Siro

by David Ignatius

  Taylor had sent George the tape of the last few minutes of the bug’s life: the officer talking happily to himself in Bulgarian; the sound of him cleaning the barrel, inserting the powder and shot. The sound of him walking outdoors, a long pause while he aimed, then BLOOOEY! A terrible explosion; and then a ghastly, empty silence. Taylor thought it was funny, but George was upset. His microphones were his children, sent out into the world with all the love and care he could muster. He didn’t like it when they died prematurely.

  They walked swiftly through the airport terminal.

  “Let’s get to work,” said George enthusiastically as they got in the car.

  “Too early,” said Taylor, looking at his watch. It was just nine-fifteen. The two Turkish agents would be waiting for them on Horhor Street at midnight. They had nearly three hours to kill.

  “Have you eaten?”

  George nodded.

  “Eat some more,” said Taylor.

  They went to a fish restaurant in Kumkapi, a district in Old Istanbul overlooking the Sea of Marmara. The area was inhabited by a rich mix of nationalities: Armenians, Georgians, Bulgarians, Kurds. Taylor chose a restaurant called Ucler, run by three Albanian brothers. They were a suspicious lot, and spent much of the evening peering warily out the door, watching for trouble.

  “What’s with these guys?” asked George when one of the Albanians went to the door for what seemed the twentieth time.

  “That’s the way people are in this part of the world, if you hadn’t noticed,” said Taylor. “They don’t trust anybody. The Albanians hate the Bulgarians, the Bulgarians hate the Turks, the Turks hate the Kurds, the Kurds hate the Armenians. So they all spend a lot of time watching each other. That’s the secret of politics in this part of the world. Play the little buggers off against each other.”

  The Albanian restaurateurs, in fact, were so suspicious of what might be happening down the street that they all but ignored the two Americans seated in their restaurant. Which suited Taylor fine. He outlined for George the basic details of the operation: the incautious Soviet diplomat who had gone shopping for an Ottoman chair; the layout of the antique bazaar; the plan for entering the building; the support agents who would accompany them.

  George nodded and grunted between mouthfuls of food. Despite the fact that he had already eaten, he proved to be surprisingly hungry, devouring most of a large bluefish and a dozen large shrimp that Taylor had ordered but couldn’t finish. He washed this down with two glasses of vodka, followed by a half bottle of wine, followed by a last glass of vodka. Taylor didn’t object. George was a professional. If he wanted to get shit-faced before installing a delicate microphone in a hundred-year-old piece of furniture, that was his business. The agency had enough nursemaids and nannies these days, and Taylor wasn’t about to join them. But as it neared midnight, he did order George an extra-large Turkish coffee, which the technician dutifully drank.

  “Georgie, my boy,” said Taylor, “let’s go buy some antiques.” George said nothing. He was an artist, and his performance was about to begin.

  Horhor Street was in a district called Fatih, a sprawling, dusty quarter of cheap apartment buildings and dimly lit workshops on the outskirts of the old city. Taylor knew the area all too well, for it had become in the past year a gathering place for Iranian émigrés and was the home of several of his putative agents. He parked his car several blocks from the Bit Pazar and walked silently with George.

  For all his bonhomie, Taylor was nervous. He had a sensation in his gut that felt like knitting needles trying to knit with no yarn. They walked slowly up the street, passing rows of darkened apartment blocks.

  As they neared the top of the street, Taylor turned right onto a small alley called Kirik Tulumba Street. In the shadows, he saw Hasan and Hamid, the two Turkish support agents, who were leaning against a building smoking cigarettes. Behind them was the antique bazaar.

  “That’s it?” asked George doubtfully, motioning toward a modern five-story building.

  Taylor nodded. It was an unlikely spot for a flea market. Rather than the usual warren of small shops, this was a tidy establishment with elevators and modern door locks and a night watchman. Most of the city’s best antique dealers had moved here a few years earlier when the old antique market in Kuledibi was torn down.

  The Turks extinguished their cigarettes. Taylor whispered something in Turkish to the younger of the two. He disappeared into the shadows beside the building and returned several minutes later, motioning to Taylor that the way was clear.

  “Hamid,” whispered Taylor to the older Turk.

  “I’m Hasan.”

  “Whatever, you ready?” The Turk nodded. Taylor motioned him to move out.

  The Turk headed toward the main entrance. He was the decoy. It was his job to distract the night watchman—to engage him in conversation, to join him for tea, to ply him with whiskey, to offer him baksheesh, as a last resort to subdue him by force—for thirty minutes, long enough for the others to gain entry to the antique shop. Taylor waited until Hasan was near the main door and then followed Hamid to the alleyway at the side of the building. The only sound was the faint reverberation of Arab music from a tape player a block away.

  Hamid turned on a small flashlight and pointed it toward the wall. In the faint light, Taylor could see the outlines of a rope ladder climbing to an open window on the second floor. Hamid had already done the hard work of arranging the clandestine entry. All Taylor had to do was follow the script.

  Taylor climbed the ladder first, gently, a rung at a time. The ladder swayed against the concrete wall of the building but made little noise. Taylor paused when he reached the window frame, moving his head up slowly till he could see into the building. It was dark, save for a faint light coming up the stairwell. Taylor eased himself over the windowsill and onto the floor. George clambered up behind him with surprising agility, followed by Hamid. When the Turk reached the top he pulled the rope ladder up after him, laid it on the tile floor, and closed the window.

  Taylor took a diagram from his pocket. The shop they wanted was called Ozcan Is. It was about twenty yards across the hall. Taylor moved silently to the door. It was locked tight, with two dead bolts. Taylor heard voices from the floor below and froze until he recognized one of them as Hasan’s.

  George reached into his bag and removed a small leather kit that looked like a manicure set. It contained a set of thirty-two picks, each made of spring steel no more than a few hundredths of an inch thick. The picks were tipped with various irregular shapes—a diamond, a square, a ball, a jagged point—that could press against the pins of the lock while an L-shaped “tension tool” gently pushed it open.

  The first lock was easy. George squirted in some graphite. Then he inserted the tension tool, selected a pick with a triangular head, pushed it in all the way, and then rapidly brought it forward. Locksmiths called it “raking” the pins. On the fourth rake, the lock opened.

  George attacked the second lock the same way, but after several dozen rakes it hadn’t budged. He studied the lock to see if it might be an exotic variety with a special architecture, but it looked ordinary enough. He tried picking it more gently with various tools and then sighed and shook his head.

  “Mushroom pins,” he said in a whisper.

  “Is that bad?”

  George nodded. Unlike normal pins, which were straight and smooth and slipped up gently to the shear line when they were picked, mushroom pins were H-shaped and tended to get stuck halfway up.

  Taylor looked at his watch. It was twelve forty-five. George had been working on the second lock for nearly twenty minutes. Downstairs, Hasan and the watchman were talking animatedly about the local soccer rivalry—the rowdies of Fenerbahce versus the gentlemen of Galatasaray. It was a favorite topic in Istanbul, but Taylor knew they couldn’t keep talking about it forever. Eventually the watchman would have to make his rounds. He looked at his watch again and then looked at George.

  “I’ll use the
gun,” whispered George.

  Oh shit, thought Taylor. He’s going to shoot open the lock.

  George reached into his bag and pulled out a small black snub-nosed object with a large trigger. Taylor was reaching to stop him when George put his finger to his lips.

  “Take it easy. It’s just a Lockaid gun,” he said. The gun in question was an automatic pick, sold under the name Lockaid, whose trigger activated a small, straight pick that snapped up sharply against the pins. The only problem with it was that it was noisy.

  Downstairs, the voices were louder. Hasan’s thirty minutes were almost up. The watchman was apologizing profusely. He had enjoyed the conversation very much, thank you, brother, and the whiskey, but now he must make his rounds. Hasan was offering him one last drink, but the watchman was declining. Taylor leaned toward George. “Now,” he whispered.

  George smiled vaguely. He inserted the gun into the lock and pulled the trigger. SPROING. George turned the tension tool and the second dead bolt opened.

  There were footsteps below. The watchman was beginning his tour of the first floor. Taylor nudged George, who eased open the door. The three tiptoed inside and closed it behind them. The watchman was climbing the stairs. Taylor motioned for everyone to lie down on the floor, behind some large pieces of furniture, until the watchman had passed. They were lying there, listening to the watchman’s footsteps, when Taylor remembered the rope ladder.

  The footsteps grew louder. Then they stopped. The watchman was at the window. There was a creaking noise that Taylor didn’t recognize at first. Then he realized that it was the sound of the window opening. Disaster. The watchman had seen the ladder; now he must be looking to see where the culprits had come from. Taylor listened to the rise and fall of George’s breathing for ten or fifteen seconds. Then he heard something unmistakable. It was the thin, vaporous sound of a man urinating. The night watchman hadn’t discovered the ladder after all. He was pissing out the window. He must be very drunk, Taylor reasoned. Urinating out a window was something a sober Turk would never do.

  The rest was easy. Taylor located the chair in question. It was a magnificent old Ottoman piece, intricately carved and stained a deep, rich brown. Inlaid in the wood were pieces of mother-of-pearl in handsome Oriental designs. Say what you like about old Kunayev, thought Taylor. He has good taste in furniture. George set up his portable workshop. From the canvas bag emerged a small high-intensity light, a silent high-speed drill, a palette of varnishes in different shades, and finally a small metal box containing his electronic treasures.

  Taylor watched him with genuine admiration. George executed each task gently and lovingly. First he drilled a small hole four inches deep into one of the legs of the chair. Into this hole he inserted the guts of the hardware—a tiny device, no more than several inches long, that, once activated, would transmit sounds to a receiver several blocks away. At a point near where the top of this transmitting device would rest, he drilled another hole. This one was almost invisible, no larger than the size of a small sewing needle. Into it he delicately placed a filiment microphone that would carry sound to the transmitter. It was a tidy little package, not state of the art, but still useful. The chair could sit dormant for weeks or months and then be switched on when needed, like an electronic sleeper agent.

  “What’s the frequency?” George whispered.

  “Say what?”

  “The Soviet consulate. What frequency do they broadcast classified traffic on?”

  “How should I know? What difference does it make?”

  “I need to set the frequency of our transmitter. Usually I like to slip in right next to the Soviets’ own frequency. It’s the one place on the spectrum they usually don’t look.”

  “Sorry. Not my department.”

  George mumbled aloud. “They’re lazy. They probably use the same frequency here as in Athens and Rome. I’ll park alongside and tune the volume down real quiet.”

  George removed the transmitter, adjusted it, and put it back in the leg of the chair. Then he filled up his hole with a fast-drying wood compound, matched the varnish and painted over the scar. Hamid sat motionless, waiting for him to finish. At one point he took out a cigarette and looked at it lovingly, as if imagining how good it would taste when the job was done. Taylor looked at his watch. It was after two o’clock. They had to be out before dawn.

  George was utterly absorbed in his work and seemed unaware of the passage of time. When he finished the first leg, he installed an identical backup device in the second. He did it just as painstakingly as the first one. At three-thirty, George was carefully applying the varnish.

  “I hate to say this,” said George as he waited for the varnish to dry, “but this is a pretty old-fashioned operation.”

  “What are you talking about?” whispered Taylor.

  “You don’t really need a microphone anymore, Al. You don’t even need a transmitter inside the premises. You just need a resonator.”

  Taylor ignored him. “Is that dry yet?” he asked impatiently, pointing to the varnish.

  “You see, anything that vibrates can be a microphone,” continued George, by now quite absorbed in the technical point he was elaborating. “A window can be a microphone. A wall can be a microphone. Even the filament in a light bulb can be a microphone. All you need is a power source to read the vibration, like an accelerometer behind a wall, or a laser across the street, or a tunable antenna. Did you know that? Isn’t that amazing?”

  “Jesus,” hissed Taylor. “It’s got to be dry by now.”

  “So this is a very old-fashioned operation, when you think about it. But still nice.”

  “Fuck it,” said Taylor. “Let’s not wait for it to dry, okay?” George smiled amiably and collected his tools. Taylor and Hamid were already out the door and to the window when George motioned to them to stop.

  “We have to lock the door,” whispered George.

  “Use the gun,” said Taylor. George looked almost disappointed, like a fly fisherman who has been told to fish with a shimmering silver lure instead of a hand-tied Gray Ghost. George inserted the Lockaid gun.

  SPROING. Taylor hoped the guard was asleep by now. One dead bolt closed. SPROING. The other bolt turned shut. Hamid opened the window and unrolled the ladder. Down went George, then Taylor. Then Hamid emerged, dangling from a rope he had clamped to the window ledge. He collected the ladder, closed the window, and slid deftly down the rope to the alley.

  It was nearly dawn when they finally left Horhor. A few yellow taxis were already beginning to shuttle the streets. The smells of fresh bread and Turkish coffee were in the air. Taylor felt intoxicated. Hamid offered him a cigarette, and although he hadn’t smoked in nearly a year, Taylor eagerly took it. Why not? To refuse would have been metaphysically unsound.

  Kunayev didn’t visit the antique bazaar in Horhor all morning. In fact, he didn’t stir from his office in the salmon-pink pile on Istiklal Avenue. Taylor was edgy. He sat in his office with George, eating doughnuts and drinking coffee, listening to periodic reports from the Turkish surveillance team in the observation post across from the Soviet consulate. As the morning passed, he began to doubt that the Soviet consul general would ever revisit Horhor Street. It would be a mistake to do so, a breach of security, and the Soviets didn’t make mistakes. That was an American specialty.

  Finally, just after three, the watchers reported that someone—Kunayev—was leaving the consulate in a big limousine and heading along Istiklal Avenue.

  When the Turkish surveillance team reported that he was nearing the Fatih district, Taylor held his breath. The Soviet diplomat was turning left on Ataturk Street, radioed the watchers. He was turning left again. Onto Horhor Street.

  “Say that again,” Taylor barked into the radio.

  “Horhor Street.”

  Taylor smiled. His eyes twinkled. The watchers reported that the Soviet diplomat had parked his car. He was walking toward the antique bazaar, accompanied by his bodyguard. He was entering
the building.

  “Now buy the chair, asshole!” said Taylor.

  “I hope the varnish dried all right,” said George.

  “Shut up,” said Taylor. He apologized an instant later.

  Kunayev finally emerged twenty-five minutes later, empty-handed. Taylor held his breath until he heard the next squawk over the radio. Behind the Soviet diplomat was his bodyguard, carrying a large brown chair.

  “Owooooo!” wailed Taylor when the last report came over the wireless. “Kunayev, you are one dumb motherfucker!” He pounded his desk, kissed his secretary, and barked again, like a stray dog with something to brag about.

  “I hope the microphone works,” said George. “I didn’t have much time.”

  “Of course it will work,” answered Taylor. “Tomorrow we start listening. Tonight we celebrate!”

  “What you got in mind?”

  “Georgie, my boy, I want you to go back to your hotel and get a few hours’ rest. Because tonight I am going to take you on a tour of Istanbul nightlife.”

  “Nightlife? What do you mean?”

  “I mean Grade A, hundred-proof sleaze. Tonight, my friend, you are going to see varieties of the human experience that you have never imagined.”

  “I dunno. I’ve been to Bangkok.”

  “Trust me,” said Taylor. “Bangkok is tasteful compared to Istanbul.”

  7

  A copy of Taylor’s cable describing the operation on Horhor Street reached Edward Stone in Washington late in the afternoon. Technically, Stone wasn’t supposed to have a copy. He was not on the routing list of division chiefs and staff chiefs and desk officers who normally would see such a communication. But he had friends. And one of them, a little spark plug of a man named Harry Peltz, stopped by just as Stone was about to head off to one of that season’s endless round of retirement parties. Peltz had worked with Stone thirty years earlier in Berlin and now held down a sinecure in the European Division.