“Let’s start with the simple stuff, whatever the hell your name is,” Bogner said slowly.
“First of all, do you understand English?”
“Sagheer.” The man managed a kind of sickly grin. He held up his hand with a small space between his thumb and index finger to indicate how much sagheer represented. His hand was shaking and his eyes were glued to the automatic.
“Okay, we’re getting somewhere. If you understand it, do you speak it?” Bogner pushed.
The mechanic shook his head.
“La, la ingleezi.”
“La means no?” Bogner asked.
The little man was still nodding.
Bogner stepped up and nudged the barrel of the automatic closer to the man’s face.
“What you’re telling me is you understand a little bit of English but you don’t speak it. Right?”
The Iraqi was still nodding, but Bogner’s automatic was scaring him.
For the first time in a long time Bogner was holding all the cards. The Iraqi mechanic was a slight man weighing no more than 140 pounds and he was at least six inches shorter than Bogner.
He stared back at his captor with an expression that was a mixture of bewilderment and fear. Bogner shouldered his way past the man, settled for a roll of duct tape when he couldn’t find rope, and pointed at the mechanic’s fallen companion.
“I want your friend’s hands taped behind his back, legs taped together, and a strip of tape over his mouth. And while you’re at it, tell him if he starts thrashing around I’ll shoot him. Understand?”
Bogner was acting out his instructions, at times feeling like he was playing a game of charades.
When the little man finally caught on, he took to the task, and when he was finished, stood over his handiwork as if he was waiting for Bogner’s approval.
“Now, lift your buddy up on the back of the truck, and cover him with this.” There were more gestures, and Bogner held up a piece of oil-stained canvas for the covering.
To Bogner’s surprise, the little Iraqi almost seemed to relish his assignment. He struggled with the lifting, but finally managed to get his partner up on the truck bed and covered with the canvas. By the time he finished he had quit most of his shaking, but Bogner could tell he was still nervous about the Mk 2.
“Now we come to the hard part,” Bogner said.
“Second question. Do you drive?” He pointed to the cab of the truck and the steering wheel. Before he could complete the pantomime the little man was nodding vehemently.
“Aiwa, aiwa.” He started to reach in his pocket for proof of his skill, but stopped when Bogner held up his hand and shoved the muzzle of the automatic close to his face again.
“You’re doing fine. So far, so good,” Bogner said.
“Now this is how we’re going to do it. You’re going to be doing the driving and I’m going to be sitting next to you with this thing buried in your ribs. One wrong move and you’re going to meet Allah a helluva lot sooner than you planned.”
The little man looked at Bogner, and the terrified expression on his face told Bogner all he needed to know. The little Iraqi was doing his best not only to painfully process Bogner’s instructions from English into something he could understand, but also to let Bogner know he intended to cooperate.
“Drive? Me?” the Iraqi repeated. He seemed elated at the prospect of having learned a new word in English.
Bogner nodded.
“You got it. Now all you have to do is climb up in the cab, start the engine, and wait until I get the hangar door open. When I do, you pull out and you wait. I’ll close the door and then you and me are going to take a little ride.
Understand?”
Bogner waited, but all he got in return was another uncertain nod. This one was even less convincing than the previous ones.
Washington was caught in the grips of a winter storm. The previous day had started with a cold, irritating drizzle, and progressed through periods of freezing rain and sleet before finally evolving into full-fledged heavy snow. Clancy Packer had left the White House after a brief follow-on meeting with Hurley and Spitz, and decided to drive to his office. Along the way he called Sara, assured her he was okay, and told her that if the weather continued to worsen he would tough out the storm in his office.
In the nearly empty parking lot of the ISA building, the snowplows had already finished their job, and there were five-and six-foot mounds of snow to attest to it. Packer parked, entered the building through the main lobby, checked with the night security guard, and decided against venturing down in the basement where the ISA night crew was monitoring the bureau’s computers and communications.
He took the elevator to the third floor, and walked through a maze of darkened offices until he heard Miller talking on the telephone.
The Georgetown grad was frantically scratching notes on a yellow tablet when Packer entered his office.
“Got it,” Miller confirmed.
“The only thing I didn’t get was their ETA in Pasabachi.”
Packer could hear a woman’s voice on the other end of the line, but was unable to determine what she was saying. Miller made note of the time and when he finished, hung up, leaned back in his chair, and handed Packer his thermos.
“Don’t turn your nose up. It’s fresh. The girls down in the commissary made it for me less than an hour ago. It’s not the greatest, but it’s hot and it’ll keep you awake.”
The longtime ISA chief slumped down in a chair across from his assistant, poured himself a cup, took a sip, and closed his eyes.
“Long day, huh?” Miller said.
“Which prompts me to ask, why the hell aren’t you home in bed?”
Packer nodded, took another sip of coffee, and sighed.
“I didn’t think there would be much use in driving all the way out to the house. By the time I got there, Spitz would have called two or three times, Sara would be a basket case, and I’d have to come back into the office anyway. Now when he tries, the calls will be forwarded here and at least someone in the family will get some sleep.”
Miller shoved the tablet he had been taking notes on across the table. Packer picked it up, tried to read it, scowled, and dropped it back on the table. Over the years Miller had developed his own cryptic kind of shorthand when it came to taking notes and Packer had never mastered it.
“So what’s the latest?”
“They’re moving fast. I called Ginny Harper over at N1. She said Langley and some guy by the name of Rogers had most of the details worked out by the time they got to Boiling. Rogers is taking three of his best men, they boarded their flight, and by now they’re somewhere over the Atlantic.
I put my best moves on Ginny, even offered to buy her dinner, but she was tight-lipped. She said Langley was getting top billing, even to the point that for a while the air traffic control at Boiling was taking their orders from a General Mayfield.
The only thing she would confirm, though, was their destination was Gaziantep and Langley was having someone from Pasabachi meet him there with a chopper. She said if you needed to know more you’d have to get your information from Admiral Stanton.”
At this stage of his life, Clancy Packer had conquered most of his vices. The only one he hadn’t been able to overcome was his pipe. While Miller waited for some kind of response, Packer took out his favorite pipe, filled it, tamped it, and lit it. The whole process took little more than a few seconds, but it gave him time to think.
“You know something, Robert? For the first time in a long time, I’ve got that old pit-of-the-stomach feeling that maybe we’ve overlooked something… something very important. There’s a real question in my mind whether we’re going to be able to get Bogner out of this one. I don’t like our odds.”