already in the news. Soon after midnight after the Pueblo disaster, a caller had identified himself as Hakim Arif. A reigning cinema queen was discussing oral sex at 12:17:26, and found herself staring into a dead phone at 12:17:30. Hakim was speaking.
Incredibly, the Iraqi responded to questions; pre-recording was out of the question. While Hakim launched into the plight of Palestinian Arabs and the need for funding to continue his heroic- struggle, network officials feverishly collaborated with police, the FBI, and several telephone companies. Hakim was obviously watching the show, to judge from his critique of one host's silent mugging.
Hakim used no terms objectionable enough to require bleeping. He merely promised to repeat his Pueblo entertainment in larger and more vulnerable gatherings until, in its vast wisdom and power, the United States of America found a haven for Fat'ah. And oh, yes, there was one condition: the country of the haven must adjoin Israel.
While voiceprint experts established the identical patterns of the Pueblo and NBN show voices, a co-host asked if Hakim realized that he was asking for World War Three. Hakim, chuckling, replied that he trusted the superpowers to avoid exaggerated responses to Fat'ah responses to Israeli banditry.
As Hakim chuckled, a Lockheed vehicle lifted vertically from Moffett Field in central California for nearby Santa Cruz. Its hushed rotors carried four case-hardened gentlemen over the coast range in minutes to a parking lot two hundred yards from the Santa Cruz telephone booth which composed one link in Hakim's telephone conversation. Police cordoned the area and awaited the fight.
There was no fight. There was only another clever device in the booth, relaying the conversation by radio. Its sensors noted the approach of the bomb squad to the booth with the `out of order' sign, and suddenly there was no telephone, no device, and no booth; there was only concussion. The Times surmised that Hakim could have been within thirty miles of the booth. No one, including Hakim, knew that the Lockheed assault vertol had passed directly over his bungalow in San Jose. Nor that a sweep-winged parafoil had narrowly missed a redwood tree while banking upward from a school playground near Soquel, California.
Hakim's next call passed through another booth in Capitola, near Soquel and Santa Cruz, to CBS. Hakim was in excellent spirits. Government agencies were in overdrive, steering madly with many corrections. No one was in position to corral even one arm of Fat'ah and when Hakim was good and ready, he closed down his media operation.
By the time his bungalow had been discovered, Hakim had a two-day start. That is, said the private report compiled for Everett by friends of David Engels, if it had been Hakim. Fingerprint gambits, falsely planted prints, were common in disinformation games. The Iraqi's M.O. varied, but he always knew how to use available channels, including the illegal importation of some of his materiel from Quebecois sources. There was more, and Everett forced himself to read it. Beyond his old-fashioned reading glasses, his eyes ached. Presently he closed them and tried to ignore the faintly resurgent whistle in his head.
Two flights and a limousine later, Maurice Everett declined help with his suitcase and carried its reassuring bulk in Palm Springs heat toward a featureless sloping lawn. At least, it seemed to have no features until he strode through a slot in the grassy berm and realized that this comedian knew how to use money.
The berm surrounded a sunken terrace open to the sun. Around the terrace and below ground level lay the translucent walls of Charlie George's hideaway. It reminded Everett of a buried doughnut, its hole a glass-faced atrium yawning into the sky, slanted solar panels more attraction than excrescence. It was thoroughly unlike the monuments erected to Mammon on the nearby acreages: it was logical, insulated, understated. Already, Everett liked Charlie George better for making sense even when he was not compelled to.
Everett was nonplussed for an instant by theman who met him at the door like a sodbuster's valet. Denims tucked into beflapped, rundown boots; suspenders over an ancient cotton work shirt; a stubble of beard. Yet there was no mistaking the loose-jointed frame or the shock of corntassel hair over bushy brows, familiar to anyone who watched prime time television. Beneath a strong nose was a mouth legendary for its mobility, from slack-jawed idiocy to prudish scorn. Everett realized with a start that it was speaking.
'You wanted it informal,' said Charlie George, and ushered Everett to a guest room.
Everett removed his coat. 'I thought you'd taken me too literally, Charlie. For a minute I thought you'd set this up in a vacant lot.'
'Just doing my bit for the Palm Springs image as the world's most elegant unfenced asylum. Complete with crazy proposals.'
'Not in my book,' Everett replied. They discussed their strategy while he changed into his scruffies. 'I haven't sounded out all the members of the Commission,' he admitted, wincing as he adjusted his pullover. 'Wills is a reasonable sort, though, and I'll lay it out for him so he'll know how you propose to separate television from terrorism. These panel talks with the AP and UPI sure haven't excited him—or me. I like your scenario much better.'
The comedian kept his eyes sociably averted as Everett donned soft leather trousers. 'We've been batting out details for an hour,' he said.
'Who's `we'?'
Charlie leaned his head toward the window facing the atrium. 'No net veepees, just a couple of pivotal people I told you about.' He led Everett through a kitchen saturated with fragrances of tortilla and taco sauce, into sunlight toward a buzz of male voices in a hidden corner of the atrium.
They found two men seated, dividing their attention between sketch pads and bottles of Mexican beer. The smaller man made a point of rising; the taller, a point of not rising. 'This is our friend in the feds,' Charlie placed a gentle hand on Everett's shoulder. 'Maury Everett: Rhone Althouse here, and Dahl D'Este over there.'
Althouse, the compact younger man, wore faded jeans and Gucci loafers. Only the footgear and a stunning Hopi necklace belied his undergraduate appearance. He was tanned, well-built, and his handshake had the solidity of a park statue. It was hard for Everett to believe that this pup was a media theorist who deserted academia for a meteoric rise in gag writing.
'I hope you FCC guys move quicker separately than you do together,' he said to Everett, with the barest suggestion of a wink.
Everett smiled at the threadbare gibe. FCC decisions never came quickly enough for the industry they regulated. 'Don't bet on it,' he replied. 'I'm still pretty rickety today.'
D'Este, doodling furiously on a mammoth sketch pad, stopped to gaze at Everett with real interest. 'I forgot,' he said in a caramel baritone, “you were the star of the Pueblo thing. Perhaps you'll tell me about it.” His tone implied, some other time, just we two.
Everett accepted a Moctezuma from Charlie George and eased his broad back into a lawn chair. 'All I know, literally, is what I've read since I woke up with tubes running into my arms. I expect to learn a lot more from you three, in hopes it won't happen again.'
'Ah,' said D'Este, beaming. His elegant slender height was covered by a one-piece mauve velour jumpsuit which, Everett hazarded, might have been tailored expressly for this event. Dahl D'Este affected tight dark curls; his tan was by Max Factor. He hugged the sketch pad to his breast and stood to claim his audience. 'Well then, the story thus far—' He paused as though for his host's permission and seemed gratified by some signal. 'Charlie has this—wild idea that he can ring in a new era of comedy. Instead of avoiding the issue of terrorism in his shtick, and believe me, luv, we all do, he wants to create a truly fabulous character.'
'A whole raft of 'em,' the comedian put in. Everett nodded; he knew the general idea but would not rob D'Este of his moment.
'Charlie has seduced the best talents he could find to plan graphics, that's me, and situations, that's Rhone —according to Rhone. Of course it's ironic because Charlie is NBN, Rhone is an ABC captive, and for the nonce I'm doing CBS sets. I don't know how Charlie beguiled his old enfant terrible,' he smirked at Althouse, 'to cross tradi tional lines in this madness.' Everett, who knew it had been the other way around, kept silent. 'As for me, I couldn't resist the challenge.'
'Or the retainer,' Althouse drawled in a murmur designed to carry.
The splendid D'Este ignored him. 'While Charlie and Rhone brainstormed their little skits, I've been inventing Charlie's logo for the new character. A cartoon of the sort of loser who—how did you put it, Rhone?'
'Rates no respect,' the younger man supplied. 'If he tried dial-a-prayer he'd get three minutes of raucous laughter.
