“Mr. President,” the Libyan replied when the American had finished, “your terms are unacceptable.”
His advisers looked at him aghast, but Qaddafi ignored them. “I do not intend to substitute an American occupation of my brothers’ lands for an Israeli one. The terms of my letter were simple. I want Begin to renounce to the world and his people publicly and forever Israel’s claims to our lands. And then I want the Israelis to leave immediately their settlements and East Jerusalem. There is no need to extend my ultimatum for that. All that I have asked can be accomplished in one hour. No more.”
As his interpreter began to translate his words, Qaddafi’s circle of advisers erupted in protest. “You can’t do this,” Jalloud protested. “We’ve won. They’re giving us what we want.”
Qaddafi smashed his fist into the table. “Fool!” he shouted. “Have you no vision? It is a trick to lull us, to win time for them.”
The President was back on the Doomsday circuit again.
He spoke very slowly this time, his tone as void of emotion as his adversary’s had so often been. “Mr. Qaddafi,” he said, “understand this, I beg you. There are, at this moment, thirtytwo Poseidon missiles targeted on your nation. They can destroy every living creature on Libyan soil. I will give the order to fire those missiles, even if it means the destruction of the finest city on earth, if you have not agreed to extend your ultimatum and end this unacceptable attempt to blackmail another nation by eight o’clock tonight. I pray God, sir, you believe my words.”
The Libyan did not stir on hearing them. Nor did he choose to measure the horror and dismay they caused in the men around him as the finality of what they were heading to had registered on them.
“I cannot and I will not live in a world without justtice for my brothers,”
he answered. “I and my people are ready to die for the justice you deny us.”
His intelligence chief exploded at his words. “Nol” he shouted. “We are not. You have no right. You have no right to sacrifice us and our children, a whole nation, for this. You can’t go through with it.”
Qaddafi did not look at the man when he replied. His dark unfathomable eyes were riveted to some distant vision whose outlines only they could perceive.
“I can, my brother,” he whispered, “and I have.”
As Qaddafi lapsed into an impenetrable silence, a third of the way around the world in the city he menaced three men stared at a map of Greenwich Village. Al Feldman had held Angelo Rocchia and Jack Rand at his Sixth Precinct search headquarters as part of his mobile reserve.
“Something isn’t right,” he told them, studying the areas they had already searched. “We should have found the damn thing by now.”
Angelo shuddered. “Christ,” he said, “you don’t suppose I could have been wrong, do you?”
He was interrupted by a shout to Feldman from across the room. “Hey, Chief,” an officer called, “they want you on the amplifier to the other command post.”
Among the underground headquarters’ many communication circuits was a copy of the New York State Police’s intelligence network, and Feldman’s caller had just torn a routine allpoints bulletin from its Teleprinter.
“Chief,” he said, “they got a DOA up in Spring Valley. Suspected murder.
The guy’s an Arab and his ident is close to one of those guys we’re looking for.”
“Read it to me,” Feldman ordered.
The officer read:
“1532 Code 71 Caucasian Male discovered DOA, 32 High Farms Road by Spring Valley PD. NYSP Troop C, McManus IC, dispatched. Victim’s height approx. 5‘10”. Weight 185. ID given by Lebanese Passport 234671 issued Beirut November 22, 1979, as Ibrahim Abboud. Electronic Engineer born Beirut September 12, 1941. Entered USA JFK International Airport in December this year. Probable cause of death: violent assault. Hair: brown. Eyes: brown. Identifying marks or features: brown moustache. Tattoo inside right forearm of dagger, snake and heart.”
“Tattool Jesus Christ, did you say tattoo?” Feldman was shouting with excitement. “Get me that file the French sent us last night,” he screamed at Dewing. He rummaged through it until he found what he was looking for.
“That’s him!” he screamed. Everyone in the crowded top floor of the Six Precinct froze at his shout. “That’s one of the guys we’re looking forl”
At almost the same moment, Art Gelb of the Times was accepting a collect call from Las Vegas.
“Mr. Gelb,” came a distant and timid voice. “This is your Reno stringer.
I’m sorry it took a while to get the information you wanted about that guy McClintock.”
“Oh yeah, that guy in Safeguards out there. Some kind of chemical safeguards, I suppose.”
“No, Mr. Gelb,” the stringer replied. “He’s assigned to one of those hush-bush government-organizations that work in a restricted area out at McCarran Airport. It’s called NEST, for Nuclear Explosive Search Teams.
They’re meant to go out and look for hidden radioactive materials, stuff that might be stolen from a nuclear power plant. Eventually, even a hidden atomic bomb.”
The stringer continued, but Gelt wasn’t listening anymore. He had gone suddenly limp. Oh, my God, he thought, how they’ve lied to us!
The officer of the New York State Police Troop C in charge of investigating Whalid Dajani’s murder raced toward his squad car.
“Hurry, Captain,” his deputy shouted. “It’s an emergency.”
The captain grabbed the radio out of his hands, listened to Al Feldman a minute, then turned to his deputy. “Quick. Get that lady in there who saw them take off.”
Flushed and excited by her sudden prominence, Dorothy Burns was bundled out of her house and down to the squad car by two burly state policemen. Miles away, bursting with strain and excitement, Dewing and Feldman interrogated her in the chaos and confusion of their Sixth Precinct search headquarters.
They already had the time her call had been logged in by the Spring Valley police, 1532. From the overwrought woman they drew out two other vital pieces of information, a description of the man and woman she had seen running out of the house and the color of the car, dark green, in which they had raced off.
“It’s the other two!” Feldman said, listening to her. “It’s got to be.”
Bannion, Hudson and the CIA’s Salisbury were gathered around the Chief’s desk following the conversation. “Where the hell would they be racing off to?” Feldman asked the state trooper. “Are you near any big arterial highways up there?”
“Yeah,” the trooper replied. “There’s an entrance to the New York State Thruway about half a mile down the road.”
“In the direction they were going?”
Feldman looked at the men around him. “That’s it!” he shouted. “They’re taking off! They’re heading north before it explodes.” He turned back to the squawk box which linked him to the squad car in Spring Valley.
“Captain,” he yelled, “get a car up to the toll gates just as fast as you can drive! Try to get me a confirmation from the guys that collect the tolls that that’s where they went.”
The captain shouted an order. One of the three cars turned around and screeched off, its siren shrieking.
In New York Feldman shouted for a map of New York State. A dozen cops ran through the building looking for one. Finally a patrolman rushed up with an old Esso road map he had found in the glove compartment of his car.