Daniel Silva - The Secret Servant

“We’ve had our suspicions about the professor for some time,” he said.

“He was in Paris for the last year working on a book at something called the Institute for Islamic Studies. It’s a well-known front for jihadist activities, funded in part by Prince Rashid. He left Paris the day after Christmas and came back to Cairo, where he resumed his teaching duties at the American University.”

“I take it you’d like to grant the good professor a sabbatical?”

“A permanent one.”

“It’s going to cost you.”

“Trust me, Wazir-money is no obstacle.”

“When would you like to do it?”

“Late spring,” he said. “Before the weather gets too hot.”

“Just make sure it’s a clean job. I don’t want you making a mess in my town.”

One hour later al-Zayyat left the villa with a briefcase containing half a million dollars. The next morning Gabriel burned his sketches and the watercolor and flew home to Chiara.

The name on the reservation list sent a chill down the neck of Mr. Katubi, the chief concierge of Cairo’s InterContinental Hotel. Surely there was a glitch in the computer reservation system, he thought as he stared at it in disbelief. Surely it had to be a different Herr Johannes Klemp. Surely he hadn’t decided to come back for a return engagement. Surely it was all some sort of terrible misunderstanding. He picked up his house phone and dialed Reservations to see if the guest had made any special requests. The list was so long and detailed it took three minutes for the girl to recite them all.

“How long is he planning to be with us?”

“A week.”

“I see.”

He hung up the phone, then spent the remainder of the morning giving serious thought to taking the week off. In the end he decided that such a course of action would be cowardly and would inflict undue hardship on his colleagues. And so at 3:30 that afternoon he was planted firmly at the center of the glossy lobby, hands behind his back and chin raised like a defiant soldier before a firing squad, as Herr Klemp came whirling through the revolving doors, dressed head to toe in Euro black, sunglasses shoved into his head of silver hair. “Katubi!” he called brightly as he advanced on the steadfast little concierge with his hand extended like a bayonet. “I was hoping you would still be here.”

“There are things about Cairo that never change, Herr Klemp.”

“That’s what I love about the place. It does get under your skin, doesn’t it?”

“Just like the dust,” said Mr. Katubi. “If there’s anything I can do to make your stay more enjoyable, don’t hesitate to ask.”

“I won’t.”

“I know.”

Mr. Katubi braced himself and his staff for a sandstorm of complaints, tirades, and lectures about Egyptian incompetence. But within forty-eight hours of Herr Klemp’s arrival, it had become clear to Mr. Katubi that the German was a changed man. His accommodations-an ordinary single room high on the north side of the building overlooking Tahrir Square and the campus of the American University-he declared to be Paradise on earth. The food, he announced, was ambrosia. The service, he raved, was second to none. He did his sightseeing in the morning, while it was still cool, and spent his afternoons relaxing by the pool. By dusk each day, he was resting quietly in his room. Mr. Katubi found himself longing for a flash of the old Herr Klemp, the one who berated the maids for making his bed improperly or lashed out at the valet staff for ruining his clothing. Instead, there was only the silence of a contented customer.

At 6:30 on the penultimate day of his scheduled stay, Herr Klemp appeared in the lobby, dressed for dinner. He asked Mr. Katubi to book a table for him at a French bistro on Zamalek for eight o’clock, then darted through the revolving doors and disappeared into the Cairo dusk. Mr. Katubi watched him go, then reached for the telephone, not knowing then that he would never see Herr Klemp again.

The silver Mercedes sedan was parked in Muhammad Street, within sight of the staff parking lot at the American University. Mordecai was seated calmly behind the wheel. Mikhail sat next to him in the front passenger seat, drumming his fingers nervously against his thigh. Gabriel climbed into the backseat and quietly closed the door. Mikhail drummed on, even after Gabriel told him to stop.

Five minutes later, Mikhail said, “There’s your boy.”

Gabriel watched as a tall, thin Egyptian in Western clothing handed a few piastres to the Nubian attendant and climbed behind the wheel of a Fiat sedan. Thirty seconds later he sped past their position and headed toward Tahrir Square. The traffic light on the edge of the square turned red. The Fiat came to a stop. The Sphinx was a careful man.

“Do it now,” Gabriel said.

Mikhail offered Gabriel the detonator switch. “You sure you don’t want him?”

“Just do it, Mikhail-before the light changes.”

Mikhail pressed the switch. An instant later the small, focused charge of explosives concealed inside the headrest exploded in a brilliant white flash. Mikhail started drumming his fingers again. Mordecai slipped the car into gear and headed for Sinai.

T he Secret Servant is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents portrayed in this novel are the product of the author’s imagination or have been used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The al-Hijrah Mosque does not exist, though no visit to Amsterdam would be complete without a walk through the lively outdoor market on the Ten Kate Straat. To the best of my knowledge there is no Institute for Islamic Studies in Paris and no Islamic Affairs Council in Copenhagen. Visitors to Parliament Square in London will search in vain for a bench upon which to sit, for no such bench exists. Christmas services at Westminster Abbey are usually held in the afternoon, not the morning. Foulness Island, though inhabited by two hundred rugged souls, is actually a restricted military zone and thus hardly an ideal place to leave thirty million dollars’ ransom. Those wishing to visit Foulness can do so by obtaining a pass from the Ministry of Defence or by booking a table for lunch at the George amp; Dragon pub in Church End. Deepest apologies to the management of the Europa and d’Angleterre hotels for running intelligence operations from their fine establishments without obtaining prior consent.

The Sword of Allah is entirely fictitious, though its background, creed, and operations are consistent with actual Egyptian terrorist groups such as al-Gama’a al-Islamiyya and al-Jihad. Anwar Sadat did indeed provide material and other support to Egyptian Islamists shortly after assuming power in an ill-considered gambit designed to bolster his base of popular support. The descriptions of torture as practiced by the Egyptian security services are based on accounts provided by victims who have lived to tell about it. The CIA program known as “extraordinary rendition,” the practice of clandestinely transferring suspected terrorists from one country to another for the purposes of incarceration or interrogation, has been well documented. It was put into place not by President George W. Bush but by his predecessor, Bill Clinton.

The statistics used to illustrate the terrorist threat now confronting the United Kingdom are based on reports by the British police and intelligence services, as is the contention that Great Britain has supplanted the United States as al-Qaeda’s top target. The rise of militant Islam across Europe and the Continent’s rapidly changing demographics are, of course, factual. Professor Bernard Lewis of Princeton has estimated that Europe will have a Muslim majority by the end of the century, and Zachary Shore, in his thoughtful study of Europe’s future titled Breeding Bin Ladens, stated that “ America may not recognize Europe in a few short decades.” Whether Europe will remain a strategic ally of the United States or become a staging ground for future attacks on American soil is not yet known. What is clear, however, are the intentions of al-Qaeda and the global jihadists. Mohammed Bouyeri, the unemployed Dutch-Moroccan immigrant from Amsterdam who murdered the filmmaker Theo van Gogh, stated them unambiguously in the manifesto he adhered to his victim’s body with the point of a knife: “I surely know that you, O America, will be destroyed. I surely know that you, O Europe, will be destroyed. I surely know that you, O Holland, will be destroyed.”