An Enemy Within

by Roy David

They came for Aban at 6.10 a.m. Iraq time.

  A hammering on his door woke everyone in the house. Deep thuds like someone was trying to break in. Throwing on his dressing gown, he rushed to the window, could see five soldiers outside, one thumping the solid wooden door with his rifle. A Humvee lay parked at an angle in the street. He ran down the stairs, his heart in pieces, drew the bolts, and turned the key.

  No sooner had he released the catch when the soldiers burst in. Two grabbed him before he could utter more than a cursory protest. Forcing his hands behind his back, he was quickly subdued with plastic handcuffs. Farrah appeared on the landing. She screamed.

  ‘Shut the fuck up,’ a soldier shouted, running up the stairs towards her.

  Their sons appeared. Aban could see they were as scared and confused as he was.

  ‘On the floor, NOW,’ the soldier shouted at them, pushing Farrah roughly.

  Aban tried to struggle free. A soldier hit him with his rifle butt, catching him to the right side of his forehead, blood immediately spilling down his face. Fighting hard not to faint, he felt his legs starting to wobble. Two soldiers entered his study. Panic gripped him. Then, a black cloth hood was roughly forced over his head and he was dragged outside. His head swam and his eyes stung from the blood dripping down his face.

  ‘What are you doing? What do you want of me?’ The words came out in a disconcerted mumble. No one answered. They bundled him into the vehicle, pushing him down. Suddenly, he felt the bulk of two powerful bodies, one either side.

  He wasn’t sure if he had passed out or not on the journey. Still dazed, he lurched against both captors each time the Humvee made a turn, could feel them pressed close. Their sweat smell taunted his intestines. Was the nausea that gripped him the result of his own fear? Where were they taking him? What for?

  He sensed the vehicle finally stopping, stiffened when the door opened. A blast of warm, fresh air hit him. Trying to gulp a lungful of the sweet solace, he groaned as he was marched double time, a soldier either side grasping him firmly under each shoulder. He stumbled and was roughly pulled upright.

  The jangle of keys, booming voices, a door clanging shut behind him. Then another door. Finally, he was pushed down into a sitting position, the cold of smooth metal chilling the backs of his knees through his thin pyjamas.

  Foosteps, fading. Another heavy door closing. Now, alone. His wrists were numb where the plastic handcuffs seared his flesh. He tried to wiggle his fingers to ease the feeling back into them. Screwing each eye, he could tell the blood had dried, but still felt as if he was wearing a mask beneath the hood. And his head ached violently.

  They left him in this state for more than twelve hours.

  * * *

  She was sound asleep when the shrill of her mobile on the bedside cabinet stirred her.

  ‘It’s me again.’ Greg’s voice carried the same edge as the previous night.

  ‘What the… you okay?’ Squinting at the clock, she cursed. It was just after 10 a.m. and she’d overslept.

  ‘Listen, no names, this thing – I got my room broken into. They stole my laptop and my phone.’

  She sat up, startled, reached for her dressing gown. ‘How would anyone know – maybe just coincidence?’

  ‘It’s dangerous. Know what I’m saying?’

  ‘No one would know we…’

  ‘Don’t want to think about it. I can’t afford to get kicked out – I’ve been contracted for another three months in Baghdad. Just watch your back and get rid.’

  The line went dead again. Alex wasn’t sure if it was Greg simply hanging up. She sat on the edge of the bed staring at her mobile. No wonder she couldn’t get through to him last night. Stolen? And his laptop? It was unlike Greg to scare like this. The man she thought she knew would have grabbed the Aban material with both hands and worked it until the cows came home. What did he mean by dangerous? And his opening words – ‘no names’ – did he think the lines were tapped or something? Shit.

  Fastening her robe, she hurriedly made coffee, taking quick short sips from the steaming mug as she carried it to her desk. A blinding headache accompanied her – the price of oversleeping. She rubbed her temples with both hands. When she sat back, the sight of the blinking red button of the answer machine almost made her jump. She didn’t have a main line into the bedroom, relying on her mobile for emergencies. So, someone had called her main line during the night – and she had slept through it.

  Greg’s call had frightened her. She stared at the machine, hesitant. Her finger trembled, hovering over the play button. Summoning her nerve, she pressed it. The voice was strained, pleading.

  ‘Alexandra. This is Farrah al-Tikriti, Aban’s wife. They have taken him, the soldiers. I don’t know where he is. Please help us.’

  She replayed the message several times. The anguish in the voice was unmistakable.

  ‘No!’ Alex cried. Why would they take him? But she answered herself just as quickly. He’d been a member of the Ba’athist Party – like everyone working for the government. There was a purge going on against former members. They’d rounded him up, probably a routine sweep.

  Jesus, the email. If they hadn’t known about it then, they would now. Soldiers didn’t march off with anyone without turning the house over. She could imagine the scene; garbage bags emptied, toilet cisterns lifted, files and papers removed. And computers taken.

  Greg’s laptop stolen? Surely too much of a coincidence. If she was right, it would mean only one thing.

  She was next on the list.

  * * *

  Quickly, she dressed. Pair of jeans, old sweater. Then tried to think. She switched on her laptop. Aban’s email jumped at her. Just too good to dump. But what the hell should she do? Who could she send it to? Who to trust? Who had the balls to investigate such stuff, never mind print it? Besides, might it be classified, therefore illegal? She couldn’t afford to be caught in possession of it, not now.

  Opening the email again sent her into a spin. A receipt box appeared on the screen asking the recipient to acknowledge they had read the message.

  Shit. Did she see this last night and click the ‘yes’ button? If they’d taken Aban’s computer, the acknowledgement would show up and they would definitely know she’d read it. Alex couldn’t answer herself. She’d ended up so tired last night that, right now, she simply couldn’t remember.

  Her mind flew in all directions. Surely she hadn’t given herself away with a weary click of the mouse? She stared at the screen, trying to concentrate, going over the sequence of last night’s events.

  Then it dawned on her. For some reason, known only to computers, there mustn’t have been a box to click last night – or she hadn’t noticed it – that’s why one was appearing now. Logic told her the message wouldn’t appear a second time had she already acknowledged receipt. She checked her ‘sent items’ file just to make sure. Nothing.

  Relieved, she leant back in her chair and stared at the ceiling, puffing her cheeks and blowing out the tension, a slow, measured rasp from deep within. She wasn’t that computer literate but, she asked herself, if she deleted the email from all her files, could anyone tell whether or not she had actually read it?

  It took only another thirty seconds before a detached logic hammered at her heart; this was the CIA she was dealing with. They could find out practically anything about anyone. The organisation hired the best brains in the business and, for all she knew, they’d already tapped into her email accounts. Maybe they knew at what time she’d opened Aban’s message.

  Even if they hadn’t secretly investigated her, the last thing she needed was for a team of goons to call with a search warrant and whisk her computer away. Some of the research she’d done on Aban’s earlier email would be on her hard drive and the CIA would have no problem accessing that and pointing an accusatory finger her way. Being thrown into a cell didn’t figure on her list of things to do right now.

  Working feverishly for the next couple of hours, half expecting a
knock on her door at any minute, she transferred Aban’s material to a memory stick then deleted all his emails. She double-checked she’d wiped all trace of any correspondence from him on either of her servers. Next, she began work on her McDermott photos, transferring them to a different memory stick.

  Her final job was to return to her email inbox. When she scrolled down to the bottom of the remaining list, she came to the oldest message on file, one she had opened and read countless times. It was from Richard Northwood, a passionate note sent only hours after they had first made love. She thought of deleting it, but checked herself. Then she called a cab.

  While waiting for it to arrive, she unplugged everything from the back of the computer, lifting the modem on to the table. Fetching a screwdriver from the kitchen, she undid the back of the casing and peered inside.

  ‘This looks like it,’ she murmured, locating the hard drive among the confusion of wires and circuit boards. She reached in and scratched the lump of metal with the screwdriver – two marks that looked like a cross.

  * * *

  The electrical store was surprisingly busy which meant Alex had to stand in line for several minutes. At her turn, the shop phone rang prompting the sole assistant to throw up his arms in a gesture of helplessness. Resigned to further delay, Alex gestured for him to answer the call.

  When she finally had the young man’s attention, she explained she needed a new hard-drive.

  ‘I could normally do that while you wait, Ma’am,’ he said, flashing a grin and taking the modem out of Alex’s large holdall bag. ‘But just now…’

  ‘That’s okay – I have to do something else. I’ll be back in twenty, though,’ she said by way of warning.

  Turning left out of the store, she began the walk three blocks north to a post office she often used. On edge, she stopped at a shop window, pretending to be interested in the display, glancing back nervously. She felt foolish, but if Northwood was on to her she’d have to play his silly games.

  Crossing a junction at the last minute a block further on, she turned round halfway, darting back on a red light and almost knocking a man over waiting at the kerb. He seemed to have stood in her way on purpose.

  ‘Well, pardon me,’ she blurted, indignant. Glancing at him, her embarrassment came king-sized when she saw the guy was carrying a white stick and wearing shades that were impenetrable. ‘Oh, sorry,’ she murmured.

  ‘Ain’t no bother, lady,’ the man said, nodding his head as if listening to music on his headphones – even though Alex couldn’t hear anything.

  ‘Okay, green for go now,’ she said as the lights changed, feeling obliged to lightly guide him by the arm.

  ‘Well, thank you kindly, Ma’am,’ the man said, sweeping the stick before him as if searching for mines. ‘Say, you goin’ far?’

  ‘Post office,’ Alex said.

  ‘Hey, me too,’ he drawled.

  * * *

  ‘We have contact, sir.’

  In a secret CIA office on East Forty-Eighth Street, near to the United Nations headquarters, Richard Northwood leant over the shoulder of a technician watching two red dots on a screen map of central Manhattan moving side by side.

  ‘Heading?’

  ‘She said the post office, sir,’ the technician added.

  Northwood smiled to himself. He had to hand it to Kowolski, it was a sheer piece of inspiration that he’d called the bureau in Baghdad after searching Alex’s hotel room at the Palestine. Finding nothing of note among her things, Kowolski suggested they might want to bug her cell phone. So they’d sent round one of their surveillance experts to carry out the simple task.

  ‘Sometimes small insurance policies pay big,’ Kowolski had remarked as he’d watched the CIA man take off the back cover, remove the lithium battery from inside and replace it with an identical-looking one.

  ‘Two thirds battery, one third GPS tracker,’ the guy had told him. ‘She won’t know any difference.’

  Northwood returned his gaze to the twin red dots. He knew he was playing a hunch. But long shots came in every day.

  * * *

  Inside the post office, she guided the blind man to a counter and stood in front of him in the line, eventually buying two envelopes, one smaller than the other.

  ‘I’m done – it’s your turn now my friend. Good luck,’ Alex said, ushering the man forward.

  Moving over to an empty counter, she wrote a hurried note on the front of the smaller envelope: ‘Dear Mom, Please put this packet in a REALLY SAFE place for me – it’s a back-up file of important pictures. xxx.’

  Quickly retrieving the memory stick of Aban’s material from her pocket, Alex slipped it inside the package, secured it, and placed it in the larger envelope, which she addressed. She suddenly became aware of someone standing close by and turned round sharply. The blind man was at her side.

  ‘Oh, it’s you,’ she said. ‘If you want the way out, it’s directly behind you.’

  ‘I didn’t say thanks back there – so thank you, Ma’am,’ he said, slowly moving off towards the exit, nodding his head to his music and sweeping the floor with his cane.

  Alex found a counter clerk who was free and said she wanted it sending by registered delivery, watching as he tossed it nonchalantly into a nearby red mailbag.

  If only he knew what the contents were, she thought, he might just have treated it with a little more reverence.

  She headed back to the electrical store in a more positive frame of mind, even managing to hum one of her favourite songs to herself. At least Aban’s material was now safe – no matter what Northwood and his crew got up to. She’d decide how to broadcast it to the world as soon as the McDermott show was over when she would have the time to sit and think. Steve might be able to help, too, she thought. Sometimes an outsider could see the wood from the trees.

  * * *

  When Alex had gone from his sight, the man took off his shades, folded them, and put them in the inside pocket of his jacket next to the stub of his collapsible white cane. Then he strode purposefully into the post office and asked to see the most senior person in charge.

  * * *

  The electrical store assistant was serving someone else as Alex entered the shop, but he raised his hand to signal he’d seen her. Presently, he joined her.

  ‘All done, Ma’am – a new hard drive installed and here’s your old one.’

  Alex turned the lump of metal in her hands, checking it had the two fine scratches she’d made on its outer casing. She ran her finger over the marks. Was she becoming paranoid about all this? She quickly dismissed the notion. If the Badgeman could be FBI, then anything was possible.

  ‘Say, do you have a hammer back there?’

  ‘Think so,’ the assistant said, disappearing behind the counter. He returned with a heavy lump hammer. ‘This okay?’

  ‘A backyard?’

  ‘Follow me.’

  He unlocked the rear door. Alex found herself in a highwalled enclosure, the tops decked with rolls of razor wire – just like Baghdad, she thought. Placing the hard drive on the concrete floor, a jumble of images and fears flooded her mind.

  Pent-up frustration taking over, she raised the hammer and began smashing the metal for all she was worth. If the CIA were going to put her life under the microscope, they’d get no help from her.

  The last two blows were particularly satisfying – one for Gene Kowolski, the final one for Richard Northwood. Her arm aching, Alex stared at the twisted piece of scrap, allowed herself a contented smile. She just knew Northwood would soon make contact.

  And she reckoned she was now ready for him.

  13

  ‘You okay, Lieutenant? I mean, if it’s all going too fast, you just holler.’

  Kowolski paced the floor, clicking his fingers in frustration, and hearing with increasing boredom McDermott’s version of the raid. It was so matter-of-fact, so one-dimensional, he knew the media would find themselves scraping the barrel to colour it up.

&nbs
p; ‘Well, it was sorta’ like I said, sir, routine sort of stuff,’ McDermott blustered.

  ‘No, no, no,’ Kowolski interjected, irritably. ‘Wasn’t routine at all. No, SIR.’

  If McDermott noticed the sarcasm in Kowolski’s voice, a withering impatience brought on by the feeling he was not giving it his best shot, he did not show it.

  ‘Surely, it’s more like this.’ He ran a hand through his hair as if the dark mop was a fountain of inspiration. ‘Okay, you were not sure what to expect – intel is never that precise – then you came under heavy fire. You and your men were in grave danger. It was a tricky situation with it being dark and all, but you had the best equipment the US Army could provide, illumination flares, night sights, powerful spotlights from the Bradley… and, of course, the firepower and the best of trained soldiers in the unit. That’s right, isn’t it?’

  McDermott blinked. It was a nervous twitch, both eyes at once, that Kowolski had noticed earlier. ‘Well, sort of, sir.’

  ‘Okay, remember what I’ve just said. Learn it off by heart. Then what happened?’

  ‘Well, we kinda just let rip an’ all – there was no taking any chances.’

  ‘Exactly, Lieutenant, nice pitch. There was no way you were going to risk the lives of any of your men in such a combat situation because they’re all like brothers to you – that’s what you say, right?’

  He nodded, blinking some more.

  ‘So you followed your training, your instinct as a soldier, the way they taught you rigorously at West Point where you learned… let’s see now… yeah, courage, discipline, exemplary behaviour – remember that, Lieutenant, CDE, easy enough.’

  ‘Yes sir.’ It was beginning to dawn on McDermott that this was all going to entail a lot more than he had ever envisaged.

  ‘And your haul – what was it?’ Kowolski read from a copy of the commendation. ‘Fifteen enemy combatants, all killed. A large cache of armaments, let’s see… bomb-making equipment, guns, ammunition, RPGs, a very substantial amount all told. It doesn’t say here how many you personally knocked off? Be great if you could say, you know, one of my guys was about to be hit when I opened up… something like that.’