On shore, Swanburg opened the three-ring binder he'd brought with specifics from the case, including the license-plate number of the Campbell station wagon. He found the right page just as Reedy's voice came over the radio.
"I see an arm coming out of the water, holding a license plate," he shouted. "Hey, I can't see it, face this way.... Okay ... New York plate, A ... C ... X ... 75 ... 18."
"BINGO!" Swanburg shouted into the microphone. "Ladies and gentlemen, I do believe we've found our Volvo!"
On the river and the shore of the Hudson, an odd assortment of police officers, scientists, investigators, an assistant district attorney, and Marlene Ciampi jumped like children and cheered as they clapped each other on the back. After a minute, Marlene suddenly noticed that Charlotte Gates was still sitting in her chair, with her head between her hands.
"Are you all right?" she asked, regretting that their success at finding a car was only part of the battle. The worst, at least for this woman who was death's constant companion, was yet to come.
Looking up, Gates had tears in her eyes. "Yeah," she said. "I'll take a look at those family shots of the kids before I look in the car. But even then, I'll be okay. I'm here to take them home now, and that will get me through this." Swanburg came up and patted Marlene and Gates on the shoulder. "I need to get a couple of things for the exhumation. If you want, I'll call Butch and let him know we found the car."
"Yes, please," Marlene said, not wanting to leave the other woman. "Here, take my cell phone."
The team spent the next hour moving their headquarters to the river access point closest to the submerged vehicle. Meanwhile, the second set of divers went back down to the car to seal the doors and hatchback with large rubber bands and hooks. This would prevent the contents of the car from slipping out as the Volvo was pulled to the surface.
A sheriff's office tow truck arrived and extended a cable that could be attached to other cables hooked to the car. Then, with a great whirring of its winch and belching of diesel smoke as the driver revved the engine, the cable was slowly retrieved along with its prize catch.
As the car was gently pulled from its resting spot, Reedy described watching the diver's arm come out of the water with the license plate. "It was like the Lady in the Lake holding up Excalibur," he said. "I was too excited to remember the correct number. But I knew we had it."
"A hunch, eh?" Gates teased.
"Male intuition," Reedy replied. "So much more refined than female intuition. We just don't like to talk about it like girls do."
"Uh-huh," Marlene, Cobing, and Gates all replied.
"Good thing we went with your hunch," O'Donnell said. "I wouldn't have wanted to check out every single flippin' dot on the chart. I mean, it was dark and cold and nasty down there. Something bumped into me—probably just a log or piece of trash—but it scared the piss out of me."
They all gathered on the bank of the river as the car slowly emerged from the water until it sat on the boat ramp, water draining from the interior. Gates directed the tow-truck driver to pull it a little farther to a flat paved spot.
The windows of the car were partly rolled up to about three inches from the top, and the interior was invisible to those outside. "Think we're going to have to cut our way into it?" Washington asked Gates, who circled the car like a boxer looking for an opening.
Gates walked to the driver's side door and pulled the handle. To everyone's amazement, the door opened and water poured out in a torrent that included several small fish, along with sand and mud. "Be careful," she said, stepping around the pile of debris created outside the door. We're going to want to sift through all of that to make sure we don't miss anything."
The tiny anthropologist and her Baker Street Irregular colleagues began the meticulous process of excavating the interior of the car. Bit by bit, Gates removed the silt and debris using a garden trowel and placed it in a bucket, which was taken to a large wood-framed screen to be sifted and examined for evidence.
When they'd finished the front seat compartment, Gates got out of the car to allow Swanburg, the group's photographer, to take shots of the interior. She spoke into a mini tape recorder. "Keys still in the ignition and turned on. The transmission is in 'Drive,' and a stick is wedged between the gas pedal and the seat, depressing it nearly to the floor."
Gates spoke to Cobing. "That engine would have been screaming when she leaned in and pulled it into 'Drive.' She would have had to jump back or roll away from the car. Was there any evidence on her body of something like that happening?"
The detective nodded. "Yeah, we've been wondering about that. In addition to the scratches that had obviously been made by the kids' fingernails, she had abrasions on her knees, the palms of her hands, and one of her elbows ... like I got when I was a kid playing stickball in the street and fell. That's damn good detective work. What else you got?"
"I'll take that as a hell of a compliment coming from an NYPD detective," Gates replied. She looked back into the interior of the car. "We are going to have to excavate the entire car; you never know what you might otherwise miss. But from here I can see a large footlocker in the luggage area."
Nobody spoke. Nobody moved, until Gates walked around to the back of the car. "It doesn't really matter what order we do the rest of it," she said, "we might as well answer the big question."
The hatchback opened as easily as the front door had, with another gush of water and river muck. With a sigh, the anthropologist and her colleagues began to dig out the footlocker.
"Would some of you strong gentlemen lift the trunk out and place it on the pavement please?" Gates asked.
Several members of the dive team, as well as Washington and his deputy, delivered it to the ground, where the anthropologist bent over to examine the lock. She straightened and walked over to the table that had been set up for evidence gathered during the excavation of the front compartment. All of the objects of potential value had been laid out neatly so they could be photographed and cataloged.
Gates quickly scanned the objects, then picked up a red laminated tag attached to a small plastic bag that bore the name "O'Hara's Hardware." She read the tag then returned to the footlocker, where she knelt and began to turn the combination on the stainless-steel lock.
Speaking into the tape recorder in her shirt pocket as well as for her audience, Gates said, "I'm using a combination written on the tag for a combination lock found in the glovebox of the Volvo station wagon. I'm turning right to 26, back around left to 5, and to the right to 13." She gave the lock a little tug and it fell open.
The anthropologist looked back, her eyes meeting Marlene's, who nodded encouragement.
"She left the combination in the bag from the store where she bought the lock," Gates said. "I guess, she thought God might need the numbers to find the kids."
The sun was dipping low as the search team gathered in a semi-circle around a small, tough woman, who placed her hand on the footlocker and paused. They weren't close enough to see inside when she took a deep breath, flipped up the latch, and opened the lid. But they could tell from the way her shoulders sagged and she slowly lowered the lid again that they'd found what they'd come looking for.
Gates stood up and faced the others. "I'd like to ask everyone for a moment of silence to reflect on the loss of these poor, innocent children." Without thinking about it, those gathered there next to the Hudson River reached for each other's hands and stood quietly. Up north, a train whistled.
When she was ready to continue, Gates spoke to the others. "I want you to know that there's no shame in sitting this part out. And Sergeant Washington..."
"Yes, ma'am," the sergeant responded.
"Now would be a good time to call the coroner."
18
The Sheik struggled to keep the asinine smile on his face as the fat banker hovered in front of him like a big pink sausage stuffed in an expensive but overburdened suit. He wanted desperately to wipe the pig's sweat off after their handshake. O
r, better yet, he thought, I want to wipe his blood off of my knife after holding his head up for Al Jazeera television.
That image was the only way he could keep smiling at the piggy little blue eyes and the small, upturned nose. The top of the man's nearly bald head—a few strands of blond hair bent over like palm trees in a hurricane— shone with sweat.
It was amusing to see how all the other bankers and brokerage-firm bigwigs kept shooting envious looks in their direction while trying to maneuver for a little "face time" themselves. It was the only reason they'd accepted the invitation to attend the Saturday night reception at the administration building on the grounds of the mosque in Harlem for the presentation of the $1.3 million check to build a new madrasah. Otherwise, they wouldn't have come within shooting distance of the heart of Harlem. The fact that it was a Muslim event at a mosque only made them sweat around the starched collars of their button-down Reuben Alexander shirts that much more profusely.
Some of the banks and brokerages had sent a black representative in an effort to demonstrate their support for multiculturalism; they were not any more comfortable than their white counterparts, having never stepped foot into Harlem unless it was for a concert at the Apollo. There were no women, as the competitors had been told that it would not be appropriate to send female reps. Even the PrimeTech Security Corporation translator, Marie Smith, who was at least somewhat modest in her dress and had wisely adopted the use of the hajib when at the mosque, had been asked to remain outside the room where the men were gathered.
Not one of them wants to be here, The Sheik thought with anger. He could gauge how uncomfortable each man was—surrounded by dark-skinned members of the mosque as well as the Saudi contingent—by the number of times they told him what "a wonderful thing" the donation was for Harlem's youth, and how they were really all one big ecumenical family: Jews, Christians, Muslims. But, of course, that was the money talking; they didn't believe it any more than he did. Or they're bigger fools than I thought.
Over the past week, they'd tripped all over themselves to impress the visitors. They'd been treated to dinner at the best restaurants in town, complete with lovely female companions in low-cut blouses and dresses immodestly displaying their breasts and necks. Even their hosts' wives and daughters, introduced at the dinner parties, were dressed like whores, from his perspective. And there'd been many late nights touring the city's discotheques where the decadence of this depraved culture was on fleshy, gyrating display.
Each banker and trading firm fought to set itself apart from its competitors. There'd been elegant black-tie affairs in lavish penthouse suites off Park Avenue, and even a "genuine American barbeque" at the beachside home on Long Island of the president of one of the largest brokerages—who just happened to "hail," whatever that meant, from Texas. Too bad no one told the man until it was too late that serving pig to Muslims was a major affront. The oaf looked like he'd swallowed his profane tongue when told why the Saudis were suddenly exiting the party with angry looks and gestures.
Of course, The Sheik had worked that faux pas to his advantage. Through urgent telephone calls, gift baskets, box seats at Yankee Stadium, and groveling visits from intermediaries, the man had practically offered himself up to be raped by a herd of camels not to lose out on a share of the hedge-fund transactions. Now there was nothing the man would question and nothing he wouldn't do for, as he called it, "a piece of the pie."
Nothing, The Sheik thought with immense satisfaction. There were two things you could count on with American businesspeople and politicians. First, they had no idea how to deal with men from other cultures. They thought that everybody thought as they did. But despite their best intentions, they were constantly stepping in dung—take their miscalculation of the insurgency in Iraq.
The second was greed. Especially the men in that room; they'd do anything for a few million dollars. Or do nothing, if that's what the situation calls for.
And those two things would be the undoing of the United States. Not bombs. Not suicidal jihadis. Not mass fatalities, although they would play a role. But unlike some of his predecessors, who thought that if they punched America in the nose, its people would back down, he thought the opposite. They'd absorbed the 9/11 attacks, and rather than grovel like the French or Spanish, they'd stormed back, even demonstrating a potent willingness to pay for revenge in blood.
No, the key to ultimate victory over the Americans, and by default the rest of Western culture, would be the very thing that made them such a formidable enemy, their economy. And I am the one who, thanks be to Allah for His blessings, knows how to use their own strength against them to drive a stake through the heart of The Great Satan.
The fat banker started talking in terrible French punctuated by English translations. "C'est une chose merveilleuse que vous faites ici.... It's a wonderful thing you're doing here.... I'm a Christian myself.... Je suis un chretien moi'mime.... But the important thing is that we are all men of faith and believe in God, and it's the same God. Uh ... Mais la chose importante est que nous sommes tous les hommes de la foi et croyons en Dieu, et c'est même Dieu. So, really, we're all just people of faith.... Tellement, vraiment, nous sommes tous les personnes justes de la foi.... It's wonderful, really, just wonderful.... Il est merveilleux et simplement." The pig beamed like he'd just recited a difficult lesson for his high school French teacher.
Idiot, the Sheik thought. Of course it's not the same God. You are infidels and don't know Allah. If there was ever a time when the roots of your misbegotten religions were intertwined with those of Islam, you long ago deviated from the One True Path. You worship false prophets who bastardized the Word of God as it was revealed again to the Prophet Muhammad, may Allah be pleased with him. Idolaters. You are fools not to recognize the supremacy of Islam. But it requires patience; the day is not yet here.
"Pas encore," he said aloud.
The banker furrowed his brow. "Pas encore? Not yet?" He shook his head. "I'm sorry, I don't understand.... Je suis désolé, je ne comprends pas."
"Il n'était rien," The Sheik replied. It was nothing. Only that Jews, Christians, Buddhists, Hindi, and all other non-believers will all be put to the sword or pay the blood price to keep your heads. And only if it pleases us.
"It was nothing?" the banker repeated in English. A light went off in his head, and he chuckled like he finally got a complicated joke. "Oh hey, happens to me, too. I forget what I'm saying all the time.... J'oublie ce que je dis toute l'heure. Ha ha." He took a quick look around at the faces of his competitors, then whispered to The Sheik, "Avez-vous pris plus d'en consideration notre offre? Je battrai n'importe quoi que mes concurrents vows donnent."
No I have not given your offer any consideration, you swine, The Sheik thought. And I'm certain you will do what it takes to beat the best offers of your competitors. Now I will teach you a lesson. He replied quietly but with a definite edge. "N'est pas maintenant I'heure de discuter des affaires."
"Now is not the time to discuss business," the banker translated aloud. The blood drained from his face. His voice trembled and his jowls shook as he back-pedaled. "Of course not, forgive me.... Naturellement pas, pardonnez-moi." He glanced back at his competitors, whose faces had as one creased with smiles as they realized from the look on his face that he'd made some major blunder. "Je ne sais pas ce qui m'a rendu si grossier. "
You don't know what caused you to be so rude? The Sheik translated in his head. That's easy. Greed. Having put the man in his place, he reeled him back in. "Oui, oui, ce n'est pas un problème. Nous parlerons plus tard, " The Sheik said, patting the banker man on his rounded shoulder.
The banker nearly wet his pants at the reprieve. In fact, he did heed the call of nature and excused himself, remembering to give his competition a triumphant look on the way out. Surely they'd seen the affectionate tap on his shoulder. New house in the Hamptons, here I come.
Pissing all over himself like a dog getting his belly scratched by his Master, thought The Shei
k as the president of a trading firm sidled up to him. He longed for the day when he wouldn't have to play these games with men whose very existence he detested. Soon, though, his public persona would disappear from the face of the Earth and he would be reborn as simply The Sheik, the nameless, faceless Scourge of the Great Satan, Defender of the One True Faith. And as an added bonus, he would be avenged for his older brother's death.
In theory, he'd agreed with his friend Osama bin Laden's strategy, which was designed to engage the United States by acts of terrorism so vicious that the Americans would be certain to react violently and without much thought. In addition to overextending its military and taxing its economy, the United States would be certain to increase its military and cultural presence in the Middle East, which bin Laden and his advisers believed would cause a general uprising in even "moderate" Muslim countries.
The desired result would be an Islamic revolution that would lead to the reestablishment of the caliphate, the combination of religion and state under the rule of one supreme cleric, the Caliph, in all Muslim lands. And as the Qur'an foretold, eventually Islam would hold dominion over the entire world until the end of days.
However, bin Laden had not been prepared for the speed or massiveness of the U.S. response after the World Trade Center fell, or the failure of any general uprising to materialize. Now, the Taliban was reduced to banditry and roadside bombs, having been hunted like dogs through the mountains of Afghanistan and Pakistan, while Al Qaeda's leadership cowered in caves and made videotapes of their useless threats.
During a recent counsel with Al Qaeda and Abu Sayyaf, an Islamic militant group in Southeast Asia and Indonesia, to make arrangements for implementing The Sheik's plan, he had listened to their argument that the attacks on the World Trade Center had also led the United States into a quagmire in Iraq. But they'd grown silent when he pointed out that while Muslim killed Muslim in Iraq, the United States was more powerful than ever, with an even larger presence in the Middle East.
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