Alex Berenson - The Secret Soldier

His father and sixty warriors had lived in the Empty Quarter in the winter of 1902, before Abdul-Aziz led the attack on Riyadh that was the first step in creating modern Saudi Arabia. To honor his father’s memory, to prove he could survive the desert, Abdullah had lived in the Quarter for a month. Now he could hardly walk. With every step, he felt his legs quiver under his big body. He forced himself to push on, though he wanted to sit and sleep for days. When had this happened to him? When had his flesh lost its vigor?

He didn’t tell his doctors, but the world was turning monochromatic, the white desert light fading to gray. Dates tasted like they were wrapped in plastic, their sticky ooze only faintly sweet. He knew what was happening to him. He had all the money in the world, the very best doctors. And nothing could stop it.

If Allah wanted to take him, he would have to succumb. All men did. The dead are children of the dead, the preachers said. But while he was alive, no one would steal his kingdom. He imagined the attack on the hotel in Riyadh, his own people killed in their beds, and a fresh fury coursed through his veins. He would raise his sword over the heads of these terrorists and—

A KNOCK STARTLED HIM. Had he been sleeping? He napped more and more. He wiped his mouth, looked at the gold Patek Philippe clock he’d installed on his desk a month before when he realized that he could no longer read his watch. A quarter past eleven. “Yes.”

“It’s Miteb. With Mansour.”

“Come in, then.” Abdullah pressed a button under the desk to alert his steward that he wanted coffee. Miteb, Abdullah’s half-brother, stepped in. Miteb was Abdullah’s closest adviser and dearest friend, the only man he could truly say he trusted. But Miteb was nearly as old as Abdullah. In the last five years, he’d had two heart attacks. He could barely walk.

Mansour, the director of the Saudi mukhabarat— the country’s secret police — followed. Mansour was the son of Saeed, another of Abdullah’s many half-brothers, and thus was Abdullah’s half-nephew. His mother was a legendary beauty, and Mansour had inherited her round face and light skin. He was nearly fifty, but his eyes were unlined and his robes flowed smoothly over his flat stomach. In truth, Mansour was unmanly, Abdullah thought. He had never understood the desert. He limped slightly, the result of a motorcycle accident two decades earlier.

“You’re late.”

Mansour knelt, kissed Abdullah’s hand. “I apologize, Your Highness.”

“Sit, then. Hamoud is bringing coffee.” Abdullah pulled himself up from his desk and shuffled over to his favorite leather chair, a gift from the first President Bush. Miteb sat across from him on a yellow eighteenth-century French couch that had cost the Kingdom a few thousand barrels of oil. And Mansour took a low wooden stool beside Abdullah’s chair.

A faint knock. “Come, Hamoud.”

Hamoud arranged the coffee, keeping his eyes down. In thirty years as Abdullah’s steward, he had looked directly at his master only a handful of times. “Anything else, Your Highness?”

“No. Go on.” Hamoud left. “Was your flight smooth?” Mansour had flown in this morning from Riyadh, the capital, five hundred miles east.

“Yes, Your Highness, hamdulillah ”—thanks be to God.

“Good. Tell me you’ve found these devils.”

Mansour shook his head.

“Tell me you’ve found them, Mansour.”

“We will find them. In the meantime, may I report what we have discovered so far?” He didn’t wait for an answer but pushed ahead. “We’ve discovered the identities of eight of the bombers. I regret to tell you that they are all Saudi. The four who attacked the drinking establishment in Bahrain, they were from the Najd”—the high Saudi desert in the center of the Arabian Peninsula. “They disappeared a few months ago. We’re speaking with their fathers to determine where they might have trained. So far, all the fathers insist that they had no idea what the boys were planning. The local clerics say the same. It’s disappointing that they aren’t being more honest. If we must, we’ll bring them in for interviews in Riyadh”—a reference to the mukhabarat headquarters.

“And the other four?”

“All from Taif”—a town in western Saudi Arabia, not far from Jeddah. “The same situation. None on our watch lists.”

“You have found nothing.”

“Whoever’s training these men is canny. These attacks were months in the making. Years. It will take time to unravel this.”

“Why do you waste my time if you have found nothing?”

“You asked me to come here from Riyadh, Your Highness.” A hint of ice crept into Mansour’s voice. “I assure you that all of us are frustrated. We won’t let these criminals attack your name. You are the state, Abdullah. We live and die with you—”

“Spare me this recital.” Abdullah was fully awake now, his anger quickening him. “If you live and die with me, you won’t live much longer—”

“Then let me say. We all want these terrorists caught.”

“I wish I were certain of that.”

“What are you implying, Abdullah?”

“I am your king, Mansour.” Abdullah knew he needed to control himself, hide his anger and distrust from his nephew. But he couldn’t. His weakness rubbed him raw. He upended the silver coffeepot, sent a gusher of black liquid onto the antique Persian rug that stretched across the study. “Never again shall you take that tone with me.”

Mansour looked sidelong at Miteb and shook his head. Abdullah pushed on, compounding his mistake. Someday you’ll be old, he thought. Someday you’ll know.

“I am your king. Say it.”

“You are my king.”

“Go back to Riyadh, then, and find these men. Whoever they are. Foreign or Saudi. We will cut off their heads and let the world know that we don’t stand for this. Do you understand me?”

“Yes, Your Highness.”

MITEB LEFT WITH MANSOUR but promised to return in a few minutes. In the meantime, Abdullah’s steward cleared away the coffeepot and wiped up the stain. Abdullah ignored him until he finished.

“Shall I bring another pot, Your Highness?”

“No.”

“Something else?”

“Leave me, Hamoud. Now.” Hamoud left. Abdullah sat alone in his study. He wanted to call Saeed, Mansour’s father, and scream at him about his son. But he knew losing his temper again would further weaken his position. He would have to go back to Riyadh. He couldn’t stay here. He needed to talk to the other senior princes. The conversations would be unpleasant. They’d burn a hole in his stomach. He shouldn’t need to beg for support.

But in his heart he knew he’d brought this disaster on himself.

The door opened. Miteb returned. “You mustn’t do that, Abdullah,” he said without preamble.

“These jihadis, they call us apostates, brother. The world is upside down when these men say they speak for our religion. They won’t frighten me. Not in this world or the next. They think the Prophet, peace be upon Him, wants them to attack their own people? I’ll pluck out their eyes and pour salt down their throats—”

“My brother. Everything you say, it’s true. But we have something else to talk about.”

“Don’t bother me with this.”

“These matters can’t wait anymore.”

“ You dare to tell me what waits?”

“Abdullah. Listen now. Yes, you to me. You can’t treat your nephew this way. He was furious. He told me, ‘I am forty-eight years old. I have my own sons and grandsons, and that man insults me like a child. No more, Miteb.’ He wouldn’t even use your name, Abdullah. ‘That man’ was all he’d say. And do you know that I was actually glad to hear his anger? Because if he’s still willing to complain, it means that he may still be loyal. If he held his tongue to me, it would mean he’d given up on you and was nursing his anger in private.”