The American Mission (23 page)

Sure enough, Saillard turned and looked almost straight at them. Alex ducked instinctively.

“Don't worry,” Keeler assured him. “We're too far away to be spotted without night-vision equipment and high-quality optics. We can see him, but he can't see us. Why, I do believe that that is your new friend, Henry. Hello, Henry.”

“I wouldn't have thought this was his scene. He seemed more like a take-a-meeting-then-lunch-at-the-club kind of guy.”

“Don't let him fool you. He's one tough bastard. I've done a little spadework on him. Before getting into the mining business, he flew attack helicopters for the French Foreign Legion. He saw action in the Balkans and in the wars in West Africa in the nineties. Won the Legion of Honor for heroism under fire in Chad.”

Without warning, Alex heard Saillard's voice in his ear. He was speaking in English. “Right on time as always, gentlemen. It's a pleasure doing business with professionals.”

“Good.” The accent of the crew chief was Slavic of some sort. “We want to unload quickly and turn around. We need to be back home and under cover before light.”

“Of course. Do you mind if we inspect the goods?”

“Please, but do it quickly.”

Alex saw the crew chief nod at one of the other Europeans, who used a crowbar to remove the lids from the dozen crates parked on the tarmac. Through his earpiece, Alex could hear the sound of the wood splitting. The CIA microphone was really a remarkable piece of technology.

Saillard motioned to the men by the truck, who took their time sauntering over. Their deliberate pace seemed intended to send a message: We are not under your orders. The African men reached into the crates and pulled out samples of the contents. Alex was not surprised to see that they were weapons. Some crates held standard assault rifles that looked like AK-47s. Other crates held more exotic weapons,
including something that Alex was pretty certain was a surface-to-air missile. He pointed it out to Keeler.

“Yep. That, my friend, is the Russian SA-16 Igla-1E man-portable air-defense system. Not top-of-the–line, mind you, but not too far back. I can also see what look like .50-caliber sniper rifles, RPG-7 grenade launchers, and a couple of machine guns. I'm not sure of the make on those from here. That is pretty serious firepower for the Congo.”

There was a new voice. “This is very good. It is certainly better equipment than what we have been working with. But it is not enough. We will need many more crates if we are to do what is expected of us.” Alex could see through the binoculars that one of the tall African men was speaking. He was dressed in camouflage pants and a light-colored shirt. It was hard to judge colors through the night-vision equipment. There was something about him that made clear he was used to command. Most strikingly, however, he spoke French with a distinct Rwandan accent.

“That guy isn't Congolese,” Alex told Keeler.

The Station Chief did not seem surprised.

“There will be more shipments, I assure you,” Saillard said. “But this should be enough to take care of that little problem you have been having in the east,
non
?”

The Rwandan nodded. “Yes. This should be sufficient.”

“Do you recognize him?” Keeler asked Alex.

“No, I don't. But I do know he's Rwandan. Probably Hutu. Almost certainly one of the
genocidaires
.”

“Very good, Mr. Baines. That is the very poorly named Innocent Ngoca. He is the commander of the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Rwanda. They go by the French initials FDLR. The locals call them the Front. I call them the rat bastards. These are the boys behind the Rwandan genocide. They killed 800,000 people in about three and a half weeks, mostly with machetes and farm tools. Then they got beat
and ran into the jungle one step ahead of the vengeful mob. They've been plotting to get back in power in Rwanda ever since, but a girl's gotta make a living and in the meantime the Front has been selling its services to the highest bidder in the Congo's wars. We have a pretty thick file on this guy back in the office.”

“I hope it's better than the file you had on Manamakimba.”

“Funny you should mention that. When Manamakimba didn't turn out to be like his jacket says he should, I started digging into that a little more. Seems like your friend Joseph has been the victim of a well-orchestrated PR campaign designed to pin on him responsibility for very bad deeds that most properly belong to Mr. Ngoca down there.”

“Who's behind that? It seems a bit sophisticated for a group of psychopaths holed up in the rain forest.”

“Sure does. And that's a very interesting question.”

“You have something else for us?” Ngoca asked.

“But of course,” Saillard replied.

Saillard retrieved a briefcase from his car, opened it, and pulled out a leather bag. He emptied it inside the briefcase.

“Some is in cash and some in diamonds. The diamonds are concentrated value. Easy to carry around and they won't rot in that forest home of yours. I trust you will know how to turn them into cash when necessary.”

Ngoca laughed.

“Yes. We have some experience in that.”

Saillard gave him the briefcase. The Africans and the aircrew began loading the crates into the back of the trucks.

“Wait a second,” Alex said to Keeler. “That doesn't make any sense to me. Saillard is giving the arms to Ngoca. If he's running guns, shouldn't he be the one getting the money and diamonds in return? It's like he's paying him to take the weapons. Why is he doing that?”

“Isn't it obvious?”

With only a moment's reflection, Alex realized that Keeler was right.

“Ngoca works for Saillard. And it's payday.”

The Station Chief nodded in agreement.

“Sure looks that way, doesn't it?”

J
ULY
16, 2009

B
USU
-M
OULI

M
arie had never imagined that being Chief could be so tedious. Her father had made it look effortless, and her respect for him grew with each of the seemingly endless decisions that she was called on to make. Her people needed her to be strong and brave, but a large part of her wanted nothing more than to run away and hide and cry over the loss of her father. The official mourning ceremonies had done nothing to help her. She had been expected to lead the rituals, not to weep like a little orphan girl. Orphan. She was a grown woman, educated, and now a chief chosen by her people to lead them. But she was an orphan now as well. Alone in the world. No mother, no father, no brothers or sisters to share the pains and joys of life. No children of her own. She had known, but hadn't truly understood, how much she had relied on her father's strength. How close they had grown since they had lost her mother. His death had blown a hole in her life as large and deep as the mine Marie was carving into the mountainside. Filling that hole would take time, Marie realized.

For now, there was work to do. Her face would betray none of her internal turmoil. The rage and grief she would hide beneath a mask of calm and wisdom appropriate to a chief. She would bear this burden silently. Of this, she knew her father would be proud.

Today she was holding court. Village disputes that could not be resolved between neighbors were put before the chief for adjudication. Her word was absolute and there was no higher authority. Because she was Principal Chief, Marie had to hear the petty complaints and entreaties not only from the residents of Busu-Mouli but from neighboring Luba villages as well. She tried not to think about all of the work on the mine and smelter that was not getting done because she was listening to two village women contest the ownership of a goat.

But this dispute, she had to admit, was kind of interesting.

“This woman's son stole my daughter's virginity. She is a good girl, never any trouble. She was led astray by this devil. Now he must make amends by marrying her and paying a bride-price equal to what she would have been worth with her maidenhood intact.”

The plaintiff was a middle-aged woman in a dress that would probably have been tight on her ten years earlier. Her name was Beatrice and Marie had known her all her life. Of course, she knew the defendant equally well. That was one of the strangest things about being Chief. It was like being both the father and the mother of a large extended family. Some days she was the nurturing mother who looked after the sick and the needy. Although the villagers called her Chief Marie because there was only one Chief Tsiolo, today she was the father.

“Is what Beatrice says true, Zawadi?” Marie asked. The defendant was thin and somewhat sickly looking. She had never recovered completely from a bad case of dengue fever that she had contracted three years ago. She had four sons with reputations that ensured no mother wanted her daughter spending time in their company.

Zawadi glared defiantly at Beatrice. “It is true that my son had relations with this girl, Nanette. But he was hardly the first. Many boys and
not a few men have been where my son has gone. He has taken nothing from her that was not taken long ago.”

Beatrice shook with fury at the insult. “That is a brazen lie,” she shouted. “This cow would dare accuse my Nanette of such behavior? She was innocent of such things, Chief Marie, before this boy ruined her forever.”

This situation would have been farcical if it had not been so deadly serious. Family was a significant financial investment in the Congo. Marriages were alliances between families, and a good bride-price for a prime daughter could be the difference between a comfortable old age and starvation. No one in Busu-Mouli would starve as long as Marie was Chief, but for the women involved in this dispute, the stakes were high.

“What do the children wish to do?” Marie asked. The two women looked slightly befuddled.
Who cares what they want?
Marie read in their expressions.
This doesn't concern them.

It was Zawadi who spoke up. “My son would marry this girl if I let him. He claims to love her. But he can do much better than Nanette, I am sure of it.”

“You would not be saying that if your Patrice had not so dishonored my daughter.”

Marie held up her hand and the two women broke off the exchange before it became too heated.

“And what of Nanette?” Marie asked Beatrice. “What are her wishes?”

“She would marry this scoundrel, Patrice. She also claims it is love. I support her in this now only because I fear that what was done to her will become widely known.”

If it wasn't going to before
, Marie thought,
you certainly made sure that it would.

“Very well,” Marie announced, “it is my decision that Patrice and Nanette are to be married, consistent with the wishes of the two young
people involved. It is also my judgment, however, that Zawadi's family will be asked to pay only one-half of the normal bride-price of twelve goats. This is to acknowledge the family's loss of opportunity to negotiate the best possible arrangement for Patrice. So it is decided.”

These last words were the ritualistic close to a ruling by the Chief that meant he—or in this case, she—would brook no opposition and no further argument. The women nodded respectfully. Neither seemed dissatisfied with the decision. Marie did not know whether her ruling was just, but it certainly was expedient. Old King Solomon had had the right idea, even if his methods may have been somewhat extreme.

Her chiefly duties done for the day, Marie headed up to the mine to check out the progress the team had made. B shaft was still a concern. The rock in that section of the hill had proven to be exceptionally brittle. She had wanted to close the tunnel, but Katanga had persuaded her that the rich vein of ore that B shaft was tracking was worth the risk.

She was still nearly a kilometer from the mine when she heard three short, sharp blasts from an air horn. The harsh sound of the horn carried all the way down to the village. She and Katanga had set up a simple system of communication. One long blast was a summons for Katanga or Marie. Two blasts announced an equipment failure requiring the attention of Mputu or one of his sons. Three short blasts was a disaster: a fire, a serious injury, or a cave-in.

Marie ran.

Katanga was standing at the mouth of the mine. A cloud of copper-colored dust hanging in the air hinted at a collapsed tunnel.

“What happened?” she asked, gasping for breath after the run up the steep final section of trail. “Is anyone still in there?” Marie was gripped by a double sense of responsibility. As Chief Engineer, the mine was hers to run. As Chief of Busu-Mouli, all of the villagers were hers to protect. She had failed in both responsibilities.

“There are three boys inside, two miners and Mputu's eldest son. The generator seized up and he was trying to get it working again.”

“Do you know what happened?”

Katanga spread his hands helplessly. “It looks like the ceiling collapsed in B shaft. Four other boys were working the face of the main tunnel and they made it out.”

Behind Katanga, Marie could see the four miners who had just survived a close brush with death. They were caked in yellow-gray dust so thick that they looked more like ghosts than men.

Marie called to them. “Boys, quickly,” she said, with a clear undercurrent of urgency in her voice. “Tell me what happened in there.”

“We're not sure, Chief Marie,” one of the men replied. “We were digging the rock when we heard a loud crack, like splitting wood, and then a roar. Next thing we knew, the tunnel was full of dust and smoke, and we got out as fast as we could.”

“Did you see a rockfall?”

“Yes, Chief,” said another boy. “The tunnel is almost entirely closed up. There were men in there.”

“I know,” Marie replied.
They are my men
.

She used a knife to cut a piece of cloth from her shirt that she wrapped around her mouth and nose.

“Uncle, bring a hammer and a metal pipe,” Marie said to Katanga, as she strode purposefully toward the tunnel entrance. If those boys were still alive, she would dig them out with her fingernails if she had to.

Katanga gathered the tools and, as he had promised, followed his niece into the jaws of Hell.

•   •   •

I
nside the tunnel, the dust was thick and choking. The flashlight that Marie had taken from the emergency locker struggled to cut through the cloud of dust. A thin, feeble beam illuminated the tunnel ahead for maybe ten feet. Beyond that was just a fog of yellow-gray.

She knew where she wanted to go. She had the mine's schematics committed to memory. B shaft was approximately 150 meters in on the
left. It was about half as wide as the other shafts. Marie had ordered this as a precaution against just the kind of cave-in they had suffered. The rock here was rotten and treacherous. B shaft should have been abandoned weeks ago. She had been greedy.

Rock dust stung her eyes and worked its way through her makeshift mask into her throat. Marie coughed convulsively and steadied herself with a hand on the tunnel wall. She was about where she thought B shaft should be. She nearly walked past it. There was no longer an entrance to the side tunnel, just a gap in the wall of the main tunnel that was filled to the top with rubble. The light from Katanga's flashlight joined her own. Marie took the heavy hammer from her uncle and banged it against the rockfall three times. Then she paused to listen. She heard nothing. She tried again and this time pressed her ear up against the wall of the tunnel. She heard three notes that sounded like metal on stone. At least one of the miners had survived the collapse. That meant there was an air pocket of some sort behind this wall. They had some time, but without knowing the size of the fall, it was impossible to know how much time.

“Uncle, try to drive that pipe into the rubble pile. See if we can make a hole into the air pocket where our men are trapped.”

Katanga located a gap in the stones and tried to force the pipe through with repeated blows of the heavy sledge. Marie heard a clatter of steel against rock. She turned her light toward the sound and saw that she and Katanga had been joined by the four men they had left at the entrance. Two were simple laborers, but the other two were experienced miners who would be a real asset if the only answer proved to be digging out the poor souls trapped in B shaft. These men had themselves just escaped being buried alive. On their own, they had come back underground to help their less fortunate brothers. Marie was immensely proud of them.

“Good boys. We need you. You two,” she said to the inexperienced laborers, “see if you can help Katanga get that pipe pushed through the
rocks. He'll tell you what to do. You boys,” she said to the miners, “start taking the pile apart. Be careful. We can't afford a secondary slide. I'd rather you take more time and get the job done without an accident. If we work together, we'll get those men out. I promise.”

Imitating Marie, the miners tied strips of cloth around the lower half of their face and attacked the rock fall with picks and crowbars. Marie directed their efforts at first, instructing them to start in one of the upper corners and work their way down at an angle to the fall. They were not trying to dig the trapped miners out. They were simply hoping to open a hole to the outside world before the men inside ran out of air.

It quickly became clear that Katanga was not going to be able to drive the pipe into the pocket behind the cave-in. The fall was just too dense. Marie thought back to her schooling, trying to dredge up some idea or insight that would help her here. There wasn't much. The mandatory emergency-management course at Witwatersrand had been geared toward the high-tech environment of a modern mining operation.

Marie's mind was racing and she made a conscious effort to slow both her thinking and her pulse rate. She would make better decisions calm. The boys trapped in B shaft deserved no less from her. Closing her eyes, she sought to visualize the schematics of the tunnel system. B shaft angled up slightly and was almost perpendicular to the central shaft. The longer C shaft was about fifty meters back and curved sharply as it followed the twisting path of the richest veins of ore. At some point, B shaft was supposed to actually cross over C shaft, and Marie had ordered that section of C shaft reinforced as insurance against the roof's collapsing. How far had the tunnel progressed? Had it reached its intersection with C shaft or were there still unknown meters of rock ahead?

Marie explained what she was thinking to Katanga. Her uncle was not certain that they had dug far enough for her plan to work. Moreover, there was a risk that they could make things considerably worse.

“I know that, Uncle. Is it worth the risk?”

Katanga paused as he weighed the unpalatable options. “It's worth it.”

•   •   •

T
he dust was starting to settle and it was a little easier to see. Marie made her way carefully back to the main entrance. She wanted to run, but she did not dare risk being injured. Outside, it was already getting dark. The trapped miners were running out of time.

There was a small shed built up against the cliff wall. Inside, Marie found what she had come for. Explosives. One wall was lined with military hardware, including small artillery shells and land mines. Commercial blasting material was hard to come by, but the Congo was awash in weapons, and military-grade explosives were as common as stray dogs. Katanga and Mputu had been working together on adapting these weapons of war to a new purpose. Their initial tests had been encouraging. Even so, these tools were nowhere near ready for regular use. They were too unpredictable. Marie found what she was looking for, a bulky antitank mine with a simple timing fuse grafted to it. She also took a roll of duct tape from the supply chest.