Mancur appeared reasonably composed to Holmes. Not remarkably so, but he wasn’t screaming or weeping inconsolably. The deputy director had seen plenty of that in recent years. Mancur also made no stupid attempt to resist or verbally stand up to the staff, which was smart. Holmes had to watch a potential operative under the most abject pressure, particularly when there was so little time to vet him for an assignment that would challenge the most hardened, experienced spy. He wanted to see for himself if Mancur was tough enough to survive, but the deputy director wasn’t alone. NSA psychiatrist Dr. Paul Williamson sat to his right, Agent Candace Anders to his left.
All three watched the screen as Tire Iron tried to raise Mancur’s stress levels even more:
“Some guys are such nail biters,” the guard said to the detainee, “especially after they’re in here awhile, that we really have to dig down in there to get a hold of them. You’re cool, though.”
Holmes watched Mancur swallow. His Adam’s apple rode high. Dr. Williamson toyed with the arm of his clear glass frames. In the light, they looked as white as his closely cropped hair. Agent Anders bit her lower lip, a nervous habit that Holmes had noted.
“Any quick thoughts?” Holmes asked Williamson.
“Not yet,” the psychiatrist replied. “Let’s see how he does in a moment. How far are you going to go with him down there?”
“Depends on how much he can take,” Holmes replied. He glanced at Agent Anders. Her eyes were on the screen, where it looked like Mancur was about to speak up.
That drew the psychiatrist’s interest. Williamson leaned forward, studying Mancur’s stark demeanor intensely. But Tire Iron reached down and cupped the man’s privates, and whatever the detainee might have said was silenced. Then the guard smirked at the camera in the ceiling and stage-whispered, “We’ve got plenty of play with this one. Enough to work with, that’s for sure.”
He turned back to Mancur, offering a quick squeeze that made him moan. “Some fat guys make it tough as shit to get in there and work around. We find a way, believe me, but we like you lean ones. But those fat guys don’t run marathons, do they? Not like you.” Tire Iron was chuckling when he added, “I’ll bet you wish you could just take off running right now. But here’s the thing, Mancur, you are about to begin the longest, hardest marathon of your life. You will never forget it, trust me. And guess what? The whole thing is going to happen right… in… this… room.”
He smacked the top of Mancur’s head with each of his last four words. Then the guard gave a thumbs-up to the camera. Rap music blasted into the room. Both guards walked out.
Holmes turned to Williamson and Anders, saying simply, “Here we go. Let’s see how he does.”
“Let’s see if he lasts,” Williamson said, “given the conventions of the trade.”
The psychiatrist was alluding not just to the rap music but to the fact that it signaled that every act they were about to witness, no matter how degrading, would conform to popular ideas of American torture. Those were the images that seethed with an arsenal of memories and misgivings for a man like Mancur, who would have seen the photos of Abu Ghraib and had read accounts of torture, according to the ongoing analyses of his computers. The “practitioners,” as the torturers were delicately called by some agents, knew that no surprise could possibly rival the deepest fears already known to a man or woman.
The conventions of the trade? Holmes marveled over the Orwellian world he inhabited. He wondered if Williamson had even noticed the irony when he said those words.
The acoustics were horrendous. Intentionally so, Ruhi figured. He could scarcely think, with the furious rap ripping apart his ears.
Above him, the spotlight began to flicker. So did the one lighting the tub, where they would no doubt waterboard him before they were done for the day. For seconds he harbored hope of a power outage—The big one, now!
The room did go black, but not silent. It stayed completely dark for more than a minute before light from a strobe exploded all around him. His eyelids could just as well have been made of tissue paper, for all the protection they provided.
He tried clenching them shut, and that helped marginally. He would have kept them in that frantic lockdown — if he hadn’t heard that growl again.
He looked around, spotting the big black German shepherd lunging at the end of his leash by the door. The beast’s eyes, pinned on Ruhi, blazed in the strobe light.
His handler stepped in a second later, locking up behind him. The man wore dark goggles and had to use both hands to restrain the crazed animal, whose carnivorous impulses might have been thrust into overdrive by the assault on its eyes and ears.
To Ruhi’s horror, the handler began to feed out the leash inch by inch.
The animal clawed the concrete floor, lunging with all its might. Twice the power of the dog’s exertions earned it a foot or more of lead before the grimacing handler regained control. He looked severely tested by the creature, whose jaws worked wildly and were lit in nightmarish, freeze-frame fashion by the unrelenting strobe.
Ruhi struggled to force down a scream. It was almost unbearable to end up in the grip of American torture, but worse to give in so easily.
He squeezed his eyes shut again; the strobe seemed to paralyze his thinking.
The dog’s paws landed on his legs like clubs. Ruhi could not avoid its rank breath. He twisted his head to the side as far as he could, only to feel moist heat and spittle on his skin.
Even over the rap blistering his ears, Ruhi heard those teeth snapping, now only an inch away.
Holmes stepped closer to the monitor, so close he might have been studying the pores in Mancur’s face. “Keep the shot tight,” he called to a small black speaker.
The screen filled with the side of Mancur’s face as he strained to keep his features away from the dog.
“Back the dog off,” Holmes ordered.
In two seconds, the creature was pulled off Ruhi.
“Keep backing up,” Holmes directed.
The camera lens widened to include the handler and canine retreating to the door.
“No. Stay tight on Mancur.” Holmes sounded exasperated.
The camera zoomed in just as the detainee looked up and yelled, “Fuck you!” to the observers he must have guessed were watching him. He could not be heard above the rap, but it was impossible not to read his lips.
Holmes turned to Dr. Williamson and Agent Anders. The deputy director’s face was lit up with a smile.
“Did you see that? That’s good news.”
“If you want defiance,” Williamson said, “you just got it, in spades.”
Holmes agreed. “I’ll let you get going on the microanalysis of his nonverbals. From the time they got off the elevator down there.”
“You’ll have it,” the psychiatrist said. “We had three teams watching him.”
“Fine. I’ll see you”—Holmes glanced at his watch—“in about three hours, then.”
After Williamson left, Holmes turned his attention to Candace Anders, whose lower lip now looked chewed. “Okay, what’s your gut check?”
“I’m surprised,” she said.
“A little shaken?” Holmes asked.
“Yes,” she acknowledged. “I am, sir.”
“Because you care for him?”
She nodded. “But I think it would have been hard to take anyway. That was, well, scary.”
“Yes, it was. What surprised you?” Holmes asked her.
“He handled it better than I thought he would.”
“My thoughts exactly.”
“It almost makes me wonder if he was gaming me when we were under attack in his building. And that makes me wonder if he was tough enough to take part in the attack on the country.”