As he walked around the old airplane with the crazy antennae, he encountered Muhammed. The mechanic was tending to something underneath an engine, and when he saw Khoury he clambered to his feet and bowed respectfully. Khoury gave him the wave, but said nothing. The Jordanian recruit was at one end of Khoury’s spectrum, the last man he would ever have to worry about. Raised in a strict madrassa, he was as devout an extremist as Khoury had ever seen. If Muhammed were not here, he would certainly be in Kandahar or Lahore being fitted for explosive underwear.
The hangar’s second working area was well defined, separated by a high partition of plywood and cloth. Inside he found Fadi Jibril. By training, the man was an engineer, years spent in university learning things Khoury could never hope to understand. His freshly earned doctorate in aerospace engineering was taken from a top school in America, and while Khoury did not know Jibril’s exact age, the man was young, certainly no more than thirty. Presently he was standing at a workbench, smoothing a long bundle of wire with his thin fingers. Everything about Jibril was delicate, almost feminine. There was no question about his sexuality — he was married to a thick, matronly woman who was, rather predictably, five months pregnant with their first child. Still, Fadi Jibril was not a man’s man. His limbs seemed to swim in the loose-fitting shirts and trousers he preferred. His shoes looked too big, like those of a clown. Yet there was no doubting his intensity, the focus that encompassed everything he did. This was forever etched in his eyes, a thing Khoury appreciated, yet never quite understood. Religion was part of it — that was why he was here, indeed why any of them were here — yet for Jibril there was something more. Khoury sensed it at this very moment as he watched the engineer caress the insulated wire, watched his sharp black eyes critique his work. Khoury could not dismiss the idea that he was watching a man who was, at heart, more an artist than a scientist.
He cleared his throat and Jibril straightened.
“Sheik,” he said, “I am honored.”
This was what Jibril always said, each day when Khoury came to check his progress. He supposed Jibril was not being polite. He truly was honored. Khoury smiled inwardly.
“And how does our work progress?” the imam asked, the pronoun covering not only the two of them, but God as well.
Jibril sighed. “Certain parts have been difficult to work with. Our lathe is not the best. If we had a better machine—”
“Fadi, Fadi,” Khoury interrupted, acquiring his most patient tone. “You know our troubles. We must make do with what we have. You have made great strides, no one can deny it.” He swept an arm across a work area that was surrounded by tools, machinery, and electronics. “Six months you have been at that bench, hammering and turning screwdrivers. Time, however, is not our ally.”
The young man relented. “Yes, sheik, I know. But things are always more difficult when one turns the screws clockwise.”
Hand tools had never been a friend to Khoury, but the metaphor was clear enough. It is easier to take apart than to build. He committed this thought to memory, recognizing its potential for a future sermon.
“The schedule cannot be altered,” Khoury insisted. “You must distinguish between what you would like, and what you must have.”
Jibril’s put his hands to his temples. He looked defeated, near exhaustion.
Khoury put a fatherly hand on his shoulder. “Fadi, look at me.”
The engineer did, and Khoury asserted his most persuasive gaze.
“Always remember — you will be to Sudan what A.Q. Khan was to Pakistan. The father of a nation’s technical might.” Khoury watched the young man swell, his ego stoked by the bellows of his words. Khoury thought perhaps he might have struck upon it. What was different about Jibril? Scientist and artist — what combination could breed a more outsized ego?
“Now,” Khoury suggested, “tell me where your troubles lie.”
Jibril picked up his gaze and led Khoury to a bench where circuit boards and test equipment were strewn haphazardly. Khoury recognized a pungent electrical odor, burnt insulation or arcing wires. The engineer picked up a metal box the size of a bread pan. Three wires dangled freely, their loose ends stripped of insulation and scorched with solder.
“This is the telemetry interface module,” Jibril said. “I told you yesterday it was giving me trouble. This unit is defective. I now suspect they are all defective.”
Khoury sighed. “Yes, the Chinese do not have a reputation for reliability.”
“Which is the very reason they paid us such a favorable price for the unit we removed.”
“Indeed,” Khoury said. He pointed to the electronic box. “Can you fix it?”
Jibril acquired a fresh air of enthusiasm. “I think it will not be necessary. I began to lose confidence in the Chinese equipment some weeks ago, so I went to the trouble of ordering a wholly different device from a German manufacturer. It should arrive today on the flight from Hamburg.”
Khoury was impressed. For a young man, the engineer displayed an uncommon balance of patience and initiative. He was working twenty hours a day in this place, moving heaven and earth to bring success. Yet the purchase from Germany was a concern. Much of Jibril’s hardware had already been acquired at considerable risk. Some clever, promotion-minded bureaucrat behind a customs desk might make uncomfortable connections.
“Hamburg?” Khoury said hesitantly. “Is this not dangerous ground, Fadi? The West watches certain exports very closely. This device you have ordered, might it be on someone’s list of sensitive technology? Are you sure there will be no questions?”
The engineer shrugged to say no. Or perhaps to say that he hadn’t really considered it.
Khoury let it go and moved to more familiar ground. He asked the question he always asked. “Will the deadline still be met?”The edge in his voice was clear.
“Yes, sheik. I will install the part as soon as it arrives. Yet …” Jibril hesitated, “I can only perform the most basic of bench tests. If there were more time—”
Khoury chopped his hand upward to cut the engineer off. There was a time for coddling and a time for discipline. He gave Jibril his most solemn gaze.
Jibril was duly inured. He bowed, and said, “It will be done, my sheik.”
The bed was surrounded by paper as Davis studied the maintenance records for a second time. Every airplane has a logbook, a bound record of that airframe’s flight and maintenance history. Since they always stay on board, the original logbook for the mishap aircraft was now resting on the bottom of the Red Sea. Fortunately, logbooks also have duplicate pages that are removed and kept as a permanent record. This was what Davis had in his hands.
The tear-out sheets were dry and brittle, like the paper had been baked in an oven. Arranged in chronological order, he was able to see where the airplane had been. Ten days prior to the crash, a hop from Dubai to Khartoum. The next day, an oil service and tire pressure check, then off to Lagos, Nigeria. On it went, bouncing around Africa and the Middle East. Two tires changed, a landing light replaced. A few gripes written up by pilots, subsequently addressed by maintenance.
Every write-up he saw was entered after a landing in Khartoum, so there had never been any contract maintenance performed at a faraway airport. In an outfit like this, Davis knew, 95 percent of pilot complaints regarding inoperative systems came after landing at the home field — not a function of where things broke, but a function of the five hundred U.S. dollars FBN Aviation would have to pay for a contract mechanic in Cape Town or Mombasa. Or the five hours the crew would have to wait for them to show up, if they showed up at all.