Thank You for Smoking

'I'm not sure that's advisable, at this point. You've sort of become… '

'A liability?'

'An issue, certainly.' BR held up the morning papers. 'Your Ms. Holloway seems to be in hot pursuit of her first Pulitzer. She does have good sources.'

'Not as good as the FBI's. Now they have sources.'

'We're getting a hell of a lot of calls about this. Very, very angry calls.'

'Yes, I can imagine what they must think.'

'Jeannette's office has fielded one hundred seventy-eight calls this morning.'

'Jeannette's office?'

'We obviously can't refer calls about you to your office.'

'No, no. Naturally. Well, Jeannette can certainly handle it. In fact, I appreciate Jeannette's abilities more and more each day. But I'm not sure that a leave of absence is a good idea.'

'And why is that?'

'Because,' Nick grinned, 'it would send the signal that you all think I'm guilty. Which of course is not the case. Right?' BR and Jeannette stared.

'I mean, the notion that I would cover myself with nicotine patches to the point of giving myself several heart attacks, and throw up a hundred times, and then leave the empty boxes all over the cabin for the FBI to find, once they were tipped off. And call the cabin from my office phone on the morning I abduct myself. And leave the number of the cabin right out in the open in my apartment. I mean, who would believe that a smart guy like me would be so FUCKING STUPID?!' Jeannette started.

'Sorry,' Nick said. 'Don't know what got into me. Anyway, I know my colleagues, my trench mates, my brothers- and sisters-in-arms, could never believe that I'd be capable of such ineptitude. So,' he said brightly, 'let's fight this all the way to the Supreme Court.'

BR said, 'Do we have a defense strategy'?'

'You bet. We're going to find the people who made me into the asshole.'

'Do you have any idea who those might be?'

'Well,' Nick said pensively, 'they would have to be people who really despise me. But in my case that comes to about four-fifths of the U.S. population. Two hundred million. Sort of a big suspect pool, isn't it? You know, they'll probably be thrilled to see me get sent off to play love slave to the Aryan Brotherhood for ten to fifteen.'

'I'm not sure it's going to come to that,' BR said. 'We ought to be able to get you into some minimum-security place.'

'Oh,' Nick said, 'I wouldn't count on it. Carlinsky says he's never seen prosecutors so pissed off. Evil yuppie scum devises cheap stunt to promote himself and cancer. He says they're out for blood.' Nick grinned. 'Mine.'

'Well,' BR said, leaning forward in a way suggesting that he was tired of badinage about Nick having to spend his next decade behind bars being gang-banged by people with swastika tattoos. 'Carlinsky is the best, and we are behind you. But I think under the circumstances a leave of absence does make sense.'

'Why don't we just run that by the Captain.'

'I wouldn't trouble the Captain with this right now. This has all come as a terrible shock to him. He's not doing very well.'

'He's not?' Nick said.

'No,' BR said, with the faintest trace of a smile. 'I'm afraid he isn't.'

* * *

As soon as the door to BR's office closed behind him, Nick clashed to his office, only to find yellow crime scene tape on his door and several FBI technicians in jumpsuits with FBI crime search team in big, intimidating letters on the back. They were wearing latex gloves, and from the looks of it, ransacking every square inch of his office in the process, making it look like Nick's old room at college. God knows what they thought they were going to find in there, Nick thought— presumably a file in his computer labeled 'self-kidnap plan. Things to bring to the cabin: 10 boxes NicArrest patches, rope, handcuffs…'

'Is this necessary?' he said to one of the FBI technicians, who pointedly ignored him.

He took Gazelle aside. 'Get me on the next flight to Winston-Salem.'

'They said you weren't supposed to leave the metro area. Conditions of your bail.'

'Gazelle.'

'Is this going to make me an accessory?'

'All right, all right. Just look up the flights. Can your conscience handle that? I'll get the ticket myself.'

He took the elevator down to I Street. A cab was parked, the driver, a Middle Eastern man with a close- cropped black beard, eating a knish from a sidewalk vendor. Nick waved him over and got in the back.

'National Airport. And hurry.' It was unnecessary to say that to any foreign-born D.C. cab driver, since they only drive at two speeds, dangerously fast and really dangerously fast. Off they sped.

Nick looked out the rear window and saw a tan sedan with two athletic-looking types with sunglasses. Feds. The headline flashed before him.

Naylor Is Back in Custody After Violating Bail Terms

According to the license posted on the dash, the driver's name was Akmal Ibrahim.

'Mr. Ibrahim,' Nick said, 'are you in some sort of trouble with the FBI?'

'Why you say this?'

'Because you're being followed. That tan sedan. Those are FBI agents. I saw them watching you when you were parked.'

Akmal looked nervously in the rear-view. 'I have no problems with FBI.'

'They seem to have some problem with you.'

'Ever since World Trade Center bombing, FBI thinks all Muslim people are bad. Is not true. I have family in Reston.'

'I know,' Nick said. 'It's awful the way they persecute people for their religious beliefs. I wonder what they want with you.'

'I have nothing to worry.'

'Why don't you take a sudden turn without a signal. See if they follow.'

Akmal made a sharp turn onto Virginia Avenue at the last minute. The sedan swerved to follow, nearly colliding with a State Department staff car.

Akmal said worriedly, 'They follow!'

'Yeah. You know, I saw them put something in your trunk while you were eating.'

'What?!'

'It might have just been a listening device, but it might have been something else, like explosives. So they can arrest you for a bomber. I'm a reporter at the Sun. We've heard they're planning a big roundup of Muslims. They need hostages to trade with Saddam Hussein in case we go to war with him.'

'But I have green card!'

'Well, good luck.'

'FBI is arresting many wrong people. In New York they arrest people for the bombing, they are not the ones who do the bombing. The bombing is done by Israeli secret police, to make bad feelings about Muslim people in America.'

'I know. It's awful. I'm writing a big article about it. But once they stop you and find whatever it is they put in your trunk, that's it, Akmal. That's how they got Sheik Omar, you know. And he's not getting out of prison until the twenty-second century.'

'Sheik Omar is very holy man.'

'Maybe they'll put you in the same prison. You and he could become friends.'

Nick wondered, as he was forced back into his seat by the g-forces as Akmal hit the accelerator, if he had done a wise thing. There was a lot of honking and screeching of tires. When he opened his eyes and looked back, the tan sedan was fifty yards behind. Even highly trained government drivers are no match for the ordinary Middle Easterner.

By the time they'd reached the Arlington end of Memorial Bridge, Akmal had gained more yardage. Then, without any warning, he did a breathtakingly precise bootleg turn into the oncoming traffic, setting off an angry