Pinnacle Event (10 page)

“I would like to say we did, but alas no one would let me and, of course, we are not that good.” She poured herself coffee and sat down opposite Bowman. “It took extensive planning, area knowledge, coordination, communications. We would have used teams of twenty or more per target, watchers, comms guys, drivers, safe house landlords, documents men. I don't have one hundred people to deploy overseas. I might be able to field one team like that, but not five. Who could?”

“If the U.S. used the Agency's Clandestine Service and military Special Ops, I suppose we could in a pinch. Otherwise? Russia, maybe Israel. Nobody else,” Bowman thought out loud.

“Our conclusion as well. We ruled you out for lack of motive and because the only people you seem to be allowed to kill are al Qaeda and ISIS,” she said, pouring him a coffee. “We haven't been able to imagine a motive that would get the SVR out doing this sort of thing. What would be in it for Russia?”

“Which leaves Israel?” Bowman asked.

“Maybe, they could be cleaning up loose ends. Didn't want the story coming out that old South African nuclear weapons in their control had suddenly disappeared?” Mbali offered.

Ray shook his head, no. “First, we don't really know that the Israelis had old South African nukes or, if they did, that anybody took them from them. All I really have is the guy at the IAEA who was told over twenty years ago that the weapons went to Israel. So, we think the bombs were not destroyed. We think one of them went off in August in the Indian Ocean, just like the test South Africa or Israel did in 1979. We think that the Trustees may have had the bombs and sold them and that, whoever bought the bombs, then killed the sellers.”

Mbali folderd her arms across her chest and looked at Ray Bowman. “You say it like it's just a theory, but it has both your President and mine convinced and both of them are about to go to battle stations looking for these loose nukes. So, for what it's worth, I am buying the theory. I like my job.”

Ray nodded. “It's plausible. And, therefore, we have to operate as if we knew with a certainty that it were true. Because, if it is true and we don't do everything we can to get these before the nukes go off somewhere or the new owners threaten to set them off…” He let the thought hang in the air.

She stood and looked Ray in the eye. “If they exist, Mr. Bowman, I am going to find those bombs, and soon. That is what I told my President and I intend to fulfill that promise.”

“Right, so back to the possibilities then,” he said and turned to face the whiteboard. “If the Israelis did get the bombs back then, in the nineties, there is no way that they would have preserved them. They don't need them and they wouldn't want old designs like that anyway. They would have harvested the enriched uranium.

“Besides, no one is getting a nuclear weapon out of Israel and no Israeli agency is going to throw one of their own citizens under a train in Tel Aviv. No, I don't buy it.”

Mbali leaned back in her leather chair. “Well, you know the Israelis better than we do. We've never really reestablished close ties. So, if not America, South Africa, Russia, or Israel, who?”

Ray moved to the whiteboard and listed those four nations with a blue marker. “We question our assumptions. Even though it makes no sense, maybe it was one of those four. Or, it was the fifth alternative.”

“Martians?” she asked.

“Nonstate actor,” he said and wrote it on the board. “Terrorist group? The White House thinks it must be al Qaeda. Narco-criminal cartel? Mega corporation?”

“You mean like Google?” Mbali laughed.

“They don't do evil, just ask them, but there are lots of big companies that have their own little intelligence services and security teams, with ex–Special Forces, ex-spooks,” he suggested. “Chinese companies, Russian, Korean, even Saudi, Mexican, and Brazilian.”

“Like Carlos Slim, the Mexican phone billionaire. What's he going to do with a nuclear weapon?” she asked. “I think it's far more likely that it was a coup within the Afrikaner world, some offshoot of the Trustees, some parallel group we didn't know about. My President is not entirely nuts to think that there may be some group of weird white folk who want to re-create their old South Africa somehow. Maybe they take over Namibia and threaten to blow us up if there is resistance or if South Africa threatens to invade.”

Bowman looked at his new South African colleague for a minute, as he stood in front of the whiteboard and she spun about in her chair. “If there were some coup within the Afrikaner expat world, you would know. It's your expertise, your raison d'
ê
tre to know what the crazier whites are up to. You don't believe that scenario for a minute, do you?”

“No, not really. We'd have heard something,” she agreed. “But there is a guy who might know what's going on. He's one of them, could have become one the Trustees, but didn't. He stayed here. Instead he and his two boys opened a winery. He's never really helped us very much, but he's agreed to see you. Still loves America.”

The telephone rang and Mbali answered, “Hlanganani.” She listened for a second, “Send him in.” Marcus Stroh joined them. “Who were they? Who were Mr. Bowman's attempted kidnappers?” she asked without preliminaries.

“We got prints off both of them, Director,” Stroh reported. “Both were on record, living in Sea Point. They're with Black Eagle.”

“What's that?” Ray asked.

“Nigerian drug group, with Italian Mafia connections. They've set up shop in Joburg and down here in Sea Point. We've let in tens of thousands of Nigerians and they're nothing but trouble,” she explained. “But these guys were South Africans?”

“Yes, Director, but working for Nigerian Black Eagle,” Stroh answered.

“Find out where their Big Man is. When we have him fixed, I'll call the Chief of Special Branch and set up a raid to pick him up and bring him in,” she directed.

“Yes, ma'am, but that could be a big fire fight.”

“Not if we do it right, Marcus. They'll never see it coming. First, find him.” She looked over at Ray. “You know, Raymond, when a Zulu chief moves about his country, he is accompanied by men skilled with arrows. Today, you are going to be my bow man. We are going on a little helicopter ride to Stellenbosch.”

 

10

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 21

ROOSMEER ESTATE WINERY STELLENBOSCH

WESTERN CAPE PROVINCE, SOUTH AFRICA

The Augusta 129 lifted off from the Special Services compound and took a tourist ride over Table Mountain for Ray Bowman's benefit. The long, flat-topped mountain stood at the edge of the city like a theater prop placed to provide a setting. Cape Town was a city like none other he had ever seen, a gem by the sea. Mbali asked the pilot to swoop over Robben Island, where Nelson Mandela had spent two decades in a cold cell. Once the aircraft set a westerly course for the wine country, they were there in less than fifteen minutes.

The pilot circled the winery, confirming the landing area on radio to an advance team that had checked out the winery. He then gently placed the aircraft down in the cleared space, kicking up walls of dust and dirt. They sat in the cabin with the doors closed, while the engine spun down and the dust storm settled. The copilot then exited the aircraft and pulled open the cabin door from the outside. Hendrik and Pieter Roosmeer were waiting for them, still brushing off the dust. The brothers looked to be in their forties, dressed alike in green polo shirts bearing the logo of the winery and jeans. They courteously introduced themselves, shaking hands first with Mbali and then Ray.

“Our father is waiting inside the winery, in the Library Reserve Room. He's anxious to meet you. Please, follow me,” Hendrik Roosmeer said.

Bowman looked out across the rolling hills, covered in vines. Whitewashed stucco buildings were scattered across the valley. Another mountain sat in the near distance, almost as perfectly placed as Table Mountain was to Cape Town. Aside from the mountain, it reminded him of Sonoma, but maybe the way it might have been fifty years ago. The sun was casting a yellow light across the scene. After the beauty of Cape Town from the air and now this magnificent valley, Bowman had to remind himself that the day had begun with men who had kidnapped him and then been shot to death a few feet from him.

Inside, the man at the head of the heavy, wooden table was clearly the laird of the manor. Slightly stooped, but still tall and thin, he had a regal mane of thick white hair. Looking at him, Ray thought this is what Hendrik and Pieter would look like in three decades. The older man was pouring from a crystal decanter into one of the dozen or more wineglasses before him. The afternoon sun was slanting through one of the narrow strips of stained glass that topped off the wood-paneled walls. It seemed like another incongruity to Bowman. This appeared to be a setting for a sommeliers' retreat, not for an interrogation about nuclear bombs.

“Johann Roosmeer, the winemakers' assistant,” the old man said, offering his hand to Mbali. “They are the winemakers, the new wave,” he said, pointing at his sons. “How familiar are you with our wines?”

Mbali set herself on one of the stools around the tasting table. “I like to think I know something about Pinotage, but I have to admit that I have not had the pleasure of tasting yours, and certainly not the Library Reserve.”

“That's because there hasn't been any of our Pinotage. It's been off the market for seven years while we grew new vines, clones, on the hillside, much better terroir for that grape than down in the valley. Here, try.” He handed her a tall stemmed glass. “It's the 2014. Very young, a barrel tasting. We have not yet bottled it. The older vintages here in the Library are awful.”

She went to taste and then stopped, held her head back and sniffed, rolling the red-purple liquid in the glass. “It has bouquet,” she sounded surprised. “Normally the better Pinotage have none. The regular Pinotage can smell like paint or rubbing alcohol. This smells like berries.”

Johann Roosmeer smiled in appreciation. “You do know Pinotage. Yes, the good ones have no bouquet and that is because they vent it to get rid of the acetone odor. This clone has no acetone odor and I mix it with twenty-five percent Shiraz and Cab Sav, as is allowed under South African law.”

Mbali finished sniffing and tasted, with her head back and her eyes closed. “Wonderful,” she said, “truly marvelous. When will it be bottled?”

“Hendrik, can we fill a bottle for our guest? It will be the first bottle of the vintage.”

The two brothers took that as their cue to leave their guests in the hands of their father. When they left, he poured three glasses of Shiraz from another decanter. “Hendrik went to the University of California at Davis. So did his sister, but she stayed there. Married an American. So, you see, I have three American grandchildren. But then you know that, don't you? Pieter studied here at Stellenbosch's OVRI. As I said, Hendrik and Pieter are the winemakers. I just assist.”

“OVRI?” Ray asked, feeling left out of the discussion to this point.

“Sorry. You are the American, of course you would not know. Our Institute of Oeneological and Vintacultural Research. It's modeled on your UC Davis, bringing us into the twenty-first century of global winemaking.”

Mbali tasted the Shiraz. “This has the Boekenhoutskloof beat hands down. This will get the medal this year.”

“You flatter an old man,” Roosmeer beamed, sitting himself down on a stool. “You butter me up so I will talk? Pieter said you wanted to bring an important American here to talk about the old days. Can't we let them die, the old days? We had the Truth Commission to put all of this behind us.”

Mbali put down her glass. “Some things from the old days have come back. The Trustees have all been killed. You were once one of them. Your life may be in danger.”

Johann Roosmeer nodded, while looking at his shoes. “I heard about the deaths. Something is obviously going on, but you are wrong about one thing, I was never, what did you call them, a Trustee? They wanted me to go with them, but I could not leave this country. This is home. My people have been here for centuries.”

Ray moved around Mbali and sat on the stool closest to the old man. “We have to dig up the past. Because what they worked on here before they left, they may have later worked on abroad. That may be why they were killed. That's why I have come from Washington. We need your help, sir.”

Roosmeer took a mouthful of the Shiraz. After a moment, he opened up, as he had apparently always intended to do. “We all saw it coming. Apartheid was a huge mistake. It had to end. The blacks, the coloreds, the Indians all would get the vote in the end, peacefully or violently. We would be the minority.

“In a way, we were like the KGB. They saw the end of Communism, of the Soviet Union, coming at about the same time. Odd coincidence really. The KGB mid-level leadership stashed gold abroad. They got ready to be the new wealthy Russians. Putin was part of that group, I'm told.”

Ray nodded his agreement.

Roosmeer continued. “My colleagues planned for years. We sold arms technology abroad, secretly, despite the UN embargo, to Israel, Singapore, Taiwan, Chile, Korea. ARMSCOR was very good in those days, we made the best field artillery in the world, good antitank missiles, antiship missiles, all sorts of things. We did not repatriate the money, the hard currencies, couldn't really. So we grew into having these huge offshore accounts.

“Then the men you call the Trustees hit up the mining interests for diamonds and gold from the reserves, smuggled them out of the country for the future when the blacks would take over. It was worth billions of U.S. dollars, the cash, the stones, the gold. No one wanted just to hand that over to Mandela and his lot.”

Ray knew all of that, but he kept the conversation going.