The last car sped out of the drive as Samuel Winters hung up the telephone in the ornate, tapestried living room and joined Varak at the large front window.
‘Which one is it?’ said the Czech, staring out at the disappearing vehicle.
‘I think you’ll know before it’s morning in California… The helicopter will be here in a few minutes. The jet’s cleared for takeoff at four-thirty in Easton.’
‘Thank you, sir. I trust we haven’t made all these arrangements for nothing.’
‘Your case was very strong, Milos. Whoever it is won’t dare place a call. He or she will have to appear in person. Is everything set at the hotel?’
‘Yes. My driver at the airport in San Diego will have the keys to the service entrance and the suite. I’ll use the freight elevator.’
‘Tell me,’ said the aristocratic white-haired historian. ‘Is it possible the scenario you presented to us this afternoon could be right? Could Andrew Vanvlanderen actually have made contact with the Palestinians?’
‘No, sir, it’s not possible. His wife would never permit it. She’d have killed him herself if he tried. Complicated arrangements of that sort could be traced, with difficulty of course, but she’d never take the chance. She’s too professional.’
In the distance, over the waters of Chesapeake Bay, the chopping sounds of a helicopter’s rotors could be heard. They grew louder.
Khalehla dropped her bag on the floor, threw the two boxes and the three shopping bags on the bed and followed them, shoving the bags aside as her head hit the bulge of the pillows. She had asked ‘Gingerbread’ Shapoff to drop her off at a department store so she could buy some clothes, since those she owned were either in Cairo or Fairfax or in a Bahamian police car or on a US Air Force jet.
‘Fiddle-dee-dee,’ she said in a weary imitation of Scarlet O’Hara as she stared at the ceiling. ‘I’d like to think about everything tomorrow,’ she continued to herself out loud, ‘but, goddamn it, I can’t.’ She sat up and reached for the hotel telephone, studying the instructions and dialling the appropriate numbers to reach Payton in Langley, Virginia.
‘Yes?’
‘MJ, don’t you ever go home?’
‘Are you home, my dear?’
‘I don’t know where it is any longer, but I’ll let you in on a secret, Uncle Mitch.’
‘Uncle…? Good heavens, you must want a pony ride. What is it?’
‘Home may end up being with a certain mutual friend of ours.’
‘My, you have made progress.’
‘No, he did. He even talked about twenty or thirty years.’
‘Of what?’
‘I don’t know. A real home and babies and things like that, I guess.’
‘Then let’s bring him out alive, Adrienne.’
Khalehla shook her head, not in the negative but to bring herself back to the reality at hand. ‘The “Adrienne” did it, MJ. Sorry.’
‘Don’t be. We’re entitled to our glimpses of happiness, and you know I want it all for you.’
‘It never happened for you, though, did it?’
‘It was my choice, Field Officer Rashad.’
‘Gotcha, pal, or should I say sir?
‘Say whatever you like, but listen to me. The first report is in from the clinic—the prisoner. They’re apparently travelling as priests, Maronite priests on Israeli passports. That boy doesn’t know very much; he’s an also-ran who was somehow permitted to be part of the team because of Kendrick. He was crippled while he was with our congressman in Oman.’
‘I know, Evan told me. They were in a police truck heading down to the Jabal Sham. To their executions, they thought.’
‘Things get fuzzy here… that youngster was told very little and rightly so, he’s completely unstable. From what our chemists can piece together, however, the two teams were to make contact near an airport—”Command One” joining “Command Two”, which presumably means the Fairfax crowd was to hook up with the Colorado unit out there.’
‘That’s a lot of arranging, MJ, a lot of mileage. They’ve got savvy travel agents working on their itineraries.’
‘Very savvy and very hidden. One might almost say bureaucratically obscured.’
‘Speaking of which, I’m two floors above the grieving widow.’
‘Her office has been alerted. She’s been told to expect your call.’
‘Then I’ll straighten up and go to work. Incidentally, I had to buy a few things to dress the part, but I’ll be damned if I’ll pay for them. Let’s say they’re not me; they’re a little on the severe side.’
‘I thought, considering Mrs. Vanvlanderen’s past associations, you might be somewhat more chic.’
‘Well, they’re not that severe.’
‘I didn’t think so. Call me when it’s over.’
Khalehla hung up the phone, looked at it for a moment, then reached down for her bag on the floor. She opened it and took out a sheet of notepaper on which she had written Evan’s telephone number in Mesa Verde. Seconds later she dialled.
‘The Kendrick residence,’ said a woman’s voice Khalehla recognized as belonging to one of the nurses.
‘May I speak with the congressman, please? This is Miss Adrienne of the State Department.’
‘Sure, hon, but you’ll have to hang on while I get him. He’s outside saying goodbye to that nice young Greek.’
‘Who?’
‘I think he’s Greek. He knows a lot of people the congressman knew over in Arabia or wherever he was.’
‘What are you talking about?’
The priest. He’s a young priest from—’
‘Get Evan away!’ screamed Khalehla, lurching to her feet. ‘Yell for the guards! The others are out there! They want to kill him!’
* * *
Chapter 33
It had been so simple, thought Ahbyahd, watching from the woods opposite the despised enemy’s huge house. A sincere and pleasant young priest whose papers were in order and, of course, had no weapons on him, bearing greetings from friends of the great man. Who could refuse him a brief audience, this innocent holy man from a distant land unaware of the formalities attached to calling upon persons of importance? His initial rejection had been countermanded by the enemy himself; the rest was up to a highly inventive believer. What remained was up to all of them. They would not fail.
Their young comrade was walking out of the house! He was shaking hands with the loathsome ‘Amal Bahrudi’ under the watchful eyes of the guards in business suits and carrying automatic weapons. The believers could only estimate the size of the guard force; it was a minimum of twelve men, conceivably more inside. With the love of Allah the first assault would remove a large block of them, killing most and severely wounding the rest beyond functioning.
Their comrade was being escorted down the circular drive to the car, courteously parked on the road beyond the tall hedges. Only moments now. And the beloved Allah looked favourably upon them! Three more guards appeared, bringing the total in front of the house to seven. Do your work, our brother! Drive accurately!
The comrade reached the car; he bowed his head politely, making the sign of the cross, and once again shook hands, his single escort now concealed from the others by the hedges. He then opened the door and briefly coughed, supporting himself on the back of the seat as his right arm reached down over the fabric. Suddenly, with the swiftness and assurance of a true believer, he spun around gripping a double-edged blade in his hand and plunging it into the guard’s throat before the government man could see what was happening. Blood erupting, the guard fell as the terrorist grabbed the weapon and the body simultaneously, dragging the corpse across the road and into the undergrowth at the edge of the woods. He looked over in Ahbyahd’s direction, nodded and raced back to the car. Ahbyahd, in turn, snapped his fingers and signalled the brothers behind him hidden among the trees. The three men crept forward, dressed, like the white-haired one, in paramilitary clothing and gripping light-framed submachine guns, grenades clipped to their field jackets.
The English-speaking killer behind the wheel started the engine, shifted the car into gear and drove slowly, casually, towards the left entrance of the circular drive. Then abruptly, the motor suddenly roaring at its highest pitch, he swung the vehicle sharply to the right and into the entrance while he reached below the dashboard and flipped a switch. Opening the door, he aimed the car over the large front lawn towards the milling guards talking with the congressman and leaped out of the racing vehicle on to the gravel. As he hit the ground he heard a woman’s screams through the cacophony of the thundering engine and the roars of the government patrols. One of the nurses had come running out of the front door yelling incoherently; at the sight of the driverless onrushing car, she turned and screamed again, now at Kendrick, who was nearest the stone entrance.
‘Get away!’ she shrieked, repeating words she had heard only moments before. ‘They want to kill you!’