by Nick Louth
‘Why?’
‘No doubt the name Anwar al-Awlaki is known to you.’ It wasn’t a question. Wyrecliffe had already started to shepherd her to the lift.
‘Um.’ The name sounded familiar, but she couldn’t for the life of her recall who he was.
‘Awlaki is the leader of Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. He is also known as Abu Kadeer. Probably the most elusive and dangerous terrorist on the planet after Osama bin Laden himself. He is thought to have been the guiding spirit for the September 11 hijackers while they were in the US learning how to fly airliners. Did you realise Awlaki is the only American citizen in history for whom a US president had ever signed an official and public assassination order?’
‘And is he in Alexandria, then?’
‘No. Well, I’d be very surprised. But, according to a trusted source in Yemen, one of his associates is. He has slipped out of the country into Egypt, and wants to negotiate safe passage to the West. I’ve been offered exclusive access.’
‘Sounds good.’
‘Good? It could be the scoop of my career. This fellow was the chief personal bodyguard for Al-Awlaki for over ten years, and would know everything about him. We’re meeting him just outside Alexandria at 8pm.’
‘Why me?’
‘Well,’ he laughed. ‘Everyone else is busy, and there is just a chance this is a wild goose chase. Don’t be offended, but you’re here to take turns on the driving. If they ask, you’re my assistant. Do not, for God’s sake, let slip that you are a journalist. The deal was me only. But just to sit in should be invaluable experience.’
* * *
The Cairo to Alexandria desert highway runs from the ring road at Giza, on the western edge of the metropolis, for 220 kilometres north-west to the Mediterranean coast. The car, a modern Toyota saloon that fixer Nimr had organised for them, was already eating up the road. Foot to the floor, Wyrecliffe reckoned they could make it by 7.30pm, less than three hours. The car radio had BBC World Service (good old Nimr for checking) and he was able to keep an ear to developments. They weren’t good. Five people had been killed in Tahrir Square during the day, shot by government forces. Demonstrators were still camped out in the square, in what was being dubbed The Day of Departure. No one knew if Mubarak could hold on, with cracks already appearing in his coalition, and the vice president reportedly beginning talks with the opposition Muslim Brotherhood.
Wyrecliffe gunned the car past a series of slow fume-belching trucks. Kat was looking at GPS maps on her phone. She had also been trying to get a line for the Internet, which had worked well enough within a half hour of Cairo, but coverage now was very patchy. Then, as they were passing through a dusty and dirty town called Kafr el-Gammal, the signal kicked in. A new e-mail popped into her inbox.
It was from Rifat.
Dear Katherine,
Where are you at the moment? Are you still in contact with Mr W?
R
Kat started to tap out a response. Chris turned to her. ‘I wouldn’t let anyone know about this, you know. Not a word.’
‘I won’t. I’m not an idiot.’ She continued to tap away, and hurried to finish her reply before the brief bubble of Internet connectivity was lost.
He’s sitting here right next to me. We’re driving to Alexandria. Big scoop on the go. Hush-hush!
Love
Kat xxx
PS can I have some more money?
It was shortly after seven and dark as they approached Alexandria. With Kat now driving, Wyrecliffe checked the directions he had been given. It was impossible to miss the garishly-lit Walid Discount SuperCenter, and as instructed directed Kat to the left immediately after it. They found themselves heading down a darkened side road. At the end was a parking lot with a single diesel pump. Opposite it was a small dimly lit café with a bare earth yard enclosed within a chain link fence on which trailed Christmas lights and Egyptian flag bunting. Beyond were dozens of red and white plastic chairs grouped around metal tables. There were two men sitting at one table, the only people in the place. Wyrecliffe got out, urged Kat to remain and went over to greet them. A moment later he called Kat over.
The two men were the café owner, Mahmoud, and Khalid the intermediary Wyrecliffe had been told about. After brief introductions, Khalid said he was going to fetch the Al Qaeda man and would be about an hour.
In the meantime, the owner offered them delicious samosas. ‘No charge,’ he said. ‘And you must also join me for some of my special arak.’
While Wyrecliffe sipped the fiery drink, he checked e-mails on his phone.
‘Aha!’
‘What is it?’
‘Fantastic news, Kat. I’m more than half way to proving that Cantara couldn’t have been the bomber. Two months ago I commissioned a voice analysis of her supposed suicide video tape. Here are the results.’
Dear Mr Wyrecliffe,
You asked me two questions: One, where exactly did this person come from. Two, was this a pure White British accent, or were there tones of any Asian or Middle Eastern voice in it.
I have listened to the tape many times. The technical analysis of voice components such as monophthongs diphthongs, plosives and fricatives is in the attached PDF, but the answers are essentially straightforward.
1) The voice on the tape is of a young woman was brought up at least until the age of fifteen in Thackley, a suburb of Bradford, and I would give a seventy-five per cent probability that her home lay within the western BD10 postcode areas delineated by 8SY, 8LU, 9PJ and 8YU.
2) There are some very nuanced Asian diphthongs, which indicates some considerable time, probably post eighteen, spent with an Urdu speaker. This person was influential enough that she imprinted certain aspects of his speech. I would work on the assumption that they have had a relationship. However, in my considered opinion it does not reach deeply enough to indicate that she is of part-Pakistani origin. My view is that she was white British at birth.
Sincerely,
Dr Eileen Sutton
Sheffield University
‘Wow, can she really be so sure?’ Kat said. ‘Who is Dr Sutton?’
‘She’s a socio-linguistics expert who made her name analysing bomb threat recordings by the IRA. She’s the best in the business. She was so effective that she had her name removed from all official reports for her own protection. The BBC had used her for Crimewatch too. She reckons to be able to place an accent within a five mile radius, or two miles in Northern Ireland’.
‘So what’s next?’
‘I’m paying this BBC’s security consultant, Pieter Hoek, to do some private detective work. He’s drawing up a list of UK missing persons: females, aged twenty to thirty-five, brought up in Yorkshire, missing for five years or less. There are seventy names on it. Now I’ll be able to narrow it down even more to a particular Bradford suburb.’
‘Must be costing you a fair bit.’
‘I daren’t even think about it. But it’s not about money.’ He shook his head.
Kat watched Wyrecliffe’s face. ‘You’re going to a lot of trouble to clear the name of someone who is dead.’
His eyes flashed. ‘We don’t know she’s dead, not for sure.’
She looked at him steadily, until he looked away. ‘Chris, you really do love her don’t you?’
He blew a sigh and inclined his head towards the café. ‘Let’s see if this lad will let me pay the bill. I’ll not have another glass of that arak. It’s given me a splitting headache.’
When he stood, she saw a Chris Wyrecliffe who was somehow older, less substantial. A man diminished and weighed by doubts. No sooner had he emerged from the café, he tottered slightly. And then collapsed.
Book Seven
Chapter Thirty-Eight
London
February 9, 2011
Chris Wyrecliffe was standing in the book-lined private waiting room of Dr Ian Muir of Harley Street, squinting into his iPhone. The scoop, if that’s what it was, had never emerged. If the Al Qaeda bodyguard h
ad actually been there, he had certainly got cold feet. His trusted source in Yemen wasn’t returning calls. Pondering this, Wyrecliffe was called in to see the doctor. Dr Muir, whom he had known since going up to Oxford, was already on his feet and shook him warmly by the hand.
‘Hello Chris, good to see you. Been in the wars again I gather? Not friendly fire this time, I hope.’
‘No, Ian. Just a bit of check-up while I’m on a flying visit. As I said in my phone message I had a suspected heart attack, in Egypt last week. As it happens it wasn’t, just some rhythm disturbance. Had a pacemaker fitted. I thought I’d get you to give me the once-over before I fly back out.’
Dr Muir looked at Wyrecliffe over the top of his spectacles. ‘The BBC has sent me copies of the hospital paperwork and all the tests. We’ve got BNP test, ECG result, echocardiogram. On a quick peek, nothing looks bad, I have to say. But there’s one thing I need from you, and that’s the pacemaker identification card.’
Wyrecliffe handed over the credit-card sized piece of plastic. ‘Hmm. Don’t know this one at all. Is there a remote control?
‘No.’
The doctor then unfolded the product information sheet.
‘Hmmm. This really is new to me. Not much of an authority on Russian devices, to be honest. Let’s take a look. Perhaps you could pop your shirt off for me.’
Wyrecliffe slid his tie off, and undid his shirt. The doctor’s eyes briefly scanned the broad, once-muscular, expanse of Wyrecliffe’s chest. The dark curly hair had mostly turned to grey, except one area of stubbly regrowth on his stomach where a livid five inch horizontal scar could still be seen.
‘Well, that’s really something,’ Muir said.
‘Not the usual place for a pacemaker is it?’ Wyrecliffe said. ‘I’ve been told they put it there because they had to do some exploratory heart surgery anyway.’
‘It used to be standard. Back in the very early days of pacemaker surgery, the devices were so large that they created subcutaneous epigastric pockets to hold them. These days they pop ‘em in here,’ he said, tapping Wyrecliffe’s chest, ‘halfway between collarbone and nipple. They’re barely half the size of a credit card, though a bit thicker. Of course what you’ve got is something much older, much more Soviet. Quite old I shouldn’t be surprised.’
‘Old?’ said Wyrecliffe. ‘The bugger better do its job. Has been so far, otherwise I wouldn’t be here.’
‘May I?’ Dr Muir palpated around the edge of the scar, pressing to find the edge of the implanted device. ‘There’s a hard nodule quite near the surface. Any soreness?’
Wyrecliffe twitched slightly. ‘Yes, a bit. Hurt like hell for the first two days. It’s much better now.’
‘Yes, yes. There’s inevitably quite a lot of trauma, bruising, especially with a device this size and weight. Fortunately, we’ve developed a fair bit of flesh down there from all those press lunches haven’t we?’ he smiled indulgently. ‘Your frame doesn’t really have any difficulty carrying it, in fact it barely raised the flesh at all. Very little scarring. It’s quite a neat job.’
‘I have to say that I couldn’t care less about the scar. If it wasn’t for the medical staff in Egypt, I don’t think I’d be here today.’
Muir pursed his lips. ‘At some convenient point in the future we might want to swap this old device out and get something a little more compact in there.
‘What I really need to know is what the implications are for travel, and getting back to work.’
‘Well, naturally I would recommend rest. But I’m sure you will ignore me as you always do. But can I make a plea? Steer clear of high-risk reporting for now. That would be unwise. No unnecessary stress.’
‘I’m a journalist, Ian. Stress is what I do. It comes with the territory.’
‘Yes, of course. But I’m sure the Beeb will be wise enough to put you back behind a desk, at least for now.’
‘Ah, well. I left the BBC last week. I’m just starting a new job tomorrow, with Arab Satellite Broadcasting.’
‘So you’ll be spending a lot of time in the Middle East?’
‘Yes, but things shouldn’t be too bad. I’m heading up their coverage of the Middle East peace conference starting on Friday in Sharm el-Sheikh. After that, I promise, I will take a long holiday. But it’s this conference that is the big deal. All the big-wigs will be there, and plenty of sharp-elbowed journalists.’
Muir pursed his lips. ‘Well, knowing that you’re going to do what you want anyway, I’d just say be sensible. Keep off the booze, take modest exercise little and often and get plenty of sleep. Don’t trouble your heart, and it won’t trouble you.’
Wyrecliffe laughed. ‘Well, it will be stressful. But at least it won’t be dangerous. I can assure you of that.’
* * *
Sinai
February 9, 2011
The only direct light that penetrated the cage was first thing in the morning. For just a few precious minutes, after Cantara had been awoken by the Fajr prayers of her captors, the grey fuzz of dawn turned pink on the cave floor as the sun crossed a gap between two mountain ridges. Warm amber fingers crept along the cave’s dusty stone floor, crawling towards the wooden door of her cell. Javelins of light pierced the gaps in the rough planks, lighting up the boundaries of her captivity, and feeling their way across the far wall, with its seventy-one scratches, each marking a day of captivity. Then after a few delightful minutes, the light faded into coral pink, and with one final blush slid away altogether.
That was the day’s best moment. The rest was an ordeal. Three times a day she was allowed a toilet trip into the narrow stinking gully beside the cave. What would have been a blessed release from captivity was spoiled by having to don the nylon niqab given her by Omar to protect her modesty. It was a hateful clinging garment, thin, hot and awkward, generating static against her hair and restricting her precious view of the outside world to a narrow slot. She had to carry her own water to the gully, and they had given her a leaking bucket on purpose. The task was both heavy and if she was not quick, pointless. A couple of times she had stumbled along the narrow path, being unable to see her way, and tripped into the leavings of others. When on the first day she had asked for some toilet paper she was denounced as a western princess. However, in subsequent days someone had taken to leaving a few sheets of newspaper under a stone in the gully. It was a small and rare kindness, but allowed her to do what she had to do in the minute or so when the guard turned his back.
Breakfast was goat yoghurt, often bitter with mould, and stale flat bread. She was permanently hungry, and ate it all. Then she endured the long hours of solitude before the start of afternoon prayers. Zuhr, Asr and Maghrib, interspersed between noon and sunset, she observed more devoutly now than ever before. When Jabr, a bony and taciturn guard, was on duty, she was now allowed to exit her cage to pray. Jabr was Omar’s deputy, but his name meant slave, a truer description of the relationship. When not running around for his boss, he spent much of his time with his eyes closed reciting the Koran under his breath. It was a couple of weeks into her captivity when she had meekly complained to him that being devout was impossible when you could not face the holy city of Mecca. He sucked his lips and tutted, but said nothing. Next time he was on duty, he allowed her out to pray, setting her a prayer mat two metres behind his in the mouth of the cave, before she was returned to her captivity.
After evening prayers, all there was to look forward to was the evening meal, a thin stew of beans and shreds of onion. A hurricane lamp was then lit for whoever was on guard duty, who sat outside all night but very often fell asleep before she did.
She had tried to get to know all her guards. Iyad, which meant pigeon, was the kindest but he was terrified of Omar, and would never let her out into the cave. When the boss wasn’t around, he would give her some extra food, even on occasions a dried date or two. They had been told not to talk to her, or tell her anything that was happening in the world. But sometimes he would recite classical Arabi
c poetry, a little of which Cantara knew. Long hours could pass quite sweetly that way. She had hopes that she might be able to use his clear affection for her to make an escape. It wasn’t that way with Hazim, a taciturn woman-hater with a big beard and deep-set eyes. He always gave her the worst food, and gave her too little time to relieve herself or wash.
The first twenty-four hours had been the worst. She had demanded to find out why she was being imprisoned, and asked to speak to Rifat. All she could glean was that the guards ‘had instructions’ but they never said from whom. Finally, after a week, she yelled out that she wanted to speak to Omar. She had not seen the leader of the group since the first night of her captivity, and he terrified her. But not knowing why she was being held was a torture too. Iyad, who was guard at the time, shook his head and tutted, as if this was a very dangerous course of action. ‘Be careful,’ he muttered. In the evening Omar appeared. He let her out of the cage, and sat her down at a camp fire outside the cave. He offered her a blanket to put around her shoulders against the cold.
‘Why do you think you are being held?’ Omar reached out for a pot that was cooking over the fire and dipped in a piece of flatbread. He chewed the stew-soaked bread without looking at her.
‘I haven’t the faintest idea,’ Cantara said. ‘I was sent to a conference in Sharm el-Sheikh, for an imam called Irfan Tiwana, in Britain. Rifat al Khalifa, someone I regarded as my friend, was supposed to be escorting me. You mentioned his name when you met me. So why isn’t he here? What have I done wrong?’
Omar looked up. The reflection of flames danced in his black eyes as he scrutinised her, for all the world as if she was some new and interesting piece of equipment. A weapon perhaps.
‘You have done nothing wrong, woman. This is merely a test, for the faithful, which you must endure until the time comes.’
‘What time? I’ve missed the conference.’
Omar hawked and spat out into the fire. ‘Your destiny may not be revealed to you, but you do have a destiny. My job is to protect you until the time is right. That is all. I do not question the word of God, and I do not question the path of light upon which we are travelling.’