The Lion's Game (49 page)

By mid-afternoon Monday, I’d moved my stuff to the Incident Command Center along with about forty other men and women.

The ICC is set up in this big commo room, which reminded me of the room in the Conquistador Club. There was a real buzz in the place, like everyone was on uppers, and the phones were ringing, faxes were going off, computer terminals were all lit up, and so forth. I’m not exactly familiar with a lot of the new technology, and my idea of high tech is a flashlight and a phone, but my brain works just fine. Anyway, Kate and I had desks that faced each other in a small, chest-high cubicle, which was kind of neat, I guess, but a little awkward.

So, I was all settled in, and I was reading a huge stack of memos and interrogation reports, plus some of the crap I’d picked up in D.C. the day before. This is not my idea of working a case, but there wasn’t much else I could do at the moment. I mean, in a regular homicide case, I’d be out on the street, or down at the morgue, or bugging the medical examiner or the forensic people, and generally making life miserable for a lot of people so that my life could be better.

Kate looked up from her desk and said to me, “Did you see this memo about funerals?”

“No, I didn’t.”

She glanced at a memo in her hand and read me the arrangements. Nick Monti was being waked at a funeral home in Queens, and his full Inspector’s Funeral would be on Tuesday. Phil Hundry and Peter Gorman were being shipped back to their hometowns out of state. Meg Collins, the duty officer, was to be waked in New Jersey and buried on Wednesday. The arrangements for Andy McGill and Nancy Tate were to be announced, and I guessed that the medical examiner had held things up.

I’ve been at nearly every wake, burial, and memorial service of everyone I’ve ever worked with, and never missed one where the person was killed in the line of duty. But I didn’t have time for the dead just now, and I said to Kate, “I’ll skip the wakes and burials.”

She nodded, but said nothing.

We kept at the reading, answered a few phone calls, and read some faxes. I managed to access my e-mail, but other than something called the Monday Funnies, there wasn’t much interesting. We drank coffee, swapped ideas and theories with the people around us, and generally spun our wheels, waiting for something.

As new people arrived in the room, they glanced at Kate and me—we were sort of minor celebrities, I guess, being the only two people in the room who had been eyewitnesses to the biggest mass murder in American history. Living eyewitnesses, I should say.

Jack Koenig entered the room and came over to us. He sat so that he was below the cubicle partition, and said, “I just got a top secret communiqúe from Langley—at six-thirteen P.M., German time, a man answering the description of Asad Khalil shot to death an American banker in Frankfurt. The gunman escaped. But the four eyewitnesses described the gunman as Arab-looking, so the German police showed them Khalil’s photo, and they all ID’ed him.”

I was, to say the least, stunned. Crushed. I saw my whole career down the toilet. I miscalculated, and when you do that, you have to wonder if you’ve totally lost whatever it was that you had.

I glanced at Kate and saw that she, too, was shocked. She really had believed that Khalil was still in the U.S.

My mind raced ahead to my resignation and badly attended retirement party. This was a bad end to things. You don’t recover professionally from blowing the biggest case in the world. I stood and said to Jack, “Well ... that’s it ... I guess ... I mean ...” For the first time in my life, I felt like a loser, like a totally incompetent blowhard, an idiot and a fool.

Jack said softly, “Sit down.”

“No, I’m out of here. Sorry guys.”

I grabbed my jacket, and went out into the long corridor, my mind not working and my body just sort of moving like an out-of-body experience, like when I was bleeding to death in the ambulance.

I didn’t even recall getting to the elevator, but there I was, waiting for the doors to open. To make matters worse, I’d lost a total of thirty dollars to the CIA.

All of a sudden, Kate and Jack were beside me. Jack said, “Listen, you’re not to breathe a word of this to anyone.”

I couldn’t understand what he was saying.

Jack Koenig went on, “The ID is not positive— How can it be? Right? So, we need everyone to keep working this case as if Khalil may still be here. Understand? Only a handful of people know about this Frankfurt thing. I thought I owed it to you to tell you. But not even Stein knows about this. John? You have to keep this to yourself.”

I nodded.

“And you can’t do anything to arouse suspicion. In other words, you can’t resign.”

“Yes, I can.”

Kate said, “John, you can’t do that. You’ve got to do this one last thing. You have to carry on as if nothing has happened.”

“I can’t. I’m not good at playacting. And what’s the point?”

Jack said, “The point is not to ruin everyone’s morale and enthusiasm. Look, we don’t know if this guy in Frankfurt really was Khalil.” He tried to make a joke and said, “Why would Dracula go to Germany?”

I didn’t want to be reminded of my stupid Dracula analogy, but I tried to clear my head and think rationally. Finally, I said, “Maybe it was a plant. A look-alike.”

Koenig nodded. “That’s right. We don’t know.”

The elevator came, the doors opened, but I didn’t get in. In fact, I realized Kate was holding my arm.

Koenig said, “I’m offering you two the opportunity to fly to Frankfurt tonight and join the American team there—FBI, CIA, and German police and German Intelligence people. I think you should go.” He added, “I will accompany you for a day or two.”

I didn’t reply.

Finally, Kate said, “I think we should go. John?”

“Yeah ... I guess ... better than being here ...”

Koenig looked at his watch and said, “There’s an eight-ten P.M. Lufthansa out of JFK to Frankfurt. Arrives tomorrow morning. Ted will meet us at—”

“Nash? Nash is there? I thought he was in Paris.”

“I guess he was. But he’s on his way to Frankfurt now.”

I nodded. Something smelled funny.

Koenig said, “Okay, let’s wrap it up here and be at JFK no later than seven P.M. Lufthansa, eight-ten flight to Frankfurt. Tickets will be waiting for us. Pack for a long stay.” He turned and walked back to the ICC.

Kate stood there awhile, then said, “John, what I like about you is your optimism. You don’t let anything get you down. You see problems as a challenge, not as a—”

“I don’t need a pep talk.”

“Okay.”

We both walked toward the ICC. Kate said, “That’s very good of Jack to send us to Frankfurt. Have you been to Frankfurt?”

“No.”

“I’ve been a few times.” She added, “This trip could take us all over Europe, following leads. Can you break away on short notice without too much inconvenience?”

There seemed to be other questions hidden in that question, but I replied simply, “No problem.”

We got to the ICC, and we went to our desks. I packed some papers in my attaché case, and threw junk in my desk drawers. I wanted to call Beth Penrose, but I thought it might be better if I waited until I got home.

Kate finished up at her desk and said, “I’m going to go home and pack. You leaving now?”

“No ... I can pack in five minutes. I’ll meet you at JFK.”

“See you later.” She took a few steps, then came back and put her face close to mine. She said, “If Khalil is here, you were right. If he’s in Europe, you’ll be there. Okay?”

I noticed a few people looking at us. I said to her, “Thanks.”

She left.

I sat at my desk and contemplated this turn of events, trying to identify the smell in my nostrils. Even if Khalil had left the country, why and how had he gotten to Europe? Even a guy like that would head home for a pat on the back. And clipping a banker was not exactly a strong Second Act after what he’d done here. And yet ... I was really burning up the neurons on this one. It’s easy to outfox yourself when you’re too smart for your own good.

I mean, the brain is a remarkable thing. It is the only cognitive organ in the human body, except for a man’s penis. So, I sat there and put my brain in overdrive. My other controlling organ was saying, “Go to Europe with Kate and get laid. There’s nothing in New York for you, John.” But the higher areas of my intellect were saying, “Someone’s trying to get rid of you.” Now, I don’t necessarily mean someone was trying to get me overseas to have me whacked. But maybe someone was trying to get me away from where the action was. Maybe this Khalil thing in Frankfurt was made up, either by the Libyans, or by the CIA. It really sucks when you don’t know what’s real and what’s made up, who your friends are, and who your enemies are—like Ted Nash.

Sometimes I envy people with diminished mental capacity. Like my Uncle Bertie, who’s senile. He can hide his own Easter eggs. You know?

But I wasn’t where Uncle Bertie was yet. I had too many synapses opening and closing, and the wiring was burning up with information, theories, possibilities, and suspicions.

I stood to leave, then sat down again, then stood again. This looked weird, so I moved toward the door with my briefcase, determined to make my decision before I left for the airport. I was leaning toward Frankfurt at that moment.

I got to the elevators, and coming toward me was Gabriel Haytham. He saw me and motioned me toward him. I went to where he was standing, and he said in a soft voice, “I think I have a live one for you.”

“Meaning?”

“I got a guy in an interrogation room—this guy is a Libyan, and he made contact with one of our stakeout teams—”

“You mean he’s a volunteer?”

“Yeah. Just like that. He has no prior problems with us, no history as an informant, he’s not on any list or anything. Regular Yusef, whose name is Fadi Aswad—”

“Why do all your names sound like the starting lineup of the Knicks?”

Gabriel laughed. “Hey, try the Chinatown task force. Their names sound like the noise a pinball machine makes. Look, this guy Aswad is a taxi driver, and this guy has a brother-in-law, another Libyan, named Gamal Jabbar. Jabbar drives a taxi, too. We Arabs all drive taxis, right?”

“Right.”

“So, early Saturday morning, Gamal Jabbar calls his brother-in-law, Fadi Aswad, and tells him that he’s going to be gone for the whole day, that he has a special fare he has to pick up at JFK and that he’s not happy about this fare.”

“I’m listening.”

“Gamal also says that if he’s late getting home, that Fadi should call his wife, who’s Fadi’s sister, and reassure her that everything is okay.”

“And?”

“Well, you have to understand the Arabs.”

“I’m trying.”

“What Gamal was saying to his brother-in-law—”

“Yeah, I get it. Like, I may be more than a little late.”

“Right. Like I may be dead.”

I asked, “So where’s Gamal?”

“Dead. But Fadi doesn’t know that. I just got off the horn with Homicide. Perth Amboy cops got a call this morning from an early commuter, who went to some Park and Ride about six-thirty A.M., sunrise, and he sees this yellow cab with New York plates. He thinks this is strange, and as he’s walking to the bus shelter, he peeks inside and sees a guy half on the floor on the driver’s side. Doors are locked. He gets on his cell phone and calls Nine-One-One.”

I said, “Let’s go talk to Fadi.”

“Right. But I think I squeezed him dry. In Arabic.”

“Let me try English.”

We walked down the corridor, and I said to Gabe, “Why’d you come to me with this?”

“Why not? You need some points.” He added, “Fuck the FBI.”

“Amen.”

We stopped in front of the door of an interrogation room. Gabe said, “I got a preliminary forensic report over the phone. This guy Gamal was killed with a single bullet that was fired through the back of his seat which severed his spinal column and nicked his right ventricle, exiting into the dashboard.”

“Forty caliber?”

“Right. Bullet is deformed, but definitely a forty. The guy’s been dead since about Saturday late afternoon, early evening.”

“Did anyone check his E-Z Pass?”

“Yeah, but there’s no toll records on his account for Saturday. Gamal lived in Brooklyn, apparently went to JFK, and wound up in New Jersey. You can’t get there without paying a toll, so he paid cash and maybe his passenger was sitting behind a newspaper or something. We won’t be able to trace his route, but the mileage on his meter checks out for a trip from JFK to where we found him and his taxi. We don’t have a positive ID on the guy yet, but his hack license looks like the deceased.”

“Anything else?”

“That’s all the important stuff.”

I opened the door and we entered a small interrogation room. Sitting at a table was Fadi Aswad, dressed in jeans, running shoes, and a green sweatshirt. He was puffing on a cigarette, the ashtray was overflowing, and the room was thick with smoke. This is a federally correct no-smoking building, of course, but if you’re a suspect or a witness to a major crime, you may smoke.

There was another ATTF/NYPD guy in the room, watching the witness for signs that he might kill himself more quickly than by smoking, and making sure he didn’t stroll away, down the elevator and out, as happened once.

Fadi stood as soon as he saw Gabriel Haytham, and I liked that. I have to get my witnesses and suspects to stand when I enter a room.

Anyway, the ATTF guy left, and Gabriel introduced me to my star witness. “Fadi, this is Colonel John.”

Jesus. I must have done really well on the sergeant’s exam.

Fadi sort of bowed his head, but said nothing.

I invited us all to sit, and we sat. I put my briefcase on the table so Fadi could see it. Third World types equate briefcases with power, for some reason.