'Go ahead, Mr. Weingrass,' said Grey gently, touching the old man's thin shoulder. 'Let it out. No one can hear you.'
'I promised I wouldn't—'
'There are promises beyond our control of keeping, sir.'
'Stop being so fucking polite!' Manny coughed out his last spasm and awkwardly, painfully got to his feet. The commando purposely did not offer assistance. 'Okay, soldier-boy,' said Weingrass, breathing deeply. 'The place is secure—from our point of view. Let's find my boy.'
Code Grey held his place. 'Despite your less than generous personality, sir, I respect you,' said the Israeli. 'And for all our sakes, I can't permit you to accompany us.'
'You what?
'We don't know what's on the upper floors—’
I do, you son of a bitch! My boy's up there!… Give me a gun, Tinker Bell, or I'll send a telegram to Israel's Defence Minister telling him you own a pig farm!' Weingrass suddenly kicked the commando in the shins.
'Incorrigible!' muttered code Grey without moving his leg. 'Impossible!'
'Come on, bubbelah. A little gun. I know you've got one.'
'Please don't use it unless I tell you to,' said the commando, lifting his left trouser leg and reaching down for the small revolver strapped behind his knee.
'Actually, I never told you I was part of the Haganah?'
'The Haganah?'
'Sure. Me and Menachem had a lot of rough-and-tumbles—’
'Menachem was never part of the Haganah—'
'Must have been some other bald-headed fellow. Come on, let's go!'
Ben-Ami, the Uzi gripped in his hands in the shadows of the Sahalhuddin's entrance, kept in touch by radio. 'But why is he with you?' asked the Mossad agent.
'Because he's impossible!' replied the irritated voice of code Grey.
'That's not an answer!' insisted Ben-Ami.
'I have no other. Out. We've reached the sixth floor. I'll contact you when it's feasible.'
'Understood.'
Two of the commandos flanked the wide double doors on the right of the landing; the third stood at the other end of the hall, outside the only other door with light showing through the crack below. Emmanuel Weingrass reluctantly remained on the marble staircase; his anxiety provoked rumblings in his chest but his resolve suppressed them.
'Now!' whispered code Grey, and both men crashed the door open with their shoulders, instantly dropping to the floor as two robed Arabs at each end of the room turned, firing their repeating weapons. They were no match for the Uzis; both fell with two bursts from the Israeli machine pistols. A third and a fourth man started to run, one in white robes from behind the enormous ebony desk, the other from the left side.
'Stop!' yelled code Grey. 'Or you're both dead!'
The dark-skinned man in the robes of a lavish aba stood motionless, his glowering eyes riveted on the Israeli. 'Have you any idea what you've done? he asked in a low, threatening voice. 'The security in this building is the finest in Bahrain.’
The authorities will be here in minutes. You will lay down your weapons or you will be killed.'
'Hello there, garbage!’ yelled Emmanuel Weingrass, walking into the room with effort as old men do when their legs do not work as well as they once did, especially after a great deal of excitement. 'The system's not that good, not when you've sub-contracted five or six hundred.'
'You!'
'Who else? I should have blown you away years ago in Basrah. But
