“We’re fine, thank you,” Tanner replied.
“Then I’ll say good night. You will be staying a few days, in case we need to ask more questions?”
Tanner and Camille nodded.
“Very good.” Tanaka stood, shook both their hands, and left.
After seeing Camille safely to her room, which was directly one floor below his, Tanner took a shower. He stood under the spray for twenty minutes, then got out, toweled off, poured himself a vodka, and stepped onto the balcony. The moon was high and the sky clear.
So much for a quiet vacation, he thought.
It had been a professional killing, that much was certain. The gunman — whoever he was — was not a paper target shooter. If the first shot had been a few inches to the right, it would have struck at the base of the skull. Even so, the first shot had been fatal. Why the second shot, then? Insurance?
This was no murder, Tanner decided. It was an execution.
And now, because of a stupid impulse — no, two impulses — he was involved. Not very smart, Briggs. There was something about the man named Umako Ohira, though…. He’d been desperate for help, as would have anyone, but he’d seemed especially glad Tanner was American. Why? And the key… Of all the things to be carrying, why that?
He took a sip of vodka, felt it wanning in his belly, and leaned on the railing. Below him, Camille stood on her own balcony. He was about to call down when he saw movement in the trees below. It moved again: a figure in dark clothing. After a moment, it slipped back into the shadows and disappeared.
Tanner looked again for Camille, but she’d gone inside.
2
The man known as Marcus stumbled over a discarded tire and fell, gashing his shin. He cursed. God, what he wouldn’t give for a working streetlight! But in Beirut — especially in Muslim West Beirut — they were as rare as mortar attacks were common. He could feel the cuts and bruises on his hands and face. His clothes were shredded. He’d lost count of the number of times in the past hour he’d fallen.
He sat down to catch his breath. At the end of the alley he could see a gutted apartment building, half its facade crumbled and blocking the adjoining street. Here and there, rifles cracked and he could hear the faint crump of grenades. The Shia and the Phalange were fighting again, somewhere near the airport shantytowns.
Suddenly an engine revved. Marcus froze.
He strained to listen. Where are they? The engine faded, went silent. A dog barked. Silence. Maybe he’d lost them. In the past half hour he’d done so several times, but still they managed to catch up. They knew the city at least as well as he did, perhaps better.
He patted his coat pocket and realized the pieces of colored chalk were still there. He emptied his pockets. He couldn’t afford to be caught with them. His pursuers were simple men but not stupid. They would make the connection.
Behind him an engine growled. Headlights swept over him. Run! He climbed to his feet and half limped, half ran down the alley and into the street.
He was pinned by spotlights. Behind the glare, he could make out the outline of a pickup truck. Half a dozen men stood alongside it, their weapons leveled at him. Behind him, a car skidded to a stop; doors opened. Footsteps pounded toward him.
Marcus turned, looking for an exit. Left… right… Nothing, nowhere to go.
Allah be merciful, he thought. I’m caught.
Two hours later, when Marcus still hadn’t appeared for their meeting, the old Armenian named Salah knew something was wrong. Marcus had never been late without giving a… What did he call it? A wave-off. He had checked all four drops and found no markings, but still no Marcus.
Salah was old enough that the various factions in the Muslim Quarter paid him little attention. Tonight, three patrols had stopped him at their hajez, or checkpoints — in each case a pair of burned out cars sitting diagonally across the particular street they governed. In each case he had been waved on.
At last he reached Marcus’s neighborhood. The street was quiet. Rats skittered in the shadows. This was a good neighborhood by Beirut standards; aside from a few bullet scars, most buildings were undamaged. Here a building wasn’t considered uninhabitable until it had collapsed. Beirutis had a sixth sense about the many dangers of their city, structural integrity being only one of them.
Salah turned the corner, then stopped, ducked back.
A car sat in front of Marcus’s apartment building. A pair of men, both armed with AK-47s, stood at the curb. Through the curtains of Marcus’s apartment Salah could see shadows moving. The light clicked off.
Moments later, four men trotted down the building’s front steps. The lookouts waved an all clear, and the group came forward, pushing a man between them.
Marcus! They shoved him inside the trunk and slammed it shut. The group piled into the car, and it pulled away.
Forty-five miles east of Beirut in the foothills of the Anti-Lebanese Mountains near the village of Ma’rubun, Abu Azhar sat before the glowing fireplace in his cottage, flipping through a cracked leather photo album.
The album was ordered chronologically, so many of the older photos were tinted sepia, but the newer ones, the images that should have evoked in him stronger memories, seemed as distant as the older ones. Photos of his mother and father; of brothers and sisters; of the now-abandoned An Nabatiyah refugee camp north of the Litani River; of a group of young men huddled around a table, smiling and drinking.
Without realizing it, Azhar smiled, a reflex. The images meant nothing to him. He turned the page.
Here the photos were of a young girl of perhaps two years old surrounded by balloons and streamers, her friends in the background, laughing and blowing noisemakers. A woman bent over the girl’s shoulder, their smiling faces pressed together for the camera.
Azhar turned to the next page and he felt his heart fill his throat.
The headline was from Al Quds, an Israeli-Arab newspaper:
YOUNG GIRL DEAD: AUTHORITIES SUSPECT ABUSE
Tel Aviv — Authorities today charged a young Levanda couple in the negligent death of their seven-year-old daughter. Though the names of the girl and her family have not yet been disclosed, sources say the cause of death appears to be…
The next page, another headline, this one from the Jerusalem Post:
COUPLE SUSPECTED OF CHILD ABUSE FOUND SLAIN
Tel Aviv — The bodies of Helena and Ira Yakov, who were acquitted last month of the negligent death of their adopted daughter, were found murdered in their apartment yesterday morning. Details of the murder have not been disclosed, but police investigators state the Yakovs both died of single bullet wounds to the head. As yet, neither motives nor suspects have been found….
“Abu, why do you do this to yourself?”
Azhar turned to see his wife sitting in the doorway. She jostled the wheels of her chair and pushed herself into the room. A petite woman of fifty, Elia Azhar would have been beautiful if not for the worry lines creasing her face. Allah, how he loved her. For all she had been through, she never felt sorry for herself but was instead a quiet rock for him.
“Why aren’t you in bed?” he asked her.