The Cairo Affair

3

He was impatient, but impatience would not serve him well. This had to be done right, or not at all.

When he brought Sophie Kohl home, he was reminded again of Jibril. He was too soft, he realized. Caring for strays was becoming his fate.

Fouada had never learned English, but she knew how to take care of someone without words. He told her, “She’s been through a lot. She may become angry. If you like, I’ll ask someone to stay here with you. Mahmoud could come.”

Fouada waved that away. “This is about the bastard?”

“I believe it is.”

“Then I will handle it. You do what you have to do.” She kissed him on the cheek, then offered Sayyid some tea. A look from Omar convinced him to say no.

He and Sayyid spoke in the stairwell. “Are you going to tell me what’s going on?” the young man asked.

“When it’s verified, yes. Not before. But I need your trust. Do I have it?”

“Of course.”

“We’ll need Mahmoud as well. Can you see to that?”

A nod.

“Tomorrow, though, all three of us will be in the ministry like usual, as if nothing is amiss. By the end of the day it should be settled.”

Sayyid ran his fingers through his thick hair, nodding.

“Go take a nap, and I’ll see you in the office.”

By the time he returned to the apartment, Sophie Kohl had fallen asleep on the guest bed, on top of the sheets, her clothes still on. Fouada said, “The girl is exhausted.”

“So am I.”

He was at his desk by nine, running through his mental list of items to look into. He went back into history, rechecking things he already knew, in particular Hisham Minyawi’s disaster in 2005, when the source he’d gained in the Libyan embassy was executed. Omar walked over to Hisham’s office on the opposite end of the building and knocked. Hisham was in his midforties, his thick mustache prematurely gray, with a heavy paunch and bleak eyes. He was smoking a cigarette and wrapping up a phone call when Omar arrived. He waved the older man in. “Omar,” he said, shaking his head. “Busy times, no?”

“Truly,” Omar said, closing the door and taking a seat in the smoky room. “How’s the family?”

“Very well. Fouada?”

“Excellent.” Omar leaned closer. “I wanted to ask you about Yousef Rahim, from the Libyan embassy.”

The bleakness in Hisham’s eyes deepened. “Any reason you’re revisiting my failures, Omar? That was six years ago.”

Omar shook his head. “Don’t misunderstand. I’m looking into other things, and wondering if this connects.”

Hisham seemed to relax, just a little. Being reminded of that black spot on his record still made him sore. “What’s to tell? It was an easy trick. Yousef was a queer. He’d been visiting boys over in Heliopolis, some dank little underground club. I offered him silence, as well as some compensation.”

“So what happened?”

He lit another cigarette, frowning as he remembered the news of the quick execution in Tripoli. “I don’t know, Omar. I ran it perfectly. No one could have known we were meeting. Full security procedures.” He shrugged. “Maybe Yousef broke down and admitted it to the embassy.”

“You believe that?”

Hisham shook his head.

“Then what other possibilities are there?”

Hisham opened his mouth, thought better of it, then shook his head again. “Ask Allah. You’re the religious one, aren’t you? Or you used to be.”

Omar climbed to his feet. He had been a religious man a long time ago, but he’d lost track along the way. He’d ignored the mosque and, until recently, prayer—that most basic requirement of a Muslim had seemed beyond his means. Praying with that frightened man in Marsa Matrouh, to his surprise, had made him feel lighter. Yet as he walked back to his office even his faith slipped from his mind, for he was thinking about the words Hisham hadn’t had the courage to speak aloud. The only possible way Yousef Rahim could have been uncovered was if someone in this office had leaked to Tripoli.

He had to wait until eleven for an audience with Busiri, whose morning had been full of meetings upstairs, discussing personnel changes. The revolution was trickling slowly down through the departments of the Interior Ministry, and Busiri had received a list of names whose continued employment in the Central Security Forces would be unpalatable to any new administration. He was collecting the files on these employees when Omar tapped on his door. “Omar! You look like hell.”

He came in and settled in a chair. “Fouada’s having sleepless nights,” he said. “Which means I’m having them, too.”

“I’m sure she’s worth it,” Busiri muttered, his eyes back on the files. “Did you know we have to say good-bye to seven people right in this office?”

He passed over the list of names, and Omar read it. He knew all these people, knew the ways in which they had, over the years, abused their position. He passed it back. “Nothing unexpected there.”

“But still,” Busiri said, and turned the paper facedown on his desk, finally giving him his full attention. “What news?”

Omar cleared his throat. “I’d like to know what Rashid el-Sawy is up to.”

“Rashid? Why do you ask?”

“Because last night he met with Sophie Kohl. He tried to convince her to work with him to find Jibril Aziz.”

Busiri looked around his wide desk until he’d spotted his Camels. He lit one. “Did Rashid tell you this?”

“Mrs. Kohl did.”

He nodded, smoke wafting around his head, as if he already knew they had talked. Perhaps he did. “Any idea where she is now?”

“Isn’t she in her hotel?” Omar asked, full of innocence.

“Apparently not.”

“Then she’s with Rashid.”

Busiri shook his head.

“Why was Rashid meeting with her?”

“He’s following leads on his own. I’ll be sure to ask him. Why were you meeting with her?”

“I wanted to question her about her husband’s murder.”

“Anything interesting?”

Omar nodded slowly. “She told me she’d been staying with Stanley Bertolli. Did you know about that?”

“Of course.”

“Apparently,” he said, breathing steadily to make his lie come off more smoothly, “Mr. Bertolli believes the solution to the mystery of her husband’s death lies not with the Americans, but with someone else. The Libyans, perhaps.”

Busiri’s eyebrows rose sharply. “Libya?”

Omar nodded, palms up, as if the proposition were just as ridiculous to him. “He thinks that the exiles who disappeared were taken by the Libyans, not by the Americans. Libya gets rid of the exiles, and Stumbler dies before it can start. The question is: How did the Libyans find out about Stumbler in the first place? This is the question Emmett Kohl wondered about. If Bertolli can figure that out, then he’ll be able to find Kohl’s murderer.”

There was only a moment’s pause before Busiri recovered. “But we know, don’t we? Zora Balašević’s ethical sense was about as lasting as Hosni’s portraits are now. She sold to us. She sold to Libya.”

It was an answer he had expected, for he’d gone through the various permutations of this conversation all night long. It was the only explanation he could have offered.

“Maybe I should get in touch with Paul Johnson, then,” Omar suggested. “I could tell him to pass that on to Bertolli.”

Busiri waved the proposition away. “I’m meeting with Bertolli this afternoon. I’ll tell him myself.”

“You’re meeting him?”

“He requested it.”

Omar nodded.

“Anything else?”

Omar shook his head and climbed to his feet. He took another walk down the corridor, and in the break room found Sayyid and Mahmoud talking on the sofa, a small television playing Al Jazeera. He nodded at the two men, then turned up the volume until it blared the gunfire of Libyan rebels into that small room. He sat close to Mahmoud while Sayyid pretended to be watching television. “I need you to watch someone today. Do not lose him.”

Mahmoud nodded gruffly, then said, “Who?”