Roarke dialed the New York number again.
“Hello.”
This wasn’t the voice he expected to hear. “Who is this?” Roarke demanded. He looked at his Treo. He’d dialed the right number, but a stranger answered.
“First, who are you?” came the reply from a very serious sounding man.
Roarke strained to hear the ambient noise in the background. There was a good deal of conversation and the distinctive wail of sirens.
“I’m calling for my friend who was supposed to meet me last night.”
“And who exactly is your friend?”
Roarke suddenly sensed that it was the kind of question a police officer asks, especially when the answer isn’t known.
“He’s a reporter for The New York Times.”
“Oh?”
A cop, he thought. “Michael O’Connell. What’s happened to him?”
“You say you’re a friend? What kind of friend?”
Roarke wasn’t sure he wanted to say quite yet. “Look, you’ve answered O’Connell’s phone. This is his number. You’re not him, so how about explaining who you are first.”
There was a slight pause, then the man spoke. “Coates — NYPD.”
Roarke knew the name. He strained to remember. Coates. Coates! “Detective Harry Coates.” Shit. That was a mistake.
The cop was caught off guard. “You know me?”
Roarke recalled that Coates was one of the investigating officers for the New York Police Department when it looked into one of Cooper’s killings during the campaign. He hit a brick wall with the CIA, but Roarke read the brief and knew a good deal about the 53-year-old policeman. Shit, shit, shit! Roarke said to himself and hung up.
Roarke’s number couldn’t be traced. In fact, it didn’t really exist, but he cursed at his stupidity. Something’s wrong. He needed information quickly. Davis can find out.
Komari was satisfied with the way that his men took pleasure torturing the Americans. Even Musaf Atef. The commander’s doubts about his lieutenant disappeared when he delivered a nose-breaking punch to one of the bound and gagged officers.
“See how the Prophet gauges our commitment? If we have the will to inflict pain on Taylor and his thugs, then we are prepared for our destiny: to liberate our land from the Christians.”
“Commander, the Americans will pay a great deal for their leader. Are you certain you want to kill him?” he said over the sound of the shelling.
“Atef, this is not a transaction. There is no monetary gain to be realized. This is fate. Ours and theirs. Listen to their bombs. Are they raining money?”
“No.”
“What kind of negotiations would we have?”
Komari didn’t expect a response. He didn’t get one. “What a shame our prisoners don’t understand the role God has given them. We have become a true army through their deliverance: truer still when we take the president’s head.”
The thought made Atef shiver. A quick death was one thing, but a traditional beheading — especially of the American leader — was another. He bravely called the decision to question. “Commander, should anyone ever find out how he died, they shall search us down to the ends of the earth. But if we execute him as a common criminal — the world will understand that. Our Muslim brothers would welcome us.”
Once again Komari saw weakness that worried him. Perhaps he should be put to the ultimate test. “The Qur’an says, ‘When you clash with unbelieving infidels in battle, strike and overpower them. Thus you are commanded. He lets you fight in order to test you.’ You are a reader of the Holy Qur’an, a true believer of the Prophet, Atef?”
“Yes, commander.” His pulse quickened in anticipation of what Komari was about to demand. “Then it shall be you who proves it, to me, and to all who are witness to your faith.”
Komari went to a hope chest he’d stolen from a fisherman’s wife. He opened it and extracted a long, beautiful ceremonial sword.
“Atef, you are a leader, are you not?”
He would feel one end of the sword or the other.
“There are far too few,” Duke Patrick proclaimed to the marchers — all 2.4 million of them. Another 46 million people watched on TV and listened on the radio. The speaker stood alone on a stage in front of the Capitol. The platform was decorated only with American flags — fifty of them. They waved in the background, providing an animated backdrop for the cameras.
Patrick hid his anger for Lamden and his hatred of Taylor. For now, he would be a statesman. One day soon he would have his revenge.
“Too few. Too few great generals — defenders of our freedom — have become commander in chief. Yes, George Washington, Ulysses S. Grant, and Dwight Eisenhower. But do you remember the others: William Harrison, Rutherford B. Hayes, James A. Garfield, Chester A. Arthur, Benjamin Harrison…”
The crowd sensed where he was going with his run of names. Applause began to build.
“…Andrew Jackson, Franklin Pierce, Andrew Johnson, and Taylor. Oh, but not Morgan Taylor — he was only a commander.” His line got a laugh. “I’m talking about Zachary Taylor. Twelve great men. Twelve extraordinary generals. Throughout our history, America has depended on men who are willing to lay down their lives for us. America has stood behind twelve exceptional military leaders in the past. We can make it thirteen! Are you ready?”
The crowd roared back with a booming “Yes!” that crescendoed across the Mall.
“Are you ready to send a signal to every city and town, every county, and every state that it is time for a new American revolution, the way the Founding Fathers intended…where the Constitution can be re-written?”
“Yes!” echoed the marchers.
“I’m ready, too!” That was Patrick’s personal ad-lib.
“Yes!”
“We are at the dawn of a new day. We have in our midst a different kind of man; a true leader; a real hero who can usher in a new era of greatness we, as Americans, deserve. Are you ready for that day?”
“Yes!”
“Did you see the dawning light?”
“Yes!”
“Are you prepared to welcome the future?”
“Yes!”
“Then I give you the man to take us there. Ladies and gentlemen assembled here…and to all Americans across the country, that future begins now with United States Marine Corps General Robert Woodley Bridgeman!”
Thunderous shouts filled the air as the general walked onto the stage. He wore a sharply tailored blue suit; his white shirt was set off by a bold red tie. Bridgeman fit in perfectly with the flags.
Duke Patrick shook his hand and hugged the general. The stage belonged to the man Elliott Strong catapulted to national attention, but in wake of the day’s news, he shared it with Duke Patrick. Bridgeman saluted and extended his arms in appreciation. The crowd cheered for another three minutes.
Elliott Strong watched a TV monitor on a bookshelf across the room and described the scene to his listeners as if he were there. He made special note of the injustice Patrick suffered and the way Bridgeman would correct it. And he smiled.
“The car is in front.”
“What?” Gonzales slid off a pair of earphones and turned down his Walkman. He was listening to Strong.
“We’re ready.”
“Thank you,” Gonzales told his man, Roger Alley, the former Ali Razak — the Miami man wanted by the FBI. “The rest of the suitcases are on my bed. Get them.”