Direct Action (30 page)

“Good.” Wyman nodded. “How many bombs, Reuven?”
“If I could count the detonators, I’d know better,” the Israeli said. “There are eight backpacks, Tony,” Tom said. “But there may be more.” “Makes sense.” Wyman looked at Tom. “Do we have the place cov-

ered? I don’t want Ben Said disappearing on us.”
“Reuven took care of it.”
“I called some friends from the old days,” Reuven said. “Corsicans.

Trustworthy. Nothing happens without us knowing.”
MJ pointed at the screen. “Why not just alert the French? Let them take
care of everything?”
“They’d get the bombs and that’s all,” Tom said. “I want Ben Said.” She crossed her arms. “The bombs are better than nothing.” “They’re nothing without the bomb maker, MJ,” Wyman said. “He
shifts locations, identities, whatever, and starts all over again. Now that he’s
perfected the detonator design, we’re talking a matter of what—weeks?” Reuven nodded. “Maximum.”
“So?”
“This time it’s high-fashion backpacks,” Wyman said. “And we have a
real leg up because we know that. Next time it could be anything. Attaché
cases. Carry-ons. Shaving kits. Makeup bags.”
MJ cocked her head in Wyman’s direction. “But won’t he shift his base
of operation anyway if he knows you’re onto him?”
“It’s possible,” Wyman said, looking at her.
“But harder to do than it might appear,” Reuven said.
She looked at the Israeli. “Why?”
“Because,” Tom interrupted, “of two factors. The first is that, from
everything Shahram Shahristani told me the day he was killed, Ben Said’s
IED designs are unique. That’s how he makes his money. He doesn’t sell
his know-how. He sells finished products. Also, he tends to oversee the jobs
himself. He was in Gaza. Now he’s here, because this is where the bombs
are going to be used. My guess is some of that is ego, but it’s also to ensure
that whoever buys his designs doesn’t reverse-engineer them and steal the
proprietary stuff.”
“Second,” Reuven broke in, “we’re not talking about making Molotov
cocktails or homemade mortars,” Reuven said. “Those you can put together anyplace. These devices are precision IEDs. Moreover, it’s amazing
what can be traced these days. You need a more or less sterile environment.
No dust, no dander, because you have to be meticulous about the postexplosion forensics. A microscopic bit of soil that’s unique to a certain place.
Or a tiny fragment of a towel—they can trace those things nowadays. So
the environment can’t contain anything that forensics sniffers or the latest
generation of airport screening devices might detect.”
The Israeli noted the skeptical expression on MJ’s face. “Look for yourself, MJ.” Reuven tapped the screen. “Run it from the beginning, Tom.” “Huh?” Tom was distracted by the police scanner. “Listen.” Tony Wyman turned toward the radio and the four of them fell silent.
The police were responding to a possible homicide on rue Bachelet. Tom turned toward the Israeli. “Reuven?”
“Later,” the Israeli said in Arabic, his eyes flicking toward MJ. “I’ll fill
you in on the details later.” He switched back to English. “Run from the beginning, please.”
Tom dutifully clicked the mouse on the screen. The DVD began with
out-of-focus moving images followed by a lot of black. “That’s from when
I stowed the camera in the fanny pack.” He fast-forwarded until he saw the
image of the safe-house wall. “Okay. Here’s where it gets interesting.” He clicked on speed then slow. The jerkiness decreased and the camera
started to pan smoothly across the room. In the foreground, the greentinged video showed a folding picnic table draped with plastic sheeting on which sat several Vuitton backpacks in various stages of disassembly. To its left, at an oblique angle, was another, smaller picnic table, also draped in dark plastic, which held the detonators. In the gap behind those two tables sat a third. It was more substantial than the other two—more like a drop-leaf dining table. In its center Tom could make out a large sewing machine sitting atop a small crate. The right-hand side of the table was visible through the backpacks, revealing what appeared to be a pasta roller bolted
to the end of the drop leaf.
The camera moved on, its autofocusing lens now concentrating on the
back wall of the room. Some sort of plastic sheeting had been hung. As the
camera panned, Tom saw that every one of the walls was covered in plastic
sheeting.
Tom slowed the DVD’s speed so he could look more closely and waited
until the camera moved from right to left. The plastic over the window
made it harder to see, but the objects on the tables were still identifiable. “Okay,” Reuven said. “Now... stop.”
Tom froze the image.
Reuven used his pen to point at the bomb-making materials on the tables. “Breaking this down won’t be easy. This isn’t the kind of thing you
throw in a garbage bag and move. The backpacks have to be handled carefully. After all, they have to look new.” He looked at Tom. “Show the pasta
maker, Tom.”
Tom double-clicked and the image of the long table with the sewing
machine popped onto the screen.
Reuven waited until the camera panned between the backpacks to the
end of the table that held the pasta maker. Just visible next to the machine
were a trio of cookie racks on which sat six-inch strips of what looked like
fresh-made lasagna. “Okay, stop.”
Tony Wyman squinted, then said, “Yes?”
“That’s the explosive,” Reuven said.
MJ said, “Just lying there? Isn’t that dangerous?”
“No.” Tom’s hand caressed her shoulder. “The explosive itself is
inert—it’s not dangerous until the detonator’s inserted. But look at how
thin it has to be.”
“You’re right.” Reuven pointed to the racks. “Looks to me like it’s
what—two, three millimeters at most.”
Wyman looked at the Israeli. “Is that significant?”
“For sure. Plastique isn’t elastic the same way pasta dough is. It’s more
like modeling clay, or Silly Putty. It’s easy to cut, and roll, and form into
shaped charges. But it’s damned hard to roll into thin, delicate sheets unless you happen to have the right equipment. Obviously, all Ben Said was
able to get was this pasta roller. Once the son of a bitch has rolled out the
explosive, it becomes very, very fragile. From what we can see here, my
guess is he’s rolled about three, maybe four knapsacks’ worth.” Reuven
looked at Wyman. “Believe me, he’s not going to want to do the job
twice.”
Tony Wyman shook his head. “He’s using a goddamn everyday pasta
roller.”
“Can you think of something less likely to attract attention?” Reuven
tapped the plasma screen. “With the exception of the explosives and the
detonators, there’s nothing in this room that can’t be bought off the shelf.” The Israeli tapped the screen then turned back toward Tony Wyman.
“Look—these guys are smart. You were able to destroy Abu Nidal’s organization because it was hierarchical. You cut the head off, and the beast
dies. These guys work out of anonymous, self-supporting cells. Or they’re
loners like Ben Said. They also study their targets. They probe for weaknesses. They bide their time. They’re patient, experienced, dangerous, well
disciplined, and above all they’re resourceful. So while the FBI or Shabak
or DST double-checks every building-supply or fertilizer manufacturer
looking for fancy-schmancy, our boy goes to Monoprix or BHV, pays cash,
and walks away with everything he needs right off the housewares and
small-electronics shelves.”
“Makes one wonder.” MJ played with her hair.
Tom said, “Wonder what?”
“Where he got the explosives. Where did they come from? Did he
make them in the next room? Where’s his laboratory? Did he bring them
into this place in a shopping bag or in his briefcase? How did they get from
wherever they were manufactured to that table?”
The three men looked at one another and realized no one had an answer. Tony Wyman’s monocle dropped onto his chest. “Roll the video again,
Tom. From the top.”
Tom clicked on the play button, then the slow button, and the camera panned slowly left to right. The four of them watched for more than two
and a half minutes in silence.
Finally, Wyman said, “Hold on the backpacks, will you?” Tom ran the disk fast-forward until the table with the backpacks was
centered on the screen. He paused the DVD and looked over at his boss. Tony Wyman said, “Can you give me a print of the table with the backpacks? I don’t care about the packs, but I want to see the whole table, legs
and all.”
“Sure.” Tom cropped the image just as his boss had asked and clicked
the printer icon. Thirty seconds later, he handed tony Tony a borderless
eight-by-ten-inch photograph.
Wyman plugged the monocle into his right eye and studied the picture
intently. After a quarter of a minute, he said, “Hmm.”
Then he gave Tom an intense look. “Can you do the same thing for me
with the table holding the detonators?”
“Sure.” Tom had no idea at all where tony Tony was heading.

3:38
A
.
M
. Tony Wyman held the photographs side by side directly in front of his long nose and examined them closely, one then the other. He said “Hmm” again. He looked at Tom, swiveled his chair, and said, “Come see.”

Tom came around and peered over Wyman’s shoulder, squinted, then shrugged. “What am I looking for?”
Wyman used his right pinkie to summon Reuven. “Now you. What do you see?”
The Israeli leaned over Wyman’s other shoulder. “Tables. Backpacks. Detonators. A kitchen towel.”
Wyman peered over at MJ. “You’re the professional here, m’dear.”
MJ took the two photos from Wyman, laid them on Tom’s desk, then rummaged through her purse but came up empty. “I guess I left my glasses back at Tom’s. Tony, can I borrow your monocle?”
Wyman dropped the gold-rimmed glass into her palm. She put the black silk ribbon around her neck, then affixed the lens in her right eye. “Whoa, this is way too strong for me.” She tried to use the monocle as a magnifying glass, but that technique didn’t work, either. A frustrated MJ handed the monocle back to Wyman. “I can’t see anything worth a damn, Tony.”
Wyman’s fingers drummed on the desktop. Then he stood up. “Aha. Follow me.”
The three of them traipsed after him, followed by the two security guards Wyman had stationed outside Tom’s door. They took the elevator down one level, then padded on an Oriental rug down an L-shaped corridor to the back of the town house and through sliding pocket doors into 4627’s research room.
In many ways the place resembled a law library: dark wood bookcases and file cabinets, and a quartet of leather club chairs, each with its own reading lamp. In one corner, MJ saw a computer whose 4627 Company screen saver bounced back and forth across the width of the flat screen. There were also a pair of long tables. On one of them sat a stack of reference books—thesauruses and dictionaries in a dozen languages. The other, which sat adjacent to a five-drawer, legal-size file cabinet of city and country maps, held 4627’s world atlases. And attached to the end of the map table was a hinged, black metal, twelve-power magnifying lamp.
Wyman laid the photos on the table, flipped the protective cover from the thick magnifying glass, turned the light on, and stepped back. “Mademoiselle, s’il vous plaît?”
Using the lamp’s handle, MJ played the eight-inch glass over the photographs, working systematically left to right and then back again. When she’d finished with the first picture, she repeated her actions with the second. The three men stood quietly, Wyman rocking back and forth on his heels, his right hand playing with the change in his trouser pocket.
Finally, MJ looked over at tony Tony. “I see anomalies in these photographs,” she said.
Wyman flashed her a wicked grin and spoke in a Long John Silver accent. “And they be what sorts of anomalies, Marilyn Jean?”
“Why would Ben Said have two containers of olive oil in what you’ve told me is a room he’s trying to keep as sterile as possible.”
Reuven Ayalon cocked his head in MJ’s direction. “Olive oil. You’re sure?”
“Either olive oil or a bulk container of imported olives.” MJ stood aside. “Take a look, Reuven.”
The Israeli played the magnifying glass over the photograph. Finally, he looked up. “She’s right—but I think it’s a barrel of olives, not the oil.” He backed away so Tom could take a peek.
Tom peered at the photo. Then he gave MJ an anxious look. When she nodded at him, he said, “Give MJ a couple of minutes to play with these. I think she can make things a lot clearer than I did.”

3:56
A
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M
. Tom waved the eight-by-ten at Tony Wyman. “She got it,” he said proudly. “She’s a genius.”
MJ blushed. “Not according to Mrs. Sin-Gin.”
Tony Wyman took the photo. “My Arabic’s rusty,” he said. “But I think it reads Boissons Maghreb Exports.” He looked at Tom. “The name sounds familiar. What’s the significance?”
“It’s an import-export company. Belongs to a Moroccan named Yahia Hamzi. He’s the third man in Shahram’s surveillance photos. Shahram described him as Ben Said’s banker.
“Dianne Lamb, our little bomber girl in Israel, met Hamzi here in Paris,” Tom said. “At a Lebanese restaurant in the seventeenth.”
“I found the place,” Reuven interrupted. “It’s called Rimal. It’s on boulevard Malesherbes.”
“Lamb was told his name was Talal Massoud,” Tom interrupted. “And that he was the editor of Al Arabia, the magazine that employed Malik Suleiman—the Tel Aviv disco bomber.”
Reuven picked up: “Hamzi’s a regular.”
Wyman cocked his head in Tom’s direction. “Does two plus two equal four here, gentlemen?”
“If you’re thinking what I am, the answer’s yes.” Tom turned to Reuven. “What do you think?”
“I agree.”
MJ gave Tom a puzzled look. “What in God’s name are you talking about?”
“That last day when I had lunch with Shahram,” Tom said. “He told me Ben Said’s new explosive was terribly difficult to make. Said it had to be cooked in small batches. Said that Ben Said used up his entire stock of the new stuff in the Gaza explosion.”
“So?”
So, one: we can extrapolate that he’s running short. Aside from what’s been rolled out and is sitting on the drying racks, I don’t see any plastique in the room—no bricks, or mounds of anything to be rolled out.” He scanned the room. “Does anybody?”
“No,” said MJ, “but I don’t know what to look for.”
“There’s nothing there,” Reuven said authoritatively.
Tony Wyman gave the Israeli a probing stare. “So everything’s on the drying racks?”
Reuven didn’t back down. “That’s what I think.”
“Next,” Tom said. “Reuven’s earlier surveillance indicated no activity on rue Lambert. That tells me Ben Said wasn’t on scene.” He looked at Tony Wyman. “But last night—there were hostiles.”
“So?”
“Indicates one of two things: either DST’s got something working or Ben Said’s getting close.” Tom put his arm around MJ’s shoulder. “Here’s my two-plus-two: you asked how Ben Said moves the explosive once it’s been fabricated. How does he get it to the safe house. Obvious answer, given the photo: the explosive gets shipped in a container of Maghreb’s imported olives. Maghreb is Yahia Hamzi’s firm. Shahram told me Hamzi was Ben Said’s banker. But was Shahram being literal or figurative? Maybe he was saying Hamzi moves stuff around for Ben Said—launders the goods, or the cash, or whatever, if you will. Okay. Now, let’s posit the explosives are fabricated in Morocco in small batches—just as Shahram said. Then they’re shipped to Paris—or wherever—in Maghreb olive containers.”
MJ played with Tom’s fingers. “Wouldn’t the oil affect the plastique?”
“Not at all,” Reuven said. “And getting rid of the oil coating would be as simple as using soap and water.”
MJ’s eyes went wide. “Holy cow.”
“Tom,” Tony Wyman said, “I think we need to speak with Mr. Hamzi about these matters.” He swiveled toward the Israeli. “In private, of course. Is there some way you might arrange that, Reuven?”
“Are there time constraints?”
“Obviously, the sooner the better. Sometime in the next twenty-four hours would be optimum.” Wyman looked at Tom. “You look dubious, Tom. Am I asking the impossible?”
“Nothing’s impossible, Tony.” Tom found it significant that Wyman had directed the initial question to Reuven. That was because Reuven had done these kinds of ops before and Tom hadn’t. Besides, Wyman had worked with Mossad in the past—when he’d targeted Abu Nidal.
Many of the CIA’s Arabists—Charlie Hoskinson was one—tended to keep the Israelis at arm’s length. They distrusted Mossad’s motives. Wyman, it was said, had liaised with Mossad off the books on some European operations during the Gates and Webster era, when Langley was institutionally opposed to any sort of risky or audacious operation.
But talk about risky. Snatching Hamzi was way beyond risky. It was dangerous. The French tended to frown on kidnapping in their capital. But there had to be a way.
Tom looked at Tony Wyman. Wyman expected results, not excuses. And he was obviously waiting for Tom to say something—Tom could almost hear the ticking of the clock in Wyman’s brain.
He let his mind go free—float with the white sound of the police scanner. Wheelbarrows, Tom. Think wheelbarrows. And then the answer came to him in a sudden epiphany—create dread. It was so simple it had to work. “We question Hamzi in Israel,” Tom exclaimed.
Tony Wyman gave him a skeptical look. “Isn’t that a bit complicated, Tom? Planes. Unwilling passengers.” He looked at Tom. “Remember when Mubarak tried to smuggle that dissident out of Frankfurt in the trunk?”
He turned to MJ as Reuven and Tom stifled guffaws. They knew the story. “Once upon a time, the Mukhabarat el-Aama—that’s Egypt’s intelligence service—kidnapped a bothersome anti-Mubarak dissident in Germany. They snatched him from Freiburg where he was teaching political science and preaching revolution. They drugged him, stuffed him in a trunk, and tried to ship him back to Cairo as diplomatic mail. Problem was, the son of a bitch woke up just as the Germans were loading the trunk on the plane. There was one hell of a diplomatic flap and the incident caused Mubarak all sorts of political embarrassment in the Western press.” Wyman looked at Tom and Reuven. “We don’t need any flaps, guys.”
“And we won’t have any because I’m not being literal,” Tom interjected. “We use the warehouse. We build a cell, a hallway, an interrogation room. We snatch Hamzi. We put him to sleep. He wakes up in a cell. He hears Hebrew being spoken outside the door. He hears other prisoners talking in Arabic. The guards—what he sees of them—are wearing Israeli uniforms. What’s he going to think? He’ll swear he’s been kidnapped by Mossad and flown to Israel.”
Tom looked at the smile spreading across Reuven’s face. “We re-create Qadima. We squeeze Hamzi. After he gives us what we want, he goes to sleep again—and badda bing, he wakes up in Paris.”
“I like it,” Wyman said. “Because if we succeed, Tel Aviv will get all the blame.” He cast a quizzical look at Reuven. “And how are you with that outcome?”
“I’m retired, remember.” Reuven shrugged. “Besides, the people at Gelilot are big boys. They’ve been blamed for a lot worse things than kidnapping.”
“Good,” Wyman said. “The question is, can we accomplish this within a workable time frame?”
“For what you want, twenty-four hours is tight. So perhaps things will take slightly longer,” Reuven said. “The construction alone will take almost a day, I think.”
Tom said, “If we keep an eye on Hamzi, we should be all right.” Reuven said: “I’d like to use one of my former networks.” “Which one?” Wyman played with his monocle.
“The Corsicans. They’re already involved—running the surveillance on rue Lambert. They’re expensive, of course. But they’re good, they’re quick—and they’re very discreet.”
“Corsicans.” Wyman’s head bobbed in agreement. “Works for me.” Tony had employed Corsicans before and they were everything Reuven said they were.
“Reuven.” Tom cocked his head in the Israeli’s direction. “Is there any chance we might snag Salah for this?”
The Israeli reacted. “Y’know,” he said, “that’s an interesting idea.” Wyman looked over at Tom. “Who’s Salah?”
“He runs the interrogation center where I interviewed Dianne Lamb.” Wyman played with the monocle’s silk ribbon. “I’m not sure I like it.” “Why?”
“I don’t like the possibility of competing agendas,” Wyman said. “Salah isn’t our unilateral or our employee. He’s liaison. That means he’ll be doing Gelilot’s work as well as ours.”
“Sometimes, Tony,” Reuven broke in, “that’s not so bad. Besides, I think in this particular case, Gelilot’s agenda and ours will run parallel—at least in the short term.” He gave the American time to think about what he’d said. “And Salah’s one of the best in the world at wringing information out of these people.”
“Can we trust him?”
“Look.” The Israeli crossed his arms. “Say you’re right. Say he’ll report to Gelilot everything he learns. Okay, sooner or later, they’ll use it—to their advantage and maybe not to ours, or to Langley’s. But Salah won’t hold back on us—and neither will Mossad.”
Wyman gave the Israeli a penetrating stare. “Why, Reuven?”
“First of all because we’re giving Mossad access to someone who might give up something useful. And second because in a sense, we’re carrying Gelilot’s water on this whole Ben Said business.”
“How so?”
“Gelilot screwed up on Ben Said. They didn’t catch the pattern. We— through Tom’s good work and Shahram’s instincts—did.”
“And?”
“And, let’s say we snag Ben Said. Do we—the 4627 Company—take the credit? Of course not. Because what is 4627? It’s a private riskassessment firm. Operationally, we don’t exist. Operationally, we are entirely in the black. So who takes credit when we succeed, eh?” The Israeli paused, then quickly answered his own question. “Nobody does—and everybody does.”
The Israeli looked around the room. “My old boss at Gelilot, Shamir, was a tough bird. A real prick—let me tell you, when the son of a bitch became prime minister, he was just as tough and unyielding. And whenever something fatal happened to one of our enemies—like the Black September murderers who planned and perpetrated the 1972 Olympics assassinations being tracked down and killed one by one, or the Fatah terrorists who bombed Israeli diplomats and then subsequently disappeared off the face of the earth—Israel, of course, would get the blame. And the government always denied, denied, denied. No comment. But Shamir always used to tell those of us who worked in the embassies, ‘Never, never, never,’ he’d insist, ‘deny the stories too loudly. Leave the sons of bitches guessing. Whether or not it was us, always leave them guessing.’ ”
The Israeli’s palms came together. “So, like I said: let’s say we snag Ben Said. Make him disappear. The putzes who write for The Guardian and The Independent will scream accusations at Mossad. And Mossad? Mossad won’t deny it too loudly. The left-wing American press and the left-wing French press, they’ll accuse CIA. And guess what: CIA won’t deny it too loudly, either. Why? Because CIA is in such bad shape that any suggestion at all that Langley might have pulled off a successful operation against a bin Laden–level terrorist will make the seventh floor happy.”
Reuven looked at Tony Wyman. “So, I say we bring Salah on, and we do what we do, and who says what afterward, or what their long-term agendas might be, none of that matters. Not one bit.”
Tom said, “I think Reuven’s right, Tony.”
Wyman said, “I’m inclined to agree.” He rapped the table and nodded. “Do it.”
“Done.” Tom started to leave, then turned back toward his boss. “Tony, can you set MJ up in a secure place for a couple of days?”
“Good point.” Wyman smiled at MJ. “I’ll put you at the Sofitel Faubourg, mademoiselle. That’s where I’m staying. The room service is good, and because it’s on the same block as the American embassy, there are hundreds of SWAT cops around to make sure no one from the banlieues gets anywhere close.”
MJ frowned. “What am I—under some kind of house arrest?”
Tom took her by the shoulders. “These people play rough. I think you should lay low—at least for a couple of days.”
“I think you just want me out of the way while you guys play cops and robbers.” She looked at him critically. “And where will you be staying?”
“Staying?” Tom gave her a reassuring smile, trying to hide the fact that she’d hit the nail on the head. Tom did want her out of the way in case events turned sour. He fell back on tradecraft: charm, deflect, redirect. “Sweetheart, I don’t think I’m going to be getting much rest in the next forty-eight hours.”