The Last Patriot

CHAPTER 68

It was several hours later when Ozbek took a break from the reams of Arabic documents he was studying from the mysterious flash drive and came into the kitchen.

“How’s it going?” asked Harvath. He was sitting at the kitchen table going over some information Nichols had brought in for him to look at. He filled him in that Lawlor had finally smoothed things over at the academy and was on his way back. He had taken a statement from the messenger, but it didn’t look like the man was going to provide any information that could be useful.

Ozbek pulled a beer out of the fridge, and Harvath signaled that he’d take one as well. He knew that having one of the operatives under Ozbek’s command killed and another put in the hospital with a very bad gunshot wound had been extremely hard on him. Green Berets were tough, but they were also human and cared deeply about the people they fought and served alongside.

“Khalifa was definitely on to something,” said Ozbek, referring to the documents that had been printed from the flash drive as he joined Harvath at the table. “The problem is that the information is incomplete. He talks about certain pieces of manuscript, but there’s no backup for it, no source.”

“Are you surprised?” said Harvath as he took a sip.

“Not really. It’s just enough information to whet your thirst, but nowhere near enough to quench it.”

“A hearty fuck-you from Mr. Dodd and his Islamist friends.”

Ozbek nodded and took a pull from his beer. “Considering the Italian State Archives all but burned to the ground, Khalifa’s copies of the Sana’a find are probably all that’s left. So if Dodd does have Khalifa’s computer, we can forget about any of it ever seeing the light of day.”

“Which makes the professor’s work even more important.”

“You know,” said Ozbek as he leaned back in his chair and stretched his legs, “this whole Jefferson story is amazing. If it’s true, Khalifa’s work really wouldn’t have mattered anyway. I mean it would have been a nice complement, but an actual missing revelation from the Koran that Mohammed’s closest confidants assassinated him over will be earthshaking in and of itself.”

Harvath agreed. “If it’s handled properly, it could tank the fundamentalists and propel the moderates into true control over their religion. The war on terror could be all but won.”

Ozbek nodded knowingly and took a sip of his beer. “Despite how confusing and contradictory I find that religion, I’ve worked with lots of good Muslim people. Frankly, I don’t think it can ever hack off the Islamist cancer without a huge bombshell being detonated from within. I really hope Professor Nichols finds what he’s looking for.”

“Speaking of which,” replied Harvath as he picked up several of the pages Nichols had decoded and given him to study, “I think he’s getting very close. Have you ever heard of a Muslim inventor named al-Jazari?”