Siro by David Ignatius (short books to read txt) 📕

he was a foreign military officer who wasn’t officially allowed to entertain Americans at home, then you pushed him to invite you home; if he lived in a country where he wasn’t permitted to accept money from a foreigner, then you gave him a very expensive present that amounted to the same thing. If he was a Central Asian emigrant who didn’t want to talk about a particular subject, then you found a way to make him talk about it. The barrier was psychological. Once it had been passed, the rest was largely a question of time and persistence.

“You’re from Uzbekistan, is that right?” Taylor said after a while.

“Yeah,” said Munzer, taking the pipe out of his mouth. “From Tashkent.”

“But you left a long time ago.”

“Yeah. Long time ago.”

“When was that?”

“Oh, you know, wartime, 1939.”

“Ever been back?”

“Where?”

“To Uzbekistan.”

“Not possible. Too dangerous.”

Taylor took the mouthpiece of the water pipe in hand again and smoked a few more puffs, not wanting to seem in any rush.

“Why is that?” he asked eventually. “What’s so dangerous?”

“Many years ago I am doing some things that Russians not like. Freedom things. So if I go back, zzzkkk.” He moved his index finger across his throat like a knife.

“What did you do to make the Russians so angry?”

Munzer didn’t answer. He just kept puffing away on the pipe contentedly, as if he hadn’t heard the question. With the stem of the nargileh stuck in one side of his mouth, his round face had the look of a lopsided grapefruit.

Taylor tried another tack. “Tell me, Mr. Ahmedov, do you think the Russians will always rule Tashkent?”

Munzer looked at him curiously and put down the pipe. “Maybe. Maybe not. How do I know?”

“You must have an opinion.”

Munzer shook his head. “Why you ask all these questions about Uzbekistan?”

“I’m interested.”

“Psss.” He waved his hand dismissively.

“Really, I’m interested in Uzbekistan. It’s one of my hobbies. I’d like to learn about your people’s struggle against the Russians.”

“This is a very sad story, my friend. Too sad for me. We talk about something else, please.” He put his hand over his heart, as if it hurt just to talk about his country.

Taylor said nothing. If Munzer Ahmedov really wanted to change the subject, he figured, he could do so himself. But the Uzbek returned to his pipe, and neither man said anything for what seemed like several minutes. A waiter brought the food, and still neither man talked. Finally Munzer broke the silence. He turned to the American, studying his face, his clothes, his hands.

“You not sell rugs,” he said.

“No.”

“You not real friend of Sheikh Hassan.”

“No.”

“You CIA.”

“I work for the government,” said Taylor.

Munzer shook his head. He took a deep breath, as if the wind had been knocked out of him.

“You people no good for me,” he said. “You go back to Washington, my friend. Don’t bother Munzer no more.”

“I’d like to talk with you. It’s important.”

“Yeah. They say that thirty years ago, and what we get? Nothing. Now I smarter.”

“I’ve come a long way to see you, Mr. Ahmedov. As I said before, it’s very important. You must believe me. You’ll be making a terrible mistake if you send me away. Not just for yourself, but for your people.”

“Yeah. Sure. My people. I hear this before, too. Why you come back and bother Munzer now after so many years?”

“Because I need your help.”

“What for, please?”

“To work for your people.”

“Psss!”

“I mean it. This is serious. It’s not the same as before. Things are changing in Washington.”

“What is different? What you do for Uzbeks now?”

“Let’s go somewhere private where we can talk about it. Not here.”

“We eat now,” said Munzer. “I think about it.”

They ate in silence. Munzer chewed each mouthful slowly, as if chewing over the sad history of his people with every bite. His eyes were fixed on an unseen spot in the distance, out beyond Masada Used Cars. He didn’t look at Taylor again until he was finished with his food, and his deliberation.

“You come to my house, please,” said Munzer at last. “We talk there.”

“When?”

“Tonight. Six o’clock.”

“Where do you live?”

“2138 Sixty-eighth Street, Brooklyn. Between Twenty-first Avenue and Bay Parkway.” He took out a pen and wrote out the address in the neat cursive script he had been taught a lifetime ago in a Russian school in Tashkent.

“Thank you,” said Taylor, shaking the Uzbek’s hand. “I am happy that you will see me.”

“I see you, but that all. Tonight I explain story of my people, and you understand everything. Why I not want to work with you CIA ever again.” He nodded and smiled politely and waited until Taylor had left, then sat down and lit the nargileh again.

25

Munzer’s home was a neat row house on the edge of Bensonhurst. It had new aluminum siding on the front and a 1975 Cadillac sedan in the driveway. The lawn was mowed and there were chintz curtains in the windows. To Taylor, it looked pretty much like every other house in this neighborhood of middle-class immigrants.

For all his bitterness toward the U.S. government, Munzer Ahmedov was in most respects an American success story. He drove his almost new Cadillac to work in Queens each morning, to a small storefront in Astoria where he sold electrical equipment. He was surrounded by other immigrants who, like him, had chosen American-sounding names for their businesses. “Delta Fashion, Inc.” “Clover Jewelry Corp.” Munzer had named his company “Utopia Trading Co.”

Munzer had gone into business in the early 1960s, when his heart was full of pain and betrayal. His specialty was small, high-value items—batteries, film, small stereos and television sets—things that could get lost in the vast hull of a freighter or fall off the back of a truck. Munzer was scrupulously honest himself, but he didn’t ask unnecessary questions. He had made it into a good business, buying at the cheapest prices he could find and charging what the market would bear. It was America.

He was, by now, a