The Network - Jason Elliot [81]
We pass into a larger chamber almost as big as the church above us. The floor is bare but the walls are covered with more faded but colourful murals of mythological landscapes and encounters. There are blind windows and door frames carved meticulously out of the pale stone and, running the length of the base of the walls, a low platform. On this platform, at the far side of the chamber, sits Gemayel.
The guards settle on either side of the entrance we have come through. Gemayel stands up and greets me warmly. His hair and moustache are grey now, but he looks in good health. There’s a patrician look of approval on his face.
‘You were a boy when I met you,’ he says. ‘Now I see a man.’
‘I did not expect to meet you again in a church,’ I say, for lack of a better reply.
‘Our Prophet recommends that if you cannot find a mosque to pray in, then you should go to a church.’
‘Better than a prison, I think.’
‘For some, even a church can be a prison.’ He smiles. ‘But for me the churches of Rome are the most beautiful in the world. This is the best city in which to take the Prophet’s advice.’
He knows I have an important reason for calling a secret meeting but is happy to delay the moment of asking until we have caught up. We talk a little of our lives and are led back to the fateful events of his capture by the Israelis, ten years earlier.
‘I do not forget what you did,’ he says. ‘I am still in your debt.’
‘There is no debt,’ I tell him. ‘What I did was my duty.’
‘To protect me, you killed a man.’
‘I failed to protect you.’
‘There is honour even in failure,’ he says, and smiles again.
It’s strange, but at this simple statement I feel a burden lifted from me. It’s as if he’s exorcised an old and troublesome ghost that’s been haunting me for years, and I feel suddenly grateful towards him.
‘Ask anything of me, and it will be repaid,’ he says.
‘Insha’allah, the opportunity for that will come. Now I have other news.’
I tell the truth, as much as I’m able. He will never know the full story: that his violent release from prison was a favour to the Israelis for providing the cover for Manny’s infiltration. That he was sold, in effect. But the rest is true. I explain I’ve come not only as a friend but as a representative of my government, and that we are seeking his people’s help in Sudan for any word of the Stinger purchases. If bin Laden is involved, we need to know. He listens attentively and nods in agreement at the request. He can guarantee no result, he says, but will alert me to any news as to whether Sheikh Osama, as he calls bin Laden, is connected or not. He reminds me that his own organisation wholly rejects the killing of civilians and has no policy of contact with any of the groups calling themselves al-Qaeda. But he will ask his people to listen.
I thank him and then tell him about the plot we have discovered against him. He says nothing but shifts his position a little and grips the bridge of his nose between his thumb and first finger.
‘First they want to save me, then they want to kill me.’ He lets out a heavy sigh. ‘But God knows best. There are details?’
I tell him what I know. Then I give him a phone number and instruct him to notify me, using a code, if our intelligence proves to be correct. He agrees again, knowing that we also need to verify the reliability of our own source.
‘Remember, our friendship is outside all of this,’ he says, and stands up. ‘We have work to do.’ His guards come to their feet as we cross the open space, and then he pauses, as if he’s remembered something.
‘You will go to Khartoum?’ he asks. ‘Perhaps there is a better way to search for such knowledge while you are there. There is a woman who has been in contact with the people in my office, to speak about our charitable work. She works with the mellal al-mottahed – the United Nations.’
I’m puzzled, because a woman with the UN isn’t much of a lead. Then Gemayel speaks again, and it’s as if