“The Lebanese government is corrupt and slow,” Nara explained. “One of Hezbollah’s greatest strengths is disaster relief and the rehabilitation funds it deploys.”
They eventually found a cramped little restaurant that reminded Alex of a New York deli. There was a counter for ordering food and just enough room on the opposite wall for a line of small tables. Nara talked in rapid Arabic to the proprietor and introduced the man to Alex. Alex didn’t catch his name, but the big man reached over the counter and shook Alex’s hand with the strength of a vise grip.
“I’m going to order for both of us,” Nara said in English.
“Great,” Alex answered. “I’ll take a Big Mac.”
“Ugly Americans,” Nara said.
The dish that Nara actually ordered was like nothing Alex had ever tasted. It featured chickpeas, olives, and radishes mixed with a creamy substance that had the texture of yogurt. All of this was wrapped inside some kind of dough. Alex ate the food with a smile and a few approving grunts. Truthfully, it didn’t compare to last night’s dinner, but Alex wasn’t about to complain at a restaurant in the Hezbollah district.
He chatted with Nara as they ate, and at least twice the owner came over to see how the guests were enjoying their meal. Alex lied about how great everything tasted, and Nara translated his compliments.
Just before they left, the man came back one last time and talked to Nara. When they finished chatting, she stood and gave him a hug. Alex also stood and shook the man’s hand. He gave Alex a good-natured slap on the shoulder.
When Nara tried to pay for the meal, another animated discussion ensued, and it was obvious that the man wasn’t going to let her. Alex smiled and nodded in appreciation. “Thanks,” he said. The proprietor smiled back.
After they left the restaurant, Nara looked for a serviz.
“What’s the deal?” Alex asked.
She unfolded a piece of paper that the man had apparently slipped into her hand. The writing was in Arabic.
“Hamza Walid is going to meet us tonight,” Nara said in a whisper.
“Where?”
“I don’t know. It just says where his driver is going to pick us up.”
64
fifteen years earlier beirut, lebanon
Hassan Ibn Talib was a teenager at a Hezbollah training camp when he first held an AK-47. He had been in training for three weeks before the leaders handed him and the other recruits their very own assault rifles. The adrenaline pumped through Hassan’s body as he smelled the steel and oil. The gun felt cold and hard in his hands.
The leaders showed the boys how to load the gun, how to fire it, and how to care for it. After what seemed like an interminable amount of time, they allowed each of the young recruits to fire at some cardboard targets shaped like human silhouettes.
When Hassan’s turn came, he knelt down, placed his finger on the trigger, and pulled. At first, he fired tentatively, slowly. Few targets fell. But then he started firing faster, one blast after another, and the targets began to drop. His heart started beating quicker. He pulled again and again, faster and faster. Shell casings flew to the ground as Hassan blew through an entire magazine of bullets. The steel became hot in his hands, and the roar of the gun rang in his head.
When he stopped firing, the silence seemed deafening. Somehow, Hassan knew that things would never again be the same. He had started this day as a boy. Now he was a man. The gun had a mystical power unlike anything Hassan had ever felt.
He was born for this.
He looked at his leader, a man who rarely smiled. The man was grinning now.
“Very good, my son. Soon you will be ready.”
65
the present beirut, lebanon
At 11 p.m., an old BMW pulled up to the curb in front of the Ramada, and the driver stepped out.
“Nara Mobassar?” he asked.
Nara responded in Arabic and told Alex that this was the one. They climbed into the backseat, and Nara had another exchange with the driver.
“Where are we going?” Alex asked.
“He wouldn’t say,” Nara responded. “Apparently Hamza is big on secrecy.”
“Are you sure about this?” Alex asked.
“For the third time, yes.”
Alex had lots of misgivings about the trip, but Nara, true to form, had an answer for everything. Alex didn’t like going without knowing the destination. But as Nara pointed out, they didn’t have much choice in the matter. What if it was a setup, Alex had asked. Nara said she trusted her sources. Plus, she had enlisted the help of several friends. She would send them text messages, updating them on her location. If they didn’t hear from her at least once every five minutes, they would call the police.
Alex could shoot a thousand holes in the plan. What if the police were slow to respond? What if somebody took her cell phone? What if Hezbollah thugs blew up their car or shot them without warning?
But he didn’t bother asking more questions. Nara was going, with or without him. If necessary, she would take someone else. And Alex wasn’t quite ready to admit that this woman from Lebanon had more guts-or a greater commitment to the case-than he did.
The one thing that still bothered him as they wound their way through the streets of Beirut was Nara’s insistence that they not tell Khalid. “If my father finds out, he’ll make us promise not to go,” Nara had explained.
That should have told Alex everything he needed to know.
Fifteen minutes into the trip, even Nara started looking a little nervous.
“Where are we?” Alex asked. He was afraid he already knew.
“The Hezbollah district.”
“And whose idea was this?”
Nara didn’t answer. She was too busy texting one of her friends.
The driver eventually veered off the main street, navigated a few side streets, and pulled into an abandoned parking lot.
“Here?” Nara asked.
The man nodded without turning around.
Alex looked at Nara and twisted his face. Are you sure about this?
“It’s an old train station,” Nara said. “The trains in Beirut haven’t been running for years.”
Without turning around, the driver said something in Arabic, and Nara replied. Alex heard tension in her voice. Nara and the driver argued for a few minutes before she turned to Alex.
“He says that Hamza will meet us down at the tracks. There are three abandoned railcars. I’ll tell you a legend about them on the way.”
Nara spoke to the driver in Arabic again. “I told him to leave the lights on and wait for us to get back,” she said to Alex. She typed out another text message. “You ready?” she asked.
“Not really.”
“Neither am I.”
Nara was the first to get out; Alex followed. They walked to the far corner of the parking lot and headed down a path toward the tracks. Abandoned buildings and overgrown weeds lined the walkway on both sides. In a few seconds they were beyond the lights from the BMW. Alex used the glow from his BlackBerry screen to shed some pale light on the path. Nara edged closer, and for some reason they found themselves whispering.
“They say that during the civil war, train cars like these were used to house prisoners and hold trials,” Nara said softly. “The legend is that the militia would hold the prisoners captive in one train car, give them a five-minute trial in the next, and execute them in the third. When that car was full, they’d haul it away to a mass grave.”
“I could have gone all night without hearing that story,” Alex said.
They were closing in on the train cars now, the noise of the city faint in the distance. Nara and Alex stepped over an old power line. Dead leaves crunched under their feet. There was an abandoned masonry building on their left, the shells of the three train carriages on their right. The place smelled like urine, and Alex imagined it was probably a hangout for the homeless.
“Hamza?” Nara called softly. “Hamza?”