THE WAVE: A John Decker Thriller (11 page)

Despite his affectations, Johnson had risen through the ranks with startling speed, earning three special commendations in the last year alone. His handsome, well-shaped lips quivered as his eyes bore into Decker. He shifted from one foot to the next, glanced at Warhaftig, the Intel specialist on loan from the CIA, and bit his tongue. After a moment of unbearable silence, he looked up at the falling rain. It had grown heavier in the last few seconds. He raised the collar of his coat and started up the street. “Let’s take a look at the apartment,” he said over his shoulder.

Someone alerted the landlord and he let them into the apartment without a fuss. Johnson had brought along a search warrant from a local federal judge based on the tax evasion charges linked to the cigarette heist. The suspects had yet to be categorized as foreign agents under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).

The team picked their way through the apartment fastidiously, finding dozens of cell phones and hundreds of badly printed radical Islamic tracts but nothing conclusive. Williams did, however, uncover pay stubs for three men, including presumably the third suspect, Mecca.

His “real” name was Salim Moussa. He drove the night shift at the Imperial Taxi Company of Queens – the same cab company where Ali Singh worked – and labored as a handyman at a place called East Village Jukebox, on Broadway and Eleventh Street in Manhattan. They photographed everything. Johnson still huffed and puffed. When Decker asked to examine the hard disk of the PC, the SAC denied it. The search warrant didn’t permit them to scan or copy any hard disk, Johnson said. Decker noticed that a standard Windows background had replaced the PC wallpaper he’d spotted earlier. He pointed this out but Johnson was adamant; he didn’t want to overstep his bounds. “Fruit from the poisoned tree,” he kept on saying.

“Well, I took some photographs before,” said Decker. “It was raining pretty hard but they should come out.”

Warhaftig, the CIA Intel specialist, was mildly interested. “What did you see?” he asked.

Warhaftig looked like an ex-Sergeant. He was fifty, with a tough but friendly face, large brown eyes framed by a pair of wire-rimmed glasses, a nose that appeared to have been broken more than once, and a grim no-nonsense kind of mouth. But he’d grown a bit of a paunch the last few years. He was always chained to his desk, and if he did get out, it was generally to the choicest restaurant, drinking or dining with someone with expensable tastes. Veal was his principle weapon these days.

“Some kind of Arabic calligraphy,” said Decker. “Bordered by an arabesque design
.
”

“You may be some kind of genius with languages and cryptoanalytics,” Johnson cut in, “some kind of wunderkid, but you’ve got a lot to learn about field work, Decker. This was a simple stakeout.” He then told Williams and Kazinski to set up additional surveillance teams where they knew the suspects worked. “Decker,” he continued, “you go back across the street and keep your eyes peeled.”

Decker and Warhaftig made their way back to the surveillance squat across the street. Decker ducked into the bathroom to clean up; he still had blood on his cuffs. When he returned to the window, Warhaftig was smoking a cigarette – a Camel. “Don’t take it too hard,” he said. “It wasn’t your fault. You probably didn’t have the shot. And Johnson, if you don’t mind my saying so, is a bit of a blowhard. I’ve never heard of anyone not being sent home or to counseling after losing a partner. He’s just pissed off his unit’s down a man.”

Decker sat down beside him and peered out through the camera at the apartment across the street. It was hauntingly empty now. Pitch black. The suspects must have turned the lights off before they left. Warhaftig said he was sorry that Decker had missed his lecture. “What do you know about El Aqrab and the Brotherhood of the Crimson Scimitar?” he asked.

“Not much,” said Decker, reluctant to start yet another conversation bound to blow up in his face.

Warhaftig filled him in about the organization, and about El Aqrab himself. It was a quick synopsis from his humble birth in Lebanon. Trained in Kazakhstan with the renowned guerrilla leader Gulzhan Baqrah. Explosives expert. Implicated in a number of bombings, including the U.S. Marine barracks and U.S. embassy in Lebanon in ‘83. Blew up oil wells in Kuwait during the first Gulf war and was responsible for dozens of bombings in Lebanon and Israel, including the booby trap in Shiheen in ’93 that murdered twelve Israeli soldiers.

Trained suicide bombers over the last decade during the intifadah, and then disappeared about three years ago, presumably killed after being targeted by an Israeli rocket strike.

But Crimson Scimitar cells continued to blow up U.S. soldiers in Iraq and in Afghanistan. The organization never died. Israeli information was uncharacteristically sketchy, especially concerning someone of El Aqrab’s renown. One thing was legendary, however: Signature pyrotechnics were a featured part of each event.

“If he was killed, what’s all the fuss?” asked Decker.

“Well, that’s just it,” Warhaftig said. “After three years, he’s resurfaced. According to our sources, he’s now in Israeli custody. Caught after slaughtering some family in Tel Aviv.”

The two sat in silence, watching the rain fall on the window. Decker could still feel the incision of the wound in Tony’s back. He could not get the image of his partner’s . . . his
ex
-partner’s fingers out of his head. He kept seeing them open, splay apart, and then slide across the balustrade, just out of reach. Just gone.

“Don’t worry,” said Warhaftig, as if reading his mind. “These things happen. I’m telling you, it wasn’t your fault. Don’t let Johnson get to you. It’s just part of the job. Won’t affect your file much.”

“Look, Warhaftig, I don’t need babysitting. And I’m not worried about my file.”

Warhaftig stubbed his cigarette out in the saucer by his feet. “I know you’re not,” he said, blowing out smoke. “What I mean is, you have a solid record. That thing in Iowa, for instance.”

Decker was surprised. Warhaftig had just joined the team that afternoon. “What do you know about Iowa?” he asked.

“You were born there, in Davenport,” said Warhaftig, “to a policeman father – John Decker Sr. – and a librarian mother – Louise Carrick. Lost both of your parents in a car crash when you were just fifteen. Spent fourteen hours in surgery, two months in a coma, and a year-and-a-half in physical therapy. Some said you’d never walk again, but I guess you proved them wrong. Raised by your mother’s older sister, Betsy, and her husband, Tom Llewellyn, in nearby Bettendorf. Your father insisted you take up martial arts since you were such a runty little kid, and you took several trophies in long-distance running and Kung Fu in high school, eventually becoming a black belt at seventeen.” He laughed. “Had a growth spurt senior year, I guess. Went to College at Northwestern on a scholarship, where you majored in mathematics; minored in foreign languages. Graduated
Summa Cum Laude
,
Phi Beta Kappa, blah blah blah
. Did your thesis on neural network predictive modeling, whatever that is. Have a facility for finding patterns in seemingly random data. It was this skill that particularly impressed your instructors at Quantico where – after college and a two-year stint on the Bettendorf Police Force – you trained to become a Cryptanalyst Forensic Examiner with the FBI. Graduated at the top of your class. Then spent eighteen months with the Racketeering Records Analysis Unit in Washington, D.C., learning the ropes, before being transferred to Chicago.”

Warhaftig paused, drifting on the river of his memory. He took a breath and said, “Had a girlfriend in college named Anne Tierney, a few love affairs in DC. Nothing too serious. A few call girls. Plus a girlfriend in Chicago named Maureen O’Donnell for about four months. Like those Irish girls. She left you when you couldn’t commit. Transferred to the Joint Terrorism Task Force in New York after the McNally case in Iowa, for which you received a special commendation. Now subletting a one-bedroom in the Village, slightly beyond your means. Don’t smoke or drink, except on special occasions. Love chicken and fish, especially Sushi, but you aren’t much of a red meat eater, are you, John? Read the
Journal of Cryptanalytics
religiously every Tuesday. Brought up a Democrat but you’re largely apolitical. Never been in serious debt. Not much of a dresser, that’s for sure. Oh, and no pets. That about sum it up?” Warhaftig smiled. “You have a facility for numbers,” he added. “I’m cursed with a near photographic memory. Pick your poison.”

Decker was flabbergasted at Warhaftig’s breadth of knowledge. He shook his head.
Is that all I’ve become?
he thought.
Just a page or two in someone’s file.

Decker shrugged. “Born with a good ear. My mother played piano pretty well. My dad spoke French and Italian and Spanish, in addition to English. He was a seaman once, in his teens and early twenties. Is that in the file too?”

“It is,” Warhaftig said. “Must have been pretty interesting with two headstrong parents, one Catholic and one Episcopalian. But I guess you could say Episcopalian is kind of Catholic lite. Me, I’m a Jew. Not a very good one, mind you.” He laughed, until he noticed his stomach wiggling. Then he frowned and said, “Still, I’d say that speaking ten languages, six fluently, is more than just ‘a few.’ You always this modest? What’s that?” Warhaftig pointed at the floor.

“Sometimes you can see a pattern better when you try and replicate it, rather than just looking at it. You can see the depth. I mean . . . Okay, for example, I didn’t even notice the number on the bottom right hand side until I drew the arabesque. Then I realized there was a break in the pattern.”

“What number?”

“Here,” said Decker, reaching out. He flipped the pages of the notebook rapidly. Once again, the illustration coalesced into a whole as the pages fanned together. “You see? The wallpaper has three obvious keys: Two lines of text, plus a number.” He turned the notebook to a specific page and pointed at the image. “Those are the words, ‘Pregnant She-Camels,’ in Arabic. See? And here – another phrase.” He flipped a few more pages. “‘When Hell Is Raised Up.’ I know the Arabic script is foliated. It makes it hard to read.” He turned back to the beginning of the notebook. “And, finally, a number. See? 540,000. On the bottom right hand side.”

“What does it mean?”

“I’ve no idea,” said Decker. He closed the notebook. “I’ve examined the words using a number of techniques and ciphers. The phrases are too brief for me to figure out a source.” He dropped the notebook on the floor. “And the number could be anything: A place reference or coordinate; a page, a chapter or verse; a bank account; or a time. Perhaps even a timer to something – an event.”

“What does that mean?” asked Warhaftig.

“The number could represent hours or, more likely, seconds, given its size. You know: A countdown.” Decker reached out for the camera. “That’s the thing about illustrations. I doubt I ever would have found that number using just a camera. Pictures only deliver images two-dimensionally. Unlike illustrations, photographs are . . . ” He froze. Then he glanced up, horrified. He looked at the rear panel of the camera and cursed under his breath.

“I’m sure I loaded this thing. You don’t think those guys could have come back and . . . ” Decker rolled to his feet and checked the apartment door. Nothing was out of place. The doorframe was clean. Nobody had tried to force it open. He walked back to the window and collapsed into his chair.

Warhaftig reached into his raincoat. He took out his cell phone and punched a number. “SAC Johnson?” he said. “It’s Warhaftig.”

Decker looked up in surprise. He could hear Johnson’s shrill voice echo back.

“Listen,” Warhaftig said, “for what it’s worth, I just wanted to say that – in my opinion – you shouldn’t be too hard on Decker. The way I see it, Special Agent Bartolo took it upon himself to follow those three suspects across the roof before backup had arrived. Probably would have done the same thing myself, given the circumstances, but you can hardly blame Decker.” He paused, then added, “Anyone can make a mistake, sir. He didn’t have the shot.” He pulled the phone away from his ear as Johnson shouted back. “What I mean is,” said Warhaftig, cutting him off, “I was in the field for almost fourteen years, and you’ll never guess what just happened. I was leaning over, reaching for my binoculars, and – well – I knocked over your Nikon, sir. Yeah,” he added, looking at Decker. “I’m afraid so. I suggest you submit a cross-charge. I’m sure the Agency insurance team will order a replacement. No, sir. Apparently nothing crucial.” He winked at Decker. “Yes, a new one, sir. Of course. Alright then,” he said. “Thank you, sir, for being so understanding. Yes, sir.” He hung up the phone and slipped it back into his raincoat.