The Cairo Code (8 page)

“Wait here.”

•  •  •

The man stepped into the bedroom and closed the door. The stand-up closet he used as a darkroom was off to the right, a faint, pungent smell of chemicals wafting out. He went in and pulled the sliding door after him, tugged a string hanging from the ceiling. A red light came on, revealing a shelf containing glass jars of developer and fixer. There was also a stopwatch, a couple of metal soaking basins, an electric fan, and a thin wooden box, topped with opaque glass and underlit with a couple of bulbs. He filled one of the basins with developer, removed the roll of film from the tiny Leica, placed it in the liquid, pressed the stopwatch, and waited for three minutes.

Finally he turned on the fan, plucked the roll of film from the tray, and held the exposed negative over the stream of air until it was dry. He flicked on the underlit glass and laid the strip on top. Carefully, he examined the exposures with a magnifying glass. As he studied one of the negatives of the pages marked “Top Secret,” he quivered with shock.

It took him several moments to compose himself, then he picked up a cotton towel and wiped his hands. He must still have looked shocked when he stepped back into the room, because Evir said, “What's the matter? Is something wrong?”

The man shook his head. “Nothing. You've done excellent work.” He tossed away the towel. “Now, let's get out of here.”

“Where are we going?”

“You want your money, don't you?”

•  •  •

Twenty minutes later they arrived outside a dilapidated warehouse on the old Nile docks. The place was deserted, the wire-metal gates unlocked, and the man turned the BSA into a darkened cobbled yard in front.

Evir felt a pang of fear. “Why have we come here?”

The man switched off the engine. “Come, you'll get your money.”

He got off the motorcycle, leaned it against a wall, and strode inside the warehouse. Evir reluctantly went after him. The building was a ramshackle, cavernous place littered with bits of rusting scrap metal, the concrete floors covered with puddles of watery oil. There was a dented oil drum in a corner, a storm lamp on top. The man lit the wick and tossed away the match.

The warehouse was flooded with soft yellow light. The man took a thick envelope from his pocket, waved it in his hand. “Before I pay you, I need to ask you some questions. Did you take anything else from the safe?”

Evir saw the man study him intently. His eyes seemed to burn into his face. “On the lives of my children, I did only as you told me.”

The man continued to stare. “You're quite sure you're telling me the truth?”

Evir felt uncomfortable, a ripple of fear down his spine. “You said to photograph every document I found in the safe. I did just as you asked. And now I want my money.”

“Have patience. And you're certain you told no one about our arrangement?”

“Not a soul. May Allah cut out my tongue if I lie.” Evir told the truth. “Besides, you warned me of the consequences.”

The man nodded, satisfied, and smiled. “Good. There's just one more thing.”

Evir frowned. “What?”

The man put down the envelope and reached into his pocket. When his hand came out the smile was gone, and Evir saw a curved Arab blade with a white ivory handle, a savage-looking thing like a metal claw.

“I can't let you leave. You know too much and you've seen my face.”

The sun was hidden behind dark rainclouds that morning as the vast gray bulk of the battleship USS
Iowa,
all fifty-eight thousand tons of her, the pride of the U.S. fleet, dropped anchor five miles off the Virginian coast.

Captain Joe McCrea watched from the bridge as the tug came heading his way from the shore, bobbing through the gentle swell, escorted by half a dozen naval vessels prowling around it like protective mother hens. McCrea had received the signal twenty minutes ago, telling him the VIP passengers were ready to join his ship. One among them was certainly the most important he had ever carried on board a vessel under his command in over twenty years' distinguished naval service, and McCrea knew he was about to undertake the most challenging mission of his life.

He turned to the young lieutenant at his side. “Make ready to bring the passengers aboard.”

“Yes, Captain.”

McCrea put down his binoculars as the lieutenant went down to the main deck. The
Iowa
was like a miniature town in itself, with a crew of two and a half thousand men. It bristled with an impressive array of heavy guns and anti-aircraft weapons, its decks and platforms covered an area of over nine acres, and despite its vast size it could travel at a speed of thirty-three knots, the fastest vessel in its class. Out in the Norfolk Sound, scattered on the gentle gray waves, was her escort, six more vessels with a deadly array of firepower, and their sight was a reassuring one to McCrea that morning. This might not be the biggest armada in history, but it was definitely one of the most vital and secret. He checked his uniform, then made his way to the lower deck to greet his passengers.

•  •  •

When the tug finally pulled alongside, McCrea saw at least a dozen people cramped in the stern, civilians and naval personnel. There was a flurry of activity as sailors on the landing boom grabbed lines and made ready. Because of the height of the
Iowa,
there was a sheer drop of almost thirty feet from the lower main deck to the sea. A small boom extended down towards the waves to enable boarding, but that was where it got difficult. It wasn't every day you got to bring the president of the United States aboard. Franklin Delano Roosevelt was a cripple, wheelchair-bound most of his life, so it posed a particular problem. He couldn't step onto the boom, so a harness had been arranged to winch him onto the
Iowa.

McCrea looked down into the gentle swell as a succession of Secret Service agents and aides jumped from the tug onto the boom, and then it was the president's turn. He saw the familiar sight of Roosevelt appear, the big, kindly face and the ready smile, as he was helped from his wheelchair. His lower legs were encased in metal braces, the spindly limbs as thin as a young boy's, a legacy of childhood polio which left him in frequent agony. It took two Secret Service agents to carry him to the harness and secure him, and then it was winched up.

It some ways it was a pitiful sight, and one McCrea was dreading. The president of the most powerful country on earth, the man on whom the world depended to win the war, being hoisted aboard the
Iowa
on a harness made of wood and rope davits. But there was no sign of fear or self-pity on the man's face, just solemn determination. McCrea waited patiently, his heart in his mouth, hoping to God there wasn't an accident, that the ropes didn't break and the president of America slip from the harness and drown.

Finally, Roosevelt was helped aboard, and McCrea breathed a sigh of relief. A flurry of Secret Service agents went to his assistance, the wheelchair appeared on deck, and Roosevelt was helped out of the harness and into the chair. One of the agents placed the familiar heavy naval cloak around the president's shoulders. McCrea had noticed the admiration on the faces of his crew as they watched the whole process, young and not-so-young American seamen who had crowded on deck to catch a glimpse of their famous passenger. They looked on in awe and surprise, wanting to applaud, but the order had gone out that no honors were to be rendered when their passengers boarded. This was a top-secret mission, and the
Iowa
's crew complied to a man. McCrea saluted. “Welcome on board, Mr. President, sir.”

Roosevelt smiled warmly, offered his hand. “Captain McCrea. So you're the poor fellow who's got the dubious pleasure of getting me safely to my destination?”

“I am indeed, sir. We've got your quarters all set up. If you'll kindly walk this way and—” McCrea left the words unfinished, remembering the president's infirmity as he looked at him in the wheelchair. It was a dumb mistake and he blushed a deep crimson. He had been Roosevelt's naval aide for two years, and yet the man's steely determination constantly made you forget that not only was he a cripple, but he also suffered gravely from heart disease.

Roosevelt brushed aside the blunder, warmly took hold of McCrea's arm and laughed. “Don't you worry, Captain. I get around pretty well in this darned contraption, so you just lead the way.”

•  •  •

When they entered Roosevelt's cabin on the upper deck, McCrea said, “I took the liberty of bringing along some route maps, to show you how we'll proceed, Mr. President.”

The president fitted a Lucky Strike into a Bakelite cigarette holder. “That's most kind of you, Captain.”

A Secret Service agent offered a light before he pushed the wheelchair over to the table. Another agent stood close at hand, carrying a black doctor's bag of emergency medicines: the president's heart pills, his rubbing mixtures for when he became soaked in sweat, which he often did from overexertion, bottles of various painkillers, and—as always—a small bottle of whiskey.

McCrea waited until Roosevelt had slipped on his glasses, then pointed to the map. “We've plotted a course south past the Azores, then northeast to the Gibraltar straits, and on to Oran. Our ETA is nine days from now—the twentieth—Mr. President, sir. Then you'll be on your way to Cairo by plane, barring problems.”

Roosevelt smiled gently, the cigarette holder clenched between his teeth. “I'll assume you're well equipped for those?”

“We've got speed, and a destroyer escort. Both should prove too much for any German subs. But then you never can tell. It's a risk we take, sir.”

Roosevelt shrugged. “The price of war, Captain.”

“We'll have our aircraft scouting for submarine activity, and the destroyers will be using their sonar equipment for the same purpose. It's the German U-boats that pose the biggest threat. They're pretty deadly.”

Roosevelt removed the holder from his mouth and looked up, his face more serious. “This is an important trip, Captain. You might even say that hundreds or thousands of lives—not to mention the outcome of the war and the future of our nation—depend upon my arrival. You think we'll make it?”

McCrea considered before replying. “It's never easy to predict, Mr. President, with so much enemy activity in the Atlantic. But then again, the Germans don't know our plans and we'll be moving fast, so I'm pretty confident we can get you safely to your destination.”

Roosevelt removed his glasses and gave one of his famous lopsided smiles. “Captain, it seems for now my fate is in your hands.”

•  •  •

The man wore a pair of dark navy oilskins, the standard issue of the U.S. Coast Guard. He had waited for almost three hours, lying in the sodden grass on the Norfolk headland as the rain pelted down, the powerful marine binoculars resting on his arm. By the time he saw the tugboat roll through the waves and come alongside the
Iowa,
the rain had stopped and the visibility had greatly improved. He lay there, observing the vessels as best he could from such a distance. Five minutes later he tucked the binoculars under his oilskins and made his way back down the headland path. He recovered the bicycle hidden in the long grass, swung his leg over the crossbar, and rode away.

Admiral Wilhelm Canaris was an odd man.

He shuffled around wearing carpet slippers, and his office was always in disarray. The obligatory wall portrait of Adolf Hitler was nowhere to be seen, for Canaris—or the “Little Admiral,” as the former U-boat commander was affectionately known to his old shipmates—had nothing but contempt for the vulgar and pompous Nazi leadership. It was a contempt he shrewdly kept to himself, for Canaris was also head of the Abwehr, Germany's wartime military intelligence, with responsibility for overseeing almost twenty thousand personnel and agents in thirty countries around the world.

It was almost noon when the young Prussian adjutant knocked on the office door in the Abwehr's headquarters at 74-76 Tirpitz Ufer in Berlin, overlooking the Landwehr canal, and, receiving no reply, entered. The adjutant was a new man, barely a week in his post, but he was already acquainted with the admiral's eccentricity. He saw a small man in his middle fifties with bushy gray eyebrows and a stooped back, who looked like a provincial schoolmaster, wearing frayed slippers and a crumpled naval uniform, kneeling on the floor, and feeding a bowl of scraps to two nervous-looking pet dachshunds.

The adjutant coughed. “Herr Admiral.” Canaris looked up, distracted. “What is it, Bauer?”

“A call from SS headquarters, from General Schellenberg.”

“And what does Walter want this time?”

“The general requests an urgent meeting at nine hundred hours.”

“For what purpose?”

“He didn't say, Herr Admiral. Only that it's urgent.”

A distant air raid siren wailed. Canaris sighed, patted the dogs to calm them, got to his feet, and dusted his knees. U.S. Air Force B-17s had been raiding Berlin during daylight all the previous week with deadly effect, and by the sound of it they were about to start again. “Very well. I suppose you had better organize the car. And make it quick, before the Americans go to work.”

“Z
u
Befehl,
Herr Admiral.” Bauer shouted the reply, snapped to attention, and smartly clicked his heels, causing both animals to whimper. Canaris frowned with displeasure.

“Do me a favor, Bauer. This heel-clicking and shouting business, it's all very well on the parade ground, but please refrain from doing it in the office. It rather frightens the dogs.”

Bauer flushed. “As the Herr Admiral wishes.”