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

     Steve glanced around at the other passengers to confirm no one was paying attention to them. Then he took Hussein’s knife from his jacket inside pocket.

     “That’s Hussein’s favorite thing, his knife!” Karim exclaimed.

     Steve held it for a few seconds before throwing it into the water. Karim let out an involuntary gasp.

     “What about your schedule?”

     “We’re leaving tomorrow, I think. I will go get him at the hospital this afternoon.”

     Karim grinned. “The only thing Hussein asked me to do was to buy him Swiss chocolates.”

     “How about your brother? Tell me what happened.”

     “I don’t have the details. There was a firefight. He was in the wrong place. He never hurt anyone. He was a good person.”

     Steve knew how much Karim’s brother meant to him. He touched his shoulder.

     “I’m so sorry.” Seeing that Karim was not going to say anything further about his brother, he asked, “What happened after I left Mali?”

     “Your friend Monsieur Gregoire didn’t like me. He asked me to tell Tariq that an American from the Embassy wanted to talk to him and to bring Tariq to a meeting with him, with Monsieur Gregoire. That was like asking for my own execution. He didn’t want to talk about how I was supposed to do that and still stay alive. He said I was not worth the money and that you had been too generous. So that money you said was being set aside, is it gone? Did Monsieur Gregoire keep it for himself?”

     The boat was nearing the Jet d’Eau fountain and tourists moved to their side of the boat to see it up close. Steve overheard someone say the jet of water was over four-hundred-feet high. Steve could see Karim was enthralled and he let him take in the sight.

     “No, I don’t think he stole it. Don’t worry; I’ll get that money reinstated. And start thinking of yourself. That money wasn’t just for your brother. It was for anything you wanted to use it for—your mother, maybe, yourself?”

     Then he turned to business.

     “So, tell me about your plans.”

     He let Karim talk, asking infrequent but targeted questions to keep him on track. But a major piece of the puzzle was missing. Hussein had not divulged what they were getting ready for.

***

They arrived to the other side of the lake and walked up the Quai Gustave Ador to a park on the right where they sat. Small children and their nannies seemed to be in the majority. After five minutes Steve got up, concerned about sticking out. They resumed their walk.

     “Hussein has stopped talking about operations in Niger or Mauritania or those places. He and al Khalil have another objective in mind ever since Gao. But I don’t know what it is. Hussein talks to me. He trusts me. But he’s not talking about the final objective. No one knows anything. Only al Khalil and Hussein, and they’re not telling the rest of us. Oh, and he has a new recruit, Habib, a Tunisian who studied in America. He’s a scientist. Anyway, Tariq and he have long conversations. I don’t know about what.

     “Since we’ve been here in Geneva, Hussein slipped once and told me that I would be taking my UAVs off a beach, close to water. At first I thought the plan was to use the UAVs like smart bombs. But now I don’t think so. Rashid, the UAV patron, he said the targets would be about twenty-five to thirty-five kilometers away. We’re buying more UAVs here in Geneva. The sales agent is an American. I met him with Hussein yesterday. His name is Spaceck. Hussein calls him ‘colonel,’ which pleases the American, I can tell. The new UAVs are being shipped to Cyprus and from there, I was able to learn that they will be shipped on a second leg, to Alexandria, Egypt, but I don’t think that’s the final destination.”

     “Could the target be in Egypt? Where do you think they’ll go from there?”

     Karim shrugged.

     Before they ended their meeting, Karim promised to find a way to send an email to Steve with additional information as soon as he found it.

***

Kella arrived the next day. Before going to meet her at the airport, Steve checked out of the hotel. During the night, he realized he had made a mistake by paying for his first visit at the Le Chat Noir with his credit card, which Luke could easily find if the police asked for it.

     He watched her stride toward him. Without wearing heels, she still could see over most of the other passengers coming out toward the luggage area and the exits—beauty in the middle of an otherwise unremarkable gaggle of humanity.

     “You don’t know how good it is to see you,” he told her. She responded with a radiant smile and a kiss.

     “There’s been a little change in plans,” he continued as he led her toward the central part of the airport. “We’re going to a village at the base of the Alps, on the other side of the border in France. Do you have any luggage?”

     “Of course I have luggage. I thought we were staying in Geneva, in the Carouge district. I was looking forward to it. It’s supposed to be an old and eclectic and fun. In other words it’s not totally Calvinist.”

     “That’s why I wanted to talk to you.”

     “You mean to discuss Calvinism? I thought this was going to be a romantic weekend.”

    “Well, that’s certainly not excluded. Sit here a second.”

     They had reached a restaurant with tables adjacent to the passengers’ main route to and from their gates.

     “Here’s what we’re going to do: take a cab to the main bus station