The Parnell Affair

by James, Seth

  “And which is it?” Tobias asked to humor him.

  The Ambassador shrugged.

  “Uh-huh,” Tobias said and wiped his face. “They didn't happen to mention Iraq trying to buy uranium from Niger, did they?”

  “Yes,” the Ambassador said. “Yellowcake. Iraq could not refine it. Is difficult. No facilities.”

  “They have documents to prove it,” Tobias said.

  “So they say,” the Ambassador said. “But I have not seen them.”

  “Just that silly report?” Tobias asked.

  “Why you come here and ask me, smart guy?” the Ambassador asked, smiling. “You smart guy, you already know.”

  “Not that smart,” Tobias said, trying to look sheepish with a gallon of his sweat between his ass and the wooden seat. It felt like prickly heat. “If I was smart, I'd have seen them already.”

  “Ah, that's what you want,” the Ambassador said. “Put more on there,” he said, indicating the ladle. Tobias complied; he was starting to feel light headed; never breathe shallowly in a sauna. “You want a leak of these documents. Would be interesting, I guess. You had a story on them before?”

  “Almost,” Tobias said. You don't have a copy of them, you son of a bitch.

  “Okay, I tell you this,” the Ambassador said, “and then you stop bothering a poor old man, huh? The IAEA has seen the originals. That Egyptian who runs it, he's a cagey bastard; he may have had them copied.”

  “You know the IAEA has seen them or you're guessing?” Tobias said.

  “I know,” the Ambassador said. “I was there. Now get the hell out of here.” He sat back and closed his eyes.

  “Thanks,” Tobias said. Everyone thinks he can talk anyway he pleases to a journalist.

  Relieved to be free of the sauna, Tobias wanted a moment to plan his next move.

  “Why not?” he said to himself and went to the ice-cold needle showers.

  “What the fuck is wrong with these people?” was heard by many a patron a moment later.

  Tobias contented himself by standing near the freezing fall of water, which was quite refreshing enough. A few snickers and an inappropriate offer to “help” and Tobias was done with the club but he'd had an idea.

  In a cab back to the UN, Tobias called his ME, Howard Lieter, and asked him to call the IAEA's office in the UN and see if its head—who would understandably attend any meetings concerning Iraq's supposed nuclear capabilities—would meet with Tobias when he had a spare second. Howard wasn't pleased and wanted his ace to return but had enough sense to see that the sooner Tobias found whatever it was he was looking for, the sooner he'd come back. Tobias knew it wouldn't take much to twist Abdel El Saada's arm (the head of the IAEA); the man was the opposite of camera shy.

  Outside the Public Lobby to the General Assembly, Tobias got the call: El Saada would use the Public Lobby and give any reporter there whatever time it took to pass within. More than Tobias needed: this was reconnaissance.

  El Saada, along with his staff, arrived an hour later and, not surprisingly, a swarm of reporters awaited him. Since Tobias had told no one, he assumed El Saada had. Tobias maneuvered into an intercept position and asked, as El Saada passed him, “Has the evidence presented concerning Iraq's nuclear capabilities convinced you of its existence?”

  Ever the diplomat, El Saada slowed his progress to answer: “All concerns of this sort must and are taken extremely serious. What I am convinced of is the need for more inspections to ascertain the full extent of the capabilities to which you allude.”

  Tobias barely heard his response; his attention was applied to his peripheral vision, taking in the faces of El Saada's staff and trying to both remember them and detect any signs of inner turmoil or discontent.

  A TV camera almost brained Tobias as it was hoisted above shoulder height and thrust—spotlight blazing—into El Saada's face. Tobias, half blind, elbowed his way out of the press and left to find breakfast. After a couple eggs, bacon—he thought that sleeping away from home was close enough to a vacation and so indulged—toast, and a couple cups of coffee, Tobias walked back from the little convenience store with a short order grill where he'd breakfasted; that is, after he'd bought a pack of cigarettes and a lighter.

  The UN grounds boast a couple of nice treed gardens, used primarily in the modern age as a place to take smoke breaks. Tobias, tapping the cigarette box against his palm, wandered around the likely spots. He wasn't sure into which building El Saada had taken his staff or if the Security Council was due to reconvene that day, so he kept manly between the buildings. The IAEA had their offices on UN grounds but whether El Saada's staff was using them or at a meeting, Tobias didn't know. At a quarter to eleven, he saw his mark come down from the Conference Building.

  Older than he should be considering his mode of dress, Tobias thought as he watched the man—probably in his thirties—wearing sneakers with his khakis and button-down shirt without a tie. The younger man had carried a laptop bag or something the same size during El Saada's entrance and the marks of its shoulder strap still creased his shirt. A tired looking pack of cigarettes yielded a slightly bent coffin nail, which the younger man tried halfheartedly to straighten.

  “Try one of these,” Tobias offered, coming around the tree the younger man employed to shield himself from the October wind.

  “Thanks,” the younger man said, taking a cigarette from the proffered pack with the easy familiarity all smokers feign.

  Tobias left a still burning cigarette in the side of his mouth; he'd learned the trick years ago of blowing just enough air up the cigarette to keep it lit so it would appear he smoked without actually taking a puff (inhaled or otherwise).

  “No problem. Tobias Hallström,” he said and then pursed his lips as if inhaling but only to buy a pause.

  “Hello, I'm Hafiz,” the younger man said.

  “The Washington Observer,” Tobias continued. Hafiz looked a little surprised but not interested. “You work with Abdel El Saada, don't you? I saw you come in with him.”

  “Yes. International Atomic Energy Agency,” Hofiz said, more focused on those first few puffs of life than the reporter.

  “What have you thought of the evidence the US Secretary of State presented?” Tobias asked.

  Hafiz shrugged. He seemed to smoke more quickly; maybe he didn’t like the cool fall air. “The Americans and British will start a war no matter what,” he said without emotion, looking at his cigarette.

  “Is that just the usual cynical outlook of the man in the know,” Tobias asked, “or did something turn up in the negotiations?”

  Hafiz shrugged again. Back to the shrugging, Tobias thought.

  “That's not much of an answer,” Tobias said.

  “I'm not supposed to talk about it,” Hafiz said with a sigh. His cigarette was nearly to the filter. He'd slowed down and looked disappointedly at it.

  “I talked to the Russian Ambassador,” Tobias said. “He said he hadn't seen the evidence of Iraq's nuclear program up close—but that the IAEA had. That true?”

  “Yes,” Hafiz said. He drew deeply on his cigarette, burning it down to the cotton filter. He exhaled a long stream of smoke and looked at the other cigarette butts at the tree's base. He added his and waved away another cigarette Tobias offered. “What do you think I can tell you? The Americans know they'll never get a war resolution. The evidence isn't strong enough. The Russians are against it, the Chinese are against it, even the French are against it. And the Americans know it,” he said, waking up enough to punctuate his last remark with pushing his face a little closer to Tobias. “That's why they're not trying very hard: they know their so-called evidence is weak.”

  If that's what you think, Tobias thought, why are you here? “They have one piece that's made quite a stir in this country,” he said. “The Niger documents.”

  Hafiz smiled wearily, shook his head.

  “Were they a part of what the IAEA was given?” Tobias asked, a thrill running up his back.

/>   “They were,” Hafiz said. “I don't think Dr. El Saada wants our official opinion made public, though.”

  “Off the record,” Tobias said.

  “What's that?” Hafiz asked.

  “Means this conversation is private,” Tobias said. “Nothing you tell me can show up in the paper. Not unless you change your mind. Or you can say it anonymously.”

  “Sources close to the investigation?” Hafiz said and chuckled silently. “What I've always wanted,” he said and looked over his shoulder. “Okay, anonymously: the Russians said they'd never vote yes on evidence they hadn't seen and questioned why the Americans hadn't shown us the Niger documents. So, they showed us but we were only allowed to look through the evidence with their people watching us. Some dour CIA agent, probably. But I saw the problem as soon as the documents were presented to me. The names of the people in charge of the mine where the yellowcake uranium was supposed to be mined appear on the documents, which are supposed to be in part the mine's letters: those names are of the current mine administrator and not that of the mine administrator who held the job in 1998, when the documents are said to have been written.”

  “Wait, what?” Tobias said, grinning all over his face. “The Niger docs are supposed to come from 1998 but the names are of the people running things now, in 2002?”

  “Exactly,” Hafiz said. “It took me three minutes to verify it on my laptop using Google. The Niger documents were forged. And stupidly forged.”

  Tobias stood with his mouth open; he looked foolish enough to elicit a chuckle from Hafiz. Anonymous sources within the IAEA declared the Niger documents forged, Tobias thought. He blinked back to reality. If you publish that, he told himself, along with the reason why the IAEA thinks so, the next time the Administration shows around the Niger docs, the names will be fixed and correct.

  “Does the IAEA have a copy of the Niger documents?” he asked.

  “Oh, that's what you want?” Hafiz said, mustering up a grin. “No, we were prevented even from taking notes.”

  “Does the US know what you think of the Niger docs?” Tobias asked, though in his mind he said: damn, damn, damn it.

  “They seemed a little surprised when Dr. El Saada repeated his request for more inspectors,” Hafiz said. He shrugged again. Tobias was beginning to wonder about that man's shoulder joints. “I have to return,” Hafiz said. Without a handshake or further acknowledgment, he turned and walked back to the Conference Building.

  “Thank you, Hafiz,” Tobias said quietly. He walked slowly around to the public entrance of General Assembly Hall. He thought: how the hell can I possibly confirm that? Hafiz could be pulling my leg, mistaken, or nuts. And why would El Saada keep back that his agency had evidence the Niger docs were forged? Tobias thought of calling Sally—unsuccessfully pretending to himself it was to ask advice—but knew she'd not want something this important said over the phone.

  In sight of the public entrance, Tobias could see cameras being carried in and what could only be TV reporters—by their dress—hurrying up the steps. Tobias hustled over and asked someone with credentials around his neck what was going on.

  “Going to reconvene for a vote,” the man said, somehow able to talk and chew gum simultaneously.

  “A little early, isn't it?” Tobias said. “It's only been a day.”

  Inside, cameras were being set upon tripods in little half circles every dozen meters, along the corridor that flanked the Security Council Chamber, in preparation for the after-resolution interviews. The ceremonial quality of TV news always reminded Tobias of a sporting event: remove the cameras to a similar hallway outside a locker room, exchange the politicians and diplomats for two teams of football players, the resolution for a score, and would the reporting change? The questions didn't: How did it go; are you happy with the result, your performance; do you feel you were prepared, what's next? Tobias hadn't much time for his internal indulgence of media rivalry: for some reason he had Heartbreaker running through his head. He thought he knew why—“Hey fellas, have you heard the news, you know Annie's back in town”—but he didn't. Some people call it psychic, some call it the subconscious perception of minutiae expressed in the only way the subconscious can: whatever, at one end of the hallway, talking on a cell phone, was Ms Dupree.

  You could tell her you think they're forged, he told himself as he weaved among the equipment and the people setting it up. Just don't tell her how obvious it is or she'll tell someone else and they'll fix it.

  She caught sight of Tobias walking toward her, grew more absent from her cell phone conversation as he approached, and then precipitously ended her call. Her eyes are telling tales, Tobias thought. He'd seen that look before—half mocking but vaguely interested—on the faces of many women who’d heard the rumors about him. Some would smile as a lord atop the battlements of an impenetrable castle, watching the investment of a meager army desperate to parlay. Others enjoyed their perceived proximity to sex, a mere “yes” away, and to inflicting rejection with a simple “no;” and so flitted about him like a moth near a flame, never ending the scene. The scene as they saw it.

  “Mr. Hallström,” she said, pirouetting across his name.

  “Ms Dupree,” he said and smiled. “Stuck waiting around like the rest of us, I see.”

  “I guess I am,” she conceded. “Resolutions always take time, particularly when they're this important.”

  “I don't doubt it,” he said. “Few have been as important. Its outcome will affect millions. But in the meantime,” he said, putting his hands in his pockets and leaning a shoulder against the wall, “we have nothing to do but chat in the hallways.”

  “I have a few other things I should do,” she said, smiling superciliously. But you're not doing them, he thought. “So, what brought you up here?” she asked. “Don't you usually cover Congress? That is, when you're not being a provocative investigative journalist,” she said, flashing her eyes teasingly.

  “Me?” he asked innocently. “I'm not really an investigative journalist. Just that once. Which I guess is what brought me up here. The Parnell affair; the Niger documents.”

  The tease dropped out of her eyes, thought she held it on her lips. You know they're forged, Tobias thought.

  “Someone really screwed up there,” she said. “Oh, that's, that's not an official State Department Opinion,” she said and took a step closer, coloring her features with sudden alarm.

  “I know; it's alright,” he said. “This isn't an interview; we're just talking. All off the record.”

  “Thank you,” she said and sighed. “Someone really did screw up there,” she repeated. “I mean, what were they thinking? What could they possibly gain by it?”

  “That's what I'd like to know,” he said. “Basically, we have the Administration on one side saying, 'the Niger docs prove Saddam has a WMD program' and Mrs. Parnell's camp on the other saying, 'they're wrong.' I was hoping to get a peek at the docs and see who had it right. Then I found out that the IAEA believes they're forged.”

  Her eyes widened—almost theatrically, Tobias thought—and her lips moved silently for a moment.

  She stepped closer still and in a whisper said, “You're wonderful! How could you have found that out so quickly? They only saw them for the first time yesterday.”

  “Well, I'd like to say it was the product of zeal and pluck and skill,” he said. “But really it was mostly luck.”

  “I don't believe that,” she said. “You're deeper in the circles of power in Washington than many of the elected politicians! I've seen Representatives cross the street just to shake your hand. I think,” she said, dropping her eyes and tucking a strand of hair behind her ear, “that no matter how high I might rise at State, I'll never know as much as the Tobias Hallströms of the world.”

  “I don't know about all that,” he said. “Right now I'm preoccupied by what I don't know. Such as why the IAEA thinks the Niger documents are forged.” He knew, no matter how pliant Ms Dupree suddenly seemed, he
couldn't risk revealing how he knew they were forged, couldn't risk them being fixed.

  “I wish I could tell you,” she said. “I really do; I think it would help the negotiations. Really, all the Secretary wants is inspectors. I can't confirm what the IAEA believes, by the way. I'm sorry. They didn't tell us why.”

  “Another reason I'd like to get a look at these things,” he said. “Or better yet, get a copy of them and take them to an expert who may be able to determine if they're forged.”

  “I wish there was some way I could help you,” she said breathlessly.

  “Help us both,” he said. “I could tell from the Secretary's presentation that he has his doubts.”

  “Yes, definitely,” she said.

  The way she looked into his eyes, he knew she wasn't thinking about WMD or inspectors anymore. Though he'd found romantic sentiment dwelling submerged in the most unlikely personalities before, it never ceased to amaze Tobias how quickly passion could overwhelm a woman once surprised. In the past, however, such a discovery was an opportunity for pleasure and indulgence: now, he'd need to use this advantage for ends entirely different from hers. It was using and thus distasteful, but Tobias consoled himself with the high aim of his endeavor as he played his next card.

  “Maybe I should talk to one of the INR guys,” he said. “Do you think any of them would be willing to let me see the Niger docs?”

  “Oh, I, I might be able to help you,” she said. “I'm just not sure if I'll have access to the documents. Let me check? I want to help you.”

  And so it's done, he thought. He asked her to call him that night, if she could, but instead of giving her his cell number, he told her his room number at The Palace. The rapid coloring of her cheeks quite convinced Tobias of the value she placed on such intelligence. She said she would try and then retreated, all but at a run, to the doors of the Security Council Chamber.

  The possibility that Ms Dupree would show up at his hotel room, sans Niger docs, with a bottle of wine and unmistakable air, only occurred to Tobias as he walked back to his hotel that afternoon. He forgot his growing appetite for dinner and called Sally. They talked generally about their days apart for a few minutes, lingering over what was not said. After a very pleasant silence, Tobias turned to the task at hand.