revive shattered economy. Refuses to discuss how he will restructure government if he comes to power.
5. Spellbinding orator. Has uncanny rapport with his audience. Speaks only in old Aztec tongue through interpreters. Language still used by many Indians of Central Mexico.
6. Mainstream supporters are fanatical. His popularity has swept the country like the proverbial tidal wave. Political analysts predict he could will a national election by nearly six percentage points. Yet he refuses to participate in free elections, claiming, and rightly so, that corrupt leaders would never surrender the government after a losing campaign. Topiltzin expects to take over the country by public acclaim.
Nichols set his pipe in an ashtray, stared at the ceiling thoughtfully for a few moments, and began writing again.
SUMMARY: Topiltzin is either incredibly ignorant or incredibly gifted.
Ignorant if he is what he says he is.
Gifted if he has a method to his madness, a goat only he can see.
Trouble, trouble, trouble.
Nichols was going over the articles again, searching for a key to Topiltzin's character, when his phone buzzed. He picked up the receiver.
'the President on one,' announced his secretary.
Nichols punched the button. 'Yes, Mr. President.'
'any news of Guy Rivas?'
'No, nothing.'
There was a pause on the President's end. Then, finally, 'He was scheduled to meet with me two hours ago. I'm concerned. If he Encountered a problem, his pilot should have sent us word by now.'
'He didn't fly to Mexico City in a White House jet,' explained Nichols.
'In the interests of secrecy he booked passage on a commercial airliner and flew coach class as a tourist on vacation.'
'I understand,' the President agreed. 'If President De Lorenzo learned I sent a personal representative behind his back to make contact with his opposition, he'd take it as an insult and scratch our Arizona conference next week.'
'Our primary concern,' Nichols assured him.
'Have you been briefed on the U.N. charter crash?' the President asked, suddenly changing tack.
'No, sir,' replied Nichols. 'My only information is that Hala Kamil survived.'
'She and two crew members. The rest died from poison.'
'Poison?' Nichols blurted incredulously.
'That's the word from the investigators. They believe the pilot tried to poison everyone on board before parachuting from the plane over Iceland.'
'The pilot must have been an imposter.'
'We won't know till a body is found, warm or cold.'
'Christ, what terrorist movement would have a motive for murdering over fifty U.N. representatives?'
'So far none have claimed credit for the disaster. According to Martin Brogan at CIA, if it is the work of terrorists, they stepped out of character on this one.'
'Hala Karnil might have been the target,' suggested Nichols. 'Akhmad Yazid has sworn to eliminate her.'
'We can't ignore the possibility,' the President admitted.
'Have the news media gotten wind of it?'
'The story will be all over the papers and TV in the next hour. I saw no reason to hold it back.'
'Is there anything you'd like me to do, Mr. President?'
'I'd appreciate it, Dale, if you'd monitor reaction from President De Lorenzo's people. There were eleven delegates and agency representatives from Mexico on the flight. Offer condolences in my name and any cooperation within limits. Oh, yes, you'd better keep Julius Schiller over at the State Department informed so we don't stumble over each other.'
'I'll get my staff right on it.'
'And let me know the minute you hear from Rivas.'
'Yes, Mr. President.'
Nichols hung up and forced his attention back to the file. He began to wonder if Topiltzin was somehow connected with the U.N. murder. If only there was a thread he could grasp.
Nichols was not a detective. He had no talent for coldly dissecting a prime suspect layer by layer until he knew what made the man tick. His academic specialty was in systems projections of international political movements.
Topiltzin was an enigma to him. Hitler had a misguided vision of Aryan supremacy. Driven by religious fervor, Khomeini wanted to return the Middle East to the Muslim fulldamentals of the Dark Ages. Lenin preached a crusade of world Communism.
What was Topiltzin's objective?
A Mexico of the Aztecs? A return to the past? No modern society could function under such archaic rules. Mexico was not a nation to be run on the fantasies of a Don Quixote. There had to be another driving force behind the man. Nichols was conjecturing in a vacuum. He glimpsed Topiltzin only as a caricature, a villain in a cartoon series.
His secretary entered unannounced and laid a file folder on his desk.
