Haggai Harmon - The Chameleon Conspiracy

“Thanks,” I said, and followed him to a building nearby. He opened the door on the ground floor. “Here, you should find everything you need. Call me if you have any questions.”

I sat on the sofa bed, glared at the walls and the small wall unit with family photos of smiling children, and thought of mine. I tried calling them using my mobile phone, and on the third attempt I reached Tom, my son, and Karen, my daughter, who was just about to go out the door. I didn’t tell them about my narrow escape just an hour earlier, and we focused on family matters. Tom was just returning to his college, and Karen was about to graduate, but both of them had that vision of the world being at their feet that only the young can claim. Neither held back their enthusiasm, telling me of their plans and what was new in their lives. It always made me feel proud to see that they were growing into strong adults. Of course, we couldn’t speak as freely as we would have liked to. Trained by experience as they are, they didn’t even ask me where I was or when I would be returning.

“I’m going to be back home soon,” I said. It was more wishful thinking than based on reality.

I decided to go to the club to socialize and get my mind off of things for a minute. There were four other men drinking beer and watching an American TV network. After an hour I was tired of watching stupid sitcoms with dubbed laughter even when they weren’t remotely funny. I’ve often thought that when a sitcom producer’s IQ reaches 50, he should sell. There was plenty about America I didn’t miss. I returned to my new makeshift home.

Leaning my head on the soft, green pillow of the couch, I pondered my next move. Ward had left the United States in 1980 or 1981, gone to Hong Kong and South Africa, and finally left a trace in Pakistan. From Pakistan, he may have continued to Iran. Was it possible that just about the same time he returned to the U.S. without leaving a record with the Immigration and Naturalization Ser vice, he’d made himself look years older, perpetrated bank fraud, and vanished again? That simply didn’t make sense. The hunch that his identity had been stolen needed no further support, but it was still just an assumption, and I needed proof. Before falling asleep, I decided to discuss this matter with Don Suarez, the legat at the embassy.

The next morning, after recharging myself with fruit juice and a muffin for breakfast at the club, I called him. “Sure, come over,” he replied.

As I sat down next to his desk, Suarez said, “I heard you had an experience yesterday.”

“Yes,” I said. “Any clues?”

“Not yet. The main direction in that kind of investigation is intelligence, not police work. The police couldn’t find any witnesses to the attack, although Abdullah said the street was bustling.”

“So are you working on intelligence?”

“Yes, together with the Agency, but that takes time.”

The post-September eleventh era had finally seen a little more cooperation between the FBI and the CIA, with a little less time dedicated to turf wars.

“What do you think? Was it because I was snooping around Ward? Was I picked at random because they saw the embassy connection with the car and Abdullah?”

“Anything is possible,” he said, shrugging, just when I needed a more concrete answer.

I told him about my suspicions about Ward, my unanswered questions about how he could be in two places at the same time.

“Maybe he wasn’t,” said Suarez. “In the sixties through the eighties, there were instances where young American men just disappeared. I guess some of them simply wanted to. I wouldn’t be surprised if some of them are monks in a Buddhist monastery in Tibet, fishermen in New Zealand, or just basking on the beach in Goa.”

“And you leave it at that?”

“Sure, if they’re adults, and if there are no complaints from families about missing persons, and there’s no evidence of foul play. Hey, there’s a limit to the amount of babysitting the federal government can do with taxpayers’ money.”

“Do you have names of these people?”

“No, because if we had a name, that’d mean somebody was looking for him. We don’t have a world chart with pins indicating where any American citizen is at any given moment. We aren’t there yet.”

I wouldn’t get any answers from him, I thought. I lost interest in the conversation.

A cable from David Stone came in. “You are authorized a one-week vacation. No work is to be performed in any country other those included on the authorized list provided before your departure. David.”

That was David’s nice way of saying, “You can go wherever you want, but don’t mess up things or you’re on your own.”

An armored embassy car drove me to the airport. I had changed my mind about Switzerland. I had started to think that the Al Taqwa link Khan was selling me was dubious. If necessary, I’d pursue it with the bank’s receivers from New York. Instead, I took a British Airways flight to London. From London, I boarded an El Al flight to Ben Gurion Airport, Israel. When I arrived, it was already dark. I rented a car, listened to Israeli oldies, and drove to my hotel on the beach in Tel Aviv.

The next morning I called Benny Friedman, my Mossad buddy. Friendship forged in military organizations lasts forever. Although we served together for only three years, we created a strong bond. Our friendship withstood the cultural gap between us. Benny came from an Orthodox family and adhered to all the tenets of the Jewish faith, while I considered myself nonreligious, only keeping the traditional rituals during holidays. Benny also had a wry sense of humor, but only those who knew him well could really “get it.” I was one of the few who did, and I felt that if anybody could penetrate what was going on in his agile mind, I could. Well, maybe.

I’d left the Mossad when I was exposed to the enemy during an operation which effectively “burned” me from participating in any future field operations. But Benny had stayed on. He’d climbed through the ranks and made it to the top of Tevel, the foreign-relations wing of the Mossad, which is charged with liaisons with foreign intelligence services, including with countries considered hostile to Israel.

When we’d first learned about this wing’s functions during our training at the Mossad Academy, some eyebrows were raised. “What? Trade secrets with your rivals?” one asked. Alex, our training instructor, was very calm about it. “We are in the game of interests, and you don’t let feelings and animosities get in your way,” he had said. “If you need to exchange information with someone, you just do it. Politics may collide, but we do our work. Same goes for any intelligence service worldwide. We collect intelligence concerning our enemies’ intentions and capabilities, and we’d get it from Satan if he were offering it at the right price.”

Benny’s secretary transferred the call.

“Dan, is that you? Where are you?”

“In Tel Aviv for a few days.”

“Business?” Benny knew what I was doing, and in the past we had helped each other in matters of our work. I never felt I was abusing our friendship, and I don’t think he felt any differently.

“Actually, I’m on a family visit. But you know me, I never stop working. Lunch?”

“Sure.” Benny never said no to a good meal, and neither did I. The only difference was that he ate only kosher food, while I ate also kosher.

Two hours later we met on the fishermen’s pier in Jaffa’s old port. The city of Jaffa, now part of Tel Aviv, is one of the oldest port cities of the world, with a history dating back five thousand years. The pier is younger, only about a thousand years old, and is mainly used by fishing boats that bring their fresh catch to the restaurants lined along its outer walls. This was a place where restaurant decorators didn’t need to fake authenticity-it was the authentic place. Weatherworn fishermen’s boats bobbed nearby. Busy people were unloading crates of fish, and there was a strong mix of smells: sea air, fish, and burning wood coal from the open air grills barbecuing fish.