The Submission - Amy Waldman [80]
“What did I always tell you?” he said, his tone as reassuringly solid as a wall, and as impenetrable.
“I know, I know. But now I’m stuck. Please. Anything. I’ll owe you. I don’t even need anything to print. Just something to get her to talk.”
“In that case you could make it up.”
As Alyssa pondered this, Oscar put his glasses on and watched her through them. “That would be cheating,” she said. “It’s no fun, you know that. And once you start doing that, what’s the point of doing this at all?”
His mouth turned up at one edge, like a wink. Good girl: she had passed the test. Ignoring the sound of the bedroom television and the woman watching it, she briefly let herself imagine a rekindled affair. That he then gave her a scrap to use only fed the dream. In their world, it qualified as a romantic gesture.
“Here’s what I got,” he said. “A buddy of mine at the bureau who was in Kabul for a while told me this, but it’s Pluto”—their shorthand for “so far off the record it’s on Pluto.” His eyes commanded now: “And you’ll see why I didn’t run with it, and you won’t, either. I have your word?”
My word, whatever else you want. She nodded.
She and Claire met near Arthur Avenue in the Bronx. It was neutral ground between Chappaqua and Manhattan. And who would spot them in an Albanian coffee shop? Its walls were mirrored, its tables marble, its espresso feral, its pastry stale. Wrinkled old men played dominoes at one table, the tiles clicking in place of talk. At another, three young men brooded, their eyes never leaving Alyssa and Claire. In posters on the walls, female fighters brandished AK-47s. Alyssa’s glance lingered on them for a moment: Albanians were … Muslim. Maybe neutral ground wasn’t so neutral after all.
Through bleary vision, she studied Claire’s bone structure and sapphire eyes, until they narrowed in suspicion. “Why are we here?” Claire asked, cool.
“I have information, but I can’t share it unless you give me an interview,” Alyssa blurted. She was underrested, overcaffeinated, and jittery.
“I can’t,” Claire said. “It’s against the rules. I told you that.”
Something on background, Alyssa insisted, that would allow her to convey what Claire was thinking, even if it came from “knowledgeable sources” or “a friend of Claire Burwell.”
“How do I know that what you’re telling me is important?” Claire said.
“Trust me,” Alyssa said, and they both looked embarrassed.
Claire unfolded and refolded her paper napkin. “This is a dirty business, isn’t it,” she said. A statement, not a question. Alyssa wasn’t sure which business she was referring to. Journalism? The memorial selection? The Albanian coffee shop, which stank of being a cover for organized crime? For a minute she pitied Claire for having to soil her pristine values in the muck where everyone else lived.
“I like to think of it as practical,” Alyssa said, in a way she hoped was soothing. She waited until Claire almost whispered “Oh, all right,” and then pulled out her notebook.
“He was in Afghanistan,” she told Claire now. “Kabul.”
“So is that where—” Claire started to say.
“He made a threat against the embassy there.”
“What?” Claire said, incredulous. “That can’t be true.” But she was white. Alyssa pushed a water glass closer to her. Claire sipped. “There must be some explanation,” she said, tremulous. “Why wouldn’t everyone know about this? Why wouldn’t they have arrested him?”
“I don’t think it was an actionable threat,” Alyssa said. “More threatening language. Supportive of threats, rather than making a threat himself. These cases are difficult—if they locked up every Muslim who said something anti-American, the prisons would be full. More full. Way more full. I’m just