Into a Raging Blaze (4 page)

They had lived together for ten years and when it ended it was liberating. A part of her, the real Carina, had been waiting all these years to reclaim her body again. Just six months later, she could no longer understand how she had been able to live with that man.

She became skeptical of men—most were uninteresting, to her eyes. She had slept with a few, but quickly became bored. But Jamal surprised her. They had met by chance. One Friday, two months after she had left Peter, she had allowed a few colleagues to persuade her to join them for a drink. In the bar, she ended up next to
an unobtrusive, pleasant guy who was utterly beautiful. They spent three hours talking about books, international law—about things she liked. She couldn't explain what it was about him that fascinated her, but he moved her deeply, on a fundamental level. She fantasized about kissing him, embracing him. That night, she couldn't sleep for the first time in a long time. She wanted to carry on talking with him and she wanted to fuck him.

A few days later he called. Under the pretext that Jamal needed to borrow a book, they met in Stockholm's Old Town for a coffee, which became an endless walk that neither of them wanted to finish. They roamed through the inner city down to Stureplan, continued to Söder and meandered through the district over Västerbron to Kungsholmen, and they talked. Finally, they ended up in a blustery beer garden down by Norr Mälarstrand, drinking wine. She had never talked so much to anyone in her whole life. His parents were from Cairo, but fled when the regime began to threaten his father, who was a lawyer. He had grown up in Sweden. She told him about herself and her family, about Poland, the diffuse wonderland, as her relatives called their homeland. They understood each other.

He was careful to begin with. Then they had sex for a whole weekend, over and over until, sweaty, they got up to make spaghetti, naked in his kitchen in Hammarby Sjöstad. For one summer week, she completely lost track of time. She wanted to eat him; she had never felt like that with any man. She absorbed him, making him an irreplaceable part of her biochemistry.

Around three she heard a mass of voices approaching in the corridor. She had been sending e-mails back and forth to the Ministry of Defense and Ministry of Finance for two hours, concerning an EU conference about security policy that the MFA was to organize, but a problem had arisen as to which budget should be used to pay for it. Now a budgetary paper was being sent back and forth between ministries with various amendments. During the last hour she had begun calling around, trying to calm everyone down so they could reach a decision. She needed certification from them, that was how
it worked: when a text or a proposal was okay, each affected ministry gave its certification, which meant that the ministry had read the document and accepted the text as it stood. It usually worked well but, for some reason, Finance didn't want to accept the reasoning by Defense that some of the money could be taken from aid funds. Involving other ministries and gathering opinions so that all expert resources were used and everyone was in agreement was the Swedish model—in the Government Offices it was called “joint preparation.” But there was nothing more trying than preparations that ran amok like this, or ran aground in a storm of e-mails.

A group of civil servants in dark suits thronged past in the corridor. She recognized Johan Eriksson's familiar laugh and smiled at a half-caught remark about not all Danes having horses in their gardens. A woman paused and loitered in the doorway.

“Hi, Carina.” Her penetrating voice filled the room. Deputy department head, Marina Steinhofer, was a burly woman with her hair tied up in a knot like a strict, old-fashioned schoolteacher. “We're having a department meeting now.” Steinhofer cast a disapproving glance around the room. “You're coming?”

“Absolutely.”

Carina had completely forgotten about the meeting. Really, she needed every last minute to finish responding to the questions from Finance, but, whatever, she would have to work half the evening anyway. She dug up her calendar and the small black oilcloth notebook she used to take notes, and followed Steinhofer out into the corridor.

Those who participate in meetings at the Ministry must know their place. Anyone who sits in the wrong place is without exception admonished with a smile and a wave of the hand, revealing by way of their mistake that they do not belong and should not be present.

In the outer ring, on the chairs lined up against the walls, sat the assistants, interns, temps, and others who didn't belong to the core group. Around the table, in the inner circle, sat the diplomats, according to rank. The department head always sat at the end with
the deputy department head beside him and the rest of the civil servants in descending order of rank to the other end of the table. An outsider would probably marvel at the fact that everyone managed to be seated like this, but it was something you learned to do quickly and soon it seemed natural. It was barely a rule—more a frame of mind.

The Security Policy Department was the largest department in the MFA. They were responsible for policies concerning war and peace, security, terrorism, and disasters.

Conversations ended abruptly when the department head, a tall man with a serious face, entered the room. As if a signal had been emitted, all faces turned in unison toward the end of the table where he sat down. Carina took her usual seat close to the middle of the table.

The room was silent. Only the sound of papers could be heard, as the department head leafed through a few documents before looking up and, in a muted voice, saying, “Well.”

The meeting had begun.

It started with a welcome for a new colleague, the new unit head who had joined the department. Anders Wahlund got up. So that was what her new boss looked like, she thought. He was about the same age as Carina. A sandy-haired, pale man in a pinstriped suit that was a little too stylish. The newcomer looked around with a broad smile and said a few words about how happy he was to return home to the Ministry and especially to the Security Policy Department. Everyone knew that he was one of the rising stars in the MFA. He was young, and had already distinguished himself in Kiev, Moscow, and Damascus. He seemed lively and perhaps a little aggressive. The dim room and rows of motionless faces looking back at him seemed only to give him more energy, as he feasted on their gazes.

“Once again, a warm welcome to Anders,” said the department head.

Everyone quietly noted the familiar way his first name was used. Her new boss sat down and, at that moment, their eyes met and he seemed to understand who she was. He nodded at her with a smile.

“Let's continue. G1, if you please.”

The unit head for G1 took the floor. He was a lieutenant colonel and filled the room with the baritone of one who had spent a lifetime training his voice to bellow across barrack yards. He and the four suits sitting around him dealt with troop contributions to UN forces. They were the nucleus of the department, officers who spent every day working within the framework of a global military system, waging war on various continents and creating peace and stability on others. When the lieutenant colonel spoke, everyone in the room pricked up their ears. They were currently extremely busy with the Libya campaign, he explained. The budget was too small to guarantee more than two months of Swedish involvement, but the Ministry of Finance was refusing to increase it. Negotiations were also ongoing with the UN about a peacekeeping force in South Sudan. Operations were scheduled to begin before the end of the year. But the government in Khartoum was making impossible demands. It was a moving target, said the lieutenant colonel.

“And will we stay on budget with the UN operation?”

“Short answer: yes. Two hundred and seventy million. Plus or minus ten.”

“Thank you.” The department head looked around the table. “G2—any relevant matters?”

That was Carina's unit. According to protocol, the unit head always had the first word but, since he was new, he merely shook his head with a smile and gestured toward her.

“You have the floor, Dymek,” said the department head.

Everyone turned toward her, rows of faces and dark suits. She cleared her throat. Even though she had sat in these meetings many times and set out EU security policy, her mouth was always a little dry the second she was put on the spot. But only for a second. She rarely doubted herself. The fact was that she had gotten by just fine without a boss and suspected she could do without this one too.

“Discussions,” said Carina in a businesslike manner, “are currently ongoing in the EU about the joint military headquarters for operations in the Horn of Africa.” Then she continued, point by
point: the circumstances surrounding the EU's new security strategy; negotiations concerning Bosnia's EU candidature. She was calm, presenting sentences like chains of logic, the words coming to her just as she wanted them. Everyone listened. She finished by mentioning the foreign minister's visit to Ukraine and by reminding everyone that she would be in Brussels the next day for the usual meeting.

“Great. Thanks,” said the department head.

She leaned back. The entire time she had been speaking, Anders Wahlund had been leaning forward, listening keenly. Now he smiled at her and jotted something in a small notebook.

The final unit to report was responsible for humanitarian aid and disaster assistance. Their unit head was away in Geneva, so Johan Eriksson had the floor. Carina didn't have many close friends, but Johan Eriksson was one of the closest. He was different from the others; he didn't do low-key irony, that slightly playful cynicism so prevalent among staff at the Ministry. Johan Eriksson was keen and forthright in a way that she had immediately liked. A farmer's son from Skövde, he had become a diplomat and actually wasn't joking when he said he wanted to change the world. His ultimate dream was a posting to New York. He often talked about the Big Apple. Everyone, except him, knew he would never get there.
Johan Eriksson will never get to New York
—it was practically an expression. He was too good for departmental management in Stockholm to let him go, and not sufficiently well liked by the UN ambassador in New York to get the post. How many times had he applied to New York? At least five. Rejected every time. Now he was a few chairs down from Carina, explaining current UN operations in Pakistan, which had been hit by flooding. Thousands of villages under water. Immense bureaucracy. India causing trouble at the UN, but aid getting through, in spite of it.

“Good,” said the department head without further comment. The meeting had already run over by five minutes. “Thank you, all.”

Afterward, a small group stayed behind, surrounding the new unit head. The room was full of Carina's colleagues flocking to
the coffee cart, engrossed in quiet but lively conversations. She approached and greeted him.

“Ah, Dymek,” said her new boss exuberantly as they shook hands. “I've heard a lot of great things about you. Good to meet you. Your presentation was perfect.”

She smiled broadly and nodded. That slightly patronizing tone that some men used toward her—she hated it. It didn't bode well. She said something about looking forward to working with him and hurried away. By the elevators, she caught up with Johan Eriksson and a group of colleagues.

“Hey, Johan—you look tired.”

He grunted in response and rubbed his eyes.

“How's it going?”

“To hell.”

A well-groomed older gentleman beside them, the Head of Disarmament and Non-Proliferation, looked at his younger colleague with amusement.

“I've been with Finance all morning,” muttered Johan Eriksson, unaware of the other's smile. “There's nothing more tiring than trying to convince those damn bean-counters. They don't get that disasters cost money. It doesn't matter what we say. They don't care—we might as well send some rubber ducks to Pakistan. Jesus Christ—that's Swedish foreign policy in a nutshell.
Completely
absurd.”

They got out of the apartment and promised to do a long lunch soon. But not this week; this week, neither of them had time.

3

Brussels, Thursday, September 22

There was dense traffic on the freeway into Brussels, but it was moving quickly and smoothly, as if every vehicle around the taxi knew that each and every minute counted for Carina and that they were escorting her into the city center in a high-speed convoy. It was nine thirty in the morning. The flight had landed on time and, if everything continued the way it was, she would arrive, as usual, just before the meeting began at ten o'clock in one of the spacious rooms inside the Justus Lipsius building.

She had nodded off on the plane and slept all the way to Brussels. As usual, she'd half-jogged along the moving sidewalk toward the Brussels international arrivals hall and got a taxi.

The large cube of mirrored glass that was the EU Council's headquarters, the Justus Lipsius building, towered above them further up the Rue de la Loi. It was where the Council's working groups held their meetings. Approximately three hundred working groups and almost three thousand committees met every other week to hammer out decisions through negotiations between representatives of member states. These formed the foundations of the EU organization. Policy issues that couldn't be resolved by working groups were escalated to the next level and dealt with every Thursday when the Brussels ambassadors of member states met. Anything that still needed to be negotiated after those kinds of wranglings normally ended up on the ministers' table at the next top meeting.

She was going to spend the day behind the Swedish flag at the Committee for Security, COSEC, a working group dealing with
issues of importance concerning joint European security policy. Today's meeting was to be about security in the Mediterranean. She glanced at the agenda. Mostly points of information, no particularly significant decisions to be taken, nothing that would lead to drawn-out discussions as far as she could tell. She would make the plane home at eight.

Security in the Mediterranean was a vague concept. Everyone could look at it from their own perspective. Countries like Italy and France saw regional security as a question of migration—i.e., stopping the flow of migration. Spain's line was that it was also a matter of fighting terrorism, and was supported in that respect by several countries, including the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, and Germany. Other EU delegates kept a low profile.

Her instructions for the meeting were summarized into four points and jointly prepared with a number of departments at the MFA, Justice, and the Ministry of Enterprise. They were brief. She was to observe the southern member states and, if necessary, intervene if discussions turned toward asylum policies. Otherwise there were no other lines in the sand to defend. It was important to emphasize that security was a part of the wider neighborhood relations with the Mediterranean nations—that was the first point. If necessary, she was also to highlight that security matters ought to be seen against the background of the dramatic political developments in North Africa and the Arab Spring, and could not limit the EU's commitment to democracy in the region. Also, if necessary, she should argue that security could not limit shipping. Reforms to the Schengen Agreement, outlining the EU visa regime and border control regulations, were not to be discussed at the meeting—Justice didn't want things like that being handled by the wrong working groups. There were already around twenty working groups in existence dealing with issues of migration and asylum with Swedish representatives from the police and Justice at the negotiating table: it was none of COSEC's business. Thus, kill any discussion of Schengen at the meeting.

She hurried across the expanse of carpet on the third floor. It always took ages to get your pass out and get through security down
at the entrance, but she had made it through the door along with two other delegates, the Slovenian and the Bulgarian. They recognized her and gave a friendly nod.

The room arched over clusters of diplomats who were standing talking as they waited for the meeting to begin. Slowly, everyone began to take their seats. The table was a huge oval that filled the room, with at least ten meters of empty space in the middle that was filled by a floral arrangement dominated by red flowers. Delegates continued to hurry through the door, primarily gray-haired men in reasonably well-fitting jackets. Out of twenty-seven delegates, only she, the Spaniard, and the Finn weren't members of the old guard. But she rarely spoke to the Finn—he usually sat engrossed in a sullen silence as if he had just tumbled out of the Karelian forest and was wondering where on earth he was. The Spaniard, who had the seat next to her, was a pleasant fellow. You always sat in alphabetical order according to country at these things, so she always had a Spanish colleague to her left, and at COSEC it was Alejandro who was standing by his seat drinking coffee.

“We must stop meeting like this.” They shook hands.

Two weeks ago they had been at the same meeting in New York. The sense of déjà vu made her smile.

“We're the Marriott caravan,” he said and laughed softly.

It was true; they were the traveling salesmen of international politics.

The murmur became subdued and a concentrated silence followed. The chairman smiled jauntily at the delegates around the table and leaned toward the microphone.

Two hours later, Carina came out from the room, trembling with anger. It was lunchtime and the wide corridor was filled with diplomats. The entire EU building hummed with people. She normally liked being in Brussels, but this morning had been unbearable. They had discussed cooperation with countries around the Mediterranean. The French proposed cooperation for stronger security. The French delegate had, unsurprisingly, spoken at length about
the importance of security and about the threats from across the Mediterranean. Human trafficking, drugs, terrorism. North Africa was a problem. The Frenchman was good—he spoke skillfully—but she could not tolerate his words. She had heard it all before, so quite why she had reacted so strongly now she wasn't sure, but she just wanted to disagree. She thought about Jamal. What would he have said? she wondered. The British and several others supported the Frenchman. A united front, they said. A joint policy to ensure Europe's security. Shortly before lunch, she had requested the floor. She leaned forward to the microphone and spoke about the importance of human rights, she reminded them all of the refugee convention and queried, sarcastically, since when had there been similarities between refugees and terrorists? She spoke far too loudly and for far too long, while the other delegates stared at her. She had overstepped the mark; she knew she had. Nothing in her instructions said that she should pursue matters as forcefully as she had, and they definitely didn't say that she should give the Frenchman a dressing-down, she thought guiltily. But that didn't matter; she simply couldn't allow statements like that to go uncontested. Eventually, she had fallen silent and leaned back into her chair. No one said anything.

She had already reached the elevators when a man caught up with her. She was still agitated and couldn't place the short, plump, plain man who had apparently been present and listening to the meeting.

“
Madame
, do you possibly have a moment?” he said. “I have something I would like to show you.”

She merely shrugged her shoulders. She would have preferred to eat lunch alone but in Brussels it was common to be approached, or for someone to get in touch, and all you could do was go along with it. She was Sweden's representative in COSEC—her lunch would have to wait. They took the elevator down together.

The man was vaguely familiar. He wasn't a delegate, but rather one of the backbenchers: temporary guests, advisers and legal experts who sat in the back row, listening, observing. The man was around fifty, dark-haired, short, and dressed in a dark gray suit that was a
little tight over the stomach. When they came out into the street, he apologized for intruding on her time but repeated that he had something that might interest her. Did she feel like taking a walk?

“Of course. But you'll have to tell me where you're from.”

He smiled uncomfortably. He said he didn't represent any particular organization. “I ordinarily work for the EU Commission.”

“I understand.” She didn't really understand at all. But she noted that he didn't give his name. He was nervous.

“Shall we?” he said. He knew a small place nearby that did excellent shellfish. He recommended the oysters, if there was time for a longer lunch. They strolled along Rue de la Loi and turned into a side street.

“You really told them off.” He laughed. “Nicely done.”

“I don't know . . .”

“What you said, those were your personal views, no?”

“Yes,” she sighed.

“You can hear the difference, you know, between personal views and when diplomats say what they have been told to say. You can tell.” He smiled.

They reached a narrow park squeezed in between chunky office blocks. The restaurant was in one corner, no more than a little local eatery. They chose a table and she ordered a salad.

“I can understand if you're wondering what this is all about,” said the man, once they had been left alone. He cut himself short and stared across her shoulder through the window. She couldn't help turning her head to look. There was nothing to see, just the street with parked cars and the dark greenery of the park.

“Are you familiar with EIS?” he asked.

She shook her head.

“European Intelligence Service. It's a federal authority. A European organization that will be formed next year. The decision is going to be taken at the next meeting of the Council of Ministers.”

“So it doesn't exist?”

“No, not yet,” he said. “But it will very much become real if no one puts a stop to it.”

He waited while she received her salad and he a cup of coffee. She examined the man as he lit a cigarette and quickly thought through what she needed to know. So he wanted to tell her something about intelligence cooperation. It was probably information from GD Home, the Commission's general directorate for security of the interior. But a proposal from the Commission for a new security organization would surely not be news to Stockholm. Not if the decision was going to be taken at the next Council of Ministers in a month. She smiled at him. Why give her information that Justice probably already had? The whole situation was a little funny, yet irritating at the same time.

“There are those who want to give the EU a new role,” he said in a tone so low she was obliged to lean forward. “Its own intelligence organization. You're probably familiar with the debate. Everyone is talking about new security and foreign policy. The EU as a superpower. They would like to see a United States of Europe. EIS is the first step—the creation of a joint spy organization.”

“Who are ‘they'?”

He waved the question away with a grimace. “People in Counterterrorism. Hawks. Please don't ask me to name names. I work at the Commission, I know what they're capable of. Look here: there is a proposal that is practically complete for the European Intelligence Service, but there are very few people who are familiar with the proposal in its entirety. EIS will be a secret authority, controlled directly by the EU's foreign minister, and its powers will be enormous. The right to conduct wiretapping and signals intelligence work within Schengen. The execution of operations not covered by the laws of member states. Special operations, things like that.” He looked hard at her to let it sink in, before continuing. “I'm a European. I have always believed in the EU as something great. Do you know what I mean? But this . . . this is the Union rotting from the inside. It has to be stopped. Here.” He produced a USB drive from his jacket and pressed it quickly into her hand. “Take it.”

“What is it?”

“The proposal.”

“But why give it to me? I don't have any . . .”

“You have a conscience.” He looked at her seriously.

“But . . .” She lost her thread through sheer astonishment and shook her head. Conscience? It was a long time since she had heard someone use that word. Didn't he understand how it worked? She wasn't there as an individual; she was part of the Swedish diplomatic corps. What her conscience said wasn't always relevant to Swedish foreign policy.

“Read it. Then pass it on to the right people.”

“But who do you think I am?” she burst out. “I don't have any powers . . .”

“I'm not talking about powers,” he said sharply. “I'm talking about your sense of right and wrong. Use it. I've sat in on a number of the most recent meetings and I've heard how you speak. What you said today was not the Swedish position,” he said with a smile. “You spoke from the heart. That's a very unusual quality in Brussels, let me tell you.”

She squirmed. He was right—sometimes she went a little too far in discussions. There was something about his agitation that was genuine, personal. He meant what he was saying.

“Okay. But, just so the picture is clear, you want me to leak a proposal from the Commission.”

“It's an unfortunate word. But, if you want to put it like that, then . . . then . . . yes.”

She was sorely tempted to tell him that, unfortunately, she couldn't help. She knew there would be trouble if she returned with a draft from the Commission about a new European intelligence organization. There was a lot of prestige and a lot of sensitivity in matters of high secrecy like intelligence cooperation. Justice and Defense were the ministries responsible for the issues; it would be important to navigate carefully from early on to ensure it didn't look like the MFA was trying to muscle in. She would need to talk to Anders Wahlund, even if the thought of explaining to him how she had gotten the report made her feel unhappy. Justice would presumably react—they were suspicious of all outsiders and intelligence was not
something a diplomat should be getting involved in. Admittedly, she was in the Security Policy Department, but some kind of explanation would be necessary to account for why she had turned up with a text like this. At the same time, she felt a childlike excitement at the prospect of taking a top secret, sensitive document back to Sweden. She opened her palm and looked at the memory stick.