Countdown in Cairo (10 page)

“I assume previous attempts have been made to recover this ‘lost property,’ ” Alex said.

“Yes, but not by me,” Guarneri said.

“Then by whom?” she asked. Guarneri glanced at Federov.

“I traveled to the island twice,” Federov said. “I have a Ukrainian passport. I can go in and out whenever I want. But I was of no help.”

Alex turned to Guarneri. “Taking into account the fact that much of the wealth before Castro was accumulated by friends of a repressive government with links to American gangsters,” Alex said, looking him squarely in the eye, “I wouldn’t think your position in Cuba would be a very popular one.”

“So you’re not encouraged that I’d be able to recover anything? Cash or any other assets.”

The coffee arrived and so did a small tray of sweets for dessert. The espresso was scalding hot. She sipped carefully. As the caffeine hit, it was a punch in the nose. So much for easy sleep tonight.

Alex waited till the waiter had departed until she spoke again. “Generally no,” she said. “And the bottom line is that restitution of property will be the sovereign decision of the new Cuban government, which can set any rules it likes.”

Federov grinned to the side.

Guarneri blinked. “Is there any sort of historical precedent,” he asked, “for recovery of property?”

“I remember that with East Germany and its reunification with West Germany, restitution of property led to a multitude of competing claims in the German courts as well as some Swiss, Czech, and Austrian courts. Look, Paul. Suppose a sugarcane farm was nationalized in the early sixties and the owners fled to Miami. By now, there are probably a half-dozen potential heirs who may well not agree on how the pie should be divided. You will have relatives coming out of the woodwork, second and third cousins whom you didn’t even know existed, claiming that they own part of the money. And that’s even if Cuban courts will award a claim to a foreigner. More likely, they will award it to people who have been on the island for most of their lives, for the reasons I already mentioned.”

The discussion took a break as the bill for dinner arrived. Guarneri was treating. He peeled off some cash and laid it on the table. Over the course of the evening, Alex had now watched her acquaintance enrich the city’s restaurant economy by close to five hundred dollars.

“So what you’re saying, Alex,” Guarneri said in closing, “is that it would be more effective for me to go directly into Cuba, grab what’s mine, and get out again?”

“If it’s a pile of money, yes, sure. That might work,” Alex said simply. “And it might not. You might get your head blown off by local police. And you might find that the stash disappeared fifty years ago. Equally, a Cuban prison would be a pretty horrible place to spend ten years if your visit hit any snags. So be forewarned.”

“I understand,” he said. But he said this in such a way that it suggested more.

“Was there something else?” she asked.

The two men exchanged a glance.

“Well, there’s my actual offer to you,” Guarneri said.

“And what’s that?”

“I’m going to make a trip into Cuba. I need to be accompanied by a woman who will pose as my wife or an adult daughter. I need a woman who is politically savvy, intelligent, able to think on her feet in dangerous situations, and is fluent in Spanish. I’m under no illusions as to how risky such a trip would be.” He paused. “Yuri suggested you.”

She looked back and forth between the two of them, then laughed.

“The two of you,” she said, “you’re
both
quite charming and completely out of your minds.”

“Will you go with me?” Guarneri asked.

“No. That’s a flat-out no. I don’t even have to think about it.”

“A woman who can handle a gun would be particularly useful,” Guarneri said.

“Ask around in this room,” she said. “I’m sure someone knows someone and can hook you up with a Lara Croft clone.”

“Again, Yuri suggested you.”

“Yuri’s full of bad ideas, Paul. This would be one of them.”

“Think about it,” Guarneri said. “A day will come when you might want to consider my offer.”

“The answer is
no
,” she said. “I’m flattered, but find someone else. My answer is not going to change.”

Federov smirked. “Remember what I said,” he reminded her. “Never say never.”

THIRTEEN

Thirty minutes after midnight, sitting again in his car on a quiet Calvert Street, Nagib had a great idea. Taking a sharp screwdriver from the glove compartment and pushing it into his belt, he turned to Rashaad and said, “Wait for me. I’ll be back.”

Nagib stepped out of the car and took a slow walk around the periphery of the building. The Calvert Arms took half the block on its side of the street, and there was an entrance to its garage around the corner.

He walked back and forth for about twenty minutes, keeping a wary eye out for those nosy cops who had given him a cross-eyed look the previous night. He strolled until he saw a car stop in front of the access to the parking garage. Now it was almost 1:00 a.m. The driver used a remote device to open the garage. The big steel door opened and allowed the car to enter.

Nagib drifted to the entrance door. Just when the automatic door was almost shut, he ducked inside, quiet as an eel in shallow water. There! He was in the building and the driver who had unknowingly let him in had already moved down to the lower level to park.

Perfect!

Nagib searched along the high part of the walls for security cameras. He didn’t see any. That was good too. He found a remote area of the garage, ducked down between cars, and waited till he was convinced he was alone. His gun was in his belt in case he encountered serious trouble.

No one came by, no one saw him. Not a single car moved. As he waited, he pulled a pair of latex gloves from his pocket and put them on.

Toward 1:45 a.m., he rose. He circulated among some of the more remote cars and found several that were dirty and covered with dust. Obviously, these cars rarely moved. If he took something from one of these cars and did it neatly, no one might notice for a week or two, maybe even longer, judging by some of the dust.

He moved from car to car, keeping low, ever attentive for the sound of anyone intruding. He looked into various cars until he found what he wanted in an old Mercedes-Benz nestled into one of the corners on the lower of the garage’s two levels. He knew his Benzes because he had been a mechanic early in his life. He had worked on old Mercedes diesels, the now-vintage 230s, 240s, and 300s, which were common where he grew up. This one appeared to be a 1980 or thereabouts, a 300 D, a dependable old Teutonic workhorse.

So this too was perfect. Judging by the dirt on the Benz’s windshield, judging by the way the tires were slightly “down,” this old silver-blue baby rarely moved. Nagib looked on the dashboard near the VIN number to see if there was an alarm. He saw none. God was smiling on Nagib tonight, he reasoned. This car was like an engraved invitation.

He wedged the sharp screwdriver between the driver’s side doorframe and the door. He pried, parallel to the lower part of the window. He created an opening of about half an inch.

With his other hand, he took a looped strip of hard plastic from his pocket and slid it through the small passageway. He dropped the loop on the peg of the lock.

He pulled it tight. Then he pulled it sideways and upward. It fought him a little and he had to squeeze his fingers between the door and the frame. But the peg of the lock popped up. The car was unlocked.

Nagib released the screwdriver, reached to the door handle, and opened the door.

He slid in. He reached to the sun visor on the right side and removed what he had spotted from the outside: a remote clicker that he assumed operated the garage door. There was also some money between the seats. He took some of that too, but not all of it. All of it would have alerted the owner to the break-in, and he didn’t want that.

He checked the glove compartment, just out of curiosity, and looked at the car registration. The car belonged to a woman who lived in the building. The name meant nothing, but he prowled through the other paperwork, one eye on the rest of the garage in case some busybody intruded.

He found a few letters and some photographs. The woman’s name was Helen Jacobus, and she seemed to be a retired teacher. Good. She was older and apparently widowed. Nagib noted her name in case it might help him sometime. He stole some of the mail, just enough to have a record of the address, in case he ever wanted to steal an identity or break in again. There was also a twenty-dollar bill and two fives. Emergency money. He couldn’t resist. He helped himself to that too.

The woman lived in Apartment 303. Now if anyone ever asked him why he was in the building or hanging around it, he had a name he could use immediately, enough to allow getaway time.

Helen wasn’t the woman he was here to kill. A much younger, more troublesome woman held that honor. But Helen might be his unwitting accomplice.

Nagib pocketed what he needed from the car and locked the doors from within. Then he closed the car door. The damage done to the door and door frame by his break-in was almost nonexistent. It would take a close examination to tell how the break-in had occurred. And by that time, he theorized, his business at the Calvert Arms would be complete.

He pulled off his latex gloves. He walked back through the driving lanes to the garage door at street level. He pressed the button on his new remote and the sliding door opened.

This was fantastic! He now had access to the entire building whenever he wanted it. There was no doubt in his mind that this would be more productive than sitting in his car for days on end, waiting.

He was pleased with himself and his accomplishment for the evening. He went back to the old Taurus on the street where Rashaad waited.

“Tomorrow,” Nagib said. “Tomorrow I’ll get her.”

Then they gave up their watch for the evening. By any account, however, their day had been a success.

FOURTEEN

Alex checked out of the Gotham by 9:00 a.m. the next morning and took the Lexington Avenue subway down to Wall Street. The office building where her interview would be held was in the new enclave of federal offices at Liberty Place.

She took the elevator to the fifty-sixth floor where two different representatives of the United States Treasury interviewed her, first in English and then, because it had bearing on the eventual assignment, in Spanish.

The job in question was similar to what she was already doing, but she would be a department head. Most of the anticrime and antifraud work would be against operations launched from Central and South America. Given her expertise in the field, she was a natural for the assignment, although there were currently no women holding similar “senior” posts around the country. She would be the first, an idea that attracted her. She would also be the youngest, the interviewer mentioned. That flattered her too.

Part of the job would entail fieldwork, on-the-spot investigations, and probably a good deal of travel. Some of it would be dangerous. In some instances she would be working with local law enforcement in places like Colombia, Argentina, Costa Rica, and Chile. She would be required to carry a weapon on the job if only for her personal safety. The opponents would be some very dirty people. She noted that there was nothing new about that, she was already carrying a gun. She knew the drill.

She felt drawn to the job and repelled by it at the same time. One part of her was a poet and philosopher, the part that wanted to settle into a village like Barranco Lajoya and bring peace and civilization to people who had never known it. The other part of her was the righteous warrior, the woman who could pull on jungle fatigues or navigate through a rough inner city, a woman who could carry a weapon, use it, and go after the malefactors of the world where they lived.

She was often torn as to which was the dominant part of her personality. When there was too much violence and action, she longed for tranquility. When things were too calm, like now, she longed for activity.

The interviews were rigorous. They took two hours. But afterward, Alex left feeling that she had interviewed well. Then again, as she rode the subway back uptown to Pennsylvania Station, where she would take the afternoon Metroliner back to Washington, she knew that the government was interviewing several dozen highly qualified men and women for various jobs at the New York FinCEN office. She was just one of several, she reasoned, despite Joseph Collins’s high opinion. One never knew whether a personal favor or connection would pull through a long-shot applicant.

Well
,
that’s fine
, she told herself.
If the position is offered
,
I’m going to take it. If not
,
there will be something else. No point to get hung up on it.

The express train back to DC left on time. She relaxed again into her novel on the trip back to Washington. In the evening, she went by the gym to swim twenty laps and burn off the nervous energy from the trip.

She was back home at the Calvert Arms by 10:00 p.m.

FIFTEEN

Shortly after 11:00, as the Saudi waited in the getaway car down on the street, Nagib walked down the fifth floor corridor at the Calvert Arms. The corridor was long and carpeted with thick plush runners, making his footfall all but undetectable. He had pulled the neck of a turtleneck sweater up over the lower part of his face and kept a wool cap down low.

These people who lived in this building, these wealthy Americans, he thought to himself. They all had peepholes. And who knew when some old busybody who couldn’t sleep, or some young girl with a boyfriend, was going to look out into the hall.

Or, as had happened before, some night owl would step out to send a bag of kitchen garbage down the chute or go outside to smoke a cigarette. Americans were unpredictable. They were a disorderly, hypocritical population with a disorderly, hypocritical society. It was just one of many reasons why he hated them. Nonetheless, he had his assignment. He would complete it, get paid, and have his family come and join him in London.