A Rope and a Prayer (42 page)

I laugh at the accuracy of his description. I never could have imagined that I would consider this a reassuring statement or affirmation of my styling abilities. Nonetheless, we decide to convert the footage to black and white, just to be on the safe side. Despite the humor, I can tell Josh feels bad for me.

“This is the latest act of desperation,” I say.

It’s true. It all seems so futile, but I am willing to try anything. I have written the script in consultation with Michael and now recite my lines as Josh signals that the camera, a portable Flip video recorder, is rolling:

“
Salaam alaikum.
My name is Kristen. I am the wife of David Rohde. Our family wants to settle this situation. We have been ready to settle this for quite some time and are concerned that you have not contacted our representative in country, John. To settle this immediately, please contact John. His phone number is on this CD. Please contact him so that the long wait may be over for all of us. Thank you.”

Looking at the footage later, Lee remarks that as a newlywed couple, David and I have compiled quite a unique DVD collection over the past six months.

 

 

Carol and I remain in close touch. She has invited me to visit her at home on the Connecticut coast. Up until now I have been too busy or exhausted to accept. I have also had reservations about staying in her home. The last time I did so was with David, en route to our wedding in Maine. While I have only happy memories of that visit, I do not know how I will react to staying in the guest bedroom alone.

It’s a sunny Saturday, and I take the local train to New London. Carol greets me. I am glad to see her. She and her husband, George, make dinner, and we reminisce about happier times and talk about how we plan to move forward when David returns. David’s captivity has been a strain on all of us, but it has also brought us closer. Of all the support Carol has provided, I am most grateful for the fact that she has respected my position as David’s wife. She has been willing to step aside and let me and Lee take the lead, while also remaining at the ready to jump in and offer support on a moment’s notice. This is something I imagine must be difficult for a new mother-in-law to do, and it is a testament to her strength.

I retire early and am surprised to find that it is comforting to be in the familiar wicker bed that I last shared with David. I fall asleep quickly and awake feeling closer to my husband. In the late morning, Carol and I visit St. Edmund’s Church on Enders Island, an idyllic waterfront retreat and chapel located a few minutes from her home. Carol is not a Catholic, but she takes time each week to go to mass at this church, light candles, and say prayers for David, Tahir, Asad, and our families. She says it gives her a sense of peace.

I’ve visited Enders Island before with Carol and David, and once on my own as a teenager, when I attended a mandatory retreat before making my Confirmation. In addition to a traditional church, the island also has an outdoor chapel that abuts the water. It consists of three modest stone walls. The front of the chapel is open and faces the ocean. The floor consists of natural stone that gradually descends into the water. Its modesty is reassuring and calming. The chapel contains a small altar cluttered with prayers, stones, charms—memorabilia of loved ones, written requests left by former visitors. Carol and I decide to say a prayer for David and leave symbolic personal items to help him find his way home.

Carol has been concerned about David’s eyesight throughout his captivity. With this in mind, she leaves a bottle of Visine on the altar as a symbol of protection, to help him see clearly—as well as to ease any tears.

Before David departed New York for Kabul back in October, I gave him a sacred-heart charm I had purchased on our honeymoon in Paris from Sacré-Coeur in Montmartre. I wear an identical charm around my neck. I recall that David looked at me quizzically when I gave it to him, because he is neither Catholic nor religious. But being somewhat of a reticent romantic, he took it with him. I was shocked at my own insistence that he do so, because I had never before given him anything to carry as a memento or good luck charm. Still, I wanted him to keep it in his pocket or duffel as a reminder of our recent time together and as reassurance that there would be cheerful times ahead.

I now remove the matching charm from the chain around my neck and fasten it to one of the branches of the twig cross that is centered on the altar. I hope that David and I will one day return to retrieve it together.

Back in New York, on June 8, I am surprised by a Google alert about David. It links to the
Huffington Post,
which has put up a story titled “U.S. Journalists Arrested, Kidnapped Abroad.” It’s a roundup of American journalists detained in the past and present and includes a short bio and photograph of each: Daniel Pearl, kidnapped and murdered in Pakistan in 2002; Jill Carroll, kidnapped and eventually freed in Iraq in 2006; Roxana Saberi, charged with espionage in Iran and recently freed on appeal; Euna Lee and Laura Ling, detained in North Korea in March and recently sentenced to twelve years in a work camp for “hostile acts.” I am mortified to see that David is included as “still missing.” A photo accompanies his bio. I am shocked that the Web site did not consult our family before posting this. While it is not the best-kept secret in town, it’s also common knowledge among the journalism community that David’s case has been kept out of the news as a safety precaution.

Lee and Ling have been in jail for three months. Recently, their families have gone public, making a plea to the North Korean government on
Larry King Live
and holding a candlelight vigil in Rockefeller Center. My heart goes out to their families. The decision to go public seems to be helping in their case because they are able to appeal to an established, albeit unreasonable, government. Recent press coverage of their case has sparked renewed interest in the issue of journalists’ safety and the role of diplomacy. It has also begun to draw attention to David’s plight.

I contact Lee and David McCraw at the
Times
and alert the paper’s vice president of communications, Catherine Mathis. Catherine has done an expert job of tracking media activity and requesting the removal of any content that may endanger David. I tell her I have no qualms about contacting Arianna Huffington and holding her accountable should anything happen to David because of the publication of this piece. But there is no need to do so. The
Huffington Post
honors Catherine’s request and immediately removes David’s name and portrait.

The main side effect of being on leave from work is that I now have twenty-four hours a day to devote to obsessing about David’s case. This is a blessing and a curse. My mother, Mary Jane, returns in mid-June after a six-week absence. She is in good spirits, but still limits her movements and activities because of the healing slipped disc in her back.

I have no idea if the family’s message sent through the FBI or my video has made it to any of our intended targets. But we receive word that another video of David has emerged through the FBI’s unnamed contact, the same one who provided the crying video. The FBI, along with a member of our private security team, plan to meet with the source of the video, who will travel to Dubai in the next few days.

As always, I am reassured by the agency before I watch that this is not an execution video and that David appears to be in good condition. They add that this video is not as menacing as the last. My mother and I huddle together on the sofa and watch it on my laptop. The sound and image do not sync up. I have to periodically stop and resume by hitting the play/pause button. The audio is clear, and David’s voice is strong, but the video is stilted and appears as a series of stills. David seems at peace as he sits on a cushion with a full white beard, wire-frame glasses, and a white salwar kameez. He looks like John Lennon. He seems to have come to some inner resolution. He is clean and calm. His words are personal.

“My name is David Rohde. Today is Thursday, June 4, 2009. Myself, Tahir, and Asad are alive and well. Please tell our families that we are alive and we miss them very, very much and we are so sorry for the pain they are feeling.”

He addresses some short comments to me and the family and then concludes by asking us to help them. “Please help us as quickly as possible,” he says. “Please free us soon. Please.”

It is a relief to know he has received my Red Cross letter—and that he knows he has not been forgotten.

I find the video reassuring: David’s message is largely personal. I take this as a good sign, as it seems his captors have permitted him to speak freely. I am comforted to hear him repeat the words in my letter. He has not given up. It is a relief, too, that he realizes the futility of our situation on the outside and trusts that we are doing everything possible to bring him home. He is composed, a striking contrast to the seemingly broken subject in the “crying video” we saw in Washington. So much for the previous video being “his last.”

I begin to realize there is a pattern to the captors’ communication. Six to eight weeks of silence, followed by some form of contact. It seems that communications will resume again. Although it is tough to think in terms of eight-week cycles of waiting, it is somehow reassuring to know the captors may actually be following some kind of thought-out strategy. My greatest fear now is not that they will harm or kill David, but that they will hold him indefinitely.

 

 

A few days later, I receive an e-mail from a friend and colleague of David’s in Pakistan, Beena Sarwar. She has been in touch with me several times over the last few months to check on David.

It seems I am not the only one who is looking for an alternative, positive outlet. Beena and some of David’s colleagues have come up with a meaningful way for people to reach out to David. Beena’s e-mail explains:

This is a lovely sentiment, and I write back to her to thank her and tell her I support her efforts.

 

 

A few days later, I hear from Michael Semple. John has made contact with the uncle of Siraj and Badruddin Haqqani and claims that they are willing to settle for much less money than what they have been demanding. Lee, McCraw, and I are skeptical, because the FBI’s point person, the one who has provided the last two proof-of-life videos, is still asking for $8 million and four prisoners.

The FBI and Team Kabul meet with the FBI source in Dubai twice over the next two days. On day one, he claims he can get David released and would be willing to carry funds should the family be able to raise them. He adds that the kidnappers are willing to be “flexible” and settle the deal for reasonable money. Day two, he changes his story, stating that he will not be able to facilitate an exchange and that the Taliban still want prisoners in addition to money. The family must work through a third party.

Similarly, we have recently heard from Karzai’s government in Afghanistan, which says the Taliban are asking them for three Taliban prisoners in exchange for David. Michael has forewarned me about these pleas. He tells me to ignore them because both channels are false. He believes John’s contact has the ability to cut a deal, even though this channel has produced no proof-of-life videos. We are told that if John’s source is correct, we should expect to hear back for instructions on how this will proceed.

Still on leave from
Cosmo
, I keep myself busy at home and sort through a clutter of papers in an attempt to restore some semblance of order to my life. My dining table overflows with notes pertaining to David’s case, updates or “sit-reps,” from our security team, and thoughtful letters from extended relatives—all of whom are now aware of our situation. Amid the random pile is a prayer card from Mother Teresa’s mission in Calcutta, a place David and I visited together during my first trip to India a year ago. Mother Teresa’s calling had always intrigued me, and we had flown in specifically to see her orphanage and home for the destitute. For me, growing up Catholic, there seemed to be only two cool contemporary female role models: Madonna and Mother Teresa. Together their various behaviors seemed to define what was possible within the realm of my faith.