Valley of the Templars

11

The man in the tropical camouflage battle dress adjusted his headset and stared at the portable control-panel-in-a-suitcase on the ground in front of him. He was surrounded by banks of ferns and undergrowth, the shadows of the tall pines and eucalyptus trees turning the rain forest floor into a complex pattern of contrasting light and shadow that swallowed up the man in battle dress and made him close to invisible.

The air was full of the soft, gentle scent of butterfly lilies and the sweeter odors of jasmine and ginger mixed with the rot smell of overripe bananas and plantains that had fallen from the trees above to lie on the dark, rich earth below. Everywhere around the man the elegant song of the tocororo could be heard and the harsher telegraphing of the ivory-billed woodpecker.

Before he’d slipped the headset on, the man had even heard the furious whisper of hummingbird wings nearby and the twittering of the tiny green and red cartacuba. This was the Topes de Collantes, the highest point in the Sierra del Escambray, a mountain twenty-six hundred feet above sea level, its flanks covered in a smothering blanket of almost impenetrable jungle foliage. What few roads existed were unpaved and dangerous for anything but high-wheeled military vehicles and sturdy four-by-fours. This place had come close to defeating Fidel more than fifty years ago, and it was no place for casual visitors now.

The man in the tropical battle dress saw none of this beauty now, nor did he hear anything beyond the empty cycling hum in his headset. He reached down with his right hand and picked up the Vectronix laser range finder. He put the small device up to his eye and looked out through the stand of trees in front of him to the brightly sunlit meadow beyond. It was empty, sloping downward gently, the tall yellow rattle grass shivering in the gentle breeze. By autumn the seed pods of the grass would be mature and the field would sound as if it were home to a million rattlesnakes as the pods shook in the wind.

“Go, One,” he said softly into the microphone.

A figure rose out of the grass fifty yards ahead. He looked as if he was carrying a large foam children’s glider. Lifting the model airplane high, he took a few running steps and launched it downhill. As he did so the man with the control panel pushed a toggle switch and the almost invisible propeller behind the wings of the aircraft began to spin. The man with the portable unit picked up the handheld game controller and began to work the controls with both thumbs. The glider, with its silent electrical motor, began to climb into the sky until it was invisible. On the screen of the portable control unit, the surveillance package began sending video and data.

The device was a Desert Hawk III mini-drone. It was thirty-six inches long with a fifty-four-inch wingspan and an interchangeable payload package of up to 2.2 pounds-one kilogram. The Hawk could fly at altitudes that ranged from nap of the earth to eleven hundred feet. It even had an infrared package for night sorties. It had a hundred-minute endurance time and could be controlled portably or by a remote operator thousands of miles away. The images could also be satellite-linked to anywhere in the world, and the man with the portable unit lying in the jungle was well aware that what he was seeing on the screen was also being watched at the Blackhawk Security Systems headquarters at the Compound in Mount Carroll, Illinois. Screw up and he’d be dead meat or at the very least unemployed. Thank God and the people for all those hours he’d spent playing Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2.

“What’s he supposed to be looking at?” Major General Atwood Swann asked, seated in the Big Chair in Blackhawk Security Systems Compound War Room. He was watching the giant flat-screen monitor showing the Desert Hawk Display from Topes de Collantes seventeen hundred miles away.

“Nothing in particular,” replied his second in command, Colonel Paul Axeworthy. “This is the afternoon recon run. The Hawk’s got a range of about ten miles or so; in that kind of terrain that’s at least half a day’s march. Put up the Hawk for an hour or so and you can make sure nobody’s sneaking up on you. Not likely, but it’s a prudent precaution under the circumstances.”

“It’s going well?”

“The men and equipment are deployed. Nobody’s made any mistakes and the only contact with the locals has been with Ruiz,” said Axeworthy.

“Our man in the hotel?”

“Yes, sir.” The colonel paused. “Any word yet, sir?”

“They picked up the doctor. It’s just a matter of time now.”

Dr. Eugenio Selman-Housein sat in his chair at the head of the George Wythe Jeffersonian table in Oak Lawn’s dining room. He was enjoying a second helping of prime rib, roasted potatoes and asparagus along with a vintage Laboure-Roi Cote de Nuits Villages burgundy that he was drinking at an alarming rate for a man of his slight build, not to mention his age.

Will Black watched him from the other side of the table and wondered if the good doctor had a tapeworm. One way or another, a man who drank that much without showing the slightest effect had to have a liver the size of a Volkswagen.

The doctor put down his knife and fork, took a sip of wine and smiled pleasantly at Black and Carrie Pilkington. “In truth, mi amigo y mi amiga, I must say, the Central Intelligence Agency feeds its defectors well, and in such a delightful environment.” He paused. “I do miss Senor Kingman, though; he was muy divertido…entertaining?”

Kingman had returned to Washington after the first three days of the doctor’s filibustering. His excuse for leaving was to make a personal report on the situation to Joseph Patchin, but all the telephones at Oak Farm were secure and encrypted and there was also a video link.

Black was reasonably sure the real reason the deputy director had left was that he thought the Cuban’s constant beating around the bush was because he had nothing of value to disclose and was simply looking for a free ride. Consequently the doctor wasn’t worth his valuable time. Both Black and Carrie had tried to convince him about Carrie’s theory that Selman-Housein was stalling because he was on some sort of prearranged schedule, but Kingman dismissed the whole idea out of hand.

“This isn’t some fanciful story about Masonic treasures buried under the streets of New York, Miss Pilkington,” he’d chided. “This is serious business.” Kingman had laughed, jeering. “If there was a secret society of ancient knights running Cuba, don’t you think the CIA would know about it?”

Black had to stop himself from reminding Kingman that, among other things, the CIA hadn’t seen the collapse of the entire Soviet Union coming, had backed the nascent groups that became al Qaeda in Afghanistan, and that both the CIA and MI6 consistently ignored the Iraqi threat to Kuwait going back to the 1960s, despite all the James Bond films or Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan. In the final analysis, neither agency was very good at winkling out the secrets of other countries.

In the Oak Farm dining room, Selman-Housein picked up his knife and fork again and began slicing up a roast potato. He speared a morsel with his fork, popped it into his mouth and chewed happily for a moment.

“Wonderful,” he murmured.

“In the United States we have a saying, ‘to sing for your supper,’” said Carrie.

“Que?” Selman-Housein said, frowning.

“Ganarse el pan,” explained Black.

“You speak Spanish?”

“Fluently, Doctor. I took a dual honors degree in political science and Spanish at Oxford. I also spent two years at the embassy in Madrid. Asi que no me jodas, Doctore, ahora mismo!”

Selman-Housein-looked shocked at the profanity, then shrugged. He offered a brief smile, put down his knife and fork again and repeated the ritual of the wine and the linen napkin. He stared down the table at Black and wagged a disapproving index finger back and forth.

“I am offended,” he said primly. “In Cuba no man or woman would treat their guest this way.”

“This isn’t Cuba, Doctor. It’s North Carolina, and you’re not a guest-you are a defector and a traitor to your country.”

“How you talk is not hospitable anywhere, Senor Black.”

“Hospitality is over. It’s been a week and you’ve told us nothing. If you’re playing some sort of game, it ends now.”

“There is no game, Senor Black. Of this I assure you, and I am no traitor. I am a refugee and that is the status I will claim if you continue to speak to me so rudely.”

“A status you’ll never get, you arrogant little shit,” said Carrie pleasantly. “I’ll make sure of that, believe me.”

“This is America,” protested Selman-Housein. “You cannot do that. There are laws.”

“You’re wrong about that,” said Black. “This isn’t America. This isn’t even Guantanamo. This is nowhere and nobody knows you’re here. This is un agujero negro, Doctor, a black hole. You don’t exist and there are no laws. Carrie and I could snap our fingers and you’d disappear. Poof! If that’s what you want, then consider that plate in front of you your own personal Last Supper.”

There was a long silence. Finally the doctor reached out and picked up the bottle of burgundy. He examined the label briefly, then poured the remainder of the bottle into his glass.

“Mr. Black, Miss Pilkington, do either of you or the agencies you represent have the slightest idea of what will happen when our great leader, que Dios tenga en su Gloria, finally dies?”

Carrie shrugged. “The presumption within the CIA is that his brother, Raul, will take over the reins but that the country will be run as a military oligarchy. Which is exactly how it is run now. My personal theory is that it will be ruled by the La Hermandad dos Cavaleiros de Cristo. The Brotherhood.”

“You know of La Hermandad?”

“I do. My superiors think they’re a fantasy.”

“They are no fantasy, senora. They are quite real. We who are not members of their sociedad secreta call them something else: Los Diablos.”

“The Devils,” said Black.

“Yes, but the Devils have become frightened because they know the truth.”

“What truth?”

“That when Fidel dies they will not have the power to stop what is coming.”

“And what would that be?” Carrie sighed. Black smiled. The good doctor really was long-winded, but after a week of inane conversations about everything but Cuban politics, he was willing to let the man talk all he wanted.

“There are eleven million people in Cuba. Of those, at least two million live in Havana-the real figure may be closer to three million, but no census taker has dared set foot in the baracoas, the slums, for more than a decade.” The doctor gave a hollow laugh. “Fidel says there are no slums in Havana, so that is that, I suppose.” He shook his head and took a long swallow of wine. “The birthrate in Cuba is almost nonexistent. The whole population grows older each year.

“The health care system is a bad joke. State-of-the-art hospitals and excellent doctors for those who can pay-tourists and members of the Central Committee of the Communist Party, but for the rest, verminous bedding and black market drugs. Food is running out, but to fish in the rivers or the sea invites jail. Farmers without shoes or electricity eat, but the people of Havana and the other towns and cities starve. With Venezuela in an uproar, Cuba’s only supply of fuel is now in jeopardy. It is all coming to an end.”

“So, what are you saying?”

“When Fidel dies, there will be a demonstration by many dissidents. I could not tell you which groups, but there will be such a demonstration and someone will die at the hands of the Secret Police. That death will lead to anger and more demonstrations. Those demonstrations will lead to riots. All this will happen in one day or perhaps two at most and they will be riots the like of which you have never seen before.

“There are fewer than twenty thousand men and women in the Cuban armed forces. A few helicopters, perhaps a dozen. If called upon, at least half of those men and women in the Cuban armed forces will refuse to fire on their fellow Cubans.” The doctor laughed again and drank the last of his wine. “Especially with guns that have no bullets and tanks that have no fuel or lubricating oil.”

Selman-Housein smiled gently, his eyes behind his spectacles softening for a moment. Black even thought he saw tears welling up. “On New Year’s Eve in 1959, there were riots in Havana as Batista fled the city, but they were good riots, riots to cut the rot from the country’s core like a tumor in the brain.

“I know. I was seventeen years old then, and like everyone else we rioted with joy.” He took off his glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose, then looked up, blinking. “There will be no joy in the riots that will come. There will only be madness. It is the motto of our country come to pass-Patria o Muerte, Homeland or Death-and the people will choose death when Fidel dies and the revolution collapses. Everything will end in the Valle de la Muerte.”

Carrie shrugged. “It all sounds very dramatic, Doctor, but when you get right down to it, what are you telling us? More nothing. Fidel Castro could live for years.”

“Fidel Castro will be dead in thirteen days,” the doctor answered. “And I have given the Brotherhood the means of killing him without leaving any trace. When the deed is done, they will begin their Operacion de Venganza and Cuba’s freedom shall be gone forever.”

“Operation Vengeance? What exactly is that?” Black asked.

“On the twelfth of April 1962, President John F. Kennedy promised that the United States would never intervene militarily in Cuba’s affairs. It is a promise that has been kept by every American president since that day. That promise is about to be broken.”

“How?” Carrie Pilkington queried, an urgent note in her voice.

“The Brotherhood is planning a terrorist attack on the United States that will make your nine-eleven pale into insignificance. Hundreds of thousands will die and there is no way to stop it.”