The Prisoner of Guantanamo (28 page)

“I've been waiting half an hour. You've got your wish, but it has to be tonight, and you can't tell a soul.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Adnan. Your half hour of glory inside Camp Echo. Now or never, take it or leave it.”

“I'll take it.”

“Then let's roll.”

“My car?”

“Do you really want to get soaked again switching?”

“No.”

“Besides, I'd prefer not to be seen leading this expedition. But hurry. We don't have much time.”

Hurried or not, Falk had to go slow in the rain, the water running now in wavelets across the banked pavement of the curves. The landscape was drinking it in as fast as it could, as if aware it might have to live on this one big gulp for weeks to come, but the ground was already choking on the excess, and streams poured through the gaps between scrub and cactus.

As they swerved around the orange barriers up to the checkpoint, a pair of headlights bobbed up behind them, nearly blinding Falk in the glare of the rearview mirror.

“Who's the asshole?” Tyndall asked.

“Don't know.”

“Anybody know you'd be coming here?”

“No.”

“Maybe it's just a night owl, then. But in this shit?”

The checkpoint MP, draped in a drenched parka, glanced at their IDs and waved them through. The trailing driver must have had his pass ready, too, because he was soon right back on their tail.

“Go past the main entrance to Delta and take the next right.”

He did, but the other car still followed.

“What the hell's he up to?” Tyndall said, turning in the seat. “Maybe we should turn around, get out of here.”

“Too late,” Falk said. They were pulling up to a gate, where another MP in a parka leaned toward the window.

“Park over there,” the MP shouted, pointing to a small gravel lot to the side. “Then come inside the hut. They'll get you squared away.”

They pulled to the side, and the second car sidled up beside them.

“Well, here goes nothing,” Tyndall said, and they unlatched their doors to run for the cover of the MP hut. No sooner were they inside than Falk heard a familiar voice.

“Wait up, fellas!”

It was Bo, who was just coming through the door. Falk sighed with relief. Bo was still in his shirtsleeves, not even wearing a windbreaker.

“It's okay,” Falk said to Tyndall.

Tyndall said nothing, but didn't look so sure, maintaining a grim expression as Bo stamped his feet, shedding water from his pants. An MP eyed them somewhat incredulously from the security desk.

“How'd you know where to find me?” Falk asked.

“Dumb luck. Was on my way to your house when I saw your car turning off Iguana Terrace. Figured I'd catch up to you. Where are we, anyway?”

“You really don't know?” Tyndall said.

“Hey, I'm still the new guy. I was just following my pal here.”

Falk tried to read his face for any hint of urgent news, but couldn't decipher it. Bo would be thrilled with the findings from the sign-out sheet and the MP duty roster. But that discussion would have to wait.

“This is Camp Echo,” Tyndall said.

“Well, now.”

“We get cleared here,” he said, turning to Falk, his body language indicating an almost purposeful snub of Bokamper. “Then an escort will take us to a booth. I'll have to be present, too, I'm afraid. House rules, since it's technically our shop.”

“I'm going in to speak to Adnan,” Falk explained to Bo, which didn't seem to win him any points with Tyndall.

“Mind if I tag along?” Bo asked. “Watching from behind the glass, of course.”

“Three's a crowd,” Tyndall said.

“Not always.” Bo slipped a folded sheet of paper beneath Tyndall's nose, so close Tyndall had to back away to read it. Then he snatched it back before Falk could get a look.

“Your friend's well connected,” Tyndall said. “You mind if he's in there?”

Now Falk wasn't sure, but there was no time to debate it.

“Long as he stays behind the glass.” He turned toward Bo. “What's on that letter? And who signed it for you? For that matter, where'd you get the car?”

“Technicalities, gentlemen, technicalities.” Spoken with a Cheshire-cat grin. “Let's get going if we're going, Mr. Tyndall. I thought you said time was short.”

He had, Falk thought, but not while you were present.

Tyndall opened the door, and the three of them ran back into the rain.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

T
HIS TIME, AT LEAST,
they didn't wake him with loud music. Or with shouting, or water, or a prod to the chest, a slap on the face. Nor did they force him to his knees and bend him over, then leave him there for hours, until his joints locked and the blood stopped and his muscles cramped into hard balls of frozen rubber. No hoods, no strobe lights, no chains—well, no more than the usual ones—and for the time being, no snakes in gray suits, hissing into his throbbing ears.

In this new place where Adnan lived you could burrow as deeply as you wanted, but it was never deep enough, because the hawks and snakes simply climbed in with you. So he had retreated to the only remaining sanctuary—a silence within the remotest reaches of his mind, protected by a shield that became harder and thicker by the hour, almost organic in the way it grew.

They had brought him here nearly six days ago, on the morning after the midnight interrogation by the snakes at the place of the cages, with all the vines. It was a cell unto itself—one of a cluster of about a dozen, judging from what he had seen on his way in—a hut built of concrete blocks with no view of the outside. Inside was his room, even smaller than his earlier burrow. There was also a second room with a table and chairs, the place where they strapped him down and tried to talk to him, visiting several times a day.

For a while he had still tried to think of himself as a mouse who had become a mole, but when the extra burrowing proved ineffective he resorted to this other refuge. The taxonomy he had developed so carefully no longer worked in this new place. Everything here was too programmed and artificial to be populated by real creatures. And there were no more calls to prayer to set his inner watch by. Meals still arrived, but seemed to do so at irregular intervals, by whim. Nor was there any network of gossip and shouting. He sensed from the noises—or lack of them—that this was a smaller world. He wondered sometimes if that earlier place even existed anymore. It was as if the snakes and hawks had eaten their fill and denuded the plains of all prey, leaving behind this isolated wasteland. In that sense, he supposed, he was a survivor.

But in keeping with the man-made aspect of his new surroundings, he began to think of his existence as comparable to a single pixel on a TV screen that someone had just switched off, a glowing dot at the center of a blankness that would inevitably swallow him as he shrank and faded from view.

Yet for the moment he must still be visible, because they had found him again and were fetching him in a far more gentle way than was customary. An MP stood at the door, calling his name. Behind the MP was a second man, waiting silently. Then the second man called out, speaking Arabic in an accent he instantly recognized.

“Adnan? Are you okay? You don't look so good.”

It was the Lizard, the patient one who lay still and brooded and watched him with what Adnan had thought was sympathy. Now he knew it for deceit, because no sooner had he given up his one big secret than the Lizard had betrayed him to the others, who had brought him here.

That first night had been almost like the plane trip again, with its vomiting and chill and shivering, teeth chattering so hard that it was like biting concrete, again and again.

Now he heard the Lizard speaking in English to the guard, who was shaking his head, speaking back. The guard pulled him over to a chair, saying something. Was he supposed to sit now, here at the table? The others never had let him sit. They stood him in a corner, or squatted him before a strobe light, or a speaker blaring music. Then they leaned low with their questions: “Tell us about Hussay. Just tell us about Hussay and you can go home.”

The MP nudged him toward the chair, so Adnan sat, still eyeing the scene through the opaque layers he had built around himself. He tried brushing them away, but his hands wouldn't move, still locked behind his back. They must have done that before waking him. But he was determined to climb back to the surface, if only for a moment. The Lizard had to hear what had become of him. Had to know the price of betrayal. So he would emerge, if he could, just long enough to vent his anger. Then he would retreat. There would be plenty of time later to rebuild all the layers of his shell, to again become the pixel on the screen, the lone dot of light fading to darkness.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

F
ALK HAD TO SPEND
at least ten minutes of his precious half hour getting Adnan settled down, and it was easy to see why. The young man was bruised, pale and gaunt, looking as if he had lost fifteen pounds. He had been here only six days, but it might as well have been a lifetime.

The props of his destruction were plain to see. A pair of strobe lights sat on the floor in a corner, next to a tape deck and a hundred-watt speaker—only one, no need for stereophonic quality when volume was your only concern. There were no truncheons, prods, or extra shackles, but that kind of equipment was portable.

Under these circumstances, Falk didn't want anyone at the table but Adnan and him, but first he had to argue with the MP.

“I'm not supposed to leave, sir, and this one's been trouble. They said to never let him out of my sight.”

Falk would have asked who “they” were, but knew he'd get nothing. He had noticed on the way in that no one filled out any forms or otherwise noted their presence for the record. Maybe that was because this visit was off the books. Or maybe every visit to Camp Echo was off the books. His bosses in Washington would have blanched to know he was here, and there was no way he would ever volunteer the information.

“Don't worry, soldier. I take full responsibility. Just lock him to the floor and wait outside. I'll call if I need you.”

“Okay, but it's kind of hard to hear from out there.”

No doubt, Falk thought, eyeing the walls and door. Whoever had built Camp Echo had thought of everything, including sound insulation.

Tyndall and Bo were behind the mirror, waiting for the show to begin. It was cramped and stuffy back there, but so be it. With the time limit, they wouldn't suffer long, and judging from what Falk had to work with, the half hour wasn't likely to be productive.

Falk had insisted that neither of them show his face or speak up once the session began. As damaged as the young man was, the last thing Falk needed was another intrusion that might set him off, or push him deeper into whatever place he'd retreated to. Adnan might well remember Tyndall from last week. Even an unfamiliar mug like Bo's could upset the balance.

Adnan was breathing heavily from the moment he entered the room, and the hyperventilation scarcely improved when he recognized Falk. He said something, but it was unintelligible, coming out as a grunt, and even that took so much effort that it sprayed a white foam of spittle across his chin. His eyes were burning, with either rage or eagerness, maybe both. But it seemed clear that he had something to get off his chest.

“Easy, now. Easy, fellow.” Good Lord, it was like talking to a child, a dog. It was all Falk could do not to reach across the table and stroke him on the head. “It's going to be okay now.” But it wasn't, of course, not if Adnan was being handed over to Yemeni intelligence, whose tactics would only be worse.

“I don't know if they've told you, but they'll be sending you back to Yemen in a few days.” He resisted the urge to say “home,” because it wouldn't have been true. He was through lying to Adnan. Or so he vowed.

“I'm told that the move is going to happen for certain.” But leaving it at that, of course, would have been a lie by omission, so Falk came clean. “You'll be released to the authorities, not to your family, although with any luck, maybe they'll let you go soon.”

He thought he heard a cough from behind the mirror. Was Tyndall trying to tell him he was speaking out of school? Too late now.

“But before you go, Adnan, you have to tell me who has done this to you. You have to tell me who brought you here to this room, and who has been coming to see you.”

“Betrayer!” Adnan finally spluttered, the word seeming to geyser from some deep recess where it had bubbled and stewed for ages. “You and the snakes. Betrayers!”

“The snakes?” It was the first time Falk had heard him use the word.

“All of you! All snakes.”

The outburst released enough pressure to calm him, and as the eruption subsided Falk leaned forward ever so slightly, not close enough to be threatening, but enough that he could lower his voice and still be heard.

“Listen to me, Adnan. Look at me.” A glance, almost holding it. Then Adnan looked off to the usual corner where his eyes went when he had nothing further to say. “You are right, Adnan. You are right about the snakes. They have betrayed you, but I want to punish them for it, and you can help me.”

He waited, and Adnan's head swiveled slowly back, a pivot that stopped just short of face-to-face. But the eyes kept coming, halting briefly as they met Falk's, then wavering and flicking back toward the corner.

“You can help me,” Falk said. “You can help us both.”

Well, there it was—deceit creeping back into his approach in spite of his best intentions. But there was no taking back the words now, especially since they seemed to be showing results. Adnan's face had moved, and now his eyes were locked onto Falk's.

“Good,” Falk crooned, master to dog. “Good. Now I am going to show you some pictures, Adnan. Some of the snakes. So don't be upset, because they're not here, and they're not waiting outside, and they're not going to hurt you again.” Another promise he couldn't keep, and he knew he would keep offering them as long as they kept working.

Falk pulled from his briefcase the copy of
The Wire
with the article on the investigative team. He had folded back the photo so that only Fowler's face was showing. He slid it onto the table where Adnan could see it, doing it slowly, careful not to break the spell. Snakes, indeed. He felt like a cobra, trying to stare his victim into a trance.

“This one,” he said, still holding eye contact even as he tapped the photo. “Do you recognize him? Look down at the picture, Adnan. The picture can't hurt you.”

Adnan looked down, and for a fretful moment Falk thought he had lost him, such was the blankness of the young man's expression as he stared at the photo. It was as if he were peering deep into a well, the focus not quite right.

“You know him?” Falk asked. “Has he been here?”

Adnan slowly shook his head, expression neutral.

“No?”

“No,” Adnan answered, mildly, as if he were declining an extra helping of dessert. “I do not know him. He is not among the snakes.”

Falk got the same result with Cartwright's photo. Then he showed the picture of Fowler once more, just to make sure, and also as a sort of test. If Adnan reacted as if he were seeing it for the first time, then maybe his mind was blanking, repressing the memory of everyone who had done him harm.

But that's not what happened.

“You have asked me already about him!” Adnan said, voice rising. “He is not among the snakes!” He was back to the precipice. Falk withdrew the photo.

“Very good, then. Very well. It's all right. You won't see that picture again.”

To Falk, this meant that maybe whoever had done the interrogations of the Yemenis at Camp X-Ray was the same person who was doing them here. If that was Van Meter, then he would have had an interpreter in tow, and Allen Lawson would have been the logical choice. Perhaps Fowler only watched from behind the mirror.

Unfortunately, he had no photos of Van Meter to show, and he doubted he could get one before either Adnan departed or General Trabert found out what Falk was up to and shut him down. Miracle enough, he supposed, that he had gotten in here at all.

“Okay, then,” he said, changing tack. “Let's talk about these snakes.”

Adnan shook his head.

“Don't you want them punished?”

Adnan looked down at his feet.

“Well, don't you?”

A slow nod.

“Then describe them to me. What they wore. What color their hair was, their eyes.”

Adnan looked up at Falk as if he were a dolt. He seemed furious.

“They are snakes!” he shouted. “What else do you need to know? They look like snakes, they bite like snakes, they coil and strike like snakes. They are snakes!”

So this was where the damage showed itself, he supposed. Which might explain why none of the pictures registered. Show him a photo of a timber rattler and perhaps he would jump to his feet, pointing wildly in recognition. But Falk soldiered on, keeping his voice low and his posture neutral. He did not again lean forward and he did not stand. He folded his hands in front of him, on the table where Adnan could see them.

Adnan responded in kind, to a point. His demeanor calmed, and he did not again raise his voice. But no matter how many different ways Falk tried to elicit a description of his tormenters, or even a hint of one, Adnan always responded the same way.

“It is all I can say of them,” he said wearily, in apparent exasperation. “They are snakes.”

“Okay, then. Fine. But how many? How many snakes have come here?”

“Three,” he said. Certain of it. “Three in this place.”

“And in the other place? From before you were here?”

“Too many. Many more.”

“But some here are the same as before? Or are all the ones here new ones?”

“Two are the same as before. One is new. Here and from the last time in the jungle.”

“The jungle?”

“The place where the monkeys lived.”

He must have meant Camp X-Ray. That last session before they brought him here. All other snakes must be those he had talked to before Falk had taken over his handling. Falk wondered what Bo and Tyndall were making of all this. Neither understood Arabic, so they would only have noticed the gestures, the changes in inflection and volume. They would have seen Falk hold out the newspaper, but wouldn't have known what it was or what he was asking. Just as well, especially in Tyndall's case. Or was the CIA man somehow taping this? Possible, he supposed, but it was too late to worry about it.

Checking his watch, he saw that only a few minutes remained. Tyndall had promised to cut him off promptly when the time expired. For all Falk knew, the rendition was scheduled for daybreak, although air traffic was likely to be grounded at least until Clifford passed through.

He made one last stab at getting a description of the newest snake, and when that failed he sighed, feeling there was nothing left to ask, if only because it seemed there was nothing left to retrieve. Adnan was calmer now, but accompanying the calmness was an expression of such vacant resignation that Falk was oddly devastated by the sight. All that was missing to complete the effect was a straitjacket, or the stitch scars of a lobotomy. Adnan was an empty vessel, thoroughly spent.

“Okay, Adnan,” he said gently. “That's good. You did well today. This will help you.”

Not even the lies seemed to matter anymore. Adnan's face remained as rigidly placid as a frozen pond. Falk got up and knocked lightly on the door. The MP was inside immediately, looking excited until he saw that everything was in order.

“All done,” Falk said. “You can put him back.”

The words in English brought a response from Tyndall, who cracked open the door of the observation room just enough to mutter, “You've still got three minutes, you know. If you want it.”

“He's running on empty,” Falk said. “Nothing left to get.”

“Empty?” Bo snorted, not bothering to whisper. “I don't speak Arabic but, hell, you hardly tried. You looked more like his therapist than his interrogator. That what they teach you at Quantico?”

There was a sudden commotion behind him, then an agonized groan from Adnan.

“Snake!” he said in Arabic. “It hisses! I hear it!” Falk turned to see Adnan's eyes glowing in fear.

“What the hell's he saying now?” Bo said.

“Snake!” Adnan struggled with the MP, who was pulling a truncheon from his belt.

“Shut up!” Falk muttered to Bo over his shoulder. “And shut the door. I want those three minutes. MP! Hold him, but don't dare hit him. Keep him there by the door, just one second more!”

Falk's stomach turned as he pulled the newspaper back out of his bag, but he mustered enough composure to catch Adnan's eye, beseeching the young man to calm down enough for one last question.

“Is this the snake?” he asked, keeping his voice low and even. He folded back the picture to the one face he hadn't showed, that of Ted Bokamper, hovering to the right of the frame.

“Yes!” Adnan said, nodding quickly, then looking wildly toward the mirror on the opposite wall. “He hisses, and he is there. He lives
there
!”

“Easy, Adnan.”

But Adnan would no longer be calmed, and even in his leg irons and handcuffs he was a handful for the young MP, who ended up simply shoving Adnan onto his bed, still locked at his wrists and ankles, then slammed home the cell door.

“Man's out of control,” the soldier said scornfully. “No wonder he's in this place.”

“Yeah,” Falk said. “No wonder.”

         

B
Y THE TIME THE THREE
of them had run back through the rain to the entry station, Falk had regained his composure.

“Bo, why don't you follow us back to my place. You and I need to talk.”

“My sentiments exactly.” Falk shot him a questioning glance, but got only the usual wiseass grin in return. “But unfortunately I can't do it right now. Previous obligation.”

“At eleven o'clock at night?”

“Hey, you know me.”

“Thought I did, anyway.”

But Bo was already out the door, sprinting for his car through the downpour. Tyndall and he followed suit, and after slamming the door of the Plymouth, Falk sat for a moment with his hands on the wheel as he sorted out the implications.

“I'm getting some weird vibes from all this,” Tyndall said.

“You should be.”

“What just happened back there?”

“I'm not sure. But thanks for getting me in.”