“Very little, actually. I know the drone strike didn’t go as planned and that you managed to track Saladin to a compound up in the mountains. After that, things get a little fuzzy.”
“For me, too,” said Gabriel.
“Were you there?”
He hesitated, then nodded slowly.
“Were you the one who—”
“Does it matter?”
She said nothing.
“Yes,” said Gabriel, “it was me. I was the one who killed him.”
And then he told her the rest of it. The woman who had detonated herself on the stairwell. The roomful of phones and computers in which Saladin had spent his last hours. The final text message.
Inshallah, it will be done . . .
“It was probably just talk,” said Chiara.
“From a man who nearly managed to smuggle a shipment of cesium chloride into France. Enough cesium chloride to build several dirty bombs. Bombs that would make the center of a city uninhabitable for years.” He paused, then added, “You see my point.”
Chiara waited until the mushrooms had shed their water before seasoning them with salt and pepper and freshly chopped thyme. Then she dropped several bundles of dried fettuccini into a pot of boiling water.
“How long are you planning to stay in London?” she asked.
“Until the British have finished scrubbing the phones and the computers we took from the compound.”
“You’re worried he’s coming after us?”
“His first target was the Isaac Weinberg Center for the Study of Anti-Semitism in France. It’s better for me to stay here while the intelligence is being processed. It’s less likely that something will slip through the cracks.”
“But no more heroics,” she cautioned.
“No,” said Gabriel. “I’m the chief now.”
“You were the chief when you were in Morocco, too.” She tested a strand of the fettuccini. Then she looked around the little kitchen and smiled. “You know, I’ve always loved this apartment. We’ve had good times here, Gabriel.”
“And bad ones, too.”
“We were married here. Do you remember?”
“It wasn’t a real wedding.”
“I thought it was.” Her expression darkened. “I remember it all so clearly. It was the night before . . .”
Her voice trailed off. To the sauté pan she added wine and cream. Then she poured the mixture over the fettuccini and tossed in grated cheese. She prepared only a single portion and placed it before Gabriel. He plunged a fork into it and twirled.
“None for you?” he asked.
“Oh, no.” Chiara glanced at her wristwatch. “It’s much too late to eat.”
Gabriel had used the safe flat so often that his clothing hung in the closet and his toiletries filled the bathroom cabinet. After finishing a second portion of the pasta, he showered and shaved and fell, exhausted, into bed next to Chiara. He had hoped his sleep would be dreamless, but that was not to be the case. He climbed an endless flight of steps that were drenched in blood and littered with the remains of a woman. And when he found the head and moved aside the veil, it was Chiara’s face he saw.
Inshallah, it will be done . . .
Shortly before five o’clock, he awoke suddenly, as if startled by the sound of a bomb. It was only his mobile phone, which was shimmying across the surface of the bedside table. He brought it swiftly to his ear and listened in silence. Rising, he dressed in darkness. And to the darkness he returned.
68
Thames House, London
The Jaguar limousine was waiting downstairs on the Bayswater Road. It delivered Gabriel not to Vauxhall Cross but to Thames House, the headquarters of MI5. Miles Kent, the deputy director, escorted him quickly upstairs to Amanda Wallace’s suite. She looked worn and tired, and was obviously under a great deal of stress. Graham Seymour was there, too, still dressed in the same suit he’d been wearing the night before, absent the club tie. Junior officers were rushing in and out of the room, and there was a secure videoconference up and running to Scotland Yard and Downing Street. The fact that they were gathered here instead of across the river could mean only one thing. Someone had found proof on Saladin’s phones and computers that an attack was imminent. And London was once again the target.
“How long have you known?” asked Gabriel.
“We unearthed the first nugget around two o’clock this morning,” said Seymour.
“Why didn’t anyone tell me?”
“We thought you could use a bit of sleep. Besides, it’s our problem, not yours.”
“Where?”
“Westminster.”
“When?”
“Later this morning,” said Seymour. “We think around nine.”
“What’s the method of attack?”
“Suicide bomber.”
“Do you know his identity?”
“We’re still working on that.”
“Just one? You’re sure?”
“So it would seem.”
“Why only one?”
Seymour handed Gabriel a stack of printouts. “Because one is all they need.”
The text message had been dispatched at three fifteen the previous morning Morocco time, when the likely sender had been under emotional distress and in physical pain. As a result, it had lacked the network’s normal secondary and tertiary encryption protocols, thus allowing an MI5 computer technician to unearth it from one of the phones taken from the Zaida compound. The language was coded but unmistakable. It was an order to carry out a martyrdom operation. There was no mention of a target, but the apparent haste with which the message was sent allowed the technician to find related communications and documents that made the objective of the attack, and the time it was to be carried out, abundantly clear. Numerous casing photos had been found, and even a document discussing prevailing winds and the likely dispersal pattern of the radiological material. The planners hoped, God willing, for an area of nuclear contamination stretching from Trafalgar Square to Thames House itself. MI5’s own experts, who had studied similar scenarios, predicted that such an attack would render the seat of British power uninhabitable for months, if not years. The economic cost, not to mention the psychological toll, would be catastrophic.
The recipient of the message had been more cautious than the sender. Still, the sender’s early mistake had effectively nullified the recipient’s care. As a result, the MI5 technician had been able to locate the entire exchange of messages, along with a martyrdom video. The subject addressed the camera in a London accent, with his face concealed. MI5’s linguistics experts reckoned he was from North London, that he was native born, and likely of Egyptian ancestry. With the help of GCHQ, Britain’s signals intelligence service, MI5 was frantically comparing the man’s voice to known Islamic radicals. What’s more, MI5 and SO13, the Counter Terrorism Command of the Metropolitan Police, were monitoring known extremists and suspected members of ISIS. In short, the entire national security apparatus of the United Kingdom was in quiet but efficient panic mode.
By six o’clock, as the skies beyond Amanda’s windows were beginning to brighten, all efforts to identify and locate the suspected suicide bomber had proven fruitless. Prime Minister Jonathan Lancaster, in the Cabinet Room at Number 10, convened a videoconference at half past. He opened it with a question no counterterrorism professional ever wanted to hear. “Should we cordon off Westminster and order an evacuation of the surrounding districts?” One by one, his senior ministers, civil servants, intelligence chiefs, and police commissioners gave their answers. Their recommendation was unanimous. Close Westminster. Shut down all rail, bus, and commuter traffic into central London. Begin an orderly and thorough evacuation.
“And what if it’s a hoax? Or a bluff? Or what if it’s based on bad intelligence? We’ll look like Chicken Little. And the next time we say the sky is falling, no one will believe us.”
The intelligence, everyone agreed, was as good and timely as it gets. And they were
rapidly running out of other options to prevent a monumental disaster.
The prime minister’s eyes narrowed. “Is that you I see, Mr. Allon?”
“It is, Prime Minister.”
“And what say you?”
“It’s not my place, sir.”
“Please don’t stand on ceremony. You and I know each other too well for that. Besides, there isn’t time.”
“In my opinion,” said Gabriel carefully, “it would be a mistake to order closures and evacuations.”
“Why?”
“Because you’ll lose your one and only chance to stop the attack.”
“Which is?”
“You know the time and place it will occur. And if you try to cordon off the center of London, you’ll incite mass panic, and the suicide bomber will simply choose a secondary target.”
“Go on,” instructed the prime minister.
“Keep the entrances to Westminster wide open. Place CBRN teams and undercover SCO19 firearms officers at strategic points around Parliament and Whitehall.”
“Let him walk straight into a trap? Is that what you’re saying?”
“Exactly, Prime Minister. He won’t be hard to miss. He’ll be overdressed for the summer weather, and the detonator will be visible in one of his hands. He’ll probably be sweating with nerves and reciting prayers. He might even be suffering from radiation sickness. And when he walks past a Geiger counter,” said Gabriel in conclusion, “he’ll light it up. Just make sure the firearms officer who goes after him has the nerve and experience to do what’s necessary.”
“Any candidates?” asked the prime minister.
“Only two,” said Gabriel.
69
Parliament Square, London
“I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.”
“Or the end of one.”
“Why are you always so fatalistic?” asked Keller. “We’re not in the Sahara anymore. We’re in the middle of London.”
“Yes,” said Gabriel, looking around. “What could possibly go wrong here?”
They were seated on a bench at the western edge of Parliament Square. It was a fine summer’s morning, cool and soft, with a promise of rain later in the day. Directly behind them was the Supreme Court, the highest court in the realm. To their right were Westminster Abbey and the medieval St. Margaret’s Church. And directly before them, across the green lawn of the square, was the Palace of Westminster. The clock in the iconic bell tower read five minutes to nine o’clock. Rush-hour traffic was flowing across Westminster Bridge and up and down Whitehall, past Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, the Ministry of Defense, and the entrance to Downing Street, official residence of the prime minister. Yes, thought Gabriel again. What could possibly go wrong?
He wore a radio earpiece in his right ear and a gun at the small of his back. The gun was a 9mm Glock 17, the standard-issue sidearm of SCO19, the tactical firearms unit of London’s Metropolitan Police. The radio was connected to the Met’s secure communications network. The head of SO15, the Counter Terrorism Command, was running the show, with assistance from Amanda Wallace of MI5. Thus far, they had identified two potential suspects approaching Westminster. One was coming across the bridge from Lambeth. The other was making his way along Victoria Street. In fact, at that very instant, he was walking past New Scotland Yard. Both men were carrying backpacks, hardly unusual in London, and both were Middle Eastern or South Asian in appearance, also not unusual. The man coming across the bridge had started his journey in the borough of Tower Hamlets in East London. The one walking past New Scotland Yard had come from the Edgware Road section of North London. He was warmly dressed and looked to be suffering from the flu.
“Sounds like our man,” said Gabriel. “I’m betting on Edgware and influenza.”
“We’ll know in a minute.” Keller was leafing through that morning’s edition of the Times. It was filled with news of Saladin’s death.
“Can’t you at least—”
“What?”
“Never mind.”
The man from Tower Hamlets had reached the Westminster side of the bridge. He passed a Caffè Nero coffeehouse and the entrance to the Westminster Tube stop. Then he passed an undercover CBRN team and two tactical firearms officers in plain clothes. No trace of radioactivity, no detonator in the hand, no sign of emotional distress. Wrong man. He crossed the street to Parliament Square and joined a small, sad protest having something to do with the war in Afghanistan. Was it still going on? Even Gabriel found it hard to imagine.
He turned his head a few degrees to the right to watch the second man—the man from the Edgware Road section of North London—walking along Broad Sanctuary, past the North Tower of the Abbey. Keller was pretending to read the sporting news.
“How does he look?”
“Sick as a dog.”
“Something he ate?”
“Or something he’s wearing. He looks like he would glow in the dark.”
A CBRN team was on the north lawn of the Abbey, posing for photos like ordinary tourists, along with another SCO19 unit. The CBRN team had already begun to detect elevated levels of radiation, but as the man from Edgware approached, the levels spiked dramatically.
“Fucking Chernobyl,” said Keller. “We’ve got him.”
A commotion erupted over the radio, several voices shouting at once. Gabriel forced himself to look away.
“What are the odds?” he asked calmly.
“Of what?”
“That he chooses us?”
“I’d say they’re getting better by the minute.”
The man crossed Broad Sanctuary to the Supreme Court building and entered Parliament Square at the southwest corner. A few seconds later, sweating, lips moving, pale as death, he was approaching the bench on which Gabriel and Keller sat.
“Someone needs to put that poor bloke out of his misery,” said Keller.
“Not without an order from the prime minister.”
The man walked past the bench.
“What level of exposure did we just suffer?” asked Keller.
“Ten thousand X-rays.”
“How many have you had?”
“Eleven thousand,” said Gabriel. Then he said quietly, “Look at the left hand.”
Keller did. It was clutching a detonator.
“Look at his thumb,” said Gabriel. “He’s already putting pressure on the trigger. Do you know what that means?”
“Yeah,” said Keller. “It means he’s got a dirty bomb with a dead man’s switch.”
Big Ben was tolling nine o’clock when the martyr-in-waiting reached the eastern flank of the square. He paused for a moment to watch the protest and, it seemed to Gabriel, to consider his options—the Palace of Westminster, which was directly before him, or Whitehall, which was to his left. The prime minister and his security aides were considering their options as well. At this point, there was only one. Someone had to grant the man the death he so badly wanted while someone else held his thumb tightly to the detonator switch. Otherwise, several people would die, and the seat of British power and history would be a radioactive wasteland for the foreseeable future.
At last, the martyr-in-waiting turned to the left toward Whitehall, with Gabriel and Keller trailing a few steps behind. A gentle breeze blew from the north directly into their faces—a breeze that would disperse the radioactivity all over Westminster and Victoria if the bomb detonated. The CBRN team that had been at Caffè Nero was now standing outside the Revenue and Customs building; their readings were off the charts as the man walked past them. It was all the proof the prime minister needed. “Take him down,” he said, and the head of the Counter Terrorism Command repeated the order to Gabriel and Keller. Then he added quietly, “And may God be with you both.”
But on whose side, thought Gabriel, was God on that morning? On the side of the fanatic with a weapon of mass destruction strapped to his body, or the two men who would try to prevent him fr
om detonating it? The first move was Keller’s to make. He had to seize the left hand of the martyr in an iron-lock grip before Gabriel fired the kill shot. Otherwise, the martyr’s thumb would weaken on the detonator switch and the bomb would explode.
They passed the archway of King Charles Street and the entrance of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. The traffic along Whitehall dwindled. Evidently, the police had blocked it off at Parliament Square to the south and Trafalgar Square to the north. The martyr-in-waiting seemed not to notice. He was walking toward destiny, walking toward death. Gabriel drew the Glock pistol from the small of his back and quickened his pace while Keller, a blur in his peripheral vision, drew a few deep breaths.
Before them, the sweating, radiation-sickened martyr passed unseeing through a knot of tourists and started toward the security gate of Downing Street, his apparent target. He slowed to a stop, however, when he saw the black-uniformed police officers standing on the pavement. At once, he noticed the peculiar absence of cars in the normally busy street. Then, turning, he saw the two men walking toward him, one with a gun in his hand. The eyes widened, the arms rose and stretched shoulder-width from each side.
Keller rushed forward while Gabriel raised the Glock. He waited until the instant Keller grabbed the bomber’s left hand before squeezing the trigger. The first two shots obliterated the bomber’s face. The rest he fired after the man was on the pavement. He fired until his gun was empty. He fired as though he were trying to drive the man deep underground and all the way to the gates of hell.
Suddenly, there were police and bomb-disposal technicians rushing toward them from all directions. A car pulled up in the street, the rear door opened. Gabriel hurled himself into the backseat, and into the arms of Chiara. The last thing he saw as the car drove away was Christopher Keller holding a dead man’s thumb to a detonator switch.
Part Four
Gallery of Memories
70