The Increment: A Novel - By David Ignatius Page 0,55

like me to share with Mr. Fellows?”

“Some. Not all. Enough.”

“I see.” Atwan smiled. “I should take Mr. Fellows into the library. But not into the bedroom.”

“You might say that. Into the bedroom, even, but not under the covers.”

“Well then, how to begin? I suppose you could say that I am in the import-export business. I obtain products that are scarce in world markets. And then I sell them to people who want to buy them. Not under my own name, of course. I have many companies. They operate so effectively that I can, as you might say, hide in plain sight. What could be simpler? Except that it is not so simple.”

“Why not?” asked Harry. He wasn’t sure where the conversation was going, or why Winkler had brought him here.

“Because I deal in products that are somewhat unusual, my dear. They are not the sort of things you find at Marks and Spencer.”

“Such as?”

Atwan looked to Adrian for guidance. The British spy nodded.

“Go ahead, Kamal. I told you: he’s one of us.”

“Very well. The sorts of products I might be looking to buy and resell at present would include, let me think…fast rise-time oscillographs, to measure very short electrical pulses. That would be one item. And something known as a flash X-ray, which can take a picture of an imploding core. That’s a useful device. And, let me think…hydrodynamic measurement tools that chart the movement of shock waves through materials. And very fast computers that can take data from these measurement instruments and use them to simulate a complex process. I’m quite interested in those, with the proper software tools.”

“Do you perhaps see a pattern here, Mr. Fellows?” asked Adrian with a wink. “Care to hazard a guess as to how one might use this equipment?”

“They’re tools for developing a nuclear weapon,” said Harry.

“You cheated,” said Adrian. He looked over at Atwan, who was sipping his Diet Coke.

“Since we’re playing twenty questions, let me ask the next one,” said Harry. “What about heavy-water reactors? The kind whose spent fuel can be reprocessed into plutonium. Any orders to get one of those up and running?”

Atwan laughed. There was a lightness about him, a Fred Astaire quality, despite the deadly seriousness of his business.

“You have a feel for the market, my dear. I can see that. We have no orders yet to complete that reactor. But I tell you frankly, I would not be surprised to get such a request soon. It is in the pipeline, shall we say.”

“And who are your customers? If I may ask.”

“I am afraid I never discuss that. Except with Adrian. A matter of business confidentiality, sir. Not something to talk about.”

“Go ahead,” said Winkler. “Tell him who you’ve been dealing with recently, Kamal. It’s all in the family.”

Atwan cocked his head suspiciously, but Winkler nodded for him to go ahead.

“Well then, my dear Mr. Fellows. My most recent customer for this scientific equipment has been an Iranian company. It operates through intermediaries, of course. Several layers. But the end purchaser is a company called Tohid Electrical Company. Not very well known to the world. But known to my friend Mr. Winkler.”

Harry didn’t move a muscle. Of course he knew the name. Tohid Electrical Company was the business address of an Iranian gentleman named Karim Molavi. Also known as “Dr. Ali.”

“Sorry,” said Harry. “Never heard of it.” He looked over to Winkler and saw him nod his chin ever so slightly, in homage to Harry’s discretion.

They ate a splendid lunch. A waiter brought stuffed grape leaves and kibbeh and a dozen other Lebanese appetizers, then a fish course of fresh lobster tails, and then rare lamp chops adorned with paper bibs so they looked like little choir boys dressed for chapel; and then a groaning board of cheese with a dozen different varieties. Atwan barely ate himself, just nibbling at the food, but Winkler went at it like a trencherman.

Harry matched him until the waiter brought out a dessert of hot fudge sundaes, which he waved off, but Adrian kept on eating—enjoying every mouthful. It seemed clear that he had sampled Atwan’s cuisine on other occasions and was eating as if he were the man’s own son—or perhaps business partner.

Atwan talked about his library. That seemed to be his dearest possession, more even than the Impressionist paintings that decorated the walls downstairs. He had first editions of all the great English novelists, he explained. Austen, Eliot, Dickens, Thackeray, Trollope. The British Library wanted to buy his collection