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shit has got to stop. We have to move him into a different gear. The Milan bombing has everybody spooked. The president is screaming at the director, asking why we can't stop these guys, and the director is screaming at us. Or at me, to be more precise. We have to break this network. Now. You tell Hani that."
    "He's not back yet. He's still in Berlin."
    "Great! That means he's working his new boy without us. That's not going to fly. Who does he think is paying the bills?"
    Ferris debated a moment, and then decided to share his suspicion with Hoffman. "I think he's after my guy. I can't be sure, but I think that's what his Berlin op is about."
    "Suleiman?"
    "Yes, sir. Otherwise, I can't figure why he would work so hard to set it up. Or why he would invite me along. It's got to be the Suleiman network he's trying to penetrate."
    "That settles it," said Hoffman. "I'm coming out to see you. We've got to own this one. Otherwise the president is going to have my ass. And yours, too, not that anyone would care. I'll send you some goodies for Hani, to show we love him. Try to soften him up when he gets back. Big Daddy will be out soon to finish the job."
    "Are you sure that makes sense?" Ferris had a sinking feeling, partly that he would be losing his handle on the Berlin operation and partly something else that he couldn't put in words, even to himself. That wasn't how things worked in this part of the world. You couldn't kick someone's ass and then assume they would cooperate. This wasn't the KGB. Arabs helped you because they trusted you. They would do everything for a friend and nothing for a stranger; and less than nothing for someone who treated them with disrespect. He was going to try to talk Hoffman out of the trip when he heard a click on the other end of the line and realized that his boss had hung up.

3
    BALAD, IRAQ
    W HEN F ERRIS HAD FIRST HEARD the name Suleiman, he was beginning what was supposed to be a one-year assignment at the CIA's base in Balad, Iraq. Hoffman had resisted giving him the Iraq job at first, wanting to keep Ferris as his executive officer, but Ferris had insisted. If anyone should go to Iraq, it should be him: He spoke the language and understood the culture. He had been tracking this target, one way or another, for a decade--ever since he had become interested in Islamic radicals while he was a student at Columbia.
    "Iraq is fucked up," Hoffman had said.
    "So what," Ferris had answered. "That's what makes it interesting."
    Ferris wasn't interested in policy. That was for the State Department, or people on TV talk shows. He was the one person in America who didn't want to talk about what a disaster Iraq was. He wanted to be there. Working for Hoffman, he had helped devise the tradecraft that was keeping young officers alive. The Arab headdress and robes, the darkened moustache; the cheap shoes; the rickety cars with Islamic beads hanging from the mirrors, Arab music blaring from the stereo cassette player. For a certain kind of person, it was the only job that was interesting. Hoffman knew he couldn't stop his protege, so he arranged an assignment that could actually make a difference.
    "Your job is to feed the machine," Hoffman told Ferris before sending him off. Ferris hadn't understood what that meant until the day he arrived at the Balad air base about fifty miles north of Baghdad. The agency's small fleet of Predators was based there, and most members of the CIA base spent their days watching what they liked to call "Pred Porn." These were the real-time images from the cameras on board the three unmanned aerial vehicles that were cruising lazily over Iraq. Ferris got his introduction from the base chief. He escorted Ferris into the operations room and pointed to a giant screen that loomed over them.
    "My star agents," said the base chief. Displayed in military block letters below the screen were three names: " CHILI ," " SPECK " and " NITRATE ." They sounded like the names of pets or cartoon