The Red Room

15

Standing in Sisli Square, Grace can understand why a person would return to this place multiple times. Worn like a cocked cap, morning sunlight the color of candle flame catches the top of the minaret. There are more pigeons than people, more cars than pigeons. The mosque’s three gray-roofed domes rise above the rectangular entrance wall, trees lurching up from within an unseen courtyard. It’s all in the middle of a bustling neighborhood awaking for the day.

She’s arrived early, having sneaked out of the apartment and snagged a cab, leaving Besim to sip his morning tea out front for the sake of anyone watching.

There is an answer here, some reason the man following her has repeatedly visited the square. She watches for it, expects it. Awaits its jumping out at her. This added depth of knowledge is exactly what Dulwich will treasure: not just the fact that she’s being surveilled, but by whom and possibly why.

Dulwich has failed to answer calls she’s made from one of several anonymous pay-as-you-call SIM chips she carries. He had warned her that she and Knox would be on their own. Nonetheless she holds out hope she’ll hear from him. She has provided him this place and time. She waits, and then spins once, slowly, holding her head scarf in place.

It reminds her of a Parisian avenue but with Turkish spices in the air and overseen by a towering minaret. Sisli was countryside in the late nineteenth century, transformed into a residential neighborhood at the end of the Ottoman Empire in the early years of the Turkish Republic, when French culture was au courant — wide avenues edged with wrought-iron balconies. It was an area of trade, soon taken over by Greek and Balkan immigrants. There isn’t a parking space to be had. The streets and even the newer buildings seem poised to be pushed over by the crush of pedestrians.

On her iPhone, she once again reads the data pertinent to Sisli Square. The man she and Besim identified as watching her the night before, the man from the airport, visited this place four times in three days. His phone’s GPS data reveals that he’s been in Istanbul but six days. Other than a discount hotel across town, this is the only place he has frequented.

Why? Beauty alone cannot account for it. Given that each visit was between four and five o’clock, it’s possible he performed afternoon prayers at this mosque, but it’s unlikely given the absence of any other repeated visit in the city. Grace decides to return at that hour if possible.

Her phone vibrates; the caller is listed as “Hopper 1.” Dulwich. The “hopper” designation assures her that the line is secure; Grace checks around her to ensure the area is as well. That’s when she sees him, sitting on a bench in the shade closer to the mosque, his back to the avenue.

“So?” Dulwich says.

“My apartment is being watched.”

“Then you were careless.”

“The GPS data from this man’s phone reveals a pay-as-you-go SIM chip initiated six days ago,” Grace says.

“You have tracked his phone?”

She thrills at the sound of his voice: shock and awe. “He has since visited this place where I sit four times in the past three days.” Grace waits. “Hello?”

“I’m listening.”

“A policeman, perhaps agent, is most likely to use a pay-as-you-go SIM chip like this. Same way we do. Let us assume, therefore, that this man arrived in-country six days ago. He buys the pay-as-you-go and sets up his phone. From what country he comes, we don’t know. You received my text, yes? This man had access to the airport’s security room. He tagged the mark upon landing. Access to Turkish security. I later identify a similarly dressed man watching the mark’s residence. Could be same agent. He was paired.”

“And is that the same—”

“Unlikely, no. The mobile unit surveilling my apartment was a solo. Who are all these people, sir? It is a crowded field.” Grace takes in her present surroundings of pigeons, pedestrians with white iPhone wires hanging from their ears and a sea of colorful scarves.

“I wouldn’t worry,” Dulwich says. “What you’re seeing is likely protection. The mark is an important man.”

It’s her turn to be unintentionally quiet. Wouldn’t worry? Since when? She collects more data from Dulwich’s body language than the conversation. His posture has tightened with her every revelation.

Grace says, “So why would a man protecting the mark spend extended time on a bench in front of a mosque three out of the six days he has been in-country?”

“He’s religious? Do we care?” Dulwich doesn’t have to try to sound offensive.

Red flag. A rule of the game is to know more about your adversary than he knows about you. “I am not comfortable with such surprises. Such unknowns.”

“You understand the op?”

He’s insulting her. She regrets bringing him in without more information. He doesn’t want to be offered half a meal. She accepts the mistake as a learning moment. It’s all or nothing; he doesn’t appreciate being teased.

“Understood,” she says.

“Well, then…” Dulwich stands and puts his phone away, offers his back and is swallowed by the tumult a few seconds later.