The Kill List

With the cab paid off, the Dane checked in and was shown to his room; small, just functional, with frosted windows (against occupant recognition) and curtains drawn (against the heat). He stripped off, stood for a while under the tepid dribble from the shower, did his best to soap and dry, and changed clothing.

In flip-flops, rough canvas jeans and a long, no-button cotton shirt, he was wearing much what a local Somali might wear. There was a satchel slung over one shoulder and wraparound dark glasses. The hands were tanned from the Israeli sun. The pale face and blond hair were clearly European.

He knew a place that rented scooters. A second taxi, summoned by the Peace Hotel, took him there. In the cab he removed the shamagh from his satchel. He wrapped the basic Arab headdress around the blond locks and drew the trailing tail across the face, tucking the hem into the fold on the other side. There was nothing suspicious in this; those who wear a shamagh often protect the nose and mouth against the constant dust and sand gusts.

He rented a rickety white Piaggio moped; the renter knew him from previous visits. Always requiring a substantial dollar deposit, the vehicle always returned intact, no need for silly formalities like a license.

Joining the stream of donkey carts, falling-to-pieces trucks, pickups and other scooters, avoiding the occasional camel or pedestrian, looking exactly like a Somali going about his business, the Dane puttered down Maka al-Mukarama, the highway slicing through the center of Mogadishu.

He passed the gleaming white Isbahaysiga Mosque, impressive for its lack of damage, and glanced across the road to something less attractive. The Darawsha refugee camp had not been moved or improved since his last visit. It was still a sea of hovel/squalor, housing ten thousand hungry and frightened refugees. They had no sanitation, food, employment or hope, and their children played in the urine pools. They were truly, he thought, those Frantz Fanon had called the wretched of the Earth, and Darawsha was one of eighteen poverty cities inside the enclave. The Western aid agencies tried, but it was an impossible job.

The Dane glanced at his cheap watch. He was on time. The meetings were always at twelve noon. The man he had come to see would glance at the usual spot. If he was not there—ninety-nine percent of the time—the other man would get on with his life. If he was there, the signals would be exchanged.

The moped took him to the ruined Italian Quarter. A white man going there without a large armed escort would be a fool. The danger was not murder but kidnapping. A European or American could be worth up to two million dollars. But with Somali sandals, African shirt and shamagh around his head and face, the Israeli agent felt safe if he kept it short.

The fish come ashore every morning at a small horseshoe bay opposite the al-Uruba Hotel, where the surge of the Indian Ocean throws the fishing skiffs out of the swell and onto the beach. Then the skinny dark men who have fished all night carry their jacks, kings and shark up to the market shed, hoping for buyers.

The market is two hundred yards from the bay, a ninety-foot, unlit shed stinking of fish, some fresh, some not. The Dane’s agent was the market manager. At noon, as he was paid to do every day, Mr. Kaamal Duale stepped out of his office and surveyed the crowd gazing at the market.

Most had come to buy, but not yet. Those with money would get the fresh fish; in one-hundred-degree heat, without any form of refrigeration, it would start to smell quite quickly. Then bargains were to be had.

If Mr. Duale was surprised to see his handler in the crowd, he did not give a sign of it. He simply stared. He nodded. The man astride the Piaggio nodded back and raised his right hand across his chest. Fingers spread, closed, spread again. There were two more slight nods, and the scooterist wheeled away. The rendezvous was set: usual place, ten tomorrow morning.

The next day the Dane descended for breakfast at eight. He was in luck, there were eggs. He took two, fried, with bread and tea. He did not want to eat much; he was trying not to use the lavatory.

His scooter was parked by the compound wall. At half past nine he kicked it into life, waited for the steel gate to open and let him out and headed back toward the gate of the African Union camp. As he approached the concrete blocks and the guardhouse, he reached up to snatch off his shamagh. The blond hair at once gave him away.

A Ugandan soldier emerged from the shelter, rifle unslung. But just short of the barrier pole, the blond rider swerved away, raised a hand and called, “Jambo.”

The Ugandan, hearing his native Swahili, lowered his gun. Another crazy mzungu. He just wanted to go back home, but the pay was good, and he would soon have enough for cattle and a wife. The mzungu swerved into the parking lot of the Village Café beside the entrance gate, stopped and went in.

The fish market manager was at a table, taking coffee. The Dane went to the bar and ordered the same, thinking of the rich, aromatic coffee he could get at the cafeteria back at the office in Tel Aviv.

They did the exchange in the men’s room of the Village Café, as always. The Dane produced dollars, the world’s common currency even in the hostile lands. The Somali watched with appreciation as they were counted out.

There would be a portion for the fisherman who would carry the message south to Kismayo in the morning, but he would be paid in virtually valueless Somali shillings. Duale would keep all the dollars, saving for the day when he had enough to emigrate.

And there was the consignment, a short aluminum tube like the sort used to protect fine cigars. But this was custom-made, stronger and heavier. He secreted it inside his waistband.

Back in his office, he had a small, rugged generator, secretly donated by the Israelis. I

t ran on the most dubious kerosene, but it made electricity. This could power his air conditioner and his fridge/freezer. He was the only man in the fish market who always had fresh fish.

Among these was a yard-long kingfish, purchased that morning and now frozen rock-solid. In the evening his fisherman would take it, with the tube rammed deep into its entrails, and sail south, fishing all the way, landing two days later at the fish dock at Kismayo.

There he would sell the kingfish, no longer quite fresh, to a tally clerk at the market and say it was from his friend. He did not know why nor did he care. He was just another poor Somali trying to raise four sons to take over his skiff when they were able.

The two men in the Village Café emerged, finished their coffee separately and left, also separately. Mr. Duale took his tube home and rammed it into the deep stomach of the frozen kingfish. The blond man wrapped his shamagh around his head and face and motored back to the rental garage. He returned the Piaggio, recovered most of his deposit, and the renter gave him a lift to the hotel. There were no cabs about, and he did not want to lose a good, if irregular, client.

The Dane had to wait until the departing Turkish Airlines flight at eight the next morning. He killed the time reading a novel in English in his room. Then a bowl of camel stew and bed.

In the dusk the fisherman put the kingfish, wrapped in wet sacking, in the fish locker of his skiff. But he slashed the tail to mark it out from any others he might catch. Then he put to sea, turned south and spread his lines.

At nine the next day, after the usual boarding chaos, the Turkish airliner lifted off. The Dane watched the buildings and fortifications of Bancroft camp fall away. Far to the south, a fishing skiff, lateen sail bending to the wind, plodded past Marka. The airliner turned north, refueled at Djibouti and in midafternoon landed at Istanbul.

The Dane from the Save the Children fund stayed airside, raced through the transit procedures and caught the last flight to Larnaca. He changed name, passport and ticket in his hotel room and took the first flight the next day back to Tel Aviv.

“Any problems?” asked the major known as Benny. It was he who had sent “the Dane” down to Mogadishu with fresh instructions for Opal.