Contract with God aka The Moses Expedition

4

NEW YORK

Wednesday, 5 July 2006. 11:10 a.m.

Orville Watson was nervously drumming his fingers on the bulging leather portfolio on his lap. He had been sitting on his well-padded rear end in the reception area of the 38th Floor of Kayn Tower for the last two hours. At 3,000 dollars an hour, anyone else would have been happy to wait until Judgement Day. But not Orville. The young Californian was growing bored. In point of fact, the fight against boredom was what had made his career.

His college studies had bored him. Against his family’s wishes he had dropped out during his second year. He had found a good job at CNET, one of the companies on the cutting edge of new technologies, but once again boredom had set in. Orville was constantly hungry for new challenges and his real passion was for answering questions. By the turn of the millennium, his entrepreneurial spirit had prompted him to leave his job at CNET and start up his own company.

His mother, who read in the newspapers each day about the failure of yet another dot-com, objected. Her worries didn’t deter Orville. He packed his 300-pound frame, blond ponytail, and a suitcase full of clothes into a dilapidated van and drove right across the country, ending up in a basement apartment in Manhattan. Thus Netcatch was born. His slogan was ‘You ask, we respond’. The whole project could have remained nothing more than the crazy dream of a young man with an eating disorder, too many worries, and a singular understanding of the Internet. But then 9/11 happened, and straight away Orville understood three things that it had taken the Washington bureaucrats much too long to figure out.

First, that their methods of handling information had been obsolete for thirty years. Second, that the political correctness brought on by eight years of the Clinton administration had made it even more difficult to search for information, since you could only count on ‘reliable sources’, which were useless when dealing with terrorists. And third, that the Arabs were turning out to be the new Russians when it came to espionage.

Orville’s mother, Yasmina, was born and had lived in Beirut for many years before marrying a handsome engineer from Sausalito, California, whom she met while he was working on a project in Lebanon. The couple soon moved to the United Status, where the lovely Yasmina educated her only son in both Arabic and English.

Adopting different identities on the web, the young man found out that the Internet was a paradise for extremists. It didn’t matter physically how far apart ten radicals might be; online, the distance was measured in milliseconds. Their identity might be secret and their ideas insane, but on the Net they could find people who thought just like them. In a matter of weeks, Orville had accomplished something that nobody in Western intelligence could have achieved by conventional means: he had infiltrated one of the most radical networks in Islamic terrorism.

One morning towards the beginning of 2002, Orville drove south to Washington with four boxes of files in the boot of his van. Arriving at CIA headquarters, he asked for the person in charge of Islamic terrorism, stating that he had important information to divulge. In his hand was a ten-page summary of his findings. The lowly official who met with him made him wait two hours before even bothering to read his report. When he had finished reading, the official was so disturbed that he called in his supervisor. Minutes later four men showed up, threw Orville to the floor, stripped him, and dragged him into an interrogation room. Orville smiled inwardly throughout the humiliating procedure; he knew he’d hit the nail on the head.

When the big shots at the CIA grasped the magnitude of Orville’s talent, they offered him a job. Orville told them that what was in the four boxes (which eventually produced twenty-three arrests in the United States and Europe) was just a free sample. If they wanted more, they should contract the services of his new company, Netcatch.

‘Our prices are very reasonable, I should add,’ he said. ‘Now, may I please have my underwear back?’

Four and a half years later, Orville had put on another twelve pounds. His bank account had also gained some weight. Netcatch now employed seventeen full-time workers who produced detailed reports and information searches for the main governments of the Western world, mostly on security-related issues. Orville Watson, now a millionaire, was once again beginning to grow bored.

Until this new assignment came up.

Netcatch had its own way of doing things. All requests for its services had to be made in the form of a question. And this latest question came with the words ‘budget unlimited’ attached. The fact that it came from a private company, and not a government, also aroused Orville’s curiosity.

Who is Father Anthony Fowler?

Orville got up from the plush waiting-room sofa in an attempt to ease the numbness in his muscles. He put his hands together and stretched his arms behind his head as far as he could. A request for information from a private company, especially one such as Kayn Industries, which was ranked among the top five of the Fortune 500, was unusual. Especially such a strange and precise request about an ordinary priest from Boston.

… about a seemingly ordinary priest from Boston, Orville corrected himself.

Orville was in the middle of stretching his upper limbs when a dark-haired, well-built executive dressed in an expensive suit entered the waiting room. He was barely thirty years old, and was regarding Orville seriously from behind his rimless glasses. From the orange tint of his skin, it was clear that he was no stranger to using a sunbed. He spoke with a clipped British accent.

‘Mr Watson. I’m Jacob Russell, executive assistant to Raymond Kayn. We spoke on the telephone.’

Orville tried to regain his composure, with little success, and extended his hand.

‘Mr Russell, I’m very happy to meet you. Sorry, I…’

‘Don’t worry. Please follow me and I’ll take you to your meeting.’

They crossed the carpeted waiting room and reached a set of mahogany doors at the far end.

‘Meeting? I thought that I was supposed to explain my findings to you.’

‘Well, not exactly, Mr Watson. Today Raymond Kayn will hear what you have to say.’

Orville was unable to respond.

‘Is there a problem, Mr Watson? Aren’t you feeling well?’

‘Yes. No. I mean, there’s no problem, Mr Russell. You simply took me by surprise. Mr Kayn…’

Russell pulled a small knob on the frame of the mahogany door and a panel slid open to reveal a simple square of dark glass. The executive placed his right hand on the glass and an orange light appeared, followed by the brief sound of a buzzer and then the door opened.

‘I can understand your surprise, given what the media has said about Mr Kayn. As you probably know, my employer is a person who values his privacy…’

He’s a fucking hermit, that’s what he is, thought Orville.

‘… but you needn’t worry. Ordinarily, he doesn’t want to meet strangers, but if you follow certain procedures…’

They walked down a narrow hall, at the end of which loomed the bright metallic doors of a lift.

‘What do you mean, “ordinarily”, Mr Russell?’

The executive cleared his throat.

‘I should inform you that you will be only the fourth person, aside from the top executives of this firm, to have met Mr Kayn in the five years I’ve worked for him.’

Orville let out a long whistle.

‘That’s something.’

They reached the lift. There was no up or down button, only a small numerical pad on the wall.

‘Would you kindly look the other way, Mr Watson?’ Russell said.

The young Californian did as he was told. There was a series of beeps as the executive punched in a code.

‘You can turn around now. Thank you.’

Orville turned back to face him again. The doors of the lift opened and two men stepped in. Again there were no buttons, only a magnetic card reader. Russell took out his plastic card and slid it briefly into the slot. The doors closed and the lift moved smoothly upward.

‘Your boss certainly takes his security seriously,’ Orville said.

‘Mr Kayn has received quite a few death threats. In fact, some years back he suffered a rather serious attempt on his life and was lucky to emerge unharmed. Please don’t be alarmed by the mist. It’s absolutely safe.’

Orville was wondering what on earth Russell was talking about, when a fine mist began to fall from the ceiling. Looking up, Orville observed several devices that were spewing out a fresh cloud of spray.

‘What’s going on?’

‘It’s a light antibiotic compound, absolutely safe. Do you like the smell?’

Hell, he even sprays his visitors before he sees them to make sure they’re not going to give him their germs. I’ve changed my mind. This guy’s not a hermit, he’s a paranoid freak.

‘Mmmm, yes, not bad. Mint, right?’

‘Essence of wild mint. Very refreshing.’

Orville bit his lips to suppress a reply, and concentrated instead on the seven figures he’d be billing Kayn once he emerged from this gilded cage. The thought revived him somewhat.

The lift doors opened on to a magnificent space filled with natural light. Half of the thirty-ninth floor was a giant terrace enclosed by glass walls, providing a panoramic view of the Hudson River. Straight ahead was Hoboken and over to the south, Ellis Island.

‘Impressive.’

‘Mr Kayn enjoys remembering his roots. Please follow me.’ The simple decor stood in contrast to the majesty of the view. The floor and the furniture were all white. The other half of the floor, with a view of Manhattan, was separated from the glassed-in terrace by a wall, also white and with several doors. Russell stopped in front of one of them.

‘Very well, Mr Watson, Mr Kayn will see you now. But before you go in, I’d like to outline a few simple rules for you. First of all, do not look directly at him. Second, do not ask him questions. And third, do not attempt to touch him or go near him. When you enter you’ll see a small table with a copy of your report and a remote control for your Power Point presentation which your office provided us with this morning. Remain by the table, do your presentation, and leave as soon as you’ve finished. I’ll be here waiting for you. Is that clear?’

Orville nodded nervously.

‘I’ll do the best I can.’

‘Very well then, go on in,’ said Russell, as he opened the door.

The Californian hesitated before entering the room.

‘Oh, one more thing. Netcatch has discovered something interesting in a routine investigation we did for the FBI. There are indications to suggest that Kayn Industries could be targeted by Islamic terrorists. It’s all in this report,’ said Orville, handing the assistant a DVD. Russell took it with a worried look. ‘Consider it a courtesy on our part.’

‘Thank you very much indeed, Mr Watson. And good luck.’