The entire site was guarded by a phalanx of religious police, stationed throughout the house and in the grounds beyond. Fanatical bodyguards whose lives were pledged to protect the sanctity of this place.
The prayer room was large, spacious, high-ceilinged. Its walls were paneled in rare, costly woods polished to a mirrorlike finish, its marble floor covered with ornate rugs. There were low divans and mounds of overstuffed cushions and pillows.
Within, a joyful celebration was taking place. Twelve men in all were assembled, a mirror image of His Majesty's Special Council, the overseers of the petroleum market glut operation veiled under the cryptic tag of Cloak of Night.
Some of those now present in the prayer room had also been present earlier in the afternoon, in the conference room of the Special Council.
Chief among them was Imam Omar himself, who now conducted this special service of prayer and thanksgiving. The Smiling Cleric was their undisputed arbiter of matters devotional and religious.
All the celebrants stood, open prayer books in hand, rocking slightly back and forth as they chanted their holy verses, God-intoxicated. It was a call-and-response ceremony, Omar passionately intoning the stanzas, his rapturous followers venting their corresponding choruses in unison.
The devotions had been going on for some time now, more than an hour, but the energy and enthusiasm of the participants never flagged, instead seemed to steadily increase.
The uninitiated might have been most surprised by the presence and fervent, wholehearted participation of Prince Tariq. Those who knew him only as a worldly, Westernized man of affairs, the smoothly polished diplomat and dealmaker of the corporate boardrooms and ministerial conclaves, would have been surprised to see him here, seemingly giving himself up heart and soul to the ritualized worship.
Still more God-maddened and inspired was Prince Hassani, caught up in the throes of an ecstatic trance. His expression was otherworldly. His gaze was fixed, the object of his glazed-eyed stare placed somewhere beyond worldly ken — perhaps on the promise of Paradise.
Such worship — one-point consciousness, channeled, underlined by repetition — can induce mystical intimations. A hypnotic quality underlay the ritual, evoked by the rhythmical chanting, the call-and-response, the rise and fall of words that lost their individual meaning and became a sonic pattern as abstract and primal as crashing surf or winds wailing across a wasteland.
The worshippers were transported beyond earthly cares into the realm of the blessed. For what could be more blessed, more joyful, than to know that one of their own, one present here tonight, would be in Paradise tomorrow?
This would-be homicidal suicide had elected to make the supreme sacrifice by taking unto himself the honor of holy martyrdom.
Tomorrow, he would kill. A sanctified killing, righteous and just, yet one that could not be accomplished without bringing death to the slayer.
The Cloak of Night had a dagger hidden up its sleeve, the dagger of an assassin.
Another showpiece of the midtown business district was the Mega Mart building.
It was visible from De Lesseps Plaza, where Jack Bauer and Pete Malo were. Pete pointed to a needlelike spire rising to the northeast behind a row of buildings lining the plaza's east side.
'There it is,' he said. 'Not far from here, as the crow flies. Too bad we're driving. We've got to go the long way around. Like the man said, 'You can't get there from here.' '
The midtown area was suggestive of a medieval fortress town, its central keep surrounded by a maze of pathways. The SUV rolled along one-way streets, making frequent detours to access the route it wanted, only to find progress blocked by a high wall, construction site, or cul-de-sac, requiring it to make another circuitous go- round.
It stopped for a red light, Jack taking advantage of the pause to reach into the inside breast pocket of his jacket and remove a nondescript metal container that was about the size and shape of a pack of cigarettes. He lifted the lid, opening it.
Inside, each nestled in its own hollow in a lining in the bottom of the box, were a half-dozen objects that looked like fuzzy black aspirin tablets.
Pete glanced away from the road ahead and at the container nestled in Jack's palm. 'What're you going to do with those?'
Jack said, 'Hang one on Garros.'
'A nice trick, if you can get away with it.'
Jack smiled with his lips. 'What's one more flea to a horndog like him?'
'It's not him I'm worried about, it's Susan Keehan. And her palace guard,' Pete said.
'Flea' — that's what the technical division called it. Unofficially. A new refinement on traditional bugging devices, it operated along lines similar to those of the microchips that pet owners have implanted in their dogs and cats to find them if they got lost. Except that it didn't have to be injected under the skin, but could be attached by a casual 'brush' contact.
Each one contained an ulframiniaturized transponder, audio pickup unit, and transmitter, all enabled by a fleck-sized power cell. The entire surface was a compound poly-fabric condenser microphone. Powerful and sophisticated, it could hear what was going on around the general vicinity of its wearer and stream the audio to a receiver.
Its sticky matte-black exterior shell was modeled after a thistle burr, and once attached to the target, unlikely to work loose and come off. The transponder also served as a locator, enabling the operator to maintain a continuous fix on the subject's location.
The light turned green and Pete drove on, wending his way Mega Mart-ward.
He said, 'You don't think Garros is going to stand still while you slap one of those on him, do you?'
Jack said, 'It'll be over before he knows what happened. It'll only take a second to stick it to him.'
Pete scoffed. 'A second, huh? What makes you think you'll get it? We're not just bucking Paz's crew this time, we're going up against the Keehan machine.'
'I'll keep that in mind.'
'Center'll make sure you do. So will headquarters in Washington.'
Jack quirked a smile, with one corner of his mouth turned down, the other turned up. 'Deep politics, eh?'
'With a vengeance,' Pete said. 'Susan's uncle, Senator Keehan, holds a top post on the Senate Intelligence Committee.'
Jack said, 'I know; I've met him a few times when I was testifying before the committee in closed-door session.'
Pete shot him a quick side glance. 'Is he as big a horse's ass in person as he is on TV?'
'Depends,' Jack said. 'He's Mr. Senatorial Courtesy and Decorum until the testimony contradicts some policy line that he's taken. Then he repeats his question in the form of a statement, telling you what he wants to hear from you.'
'What did you tell him?'
'Just the facts, Pete, just the facts. That's why I'm sitting here right now, instead of holding down atop administrative job at CTU Washington.'
Pete laughed, said, 'Aw, you wouldn't like it at HQ anyhow. All that politics and paperwork.'
'Not to mention that big pay raise and all those perks. That'd be tough to take,' Jack said.
Pete's tone was upbeat. 'Maybe this time the Senator's bitten off more than he can chew, getting into bed with Chavez on that oil deal.'
Jack said, 'It hasn't hurt him so far. But who knows, now that the shooting's started. Maybe we can monkey wrench that gruesome twosome.'
A parked car lurched away from curbside into the street, causing Pete to have to swerve the wheel hard to avoid getting hit. He hammered the heel of his hand against the horn, cursing.
The other driver flinched, looking sheepish. This was no sinister aggressor shooting a move, it was just another careless, heedless driver. He hung back a few car lengths, keeping his distance.
