The Abduction: A Novel

by Jonathan Holt

  She stood up. “How do I make it happen?”

  “I can write a simple piece of code on your phone to add to the feed. It’ll make the zoom happen automatically, in increments too small for the naked eye to spot.”

  In three minutes he’d composed a page of what looked to her like gibberish but which was actually, she guessed, the language he himself had invented; a language in which only a handful of people in the world were conversant – the unique, impenetrable code from which Carnivia was built.

  “There,” he said, handing the phone back to her.

  “That’ll do it?”

  He nodded, exhausted.

  “Daniele, thank you. You won’t regret this.”

  She went straight to Saito and told him what Daniele was proposing. She left nothing out, although she glossed over several sections – the fact that her laptop had been infected by Ethereal’s RAT, for example; and the strange gift from Holly that had somehow convinced Daniele to cooperate.

  When she’d finished, Saito said, “I have absolutely no idea if what you’ve just done is criminally reckless or a breakthrough. Or possibly both.” He lifted his phone and dialled a number. “Can you see how quickly Inspector Pettinelli can get here?”

  It took her half an hour, during which time Kat was made to sit outside the general’s office like a naughty schoolgirl. Then Inspector Pettinelli swept in, and Kat explained everything for a second time.

  “Well?” Saito demanded. “Will it work?”

  Inspector Pettinelli considered. “I doubt it.”

  “Why not?”

  “This small ribbon of border we’ll be able to see – if Daniele Barbo is telling the truth about that – won’t actually show us anything new. The kidnappers wear masks at all times. And the camera’s in a closed cell.” She shook her head. “In my opinion, this is Barbo throwing us an insignificant bone in a last-ditch attempt to save his website.”

  “Which suggests that CNAIPIC’s hunt for the servers is forcing him to play ball,” Saito suggested. “If he’s been prepared to offer the captain here this small concession, he may yet offer more.”

  “Perhaps. But I don’t believe we need his cooperation now in any case. Yesterday we found a Carnivia server hidden on an industrial estate near Milan. Our feeling is he’s probably got only one more, and that it’s somewhere in this country. If we can find it, we can take him offline altogether.”

  “And what will the kidnappers do then?” Kat interrupted. “Kill Mia? Cut off her ears and nose like Daniele’s, to show us how angry they are? It’s the most horrific gamble.”

  Pettinelli looked at her calmly. “We can’t know what they’ll do. But whatever it is, it will be their responsibility, not ours. Whereas leaving Carnivia up when we have the means to block it would be abetting them in their criminal activity. CNAIPIC’s position is clear: broadcasting these films is itself a crime and should be prevented by any means possible.”

  Inspector Pettinelli’s world was almost as black-and-white as Daniele’s, Kat reflected.

  Saito looked from the inspector to Kat, his eyes hooded. “Very well,” he said at last. “We’ll pursue both avenues. The zoom can do no harm, assuming that it’s technically possible, so we’ll set up a small team to monitor it. Meanwhile, Barbo stays in preventative detention, and CNAIPIC will continue their efforts to find his servers. Thank you, Inspector.” As the two women turned to go, he added, “Captain, a word.”

  When the inspector had left them, Saito shut the door. “I thought you were assigned to family liaison with the Elstons. Not to negotiations with a man detained under anti-terrorism legislation.”

  “I saw the opportunity, sir. It seemed sensible to explore it.”

  “Did it indeed?” He fixed her with a withering look. “Let me explain what CNAIPIC are doing, Captain. They’re making sure that everything they do is by the book, so that if this case has a tragic ending – which, let’s face it, is looking more and more likely – no one is going to be able to say they were the ones who messed it up. In that situation, the very worst thing would be for the Carabinieri to seem as if we were charging around the place without any clear strategy or lines of authorisation. From now on, stick to your remit, Captain. Is that understood?”

  SIXTY-TWO

  SHE SAW THE gurney and the watering can through the door of her cell when they brought her lunch, and knew immediately what it meant.

  “It wasn’t my decision,” Harlequin said, following her gaze.

  She wanted to shout, Oh, take some responsibility. But she was determined to follow through on her new strategy. “And you think this will help you make your case?”

  “I’m sure of it. Otherwise I’d never go along with it.” He sighed. “We were certain that when ordinary Italians saw what your countrymen do to their prisoners, they would be so disgusted they would immediately demand a referendum. But it hasn’t happened that way yet. We’ve been hoping this wouldn’t be necessary. But we can’t hold back any longer.”

  “Then do it,” she said. “If it needs to be done, just do it.”

  “You mean that?”

  Like I have a fucking choice. “Yes. Just… look after me, will you? I know how dangerous it is.”

  “I promise I won’t let you come to any harm.”

  Really? How’s that going for you, then? Because it seems to me you’ve already agreed to half-drown me. “Thank you. I trust you completely – I hope you know that.”

  As he turned to leave she said, “Wait… Are you – were you – a priest?”

  He stiffened, but didn’t reply.

  “The reason I ask…” She took a breath. “I want you to hear my confession. Before you waterboard me. Just in case.”

  He turned, the dark eyes behind the mask searching her face. “You know I can’t discuss who I am. Or say anything that might identify me afterwards.”

  “Then don’t. But hear my confession. If you’re not really a priest, I don’t care. If you are, then that’s good.”

  “And if I refuse?”

  “But you can’t, can you? It’s canon law: ‘In urgent necessity, or in danger of death.’ And even if you’ve left the Church, that doesn’t let you off the hook. Not in a theological sense. I learned that at school – the sacraments you took are embedded in your soul. Even if you’ve lost your own faith, you’re still the conduit by which grace flows from God to me.”

  “Clever as well as brave,” he murmured. “Your teachers must hate you.”

  “Some do.”

  “I won’t tell you if I was once a priest or not,” he said, shaking his head. “That’s private. But I will hear your confession.”

  He sat on her mattress while she knelt beside it.

  “Bless me, Father, for I have sinned.”

  “Have you examined your conscience?”

  “I have examined my conscience.”

  “May God, who has enlightened every heart, help you to know your sins and trust in his mercy.”

  “Amen.”

  He reminded her of the passage from Luke in which Jesus defies the Pharisees and tells a sick man his sins are forgiven. “The scribes and the Pharisees began to reason, saying, ‘Who is this man who speaks blasphemies? Who can forgive sins, but God alone?’”

  She knew why he’d chosen that particular passage: both because it described a scene in which Jesus had broken the law, and because it was as the son of man, not God, that he forgave.

  “I confess to Almighty God that I have sinned, through my own fault, in my words and deeds,” she began quietly.

  “Is something in particular troubling you?”

  “Yes.” She told him about Club Libero, how she’d thought it would be exciting to go and see what people did there. “And now my dad must know about it. He’ll think I’m some kind of pervert.”

  “But you’re not.”

  She shook her head. “All I did was take a look. I mean, don’t get me wrong. I was only a kid when he made me take that stupid vow. I d
on’t consider myself bound by it.”

  “Your father’s views on sex and marriage are also the views of the Church,” he reminded her.

  “I know.” She shrugged. “I don’t care about that so much.”

  “Is it God’s forgiveness you really want?” he asked gently. “Or your father’s?”

  She thought. “My dad’s.”

  “Then I can’t help you,” he said, a little sadly.

  He led her through the Act of Contrition, then the Absolution. “The Lord has freed you from your sins,” he concluded. “Go in peace.”

  But as they sat there, neither of them appeared to have achieved very much of that.

  SIXTY-THREE

  From Rai News24:

  ANCHOR: Tell me, Doctor, what is it about waterboarding that makes it so contentious?

  DOCTOR: First of all, it can cause a range of very serious injuries. These include lung damage, broken bones due to the violence with which victims struggle against their restraints, brain damage from oxygen depletion, pneumonia, hyponatraemia – that’s a rare but deadly condition caused by lack of sodium in the blood – right through to asphyxiation, choking on vomit, or dry drowning. But what makes it especially controversial is that, unlike other harsh interrogation techniques, it is specifically designed to take the subjects as close to death as possible.

  ANCHOR: We have here a copy of the American so-called

  “torture memos” setting out in almost clinical detail how this practice works.

  DOCTOR: Indeed, and it makes for unpleasant reading.

  [READS FROM MEMO] “After immobilising the detainee by strapping him down, interrogators tilt the gurney to a ten- to fifteen-degree downward angle, with the detainee’s head at the lower end. They put a cloth over his face and pour water, or saline solution, from a height of about six to eighteen inches. The slant of the gurney helps drive the water more directly into the prisoner’s nose and mouth.”

  ANCHOR: How long would this go on for?

  DOCTOR: The flow of water onto a detainee’s face is not supposed to exceed forty seconds during each pour. Interrogators could perform six separate pours during each session.

  ANCHOR: And each time the interrogators just pour the water over the cloth?

  DOCTOR: Exactly. According to the memos, it “closely replicates” the sensation of drowning.

  ANCHOR: So the subject isn’t actually in any danger?

  DOCTOR: The language is misleading – the subject is drowning, just not underwater. Interrogators are instructed to pour the water when a detainee has just exhaled, so that he’s forced to ingest water directly into the lungs. That’s drowning, by any medical definition. Interrogators are also allowed to force the water down a detainee’s throat using their hands. [READS FROM MEMO] “The interrogator may cup his hands around the detainee’s nose and mouth to dam the runoff, in which case it would not be possible for the detainee to breathe during the application of the water.” And here, a little later: [READS] “We understand that water may enter – and accumulate in – the detainee’s mouth and nasal cavity, preventing him from breathing.”

  ANCHOR: So there is a very real risk of death?

  DOCTOR: Inevitably, the margin of error is a very slim one.

  [READS FROM MEMO] “If the detainee is not breathing freely after the cloth is removed from his face, he is immediately moved to a vertical position in order to clear the water from his mouth, nose and nasopharynx. The gurney used for administering this technique is specially designed so that this can be accomplished very quickly.” And here’s one from the CIA’s Office of Medical Services: [READS] “An unresponsive subject should be righted immediately. The interrogator should then deliver a sub-xyphoid thrust to expel the water.”

  ANCHOR: Essentially, the Heimlich manoeuvre.

  DOCTOR: Yes. And where that doesn’t work – and we know it sometimes doesn’t, because the memo specifically refers to “spasms of the larynx” that keep a prisoner from breathing “even when the application of water is stopped and the detainee is returned to an upright position” – a medic would perform a tracheotomy.

  ANCHOR: The medics are there to save the detainee’s life, then?

  DOCTOR: In part, but also to monitor their respiratory state and make a judgement on whether it’s safe to go further. Effectively, the medic is helping the interrogator to push the prisoner even closer to the edge. This is calibration of harm by medical professionals – which in any country is against the Hippocratic oath.

  ANCHOR: Do we know if anyone has actually died from a CIA waterboarding?

  DOCTOR: The implication in the memos is that several have. One memo specifically speaks of “death due to psychological resignation”. In other words, rather than fighting the water, there have been subjects who have effectively used the water-boarding itself as a means to commit suicide. And at the end of another memo there’s what basically amounts to an appeal for more information, to help refine the process. [READS FROM MEMO] “In order to best inform future medical judgements and recommendations, it is important that every application of the waterboard be thoroughly documented: how long each application lasted, how much water was used in the process – realising that much splashes off – how exactly the water was applied, if a seal was achieved, if the naso- or oropharynx was filled, what sort of volume was expelled, how long was the break between applications, and how the subject looked between each treatment.”

  ANCHOR: One imagines they didn’t look all that well. Doctor, thank you. We should point out that in 2009 President Obama declared the use of the waterboard “a mistake”, implying that it is no longer in widespread use by American intelligence agencies.

  From MTV Italia:

  PRESENTER: Your ninety-second news this afternoon. Journalist and comedian Giancarlo Casamonti today volunteered to undergo waterboarding, in an attempt to prove that it wasn’t as bad as it was being painted. He was given two weights to hold, and told to drop them when the procedure became unbearable. He lasted twelve seconds.

  From Canale 5:

  NEWSREADER: In an opinion poll conducted for Canale 5 by MORI today, people were asked how they would vote if there was a referendum over the future of the Dal Molin military base. An overwhelming majority said that they would vote against the kidnappers’ proposals, including many who had previously signed petitions protesting the American presence…

  By 4 p.m., when the ubiquitous web counters showed just five hours to go, the torrent of second-hand information and chatter had abated. Now there were only the newspapers’ posters of Mia that had been appearing on railings and church doors all across Italy, often accompanied by votive candles and bunches of flowers – shrines that had the unfortunate effect of making it look to the rest of the world as if many Italians considered Mia already dead.

  At 5 p.m., a voice shouted across the operations room, “The American President’s about to make a statement.”

  In the hush that followed, the American leader was seen in the White House press room, reading out a surprising announcement: a public apology for the “excess of zeal” of the previous administration, which had allowed the CIA to “mistreat, abuse, and even torture those who should not have been detained in the first place”. He re-pledged his own administration’s commitment to “a fairer, more rigorous approach to the nation’s security”, declaring that the use of the waterboard “and certain other harsh techniques” was “a grave error”. Finally, he called for Mia’s release.

  Kat joined in the spontaneous applause. All around her she felt a surge of optimism, even expectation, that this unprecedented gesture would be enough for the kidnappers to claim a moral victory and let Mia go.

  But, once the effect of the President’s soaring oratory had worn off, she was forced to admit that he had promised nothing specific, or even new.

  Soon after six, a dense fog crept in from the sea. On the seven o’clock Rai bulletin, the anchor noted that there was no passeggiata anywhere in the towns of the Veneto th
at evening. Traffic was lighter than usual, and restaurants and bars were empty.

  It was, he said, as if the country were battening itself down for some terrible storm.

  SIXTY-FOUR

  AT CAMPO SAN ZACCARIA, they’d made what preparations they could. The zooming software, it was calculated, would allow their technicians to see an extra ribbon of screen around the webcast equivalent, after three minutes of broadcast, to about one twentieth of the total picture.

  There were few who thought it would be enough, but they had equipment set up anyway that would allow them to toggle between the two images at a moment’s notice.

  The webcast was late starting, prompting a flurry of speculation that it wouldn’t happen after all. Then the familiar crude titles appeared.

  AS WE UNDERSTAND IT, WHEN THE WATERBOARD IS USED, THE SUBJECT’S BODY RESPONDS AS IF THE SUBJECT WERE DROWNING. YOU HAVE INFORMED US THAT THIS PROCEDURE DOES NOT INFLICT ACTUAL PHYSICAL HARM. THUS, ALTHOUGH THE SUBJECT MAY EXPERIENCE THE FEAR OR PANIC ASSOCIATED WITH THE FEELING OF DROWNING, THE WATERBOARD DOES NOT INFLICT PHYSICAL PAIN.

  THE WATERBOARD, WHICH INFLICTS NO PAIN OR ACTUAL HARM WHATSOEVER, DOES NOT IN OUR VIEW INFLICT “SEVERE PAIN OR SUFFERING”. IT IS A CONTROLLED ACUTE EPISODE, LACKING THE CONNOTATION OF A PROTRACTED PERIOD OF TIME GENERALLY GIVEN TO “SUFFERING”.

  As if the extraordinary assertion contained in these words were not enough – that if waterboarding didn’t cause “physical harm”, it didn’t cause pain; that if it didn’t last long, it didn’t inflict “suffering” – there then came a second series of titles.