‘So?’

‘So I forced him to speak. To tell me the truth.’

‘You forced him?’ Dempsey interrupted. ‘How?’

‘This is not a question to which you want an answer,’ Shah replied.

Dempsey opened his mouth to respond, but Grace spoke first.

‘What did Aryo tell you?’

Shah took his eyes away from Dempsey and focused again on Grace.

‘He told me that everything he had told me before was a lie. President Knowles and his team, they were there. They did go to Tootkai. But their reason was truthful. American citizens had been taken hostage by a Taliban group in the village. They went there to rescue them. They did that and they left. Nothing more.’

‘But the graves. You said you saw—’

‘Yes, the graves. I saw them and they were why Aryo lied to me. The story that he told me, it was not ready to be revealed. It was for later. But I found the mass grave and I demanded an explanation. And so Aryo told me the lie, because he knew he could not tell me the truth behind it. And he did not think that his lie would reach the Americans.’

‘The truth?’ Grace ignored the final sentence.

‘The truth that the graves came from a second incursion in Tootkai. One which occurred much later. A year, perhaps.’

‘By who?’

‘There is a private defence contractor – mercenaries, we can call them – based near to Tootkai. They call themselves Blackspear. It was the executives of the company that owns this base who had been taken hostage. Who Knowles’ team had been sent to free. And during Knowles’ mission, the mercenaries from the base were already in Tootkai. Looking for the same hostages.’

‘You mean the missions crossed over?’ Dempsey asked.

‘Yes, at first. But Knowles ordered them to leave when he and his team arrived.’

‘And what does that have to do with the second incursion? What happened?’

‘Aryo told me that it was Blackspear again. They drove into Tootkai and just attacked. They killed men, women and children. They raped. They tortured. And then they told the villagers that were left alive that worse would come to them if they did not cooperate.’

‘Cooperate how?’

‘They said that a time might come when new villagers would arrive. Brought in by Blackspear. These new villagers would tell a story. A story that blamed American forces for what Blackspear had done. They were told to support that story, whatever it might be.’

‘New villagers? What . . .’

‘Professional witnesses,’ Shah explained. ‘Taught to lie. And taught the details needed to support those lies. They would be brought to Tootkai as if they had lived there their whole lives. Imported victims, trained to bring down your president.’

Grace could not believe what she was hearing. It was . . . incredible.

‘I don’t understand,’ she said. ‘Why . . . why would they set all of this up to incriminate President Knowles and then . . . well . . . not incriminate him.’