Nelson Demille - The Panther

“I handled it differently than you might have handled it.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning I shared with him my suspicion that you and I were asked to come to Yemen so that the CIA could even the score. Meaning you whacking Ted Nash.”

She stayed silent for a while, then said, “I don’t necessarily agree with your suspicion.” She added, “It’s too… crazy.”

“You think? Look, it’s not only about you terminating Ted, and you being cleared of any wrongdoing. It’s also about you and me screwing up the CIA’s plan to nuke Islam. That was a biggie. And we know about it.”

“We’ve stayed silent-as per the deal.”

“Right. But that’s not good enough for worried people in Langley. Dead is better.”

She didn’t reply.

“So that’s why we’re here.”

Again, she didn’t respond, but asked me, “What else did you say to Chet?”

“Well, I told him if anything happened to you, or if I even thought you or I were being set up, I was going to blow his head off.”

“You shouldn’t have said that.”

“All right. I’ll tell him it’s okay for him to kill us.”

“What I mean, John, is that you may be wrong about this.”

“If I’m wrong, I’m wrong, and there’s no harm done.”

“You don’t threaten someone’s life without some harm done. Especially if that person has done nothing wrong-or knows nothing.”

“Okay. But Chet took it well. He was even pleasant to me after he returned from the van. Did you notice?”

“You may be as crazy as he is.”

“Crazier, I assure you.” I reminded her, “ You said to look for the triple cross.”

She didn’t reply.

I continued, “What’s in a name? Why is this called Operation Clean Sweep? Why are you and I here?”

“All right. I get it. But… what did he say?”

“He neither confirmed nor denied my suspicions. Actually, he said he could understand how I might come to such an erroneous and paranoid conclusion, and that I might actually be right, but he has nothing to do with whatever it was that I was wrongly suggesting.” I asked, “Follow?”

“No.”

“I guess you had to be there. Bottom line here, I let the cat out of the bag, and Chet cabled his people in Langley. Or maybe he actually spoke to them. So I think we now have less than a fifty-fifty chance of becoming victims of friendly fire-or winding up whacked by Musa or Al Qaeda.”

Kate nodded, then said, “In this business, the past comes back to haunt you.”

I’m not haunted by anything. My problem is when the past comes back to kill you. Like The Lion. Like Ted Nash. This business is a cycle of vendetta, an ever-widening circle without end. Someday, maybe when I’m old, sitting in a rocker, someone from the past will get me. But not today. Not this week.

To make Kate feel better, I said, “It was self-defense. You saved our lives. Don’t replay it.”

She nodded.

So we finished our three hours of guard duty and woke Chet and Buck. Chet was actually already awake. Maybe he had a bad dream about someone cutting his throat while he slept.

The five gentlemen of the A-team had breakfast with the eight gentlemen of the desert down in the courtyard, while Kate used the opportunity of privacy to wash up with bottled water.

Breakfast was the same glop, except the Bedouin had added tuna.

After breakfast, Chet, Buck, Brenner, and I went into the van and watched TV. Both screens had reruns of yesterday’s show-beautiful Yemen from the air. I felt like I was soaring.

Chet did a commo check and a sit-rep, and ground control reported no unusual activity in the area. Just another routine day in the tribal lands, and a quiet day in Al Qaeda territory. But that could change quickly.

We walked around the courtyard for exercise, the way convicts walk around the prison yard. I counted fourteen lizards.

Later I suggested to Buck, “Ask our Bedouin hosts if they can get us a soccer ball. Also some real food from Marib. I’ll buy.”

Buck informed me, “They’ve told me they’re not allowed to leave here. And no one can come here unless the food and water runs out.” He explained, “We’re all in lockdown until further notice.”

“When do we start killing and eating the camels?”

“There are no camels. But there are goats outside the walls and our hosts seem to be killing one a day.”

“How many are left?”

“Enough for a long siege.”

On that subject, Kate, Brenner, and I bugged Buck and Chet about getting some info about how Sheik Musa was doing in his talks with Al Qaeda.

But Buck and Chet both agreed that it was premature to send a message to the sheik.

Buck said, “It would be impolite to ask him now. Maybe in a few days.”

Chet agreed. “Let it play out.” He added, “We need to appear trusting, unworried, and cool.”

Who makes this shit up?

Anyway, we had lunch on the diwan level where we lived. Tuna again. Buck explained away the poor provisions from Washington by saying, “We don’t want to accentuate the differences between us and our Bedouin allies.”

“That’s idiotic, Buck. We should celebrate our differences. Like with pork chops.”

Buck continued, “Also, we don’t want to look too good for the Al Qaeda men who come to see us. We’re supposed to be subsisting on goats and oats.” He smiled and added, “We can’t be getting fat in captivity.”

I pictured another CIA committee discussing this. They really are into smoke and mirrors, and as I just discovered, they are believers in method acting. The A-team had to starve a little to look the part of kidnap victims. Not to mention we all needed a shower and shave.

Anyway, there wasn’t a lot to talk about anymore, without saying stupid things, so we all sort of retreated into ourselves, and read, and did crossword puzzles. Kate exercised a lot, and Mr. Brenner joined her a few times, twisting and bending. I should call the Bedouin in to see this.

We had a first-aid kit, and Brenner helped Zamo change his dressing, and later Brenner assured us that Zamo was okay. Maybe he was. But maybe we had to get him out of here.

We also wrote out in longhand our required notes of assurance to friends, family, bookies, and whomever. These notes would be e-mailed to the parties we indicated.

Buck had some suggested wording for the last paragraph, and it went something like this: I’ll be out of communication in a remote area for a week or two, but if you need to contact me, this is the U.S. Embassy e-mail address set up for this purpose. I may not be able to respond for a week or more, but be assured I will see your e-mail and I will contact you shortly.

I said to Kate, “Tell your parents I miss them.”

Chet and Buck gathered up the handwritten notes from Kate, me, Brenner, and Zamo, then took them down to the van for encrypted transmission to the embassy, or to Washington-they weren’t clear about that.

I said to Kate, Brenner, and Zamo, “This is like the stupid postcards you had to send to your parents from camp.” Except there was something creepy about this.

The day passed, the Bedouin answered all their calls to prayer, and all their cell phone calls. We walked around the courtyard, and we explored each floor of the six-story tower, which was all the same except for the open-arched mafraj level. Good view. Also, to break up the monotony, I took a leak from the mafraj down the excrement shaft-six stories to the ground floor, which was piled high with shit. Longest piss I ever took. TMI. The other highlight of my day was recharging my commo equipment in the van. It’s fascinating to watch the charge levels rise.

The Bedouin, by the way, never seemed bored. They had an infinite capacity to sit around and bullshit. And when they weren’t talking to one another, they were talking on their cell phones. They made tea all day, prayed, and slept when they felt like it. They had some kind of washing ritual associated with the call to prayer, but it seemed more symbolic than rub-a-dub-dub.