"Do you know anything about a mosque being surrounded by the FBI?"
"It was my doing."
"Do you have any idea how this will play in the media?"
"Not if we contain the situation before the Messengers of Muhammad strike again."
"But a mosque. It's a house of worship. If anything goes wrong, the entire Muslim world will be inflamed like one gigantic, angry boil. We're just getting the Israelis and the Palestinians to simmer down."
"We have to think of U.S. security first, Mr. President," Harold Smith said stiffly. "These jihad groups operate under the command of religious leaders seeking religious goals, and to a significant degree are sheltered by U.S. laws protecting freedom of worship. That can only be dealt with through extraconstitutional means."
"What the hell do these people want?"
"To establish a global Islamic theocracy by converting the entire world to their faith by force of arms and terror." .
"They're using our constitutional freedoms to take them away from us?" the President blurted out.
"It is for exactly such conscienceless predators that my organization was created."
In the background, a pouty voice said, "I want my blond infidel. I can taste his salty juices in the mouth of my face and my other mouth, which only he will be allowed to devour."
"Who was that?" the President asked.
"Abeer Ghula."
"You have her there with you?"
"No, in a secure room in the World Trade Center."
"Is this line secure?"
"It's a scrambled cellular patch-through from the dedicated line."
"Oh. I wondered why it took you three rings."
"Mr. President, I have just dispatched my people to the al-Bahlawan Mosque. If our intelligence is correct, we will find the mastermind behind this jihad group within."
"Then what?"
"My people will penetrate it and come out unseen. After a while, the FBI will be withdrawn. And the bodies of the conspirators will be discovered by the appropriate parties. Dead of natural causes."
"Sounds foolproof."
"Nothing is foolproof, Mr. President."
"They saved my presidential butt once. I trust them to close this out quietly and with absolute deniability,"
"That is their function," said Harold Smith.
"Good. Gotta go. I got a grips-and-grins function in the Rose Garden, and it'll be the perfect opportunity to assure the voters we're working the problem to a successful wrap-up."
The line terminated, and Harold Smith went into the bathroom to check on the condition of Abeer Ghula, the most hated woman in the Muslim world.
He was relieved to find her hanging from the shower curtain just as he'd left her. Her gold eyes glared at him venomously.
"When you are agreeable to behaving properly, I will cut you down," Smith told her.
Smith stepped back just ahead of a naked kicking foot and decided the time was not yet right to untie her wrists.
in the Rose Garden when the fax was handed to him.
The portable presidential podium had been set up and he was standing before it waiting for the grinning ghouls—as he was calling the White House press corps this week—to settle down so he could begin.
The President glanced at the fax. It was from the FBI and read, "Purported communique received from M.O.M. via fax at 11:11 today. No verification."
The President figured "no verification" meant it was not important. He was here to reassure the nation, not pass on new threats, so he didn't read the text of the communique.
Clearing his throat, he began to speak. "I just want to say a few words to reassure Americans everywhere that the nation is secure, the post office functions as it should and the FBI is working diligently to get to the bottom of yesterday's terrible events."
There. Short, concise and guaranteed not to be misquoted or misconstrued by the press.
Then came the barrage of questions.
"Mr. President, is it true you have ordered a postal holiday—effectively shutting down the mail?"
"Absolutely not."
"Then why has mail delivery virtually ground to a halt?"
"No follow-up questions today," the presidential press secretary inserted. "You know the rules."
"Mr. President, some airlines are refusing to transport mail for fear of mail bombs. Will you order them to reverse their decisions in the national interest?"
"Thaf s under advisement," said the President, who was hearing this for the first time.
The verbal tennis balls kept coming, and the President lobbed them back with ease and aplomb. This was going to look great on the evening news.
"Mr. President, word is coming out of Justice that the so-called Messengers of Muhammad have threatened to launch what they claim is a nuclear missile called the Fist of Allah at an unidentified target on U.S. soil. What can you tell us about this report?" The President experienced a frozen moment in time. Off to one side, his press secretary was surreptitiously pointing to the fax lying on the podium.
"Let me refresh my memory," the Chief Executive said quickly.
Scanning the unread text of the FBI fax, his eyes widened.
The reasonable demandment of the Messengers of Muhammad not having been met by the godless of America, we have no choice but to announce this day the existence of the dread Islamic bomb. This bomb had been installed in a missile unlike any the Western world has before seen. And the name of this missile is the Fist of Allah. It is to be launched on this day at a target unknown to the Infidel Nation, for the purpose of destroying it utterly, thereby showing the Western world that Islam is as powerful as the pagan science of the West.
Ma sha'Allah!
The President actually paled three shades of color on national television. Every viewer with good color balance saw it. They also heard the White House press corps lob question after question the President could not convincingly answer, and they saw that, too.
"I want ail Americans to know that, while we cannot accept this threat at face value, neither do we dismiss it out of hand. That would be unwise. We have no hard intelligence confirming the existence of any so- called Islamic bomb. But I have ordered our early- warning missile-defense systems on the highest state of alert possible as a precaution."
Then the President stalked off to give the order, hoping he was in time to do exactly that.
through the original FBI reports of the arrest of the Deaf Mullah in the Abu al-Kalbin Mosque in Jersey City in the aftermath of the failed terror spree of three years ago when his computer alerted him of incoming mission-critical intelligence.
A fax intercept popped up at the touch of a key.
Smith read the Messengers of Muhammad warning of a nuclear missile called the Fist of Allah, and in one reading reached a firm conclusion.
There was no such missile, unless it was a war- surplus Scud. And for a short-range Scud missile to reach the continental U.S., it would have to be
launched from either Canada or Mexico, neither prospect very likely.
As for the Islamic bomb, it was also doubtful. M.O.M., most of its messengers of terror in FBI custody, was attempting to ratchet up the level of fear and anxiety among the American populace. Whether it worked or not depended upon how the media treated the story.
Smith went back to the FBI computer files, his gray
face frowning. The Deaf Mullah was in federal prison,
yet his followers were making no attempts to liberate him.
There had to be an explanation.
And Harold Smith was determined to find it.
The clerk at the car-rental agency in the Toledo airport proudly informed Remo Williams that his car was equipped with the latest satellite navigational system for his convenience.