A short man with a high, scarred forehead hoisted his rifle into his armpit. As he walked toward Bicking, he motioned for his companion, a giant of a man, to go to the others. Bicking stole a glance to the right as the big man effortlessly picked up one of the men who'd been shot in the leg. He tossed the man over his shoulder, then lifted up the second.
'I'm an American,' Bicking went on, 'and these men are my colleagues.' He cocked his head toward the planter, where Haveles and Nasr had also sought refuge. They rose.
The man standing watch at the door turned suddenly. 'People are coming!'
The short man looked at his big companion. 'Can you manage?'
The giant nodded as he shifted the weight of the man on his right shoulder. Then he held his rifle so it was pointing straight ahead, between the man's legs.
The short man turned to Bicking. 'Come with us.'
'Who are you people?' Haveles asked. The ambassador stepped forward unsteadily. He reminded Bicking of a car-crash victim who was in glassy-eyed shock but still insisted that he was okay.
'We were sent to collect you,' the short man said. 'You must come now or remain here.'
'The representatives of Japan and Russia are in the room as well,' Haveles said. 'They're in the alcove over —'
'Only you,' the short man said. He turned toward the door and motioned to the man standing who was there. The man nodded and headed left down the corridor. The short man turned back. 'Now!'
Bicking took the ambassador by the arm. 'Let's go. The palace guard will have to handle the rest of this.'
'No,' said Haveles. 'I'll stay with the others.'
'Mr. Ambassador, there's still fighting—'
'I'll stay,' he insisted.
Bicking saw that there was no point arguing. 'All right,' he said. 'We'll see you later at the embassy.'
Haveles turned and took stiff, mechanical steps toward the dark alcove which doubled as a bar area. He joined the other men who had sought safety in the shadows.
The big man headed to the door, followed by the smaller man.
'Our train is pulling out,' Nasr said as he walked past Bicking.
Bicking nodded and joined him.
The man who'd gone down the hall returned with Paul Hood. Hood handed the videotapes to the short man, and the group started down the hall. Two of the masked men were in front and the giant was in the rear.
'Where are the ambassadors?' Hood asked. 'Is everyone all right?'
Bicking nodded. He glanced at his red knuckles. He hadn't punched anyone in six years. 'Almost everyone,' he said, thinking about the Kurd.
'What do you mean?'
'The Kurds are all dead and Ambassador Haveles is slightly shaken up,' Bicking said. 'But he decided to stay. Our escorts here were pretty specific about who they were willing to take.'
'Only our group,' Hood said.
'Right.'
'And it probably cost Bob Herbert a lot of chits to get that.'
'I'm sure,' Bicking said. 'Well, diplomatically, it's probably the smart thing for the ambassador to have done. There'd be a major international shitstorm if a rescue attempt favored Washington. Not that Japan or Russia would spit on an American diplomat if he were burning.'
'You're wrong,' Hood said. 'I think they would.'
The men continued down the corridor to a gold door. It was locked. The man in front shot off the knob and kicked the door in. They entered, the man in the rear closed the door, and the man in front turned on a flashlight. The group proceeded quickly through a grand ballroom. Even in the near-dark Bicking could feel the weight of the gold drapes, smell their long history.
There was a sudden clattering of boots outside the door. The three men of the Mista'aravim froze, their weapons turned toward the hallway. The flashlight was doused and the short man hurried back to the gold door.
'Continue straight ahead and wait by the kitchen,' the giant man whispered to Hood, Nasi, and Bicking.
They did as they were told. As they walked, Hood looked back. The small man peeked through the hole where the knob used to be. When no one entered, the masked men rejoined them.
The small man said something to the others in Syrian.
'Presidential guards,' Bicking translated for Hood as they ran through the enormous kitchen.
'Then this whole thing was a kabuki, as the ambassador suggested,' said Nasr. He pushed back his wavy gray hair, which had become disheveled in the excitement. It immediately fell back over his forehead.
'What do you mean?' asked Hood.
'The Syrian President expected this to happen,' Nasr said, 'just as Ambassador Haveles predicted. He allowed his stand-in and the foreign ambassadors to take the heart of the attack, protected only by palace guards—'
'Who are like museum or bank security personnel in the U.S.,' Bicking interjected. 'They're trained for one- on-one response. If there's big trouble they have to call for help.'
'Correct,' said Nasr. 'When the President was certain the Kurds had sent in the bulk of their force, he had his elite guards close the door on them.'
'The President uses other nations as a buffer against his enemies,' Bicking said. 'He uses Lebanon to throw terrorists against Israel, Greece to fight Turkey, and helps Iran to create trouble around the world. We should have been prepared for him to do the same with people.'
The sounds of gunfire increased. Hood imagined phalanxes of well-armed soldiers moving through the corridors, gunning down any and all opposition. Though wounded Kurds would be captured, he couldn't imagine any of them surrendering. Most would find death preferable to incarceration.
The men stopped at another door. The short leader told the others to wait. After withdrawing a small slab of C-4 from his pocket along with a timed detonator, he opened the door and exited. These people might not be the most personable men Bicking had ever met, but he was impressed by how prepared they were.
'Is Ambassador Haveles going to be safe?' Hood asked.
'That's difficult to say,' Nasr admitted. 'Whatever happens is a win-win situation for the Syrian President. If Haveles dies, it's the Kurds' fault and the U.S. declines to support them in the future. If he lives, then the elite guards are heroes and the President gets concessions from the U.S.'
The short man returned and motioned the others ahead. The group passed through a large pantry to a door which led to a small outdoor garden. It was surrounded by a ten-foot-high stone fence with a ten-foot-high iron gate at the south end. They walked along a slate path through an immaculately manicured waist-high hedge. When they reached the end of the path, the short man stopped them. They waited some twenty feet from the gate. A moment later the lock exploded, blowing a hole in the gate and in the fence. Almost at once, a large truck with a canvas back pulled up to the curb. The short man ran ahead of the others.
The street was free of pedestrians. Either the fighting or the local police had chased them away. The street was also clear of news crews, which could not go anywhere without the government's consent. Though as Bicking thought about it, he realized that the government might have sent undercover operatives to the scene. That was probably why the group had taken the long way around. The men didn't want to be photographed.
The short man pulled the rear flap to one side. Then he motioned to the men at the gate.
As the men approached the truck, they were struck by the strong smell of fish. But that didn't stop them from boarding. Hood, Bicking, and Nasr climbed in first. They helped the giant man carry on his two wounded companions. Then the rest of the team got in. The wounded men lay on empty canvas sacks, while the other men sat on greasy wooden barrels which lined the back. In less than a minute the truck was on its way, headed southeast toward Straight Street. Turning left, the driver sped past the sixteen hundred year-old Roman Arch and the Church of the Virgin Mary. Straight Street became Bab Sharqi Street, and the truck continued northeast.
Nasr peeked out the back flap of the truck. 'As I expected,' said Nasr.
'What?' asked Hood.
Nasr shut the flap and leaned close to Hood. 'We're avoiding the Jewish Quarter.'
'I don't understand,' Hood said. 'What does that mean?'
