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  He came to a bank of three full-length turnstiles installed in cylindrical steel cages. They too were locked. After waiting another ten minutes, slumped and sweating under the weight of his gear, he finally gave up, dumped his stuff on the ground, and sat on the bare concrete. No sooner was he seated than he heard a click and saw a green light winking over the nearest of the three turnstiles. Scrambling to his feet, he picked up his gear and rushed toward it, only to see the light turn red again just as he reached for the bar.

  He hurled his kit to the ground again. “You goddamned sons of bitches!” he shouted. To his further rage and humiliation, it came out as more of a shriek than a bellow.

  There was a long pause, and then another green light winked on over the turnstile farthest away from him.

  This turnstile, he discovered, was so narrow that he could not pass through it while holding the heavy-duty bag containing his helmet and flak jacket. He tried pushing the bag through ahead of him, but it got wedged between the cylinder and the teeth of the turnstile so that he had to lie full length on the ground and stretch his arm through the bars to poke the bag through to the other side. And then he heard a faint click and saw that the light over the turnstile had gone red again. He closed his eyes and lay there for a while, feeling the concrete rough and cool on his cheek, and then he heard another click. This time it was the middle turnstile that was open. There was a noise from a loudspeaker on the wall that sounded like people sniggering.

  Beyond the turnstiles was a short concrete passage that ended in a wall bare except for a sliding metal hatch only a little larger than a standard house door. The hatch was painted gunmetal gray, and as he approached it, it slid noiselessly open, flooding the passage with daylight. Driscoll, fearing another last-second reverse, hurried through the door before it could close again. And thus he found himself, with no time to steel his nerves, standing alone in the Embargoed Zone, on the terrorist side of the wall. Dismayed, he spun on his heel, but the door had already slid shut behind him.

  Driscoll sank back against it. The sun was now quite high in the east, and dust and haze had turned the sky the color of watered milk. He turned his head to squint into the Embargoed Zone. Immediately before him, a long straight road—once tarred, now ripped and scored by tank tracks—led away across the free-fire zone. On either side of it lay heaps of crushed concrete and twisted steel rods, the bulldozed and bombed remains of houses and factories and border facilities. The nearest intact structures were a group of wood and tin shanties almost a mile away. Beyond them, the road stretched on through ragged fields toward the broken blocks of Hilltown, perched on their ridge three miles off. He heard sparrows in the rubble and drones wheeling in the sky. A flock of goats was grazing near the road, about halfway to the shanties, but he could see no sign of a goatherd.

  Behind him and stretching off on either side until the land rose or sank to hide it was the hard gray fact of the wall. A few yards to his right, twin watchtowers guarded a metal gate; Driscoll recognized it as the same armored gate that Captain Smith had taken him through in his jeep the day before. He could see no movement behind the tower’s tinted windows, but he guessed that there must be soldiers behind them, and that the soldiers must be watching him.

  That gave him some heart. He took his flak jacket and helmet out of their bag and put them on, then hid his passport and press ID and wallet behind the bulletproof plate in the front of the jacket. Rallying his nerves, he launched himself out into space.

  The way here was flat, the ground hard beneath a thin layer of dust, but as he trudged on and the wall fell away behind him, Driscoll felt as if he were climbing a steep and narrow path. Before he had walked two hundred yards the sweat was flowing in streams under his helmet and armor. He pressed on. Another hundred yards and the goats had noticed him, lifting their heads from the thin green shoots that pushed through the rubble, twitching their ears. A large billy goat took a few steps toward him, head lifted, fixing him with one yellow eye. Do goats attack people? Driscoll asked himself, his steps faltering. Should I make eye contact to show I’m not scared, or would that just provoke it? The goat bleated loudly, and the other goats became still, all staring at Driscoll. The billy goat took another couple of steps, almost to the edge of the road, as if planning to cut Driscoll’s line of advance, and Driscoll came to a halt, frowning past the goat at the towers of Hilltown. I mustn’t let it know that I’m scared, he told himself. They can sense that. And before he quite knew what he was doing he had taken the phone from his pocket and was pretending to dial a number.

  “Hello?” he told the phone loudly, then closed his eyes in mortification. And then, just as self-loathing was supplying him with the courage to advance, a long burst of automatic fire ripped through the air, seemingly from somewhere behind him. Driscoll spun on his heels, looking frantically about. Dear God, he thought, half crouching instinctively. Has that got something to do with me?

  There didn’t seem to be anyone else around: no obvious target or source for the fire, no one for him to take his cue from. The birds were still singing. The goats were staring at him, unperturbed by the shooting. What was the etiquette for such an occasion? Should he take cover, or would that look silly? Who would know? When he turned to the wall for guidance, it stared silently back at him.

  Only then did it occur to Driscoll that the grunt soldiers in the towers might not know who he was. They might well think that he was one of those terrorist-loving journalists and human rights people who caused their army so much trouble. In fact, he realized, they were sure to think so—what other kind of person would want to enter the Embargoed Zone? Perhaps it was the soldiers who had fired the machine gun as some kind of taunt or warning. He shuddered despite the heat. Could he decently go back now? Was honor satisfied? He had truthfully been to the Easy that day, so he could justify putting the dateline on his exclusives. But he had also undertaken to dig out original interviews, to visit the scene of yesterday’s terrorist charade, plus there was still the Toploader Project . . . . The billy goat had lost interest in him, turning its back and wandering off a few paces, and the rest of the herd was grazing again. Driscoll waited another couple of minutes, but there was no more shooting. Steeling himself, he hoisted his kit and trudged on into the Embargoed Zone. There was now a curiously tight sensation between his shoulders.

  The shanty huts, which he took to be some kind of border facility, stood at the farther end of what once must have been a car park. The door of one hut stood open, with a canvas awning stretched over it. Beneath the awning two men in black polyester trousers and gray polyester shirts sat behind a wooden table. The long walk, the sleepless night, the heat and the sweat, and the adrenaline comedown had all combined to leave Driscoll groggy; he had already handed the pair his passport before he realized what was happening. He, Flint Driscoll, was face to face with terrorists, on terrorist ground! He watched, fascinated, as the older of the two, a small, very thin man with brown teeth and combed-over hair, opened his mouth. Driscoll heard the terrorist address him.

  “Hello and welcome,” said the old man. “You’re the first foreigner to come through this week. Would you like us to fetch you a donkey?”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  Colonel White carefully turned the knob on the door, eased it open two inches, and put an eye to the crack. A new shift of drone jockeys had come on duty since his last visit. One of them was hunched blearily over a computer terminal while the other dozed in his chair, unperturbed by the explosions and machine gun fire blaring from the computer speakers or by the voices screaming “I surrender!” and “I’m wounded!” in German. Still with the World War II games, the colonel thought, feeling a stab of resentment. What was wrong with their own war, the one that they themselves were fighting? Not that it really mattered, he reassured himself: he would have been a fighter ace in World War II had he been in it. He was sure of it.

  He threw the door open, letting it bang against the wall, and surged into the room. The two drone
pilots stumbled to their feet with a pleasing air of fear and confusion.

  “Sit down!” shouted the colonel, and came to stand close behind them. “What is your situation? Lieutenant: report!”

  “Um, it’s quiet, sir,” said the older one. “Nothing since we came on duty. The artillery is shelling a few places, but we’re not spotting for them, so I guess they’re just shooting blind on a schedule or something.”

  “Very good,” rapped the colonel. “Thank you, son. You may consider yourself relieved.”

  The two airmen peered up at him, perplexed. “Relieved, sir? But regulations state—”

  “Shut up!” roared the colonel. “Regulations state that lieutenants do whatever colonels tell them. Now get the fuck out of my control room!”

  The two kids looked at each other, shrugged, and left. The colonel waited a few seconds and then followed them to the door, opened it, and peered into the dark corridor. “It’s clear,” he whispered.

  Captain Smith slipped inside. “You might have been a bit more subtle. People remember being shouted at.”

  Smith sat at the console and took a smart phone and a laptop from his bag. “Well, remember, Colonel, they didn’t see me: unlike you, I was never here this morning. Now, if you could kindly take command of the drone systems; Daddy Jesus is on standby at the wall, ready to go back into the Easy as soon as we hunt up a lead for him.”

  “Right. So where do we begin?”

  “I suppose I might as well start with Cobra. You never know; he might be stupid enough to have switched his phone back on.”

  He punched a number into his cell phone and listened for a few moments, and then his face lit up. “It’s ringing! Good old Cobra! Hello, Cobra? I hope I find you well . . . . No, the line’s pretty bad at this end, too. Perhaps you’re having trouble with your aerial . . . . Yes, yes, I know it’s too early for you to have anything new for me; I just wanted to make sure you were okay. I heard there was some kind of explosion in your neighborhood last night . . . . You didn’t know? The locals are blaming the air force, as usual, but the army press office says it was a terrorist bomb that went off prematurely. The important thing is that you’re okay.”

  Colonel White leaned over and snatched the phone from Smith’s hand. Glaring at his subordinate, he switched the phone to loudspeaker and then handed it back.

  Cobra’s voice crackled loudly in the darkened control room. “Hang on a minute, Captain. I’ll just go upstairs and see if I can get a better signal outside. I’m unplugging now.” Smith and White heard several seconds of static and muffled steps and clangs, and then Cobra’s voice burst forth again, clear and loud.

  “Okay, I’m outside now—Holy God! What the . . . ? Where the hell . . . ? My God, Captain, half the street is missing!”

  Smith rolled his eyes at the colonel. “Oh, dear. That does sound serious.”

  “There are rescuers digging in the rubble. They’re still pulling bodies out. How the hell did this happen?”

  “Like I said, Cobra, we’re still not sure.”

  “Nobody in Hilltown could have built a bomb that big without me knowing about it. God . . . Could you call me back in five minutes? I need to find out if anyone survived. My cousins lived in that building.”

  The phone went dead. The two officers exchanged glances, then simultaneously reached into their breast pockets and pulled out their cigarettes. Smith deployed his lighter, and they hunched, smoking in silence, until it was time to call again.

  “Cobra,” said Smith urgently, “please, before we go any further, tell me, are your relatives okay? Is there anything I can do to help? Medicine? Cash? I might be able to swing permission for children to be treated in our hospitals, if their parents agree to work for us. Just say the word: I’m here for you.”

  There was a long pause before Cobra spoke. “That’s all right, Captain. They’re all dead.”

  “I’m most dreadfully sorry.”

  “They’re all dead,” Cobra repeated, sounding baffled now. “The whole building imploded on them. God . . . ”

  “There, there, Cobra,” Smith said soothingly. “There, there. I’m sorry for your loss.”

  Cobra said nothing for a while, and then he spoke again. “I heard something else, too, from the rescuers. At the same time that my cousins were killed, your drones attacked 24/7’s jeep in Hilltown. They killed that guy Tony I told you about last night and a whole lot of other people who came into the street.”

  “Yes, I heard that too. Very sad business. I’m still trying to find out why that happened. Probably a mistake, I should think. Wrong place, wrong time sort of thing.”

  Smith and White took synchronized pulls on their cigarettes and hunched in on themselves, waiting.

  “It seems a bit odd,” mused Cobra. “Do you think it might have something to do with that washing machine business? Tony was involved in that . . . . And so am I, come to think of it.” His voice rose suddenly. “Good God, Captain! Are you trying to kill me? Was that bomb last night meant for me?”

  Colonel White winced. Smith opened his eyes wide and then closed them again for maximum concentration. His fingers drummed a temple. “Dear God, no, Cobra! After all we’ve achieved together? I would never allow you to come to any harm. But you know—hang on—there is one possibility: it could be that new commanding officer I told you about. The one who’s a bit of a prick.” White gave him a foul look, but Smith waved him off. “He keeps me in the dark about a lot of things, and I’m not sure that he even knows what he’s doing himself half the time. He’s the one who wants that washing machine so badly. I don’t know why—he’s quite mad. Maybe—just maybe—he’s got something to do with these regrettable incidents.”

  “Oh, my God!” Cobra shrieked. “Your commanding officer wants me dead? What on earth can I do?”

  “Let me think about that for a moment . . . . Cobra? It occurs to me there’s just one way that maybe we can solve this thing. Here’s a thought: if you find that washing machine and hand it over to me, I can intercede for you with the colonel—that would probably work. But without the washing machine I’ve got nothing to work with; the colonel hates my guts. I’m hanging on by my fingernails as it is.”

  White grunted his agreement.

  There was another wait before Cobra spoke again. “Okay, I’ll find your goddamn washing machine. But the price has gone up, Captain: I want twenty grand now, not what we agreed to last night. And when this is done, you’re going to take me out of the Embargoed Zone. I can’t go on like this anymore: I want to go into your relocation program.”

  “But Cobra, what would I do without you in the Easy? You’re my best operator!”

  “Not for much longer, Captain—I’m living on borrowed time here. The few men I still have are beginning to suspect me. And that mad American bitch from People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals has started putting up posters of me all around the Easy, saying I’m wanted for donkey murder—I’m the laughingstock of the militant community. And now your boss is out to kill me as well! You have to get me out of here—let me go abroad and join my family.”

  “Oh, very well. Twenty grand it is, and when it’s over, I’ll put you in the program. Just get us that washing machine. Go and see that girl again—there’s no time to waste. I still think she might know something. And don’t try making any side deals with the Iranians, Cobra. We know all about them. They’ll be no use to you.”

  “Iranians? What Iranians?”

  “Don’t play games with me. Go find the girl.”

  Smith hung up the line.

  “He can’t be all that stupid,” commented the colonel. “He’s smart enough to demand twenty grand and a place in the program.”

  Smith lit another cigarette and puffed meditatively. “Oh, he’s stupid, all right. There is no relocation program—we don’t have a budget for one. It’s just something I made up to keep my agents happy.”

  “Really? So what happens when an agent is blown?”

  “Well, ob
viously, we can’t leave them in the Easy—they’d tell the other terrorists all they knew under torture. Worse, they might even start talking to journalists about some of our more . . . proactive activities.”

  “So you give them a new identity on this side of the wall?”

  “Yes, you could say that.” Smith took another expansive drag on his cigarette. “What normally happens is that Daddy Jesus picks up the blown agent at an agreed rendezvous inside the Embargoed Zone. He takes them out through the wall, and then he drives them on a way, alone, out into the national park. And that’s where he puts them in the program.”

  The colonel shook his head. “That’s pretty cold-blooded,” he marveled.

  Smith gave a little bow. “I’ll take that as a compliment coming from someone who used to fly attack helicopters.”

  “But you’ve worked with these people. Surely some kind of bond forms with them . . . like a reverse Stockholm syndrome?”

  Smith looked pained. “I’m doing them a kindness, sir! It wouldn’t do to leave them in the Easy to be tortured to death. Daddy Jesus is very quick and businesslike when he wants to be.”

  “I have to admit, Smith, that I may have underestimated you. So what shall we do now? Sit and wait?”

  “No, we’ll keep working my contacts. We can’t put all our eggs in one basket.”

  The colonel sat back and drummed his fingers on the arm of his chair. A frown spread slowly across his face. “There’s something else that’s bothering me,” he said finally. “Why is Cobra upping his price to twenty thousand euros? I thought you’d agreed on twenty grand with him already.”

  Smith’s phone, which he’d placed on the console, beeped twice.

  “Oh, good!” he said brightly. “This could be a break. One of my leads has just sent me a text message.”