It was clear to everyone in the room—and once again the hidden cameras confirmed it was so—that Jean-Luc Martel did not understand the significance of the words he had just spoken. I’d say he was an Iraqi . . . An Iraqi who called himself Khalil. No family name, no patronymic or name of an ancestral village, only Khalil. Khalil who had found a partner in Mohammad Bakkar, a hashish grower of deep Islamic faith who hated America and the West and would fly into a rage at the mere mention of Israel. Khalil who wanted to maximize profits by forcing more product onto the European market. Gabriel, the silent observer of the drama he had conceived and produced, cautioned himself not to leap to a premature conclusion. It was possible the man who called himself Khalil was not the man they were looking for, that he was merely an ordinary criminal with no interests other than making money, that he was a wild goose chase that would waste precious time and resources. Still, even Gabriel found it difficult to control the banging of his heart. He had tugged at the loose thread and connected the dots, and the trail had led him here, to the former home of a vanquished foe. The other members of his team, however, seemed entirely indifferent to Martel’s revelation. Natalie, Mikhail, and Christopher Keller were each peering into some private space, and Paul Rousseau had taken that moment to load his first pipe. A moment later his lighter flared and a cloud of smoke rolled over the two Venetian canal scenes by Guardi. Gabriel, the restorer, winced involuntarily.
If Rousseau were even remotely intrigued by the Iraqi who called himself Khalil, he gave no outward sign of it. Khalil was an afterthought, Khalil was of no importance. Rousseau was more interested, or so it seemed, in the nuts and bolts of Martel’s relationship with Mohammad Bakkar. Who ran the show? That was what he wanted to know. Who held the upper hand? Was it Martel the distributor, or Bakkar the Moroccan grower?
“You don’t know much about business, do you?”
“I’m an academic,” apologized Rousseau.
“It’s a negotiation,” explained Martel. “But ultimately the producer holds the upper hand.”
“Because he can cut out the distributor at any time?”
“Correct.”
“Couldn’t you find another source of drugs?”
“Oranges,” said Martel.
“Ah, yes, oranges,” agreed Rousseau.
“It’s not so easy.”
“Because of the quality of Mohammad Bakkar’s oranges?”
“Because Mohammad Bakkar is a man of considerable power and influence.”
“He would discourage other producers from selling to you?”
“Strongly.”
“And when Mohammad Bakkar told you he wanted to sharply increase the amount of oranges he was sending to Europe?”
“I advised against it.”
“Why?”
“Any number of reasons.”
“Such as?”
“Large shipments are inherently dangerous.”
“Because they’re easier for the authorities to find?”
“Obviously.”
“What else?”
“I was concerned we would saturate the market.”
“And thus drive down the price of oranges in Western Europe.”
“Supply and demand,” said Martel again with a shrug.
“And when you raised these concerns?”
“He gave me a very simple choice.”
“Take it or leave it?”
“In so many words.”
“And you took it,” said Rousseau.
Martel was silent. Rousseau tacked abruptly.
“Shipping,” he said. “Who’s responsible for the shipping?”
“Mohammad. He puts the package in the mail and we pick it up at the other end.”
“I assume he tells you when to expect the package.”
“Of course.”
“What are his preferred methods?”
“In the old days he used small boats to bring the merchandise directly across the Mediterranean from Morocco to Spain. Then the Spaniards tightened things up on the coast, so he started moving it across North Africa to the Balkans. It was a long and costly journey. A lot of oranges went missing along the way. Especially when they reached Lebanon and the Balkans.”
“They were stolen by local criminal gangs?”
“The Serbian and Bulgarian mafia are quite fond of citrus products,” said Martel. “Mohammad spent years trying to devise a way to get his oranges to Europe without having to go through their territory. And then a solution fell into his lap.”
“The solution,” said Rousseau, “was Libya.”
Martel nodded slowly. “It was a dream come true, made possible by the president of France and his friends in Washington and London who declared that Gaddafi had to go. Once the regime crumbled, Libya was open for business. It was the Wild West. No central government, no police, no authority of any kind except for the militias and the Islamic psychos. But there was a problem.”
“What’s that?”
“The militias and the Islamic psychos,” said Martel.
“They disapproved of oranges?”
“No. They wanted a cut. Otherwise, they wouldn’t let the oranges reach the Libyan ports. Mohammad needed a local partner, someone who could keep the militias and the holy warriors in line. Someone who could guarantee that the oranges would find their way into the bellies of the cargo ships.”
“Someone like Khalil?” asked Rousseau.
Martel made no reply.
“Do you remember a ship called the Apollo?” asked Rousseau. “The Italians seized it off Sicily with seventeen metric tons of oranges in its holds.”
“The name,” said Martel archly, “rings a bell.”
“I assume it was your cargo.”
Martel, with his expressionless gaze, confirmed that it was.
“Were there other ships before the Apollo that weren’t intercepted?”
“Several.”
“And remind me,” said Rousseau, feigning bewilderment, “who bears the expense of a seizure? The producer or the distributor?”
“I can’t sell the oranges if I don’t receive them.”
“So you’re saying—and please forgive me, Monsieur Martel, I don’t mean to belabor the point—that Mohammad Bakkar personally lost millions of euros when the Apollo was seized?”
“That’s correct.”
“He must have been furious.”
“Beyond,” said Martel. “He summoned me to Morocco and accused me of leaking the information to the Italians.”
“Why would you do such a thing?”
“Because I was opposed to the large shipments in the first place. And the best way to make them stop would be to lose a ship or two.”
“Were you responsible for the tip that led the Italians to the Apollo?”
“Of course not. I told Mohammad in no uncertain terms that the problem was at his end.”
“By that,” said Rousseau, “you mean North Africa.”
“Libya,” said Martel.
“And when the seizures continued?”
“Khalil plugged the leaks. And the oranges started to arrive safely again.”