YAOUNDE, CAMEROON
Bumping up against the hotels and high-rise apartments between Avenue Monseigneur Vogt and the railroad tracks, running nearly to the wide front steps of the Cathedrale Notre Dame des Victoires, with its pitched gable roof, lofty white crucifix, and swirl of Christian hymns and animist chants spilling on the streets at Mass time, the Marche du Mfoundi was the busiest open-air market in Yaounde, the capital city of Cameroon.
Displayed under faded, slightly tattered pastel sun umbrellas were meat, fish, vegetables, religious totems, folk medicines, sculpted wooden figures, handcrafted rugs, garments, and baskets, and merchandise of countless other varieties. French and English could be heard mingling with Beti dialects as buyers and sellers haggled over prices at the crowded vendor stalls. Motorcycle taxis and yellow cabs weaved through traffic, cutting off cars, vans, and trucks of assorted vintage, startling pedestrians as they veered past. In the near distance, nestling Yaounde’s spaghetti tangle of streets and avenues on all sides, the Central African hills rose with their shags of green forest, tumbledown shanties, and rugged dirt roads, over which many of the vendors made their way down to the city’s marketplaces each dawn, carrying their goods in mule carts or flatbed trucks, hoping to return with lighter loads and something of a profit before nightfall brought its threat of predatory thieves and bandits.
A short walk from the market, Ryan Kealey emerged from his hotel into the warm noonday sunshine, feeling just a little the worse for wear after his trip, which had been long but fairly comfortable. The flight out of Johannesburg on Kenya Airways had been followed by an extended layover at JKIA, west of Nairobi, where his connection, a sleek Boeing 737, had arrived after an hour’s delay for the final sprint to Yaounde’s Nsimalen International. Informed he’d missed his hotel’s courtesy shuttle, Kealey had hailed a taxi for the thirty-minute drive to the Hilton on Boulevard du 20 Mai. As Harper had promised, a prepaid reservation had been made for him there.
He’d left South Africa at eleven o’clock the night before and spent nine hours in travel, reaching his hotel room at about six in the morning due to the difference in time zones. Gaining the two extra hours hadn’t hurt-it had given him a chance to rest up before he met his contact. Though he’d been convinced he was too wired and out of synch to sleep, he’d set his cell phone alarm for ten thirty just in case and actually dozed off on a chair while skimming through a complimentary copy of the Tribune, the country’s bilingual French-English newspaper.
When the alarm went off, Kealey showered, changed his clothes, called room service for some coffee, and headed out toward the market feeling decently refreshed. The temperature even in the full sun was probably in the seventies-about what it would have been in Johannesburg, where the winter climate was similarly moderate.
Now he crossed the boulevard on Rue Goker, passing a statue of John Kennedy on the avenue named after the assassinated U.S. president. Among the people here he was a heroic figure, his status rising almost to the same level of myth as in the States-and the reason, for Kealey, was no mystery. A lifetime ago, when he’d lectured in international relations at the University of Maine, he’d reminded students that the Peace Corps, which most of them believed had sprung from charitable ideals, had actually been brainstormed as a proactive-and cannily pragmatic-foreign policy initiative for staving off Soviet influence in the third world. In Cameroon, then a young republic after gaining independence from French colonialism, Communist maquisards had been entrenched in the bush, launching repeated terrorist strikes at its pro-Western government. It had been an early test of Kennedy’s Cold War plan to offer the carrot before the stick in strengthening American interests. And in this country, at least, it had proven an effective tool.
Kealey went several more blocks on the avenue, then turned right toward the marketplace. It was full of activity, people milling about everywhere, some dressed in Western clothes, others in flowing, big-pocketed cotton shirts and pants with embroidery and colorful patterns spun into their fabric.
His dark eyes scanned the street through the jumble of shoppers crowding the stands-tourists, locals, men and women of every age. Mothers in traditional kabbas, many with three or four children while barely out of adolescence themselves, held babies in carriers against their breasts and urged dawdling toddlers along with quick tugs on their wrists.
Up ahead at the curbside, Kealey noticed black coils of cooking smoke wafting from a food stall occupied by 2 women in traditional robes. Their skin the color of burnt caramel, Kealey guessed them to be mother and daughter, with the younger of the pair stirring the contents of a large saucepan on a barrel-shaped, coal-fired oven. He could smell roasting peanuts and a sweet, not quite identifiable overlaying scent in the thick smoke.
After a moment he checked his chronograph wristwatch. It was 12:20. Still a little early.
There was a gray-bearded man to his left standing over an assortment of knives spread out on a threadbare woven carpet, and Kealey decided to kill a few minutes by having a look. The vendor had a large choice for sale-machetes, bowies, hunting knives, a whole array of combat blades.
Kealey picked up a Spanish-made Muela Scorpion with a rubber grip and seven-inch black chrome finish blade, then simultaneously tested its balance and examined it to make sure it wasn’t a knockoff.
“How much?” he asked.
“Eighty euros,” the man said.
Kealey leaned over to put it down.
“Sixty, no lower.” The vendor lifted its sheath from the carpet to display it. “Come with this!”
Satisfied, Kealey got out his wallet, paid for the knife, and slipped it into his carryall.
A moment later he wound his way toward the food stall, paused a short distance from it, and stood quietly observing the female vendors. There was something at once sad and impressive about them. It was hard for him to separate the feelings or even know where they came from. He did not examine them any more than he had any others inside him, not for a very long time. He was keeping things simple. Blackwater was done. There was nothing more for him in South Africa. And he had agreed to do a job for Harper. He did not want to look further back than that. Or beyond it.
Kealey checked his watch again, grunted with mild impatience. Half past noon, not early anymore. At the food stall, the elder stood in front of the oven, repeatedly sliding baking sheets out of its front door and shaking their contents into plain white cardboard food containers. He watched quietly as she arranged the containers on a wooden table beside her or held them out to passing customers.
“Are you on line for the honey peanuts?” someone said from behind him. Speaking in a soft, French-inflected female voice.
Kealey turned. The woman facing him was tall and slim, with slightly up-slanted eyes and long, glossy black hair gathered into a ponytail. She had on a light cream-colored, midlength skirt, a yellow sleeveless halter, and open-toed sandals.
“I prefer an African fool,” he said and took her hand. “Ryan Kealey.”
“Abigail Jean Liu,” she said. “Though Abby would be fine.”
Kealey nodded, looking at her in silence.
“As far as your mango custard…I am afraid you’re looking in the wrong place for a chilled treat,” she said.
Kealey kept his eyes on hers. “Anywhere else you’d recommend?”
She tilted her head sideways over her bare, tanned shoulder. “There’s a delightful cafe over on Avenue de l’Independance, where it is served with a touch of lime… I was just going in that direction, if you’d like me to point it out.”
Kealey gave another small nod. “I’d appreciate it. If you don’t mind.”
He identified her smile as altogether professional. “Not at all,” she said. “In fact, I might just stop in and have a bit myself.”
“You don’t seem too thrilled with the custard,” Abby said.
Kealey sat with his dessert untouched, his folded napkin on the table beside the parfait cup. “I’ve never liked mangoes,” he said. “Or cloak-and-dagger routines.”
Abby spooned some of her own serving into her mouth. “I’m sorry in both instances,” she said. “One is a delight to me. The other, unfortunately, a necessity.”
Kealey was silent, thinking. The cafe, Exotique, was run by an expat Frenchman named Gaston who’d seemed to know her well, engaging her in several minutes of familiar small talk before showing them to a small outdoor table set apart from the rest in the small rear garden.
“I don’t know how Interpol operates,” he said quietly. “But an arranged public meeting and code phrase are rigmaroles I’d rather have skipped.”
“And your preferred alternative?”
“You knock on my door at the hotel. We make our introductions. And then we talk,” Kealey said. “It lessens the high intrigue but gets right to the point.”
Abby Liu delicately ate her custard. She was looking at Kealey, but there was something in her gaze…a keen peripheral awareness, which didn’t escape him. “This is Cameroon, not South Africa,” she said. “The clerk at your hotel’s registration desk, the bellhop, or housekeeper could well be a relative of one of the pirates that raid the coastline. Or a member of the gendarmerie that’s in bed with them.”
He was thoughtful a moment. “Beware of prying eyes, that it?”
Abby nodded. “And ears,” she said, barely moving her lips, speaking in a voice as hushed as Kealey’s. “As an American, you’re an instant red flag. Putting aside the affiliation you mentioned, I am a French citizen of Chinese descent. If nothing else, that makes me easy to spot and track. An odd-looking vegetable in the patch, if you will. Our meeting cannot help but draw notice.”
“And you think a crowded market is less conspicuous than, say, your office?”
Her lips tightened at the corners. “Mr. Kealey, I hardly appreciate you making light of my understanding and experience.”
“I’m not…and feel free to drop the ‘mister.’” He paused, motioned vaguely to indicate their surroundings. “This place-”
“Gaston can be trusted.” She’d cut him off. “I prefer we leave it at that for now.”
Kealey nodded, his hunch confirmed. The cafe was an Interpol safe harbor.
“Another point worth bearing in mind,” she said. “I use the term pirates as a convenient reference. But it is a misnomer. Or at the very least an oversimplification. While some groups in this region are wholly mercenary in their motives, others are political extremists or religious militants. Their connections aren’t easily sorted out.”
Kealey gave her words a minute to sink in. “Anything else before we get down to business?”
“You should pretend to enjoy your African fool or risk looking conspicuous.”
“And if I don’t?”
Her eyes suddenly gleamed with humor. “The legal penalty is life imprisonment,” she said. “Also, I might be tempted to eat it rather than let a serving go to waste…and I try to limit my calories.”
Kealey made no comment. Lithe, trim, athletic, Abby Liu had the look of yoga with light weights, and possibly martial arts-he would bet t’ai chi ch’uan. It was hard to imagine the extra calories would be a problem for her.
“All right,” he said, “what do I need to know up top?”
She leaned forward. “Six weeks ago a ship loaded with military equipment was seized by pirates in the Gulf of Aden. It was a Ukrainian-flagged vessel, but much of its cargo came aboard in Iran.”
He raised an eyebrow. “What about its destination?”
“The endpoint of record was Egypt.”
Of record. Kealey did not miss the implication. “The last time something like this happened-must be three, four years ago-the Russians went into an uproar and sent battle frigates from the Black Sea after the pirates.”
“Yes.”
“That shipment was legal…arranged by an officially recognized arms merchant and bound for Kenya.”
“Yes.”
“But the cargo you’re telling me about sounds like an altogether different story.”
Abby nodded. “It was going down into Sudan.”
Kealey was silent a moment, thinking. “A Russian-Iranian arms deal with the Sudanese…in flagrant violation of international sanctions.”
“And with the cooperation of certain Egyptian officials.”
He grunted. “I guess it’s obvious why none of the parties involved would want to make a stink.”
She shrugged her shoulders. “Obvious, yes. But it is also an open secret that Bashir’s government has its supporters. And that the arms blockade imposed by the United Nations has been porous. As far as Egypt, there are deep ethnic and historical ties.” A pause while she spooned more custard into her mouth. “Of far greater significance is the composition of the shipment, and where it may wind up.”
Kealey looked at her. “Let’s hear it,” he said.
“We believe there are as many as thirty-three Zolfaqar main battle tanks. A dozen ANSAT/Sharaf helicopters. An indefinite number and variety of armaments.”
Kealey dipped his spoon into his custard and idly held it there by the handle. Back in his Agency days, he’d read intelligence reports asserting the Zolfaqars and choppers were reverse engineered from American technology. In the case of the tanks, he’d heard rumors that Iranian forces had captured an M1 Abrams that had crossed the border with Iraq sometime during the 2003 invasion, using its chassis as the basic design for their own MBTs. The choppers were supposedly advanced, muscled-up versions of the Cobra attack birds that had been gifted to the shah before the Islamic takeover.
He fidgeted with the spoon, half twirling it between his thumb and forefinger. May wind up. Given Harper’s reason for urging him off on his junket across the African continent, he had a general hunch who the prospective buyer might be.
Kealey took a careful glance around. Either business was slow at this hour or Gaston was discouraging customers from the garden. A glance through the glass patio doors leading to the cafe’s interior told him it was probably the latter-there were plenty of people at the inside tables. But the only others in the garden besides Abby and himself were a middle-aged white couple in matching white shorts who had the unmistakable look of tourists, and a dark-skinned teenaged girl sipping coffee while watching videos on a notebook computer. He was certain none of them were eavesdropping. Or even within earshot if he kept his voice down.
“How did you find out about the pirate grab?” he said after a while.
“With a grab of our own,” Abby said. “Pirates choose their targets by different means. Years ago they were mainly opportunistic. But they have since extended their tentacles into customs offices around the world.”
Kealey considered that. “If they get a shipping officer on the take, he can tell them where a ship’s going. Give them the route it’s taking to its destination. Even tip them to what’s on a manifest.”
“And if he is in the right position, items not on the manifest,” she said. “Since the nominal buyer was Egypt, the tanks and helicopters were technically legal cargo. We don’t know whether any banned armaments may have been aboard, but it is certainly possible.”
“So you’ve got an inside man working all ends against the middle-someone you nailed and cut a bargain with.” Kealey was nodding. “He gets paid to set up illegal trades by one party, passes that information to the pirates, then sings to your people about it.”
“And in exchange we let him stay out of prison.”
Kealey sat there a minute, recalling Harper’s rundown on Simon Nusairi and his alter ego David Khadir.
“The pirates…Are they connected to our man from Paris, Marseille, and recent parts unknown?” he said.
Abby gave him a look. “I couldn’t tell you with certainty whether there’s a direct line of communication between them, “she replied. “What we know is that our man, as you say, has linkages to many individuals and organizations whose reputations are the definition of nonexemplary. One is Ishmael Mirghani-”
“The war chief who cut loose from the SLA and the JEM?”
“Then started the Darfur People’s Army, yes,” she said. “I see you’ve been well briefed.”
“Well enough to get me on a red-eye to Cameroon,” Kealey said. “Now I’d just like to know what I’m doing here.”
“I’ll come to that in a moment.” Abby nodded her head at his parfait cup. “First, I thought we agreed you would have some dessert.”
He stared across the table. “You’re serious.”
“And you are noticeably not eating it,” she said. “Have a taste, please.”
Kealey frowned, slowly scooped out a mouthful, and ate. Abby sat watching him, that amused sparkle in her eyes again.
“How is it?” she asked.
He shrugged. “Like I’d expect mango custard to be.”
Abby chuckled, and Kealey suddenly felt an alien smile touch his lips. It took him by surprise.
“Is the name Hassan al-Saduq at all familiar to you?” she asked.
He shook his head in the negative.
“Saduq has been a middleman for a great many arms deals over the past two decades, primarily between the Russian Federation and various nations in Africa and Central Asia. He has a long-standing relationship with the Federal Security Service.”
“KGB lite.”
“A fair characterization,” she said. “I suppose you could make a similar comparison between Saduq and Adnan Khashoggi. Although not one to hobnob with Western aristocrats and celebrities, Saduq has accumulated substantial wealth and invested millions in Russia’s Sudanese oil exploration.”
“Are you telling me he’s the one who did the deal that the pirates mucked up?”
“We can’t prove it but believe that to be true,” Abby said. “What we do know is that Saduq is about to meet the pirates to negotiate the shipment’s resale.”
Kealey locked eyes with her. “To Mirghani?”
“Yes.”
And through him to Nusairi, Kealey thought. He stared at Abby some more, blew a long stream of air out his mouth. “Saduq…He set up his own customers to be hijacked.”
“Again, it is what we believe.”
“And when is the meet set to happen?”
“Tomorrow night.”
“Here in the capital?”
She shook her head. “In Limbe, if our intelligence is correct.”
Kealey drew an imaginary map. The coastal city was about 90 klicks-or 50 miles and change-to the southwest.
“This intel,” he said. “How about sharing how you got it with me?”
Abby started to reply, glanced over to her right, closed her mouth. A tall, heavyset man with skin the color of roasted almonds, Gaston was approaching their table from the doors to the indoor cafe.
“Abby, mon amie, please excuse the interruption,” he said, flashing Kealey a courteous smile. He tilted his head back toward the glass doors. “It is likely a coincidence-they occasionally stop here as they make their neighborhood rounds-but two uniformed agents of the city council have stopped in and requested an outdoor table of my barista.”
She nodded her appreciation. “ Merci, ” she said. “We will be on our way in a moment.”
Kealey glanced through the doors as Gaston withdrew, saw the uniformed men standing at the counter.
“They different from the gendarmes?” he asked.
“Council agents are civil functionaries… You might consider them the equivalent of housing inspectors. In Yaounde they mainly chase off unlicensed street vendors. Their latest big campaign was to clear the streets of call-box owners-people who run phone lines from indoor connections to the street and charge a small sum to customers who need to make emergency calls. Many in the city cannot afford mobile phones and depend on them.”
“And how’re they a problem?”
“They aren’t…but they make easy marks for shakedowns.” Abby shrugged. “Officials here line their pockets any way they can, which is why I trust none of them.”
“What if it’s one who’s got his hand out to you?”
“I just assume he’ll be holding his other hand out to somebody else.”
Kealey grinned but said nothing.
“I will tell you more when we have time,” she said. “Right now we’d best make our plans.”
“When do we leave for Limbe?”
“Tonight,” she said. “The drive is only a bit over an hour.”
“The two of us going alone?”
She shook her head. “I have some associates who can be trusted. A couple with RB Yaounde-the regional Interpol bureau. And another few that are dependable.”
He nodded, waiting for the rest.
“We’ll pick you up at nine o’clock,” she said. “Walk two blocks from your hotel, turn the corner, wait halfway down the street. You’ll be between the Avenue Foch and Rue de Narvik.”
Kealey looked at her. “More cloak and dagger?”
Abby Liu shrugged, collected her purse from where she had hung it over her chair.
“Don’t push me, Kealey,” she said, her eyes flashing again. “It’s enough I haven’t insisted you eat more of your African fool.”
Closed up for the night, the cluster of variety shops had gaudy window signs that advertised everything from used DVDs and children’s clothing to cigarettes, aphrodisiacs, and condoms. Kealey was standing outside them in the night when the vehicle pulled up against the sidewalk-a gray BMW SUV X5.
Its darkly tinted passenger-side window rolled partway down, Abby Liu looking out at him. Then the rear door swung open.
“Better get in,” she said.
Kealey leaned forward to glance inside, saw two men in the rear, behind Abby and the driver, then rapped the door with his knuckle as he slid into the backseat with them. As he’d expected, it had the solid thump of 3/16-inch armor plate.
The car swung from the curb, glided off along the lightless street.
“Etienne Brun, Leonard Martin…Ryan Kealey,” Abby said, shifting around to face him over her backrest.
Kealey looked across the backseat at his fellow passengers. Sitting farthest from him, against the opposite door, the one named Brun had extended his arm as Abby made their introductions. He was a wiry, light-skinned black man with a shaved head.
Kealey gripped his hand, looked at the man between them, shook his as well. Martin was white and broad-shouldered, his longish blond hair combed straight back from a high forehead.
Kealey settled back, met the driver’s gaze in the rearview mirror.
“Dirk Steiner,” the man said in German-inflected English. The soft bluish glow of a dashboard GPS unit revealed his sharply angular features. “I have heard much to recommend you, Mr. Kealey.”
Kealey grunted. “I hope it outweighs whatever else you’ve heard about me.”
The man laughed a little but said nothing, his eyes on the winding road ahead of him.
“Etienne and Leo are both Interpol colleagues-we’ve been working together for a while,” Abby said. “They’re specialized officers for maritime crime. Dirk’s our liaison with the EU’s antipiracy task force.”
Kealey thought for a while, then shrugged.
“I suppose it leaves me the odd man out,” he said. “Since I don’t know a single goddamned thing about pirates, boats, or water.”
A faint smile crinkled Abby’s features. “Somehow I doubt you’re being altogether truthful,” she said. “Be that as it may, I’ve been advised that you do have other knowledge and abilities that ought to be valuable to us.”
“Namely?” Kealey asked.
She turned around in her seat and then reached under the glove box. When her hand reappeared a moment later, it was holding something low between the two front seats.
Identifying it at once, Kealey reached forward and took the weapon from her grip. It was a Brugger amp; Thomet MP9 tactical machine pistol with a high-capacity magazine and sound suppressor attached to its bore.
Abby returned to watching him over her backrest as he examined the carbine on his lap. “Does your skill set include using that particular item?” she asked.
He looked at her in the dimness of the SUV’s interior, their eyes meeting, then holding steadily. “What exactly are we getting into here?”
“I told you about Hassan al-Saduq’s meet tonight, yes?”
He nodded.
“Well, Saduq owns a pleasure boat…a small yacht,” she said. “We have learned it is currently anchored in a Limbe marina.”
Kealey’s eyes remained locked on hers. “Is that where you intend to take him?”
“There or in the bay, however circumstances dictate,” she said. “Ultimately, it will be your call.”
“Why the hell is that?”
Abby did not so much as hesitate for an instant.
“It should be apparent, Kealey,” she said. “We’re counting on you to lead us.”