Grains of Truth (37 page)

Security would be on full alert at the border of Taba. The nagging worry buzzing around in Benjamin’s head concerned security along the Israeli-Jordanian border. Jordan was known to have the tightest, most excellent intelligence service in the region. In spite of this, not long ago, terrorists had managed to accomplish three simultaneous bombings at top hotels in the Jordanian capital of Amman. Thousands of Jordanians protested against the Mujahideen for the indiscriminate murder of innocent—and mostly Muslim—citizens. 

What worried Benjamin was the possibility of the chemical weapons being smuggled from Egypt into Jordan. From there it would be much easier to cross the border into Israel, into the vastness of the Negev Desert. It might be a longshot, but it was the kind of audacious plan that would appeal to these bastards. Not only would they accomplish their loathsome objective, they would also implicate Jordan in the act, thereby placing the Jordanian King in an impossibly compromising position.

Benjamin never underestimated this enemy.

Oh, no. The men who devised these heinous attacks displayed intelligence, meticulousness and—above all—patience. A plot of this magnitude must have been in the planning for years. They would have been careful to have men ensconced in strategic positions all along the way, establishing a network of formidable proportions and means.

His mission was to discover and infiltrate that network. He and his carefully chosen team had only a few days—at best—to accomplish this daunting task. 

One of the taxis, carrying Benjamin and two of his men, pulled up in front of a second-class hotel on a back street near the port. He paid the driver, took rooms, and waited for the others to arrive.

“We will spread out in teams of two. First, check out the usual channels. Use extreme caution in this. We must not raise any speculation. Look for anything out of the ordinary. It is doubtful that this route will turn up a lead of significance, but we must first make the effort. After that, we go undercover.”

Each man knew what that meant. 

Twelve hours later, the news was disheartening but pretty much what they’d expected. Now they would have to go underground, again in teams of two. Benjamin surveyed the five attentive faces crowded into the shoddy room.

“Ibrahim, you go with David, Ezer with Aharon. Joshoa, you will come with me.” The youngest and least experienced of them all, Joshoa tried not to show the pride he felt at being chosen to accompany his commander. His minimal experience in the field was exactly why Benjamin chose him. Joshoa was a good man but perhaps a bit brash. Should there be any action, the leader felt compelled to have him under his close supervision.

Over the next arduous twenty-four hours, what little they turned up brought only discouragement, although a tense air seemed to permeate the usual deviant haunts. But Benjamin knew, from past experience, that could be their imagination. The one solid piece of information unearthed was particularly disturbing.

A well-known Jordanian terrorist had recently resurfaced. Faoud Arabiyat had been a leader in Hamas and active in the Palestinian conflict. The last Israeli Intelligence knew of him, he was arrested and jailed in Egypt for attempting to smuggle guns into Gaza. That was over seven years ago. Those years spent in the unmitigated hell of an Egyptian prison appeared to have done little to curtail his appetite for violence. After his release, rumor had it, he hooked up with the Mujahideen in Jordan and was, several times since, seen in Aqaba.

The hair on the back of Benjamin’s neck again prickled as he stared down at his square, sun-browned hands. He looked at the watch on his wrist. His parents had given it to him on his twenty-first birthday. To Benjamin, it was a symbol of love and honor. It represented all that he strove to defend and protect—and it gave him strength. The glowing dial now read six minutes past midnight. 

“All right. We will take four hours’ sleep. Ibrahim and David, you will stay here and see what else you can turn up. The rest of us will rent a car and drive to Aqaba. 

The ill-fated childhood friendship that ended so painfully left Benjamin with a valuable legacy: He spoke fluent Arabic with a convincing Palestinian dialect. The other three men in the car spoke Arabic as well, in varying degrees of proficiency.

Due to the relatively friendly relations between the two countries, the Israelis had no difficulty crossing the border. Once in Jordan, they stopped to make slight alterations to their appearances. Although the changes were subtle, the four Israelis could easily have been completely different men.

As dawn broke over the mosaic of rooftops, they split up to spend the day scouring cafés, coffee shops and mosques in search of anything that might bring them closer to the men they sought. As nightfall drew near, Benjamin met with success.

His Palestinian accent enabled him to get friendly with a couple of fiery youths with ties to Gaza, both seething for retribution. In the course of a long, tedious tirade on the evils of the Western Infidels and the need to eliminate their Israeli enemies, the fervent young men could not contain their excitement for the “next big plan.” They knew of Arabiyat: that he had met here with others. Though no specific details were revealed—Benjamin seriously doubted that any of them, in truth, knew any details—not-so-well-veiled hints were scattered like crumbs of bread.

The breadcrumb trail led to Nuweiba.

Chapter 44

“Slow down!” shouted Linda over the Jeep’s roaring engine. She pointed up ahead to a darkened vehicle parked by the side of the road. Mariette nodded and pulled over, still a considerable distance away. 

She reached for a pair of binoculars. “Oui, it is the same.”

The others came up behind as Linda jumped out. Mariette followed her to the passenger front seat window of the van. Those inside leaned forward towards Linda as she said, “It’s them. What’s the plan?”

The archeologist took the lead. “Linda, we will drive ahead and ask if they need assistance. Everyone else should remain here. I am a friendly face and yours they will not know.” She turned to Alex in the back seat. “Monsieur, you must give me a gun.”

He found the request unexpected—but not all that surprising. Clearly Linda would have told their new French confederate something of what was going on. And he’d already handed over the Beretta to the female agent. Brad Caldwell had managed to smuggle his own weapon through security in Aswan. That feat of secret service professionalism impressed Alex more than anything about the man he’d learned thus far. 

He glanced at Brad, who shook his head in disapproval while throwing up his hands in consent. Alex pulled the Mauser from inside his jacket and passed it through the window. 

“Don’t show it unless you have to. Wait for Linda’s lead,” ordered Brad. “If you’re still there in five minutes, we’re coming in.”

“Je comprends.” Mariette shoved the gun in her jacket pocket and without further discussion headed back to the Jeep.

Linda stood speechless, with raised eyebrows directed at her boss. Brad shook his head again and rolled his eyes then gestured her on. “Play it by ear.”

He ran a hand over his disheveled hair. Great. A shoot-out in the Sinai involving terrorists and civilians. Bob Bronson’ll love it.

The sound of the Jeep grinding into gear set everyone’s teeth on edge. A full moon allowed them a good view of what went on up ahead.

As Mariette approached the immobile van, both women tensed. She drove slowly past and pulled up in front. “I didn’t see anyone, did you?” asked Linda in a low voice, looking back in the side mirror.

“Non, but we will see.” With a last glance in the rearview mirror, she stepped down as she called out, “Hallo? Sharif, is that you? Do you need assistance?” 

No answer. Only silence in the desert wind.

Linda kept her eyes anxiously fixed on the side mirror and removed the safety on the Beretta as Mariette approached the van. After circling it and peering in all the windows, she turned to survey the surrounding landscape. Nothing. In all directions—nothing but mountains, shadows and sand. She raised a hand to wave for Linda to join her and reached with the other for her phone.

~

“They can’t have just disappeared,” groused Mohamed. 

Henry saw Alex’s eyes narrow and answered Mohamed’s unhelpful comment quickly before the other man could say something they all might regret. “No, of course not. There are several possibilities. A passing driver might have picked them up. They could have been met by a confederate with another car. Or…”

“Or,” interrupted Sarah in a voice filled with wonder, “they could’ve been carried away by the Bedouin.”

“Oh, for Christ’s sake,” began Brad irritably. Then his tone changed to one of incredulity as he repeated with far less vehemence, “Oh. For Christ’s sake.”

They all turned to look in the direction of his stupefied gaze. A caravan of camels approached beneath the blue moon. The band of Bedouin, only a few hundred yards away, seemed to have magically appeared from the desert sands.

“This thing just keeps getting better and better,” murmured Linda, shaking her head.

Mohamed and Mariette strode toward the caravan and approached the lead beast. Its rider, a man of indeterminate age, bared blackened teeth as he inquired in broken English, “You want camels? We have good camels. Good price.”

Mariette held her tongue as the camel-seller answered Mohamed’s sharp inquiries about who might have occupied the abandoned van.

None of the others spoke as they watched Mohamed stomp back across the rocky sand, trailed closely by the pensive French archeologist.

“Their van broke down,” Mariette said unnecessarily. “There are still only three of them. One of the Bedouin took them by camel to an oasis not too far from here, called Wadi Ghazala. We can reach it much faster by automobile.”

Alex looked down at the scuffed toes of his shoes without comment. She was still alive. And they were closing in.

A brief exchange resulted in unanimous agreement of the foregone conclusion: Accomplices must be meeting the kidnappers at the oasis with another vehicle. Catching up with them on the camel track was out of the question; but beating them to the oasis presented a distinct possibility. Naturally, the Bedouin didn’t know the exact time the others had set out through the mountains, but it couldn’t have been too long ago.

They might be able to get to the oasis first, if they drove like hell.

No one articulated the depressing thought that occurred to them all: If someone was bringing Julia’s captors another vehicle, it no doubt meant reinforcements as well.    

~

The chilling fury on Ahmed’s face when the engine started to choke again shocked Julia, filling her with dread. When his phone rang she thought at first the call might assuage his anger; but then his voice rose and he shouted profanity in several languages. She shrank back into the seat, trying to disappear. 

Ahmed slammed the phone down on the dashboard, visibly shaking in an attempt to control his wrath. “That French bitch! She called the police. Praise Allah that the message was intercepted before any harm was done.”

Even so, they needed to lose this piece of crap and get the other vehicle as soon as possible. Who knew what the Infidel whore might do next? Faoud was right—they should have killed her.

Faoud always wanted to kill people. Ahmed had gotten into the habit of automatically saying no. Next time, he would give the suggestion more consideration.

  Had it not been for the almost miraculous appearance of the Bedouin, offering their camels for hire, things might have turned very ugly. The one thing the helpful purveyor of transport failed to mention to either the kidnap party or the rescue party was how ill-advised it would be to attempt the trek in the dark. Even with the light of the moon, it was treacherous terrain.

Julia spent several long, frigid hours huddled in one of the Bedouin tents alongside the three men. She shivered as the icy air seeped into every crevice of her aching body, alongside the fear. Ahmed sat upright, with eyes closed and ears alert. Faoud slept the deep sleep of a man without a conscience.

~

Mariette and Linda at the same time saw headlights appear over a distant hill, coming from the opposite direction. The Jeep slowed and they watched as another car followed the first down the hill.

“The turn off to the oasis is not far ahead,” shouted Mariette. She stopped by the side of the road and kept the engine running.

It was a good thing they drove without headlights and even better that they waited, because the two cars ahead slowed and made the turn onto the road to Wadi Ghazala. By this time, the van had pulled up behind the Jeep. Both front doors swung open and Brad and Alex jumped out. The others followed suit as Linda and Mariette joined them.

“Did you see the headlights?” asked Linda. Seven heads nodded yes.

“This oasis is not large. The arrival of these cars at this time of night is, ah, a bit unusual.” The French woman pursed her lips before adding, “Nothing happens in a place like this without being observed. It would, I think, be a mistake for any of us to drive in there now.”

Dawn was but a few hours away. After their now-routine debate, they agreed that as soon as there was enough light, a scout team including Alex, Mohamed, Brad and Mariette would take the Jeep as far as they could without being seen or heard from the oasis. After parking it well off the road, they would climb the hill on the western side, where, Mariette assured them, they would have a full view of the small community.