I Am Pilgrim(240)

He looked at his watch – thirty-two seconds until the four minutes was up. He was about to hang up and try again when the voice, out of courtesy to the phone company’s customers, repeated the message in English: ‘The subscriber you are calling is either out of cellular range or has their mobile phone switched off.’

Bradley lowered the phone and stared into space. Oh, Jesus.





Chapter Thirty-four


CUMALI HAD WALKED down a flight of broken marble steps and entered an area which, more than any other, had attracted legions of archaeologists and historians to the ruins.

Deep underground, in a vaulted space still decorated with fragments of mosaics and frescoes, she stood beside a reflecting pool, its surface as still as death. It was the centrepiece of what had once been a temple, a place where the highest officials made offerings to their gods in thanks for a safe journey. Cumali had first seen it years before, and had returned to its mysterious beauty in the belief that being so far underground would make it impossible to hear Spitz’s screams and desperate pleas. She didn’t realize it, but the subterranean space was equally good at deadening cellphone reception.

She stared at her face in the mirror-like water, telling herself that whatever her brother was doing to the American was little different from what had been visited upon Muslim men at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay. Bright Light, too.

Comforted by the thought, she walked on, passed the end of the reflecting pool and headed deeper into the temple’s catacomb-like passages.

No sound or signal would ever find her there.





Chapter Thirty-five


MUSCLEMAN AND THE helper had retrieved a short wooden plank that had been hidden among the mound of rubble and trash. I fought and struggled, trying to chew up time, but my injured knee and the pain in my chest meant they had little trouble binding me to the wood with heavy leather straps.

I was face up, trussed so tight I couldn’t move, when the Saracen’s face appeared above me – impassive, his hand reaching down and taking my wrist. He was a doctor, and he was checking my pulse. He gave a grunt of satisfaction – he knew from my heart rate I was scared.

He pointed at Nikolaides. ‘When I’m finished,’ he told me, ‘the man with the dental problem will question you about a murder your intelligence agencies committed in Santorini.

‘He wants to know who ordered the attack and the names of those who did the killing. You understand?’

‘Santorini? I don’t know anything about Santorini.’

They didn’t look convinced. Nikolaides threw a bucket to Muscleman and picked up a length of dirty towel from the rubble. They were about to start.

The Saracen kept looking at me. ‘You can avoid this,’ he told me. I said nothing, and he shrugged.

‘When I was in the Hindu Kush, some people helped me. As you know, one of them has decided to betray us. Obviously, I can’t allow that to happen. I want you to tell me the name of the traitor.’

‘Even if I knew it,’ I replied, ‘once I told you, you’d just kill me.’

He nodded. ‘I’m going to kill you anyway.’

‘I figured – otherwise, you’d be trying to hide your faces.’

My best guess was that I would end up in a waterproof shroud, probably already hidden in a locker on the half-cabin cruiser, and it would likely be years before a fisherman finally hauled it aboard. If Ben didn’t come through, I just hoped I was dead before they put me inside.

‘If you know you’re going to die, what’s the point of suffering first? The name, Mr Spitz.’

‘I am an FBI agent. I came to Bodrum to—’

‘I’ve seen an email!’ he snapped, his face coming close to mine. ‘From the deputy director of the CIA.’

I did my best to look shocked. He registered it, and smiled. ‘Now – the name of the traitor.’

‘I’m an FBI agent—’

Exasperated, he signalled to Nikolaides. The Greek wrapped the dirty towel over my face, covering my eyes and nose, jamming my mouth open. Nikolaides took both ends of the rag behind the plank and tied it tight. I was in darkness, already finding it difficult to breathe, my head bound so firmly to the plank I couldn’t move.

I felt them lift me and, in my private blackness and terror, I knew they had me suspended over the water.

Twenty-nine seconds by my count – the same amount of time the drug courier had endured. Despite my own weaknesses, even though I had always doubted my courage, I only had to withstand it for as long as he did.

They started to lower me down, and I dragged in a breath. The towel stank of sweat and engine oil. The last thing I heard was the Saracen: ‘You’re shaking, Mr Spitz.’