The Increment (34 page)

The next day at
noon, the British prime minister delivered an unscheduled address from his office at No. 10 Downing Street. The British television networks were given only thirty minutes’ warning to get their cameras in place. The U.S. Embassy in Grosvenor Square was informed of the address five minutes before the prime minister began to speak. The embassy was told only that it would concern Iran. By the time a frantic call was placed from the White House, it was too late. The prime minister had begun speaking.

The British leader said he was taking the unusual step of revealing a secret intelligence operation. Over the past several months, the British Secret Intelligence Service had obtained new details of Iran’s covert nuclear weapons program. They had discovered that the Iranians were experimenting with some of the technologies needed to produce a bomb, but that their research was impeded by serious technical problems the Iranians had not anticipated.

Britain had received secret help from a brave Iranian scientist who worked inside one of the front companies used by the regime to shield its nuclear research, the prime minister continued. During the past several weeks, British intelligence agents had helped that scientist escape from Iran to a third country, where he was debriefed extensively. The scientist described weapons research at a previously unknown covert facility in Mashad. The scientist had bravely agreed to reenter Iran with the team of British intelligence officers who brought him out, so that he could gather more information. He was killed, along with the three members of the British covert team. They were all heroes, the prime minister said. Because of their courageous actions, Iran’s effort to develop nuclear weapons had been dealt a mortal blow.

The prime minister said that at that hour, Britain’s ambassador to the United Nations was turning over a detailed dossier of evidence about Iran’s nuclear program to the International Atomic Energy Agency and the United Nations Security Council so that these organizations could take appropriate action. He said that Britain would oppose any effort by any nation—he repeated the words “any nation” for emphasis—to impose an embargo against Iran or take other military action. The Iranian nuclear program had been exposed by Britain’s intelligence operations, he said. The proper course now was vigilant monitoring and nonmilitary sanctions to make sure the program was not reconstituted.

The prime minister concluded by saying that he would be consulting soon with the president of the United States to work out a joint position at the United Nations. But he was certain—quite certain—that the United States would cooperate with the policy he had just announced.

Harry Pappas arrived at
Heathrow a few hours before the prime minister’s speech. He had one more chore, and he was rather looking forward it. He didn’t like symmetry, normally. Most loops in life don’t get closed, and for good reason: they aren’t really loops but loose strands that only appear to connect. But in this case, there was something that should come full circle, and then stop.

Harry treated himself to a London hotel room when he arrived. He slept through the morning with the television on, just in case, and he was awakened by the sound of the prime minister’s voice. When the speech was over, he dozed for another few hours. He wanted to be fresh for his meeting. He was about to play a game in which he held many good cards, and knew some of what was in the other man’s hand. But a satisfactory outcome would depend nearly as much on his demeanor as on the substance of what he had to say.

Harry arrived at
Kamal Atwan’s residence on Mount Street in the late afternoon. It was a brisk November day; loose bits of trash billowed along the streets and alleyways, and low, rain-laden clouds scudded by overhead. The butler said stiffly that Mr. Atwan wasn’t home, but Harry suspected he would say that to any unannounced visitor. So he repeated his name, Harry Pappas, and said to tell the master of the house that he was visiting from Washington and needed to speak to Mr. Atwan urgently, right now, about a matter of great importance. The butler retreated upstairs and descended a minute later to say that Mr. Atwan had returned home and would see his guest immediately.

The art that lined the walls didn’t make quite the same impression on Harry this time. It was so much loot, gathered from the treasure troves of other people less clever or larcenous than the proprietor of Mount Street. Who even knew if it was real? The luminous Monet painting of the water lilies that dominated the entrance hall: How could you know if it was a masterpiece, a brilliant fake, or something in between—an authentic object that had been detached from its original owner and converted to this man’s personal use? “Provenance” was the word art dealers used to describe the ticklish problems presented by such a collection. How did you know where anything came from, and what of its putative history was real and what imagined? That was in fact Kamal Atwan’s business—blurring those lines of provenance so that people weren’t sure whether what they had was true or false.

Atwan was standing at the top of the stairs. He was wearing a new double-breasted smoking jacket, with rich black velvet lapels and a fine paisley print in the body of the garment. His long silver-gray hair was meticulously combed. He looked like an Edwardian dandy, a man out of time.

“How good of you to call, my dear,” he said, taking Harry’s hand as he reached the top step. “Did you hear the prime minister’s speech? Very bold, don’t you think? Preempts any other sort of action, I would say.”

“Good speech,” said Harry. “War with Iran is a bad idea.”

“Your American friends will be angry, I think.”

“They’ll get over it,” said Harry.

Atwan led Harry by
the hand into the library and sat him down by a gas fire. On a table between two comfortable chairs was another fat novel by Anthony Trollope, this one titled
He Knew He Was Right
.

“I have been waiting for your visit, my dear Harry. I have been worrying about you.”

“I’m sure you have, Kamal Bey, worried to death, and for good reason, too. Do you know that someone has been spreading nasty stories about me to the Federal Bureau of Investigation? Can you imagine that? That someone was suggesting I had been doing secret work for the British government. Treasonous work, some people could say, under a false name.”

“How dreadful,” said Atwan, throwing up his hands in apparent horror. He was a good actor, you had to give him that.

“Yes, but that’s all taken care of. I went to see my boss yesterday in Washington. My real boss, the CIA director. He’d been fully informed of what I was doing, obviously, but we talked it through anyway. Not a problem, all over. My lawyer will work out the details with the FBI. But thanks for your concern.”

“Oh
good.
I am so glad.”

There was a hint of actual mirth in Atwan’s voice. He was a sporting man; he knew that he couldn’t win every rubber.

“I actually came to give
you
a bit of advice, Kamal. A warning, really.”

“Oh, how thoughtful. And what might that be, my dear?”

“Well, sir, I’ll be frank, even though we’re not in a secure location, and you never know who might be listening. I believe there is an acquaintance of yours who is in a bit of difficulty in Iran. A Lebanese fellow originally, like yourself. His name, or at least the one he was born with, is Kamal Hussein Sadr. He travels under various labels these days, but the one people seem to use most frequently is Al-Majnoun. Does that ring any bells?”

Atwan tried to laugh. It came out dry, more like a croak.

“But my dear Mr. Pappas, this gentleman Sadr, or Majnoun if you like, he died more than twenty years ago. The Israelis killed him, if I’m not mistaken.”

“Yeah, right. Well, somehow he’s come back to life. And the problem is that the Iranians are onto him. They suspect he had a hand in our little caper in Mashad. They don’t know all the details yet, so they’re going to arrest and interrogate him, and find out. Unless someone moves pretty damn quick.”

Atwan coughed. He was trying to conceal something, but the tension was evident. “Why should this possibly concern me?”

“Well, the problem is, the Iranians are going to find a little device that was smuggled into a nuclear laboratory. A sophisticated device that could melt parts of computer chips and change code. Supplied by a certain Lebanese businessman who resides in London. We’ve picked up a lot of chatter through our technical collection, as you can imagine, and they seem to know more about you than I would have suspected.”

“So what are you saying?”

“What I am saying,
sir,
is that unless you do something pretty goddamn fast, a big pile of shit is going to land on your head.”

“What a vulgar expression. That is unworthy of you, my dear Mr. Pappas.”

“Perhaps, but an accurate one. But hey, what do I know? I’m just an American. I don’t understand how really sophisticated people like you operate. Just a word to the wise, that’s all. The facts are that Al-Majnoun was working for you, and that you were working with us—and the Iranians are just naturally going to figure it all out. They’ll realize he killed our guys, and their guys, and they’re going to be pissed off. I would hate to see your business ruined, after all the good work you’ve done.”

Atwan rose and walked to the mantel. Over the fireplace was a pastel by Edgar Degas showing a group of ballerinas preparing for class. Pappas wondered if it was real. The Lebanese businessman stared at the picture for a few moments, composing himself, and then returned to his chair.

“And what do you propose, Mr. Pappas?”

There it was, inevitably: the solicitation of a bid. Atwan was a dealmaker, first and last, and now he was looking to make a bargain.

“I don’t propose anything. Except that you better move quickly to get your man Al-Majnoun out of Iran. To London, probably, where you can keep an eye on him. I think you better do that before he takes you down, and a lot of other people with him. That’s not a threat, obviously. I’m not in the threat business. Just a suggestion. Otherwise, I would have to say that, as we Americans so vulgarly like to put it, you are fucked.”

Atwan looked away, to mask his expression. He was a man in absolute control, always. He was thinking about his options, evidently, weighing what he had to lose, depending on what options he chose. They say there are chess players who can calculate many dozens of moves ahead that flow from the exchange of one piece on the board. Atwan had that facility. He had worked as hard as possible to take risk out of the world’s riskiest business. He turned back toward his guest.

“You’re being quite aggressive, I see,” he said stiffly. “Well then, message received.”

Atwan rose from his chair, still lost in his own private calculations. He didn’t take Harry’s hand this time, just led the way out of the library and back down the stairs. The show was over. That was the virtue of crude speech. It broke through the false layer of politeness that covered the facts, and got down to the bare reality of things. Atwan walked slowly, one step at a time. You might have thought he would be eager to get Harry out of his house, but he was taking his time, weighing another bid.

He stopped at the bottom of the stairs in the entrance hall. It was raining outside now. You could hear the beating of the raindrops against Atwan’s leaden windows. He took Harry’s hand again.

“It is not a nice evening out, I think. Beastly, as the British would say. Why don’t you stay a bit longer, Harry, until the clouds have passed.”

Atwan led Harry into a sitting room off the main entrance hall and closed the double doors. Harry took a seat while Atwan went to the intercom. He rang his chief of staff, waited a moment, then said a few words in Arabic.

“I would like a drink tonight,” said Atwan. “I rarely drink, you know, but tonight I think that I should make an exception, with you, my dear. Is that all right?”

“Of course,” said Harry. “I’ll have a whiskey.”

Atwan went to a mirrored bar, set in an alcove of the room, and poured two glasses of whiskey, neat. He paused, and then poured a third.

“Another guest coming?” asked Harry.

“Yes, I think so. A little party. A reunion, you could say. Why not?”

Atwan brought the whiskey to Harry and sat down on the couch next to him. The host took a sip and then a large gulp that nearly drained the glass. There was a knock at the double door. Harry expected that they would be joined by Adrian Winkler, the partner in this bizarre enterprise, but he was mistaken.

The double door swung
open, and a man in a black suit entered the room. He walked with a quick, erratic step, almost a scampering. His head was down as he entered the room, and black sunglasses covered his eyes, but when he reached Harry, he stood up straight and removed the shades. It was the oddest human face Harry had ever seen. The eyes were tight at the corners and tilted up slightly, as an Asian man’s might be. The nose was bulbous, as if a new infusion of flesh had been added. The lips were almost feminine, pumped with fat and gel so that they appeared as little pontoons. The face seemed almost to be in motion, the different pieces going in different directions. Scars were visible along the edges, and there was a bit of puffiness, as if the man had just had another operation to recombine and rearrange.

Atwan walked over to this most peculiar gentleman. He was smiling now, as if he were a farmer exhibiting his prize pig. He patted Al-Majnoun gently on the back, and then steered him toward Harry.

“My dear Harry, let me introduce Kamal Hussein Sadr. Al-Majnoun. The Crazy One. You know the name of course, but perhaps not the face.” He laughed to himself, as if this were a private joke.