State of Honour (10 page)

Brigadier Hasni, Head of the ISI’s Joint Intelligence X Department, which coordinated the other seven departments, was a tall, heavy-set man with a thick moustache and greased-back hair. His face was wide but hard, as if chiselled from a slab of caramel-coloured marble. Dressed in a white pathani suit, he sat at an ornate desk, his hands folded in his lap. The room was his study, the polished wooden floor half covered with expensive hand-knotted rugs.

Another man sat opposite him on a padded armchair. He was of paler skin and flabby, his bald head speckled with liver spots. His name was Asad, and he was Hasni’s deputy. Gripping a Mont Blanc, he’d just handed Hasni a draft report on the events that had happened outside the children’s hospital.

“General Malik is being suitably apologetic by all accounts,” Asad said, referring to the new Foreign Secretary.

“The man has the manners of a monkey and the morals of a street boy.”

Asad grinned.

“But it’s not the generals we have to worry about,” Hasni said.

Although the new breed of younger high-ranking military officers were too radical for his taste, Sunni hard men, no one but the illiterate poor harboured any doubts about who wielded the real power in Pakistan, at least as far as foreign affairs were concerned.

“Indeed, sir.”

But we still need them, Hasni thought.

The generals’ predecessors had ruled Pakistan on and off for a total of over three decades, the first military era occurring for a thirteen-year period from 1958—just eleven years after independence from the British. As far as Hasni was concerned, it was as natural as night passing into day. The generals held all of the ministerial offices. There was no way that the population, riotous as they were, would allow the ISI to openly control the country’s international dealings. But it was a temporary measure, or had been sold as such. The previous civilian government just couldn’t deal with the security crisis and the army had stepped in. For now, the people saw it as an expedient measure. A strong if interim government.

After scanning the typed pages of the report, Hasni said, “Make sure it emphasizes the fact that four police officers identified known Leopards as the perpetrators.”

“Of course.”

“Underline it.”

Asad nodded.

“And you should add that they drove the cars. That the secretary was definitely abducted by them.”

“As you say, Brigadier.”

“That ought to keep the Americans off our backs for a while at least.”

There was a knock at the door and a young woman dressed in a turquoise and gold Shalwar Kameez entered. Her hair was the colour of a raven’s breast. It was tied back tightly from her make-up-free face in a ponytail, accentuating her high cheekbones and luminous eyes. Her name was Adeela; Hasni’s daughter. He allowed her to remove her hijab inside the house. His own view on the headscarf was that it was oppressive and cumbersome, especially when coupled with the face-obscuring niqab. But outside, she had to keep up appearances, at least until another less dogmatic regime took over.

“A man is here to see you, Father.”

“Did he give a name, my dear?” Hasni said, smiling.

“Only that he was The Mullah, Father.”

Hasni leaned in close to Asad. “The fool thinks he’s a holy man.” He glanced over at his daughter. “Give me five minutes, Adeela.”

“Yes, Father.”

She left, closing the door quietly.

“Have you contacted the Saudis?” Hasni asked, smoothing down the ends of his moustache with a thumb and forefinger.

“Yes, Brigadier.”

“And?”

“Our brothers there are most concerned that Iran will invade Balochistan,” he said, referring to the Pakistani province that bordered south-east Iran.

“Our Saudi brothers have their own agenda.”

Asad looked puzzled.

“Don’t worry, everything will become clear with time. As for the Iranians, with the addition of a little more evidence about their involvement in the abduction of the secretary, they will be too focused on appeasing the Americans to seriously contemplate invading Balochistan.”

“Let us hope so.”

“Later, then,” Hasni said.

Asad rose and left.

A few minutes later, Kakar was ushered in by Adeela, a resigned look on his bearded face. Hasni remained seated, and gestured to the armchair left vacant by Asad.

“Some tea, Father?”

“Tea, yes. Thank you, my dear.”

Kakar sat in the chair, his hands going first to the arms before he finally placed them in his lap, mimicking Hasni’s.

“Thank you for coming to see me at short notice.”

“When the Brigadier summons, his servants respond,” Kakar said, bowing his head.

Kakar wasn’t subservient by nature. He was too well educated for that. But despite his usefulness to Hasni, he knew the man demanded respect, and he had to make out as if he knew his place. Besides, he feared him. Or rather, the power he wielded.

Hasni tapped the report lying on the desk with his forefinger. “This is evidence that the Leopards took part in the abduction of the US Secretary of State. Police evidence. This is to be expected. This is what you will say to your Taliban friends.”

“Of course, Brigadier.”

“If all goes well, the ISI will continue to support your cause. But I expect the Taliban to do their duty in return.”

“We know the whereabouts of several of their leaders in the Upper Kurram Valley. My men know who their guardians are.”

Hasni grinned.

Kakar had been on the ISI’s unofficial payroll since 2001. He resented this, but could do nothing about it. The alternative was to face almost certain death. Those Taliban leaders who’d escaped to Peshawar, but who’d refused to bend to the ISI’s will, were found bound in gutters, their throats slit. The price to be paid for sanctuary on Pakistan soil was obedience. Besides, he viewed Iran as a common enemy. In 1998, after the Taliban Sunnis massacred the inhabitants of Mazar-i Sharif, a Shia town, Iran deployed three hundred thousand troops on the border and threatened war. A nuclear Pakistan, the Taliban’s main ally, had been a major deterrent, Kakar believed.

Hasni leaned forward, arching his fingers. “I have heard that some of the Leopards responsible for this atrocity are still here in Islamabad. Your men will no doubt find them and hand them over to me tonight.”

“But, Brigadier, how can–?”

Hasni slapped Kakar hard across the face.

As his head spun Kakar had to force himself not to urinate. With his breath reduced to shallow gasps, he felt his cheek throb. Apart from making him feel humiliated, Hasni had now given him an impossible order.

The door opened and Adeela brought in a tray with china cups and a silver teapot. Kakar was relieved. He knew that if Hasni hadn’t been in his own home, well, anything could’ve happened. Then he remembered the torture-cell rumours. He resolved to provide Hasni with bodies, as long as they were Shia ones.

“Ah, tea. Excellent, my dear,” Hasni said, wiping a slither of spittle from his bottom lip.

“Shall I pour, Father?”

“Please,” Hasni said. “We don’t want tea spilt on my rugs.”

Kakar saw that Hasni had glanced over at his lap. His hands were shaking.

The co-pilot was a lean-faced guy with a trace of teenage pimples, who spoke with a Midwest accent. He sat on one of the flimsy seats in the Chinook’s cabin, a laptop balancing on his closed thighs.

“It’s been taken down, but I guess it’s been downloaded and seen worldwide already,” he said, clicking on the saved video.

Tom, who was seated one side of him, Crane the other, as Sawyer sulked to the side, winced. The secretary was slumped in a wooden chair, bound and gagged with a bare-stone wall behind her. She wore a T-shirt and cotton pants. Next to her on a stool was a radio playing a news report.

“It’s the BBC World Service. The report was aired ten minutes ago,” the co-pilot said.

“They want us to know she’s alive,” said Tom, just glad that she was, despite her predicament.

A masked man walked behind her carrying an old-fashioned tape recorder. He switched off the radio and turned on the recorder. The crackly recording began, the sound of a thunderstorm breaking the silence.

“They like the sound of thunderstorms,” Crane said. “Taxi drivers play it all day long as an imam recites apocalyptic verses from the Qur’an. Still, I suppose it beats most of the shit we get stateside.”

“This is where the guy speaks,” the co-pilot said.

A male Pakistani’s voice spoke in English as the eerie sound of the thunderstorm drained away.

“
The Leopards of Islam, the true followers of the faith and the Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, will bring the Westerners to their knees and avenge the deaths of our brothers and sisters. The US Secretary of State has confessed to being a murderer of children and a desecrator of mosques. Despite her vile crimes, Allah is Most Merciful. The Westerners will release our brothers being held in the United States, the heroes of the Shia jihad. The Westerners will pay ten billion dollars for crimes against Shia Islam. If these demands are not met in full within seventy-two hours, the Secretary of State will be beheaded live on the Internet.”

Tom ran his hand through his close-cropped hair and groaned, a deep sense of personal failure and shame engulfing him.

Crane stood up and put his hand on Tom’s shoulder. “I’m sorry, Tom.”

Tom knew that the chances of the president agreeing to the release of those who’d attempted the assassination of his Pakistani counterpart and the payment of the ransom were non-existent. The Leopards had killed thirty innocent men, woman and children in the attack, simply because the Pakistani leader had escaped unscathed. They’d gone on a killing spree. Besides, her kidnappers hadn’t said that they would release her, just that they wouldn’t kill her within the three-day timeframe.

But then his training kicked in and he glanced at his wristwatch. The clock had started ticking at 19:40 Pakistan time.

He got up and walked to the cockpit, asked for a satphone. He’d spoken with Vice Admiral Theodore Birch, the head of DS and an Assistant Secretary of State, a couple of times already. After a few minutes, Tom was speaking with him again. He asked him if there was anything their people in the office of counterterrorism division could do. Anything at all. But he knew what the answer would be before it came.

He rubbed his temples with his thumbs and forefingers, his mind racing in a hundred different directions, trying to find a way to get a lead, anything other than accepting the status quo. He’d seen the ligature marks on her wrists and ankles, and had watched her eyes as the recorded voice had fallen silent. It was clear to him that she hadn’t been aware of her fate up until then. He wondered what kind of impact that had on a person’s mind, even one as strong and resourceful as the secretary’s.

Crane came up to him. “The Pakistani fighters are closing in. We’re outta here now.”

Crane was slumped in an armchair in his small suite back at the Ariana. He wore a dark-blue bathrobe and picked at his fingernails, as if he were still trying to remove the dirt from the fort. The living area was neat but tired-looking, with sickly pea-green walls and furniture that looked as if it had been brought in flat-packed. The light bulbs were of the energy-saving variety, and gave off a jaundiced glow.

“Helluva day, huh? But don’t let the white towels and clean bed sheets fool you, Tom. This is still Kabul, so keep alert. I know at least five analysts who sleep with the light on and cuddle a Smith and Wesson Sigma like a comfort cloth. You gonna take a shower? You smell like a rodent.”

Although he’d removed his dusty jacket and had slipped on a white shirt previously, Tom was still dressed in combat pants and scuffed boots. He hadn’t washed yet. He was anxious for answers. He bent over an oval table and placed down two glasses, with heavy serrated bases. He poured a large whisky for Crane, a smaller one for himself. Crane said that despite sampling almost all of the world’s alcoholic drinks in their natural environments, he loved Scotch above all else. It beat ouzo, schnapps, rum, sake… He rattled off another five national drinks, most of which Tom had never heard of. Ignoring him, Tom walked over to the armchair and handed him his drink.

“How did they disable the GPS sensor under her skin?” he asked.

“You can buy a tracker defence device on the net. A small unit with enough power to jam a signal within a five-metre radius,” Crane replied, almost nonchalantly.

Still standing, Tom took a sip, felt the alcohol warm his throat. “Why would they lead us to the fort? They must have known we would kill the men there.”

“They kill their own by the dozen a day. Internal feuds. One tribal warlord taking another’s land. Think suicide bomber. Think a country where you sell your twelve-year-old daughter for two hundred bucks. Think–”

“I got it, okay.”

“Besides, we just used up all our resources on the proverbial wild-goose chase. I’d say that was kinda smart.”

Tom walked back to the table, put his glass down. Turning, he said, “Is Brigadier Hasni still around?”

“Hasni?”

“I heard about him when I did my spell in counterintelligence.”

“Yeah, he’s still around. Like a bad smell,” Crane said, smiling at his own jibe.

“I guess he knows the answer to my conspiracy theory, as you call it.”

Crane laughed hard, his chest heaving. “And I know for a fact that man has tortured to death over twenty people. He’s a butcher. But in his own way, he’s as passionate about Pakistan as POTUS is about America. Besides, he’s an untouchable, so any little caper you’ve dreamed up won’t be worth a dime.”

“You think,” Tom said, eyeing the older man and nodding.

He had a plan, one that he needed Crane’s help to accomplish, although he’d already decided that it was more of a desire to act, rather than a coherent strategy.

“I don’t feel inclined to score points here, so I’ll just say that if you’re planning on going back to Islamabad, I’ll do my best to dissuade you,” Crane said. “You go back there, you’ll go it alone, and that, I can tell you, is just plain suicide.” He took a gulp of whisky, licked his lips. “Besides, I got a duty to have you arrested by the Marines, you talk like that.”

“I made a promise to Lyric, and I’m not about to renege on it. You’re the only man I know who can help me out. If things go wrong, I won’t mention your name.”

Despite Crane’s scepticism, Tom still believed the ISI were responsible. Even if they hadn’t executed the abduction, there was no way the secretary could’ve been taken if they hadn’t sanctioned it.

“If the ISI know you’re a loner, you’ll say my name. You’ll fucking sing it,” Crane said, scratching the back of his head. “They have these machines that turn your vitals into the size and consistency of plums. Get it?”

Tom walked over to a taupe-coloured sofa opposite Crane, dropped down onto it, said, “Then give me someone who knows the city.”

“You’ll put them in danger, too. I’ve had five assets arrested and imprisoned by the ISI this year already. I’m not inclined to lose any more.”

“So what are we gonna do, huh? Sit on our asses until Lyric’s head is cut off on YouTube? Just gimme a break here.”

Crane eased forward, spread his arms. “And if I don’t?”

“I’ll go back anyways.”

“Don’t you think we are talking to everyone who might know something? Jesus, Tom, we got close to five hundred people on this,” he said, cradling his glass of Scotch as if it were a panacea.

“I just can’t go home and do nothing.”

“You won’t make it. I’m telling you the truth. So just forget it. And if you persist, I
will
have you restrained.”

“No, you won’t,” Tom said, getting up from the sofa.

He figured Crane was old school, too. He sure as hell wasn’t a stuffed-shirt Ivy League type out to play the game in DC by the time they were thirty-five.

As he got halfway to the door Crane said, “Wait.”

Tom turned. Crane seemed deep in thought. He rubbed the rim of his glass with his forefinger, and looked oddly sad, given that they weren’t exactly tight.

Looking up, he said, “You didn’t even ask the right question.”

“What do you mean?” Tom said.

“Sit down.”

Tom walked back to the sofa and sat back down.

Crane pursed his lips. “You shouldn’t have asked how the GPS sensor under her skin was deactivated. You should have asked how they knew it was there. I told you not to trust anyone. Don’t.”

Tom shuffled uncomfortably on the sofa. He hadn’t asked the right question. But his mind was made up. His eyes locked with Crane’s and, for a second or two, he had a notion that he was going to tell him something extraordinary. But when the man spoke, it was practical.

“Whatcha got in mind anyhow?”

“I could pass for a Pakistani, least at night,” Tom said. “I’m good at finding weak spots in security. Buildings, in particular. I make them strong. But this time I’ll exploit it. You know Hasni has to be implicated in some way. Just let me check his place out. Then maybe I could plant some of those bugs your techs make, the ones that look like stones or moss. People feel safe in their gardens. They say all kinds of things.”

Tom knew that satellites and drones could pinpoint a man or woman from thousands of miles away, but it still took a bug from relatively close quarters to hear a conversation that wasn’t taking place on a cellphone.

Crane groaned. “How do you know he has a garden?”

“I was busy when you were taking a shower. Took a peek at some satellite imagery.”

“Houseman would crucify me for even having this conversation with you. You realize that, right?”

Tom nodded.

“Okay,” Crane said, sighing. “I’ll put you in touch with someone. His name is Sandri Khan. But don’t ever repeat that. Now listen.”