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

leave. Feel free to use anything in the house. The cook’s name is Benjamin, and the maid is Achoura. Also, I attach an invitation to the American Ambassador’s residence if you’re interested. Enjoy.

     Next to the note was a key that he put in his pocket.

    His body was still on East Coast time where it was the middle of the night. He took a quick shower and laid down for a nap after which he would be “good-to-go,” an expression he had picked up from his Air Force buddies in Korea where he had obtained his pilot’s license. But, before he could go to sleep, he heard the police come in.

    After a few minutes, Benjamin called him, “Steve? Steve? Can you come down? The gendarmes want to speak with you.”

     Benjamin was sitting at the large dining room table across from a police detective dressed in mufti. The mahogany table was easily large enough for a dinner party of twenty-four.

     “Steve, the inspector here wants to talk to you,” Benjamin said then left the room.

     The detective extended his hand.

     “I am Detective Beauvais, Monsieur.”

     Except for his ample girth, testifying that he had not been a street cop for a long time, Beauvais’s broom-like mustache and bald head reminded Steve of the Dupont and Dupont twins, inspectors from the Tintin cartoons he had loved while living with his family in Francophone countries.

     After inspecting his passport and flight tickets, the detective asked, “Why are you in Paris, Monsieur? Business? Tourism?”

     “Vacation. Dr. Coogan is a friend of my father’s. He was supposed to pick me up at Charles de Gaulle airport this morning but he didn’t show.”

     Steve remembered his surprise that Coogan might even be late. If he had learned anything from growing up with a CIA father it was that there was no alternative to operational punctuality; lives depended on it. It was one of Marshall’s unbending, and unending, rules.

     “And who is your employer?”

     At this point, Steve sensed that the detective was well aware of Coogan’s prior incarnation. Beauvais might have looked like a cartoon character but Steve realized that it would be a mistake to underestimate him.

     “West Gate Scientific International. We provide consultants, experts, in the area of national defense and crisis management to state and federal agencies in the United States.”

     “Very interesting. And what is your specialty Monsieur Church?”

     Steve guessed from the line of questioning and the conspiratorial smile that the detective thought he had an American intelligence officer on his hands.

     “I’m just an analyst. Have you tried to reach Dr. Coogan? He should be informed.”

     Steve surprised himself that he did not tell Beauvais that he was on his way to Morocco on business. There was no secret about it. With annoyance, he recalled another of his father’s saying, “Don’t answer questions that have not been asked, especially when speaking to cops.”

     Another rule, but probably not bad advice.

     “Yes. We are trying to reach him. The cook gave me his number.”

    Two gendarmes appeared on a patio off the dining room and called the detective who joined them outside. Steve followed. Stone stairs led down from the patio to a rectangular gravel garden demarcated by three walls at the base of which were shrubs and flowers growing in a three foot wide ribbon of earth. One of the policemen pointed toward the left. There were footsteps in the dirt around flowers that had not survived a trampling. Steve assumed that the Saudi Ambassador had a similar garden on the other side of the wall.

     Steve asked the detective, “What happens next? Do you go next door and ask questions?”

     “No, Monsieur. We don’t deal with the diplomatic corps. That’s not in our jurisdiction. But, if nothing is missing…”

     His voice trailed off.

     Steve guessed that, since the evidence involved the Saudis, the investigation was over. He went upstairs. A half-hour later, he knocked at Benjamin’s door dressed in a dark suit, blue shirt and a tie decorated with a multitude of national flags.

     “I’m leaving. I’ll be back after dinner.”

     Not certain that he would get to talk with Ted Coogan, Steve decided to pay a visit to the Institut du Monde Arabe. In the Metro, the French President’s memorable statement, “We are all Americans!” made immediately following al Qaeda’s attack against New York and Washington, came to his mind. How long ago that seems, he thought. Since then, al Qaeda had inspired and directed attacks in several countries, to include Morocco.

     The Arab Institute building seemed to be of recent vintage. His guide book informed him that the southern façade was a geometric pattern of metallic rectangles at the center of which was a camera-like aperture that opened and closed according to the available light. He noticed, however, that some were wide open and others closed.

    One of the guards explained, “They haven’t worked for several years now.”

     The exhibits were disappointingly sterile and bare as if the funding had run out.

     Before leaving, he went up to the ninth floor terrace for a view of Notre Dame across the river but was turned away. It was closed for a special event. Steve looked past him where a group of men dressed in suits were being served drinks and finger food. A cluster of VIP’s had their backs to him and seemed to be listening to someone hidden by their bodies. The signs to the cafeteria reminded him that he hadn’t had anything to eat since landing.

     As he sat enjoying his tabouli at a plastic-topped table, a light rain drove the VIP’s into the cafeteria. The well-dressed group was men-only and seemed a bit out of place in the low-ceilinged, self-help, cafeteria. Steve noticed that the center of attention