‘Colonel Beckwith always said Qena was a shit-hole. If you’d read up on Eagle Claw and Tehran before you signed on, Elliot, you might have elected to stay at home.’
‘I didn’t have a whole lot of choice.’
McBain shrugged and moved to a small fridge beneath a shelf crammed with books about the Middle East, terrorism, and military hardware. He threw the can of Budweiser across the room and Ulm caught it cleanly.
Ulm snapped the can open and poured half its contents down his throat before he came up for air. ‘So this is what it’s like outside the firing line,’ he said, taking in the clean, businesslike appearance of McBain’s office. ‘Judging by your beer gut I’d say they must be preparing you for a nice fat job in Washington.’
‘Repeat those words across a volley-ball net some-time and I’ll make you eat them, Elliot.’
Ulm snorted and they both laughed. McBain took a step forward and they embraced, slapping each other heartily on the back. ‘It’s good to see you again,’ Ulm said.
‘You, too, Elliot. So, you finally managed to get away from that rest home in New Mexico.’
‘Yup. One fucking desert to another.’ Ulm waved his can around the room then lowered his voice. ‘I take it this place is clean.’
‘Swept every day.’
‘I need the big picture, Cy. Tell me what’s been happening these past three days. Is there any news?’
McBain sat back at his desk and began rolling a pencil between his palms. ‘Not a squeak. It’s like the Angels of Judgement and Franklin’s negotiating team never existed. Don’t they get newspapers out where you are?’
‘We don’t get Jack,’ Ulm said.
‘No Early Bird?’
The Early Bird was the Pentagon’s own cuttings service, a faxed digest of all the important news stories of the day.
‘Minimum transmission, remember?’ Ulm said. ‘That’s why I’m here. Cyrus, there’s a whole lot I don’t like.’
‘I’ve known you a long time, Elliot. And the last time I saw you look this way was the day. before the court-martial brought home its verdict. What’s up? I guess it’s got something to do with this guy Jacob-son that keeps sending all this encrypted shit for you. I thought I’d seen some classification levels before, but. .’
‘There’s not much I can tell you.’
‘Just make sure this thing stays an Air Force operation,’ McBain said, his voice set. ‘You know what happens when Marine pilots get involved.’
‘Come off of it, Cy. What happened at Desert One could have happened to anybody. Shit, look at me. I should know. The suits punished me long enough for a lousy piece of bad luck. The Tehran operation wasn’t the operators’ fault, it was the system. Washington fucked Eagle Claw, and the same guys are pulling the strings this time around. But I’ve done my stretch, Cy. I’m not going to pick up the tab again.’
‘What can I do, Elliot?’
‘I need the big picture.’
McBain shook his head. ‘Like I told you. Everybody’s running around like headless chickens here. When it comes to the Angels of Judgement, nobody knows. Nobody.’
Ulm wondered what his old friend, dyed-in-the-wool Colonel Cyrus J. McBain, USAF, would say if he were to tell him that the Pathfinders were hooked up with Spetsnaz, or Opnaz, or whoever the fuck Shabanov and his men were.
‘That’s not exactly true,’ McBain said, correcting himself. ‘There’s one guy around here who seems to know what’s going on but-’
‘Who?’
McBain looked uncomfortable. ‘Well, he’s not exactly cleared.’
‘Tell me about it.’
‘The guy’s a journalist, Elliot. A British journalist from the magazine that broke the story, Dispatches.’‘
Ulm was immediately suspicious. ‘Shit, you don’t think-’
‘Relax. Girling’s got too much on his mind to start digging into special operations activity here in Egypt. Besides, people’s attention is on the Lebanon task force. If there’s going to be a rescue that’s where they think it’s coming from. Read any of the papers.’
‘You said he had some things on his mind.’
McBain put down his pencil. ‘A guy called Stansell, their Middle East correspondent, got himself snatched by the Angels of Judgement. Girling has been here the best part of a week trying to get him back. We just heard he didn’t luck out. They fished Stansell out of the river a few days back with a couple of holes in him.’
‘So what good is Girling to me?’
‘I never said he was good; in fact, he smells like trouble. But you asked who might be able to give you more on the Angels and Girling’s the only guy I can think of who fits the bill. He’s got the Mukhabarat, the secret service, running around in a blue funk, he’s stirred up a hornet’s nest in the Islamic fundamentalist community, and he’s even got the Israelis going. We intercepted a transmission from their embassy here to Tel Aviv the day before yesterday. And guess whose name was on it. The Israelis are convinced that Girling’s going to lead them to the Angels of Judgement and, God knows, they’ve got just as much to be worried about as we have.’
‘So how do I get in touch? I haven’t got much time, Cy.’
McBain poured himself some coffee. ‘Something’s really gotten under your skin, hasn’t it?’
Ulm said nothing.
‘Girling’s already contacted our public affairs people here,’ McBain continued. ‘He wanted to meet with me, or someone who could give him updates on what’s happening in the Lebanon. So far, I’ve told the P/A guys I’m out — permanently. I don’t give intel briefs for people I don’t know. But there’s no reason why we shouldn’t have a change of heart.
Someone from P/A will sit in on the meeting, but there’s no way they’ll be able to guess who you are. Even if they do, they’ll play dumb. You’re just another suit from Washington, right? All you need is a name. Your mother’s maiden name mightn’t be a bad place to start. That’s if you had a mother, Elliot.’
Ulm sat back.
‘Thanks, Cy. I owe you.’
McBain said: ‘You can pay me back by forgetting I ever did this.’ He punched a four-digit extension number and held the phone to his ear.
‘Get me Mike Schlitz,’ he said, as soon as he had a connection.
CHAPTER 16
Girling turned the BMW onto Shari’a Al-Ahram, the road that led almost from the centre of Cairo to the pyramids of Giza, and settled down to a steady pace in the centre lane. It was coming up to one o’clock. He was in good time for his lunch appointment at the Mena House Hotel, a luxury affair in the shadow of the Great Pyramid. The Mena House was just that little bit remote; he guessed that was why Schlitz and McBain had picked it.
It had been a busy morning and it was getting busier. First he had called on his old friend John Silverman at Reuters and dropped the story onto his desk. Silverman was shocked. He had known and liked Stansell. But Girling recognized a look in Silverman’s face that said he also knew a good story when he saw one. With kidnapping and hijack in the air, the fact that a leading British journalist had been murdered by the world’s latest public enemy made the story dynamite. And despite his previous visit from the Mukhabarat, Silverman wasn’t going to be deterred. With commendable restraint, Girling thought, Silverman had not pressed him for any of the details of Dispatches’ forthcoming exclusive on the Angels of Judgement, which was just as well.
Next he drove to the Khan, parked and retraced his steps to Kareem’s coffee house on the Street of the Judges. This time, he gained access to Old Mansour without difficulty. Mansour accepted Stansell’s death with a sad, wise look in his face which said that he had known all along that Stansell would never again smoke and exchange banter at Kareem’s. Girling explained that it was important he get in touch with Uthman, the doctor from Duqqi, who worked part-time at Mukhabarat HQ. He gave Old Mansour Sharifa’s number and told him to get Uthman to ring him, day or night.