The president is doing much, much better, still off the record, Kuttab’s e-mail began after inquiring about my safety. The last few weeks have seen a nearly miraculous recovery. He’s not just walking now; he’s actually exercising. His appetite is returning. His color looks good. He still struggles with severe pain and, between us, even more severe depression. He smiles for the cameras, for the videos, for the media. But the man you saw in Amman—the man you remarked on who seemed so relaxed, even full of joy—that man, I’m afraid, is gone. Will he return? I don’t know. We have seen other miracles, so I guess anything is possible. Inshallah.
With every sentence, I found myself wincing. My heart grieved for Mansour. He had sacrificed so much to serve his people and try to hammer out a comprehensive peace accord with the Israelis, only to see the process literally explode in his face just before the final deal was signed. Now there was nearly zero interest in reviving the peace process among the Palestinian and Israeli populations, or among their leaders. Everyone knew ISIS was responsible for the terror attacks in Amman. But conspiracy theories had metastasized. Suspicion ran deep on both sides of the Green Line. Bloggers and activists on both sides blamed the other side for sabotaging the peace process, and emotions were running high.
At the end of Kuttab’s note was an invitation to come and visit him and the president at my earliest convenience. I appreciated the gesture, and I liked the idea of sitting with these dear friends and sipping mint tea and seeing firsthand how they were doing. Perhaps if I headed over to Amman, I should go to Ramallah, too, and do an exclusive interview with Mansour—something to make Allen happy. Or at least get him off my back.
But then I glanced in my rearview mirror and suddenly my blood ran cold.
25
A black Mercedes pulled into the service station, covered in snow.
It eased into the line behind me, about six cars back. I was pretty sure I’d passed it several times before, but each time it had caught up with me. About twenty minutes earlier, I thought I’d seen it exit the turnpike. Now it was back.
The snow had turned to sleet. Visibility was getting worse. The Mercedes’s windshield wipers were going full blast, and its front windshield was fogged up. I strained to see faces, but there were too many cars between us to get a good look. Then, in my side mirror, I saw the back passenger door of the Mercedes fling open, and despite the cold I broke out in a panicked sweat.
But out of the car came two figures I did not expect. They weren’t Syrian or Iraqi men. They were two blonde little girls with pigtails and a puppy. They were wearing matching pink snowsuits, boots, mittens, and scarves, and they bounded out of the car without a care in the world. They didn’t seem bothered by the cold and the sleet. Nor were they paying attention to the traffic around them.
In my rearview mirror, I stared in horror as the girls started racing across the parking lot toward the front door of the restaurant, oblivious to a Ford F-150 pickup bearing down on them. Their mother was now out of the car. She was screaming as the driver of the pickup laid on his horn and hit his brakes. Every driver in every car watched helplessly as the truck—which had been coming off the highway far too fast—fishtailed and skidded across the ice toward the girls, who stopped in their tracks, paralyzed in terror. I expected to see the truck smash into the girls and at the last moment turned away. I expected to hear the impact, but it never came. I expected to hear more screaming, but everything grew quiet.
Finally I forced myself to look again. To my amazement, the truck had come to a full stop just inches from the girls. The mother bolted to her daughters and grabbed them. The father was right behind her. Eventually I started breathing again. My heart started beating again.
But then I was startled by someone tapping on my window. I turned quickly only to find it was the service attendant, a young Hispanic kid no more than nineteen or twenty, motioning me to roll down my window. “Sixty-three bucks,” he said.
Had I been in a different frame of mind, I might have asked this kid why the state of New Jersey didn’t trust ordinary citizens to pump their own gas without blowing the place up, why the governor and the legislature were stuck in the twentieth century. Instead, I pulled out my wallet and handed him my Visa card. When it came back with a receipt, I pulled over to the rest area’s entrance. Matt hadn’t come out yet, so I returned to my e-mails.
I sent a quick note to Kuttab, assuring him that I was okay and telling him I would be honored to come see him and his boss soon. But for the moment, that’s all I said. I knew I could work that into a trip to Jordan. But I genuinely had no desire to go to Amman. What I really wanted to do was go see Yael in Tel Aviv or Jerusalem. If I did that, a stop in Ramallah might still make sense. For now, however, a visit with the Palestinian president would have to wait.
The second e-mail was from Allen MacDonald’s executive assistant. As promised, Mary Jane had sent me the details of the flights she’d booked for me from Bar Harbor to Boston, and then from Boston to Amman, via Istanbul, on Turkish Airlines. I didn’t respond. I didn’t know what to say. So I just moved on.
The third e-mail in the queue was from someone claiming to be a top aide to General Amr El-Badawy, commander of Egyptian special forces. I had met the general on a remote Jordanian air base in the final hours before the joint assaults on Dabiq and Alqosh. We hadn’t spoken much then. I hadn’t heard from him since. But now his aide was writing to tell me El-Badawy wanted to speak to me. The subject was too sensitive to discuss by e-mail, the message writer indicated, asking if I could please call the general—through him—at the private number he provided. I glanced at my watch. I couldn’t call now, of course. Matt would be back at any moment. But I was curious, so I sent a note back that I would call at my soonest opportunity.
The fourth e-mail was a somewhat-cryptic message from a partner in the law firm claiming to represent the estate of Robert Khachigian. The firm apparently had “important business” to discuss with me concerning the final will and testament of the former senator and CIA director, who had been assassinated the previous November in D.C. This, too, was apparently a sensitive matter and required an in-person meeting in the firm’s office in Portland, Maine. The partner indicated it was not something he could discuss by phone. I couldn’t imagine what that was all about, nor did I care to guess.
Normally I’d be nowhere near Portland, but as fate would have it, I was about to be. Maine’s largest city was a mere 175 miles south of my hometown of Bar Harbor, roughly a three-hour drive, depending on traffic. I decided I would find the time to make the trip. Khachigian, after all, had been a dear friend of our family and a personal mentor of mine. He had been shot and killed right in front of me while helping me track down one of the most important stories of my career: the capture of chemical weapons by ISIS forces in Syria. Whatever this lawyer had to say about my old friend, I would hear him out. I owed Khachigian and his memory and his family nothing less.
The newest e-mail was from Allen. He apologized for getting testy with me. He assured me that he understood what I was going through, and was ready to request a two-month sabbatical of sorts for me—not counted against my vacation time—so long as I would first go to Jordan and then take the next few weeks to follow this story about the manhunt for the ISIS jihadists that had just hit Washington. After that, he said, he would fully support me taking a “much-needed” break. I read it twice but didn’t reply. My answer hadn’t changed, and frankly I was peeved at him for pushing. I wasn’t going to Amman, and that was final.
Again I glanced at my watch. Matt still wasn’t back. I was about to put the phone down and turn the radio on. But suddenly—and somewhat oddly—I found myself thinking of our home in Maine. It occurred to me that I was actually looking forward to the visit. I craved a hot, home-cooked meal, prepared in that old kitchen, served on that old wooden table, in that old drafty house—the house I grew up in—with my mom and Matt. I couldn’t wait to play with my niece and nephew, to laugh and giggle with them
, maybe play hide-and-seek. Most of all, I wanted not to talk about ISIS or the manhunt or my work or anything related to Washington or the Middle East. Instead, I wanted to sleep in my childhood bed, and awake to a blanket of new-fallen snow and the smell of fresh coffee and bacon and sausages frying in the kitchen. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d had anything like that, and the fact was I missed simple times and a quieter life.
I made a snap decision and sent a quick e-mail to my mom. I briefly described the anniversary surprise Matt was plotting, gave her our location and estimated time of arrival, and said I was looking forward to seeing her. Then I swore her to secrecy and hit Send.
Matt finally got back in the car with to-go cups of steaming black coffee for both of us and a couple of breakfast sandwiches. It dawned on me that I hadn’t texted him like he’d asked, hadn’t told him what I wanted. But rather than apologize, I said nothing. I just nodded my thanks, drank in the infusion of caffeine, and pulled back onto the turnpike.
26
We had no music playing.
The interior of the Audi was silent, save the whoosh-whoosh of the windshield wipers and the hum of the road beneath the treads. Matt, still annoyed or at least disappointed in me, had eaten in silence and then quickly drifted back to sleep.
I was thinking about nothing in particular, just doing my best to stay alert, when I glanced at a passing road sign. I thought we might be getting close to Newark, but the sign didn’t say anything about Newark. It didn’t mention Trenton or Shore Points or Manhattan either. It wasn’t a mileage indicator. It simply noted that VFW Post 8003 in the town of Lawnside had adopted this stretch of the turnpike to keep it free of litter.
Lawnside. Lawnside. Something about the sign caught my attention. But why? Did I know anyone from there? I didn’t think so. Had I ever been to Lawnside? Not that I could recall. So why had I noticed that sign? Why had it caught my attention? Why did I care? Was there any reason at all, or was I just growing exhausted? Maybe it was time to switch with Matt and let him drive. After all, we still had nine hours to go.
Suddenly I realized it wasn’t the name of the town but the organization on the sign that had tickled my subconscious. I grabbed my phone, hit Redial, and got Allen on the third ring. He was finally in the office.
“What about a VFW post?” I asked.
“What?”
“Or an American Legion post?”
“I’m not following you, J. B. What are you talking about?”
“We have them all over Maine,” I said. “Some of these places have old Revolutionary War cannons out front. Others have World War II tanks and other vehicles. Maybe some have howitzers. Maybe that’s where ISIS got them from.”
“Hmm, okay, that’s interesting,” Allen said quickly, catching up with my otherwise-random train of thought. “My father-in-law landed on Omaha Beach on D-day, and he was very active in the VFW in Topeka.”
“Did his post have a howitzer?”
“No, an old half-track,” he said. “But you’re right; maybe some do.”
“Agent Harris mentioned three names—Lowell, Coon, Marion. What if they’re towns with VFW posts and missing howitzers?”
“I knew a town called Lowell when I was growing up in Wisconsin,” Allen said. “It was about seventy miles northwest of Milwaukee, along the Beaver Dam River. My grandpa used to fish not far from there. But it’s small. I mean, really tiny. I bet there’s not a thousand people in the whole town.”
“Did they have a VFW post?” I asked.
“I don’t know—maybe,” he said. “A lot of those small towns do.”
“Can you look it up?”
“Right now?”
“Absolutely. This is important.”
“Fine,” he said. “Hold on.”
The sky was brightening, but I couldn’t see the sun. A layer of thick winter clouds obscured the sky. The digital display on my dashboard said the temperature outside was a mere nine degrees above zero. The forecast called for more snow, but it wasn’t coming down at the moment. The turnpike was pretty clear, considering, but the snowplows and salt trucks were out. More was coming, and they were ready. Was I? It occurred to me then that I didn’t have snow tires on my car. Why would I? Washington rarely had this much snow, and when it did, it usually melted away within a few days. Now I was headed to Maine in a sports car I’d bought well below the Mason-Dixon Line.
A moment later, Allen was back on the line. “Get this,” he said. “Lowell’s population is a whopping 340.”
“That’s it?”
“Yeah—just eighty-nine families and a post office.”
“And a VFW post?”
“Yes—Post 9392.”
“And are they missing anything?”
“As a matter of fact they are,” Allen said. “I just pulled up an AP story from January 2. That’s, what, six weeks ago? Turns out your instincts were right on the money. According to the story, an M114 U.S. Army howitzer used in World War II was stolen from outside VFW Post 9392 sometime after midnight on New Year’s Eve. A police officer is cited saying the evidence suggests this may have been some kind of high school prank. They found empty beer cans and cigarette butts at the scene, rocks thrown through windows, spray paint on the walls, that sort of thing.”
“Pretty smart,” I said, “making it look like some kids out to goof around on New Year’s.”
“Right. I bet the theft wasn’t even reported to the Feds. Why would it have been? No one could have imagined a World War II–era howitzer was going to be used in a terrorist attack.”
Other pieces quickly started falling into place. Searching the Times’ database of news stories from all manner of publications all over the country, Allen pulled up several promising articles. One was about a howitzer stolen on January 9 from a VFW post in Coon Valley, Wisconsin, population 765. Another concerned a howitzer gone missing from a VFW post in Marion, Massachusetts, population 4,907. The articles were brief, little more than curiosities mentioned in the police blotter of obscure newspapers. In each case, the thefts were described by authorities as apparently the work of local youths. The details of the crimes were nearly identical—beer cans, cigarette butts, spray paint, and other forms of vandalism, all suggesting a high school prank of some kind. There was no indication that the police in any of the jurisdictions were aware of the other stolen howitzers. And there certainly was no mention of any notion that a larger plot was being set into motion.
Allen promised to work with his counterpart on the national desk to send Times reporters and photographers immediately to each location. For the moment, we were operating on a hunch. It was a good one, a plausible one—indeed, one Harris himself had set me onto—but before we went to press, we needed more hard information. We couldn’t rely on old stories in local papers. We needed our own people to talk to the VFW folks in each town and interview the local cops. We also needed to confirm that the FBI had been talking to the local authorities and try to pick up any other useful tidbits that would help our readers better understand the ISIS plot.
After I hung up, I drove for another hour.
Then Matt’s phone rang—the ringtone of a dad, some song from Toy Story. He woke up instantly and groggily fumbled to take the call. It was Annie. He motioned for me to be quiet, not wanting me to spoil the surprise of our visit. But no sooner had he said hello than I saw the anxiety in his eyes. He said only a few words before ending the call and reaching for the car radio.
“What is it?” I asked. “What’s going on?”
“Annie says there’s been a terrorist attack in New York.”
27
Matt quickly found a news station out of Manhattan.
The attack had occurred in the subway system. But it wasn’t a stabbing, a shooting, or a bomb. We tuned in just in time to hear a reporter broadcasting from outside of Penn Station say that this was another chemical weapons attack. Terrorists had somehow pumped sarin gas into the subway tunnels through the ventilation system.
r /> “One transit official has confirmed to me that there have been simultaneous and closely coordinated attacks at nine different subway stations in Manhattan, Brooklyn, and the Bronx,” the reporter said. “We have no casualty figures yet, but hundreds of ambulances are being called in and hazmat teams are being deployed.”
As the minutes ticked by, the situation devolved from bad to worse. The news anchor said the Associated Press was now reporting that Washington D.C.’s Metro system had been hit as well. Soon there were reports of chemical weapons attacks in Philly, Boston, Chicago, Minneapolis, Dallas, and Atlanta.
The first detailed reports came from Atlanta. There, the city’s transit systems hadn’t been targeted. Instead, several large luxury hotels had been hit, including three Hiltons, a Marriott, and a Ritz-Carlton. The news station played a sound bite from the Atlanta fire chief, who said the terrorists had apparently employed some kind of aerosolized dispersion system to pump the gas through the hotels’ ventilation systems. In so doing, they had effectively reached every room in the building and had killed nearly every guest and employee. Hundreds were reportedly dead in Atlanta alone, and several hundred more were wounded and battling for their lives.
Then came an update from Boston. The correspondent—reporting live from an emergency command center that had been set up at city hall—said that terrorists had found a way to pump sarin gas into the city’s underground train system known to locals as “the T.”
“I’m standing here with Police Chief Ed McDougal,” the reporter said after setting the scene. “Chief, this is a fast-moving, fast-changing story. What can you tell us so far?”
“Thirty years on the force and I’ve never seen anything like it,” the chief responded. “This is without question the worst terrorist attack in the history of the city. As of five minutes ago, we had over six thousand casualties. We’re calling in ambulances from all over the state to come help us right now.”