The waves lapped stronger against the hull. The boat shifted. The memories made Andrew’s father hesitate. Drawn into the past, he took a moment before glancing toward clouds moving across the sky.
“Finally, the wind’s picking up. Grab the wheel, son. Check the compass. Take us southwest toward home. By the way, that James book, The Ambassadors? After all my effort, I was determined to finish it. In the end, it turned out that Strether’s experience in Paris was so broadening that he felt he’d become smarter, aware of everything around him. But he was wrong. The rich woman’s son gained his trust, only to make a fool of him. Despite all his awareness, Strether returned to America, where he assumed he’d lose everything.”
“Four days,” Andrew promised the somber group in the high-security conference room. He was thirty-nine and spoke with the authoritative tone of his father.
“Is that a guarantee?”
“I can possibly get results sooner, but definitely no later than four days.”
“There’s a time element,” a grim official warned, “the probability of smallpox dispersal in a subway system during peak hours. Ten days from now. But we don’t know the exact time or which country, let alone which city. Our people apprehended the subject in Paris. His fellow conspirators were with him. One escaped, but the rest died in a gun battle. We have documents that indicate what they set in motion-but not the particulars. Just because they were in Paris, that doesn’t rule out another city with a major subway system as the target.”
“Four days after I start, you’ll have the details,” Andrew assured them. “Where’s the subject being rendered?”
“Uzbekistan.”
Andrew’s beefy neck crinkled when he nodded. “They know how to be discreet.”
“They ought to, given how much we pay them.”
“But I don’t want any foreign interrogator involved,” Andrew emphasized. “Thugs have unreliable methods. A subject will confess to anything if tortured sufficiently. You want reliable information, not a hysterical confession that turns out to be baseless.”
“Exactly. You’re completely in charge.”
“In fact, there’s no reason why this needs to be an extraordinary rendition.” Andrew’s use of “rendition” referred to the practice of moving a prisoner from one jurisdiction to another, a common occurrence in the legal system. But when the rendition was “extraordinary,” the prisoner was taken out of the legal system and placed where the normal rules no longer applied and accountability was no longer a factor. “The interview could just as easily take place in the United States.”
“Unfortunately, not everyone appreciates the difference between torture and your methods, Andrew. A jet’s waiting to fly you to Uzbekistan.”
Andrew’s father had been heavyset. Andrew was more so. A big man with a large chest, he resembled a heavyweight boxer, an impression that frequently made a detainee’s eyes widen at first sight of him. With his deep, raspy voice, he exuded a sense of menace and power, causing his subjects to feel increasing dread, unaware that Andrew’s true power came from numerous psychology courses taken at George Washington University, where he had earned a master’s degree under a created identity
A burly American civilian guard greeted him at a remote Uzbekistan airstrip next to a concrete-block building that was the rendering facility, the only structure in the boulder-dotted valley.
Andrew introduced himself as Mr. Baker.
The guard said he was Mr. Able. “I have the subject’s documents ready for you. We know his name and those of his relatives, where they live and work, in case you want to make him talk by threatening to kill people he loves.”
“That won’t be necessary. I’ll hardly ever speak to him.” A cold wind tugged at Andrew’s dark suit. When working, he always dressed formally, another way of expressing authority.
Escorted by Mr. Able, he passed through the security checkpoint, then entered the facility, which had harsh overhead lights and a row of doors with barred windows. The walls were made from unpainted cinder blocks. Everything felt damp.
“Your room’s to the right,” Mr. Able told him.
Andrew’s travel bag contained four days of clothes, the maximum he would need. He set it on the concrete floor next to a cot. He barely looked at the stainless-steel sink and toilet. Instead he focused on a metal table upon which sat a laptop computer. “The other equipment should have arrived.”
“It’s been installed. But I don’t know why we needed to bother. While we waited for you, my men and I could have put the fear of God into him.”
“I can’t imagine how that’s possible when he’s convinced God’s on his side. Is the interpreter ready?”
“Yes.”
“Reliable?”
“Very.”
“Then let’s get started.”
Andrew watched Mr. Able unlock a metal door. Holding a.45-caliber Glock pistol, the guard and two others armed with identical pistols entered the cell and aimed at the prisoner. Andrew and the interpreter stood in the open doorway. The compartment was windowless, except for the barred opening in the door. It felt damper than the corridor. The echo was sharp.
A short, gaunt Iraqi man was slumped on the concrete floor, his back against the wall, his wrists shackled to chains above his head. In his midthirties, he had a thin, dark face and short, black hair. His lips were scabbed. His cheeks were bruised. Dried blood grimed his black shirt and pants.
As if dazed, the subject stared straight ahead, not reacting to Andrew’s entrance.
Andrew turned toward Mr. Able, his stark expression making clear that he’d sent explicit instructions not to abuse the prisoner.
“That happened when the team grabbed him in Paris,” the guard explained. “He’s lucky he didn’t get killed in the gun battle.”
“He doesn’t think so. He wants to die for his cause.”
“Yeah, well, if he doesn’t talk, we can arrange for him to get his wish,” Mr. Able said. “The thing is, as much as he’d like to be a martyr, I’m sure he didn’t intend for any suffering to be involved.” The guard faced the prisoner. “Isn’t that right, chum? You figured you’d jump over the agony and get straight to the virgins in paradise. Well, you were wrong.”
The prisoner showed no reaction, continuing to look straight ahead. As an experiment, Andrew raised his arm above his head and pointed toward the ceiling, but the prisoner’s eyes didn’t follow his broad gesture. They remained so resolutely fixed on the opposite wall that Andrew became convinced the subject wasn’t as dazed as he appeared.
“Translate for me,” Andrew told the interpreter, then concentrated on the prisoner. “You have information about a soon-to-occur attack on a subway system. This attack will probably involve smallpox. You will tell me exactly when and where this attack will take place. You’ll tell me whether the attack does involve smallpox and how the smallpox was obtained. You’ll tell me how the attack will be carried out. The next time you see me, you’ll tell me all of these things and anything else I wish to know.”
The prisoner kept staring straight ahead.
When the interpreter finished, Andrew pointed toward a narrow cot bolted to the floor along one wall. He told Mr. Able, “Remove it. Leave a thin blanket. Unshackle him. Lock the room. Cover the window in the door.”
“Look, is all this really necessary?” the guard complained. “Just give me two hours with him and-”
Andrew left the cell.
The way he avoids eye contact, Andrew thought. He’s been warned about some types of interrogation.