Requiem for the Damned

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Chapter 43

Chapter 44

Chapter 45

Chapter 46

Chapter 47

Chapter 48

Chapter 49

Chapter 50

Chapter 51

Chapter 52

Chapter 53

Chapter 54

Chapter 55

Chapter 56

Chapter 57

Chapter 58

Chapter 59

Chapter 60

Chapter 61

Chapter 62

Chapter 63

Chapter 64

Chapter 65

Chapter 66

Chapter 67

Chapter 68

Chapter 69

Chapter 70

Chapter 71

Chapter 72

Chapter 73

Chapter 74

Chapter 75

Chapter 76

Chapter 77

Chapter 78

Chapter 79

Chapter 80

Chapter 81

Chapter 82

Chapter 83

Chapter 84

Chapter 85

Chapter 86

Chapter 87

Chapter 88

Chapter 89

Chapter 90

Chapter 91

Chapter 92

Chapter 93

Chapter 94

Chapter 95

Chapter 96

Chapter 97

Chapter 98

Chapter 99

Chapter 100

Chapter 101

Chapter 102

Chapter 103

Chapter 104

Chapter 105

Chapter 106

Chapter 107

Chapter 108

Chapter 109

Chapter 110

Chapter 111

Chapter 112

Prologue

There is a legend about a Karaite Jew from the Tribe of Dan, a learned trader and explorer named Eldad ben Mahli, who left Constantinople in the year 877 of the Christian calendar and set out to find the Lost Tribes of Israel. Eldad had a companion, another Jew from the tribe of Asher. While sailing south on the River Nile beyond the territory of the Egyptian Caliph, a terrible storm capsized their boat, but God saved them by delivering them a plank upon which they could float. Eldad and the Asherite floated all night until they were thrown ashore among a cannibal Abyssinian tribe who called themselves the Romrom. The Asherite, who was fat, was immediately eaten, while Eldad, who was thin, was put into a pit to fatten and forced to eat food that was unclean. One night, the Romrom’s village was attacked by a fire-worshiping tribe called the Abantu and Eldad was taken prisoner.

He remained in captivity for four years and soon became a favorite of the Abantu king because he told amazing stories of the people of the Christian and Mohammedan lands to the north. He taught the children of the king mathematics and astronomy; though treated well, he was still a prisoner. In the spring of Eldad’s fourth year of captivity, the king decided to travel west to find a legendary tribe that inhabited a land they called Havilah. They traveled for three months and eventually reached a river. The river was wild, with water flowing so powerfully that large boulders were tossed into the air like so many pebbles, the mist so thick that it was impossible to see the other bank. The king told Eldad to wait patiently because, legend had it, one day in seven, the river calmed completely and could be crossed. So the travelers pitched their tents and waited.

Just as the Abantu king foretold, when they awakened on the morning of the seventh day, the river was completely calm. On the other side, they could now see a city of smooth, red clay shimmering in the sunlight. They crossed the river, entered the city—which, strangely, had no ramparts—and made their way to the central market. On the way, Eldad noticed amulets on many of the doorposts. Strange, he thought, they look like mezzuzot. When they arrived, the market was deserted.

A lone sentry was on duty. They approached him and asked in several languages where they could find lodging. To the amazement of Eldad, the soldier answered in Aramaic, which the Jews of Persia and Arabia still spoke. He told them that it was the Sabbath and all places of lodging were closed. Instead, the soldier took them to the palace of the queen.

The queen, whose name was Yudit, received them in her throne room. Surrounded by her viziers and generals, Queen Yudit explained that they were indeed Jews and were called the Beit Moshe. They were from the Tribe of Reuben and they had come to this land a thousand years before the Romans conquered the Kingdom of Judea and banished the tribes of Israel to the four corners of the Earth. The river they had crossed was called the Sambation. Eldad knew the name immediately. According to the Rabbis, the Sambation was the river beyond which the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel were exiled by the Assyrian King Shalmaneser, may his soul burn forever in the fires of Gehennam. The river completely encircled the land of the Beit Moshe. Six days a week, it was a raging torrent, but on the Sabbath, it rested. When Eldad asked the queen why she did not send emissaries to make contact with the Jews of the Christian and Mohammedan lands, she replied that she could not, for on the one day the river was calm, God forbade them to travel.

The queen was delighted that Eldad was a Jew and could speak to them in their native tongue. Queen Yudit immediately freed Eldad by giving the Abantu king thirty-six pieces of pure gold.

The travelers were given places to sleep and were permitted to explore the city.

They discovered that the Beit Moshe lived in beautiful houses and there were no unclean animals to be found on their land. Their cattle and sheep bore their young twice a year rather than once. Likewise, their fields produced two crops between the spring and the fall instead of just one. No child died during the lifetime of his parents and most people lived to see a third or even fourth generation. They did not need to close their houses at night because there were no thieves among them. All this the queen attributed to the fact that they adhered strictly to the Law. And so God had rewarded them.

Eventually, the Abantu king wished to return to his homeland. He offered to escort Eldad, now a free man, as far as the upper Nile in the land of Kush, where Eldad could head north and the Abantus south to Abyssinia. When they came to the palace to take their leave of Queen Yudit, they found her much distressed by the news that Eldad was leaving. For the queen was so taken by the charming and learned Eldad that she asked him to stay and become her prime minister. He refused, wishing to return to his family in Constantinople. As you wish, the queen replied.

Eldad the Danite left the city and was never heard of again. But in the ensuing decades and centuries, in the miserable ghettos in medieval Europe, huddled groups of Jews told and retold the legend of Eldad, his discovery of the magic city of the Beit Moshe and of the River Sambation, flowing wildly six days a week only to rest on the Sabbath. Eventually, the story died out to be replaced by wild tales of protectors, like the Golem of Prague, or rumors of the arrival of the Messiah in the cities of the East come to Earth to redeem them.

The legend of Eldad the Danite might have been lost forever but for the discovery of an obscure Hebrew manuscript in the library of a Benedictine monastery in Mantua, Italy in 1877 by the eminent German biblical scholar, Dr. Alois Metz-Stauffenberg. Dr. Metz-Stauffenberg translated it into German where it was published in the Winter 1880 issue of Das Jüdische Litteraturblatt. The manuscript was purported to be written by Eldad the Danite himself and it told of his many adventures—from his visit to the land of the Viking Kings to his journey beyond the land of Kush to the lost city of the Beit Moshe Jews surrounded—and protected—by a mystical river called Sambation.

PART I—THE PAST

Chapter 1

Khartoum, Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, 1941

Before the war, the Royal Army’s garrison in Khartoum was small, more of a frontier police force than an army. But the last year had changed all that. Sudan was now the staging ground for the liberation of Ethiopia from the Italians. The streets were teeming with soldiers from every nationality in the British Empire—Indians, Nigerians, South Africans, Rhodesians, New Zealanders, Nepalese Ghurkas, and Australians. Then were even the odd units of Free French and Belgians, Dutch marines and Polish pilots—the remnants of the defeated Allied nations.

With the military buildup, nightclubs, bars, and restaurants sprang up almost overnight on the busy streets near the confluence of the Blue and White Nile. The nightlife of Khartoum came roaring to life. With the new demand for entertainment, Khartoum saw the arrival of a different kind of army—musicians, singers, barmen, cooks, waiters—and behind them yet another group, the shadowy figures who always thrive in times of war: the opportunists and con men, the black marketers and smugglers, the gamblers, the whores, and of course, the spies.

One of the many clubs that opened was called The Cosmopolitan Club. It was run by a White Russian named Count Alexander Petrovsky, a distant cousin, so he claimed, of the late Empress Alexandra, murdered so cruelly by the Bolsheviks. Petrovsky was actually an Armenian petty-criminal named Garabedian who had wandered into Paris after the First World War and made money shaking down wealthy Russian émigrés. By assuming the role of a corrupt Bolshevik agent—a man who, for the right price, could be bought—he took full advantage of the rampant paranoia that gripped Paris’ sizable White Russian émigré community. His scheme worked well until he made the grave error of trying to blackmail a Russian émigré who, in actuality, was an agent of the feared All-Russian Extraordinary Commission for Combating Counter-Revolution and Sabotage, better known to a frightened world by its acronym, the Cheka. The Cheka was not amused by Garabedian’s shakedown scheme and he realized he must leave France on the next available ship. At the invitation of a cousin, he fled to Alexandria.

A born entrepreneur, Garabedian saw opportunity everywhere in Alexandria. He used his bankroll to open a bar, a lowlife juke joint favored by merchant sailors down by the docks. In 1933, assuming the identity of Count Petrovsky, he opened a second, more upscale club in Cairo called the Empire Room. One afternoon, shortly before opening time, a young woman entered the club and asked if they were hiring singers. She said her name was Fatima—no last name, just Fatima. She was of mixed parentage, she explained, her father a Spanish soldier of fortune and her mother a Rif princess from high in the Atlas Mountains of Morocco. Count Petrovsky, of course, did not believe a word of it, but he was amused. She sang for Petrovsky. He was bowled over. Her voice was sensual, her body beautiful, her face exotic and frankly sexual. Petrovsky knew talent when he saw it and he hired Fatima on the spot.

In the winter of 1940, Petrovsky seized the opportunity presented by the military buildup in Sudan. And so, with Fatima and a few key employees, he relocated to Khartoum and opened the Cosmopolitan Club, leaving his cousin in charge of the Empire Club. As in Cairo, Fatima was a hit. She took many lovers, as was expected of torch singers in those days, and she was in great demand. She favored military officers, high-ranking diplomats, and businessmen.

Petrovsky needed waiters and kitchen help and among the workers he hired was a small, wiry Chinese man named Wong. Although, Mr. Wong’s given name was Tao, he went by Charlie, a name he picked up working for the British army in Hong Kong. He had come to Khartoum in 1937 in the service of a British Colonel. The Colonel, who returned to Britain a year later, found a job for Charlie at the British Officer’s Club. In the meantime, Charlie had married, his wife was expecting, and he needed money. So he decided to take a second job. When he saw an advertisement in the Sudan Monitor for a waiter at one of the swanky joints opening along the Corniche, he leapt at the chance. This was not any job, but a job at a nightclub, where the tips had to be better than the paltry coins and stern looks he received from the British officers.

Charlie spoke excellent English for a Chinaman, as the British never failed to remind him. Petrovsky, duly impressed, gave him the job. Fatima took a liking to Charlie. Before the doors opened, she would sometimes sit with Charlie, the other waiters, and the members of the band and read the newspapers or listen to the war news on the radio. Charlie was smart and Fatima noticed. At first, she would ask his opinions about the war. Later, her questions expanded to other topics. Sometimes she would ask—confidentially, of course—if the British officers ever said anything about what was going to happen in the War.

Charlie was flattered by the attentions of Fatima and by the fact that she seemed truly to respect him.

Not long after Charlie was hired, Count Petrovsky asked him to start taking care of some things for Fatima—to drive her home in Petrovsky’s big black ’36 Humber or take her to her assignations with the wealthy and powerful men that were forever falling in love with her. Charlie’s job was to keep Fatima safe. Yes, she was temperamental and needed constant attention, but she was worth her weight in gold, he said. Petrovsky paid Charlie extra to keep an eye on Fatima.

Charlie began to save money for the first time in his life. He confided in Fatima that his dream was to open a restaurant of his own. He already had the name picked out, the Golden Pagoda. Charlie shared with Fatima his plans for the restaurant, from the menu to the lush red, black, and gold interior. Fatima seemed genuinely interested in Charlie and told him, eyes burning with shared excitement, that maybe she could help him realize his dream. Charlie wasn’t sure what Fatima meant by that and she didn’t elaborate.

One Sunday afternoon in the summer of 1940, when the war news was worse than usual—the Italians had just overrun a British outpost in the far south of the country and Hermann Göring was boasting that his Luftwaffe would squeeze the life out of England—Charlie was parked in front of an apartment in a European neighborhood near the whitewashed old Government House. He had just dropped off Fatima. A man knocked on the car window and signaled to the startled Charlie to follow him upstairs. Fatima told me to come get you, he said gruffly in thickly accented English. The man was a short, balding fellow, powerfully built, his sleeves rolled up to reveal muscular arms. This was in contrast to the thick, coke bottle glasses that made him look like he had huge eyes. Not what Charlie expected in one of Fatima’s lovers; not at all. Was he some kind of servant?

Charlie followed the man to a third floor apartment. He knocked three times, paused, and knocked four more times. The door opened. It was Fatima, her long, thick hair pinned up in a messy bun, wearing a plain summer dress, no make-up, her feet in a pair of oversized bathroom slippers. The fancy dress she had worn when she entered the apartment was nowhere to be seen.

Please come in, Charlie, and join us, she said.

Charlie entered the room, which smelled of tobacco, boiled cabbage, and something else, a musty smell… old books, perhaps. Three men and a woman sitting around a large dining table looked up at Charlie. Not English, thought Charlie. Europeans of some sort.

This is Mr. Wong. Is that correct, Esther? asked one of the men. He was older, with a graying goatee and thin wire rim glasses. His accent was so thick, Charlie could hardly understand him. He pronounced Wong as though it started with the letter V and ended with the letter K—Mr. Vonk.

Yes, answered Fatima.

Who is Esther? asked Charlie.

Charlie, Esther is my real name. But not many people in Khartoum know that.

The older man smiled. Please sit down, Mr. Wong. We have a business proposition for you.

Fatima or Esther or whatever her name really was sat down next to Charlie. She squeezed his hand reassuringly.

The other woman, who was older, got up and stepped to a large breakfront, where an ornate and very tarnished silver samovar sat, and began to pour cups of tea. She put them on a tray, which she carried back to the table.

Tea, Mr. Wong? asked the older man.

Charlie nodded and the woman put a cup and saucer in front of him. She offered sugar and some small cookies. No milk, proof positive that they were not British. Charlie drank the steaming amber liquid.

So, Mr. Wong, shall we get down to business?

Charlie nodded again.

Esther informs us that you are interested in opening a restaurant. Is that so?

Charlie glanced over at Fatima, who smiled encouragingly and squeezed his hand once more.

Yes, he said, I would like to open a restaurant Charlie spoke slowly so the foreigners could understand.

Mr. Wong, we are prepared to give you £1,000 to assist in the opening of your business provided you will do… certain things for us.

What kinds of things Mr…?

You may call me Mark, he said.

We want you to tell us what you hear in the British officer’s club about the war. The names of generals, gossip, plans, and anything whatsoever to do with Palestine.

Why Palestine, Mr. Mark?

Mark is my given name, Mr. Wong, just as yours is Charlie.

And what is your Christian name… Mr. Mark?

They all laughed.

I can tell you with certainty, Mr. Wong, there is not a Christian name among us. Charlie didn’t get the joke.

So why do you need to know these things from the British?

Not just the British. We are also interested in what you hear at the Cosmopolitan, especially from the Lebanese businessmen and the people from the neutral countries. The soldiers are important too.

Who do you work for? The Germans? The Italians?

Show him, Jacob, Mark said to a younger man sitting across from Charlie. The man loosened his tie and unbuttoned the first few buttons on his shirt, revealing a series of angry red scars across his neck and chest.

You have heard of the German concentration camps, Mr. Wong?

Charlie nodded.

Well, when the Nazis came to power in 1933, Jacob was active in the Social Democratic militia. They arrested him and threw him into Dachau for a year. The Gestapo put hot coals in his shirt to persuade him to inform on others. That was the least of it. The man named Jacob rebuttoned his shirt.

No, Mr. Wong, we are not Nazis and we are not Christians. We are Jews and we work for the Jewish Agency for Palestine. Our job here in Khartoum is to gather information. You are well placed, Mr. Wong, to gather that information and to report it to us.

I don’t like the Germans or the Italians. But I hate the Japanese. What about them?

If the Japanese were here, we would probably fight them too, Mr. Wong, but they are not.

The British, they are bastards, said Charlie, thinking about the superior and condescending attitude of the British soldiers who laughed and mocked him, who slapped him on the back like it was a big joke and called him Charlie the Chink. He worked for them, but didn’t have to like them.

We feel the same way as you do about the British. They rule over us in Palestine. Someday, we may have to fight them to gain our country’s independence. But for now, they fight the Nazis and until Hitler and his friend Mussolini are defeated, we will fight with them against our common enemy.

Charlie nodded. It made sense, what this Jew had to say. He turned to Fatima.

You are one of them?

Yes, Charlie.

You are a Jew?

Fatima merely smiled.

When I open my restaurant, I will quit working for the British and I will stop hearing things. What then?

You will hear things there too, Mr. Wong. And of course, we will pay you for the information you provide.

A long silence followed. Charlie wasn’t sure what to do. He was frightened.

Well, Mr. Wong, what do you think of our proposition?

I must think about it.

Very well, Mr. Wong, we respect thoughtful consideration in the people who work with us.

On May 5, 1941, five years to the day after he was forced to evacuate his imperial capitol, the Emperor Haile Selassie entered Addis Ababa, the Ethiopian capital, in triumph, the culmination of the successful British campaign to throw the Italians out of east Africa. That same day, just off bustling Al Qasr Avenue on a small side street named Barfeen—Perfume— in central Khartoum, Charlie Wong’s Golden Pagoda opened up its doors. The first Chinese restaurant in Khartoum, it was an immediate success. To celebrate the opening, the glamorous singer Fatima performed to a packed crowd, all proceeds for the evening going to Abyssinian War Relief.

That evening, Charlie Wong, proud and smiling in an ill-fitting rented tuxedo, was photographed with Fatima, looking more glamorous than ever in a black sequined cocktail dress, and General Orde Wingate, celebrated commander of the Ethiopian Irregulars. The photograph was featured prominently in the Sunday society section of the Sudan Monitor.

If one studied the photograph carefully, sitting at a table behind the smiling threesome was a group of uncomfortable looking European Jews for whom Chinese food was a new and surprisingly good culinary experience.

Chapter 2

Berne, Switzerland, 1999

The woman walked down the sidewalk neither slowly nor quickly, taking care with each step. She was tall and lanky and wore the sort of outfit—a well-tailored navy blazer over matching pants, a strand of pearls falling nicely over a white blouse—that pegged her as an American. She stopped in front of the building at Kramgasse 49 and read a large brass plaque commemorating the fact that it was while living there that Albert Einstein conceived the theory of relativity. In truth, the woman could care less about Albert Einstein. She had paused so she could survey the street. After satisfying herself that she had not been followed, she crossed the street and entered her destination, the café at Kramgasse 51. She arrived first and took a seat at a table at the front window to wait.

Several minutes later, a man entered the café and sat down at the woman’s table. He was the perfect complement for his female companion, well dressed, his charcoal grey flannel business suit ventless, in the European style. His shirt was white and his tie was black. He was an Israeli. Together, they were an entirely forgettable pair and, as intended, their visit to the café went unnoticed that day. The American opened up her shoulder bag and handed the Israeli a manila envelope. It contained one hundred $250,000 six-month U.S. Treasury notes with various maturity dates. They were made out to the New York branch of Bank Leumi of Tel Aviv. The two sipped their coffees and pastry and made amiable small talk as if they actually knew one another. A few minutes later, after paying the bill, they got up and went outside into the pleasant summer air. Shaking hands, they went in opposite directions down Kramgasse.

They never met again.

As the Treasury notes matured, they were cashed and the proceeds deposited in an account of the Banco Santander in Grenada, Spain. That account was held by a private equity investment firm named I.M. Investment Partners, whose principal place of business was a post office box in the Grand Cayman Islands. I.M. Investment Partners was owned by an Islamic Charity located in Oslo, Norway called the Salaam Foundation. The Director of the Foundation was a Palestinian by the name of Basim al-Durah. Al-Durah was a gifted fundraiser and a fiery orator, raising money for the cause of the downtrodden and oppressed of the Arab world. Of course, no one was more downtrodden than the oppressed of Palestine, who were suffering because the western world refused to recognize the injustice that had been perpetrated when the Zionists established their colonial state in 1948. He railed against the duplicity and unfairness of it all. He gathered donations and the names of volunteers.

In actuality, al-Durah was an Israeli Druze from Haifa. But who among the expatriate Muslims and the idealistic Scandinavian fellow travelers would really know the difference? It was a very successful operation that enabled the Mossad to collect money from Israel’s adversaries and use it to fund espionage operations in Arab countries. One wintry morning, Basim al-Durah rose to a podium in the Oslo Press Center to announce that the Salaam Foundation, together with its investment arm, I.M. Investment Partners, would soon begin a twenty-five million dollar initiative to purchase and renovate multi-family residential real estate and improve agricultural property in underserved emerging markets in the Arab World—principally in Sudan, Yemen, and Syria. The profits would be used for relief and charitable work in the Palestinian territories.

PART II—THE PRESENT

Chapter 3

Janub Darfur Province, Sudan

Colonel Lin Bao’s knees hurt and the pain was making it difficult for him to concentrate. He sat on the faded carpet on the floor of a large tent, legs crossed, back held rigidly erect, a fixed smile on his face, nodding in agreement with Sheik Musa Hilal, the leader of the Janjaweed militia, as the old man held forth on his theories of government. The sheik was a pompous fool, as well as a bloodthirsty killer—which didn’t concern Lin Bao one way or the other. Lin Bao, who was the senior representative in Sudan of the Second Department of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army—military intelligence—had no choice but to do business with Sheik Hilal if he ever hoped to find his kidnapped oil workers. Beijing was outraged and embarrassed that rebels from the Justice and Equality Movement—the JEM—could enter an oil refinery supposedly protected by the Sudanese Army and kidnap Chinese workers. He was ordered to get them back—whatever it took. At the insistence of his government, an additional 500 PLA peacekeepers—actually a specially trained counterinsurgency unit—would be sent to Sudan to beef up the defense of China’s massive investment in Sudan’s oil industry. Until he had the capability on the ground to pursue the rebels himself, Lin Bao needed to rely on the so-called black Arabs of Sheik Hilal’s Janjaweed to do the work for him.

After what seemed an eternity, the sheik stopped talking and stood, extending his hand to the colonel. Lin Bao stood as well, his knees creaking as he rose.

A triumphal smile broke over Sheik Hilal’s weathered face. Colonel, we believe your men are being held in two villages perhaps 250 kilometers south west of here. Tomorrow, we will mount an expedition to free them and punish the villagers.

Finally, the old thief gets to the point, thought Lin Bao.

That is very good news indeed, Lin Bao responded, bowing to show his gratitude. Turning to Captain Turaba, the liaison officer of the Sudanese People’s Armed Forces, he said, I would like to go along as an observer.

Although the villages are within the boundaries of your oil lease, it is a dangerous area, said Turaba, frowning.

But Sheik Hilal would have none of it. You will be greatly entertained, he said. Can you can ride a horse?

Yes, I served for a time in the far west of our country, where the Uyghurs, who are Muslim, live. We patrolled the mountains on horses.

Well then, said Sheik Hilal, gently touching the Colonel’s shoulder to gesture that it was time to leave, perhaps you will want to retire early to your tent to get some sleep. You will need to leave by midnight to get into place for the attack at dawn.

Lin Bao rose, bowed slightly, and shook Hilal’s hand. Lin’s face was smooth and closely shaven, making him look younger than his sixty-two years. He was a devout practitioner of Tai Chi and his body retained a kind of physical grace and tensile strength normally seen in younger men. Despite his good physical condition, Lin Bao’s knee joints now felt every one of their years.

Captain Turaba and Lin Bao walked toward their tents to rest. In a clearing next to the tents stood the hulking frame of the Chinese-made Hind helicopter that would take them south to witness the Janjaweed attack.

It was just before dawn and a thin crescent of light could be seen on the eastern horizon. Although the moon had set, the stars were still thick and bright in the sky. The horses of the Janjaweed were restless, sensing, Lin Bao supposed, that the attack was imminent. They chewed on the short grass, but kept looking up and turning, betraying their agitation. The mounted riders yanked on their reins or patted them gently to keep them calm. No one spoke, as the Janjaweed were under orders to remain silent. The only sounds that could be heard in the night were hoof beats and the breathing of the horses.

Lin Bao smiled, amused at the thought that he was about to witness a full-blown cavalry charge. He felt a kind of boyish excitement. As an adolescent living in the teeming factory worker district of Shanghai, Lin’s imagination was fired up by the propaganda images of the glorious Red Cavalry, sabers drawn, charging the forces of the corrupt Kuomintang dictator Chiang Kai Shek during the Revolution.

The Janjaweed were dressed in flowing black robes, scarves wrapped tightly around their heads and mouths, so that only the whites of their coal black eyes could be seen in the starlight. They are proud men, thought Lin Bao, even if they are butchers. The Janjaweed—the word meant, as he understood it, devils on horses—were drawn from the fierce Arab cattle ranching tribes of Darfur and their historical enemies were the Fur speaking farmers of Darfur. When the government of Sudan began its campaign to relocate the non-Arab Fur people, whose land sat inconveniently atop huge oil reserves—oil that China needed and had paid for the right to exploit—it naturally turned to the Janjaweed to do the dirty work.

Lin Bao was anxious to see the Justice and Equality Movement crushed. Recently, it had begun to target the Chinese oil infrastructure. First came their bombing campaign and now, they were turning to kidnapping. Beijing wanted the attacks stopped and the revolt in Darfur crushed.

What had begun as a temporary assignment had been repeatedly extended. He had promised his wife he would retire, but when he returned to China on leave, he told her he had to go back. While Wei Wei said nothing, her sadness was evident, because she understood he wanted to return to Sudan. Their marriage was childless, and from that barren spot, like a pebble placed on top of a pebble, a wall had grown between them. Soon after he arrived back in Sudan, Wei Wei died suddenly of a heart attack. He returned home for a week’s compassionate leave, buried her, closed up their apartment, and flew back to Khartoum. If he grieved for her, he did not show it.

The dawn was coming fast now. The local Janjaweed leader, a scarfaced one-armed former camel herder they called Abu Gamal—Father Camel in Arabic—yelled sharply and his two hundred men assembled into a ragged line for the attack. Lin Bao and Captain Turaba followed behind the main group of troops on borrowed horses.

The Janjaweed would be charging across a broad valley on a slight downward slope planted with fields of sorghum. The valley was bisected by a dry riverbed that lay in front of them. Lin could just make out the targets of their attack: two villages, one in front of the riverbed and one behind it. With the sun rising at their backs, conditions were textbook-perfect for a cavalry charge—if, Lin mused, there were any cavalry textbooks still in existence.

The line of horses started to walk slowly, then trot. Some of the riders drew scimitars, others, rifles. They began to spread out, forming two groups, one to attack the closer village, Kadoom, and one to attack Sambat, the village across the dry riverbed.

Beautiful, is it not, Colonel? asked Captain Turaba.

Not if you are one of those villagers, replied Lin calmly.

They are pigs. They harbor terrorists who attack our oil refineries and kill and kidnap your workers. Turaba’s voice came out almost as a hiss.

Yes, responded Lin in a whisper. This fool is much too emotional to be a good soldier, he thought. Typical of these people.

Let’s go, said Turaba, spurring his horse forward.

Lin followed. Five hundred meters ahead, the horses of the Janjaweed militia began to canter. The yellow-orange disk of the rising sun was now gloriously bright behind them. Lin could feel its heat on his neck and hands.

The riders crossed the halfway mark to their target and, as if of one thought, there arose from the pack of horsemen a great guttural yell, which turned into a roar of Allah Akbar—God is great—and the horses began to charge at full gallop. One group of Janjaweed bore down on the first village, from which the first screams could already be heard. A shot was fired from the village—the boom of a shotgun. It was too little, too late. Lin Bao could see people running in panic from their mud and brick houses toward the fields.

The second group of riders drove hard around each side of the village, cutting down the villagers who were trying to escape into the fields. The sun’s reflection glinted off the curved blades of their swords as they chased down and swung at the running men, women, and children. Then the first fires started, ignited by grenades tossed into open doors of huts and granaries. They continued on down and over the dry riverbed to attack the second village.

Colonel Lin and Captain Turaba arrived at the first village a few minutes later. There were bodies scattered about and a smoky haze enveloped the area. Dismounted Janjaweed were herding the survivors toward the center of the village. Between two houses, Lin Bao saw one of the riders raping a young woman, his hand over the girl’s mouth. The Colonel looked away. Had it been one of his men, Lin Bao would have executed him on the spot for such a breach of discipline. But these were not his men and their excesses were not his concern.

When the two officers reached the center of the village, the bearded Janjaweed commander, Abu Gamal, whose men called him Aqid al Oqada—"colonel of colonels"—reported that none of the kidnapped Chinese workers had been found.

Captain Turaba started giving orders. Abu Gamal, you will conduct a house-by-house search of the village and interrogate the village elders. Tell your men they must refrain from burning down any more buildings until a thorough search for the Chinese workers has been completed. It would be very bad if your men were responsible for harming those workers. Is that understood?

Yes, yes, I understand, Gamal responded in the strained tone of a man who gives orders, but does not like to take them.

Abu Gamal turned his horse and began to bark out orders. Those unable to work—the elderly and infirm, the infants and young children, the pregnant women—were forcibly separated from their loved ones and marched down toward the riverbed. The surviving villagers started to wail in panic. A large man stepped in front of his wife and infant and tried to argue with the Janjaweed fighter grabbing at her. Abu Gamal rode up with his pistol drawn and ordered the man to move aside. When the man began to plead with Abu Gamal, he put the gun to his face and pulled the trigger. A neat little hole formed in the man’s forehead and he stood for a second, a vague look of surprise on his face, before his knees buckled and he crumpled to the ground. The man’s wife cried out, but did not move. Smart girl, thought Lin Bao. The cries of the other shocked villagers sputtered out and then died altogether.

Lin Bao had seen enough. Captain Turaba, I want to go to the other village to see if my people are being held there. It is evident to me that they are not here and this village is not, as I was informed, a hotbed of rebel activity.

Of course, Colonel, as you wish. Obviously, our informants were wrong about this village.

Let’s see if they were more accurate about the next, responded the colonel coldly, spurring his horse toward the riverbed.

As they made their way across the sandy bottom of the riverbed, they could hear sustained automatic weapons fire from behind them. Lin Bao stopped.

What is that?

I believe, Colonel, the Janjaweed are eliminating those who are too old or sick or too young to move.

Lin Bao looked at Turaba. Captain Turaba, what do you think the odds are that I will get my workers back alive if these men kill children and old people? The world accuses your government of genocide and we are implicated. The bandits who kidnap our workers will feel justified in executing them.

Turaba laughed. You Chinese have become… soft. Wasn’t it your Chairman Mao who said ‘if you want to make an omelet you have to break a few eggs?’

Lin Bao nodded and smiled at Turaba ambiguously. He would not be drawn into a debate with a fool.

Lead on, Captain.

They picked their way between the large, round boulders that lined the riverbed. It was deeper and wider than Lin had anticipated. Between the boulders was a thick layer of sand. They could see the hoof prints of the Janjaweed horses in the sand. It struck Lin as odd that a river in such flat terrain would have been filled with such large boulders. In his experience, big boulders were in rivers in mountainous regions. Where had they come from?

Does this river flow in the winter? asked Lin.

No, from what I understand, Colonel, it is dry, the remnant of the river system that flowed here when the Sahel had a more temperate climate. Did you know, Colonel, as recently as Roman times, there were lions, giraffes, and hippos here?

I didn’t know that, Captain. But that is most intriguing.

They were at the far side of the river and began to climb up the well-worn trail to the top. Their horses snorted with the exertion.

When they reached the riverbank, they could see the second village up ahead. The buildings, in stark contrast to the dark mud covered structures in the other village, were almost red in color and looked like they were made of sandstone blocks. Lin Bao had not seen architecture like this in Darfur.

A thin, greasy plume of smoke rose above the buildings. Contrary to his repeated requests, the Janjaweed were evidently busy destroying this village as well. Lin Bao not only felt increasingly contemptuous of the utter lack of discipline of these Arabs, but was growing increasingly annoyed with himself. He had been a fool to give credence to Sudanese military intelligence reports stating that his workers were being held in these two villages. It was evident that the whole episode was just an elaborate effort by the Sudanese to demonstrate to the Chinese that they were seriously trying to rescue the abducted oil workers. As for the Janjaweed, they were just engaging in their national pastime: murder and pillage.

As they approached the center of the village, the Janjaweed were in the process of separating the weak from the strong. Lin Bao had no desire to stay and witness more slaughter. He wearily asked the Janjaweed lieutenant in charge if they had searched the village. The man replied that they had, but had not found any of his workers. Turaba asked him if they had encountered any resistance. Almost none, the man said, except when they came across some kind of a strange mosque. When they tried to enter, a crazy old man in a white robe charged at them waving an ancient rifle. With evident satisfaction, the lieutenant explained that they shot the old man, then tied him to the back of one of the horses and dragged his dying body around the village as a warning to the others not to resist.

Where is this strange building? asked Lin.

Over there. The man pointed in the direction of a street of houses to his left. The Janjaweed were going from house to house trying to set them alight, despite the fact that they were made of stone.

Lin Bao and Turaba rode over to see the building, which did look like an unusual mosque. There was no tower, but it was clearly some kind of public building. It was small, but sturdily built out of ancient stone blocks, thicker and larger than those from which the surrounding houses were constructed. The roof of the building was arched all the way down its length. Lin Bao didn’t see any mortar between the stones. It didn’t seem possible that these simple villagers had expert stonemasons who could build such a structure. Could it be an ancient Christian church or even Roman basilica converted to a mosque? As they dismounted and entered beneath the low doorway, Lin Bao noticed worn letters carved into a small raised area on the lintel. Inside, there were no decorations and the walls were whitewashed. The stone floor was covered by ancient rugs, thin and frayed, and, hanging from a chain on the ceiling in the apse, a brass oil lamp, blackened—as was the ceiling above it—from countless centuries of use. The only furniture in the room was an old wooden cabinet against the back wall. Its doors were open, but there was nothing inside.

Strange, said Turaba. I think this is very old. I’ve seen nothing like it in Darfur. You know, these Darfuris accepted Islam quite late; some people think the pigs never really accepted it at all.

It was my understanding, Captain Turaba, that the Fur people are quite devout practitioners of your faith.

Turaba walked over to the cabinet to inspect it.

So they say, Colonel, but they are Africans, not Arabs and, as it is said, their hearts are black.

Lin Bao turned to walk to the door. Captain Turaba, I think it is time to go. Obviously, my oil workers are not here.

Do you wish to personally conduct the interrogation of the villagers?

No, no, that is not necessary. I think your Janjaweed are more than capable of finding out if these people know anything useful.

As you wish.

By the way, Captain Turaba, what will the Janjaweed do with these people—at least the ones who survive?

Turaba laughed. They sell them.

Lin Bao didn’t know if this was another joke or Turaba was telling the truth. He decided not to ask.

Chapter 4

Kotto River Road, Central African Republic

On the second night, Avram’s uncle Shmuel died. He did not complain, he did not question God. He looked up at Avram and nodded, his eyes swollen from the biting flies which they could not wipe away because their hands were shackled. Then the old man took a heaving breath and his head fell down to his chest. He could not fall forward because the shackles bound each man to the next, their arms crossed.

Avram said the prayer to the one true God. It was a secret prayer, which they were taught never to say out loud. It was a prayer of affirmation in the power of God over their people and over the entire Earth. They said it before they slept and when they woke, upon a birth and upon a death. It was said that the prayer was so powerful that a man who died with it on his lips would surely go to heaven and be redeemed on the Day of Judgment.

He could see that the lips of some of the other men from the village were moving. Were they praying too?

The guard sat against the cab of the pickup truck, his knees drawn up and his rifle resting in the crook of his lap. He must have heard the old man’s groan. He muttered something to himself, tossed his cigarette over the side of the truck, and made his way carefully over to the old man. The truck was traveling fast on the potholed road and it was too bumpy for him to stand up. He used the barrel of his AK-47 to raise the chin of the old man, who stared back with the fixed expression of the dead.

Shit, he said in guttural Arabic, crawled back to the cab window and began banging the butt of his rifle on the glass. The truck came to a stop, dust swirling everywhere. The passenger door flung open and a big man got out.

What’s wrong? he asked, obviously irritated.

He nodded at the dead man. This man is dead.

Okay, let’s get rid of him.

Achmed unlocked the old man’s shackles and manhandled his body onto the sidewall of the pickup truck. His head hung down, mouth open, eyes bulging. From the ground, the other guard grabbed the old man’s shoulders and pulled him over the side. He fell to the dirt with a muffled thud. The