by Nathan Ronen
“Listen, Eddy,” Arik resumed talking. “I’m just like you. We both come from poor families. We’re both state employees, and when we retire, no one will remember us and no one will appreciate the mental and physical sacrifice, the many hours when we were away from home, the children we abandoned, the wife who spent many nights without a husband. Even if we want to write our memoirs, the censors will toss it in some distant drawer for seventy years and prohibit us from publishing it. Our sacrifice is not expressed in our pension pay slip. To the bureaucrats who issue those slips, we’re just like any old clerk from the Bureau of Environmental Affairs who shows up for work at nine and goes home at four in the afternoon. We’re like transparent public servants. I know how much you worry about your children and want them to enjoy the compensation for the suffering you experienced as a child. I understand that all you wanted to do was ensure your children’s financial future. Am I right?”
Eddy nodded.
“To me, you’re not a traitor,” Arik continued his tenderizing assault. He remembered the entire biography of the man across from him.
Eddy looked at him with a companionable gaze. Arik noticed a moistness in the eyes of the broken man facing him. He offered him the cigarette pack along with the lighter, and Eddy hastily pocketed them: another small gesture in establishing a bridge of trust.
“I know your wife was the one who wanted a better life, big house, expensive furniture, and clothes to make up for a difficult life as the wife of an operative,” Arik continued talking. “It’s not in your nature to be corrupt. You’re little Eddy, who grew up at the mission and in boarding schools after his parents were murdered by the FLN, the Algerian National Liberation Front. I know you’re a brave officer, a humble man sucked into this reluctantly and against your will. But the moment you let your wife pull you in, it was already hard to change course. The good life, the vacation home in Martinique and the holidays abroad, the jewelry, the mortgage on the house in Paris’s most elegant arrondissement, the expensive sports car, and so on.”
Eddy Constantine stayed silent, but his eyes were wet. He wasn’t crying, but he was close. For three months now, he had undergone mental torture under the implied threat that he would be better off talking. He, who had dedicated his best years to France, was now being treated by his interrogators, his former subordinates, as if he was the lowliest of terrorists.
Under different circumstances and perhaps at a different time, Eddy Constantine would have seen and understood the mental manipulation to which Arik was subjecting him. It was an exercise in establishing trust and basic emotional blackmail. But he was so humiliated and broken, and so in need of consolation, that a bit of encouragement was like a cool drink of fountain water in a steaming desert. The excellent hot coffee, the delicious croissants, and Arik’s compassionate words touched his heart.
The admiral looked at Arik in admiration. It had been quite a while since he last saw a master interrogator in action. But the jaw of the judge standing beside him dropped. He was stunned by the dissonance between what he knew about Eddy and his exploits and what he was hearing about patriotism, compassion and understanding regarding acts of treason, breach of trust and corruption. The investigative judge had not been privy to the secret identity of the person who had provided the material incriminating Eddy. As far as he was concerned, it was the French security agency.
“Eddy, you wanted to see me and here I am. I’m listening,” Arik said gently, placing an empathetic hand on the prisoner’s hand, making sure to stay seated so that his eyes were on the same level as his interlocutor’s.
Eddy’s voice broke as he whispered, “I don’t trust the French government to take care of my family. I’m afraid that the minute I’m not around, the state will confiscate all my property, including the cash in my safe and my foreign bank accounts. And I need your help.”
Arik watched him, the muscles in his face immobile. He knew that legally, the French government had justification to do just that.
“I have something you Israelis want,” Eddy continued, “and in return, I want you to provide a sustenance grant for my wife and my boys. I want them to have a good education. I don’t want them to know who took care of them, and I don’t want it to have Israel’s fingerprints on it. As far as I’m concerned, they can receive a stipend from a Rothschild Bank fund.”
“Like every negotiation, I have to first hear what you’re offering before I commit,” Arik said.
Eddy gazed at him with desperate eyes and said, “You see my situation here, after all. Look at me in this outfit. You’re talking to a dead man walking.”
“You told the investigating judge that you wanted to talk to me about the ‘yellowcakes,’” Arik reminded him, his voice tough.
“Right. You know that the Iranians hid a delivery of 200 tons of yellowcake in Chad.”
“Yes, I do know,” Arik confided. “And I also know that their contact person and intermediary with the Iranians was actually you.”
Eddy nodded wearily. The investigating judge looked at him in surprise. He had not interrogated Constantine on this topic at all.
“The problem is that the moment that notice of my death appears in the papers,” the prisoner began to explain, fatigue in his voice, “the Iranian intelligence officers here at their embassy will panic and try to get the material out of Chad as quickly as possible.”
“That can be handled,” Lacoste intervened. “Publication of the death notice could be delayed by a few days.”
“True, but that’s a technical delay. You people are full of leaks like an old sieve, and the journalists will immediately start asking what’s going on here,” Arik said, then saw Lacoste’s face flush with rage. He instantly added the magic word, “Désolé.”
If Admiral Lacoste was hurt, he did not express it out loud. But the judge obviously wanted to say a few words in defense of the French Republic to that impudent man who was speaking French in an appalling accent. One look from Lacoste calmed him down.
Arik turned to Eddy. “I need you to call your friend, Chad’s minister of defense, Field Marshal Idris Ma’alum, and tell him that the Iranians are stressed out because of the impending administration change in the United States, and they want to transfer the material to their facility in Isfahan to bake the yellowcake there.”
Eddy thought it over. In this chess game, he did not have many pieces left with which to threaten anyone.
“How much have you already received from them in advance, and no bullshit this time, please?” Arik asked, although he knew the answer, from the surveillance he himself had conducted in Eddy Constantine’s home.
“So far, we’ve received five million euros, which we divided between us. But the Iranians are supposed to pay another hundred thousand euros in cash to Field Marshal Ma’alum during the transfer, as a storage fee, so that he releases the material,” Eddy said dejectedly.
“Don’t worry, we’ll give him that sum,” Arik said. “The question is, does he know you were arrested? Is there a risk that he won’t cooperate?”
“I don’t think so,” Eddy creased his brow. “He and the president are busy with survival. In my humble opinion, he’s currently dealing with quelling the Boko Haram5 rebel uprising. They’ve come from the north, and just last week, tried to take over the presidential palace and topple the president and his government.”
“Call him now!” Arik said.
“But he won’t give the material to you Israelis,” Eddy said skeptically.
“He definitely won’t be giving it to Israelis, but to Iranian soldiers from the Revolutionary Guard who will arrive to receive the delivery from him,” Arik calmed him down, winking at him.
The shadow of a weary smile dawned on Eddy Constantine’s lips. The Mossad’s way of thinking outside the box and its creativity both surprised and excited him.
“Do you really mean that we should call him now?” he
wondered in disbelief.
“Now!” Arik said, extending his hand to the investigating judge. Eddy’s cell phone was taken out of a sealed plastic bag, brought there by the warden.
“Call and tell him a delegation will be coming to him in two or three days,” Arik instructed Eddy, “and that they’ll give him a suitcase with the money in cash, but only after the plane is loaded and the cargo is checked out. If there are any misunderstandings, for example, if he tries to sell them something else, like dyed laundry detergent, they might be very unpredictable, and even violent.”
“I’ll do it,” Eddy said, “but I just want you to know that that crazy black guy is an unpredictable type, the kind who breaks his promises according to the way he reads the situation. If his take at the airport is that the Iranians coming to see him are stressed out, he might not release the material. You should already take into account that the final price might go up at the airport itself. So come with extra cash.”
“Don’t worry about me. Make the call!” Arik commanded.
Eddy dialed and talked to his colleague in Chad. He tried to assume a tone of jolly cheer, but his face was solemn and concerned. He covered the speaker with his hand, looking at Arik. “Field Marshal Ma’alum says he doesn’t know what’s going to be happening there next week. His forces are fighting the Boko Haram rebels, who are coming from Nigeria; ISIS forces, which are coming from Libya; and Islamic Jihad forces from Sudan, all of whom are trying to take over the country. He has requested several times that the president of France send him a commando unit in order to protect the regime, but someone at Élysée is dragging their feet. Apparently, we’re running out of time.”
“Tell him that you’ll personally speak to the Iranians, and they’ll be there in two or three days to take the yellowcake from him,” Arik instructed him. “Tell him to get everything ready, and the Iranians will call him to set the exact day and time.”
Eddy signaled that he had passed on the message and handed Arik the phone once the call ended. Arik feigned momentary clumsiness and dropped the phone. When he picked it up off the floor, with a magician’s rapid sleight of hand, he stripped it of the SIM card, handing the empty device to the judge. From the corner of his eye, Lacoste saw Arik sneaking the SIM card into his jacket pocket but did not say a word. He understood that Arik needed the field marshal’s private number.
“I’m not expecting a written statement from you, but I want a promise and your handshake, as an officer and a gentleman, that you’ll take care of my wife and sons,” Eddy said, his fatigue apparent, extending his hand to Arik. “I know that you Israelis are true to your word.”
They gazed at each other in a farewell of sorts. Both of them knew they would never meet again. Arik recognized the deep fear in Eddy’s eyes. His expression resembled a mask of terror worn under the skin.
The judge signaled the warden, who signaled the guard. The latter walked over and cuffed Eddy’s hands and legs once more, and they left in a slow duck-like procession, heading for death row.
* * *
5Boko Haram is an extreme Islamic Sunni terrorist and jihadist organization. In 2009, the organization initiated an armed rebellion against the Nigerian government, which later expanded to include neighboring countries as well.
Chapter 8
The Mossad’s Paris Bureau
Arik stormed into the Mossad bureau. Other than the officer on duty, there was no one present. He wanted to call the hospital and ask how Eva was doing, but remembered she was sedated and intubated, and there was no point in bothering the staff.
“Do you want me to ask Haya Calmy, head of the bureau, to come back here from home?” asked the young female officer on duty, who was working through some exercises.
“No,” Arik shook his head. “I see you’re studying physics?”
“It’s actually physical chemistry. Nanotechnology,” replied the pretty girl, who was studying toward a doctoral degree at the Sorbonne.
Arik smiled at her appreciatively. “What’s your name?”
“Daria Oren,” the young woman replied with a radiant smile.
“Connect me to the command center6 in Israel. I’ll wait in Haya’s office.”
The Red Line buzzed. Arik picked up the receiver.
“This is Captain Kitty Natalie, the officer on duty. What can I do for you, sir?”
“Please connect me to Mossad Director Cornfield,” Arik said dryly.
He heard the odd sound of the ‘Anemone’ secured phone synchronizing, immediately followed by Cornfield’s familiar bass voice.
“I’m at a crappy concert,” he heard Cornfield whispering into his Chameleon phone. “Is this urgent?”
“Yes. It’s Arik Bar-Nathan. I’m calling you from Paris. It’s highly urgent!”
“Hold on, it’ll take me a few minutes to get out of here with my prosthetic and my limp. I’ll be right back,” the Mossad director sighed.
A few minutes later, Arik heard Cornfield breathing heavily into the phone. “What was so urgent?”
“Ben-Ami, I’m sorry for interrupting you in the middle of a concert,” Arik apologized. “I’m asking that you go to your car and talk to me through the encrypted ‘Anemone’ system. Call me back at the Paris bureau. I’m in Haya’s room. I can’t talk to you on a regular cell phone line.”
Cornfield called him back a few minutes later, all enraged and impatient.
“This really better be important!” he grumbled.
“I have a request from the former head of the French intelligence service’s Special Operations Division. He’s asking that we fund scholarships for his family and establish a sustenance fund for his wife, too.” Knowing Cornfield, Arik began at the end.
“In return for what?” Cornfield asked, unfamiliar with the condemned man’s history.
“This is Brigadier Eddy Constantine we’re talking about, formerly head of the DGSE’s operations administration. Apparently, the government salary wasn’t enough for him, and he made illicit deals with international finance corporations, as well as corrupt leaders, thus supplementing his income,” Arik explained. “He sparked our interest because we discovered he was mediating between the Iranians and the minister of defense for Chad, which is a major uranium exporter. They concealed yellowcake material for the Iranians near the airport until the IAEA’s7 inspectors leave Iran.”
Cornfield was beginning to lose patience. “I don’t understand anything! What’s ‘yellowcake’? And what’s that weird acronym? And what’s it got to do with you? And what exactly am I supposed to do with this information?”
“Well, it’s a long story,” Arik said. “I suggest that tomorrow, you invite Dr. Alex Haimovitz, head of the Office’s Intelligence and Research Division, to your office, and he’ll explain it all for you. I’m sorry for dragging you out of the concert.”
“I’m actually glad I had an excuse to get out,” Cornfield said. “My wife is coercing me to be a good grandfather, to sit quietly next to her and listen to all these kids play horribly off-tune, watching the fake pleased expressions of parents and grandparents admiring their precious heirs and taking obsessive photos of them with their cell phones.”
“I just wanted to tell you that I already shook Eddy Constantine’s hand and gave him my word of honor,” Arik continued to explain. “In exchange, he’ll open the door to a quick operation that will give us a one-time opportunity to steal the cargo of yellowcake from the Iranians.”
“I don’t know what these cakes are or what they’re made of, but the very idea of screwing the Iranians over already appeals to me. You have my full support,” Cornfield said. “I need you here by my side. When are you coming back to work from this unpaid leave of absence you’ve taken?”
“At the moment, I have a personal issue, and I can’t go back yet. Eva fell down the hotel stairs this morning and was injured. We’re currently at the
hospital. I almost thought I was going to be returning her home in a casket,” Arik said. The meaning of the words suddenly sunk in and he felt his throat closing up.
“I don’t understand. When did all this happen? Weren’t you supposed to receive the Legion of Honor medal this morning?” A note of worry crept into Cornfield’s voice.
“I received the medal this morning. The incident with Eva took place later. But I don’t want to go into it now. The main thing is that my wife and our baby girl are out of danger. Eva underwent an emergency C-section on the way to the hospital.”
Cornfield’s silence indicated he grasped the gravity of the situation.
“What’s our timeline and latitude with the yellowcake affair?” Cornfield asked.
“Immediate,” Arik replied succinctly.
“Why?” Cornfield asked, not understanding the urgent timetable.
“Because at the moment, an attempted coup is taking place in Chad, and the parties who might seize control aren’t our friends. The guy opening the door for us will also expire within twenty-four hours.”
“Got it. Stay where you are. I’ll talk to the prime minister. I think he’ll be very pleased. Meanwhile, if Muhammad won’t go to the mountain, the mountain will come to Muhammad,” the Mossad director declared. “I need to make preparations. I’ll come see you in Paris tomorrow; you’ll be informed of the time. We’ll meet in the bureau head’s office. Do you need anything else?”
“I do. Bring along Alex, our intelligence guy, as well as Brigadier General Zvi Rouach, head of the Commando Division in IDF’s Operations Directorate.8 And maybe someone from Air Force Operations as well. I’ll see you tomorrow. I’m at the ICU at Georges Pompidou Hospital in Paris, 15th Arrondissement,” Arik said.
“I’ll go to Jerusalem this evening to update the prime minister and get an ‘okay’ for the operation. Is there anything else for which we need his approval?”
“It looks like we’ll have to squirrel away quite a hefty sum of cash in our coffers to pay the air transport company, as well as a few more hundreds of thousands of dollars for the mediators. I don’t want Ministry of Finance bureaucracy to slow us down,” Arik explained.