by Dick Wolf
“Hi, Colin,” she said.
“Jenny,” said Frank, recognizing the reporter with a knowing smile.
“The reporter becomes the story. How strange is it to be on that side of things, and I’m wondering if you think there might be a book somewhere in all this?”
Supportive laughter from the rest of the press corps.
Frank thought of a dozen pithy things to say and declined them all. “Here’s something I never thought I’d hear myself say, Jenny: no comment.”
The room erupted with laughter, even the mayor.
Chapter 20
Fisk himself arrived at the Grand Hyatt just as some of the reporters were filing out of the lobby, while others were doing video pickups just inside the revolving doors. He stepped to the side, flapping the wings of his jacket in an attempt to cool himself down. His shirt was damp down both sides. He billowed it, getting some cool air moving. He could not remove his jacket because he was carrying. He figured he would start to dry out just about in time to head back outside.
He rode the short escalator to reception and eyed the bank of elevators. Half of the expansive lobby was curtained off for renovations. He detoured into the gift shop for an apple or a banana, and true to form came out unwrapping a bar of chocolate instead.
He pulled out his phone to text Gersten, but then saw DeRosier and Patton at the same time they saw him. “Everything all right?” asked DeRosier.
“We’ll see. Right now just cleaning up a couple of questions. What floor?”
“Twenty-six. It’s one of the ones still being renovated. How you liking the heat?”
Fisk rolled his eyes. “How you liking the air-conditioning?”
DeRosier pressed the elevator call button. “Liking it just fine.”
They stepped into one of the elevators. Fisk pressed 26 and nothing happened. Patton swiped his key card and the elevator started to rise.
Mike DeRosier was shaved bald and broadly built, a former Boston University hockey star who had played three years in the AHL and Europe before letting go of that dream in order to pursue his backup plan in law enforcement.
Alan Patton was shorter than DeRosier, and further differentiated by a thick head of black hair marked by a thin stripe of silver flaring up from his widow’s peak, a “skunk stripe” he was unusually proud of.
Patton said, “Gersten’s in a great mood, by the way.”
Fisk smiled to himself. He played his part. “It’s not such a bad assignment.”
“Not for me,” said Patton. “Anyway, from Gersten I’m willing to put up with the attitude.” Patton turned to DeRosier. “She’s wearing the tan pants with no back pockets.”
Fisk watched them in the reflective gold doors. DeRosier nodded as the floor numbers rose. “Know them well.”
“I think I would pay twenty dollars to see her in yoga pants,” said Patton. “God, I love yoga pants.”
“Yeah?” said Fisk. “How many pairs you own?”
DeRosier laughed.
Patton said, “You know how Jeter gives his one-night stands autographed baseballs? If I were him, I’d endorse a line of yoga pants. Just set up a rack inside the door of my penthouse, hand them to the hotties as they walked in.”
DeRosier said, “You downward dog, you.”
The doors opened on 26. The hallway to the right was curtained off, collapsed scaffolding and paint cans stacked against the wall—the renovation discontinued for the time being.
They turned left. Two uniformed cops posted to the hallway quickly tucked away their personal phones.
Two adjoining rooms had been opened up and converted into a hospitality suite for the floor. A small buffet table was set to the left with coffee, croissants, soda, and mini designer cupcakes from the shop downstairs. A wall television was on, pundits talking over footage of The Six’s press conference.
“My god, I look like absolute shit!”
Fisk recognized flight attendant Maggie’s voice from the adjoining room. Then laughter from her fellow heroes. Fisk looked in and saw that they were watching a second television, either sitting or standing, drinking Diet Cokes, stirring tea, snacking on coffee cake.
Fisk got Gersten’s attention and she cut in front of the television, joining him in the first room. DeRosier and Patton lurked within earshot. She was indeed wearing the tan pants, her badge clipped to the belt loop.
“How we doing?” he asked.
She looked back through the door. “Unwinding,” she said. “Awaiting our next move.” She looked back to Fisk. “How you want to do this?”
He looked around. “This setup is fine as is. I’ll just speak to each one at a time. Keep it casual, relaxed. In and out.”
Patton said, “Ah, the old in-and-out.”
Gersten said, “You’re lucky you’re here now. I think once the fame bomb hits them, it’s full-on diva time. This thing is exploding. That press conference?”
Fisk said, “Caught some of it.”
“If it played half as big as it did in the room, we’re in for a busy weekend.”
Fisk pulled over two chairs. “I want to work on them in terms of no specifics, keeping everything general.”
“And,” she added, “I would be careful not to raise too many questions in their minds either, if you can help it. I know the mayor’s office is setting up some things, TV things, and they’re not pros. Last thing anybody wants is one of us stepping into the middle of an interview to cut them off.”
Fisk agreed. “One question each,” he said.
Patton’s phone rang. He stepped away, and DeRosier seized the opportunity to go off in search of Danish pastry.
Alone for the moment, Fisk said quietly, “You okay?”
“I’m fine,” she answered, rolling her eyes. “Momentary breakdown. I’m good. Whatever.” She nodded through the door. “Their excitement is a little contagious, I have to say.”
“Good. Oh—and Starsky and Hutch really like your choice of pants today.”
She rolled her eyes again. “Ass monkeys.”
Fisk shrugged. “They’re not wrong.”
She turned then and walked away into the adjoining suite, leaving him watching. He forced the smile from his face and switched off the television in the room so there would be no distractions.
Gersten brought him Maggie first. Fisk reintroduced himself and offered her the empty chair, himself remaining standing before the drawn window shade.
“One quick follow-up question,” he said. “We’re tying up loose ends and I’m wondering if you remember a Saudi Arabian businessman on the flight. He was seated in eight-H, window seat?” He watched her thinking. “Coffee-brown suit. Large, flat mole on the left edge of his jawbone.”
Maggie closed her eyes, visualizing the airplane’s interior. “I do . . . vaguely.” Her eyes opened. “Why, what do you want to know?”
Fisk shook his head. “Anything you got.”
“I didn’t serve him. For meal service, I worked economy.” She thought hard, struggling to give him something. “He was quiet . . .”
Fisk nodded. The last thing he wanted was for her to overreach, to invent something just so that she felt she was contributing. Just the facts, ma’am. “That’s fine. Great. Thank you.”
“Really?” Surprised, she stood. “That was easy.”
Fisk said, “I think, given what you went through yesterday, everything is going to seem easy for quite some time to come.”
Maggie liked the sound of that, and with a wink at Fisk, she returned to the adjoining room.
IKEA manager Sparks, retired auto parts dealer Aldrich, and cellist Nouvian all failed to remember the slim Arab in 8H. Reporter Frank believed he had stood behind him in line at the gate entrance, but could not give Fisk anything more than that the man carried his own neck pillow.
Fisk pushed it
with the journalist. “I’m wondering if you saw him with or near the hijacker at any time prior to boarding.”
Frank looked at the ceiling. Fisk had the feeling Frank wanted badly to be part of the investigation, out of professional curiosity. “No,” he said, disappointed with himself. “Sorry.”
“In fact I think I did.” Jenssen, the wounded Swede, answered that same question, while looking pensively at a long-armed floor lamp.
Fisk said, “At the gate?”
“In the business-class lounge at Arlanda Airport. To be honest, I don’t remember seeing him at all on the plane . . . but definitely in the lounge.” Jenssen swirled the tea in his nearly empty porcelain cup. “I remember I was waiting for hot water. Now that I think about it, I believe they spoke briefly at the courtesy counter.”
“They who?”
“The man in question and the hijacker.”
Fisk studied Jenssen. He liked the schoolteacher’s matter-of-factness. He could see that this man would not tolerate a hijacker taking control of his airplane any more than he would allow somebody to muscle in front of him in a line.
But this was important. Fisk wanted to give him a chance to varnish the story, just in case. He had to be sure. “Mr. Jenssen, are you positive?”
“I am, yes. I presume you are asking for a reason?”
Fisk nodded, allowing that, but did not elaborate. “Can you remember any other details? Try.”
Jenssen focused his eyes on the unlit lamp as though constructing an image and examining it. It was another thirty seconds before he spoke.
“Something about the way they stood together made me think they were related in some way. Or acquaintances at the very least. A lack of acknowledgment, I think. Like they were familiar. They had a shorthand.” He closed his eyes. “I believe the man in the brown suit showed the hijacker something in a magazine he was reading. Our flight was called right after that.” He opened his eyes and looked at Fisk with an expression that said, Anything else?
Fisk said, “How certain are you of what you just told me? Would you say fifty percent? Seventy-five percent? A hundred percent?”
“How certain I am of seeing those two men together in the departure lounge?” Jenssen said. “One hundred percent.”
Fisk nodded. “One last question. How’s the wrist?”
Jenssen smiled, looking down at his cast. “I’ll know in three to four weeks.”
Chapter 21
Baada Bin-Hezam had been to New York often enough to know that the quickest way into the city from Newark Airport was the New Jersey Transit train into Penn Station.
He had threaded his way through hundreds of people waiting outside customs for the passengers of SAS Flight 903. Some of them had carried cameras and microphones, which they had thrust at any of the exhausted people who gave the slightest indication that they would tolerate the intrusion. Bin-Hezam had not ducked their glare, but instead had strode through it like a busy professional whose plane had landed long overdue. No one was interested in a man of Arab descent.
One of the greeters had had a clutch of red Mylar balloons, each in the shape of a heart. He had been a conservatively dressed man, trying to hand them to the rescued passengers. Other celebrants had held signs, many under the mistaken belief that the flight attendant and five passengers who had overpowered the hijacker were still on Flight 903. They were there to give them a hero’s welcome.
NEVER FORGET!! 9/11/01
WE LOVE YOU!!!
THANK YOU, HEROES
USA USA USA
Bin-Hezam had avoided direct eye contact, making his way to the end of the crowd, while his peripheral vision had been carefully tuned to the telltale signals of police surveillance. A glance lingering too long . . . an ear bud . . . a sudden move as he had made his way to the escalator . . .
He had ridden the steep flight of mechanical stairs, up out of the melee to the arrivals hall. He had stepped off and proceeded to the tram that would shuttle him to the train station.
No one had been with him.
There had been a twenty-minute wait until the next scheduled train. He had found the lodging kiosk, a tilted bank of lighted square advertisements listing dozens of hotel selections. He had determined it best not to make lodging arrangements in advance. He wanted to shrink his electronic footprint down as small as possible. His only requirement had been that he sleep that night far from any established Muslim neighborhood.
He had selected the Hotel Indigo on West Twenty-eighth Street in Manhattan, a small boutique hotel tucked away in the middle of a block known as the center of the flower district.
Again, he had been unobtrusively vigilant during the train ride. He had disembarked at Penn Station, pausing for some minutes in a bookstore in order to allow his fellow passengers to filter through, then had headed for the street.
The summer heat had been instantly discomforting. He was unused to the humidity. To him, water and moisture symbolized relief, but on the island of Manhattan it was oppressive and a bit disorienting.
The hotel was just a three-block walk from Penn Station, but Bin-Hezam had traveled a roundabout way just in case. His luggage was not heavy, but anything that restricted mobility in the heat was a burden. When he was confident he had not been shadowed, he had headed for the hotel.
On Twenty-eighth Street, he had passed many open shop gates and idling flower trucks, the sweaty vendors working busily on the last day of the work week.
As well they should, Bin-Hezam had thought. Many memorial flowers would be needed before the end of this weekend.
Past a young Hispanic bellman inside the hotel’s chrome-and-glass doors, the clerk at the reception desk had been a young woman with dark ringlets and a false brightness that Bin-Hezam had found grating. A Jewess, of course. The neighborhood abutted the garment district, an old Zionist stronghold now flowing into Asian.
Bin-Hezam had masked his distaste, wiping his brow with a handkerchief and presenting himself for check-in. “I would like a suite for two nights, please,” he had said, in his refined British art dealer voice.
“Do you have a reservation?”
“I do not.”
“Because we are nearly full this weekend for the Fourth of July festivities.” She had smiled with nonsensical enthusiasm and clicked her computer keyboard in search of accommodations. “We have a junior penthouse suite available on the top floor,” she had said.
“That will be fine.”
“Wonderful,” she had enthused, as though by accepting her recommendation he had accomplished some great feat. “May I have a credit card and a driver’s license or other form of picture identification?”
“I will pay cash,” Bin-Hezam had said.
The girl had hesitated, having been thrown off her routine.
“Unless that is a problem?” Bin-Hezam had asked.
“No, of course not.” She had recaptured her smile, resuming her singsong voice. “The rate for the junior penthouse suite is eight hundred dollars. If you do not wish to leave a credit card, we do require a two-hundred-dollar cash deposit, which will be refunded—minus incidentals—to you upon your departure.”
Bin-Hezam had reached into the breast pocket of his rumpled but expensive brown suit jacket, retrieving a slim black leather billfold. He had selected sixteen crisp one-hundred-dollar bills and slid them inside his pale green Saudi Arabian passport, handing both to her.
She had smiled and counted the bills in front of him. In Manhattan, a foreign traveler bearing high denominations of U.S. currency was not at all unusual. “And the deposit?” she had asked, her voice inflecting the question mark.
“There will be no incidentals,” Bin-Hezam had said, offering her a tight smile that communicated his insistence.
She had hesitated again, looking into his tea-colored eyes—a greedy Jew, of course—then had set aside the alleged ho
tel policy without further complaint. “All right, Mr. Bin-Hezam. That will be fine.” She had counted out the sixteen hundred dollars again before depositing them into her under-counter tray. “Would you like to join our rewards program?”
“I decline.”
She had smiled and nodded. “No problem.” Another flourish of keystrokes and she had printed a receipt, returning Bin-Hezam’s passport to him. “Would you like one room key or two?” she asked.
“Just one.”
She had made the key and had slid it into a small folder, writing the room number on the outside. “Please enjoy your stay.”
Bin-Hezam had slept, something he had not counted on doing. He had budgeted his time for a lengthier detention in Bangor or at Newark. More questions. More computer checks. He was immune to any form of scrutiny.
He had been hours ahead of schedule. The sleep would sharpen him for the next day’s work. Insha’Allah it would all go this smoothly.
His room was so garish as to be painful to his soul, haute decor of a sort that reeked of competition among designers to prove who could combine the most outrageous colors in the most off-putting patterns. In this case, shades of purple with red counterpoints and aqua-blue details. He had looked out his window before drawing the shade, the lights of the city peaceful, unsuspecting.
Bin-Hezam had set his wheeled carry-on upon the luggage stand. He had drawn back the zipper but had not unpacked. He had gone into the bathroom, another assault of form versus function, and quickly had shed his clothes. He had hung the suit on a towel rod while he had showered, hoping to steam out the wrinkles and some of the perspiration.
Afterward, he had put on a light cotton dishdasha from his luggage and knelt to pray, seeking God’s blessing that he remain calm within this den of chaos. That he perform his duty with grace and cunning. And that he be brave at the end.
He had climbed into the bed. There, beneath the covers, Bin-Hezam had given himself over to a remembrance of the night he had been called to be. This had been his nightly routine while waiting for sleep to take him.