Razing Beijing

by Sidney Elston

  “Lester?”

  “Tehran’s a very, very hard target. We simply don’t have anyone deep enough to corroborate this.”

  * * *

  “MR. SECRETARY, THE PEOPLE OF IRAN convey their deepest condolences,” assured the consular general by way of the speakerphone. In protest of the intensified United States naval presence, and the president’s explicit threat to blockade the Iranian oil trade, the consulate had already withdrawn all non-emergency diplomatic personnel from its Washington offices and relocated them in Ottawa.

  Walter Laynas watched the President fold his arms across his chest in response to the heavily accented words. “I’m sure that they do,” Laynas replied. “Does it surprise you we believe the collapse was no accident?”

  “Naturally, that tragic possibility occurred to us. As I am sure it did to much of the world.”

  Laynas glanced down at the points he had prepared with the help of President Denis. “Mr. Hamid, today our administration was presented with evidence compelling us to conclude that destruction of the George Washington Bridge was the result of malicious intent on the part of the Iranian leadership. We believe agents of your government were directed to conduct a hostile attack upon the United States of America.”

  The speakerphone responded with lifeless silence.

  “Mr. Hamid, you do understand—”

  “Both the President and the Supreme Leader, may Allah secure their wisdom, convey their strongest condemnation of this atrocious loss of innocent life. We categorically deny any role in attacking your country. It is you who threaten to attack our coastline, you who wish to blockade our commerce.”

  “We wish to have the following message conveyed to your leadership.” Laynas read aloud from his notes. “First, we demand an accounting of those inside our country who, to the full extent of Iran’s knowledge, are associated either directly or indirectly through any organization, terrorist cell, attempt to divert funding, or Iranian intelligence arm whose purpose or potential is to inflict harm on the American people. Those deemed not complicit in prior attacks against the United States will be deported. All others shall be detained to stand trial before the appropriate international tribunal.”

  “Trial...? Of all the arrogance! We have done nothing to injure Americans.”

  “Second, Iran shall present the United Nations Security Council with a proposal allowing an international team of inspectors to visit designated installations inside Iran, the purpose of which will be to establish that your country has not participated in the illegal proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, nor stands in violation of the Missile Technology Control Regime, the only purpose otherwise being to wreak destruction on the U.S. and our allies.

  “The United States has a moral obligation to serve justice on all war criminals responsible for these acts. If Iran meets these conditions, we shall stand-down our military presence in the region.”

  “Moral obligation? Even a godless bully like the United States government must submit proof along with such fantastic allegations. That is your moral obligation.”

  President Denis turned his head away from the phone.

  “God does not condone murder, Mr. Hamid,” Laynas replied. “The FBI is preparing an unclassified summary for the Security Council.”

  “Mr. Secretary, you make a terrible mistake.”

  “You made the mistake!” shouted the red-faced President, causing Laynas to flinch. “You made the mistake several years ago by colluding with OPEC to deprive the United States the essence of her economy. You made the mistake by waging a campaign of terror inside the United States, attacking our sacred monuments, attacking our Middle East ally. You made the mistake destabilizing the world with your lust for dangerous weapons. And you made the mistake of killing five hundred Americans!”

  “I...was not aware of your presence, Mr. President. I will repeat that my leaders condemn any such attack. They will categorically deny these accusations.”

  “Was there anything unclear in Mr. Laynas’s conditions?”

  “The conditions are clear. Sir, the problem—”

  “Your problem is now my dispatch of another carrier group from Yokosuka to the Gulf of Oman. It was not I who chose to escalate tensions between our two nations. The burden is on Iran to take the next step. Do I make myself clear?”

  “Perfectly. This is wholly unnecessary. I fear you will provoke a calamity with such threats.”

  “No threat can provoke like the murder of innocent Americans. Good afternoon.” President Denis reached out and broke the connection.

  94

  THE RUMBLE OF AN APPROACHING car disturbed the evening calm along the leafy stretch of Kalorama Road. The cream-colored Lexus passed beneath bright circles thrown by gaslights lining the street of the upscale District of Columbia neighborhood. The car eventually slowed and turned into the driveway of a quaint, nineteenth century fieldstone residence.

  Paul Devinn ducked behind the corner of the garage to avoid the wash of headlights as a mechanical ratcheting noise announced the garage door beginning to rise open. He waited in a ready crouch for the vehicle to pull to a stop inside, and the driveway shone red with the car’s brake lights—his cue. The door sounded the beginning of its descent.

  Joanne Lewis switched hands so she could hold the phone to her ear as she turned off the ignition. “Does that give us enough time?” she heard Ralph Perry ask. It was unlike him to negatively greet positive news, she thought. That she had managed to plead her way onto the busy Eastern Virginia Fourth Circuit’s schedule for a hearing at all was a major accomplishment.

  Perry did have a point. The hearing was scheduled for 9:45 A.M. Friday—the day after tomorrow—at the Richmond courthouse. Her eyes swept the clock in the dashboard; just before eight, five o’clock on the West Coast, still enough time to catch people at work. She had already spent the last three-and-a-half hours on the phone trying to draw on some of the best minds in her Rolodex. She planned to spend what remained of tonight and tomorrow similarly working the problem.

  “We knew we’d be cutting this close, Ralph. I don’t want to mislead you. Legal precedent for suing the government on breach of contract isn’t encouraging.” Of course, their exit clause guaranteed them—eventually—financial redress by the government. Perry wanted the research contract reinstated.

  “I heard you the first two times,” Perry barked. “I’m willing to go in there with anything. Make sure you get the DOE guy to show up. He told me they’d support us, but dammit, I can’t get Donna Gingras to even return my calls!”

  Satchel in hand, she climbed out of the car and swung the door shut with her knee. “Would you mind having someone else round up Campbell? I just think my time’s better spent preparing our argument. I need to drum up a lot of counsel before I can even start, including the other side.”

  “Sure,” Perry grumbled. He asked if there was anything else he could do.

  Lewis walked the few feet to the door leading into the house and fumbled her keys. “Meet me at the courthouse at eight Friday morning. That’ll give you and Gil a chance to familiarize yourselves with what I prepare. Be sure you’re conversant on security upgrades incorporated at CLI—that will probably be important. Keep your fingers crossed. That’s about it.”

  Lewis entered her townhouse, turned on the kitchen lights—a low groan at the sight of dishes piling up in the sink. She doused the lights to the garage.

  She had not seen the figure dressed in black as it ducked beneath the closing garage door, cautiously avoiding the electronic eye.

  WORKING THE PHONE from her study and moving west through the time zones, Joanne Lewis hit up three fellow alumni living in the Chicago area, one of whom ran the legal studies department at Northwestern University. The result was more negative prognoses. It was after midnight by the time she finished the last of seven more calls, these to the San Diego region and her Pepperdine alma mater.

  Joanne glanced at the list of willing and not-so-willing assist
ants. A good exercise tomorrow would be to rank their recommendations by prospect. Now exhausted, she planned to hit the Library of Congress as soon as it opened.

  In her dream, the bed bowed beneath her as if she were under the weight of some enormous creature...she tried to lift up her hand, her arms, her legs. Nothing budged under the deadening load of this thing...a dream, a harmless illusion. Or was it? Her pulse raced ahead, thumping softly and steadily like a tiny helpless animal frantic in its effort to escape. In time the dream-nightmare receded, driven away by the faint smile that came to her lips—consciousness rising, barely there at the edge of sleep, bringing fresh certainty that day follows night and whatever nightmarish ghouls invade the minds of the weary, they cower in the clarity of consciousness...

  All this Joanne perceived in the five seconds or so it took her to realize that the thing on her back hadn’t floated away. By sheer will her eyelids flickered open in the darkness. She drew in a deep rush of air to scream—

  A gloved hand pressed hard over her mouth. At the same instant a hard object bore against the side of her head—the unmistakable sound of a cocking pistol resonated through the sinus cavities of her skull. The glove smelled bitterly of leather and oil. She scrunched her eyes shut tightly and tried to scream, but managed only a squeal.

  “Scream when I remove my hand,” the man said with lips close to her ear, his voice relaxed, “and I’ll pull the trigger. Nobody will hear it, especially not you. The decision is yours.”

  Lewis opened her eyes. She was lying on her stomach and didn’t dare move. Light coming in from the street cast his shadow against her bed’s headboard. It seemed forever before the hand drew away from her mouth.

  The man withdrew the gun from her head, and ripped the bed sheets away. It was not so dark that his eyes couldn’t take in her nakedness. Never in her life had Lewis felt more vulnerable than she did at the instant he began to fondle her hair. Oh God, he’s going to rape me.

  “What do you want with me?” she asked, ashamed that her voice sounded so weak. Then she felt the cold barrel of the gun placed between her legs. “You sick bastard,” she managed to say.

  The gun was removed. She felt the mattress deflect as the stranger again straddled her and roughly blindfolded her eyes.

  He gripped her shoulders and rolled her onto her back. “Now sit up. You’re getting dressed. Dark clothes. Where are they?”

  “Where are you—”

  A sharp slap landed across her mouth.

  “Ow!” Lewis tasted blood on her lips. “Fuck you!”

  He slapped her again.

  “Oh God...my jeans are hanging in the closet. There’s a sweater in the top drawer of my dresser.”

  She heard him root through her things. Clothing landed across her thighs.

  “Quickly. Don’t make a sound or I pop you.”

  “Who are you?”

  “Never mind who I am. Shut up and get dressed.”

  Fumbling under darkness of the blindfold, Lewis pulled the pair of jeans up past her naked hips.

  “So we’re going to play a game,” the man said after watching her pull her pants on. “The way it works is I ask you a question. You get one chance to answer it truthfully, and some of the answers I already know. Now, then. Do you know a man by the name of Robert Stuart?”

  Lewis felt herself stiffen. “I think—”

  “One chance.”

  A heavy dread welled up in her chest. “He’s at the company where I work, a company called CLI.”

  “Good. And what does he do at CLI?”

  “He’s an executive.”

  “I asked what he does—not what he is.”

  “I’m not sure. Engineers report to him on a research program. He runs it.”

  “What kind of research?”

  “I don’t know what—”

  This time the slap across her face slammed her head backward into the brass of her bed.

  “I’ll make an exception,” the man said. “You can try that one again.”

  Lewis huddled her legs against her bare chest, sobbing. “It’s a government research project, something to do with lasers and I’m a lobbyist, I don’t understand what it is! The program’s in trouble...it’s going to be canceled.”

  There were several moments of silence. Lewis had the sense that the stranger was considering her answer, as if maybe he hadn’t expected it. The man’s voice was middle-aged, confident, and intelligent. Was this about CLI, or Stuart? Lewis was scared, now she became suddenly chilled: Had somebody—in the government—determined that she posed a risk to their plans?

  “Better,” the man said, breathing deeply. Something soft landed on her lap. “Put it on.”

  Lewis pulled what felt like her gray mohair turtleneck sweater down over her head.

  “Next question. Does this Stuart have any family?”

  “He’s divorced,” Lewis said, “and his ex-wife is dead. She died six months ago of lymphoma.”

  “How sad. Any children?”

  “No, thank God.” She clenched her teeth, probing the room with her mind for the falling swing of his hand.

  Long seconds passed before the man said simply, “Yeah, thank God.”

  The intruder had her tie back her hair in a tight pigtail, and he gave her a thick wool cap to wear. Lewis was forced onto her stomach again while he pulled her wrists behind her back, and then cinched them together with plastic ties.

  “Where are you taking me?”

  The man plucked her off the bed by the arm, intentionally revealing his strength. “Before I answer your questions, I still have a few of my own.” He stuffed a stocking into her mouth and walked her shuffling and tripping down the stairs, through the kitchen, and out the back door. The back yard’s grass contained tiny rocks that dug into her feet, and she was disheartened by the realization that the neighbors would all be asleep. They walked a short way in a direction that she guessed would lead to a small park up the street. Her heart sank further; the lights there this time of night were extinguished. No one would see her there either.

  They stopped as she heard the juggling of keys, followed by the sound of a trunk lid popping open. The stranger gripped her by the back of the neck and slowly steered her head down until she fell forward into the trunk.

  “Make a sound and you’re dead.” The trunk slammed shut like the lid of a coffin.

  Shivering uncontrollably, her mind fought to deny the realization of her helplessness. The stranger climbed behind the wheel and shut the driver’s door. He started the engine. I’m going to die and no one will ever find me. Lewis rolled onto her back as the car started to move, her scream stifled by the stocking still in her mouth. She willed herself to remain calm, to fight back panic. Slowly, gradually, she succeeded.

  I have to get out of here. Arching her back, she frantically probed her bound hands around in the carpeting for something—to fight back with, or to unlatch the trunk lid? If only I could cut the ties holding my hands... The car smelled new. Maybe there was a tool kit or...her fingers came across a small square of paper. It was thick, like a business card...oh how totally fucking useless. Finding something loose and unattended gave her hope that she’d find something else. Fending off tears, she slid the card into the back pocket of her jeans and continued to probe the carpeting with her fingers, shifting her body to cover as much area as possible.

  The whirring sound of tires and the low, guttural roar of the speeding engine soon overcame her hopes. Wherever they were going, they were doing it quickly.

  95

  Thursday, July 9

  THE FACE BEHIND THE WHEEL and the double-S logo adorning the side of the company’s van were instantly recognizable to the security guard. Yet these were increasingly dangerous times, particularly in his line of work, so the guard carefully scanned the morning list of visiting contractors.

  Mohammad Mousavi and Salman Ehteshari had anticipated an elevated level of scrutiny, beginning with a cross-examination as to how they had manag
ed to defy Parkway rush-hour traffic from Paterson to Woodbridge for their 8:42 A.M. arrival. The guard seemed to ignore that particular subtlety as he flipped through the pages of his clipboard. Having witnessed the company dispatcher phone in their service call to the refinery’s purchasing agent, Mousavi was confident that SecuritySolutions was included on the list.

  “You guys must like it here,” the guard casually observed, noting in his records the engineering representatives’ second service call in as many weeks.

  “Well sure,” Mousavi replied cheerfully, thinking that several hundred people employed within the Standard Oil refinery complex would soon most decidedly dislike it here. “This is where my cousins all ship their oil to become rich.”

  The guard chuckled. “Yeah, well, not so much lately they don’t.”

  “Sadly true—the fools.” Mousavi thumbed over his shoulder toward the back of the van. “Actually, we are here on account of a defective batch of batteries.”

  The guard slid the side door open to conduct the obligatory inspection of portable electronic equipment. Among the assorted non-threatening items was a standard cardboard carton, the South Korean manufacturer’s label identifying the contents as one dozen nickel-cadmium batteries. Seeing the top open, the guard flipped aside the flap and removed one. Turning the rechargeable pack over in his hand, he didn’t notice the dark eyes watching closely in the rearview mirror. Had he taken a moment to dig beyond the carton’s top layer, the guard might question why the remaining nine battery packs were all wired together to form a powerful series circuit. As it was, there were fewer implements than what normally accompanied the men into the plant. He replaced the object where he had found it, slid the van’s door shut, and returned to the guardhouse.

  The man reappeared moments later carrying a small cylindrical object, which he magnetically attached to the van’s roof over the cab. Immediately a strobe light began flashing. “Now, you remember—”