Chapter 60
Sachs and Ercole sped to the refugee camp, about ten kilometers from downtown.
Sachs parked outside the camp, at the main gate, where they were greeted by Rania Tasso, who gestured them inside and hurried them through the congested spaces between the tents.
Breathing hard from the fast pace, Rania said, ‘As soon as you called, I sent our security people to seal all the exits. All around the perimeter. It’s secure. We have guards and police watching Fatima’s tent — they are being discreet, hiding nearby — and she has not come out... if she was inside. That we don’t know.’
‘Could she have left the camp?’
‘It’s possible, before we sealed it. As you asked, we haven’t been inside the tent or contacted her husband. He has not been seen either.’
After a fast walk to the center of the camp, Rania pointed. ‘This is the tent.’ Light blue, mud-spattered, several rips in the Tyvek. Laundry hung outside like semaphore flags on old-time ships. Only bedding and men’s outer clothing and children’s garments fluttered in the wind. Was that all that could be properly displayed to the world?
The tent door was closed. There were no windows.
A uniformed officer, very dark skin, dark eyes, sweat dripping from beneath his beret, joined them. He’d been watching from behind a stand offering water bottles.
‘Antonio? Have you seen inside?’
‘No, Signorina Rania. I don’t know if Fatima’s there or not. Or anyone else. No one has come in or out.’
Sachs opened her jacket, exposing the Beretta. Ercole unsnapped his holster.
Sachs said, ‘Ercole. I know what you’re thinking. She’s a woman and a mother. And may not be a hard-core terrorist. We don’t know what Ibrahim and Gianni are using as leverage to force her to do this. But we have to assume she’ll detonate the device in an instant if she thinks we’ll stop her. Remember: Shoot for her—’
‘Upper lip.’ He nodded. ‘Three shots.’
Rania was looking about her, her quick gray eyes reflecting both bright sun and her heart’s dismay. ‘Please be careful. Look.’
Sachs saw what the woman indicated: in a vacant area next to the tent a half-dozen women sat on impromptu seats like tires and railway ties and water cartons, holding babies. Other children — from ages two to ten, or so — ran and laughed, lost in their improvised games.
‘Clear the area as best you can. Quietly.’
Rania nodded to Anton and he reached for his radio.
‘No,’ Sachs said fast. ‘And turn the volume off.’
Both he and Rania silenced their units and gestured to other security people. The officers did their best to shepherd people away from the tent. As soon as the officers moved on, though, the empty space filled with the curious.
Sachs glanced at them. Well within stray bullet range.
Nothing to do about it.
She asked Rania about the layout of the interior of the tent. The woman replied from memory: clothes neatly folded in cardboard boxes against the right wall, a dining area to the left. Prayer rugs rolled and put away. Three beds — one for the adults, one for their daughter, and a spare. Separated by sheet-like dividers.
Hell, good cover.
And the daughter, Muna, had a number of toys given to the family by volunteers. Rania remembered them scattered on the floor. ‘Be careful not to trip.’
‘Suitcases or trunks that someone might hide behind?’
Rania gave a sad laugh. ‘Plastic bags and backpacks are the only luggage these people bring with them.’
Sachs touched Ercole’s arm and he looked down into her eyes. She was pleased to see his own were confident, balanced. He was ready. She whispered, ‘You go right.’
‘Destra, yes.’
Drawing her pistol, Sachs held her left index finger up in the air then pointed it forward. He too drew his Beretta and then she gestured to the door and, with a nod, pushed inside, moving very quickly.
Khaled Jabril gasped and dropped his glass of tea, which bounced on the Tyvek floor, scattering the steaming contents everywhere. Sachs stepped over the toys — and the boxes they had come in — and quickly swept aside the divider sheets. He was the only occupant.
Khaled recognized Sachs, of course, but he was still groggy and disoriented from the drugs. ‘Aiiii. What is this?’
Sachs motioned Rania inside, then said to Khaled, ‘Your wife. Where is she?’
‘I don’t know. What is going on here? Is she all right?’
‘Where did she go? And when?’
‘Please tell me! I’m frightened.’
It was clear he hadn’t known about his wife’s mission when he’d been interrogated, though Fatima might have explained later. But, after Sachs gave him a synopsis of Ibrahim and Gianni’s plan of using her as an apparent terrorist, it was clear he was taken completely aback.
His initial response was a gasp of horror. But then he was nodding. ‘Yes, yes, she has not been herself. She has not been acting in a normal manner. Someone forced her to do this!’
‘Yes, probably.’ Sachs crouched across from him and said in a firm tone, ‘Still she’s going to hurt people, Khaled. Help us. We need to find her. Is she in the camp?’
‘No. She left an hour ago. She was going to be buying some things for Muna. At the shop here in the camp or maybe at one of the vendors outside. I don’t know if she said more. She might have. After my incident, after what happened to me, my mind is very, you would say, uncertain. Confused.’
‘Does she have her phone?’
‘I suppose she does.’
‘Give me the number.’
He did and Charlotte McKenzie, listening over speaker, said, ‘Got it. I’ll send it to Fort Meade, see if they can track it.’
Sachs asked the refugee, ‘Do you remember if she’d met with anyone recently? Did anyone give her anything?’
He frowned. ‘Perhaps... Let me think.’ He actually tapped his forehead. ‘Yes. She got a package. It was tea from her family.’
Rania’s stern but pretty face tightened in a grimace. ‘Yes, I remember.’
He pointed to a locker. ‘I think she put it in there.’
Ercole opened the lid and handed Sachs a brown cardboard carton.
Sachs held the box to her nose.
A sigh.
‘This too,’ Ercole said. He’d found plastic wrapping for a cheap mobile phone, but not the label that gave the phone’s number or details of the sim card; Fatima had taken that with her.
Pulling on her headset, Sachs speed-dialed a number.
‘What?’ came the abrupt response. ‘We’ve been waiting.’
‘She’s not here, Rhyme. And she got a delivery: C4, maybe Semtex. Like the others, looks like a half kilo. And another phone. For the detonator.’
Mobile phones had supplanted timers and radios as the most popular way to set off explosive devices.
‘A bomb? Are we the target here?’ Rania asked Sachs in a grim voice.
Those in the Questura had heard and, after a brief discussion, Rhyme answered, ‘No, very unlikely. The whole point of the plot is to sabotage the immigration legislation in Parliament. That means Italian citizens have to be hurt, not refugees.’
Khaled found his own mobile and asked, ‘Should I call her? Try to talk her out of this madness?’
Rhyme and Spiro, she could hear, were debating this.
But McKenzie came on the line. ‘Never mind. Meade says it’s dead. They’ll keep monitoring but I’ll bet she tossed it.’ Then the woman said, ‘Wait. They’ve got something.’ There was a pause and Sachs could hear computer keyboard clatter. ‘This could be good. The NSA bot just logged a call to the coffeehouse in Tripoli from a burner mobile in Naples that was just activated this morning. It’s still live.’