Gabriel Allon: The Black Widow Part 33

"That's not necessary. I'll ring him in the morning. But don't mention any of this to him," Gabriel added conspiratorially. "I want to surprise him."

Gabriel went outside into the chill night. He waited until he was in the back of his Suburban before ringing Adrian Carter. Carter was still at his office in Langley.

"I want you to have a look at someone named al-Farouk. He's about forty-five years old, maybe fifty. I don't know his first name or the color of his pa.s.sport."

"What do you know about him?"

"He's staying at the Four Seasons."

"Am I missing something?"

"I got a funny feeling at the back of my neck, Adrian. Find out who he is."

The connection went dead. Gabriel returned the phone to his coat pocket.

"Back to N Street?" asked the driver.

"No," answered Gabriel. "Take me to the emba.s.sy."

51.

AUBERVILLIERS, FRANCE.

THE ALARM ON NATALIE'S MOBILE phone sounded at seven fifteen, which was odd, because she didn't remember setting it. In fact, she was quite certain she hadn't. She silenced the phone with an annoyed tap of her finger and tried to sleep a little longer, but five minutes later it rang a second time. "All right," she said to the spot in the ceiling where she imagined the camera to be hidden. "You win. I'll get up."

She threw aside the bedding and swung her feet to the floor. In the kitchen she brewed a pot of oily black Carte Noire in the Mocha stovetop maker and poured it into a bowl of steaming milk. Outside, the night was draining slowly from her drab street. In all likelihood, it was the last Paris morning that Dr. Leila Hadawi would ever see, for if Saladin had his way, she would not be returning to France from her sudden, unexpected trip to America. Natalie's return was uncertain, too. Standing in her sooty little window, her hands wrapped around the cafe au lait, she realized she would not miss it. Her life in the banlieues had only reinforced her conviction that there was no future in France for the Jews. Israel was her home-Israel and the Office. Gabriel was right. She was one of them now.

Neither ISIS nor the Office had given her packing instructions, and so instinctively she packed lightly. Her flight was scheduled to depart Charles de Gaulle at 1:45 p.m. She journeyed to the airport on the RER and at half past eleven joined the long line at the economy check-in counter. After a wait of thirty minutes a disagreeable Frenchwoman informed her that she had been upgraded to business cla.s.s.

"Why?"

"Would you rather stay in economy?"

The woman handed Natalie her boarding pa.s.s and returned her pa.s.sport. She loitered for several minutes in the shops of duty-free, observed by the watchers of the DGSI, before making her way to the departure gate. Because Flight 54 was bound for America, there were special security measures. Her hijab and Arabic name earned her several minutes of additional preflight screening, but eventually she was admitted into the departure lounge. She searched for familiar faces but found none. In a complimentary copy of Le Monde she read about the French president's upcoming visit to America and, on an inside page, about a new wave of stabbings in Israel. She burned with rage. She rejoiced.

Presently, the crackle of a boarding call brought her to her feet. She had been given a seat on the right side of the aircraft against the window. The seat next to her remained empty long after the economy pa.s.sengers had boarded, instilling in her the hope she might not have to spend the next seven and half hours with a complete stranger. That hope died when a business-suited man with coal-black hair and matching eyegla.s.ses lowered himself into the seat next to her. He didn't appear pleased to be sitting next to an Arab woman in a hijab. He stared at his mobile phone, Natalie stared at hers.

After a few seconds a message appeared on her screen.

LONELY?.

She typed, YES.

WANT SOME COMPANY?.

LOVE SOME.

LOOK TO YOUR LEFT.

She did. The man with coal-black hair and matching eyewear was still staring at his phone, but now he was smiling.

"Is this a good idea?" she asked.

"What's that?" asked Mikhail.

"You and me together?"

"I'll tell you after we land."

"What happens then?"

Before he could answer, an announcement instructed pa.s.sengers to switch off their mobile devices. Natalie and her seatmate complied. As the plane thundered down the runway, she placed her hand on his.

"Not yet," he whispered.

"When?" she asked, pulling away her hand.

"Soon," he said. "Very soon."

52.

HUME, VIRGINIA.

IN WASHINGTON THE RAINS HAD finally ended, and a blast of cold, clear air had scrubbed the last remaining clouds from the sky. The great marble monuments glowed white as bone in the sharp sunlight; a brisk wind chased fallen leaves through the streets of Georgetown. Only the Potomac River bore the scars of the deluge. Swollen by runoff, clogged with tree limbs and debris, it flowed brown and heavy beneath Key Bridge as Saladin drove toward Virginia. He was dressed for a weekend in the English countryside-corduroy trousers, a woolen crewneck sweater, a dark-green Barbour jacket. He turned right onto the George Washington Memorial Parkway and headed west.

The roadway ran along the bank of the river for about a quarter mile before climbing to the top of the gorge. Trees in autumn leaf blazed in the bright sunlight, and across the muddy river traffic flowed along a parallel parkway. Even Saladin had to admit it was a welcome change from the harsh world of western Iraq and the caliphate. The comfortable leather seat of the luxury German sedan held him with the tenderness of a cupped hand. A member of the network had left it for him in a small parking lot at the corner of M Street and Wisconsin Avenue, a painful walk of several blocks from the Four Seasons Hotel. Saladin was tempted to put the machine through its paces and test his skills on the smooth, winding road. Instead, he kept a.s.siduously to the posted speed limit while other drivers rode his rear b.u.mper and made obscene gestures as they roared past on his left. Americans, he thought-always in a hurry. It was both their greatest strength and their undoing. How foolish they were to think they could snap their fingers and alter the political landscape of the Middle East. Men like Saladin did not measure time in four-year election cycles. As a child he had lived on the banks of one of the four rivers that flowed out of the Garden of Eden. His civilization had flourished for thousands of years in the harsh and unforgiving land of Mesopotamia before anyone had ever heard of a place called America. And it would survive long after the great American experiment receded into history. Of this, Saladin was certain. All great empires eventually collapsed. Only Islam was forever.

The car's navigation system guided Saladin onto the Capital Beltway. He drove south, across the Dulles Access Road, past the shopping malls of Tysons Corner, to Interstate 66, where he once again headed west, toward the foothills of the Shenandoah Mountains. The eastbound lanes were still clogged with morning commuter traffic, but before Saladin stretched several car-lengths of empty asphalt, a rarity for the metropolitan Washington motorist. Again, he kept diligently to the speed limit while other traffic overtook him. The last thing he needed now was a traffic stop; it would put at risk an elaborate plot that taken months of meticulous planning. Paris and Amsterdam had been dress rehearsals. Washington was Saladin's ultimate target, for only the Americans had the power to unleash the chain of events he was attempting to bring about. A final review of the plan with his primary Washington operative was all that remained. It was dangerous-there was always the possibility the operative had been compromised-but Saladin wanted to hear from the man's lips that everything was in place.

He pa.s.sed the exit for a town with the quintessentially American-sounding name of Gainesville. The traffic thinned, the terrain turned hilly, the blue peaks of the Shenandoah seemed within reach. He had been driving for three-quarters of an hour, and his right leg was beginning to throb from the effort of controlling his speed. To distract himself from the pain, he allowed his mind to drift. It settled quickly on the man he had seen in the lobby of the Four Seasons Hotel the previous evening.

Gabriel Allon . . .

It was possible Allon's presence in Washington was entirely coincidental-after all, the Israeli had worked closely with the Americans for many years-but Saladin doubted that was the case. Several Israeli citizens had died in the Paris attack, along with Hannah Weinberg, a woman who was a personal friend of Allon's and an a.s.set of Israeli intelligence. It was entirely possible that Allon had taken part in the post-attack investigation. Perhaps he had learned of the existence of Saladin's network. And perhaps he had learned, too, that the network was about to carry out an attack in America. But how? The answer to that question was quite simple. Saladin had to a.s.sume that Allon had managed to penetrate his network-it was, thought the Iraqi, Allon's special talent. And if Allon knew about the network, the Americans knew about it, too. Most of Saladin's operatives had infiltrated the country from abroad through the porous American visa and immigration system. But several operatives, including the man Saladin was about to meet, were American based, and therefore more vulnerable to U.S. counterterrorism efforts. They were critical to the operation's success, but they were the weak link in the network's long chain.

The navigation system advised Saladin to leave Interstate 66 at Exit 18. He followed the instructions and found himself in a town called Markham. No, he thought, it was not a town, it was a tiny collection of houses with covered porches looking out upon overgrown lawns. He headed south along Leeds Manor Road, past fenced pastures and barns, until he came to a town called Hume. It was slightly larger than the first. Still, there were no shops or markets, only an auto repair shop, a country inn, and a couple of churches where the infidels worshiped their blasphemous version of G.o.d.

The navigation system was now essentially useless; the address of Saladin's destination was far too remote. He turned right onto Hume Road and followed it six-tenths of a mile, until he came to an unpaved track. It bore him across a pasture, over a ridge of wooded hills, and into a small dell. There was a black pond, its surface smooth as gla.s.s, and a timbered A-frame cottage. Saladin switched off the engine; the silence was like the silence of the desert. He opened the trunk. Concealed inside were a 9mm Glock 19 and a high-performance sound and flash suppressor, both of which had been purchased legally in Virginia by a member of Saladin's network.

The gun in his left hand, his cane in the right, Saladin cautiously entered the cottage. Its furnishings were rustic and spa.r.s.e. In the kitchen he boiled a pot of water-it smelled as though it came unfiltered from the pond-and coaxed a cup of weak tea from an elderly bag of Twinings. Returning to the sitting room, he lowered himself onto the couch and gazed through the triangular picture window, toward the ridge of hills he had just crossed. After a few minutes a little Korean sedan appeared, trailing a cloud of dust. Saladin concealed the gun beneath an embroidered pillow that read G.o.d BLESS THIS HOUSE. Then he blew on his tea and waited.

Saladin had never met the operative in person, though he knew him to be a green-carded Egyptian citizen named Qa.s.sam el-Banna, five foot nine inches in height, 165 pounds, tightly curled hair, light brown eyes. The man who entered the cottage matched that description. He appeared nervous. With a nod, Saladin instructed him to sit. Then in Arabic he said, "Peace be upon you, Brother Qa.s.sam."

The young Egyptian was clearly flattered. Softly, he repeated the traditional Islamic greeting of peace, though without the name of the man he was addressing.

"Do you know who I am?" asked Saladin.

"No," answered the Egyptian quickly. "We've never met."

"But surely you've heard of me."

It was obvious the young Egyptian did not know how to answer the question, so he proceeded with caution. "I received a message instructing me to come to this location for a meeting. I was not told who would be here or why he wanted to see me."

"Were you followed?"

"No."

"Are you sure?"

The young Egyptian vigorously nodded his head.

"And the moving company?" asked Saladin. "I trust there are no problems?"

There was a brief pause. "Moving company?"

Saladin gave him a rea.s.suring smile. It was surprisingly charming, the smile of a professional.

"Your caution is admirable, Qa.s.sam. But I can a.s.sure you it's not necessary."

The Egyptian was silent.

"Do you know who I am?" Saladin asked again.

"Yes, I believe I do."

"Then answer my question."

"There are no problems at the moving company. Everything is in place."

Again, Saladin smiled. "I'll be the judge of that."

He debriefed the young Egyptian with the patience of a skilled professional. Saladin's professionalism, however, was twofold. He was an intelligence officer turned master terrorist. He had honed his skills in the badlands of Anbar Province, where he had plotted countless car bombings and suicide attacks, all while sleeping in a different bed every night and evading the drones and the F-16s. Now he was about to lay siege to the American capital from the comfort of the Four Seasons Hotel. The irony, he thought, was exquisite. Saladin was prepared for this moment like no other terrorist in history. He was America's creation. He was America's nightmare.

No detail of the operation was too small to evade Saladin's scrutiny-the primary targets, the backup targets, the weapons, the vehicle-borne bombs, the suicide vests. The young Egyptian answered each question fully and without hesitation. Jalal Na.s.ser and Abu Ahmed al-Tikriti had been wise to choose him; he had a brain like a computer hard drive. The individual operatives knew portions of the plot, but Qa.s.sam el-Banna knew almost everything. If he happened to fall into the hands of the FBI while driving back to Arlington, it would be a disaster. For that reason alone, he would not be leaving the isolated cottage outside Hume alive.

"Have all the operatives been told their targets?" asked Saladin.

"Everyone but the Palestinian doctor."

"When does she arrive?"

"Her flight is scheduled to land at four thirty, but it's running a few minutes ahead of schedule."

"You checked?"

He nodded. He was good, thought Saladin, as good as Mohamed Atta. Too bad he would never achieve the same fame. Mohamed Atta was spoken of with reverence in jihadi circles, but only a handful of people in the movement would ever know the name Qa.s.sam el-Banna.

"I'm afraid," said Saladin, "there's been a slight change in the plan."

"Regarding?"

"You."

"What about me?"

"I want you to leave the country tonight and make your way to the caliphate."

"But if I make a reservation at the last minute, the Americans-"

"Will suspect nothing," Saladin said firmly. "It's too dangerous for you to stay here, Brother Qa.s.sam. You know too much."

The Egyptian made no reply.

"You've cleaned out your computers?" asked Saladin.

"Yes, of course."

"And your wife knows nothing of your work?"

"Nothing."

"Will she join you?"

"I doubt it."