Blood From A Shadow (2012) Read online

  I was ready to call Paolo again when a young woman walked into the restaurant. A quick word with the waiter and she headed straight for me. I thought it was Conroy, my heart jumped. Class and style, formal black business suit, New York heels, born self confident, briefcase in her right hand, looked like she was strolling into her office in Washington D.C.

  “Sergeant Maknazpy, I have a package for you sir, if you don’t mind?”

  Maybe 27 years old, about 5′9″, bobbed blond hair, natural, big dark eyes, tanned, taut, toned. No name. Really looked a lot like Conroy, could be her younger sister, except for the hint of a twang, maybe Texas, or somewhere down south.

  She waited on my invitation before taking a seat, her perfume bloomed around me, she opened the briefcase and presented a red folder to my lap.

  “May I ask you to sign a receipt for this, sir, if you don’t mind?” she said.

  “Thanks, but tell Duffin I’m not signing anything,” I said.

  That wiped the southern belle smile off her face and she tightened her grip, not ready to release it to me.

  “I’m very sorry, sir, I don’t think you understand. I must get a receipt for this. I would be in a lot of trouble if I didn’t,” she purred, more tiger than kitten.

  Her sly eyes flashed their message. Conroy had the same dangerous eyes, had made me do things I should have regretted. Conroy lite knew she was never going to have any trouble with me, either. And maybe I could use that signature later, if I had trouble with Duffin.

  Afterwards, back in my room, I spread the papers on the floor. Background from the CIA’s World Facts website and Europol reports. Tittle tattle from journalists and crusaders.

  Turkey is the key transit route for heroin between Asia and Europe. Afghanistan world’s biggest producer of heroin, and 75-80% of Afghan heroin trafficked through Turkey to Europe. 138 known gangs operating in Istanbul. Opium produced in Taliban controlled areas of Afghanistan, transported through Iraq, into Iran. Proliferation of laboratories in Afghanistan and Iran to convert morphine from opium into heroin. Easy access across Iranian-Turkish border for smugglers through the Guburlak Pass, eastern Turkey, then to hub in Istanbul. Heroin delivered from Istanbul to north west hub (Netherlands and Belgium), from there on to UK, France, Germany, Italy and the Nordic countries. Also to southern hub (Italy) primarily by Turkish based Albanian speaking gangs. Links between Turkish gangs and the al-Qaeda offshoots of al-Shabaab in Somalia and al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb in the southern Sahara. A new route to the US via Ireland had been trialled by gangs with terrorist links.

  But this was crap. Just general gossip, nothing like the quality of briefing the army would produce. No clear mission objective. No target names, addresses, known associates. No network of friendly contacts. No guarantee that Swansea wouldn’t be pinned on me. No mention of what I would be paid for my trouble. Just the instruction to channel all communications through Mehmet Kaffa, Turkish Department of Anti Smuggling and Organised Crime. And an order to terminate all contact with Monsignor Arthur McCooey, with immediate effect. Had Lutterall got it right that first day in Swansea’s interrogation centre, this was some half assed scheme that Duffin was running on his own, cribbing the intell from the internet?

  The only reason I didn’t bin the whole thing was Mehmet Kaffa. He had saved our lives before, in Iraq. He had found Ferdy’s body in Istanbul. He had been with Artie in Ireland. He must be the reason that Ferdy and I were shuffled into Duffin’s game.

  Yes, I would get this done and then get home, for young Con’s sake, but along the way Kaffa would tell me who had killed our troubled Ferdia. His mother would rejoice, I would be redeemed, even Artie would relish it, secretly. Yes, I would avenge Ferdia, old style Irish, blood for blood without remorse.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  A car was waiting outside the next afternoon, 13.30 hrs. An American driver who didn’t speak handed me the envelope with printed instructions and train tickets for Roma—Bologna. I would be met at Bologna station and taken to the airport, my flight to Istanbul would be met by Kaffa.

  My red chariot to Bologna was dead on time, the Frecciarossa high speed train glided out of Roma Termini at 14.15 hrs, I would be in Bologna in just over 2 hours 15 minutes. And I would have been, if I hadn’t contacted Artie and arranged to meet him in the tourist Mecca of Florence. The Frecciarossa sailed into Firenze Santa Maria Novella station at 15.45 hrs, I hopped off and soon found the Piazza named by the Basilica di Santa Croce, Artie was in there somewhere.

  If we had been meeting in any Church in New York we would have had the place to ourselves, but here in Florence the churches were open for the tourist dollar, so I squeezed through a party of Japanese video hunters to get into the place. Rival pods of culture consumers tagged their chaperones around the church, cameras flashed the marble and gold, marketplace prattle drowned the hushed devotions. I spotted him at the far side, knelt in prayer, even though he wasn’t in priest uniform today.

  “Sorry I couldn’t get to see you last night, Con, we had a meeting with the Holy Father,” Artie said.

  “Well, nobody has ever stood me up for the Pope before, Artie. What’s wrong now, some asshole stole the Turin Shroud?” I said.

  He took my elbow and guided me through the hordes towards a sort of side altar, his fragrant aura defining our space.

  “This is Michelangelo’s tomb,” he said. “You don’t have to be a Christian to get goose bumps standing here, do you?”

  “I guess not, Artie, but I’m more likely to get a migraine from all these camera flashes. Couldn’t we have met somewhere more private?” I said.

  “I find this to be a very peaceful place, no matter how many sardines they manage to squeeze in,” he said. “Look over there, the tomb of Galileo Galilei. Look around, there are the tombs and monuments to Machiavelli, Rossini, Dante. Enrico Fermi’s is over this way, the ‘Father of the Atomic Bomb’, his wife was Jewish, so they had to move to the US to escape the Fascists. Over here, look, this is my favourite,” he said as he disappeared into the crowds.

  I pushed after him, found him with his whiskey flask out.

  “Here he is, Gugliemo Marconi, inventor of the radio, the father of modern communication! Let’s toast his memory, Con,” he offered me the flask. I sipped, Artie gulped.

  “Just think where the United States would be without him now, eh? No radio, no TV, no cellphones, nothing!” he said.

  “We would have been better off, Artie,” I said. “We would have splendid isolation from the parasites that denounce ‘American Imperialism’ but cry for us to fight their battles for them. Anyway, somebody else would just have invented all that crap instead.”

  Artie was disappointed.

  “I suppose you’re right,” he said. “And he was a big time Fascist during the Mussolini years, apparently, I was heartbroken when I found out about that. Gods with feet of clay, huh? Never mind, he’s still my favourite, I always toast him with Jameson’s when I come here.” He half hid his smug smile.

  Duffin’s people would be waiting on me at Bologna airport, I hadn’t time to follow Artie’s tourist trail.

  “Sure, Artie, but what about the living, like me?” I said. “If things don’t work out so good in the next few days, you might need a memorial to me. So what do you know about Ferdy, what was he doing with Kaffa in Istanbul? What’s it all about?”

  “Well, take a look around you in here, for a start, that’s what it’s all about,” he said. “The people buried here represent the glories of European civilisation, that’s what America is based on, after all, isn’t it, European civilisation? That’s what you were defending in Iraq. That’s what Ferdia was doing, the poor devil.”

  We left Marconi and the rest behind and filtered through the doors to the Piazza outside. There were two Carabinieri vehicles at the main entrance to the square, paramilitary police monitored the crowds.

  “Duffin says I only talk to Mehmet Kaffa,” I said. “You are to be kept out of the loop, Artie
, no communication with you as of yesterday.”

  “Really? Well, Kaffa is undoubtedly an excellent officer, and a real gentleman, he has my utmost respect. But if you ever need to contact me, go to the Reverend George Walker at the American Church in the Galata district. Just tell him Monsignor Artie sent you. As for poor Archer Duffin, I’m afraid he isn’t as important as he likes to think he is. He only knows what his superiors have told him, that’s what I found out at our meeting last night. Don’t look so surprised, Con, the Holy Father is a world leader too. We are asked to advise on things Duffin doesn’t even know exists. Duffin only knows the target is the new route from Istanbul to the United States via Ireland, and he thinks the concern is just about heroin. He’s wrong, but he doesn’t have the security clearance to be informed about it. Only the very top people are on board with this one.”

  Artie tipped the whiskey flask to his lips again. It was never far way, the whole time I had been with him, but it never had any effect on him before. Now, his pupils were dilated, he spoke a little too loudly, his gestures were just slightly too demonstrative. His whiskey breath plumed over his cologne.

  “Ever since we got Bin Laden, we’ve been expecting payback, something big, the last kick of the dying animal,” he said. “That was always their thing, something big, grand gestures in your face. But they’re finished in Iraq now, really, all bar the shouting. Afghanistan will be next. Talks with the Taliban are slow, but the writing has been on the wall since they agreed to open an office in Qatar, keeping lines of contact open. That will bear fruit in the end, just wait, soon there will be little solace for al Qaeda in Afghanistan either. I’m proud to say I’ve played my own small part in that, you know. Not that I wish to overstate my own importance, you understand, but success is built on all the small things, we all play our part.”

  Maybe it was the whiskey talking, but Artie made me feel as if he needed me, needed someone to open up to. I had confessed my betrayal of Ferdia, now Artie needed to confide in me. It was easier to trust him now, he was alone and vulnerable.

  An English woman jostled past Artie, and cursed him for his trouble. Artie looked after her as she disappeared into the Basilica. “That’s right, just walk over me, you fat whore!” he shouted. Two Carabinieri noticed the exchange and looked our way. I guided him away from the entrance, found a quiet spot to the side of the Piazza.

  Artie carried on, “It’s all the little things that add up, you see. Remember the 9/11 Commission? People said the atrocity should have been prevented, the intelligence was already out there. But it was all just little hints here and there, and it’s impossible to follow up on everything, because 99% of it is bullshit. People are always wise in retrospect because then you can pick out the significant things, just like anything in life. Well, there are snippets of information now, bits of gossip, people adding two and two together. I’ve heard some of it through my work to facilitate talks with the Taliban.”

  The dark energy pulsed through my head as Artie spoke, the danger alert was clear and strong, but I ached for the strength and freedom I knew would soon be unleashed. I didn’t need the breathing exercises anymore, wouldn’t need to control myself, and my mind felt free. Strong and free.

  “Believe me, Con, the Christian way of life is under severe threat,” he said. “People maybe thought it was all over when Bin Laden was found, and God above knows our own liberal establishment do their best to sleepwalk the people into a false sense of security. I mean, according to them, we are the fanatics! Well, they’ll wake up from their slumber when the shit hits the fan, but it would be too late then, that’s why we need men like you to do their duty now. Duffin knows about the drugs route, he doesn’t know the same gang of heathens are planning a major terrorist attack on the United States.”

  The Carabinieri were hard to miss, with their jackboots and distinctive red stripe up their trousers. Four of them moved closer to our side of the Piazza, formed a loose protective cordon around us. Artie wasn’t alone, after all.

  “Why don’t we just wipe them out?” I said. “Send in the SEALS again, take them out, game over.”

  “It’s not that simple,” Artie said. “There will always be more of them, always ready to poison thousands of Americans, and strike fear into our infidel Christian hearts. So that’s what it is all about, protecting our Christian way of life, the way it has always been since the Crusades. Sometimes I regret wearing this collar, you know, my hands are tied. But we need men like you and Ferdia, Con, now more than ever. You are the last of the Crusaders.”

  Artie was drunk, the whiskey had tugged his progressive mask, but I knew what he meant. And I was ready, they needed me now and it felt good. Good to be important again, good to be noticed. Good to have a purpose, restored above the ordinary, back where I belonged. Like my father before me. Better than being a hermit in Hoboken. Better than living a stale life with a reluctant wife and ungrateful child. Florencita Conroy must have known I deserved better, and that made me feel good too. I told myself I would do it for young Con, of course, avoid the Swansea rap and put him straight. So I really needn’t be ashamed, the US needed me, I deserved to feel good.

  But Rose knew me better than any of them. Deep down, I knew she had busted me that time in the apartment, I couldn’t wait to be the big hero again and I really was an asshole. Yeah, Rose, you knew what turned me on, but no-one else did, and I wasn’t about to tell them.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Istanbul is bigger than New York City. So big that nobody can say for sure how many people live there. At least 13 million, maybe 16 million. Ataturk International Airport is big too, thousands flowing through 24/7, in a hurry, no stopping, nobody looking at anyone else, too busy, keep going, get there first.

  But they all stopped and watched as four uniforms jumped me and pinned my arms, cuffed me and dragged me along past the queues of people waiting to pay for a visa stamp on their passports. Two plain clothes took over, the fat middle aged one tugged me along by my hair, the better dressed younger one twisted my arms further up my back. They both screamed in my ears. Questions in Turkish I couldn’t answer. I struggled to see Mehmet Kaffa, but instead there were hundreds of eyes fixed on me, the flux suspended so they could take in the show, see the American thrashed into Turkey. Curious about my crime, relieved it wasn’t them.

  They had to loosen their grip to get me through the door beside the exit turnstile, that was enough for me to twist my torso and land a crunching head-butt on one of the uniforms, he fell against another one, I screwed backwards and kicked that one below the ribs, right in his kidneys. They both went down but the others were on me now, the two plain clothes wedged themselves between me and the uniforms, the fat one pinned me to the ground, and laughed in my ear,

  “Welcome to Istanbul, Sir! Inspector Kaffa is waiting on you. Please do not injure any more of our colleagues.”

  He closed the door to the room, leaving the uniforms outside. The younger one opened the door on the opposite wall, both dragged me out into a corridor, pushed past airport workers, cleaners, maintenance, security, baggage handlers. Angry shouts and slaps around my head. Then out a side door, into an unmarked van. The younger one driving, the older in the back with me, still pinning my cuffed wrists up my back.

  We pushed through the airport traffic, joined a freeway, sped along for twenty minutes before slipping off, down left and into a business area, warehouses behind high security fences. If they planned to nut me, this was the place to do it. I knew I could take fatso out, even with the cuffs. The young one could be a problem, they must be carrying. We went round in circles a couple of times, a white BMW carrying two men paced behind us. I nodded to the Beemer, fatso smiled, “Ok, friends.” Instinct told me to trust him, not to cave his skull, yet.

  He lent over, fumbled a key, and unlocked my wrists. I swayed in my seat as we spun into a factory yard, the gate started to close before we were through. I steadied myself and saw the open doors of a warehouse ahead, straight into the bl
ackness before coming to a dead stop. Warehouse doors snapped closed, sitting in total darkness, except for the luminous dial on fat guy’s fat wrist. “Wait,” he said, his spray freshened breath right in my face. The van doors opened and closed and I was on my own, waiting again to find out what somebody had decided to do with me.

  Voices outside, echoed in the empty warehouse, an engine turned on, a hand drawing me out, warehouse doors at the opposite end opened, fat guy holding open the passenger door of a black Merc, a shadow behind the wheel. I slid in.

  “Sergeant Maknazpy, I cannot tell you how glad I am to see you again, my dear friend. You are very welcome to Istanbul, please accept my apologies for your rough reception.”

  Mehmet Kaffa, the man who gave me back my life when an al-Zarqawi sword was sharpened above my infidel neck. I hugged him tightly, half dragged him across the driver’s seat, slapped and rubbed his shoulders and back. I surprised both of us with my emotion, but the memory of that blood soaked execution sword was always close to my mind’s eye.

  Kaffa beamed his warm smile, straightened behind the wheel.

  “Your arrival will have been noted, no one will think you are a friend of mine, that gives us a good start. I will take you to a safe place now, but I must apologise again, my friend, I must ask you to lie down on the floor. There are many eyes in Istanbul, we must give them nothing to see.”

  I half crouched in the back, a blanket over my head, felt the torque of the Merc as we took off out of the warehouse.

  “It makes me very glad to see you again, Con, but I am sorry about the circumstances. Perhaps we will meet as friends some day, when our enemies are not there to watch?”

  He was an educated man, his formal English closer to a London Gentleman’s than my sloppy Yonkers tongue. Only the “V” sound on his “vatch” tripped him. His easy confidence rubbed off on anybody with him, I knew that from before. I wasn’t afraid about what lay ahead, exactly, but his upbeat tone reinforced my own resolve.