The Psalter Read online

  The imam thumbed the pages, pressing his face close to the ancient script, peering at the text through half-moon spectacles. Occasionally, he mouthed a word. “This is the one. You saved it and restored our honor.”

  “What’s the importance of this Latin book?” Rashid asked.

  “Ah, my son, the meaning is of little use to us. The significance lies in a great sin committed by our forefathers.”

  “What sin is that?”

  The Imam breathed a gloomy sigh. “One that obliges us to protect the book until the Mahdi returns and brings the golden days of justice.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Of course you don’t, but understanding will come sooner than you can imagine. You’re part of the plan. It’s your heritage.”

  “Can you not tell me what that is?” Rashid chafed at the arcane answers.

  “Not yet, but when the time is right. First, you must deliver the book to someone.”

  “I’ll tell Hassan to get ready.”

  “No.” The imam stopped Rashid with a hand on his shoulder. “This is a task for you alone. No one else must know. Hassan has his special talents, but this job requires precision and subtlety. Those are not his strengths. After all, he’s not one of us.” Surprise covered Rashid’s face and made the imam laugh. “Oh, don’t think for a moment I don’t understand Hassan completely. He’s a brute and his faith waivers in the slightest breeze, but he has skills I need. However, only our family can do what has to be done. Now you must take the book to Paris.”

  “We’ve just come from there.” Rashid was confused.

  “Of course, and the book must go back, but somewhere else in the city.”

  “What’s the address”?

  “I’ll call you when you’re on the road, but go now,” the imam said. “Under no circumstances can you return here. Leave the rental car. One of the men can deal with it. I bought a used car from a local and haven’t changed the registration. One can’t be too careful.”

  “Is something wrong?”

  “No Rashid. All is as it must be. No more questions; time to go.”

  “You’re not leaving me here.” Hassan threw himself on the bed, exasperated. “Where are you going?”

  “I was told not to say.”

  “Oh come on, I swear I won’t tell.”

  “I can’t, Hassan.”

  “Well, what am I supposed to do, milk cows?”

  “There are no cows.”

  “You know what I mean. We’re in the middle of nowhere and when I tried to walk through the gate, the guards stopped me. They say I’m not allowed to leave without permission from the imam. Can you imagine? This is worse than living at home.”

  “You knew what you were getting into when you signed on.”

  “All I wanted was a ticket out of the desert. I didn’t expect this. Please take me with you. I’ll do anything you say, I swear.”

  Rashid was sympathetic to his friend and spoke deferentially. “I would if I could, but it’s not possible.”

  “Come on, we’re a team. We’ve been one since our days in the camps, remember? Who helped you finish early morning runs when the instructors were on your ass and you barfed your guts?”

  “You,” Rashid admitted.

  “Who spent late nights showing you how to take apart and reassemble machine pistols and AK-47’s when you thought you were failing out? And you would have blown yourself up when they tried to teach you how to make explosives if not for me. I laughed my ass off watching you get gel all over your hands. So what if we’re from different tribes? We’re brothers to the end, remember?”

  “I’ll never forget, but I still can’t take you with me. Orders.”

  Hassan jumped from the bed in a rage that Rashid knew was more act than ire. “You’re an ungrateful bastard, Rashid. Don’t ever ask me for anything.” He stormed out of the room, slamming the door.

  He hated to hurt his friend’s feelings, but the imam was right: Hassan was not one of them. Rashid had grown up destitute in the desert on the Iran-Iraq border, where his village recognized no manmade boundary in the land Allah had given his people. The youngest of several sons, he was mostly uneducated until his twelfth birthday, when his father had led him to a Mosque and turned him over to the care of the imam. From that day forward, his life was never to be the same. Indeed, the imam transformed him completely. He sent him to school to learn the Qur’an and, when he was lettered enough, began to tutor him personally in other books, foreign books with ancient writing. The Aramaic was easy since it was like Arabic, but Latin and Greek were bizarre, written the wrong way, from left to right as though they were in opposition to God. Hassan knew nothing of these languages and less of the burden placed on Rashid’s people, the Children of the Book.

  After his education, he was sent to a camp in Lebanon to learn how to fight. That’s where he had met Hassan, who became his fast friend and helped him train during those grueling days when he was brutalized by merciless instructors. After Rashid finished his training, his first assignment was to open a safe house in Rome. He chose Hassan to be his assistant since they had forged a bond of loyalty in the desert, a connection only soldiers understand. Now, for the first time in ages, they’d be separated.

  Anyway, his task was confusing and he couldn’t explain what it was to Hassan because he didn’t know himself. First they seized a book in Paris and now he had to return it, all very cryptic. The job would have been much easier if they had just dropped it off in the city. Then their mission would be over and they could go back to Rome. But soon, the imam had said, all would be revealed.

  Rashid saw Hassan’s sullen face in the rearview mirror as he steered the rattling Peugeot 206 through the open gate into the early evening. Hassan was selfish, easily provoked to violence and devoted to his worldly distractions, but they had a past together. I’ll buy him something in Paris, he thought. Maybe an MP3 player or some rap music. Then he drove into the tunnel of trees lining the narrow lane that was illuminated only by the dim, dirty lights of the creaky Peugeot.

  26

  Halawa

  Colonelo Del Carlo poured over copies of ledgers the forensic accountants of the French counter terrorism unit, the GIGN, had prepared. They showed a complex series of financial transactions, but the number crunchers had sorted them out. Money from financiers with links to terrorist groups was transferred from accounts in Saudi Arabia to Lebanon and Jordan. Then the cash went to banks in Dubai, which obeys few international banking regulations, and was wired to Muslim charities in Europe.

  More difficult to trace was money from Islamic charities whose source was legitimate, but was diverted later for illicit purposes. Virtually impossible to follow was a system of cash transfers used for hundreds of years. Known in Asia as chop or hundi in India, in the Middle East halawa was a network to move money without banks. A code was sent from one country to another, often simply a password by email. Then the receiving party collected cash from a businessman who lived in the country. No bank transfers and no records.

  Legitimate banking institutions had a hand in money laundering, as well. Bankers who charged fat fees turned a blind eye because their bottom line mattered more than shutting down cash pipelines to terrorists.

  The ledgers made clear that an imam in France had used laundered money to buy a farmhouse and the surrounding land. According to Capitaine Desmoulins, an attorney had negotiated the deal while keeping his client’s name hidden. The residents eventually found out and filed suit to keep the transaction from being concluded. However, the imam claimed in court that the farm would allow young Muslims to escape city slums and spend their vacations in the countryside. He had played the racism card and the French court ruled in his favor, finding no legitimate reason to nullify the sale. Of course, the courts had not been able to trace the source of the money used to buy the property. Too bad, Del Carlo thought.

  The Colonel read several statements from locals that gunfire often came from the farm and laugh
ed out loud. Did the imam truly think he would find anonymity in Normandy, one of the most conservative regions in France? The imam claimed that rifles and shotguns were fired only during hunting season or for target practice, and refused to allow police to search the premises. Nevertheless, residents lodged lots of complaints—hundreds, in fact. The local cops passed reports to the GIGN, and they had ended up on Desmoulins’s desk. He theorized that the farm was being used as a training camp.

  The reports fascinated Del Carlo, but he wondered why Desmoulins had sent them to him. An attached note requested that he call after his review. His interest piqued, he dialed the direct line to the GIGN captain. “Hello, Capitaine. Del Carlo here.”

  “Bonjour, Colonel, a pleasure to hear from you. How’s your American priest?”

  “Fine, as far as I know. I heard he received a fat promotion, in charge of Technology and Security at the Vatican Library.”

  “Security? After the fiasco in Paris?” Capitaine Desmoulins was incredulous. “You’re kidding, surely.”

  “Who can fathom the workings of the church?”

  “Did you read the report I sent you?” Desmoulins asked.

  “With great interest, and I appreciate your courtesy in keeping me informed, but I don’t grasp the relevance to the dead priest or missing prayer book?”

  “Do you recall Father Romano’s description of his attacker?”

  “Sure do. I thought it might be a paramilitary operation,” Del Carlo said.

  “Me too. Not many Europeans dress in military fatigues. Imagine my surprise when a surveillance team spotted a man on Interpol’s Terrorism Watch List dressed in secondhand army clothes, complete with boots and a crew cut. So I did some checking. He’s a known associate of a radical imam and flew from Rome to Paris the morning of the break-in. Are you interested now?”

  “Of course. I would never have guessed Arabs. Is he at the farm with the imam?”

  “Yes and we’ve planned a raid. I thought you might like to observe,” the French captain said.

  “You bet, but…”

  “What is it, Colonelo?”

  “Well…”

  “Come on, spit it out,” Demoulins said bluntly.

  “Father Romano might be of some use. How would you feel about him joining us?”

  “You must be joking!”

  Romano was incredulous as he answered the colonel. “What use would I be on a raid of a terrorist compound?”

  “It’s a hunch, Father, but if these are the men who attacked you, there’s a good chance they have the Psalter with them. It might be our only chance to examine it.”

  “Couldn’t you bring it here?”

  “Father, this is a French operation. If the book is there, I doubt Capitaine Desmoulins would release it to me and certainly not to you.”

  “I get your point. I’ll have to ask my cardinal for permission.”

  “If he agrees, will you come?” The Italian colonel asked.

  “I wouldn’t miss it.”

  Romano told Isabelle he had to attend to some business out of town and would leave her in the charge of Cardinal Minissi’s secretary. Father Sabella was a quiet priest with a keen intellect and unswerving devotion to the Library’s Cardinal. His was the theology of efficiency, and he used his quick mind to carry out Minissi’s instructions to the letter with robotic zeal. He balked at having a woman in his charge, admitting it made him uncomfortable. But when Romano explained Isabelle’s mission, to install a digital photography system that could detect scriptures long erased, he became enthusiastic to be even a small part of the task.

  For her part, Isabelle said she wouldn’t have the time to miss Romano since she had thrown herself into researching which system would be best for a massive Library with such a miniscule budget. Unfortunately, IsyReADeT was proprietary, and the beta software was on loan to the French National Archives. She mused that IsyReADeT would have been perfect because the system practically ran itself. Instead, she would have to choose something more labor-intensive, and that meant a good deal of training.

  Unmarked cars from the French GIGN raced down National Route Fourteen, blue lights flashing, followed by four large vans loaded with strike units from the Paris gendarmerie attached to Capitaine Desmoulins. Romano sat between Del Carlo and Desmoulins. He felt out of place and ill at ease. He knew that even though the church had forgiven him for losing the Psalter, these two professionals regarded his actions as amateurish at the least and more than likely incompetent. He squirmed in the little space he had.

  Approaching the turn to the farm, Desmoulins spotted a beat-up Peugeot turning onto the highway from the narrow lane. He ordered the driver to slow. Through binoculars, he read the license plate and keyed the number into his notebook processor. The car was registered to a local farmer.

  “You understand,” the French captain said to Del Carlo and Romano, “you’re observers and must remain in the car until we’ve secured the site. Then I’ll send for you.”

  “Of course,” Del Carlo replied. “I have but two interests, the prayer book and the men who stole it.”

  “Then we’re agreed, Colonelo, you’ll be responsible for Father Romano?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good. I’ll rely on your professionalism.”

  Capitaine Desmoulins gave instructions to his lieutenant, and the operation was set in motion. Elite military police from the gendarmerie dressed in black with MP5A3 submachine guns and wearing night-vision goggles scaled the stone walls surrounding the compound. They dropped to the other side and ran across the courtyard. Gravel scrunched under their rubber-soled boots as they surrounded the farmhouse and brick dormitories.

  A dog barked from inside one of the houses. A light flicked on in one of the upstairs windows. “Merde,” Desmoulins swore, then shouted into his walkie-talkie, “Allez, allez, allez!”

  On cue, gendarmes pried open ground-floor metal shutters with crowbars and tossed stun grenades inside. They detonated with a percussive bang. Three teams of gendarmes burst through doors and windows. They screamed at the occupants, who rushed downstairs in boxer shorts and t-shirts, waving rifles and shotguns.

  One of the Arabs fired a blast from his double-barrel. Pellets splattered the wall, sending plaster flying. The French team flopped to the ground and sprayed the stairs from prone positions. Two Arabs plummeted over the banister, crashing to the floor with lifeless thuds. Another slumped on the steps. Gunfire erupted in short bursts from the other buildings.

  Desmoulins ordered the sergeant at his side to open the gate. He produced a battering ram and with a second gendarme, they swung hard. The gate resounded with a metallic clang but didn’t budge.

  “Blow it,” Demoulins said. They placed a small plastic charge on the lock and retreated behind the cars. The sergeant pressed a red button on a miniature black box and the detonation shattered the lock. The gate limped open. Desmoulins marched, in alert and focused, his Beretta automatic pistol gripped in his hand. He knew his team was mopping up by the chatter on his radio. They dragged out men still in their underclothes, arms behind their backs and secured with plastic tie wraps. Police pushed prisoners to their knees, then onto their faces.

  The lieutenant, seeing his captain in the courtyard, ran to his side. “Report,” Desmoulins said.

  “No casualties, mon Capitaine. They have three dead and two wounded.”

  “Where’s our imam?”

  “Inside. He hasn’t been roughed up or humiliated, sir.”

  “Good. I don’t want any martyrs…and our suspects?”

  “They haven’t been found, Capitaine. We’re searching the buildings now.”

  “Merde! Very well, Lieutenant, carry on.” Desmoulins walked back to the gate, proud of his men. Once again, they’d been lucky; but Desmoulins’s definition of luck was when skill and nonstop training met with opportunity. His teams were skilled and he trained them relentlessly. Their dangerous assignments provided all the opportunity anyone could desire. Still, he
was troubled that two had flown the coop, and he thought again of the Peugeot 206. He was making a mental note to contact the owner when he was jerked backward by the collar, the barrel of a gun shoved under his chin. “Make a sound and I’ll blow your face off,” the voice from behind hissed as the captain was pulled to the stone wall. “And drop the pistol.”

  “Calm yourself,” Desmoulins said with difficulty. “My men are everywhere. You can’t escape.”

  “We’re leaving together or we’ll depart the earth together. The choice is yours.”

  The GIGN captain registered deadly intent in the passionless voice. This man felt no fear and no emotion. That was truly dangerous. He didn’t fit the profile of someone who negotiated. For the first time in his life, Desmoulins knew his odds weren’t good. His only hope was to help the man escape. Yet once free, Desmoulins would be a hindrance and eliminated without so much as a passing thought. The faces of his beautiful wife and two little daughters rushed into his thoughts and he was grieved to think of tears in their lovely eyes.

  “Drop your weapon!” Colonel Del Carlo shouted, pointing his service Beretta at the attacker from an acute angle. He edged closer to get a more direct shot, but Hassan had his back against the wall and shielded his front with the captain.

  “No, you drop yours.” Hassan shoved the automatic harder under Desmoulins’ chin, making him wince. “Or I’ll blow his brains out.”

  “Don’t do it, Colonel,” the French captain rasped.

  “Shut up,” Hassan said.

  “Shoot, Colonel.”

  “I don’t have a shot.”

  “I’m ordering you.”

  Del Carlo moved the barrel micrometers back and forth, searching for a better angle.

  Hassan squeezed his trigger finger tighter and Desmoulins felt the hand flex. “Shoot now, for God’s sake!”

  “I said shut…” Hassan was saying as the gun fired. The discharge burned Desmoulins’ cheek, and he fell to the ground. His eye stung and he caught only glimpses of a man in black, spinning.