Countdown in Cairo (30 page)

He opened the tube and pressed several crystals into it. Then he found a Q-tip and pressed the crystals down into the paste. He worked the crystal into the paste so that it would dissolve. He closed the tube again, careful not to allow any sign of tampering. He smiled. If this stuff was as mean as he understood it to be, a simple ingestion of the toxic substance would lead to an agonizing death within a few days. It would start with head pain and stomach discomfort and quickly deteriorate from there.

Inch’allah
. As God willed it, he told himself.

Hamzah stepped back, breathing heavily within his mask, while Mamdouth continued to watch the door in the living room. The worst thing that could happen would be if the Canadian woman came home early.

There! Done!

“Mamdouth!” he called.

His associate quickly came back into the room. They lifted the mattress back into place and settled it on top of the bed. It settled on perfectly straight, just the way old Mellilah had left it.

They packed up the thermoslike canister and put it back in the suitcase. They clamped the suitcase shut. They walked quickly to the next room and pulled off their masks and gloves.

Mamdouth opened the door a sliver. He looked out and then ducked back quickly. He recognized a nasty-looking figure in khaki.

It was Colonel Amjad, strolling up and down the hall, looking at doors.

Mamdouth indicated to Hamzah that they should wait. They did, Mamdouth’s hand remaining on the doorknob.

Then the colonel was gone. Mamdouth poked his head fully into the hall. No one. Perfect. They stashed their garments and stepped out. They pulled the door shut. It clicked and locked behind them.

They went down the back stairs wearing their hotel uniforms. The Metropole was a big hotel, and security was nowhere as good as Western guests thought it was. Plus, they had bribed the rear guard, who was a brother in Islam.

They were out the gate within two minutes. This was even easier than planting a car bomb. They were away in a waiting car in four minutes.

It was neater than a car bomb too. The poison wasn’t messy for anyone unless you were the victim who slept on it or someone who had inadvertently been exposed to it for several hours. If that was the case, it would be living hell and a horrible death.

THIRTY-NINE

Voltaire led Alex to the next room, which was a smoky sitting area—a shabby chamber with peeling paint, a pair of rundown sofas, some extra tables and chairs. There, a group of three men sat around a small table, on the sofa and on a cushion on the floor. They wore Western shirts and pants and white Arab headgear. They turned toward Voltaire when they saw him, and their faces illuminated in smiles. One man was cleanly shaven, two had bushy first-growth beards. Their gaze jumped quickly from Voltaire to Alex, and all three faces broke with even broader smiles and greetings in Arabic.

They stood. They liked Voltaire, whoever they thought he was, and they liked the idea of a female guest. Voltaire introduced her as a family friend who was visiting Egypt and the Holy Land on holiday.

They switched into English. The men around the table could not have been politer. Alex already knew that men in Cairo tended to be very polite, unless they were trying to assault or kill you.

Getting a further grip on where she was, Alex realized that they were in a small café and storefront that was part of someone’s home, a common setup in Cairo, much as it is in Central and South America. The front of the place opened onto the street, and there were four other tables, though all of them were empty. The small group that she and Voltaire had joined were the only customers. It was just past midnight now. Abdul, who had led them there, seemed to have disappeared. Alex didn’t question his absence.

A waiter appeared. Voltaire ordered in Arabic before Alex could speak. The waiter addressed him as “Monsieur Lamara.” Two more teas arrived. And then, before she could object, a hookah.

She looked at him in astonishment.

“When in Cairo, do what the locals do,” Voltaire said with a wink.

A single hookah with a double hose sat before them. It was a giant water pipe, decorated in gold and blue, that stood about three feet off the ground. The waiter gave Voltaire and Alex fresh plastic mouthpieces. Alex looked at the substance being packed into the bowl of the pipe.

“What’s in this?” Alex asked.

“Not what you think,” Voltaire said. “Maybe not even what you’re hoping for.”

“Can you be more specific?”

“Ever smoked one of these?”

“No.”

“Well, you’re about to, my Canadian friend,” he said. “I ordered something called
ma’sal
. It’s special hookah tobacco.
Ma’sal
is tobacco with honey and other sweeteners added.” He paused and seemed to be enjoying this. “You know what the original Voltaire once wrote? ‘Once a philosopher, twice a pervert.’ ”

The Egyptian men watched her with smiles and amusement. In turn, she watched as the waiter packed a damp sticky brown substance into the bowl.

“I don’t smoke,” she said.

“Tonight you do,” he said.

“Unhealthy,” she said.

“So is our line of work,” he countered. “So don’t insult my friends.”

“I want to see you smoke it first,” she said.

“Oh. With pleasure.”

There was a small amount of a special charcoal in the bowl, burning black and red. Voltaire nurtured the flame and drew in a breath. The smoke filtered and cooled through the water. The conversation around the table resumed as Voltaire held the smoke in his mouth and exhaled. The aroma that drifted toward Alex was more suggestive of a fruity pipe tobacco than anything else.

Deftly, Voltaire steered the conversation to politics and to the new American president, who was a great improvement on the world stage the men at the table agreed. But then Voltaire inched the conversation a few years farther back, to the previous administration and the attacks on New York and Washington in September of 2001. Around the table, it was common currency that Osama bin Laden and Al-Qaeda were not responsible for the attacks of September 11, 2001. The United States and Israel, according to the general opinion put forth, had to have been involved in the planning and execution of the attacks.

“I don’t believe what the American government says,” one man at the table said. “They don’t tell the truth, the Americans. The United States did 9/11 to itself with its own airplanes so that they could invade Iraq for the oil.”

There were nods all around. Voltaire gave Alex a conspiratorial glance. He picked up the second hose and handed it to Alex. With some reservation, she put it to her lips.

“Don’t inhale into your lungs,” Voltaire said, softly and outside the conversation around the table. “Just hold it in your mouth, get the flavor and the relaxation. Then exhale slowly.”

“Like Bill Clinton?” she asked.

Voltaire laughed.

“The attacks were part of a conspiracy against Muslims,” said another man, who turned to Alex, hoping for agreement. “I do not believe that a group of Arabs could have waged such a successful operation against a superpower like the United States. We are not smart enough. We are not powerful enough.”

“But the hijackers were Saudis,” Voltaire reminded them.

“Ah, but look at Washington’s post-9/11 foreign policy!” the first man countered quickly. “It proved that the United States and Israel were behind the attacks, especially with the invasion of Iraq.”

There were nods all around. Alex drew some soft, sweet smoke into her mouth. She was convinced that she was going to cough, but didn’t. There was a further glimmer of amusement in Voltaire’s eyes and a sparkle in the eyes of some of the other men.

There was also a sparkle in the
ma’sal
concoction. It was infused with honey, possibly with a hint of raspberry also. Alex exhaled the smoke in a long, steady stream. She felt like the smart-ass self-satisfied caterpillar in
Alice in Wonderland
. Oh, if her friends back home could see her now, she thought.

One of the men couldn’t take his eyes off her. When his gaze caught hers, he motioned to her headscarf. “Are you a follower of Islam?” he asked.

“No, I’m not,” she said.

“Then …?”

Thinking quickly. “I am a guest in your country,” she said. “So I wear this out of respect for your customs.”

Good answer, she thought to herself.

“That is gracious of you,” he said. There were nods all around. She was okay, they decided. She took a second draw on the hookah pipe and blew out the smoke gently and soothingly. Nothing extraordinary happened. She took another drag and didn’t mind it at all.

Voltaire gave her a wink. Tonight, she was one of the boys.

“Maybe people who executed the operation were Arabs,” said a third, younger man, joining in politely. “But it had to have been organized by other people. The Israelis, the Americans,” he said. “The Mossad. The CIA. Zionist businessmen.”

“Jews did not go to work at the World Trade Center on that day,” the first man insisted, finding a further thread of agreement.

“Yes. Why is it that on 9/11, the Jews did not go to work in the building?” said the second man. “Everybody knows this. I saw it on TV. Everyone discusses this. It is evidence of Zionist involvement.”

Alex drew and exhaled a fourth drag from the hookah. Then, provoked by what she was hearing, she joined in the conversation.

“Much of what you’re saying is preposterous,” Alex said. “Even if it were true, which it is
not
, how could Jewish workers have kept it a secret from coworkers?”

Momentarily, the men were taken aback, not used to a strong, articulate opinion from a female.

“Jews do things like that,” the second man was quick to say. His tone suggested that he was willing to explain the world to a female who didn’t understand as well as he did. “They are loyal only to other Jews and their financial interests.”

“And to Israel!” said the younger man. “American Jews will do anything to protect Israel!”

Alex felt herself losing her patience very quickly. The monstrosity of all this from apparently otherwise rational people left her momentarily speechless. But the fuse of indignation was burning down.

“I don’t agree with you,” she said.

“That’s because in America where you are from, the government controls the press.”

“I’m from Canada,” she said.

“Canada is part of the United States,” said the younger Arab.

“The Canadian government controls the press too,” said the first man.

Emboldened, she was about to respond with a barnyard epithet, something not far from
bolshoi
. But Voltaire, highly amused, picked up on the feeling. He tapped her hand quickly, a reminder to stay under control. He had brought her there to listen and to observe, after all, not to make sparks fly.

“What is important is that this was an attack against the world of Arabs,” the third man said. “Why is it that the Americans never caught him, Bin Laden, if they say he was responsible?”

“How can they not know where he is?” muttered another man.

“Because he launched the attacks and then disappeared,” Alex said. “That or he’s dead.”
And burning in hell
, she might have added, but didn’t.

Her audience was having none of it. With no malice whatsoever, they ignored her.

Voltaire gave her hand another tap and threw a sharp frown at her. She knew he was reminding her to stay cool.

“Americans know everything,” the man who was speaking maintained, dismissing Alex. “They didn’t catch him because he hasn’t done anything. What happened in Iraq confirms this. The Americans attacked against Arabs and against Islam. They did it to serve Israel.”

“How true it is!” Voltaire said. “Zionist conspirators, all of them.” He turned to Alex and guided the conversation. “
Comment va ta fumée?
” he asked. “How’s your smoke?”

“Better than I thought it would be,” she answered in French, “unless you’re talking about the smoke coming out of my ears.”

“Better smoke coming out of your ears than intemperate remarks coming out of your mouth,” he said succinctly. “No point offending my friends when there’s no chance to change their minds now, is there?”

Alex retreated into another drag from the hookah.

“The problem is that Americans are brainwashed by their leaders,” the first man said. “It makes no sense that Mr. Bin Laden could have carried out such an attack from Afghanistan.”

“There are a lot of Arabs who hate America, but this is too much,” the younger man said. He was more passionate than the older men. “And look at what happened after the September eleventh attacks! The Americans invaded two Muslim countries! They used 9/11 as an excuse to invade Afghanistan. Then they went to Iraq. They killed Saddam, they killed his sons. They killed tens of thousands of civilians and claimed they were ‘liberating’ them. They tortured ordinary Arabs in their prisons. They sent hostages to Cuba. How can you trust the Americans?”

“You can’t!” Voltaire said sharply. “Never! Filthy infidels!”

Alex felt like launching into them. But she retreated again into the smoke from the hookah and eased back. Voltaire was right and she was learning from him. She wasn’t going to change their minds, and they weren’t going to change hers.

She finished her drink.

She thought of many things to say and silently swallowed every one of them. Within minutes, the fuel in the hookah had burned down and the conversation had drifted to soccer and Egypt’s chances against Cameroon in the upcoming World Cup.

Her temper was easing down too.

“Do you know anything about sports?” one of the Arabs asked her.

“I know that Egypt’s national footballers are the best in Africa,” she said generously, playing her audience. Football here, of course, meant soccer. The men cheered and applauded. Alex had ended the conversation on an up note and had made friends. She didn’t chip in her further opinion that the glorious giants of world soccer—Brazil, Italy, Spain, and Argentina—would, if given the chance, annihilate the hapless Egyptians.