Man in the middle

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

The receptionist was a gentleman of Arab descent, heavyset, wearing a black Western suit and a skinny black necktie, who looked up with a naive smile as Tirey and I entered the office.

The smile evaporated after five more agents pushed through the doorway and began fanning out around his office-this seemed to clear up any misunderstanding that we were welcome guests. Sounding suddenly anxious, he asked, "How may I help you?"

Tirey stopped about a foot from his desk and flashed a phony piece of paper and a real shield in his face. He identified himself and said very forcefully, "I have reason to suspect that somebody in this office is involved with a kidnapping. This warrant authorizes my agents to conduct a search."

The space we had entered was a large anteroom that was messy and disorganized, with about seven desks, behind each of which sat an Arab gentleman, dressed, as was the receptionist, in severe business attire. It smelled of stale cigarettes and old teabags, and looked like a cross between a ward politician's back room and a busy mortuary. Tirey instructed the receptionist, "Tell your people to leave their desks and stand against that wall." He pointed at a wall. "If anybody touches anything, they'll be cuffed and arrested."

Apparently they all spoke English, or they knew the drill, because they began standing, hanging up phones, dropping pens, and stepping away from their desks.

I asked the receptionist, "Is Mahmoud Charabi in?"

We had checked beforehand and confirmed that indeed, he was at that moment in his office. Still, it was instructive to see the look on this poor man's face. Unlike his boss, this guy must've hung around during Saddam's reign, because the sudden appearance of armed men bearing legal papers and threats put a very worried expression on his face. He replied hesitantly, "I… I do not know this."

I pointed at the phone on the desk. "Tell him Colonel Drummond from the American Army wants a word with him. Now."

He lifted up the phone and punched a number. He spoke in Arabic, but whatever he said took a lot longer than what I said. For all I knew, Charabi's office had a fire escape, and this guy was telling his boss to make tracks.

It was time to make my move; there were two doors on the far side of the room and I walked swiftly toward them. I opened the first door, which turned out to be a toilet, and then I threw open the second door, which turned out to be the devil's lair, and I entered. The door had a switch lock, and to ensure I wasn't disturbed, I shut the door gently behind me, turned the switch, and then turned around and faced my enemy.

A man sat behind a medium-size wooden desk in an office that was neither large nor even well-furnished-it contained only the aforementioned desk, a metal file cabinet, a badly stained wall-to-wall carpet, and Mahmoud Charabi sipping a cup of tea. This was hardly what he had schemed and plotted for decades to end up in, but that was the whole point; this room was a way station, and if things worked out, his next office would be palatial in size and decor, he would have an army at his beck and call, and a nation at his feet.

He stared at me a moment, hung up the phone, started to stand, then changed his mind and fell back into his chair. That moment of indecision aside, he had enough presence of mind to demand, "Why do you wish to see me? You have no appointment."

I moved toward his desk. A rotating chair was positioned in the middle of the floor that looked like, and probably was, U.S. Army property, which I interpreted as permission to sit, and I did.

He suggested, "I think you should leave." After a moment in which I did not leave, he informed me, "Now I am calling the American ambassador to protest." He lifted up the phone and began hitting numbers with angry little punches.

There are two ways to approach a delicate situation such as this; diplomacy is the recommended course for all the obvious advantages that it avoids nasty confrontations, often gets results, and leaves no ugly feelings. And to be fair, the man to my front was perhaps weeks away from becoming the most powerful man in this country, and as such, he deserved my respect and courtesy, if not for himself, then for the office within his grasp. Also he had powerful friends in Washington who could screw up my paycheck, my career, or worse.

That, however, has never been my way and I said, "Put down that phone."

He continued dialing.

I said, "Go ahead, then. It's your funeral."

He stopped dialing. I seemed to have his attention and he asked, "What are you talking about?"

"Well… for starters, who murdered Clifford Daniels? Then, who told the Iranians that we broke their intelligence code? And finally, who shot and kidnapped an American Army major? There's more, but I think that's a good beginning. Don't you?"

Somewhere in there I struck a chord, or several chords. His face went white. He said, "I… I have no idea what you're talking about. W-who are you… and w-who sent you?"

I ignored his questions and said, "Ordinarily, at moments like this, I would read you your rights and advise you to get a lawyer. But today, I'm your lawyer. And today, you have no rights, only options." I paused, then briefly explained why he should pay attention to these options. "I can destroy you with one phone call."

Mahmoud Charabi, incidentally, was in his late fifties, medium height, and a bit on the plump side-pampered and soft-looking, actually-which did not reinforce the tough-guy expression he was trying to give me. He had graying hair around a bald dome, waxy flesh around a formless face, thick lips around a tight mouth, and full cheeks around small brown eyes that were staring at me a little incredulously. The overall impression was a sort of roundness and flabbiness, which might be why people underestimated this man.

Also he possessed excellent English and was fairly well-spoken, but with a discernible accent, and I detected a slight stutter, perhaps a nervous affliction. To tell the truth, nothing about him looked powerful, charismatic, or even slightly imposing. He looked more like an overweight insurance adjustor than the George Washington of this country. Probably this accounted for why he was trying to lie, scheme, and murder his way into power.

Also he had the unfortunate Nixonian reflex of squeezing his hands together at moments of high stress-at that moment, he looked like he was pressing coal into diamonds.

Lest he harbored any doubts, I informed him, "I have Clifford Daniels's laptop computer." His eyes widened, and to confirm his worst fears, I continued, "You're Crusader Two. And yes-Clifford was both stupid and sloppy. Because, yes, he failed to eliminate the e-mail messages. And yes, Mr. Charabi, they were decoded, and they are very… incriminating. Message after message."

"But they-"

Not allowing him to get a word in, I continued, "Imagine, if you will, how those messages will look on the front page of the New York Times." He began contemplating the empty blotter on his desk, and in case he forgot, I reminded him what he had written, saying, "Those unflattering assessments of your fellow leaders here in Iraq. Your whiny complaints about the American Army and the American ambassador-'dickhead'?… Do you think he'll be flattered by that nickname? I don't. And best for last: You and Cliff cooking up that deal to tell the Iranians we had broken their code."

When he made no response, I said, "Wow. I mean, wow. How is that going to look?"

If his face had looked white before, he now was on the verge of disappearing into thin air. He never imagined he would hear these words; he thought Daniels was dead, that his secrets went to the grave. He said, "Uh… w-who… please, who are you?"

"It doesn't matter. Major Bian Tran will be brought to this office immediately. You have ten minutes, or…" I allowed that thought to drag off.

He looked up at me, very surprised. "I… I… w-what? I have never heard of this… major… what did you say is her name?"

I stood up and leaned over his desk. "On your orders, her vehicle was ambushed yesterday evening. She was wounded and kidnapped." We locked eyes. "If she's dead, you're dead. I'll kill you myself." I pointed at my watch. "Nine minutes."

"I have told you the truth. I do not know her… and d-definitely… I have not kidnapped her. Whoever told you this… It is a d-despicable l-lie."

I maintained eye contact and informed him, "Major Tran wrote your name in blood on the dashboard before she was dragged out of her car."

"Oh…" He glanced around his office, tried to compose himself, and a modicum of color returned to his face. He said with surprising coolness, "Why don't you sit? Let us talk this over without further threats."

"Here's a better idea. Why don't you pick up the phone and order your people to get Tran over here. Chop-chop."

"Because I can't. You are wrong." He drew a few breaths, then said, "You come into my office-my office-accusing me of murder and kidnapping. You cannot blackmail me into confessing things that are such big, terrible lies." He had found his voice, apparently, because he then ordered imperiously, "Sit down."

This guy needed a pop in the nose and I leaned forward to give him one, but he did something that slightly upset my plan. His right hand came up from underneath his desk and in it was a Glock with the barrel about six inches from my groin. He repeated himself, saying, "Sit down," more emphatically and, given that the pistol was threatening man's best friend, more persuasively.

I did not sit, but I did back off a few steps. I said, "Half a dozen FBI agents are in your outer office. Listen…" We both took a moment, and you could hear through the walls Tirey's Feds noisily trashing his outer office. "Hand me that pistol and I promise I won't beat the crap out of you."

"I think not. You broke into my office, you threatened me, went crazy, and attacked me. Self-defense-I have justification to kill you."

At moments like this, you have to ask yourself, is he serious or is he bluffing? Well, I had just threatened everything he had schemed for decades to get, I knew he was ruthless, and I had no doubt he was capable of murder. Also he was right; when there are only two witnesses to a murder, the living one has a monopoly on the truth.

But given all that, he hadn't fired yet-that meant I had something he wanted. His curiosity was the only reason I was alive. As long I didn't cure that problem, I had a chance.

You should never take your focus from a man's eyes at a moment like this, but I looked at his gun. "Hey, you know what?" I told him what. "Clifford Daniels died of a gunshot from an identical pistol. A Glock 17 Pro. Right?"

"Is this so? Well… I had no idea."

"I just thought it was, you know, odd. A quirky coincidence."

"Perhaps not such a coincidence. I purchased one for me, and one for Cliff. Matching pistols. Brothers in arms." He smiled at me. "A fitting gift-for all he was doing for my poor, miserable country."

"You give America phony intelligence, and now over a thousand of our soldiers are dead. You give Clifford a present and he dies by that gun. Does anybody ever get gifts from you and live?"

He waved the pistol. "You will not be alive to hear me say this again. Sit down."

I saw that his trigger finger had turned white. I sat.

He came right to the point and demanded, "Where is Cliff's computer?"

Clearly, this was part of what was keeping me alive-probably the only thing. I was sure that if I told him the computer was the property of the CIA, and that I alone did not hold the key to his political survival, I was dead. In summary, he needed me alive long enough to learn how to contain this thing, and I needed to stay alive long enough to get my hands around his throat. So I lied. "Hidden. Major Tran and I, well… once we saw what was on the hard drive… frankly, it was impossible to resist."

"Why?"

"Because there are enough powerful names in those messages to make sure we'll both retire as general officers."

He appreciated my self-serving logic and asked, "So you hid it?"

"I put it in a safe place. Someplace only the major and I know about."

He regarded me a moment, then said, "Who are you?"

"You know who I am."

He repeated his question with his pistol pointed between my eyes, this time adding, "You won't hear me ask again."

"Major Tran's partner. She and I are investigating the death of Clifford Daniels."

"Ah… well, then I am confused. I was informed that my old friend took his own life. So, Colonel…" He apparently had a politician's vanity about glasses, without the politician's gift for name recall, because he had to lean forward and study my nametag. "Colonel Drummond… suicide or murder? Which was it?"

"You don't know me?"

"Why? Have we met before?"

He did look clueless, as if he was totally unfamiliar with my name. But if somebody in Washington had informed him about Bian Tran, surely they had also informed him about me. I found it curious that he felt a need to play games; he had the gun, after all. But, since he was being selective, I decided to be selective, too, and instead addressed his first question. "Cliff's death looked like suicide. Certainly, he had ample motive-a nasty divorce, a disappointing life, and as you know, an order to appear before a congressional investigating committee. He was already professionally ruined; next stop was public disgrace."

"So then… it was suicide?"

"It was murder. A hired female assassin. It was staged to replicate suicide, and you know what? But for a few sloppy mistakes and contradictions, that might've been our ruling."

I quickly recounted those mistakes, and he listened, but it looked like his mind was on other matters, and he did not seem all that focused or bothered. I concluded, "Were she my employee, I'd cancel her Christmas bonus."

Charabi's expression had now turned to suspicion. He studied me a moment and asked, "Are you wired?" He did not wait for an answer. "Stand up. Remove your shirt."

I did not stand. I had had enough. A murderer, a betrayer, a kidnapper-no way was I going to indulge this man by stripping.

"Your shirt-now," he barked, and once again directed the pistol at my groin. His hand was shaking and his trigger knuckle was white.

Well, why not? I unbuttoned and threw my Army blouse on the floor. I stood and pulled my trousers down to my ankles and did a slow pirouette so he could see I was not wired. He said, "The T-shirt, also," and I pulled it off as well. He informed me, "There is a wonderful Kurdish saying that predates modern electronics. A naked man tells no lies."

"If you think my underpants are coming off, shoot me now."

He laughed, then said, "You can put them back on," and I took a moment and redressed.

Everybody watches cop shows these days, and they presume you can visually detect a listening device, though frankly that perception has long been outmoded by the miracle of miniaturization. My Bureau friends, I knew from personal experience, actually have a bug in a suppository, which gives a whole new meaning to the phrase "talking out your ass." But, to be blunt, yours truly is not that dedicated. Had I been wired, though, Tirey's people would already have busted down the door, I would be pointing the pistol at his head, and he would be answering my questions. On second thought, a suppository up your ass is not that bad.

Anyway, while I buttoned my blouse, I sat and considered my options and he toyed with his Glock and appeared to consider his. Letting me go seemed out of the question, but shooting me and claiming self-defense clearly wasn't off the table. I had something he wanted- information-and he had something I wanted-the gun. I saw no way that we could meet each other halfway; I don't think he did either.

He eventually said, "Listen to me. I did not kill Cliff-he was my friend-nor did I have him killed." He leaned closer and added, "Nor have I kidnapped this major you keep talking about."

Involuntary sounds sometimes escape from my throat, and I heard somebody say, "Bullshit."

This annoyed him and he reminded me, "I have a gun and you do not. A man in my position has no need to lie."

"You know what? You're right. Boy, I'm glad we've cleared the air, and… well… I'm sure you're very busy." I stood and got about two steps toward the door.

"Sit! Or I shoot."

"A bullet in my back won't help your self-defense claim," I informed him. I did not like the tone in his voice, and I did stop walking.

"The real issue, Colonel, is what a hole in the back of your head will do for your health."

Good point. I turned around and sat. He waved his pistol. "I do not think the Army sent you here. Who do you work for?"

I decided to tell him the truth. "The CIA." I think he had already put this together, though, because he did not appear surprised or shocked. I told him, "So, this is great. I know you work for Iran, and now you know who I work for." I smiled at him. "Naked men tell no lies, right?"

He asked, "But you are in the Army also? This uniform is real?"

"Yes."

He waved his weapon at my shoulder and said, "You have a combat patch. This means you have been in battle, yes?"

I nodded.

"Have you killed for your country?"

I did not respond.

"How many have you killed?"

"I didn't count."

"This means you lost count. Am I correct?"

I didn't like his questions and said, "What's your point?"

"Do you consider yourself a patriot?"

"I'm a soldier."

"And you have killed for your country-for your people." He looked at me thoughtfully, and asked, "Do you know how many Shiites Saddam Hussein murdered?"

"A lot."

"Is a million a lot? How about two million?" he asked in a mocking tone. "Murdered, Colonel-poison gas, bullets in the back of the head, torture, rape, starvation. Men, women, children, the aged-nobody was given mercy. And I do not even include in this number the four hundred thousand Shia who were forced to fight and die in Saddam's idiotic wars with Iran and America."

"I read the newspapers."

"When so many Jews died at the hands of Nazis, the whole world condemned this. It even was given a name-the Holocaust-as if mass extermination pertains only to Jews. Why does the mass murder of my people not have a name?"

"The murder of your people was a tragedy. And you know we did our best to end it, with food and medical programs, and no-fly zones over southern Iraq to keep Saddam from using his aircraft to slaughter Shiites."

"Your best? I think not. Did the murders ever stop? You knew they did not. In the most merciful years, it was only tens of thousands."

"It was not our fight."

He had made his point, he knew it, and he returned to his smaller point, saying, "So you have killed for your country. Would you also lie for your country? Surely a liar has less need for shame than a killer."

"Killing in defense of your country is no sin."

He relaxed back into his chair and gave me a little smile, or a nasty smirk-his lips were fat and it was hard to tell. He said, "Neither, I think, is lying to save your own people a sin. Taqiyya… are you familiar with this Arab word? This concept?"

"In fact, I think I ordered some yesterday. Means burnt goat meat, right?"

He ignored my sarcasm and explained, "It is a Shia concept. It sanctions lying in defense of our poor, persecuted faith. If I perhaps passed on some untruths to your government, if, before this war, I perhaps exaggerated a few claims, I have no qualms or regret for this."

"When you lie at the behest of your Iranian bosses, and to further your own rise to power, that doesn't make you noble, Mr. Charabi. It makes you a liar and a cheat."

A surprised pout creased his face. "My bosses? Surely, you do not believe I work for Iran?"

I looked at him a long time, then told him a few things he already knew. "You've met with Iranian intelligence, you passed vital intelligence to Iran, and I have no doubt that if we dig deep enough, we'll find you're also implicated in shipping Iranian weapons and agents into Iraq." I told him, "If we dig deeper still, I suspect we'll also find that you were talking to the Iranians long before the war."

"Look all you want."

"Thanks for your permission."

"In fact," he said, smiling, "I will save you some trouble. Yes, you are right." He stopped smiling. "Well, you are partly right. I have been talking to… certain friends in Iran. And yes, since long before your invasion. And yes, now I am helping them expand their influence among my Shia people inside Iraq. And do you know why?"

"Because you would pimp your own mother for a throne?"

He chose not to respond to this.

So I took another stab. "Because they want their hands around the nuts of whoever's running Iraq, and you've volunteered your balls?" I looked him in the eye and asked, "Yes? No? Am I warm?"

He knew I was trying to piss him off, and his eyes narrowed. He was shrewd, though, and to piss me off, he did not rise to the bait. He gave me a cool gaze and answered himself. He said, "Because it helps me… and it helps my people. And because those who I now find myself vying with for leadership of the Iraqi Shia, and for leadership of Iraq-the clerics Sistani, Sadr, and others-they have their own long relationships with the Iranians."

He paused and looked at me.

He said, "Like your government in Washington, Tehran also has many views, many factions. Not everybody there is happy with Sistani, or with Sadr. So I give this gift of great intelligence significance to certain friends in Iran's government, they pass this along to the appropriate people, and now-wallah!" — his chubby hands flew through the air and he performed a silly pantomime of pulling a rabbit out of a hat-"Mahmoud Charabi has his own very powerful supporters in Tehran-and here, in Iraq."

Amazing. Basically, he had found Iranian doppelgangers of Cliff Daniels, and just as he had exploited Daniels, he now was using these "friends" to make deeper inroads inside Iran's government. Then again, maybe it wasn't so amazing. Every con man has his favorite swindle and the conviction that what works once, can work again and again. I should tell his new Iranian friends how well it had worked out for Cliff.

In that light, I said, "When you play so many sides against the middle, sometimes you forget where the middle is."

He interpreted this literally and replied, "Washington is seven thousand miles away. Iran is next door." He got a sort of thin smile on his lips and added, "In the long run it will make no considerable difference. Do you know why?"

"I have the feeling you're going to tell me why."

"Because it is entirely irrelevant. Frankly, the Iranians have as little control over me as you, as America. I am Iraqi, Colonel. I do not even like the Iranians."

"That's not a good enough why, Charabi. Tell me more."

"Because what I have is fear of the Sunnis who, you might have noticed, receive considerable support from our Sunni neighbors. These people, they are savages. Murderers. For decades, they have slaughtered and crushed my people, the Shia, while they lived regally off the oil wealth that rightfully belonged to all of us. If saving my people means partnership with the Iranians… What was that priceless phrase of Churchill's? That one about Stalin? The one about sleeping with the devil…?"

"I think, Mr. Charabi, it was we who slept with the devil. And you should worry deeply about what happens when America learns about your betrayal, about what an asshole you are. We've lost many lives and spent a fortune trying to liberate your country."

"Betrayal? Ah, I think not, Colonel. I merely passed along a gift. The selection of this gift was not mine, was it? You have read these messages. You know this choice was Cliff's." Shaking his head at me, he added, "Your problem, I think, is not with Mahmoud Charabi… it is with Cliff, who, after all, is now well beyond your reach."

This apparently jogged his mind, because after a moment he complained, "Americans are too impatient. They do not like long wars and struggles. You have this maddening obsession for instant gratification."

He thoughtfully played with his lower lip, then added, "If your army departs prematurely, my people will be slaughtered. So what was for us a big dilemma, by bringing in my Iranian friends, I have now helped turn into your big problem. Now you dare not leave for fear that the Iranians will fill the vacuum, and you will have fought this war only to turn Iraq over to them. Yet if you do leave, Iran will rush in, and my Iranian friends will save us. So, Mr. Drummond, your people face a strategic checkmate, and the Shia, my people-Allah be praised-win either way. Either the Americans or the Iranians, or both of you, will save us. It is a nice position for us, don't you think?"

What I thought, as I looked at this man, was that he was about ten steps ahead of anybody in Washington. He was right, we are a nation addicted to instant gratification-instant food, instant sex, instant victories. Also, we never think deeper than tomorrow. Here, he had not only helped lure us into Iraq, he had already devised a trap play to keep us there. It was amazing, I thought-and very troubling.

I changed subjects and asked, "What was Clifford Daniels to you?"

"A friend when I needed a friend."

"I find it interesting that you would describe him that way. And I'll bet he would find it interesting. Because now you're here, and he's in the morgue."

And it was interesting. I could call this man a liar, a schemer, a thief, a murderer, and a traitor-but accusing him of bad friendship really got under his bonnet. He flew into a long and indignant harangue regarding his "most dearest friend," admitting that Cliff was, yes, an ordinary human being with warts and blemishes-with an excessive professional appetite, perhaps, and yes, that off-putting self-importance some people found obnoxious-but also he was noble and dedicated, a flawed saint, and so forth. Arabs have a real flair for flowery bullshit, and by the time he anointed Daniels the Lafayette of Iraq, I was ready to blow lunch.

When my host has a gun, however, I tend to listen patiently and behave. For some reason, Charabi felt a need to expiate about Daniels, so I nodded agreeably as he spoke. I actually let him finish before I said, "Cliff Daniels was an idiot. When that became clear-even to himself-he went to pieces. A blowhard, a drunk, a womanizer, a man who went psychotic over his career."

"No, he was-"

"He was a small, weak man with unhealthy appetites. A man with elephantine ambitions and pygmy talents on a pathetic quest for power and fame. Unfortunately for him, he chose the wrong meal ticket-you."

"I did not say Cliff was perfect."

"No, you didn't. From the moment you met, you recognized exactly how stupid, how vain, and how vulnerable he was. You exploited those ambitions and vanities. By persuading him to support you and your lies about Iraq, you made a fool out of him, and later, as his world began imploding, you exploited his despondency and made a traitor out of him. With a friend like you, a man has more enemies than he can handle."

"Well…" he replied, suddenly uncomfortable. Then he found the bright side, and confessed, "It is a big relief for me to learn this was not suicide, but murder. I was feeling… a little guilt."

"You're not off the hook. His murder was the direct consequence of your relationship."

"But I did not kill him." This topic obviously bothered him, and he had the gun, so he changed it and asked, "Tell me about this major. Why do you believe I kidnapped her?"

He had rested his Glock about two feet away on the desktop, I noticed. About twelve feet from me, and I began inching my chair in short, noiseless scoots across the carpet.

Actually, I was somewhat surprised that Mr. Charabi was revealing so much of his thinking to me. Of course, this did not mean he trusted me or enjoyed my company-this meant I was dead.

Instead of answering his question, I asked him, "Did Cliff ever tell you how he learned we broke Iran's code?"

"Why do you ask?"

"It was a tightly controlled CIA program. He wasn't supposed to know about it. It's… well… something of an embarrassment."

He laughed.

"To be truthful, a friend of mine has his ass in a sling over it," I told him with a wink. "I owe him a favor."

"You're saying your agency still does not understand how this occurred?"

Another short scoot. "Why are you surprised? These are the same people who never noticed Aldrich Ames's shiny new green Jaguar sedan in the Langley parking lot."

He seemed to relish this analogy, as well as the irony that Cliff- and by extension, he as well-had picked the Agency's pocket. If I had to guess, he still harbored a grudge that the CIA had rejected his early overtures for a partnership, and later, that Agency people trashed his reputation around Washington and in the press. He obviously had a big ego; now he was being petty. He said, "Why don't I give you a hint? The CIA courier for this cell was a woman."

"Oh… and-"

He nodded. "And… yes. She was not especially attractive, but as Cliff liked to say, all ladies look the same in the dark." He shrugged. "Theirs was a most brief affair." He smiled and added, "I was given the impression from Cliff that her pillow talk was more intriguing to him than the lady herself."

I took a moment and considered this. The prewar intelligence circle of Iraqi experts in Washington was small, so it was not surprising that Cliff and this courier, whoever she was, were acquainted. And I recalled again what his ex-wife said about Cliff: If it couldn't outrun him, he laid wood on it. So in the end, this lady was both literally and figuratively screwed by Cliff. But that left a big open question: Why did she tell Cliff about the program?

But maybe it wasn't all that hard to figure out. It could have been as innocuous as her justifying her frequent absences to Baghdad, or as mundane as her bragging to her lover about her important work, or she mumbled in her sleep, or she sloppily dropped enough clues that Cliff put it together on his own.

Any or all of these explained how the leak occurred. They did not, however, answer how this courier got past her polygraph sessions. Because, if I believed Phyllis, anybody and everybody involved in this fiasco had been lie-tested so many times that the Agency would know the names of everybody this lady played doctor with in kindergarten, and everybody who hid the pickle in her thereafter. Money, sex, and drugs/booze-these sins are the source of most betrayals, and also these are the things Agency inquisitors show great interest in and never fail to ask about.

Well, also, there are ego, ambition, and power-consider Cliff Daniels and Don, aka Lebrowski-but if those were disqualifying evils, the only people left in D.C. would be janitors. Maybe.

Charabi broke into my thoughts and insisted, "I have answered your question. You will now answer mine."

"Okay. The major and I were investigating everything about Cliff Daniels, including his bosses, and including you. Plus we have Cliff's computer, and that's known inside the Pentagon. So Tigerman or Hirschfield contacted you and told you to find out what Major Tran and I know, and maybe to stop us. Damage control. Right?"

He laughed; I scooted another few inches forward. He seemed amused by my logic, and he leaned back in his chair and said, "No, this is not right. This is very stupid. Tigerman and Hirschfield stopped talking to me months ago. I am a pariah in Washington." He laughed again.

"All right. If you didn't kidnap the major, who did?"

"I believe that is your problem, Colonel."

"Is it? Then why did she write your name in her blood?" Another short scoot.

"I really have no idea," he replied, and we stared at each other a moment.

I knew this man was a liar and a cheat, and I shouldn't believe a word that came from his fat lips. Not his denial about murdering Cliff Daniels, or about kidnapping Bian, but I did. That left open the issues of who did kill Cliff and who took Bian, but as he said, that was not his problem; it was mine.

I mean, he had already confessed he was a liar, that he had betrayed his pals in Washington, and that he was willfully consorting with Iran, our presumptive enemy. On second thought, confession was the wrong word; he was bragging. He was enjoying himself, looking an American officer in the eye and boasting openly and freely about how smart he was, and how deeply and easily he screwed the big, powerful USA, and his enemies in the CIA.

And why not? He thought he was talking to a dead man. Which reminded me, and I took another short scoot closer to his desk, and to his gun. But he quickly picked up the pistol and asked in a coldly reasonable tone, "Do you really think I am so stupid I haven't noticed you doing that? Back away."

Whoops. I backed away.

But it seemed our conversation was drawing to a close, because he sort of summarized our situation, saying, "So, you and I, we seem to be at a crossroad. I do not have this major you want, and you have this computer that is very troubling to me."

"And you have the gun."

"Yes, that also." He leaned toward me and asked, "If I asked you where this computer is, can I trust you to tell me the truth?"

"Can I trust you not to shoot me afterward?"

I saw that his finger was back inside the trigger guard. He was too preoccupied with his own thinking to answer my question-actually, I knew the answer-and he leaned farther forward and began sharing his own thoughts. He said, "Of course, only you and this missing major know where Cliff's computer is located. Now she has been kidnapped, and of course, this is Iraq-forgive me if this sounds cruel- she is as good as dead." He paused very briefly and then said, "So… if you are dead, too, nobody will find this computer."

I was afraid he would put that together. Looking like a man who was happy with his own reasoning, he aimed the pistol at my chest, and his finger began to squeeze.

I quickly said, "Well… maybe I wasn't completely forthcoming about the computer."

The pistol didn't go down, but neither did it go off.

I told him, "When I said I have the computer, I meant the Agency has the computer."

"So you lied. It is not… hidden?"

"That depends on your definition of hidden." Actually, it was hidden from me; that's a pretty good definition.

He asked, "And what is your definition?"

"It's in the possession of my boss, who works directly for the Director. Only three or four people have read the messages, or know about them, including the Director."

I was telling the truth, of course, but he looked a little surprised, and also a lot dubious. He asked, "If you lied to me once, why should I believe you now?" Then he answered his own question and said, "I think I will just kill you and take my chances."

"I thought you were smarter than that. You know, for instance, that your e-mails were professionally encoded. Do you really believe a couple of Army officers broke that code? It was a real ballbuster." I tried to remember some of John's technogibberish, and sort of mumbled, "VPN, and ISP protocols… firewalls layered upon firewalls…"

While he mulled this over, I said, "Kill me, and the deal will be off."

"You have never mentioned a deal."

"Well… the idea was that you and I would have a confidential discussion. This whole thing would be kept under wraps, and nobody would be the wiser."

He stared at me very intently with his finger caressing the trigger.

I said, "Why do you think you and I are in here alone? Why did I lock your door? Talk with the agents searching your office-they've been told they're investigating a kidnapping, period. So I go out, tell them you're free and clear, we go away, and you resume your rise to power."

"And why would the CIA consider this a good outcome?"

"We regard it as a terrible outcome."

"Then-"

"You outsmarted us, Mr. Charabi. We recognize reality."

I could see that it made him happy to hear this, and he asked, "And what is this… reality?"

"Discretion is best for you, best for us, and best for Iraq." I told him the truth, saying, "The Agency and this administration have taken more than enough black eyes over Iraq. The last thing Washington wants is another public scandal. This scandal in particular." I added, after a beat, "Unless you kill me."

"And then?"

"Good question. Because then… well…" Because then, well, what? Well, then Sean Drummond would be dead, and who cares what happened afterward? I didn't say that, of course. As persuasively as I could, I said, "Because the CIA does not like it when you kill one of its own. Right now, it's professional. You don't want to make it personal."

He needed a moment to reconsider the situation in light of this new variable. Mahmoud Charabi was indeed sly, and also, I thought, a more complex individual than I had been led to believe. As Don- aka Martin Lebrowski-had described, the man was an inveterate schemer, and a brutal and habitual manipulator of truth and people, as well as nations. But what Don missed-what you would expect an egocentric, careerist prick like Don to miss-was that Charabi could self-justify these behaviors as necessary means to a good end, a moral end, a righteous purpose.

I thought, too, that Charabi truly believed he was the anointed savior of his people, just as he now genuinely believed that he, and he alone, could lead them to the Promised Land. He wasn't the first man to mix selfless impulses with his own greed for fame and power, and he wouldn't be the last. And depending on how things worked out, Mahmoud Charabi would have a place in his country's history books, either as a cherished hero or as a miserable flop who overreached and delivered only more death and misery to a land that already had suffered more than enough of both.

He asked for a war, and he had gotten his wish; I was sure, though, that this wasn't the war he anticipated-or wanted. I looked at his face as he contemplated what to do with me, and it struck me that, like America, he had assumed that the war would be swift, the victory complete, and with the Pentagon's backing, he would already be on the throne. As they say, man plans, and God laughs. Now he was jukin' and jivin', caught up in a civil war partly of his making, playing one side off the other, dividing powerful governments against each other, dancing on powerful cracks, and praying the tectonic plates did not shift and squash him in the middle.

This squat, unimpressive-looking man had grabbed a hungry wolf by the ears. And I was sure I did not need to explain to him what would happen if the wolf got loose.

No, I could not really condemn Mahmoud Charabi for his deceptions, his lies, and his plots; but I could and I did blame those in Washington who wrapped his lies into a nation's justification for war, and in so doing, allowed his machinations to become ours.

I looked up and saw that the pistol still was pointed at me. I could almost hear his thoughts-kill me, or not? I was sure Charabi could, and without remorse, if he believed that was best for his people-and best for himself. Just as I would snap his neck if I could only get close enough. He eventually asked, "How do I know I can trust you?"

If he was smart, he wouldn't. But I decided to appeal to his kind of logic. "Because we all have dirt we want kept under the rug. Because this administration trusted you, it used your lies to justify this war, and it flew you over here to become the next prime minister. And because now it turns out you played them like gullible idiots, you were and you are working with Iran, and you betrayed us. In the midst of an election, this administration would be destroyed if the public became fully aware of what utter fools they've been. Our coalition partners might take a walk, and American public support for this war might evaporate." I told him, "We would lose, and you would lose."

"Ah, but I have already prepared for this."

It was my turn to smile, and I said, "Were I you, I wouldn't be so smug."

"What does this mean?"

"Perhaps your Iranian friends might step up and save the day, or maybe a raging conflict in Iraq is more than they want to bite off, and they'll take a pass. Then there will be a bloody civil war, and possibly a Sunni victory and another Saddam, in which case I wouldn't want to be you." It was time to force the issue and I stood up and said, "Make your choice."

This made sense to him; it should, because it was true.

The pistol came down and he said, "Tell your CIA bosses I have embarrassing secrets about them also. We can burn each other's houses down."

"I understand," I assured him. "And they understand."

I got up and took a few steps toward the door, and he said somewhat weirdly, "You know, Cliff really was my dear friend. I liked him."

I turned around. We stared at each other a really long time, then I said, "What you like, Mr. Charabi, you seem to destroy. You killed Cliff as surely as if you had pulled the trigger yourself. And your scheming, lying, and manipulations have done the same thing for your people. They are still being slaughtered by Sunnis, and you are not the man to save them. That said, I truly do wish you good luck."

I walked out and closed his office door quietly behind me. I approached Jim Tirey and informed him that this was a bust, that Charabi was not in any way implicated in Bian's kidnapping, or in the murder of Clifford Daniels, and it was time to clear out. He gave me a look that combined surprise and confusion with annoyance and said, "You told me it was conclusive."

"I was wrong."

"Wrong…?"

"He had nothing to do with Bian, or with Daniels's murder. Sorry."

"You're… sorry?" He asked, "And just how do you know this?"

"Because he had a gun, the perfect legal justification to kill me, and I'm alive."

He stared at me for a long time. Eventually, he called his agents into a knot and informed them, "We had bad information. Time to get out of here-now."

He opened the door and we began quickly filing out.

To our common surprise, however, awaiting us in the hallway was an attractive blonde female reporter with a man beside her holding a reflective light, and a second man hefting a camera on his shoulder.

The reporter was staring at me, though I was sure we'd never met. But in her eyes I was sure I saw recognition, which was odd. Jim Tirey also caught her look, and he stared at me a moment inquisitively.

Then the light flashed on and the lovely female reporter completely ignored me and stepped forward, directly in the path of Jim Tirey. She stuffed her mike into his face and said, "Inside sources tell us that Mahmoud Charabi is under suspicion of passing vital secrets to the Iranians. Specifically, that we had broken their intelligence code. Could you comment on what your search turned up?"

Tirey looked at me, and we shared an unspoken thought. He then did something unfortunate and shared that thinking. "Oh… shit."

So in the interest of getting a more family-friendly comment, the reporter and Tirey tried again, and in true Bureau form, he told her, "No comment."

He shoved the mike out of his face and began walking as fast as his feet could carry him down the hallway and out of the building.

We all walked behind him. The reporter, true to her profession- i.e., a big pain in the ass-jogged along beside us and persisted in peppering us with relevant questions like, "Is Charabi under arrest?… Did you find a smoking gun?… Who ordered this search?"

Nobody commented. We all looked like idiots.