November Rain
ALSO BY DONALD HARSTAD:
Eleven Days
Known Dead
The Big Thaw
Code 61
A Long December
Three Octobers
November Rain
Donald Harstad
This is a work of fiction. All of the names, characters, organizations, places and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to real or actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2013 by Donald Harstad
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by Crooked Lane Books, an imprint of The Quick Brown Fox & Company LLC.
Crooked Lane Books and its logo are trademarks of The Quick Brown Fox & Company LLC.
The Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.
ISBN (hardcover): 978-1-61129-049-3
ISBN (ePub): 978-1-61129-049-3
Cover design by Lori Palmer
www.crookedlanebooks.com
Crooked Lane Books
2 Park Avenue, 10th Floor
New York, NY 10016
Second Edition: September 2015
Contents
Acknowledgments
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Acknowledgments
I would like to thank several young women who provided insight and information for several characters in this book. Courtney Zapf Bently, Kelly Zapf Carnes, and Molly Zapf, who provided great insights into the thinking of the young women in the book.
Victoria Baillie McCorkindale, a nurse who worked at St. Thomas Hospital in London, and who I met at a party in Elkader, Iowa. Victoria gave a description of the workings of the hospital that proved invaluable, and a delightful rhythm of speech that was of great use in one character in particular.
I would also like to thank Bob Mecoy, my agent, for his tireless efforts, persistence, and sense of humor.
To My Wife, Mary
Who has never stopped believing in me.
Prologue
My name’s Carl Houseman, and I’m a Deputy Sheriff in Nation County, Iowa. It’s a pretty big county, as Iowa goes, covering about 750 square miles. Our total population is about 19,000, and our largest town has nearly 2,000 people. Among other things, that means that when our daughter Jane went to college, there were more people in her dorm than there were in her hometown.
I’m 56; about six feet four and about 275 lbs., give or take. I have less hair than I did last year and a whole lot more than I’ll have in a year or two. It’s harder to tell it’s thinning, since it’s all gray now. I’m what those who don’t want to irritate me refer to as “experienced.” Under Iowa law, in fact, I’m so experienced I’m eligible to retire. Under Iowa’s Public Employee’s Retirement System, I can’t afford to.
This is the story of the Schiller case. It doesn’t have a case number, because it didn’t happen anywhere near our jurisdiction. That’s the same reason that the official case file is out of my reach. Nonetheless, I got assigned to it. Reluctantly, just for the record.
Washington, DC
Excerpt from an Intelligence Briefing entitled: “Task, Collect, Process and Use” presented by special agent Volont of the F.B.I. to a joint task group on April 19, 2002.
One of the weaknesses of a typical terrorist organization is their inability to act in a timely fashion. This is the window of opportunity that can enable us to discover the intent to act and to intervene decisively before the act is committed.
This is the area where our response has been the least effective. We feel that the primary reason for that lack of effectiveness is twofold: insufficient resources to enable us to differentiate between accurate and inaccurate information; and a failure of interpretation after reliable information has been received and identified as such.
Chapter 1
Tuesday, October 28, 2003
Pond Square Park
Highgate, London, UK
Emma Schiller left the Gatehouse Pub, and walked quickly toward her flat on the southwest side of Pond Square Park. She’d been drinking, was embarrassed, hurt and very angry at one Martin Granger, and wasn’t quite ready to see her roommates.
She walked to the south edge of the little park, scrunching the tiny rocks under her feet, and sat on a bench near the public restroom. The lighting was adequate, although she thought it was too yellow. There was very little activity in the village, and except for the make of the cars parked in the square, she could have been home in Maitland, Iowa.
“Well, it’s a good thing you’re not,” she said, quietly, to herself. In Maitland, they probably just wouldn’t understand. The problem had started with Martin Granger, a young teacher she’d met at the Pub more than a month ago. They’d struck up a conversation, enjoyed each other’s company, and she had wound up sleeping with him at his flat four nights later. Emma had no regrets about sex with Martin. None whatsoever. Emma’s attitude toward sexual relationships had been, for at least the last fifteen of her thirty-four years, very much focused on the here and now. She would have termed any sexual relationship that lasted more than six months as having gone on too long. She very nearly always managed to end them on her terms, and in her way. She was happy to have brief relationships, and was absolutely convinced that she would never have one that lasted as long as a year. She certainly didn’t want or need something long-term.
“The little prick,” she said softly.
Martin had caused her to violate one of her very few hard and fast rules about relationships. Never sleep with a married man, or one who was engaged. Everybody else was fair game. A simple rule, and in her entire life she’d never found herself seriously attracted to anyone who had been married. She was determined to never be the other woman in a relationship.
Tonight, Martin had informed her that he was engaged, that the wedding would be quite soon, and that he was sorry, but that things would have to stop. Worse, he’d done it after she’d joined him and some of his friends at their table, and had actually asked the little creep to escort her home. The implication of her request had been very clear to him, and to his friends. He had acted embarrassed, and the inflections of his voice had made it appear as if she’d already known of his fiancé.
“The bastard,” she said. She had, in fact, asked him if he were encumbered in any way before she’d ended up in his bed the first time. She’d never forget his answer.
“Hardly. I’m not the sort who has long relationships.”
She’d thought they were birds of a feather. She took a deep breath. So much for that idea. And to top it all off, she’d come to the Pub tonight with her roommates, and had insisted that they leave and not wait up for her. Both Jane and Vicky had asked her if she were “sure you’ll be all right?” She’d been irritated. Neither of them had any romantic action at all. Why interfere with her?
The statement that had topped it all was that one of the other men at Martin’s table had sai
d something she hadn’t entirely caught, but involved the words “slutty,” and “American.”
She’d put him back very firmly in his place, when she’d grabbed his collar and said, “Fuck off, you pencil necked little schoolboy.” Well, she thought that maybe she had. It had felt very good to say it, but the recollection was beginning to sour.
She leaned forward, and put her head in her hands. “Aw, shit,” she muttered, and took a deep breath. “Forget him. Hell, forget them. You’re just embarrassed.”
She thought that was good advice, straightened up, and almost started to get to her feet when she became aware that there was somebody standing very close in front of her. Her first thought, before she raised her head back up, was that it was Martin.
“Piss off,” she said, loudly, as she stood.
It was not Martin. Instead, in the yellowish light, she found herself staring at a fairly tall man with sharp features.
“Oh.,” she said, with an embarrassed giggle. “Oh, I’m so sorry, I thought . . .”
The first blow was to the left side of her face, and nearly knocked her off her feet.
“What?!” she yelled, as she caught herself with her right and on the seat of the bench. Her first instinct was to kick out, and she did, but he jumped back, and she missed. She became aware of a hand trying to grab her from the rear, and she lunged to her left, pulling the shoulder of her sweatshirt from his grasp.
Emma had always been something of a fighter, and even surprised and a little drunk, her reactions were very good. She lunged directly at the man who had hit her, screaming as loudly as she could. He grabbed her, but she frantically twisted her five foot one inch frame, at the same time as she struck out with a flurry of blows to his face. They both went to the ground, and she managed to stand before he did. In three steps, she’d left him behind, and was just filling her lungs to scream when a third man she hadn’t seen stepped from a shadowy area near a tree, put his shoulder down, and ran right into her. His shoulder hit her in the chest and abdomen, driving her upward and back, completely off her feet, and knocking her breath away. She hit the gravel with a thump that knocked the remaining wind from her, with his body crashing down on hers an instant later. She flailed her arms, but was picked up by her legs and arms by what she thought were two people, and the third delivered a kick that caught her in the kidneys.
She came around a few seconds later, confused and in a lot of pain, but was able to realize that she was already in a car. She was trying to fight, get her breath, and vomit all at the same time. Someone was pounding on her back saying “Lie still! Lie still!”
Another was trying to put some tape over her mouth, and the one pounding on her back stopped for an instant, and said something in a language she didn’t understand. The tape disappeared, replaced by a rough hand pressing her face into the crack of the seat. As she vomited up her last Guinness, she tried to move her head, afraid that she would drown.
Every time she raised her head, somebody would strike her in the middle of her back, and say, “No!”
She started to get her breath back, gasping, spitting, and gagging. She had a dim awareness of looking at the back of a driver’s seat, before some hands grabbed her ankles, held them tightly together, and bent her legs, bringing her feet up toward the back of her head. Then, whoever that was, leaned heavily, pinning her even more firmly to the seat.
The hand on her neck relented, and her face was turned toward the front of the car. Tape was slapped over her mouth, wound part way to the back of her head, tangling in her hair. She jerked her head back, and was rewarded with another blow to the face. Stunned, she was dimly aware that a roll of tape was being wound around her head, over and over. Then her wrists, behind her back, were tightly bound. Then her ankles. Then they seemed to pass something between her ankles and her wrists, tightly bringing them together behind her back.
Then, and only then, did the pressure ease and the blows stop.
“American whore.” It was said in a low tone, but very clearly. Then the same voice said, “Call him. Tell him you have her.”
“Right. Yes. Is she alive?”
“Don’t be so foolish. Call him and tell him you have her.”
What Emma Schiller couldn’t know, and surely couldn’t have cared about at that moment, was that these things happening to her were the result of months of planning.
Chapter 2
January 11, 2003
Ashburnham Road
London, UK
22:35 Greenwich Mean Time
It had begun months before, on a cold night in London, with what was effectively a committee meeting. The organizational meeting of the steering committee of the London Movement for the Freedom of Khaled al Fawwaz and Ibrahim Eidarous, as it was originally known, brought together three people with similar interests; two men and a woman. Dr. Robert Northwood was a professor of English, a man known only by the name of Imad was an electrical engineer, and Hanadi Tamish was a solicitor. The three had initially met at a rally for the liberation of Palestine, and had continued their relationship ever since. Tonight, at the professor’s flat on Ashburnham Road, they met to formalize their interests.
Unbeknownst to both the professor and the solicitor, the electrical engineer Imad, who had graduated from University College with an MSc in Broadband Communications was also a 1988 graduate of an al-Qaeda training camp. That particular credit he had never shared with the administration of UCL. It is important to note that, while he had attended the camp, he was not a member of al-Qaeda. He had not, as the Americans would say, made the cut; and as a consequence, had not been permitted to take an oath of loyalty to Osama bin Laden. He had been informed, though, that his subsequent actions and activities would be closely watched. Anything that furthered the broader goals of that organization would be considered in his favor.
The solicitor Hanadi insisted upon the keeping of “proper minutes.” That was agreeable, especially since she had just volunteered to be the group’s secretary.
The question of chairman was the first real order of business. The professor of English, much to his feigned surprise, was the unanimous choice.
The post of Treasurer went to the engineer, because the posts of secretary and chairman were already occupied.
Finished with those mundane tasks, the three discussed their agreement to work together to obtain release of political prisoners held in the UK; especially Khaled al Fawwaz and Ibrahim Eidarous. That their release would be the ultimate goal of the group was agreed upon unanimously, and so recorded. It is of interest that both Professor Northwood and the solicitor Hanadi were thinking exclusively of an activist organization, and nothing more. Both envisioned pamphlets, protests, and letters to the media. Imad the engineer had no such reservations, but kept his thoughts on that matter to himself.
The adoption of their group name required no thought at all, and was also a unanimous decision.
There remained the question of who would design the website for the group, and it was a task happily given to Imad, since he had extensive computer training and experience, and one of his fellow workers was skilled at computer art, and could design a logo. This was entered into the minutes as a consensus of the group, with the provision that the logo be approved by unanimous vote at a later meeting.
During this original meeting, the subject of religion was obliquely addressed. Although they were fully aware that Professor Northwood was the only non-Muslim present, Hanadi said that it was her opinion that a unity of purpose was the primary requirement for the members, and that politics was the principle tool for their joint endeavor. Not only that, but she offered that religious diversity within the group was very likely beneficial, and would serve to underscore the universality of their cause. Northwood and Imad agreed.
Imad then brought up two questions that occupied much of the time in that first meeting. First, he stated his opinion that they would require “soldiers” to do much of the unimportant work for the organization, as the three of the
m were professional people and had serious work-related obligations. Recruitment was discussed, and eventually turned into a task to be handled by the engineer, who was going on holiday beginning the next week and would have the free time to interview prospects. Hanadi then objected to the word “soldier,” and even though Imad strongly disagreed, he kept it to himself and it was changed to “worker” by consensus.
The second question put forth by Imad regarded the utility of an “operations” manager. He was quick to state that it would in no way effect the true chairmanship. It would, however, facilitate the supervision and direction of whatever workers they would be able to recruit.
“Organizer,” said Hanadi. “It would be more of an organizational function.”
“Not unlike a Chief of Staff,” said Professor Northwood. The idea had a certain appeal. There was very little discussion regarding this, since Hanadi said she was certain that it would be a very time consuming task, and she did not have the time to devote to it. Consequently, the Imad also became the Chief of Staff.
The engineer Imad, therefore, had gotten himself in the position of financial officer, Chief of Staff, and field general all in one. The pre-conception by Northwood and Hanadi regarding the activist nature of the group allowed for unbalanced responsibilities. Given the nature of the group as they saw it, it couldn’t possibly make a significant difference.
The professor had sincere and honest concerns about the nature of the people being held at Belmarsh prison. He also sympathized with some of the ideology of Osama bin Laden, particularly where the presence of Western troops in the Middle East was concerned. Although not an anti-Semite, he also opposed the Israeli actions in Palestine, and their handling of the entire Palestinian matter. Professionally, the professor also felt that a position within a group that opposed political repression would enhance his reputation among his peers. The University could hardly object to faculty members participating in an activist organization of high ethical and moral standards; and the inquiry by a private organization into the welfare and status of political prisoners in Belmarsh would certainly qualify. The fact that he was the non-Muslim among them also appealed to his ecumenical sensibilities. The fact that he had been elected their chairman appealed to a somewhat more pedestrian side of his nature. He was, as he enjoyed telling his friends, a man of four passions: English literature, politics, women and the history of the London Underground. Or, as he would sometimes put it, his profession, his beliefs, and his two hobbies.
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