by John Case
But the food was delicious.
With the exception of Zero and Khalid, sipping tea at a table near the door, Wilson and Hakim were alone. Their party seemed to be the hotel’s only guests, though whether this was by accident or design was uncertain.
By now Wilson was not shocked by the arrival of the bottle of wine or the pleasure Hakim took in the ritual. Despite the Islamic ban on alcohol, the Arab liked to peruse the label, take a careful sniff of the cork when the waiter presented it, and judiciously taste the small splash of wine poured into his glass.
Hakim smacked his lips, nodded, and dismissed the waiter. He poured a glass for himself, then Wilson.
It was as if Hakim had read Wilson’s mind. Holding his glass up to the light, he sent the liquid into a slow, centrifugal spin. Finally, he took a sip. “I’m Takfiri,” he explained, his voice low and matter-of-fact. “You know this word?”
Wilson shook his head.
“It means that for us, the rules don’t matter. Wine, a girl, even pork – everything is allowed. Nothing is haram.”
“Sweet,” Wilson remarked.
Hakim ignored the sarcasm. “It’s not ‘sweet.’ Everything is different for us. It has to be.”
“Why?”
“Because we’re in a war,” he said, “and because we’re ‘behind the lines.’” Hakim said this as if he were explaining the obvious. “For us, sin is a kind of disguise.”
Wilson nodded.
“It makes me invisible,” Hakim said.
Wilson got it, but he didn’t buy it. After a week in Lebanon, it was obvious that the Arab knew how to enjoy himself, whatever the Koran might say about it. Their second night in Beirut, Hakim had gotten drunk in the bar of the St. Georges Hotel, eventually wandering off with an expensive-looking girl young enough to be his granddaughter. Was that an exercise in cover?
Either way, there was no denying Hakim’s commitment to “the cause,” and even to the plan at hand. However skeptical he may have been of working with an American, however doubtful he may have been that Wilson’s project would work, Hakim had come through on every promise. And why shouldn’t he? Wilson wondered. It wasn’t as if the Arab was doing it for shits and giggles. Once the two of them hooked up in Antwerp, Hakim would walk off with seventy percent of the take. So even if Wilson’s own operation went nowhere, the Arab would make a great deal of money. And Wilson would be taking all the risks.
Hakim drained his glass, then poured another. The waiter came and went in a blaze of smiles, distributing a mezze of small dishes around the table. Hakim swirled his wine, somehow managing to do so without ever seeming to move his hand.
“You haven’t said anything about Belgrade,” Hakim remarked.
Wilson shrugged. “Not much to tell. I did what I went to do. It snowed.”
“And then you came here.” It didn’t sound like a question, but it was.
“No,” Wilson told him, wondering how much the Arab knew. “First, I went to Lake Bled. Then I came here.”
“Lake Bled?”
“Slovenia.”
Nodding to himself, Hakim tore a chunk of pita in half and, using it as a scoop, slid a mound of baba ghanoush into his mouth. “And what’s in Slovenia?”
“A notebook.”
“Oh, yes, the famous ‘notebook’! Bo told me about it. You found it!?”
Wilson nodded. “I did. Many notebooks.”
Hakim smiled encouragingly, humoring the man across from him. He didn’t really understand what the American was up to. Bobojon had explained it to him months before, but none of it made much sense. The operation had something to do with this crazy scientist, Tesla, who’d been dead fifty years. Some lost books. A bomb that wasn’t a bomb. The way his nephew told it, the American was going to “stop the motor of the world.” Hakim laughed. The motor of the world!
“What’s so funny?” Wilson asked.
The Arab shook his head. “I was thinking of something else,” he lied. There was no point in insulting Wilson. Even if he was crazy, he’d been tested – and he’d passed. So he was a serious man and the important thing was to humor him, as a favor to Bobojon. Bobojon was doing serious work. And besides, Hakim needed help moving the hash. He paused. “I have good news for you!”
“What’s that?” Wilson asked, trying not to sound suspicious.
“Tomorrow you’re going to Tripoli.”
Wilson was puzzled. “Libya?”
Hakim shook his head. “Not that Tripoli,” he said. “This one’s in Lebanon, fifty miles north of Beirut. It’s the main port. Everything goes through there. Molasses, too.”
Wilson’s annoyance vanished.
“I’ve arranged a car. You’ll leave in the morning.”
“What about them?” Wilson lifted his chin in the direction of his babysitters.
Hakim turned in his seat and waved to the boys, whose faces lit up in smiles. “They go where the cans go.”
“And after the cans?”
“They go everywhere.”
Pushing a wedge of pita into a soft dune of hummus, Wilson brought it up to his mouth. “And once I’m in Tripoli, how do I find the ship?”
“No problem,” Hakim told him. “It’s in the port. Turkish flag. More rust than paint. The Marmara Queen.”
“And they’re expecting me?”
Hakim shrugged. “They’re expecting ‘the shipping agent’ for Aswan Exports. That’s you. It’s your molasses.”
“What about visas?”
“You won’t need any. Belov will meet you on the docks in Odessa. It’s all arranged. He’ll walk you through.”
Wilson frowned.
“What?” Hakim asked.
“I was thinking about Belov,” Wilson said. “Why doesn’t he rip me off? Just take the product, and walk away?”
“He won’t do that,” Hakim told him.
“Why not? Who’s going to stop him, Zero and Khalid?”
“Maybe not, but … I wouldn’t underestimate them,” Hakim said. “They’re good boys.”
Wilson chuckled ruefully. “You realize I don’t know shit about guns, right?”
Hakim shrugged. “So what? We do a lot of business with Belov,” Hakim said. “He won’t try to cheat us. It wouldn’t be smart. And Belov’s very smart. He’s Russian, but he works out of Sharjah. So we have a little influence. His planes are there, and he has a couple of warehouses. It’s a good place for him. He won’t risk that. Not for something like this.” He brought the tips of his thumb and forefinger almost together. “Anyway, if I’m wrong, you’ll be the first to know.”
“That’s what worries me.”
Hakim smiled, then popped an olive into his mouth, worked it around, and spat the pit onto the floor. “I’m going out of town for a few days,” he announced. “So maybe you’ll get to Antwerp first. Either way, get a room at De Witte Lelie Hotel. Can you remember that? ‘The white lily.’ Like the flower.”
Wilson nodded. “Then what?”
“When I get there, we’ll go to the diamond exchange. You and me. There’s a Jew we do business with.” He closed his eyes and shook his head, then opened his eyes again. “He’ll take the diamonds, arrange the wire transfers. As we discussed: It’s seventy-thirty. You get the thirty. After that? You’re on your own.”
Wilson forked a chunk of lamb kebab into his mouth, and savored it on his tongue. “What about Bo?”
Hakim looked puzzled. “What about him?”
“Will he be there?”
“Of course not.”
“Why not?” Wilson asked.
“He does special work. Even I don’t see him.”
Wilson dipped a chunk of pita into a dish of gray puree, and brought it up to his mouth. “What is this stuff?”
“Lamb tartare.”
Wilson set the bread aside. “What does ‘special work’ mean?”
Hakim considered the question. Finally, he smiled and said, “My nephew, he’s good with computers. So he helps us with communicatio
ns.”
“How?”
The Arab sipped his wine, then carefully set the glass on the table. Folding his hands in his lap, he said, “Let me give you a bit of advice.”
Wilson raised his chin.
“We’re in business together,” Hakim told him. “You and me and Bobojon. Which is good. But you’re not one of us. And the way things work, it’s better if you’re not too curious. People get nervous. I get nervous. And that could be bad for you.” When Wilson said nothing, the Arab sat back in his seat and frowned. “Tell me something. Why are you doing this?”
Wilson rolled his eyes in a way that said, It’s complicated.
Hakim wagged a finger at him. “You know what I think? I think you’re an intellectual.”
Wilson grinned. “I’m an engineer,” he said. “It’s not the same.”
“Of course, but … when you were in prison, my nephew says that you were reading – always, you were reading. He says you read Qutb. Is that true?”
“Yeah.”
“Which book?”
“Milestones.”
The Arab nodded to himself. “What did you think?”
Wilson pursed his lips. Until he was hanged by Egypt’s Nasser, Sayyid Qutb was a revolutionary who preached a return to Islamic purity and the overthrow of corrupt Arab regimes. More than anyone else, his views had shaped the thinking of people like Osama bin-Laden. “I think Qutb is fine,” Wilson told him, “if you’re an Arab.”
“And if you’re not?”
“If you’re not, you need to look for someone else.”
“I couldn’t agree more,” Hakim exclaimed. “To each his own! So what about you? If not Qutb, who?”
Wilson shrugged.
“Bobojon said you have Indian blood,” Hakim persisted.
Wilson said nothing.
“Forgive me,” Hakim said. “I know nothing about Indians. Just the old movies.” He paused. “But tell me, does your tribe have anyone like Qutb?”
“My ‘tribe’?” Wilson repeated. “No, ‘my tribe’ doesn’t have anyone like Qutb. No tracts, no pamphlets, no Fiery Flying Rolls.”
Hakim laughed. “Then what? What do you have?”
“Laments.”
“Laments?”
Wilson nodded. “Yeah, there’s a lot of sad songs.”
“That’s it?”
“No,” he said. “We have the Ghost Dance.”
Hakim laughed, and poured each of them another glass of wine. “Sad songs and dances! What a people!”
The Arab’s sarcasm struck a nerve. But even as the adrenaline curled through Wilson’s chest, his features remained as neutral as a sundial. After a moment, he said, “I didn’t know my parents. I grew up in foster homes. So I didn’t have any history – none that I knew, anyway. Someone said I was Indian, and I looked Indian. But it never meant anything. The first time I heard about the Ghost Dance, I was just a kid. I was in the dentist’s office, and there was an article in a magazine.”
“Yes?” Hakim looked confused, perhaps a little drunk.
“It was just an article. And pictures of a man they called Wovoka. He was all tricked out in a ghost shirt, with stars and moons on it.”
Hakim frowned. He had no idea what the American was talking about. Ghosts?
Wilson continued: “It turned out, we had the same name. Not ‘Wovoka,’ but the same real name. I guess I kind of forgot about it, you know? Until later, when I went to prison. My second year in Supermax” – he laughed at the memory – “I’m sitting in my cell, watching the wall. And it hits me! This thing with the name – it’s no coincidence. It’s who I am. Literally! So it’s my past, my future. Everything.”
Hakim nodded absently. Wilson could see his confusion draining to boredom, the boredom to irritation. “What are you talking about?” Hakim glanced around for the waiter.
Wilson cocked his head. The Arab didn’t have a clue. And then he realized why. Hakim didn’t know his real name, or if he did, he’d forgotten it. To Hakim, he was “Frank d’Anconia” – and that was that. So there was no point in telling him about the other Jack Wilson. For Hakim, the coincidence didn’t exist.
Finally, Wilson said, “I’m talking about the Ghost Dance,” he said. “It’s what we have instead of Qutb.”
Hakim frowned. “But you haven’t told me what it is.”
Wilson leaned forward. “Wovoka … he had a vision. He saw the Indians begin to dance. By themselves, at first, and then with their ancestors. After a while, the earth shook and the dancers … well, in the vision, the dancers went into the sky. Just floated up. Then the earth swallowed everyone who was left. Which was the whites. All the Indians’ enemies. After that, the world began to heal.”
“To heal.”
“Yes. It went back to the way it was, the way it had been,” Wilson explained.
Hakim stared at him, blinking dully. Finally, he said, “I think you’ve had too much alcohol.”
Wilson took a deep breath. The fat bastard in front of him would never understand.
Then the Arab did something unexpected. With a wave of his hand, he brushed the conversation aside, and reached into the shoulder bag on the floor beside his seat. Removing a small black jewel box, he set it down upon the table, and pushed it toward Wilson. “This is for you,” he said, and lowering his head, touched his fingertips to his chest.
Wilson eyed the box. It was one of those velvet-covered cases used for wedding rings. “I didn’t know you cared.”
Hakim smiled. Open it, his eyes said.
For a moment, Wilson hesitated. Then he reached for the box and, prying it open, found a bloodred capsule in the silk niche that was meant for a ring. It wasn’t a vitamin.
Hakim chuckled. “Till death do us part.” Lifting the left side of his shirt collar, he offered a glimpse of an identical capsule taped to the collar’s underside, where a collar stay might have been.
Wilson stared at the capsule. “You think I’d take this?”
Hakim shrugged. “That’s up to you,” he said. “But if you’re caught, they’ll hurt you.”
Wilson closed the box, and put it in his pocket. “It’s painful?”
Hakim shook his head. “No. You see pictures from Jonestown? Afterward? Everybody’s smiling.”
Wilson leaned forward. “That was rictus. It’s different.”
Nine
Coast Road, Lebanon | February 19, 2005
THE CAR NOSED around a rotary out of Jounieh and angled off in the direction of a sign that pointed the way to Tripoli.
The driver was stern-faced and silent. Zero and Khalid, on the other hand, sat in the backseat talking animatedly and nonstop in Arabic. The language washed over Wilson like white noise, with only the occasional word or phrase in English to claim his attention. Okay! Fifty Cent! Viagra … them Knicks.
Zero and Khalid were there for his protection. Or so Hakim claimed. But Wilson knew better. Yes, they would protect him if someone tried to rip him off, but their main purpose was to make sure that he didn’t walk off with Hakim’s cut.
After a couple of hours jouncing up a decrepit highway, they entered the dusty outskirts of the port. They passed a derelict orchard, the weeds high between the evenly spaced trees, then a squatter’s village of brightly colored tents.
“Syrians.” Khalid sneered. “They take all the jobs.”
The Syrian encampment gave way to apartment blocks that looked like mausoleums. The ground and buildings were the same dun color. Kids chased a soccer ball, kicking up clouds of dust. A woman in white robes swept with a broom.
From the backseat Zero spoke in a voice suddenly louder than it had been. Khalid laughed, a soft scoffing sound. He said, “No way.”
At the checkpoint leading to the docks, the driver flipped open a worn wallet and extracted a folded piece of paper, which he handed over for inspection. The guard perused it, carefully refolded it, and handed it back, giving some instructions.
They passed a couple of small freighter
s being unloaded by gantry cranes, then skirted a large structure that looked to be a drydock. And then, there it was: The Marmara Queen. The links that made up the anchor chain were as thick as Wilson’s wrists. It flew the Turkish flag, crescent and star bright white against the crimson background. As the driver pulled up in the shadow of its enormous bow, a mammoth crane swung out over the deck and began to lower a bright blue container.
“Look at the size of this thing,” Khalid said. “It’s bigger than a football pitch.” He nodded toward the blue container. “You think that’s ours?”
Wilson shrugged. He knew one thing for certain. Hakim had a lot of juice, so barring some major catastrophe, the container would be on board before they sailed.
Wilson’s job was to accompany the hash to Odessa, where he would exchange it for a consignment of arms. Wilson would then escort the shipment of arms to Africa where it would be traded for diamonds – which he would deliver to Hakim at the De Witte Lelie Hotel in Antwerp.
Which meant that he was a glorified mule. Just like the girls who ferried coke up from Colombia, he would be earning his fee by putting himself at risk. Each leg of the journey would be dangerous and the peril would escalate as the trip continued. Wilson understood that there were dozens of things that could go wrong, with the greatest exposure at the points of transaction. Until he turned over the diamonds to Hakim, his ass was on the line.
It was quite a résumé to compile in a short stretch of time: drug trafficker, arms dealer, gem smuggler. But the rewards were commensurate with the risks. If it wasn’t the safest way for someone with no funds to make a lot of money, but it was the fastest.
The ship was an odd sight, the huge deck holding as many as a hundred or more containers, different in color but each the size of a small cottage. About two thirds of the way between the prow and stern, the clean, white, many-windowed bridge hove into view, like a castle looking down on a shantytown.
The driver dismissed them with a curt nod, their signal to get out.
Zero and Khalid carried their well-worn backpacks, as well as the Diadora bags that held their weapons. Wilson’s wheeled suitcase seemed conspicuous as they crossed the ship’s gangway. He pushed in the handle and carried it by the strap.