The Damascus Cover

  THE DAMASCUS COVER

  HOWARD KAPLAN

  Copyright © 1977 by Howard Kaplan

  First ebook edition © 2014 by Howard Kaplan

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system now known or to be invented, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who wishes to quote brief passages written for inclusion with a review.

  Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data

  Kaplan, Howard

  The Damascus Cover.

  ISBN 978-0-9905263-0-8

  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  FOREWORD TO 2014 EDITION

  1.

  THE PREVIOUS SPRING

  3.

  4.

  5.

  6.

  7.

  8.

  9.

  10.

  11.

  12.

  13.

  14.

  15.

  16.

  17.

  18.

  19.

  20.

  21.

  22.

  23.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  For my parents

  ALBERT and CLAIRE KAPLAN

  FOREWORD TO 2014 EDITION

  Several weeks before I arrived in Damascus in the spring of 1971, a friend at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, where I was studying on my junior year abroad, suggested that we fly to Cairo and take pictures waving an Israeli flag in front of the pyramids to sell to Life Magazine. It would be a half dozen years before peace between Israel and Egypt. His idea immediately seemed preferable to studying for finals.

  In Cyprus, the American Embassy slipped our Israeli stamped passports in their safe and issued us new ones. At the Egyptian Embassy in Nicosia, we handed our crisp passports to the visa officer. She smiled and asked us when we’d gotten in from Israel. She was more than happy to issue us visas, but would only do it on our old passports. Instead, we flew on the new ones to Beirut. The Lebanese civil war would not tear apart the city for another four years, and Beirut then was known as the Paris of the Middle East. On the plane ride to Beirut, Canadian Sgt.-Major MacMillan offered to procure us gold or clean women, as we wished.

  We headed to the dorms at the American University of Beirut in search of an American exchange student. Lebanese students staying at a hostel in Cyprus had given us his name, Cary, and told us he was also from California. We knocked on his door and his Syrian roommate explained he was away for the weekend. He asked if we were friends and I told him we were not and explained the tenuous connection. He immediately invited us to spend the weekend in their room until Cary returned. This was my first experience with the ubiquity of Arab hospitality, its antecedents in desert culture.

  In the Beirut dorms, the Syrian roommate explained we could take a shared taxi from Beirut to Damascus, an hour and a half drive in a large nine seat Mercedes Benz. So I saw and walked through the magnificent oasis of Damascus, the oldest continuously inhabited city in the world.

  When I graduated college and began to write suspense novels, I set my first in that fascinating place. Dutton published The Damascus Cover in 1977 and seven foreign translations soon followed. It climbed the lower rungs of the Los Angeles Times best seller list for 10 weeks, was officially banned from the Eastern European market, and has been out of print for over three decades, until now.

  Syria has tragically been much in the news in recent years and Damascus has suffered in tandem with her people. Still, most of the bazaars, back alleys and streets the novel’s characters move through remain, even now, as they have for centuries. Changes in book publishing have made it possible for The Damascus Cover to catch up to the digital age.

  Howard Kaplan

  August 2014, Los Angeles

  1.

  SEPTEMBER 21

  Dov Elon sat in the dirt in his cell leaning against the whitewashed wall. The cubicle, three feet by five feet, was windowless. The air stank of urine. A can, his washbasin, lay on its side in one corner. A thin blanket covered the mound of damp straw piled in the other.

  Dov’s eyes rested on the food trap in the door. Not long before he’d heard the banshee cry of the muezzin beckoning the Muslim inmates to prayer. He assumed a bowl of jasmine tea would soon be pushed through the food trap, but he wasn’t sure. The previous day he’d been transferred from Tadmor Prison, near the ancient Greek ruins of Palmyra in the north, to Sigin al-Mazza, on the outskirts of Damascus. He didn’t know if his new guards would feed him regularly or at random intervals. So he waited, listening for approaching footsteps, not moving—for every shift in position arched pain through his bruised body. After a while he closed his eyes. The minutes fell away. There were no sounds. The silence hummed in his ears.

  With the grating of wood against metal the heavy door swung open, jarring Dov out of semi-conscious stupor.

  “Get up,” the guard said in Arabic.

  Although the Israeli understood his captor perfectly, he didn’t respond.

  “Stand up!” The guard gripped his kurbash, a leaden whip made from the coarse hairs of a bull’s tail.

  “My pleasure,” Dov said, struggling to his feet, refusing to let the pain rippling through him register on his face. Several of his ribs were cracked and the open wounds on the backs of his legs, inflicted by palm frond lashings, festered with infection.

  Haltingly Dov followed the guard through the dimly lit underground corridor, past two narrow passages lined with the fourteen al-Aadem, death row cells; then past the damp muabed section, containing those serving life sentences; until they reached an iron gate. The guard fitted a single key into the lock. The bolt clattered and the metal squeaked loudly as he pushed the gate open.

  Farther on, the corridor walls changed from gray to white. As they mounted a flight of concrete stairs the temperature rose. By the time Dov was led into the second-floor interrogation room lines of perspiration glistened on his brow.

  In the center of the room stood a high straw stool supported by wooden legs. Opposite it was a desk, uncluttered, with an upholstered chair. The plaster walls were bare; the lone window closed; the blades of the fan overhead, still. The guard motioned to the stool with the butt of his kurbash. Dov moved toward it and sat. His legs dangled; neither they nor his back had any support. Outside the sun beat down on the desert. The sweat began to trickle from Dov’s body, dampening his brown prison shirt. According to a thermometer by the door the room temperature stood at 102 degrees.

  Moments later Suleiman Sarraj entered carrying a copper tray loaded with iced drinks. He set it on the edge of the desk, removed a tan folder from the top drawer, and sat down. The guard stationed himself against the wall at the prisoner’s back.

  “How are you, Dov?” Sarraj asked, with the familiarity developed during previous interrogations.

  “Just fine. I’m in a beautiful suite on one of the lower levels. It’s got everything—a blanket, a gallon can, room service, meals delivered directly to my door. You ought to stop by sometime.”

  “Oh Dov,” Sarraj said, shaking his head. “I thought a few weeks at Tadmor would convince you further resistance is quite futile. Evidently I was mistaken.” He took one of the drinks in his hand and almost spilled it. The condensation on the outside of the glass made it slippery. “Or maybe my men have been too gentle. In any event, it seems they’ve failed to show you exactly how serious I am.”

  A drop of perspiration rolled down Dov’s nose and onto his shirt. The dry heat invaded every cavity of his body. There w
as pressure on the sockets of his eyes. His mouth was viscid. His nostrils parched. His throat felt like someone had run sandpaper along its inner walls.

  “Give me a drink, Sarraj.”

  The Second Bureau chief set his glass down. “I’m sorry I can’t do that, at least not yet. But as soon as you begin cooperating you shall have a glass of Kortisan. It’s a local specialty, made by soaking licorice roots in water for several days. The result, chilled, is quite delicious. I’m sure you’ll find it . . . “

  “Why don’t you just kill me and get it over with!” Dov shouted.

  “I’m afraid that would do neither of us much good. Besides you are too young to lose your life. Believe me, at twenty-six you’ve barely begun. I know, I have a son and daughter about your age.” There was paternal warmth in his voice. “I don’t want to see you dead. As I’ve told you before, I want to help you, to send you back to Israel. In fact, let me do something now, as a gesture of good faith.” Sarraj reached behind him and flipped a switch on the wall. The whine of an electric motor sounded overhead and the black blades of the fan suspended from the ceiling gradually picked up speed. Dov shivered as a stream of hot air glanced off his sweaty brow.

  “Is that better?”

  He nodded.

  “Good. Now, tell me—what do you know about the former Nazis living in Damascus?”

  “Which Nazis?”

  “How did you penetrate the German colony here?” Sarraj demanded impatiently.

  Dov’s lips curved into a smile. “I just asked where I could find the best knockwurst and sauerkraut in town.”

  Sarraj strummed his fingers on the desk. “If you persist in this manner, I’ll have the answer beaten out of you. I will ask just one more time. How did you penetrate the Nazi colony?”

  A long silence followed.

  Sarraj stood up. “You are a fool. You will regret this, I promise you.” He motioned to the guard and left the room.

  The soldier closed the door behind Sarraj, then turned toward the prisoner.

  “Over here,” he said.

  Dov lowered himself to the ground and looked over to where the Arab pointed. Two wrist shackles were bolted into the wall just above the casing. As he moved near, the guard grabbed his shoulder, pushed him face forward against the door, lifted his right hand, locked it inside the manacle, then did the same with his left. Dov hung over the door. The wood felt warm where it pressed against his cheek.

  He heard the sound of the kurbash beating the air, then abruptly the first blow ripped into his infected calves. The bull’s hair shredded his prison garment and the outer layer of his skin with one stroke. Dov bit his lower lip hard. Again and again the guard lashed at the back of his legs, cutting through tendon and muscle, bloodying his whip. Dov tore at the shackles, writhing in agony. Streams of sweat ran down his face. He smelled the salt odor of tears in his nose. The guard paused for a moment, stepped to his left, then sent the ends of the kurbash slicing through the side of Dov’s knee. The second blow struck the exposed peroneal nerve. Excruciating pain clawed down Dov’s leg and exploded into his foot. His tongue caught in his throat. He screamed without restraint.

  The door opened. Sarraj stood there for a long time, studying the boy’s face. Finally he spoke in a soft voice:

  “Have you had enough?”

  Dov turned his head away.

  “Take him down,” Sarraj said to the guard.

  When Dov was seated on the stool, Sarraj reached into his desk and withdrew a gun. It was an FN Browning .45 caliber High Power Automatic Pistol manufactured in Belgium under license as a copy of the American original. He circled around the desk and faced the young Israeli.

  “I have lost my patience, Elon. I did not bring you to al-Mazza for you to waste more of my time. We have reached the turning point in our discussions. Either you begin cooperating or you will not leave this room alive.” His voice was flat.

  Dov felt the control of his mind slipping. His head throbbed. And the thirst. “Sarraj, give me something to drink,” he cried out.

  Sarraj sensed that he was on the verge of victory. He lowered the Browning to his side. He had now only to apply the coup de grâce. But he would edge toward his final threat. He knew better than to spoil his advantage by proceeding too quickly.

  “Why did the Colonel send you to Syria?”

  “Please, Sarraj, my legs. Let me lie down.”

  “In a minute. There’s a doctor waiting in the next room. As soon as I have the information I want you shall have treatment, a bed, food. Now, tell me, how did you penetrate the Nazi colony?”

  “No,” he whispered, weakening.

  Moisture built in his eyes.

  “Come on, Dov, talk and it will be over for you. In a few days you’ll be home. Think about it, no more beatings, an end to the pain.”

  Dov licked his lower lip; it was bleeding.

  “Nobody ever holds out under prolonged torture. You’ve been here for five months. The Colonel will understand. Nobody will blame you. You’ll be considered a hero for lasting as long as you did. Please don’t make me use the pistol. You made a special effort to seek out the Nazis. Tell me, did Ludwig Streicher help you?”

  “I can’t,” he shouted, burying his head in his arms—waiting, wanting to die.

  Sarraj moved next to the chair, gun in hand. “You leave me little choice.”

  Dov looked up.

  The pistol was pointed at his elbow. In one terrible instant he realized Sarraj was not threatening to kill him.

  “You wouldn’t …”

  “The bullets for this pistol are forty-fives. Notches have been sliced into the ends. They’ll shatter on impact. Why did you come to Syria?”

  “The Colonel sent me.”

  “I know that,” Sarraj said, anger in his voice scratching his words. “Why?”

  “I can’t tell you.”

  “I’m not bluffing!” Sarraj pushed the muzzle of the Browning against Dov’s skin. “Who is your contact in Damascus?”

  “I have no contact here.”

  “You’re lying! Who is Operative 66?”

  At the mention of the highly placed Israeli agent terror swept through Dov. How had Sarraj known? It was impossible. But no time to think now. He had to focus his will against Sarraj. Defy him. Resist. That’s all that mattered.

  “I’ll give you one last chance. I want the identity of Operative 66.”

  Silence.

  “I want his name!” Sarraj screamed. “Now!”

  Dov stared into his eyes. “I’ll never tell you,” he said, gritting his teeth.

  Sarraj pulled the trigger. The sound exploding in such close quarters was deafening. Pieces of flesh splattered the wall. Blood gushed from the open wound. Dov’s arm, hanging from the elbow by a piece of membrane, swayed in the air. Then the skin tore and it fell to the ground.

  “Get a doctor,” Sarraj shouted at the guard. “I don’t want him dying.”

  THE PREVIOUS SPRING

  2.

  APRIL

  The man known as Hans Hoffmann cried out in his sleep.

  Jarred awake, Michelle shook the naked body beside her until his eyes opened. Slowly he stirred. Drawing his hand from under the covers he touched her cheek, seeking palpable proof that she was real and the dream was not.

  “Qu’est-ce qu’il y a?” Michelle asked in French.

  For a split second Hans didn’t understand her. The dream had been in German; that dream from his youth was always in German.

  “What do you mean, is anything the matter?” he said, adjusting his thoughts and words to her language.

  “You cried out.”

  He shrugged and turned onto his back. “I must have been dreaming. It’s nothing to worry about. An occasional nightmare is healthy, it releases tension.”

  Comforted by an explanation, she smiled and hooked her foot around his. The night air brushing through the curtain bore the damp odor of the sea and the pines outside. Though Hans’s eyes were open, the
dream was still there: the mud, the barking dogs, the barbed wire. Michelle sensed his thoughts, still clinging to the nightmare. Helping the only way she knew how, she drew him close and brought their lips together. Her mouth worked, arousing him. Strands of her long black hair embraced his face and she felt his response to her breasts. Slowly she rolled her tongue from his ear to the base of his neck and back again. He reached for her; the memories had been put back in their place.

  In the morning, awake early, Hans and Michelle stood in front of the white hillside cabin looking down at the Cyprus coastline. Ten miles to the east lay Kyrenia, a hamlet-like fishing village, plaster and red tile roofs. Below the town fishing smacks and small boats were sheltered inside two arms of a sea wall that formed a miniature harbor. On one arm stood the Virgin Castle. The other arm was a quay with a lighthouse at the end. Anchored outside the harbor, flying a red flag with a gold crescent, was the 3,500-ton M. Feuza Cakmak, a World War II vintage destroyer stationed there ever since Turkey first landed six thousand troops on the island in July, 1974.

  The white cabin Michelle had rented stood in the midst of a forest of pines and acacias. Behind them rose the Kyrenia mountains, whose terraced vineyards and olive orchards reflected the early morning light. Above the orchards, atop a three-thousand-foot peak, St. Hilarion’s Castle stood guard over the rolling hills to the west. Though inhabited more than seven hundred years earlier by Richard the Lion-Hearted and his beloved Berengaria, its royal apartments, great halls, monastery, and fortifications have been preserved intact.

  On their way down to the beach Hans and Michelle saw no one. She had chosen the cabin with care. The nearest neighbors were several miles away. Michelle wanted to stay away from any place where they might be seen. She said she was married. Hans didn’t mind one way or the other.