Born of War (16 page)

T
he child had a high fever all night. She kept crying and holding her neck. The whole family had become sick earlier that afternoon.

The sky was a crystal clear blue over the mansion and his corner of the lake. He had bought the stone house and the land for his wife when she told him she was pregnant with their first child.

The villa had large glass doors that swung out onto a porch that extended the full length of the structure on both the back and front. Slate covered the roof. The trim was a copper metal that had turned a grass-colored green with time. They were on a secluded drive that wound up to the top of a small hill. It had been purchased for millions of Swiss francs.

The summers were perfect. The days rarely got hot and leaned more towards chilly on occasion. The evenings were always cool, particularly when a breeze came across the lake. They were known for their parties during the summer. She wore gowns from Paris and designer shoes from Milan. She was known for her collection of shoes that ran in the hundreds of pairs.

He did have neighbors. Some were small farmers with large black-and-white cows raised for their milk. The cows would wander across the hillsides and even come on to his estate. The two girls loved them. A person could hear the cows' bells, strung around their necks, from some distance. A cow was sometimes found and then gently channeled back to where it came from; the girls would throw small stones at the cow and occasionally get a moo out of it. The farmers were not pleased but they would put up with the stranger.

Everyone in the village suspected where the money came from.

He rarely drove his convertible Rolls-Royce, but his wife would take the girls to town and school every day in a black Range Rover.

The villa came with a butler who would drive him and his wife on occasion as well. He was an old Swiss who was born in the valley and tended to the villa. He'd worked for the last owner and would continue with the next. Genret had not planned for there to be a next owner. Genret had the money to keep the villa in his family for generations beyond the life of the butler.

“Bart, we must get a doctor,” his wife begged.

“I am afraid that we are all sick.” Genret stood there in a robe and pajamas looking particularly odd, as he also wore a pair of sunglasses. “I cannot stand the light and I have a pounding headache.”

The headache had become so severe that he'd even resorted to the bottle of narcotic pills he kept hidden in the back of the closet. Genret had paid enough for his security team that he felt comfortable that both his gold and his bottle of narcotics would be left alone. However, he knew that he had only survived this long because he always kept on alert. There was no safe place for a man who dealt in weapons sold to the likes of Al Shabaab or others.

Genret's security director brought back a doctor from the nearby town.

He pulled the Rolls up to the villa's front door. Normally, Genret would be waiting outside but the bright sunlight prevented his going past the drawn curtains.

“Let me show you,” the security director said.

“Who is sick?” the doctor asked.

“They all have been ill for the last day or so. The children seem worse. One of the daughters is very bad.”

“And what are the complaints?”

“High fevers, and they scream if they are not in complete darkness. When the sun came up they all cried.”

“Can they move?”

“I don't know.”

“Okay
,
wait here.”

Bertok Genret thought that unusual.

“Should I not show you where to go?”

“No, I know this villa. I have been here before. The Countess who lived here before was ill.”

Genret stood by the car while he waited for some word. After a brief moment, the doctor came out running. He was generally a calm man who rarely got excited.

“We must get help.”

“What is wrong?” Genret was stunned.

“Are you the only one who has been exposed to them over the last forty-eight hours?”

“He came back from a trip late Thursday, and no one else has been here besides the family and me.”

“The military will want to isolate the villa.”

Genret looked out over the lake.

“Will they be okay?”

“No.”

The World Health Organization's headquarters was just beyond the valley in the city of Geneva. Word got to them later that day that another case caused by the Neisseria meningitidis bacteria had been registered. The lab slides didn't take long. Everyone in the village had been started on an inoculation program. And the WHO began giving shots to each of its physicians, scientists, and employees. A Swiss team was leaving for Somalia when they received the news that their family members at home were in as much risk as they were.

Genret and his children died that night. The wife survived but had to have both feet amputated. The price of gunrunning was high.

“D
o you know where you are going?” Hernandez sat in the front fidgeting with Gunny Moncrief's radio. “He doesn't have a cell phone.”

“Yes. Leave the radio alone.” Moncrief enjoyed listening to his baseball on a channel with Sirius. It was a close one between the Braves and Philadelphia.

The truck headed back north, and after passing Interstate Beltway 285 that circled the city, he pulled onto the exit to Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport.

“Are we stopping?”

“No. Just listen to the game.” Moncrief had forgotten what a pain Hernandez could be. He drove the truck around the loop, passing through a tunnel near the terminals. It was the meeting spot. They slowed down and as they did, Moncrief looked up in his rearview mirror. A black truck suddenly appeared just behind them.

“Okay
,
let's go.” He headed south to the beltway and then turned onto the west side of Interstate 285. They traveled north, again, until the highway intersected with Interstate 20. They traveled on I-20 west for more than a dozen miles. The black truck stayed in his rearview.

The exit off I-20 had the usual Waffle House and a new Walmart, but the road soon turned into woods and the occasional small fields of grass and stumps of trees. They drove for another thirty minutes until they crossed a bridge over a river. Just beyond the bridge, Moncrief took a turn to the left onto a dirt and gravel road.

Several hundred yards in, a gate spanned the road with several signs that said N
O
T
RESPASSING
and W
ARNING
—D
OG
.

“Damn, Gunny, I haven't been here for years.” Hernandez looked around the woods. “I didn't know you had a dog.”

“Don't.” Moncrief was looking in his rearview mirror to make sure that the truck had also made the turn. “Need one, though. Best burglar alarm system in the world. Here, go unlock the gate.”

He handed Hernandez a key on a chain containing an eagle, globe, and anchor.

The two trucks pulled up to a small shack no bigger than a one-car garage. The house was tucked underneath some tall pines and in the shade it was nearly impossible to see. A small skiff was on a trailer bed parked next to the house. The Boston Whaler could not have been more than thirteen feet in length.

A flatbed trailer was parked on the other side of the house and next to it was a van that was marked M
ONCRIEF
P
AINTING
C
OMPANY.
Less than fifty yards on the back side of the cabin, the river they had just passed over cut through the property. The sound of running water filled the forest.

“Come on.” Moncrief turned off his truck.

“I need to see your computer.” William Parker swung the door closed to his truck.

“Hey, boss.” Hernandez held out his hand.

“Hernandez, how's your daughter?”

“Growing like a weed.”

“Gunny, sorry to bug you.”

“No problem.”

“Let me show you something.”

Despite his isolation, Moncrief had one telephone line running to the cabin. It was used for his sole source of business besides his Marine Corps retirement. Moncrief's paint company had a Web site that got him just enough business. Not too much and not too little. He didn't want to do more.

“Sure.”

They walked into the cabin, which was divided into a bedroom and small living room with a large lounge chair in front of a television and two open doors. One room had a small bed with the blanket stretched as tight as a drum, and the other room had a small kitchen. It was as close as you could possibly get to being a BEQ; the Bachelors Enlisted Quarters room of old—not one of the revised enlisted barracks of more recent times.

“It's over here.”

A small desk was in the corner with an old computer and printer.

“Need to upgrade.”

Both Parker and Hernandez looked at each other and smiled.

Moncrief sat down at the table and started up the computer.

“Go to Google and search for Omar and Al Shabaab under YouTube.”

It didn't take a minute for several choices to show up. Omar had been busy even in combat. The videos showed a white-faced, bearded man who seemed overly theatrical. He moved his hands as he spoke. There was a burned-out, armored personnel carrier in the background.

“Any idea as to where this is from?” Moncrief asked.

“Yes, I think it is south of Luuq in western Somalia.” Parker sounded authoritative as if he had studied the footage for some time. “There was a battle there a few days ago and that is a Kenyan APC. It is still smoldering from the round it took.”

A wisp of smoke rose from the wreckage.

“Look at his hands.” Parker pointed to the screen over Moncrief's shoulder. “See how he uses his finger one way and then another?”

Omar gestured, then pointed with his index finger, and then gestured again. Then he waved his hand with his thumb out and his index finger up.

“So what do you think?”

“When you got me out of jail didn't you talk to the operations group from the FBI?”

“Yes.”

“Did they have someone from TFOS?” Parker knew who they needed to talk to.

“Probably. If they didn't, I am sure that they would know how to get in touch with that section.” TFOS was the Bureau's Terrorist Financing Operations Section. They had the job of tracking the money that fed the terrorists. Gunny Moncrief had kept the telephone number on his desk.

“He is telling somebody in the United States something. The letters he formed are D and L.”

“D and L?”

“I think what he is really doing is activating another cell.” Parker looked at the screen closely.

“But they have a million guys looking at this video.” Moncrief was thinking of the scrutiny Omar's videos had gotten.

“Sure, but he doesn't care about the thousands of techs at DOD or the FBI who are looking at it. He only cares about one out of the millions who are looking at it. The Internet has become our own worst enemy.” Parker was right. The Internet had given Al Shabaab and every other terrorist group in the world a free and unlimited ride. Instant communications around the world were always available. A terrorist cell from Toronto or Minnesota could be on standby to respond immediately.

“So what's the TFO section have to do with all of this?” Hernandez asked.

“You can't trace the people who are watching it, but you can trace the source of money. The money can tell you who is really vested in this guy.” Parker continued to study the screen as he spoke. “Even the most basic terrorist operation needs money, whether for gas or fertilizer or the odd purchase of a pipe at Home Depot. And the more money, the more serious they are.”

“Shit.” Moncrief let it out like a breath of bad air. “What's the scenario?”

“Who knows?” Parker kept watching the video. “He obviously needed to send another signal to both the world and his bosses. Faud and Godane are known to be temperamental. They will keep him as long as he proves he's useful.”

Moncrief had heard the names before. Godane was the CEO and Faud the CFO of Al Shabaab.

“They will always want weapons. And the more they can afford, the more dangerous they become.” Parker continued to study the face of the man. “Their pirates steal any ship that comes within a hundred miles of the coast. And if Al Shabaab had something to shoot at American jets or destroyers to help its pirates steal the ships, Al Shabaab would be in the market to buy.”

“We didn't tell you why we were at your cabin.” Moncrief pushed his chair back from the table. “Dr. Stewart needs your help.”

“Yeah, he wants to talk to you real bad.” Hernandez had been squatting down as they spoke but stood up when the subject was raised. “Really bad.”

Parker kept studying the video. The picture was frozen on the one frame of Omar staring into the camera. The barrel of his AK-47 rested against his shoulder. He wore a smirk of a smile as if he was getting his revenge on America. “What's going on?”

Moncrief went back to Google and searched for the World Health Organization's Web site. It had one category of health alerts. He clicked on “News” and an emergency alert appeared on the screen warning that anyone traveling to or from either Yemen or Somalia needed to be aware of an outbreak of meningitis.

“Meningitis is all over that part of the world. It's called the belt.” Parker wasn't immediately impressed.

“Not this one.” From his years with security at the CDC, Hernandez did have some sense that this strand was something very different. “They are acting like this is a bad bug.”

“Yeah, Colonel.” Moncrief rarely mentioned rank. It was a trump card that he used only when he needed to get Parker's attention in a special way. “And you are the only one that they know for sure who has survived it.”

“So, they need me to come in and give them some blood?” Parker didn't see the complication. Donating a tube or two of blood wasn't that difficult a process.

“Stewart wants to talk to you today. He has been sitting by his telephone at his CDC office since daylight.”

“Okay.” Parker sensed something more to the story. “There were two doctors taken by Al Shabaab from an MSF encampment. Wasn't one of them an American with the name of Stewart?”

“Yes, sir.” Hernandez spoke again. “Stewart lost his wife not too long ago.”

Moncrief stared at Hernandez with a frown that could have frozen him in his place.

“I mean . . .”

“No, don't apologize.” Parker kept looking at the screen. “You don't need to apologize.” There was a silence in the room for what seemed to be several minutes.

“I don't want to meet him at the CDC. There are too many cameras.”

“He will meet you anywhere.”

“You need to call the FBI—and not from a cell.”

“I know a temp store at Walmart where we can buy one with a few minutes on it. You can stay in the truck.” Moncrief paused. “I will call the folks I talked to about Mobile. One of them was a wounded Marine who got a job with the FBI after Afghanistan.”

“Okay
,
let's get the word to them that he is using this video to activate another cell and then we can go see Dr. Stewart.”