kept under regular observation by the various French police agencies.
In sticking to public places and chattering like normal people, they avoided conspiratorial meetings in small rooms that could be bugged by clever policemen. Open-air meetings were easy to observe but nearly impossible to record. And nearly every man in France had regular lunch mates. However large and well funded the French police were, they could not investigate everybody in this infidel country. With regular visibility came anonymity. Quite a few others had been caught or even killed by taking the other route. Especially in Israel, where the police agencies were notoriously efficient, largely because of the money they so liberally spread on the street. There were always those willing to take money for information, which was why he had to choose his people so carefully.
And so the meeting did not begin with religious incantations. They all knew them anyway. And they spoke exclusively in French, lest someone take note of a foreign language. Too many Westerners were learning what Arabic sounded like—and to them it always sounded conspiratorial. Their mission was to be invisible in plain sight. Fortunately, it wasn’t all that hard.
“So what is this mission?” Shasif Hadi asked.
“It’s an industrial facility,” Ibrahim answered. “For now that’s all you need to know. Once we’re on the ground, you’ll be fully briefed.”
“How many?” Ahmed asked. He was the youngest member of the team, clean-shaven with a well-groomed mustache.
“The goal isn’t casualties—at least not human casualties.”
“Then what?” This was Fa’ad. He was a Kuwaiti, tall and handsome.
“Again, you’ll know more when it becomes necessary.” He drew a piece of paper from his pocket and unfolded it on the table before them. It was a computer-printed map, altered with some image-editing software so all the place names were missing.
“The problem will be selecting the best point of entry,” Ibrahim said. “The facility is fairly well guarded, both within and along the perimeter. The explosive charges necessary will be trivial, small enough to carry in one backpack. The guards inspect the area twice daily, so timing will be critical.”
“If you’ll get me the explosive specifications, I can start planning,” Fa’ad said, pleased to have his education being used in Allah’s Holy Cause. The others thought him overly proud of his engineering degree from Cairo University.
Ibrahim nodded.
“What about the police and intelligence services there?” Hadi asked.
Ibrahim waved his hand dismissively. “Manageable.”
His casual tone belied his thoughts. He had a genuine fear of police investigators. They were like evil djinns in the way they could inspect a piece of evidence and turn all manner of magical information from it. You could never tell what they knew and how they could tie it all together. And his primary job was not to exist. No one was to know his name or his face. He traveled as anonymously as a desert breeze. The URC could stay alive only if it remained hidden. For his part, Ibrahim traveled on numerous unknown credit cards—cash, unfortunately, was no longer anonymous at all; the police feared those who used cash, and searched them out rigorously. He had enough passports in his home to satisfy a nation-state’s foreign ministry, each of them expensively procured and used only a few times before being burned to ashes. And he wondered if even this was precaution enough. It took only one person to betray him.
And the only people who could betray him were those whom he trusted absolutely. Thoughts like that turned over and over in his mind. He took a sip of coffee. He even worried about talking in his sleep on an aircraft during an overwater flight. That’s all it might take. It wasn’t death he feared—none of them feared that—but rather failure.
But were not the Holy Warriors of Allah those who did the hardest things, and would not his blessings be in proportion to his merit? To be remembered. To be respected by his compatriots. To strike a blow for the cause—even if he managed to do that without recognition, he would go to Allah with peace in his heart.
“We have final authorization?” Ahmed asked.
“Not yet. Soon, I expect, but not yet. When we separate here, we won’t see each other again until we’re in country.”
“How will we know?”
“I have an uncle in Riyadh. He’s planning on buying a new car. If my e-mail says it is a red car, we wait; if a green car, we move to the next stage. If so, five days after the e-mail we will meet