Portrait of a Spy

“This is your operation,” Carter said.

“This is all for one operation?”

“We’re Americans,” said Carter with a trace of contrition. “We only do big.”

“Does it have its own zip code?”

“Actually, it doesn’t even have a name yet. For now, we’re calling it Rashidistan in your honor. Let me give you the nickel tour.”

“Under the circumstances, I believe I’m owed at least ten cents’ worth.”

“Are we going to have another pissing match over turf?”

“Only if it’s necessary.”

Carter led Gabriel down a tight spiral staircase onto the floor of the op center. The stale air smelled of freshly laid carpeting and overheated electrical circuitry. A young woman with spiky black hair brushed past without a word and sat at one of the many worktables at the center of the room. Gabriel looked up at one of the video screens and saw several famous Washington pundits chatting in the warm glow of a television studio. The audio was muted.

“Are they plotting a terrorist attack?”

“Not that I’m aware of.”

“So why are we watching them?” asked Gabriel, looking around the room with a combination of wonder and despair. “Who are all these people?”

Even Carter, the nominal leader of the operation, appeared to deliberate for a moment before responding. “Most come from inside the Agency,” he said finally, “but we’ve also got NSA, FBI, DOJ, and Treasury, along with several dozen green-badgers.”

“Are they some sort of endangered species?”

“Quite the opposite,” said Carter. “The people you see wearing green credentials are all private contractors. Even I’m not sure how many we have working at Langley these days. But I do know one thing. Most of them make far more than I do.”

“Doing what?”

“A few of them are former counterterrorism types who’ve tripled their salaries by going to work for private firms. In many cases, they do the exact same jobs and hold the exact same clearances. But now they’re paid by ACME Security Solutions or some other private entity instead of the Agency.”

“And the rest?”

“Data miners,” said Carter, “and thanks to that meeting in Zurich yesterday, they’ve hit the mother lode.” He pointed toward one of the worktables. “That group over there is handling Samir Abbas, our friend from TransArabian Bank. They’re tearing him limb from limb, e-mail from e-mail, phone call from phone call, financial transaction from financial transaction. They’ve managed to assemble a data trail that predates 9/11. As far as we’re concerned, Samir alone has been worth the price of admission to this operation. It’s remarkable he’s managed to escape our notice all these years. He’s the real thing. And so is his friend at the University of Mecca.”

The girl with spiky black hair handed Carter a file. Then he led Gabriel into a soundproof conference room. A single window looked onto the floor of the op center. “Here’s your boy,” Carter said, handing Gabriel an eight-by-ten photograph. “The Saudi dilemma incarnate.”

Gabriel looked down at the photograph and saw Sheikh Marwan Bin Tayyib staring unsmilingly back at him. The Saudi cleric wore the long unkempt beard of a Salafi Muslim and the expression of a man who did not care to have his photograph taken. His red-and-white ghutra hung from his head in a way that revealed the white taqiyah skullcap beneath it. Unlike most Saudi men, he did not secure his headdress with the black circular cord known as an agal. It was a display of piety that told the world he cared little about his appearance.

“How much do you know about him?” Gabriel asked.

“He comes from the Wahhabi heartland north of Riyadh. In fact, there’s a mud hut in his hometown where Wahhab himself is said to have stayed once. The men of his town have always regarded themselves as keepers of the true faith, the purest of the pure. Even now, foreigners aren’t welcome. If one happens to come to town, the locals hide their faces and walk the other way.”

“Does Bin Tayyib have ties to al-Qaeda?”

“They’re tenuous,” said Carter, “but undeniable. He was a key figure in the awakening of Islamic fervor that swept the Kingdom after the takeover of the Grand Mosque in 1979. In his doctoral thesis, he argued that secularism was a Western-inspired plot to destroy Islam and ultimately Saudi Arabia. It became required reading among certain radical members of the House of Saud, including our old friend Prince Nabil, the Saudi interior minister who to this day refuses to admit that nineteen of the 9/11 hijackers were citizens of his country. Nabil was so impressed by Bin Tayyib’s thesis he personally recommended him for the influential post at the University of Mecca.”

Gabriel handed the photograph back to Carter, who looked at it disdainfully before returning it to the file.

“This isn’t the first time Bin Tayyib’s name has been connected to Rashid’s network,” he said. “Despite his radical past, Bin Tayyib serves as an adviser to Saudi Arabia’s much-vaunted terrorist rehabilitation program. At least twenty-five Saudis have returned to the battlefield after graduating from the program. Four are believed to be in Yemen with Rashid.”

“Any other connections?”

“Guess who was the last person to be seen in Rashid’s presence on the night he crossed back over to the other side.”

“Bin Tayyib?”

Carter nodded. “It was Bin Tayyib who issued the invitation for Rashid to speak at the University of Mecca. And it was Bin Tayyib who served as his escort on the night of his defection.”

“Did you ever raise this with your friends in Riyadh?”

“We tried.”

“And?”

“It went nowhere,” Carter admitted. “As you know, the relationship between the House of Saud and the members of the clerical establishment is complicated, to say the least. The al-Saud can’t rule without the support of the ulema. And if they were to move against an influential theologian like Bin Tayyib at our behest . . .”

“The jihadists might take offense.”

Nodding his head, Carter delved back into the file folder and produced two sheets of paper—transcripts of NSA intercepts.

“Our friend from TransArabian Bank made two interesting phone calls from his office this morning—one to Riyadh and a second to Jeddah. In the first call, he says he’s doing business with Nadia al-Bakari. In the second, he says he has a friend who wants to discuss spiritual matters with Sheikh Bin Tayyib. Separately, the two calls appear entirely innocent. But put them together . . .”

“And it leaves no doubt that Nadia al-Bakari, a woman of unimpeachable jihadist credentials, would like to have a word with the sheikh in private.”

“To discuss spiritual matters, of course.” Carter returned the transcripts to the file. “The question is,” he said, closing the cover, “do we let her go?”

“Why wouldn’t we?”

“Because it would violate all our standing agreements with the Saudi government and its security services. The Hadith clearly states that there shall not be two religions in Arabia. And the al-Saud have made it clear they won’t tolerate two intelligence services, either.”

“When are you going to realize they are the problem rather than the solution?”

“The day we no longer need their oil to power our cars and our economy,” Carter said. “We’ve arrested and killed hundreds of Saudi citizens since 9/11, but not inside Saudi Arabia itself. The country is off limits to infidels like us. If Nadia goes to see Sheikh Bin Tayyib, she has to go alone, without backup.”

“Can we bring the mountain to Muhammad?”

“If you’re asking whether Bin Tayyib can travel outside Saudi Arabia for a meeting with Nadia, the answer is