square, and heard the celebrating pilgrims screaming in horror.
Early the next morning, Monday morning, twenty-four hours after he had killed the Pope, Romeo decided he would walk along the American ocean shore and get his last whiff of freedom. The house was silent as he came down the stairs, but he found Dorothea and Richard sleeping on the two couches in the living room, as if they had been standing guard. The poison of his treachery drove him out the door into the salt breeze of the beach. On sight, he hated this foreign beach, the barbaric gray shrubs, the tall wild yellow weeds, the sunlight flashing off silver-red soda cans. Even the sunshine was watery, and the early spring colder in this strange land. But he was glad to be out in the open while treachery was being done. A helicopter sailed overhead and then out of sight; there were two boats motionless in the water with not a sign of life aboard. The sun rose the color of a blood orange, then yellowed into gold as it rose higher in the sky. He walked for a long time, rounded a corner of the bay, and lost sight of the house. For some reason this panicked him, or perhaps it was the sight of a veritable forest of thin high mottled gray weeds that came almost to the water's edge. He turned back.
It was then that he heard the sirens of police cars. Far down the beach he saw the flashing lights and he walked rapidly toward them. He felt no fear, no doubt in Yabril, though he could still flee. He felt contempt for this American society that could not even organize his capture properly, how stupid they were. But then the helicopter reappeared in the sky, the two ships that had seemed so still and deserted were racing toward shore. He felt fear and panic. Now that there was no chance of escape he wanted to run and run and run. But he steeled himself and walked toward the house surrounded by men and guns. The helicopter hovered over its roof. There were more men coming up the beach and down the beach. Romeo prepared his charade of guilt and fright; he started to run out into the ocean but men rose out of the water in masks. Romeo turned and ran back toward the house, and then he saw Richard and Dorothea.
They were chained, in handcuffs, ropes of iron rooted their bodies to the earth. And they were weeping. Romeo knew how they felt-so he had stood once long ago. They were weeping in shame, in humiliation, stripped of their sense of power. And filled with the unutterably nightmarish terror of being completely helpless, their fate no longer determined by whimsical, perhaps merciful, gods but by their implacable fellowmen.
Romeo gave them both a smile of helpless pity. He knew he would be free in a matter of days, he knew he had betrayed these true believers in his own faith, but after all, it had been a tactical decision, not an evil or malicious one. Then armed men swarmed over him and linked him with steel and heavy iron.
Far across the world, that world whose roof of sky was riddled with spying satellites, its ozone patrolled by voodoo radar, across the seas filled with American warships sweeping toward Sherhaben, across continents spaced with missile silos and stationary armies rooted to the earth to act as lightning rods for death, Yabril had breakfast in the palace with the Sultan of Sherhaben.
The Sultan of Sherhaben was a believer in Arab freedom, of the
Palestinian right to a homeland. He regarded the United States as the bulwark of Israel-Israel could not stand without American support.
Therefore America was the ultimate enemy. And Yabril's plot to destabilize America's authority had appealed to his subtle mind. The humiliation of a great power by Sherhaben, militarily so helpless, delighted him.
The Sultan had absolute power in Sherhaben. He had vast wealth; every pleasure in life was his for the asking, but all this had become stale and unsatisfying. The Sultan had no vices to add spice to his life. He observed Muslim law, he lived a virtuous life. The standard of living in
Sherhaben, with its vast revenues of oil, was one of the highest in the world; the Sultan had built new schools and new hospitals. Indeed his dream was to make Sherhaben the Switzerland of the Arab world. His only eccentricity was his mania for cleanliness, of his person and in his state.
The Sultan had taken part in this conspiracy because he relished the sense of adventure, the gambling for high stakes, the striving for high ideals. And there was little personal risk to himself and to his country, since he had a magic shield, billions of barrels of oil safely locked beneath his desert land.
Another strong motive was his love for and gratitude to Yabril. When the
Sultan was only a minor prince, there had been a fierce struggle for power in Sherhaben, especially after the oil fields proved to be so vast. The American oil companies had supported the Sultan's opponents, who naturally favored the American cause.
The Sultan, who had been educated abroad understood the true value of the oil fields, and fought to retain the fields for Sherhaben. Civil war broke out. It had been the then very young Yabril who helped the Sultan achieve power by killing off the Sultan's opponents. For the Sultan, though a man of personal virtue, recognized that political struggle had its own rules.
After his assumption of power, the Sultan gave Yabril sanctuary when needed. Indeed in the last ten years Yabril had spent more time in Sherhaben than in any other place. He established a separate identity with a home and servants and a wife and children. He was also, in that identity, employed as a special government official in a minor capacity. This identity was never penetrated by any foreign intelligence service. During those ten years he and the Sultan became close. They were both students of the Koran, educated by foreign teachers, and they were united in their hatred of Israel. And here they made a special distinction: they did not hate the Jews as Jews; they hated the official state of the Jews.
The Sultan of Sherhaben had a secret dream, one so bizarre he did not dare to share it with anyone, not even Yabril. That one day Israel would be destroyed and the Jews dispersed again all over the world. And then he, the Sultan, would lure Jewish scientists and scholars to Sherhaben. He would establish a great university that would collect Jewish brains. For had not history proved that this race owned the genes to greatness of the mind?
Einstein and other Jewish scientists had given the world the atom bomb.
What other mysteries of God and nature could they not solve? And were they not fellow Semites? Time erodes hatred; Jew and Arab could live in peace together and make Sherhaben great. Oh, he would lure them with riches and sweet civility; he would respect all their stubborn whims of culture. Who knew what would happen? Sherhaben could become another Athens. The thought made the Sultan smile at his own foolishness, but still, where was the harm in a dream?
But now Yabril's plot was perhaps a nightmare. The Sultan had summoned Yabril to the palace, spirited him from the plane, to make sure that his ferocity would be controlled. Yabril had a history of adding his own little twists to his operations.
The Sultan insisted that Yabril be bathed and shaved and enjoy a beautiful dancing girl of the palace. Then, with Yabril refreshed, and in the Sultan's minor debt, they sat on the glassed-in air-conditioned terrace.
The Sultan felt he could speak frankly. 'I must congratulate you,' he said to Yabril. 'Your timing has been perfect, and I must say lucky.
Allah watches over you, without a doubt.' Here he smiled affectionately at Yabril. Then he went on. 'I have received advance notice that the United States will meet any demands you make. Be content. You have humiliated the greatest country in the world. You have killed the world's greatest religious leader. You will achieve the release of your killer of the Pope and that will be like pissing in their faces. But go no further. Give thought to what happens afterwards. You will be the most hunted man in the history of this century.'
Yabril knew what was coming, the probing for more information on how he would handle the negotiations. For a moment he wondered if the Sultan would try to take over the operation. 'I will be safe here in Sherhaben,' Yabril said. 'As always.'
The Sultan shook his head. 'You know as well as I do that they will concentrate on Sherhaben after this is over. You will have to find ' another refuge.'
Yabril laughed. 'I will be a beggar in Jerusalem. But you should worry about yourself. They will know you have been a part of it. '
'Not probable,' the Sultan said. 'And I sit on the greatest and cheapest ocean of oil in the world. Also, the Americans have fifty billion dollars invested here, the cost of the oil city of Dak and even more. No, I think I will be forgiven much more quickly than you and your Romeo. Now, Yabril, my friend, I know you well, you have gone far enough this time, really a magnificent performance. Please, do not ruin everything with one of your little flourishes at the end of the game.' He paused for a moment. 'When do I present your demands?'
Yabril said softly, 'Romeo is in place. Give the ultimatum this afternoon.
They must agree by eleven Tuesday morning, Washington time. I will not negotiate.'
The Sultan said, 'Be very careful, Yabril. Give them more time.'
