37
A
liyah’s mind was a chaos of urgent questions as she walked robotically alongside Dr. Hassan through the streets of Bakaa.
How soon would the airport reopen? Could she arrange another flight home? If so, how could she get away from the doctor? Even if she could, would she be too late? What day was the senator’s funeral, and at what time? How far along was the tunnel, and had Abbas yet reached the point of no return—not just in his digging, but in his spiral down a sinkhole of vengeance?
The only images strong enough to penetrate this emotional tangle were unwelcome—flash visions of Nabil’s face as he receded into the mob, echoes of his daughter’s sharp cries of sorrow. Every time she recalled little Jena sprawled against her on the floor she had trouble swallowing. Jena had reminded her a little of Shereen, her poor lost daughter.
“Please, come inside my office where you can rest.”
It was the doctor’s voice. Or Dr. Hassan, as she now knew he was called. His name was on the door, and as soon as she saw it she remembered Nabil using the name when they had run into the American at the field office.
“Dr. Hassan is expecting us,” Nabil had said, seizing upon it as an excuse to depart. Now it all made a certain sense, especially if the doctor had been in position to betray Nabil to the authorities.
And where did that betrayal leave her? she wondered. Perhaps she was also vulnerable, especially if her name had been put on some list as a result of her dealings here. She might be marooned here indefinitely, unable to return to America. And if Abbas succeeded, then that would close the door forever. She would spend a lifetime on the run in the Middle East, month upon month in teeming places like Bakaa, sleeping beneath sheet-metal rooftops and owing her freedom to the likes of Dr. Hassan.
Enough of this self-pity. She would turn her energies to the task of getting home as soon as possible.
“You will have tea?” Dr. Hassan asked.
He had opened the door onto a gloomy office where all the curtains were drawn. At least here the electricity was working, although all the light seemed to be soaked up by dark paneling and a large brown couch. It must be the waiting room.
“My receptionist has gone for the day, but I will be happy to make you a cup.”
“Yes, that would be fine.”
“Milk and sugar?”
“Just sugar, please.”
“Take a seat in my office. Right through that door. And please, do not even think about leaving. You are now under my protection, and will remain so. I suppose I should be angry with you for nearly getting away from me, but seeing as how things seem to have turned out for the best…”
He smiled with a slight shrug, very satisfied with himself, and then stepped into the other room to make tea. She collapsed on a chair by his desk. It must be where his patients sat. She looked at the anatomical charts and file drawers. There was a stethoscope on his desk. She shuddered to think of him pressing it coldly against her skin, then she sat up straighter as he entered with a tea tray. A sprig of fresh mint poked from each steaming china cup.
“We will be happy to provide shelter for you, of course, after your husband has brought his plans to fruition. There are many places where we can keep you out of harm’s way.”
She didn’t like where this was going.
“What do you mean?”
“Well, you can’t very well go back now, can you? And unfortunately there may be people here who will want to talk to you about tonight’s events.”
“But I had nothing to do with anything that happened tonight.”
“Of course you didn’t. But certain people you have been seen with are now under suspicion, justifiably or not. The authorities will cast a very wide net, I’m afraid. Without our assistance, you might fall into it.”
“It’s only because of your ‘assistance’ that I’m vulnerable at all.”
He spread his hands and tilted his head, a smug gesture suggesting he was conceding the point. That was the closest he ever came to admitting a mistake, she imagined. It was the arrogance of the lifegiving. The same arrogance, she supposed, that had made Abbas decide that he, too, could be the arbiter of the fate of hundreds, drawing on his balance of human capital as if it were a personal savings account.
Or maybe, between his grief, his medication, and his misguided zeal for vengeance, Abbas had simply lost sight of what was moral. She might never find out for sure unless she got home in time to stop him.
Dr. Hassan was still prattling away, gloating about his little victory over Nabil in whatever silly dispute had existed between them. Then he moved on to a more sensitive topic.
“You must be so proud of your husband,” he said, eyes glittering. She detected no hint of sarcasm. He must have convinced himself that she, too, was committed to the cause even if wary of the means.
“Yes,” she said, playing along. “I am.” She set aside the teacup. The doctor had added far too much sugar. “But I haven’t been able to speak with him, of course, due to our precautions. We agreed before I left that it would be too risky to communicate by phone, or even by e-mail.”
“Very wise of you.”
“It has been a sacrifice, but it is the only way.”
“Of course.”
The pompous fool.
A sudden bumping noise from another room startled her, and she wondered if his receptionist had returned. Dr. Hassan looked up with a questioning frown.
“Are you sure we’re alone?” she asked.
“Quite alone. I regret to say that what you just heard was probably a mouse.”
He lowered his head in a gesture of humility, which, as far as Aliyah could tell, was entirely for show.
“They are quite a problem, you know. Yet another threat to the health of the people here.”
“All the better, then, that people like you are here to serve them.”
“I thank you.”
“So tell me where things stand, then, with Abbas and our plans. What have you heard?”
He proceeded to offer the latest news in loving and probably embellished detail. Then he went over the proposed timetable. Aliyah listened closely for any sign of weakness or opportunity, and for the first time all day she perceived the faintest glimmer of hope.
38
I
headed straight for Dr. Hassan’s in hopes of taking him by surprise. Sneaking up was probably the only suitable way of confronting a slippery character like him.
I had a nagging sense that the doctor possessed information truly worth ferreting out. My original job of keeping tabs on Omar, so important only twenty-four hours ago, had uncovered nothing more consequential than a cell of archaeological zealots, worshippers of yet another deity in a region rife with them. But someone as prideful about his accomplishments as Dr. Hassan might be prodded to offer a genuine revelation, or at least something worth passing along to Carl Cummings on my way out of the country.
That is, if I ever made it out of the country. The radio said that the border had been sealed, meaning that the airport was closed. Even if it reopened tomorrow, there were now plenty of people who might want to keep me here, to keep an eye on me. I hoped Mila had an easier time getting free and clear. If she made her flight as planned, then she would soon be safely high above the Atlantic. Tonight’s upheaval in Jordan might even work to her advantage, by distracting an organization like the Mossad long enough to let her slip away unnoticed.
The streets of Bakaa were still seething with emotion. All the women and children seemed to be indoors, and every man who passed wore an intense, purposeful expression, as if he had been jarred out of bed by an earthquake. The police were in evidence everywhere. A few blocks from the doctor’s office I witnessed an arrest that gave me a hint of what Nabil must have just gone through. A blue van pulled up at an unmarked door, and five officers carrying truncheons and riot shields barged inside while another five waited outside with automatic weapons locked and loaded. The first bunch emerged with three young men in tow, all with their hands bound behind them. A crowd formed quickly, shouting and tossing stones. A curfew was supposed to be in effect across the country, but out here it hadn’t taken hold, and the police were too busy rounding up suspects to care.
A day earlier you might have found sympathy, even support, for the arrested men, just as you would have found plenty of people eager to give lip service to the exploits of Zarqawi in Iraq—he was a Jordanian, after all—or bin Laden in Pakistan. I couldn’t help but recall Rafi Tuqan’s comment about how there was a little Osama in the heart of every Arab. For tonight at least, those little Osamas were being evicted all across Jordan.
I reached the doctor’s office and checked in the back for his car. It was still there. I went around to the front, where I considered knocking. Then I dismissed the idea and tried the knob. It wasn’t locked, so I slipped inside and latched it gently behind me. The reception area was empty. I was about to call out the doctor’s name as stridently as possible, hoping for the shock value of an intruder. If he objected, then I would wave the gun in his face. Give him a well-deserved scare. Then I heard muffled voices from the rear, and I held my tongue. It was a man and a woman, but I couldn’t make out the words.
I ducked under the reception counter and entered a treatment room behind it. It was dark, but the voices were louder. I groped my way around a table toward a door on the left, which, if I remembered correctly, led to the doctor’s private office. The top half of the door was smoked glass, so I approached with care, not wanting to cast a shadow. And it was a good thing I was moving slowly, because I nearly tripped on a footstool. I had to grab the back of a chair for support, and it made far too much noise.
The voices stopped. Blood rushed to my fingertips as I waited to be discovered. What the hell would I say if he caught me sneaking around like a thief? Fortunately I never had to answer that question, because they resumed their conversation. Then I heard a skittering noise in the corner and realized it was probably a mouse, some country cousin of the one at my place.
I crept as close as I could to the doorway and paused to listen. It was indeed a man and a woman, both speaking Arabic. The woman had an American accent. It was Aliyah Rahim, the surgeon’s wife, still visiting. Good thing for her that none of the bombs had been at the InterContinental.
As my eyes adjusted to the dark I noticed a framed portrait of the king watching me from across the room. I was spying on one of his subjects, but he smiled anyway. The doctor spoke. He seemed to be talking about funeral arrangements, yet his tone was upbeat, even cheerful, and for a moment I assumed he was gloating about Nabil. Maybe the poor fellow had been beaten to death.
Then Dr. Hassan mentioned Washington, and although I couldn’t be positive I thought he also made a reference to the Secret Service. In Arabic the translation was imprecise, but it certainly made my ears perk up.
When Aliyah Rahim spoke, the words were clearer, even if the tone was altogether more somber.
“So the president won’t be there?”
The doctor’s answer was indistinct. A few moments later he said something about a tunnel. Phrases came and went, with too many blanks in between to make total sense of the conversation. By the end I had heard several more references to a funeral, and, incongruously, to a pizzeria. From the general sense of things, this pizza joint seemed to belong to Aliyah’s husband, Abbas. But that made little sense if he was a surgeon. Maybe I misheard. Or maybe there was a different Abbas Rahim, married to a different Aliyah. Or, for all I knew, Dr. Hassan and she were merely discussing plans for a late dinner.
The thought made me hungry. I hadn’t eaten since breakfast, unless you counted the sweet, milky tea Mahmoud served on the Eighth Circle. So, of course, I was suddenly and absurdly ravenous. Enough of this sneaking around. Why not just burst through the door to confront the doctor then and there? I would demand an immediate accounting of his role in Nabil’s demise.
A single word from Dr. Hassan stopped me: “explosives.”
He said it clearly, and a few seconds later he said it again. Shortly afterward he repeated the word “tunnel.” It convinced me to remain in hiding. I was even a little frightened now, and for the first time I noticed the deepening chill of the darkened room.
The next noise I heard was the scraping of chairs as they stood. They exited toward the waiting room, so I eased back across the floor, where I heard the main door of the clinic open. They must have paused on the threshold, because Dr. Hassan’s next words were clearly audible. This time I was able to make out an entire sentence, even though it made little sense.
“I like the idea of your husband, down in his pizza parlor, ready to serve, but with a new kind of delivery,” the doctor said. Then he laughed lightly, and somewhat pridefully, as if he had just made a bon mot over cocktails. “It will be grand and glorious, and for me the day cannot come soon enough.”
Maybe it was the shock of hearing this that made me cough. Or maybe I had dropped my guard because they were already outside. Whatever the reason, a sudden tickle in my throat burst into a gasping hack.
“Who’s there?” Dr. Hassan shouted. “Who is it?”
By the time I heard him throw back the door I was thumbing a lock on the knob of the door to the treatment room, and then running for the rear window. I heard the door behind me rattle violently as the doctor shouted again and I fumbled with the window latch.
“Who is it? The drugs are locked in a safe! I am calling the police!”
I heard him detouring through his own office to get to my room’s other entrance, but by then I was vaulting across the windowsill and landing on the packed dirt of a dark alley. I scrambled blindly toward a side street, and the last thing I heard as I rounded the corner was a fearful shout from the open window.
“Stop! I have called the police!”
But the police, of course, had far more to do tonight than respond to a mere break-in, so there was little worry of being apprehended. What did concern me was the sudden sound of footsteps, from just around the corner. They couldn’t have been the doctor’s—his shout had been too distant—but clearly someone else was running just as fast as I was. I redoubled my effort and sprinted off into the night.
I was exhausted by the time I reached my car, and I knew there would soon be other worries to contend with. Would I be able to make it back to Jebel Amman the same way I had come? Once I reached the main highway I decided to tell the checkpoints that I had been out at Jerash, a popular tourist site to the north, and had been delayed in returning by the uproar over the bombings. I was also in violation of the curfew. But, for a change, having an American passport was likely to be a help rather than a hindrance. Playing the bumbling tourist should help get me back to my house.
I moved with urgency, and not just for my own safety. Whatever Dr. Hassan and Aliyah Rahim had been talking about, it certainly seemed worth reporting, especially given the references to explosives and to Washington. I was assuming the worst possible interpretation, of course, but I supposed that’s what a fellow like Carl Cummings would have wanted me to do.
Who knew, maybe now I might even begin to balance the scales a bit. First thing in the morning, I would report for duty at the embassy. Then, having fulfilled that obligation, I would give everyone the slip to join Mila in Massachusetts.
The sooner the better. Today’s events had made it all too clear that I was playing among people and forces well out of my league.