The Third World. Russian diplomats posted to Paris didn’t need CIA guys to buy them baguettes, but meet a lonely Russian in barren, alien Khartoum, his family back in Moscow, and give him some shchavelya sup, sorrel soup, like his mama used to fix, and put on a DVD, and open a bottle of bourbon, and you could talk to him endlessly about American salaries, or muscle cars, or Las Vegas pussy, or maybe just about the freedom to choose, and some dust-stormy night with the shutters rattling, he’d say yes, and you’d have an SVR recruitment in the bag. Some of Gable’s best scalps came from the Sandbox.
COS Khartoum Gordon Gondorf was sitting at his desk in the Station on the top floor of the embassy, a two-wing, three-story blockhouse on a five-acre compound, with grenade-proof slit windows and a curved-steel porte cochere. COS Khartoum was short, pig eyed, and preternaturally obtuse. Gable often said Gondorf couldn’t pour water out of a boot if the instructions were printed on the sole. Known as “little feet” by the beleaguered officers in his stations, Gondorf seemed to reappear every two years, like a fever blister. He had been the Chief in Moscow where he tried to fuck Nash’s career, then went on to ruin Latin America Division, and subsequently became COS Paris where he refused to mobilize resources to look for an escaped CIA traitor loose in the city. This consistent performance had earned him everlasting scorn from Benford, who arranged for Gondorf to be given his current command—this uncomfortable third-tier Station where you had to check to see if a boomslang was coiled under the rim, resting in the cool of the toilet porcelain, before you sat down.
Gondorf’s office was dominated by a huge wooden desk, reflecting his belief that the larger it was, the more gravitas it conferred on the person sitting behind it. This theory was vitiated somewhat by the fact that the glass top came up only chest high on the Chief, giving the enduring impression of a red-faced little boy sitting at his father’s desk on family day. A dusty A4 rifle was propped in a corner, as if the Chief personally engaged terrorist cells in Khartoum every day before lunch. Of course there was the usual vanity wall, covered with photographs of Gondorf being greeted by members of Congress, foreign dignitaries, and diplomats in tuxedos. A single framed photograph of Gondorf incongruously dressed as a Bedouin with a jambia—the curved ceremonial dagger of the Arab world—stuck in his belt, epitomized his catchpenny career. A camel in the background of the photo glared at him as if the half-pint desert nomad owed him money.
Gable was only faintly aware of Gondorf’s current dilemma. Benford had not related the details. The story came out in halting sentences, punctuated with “through no fault of mine,” or “no one could have anticipated,” or “events beyond anyone’s control.” Months ago, Washington had resolved to covertly deliver shoulder-fired surface-to-air missiles to rebels in Darfur—southern Sudan—to offset massive military aid from Russia and China flowing to the genocidal host government in Khartoum. It was vital that the US aid be kept secret to avoid bilateral friction. At the eleventh hour, a dithering National Security Adviser changed her mind, resulting in canceled plans to deliver the missiles. A pallet load—twelve five-foot dark-green aluminum cases with metal handles—of the missiles were stranded in a secure storeroom in the basement of the embassy.
The cases were smuggled in as construction materials, but getting them out was a different matter. They could not be driven to the airport and flown out on the weekly support flight. If Sudanese Customs officials inspected the pallet, the diplomatic flap would be unsustainable. During a heated embassy principals meeting, the ambassador declared himself unwilling to keep a dozen FIM-92 stinger missiles with high explosive annular blast fragmentation warheads in his chancery indefinitely. The military attaché (called Milatt), marine Colonel Claude Bianchi, respectfully submitted that he had no way to extract the cases until the carrier USS Nimitz transited the Red Sea in a week, at which time a Seahawk helicopter could be flown in to extract the missiles; extended-range tanks could be fitted on the bird to make the 450-mile flight. COS Gondorf, eager to curry favor with his Chief of Mission and outshine the Milatt, coyly declared that he had “assets” capable of disposing of the munitions right now. In this he overplayed his hand.
Displaying monumental bad judgment, Gondorf had directed three low-level Sudanese support assets to load the cases onto a stake truck, exit out the back gate of the embassy, drive a hundred yards east across a fallow sunflower field, and dump them into the river.
Gable sat up. “In the fucking Nile?” he said.
“The cases are fifty pounds each,” said Gondorf miserably. “They sank right away.”
“I don’t care if there was a frigging glacier over there,” said Gable. “You dumped them a hundred yards from the embassy?”
“We did it at night, so no one could see,” said Gondorf.
“I don’t know what’s wrong with you, Gondorf, but I bet it’s hard to pronounce,” said Gable.
“There’s another problem,” said Gondorf. He walked to the window, raised the blinds, handed Gable a pair of binoculars, and pointed toward the river. Gable focused on the riverbank, fringed by a thin line of vegetation.
“Holy shit,” said Gable. The black mud bank was littered by the missile cases, some on their sides, some sticking straight up, like uprooted coffins in a flooded cemetery.
“Rivers aren’t supposed to have tides,” said Gondorf.
Centuries of Egyptian pharaohs, nomadic Baggara tribesmen, and Nile basin farmers were familiar with the amaranthine floods. Not Gondorf, however. Between July and October, the Nile would swell from snowmelt in the Ethiopian mountains. In June, the river would subside, leaving dark fertile mud, kemet in Arabic, behind. Gondorf had dumped the crates months ago, at high water. Now he had a fifty-foot mud bank with missile crates sticking out of the muck a hundred yards from his office window. Gable looked at the narrow pinched face, the close-set jerboa eyes, and the pinched mouth that was full of “it’s not my fault” right behind his teeth.
“There are militia patrols everywhere, boats on the river, scavengers on the riverbanks,” said Gondorf.
“How long have those cases been out there?” said Gable. “Why don’t you get your gomers to retrieve ’em?”
“I can’t. They’re out of contact,” said Gondorf.
“What’re you talking about? You can’t contact your assets?”
“I can’t find them; they don’t respond.”
“Jesus wept,” said Gable, flipping the binoculars to Gondorf. He walked down the hall to the Milatt’s office and introduced himself to Colonel Bianchi, who was tall, dark, ramrod straight, with hair combed straight back and shiny with brilliantine. He was in civvies: a light suit with a blue shirt and plain black tie. He wore a marine corps pin on his lapel. Gable sat down and explained the problem. Bianchi shook his head.
“I’ve known a lot of you spooks over the years,” he said, with Mississippi in his mouth. “But that boy of yours is as sharp as a sack of wet mice.”
“Yeah,” said Gable, “he’s a real asshat. Colonel, those cases have been immersed for three to four months, and now they’re covered in mud. Any chance those stingers will be functional?”
“Those cases are water-resistant, but not waterproof,” said Bianchi. “If some of the gaskets on those cases held up, you probably got a handful that would light up and fly. But nothing reliable.” He shook his head. “But that’s not a worry. The militia finds those Stingers there will be more political trouble than we can handle.”
“Militia any good?” asked Gable.
“They ride around town, four to a jeep, with AKs, looking for trouble. Not much training, but pretty mean.”
“You got anyone who could help me get those cases out tonight?” said Gable. Bianchi shook his head.