Grown Weary Too Soon

Great efforts were made to hush up for a little while longer the true facts. . . . But talking about other people’s affairs is so indispensable an occupation that such efforts are commonly of little avail.

—Lady Murasaki, The Tale of Genji

When I got back to my hotel from this latest difficult session with CAPTUS, I ran my normal four miles through the typically acrid, sickly sweet air and fumes of the city, showered, and ate in the hotel lounge, while reading a book and listening to the live band. My lounge mates were the typical smattering of drunken businessmen on the make, European tourists, locals out on the town, and young but slightly worn hookers. After my dinner, I walked out to the hotel parking lot to my car. Two rather shabby young women with hungry, worn expressions followed me out from the lounge. They were in their early twenties, thin, nice figures, but graceless and tired. I had not seen them in the lounge before; new girls looking to make a buck. They caught up to me as I was about to put the key in the lock, their high heels clicking on the pavement. The homelier of the two placed her hand on the door handle of my car, fixed me with what she wanted to be a sultry look, and asked, “Would you like us to come to dinner, yes?”

The prettier girl spoke no English at all. She smiled hopefully but stood awkwardly, not knowing what to do with her hands, as her companion placed herself between my car and me.

“I will speak for you, for her. We can, she can . . . be with you, if you want. Me, too, but I will speak for her, if you want, at dinner, and . . . after.”

I stared, a little taken aback, at what struck me as a slightly bizarre and desperate proposal.

“No.” But I did not say it harshly and I tried to convey empathy; they seemed abashed, hard maybe from experience, but at heart young girls, really. It was sad; I was touched. The girl repeated her offer, thinking perhaps that I had not understood, but they left me alone, momentarily embarrassed, once they realized that I knew what they were saying and still refused. I watched them walk back to the lounge to hope for, or at least to pursue, a successful mark later that evening, their heels clicking and their hips swaying now with attractive naturalness. They came to me artificially brash prostitutes; they left me once again two vulnerable young women sustaining each other’s confidence. Thereafter, we smiled at each other across the lounge each night when I arrived there from work.

Later that evening I returned to the lounge to read, sitting as far toward the back wall as I could (this is a reflex practice for a case officer; you always want to have everyone in your sight). I was the only one there, ever, reading a book.

The regular waitress, who had come to know me after weeks of the same routine, spoke to me after taking my order. This was unusual. The locals are assertive tonight; the natives are restless, I thought.

“We all say that you are ‘the spy,’ you know.”

“You do? Why?”

“You are American. XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX X. You sit alone every night. What else would you be?”

One got used to this in the Agency. XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXX we called it playing “spot the spook.”

“You think I’m a spy because I sit alone here?” I suppressed a smile. “No, I’m here for the waters.”

She looked at me, uncomprehending.

“I read after dinner. I like the music. It’s true.” I returned to my book, Lucretius’s On the Nature of Things. The waitress left me alone.

I enjoyed listening to the band each night, watching the hookers chat up the businessmen, who told themselves that the tired women were actually interested in what they had to say, and the enthusiastic tourists struggling with the menu and speaking too loudly, to make themselves understood by the natives. Other nights I went to a bar where men sat in small groups, smoking from a common cheicha, their several tubes bending out from the multicolored instruments on a low coffee table before them, sweet smoke scent filling the air. I liked being alone in the crowd, a sentiment I felt throughout my career, wherever I was: the man on the margins, observing the rituals and routines of daily lives.

As far as the CAPTUS case was concerned, however, I was the man in the middle and on the spot. XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXX. I could see that he was doomed no matter what he did or what I reported.

Bid me bear all toil,

And keep me awake at work through cloudless nights

Seeking not only words but verses, too,

To be bright shining lights before your mind,

That you may see deep into hidden truth.

I put my book down. The music pulsed below me.

XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXX. I thought of the old DO saw that CTC—the Counter-Terrorism Center, to whom I was reporting on the case— stood for “Check That Cable.” CTC had always been a bit of the Island of Misfit Toys in the DO; officers who had had some problem or were relatively poor performers often landed in CTC. It was considered a second-rate division. Then, 9/11 occurred, and CTC immediately found itself the star of the show, the center of attention, overwhelmed with additional resources. (“What are we going to do with them all?” was a regular refrain among Agency officers, when the stock solution to the “failures” and “problems” of the Agency in the pursuit of terrorists was to provide “50 percent more collectors, and 50 percent more analysts.” Colleagues and I often responded to this increase in resources by noting that “more was not better. Better was better.” But this was a cynic’s—“old guard’s”—view, unable to oppose momentary political realities.)

The CAPTUS case, as I had come to know it while running it, was shaping up in my mind more and more as a major-league screw-up XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXX. Yet, many officers had followed his life for years; I hesitated still to dismiss their views as fundamentally wrong. I still wondered, after all the time I had spent with him, if I had not yet grasped the subtleties of the case, which perhaps my colleagues who had specialized on CAPTUS saw in a way that I could not.

Perversely, just as CAPTUS had convinced me that he was, more or less innocently, caught in the middle of the Global War on Terror, the same routine nature of much of the information he provided me had convinced Headquarters that he was dissembling.

But I knew that this was a rationalization. I knew the man. I knew ops. I knew my business. I knew this case. XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX . I knew—I knew—I was right, but I was not prepared quite yet to go to the mat about it. XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX X. And I knew that a formal, collective position was hard to change and that individual or piecemeal criticisms were almost always outweighed by collective inertia and the settled position of the institution.

I sat listening to the music, watching the tired hookers convince the fleshy and pale visiting businessmen that they were sexually iridescent, or at least for the having. Mostly, though, I mulled what to do about CAPTUS, and how to meet what I considered Headquarters’ impossible “guidance.”

But if the heart’s not whole, what struggles then, what dangers must engulf us against our will?

My choices were to run the case as well as one could run it, or to try to challenge the entire case. I knew how that would work out. I would be removed from the case. I would be characterized as a troublemaker—and CAPTUS would be handled by someone who did not question the approach to interrogation that had been authorized, or the foundations of the case XXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXX. The case would continue, from inertia. XXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXX. Better this than to have to come to grips with error, delusion, misinterpretation, and group-think. And groups could not recognize group-think. XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX .

No, malcontents in the DO almost never accomplished anything but destroy themselves. And yet, this was how one proceeded in DO culture for a normal operation; our counterterrorism war had changed many rules, and the stakes and our responsibilities had become even greater.

The only way to achieve anything was to work within the system, which of course raised the issues I frequently weighed: When did it become my duty to say no? At what point did doing the best job I could, in the most honorable, legal, and effective way I could, cause me to traduce my oaths and obligations “to the flag” that I served, as Wilmington had so acidly put it when he and I had our tense exchange? I was determined to run the case as well as I could; this was my involvement in our efforts to destroy al-Qa’ida XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXXXXXXXXX XXXX. I would be hard, if I needed to be, while acting honorably. I had been. I did not want to let a terrorist avoid capture or elimination by misplaced tenderness. I had pursued this career to be challenged mentally, physically, and morally. Well, here was the supreme challenge of my career, a responsibility fraught with ambiguity about what was the right course.

The thing we want but don’t possess seems far the best; we get it, and beg for something else. . . .

The two hookers who had approached me in the hotel parking lot were sitting down by the band, momentarily alone, looking vaguely forlorn. They stared across the lounge, eyes vacant. They were struggling to remain themselves while, with some visible discomfort, they made the compromises they had to make to get through sometimes callous nights. I watched them for a while, pensive, wondering how deeply they felt, how self-aware they were, feeling compassion for two young girls grown weary too soon.