The Consulate Conspiracy

by Oren Sanderson

  “But—” Laure objected.

  Moses, however, was in the swing of it and could not be stopped. “We have enemies — those who try to sabotage the efforts of the good people, the righteous like Barkat who only bring redemption closer.”

  "Redemption by warhead?” she challenged him.

  "You’re still young,” Moses dismissed her. “It was a stupid move on your part to leave Barkat,” he rebuked her, increasing my anxiety. “But I think you understand that now.”

  "What do I understand?” Laure was trying to draw him out. We were in a dangerous race against time. Moses’ theories were chilling, but he was not alone in this.

  “A warhead,” he said proudly. “An accurate warhead, containing the right elements, is just the end of the road. The yeast in the leaven, as it were. You must recognize the difference. The warhead is the decisive strategic weapon. Do you understand? It guarantees a final victory. However, until then, there is still a long way to go. ‘Such is the redemption of Israel, at first it comes bit by bit, but then it waxes greater and greater.’ Until judgement day, we must be prepared for ‘the day of small things.’”

  “‘The day of small things’?” Laure wondered.

  “Tactical arms. Tactical arms, my dear. Many small victories, on the way to a great goal. Biological balance can also be achieved by quietly aiding nature, against all defamers and slanderers. Today it is easy and simple. Natural gases are lethal. It’s just a matter of packaging. Someone can stand next to you with a cigar, and from the smoke, you die on the spot with the symptoms of a heart attack. Or a simple spray in the ear. A bit awkward to operate, but also efficient and convenient. A simple chemical formula. Soluble in the blood, leaving no trace.”

  I had found Mevorach’s killer.

  "Or a pen gun, for example,” Moses continued enthusiastically. Perhaps he was stalling until Barkat could arrive. “A gun that fires a pin to penetrate the heart or the brain. It also leaves no trace.” He laughed, a dry, throaty sound. “Do you know about the neutron bomb? The shockwave kills all living things, but leaves the whole environment intact. It’s ideal for solving localized problems.” I could hear him getting up, moving chairs around and dragging out a heavy box. “You see. It’s all just a thick tube. We call it a pencil.”

  "With a clock on the end?” she asked, perhaps for my benefit.

  "It’s for arming the explosive. It’s just a model,” he said proudly. “But a working model. It has the effective range of a room. Here’s an antenna for detonating it by remote control. A tactical neutron bomb for limited purposes. Maximum range of thirteen feet. Ideal for a room or car. The victims look like divers who surface too quickly and get the bends. Their intestines are twisted and mangled, but from the outside, you cannot see a thing.”

  A suspicious silence ensued in the room. I couldn’t see him, but if he got close, I had six feet to react.

  "You create order, without any external signs.” The voice came from behind the desk; he had returned to his seat.

  “Well, that’s ideal,” she said in a choked voice, but he did not notice the sarcasm.

  "The essence of the matter is that the weapons must be held by responsible hands. For I have given power to the prudent, says the Lord.” Since he’d used up real quotes, now he was fabricating verses on the fly. “So what exactly did you want?"

  "Shuki said you could explain it best. I wanted to understand how you plan to create order.” Laure had a knack for being persuasive, even if she were reading the phonebook.

  “‘Turn from evil and do good,’” he admonished her. Now he was back to quoting our people’s sacred literature. “‘Know what is above you: a seeing eye, a listening ear, and all your deeds being inscribed in a book.’”

  It was time to make our getaway, I thought, and I got ready to emerge from the alcove where I’d been hiding. However, there was a rickety bookshelf over my head, and when I began to straighten up, it collapsed with a thundering clatter. I heard footsteps, and suddenly Moses was standing over me. “Run, Laure!” I managed to scream, as I dodged something he was trying to hit me with. It whistled past my ear by a hairsbreadth. I rolled out of the alcove and into the office, then got to my feet and tried to get my bearings. Moses stood in front of me, examining me carefully, glancing at his shelf of special accessories. Close up, he looked shorter than I’d thought. With Moses facing me, Laure was able to grab something and flee from the room.

  Moses was afraid to move, knowing I was about to leap on him, so he tried to needle me. “Our peacemaker,” he said mockingly. “Knight in shining armor, here to save his damsel in distress.” He tried to dart toward the shelf of special accessories, but I raised my leg and kicked him in the ribs with all my might. He doubled over, howling hoarsely. Then he slowly straightened, holding a short, white cylinder, similar to a candle.

  "One little shot?” I asked. In my head, voice of a Krav Maga instructor in the El Al security course echoed, “A person can absorb almost countless blows to the body and move on. If you want to hurt them, then go for the head.” I feinted with my right hand, then slammed my left fist into his forehead. He collapsed.

  I turned around to make my escape, but he got up and leaped on me, grabbing my legs and knocking me down. I gathered he had not heard of Krav Maga classes. I twisted around to face him. Blood flowed from his mouth, and again he raised his hand with the “candle.” I grabbed his wrist and tried to twist it away from me. Moses now seemed to have superhuman powers. It was clear to me that only one of us was walking out of there alive. With supreme effort I twisted out of his grip, shoving him away and struggling to get to my feet. Moses was on all fours. The strange cylinder in his hand is an automatic shot, I thought. Like the atropine syringe I remembered from chemical-warfare training in the army. Apply pressure, and the substance inside is injected right into the bloodstream. This realization took a fraction of a second, during which I kicked him in head again, with all my might. Moses flew back, airborne for an impossibly long second, then hit the wall in the corner of his room, slumping forward on his stomach — with his hand holding the syringe under him.

  A low, weird groan emitted from his throat. “Bad, very bad,” he murmured, then froze in place. His eyes went wide, completely white. The pupils were gone, as his eyes rolled back in his head. Then the lips begin to whiten. The corpse was drying up before my eyes. The skin became taut, the cheeks scarred as they collapsed into the oral cavity. That was enough for me; I didn’t want to witness any more of the horror.

  I ran down the street. The afternoon was torrid. Cars passed lazily, in the relative comfort of air conditioning. The air outside was thick and sticky, and I could barely breathe. I went around the corner. Laure was sitting on the bumper of the Trans Am, her entire upper body bent forward looking at the sidewalk.

  “Laure!”

  She straightened up, very pale and in tears. “God!” She hugged me, shaking with anxiousness. “You made it!” A homeless man sat on the sidewalk and looked at us in great amazement. Laure did not give up. She grabbed me and slipped her hands under my shirt. “I want you.” In the middle of a dirty street in a run-down commercial district in Houston. I returned the embrace.

  “Moses is dead,” I sighed. “He’s toast. Literally.”

  "Take me now,” she gasped, and I felt my adrenaline, which was beginning to subside, shoot back up. I dragged her to the emergency exit of the office building across the street. The exit door responded to me with a slight push. Stumbling, we climbed the emergency stairs halfway to the first floor. I hugged Laure and she wrapped her legs around my waist, unbuttoning my pants with one hand and pulling down her panties. My brain was disconnected from my enflamed body. I found my way into her in a matter of seconds. She was all wet and waiting for me. She convulsed around my waist with feverish speed, and a brief moment later, we both fell apart.

  I had never finished so fast, not since my fir
st time with Yvonne; but I only thought about it when we were in the car again and I tried to decide where to go.

  “To Galveston,” said Laure. “Let’s disappear.” She smiled. This was not a bad idea at all. It was impossible to vanish or escape, but I would have given a lot to stay with Laure and away from the rest of the world for a day or two. Maybe a year or two.

  41.

  The white Crown Victoria drove into the motel parking lot, the gravel crunching like popcorn. It was obviously a government car.

  Through the window I saw O’Brien coming out of it. As the special agent in charge of the FBI field office here, he had at least twenty agents working with him, and yet he preferred to do some field work alone. What an honor!.

  The phone rang, and I told O’Brien that in five minutes I’d be at the front desk to talk to him. I had no intention of evading him. If they had wanted to arrest me, O’Brien would not have come alone.

  The Sixpence’s reception area was as shabby as an old prostitute who’d known better days and no longer bothered to put on makeup. Only those who had no other options would stay there, with the peeling Formica counter, cheap imitation-leather armchairs, a Coke machine with a flickering bulb inside, and a musty smell.

  "We could have had a coffee in a slightly more hospitable place.” O’Brien showed uncharacteristic generosity

  “Will this take a while?”

  “Could be. It’s up to you.”

  “I prefer to talk here.”

  “Is this the best place you could afford?” We stayed put. Even he had a hard time hiding the nausea the place induced. “Why not clean up your apartment? How hard could that be?” Good, he knew about the visit I had yesterday. I would actually have been surprised if he hadn’t. The doorman would have reported the incident, my neighbors, who knows who else?

  “I need to rest a bit.”

  “I get that. Someone was having a shootout on the streets of Texas City yesterday.” O’Brien was tall, thin, and dark-complexioned. Irish name, but clearly biracial. Half Native? From his height of six foot three, he surveyed me intently. "We received an anonymous phone call this morning about a body in the Enterprise Building. Someone you know.”

  "I’m listening.”

  "Have you heard anything about that?”

  "From you, just now. Whose body is it?”

  "Listen up.” O’Brien was furious, but he did not raise his voice. “You’re proving to be a huge fucking headache. As long as you’re running around, more bodies are gonna turn up. Eventually, I’m thinking, it’ll be your body…” It wasn’t clear if he saw this as a particularly bad outcome.

  "Whose body did you find this time?”

  "Moses, you know him?”

  I didn’t answer.

  "Whatever is going on at the consulate, the moment of truth is coming. Your time has run out,” he continued in his quiet and harsh tone. “And you can say that to your consul general as well. Very soon you will have to just close up shop and run off with your tail between your legs. There is a limit to what a diplomatic mission can do. Even if it is Israeli. Do you hear me?”

  "I hear you fine,” I said. “For that you came to Galveston?”

  "Not only that. I was hoping you could help us with the investigation. You must understand that it’s in the best interests of all of you at the consulate. Also for your personal benefit. I don’t know where you are less dangerous. Roving the streets, or in lockup? Protective custody, you know, for your own benefit.”

  "You’re following me anyway...”

  "Don’t rely on it. You aren’t important enough.”

  "So why arrest me?” I seemed to be stretching him to his breaking point.

  "I have at least one person who saw you in the vicinity of the Enterprise.” He ignored the question. “I think you called us to tip us off to the body. I have no idea why. You really should share with us what you know. As a local hire, you know, you have no diplomatic immunity.”

  "So why are you not arresting me?” I asked again.

  “Because you’re more useful when you’re out. You’re first-rate bait.”

  42.

  Saturday was a day I spent fielding phone calls from all sorts of people; they knew it was a great time to catch me at home. O’Brien thought I was bait now, so answering the phone was no bother. If the SAC was so smart, he could do his job and keep me safe. If not, I was confident that I could protect myself.

  To my surprise, the first call was from my brother Dubi. He caught me as I was attempting to clean up my apartment, and I was happy for the break. He asked me all the usual questions, and I waited patiently for him to get to the point.

  “Do you think you could do me a favor?” he finally asked. “I need someone in New York for the MarkOffice.” In the past year, he had bought two American companies.

  "But we talked about it before I left. It’s just not for me. I’m not interested in the family business. Why do you keep harping on this?”

  “Look, one of our managers quit. I need someone I can trust.”

  "You have managers quit all the time. What’s so special about this one?”

  "I want you out of Houston,” he said, and there was silence on both ends of the line.

  "What have you heard?” I finally asked.

  "That you’d better get out of Houston.”

  “I’m not leaving!” I declared. I was sorry to hurt him, but I had no intention of abandoning this whole mess to others. Plus, I had a degree to complete. I’d already failed one Research Methods exam.

  Dubi was still trying to joke and tell me about the family. About our sister, about his wife and kids. Everybody’s fine. “They’re worried about you,” he tried again. “Think about New York.”

  There was no chance. I would go back only to further my own interests. My mom exemplified for me why family was an after-hours subject, not to be raised at work. She was gone, so no one could drag me back.

  My next call was from Ofra, Giora’s chipper secretary, in New York. “What are you doing tomorrow?”

  “Sunday?” I was amazed. The melancholy from the conversation with Dubi dissipated almost immediately; I had fond memories of Ofra. What would happen with Laure? “I’m busy.”

  "Getting busy, I’m sure,” she replied. “Giora wants to see you.”

  “Is he with you in New York?!”

  "No, with you in Houston. There’s an airshow in Galveston. At ten in the morning, be at the Holiday Inn there. And be nice to him. He’s under pressure. He doesn’t have many friends left.”

  "You’re advancing in life,” Giora told me the next morning, appreciating my new Trans Am. “There’s no way you could afford that on an information officer’s salary.”

  "I’m Markovsky of the pencils, forgot?”

  "Well, that explains it,” he conceded. Scolding me for my ostentatiousness was a waste of time. “And what’s that?” he asked about the squat tube in the back seat. That was what Laure had taken from Moses, the neutron bomb, with its limited-range remote control. It looked like a jar of spicy artisanal olives. A pencil, he called it? Well, a Markovsky knows a thing or two about pencils. Giora was to take the tube to his room at the Holiday Inn.

  Half of Texas showed up at the Galveston Airshow. Giora said the runways could not accommodate more than a million and a half people, but up close it seemed like more.

  Giora’s boyish face was carved with new wrinkles. Something had changed in him.

  “The situation has become… challenging,” he said, thoughtful and worried.

  "You’ve been gone lately.”

  "Operational activity. Nothing good. I told you, it’s a snafu.”

  "Something I can help with?”

  "I don’t know anymore,” he admitted. “It’s a systemic problem. You know how mushrooms are cultivated?”

  “Mushrooms?”<
br />
  “Feed ‘em shit and keep ‘em in the dark.”

  "That’s funny. I know even less, but O’Brien from the FBI settled on me. I’m supposed to be in contact with them. Instead they’re shutting me down. They won’t let me move. And not just them: my family in Israel, our people here.”

  “‘Our people’?”

  "Hinenzon."

  "He’s not ‘our people.’ I’m uncomfortable with him. He sets off an alarm every time I come across him. Since he started up with Houston, it stinks even more. I have to be there personally and keep an eye out. These problems won’t solve themselves. What is happening is unbelievable.”

  "Why do you put yourself through all of this?” I asked, as we made our way to the runway.

  "I don’t know anymore. Maybe it’s inertia. Maybe it’s a matter of principle. There’s something twisted inside us.”

  "And you have someone to talk to?”

  "I’m not sure. I’ve only got a relationship with one person on the inside. For better or worse, I’m wholly dependent on him.”

  “And you sleep well at night?”

  "I have no choice. It is what it is.”

  The runway hosted a grand display of American aircraft, through the decades: from the first mail planes to the formidable transport planes and the new strategic bombers.