hear the rotors howling on a landed helicopter somewhere behind the houses. He stared up to the rooftops and in the distance he could see what looked like an entire SWAT team fanned out in surveillance mode, high above the park.
It was 5:40 and suddenly, advancing down Marylebone Road, there was an unmistakable convoy consisting of two police-escort cruisers, four motorbike outriders, and then two long, black U.S. Navy staff cars, the American flag fluttering from both of their front wings.
The motorcade swept left into the wide entrance to the park, policemen waving them in. The first cruiser turned across the road, blocking it northward, and the second skewed across the entrance immediately the U.S. Navy cars were past. Ravi, standing some fifty yards south of the Residence, saw the rear door of the cars open and six obvious agents emerged.
Then two more people disembarked. In the gathering light, Ravi could see a smallish, broad-shouldered, tough-looking character accompanied by a stunning redhead. The agents closed around them, and the U.S. Marines moved up tight, all four of the original guards by the cars, two accompanying the tall figure of the U.S. Ambassador as he came out of the house.
Ravi sent four blips to the Syrian assassin — Weapons tight! Then he sent five blips — Abort mission instantly! One thing was for certain, any shot fired could not possibly hit the Admiral, not in this mob scene of security.
If anyone did get a shot off, he stood a near one hundred percent chance of being shot down like a prairie dog before he'd traveled ten yards. These guys were not joking. They were ready for anything, and Ravi knew how to weigh up danger.
'Fuck it,' said General Rashood to himself. 'I'm outta here.' And he called a cab, snapping somewhat irritably to the driver, 'Waterloo Station, in a hurry.'
But his mood lightened as he pondered lunch in Paris with his Palestinian goddess, followed by a relaxed afternoon in bed, and then a wonderful dinner.
His trip had been, he decided, a bit of a disaster. His parents were in tears, Persian Lady was defeated, two completely innocent men were dead, and Arnold Morgan was cast-iron safe.
Now he had a long journey ahead of him. But not as long as Rupert Studley-Bryce's. In the back of the cab, there was a thin smile on the face of the Hamas terrorist.
6
The splash headline on the front page of last Saturday's London Daily Mail was, well, arresting. And General Rashood stared at it intently:
RUPERT STUDLEY-BRYCE MURDERED
Tory MP's body discovered in London flat
Ravi had just brought the newspapers home from the Librairie Avicenne, and though he had expected to see some coverage of his old roommate's death, he had not imagined it would be quite on this scale.
Before him was a large photograph of Rupert in his Ascot clothes, taken by the photographers who permanently loiter around the main gates to the racecourse. Beneath it, the caption read: 'A day at the races for the Tory firebrand — he died in his top hat and tails.'
The story described how the body had been found midafternoon on Friday, the final day of the Royal Ascot meeting. His House of Commons secretary, unable to locate him, had phoned his wife, Susan, in Bedfordshire, who had also heard nothing. Receiving no reply from the flat, the secretary had arrived at Prior's Court with two policemen at three o'clock in the afternoon. There she found the place was already swarming with detectives trying to find out who had stabbed the sixty-three-year-old doorman, Alf Rowan, to death, on the previous evening. The story continued:
Police believe the same killer murdered both men, probably because the doorman refused him entry, on this quiet Thursday night when very few people were around. Residents were being interviewed last night, but no one admitted seeing anything or anyone suspicious in the building.
A spokesman at New Scotland Yard said the causes of death were very different. Mr. Studley-Bryce, who was 36, had not been stabbed, but had died as a result of head injuries inflicted by persons unknown.
Little was known about the MP's movements during the day, save that he did attend the Royal Ascot race- meeting and had spent some of the afternoon with friends in the private tent of White's Club. It is believed that he dined out in the West End, but no one at the Club would confirm that he had been there.
Police are continuing with their inquiries.
There followed a two-page biography of the Member for South Bedford, detailing his school days at Harrow, his three years at Oxford University, and his rambunctious entry into politics. Of Mr. Alf Rowan, who was equally dead, but considerably less important, there was a small, single-column story and a short interview with his heartbroken wife.
Ravi Rashood put down the newspaper and poured himself some afternoon tea. Then he scanned the sports pages of the London Sunday Telegraph, noting that the six-year-old Homeward Bound had been sold for nearly $300,000 to go jumping. The purchasers were John Magnier, boss of Cool-more, the world's greatest thoroughbred stud farm in County Tipperary, and his friend J. P. McManus, the hugely wealthy Irish sportsman and gambler. Homeward Bound would be trained in Tipperary by Aidan O'Brien.
Meanwhile, Shakira had settled down with the Daily Mail and very quickly asked, 'Did you know that MP who was murdered in London? He went to your school and he's the same age.'
'Yes. Yes I did. Knew him quite well. He was not a friend. Guess someone had it in for him. Those MPs get mixed up in a lot of shady stuff these days.'
'I suppose so. His wife is only twenty-nine. And they had three very young children. It's got the English guessing by the look of it.'
The problem with buying newspapers that are nearly a week old is you can get behind the times, very swiftly.
Six thousand miles away, in the National Security Agency in Maryland, Lt. Jimmy Ramshawe was doing some very advanced guessing on precisely the same subject. He had spotted a paragraph in Tuesday's London Telegraph that had seriously intrigued him. 'Police investigating the murder of Rupert Studley-Bryce admitted last night that a small part of the inquiry was being conducted by the antiterrorist squad based at New Scotland Yard. However, they had no further information.'
Lieutenant Ramshawe knew what that meant. Some reporter had discovered the antiterrorists were on the case and had tried to find out what was going on. The police, not willing to tell an outright lie, had confirmed, and then fobbed him off.
'So what,' murmured Jimmy Ramshawe, 'are the bloody antiterrorists doing in there?'
This was precisely the kind of puzzle that appealed to the Lieutenant, but he was busy today and had no time for luxuries like a foreign murder inquiry. It was a story in Wednesday's London Daily Mail that really switched him on.
Police admitted to being completely baffled by the news that the knife used to stab doorman Alf Rowan to death in Westminster last Thursday night almost certainly came from the kitchen of the murdered M.P. Rupert Studley-Bryce.
Unlike Mr. Rowan, the M.P. was not stabbed, but died from head injuries. They now believe Mr. Studley- Bryce may have been killed BEFORE the doorman. And that the killer may have murdered the doorman on his way out of the building.
