Authors: Simon Conway
Arriving at the bottom he crouched against the wet ground and surveyed the terrain. His mind was racing. They were next to a row of huts and ahead of him there was an open space and the dark outline of the
pipal
tree by the wall. It was a huge old fig with a trunk like writhing cables and limbs that looked easily strong enough to hold their weight. They might be able to use one of the upper branches to cross the wall to the other side. How to get there? They were safe where they were, for now at least, protected by a slight overhang but if they moved they would become visible to the gunmen on the roof. Unless they stuck to the shadows cast by the row of huts.
He looked at Leyla. She was watching him, holding her hands, bloodied from the descent, in her lap.
‘Ready?’
She nodded.
‘I love you,’ he said.
‘I love you too,’ she replied without hesitation.
‘So it’s going to be fine…’
‘You think?’
He drew the pistol from his waistband. ‘Come on!’
He led her along the backs of the huts, sprinting across the space between each one. Within seconds they had arrived at the comparative safety of the wall. They moved swiftly alongside it towards the tree. Reaching it, they saw that the back of the tree was dappled with pale freshly sawn stumps. Someone had cut off all the overhanging branches.
‘Damn.’
Looking around he saw a small recess in the wall with three concrete steps that led down to a metal door. It was locked and it would not budge when he put his shoulder against it. Behind him there was a lot of shouting and calling out as the gunmen moved from room to room in the house, but the firing had stopped. If he tried shooting out the lock it would immediately draw their attention.
‘Here,’ said a voice, in Pashto.
With a start, Ed realised there was a small boy squatting at the top of the steps. He was wrapped in what looked like a ragged black cloak and was holding out a key in his hand. Ed took it and tried it in the lock. It worked. The door opened onto the playing fields. When he looked back to thank him he found that the boy had disappeared. There was only Leyla, with an incredulous expression on her face.
‘Come on.’
They were about halfway across the pitch when they were lit up. From directly in front of them a pick-up truck switched on its rack of floodlights. They were blinded. Pinned like moths. Then he was being shouted at through a loud hailer.
‘Put down the weapon!’
There was no alternative he could think of and so he flung the pistol away.
‘Get down on your knees and put your hands up!’
They sank onto the soft wet grass with their hands in the air, and as they knelt there, squinting, he became aware of a man, in silhouette, approaching with his arm raised and something stick-like in his hand.
Ed swore softly.
When his vision adjusted, Javid Aslam Khan was standing over him. His appearance was entirely consistent with his reputation. He was ramrod-straight despite his advanced age, wearing a three-piece tweed suit and polished brogues and in one of his hands he was holding a leather-covered cane.
‘You think I don’t know what Burns is playing at, young fellow?’ he said, tapping Ed on the soft skin of his temple with the end of the cane. ‘She’s an insightful woman, I’ll give her that. She knew that Noman would fall into her trap. What I don’t understand about this whole foolish business is why? What was she trying to achieve?’
‘A different outcome,’ Ed replied.
‘She wanted Noman in charge?’
Ed laughed. He remembered what Queen Bee had told him about wanting to change the
choice architecture
. ‘I think anyone but you.’
44. The KSM Suite
They flew into a storm. As the plane crossed from sea to land it was shaken by turbulence and forks of lighting stabbed the clouds. By the time they began to descend into Islamabad, half the passengers were screaming and the aisles were running with vomit. It wasn’t so much a landing as a slam-dunk. They skidded down the runway with a torrent of water running off the wings and came to a sudden halt on the taxiway.
Staring out through his window seat Noman could see what looked like a line of army Jeeps and in front of them a huddle of soldiers in ponchos. While the engines idled, a set of steps was manoeuvred alongside the plane and about a dozen sodden corps of Military Police officers in their distinctive red berets came aboard. They marched up the aisle and stopped at Noman’s row. He was sitting with his fists clenched on his knees. This wasn’t meant to happen.
‘Colonel Noman Butt I am arresting you on a charge of high treason,’ the senior redcap said, and issued a
Danda
warning informing him of his constitutional right to protection against self-incrimination and his constitutional right to the services of a legal practitioner.
‘I’m sorry, darling,’ Mumayyaz said, ‘I did try to warn you.’
#
Khan and his colleague Farrukh from the Committee of the Joint Chiefs of Staff stood behind glass in the viewing area of the KSM Suite, named for the 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who was interrogated here in 2003. They were underground, in the prison complex beneath Army Headquarters in Rawalpindi, and Farrukh was wearing the uniform of a Major-General.
The oldest cells in the complex dated back to the pre-colonial era and extensive work had been undertaken in the last decade to modernise them, adding cameras and recording equipment. And in the case of the KSM Suite, a hole had been cut in a stone wall that divided two cells and a pane of mirrored one-way glass added. It allowed visitors, Americans and representatives of other intelligence agencies, to observe interrogations anonymously.
On the far side of the glass Mumayyaz was sitting at a metal table in a cell. She had been brought straight here from the airport and was wearing her travel clothes, a midnight blue
shalwar kameez
with a white silk headscarf. Her lipstick was a deep, dense red and her nails were painted to match. Tufail Hamid was sitting opposite her, with his white-gloved hands resting, palms down, on the surface.
Tufail spoke softly. ‘Please state your name.’
She tucked a stray lock of hair into her scarf and nodded demurely. ‘I am Mumayyaz Khan.’
‘Can you confirm that since 2006 you have travelled once a month to Dubai, ostensibly on a shopping expedition?’ Tufail asked.
‘Yes.’
‘Can you confirm that in Dubai on your monthly trip you attended a suite in a hotel and on each occasion you received fifty thousand dollars in cash?‘
‘Yes.’
‘Speak up!’
‘Yes.’
‘What did you do with the money?’
‘I paid it into a bank account in my name.’
‘Where did the money come from?’
‘I had no idea.’ She was crying, tears rolling down her cheeks. ‘I did what I was told to. That’s all. I was told there was no hope for Pakistan and one day we would have to leave the country. The money was for our future together. How could I refuse?’
Khan removed his glasses and used a handkerchief to wipe the sweat from his eyes. He resisted the urge to loosen his tie.
‘What is your relationship to the accused?’
She paused, milking it for full dramatic effect. For a few seconds Khan thought he might have a heart attack.
‘He is my husband.’
‘Soon he will be her ex-husband,’ Khan explained to Farrukh, once the pounding in his chest had stopped. ‘
Talaq
has been pronounced and written notice has been submitted to the Union Council. I can assure you their divorce will be finalised within ninety days.’
Farrukh nodded inscrutably.
‘Why did you turn him in?’ Tufail continued.
‘Because he admitted that he was a traitor. He had been hiding out in Lahore and now had fled to Dubai. He confessed to everything, every sordid little detail, his unnatural relationship with Tariq Mahoon and Tariq’s wife, and how together they sold secrets to the British.’
‘We believe that for five years Noman used Tariq as a conduit for information, including details of assistance to our allies in Afghanistan,’ Khan explained. ‘Noman was in Abbottabad at the surveillance house the night before the Americans launched their operation against bin Laden. He may have warned Tariq of what was coming.’
‘He begged me to run away with him,’ Mumayyaz sobbed. ‘He asked me to withdraw the money, every last dollar, and hand it over to him.’
‘How did you respond?’
‘I refused. I told him it was out of the question. I love my country. And I love my father. I simply couldn’t.’
‘Then what happened?’
‘While he was sleeping I made a call to my father. I told him everything. Everything! I couldn’t bear the thought of Noman’s treachery and how it might bring shame on my family.’
‘And how did your father respond?’
‘He told me it was vitally important to persuade Noman to return to Pakistan. He advised me to tell my husband that, although I was not ready yet, I might agree to hand over the money in the near future. I made my case and reluctantly Noman agreed to travel back with me.’
Farrukh was causing Khan some anxiety. Despite Mumayyaz’s performance it was a thin story and if Farrukh didn’t buy it then Khan could find himself hanging at the end of a rope. The whole thing was a mess, a bloody great mess. He would have to draw heavily on his reputation for efficiency and integrity if he was to survive.
‘She will have to hand over the money,’ Farrukh said eventually. ‘You can make the payment into the Army Relief Fund.’
Although it was not unexpected, Khan was still extremely angry. More than three million dollars saved up and now lost. He was careful not to show it, though. It was imperative that he did not seem upset in front of Farrukh.
‘Of course,’ he agreed.
Under different circumstances he might have left the country at the first opportunity, and even if some amongst the Joint Chiefs entertained doubts, they might have been prepared to see him depart without any fuss. After all, others had left under a similar cloud. But without the money it was out of the question. He was going to have to keep on going, outplaying his enemies, relying on his determination and fortitude.
Meanwhile there were loose ends still to be sorted. Ed Malik must be disposed of and Noman too, preferably without the embarrassment of a court-martial. Then there was the question of repairing his relationship with the British.
‘I’ll handle the clear-up,’ he said.
‘That would be best for all concerned.’
‘You can rely on me,’ Khan replied. His uneasiness began to dissipate. Perhaps it was all going to be ok, after all.
45. #TheHiddenHand
Leyla waited for the army to collapse the cordon and leave before getting out of the car. Crossing the road she ducked under the incident tape at the entrance to the cul-de-sac and cautiously approached the Gulberg house, skirting potholes filled with muddy rainwater.
She had spent the last couple of hours in her aunt’s Volkswagen, within sight of one of the roadblocks, waiting to get back inside. After they were captured she was separated from Ed and driven back to her aunt’s place and dropped outside. She’d ditched the orange coveralls, thrown on some new clothes, taken her aunt’s car without asking and driven straight back. Since then she’d watched unmarked black vehicles come and go. She’d kept an eye on Twitter. At the time of attack several Gulberg residents had commented on the gunfire and what sounded like a tank in the road, and later others chipped in with details of the road closures. A Lahore-based news site was reporting that a major anti-terrorist operation was underway in the city.
Now it was eerily quiet.
She squeezed through the gap between the gatepost and the bulldozer and clambered over the flattened gate into the compound. There were spent cartridge cases scattered everywhere and scorch marks on the walls. She saw several large bloodstains and bloody drag marks in the sand that suggested bodies had been removed.
She climbed the steps and went in through the front door. She walked from room to room, hoping for some clue as to where they had taken Ed and why.
#
Half-an-hour later she was sitting on the kitchen steps at the back of the house, trying to work out what to do next, when the boy appeared. One moment she was alone and the next he was there, standing watching her from beside the
pipal
tree, a malnourished-looking teenage boy in a long black coat, the same boy who had given them the key the night before.
‘Hello there,’ she said, getting to her feet.
The boy shrank back into the shadows.
‘I mean you no harm,’ she said, walking slowly towards him.
The boy remained where he was.
‘I’m looking for my friend,’ she told him, ‘the man who was with me last night. They’ve taken him somewhere. I don’t know where.’
The boy nodded, solemnly.
‘Do you know where he is?’
‘Pharaoh has taken him.’
‘Pharaoh?’
The boy reached inside his jacket and took something small out of his pocket. He held it out on his palm. On it was a plain black USB stick.
‘What’s on it?’
The boy shrugged.
#
She sat cross-legged in the back of the Volkswagen with her MacBook on her lap, gave a prayer to a protector she didn’t believe in, held down the shift key to
disable auto-play, plugged the USB stick in and ran a virus scan. Nothing. She breathed a sigh of relief.
A folder of audio files. She settled back and listened to the voices. Ed’s softly delivered account of six years of clandestine meetings in ditches and graveyards and Noman’s questioning, by turns encouraging and hectoring, and always that name…Khan.
She listened and listened again, and the rain came, at first gentle and then torrential, while it hammered on the car’s roof, she swapped the USB stick for a dongle, and started doing what she knew best, digging around on the web. There were plenty of surface markers, some of them as large as roadside advertising hoardings – library photos of Khan, beaming like a talent scout, alongside the Mujahideen warlords Gulbuddin Hekmatyr and Jalaluddin Haqqani.