The Fourth K (6 page)

Yabril looked at his watch, it would be another fifteen minutes. The van was going at moderate speed along the highway to the airport.

It was time to begin. He collected all the weapons and grenades from his cadre and put them in a suitcase. When the van stopped in front of the airport terminal, Yabril got out first. The van went on to discharge the rest of the cadre at another entrance. Yabril walked through the terminal slowly, carrying the suitcase, his eyes searching for undercover security police. Just short of the checkpoint, he walked into a gift and flower shop. A
CLOSED
sign in bright red and green letters hung on a peg inside the door. This was a signal that it was safe to enter and also that the shop would be kept clear of customers.

The woman in the shop was a dyed blonde with heavy makeup and quite ordinary looks, but with a warm inviting voice and a lush body shown to advantage in a plain woolen dress belted severely at the waist.

“I’m sorry,” she said to Yabril. “But you can see by the sign that we are closed. It is Easter Sunday, after all.” But her voice was friendly, not rejecting. She smiled warmly.

Yabril gave her the code sentence, designed merely for recognition. “Christ is risen but I must still travel on business.” She reached out and took the suitcase from his hand.

“Is the plane on time?” Yabril asked.

“Yes,” the woman said. “You have an hour. Are there any changes?”

“No,” Yabril said. “But remember, everything depends on you.” Then he went out. He had never seen the woman before and would never see her again and she knew only
about this phase of the operation. He checked the schedules on the departure board. Yes, the plane would leave on time.

The woman was one of the few female members of the First Hundred. She had been planted in the shop three years ago as owner, and during that time she had carefully and seductively built up relationships with airline terminal personnel and security guards. Her practice of bypassing the scanners at the checkpoints to deliver parcels to people on planes was cleverly established. She had done it not too often but just often enough. In the third year she began an affair with one of the armed guards, who could wave her through the unscanned entry. Her lover was on guard duty this day; she had promised him lunch and a siesta in the back room of her shop. And so he had volunteered for the Easter Sunday duty.

The lunch was already laid out on the table in the back room when she emptied the suitcase to pack the weapons in gaily colored Gucci gift boxes. She put the boxes into mauve paper shopping bags and waited until twenty minutes before departure time. Then, cradling the bag in her arms because it was so heavy and she was afraid the paper might break, she ran awkwardly toward the unscanned entry corridor. Her lover on guard duty waved her through gallantly. She gave him a brilliantly affectionate smile. As she boarded the plane the stewardess recognized her and said with a laugh, “Again, Livia.” The woman walked through the tourist section until she saw Yabril seated with the three men and three women of his cadre beside him. One of the women raised her arms to accept the heavy package.

The woman known as Livia dropped the bag into those waiting arms and then turned and ran out of the plane. She went back to the shop and finished preparing lunch in the back room.

The security guard, Faenzi, was one of those magnificent specimens of Italian manhood who seemed deliberately created to delight womanhood. That he was handsome was the least of his virtues. More important, he was one of those sweet-tempered men who are totally satisfied with the range of their talents and the scope of their ambition. Faenzi wore his airport uniform as grandly as a Napoleonic field marshal; his mustache was as neat and pretty as the tilted nose of a soubrette. You could see that he believed he had a significant job, an important duty to the state. He viewed passing women fondly and benevolently, because they were under his protection. The woman Livia had spotted him almost immediately on his first day of duty as a security guard in the airport, and marked him as her own. At first he had treated her with an exquisitely filial courtliness, but she had soon put an end to that with a torrent of flirtatious flattery, a few charming gifts that hinted at hidden wealth, and then evening snacks in her boutique at night. Now he loved her or was at least as devoted to her as a dog is to an indulgent master—she was a source of treats.

And Livia enjoyed him. He was a wonderful and cheerful lover without a serious thought in his head. She much preferred him in bed to those gloomy young revolutionaries consumed with guilt, belabored by conscience.

He became her pet and she fondly called him Zonzi. When he entered the shop and locked the door, she went to him with the utmost affection and desire, but she had a bad conscience. Poor Zonzi, the Italian antiterrorist branch would track everything down, and note her disappearance from the scene. Zonzi had undoubtedly boasted of his conquest—after all, she was an older and experienced woman, her honor need not be protected. Their connection would be
uncovered. Poor Zonzi, this lunch would be his last hour of happiness.

Quickly and expertly on her part, enthusiastically and joyfully on his, they made love. Livia pondered the irony that here was an act that she thoroughly enjoyed and yet served her purposes as a revolutionary woman, Zonzi would be punished for his pride and his presumption, his condescending love for an older woman; she would achieve a tactical and strategic victory. And yet poor Zonzi. How beautiful he was naked, the olive skin, the large doelike eyes and jet-black hair, the pretty mustache, the penis and balls firm as bronze. “Ah, Zonzi, Zonzi,” she whispered into his thighs, “always remember that I love you.”

She fed him a marvelous meal, they drank a superior bottle of wine and then they made love again. Zonzi dressed, kissed her good-bye, and glowed with the belief that he truly deserved such good fortune. After he left she took a long look around the shop. She gathered all her belongings together with some extra clothes and used Yabril’s suitcase to carry them. That had been part of the instructions. There should be no trace of Yabril. Her last task was to erase all the obvious fingerprints she might have left in the shop, but that was just a token task. She would probably not get all of them. Then carrying the suitcase, she went out, locked up the shop, and walked out of the terminal. Outside in the brilliant Easter sunshine, a woman of her own cadre was waiting with a car. She got into it, gave the driver a brief kiss of greeting and said almost regretfully, “Thank God, that’s the end of that.” The other woman said, “It wasn’t so bad. We made money on the shop.”

Yabril and his cadre were in the tourist section because Theresa Kennedy, daughter of the President of the United
States, was traveling first class with her six-man Secret Service security detail. Yabril did not want the delivery of the gift-wrapped weapons to be seen by them. He also knew that Theresa Kennedy would not get on the plane until just before takeoff, that the security guards would not be on the plane beforehand because they never knew when Theresa Kennedy would change her mind and, Yabril thought, because they had become lazy and careless.

The plane, a jumbo jet, was far from fully occupied. Not many people in Italy choose to travel on Easter Sunday, and Yabril wondered why the President’s daughter was doing so. After all, she was a Roman Catholic, though lapsed into the new religion of the liberal left, that most despicable political division. But the sparsity of passengers suited his plans—a hundred hostages, easier to control.

An hour later, with the plane in the air, Yabril slumped down in his seat as the women began tearing the Gucci paper off the packages. The three men of the cadre used their bodies as shields, leaning over the seats and talking to the women. As there were no passengers seated near them, they had a small circle of privacy. The women handed Yabril the grenades wrapped in gift paper and he adorned his body with them quickly. The three men accepted the small handguns and hid them inside their jackets. Yabril also took a small handgun, and the three women armed themselves.

When all was ready, Yabril intercepted a stewardess going down the aisle. She saw the grenades and the gun even before Yabril whispered his commands and took her by the hand. The look of amazement, then shock, then fear was familiar to him. He held her clammy hand and smiled. Two of his men positioned themselves to command the tourist section. Yabril still held the stewardess by the hand as they entered first class. The Secret Service bodyguards saw him immediately,
took note of the grenades and saw the guns. Yabril smiled at them. “Remain seated, gentlemen,” he said. The President’s daughter slowly turned her head and gazed into Yabril’s eyes. Her face became taut but not frightened. She is brave, Yabril thought, and handsome. It was really a pity. He waited until the three women of the cadre had taken their positions in the first-class cabin and then had the stewardess open the door leading to the pilots’ cockpit. Yabril felt he was entering the brain of a huge whale and making the rest of the body helpless.

When Theresa Kennedy first saw Yabril, her body suddenly shook with the nausea of unconscious recognition. He was the demon she had been warned against. There was a ferocity in his narrow dark face; its brutal, massive lower jaw gave it the quality of a face in a nightmare. The grenades strung over his jacket and in his hand looked like squat green toads. Then she saw the three women dressed in dark trousers and white jackets with the large steel guns in their hands. After that first shock, Theresa Kennedy’s second reaction was that of a guilty child. Shit, she had gotten her father into trouble; she would never ever be able to get rid of her Secret Service security detail. She watched Yabril go to the door of the pilots’ cabin holding the stewardess by the hand. She turned her head to exchange a look with the chief of her security detail, but he was watching the armed women very intently.

At that moment one of Yabril’s men came into the firstclass cabin holding a grenade in his hand. One of the women made another stewardess pick up the intercom. The voice came over the phone. It quavered only slightly. “All passengers, fasten your seat belts. The plane has been commandeered by a revolutionary group. Please remain calm and await further instructions. Do not stand up. Do not touch
your hand luggage. Do not leave your seats for any reason. Please remain calm. Remain calm.”

In the cockpit the pilot saw the stewardess enter and said to her excitedly, “Hey, the radio just said somebody shot at the Pope.” Then he saw Yabril enter behind the stewardess and his mouth opened into a silent “O” of surprise, words frozen there just as in a cartoon, Yabril thought, as he raised his hand that held the grenade. But the pilot had said, “… shot at the Pope.” Did that mean Romeo had missed? Had the mission already failed? In any case Yabril had no alternative. He gave his orders to the pilot to change course and head for the Arab state of Sherhaben.

In the sea of humanity in St. Peter’s Square, Romeo and his cadre floated to a corner backed by a stone wall, and formed their own island. Annee in her nun’s habit stood directly in front of Romeo, gun ready beneath her habit. She had the responsibility to protect him, give him time for his shot. The other members of the cadre, in their religious disguises, formed a circle, a perimeter to give him space. They had three hours to wait before the Pope appeared.

Romeo leaned back against the stone wall, shuttered his eyes against the Easter-morning sun and quickly his mind ran over the rehearsed moves of the operation. When the Pope appeared, Romeo would tap the shoulder of the man on his left, who would then set off the radio signal device that would detonate the holy figurines on the opposite wall of the square. In that moment of the explosions he would take out his rifle and fire—the timing had to be exact so that his shot would seem to be a reverberation of the other explosions. Then he would drop the rifle, his monks and nuns would form a circle around him and they would flee with the others. The figurines were also smoke bombs, and St. Peter’s Square
would be enveloped by dense clouds. There would be enormous confusion and there would be panic. With all this he should be able to make his escape. Those spectators near him in the crowd might be dangerous, for they would be aware of his actions, but the movement of the multitude in flight would soon separate them. Those who were foolhardy enough to persist in pursuing him would be gunned down.

Romeo could feel the cold sweat on his chest. The vast crowd waving flowers aloft became a sea of white and purple, pink and red. He wondered at their joy, their belief in the Resurrection, their ecstasy of hope against death. He wiped his hands against the outside of his coat and felt the weight of his rifle in its sling. He could feel his legs begin to ache and go numb. He sent his mind outside his body to pass the long hours he would have to wait for the Pope to appear on his balcony.

Lost scenes from his childhood formed again. Tutored for confirmation by a romantic priest, he knew that a red-hatted senior cardinal always certified the death of a Pope by tapping him on the forehead with a silver mallet. Was that still really done? It would be a very bloody mallet this time. But how big would such a mallet be? Toy-sized? Heavy and big enough to drive a nail? But of course it would be a precious relic from the Renaissance, encrusted with jewels, a work of art. No matter, there would be very little of the Pope’s head left to tap; the rifle under his coat held explosive bullets. And Romeo was sure he would not miss. He believed in his left-handedness, to be
mancino
was to be successful, in sports, in love and, certainly by every superstition, in murder.

As he waited, Romeo wondered that he had no sense of sacrilege—after all, he had been brought up a strict Catholic in a city whose every street and building reminded one of the
beginnings of Christianity. Even now he could see the domed roofs on holy buildings like marble disks against the sky, hear the deep consoling yet intimidating bells of churches. In this great hallowed square he could see the statues of martyrs, smell the very air choked with the countless spring flowers offered by true believers in Christ.