Devil's Light, The

by North Patterson, Richard

  In the darkened bedroom, he could not see her face. “‘Here’?” she asked softly. “If you mean the world of Brooke and Anit, it’s a very seductive place.”

  “But?”

  “But that place must exist in a country. To believe that whatever person you may love is more important than anything is very American. And Americans think that anyone would be delighted to live here.”

  Brooke touched her arm. “But if there were peace for Israel—a true peace—could you?”

  For a time, Anit was quiet. “I love being with you,” she answered. “Right now, that’s all I know to say.”

  Her Israeli friend Meir remained a phantom in Brooke’s mind.

  Over Christmas, they busied themselves in the city—several plays, a concert by the Dixie Chicks, skating in Rockefeller Plaza, dinners with Ben and Aviva. But it was the last such dinner that settled in Brooke’s memory.

  The two couples had intently followed the peace negotiations at Camp David. As the prospects waned, so did Brooke’s hope—shared with Ben and Aviva—that Anit might consider staying. With shameless selfishness, Brooke weighed every new proposal on the scale of his own desires—that Israel yield sovereignty over the Temple Mount; that the Palestinians give up the claim to land in what was now Israel—relating all of them to his prospects with Anit. Unaware of his seesawing calculations of cause and effect, she remained skeptical throughout. “In the end,” Anit predicted, “Arafat can’t say yes. There’s no true greatness in him.”

  That night, Aviva and Ben had come late to Raoul’s, their smiles of greeting perfunctory. Anit caught this at once. “What has happened?” she asked them.

  Aviva glanced at Ben. “Camp David blew up,” she said flatly. “It’s done.”

  Anit closed her eyes. “Now our future is in the hands of settlers and jihadists.”

  In that moment, catching Ben’s look of compassion, Brooke sensed the beginning of their end.

  When Brooke awoke, the plane was gliding into Dulles. Images of Anit Rahal mingled with the residue of a three-scotch hangover.

  He had been here before. A few hours’ sleep and a shower was all it took.

  Getting off the plane, Brooke thought the airport oddly muted. Then he saw a crowd gathered around a video monitor, their faces stricken, their torsos tense and still. His first and terrible thought was that someone had shot the president.

  As he edged closer to the monitor, a woman turned from the screen, tears welling in her eyes. Glancing up, Brooke saw the face of Osama Bin Laden, and stopped where he was.

  Though his mouth moved, his voice in Arabic was muted, covered by a stilted translation into English. “Our plan is simple,” the voice said, “its implications profound. On September 11, the tenth anniversary of our strike against America, we will destroy one of your cities with a nuclear weapon.”

  On the screen, Bin Laden looked quietly commanding. “You have only one way to prevent this,” the voice continued. “To withdraw your forces from our lands, and cease your support of the entity known to blasphemers as Israel. Or else hundreds of thousands of your citizens will perish on impact, and that many more from the same poisonous sickness you inflicted on the Japanese. And yet that still will be as nothing to all the Muslims you have killed, and the further revenge we will exact from you in blood.”

  A woman beside Brooke moaned. Then, beneath the translation, he began to pick up Bin Laden’s voice in Arabic, the adamantine tone of a vengeful prophet. “The clash of civilizations is upon you,” he intoned, “and it will go on until the Hours.”

  For a moment, reason yielding to superstition, Brooke believed that Bin Laden was still alive.

  Then he grasped the global impact of a voice from beyond the grave.

  His cell phone rang. Even before answering, he knew it was Carter Grey. “I’m on my way,” Brooke snapped.

  PART THREE

  THE PROPOSAL

  Washington, D.C.—Kuwait—Iraq—Lebanon

  August–September 2011

  ONE

  On the drive to Langley, Brooke learned from NPR that Bin Laden had succeeded brilliantly. In the hours since his announcement, the Dow was down nine hundred points and some New Yorkers interviewed on the way to work said they would leave the city. By the time Brooke parked his car, the stock market was in freefall.

  Gathered in the director’s conference room were several members of the president’s task force, led by the national security advisor, Alex Coll. Representing the agency were Noah Brustein, Carter Grey, and the director himself, Carl Azzolino, a saturnine Washington insider selected for his political skills. When Brooke slipped into the room, Grey glanced up and then continued addressing Coll. “All of us should wonder why Bin Laden was thoughtful enough to pre-record a public warning, complete with date—”

  “What are you suggesting?” Coll interrupted.

  “That we consider what he’s accomplished.” Grey pointed at muted TV screens showing CNN and al Jazeera. “People in major cities aren’t showing up for work. Within days, we’ll be conducting searches at every major port, bringing commerce to a standstill.” Turning to Coll, he demanded, “Think about it, Alex. Bin Laden has demonstrated his supernatural powers without limiting al Qaeda’s options. The bomb could be anywhere, ready to destroy any major city in the West.”

  “Maybe so,” Coll retorted. “But if one of our cities disappears on September 11, dead or alive Bin Laden will be the most powerful man on earth. Americans will be paralyzed, waiting for the next city to disappear. They won’t believe in our government, our system of civil liberties, or even in our future as a democracy. No matter what, we have to keep that from happening.” Coll looked around the room. “Tonight, the president will try to reassure Americans that we can keep them safe. We cannot—absolutely cannot—refuse to believe Bin Laden.”

  On al Jazeera, Bin Laden reappeared, repeating his warning to America. “So what are you proposing?” Brustein asked.

  Coll glanced at Deputy Defense Secretary Joseph Farella. “First, we have to redirect our land, sea, and air defenses—dispersing troops along the border with Mexico and Canada, providing air cover for New York, Washington, and Los Angeles, and deploying nuclear search teams in major ports and cities.” He turned to Carl Hobbs of the FBI. “The bureau will exploit every source who can lead us to domestic terrorists; the CAA will restrict the use of private aircraft; ICE will stop all immigration; the coast guard will seize and search any suspicious craft. As for commercial shipping, Homeland Security will search every suspect container traceable to Pakistan or the Middle East, however ruinous that is to commerce. Preventing a nuclear disaster comes first.”

  Silent, Brooke recognized that the face of the country was already changing. “You mention air security over major cities,” Grey prodded. “Is there any?”

  Looking at Farella, Coll raised his eyebrows. “Not enough,” Farella conceded. “Private aviation is the black hole of national security. A small aircraft could deliver a nuclear weapon to any city in America—”

  “Including D.C.?” Grey interjected.

  “Especially D.C. In theory, we’ve got a fifteen-mile no-fly zone around the capital, enforced by surface-to-air missiles and jets at Andrews Air Force Base on a five-minute alert. But thousands of aircraft fly within fifteen miles of the White House—if one crosses the line going three hundred miles an hour, five minutes won’t cut it. Truth to tell, multiple planes fly over the capital every year, and we don’t spot half of them until it’s over.” Farella turned to Hobbs. “Right now, al Qaeda could turn the White House into the epicenter of a nuclear blast. The surest way to stop that is to catch the airplane on the ground. Or, better yet, find the bomb.”

  Plainly discomfited, Hobbs turned on Azzolino. “We don’t know that this weapon is even in the country. How are we going to find out?”

  Azzolino inclined his head toward Brustein. Crisply, Brustein said, “We’re training all our image and signals intelligence on major pathways to th
e U.S. Now that the threat is public, we can squeeze foreign intelligence agencies and sources for all potential leads. We’ll focus on the modes of transfer—foreign aircraft, airports, ships, and ports. Any possible means of moving the bomb—”

  “Toward America, I assume,” Coll interjected caustically. “We can’t be running off to Dubai, chasing down heroin smugglers in the Middle East.”

  Brooke reined in his anger. “Consult the map,” he said evenly. “There are only so many ways to move a bomb to the Gulf, and so many ports with shipping channels to America. Dubai is one. Next time a ship from Dubai shows up in New York, which happens to be tomorrow, you might want to take a look.”

  Despite the gravity of the moment, Grey permitted himself a smile. Stung, Coll told Brooke, “Karachi would be more likely—”

  “Only if you want to get caught,” Grey interrupted. “The Pakistani government actually functions in Karachi. I assume you’ve never been to the Makran coast.”

  Coll did not respond. Addressing Brustein, Brooke said, “There’s one other point I’d like to make.”

  “Go ahead.”

  Brooke faced Coll. “I appreciate all the pressure that’s building—from Congress, the media, and three hundred million frightened people. But so did Osama Bin Laden. He knew perfectly well the effect his threat would have—he could have scripted the lines for everyone in this room. So he also knew that, in some measurable degree, he’s reduced the chance of achieving his stated goal: the destruction of an American city on the tenth anniversary of 9/11.

  “That threat carries its own magic: the power to make all of us work to the brink of exhaustion, blaming each other for any prospective failure. The nightmare driving us all will be New York City or Washington in ashes, and maybe dying in the bargain—”

  “What’s your point?” Coll snapped.

  “You ask what the CIA can do. For a host of reasons, some political, we have only thirty-five hundred agents in the field—less than the number of meter maids in New York City. And now they’ll all be focused on America.” Brooke’s voice hardened. “Bin Laden didn’t jeopardize his plan because he thought we’d try to save ourselves by abandoning Israel and the Middle East. He warned us because whoever designed this plan isn’t targeting America at all. The heroin in Dubai was a decoy, and this announcement is the next one. Two weeks from now, al Qaeda will level a city in Israel or Europe. And we won’t have a clue until it happens.”

  Across the table, Coll leaned forward, closing the space between Brooke and himself. “The ‘magic’ of 9/11, as you call it, has a certain history—”

  “I know it well,” Brooke interrupted. “I saw the Twin Towers go down, and not on television. So you might say I take a personal interest—”

  “The towers went down,” Coll shot back, “because we ignored Bin Laden’s warnings and every scrap of intelligence that should have told us that he meant what he said. Three years before September 11, Bin Laden proclaimed that his mission from God was killing Americans. That same year, your agency called off an operation intended to kill Bin Laden—”

  “As I recall,” Grey put in, “the plan was more likely to kill a horde of civilians.”

  “At least they wouldn’t have been ours.” Coll produced a paper from his briefcase. “In May 2001, Richard Clarke sent an email to the person who then held my job, Condoleezza Rice, predicting that al Qaeda would attack us. Two hours ago, I reread it.” He paused, then quoted in a grave tone, “‘When these attacks occur, as they likely will, we will wonder what more we could have done to stop them.’”

  “We’ll wonder the same thing,” Brooke responded evenly, “when they blow up Tel Aviv.”

  Coll gave him a tight smile. “I can quote another of Clarke’s emails from memory. On September 4, he wrote Dr. Rice again, begging her to envision hundreds of Americans slaughtered in the next attack—the very one you witnessed. He concluded by saying that your agency had become ‘a hollow shell of words without deeds, waiting for the next big attack.’ “He turned to Brustein. “While your subordinates are talking about Lebanon and Dubai, I hope the CIA is focusing on Canada and Mexico, or the possibility they’ll fly this bomb from somewhere in Central America.”

  Brustein’s face darkened. “Bin Laden could read emails, too, and the ones you just read are public knowledge. The question is why he chose to make everyone in this room relive 9/11.”

  “Another question,” Coll retorted, “is how many millions of people now think he’s still alive.”

  Grey seemed to wince, perhaps from physical pain. “Half the world?” he said gruffly. “I’d love to know when he made that tape, or who may have told him to do it. For all we know it’s been in the can for years, waiting for some unknown genius to steal a Pakistani bomb, then air the image of a dead man to make us wet our collective pants.”

  “He should have died years ago,” Coll insisted. “We let him live too long, and now he’s back to haunt us.”

  On CNN, Brooke noted, the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee was solemnly addressing the camera. Judging from the closed captions at the bottom of the screen, he was promising to see to it that the responsible arms of government would keep America safe. “The agency will do its utmost,” Brustein told Coll. “That includes thinking clearly. The possibility of disinformation exists, and the points Carter and Brooke make are fair ones. Rather than try to shame them into silence, please consider the possibility that they’re the next Richard Clarke.”

  Coll hunched a little, as though feeling the weight of his responsibilities. As he gazed at the table, Brooke imagined this man staring into the abyss—a failure of will or judgment that led to a historic tragedy. “I understand,” he finally said. “But the legacy of 9/11 is the most catastrophic failure of intelligence in American history. And that will be as nothing after the destruction of Washington or New York.”

  “Or Israel,” Brooke insisted quietly.

  Coll stared at him fixedly. “It’s not that I don’t care. But we don’t bear the responsibility, or the blame, if Tel Aviv ceases to exist. That’s what the Mossad is for.”

  In the silence that followed, Brooke thought not of Bin Laden, a dead man, but of Amer Al Zaroor as he imagined him, and how deeply this meeting would amuse his adversary.

  TWO

  In the deep of night, the dhow lowered its auxiliary skiff, and a nameless crew member steered Al Zaroor and his cargo toward a desolate island off the coast of Kuwait.

  Nearing the beach, Al Zaroor saw the beam of a single flashlight. The crewman cut his motor, and the prow of the boat kissed the sand. The beam moved toward them. Al Zaroor tensed, his hand on the Luger wedged in his belt. Then the light traced a circle, and Al Zaroor stepped from the boat.

  “Allahu akbar,” a voice called out. God is great.

  Now Al Zaroor could see him in the moonlight. Stopping on the beach, he waited until the outlines of three other men appeared at their leader’s side. Quietly, the man said, “I am Omar Haj.”

  Stepping forward, Al Zaroor appraised him. “Haj” was a pseudonym. This man had brought it glory in Iraq; the smile that lit his bearded face did not extinguish the light in his eyes, the look of a fighter prepared to die. “How is it in the world?” Al Zaroor inquired drily. “I’ve been at sea.”

  Haj’s face became solemn. “The world is much changed. Osama has spoken. He lives, my friend.”

  Al Zaroor’s face showed nothing. Watching Haj’s men retrieve the cargo, he answered softly, “He will live for a thousand years. Tell me his words.”

  Haj answered in an undertone that bespoke awe and wonder. “We have a nuclear bomb, my brother. Osama has pledged to destroy an American city.”

  Al Zaroor repressed a smile. “And how was this received?”

  “Overnight, the Americans became rabbits. Their stock market is sinking, and panic is spreading. Neighbors inform on neighbors with brown skins.” Haj’s voice filled with rapture. “The veneer of power slips away. Soon Bin Laden wi
ll be their master.”

  “God is great indeed.” Even in his pleasure, Al Zaroor scanned the darkness that enveloped them. “What of this island?”

  “Failaka is almost deserted. You have chosen well.”

  And carefully, Al Zaroor thought. Once pretty and well inhabited, Failaka Island was a casualty of war, largely abandoned since Saddam had invaded Kuwait more than twenty years before. The Iraqis had moved the inhabitants to the mainland, then used their schools and homes and offices for target practice. Allied bombing of Iraqi positions completed the demolition. What remained was a virtual ghost town—cratered streets and abandoned buildings—lightly populated by Kuwaitis clustered miles from where they stood. “We should take cover,” Al Zaroor said simply.

  Nodding, Haj gave orders to his men. They lifted the crate, one man grunting with its weight, and began plodding inland through waves of sea grass. The sounds of the motorboat receded, headed for the unseen dhow; Al Zaroor and the bomb were in the hands of al Qaeda fighters who knew their role and nothing more. “No one comes here,” Haj assured Al Zaroor. “If they did, we’d kill them.”

  Ahead, Al Zaroor saw the shell of a building, perhaps an abandoned home. “Is our plan intact?”

  “Yes. In two nights’ time, we’ll smuggle your package by Zodiac boat into Iraq, landing near the harbor at Umm Qasr. A truck will wait there, sent by our Sunni brothers.”

  “You’re still certain they’re reliable?”

  “Yes. We’ve used them many times, for men and arms to kill our enemies. Even at the height of the American intrusion, they’ve had no problem: Our friends pay the police, the army, and the militia—Shia or Sunni.” He glanced at Al Zaroor. “As you anticipated, the American withdrawal has aided our cause. They hide in their bases as Iraq descends into chaos. As for the Jews, they have no assets here to speak of. We will leave you nearer your destination, wherever that may be.”