‘I see,’ said the deputy director of Consular Operations. ‘What kind of shape are you in?’
The visitor shook his head in exasperation. ‘I smoke an occasional cigar or a cigarette after a meal, Doctor, and I drink moderately. I do not, however, lift weights or run in marathons. However, again, I do ride Class Five white water and backpack in the mountains whenever I can. I also think this is a bunch of bullshit.’
‘Think what you like, Mr. Kendrick, but we’re pressed for time. Simple, direct questions can help us assess a person just as accurately as a convoluted psychiatric report from one of our clinics in Virginia.’
‘Blame that on the psychiatrists.’
‘Tell me about it,’ said Swann, with a hostile chuckle.
‘No, you tell me,’ countered the visitor. ‘Your show-and-tell games are over. Do I go or don’t I, and if not, why not?’
Swann looked up. ‘You go, Congressman. Not because you’re an ideal choice but because I don’t have a choice. I’ll try anything, including an arrogant son of a bitch which, under that cool exterior, I think you probably are.’
‘You’re probably right,’ said Kendrick. ‘Can you give me briefing papers on whatever you’ve got?’
‘They’ll be delivered to the plane before takeoff at Andrews Air Force Base. But they can’t leave that plane, Congressman, and you can’t make any notes. Someone will be watching you.’
‘Understood.’
‘Are you sure? We’ll give you whatever deep cover help we can under severe restrictions, but you’re a private citizen acting on your own, your political position notwithstanding. In short words, if you’re taken by hostile elements, we don’t know you. We can’t help you then. We won’t risk the lives of two hundred and thirty-six hostages. Is that understood?’
‘Yes, it is, because it’s directly in line with what I made clear when I walked in here. I want a written guarantee of anonymity. I was never here. I never saw you, and I never talked to you. Send a memo up to the Secretary of State. Say you had a phone call from a political ally of mine in Colorado mentioning my name and telling you that with my background you should get in touch with me. You rejected the approach, believing it was just another politician trying to make mileage out of the State Department—that shouldn’t be difficult for you.’ Kendrick pulled out a notepad from his jacket pocket and reached over, picking up Swann’s pencil. ‘Here’s the address of my attorney in Washington. Have a copy delivered to him by messenger before I get on the plane at Andrews. When he tells me it’s there, I’ll get on board.’
‘Our mutual objective here is so clear and so clean I should be congratulating myself,’ said Swann. ‘So why don’t I? Why do I keep thinking there’s something you’re not telling me?’
‘Because you’re suspicious by nature and profession. You wouldn’t be in that chair if you weren’t.’
‘This secrecy you’re so insistent on—’
‘Apparently so are you,’ Kendrick broke in.
‘I’ve given you my reason. There are two hundred and thirty-six people out there. We’re not about to give anyone an excuse to pull a trigger. You, on the other hand, if you don’t get killed, have a lot to gain. What’s your reason for this secrecy?’
‘Not much different from yours,’ said the visitor. ‘I made a great many friends throughout the whole area. I’ve kept up with a lot of them; we correspond; they visit me frequently—our associations are no secret. If my name surfaced, some zealots might consider jaremat thadr.’
‘Penalty for friendship,’ translated Swann.
‘The climate’s right for it,’ added Kendrick.
‘I suppose that’s good enough,’ said the deputy director without much conviction. ‘When do you want to leave?’
‘As soon as possible. There’s nothing to straighten out here. I’ll grab a cab, go home, and change clothes—’
‘No cabs, Congressman. From here on until you get to Masqat you’re listed as a government liaison under an available cover and flying military transport. You’re under wraps.’ Swann reached for his phone. ‘You’ll be escorted down to the ramp where an unmarked car will drive you home and then on to Andrews. For the next twelve hours you’re government property, and you’ll do what we tell you to do.’
Evan Kendrick sat in the back seat of the unmarked State Department car staring out of the window at the lush foliage along the Potomac. Soon the driver would veer to the left and enter a long wooded corridor of Virginia greenery five minutes from his house. His isolated house, he reflected, his very lonely house, despite a live-in couple who were old friends and the discreet, though not excessive, procession of graceful women who shared his bed, also friends.
Four years and nothing permanent. Permanency for him was half a world away where nothing was permanent but the constant necessity of moving from one job to the next, finding the best quarters available for everyone, and making sure that tutors were available for his partners’ children—children he wished at times were his; specific children, of course. But for him there had never been time for marriage and children; ideas were his wives, projects his offspring. Perhaps this was why he had been the leader; he had no domestic distractions. The women he made love to were mostly driven like himself. Again, like himself, they sought the temporary exhilaration, even the comfort, of brief affairs, but the operative word was ‘temporary’. And then in those wonderful years there was the excitement and the laughter, the hours of fear and the moments of elation when a project’s results exceeded their expectations. They were building an empire—a small one, to be sure—but it would grow, and in time, as Weingrass insisted, the children of the Kendrick Group would go to the best schools in Switzerland, only a few hours away by air. ‘They’ll become a boardroom of international mensch!’ Manny had roared. ‘All that fine education and all those languages. We’re rearing the greatest collection of statesmen and stateswomen since Disraeli and Golda!’
‘Uncle Manny, can we go fishing?’ a young spokesman would invariably implore, wide-eyed conspirators behind him.
‘Of course, David—such a glorious name. The river is only a few kilometers away. We’ll all catch whales, I promise you!’
‘Manny, please.’ One of the mothers would invariably object. ‘Their homework.’
‘That work is for home—study your syntax. Whales are in the river!’
All that was permanence for Evan Kendrick. And suddenly it had all been shattered, a thousand broken mirrors in the sunlight, each fragment of bloody glass reflecting an image of lovely reality and wondrous expectations. All the mirrors had turned black, no reflections anywhere. Death.
‘Don’t do it!’ screamed Emmanuel Weingrass. ‘I feel the pain as much as you. But don’t you see, it’s what they want you to do, expect you to do! Don’t give them—don’t give him—that gratification! Fight them, fight him! I will fight with you. Show me your posture, boy!’
‘For whom, Manny? Against whom?’
‘You know as well as I do! We’re only the first; others will follow. Other “accidents”, loved ones killed, projects abandoned. You will allow that?’
‘I simply don’t care.’
‘So you let him win?’
‘Who?’
‘The Mahdi!’
‘A drunken rumour, nothing more.’
‘He did it! He killed them! I know it!’
‘There’s nothing here for me, old friend, and I can’t chase shadows. There’s no fun any longer. Forget it, Manny, I’ll make you rich.’
‘I don’t want your coward money!’
‘You won’t take it?’
‘Of course I’ll take it. I simply don’t love you any more.’
Then four years of anxiety, futility and boredom, wondering when the warm wind of love or the cold wind of hate would blow across the smouldering coals inside him. He had told himself over and over again that when the fires suddenly erupted, for whatever reason, the time would be right and he would be ready. He was ready now and no one could stop him. Hate.
The Mahdi.
You took the lives of my closest friends as surely as if you had installed that conduit yourself. I had to identify so many bodies; the broken, twisted, bleeding bodies of the people who meant so much to me. The hatred remains, and it’s deep and cold and won’t go away and let me live my life until you’re dead. I have to go back and pick up the pieces, be my own self again and finish what all of us were building together. Manny was right. I ran away, forgiving myself because of the pain, forgetting the dreams we had. I’ll go back and finish now. I’m coming after you, Mahdi, whoever you are, wherever you are. And no one will know I was there.
‘Sir? Sir, we’re here.’
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘This is your house,’ said the marine driver. ‘I guess you were catching a nap, but we have a schedule to keep.’