The Disciple

Twelve nuclear warheads, mounted on missiles hidden in deep tu

Twelve warheads should satisfy Ahmadinejad, Sultani thought.

Callie was in bed Saturday night when Jake heard his doorbell ring. He padded to the front door and peered through the peephole. Sal Molina was standing there.

Grafton unlocked the door, held it open and said, “Come in, come in.”

“Can a man get a drink around here?” Molina asked.

“If he has plain tastes and isn’t a co

“I’ve been accused of a lot of things,” Molina said with a sigh, “but no one ever called me a co

As they walked toward the kitchen, Molina muttered, “You alone?”

“Callie is in bed. Name your poison.”

“Bourbon. It’s not just for breakfast anymore.”

Callie came out in a robe and said hello, then made her excuses and went back to bed. Settled in Grafton’s den with the door closed, Molina said, “I was on my way home and thought maybe you could tell me something that would make me sleep better.”

“I doubt it, but ask away.”

“You’ve been at the CIA… what? Three years?”

“About.”

“What’s your assessment of the agency?”

“I’m not going to trash my boss.”

“This is off the record. I want an honest opinion, if there is such a thing inside the Beltway.”

Jake Grafton took his time answering. He sipped his drink-he was having bourbon, too-then said, “The Company is a large, fossilized bureaucracy. Most of the people there are mediocre, at best. A serious number are incompetent. Most case officers don’t speak the language of their subject countries. No one reads the area newspapers. The analysts’ reports are often treacle-all they do is look at satellite photography and radio intercepts. Human intelligence is not high on the priority list and hasn’t been for a generation. A lot of the agency’s people are working their way to retirement by doing nothing that makes waves-most bureaucracies are like that. This one is no different.” He turned over a hand. “How much more do you want?”

Molina made a face. “That’s enough, I guess.” He worked on his drink. “How likely are we to find out what Iran is going to do with its nuke warheads, which the agency says it isn’t building?”

“The agency said it has no hard evidence Iran is building nuclear warheads,” Grafton said, correcting Molina. “The turtle has pulled its head into its shell.”

“What about these op-ed pieces Professor Azari has been writing? They’re full of facts and figures. He’s making us look like total idiots.”

“Azari has been getting info from a private spy network in Iran. Some of his information is verifiable, some of it isn’t. I suspect some of his people are government double agents.”

“Does Azari realize that’s a possibility?”

“He suspects it, I imagine. Hell, he may be on Ahmadinejad’s payroll.”

“Is Iranian security reading these messages, too?”

Jake Grafton considered his answer carefully. “I doubt if they have cryptographers sophisticated enough and computer programs powerful enough to break the code. They might have the contact in their pocket, of course, and have gotten the key from her. Or from Azari.”

“Her?”

“Her. The Iranians read the American press, so they must know about Azari and his articles, and they must have penetrated his network.”

“You have a man in Iran, don’t you?”

“Yes. Tommy Carmellini.”

“What’s he doing?”

“Trying to find out the truth about their nuke program.”

Sal Molina took a healthy swig of his drink, then sat processing Grafton’s remarks. He changed the subject. “The generals think they have the factory pinpointed that is making the EDs that Iran is sending to Iraq.” EDs were explosive devices-bombs. “They want to launch a commando raid against the factory. What’s your assessment?”

“Now isn’t the time to stir up the Iranians,” the admiral said. “Not with Tommy trying to gain access to government buildings. Can we wait a while?”

“Wait, wait, wait. That’s hard for generals and politicians to do. Everyone is getting damn tired of waiting. Our kids are getting killed and maimed in Iraq and the press is full of stories about Iranian nukes.”

“Waiting is difficult for Americans,” Jake Grafton agreed, “but timing is everything in life.”

“The waiting for this is over.” Sal Molina attacked his drink again. After a bit he said, “Does Carmellini have a chance?”

“If I didn’t think so I wouldn’t have sent him over there,” Jake replied.

Ten minutes later, when Jake escorted Molina to the door, he asked, “Did you get anything to make you sleep better?”

“Hell, no. I never do when I talk to you.”

“I’ll send you some intelligence assessments in the morning. They’re good bedtime reading.”

“Send me something on the Russians. Those bastards are good copy.”

Grafton pursed his lips in thought, then said softly, “The Russians will be in the catbird seat if the Middle East explodes, won’t they?”

“With all their oil and gas, Russia will become the new Saudi Arabia,” Sal Molina said sourly. “Russia will quickly become the richest nation on the planet, and Vladimir Putin will be the most powerful man on earth.”

Molina walked out Grafton’s door and headed for the elevator.

The Mossad’s Joe Mottaki was full of information when he and I finally got into the little soundproof security booth I had built in the basement of the embassy a

Mottaki had a job with the firm that cleaned the embassy, and he came around every other day or so. He was a little guy, looked every inch a Persian, spoke Farsi like a native and fairly decent Arabic. The first time I met him he told me he had been born in Egypt. He refused to tell me any more about himself.

“Davar Ghobadi is single,” he told me today. “No lovers or suitors that we know about. She has spent the last two days talking to a variety of people all over Tehran, all apparently friends of hers. Don’t know the subjects, but the conversations were serious and long.”

“Um.” I wondered if she had told everyone in town that she was talking to an American spy, but even if she had, what could I do about it? “What about Ahmadinejad’s political opposition?”

“They are unhappy. Most of the people in this country are poor as dirt, yet Ahmadinejad and the mullahs are squandering tens of billions of petrodollars on the nuclear program. Even if the program was for peaceful purposes and they gave electricity away to everyone in the country who wanted it, that wouldn’t justify the expenditures. People also need clean water, roads, hospitals, sewers, schools-in short, everything.”

“Is Ahmadinejad in danger of a political revolt?”

Mottaki shrugged. “Who can say? The opposition does what it can under the gaze of the mullahs. Believe me, all is not well at the Parliament building.”

We talked for an hour about names and personalities. I was learning a lot, but I wondered if any of it meant anything.

When we had beat the hell out of that topic, I told Joe that Davar had told me she used dead drops. “It would be nice to find one and aim a camera at it. See who services it.”

“I have exactly three people,” Joe said, “counting me. Your two chaps make five. Still, only five men…”

“Do the best you can.”

“What if she lied to you?”

“Well…”

“We can’t prove a negative.”

“Watch her carefully for a couple more days. See if you can catch her at a drop.”

“We’ll have to really stick to her.”

I’m such a hard-ass. I didn’t say anything.

“Okay,” he said forlornly.

“Someone needs to write a new Koran.”