The Scorpio Illusion (75 page)

T
he highway from Dulles Airport was in shambles. Thirty-seven vehicles had piled up, smashing into one another as the fires from the explosion spread across the road, the result of the multi-punctured fuel tank of the destroyed limousine. Within minutes the sound of sirens and the deafening roars of helicopter rotors filled the morning air, joined shortly by the two-note screeching
nah-noahs
of the medical emergency units skirting both shoulders of the road to reach the casualties.

It was not only the death of the messengers from Tel Aviv, it was the end of their lives for twenty-two innocent men and women who wanted only to get home and to their families after arduous journeys. It was an obscenity born of a far more obscene conspiracy, born yet again years before by a child forced to witness the beheading of her mother and father in the mountains of the Pyrenees. Madness at 10:52
A.M
. on a bright summer’s day.

Bajaratt was close to losing her temper, if not her sanity. She could not get through to Senator Nesbitt! Instead, it was first a receptionist, then a subordinate secretary, followed by the personal secretary, and finally an aide to the senator himself.

“This is the Countess Cabrini,” said the Baj firmly. “I truly believe the senator wishes to speak with me.”

“He does, indeed, Countess, but unfortunately he’s out of the office. You must remember, Countess, the Senate’s in summer recess, and our schedules are not as rigid as when we’re in session.”

“Are you saying you cannot find him?”

“We’re trying, Countess. He might well be on the golf course, or visiting friends—”

“He has a housekeeper and a driver, young man. Certainly they know where he is.”

“The housekeeper knows only that the senator went out in the car, and the car’s telephone merely repeats that the owner has left the vehicle.”

“I find this quite intolerable. I wish to speak to the senator himself.”

“And I’m sure he would wish to speak with you, Countess, but if you’re inquiring about your appointment at the White House, let me assure you that it’s on the firm schedule. I have it here in front of me. You’ll be picked up at the Carillon hotel at seven-fifteen sharp this evening. It’s somewhat early, but just in case there’s heavy traffic.”

“You do reassure me. Thank you very much.”

Hawthorne pounced on the Shenandoah Lodge’s desk telephone. “Yes?” he said.

“It’s Palisser. I’m surprised I haven’t heard from you.”

“Haven’t
heard
? I’ve left a half-dozen messages!”

“You did?… That’s odd, you were cleared to reach me.”

“I know that; the operators said that. They told me each time they were sending my name down to you.”

“I never got it. On the other hand, the whole day so far has been a basket case. There was a foreign policy crisis, but with luck and a few threats we may have diffused it.… What happened with General Meyers?
Frankly, he behaved like an idiot during the conference. His answer to everything was ‘sweet bombs’!”

“What’s that?”

“Missiles that blow up selected targets housing the leaders on both sides—he was serious.”

“He’s more than that, he’s a confirmed Scorpio. We’ve got him on tape. He had information that could have come only from the Scorpio network. He’s one of them, there’s no doubt any longer. Trust me, I know. Take him, isolate him, put him under chemicals!”

“We’ve got something else too. A friend of mine in Israel, a colonel in the Mossad who thinks we’re riddled with so many leaks we’re a sieve, sent two of his people here with what must be vital information. He wouldn’t take such drastic measures otherwise. Let’s wait until they reach me, then we’ll move on all fronts.”

“That works for me. We’ll pull them all in and blow this bitch out of the sky.”

“What’s the bromide, Commander? ‘From your mouth to God’s ear’? Let us hope.”

As Hawthorne hung up the phone, the hotel television set was showing the carnage on the Dulles access road from a helicopter in the sky on the outskirts of the airport. Cameras transmitted pictures of burning vehicles, some suddenly exploding, charred bodies on the pavement, a tragedy beyond words.

The obese chief of immigration security felt the short, sharp impulses of his Scorpio monitor, excused himself once again from his quarters, and walked rapidly to the nearest public phone in the outside corridor.

“Number Fourteen,” he said, after pressing the digit litany.

“Number One here” came the harsh voice on the line. “Outstanding, Fourteen, well done. It’s all over the news.”

“I hope to hell it was the right couple,” said Scorpio
Fourteen. “I figured the fund-raiser for the Negev desert was the key.”

“It was. My source in Jerusalem gave it to me, and he’s a tough old bastard. If he could pop-gun this whole administration, he’d do it himself. I’ll reach him and give him the news. He wants what I want and we’re going to get the whole
enchilada
!”

“Don’t tell me, Number One, I don’t want to know.”

“You can count on it.”

Eight thousand miles away, on Jerusalem’s Ben Yehuda Street, a heavyset, barrel-chested man in his early seventies sat hunched over his desk, studying the contents of a file folder. His face was like leather, the creases deep, the eyes small and hostile. His constantly swept private telephone rang; if the caller was a member of his family, he would cut him off quickly, for that line had to stay clear, it
had
to.

“Yes?” said the old Israeli curtly.

“Shalom
, Mustang,” said the voice on the other end.

“Goddamn you, Stallion, what took you so long?”

“Are we secure?”

“Don’t start the foolish questions.
Talk.
”

“The messengers have been rerouted—”

“For Christ’s sake, you’re not in a wired bunker, speak English!”

“The couple’s limousine was shot to pieces, then blown up—”

“Documents?” asked the Israeli sharply. “Instructions, identifications?”

“Nothing could have survived the explosions, and even if anything did, it would take the forensic laboratories days to piece it together. It’d be too late.”

“Ah-hah! You have something
else
to tell me?”

“Word from our person at the Agency is that it will happen tonight. London intercepted the call.”

“My god, then the White House will be alerted!”

“No, they won’t. Our person short-circuited the in-channel information, and
nothing
goes outside that channel. As far as anyone here in Washington is concerned, the MI-6 operation never took place, or was aborted. Tonight is just another night.”

“Bravo, Stallion! Everything we wanted, no?”

“Thanks to you, Mustang.”

“A terror will spread across the world like a gargantuan brushfire! And if London and Paris are successful—may God in His wisdom permit it—the fires will become a global conflagration, and we, the
soldiers
, will again be supreme.”

“I said as much a short while ago. But it could not happen without your call to me, old friend.”

“Friend
?” the Israeli broke in. “No, we are not friends, General; you’re as big an anti-Semite as I’ve ever known. We simply need each other, you for your reasons, me for mine. You want your massive toys back, and I want Israel to maintain its strength, which we cannot do without America’s largess. When this is over and we trace the horrors to the Arabs in the Baaka, your administration and your Congress will open their coffers to us—for those who would destroy
us
have done this terrible thing to you, this horrible,
demeaning
thing!”

“We see alike, Mustang, and you’ll never know how grateful I am that you did call me.”

“Do you know
why
?”

“I think you just explained it.”

“No, no, not
that
why, the
how
before the why?”

“I don’t understand you.”

“That compromising intellectual Abrams, Colonel Abrams of the almighty Mossad,
confided
in me. Can you imagine, that so-called organizational genius thinks I’m on his side, that I want peace with the filthy Arab savages, simply because I was the greatest fighter in our country’s history, who now gives lip service to
the government idiots so as to keep my position and stay in the public eye.… He said to me, he said—and I swear on the Torah—‘The leaks are too deep, too copious, I can no longer trust our channels.’… So I said, ‘Who
can
you trust?’ and he said, ‘Only Palisser. When I was the military chargé d’affaires at the embassy, we spoke frequently, and I spent a weekend at his house on the seashore. We see alike.’… Then I told him, ‘Send couriers, two, not one, in case there is trouble, but only to see him. Make them engineers—
everybody’s
an engineer—and I have projects in the Negev, I’ll back you up.’… Like a hungry puppy, he yapped how marvelous it was, how creative I was. I
was
. Now his Senator Nesbitt from the state of Michigan is a nonissue!”

“Then you called me,” said the voice quietly.

“Yes, I called you,” agreed the heavyset old man. “We met twice, my
friend
, and I saw a man filled with hate, with a hatred that matched my own for not dissimilar reasons. It was an intuitive risk that I felt was worth taking. I spelled out the facts but drew no conclusions, you did that by yourself.”

“Your intuition was right.”

“Outstanding soldiers, especially battle-tested leaders, have a way of seeing into each other’s souls, don’t we?”

“You’re wrong about one thing. I’m not an anti-Semite.”

“Certainly you are, and so am
I
! I want fighters first and Jews second, just as you want fighters first and gentiles second! The temples and the churches are too often impediments.”

“Come to think about it, you’re right.”

“What will you do—tonight over there?”

“Stay close to, or perhaps even in the White House. After all, I’ll have to take charge very quickly, very firmly.”

“Is that where it’s going to happen?”

“Where else?… I doubt that we’ll talk again.”

“I should think not. Have a good day, Stallion.”

“Shalom
, Mustang.” General Meyers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, hung up the phone.

35

Angel Capell walked through gate seventeen of National Airport, passengers and paparazzi crowding her, shouting questions. She spotted the
barone-cadetto
and his aunt; they were taken by an airline official into a private office.

“I’m so sorry, Paolo! All this nonsense must make you very uncomfortable.”

“Everyone loves you! How can that make me uncomfortable?”

“It does me. My only consolation is that a month after the series is over, I’ll be a has-been and I’ll hear things like ‘Didn’t she used to be Angel Capell?’ ”

“Never
!”

Bajaratt interrupted, giving Angel the sealed document envelope. “Dante Paolo’s father does not want him to see the instructions until tomorrow.”

“Why not?”

“I cannot say, for I don’t know, Angelina. My brother has his brilliant ways and I do not question them. All I know is that I have business elsewhere, and Dante Paolo tells me he wishes to go to New York tomorrow morning to see you and your family.”

“If you will permit it, Angel,” said Nicolo questioningly, his eyebrows together in fear.

“Permit
it? Holy moly, that’s terrific! I got my folks a place on a lake in Connecticut. We can all go up there
for the weekend, and I’ll show you an actress who can cook, noble guy!”

The airline official who had escorted them into the room suddenly opened the door. “Miss Capell, we’ve been in touch with your studio and they agree. We have a private jet that will fly you to New York; it will be much simpler and you won’t be bothered.”

“It doesn’t bother me being bothered. Those people are my audience, mister.”

“Well, they also keep leaving their seats and fill up the aisles while in flight.”