The Pakistan Conspiracy, A Novel Of Espionage (26 page)

“And what would be your guess about the intended target?” Kate asked.

“If they are going to detonate the bomb while it is still in the hold of the ship, or in a container by the superstructure, that would suggest any of the larger ports in the Mediterranean, or the Suez Canal itself.”

“The Canal? That would kill Egyptians, most of them probably Muslim.”

“That’s true, but remember that Al-Zawahiri is an Egyptian who detests the Egyptian regime, and the destruction of the Suez Canal would be a huge blow to Egypt, both in economic terms and as a matter of prestige. Killing people may not be the only part of Al Qaeda’s terror equation.”

“I remember that they used to brag that they had achieved $500 billion worth of damage in 9/11 with less than $500 thousand in investment,” Kate said, “an astronomical rate of return, as they stated in one of their videos.”

“Exactly. There might be other reasons, too. Consider that a bomb going off in the Suez Canal is not likely to attract the full retaliation of the United States as an attack on the homeland surely would. Also, it would pit Muslim against Muslim in one of the most powerful and populated Arab nations in the Middle East. It would change the focus of the terrorists from the so-called Crusader nations to the ‘near enemy,’ namely those Muslim nations accused of having sold out their Islamic heritage to the West for material gain.”

“What about Israel?”

“Well, it’s just me talking here, but I think that’s less likely,” Carulla said. “The Canal is a bottleneck they must realize will be hard to traverse.”

“But once, or if, they reach Port Said and the Mediterranean, the Israeli port of Jaffa—which for all practical purposes is part of metropolitan Tel Aviv—is one hundred miles up the coast. Surely that would be a target? What’s the population of Tel Aviv?”

“The Jaffa and Tel Aviv metro area is the most densely populated part of Israel. Maybe 3.5 million people? I’m guessing, I can easily get accurate numbers on this. But if Israel is really their target, then they are taking the most roundabout route imaginable to reach it. Think of it, Kate. They traveled from Moscow to Uzbekistan, then swung west and south in a circle with a radius of thousands of miles to arrive at a destination they could have reached by a much more direct route, through the Caspian, or Turkey via the Black Sea. Why would they do that?”

“Well, the roundabout travel plan has a lot of advantages. The route they took is through ungoverned and ungovernable lands, with little risk of detection.”

“Israel has to be on the list, I agree,” Kate said. “A nuclear bomb going off in Jaffa harbor would be a game changer. But I’ve got to believe though that the Israelis bring to intermodal transport the same sort of hyper-vigilant security that they bring to El Al air travel. If Al-Zawahiri is still in charge, Egypt seems like a better bet to me, given what we now know.”

Kate thanked Carulla for chatting with her for so long and rang off. Honestly, she felt sidelined and not usefully employed in Peshawar. In the afternoon, she used a street map to figure out that only a couple of miles separated the American Consulate and Chowk Yadgar Square. She decided to walk the distance on foot. To blend in with the locals, she put on a grubby
shalwar kameez
, one of several available in the consulate for just the purpose she intended, and wrapped her hair and neck in a scarf, as Peshawar women did outdoors, both for the sake of modesty and to protect against the sun. The clothing would not hide her from any skilled or expert tracker, but at least she would not attract the stares and lewd attention any young Western woman always got on the streets of Peshawar in Western attire.

Kate Langley strolled from the American Consulate to Mall Road and headed east, past ISI headquarters, where she knew Brigadier Mahmood was working that day. She walked by the venerable Governor’s House and its extensive, leafy grounds on Saddar Road, then crossed into the Old City.

Though the wall that used to encircle it was gone, the transition from wide, Western-style roads to the narrow lanes of an ancient city designed for a world before automobiles was impossible to miss. One could trace a line in the ground where the old fortifications once stood. The Old City was packed with human beings, a kind of chaos of bodies, bicycles, pedi-cabs, and honking vehicles, all wreathed in a bluish haze of terrible, choking smog.

Kate went south of the wrought iron fence fronting Lady Reading Hospital, the medical facility that bore the name of the wife of a former Viceroy of India. The hospital had been established when Pakistan was still part of the British Raj. Its serene, park-like grounds belied the fact that hundreds of Peshawar’s bomb blast victims were treated here.

She followed the hospital fence north on Cinema Road to the narrow Andar Sheher Bazaar, and then on to the Mohabbat Khan Mosque. By circling the entrance several times, she was able to find a spot on the lane opposite that gave her a direct view of the wall on the stairwell where Brigadier Mahmood had pointed out the drop.

She had not practiced those CIA surveillance techniques learned at the Farm and on field trips in downtown Washington for months; she felt rusty and conspicuous. Did she really expect to see someone actually service the drop? The idea seemed ridiculous to her, of very low probability, and if anyone saw her and had the slightest suspicion, it might compromise Mahmood’s effort to contact Yasser al-Greeb. The truth was, she had no good reason to be there at all.

Kate heard her cell phone ringing. She pulled it out from underneath her heavy clothing and answered it.

“Is that you across the street, my dear?” She recognized Mahmood’s voice.

Kate squelched letting her surprise show. Looking up and down the lane, she could not see Mahmood.

“Where are you?” she asked in a hoarse whisper.

“About fifty yards in front of you, at eleven o’clock, to the east of the ablution pond,” Mahmood said. She looked in that direction and saw a tall man waving.

“Oh god, I’m so damned embarrassed,” Kate said grimly, “All my training, down the drain. How did you spot me?”

“Coincidence and luck, mainly. I’ve been tailing you since Lady Reading,” Mahmood said.

“And I suppose I stand out like a sore thumb?” Kate said.

“Not really. You’re pretty good, but you have a very special gait, quite unique, almost like a ballet dancer. It is not Pakistani. At first I wasn’t quite sure, but then I saw your hair peeking through your scarf. Too light an auburn color to be a Pakistani woman. That’s what gave you away. I knew then it had to be Miss Kate Langley of CIA. Next time wear a wig.”

“Trying to look inconspicuous in Peshawar is hard,” Kate said.

Mahmood crossed over. His disguise was a simple
shalwar kameez
just like Kate’s, the universal dress of South Asians of both sexes, but somehow the clothes fell on his body in a more natural way. He also wore a turban and a heavy wool vest. Had she passed him in the street, she might not have recognized him, but for his eyes.

“I can only guess what brought you here,” Mahmood said.

“And you’d be right. I was bored. I had nothing worth doing, and then I realized that the Consulate is really quite close by, and it was such a beautiful day. I needed to get away from desks and reports.”

“Spoken like a woman and not a clandestine officer!” Mahmood said.

This offended Kate, but she laughed anyway, a reflex in herself that she abhorred.

“Well, now that you’ve found me doing some illicit spying, aren’t you going to take me to lunch?”

“You are very forward,” Mahmood said. “Actually, I was going to propose exactly that. There are some wonderful places to eat right down the road at the Clock Tower, just on the other side of Chowk Yadgar, or if you want something uniquely Peshawar, there is a famous kabab place north of here, across the street from Jinnah Park.”

“Kebab for sure!” Kate said. “I am definitely in the mood for something unique to Peshawar.”

“Now, I must warn you, what we call a kebab, or kabab, is not the skewered meat you Americans call a kebab. That conception is more Turkish than Pakistani.”

“Mahmood, I am famished, and I trust you, and I’m also eager for a lesson in Peshawar cuisine, so lead on, and I will follow you anywhere.” She took his arm by the elbow and they started back toward Cinema Road.

“This hole-in-the-wall is called Jalil Kabab and it is famous for what we call a
chappali
kabab. This is what I would call a Pakistani version of the American hamburger, only we were eating these thousands of years ago and they are more tasty than the fare at your fast food joints.”

“So it must be made from beef?”

“Yes, beef, which is an expensive meat here in Pakistan, where lamb is the staple.
Chappali
kabab is made from ground beef, just like a hamburger.
Chappali
comes from a Pashto word that means ‘flat’ and so the meat is flattened into a disk, as a meat patty, just as you do it. Most kabab shops overcook them but Jalil Kabab makes them as a delicate dish, slightly underdone, just right. And then there are countless toppings, as you will see. Someday I would like to open such a shop in a big American city. I know it would be a huge success.”

“I’m getting the feeling that you are trying to say that Peshawar invented the hamburger,” Kate said.

“Oh, I would never claim that! But you will see for yourself. Remember—we have been eating
chappali
kababs in this part of the world since long before the Romans conquered North Africa.”

At Cinema Road, they turned right, heading north. Bala Hisar Fort took up two city blocks. It was a building with massively thick walls made of dark red clay, the battlements towering 90 feet or more above the street.

“This hill is the twin of that on which the Mohabbat Khan Mosque is built, a matched pair, and the fort is even older than the mosque. Until the recent building boom here because of overpopulation, the Fort was outside the walls of the Old City, but new construction has covered the distance between the warren of streets inside the wall and the fort itself,” Mahmood said. “The fort is still a military headquarters, still used. It is home to the Frontier Corps, who have been here since 1949.”

They crossed traffic-choked streets to reach Jinnah Park and soon reached Jalil Kabab. Both ordered their
chappali
kababs with a topping of hardboiled egg served between two pieces of flat oven-baked
naan
, leavened bread. It looked for all the world like a very large hamburger with too-thin buns.

“Delicious,” Kate pronounced, “better than any American fast food. Maybe almost as good as burgers cooked on a home grill with Omaha beef.”

“And you see the resemblance,” Mahmood said. “A pre-historic hamburger, can you deny it?”

They both laughed. Kate was as happy as she had been in a long, long time.

***

“So now that we’ve had a wonderful lunch and I’ve confessed to snooping in ISI business, can you tell me what you were doing at the mosque?” Kate was wiping her hands on a paper napkin. She had eaten her kabab with her fingers. She tried to speak in a low voice, but she could barely hear herself, the restaurant and street outside were so crowded and so noisy.

“I fear that I am as impatient as you are and as I was getting restless in the office and not eager to explain myself to my superiors in Islamabad and Rawalpindi. I too wanted to wander around like an ordinary pedestrian.”

“Are you personally checking the drop?”

“No, not me. I’m too conspicuous and far too old for grunt work of that sort, though I did it today just for fun, and because I was in the area. There was nothing there.”

Kate told Mahmood about her conversation with Alice Carulla, and the various possible destinations for the bomb.

“My worst fear personally would be a target in Israel,” Mahmood said. “That would be the end of Pakistan, whether the Israelis retaliated or not.”

“You mean the public reaction?”

“I mean the fact that it would surely become public knowledge in the press that the route the bomb took was through Pakistan. That would be inexplicable—and unforgivable. It would be the end of Pakistan as an international player. Even if it could be conclusively proved that the device itself was of Russian origin, we would never recover from the fact that Al Qaeda was involved and that Karachi was the port of departure for the device.”

“I’m not as convinced as Alice is that Israel is the target.”

“There is always the possibility of Suez in Egypt,” Mahmood conceded. “Al-Zawahiri has plenty of scores to settle in that country, even now that the players have changed at the top.”

“You know, I was thinking this morning that there is an alternative way to try to corral Yasser al-Greeb,” Kate said.

“A different message in the drop?”

“Something more provocative. For example, we could mention that
Nippon Yoku-Maru
was about to be boarded, to spook him.”

“But wouldn’t that show our hand?” Mahmood asked.

“We may not have a choice. Think about it. If Al-Greeb feels his project is going well, why would he risk contact with the ISI or you? And remember, too, that he may be with the cargo at sea and not available in Peshawar.”

“So you’re saying that if we told him we knew about the bomb and what occurred in Karachi and Bharuch, he would have no choice but to contact us.”

“Potentially, yes. Or, if not that, he might change his plans in such a way as to reveal himself to us. We would be throwing a new variable into his calculations, a monkey-wrench. He might do something different.”

“But it involves giving him valuable information without any guarantee of a return.”

“That’s the risk,” Kate agreed. “Well, it was worth a thought. I suppose we should report back to Mort and tell him that we have no results today.”

“I had the feeling that it was Olof Wheatley and not Mort who was keen on setting up a meeting with Al-Greeb,” Mahmood said.

“That’s very true,” Kate said. “I don’t think Mort can comprehend the idea of actually negotiating with Al Qaeda directly. It’s not something in our playbook and, as I’m sure you’ve guessed, Olof Wheatley doesn’t quite trust you. Not after Mort’s kidnapping. He probably doesn’t think you’ll really share Al-Greeb with us.”

“Yes, I do understand that. Although, in this country, meeting with people like Yasser al-Greeb is not much different than meeting with the Saudi or Jordanian intelligence services. We see them as people, not monsters.”

“Why did ISI kidnap Mort Feldman?” Kate felt she had gotten close enough to Mahmood to ask questions now that she might not have considered asking a week or two earlier.

“It was not a decision taken in any kind of organized or even logical way,” Mahmood said. “And I repeat to you what I have already told Mr. Wheatley, that I had no part in it. But in the days after Sheikh Osama was killed, emotions ran very high here, and someone at a senior level made a very bad mistake.”

“You could have just PNG’d him you know.”

“To many in Pakistan, America is far more sinister an enemy here than Al Qaeda is perceived to be in Washington. What you did with OBL was a poorly thought out emotional response. It got good press in America but nowhere else.”

“But it sent a clear message didn’t it? Don’t fuck with the United States. I suppose there were days when CIA could have made a decision like that, to kill someone, all by ourselves. But we are so much under the microscope now. CIA is a bureaucracy. Taking initiative does not result in career advancement.”