Jihad

CHAPTER 47

Dean grabbed a four-hour nap between two and six A.M., then was back on Asad’s trail as the terrorist organizer once more played tourist, beginning his day with a visit to the New Mosque near the Eminönü waterfront. From there, Asad walked around the corner to the Spice Market, an indoor bazaar that featured mostly food items, including large bags of piquant-smelling spices.

“Buy something nice for me,” Lia told Dean, who was on the far side of the building.

“I’ll get you a rug.”

“Handwoven.”

Asad walked through slowly and came out behind the mosque. Lia took up the tail while Dean doubled back through the bazaar.

“Going underground,” said Lia as Asad headed toward a walkway that went under the heavily trafficked highway near the waterfront. The passage was filled with shops and vendors who spread their wares on blankets and rugs, hawking them to the crowds coming off the bridge or the nearby tram station.

“This is probably it,” said Rockman. “We have the U2 ready today; if he goes underground, we’ll have a map available in seconds.”

A gaggle of Japanese tourists pressed into the narrow hallway at the front of the Spice Bazaar as Dean tried to get out. He nudged his way through and began trotting toward the passage. Another flood of people, this one from a tram that had just stopped nearby, clogged the steps as he descended, and he was caught in a steamy mangle of bodies.

“Lia?” he said.

“He’s heading for the ferries. Pier Three. He just bought a ticket. I’ll stay with him. Relax, Charlie Dean.”

About an hour and a half later, Asad got off the ferry at a small fishing village cum tourist trap called Anadolu Kavagi just south of the Black Sea. Lia watched him go ashore before following herself. When he went into a restaurant just off the pier, she found another nearby. She went up to the second floor, looking down through the open windows at the corner of his table.

“So what’s he saying?” she asked the Art Room a half hour later.

“That the red mullet isn’t that fresh.”

“Pity,” said Lia.

An hour passed without anything happening. Finally Asad left the restaurant and headed up the road in the direction of an old fortress. Lia followed, but stayed a half mile back; Fashona was flying above and had the area under surveillance. She found a small grocer and bought a bottle of water, then camped in the shade below the ruins. More than likely, she thought, he’d hold a meeting in some underground cavern like yesterday, but a flyover by the U2 failed to turn up any hidden chambers, and within forty-five minutes Asad was headed back to the village.

“Where are you, Charlie?”

“Still offshore. You want me to come in?”

She did, but not for anything work related.

“Asad’s going back toward the dock. Thought you’d want to know.”

“Thanks.”

Dean watched from the small boat as the ferry approached across the strait. It was the last one of the day; if Asad was going to return to Istanbul, he’d have to board it.

Or not. A boat could easily be waiting nearby.

The ferry moved in slow motion toward the dock. Dean, tired from the mission and convinced that Asad wasn’t going to do anything important today, pulled his cap down over his eyes; shade was a poor substitute for sleep, but it was the best he could do for now. A faint odor of rotting fish hung over his boat, normally used for fishing; between that and the unsteady rocking of the waves whenever a large tanker passed nearby, Dean’s stomach felt queasy.

“Looks like he’s going to get on this one,” Lia told him. “He’s moving toward the dock. I’ll get on after him.”

“No, go ahead and get aboard first thing,” said Marie Telach. “If he stays ashore, Charlie can go in and follow him, and we’ll have one of the backup units come closer.”

Lia didn’t answer, which Dean knew meant she didn’t agree but would go along anyway. A few minutes after the ferry docked, she reported that Asad was in the bow with his bodyguard.

“I’m going to plant some video bugs,” she added.

Rockman gave her the usual cautions. Dean had his boat’s captain — a one-time army special forces soldier who’d retired to Turkey about a decade before — turn the craft toward the opposite shore, where the ferry’s next stop would be.

It wasn’t until two stops later that a pair of Middle Eastern businessmen drew near Asad. One of them called him sheik.

“Hey, here we go,” said Rockman. “Oh, yeah. Hang on while we see if we can ID these guys. Charlie, we’re going to download the video from the fly to your PDA so you can get a look at them, too.”

Dean took out his handheld computer and flipped into the feed from the Art Room. The slightly blotchy picture showed Asad sitting with two bearded men in tan suits.

“The guy on the far teft — we’ve just ID’d him as Tariq Asam,” said Rockman. “He’s a Saudi. We don’t know the other guy, not yet. We want to follow them.”

“I’ll get on at the next stop.”

“We have somebody there already, Charlie. They’ll get on and trail the Saudis. You stay with the boat.”

“Not you again,” said Lia, walking next to Pinchon at the food bar on the ferry.

“Funny. I thought the same thing.”

“The two guys with the tan suits in the bow are Saudis. You can’t miss them — they’re the only ones who have jackets on. They’re yours. Don’t lose them.”

“Where’s Grandpa?”

“Pinchon, just do your job, okay?”

“Baby, I thought you’d never ask.”

Lia ordered a bottled water, trying hard to ignore Pinohon as he walked away.