Abigail – The Avenging Agent: The agent appears again (53 page)

            The
matter of Timmy was raised at a meeting of the Organization.

            “Someone
has to replace him as the program cannot be stopped because of one person.”

            “What
about Michael, his father?  Perhaps he can continue the surveillance and support
of the ‘Noodle’?”  San suggested.  “I shall invite him here today.”

            “Are
you certain?  I don’t think he is up to it.”

            And,
indeed, Michael did not agree to come.  He made various excuses, but an hour
later he appeared at the office, sat down with an expressionless demeanor.

            “Michael,
we thought it might be meaningful to you to complete the assignment that Timmy
began,” Barak explained, hoping to arouse his interest.  Michael blew his nose
in response.

            “Just
because the job is so important, it seems to me that you should take someone
else, someone whose spirit is stronger than mine.”  He looked at those present
and then added a second later:

            “But,
tell me what Timmy was supposed to do.”

            “He
was expected to reach the ship “Ankara” to accompany the ‘Noodle’ on the
assignment.  Lucy will also go there.  But, we understand, for you it is
difficult.”

            “Hey,
I am finished.” He stopped and suddenly his voice broke.

            “Do
you want to hear my truth? I don’t see that Timmy’s death served any purpose. 
It was just a waste of life, and for what?!” 

            He
raised his voice and when Barak laid his hand on his arm, he shouted even
louder.

            “No,
don’t try and placate me.  I tell you that all is vanity.  They will continue
hitting us, we will attempt to outsmart them, we will lose people who are dear
to us and…”

            “Stop,
Michael, go home, we will talk some other time,” and, in his heart of hearts he
thought it was a great mistake to bring Michael here today.

            “No,
you see you haven’t understood? Perhaps I said things that didn’t suit you, but
it’s the truth and it’s the reason I’m informing you that I am resigning from
the organization.”

            Barak
sighed.  He didn’t know how to tell him that there is no such thing as a resignation
from the ‘Mossad.' He would belong to it forever and it was impossible to stop
and get off the merry go round.  He stared at Michael and added in a casual
tone:

            “Once
in the ‘Mossad’ – always in the ‘Mossad.'”

            Michael
laughed drily.

            “Yes
there was a movie like that and, if I’m not mistaken it was called “Once a
thief – always a thief.”

            “Precisely,”
Barak commented, “I was just afraid that you would say: “The thief’s end is to swing
on the gallows” and San completed his remarks adding:

            “That’s
also true, but it’s a different movie.”

Michael stood up exhausted and walked
towards the door and before he went out, he said:

“I wanted to tell you something about
Lucy, who found Timmy.  She said she came too late to help, so I want to let
her know that she did help.  So, tell her that…” his face grew red and he
turned his face away from them and left.

San said:  “I understood him.  He was
suggesting that we give the job to Naima.”

“I
also think so.  It’s a big job.”

*
* *

            Abigail
reached the port at ten o’clock at night.

            She
waited till eleven o’clock when, according to the plan, she was to board the
ship, ‘Ankara’ and set sail for Turkey.  She had not been updated with an
important fact.  Karma, her husband, was also supposed to board the same ship
with his motor car.

            Her
assignment was to meet with a Turkish agent and receive instructions and
material in preparation for an operation named “Water”.  What she knew was that
she had been appointed to deal with the issue of the ‘heavy water’ that flows
in the Iranian reactors.

            “I
hope you took into account that I will be giving birth to my son at the new
location.”

            “No,
that wasn’t taken into consideration.”

            She
exhaled and thought what she should say when she heard the answer.

            “It
will happen long before he is born.”         

“Just don’t forget that you will board
the ship that sails at eleven o’clock. Come early, in case there are any last-minute
changes.”

            “I’ll
be there,” she confirmed.

            Now
Abigail waited in the Italian Gulf, on the shores of the Adriatic Sea.

            An
off-putting odor of sewage wafted in the air and drunken singing came from a
nearby building. Even under cover of dark, there was much milling around and
through the windows she saw figures in a haze of cigarette and cannabis smoke. 
She yawned and listened disinterestedly to an argument between a client and a
yellow-haired prostitute wearing cut-off shorts that revealed long shapely
thighs. Nearby, the arm of a crane unloaded a pallet piled with sacks.  It laid
them on a wooden surface, then turned back to the loaded deck of the ship, that
rolled on the swell of the water near the pier.

            A
young man appeared out of nowhere leading a long-eared donkey to the palette of
sacks and loaded two of them on his donkey’s back.  Suddenly a slim fellow came
on the scene.  He ran holding an unsheathed knife in his extended hand and
plunged it into the sack on top. A white substance began flowing out of it into
a vessel he pushed beneath it. The owner of the donkey wielded a stick at him
and a noisy squabble broke out between them, but no one intervened.  The two of
them fell on the ground, fighting wildly until one of them shouted a
bloodcurdling scream.  The skinny guy got up from the ground, picked up the
vessel which already filled to the brim and ran away with it like a madman. 
The donkey owner was left lying in the field, a rivulet of blood flowing from
his leg onto the filthy earth.

            A
policeman appeared out of one of the alleys and bent over the fellow writhing
on the ground and Abigail raised her brow in surprise.  She tried to find where
the policeman had come from and wondered if there were more policeman in the
area of the port.

            As
he speeded to the harbor, Karma knew that he only ten minutes left till the
ship was set to sail and he estimated that he still needed another twenty
minutes to get there.  He stopped on the roadside and called Ian’s phone
number, which he had received two days earlier when the two men had delivered this
car to him.  He didn’t know that the man was on the ferry, his car was soon to be
loaded on.

            Ian’s
phone rang at his waist and vibrated against his skin. Since he was preoccupied
for the moment getting the last cars loaded on board the ferry, he ignored it
and did not pick up the call.  At that moment, Ian was directing a
dreary-looking ‘Lada’ to continue on the short bridge leading to the ferry when
the telephone on his hip rang again.

            “Yes,”
he answered impatiently.

            “Hello
Ian, I’m about twenty kilometers from the port with a car that is sailing on
the ‘Ankara.'  Please wait for me.”

            “Fine,”
he blurted out.  “I’ll wait for five minutes and don’t call here again.”

            For
a second, he thought about what car was being referred to and who the caller
was.  He put the phone back on his hip and continued directing the last vehicles,
without giving the matter any further thought.

            About
five kilometers from them was the gigantic ship ‘Ankara’, waiting for the cars
on this ferry to be loaded on it.

            When
Karma entered the area of the port, Abigail was sitting on a large rock on the
pier. She gazed with no particular interest in the silver luxury car that
slowed down and progressed towards the ferry loaded with cars.  The light that
shone out of the windows of the bar illuminated the face of the driver inside
and then she tensed.  It was Karma, her husband, and with that, things became apparent
to her.  She understood that he was the man who was delivering the “Bentley” that
was identical to the one Timmy had sat in.  She also recalled that it contained
a bomb set to explode at a quarter past eleven.

            At
first she froze and a second later she got up and screamed his name, but he
didn’t hear her and didn’t turn towards her.  Suddenly, two people approached
her, caught her arms and pulled her back.  One of them covered her mouth.  She
bit his hand and kicked him wildly and heard him yell out in pain but then,
felt a prick in her arm, her muscles relaxed and everything went dark.  The two
men dragged her to a car and drove off at once, making their way between
hundreds of vehicles in the bustling plaza of the port.

            “Is
she alright?”

            “Yes,
Michael, just a little sleepy.”

            The
change in the assignment and the personnel occurred two days after the meeting
at the office.  Michael approached and asked to be added to the team of
“Operation Bentley,” especially after he understood that Naima was also a
member.  Meanwhile, changes were made to the plan because Effendi Khaidar had
been killed by the Italian police.

            “Did
you cancel?” Michael asked, “Because Khaidar was killed?  What about Lucy? You
said she was involved in this.”

            “Correct,
she’s on her way to the ship, ‘Ankara,' to prepare for the operation.” And he
said nothing more.

            “Hey,
did you consider that she might meet up with her husband, the ‘Noodle,' at the
port?”

            “Of
course,” San remarked, “That’s why you’re going there to arrange to keep them
apart.”

            He
ignored Barak’s surprised expression because, just on this second, he got the
idea that it was with his approval.  Now he understood that they had forgotten a
possible meeting of the couple at the port.  However, then a problem arose.

            “We
should remove the bomb from the car that is parked at the Italian hotel and, of
course, not inform the ‘Noodle’ about it.”

            “Correct,”
Barak confirmed.

A
spark of light appeared in San’s only eye and he was enthusiastic.

            “That
means that the ‘Noodle’ will set out as planned to the port, not knowing that the
bomb in his car is about to explode.  He will board the ‘Ankara’ in the Italian
Gulf and will disappear in the Turkish-Gulf, alive and well.”

            “Bravo!”
Foxy added, “The man will finally be frozen and, perhaps, we can bring him to
Israel, eh?”

            Barak
threw him a surly glance and they all chuckled.  They all knew very well that
Barak was in love with the agent.

            “What’s
up!?” Michael teased him, “His wife is pregnant.  He deserves time off from the
grind till the birth of the Kurdish Crown Prince,” and he laughed when he saw
Barak squirming in his chair.

            Of
course, they didn’t know that after Effendy disappeared from the area the
members of ‘Kaukab’ had changed their plan and decided to kill Karma.

            In
the Italian port, Karma continued driving the “Bentley” and progressed slowly
up the bridge to the ferry.  As soon as Ian noticed the car and the driver he
turned to one side and sent a message to Aziz, the man who had replaced Rulam
in the organization.

“The
Kurd has just arrived in his car.”

            The
response was immediate.

“Lose
him.”

            Ian
didn’t waste a moment to think.  He bent down behind the rear wheels of the
silver car and removed the metal strip that prevents the car from slipping backward.

            The
ferry that was loaded with vehicles drew closer to the ship ‘Ankara’ and the
bridge was slowly extended from the gaping opening in its stern and connected
to it.  The cars drove over the bridge and one after another disappeared into
the hold of the ship.  The luxury silver car was the last in the line and when
the ferry was empty and the last car had been swallowed by the gigantic gaping
mouth of the ship, Ian was standing two meters from Karma.

            He
put his hand in his trouser pocket and fired only one round from his revolver,
almost without aiming and using a silencer.  He saw the flinching of his
shoulder and the look of surprise on the face of the driver inside.

            Without
the reinforcement and the brake on the wheels, the car began to roll back and
Ian pressed the sole of his shoe on the headlight and pushed hard.  He watched
how it slipped back, its undercarriage hit the end of the bridge and
overturned.  With the four wheels faced upwards, it floated initially for a few
seconds and sank as large bubbles were released and burst on the surface of the
water.  Within ten seconds, even the silhouette of the car was gone.

            Ian
raised his arm ordering the bridge to be rolled into the ship and the closing
of the opening. He transmitted a short message:

“It’s
all in the water.”

       
The
response on his telephone was:

“Well
done!”

            One
of the workers on the shore saw the car overturn into the water and screamed on
top of his voice.  An emergency assistance raft was quickly sent to the scene
while, in the distance, the ‘Ankara’ was still visible.  Within minutes, the
Italian Coast Guard called in reinforcements and a ship to which a large crane
was attached, arrived at the location where Ian’s car ferry was estimated to
have been.

Four divers boarded the raft, dived into
the water and after a long while, the large, silver car was pulled out of the
water, hanging on a huge hook.  A great deal of water poured out of it.  The
crane lowered the car slowly and when it reached the shore, they looked
inside.  It was empty and no living soul was found inside it.

This created a mystery.  Where was the
driver who drove the car to the ferry?  They made immediate contact with the
ship that had already disappeared over the horizon.

“Is a car missing on board or does
someone on board your vessel claims his car is missing?”

“We know nothing about a missing car. 
All the cars listed are on board the ship.  Everything is in order.”

In the meanwhile, the car in which
Abigail was asleep raced along the darkened roads. 

Michael glanced at the rear of the car,
at Abigail with her eyes closed, as she leaned against Antonio, the Italian.

“You also have a great bargain here,” he
said and indicated by moving his chin in Abigail’s direction.

“Did you see what a fight she put up? 
If not for the sedative shot, she would have put one of us out of action for a
long time.”

“Or put us on the list of people getting
disability grants from National Insurance and even from PTA in the future.”

“Good, so why do you think I sent you to
her?”

“You’re behaving
evasively but hey, was there a chance she wouldn’t have spotted the ‘Noodle’?”

“Absolutely not, there’s no chance that
one would miss anything,” Michael stated.  “To tell the truth, there were
moments when I worried if the ‘Noodle’ would get there because he was late,
which is unusual for him.”

After driving for an hour, Abigail woke
up and heard what was being said in the car.  She kept her eyes shut and her
ears cocked to listen and understand what was happening and where she was at
that moment.

Twenty minutes later, they passed
through the streets of Fiumicino, the coastal down near to the Da Vinci airport
and they parked at a public parking lot.  Michael took out an airline ticket he
had prepared, a one-way ticket – to Baku in Azerbaijan and left it on the front
seat from which he got up.  The thought that had just occurred to him was that
he was also bringing her closer to home, in preparation for the big operation
that awaited her.

He didn’t know that Abigail was
completely awake and heard everything.

“Come,
friends, let’s
get out of here before she wakes up and hears us.”

The three men got out of the car and
closed the doors carefully.  Abigail waited a minute longer until the sound of their
footsteps faded.