Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 130, No. 3 & 4. Whole No. 793 & 794, September/October 2007

by Donna Andrews

  Within a week, Michaleen Donahue was almost ready to move.

  “The CV-6 Russian half-track,” he reported to Morgan, “is hidden under a camo tarp about five miles from the prison. The Hummers are concealed nearby; we got lucky and stole one of them from the Marines down near Ghazni, so we saved a nice piece of change there. The launchers and rockets are stowed in a house on the outskirts. The K-2 explosives are stashed in another house not far away. All weapons and ammo, including the flamethrower, are at a third location convenient to the other two. And I’ve got personnel all over the bloody city, paid and waiting to be summoned.”

  “What kind of men have we got?” Morgan asked.

  “Good men, the lot of them. Three have relatives in the prison that they’re going to try and spring. Those are Afghanis, of course. Then,” he began to count on his fingers, “I’ve got two of me own Irish lads from Belfast; two Aussies who’ve worked together as a team for twelve years; a couple of real killers from Tajikistan who deserted the Russian army; a Pakistani, and two Turks.”

  “Turks, good.” Morgan nodded. “I’ll fight with Turks any day.”

  “I feel the same way,” Donahue agreed. “We’ll put them on the Hummers with ourselves.”

  “Right. Inside help?”

  “Two guards have been bribed. They’ll see to it that the Block One prisoners will be let into the courtyard for exercise ten minutes after our mechanized force breaks cover and heads for the prison. All the men will be armed before daybreak and rendevous at two separate locations to be picked up by the Hummers. The K-2 will have been placed on each side of the main gate during the night; I’ll carry one igniter switch and one of my Irish lads will have the other one in the second Hummer. Launcher gunners and their rockets will be in slit trenches fifty yards away on each side; they’ll take out the gun turrets. The flamethrower man will be on the half-track.” Donahue lighted a fat Cuban cigar. “All’s left is for us to set a time.”

  “You said we had money left?”

  “Sure. What we saved by stealing one of the Hummers. What d’you need?”

  “I’m thinking some kind of diversion on the side of town farthest from the prison, to distract the civilian law and the local army garrison.”

  “Good idea. Let’s see what we can find here...” Donahue unrolled on his desk a map of the city and began tracing it with one tobacco-stained finger. “Over here we have a sugar-beet plant and a few food-processing and canning factories. There’s a rather large woolen mill here. At this point here, farther out, there’s an industrial district with some metalworking shops, a lumber mill, a number of woodworking businesses—”

  “How big’s the lumber mill?”

  “It’s quite a good size.”

  “Let’s set it on fire.”

  Donahue frowned. “All the wood’s pretty dry this time of year. The place’ll go up like a tinderbox. Could spread and burn down a couple square miles of the city. Including a lot of homes.”

  “Too bad,” Morgan said. “I don’t owe these people anything. Let’s set it on fire.”

  Donahue shrugged. “All right. It’s your call.”

  Morgan could tell that the idea didn’t sit well with Donahue. But it wasn’t Donahue’s brother in Pul-e-Charki. “Can you get somebody to do it?” he asked.

  “Sure,” the big Irishman said quietly. “I know a couple of Iranian thugs who’ll do anything for a laugh.”

  “Okay. Set that up and then we’ll decide on a time.”

  As Morgan started to leave, Donahue said, “Incidentally...”

  Morgan stopped. “What?”

  “One of my lads saw you in a restaurant with that radio woman, Liban Adnan.”

  “Yeah. She’s been after me to do an interview on mercenaries. I’m just stringing her along.”

  “Well, you might want to be extra careful with her. She’s a police informant.”

  That night, walking arm in arm back to Lee’s apartment after a late dinner, Morgan was trying to decide how to kill her.

  Breaking her neck was probably the best way; it was quick, quiet. And with the difference in their size and weight, it would be easy enough.

  But he hated like hell to do it.

  During the past week they had been developing — something; Morgan wasn’t quite sure what. Ever since they had sat in the shadows on the back steps of her building and he had told her about himself and Virgil, and she had ended up with her head on his shoulder, they had both begun feeling — something.

  It had started with casual touching, quick, spontaneous hugs, brief kisses on the cheeks, then the lips, lightly at first, barely, then longer, more serious, urgent.

  “What are we doing?” she had asked just the previous night. They had stepped into the doorway of a shop to get out of a sudden downpour. She had come into his embrace, her arms crossing behind his neck, her lips and body hungry. And then: “What are we doing?”

  “I don’t know,” Morgan said. “Are we falling in love?”

  Then it was her turn to say, “I don’t know.”

  “I’ve never had feelings like this before—”

  “Nor I—”

  “It’s a crazy thing to have happen—”

  “I know. It’s insane—”

  “With what’s going on and all. It’s not rational—”

  “No, not rational at all—”

  Still, they had kissed some more, and when the rain stopped they had walked with their arms around each other back to her apartment. But she would not let him come in.

  “Wait, Morgan, please. Until tomorrow night. Let’s give ourselves a night to think about this.”

  “I don’t have to think about it. I want you.”

  “And I want you—”

  “Then let’s go inside.” Gently he took her arm.

  “Please, Morgan. Not tonight. Today is Friday. There is a khutba tonight. A special congregational prayer. I want to go to it. To see if perhaps there will be a message in it for me. For us.”

  “I don’t understand,” Morgan said, confused. “I thought you walked away from all that. I thought you were liberated.”

  “I am. But I still have my own beliefs. So, please. Wait. Until tomorrow night.”

  So Morgan had waited.

  And later that night Donahue had told him she was a police informant.

  Now tomorrow night had come. And instead of thinking about making love to this pretty, sad-eyed, anxious young Afghani woman, Morgan was thinking about how to kill her.

  At Lee’s apartment, she led Morgan into her tiny bedroom and lighted ivory votives in each corner that threw enough flickering yellow light to illuminate a bed made up with pristine white satin hemmed in puce, stitched with gold thread.

  “This is our bridal bed,” Lee said softly. “At the khutba last night, the message I got was to follow my heart. That is what I will do.” She touched Morgan’s cheek. “You undress while I prepare our bath.”

  “Our bath?”

  “Yes. Before we make love, we must cleanse ourselves together.”

  At that moment, Morgan desired her with an intensity he had never imagined he could feel. Through the open door to the bathroom, he watched as she ran water into a large old sunken family tub made of blue tiles. Then she began to undress. As did he.

  When they stood naked in the now steamy little bathroom, Lee opened a basket and from it sprinkled small red, yellow, and white flowers onto the surface of the bathwater.

  “These are wild honisoukes,” she said. “You Westerners call them honeysuckles.”

  They got into the tub together.

  All thoughts of killing her left Morgan’s mind.

  “Everything’s ready when you are, lad,” Donahue told Morgan the next day. “The two Iranians are straining on their leash to torch the lumber mill, God forgive us. All the men, weapons, and vehicles are in place, and we’re locked and loaded. We just need to give our two inside men one day’s notice.”

  Morgan nodded. “I’ll se
t up our exit with Benny Cone. His Kabul contact said he’s flying in with a load of hijacked cigarettes tomorrow at noon.” Pausing a beat, he then added, “And just so you know, I’ll be taking Liban Adnan with Virgil and me when we go.”

  Donahue’s ruddy Irish face darkened in a scowl. “How much does she know? And don’t lie to me, Morgan.”

  “She knows everything, except the day. And the lumber-mill fire.”

  “You bloody fool!”

  “Listen to me. It doesn’t matter. She’s on our side. I guarantee it.”

  “You guarantee it! Who the hell do you think you’re talking to! I warned you about her! We could be walking right into a trap, all of us!”

  “That won’t happen, Donny. Listen to me. I confronted her about being a police informant. She admitted that at times she had cooperated with certain police officials, but only in matters involving drug smugglers, slave traders of children, things like that. Listen, think about it. If she had informed on us, if the military or the prison authorities knew about the plan, they’d already have moved in. They wouldn’t wait until we launched our attack; they’d have to take casualties and structural damage that way. They could have taken us anytime without a fight. All they’d have to do is seize our weapons stockpile and we’d be out of business.” He stared down Donahue. “I’m telling you it’s all right, Donny. You have my word.”

  “I need more than your word to risk my life!” Donahue declared.

  They fell silent for a long moment. The little office was still as death, as if both of them had stopped breathing.

  “I didn’t have to tell you about her,” Morgan pointed out.

  “I know that.”

  “It should be easy enough for you to find out if there’s been a betrayal of any kind.”

  Donahue nodded brusquely. “I’ll do you the courtesy of checking it out. I’ll meet with the two guards I’ve paid off. If anything’s amiss, they’ll know it. And if they try to lie to me, I’ll know it.” He came over to Morgan and got square in his face. “If you’re wrong, lad, you’ll never have a chance to be right again.”

  It was as clear and cold a threat as Morgan Tenny had ever heard.

  On Sunday at noon, Morgan was back out at the cargo terminal of Kotubkhel Airport. He hung around the Customs area, staying well out of sight so that Moazzah, the agent who had let him into the country, would not see him. Benny Cone’s old Constellation touched down an hour late, at one o’clock, and awhile later Morgan saw him come into the terminal and loiter around Moazzah’s desk for a few minutes while passing along several parcels of bribery goods. There was a cafe in the passenger terminal next-door, and Morgan gave one of the shoeshine boys near the baggage kiosks a handful of Afghani dollars, equal to about one buck U.S., to take Benny a note he had prepared in advance, which read: MEET ME CAFE. TENNY.

  After watching to make sure the note was delivered, Morgan went over to the passenger terminal. It was a great anthill of people, long queues trying to check in at the counters of Ariana Afghan Airlines, which consisted of several old Air India airbuses repainted and being flown by Russian contract pilots. The only uncrowded counters were where the VIPs and others were checking in at UNHAS to board one of the modern daily United Nations Humanitarian Air Service jets that served Kabul. The terminal itself was filthy and stank of every imaginable odor; its air was infested with large, aggressive flies, and was smoke-filled by many passengers standing obliviously under No Smoking signs. Security guards, all of them in British Royal Air Force uniforms, stood everywhere, armed with H&K G3 automatic weapons.

  Morgan went into the grubby little cafe on the upper level, purchased a bottle of unchilled Fiji water, and found a small table in the back corner, away from pedestrian traffic. Awhile later, Benny Cone sauntered in, located him, and came over to sit down.

  “Well?” Benny asked. “Was I right?”

  “Right about what?”

  “About Kabul. Is it a shit hole or isn’t it?”

  “It’s a shit hole,” Morgan agreed.

  “Told you so.” The pilot tilted his head. “You ready to get out?”

  “I will be, day after tomorrow, Tuesday. Can you be on the ground ready to fly at four in the afternoon?”

  “I guess. Where to?”

  “Anywhere you can set us down without papers. Karachi, where we can get sea transportation, would be nice; Abu Dhabi, if the Emirates are open; Bahrain or anywhere in the Gulf of Oman. I’ll leave it up to you.”

  “Okay. You said us. Who’s us?”

  “Me, my brother Virgil, a woman, maybe Donahue, if I can talk him into it.”

  “Who’s the woman?”

  “An Afghani broadcast journalist. She’s clean but doesn’t have a passport.”

  “Who the hell does these days?” Benny grunted. “Baggage?”

  “Carry-ons, two or three personal weapons per man.”

  “What can you pay?”

  “What do you want?”

  “What I want is a hundred thousand per person, but what I’ll take is five per. Twenty thousand.”

  “Deal. Payment in the air?”

  “Deal.” Benny bobbed his chin at the bottle of water Morgan was drinking. “You shouldn’t be drinking that shit.”

  “Why? It’s Fiji water.”

  “It’s a Fiji water bottle, probably been refilled a dozen times from the tap.” He took a pewter flask from his inside pocket and passed it over. “Here, gargle and rinse your mouth out with this.”

  Morgan took a swig, rinsed, gargled, nearly choked, and spat it on the floor behind his chair. “Jesus!” he said. “What the hell is it, cyanide?”

  “You’re close. It’s Kazakhstan bootleg vodka. Tastes like hell, but it kills bacteria. I never leave home without it.” Benny rose. “I have to get back or Moazzah will piss his pants. He’s edgy today.” He took back his flask and held out a hand. “See you Tuesday.”

  “Tuesday,” Morgan said.

  Back in town, late in the afternoon, Morgan looked for Donahue at the Dingo Club.

  “He ain’t here, mate,” one of the Irishman’s cronies told him.

  “Know where I can find him?”

  “I do. But he don’t like to be bothered on Sunday afternoons.”

  “It’s important. He’ll want to see me.”

  The crony studied Morgan for a moment, then said, “You’ll find him at the Italian Embassy, out on Great Massoud Road.”

  Morgan frowned. “The Italian Embassy?”

  “That’s what I said, mate. But don’t expect him to be in a jolly mood. Like I told you, he don’t like to be bothered on Sunday afternoons.”

  Outside, Morgan found a dilapidated taxi whose driver, incredibly, knew exactly where the Italian Embassy was located. But what in hell, Morgan wondered, would Donahue be doing there? He was an Irish Free State national traveling on Swiss and Swedish passports, none of which had anything to do with Italy. Just what, Morgan puzzled, could the old Black Irishman be up to?

  When he got to the embassy grounds, Morgan found it to be casually guarded by several carabiniere wearing sidearms but without heavier weapons. He was courteously directed toward a small group of people congregating in a flowery ornamental garden near a small chapel. One of the people was Donahue, clean-shaven, wearing a starched white shirt, appearing unarmed, talking to two nuns. When he saw Morgan, he smiled, excused himself, and came over to him.

  “What the hell are you doing here?” he asked irritably. Morgan, seeing a priest join the two nuns and go into the chapel, quickly said, “Going to Mass. You?”

  “Well, I’m going to Mass too,” the Irishman growled. “But I didn’t expect to see you here.” He squinted suspiciously. “How’d you find the place anyway? It’s the only Catholic church in the whole of Afghanistan.”

  “Taxi driver told me.”

  “I’ve a feeling you’re lying.”

  Morgan shrugged. “Why would I lie?”

  “Well, tell me, then, Morgan Tenny, if you go t
o Mass, who will you pray to?”

  “The usual people. Jesus. Blessed Mother Mary—”

  “No, no,” Donahue challenged. “I mean, who specifically?”

  Morgan caught on quickly and outsmarted him. “St. Philomena,” he said confidently.

  “Ah,” said Donahue, surprised, a little chagrined. “The Patroness of Desperate Causes. A good choice.”

  Morgan tilted his head. “And you, Donny? Who do you pray to?”

  “Me?” The big Irishman shrugged. “I go straight to the top. Jesus himself. I used to pray to St. Michael the Archangel, you know, to protect me in battle. But he let me get shot by an Orangeman in Derry some years ago, so I dropped him. Now it’s between me and Jesus on the Cross. My best hope at this point is to get into purgatory.” He patted Morgan on the shoulder. “Yours too, I’d wager.”

  “I’m not even counting on purgatory,” Morgan said. “I expect to go directly to hell.” He put his own hand on Donahue’s shoulder. “And you will, too, Donny. Neither of us will ever see heaven.”

  From inside the chapel, chimes sounded. The two men fell in behind others and entered, dipped a fingertip in holy water, walked down the narrow center aisle, genuflected, made the sign of the cross, and entered a pew made of hardwood where they knelt and closed their eyes in prayer.

  There was nothing much different about them from the rest of the mixture of U.N. employees, Europeans, and Americans in the congregation, except for the few whispered words they exchanged upon entering.

  “Are we set?” Morgan had asked.

  “We’re set,” Donahue said.

  “Okay,” Morgan told him. “We go day after tomorrow.”

  “Tuesday?”

  “Tuesday. At noon.”

  Their killing schedule was on, now firmed up in the little Catholic chapel.

  Morgan spent all day Monday and Monday night with Lee.

  During the day they walked around, exploring the parts of the once-great city that were being rebuilt after being pillaged, looted, and desecrated first by Russian soldiers, then by Taliban officials, finally by rogue mercenaries from around the world.

  “Not all of it is the wreckage you see around you,” Lee told him. They were having a Western lunch at the new Marco Polo restaurant. All the patrons were Westerners, with not an Afghani to be seen. “I will show you something very beautiful that is still intact after four centuries.”