They approached an old grain-warehouse leased to a plumbing-supply firm that had just gone out of business. The police had arranged entry and there was still a working telephone.
The four men went inside. They checked the open space being used for the conference. A rostrum, folding chairs, auxiliary lighting. Then they went into the main office and Charlie telephoned his colleagues and told them to load the bus and come ahead. Bill looked around for a toilet. Seconds after Charlie hung up, the phone rang. One of the detectives answered and all of them could hear the voice at the other end shouting, 'Bomb, bomb, bomb,' and the man's accent made it sound like boom boom boom. This seemed pretty funny to Bill, who had to take a leak and saw no reason to do it in the street.
The call annoyed the detectives. One of them anyway. The other just gazed across the office at a bookshelf filled with specification manuals. Bill found a toilet and was the last one out. One detective took up a position near the front door and the second man moved their car about fifty yards up the street and then called headquarters.
Charlie said, 'I wish I understood the point.'
He and Bill went across the street and waited for the bomb unit to arrive and search the building.
'The point is control,' Bill said. 'They want to believe they have the power to move us out of a building and into the street. In their minds they see a hundred people trooping down the fire stairs. I told you, Charlie. Some people make bombs, some people make phone calls.'
Soon they were talking about something else. The rain stopped. Charlie crossed the street, said something to the detective and came back shrugging. They talked about a book Charlie was doing. They talked about the day Charlie's divorce became final, six years earlier. He recalled the weather, the high clear sky, distanceless, flags whipping on Fifth Avenue and a movie actress getting out of a taxi. Bill reached for his handkerchief. The blast made him jerk half around but he didn't leave his feet or go back against the wall. He felt the sound in his chest and arms. He jerked and ducked, shielding his head with his forearm, windows blowing out. Charlie said goddamn or go down. He turned his back to the blast wave, bracing himself against the wall with his elbows, hands clasped behind his head, and Bill knew he would have to remember to be impressed. He also knew it was over, nothing worse coming, and he straightened up slowly, looking toward the building but reaching out to touch Charlie's arm, make sure he was still there, standing and able to move. The detective across the street was in a deep crouch, fumbling with the radio on his belt. The street was filled with glass, snowblinking. The second detective remained in the car a moment, calling in, and then walked toward his partner. They looked over at Charlie and Bill. Dust hung at the second-storey level of the warehouse. The four men met in the middle of the street, glass crunching under their shoes. Charlie brushed off his lapels.
The bomb experts arrived and then the press bus and some publishing people, more detectives, and Bill sat in the back of the unmarked police car while Charlie huddled with different groups making new plans.
About an hour later the two men sat under the vaulted skylight in a dining room at the Chesterfield, eating the sole.
'It means a day's delay. Two at the most,' Charlie said. 'You definitely ought to change hotels so we can move quickly once we're set.'
'You showed presence of mind, taking that protective stance.'
'Actually that's the recommended air-crash position. Except you don't do it standing up. I knew I was supposed to lower my head and lock my hands behind my neck but I couldn't place the maneuver in context. I thought I was on a plane going down.'
'Your people will find another site.'
'We have to. We can't stop now. Even if we go to the bare minimum. Fifteen people in five rowboats on a secluded lake somewhere.'
'Anybody have a theory?'
'I talk to an antiterrorist expert tomorrow. Want to come along?'
'Nope.'
'Where are you staying?'
'I'll be in touch, Charlie.'
'Rowboats are not the answer, come to think of it. Isn't that where they got Mountbatten?'
'Fishing boat.'
'Close enough.'
Bill knew someone was looking at him, a man sitting alone at a table across the room. It was interesting how the man's curiosity carried so much information, that he knew who Bill was, that they'd never met, that he was making up his mind whether or not to approach. Bill even knew who the man was, although he could not have said how he knew. It was as if the man had fitted himself to a predetermined space, to an idea of something that was waiting to happen. Bill never looked at the man directly. Everything was a shape, a fate, information flowing.
'I want to talk about your book,' Charlie said.
'It's not done yet. When it's done.'
'You don't have to talk about it. I'll talk about it. And when it's done, we can both talk about it.'
'We were nearly killed a little while ago. Let's talk about that.'
'I know how to publish your work. Nobody in this business knows you better than I do. I know what you need.'
'What's that?'
'You need a major house that also has a memory. That's why they hired me. They want to take a closer look at tradition. I represent something to those people. I represent books. I want to establish a solid responsible thoughtful list and give it the launching power of our mass-market capabilities. We have enormous resources. If you spend years writing a book, don't you want to see it fly?'
'How's your sex life, Charlie?'
'I can get this book out there in numbers that will astound.'
'Got a girlfriend?'
'I had some prostate trouble. They had to reroute my semen.'
'Where did they send it?'
'I don't know. But it doesn't come out the usual place.'
'You still perform the act.'
'Enthusiastically.'
'But you don't ejaculate.'
'Nothing comes out.'
'And you don't know what happens to it.'
'I didn't ask them what happens to it. It goes back inside. That's as much as I want to know.'
'It's a beautiful story, Charlie. Not a word too long.'
They looked at dessert menus.
'When will the book be done?'
'I'm fixing the punctuation.'
'Punctuation's interesting. I make it a point to observe how a writer uses commas.'
'And you figure two days tops and we're out of here,' Bill said.
'This is what we're hoping. We're hoping it doesn't continue. The bomb was the culmination. They made their point even if we don't know exactly what it is.'
'I may need to buy a shirt.'
'Buy a shirt. And let me check you in here. Under the circumstances I think we ought to be able to find each other as expeditiously as possible.'
'I'll think about it over coffee.'
'We use acid-free paper,' Charlie said.
'I'd just as soon have my books rot when I do. Why should they outlive me? They're the reason I'm dying before my time.'
The man stood by the table waiting for them to finish the exchange. Bill looked off into space and waited for Charlie to realize the man was standing there. The table was large enough to accommodate another person and Charlie handled introductions while the waiter brought a chair. The man was George Haddad and when Charlie called him a spokesman for the group in Beirut the man made a gesture of self-deprecation, leaning away from the
