The Leveling (2 page)

“It’s an animal—
qunduz
.” Mark had downed one cup of Turkish coffee before meeting Heydar at the library but was now wishing he’d ordered a second one to go. “It builds dams. And it’s not one of the answers offered. Focus on prefixes if you don’t understand the words.”

They’d been working for a full half hour already and were only on question five.

“I take you to Turan, I show you the beaver.”

The Turan was a dive bar in Baku known for its weak drinks, sticky floors, and remarkable prostitute-to-customer ratio. Mark hadn’t been there for years.

“No thanks.”

“Serious, I take you.”

Mark ran a hand through his hair. “Focus on the question. Guess if you have to.”

Heydar made a show of concentrating.

“What does
constructed
mean?” pressed Mark. “You should know that word. It was on last week’s vocabulary list.”

Heydar stuck out his chin, which was covered with thick black stubble. “When someone has built something.”

“That’s right.” As Mark nodded with as much feigned encouragement as he could muster, he noted the sound of footsteps behind him—someone was entering the room. “And
examined
?”

Heydar’s jaw muscles went slack and his mouth dropped open as he stared at the SAT book. He breathed loudly through his mouth.

“To look at closely,” said Mark eventually. “Like if you look at the cover of this book for a long time, you have examined it. Understand?”

Because Heydar’s father was the powerful Azeri minister of national security, the kid had a bodyguard assigned to him at all times. Out of the corner of his eye, Mark saw the bodyguard currently on duty slowly lower a natural gas industry magazine he’d been pretending to read.

“At the Turan you can examine the beaver,” said Heydar.

“You’re not funny. And if you don’t study the vocabulary lists, I can’t help you.”

“I think I am funny.”

“You’re not.”

The boy shrugged and looked up at the ceiling. “I have too much hunger.”

“I don’t care.”

“We buy two chicken
donors
, one for me one for you. Then we study in the park.”

It was eight thirty in the morning. Mark had just eaten breakfast. Besides, he’d tried the studying-in-the-park routine before; Heydar had spent far more time ogling women than he had studying.

“If you don’t want to do this, fine. Personally, I don’t give a shit. That’s between you and your dad. We both know I’m just doing him a favor.”

“They do not like your big speech, I see. This is why you have such a bad mood. This is why you think nothing is funny.”

Mark cradled his head in his hands. “My speech went fine.”

“OK. If you say so.”

“I do say so.”

But that was a lie.

Yesterday afternoon, at an academic conference in Tbilisi, Georgia, Mark had given a speech about Russian influence in Azerbaijan during the 1920s. Two of the paltry ten people in the audience, including a fellow professor from Western University—a colleague!—had nodded off. Mark had spent two weeks preparing for that presentation. He should have just passed out packets of Ambien right at the start and not bothered.

Also, he was a little hungover. The kid was right. He was in a foul mood.

Mark stood up. Heydar’s bodyguard stood up as well.

“Wait. I try, I try,” said Heydar.

That Mark began to think of his own death at this point was pure coincidence. It was a technique he used, whenever he got annoyed at something or someone, to put things in perspective. He reasoned that in forty years or so, maybe a lot sooner, he’d be a rotting corpse. So why let an eighteen-year-old kid get under his skin? And so what if his presentation had flopped? Would that matter when he was on his deathbed? Let it go already.

“Then tell me what
dismantled
means, or what you think it might mean. Focus on the prefix,
dis
. Come on, Heydar, you can do this.”

Heydar’s jaw went slack again as he looked at the word. Twice he almost began to speak, as though he hoped the answer would come to him if he just opened his mouth and let the words form on their own. Finally he said, “Screw up the University of Texas. I don’t care if I go.”

“Well, your father does.”

Just then, three shots rang out in quick succession.

J
OHN
D
ECKER OPENED
his eyes slowly, forced into consciousness by the excruciating throbbing in his head. Walls pressed around him on all four sides, as if he were in a coffin. Each time his heart beat, he felt as though his skull were going to split open.

He blinked a few times and brought his fingers up to his eyelids, to confirm that nothing was impeding his vision. His eyes were clear; it was simply that the darkness was absolute. He wondered whether he was dead, but the pain in his head—and his leg, what was wrong with his leg?—suggested otherwise.

He touched his massive left thigh, but instead of hard muscle, he felt something spongy and warm and wet.

You’ve been shot.

Decker grabbed at his chest, intending to break the rubber band that held his emergency tourniquet in place on his gear vest, worried that his femoral artery had been hit. But there was nothing. No vest. No tourniquet.

His mind flashed back to the disaster at the mansion, and he remembered that he’d already used his tourniquet, but only as a pressure dressing. Someone had removed it. He felt his leg again. It was wet, but the bleeding had stopped.

Calm down, you’re not going to bleed out.

It all came back to him in a rush. A little swell of panic began to rise up in his throat. He had a sudden urge to kick out at the darkness.

Keep your shit together, buddy. Manage your emotions. Remember your training.

Baku, Azerbaijan

T
HE
M
INISTRY OF
National Security occupied a monolithic limestone building on Parlament Prospekti. It was the same building that had housed the KGB back in the Soviet era, which Mark thought appropriate, given what he knew about the Azeri national security ministry. He was taken to an interrogation room in the basement. To be questioned about the incident.

“But I’ve already been questioned. I’ve already told you everything I know.”

It didn’t matter. He was a witness. There were forms that needed to be filled out, procedures that needed to be followed.

“Does Orkhan Gambar know I’m here?” he asked, just as the door was closing shut.

It was a cheerless room, with just a table, a few metal chairs, bare concrete walls that leaned in a little bit, and a stopped clock that hung above the door. As he sat down, he replayed the scene from the library in his head: Heydar struggling with the SAT practice questions, the sound of gunfire, the would-be assassin shot through the head and crumbling into an untidy heap of flesh, Heydar panicking, and the bodyguard blocking the door and calling in reinforcements with ruthless, unflappable efficiency.

Mark had just stood there until the Azeri security forces had escorted him away.

He should have noticed the gunman sooner, been more attentive to the bodyguard’s reaction, sat at a table that would
have allowed him an easy exit, used a book or a chair or a pen as a weapon…

Not that it really mattered. He didn’t need to be sharp anymore. Heydar’s father had survived two assassination attempts within the past year. This latest spasm of violence was undoubtedly just a way to try to get at the father by coming after the son.

It didn’t have anything to do with him. Security on Heydar would be redoubled. Life in Baku would go on.

Mark fished his cell phone out of his pocket and checked the time—it was a little after eleven. He was starting to get hungry.

He’d cooperate with the Azeris as best he could today, but by evening he planned to be drinking a bottle of wine on the balcony of his eighth-floor apartment, figuring out a lesson plan for the senior seminar he was teaching at Western University the next day. He’d go to sleep just after the sun went down, and by morning the memory of his lousy presentation and the incident at the library would be behind him.

Heydar’s father showed up around noon, wearing a dark tailored suit and a showy gold watch that matched the gold fillings that gleamed in the back of his mouth. Although he wasn’t much taller than Mark, he was much heavier and built in a powerful, bear-like way. His nose was thick, long, and hawk-like. He smelled of aftershave.

“Get out,” said Orkhan to the guards who’d accompanied him.

The door clicked shut. To break the ice, Mark leaned back in his metal chair and said in Azeri, “I spent last night with a Russian.”

Orkhan grunted as he considered this information for a moment. His eyes, usually dead in a KGB sort of way, showed a brief flicker of interest, as Mark had known they would.

Mark had been declared to the Azeris, both when he’d run the CIA’s Azerbaijan station and when he’d served as an operations officer. As a result, he’d known Orkhan for the better part of a decade. Early on in their relationship, he’d learned that there were few things Orkhan liked better than hearing the Russians insulted.

“It was on the train back from Tbilisi,” said Mark. “I was unlucky. He was assigned to my sleeping compartment.”

“This is why you should drive.”

“He was drunk.”

“Of course he is drunk, you already told me he was a Russian.”

“He had a bottle of vodka. Dovgan. Kept me up all night.” Mark intentionally didn’t mention that he and the Russian had hit it off well and talked late into the night about Russian politics, a conversation partly fueled by the many toasts the Russian had offered and Mark had accepted. To their collective health! To love! To friendship between the United States and Russia! To the men who made the train! To blow jobs! To…

Orkhan exhaled loudly through his nose. “The drink is their religion! You should have asked for a different compartment the minute you see he is a Russian. They are as bad as the Armenians. Filthy, drunk, and not to be trusted. You should know this.”

“I never learn.” A moment of silence passed as Mark waited for Orkhan to begin questioning him about the shooting. Finally Mark said, “Heydar’s bodyguard was quick.”

“Of course.” Orkhan sat down, plumping onto a metal seat and letting out a huff as he did so. “He is one of my men.”

“Heydar is OK?”

“Ah yes, Heydar.” Orkhan spoke with a tinge of weariness. “The problem with Heydar is that he is lazy, like his mother. It’s his genes.”

“English is a hard language to learn. And the SAT is a hard test.”

Eight months ago, when the CIA station in Baku was under siege, Orkhan had done Mark a favor. To repay this favor, Mark was trying to help Heydar get into the University of Texas so
that Heydar could become a petroleum engineer and help run Azerbaijan’s oil industry. The SAT, however, was proving to be a nearly insurmountable obstacle for the boy.

“I am not speaking of the SAT. I am speaking of his performance after the shooting.”

After first running away in a panic, Heydar had returned with false bravado and piss-stained pants to try to belatedly kick at the corpse. His bodyguard had held him back.