going to stand by and watch while you shoot up the place?”
“I’m not going to shoot up the place. Mr. Thompson, I’m happy to talk this over with you face-to-face. Show you the intel, sat photos, forensic work, et cetera. You’re not convinced, I’ll reconsider. But it has to be tomorrow morning. My men and I are going in at noon.”
“Your men? Where’d they come from?”
“Sources and methods.”
“Please stop saying that. It’s meaningless. Anyway, what kind of commando attacks in broad daylight?”
Another point for Thompson. “Why they’ll never expect it.”
“What if I told you that I’ve just received a credible ransom demand and I’m sure the hostages are nowhere near that camp?”
“I’d say the timing’s awfully convenient. And I’ve got to trust my own intel.”
“Give me Moss.”
Wells handed over the phone. “I told him he was being rash . . . I’m not the one who said he could come, Jim. You did . . . I can tell you he’s not listening to me . . .” She gave the phone back to Wells.
“I want to talk you out of this foolishness, I have to come to Dadaab tomorrow morning,” Thompson said.
“Correct.”
“I’ll take the first plane I can. And I’ll expect you to be on it with me when I go back to Nairobi. And then you’re going home. I don’t care who you are.”
“Moss and I will pick you up.”
“Promise me you won’t do anything before then.”
“Agreed. Over and out.”
—
The next morning, Wells had just finished his dawn prayers when his phone rang. “You still serious about this?” Thompson said without preamble.
“Yes.”
“I’ll be in the air in five minutes. Should be in Dadaab around seven a.m.”
“We’ll be there. With a thermos of hot coffee, plenty of milk and sugar.”
“First smart thing you’ve said since we met.”
Dadaab’s airport was a fenced strip of pockmarked runway, with a one-room concrete building for a terminal. A wind sock at the far end served in place of a control tower. North of the runway, an old Dash-8 listed over its front wheels, paint peeling. Wells doubted it could taxi, much less get airborne. A GSU officer smoked in front of the terminal, his AK tossed over his shoulder.
“No flights today.”
“We have a charter. A friend coming in a few minutes,” Moss said.
“He has permits?”
“Of course.”
“No permits, he can’t stay.”
Wells wondered again why the GSU seemed so much more interested in keeping people out of Dadaab than finding the volunteers. But this officer wasn’t the man to ask. Instead Wells followed Moss around the building as a plane rumbled in the distance. “Right on time,” Moss said.
A boy of six or so ran from a cluster of huts south of the fence. He ducked through a hole in the wire and ran to them, his arms outstretched like wings.
“De plane, boss, de plane,” he yelled when he got close.
“Our very own Tattoo,” Wells said.
“I don’t know who taught him that, but he does it whenever a plane comes in,” Moss said. “Hey, Freddy,” she yelled.
“Hey, hot mama.” The boy wore a blue T-shirt imprinted with the words
“No fifty shillings, Freddy.”
“Ten shillings, boss.”
“Go on. Back to San Diego.” Wells was surprised to see Moss dig into her pocket, hand the boy a coin. She said something in Swahili. The boy ran off with his arms spread. Moss nodded at the huts. “Have to give him something or whoever’s watching over there will take a stick to him when he gets back.”
“What about when five kids show up? Or five hundred?”
“I know. Solve one problem, create dependency and a bigger one. You have a better solution?”
“My first instinct would be to beat the stuffing out of whoever’s hurting that boy.”
“Then you leave, and he gets paid back tenfold.”
Wells had no good answer. They watched as the plane came in low and slow, a stubby-winged four-seat Cessna 172, the Toyota Corolla of aviation. Simple, cheap, reliable.
“So how’s this going to work, John? You tell Jimmy you want his phone and the truth? And he confesses everything because you’ve asked the question just so.”
“That would be the elegant alternative.”
“I sense you’re not the elegant type. You want to tell me, then?”
“Better if you don’t know.”
The Cessna touched down, bumped over the potholed runway, taxied to a halt fifty feet away. The passenger door swung open. Thompson stepped down, his laptop bag strung over his shoulder. He closed the door, walked toward them. His face was tight and angry. “Let’s go,” he said. “Get this over with.”
—
Wells sat in the back of the Land Cruiser and poured himself a mug of coffee.
“I get one?” Thompson said. “Been up since four.” Wells poured another mug and handed it forward. Thompson took a long swallow. “Hits the spot. Best thing about this country, the coffee.” He drank again. “You use something artificial as a sweetener, John?”
“Just sugar.”
“Because it has kind of a funny aftertaste.”
“I’m not getting that.”
“Strange. Guess I’m tired.” Thompson licked his lips, drank for the third time. “I feel, I don’t feel—” He looked over his shoulder at Wells. “You.”
Thompson’s mouth hung open. His eyes drooped closed. His head hung down and his body slumped forward, deadweight against his seat belt. The mug tipped from his nerveless hands and coffee rushed onto his khakis.
Moss pulled over. “What in the name of all that’s holy just happened?”
“Your Irish comes out when you’re stressed.”
“This was your plan? Tell me you didn’t poison him.”
“He’ll be fine. Sleep twelve hours, maybe a little more, wake up with a headache.” Unless he drank too much. Then he might die.
“What is it?”
“Rohypnol.” Wells had packed the pills in his bag of tricks from New Hampshire. He’d ground up twelve, mixed them into the thermos. Coffee and milk masked their bitter taste. “It’s a sedative, like Valium. Puts you to sleep. Just faster.”
“Don’t piss on my leg and tell me it’s raining, John. You carry that stuff around? Isn’t that the date-rape drug?”
“I don’t plan to rape him. Though you’re welcome to.”
“I thought you were going to talk to him.”
“I am, eventually.” Wells lowered the window, dumped out the thermos. “Let’s go.”
“I hope to God you’re right about this.” Moss slipped the Land Cruiser back into gear and they drove in silence for a while. “What are you going to tell him when he wakes up?”
