The Exile (20 page)

“I'm sure they must have been few and far between.”

Kealey glanced up at Harper without comment, returned his attention to the snapshot. “He hasn't changed much in fourteen years,” he said. “At least not noticeably. There are no gray hairs, no new wrinkles, not even a couple of extra pounds.” He sat lost in thought for a moment, then shook his head and looked up. “What's Cullen White doing in Khartoum?”

“We don't know yet,” Harper said. “But we have some ideas, thanks to our man in Khartoum. His name's Seth Holland….”

Harper explained how Holland had talked the detachment commander into turning over the MSG's security footage, despite the ambassador's orders to the contrary. He explained how Holland and White had worked together briefly back in ‘95. The event that brought them together was the interrogation of a Serb general captured in Srebrenica in the closing months of the Bosnian War. Given the fourteen-year gap and White's minor role in the interrogation, it wasn't surprising that Holland hadn't been able to put a name to the face. But that didn't matter, as White was quickly identified when the recordings were sent via an encrypted link to Langley. A twenty-year veteran of the Operations Directorate picked him out just by looking at a still image from the embassy's cameras, and the Agency's bio-metric identifiers proved the officer right. The only thing they hadn't been able to figure out was why White had met with Walter Reynolds in the first place.

“Why can't you just ask him?” Kealey asked when Harper was done explaining it. “Call Reynolds up and ask him. See what he says. He's a diplomat…. The worst thing he'll do is tell you to go fuck yourself. Even if that happens, you'll be no worse off then you are right now.”

“We can't ask him for the same reason we can't go to Fitzgerald,” Harper pointed out. “Anything I say to them is bound to find its way to the president, and he clearly doesn't want us involved in this. We have to tread carefully if we're going to get any answer…. I can't risk having him shut me down completely.”

Kealey thought about that for a second. “Do you think White is still in Sudan?”

“I don't know.” Harper could see where Kealey was going with this. “It's anyone's guess. Holland has only four case officers under his command, and he hasn't been there long enough to cultivate any real assets. So he's limited in what he can do. He's had a few locals watching the embassy since we identified White, but he has yet to make a reappearance. However, another man
has
showed up on several occasions, and thanks again to our friends at MI Five, we've managed to put a name to the face.”

The deputy director opened the last folder and withdrew a grainy 8 x 10, explaining its significance as Kealey examined the photograph. “His name is Ishmael Mirghani. He's forty-six years old, a Sudanese national and a graduate of Assiut University in Egypt, where he received a degree in electrical engineering. That was over a decade ago. We don't have any record on him prior to that year, but we have plenty since.”

“A late bloomer,” Kealey observed.

“Maybe, but he bloomed nonetheless,” Harper said. He paused as their waitress left a fresh drink in front of him, smiled at her, and reached for it. “How much do you know about the predominant rebel groups in Sudan?”

“Not much.”

“That's what I thought,” Harper said and brought his glass to his lips. He was disappointed, but he wasn't surprised. Kealey had operated in Africa only once before and never in Sudan. He had no reason to know about the country's politics. “For the time being all you need to know is that the two most prominent ones are the Sudanese Liberation Army and the Justice and Equality Movement, otherwise known as the JEM. Both have been thorns in Bashir's side—enough so that Bashir was forced to cut a deal with them. He later reneged on the agreement, but they're still a factor. Especially now. We've seen a lot of increased rebel activity since the attack on Camp Hadith, particularly in the south, and there has been a series of mass demonstrations against Bashir's regime in the larger cities, including Khartoum. Holland has been sending me detailed reports on all of it, and frankly, I'm just as concerned as he is.”

Kealey made a winding gesture. “And Mirghani fits in exactly how…?”

“He was a senior figure in the SLA until recently. A field commander at the very least.”

“He isn't with the group any longer?”

Harper shook his head. “We believe he may have left and founded his own offshoot,” he said. “The Darfur People's Army.”

“Original.” Kealey chuckled a little.

“What can I tell you?” Harper said. “Anyway, so far Mirghani's managed to stay off the regime's radar. And ours, for the most part. We don't know why he left the SLA. Nor do we know whether he's still connected to the group, or gone completely off on his own toot, or formed affiliations with other rebel factions…the JEM being a possibility. Either way, it makes me think something's brewing in the hinterlands.”

Kealey nodded thoughtfully and said nothing.

A long moment passed. Sipping his drink, Harper rode out the silence. The escalating situation in Sudan—particularly in Darfur—had been all over the news for the past several weeks, and he supposed he'd understated just how serious it was. To put it bluntly, the country was on the verge of a full-blown revolution.

“So what was Mirghani doing at the embassy?”

“We don't know. All we know for sure is that he met with Reynolds on three separate occasions, and each time he left with the MSG's security footage. According to Holland, Reynolds ordered the detachment commander to turn over the disks, just like he did with White. We have no idea what they've been talking about, but we're ninety percent sure Mirghani is working with White. Or for him, maybe.”

“I assume you've tried following him.”

Harper nodded. “We've tried, sure. But the man knows what to look for. He's different from most of the rebels in that respect. Whoever trained him did a damn good job…. We haven't been able to track him. He shakes the surveillance every time.” A shrug. “I suppose it doesn't help that we're using locals and not trained officers. The problem is that Mirghani would spot our men in a matter of minutes, and we can't risk losing him altogether.”

“Fair enough. But how is Mirghani tied in with White?”

“We don't know that, either,” Harper admitted. “What we do know is that Mirghani can be directly linked to Simon Nusairi. They're cousins. First cousins, related by blood. I guess family makes the world go round.”

“And here I thought it was money.”

Harper shrugged. “In this case the two are inseparable.”

Kealey showed the faintest grin. Watching him, Harper almost could have imagined this was another time and place. Say, five years ago at the Dubliner Pub in D.C. Kealey had liked the amber draught ale and hot corned beef sandwiches. He'd usually gone for Guinness and the shepherd's pie.

Harper reached for his whiskey and drank in silence.

“Okay,” Kealey said after a while. His thin smile was gone. “So what do we have here? One month ago five million dollars disappears from a secret DOD slush fund. Soon thereafter it lands with Nusairi, a Sudanese national living in France. Nusairi is wholly opposed to Bashir's regime, just like his cousin, who is almost certainly working with Cullen White, a disgraced former CIA officer. It seems pretty clear that the money was meant for White to disperse all along.”

Harper nodded. “That would be my guess as well,” he said.

“But what's he using it for?”

“That's another question we can't answer right now,” Harper said. “But the recent upheaval can't be a coincidence. The demonstrations, the increased rebel activity in the south…I just don't buy the timing. Nor do I believe a word of that meeting I had to sit through in April. Stralen is up to something, and he's managed to pull the president into it. Fitzgerald and Thayer are involved, too, and they're doing their best to shut the Agency out. I want to know what's happening, Ryan. So does the director, and that's why I'm here. We want you to talk to Nusairi. We need you to figure out what's going on in Sudan.”

“Now there's a surprise.” Kealey pushed the photograph of Mirghani back across the table. “And what exactly do you want from me? Am I supposed to talk to Nusairi, or would you like me to the find the man who killed Lily Durant? Because last time I checked, we don't have any idea who did it, and Bashir certainly isn't about to hand him over, assuming he even knows who's responsible.”

“We're hoping Nusairi might be able to shed some light on that.”

Kealey shook his head in disbelief. “That's a stretch, John. I can't believe you don't realize it. There's nothing to indicate that Nusairi is linked to the men who raided the camp. If your theory is right, and Nusairi is opposed to Bashir's regime, we're looking at the exact opposite scenario. If he knew who did it, he would have already made it public.”

Harper straightened in his seat. “Maybe you're right, Ryan,” he said. “But I haven't told you it's going to be easy. Nusairi is our starting point, and we have no choice but to see where he takes us. Right now he's all we have.”

“He's all
you
have,” Kealey corrected. His eyes locked with Harper's. “I'm sorry. But I want no part of this.”

He started to slide out of the booth, and Harper knew it was time to bring out his hole card.
Okay, Allison, here we go into the proverbial breach. For the sake of everyone involved, I hope it's worth bulldozing through all those lines of ethicality you talked about.

“How do you put relative value on good people's lives, Ryan?” he said. “I'm just wondering.”

Kealey paused, staring at him. “What are you talking about?”

Harper put his hands out in front of him, palms up in the air, as if they were two sides of a scale. “Here's Lily Durant,” he said, motioning with his right hand. “And here's Naomi Kharmai.” He moved his left hand. “I'm just trying to understand the way you measure one against the other…and then decide the president's niece had less intrinsic worth. Or was what you did for Naomi more about purging your own conscience?”

Kealey had frozen across the table, his eyes still boring into Harper. They were suddenly hard as stone. “You miserable son of a bitch.”

Harper remained very erect. He turned his hands over, set them down flat on the tabletop. “We've been working with the Feebs to find Javier Machado and other members of his network. It would help us get to the bottom of some lingering questions about Brynn Fitzgerald's abduction. And Naomi's death. But they're gone, poof, like ghosts after the midnight bells have rung. No one knows what happened to them…which you might agree is probably for the best overall.”

“Is this a threat, John? Because you don't scare me.”

“In all the years we've known each other, I've never for a second believed anything scares you, Ryan.” He didn't blink. “Except maybe failing at what it is you do best.”

“What kind of ambiguous horseshit is that?”

Harper shrugged. “I was actually trying to be tactful—serves me right for overrating my people skills,” he said. “But to answer your first question…I consider you a friend, and there's no threat, implicit or explicit, in anything I've said. But I am making an appeal.”

“To what? Some kind of guilt complex you've decided I'm carrying in my brain?”

Yes,
Harper thought.

“No,” he said. “Your sense of justice.”

Kealey's lips peeled back in a humorless grin. It was almost a rictus. “Now there's a platform for your high and righteous sermon.
Justice.
For Lily Durant, I assume. But how does she figure into this? I mean really figure in. Because as far as I can tell, it's got nothing to do with finding the people who killed her and everything to do with settling some kind of interagency feud.”

“You're dead wrong,” Harper said with an adamant shake of his head. “In fact, we—that is, the director and I—agree that finding the man who pulled the trigger in West Darfur might be the only thing that can bring this all to a halt. Everything Stralen has done so far has been because of what happened to Durant.”

“Except it doesn't seem Stralen has done anything without the president's approval.”

“Come on, Ryan. You're acting like you haven't heard a word out of my mouth. If Lily Durant hadn't been the president's niece, or if they hadn't been as close as they were, maybe Stralen wouldn't have been able to talk him into it…whatever the hell ‘it' may be. But she
was
his niece, and they
were
close, and he's been making political decisions based on misplaced emotion.”

Kealey shook his head. “I've got news for you, John. Lily Durant can't be brought back to life. No matter what the hell we do.”

We.
Harper filled his lungs with air, exhaled slowly through his mouth. There you had it—the word he'd wanted to hear. Allison had more than earned her chit.

“No,” he said. “She can't. But if you can find the man who killed her, we can take the emotional element out of it. Perhaps then he'll be more likely to listen to reason.”

Kealey gave him a long look, settling back into the booth. “And justice will have been served. Is that right?”

Harper's smile was tinged with sadness.

“As much as it can be,” he said.

T
he Beechcraft A36 Bonanza wasn't much of a plane, even by North Africa's lax aeronautical standards. Certainly, it would never have passed an FAA inspection. The exterior was painted eggshell white with a brown stripe running the length of the fuselage, a dated color scheme betraying the aircraft's twenty-nine years of service. Fresh paint on the port wing hinted at recent damage to the wing's leading edge, a defect that would have grounded any pilot with an ounce of concern for the lives of his passengers. But for all its faults, the single-prop plane was ideal for the ninety-minute flight from Khartoum to Nyala Airport. They were now less than twenty minutes out, having departed the Sudanese capital just after eight that evening, and both passengers were eager to get on the ground, though only one showed any sign of his inner turmoil. Ismael Mirghani was sweating profusely, despite the frigid air inside the cabin, and his hands were in constant motion, searching for some way to fill the time.

The second passenger was oblivious to Mirghani's fidgeting. His interest was fixed on the reading material he'd picked up at Khartoum International.
Al-Rayaam
was by far the largest and oldest newspaper in Sudan. It could trace its roots back to the 1940s, but as he read through the headlines, Cullen White was disappointed to see that its reputation for honest, straightforward reporting was completely undeserved. As far as he could tell,
Al-Rayaam
was nothing but another mouthpiece for the Sudanese president. The paper neglected to mention the demonstrations that had taken place the day before in Zalingei, Tulus, and Al-Fashir. Even the massive protest in Khartoum—a demonstration that had cost White more than three hundred thousand dollars in bribes and “donations” to organize—had been largely ignored.

That in particular bothered him more than he cared to admit.

The article he was looking for was buried in the back of the political section, a bad sign right from the start. Anything that showed Bashir in a positive light would have appeared on the front page, but the fact that they'd printed the story at all meant they had skewed the facts to their liking. When White finally managed to find the passage, he read through it quickly:

White lowered the paper and shook his head in disgust. He had watched the demonstration gather outside the palace from the safety of a nearby rooftop and had seen what had actually transpired. Needless to say, it was nothing like what the paper reported. More than 4,000 people had been in attendance that day, and they had not run at the first sign of trouble, holding their ground against the rapid response of the state police and the brutal tactics they'd employed to put down the revolt. By the time the crowd eventually broke up, White had lost track of how many ambulances had come and gone. And though he didn't have access to any hard numbers, he guessed that at least 100 protesters had been taken into custody before the square was finally cleared of people. The brutal efficiency of the state police made him grateful he had not tried to recruit their deputy commander, an act that would have surely resulted in his immediate arrest.

It was disheartening to see that his work was being so thoroughly dismissed by Sudan's major news agencies, but with just five weeks in-country, he was already making some serious inroads, and he knew it was just a matter of time before the truth came out. To a certain extent, the regime could control what was printed, but many of Sudan's most popular publications had flourished regardless, including the
Tribune
and the
Mirror,
two of the more successful independents. It was no coincidence that the former was based in Paris and the latter in Kenya. For Sudanese nationals, freedom of the press was something that could be found only online or outside the country, but it
could
be found. Sudan was not immune to external influence.

White couldn't help but smile at the thought; he was proving as much with each passing day.

It had been ten days since he'd visited Walter Reynolds at the embassy in Khartoum, and he'd accomplished a great deal in the interim. He'd met quietly with public figures in and around Khartoum and the capital cities of the three federal states in Darfur: Al-Fashir, Al-Geneina, and Nyala, his current destination. Prior to the meeting with the ambassador, he'd spent several days in Juba, the regional capital of Southern Sudan, where he'd worked with the local SLA commander to stage a large demonstration in Buluk Square. That event had cost the U.S. taxpayers a hundred thousand dollars, but it had been a major success. A huge mass of people had shown up to protest the government's nationwide expulsion of aid workers from the International Red Cross, the World Health Organization, and UNICEF, the United Nations Children's Fund. Most of those workers had been based in the south, where they had been in the midst of a campaign to eradicate the polio virus, which had popped up six months earlier, after seven years in remission. More than 400 children had been infected in Juba alone, and with the aid workers out of the picture, it seemed likely the virus would continue to spread. The epidemic had almost been enough to incite a revolt on its own, and with the support of the SLA, which carried a great deal of sway in the area, White had convinced the locals to stand together for much less than he'd initially anticipated. Most of the funds he'd dispersed in Juba had gone to families affected by the polio outbreak, and that was money he didn't mind spending.

He put the paper aside and stared out the window, letting his mind drift. Technically, there was nothing surprising about the way things had progressed. He was, after all, adhering to the timeline they'd developed during those endless meetings at State, but he'd never really expected things to go according to plan. Even before his plane touched down in Khartoum, he'd come to terms with the fact that something would happen to throw him off track. Something to delay his forward progress. But much to his surprise it had never happened, and now he was about to finalize the arrangements they had made back in April. The importance of the meeting he was about to attend could not be overstated. As it stood, the work he'd accomplished over the past five weeks could all be undone with a single call, but that was about to change. The window for retreat was rapidly closing, and in less than two hours there would be no turning back.

White smiled to himself as he gazed into the pitch-black night. Everything was coming together as planned, and he had accomplished most of it all by himself, circumventing Bashir's regime at every turn. As Harold Traylor, he had entered Sudan on a false passport without incident, a remarkable feat given the countrywide security clampdown that was put into effect after the massacre at Camp Hadith. As James Landis, he had bought politicians, recruited senior rebel leaders with the SLA and the JEM, and engineered mass demonstrations in five major cities in the largest country in North Africa. As Cullen White…

The smile faded, and he saw his reflection change in the port-side window. As Cullen White, he had made mistakes. That was the cold, hard truth, and though he had tried to run from his past, he had never been able to leave it behind. Over the years he had tried to console himself with the fact that he had been young, that there was no way he could have seen what was coming. But he had never really been able to convince himself. Nor had he been able to convince his immediate supervisors. As far as they were concerned, his age was no excuse for what he had done, or rather, for what he had failed to prevent, and they had reacted accordingly. He'd been with the Operations Directorate for less than a year when Jonathan Harper, the DDO at the time, had brought him back to Langley to ask for his resignation in person. That was in '96, a few months after the incident that marked the end of his career with the Central Intelligence Agency.

The ensuing years had seen him drift from one meaningless government job to the next. After his embarrassing departure from the DO, he was shuttled over to State, where he worked as a passport specialist at the Washington Passport Agency, a consular officer in Gabon, and a cultural attaché in Dubai. Those were just a few of the figurehead titles they had seen fit to saddle him with. Middle-management roles in thankless posts, the career path to nowhere—to becoming another Reynolds. White knew they would have loved to cut him loose completely, but it was a risk they couldn't afford to take.

He never asked why they had kept him close, mainly because he didn't need to. Despite his short-lived association with the Agency, he had seen and heard a great deal—much more than he should have, given his age and rank. It would be just as dangerous for them as it would be for him if the truth came out. But they had learned from their earlier mistakes. He was never again placed in a position of authority or given any real responsibility. Nor was there any chance of his security clearance being reinstated, and while his promotions arrived on schedule, his workload did not reflect his seniority. Nor did his staff. In his thirteen years with the State Department, he had never had more than three people working under him. At least to his way of thinking, that spoke volumes about the contempt his superiors felt for him.

At first, he had tried to make the best of it. He had sought in vain for some way to redeem himself, but nothing he did seemed to make a difference. As the years rolled past, his bitterness had gradually seeped to the surface. Much of his rage was focused on the people who'd sold him down the river, his former employers at Langley—and for good reason. After all, there was no question that they were the ones at fault.

He'd been twenty-three at the time, just six months out of the Career Training Program at Camp Peary.
Twenty-three years old.
Even now White had to shake his head at the sheer stupidity of it. There was no way he should have been given the responsibility they'd thrust upon him. But they'd done it regardless, and in retrospect, it was easy to see what a bad decision that had been. Even he could admit as much, though it pained him to do so….

Catching himself, he grimaced and shifted his eyes away from the window. He did not want to dwell on the past. It had no bearing on what he was doing now, and besides, he was not the same man he had been back then. He had been immature and ill equipped for the work he was tasked with, but those days were over. Ironically, his work with the State Department—which was meant to be more of a punishment than anything else—had provided him with many of the skills he'd lacked as a young operations officer with the CIA.

The three years he'd spent in Jordan had given him rudimentary Arabic, which he later improved on, and an endless stream of embassy functions in half a dozen countries throughout Africa and the Middle East had taught him about the dark side of diplomacy. He'd learned how to spot the intelligence officers posing as minor functionaries, and an interview with a stunning female reporter from
Khoa Ditore
—a supposedly independent newspaper in Kosovo—had shown him just how far the host government was sometimes willing to go to recruit a source, even someone as lowly placed as himself. He could still picture the reporter's silky black hair, blood-red lips and full, perfectly formed breasts. He remembered the way she had leaned forward to give him a glimpse of her cleavage, the smell of her perfume as she whispered her proposition an inch from his ear.

White had possessed photographic recall since he was a child, and even now, eight years later, the memory was still enough to bring about a physical reaction. And that was the memory alone; confronted with the real thing, he had not been able to resist the temptation. He had told her what she wanted to know, and she had rewarded him with the best sex of his life, right there on the ratty couch in his small corner office.

The memory brought a smile to his face. White still wondered how she might have reacted when she learned that he'd made it all up, but he didn't feel the slightest bit of guilt. She had tried to manipulate him, and he had simply reversed the process. That was the name of the game. It was also the most important thing he'd learned during his time overseas—namely, how to manipulate people. He'd learned how to determine what they wanted, which told him in turn how to get what
he
wanted. The trick, he'd discovered, was simply listening. Listening to their problems, hopes, fears, and desires. It was amazing what people would say when given the chance, even at an embassy function, where they were surrounded by their countrymen and more than a few of their own intelligence officers, many of whom would gladly kill the loose-lipped official for speaking out of turn.

Cullen White had quickly seen the value of his ability to draw people in and secure their trust, even if he didn't understand where it came from, and he'd done his best to use it to his advantage. At first, he had passed everything on to the CIA, mainly because he didn't see any alternative. That was back when he still believed in the possibility of redemption. Later, when he realized they would never take him back, he still took notes and retained what he knew, but he no longer shared his insider knowledge…at least not until his posting to Liberia.