âEnough self-absorption. Whatâs on our plate today?â
I walk him through the morning meeting, and he nods, beginning to look human again. âTRIPWIRE, you say?â
I nod.
âThere was somethingâ¦â He begins to type with determination, and I lean back, allowing him his moment of escape inside the job. He uses work that way, to sidestep the realities of his miserable life. The best of us do that. âYes. Here. In â04 TRIPWIRE gave us a load of shit about an al Qaeda cell in Salzburg. We wasted a lot of time with the Interior Ministry, trying to get them to storm a warehouse. Empty, of course.â He shakes his head. âWe can keep an eye on this, but Iâd say thereâs an eighty percent chance heâs selling us another fairy tale.â
âMaybe,â I tell him, âbut look at your in-box. From Europol.â
He goes back to his computer, scrolling until he finds the message I saw when he showed up. Itâs a mention of the arrival of one Mashood Al-Fakeeh, on a Saudi passport, in Barcelona two days ago, arriving from Jordan. Mashood Al-Fakeeh, the analysts believe, is in fact Ilyas Shishani, a Chechen radical who reportedly joined forces with Ansar Al-Islam. It isnât much of a leap to wonder if heâs one of the operational planners that Ansar Al-Islam has lent to Aslim Taslam for TRIPWIREâs âairline-related event.â
Bill certainly doesnât need any prodding. He reads the message, then raises his head to look hard at me. Without a word, he nods and stands up. Heâs in command again, using work the way it should be used as he marches off to Vickâs office.
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4
Maternal feelings are the only explanation for why I insist on taking Bill to lunch when Iâm not even hungry. Maternal feelings, and pity. So a little after one oâclock I tap on his door frame and ask when he last ate. Heâs hunched over his keyboard, gray hair scattered across his forehead. âLast night,â he says, looking surprised by his own admission.
âPack your things. Iâm treating you to the Golden Dragon.â
It takes some convincing, but the truth is that other than putting out an alert to watch for Ilyas Shishani and fretting about a rumor from Damascus, thereâs not a lot to do. He says, âYouâre not lunching with Mr. Right?â
âHeâs on the other side of town. Shaking down networks. Following leads.â
âAha,â Bill says, bobbing eyebrows, then gives in. âBut Iâm buying.â
âYes, sir.â
Goldener Drachen is nearby, down steep stairs beneath a typical Viennese monstrosity at the southern end of Liechtenstein Park and its Garden Palace. Once we get downstairs, a disarmingly cheerful man brings us into the main dining room, full of civil servants of various nationalities eating cheaply off the Mittagsmenü, surrounded by twisty dragons and ornate Chinese characters adorned in red. The Dragon advertises itself as Austriaâs first Chinese restaurant, and with its photos of famous personages over the decades, smiling with the owner, itâs not hard to believe this claim.
Weâre in luckâa free table beside the aquarium. As we settle down Bill taps irreverently on the glass, scaring aquatic life. We ask for tea and go through the menu. Unlike the government workers around us, weâre unable to bend our tastes to their preset lunch menus, and we end up ordering a smorgasbord: spring rolls, mixed grill, wonton and egg-drop soups, Hou-You chicken in oyster sauce, and Szechuan duck. Tea comes, we place our order, and once weâre alone Bill returns to the aquarium and its strips of faux seaweed, through which exotic fish dart and hide. âYou want to talk about it?â I ask.
Iâm not sure heâs heard me. His gaze doesnât shift. Then he says to the fish, âIâd rather hear about you and Henry. How is utopia?â
He
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