The First Casualty

60

From his recon the day before, Viktor had learned only a few streets had names in Timbuktu. At least not names posted at corners or on buildings like any city he had ever seen. Best he could tell, there was simply “the street where bazar is” or “the street that runs by the police station.” Things like that. If one of the narrow, meandering lanes with sand over your ankles didn’t pass some landmark, it simply had no name.

That was true of the kilometer of road that went from the police station west to the Sankore Mosque. The police station was also a puzzle. Like many third-world countries, there was no such thing as police in the sense of a civil force whose function it was to preserve order and keep the city safe from crime. These men were militia, soldiers, whose main job, Viktor guessed, was to discourage any number of rebel, separatist, or religious factions from taking over the area.

After his trip to the Sidi Yahya Mosque yesterday, he had come to this street and haggled with a street vendor whose donkey-borne wares had included flashlight batteries, rubber flip-flops made in China, strips of brightly colored cotton cloth, and plastic bottles full of murky water, the source of which was something Viktor didn’t dare speculate upon.

Viktor had been interested in none of the above but the pantomime debate had afforded him an opportunity to observe the police station. Three trucks, two Toyota pickups and a Suzuki with what looked like a .50-caliber machine gun mounted on the bed. Through glassless windows of the station itself, he could see perhaps four or five figures lounging under an overhead fan. There might be more he could not see.

No matter; it was the vehicles that had his interest. That was why he was standing in this sandy road in the predawn darkness. The police station was dark, apparently unused during the night. The important thing was that the three trucks were silhouetted against the darker night sky.

Unslinging a sack from his back, he heard voices and the squeak of footsteps in sand. Hastily picking up his bag, Viktor retreated into the darkest shadows he could find, that given by one of the five million or so trees the World Food Program had planted in and around the city in hopes of slowing the encroaching desert, now one of the few remaining trees that had not been chopped down to make charcoal as soon as the well-meaning but naive WFP representatives had left.

Viktor could hear two voices now, a series of sounds more like clicks and grunts. Certainly not French, the country’s official language. Koyra Chiini, Arabic, Bambara, or one of the dozens of dialects indigenous to the city. The only thing he knew was they were getting closer. He guessed no one other than the militia or those early for worship would be out at this hour. And the footsteps were coming from, not toward, the mosque.

A voice in unmistakable English asked, “Kremlin, you online?”

Dermo! Shit! He should have remembered to turn off the little two-way radio Jason had given them all!

The approaching voices stopped. Then resumed. The inflection was certainly a question answered by a single word. Carefully placing his feet, Viktor pressed backward until stopped by a wall. He turned the knob on the device in his pocket. He thought he had turned it off, but he sure wasn’t going to chance exposing the lighted dial if he were mistaken.

The footsteps began again, this time much slower. They — whoever “they” were — were searching for the source of the radio broadcast. Viktor was trapped. The slightest move might well give him away.

Wait a minute. What was he hiding from? He had done nothing wrong, not yet.

But what if they looked in the bag?

Why would they? In a city where merchandising was largely a curbside enterprise, a man in Bedouin attire carrying a sack would hardly be worthy of a second look. At least during daylight hours. Well, he couldn’t stay where he was and do the task he had been sent to do.

He took a step forward, then another. One hand gripped the bag, another the butt of the Glock under the Bedouin vest.

Suddenly, he was blinded by a flashlight. A voice was demanding answers to questions he could not understand. In the periphery of the light, Viktor could see uniforms. Militia. He shrugged and shook his head as his eyes rolled. In third-world countries the nonviolent mentally disabled are more often left alone than institutionalized. The problem in playing this role was that few would mistake the fair-skinned, clean-shaven Russian for a bearded, desert nomadic Bedouin.

Viktor kept the lower part of his face covered by the flowing ends of his kaffiyeh while he muttered, a man not comprehending.

Now the questions were coming harsher and in another language. Viktor’s mumbling became more agitated.

One of the two spoke, this time to his companion. The other man laughed. The light went off, and the two vanished in the direction of the police station.

Viktor stood still for a full minute, making sure they had really gone before he reached into his bag and began the task he had been assigned.