Worth Dying For

and slogged on north, towards the two wooden buildings on the horizon.

TWENTY-TWO
    T HE C ANADIAN SEMI TRUCK WITH THE D UNCANS ’ SHIPMENT aboard was making good time, heading due east on Route 3 in British Columbia, driving mostly parallel to the die-straight international border, with Alberta up ahead. Route 3 was a lonely road, mountainous, with steep grades and tight turns. Not ideal for a large vehicle. Most drivers took Route 1, which looped north out of Vancouver before turning east later. A better road, all things considered. Route 3 was quiet by comparison. It had long stretches of nothing but asphalt ribbon and wild scenery. And very little traffic. And occasional gravel turnouts, for rest and recuperation.
    One of the gravel turn-outs was located a mile or so before the Waterton Lakes National Park. In U.S. terms it was directly above the Washington–Idaho state line, about halfway between Spokane and Coeur d’Alene, about a hundred miles north of both. The turn-out had an amazing view. Endless forest to the south, the snowy bulk of the Rockies to the east, magnificent lakes to the north. The truck driver pulled off and parked there, but not for the view. He parked there because it was a prearrangedlocation, and because a white panel van was waiting there for him. The Duncans had been in business a long time, because of luck and caution, and one of their cautionary principles was to transfer their cargo between vehicles as soon as possible after import. Shipping containers could be tracked. Indeed they were designed to be tracked, by the BIC code. Better not to risk a delayed alert from a suspicious Customs agent. Better to move the goods within hours, into something anonymous and forgettable and untraceable, and white panel vans were the most anonymous and forgettable and untraceable vehicles on earth.
    The semi truck parked and the panel van K-turned on the gravel and backed up to it and stopped rear to rear with it. Both drivers got out. They didn’t speak. They just stepped out into the roadway and craned their necks and checked what was coming, one east, one west. Nothing was coming, which was not unusual for Route 3, so they jogged back to their vehicles and got to work. The van driver opened his rear doors, and the truck driver climbed up on his flatbed and cut the plastic security seal and smacked the bolts and levers out of their brackets and opened the container’s doors.
    One minute later the cargo was transferred, all 1,260 pounds of it, and another minute after that the white van had K-turned again and was heading east, and the semi truck was trailing behind it for a spell, its driver intending to turn north on 95 and then loop back west on Route 1, a better road, back to Vancouver for his next job, which was likely to be legitimate, and therefore better for his blood pressure but worse for his wallet.
    In Las Vegas the Lebanese man named Safir selected his two best guys and dispatched them to babysit the Italian man named Rossi. An unwise decision, as it turned out. Its unwisdom was made clear within the hour. Safir’s phone rang and he answered it, and found himself talking to an Iranian man named Mahmeini. Mahmeini was Safir’s customer, but there was no transactional equality in their business relationship. Mahmeini was Safir’s customer in the same way a king might have been a boot maker’s customer. Much more powerful, imperious,superior, dismissive, and likely to be lethally angry if the boots were defective.
    Or late.
    Mahmeini said, ‘I should have received my items a week ago.’
    Safir couldn’t speak. His mouth was dry.
    Mahmeini said, ‘Please look at it from my point of view. Those items are already allocated, to certain people in certain places, for certain date-specific uses. If they are not delivered in time, I’ll take a loss.’
    ‘I’ll make good,’ Safir said.
    ‘I know you will. That’s the purpose of my call. We have much to discuss. Because my loss won’t be a one-time thing. It will be ongoing. My reputation will be ruined. Why would my contacts trust me again? I’ll lose their business for ever. Which means you’ll have to compensate me for ever. In effect I will own you for the rest of your life. Do you see my point?’
    All Safir could say was, ‘I believe the shipment is actually on its way, as of right now.’
    ‘A week late.’
    ‘I’m suffering too. And I’m trying to do something about it. I made my contact send two of his men up