The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
Text copyright © 2010 Florencia Bonelli
Translation copyright © Rosemary Peele
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.
Published by Amazon Crossing
PO Box 400818
Las Vegas, NV 89140
ISBN-13: 9781612184357
ISBN-10: 1612184359
Library of Congress Control Number: 2012920904
For Miguel Ángel, my Horse of Fire.
For my nephew Tomás, as always.
CONTENTS
PROLOGUE The Bijlmer Disaster
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 12
CHAPTER 13
CHAPTER 14
CHAPTER 15
CHAPTER 16
CHAPTER 17
CHAPTER 18
CHAPTER 19
CHAPTER 20
CHAPTER 21
CHAPTER 22
CHAPTER 23
CHAPTER 24
MY HEARTFELT THANKS:
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
* * *
* * *
PROLOGUE
* * *
* * *
The Bijlmer Disaster
Amsterdam, Holland. 1996.
The Boeing 747-200 belonging to the Israeli airline El Al was waiting to take off at the end of runway number one at Amsterdam-Schiphol Airport. The aircraft engineer stuck his head out of the cabin to give an order to the only passenger, Yarón Gobi.
“Take the jump seat,” he said, indicating the folding chair next to the plane’s door, “and fasten your seat belt.”
They were next.
“El Al flight 2681,” the air-traffic controller radioed, “ready for takeoff?”
In the midst of the roar from the jumbo jet’s four engines, its only passenger shivered. He had never liked flying, but especially not with the present cargo occupying the entire fuselage, for which he was responsible. According to the shipping documents, the plane carried perfumes and other cosmetic products, but he knew the cargo’s true nature.
He was nervous. He shook his wrist to uncover the watch that had slid under the cuff of his shirtsleeve. Six p.m. In around five hours they would be landing at Tel Aviv Airport. There, vans that had been specially adapted to transport “security-related products” would take the crates on the final leg of their journey to the Israeli Institute of Biological Research in Ness-Ziona, a city in central Israel.
The plane began to climb toward cruising altitude. Yarón’s stomach clenched and he started to feel nauseous. He forced himself to calm down, closing his eyes and inhaling deeply.
His eyes shot open. He was jolted in his jump seat by a deafening explosion. The plane veered sharply to the right and he lurched in his seat as though he were on a roller coaster. The young copilot’s voice filtered through the closed door: “Mayday! Mayday! Mayday!” He knew what it meant to hear the word repeated three times. It was an emergency call, derived from the French expression m’aidez—help me.
Less than a minute later, the pilot had regained some control of the aircraft, although it was still being tossed around in a sea of turbulence. Yarón immediately ripped off his seat belt and rushed into the cockpit.
“What’s happening?” No one answered.
He heard the copilot talking to the control tower, explaining that engines three and four had stopped functioning and asking permission to carry out an emergency landing.
“Given our air speed,” he explained, “we’ll need the longest runway the airport has.”
Yarón closed the door and headed to the back of the plane, clinging to the walls and furniture for support. He looked out through a window. They had lost altitude and were flying over the southern suburbs of Amsterdam. He realized that if they weren’t able to land at the airport, they would crash into the housing beyond.
“My God,” he gasped.
Ariel Bergman was sitting at his computer when he saw a phone number he recognized flash up on his telephone. His office at the European headquarters of Israel’s intelligence service—known as Mossad in the world of espionage and often referred to simply as “The Institute”—was located in The Hague. As a katsa, a Mossad officer, and the head of Recruitment Operations, Bergman instantly knew what this call might mean. It was from the collaborator, or sayan, they had recruited in the control tower of Amsterdam-Schiphol Airport. He lifted the receiver and asked, “What’s going on?” Even though they were using secure lines, protocol dictated that they never use first or last names.
“We’ve just received a Mayday. It’s coming from El Al flight number 2681.”
The call was the air-traffic controller’s first contribution as a sayan, the term used by Mossad to describe any member of the Jewish Diaspora willing to serve to help the defense and survival of Israel. The vulnerability of El Al, a prime target for terrorists, meant the control tower operator at Amsterdam-Schiphol, one of the airports most frequently used by the Israeli airline, was a sayan of incalculable value. Bergman had suspected as much when he had first recruited the controller, and it had only been a matter of time for him to be proved right.
He wedged the phone between his ear and his shoulder and typed on his keyboard while they spoke.
“What more can you tell me?”
“Engines three and four have stopped functioning. They’re returning to Schiphol to attempt an emergency landing. I’ll call again when I have more news.”
The screen displayed the information he had requested. It was a cargo rather than passenger plane, which, Bergman thought with some relief, would reduce the number of victims if the worst happened. However, when he read the next line, he cursed in Hebrew under his breath. Flight 2681 was transporting “highly toxic chemical substances.” Destination: the Israeli Institute of Biological Research, Ness-Ziona, Israel. There were no details about the merchandise, only a warning about its toxicity.
A few minutes later the response team had sprung into action like clockwork. A Chinook helicopter took off from a private base twenty-five miles south of Amsterdam. Faster than other transport helicopters, it would have a group of experts on chemical and biological attacks at Amsterdam-Schiphol in under half an hour in case the plane was unable to land successfully. Meanwhile, two katsas stationed in Amsterdam were on their way to the airport and would arrive in a matter of minutes. Another team was deployed to begin the search for terrorists who might have targeted the jet with an RPG and destroyed the engines. Finally, the director-general of The Institute was brought up to speed. He’d be the one to decide when to inform the prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, the defense minister, Yitzhak Mordechai, and the minister of foreign affairs, David Levy.
At six thirty p.m., El Al flight 2681 was preparing for its emergency landing. After the copilot had informed the control tower, the captain lifted the nose of the plane to slow it down. However, this routine maneuver disrupted the flow of air keeping the plane aloft, and the plane lost stability once more.
Yarón was catapulted to the right and rolled until he hit the fuselage. He dragged himself upright, holding on to the windowsill and a bolt used to tie down the cargo. He realized that they were still losing altitude but that no
w the captain had lost control of the aircraft. He had seen a National Geographic documentary that said a 747 like this one could still fly with only two of its engines working. If the problem stemmed from the fact that engines three and four had stopped functioning, why was the plane still shaking, losing stability and spiraling downward? They weren’t caught in a storm or turbulence. He was sure that they were going to die.
He was struck by a sudden vision that both surprised and calmed him: Moshé’s face reflecting back at him in the plastic of the window. His lover, Moshé, who was waiting for him in Ness-Ziona. It wasn’t easy to be homosexual in a country like Israel. Eventually, he and Moshé had learned to accept their love, but they concealed it, to protect it, especially at the Institute of Biological Research, where they worked. They had experienced freedom for the first time on their vacation last year, right there in Amsterdam. He remembered those happy days, when they would stroll hand in hand or hug on a boat crisscrossing the canals without anyone giving them a second glance. He also remembered their walk around Lake IJssel.
“The lake!” he shouted.
He hauled himself to his feet, fell flat on his face but kept on moving until he reached the cockpit. He opened the door and screamed, “For the love of God, avoid the water! At all costs! Don’t let this plane hit the water! Or God help us!”
The journalist Lars Meijer was writing an article about mercenaries for the NRC Handelsblad, a well-respected Dutch evening paper. He was working in the living room of his apartment in Bijlmermeer, better known as Bijlmer. His colleagues at the paper, friends and family all thought it an eccentric choice to live in the suburb to the southeast of Amsterdam, a notoriously violent area, but the neighborhood suited Lars well. He liked the vibrant environment created by his multiracial neighbors. Many immigrants found refuge in Bijlmer, especially those who had left Suriname after the country achieved independence in ’75. Conceived as an avant-garde modernist project inspired by the revolutionary ideas of Le Corbusier, Bijlmer consisted of long blocks of ten-story housing complexes that overlapped to form a beehive. Green spaces, lakes, commercial areas and offices were distributed between the rows of buildings.
Lars halted his frenetic typing, stretched his arms, cracked his neck and took a sip of coffee. He read through the first few lines of his piece. His research into mercenary organizations was revealing some of the darkest and cruelest aspects of human nature. The United Nations had approved a resolution condemning “the contracting, financing, training and operation of mercenaries” and recently had even named an expert for mercenary activities charged with ensuring that the ban was observed. The previous week Lars had interviewed him in his office at UN headquarters, in Turtle Bay, Manhattan. During the interview, the expert had offered him some advice: “Let me be clear. If you want to find out more about the world of so-called private military companies, your man is Eliah Al-Saud. All roads lead to him.”
He felt a slight vibration run through his body, barely a tickle. He looked at his mug. Concentric waves spread out across the surface of his coffee, accompanied by a whine that quickly developed into a roar, thundering through the double-glazed windows. Now the whole house was shaking.
Lars ran onto the balcony. On seeing what awaited him outside, he uttered, “It’s all over.”
The gigantic airplane’s nose was pointed straight at him and would crash into the building in seconds.
He had heard it said but never believed it until that day: in the instant before death, your whole life, from childhood to maturity, flashes before your eyes.
The plane swerved to the left, toward a neighboring building. It seemed to Lars that if he had stretched out his hand, he would have been able to touch the belly of the aircraft. He ran to the telephone and called the emergency services.
The phone rang again in the office of katsa Ariel Bergman.
“Yes.”
“The plane has just disappeared from the radar screen,” the sayan informed him. “It crashed! It hit the ground!” Bergman stood up. “We can see the column of black smoke in Bijlmer from the control tower.” He pronounced the neighborhood “Beilmer.”
“Bijlmer,” Bergman murmured. He had to lean against his desk for support. “Bijlmer!” he shouted, because he knew that it was one of the most densely populated areas in Amsterdam.
Lars Meijer rescued many of his neighbors who had been trapped in their apartments by the flames that roared and licked around the building’s structure. Days later, when the chief firefighter explained that the wings of the 747 were carrying more than fifty thousand pounds of fuel, he would understand why the fire had spread so quickly and burned so ferociously.
The number of victims rose to forty-three, including the flight crew: the captain, copilot and engineer. The plane had blown a hole in the long block of apartments, splitting it in two. The international press speculated about the cause of the accident. Terrorism was on everyone’s lips, even though weeks went by and no organization claimed responsibility for the disaster. No evidence of explosives was found among the wreckage. A member of the public who had been sailing on Lake IJssel provided the first ray of light for the investigation when he testified that he had seen the 747’s engines falling into the bay. The engines hadn’t stopped functioning; they had fallen off the plane. Divers found engines three and four and the crash technicians started their work.
Lars Meijer attended the press conference in which it was announced that the engines had fallen off due to metal fatigue in the joints that fixed them to the wing.
“If it had just been a case of the engines failing,” the head investigator explained, “the plane would have been able to land without any trouble. But, having lost both engines, the wing suffered a design fault and lost stability.” With images and diagrams, he explained the phenomenon of air passing above and below the wing at different speeds that makes it possible for aircraft to fly. “The part that joined engine three to the wing was defective. Eventually it gave way, releasing engine three, which subsequently crashed into number four, ripping it from the wing as well.”
Lars raised his hand to ask a question. He explained that it was for El Al’s PR manager.
“Can you explain why, weeks after the disaster, some residents of Bijlmer, myself included, have suffered respiratory problems, acute dermatitis, and stomach, eye and nerve ailments? Some are even vomiting blood.”
“We haven’t received any information about that. Any other questions?”
“There are those who compare the symptoms to those suffered by Iranian soldiers during the Iran-Iraq war,” Lars insisted.
“No comment. Any other questions?”
* * *
* * *
CHAPTER 1
* * *
* * *
Ministro Pistarini International Airport, thirty-five miles southwest of Buenos Aires, Argentina. December 31, 1997.
Eliah couldn’t take his eyes off the girl as she crouched down to get something from her backpack; the ends of her hair touched the floor. He was surrounded by women who wore their hair long: his sister, Yasmín; his mother; his aunt Fátima. Samara, he thought, and clenched the cell phone tightly in his fist. Just thinking her name caused him pain.
The girl was still there, rummaging through her backpack as her hair brushed against the linoleum floor. He had never seen hair this long, this blonde or this striking. It didn’t hang limply but rather fell, languidly, in a cascade of ringlets that shone in the dimly lit airport. Was she Swedish? Danish, maybe? He moved closer to get a better look at her face. She must be stupid, he thought; he preferred brunettes.
His cell phone rang.
“Allô?”
“Eliah, c’est moi. André.”
“Á la fin, André. I’ve been trying to get hold of you.”
“What’s up? What’s the big rush?”
“I need to ask you a favor. I’m at the airport in Buenos Aires and I need to get a seat on the next Air France flight. The one that leaves at two.??
? André didn’t respond. “Allô? André? Are you there?”
“Yes, yes, sorry. It’s just that you surprised me. You? A seat on the next Air France flight? What about your plane?”
The question annoyed Eliah Al-Saud. Blame it on his profession, or perhaps his temperament, but the truth was that he rarely had much patience for being questioned; even when he was a little boy, he’d refused to explain himself, regardless of the punishments he’d received as a result. In fact, there was no doubt that it was in his character to bristle when questioned, and maybe that was why he was good at what he did. But since he was asking Yasmín’s boyfriend for a favor, he decided to make an exception.
“I flew my plane to Buenos Aires but when I tried to take off today, I heard a rumbling in the fuselage that I didn’t like the sound of and decided not to risk it. The technicians can’t look at it for at least two days. And it’s extremely urgent that I get to Paris tomorrow. I have a meeting with Shiloah Moses, who’s getting in very early from Tel Aviv.” He had revealed too much information. His mood started to deteriorate.
“Which plane? The Learjet 45?”
Eliah raised his eyes to the heavens as he heard his sister’s voice: “André, leave him alone. You’re annoying him with all these questions.”
“I mean the new plane, the Gulfstream V. The point is, André, that I need to be in Paris tomorrow morning.”
“So buy a ticket then.”
Sometimes Eliah had trouble understanding how his future brother-in-law had risen so high at Air France; he was also baffled by Yasmín’s taste in men.
“André, I’m calling you because the saleswoman at Air France has just told me that there aren’t any seats left in first class, just business. It’s because of the special offer on first class—”