The Caliphate, André Gallo [best books to read ever .TXT] 📗

     With Marshall’s interference, Mel was forced to let Steve plan and buy his own flight tickets. Mel was only looking at the cost to the government, but Marshall had pointed out that all tickets bought at government fares are so labeled and would give Steve away.

***

Steve left Dulles on a five-and-a-half-hour night flight to Paris, had breakfast at Charles De Gaulle airport during the four-hour layover, and read and dozed during the eight-and-a-half-hour leg to Bamako.

     As they flew over the hundred-mile-long ergs and then the massive dark and rocky plateaus of the Anti-Atlas range, Steve was struck by the vast desolate space and wondered how anyone could survive down there.

     The moment he stepped out of the plane at Bamako Airport the acrid smell of smoke filled his nostrils. He had expected the heat and the poverty. He knew that, with few paved roads, it would be dusty. But he knew he would always associate the burning smell with Bamako.

     Upon arrival at l’Amitié Hôtel, he made arrangements to rent a Toyota Land Cruiser for pick-up in Timbuktu.

     In answer to his question, the desk clerk told him, “The smell, Monsieur? Ah, you mean you smell smoke! That’s from the fields, Monsieur. They burn the old crop.”

     He looked at Steve like a kind teacher at a student with limited intellectual ability.

     As pre-arranged, he met the CIA’s chief of station, Rod Descouteaux, at his home on the banks of the Niger the evening he arrived. The purpose of the meeting was simply to give Steve a local contact in case of problems.

     Rod was in his thirties, tall and thin, with sandy hair combed straight back. They sat outside on a patio lit by the dining room lights. Outlined against the moonlit sky were hundreds of fruit bats flying over the river.

     Sipping a dirty martini, Rod said, “I appreciate your help. IMRA is an information target but I have had problems just getting access, let alone recruiting anyone in al Khalil’s group. Since you already know al Khalil, it should be simple. You meet him once or twice, take his temperature, take a look at his operation, and you’re done.”

     “I don’t guarantee anything but I’ll do my best.”

     Before Steve took his leave, Rod told him, “You should call on the cultural attaché at the embassy tomorrow. It will reinforce your cover. He’s in charge of contacts with the media for the embassy and might know some people who could open doors for you in Timbuktu for your photo shoots.”

***

Before getting on an Air Mali flight to Timbuktu the next day, Steve stopped by the American embassy, a whitewashed building that had once been a bank. He told the cultural attaché, a bearded, rather short and rotund Afro-American, about his photographic assignment. In return, he received the names of a couple of Malian officials in Timbuktu who might be helpful. The attaché, a friendly and outgoing bon-vivant walked him out to the street and, laughing, he said, “Thank God that my great-grandfather was a slow runner.”

    “What do you mean?”

     “Nothing really.” Seeing Steve puzzled face, he added, “Only that I’m here today as an American diplomat rather than in the ranks of the local unemployed getting picked up by government trucks for unpaid labor only because one of my ancestors got caught and sold to the slave traders on the coast.”

     As his Antonov-24 landed in Timbuktu, he noticed the rusted wreck of his plane’s twin that had been pushed to the side of the runway. After checking in at the Hôtel Bouctou, he followed Rod’s advice and hired a local driver. By any measure, anyone born and raised in Mali was not half as expert behind the wheel as the average Westerner. He hired a Tuareg named Atrar who had driven a truck in Marseilles for five years and spoke decent French. He soon realized that, along with Atrar, he inherited the driver’s wife, young son, and brother.

    When Atrar showed up to take Steve to a Tuareg camp outside of Timbuktu, he came with his brother, Izem. On the way out, Atrar proudly told Izem, who sat in the front passenger seat like a security guard, “Tell Monsieur Christophe; go on.”

     Izem appeared initially reluctant but said, “I am a soldier. Ever since I was a young boy. When we fought the Malian Army, maybe fifteen years ago, I rode with my brothers. It is our history to fight. At the beginning we won. We knew the desert. But too many Malians—they took over the wells.”

     “And what did you do after the fighting?” Steve asked. “Were you a prisoner?”

     “No, never. Many of us made our way to the military camps on the other side of the Libyan border. At first, the Libyans didn’t know what to do with us. But, they saw that we were good soldiers. They trained us, gave us guns, and we became part of the Libyan Army. We patrolled the Libyan Desert, and then we fought in Chad.”

     Again prompted by Atrar, Izem said, “My name means ‘lion’ in Tamasheq.”

     Steve realized Izem could be useful to him, although he didn’t yet know how.

     Later that day, he began to establish his cover credentials as a photojournalist. Back in his room, he sent his first message to CIA headquarters in Langley. Using steganography, Steve was able to hide his message in the photographs he took that day. His email, sent to an ostensibly commercial URL, summarized his visit to the Tuareg camp and the attached photographs hid his real message.

     Steganography is the modern version of microdots. Steve had the option of hiding his messages in graphic images, Web sites, or recorded music. In view of the questionable reliability of the Malian