lot alike, don’t they?” Darius calmed down and sat again. “Now where were we? Oh, yes, don’t you think it’s a little odd for two people from your organization to die of a heart attack within four weeks?”
“Why? Do you suspect something else?”
“Yes. There are a couple of irregularities, which I will not discuss with you, but I digress, I have questions to ask. When was the last time you saw Peabody?”
“Actually, it was a day or two after Ali Kaba died. Eldon didn’t feel well, and he went home sick. He later called in and said he needed to take some time off. We gave him a leave of absence. To my knowledge, no one at the office heard from him again.”
“And was it you that gave him the leave of absence?”
“No. To my knowledge, nobody officially granted him a leave. He said he needed to take it and no one questioned him. Whom he talked to, I am not sure. It was probably Rayya. I just remember asking about him and she told me.”
“Do you have any idea what Peabody was doing?”
“You mean during his leave? I’m sorry, no.”
“Do you know if he went anywhere? Like Germany, for instance?”
With that, Kelly did a double take. His surprised expression was revealing. “Germany? Why do you ask that?”
Inspector Jones was about to follow up when Rayya, along with Jane, walked in. Jane walked over to Darius and showed her ID. “Mr. Jones, we have an ongoing operation here, and you may be jeopardizing it. I’m afraid we‘re going to have to ask you some questions.”
Now was Darius was surprised. He glanced about at the three of them, then asked, “What would you like to know?”
Kelly spoke up, “Well, for starters I’d like to know the basis of your comments about Peabody’s death.”
“We have determined that Mr. Peabody did not die in his flat. He was moved after rigor mortis had started to set in. This is probably indicative of some foul play.”
Jane looked at Kelly and Rayya, and then asked, “So it wasn’t a heart attack?”
“Oh no. It was definitely a heart attack, but they can be induced.”
Kelly had liked Eldon very much, and he was starting to get upset. “OK. Eldon was probably murdered. What is the German connection?”
“We’re not sure, but the autopsy showed he had a parasite that is common in Germany. He had recently acquired it. He also had some dirt under his fingernails that is not found on the British Isles, but in central Europe.”
“Are you aware that Eldon was doing undercover work for MI-6?” Jane asked.
“Yes, we are. I wasn’t sure you were.”
“Can you tell us if he was on an assignment when he was killed?” asked Kelly.
“Yes, he was. I’m not sure what it was about, being in different departments, but it had something to do with resurgent Nazis.”
“Did you know Eldon personally?” asked Kelly.
“I’m afraid not. My captain knew him and liked him a lot. I don’t mind telling you we wouldn’t mind finding the people that did this.”
Kelly was steaming. “No more than we would.”
Jane decided to curtail the interview. “We can’t talk about the operation with you. I’ll see if we can bring you in, assuming it’s all right with your superiors. I might warn you that it will be dangerous.”
“No problem. I might not look like it but I can handle myself. I’m a crack shot.”
“OK, we’ll let you know. Before you go, I have one more question. When was Eldon killed?”
“As I said, he had a heart attack approximately thirty-six hours ago.”
Jane said, “That leads to two more questions. How did you find him so fast, and how are heart attacks induced?”
“A smoke alarm alerted a neighbor who called the manager. Someone had set an empty pot on the stove, or maybe it originally had water in it. The pot started melting, smoking, and set the smoke detector off. As for your second question, there are many ways to induce a heart attack: injecting insulin or potassium directly into the heart, or injecting a large air bubble into the bloodstream.”
* * * *
After Darius left, the three of them and Haman went to the op center and met in the conference room. Kelly called ahead and Mariam met them. He briefed her about the afternoon’s happenings so she would know everything when they met.
In the conference room Jane said, “I checked with MI-6 on the way over here. Eldon was sent to Germany to check out the Nazis. Apparently, we were running parallel investigations, because they s
tarted their own investigation when I gave them the information about the bomb threat to Parliament. They figure he got caught, tortured for information in such a way that would not leave marks, and murdered. He was most likely murdered in England, but before he they returned him to his flat.
“There’s a good chance that he told them about you before he was killed, which means we can no longer think about going to their convention. It was dangerous before, and now it would probably be suicidal. Luckily, Eldon’s knowledge of our operation was limited, and he never had the opportunity to join us at either of our field offices.”