Gauntlet (43 page)

“Logically, then,” said Turbee, “the question becomes what was the closest port when the
Haramosh Star
was the most off course, which I guess would be the location of the red dot that George first put on the map. Can you put a circle around that point, George, and magnify that portion of the map a little more?”

“Sure can, little buddy,” smiled George, pleased that Turbee had figured out the issue he’d been driving at. He punched a few buttons, and the section around the glowing red dot was enlarged on the Atlas Screen. “The closest port is, of course, Prince Rupert, with its new container port and its deep-water coal port. Maybe the Semtex was off-loaded there, assuming that it was still on the
Haramosh Star,
somehow,” he suggested tentatively.

“Doubt it, George,” said Rahlson. “The Canadians are watching their ports as closely as we are. The new container port has literally hundreds of cameras on it. It’s probably being patrolled and monitored as extensively as our own deep-water ports. And the
Haramosh Star
was being watched. She couldn’t have gone into the port without someone seeing. And there’s no way that a speedboat could have approached her, taken on a four-ton cargo, and brought it ashore, without anyone noticing. No way.”

“What about a submarine?” asked Turbee, going back to one of his original ideas.

Dan interrupted. “Listen Turb. Now you’ve become completely ridiculous. What next? A transporter beam, maybe? Alien conspiracy?” he asked sarcastically.

“Nevermind those things,” interrupted Rhodes. “From everything that we now know, we need to keep watching that ship. We’ve seen a lot of engineering excellence so far. A sub might not be out of the question, Dan. And when the ship arrives in Vancouver, she should be searched from end to end. Again.”

“Again?” asked Dan.

“Yes, again,” said Rhodes. “If our Canadian friends would consent to such a process, given the twisted history of this ship.”

The room was silent for a few seconds as everyone studied the three photographs that Turbee, with Kingston’s assistance, had developed. There was no mistaking it. No fuzziness lending itself to argument or contrary point of view. It was Semtex. A pallet full, being moved from the
Mankial Star
to the
Haramosh Star.

“There are only two possibilities,” said Turbee. “Only two. Either the Semtex is still on the
Haramosh Star,
or it’s been off-loaded at some point.”

“Looks like the SEALs missed it after all,” said Rhodes.

“Well assuming that Turbee’s right — which I’m not admitting, yet, but assuming maybe he is — it could have been off-loaded before the SEALs got to the ship, in which case they didn’t miss it,” argued Dan.

“No way could it have been off-loaded between the Maldives and the east coast of Ceylon, where the intercept took place. We have satellites focused on that area and would have photos of it happening,” Rahlson answered. “It was still on the ship. The SEALs missed it.”

“Damn right they did,” said George. “And in the process, made us an international laughing stock, almost got the President impeached, got the Secretary of Defense fired, and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs too, and double dammit, almost got Turbee here killed.” He chucked a thumb toward the still wounded and bandaged Turbee.

“We need to find the
Haramosh Star
again,” sighed Rhodes.

Dan swelled defensively. “If you think I’m going to be party to a move like that you’re nuts. No way. And I’m the guy running the show. No way,” he snapped. He was no longer trying to get along with his crew.

“Aw fuck, Alexander will you–” started Rahlson.

“I already know where she is,” Turbee interrupted.

“Who?” retorted Dan.

“The
Haramosh Star.
She’s sailing along the Hecate Straights, between the Queen Charlotte Islands and the British Columbia mainland. She’ll be in the port of Vancouver in 17 hours and 30 minutes.”

“You see, Dan, that’s why we need this kid,” said Rahlson, with an edge in his voice.

“How’d you do that, Turb?” asked Khasha in amazement.

“Well, I read somewhere that the Canadian Coast Guard tracks all Pacific ships destined for either Prince Rupert or Vancouver. I got into their web site. Didn’t even need to hack into it or do anything illegal because Canada is on board with TTIC. They have a continually updated database that shows the present location of all inbound ships. The
Haramosh Star
is in the database, and...” His voice trailed off for a few seconds.

“What is it, Turbee?” asked Khasha.

“There’s a note here about the course deviation. It doesn’t say where, or how, or why. It just says there was a deviation,” said Turbee, slowly. “It also indicates that the
Haramosh Star
was boarded by a Captain LaMaitre. We should probably talk to him.”

“Yes, I guess so,” muttered Dan. “Johnson, god dammit, get me someone in the Canadian Coast Guard who knows more about this. And make it fast.”

T
HIS IS CAPTAIN JEAN LAMAITRE from the bridge of the
HMS John A. MacDonald.
To whom am I speaking?”

“This is Daniel Alexander, Director of the Terrorist Threat Integration Center in Washington, DC. You are on the speakerphone in our central control room. There are some two dozen TTIC members listening to this conversation.”

“Very nice. Good morning, TTIC. I gather you need some information from us.”

“Yes, Captain, we do,” replied Dan. “We certainly do. We need to know about the course deviation of the
Haramosh Star.
What can you tell us about that?”

“An ill-fated vessel, to be sure,” said LaMaitre. “First that delightful incident off the coast of Ceylon, and now this. Yes, the
Haramosh Star
was plenty off course all right. So far off that I boarded the vessel with a small group of my men and had a look around. Those SEALs made quite a mess of things, by the way.”

“OK,” said George. “This is George Lexia, with TTIC. I’m the map keeper here. Can you tell me where she should have been, and where she actually was?”

“Sure. She should have taken a great circular route, the same as jet planes would, going north from the Philippines, turning to cut just south of the Aleutians, and then straight on, to approach British Columbia from the northwest. Let me give you a few coordinates.”

As the points of latitude and longitude were given, George plotted them on the Atlas Screen, and created a red curve connecting them. He sent an “I told you so” smirk in Dan’s direction. “OK,” he said, sitting back. “I’ve got it plotted. Now where did you board her?”

“Just outside of Prince Rupert. North of Dundas Island.” The Captain gave George those coordinates as well.

“I see what you mean,” said George. “She’s 200 miles east of where she should have been. What did her Captain say about that?” At this point George actually mouthed the phrase “I told you so” at a red-faced Dan.

“I knew the Captain of that ship from other encounters. Vince Ramballa. Decent guy. Very experienced sea hand. He said that he’d become confused about their point of destination. He thought it was Prince Rupert, and not Vancouver. When I looked at the papers, they stated very clearly that Vancouver was the destination. He said that the SEAL episode two weeks ago had created havoc on his ship, and that was where the confusion stemmed from. So I told him it was fine, and ordered him to hightail it to Vancouver, which he’s currently doing. Funny thing, though.”

“What’s that?” asked Rhodes.

“Even if she was going to Prince Rupert, she would still have been off course. They were about ten miles northeast of Dundas Island, near the mouth of the Portland Canal, whereas they should have been about 12 miles south of Dundas, to approach Prince Rupert. An experienced sailor would never make a mistake like that.”

“Did he say why he was off course for an intended destination of Prince Rupert?” Rhodes responded.

“I never pointed that part out. Didn’t occur to me until I was back in my own quarters.”

“What’s at the end of the Portland Canal?” George asked slowly, tapping his pencil on the desk as he stared at the map.

“A mostly abandoned mining and fishing village called Stewart,” came the reply.

“Are there docking facilities there?”

“Yes, in fact there are. It used to be quite a mining hub, so they have infrastructure left over. Hundreds of feet of abandoned docks. Just the odd fishing boat hooked up to them now, though.”

“OK, thanks,” said George. He and Turbee glanced at each other. As far as they were concerned, that answered the question of where the Semtex was.

Dan asked a few more questions, and the conversation ended.

N
ICE PLACE, RIK,” said Yousseff, glancing at his childhood friend. “A long way from the school yard in Jalalabad.” He was standing in Rika’s thirty-seventh-floor office, looking toward downtown Los Angeles. The name on the door read “Rika Mahafi Financial Corporation.” She had a staff of 15 workers; all were Pashtun, and most were women. Each had been chosen for two qualities — first, loyalty, and second, an adeptness with numbers. The financial controls for all of Yousseff’s North American operations were headquartered here. It was here that the company moved money from one numbered account to another, from a Liechtenstein Trust to a Nigerian Bank, through mazes of numbered companies and accounts spread throughout the world. It was here that the profits from the Canadian stores and gas stations, Pacific Western Submersibles, and hundreds of real estate properties were tabulated. It was here that the shares for Ba’al, Izzy, and Kumar, among others, were assessed and weighed.

A sister company existed in Karachi, where Rika was also in charge. The Pakistani company was called the Karachi Mahafika Accounting Corporation, and had about 30 employees. That was where Rika handled the accounts of Karachi Drydock and Engineering and Karachi Star Line. The Karachi branch also managed and tracked thousands of real estate investments held by a host of shell companies, in both Afghanistan and Pakistan. And it managed the jewel in Yousseff’s crown — more than $100 million in prime downtown Karachi real estate. It also kept accounts on the drug sale operations, though these accounts were heavily disguised.

If one were searching for the nerve center of Yousseff’s operations, the Karachi and Los Angeles accounting offices would be a prime place to start. If a paralyzing strike were to be made against his criminal enterprise, it would have to be focused here, in Rika Mahafika’s offices. Yousseff realized this, and it was for this reason that he and Rika had hand picked each and every employee. The currency of loyalty held sway, and everyone in the company knew it. A betrayal here would destroy the entire organization. Before it did that, however, it would bring on Ghullam or Marak, with their guns. This fact alone had kept the employees in line for the last 20 years.

Rika had picked Yousseff up at the PWS Long Beach factory and driven him to Century City to show him around her offices. The door leading from the reception area to the main office of her building was equipped with locks and deadbolts. The office contained workstations, but no separated areas, and her own corner office. When Rika wasn’t there, a state-of-the-art security system was activated.

Rika’s personal office had more than 400 square feet of floor space, and was equipped with a massive black granite desk, facing outward toward the window that overlooked Los Angeles. Half a dozen computer screens were sitting on the desk, all displaying the ever-changing colors and shapes of Microsoft screen savers. Yousseff and Rika were sitting in two comfortable chairs at a low coffee table in a corner of the office.

“Say you want me to go to Jalalabad, Youssi. It’s still home. Always will be. I could go back there today and be comfortable and happy.” She was two years younger than Yousseff, and even in her 40s still possessed the striking beauty of her youth. She had an ex-husband in Karachi, an ex-husband in Los Angeles, and an on-and-off-again relationship with a lawyer working in another building in the Century City complex. Neither ex-husband nor lover had ever been allowed into Rika’s office, and neither was privy to the nature of the commerce that flowed through its doors and Internet connections.

“Four children, Rika, and you still look great,” Yousseff said affectionately.

“Go on, Youssi. You’re going blind in your old age,” she replied. “And probably desperate too.”

He smiled and bowed. “Yes. To both.” They both knew that, despite their sporadic connections, and visits that numbered only three or four a year, she still loved him. It had been true at the great battle of the Four Cedars. It was still true today. They both knew that his feelings toward her were almost as strong.

“What brings you here to me, Youssi? Surely not just to make love?” Rika joked.

“Well, maybe that, and an exit strategy,” he replied.

“Exit strategy? We talk of making love and all you think of is an exit strategy. Men are pigs,” snorted Rika.

Yousseff smiled. “For business. Not for love, dummy.”

“What are you up to, Youssi? I feel something big afoot.” They had both switched to their native Urdu at this point.

“Yes. There’s going to be a large event. Soon. It will create a financial earthquake that I want to take advantage of. It will also create an intense manhunt.”

“Youssi, you had better not be thinking of sending airplanes into buildings. If you’re ever a part of anything like that, I will never work for you or see you again. What are you planning?”

“I can’t tell you, Rika. But I can say that there will not be a large loss of life. Not even 100 people will die... less, I think, than the number killed every hour when that madness with the Soviets was at its height in Afghanistan. Less than the number that die every day in Iraq. But it will be truly spectacular. I can promise you that.”

Ever since the battle of the Four Cedars, Rika had believed anything Yousseff told her. If he said something would come to pass, and would be spectacular, then it was undoubtedly so. She grew more serious.

“What do you need me to do, Yousseff?”

“A couple of things. We are going to have some fun in the stock and commodities markets. Here is a list of stocks to short. On margin. I want you to use that Liechtenstein Trust, together with one of the Russian or Nigerian offshore banks. This has got to be hidden so deep that Allah Himself couldn’t find it. Can you do that?”

“Youssi, what do you think I’ve been doing for you ever since we started Karachi Drydock and Engineering? I’ve been burying things that deeply for more than 20 years now. Yes, I think I can do that.”

“Good, my love. Very good. Here is a list of companies whose shares I want you to buy, also on margin. Hide this the same way, but use a totally different connection of banks and trust companies. If, perchance, someone finds out about the first series of transactions, I don’t want them to automatically find the second.”

“I think I can probably do that too, Youssi.” She looked at the list. One entry stood out. “You want to short KSEW?” she asked, looking at the name of their old nemesis.

“You noticed,” replied Yousseff.

“You’re going to whack Nooshkatoor?”

“Kind of,” said Yousseff. “He made things very miserable for Kumar and me for many years. In several ways, actually.”

“You know he lives in England now, in some fancy district in London? You know he’s become very important and powerful and all that, right?”

“I know, Rik. It will make things all the more delightful,” Yousseff replied.

“Anything else?” asked Rika.

“Oh yes. Don’t do all the purchases, sales, or stock positions at once. Use multiple transactions, spread out over the next two days, starting now. Try to vary the banks, trusts, offshore banks, and Third World banks. Can you do that too?”

“Of course, Youssi, anything for you. Nothing is impossible. I’ll probably have to work a little harder, but I can do it. Sure. My staff is capable. We can handle it.”

“Good,” he continued. “We need to go short in some commodities and long in others. Do you know your way around the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, the London Metal Exchange, the Beijing Commodity Exchange, the Hong Kong Futures Exchange, the Tokyo International Financial Futures Exchange, the International Petroleum Exchange, you know, places like that?”

“I’ve been doing it for many years. You know I know,” she said, starting to become frustrated with the way he was questioning her knowledge and ability.

“Here is a third list of commodities on which I want you to go short, and a fourth list for long. Can you do that too, starting now? Again, everything on margin.”

With each request, her response became a little less eager, her smile a little smaller. “Yes, Yousseff. Yes, I can do that too. I will get some more coffee, and will sleep less. I can also do this for you,” she said, sighing.

“And Rika, I know I am asking much. But you must use different banks and offshore institutions than with the other transactions. And it can’t be done all at once. There must be different paths. You realize that, right?”

“Yes, Yousseff, but can we talk about something else now? This is much that you ask. Yes, I can do it, but I’m tired of talking about it.”

“There is one last thing,” added Yousseff.

“There is more?”

“Only a little thing. We need an exit strategy.”

“There you go again,” she pouted.

“Business, Rika. Business. The Americans are very clever. They will throw great resources at the perpetrators of my plan. There have to be a few sacrificial lambs. You know how they are. There always has to be a ’bad guy,’ like in the movies. We need to create one. I need money deposited in these bank accounts, in these amounts, via the following banking trail. Can you do that too?”

“What, you are giving money to Nooshkatoor?” Rika asked, glancing at this newest list. “Are you crazy? After what he did to Kumar’s family? Why give the bastard any money?” Rika couldn’t see the sense in it.

“Rik, use your head. What do you think is happening here, exactly?” asked Yousseff.

For a moment she looked perplexed, and then a smile started to play about her face. “Ah. I see it. I see.”

Yousseff gave her a few more instructions. She took his sheets of transfers, purchases, and sales. She whistled to herself. This was nothing short of a multi-billion dollar bet. She smiled to herself at Yousseff’s audacity, to be planning such a thing. But then she saw how much work it would be. She would need to be at it for most of the next 48 hours. Forty-eight hours without sleep.

Suddenly the smile was gone. There was weariness in her features, and wrinkles appeared around the down-turned corners of her mouth. “Yes, Youss. Yes. Why don’t you just ask me to refinance General Motors while I’m at it?”

“Rika, there will be time for pleasure in a week or two. When this is all done, you can take $100 million for yourself, if you like. There should be money to spare.”

“It’s not the money, Youssi. It never is, for me. We need more time to talk. To catch up on old times, and what is going on today. To be real people, with real lives and real relationships. That’s what I need. That’s what I want, Youssi.”

“I know. I know. I will see you in a few days. Please do this for me.”

He kissed her on the forehead, and then was gone, vanishing like smoke. “No different than 30 years ago,” she whispered to herself as she saw the outer door swing shut. “Always with an exit strategy, and leaving the rest of us in the dust.”

T
HEY CAME BY SEPARATE FLIGHTS, though both came through Heathrow. Both came with superbly forged passports. Vijay arrived as Donovan Smith, computer systems specialist. Ghullam had adopted the identity of David Priestley, security specialist.

Ghullam was of Pashtun heritage, from the Northwest Frontier Province. He’d been assisting Marak for years, doing whatever it took to ensure that Yousseff’s heroin shipments were the only ones that made it down the Indus to Hyderabad or Karachi. He possessed a multitude of skills, many of which had been honed to perfection by his mentor. He was a gifted marksman, able to use almost every firearm imaginable. He was physically imposing at 6′1″, and was in peak physical condition. He was the master of many forms of martial arts, and possessed the same reptilian gaze as his master. He could pick any lock, break any bone, and kill in a thousand different ways. Some of the deaths on his list of accomplishments included government officials, rival drug lords, and rivals in Yousseff’s vast commercial affairs. He found killing up close to be especially satisfying. To feel the fear, and to see the look of death, to touch it... that was almost sexual for him. He was Marak’s star pupil. He was the one that was sent when there was killing to be done.

Ghullam met Yousseff at his small suite in the Long Beach hangar. Yousseff had just traveled from Los Angeles and was already exhausted. Much had happened since they had last met, in an almost identical apartment, in Islamabad, Pakistan. But this was just the beginning, and there were still many details to be discussed and attended to. Yousseff skipped the pleasantries and started giving orders the moment Ghullam entered the room.

“Here are three telephone numbers,” he said, handing Ghullam a sheet of paper with the names and numbers of the Emir’s LA-based sleeper group. “The leader’s name is Ray. He’ll be at one of these three numbers. Identify yourself as the Emir’s messenger. Then give him the following numeric sequence.” He read the numbers and made Ghullam repeat them back to him. “I will call you in exactly 24 hours, with your instructions. These men must begin their journey the moment I call.”

Y
O. RAY HERE,” came the thoroughly American trucker’s voice, with a hint of southern twang. The man who answered the phone had shoulder-length black hair, peppered with gray, and combed back into a ponytail. He wore faded jeans and a black T-shirt with the moniker of the Orange County Choppers emblazoned across its shoulders. His hat had the insignia of the White Sox stitched across the front. He listened to the other voice on the phone for a moment, and the smile disappeared from his face. The day and the hour had come. He had known that it would. He had been following the newscasts, and had seen the image of his master many times of late. He’d heard the Emir’s messages, along with billions of others. He’d been wondering if he had a role to play in the great attack the Emir had so publicly promised.

For the first five years after coming to America, Ray had read the Koran daily, and kept up with his prayers in the privacy of his apartment. He’d eaten only appropriate foods, avoided women, and had no alcohol. He met with his three comrades as often as he could, to share memories of their homeland. It had been a painful, lonely journey, and each evening had been a disappointment when the call still hadn’t come. Each dawn had brought the hope of a call to arms.