Passport to Vengeance

http://www.amazon.com/Margaret-Raymond/e/B006MZUHUA

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PA$$PORT to VENGEANCE

Margaret Raymond

The central situation of prejudice and corruption in this book is based on a situation the author lived through in the 1980s and finds revolting. Except for the pretty romances. They're true, too.

***

To Mou Maggie

***

PROLOGUE

On the night Zeki al-Khafouli nearly lost a kidney, he came close to having sex for the second time in his life. Later he remembered only the sight of Susan’s firm little breast and the feel on his palms of her round, bare buttocks under her skirt.

Something hit his head, then his back just over his right kidney. Susan’s voice came from far, far away; “Daddy! Sorreee...”

The one-man gang who beat him up was Henry Ohrbach; twice Zeki’s age, twice his weight, and the girl’s father. He had a sixth sense for horny women, and a temper so violent he was widely known to black out when aroused.

Zeki was stupid about America and Arab to his soul.

PART I

Chapter 1

“For Counts One through Three, fourth-degree felony child molestation, thirty thousand dollars each.” The prisoner, a fragile-looking youth with dark hair, whirled wide-eyed toward the onlookers. He wore a white dress shirt and black slacks, an Arab uniform on the Cal State campus. He favored one leg when he moved. The crest of a yellowish bruise reared brightly above the collar of his shirt and across his throat.

“For Count Four, second-degree felony sexual congress with a minor child, also thirty thousand dollars. Your bail is set at one hundred, twenty thousand dollars, Mr. al-Khafouli.”

The prisoner found the eyes he sought. A tall man in the same uniform rose and gestured peremptorily. The prisoner turned obediently to the justice and the tall man slowly resumed his seat.

“Do you wish to make a statement at this time, Mr. al-Khafouli?”

His accent was dense: “I do not understand this, sir.”

“Do you understand our process of bail, then, Mr. al-Khafouli?” the justice asked.

“I think so, sir.” It sounded like “tink.”

“That is enough. You may post bail and be released until your trial.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“Next case.”

In the back of the room Dierdre Roarke looked for, and was unable to detect, irony in either man’s tone. As a pre-law student she knew that total bail for child molestation was limited to thirty thousand dollars. She was shocked; Justice Burnham was intimidating the prisoner. She would do something.

Two deputies came forward to escort al-Khafouli to his cell, passing a line of shackled vagrants and drunks. At the door the boy paused a last time to look into the crowd. Dierdre had never seen such unmixed terror.

A middle-aged man in a gray double-knit suit and flaring sideburns rose, nodded formally to the justice, and left. The deputy at the door nodded deferentially. A man in corduroy pants with a little notebook joined the prisoner’s friend, talking quietly. The other man answered with a sharp, negative jerk of his head. His expression was controlled; his hands were white-knuckled fists. A vein throbbing across his temple was visible across the room.

The Gold County courthouse was small-roomed and ill-smelling, old and cheaply remodeled. It offered, by way of compensation, corners and oddly shaped nooks which held candy machines and a sort of privacy. Dierdre left the room to think. Last week Justice Burnham had released an incestuous father of a six-year-old girl on his own recognizance. Two weeks before that, he had given a child rapist bail set at one hundred dollars. Both offenders were Anglos. Idly she pushed a couple of quarters into the candy machine, changed her mind and called them back. “Shit,” she said. She remembered the look on the boy’s face. ”Shit,” she said again.

When the prisoner’s friend emerged from the hearing room, Dierdre was waiting. This time she noticed his looks; dark, sharp-boned and bearded. A bail-bondsman accompanied him. She walked over quickly, her red hair swinging and her green eyes big with purpose.

“You can’t go bail yet,” she interrupted. “The amount is illegal, and there’s paperwork to do in order to reset it.”

She had been loud. The bail-bondsman stopped talking and stared at her.

The tall man bent slightly to hear her. “I beg your pardon?” His voice was deep, his accent intriguing.

“The justice set such a high bail to delay your friend getting out of jail. If we move right now, you can get him out by tonight for only three thousand dollars.”

“Zeki is my brother.”

“Come with me,” she ordered, and moved toward the Recorder’s Office. The man did not follow. “You don’t need a bondsman yet,” she called, because she saw that he was still dealing. She headed back. “Listen to me. I’m studying law, and I can help your friend. Your brother. He’s being railroaded on this bail thing, and you need me.”

The man turned her and seemed to notice her fully. He inventoried her, red hair to dirty running shoes, noncommittal. “I’ll be with you in a moment, Miss.” He turned to the bail-bondsman. “Is this lady correct?”

“I guess so, sure. But you won't lose money either way, Mr. Kafooli.”

“But I will lose time, and my brother will remain in jail another night. I will also lose the use of one hundred seventeen thousand dollars.”

The bail-bondsman's eyebrows went up; he was all innocence. “Yes.”

The man with the notebook emerged from the hearing room and listened. “Are you a friend of the prisoner?” he asked Dierdre, nodding toward the others as they talked.

“No. I just want to help.”

“You may have trouble doing that. Do you know the girl in the case?” Dierdre shook her head. “That was her dad in the plastic suit. Heavy.” Dierdre nodded that she understood. The man before her was of an age, with wavy brown hair swept from a broad, freckled face. He had a wrestler’s compact body.

“Are you from The Chronicle?”

“Yes.”

“This isn't the usual hearing, is it? I mean, I only came here for a class, so I don’t actually know.”

“Like I said, it’s heavy. Call me if you need help. Maybe a little attention won’t hurt, later on.” He moved off.

“What’s your name?” Dierdre called.

“Ask for Gary. The news editor.”

The bail-bondsman followed him out, throwing Dierdre a look.

The tall man was thoughtful. From the pocket of his silk shirt he pulled a long-filtered cigarette and lit it with a gold lighter. When he finally looked at Dierdre, it was another inventory-taking, so frank that she couldn't feel offended.

“My name is Khamis. That means Thursday in Arabic,” he said, and released a baleful, head-circling cloud of smoke. “I do not need you.”

“Your brother does, or you'd have a lawyer with you right now. And you wouldn't waste your time talking about that ridiculous bail.”

Khamis dipped his head to concede her point. “True. I do not know American jurisprudence.” He drew again on his cigarette. “It has made me very angry. It is complex and dirty; I do not think I want to know a system like that.”

“Complex, yes. Sometime dirty, sometimes not. Today it’s dirty. Do you always speak so nobly?”

“Forgive me for being abrupt, miss. My brother disappeared last week and I have been worried for him. Not until last night did your police tell me where I would find him. He is injured. He is a prisoner, no doubt to Middle Eastern politics at second-hand.” He paused and lowered his defensive cigarette. “Will you help me as an interpreter of it? Of this procedure of bail?”

“I’ll do as much as I can.”

They stood in the stuffy courthouse hall while she recited the steps they could take to help his brother. People passed them, eventually crowding them against a wall. Twice Dierdre repeated each legal step and described the rules. It became obvious that Khamis did not follow what she said.

“This isn't working,” she told him as he searched for another cigarette. “Come with me.” He stopped fumbling. “Please.” He half smiled. Dierdre blushed.

She took him to The Bakery; he was Arab, and The Bakery served Turkish coffee. He ordered it brewed without sugar, then ignored it, hunching forward with his elbows on the tabletop. His height dwarfed the booth. His legs had trouble finding space.

He began, “What do you mean, ‘go bail’ and ‘railroaded’? Are they taking him somewhere? Why don’t I need a bail bond?” He pulled a third cigarette from his pack and restored it with great concentration, waiting for her answer.

“How long have you been in this country, anyhow?”

“Four, no, four and a half years.”

“Student?”

He paused, seeming to translate not her words, but her motive. “Finishing my dissertation. Macroeconomics: The Interface of Islam and the West, Its Cause and Cure.”

“You’re teasing me.”

“Aggressive women make me bold in turn.”

“Don’t you know what I’m talking about? Really?”

“I may have an accurate idea, but only you can tell me that.” He leaned back again, his unlit cigarette cocked and his elbow on the table.

“What about your brother? Zeki? Is that his name?”

“What about him?”

“When did he arrive?”

“In January.”

“In mid-term? Why?”

“So I can look after him.”

“Big job for another student,” Dierdre remarked, and added another packet of sugar to her coffee.

“Many American men with families seem to accomplish it.” His face was so expressionless that it might have been carved, so guarded that even its bony elegance became a statement of suspicion.

“Talk,” she demanded. “Say it.”

He thought it over. “You are a female, a student of law.” Dierdre nodded. “Are you going to be a lawyer?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

Dierdre shrugged. “Why not?”

“How old are you?” Khamis asked.

“For heaven’s sake, what’s wrong? Why don’t you trust me?”

“I simply wonder why you want to do this. Do you want to save the world from your country’s injustice? Does my brother remind you of someone you love?”

Dierdre took a deep breath, thought, and sighed. “I want to help your brother. He’s being discriminated against.” She looked Khamis over, mocking, offended by his scornful “your country.” and deliberately imitating his survey. Broad shoulders, narrow hips. Eyes to drown in. Swift, economical movements. Crazy-gorgeous. Acted older than he was, too cautious. Suspicious. Irksome. But with overtones of shy friendliness and gratitude, something in the way he held his head when he spoke to her. It was infuriating. She said, “You know English all right, but not we Americans. We're noted for our generosity. Our idealism. At least, us common folk.”

Khamis remained doubtful. “I have studied English since I was seven years old. And women nearly as long, in Europe, at home, and now here. It is apparent, however, that you have no Arab studies at all.”

“Is that a crime? Does being inexperienced with Arab men prevent me trying to help that kid?”

“Not if that's all you want.” His answer was a shade too swift to be courteous.

“Of course it is.” She looked into her untasted coffee. The colors in The Bakery had become vivid; their outlines were ultra-sharp. Khamis's hand, long-fingered and elegantly shaped, was tanned; dark hairs lay across its back. He wore a gold watch; gold, not brass, very foreign. She said, “It's true I have no Arab studies. I’d like to learn, given the opportunity.”

Khamis relaxed into his seat and finally took some coffee, watching her with one fine eyebrow cocked. “You are not alone,” he said.

“I don't understand.”

“Many American women want to learn. About Arab men.”

There was no mistaking his tone. Dierdre rose, grabbed her purse and left, slamming the cafe door and stamping into the street and around the corner toward her car. She was aware that he followed, that he paid for the coffee, that he ran to catch her. He was there when Dierdre reached her Colt, leaning against it with folded arms, grinning widely through his absurd patriarchal beard, playful and charming in a complete about-face.

“What is your name, Miss?”

“Get out of my way!”

“Certainly. But tell me your name, please. I want the name of everyone who hates me.”

“I don't hate you, I'm angry at you. At your ingratitude and your dirty insinuations. Get out of my way.”

He remained rock-solid against the driver’s door, still grinning. “You owe me for your coffee.”

Her fury flared and solidified. She told him, “Your scorn for Americans means more to you than your injured brother's release from prison; I want nothing to do with you. Now, step away from my car.”

Khamis's grin dissolved. He straightened, appalled. “Is that how you see me?”

“Of course. I offered you my help. I saved you a hundred thousand dollars. You insulted me in return. You haven't even thanked me.”

He was abject, flushed, remorseful. His words came awkwardly, but they came. “I apologize.” Distress thickened his accent. “Truly. Sincerely.” He started to leave. “I am an ass. I won't bother you.”

“You were,” Dierdre affirmed, but didn't move. He hesitated. “All right,” she said, “Apology accepted. Meet me at the Recorder's office. Bring cash, three thousand dollars and a little more.”

“The Recorder's Office? Across the hall from where we were before?”

“Yes.”

“Will that take care of the charges against Zeki?”

“It will get him out of jail until he has a trial. If he doesn't leave Gold County before the trial, you'll get your money back. The law assumes you'll want it badly enough to keep him here.”

“I see. He can't go to Barstow before the trial?”

“He can't go to Barstow until the trial. Especially if he's in jail. You'd best hurry.”

“Or Blythe? Needles? No big-city night spots?”

Dierdre finally understood that he was teasing her; it seemed they were to be friends. “Will you do it? He can’t go to Barstow at all if he’s in jail.”

“Your logic is persuasive.”

“And you are a pain in the ass. My name is Dierdre.’

“DD?’

“Dierdre.”

Chapter 2

“Dierdre walked slowly toward the courthouse. It was a cool day, a desert springtime with the scent of greasewood coming into leaf. She could see the scrub at the end of the street where the town stopped, sloping dark-khaki green toward rock hills washed blue in the late morning light. A breeze lifted the hair from her shoulder and pushed some of it across her cheek. She felt freer than she had in a long time; leisured. She sat on a bench under a Salt cedar where she could watch the courthouse parking lot.

“Miss,” she heard, and looked up. It was the man from The Chronicle, Gary. Nice face. Mid-thirties. Light brown hair and freckles. He stood with both hands in the back pockets of his cords. “Have any luck with that boy?” he asked.

“Not yet. His brother’s gone for some money. Why?”

“Something you ought to tell him and his little brother when he gets out. There’s no way to keep this out of the paper. Even if there’s nothing to write a story about, the police log has to be printed.”

“Oh.”

“They’re Arab, and they hate this sort of thing being public. It reflects on their families.”

“I didn’t know that.”

“Mind if I sit down?” He sat angled to the street and rested an elbow on the back of the bench. “I didn’t think you did. I see a lot of it. Arab kids like to study here; the Desert Ag courses are popular, and engineering. When they get into trouble, they yell at me about publishing their names. There’s nothing I can do about it; it’s the law.” He seemed sorry. Dierdre said nothing. After a minute Gary asked, “So you just saw this kid and offered to help?”

“Yes. He seemed so frightened.” Dierdre crossed her ankles and clasped her hands into her lap, prim.

“He’s in trouble. The girl he knocked up is only sixteen, and her shit-kicking daddy runs the bank.”

Dierdre relaxed against the bench with an exaggerated sigh of relief. “Then there’s no trouble! His brother told me Zeki only got here last month.”

Gary stopped reaching toward a branch over his head, his fingers still touching the lowermost needles. Slowly he let his arm fall. “No kidding?”

“Yes, no kidding. It must have taken them some time to get acquainted before they went to bed. And unless she’s in the habit of getting pregnancy tests, she wouldn’t know so soon.” She paused to take in the rest of what Gary had told her. “Only sixteen?”

“Yes, and with an influential father. He beat the boy up pretty good, but he’s still mad.”

“Didn’t the girl tell him it wasn’t Zeki?”

“I don’t know; I guess not. I just talked with the deputies. They say they have a confession.”

“Oh, Lord.” Dierdre stared at her clasped hands. “Four felony counts.”

“Yep.”

After Gary left, Khamis drove up in an old, silver-gray TransAm. When he unfolded from it he saw her and gave a short, backward tilt to his head. It was a greeting, . He joined her on the bench and Dierdre explained about the public notices. Khamis didn’t like it but he nodded, sitting with his elbows on his knees and his head dipped to concentrate. “Does he want money, do you think?”

Dierdre was puzzled. “Money?”

“All right, does the publisher?”

Dierdre understood. “Jesus. That’s bribery, and you’d only antagonize them. They’d put your name all over town if you tried.”

Khamis took that in. “All right, I understand. What else?”

“Zeki’s girl friend is pregnant, and the police have a confession from him.”

Khamis’s head jerked up. “Impossible,” he said.

“That’s what I told Gary, the editor of the newspaper. It’s unlikely that Zeki’s the father of that child.”

Khamis was furious though, or losing control; there were tears in his eyes. “Not unlikely, impossible! I know my brother!” With a slap he struck the branch Gary had touched. Needles showered onto his head. “The boy is innocent! Zeki is not a shy man--I think I mean a prude--but he is pure! Old-fashioned! And he only met that girl a week before he disappeared.”

Dierdre used her gentlest, most reasoning, tone. “Yet she could be pregnant from him.”

Khamis glared at her. “Not from Zeki.”

“Then why would he confess to those crimes? Four of them?”

“I don’t know. I don’t think he would, unless your American police used their overfed American muscle. They seem the sort of men to be easily bought.”

Dierdre was finally, personally, shocked. “You despise us.”

“Wouldn’t you?”

It was Dierdre’s turn to consider. “Maybe sometimes I do,” she confessed, and looked out to the street. “I haven’t thought about it.”

“Then you are as young as you look. Think about it,” Khamis advised. “When you have, let me know. I’m going to show you how Arab men deal with crooked police when the odds are even.”

“Don’t talk petty vengeance.”

“I’m not.”

Chapter 3

Zeki shot out of jail and into Khamis’s jubilant embrace. The brothers shouted and capered on the sidewalk, chattering in Arabic, until Dierdre became self-conscious at the attention they attracted. A stout woman in a flowered dress wanted to pass; she held her white purse close to her chest.

As they drove to dinner the brothers continued to talk. They were loud and spoke fast; Zeki’s hands blurred in expansive gestures. Often Khamis checked Dierdre in the rear-view mirror. Zeki’s attention was exclusively for his older brother.

They went to a steak house with white napery and plastic crystals scattering the lights. An excited giggle caught in Dierdre’s chest. Khamis ordered, then spoke to Zeki in Arabic with many gestures toward Dierdre. Zeki, listening, took her hand. His eyes darted between them. Champagne came, and oysters.

Khamis stopped talking. Zeki still had Dierdre’s hand; the pressure hurt her fingers. “I owe you my freedom, lovely lady,” he claimed. “I am your friend for your whole life. Ask! Anything! If I can do it and live, I swear to you that I will.” His deep-set eyes were passionate with sincerity.

Dierdre tried, but could think of nothing to say that would match his tone. She retrieved her hand and picked up an oyster. Khamis had not begun to eat, so she set it down. She folded her hands on the rim of the table, then moved them to her lap, still folded. She leaned forward. Still she had no words, only her idiot grin.

“A toast to Dear-druh Roarke,” Khamis finally said, and Dierdre drank.

Zeki asked personal questions; how old was she? did she have children? A husband? Why was she not with her parents? She described her studies in law; he wasn’t satisfied. Khamis said something in Arabic, curt because he saw that she was embarrassed. Zeki’s eyebrows rose. “But you are so beautiful that you could be married!” Her giggle rose like a bubble. The champagne and the success of her first legal effort blew it into laughter.

A blond, sideburned businessman across the room turned to look. He saw Zeki and frowned. It was the man from the hearing; the father. Her laughter stopped.

Khamis glanced across the room and turned back grim. “Your would-be persecutor is here,” he told Zeki.

“Excuse me?”

“The girl’s father,” Dierdre told the boy. “He’s to your left, against the back wall. What’s his name?”

Zeki flushed. “Mr. Henry Ohrbach.”

Dodging his brother’s arm, he rose and limped to the man’s table with his hand extended as if in friendship. Dierdre could not see his face as he bent over the other table, or hear what he said.

The father’s flush deepened and he shook his head. Zeki said something more, then shrugged and made as if to turn. As he did, his hand struck the man’s drink. A colored spot spread across Ohrbach’s shirt. Zeki turned again, as if in apology. Another glass overturned, another splotch spread across the shirt. The father half rose and was pushed back by the chattering, gesticulating boy as he grabbed a napkin and began mopping the man’s chest. With his other hand Zeki beckoned anxiously to a busboy. Dishes clattered; flatware fell. Ohrbach’s companion, a dark, mustached man with a paunch, rose to wave Zeki and the busboy away. Still apologizing, still mopping, Zeki stood his ground. Another glass fell. By this time, most of the diners in the restaurant were watching.

“Khamis, we’d better get out of here,” Dierdre said.

He was already reaching for his wallet. He tossed some bills to the table and helped her out of her seat, grinning broadly. “Wait for me at the door,” he said. “This will only take a minute.”

Dierdre went to the lobby and watched from behind a pillar. Another glass fell and the portly man, standing, looked down in disbelief at his sopping trouser front. Zeki still chattered and gestured, but now in the midst of a growing cluster of waiters and busboys. Khamis’s long arm reached between shoulders and caught his brother. There was another small crash; Zeki emerged triumphant. The brothers were at Dierdre’s side, then out the door.

“Friends of yours?” the hostess asked.

“Never saw them before.”

They just made it into Khamis’s car and to the street before Ohrbach and his friend appeared at the restaurant door. The brothers’ laughter was as jubilant as it had been outside the jail, but Dierdre’s was louder. As she dissolved into it she realized she’d felt personal joy since she had first spoken to Khamis.

Chapter 4

They went to the al-Khafouli apartment near the university campus. Dierdre was surprised by its luxury and European taste. Mahogany tables held crystal vases with fresh flowers. The upholstery was silk. Oriental rugs were everywhere. There were few pictures, mostly delicate line drawings on wide mats in neutral colors. Dierdre’s jeans and running shoes were, suddenly, peasant wear.

Zeki cooked while the others watched. Khamis leaned against the kitchen sink with his arms folded. It’s his job,” he explained, but Dierdre caught Zeki’s quick, negative look.

He asked questions about what Ohrbach found that night, then the beating. (“...nothing! I swear it! We were clothed! We were...[many gestures]...you know...but...)

Dierdre ate olives at a large, Formica-topped work table and refined Khamis’s questions for what she hoped were legal points. The dining area was beyond a wide arch at her back. Disconcertingly, in view of the western-style living room, al-Khafouli family photographs were hung at the juncture of wall and ceiling, draped beneath red streamers and over a strange flag. Loquacious, expansive, Zeki gestured with a wooden spoon or his cigarette and stirred lentils, sliced a cold leg of lamb from the refrigerator. The brothers were temperamental opposites, but the crowded kitchen heightened the contrast. Zeki was small, quick and hyper; Khamis was tall, still and deliberate. Dierdre searched for an adjective and produced “dignified.” He watched his younger brother attentively, but scarcely moved. He spoke only to clarify a point.

Ohrbach’s blows had been concentrated between Zeki’s knees and shoulders; a professional touch. The beating continued after he lost consciousness, because he didn’t remember receiving his injuries. When he woke a doctor was stitching his groin. He mimed waking with painful clarity, using unnecessary Arabic words. Dierdre watched and winced. He had two broken ribs, many contusions, and a damaged kidney. He needed further treatment. Curiously to Dierdre, he expressed little outrage at the beating. “It was what I deserved,” he declared, “for what I would have done to Susan. Although, I swear to you I thought she was a woman.”

“Susan sent him a letter,” Khamis supplied.

“Speak English, Zeki,” Dierdre prompted. “I can’t help if I don’t know everything. What did it say?”

“I don’t remember all of the words, mou Deard.” He hesitated, put out his cigarette and looked for another. “Sorry; ‘mou’ means mother.”

“I like it. Call me ‘mou’.”

“Well,” he went on as he lit the cigarette, “she asked me not to tell the truth. She said the father of her baby will die by Mr. Ohrbach’s hand.”

“Jesus. So you haven’t.”

“No.”

“Jesus. Go on.”

“There is nothing more. He tried to kill me; if he learns it is a baby by another man, who knows? Maybe he will kill his daughter, if he thinks she is...loose? Is that the word?”

Dierdre took an olive pit from her mouth and lined it neatly on the table against three others. “But he’s destroying your chance for an education in the U.S. He has your confession, and you’ll be deported.”

“What’s confession?”

Dierdre was dumbfounded; Khamis answered in Arabic.

“Oh. But that is not what I did.”

“The police say differently,” Khamis told him, “and it appears that is all Mr. Ohrbach needs.:

“All he needs to deport me? That I admit I only that I would take what was offered to me?” Zeki demonstrated his disbelief with open palms beside his shoulders. His nearly-dead cigarette dropped a long ash onto the floor. Khamis slowly crushed and smeared it with the toe of his shoe, frowning. He said nothing.

“What do you mean, ‘I admit I wanted to take,’ et cetera?” Dierdre asked. “Is that all you confessed?”

“Absolutely.”

“Did you sign a paper saying that? Did you read it carefully?”

“Oh, sure.” Zeki gave his brother a quick glance. “Of course, my reading in English is not so good. Not so good as Khamis’s.”

“Tell us about signing,” she ordered.

By now she realized that Zeki loved to tell a story. He began, chain-smoking as he chopped onions and lettuce or rechecked the lentils and rice. By the time he finished, she was pacing into the dining room and back to the kitchen, her fists jammed into the waistband of her jeans. She had forgotten Khamis.

A policeman had come to Zeki’s hospital bed with another man, the one with Ohrbach at the restaurant. The man explained - too folksy, Dierdre thought from Zeki’s description - that everything would be simpler if Zeki just told the policeman what made Mr. Ohrbach so angry. Zeki has complied, groggy and eager to make peace. Susan threw a party, came on to him, and finally took him to her bedroom. He did not see Mr. Ohrbach--the boy’s only form of reference to her father--during the evening.

The policeman took notes and left. The other man stayed to chat. He’d spent time in the Arabian Gulf, he said, and he thought he understood a little about how things were done in the Middle East. Not everything, of course; but in many ways the West could learn from that part of the world. If a disagreement arose between families, they got together, a satisfactory solution was found, et cetera. Too bad it wasn’t the same here, but with patience and a reasonable attitude.... The policeman returned with a typescript for Zeki’s signature.

“Did the policeman say anything when he came back?” Dierdre asked. She stood on one foot, the toe of her other shoe wrapped around her ankle, ungainly as a stork and with her hands still balled into her waistband. Zeki thought, starting another cigarette as Khamis held the lighter.

“No.”

“Nothing about attorneys, or ‘You have the right to,’ or anything like that?”

“No, mou Deard.”

“He never spoke?” Zeki shook his head. “Was he the first cop you saw?” Zeki nodded. “How long was the typing? Several pages, or only two or three?”

“Several.”

“And you skimmed it - read through it quickly - and signed it?”

“Yes. So did Mr. Randall, the other man.”

“Randall? Randall witnessed your signature?” Dierdre set her other foot on the floor. She finally recognized the fat man in the steak house. She turned to Khamis. “Brace yourself. The bastard who framed your brother is the county sheriff.”

Chapter 5

That was Tuesday. Zeki was arrested Wednesday for vagrancy. He was walking to the doctor’s office. Khamis found Dierdre in the library reading a book about Islamic law. Once having got her, he ignored her; she ran to keep up. As he held her door open, though, he saluted a pair of dark-haired students.

“Who are those men?”

”Brother Arabs.” He waved to them again as he drove by. After a few blocks he said, “Thank you for coming.”

”No problem.”

“Should we go to the same office as before?”

“No, to the sheriff’s office. In the basement of the same building.”

Once there, he covered her hand with his. “It is good of you. Really. I think you must be a very good person.” A little smile broke through his beard. “For an aggressive American woman.”

“You had to say it,” she smiled, and squeezed his hand.

They got Zeki released by noon.

Thursday Zeki was given a ticket for littering. American money confused him, so he never carried it; he was put into jail as a vagrant again. Khamis got Dierdre as she left a computer class, and she spent the rest of the day with the brothers after Zeki was freed. For lunch, Zeki heated lentils and rice and topped them with lettuce and yogurt. He squirted the mess with lemon juice. It was delicious.

Zeki was a wizard with computers. Dierdre helped him do homework in language, and he gave her his paper on advanced data retrieval.

All during her stay she was aware of Khamis; his location, his posture, his expression. She would raise her eyes and catch him watching her, his horn-rimmed glasses sliding down his narrow nose, his lap covered with forgotten research into the Arab League. It was a warm day of flies buzzing against window screens. Arab disco music, played low at her request, colored Dierdre’s memory of that afternoon for days. None of them mentioned police harassment, there was no need. They drew as close as those under siege.

Friday Zeki declined to walk - or rather, limp - anywhere off-campus. Dierdre realized that Khamis didn’t know they needed a lawyer. She made an appointment with the town’s liberal attorney.

Saturday she stayed home so she could listen for the phone as she studied. She was in cut-offs and a T-shirt, halfway through a beer, and Khamis rang the doorbell. He was elegant in tailored slacks and Italian loafers. He carried a lot of long-stemmed red roses.

“For service above and beyond the call of pity,” he intoned.

Dierdre stood in the middle of the room feeling shy and unable to speak, so she looked silently at the flowers he put into her arms. There was an awful, an inexplicable, rush of tears. Khamis stood formal, stiff, uncomfortable and foreign-looking. He left without saying goodbye.

“Oh, Christ.”

She shoved the roses into a vase and got into the shower to calm down.

The bathroom door opened; she yelped and peered around the curtain. Khamis’s hand placed more flowers, carnations, on the floor. “I am sorry if you don’t like roses,” he called. “I’ll wait out here.”

When she emerged, relieved and still amused, he was brewing coffee in her kitchenette. She leaned against the doorway and watched his economical movements until he became aware of her.

“Next time I’ll telephone first,” he said.

He wanted to kiss her; Dierdre knew it. But he smiled instead, and as soon as the coffee and conversation reestablished their comfort together, he left.

Sunday Dierdre was writing a practice brief when Zeki called her with an invitation to dinner. She wore a dress to make up for Saturday’s dishabille. Zeki, though, was unshaven and in a bathrobe, and Khamis wore a long gown that looked like a nightshirt. A thobe, he called it.

The men knew about the squad car parked around the corner, and practiced cursing in Arabic to amuse her. Dierdre tried using pita bread instead of a knife and fork, and they teased her when she spilled her food. Zeki described his first and only sex, with a prostitute in Egypt’s salty Lake Moeris, bawdy and sly. He told the story with significant pauses and much obscene body English and Dierdre’s laugh, which had disappeared during the week, found its way back. She stayed that evening until after ten. As she shivered in the doorway Khamis draped his red and white khufilla around her shoulders. “It’s yours,” he said. Dierdre looked to Zeki for amplification.

“Arab women use the scarves that way too,” he told her. Dierdre pulled it tight and strutted a little past the squad car.

Monday was quiet. Dierdre went from class to library to class, and wrote another practice brief and a short opinion.

Tuesday she called the brothers but got no answer.

Wednesday morning Khamis called before breakfast. He was in jail he would tell her about it later.

Dierdre dressed in a flash and was at the police station right afterward. As she shoved bail money under the grille to the desk sergeant, she asked him what had happened.

“Your tall friend got pushy with a deputy, ma’am.”

“Why? What happened?”

“Well, his little brother was getting another ticket. Your friend sort of lost control.” Soberly he used a receipt stamp on a paper. “That’s what I heard, anyway. A couple of his fellows held him down, or he’d have taken the deputy’s head off.” His mouth was held tight; he disapproved of Khamis.

“Is his brother in jail too?”

“Yes. He was only jaywalking, but he threatened the officer. Had to bring him in.”

“Sure.” She shoved more cash toward the sergeant. “You’d better get him for me, too.”

-$-

“I’ll burn this place down! I’ll burn down every stick of it!” Zeki shouted as he got to the street. “God curse this town!”

Khamis, quiet but barely contained, was so angry he jerked as he walked and had trouble speaking. They stopped at the corner.

“This way,” Dierdre said, and tried to lead them to her car, but the furious brothers ignored her. “The car’s this way,” she said again. Zeki stood looking at the squat jailhouse wing with black hatred, rooted in place. His diatribe continued in loud Arabic. Khamis had his hand on Zeki’s shoulder as if to hold, or calm, him. Dierdre realized the boy was no longer afraid of the American police, but that rage like his was too intense; it would find a dangerous outlet. “I’ll get the car,” she said, and did. The drive to the TransAm was silent.

Khamis got out and leaned through the passenger window to thank her.

“We’ve got to talk,” she told him. “I’ll follow you home.”

“I think now. I’m too angry to be polite.”

“Exactly. And Zeki is so mad he might do something dangerous. I’ll follow you.” Khamis looked at, then, past her, his long forearms hanging into the car. His face was unreadable.

“Khamis, is Zeki innocent of rape? Really?”

“Yes.”

“Why was he sent to you? Why must you watch him? Because that’s what you told me you must do.”

Pause. “He has not always been innocent.”

Oh. Dierdre stared at the dashboard while her brain whirred through potential meanings. “Is he a thief?”

Another pause. “I believe not.”

“But you don’t trust him.”

“I want to.”

“What did he do? Where?”

“A westerner would not understand. It happened in Egypt.”

“It’s politics, then.” No answer. “Khamis, you’re too mad to be smart. We have to make plans before we get into real trouble.”

“You always say ‘we,’” he remarked.

“Us, then.”

He studied her. “Are you completely sure?”

Dierdre didn’t even think. “Yes.”

Later she called the liberal attorney from the al-Khafouli apartment to report the harassment. He said they’d better come right over.

Chapter 6

David Friedman had a large reputation and Dierdre was eager to meet him, but her enthusiasm dimmed when she entered his messy office. Short, thin, pot-bellied, with sloping shoulders and dark hair gone wispy from forehead to crown, he offered a limp handshake when they met. She secretly dried her palm against her skirt.

They sat in low chairs around a littered coffee table. Friedman asked formal questions about addresses, ages and backgrounds. His voice was high. A nasty little man, Dierdre decided. But he surprised her; he looked at her directly and said, “I’ll get the judge to appoint me as Zeki’s lawyer. Technically the kid has no income of his own, so he’s entitled. I was born on a kibbutz; the court will expect me to hate him. Save him money. Agreed?”

“Fine,” Dierdre said, then remembered it wasn’t her decision.

The questioning resumed, going for a narrative from the night of Zeki’s beating. Zeki was tense and deferential; Khamis was quiet, occasionally nodding encouragement.

Dierdre wanted to get to the harassment. Friedman took notes in a tiny, crabbed hand or rubbed his nose with the back of his hand, so noncommital, so busy, that she squirmed. He spoke without raising his eyes, shifting his notes from his knee to the chair arm and back to his knee. When they got to the hospital scene with the sheriff, and Friedman still wrote methodically, his eyes steadily on his legal pad, Dierdre said, “Frame. Right?”

“No witness,” he observed without raising his pen or his gaze, and kept writing.

Khamis eventually got to the scene in the steak house. Friedman’s face finally assumed expression. His mouth twitched and he glanced up. Still, no comment.

When he finished, he stared at his notes. The others waited. The silence stretched so long it became merely quiet, then boring. Dierdre looked around. Used tissues were everywhere; on bookshelves, dictating equipment, on Friedman’s desk among piles of books. One poked above his waistband, white against pink-striped oxford cloth. Without surprise she found another wedged into her own chair between the cushion and the arm.

Friedman spoke to Zeki.

“Trouble, kid. Susie Ohrbach’s a nympho and they say she had an abortion just last fall, but we can’t use that.” Zeki sat straight and nodded solemnly, hand holding hand between his knees. Dierdre knew he hadn’t understood. Friedman thought before he continued, reached for the tissue at his waist, blew dryly and put it back. “You made a couple of stupid mistakes. Her daddy’s big and you made him look small in public. You signed a confession. In a small-time, bigoted, shit-kicking, wrong-headed, poky, incestuous, nosy, boring college town. In America, where your daddy and mommy can’t help you.”

“I know, sir,” Zeki said. Dierdre made a mental note to find out who, or what, Zeki’s daddy was. Friedman went on.

“And you offered to bribe an officer of the law. Twice. I got all your records yesterday. God knows what you tried last night in jail.”

“You offered money to a cop?” Dierdre asked, big-eyed.

Zeki was acutely embarrassed. He said, “I didn’t know it is a crime, mou Deard. It was Monday, the day we didn’t talk to you.”

Dierdre turned to Khamis. He shrugged. “He won’t do it again.”

“No! I swear it!”

“You won’t do shit, kid,” Friedman said in his squeaky voice. “You’ll move your things on-campus away from the cops, and you won’t go off till the trial, or I’m not your lawyer.” He lifted his eyes from his lap to the boy. “Understood?”

“Yes, sir.”

“You explain it, Ms. Roarke. See you next week, same time. I’ll talk to Ohrbach.”

Chapter 7

It was a freaky-hot day for March: the air buzzed with cicadas and rimmed the trees with a yellow light. As Dierdre, Khamis and Zeki left Friedman’s office, Gary Phillips descended the courthouse steps and angled across the street to intercept them. He didn’t look for traffic; away from the university, Tipperton had none. Dierdre liked the smile he sent ahead. He still wore cords and still needed a haircut. He went straight to Zeki. His broad shoulders disguised his considerable height; he towered over the skinny boy, a folksy Father Christmas.

“Mar habbah,“ he said, “I’m the news editor for The Chronicle.“

Zeki was confused. “Mar habbah, sir.“

“They’re going to shaft you, kid. Can I sell you a little news coverage?”

“Not sell, he doesn’t mean that,” Dierdre interpreted.

Gary ignored her. “I find your name on the docket so often I can make it front page.”

Zeki glanced from Phillips to Khamis and back, his hands jammed into his waistband. “What sort of news coverage do you sell, please?” he asked.

“Just something to make Randall back off. An editorial, maybe, if it’d sit better with you.” Gary turned to Khamis. “I thought you might like to take a breather, and a little light on this hanky-panky would goose our errant public servants into rectitude. Might get to Ohrbach too, indirectly.”

“What did he say?” Zeki asked the air.

Khamis enunciated carefully. “Do you think Zeki’s case would be helped by publicity from your newspaper?”

“A tad. Couldn’t hurt. Throw a little dust in their eyes.” Phillips’ own eyes had become crinkled at the corners.

“I do not want my name on your front page,” Zeki said.

“Right. I can see that.”

Khamis thought; looked at the sidewalk, at Dierdre, at Gary. “I dislike saying it, but go ahead. You are probably correct. Also, this excellent lady seems to trust you.”

“Good.”

“But she has taught me the American form of bribery. Yours could come Friday evening, when you bring your wife to dinner at our home. Meet some of our friends.”

“I couldn’t ask for more. Friday’s great.” Phillips stuck out his hand. “Gotta catch a hearing. Call me.” He ambled off. Khamis watched him and at the same time, with supreme nonchalance, but his arm across Dierdre’s shoulders. She blushed and felt silly, but leaned into his side.

“I don’t believe I heard that,” she said, looking up at him.

“I like him.”

“If you say so,” Zeki told them. “I don’t know what he said.”

Dierdre explained. “He was teasing you. About your very good English.”

-$-

Friday’s newspaper contained an editorial about police and deputies harassing university students, especially foreign students who brought so much money to Tipperton and Gold County. In the adjacent column was an op-ed letter to the editor about the Court’s indifference to minority concerns. It was signed with a Mexican surname. The layout seemed effective, and Dierdre was gratified.

“I’m surprised he didn’t mention Zeki directly,” Khamis remarked as they shopped for the dinner.

“You’re a cynic,” Dierdre told him.

-$-

She brought Zeki from his coed dormitory for the dinner. He jabbered all the way. “These girls! They roam the halls in their underwear! And believe me, mou Deard, underwear is not enough! Just when I sit down to study...” His hands described them, caressing the air with desperate, aggrieved horniness. The whites of his eyes fairly flashed.

“You led a deprived childhood,” Dierdre told him. He seemed to take her seriously. “Close the door when you study.”

“I would remember what I saw!”

“Take a soapy bath. Hack; you’re on the net.”

“Hack? Go into someone’s computer?”

Bingo; his eyes grew dreamy.

-$-

Three Arab students, Mohammed, Riad and Abdul, attended the dinner. Gary and Candy Phillips brought a big zip-lock bag of fresh mint from their garden, which delighted Khamis and Zeki. Candy surprised Dierdre; she was a fierce-eyed, dark beauty in her mid-thirties, flamboyantly dressed, and with a controlled intensity of speech. She seemed the last person to attract the casual, laid-back style of her husband.

The women served from casseroles on a mahogany buffet, then sat at the formally set table and listened. The talk went from world politics to Middle Eastern affairs. From there it progressed to local corruption, then, as the Arabs became easy with the strangers, to Zeki’s case. Finally everyone was talking about justice - and revenge. The mood got heavy despite Gary’s efforts to keep the discussion abstract.

“Listen,” Candy finally said. “You crazy Ay-rabs gotta get mad, not even. Let us Americans teach you something there.” Khamis’s friends had tried to ignore her; not only did she drink the beer she and Gary brought, she seemed to have no feminine reserve at all. “You see,” she went on, “what you want to do is make life miserable for those bastards. Honey, you remember how we got Mark Chappell?”

Gary grinned and took a sip of beer. “It was gorgeous,” he said. “Candy’s idea. I didn’t learn about it till later. Mark Chappell was the County Attorney, a carpetbagger from L.A.” He turned to Zeki. “Taking advantage of less sophisticated people.”

Khamis nodded.

Candy took over. “Chappell balled a Superior Court judge’s wife and a couple of other Tipperton socialites. I use the adjective advisedly. The judge is a good man, a friend of ours.”

The Arabs were disapproving - but titillated - by a woman’s mention of sex. Gary tactfully continued. “Know what they did?” he asked, looking around the table. Zeki, anticipating and grinning, shook his head for the rest of them. He leaned forward. “Put busted red rubber balls everywhere he went for a couple of weeks. Worked like a charm.” He leaned back in his chair.

Dierdre understood first, then spluttered into her tea. “Where did you put them?” she demanded.

Candy answered. “We got them into his home. You know, his underwear drawers, his car seat, glove box, the toilet tank, under his pillow. We got help; his office chair and files and things were stuffed with them. Christ, the man couldn’t even order a hamburger after a while without finding a deflated, flabby little red rubber ball, and...”

For some moments there had been a growing disturbance from Khamis’s end of the table. Now he laughed aloud, so hard that he rose to leave, but stood laughing helplessly, holding the back of his chair for support. Zeki joined him, then everyone else, hooting and uproarious, doubling up and banging fists against their knees, the table.

“Gary, I am in love with your wife,” Khamis finally gasped.

They took it from there and included the women. They concocted elaborate, ridiculous plots with abducted pets and bogus missing persons, death rays and echo chambers, phony bank accounts and shadowy forms half-glimpsed in alleys.

It later seemed to Dierdre that despite the laughter and table-slapping, it was the most serious part of the night. Hands flicked and jerked, glances just failed to meet or caromed off one another. Khamis lounged with his cigarette like a presiding officer at the head of the table and seldom participated, but each suggestion was referred to him with a glance. Even Gary Phillips did it. Dierdre remembered tales of Turkish courts and pictured Khamis there, the sinister power behind the throne.

Gary was declaiming. “It’s got to be untraceable. Non-violent if possible, and completely untraceable to us.”

Candy had become even more animated, even flushed, and her beauty incandescent. “Absolutely,” she agreed.

“NO!”

Zeki jerked it out. The others paused; a new note had entered the foolery. Dierdre squirmed.

“Those men must know that we did this to them.”

“It’s got to take their power,” Mohammed agreed, and Dierdre turned to him with protest on her face. Very white teeth flashed in his square face, but he was not smiling.

“They must be helpless, like children, when we have finished,” said Abdul. “They must never be able to do this again.”

“They must be taught respect!” exclaimed the beak-nosed boy names Riad.

“Just frighten them,” Gary admonished. “Be reasonable.”

“Terrify them!” demanded Mohammed.

“Humiliate them,” corrected Riad.

“Destroyed!” Zeki insisted, with such intensity that his voice cracked.

Any pretense of lightness was gone. He collected himself. “Those men must be destroyed,” he repeated.

Silence. Gary lowered the front legs of his chair to the floor. “Hey! Lighten up, little buddy,” he finally said. “We’ll get ‘em. Won’t we, Khamis?” He studied the older brother. “Yeah. I guess we will.” He looked around the table. “Anybody want to change the subject?”

“I don’t think so,” Khamis said.

Dierdre was appalled. “Excuse me,” she said, and left.

On the living room balcony the night air poured down her bare arms and across her throat, welcome. Silly; she was tear-choked, frightened, because for the first time she realized the man she was beginning to love was prepared to go a very long way for revenge. She turned to watch what she would of the dining area. Beyond the half-lit living room, Khamis and two of the students were brightly lit. They were raising a toast. Zeki’s voice said, “To Mr. Henry Ohrbach and Sheriff James Randall; may they live to suffer long.” Khamis nodded solemnly and drank.

She turned away and looked over the little town to the star-silhouetted mountains in the north. They looked very solid; she watched until they grew and blotted out the night and awareness of the frightening people behind her. She became nearly calm.

Khamis’s footstep vibrated through the floor and Dierdre braced herself to say something definitive, something to prevent madness and yet let her remain his friend. Instead, “This won’t work, Khamis,” she told him. “You’re too intense, and I’m too pacific. It’s been fun.” Her voice broke as she turned to go.

“Fun? Only fun? You’re telling me goodbye?” He made a movement to prevent her, but stopped short of contact. “Not without talking with me! Not without me knowing why! No, stop.” This time he took her arm. “Just for a minute.” Dierdre hesitated. He said, “Give me a reason I can understand, and to explain to my brother.” His hands went to her shoulders. No matter what you may think of me, you can’t deny your fondness for Zeki.”

She shook her head. “I’m fond of the rascal. I feel close to both of you.” Khamis dropped his hands and after a moment she went on. “I don’t’ know how to put it; I have to leave before there’s damage done. I love the law. I study it so I can help people to get justice. But revenge is not justice. You and Zeki want revenge.”

Khamis walked to the balcony rail. He looked absently down the street, drumming his fingers on the wrought iron. “Yes, we want vengeance,” he admitted. “We understand that your sheriff is at the command of Tipperton’s commercial interests, and especially of your banker. We understand, too, that for us and all the other minorities who stay here, there will never be justice. So we want to get even. If we did not, it would indicate a lack of pride and self-respect. Do you understand that?”

“Intellectually, yes.” Dierdre joined him at the rail.

“But your American feelings don’t agree.”

“Right. I am law-abiding on principle and from conviction. While Gary, Candy and I were playing games, you and the others were making actual plans to destroy people who are important in this little place. It’s not a very nice place, or important to many people, but...”

Khamis said, “I agree; it deserves better. It deserves impartial government, impartially administered. Better law enforcement. Better officials.” Dierdre nodded. “When do you suppose it will have those things?”

She shrugged. “Not so long as Ohrbach commands and the police obey. I know; I don’t defend it.”

“Of course not.” Khamis gestured toward the apartment. “We can’t permit the indignities to our people. Your people shouldn’t either, but as foreigners we can’t act for them. If we can make justice for ourselves, we will.” He brightened. “But not by playing childish tricks, Dierdre. Not by placing toys in embarrassing places.” He chuckled.

Dierdre, made safe by abstraction, might have waxed eloquent about citizen revolt through petition, recalls, maybe neighborhood watch campaigns. She didn’t get the change; Khamis took her in his arms for the first time. “My Dierdre’s afraid of our silliness,” he said, and kissed her hair, then her face, and was laughing when his lips found her mouth.

So she dismissed her speech, and kissed him back, and tried not to overreact to her own joy and triumph and craziness. Then she rejoined the group and contributed to the game.

Chapter 8

Which helped make it a successful dinner party, but made Dierdre’s early, still-panicky leave-taking awkward. “My Dierdre,” she kept hearing as she drove, although Khamis hadn’t said it again.

She was nearly home before she realized that she was being followed by the sheriff’s patrol car. Driving with extra care about turn signals and lane changes, trying to remember just where the gerrymandered city limits began, and with one eye at her rear-view mirror, she made it safely to her usual parking spot on the street. The deputy parked behind, hailed her, then took nearly an hour to inspect and search her car. He finally gave her a warning about low tire tread.

Next morning she was given a parking ticket while she bought groceries. She’d parked too far from the curb. When she drove home, a patrol car waited down the street and the man in it watched her. “Damn,” she muttered, and re-parked to get nearer the curb. Leaving the motor running she got out to see whether she was clear of the red zone, then eased the car forward a few inches. When she got out again the deputy saluted her from behind his windshield. It was the officer from the night before. When she drove to the library he followed her again, up to the campus gate. An hour later she left by another gate and got home alone.

She wanted to tell Khamis, but didn’t call because of her lingering mistrust of involvement. She didn’t see him until they met at David Friedman’s office, Monday. She wore a beige suit, though; Khamis’s taste. The patrol car followed her.

Friedman had no news, except that Ohrbach would not talk to him. “I spoke to his attorney about the girl, Susan. She’s in family counseling because of this case, but she’s still pregnant. She may get an abortion.”

“Sad,” Zeki said.

Dierdre had become fine-tuned to Zeki’s poorly expressed thoughts through weeks of trying to understand his English. With a rush of affection she realized that his one word, spoken half to himself, expressed genuine depth of sympathy for a little girl who lost her youth and might lose her child.

“You bet,” Friedman agreed. “She may come out of it all right, though. Her daddy doesn’t know, but she’s spending a lot of time at the Family Center. Paints there, and the therapists look at the pictures. Candy Phillips, the newsman’s wife, is a painter. She volunteers. I understand you know her.” Then blowing his dry nose and writing in his finicky hand, he instructed Zeki to gather character references, especially from the professors. And yes, Gary and Candy Phillips might be good references, even though they barely knew him. Winding up, he asked whether there had been any more problems with the police.

“There’s a patrol car around the corner waiting to follow me home,” Dierdre said, deliberately avoiding Khamis’s eyes.

Zeki gave a start.

“How do you know?” Khamis asked quickly.

“Uh-hm,” Friedman said at the same time.

“He’s been with me since Friday night.”

“Any direct contact?” Friedman asked.

“One warning Friday night. One parking ticket Saturday, then he waited for me at home.”

“Uh-hm.”

“Were you frightened?” Khamis demanded.

“Sure.”

For a moment his face looked the way it did over the bouquet of roses, crumpling, baffled. “You didn’t call me.”

“I didn’t want to bother you.”

Friedman interrupted them. “The police are within the law. You’ll have to keep cool. And be patient.” He sized her up, then turned to include the others. Dierdre’s news had upset Zeki; he fairly bounced in his seat with outrage, his hands gripping the arms of his chair. Friedman continued. “The cops here may be cretinous, but with the outstanding leadership available to them in the person of the sheriff, they can be amazingly productive of generalized gloom and despair among the citizens.” He set down his notes and linked his hands across his chest, leaning back into cushions to declaim. “When it comes to ingenuity, Tipperton’s deputized schmucks can think up more ways to raise hell with the average decent, law-abiding, tax-paying, cop-fearing citizen than is dreamed of in your incipient philosophy, cuteys. Keep cool.” He addressed Dierdre directly. “And re-read the California Motor Vehicle Code.” The appointment was ended.

Khamis took Dierdre’s arm and, without speaking, led her to his car. Silently they drove Zeki to the campus, then went to her apartment. They still hadn’t spoken. He took the key from her hand, opened the door for her, and ushered her to the couch.

“Sit,” he ordered, and entered the kitchenette.

“You’re angry,” Dierdre said after a while.

“Of course.” He was making tea. She picked at a pillow tassel beside her. She could see him at work, rummaging for a tray, finding cookies.

“Why?” she finally asked.

He brought the tray to the coffee table and sat in a chair. “You needed help and didn’t let me know. That makes me angry.”

Dierdre continued to fiddle with the tassel. Khamis poured tea. Dropped and spoon and replaced it. Loosened his tie and rolled his cuffs.

“All right,” he said after half her tea and one cookie were gone. “You only talk well for others.” She finally looked at him. He continued. “I’ll be gone in a year. You’ve been hurt before. This business was supposed to be an adventure, nothing serious, no personal involvement.”

Dierdre made a move for another tassel, reconsidered and folded her hands in her lap. Her eyes focused on a print across the room. “That’s pretty close,” she admitted.

“You won’t be bothered by the police any more. I swear it. But what will you do about the rest of it? The affair al-Khafouli?”

Dierdre breathed deeply. “Oh, Lord, Khamis. I don’t know. I don’t know what you want; how can I say what I’ll do?”

Khamis’s voice became low, with such tenderness that Dierdre suddenly ached to laugh, or cry. “But you know what you want, don’t you, Dierdre?” She would never tire of watching his face, of studying the expression around his mouth, the tender skin stretched across his temple, the depth of his eyes. “And you won’t say it. Some aggressive, liberated lady you turned out to be.”

Quickly Dierdre knelt beside his chair before she could change her mind. “Say it for me, Khamis; I need help. I’m telling you now. Please.”

“I love you, too, Dierdre,” he said, and reached to touch her face.

Chapter 9

Lunching back and forth with Dierdre and the al-Khafoulis became routine for Candy, but Gary could attend only at dinner. They were at the brothers’ apartment two Fridays later.

“It’s the damnedest thing,” Gary said. He was finishing some early melon, waving and waggling his fork as he talked. The others, Dierdre, Zeki and Khamis, were finished and listening. “Looks like Sheriff Randall’s in for a long siege of investigation. At least that, if not something more serious. A couple of patrolmen are singing like sparrows, coming up with dates and times for harassment. Even,” and he leaned forward eagerly, “some paper!”

“Admitting they harassed people?” Candy demanded, and referred a look of doubt toward the others, who frowned soberly back. “Admitting to false arrests? Roughings-up? Why admit to such petty things? And how come the sheriff’s deputies are responsible for arrests in Tipperton? Aren’t they County men? I mean, the least that will happen is that they’ll lose their jobs.”

Dierdre agreed. “Maybe lose their whole careers. And accusing Randall! Not that I don’t actually like it. I was mad enough to kill.” She fingered her necklace, a chain simple and heavy enough to obscure the fact that it was solid gold; a gift from Khamis. It was so valuable that she still touched it to be sure it hadn’t vanished.

“And I also am surprised,” Zeki solemnly agreed. “It is a terrible, foolish thing for a policeman to do.”

“What’ll it do to Sheriff Randall?” Candy wanted to know. She rose to clear the table. She was exotic in soignée velvet from the Thirties.

“Let me, Candy,” Zeki said. “You are my guest.” He took the plates.

“But you look so much like a little waiter in that white shirt! I can’t allow it.” She took them back. Khamis smiled; only Dierdre saw it. Zeki sat.

“As to the County men giving tickets inside of town,” Gary said, “have you ever looked at our city map? It’s like a little desert flower, with petals sticking out at every angle. But if the deputies’ evidence can prove Randall gave orders to harass people, even if it doesn’t put him into jail, it’ll do him in come election time.”

“Misprision,” Dierdre said. “It’s a sort of dereliction of a public duty. All the authorities need is his signature on something, like a memo. Or even a note to himself. Anything.”

Khamis, smiling, said, “I understand from Mr. Friedman that they found one this afternoon.”

“Really?” Candy drawled.

“Officer Murphy, whom you remember, was obliging enough to drop a note from the sheriff out of his pocket. In Counselor Friedman’s office.”

Gary came to attention. “From Sheriff Randall? How did Friedman get him to do that?”

“What did it say?” Candy asked.

Zeki, concentrating on Candy’s clinging blue gown, said, “Let us say the note mentioned my name, and some dollar amounts.” He gave Khamis a sidewise grin.

Gary glowered around the table. “Is it a phony note?” he finally asked.

“Apparently not,” Khamis said. “Of course, the sheriff must have a private financial accounting somewhere as well. It might be found among his files. If the authorities choose to look, of course.”

Gary was riled, confused. “How do you happen to know so much? All of you?” He shoved away his plate. “Candy?”

She smiled. “Simple, love. I was here when Khamis got the call from David Friedman. I had to help cook.”

“Candy...”

His gorgeous wife did a charming, possibly ingenuous thing; she lifted her right hand, which held a dirty cup, and swore, “Innocent, darling. I promised you, after the Mark Chappell thing. And as Khamis just said, finding the sheriff’s accounts is only a possibility.”

Gary said, “But they’d be dynamite. There’s no rational way to write...”

Khamis wasn’t through speculating. He interrupted, “Personally,” he mused, “I would begin looking in the most obvious place; the cabinet behind his office desk.”

Candy put detergent into the dishwasher and slammed its door. “It would probably look innocuous, maybe like a little record book that resembles the key log. Something like that.” She smiled at Khamis. “They’re sold everywhere.”

“You’re doing it!” Gary yelped. “You’re mind-fucking!”

“Of course not, my love.”

Dierdre interrupted. “What I want to know is motive.” She held a lighter to Khamis’s cigarette. The lighter was gold. “What would a deputy confess for? Why endanger his career for some nasty, petty little crime?”

Gary subsided “Who knows?”

“Persuasion,” Candy offered. “Maybe the deputies are being harassed into rectitude by other victims. I mean, like the Latino whose dog they shot last month? Or that Vietnamese grocer. They could be responsible. Let’s drink to it. Honey, where’d you put the beer?”

A sudden, echoing bang hit the front door. The bell chimed and chimed. Khamis rose to answer, but the door flew open and hit the wall. David Friedman strode directly into the kitchen, breathing fire. Everyone froze. The ceiling light became harsh, the desert night loud with approaching sirens.

“Deep shit, kids,” the lawyer spat. “The Foreign Student Advisor says they found two handguns and about five pounds of crack under Zeki’s bed. Must have been all the confiscated evidence Randall could scare up. The kid’ll be deported by tomorrow night.”

Khamis surprised everyone; he lost control. Terrible and mighty he rose, grabbed the little attorney and pinned him against the wall. “That cannot happen!” he hissed. “The boy is innocent!”

“Khamis!”

Candy caught Dierdre and pulled her toward the sink.

“God damn!” Friedman yelled. “Put me down, idiot!”

Khamis lowered him to the floor. He seemed to grow even more, to become magisterial, prophet-like, a personification of moral outrage and righteous judgment.

But Khamis was not being moral. The men’s gazed locked. “Anything!” he demanded, “Do anything, even illegal. Say anything, truthful or false. You will never regret it.”

A sneering, nasty voice came from the landing by the open door. “That sounds incriminating to me.”

Friedman recognized the voice. “Ohrbach!” he yelled, “Enter and it’s trespass!”

“Ignore him!” Khamis demanded, and caught Friedman as he headed through the dining room. Friedman was too mad not to struggle. Khamis roared, “Ignore him! He’s taken care of!” But Friedman’s elbow drove into the big man’s diaphragm and he leapt toward the front door. Gasping, doubled, Khamis followed.

“Stop them!” Dierdre cried. She heard a scuffle, grunts, and the curiously unemphatic sound of fists pounding flesh. Someone was being hurt.

As she made for the dining room Candy stopped her again, shoved her onto a chair and stood before her with her hands hard on the girl’s shoulders. “Hush! Sit! Better that Friedman should hurt the man, not Khamis!”

Zeki dithered, frightened, by the stove. Gary blocked the dining room door, undecided what to do. The sounds of fighting stopped. The sirens, which had grown louder, wound down just outside. Car doors slammed. Footsteps climbed the stairs. They entered the apartment. Two policemen appeared.

“Zeki Mohammed al-Khafouli?” one of them asked.

“Here, sir,” Zeki said quietly. “We are too well acquainted.”

With a howl Khamis grabbed one officer from behind, then the other. Friedman appeared, a ferret-sized swarm, all over Khamis’s back. Gary grabbed them both. Finally all of them; Khamis, Friedman, Gary and the two policemen, fell into a lumpy, agitated heap.

“Zeki! No! They’ve pulled their guns!” Candy shouted, and bounded from Dierdre’s side to his. Her raised hand flashed and something clattered to the floor. A boning knife skittered under the table.

A policeman rose from the tangle and grabbed Zeki. “Go limp, kid!” Friedman barked. He was struggling with Khamis.

“Get out get out get out get out,” Dierdre wailed. She heard, didn’t see, the handcuffs. Zeki and the policeman left the kitchen as the other men rose from the floor. The second policeman turned to Khamis, pulling cuffs from his belt.

Khamis quieted. He straightened, looking toward the front door. “Mr. Henry Ohrbach,” he said, and a more sensitive man than Ohrbach would have fled. His chuckle grated through the front room. “I may have a busted rib, but I just had to see this.”

“Sorry there was no more warning,” Friedman told Khamis as he tucked in his shirt. “You had your message machine on.” Khamis nodded as he was cuffed, but continued to glare toward the entry to the apartment.

Zeki spoke from the living room, apparently to Ohrbach. “My family will never forget this,” he said. “I will never, ever forgive it. And you will pay.” Dierdre heard him spit. Many feet shuffled across the carpets. A voice began reciting the Miranda.

“Just a moment, officer,” Khamis commanded, and the majesty had returned to his voice. The shuffling stopped; the policeman stopped speaking. “As the oldest son of a foreign sovereign and thus his agent, I invoke diplomatic immunity for myself and for my brother, who enjoys the same status.”

There was a moment of total, nearly audible silence. “Son of a bitch,” Friedman finally muttered.

“What’s immunity?” Zeki asked.

Glaring fixedly at Ohrbach, Khamis reached his coupled hands toward Dierdre. She came.

-$-

Things moved smoothly after Friedman, muttering about secret identities and men of steel, took over. He left with Zeki to lodge a series of formal complaints against all and sundry. Gary followed, ostentatiously taking notes. Candy stayed. She began restlessly fiddling with salves and bandages.

Dierdre was dazed. She stared at Khamis across the kitchen table, fingering the gold chain at her throat. “Is it really all right? Is it as simple as that?” she asked.

Khamis’s face was scraped and beginning to puff under one eye. He gave an amused snort. “You have often claimed that I am a prince,” he remarked. Dierdre nodded. “Come here,” he said.

“Break that up and start putting away dishes, kids,” Candy ordered. “I’m making us coffee. We have to talk.”

PART II

Chapter 10

Once in Ohrbach’s Chrysler, Bebe Stubbs seemed self-conscious about going to the motel; Henry couldn’t get her to loosen up. This was probably her first planned, deliberate affair, he reasoned; she was a classy girl.

The highway was scored across the shoulder the of hill and through scattered rabbit brush. Everything was low and gray and scruffy in the summer heat. The mountains had become sloppily piled stone, the ocotillo scratched against the sky. Bebe was silent and slouched with one foot against the dash. Her yellow cotton skirt smelled of fabric softener and rode well up her naked thigh. With surprise Henry realized that she dyed her hair, that the brown was too even to be natural. The rest was unfakeable; the long legs, the fine bones, the clean line of her throat.

“Are you sure your daughter won’t find out you’re gone?” she asked. “She won’t call?”

Henry snapped out of a salacious reverie. “No, she won’t notice. She’s in L.A. If she calls, I’ll get the message on the beeper and call her back.”

“And the bank people won’t need you, or the sheriff?”

“It’s all right, Bebe. No one’s going to want me tonight.”

“Sheriff Randall? He’s a good friend of yours, isn’t he? I thought you two went fishing and things on weekends.”

“Not every weekend, sweet-cheeks.”

Wrong endearment. Bebe Stiffened beside him, just enough that Henry could see it was involuntary. “Sometimes we don’t see each other for a couple of weeks at a time.”

Bebe’s foot came down from the dash. She crossed her ankles and pulled her skirt to cover her knees. Henry threw her a grin to make up for his gaffe. “Well I’m nervous, Henry,” she said. He nodded, concentrating as he passed a pickup truck. “I mean, I realize it’s probably a good idea for you to get out of town, especially now.”

“Now?”

“Well, with your little girl sick. You know. It’ll get your mind off that whole thing.”

As Henry pondered the lightning spread of gossip, Bebe glanced at the driver of the pickup, a dark-haired man with a big nose. Henry pulled ahead; the man grinned at Bebe and threw her an insolent salute. She grinned back, flattered.

“Don’t do that, hon.”

They drove in silence for some minutes. Bebe gradually relaxed her prim pose and finally recocked her foot on the dash. Henry was gratified that the skirt began to ride again toward her lap, creeping in little jerks as the air conditioner blew under its hem. She twisted to look at the following truck, and the top button her sleeveless blouse popped open.

“He waved at me again,” Bebe giggled, and waved back. “Cute, isn’t it?” Absently she rebuttoned her blouse, watching Henry. Her fingers lingered over the neckline. She’d always watched him like that. It was naive and a little endearing.

“Yeah, it’s cute,” Henry said, but his voice didn’t refer to the man in the pickup. He reached toward her exposed thigh.

“Not yet, boss. I told you that,” she said quickly, and lightly slapped at his hand.

“Um-hm,” he said. His hand dropped so that it touched her hip. She put it back on the steering wheel.

“Not till we’re actually in bed, Henry. I have a thing about it. Honest.” Her fingers went again to the heavy chain at her neck and her eyes got big to show she was serious.

“Um-hm.” A thing about it. He’d take care of that thing with a thing of his own.

There was a mechanical roar, and a low-slung car passed them so closely that Henry swerved to avoid being hit. “God damn it!”

“You don’t need to cuss, Henry.”

The little car slowed. The pickup came up from behind. Henry saw its driver waive to him, smiling, through the rear-view mirror.

Trap.

Thank God for the pistol in the glove box. He loosened his grip on the wheel to be ready. The car ahead suddenly sped up, slowed, and spun to a stop, blocking the highway. The bastards had chosen a good spot, just where the road bridged a gully, and there was no shoulder. Without special urgency, but with rising anger, Henry stopped. The man in the truck got out and ran forward as Henry reached for his gun.

That’s when things began to go wrong. Yelling and yanking at her ankle, Henry couldn’t make Bebe understand quickly enough that he had to move her foot. The first thug opened the door and she was protesting and yelling, “My God they’re coming for you, my God,” with her foot still jammed against the glove box. Henry’s furiously pumping elbow rammed the horn and it blasted. He was pulled out of the car; fell onto the pavement. All he wanted was to kill. Anything.

All his lights went out.

-$-

Despite a life-long dread, Henry seemed to get all the breaks. His dead wife had been rich. Henry’s work as a banker was easy, approving loans to the right people and selling credit cards to everyone else. He had a good house outside of town on its own hill; a pair of good cars; a wall full of civic awards; and his affectionate little girl was nearly grown. He was thinking of her when he woke up in the motel. Susan’ that’s what it was all about.

He thought, distantly, that maybe he’d been groaning. Then he felt the pain in his head and ground his eyes shut. “Bebe?” he tried to say, and he guessed it got past his teeth because he felt her sit on the side of the bed and touch his forehead.

“Take these,” she said, and helped him get pills into his mouth with a drink of water. “We’re at the motel.” He nodded and lay back down. He was still furious.

“I screamed so much I think I spooked them,” Bebe claimed. “Anyway, they didn’t do much after I jumped on that one guy. He’ll carry those scratches for a while! A big truck was coming, so then they took off fast. I drove us here. You’re heavy, you know?”

The bastards.

“I’m going to the little store out front and get some aspirin and things. I’ll be right back.”

Henry closed his eyes and smiled, or tried to. He heard Bebe walk across the carpet and shut the door.

The bastards.

That’s when a prickle settled at the back of his neck and he began to be worried, as he had forgotten to be for maybe six months. Bebe’s voice. Not the talk, the voice. It was peppier. Louder. Forceful, almost. Like she was in charge. Something was going on with her; she’d acted funny ever since he’d picked her up. When she came back, he’d call the whole thing off and they’d go home before she could play any games. He felt like hell; he’d say he wanted a doctor. Just as well. He had no business dicking the help.

He wanted Susan.

Gingerly he eased upright and the bed creaked. The bedcover was rough under his scraped hands. He knew he wasn’t badly hurt; the kidneys had not been kicked, nor his Adam’s apple, nor any of the other sensitive spots the men might have chosen. Henry thought with satisfaction that all they had succeeded in doing was make him mad. Good and mad, the kind of anger he’d remember and use when he found them. And he would find them.

He levered his legs against the mattress to move off the bed, then stood still to check whether he was dizzy. He was. When he found he could stand, he walked along the wall to the window and looked out. He knew where he was; he had financed McReady’s motel here in the middle of nowhere. A low, hand-painted sign on the highway pointed to a dirt drive around some gas pumps; that was its only advertising. The concealing gas station and mini-mart spread themselves across a windshield like a smirk. Six rooms and the owner’s apartment. A money-maker.

Bebe stood outside with her arms across her chest and one foot wrapped around the other ankle, looking down the slope at Tipperton. One hand dangled a sack from the market. She looked around, starting from the highway and the view down-slope, then turning north to the arroyo-laced country behind the motel. She walked aimlessly toward the ravine at the edge of the drive, kicking at gravel with her head down. Probably crying, Henry guessed. Her shoes cleared a little spot down to the dirt, then she stopped and doodled with a stick. Poor kid.

Or maybe not poor kid, he thought, remembering the change in her. If she had to go buy aspirin, what in hell were the pills she gave him?

The sun was westering, but the heat pressed right through the window. It would do that all night. Suddenly Henry felt groggier; reaction? He inched back to the bed and carefully lay across it again. In a while Bebe brought red salmon caviar, Ritz crackers, Cold Duck, cream cheese, and a pack of styrofoam cups. She laid them on the table beside a bouquet rendered in blue plastic and began spreading cheese onto a cracker with a plastic knife.

“You’ll want to rest, Henry. We’ll eat a little first.” She glanced at him while she worked. Now that his head was clearing, he could see the change in her. She hadn’t been crying. Her face was composed, without red eyes or any sign of worry. A phony smile made her mouth rigid and hard. Her eyes were expressionless as a snake’s. Bitch. A power tripper. He should have recognized the type.

He still had trouble making words come because his lips were swollen. “We’ll go back,” he managed to say, though it came out mumbled. “Back,” he said again more carefully.

“No, Henry.” It was a statement, not a protest. She spread another cracker and opened the jar of cheap caviar. “We’ll stay here for a while. Together.” She brought a cracker to the bed and leaned over him. As she did, the first wave of nausea swept from Henry’s stomach to his head, and he was left so weak and dizzy he couldn’t speak. “Eat,” Bebe said, and smiled as she shoved the cracker at his mouth. It struck his teeth and spread messily across his lips. Henry wanted to grab her hand to shove it away, but fumbled. Bebe pulled from him, still smiling tightly. “Don’t you like it, Henry?” Something was definitely wrong; he couldn’t do a damned thing, and her face was growing and shrinking, growing and shrinking. “It’s no more synthetic than...” Her voice faded. She bent over him again, peering closely at his eyes.

Now.

He made a powerful grab for her neck, but she brushed his hand aside. It was the damnedest thing; the madder he got, the less he could do.

“You’re pathetic, little man,” Bebe claimed. “Roi Tan cigars, Zamphir tapes, blowing up your chest to hide your gut. You even have a phony bank. I found a bunch of your extra accounts my first week on the job. You can’t even disguise two-bit embezzling.” Her voice was really Dopplering now; far, then near enough to jazz his brain. It went on, droning, filled with scorn, disgust, hate. Extended loan periods, Randall’s secret account, trusts, Susan’s special money. Susan’s abortions, even this one.

His temper finally exploded. He’d kill her. He’d rip her guts out. With all his will he reached for her long neck. Strength poured into his hands, crazy strength. He had her.

The world went red, then black.

-$-

He woke because of the awful smell. At first he tried to force his eyes to see, then realized it was night. The curtains were probably drawn.

He began to remember the girl, then the hotel.

What in hell was that stench? He turned groggily toward the lamp and groped for the switch. Instead, he touched something sticky. There seemed to be a lot of it. He reached farther and found the lamp. He turned it on.

It was all over. Beneath his shoulder, soaked in under his hips, across his pants and shirt. A lot of it. He jerked up cursing and stared first at the filthy bed, then the horrendous mess spilling onto the carpet. More than blood; entrails, viscera. There was a yellow-flecked trail of it leading to the bathroom. Everywhere were bloody rags, once a yellow skirt.

“Jesus,” Henry said, and came wide awake.

Hastily at first, then slowly as he tried to keep his wits, he searched the room, the bathroom, the shower stall, even under the bed. Nothing, no one. His watch was gone, probably stolen on the road. He reached for the phone to ask the time; jerked back his hand. He mustn’t call attention to himself. He’d lost his temper before with a woman, and done a lot of damage, but - well, this time he’d gone too far.

Something could be done. Had to be done. He had to think. He stood rather than use his aching legs to sit. Yes; he’d for sure tried this before. Only that one was a whore, really a whore. A bank clerk was different. He’d think of something.

He began. Pain skived his back when he bent, and his legs buckled a couple of times, but eventually he got everything movable into one place. He tied all the torn clothing, the gore and chunks of brown hair into the sheets and shoved them into the car trunk. Back in the room the reek hit him all over again, so bad he vomited. He changed his clothes. There was still a splotch on the mattress, but after a while he got it heaved onto its other side. He couldn’t do anything about the carpet stain but pull the bed over it. The room looked unbalanced; he rearranged everything. Then he used a lot of toilet paper to clean the bathroom, flushing the toilet often. He didn’t know what to do about the smell; it lingered, even with all the windows open. Probably stay in those plastic-backed curtains for months. He was more and more sick. More and more his hands shook, swear ran under his clean shirt, he needed a drink.

He’d done enough.

He hadn’t. As he started for the car again he noticed the barely visible scrape marks in the gravel, like feet being dragged a long way. Like Bebe’s feet scraping the gravel, toward the arroyo where he had seen her write in the dirt. He followed the marks.

Here was another job. Henry, sore, exhausted by fear and adrenaline, heart-sick, wanted to cry. At the bottom of the ravine, its top highlighted by light-spill from the mini-mart, was a scuffed-up mound about the length of a woman’s body. A grave. Reason prevailed. It was dawn before he disguised that pile, erased his footprints in the gravel and drove off, hoping no one noticed.

Chapter 11

The day began badly even for a working Monday, and Henry resented it. Horror at the affair in the motel distracted even his talk with waitresses and service station attendants. He ached in every muscle and most of his joints. And of course Susan was still out of town. From his desk he weighed his tellers, all of them either late or ugly, through a glass partition. Frowning he hauled a stack of papers from his In box, pawed it, put it back.

“Linda!” The in-house auditor swiveled at her desk. “Bring me some coffee, will you?” She headed for the lunchroom. Needed to lose thirty pounds; and stop wearing those raffia wedgies, for the love of Jesus X. She reappeared, delivered, and turned with an aggrieved expression for her desk.

Henry said, “Sorry to bother you. I don’t feel well.”

“That’s quite all right, Mr. Ohrbach.”

“I got beat up. They tried to rob me.”

She turned back. “That’s terrible! What a terrible thing to happen!” Her tan eyes were big.

“Hijacked me outside of town. A trucker came along; stopped >em. Nothing broken, nothing like that. It’s hard to move, though. Hurts.”

“Terrible!”

Henry appeared to consider something of even greater importance than his pain. And he was; he was considering the morning news, which featured the singing deputies, one dead in an auto accident and the other live on TV claiming Sheriff Randall killed the first. Christ. And Henry couldn’t reach Randall; the had just left, he was in conference, he was investigating the deputy’s accident. Henry said, “Got a minute? Bring your coffee in here if you do.”

Linda’s consternation dissolved. She tripped away and back, smoothed her flared skirt over her sizable rump and settled into a chair with her mug. “Have you been to the doctor?” she asked.

“No, I’m all right. Only I want your opinion about what happened.”

Linda nodded. She was a sallow, middle-aged woman with hair turned yellowish from too many permanents. It rose from her shoulders in tight spirals and peaked over her narrow forehead. This had the unfortunate effect of framing her face in three clownish points.

“There were two of them, Mexicans,” Henry began. “Trapped me out north of town. Right by that same dirt road where Deputy Garrison was found dead.”

“Right there? By the same road?”

“Friday. The same night he was killed, too.”

Linda grasped his implication. She sipped at her coffee with narrowed, knowing eyes. She said, “They may have been the killers, then. Maybe they thought you saw something.”

“That’s what I thought, too. I wanted another opinion before I bother the authorities, though.”

Linda mused. “There may be another connection too,” she said after a moment. “They could be Mexican dope dealers. Maybe they know you and Sheriff Randall are friends, and thought he’d blab to you.” Leaning forward and punching the naugahyde chair arm with a finger for emphasis, she finessed her theory. “I bet the deputy was working on the investigation, and those criminals knew it, so they lured him out there and shot him. They waited for you...no, that couldn’t be it.” A crease appeared between her dark-penciled brows. “Unless they knew to expect you, because you know you drive out that way most Fridays. That’s it. They were waiting for you. They knew your car.”

Henry shrugged. “Possible,” he agreed. “Randall is an excellent lawman, but there’s no denying that he lets things slip to me that he wouldn’t tell another man.”

“That’s only natural, Mr. Ohrbach.” Linda beamed.

Henry beamed back, but quickly resumed seriousness. “Of course, none of this goes beyond these four walls, Linda.”

“Of course, Mr. Ohrbach.”

“Not to change the subject, but has Ms. Stubbs called in?”

-$-

The following days were calmer, but that prickle stayed at the back of Henry’s fleshy neck. After hours he double-checked his accounts, looking for cracks in their intricate structure. He kept them on diskettes which he took home. He found nothing traceable; Bebe had been bluffing. By Wednesday there was general talk at The Bakery about the gang of Mexican dope smugglers who killed Deputy Garrison. Henry’s most severe bruises had bloomed and were beginning to fade. The tellers decided that Bebe had run off with some man.

Friday morning the bank staff bunched over the newspaper during their coffee break. Linda brought his copy late, opened and badly refolded. “WHERE IS Bebe STUBBS?” read the banner headline, and a reasonably good photo of her was centered just beneath.

“Oh, Christ.”

“Beauty Queen Missing,” the sub-head announced. Henry waived Linda way from the door and read.

Sheriff James Randall Thursday evening made a public appeal for help in locating Babette “Bebe” Stubbs, 19-year-old beauty queen and newcomer to Tipperton from Las Vegas. Stubbs left her apartment Friday afternoon in a beige Chrysler LeBaron and has been missing since that time.

“Jesus.”

A search of Stubb’s apartment revealed nothing. “Everything is there,” her landlady, Gabriella Mendoza, told The Chronicle. “It’s just as if she stepped out for a minute, and will be right back. Even her purse is there, sitting on the coffee table.”

Statistics followed; five-feet-nine, 120 pounds, etc. A feature on page three continued for two folksy columns and jumped to the back page. It told the pathetic story of Bebe’s elation over finding a job, of her tentative first friendships, her efforts to establish herself in Tipperton. It described her (pictured) striped kitten, now tragically without the care of its mistress. It described the colorful stuffed animals on her bed, her love of beauty as expressed in the living room seascape made from inlaid abalone shells. By the time Henry had read every word, he wanted to throw up.

He also knew a lot more about that prickle on his neck. That was Bebe’s picture all right, but the girl which the article described was not the one he’d taken with him last Friday. That one would loathe abalone-shell pictures, and she would sleep on the floor rather than share her bed with a toy. Bebe Stubbs might be ignorant, but she was born with class.

He called Randall’s office again; Randall was in conference. Henry slammed down the phone, knowing the secretary lied and that the sheriff was avoiding him. He called The Chronicle and asked for whoever wrote the lead story. Mr. Phillips was at the courthouse. Henry headed downtown.

He found Gary in the basement cafeteria, interviewing the Court Clerk. Funny, he realized; Phillips dressed like a sloppy bum, but that was misleading. His eyes never left the clerk’s face, and he sifted legalities and points of procedure it would never occur to Henry to consider. He sat at their table and listened. Soon Phillips pocketed his narrow notebook and the clerk left. The newsman stuck out his hand.

“Good to see you, Mr. Ohrbach. Hope there are no hard feelings about the ribs.”

“None for the press, Phillips. You didn’t start that mess.” Henry was almost jovial. “I’ve been looking for you. You know, Bebe Stubbs works for me, and...”

“Right.”

“I wondered; is that all the facts there are? Just what you put in your article this morning?”

Gary looked blank, then seemed to understand. “Yes. That’s all the sheriff had up to last night, when he called.”

“He called your paper?” Phillips nodded, made as if to rise, and resettled on the bench. “At night? About some bank teller disappearing?” Henry asked. Gary nodded again. They shared a speculative look. Henry could almost hear the whir and click of gears meshing in the journalist’s head.

“What kind of person is Bebe Stubbs, anyway?” Gary asked. “What do you think of her?”

Absently Henry said, “Good enough worker.” He was digesting the news about the talkative sheriff. The sheriff accused of murdering a deputy on the same night he himself had been--set up? Set up. He continued. “Stayed after hours whenever I asked her to. Bit of a flirt, but a good worker.” His automatic smile hinted that he was the object of Bebe’s flirtatious attention.

“Popular with your other employee? Dating anyone?”

“Don’t think so. Not any of my people.” Then, inspired, “Mentioned someone, an old friend. From out of town.”

“That would be Las Vegas?”

Henry became judiciously evasive about knowing too much. “I couldn’t say. It only came up because of my car. Another tan Chrysler, she said.”

“What does she do with her spare time? Is she a party girl? A homebody?”

“ASK HIM WHAT SORT OF LAY!”

The early lunch crowd was getting noisy, but the shout ricocheted from the cinder-block walls. Henry whirled. David Friedman was rising from his seat, grinning. “Maybe you should interview Mr. Ohrbach more CLOSELY, Phillips,” he called.

Henry’s shoulders hunched, his fists closed. It felt good.

Phillips joked, trying to lighten the mood, “I never ask intimate questions in public, counselor.”

Henry was half-risen and ready to punch. He jerked away as the newsman grabbed his arm. “Jesus, you little kike!” he yelled to Friedman. The echoes returned. “Don’t you have any respect? The girl might be dead!”

“I love it, Phillips!” Friedman called. “The shit-kicker talks about respect! I still think you ought to ask him about learning his teller’s tricks!” He stood with his hands in his pockets, his jacket flaring and a tissue poking out of his waistband. People began edging toward the walls.

“Maybe some other time, counselor,” Phillips answered, still trying for lightness. He tugged Henry’s arm.

“And while you’re at it,” Friedman continued, “you might ask him more closely about his little girl’s!”

That did it. Henry was quickly all over the smaller man. Women screamed, trays spilled drinks and macaroni casseroles, and some men pulled him off before he could really land a clean punch.

Twelve stitches to the Ohrbach forehead because of a table edge. Strained arm muscles. Bruised knees.

And a throat sore from yelling, from roars of frustrated rage that had built from the time he’d tried to fight Friedman before. Not least painful, the suspicion in the journalist’s speculative gaze, watching him limp from the cafeteria.

Chapter 12

“Khamis, what time is it?” Dierdre asked from her desk. Zeki’s bedroom had been converted with a pair of desks and a full complement of office equipment.

Khamis, on the couch, raked his longish hair and checked his watch. “Five.” He scribbled on a green-line printout. “Why?”

“I want to quit for the day.” She sat with her hands in the lap of her dress, demure from the waist up. Her bare toes wriggled over the legs of her typing chair; her knees beat against one another.

“Pretty soon. Some amounts here do not meld.” Khamis continued to scan his printout.

“Jibe.”

He made another note. “Jibe. These figures do not connect the way I expected them to do.”

“They’re incongruent.”

“All right, they’re incongruent.” Another marginal note. “But doesn’t that mean inappropriate?”

“You’re thinking of incongruous.” The rhythm of her knees picked up; they began to bounce.

“Yes. They’re incongruent.” He finally looked up. “Pearl of the West, you are undoubtedly correct. Now, leave me alone.”

“That’s inappropriate to my mood.”

“And yours is inconsistent with mine Let me work, woman.” The move of Khamis’s shoulder was more eloquent, half shutting her out. Dierdre headed for the kitchen to make tea. When she returned with a tray, Khamis had set down the printouts. She set the tray on the coffee table before him and poured into a cup. “Why don’t you use the glasses for this?” he asked.

“They burn my fingers.”

“Use the holders.”

“Then I’d have to polish them.”

“Western decadence.” Dierdre drew her feet under her hips and leaned back with her tea. Khamis lit a cigarette. “What would you like to do tonight?” he asked.

“Nothing special.”

“Henry had been in another fight, so he won’t be out.”

“Perhaps, but I’m content to stay home.”

“It’s been a week since you left the apartment.”

“Still, I’m content.” Dierdre grinned and brushed her new bangs off her forehead.

Khamis studied her hair. “It’s all right that way,” he said.

“It’ll grow back. Meantime, it’s fun to slick it down like this.” Khamis made a face. “But I won’t do it very often.”

“Good.” He shifted, finding a place beside her hips for his feet, and stretched the length of the couch. Dierdre watched his cigarette send a still column of smoke to the dense layer at the ceiling. “I should open a window.” Dierdre chuckled. “What’s funny? As Henry would say, you could cut it with a knife.”

“Us. Two months together, and we talk like an old married couple.”

“Do we? Well, that’s all right. Our words and our feelings are two different things, sometimes.” He stubbed out the cigarette. With his hands behind his head he studied her, the way he had the first time they met, frankly, approvingly. “You are the most exciting, mystifying woman. I am never bored when we are together.”

“Praise from Caesar,” Dierdre remarked.

“What does that mean?”

“It’s part of a quotation from Shakespeare. ‘Praise from Caesar is praise indeed’ is the whole thing. I’m flattered.”

“It’s not flattery, Dierdre. I might tire of you if your beauty were all you offered.”

Dierdre set down her cup, self-conscious. “You still fluster me, Khamis.”

“That’s still charming.”

The silence that often overtakes new lovers followed; Dierdre and Khamis were lost in one another’s eyes. Khamis was the first to speak, softly. “I sometimes become unsure, Dierdre. You know I didn’t want to tell you about my family, my role within it. No,” he said quickly as the first sign of withdrawal entered her eyes. “No because we must be parted. That’s unnecessary--unless you wish it. I am unsure whether you might wish it, some day.”

Suddenly tears came to Dierdre. She was as surprised as Khamis, but as she cried she continued to study his mouth, the line of his beard, and his eyes. “No Khamis.” Her voice was husky, but calm. “You are not a novelty. I never felt so much at home as I do with you.” The tears wouldn’t stop. She felt a scream in her chest, a torrent of begging which if released would only estrange him. So she sat, and the tears poured down her face and collected in the hollow of her throat.

Khamis sat up and pulled her to him, cuddling her head into the hollow of his neck, stroking her arm, holding her. His beard swept her forehead as he kissed it, then kissed her eyes. When he did that, she felt the startling tears on his own face. “Don’t cry. Don’t cry,” he was saying. “My God, don’t ever cry.” Their hands fumbling, their lips brushing, they began to undress one another like children as their silent tears continued. Khamis pulled her onto his naked chest, heart to heart. “There is only one rational solution to this problem,” he said. “We must be married.”

Dierdre pulled her head back to see him more clearly. “Will that make you happy?”

“Yes.”

“And your family?”

“Of course; they love me.”

“And your people?” She began to smile.

“They will rejoice at such a politic relationship with the U.S.”

“And your mullah, or whoever?”

“You know I’m not religious.”

“Are you sure about your brothers? How about your ambassadors?”

“Woman, answer! Will you marry me?”

“You’re supposed to say, like Marc Antony about Cleopatra’s arms, ‘Let Rome in Tiber melt, and the wide arch of the ranged Empire fall! Here is my space!’“

“And you, woman, are supposed to say ‘yes’!”

“Yes,” she said, and tucked her head back into his neck. “Yes, I’ll be your wife and grow my hair long and give you a baby every year. Yes yes yes...EUREKA!” She rose and, trailing her shirt and tripping over his pants, streaked to the computer. “Zeki was right! It’s on the hard drive, that’s all! Yes! It’s in the temporary files! Ohrbach keeps his records on diskettes, but...” She turned to the telephone and dialed. “You see?”

“No! Come back here!”

“The files which the machine makes at each automatic save. Blast! He’s not there.” She hung up the phone.

“Woman!”

“Love, this is important! Henry Ohrbach must keep his private accounts on diskettes, or we’d have found something when I copied all that main-frame stuff at the bank. But even if he does, the material is on the machine! And we’ve ignored it! That’s what Zeki’s been trying to teach me to look for, poor kid, and I’ve been too dense to understand.”

“I understand,” Khamis sighed. Dierdre turned back to the computer and began keying in commands. “Wait,” he said. “I”ll get Zeki and Mohammed tonight.”

Click click click, pause. “What?”

Khamis picked her up. Dierdre giggled all the way to the couch.

-$-

It was nearly four o’clock in the morning. Zeki was still hunched over the computer keyboard, although his work had been done for some time. Dark smudges of fatigue surrounded his eyes, and his finger shook from cigarettes. Riad, slender as Zeki but tall, was hunched over the blotter of Khamis’s desk, working a calculator.

“Fifty-two hundred dollars in May, 1988,” Dierdre told Riad. She was lying on her belly, now clothed, in a sea of new printouts. “That’s a big one.” Riad nodded, made a note on a legal pad and entered the amount on the calculator. It clanked and churned out another eighth-inch of paper tape, The tape was curled in swirls across the whole desk.

“We must be getting near to four million,” Zeki said listlessly.

“Three million, nine hundred seventy-four thousand dollars,” Riad confirmed. “It’s amazing.”

“And none of it found before this. It certainly is,” Dierdre agreed.

Khamis was on the couch, sleeping on his back. He snorted. “Khamis agrees,” she said. The other two smiled, but weakly.

“To what do I agree?” Khamis asked as he woke. He turned onto his side to face them.

“The total is nearing four millions of hidden dollars, and we are only back as far as 1988,” Zeki told him.

“When did Henry take over the bank?” Khamis asked.

“I think it was the year before that,” Dierdre said.

“So we’re nearly at the end. Have the amounts become smaller as you went backwards?” Khamis asked.

“Yes,” Riad told him. “But they were never small.” His huge nose and ears, his habitual stoop, made him seem comic; his air of pedantry intensified the impression. He was the most honorable of men, as shocked as Dierdre by injustice. “It strikes me that there is absolutely no way to know from whom this monster has stolen.”

“His scheme was nearly foolproof,” Zeki said. “If only he had used an old PC, or...”

“You must be very tired, Riad,” Dierdre said. “Would you like me to take over, so you can go to bed? The living room couch makes a good one.”

“And leave you to do this? No, Dierdre.” When he smiled, the tenderness in his eyes eclipsed the rest of his ungainly self. “Besides, we are nearly finished.”

“All right; it looks like there’s another thirty-five hundred in December, 1987.” She listened to the calculator and ticked off the date with Khamis’s gold pent. “Then in October, that’s October 16, there’s an entry that looks funny. Zeki, do you have anything on that special file for October 16, 1987?”

The keyboard clicked smoothly. “No, mou Deard.”

“That’s it, then; fifteen hundred dollars in October.” The calculator sounded. “What’s seventy-five hundred thirteen, subtract fifty-seven hundred forty-eight, Riad?”

“Seventeen hundred ninety-five,” he told her “Shall I enter that?”

“Yeah, for October first. Must have been a heavy gambling month.”

“Or woman month,” Zeki said, still staring at the screen. Its green light silhouetted the edges of his shirt.

“You forget, Zeki; this is money going into Henry’s accounts,” Khamis said.

“I know. Since we’ve accused him of everything else, we might as well accuse him of selling women as well.” His shoulder twitched and he chuckled.

“You’re losing your grip,” Dierdre said. “Go to bed.”

“Not until we finish.” He twirled in the typing chair until he faced the others. Khamis seeing his pallor, said something short in Arabic and rose. Obediently Zeki left the computer, crossed the room and took Khamis’s place on the couch. Dierdre and Riad ignored the brothers. Khamis reached over Riad and got the phone, then dialed as he stood.

“Whom are you calling, love?” Dierdre asked.

“Gary Phillips.”

“Don’t.”

“He will be delighted to learn this.”

“Of course he will. But it’s not time to tell him. All this is inadmissible evidence. So far as the courts are concerned, it’s conjecture. It can’t do Henry any harm.”

“Damn!” He replaced the instrument as Riad bent out of the way. “Can our knowing, then, do him no damage?”

Dierdre looked at Khamis, then Riad. They looked back.

“I’ll call Candy after Gary’s gone to work.”

Chapter 13

Henry’s pastry arced right out of the toaster and fell to the floor just as Susan goosed her pink convertible out of the garage. The rumble of the engine vibrated the floor clear through the laundry room. Henry stooped, grunted, and offered an incantatory “shit” to the dawn. The exposed pastry filling burned his fingers; he dropped it again--”fuck!”--and tried to rise. The kink in his back stayed put. So did Henry, halfway between a crouch and a squat. “Christ!” Sucking his thumb, eventually he straightened and dumped the tart into the sink.

He watched Susan’s car swerve down the drive. Another art lesson with the Phillips woman; getting to be every day. Susan wouldn’t listen to his reasoned, legitimate objections to associating with a friend of those Arabs, either.

The air conditioner kicked on with the first rays of the sun. Already birds panted under ornamental shrubs to escape the heat. He still ached everywhere, especially after that fool scene with Friedman in the courthouse. The newspaper continued to bleat about Bebe Stubbs. Randall avoided him. And of course now there was an upcoming FDIC audit at the bank, and who knew why? Some stranger had called him about it. All of that was on his mind, plus the al-Khafouli thing was hanging fire while the lawyers took their profitable time about suits and counter-suits.

But he could do something. Gather data, ammunition, and sink the lot of them; Randall, Friedman, the fucking sheiks. Everybody had secrets to keep.

Moodily he got a fork and, spearing the pasty, nibbled its edge.

Mustn’t forget to crash the computer downtown before the auditors got here; shouldn’t take much to erase the disc.

-$-

Bebe Stubbs’s “apartment” was a converted garage. Gabriella Mendoza, the landlady, lived in the main house, which was a little plastered blue box, pink-shuttered and tan-lawned, heavily shaded by a pair of huge ficus trees. Not so the “apartment” which stood exposed to view, to the sun, and the depredations of the wildlife in the weeds.

Concrete steps rose steeply to the Mendoza door to make a bleak, unadorned porch too narrow for comfort to a man of Henry’s bulk. The black buzzer was canted a little to the side, as if it had seen too much use. Henry pushed it. He heard nothing, so he backed down a step to open the screen and knocked on the door. It opened immediately; the bell must have worked.

“Mrs. Mendoza?”

She was very fat, about fifty. She wore a flower-bordered apron over a blue-flowered dress. Her hair was a intricate construct of shiny dark rolls. Henry smiled warmly.

“I’m Henry Ohrbach, Bebe Stubbs’s boss. May I come in?”

She didn’t move. “I know who you are. Can I help you?” She turned to address someone inside. “Es el empleador de la chica.” She turned back to Henry, still holding the door.

“May I take a few minutes of your time, Mrs. Mendoza? Bebe’s parents have some questions, and naturally I’d like to help.”

“I have company.”

The screen door dug into Henry’s tendon over the back of his shoe. He could feel the torn screen dig into his jacket. “Did anyone visit Bebe last Friday before she left? Do you know? Was there anyone here to see her?”

“You.”

“Well, yes, but besides me, her parents...”

“No.”

The morning was hot, the neighborhood was bad, and Gabriella Mendoza, bland and motionless, was rude. Again she turned to speak to someone. “Es gordo y feo. Y tiene miedo.”

“Mrs. Mendoza, we don’t seem to understand each other, though I do speak Spanish.” Henry took a half step forward, hoping to suggest, just to hint, menace. “I am overweight and ugly, true; but not afraid. Of anyone. Perhaps I’ll just come back when you’re alone.”

She was not intimidated. “I’m sorry, Mr. Ohrbach, that won’t be possible.”

“Well, but the paper says you know Ms. Stubbs. What can I tell her par...”

“Mr. Ohrbach, you had better go. Bebe told me her parents died last year in a plane crash. You picked her up and didn’t bring her back. She’s still missing. You just threatened me. I don’t have anything to say to your kind.” She closed the door, which forced Henry to step backward into the ragged screen.

“Estupido!” he heard, then a man’s laugh.

-$-

Henry was having trouble finishing sentences.

“Mrs. Phillips? ...just saw Susan’s car...how she’s doing...of course if I’m interrupting...”

“Come in.” Candy stepped into the comparative gloom of her restored adobe, holding open the heavy carved door. “I’ve been meaning to call you.”

Henry entered a room without shadows, lighted by a frieze of clerestory windows. Easels ranged about the center of the red Saltillo-tiled floor, where a low table held the subject of the lesson; brass bowls and pitchers filled with cerise bougainvillea. The walls were covered with floral studies in lush colors. Roses were on small tables along the walls and smelled good. He could not see Susan.

“She’s in the kitchen,” Candy supplied, guessing his question. “We were taking a break.”

“I didn’t mean to interrupt.”

“No, that’s fine. I want you to see her work.”

Candy Phillips was the most beautiful, the most desirable, the most exotic, the most... So beautiful, so foreign, she made him awkward and humble. Her large breasts moved readily under her velvet-by-god russet gown, which fell toward the floor over long, slender thighs. Her dark hair escaped a knot in, well, tendrils, and flirted at her earlobes.

Jesus, how did a slob like Phillips do it?

Only when confronted by his daughter’s sketch did he realize the room was full of children, one to an easel, and they were staring. He studied Susan’s turgid effort, tilted it for a beguiling nymphette to view, and looked back at Candy. It was important to meet her gaze; to not grin. “Lovely,” he said, and grinned. Moonlight; she smelled like moonlight.

“Susan’s study should be framed, Mr. Ohrbach. Really, it shows an impressive flair for composition.”

“Well that’s fine, Mrs. Phillips. You’ve done a great job.”

“No, Mr. Ohrbach. Susan has talent, and it should be developed. All I’ve done is to indicate principles. She’s...”

“No kidding?” Looking into those eyes, Henry had to agree. “Can you suggest a framer?”

Candy gave him a name and address, and although he waited, he eventually left without seeing his daughter. Randall was due at the house soon to make peace. An envelope crackled in Henry’s pocket; he’d found it on Susan’s passenger seat, marked “Private and Confidential.” He would read what it said in the car.

-$-

He didn’t go right home. Half an hour later he sat at a drive-in and tended to stare. The note in the envelope was from Sheriff Randall. It had been sealed; Susan hadn’t read it. But she knew. She had to know what it was about. It glimmered on his passenger seat, white against the brown upholstery. Henry reread parts of it.

...of course we all suspected it after Mrs. Phillips’s reports, but your tragic statement...

The dick-headed hypocrite, what about him and those senoritas in Tecate? They weren’t more than thirteen, any of them. Everybody knew.

...unnatural pregnancies...fortunate little girl to find the Phillips couple...little paperwork to finish...

And that’s what they were doing behind his back, all this time since maybe right at the beginning, sure, stealing his chi...his daughter’s affection. For Chrissakes, she loved him back. Said so. Hadn’t she said so? Even just this morning? Course she did. “I love you,” she’d said.

How did the note start out? “Susan, this has come as a painful shock to me...”

Well, Randall’s bullshit wasn’t important. What he, Henry, was concerned about was the part telling her what time the Social Services people would pick her up. He looked at his watch and slurped coffee. Just about now, at the Phillips house. So then Randall himself could come to Henry’s for that “talk”, but Henry would die resisting arrest. While the bastard stole the only thing he truly loved. Sure. The bastard would kill him, like he did Deputy Garrison, to save his own skin in this whole Stubbs thing, no this harassment thing, this deputy thing, maybe even pin Garrison’s death on him, on Henry, oh shit oh shit. Probably this latest thing, this Mrs. Candy Whore Phillips Lie bullshit, tipped the scale, the investigation over Garrison’s death, and the smelly affair of the beaten, harassed little sheik.

Henry was so upset he paid the roller skating waitress without paying special attention to her legs. Slowly he backed out of the drive-in and headed for Randall’s house. The sheriff’s wife owned a flower shop, so she wasn’t at home. They used gas for both heating and cooling; there were a lot of pilot lights. Henry was in his own living room twenty minutes after he exited the drive-in.

He selected and removed the drain pipe under Susan’s bathroom sink. When Randall entered for their meeting, ducking his head to remove his corny cowboy hat, one blow to the back of his neck would do the job. then he’d take the body home, quickly before the explosion. A broken neck could be made to look like an accident, as if something had fallen onto him when the house went up.

Then Henry sat in his wing chair, cuddling a big glass of whiskey and dealing with the belated case of nerves he had known would come. Maybe he should call Candy Phillips about Susan, to be sure. Or Mrs. Randall at her shop and tell her not to go home. Maybe he’d done the wrong thing, come to that; he and Randall went back a lot of years. Maybe blowing up the man’s house was harsh. Would his fingerprints show up on any doorknobs? Would the whole building go up? Maybe just a fire in the kitchen. He’d never done anything with gas before.

But what was he supposed to do? Wasn’t that note enough? Hadn’t Randall destroyed his family? His home? His life?

The first surprise was that it was the back door into the laundry, not the front, which opened. Henry leapt to his feet, forgetting the pipe. “Where in hell you been?” he called, “We have all kinds of things to talk about!” He set down his glass, kicked the pipe and picked it up. Maybe when Randall came through the dining room door. He craned his neck to see past it into the kitchen.

The man in the kitchen doorway was not Sheriff Randall; he was a stranger, wearing tan whipcords and a matching shirt. Deputy Albertson, Garrison’s erstwhile partner, stood behind him. The pipe slid from Henry’s hand back to the carpet.

“Henry Ohrbach?” the stranger asked.

He entered the dining room. “Yes.”

“I’m Allen White, sent by the FDIC.” He flashed cards and badges from a billfold. “I’m afraid we have some bad news.”

“Yes?” Henry’s mind raced. The stitches on his forehead itched like hell.

Albertson spoke, angling behind the dining table and keeping an eye on the fallen pipe. “Ms. Stubbs uploaded your files to them, Mr. Ohrbach. You know, with computers, anything you work on goes to the hard drive. Even from diskettes.”

White said, “The audit became academic at that point. You haven’t studied computers much, have you?”

Henry gave way automatically as the men advanced.

“Sorry, Mr. Ohrbach,” Albertson said. “They seized your bank.”

Words wouldn’t come.

Albertson said, “And under the circumstances, I have to take you in. On suspicion of murdering Ms. Stubbs.”

Henry found something to say: “Shit.”

Albertson cuffed Henry’s hands in front rather than behind so he wouldn’t be too uncomfortable. They walked to the patrol car at the back of the garage, where Henry took a distracted look at Tipperton and the slope to the south.

As he bent to enter the squad car he received the final surprise of the day. There was a series of slow, rumbling, and by his reckoning premature, booms.

“What was that?” he asked, and straightened without looking toward Randall’s hill. A slow smile spread across his sweating face.

“Explosion,” White told him. “There’s smoke over there on that hill.”

“Sure is,” Albertson said.

Henry turned to watch. Majestically, turning in upon itself in a thousand bulges and black flowerlets, a cloud of smoke rose toward the heavens from what had been Randall’s demesne.

PART III

Chapter 14

WHY DID THE DEPUTIES TALK?

An Editorial Opinion

Both Deputies Garrison and Murphy confessed to harassing ethnic minorities and claimed the sheriff made them do it. Both are now “accidentally” dead. Their deaths are tragic, but not a big mystery; even this far from Las Vegas, the rule is still you play, you pay, and the sheriff whom they accused is under investigation.

What bothers The Chronicle more is expressed in the title of this editorial. Because these deputies were home boys and experienced lawmen; they knew what sort of justice to expect if they confessed. The real mystery is, why? Knowing what they did about local customs, born with lifetime memberships in the Grand and Archaic Brotherhood of Good Old Boys, why did Arnold “Skip” Garrison and Orland Murphy go to the County Attorney and accuse themselves and their chief of outrageous, but relatively small, crimes? And why...WHY... did they stick around afterward? It is The Chronicle’s opinion that someone extorted their confessions, then failed to protect them.

Gary stared at the green computer screen and fingered the keyboard, listening to the whoosh of the air conditioning and trying to think. He had heard theories; that the deputies became Christian; that someone scared them straight by stalking them; that the County Attorney was about to investigate them anyway. Having grown up with them, he knew each of the theories had merit. Trouble was, he couldn’t forgive their deaths, and did not want to write this editorial. He scratched his nose, lifted his eyes to the street beyond the window. It was Saturday; shouldn’t have to work. A good Managing Editor could see to it, fix it, put the weekend to bed Friday night.

“That’s long enough,” Bilbo called from behind him.

“Long enough for what?” Gary called without turning.

“For the editorial hole. Do something with the Arab guy’s donation for page one.”

Bilbo owned The Chronicle, ran it profitably, and occasionally played newsman. His full name was William Bough. He was desiccated by too many years in the desert, too many cigarettes and too much coffee. Gary shoved a peanut into his mouth and turned. The publisher’s office was glass-walled and raised a step above the editorial-room floor, the better for surveillance. His rimless glasses slid down his long nose and his hair hung along the side of his temple.

Gary said, “I thought you were going to do that.”

“Not enough time. Besides, you know the people.”

“I have a full day already. The police chief, and I have interviews with the Mendoza woman and Henry Ohrbach now he’s out on bail.”

“Ohrbach? Should you do it?” Referring to Gary’s status as Susan’s court-appointed foster-father.

“I’m the only one he’ll talk to. Says he trusts me because I’m taking care of his little girl.”

“Are you?” There was a leer in Bilbo’s tone.

“Don’t be crude. Plus there’s Khamis’s dinner tonight, I have to go so I’ll cover it. But I’m full today; I can’t even make his press conference.”

Bilbo held a light blue editing pen in one hand, a collection of tab proofs in the other. He rustled the proofs. “Do a profile of the guy then, a sidebar.”

“On page one? Get real, Bilbo.” Gary walked to the publisher’s door and braced a hand on each side of the jamb. Refrigerated air shivered across his back. “I’m using Khamis in the tab tomorrow, when he goes home. He parlayed false arrests and diplomatic immunity into most-favored-nation status for his little sandbox. Says he’s going to bring his tribe right up to the twenty-first century. Worth half a page, easy.”

“Run it today.”

Gary objected. “No! I need to use the sheriff story. There’s not a lot of facts, but it’s hard news and there’s may be six, seven inches worth of material in it.”

Bilbo was proofreading. “It didn’t get written,” he mumbled.

Gary slumped against the jamb and crossed his arms, switching the stream of conditioned air onto his chest. “Let me guess,” he drawled. “Johnson didn’t write up his Grand Jury notes. If he took any last night. If he even attended the session.”

“Right,” Bilbo said, and looked up. “Come on, Phillips. Johnson’s a sports writer, and that filth McKinley’s still so drunk he doesn’t even know I fired him. You know all about this Arab, so it’ll only take you half an hour to write it.”

“Yeah. Instead of eating lunch.”

“Yeah.” Bilbo tossed the proofs onto his desk. “What’s he like? The big brother?”

“What do you mean? He’s big, he’s smart, he’s rich.”

“You like him.”

“He’s all right. Candy and his fiancée are close; that’s why we’ve socialized.”

Bilbo lifted his eyebrows. “Candy’ll never stop adopting waifs. Like Susan,” he said.

Gary nodded. “She was a social worker. Anyhow, she took to Dierdre right away.”

“And set her straight about Islam, right? About Arab men, et cetera?”

“Probably.”

“She think this guy’s any different?”

“She likes him.”

“May she have the joy of him and his brother. La Roarke, that is. Background says the younger one’s been frisky before. In Egypt.”

Gary shrugged. “He was caught with a beer in public. It scandalized the conservatives like his dad.”

“That’s precisely it. This girl is entering a Moslem theocracy with a couple of hot-eyed radical reformers who happen to be royal, which could be a very temporary situation. But they’re still Moslem, those brothers. It’s going to be very rough going. For them, yeah; but they’ll know rules she never heard of.”

Gary recognized Bilbo’s point. “Jordan’s American queen was happy enough. Look at how many times King Hussein was attacked.”

“Jordan and the conservative emirates are apples and oranges.” Bilbo finally set down his blue pen, speculated, and returned to the present. “‘Course, you have a streak of it, too.”

“Streak of what?”

“Do-gooder. But what I was getting at, the big brother probably doesn’t. I’m sceptical. Why is he giving all this money to the university? And to this particular campus? What’s he get out of it? I mean, it’s something over four million dollars, American.”

“His press release says he’s grateful to the people of Tipperton. He got his doctorate here, and his bride.”

“Bullshit. That’s just bullshit. You’ll be sitting up there at the head table tonight; find out. Ask around. His whole family’s here, from the looks of that plane out at the airport. Two of his uncles speak English, and his mother’s half Australian. Ask ‘em. Find out.”

“Why? You know something I don’t?”

“Just ask, Phillips. I got a hunch. And get over to that press conference.” Bilbo squeezed by and walked to the front door, his loose Mexican shirt flapping against his ribs. Gary went back to his desk and checked his camera for film. A pair of photos lay under it, taken at Khamis’s apartment the night before. Sheiks and chic; international guests. He shoved them into his shirt pocket in order to get more identification and spelling at the press conference.

Bilbo’s head popped back in from the door. “Phillips?” He was pleased by a secret, blushing.

“Yo!”

“Use your initials on that editorial. You’re Managing Editor, now I fired McKinley.”

Gary was startled; he set the camera on the exact center of his In box, swiveled his computer screen, studied his telephone. He sat down. Bilbo elaborated. “I’ll bring Dawnie up to News Editor.”

“Good choice.”

“Okay?”

“Sure.”

“Starting tomorrow. I mean Monday.”

“Great.”

“All right, Phillips?”

Gary’s brain caught up with his ears; he looked up. “Really? Managing Editor? Not Apprentice or Acting Managing Editor or Managing Editor Pro-tempore? Not Associate? Big-city-style Managing Editor?”

“You got it, Flash.”

Chapter 15

He was late for the press conference. As he entered the faculty dining hall where it was held, a television crew banged out the door with cameras and mikes. Other men, shoving a dolly with folding tables, followed him into the room. At the dais David Friedman paused and eyed him, but continued speaking to Khamis and the U.C. chancellor who came down from Berkeley. Gary took discreet photos with his long lens; Khamis, Zeki and Dierdre; H.R.H. al Khafouli and his chic wife; and the Roarke parents, who turned out to be prosperous investment counselors from Palm Springs. Zeki, behind Friedman, repeatedly scanned the room. He adjusted and readjusted his tie, fiddled with his new mustache, bent attentively over his seated, elegant mother. The fledgling diplomat was having a grand time. When he sighted Gary he came to the back of the room, excited and beaming, his hand extended.

“Mar habbah, Gary! Are you at work?”

“Mar habbah yourself, little buddy,” Gary said. “I’m sorry to be late for the announcement. Can you get me a statement from Khamis before he leaves?”

“Oh, sure. I will get him.”

“No, don’t interrupt him. If you’ll pass the word, I’ll catch him on the way out.” He returned a nod from the boy’s mother; they had met at the al-Khafouli apartment. “What about you? Can I ask you some questions? Like, what do you think about starting a School of Oriental Studies here in the desert, instead of at an Ivy League college in the east? For the press, that is.” Gary let his camera dangle and produced a notebook and pencil.

“Me? Oh, I like the idea fine, Gary. This desert reminds me of home.” Zeki smiled broadly and tilted his head to watch the other write. “My brother says he wishes merely to thank Tipperton for his post-graduate education, and for bringing him his bride.”

“And you obviously think highly of his choice. Dierdre.”

“Oh, sure! I mean, the school is a quite appropriate gift in exchange for such a legal scholar as she, of course.” The boy adjusted his tie again and glanced toward the group at the front of the room. His swift fingers unbuttoned his suit jacket. A tissue dangled from his waistband. Another poked from behind the carefully folded handkerchief in his breast pocket. Gary grinned. He glanced toward David Friedman. “Of course,” Zeki added, “the gift of a school would be difficult to make without the able assistance of Mr. Friedman.” He indicated the man. When his arm lifted, another tissue lay exposed in the cuff of his sleeve.

Gary’s grin widened. “Mr. Friedman is representing your brother in this project; right?”

Zeki’s voice rose even further. His father turned, puzzled. “Yes, MR. FRIEDMAN continues as my brother’s agent in many things.” More softly he added, “always excepting his habitual catarrh,” and slid Gary a leer. The attorney looked their way. Zeki’s voice rose again. “He is like my brother’s RIGHT ARM,” he called, pointing widely and dislodging the tissue from the cuff of his sleeve. He bent to retrieve it, stuffed it back. When he did, the one in his pocket escaped and drifted to the floor. He lunged for it. “The school will be housed in a new building of its own, next to the main library of the university. Construction will start next...” Zeki called out dates, the name of the architect, the contractor, a history of the project. He was thorough. As Gary took notes, the boy’s agitation released tissues from pockets and cuffs, his expression increasingly earnest, his fingers increasingly busy. The wad of tissues which they caught grew exponentially, coming from every fold and compartment of his clothing, too many to hold, spilling from time to time to the floor, tattering, their lint drifting between his feet, pieces flying about his shoulders. His elbows became involved, flapping in and out as he spoke. More and more torn tissues appeared, more and more facts found their way to Gary’s notebook. Zeki intoned with maniacal intensity in a veritable blizzard of tissue and apparent good intentions.

“What do you think of your brother’s generosity?” Gary asked, still writing, ignoring the burlesque. Friedman, bravely conversing with Zeki’s father, nevertheless seemed fascinated by the show.

“Oh, the world knows Khamis is a generous man,” Zeki intoned, diving for a shred of paper, missing it, and in the effort sending it over his head. “Khamis is a GREAT SOUL. He has the soul of a VERY GREAT man. Put that in your paper, please. Khamis is DIVINE GENEROSITY housed in HUMAN FORM, Allah be praised.” He made a final leap for the last piece of lint.

Gary flicked tissue from his notebook. “And the four million dollars mentioned in the press release, is that from his personal fortune? I mean, does any of it come from money that would otherwise belong to you?” Friedman headed for them, his shoulders hunched and his head lowered.

“No, Allah is merciful and nearly as generous to Khamis as Khamis is generous to Tipperton.”

Friedman was beside the boy, staring hard. Zeki subsided. His dark grey suit, Gary finally noticed, was exactly the cut and fit of Friedman’s. Their shirts were the same, their shoes and socks. Only the stripes on their ties were different.

Zeki resumed. “All of the money is intended to educate the good people of America about us, about our culture.” He finally stood still, a huge wad of tissue and lint clutched to the breast of his jacket. “My own interest lies elsewhere, in clean government. Allah is just, and so must be the governance of Man.” He snuck a sidelong glance at his attorney. “And Woman. That is very important.”

Friedman shook his head. “You worthless little gentile. Never before in my presence have you spoken Allah’s name. It is well for you, scum of Academe, that you now invoke it. For by the fathers of my fathers’ fathers and the sacred womb of my mother’s mothers, Jahweh’s going to get you for this.” He fished into his waistband and added a tissue to the pile under Zeki’s chin. It fell across the boy’s fingers and drifted to the floor as Friedman returned to the others.

“Gary, would you mind?” Zeki asked, indicating with his eyes the fallen tissues. Gary stuffed them into Zeki’s waistband.

Then he headed for Khamis. It was nearly time to see Mrs. Mendoza. He had forgotten to ask an important question; Khamis’s generosity neatly matched the amount of Henry Ohrbach’s embezzlement.

Chapter 16

It was a hot day; Gary’s skin prickled each time sunlight touched it. He followed Gabriella Mendoza, who tended to waddle, across a sizzling infinity of shadeless bare yard and cracked cement driveway toward Bebe’s former cottage, the former garage. It was too hot even for the dust to smell like dirt; all the smells had been baked away.

“You know my son,” Mrs. Mendoza told him.

“I do?”

“He’s the Chief of Police”

“Really?”

Everything glared with second-hand light; he could barely see.

“We’re neighbors, too, you know that? I see you drive by in the mornings.”

“You do?” He swerved and barely missed stepping on rake tines; lifted a sweating hand to shade his eyes.

“Only I didn’t realize you’re with the paper.”

He remembered, with a start, his new position. “I sure am.”

If Mrs. Mendoza was more forthcoming with Gary than with Henry Ohrbach, there were reasons; her son spoke highly of the paper, and she wanted her picture on the front page. Also, she liked Gary’s type; broad, tall, deep-chested. She turned and smiled as she unlocked Bebe’s front door.

“The reason I called, and you’ll have to get clearance from my son before you can use this, the blood on Henry Ohrbach’s shoes wasn’t human, it was chicken blood.” She stepped into the utter dark of the closed cottage and disappeared.

Gary blinked and followed the woman inside. It was just as hot there, maybe hotter, stygian, and smelled of melting tar from the roof. “You mean there was no murder?” he asked. “Bebe Stubbs isn’t dead? Is that what you’re saying?”

“No, sir, because I think that is for the court to decide. But she certainly isn’t here anymore, so she could have been killed. I’m only reporting what I know and what I heard. And you can tell by the way these windows are arranged, I could hear whatever Bebe said, or her company too. Even inside.”

A metallic clatter from a venetian blind accompanied a startling access of light and a view of a dirt back yard. The main house, not thirty feet away, had a vine-shaded veranda with tables, benches, and a fountain. It would be a lot cooler under there, and the jasmine would smell good. Perfect place to eavesdrop.

“So you heard Bebe say something relevant, is that correct? You were seated across from this window, and she said something relating to the blood on Mr. Ohrbach’s shoe?”

“That’s right, maybe a week before she disappeared. At first I thought she was laughing about a recipe or something like that, but then when I heard about the evidence on that banker’s shoes, I learned the truth. At least, I realized that there might be a connection. I told my son that. He’s going to follow it up.”

“On the connection to what Bebe Stubbs said about chicken blood?”

“Exactly. She was seated right here; I couldn’t see who her company was, but by her laugh it was a woman. She stayed until after I went to bed. Bebe said something about chicken blood and guts, and they both laughed. That’s what caught my attention. Then they changed the subject. They started talking about how the eggs in a hen, the ones that aren’t laid yet, go big to small and smaller like a little production line in reverse. I stopped listening.”

“I see.” His eyes were adjusting to the interior gloom, and he was curious. “So this is the living room, and that door would be the into what, the bedroom?”

“Kitchen. There have to be two doors between the kitchen and the bathroom, so the bath is though the bedroom. That other door.”

Gary approached it, fingering his lens cap. He was curious about the stuffed animals on the bed. “May I see it?”

Mrs. Mendoza was eyeing his camera. “I suppose so. You can’t touch anything though, even with the yellow tape gone.”

“I can appreciate that.”

“You can’t take any more pictures in there, either. That reporter of yours snuck his camera in.”

“I wouldn’t, not without your permission, ma’am.”

“Because if you want pictures, you can get some of me, or my house, but not in here.”

He finally understood. “All right, let’s go out to your veranda. How’s that? Maybe a shot of you pointing toward this window? Something like that?”

“Certainly. Something like that, I don’t think my son will mind.”

She opened the door and the remaining shadows were gone. Hanging right over his head, Arab fashion at the juncture of wall and ceiling, was hung the abalone-shell seascape. It was just as ugly as he had imagined.

Chapter 17

Henry showed up at The Bakery on time and went with Gary to a booth. The banker wore plaid slacks and a striped shirt. With his sideburns trimmed to cover his fleshy cheeks and hair too full over the ears he sat revealed as the quintessential shit-kicker. His shoulders were hunched. His hands moved fretfully. The transformation from bully to loser was incomplete, but well begun. Gary almost pitied him, except for what he had done to his cowed, too-obedient daughter.

Henry dug into his story and his lunch with equal avidity, talking as he chewed, gulping coffee and gesturing with his cup until it spilled. He seemed to be unaware of the room full of people, the food he gulped, or of anything but his pressing need to be heard. His story rambled and accused, returning to point after point. Eventually Gary thought he understood, so he read back his notes while Henry confirmed what he could.

“So you saw Bebe Stubbs yesterday, driving a TransAm?”

“No doubt about it, Phillips. We both pulled up at the light out here.” He waved toward the street corner with his fork. “She’s got to be one of the richest girls in Gold County right now, and that fancy car proves it.” He glared belligerently across the table to emphasize his point. “Her hair’s red now, and she’s wearing fancy earrings with diamonds. Same girl though, the bitch. Pretended she didn’t know me.”

“And you say she is the embezzler?”

“Of course! I’m sure as hell not! And I didn’t kill her. Or else she wouldn’t be driving around with all that expensive stuff, would she? She took the money. Probably sent it to Los Angeles while she was working, then transmitted the doctored files over the wire to all those government agencies. Framed me.” He reminisced, leaning across the table with a hitch at his crotch. “She made me crazy, you know? From the day I hired her. You know how. Leaning over whenever I was around so I saw down her dress or around her butt. Found extra ways to help, brought me coffee. What was I supposed to do?” He leaned back and his voice dropped. “I finally asked her for a weekend. She jumped at the chance, too. Then she made me think I killed her, to keep me quiet.” He went into a detailed narrative of his improbable night with Bebe Stubbs and got angrier as he went. Soon he fairly danced in place, rocking the banquette. All the details were there; the trashy food, Bebe’s sneering tone, the nasty smell of blood in a mattress. But...it was too far-fetched.

“Susan’s fine,” Gary blurted, wanting time to think. “Come on by and see her, now that you’re free.”

Henry’s eye lit, then dimmed. “Thanks. I’ll do that.” He poured a lot of sugar into his coffee and pulled the mug toward him, quieting. It took a visible effort. Gary hadn’t recognized the degree of Henry’s anger. “She’s what it’s all about, you know,” he confided. “With the feds running my bank and everybody talking about me behind my back, she’s all I have left.” He smeared his face with a freckled hand and emerged one of the sorriest men Gary had ever seen. “Does she ask about me?”

“She doesn’t talk much, no. I think she misses you. But she still hurts. She will for years. And she’s confused about her own father...”

“She told you, then?”

“Yes.” Gary studied his bowl of chili. “She didn’t have to; we could tell before that. She has all the symptoms. The Center spotted them right off, too, but Candy was the first.”

“You mean, like a sickness?”

Gary goggled at the revelation of obtuse stupidity. There was an awkward silence. “Lovely woman, your wife,” Henry finally said.

“Thanks.”

“I’ll see you don’t lose anything, after this is over. After I get back my bank.”

“Forget it.” The waitress brought the check and Gary picked it up. “I still have questions about your story, but I’m not sure you can answer them. For example, how did Bebe fake a murder? What did she use for a body? Or a phony weapon? How did she heave you around? It would take a lot of muscle to get you back into your car after the mugging. Ditto, getting you into that bed.”

“I don’t know all that myself.” Henry leaned forward again. His anger rose again, coloring his throat, then his face. “Some drugs are supposed to work better if you’re upset, and by God she made me mad! I really did try to choke her, you know. I have a temper.” He smirked, proud of it, and the color paled along his hairline. “It’s my personal opinion that she had help. Those men on the highway, for instance. All they really did was get me riled. They didn’t do any real damage when they beat me up, though God knows they could have. And they didn’t take anything. Ms. Stubbs...” He emphasized the Ms....”said she and a trucker scared them off. I think they all three, the thugs and Bebe, put me back into the car and took me to the motel. Then they picked her up, or left a car there for her to use when she was through.”

“Possible,” Gary agreed. “What did those men look like? What did they drive?”

“Hell, I don’t know what they looked like.” Henry fondled his mug. “We passed one guy in a pickup, he was dark. Looked like a Mexican. I remember, because he waved to Bebe and she waved back. The other car was a convertible, but the top was up. One of them hit me when I was trying to get my gun out of the glovebox. Hit me from in back.” He thought. “See what I mean? She knew those guys all along. They were just playing games with me.”

Gary made a connection; Mexican bandits on the highway. Another connection; Mexicans accused of stalking the singing deputies. Khamis, often mistaken for a Mexican, on the night he revealed himself to save his brother, had claimed of Henry, “He’s taken care of.”

Gary was suddenly furious. Khamis, Zeki, Dierdre; that awful feature about the missing Beauty Queen; they must have loved it. The nights of dinner; the evenings of beer and chess, when everyone but he knew about this elaborate hoax. It angered Gary so much that he did something he would regret. He forgot what the sheriff’s little book implied--that Henry could buy anything, maybe even a murder. He pulled the photos from his jacket and laid them onto the table.

Henry was talking again and didn’t notice. “The cops won’t listen to anyone under indictment, or I’ve have gone to them with all this,” he said. “If you’ll just put some of it into the paper...” He sat with his hands around his mug, looking hopeful.

“Won’t your friend the sheriff listen to you?” Gary asked. “He’s still in charge, at least until he’s indicted for something.” His finger accidentally pushed a photo.

Henry glanced at it but ignored it, thinking about Sheriff Randall. “Randall? Help me? The bastard can’t find his ass with both hands.” Slowly a feral, furious look took over his face, bringing his nostrils wide and baring his teeth. With his eyes crazy, Henry looked right through Gary at some unsubtle memory of revenge. It was enough to show Gary a killer. A real one, not a suspect. He thanked an unnamed god when the expression changed. Then it returned; Henry had focused on the photographs.

He jumped to this feet. “Where in hell did these come from? Who is that with Bebe?” He leaned over until his nose was almost on top of the pictures and drank in the faces; Zeki, Khamis, Dierdre. Quickly as he could, Gary pocketed them and pulled out his wallet to pay the check. He fumbled, dropped and wallet to the floor and nearly hit his head against the table. By the time he had paid, Henry Ohrbach was gone.

He had to warn Khamis. He called the al-Khafouli apartment from the pay phone by the cash register. A machine answered. He tried Zeki’s dormitory room and got no response. Finally he had Khamis paged at the university banquet room and the man came to the phone.

“Yes, my friend!” Khamis was nonchalant, happy.

“Listen, you bastard. I don’t know which of us is madder at you, Henry Ohrbach or me, but we both know what you and Zeki did to him, and he’s gunning for you.”

Khamis took his time to answer. Gary could imagine his expression as he pulled on a cigarette. “It’s ‘I’,” he corrected Gary. “Henry Orhbach or I.” There was another pause “I am truly distressed that you learned before we could tell you tonight. I have planned to tell you many things. You must believe that, Gary.”

“I can imagine how sorry you are, and how much ‘explaining’ you’ll do after I punch you out. Those nice stories about your god-damned generosity may not hit the front page, either. But you’re in bigger trouble, too. That S.O.B. wants to kill you all, starting with Dierdre. And he’ll do it; he’s out of jail.” The cashier, standing nearby and counting customers, slid him a look. “So keep low. Keep Dierdre out of sight; she’s the one who hurt him between the legs.” Gary was trembling with fury; he tried to keep it out of his voice.

“Thank you. We have made preparations for such a contingency.”

“I wouldn’t put it past you.” He’d for sure show up at that party.

Chapter 18

Bilbo was back at the office, sitting at Gary’s desk and reading from the CRT screen. Gary saw him from the street; colorless, intent, his longish face tinted green by the computer’s light. Sometimes Gary just wanted to pick the old man up and hug him. Then Bilbo fished Gary’s file box, his private editorial notes, from under the desk. The urge evaporated.

“What are you looking for?” Gary pushed through the latched gate by the counter and strode toward his desk.

Bilbo glanced up and balanced the box across his knees. “Your Ohrbach notes. It’s time to put them with these I got on Randall.”

Gary grabbed the box from Bilbo’s knees. “You want to be a hotshot journalist, get your own damned notes!”

Bilbo grabbed the other side of the box. “Give me that! You crazy?”

Tableau; glare for glare, the sides of the box bending outward as they tugged, the men reacted to a tense, frustrating day. Bilbo hissed, “You want to cover Ohrbach and Randall both? And the courthouse beat and the city cops and lay out the front section?” Gary let go of the box. “I was going to help while you get used to managing this paper, asshole.” Still glaring, Bilbo reached for his coffee, noticed it was empty and set it down.

“Sorry,” Gary muttered, “It’s in the back of the box.” He sighed and hitched up his pants. “I’m screwing up today. I learned some stuff about the Ohrbach case that’s really close to home. It’s got me crazy.” Bilbo found the Ohrbach folder and pulled it out. “There’s another one you’ll want to read. The al-Khafouli stuff.” Bilbo looked quizzical, so while he found Khamis’s file and returned the box to within kicking distance under the desk, Gary told him about Henry’s speech in The Bakery and that he, Gary, believed the man. Bilbo smoked and nodded.

“Yeah,” he said when Gary had finished, “It hangs together. But you know what? You’re never going to pin anything on those guys, or the Roarke woman. If it’s a conspiracy among Arabs, they’re going to hang together just long enough to get out of school and go back home. Know why?” Sometime Bilbo got theatrical. He did then; he rose and punched at Gary’s chest with a finger every time he made a point. “First, they’re all tight because they’re in a strange country and need friends. Second, because Khamis al-Khafouli is their leader, and so far he hasn’t made a dumb move so he hasn’t been caught. As long as he’s not caught, they’ll support him. Third, because Zeki al-Khafouli is the youngest Arab at that school, and the others have adopted him like the spoiled darling in any Arab home. Fourth, there’s not an Arab or a Mexican or an Indian or a Jew in the county who hasn’t been rousted by our crooked sheriff or his crooked deputies or Henry Ohrbach, their bigoted boss. Shall I go on about the Arabs’ Anglo women, who will stay loyal because they’re so well-treated they’ll never have it so good again? Or do you get the idea there ain’t no justice, Phillips?”

By that time Gary was grinning. Bilbo took the files into his office and sat down. “I’ll be at the prince’s shindig tonight until nine. That way you can have some time with your wife and Ohrbach’s daughter.” Gary’s eyebrows rose. Bilbo explained. “The kid could use a little cross-cultural exposure. Make sure she’s dressed right. Not sexy.”

-$-

Gary stopped at the Police Department for the blotter, then entered the Police Chief’s office. The story on Sheriff Randall was tentacled as an octopus; he couldn’t print anything yet, but the Chief kept him posted on most of it. When Gary entered, a wallet-sized record book was squarely in the center of the officer’s desk.

“Randall’s?” Gary guessed, and took the visitor’s chair.

“Just got it. It was in his file cabinet, for the luvva God.”

The Chief was young, clean and militantly Hispanic. He had bushy eyebrows that crawled toward each other like caterpillars when he worried. His eyebrows were now copulating. He played drop-the-pencil on his blotter.

Gary thumbed through the booklet. Columns of numbers and dates were matched to initials and occasional abbreviations. “I don’t get it,” he said. “What’re you edgy about?” You knew it had to be somewhere.”

“Not in his goddam file cabinet. We’ll probably match a lot of those dates with his bank accounts. He can’t have that many.” He dropped his pencil again, retrieved it again, prepared to drop it. “Also, the timing in there worries me. Every late December for maybe six years, like Christmas presents. Then September last year, February and May this year.”

“Why? It just means he was on someone’s payroll, doesn’t it? Like the script to a bad TV show.”

“Yeah, yeah. Well, think back for a minute to some of your headlines, Phillips. The fire in the synagogue for one instance, or the one at Casa Nuestra.”

Gary obediently thought. “Yom Kippur, Cinco de Mayo; I get it. But what happened in February? Student...oh, wow.” He slumped against the chair back.

“Yeah,” said The Chief. “The Little Prince. Ties the sheriff pretty tightly to our esteemed banker-cum-embezzler and murder suspect. Because these numbers look a lot like some withdrawals in the Henry Ohrbach files.”

“Hunh.”

“And the dates jibe, too.”

Gary’s head snapped up; he’d just realized what The Chief said. “You have the Ohrbach printouts? Where’d they show up?”

“County Attorney got them in the mail I told you about. He let us have copies.”

“How much did Ohrbach get?”

“You won’t believe it; it’s gone. Nearly four million. The sniveling weasel got into his own customers for nearly twenty years, just a little at a time, and he’s broke. He’d maybe charge them another loan payment, or one month’s extra interest; they’d never notice.” Gary shook his head. “Right. Thing is,” The Chief continued, “you can’t trace it to the right people. Can’t pay it back.”

Gary waggled the little book. “How close are the numbers?”

“Close enough.”

“For what?”

“Bribery of course, embezzling, and the ever-popular subornation of perjury. With both the sheriff and the banker being rousted on top of those dead deputies’ depositions, this town’s in for a lot of pain.”

Gary had another look, riffled the pages until they opened near the front, then the back. He laid it open on The Chief’s blotter, his finger jabbed against an entry. “ZAK as in Zeki al-Khafouli,” he prompted.

“The prince? You find him in there?” The Chief’s eyebrows uncoupled. He regarded the entry for so long that even his thick mustache, like his eyebrows, spread, and he smiled. “Hot damn!” He grabbed the book. “It’s in here a couple of times!”

Gary grinned too. “Does any of this go onto the blotter?”

“Not yet.”

“How about your mom’s chicken blood?”

“Sheesh. She call you?”

“Gonna have her picture on the front page.”

“Omigod.”

Gary rose to leave.

“He’s out on bail now,” said the sheriff.

“Ohrbach?” Should he warn the sheriff about Ohrbach’s craziness? No; there were no grounds for arrest, and all the deputies had their hands full with the visiting royalty and their guests. Forget it. “I know,” he said. “He called me.” He paused by a display case of Missing Persons photos on the wall. Bebe Stubbs’ photo smiled from near-center.

“Watch your editorial butt about him, Phillips. I don’t want his trial messed up because you wanna sell papers.”

“Right, Chief.”

Ruminative pause. The Chief said, “I don’t know why you called her a Beauty Queen.” He put the sheriff’s booklet into his desk drawer and locked it, jingling many keys as he did.

“She looks okay in this picture,” Gary said. “Where’d this come from, anyhow?”

“It was hanging in her bathroom.”

“Hunh.”

Bebe was shown with big, messy hair. She was looking kittenish over one shoulder in a bad glamour pose. There was too much lighting to see the shape of her nose, but not enough to soften the heavy spikes of eyelash or patent-leather eyebrows.

“There’s lots of girls around, look better than that. She’s just average-looking, you ask me.”

The Chief was trying to get at something. “That right?”

“Right. There’s a girl here in town, looks a lot better if you want to compare within a type.”

“I forgot what a connoisseur of women you are, Chief. What type?”

“Long legs, not much front, big eyes. That type. Only with real short hair.”

“Yeah? Who beats Bebe Stubbs with Beauty Queen within her type?”

“Name’s Roarke. Cute kid, lots of energy. Going to marry the Prince.”

Gary whirled, banging his head with an open palm and staring. “Sheeeeit!”

“Better run. We’re about to call her in for questioning.”

Gary grabbed The Chief’s phone, called Bilbo’s home and gave his first executive assignment. “Grab la Roarke before the cops get her,” he barked.

Chapter 19

And Bilbo had delivered; had swept the entire al-Khafouli entourage, including Dierdre as the official hostess, onto the local Rancheria for a tour of Native American culture. Then he gave Chief Mendoza a quick course in international relations and most-favored-nation politics which accomplished a grudging, temporary amnesty for the girl.

That evening the banquet was a qualified success; as Gary would have put it, mostly boring guests, decent food. As he focused his camera for a shot Bilbo, behind him at another table, heckled. “Be sure to get the guy from the Board of Regents.”

“Really think I should?”

“Try to get him with al-Khafouli’s old man and the Chancellor.”

“Yeah? Would his old man be the guy in the head scarf and the black suit?”

“Sure; next to the good-looking broad in black. You know, head of state, head of California’s educational empire, that sort of thing. Two regents, get it?”

“Sure thing, Boss.”

Across the table, Candy disapproved of the banter and let Susan see her frown. David Friedman was oblivious. Seated to Gary’s right, he maintained a clear view of the room and doors.

“Lots of heavyweights here,” he said.

“Big news,” Bilbo reminded him.

“I don’t mean politicos. Look at the doors.”

Gary took his first real look at the gathering. The tables were filled with dining professors, their mates and offspring, a few students, and a lot of Arabs. He looked again. Dark men in black suits, very large men, were seated one to each table and paired at the three exits. “Even the waiters,” he said. “They look like Khamis’s people. Did you do it?”

“Zeki. His father’s men are out in the halls. Turks.” Gary nodded. “The guys in skirts,” Friedman helpfully supplied.

“Oh. Turks, you say? Let me write that down.”

Susan was having fun. “Are those real diamonds on the queen?” she wanted to know, and “I thought Arabian women had to wear veils.” Later, “They’re so thin!”

“Not Zeki’s mother, and she’s wearing the most jewels,” Candy said. Pudgy Susan pulled a comic face and smiled.

Gary speculated about Dierdre. The future queen sat farther down the table. She was serene and regal; a lot different from that photo of Bebe Stubbs. He felt better about missing the resemblance before.

After dinner there were speeches, thanks and acknowledgments. Friedman had to take a bow. There was a film about the people of the Arabian Gulf. Bilbo began collecting his camera and notes, ready to go. Dierdre quietly left the room. Two men peeled themselves from the exit to escort her, presumably to the ladies’ room.

When she returned the lights were up. She looked frightened. Candy sent her a sharp, questioning look. It wasn’t answered.

“Something up?” Gary asked.

“I can’t tell.”

Zeki was seated next to Dierdre. He asked her something; she whispered back. He beckoned to a guard. Khamis, on her other side and next to the lectern, didn’t notice. The last speaker sat down and the Master of Ceremonies thanked everyone. People began to leave. The guards’ eyes went into overdrive.

Friedman jerked. He stared. “Ohrbach!” he hissed. “Get Susan out of here!”

“Mother of God,” Gary breathed.

The lawyer crossed to Khamis and leaned over the table, jerking his thumb as he spoke. Gary, whispering the news to Candy, could not follow all he said. “I wasn’t sure,” he thought Dierdre said. “Candy,” He ordered, “Take Suse into Khamis’s suite. It’s through those curtains by the lectern. If her dad gets into any more trouble, we don’t want her to see it.”

There was a flutter of activity. The university nabobs left; Khamis and his party were quickly invisible in a sea of black-suited guards. The route to the curtains was jammed.

“What’s happening?” Susan demanded. “Did he say daddy’s here?”

“Yeah,” Bilbo interrupted. He hunkered between Candy and Susan’s seats, one arm on each. “What’s happening?”

Friedman returned. “Where did you see him?” Gary demanded.

“Christ! He’s dressed as a sheriff’s deputy! Get that girl out of here!”

“Where to?” Candy snapped. “All the exits are blocked.” Angrily fussing with the fringe, she wrapped Susan to the chin in her own silk shawl.

“I guess the Sheik’s bodyguards were fooled,” Friedman said. He was no longer being quiet. “I’m going out to the hall and tell Riad and Mohammed. They’ll recognize him.”

“Let the deputies do it, Friedman,” Gary said. He had circled the end of the table to urge Candy and Susan toward the curtains. “They know Henry.”

“The deputies? Who in hell do you think gave him that uniform?” Friedman took off for the exit.

Bilbo shoved his camera at Gary. “I’ll take the ladies. We’ll stick with the royals and do interviews.”

“Gary!” Susan grabbed him around the ribs.

“Bill, take Susan,” Candy said. “I’m staying.”

Gary juggled the camera, the clinging girl, and rising frustration that news was happening in the corridor and he wasn’t there. “No, you’re not!” he barked. “There’ll be trouble.”

Candy was imperious. “Bill, take that girl into that crowd! Now!” Bilbo acknowledged the voice of authority; he grabbed Susan’s wrist and headed for the crowd. The curtains parted, revealing a door, and the inner circle of guests began to disappear.

“You’ll be all right, Suse,” Gary called. “We’ll be right in.”

“Daddy!”

Silly; his eyes teared for her frightened face. He crossed to her and kissed her forehead, but couldn’t reassure her beyond that. “Thanks, Bilbo,” he muttered. The two disappeared.

He went back to the table, to Candy, clearing his throat of tears. Most of the room was empty. A few waiters, real ones, picked up dishes and began to straighten the tables. It almost looked like the end of an everyday banquet, except that the doors were shut and the guards were armed. Candy was seated with her clutch on the table, worrying the clasp with her fingers. The circlet of roses in her hair was beginning to wilt. She looked worried and defensive, vulnerable.

Gary was in no mood to be gallant. He cleared his throat. “How well do you know Dierdre Roarke?” he began. “How much do you trust her? How far would she go for Khamis?” It wasn’t the greeting Candy wanted; she blinked, resettled her shoulders, and was no longer vulnerable. Magic. Gary, however, was adrenaline-innoculated. “And what’s this crap about staying with me? Susan needs you. And I can’t worry about you when I’m working.”

Candy shook her head. “Susan doesn’t need me. Me least of anyone.”

Gary groped for a chair and lowered himself into it. Suspiciously he asked, “Meaning?”

“Simple. If she’s with me, she’s in danger.”

The adrenaline leaked out all at once. He took Candy’s fidgeting hands. “Danger?” He searched her face. “Christ,” he said, and, solemn, Candy nodded. “Candy, you make me so crazy...”

“You’re shaky,” she observed.

“It was all your idea, wasn’t it? Getting even with Henry.”

“Mostly.”

“All.”

Her chin lifted. “I was already working with Susan, furious at Henry anyway. Zeki was too mad to think. After the sheriff put that stuff under his bed, Dierdre and Khamis were so eager...”

“...that you planned a phony murder. You got these flaky Arabs to help Dierdre. She stuffed Henry full of drugs, gambling that when he got mad enough to kill, he couldn’t. But Jesus Candy, he might have.”

“Honey, the others were in the room all the time she was there. They were in the shower. She might have got a bruise or two, but she was never in serious danger. They taped everything, just in case. You can hear Dierdre on it, asking if the mound in the gully really looks like a grave. There’s no way to misinterpret what she’s saying, or who it is. And just to be sure, first we e-mailed his phony accounts to the authorities.”

“Jesus Christ.” Gary released her hands. He couldn’t stop examining her angel face, trying to believe what his head told him; that she had engineered so much pain. There was no twitch to the mouth, no evasion in their eye contact. The hell of it was, he couldn’t blame her. She remained the lovely, warm wife, the helpmeet, the partner, the mate of his adolescent wet dreams.

She had the grace to explain. “Actually, we enjoyed that part in a kinky sort of way. Of course there was a certain amount of risk, but did you know he gets so mad he faints? I got his medical record. We messed up the motel room with offal from the stockyards. It was convincing; it had to be. But Dierdre wasn’t in danger.” Gary broke eye contact. “Believe me, love! We didn’t know the rest would happen! We thought Henry would be arrested for embezzlement, then Dierdre and Zeki would show up at the trial to show who destroyed him.”

“Yeah. So what changed your minds? Why did you go forward against the sheriff?”

“Deputy Garrison’s murder. When your paper started linking it to Riad and Mohammed, to their intercepting Henry, we had to. Do you see? Then you put that big story on page one that Bebe Stubbs was missing, and everyone in town was looking for Dierdre. Well, we had to go on. We spooked Randall. But I swear, darling. We were going to tell you. Tonight, at the party.”

“That’s what Khamis said.”

“It’s true.” She stared at the tablecloth. “Sometimes you’re so decent, love. We couldn’t let you know while it was happening.”

“It would never have happened. I would have stopped you.”

“Of course you would, love. You’d have printed everything as soon as you knew.”

Gary realized he was playing with a dirty fork. He put it down. “How many of you were in on it?”

“The six of us, plus a bunch of the other students. They found evidence for the city police to discover. You know, when they’d get into someone’s desk or car.”

“Little books. Books that look like key logs.”

Candy blushed. “You know more than we thought, love.”

“What kind of things did they do? Like with Mark Chappell?”

“Yes. And once in a while they spread some blood.”

“Yeah.”

“Chicken blood.”

“That’s what was on Henry’s shoes.”

Candy was surprised. “You knew that too?”

“The Chief’s mother told me. ‘Bebe’s’ landlady. She heard you laughing about it.”

Candy grabbed his hand again, hard, her yellow-flecked eyes boring into his. “Tell me you disapprove, Gary. Tell me you, of all the people in Tipperton, didn’t know the sheriff’s men appeared whenever three or four Chicanos got together. Tell me Randall should be permitted to continue, and Henry to tell him when to go farther. Tell me Henry shouldn’t have been pulled his own daughter off that boy.” Gary was silent. “Tell me the city police could do anything about it, without what we did.” She let go of his hand. “Get me a brandy, will you? My head is bursting.” She pulled the roses from her hair. Her hair rustled down to her shoulders and curled against her shoulders.

Gary went to the liquor cart, thinking hard. He returned with two collins glasses of brandy. At last he understood all of it. The announcement about the School for Oriental Studies would have been the final, ironic twist of the knife in Henry Ohrbach’s ego; the unrestorable money he had stolen would teach Tipperton students about Arabs. He handed Candy one glass, gulped from the other and didn’t choke.

Suddenly there was a lot yelling in the hall. Gary and Candy jumped to their feet. Hoping that love really does conquer all, that he could forgive his wife, Gary said, “Get into that party behind the lectern. I’ll see what that’s about.” Gunshots, nearly simultaneous, popped through the doors. “Scoot! Now!”

Candy turn to go, then turned back. “I’ll never be sorry, Gary.”

“Go!”

When she passed through the door he heard Khamis’s party; music from an oud and the crazy ululation used at Middle Eastern celebrations. Khamis appeared. “Dierdre!” he called. “Riad! Ohrbach has them both!”

They ran for the hall.

Chapter 20

Under different circumstances, Dierdre would have enjoyed receiving on the line with royalty. Flanked by Khamis and his elegant little mother, meeting people as if their hurried flight from the banquet were planned, memorizing their names, conducting waiters with a glance or a nod, she had found her element. Except that two armed guards stood behind the curtains in the foyer, and at any minute she knew the night might explode into death, and that she must not let her knowledge show.

“Khamal el Kasmieh of Jordan,” Khamis introduced, and she smiled as she recognized a fellow student.

“Khamal, how are you? You study Civil Engineering, don’t you?” The young man murmured, and Dierdre gave his name to Khamis’s mother.

“Enchanted,” said the queen.

“Suleiman al Rahman from the Sudan,” Khamis said of a very tall black man. “Taher Raziq, formerly of Lebanon, now banking in Los Angeles. Tasin al Shani, my cousin, studying Business Administration.” It went on and on.

“I’m nervous, Khamis,” Dierdre murmured as she handed on another guest.

“And I. Inshallah, my Pearl; as Allah decrees. Persevere. The police are in control. Ibrahim! I wasn’t sure you could come.” Each shook Ibrahim’s hand, then Ismael’s, Umar’s, and Yazid’s.

Dierdre said, “If they’re in control, how did Henry get onto the campus? How do you do, Mustafa? Nice of you to come.” Across the room a door opened and shut. She only saw its enameled top over the heads of the crowd, but she hadn’t known it was there. It worried her, but that was silly. Khamis and his father’s guards knew, they would have inspected the room much earlier. The door was locked. Probably guarded as well.

However, the knowledge gnawed. She knew Mustafa was not invited tonight, nor was Khamal, nor anyone outside their immediate circle of friends. Yet others were here, had been admitted. Had Zeki, so eager to please...? She couldn’t see through the crowd. She glanced at Khamis. “How many people do we expect? There must be sixty here already. She shook another hand as the far door opened again.

She felt a vacuum on her left. “Khamis?”

Khamis wasn’t there; he was shoving people and plowing across the room, headed for that worrisome door. “Get him!” he shouted. “It’s Henry Ohrbach!”

Dierdre’s mouth went dry; she lost her hearing. “Excuse me, she mouthed, and dashed after him.

Ohrbach’s arm, pistol in hand, aimed through the door at Khamis’s head. She rammed Khamis’s back; he fell. Her shoulder, following through, struck the door; the door struck Henry’s arm. The gun spat, the sound procketed, people screamed. Henry spun into the room, grabbed her arm and hauled her to her feet with the pistol at her neck. Khamis regained his feet. Then he caught himself in time to halt his attack. People packed themselves against the walls.

Ohrbach’s voice was matter-of-fact. “You too, Khafooli! Come with me or she dies first. Your big-eared friend is waiting.”

“Keep back, people!” Khamis boomed. “Seal the room when we’re gone!”

Dierdre and Henry backed down the corridor. Before them it stretched a long way, pale flowered wallpaper and deep-red carpeting ending at a neon Exit sign. Khamis followed, half crouched but out of reach. Someone shut the door to the suite. A trash can glided past; a fire hose. They paused at the meeting with the main corridor.

“Call them off, Khafooli.”

Khamis passed them; they pivoted; Khamis now led. “Stand back, people!” he called, “Mr. Ohrbach has Miss Roarke!” He peered around the corner. Dierdre heard murmurs, movement. She felt Henry turn to look over his shoulder. She could see only a little, peripherally, but thought she recognized Sheriff Randall’s big shadow on the wall beyond Khamis. The shape of a useless pistol hung toward the floor.

Khamis waved at someone. “Get back! Please! Take no chances!”

Henry shoved her forward with her arm twisted violently behind her. The muzzle of his gun dug deep under her jaw. “Just back up into the hall, Khafooli,” he said.

“Riad?” Khamis asked. He had straightened. His tuxedo was unbuttoned.

“In the ladies’ room. Waiting for you.”

They were halfway across the corridor, angling away from the sheriff’s shadow.

“Is he well?”

“He’s probably real uncomfortable.”

Dierdre tripped over Henry’s foot. She thought her shoulder would snap from its socket. The gun muzzle sank deeper into her neck.

“Watch it, cunt.” Henry’s voice was level. “Yeah. Your funny-looking friend is pretty uncomfortable, I’d say.”

“You find that amusing,” Khamis claimed. He was closer. His pistol bulged in his cummerbund. Henry mustn’t notice. Dierdre prayed.

“It’s downright funny. Keep your distance, wog.” Khamis’s eyes flickered with angry lights. “Sorry. Wog, your Highness.”

Khamis said, “You’ve missed my brother.”

The grotesque march continued. Henry stopped at the wall; they were at the women’s restroom.

“Stay right there, Khafooli.” Henry released Dierdre and fumbled for the door knob. He was too far from it to reach; he took a half-step back.

It might have ended there, one way or another. As Dierdre ducked and jammed her spike heel into Henry’s instep, Khamis dove for the floor, drew his gun and fired. But Sheriff Randall, shouting and pounding down the hall like an assaulting tank, shook Khamis’s aim and missed with his own. Henry yanked Dierdre after himself into the restroom and flung her so hard she slammed against the far wall and went down. He bolted the door with his left hand. The gun, as steady as the floor, was in his right.

She raised herself to a crouch, wary. “You’re shot.”

“Yeah.”

Henry leaned against the door. He was grey with pain, but his voice was crazy-calm. Blood ran down his neck. Most of his right ear hung from the lobe.

They were in the softly lit lounge; cream satin chaise longue and benches, pink„tinted mirrors above a long marble shelf, deep shadow beneath it. No window. Dierdre slid down the wall, her feet tucked in case she got the chance to jump.

A figure lay under the shelf, his face to the wall. Duct tape circled his wrists and ankles. He was limp. Riad.

Henry ignored him. For a pregnant moment he seemed to totter. Puffing as he bent, favoring his injured foot, he dragged a bench into the entry to the commodes. He sat. There was no sound from the hall.

Dierdre asked, “What’ll you do now?”

“Shut up.”

They listened. Dierdre’s feet prickled, then hurt. Something brushed the wall from the other side, in the hall. She shifted her weight while Henry’s head was turned to hear. Someone knocked. “It’s Jim, Henry.” The knob turned gently, fractionally, silently. Henry fired. Splinters flew. Riad’s body spasmed. The noise bounced and bounded against the tile-lined bathroom and belched into their lounge. It grew silent, even from the hall. Dierdre heard the hands of her watch as they moved. Henry’s breath. Riad’s. “What did you do to him?” she asked, indicating Riad. She rubbed her shoulder.

“Sit still.” She couldn’t see his ear, which was fine with her, but blood fell from Henry’s chin to his lap. Suddenly he yelled, “Randall! Bring me the brothers!” Things were quiet again, except for her watch, their breath. “Randall!”

There was no answer.

“You didn’t shoot him, did you?” Dierdre asked.

“No. I aimed high. He knows it.”

“I mean Riad.”

”No, I didn’t shoot him.” Henry shifted on his bench. It seemed amazing that he could hurt, focus so hard on the door, and all the time keep his pistol aimed at her forehead. “This thing stings,” he finally admitted. “I’m going to get a towel. You move, I shoot.” The pistol gestured for the first time; it aimed at Riad. “Him.”

“I’m a statue.”

Running water, grunts, the ratchet of a paper towel dispenser. Dierdre’s feet were agony. She edged them forward and the pain increased as circulation resumed. Henry pulled more towels. The water ran. Riad stopped breathing. She panicked, reached for him and checked her motion lest Henry see it. Riad’s breathing resumed.

Something was being dragged along the hall carpet. There were whispers. She was trembling but felt calm, thought clearly. If he got mad enough, Henry would faint; but first he might shoot her or Riad. Her best defense would be to distract him, to divide his attention until he did something so unguarded that she could get his gun.

“Someone’s outside,” she said.

He reappeared, a wet towel to his ear and his gun in his left hand. “Yeah.”

“Riad stopped breathing, but he started again.”

“Shut up.”

“Can I see if he’s all right?”

Henry sat on the bench and held his ear. The muzzle of his gun stared directly at Dierdre’s face again, rock-steady. His crazy eyes focused on her forehead. “Be quiet, Bebe.” Dierdre sat still. More dragging sounds came from beyond the door. “Probably shields,” Henry said, although not to her.

She entered another world, a void without sensation or thought, and found it good. It lasted...minutes? Of course; and it ended only because the calves of her legs bunched and cramped. Could she reenter it? She wanted to, tried and failed. She swiveled her gaze to Henry. He seemed not to have moved, but blood no longer dripped from his chin.

There was a rap on the door. “Dierdre?” It was Khamis’s careful voice. Henry warned her quiet with his eyes. “Dierdre, answer me. Are you hurt?”

Henry’s gaze didn’t leave her forehead. “She’s okay. Come on in here and see for yourself.”

Khamis murmured in English. Gary Phillips’ voice answered, then Zeki’s. They must be next to the doorjamb.

“Henry, this is Jim Randall.” It was a bullhorn. “The princes will come in, if that’s what youÏwant, but first Miss Roarke has to come out. Just let her say something so they know she’s all right.”

Henry smirked. Dierdre could not move, mesmerized by the bore of his pistol. He called, “No. I want all three. I’ll tell you what I’ll do, though; you can have the little guy in here, he’s still alive, for the brothers.”

More mutters. Something rubbed against the wall; a shoulder? Zeki’s high, urgent whispers explained a tactic. Khamis’s answer vetoed it. Gary’s did too. The bullhorn spoke again. “Think about it, Henry. You can’t get out, there’s no windows in there, so sooner or later you’ll have to come out that door.” The echoes of the machine, in the long, low-ceilinged hall, were vast. They paused. Then, “When you do, that’s when the rest of your life gets decided; by the way you do it. So give us the girl. The brothers swear they’ll come in.”

“To do what? Shoot me from behind the shields you give ‘em? Get serious!” Henry’s gaze shifted for the first time as he mopped again at his ear. The gun dipped. “You and I can’t trust each other. You know that. Matter of fact, after what I did to your house I don’t expect to get out of here at all.”

The bullhorn: “I thought you wanted the boys.”

“All three of them! Bebe and the dognut brothers! Then I want Phillips to listen! To hear the rest of it!”

The following silence was profound. Dierdre, despite her terror, refocused. What did Henry want to tell Gary? The press? Would he confess? Implicate Sheriff Randall? Was this stiff figure crazy with fury? Or was he only hurting? Did he finally hurt enough, stripped of his career, his position and even his child, to ask for mercy?

Bullhorn: “Henry, I give you my word of honor it’ll be like I said. We all know why you’re in there and what these people did to you. Believe me, we understand how you feel.”

The answer to Dierdre’s question was: Henry was furious, but in control. With snake-quick movements he fired into the wall, then whipped back to position, threatening Dierdre again.

There was a howl, and scuffling and cursing in Arabic. He grinned as Dierdre jerked forward and eased back, watching him with eyes widened by fear. “Got one.”

“It’s all right, Dierdre,” Gary called. “Some plaster nicked Zeki’s hand. He’s okay.”

“They’re farther down the hall,” Dierdre whispered.

Henry’s fist was tiring, his aim wobbled. He moved to the door and listened. He shouted. “Jim!”

Bullhorn: “Henry? What?”

“I’ll give you five minutes before I begin on the girl! First her feet, then her ankles, then her knees! Give me those men!” He dropped the blood-soaked paper towel to the carpet and eased the bolt on the door open, watching Dierdre. She stared back. Using her normal voice she said, “This is it, Henry; I can only get so scared. Do what you want. You’re not getting Khamis or Zeki, though.”

“I’m not?” His pistol rose.

“Go ahead; shoot me. Every man in that hallway will be in here and you’ll be killed.”

“I know that. Al-Khafooli and his brother’ll come first.”

“No. The police have taken them away, because they finally realized that with a prince dead, there’d be hell to pay. They took them just now.”

“Bullshit.”

“No, truth. And you won’t get the others. You won’t get Mohammed, or Tallal, or Ramon, or Constanza, or Candy, or...

“Candy Phillips?” His eyes widened.

She was scornful. “Did you really think it was just the three of us? We had people drawing lots to help us do you in; both you and your store-bought sheriff. If you want revenge, you’ll have to get a whole bunch of people.”

Henry considered her for what seemed minutes. Dierdre’s trembling returned. Still, she felt nothing but fury. “Go ahead, Henry. Tell Gary what you have to say, while he’ll listen to you. Once you pull that trigger, no one else will get a chance.”

“Phillips!” Henry called.

Promptly, “Yes?” He must have been waiting. And Henry must be right about the shields; they probably covered everyone in the hall, especially after his last shot.

“Print this! Randall killed Garrison and Murphy! Both of them! You’ll find an entry in those books of mine, I paid him to do it. Stupid, but I didn’t think so at the time. The computer file’s called ‘Paid,’ and the code word is ‘Fats.’ There are some other entries in the same file, with dates. They’re all the same kind of thing. Got that?”

“Right,”

“There’s others, before; that Vietnamese whore, and the Rabbi.” Pause. “And last winter’s fires.” He paused again. “Did you take that down?”

Gary sounded sick, or pained. “Got it. Anything else? Was anyone else involved?”

“Not that I know of. Maybe your Chief of Police can sweat some more names out of Randall. We just did the fires, that one whore, the Rabbi, then Garrison and Murphy. Rousting people, like the Kafooli kid, that was usually his own idea. He’s a bully.”

“Got it,” Gary repeated.

What’s Randall doing now?”

“Not a lot. There’s a thing down the hall that looks like a bazooka, though. I think it’s a water cannon. They’re rolling it this way.”

“Yeah. I’d get out of there, Phillips. Now he’ll be after you too, because of what I just told you. Anyone else hear it?”

“A couple of us.”

“I don’t mean those Arabs.”

“There’s the publisher; Bill Bough.”

“He hear it?”

“I did.” It was not Gary’s voice. Dierdre wondered how many people were outside that door, betting against Henry’s bullets with their safety. The strange voice resumed. “This is William Bough, and I heard you, Ohrbach. You confirmed a lot of things we suspected.”

“Confirmed, huh?” He glanced at Dierdre, smirking again. She nodded.

“It’s going to help you in court,” Friedman’s voice rasped.

There was a rush of furtive movement along the wall, grunts and exclamations. “God damn it!” Gary said.

“Over here.” from Bough. “Lower. He’s shooting through the wall.”

“All right.”

It was Candy. Dierdre didn’t even think. “Get out!” she shrieked. “He knows!”

Henry whirled and struck her instep with his gun, using all his force. Pain flared red. Her loud cry was for the pain; for wounded, spasming Riad; for the blood spreading darkly across Henry’s uniform shirt; for the low-down, gut-deep misery of the end of her triumph over injustice...”Oh God!”... and she began to sob.

The hall was still as a tomb. Candy called, awed and tentative. “Mr. Ohrbach?”

Henry whirled and shot.

The bullet banged off the rim of the doorknob and went into the hall. Footsteps thudded and bodies fell. People shouted and screamed. Zeki began jabbering, “It’s my fault! The revenge is for me. I go in!" Khamis’s rumble cut through, then Friedman’s furious whine.

“Bicker, you idiots! Get that woman away from the door! Fucking semites! Jesus! Everyone’s a fucking hero...that’s right! Now cut across...” The voices and footsteps faded. Dierdre could hear nothing. Again, minutes passed in silence. Henry disappeared into the next room and reappeared with a fresh, wet paper towel. Riad tried again to move.

Henry grinned wryly, mopping his face. “Had a little adventure out there, didn’t they, Bebe?” She stared coldly.

“Mr. Ohrbach, this is Candy Phillips.”

She had the sheriff’s bullhorn.

“I just left Susan. She’s crying because she thinks her father is going to be killed. Please listen!”

Henry became attentive. Candy said a lot of simple things. Susan was wearing a dress he had chosen for her, and was proud of the way it looked. That day Susan had baked cookies and said they were Henry’s favorrites. Susan this, Susan that. Susan was afraid. Susan loved him. Susan forgave him. Finally Henry’s gun trembled.

“She’s right, Henry. Susan needs you,” Dierdre told him. “Even if you’re in jail, she needs you alive. Otherwise she’ll blame herself.”

Henry almost sounded meditative. “He really did kill Garrison, you know,”

“Yes?”

“He’ll say I did it, and the cops will believe him.”

“No they won’t. Not if you’re innocent.”

“They’ll believe him. He has his own set of books he can doctor.”

“Where are his books, Henry?” Dierdre asked the question just to keep him talking, then remembered the account book Riad had found in the sheriff’s bedroom; the trouble he had taken to get it into the sheriff’s downtown office. Oh. And of course Henry didn’t know yet that it would be found, that it was safe, that the Chief of Police had been sent hints and tips. Henry, right now, was being desperately honest, trying to believe he would surely be killed, so that he would have the courage to actually shoot James Randall. After, of course, killing Khamis, Zeki and herself. And maybe Candy.

She said, “Henry, you’re not a murderer at all, are you? You’ve never actually done it yourself.” It was at once a revelation and a terrific relief.

“There’s a first time for everything,” Henry told her. His face was even more grim than before.

They were his last words. Suddenly he jerked open the door and jumped back, facing the hall. Then he leapt.

“Drop it!” the sheriff yelled.

Henry stepped back, out of Dierdre’s sight. His coupled hands lifted his pistol into view, aiming. Gunfire blasted from all over.

Henry’s hands fell.

The echoes died.

“By God, he got the sheriff,” Friedman yelped, and the murmur of many voices filled the hall.

Somewhere an Arab ululation began, was joined by another, and another, raucous and triumphant, but not joyous.

Dierdre sat on the floor of the ladies’ lounge, waiting. Khamis arrived, then the others.

THE END

Also by Margaret Raymond:

No Reservation

My More Than Sister

Dead on Dutcher's Mountain