The Cairo Affair

3

She lay on her bed in room 306 and stared at the ceiling, troubled by the fact that she was still unsure. She had her plane ticket, yet she kept asking herself questions. Was she really done here? Or was she going to try to find Jibril Aziz? What would she do once she found him? What answers did she expect from him? And if he gave her the same answer this Egyptian had given her—that the American government had killed Emmett—then what would she do with it? Would she call The New York Times and start shouting down the line?

She wasn’t sure she trusted Omar Halawi. He had an air of madness about him, the kind that changes the faces of zealots and bigots. He was building his world on a foundation that was subtly different than her own, and therefore whatever he said was just beyond her own way of looking at things. It was a cultural difference, perhaps, but it also made him sound like a loony to her.

What if she did call The New York Times—what then? She tried to imagine the reaction of the American government, of the CIA. How long would it take for them to discredit her? How hard would it be for them to connect the dots and discover that, for over a year, she had been an agent of a foreign power? And how would she defend herself—with the story of Yugoslavia in 1991? That was no defense.

The real question, she suspected, wasn’t what she would be able to accomplish, but what was right—and in this situation what did right mean?

Even though she knew better, she wished that Stan were beside her in bed. He might give her lies, but at least his mouth would distract her from her confusion for a little while.

There was a tap at her door. At first, wrapped in her thoughts, she didn’t hear it, but then it came again, louder, and she sat up. It was after ten. She considered not answering, but then a voice said, “Sophie Kohl? My name is Michael Khalil. I used to work with your husband. May I have a word?”

She got up, went to the door, and touched the handle before hesitating. She used the spy hole and saw a man holding up a photo ID that said on one side, in blue letters, “FBI.” On the right was a photo and “Michael Khalil.”

“I’m FBI,” he said unnecessarily.

She started to open the door, then remembered Andras Kiraly. The old Hungarian had asked about Michael Khalil, who claimed to be FBI. We have our doubts. Khalil had spoken to Emmett about Stumbler on the day that … on that day. “What do you want?” she asked, a sudden, deep fear tightening the muscles in her back.

Through the spy hole, he lowered the ID so she could see his face. A swarthy man, tall and thin, with a smile. Handsome, even. He looked Egyptian, but his voice was flat midwestern. “Sorry for the hour. I wondered if I might have a word.”

“You couldn’t have called first?”

Irritation sharpened his features. “Well, I’m coming here unofficially. And I’d appreciate it if you kept this conversation to yourself.”

“We’re not having a conversation yet.”

“I hope you’ll decide to talk to me.”

“Why should I?”

He frowned, glancing up the corridor again, as if expecting—or fearing—someone. “I’m here because I don’t want you to get killed.”

It wasn’t the answer she had expected, nor was it the answer she had desired. “Why do you think I’m in danger of getting killed?”

“May I come in?”

She stepped back, thought a moment, then secured the door latch up beside her head. She opened the door until the latch caught, leaving five inches through which Michael Khalil could see a slice of her. “You stay there.”

Again, irritation. A tongue rummaged in his cheeks.

“Now tell me why you think I’m in danger of getting killed.”

Another glance down the hall, and he lowered his voice to a high whisper. “Do I have to say it aloud?”

“I think you do, Mr. Khalil.”

He tugged at the lapels of his jacket, straightening it. “You know by now who murdered your husband?”

“Why don’t you tell me?”

“CIA.” He paused. “Is this a surprise?”

“It doesn’t matter how many times I hear it—it’ll always be a surprise.”

“Emmett was preparing to betray the Agency. He’d learned about an operation in Libya, and he was going to expose it. He told one colleague—direct quote—that he would find a whistle and blow it. Emmett didn’t mince his words.”

She leaned back a little, thinking of how good Emmett was, and how little she’d really known him. “Stumbler,” she said, then shook her head. “But Emmett didn’t believe that. Jibril Aziz believed it, but he didn’t. He wasn’t going to blow any whistle.”

“Did Mr. Halawi tell you this?” he asked.

“How do you know about him?”

A half-shrug. “I just know him. He’s a good man, but that doesn’t make his word gospel. Consider your husband’s position—he’s got a young man, a man with a family, preparing to rush into Libya and get himself killed. What would a good man do? Let calmer minds prevail. Lie to Jibril, get him to go home to his wife, and then go about it the diplomatic way—memos to people who matter.”

“Wait,” she said, and he did just that, his face relaxing as he stared at her through the gap, waiting. She took a moment to think this through. She said, “Emmett’s the one who wanted to write memos, not me. I still don’t understand why I’m in danger.”

Again, he looked back down the corridor. “Well, you didn’t follow the script, did you?” he said as if to a child, full of patience for the nonprofessionals of the world. “You didn’t bow down like a grief-stricken widow and go home. You’ve come to Cairo and started digging. You’ve gone to Stanley Bertolli, an officer of the Agency, for help. Why don’t you figure out how long it took for the Agency to find out exactly where you were and what you were up to?”

“Stan didn’t tell anyone,” she said quickly.

“Do you really believe that?” He gave her a moment to come up with an answer, then said, “Listen, I’m not saying Stan Bertolli isn’t decent, but he’s first and foremost an Agency man. He may not even know what’s going on, but he’s certainly going to follow procedure. It’s in his DNA. His father was CIA, too, you know.”

She didn’t know—he’d never talked about his family, which probably should have told her something. She stared into a space just to his left, a bit of wallpaper, wondering if she could believe this stranger. Stan had been so worried about discovery—and this man, who was he? Kiraly thought he wasn’t who he claimed to be, but maybe the Hungarian was wrong. Weren’t they all liars? “Did you talk to Emmett about this?”

“I didn’t have a chance.”

“You never talked to Emmett?”

He hesitated. “Your husband was dead before I could talk to him.”

Who was lying? Why would Kiraly make it up? “And who are you?”

“I told you, I’m Bureau. We cooperate with our friends in the Agency, but we are quite separate.”

“No,” she said, shaking her head. “I mean, who are you? What’s your stake in this?”

He blinked at her, as if stunned by her question. “Well, a man was murdered, Sophie. One of our people. And it turns out that another section of our government is responsible. It’s sort of my job to be worried about this kind of thing.”

She straightened now, feeling the anger bubble up inside her but trying to keep it under control. She was sick of people being vague and handing her outright lies. “Connect the dots for me,” she told Michael Khalil. “Show me how this puts my life in danger.”

“Connect the dots?” he said, opening his hands. Impatient again. “Okay, Sophie. It’s this way. Your husband wanted to blow the whistle on Stumbler. If he’d done that, it would have been a major embarrassment for the Agency. A disaster. So they got rid of him. His wife—you, Sophie—has not disappeared like she’s supposed to. She’s slipped her handlers and run off to Cairo, presumably to uncover who killed her husband. Do you really think the Agency’s going to sit around and wait for you to connect them to that Albanian thug?”

“Where is the connection?”

He opened his mouth, then closed it.

“Go ahead, then. If you’ve got all the damned answers, then hand them over.”

Michael Khalil leaned forward, face close to the crack in the door, and she could smell garlic on his breath. His eyes were big and veined. “Someone like Gjergj Ahmeti, he’s a ghost. You won’t find his name in any records. He’s hired for specific jobs, paid in cash, then sent on his way. So you won’t find a paper trail—the best you can do is find a person who knows what the Agency is up to. The best you can do is track down Jibril Aziz.”

“And how, pray tell, am I going to do that?”

“Let me in, and we’ll discuss it.”

“No,” she said.

“You’re being childish. You saw my badge. I just want to come to an arrangement, Sophie.”

There was noise up the corridor, and he glanced back. She soon saw what he saw—a laughing couple, maybe a little drunk. Germans muttering in slurred accents to one another, his hand on her ass. They paused in their revelry to eyeball Khalil and the slice of Sophie they could see. They passed, but before he could speak again three men arrived in the corridor—Germans, again—singing “Hände zum Himmel.” Khalil, clearly frustrated, turned back to her and whispered, “Let’s meet in the morning. Okay? You’re nervous—I understand that. So I’ll meet you for breakfast downstairs. Agreed?”

She nodded.

“What time?”

She thought, At nine thirty I get on a plane and leave all of this behind. “Ten o’clock,” she said, smiling the way Zora had taught her to do when she was lying. “I’m sleeping late tomorrow.”

He hesitated again, brow furrowing, then nodded sharply. “I’ll be waiting.”