Twelve Days (11 page)

—

After carving through the downtown traffic, the Mercedes turned west onto an eight-lane highway that Saudis called the Mecca Road. The city’s sprawl seemed endless, an infinite loop of concrete towers, asphalt roads, and dirt lots. Beige and black and brown blurred together, as if Riyadh’s builders wanted the city to reflect the monochrome desert that surrounded it.

The limousine left the highway and turned south down Prince Turki Road, a six-lane boulevard. An oversize complex of buildings loomed to the left, with signs announcing
“
King Faisal Specialist Hospital and Research Centre”
in English and Arabic.

“Best hospital in Saudi Arabia. World-class.” Ghaith spoke the last two words in English, with relish. “We’re almost there.”

The Mercedes turned right, into a crowded residential neighborhood, a mix of blocky apartment buildings and new houses. Then left, right, and left again, before squealing through an open gate watched by two guards. It stopped outside a three-story mansion.

“Twenty minutes exactly. Well done, Khalid.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“This is the small residence?” Wells said.

“Only one thousand square meters.” Ten thousand square feet. Ghaith stepped out, and Wells followed him into a foyer that had more marble than most churches. A gold-leaf chandelier hung overhead. The Saudis didn’t consider subtlety a virtue.

Ghaith pointed down a corridor. “Kitchen’s that way. There’s a chef if you’re hungry.
Halal
only, I’m afraid. Though I do believe there’s a liquor cabinet in the closet of the master bathroom.”

“I won’t ask how you know.”

“Also an indoor pool at the back of the house, an exercise room.”

“Who stays here, Colonel?”

“Mostly Western doctors working at the hospital.”

“Of course.” Abdullah would hardly mind spending a few million dollars on mansions to entice the best specialists to come to Riyadh to treat him and his family.

“I’ll be back at eight to pick you up, but my men will wait in front. If I can be of service, please call. Is there anything else you need, Mr. Wells?”

Wells thought of the mysterious Nissan. “Wouldn’t mind a pistol. If you have one to spare.”

“I assure you you’re safe here. These are some of the King’s best men.”

“No doubt. But I prefer to look after myself.”

“
Al-Hamdu lillah.”
Praise be to God. “I’ll see you this evening, Mr. Wells.”

—

Wells forced himself onto a treadmill for an hour, flipping on CNN International to see what he’d missed on the flight from Rome. Laura Frommer, the chairwoman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, had announced her support for the President.
The CIA offered a convincing case at our hearings,
Frommer said at a press conference
. And the Iranians can defuse this crisis very simply. Open your nuclear facilities, let us speak to your scientists. You say you aren’t trying to build a bomb, but this uranium ingot tells a different story.

The American government had found its line:
If war comes, it’s Iran’s fault, for refusing to open
up.
The argument had traction. Polls showed that sixty-three percent of Americans favored military action, up eleven
percent since the missile attack that downed United 49. If Duberman was behind the missile, it had worked even better than he expected. Wells briefly wondered if he should have gone to Mumbai instead of coming here. But he had no leads in India. And he and Shafer and Duto were far better off staying off the agency’s radar. That would be impossible in Mumbai.

Exhaustion overcame Wells as he stepped off the treadmill. He found his way to the master bedroom, set his phone for 7 p.m., pulled the shades. And slept.

He woke not to the beeping of his alarm but amplified Arabic voices in the distance. He didn’t have the usual traveler’s dislocation when his eyes snapped open. He knew exactly what he was hearing. The
Maghrib
, the sunset call to prayer, the fourth of the day. Wells felt an oddly urgent need to pray outside, launch his devotions into the setting sun, nothing but desert between him and Mecca.

He found a prayer rug in the bedroom’s cavernous closet, made his way to the mansion’s flat roof. The wind yanked the sleep from him and he prayed vigorously, purposefully. By the time he finished, the sun had nearly disappeared. He felt calmer and stronger than he had in weeks.

He stood, turned to go inside—

And saw the white Nissan from the airport rolling past the mansion’s back gate. The scratch in the driver’s door left no doubt.

Wells didn’t panic. Whoever was inside wouldn’t try to storm the mansion. Far easier to attack as the Mercedes left the grounds, a natural choke point, or on the road to the Ministry of Defense.

He would shower, get ready for his meeting. When Ghaith returned, they’d talk.

As he was showering, his phone buzzed. He stepped out unwillingly, grabbed for it. Kowalski. “I don’t know if this qualifies as good news or bad, but the Russian says he’ll meet you. No surprise, you come to him. Fly into Volgograd.”

“It’s not back to Stalingrad?”

“Nor Putingrad. Yet.”

“When?”

“He can do it as soon as tomorrow. If I were you, I’d get there before he changes his mind.”

“What about the visa?”

“Get to any Russian embassy or consulate, he’ll arrange it.”

Buvchenko proving the power of his connections. Wells wondered if he could leave Riyadh tonight after his meeting with Nawwaf. A direct flight to Russia would be impossible, but Saudia or Turkish Airlines surely had overnight service to Istanbul. From there he could get the visa, be in Volgograd by the next night. He wished he could ask the Saudis for a private jet, but had pushed Abdullah’s generosity too far already.

“What did you tell him?”

“That you had a question for him, one you had to ask in person.”

“That’s all?”

“And that you would pay a lot of money for the right answer. He likes money. As do we all.”

“Thank you, Pierre.”

“Don’t thank me until you get out.”

—

Ghaith arrived as Wells was raiding the refrigerator, which was disappointingly empty.

“No chef?”

“Didn’t want to bother him. I saw the Nissan again, Colonel. From the airport.”

“You’re sure?” His tone surprised Wells. More annoyed than nervous.

“I was on the roof. For the
Maghrib
.”

“It’s ours.”

Wells’s turn to be surprised. “You said—”

“I lied. I didn’t want to worry you. I didn’t think you’d make it. There’s one other undercover car, too.”

Wells crossed the kitchen in two big strides, put himself face-to-face with Ghaith, close enough to smell the sugary coffee on the colonel’s breath. He had six inches and fifty pounds on the Saudi.

“
You
didn’t want to worry
me
?”

“An error. I apologize.” Ghaith pulled his phone from his pocket. “I’m married to one of His Majesty’s grandnieces. Check for yourself. If you’re concerned whether you can trust me.”

“If Abdullah sent you for me, then I trust you. I don’t doubt your loyalty, Colonel—”

“Thank you.”

“It’s your judgment I’m not sure about. You have anything else to tell me, now’s the time. A specific threat, whatever.”

Ghaith shook his head. “Nothing like that.”

“Then why all this? Four cars. How many men?”

“Eight. Plus the guards at the house.”

“Eight agents. For what?”

“Word about your arrival has spread.”

“In one day? Did someone email the whole country? John Wells is in town. Huntin’ season.”

“I told no one. Several of His Majesty’s secretaries know. His brother. General Nawwaf, too.”

“Nawwaf must be reliable or he wouldn’t be running your missiles.”

“He’s reliable. But I don’t know everyone on his staff. The wrong person hears. A ten-second call to AQAP.” Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.

“And you were planning to tell me when? When you dropped me back at the airport?”

“I am sorry.” Ghaith’s embarrassment seemed genuine.

“I’d like that pistol now. Don’t tell me you don’t have a spare somewhere in that Mercedes.”

Ghaith pushed past Wells, out of the kitchen.

He came back a minute later with a big black pistol. A Glock 22. Forty-caliber.

“You didn’t have anything bigger? Like a cannon?”

“It’s too big for you?”

Point, Saudi Arabia.

“As long as it’s loaded.” Wells popped out the magazine, found it full. Fifteen fat copper-jacketed rounds.

“You understand you can’t bring it inside the ministry offices.”

“If I need it in the Ministry of Defense, we’re really in trouble.” Wells snapped the magazine back into the pistol. It would kick harder than the 9-millimeters he preferred. Still, he was glad to have it.

He stuffed it into his jacket pocket, the butt poking out. Not ideal, but better than shoving it into the back of his jeans like a wannabe gangster. “Can we go now?”

—

At first glance, the security around Riyadh Air Base seemed more appropriate for an installation like Kandahar or Bagram, an American airfield in hostile territory. A high concrete wall stretched around the perimeter. Cameras were everywhere. Signs warned in Arabic and English: “Danger: Armed Guards—Do Not Approach Without Authorization!”

At first Wells didn’t understand why the Saudi military had chosen to present such a hostile face to its capital city. Then he saw that hostility was precisely the point. The Sauds wanted their people to remember that they were
ruled
, that the concept of
consent of the governed
went only so far in Riyadh.

The base’s walls extended for what seemed like miles. Finally, the Mercedes reached its main entrance, marked by a tall and strangely elegant arch of tan-colored concrete. Four soldiers in a fortified machine-gun nest targeted them with a spotlight as the limousine stopped at the outer gate guardhouse. Khalid lowered his window to hand over his identity card. After a brief conversation, he looked over his shoulder at Ghaith.

“Colonel. They say we aren’t authorized.”

Wells liked this day less and less. He rested his fingers on the butt of the Glock. But pulling it would only make the guards more nervous. Through the glare of the spotlight, he saw their chase car five meters behind. Both too close and too far to do any good. They would make a fat target for a suicide bomber.

Two guards stepped out of the gatehouse and motioned for the Mercedes to turn around. Ghaith pushed open his door. The guards lowered their rifles, but the weapons seemed only to make him angrier. “We’ll sort this out in one minute, no more. Or by next week you simpletons will be in the Empty Quarter chasing scorpions.” Ghaith meant it, Wells saw. Nobody pulled rank quite like the Saudis.

The guards looked at each other, then waved him into the guardhouse.

Three minutes passed before Ghaith stepped out of the guardhouse, back into the Mercedes. He slammed the door. Whatever he’d said seemed to have carried the day. The gate slid open. “Go, Khalid.” The Mercedes eased inside.

“They still had us coming this morning. Oafs.”

Another easy explanation. Or maybe someone wanted to be sure that their arrival would attract notice instead of being quiet.

—

Finally, Wells walked into Nawwaf’s office, a square room that overlooked the airfield’s main north–south runway. Models of American, Russian, and Chinese missiles filled a glass cabinet by the door.

As was customary in Saudi offices, photos of Abdullah and Salman hung prominently. Wells expected to see personal photos of Nawwaf with Salman, a way for the general to remind visitors of his place in the hierarchy. There were none. The omission mildly impressed Wells. Nawwaf was confident enough in his own authority not to rely on his father.

Nawwaf was tall and thin, with a crisp uniform and a neatly trimmed beard that framed his narrow lips. He stood from behind his mahogany desk and saluted Wells, more than a hint of irony in the gesture. “Mr. Wells. Hello.”

“
Salaam aleikum,
General
.”

“I’d prefer we stick to English, Mr. Wells. I studied physics at Oxford. I expect my English is adequate for your needs.”

“Nam.”
Yes.

Nawwaf didn’t smile. Wells decided to take a friendlier tack, get the general talking generally about the Iranian program before moving on to the questions he’d come to ask.

“I appreciate your taking the time to see me. Do you know why I’m here?”

“I was told only that it was not related to our base at Watah.” Making sure Wells knew that the topic was off-limits.

“I have questions about the enrichment process. I’ve heard you’re an expert.”

“I doubt I can tell you anything your own scientists haven’t.”

“Humor me.”

“As you wish.”

“I’ll start with the obvious. Could Iran have enriched uranium to weapons-grade? Even though we and the IAEA watch their stockpiles.” The International Atomic Energy Agency.

“The Iranians acknowledge they’ve enriched several thousand kilos to twenty percent enrichment. If they hid a fraction of that, they could easily take the final step, from twenty percent to weapons-grade.”

“But could they have hidden it?”

“Certainly. They had years when no one was watching on-site. The inspectors checked afterwards, but it’s a matter of altering output tables, hiding the efficiency of the process.”

“That simple.”

“Did you know, Mr. Wells, that the United States has lost hundreds of kilograms of weapons-grade uranium over the last fifty years?”

Wells shook his head in genuine surprise.

“No one really thinks it’s missing. Otherwise, Washington and London would be ghost towns. Probably it never existed at all. Uranium enrichment is an industrial process, and like all industrial processes it has a margin for error. Especially if you want it to.”

“So they hide this uranium. Then? They build another plant without anyone noticing?”

“Possibly.”

“Wouldn’t it be huge?”

Nawwaf shook his head. “Once you reach twenty percent, you need only a hundred or so centrifuges running for a few weeks to reach the weapons-grade level. A small factory or warehouse could hide those.”