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“This couldn’t be done beforehand?”
Don Fernando shook his head. “Every delivery to El-Gabal is put through three different screeners. One is an X-ray machine. The chips would show up. No, they have to be planted by hand on site.”
“And then?”
Don Fernando smiled like a fox. “You have only to press six-six-six on this phone’s keypad, but you must be close and within line of sight of the SIMs for the Bluetooth signal to work. You will then have three minutes to get out of the building. The resulting explosion will destroy everything the Domna has stockpiled as well as everyone inside El-Gabal.”
27
SAVE FOR THE heightened security, Boris found Damascus much as he had left it, a modern city painfully growing up around the oasis, sporting minarets, mosques, and sites dating back to the time the Book of Genesis was written, somewhere during the thirteenth century bc. At the head of his army, Abraham descended into Damascus from the land of the Chaldeans, north of Babylon. He ruled the city for some years, refreshing himself and his men, enchanted by this bejeweled city in the fragrant valley between the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers, before pushing on to Canaan. Subsequently, Damascus was conquered by Alexander the Great and, later, taken by the Roman general Pompey. Septimius Severus decreed it an official colony of Rome, but Christianity came to the city also. Saint Paul was struck down by holy light on the road to Damascus. Subsequently, he and Saint Thomas lived in Bab Touma, the city’s oldest neighborhood. A crossroads of East and West of major importance, Damascus became the spiritual home of Severus Domna.
In modern times the city was made up of three distinct sections. The ancient Medina—as the Old City was known—and the French Protectorate, whose lyrical architecture and ornate fountains dated from the 1920s, lay side by side like beautiful pearls, but what had accreted around them was the ugly sprawl of the modern city, with its brutal Soviet-style concrete buildings, shopping malls, and traffic-choked avenues.
Boris identified the SVR agents hanging around the arrivals terminal the moment he passed through immigration, trying without success to blend into the scene. He felt for them. At two in the morning there were no crowds to blend into. He entered the men’s room, washed up, and stared at himself in the mirror. He scarcely recognized himself. Decades maneuvering through the minefields of the Russian clandestine services had changed him. Once, he had been young and idealistic, loving the motherland, willing to offer himself on the altar of making it a better place. And now, years later, he realized that Russia was no better off for his hard work. Possibly, it was worse off. He had squandered his life on an impossible dream, but wasn’t that the mirage of youth: the dream of changing the world. Instead, he himself had changed, and the realization disgusted him.
Returning to the arrivals lounge, he found the one food stand open, bought a meze plate, and sat at a round table no larger than a Frisbee. He ate with his right hand while watching the arrivals board for the flight carrying Cherkesov. It was on time. He had forty minutes until it touched down.
He rose and went to the car rental desk. Fifteen minutes later he was sitting behind the wheel of a rattletrap, engine coughing and groaning. He used the time left to consider his pact with Zachek. An eye for an eye, a curious riff on Strangers on a Train, one of his favorite films, where two strangers talk about committing murders for each other to avoid becoming suspects. In the clandestine services, this kind of pact wouldn’t work. Strangers wouldn’t be able to get near Cherkesov or Beria. But those close to them could. Even after decamping to the Domna, Cherkesov remained a thorn in SVR’s side—according to Zachek even more so now that his power had grown outside Russia’s borders. Boris had offered to terminate Cherkesov for Zachek. In return, Zachek would plant Beria six feet under. He would assume control of SVR and Boris would have gained an ally instead of another enemy. Boris, of course, had his own reason for wanting Cherkesov dead. He owed his job to his former boss, but as long as he was alive Boris lived under his thumb.
Boris checked his watch. Cherkesov’s flight had landed. By the time he pulled out of his space in the lot, passengers from the flight had begun drifting out of the terminal. Boris waited until he saw Cherkesov striding out. He smiled to himself because he was certain his former boss had picked up the SVR agents just as he had, and he knew that Cherkesov would believe they had been waiting for him.
As Cherkesov hurried to the short line of waiting taxis, Boris gu
“Get in, Viktor.”
Cherkesov’s eyes opened wide. “You! What are you doing here?”
“The SVR is right on your heels,” Boris said urgently.
Cherkesov climbed in. As soon as he closed the door, Boris threw the car in gear and pulled out with a squeal of rubber against tarmac.
At night, the wailing of the calls to prayer rang from minaret to minaret, enmeshing the city in a veil of language sung in alien ululations. At least, they seemed alien to Boris as he approached the city in the squeaking car. Green lights burned from the tops of the minarets, far more than he remembered. Cherkesov sat beside him, fuming while he smoked one of his vile Turkish cigarettes. Boris could feel the energy coming off him like electric sparks from a severed power line.
“Now,” Cherkesov said, half turning to Boris, “explain yourself, Boris Illyich. Have you taken care of Jason Bourne?”
Boris took an exit ramp off the highway into the streets. “I’ve been too busy taking care of you.”
Cherkesov stared at him openmouthed.
“After our talk about the SVR I went back to Zachek, Beria’s man.”
“I know who Zachek is,” Cherkesov said impatiently.
“I made a deal with them.”
“You did what?”
“I made a deal so I could find out why they’re shadowing you.”
“Since when have I been—”
“I spotted one of their agents out on the tarmac at Uralsk Airport. I wondered what he was doing there. Zachek told me.” He turned the wheel and they headed down a darkened street lined with anonymous white concrete buildings. Somewhere a radio blared a muezzin’s recorded voice. “Beria is very much interested in your new post inside Severus Domna.”
“Beria could not know—”
“But he does, Viktor Delyagovich. This man is a devil.”
Cherkesov chewed his lower lip in anxiety.
“So I have been following Beria’s agents, from Moscow to Munich and now here, wondering what their orders are.”
“Zachek didn’t tell you?”
Boris shrugged. “It’s not as if I didn’t ask, but I couldn’t press him. There was the danger of him becoming suspicious.”
Cherkesov nodded. “I understand. You did well, Boris Illyich.”
“My loyalty did not end when you bequeathed me FSB-2.”
“Much appreciated.” Cherkesov squinted through the fug of bitter smoke. “Where are we going?”
“To an all-night café I know of.” Boris hunched forward, peering through the scarred windshield. “But I seem to have lost my way.”
“I’d rather go straight to my hotel.” Cherkesov gave an address. “Get back to a major intersection. From there, I’ll know which way to go.”
Boris grunted and turned right, moving along a slightly better illuminated street. “Why the hell is Beria so damn interested in where you go and who you see?”
“Why is Beria interested in anything?” Cherkesov said, an answer that gave away nothing.
Boris came to an intersection where the light was broken, not an uncommon occurrence in this neighborhood. The sound of the muezzin’s ca