he’s in the area, there might be a reference in the local paper. He’s a very influential person, former national security adviser to the president. He’s too big a man to get lost entirely.”
“Will you try to kill him again?”
“Certainly,” replied her husband. “That’s why we’re here, and in particular that’s why we switched to the east side of the country, where he’s most likely to be.”
They checked into the Claymore, and Ravi slept for two hours. Shakira went out and bought some magazines, which she came back and read. It was obvious to anyone, at least anyone who was awake, that she was sick and tired of this relentless chase to assassinate the American.
Shakira had a foreboding that it would end in tears. In her opinion, everything had gone wrong, right from the start — the ludicrous Matt Barker, the unlucky Jerry O’Connell, the equally unlucky George Kallan. They were all dead, and in Shakira’s mind she and Ravi would soon be dead if they didn’t call the whole thing off and leave for the Middle East forthwith.
Even Ravi had admitted that the amount of security surrounding the admiral was very intense. But as her determination waned, so Ravi’s had increased. And Shakira was afraid he might be losing the cold-blooded streak of realism that had always kept him on the straight and narrow, no matter what the mission.
In Shakira’s opinion, this was all connected to that terrible night in Damascus when their house had been flattened by a bomb and she had been so lucky to get out. She’d never really gotten to the bottom of that, but she had asked Ravi, and he had been very vague except to say that he suspected the Israelis, under American guidance. Especially under Arnold Morgan’s guidance.
But it had all taken so long. They had journeyed so far. And now they were off on some wild-goose chase to find the admiral, and they did not even know his address. They did not even know what town he was in, never mind what country. And there was an unreasonable determination about her husband. He was a man possessed. Nothing else mattered to him. Shakira had never seen him like this before.
She sat disconsolately in an armchair in their room at the Claymore. For a while she read
Against all Muslim teaching, she felt like a glass of wine; she phoned down, asking someone to bring up two glasses and to reserve a table for two in the dining room for 7:30 this evening.
Ravi awakened at seven and without a word went into the bathroom to take a shower. He was totally preoccupied and was becoming almost distant. Shakira did not for one moment believe he was losing interest in her, but she was beginning to worry about this obsession that had taken over his life. Because it was an obsession to kill not an opposing force, but one single man whom he had never even met.
Generally speaking, Shakira did not believe this was a healthy situation. And she did not believe commanders of serious military organizations should behave in that way. It seemed both unnatural and unnecessary.
But Ravi maintained a passionate hatred for the American admiral, and when he came out of the bathroom, as if reading her mind, he said, “I’m not giving up, Shakira. If I have to pursue him to the ends of the earth, I will do so.”
Dinner that evening was thus fraught, and the tension between them seemed to grow, as Shakira harbored more and more doubts about this very personal vendetta in which her husband was involved.
Ravi, for his part, was more determined than ever to end the admiral’s life, but he sensed that his wife did not wish to hear any more about it. Shakira wished only to tell her husband yet again that she wanted to call the entire thing off, but did not dare to do so. As silent dinners go, this one was right up there.
They were only around thirty miles short of the Scottish border, but it was another ninety miles to Glasgow, which was their vague destination. The truth was, Ravi did not know where the hell he was going. All he knew was that Great Britain’s submarine roads were out to the west of Scotland’s second city, and that was where Admiral Morgan had served as captain of a nuclear boat out of the American base at Holy Loch.
Emily Gallagher had confirmed that her daughter was going to Scotland, but the rest was pure guesswork on Ravi’s part. His game plan was to check into a hotel in Glasgow, one with access to the Internet, and start searching for any shred of evidence that a former NSA to the American president was expected in the area.
He and Shakira once more drove with hardly a word spoken. They reached the outskirts of Glasgow around noon and moved fast around the city on the freeway. Ravi followed the signs to the city center, crossed the River Clyde, and pulled up outside the Millennium Hotel in George Square, Glasgow’s focal point.
Ravi had not been here for many years, but he remembered Scotland’s last great shipbuilding city, and he smiled for the first time this week when the receptionist told him there was a large double room which he and Mrs. Barden could have for two nights. And yes, there was a communications room for visiting businessmen who wanted access to the Internet. There were four desktop Apple Macintosh computers in there, and it was open twenty-four hours.
Ravi and Shakira checked in, and immediately his mood began to lighten. He took Shakira down to the hotel’s conservatory, which looks out onto the square, and ordered coffee and chicken sandwiches for lunch.
He apologized for his melancholy demeanor and tried to explain that he had taken a sacred oath, among his peers in the Hamas High Command, that he would rid the
“But what about me?” asked Shakira, plaintively. “I won’t let you die alone. But I still don’t understand why this cannot be like any other military operation. You try, you fail, then you retreat, regroup, and perhaps someone else takes over as leader. Great victories are sometimes won at the second or third try. It does not have to be all or nothing, every time.”
“This one does, Shakira. This one is to the death.”
“Do you have any real hope of finding him here? This Glasgow is a very big place.”
“I know,” said Ravi. “It’s a kind of surprise after driving all through that amazing lonely country — the Yorkshire moors, then the Lake District, then the border country, and suddenly there’s this giant metropolis right on the banks of the Clyde.”
“And those freeways, it was like being back in London.”
“A long time ago,” said Ravi, “Glasgow was described as the Second City of Empire. After London, that is. And there were a lot of cities in the British Empire. Half the bloody world. It was a very important place.”
“You still haven’t told me what happens to me if you manage to get yourself killed. What am I supposed to do? Where could I go?”
Ravi was once more silent. “You are right in your thoughts. There would be nowhere else for you to go. Because they’d hunt you down and charge you with the murder of Matt Barker. Plus God knows how many other crimes. Shakira, I am pretty hard to kill, and I’m not even considering that possibility. But if we have to die, we die together, like Holy Warriors.”
“Well, I’m sick of this dying business,” she replied. “I’m sick of blowing things up and hating everyone. I’ve been in the West for a long time now, and I can’t think of any reasons why we should go around trying to kill people. I’ve liked nearly everyone I’ve met. I’m not even sure this Admiral Morgan is all that bad.”
Despite the seriousness of Shakira’s mindset, Ravi laughed. He had another bite of his chicken sandwich, principally to give himself time to think up a reply, and then he said, “Sometimes there is a far bigger picture than the little corner we occupy.”
“I’m not in a picture,” she said. “I’m right here in Glasgow eating chicken sandwiches, and I don’t want you to go off and blow this admiral’s head apart with your special bullets, and then get shot by the police. That’s all.”
“And I don’t want to go around being told to
“Because I’m wanted for murder in County Cork,” replied Ravi. “And there would never be any peace for us. We have just one choice. I have to complete my mission, and then we go back to Gaza or Damascus where we will be protected. We must live in an Arab country, because that’s where we will be looked after for the rest of our lives.”
