There must be something!” Majid ducked under the guardrail. Henry followed him down one of the piers, past the giant moorings. Two boys were fishing in the dark water, which glistened with oil stains. Majid spoke sharply to them about the danger they were in, but they laughed at him. Henry could see the shock in Majid’s eyes at being so carelessly disregarded. The war had thrown off any sense of authority or obligation or respect. Saudi Arabia would never again be what it had been.
At the end of the darkened pier there was a little two-masted dhow, nearly invisible until the men came upon it. Majid called out three times, but no one responded. “Henry, can you sail?” he asked.
Instantly a small man in a turban appeared on the deck, brandishing a pistol. Majid and Henry stepped back in alarm. Majid spoke to the man in Arabic, but he responded in English. “You try to steal my boat!” he cried.
“Please, my friend, we will pay,” said Majid.
“Now you say so, but you intend to steal.” From his accent, Henry thought he was Indian or Bangladeshi. His eyes darted about in fear, making the pistol in his hand all the more menacing.
“It’s true, I am desperate,” Henry admitted. “I have to get home to America. I would do anything to see my family again.”
“You think this boat can go to America?”
“I just need to get to Bahrain, to the American base there.”
Majid took his watch off his wrist and held it up. “Sir, this watch is worth as much as your dhow. I offer it to you if you will take my friend.”
The owner of the boat lowered his pistol and examined the watch. He nodded at Henry. “But you know it is dropping off only,” he said. “No round trip.”
Henry agreed, then turned to Majid. “Thank you, my friend,” he said. “I don’t know if we’ll meet again.”
“Our fate is already written,” Majid replied. “Every Muslim knows this.” He reached into the pocket of his uniform. “I have this for you to remember me by. It’s an English Qur’an. You don’t have to read it, but if you do, you might find some wisdom and perhaps some solace. Anyway, you may remember our friendship, and that would be enough.”
They embraced, and then Henry climbed aboard.
33
The War Zone
The Russian foreign minister was tall and elegant, a perfectly carved diplomat, made of obdurate material like one of those great stone heads on Easter Island facing the typhoons of the Pacific, content in the knowledge that every storm passes and that lies are rarely held to account. “We are not in Iran in any meaningful way,” he insisted in his interview with Chris Wallace on Fox News. “We sold them military equipment, which we also service, so this is our only obligation.”
“If America supports the Saudis in their war against Iran, what will the Russian response be?” Wallace asked.
The foreign minister shook his head dismissively. “No, no, this discussion presumes we are choosing sides in this conflict. We do not make this choice.”
“U.S. intelligence says otherwise,” Wallace said. “There’s a report in The Wall Street Journal this morning that Su-57s have been stationed in Tabriz and Mehrabad, Iran. Your most advanced stealth fighter jets, is that correct?”
“It is correct that it is our most advanced jet, but all that you say except for that is false. We do not deploy this aircraft outside Russian borders.”
“You see this image on the screen?” Wallace said, gesturing to a grainy picture of an airfield taken from a satellite. “The report says those are your jets on the ground in Tabriz.”
The foreign minister stared at Wallace as if he were a small dog that had hold of his pants cuff. “You accuse us of misinformation, of deception,” he said. “We also accuse you, the United States, of lying to the world about the greatest plague we have ever seen, this Kongoli virus.”
“What exactly is your charge, sir?”
The foreign minister’s eyes narrowed. “We have information. Our scientists have analyzed this virus. It is not natural. It comes from the laboratory. There is only one place that has the capacity for making such an evil disease. Your Fort Detrick.”
“Are you claiming that the U.S. manufactured this disease? More than ten million Americans are dead. Hundreds of millions worldwide. Why would we do this?”
“The cause, we can only speculate. Perhaps it is released by mistake. Such things happen. But we can say for sure this is an American product.”