by Alex Archer
Yahya looked at him and was quiet for a moment. “Do you think it’s a treasure map?”
MacKenzie had to fight to keep from grinning. Yahya didn’t open up to many people, but when he did, he could get his feelings hurt easily. And hurting Yahya’s feelings could be dangerous. MacKenzie had seen the young man kill over the slightest affront. He didn’t think Yahya would ever try to kill him, or that the young man could if he tried, but he didn’t want to test either theory.
“No.”
“Why?”
“She has never referred to it as a map. Neither have the people who sent us here.”
“Do you think they would know?”
MacKenzie chose to give the impression he was giving that possibility some thought. “I do.”
“Or that they would tell us?”
“That would be another matter.”
Yahya shook his head, then slurped more of the thick soup. “It must lead to a treasure.”
“Why?”
“Nothing else would be so important. This man, Thabit—”
“Yahya, listen to me,” MacKenzie said in a low-pitched command.
The young man quieted at once.
“Never mention that name. It is a very dangerous name to use carelessly in public.”
After a moment, Yahya bowed his head. “Of course. I am sorry.” But his right hand was out of sight beneath the table’s edge. MacKenzie was certain there was a weapon curled up in those calloused fingers. Yahya didn’t react well to harsh tones or direct commands, and he always went on the defensive when criticized. If he’d tried to take up with someone else in MacKenzie’s line of work, he’d be dead already.
MacKenzie adopted a more casual tone. “I’m telling you this only for your own protection.”
Yahya nodded. “I understand.” But the hurt in his tone relayed that he really didn’t.
“I understand that you don’t trust the woman. You shouldn’t, and I don’t. But you should trust that you know what she is after, what she can do. She wants whatever secrets are in that scroll, and her mission isn’t done until she gets her hands on what she is missing.”
“As you say.” Yahya relaxed a little.
They sat quietly at the table and watched Annja Creed through the dirty window. If she knew they were watching, she ignored them.
A man entered the restaurant and stood in the doorway for a moment to acclimate his vision. He was dark enough to pass for a Moroccan, but his suit was expensive and European. He slipped off his sunglasses and glanced around the room until he saw MacKenzie.
The man’s gaze unsettled MacKenzie at once. He’d felt the same way when he’d found himself face-to-face with a cottonmouth in the swamplands as a kid.
Leaning back slightly, MacKenzie dropped his left hand to the pistol holstered at his hip under his shirt.
A moment later, the man approached the table and stopped just out of reach. He smiled politely. “Mr. MacKenzie.”
MacKenzie didn’t like that the man knew his name but he was in the dark about the man’s identity. “I don’t know you.”
“I was sent here to speak with you.”
“Who sent you?”
“Someone who would pay most handsomely for your time.”
MacKenzie picked up the hot tea he was drinking, thinking that he could throw it on the guy and keep from shooting him if possible. “I’m not interested.”
“You’re making a mistake.”
MacKenzie glared at him. “Go away.”
The affable smile disappeared like coke up an addict’s nose. “The person I work for could also have your life snuffed out in an instant for your insult.”
Shifting only a little, MacKenzie freed the pistol he carried and pointed it at the other. He hid all but the muzzle beneath his arm. “Not by you. You’ll be dead as soon as you give the order. If your boss has told you anything about me, he’s told you I don’t mind killing.”
The man’s sneer vanished completely at that point. Yahya also had his weapon trained on him and was searching around the room for anyone who might be in collusion. MacKenzie took pride in the young man’s skills.
“I was told to offer you twice what you’re being paid.”
MacKenzie grinned. “Why not make it three times that amount?”
The other hesitated a moment, then gave a short nod. “I was told that can be arranged.”
“Do you even know how much I’m being paid?” MacKenzie knew that if he tried to break his deal he’d never work for Sophie again. Business was business, but it often became personal.
A sigh escaped the man before he caught himself. “No.”
“Then go away.” MacKenzie waggled the pistol.
“I was told to get a definitive answer from you.”
“Would a bullet through the lung be definitive enough?”
Grimacing, the man turned and walked back the way he’d come.
Yahya watched him go. “He is not happy.”
“Neither am I.” MacKenzie kept his pistol hidden and didn’t put it away.
“He seemed very serious.”
“I believe he was.” Picking up the teacup again, MacKenzie sipped the hot liquid and added more sugar. His granny used to brew the tea and the sugar together, steep it as dark as soot, then add water to lighten it up. He hadn’t gotten tea like that since he’d left Alabama.
“Do you know who he works for?”
“Yes.”
“The one whose name you do not wish me to speak?”
“I believe so.”
Yahya considered that. “This is a very dangerous man, and you have just offended him.”
“He offended me first. Thinking I could be bought off.” MacKenzie smiled. “Besides, Yahya, a man who offers to buy you off after he’s tried to kill you isn’t sincere. Or trustworthy.”
“No, I suppose not.” Yahya studied the room. Then he looked back at Annja Creed on the other side of the window. “However, the lengths the man is willing to go to in order to get whatever Annja Creed is after makes me think it must be worth quite a lot.”
“Yes.”
Yahya folded his napkin. “I am curious as to how much it is worth. And if it is worth enough for us to consider retiring from the business we’re in after taking it.”
MacKenzie blew on his tea. “It’s something to consider.”
McLean, Virginia
THE PHONE VIBRATED against Brawley Hendricks’s chest and woke him from an uneasy slumber. He’d been having nightmares about Paul Gentry. They had been in the hospital awaiting the birth of Paul’s daughter, Jenny. Heather had suffered through a long and exhausting pregnancy that was about to pay off.
A middle-aged nurse with frizzy brown hair had stepped through the door of Heather’s room. “Agent Hendricks?”
Hendricks had stood, just as he had when Jenny had been born. “I’m Hendricks.” He knew her calling him “Agent” Hendricks was odd. The hospital hadn’t known he or Paul were with the CIA. The nurses had thought Hendricks was Paul’s father. Paul’s actual father had died in the first Gulf War.
“It’s time. Where’s the father?”
Hendricks looked around the room. Paul had been with him only the moment before, sitting in the chair next to Hendricks. But Paul wasn’t there now.
“I don’t know.” Hendricks had known something was wrong. Paul had never left Heather’s side during the delivery.
Someone called from inside the room and the nurse looked anxious. “You need to find him. Now.”
In the nightmare, Hendricks had started for the waiting room door, thinking he might find Paul in the hallway. But he’d known that Paul was dead in Algiers, his body waiting in a morgue while the State Department struggled to get through the red tape.
Hendricks shivered, then he realized it was the phone vibrating against his chest. He came fully awake and sat up in the darkness of his bedroom.
Caller ID showed Blocked—2:18 a.m.
Only one blocked caller could be reaching him on this line. He punched the answer button and held the handset to his ear. “Hendricks.” He didn’t worry about the line being secure. That made as much sense as wondering if he’d taken his last breath.
“Contact was made.”
The icy grip around his heart loosened slightly. He had known MacKenzie was forcing Thabit’s hand, and he’d been expecting contact. “Good.”
Sophie sounded the same as she always did even at this late hour. He’d always wondered how she’d managed that. “Evidently your target is getting antsy.”
“Because of your people?”
“No, because of whatever the woman is doing.”
“Do you know what that is?”
“No.”
Sitting on the edge of the bed in the darkness, Hendricks tried not to feel frustrated. He’d researched Annja Creed. Sophie had done the same thing. The woman was nothing more than she appeared to be—a television celebrity who had achieved some international recognition—but she should have been nothing to a man like Thabit.
“What happened?”
“One of your target’s men tried to bribe my agent.”
“And?”
“My agent turned the offer down. We’re pushing the ball back in your target’s corner. Let him make the first mistake.”
And what if he doesn’t make a mistake? What if he kills Annja Creed and your man? In the darkness, he could see the blood-covered nurse. “All right. Keep me apprised.”
“Of course.” Sophie hesitated. “Get some sleep, Brawley. You sound horrible.” She didn’t wait for a reply. The phone beeped as she disconnected.
Realizing he was thirsty and his throat was dry, Hendricks left his phone on the bed and went into the bathroom. He took down the small medicine cup he kept there and got a drink, doing it all in the dark because he knew where everything was.
As soon as his thirst was sated, though, the harsh, fierce anger over Paul’s death returned. He considered asking Sophie to bring in the Creed woman for her own protection, thinking maybe they could sweat out whatever knowledge she had of whatever it was that interested Thabit.
But he wasn’t sure they could manage that, either. Based on the information he had gathered about Annja Creed, the woman was quite capable of taking care of herself. For the moment, they had MacKenzie with her. Hendricks hoped that would be enough.
Chapter 20
Marrakech
Kingdom of Morocco
Even standing in the shadow of the building eaves, Annja felt the city heating up around her. It would only be a matter of hours before Marrakech was once more in full fever. Thankfully, the city was high in the Atlas Mountains.
As she leaned against the wall behind her and kept watch of the foot-and-vehicle traffic around her, Annja knew MacKenzie observed her from the small restaurant at the corner. She made certain she didn’t step out of his view because she didn’t want to worry him while she talked with Professor Khadija Zayd.
“How much do you know about Philip Gardiner and his service aboard the Spanish ships?” Khadija had a soft voice, but she was a direct person.
“Not much.” Annja referred to her journal and flipped through the notes she’d taken while talking to Ernest Woolcot. “I’ve been on the run and I haven’t actually been in the best place to research what I’ve found.”
“That may not be true.” The woman had a curious blend of Indian and British accents. “Philip Gardiner’s work caught the eye of a rather skilled Syrian historian, Dr. Ulker Bozdag. Have you heard of him?”
“No. Can you spell it?”
“Of course.”
Annja wrote the name down in her journal.
“I’m not surprised that you haven’t heard of him, Miss Creed.”
“Call me Annja, please.”
“If you were not interested in the caliphs immediately following Muhammad, you would never run across his name. Even at that, he would be hard to find. Bozdag was trained at Oxford in the 1960s and fell in love with pop culture. I have been told he loved the Beatles and favored esoterica bordering on conspiracy theory. Adored the notion of hidden puzzles lying about in history.”
“There appear to be no shortage of those kinds of puzzles. I’ve tripped across a few myself.”
“I think most of what people believe are puzzles are nothing more than events, people and objects that have been forgotten over the years. But in the case of the Middle East, the battles between Christian and Muslim forces have never been out of the international eye since the Crusades. And many people are interested in what happens there, and what has happened there. You’re familiar with the Battle of Bassorah, yes?”
“Yes. The Battle of the Camel. Muhammad’s widow Aisha rallied forces around her to chase down Uthman’s assassins.”
“So it is written in some histories. In other histories, Aisha was making her bid to control the caliphate by naming Muhammad’s true heir after Uthman’s death.”
“As I recall, that didn’t work out for her. Ali ibn Abd Munaf became the fourth caliph despite her protests. Ali let her live, but he banished her.”
“To Medina, yes. And she lived there for the rest of her life. Probably as a very bitter woman.”
“As one of Muhammad’s wives—”
“Purportedly his favorite.”
“—she had everything. Then she was left with nothing.”
“She was still referred to as the Mother of the Believers. But while Muhammad had been alive, she had led more of a life than women in that day could be expected to have. She was an expert politician and theologian. When she spoke, men listened. Then, with Muhammad’s death, all of that was lost. Except for one thing.”
Annja waited.
“Aisha still had the services of Abdelilah Karam, the historian. She died in 678. Did you pinpoint the time that Karam was in Morocco?”
“He was here at earliest in 698. There were gold coins with his body that were struck in 79 AH.”
“Twenty years after Aisha’s death.”
“Yes.”
“Interesting.”
“But what does any of this have to do with Bozdag?”
“You are familiar with the Yazidi?”
“Sure. Kurdish people living in the Mosul region in Iraq.”
“There are also groups of them living in Transcaucasla, Turkey, Armenia and Syria.”
“Syria. And Bozdag is from Syria.”
“So you see how this begins to come together,” Khadija said in amusement.
“I do.”
“Have you heard of the Melek Taus?”
Annja thought back, but even with her prodigious memory she couldn’t remember having heard the term before. “No.”
“I’d have been surprised if you had. The Melek Taus is also called the Order of the Peacock Angel. They also have another name, Shaytan, which is the same name the Koran has for Satan.”
“Living in Muslim countries, I’ll bet the order wasn’t popular.”
“No. And it still isn’t. They have a story about a jinn, a genie, named Iblis, who refused to acknowledge Adam as superior over him. In the Muslim belief, Iblis became the leader of the fallen angels, the Devil in Christian terms. Bozdag became fascinated by the Melek Taus while in London. One of the books he read was Secret Societies Yesterday and Toda
y. He was a young man at the time and was convinced that he’d found his calling in history. His university was not so enchanted as he was, and he was ultimately released from his contract. However, he had been traveling back and forth to Fes, Morocco, to continue his studies.”
Annja understood immediately. “The University of Al-Karaouine.”
“Exactly. The university there is one of the most influential areas of study in the Muslim world. So if anyone would have information on the Melek Taus, Bozdag felt certain that university would.”
“Does it?”
“No more than any other place, that I know of. And none of that ties directly into your search. But Bozdag does. He secured a teaching position at the university and worked there until he died in 1983. Some of the papers he left behind mention his follow-up work on Philip Gardiner’s investigation into Abdelilah Karam.”
“Bozdag couldn’t have found the scroll that was with Karam. That scroll was still buried.”
“No, but he did find another. This one was written by a young historian from Persia who claimed to have been learning his craft from Abdelilah Karam. That scroll, written by Allal Khaldun, was included in the papers kept at the university. Bozdag wrote a small monograph that underscored the thought that Philip Gardiner had been with the Barbary pirates and had gotten his Kufic scrolls from Morocco. Of course, at the time no one really cared.” Khadija was silent for a moment. “But if you can find papers written by Abdelilah Karam detailing events during the caliphate wars, this could be a spectacular discovery. The Battle of Bassorah divided the Muslim people, splitting them into the factions that have become known as the Sunnis and the Shiites.”
Annja burned with excitement. “Khadija, I really appreciate your time this morning.”
“Do not just appreciate my time.” The professor laughed. “You have made me most curious. When you have the story, please tell it to me. And if you ever find yourself in India someday, let me know. I would love to meet you.”
“I will.” Annja thanked the woman again and disconnected. She turned and walked back to the restaurant, hoping she could get her hands on the missing piece of the scroll.