Gersten watched the mayor’s publicist look up at the sky as though praying for lightning—anything to change the topic. The woman reached for her phone before it could ring.
Matt Lauer ended the long segment with thanks to all, linking their brave feat to the anniversary of the country’s independence. The audience’s applause turned to sustained cheering, and Gersten watched a monitor as the shot was held for a long time. The cameras took in the crowd, finding tears, then came back to the group. Maggie Sullivan spontaneously grabbed Colin Frank’s hand, then Doug Aldrich’s, raising both in acknowledgment and appreciation. They bowed like members of a Broadway cast, the moment beaming out to a grateful nation.
The others joined the chain, even Magnus Jenssen, who moved around the group so he could lay his good hand on Alain Nouvian’s shoulder. The producers held the shot for more than a minute—in television, an eternity—before finally breaking for a commercial.
Chapter 32
Some street cameras look like radar guns or radiation detectors. Those stationary cameras are primarily traffic cameras, useful for capturing license plates, car makes, and drivers’ faces.
Others are rotational, operated by remote control. Usually these are placed in high pedestrian traffic areas, such as Times Square, around major landmarks, and at Ground Zero.
The third kind of New York Police Department surveillance camera is the globe. These resemble the shoplifting deterrent bubbles descending from store ceilings. On the streets of New York, they are most often suspended from streetlamp posts like shaded eyeballs.
Fisk stood looking at the one hanging over the intersection of Thirtieth Street and Ninth Avenue, near Penn Station. The globe hung there in plain sight. He glanced down at the color printout in his hand, with the NYPD shield in the lower left-hand corner and a time stamp along the bottom. He looked again at the street around him.
Baada Bin-Hezam had stood in this exact spot less than three hours ago.
No question. Fisk had a zoom-in of his face as well. No disguise. Fisk could just barely make out the dark spot that was the mole on the left edge of his jaw. Bin-Hezam wore a dark blue or black Windbreaker, blue jeans, and black Adidas sneakers. He carried a large plastic generic store bag in his hand, the printed words THANK YOU plainly visible.
Fisk distributed a packet of images, including one of just the bag, and dispatched twelve Intel officers to canvas the immediate neighborhood in an ever-expanding grid. They were to show store workers the image of the bag, and if they got a positive match, then and only then Bin-Hezam’s face. He expected to get a lot of bag matches. He hoped to get at least one face match.
But he never expected to be the one to score the positive identification. It did not come from the shop that was the source of the bag, but rather from a store owner who remembered a man matching Bin-Hezam’s description carrying such a bag.
It happened at a small hobby shop called To the Moon, sandwiched between an Irish pub and a Thai food takeout restaurant, mere steps from the surveillance camera. The proprietor, a burly man wearing a black-and-white-striped railroad engineer’s cap over a bush of white hair, looked up from his steaming bowl of noodles and his open copy of Model Railroad News and nearly stabbed at the enlarged image of the THANK YOU bag with his chopsticks.
“The Saudi,” he said.
Fisk’s eyes widened in surprise. “Come again?”
The man looked at Fisk’s shield. “Aw, shit. Tell me he’s not a bad guy.”
The hobbyist confirmed the full photo of Bin-Hezam. He even claimed to know what was in the plastic bag: “A satchel or shoulder bag of some sort. I think it was imitation leather, though. I could see right down into it. Please tell me this guy’s not a mad bomber or something.”
“I don’t know what he is, sir,” said Fisk, “I’m just trying to identify him.” Fisk excused himself for a moment, calling in support, then returned to the man. “When would you say he was in here?”
“Oh, I’d say, about three hours ago? Soon after I opened. That’s usually at nine but I got in a little late today—I was up late watching junk.”
This guy wasn’t a kook. Fisk now had a positive ID on Bin-Hezam.
“Sir, I need to know, to the best of your recollection, everything he said, touched, and bought.”
The hobbyist took another mouthful of noodles. “Bought is easy.” He came down from behind the high glass counter and walked Fisk to the back wall rack of rocket kits. “He picked up one of these big boys. The full kit. Said it was for his son.”
The kit the hobbyist was referring to was to construct a rocket approximately three feet long by three inches in diameter.
“I went over the safety key for him, on account of his kid. He didn’t seem to want to talk much otherwise. Well spoken. Paid cash. Hundreds.”
Fisk stood before the display of rockets, running various scenarios through his head. One word kept recurring to him: “fireworks.”
The hobbyist said, “This guy didn’t have a kid, did he.”
Chapter 33
In her Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, apartment, Aminah bint Mohammed sat watching her cellular phone vibrate on the kitchen table. She stared at it as though it were a giant mechanized roach, summoned to life.
At first she was paralyzed by a mixture of fear and surprise. Twice before she had been instructed to clear her weekend for an opportunity to be of service. Twice before she had done so, remaining indoors and alone with the phone they had given her, waiting for it to ring.
Twice before, the weekend had passed with no contact whatsoever.
But, far from becoming complacent, in fact she was confident that this third weekend alert would be fulfilled. She had been given explicit instructions earlier in the week. Still, with the phone now lighting up and moving, she fought back panic.
She only hoped she was worthy of the trust they had placed in her.
She was under strict orders not to answer the phone. She was to wait for a voice mail to be recorded, and access that.
The phone stopped moving, but Aminah’s hands remained gripping the edge of the table. She watched the device.
A minute or so later a blue light began pulsing, indicating a voice mail.
She stood and wrung her hands, pacing out of the kitchen and then back in. The windows were open, and her fans moved hot air through the apartment. City sounds floated in over the whirring. She had been uncomfortably hot all weekend; now she felt only chills.
She rummaged in a drawer for a pen and paper so as not to make any mistakes, then thought better of it. She closed the drawer, wiping her clammy hands on her long robe.
She went to the telephone, picked it up. She unlocked the screen and dialed voice mail, her fingertip leaving a wet smudge on the touch screen.
It rang, asking for her pass code. She entered the six digits that corresponded to her first name.
It was a male voice. He spoke in English, no words, only a return number. She listened to the message twice, but did not bother to memorize it. The device did that for her.
She redialed the number from her call register. It was the only call she had ever received on this phone.
The call rang once.
The same male voice answered. “You are prepared?” he said. He spoke with a directness of purpose, and the reverence of a prayer.
“I am prepared,” she answered. American English was her native tongue.
“The Hotel Indigo, West Twenty-eighth Street. Between Sixth and Seventh Avenues, Manhattan. Top floor, penthouse suite A. Do not come veiled. Not even a hijab. Speak only English. And bring what you have.”
She was searching for an appropriate response when he hung up. The line was dead, the call ended.