Christopher Reich - Rules of Deception

Von Daniken hadn’t known that Ransom’s wife was so intimately involved in aid work. He asked about her position on these assignments.

“Emma did everything. Her title was logistician. She set up the mission, made sure that the medicine got there on time, coordinated the local help, and paid off the bully boys so they’d leave us in peace. She ran the place so Jonathan could save lives. One of her was worth five ordinary mortals. What happened to the woman is a tragedy. We already miss her.”

A wife who involved herself in her husband’s work. A competent woman. A woman who asked questions. Von Daniken wondered if she’d asked one too many. “And what is Dr. Ransom working on at the moment?” he inquired.

“You mean before he started murdering policemen?” The Somali woman gave him another smirk to show what she thought of his investigation. “He’s supervising an anti-malaria campaign we’re mounting in coordination with the Bates Foundation. I don’t think he’s terribly happy. It’s an administrative job, and he prefers to be in the field.”

“And how long is the posting to last?”

“Normally, this kind of thing is open-ended. He would remain in his position until the program was implemented, at which time he’d brief his successor and turn over the reins. Unfortunately, I recently received a complaint about his comportment. Apparently, he’s been a bit brusque with the American side of this…the money side,” she whispered. “Mrs. Bates doesn’t like him. A decision has been taken to remove him from his post.”

Von Daniken nodded, but inside him, a bell sounded and he was aware that he’d located the unseen hand that guided Ransom’s moves from country to country. It started with a complaint voiced to the personnel director. A suggestion. Maybe something stronger, but the woman would get the idea. Jonathan Ransom needs to go to Beirut. He must be sent to Darfur.

“Any ideas where he’ll be going next?”

“I was hoping Pakistan. We have an immediate opening at a new mission in Lahore. The director dropped dead of a heart attack. Only fifty, the dear man. He’d scheduled an important meeting with the minister of Health and Welfare for Tuesday. I’d rather hoped that I could convince Jonathan to fly out on Sunday in time to make it.”

“This Sunday?”

“Yes. On the evening flight. I know it’s asking rather a lot of a man who just lost his wife, but knowing Jonathan, I think it would do him good.”

“Sunday,” von Daniken repeated, as it all began to sink in.

Seventy-two hours.

Von Daniken’s theory was simple. Ransom was a trained agent in the pay of a foreign government. His position as a physician working for Doctors Without Borders offered ideal cover to move from country to country without attracting undue attention. The way to figure out who Ransom worked for was to discover what he’d done in the past. That was why von Daniken was seated at a computer in the watch room of the Geneva police on Rue Gauthier, staring at a picture of a gravely wounded woman being freed from a pile of rubble inside a bombed-out hospital. The picture came from the front page of the Daily Star, Lebanon’s English-language newspaper, and was dated July 31 the past year.

The article was titled “Blast Kills Police Investigator,” and it concerned an explosion that had killed seventeen persons, including a prominent policeman who had been leading the investigation into the assassination of the former Lebanese prime minister. At the time of the explosion, the investigator was undergoing weekly dialysis to treat a failing kidney. A detective at the scene revealed that he suspected that the bomb had been planted in the floor of the clinic during a renovation completed three months earlier. He estimated that the blast was equivalent to one hundred pounds of TNT.

The article went on to say that no responsibility had been claimed for the attack and that the police were following up reports that Syrian agents had been seen at the hospital prior to the blast.

Von Daniken looked up from the computer. A bomb planted during renovation three months prior to the attack. One hundred pounds of TNT. The scope of the attack sent a chill down his spine. The people involved had to number in the dozens. Builders, contractors, city officials who’d granted permits, someone in the doctor’s office to pass on details of the victim’s appointments. As a policeman, he was impressed. As a human being, he was horrified.

Before Lebanon, Darfur…

A United Nations C-141 transport carrying leaders of the Muslim Janjaweed and the indigenous Sudanese en route to Khartoum to discuss a government-sponsored cease-fire explodes in midair. There are no survivors. Evidence is discovered showing that a bomb had been planted in one of the engines. Both sides claimed that the other was responsible for the calamity. Civil war intensifies.

And before Darfur, Kosovo. Page two of the National Gazette: “An explosion has claimed the life of retired General Vladimir Drakic, known familiarly as ‘Drako,’ and twenty-eight others. At the time, Drakic, 55, was attending a secret meeting of the outlawed right-wing Patriots Party, of which he was rumored to be a top leader. The subject of an international manhunt for over ten years, Drakic was wanted by the United Nations War Crimes Commission in connection with the massacre of two thousand men, women, and children near the town of Srebrenica in July 1995. Evidence at the scene pointed to a ruptured gas main as the cause of the blast. Police are investigating claims that a rival Albanian organization was involved. Two men have been taken into custody.”

The three attacks bore similar hallmarks. All involved targeting a highly placed, well-protected individual. All were the product of meticulous planning, extraordinary intelligence, and long-term engagement. And in each case, evidence was found pointing to a third party.

But what finally convinced von Daniken of Ransom’s participation was the timing of the three incidents. The bombing in Beirut took place four days before Ransom left Lebanon for Jordan. The downing of the Sudanese jet occurred two days before Ransom left the country. And the attack in Kosovo just one day before Ransom returned to Geneva.

Still, he was at a loss as to who would gain most from the attacks. Cui bono? Who would benefit? Motive was the investigator’s touchstone, and none was readily apparent.

Von Daniken pushed his chair away from the computer, the words of the director ringing in his ears.

“We have an immediate opening in Lahore. I was hoping he could fly out this Sunday.”

A two-man patrol responded to the report of an intruder at Waldhoheweg 30. The officers rang the caller’s bell and were admitted to the building. They were not unduly concerned. A CrimeStat analysis ranked the street and neighborhood as one of the safest in the city. Only two burglaries had been reported in the last ninety days. There had been no reported instances of armed robbery, rape, or murder in the past year.

“He’s inside,” said the aggrieved tenant, after shepherding the policemen into her apartment. “I’ve been watching since I called. He hasn’t gone anywhere.”

“And what makes you think he’s a burglar?”

“I didn’t say he was a burglar. I said he was an intruder. He shouldn’t be in the building. First he said he was waiting for Eva Kruger. He wanted to come inside. But he was bleeding here…” She pointed at her neck. “I told him that since I didn’t know him it would be better if he waited outside for his sister-in-law. A minute later, I heard him on the landing. He had a key to her apartment. I watched him enter.”