Two guards flank the double doors that lead to a side wing. The Walther’s silencer comes in handy. I neutralize the men without making a sound. The path is clear. Like a thief, I tiptoe down the corridors until I reach an atrium with a waterspout fountain. I smell frankincense. The fragrance of The Arabian Nights. I make quick work of one more security man and stow away his corpse in a bathroom: gold-plated faucets, marble slabs on the floor.
I get to a pillared hall, its walls decorated with calligraphic symbols, when I’m startled by a voice calling out to me. I have been discovered. I duck behind a pillar. The guard fires at me, but his shot just bounces off the column. I hear more voices, as others hurry to his aid. Now, it’s time for the Uzi. I empty a magazine, spraying the four guards with bullets, while they are rushing at me. They never stand a chance. I quickly reload and shoot at the two men who are now coming down the stairs. My movements are fluid, my actions those of a robot. Pierced by a number of slugs, the men tumble down the steps and slump on the floor. They’re both dead. Ignoring the first guard, who’s still firing at me, I run up the stairs to the first floor, my opponent stubbornly on my heels. I kick open a door, look around the bedroom behind it, cross an antechamber, and gingerly open a door to the hall, where I stop. The guard thinks I’m still in the other room and turns his back to me. Plop. Plop. The Walther ends his life, barely making a sound.
While I climb floor after floor, a TV feature about the Imam comes to mind. His lair was located in the fifth floor of the fortified tower, he then boasted to the beautiful blonde female reporter.
When I push open a door I end up in a windowless room. I lower my gun. The view in front of me sends a shiver down my spine. Arranged around a calligraphic ornament on the floor, spears have been anchored in holes drilled into the marble slabs. I hold my breath. There are heads impaled on these spears. Skulls and hair are glistening as if coated with a layer of wax. Little name plaques nailed to the shafts of the spears list the names of their owners. I recognize the six Chechens, the Imam’s first victims after he seized power. But there are other faces I’ve never seen before. The features of the dead lose their distinctive marks with time like those of mummies. Some of the heads date from decades ago. My guess is that it must be more than sixty of them altogether. A chronicle of the Imam’s murderous career. The story of a deplorable life, as told by the heads of the dead. I walk along the row of heads, only looking up now and then. When I finally stop, I have to swallow. This is the view I’ve been afraid of all along. My hope evaporates that I can still make it in time. For the row ends with the head of Lucas. I stop for a while, lost in thought as if I was praying. Then, I pull the head off the spear, put it on a chair, and carefully wrap it in a blanket. I want to spare him this last indignity.
Lucas was the roof-runner, the killer of the Salafists. This much is clear. He wanted to avenge the 21 martyrs. The photo of the group must have fallen into his hands somehow. The one with the Imam and the other ruthless murderers, posing in an unknown desert. He’s the one who killed the Chechen and the Arabs. However, he failed to fool a blind man of the cloth. Ali Bansuri, your time has come to pay for all the evil you did. I’ll be the hand, Lucas doesn’t have any longer. I’ll be his tool. I take the habit from my briefcase and put it on. It fits like a glove. After I have donned the hood, I reach for the Glock. The case and the other gun I leave behind. When I hear noises from the bedroom, I check the magazine of the pistol. The dum-dum bullet is waiting right on top. Step number three. Much too easy for a bastard like him.
13
An old man is in front of a fireplace, hastily tearing out sheets from a file folder and tossing them into the flames. Even though he is blind, he easily finds the next file on his desk. The old man seems to try to destroy evidence before
