The car doors opened, and three men carrying AK-47s got out. The men frisked Marzak and relieved the professor of his satellite phone, then blind-folded both men and gestured for them to get in the back of the car, squeezed tightly with a guard on either side. The professor felt the car bump along for a short while, then the ride smoothed out as they left the field for a road. Fifteen minutes later the car stopped again, and they were told to get out.
The men grabbed them by their shoulders and guided them a short distance. When their blindfolds were removed, the professor saw that they were in a windowless room furnished with a small table and three wooden chairs.
The man sitting behind the table had black hair neatly cut and parted, and a short wiry beard. He was dressed in a conservative western-style black suit and wore a white shirt and no tie.
He had small delicate hands, warm, dark eyes and a soft-spoken manner. He wore no traditional headdress, suggesting that he was urban and educated, which he confirmed when he said he that they could call him the Doctor. “I am pediatrician,” he said, unnecessarily adding, “I treat children.”
He told his guests to have a seat and poured glasses of tea from a pitcher.
He acknowledged Saleem with a nod of his head.
“You must be the professor.” Then he looked at Marzak. “And you are the Jeweler.”
The professor sensed something unspoken pass between the men. Marzak’s half smile grew into a broad grin, as if he had suddenly recognized an old friend in a crowd. A chill ran down the professor’s spine.
“Thank you for coming all this way,” the Doctor said. “We appreciate the work on the Prophet’s Necklace that you and your brother have been doing for us. I’m sorry he is not with you. Is he well?”
“No,” Marzak said, with no change in expression. “He is dead.”
The man’s heavy mono-brow formed a V. “I am sorry to hear that. An accident?”
“In a manner of speaking. He was killed during the course of an assignment.”
“By an American?”
“Yes. I’m sorry, but I’m not allowed to provide more details.”
“Let me tell you something,” the Doctor said. “When you first made contact and offered to serve us I thought it might be a CIA trick, even after you killed an enemy of ours to persuade us of the sincerity of your intentions. You were mercenaries, working for money, and you were not of the Faith.”
“I have no faith,” Marzak said.
“That is not important now. We are kin, bound together by blood. The Americans killed my brother, too,” the Doctor said. “And his wife and children. The cowards sent their drone airplane to bomb their house. That is how I came to be in the Shadows. We have all had friends or family killed by the Americans. Our goal is revenge.”
“A laudable goal, Doctor.”
“We have watched failure after failure. The shoe bomber. The underwear bomber. Pitiful attempts by amateurs. Then came the assassination of Bin Laden. We feel that if we do not act, we will become irrelevant. Which is why we are so interested in your plan. Please bring me up to date on the necklace.”
“The clasp can be connected at any time. The strands run from coast to coast. There are a half dozen beads. Each one represents a location where large numbers of people gather. An explosive device in an innocent form has been hidden in each place. When the explosive is activated, it will spread sarin over a large area. Ingestion through the lungs or skin contact will be fatal.”
Sarin.
The professor folded his arms in front of him in an attempt to hide his trembling hands. He needn’t have worried, because the two men were deep into a discussion of the physiological effects of the deadly chemical nerve agent. He knew that sarin was 500 times more potent than cyanide and that it worked on humans the same way bug spray killed insects, but with more horrible effects leading to death.
As a member of an elite intelligence service, the professor had been exposed to the venality of every type of human behavior, ranging from suicide bombers who killed children to political assassins who killed women. But as he sat in the small room listening to a quiet discussion of how to murder scores of people, he knew he had never before been in the presence of such evil incarnate.
“How many casualties do you estimate?” the Doctor said.
“Impossible to say, but it will keep the undertakers busy for a long while.”
The Doctor closed his eyes, a beatific smile on his face, then opened them. “The simple purity of your plan is appealing. How will you trigger simultaneous explosions?”
“I will call a certain telephone number and enter a code that will activate the explosions at the same second. Just give me the signal and it will be done.”
“As soon as we acquire the treasure.” The Doctor stared at the professor, as if reading his thoughts. “I understand that our plans must be daunting to consider.”
Saleem knew better than to lie, outright.
“They are very ambitious. I worry about people of Pakistan origin who live in the U.S. and might be harmed.”
“We have considered that,” the Doctor said. “Those people have gone over to the infidels. They have become one with them in life and so shall they be in death.”
The professor nodded.
“But don’t think we are murderers. We merely want to cripple the United States. It’s like disfiguring a man’s wife in front of her husband to teach him a lesson in humility. Marzak understands, don’t you?”
“With crystal clarity, Doctor,” Marzak said.
The professor’s mouth felt as if he had eaten sand. His legs wanted to carry him far away from these two madmen, but he willed his facial muscles to show no hint of the emotions roiling inside his chest.
“Have no fear. I understand as well,” he said.
“Good. Now that Marzak is here we will pursue our immediate objective.”
“I have contracted for an assault team I’ve used in other assignments,” Marzak said. “Pulling together the dive team was a little more difficult, but I have four divers with combat and salvage experience. We will have three Bell Cobra helicopters and a transport helicopter.”
“What do you think?” The Doctor asked Saleem. “Enough to do the job?”
“More than enough,” the professor replied. “The Cobras are devastating weapons.”
“Good. An assault force made up of tribesmen has arrived at a staging area closer to the target,” the Doctor said. “While the Cobras deal with Amir Kahn, your divers will go into the lake to retrieve the treasure. The Cobras will also come in handy should the American mission arrive.”
“A sound military strategy,” Saleem said. “Since we are footing the bill for this mission, ISI maintains operational control, but I will try to stay in the background as an observer.”
“Yes, yes,” the Doctor said. “I’m sure the arrangement will work out fine, aren’t you, Mr. Marzak?”
Marzak said, “As long as there is no interference with military decisions.”
“Of course. We owe a great deal to the ISI,” the Doctor said to Saleem. “Without the intelligence service we would not have known that the Americans were sending an expedition of their own. You and the Jeweler will be our guests tonight and fly out tomorrow to an advance base.”
The meeting was over.
The Doctor called in a guard to show the guests to their quarters. Saleem was glad to see that his room had a bathroom with a working shower. He stripped and turned the shower up to full. He didn’t know if he could wash evil away with cold water, but he tried.
As he toweled himself dry he realized that he had fulfilled the first part of his assignment faster than he could have imagined. He had important details of the Prophet’s Necklace, but without his phone he had no way to share the intelligence with his cousin. He stared at the blank walls of his room, and although he was not a religious man, he began to pray for a miracle.