The Assassin (9 page)

From across the crowded asphalt road, Erich Kohl watched as the young man finished his tea and left the coffee shop, walking north on Souq Khan al-Harir. Kohl returned the copper pot he’d been examining to a disappointed shopkeeper and followed at a leisurely pace, the cuffs of his loose cotton pants gathering fine dust from the street. It wasn’t difficult to trail the other man. Rashid al-Umari, he thought, still had a lot to learn about his new profession.

Kohl had arrived in the city two days earlier and had immediately taken up watch outside al-Umari’s small room south of the Citadel. It was countersurveillance, really; he knew exactly where the Iraqi was supposed to be, for he had been the one to formulate the travel plans, and the young man was not imaginative enough to deviate from his instructions. At least, that was what Kohl had thought until earlier in the afternoon, when al-Umari had walked out after three days in seclusion, blinking his eyes like an animal emerging from a long hibernation, and had set out to explore the city.

At the time, he’d been angered by the Iraqi’s inability to follow simple instructions. In retrospect, though, he could see that this was a positive turn of events. There were too many places around the hotel where security officers loyal to the West might have burrowed in. Had that been the case, even Kohl’s practiced eyes might not have been enough to pick them out of the crowd. With Rashid on the move, a watcher was forced to risk exposing himself, which put him at a distinct disadvantage. Fortunately, it did not appear to be a concern in this case; Kohl had been trailing the Iraqi for several hours now, and nothing seemed out of the ordinary.

On reaching the intersection, al-Umari turned right on Sharia al-Jamaa al-Umawi, passing the north entrance to the Great Mosque a moment later. Devout Muslims carrying their prayer rugs were already congregating on the hard-packed dirt of the parking area, smoking and engaging in idle conversation. As al-Umari made his way through the small crowd, Kohl dropped back, preparing to break contact. The younger man was clearly heading back to the Citadel, but…

Something was wrong. Kohl slowed his stride and tried to take in the larger scene. The crowd was building by the minute. The muezzins started up far overhead — not the muffled recordings found in so many Middle Eastern cities, but individual singers perched high in the minarets, the stone towers attached to the mosques. The day’s fourth call to prayer rippled over the city as the first singers were joined by hundreds more. With the mournful tones came the expected response; the crowd in the street continued to swell. His eyes passed over the scene: the wood-shuttered windows climbing above the pavement, the sand-stripped cars lining the curb, the faces sweeping past in the road. He was rifling his memory, searching for something,
someone
he had seen before. Nothing jumped out, but then he saw a dark head turning, tracking. He followed the gaze to al-Umari, who was just passing out of view, having found a shortcut through an alley framed by buildings of red stone. The man’s feet followed the gaze, stepping into the street, pushing through the throngs. There was something wrong with this dark, unlined face, Kohl thought. It was the face of a boy not yet twenty, too young for intelligence work. But those eyes were so intent, so
focused.
…

Kohl considered quickly. There was nothing professional in the man’s movements, though that could be intentional; he had seen it done before. One watcher was given away to draw a response, to distract the target, but he didn’t think that was the case here. Syria’s internal security apparatus was an ever-shifting maze of poorly funded agencies with overlapping missions. The internal squabbles prevented any one organization from becoming too powerful, and none had the ability to develop competent field men. It was, Kohl suspected, the way Assad wanted things; by limiting his subordinates’ power, he robbed them of the authority they would need to displace him.

But there was something more. Through Kohl, al-Umari was tied in with the highest ranks of the Syrian government, and what he was prepared to fund would be greatly profitable to many people. These people, the parties of interest, would gain nothing by killing him.

Unless, of course, they were trying to cover their tracks, but it was too soon for that. They didn’t have the money yet, and besides, Kohl had been running countersurveillance for two days, during which time nothing had piqued his interest. Which left just one alternative: a simple robbery, the worst kind of luck.

The boy was across the street now, 10 meters in front of him, stepping into the alley. Even at this sharp angle, Kohl could see that the space between the buildings was too dark and narrow to attract a shopkeeper’s stand. Having lost sight of both men, he cursed under his breath and picked up the pace, brushing past a small group of bearded students before making the sharp right turn.

“Got something,” Peterson announced.

Naomi glanced up from the folder she’d been reading. “What’s that?”

“Nineteen-point match, ninety-five probability. It’s your guy, Kharmai.”

Naomi sat up in her chair abruptly. The file she’d been looking at slipped off her lap and scattered over the floor, but she was oblivious. “No way it’s a mistake?”

“Not unless you forgot to tell me something else,” was Peterson’s sardonic reply. “This one matches all over the board. There’s just one problem.”

The younger woman groaned. “Please tell me you have the clearance….”

“It’s not that. The background file was purged from the system.”

“What?” Naomi shook her head in confusion. “That doesn’t make any sense. Why would you still have the voiceprint if the record was deleted?”

“It happens more than you’d think,” Peterson confessed. “Remember, we intercept thousands of signals every week. We have a full-time staff whose only job is to compare the flagged intercepts with the records on file, but sometimes they make mistakes. It could be a clerical error. On the other hand, this record might have been deleted on purpose. If a known subject dies of causes natural or otherwise, the record is manually removed to save space in the servers, leaving only a couple of key identifiers, such as race, nationality, and languages. We don’t usually bother with the voiceprints, because they’re so small by comparison.”

“So you’re saying this guy is dead?”

“It’s a possibility. I hate to let you down, but that’s the truth.”

Naomi sighed heavily. “I can’t believe this,” she said. “That recording was made less than three months ago.”

Liz Peterson looked at her sharply. “How do you know that?”

“Because al-Umari — the known voice on the tape, I mean — wasn’t… around when we found it.” Kharmai silently chastened herself for nearly slipping up there; Peterson couldn’t know where the tape was found. “There’s no way he could have recorded it sooner, Liz.”

Peterson thought about that for a second, then reached for the phone and punched in a number. Lifting the receiver to her ear, she turned to the younger woman and said, “You’re right; none of this makes sense. We add new files to the database all the time, but extraneous files are only removed twice a year, and the last update was four months ago. If you’re right about when this tape was made, he should still be in the system.”

“So who are you calling?”

“The records section. We might have a hard copy, but they’ll have to dig for it. I hope you have some time on your hands.”

The alley was draped in shadow. Beneath his feet, damp stones worn slick by centuries of use. The smell of rotting fish rose to greet him as he moved past metal cans overflowing with garbage, past the rectangular black holes in the walls that passed for doorways. Somewhere, he heard running water. Up ahead, Kohl could see a hunched, fast-moving figure and, beyond, the familiar, rail-thin frame of Rashid al-Umari.

From there, things happened fast. Too fast. Kohl heard a voice, followed by a question — not nervous, exactly. The forced pleasantries of a man caught outside familiar terrain. A man who knows, too late, that he’s in the wrong place. A guttural command, harsh words scraping the dirty walls, and then a panicked shout. A struggle up ahead, feet sliding on dark stone. Kohl closing quickly now, reaching out as a knife came up for the first time.

Al-Umari had hesitated, just for a moment, on entering the alley. Seeing the dark and the solitude, his inner caution had nearly won out, but he’d pushed forward, tired from the long walk, eager to save time. The regret came a few steps later, when he heard ungainly feet on the path to his rear. In this narrow space, Al-Umari was keenly aware of his slight stature and his privileged childhood. His hatred for the West was born of circumstance, backed up only by his native intelligence. It was his nature to develop, to fund, but never to execute. For this reason, he could not summon up the necessary indignation, which might have saved him when the hand came down on his arm.

He pulled away slightly, but it wasn’t enough. He heard a harsh demand for money. Rashid al-Umari had a glimpse of dark eyes on the verge of panic. He felt a sudden surge of pride… Perhaps he could win this one. Before he could assert himself, though, a knife came out of nowhere. The right arm swinging around, the blade glinting in bright orange light…

The hand holding the knife was suddenly seized from behind, then snapped back at a strange angle. Rashid could only watch in disbelief as his assailant cried out in agony. In the confusion, he had not seen anyone approach. The knife clattered into the shadows, the boy’s right leg buckling forward. He hit the ground hard, but still conscious, fighting for breath, groaning in pain.

Al-Umari took a few uncertain steps back, staring at the man who had come to his aid. In all his years he had never seen such speed of movement. There had been no hesitation… He was a student of science. His belief lay in consideration before action; it was the foundation on which he had built himself. Violence attached to such utter conviction was alien to him.

That he was prepared to do much worse — and on an infinitely larger scale — was, for the moment, lost on Rashid al-Umari.

The shock, still with its hold on his senses, delayed the connection. It took him a few seconds to reconcile the face he knew with the one he now saw, as the German’s appearance had changed considerably. Hair that had once been reddish brown was now black and trimmed short, and watery blue eyes had given way to a dark shade of brown.

“What are you doing here?” Rashid demanded. “We’re not scheduled to meet for another two days.”

Kohl did not reply. Instead, he knelt by the wounded man and rapidly checked his pockets. Coming up with a thin leather billfold, he flipped it open and went through the contents: a frayed bus ticket, a few pounds in worn notes, and an expired identification card. This last item gave him a small measure of comfort. A trained intelligence officer might carry a forged card, but never an expired ID; it was the sort of thing to guarantee unwanted attention at a border checkpoint.

Rashid’s assailant was starting to come around. He was still facedown, his left arm tucked under his body, his good hand clutching the fractured bones of his right wrist. Satisfied, Kohl placed his left knee in the small of the man’s back. The weight brought another small groan, but the struggling ceased.

Kohl turned his attention to Rashid. The Iraqi was still talking, the words coming fast, his fear made plain in his pointed questions.

“What are you going to do? He’s probably linked to Iraqi intelligence.”

“He asked you for money.”

“Yes,” Rashid sputtered, “but they would have paid him to make it look like a robbery. They are not stupid, you know, and they still report to the Americans—”

“Go back to the hotel.” Kohl spoke quietly, in fluid Arabic. “Stay in the streets on your way back, and don’t go anywhere until I come for you. We have to move. I’ll make the necessary calls.”

Rashid nodded numbly. He tried to say something else but stopped and turned instead, walking fast to the end of the alley. He did not look back.

Once al-Umari was out of sight, Kohl turned his attention to the young man he had all but crippled. The boy was still writhing beneath his knee. A few distinct words came through on occasion, the surprisingly quiet, arrhythmic sounds of unbearable pain.

Al-Umari, as naïve as he was, had brought up a good point. The corruption born under the former regime was still rife in the region, and the CIA, after all but developing the Iraqi National Intelligence Service themselves, had resorted to recruiting men who had not been polluted by the old guard. For the most part, they were amateurs — too young to be truly effective. It was entirely possible, though unlikely, that this man was an Iraqi spy, but it didn’t really matter; he had seen al-Umari’s face. That was all the justification Kohl needed.

He fired a backward glance down the length of the alley. Seeing that he was alone, he slid his knee up between the man’s shoulder blades. The shift in weight brought another muffled cry, but Kohl ignored the noise as he reached down and grabbed a handful of greasy hair with his left hand. Lifting up, he slid his right arm under the boy’s head, tensed, then pulled back sharply.

He regretted the action a split second later, when the young man’s vertebral column snapped in two places simultaneously. The sound was like a shot ringing off the damp stone walls. Aware of the uneasy silence that followed, Kohl paused only to pocket the boy’s money and ID before tossing the billfold into the shadows. Seconds later he was back in the street, where the crowd took him in as one of their own. A startled cry rose up from behind, the body discovered too soon, but Erich Kohl was already gone.

The background file was hand-delivered less than ten minutes after Peterson placed the telephone call. As the other woman signed for the numbered folder, Naomi wondered at the speed with which the document had been produced. For a file that had been supposedly misplaced, it had reappeared rather quickly, and she couldn’t help but think that it had been readily available all along.