Honour Among Thieves (49 page)

Scott
lay awake most of the night, staring through the glassless window, while Hannah
hardly stirred in his arms. Having attempted to pay the chief the greatest
possible compliment, Scott’s mind went back to the problem of getting his team
over one of the borders and ensuring that the Declaration of Independence was
returned safely to Washington.

When
the first ray of light crept across the woven rug that covered their bed, Scott
released Hannah and kissed her on the forehead. He slipped from under the
sheets to find that the little tin bath was already full of warm water, and the
women had begun boiling more urns over an open fire.

Once
Scott was dressed, he spent an hour studying maps of the country, searching for
possible routes across Iraq’s six borders. He quickly dismissed Syria and Iran
as impossible, because the armies of both would be happy to slaughter them on
sight. He also felt that to return over the Jordanian border would be far too
great a risk. By the time Hannah had joined him he had also dismissed Saudi
Arabia as too well guarded, and was now down to only five routes and two
borders.

As
his hosts began to prepare breakfast, Scott and Hannah wandered down into the village
hand in hand, as any lovers might on a summer morning. The locals smiled, and
some bowed. Although none could hold a conversation with them, they all spoke
so eloquently with their eyes that they both understood.

Once
they had reached the end of the village, they turned and strolled back up the
path towards the
chiefs
house. Cohen was frying eggs
on an open fire, and Hannah stopped to watch how the women baked the thin,
circular pieces of bread which, covered in honey, were a feast in themselves.
The chief, once again sitting at the head of the table, beckoned Scott to the
place beside him. Cohen had already taken a seat on a stool and was about to
begin his breakfast when a goat walked up and tugged the eggs straight off the
plate. Hannah laughed and cracked Cohen another egg before he had a chance to
voice his opinion.

Scott
spread some honey on a piece of warm bread, and a woman placed a mug of goat’s
milk in front of him.

‘Worked
out what we have to do next, have you, Professor?’ asked Cohen as Hannah
dropped a second fried egg on to his plate. In one sentence, he had brought
them all back to reality.

A
villager came up to the table, knelt by the side of the chief and whispered in
his ear. The message was passed on to Aziz.

‘Bad
news,’ Aziz told them. ‘There are soldiers block ... ing all the roads that
lead back to the main highway.’

‘Then
we’ll have to go across the desert,’ said Scott. He unfolded his map and spread
it across the table. Alternative routes were highlighted by a dozen blue
felt-tip lines. He pointed to a path leading to a road which would take them to
the city of Khalis.

‘That
is not a path,’ said Aziz. ‘It was once a river, but it dried up many years
ago. We could walk along it, but we would have to leave the truck behind.’

‘It
won’t be enough to leave the truck,’ said Scott. ‘We’ll have to destroy it. If
it were ever found by Saddam’s soldiers, they would raze the village to the
ground and massacre your people.’

The
chief looked perplexed as Aziz translated all Scott had said. The old man
stroked the rough morning stubble on his chin and smiled as Scott and Hannah
listened to his judgement, unable to understand a word.

‘My
uncle says you must have his car,’ Aziz translated. ‘It is old, but he hopes
that it still runs well.’

‘He
is kind,’ said Scott. ‘But if we cannot drive a truck across the desert, how
can we possibly go by car?’

‘He
understands your problem,’ said Aziz. ‘He says you must take the car to pieces
bit by bit, and his people will carry it the twelve miles across the desert
until you reach the road that leads to Khalis. Then you can put it together
again.’

‘We
cannot accept such a gesture,’ said Scott. ‘He is too generous. We will walk
and find some form of transport when we reach Huwaider.’ He pointed to the
first village along the road.

Aziz
translated once again: his uncle looked sad and murmured a few words. ‘He says
it is not really his car, it was his brother’s car. It now belongs to me.’

For
the first time, Scott realised that Aziz’s father had been the village chief,
and how much his uncle was will ... ing to risk to save them from being
captured by Saddam’s troops.

‘But
even if we could take the car to pieces and put it together again, what about
army patrols once we reach that road?’ he asked. ‘By now thousands of Hamil’s
men are bound to be out there searching for us.’

‘But
not on those roads,’ Aziz replied. ‘The army will stick to the highway. They
realise that’s our only hope of getting across the border. No, our first
problem will come when we reach the roadside check at Khalis.’ He moved his
finger a few inches across the map. ‘There’s bound to be at least a couple of
soldiers on duty there.’

Scott
studied the different routes again while Aziz listened to his uncle.

‘And
could we get as far as Tuz Khurmatoo without having to use the highway?’ asked
Scott, not looking up from the map.

‘Yes,
there’s a longer route, through the hills, that the army would never consider,
because they’d run the risk of being attacked by the Peshmerga guerrillas so
near the border with Kurdistan. But once you’ve gone through Tuz Khurmatoo it’s
only a couple of miles to the main highway, though it’s still another
forty-five miles from there, with no other way of crossing the border.’

Scott
held his head in his hands and didn’t speak for some moments. ‘So if we took
that route we would be committed to crossing the border at Kirkuk,’ he
eventually said. ‘Where both sides could prove to be unfriendly.’

The
chief started tapping Kirkuk on the map with his finger while talking urgently
to his nephew.

‘My
uncle says Kirkuk is our best chance. Most of the inhabitants are Kurdish and
hate Saddam Hussein. Even the Iraqi soldiers have been known to defect and
become Kurdish Peshmergas.’

‘But
how will they know which side we’re on?’ asked Scott.

‘My
uncle will get a message to the Peshmergas, so that when you reach the border
they will do everything they can to help you to cross it. It’s not an official
border, but once you’re in Kurdistan you’ll be safe.’

‘The
Kurds sound our best bet,’ said Hannah, who had been listening intently.
‘Especially if they believe our original mission was to kill Saddam.’

‘It
might just work, sir,’ said Cohen. ‘That is, if the car’s up to it.’

‘You’re
the mechanic, Cohen, so only you can tell us if it’s possible.’

Once
Aziz had translated Scott’s words the chief rose to his feet and led them to
the back of his house. He came to a halt beside a large oblong object covered
by a black sheet. He and Aziz lifted off the cover. Scott couldn’t believe his
eyes.

‘A
pink Caddy?’ he said.

‘A
classic 1956 Sedan de Ville, to be exact, sir,’ said Cohen, rubbing his hands
with delight. He opened the long, heavy door and climbed behind the vast
steering wheel. He pulled a lever under the dashboard and the bonnet flicked
up. He got out, lifted the bonnet and studied the engine for some minutes.

‘Not
bad,’ he said. ‘If I can nick a few parts from the truck, I’ll give you a
racing car within a couple of hours.’

Scott
checked his watch. ‘I can only spare you an hour if we’re hoping to cross the
border tonight.’

Scott
and Hannah returned to the house and once again pored over the map. The road
Aziz had recommended was roughly twelve miles away, but across terrain that
would be hard going even if they were carrying nothing.

‘It
could take hours,’ Scott said.

‘What’s
the alternative if we can’t use the highway?’ asked Hannah.

While
she and Scott continued working on the route and Cohen on the car, Aziz rounded
up thirty of the strongest men in the village. At a few minutes past the hour,
Cohen reappeared in the house, his hands, arms, face and hair covered in oil.

‘It’s
ready to be taken apart, Professor.’

‘Well
done. But we’ll have to get rid of the truck first,’ said Scott as he rose from
the table.

‘That
won’t be possible, sir,’ said Cohen. ‘Not now that I’ve removed one or two of
the best parts of its engine. That Cadillac should be able to do over a hundred
miles per hour,’ he said, with some pride. ‘In third gear.’

Scott
laughed, and accompanied by Aziz went in search of the chief. Once again he
explained the problem.

This
time the chief’s face showed no anxiety. Aziz translated his thoughts. ‘ “Do
not fear, my friend,” he says. “While you are marching across the desert we
will strip the truck and bury each piece in a place Saddam’s soldiers could
never hope to discover in a thousand years.” ‘

Scott
looked apprehensive, but Aziz nodded his agreement. Without waiting for Scott’s
opinion the chief led his nephew to the back of the house, where they found
Cohen supervising the stripping of the Cadillac and the distribution of its
pieces among the chosen thirty.

Four
men were to carry the engine on a makeshift stretcher, and another six would
lift the chrome body onto their shoulders like pallbearers. Four more each
carried a wheel with its white-rimmed tyre, while another four transported the
chassis. Two held onto the red-and-white leather front seat, another two the
back seat, and one the dashboard. Cohen continued to distrib ... ute the
remaining pieces of the Cadillac until he came to the back of the line, where
three children who looked no more than ten or eleven were given responsibility
for two five-gallon cans of petrol and a tool bag. Only the roof was to be left
behind.

Aziz’s
uncle led his people to the last house in the village so he could watch his
guests begin their journey towards the horizon.

Scott
shook hands with the chief, but could find no words adequate to thank him.
‘Give me a call the next time you’re passing through New Haven,’ was what he
would have said to a fellow American.

‘I
will return in better times,’ he told the old man, and Aziz translated.

‘My
people wait for that day.’

Scott
turned to watch Cohen, compass in hand, leading his improbable platoon on what
appeared likely to be an endless journey. He took one of the five-gallon cans
from the smallest of the children, and pointed back towards the village, but
the little boy shook his head and quickly grabbed Scott’s canvas bag.

Would
history ever reveal this particular mode of transport for the Declaration of
Independence, Scott wondered, as Cohen shouted ‘Forward!’

General
Hamil continued to pace round his office, as he waited for the phone to ring.

When
Saddam had learned the news of Major Saeed’s incompetence in allowing the
terrorists to escape with the Declaration, he was only furious that he had not
been able personally to end the man’s life.

The
only order he had given the General was that a message should be put out on
state radio and television stations hourly, stating that there had been an
attempt on his life which had failed, but that the Zionist terrorists were
still at large. Full descriptions of the would-be assassins were given, and he
asked his beloved countrymen to help him in his quest to hunt down the
infidels.

Had
the matter been less urgent, the General would have counselled against
releasing such information, on the grounds that most of those who came across
the terrorists might want to help them, or at best turn a blind eye. The only
advice he did give his leader was to suggest that a large reward should be
offered for their capture. Enlightened self-interest, he had found, could so
often overcome almost any scruples.

The
General came to a halt in front of a map pinned to the wall behind his desk,
temporarily covering a portrait of Saddam. His eye passed down the many thin
red lines that wriggled between Baghdad and Iraq’s borders. There were a
hundred villages on both sides of every one of the roads, and the General was
painfully aware that most of them would be only too happy to harbour the
fugitives.

And
then he recollected one of the names Kratz had given him. Aziz Zeebari – a
common enough name, yet it had been nagging at him the whole morning.

‘Aziz
Zeebari. .. Aziz Zeebari
...
Aziz
Zeebari ...” he repeated. And then he remembered. He had executed a man of that
name who had been involved in an attempted coup about seven years before. Could
it possibly have been the traitor’s father?

The
load-bearers halted every fifteen minutes to rest, change responsibilities and
place the strain on yet-untested muscles. ‘Pit stops’, Cohen called them. They
managed two miles in the first hour, and between them drank far more water than
any car would have devoured.

When
Scott checked his watch at midday, he estimated that they had only covered a
little over two thirds of the distance to the road: it had been a long time
since they had lost sight of the village but there was still no sign of life on
the horizon. The sun beat down as they continued their journey, the pace
slowing with each mile.