“Michael?” She started to repeat the question, when I answered her.
“Thirty-two degrees north is the approximate latitude of Tel Aviv,” I said.
Chapter 5
Teresa Malandra
May 18 to June 10
The reason why Michael is so difficult to understand — especially for journalists — is that he is not one person but a committee of several. There is, for instance, the Greek money-changer with thin fingers moving unceasingly as he makes lightning calculations on an abacus; there is the brooding, sad-eyed Armenian bazaar trader who pretends to be slow-witted, but is, in fact, devious beyond belief; there is the stuffy, no-nonsense Englishman trained as an engineer; there is the affable, silk-suited young man of affairs with smile lines at the corners of wide, limpid, con man eyes; there is the mother-fixated managing director of the Agence Howell, defensive, sententious, and given to speechifying; and there is the one I particularly like, who. . but why go on? The Michael Howell committee is in permanent session, and, though the task of implementing its business decisions is generally delegated to just one of the members, the voices of the others are usually to be heard whispering in the background. Ghaled certainly detected the faint sounds of those prompting voices, but to begin with he positively identified only the engineer. About that member of the committee, at least, his judgment was correct; the Englishman’s professional pride borders on the obsessional.
In the days that followed that second meeting with Salah Ghaled there seemed to be no more enthusiastic and devoted adherent to the cause of the Palestinian Action Force than Comrade Michael. Within forty-eight hours the drawings and specifications of the fuse adapter ring had been completed and sent to the Beirut machine shop. A day later, after a telephone discussion, a price had been agreed and work on the sample ring put in hand. Meanwhile, the probable Howell shipping movements for the months of June and July had been analysed and a number of projections made. Then the possibilities of change and manipulation were explored.
It was like a mad chess problem.
On July 2 the M. V. Amalia Howell (4,000 tons, Captain Touzani) must sail, possibly though not necessarily in ballast, from Latakia bound for Alexandria. Problem: bring this sailing about in not more than three moves, none of which may be observed by your opponent (in this case your own shipping agents) or, if observed, not recognized as moves.
Michael thought about it on and off for days. In the end he found a solution requiring only two moves: first, the contrived, temporary withdrawal of the Amalia’s Deratization Exemption Certificate (required under Article 17 of the International Sanitary Regulations) which would hold her idle in port for three or more days; second, a consequential rearrangement of Howell freighter sailings which would send the Amalia, when released, to Ancona to pick up a cargo for Latakia. His eyes gleamed with pleasure as he went over the mechanics of it with me.
“Tell Issa to pass the news on,” he said finally. “No details, just the name of the ship. You can tell him, too, that the sample ring will be in our hands on Monday next. Ghaled will want to see it. Request orders. We want to appear to be cooperating one hundred percent.”
“Why do you say ‘appear’ to be?”
“What do you mean?”
“Well we are cooperating, aren’t we?”
He frowned impatiently. “What else do you suggest we do?”
“Is this adapter ring going to work?”
“Of course it’s going to work.” He was indignant for a moment, then he shrugged. “Oh, I see. You think it would be better if the ring didn’t work.”
“Don’t you think so?”
“Aren’t we out to sabotage this criminal operation of Ghaled’s, you mean? Of course we are. But how can we sabotage it when we don’t know exactly what he’s planning?”
“We know some things.”
“Bits of things. Not enough. Anyway, messing about with the adapter ring wouldn’t do any good. I considered changing the flange dimensions slightly.
Maybe that would have made a difference, but how could I be certain? I don’t know enough about ammunition to say. Anyway, he’s not going to take it on trust. He’s bound to try it out.”
We were in the villa office and he tried to change the subject then by opening the Urgent file on his desk and starting to go through it. I had already dealt with the really urgent things there and wasn’t going to be put off like that.
“Michael, I’ve been thinking,” I said.
“Yes?” His tone was a clear intimation that he wasn’t interested.
“About those confessions we signed.”
That caught him. “What about them?”
“We’re both supposed to have been in touch with the Israeli intelligence service.”
“Standard incriminatory stuff. Mandatory death sentence.”
“They gave the name of an Israeli agent in Cyprus.”
“I know. Ze’ev Barlev.”
“Well, why don’t we get in touch with him? He must exist or they wouldn’t have named him.”
Michael sat back. I had his attention. “Oh yes, Barlev exists. He was based on Nicosia.”
‘Well, then.”
“I said was. He hasn’t been in Nicosia for six months. There was a little trouble. He was blown.”
“He must have been replaced by now.”
“I daresay.”
“Famagusta could find out about the replacement.”
“You make it sound very easy, but let’s say, for the purposes of your argument, that they could find out. One of us gets in touch with him? Is that your idea?”
“We’ve already confessed to being in touch with Barlev. Why shouldn’t we really be in touch with his successor?”
“Be hanged for a fact instead of a fantasy?” The con-man was wrinkling his eyes at me now, roguish and extremely tiresome.
“I was hoping to avoid hanging,” I said tartly. “I assume you are, too. Among the other things I am hoping to avoid is any responsibility, direct or moral, for whatever atrocity this Ghaled is planning. You say we can’t go to the authorities here. In the case of Colonel Shikla and the Internal Security Service, that I accept. We know now that Ghaled has ISS sympathizers. But there are others who would listen to us. Colonel Shikla has enemies who would be glad of a chance to embarrass him.”
“And you think Shikla would not know that we were responsible? Of course he would know. And so would everyone else.”
“Yes, it would be bad for business. Poor Agence Howell.”
“That is unfair!” The managing director had suddenly emerged from the committee room. “We have been over all this a dozen times. It is not a matter of business but of our personal safety. Any action, official or unofficial, that we initiate here against Ghaled will result in action, direct action, against us. I am not talking about cargo fires and engine room explosions in company ships, but personal attacks.”
“We could demand protection.”
“Against Colonel Shikla when Ghaled has passed him our confessions and they are sitting on his desk? You know better than that, Teresa.”
“Very well. So we have a choice. We either run away or we sabotage Ghaled without his knowing it. And since you say we mustn’t run …”
“I have already accepted the policy of sabotage, providing that it can be carried out without personal risk. What more do you want?”
“Some assurance that the sabotage is going to be effective.”
“We’re going to get that by sticking our necks out with Israeli intelligence? Is that what you believe?”
“Our necks are already sticking out.”
“There is a certain difference, as I have been endeavouring to point out,” he said coldly, ‘’between the words in a false confession and the deeds you are proposing. Do you think I haven’t already considered the possibility of contact with the Israelis? Of course I have.”