‘Why did they send you?’ Salhus asked. ‘As far as I understand, you head a kind of… behavioural psychology anti-terrorist group. Is that right?’
The American nodded indifferently.
‘So you’re not a head in the FBI. You’re not head of any operative group whatsoever. But still they send-’
‘That’s where you’re wrong. We are highly operative.’
‘But I still can’t understand,’ Peter Salhus insisted and leant forwards across the desk, ‘why they didn’t send a-’
‘Well observed,’ Warren Scifford interrupted. ‘Very well observed. You do, of course, have a point.’
For the first time, Adam thought he saw something helpless in the self-assured man. His eyes wavered for a second, a pull at his mouth aged him, even made him look old. But he said nothing. The hailstorm had stopped just as abruptly as it had started.
‘So what’s the point?’ Peter Salhus asked quietly.
‘That my colleagues don’t believe the answer to this mystery lies in Norway,’ Warren Scifford replied and took a deep breath. ‘The point is that they’ve sent me because they don’t want me at home. They’re convinced that we can find the answer in the chaos of intelligence that we already have, combined with our own ongoing investigation. It is… intense. To say the least. Heavy-handed, you Europeans might say.’
He picked up the glass again, paused, then put it back down. It was empty.
‘The FBI believes that the President’s disappearance is a terrorist plot that only the US can deal with,’ he continued. ‘In that context, Norway is nothing more than a little… a very little and insignificant…’ He smiled briefly, almost apologetically, and shrugged. ‘I’m sure you understand. And as I and my men differ slightly from the top leaders in our view of what constitutes a terrorist, what terrorists are trying to achieve and…’
He stopped suddenly again. He sat up straight in the chair, smoothed down the front of his jacket, then leant forward and looked Salhus straight in the eye.
‘Internal FBI conflicts are hardly of any interest to you,’ he said. ‘And I don’t need to discuss them, either. But I’m not giving away too much when I say that the US’ main suspect in this case is unambiguous: al-Qaeda. They have money. They have a network. They have a motive. And as is well known, they have attacked us before.’
‘But not yours,’ Salhus commented.
‘What?’
‘Your suspicions are not focused on al-Qaeda.’
Warren Scifford didn’t answer. He ran his fingers through his hair. A vague scent of shampoo wafted around him.
‘You’re director general of the security services,’ he said, finally, a bit too loud. ‘What do you think?’
Now it was Peter Salhus’ turn not to say anything. He beat a rhythm on his desk with a pen.
‘I thought as much,’ Warren Scifford said.
‘I haven’t said anything.’
‘Not in as many words. But both you and I know that this is far removed from al-Qaeda. Osama bin Laden wants to spread fear, Salhus. Al-Qaeda are holy warriors, driven by a burning hate. They want spectacular scenes of absolute… terror. They are terrorists, in the purest sense.’
‘Terrorism,’ Salhus said and put the pen back in a drawer, ‘is defined roughly as an illegal action where the victim of violence or threats of violence is not the main target, but a means to impact on a larger group of people. Through terror and fear, quite simply. Is kidnapping the American president not an act of terrorism? As far as I can make out from the news broadcasts…’ he nodded at the ancient TV screen, ‘terror is rife in your country right now.’
‘Or uncertainty,’ Adam said and coughed. ‘A tortuous uncertainty. Which is perhaps even worse. To me, this seems very different from what I would normally associate with terrorism. It seems more like someone…’ He held his breath, searching for the right word, as he looked at Salhus’ sketchy map of Norway, scattered with red dots. ‘Like someone is playing with us,’ he said, finally. ‘It feels like someone is taking us for a ride. Which isn’t really Osama bin Laden’s style.’
The two other men looked at him. Salhus nodded in surprise and then shrugged. He was just about to say something when Warren Scifford suddenly got up.
‘We have to go.’
Adam still felt uncomfortable when he took Salhus’ hand at the door. The American had his mobile phone pressed to his ear and was heading for the lift.
‘You’re absolutely right,’ Salhus said very quietly, in Norwegian. ‘They’re playing with us. Someone has the motive, the resources and the opportunity to take us for a ride, big time. And I’m damned if your friend over there doesn’t have an idea of who it is. If you get so much as a hint of what this is all about, contact me immediately. OK?’
Adam gave a weak nod and was astonished to discover that the Director General of the PST’s hand was cold and sweaty.
IX
Abdallah al-Rahman loved the newly born foal. She was jet black, just like her mother, and the lighter patch between her eyes gave him hope that she had inherited her father’s white blaze. Her legs were disproportionately long, as they are on a one-day-old foal. Her body was promising and her coat was already polished and shiny. She tottered backwards when he slowly entered the box with his hand outstretched. The mare whinnied aggressively, but he quickly calmed her with some soft words and a stroke on the muzzle.
Abdallah al-Rahman was happy. Everything was going according to plan. He still hadn’t had direct contact with anyone. It wasn’t necessary. As an adult, he had never done anything unnecessary. As human beings were only granted a limited amount of time on this earth, he believed it was important to keep the balance, to follow a strategy. He looked at his life in the same way that he looked at the fantastic carpets that adorned the floors of the three palaces he felt he needed at the moment.
A carpet weaver always had a plan. She didn’t start in one corner and then work willy-nilly until the carpet was finished. She knew where she was going, and it took time. Sometimes she was inspired and might include the most beautiful details, on impulse. The perfection of a hand-made carpet lay in its imperfection, in the tiny deviations from a preordained yet strict symmetry and order.
The most beautiful carpet of all was in his bedroom. His mother had knotted it, and it had taken her eight years to make it. Abdallah was thirteen when it was finished and she gave it to him as a present. No one had ever seen its like before. The golden hues changed according to the light, making it difficult to say what the colours actually were. No one had ever seen such close knots or felt such indescribably soft, thick silk.
The foal came up to him. She had pitch-black eyes, and she opened them wide as she tottered sideways, tossing her head to keep her balance. She snorted helplessly and pressed into her mother’s flank before trying once again to walk towards him.
Abdallah’s life was like a carpet, and when his brother died, he had decided what the pattern would be. He had made some small changes along the way, some minor adjustments, but never any more than his mother had done: a deeper, darker thread here and there, or another shade because it was beautiful and fitted in.
His brother was three years older than him and had been killed in Brooklyn on the 20th of August 1974. He had been on his way home from seeing an American girlfriend that his parents knew nothing about, and it was very late. When he was found by an elderly woman the next morning, his genitals were a bloody mess from all the punches and kicks. Their father flew immediately to the US and returned one month later, an old man.
The murder was never solved. The father’s powerful position in his home country and his indisputable authority, even in his meetings with the American authorities, had made no difference. After fourteen days, the chief investigator shrugged and looked away when he admitted that those responsible would never be caught. There were so many murders, so many young men who didn’t understand that they should avoid dangerous areas and stay indoors after midnight. He complained that there weren’t enough resources, and then closed the thin case file for good.