We Are Holding the President Hostage (16 page)

"AN ELABORATE TRICK," the young man said, his
face pink with little puddles of natural red flush on either cheek. Ahmed
watched him with pleasure, thinking how well he had absorbed the lesson. Trust
few people. Trust only actions. Never words. He patted the boy's blond hair,
the texture soft and fluffy to his touch. An aberration in the genetic pool, a
blond Arab, product of some horny Crusader who had poked his way eastward in
the name of Christ, spoils, and pleasure.

"You think so?" Ahmed said, pouring another spill
of scotch into the tumbler and lifting it to the light of the single naked
bulb. Then he tipped the tumbler in the direction of the boy, who stood posing
against the wall in his tailored camouflage greens, a delicate hand poised on a
polished leather holster. My toy soldier, Ahmed thought, upending the drink as
he watched the flickering image on the television screen.

"They want us to think that," the boy said,
encouraged by Ahmed's air of approval. Ahmed smiled and poured again. He knew
that the news was true. By way of celebration, he told himself. At first the
news had stunned him. Then it had recalled to him an emotion he had not
observed in himself for years. Fear. Not a simple fear of death, but of
immensity.

Less than a half hour had passed since the news had flashed
over Beirut radio. It played constantly, plugging him into the outside world.
Prior to this new announcement, the killing of an American hostage had been the
only news of importance. Everything else had been repetitive. The killing had
annoyed him. It had removed him momentarily from center stage.

He had been listening with half an ear, his mind
concentrating on the process of inveiglement. He had planned to seduce the boy
as a diversion, had set him up for this moment, had plotted, as always when an
innocent was about to be initiated. Then this new announcement had exploded
into his consciousness, emptying him of desire.

Three quick shots of scotch steadied him. Yet he did not
wish the boy to see his uncertainty. Worse, he suddenly did not trust the boy
or any of the others whom he had spotted about the building. The legitimate
dwellers had long since fled.

The woman and her son had been placed in an apartment on
the third floor of a building in West Beirut. Men from his group lived above
and below the apartment. Others inhabited adjacent apartments, one of which he
used for himself.

He had organized everything in shifts, food preparation,
guard duty, time off. He had also devised a pattern to the captivity. Every few
days they would move to another building. Sometimes it would be for only a few
hours. The object was to keep moving in a pattern much like a child's drawing
in which lines were drawn in numbered sequence.

Most of the gunmen he chose from among the militias were
very young. Some, like the boy who stood before him, were barely sixteen.
Through the clever use of myth, ritual, and mystery, he had found that the
youngest were the easiest to manipulate. Thus, he could easily take full
advantage of the fanaticism that had been built into these boys from earliest
memory. Boys of this age had no concept of death and dying. They yearned for
martyrdom, assured by some crazy mullahs that death was merely an unpleasant
interlude between pain and paradise.

He had, of course, been ridiculed for his bungling of this
last caper. A woman and a child. Of no value. They wanted this Assistant
Secretary of State from America and would pay for none other. Even the Arab press
had demeaned him. But when they discovered the real value of this currency, he
would be catapulted to fame.

The value of the woman and the child had increased a
million-fold. He had in his possession one of the great political prizes of all
time. A mere exchange of prisoners was hardly fitting for such a prize.

"We must leave in a few hours," he told the boy.

"Because of that?" The boy moved his head in the
direction of the television. A short time ago, Ahmed might have permitted the
intimacy of truth.

"No," he lied.

"It is a trick. I'm sure of it," the boy said.

Ahmed smiled and patted the boy's head. He wrote down the
address of the apartment building he had chosen, a damaged structure a mile
away.

"You will reconnoiter and set up a new place."

"Yes, Ahmed."

Ahmed embraced him and kissed him on both cheeks, his usual
gesture of soldierly camaraderie, a subtle step removed from a more intimate
embrace.

When he had gone, Ahmed stepped into the corridor, where
one of his men snapped his AK47 into firing position, then slowly shifted the
muzzle. It had been his own instructions. Trust no one. The axiom of his trade.

He carried the portable television set with him to the
apartment where he kept the woman and the boy. He stepped inside and relocked
it from the inside, a precautionary step he might not have taken previously.
His weight made the barren wooden floor creak as he moved farther inside,
listening for the telltale signs of the chain links.

The apartment consisted of two rooms as well as a tiny
kitchen and a bathroom. The windows had been tightly boarded from both the
exterior and interior wall, with tiny holes for ventilation. The woman and the
boy were chained by the ankle to a pipe, with the links long enough to permit
them to reach their sleeping bags.

Compared to how it had been in Egypt, it was a
comparatively benign imprisonment. He had made sure the food was nourishing,
and access to the bathroom was allowed for a minimum of personal hygiene. The
rooms were barren. He did not trust beds or furniture. Pieces could be pulled
apart and used as weapons. He put the television set on the floor.

"Who is it?"

The woman's panicked voice came from the corner where the
sleeping bags had been placed.

"Mommy?"

"Only an old friend," Ahmed said.

His English had come from two years of high school and
American television programs. He had established, he believed, a workable
system of communication with the woman. Like all women, she was irascible and
sarcastic, and, of course, her disposition was not improved by her situation.
The child he had bribed with candies and comic books.

There was no point in holding back the news. In fact, he
was anxious to impart it. They were now colleagues of a sort, certainly
co-conspirators. He chuckled at the thought. American Mafiosa. The idea of it
had the ring of comedy.

He flicked the light switch. A bare bulb of weak wattage
lit the room. The woman stirred in the sleeping bag and sat up rubbing her
eyes. The boy opened his eyes and looked fearfully at Ahmed.

"It's all right, sweets," the woman said
soothingly. "Go back to sleep."

The boy looked at her tentatively, then, reassured, closed
his eyes again.

Ahmed squatted down and settled himself cross-legged beside
the woman, an uncommon gesture for him. The woman looked at him curiously.

"I have news," he murmured, smiling.

"You're letting us go?" the woman asked
expectantly.

"Depends," Ahmed replied, "on how your
father handles the situation."

"My father!" She unzipped the sleeping bag and
sprang upward like a missile released. She was sleeping in a man's shirt, which
served as a kind of nightgown.

"You've been a naughty girl," Ahmed said, waving
a finger at her. "Not telling me whose daughter you were."

"It was none of your business."

"I could have saved the lives of my men, plucked you
right off the parking lot of the Egyptian Museum. You, my dear, are the real
prize."

"All right, so you know," she said. She moved
around the room on her bare feet, as far as the chain would take her. Then she
turned suddenly. "Most men in your position would be paralyzed with
fright. My father is not a forgiving man when it comes to his family."

"So the world has discovered," he said with a wry
chuckle.

Her face expressed puzzlement. He debated keeping her in
suspense, then decided to plunge forward.

"He has taken the President of the United States
hostage."

"My father?"

"The Padre himself."

She shook her head in disbelief. A hysterical giggling
sound bubbled up from her chest.

"Oh Jesus," she cried.

"He has him in the White House. Along with the President's
wife."

"I can't believe it."

"You are welcome to see for yourself." He stood
up and plugged in the television set. It warmed slowly, then burst into light.
He waited while she absorbed the confirmation. It was clear in any language.
The hostage-taking of the President was the dominant theme of all the channels
he flipped through.

She paced the room as far as the chain allowed, then moved
back to where he was squatting, towering over him. His eyes met hers. "You
want to hear something funny? I kept saying to myself, he finds out, there'll
be hell to pay. Now I'll tell you something funnier. I don't think I'm as
surprised as I should be."

Ahmed laughed, a belly laugh, which grew in great waves
until his eyes began to glisten. The boy sat up and rubbed his eyes.

"It's all right, sweets," the woman said, bending
over him and kissing him on the forehead. He slipped lower down in the sleeping
bag and she kissed him again on both cheeks.

"He must love you very much," Ahmed said, wiping
his eyes on his sleeve.

"Not half as much as he must hate you," the woman
snapped.

"Does he seriously believe that you and the child are
worth the price of the President himself?"

"You don't know my father."

"Perhaps I will meet him someday."

"Oh, you'll meet him. One way or another. If I were
you, I wouldn't be making any long-term plans."

Despite himself, Ahmed felt a brief tremor of fear, which
rattled him for a moment and left him suddenly angry. It passed quickly. What
he must do is consider all aspects of the situation, especially the political
realities within the Arab world. As always, they would fight among themselves.
Some would see it in its true light, as a major victory, rejoicing, urging more
blood, hoping that the President would be blown away. Some would see it as a
standard to be matched, perhaps upstaged.

No, he decided, this was the summit of such action. However
they pushed the tide of terror further and further into the dark oceans of
intimidation and blood, few, perhaps none, would be able to match the reaction
he had achieved. He savored the sense of it, the exhilaration of owning power,
of manipulating events on the vast world stage. One could not characterize
these events as mere fantasy. He was not a puppet on a string any longer, to be
jerked and pulled to fit the design of others. He was the fingers now,
manipulated by his own brain.

"So what do you think you are worth?" Ahmed
asked. "To get you back. What should we ask for?" Yes, he thought,
enjoying the special irony of the collective pronoun.

"You will soon get something you didn't ask for."

He ignored her belligerence. "No. I am serious. You
know the man. Think what lengths he has gone to. It is beyond conception. The
boldness. The daring. What is in his mind?"

"That should be easy for a man like you to figure
out."

"A man like me?"

"A man totally devoid of moral scruples," the
woman said, her voice tinged with regret.

So her father's act had puffed up her courage, engaged her
hope. He smiled.

"If I were you," the woman said, "I would
just get us out of here and send us on our way."

"Good idea. Get dressed."

The woman looked at him warily, studying his expression.
Ahmed watched her run the gamut of uncertainty, warmed by her confusion.

"Now?" she asked, looking toward the boy.

"Now."

"We're going home?"

"That would be strictly up to your father. He will
decide."

I will decide, he silently corrected himself.

He did not move, but continued to stare silently at her as
her confusion increased. Finally she turned away, moved toward her son, bent
down, and shook him gently. Again he opened up cranky eyes and she managed to
get him out of the sleeping bag.

Ahmed watched her dress the child with a mother's care.
Briefly he thought of his own mother, her gentle touch, the soft cool lips on
his forehead. For a moment his thoughts drifted to another time, his childhood,
the billowing safety found between his mother's breasts. Often he had found
comfort there.

His gaze turned inward, explored another landscape, a place
where he had been before, narrow streets of pounded dirt, the smell of cooking
oil and sweat, raindrops on the roof of corrugated steel, the feel of the cold
metal of his first rifle. Where does the road to hate lead? Hate Israel. Hate
America. Allah had decreed his destiny. The door to paradise led through a
curtain of blood.

He had pushed such speculations far out of his mind. Until
now. They were wrong. All of them. Paradise was power. Of course. Allah was
merely the idea. He looked upward at the naked bulb and nodded.

Suddenly the woman's actions intruded. She had unbuttoned
the shirt. Now she removed it. She was totally naked, but she paid no attention
to him, as if he were some inanimate object. Her figure was full, high large
breasts, small waist, a thick bush of pubic hair.

Again she was flaunting herself, showing her contempt.
Arrogant bitch, he thought. Anger welled up inside him. Was this the prize? He
tried in his mind to calculate the worth of this woman, daughter of the Mafiosa
Padre. Hardly something so paltry as a king's ransom. She seemed to be
deliberately stalling, holding back, determined to show him her body, mocking
him. You fucking fag. Had he heard those words?

Then it came to him, what he should ask in trade for this
bitch and her boy. Black void for black void. All that must be done would be to
light the fuse. Perhaps he was not technically correct, but the image would
suffice. He chuckled. A very fair trade indeed.