“Yes, as well as a Pakistani one.”
“May we know under what name?”
Haaris laughed softly, and for just an instant McGarvey thought he recognized it. “‘The Messiah’ will suffice for now; it is the people’s choice.”
“One definition of the word is a zealous leader of a cause,” McGarvey pressed.
“I think that the people had in mind the deliverer they’d hoped for.”
“A deliverer of what?”
“Not of what but from what,” Haaris said. “From the strife that has torn this country apart for most of its history. Before we can expect to be at peace with the world we must first be at peace with ourselves.”
“Does that include India?”
Rajput bridled, but Haaris held him off with a gesture. “Especially India.”
“And the U.S.?”
“I wasn’t aware that we were at war with your country,” Haaris said. “I rather thought that we were partners in the war against terrorists.” He looked at the mufti. “A war that has gone on entirely too long, at a cost so dear it hurts us all.”
“Peace, you say,” McGarvey said. “That was begun with the beheading of Pakistan’s properly elected president, and the suicide or possible assassination of the prime minister?”
“Both of them were corrupt,” Rajput answered. “We have proof that both of them were siphoning aid money, for their own purposes, that we were receiving from the U.S.”
“Wouldn’t it have better suited your purpose to arrest them and place them on trial?”
“No,” Haaris said. “Pakistan was in dramatic trouble; a dramatic solution was needed to get the people’s attention.”
“By ‘dramatic trouble,’ are you referring to the nuclear event near Quetta? It’s thought that perhaps the Taliban hijacked a nuclear weapon that was being moved and somehow set it off.”
“We’re investigating that possibility. But there have been other attacks, as you well know. Attacks on the military headquarters, the killing of innocent citizens. Suicide bombers. Tribal warfare along the border with Afghanistan. The list is long.”
“Why do you think that the U.S. ordered the strikes against Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal? And why has it been kept out of the press? There must have been many casualties on both sides.”
None of the three men seemed to be affected by the question. But Haaris took a long time to answer.
“I’m told that you may be a journalist, but that the CIA’s chief of station here claims that you are a rogue CIA analyst who’s come to trade information for asylum.”
“He’s wrong,” McGarvey said.
Again Haaris took his time in responding. “I expect he might be, but I don’t know his reasons, except that you are probably an NOC, perhaps even freelance. But here to do what, exactly? Something beyond your orders, making you a rogue operator but of a different sort than he suggests?”
“Have you heard of a man by the name of David Haaris?”
If any of them reacted, it could have been Rajput, but the changes in his expression and demeanor were so slight as to be scarcely noticeable.
“No, is it significant?” Haaris asked.
“General Rajput certainly knows him. They’ve worked together for several years, from what I was told.”
“Told by whom?” Rajput asked, the look on his face deadpan.
“A CIA insider whose name I can’t mention, for his own protection. Haaris worked in a section called the Pakistan Desk and came here often.”
“You do work for the CIA,” Rajput said.
“I’m not on the CIA’s payroll,” McGarvey replied calmly.
Haaris again held Rajput off. “I believe that Mr. Parks is telling the truth, so far as it goes. But why,” he turned to McGarvey, “are you here at this moment? What does Mr. Haaris have to do with me?”
“Perhaps nothing, but he went to London several days ago and has disappeared.”
“And you were sent to find him?”
“No, that would be up to the CIA. I was merely told he’d disappeared and it was presumed that he would naturally come here to find out what was going on. I’d like to interview him, and I’d hoped that General Rajput might lead me to him.”
“What do you think I can do to help you find him?” Haaris asked.
“Nothing, sir. But you’re news, so I figured that I could kill two birds with one stone — find a clue to Haaris’s whereabouts and interview you.”
“I think that you are a liar,” Haaris said. “This interview is at an end. It’s time that you leave Pakistan while you still can.”
McGarvey got to his feet. “Thank you, gentlemen, I believe that I got most of what I came for.”
The side door opened and two armed men dressed in the uniforms of the Secretariat Security Service, their pistols drawn, came in.
“You’re under arrest, Dr. Parks,” Rajput said.
“On what charge?”
“Espionage.”
FORTY-NINE
The gruff flight sergeant gently touched Pete’s shoulder and she came awake instantly. His name was Bert Cauley and he’d been the attendant for her and the other two passengers who were last-minute additions to the staff at the British embassy. On the flight over they’d mostly stayed to themselves. They’d been told that she was CIA.
“We’re forty minutes out, ma’am,” Cauley said. “You have a call, but you might want to come forward to take it. You’ll have a little more privacy.”
Pete went forward to the Citation’s tiny galley just aft of the cockpit, where Cauley took the phone from its hook on the bulkhead, pressed one of the buttons and handed it to her.
“It’s a secure circuit,” Cauley said, and he went aft.
The copilot reached back and closed the cockpit door.
“Yes?” Pete said. She was afraid that it was trouble. She looked at her watch which she had set to Pakistan time just after they’d lifted off. It was a few minutes before midnight.
“Mac is missing,” Otto said.
Something clutched at her heart, and she closed her eyes. “Are you sure?”
“The battery was removed from his phone six hours ago, but he’s done it before to avoid detection if he got into a bad spot. But it’s worse than that. I didn’t want bother you before, but now it looks like you could be walking into a tornado.”
“I’m listening.”
“It’s Ross Austin. He told Rajput that Mac — as Travis Parks — is a CIA analyst sent out to find the Messiah’s identity and the man’s agenda.”
“Goddamnit to hell, Otto. Why? What the bleeding Christ is wrong with the bastard?”
“He’s friends with Susan Kalley, the president’s national security adviser. Apparently she sidestepped Page and contacted Austin directly. Told him that the president had called off the deal with McGarvey and they wanted him out of there immediately.”
“Page could have talked to him.”
“It wouldn’t have done any good, and you know it,” Otto said. “Austin told Rajput that military aid was on the line and that the CIA wanted Mac arrested and turned over to him personally for immediate deportation back to the States.”
Pete felt a glimmer of hope. “Maybe that’d be for the best after all.”
“There’s more,” Otto said, and he sounded worried. “Mac went to the Secretariat and bullied his way into Rajput’s office as Haaris and a TTP rep were marching up Constitution Avenue. He wanted to interview not only the PM but the Messiah as well.”
“If Haaris was told that Mac was a CIA analyst it’s more than possible he’d know that was a lie. The son of a bitch knows just about everyone on Campus. And he’d have to think that Mac was there to spy on him and maybe even assassinate him.”