Advocate. 'That's the new flashpoint.
The mujahideen need more weapons and supplies, but how can they obtain them?
Pakistan is working closely with the USA, blocking all the holes. NATO is
keeping an eagle eye on traffic out of the Middle East. Thanks to the pirates,
Somalia is no longer an option.'
'Price of opium is down too,' said Rajkumar. 'Taliban cash
flow is not what it used to be.'
'So where do you send your supplies from?' asked Masilo and
answered his own question: 'From here.'
'How?'
'I don't know. By ship?'
'Why not?' asked Rajkumar. 'Afghanistan has no coastline, but
Iran has.'
'Then why not ship the arms from Indonesia. Lots of angry
Muslims there.'
'Good point. Perhaps because that is what the US will be
thinking too. They have a big naval presence ...'
They looked towards Mentz. She nodded, pushed the papers into
a neat pile in front of her. 'And yet, according to Ismail they are talking
about a local attack ...'
'On the lower levels.'
'You know how information filters down from the top, Raj.'
She looked at Masilo. 'How easy is it going to be for us to replace Ismail
Mohammed?'
'Not easy. Ismail's escape ... it made them jittery. They
don't meet in Schotschekloof any more, we still have to ascertain where their
new hide-out is. If there is one.'
'That's a priority, Tau. Track them down. I want Ismail
replaced.'
'That will take time.'
'You have less than a month.'
He shook his head. 'Ma'am, they weren't a priority for three
or four years. It's a closed circle, Ismail was inside already.'
'There must be someone inside that we can ... reach.'
'I'll prepare a list.'
'Raj, why can't you read their email?'
'They're using an encryption we've never seen before. It
might be a variant of 128 bit, but the bottom line is, we can't crack it. We will
continue to sniff every package. Sooner or later, they will make a mistake and
forget to encrypt. It happens. Eventually.'
She thought for a while before she spoke: 'There is something
brewing here, gentlemen. All the signs are there. The email traffic, the sudden
action against Ismail, the rumours, the so-called shipment, after two years of
quiet. I want to know what it is. If you need more people or resources, talk to
me. Tau, double our surveillance. I want someone in Ismail's place, I want
weekly progress reports, I want focus and commitment. Thank you for coming in
early.' i.
She went to fetch two more suitcases, then the sleeping bag
and the air mattress out of the white Renault Clio she had parked in the
street. Outside she felt self-conscious. What did the people here think? A
forty-year-old woman moving in alone. That vague anxiety in her, undefined,
lurking there like a slumbering reptile just below the surface of the water.
She unpacked her clothes into the built-in cupboards of cheap
white melamine. In the bathroom the little white cabinet above the basin was
too small for all her things. When she pushed the door closed, it caught her in
the mirror - almost a stranger. Black hair, between long and short, not well
styled. Not dyed, the grey hairs visible. The sallow Mediterranean skin,
wrinkles at the corners of the eyes, two creases at the corners of the mouth.
No make-up, lifeless, tired. An awakening, God, Milla, no wonder - you let
yourself go, what man would stay with you?
She turned around swiftly, went to inflate the mattress.
In the bedroom she sat on the floor and unrolled it, putting
the valve between her lips. Words ran through her, as always, too many.
Some of those words she would write in her diary: I am here because the woman in the
mirror failed in a small way, day after day. Like holding a rope in my hands,
the invisible weight on the other side of the cliff just heavy enough to slide
down little by little, until the end slipped through my fingers. The cause, I
know now, lay just here under my skin. In the texture of my tissue, in the
twisting of my DNA. Simply made this way. Unfit. Unfit despite my best efforts
and all my