The Last Refuge

by Ben Coes

  “Hello, Hector,” said Dayan from the tarmac.

  Jessica watched as General Menachem Dayan ducked his head and entered the cabin. He reached his hand out and shook Calibrisi’s hand. He shot a look down the aisle to Jessica, who stood.

  “Jessica,” he said, a serious expression on his face. “I didn’t know you would be coming.”

  “General Dayan,” she said. She stepped forward as he moved back to her. They shook hands. Dayan smiled at her.

  “You look as beautiful as always, Jessica,” said Dayan.

  “I don’t feel beautiful, General Dayan,” she said. “I feel tired. But thank you.”

  “You called this meeting,” said Dayan. “What can I do for you?”

  “It concerns Iran,” said Calibrisi, motioning for Dayan and Jessica to sit down. “Kohl Meir. But before we start, I need your assurance that this is off-the-record. Dead-man talk.”

  “Of course.”

  “Not Shalit,” said Calibrisi. “Not anyone. Are we clear?”

  “Yes.”

  “Our hands are tied,” said Calibrisi. “We’re under strict orders by President Dellenbaugh. We’re not supposed to have anything to do with Iran right now.”

  “I figured as much,” said Dayan.

  “President Dellenbaugh believes we’re within days of getting Iran to agree to stop the development of its nuclear program,” said Jessica.

  “And you believe them?” asked Dayan.

  Jessica stared into Dayan’s eyes, then looked at Calibrisi.

  “Iran has completed its first nuclear device,” said Calibrisi. “We’re estimating it at fifteen to twenty kilotons.”

  Dayan was silent for several moments.

  “How do you know this?”

  “An informant within Nava’s administration.”

  Calibrisi pulled the photo that Dewey gave him out of a folder and handed it to Dayan, who stared at it for more than a minute.

  “My Persian is rusty,” said Dayan, staring at the photo. “Does that say what I think it does?”

  “Yes,” said Calibrisi. “‘Goodbye, Tel Aviv’. The informant believes it will be brought in by water.”

  “When?”

  “We don’t know.”

  Dayan closed his eyes and rubbed them for a moment.

  “Do we have any idea where it is?” asked Dayan.

  “No. There’s something else. The reason Kohl was in the United States, in addition to visiting Ezra Bohr’s parents, was to ask Dewey Andreas to help him design an operation to destroy the bomb.”

  Dayan’s face flushed red.

  “And he didn’t come to me?” asked Dayan, anger in his voice.

  “Before you get mad, you need to know something: Mossad has a mole. Someone high up. Someone feeding intelligence to the Chinese, who are then handing it over to VEVAK.”

  Dayan was silent.

  “We’ve been looking for more than two years,” said Dayan.

  “So you know?”

  “Yes.”

  “The Iranian informant understood the danger this double agent represents. If Nava or Suleiman or whoever is running this thing from Tehran’s perspective gets wind that Israel or the U.S. has knowledge of the bomb, they’ll launch it preemptively. We can’t confide in anyone. You can’t confide in anyone, General.”

  “What am I supposed to do?” asked Dayan, gesticulating with his arms. “Let them sail into Tel Aviv and destroy the city?”

  “No,” said Calibrisi. “That’s why I asked you here. We’re doing something. It’s being run outside Langley. Andreas is running it. But I need your help.”

  “What?”

  “You have a kill team inside Tehran?”

  “How do you know?”

  “Someone’s killing politicians.”

  “Yes. We have some men there from Sayeret Matkal.”

  “How is Iran not spotting them?”

  “The same way the CIA does it; they’re all recruits from Kurdistan.”

  “Dewey’s going to need help. I can’t put CIA paramilitary on the ground in time or without risking the president finding out.”

  “How many men are we talking?”

  “Three or four. Position them in Tehran on my go.”

  “What if Andreas doesn’t succeed?”

  “You need to watch your ports, General. Amp up your naval perimeters immediately.”

  Dayan held the photo out toward Calibrisi.

  “Look at this fucking thing,” said Dayan. “You could fit it on a fishing boat. Do you realize how many small little chickenshit fishing boats come into Tel Aviv each day? Not to mention sailboats and cigarette boats?”

  Calibrisi met Dayan’s gaze.

  “I don’t know what to tell you,” said Calibrisi. “Get Geigers into the hands of your patrol vessels. Restrict entry. Get planes in the sky.”

  “Hector, we don’t have the boats necessary to enforce a blockade of smaller vessels,” said Dayan, rubbing his forehead. “Even if we wanted to. Not to mention the fact that Tehran would know immediately if we did move to tie-off the ports. Then they could simply fly the fucking thing in in a private plane. Or bring it into Haifa.”

  “Dewey knows what he’s doing,” said Jessica.

  “What is he doing?” asked Dayan.

  Calibrisi paused.

  “We don’t know exactly,” said Calibrisi.

  Dayan was silent. He looked worn-out. A sheen of perspiration covered his balding forehead.

  “You have to understand something,” said Dayan, his voice hoarse with emotion and anger. “If Iran detonates a nuclear device in Tel Aviv, or anywhere in Israel, we will eradicate them from the face of the earth.”

  40

  ERZURUM, TURKEY

  From London, Dewey and Tacoma flew with Borchardt on one of Borchardt’s private jets—a buffed-out, used Boeing 757. He’d spent more than $10 million retrofitting the plane, turning the interior into a luxurious fortress, with four staterooms, a large dining room and kitchen, a game room including a pool table, and a media room with several flat-screen TVs. The plane was designed to allow Borchardt to travel anywhere in the world in comfort.

  Before leaving England, from a pharmacy near Borchardt’s house, Dewey had purchased black hair dye. From an Islamic men’s clothing store, he’d purchased a hijab to cover his head, a few shirts and pants.

  Once they were airborne, Dewey went to one of the stateroom bathrooms and dyed his hair, beard, and mustache. He put on a pair of the pants, a tan button-down work shirt, then wrapped the hijab about his head.

  From his traveling case, he took out a small plastic contact lens case. He hated contacts, but he put the brown-hued lenses into his eyes.

  He stepped out of the bathroom and stood in front of the mirror in the bedroom. At first, he didn’t even recognize himself. He looked like a working-class Arab, except for his size.

  “Praise Allah,” he said into the mirror. “Give me three falafels and a grenade, please.”

  When Dewey stepped out of the stateroom and into the media room, Borchardt almost fell out of his seat.

  “Not bad, Mr. Andreas,” said Borchardt.

  * * *

  They landed in the small, remote Turkish city of Erzurum as night was approaching. From the airport, a sedan took Dewey, Tacoma, and Borchardt into the low hills east of the city, toward a farming village called Maksut Efendi.

  Borchardt smoked the entire ride out in the car, sitting in the front seat.

  “Who are we going to see?” asked Dewey.

  “His name is Tuncay Güney,” said Borchardt. “An old friend.”

  “Who is he?”

  “Have you heard of Ergenekon?” asked Borchardt.

  “No,” said Dewey.

  “I have,” said Tacoma. “Ultranationalists.”

  “Yes, that’s right,” said Borchardt. “It is a deep state.”

  “What is a deep state?” asked Dewey.

  “Within Turkey, there is a shadow government tha
t is trying to form,” said Borchardt. “Ergenekon. They say upward of a third of the Turkish military hierarchy has loyalties to Ergenekon.”

  “Who is Tuncay Güney?” asked Dewey.

  “Their strategist. Very smart. I have … helped them out on occasion. That said, I also have very close ties to the elected government. I keep my options open.”

  The road was pitch-black, and rutted with holes and bumps. Peasants every few hundred yards could be seen walking along the road.

  The driver, a young Turk with shaggy black hair and a mustache, who had remained silent until that point, looked at Borchardt. He said something in a language Dewey couldn’t understand, his voice deep; there was a hint of anger in his words.

  Borchardt responded by nodding, then barking out a few equally unintelligible words in Turkish.

  “What did he say?” asked Dewey.

  “He told me that to speak to you about Ergenekon was bad. He told me to shut my mouth.”

  “And what did you say?”

  Borchardt craned his thin neck around, his eyes meeting Dewey’s.

  “I told him if he said one more word I would have General Güney execute him.”

  Fifteen minutes later, they pulled off the main road onto a dirt driveway. After several hundred yards, they stopped at a small rectangular, one-story structure made of brick. Several old pieces of equipment, including a few bulldozers, and a sideboom crane, stood next to the building. Standing outside, smoking a pipe, was a tall man with brown hair, dark-skinned, clean-shaven.

  Borchardt climbed out of the sedan, joined by Dewey and Tacoma.

  “General,” said Borchardt, “good to see you again.”

  Güney nodded matter-of-factly, extending his hand to shake Borchardt’s. As he did so, he scanned Dewey and Tacoma, an unfriendly look on his face.

  “These are the Americans?” asked Güney, his accent thick.

  “Yes,” said Borchardt. “Have you finished the bomb?”

  “We did as good a job as we could,” said Güney.

  They followed Güney through a door. Inside the building, the floor was concrete. A large, long steel workbench ran along the side of the room. Bright halogen lights, like an operating room, shone onto the center of the floor, where, on a steel platform, stood a bomb.

  Two other men were sitting in the room, on the workbench, both smoking cigarettes. Each man wore a dark green soldering smock.

  Dewey and Tacoma stepped to the bomb. It was like a large, elongated football with flat ends.

  “Eight feet, eight inches,” said Güney as he watched the two men inspect the device. “The weight is within a few pounds.”

  “What did you weigh it down with?” asked Dewey.

  “Lead and concrete,” said Güney. “It wasn’t easy figuring out the math. But we did it.”

  “What about the Geiger? Will it set it off?”

  “A handheld one, yes.”

  From a drawer in a red, metal tool cabinet near the door, Güney removed a small yellow Geiger counter. He flipped it on. It made a crackling, high-pitched noise. He moved it toward the bomb and the beeping became faster, more intense.

  “How?” asked Tacoma.

  “X-ray waste,” said Güney. “From the hospital. If they use a sophisticated detection device, it will be exposed for what it is. If a simple handheld Geiger is used, it should fool them.”

  Dewey walked to the workbench. Taped to the wall was the photo of the bomb that Tobias Meir had given to Dewey, and which Dewey, in turn, had provided Borchardt. Dewey pulled the photo from the wall. He stepped back to the bomb and, holding the photo next to it, compared the two.

  The seaming on the fake bomb looked rougher. The patina of the steel was smoother. The nosepiece didn’t look exactly right; it was somehow flimsier-looking.

  Still, to a casual observer, or one who had never seen the real thing before, the resemblance was striking.

  Dewey pointed to the Persian script on the side of the bomb.

  “It says what you asked for,” said Güney.

  “Will it work?” asked one of the Turks seated on the bench.

  “It’ll work,” said Dewey. “Let’s get it loaded.”

  Dewey stepped toward the door, where Borchardt was standing.

  “Now will you tell me where the bomb in my house is?” asked Borchardt.

  Dewey grinned.

  “Not yet, Rolf. When I’m safely out of Iran, that’s when I’ll tell you where the bombs are.”

  “‘Bombs’?” asked Borchardt. “That sounded like you just said bombs, plural?”

  “Did I forget to tell you there’s more than one?” asked Dewey, patting Borchardt on the back. “My bad.”

  41

  EVIN PRISON

  TEHRAN

  They came and got Kohl Meir as the distant lights of downtown Tehran were beginning to twinkle, like stars, in the darkening sky, visible through a small window in his new cell.

  The cell itself was clean. Unlike his previous cell on the first floor, this one contained a chair, a small sink, and a bed with an actual mattress, albeit one that was barely one inch thick.

  They brought Meir two meals. As if they knew he would soon be found guilty and sentenced to death, whoever made such decisions—Evin’s commandant, Achabar, perhaps Paria himself—had decreed that Meir receive not only a cell that was comfortable, but some food that would make his last hours decent. By feeding him they no doubt imagined the gesture would somehow cleanse the guilt of their actions.

  He’d awoken to a tray that had fruit on it—two bananas and a handful of figs—as well as a glass of milk and a bowl of muesli. At lunch, half a loaf of bread had arrived along with several pieces of cheese, slices of some sort of meat that he couldn’t identify, and a soda, which was very sweet and had the faint aftertaste of formaldehyde.

  Because they had barely fed him since his abduction, Meir ate ravenously, then got sick afterward, both in the morning and in the afternoon. Still, when he heard the steel key turning again in the early evening, he anticipated another round of food.

  Instead, the door opened and Achabar, his attorney, was standing in the doorway with two armed guards.

  “Do you like your new accommodations, Kohl?” asked Achabar, a cigarette in his hand, which he brought to his mouth. “It looks like a room at the Hilton. I understand they even brought you food from the staff cafeteria.”

  “Come to Tel Aviv sometime and I will return the favor,” said Meir, lying down on the cot.

  Achabar laughed.

  “Tel Aviv,” said Achabar. “I hear it’s beautiful. A pearl, as someone once told me. The problem is, Jews make me break out in hives.”

  “That’s the difference between us,” said Meir. “I don’t hate you just because you’re Iranian; I hate you because you’re trying to destroy us. You hate me simply for being Israeli.”

  “Actually, that’s quite well put,” said Achabar. “I couldn’t have said it better myself.”

  “The problem you will have is that you are in the minority, even in your own country,” said Meir.

  “What do you mean?” asked Achabar.

  He stepped into Meir’s cell. As he did so, he tossed his cigarette on the ground, then stepped on it with his shoe. He took a seat in the steel chair that was bolted near the bed.

  “You know exactly what I mean, Achabar. You’re outnumbered. Iranians want freedom. Your mullahs are growing old. The only thing that keeps them in power is thugs like Paria and VEVAK, and, of course, vermin like you.”

  Achabar grinned, but a flash of anger creased his lips.

  “Ah, there you’re wrong,” said Achabar. “There is always more clergy. Meanwhile, the numbers of citizens who desire a caliphate, who want strict Islamic rule, those numbers grow every day. It is an inevitable tide. The time to have beaten us was in the nineties. Perhaps even a little earlier. But we’re too entrenched now. You missed your window.”

  “We’ll beat you. Unlike Iran, unlike every country
in the Middle East, Israel is united with its people. Its people are the country. Here, you kill your own citizens simply for something they say. No, you can’t survive as long as your rule is based upon the enslavement, the murder, the abuse of your own citizens, which it is.”

  Achabar leaned back.

  “Well, let’s agree to disagree then, yes,” said Achabar. “Unfortunately, you will not be around to win this debate, I’m afraid. Judge Khasni has made his decision. That is why I’m here.”

  Meir stared at Achabar’s brown, snakelike eyes.

  “I assume I’ll be able to appeal?” asked Meir as he sat up.

  Achabar laughed.

  “You have a strange sense of humor,” he said.

  * * *

  At the Supreme Judicial Court, Meir was led to the cage at the front of Khasni’s courtroom.

  The room was mostly empty. Paria, Meir noted as he sat in the chair inside the cage, was absent. Behind the prosecution table, a photographer was seated, holding a large camera and snapping photos of the whole proceeding.

  Judge Khasni was writing on a pad of paper, and he continued to do so for several minutes.

  Meir glanced at the clock: 8:10 P.M.

  Finally, Khasni stood up. He picked up a gavel and hammered it gently down on the table.

  “Good evening, everyone,” said Khasni. “It’s my duty to reconvene the matter of the Islamic Republic of Iran versus Kohl Meir. Before I begin, I must ask Mr. Achabar, do you have any further exculpatory evidence to present on behalf of your client?”

  “No, I do not,” said Achabar, who looked at Meir and grinned.

  “Very well,” said Khasni. “Let us begin. With the permission of Allah, I am here this evening to render justice on behalf of the Islamic Republic of Iran and five of its hardworking citizens, all of whom lost their lives due to the actions of the defendant, Kohl Meir. While one could argue, as the defense has, that the four Iranians killed aboard the Adeli lost their lives in battle, in an undeclared war, so to speak, between Iran and Israel, and that the defendant was merely following orders and acting in self-defense of his nation, I found this line of reasoning to be a fallacy. This was an offensive operation conducted in Iranian waters—”