Exile: a novel (78 page)

“I dispute nothing,” Saeb answered in a clipped voice. “I confirm nothing. Nothing about this is important.”

“Really? Then let me quote an answer you gave earlier this morning: ‘Like any experienced traveler, I do not stuff my wallet with cash. For that reason alone, I would not buy a cell phone in this fashion.’ Do you remember making that statement?”

“Of course.”

“So what about a nine-hundred-and-thirty-dollar hotel bill paid two weeks before the assassination of Amos Ben-Aron. Did you pay
that
bill in cash?”

“I don’t remember.”

“How could you have paid in cash if you dislike carrying cash?”

Saeb’s voice rose. “I don’t recall my thought processes.”

“That was less than six months ago, Dr. Khalid. Do you at least recall
whether that cash was given to you by the representative of a foreign government?”

“Of course not.” Saeb paused, then added, “At least as far as I know.”

“So you
do
recall that
someone
gave you cash to pay that bill?”

In the jury box, Ardelle Washington looked intrigued; though she could not know what David’s questions portended, Saeb’s growing agitation suggested their importance. Biting off each word, he said, “I do not recall anything specific.”

David felt his heart beat faster. “You don’t recall whether you got this cash from your bank account or from an outside source?”

“No.”

“But if you got it from your bank, its records would show that, correct?”

A hint of panic surfaced in Saeb’s eyes. In that moment, David saw that for the first time his antagonist feared that—as with Barak Lev and Hillel Markis—David Wolfe might bring about his death. His tone less assured, Saeb said, “I cannot tell you the state of my bank records.”

“Do you still deny that someone else gave you cash to pay for your hotel room?”

“As before, I’m neither confirming nor denying.” Saeb’s voice rose in challenge. “Are you suggesting that someone bribed me to implicate my own wife in the murder of Ben-Aron for the price of a hotel room in Amman?”

David smiled briefly. “No, Dr. Khalid, I’m not suggesting that. Are you familiar with a concept called ‘honor killing’?”

Saeb crossed his arms. “I do not know how such a question can possibly relate to this trial.”

David moved closer. “I do. So does Ms. Sharpe, who, you’ll note, is not objecting. I’ll repeat the question: are you familiar with a concept called ‘honor killing’?”

Saeb looked toward his wife, and then abruptly faced Judge Taylor, speaking in a tone that seemed more shrill than confident. “Must I respond to this nonsense?”

“Yes,” Taylor answered evenly. “Unless you believe that the answer may tend to incriminate you. If so, I will give you the opportunity to consult with counsel.”

Saeb stiffened, hands braced on the arms of the witness chair. Without responding to the judge, he spun on David, saying scornfully, “Yes, I am familiar with the concept of an ‘honor killing.’ ”

“Under that concept, Dr. Khalid, is an Arab man entitled to kill a female relative who has brought dishonor to his family or to himself?”

Saeb looked directly into David’s eyes. “Yes,” he said grudgingly. “Under that concept.”

David moved still closer. “What kinds of behavior constitute dishonor?”

Saeb shook his head. “This is too subjective,” he protested. “You are asking my opinion on what some generic proponent of honor killings might feel—”

“No,” David interrupted, “I’m asking for your understanding of the traditional grounds for an honor killing. For example, is a man entitled to kill his wife for having sexual relations with another man?”

Saeb’s eyes hardened. “I have heard of such things.”

“Suppose,” David ventured in a tone of mild curiosity, “that the woman involved is only his fiancée. Is an Arab man entitled to kill his
fiancée
for having sexual relations with another man?”

Saeb’s mouth opened, and his chest shuddered slightly. An awful suspicion crept into his eyes; David knew that Saeb knew about his affair with Hana, and now David intended to hold nothing back. “According to whom?” Saeb answered. “All this is hypothetical.”

“Then let me narrow the hypothetical a little. Is an Arab man entitled to kill his fiancée for having sexual relations with a Jew?”

The thin veneer of indifference slipped from Saeb’s expression. In a tone etched with venom, he answered, “I cannot imagine a woman so degraded.”

“Can’t you?” Abruptly, David walked to the defense table, watching Hana’s stricken gaze.
I have to do this,
he tried to tell her with his eyes, knowing that, for the three of them, all that had once passed between them and the thirteen years of deception that had followed were coming to a final reckoning. Then David took a three-page document from a manila folder and gave it to the court stenographer. Saeb stared at the document, utterly still, as though unable to speak or move. With a calm he did not feel, David said, “I would like this document marked as Defense Exhibit Number Twenty-three.”

The court reporter stamped it. As Judge Taylor looked on, stone-faced, David presented the exhibit to Marnie Sharpe, who flipped its pages and handed it back. David then passed the document to the jurors; as each juror inspected it, David looked across the courtroom at Saeb Khalid.

Saeb stared back at him with an expression that combined dread, humiliation, and enormous rage. But what David felt toward Saeb was a terrible coldness; as with Muhammad Nasir, David had the sudden sense that he was staring at a dead man. He did not care if Saeb died on the witness
stand or in a murder intended to silence him, precipitated by David’s questions. All that mattered was whether Saeb would force him to take this to the bitter end, exposing Munira’s paternity and traumatizing a young girl who was not Saeb’s daughter, but David’s. Every moment that the jurors perused the lab test, not yet grasping what it meant, brought the two men closer to the moment of Saeb’s decision, a moment David dreaded as much as Saeb must.

At last, David retrieved the exhibit from the jury. Crossing the courtroom, he placed it in Saeb’s hands. “Can you identify Defense Exhibit Twenty-three?”

Saeb raised his head, the document in his lap almost forgotten, the two men’s eyes meeting as at that long-ago lunch in Cambridge, with Hana caught between them.
There is no “way out” for “us,”
Saeb had told him.
In the end, only one of “us” survives.

Abruptly, Hana’s husband turned to Judge Taylor. In a brittle voice, he said, “I ask to see a lawyer. To discuss my rights.”

Taylor’s expression was opaque. “Very well, Dr. Khalid. We will recess the trial until tomorrow morning. If you cannot find or afford a lawyer, the court will refer you to a federal public defender.”

David felt a shudder of relief pass through him. Then he saw the terrible dullness that had surfaced in Saeb’s eyes. In that moment, at last, David felt something like pity for Saeb Khalid.

“I do,” David answered. “We request a further recess, to allow us time to renew our request for information from the government of Israel.”

Sharpe looked nettled, the judge wholly unsurprised. “What information do you want?” Taylor asked.

“Anything that links Saeb Khalid to Hamas, the Iranians, or the breach in Ben-Aron’s security—testimony, documents, phone records. Any connection, direct or indirect, that might tie the Iranians to the Israeli right. Any information about the murder of Hillel Markis and Barak Lev. Any and all information about the operations of the Iranian secret intelligence service in
the United States or Israel. Anything relevant to my further cross-examination of Saeb Khalid, assuming he decides to testify.” David turned to Sharpe. “And no more polite requests through legal channels, please. I want the Israeli ambassador, or some other suitable official, brought before the court in person. If Israel continues to refuse discovery, the United States should not be allowed to maintain this prosecution.”

The judge angled her head toward Sharpe. “Before you respond, Ms. Sharpe, let me say what troubles me. Thanks to Dr. Khalid, Mr. Wolfe’s broader defense—a multifaceted conspiracy—has become less speculative and more germane. In my opinion, his case against Khalid is as good as your case against Arif. Yet the government of Israel may still be withholding evidence pertinent to Khalid and Mr. Wolfe’s conspiracy theory, while the United States maintains this prosecution based on the only evidence anyone has against Ms. Arif. If you were presiding over this trial, you might be as uncomfortable with that as I am.”

“
This
trial,” Sharpe responded, “is about Hana Arif. What we do about Khalid is a separate matter. But the fallacy in Mr. Wolfe’s argument is that his direct evidence of Khalid’s guilt—which comes down to the grievances of a twelve-year-old girl regarding cell phone use, a girl who so far has not even testified—does not logically equate to his client’s innocence. The evidence against
her
remains intact.” A note of accusation crept into Sharpe’s tone. “Mr. Wolfe resents the term ‘blackmail.’ But what he’s trying to do is end this prosecution—not with a jury verdict, or on the basis of the evidence but by cornering the State of Israel, which says that it has no evidence about Arif herself. Like so much of this defense, it’s a cute trick hiding behind a fig leaf of legality.

“As for his factual defense, it comes down to the same tired ploy: blame your client’s coconspirator for everything your client did. That hardly justifies a fishing expedition into the national security apparatus and investigative processes of Israel. The court should tell Mr. Wolfe to put his theory of a frame job to the jury, and let
them
decide for themselves.” Sharpe held her hands up, palms extended. “Maybe Hassan deliberately lied to Jefar. Maybe he rigged Jefar’s motorcycle not to detonate, confident—for some reason that eludes me—that Jefar would survive the explosion. Maybe Khalid managed to keep his fingerprints off a piece of paper that he was certain had Arif ’s prints. Maybe he sneaked into the closet at midnight so Hassan could call him on his wife’s phone. Maybe he informed Hassan about the change of route while watching CNN with Mr. Wolfe’s daughter. Maybe the shadowy masterminds who plotted the assassination were more concerned with assisting Khalid’s revenge against his wife than with ensuring that
Jefar
blow up Ben-Aron if
Hassan
could not. Maybe Ms. Arif was wandering Union Square by mere coincidence. And
maybe
—given Mr. Wolfe’s considerable talents—he can sell this preposterous package to a jury. But this court should make him try.”

Sharpe’s sarcastic litany rattled David; in essence, he had just heard Sharpe’s closing argument, and it was as compelling as anything he could muster—at least without exposing Munira’s paternity and calling her as a witness. “That’s a well-crafted rebuttal,” he acknowledged to Judge Taylor. “But it only works if the prosecutor can wrench facts out of context. Here’s the context: did the Israeli mole—no doubt Markis—call Khalid? We don’t know; the Israelis may. Did Khalid work for the Iranians? We’re not sure; the Israelis may be. What was Khalid’s relationship to Hamas? We have
intimations; the Israelis may have facts. Did the plotters plan to frame Hana, or did Khalid alter the plot? If the Israelis can put us on the road to finding
that
out, the argument Ms. Sharpe just delivered collapses altogether. And I won’t be forced to do what I otherwise will have to do: blow up the world of a twelve-year-old in order to defend her mother—”

“That’s not my problem,” Taylor cut in brusquely. “Your domestic drama is your own concern. But I remain troubled by the prospect of convicting Hana Arif based on hearsay testimony in which Jefar channels a dead man, Hassan, whom the jury will never see. And now there’s one more problem: Khalid’s testimony. What should I do if Khalid refuses to continue, and the prosecutor can’t cross-examine him for the benefit of the jury?”

“There are only two things the court
can
do,” Sharpe said promptly. “Either instruct the jury to disregard Khalid’s testimony or, better, declare a mistrial and start the trial all over again with different jurors. Anything else is unfair to the prosecution.”

“That may be true,” the judge responded with an ironic smile. “Still, ‘fair’ is the entitlement of both sides. We’ll worry about Khalid when the time comes. But in this trial, or a new one, Ms. Arif should have the benefit of whatever relevant information Israel may possess.

“I’ll decide what’s relevant. But my idea of relevance is very close to Mr. Wolfe’s. I’m adjourning the trial for a week. Four days from now, next Monday, I want a representative designated by the State of Israel to tell me whether it possesses any information about Khalid’s direct or indirect connection to the Israeli security detail, Hamas, Iran, Barak Lev—and what, if anything, it is prepared to divulge. And I also want the United States government to produce for the court, under the strictest confidentiality, any information it may have as to whether the Iranians or Hamas were involved in assassinating Amos Ben-Aron.

“Israel can decide what to do. Based on its decision, the court will either dismiss the case or allow the trial to continue. And neither government should assume that this court is bluffing.”

As Taylor hesitated, relief cut through David’s apprehension and exhaustion. “There’s one more thing,” he put in quickly. “Khalid. Not only is he a flight risk, but witnesses in this case have a way of getting killed. What I did to him today may have qualified him for indictment
and
put his life in danger. On either ground, the court should place him in protective custody.”