"I'm going to say this one last time. Who gave you the order to come here?"
"The Deaf Mullah."
"You see him?"
"In the holy flesh."
"Where and when?" "Many months ago, in the storefront mosque in Jersey City. Although he sat behind a bulletproof screen to protect him from those who would do violence against him, it was unmistakably he. I swear by the Holy Beard."
The death's-headed one turned to the Asian. "How's he sound to you?"
"He is telling the truth. You can hear it in his pounding heart."
"I am telling the truth. Now I must kill and die."
"No killing, but you get to die."
"I cannot die until I kill the heretic."
"She's sleeping and doesn't want to be killed right now," said the Westerner in a serious voice, although his words were foolish in meaning.
"Then I will refuse to martyr myself."
"That's what they all say," said the white infidel.
And the irresistible vise of a hand on the Uzi-and- mangled-hand combination led him out into the rectangular corridor and to the low edge of the retaining wall.
"What are you going to do?" asked Farouk.
"Nothing. You're going to commit suicide."
"Gladly. If you tie Abeer Ghula's feet to my own."
"Out of rope today," said the man, peering down. "Not here," he muttered.
"Good. I am not ready to die just yet."
But Farouk's relief was short-lived. He was walked around the corner to another point of vantage.
The infidel leaned over. "This looks good."
"Why is this spot good and not the other?" Farouk wondered aloud.
"Because there's a restaurant down there, and I didn't want to drop you in somebody's Caesar salad." "I do not mind taking infidels with me when I go to my welcome death."
"But I do."
And though the infidel with the thick wrists was on the lean side and showed insufficient muscle for the task, Patrick O'Shaughnessy O'Mecca, a.k.a. Farouk Shazzam, found himself lifted bodily and dangled over yawning space.
"There is still time for you to relent and embrace Allah," Farouk offered hopefully.
"Have him give me a call," said the infidel, letting
go.
It was not so terrible. The force of gravity simply took hold of Farouk's stomach, and he fell, pulling the rest of him with it. He enjoyed the acceleration, the lightheadedness and the wild thrill that comes from free-falling at over one hundred miles per hour without a bungee cord.
When he struck the parquet floor, he became an instant bag of blood, brains and loose bone that lay flatter than it seemed possible for a fully grown human being to lie.
But he died with a smile of joyous expectation on his shattered face.
Remo shut the door to the screams wafting up and told the Master of Sinanju, "That should give the FBI guys reason to tighten their security."
"They are not perfect," said Chiun, who was watching the local Korean-language channel on TV.
"They let one get through."
On the bed, Abeer Ghula stirred. She twisted one way and then the other like a cat, the royal blue bed clothes slipping off her supple, dusky form.
One arm flopped over the edge of the mattress, and as she began a subvocal murmuring that promised full wakefulness, Remo indicated the exposed underside of her wrist and said to the Master of Sinanju, "Your turn."
Chiun refused to drag his hazel eyes from the screen. "I will wait. It may yet be possible that the Messengers of Muhammad will succeed in their task and I will be spared the ignominy."
"Fat chance."
"Another five minutes will do no harm."
Dr. Harold W. Smith snapped up the receiver as soon as it rang. It was the blue contact phone.
"Yes, Remo?"
"M.O.M. just tried again."
"Did you interrogate the assassin?"
"I wouldn't dignify him with that word," Remo said dryly. "But yeah. He was dressed up like a mailman. Somehow he got through the FBI security ring. Or maybe the NOW bruisers."
"Go ahead."
"He swore on Allah's beard it's the Deaf Mullah."
"Allah is not known to wear a beard. You mean the Prophet."
"He swore, he spoke the truth as he saw it, and as a lesson to the FBI, we disposed of him after we were done. Expect to hear about another postal suicide before long."
"They will not give up this easily," warned Smith.
"Just look into the Deaf Mullah thing. Something's not right here."
"My thinking exactly." "If these people served the Deaf Mullah, wouldn't they be calling for his release rather than screw around with the Middle Eastern version of Bella Abzug?"
"There is something very wrong here, I agree. I will get back to you."
"Can't be soon enough," said Remo.
A rippling ululation like a grieving woman at a Lebanese funeral came across the wire.
"What is that sound?" asked Smith.
"Oh, that's just Abeer Ghula going into paroxysms of ecstasy."
"Who is-?"
"It's Chiun's turn."
"You are joking, of course."
Then a squeaky voice rang out. "Remo! Come look. See the lips? They are relaxed. See how the mouth is parted? That is how a woman is pleasured."
"What is going on down there?" Harold Smith demanded.
"We're just keeping Abeer out of trouble our way," explained Remo.
"Do nothing to her that cannot be explained to the First Lady."
"I think the First Lady knows about this kind of stuff by now," said Remo, hanging up.
Smith used the untappable blue contact telephone to reach the warden of a Missouri federal prison.
"This is Assistant Special Agent Smith, FBI Washington."
"Go ahead."
"We are calling to confirm the security of Prisoner 96669." "How many times do I have to tell you people? He's in administrative detention. That's solitary to you."
"Can you assure me he has no contact with the outside world?"
"That's why they call it solitary. He's in a bare cell, with no loose items except a fireproof blanket and a paper prison uniform. He gets one hour a day to shower and exercise under armed guard."
"How does his counsel communicate with him?"
"He doesn't. The lawyers stopped coming around about six months ago."
"Do you know the status of his appeal?"
"Dropped."
"Dropped?" Smith asked sharply.
"Dropped cold."
"Doesn't that strike you as unusual?"
"Yeah. We assume his people are waiting for the day they can ransom him out through hostage taking or terror threats and are saving their money for blasting caps."
"I concur with that assumption," Smith said tightly.
"If I'm told to release him by a federal authority, I will. Until then, he's just Prisoner 96669 and a son of a bitch besides."
"You should consider doubling his guards."
"I can guarantee you they won't be busting him out."
"A simple precaution may save you embarrassment, if not serious career consequences."
Chapter 29
In the al-Bahlawan Mosque in the flat state of Ohio- stan, the Deaf Mullah read the news that a postal worker had jumped to his death in the Marriot Marquis Hotel in Manhattan.
Farouk Shazzam of the Moorish-Irish face had failed. That meant he had been murdered by U.S. secret agents, his mission unfulfilled. That further meant that the Messengers of Muhammad lacked another willing martyr.
And Abeer Ghula lived.
He considered this at length. To send another messenger? Or not? They were intended to be used in this way, but with so many in FBI hands, they were now precious. And the two at hand, Yusef and Jihad Jones, were critical to the next phase.
Tapping a chime, he sat back and listened to the incessant ringing that troubled his waking hours and whisp
ered of the vengeful god he served.
Sargon appeared.
"Farouk is no more, but the hypocrite lives," the Deaf Mullah intoned.
"Her hours are numbered," Sargon replied.
"As are yours."
"I hear and obey."
And without another word, Sargon, trusted Sargon the Infallible, left the room never to return.
For it was his duty to prepare the Fist of Allah for launch.
Facing the electronic green minarets of his terminal, the Deaf Mullah began composing the communique that would signal to the godless the nearness of Allah's holy wrath.
On the Ohio Turnpike, Yusef Gamal watched the miles speed by as Jihad Jones drove the practice missile eastward.
"When will it be my turn to drive the practice missile?" he complained.
"When it is," the Egyptian spat.
"Why do you always take this tone with me?"
"Because you annoy me always."
"I am hungry," Yusef said suddenly.
"I, too, am hungry," Jihad admitted.
"There was a seafood restaurant two miles back. Since I may die at any hour, I am in the mood for seafood."
"I myself am in the mood for shrimp."
"I do not eat shellfish," Yusef muttered.''I belong to the Hanafi school. Shellfish is impermissible."
"I am a follower of the Shafeii school. Shellfish is halal with us. We eat it up and say, Alhamdulillah."
"That is your school," said Yusef as Jihad wrestled the big silver bus off the turnpike exit.
After a silence, Jihad said, "The Jews are forbidden to eat shellfish, too."
"I am just pointing out a known fact. Jews do not eat shellfish. You do not eat shellfish. There may possibly be a connection. I do not know. I cannot say. I am just saying it."
"Say it to yourself," said Yusef. "I am wondering something else."
"And what is this you are wondering?"
"Why if we are to pilot a missile called the Fist of Allah into Paradise, Sargon is making us practice by driving a mere bus. A bus rides on wheels. A missile streaks through the air like an arrow."
"There is a good reason, never fear."
"I know there is a good reason. What I am wondering is what this reason is."
"I am wondering this same thing, too," Jihad Jones said as he pulled into the seafood restaurant in exotic Ohiostan.
Yusef took the cell phone with him because Sargon the Persian had insisted he carry it at all times in case they were to be summoned.
After they entered the restaurant, a convoy of official FBI cars and Light Armored Vehicles raced along the Ohio Turnpike in the direction of the Al-Bahlawan Mosque.
But neither man saw this.
Chapter 30
Tamayo Tanaka wasn't going to take it lying down.
She was supposed to be the story. Now Abeer Ghula was the story. If Tamayo Tanaka wasn't going to be the story, then she had to get next to the story.
And that meant getting next to Abeer Ghula, distasteful as it was.
Not that it was going to be easy.
Everyone wanted to get next to Abeer Ghula. Especially after it was reported an attempt had been made on her life. The First Lady herself had denounced the attempt and thrown the awesome weight of her political power behind Abeer Ghula. That made it the lead story of the day. And Tamayo Tanaka had to own that story.
So she called her news director up in Boston from her Washington hotel.
"Check it out, Tammy. Still got your hidden camera?"
"It's my pillow at night, you know that."
"After last night, your face will be recognizable all over Manhattan."
"Don't worry. I'll wear a fright wig and dark glasses."
"Try to blend in with the other Asian reporters.
There must be a tidal wave of them down there by now."
"Got it covered," said Tamayo Tanaka, blow- drying her pert blond coif. No one was going to recognize her in her undercover disguise. No one at all.
Except maybe her mother.
They were taking out the body when the Yellow Checker cab dropped Tamayo off at the corner of Broadway and West Forty-fifth Street ninety minutes later. A sheet shrouded the gunman, but as they bumped him into the back of the waiting ambulance, an arm flopped out. Literally flopped. It was as thin and boneless as a noodle. But it was covered in fabric that, while stained burgundy, showed clean patches of USPS blue gray.
With her hidden camera, Tamayo Tanaka captured it all.
Then, breezing past the stony-faced FBI agents once she gave them her hotel confirmation number, she took a glass elevator to the upstairs reception area.
It was a joke. The FBI had the place guarded against mailmen and famous-faced journalists, but it was still a public building and one of the best hotels in the city.
No one could stop a guest from checking in.
"I want a room as far above Abeer Ghula's as possible," she told the reception clerk, "unless she's on a lower floor, in which case give me one beneath her in case I have to evacuate for a bomb threat. I don't trust these glass elevators. They make me nervous."
"Will the third floor do?"
"It'll do perfectly," Tamayo Tanaka said, suppressing a grin. That narrowed the floors down.
At her room door, the bellboy accepted a twenty- dollar bill in return for revealing the floor where Abeer Ghula was holed up.
"I don't know the room number," he said.
"Not necessary," Tamayo said. "I don't suppose I could talk you out of that uniform?"
"I'm not allowed to fraternize with the guests."
"Bend a rule for a blonde with a problem."
"Man, this never happens to me," the bellboy said, shucking off his uniform tunic and stripping down his
fly.
"Change in the bathroom and toss your duds out as you go," Tamayo told him.
The bellboy shrugged. "It's your party."
When he was done, the bellboy was chagrined to see the blonde was buttoning his tunic over her pink silk bra.
"Is this a TV kind of deal?" he asked.
"I'm not on TV."
"I mean transvestite TV. Because if it is, I'll wear whatever I have to if it makes you horny—I mean happy."
Zipping up her fly, Tamayo threw open the room door.
"Where are you going?" the bellboy called after her.
"I'll be back as soon as I can. Sit tight."
"What do I do with this hard-on?"
"Soak it in something."
"Wait!"
But the door slammed in his face and his unhappy "Oh, shit."
On the tenth floor, Tamayo Tanaka walked as if she were wrapped in a starched straitjacket. That was how it felt, but if it worked she was back in the game.
And nothing was going to knock her out of the game again.
Yassir Nossair had a problem.
It was not a little problem. It was a very big problem.
Hiring the aircraft to fly over Manhattan was not the problem. This was easily done for the right amount of money. Many journalists were hiring aircraft, so it was not unusual to do this.
The problem was crashing the aircraft into the hotel room of the hypocrite Abeer Ghula.
It had been leaked, the floor. Counting up from the first floor was easy. Yassir Nossair used his Zeiss field glasses. He had the floor pinpointed exactly.
It was the correct side of the hotel. The correct room would have been better, but this was impossible. Obtaining the correct side ensured success. Once the aircraft smashed into the appropriate side of the hotel, the explosion would totally rip that wall of her building apart, ripping Abeer Ghula's heretical bones apart with them.
"Want to circle again?" asked the pilot.
"Yes, I am thinking."
Would it be the side facing Mecca? he ruminated. No, it would not be the side facing Mecca. Abeer Ghula was too contrary.
Perhaps it was the side opposite, facing away from
Mecca. Would that not make sense?
At last, after careful thought because he possessed only one plane and one life, Yassir Nossair decided it would be the side opposite Mecca.
"It is time," he announced.
"You're done?" the pilot asked.
"Nearly so. I must ask you now to fly closer to the hotel."
"How close?"
"Point it at the hotel and fly toward it."
"Sure."
The Piper Cherokee banked and came in on a level line.
"Lower, slightly," said Yassir Nossair, looking through the windscreen with his field glasses. Quickly he counted up.
"Yes, remain on this level."
"Aren't you going to take a picture?"
"Yes, yes. How stupid of me."
And from the gym bag at his feet, Yassir Nossair took up a 9 mm pistol and placed it against the pilot's unsuspecting temple.
He fired once. The pilot's eyes were dragged from their sockets to smear like burst grapes against the suddenly-shattered side window.
Yassir Nossair took the control wheel from him and held the plane steady as he shouted, "Allah Akbar! God is Great!"
There were approximately ten doors on each of the four sides of the tenth floor of the Marriot Marquis. The sun was high in the sky now, and the autumn light streaming down through the skylights made eerie golden shafts in the cathedral interior.
Tamayo walked the wide, rectangular corridors as softly as possible, so that she could catch any sound that came from behind the doors.
At each door where she heard a noise, she knelt beneath the glass eye of the peephole and laid an ear to the panel.
She heard TVs, afternoon lovemaking, but nothing that suggested Abeer Ghula's strident voice.
At one door, she heard a TV set tuned to CNN, a network she loathed because their anchors might as well be working in a factory as a broadcast studio for all the publicity their careers got. Not one of them had ever been asked to appear on Leno, never mind Let- terman.
About to rise, she heard a squeaky voice say, "See who is lurking at the door, Remo."
The voice sounded familiar, but before Tamayo could think it through, the door swung inward and she spilled inside, yelping like a cat with a trampled tail.
Her big bag was taken from her, and a hand reached down and grabbed her by the collar. She was hoisted up as if weightless.
When hex face came level with her molester, she recognized the deep-set eyes and high cheekbones, not to mention the T-shirt and chinos.
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