Velvet Interrogation

The irony is that Joseph didn't know I knew she was one of his cadre. He didn't know that I'd seen her with him on more than one occasion and had put it all together. That was what had given me comfort that he had no idea I had compromised her in Beirut.

At the time I was scared that she was my replacement. That Joseph would get her into Chet's bed and would tell me to sever my ties to the American embassy officer and either reassign me or dispense with me altogether. But even then I saw the possibilities in what I could achieve through Chet—and I assumed that Joseph didn't fully understand just how attached Chet was to me—that we were lovers.

Once I'd gotten Mariam out of the way in Beirut, there was only me. Then Joseph had to put all of his efforts into my ties with Chet.

And then later, in Washington, I almost reveled in the convoluted cat-and-mouse game being played. Joseph insisted I get close to Mariam as I was establishing my ties with the Lebanese power brokers in the States. He was grooming me for greater things in Lebanon and promoted my marriage to Mariam to reinsert her—as well as me—in strategic positions in Lebanon, unaware, I was quite sure, that I knew she also was his agent. And I, in turn, was using both Mariam and Joseph to move into a position of personal power in Lebanon. And it was all working splendidly for all of us, but mostly for me.

At least it would be if Joseph could be made comfortable about any loose ends before it all blossomed and came into its own.

Chet was one of those loose ends.

* * * *

"Yes, well. They do make a fine couple," Chet was saying on the other side of the glass, "and having been married to her will be a real asset to him if he wins the presidency."

I lifted my head from the glass. We had peaked out. That shoe hadn't fallen. Moorhead was moving on in the interview. But then there was yet another unforeseen glitch.

"The Sudan. You were supposed to go there from Beirut, and then you didn't."

"Yes, I was hurt in the bombing of the embassy in Beirut before I rotated out," Chet answered.

"And they never found out what faction . . .?"

"No, any one of a half dozen militant factions in Beirut at the time could have been behind the bombing," Chet answered. "I always thought it was probably the Phalangists myself," he went on. "Soon after that, the whole balance there broke down, and everyone was bombing everyone else."

Ah, good, I thought. He handled that smoothly—and he'd suggested someone far away from Joseph's cadre in political position had been responsible. I was sure he had no idea that it was Joseph, but if Joseph suspected otherwise, he would eliminate Chet.

"But you were mentoring Nabil in Beirut, where he was enrolled in the American University at your expense," Moorhead was asking. His constant smile was unchipped.

"Yes, what about it?" Even I could hear the irritation in Chet's voice. The mention of who was paying my university fees in Beirut cut a bit too close to the quick.

"What were you planning about him then? It's rather an interesting twist, isn't it? If you'd taken him off to the Sudan, it's unlikely we'd now be seeing him at the edge of wielding so much power in the Mideast—being able to be such an asset to the United States in the peace process. He's already being touted as possibly the key to reaching a settlement there in what has festered for nearly a century. Amazing isn't it?"

I hung on the brief silence that ensued, and I saw Joseph tighten up in the corner of my eye. Mariam hadn't been the defining moment of the interview. This was. The nub of my relationship with Chet. That he had asked me to go to the Sudan—and that, without consulting Joseph—without getting his permission—I'd said yes. If Joseph knew I'd done that or even suspected I had been prepared to do that, the game would have ended right there.

And so Chet did know what would make the difference after all. He had asked and I had said yes—without Joseph's knowledge.

"Well, I guess Nabil would have just stayed in Beirut and finished his education," Chet said. And he said it so nonchalantly that he must not have seen the sword over his head hanging on every word of his response. "By then he was considered so skilled," Chet continued, "that I have no doubt that he would have been taken on as a language tutor in any of several languages. He is a truly gifted linguist. And, yes, I see what you mean about the vagaries of fate. He'd probably have just stayed there and become a professor of linguistics at the American University. I quite agree that this small quirk of fate—the bombing of the American embassy that stopped me from going to the Sudan—might very well have deprived us of an ultimate peace settlement in the Middle East. But as a professor now myself, I can tell you that there would have been worse fates for Nabil himself than becoming a teacher of the leaders of tomorrow."

And then almost as an afterthought, Chet addressed having paid my tuition. It was smoothly done, although I was sure that it had been screaming in his head until he could come up with something to say about that. "You asked me about paying Nabil's college tuition in Beirut," he said to Moorhead. "The trip I made to bring out a busload of refugees from the camp jolted me to the quick. I felt responsible for the people I brought out, and I did everything I could to help them all resettle and stabilize their lives. The tuition wasn't a gift either. Nabil paid me back later. I had faith he would."

"That was admirable," Moorhead said. I held my breath on whether he would pursue that—ask what Chet had done for any of the others on the bus—but, mercifully, he moved on. But he didn't really move on; he backtracked. I wondered if this was in Joseph's plan—that Moorhead would circle back to an issue of more interest to Joseph.

Chapter Seven: Chet

"And it was you who introduced Nabil into the expatriate Lebanese and Palestinian power circles in Washington, wasn't it, Mr. Bender? Not just Mariam Garfeh, but other influential people as well," Moorhead asked me, smiling that benign smile at me.

"Why, yes. Yes, I guess you could say that, although Nabil did much to cultivate his contacts," I answered. "But haven't we already. . .?"

"And so I guess we can say that you were instrumental in his rise in Lebanon, that he probably would not have been able to do it without the step up you gave him—I mean isn't that much of what the public interest—the worldwide public interest—is in Nabil Shalili? The heights to which he has risen from the depths he was in when you first met him?"

"Yes. No," I responded. "I mean that, yes, I had some part in helping him connect in Washington. But it was his own charisma and charm—and brilliance—really that made the difference. And even concerning the connections made, the introductions I provided Nabil weren't in any way as important as those that Mariam Garfeh . . . well, he just couldn't have done it, as talented as he is, without Mariam's help. The Senate circles her father moves in alone . . ."

"But Mariam died, didn't she?" Moorhead asked softly. "And after that . . ."

"By that time, I no longer was in the picture," I broke in, "going back to the thrust of your original question. And Mariam had already done enough for him to . . ."

"No longer in the picture. Immediately after her death, weren't you there, constantly, at his side?"

"Yes, but only for a few brief weeks and to comfort him in his personal loss. By then his friends were far more powerful in Mideast affairs than any of mine."

I wished Moorhead away from this subject. How could he know what sort of comforting Nabil had needed after Mariam had died of a heart attack—much too young and vital. No one had seen that coming on. The comforting Nabil had needed was that of a devoted lover. It didn't have anything to do with Mideast affairs or Nabil's political future. It was so personal that I wished Moorhead to move on to another topic. I didn't need any stroking as a kingmaker for Nabil. That had all been Nabil—using me and Mariam and anyone else who would be of use to him. And doing it with brilliant success—and almost ruthlessly. He was on a mission to get back to Lebanon and in a position of power.

Nabil didn't fool me. He never had fooled me, really. He did control me, though, and I wanted him to. I chose for him to control me. I could deny him nothing—once we were partners—and, yes, lovers.

I had known I would lose him—at least partially—even when I was arranging to bring him to the States. He made no secret of having higher ambitions. And as soon as he had his doctorate under his belt—which he accomplished in championship time at the University—he cast his eyes on Washington.

And I was in a position to help. I still consulted with both the State Department and the Brookings Institution on Mideast affairs. So, I got invited to many of the gatherings of various groupings of special interests in Washington. Nabil was particularly interested in those involving Lebanese and Palestinian affairs, and when I attended those events, I took him with me.

He was very welcome in those circles. He was young and extremely handsome, glib and, with his doctorate in linguistics under his belt, given instant cachet.

In almost no time he had met, through me, Mariam Garfeh, recently returned from Lebanon to act as hostess for her powerful senator father, and Nabil no longer needed me as a conduit to these events. Mariam moved in a circle of much rarer atmosphere than I did, and soon I was only being welcomed into the inner chambers at Nabil's invitation.

Nabil warned me before the formal announcement was made of his engagement to Mariam—more than out of common courtesy, he declared. He voiced assurances that he wasn't deserting me, really—that Mariam was someone he needed. That he planned to return to Lebanon in a power position and she could get him there. And I could see that—I could see him rising in attention and acclaim with each passing day under Mariam's wing. And he had his way of assuring me—and of maintaining control over me. He still regularly drove south to my country home and occupied my bed.

And then Mariam suffered her fatal heart attack—in the night, in the house she shared with her senator father. The father was in New York that day, though, taking in some meetings with constituents. And he didn't find her until the following evening. She had gone so quickly that she hadn't even had the chance to dial 911. Everyone was in shock. There had been no warning whatsoever that she had a weak heart—and she was much too young for this to be contemplated.

I was the first one Nabil telephoned.

"Chet, I don't know what to do . . . I need you here." The call from Nabil had come early in the evening that she had been found dead, and his voice, the worry and uncertainty in it, sent a cold shiver through me.

"What's happened? Are you all right? What's—?"

"She's gone. Mariam is dead," Nabil had said in a shaky voice. "A heart attack. I don't know what to do. How to behave with the family."

I understood. "I am coming, have you called them to say how sorry you are and asked if they'd like you to be with them."

"I can't face the senator. He acted like he accepted me. But I don't know, I think he always suspected I married Mariam just for what she could do for me politically. I liked Mariam. I really did."

"You need to share their grief Nabil, if you don't, it will look bad. Call them. You have to."

"OK, I will call them and offer to go to the house if they want me to. You will come?"

"Yes, I am on my way. I can think in the car about how we should handle this. If you need to, call me. I am sorry, Nabil. She was a vibrant . . . and useful . . . woman."

"Yes . . . yes, she was."

As I drove into the night, north on route 29 and then 66 into D.C., I tried to compose myself. I think I may have loved Mariam more than Nabil did. But some part of me was thinking that I was happy that she had supplanted me, but now I would be coming back into my own with Nabil. The truth was that I loved Nabil more than I loved anyone else.

But that was not to be. Three weeks with Nabil in the small Georgetown apartment he occupied while he worked his magic on the separate Lebanon and Palestinian lobbies in D.C.—at my expense, I might add—and he was on his way back to Lebanon. He had been offered a position at the American University and already was talking with key politicians in the fractured political structure in Beirut. He was on his way up in Lebanon.

I had told Nabil I thought it was too soon for him to return to Beirut, but he'd said that if he didn't make use of Mariam's connections there now, they would evaporate.

* * * *

I looked at Moorhead. He was sitting there, patiently. He must have asked me a question that I had not heard in my reverie.

"I'm sorry. You were saying?"

"The death of Mariam Garfeh seems to have a bit of mystery around it. Did you think that possibly there was more to it?"

"No, no, not that I'm aware," I quickly said. "As you noted, when she died, I came up to Washington to help Nabil in his grieving period. But only briefly, as an appointment in Beirut came in that he simply couldn't turn down."

"The timing on that seems quite convenient, doesn't it?" Moorhead asked. "It almost was as if Mariam Garfeh's usefulness to him in Washington ended right at the time of her death. It's almost as if Nabil was born under some magic star that made things happen just when it suited him best."

Why was Moorhead doing this, I wondered. It almost seemed like he was moving into exposé—as if there was some dirt he wanted me to dish about Nabil. He was surfacing in me memories from the time that I had long forgotten. But if he thought I was going to bring any of that out, he was quite badly mistaken.

"Mariam Garfeh was a major player in Lebanese power circles," I said. "She would have continued to be a major asset to Nabil if she had lived. She would be on the cusp of being probably the most personally powerful first lady of Lebanon after the next election." I didn't want to sound angry or snappish, and Moorhead was smiling that smile at me as if I was keeping an even tone, but I knew there was an edge to my voice when I spoke. I had to get him off this topic. I had to curb my tongue and my emotions.

It's true that in those first few days when Nabil was in shock over Mariam's sudden death, he had spoken of fears that some would think she had been murdered, that it wasn't a natural death—and that it somehow had to do with him. But he quickly recovered his faculties, and we both pretended that he never had voiced such concerns. And here Moorhead was possibly trying to insinuate that Nabil had something to do with her death? I couldn't conscience that. I could not let him pull any hint of that out of me. And, besides, Nabil was babbling about someone else altogether as possibly having a hand in her death. There was no way that Nabil had been party to anything like that.

"Well, she was an American, wasn't she? Could she possibly be accepted by the Lebanese as their first lady as an American?"

"The Lebanese love America in their hearts," I answered in as level a tone as I could manage. "I lived there and experienced them at first hand. They are a lovely and gracious people. They fully accepted Mariam when she was living there, and I'm sure she would have been welcomed as first lady with open arms, if she hadn't tragically died from that heart attack."

"Yes, well . . . perhaps yes," Moorhead was saying.

Chapter Eight: Nabil

Both Moorhead and Chet were all smiles now, and Moorhead was concluding his interview, having used the vagaries of fate concept as the interview wrap-up.

I almost collapsed with relief, but when I turned toward Joseph, he was just smiling that inscrutable smile of his.

"So, everything is fine, right?" I asked.

"We shall see," was all that Joseph answered.

I couldn't tell whether he had been convinced or not. Joseph was such a cipher in that regard. But it didn't really matter to me now. I held my breath as Chet and Moorhead stood and shook hands and Chet was permitted to leave the studio. And I held my breath as I walked out into the corridor when he had exited the building—and while I watched him get into his car—and beyond the moment when I knew he'd turned the ignition on and there had not been the feared explosion. And I didn't release my breath until I saw him drive off and didn't see any tail car move in behind him.

I was a bit perplexed. All seemed to be fine, but why had Moorhead returned to the question of Mariam? I thought on that, and the longer I thought on that, the more it concerned me. I began to sweat. Perhaps this interview hadn't been about Chet's survivability at all—but about mine. I moved out of the television studio as quickly as I could. When I reached my car, I decided to leave it where it was and to take the subway instead.

Suddenly my whole world was changing around me, but I knew exactly what I had to do. The wrap-up to the interview had made it all clear.

Chapter Nine: Chet

The interview had gone long, as I knew it would, finishing in the late afternoon. I drove across Key Bridge to the Marriott in Roslyn, Virginia, across the Potomac from Georgetown, where I had a room overlooking the Washington mall. I could have driven back to my home on the other side of Culpepper. I could have been home within an hour and a half. But I had been nervous about the interview and had known that I'd be too shaky to drive home that evening.

And that was true, my hands were trembling, although I thought the interview had gone fine. I didn't think I'd revealed anything that would harm Nabil's chances in his campaign, and favorable coverage in Moorhead's television show would do him a world of good. His most important backers were here in the States, not in Lebanon. The strength of his power in Lebanon was very important, but even more important were his connections with lobbies pushing for a stable peace in the Middle East that were provided through his wife's connections in the States.

Moorhead had almost thrown me on those questions about Mariam—and coming back to the topic at the end of the interview. I indeed was sensitive about Nabil having been married to Mariam. I understood why he'd done it, of course, and there had been no reason for him to know the circumstances of how I had lost her. Nabil vaguely knew I had escorted Mariam to some events and parties in Lebanon, but since he was fucking me at the time and our relationship could not have been any closer, I trusted he realized that this was mostly window dressing and normal diplomatic fare.

He couldn't have known, however, how hurt I was when he told me they were getting married. I had always assumed that her family had seen me as not good enough for her and had pressured the State Department to call me off. But then they obviously considered Nabil was good enough. And I knew where Nabil had come from. How could I help but feel hurt and insulted when the family had permitted the marriage. I did know, though, that the senator hadn't been wild about it.

Mariam had certainly guessed right in going with Nabil rather than me. I didn't have the future that Nabil did. With me, she would now have been nothing more than a professor's wife, although I'm sure she would have kept her salon in Washington and continued hostessing and political power broking. And who knows, maybe she'd be someone on the political scene now in her own right—that road certainly had worked for the current secretary of state, Madeleine Albright. With Nabil, Mariam would have become the first lady of Lebanon's president. I didn't see anything stopping Nabil's rise to power now.

I brooded about this over dinner alone at the Orleans House near my hotel in Roslyn. I couldn't fault Nabil for his ambition, and I'm glad that I had decided to help him rather than sink him in this interview. But I was hurt and felt used and cast aside. Still, I had to acknowledge that my love for him endured and trumped everything else. I ordered a champagne cocktail; toasted my lost lover's future; ate my perfect prime rib roast, the specialty of the house; and walked the four blocks to the hotel.