The Guardian

by David Hosp

  The little girl’s mother came into view a moment later, and Cianna recognized Jenny, from the Old Colonial Projects – the girl she and Milo had saved from a drug-crazed rape-train in that dreary apartment two days before. She looked healthier, somehow. She was still skinny, but there was color in her face, and she was smiling. She had a nice smile, Cianna thought. Far nicer than she would have suspected.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Cianna said. ‘Sometimes I think I can do more good in the world right here in this little neighborhood.’

  She looked up again. Jenny and her little girl were passing out of view, but just before she lost sight of her, Cianna noticed Jenny looking behind her, giving a smile to someone behind them. Cianna’s heart sank, and a moment later, as she knew he would, Vin passed into view. He had two black eyes and a bandage on the nose she had broken with the butt of his gun. ‘I’ll think about it,’ she said with a heavy sigh.

  ‘That’s all I’m asking.’

  She lowered her head as the weight of the past two days came crashing down upon her. ‘Right now, I just want to rest.’

  Cianna turned her face to the sun on the walk back to her apartment. The air was crisp and clean, the way autumn gets in New England, when it seems like you could see forever out on the water if only you could get up high enough on the hills of South Boston. Notwithstanding what the calendars said, the fall always felt like the beginning of the year to Cianna. Children hurried off to school, excited to meet their new teachers and test the new kids; a fresh wave of college freshmen descended on the most over-Universitied city on the face of the planet; people came back from vacations tanned, rested, and ready to pick up their jobs with renewed vigor. For Cianna, an autumn day like this one usually held the promise of opportunity. Today, though, all she felt was loss.

  They walked along Columbia Avenue all the way around Pleasure Bay, down toward the southwesternmost end of South Boston, where the housing projects blended over into Dorchester, a town that had become even more renowned for its grit than Southie.

  They cut up Old Harbor Street and over a block to her apartment house. In days long ago it might have been referred to as a tenement house. Laundry hung from clotheslines sticking out from several windows, and the stairs creaked as they made their way up. She hadn’t asked Saunders to come to her apartment, at least not specifically, but Lawrence Ainsworth had instructed them to make themselves scarce for a few days. She assumed that meant together. Saunders clearly had the same notion.

  She wondered whether they would make love again. It had certainly been the most alive she’d felt in years when they’d been together the night before. But that was when the adrenaline was still flowing, and before the enormity of the events of the past days had truly set in. She decided she would let herself be carried along by whatever happened between the two of them for the moment. She no longer had the energy to try to direct events.

  The sound of the lock turning as she opened the door brought some comfort. It was familiar, and that was what she needed right now. She was desperate for a quiet moment to start digesting all that had happened.

  She took two steps into the apartment before she realized that something was wrong. An old wing-backed chair at the far side of the room was turned around at an awkward angle so that it was looking out onto the street, rather than back toward the rest of the room. She could see a head just over the top of the chair. She turned to warn Saunders, but never got the chance.

  A gun was pointed directly at her face.

  A man grabbed her and threw her against the wall, pulling her hands up high, palms down; kicking her legs out and apart as he frisked her. He seemed to be taking his time with it.

  She looked to her left briefly and saw that Saunders was getting the same treatment. A hand slapped at her face. ‘Eyes forward!’ a voice ordered.

  As the searching continued, the man sitting in the chair spoke. ‘Be careful with both of them. They are both exceptionally well-trained.’ The hands kept moving over her body. They found the gun tucked in her pocket and pulled it out. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see that they had taken Saunders’s gun and knife as well. After a moment the man was done and he stepped back. She remained facing the wall.

  ‘You may turn around,’ the voice from the chair said.

  She and Saunders turned slowly, keeping their backs to the wall. There were two men standing in front of them. They were both tall and powerfully built, with short hair and thin lips that looked like they would tear if a smile was forced onto them.

  The man in the chair stood up, still facing away. ‘You two are in a lot of trouble,’ he said. He turned. ‘And I am the only hope you have to make things right.’

  She didn’t recognize the man, but Saunders clearly did. His expression telegraphed his hatred. ‘Toney,’ he said. ‘I should have known.’

  The man nodded. ‘Yes, Jack. You should have.’

  CHAPTER FORTY-NINE

  Saunders’s mind was racing. The men with Toney were too big to be overpowered, and he had little doubt they had been warned to watch Saunders very closely. They never let their eyes leave his face.

  ‘Where is it?’ Toney asked.

  ‘What’s the matter? Government work not paying enough?’ Perhaps he could goad the man into making a mistake, Saunders thought.

  ‘The government pays me exactly what I need,’ Toney said, calmly. He walked over to Cianna. ‘I’m being rude,’ he said. ‘Ms Phelan, I presume? My name is Bill Toney. I am the Director of the National Security Agency.’

  ‘Wow,’ Cianna said flatly.

  ‘Indeed. I need to know where the Cloak of Mohammed is, and I need to know now. Do you understand?’

  ‘I’m not sure what you are talking about,’ Cianna replied.

  He stepped toward her, so close that she had to push her head back against the wall to prevent him from touching her. He was taller than her by several inches and he loomed over her, bending his neck so that his face was right in hers. ‘I don’t have time for these games,’ he said in a slow, menacing voice. ‘I need to know where it is, now.’

  ‘How much is Fasil paying you?’ Saunders asked. ‘Whatever it is, is it worth betraying your country for?’

  Toney kept staring at Cianna, though an angry smile crossed his lips. ‘You truly don’t understand anything that is happening here, do you Jack? It’s amazing that someone with your reputation for field skills could be this clueless.’ He still hadn’t looked directly at Saunders. ‘You see, Ms Phelan, while Mr Saunders may be charming, he is operating with less than perfect information. I am not the traitor, he is.’ Finally, Toney turned his head and looked at Saunders. ‘He just doesn’t know it yet.’

  The room was silent for a moment, and Saunders could hear a huge fly, sleepy from the gathering cold, banging off a window pane out in the tiny living room. ‘You’re lying,’ Cianna said. Saunders was glad she had said it before he’d had to. ‘He’s not working with Fasil. They have been trying to kill each other for the past two days.’

  ‘Yes, that’s true,’ Toney said. ‘He is not working with Fasil. But he is a traitor, nonetheless.’

  Saunders said nothing. He knew that Toney was trying to draw him out; trying to get a reaction out of him so that he could move him off balance. That’s when an interrogation subject gives up useful information. Saunders wouldn’t give Toney that satisfaction.

  ‘How is he a traitor, then?’ Cianna demanded. Saunders shot her a look, trying to signal her to stop talking; it was exactly what Toney was looking for.

  ‘Someone who works with a traitor is a traitor,’ Toney said. ‘Even if he doesn’t know it.’

  ‘Jack works with the CIA,’ Cianna said.

  Toney shook his head. ‘He was suspended two days ago. Didn’t he tell you?’ He looked back at her, and Saunders could see the shock in Cianna’s face. Toney laughed. ‘Of course not,’ he said.

  ‘He’s still working with them, though,’ she protested. Her voice was thin now, though. ‘I
know he is, I met his boss.’

  Toney’s expression went deadly serious. ‘Ainsworth?’ he demanded. ‘You met him? He was here?’

  ‘Yes,’ Cianna said quietly.

  ‘When?’

  ‘This morning.’ It was clear from her tone that she had lost all confidence. She looked over at Saunders and he could see the doubt in her eyes. ‘We gave him the Cloak,’ she said.

  The reaction was instantaneous. Toney whirled on Saunders, grabbing him by his shirt and pushing him up against the wall. Saunders was surprised at the man’s strength. He was taller than Saunders, but Saunders expected him to be skin and bones and ego, and nothing more. But Toney had real power in his body. ‘You fool!’ he yelled. ‘You gave the Cloak to Ainsworth?’

  Saunders kept his silence.

  ‘Where did he take it?’

  In spite of himself and all his training, Saunders couldn’t help responding. ‘He’s taking it back to its rightful owners. He’s taking it back to the mosque where it belongs, and to the people who have guarded it for hundreds of years.’

  Toney was shaking his head violently. ‘No, he’s not,’ he said. ‘He’s going to give the Cloak to Fasil. Don’t you understand that?’

  Saunders shook his head reflexively. ‘No, he’s not. Lawrence isn’t working with Fasil,’ Saunders said. ‘You are.’

  ‘No, I’m not, you fool!’ Toney said. ‘Ainsworth is working with Fasil. And if we don’t figure out a way to stop him, he will give the Cloak to the enemies of Afghanistan.’

  ‘That’s a lie.’

  ‘It’s not. Think about it, for Christ’s sake! Who knew where and when you were meeting Hassan Mustafa on the night he was killed down in Virginia?’

  ‘No one,’ Saunders said. ‘Just me.’

  ‘No? Only you and . . .?’

  Saunders blinked twice. ‘Me and Lawrence,’ he admitted.

  ‘And who gave you the information you needed to track down Charles Phelan?’

  ‘Ainsworth,’ Saunders said grudgingly. ‘But he got that information from the memory stick we took off the doctor during the raid in Alexandria.’

  Toney shook his head. ‘There was some useful information on the drive, but Phelan’s name wasn’t on it. If Ainsworth gave you his name, he had to have gotten it from somewhere else.’

  ‘You’re lying.’

  ‘Am I? Did he actually show you the data from the drive? Or did he just show you some dummy report he had thrown in a file?’

  Saunders didn’t answer. ‘Why would I trust you – you had me suspended from the Agency? You started all this.’

  ‘No. Ainsworth suspended you. And he did that so he could cut off all contact you had with anyone on the inside. Once you were on your own, the only way you could get any information was through him. And you let him know where you were every step of the way. Did you not notice that Fasil has been able to track your every move? How do you think that was possible?’

  ‘Lawrence was helping me.’ Saunders was beginning to wonder, though.

  ‘Was he?’ Toney shook his head. ‘Did he bring in anyone to actually help you? Or was he just following your progress so he would know if you got your hands on the Cloak?’

  The ground continued to slip away from Saunders, and he reached for anything that might allow him to keep his sanity. ‘You’re wrong,’ he said. ‘Ainsworth was working with the son of Mohmar Hazara. They have been trying to get the Cloak back to the mosque in Kandahar. Hazara was killed, but Lawrence is going to finish the mission.’

  ‘How do you know that Ainsworth was working with Hazara?’

  ‘Akhtar told me.’

  ‘Who told you?’ Toney demanded. ‘Think carefully. Was it Hazara himself, or was it just Ainsworth?’

  Saunders thought hard. ‘Hazara told us he was working with an American; someone in our intelligence branch, but he didn’t have a name. Ainsworth confirmed he was the one.’

  ‘So you never heard it directly from Hazara.’

  ‘No. He died before he had the chance to contact Ainsworth again.’

  Toney shook his head as though he was looking at one of the most pathetic souls he’d ever had to deal with. ‘You really believed it, didn’t you? You trusted Ainsworth that much.’

  ‘Of course I trust him. Why wouldn’t I? And for all your bullshit, you still haven’t given me any proof that Lawrence wasn’t working with Hazara. Why would I trust you more than him?’

  Toney let go of Saunders’s shirt and backed away a little bit. ‘I’m not asking you to trust me.’ He turned and walked across the room, over toward the closed door to the bedroom. He turned the doorknob and pushed the door in.

  There was a man there, visible only in silhouette, the sun streaming in behind him. Saunders squinted at the figure, trying to make out the features of the face. Then Akhtar Hazara stepped into the living room. Saunders felt the ground give way completely underneath him, and the sensation of falling was dizzying. ‘You died,’ Jack whispered. ‘We saw it.’

  ‘No,’ Akhtar replied. ‘Mr Toney’s men saved me. Jack, he is the contact I have been working with. He received my message last night, and was on the way to help us when Fasil was chasing us. I was lucky; his men were on the way to the tavern when they saw me crash on the street. I would have died, but his men engaged Fasil in a gunfight, and got me out of there.’

  ‘We thought . . .’ Saunders didn’t finish the sentence.

  ‘I do not know Mr Ainsworth, but I do believe Mr Toney. Mr Ainsworth is the one who is working with Fasil. Will you help us?’

  Saunders looked over at Cianna. She was standing there, gaping at Akhtar like he was a ghost. ‘How is it possible?’ she whispered.

  Saunders slid down the wall until he was sitting on the floor, his head in his hands. ‘Oh God,’ he said. ‘What have I done?’

  CHAPTER FIFTY

  The wind cut into Lawrence Ainsworth’s skin as he walked along the mountain trail. The trees had lost most of their leaves, and the evergreens that dominated the hillside below grew sparse as he climbed higher, approaching the tree-line. He’d hiked these trails a thousand times since he was a boy, and he felt a connection to the past as he moved along the mountainside – a past when the world was less complicated, and considerably less dangerous. People could say what they wanted about the Soviets, but at least they were relatively stable and predictable. They provided a steady wind against which those in his profession could set their sails. There was a tacit understanding of what the rules were back then, and a general comprehension that, ideology aside, both sides needed each other.

  Now all that was gone, and the United States sat rudderless in the water, assaulted from all sides by unpredictable gales that blew and died faster than anyone could predict. It could not go on this way, Ainsworth knew. The country could not survive it.

  The tiny schoolhouse was up ahead now, in a clearing near the top of the mountain. He looked down at the wooden box cradled under his arm. He hadn’t looked inside of it; hadn’t touched the sacred relic within. He cared little for such superstitions. His was a mission grounded in the cold hard facts of the real world.

  The door opened and Fasil stepped out. His gun was in his hand, gripped sure, pointed at the ground. His one remaining bodyguard came out and stood next to him. Sirus Stillwell was there as well, and as he exited and separated from the other two, he walked over and stood next to Ainsworth, facing Fasil.

  ‘You have the Cloak,’ Fasil said, nodding at the box under Ainsworth’s arm.

  ‘I do.’ Ainsworth stepped forward and held the box out. Fasil took it and set it on a stump near the front of the tiny building. Slowly he unlatched the top and opened it just enough to see inside. Then he closed the box back up and re-latched it, turned and handed it to his man.

  He looked back at Ainsworth. ‘The plane is still ready to get us back to my country?’

  Ainsworth nodded. ‘It will be at the airstrip at nine to take you to Canada. From there, I have a jet waiting. You wil
l leave this evening. I will come to get you. If I’m not here by nine o’clock, it means something has gone wrong, and you need to get moving.’

  Fasil nodded. ‘Good.’

  Ainsworth looked at Sirus. ‘You need to come with me.’

  ‘Yes sir,’ Sirus responded with a half-hearted salute. He looked at Fasil with distain, clearly glad to be rid of him.

  As Ainsworth turned and headed back down the trail, Sirus followed him. ‘Is there a problem?’ he asked.

  ‘I don’t know yet,’ Ainsworth said. ‘We’ll have to wait and see.’

  They were only twenty feet down the path when Fasil called after them. ‘Perhaps we shall meet again, Mr Ainsworth!’

  Ainsworth turned and looked at him, the hatred clear in his eyes. ‘If we ever meet again,’ he said, ‘I will kill you.’

  Fasil laughed derisively. ‘I have no doubt!’ he called.

  Ainsworth walked away. As he followed the path down from the mountain peak, it seemed as though the wind had never blown so cold.

  Saunders could hear Toney pacing as Jack stared out the window onto the narrow street in South Boston. ‘Did he say anything specific about how he was getting the Cloak out of the country?’ Toney was asking.

  Jack didn’t respond.

  ‘He said he had arranged for a plane,’ Cianna answered.

  ‘Did he say out of what airport?’ Toney asked.

  ‘No,’ Cianna said. ‘Not unless he told Jack.’

  Saunders could feel the eyes on him as he stood there, motionless. He shook his head without turning around. It felt as though his entire world had collapsed. Nothing made sense anymore.

  ‘Call down to Langley, and have them run a check to see whether Ainsworth used any of our people to arrange a flight,’ Toney ordered one of his men. ‘It’s a long shot, but it’s worth a try. In all likelihood he’s got someone to freelance. No records. The question is, where would he fly out of?’

  Saunders turned and looked at them. ‘It won’t be an airport.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘I know him.’