And with that, Dobson opened the file.
Chapter 106
The first thing he held up was a color photograph, measuring roughly eight by ten. It could’ve been a head shot for a leading man, albeit one more suited for Bollywood than Hollywood.
“This is Dr. Prajeet Sengupta,” said Dobson, his exaggerated diction suggesting just a trace of xenophobia. He then read from the file in bullet-point fashion. “Born in India, educated here in the States. Stanford undergrad, Harvard Medical School. Currently a staff neuroscientist with the New Frontier Medical Institute in Bethesda, specializing in ionotropic and metabotropic receptor manipulation in the human brain.” Dobson paused, looked up. “If anyone knows what that actually means, be my guest.”
I didn’t. Not exactly. Still, it wasn’t hard to see where this was heading.
Sure enough, according to Dobson, Prajeet Sengupta was the missing link to the serum, the guy Karcher had used to turn Owen’s research into an injectable polygraph machine. One question, though, and I didn’t hesitate with it.
“How do you know this?” I interrupted.
Dobson nodded slightly as if he’d expected me to ask that. “Again, this isn’t for broadcast, but before the CIA could do its reconnaissance on Karcher’s apartment, including his hard drive, I got in there first.” He corrected himself with a raised palm. “Not me personally, but a special investigator with the FBI. Working unofficially, of course.”
All the while, Dobson was still holding up the picture of Sengupta. It was a posed photograph, most likely taken on behalf of the medical institute where the doctor worked. I could picture the website, complete with a glowing bio underneath his good looks and warm smile. Nowhere would his moonlighting efforts be mentioned.
Then — poof! — he was gone.
Dobson lowered the photo, only to lift another one from the file. Exhibit B, apparently.
“Now meet Arash Ghasemi,” he said.
The only thing the two pictures had in common was the size. Instead of a posed head shot, this one was courtesy of a zoom lens from an angle that suggested the photographer was somewhere in the Middle East he really shouldn’t have been. Black-and-white and a bit grainy, it was still clear enough to tell that Ghasemi was the opposite of Sengupta in the looks department. More to the point, Ghasemi had pretty much been hit by the ugly stick. Repeatedly.
Again, Dobson read from the file. “Born in Iran, educated in the States. Stanford undergrad; MIT graduate program, nuclear science and engineering. Then, days after accepting a job with General Atomics in San Diego, he suddenly split town and returned to Iran.”
The subtext of that last sentence was crystal clear. Arash Ghasemi was now working for the Iranian nuclear program.
Less clear was whether it was by choice. And even less clear than that was what this Iranian nuclear engineer had to do with Sengupta, the Indian neuroscientist.
Until I replayed Dobson’s descriptions of the two in my head. Word for word. And the one word — the one school — he’d mentioned twice.
“Stanford,” I said.
“Very good, Mr. Mann. You win the Samsonite luggage,” said Dobson. “You see, this is a tale of two roommates.”
Chapter 107
He had it all right there in the file, right down to the actual dorm where they first met freshman year. Arroyo House in Wilbur Hall.
Prajeet Sengupta and Arash Ghasemi had become fast friends at Stanford. Put them most anywhere else in the world and they had little in common. Under the bright glare of a California sun, however, they might as well have been brothers. Two strangers thrown together in a strange land.
By sophomore year they had become roommates, all but inseparable, including rushing Sigma Chi together.
“And if you’re looking for a reason why Ghasemi trusted Sengupta so much — even twenty years later — look no further than that fraternity,” said Dobson.
The handsome and more gregarious Sengupta had been tapped to pledge. But Ghasemi had been passed over. That is, until Sengupta made it very clear that they were a package deal. Sigma Chi couldn’t get one without the other.
Of course, who the hell was some pledge to be making a demand like that?
“A pretty damn clever one,” said Dobson. “In true frat-boy fashion, Sengupta challenged the rush chair to a drinking contest — shot for shot, last man standing. If Sengupta won, Ghasemi could become a brother. And if he lost? That was the clever part. The rush chair outweighed the skinny kid from Bangalore by nearly a hundred pounds. It wasn’t a fair fight. How could he ever lose?”
But he did.
Dobson smiled. “Like I said, it wasn’t a fair fight. Sengupta, who was premed at the time, had injected himself with a derivative of a drug called iomazenil. Apparently, it binds the alcohol receptors in the brain. In other words, it’s a binge drinker’s dream come true.” Dobson pointed at me. “Okay, now this is where you ask me that question again, Mr. Mann. How do I know this?”
For sure, I was about to. Not Valerie, though. She’d been around the block a few times in the world of intelligence gathering. All she could do was sigh in a way that had only one translation. We live in a very complicated world.
“CIA or NIA?” she asked Dobson.
“Both,” he answered. Then he explained.
Not long after Ghasemi returned to Iran — against his will — to work for the Iranian nuclear program, Sengupta was recruited by the National Investigation Agency of India, the NIA. This was at the urging of the CIA based on the greatest shared interest the US and India have as two nuclear powers: making sure Iran doesn’t become one as well.
“Sengupta knew that his good friend Ghasemi was miserable back in his homeland of Iran,” Dobson continued. “Iranians might despise what they see as US hegemony, but they do so having never spent time in this country. But Ghasemi had. We weren’t the enemy.”
I listened to Dobson, almost dizzy. It was hard enough to keep track of the names, let alone the motives and inferences.
Valerie might have had the pole position, but I was finally up to speed.
Ghasemi was giving Sengupta, his good friend and former roommate, Iranian nuclear secrets.
Dobson took another sip of coffee before leaning forward, his words coming slowly. “I understand you’ve lost someone very close to you, Mr. Mann, and that undoubtedly you want justice. I sure would. But I’m afraid justice means exposing Sengupta, and that would mean no more connection with Ghasemi. Thanks to that relationship, our government currently knows more about the Iranian nuclear program than the Supreme Leader himself. And I wish it were hyperbole when I say that the fate of the world could very well depend on that relationship continuing.”
Yes, indeed. We live in a very complicated world.
I wasn’t sure what I was going to say, only that it was something. Perhaps a feeble attempt to strike some sort of “justice bargain,” the way I used to with prosecutors after I went to the dark side, as Claire liked to call it, and became a defense attorney.
But before I could even push out the first word, the door of Dobson’s office opened. It was his secretary.
“I’m sorry to interrupt, but there’s—”
Dobson cut her off. “I said no calls, Marcy.”
“I know, but it’s not for you. It’s for Mr. Mann,” she said. “Apparently, it’s an emergency. Someone named Winston Smith?”