The Informationist: A Thriller (32 page)

“It’s been a decade or more,” he said. “And I was never very good. You?”

“I used to play often with Francisco—obviously, it’s been a while.” She nodded toward the board. “I rarely beat him, but this time I’m giving him a run for his money.” She handed Bradford the notebook. “Have you been published?”

“Yeah,” he said, and his cheeks flushed color. “Four books.”

“I suppose we all have our little secrets,” she said, and smiled a half grin. And then, in seriousness, “We’re leaving at first light tomorrow. If you want in, you can have at it, but there are a few stipulations you’ll have to agree to. One: You cannot under any circumstances contact anyone without my explicit approval—no calls or e-mails, period. Two: If you become a liability, we will leave you wherever we are and you’ll have to work your own way out.”

“I can live with those.”

“And I’m no longer your job,” she said. “Whatever the terms were in your arrangement with Richard, they’ve changed. I’m letting you come along because Emily knows you and it might come in handy when we
find her. You’re not coming to protect me or stick by my side, and you’ll have to agree to follow my instructions whether they go along with what you think is your assignment or not. Will that be a problem?”

“I’ll manage.”

She nodded. “Then welcome back.” She took a deep breath and said, “I wish you’d have told me about Richard from the beginning. It might have saved me from getting dumped into the ocean, and we might already have found Emily by now.”

Bradford hesitated and then said, “Told you what about Richard?”

“That he wasn’t the one behind this whole assignment—you were. Not to mention that you were fucking his wife.”

Bradford drew a breath and his face grew hard, evidence she’d struck personal, pushed him far. Although she expected him to react, after a moment’s pause he said only, “I don’t get it, you think Richard is out to get you?”

“Did you tell Richard we were going to Malabo?”

“Yeah.”

“What about Bata?”

His whisper was so low she could barely hear it. “Yes.”

“I don’t have all the dots connected yet,” she said. “But it’s looking like Richard has had his hand in this somehow. From the way Francisco tells it, you’ve been the main person concerned with finding Emily, regardless of how Richard represented himself to me. That’s a strike against him. That Titan Exploration just happens to have its oil wells in the same country that Emily goes missing could be coincidence, but I don’t think so—at the very least, Richard has governmental connections in Equatorial Guinea. That’s strike two. Someone close to me has been feeding information to the bad guys—it’s the only explanation I have for some of the events that have taken place. Strike three.”

Bradford ran his hands through his hair and then stared up at the ceiling. His breathing was slow and deep, and finally he said, “But why?”

“I don’t know, Miles. There are a lot of unknowns at this point. But if I had to make a guess, I’d say it was money.”

Disbelief was written on Bradford’s face. “Richard has more money than God.”

“Maybe he does and maybe he doesn’t. I’m living proof that what
you see is not always what it is. You said Richard was trying to get Elizabeth to change her will. That says money. You’re a smart man, Miles. Don’t tell me you haven’t thought of it yourself.”

“You know, the thing with Elizabeth, I can understand that. He was a crappy husband, and maybe it was about money then—that happened before Titan hit oil, before his big break. But for all his faults, he is a good father, and he loves Emily, and he’s suffered a lot through this. It may have been me pushing for it, but Richard has financed each step, never hesitated once. It was only this past year that he started to protest, and it was never about the money. It was because of the personal pain that came from not being able to let it go. Why would he want the one person who can find Emily killed? It makes no sense.”

“Maybe someone else is using him. There are too many unknowns, but I’m willing to place a hefty bet that when we find Emily, a lot of the answers will be waiting with her.” She stood. “And now I have to make a phone call that I wish I didn’t have to make.”

Munroe picked up the phone and dialed Burbank’s office. As before, she was immediately transferred to his direct line, but this time she was left on hold for at least five minutes. When he picked up the phone, the exhaustion in his voice carried through the wires. “It’s been a while, Michael. I’ve heard that things have been rough for you over there—I hope all is well.”

“Things are fine, Mr. Burbank,” she said. “As required, I’m calling to update you. As I’m sure you’ve heard through Miles, and though it may be difficult to believe, we have eyewitnesses who’ve placed your daughter alive on the mainland of Equatorial Guinea, the latest sighting now within the last six months.”

“Yes,” he said. “It was amazing news, still is. Getting word about the death certificate was devastating, though a relief in a way. It meant that we could lay her memory to rest. And then to follow that with the hope that she might possibly be alive, it all seemed like such a cruel joke. I’ve been on an emotional roller coaster since.”

“I assure you the sources are genuine,” she said.

“What’s the next step?”

“Now that Miles is here, we’re waiting on a few details to get sorted out. I’m estimating a week before we’re ready to return to Río Muni—the Equatoguinean mainland.”

“A week? That long?”

“About that, yes.”

“Thank you, Michael,” he said. “This is excellent news, although honestly, I’m terrified of falling prey to false hope. Please let me know as things progress.”

“Of course.”

T
HE CALL OVER
, Munroe turned to Bradford and then to Beyard, who had just entered the room. “If we’re lucky, we just bought ourselves a week.”

T
he road was dry, the atmosphere hazed by harmattan—fine Saharan dust blown from the north—which clouded the sky, cut visibility, and filled the horizon with the orange-tinged illusion of smog and pollution. Munroe checked the rearview mirror, caught the outline of Beyard’s vehicle, and returned her focus to the pothole-pitted road ahead, stopped and shifted into four-wheel drive.

She worked the clutch and gas heading down, then up, a chunk of missing road that had most likely washed out during a previous downpour. Bradford stared out the passenger window with his arms crossed. It was more or less the same silent position he’d held since Douala and under the circumstances probably as close as he could get to turning his back to her. Whatever the mood, he was certainly entitled to it; she’d been treating him like crap since he’d returned to Cameroon, and though it would eventually be necessary to make nice, now wasn’t the time.

They had left Douala before dawn, routing east to Yaoundé and then south, the quality of the road rapidly deteriorating the closer they drew to the border. Entering Equatorial Guinea from Cameroon was inconvenient at best. The countries were separated at the coast by the Ntem River, and where the water no longer delimited them, the countryside was thick with dense forest, through which village populations were able to traverse on
foot, often unaware of the exact place one country ended and another began. There was only one vehicular transit point along the 120-mile stretch, and they were now driving down the road that led to it.

A gate barring the road and a small building standing next to it marked the entrance into Equatorial Guinea. Munroe slowed to a stop. By all appearances the checkpoint was deserted. When after a minute no official exited what should have been an office, she switched off the engine and stepped into the afternoon heat.

The one-room structure was empty, bare-board walls with a cement floor and holes for windows, and the only sound came from the insects that buzzed along the ceiling. Munroe stood in the doorway for a moment, then turned and walked toward the metal barricade. It was held in place to adjacent poles by three chains, which meant they would need to locate three officials, each with a separate key. The border didn’t close until five, but with the post deserted, traffic nearly none, and it being midafternoon, the authorities were no doubt already finished for the day. It wasn’t too much of a stretch to expect that at least one of them had already returned to his village, taking the key along for the evening.

Through the dust caked on Beyard’s windshield, she could see him leaning on the steering wheel, eyes following her movements, and when she strode toward him, he stepped out of the vehicle. “Three locks,” she said, “empty office.” She stared in the direction of town. Somewhere along those streets, in some bar or hotel or restaurant, was an unknown face expecting her to arrive within the week, waiting to pass along the word and thus guarantee that she never made it to Mongomo.

If they’d come to the country under any other pretense or if they’d had more time, perhaps a wiser move would have been to turn back, head west, and then cut tracks across the unmarked border. Here they were set out like targets on a firing range, and if the artifice of an Israeli convoy was transparent, they’d know it soon enough.

Women and children approached the vehicles, some trying to get Bradford’s attention through his window and others crowding around Beyard and Munroe, each offering items for sale. A boy of eight or nine balanced a dirty plastic basin filled with bananas on his head. Beyard examined a bunch and then pulled a handful of loose change from his pocket. He knelt down at the boy’s eye level, handed over the cash, and
flashed Munroe a dashing smile; the unriddling of the missing officials had begun.

It took thirty minutes before they were able to locate the first official with his key, another forty to find the second. It was two hours before the third was found, and when he was, he was drunk and unable to locate the key until Munroe, unwilling to offer bribes or wait out the length of time it would take to play the game, began to name-drop. With the appropriate level of threat provided, the missing key was swiftly produced, and the convoy moved into the town of Ebebiyín. By now even the most incompetent of lookouts would be more than aware of their presence. If there had been someone waiting—and Munroe was sure that there was—no threat or whisper of awareness to the convoy’s intent had blown on the wind.

The village of several thousand was a gateway at the crossroads between Gabon, Cameroon, and Equatorial Guinea: a marketplace and hub of activity for miles to the west and south; a small grid of mostly unpaved roads and the whitewashed and red-stained buildings that fronted them; and like most rural towns on the continent, life here moved at a lethargic pace. It took less than ten minutes for the convoy to crawl through the sprawled, dusty streets, and when they were on the narrow but paved stretch that would take them to Mongomo and were far beyond the reach of townsfolk curiosity, Munroe turned the vehicle off the road.

Verdurous vines that thrived in the open light of the swath of tarmac created a wall of green on either side of the road, and so, in view of any vehicle that might pass, Munroe and Beyard moved quickly, switching out Cameroonian plates and papers for Equatoguinean, stashing the old ones behind door panels, and minutes later they headed back onto the road in vehicles registered in the name of the country’s president. There were still eighty kilometers to Mongomo, and with the improved road conditions it would be possible to reach the city by early evening. But they would wait until tomorrow’s dawn; it would be far better to approach the target house with a full period of daylight ahead, and staying in Mongomo overnight created too much exposure.

A half hour after dark, they went off-road, following a track that connected a small village to the Mongomo road. In the hour since Ebebiyín, they had covered forty kilometers, the empty stretch taking them
past an occasional bush taxi, several abandoned and cannibalized cars, and expected roadblocks; nothing out of the ordinary that would signal awareness to their presence and the relative silence among the local military frequencies so far confirmed that all was in order.

Before reaching the designated village, the convoy detoured into the bush, where they would bide the night well hidden in the black of the forest. In the dark, Munroe felt for the vehicle’s communications equipment, and when she had disconnected it, she placed the pieces into a duffel bag, slung the strap over her shoulder, and opened the door. She stepped into the night, and Bradford said, “Where are you going?”

She nodded to the rear. “Other vehicle,” she said, and although she knew it was unnecessary, added, “Keep the lights off and, unless you want to get devoured by mosquitoes, the doors and windows shut. Don’t run the air conditioner—the engine noise will attract attention. I’ll be back at dawn.” She shut the door before he had a chance to respond, knowing he’d hate her all the more for it.

Munroe slid into the backseat of the rear vehicle. Francisco was in the front, reclined, hands behind his head, and when she shut the door, he brought the back upright and climbed between the front seats to where she was. His foot hit the duffel bag. “What’d you bring?”

“Everything that transmits.”

He slid next to her and maneuvered her onto his lap so that she faced him. “Still don’t trust him?”

“Not enough to leave it with him overnight,” she said.

His hands were already inside her shirt. She removed his uniform, and like two teenagers on a forbidden tryst, hormones transcending heat and discomfort, they left the interior of the vehicle as damp and humid as the air outside.

It was well past midnight before they finally returned to the front and reclined the seats in an attempt to sleep through what was left of the night. The mirrors of the lead vehicle reflected dim specks of canopy-filtered moonlight, and Francisco nodded in their direction. “You didn’t need to bring the equipment,” he whispered. “You know he’s not the one trying to get you killed.”

Munroe stared out the passenger window.

“I see the way he looks at you when your back is turned,” Francisco
said. He paused and turned his head toward her. “You’re a very perceptive woman, Essa. You can’t help but know that he wants you alive as badly as I do.”