Hamburg had sent the wrong parts.
Jibril sat still for a full minute, a cloak of despair casing his thoughts. Then, with all the deliberation he could muster, he picked up his Koran and went to the prayer room.
Davis had never had much of a bedside manner. Fortunately, that didn’t matter. He was handy with a wrench, and what the clinic needed more than anything was to have an inoperative generator repaired. The whole tent city was off the larger electrical grid — which according to Antonelli was unreliable anyway — and depended on a pair of old diesel generators. One of these had been broken for weeks, and Davis was tasked to get the thing running.
The clinic had some basic hand tools, and Davis found a few more under the seat of the truck. It took most of the morning, but he finally identified the problem as being in the fuel feed — a severely clogged filter and a faulty shutoff valve. The filter he simply removed. The valve Davis rehabilitated by way of brute force — hammers and wrenches, banging and bending. Neither repair was permanent, but the unit would be serviceable for a few weeks.
It was nearly noon when he finished, and Davis was covered in grease and diesel. He went looking for Regina Antonelli, and found her in the supply tent digging deep into an almost empty box.
“The generator is up and running,” Davis said. “But it’s only a temporary fix. I’ll need a few things to make the job permanent. I made a list of the parts, along with the make and model number of the generator. I’m not sure how long it will take to get spares like that, but maybe I can twist some arms at FBN Aviation, get them to expedite a shipment for us.”
Antonelli eyed him, top to bottom. He had to look like he’d been in a grease pit all day. She smiled a half smile, but a smile all the same. It was just like he’d expected. Downright stunning.
“Thank you,” she said. “Anything you can do to get replacement parts would be greatly appreciated.”
He began cleaning his hands with a rag.
“So how long have you been here?” he asked.
“Since June, but my term is nearly done. Three new physicians arrive tomorrow. I’m hoping they will bring supplies to replace those we lost.”
“So you’re leaving? Back to Italy?”
“In a few days. I must first oversee the delivery of a shipment to a small village north of here — al-Asmat, on the Red Sea. Even in the north there is need. After two days there, I will continue to Port Sudan and take a passage home.”
Davis nodded. “Are you looking forward to it? Going home?”
She shrugged. “In a way. But it is a difficult transition. The people in Milan, they can be rather self-absorbed. Nice food, expensive clothing, exotic cars. It all seems rather trivial when one sees things here. To watch a thirty-year-old pregnant woman die for need of a two dollar dose of medicine — it gives one a certain perspective.”
“I’m sure it does,” he said.
“But I do not wish to paint myself as a saint. I too have fine clothes, a decent car, and a house twice as large as I need.”
“I have all those things too,” he said. “Do you think less of me?”
She looked at him thoughtfully. “Sometimes I feel …” she hesitated.
“Like you can never do enough?”
She nodded.
“My investigations make me feel that way sometimes. It can be frustrating.”
“That reminds me, I have something for you.”
Antonelli retrieved a satchel and pulled out a stack of papers that were neatly clipped together.
“These are the load manifests you asked for. They cover the last five months. Please take them if it helps your investigation. I only ask that you return them when you are done. We must keep our records current to avoid funding cuts.”
“I’ll make sure it all gets back to you. And thanks for digging them out, I know you’re busy. I have to get back to the airfield now, but I’ll finish with that generator when the parts arrive. I also might be able to get your sterilizer working better if—”
“Dr. Antonelli!” a strident voice interrupted. A nurse came into the tent and rushed to Antonelli’s side. Eying Davis with caution, she leaned close and whispered into the doctor’s ear.
Antonelli closed her eyes. “Thank you,” she said in a soft voice.
The nurse disappeared.
Antonelli seemed to lose her focus, much as she had earlier.
He raised an inquisitive eyebrow. “Bad news?”
“Yes. The man I was treating when you first arrived, the dengue patient. He has died.”
“I’m sorry,” Davis said. He really was, but he wondered why she seemed so close to this case. Maybe she’d gotten to know the man. Maybe something deeper.
“Was he a friend?” he asked.
“Yes,” she replied, her voice shot with anguish.
Davis wanted to help her find strength. He said, “Regina, there are a lot of other patients here depending on you. Being staffed so thin — you are vital to their well-being.”
She looked up at him curiously, took a deep breath, and seemed to pull herself together. “Yes, I know. You are right. But perhaps I should have explained. The man who just died — he was the other doctor.”
Larry Green was at his desk, ten-mile run complete, by seven in the morning. It had been less than a day since he’d forwarded Davis’ requests to Darlene Graham, and answers were already coming in. This told him that the emphasis on finding the lost Blackstar drone hadn’t wavered one bit.
The information had again come by courier, and the papers in front of Green ranged in classification from CONFIDENTIAL to TOP SECRET. On top were the most recent satellite and radar images of the hangar outside KNIA, Khartoum International Airport. Green had seen a lot of surveillance in his day, and what he saw here didn’t add anything new. He leafed through the rest, flicking aside a CIA overview of Sudan’s political situation, along with a security assessment on the upcoming Arab League conference in Egypt. He guessed some wonk had thrown that in just to make the file seem a little more substantial. At the bottom of the stack he found a computer disc in a plastic case. A handwritten sticky note was attached:
Larry, Got this from a Navy cruiser that was in Gulf when FBN aircraft went down. Thought you might make something out of it. Still working on aircraft histories for the two tail numbers JD gave you and 121.5 records. DG
Green took the disc, which was dated September 20, the date of the accident, and slid it into the drive on his desktop computer. The screen came alive with a familiar picture, one Green recognized as a slight variation of other displays he’d seen. It was a radar tape, a digital record of what some Navy cruiser had been painting on the night of the crash. Green could see that certain data readouts and information bars at the top of the screen had been sanitized, blacked out electronically to mask sensitive information regarding the range and operational modes of the ship’s radar. The Navy might be helping, but turf wars were eternal.
Green oriented himself to the display and saw that north was up. There were no geographic boundaries drawn on the screen, but instead the references used by air traffic controllers — airspace boundaries. Green knew the general area in question, so the layout of the airspace made for a pretty clear picture. Egypt, Israel, Saudi Arabia, Sudan. For a pilot, these were hard lines you didn’t cross, not unless you either A: had the necessary authorizations and a carefully filed flight plan, or B: were in the mood for an armed fighter escort.
As the recording began, Green saw a dozen commercial flights floating across the screen, tiny white airplane symbols with blocked data tags to give their altitude, call sign, and airspeed. There were a handful of other aircraft on the screen, but data on these had been blacked out — once again, the Navy keeping itself to itself.