Assassin's Strike Page 14

  “Salma could say she was only helping a friend. She couldn’t have known the police were looking for you.”

  Ludmilla said, “Actually, the owner of another salon recently called her. She told Salma the police had come looking for me at her own place. Anyway, none of that would matter to the Muk. Salma is gone, along with her car and her son. They will learn I was staying there, in the very room from which you just launched an attack. There is no way they can go back.”

  As much as he didn’t like it, Slaton knew she was right. Salma had burned her bridge—or more precisely, he and Ludmilla had burned it. This mother and son were now fugitives every bit as much as they were. He heaved a sigh and looked outside. In the distance he saw an ambulance running in the opposite direction down a parallel street. Of course he knew where it was going.

  Slaton hadn’t come to start a war. Yet that was exactly what he’d done. Now they had to get out of town, and it wouldn’t be easy. The checkpoints he’d seen on his way in would be reinforced, every car leaving Damascus searched thoroughly. Every policeman and soldier not already on duty would be called in to comb streets and conduct raids. Getting Ludmilla to safety had suddenly become exponentially more difficult. And now he had Syria’s two newest refugees in tow.

  Yet it wasn’t all gloom. His deficiency when it came to speaking Arabic was no longer an issue. He now had a perfectly fluent interpreter, even if she could never pass for a local on appearance, and two native speakers, one of whom was intimately familiar with the city. It was a start.

  “Okay,” he said. “Tell Salma I can’t make any promises about citizenship, but I’ll do my best to get her and Naji out of Syria. The first order of business is to ditch this car.”

  “Go to Mezzeh,” Salma said.

  Slaton eyed her skeptically, and she expanded, “My uncle, Achmed, lives there. He will help us.”

  “How?”

  “He has a garage. We can hide this car, and he will get us another.”

  Slaton had no better ideas, but caution ruled. “Do you trust him?”

  “I—”

  Ludmilla interrupted with, “Achmed lost two sons to the war.”

  The women exchanged a pained glance.

  Slaton looked at them in turn, then blew out an extended sigh. “All right. Uncle Achmed’s it is.”

  * * *

  From his office window, Petrov regarded a day whose bleakness matched his mood. The sky was gray and sulking, and a sharp wind kept heads down and brushed waves across the river. October was rarely kind to Moscow. But then, Petrov mused, who was these days?

  This morning’s briefing had been unusually dire. Unusual not because the national condition hadn’t long been one of suffering, but because one of his minions had dared to speak the truth. General Markarov, who was fast nearing retirement, had taken it upon himself to speak candidly.

  It was getting more difficult to control the masses, he’d said. Every time the government issued good news, organizers on the internet would shoot it full of holes. A burgeoning protest yesterday had been shut down by police, only to have cretins using WhatsApp move it three blocks away. The technology division disabled WhatsApp, only to see the crowd switch to a different application. It was like chasing ten thousand butterflies in a swirling breeze. The information blunderbuss Petrov had built for his trolls, so effectively when it came to meddling in the West’s affairs, was now being turned against him. A digital anarchy that no one controlled. After Markarov had left, Petrov was left shaking his head somberly, not unlike Khrushchev in his final days.

  The red phone on his desk chirped its signature tone. The handset was his most secure, and rarely used. On this day Petrov could imagine only two reasons why it would ring: impending nuclear annihilation, or the arrival of an important call he’d been waiting for.

  He picked up, and said, “Tell me you have found her.”

  A hesitation. An audible swallow. Vasiliev said, “We found the hair salon where she was hiding, but the Syrians bungled the arrest. Kravchuk escaped before we could reach her.”

  “I heard an absurd rumor that half a city block was destroyed.”

  Silence in return.

  “Have we underestimated our interpreter? Perhaps she is not an amateur after all.”

  “It’s not that,” said Vasiliev. “There is significant evidence that she’s gotten help.”

  “Help?”

  “To begin, the salon owner is missing, along with her young son. There is also a report of a stranger.” Vasiliev told him about the lift bucket found against the window, the semiconscious municipal worker who’d been in the closet. “Whoever this man is, he managed to steal a Ural from Hezbollah, then used it to enter the city. The truck was carrying a full load of rockets which exploded just as Inspector Hadad and his team arrived.”

  “Not by chance.”

  “No.”

  “Did Hadad survive?”

  “Yes, he’s fine. He is already going over the apartment where Kravchuk was staying, and there is one bit of news.” Vasiliev hesitated. “He asked me about a pair of shoes he found on a table. I told him nothing, of course, but asked him to send me a picture. The one with the recording device has been disassembled, and the heel containing the memory card is gone.”

  Petrov held steady. This was bad news, but a scenario he’d been contemplating since Kravchuk’s disappearance. If nothing else, it confirmed what he was up against.

  “This man who is helping her,” he prodded, “who do you think he is?”

  “Two witnesses saw him, but according to Hadad their descriptions weren’t of much use. Whoever he is, he clearly has operational experience.”

  Petrov felt a sudden worm of anxiety. The last time he’d had such a feeling was last year, at his palace on the Black Sea, when an assassin had nearly gunned him down. Surely not, he thought.

  He forced himself back to the matter at hand. “Does Hadad have any idea where they might have gone?” His tone was that of a teacher addressing his most simple-minded student.

  “No, but he is confident they remain in the city. The police and army have locked down every outbound road.”

  “What if they don’t use a road?”

  “Well … the airports are also being watched.”

  Petrov hesitated for effect. “This problem is expanding—there are now four people who must be found. Can you and Hadad manage it?” he asked. “Or should I send in someone else?”

  It was nothing short of an ultimatum.

  “We will find them,” Vasiliev said none too convincingly.

  “Then do so … and quickly!”

  Petrov rang off.

  The president turned away from his desk. The cheerless visage of Red Square was still there. Framed by the sky and river, a veritable masterpiece of dullness. He could only assume Kravchuk, or whoever had rescued her, was carrying the recording. The device in her shoe had been a precaution, a potential bit of leverage for certain contingencies. It had never occurred to Petrov that it might fall into the wrong hands. He found himself trying to recall the exact words he’d spoken four mornings ago. Did it matter if someone disclosed them? Or even put the recording in its entirety on the internet? No, he decided. Voiceprints could be fooled, conversations digitally manipulated. And anyway, denial was his specialty.

  His words had been damning, to be sure, but the damage was not insurmountable. And if Vasiliev could recover the recording? Then that problem would be solved.

  Either way, the greater plan could no longer be stopped.

  THIRTY-THREE

  They called him Happy but he no longer was. His given name was Jamal al-Badri, yet the playful name bestowed upon him as a child, a consequence of his sunny nature, had pursued him relentlessly into adulthood. For forty-something years—he’d never bothered to count birthdays—the nickname had mostly fit. He’d married, had six children, and by local standards led a prosperous life. Ultimately, however, the hardships of Darfur had taken their toll.

 
The high sun was giving its worst. With aching feet, Jamal plodded across parched terrain, his loose sandals kicking up clouds of dust with each step. The rainy season had once again come and gone without living up to its name, less than an inch falling through the high summer months—a fraction of the meager standard for Western Sudan. There had been storms of a kind, great tsunamis of dirt that blotted out the sky and rolled across the land, but they brought no moisture. The wind would howl, whipping the sand to sting faces and rearrange the landscape, yet in the end the haboobs did little more than spit on the cracked earth. The imam in Kuma faulted the idolatrous Christians for offending God. The government blamed the rebels, the rebels the government, although how either side could have any effect on the skies Jamal didn’t know. A Western doctor at a clinic Jamal had visited—he’d needed a rotted tooth pulled—told him it was all due to something called global warming. Jamal didn’t really care who or what was responsible. He only wanted grass for his herd and a well from which to drink. A year of that, perhaps two, and his old name might fit once again.

  He paused to wipe sweat from his forehead, his leather-skinned hand sweeping up through close-cropped black hair. He jabbed out with a stick to prod his lead animal onward. The bull was the best of his herd, although the brute had come up mildly lame a few months back. He could still travel, still sire, but he was no longer any good behind a plow. One more source of income lost, meager as it was—the farmers, too, had largely given up, many of them abandoning the land for the treacherous passage to Europe.

  He turned and saw his youngest son behind the herd. Musa was sixteen, but looked four years younger. He was small and frail, although Jamal had come to view it as a blessing—a reversal of thinking compared to his older boys. Adan and Manute had grown tall and strong, and for that reason they’d been taken away, one requisitioned by the Janjaweed, the other by the rebel alliance.

  Jamal had not seen either of them in years, and the hope in his heart had fallen to little more than a flicker. He feared it was only a matter of time before someone came for Musa. A new militia, a new alliance. Spindly as he was, the boy was growing, and soon his rising stature would intersect with the militias’ declining standards. He’d heard they were taking young boys these days, eight and nine years old. Even girls who showed a willingness to fight. His three daughters, at least, were safe. They’d gone south of Nyala to live with a cousin, the only option after his wife had succumbed to the fever last year.

  While he strived for optimism, Jamal was at base a realist. He’d reached the point in life when one spent more time reminiscing about days behind than dreaming of those ahead. The only livelihood he’d ever known, that of the baqqara, or cattle-keepers, was fast coming to an end. For a thousand years his ancestors had wandered these lands without respect to borders, their herds grazing pastoral hillsides. Today only eight beasts remained in his herd, from what had once been a wealth of over a hundred. The survivors were little more than skin and bones, and he’d been blessed with but one calf this year—bartered away for food last month.

  Jamal looked ahead, toward the east. His vision had been getting worse in recent years, an opaqueness settling in, but in the bright sun he could easily make out the scalloped hills in the distance. The landscape in Darfur seemed the one remaining constant, tawny undulations beaten by the sun and reorganized by the wind. He wasn’t precisely sure of their location—somewhere north of Mount Teljo, which was still visible on the horizon—yet he was sure they’d mounted the southern plateau, skirting the edge of the great Sahara. What lay farther east was a mystery, but Jamal decided it had to be better than what was behind him. Western Darfur was again becoming treacherous, the rebels launching a new campaign. The land there, the only home he’d ever known, seemed closer to dying each day.

  Fortunately, the militias couldn’t be everywhere. The frontlines of the conflict ebbed and flowed, and according to the latest rumors the east was calm. Jamal thought it might be true, although few of the baqqara had ventured there. He prayed the land was better than what he saw now. Here even the toughest shrubs, the black thorn and sage, were withering to straw, and the earth beneath his feet was cracked from dryness. It occurred to Jamal that his herd was raising a considerable cloud of dust. This was yet another complication of living in the new Darfur: any movement could be seen for twenty miles, making it impossible to hide from the various factions. There was little to be done about it, other than avoiding known encampments by the greatest possible distance.

  “There!” came a shout from behind.

  Jamal stopped and turned. He saw Musa pointing toward a basin in the distance, slightly to the left. Jamal squinted and saw what had drawn his son’s attention. A lalob tree was the most prominent landmark, suggesting a source of water. Beyond that he saw a small cluster of buildings.

  Musa came and stood next to him. “It is exactly where they said it would be.”

  “Do you see anyone?”

  Musa studied the place with his sharper eyes. “No, it looks abandoned—just as promised. Perhaps the well still gives water.”

  Jamal nodded cautiously.

  They’d journeyed here, to this forgotten valley, based on whisperings that had been sweeping through the souk in recent days. A visiting merchant had spread the word that conditions in the east were vastly better. He said the rebels had moved away, and that the valleys at the distant heel of the great plateau were thick with green grass. Jamal had talked to the man briefly, and found him convincing. He wasn’t a local, and spoke Arabic from the north, but his glowing recommendation seemed sincere. Jamal would not normally be swayed by such gossip, but between the fighting and the drought, conditions at home had reached the point of desperation.

  He’d discussed the idea with a few of the other baqqara, and slept on it that night. By the next morning he was convinced: it would be a three-day journey, but someone had to take the initiative. As far as he knew, he and Musa were the first.

  He looked to the horizon, and thought the far-off hills might perhaps be just a bit greener. The small compound had also been mentioned: a forgotten waystation where a man could water his herd and take shelter for the night.

  He turned to his son, and said, “All right, then. Let’s have a look.”

  * * *

  It took thirty minutes to reach the tiny outpost—things in the desert were invariably farther away than they appeared. Jamal beat his herd along a dry wadi for the last half mile, and in the low channel he lost sight of the small cluster of buildings. Even so, he could navigate easily by referencing the distant hills. He eventually saw the lalob tree, and soon after that the compound came into view.

  There was still no sign of life. No goats tethered to stakes or blankets strung up for shade. Best of all, Jamal saw no vehicles. The buildings were in a state of near ruin. The largest had two misshapen walls, and the smallest, little more than a shed, was topped by a skeletal roof of rotted branches, probably taken from the tree decades earlier.

  Of the three, the center building was the only one that might be habitable. There were four walls and a roof, but the door was missing and he saw only one open-air window. The construction was archetypical, earthen walls blending seamlessly into the land from which they’d been drawn. An animal pen in front suffered a buckled segment of fence, and where it abutted the building Jamal saw a watering trough. Not surprisingly, all three buildings showed telltale pockmarks of varying calibers—on appearances, a series of minor engagements, with perhaps the odd wedding celebration thrown in. Virtually every rural building in Sudan was so adorned.

  Fifty steps short of the compound, Jamal brought his herd to a stop. He exchanged a look with his son, then nodded to send him ahead. Quiet as things seemed, it was best to check the building out. Musa moved ahead surely. Frail or not, the boy was gaining confidence. Growing into a man.

  Jamal watched him pass beneath the shade of the big tree. Musa paused near the collapsed pen, and called out, “The trough is full.”


  A herder at heart, Jamal smiled. They could water the cattle.

  Musa approached the doorway of the midsized building cautiously. Jamal held his breath. Some months ago, they’d come across a similar shack that appeared abandoned, only to find two nervous and heavily armed teenagers inside guarding a cache of rebel weapons.

  He watched Musa lean toward the entrance and peer inside. When he turned back he was grinning. “There is no one inside … only some equipment.” Musa disappeared into the shadowed interior.

  A relieved Jamal began prodding the herd forward. The bull was the first to arrive at the trough. He dipped his head, and soon two cows were at his shoulders. Jamal noticed a tall wooden pole next to the house. At the top he saw what looked like a few long threads of yarn. The yellow strands danced festively in the light breeze. He took in the surrounding brushland and wondered if any other baqqara had used this place. He supposed they had, although more likely in the summer months.

  A momentary glint caught his eye at the base of a low ridgeline. He studied the spot for a time, but discerned nothing of interest. Only my old eyes playing tricks on me again. Jamal moved into the shade of the tree. He’d just put a hand to its ancient trunk when Musa called from inside.

  “Father—”

  He looked at the earthen shack, but didn’t see his son. He did however hear a peculiar sound—a sharp crack, followed by a faint hissing sound. It reminded him of air being vented from the valve of a bicycle tire. The sound soon faded, then there was nothing for a time.

  “Musa?” he called.

  No reply.

  Jamal felt the first pang of discomfort. His eyes went back to the spot below the ridge. “Musa! Are you all right?”

  Still nothing.

  What happened next took Jamal completely by surprise. The cow nearest the window lurched back as if startled. She issued a terrible bleating sound as her front legs wobbled, then buckled completely. She fell facedown into the dirt before tumbling on her side. All four legs began to spasm violently.