“No. It would be nicer. No taxes.” This response made it immediately obvious to Yousseff that Vijay did not have an inkling about the true nature of Yousseff’s enterprise. There was no hesitation whatsoever, no momentary struggle with principles or conscience. He smiled to himself at this show of youth.
After half an hour of haggling over details and payment, they had the deal sorted out. As Vijay was leaving, he finally nodded to Yousseff, who had not been introduced, but had not spoken a single word.
“Who is this man?” he asked, pointing to Yousseff.
“Ah, he’s a Pashtun peasant. The gardener. Does the landscaping around here. A friendly bastard — loyal but stupid,” said Marak, with an immense grin. “Dumb as a post.”
Yousseff held his tongue. Over the years he had become more and more obsessed with protecting his identity. Most days, in Pakistan or Afghanistan, he dressed as he had this particular day. Sometimes he would elevate himself to wearing jeans with an old sweater or perhaps an aging shirt. When the situation demanded it, he could easily pass for an aristocrat, but generally he avoided the Gucci outfits. He was the same way about the other aspects of his life. He was constantly hiding his identity, or changing it. He had Canadian, American, Mexican, Pakistani, and Afghani passports, all in different names. He disguised or hid his presence everywhere he went. This was also true of all his possessions. The legal ownership of the hangars, the properties, and the aircraft was characteristic of how Yousseff owned and operated any asset. His name was not associated in any way. There was a Byzantine system of trusts and numbered companies, with one owning the other, and controlling yet a third or even a fourth. If someone had the time, effort, and resources to apply, and had the political power or the skill to breach the seemingly impervious walls of security and nondisclosure found in places like Liechtenstein, Switzerland, and the Caymans, their search would still come to a dead end. Even if the thread of ownership could be untangled and divined from all of these legal devices, the ultimate owner of a company would be listed as Badr, Mustafa, Izzy, Ba’al, Marak, Rika, or any one of a dozen other individuals. The deeds and title documents of the vast poppy fields in Afghanistan held names other than Yousseff’s. “There is no such thing as ownership,” Yousseff would say from time to time. “There is only control.”
It seemed to Yousseff that he had always known that business had to be done in this obscure manner. That way there would be no paper trail, and less danger. By the time he reached his early 20s, he had taken care to become all but invisible, with business always being done through surrogates.
At the sound of Marak saying goodbye, Yousseff pulled his attention back into the office. The meeting was ending, and Marak was escorting Vijay to the door. Once he’d seen the young man out, Marak picked up the telephone and dialed a number. “Please come now,” was all he said. Ten minutes passed in silence, then there was a knock on the front door of the office. Yousseff directed Marak to open it and saw Mahari Dosanj, a rising star reporter with Al Jazeera. The young Mahari had one major shortcoming — he was married to a woman who spent money endlessly, no matter how he reprimanded her. He loved her deeply, but could not support her spending on the salary of a reporter. Far from it. He had descended precipitously into a death spiral of debt and was now flirting with bankruptcy. Most men would probably have left such a woman, but he could not imagine life without her. Yousseff had learned about these circumstances, and had decided that the time had come to exploit them.
An intense discussion soon started between Mahari and Marak. Mahari was not interested in what Marak had to say, and did not want to hear about the deal he was being offered by people he saw as lawless hooligans. Yousseff shrank noiselessly against a corner, allowing Marak to sort things out. After some threats and posturing on Marak’s part, Mahari finally realized that he was in tough with some scary people, and that there was no easy way out of the situation.
“Here is the first DVD,” said Marak in even tones. “It contains the first message. There will be a number of others. If you betray me, if you break your word on this, I will feed your body to the dogs, little bits at a time. While you watch. Do you understand what I’m telling you?”
“Yes, yes sir. Yes I do,” Mahari stuttered.
“I, or one of my men, will notify you of further messages,” continued Marak. “And with each, we will provide you with one of these briefcases, filled with American dollars. Each contains a quarter of a million, more or less. All that is required is that you take the message that we give you and get it on Al Jazeera airwaves immediately.”
Marak flipped the Samsonite briefcase open, and Mahari gazed hungrily at its contents. In the corner, a small smile curled around Yousseff’s lips. It was always the same, he thought. The hunger for mountains of money. This was $250,000 in cash, which Yousseff considered more of a millstone than anything else. He had, in his various houses and fortresses around the globe, rooms and barns full of the stuff. He couldn’t buy or expand businesses quickly enough to absorb it. And this man, this reporter, was willing to put his life and career in danger just to get his hands on it.
“Do we understand each other?” Marak repeated.
Mahari shifted uncomfortably in his chair. “Yes, we do. I will not betray you. But I do have a concern.”
“And that is…” said Marak softly.
“The Americans will come looking for me. They may find me. They may find this DVD and that will end all of this. I would be looking at a lifetime in some miserable Karachi jail cell.”
“I will protect you. If necessary, the police forces of both Islamabad and Rawalpindi will protect you. No harm will befall you. You have my word on this,” said Marak.
Mahari smiled weakly. He found little comfort in Marak’s disturbing eyes, and had been around long enough to know that he couldn’t trust people like this. Had he known what was happening to Zak Goldberg at that moment, he would have run screaming for the door.
“And what of this DVD here?” he asked, pointing to the silvery disc lying on the desktop. “When do I do the story for Al Jazeera?”
“Why, now of course. You have been paid. Deliver it to your employer. Do the story,” commanded Marak.
“And if I am pushed by anyone to reveal your name or identity?”
“It is journalist confidentiality. The Americans understand the concept very well. You protect your sources. And, as a further inducement, if you do not protect your sources, you will die. Slowly.” Marak hissed his last words.
“Yes. Thank you. I understand. I will be on my way, then,” said a shrinking Mahari. The young reporter was obviously aching to be out of the room.
“Oh, one more thing, Mahari,” said Marak. Mahari halted halfway out the door.
“Yes?”
“Do not throw that money around. Do not tell your woman. Stuff it away in a corner someplace. You can go wild with it once this project is done.”
Marak glanced at Yousseff at that point, and the two understood one another perfectly. Marak knew what his own task would be once the project was done. Mahari would never have the chance to spend any of the money.
“I will be careful, sir,” Mahari said, opening the outside door of the hangar and stepping out into the blazing August sun.
When the day finally grew dark, the meetings were concluded, and the last of the loose ends put together, Yousseff bid Marak farewell and boarded the sleek Gulfstream. “Let’s get to Karachi, Badr,” he said, settling into a soft leather reclining seat.
They taxied to the main runway and, after a short wait, roared down the strip and rocketed skyward. The familiar rush of power was as intoxicating as it had always been for Yousseff. But he wondered if the dual engines could be tweaked a bit more, to extract even more horsepower. He should broach the topic with Kumar.