the Hunted (1977)

Leonard, Elmore

Unknown publisher (2011)

The Hunted (1977)

Elmore Leonard

*

"THERE ARE OTHER WAYS TO GET HOME BEFORE YOUR TOUR IS UP. YOU CAN GET SHIPPED HOME IN A BODY BAG, OR YOU CAN PULL A HAT TRICK AND GET THREE

PURPLE HEARTS. IF YOU THINK IT'S WORTH IT." --In a letter from Michael Cerre, formerly second lieutenant, 1st Recon Battalion, 1st Marine Division.

Postmarked December 3, 1970, Da Nang Vietnam.

*

THIS IS THE NEWS STORY that appeared the next day, in the Sunday edition of the Detroit Free Press , page one:

FOUR TOURISTS DIE

IN ISRAELI HOTEL FIRE tel aviv, March 20 (AP)--A predawn fire. g utted an eight-story resort hotel Saturday , killing four tourists and injuring 46 others, including guests who leaped from upper-story windows to escape the flames. No American s were killed, but two were reported injured, including an Ohio woman who jumped from a fourth-floor window.

The blaze swept through the 200-room Park Hotel in Netanya, a Mediterranean resort city about 20 miles north of Tel Aviv.

About 20 Americans escaped from the fire, an American Embassy official said, includin g a tour group of 17 who arrived in Israel a week ago from Columbus, Ohio.

According to a state radio report, the Park's management had recently considered closin g the building after receiving threats from protection racketeers who had failed to extort payments from the hotel's owners.

Firemen extinguished the flames after a seven-hour battle.

In a six-column picture on the news-photo page of the Free Press, several elderly tourists who had escaped the fire were gathered in a group on the street, holding blankets around hunched shoulders.

It was raining and they looked wet and cold. A d ark, bearded man wearing white trousers, hi s chest and feet bare, stood apart from the group , somewhat in the background, and seemed to hav e been moving away when the picture was taken.

The bearded man, glancing over his shoulder, was caught in that moment with a startled, openmouthed expression.

The picture caption repeated most of the facts from the page-one story and quoted Mr. Natha n Fine, leader of the Columbus tour group, as saying , "It's a miracle we're alive. There was somebod y went up and down the halls banging on doors, getting people out, telling them to put wet towels over their heads and follow him--crawl along the hall t o the outside stairway in back. He must have save d the lives of twenty people. It was lucky, I'll tell you , those stairs were outside, or nobody would be her e now."

The man who had gone up and down the halls banging on doors was not identified by name. Outside the hotel that rainy Saturday morning, no one seemed to know who he was or where he had gone.

ROSEN FIRST NOTICED the tourist lady on Friday, the day before the fire. He saw her and said to himself , New York.

She had the look--a trim forty-year-old who kept herself together: stylish in a quiet way, neatl y combed dark hair and sunglasses; tailored beig e sundress, about a size eight or ten; expensive canetrimmed handbag hanging from her shoulder; nothing overdone, no camera case, no tourist lape l badge that said "Kiss Me, I'm Jewish." Rosen , watching her walk past the cafe, liked her thin legs , her high can, and her sensible breasts.

In Netanya the main street came in from the Haifa Road, crossed railroad tracks, and passe d through crowded blocks of shops and busines s places before reaching an open parkway of shrub s and scattered palm trees--Netanya's promenade.

Beyond were the beach road and the sea. Looking down on the park were hotels and flat-faced apartment buildings. On the ground level of these buildi ngs were shops that sold oriental rugs and jewelr y to tourists, and open-air cafes with stripe d awnings. One of the cafes, on the north side of th e park, was the Acapulco. There Rosen had his midmorning coffee with hot milk, and there he was sitting when he first noticed the trim, New York looking tourist lady.

He saw her again that evening at a quarter of ten in a beige pantsuit and red Arab jewelry, with re d earrings dangling below neatly combed dark hair.

He imagined she would smell of bath powder.

She pretended to be interested in looking at things--at signs, at the bill of fare on the stucco wal l of the cafe--smiling a little now at the way "Blood y Mery" was spelled, and "Manhatan" and "te." Sh e needed something to look at, Rosen decided, because she was self-conscious, feeling people at the tables looking at her and making judgments in Hebrew and in foreign languages. She maintained a pleasant expression, wanting people to like her.

Rosen never worried about what people thought. Years ago, developing confidence, yes , he'd used to say, "Fuck 'em." Now he didn't eve n think about people thinking. He felt good and h e looked good, a new person: face deeply tanned, ful l beard with streaks of gray in it. Hair a little thin o n top, but the way he combed it across on a slant , curling over his ears, his scalp didn't show. He never wore suits anymore. Dark blue knit shir t open to show the pale blue choker beads and som e chest hair. Contrast was the key. The faded , washed-out safari jacket with short sleeves and th e fifteen-hundred-dollar gold wristwatch. The outdoor look. The sun-blackened forearms and hands.

Authentic casual. Off-white trousers, lined, seventyfive bucks in the U. S., and ten-dollar Israeli sandals.

(There were other combinations: fifteen-dollar faded Levi's with two-hundred-dollar Swiss boots; cashmere sportcoat and French jeans. But no business or even leisure suits, no matching outfits.) He felt that he looked very good, in fact, down to one-forty-nine from the hundred and sevent y pounds he had carried for more than twenty years.

He was also down to five-nine from the five-ten he had measured when he'd gotten out of the service , but that didn't bother him. He still considered himself five-ten and tried to remember not to let his shoulders droop or his gut hang out.

He could hold himself up and in and still sit low, relaxed--the quiet man who knew where he was--a thumb hooked in a tight pants pocket and a pencil-thin Danneman cigar between the fingers o f his hand on the metal table. The thumb remaine d hooked; he would use his cigar hand to raise th e demitasse of Turkish coffee.

Rosen was always comfortable in his surroundings. A few days in a new place, like Netanya, and he was at home and would never be taken for a tourist. And after three years in Israel--three year s next week--he felt he might even pass for a Sabra.

Rosen was forty-nine and had been forty-nine for the past year and a half. Sometimes he was younger.

For the neat-looking tourist lady, if age came up, he would probably be around forty-six.

He did not change his position, but looked up and gave her the one, "Did you know that if you si t at the Acapulco Cafe in Netanya long enoug h everyone you know will pass by? How about a cu p of coffee?"

Her smile was natural and she seemed relieved, saved, though she glanced around before sittin g down in the chair Rosen offered.

"Are you meeting someone?"

"No, I was just . . . taking a walk." She smiled again, looking toward the open front of the cafe.

"I've been wondering--why do you suppose this place is called the Acapulco? I can't figure it out."

"The owner," Rosen said, "is an immigrant, a Mexican Jew. He came here from Mexico." It wa s probably true.

"That's interesting. You don't think of Mexico."

She hunched over the table, holding her arms.

Good rings, a diamond, no wedding band. "I was reading; I think it's eighty-two different nationalities are represented in Israel. People who've come here to live."

"Eighty-three," Rosen said. "The latest figure."

"Really?" She believed him. "Do you, I mean, are you Israeli?"

"I live here. Actually, I live in Jerusalem about eight months--"

"I'm dying to see Jerusalem."

"About eight months out of the year. I spend some time up in the Golan, in the mountains. Usually a couple of months in the winter I go down to Eilat." Carefully, as he spoke, feeling her watchin g him, Rosen turned the demitasse upside down o n the saucer. "It gets too cold in Jerusalem, so I g o down to Eilat, the Red Sea area, do some skindiving around Sharm el Sheikh." The names sounded good, they were coming out easily. "Yo u been to the Sinai?"

"We just got here the day before yesterday.

We've been to Tel Aviv, Jaffa--"

"And today was a rest day, uh?"

"Most of the people in the group are a little older. So they set the pace, you might say."

Rosen turned the demitasse cup upright and looked into it, the cup white and fragile in hi s brown hand. He said, somewhat surprised , "You're with a group?"

"Yes; from Columbus, Ohio. What are you doing?"

"Hadassah ladies?"

"No--"

"United Jewish Appeal."

"No, a group from our temple, B'nai Zion."

"But your husband's not along?"

"What are you doing? Tell me."

"Reading your fortune." He showed her the shapes formed by the wet chocolaty sludge, th e residue of the Turkish grounds that had ooze d down the insides of the cup while it was inverted.

Their heads were close. Rosen caught a hint of perfume with the bath powder. He raised his eyes. Very nice skin, no blemishes. He didn't even see an y pores.

"Hmmmm," Rosen said, looking down again.

"You're with a group, uh?"

"Why, what do you see?"

"Are you in show business? An actress maybe, or a model?"

"God, no. I work in a medical lab."

"You're a nurse?"

"I used to be, before I was married."

"See that, right there, it looks like a statue? Like Venus, no arms but all the rest. That's you."

"It is?"

"Like you're posing or on a stage, all by yourself."

"I've got two teenaged daughters at home, and I'll tell you, that's not being all by myself."

"But no man around."

"We were divorced."

"How long ago?"

She hesitated. "Three years."

The next question in Rosen's mind--"You fool around?"--remained there. "I see the trip, all thos e thin lines there, but I don't see you with a group. I s ee you as sort of a loner."

"If it's your cup," the tourist lady said, looking at him now, "shouldn't it be your fortune?"

Rosen gave her a nice grin. "I didn't think you'd notice that."

"So it's not me who's the loner, it's you. Am I r ight?"

"Well, in some ways, maybe. But I'm very friendly and easy to get along with." He smiled an d offered his brown hand. "Al Rosen."

And the nice-smelling divorced lady on a tour with an elderly group from Columbus, Ohio, wa s Edie Broder; in Israel for twenty-two days, her firs t vacation in three years, more interested in the life o f the country today than in looking at old stone s from Biblical times, though she was dying to se e Jerusalem.

And Rosen actually lived there?

Most of the time.

It must be tremendously exciting, being here with all that's going on. It must be fascinating.

That's why I've stayed, Rosen said.

It was something she could already feel, the vitality of the people, their purpose.

It's something, all right, Rosen said, thinking she should see them getting on a bus in Dizengoff Street.

When you consider all that's been accomplished since just '48. It's fan tas tic.

Unbelievable, Rosen said. Maybe she'd have a cocktail?

Edie Broder hoped she didn't sound like a tourist. She couldn't help it. It was what she felt , being here, experiencing it in the light of Judaic history, witnessing the fulfillment of a four-thousandyear-old dream. And on and on for several minutes, Edie Broder from Columbus letting out what she'd been feeling about Israel for the past few days.

Rosen wasn't sure he followed all of it. He nodded, though, paying attention, seeming to enjoy her enthusiasm.

She was kind of sorry now she was stuck with the tour group, when there was so much to see.

Rosen followed that all right. He straightened in his chair, waiting.

She would like to see more of how the people lived and learn what they thought. Maybe eve n stay on a kibbutz for a few days, if that was possible. Talk to the real people.

"How about a drink?" Rosen said. "Or a glass of wine?"

"Israeli wine?"

"Of course." Rosen raised his cigar to the owner or manager, who was standing inside the cafe. "Th e Grenache rose, Car-mel. Nice and cold, uh?"

The manager came out to them. "Please, you want the rose wine?"

"Car-mel Avdat," Rosen said, in front of the tourist lady. "Israeli wine."

"Yes please. For two?"

"For two," Rosen said, and he smiled. See? He was patient, very easy to get along with.

Edie Broder leaned toward him on the table again, holding her arms. "Do you speak Hebrew?"

"Oh, a little. Actually, there's only one word you have to know, at least when you're driving.

Meshugah."

"Meshugah?"

"That's it. It means 'Idiot.' You yell it at the other drivers," Rosen said and smiled to show h e was kidding. "You feel they have spirit, wait til l you drive against them."

"Well, I won't have to worry about that," Edie said, almost with a sigh. "I'll be on the big red tou r bus."

"I suppose it's comfortable," Rosen said, "but a little slow, uh? I mean a lot of waiting around."

"It takes them forever, the older folks, to get on the bus. But they're dear people and I love them."

"One of them slips and breaks a hip, you've got another delay," Rosen said. He eased lower in th e hard chair, getting comfortable. "I think the way t o see Israel is in an air-conditioned Mercedes. Start i n the north, in the Galilee. There's a little town u p there built on a cliff, Sefad, with a great artis t colony. And a kibbutz near there, at Sasa. Com e down to Tiberias, on the Sea of Galilee. Visit Jericho on the Dead Sea, the oldest city in the world.

Hebron, the city of patriarchs, where Abraham's buried. Maybe Ramallah--"

"You make it sound fascinating." Giving him her full attention.

"Spend a week in Jerusalem, then drive through the Negev to the Red Sea, follow the Sinai coast t o an oasis on the southernmost tip, Sharm e l Sheikh." There, he'd gotten it in again. He pause d and looked at her and said quietly, "Why don't yo u let me be your tour guide?"

She hesitated, knowing he wasn't kidding.

"You're serious, aren't you?"

"Uh-huh."

"But you must be busy, have things to do," Edie said, staring back at him.

"Nothing I can't put off." He hoped she wouldn't laugh and say something dumb, like the y hardly knew each other.

She didn't. She didn't say anything, in fact, but continued to look at him.

Rosen decided to push on. He said, "I've got an idea. I'm at the Four Seasons. Why don't we tak e the wine and go sit by the pool, get away from th e commercial atmosphere?"

"I'm at the Park," Edie Broder said after a moment. "Why don't we go to my room instead?"

"Well now," Rosen said, straightening.

"I mean we aren't getting any younger," Edie Broder said.

In room 507 of the Park Hotel, at two-twenty in the morning, Rosen said, "I'll tell you something.

Nothing surprises me anymore. You know why?

Because I'm never disappointed, no matter what happens."

"You weren't shocked?" A subdued voice coming from the bed. Rosen was over by the bank of dressers in the lamp glow, looking for cigarettes i n his super-brief white Jockeys.

"No, I wasn't shocked. Not at all."

"I was," Edie said. "Hearing myself. I've never done that before in my life. But I thought, It's goin g to happen. I was sure it was because I felt comfortable with you. So I thought, why be coy about it?

Like not kissing on the first date."

Rosen was feeling through the pockets of his safari jacket. Passport, sunglasses, a disposable lighter but no cigarettes. "Listen, I thought it wa s great, except for the last part--'We're not gettin g any younger.' Don't put yourself down like that."

"I'm facing facts," Edie said.

"Fine, but don't use facts as a putdown. We all have a birthday every year, fine," Rosen said. "I'm forty-five and there's nothing I can do to change it , but so what? Why would I want to?" Rose n paused. "I've got a new theory and I don't kno w why--it's amazing--I never thought of it before.

You want to hear it?"

"Sure."

"You believe in God?"

She took a moment. "I suppose I do."

"This has to do with God's will," Rosen said, "and you either get it right away, what I'm talkin g about, or you don't."

Edie pushed up on her elbow to look at Rosen in his Jockeys. "Are you a religious person?"

"No, I never was what you'd call religious."

"But you went to temple once in a while, you were Bar Mitzvahed."

"No, as a matter of fact I never was. But listen, living in Jerusalem three years--the Jewish, Christian, and Moslem religions all jammed together there in the Old City--all these holy places, everything directed to the worship of God--maybe some of it rubbed off on me. I started thinking about Go d and what it might do for me. Then I started thinking about God's will and how people referred to it.

Somebody dies, it's God's will. Somebody gets wiped out in business--God's will. You find ou t you've got cancer or multiple sclerosis--you kno w what I'm saying?"

"I know," Edie said. "It's supposed to make it easier to accept those things when they happen."

Rosen was ready. "Fine, but nobody says, a person swings a million-dollar deal, it's God's will. It's always something bad. So I decided, wait a minute.

Why can't the good things that happen to you also be God's will? Like making a couple hundred gran d a year tax free."

Yes, and like scoring with stylish ladies who appreciated you and absolutely fucking loved it and knew you weren't going to spread it around or tel l the folks back home in Columbus.

"Or like you and I running into each other." He paused, looking toward the open balcony. "Tomorrow evening we'll walk the wall of the Old City, past the Armenian Quarter, and see, across th e rooftops, the Dome of the Mosque bathed i n moonlight." He turned from the balcony. "No, I w asn't surprised, and not because I had you figure d out in any way. But as you said, you knew it wa s going to happen. I did too, and I accepted it a s God's will." Rosen picked up his trousers from th e chair and felt the pockets. "I thought I brough t some cigarettes."

"I don't know if I can handle that," Edie said, "bringing God into it. I can't say I was thinkin g about God at the time."

"You don't have to. See, what you do, you aim in the direction you want to go, or to get what yo u want. But you don't manipulate or force people t o do anything. What I mean is, you have to be hones t with yourself. You're not out to con anybody; yo u let things happen and you don't worry about it.

That's the key--you don't worry. Something happens or it doesn't."

"What about when something bad happens?"

Edie said.

"What's bad? A week later you're telling somebody about it; you're laughing."

"Like if you find out you have terminal cancer."

"Then you're fucked," Rosen said. "No, I'm kidding. There's nothing you can do about that , right? So why fight it? That's the secret. Accep t what comes and don't worry about anything yo u know you can't change."

"It's that simple, huh?" Edie eased back down to the pillow. "Maybe for some people."

"For anybody," Rosen said. "Listen, you didn't know me before. I've learned to be patient. I've almost quit smoking. In fact, it looks like I have. I haven't had a Gelusil in almost a year. And no w you and I've met and we're going to have a wonderful time together. . . . You don't smoke, uh?"

"I quit two years ago."

"You don't happen to have a mashed-up pack in the bottom of your purse?" Rosen went into th e bathroom and closed the door to take a leak.

It was getting easier to explain his revolutionary Will of God theory. A few months ago it hadn't sounded as clear or foolproof when he'd brought i t out in the open. Like the time he'd told the lady a t the Jerusalem Hilton about it--in that big, activ e cocktail lounge--their second day together, an d she'd said, "Jesus Christ, I was worried you were a gangster, and you turn out to be a religious freak."

He had put down in his mind: Never talk philoso phy with tourist ladies. Then qualified it later: A t least never talk philosophy with ladies who stay a t the Hilton.

And don't overdo it with any of them. Edie seemed content--why confuse her?--lying in be d with her bare arms and shoulders out of the sheet , watching him as he came from the bathroom int o the lamplight again.

"Were you smoking in there?"

"No, I told you, I don't have any." He looked on the low bank of dressers again, catching his reflection in the mirror, the deeply tanned hard body--relatively hard for his age--against the brief white Jockeys.

"I thought I smelled cigarette smoke," Edie said.

"Guess not. . . . Is there any wine left?"

"All gone." Rosen came over and she moved her hip to give him space to sit down. "We can cal l room service."

"I think it's too late."

"You don't want the waiter to see me. Listen, they've seen everything. You can't shock a roomservice waiter."

"I really do think it's too late."

"I can get us a bottle somewhere." He was touching her face, letting his hand slide down t o her bare shoulder.

"Isn't everything closed?"

"If you want more wine, I'll get it," Rosen said, though he had no idea where.

"Do we need it?"

Quietly, caressing her: "No, we don't need it."

She looked ten years younger in bed, in the lamp glow from across the room. Her breasts were good , hardly any sag--right there under the sheet--an d her thighs were firm, with no sign yet of dimples , and not likely to develop any during the next te n days.

Edie sniffed. "I still smell something."

"It's not me," Rosen said. "Must be somebody else."

"No, like smoke. Don't you smell it?"

Rosen sniffed. He got up from the bed and walked across the room sniffing. He stopped.

"Yeah--like something burning." He walked through the short hallway to the door, opened it--

"Christ!"--and was coughing, choking, as he slammed the door against the smoke billowing i n from the fifth-floor hall.

"Christ, the place is on fire!"

He was coughing again, then seeing Edie Broder out of bed naked, seeing her terrified expression a s she screamed.

TUESDAY, TEN-FORTY A. M.: Rosen was the Acapulco's only customer. He sat with his coffee and pack o f cigarettes in the row of tables nearest the street, a t the edge of the awning shade. Across the square , above the shrubs and palm trees, the facade of th e Goldar Hotel showed its age in the sunlight. Som e of the guests from the Park Hotel had been move d there. Others were at the King Solomon. Mr. Fin e had taken Edie Broder and the rest of the Columbus group to the Pal Hotel in Tel Aviv, to be near the U. S. Embassy and whatever attache handled legal matters for American citizens.

It was getting complicated. Why go to Tel Aviv?

She could move in with him at the Four Seasons.

But Edie felt she should stay with the tour until they decided what they were going to do, and made sur e she'd have a flight home if they left, and all that.

Rosen said that was the tour leader's responsibility.

Edie said yes, except all Mr. Fine talked about was suing the hotel. She'd be back Tuesday afternoon , promise, ready for Al Rosen's super five-star Mercedes tour of Israel.

Ordinarily the new Rosen would have accepted this quietly. If she came back, fine. If she didn't, tha t was all right too. But there was a problem. Edie ha d his short-sleeved safari jacket, with his passpor t and prescription sunglasses in the pocket. Up i n 507, before getting the wet towels, he'd jammed hi s shirt and jacket into her suitcase, on top of he r clothes, and sailed the suitcase from the balcony , out into the night and straight down five stories t o the pavement. All she had lost were some bathroom articles and makeup. He'd lost his sandals.

He should have driven down to Tel Aviv yesterday and picked up his passport and stuff.

That's where most of the cars were still coming from--Tel Aviv, sightseers. The cars passed close t o the cafe, following the circle around the parkway , then turned off on the beach road north and crep t past the fire-gutted hotel, everybody gawking up a t the honeycomb of empty balconies and at th e places where the cement was singed black. Saturday, the Shabat, had been the big day, the cars bumper to bumper all around the square, comin g and going.

There were relatively few cars this morning--n ow that he thought about it--coming from th e street to the parkway. There were no cars standin g along the curb by the cafe. It gave Rosen a nic e view of the square.

Sunday he had read the account of the fire in the Jerusalem Post and looked through the Hebre w dailies, Ma'ariv and Ha'arez, for pictures. Ther e had been photos in all three papers of firemen fighting the blaze, and "before" and "after" shots of the hotel. But no pictures of rescued tourists, or o f Rosen walking around without a shirt. So he didn't have to worry about becoming a celebrity.

Still, he was keyed up, experiencing old anxieties, smoking again, into his third pack of cigarettes since Saturday morning. Getting away for a while with Edie felt like a good idea.

He saw the white sedan go past, moving toward the beach. With an Arab driving? It was possible , but not something he was used to seeing. Arab s were usually walking along the road, old me n wearing the head scarves, the kaffiyeh, and drab , thrown-away clothes, old suitcoats that had neve r been cleaned. The one in the car wore the traditional kaffiyeh--the white with black checkered lines that gave the cloth a grayish look, a double d black band holding it to his head.

The white car turned left and crept around the circle to the other side of the parkway, the drive r maybe looking for something or not knowin g where he was going. Rosen could see the front en d now on an angle, two vertical ovals on the grille. A BMW. The higher-priced model that would cos t roughly thirty thousand in Israel, maybe more. A n Arab driving an expensive German automobil e around Netanya, an expensive resort town.

Rosen lit a cigarette, keeping an eye on the BMW, waiting for it to come around this end of th e circle. When it went past he'd try to get a look a t the Arab. He wasn't suspicious, he was curious; h e had nothing better to do. He heard the BMW, across the parkway, downshift and pick up speed.

It would probably keep going now and duck into the main street, away from the beach.

But it didn't. The BMW was coming around the near end of the circle. In second gear. Rosen coul d hear the revs, the engine winding up. He heard th e tires begin to screech, the BMW coming throug h the circle now toward the cafe, Rosen looking directly at the grille and the broad windshield, thinking that the Arab had better crank it now, and knowing in that moment that the dark face unde r the kaffiyeh looking at him through the windshiel d had no intention of making the curve. Rose n pushed the table as he lunged out of the chair. He saw the owner standing inside the cafe and the expression on his face, but Rosen did not turn to look around. He was to the walk space between the caf e and the tables when the BMW jumped the curb an d plowed through the first row of tables and kep t pushing, taking out part of the second row befor e the car jerked to a stop and the dark man in the ka f fiyeh was out, throwing an end of the scarf aroun d the lower part of his face and bringing the heav y Webley military revolver from beneath his coat , aiming it as the owner of the cafe dropped flat t o the tile floor, aiming at Rosen, who was inside now , running toward the back of the place between th e counter and a row of tables, and firing the heavy revolver, firing again down the aisle, steadying the outstretched revolver with his left hand and firin g quickly now, three times, before Rosen bange d through a doorway and the door slammed closed.

In the ringing silence the man with the Arab scarf across his face stared into the cafe, making up hi s mind. He looked down at the owner of the Acapulco on the floor, his face buried in his arms. The man with the Arab scarf turned and looked up th e sidewalk in the direction of the shops that sold oriental rugs and jewelry, where the sidewalk passed beneath the arches of a street-front arcade, wher e people were standing now, watching him. He go t into the BMW and backed out, dragging a chai r that was hooked to the front bumper, braked hard , and mangled the chair as the BMW shot forward , engine winding, taking the curve into the busines s street east; and then it was gone.

The owner of the Acapulco got to his hands and knees and looked out toward the street for a moment, then scrambled to his feet and went to th e phone behind the counter. No--he remembere d the customer--the customer first, and he hurried t o the back of the cafe and opened the door with th e sign that said toilet.

Rosen was standing in the small enclosure, his back to the wall. There was a sound of water, th e toilet tank dripping.

"He's gone," the owner of the cafe said. Rosen stared at him, his eyes strange, and the owner of th e cafe, frightened and bewildered, wasn't sure Rose n understood him. "That man, the Arab, he's gon e now." He wanted to say more to Rosen and as k him things, but he could only think of the words i n Hebrew. Finally he said, "Why did he want to d o that to you? The Arab. Try to hurt you like that."

"He wasn't an Arab," Rosen said.

The owner of the cafe tried to speak to Rosen and tried to make him remain while he called th e police. But that was all Rosen said before h e walked out.

"He wasn't an Arab."

Edie Broder, with Rosen's shirt and jacket in her big suitcase and his passport in her tote--anxious , antsy, hardly able to sit still--took a taxi back t o Netanya from Tel Aviv and paid one hundre d twenty Israeli pounds, almost twenty dollars, fo r the ride.

It was worth it, arriving at the Four Seasons just a little after one o'clock, in time to have lunch wit h her new boyfriend, God, as eager as a twenty-yearold but not nearly as cool about it. Her daughters would die. They wouldn't understand a mothe r having this kind of a feeling. They'd like him , though. He was kind, he was gentle, he was funny.

He wasn't nearly as patient as he thought he was.

She had to smile, picturing him in his Jockey shorts looking for cigarettes, holding his stomach in an d glancing at himself in the mirror. (Telling her h e was forty-five when his passport said fifty.) The n very cool with the whole building on fire, knowin g exactly what to do, keeping everyone calm as he le d them through the smoke. He was great. He migh t even be perfect. She wouldn't look too far ahead , though, and begin fantasizing about the future. No , as Al Rosen would say, relax and let things happen.

The doorman asked Edie if she was checking in.

She told him just to put the bags somewhere, she'd let him know, and went to a house phone to cal l Rosen's room. There was no answer.

She made a quick run down to the corner of the lobby that looked out on the pool. He wasn't there.

He wasn't at the bar, or, looking past the bar, in the dining room.

At the desk she asked if Mr. Rosen had left a message for a Mrs. Broder.

The desk clerk said, "Mr. Rosen--" As he started to turn away, an Israeli woman Edie recognized as a guide with Egged Tours reached the desk and said something in Hebrew. The clerk paused t o reply. The tour guide had him now and gave th e clerk a barrage of Hebrew, her voice rising, intense.

When the clerk turned away again, Edie said, "Mr.

Rosen. Did he leave a message--" The clerk walked down to the cashier's counter and cam e back with something, a sheet of paper, and bega n talking to the Egged tour guide, who seemed in a rage now and reached the point of almost shoutin g at the indifferent clerk. The Egged tour woma n stopped abruptly and walked away.

"Mr. Rosen," Edie said, trying very hard to remain calm. "I want to know if he left a note for me, Mrs. Broder."

The clerk looked at her vacantly for a moment.

"Mr. Rosen? Oh, Mr. Rosen," the clerk said. "He checked out. I believe about an hour ago."

MEL BANDY SAID to the good-looking Israeli girl in the jeans and white blouse and no bra, "Actually , the flight was ten minutes early coming into Be n Gurion. So what do they do, they take you off th e 707 and pack you on a bus with everybody and yo u stand out there for fif teen minutes to make up fo r it. How'd you know I was Mr. Bandy?"

"I asked the air hostess," the girl said. "She point you out to me."

"And you're Atalia."

"Yes, or Tali I'm called." She smiled. Nice smile, nice eyes and freckles. "We write to each othe r sometime, now we meet."

"You got a cute accent," Mel Bandy said.

"You're a cute girl," looking down at the open neck of her blouse. Not much there at all, but very tender. Twenty-one years old, out of the Israeli Army, very bright but seemed innocent, spoke Arabic a s well as Hebrew and English. She didn't look Jewish.

The guy with her didn't look Jewish either. He looked like an Arab, or Mel Bandy's idea of a young Arab, with the mustache and wild curly hair.

The rest of him, the jeans dragging on the ground and the open vinyl jacket, was universal. His nam e was Mati Harari and he was a Yemenite, supposedly trustworthy. But Mel had seen the guy too many times in Detroit Recorder's Court. White , black, Yemenite, they all looked alike--arraigne d on some kind of a hustle.

Mel was carrying an alligator attache case. He pointed to his red-and-green-trimmed Gucci luggage coming into the terminal on the conveyor loop. The skinny Yemenite picked up the two bags , brushing the porters aside in Hebrew, and Tal i smiled and said something to the two Israeli Customs officials, who waved them past. Nothing to it.

Mel was surprised. Outside, waiting in front of the terminal while Mati got the car, he said, "I though t it was tight security here."

"They know you are searched before you get here, in New York or Athens." Tali shrugged. "Yo u know--only if they don't like the way you look."

"It's hot here."

"Yes, it's nice, isn't it?"

Mel was sweating in the lightweight gray suit.

The next few days he'd take it easy on the booze and all that sour-cream kosher shit he didn't lik e much anyway, maybe drop about ten pounds. Goddamn shirt, sticking to him--he pulled his silver-g ray silk tie down and unbuttoned the collar. Goddamn pants were too tight. He gave Tali his attache case, took off his suitcoat, and, holding it in fron t of him, adjusted his crotch. What he'd like to los e was about twenty-five pounds. He hadn't though t it was going to be this hot. Shit, it had been snowing when he'd left Detroit.

The car was a gray Mercedes. Tali wanted Mr.

Bandy to get in front so he could see better, but Mel arranged the seating: him and Tali in back. He'd se e all he wanted with the girl next to him and also b e able to talk to her without the Arab-looking guy listening. He waited, though, until they were out of the airport and passing through open country o n the way to Tel Aviv.

"Have you heard from him since we talked on the phone?"

"He didn't call last night or this morning," the girl said. "I don't know where he could be."

Mel Bandy looked over--she sounded genuinely worried--wondering if Rosen was getting into her.

Why not? She worked for him. Probably made more than any secretary in Israel. If that's what sh e was, a secretary.

"You can't call him?"

"I tried three places. He wasn't there."

"He knows when he's supposed to get his money?"

"Yes, of course. Tomorrow, the twenty-sixth of March. Always the twenty-sixth of March and th e twenty-sixth of September."

"When'd you last see him?"

"It was . . . a week ago today in Netanya. He wanted to write letters."

"In Netanya. What was he doing there?"

"I don't know. Maybe to swim in the sea."

"Or chasing tail. Was he staying in that hotel?"

"No, another one. I don't know why he was in the hotel that burned," Tali said. She imagine d the building on fire, people running out through th e smoke. "Did you bring the newspaper with th e picture?"

Mel pulled his attache case from the floor to his lap, opened it, and handed Tali a file folder. "Ou r hero," Mel said. "See if you recognize him."

She brought the tear sheets out of the folder, glanced at the front-page story, unfolded the sheets , and stared at the photo page, at the figure s wrapped in blankets and the bearded, shirtless ma n in the light-colored trousers.

"Yes, he looks like an Israeli there," Tali said, "but I can see it's Mr. Rosen. We don't have thi s picture here."

"Wire service," Mel Bandy said. "It was in the Times, the Chicago Tribune, the Detroit papers, it could've been in every paper in the country--Rosi e showing off his body--and he doesn't know it."

"He called you from Netanya?"

"I think that's what he said. But he was--what should I say--upset, distraught? He was shitscared is what he was. See, I already had my reservation. I told him hang on, call me late Wednesday afternoon at the Pal Hotel, Tel Aviv, we'd work i t out together."

"Oh, you were coming here to see him?"

"I told him last month I'd be here sometime in March."

"I didn't know that," the girl said. She had thought Mr. Bandy, Mr. Rosen's lawyer, was her e because someone had tried to kill Mr. Rosen. Sh e didn't know of another reason for the lawyer to b e here. She didn't want to ask him about it. He looke d tired and hot, even in the air-conditioned car.

"It wasn't in the newspapers about a man shooting at anyone," Tali said. "I went to Netanya, but I didn't find out what coffeehouse it was that it happened at. Only that he checked out from the hotel."

Approaching a highway intersection, they followed the curving shortcut lane past a green sign with arrows and the names of towns in Hebre w and English-- Peta Tiqva, Ramla, Tel Aviv--an d past lines of soldiers waiting for rides: girls in min i uniform skirts and young bareheaded men, some o f them armed with submachine guns.

"How far is it?" Mel said.

Tali looked at him. "Netanya? I don't think he's there anymore."

"Tel Aviv."

"Oh . . . twenty minutes more."

"How about the money? The guy get it yet?"

"He receive it yesterday," Tali said. "I call when we get to the hotel."

"Have him bring it over as soon as he can."

Tali hesitated, not sure if it was her place to ask questions. "You want to give it to Mr. Rosen yourself?"

"I'm thinking about it," Mel said. "We'll see how it goes."

The black guy, standing by the open trunk of the BMW, waved in quick come-on gestures to the tw o Americans walking out of the Ben Gurion termina l building, each carrying a suitcase and a small bag.

The older of the two men, who had the look of a retired professional football player, a line coach , was Gene Valenzuela. His gaze, squinted in th e sunglare, moved from the white BMW to the right , to the flow of traffic leaving the airport, and bac k again to the BMW. Valenzuela had short hair an d wore his sport shirt open, the collar tips pointin g out to his shoulders, outside his checked sportcoat.

The younger one, Teddy Cass, had long hair he combed with his fingers. He had good shoulder s and no hips, the cuffs of his green-and-gold prin t shirt turned up once. Teddy Cass was saying, "Shit , we could've brought it with us. Anything we wan t to use."

The black guy was waving at them. "Come on, throw it in. They already took off."

Reaching him, Valenzuela said, "You see their car?"

"Gray Mercedes. Chickie with the nice ass got in with him."

"So they're going the same way we are," Teddy Cass said.

"My man," the black guy said, "any place you are, they four ways to go. They could be going t o Jerusalem. They could be going north or south. We got to know it."

In the BMW, driving away from the terminal, Teddy Cass still couldn't get over breezing throug h Customs without opening a bag.

Gene Valenzuela had the back seat to himself.

He had a road map of Israel open on his lap. He would look out the window at the fields and th e sun and then look at the map.

The black guy asked, "He see you on the plane?"

Leaving it up to either one.

"He was in back with the rabbis and the tour groups," Valenzuela said. "I know what he did, th e cheap fuck. The company buys him a first-clas s ticket and he trades it in on a coach. Makes about a grand. I don't know, maybe he saw us. It doesn't matter. He's gonna see us again."

"We could've brought anything we wanted,"

Teddy Cass said. "Any thing. Shit, I thought it was gonna be so tight I didn't even bring any e-z wider."

"Paper's scarce, but nobody gives a shit. You get all the hash you want," the black guy said. "The y say anything to you at Immigration?"

"That's what I'm talking about," Teddy Cass said.

"No, that's Customs. Immigration, the man who looked at your passport." The black guy was holding the BMW at seventy-five, passing cars and tour buses in effortless sweeps. "Man look at mine, h e look at me. He look at the passport again. He say , 'Kamal Rashad.' I say, 'That's right.' He say, wher e was I born? I say, 'It's right there. Dalton, Georgia.'

He say, where was my mother and daddy born? I s ay, 'Dalton, Georgia.' He say, where do I live? I s ay, 'Detroit, Michigan.' He want to see my ticket , make sure that's where I came from. He say, whe n was the last time I was in an Arab country? I say I n ever been to an Arab country. He say, 'But you a n Arab.' I say, 'My man, I'm a Muslim. You don't have to be an Arab to be a Muslim.' "

Teddy Cass said, "Kamal Rashad, shit. Clarence Robinson out of Dalton, Detroit, the Wayn e County Jail, and Jackson Prison."

"A long way around," Rashad said. "And I ain't goin' back."

"You're not going anywhere, you blow another setup," Valenzuela said.

"Man saw me," Rashad said, looking at the rearview mirror. "He moved. I had five in this bi g old army piece, that's all. What was I supposed t o do? Once I emptied it--see, there was people--I d idn't have the time to load and go after him."

"So it doesn't sound like you prepared it,"

Valenzuela said.

"I didn't have time. I had to get a car. I had to buy a gun. I had to locate the man and kill him i n like twenty-four hours."

"No you didn't," Valenzuela said. "You had to locate him. That's what I'm saying--you didn't prepare it. You wanted the quick shot and some points. Now the guy's flushed and we gotta fin d him again. We can assume, I think, he hasn't left th e country. Otherwise Mr. Mel Bandy wouldn't b e here to see him. That's the only thing we got goin g for us. But we lose him, you don't get on that Mercedes' ass pretty soon, we might as well go home and wait for another fire."

"We already on it," Rashad said. "Three, four cars ahead of us." Nice. He felt his timing comin g back.

Valenzuela leaned forward to lay his arms on the back of the front seat and study the traffic ahead o f them. After a moment he said, "You're gonna hav e to get another car. Christ, driving around in a whit e car with red paint all over the front end. Also, w e gotta make a contact for guns where we've got a selection, not some rusty shit they picked up in a field."

"I already done it," Rashad said.

"We could've brought our own if somebody'd told us," Teddy Cass said. He was looking out th e window as they approached a line of hitchhikin g soldiers. He got excited seeing them. "Hey, shit, w e could take theirs. You see that?" Teddy Cas s twisted in his seat to look back. "What's tha t they're carrying, M-16s?"

"M-16s and Uzis, the submachine gun," Rashad said. "Fine little weapon. Holds thirty rounds in a banana clip. Fold the stock up on the Uzi, it fit i n your briefcase. But you take one off a soldier--I'm told they roadblock the whole fucking country, ge t your ass in half an hour."

"I like it," Teddy Cass said. "I like the sound.

Ouuuzi."

"Five bills on the black," Rashad said. "You want to pay that much. Nice Browning automatic , Beretta Parabellum, we can get for two each. Ver y popular."

"How about explosives?" Valenzuela said.

"I haven't priced none of that," Rashad said. "I f igure that's Teddy's department." He slowed dow n as he saw the Mercedes, now two cars ahead o f them, make a curving right into an intersectin g highway. Rashad grinned. "Keeping it easy for us.

They going to Tel Aviv."

The five-star hotels in Tel Aviv are all on the Mediterranean on a one-mile stretch of beach: th e Dan, the Continental, the Plaza, the Hilton, an d the Pal.

Mel Bandy could see the Hilton as they came south on Hayarkon and turned into the Pal. Th e Hilton looked newer, more modern. The Pal looke d put together, its newest wing coming out from th e front on pillars, with a parking area and the mai n entrance beneath. Tali said oh yes, the Pal was a n excellent hotel. Mel Bandy wasn't sure.

He got out of the Mercedes and entered the lobby, pulling at the trousers sticking to his can , and waited while Tali spoke to the desk people i n Hebrew, sounding like she was arguing wit h them--good, not taking any shit--then brough t out the manager, Mr. Shapira, who was delighte d to meet Mr. Bandy from Detroit. Mel was surprise d and felt a little better.

Moving to the elevator, he said, "We got a suite?"

Tali looked at the two keys she was holding. "I d on't know. I think it's adjoining rooms."

"I told them I wanted a suite."

"Let me ask Mr. Shapira."

"Never mind," Mel said. "Get the bags upstairs and call the guy at the embassy. I'll look at th e rooms. I don't like them, we'll have them changed."

Tali said yes, of course. She didn't know if she liked this Mr. Bandy. He wasn't at all like Mr.

Rosen.

The white BMW, motor idling, waited on Hayarkon in front of the Pal.

"Where's the Hilton from here?" Valenzuela was leaning forward again, looking through th e windshield.

Rashad pointed. "The one right there. Independence Park in between. You can run it in two minutes."

"Looks better'n this place," Teddy Cass said.

But it was Valenzuela who'd decide. He said, "I d on't like to run. I want to be close by, in the sam e place."

"How do I know where the man's going to stay?" Rashad said. "See, he didn't call me and le t me know."

Valenzuela didn't bother to give him a look. He said to Teddy Cass, "Go in, tell them we got a reservation. Two rooms. Wait a minute, tell them you're a friend of Mr. Bandy's. And find out what roo m he's in."

Teddy Cass got out of the car and walked into the shade of the parking area beneath the ne w wing.

Valenzuela sat back in the seat, thoughtful.

"Where's the gun contact? How far?"

"Cross town, over in the Hatikva Quarter."

"You and Teddy'll go there this afternoon. But you got to watch him. Teddy'll buy the fuckin g store."

"I'm supposed to meet the man tonight. Ain't somebody you call up and say make it three fortyfive instead."

"All right, this evening. How'd you find him?"

"You recall I came here with a name. Friend of a friend."

"Five for an Uzi, huh?"

"Going price yesterday. Subject to change."

"We're not going to worry about that. We're not gonna go crazy, but we're not gonna skimp either.

How about shotguns?"

"I 'magine. Probably buy shotguns on a street corner. This man leans toward the more exoti c weapons."

"Teddy wants dynamite or some plastic, C4. He was thinking they got everything here, with all th e fucking wars."

"If he's got it in stock," Rashad said. "See, the man's been dealing over the border, in Lebanon , selling everything he can get his hands on."

"We'll make him a better offer," Valenzuela said.

When Teddy Cass came back they saw him nodding before he reached the car.

"Okay, Clarence-Rashad," Valenzuela said.

"Check out and come back here. We'll show you how it's done."

THE MARINE BEHIND the high counter that was like a judge's bench inside the front entrance of th e United States Embassy, Tel Aviv, was Gunner y Sergeant David E. Davis: Regulation haircut, white cover with the spitshine peak straight over his eyes, blue dress trousers, and short-sleeved tan shirt, the colla r open, "Charlie" uniform of the day. He wore fou r rows of ribbons: all the Vietnam colors, Comba t Action Ribbon, Expeditionary Forces Medal, thre e Unit Citations, two Hearts and a Silver Star. Belo w the ribbons were an Expert Rifleman badge and th e smaller crossed-rifles-on-a-wreath version that indicated "expert with a pistol."

Davis appeared squared away, but with a tarnished look about him: a scrub farmer in his good Sunday shirt and tie. Davis was thirty-four. He ha d been in the Marines sixteen years. He was gettin g out of the Corps in exactly twenty-seven days an d he couldn't sleep thinking about it. It scared him.

He picked up the phone on the first ring and said, "Sergeant Davis, Post One . . . Oh, how ar e you? . . . Yeah, I can bring it when I get off duty."

There was a hint of a wearing-off southern accent in his voice. "I got to change first and do a fe w things, so it'll be about an hour and a half. Tha t okay?" He listened to the girl's voice, staring at th e round convex mirror above the front entrance. Th e mirror showed the area behind him all the way t o the fenced-off stairway at the end of the lobby.

When someone came down the stairs or wanted to go up, the watch-stander on Post One pressed a button and buzzed open the gate in the low meta l fence.

He said, "Pal Hotel. What room? . . . Okay, I'll call you from the desk. Listen, I told you I was going on leave? . . . It's like a vacation. I got twenty days coming and I'm taking some before I g o home. . . . No, what I'm trying to tell you, I'm going on leave soon as I get off duty. But I'll drop the package off first. . . . Okay, I'll see you in a while."

His gaze lowered from the mirror to the front entrance and the Israeli security guard at his desk next to the glass doors that sealed out the street noise s and the sun and the construction dust. The facad e of the embassy reminded Davis of a five-story pos t office, with official U. S. seal, placed by mistake o n the street of a Mediterranean city. Inside, the embassy reminded him of a bank--the lobby with th e high ceiling, clean, air-conditioned. He was th e bank guard. When someone wanted to see th e manager he buzzed the gate open.

When someone had an appointment upstairs Davis would call up first before buzzing the perso n through the gate. Or he'd direct people to the reading lounge or to the visa office. Or explain to someone, very politely, no, you can't stop in and say hi to the ambassador unless you have an appointment. Some of the tourists came in and were surprised that the ambassador wasn't there to greet them.

Embassy security guard duty was considered good duty.

Eight-hour watches, here and at the ambassador's residence, divided among a complement of seven Marines under Master Sergeant T. C. Cox o f Amarillo, Texas, twenty-two years in the Corps.

Military training two days a week. A hundred hours of language school, Hebrew. (Davis kne w about five words.) Deliver some papers to the consulate in Jerusalem. Pick somebody up at Ben Gurion. Recommended calisthenics and a three-mile run every morning out at the Marine House in Herzliya Pituah. (Sgt. Willard Mims of Indianapolis, Indiana, a former 1st Force Recon Marine, ran te n miles every morning, down to Afeka and back , wearing a flak jacket and combat boots. Davi s would say, "As long as we got Willard, nobody's gonna fuck with us.") Good quarters. Each ma n with his own room in a pair of townhouse condominiums a block from the sea. Each room comfortable and personal. (Sgt. Grady Mason from Fort Smith, Arkansas, had Arab rugs, a brass waterpip e he didn't use, and a Day-Glo painting on black velvet of the Mosque of Omar. Stores included refrigerators full of Maccabee beer and several cases of vodka. Fried eggs, potatoes, bacon, and pancake s for breakfast. You didn't wear a uniform more tha n a couple of days a week. Three days off out of ever y eleven. Good duty.

All the Marines at the Marine House said it was.

Davis had asked each of them once, at different times, if they'd ever had bad duty. Each one ha d thought about it and said no, he'd never had ba d duty. Davis had said, What about BLT duty-Battalion Landing Team? No, it was all right; yo u got to see foreign capitals and get laid. He'd said , What about in Nam? They had all been there an d each one of them had thought about it some mor e and said no, Nam was bad, but it wasn't bad duty , it was part of it. Part of what? Part of being in th e Marines.

MSgt. T. C. Cox would look at Davis funny.

How could Davis be in the Marines sixteen years and ask questions like that? Davis didn't know. Fo r sixteen years he had been looking for good duty.

(He had been to Parris Island, Lejeune, the supply center in Philly, on Med Cruise BLT duty, Gitmo , Barstow, California--Christ--MCB McTureous o n Okinawa, and with the 3rd Marines in Vietnam.) Now he was at the end of his fourth tour and still hadn't found any.

Sgt. Mims, roving security guard today, stopped at the Post One desk.

"Top wants to see you before you shove off."

Davis nodded. "Where is he?"

"Down the cafeteria."

He'd see "Top"--MSgt. T. C. Cox--have a cup of coffee with him, and tell him again, "Yeah, I'v e thought about shipping over, but . . ." Then say , "You want to know the truth? I don't want to sta y in, but I don't want to get out either. Do you understand where I'm at? If you do, then explain it to me."

And before he left for good, he'd see about getting somebody to take his place--somebody willing to receive by APO mail every six months a package that contained one hundred thousand dollars in U. S. currency. You could look at it, make sure it was money and not dope or dirty books--t here was nothing illegal about receiving money i n the mail. Just so you didn't ask too many questions , like, what was the money for? The girl wouldn't tell you anyway. Good-looking girl, too, with a nice little can. He should've gotten to know he r better.

A girl in a white bridal gown was having her picture taken in Independence Park, posed in an arbor of shelf rock and shrubbery.

"There's another one," Mel Bandy said. He stood at the bank of windows in the eighth-floo r hotel room, looking down at the park. "What i s this with the brides?"

"It's very popular for wedding pictures," Tali said, "with the trees and the flowers."

"And the dog walkers. They're having a convention over there, all the dogs, and the owners sitting around on the grass." Mel turned to look at Tali , who was standing between the two beds with th e telephone in her hand. "You going to call the manager?"

"I'm thinking the concierge would be the person for something like this."

"I don't care who you call."

She began to dial the number.

"What time's the Marine coming?"

Tali pressed the button down to break the connection. "He said in about an hour and a half."

"You know this guy pretty well, uh?"

"No, I've seen him only sometimes."

"Three years you've been dealing with him, you don't go out together?"

"There was another Marine before him we used.

The first one went home. This one, David, I believe it's the third time only he receive it."

"What do you give him?"

"A thousand lira."

"Lira?"

"Israeli pounds."

"That's what, about a hundred and a half?" Mel said. "To hand over a package. The Marine kno w what it is?"

"Oh yes. Mr. Rosen said, 'Let him look. Show him what it is.' The first one, I believe he though t maybe the money was to buy hashish. I told hi m no, I wouldn't do something like that, against th e law."

"What about the Marine?" Mel said. "What if he gets ideas?"

"No, Mr. Rosen trusts him. He said, 'How is he going to steal it? We know who he is. He works fo r the embassy.' "

"Does the Marine know who Rosen is?"

"No, I wouldn't tell him that."

"Have they met?"

Tali shook her head. "Mr. Rosen didn't think it was necessary."

"Or a good idea," Mel said. "You going to call the manager?"

"Yes, right now," Tali said. She dialed the concierge, waited, said, "Shalom," and bega n speaking in Hebrew.

Mel Bandy watched her. "Tell him what you want. You don't have to explain anything."

Tali was listening now and nodding, saying, "Ken . . . ken," then gesturing with her hand as she began speaking again in a stream of Hebrew.

"You don't ask him, you tell him," Mel said. He came over from the window and took the phon e out of her hand.

"This is Mr. Bandy in 824. I want a couple of men up here to move some furniture around. I wan t a bed moved out and I want a couch brought in . . . a sofa, and a small office refrigerator. . . . No, I sai d furniture. I want some furniture moved. You understand? One of the beds, the double bed in here, I want it taken out. . . . No, out. I want to get rid o f it. It takes up too much room. And I want a couch , a sofa, brought in. . . . Jesus Christ," Mel said. He handed the phone to Tali. "Tell them what w e want."

Late afternoon; they were the only ones in the embassy cafeteria: MSgt. Cox stirring two sugars and cream in a fresh cup of coffee; GSgt. Davis with a Heineken, sipping it out of the bottle and trying t o explain where he was, which Cox would never understand.

They had already gone through his being nervous, Sgt. Cox saying that if short time scared him , then he had no business stepping down. What wa s the date of his relacdu orders? Twenty April.

That's all? Shit, Sgt. Cox said, Davis was so short he'd fart and get sand in his face. From today , twenty-seven and a wake-up and he'd be out of th e Corps with his DD214. That kind of talk.

Well, Sgt. Cox supposed Davis knew what he was going to do when he got out.

"I don't have any plans, no. But I feel right now it's time. I know, I put in four more years, at least I g et some retirement. . . ."

"Some? You get half pay the rest of your life,"

Sgt. Cox said. "Twelve more years, seventy-five percent for life."

"I know, but if I stay in any longer--this is how I f eel--it'll be too late to do anything else."

"Like what?"

"I don't know. But I don't want to be a bank guard. That's the way I feel about it."

"What do you have to be a bank guard for?"

"I mean right now. That's what I feel like."

Sgt. Cox didn't understand that. He squinted at Davis, thinking. "What's your MOS, Administration? You can probably get into I and I."

"Shit no, I've got an oh-three MOS," Davis said.

"Oh-three sixty-nine, Infantry Unit Leader."

"I didn't know that." Sgt. Cox paused, giving it more thought. "Well, the way I see it, Davis, yo u maintain pretty good. Passable service record o n MSG duty. Re-up and I'll recommend you to th e RSO in Karachi. They'll give you a choice of embassies, depending on openings. I hear Seoul's pretty good duty."

Jesus Christ, Korea. Davis was shaking his head.

"No, that's what I'm talking about. Sitting at a guard post, or sitting out at the Marine House shining my shoes, getting ready to sit at the post. You know what I'm saying? What the fuck are we doin g here? We're bank guards."

Sgt. Cox was squinting at him again, irritated.

"What do we do anywhere? It's what we do."

"That's what I'm saying," Davis said.

"You don't like it, then get back into your MOS.

You picked it."

"Or get out," Davis said. "See, basically, I'm an infantryman. . . ."

"We all are," Sgt. Cox said. "You're no different."

"Okay, but I'm just speaking for myself, the way I see it. I'm an infantryman without a job. But I w ouldn't want the fucking job again if it was t o open up. So what am I doing waiting around?"

Sgt. Cox wasn't squinting now, but continued to stare at him. "I think you got a problem, Davis.

Finding out where you belong."

Davis almost smiled, relieved. He wanted to, but he didn't. "I probably make it sound more complicated than it is."

"I'll agree with you there," Sgt. Cox said. "We talk about something, it seems like a fairly simpl e issue, then you start telling me how you feel.

What's that got to do with it?"

"Well, I'm gonna go away and think about it."

Davis did grin then. "I don't know. I'm liable to come back and ship over again, but I got to be certain what I want to do."

Sgt. Cox hesitated, but decided not to get in any deeper. "You have transportation?"

"I was gonna rent a car, but Raymond Garcia's letting me use his."

"Going hot-rodding, huh? Scare the shit out of the Israelites?"

"No, I'm gonna take it easy," Davis said.

"Maybe go down into the Sinai and shoot some birds. Get off by myself and think. I haven't mad e any real plans."

"Maybe that's your trouble," Sgt. Cox said.

The previous night in the Hilton bar, Kamal Rashad had been talking to a couple of Canadia n U. N. soldiers stationed at Ismailiya on the Canal.

Couple of assholes from Guelph, Ontario, sitting at the bar drinking their Maccabees, not knowing shi t about anything.

That's what Rashad thought Davis was--walking into the Pal Hotel lobby with his haircut and hi s canvas bag and carrying a brown-paper packag e the size of a shoe box--a U. N. soldier.

Going over to the house phones at the end of the desk, Davis passed close to the spot where Rasha d was sitting. Rashad saw the USMC and insignia o n the olive-green canvas bag. Man had to be something like that with his haircut and suntans: a soldier or a man who worked construction. Rashad was watching the entrance and the pair of elevator s that served the new wing of the hotel. He didn't look over at the Marine again until he heard th e Marine say to the operator, "Mr. Bandy--can yo u give me his room number, please? I forgot it."

You never knew, did you? Rashad watched the Marine now. He could've raised his voice a littl e and said, "Eight two four." He heard the Marin e say, "Thank you," and watched him dial the number.

After a moment the Marine said, "It's me. I'm down in the lobby."

Yeah, it's you, Rashad was thinking. But who are you? He waited until the Marine crossed to the elevators, then went to the same house phone and dialed 518.

Teddy Cass answered. Rashad said, "Man look like a soldier boy went up to their room. Had a overnight bag and a package with him." Tedd y Cass told him to hang on. When Teddy came bac k to the phone he said, "Val wants you to stay awake.

The guy comes down, follow him. You got it?"

"If I can remember all that," Rashad said.

It looked like somebody was moving, all the furniture strung along the hall on the eighth floor. The doors of both 823 and 824 were open. Davi s stepped aside as two hotel employees came ou t carrying parts of a bed. He saw Tali inside 823 an d went in when the hallway was clear. She smiled a t him as if he were an old friend.

Davis smiled back, handing her the brown-paper package with his name and address on it. "What's going on?"

She gave him a tired little shrug. "I don't know.

He wants more room for something."

"Who does?"

"Mr. Bandy. I told you, the lawyer who came from the States. He's in there." She nodded towar d the open connecting doors.

Davis coul d hea r him: "You brin g th e couch? . . . I said I wanted a couch. It goes righ t there against the wall. . . . Hey, and another chai r like this one. And the refrigerator. I'm supposed t o have a refrigerator. . . . TALI!"

"He's going to have a heart attack," Davis said.

"I hope so," Tali said.

Mel appeared in the connecting doorway. He was in his socks, his silver-gray tie pulled down, hi s appearance rumpled, coming apart.

"The hell you doing?"

"Trying to stay out of the way," Tali said. "Mr.

Bandy, this is Sergeant Davis."

Mel only glanced at him and nodded, more interested in the package. "That's it, huh?" He came in, taking the package out of Tali's hands, and move d past the double beds to the coffee table by the windows. "Give me a knife or something and get the sergeant a drink. Sarge, what do you like?"

"It doesn't matter. Anything."

Mel was grimacing, pulling at the cord tied around the package. "Tali!"

"I'm here."

"You call room service?"

"They should be here soon. You want something else?"

"Fucking string--see if one of those guys has something to cut it with."

As Tali turned to go, Davis stopped her. He dug a clasp knife from his pants pocket, pried open th e blade as he stepped over to where Mel was sitting , and cut the cord from the package.

"Never mind!" Mel called out.

Davis looked at Tali, who gave him the little shrug again. They watched as Mel tore the pape r from a light metal box, opened it on his lap, and began taking out packets of U. S. currency, twenty of them, placing them on the coffee table and squaring them off evenly into two stacks.

"You ever see this much money before?" He glanced up at Davis.

"More 'n that," Davis said.

"Where?"

"Parris Island. On payday."

"That doesn't count," Mel said, looking at the currency again. "How much would you say i s there?"

"I don't know. The other times, Tali said it was a hundred thousand. But that looks like more."

"How much more?"

"Probably two hundred thousand."

"On the nose," Mel said.

Tali was frowning. "Why is it more this time?"

But Mel was already talking. "Doesn't look like that much, does it? But they're all hundred-dolla r bills. You ever wonder about it? Where it goes?"

"Not too much," Davis said. He was wasting time while the guy played with him, showing off.

He said to Tali, "Did you want to pay me now? I've got to get going."

"Yes, let me get my purse." Tali went into the adjoining room.

Mel was still watching him. "Where you going?"

"I've got some leave coming," Davis said, "and I'm getting out pretty soon, for good. So I thought I b etter take it."

"How long you been in?"

"Sixteen years."

"Jesus," Mel said.

"That's about the way I feel," Davis said. He was going to be paid and get out, so he didn't min d talking a little now. The man asked him where h e was going, if he'd be staying right around here.

Davis said the country wasn't that big. Anywhere you went, you were still around, you might say. Tal i came in with her purse and handed him an Israel i thousand-pound note.

"I wanted to mention," Davis said, "I'm borrowing a car from a friend of mine, Sergeant Raymond Garcia. He's the NCO in charge at the consulate i n Jerusalem. I've been thinking he'd probably be willing to take over for me, have the package mailed to him. The only thing, he's in Jerusalem. I didn't know if that would make a difference."

He looked from Tali to the heavyset, rumpled guy in the chair, Mr. Bandy, not sure who was goin g to make the decision. Neither of them said anything.

"He's driving over this evening. I'm supposed to meet him at Norman's. He's got a girlfriend her e he'll probably stay with and she'll drive him back."

Davis waited.

Tali nodded finally and said, "Yes, I could speak with him."

"Or hold up on it for the time being," Mel said.

"Sarge, why don't you let us think about it. What I w ould like you to do, if it's not too much trouble"- p ulling himself, with an effort, out of the chair a s he asked the favor--"is stay with Tali while sh e takes the money downstairs to the hotel safe.

Would you do that for us?"

Davis said it wouldn't be any trouble at all. He waited while the guy stacked the money in th e metal box, then took it out again and sent Tali t o get his attache case from the next room. He too k time to glance at some papers while he emptied th e attache case and threw the papers on the bed. Th e guy didn't seem very organized. Didn't give a shit a t all about other people, Davis decided. A roomservice waiter came with a bottle of Scotch and ice while they were still there, but the guy didn't offer a drink now. He'd forgotten about it. He didn't eve n say anything as they walked out.

In the elevator, Davis waited until the door closed.

"What's the matter?"

Tali shook her head. "I don't know. Something is going on. Something strange, but I don't kno w what it is." She was tense, holding the attache cas e at her side.

"And you can't tell me what's wrong."

"I don't see how I can."

"Come to Norman's with me and have a drink."

"I would like to, but I have to go back."

"You work for that guy? Mr. Bandy?"

"In a way I do, I suppose."

"Upstairs, you looked at the money, you said, 'Why is there more this time?' He didn't answe r you."

"I don't think he heard me. Or didn't choose to tell me. He doesn't have to."

"What's Mr. Bandy do? Can I ask you that?"

"He's a lawyer."

"In Tel Aviv with two hundred thousand dollars and you don't know why," Davis said, "and you'r e not sure if you work for him, but you have to ge t back upstairs."

The elevator door opened. Walking out into the lobby he stopped her, taking her gently by the arm.

"Why don't you put the money in the safe and come with me to Norman's? Or don't come wit h me, but get out of whatever you're in. Okay?"

She shook her head, looking past him, avoiding his eyes. "I can't do that."

"Why?"

"Really, it isn't something to worry about. It isn't even my business to know. You understand? So how can I tell you anything?"

"I'm worried about you," Davis said. "I hardly even know you and I'm worried."

"Don't, please. I'm sorry."

"I'll be at Norman's," Davis said. "If I'm not there later, leave word where you are. Okay?"

He liked the way she was looking at him now.

He thought for a moment she might change her mind and come with him. But she said, "Than k you, David," and walked off toward the desk wit h the attache case. He watched her, still hearing he r voice, realizing it was the first time she had eve r said his name.

Rashad was sitting next to Valenzuela. They had a good view of Davis and the girl. Teddy Cass wa s across the lobby, looking at a display case containing handmade leather goods.

"Look at him looking at her ass," Rashad said.

"He saying, 'I wouldn't mind me some of that.'

Man, I wouldn't either."

"That's the briefcase Bandy had on the plane,"

Valenzuela said. "What'd you say the guy was carrying?"

"Yeah, he doesn't have them now," Rashad said.

"Left them upstairs. A brown-paper package and a bag say Marines on it, U-S-M-C. Don't he look lik e one?"

"He's leaving," Valenzuela said. "Get on him."

Rashad stood up. He waited until Davis was outside before following him. Valenzuela crossed the lobby to where Teddy Cass was looking at himsel f in the glass case, reflected among the sandals an d handbags.

"See anything you like?"

"They're made out of camel hide, all this stuff here."

"No shit," Valenzuela said. "You through, we'll go up and talk to the lawyer."

MEL BANDY TOOK HIS SHOWER in 823. It would be his bedroom. When they got 824 fixed up with a couc h and refrigerator, it would be his sitting room, wit h a single bed in there in case he wanted the gir l handy. He didn't like a girl living in the same roo m with him or using his bathroom.

He had a Scotch with him in the steamy bathroom and sipped it while he dried off and shaved, standing naked in front of the wall mirror. He could use some sun. Drop about twenty-fiv e pounds right out of the middle, where he coul d grab a handful. He'd always tended to be a littl e heavy. But at thirty-eight, he told himself, he wasn't in any worse shape than half the guys at the Southfield Athletic Club. Slimmed down, though, or able to hold it in, it made your pecker look longer. He wondered if Rosie was making it with the Israel i girl. He wondered if the Israeli girl was an up-todate-thinking-today girl about sex. So you didn't have to go through a lot of shit and waste time.

Fucking jet lag. He'd get in bed. She'd come in.

He'd play it from there. "You must be worn out, all the running around. Why don't you come take a little nappy?"

Mel walked out of the bathroom naked.

Two guys he had never seen before in his life were sitting in the chairs by the windows, each wit h a drink, the older of the two smoking a cigarette.

The younger one, with the hair, grinning.

"Jesus Christ, I think somebody's got the wrong room. Huh? What is this?"

Standing there naked--not at the athletic club, where it was all right--in a hotel room. Wanting t o show some poise, but wanting to cover himself.

"No, we got the right room," the older one said.

"We've come to visit you."

"You've come to visit. You walk right in--I d on't even know you." He was looking around fo r something. The clothes he had taken off were o n the floor by his open suitcase.

"You know me," the older guy said. He waited, seeing Mel bending over the suitcase, aiming hi s white ass at them. "Gene Valenzuela, Mel." It wa s as though the name goosed him, the way Me l Bandy came up straight and hurried to get into hi s pants.

"Three years ago . . ." Valenzuela was saying.

Turning, zipping up, Mel began to get himself together and effect a smile.

". . . at the Federal Building in Detroit. I was down there with Harry Manza."

"Sure, I know your name, of course," Mel said.

"But I don't believe we ever really met."

"No, as I recall your friend had somebody else representing him with the grand jury," Valenzuel a said, "and I guess you handle his business lega l work. Is that it?"

The man was being nice, soft-spoken. He knew all about Mel and Mel could feel it. He hoped th e man continued to be polite. He hoped the man ha d a good ear and could sense when someone wa s telling the truth. He had never imagined himself being alone in an eighth-floor hotel room in this kind of situation. He didn't want to appear nervous. He wanted to calmly get right to the point, show the m he wasn't hiding anything. Fortunately, at the moment, he didn't have anything to hide. He didn't have the answer to what they were going to as k him. But they had to realize he was telling the truth.

He didn't know whether to sit down or keep standing. On the dresser there was another roomservice glass by the bottle of J&B and the ice. He fixed himself a drink, telling Gene Valenzuela yes , he'd been handling most of the company's lega l work for the past several years.

"But the reason you're here," Mel said--after swallowing a good ounce of Scotch and warmin g up--"you saw the picture in the paper, the fire. If I s aw it, I assume you saw it too. So there's no sens e in kidding around, is there? You believe I'm in contact with him, since I'm here and I'm his corporate lawyer. But I'll tell you the absolute God's truth , gentlemen--I have no idea where he is."

There. Like making a confession without telling anything. Mel took his drink over to the bed an d sat down on the edge of it.

Valenzuela sipped his Scotch. He said, "You come over to visit the Holy City, Mel? See the Wailing Wall?"

"No-no, I'm here on business. At least I came for business reasons. I'm not gonna try and tell you I'm a tourist. But I haven't heard from him and I h aven't been able to contact him. So--I don't know--I'll probably be going back in a couple o f days."

"Unless you hear from him."

"That's possible."

"I think you already did," Valenzuela said, "or you wouldn't be here."

"No, I swear I haven't."

"I mean since he almost got run over by a car.

What was that? Four days ago."

"Well, yeah, we heard from him at that time. I d idn't personally. He called his office."

"And they sent you?"

"Actually I was coming anyway. See if we could locate him and get some papers signed."

"See if you could locate him," Valenzuela said.

"Come on, Mel. You didn't have a phone number?"

"Honest to God. Nobody, and I mean nobody, knows where he lives."

"What name's he using?"

Mel had known it was coming. He saw no choice but to tell them. As he said, "Rosen," both Valenzuela and the younger guy were looking up, away from him.

Tali came in through the connecting doors. She stopped and said, "Oh, excuse me," seeing the tw o visitors and Mr. Bandy sitting on the bed with hi s shirt off and his hair uncombed. And smiling at her.

The first time she had seen him in a good mood since he'd arrived.

"Tali," Mel said, "you want to call room service? Get some more ice and some peanuts and shit, you know, something to nibble on. Use the phon e in the other room."

"Not for us," Valenzuela said, looking at the girl. "Tali, you go sit over there by the desk."

She looked at Mel.

"Yeah, if you don't want anything," Mel said, "that's fine."

The desk was built into the row of dressers, at the end nearer the windows. The younger gu y reached with his foot to pull the chair out an d stared at Tali as she sat down, half-turned fro m him, to face Mr. Bandy.

Valenzuela said, "What was the name again?"

Mel hesitated. "Rosen."

"Just Rosen?"

"Al Rosen. I think it's Albert."

"It's funny the names they take," Valenzuela said. "Al Rosen. Changes it from Ross to Rosen , like he doesn't want to change it too much and forget who he is. . . . What's he doing now?"

"I really don't have any idea," Mel said. "I h aven't been in contact with him at all. In fact, thi s is the first time the company's asked me to do anything connected with him. I didn't even know where he was."

Tali watched Mr. Bandy, knowing he was lying.

Why? She had no idea who these men were. She jumped as she felt her chair jiggled.

Teddy Cass, his foot still on the rung, said, "How about Tali here? Hey, you ever hear of a ma n name of Rosen?"

"Do I know him?"

"I asked if you ever heard his name."

She was looking at Mr. Bandy and saw his eyes shift away, offering no help.

"I've heard the name, yes, from Mr. Bandy, but I d on't know him."

"Tali's working for me while I'm here," Mel said. "She's called a few hotels asking for a Mr.

Rosen. That's about it."

"What I'm wondering," Valenzuela said, "is what he's been living on. He bring some mone y with him?"

"He must've," Mel said. "Unless he's working."

Valenzuela shook his head. "That doesn't seem likely. There isn't any kind of work over here coul d support him. I was thinking his company must b e sending him money."

"That might be," Mel said.

"But if that's the case," Valenzuela said, "I'd think they'd get tired of carrying him. Thre e years--what's he done for the company?"

"So maybe they're not carrying him," Mel said.

Valenzuela stared at him for a moment. "For a lawyer you're very agreeable, aren't you?"

Mel shrugged. "Why not? What you say makes sense."

"You look like a pile of white dog shit," Valenzuela said, "but you're agreeable." He got up out of the chair and walked over to the dresser to pu t his glass on the room-service tray.

Mel sat with his shoulders drooping, tired. He seemed to shrug. "What can I say? I'm on th e wrong side. Guilt by association."

Tali felt the hand of the younger one move over her back as he got up to walk past her. His touc h was frightening. The way they stood over Mr.

Bandy was frightening. As though they might pick him up and hurt him and he'd do nothing to defend himself. She watched the younger one walk toward the door, hoping he was leaving. But h e stooped to pick up a green canvas bag and droppe d it on the bed.

Teddy Cass looked at Valenzuela. "Guy comes up with a bag and a package. Leaves withou t them."

Valenzuela said, "Mel, who's the guy? He work for you?"

"He's a friend of mine," Tali said. "Tell them, please, Mr. Bandy, he's a friend that came to see us.

He left, he forgot his bag."

"Jesus Christ," Valenzuela said, "what is this?

She winking at you? You keep your fingers crossed it's all right. Where's the package the gu y brought?" Valenzuela turned, looking around th e room.

"Yes, he brought something for us," Tali said.

She got up and went to the dresser, Mr. Bandy and the older man watching her. The younger one wa s zipping open the canvas bag. "This," Tali said , picking up the J&B.

"He brought you a bottle of booze," Valenzuela said.

Tali nodded. "Yes, as a present for Mr. Bandy coming here. Because I work for him. He was bein g nice."

"Nothing much in here," Teddy Cass said.

"Some dirty clothes." He held up a uniform shirt that had been worn. "Guy's a sergeant in th e Marines. What's he doing in Tel Aviv?"

"He works at the embassy," Tali said. "I know him for a little while. We're friends. So he bring u s this when my boss comes."

"It was wrapped like a package that'd been mailed," Valenzuela said.

"There was some paper on it." Tali shrugged her shoulders. "I don't know."

"You want the wrapping paper?" Mel said. "I t hink the room-service guy took it. Gene," he sai d then. "You mind if I call you Gene? You mind if I s uggest you're getting this all out of proportion?

You want Ross. Okay. Looking at it from your standpoint I accept that, I understand. But I cam e here, I planned to come here, hoping to see him o n business, on the chance of getting a few paper s signed. Then this thing happens, he gets his pictur e in the paper and it's a whole different ball gam e that I don't know anything about. I think the man's hiding and I don't blame him, do you? He's not a dummy. If he knows people are looking for him he's gonna stay out of sight. Or he might've already lef t the country. I don't know. Unless I hear from him--w hich I admit is a possibility--there's no way I ca n contact him. So the chances are I'm gonna go hom e with my papers unsigned."

"Well, it sounds like you're giving me some shit," Valenzuela said. "Except you know the position you're in, so I don't think you'd lie to me."

"Listen, I've always been realistic," Mel said.

"I'm not gonna hit my head against a wall if I know a situation is beyond my control."

"Or hit it on the pavement down there, eight floors," Valenzuela said. "You hear from him, Mel , give me the papers. I'll get them signed for you."

When Mr. Bandy poured another Scotch Tali thought he might get drunk now because he wa s afraid and didn't know what to do. But he didn't get drunk. He sat in a chair sipping the drink, th e cold glass dripping on his stomach, and smoked a cigar. After looking so helpless, almost pathetic, h e was composed now and didn't seem worried. Sh e wanted to ask him all the questions that were jumping in her mind.

But they were interrupted. The men came with the furniture and Mr. Bandy went into 824 to tel l them where to place the couch and refrigerator an d extra chair. When the men left, Mr. Bandy told he r what he wanted stocked in the refrigerator: different kinds of cheeses, olives, soda, smoked oysters.

She was to make sure there was always ice.

"Mr. Bandy please," Tali said. "Would you tell me what they want?"

"What do you think?" He went over to the couch and sat very low and relaxed, his hea d against the cushion, looking up at her.

"I don't know. I'm asking you."

"They want to kill him," Mel said. "You understand that much?"

She didn't understand that or anything. Why?

Who are they? What is Mr. Rosen, or Mr. Ross? After doing things for him for three years--being paid one thousand pounds a week as his "assistant," a s he called her--she realized that she knew nothin g about the man. He wasn't a retired American businessman. He was hiding. And these people wanted to kill him. Why?

But Mr. Bandy avoided questions. He said, "You did all right. I liked that about the Scotch being a present. See, they've been watching, we know tha t now, and they're going to keep watching. So wha t do we do about it?"

"You told them he might have left Israel," Tali said.

"It's possible. But I don't think he'd go right away, knowing his money was due on the twentysixth."

"But why do they want to kill him? Who are they?"

"I'm gonna give him five days. If I don't hear from him by then I'm gonna pack up and g o home."

"Why are they watching us?"

"But if he does call, then we're gonna have to be ready with a pretty cute idea. You hungry?"

"What?"

"Call room service and get me . . . I think some roast chicken, baked potato, something they can't fuck up. Bottle of chilled wine. Ask them what kin d of pastries they've got. Torte or a Napoleon, yo u know, something like that."

She didn't understand Mr. Bandy at all. He should be afraid or worried, or at least show som e anxiety. But he wasn't worried. He was hungry.

THE MAN SEEMED TO DISAPPEAR. He was walking along, up ahead on the wide sidewalk between th e buildings and the trees that were spaced along th e street, and then he was gone.

It was Dizengoff Street, but ten blocks from the Dizengoff that was the heart of Tel Aviv--a carnival midway of cafes with sidewalk tables, pizza joints, ice-cream stands, and the movie theaters o n the Circle. Up at this end, Dizengoff had a few cafe s and small stores, but it was quiet and apartmenthouse residential, without the stream of people on the sidewalk. That's why Rashad couldn't figur e out how he'd lost the man. There were only a fe w other people on the street; it was five-thirty in th e afternoon.

He came to about where the man had been: a storefront, a place that looked like it had gone ou t of business, boarded up and the boards painted red.

Except the metal street numbers looked new. 275.

Rashad heard the music before he opened the door. Something familiar--yeah, Barry Manilo w trying to get that feeling. Rashad knew he was going to be surprised. But stepping from a near-empty street into a crowded pub, into a hum of voices an d music, also brought him a good feeling, a feeling o f pleasure. All the people sitting in booths and at a long row of tables and two deep at the bar--wher e the guy he'd been following was reaching over a shoulder to take a drink from the barmaid-Rashad liked it right away. A place where everybody was friendly and talked and where the new guy in town could ask dumb questions. A sign ove r the bar--tacked up over some of the snapshots tha t were on display and notes that had been pinne d there--said happy hour--drinks 1/2 price. A n eighborhood saloon in a city where you coul d count the no-shit beer-and-whiskey establishment s on one hand without using the thumb. But no nam e outside.

He'd save asking it. He made his way through the Happy Hour crowd toward the bar. Mostl y Americans, it looked like. Young dudes in spor t shirts or work clothes. American-looking girls, too , dressed for the office, and a few Israeli groupies i n tank tops and jeans. There was an English accent, a friendly Limey sound coming from a gutty-lookin g little guy wearing a hard-hat. He seemed popular , everybody saying things to him. There was a blac k guy at the corner where the tight little bar made a turn. Rashad kept moving--he didn't need a brother today--finally getting next to the guy he'd been following and saying, "How's a man supposed to get a drink in here?"

Davis glanced at him. "What do you want?"

"Scotch'd be fine."

Davis raised his voice a couple of levels. "Chris, a Scotch here."

The girl behind the bar said, "You changing, Dave?"

"For this gentleman here."

"Oh, right."

Another Limey accent, Rashad thought. Man, a real barmaid, showing her goodies in the blouse a s she bent over to pop the tops off some beers.

But talking to the guy named Dave he found out Chris was Australian. The other barmaid, Lillian--w ho was also very friendly and knew everybody's name--was Israeli. The gutty little guy in the hardhat was Norman, who was from London and owned the place that had no name outside but inside was Norman's Bar, The Tavern. Dave was Sergeant Dave Davis, on Marine security guar d duty at the U. S. Embassy. There were a dart boar d and a slot machine in the next room, where th e cases of Maccabee and Gold Star were stacked up.

During Happy Hour there were free hors d'oeuvres and new potatoes baked in their skins. The barmaids also fixed beans and franks and pizza in a closet kitchen off the bar. And in the toilet, after hi s third Scotch, Rashad stared at an inscriptio n scrawled on the wall that said, "Fuck Kilroy. The cobrahookie's been here." Yes sir, it was a serviceman'sworking man's bar. Loud but very friendly.

"Kamal Rashad," Davis said. "Like Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, huh?"

"Yeah, you hear of the famous ones," Rashad said. "Maybe Elijah Muhammad, the Messenger.

But how about Wallace Muhammad? I belong to the Wali Muhammad Mosque Number One in Detroit."

"I guess I don't know anything about the Moslem religion," Davis said. He wasn't sure h e wanted to stand here talking about it, either.

"What I believe, mainly, is one thing," Rashad said. "If you take one step toward Allah, he'll tak e two steps toward you." He sipped his Scotch. "It's a good arrangement and can keep you from fucking up on your way to heaven. How long you say you been in, sixteen years?"

"April twentieth," Davis said.

"And now you don't know whether to stay in or get out."

"I'm getting out," Davis said. "What I don't know is what I'm gonna do."

Rashad tried an approach; see if the redneck United States Marine sipping his glass of Jim Bea m would follow along. "I don't imagine you able t o put much money aside, being in the service."

"Not at two bucks a drink most places."

"Or have a chance to moonlight at some job, make a little extra."

"I guess I never looked at money as a problem,"

Davis said.

"Some guys, I understand, they get into deals where they take stuff out of a country with them t o make some bread. You understand what I'm saying?"

"What've you got," Davis said, "hash? You want me to put a few kilos in my footlocker?"

"Yeah, I understand they get next to a man going home, pack it in with his personal shit. Man goin g home from the U. S. Embassy look even better."

"What've you got?" Davis said.

"Excuse me, my man, but have I said I was dealing anything?"

Davis waited, leaning against the bar, the two girls behind him busy, chattering away with customers.

"But say a person did want to ship something,"

Rashad said. "How would he know if this United States Marine could handle it? Tell if he had the experience or not?"

"He wouldn't. Excuse me a minute, my man,"

Davis said. He moved off in the direction of the toilet, talking to people on the way.

Rashad fooled around Norman's for seven and a half hours drinking Scotch, trying to get close to th e Marine: getting into it again with him--trying t o get the Marine to say if he was dealing with somebody or had something going on delivering goods that made him some money--learning one thin g interesting, that the Marine was going on a tri p tomorrow--but people kept coming up to the Marine or the Marine would see somebody and say excuse me a minute and be gone for a while.

The place was like a club, everybody friendly and knowing one another. Rashad talked to a heavy blonde girl from the British Embassy wh o undid a couple of buttons on his shirt and move d her hand over his chest while they talked. Peopl e would leave, the place would nearly clear out; the n they'd come back and it would be crowded again.

Norman took off his hardhat and showed him the nineteen stitches in the crown of his head wher e he'd been hit by the drunken Israeli whom he'd asked to leave and who had come back in with a piece of lumber from the construction site on th e corner. Norman had the piece of lumber over th e bar. He said the Israeli had sobered up but was stil l in Assuta Hospital. They talked about how com e Irish people drank and Jews didn't--except for th e guy in Assuta. Scotches kept appearing in front o f Rashad. Chris would say it's on Norman or it's o n Dave or somebody else. Rashad promised a man h e couldn't understand he'd visit him in Wales, in a town he couldn't pronounce. Rashad wasn't eve n sure where Wales was.

The Marine introduced him to another Marine, a skinny dark-haired sergeant from the U. S. Consulate in Jerusalem, Raymond something, a Mexican name, and he watched them standing shoulder to shoulder at the bar, their Adam's apples going u p and down as they drank their pints of dark. Davi s would switch from whiskey to beer. Listening t o him and the Marine from Jerusalem it sounded lik e they were arguing, the way they talked to eac h other. The Marine from Jerusalem handed Davis a set of car keys. He said no, he hadn't brought hi s shotgun along. Was he supposed to? How was h e supposed to know Davis wanted it? Davis said because he'd told him. How was he supposed to shoot any birds without a shotgun? The Marin e from Jerusalem said bullshit he'd told him. He hadn't told him nothing about a shotgun. Norma n came along. He said, "All you want's a shotgun?

What else you need? Shells?" Norman had a Krieghoff over-and-under Davis could use, a threethousand-dollar German beauty you barely had to aim. Norman motioned to Chris to set up a round , took his Campari and soda, and moved off again , adjusting his hardhat.

Rashad got next to Davis again. "You say you going on a trip tomorrow?"

"About ten days."

"Where you going?"

"I don't know. South, I guess."

"What you need the shotgun for?"

"Birds. Do some bird shooting."

And maybe it was for something else he called "bird shooting." Maybe he needed a shotgun alon g for protection. Rashad said, "I wouldn't mind seeing the countryside down there. Whereabouts south?"

But the Marine was bullshitting with the Mexican Marine again. Rashad hit his arm and said, "Hey, you want to go get something to eat?" Davi s said they were going to get some Chinese later on.

Rashad lost twenty pounds (three dollars) in the slot machine. He lost a hundred pounds throwin g darts to one of the Canadian U. N. soldiers he'd me t in the Hilton bar the night before--the asshol e slapping him on the back and grinning as if the y were a couple of old, old friends.

Rashad sat down in a booth. Young Israeli chicks with long hair would look over at him, th e way he was lounging against the wall with one le g up on the bench. The goddamn guy from Wales h e couldn't understand, speaking English as if it wer e a foreign language, came over with two drinks an d started talking to him again while Davis and th e Marine from Jerusalem kept yelling at each othe r and laughing.

A skinny young guy--looked like a street hustler--c ame in. Israeli, or maybe Arab. Rashad wasn't sure which, but the skinny guy looked familiar. Bi g high-heeled funny-shoes and a cheap fake-leathe r jacket. He went over to Davis--everybody wen t over to him at one time or another--and had a Coca-Cola while he told Davis something, a lon g story, Davis listening and finally nodding and saying something. One minute laughing, clowning around with the Marine from Jerusalem. The nex t minute quiet, serious, not showing any of the Ji m Beam in him while he listened to the skinny Arablooking kid. Rashad couldn't remember where he had seen him before. It didn't matter. The skinn y kid left and Davis went on drinking.

Rashad closed his eyes. He'd rest a few minutes.

When he opened them Norman was saying to him, "You gonna spend the night here, are you?"

"Where's that Marine?"

"Dave? I don't know. He left."

The place was empty except for Chris and Lillian, and the Welshman hanging on the bar.

Leaving the place, Rashad tried to think of what had been going on just before he'd fallen asleep.

The Marine talking to the skinny kid. Yeah. It was cool outside, the street deserted. No taxis, shit, no t even any cars. About six blocks to the hotel. He could see the skinny kid--bony face, long haird rinking his Coca-Cola in the bar. He could see hi m inside another place then. Yeah, waiting for luggage. The skinny kid and the Israeli girl with th e nice ass, meeting the man at the airport. The sam e girl talking to the Marine in the lobby.

The Marine was gone, but he was still mixed up in it, wasn't he?

ROSEN DECIDED there was one employee at the King David who did nothing but watch for him. The gu y would say, "Quick, here he comes," and they'd ge t the basket of fruit up to 732 with the note from Mr.

Fink, the manager. "With compliments and sincere good wishes for an enjoyable visit." Rosen ha d been living in the King David for three years. He'd go to Tel Aviv or Haifa for a couple of days, com e back, and find Mr. Fink's note in the fruit.

Usually Rosen ate the banana, apples, and oranges within a couple of days. This time the fruit remained beneath its cellophane wrapper whil e Rosen paced the floor of his suite and stared out th e window. It was a nice view: the lawn and gardens , the cyprus trees around the swimming pool, and , beyond the hotel property, the walls of the Old Cit y at the Jaffa Gate. Directly beneath his window , seven stories down, was the terrace where Pau l Newman and Eva Marie Saint had sipped martini s in Exodus.

He felt protected within the familiar rooms of his hotel suite. The King David was home; they'd guard his privacy at the desk and the switchboard.

But outside, on the road from Netanya to Jerusalem, setting a new personal elapsed-tim e record of fifty-five minutes, he'd felt vulnerable.

The country was too small to hide in for any length of time. He'd have to leave soon, fly to Athens o r Paris. But to leave he needed his passport, and t o get it he had to find Edie Broder. He pictured her lying in bed looking at him. Yes, at least ten years younger in the dim light. Mature, a grown-up lady , but no excess flesh or fat. Nice tits. He pictured he r back home in Columbus, his passport in the pocke t of his safari jacket hanging in her closet.

Come on, he had to think.

All right, first try to locate Edie. Check.

Then fly out. Leave the car at Ben Gurion . . .

No, they'd be watching the airport. The colored guy in the kaffiyeh would have help by now. Or h e might have been replaced. Rosen couldn't get ove r it: their sending a colored guy to do the job, as i f they'd thought it was going to be easy--with onl y about a hundred and ten colored guys in the whol e country--not somebody who'd blend in with th e crowd. Christ, they could've gotten a real Arab fo r twenty bucks.

Instead of Ben Gurion, drive down to Eilat and get an SAS flight to Copenhagen.

No, first call Tali and get the money. Tomorrow was the twenty-sixth. Convert it to pounds on th e black market at ten and a half or eleven to one. . . .

Then what? Put it in the bank? What if he didn't come back to Israel? But how was he going t o take it with him? Get a hundred thousand U. S. dollars through the security checks--plus the fiftysomething grand he had in a Bank Leumi safe-deposit box? There was too much to thin k about. Too many loose ends. All right, but arrang e to get the money tomorrow or the next day. Cal l Tali and work something out. Thinking of Tali, h e thought of Mel Bandy.

Mel was supposed to be here, when? Today.

Something else to think about. He was coming--t hey'd said on the phone--to review the busines s and discuss future plans, which had sounded a littl e funny to Rosen. They didn't need his approval o n anything. Why, after three years out of the business , would they give a shit what he thought about future plans? His business partners seldom contacted him. They sent the money and a Christmas card.

Why, all of a sudden, were they sending a lawyer? It hadn't bothered him before, but now it did.

The lawyer arrives the same time a payment is due.

The lawyer arrives the same time somebody is trying to kill me.

Was there a connection?

He was getting off on something else now. He didn't need to imagine problems, he had enoug h real ones. First, find Edie Broder.

He phoned the Four Seasons in Netanya. There were no messages. He called the Goldar Hotel. Th e Columbus, Ohio, group had checked out, gon e home. The ones at the Pal in Tel Aviv had als o checked out. How about Mr. Fine, the tour leade r with lawsuits in his eyes? Mr. Fine was at th e Samuel. No, he wasn't, the Hotel Samuel said, Mr.

Fine had checked out. Voices at the U. S. Embass y knew nothing about a Mr. Fine or the Columbu s group.

What Rosen finally did--which would have saved him hours hunched over the phone staring a t the wall if he'd thought of it earlier--he calle d Columbus, Ohio, directory assistance. They didn't have an Edie or an Edith Broder. The closest the y could come was E. Broder. Rosen got a teen-age d Broder girl out of bed at four in the morning, eleve n o'clock Jerusalem time, and asked for her mother.

The sleepy, irritated voice said her mother was in Israel. "Ahhhh," Rosen said. "Where in Israel?"

On a tour. "Where on a tour?" With some group.

"But the group went home." No, her mother had called; she was with another group. "What othe r group?" The girl couldn't remember. "Think!"

Well, it sounded like egghead. "Egged Tours,"

Rosen said. "Where? Where did she call you from and when?" Tuesday night, from Tel Aviv. "You'r e a sweet girl," Rosen told her. "I'm going to sen d you a present." Big deal, the sweet girl said.

Rosen called Egged Tours in Tel Aviv. Yes, a Ms.

Edie Broder had joined one of their tours, "Hadassah Holiday," and was staying at the Dan Hotel.

Closing in, Rosen called the Dan. The Hadassah group, just a minute . . . had gone to Hadera, to th e kibbutz Shemu'el, for the day; returning this evening. Eight hours later: the Hadassah group was back, but Ms. Broder was not in her room. Wa s there a message? Rosen hesitated, then said yes, as k her to please call Mr. Rosen at the King David , Jerusalem.

He felt better. He felt good enough, in fact, to shower and dress and leave the room for the firs t time in two days.

Silva, the barman, placed a cocktail napkin in front of him and said, "Mr. Rosen, sir. We haven't been seeing you lately." He poured Scotch over ice , adding a splash of water and a twist. Then put ou t dishes of nuts and ripe olives.

"Netanya doesn't have it," Rosen said. "There's only one city in Israel."

"Of course, sir." Silva was Portuguese, born in Hong Kong, and spoke with a British-Israeli accent. To Rosen, Silva was the King David. Silva, th e oriental carpets, the bellboy who actually rang a bell as he paged and carried the guest's name on a square of blackboard.

Rosen eyed a tourist lady having her lonely cocktail and was tempted. Not bad, though a little too elaborate, with a fixed blonde hairdo you could no t muss up, though you might chip it with a hammer.

More the Hilton type, lost here in the quiet of the King David's lounge. No, he had enough going o n and phone calls to make. Three sundowners an d quiet conversation with Silva would do this evening. He dined alone, three tables from the blonde tourist lady, went up to his suite, left it semi-dark , and phoned Tali's apartment.

There was no answer.

He'd been afraid of that. Assuming she had picked Mel up at the airport--this had bee n arranged more than a week before--she might stil l be with him, knowing Mel. He'd either be dictatin g letters, eating, or trying to get into her pants. Rose n wasn't worried about Tali. She was a stand-up littl e girl. If Mel got obnoxious she'd belt him or else politely walk out. What did worry Rosen was the unknown, what might be going on out there in the near world. Tali was alert, she sensed things, and h e wanted to talk to her before he talked to Mel.

Well, he would or he wouldn't. Rosen called the Pal Hotel, asked for Mr. Bandy, and Tali's voic e said, "Ken?"

"Be cool," Rosen said. "Don't say my name yet.

I'm your boyfriend calling or your mother, okay?"

"Where are you?" Her voice low.

"Home. Are you with Mel? Mr. Bandy?"

"He's in the bathroom." Her voice rushed at him then. "There were two men here to see him. The y threatened him. I didn't know who they were, th e way they were talking, saying things about you , asking questions--"

"It's okay," Rosen said quietly. "Take it easy, okay? What were their names?"

"I don't know. Mr. Bandy said . . . first he was afraid, when they were here and threatened him.

Then he wasn't afraid anymore, when they were gone. He was like a different person. He said . . . a terrible thing."

"What did he say?"

"He said they wanted to kill you." Her voice dropped. "He's coming out."

Rosen could hear the toilet flushing. "Did the money come?"

"Yes, but it was more this time."

He could barely hear her. "What? How much more?"

"Two--"

"Listen, okay, tell him it's me. Tali? Don't worry." He heard her saying, away from the phone , "It's Mr. Rosen."

Rosen sat back in his chair in the semi-dark room, the Jaffa Gate illuminated outside beyon d the garden. He looked at his watch. Ten-fifteen. He lit a cigarette and felt ready, a leg up on Mel, read y for Mel's openers. He began to think, If you neve r liked him much, why did you hire him? . . .

"Rosie, Jesus Christ, man, I been worried sick. I t hought you were gonna call this afternoon."

"I didn't know I was supposed to," Rosen said.

"They told you. My flight was due in at one thirty-five. I've been sitting here, Jesus, worrie d sick."

"How was the flight, Mel? You're feeling a little jet lag, I suppose."

"Rosie--"

"Mel, just a minute. Ross . . . Rosen . . . even Al. But no Rosie, okay?"

"Sorry. Christ, you're worried about that--Gene Valenzuela was here."

"Yeah, go on," Rosen said.

"I mean right here in this room. He's looking for you."

"Mel, a guy tries to run over me with a car and takes five shots at me. You think it's some guy of f the street?"

"I mean he walked right in here, he says, 'Where's Ross?' He's not keeping it any secret."

"If I already know the guy's after me--" Rosen said. No, forget it. "Mel, tell me what he said."

"He asked me, he wants to know where you are.

I told him I had no idea. I said I was here to see you on business, but now I wasn't sure if you'd contac t me or not."

"What business?"

"I tried to explain that the reason I was here had nothing to do with what was going on."

"What business, Mel? You said you wanted to see me on business."

"It's not something we can handle over the phone, I mean in any detail," Mel said. "I want t o see you--as I told them, it's the reason I'm here--b ut under the circumstances I think we're gonn a have to wait. They'll be watching me like a fuckin g hawk, every move I make."

"Tomorrow's payday," Rosen said. "I was wondering if it had arrived."

"Yes, the guy brought it, the Marine."

"Did you look, it's all there?"

"Everything's in order." Mel paused. "As a matter of fact there's more this time. Considerably more."

"Why?" Rosen said.

"Jesus Christ, I never heard anybody questioning money coming in."

"Mel, why'm I getting more?"

"I want to sit down and talk to you, Rosie, as I m entioned. But we can't do it over the phone. Righ t now, the thing to decide is how to get the money t o you."

"Why don't you bring it?" Rosen said. "Then we can talk."

"That's exactly what I can't do at the present time," Mel said. "They're on my ass. I go down t o the lobby, Valenzeula's sitting there reading th e paper."

"What do you want to do, send Tali?"

"Rosie, where are you? You in Tel Aviv?"

"I don't want Tali to deliver it," Rosen said.

"You understand? She's not in this."

"Christ, I'm not either," Mel said. "I'm trying to help you on something that doesn't concern me a t all, but it's entirely up to you. You tell me wher e you are or where you're gonna be and I'll get th e money to you, somehow, without sending Tali."

"I'll call you back," Rosen said.

"Wait a minute--when?"

"Sometime tomorrow." Rosen hung up.

He lit another cigarette and sat in the evening quiet by the window that faced the Old City. He could still picture in detail the hall in the Detroi t Federal Building, could still see Gene Valenzuel a and Harry Manza coming along with their attorneys. Valenzuela with his heavy, no-shit look, from the time he had been with the Teamsters and th e time he was Harry Manza's construction supervisor: showing the T-shirt beneath the open collar, hair skinned close like a cap over the hard muscle i n his head that narrowed his thinking. No style, n o imagination. He remembered the time the Teamsters had walked out and the independent hauler had been trying to talk to Valenzuela, explai n things, and Valenzuela listening before beating th e shit out of the guy and burning his rig. That wa s business, his job. The situation now was personal.

All right, how did you get through to somebody like that? Rosen smoked cigarettes and though t about it quietly, trying to keep fear out of it. Ho w did you go about stopping somebody like that?

You didn't; you stayed out of his way. There were no alternatives. Get the money and the passport and run.

LEAVING THE BLACK MUSLIM ASLEEP at Norman's hadn't been a bad thing to do. He was a big boy, an d if he wanted to drink that much it was up to him.

Waking up with the hangover and the Israeli girl who snored wasn't so bad either. Hangovers wer e made to be cured with cold beer and hot lamb an d peppers stuffed inside pita bread. The girl woul d still be sleeping when he left. At times, though, h e wished he could wake up and remember everythin g from start to finish. The details came gradually an d sometimes, long after, unexpectedly.

He had gone to the Singing Bamboo with Raymond Garcia to meet Raymond's girlfriend Rivka, who was the receptionist at the Australian Embassy. Rivka was depressed. She had fixed up her good friend Sadrin with a date, an American, an d the sonofabitch had stood her up. Like it wa s Davis' or Raymond's fault because the guy wa s American. Poor Sadrin was sitting home, dressed , alone, playing her piano. Davis said why didn't sh e go to bed; it was eleven o'clock. Rivka made pouting sounds in Hebrew and Davis said okay, call her.

He went to pick the girl up in Raymond's Z-28, which he'd have for the next two weeks, rumblin g along the dark street, feeling the car under him: '72

Z-28 Camaro, the hot setup from here to Jerusalem, a screamer with its 302 V-8, Pirelli radials on American racing mags, lime green with a white stripe that came up over the hood and dow n the trunk lid to the spoiler.

The next part was weird.

The Israeli girl, Sadrin, wore a yellow dress and pearls and played Chopin on the piano softly. He remembered that. He remembered drinking brand y with lemon and soda. She drank more than he ha d ever seen an Israeli girl drink as they talked, and sh e started to laugh at things Davis said. They finishe d the brandy and got into a bottle of white wine tha t was starting to turn, the girl laughing and tellin g him how funny he was. He felt good, he felt attractive to her. She said to him, "You give pleasure to my eyes." She put him in the mood with her cris p yellow dress and pearls--that was one of th e strange parts--and her round full lips that he tol d her looked like a basket of fruit. He didn't kno w where he'd gotten that, but she liked it and laughe d some more and when they started kissing it felt lik e she was sucking his mouth, trying to get him all in.

It was good, but it was hard work and she wore him out in bed, working away, her mouth clampe d to his, Davis thinking she was never going to come , thinking what the fuck am I doing here? But he sa w her in her yellow dress and pearls sitting alone. He remembered how glad she had been to see him, t o see somebody, anybody, and he let her work at it a s long as she wanted, finally getting his mouth fre e and telling her she was pretty--she wasn't bad--a nd that he loved her mouth and her eyes and he r body--much bigger and heavier out of the yello w dress--telling her nice things as he held on and sh e bucked against him. She went into the bathroo m after and got sick in the washbasin. She moane d and told him she didn't feel good and wanted to di e and didn't have an aspirin. She went to sleep, tha t big girl, calling for her mother in Hebrew.

Out at the Marine House--he didn't see anyone around--Davis got cleaned up: put on a shirt an d jeans and a white snap-peak civilian cap he like d that was broken in, well shaped. He liked to wear i t low over his eyes when he was hung over . . . taking time now to eat a couple of egg-and-onion sandwiches with two ice-cold Maccabees. Jesus, h e was reborn.

He threw extra clothes into a valpac and gathered up a pile of Louisville Courier-Journal s his aunt had sent him. What else? Stop by Norman's apartment in Ramat Aviv for the shotgun. Wha t else? See Tali and pick up his travel bag full of dirt y clothes. Something else. Shit yes, first he was supposed to meet her friend, Mati Harari. At eleven o'clock.

It was twenty to eleven when he drove away from the Marine House and passed gungy Willard Mim s jogging back from Afeka in his flak jacket and combat boots. A beer with Norman, in his underwear, took a few minutes. Still, it was only eleven-fiftee n when he pulled up in front of the M&A Club o n Hayarkon, half a block from the Pal.

He remembered something else he hadn't thought of in the past twelve hours or more and i t gave him a sinking feeling. Twenty-six days to g o and he'd be on his own.

The M&A--Miguel and Ali's, where Argentina met the Middle East--was a place with a courtyar d in front, hidden from the street; it had white stucc o walls with dark beams, and impressionist paintings. Not a drinking bar like Norman's, a conversation bar where young Israelis who were making it came in to talk and play backgammon and sip coffee or one glass of wine for an hour. Each time Davis came to the M&A he liked it, the atmosphere, and promised himself to come back and learn how to play backgammon. But he usuall y ended up at Norman's.

He asked Mati if he wanted something to drink.

Mati shook his head. There was no one in the place except Mati Harari, Tali's friend, and Miguel's wife, Orah, behind the small bar. Davis got himsel f an ice-cold Gold Star from her before he sat dow n with Mati and saw his Marine travel bag on th e bench.

"You brought it. Good."

"Man, she's anxious to see you. But you got to not go in through the front."

"I've got to not go in through the front, uh?"

"I'm suppose to show you a way, how you take the lift from the lower level."

"What're you nervous for?"

"You talking about? I'm not nervous. Listen, they watching them, man. Tali don't know what's going on."

"I don't either," Davis said. "I don't even know what you're telling me."

"I'm not going to tell you nothing, so don't ask me." Like, try and make me. The street kid, th e dark Sephardim with his bandit mustache and hi s bushy Israeli 'fro. He could look mean, all right , and Tali had said he'd served time in Haifa. Davi s accepted that. The guy was still about a Grade C h otshot. He'd last about two minutes on the line.

"I don't think we're getting anywhere," Davis said. "Is there anything else?"

"Follow me," Mati said. "That's all you got to do."

Rashad was across the street from the Pal at Kopel "Drive Your Self" Ltd., seeing the man about getting a Mercedes before he dumped the BMW.

Rashad wasn't watching for anything. He had moved away from the counter and was standing i n the open doorway while the Kopel agent shuffle d through his papers. Rashad was in the right plac e to see them coming along Hayarkon, walking i n the street. When the Kopel man said, "Here it is," a nd began to quote rates, Rashad turned to hi m and said, "Hold it, my man. Before we get int o that, let me use your phone. Got to call my father."

Valenzuela answered. Rashad said, "He's back, coming down the street this way . . . the Marine , man. I'm across the street at the car rental. The Marine's with the Arab kid again. Same one as last night . . . Wait a minute. No, they're going dow n the side street next to the hotel. The Marine's go t his overnight bag again . . . going down there lik e they heading for the beach. . . . I don't know , maybe he's got something going with the cute Ara b kid." Rashad listened, nodding--"Yeah, al l right"--and he hung up.

He said to the Kopel agent, "Sorry. My father say I got to come right home."

Through a gray basement hallway and up a service elevator to eight. Tali was waiting for them, th e door to 824 open.

"You're very good to come, David. I hope this isn't bothering your trip."

"No bother," Davis said. Entering, he picked up his travel bag from the bed. "I thought you jus t wanted to give me my dirty laundry."

"Mr. Bandy would like to speak to you," Tali said. "Sit down, please."

The room was like a living room now. Davis glanced around as he walked over to the windows.

Now wait for the important lawyer. He looked out at Tel Aviv, at the scattering of highrises that ros e out of the tan five-story skyline, the easter n Mediterranean going to glass walls. Somebody ha d said to him, "Tel Aviv used to be an ugly town.

Now they're building all these Hiltons and Sheratons to hide the view of the sea and it's uglier than it was before." Davis liked Tel Aviv. He wasn't sur e why. He liked the people, the younger ones. He'd like to get to know some of their troopers, talk t o them. He wouldn't have minded having some o f them along in Vietnam. Shit yes, pros; hard fuckers.

"There he is. How you doing, Sergeant? What can I get you?"

Davis turned to see Mel Bandy coming through the connecting doors. He looked different, his fac e pink, flushed--the guy coming all the way over t o shake hands this time, trying to give Davis a goo d firm one with his fat hand, smelling good of something, all slicked up in a light blue outfit--light blue print shirt with a movie-star collar, light blu e slacks, white belt, white loafers with little gol d chains on them.

"We're set up, finally," Mel said. "What would you like?"

"Beer'd be fine," Davis said.

"Shit. You name the one thing--Tali, call room service. Get the sergeant some beer."

"No, I don't care. Anything'll be fine."

Mel went to the bar that was set up on the desk and began fooling with bottles, bending over , showing his big can as he got ice and mix from th e refrigerator wedged into the desk opening.

"Where you from, Sergeant? I detect an accent."

Davis said, well, he'd been born in Harlan County, Kentucky, but had moved from there whe n he was six years old. His dad had been killed in a coal-mine accident. They'd moved--he and hi s mom and sister--they'd gone to live with his aunt , who had a farm in Shelby County. That was abou t halfway between Lexington and Louisville--Tal i and the street kid, Mati, watching him, not havin g any idea what he was talking about. He'd gone t o school one year in Cincinnati, but it was i n Louisville that he'd enlisted in the Marines. Boring , Christ, hearing himself. He felt like a straight ma n when Mel came over and handed him a frost y drink.

"Hundred-proof pure Kentucky bourbon. How about that."

Like it was a treat and all Davis drank was some kind of piss-poor shine. The guy wanted to d o more than talk. He wanted something. The drin k was all right, something like a bourbon collins. Th e guy didn't offer Tali or the street kid a drink. He made a Scotch for himself and sank down on th e couch with one short leg stretched out. He wor e light blue socks, too. Davis sat in a chair by th e windows. He wasn't in a hurry, but if the guy farte d around too long he'd tell him he was. Eleven-thirt y Friday morning sitting around having a two-ma n party. Tali sat quietly, a little expectantly; the stree t kid hunched over in a straight chair, his darkskinned left hand holding his right fist.

Davis looked over at Mati. He said, "Don't you want something to drink?"

"No . . . nothing." Straightening awkwardly, shaking his head.

Okay, he had tried. Davis looked at the light blue lawyer. "Are we waiting for something?"

"As a matter of fact, we're waiting for a phone call," Mel said. "But I want to take a little time, fil l you in first."

The guy was ahead of him, assuming things.

"I'm on leave," Davis said.

"So you got time. Good."

It wasn't what he'd meant. "My car's packed.

I'm ready to go." Shit, it still didn't sound right. "I m ean I've made plans," Davis said. "I'm taking a trip."

"I understand that," Mel said. "All I want you to do is drop something off for me."

"Where?"

"That's what we're waiting to find out. How's your drink?"

"I'll have another one."

Mel pushed himself up and went over to the bar with their glasses.

"You recall the package, the money. You give it to Tali, right? She's the one set it up, she delivers it.

That's the way it's been. This time I want you to deliver it. You saw it yesterday? Two hundred grand?

That money." Mixing drinks, Mel spoke with his back to Davis. "We get a phone call from an individual, a client of mine. He tells us where to make the delivery. You go there and give him the money.

He calls again, tells me he's got it. That's all you have to do."

Mel opened the desk drawer and took out a packet of bills. He walked over to Davis an d dropped the packet in his lap as he handed him a fresh frosty bourbon.

"A thousand U. S. bucks. That look about right?"

Davis picked it up, fingering the packet of crisp hundred-dollar bills. He watched Mel get hi s Scotch and shuffle back to the couch, the big dealer.

"If it's such a pissy little job, how come a thousand?" Davis said.

"Looking for the catch, uh?" Mel grinned at him. "Well, I'm not gonna lie to you. There coul d be--there's a very slight chance of a complication.

But not if we do it right. Okay, you want the whole story?"

"I wouldn't mind knowing a little bit more,"

Davis said.

"I'm not gonna give you details, it's a long story," Mel said, "but. There's a man by the nam e of Al Rosen living here who used to live in Detroit.

Three years ago he testified for the Justice Department before a federal grand jury. The Justice Department wanted to indict two individuals for murder and they persuaded my client, Mr. Rosen , against my advisement, to testify as a key witness.

Okay, the two individuals were never brought to trial and my client was left standing there in his underwear. You follow me?"

"You say his name's Al Rosen?" Davis said.

"Right, Albert Rosen," Mel said. "One of the individuals he testified against had a stroke. He's still alive but he's fucked up, paralyzed on one side , doesn't talk right. The other one served nine month s in Lewisburg on a separate, minor indictment--c onspiring to defraud. One day my client's ca r blows up, killing a gas station attendant who ha d come on a service call. It was a cold morning, th e car wouldn't start. Otherwise it would've been m y client. You understand? So my client, with th e help--if you want to call it help--of the Justice Department, which got him into this, changed his identity and came here to live."

"Who sends the money?" Davis said.

"That's another story. Well, let's just say the company he used to be with," Mel said. "In th e mortgage loan business. The company's been carrying him the past three years and we're the only ones who know where he is. Everything's fine . . . relatively. So what happens? Rosen gets his picture in the paper."

"Here?"

"No, it wasn't even in the papers here. The story was about the hotel that burned down last week i n Netanya. No, Rosen shows up in the Detroit papers and some others, picture of him standing out in front of the hotel."

Davis was nodding.

"You got it now?" Mel said. "Three days later, not wasting any time, somebody makes an attemp t on his life. Yesterday two guys came to see me.

They want to know where he is. If I'm here in Tel Aviv then it must be to see Rosen. So they're watching me. They're watching Tali. They're watchin g the kid here, maybe. Rosen wants to get the hell ou t and hide someplace else. Change his identity again.

But he has to pick up his money first, and we can't deliver it because these guys are watching. The y know who we are."

"Okay," Davis said.

"Just like that?" Mel seemed a little surprised.

"Great."

"You haven't told him," Tali said. "They also know who David is."

"No, they don't know him," Mel said. "Maybe they saw him talking to you in the lobby."

"It's the same thing," Tali said.

Mel was staring at her, giving her a look. "They don't know his name or what he does, where h e lives. That's quite a difference." He turned to loo k at Davis. "Of course it's up to you, Sergeant. I f you'd just as soon pass up a quick thou."

"I'll do it," Davis said. "Where's the money?"

Mel gave him his grin. "You're not getting any ideas, are you, Sergeant?"

Davis didn't say anything. He grinned back.

He listened to the plan Mel described. There wasn't much to it.

They had the metal box that the money had been mailed in wrapped up again with paper and string.

When Rosen called, Mati Harari would take the package, walk through the lobby, get in the Mercedes, and drive off.

A few minutes later, Davis, with the money in Mel's briefcase and the briefcase in Davis' trave l bag, would leave by the service entrance. He'd cu t through the beach parking area next to the hote l and come out on Hayarkon, where his car wa s parked in front of the M&A Club. Some plan.

If anyone tried to stop him--well, Davis was not expected to resist. "Unless you want to," Mel said , and then asked him if he'd been in Vietnam. Davi s nodded. Mel said, "Well, as I say, it's up to you , considering the remote possibility anything happens. But I can't imagine a Marine taking any shit from anybody."

Davis said, "It's about all a Marine takes."

They sat around waiting. Mel would go into the adjoining room for a while and come out lookin g at his watch, showing Davis he was as anxious a s anybody. He'd walk around with his hands in hi s pockets, his shoulders hunched. Once he went ove r to the window and looked down at Independenc e Park, where the brides had their pictures taken an d people walked their dogs, and said he bet fags hun g out down there, it looked like a fag park. He didn't offer any more frosty drinks.

At about one-thirty Mel decided it was time to eat and asked Davis what he wanted. Davis said, I g uess shwarma. Mel said, What the fuck's shwarma?

And Davis told him--lamb and stuff inside pita.

Mel told Tali he'd have a cheese and mushroom omelette and fries. He didn't ask Mati what h e wanted. Tali did, and then got on the phone t o room service and began speaking Hebrew.

After a few moments she placed her hand over the speaker and said to Mel, "They can't put th e dairy and meat dishes on the same table."

"What dairy dishes?"

"The omelette."

"Tell them eggs are from chickens, for Christ sake."

"The cheese in it," Tali said.

"Jesus Christ," Mel said to Davis. "You believe it? Then tell them to put it on two tables," he said t o Tali. "I don't give a shit how many tables they use."

That was as interesting as it got, sitting around waiting. Davis talked to Tali a little, asking he r about her year in the Israeli Army, and found ou t where she lived. But he couldn't relax and sa y funny things to her with Mel in the room.

Finally, going on four, the phone rang and Tali answered it. He knew it was Rosen from the wa y she turned and looked at him before she looked a t Mr. Bandy and held out the phone, nodding.

Davis didn't hear much from where he was sitting. Mel stood with one hand in his pocket looking up at the wall, saying, "Yes . . . of course . . . w e've been waiting, we're ready to go," his ton e much different, being efficient and a little kissy-ass.

He waved the phone at Tali and said, "Here, you get the directions from him. Make sure it's clear."

Then he said into the phone, "Rosie, don't worry about a thing. It's as good as done."

Tali spoke to him again. When she hung up she seemed sad. "The address where he is is Rehov Bil u 30 in Herzliya."

"I know about where it is," Davis said.

"Write it down for him," Mel said. "What is it, a house, what?"

"An apartment. Number 23 on the fifth floor. It belongs to a friend of his," Tali said. "There's a lif t you take."

Mati picked up the package and left, not looking back when Tali said something to him in Hebrew.

A few minutes later it was Davis' turn, carrying the alligator attache case inside the Marine trave l bag and the thousand bucks in his back pocket. A t the door, Tali said, "If you come back this way o n your trip, please stop and tell me how Mr. Rosen is , how he looks."

Davis left, wondering if Tali was sleeping with the guy. He was anxious to see this Mr. Rosen.

Mati got no more than three strides out of the elevator before Teddy Cass hit him with a stand-up bod y block, forearms into Mati's chest, and pushed hi m back inside. Valenzuela came in after them. Th e doors closed and the elevator went up. Teddy Cas s held Mati against the wall, his forearm now agains t the skinny kid's throat, staring at the kid's wide-ope n eyes while Valenzuela ripped open the package.

"Bullshit time," Valenzuela said. "Paper in a tin box." The elevator stopped. Valenzuela jabbed th e button for the lobby. "We'll bring him along."

Rashad was over by the taxi stand to the left of the hotel entrance, where a cement stairway le d down to the side street that sloped toward th e beach. Rashad waited for them as they came ou t with the Arab-looking kid between them, the ki d looking very frightened or sick.

"The decoy," Teddy Cass said.

"Car down the street's got a Marine thing on the windshield. They like to tell you what they do, don't they?" Rashad said. Next to him, on the cemen t wall at the top of the stairway, was a plaid overnigh t bag. "Looks like he should be along any time now.

It's one way, so he's got to come toward the hotel before he turns to go anyplace else." Rashad picke d up the overnight bag. "I'll see you gentlemen."

He walked down the hotel drive toward Hayarkon and gave a little wave without looking back.

Valenzuela and Teddy Cass walked Mati over to the white BMW parked in the shade of the hotel.

HE'D GO WEST on Nordau to Ibn Gvirol, then cut over to the Haifa Road. He could keep going nort h after the stop in Herzliya, drive up to the Golan o r Metulla, see if maybe there was some action alon g the border--terrorists sneaking in. Maybe talk t o the troops up there on border watch. He could stil l make the Sinai in a day.

Davis put the Camaro in gear and got almost to the end of the block. The crazy Black Muslim cam e running out into the street right in front of him , grinning and holding up his hand. Davis recognize d him, couldn't miss him, as he braked to a stop. Nex t thing, the guy had the door open and was getting in.

"What way we going?"

Davis pushed the gear into neutral. He didn't like it, but he didn't have time to think.

"I'm going north."

"That's fine with me," Rashad said. "I'm ready to see some country." Davis didn't move an d Rashad eased up a little. "I don't want to fuck u p your plans, my man. You don't want me along, sa y it. But I would appreciate a lift out of Tel Aviv.

Place is beginning to press down on me. . . ."

Davis started up, creeping, and made the turn at Nordau.

". . . All the nightlife, places like Norman's.

Man, it's warm and friendly, but it gets to you. Hey, I thought we were gonna have some Chinese."

That was the way it went. Rashad talking, Davis holding on to the steering wheel. Rashad admirin g the gutty sound of the Z-28, saying shit, this machine ought to blow the mothers off the road, put a Mercedes on the trailer. Davis began to relax. A n insistent Israeli car horn would sound behind the m at a light and Davis would give it some revs wit h the clutch in, letting the horn-blower have som e heavy varooms, then release the clutch and slingshoot the Camaro away from the light. Kid stuff, with gas a buck sixty a gallon. But he enjoyed i t once in a while and the black guy ate it up. The gu y didn't seem so bad when he wasn't trying to com e on, when he relaxed. He asked Davis was that al l he had, the one bag? It was on the back seat. Davi s said no, he had stuff in the trunk. Some newspaper s his aunt had sent him. Rashad said he liked t o travel light. He unzipped his plaid bag and pulle d out a white and black kaffiyeh and draped it ove r his natural, saying, man, it made sense. It was cool , and he meant cool cool. The guy tried to be entertaining, trying to be friendly. He was tiresome.

On the highway, the Haifa Road, Davis said, "I g ot to make a stop in Herzliya. It's a suburb u p here."

"You going to be long?" Rashad laughed then, taking off the kaffiyeh. "Shit, like it makes any difference. Man, I don't even know where I'm going.

But if you want me to get out up here, say it. It won't hurt my feelings any. You've been very kin d and I appreciate it. I suppose after talking to yo u last night and all, meeting your friends," Rasha d said, "I feel like I'm one of them."

"Well, I don't think I'll be too long," Davis said.

Dumb. Backing down because he felt sorry for the guy. He didn't say anything else until they were i n Herzliya, passing streets lined with new apartmen t buildings.

"I'm looking for Bilu. That's the name of the street."

"You never been here before?"

"Well, it's not a friend," Davis said. "I just have to stop and see a guy for a minute."

Rosen heard the car, the rumbling engine sound.

He stepped out onto the balcony to see it roll into the blacktop parking area facing the building: a lime-green American car among the Europea n minis. That would be the Marine.

Except there were two people in the car. Rosen watched the driver, in a white cap, get out an d reach in again to get the canvas bag, then slam th e door and start toward the building.

Rosen stepped back, a reflex action. He could still see the car and make out the figure sitting in th e front seat. He didn't see the man's face, though, until the side window came down and the face inside leaned over to look up at the building. Rose n jumped back again.

The guy in the car was black.

He told himself it couldn't be the same one.

Probably another Marine or a guy who worked at the embassy. When he heard the elevator comin g up--one door away in the hall--he stepped out t o the balcony again. The black guy was still in th e car. If it was the one from Netanya he wouldn't b e sitting there doing nothing. Rosen went to the doo r of the apartment and opened it about an inch, the n moved to a table facing the door where his attach e case was lying open, the top half of it standing up.

The small automatic pistol he brought out of the attache case was wrapped in tissue paper.

He didn't know for sure that the guy in the cap was the Marine named Davis. Or if the guy wa s coming here. He was thinking now he should hav e waited, given it more thought and picked anothe r place. This seemed too close to Tel Aviv. They'd gotten here in twenty minutes. Maybe it shoul d have been out somewhere in the desert, in th e Negev. They drop the money and leave and h e picked it up later. He should have taken more time.

The guy, somebody, was knocking at the door. . . .

"It's open."

"My name's Davis. I've got something for Mr.

Rosen."

"Show me your name's Davis," Rosen said. He closed the attache case, bringing the top par t down.

Davis saw the automatic pointing at him. Little 32-caliber Beretta, seven shots. Not a bad weapo n if the man knew how to use it.

"Are you Mr. Rosen?"

"Let's see something with your name on it."

Davis dropped the canvas travel bag on the table. He dug his wallet out of his pocket, opene d it, and held it out for Rosen to see his Marin e Corps I . D . The man was too old for Tali. He couldn't see the two of them making it together.

The man would be like her father. Davis wondered if he should take the Beretta away from him. No--l eave him alone. The man was nervous and had a right to be.

"Who's the one in the car?"

Davis put his wallet back in his pocket. "Some guy thinks he's a friend of mine."

Rosen looked at him, stared for a moment. He didn't understand, but it wasn't something he wa s going to get into a discussion about. He said, "Yo u know what it is you're bringing me?"

"Yes, sir. Money."

Davis got the alligator case out of the travel bag and reached over to lay it on top of Rosen's attach e case. He watched the man snap it open.

"You mind my asking, sir--your name's Al Rosen?"

"That's right."

"You weren't by any chance a third baseman?"

Rosen looked up at him, his hands on the case.

"You're about the right age," Davis said. "The one played for the Indians, made Most Valuabl e Player in, I think, '53. Hit forty-three home runs , led the league with a three thirty-six average."

"You want to know something? You're the first person over here's asked me that," Rosen said.

"How old you think I was then?"

"I don't know. In your twenties?"

"He hit three thirty-six," Rosen said, "but Mickey Vernon led the league that year. Beat hi m out by oh-oh-one percentage point with a thre e thirty-seven."

"Yeah?" Davis was interested and more at ease.

"I don't remember what happened to him after that. I was only about eleven."

"Rosen? He retired, thirty-one years of age.

Greenberg, the sonofabitch, wouldn't give him any more than twenty-seven five to come back, an d Rosen said fuck it. He was already in the brokerag e business."

"Greenberg from the Tigers?"

"Yeah, he was general manager of the Indians then."

"I guess I don't recall that," Davis said.

"Yeah, well, I'm about ten years older than you are." Opening the alligator case, Rosen said, "So you remember Al Rosen, huh?"

He picked up a sheet of paper that was inside and his expression changed as he began reading it , squinting or frowning, Davis wasn't sure which.

Something wasn't right. Davis stepped around to look in the case. There wasn't anywhere near tw o hundred thousand inside. Just a bunch of loos e hundred-dollar bills.

"You know about this?" Rosen was staring at him again. "He sent five grand. That's all."

"You think I took it?"

"I'm asking if he said anything about it, if he told you what he was doing."

"No, sir. He put two hundred thousand in there yesterday. I watched him."

"You counted it?"

"He said how much it was. There were twenty packs of hundred-dollar bills."

"How long have you been working with Tali, getting the packages?"

"This was the third one," Davis said. "There were some letters other times."

Rosen held up the sheet of paper. "My lawyer says, 'I'm not sure we can trust the Marine.' "

Davis was used to standing on the front side of a desk, at ease or at attention. He made no comment.

It was all right, because he felt much different with Mr. Rosen than he did with Mr. Bandy. He respected Mr. Rosen.

"My lawyer says we can't trust anyone under the circumstances. 'Anyone' underlined. He says, m y lawyer who's been here two days, 'Let's conside r this a test run. If you receive the five thousand intact we will know we have established a reliable liaison'--Jesus Christ--'and I will feel more confident in carrying out the responsibility of seeing that you receive the entire amount.' "

"He writes different than he talks," Davis said.

"Fucking lawyer," Rosen said. "His responsibility! It's not his responsibility, he's got nothing to do with the money!"

"Why don't you fire him?" Davis said.

"He says if I receive this and so on. He doesn't say anything about if I don't receive it. You notic e that?" Rosen said. "All right, why wouldn't I receive it? One, you ran off with it. Two, I didn't show up here for some reason. But if I knew it wa s coming, what's the only reason I wouldn't b e here?" Rosen waited.

Davis shook his head.

"Because I'd be fucking dead is what I'd be,"

Rosen said. "The sonofabitch, he's waiting to see if I stay alive before he delivers the two hundred. I'v e got to save my ass and he's concerned, he's worrying, he says he wants to feel confident about his responsibility!"

"Why don't I go back and get it?" Davis said.

Rosen looked at him and seemed surprised.

"You mean right now? You'd do that for me?"

"He says he wants to establish a liaison. Well, let's show him it's established." He watched Rose n reach into the case and pick up some hundreddollar bills. "No, I don't need any more. The thousand Mr. Bandy gave me'll cover it."

Rosen paused. "How long you think it'll take you?"

"Forty minutes. If Mr. Bandy's there and he's got it ready."

"He'll be ready," Rosen said. He went over to the phone that was on the counter separating th e kitchen from the living-room area. He dialed a number and asked for the room.

Now the lawyer would get chewed out. Davis felt good about that and was anxious to hear it. He didn't want to appear to be listening, though. I t wasn't any of his business. Walking out on the balcony, he heard Rosen say, "Tali, let me speak to Mel. . . . Yeah, he's here. Everything's fine." Hi s voice sounded calm; he was in control, knew wha t he was going to say. The man was all right. Peopl e trying to kill him, he still seemed to have it prett y well together.

"Mel . . . I got your note. . . ." Rosen was listening; then: "Mel . . ." not able to get a word in.

Davis could picture the lawyer with his hand in his light blue pants, talking, looking up at the wall.

Davis was looking down five stories at the limegreen Camaro, the racing stripe--he hadn't realized the white stripe didn't extend over the roof of the car. Just on the hood and the trunk. The ca r looked empty. The black guy, his new buddy , wasn't inside.

"Mel, you're a wonderful person, I appreciate your concern. . . . Of course not, I understand. . . ."

It surprised Davis, Mr. Rosen's tone, his patience.

There he was. The black guy was over toward the far end of the parking lot standing by a car , leaning against the side, bending down a little now , talking to somebody in the car. One in front, behind the wheel, one or two in the back seat.

". . . I understand, Mel, you don't want to delay this any more than I do . . . Mel, would you just d o one thing for me? PUT THE FUCKING MONEY IN A BOX AND HAVE IT READY . . . RIGHT NOW!"

Davis heard the phone slammed down.

"There," Rosen said, quietly again.

"You better come out here," Davis said.

"What is it?"

"You know anybody owns a white BMW?"

Teddy Cass was the driver. Valenzuela was in back with the worried-or sick-looking street kid, Mat i Harari, who sat with his hands folded tight.

"He says he thinks its the top floor," Valenzuela said. "Number 23?"

Mati nodded.

"No name of Rosen on the mailboxes," Rashad said. "Less it's in Jewish. There's a little elevator , one set of stairs, very dark. I think it looks good.

You want to hand me something out of the trunk?"

"When the hot-rodder leaves," Valenzuela said.

"What do I do, he comes out?" Rashad said.

"I'm standing there."

"No, you better get around the back of the building someplace, till he comes out," Valenzuel a said. "He'll think you got tired and left."

"What about him?" Teddy Cass said, half turned on the seat, nodding at Mati.

"He's going with us," Valenzuela said, "He's gonna knock on the door for us."

"It's the same car," Rosen said. "You can almost see the dents in the front end. Sonofabitch with a n Arab thing over his head."

"He showed it to me," Davis said. "Jesus, I never had any idea. Guy trying to get you to like him."

"I'm not blaming you," Rosen said. He was standing away from the balcony railing so that h e could just see the BMW past the flat cement surface. "You wouldn't have any way of knowing.

Maybe--could they have seen you with Tali?"

"I guess that was it, in the lobby. We weren't together more than a minute."

"Then the colored guy sucks up, gets in your car," Rosen said. "The one in front, I think that's the young guy with the hair. I don't know his name.

Val's probably in back. You see a guy looks like an off-duty cop, that's Val. Or a fucking linebacker , something like that."

"The colored guy said his name was Kamal Rashad."

"Yeah, they're getting these cute names now,"

Rosen said. "Alabama Arabians. Well, shit, I don't know--" He turned to go into the room and cam e around again and stood there.

Davis watched the black guy, Rashad, coming away from the BMW, past empty parking spaces , then go behind some other cars, walking towar d the Camaro.

"Which one's your car?" Davis said.

"The black one, right near the walk." It was a Mercedes four-door sedan.

"They know it's yours?"

"I don't see how they could."

It was next to the Camaro. They could run, get to the cars--then what?

All the BMW had to do was back up and it would block the drive. There were shrubs alon g the street; you couldn't run over the lawn to ge t out. Well, maybe, but you could get hung up on a bush.

If they sat here long enough the guys in the BMW w ould come up looking, assuming they wanted t o kill Rosen and they knew he was upstairs.

Davis realized he was getting excited. It was a good feeling. Not being aware of it as a feeling, bu t thinking, figuring out a way to gain control and either neutralize the situation or kick ass.

One option--call the police.

There's a suspicious-looking white car down in the parking lot. Then what? An Israeli cop comes i n his white car. But if they were serious and it wa s their business--the guys in the BMW--they wer e liable to shoot the cop. Davis tried to imagine calling the police and explaining it in English over the phone, telling a long story.

Or call the embassy. Get somebody there, after he explained it, to call the cops and explain it again , second-hand, in Hebrew. How long would it take?

The black guy was opening the door of the Camaro now, getting his bag out, looking up at the building.

They'd be armed. They could be impatient--

"What'd he shoot at you with?" Davis said.

"The colored guy."

"I don't know. Some kind of a pistol."

Davis went into the room and picked up the Beretta. "This fully loaded?"

"I checked it," Rosen said.

"You got more cartridges?"

"In the briefcase. With an extra clip."

The Beretta had a three-and-five-eighths-inch barrel that barely extended past Davis' knuckl e when his finger was wrapped around the trigge r guard. "Are you any good with it?"

"I've had it since I came here," Rosen said.

"Can you put the rounds where you want is what I'm asking," Davis said.

"I've fired it a few times, in the desert."

He probably couldn't hit the wall but would never admit it. "Makes a noise for a little thing , doesn't it? Well," Davis said, "I think, instead of u s standing around scratching our asses, we might a s well be doing something."

"Like what?" Rosen said.

He was nervous but controlling it. That was good. "You want to get out of here," Davis said.

"How about if we get the police?"

"The pol ice? What do I say, these guys are annoying me? We're standing there looking at each other? Listen, these people, you put them in a position, they'd shoot the cops cold, no fucking around. I don't think you understand who thes e people are."

"I said get the cops. I didn't say call them and get into something we can't explain," Davis said. "No , we give your friends a little time to get out. Work i t so you don't get mixed up in it and have to answe r questions."

"How?"

"Take your money, whatever you're gonna take, go downstairs by the door, and wait. You see thei r car leave, watch which way it turns going out. Yo u take off and head the other way."

"Where will you be?"

"Don't worry about it. Then, once you're clear, where do you think you'll go?"

"Jesus Christ, I'm standing here--I don't see how I'm going anywhere, for Christ's sake, three , four of them waiting down there--"

"Mr. Rosen, come on. You got it pretty much together," Davis said. "You don't want to lose it now.

Tell me where you're likely to go."

"I guess Jerusalem"--calm again--"the King David."

"Okay, later on I'll give you a call, see how you made it."

Rosen was frowning at him again, trying to figure something out. "Whatever you're doing, this is still part of the grand Mel gave you?"

"You worry too much about money," Davis said.

He waited on the balcony with the Beretta, the extra clip, and the box of cartridges, giving Rosen two minutes to get downstairs--seeing the blac k guy with his bag over by the BMW again; the drive r with long hair out of the car on the other side, th e black guy moving away then, starting across th e lawn toward the side of the apartment building.

Davis planned his shots and when he began firing the Beretta--the sound coming suddenly, echoing in the afternoon, in the shadow of the building--h e knew where he wanted to place the rounds an d fired methodically, steadily, running the black gu y back to the car first, then creasing one off the roo f of the car and seeing the guy with long hair duc k out of sight. Four, three, two, one more. He pulle d out the clip and pushed the spare one into the gri p with the flat of his hand and began firing at th e open space of blacktop close to the car--hopin g someone was phoning the police by now--puttin g a couple of rounds into the doors, but being carefu l to keep away from the engine and windows. He didn't want to disable the car and he didn't want t o hit any of them on purpose. He had fired on an d killed people he didn't know before, but it wasn't his purpose now to kill. He was throwing rocks a t crows in a planted field, getting them out of there; h e wasn't at Khe San or Da Nang or Hill 881. He reloaded a clip and fired three rounds, then reloaded the second clip before he emptied the first one and reloaded it again. He heard the sirens, th e irritating wail becoming gradually louder. He waited, giving the guys in the car time to hear it an d think about it, then poured five rounds hard int o the flank of the white car. The car was backing out.

He was tempted to glance one off the windshield, but it could fuck things up, delay them. The sire n wail was doing the job, the sounds coming fro m different directions now. He fired two more shots , changed clips, fired three times as the BMW backe d up, cutting hard, and emptied the clip at the taillight as the car shot out the drive and turned right.

Rosen was outside . . . getting in his car.

Come on, get the fucker out of there! Quick!

Rosen made it. He was out the drive and on the street, then taking his time--good--as three Israel i police cars, sirens flashing, came screaming up Bil u toward the apartment building.

Davis used his shirt tail to wipe the grip of the Beretta. He dropped the gun and the extra clip an d the box of cartridges over the side, down five floor s into thick bushes.

A squad car sealed him off before he got the door of the Camaro open. He asked them what the hell wa s going on, man. They patted him down and looke d inside the Marine bag and asked to see his I . D . w hile squad cars came wailing in and police bega n swarming around the building. Davis gave them a n anxious, bewildered look. They asked him if h e lived here. He said no, he'd been visiting somebody.

The shooting had started and he hadn't known if it was another war or her husband coming in th e fucking door. Either way he was getting out of here.

He'd have told them more if they'd wanted to wait and listen.

THE MAN SEEMED TO SPEND half his life in the bathroom. When Tali came back with his cigarettes---a fter looking around the lobby and then lookin g outside for Mati or the car, not knowing where h e had parked it yesterday--Mr. Bandy was still in th e bathroom, the one in 823. The only time he'd use d the one in 824 was when he'd say to her, "Hold it, I g ot to piss," or, "I got to take a leak," telling he r what he was going to do.

She thought about the Marine. Mr. Rosen had said yes, he was there, everything was fine. But sh e knew it wasn't fine, at least not everything, becaus e Mati hadn't come back.

She thought of a friend of hers named Omri who worked for El Al as a flight security officer. He ha d shot a terrorist and arrested another during an attempted skyjack. It had been more than three years ago. She didn't know what Omri was doing now o r why she thought of him. Maybe she wanted to se e him again. Maybe the Marine reminded her of him , though they looked nothing alike.

Mr. Bandy confused her a little when he came into the room with the towel wrapped around hi s middle and carrying a magazine, which he thre w on the couch. She could not understand why a ma n with his body would like to walk around hal f naked. Even people at the beach would look a t him; he was so white. She had to pretend not to notice his nakedness.

"Your cigarettes are there on the table."

"I see them." He was making another drink, which he always did after bathing, before he go t dressed.

"Those men weren't in the lobby," Tali said.

"They're probably still following what's-hisname." Now, as he always did, he sprawled on the couch and raised one of his legs to rest it on the cushion. She could see the fleshy insides of his thighs.

"It wouldn't take him that long to go to Jaffa and return," Tali said. "Even if he walk there." Mat i was to go to the archeological excavation in th e center of the tourist area and, when it appeared tha t no one was watching, drop the package into the dig.

"He's cruising Dizengoff in the Mercedes," Mel said. "Lining up some ass."

"He was suppose to come right back." Tali walked to the windows and watched the cars o n Hayarkon. "Maybe they didn't follow him."

"Or maybe he took off," Mel said. "Rosie actually trusts him with a Mercedes?"

"Mr. Rosen bought a new one," Tali said. "He's going to sell the one we're using, when he tells m e to advertise it in the Post." From the window, al l the cars on the street looked the same. "Mat i should be back," Tali said.

"You sleeping with Mati?"

"No, I don't sleep with him. He's a friend."

"Don't you sleep with friends?"

"I know Mati a long time, when I am teaching at the ulpan in Jerusalem, the language school for immigrants. Do you know the ulpan? Like an absorption center."

"I hope you weren't teaching him English."

"No, I taught Hebrew. Mati is Yemenite, but he was living with his family in Bayt Lahm-Bethlehem. Well, one day when Mati was muc h younger . . . the people there, this day they are Jordanian, the next day they are Israeli. In the '67

War." Tali gave her little shrug. "So we have a place, the ulpan, where we teach them Hebrew.

Also people from Europe, from all over they come there. I did that when I moved from Beersheba an d was going to the university."

"You teach Rosie Hebrew?"

"No"--she shook her head in a relaxed sweep, with an innocent expression, thinking of what sh e was going to say--"after my army service I went t o work for El Al as an air hostess. That was where I m et Mr. Rosen." She smiled. "He talk to me all th e time from New York to Athens. Then I was wit h him again in a few days here at the Pal where h e was staying. We talk some more." She was smilin g again. "I laugh very much at the things he say.

Then, no, it was weeks later I saw him at Mandy's Drugstore having dinner. He came over by us an d asked me if I would work for him."

"To do what?"

"Be his secretary."

"You sleep with him?"

"No, I don't sleep with him." Irritated. "Why do you ask if I sleep with somebody? I sleep with wh o I want to."

"That's good," Mel said. "That's exactly the way it's supposed to be. You want to go to bed?"

"No, I don't want to go to bed."

"Don't you like to fuck?"

She said, "I enjoy to make love, but I do not like to simply, what you said, fuck. What is that? I t should be a natural thing."

"What's the difference?" Mel said. "You're with somebody who doesn't turn you on all the way , close your eyes, pretend it's somebody else. Yo u ever do that?" When she didn't answer he said , "Listen, I'm not talking about anything kinky. I d on't mind it straight once in a while."

"I'm here to do work," Tali said. "Different things, if you want me to call on the telephone o r write letters, or show you places in Tel Aviv. Mat i or I would be very happy to drive you." She wante d to be honest without offending him. "But what i s personal to me is not part of the work."

"Let's give it a little time," Mel said.

She didn't know what that meant. She wanted to tell him the man who came here yesterday wa s right. Mr. Bandy was like white dog shit. What di d he say. A pile of it. If white dog shit could be selfis h and never consider the feelings of others.

She wanted to be away from him and the sound of the air-conditioning and the room-service tray s of dirty dishes sitting in the hall. She remained because of Mr. Rosen. In case he needed her. Or to learn something Mr. Rosen would want to know.

She would do anything for Mr. Rosen.

"Well," Mel said. He got up and started across the room. "What's the Marine's name?"

"David."

"David. When David comes back tell him to wait."

"He's coming back here?"

"I may go downstairs for a while." He went into 823, unwrapping the towel.

The BMW looked like it had come over the border from Lebanon without stopping: bullet puncture s all over the body, lights shot out front and rear.

Only the glass had not been hit. In Valenzuela's mind, that made it the Marine who had been doin g the shooting. Ross would have broken window s trying to hit somebody. But why the Marine?

They were somewhere in the Tel Aviv area--

Ramat Gan, Rashad said--the BMW parked within the shell of a new building under construction, in semi-darkness, hidden from the street.

Teddy Cass had gone to the railway station, about half a mile west--they had passed it--to see abou t renting a car. Rashad was in the back seat of th e BMW with the Arab-looking kid, talking to him.

Valenzuela was out of the car looking at the cement forms and footings, like a building codes inspector.

When Teddy came with the car, they'd switch the guns and explosives from the trunk of the BMW t o the new one. It would be a temporary car, something to drive until they could pick up another car without numbers or a rental license plate. The ma n in the Hatikva Quarter who sold guns had said h e could get them a good car. Maybe even an American model. He had looked at the BMW early this morning when they'd gone to pick up the Uzis an d handguns and the C4. He had run his hand over th e front-end dents and red paint on the grille--befor e the bullet holes were added--and said, "But i t would cost you seven thousand lira a week." A g rand. Deal, Rashad had said.

They'd leave the BMW here. Rashad might call the man he'd gotten it from and was paying fiv e hundred a week to and tell him where to pick it up.

Or he might not.

Rashad, talking to the Arab-looking kid now, said, "For true? They called the Black Panthers?"

Mati nodded solemnly. "They not the same thing as your Black Panthers are, but they called tha t name. There was a place, on King George Street i n Jerusalem, we used to meet, go there and drin k something and talk. Everyone knew it was th e place of the Black Panthers."

"You ain't shitting me now, are you?" Rashad said.

"No, I'm not shitting you. We call ourselves that, the Sephardim, the dark-skin ones."

"Things the same all over," Rashad said.

"Giving you the shit," Mati said. "Throwing you in jail."

"Come on," Rashad said, "you done time?"

"Yes, in Jerusalem it was demonstrating. Last May."

"Just trying to make yourself heard, huh? Explain your beef?"

"We were in front of the Knesset to speak to Sapir, the minister of finance. The police come an d beat us with clubs. In jail they treat us like animals , don't give us to eat any good food. Also Haifa, I w ent there before. They arrest me for robbing a rich tourist, stealing his camera and watch. Nin e months, man, I was in Haifa."

Rashad said, "Hey, it's a kick, you know it?

Meet somebody waaay over here deep in the same shit. Same everywhere you go, have to take th e man's shit, huh? How about the man you work for?

Keep pushing your head in it?"

"Mr. Rosen?" Mati shrugged. "He don't give me trouble."

"I was thinking of the one at the hotel," Rashad said. "Don't you work for him?"

"That one, he's a fat pig. He sits on your face."

"Yeah--I wonder why this Mr. Rosen would work for a man like that."

"No, the other way," Mati said. "The fat one work for Mr. Rosen."

"Unh-unh." Rashad shook his head. "The fat one was paying this Rosen some money, wasn't he?"

"Yes."

"So this Rosen works for the fat one. We can't understand it. See that gentleman out there? He was a friend of Mr. Rosen in the States, see. Hasn't seen him in a while. He wants to talk to Mr. Rosen , but the fat one don't want him to. You understan d what I'm saying?"

"He wants to kill Mr. Rosen," Mati said.

"No. Who told you that? No, the fat one is con trol ling Mr. Rosen. Got him by the nuts, as we say.

And that gentleman, he wants to talk to Mr. Rosen and tell him hey, nobody's mad at you, man. Com e on home. See, the fat one's been giving Mr. Rose n some shit, messing up his head. This gentleman , Mr. Valenzuela, just wants to get it straightene d out. But shit, now Mr. Rosen's got some craz y motherfucker wants to shoot and kill us."

"That Marine," Mati said.

"Yeah, you see any of us shoot back? No, we don't want to shoot Mr. Rosen. We want to talk t o the man. But we don't know where he is."

He watched the Arab-looking kid chew on his lip, the kid sitting there covered with snow.

Valenzuela came over to the car, looking out toward the street.

"Here comes Teddy. Get Ali Baba out, we'll have a talk with him."

"We already talked," Rashad said. "Mati here's my buddy."

A CHIMNEY MADE OF OIL DRUMS extended from the top floor of the Park Hotel to the ground: a chut e for debris as they cleared out the gutted structure.

Davis had read about the fire and forgotten it. He looked at the place now--it was strange--with a personal interest. He knew someone who had bee n in the hotel that night. A friend of his.

At six-fifteen Davis called the King David from a cafe on the square. They said they were sorry, ther e was no Mr. Rosen registered at the hotel. Davis sai d how about if he left his name and a phone number , in case Mr. Rosen checked in?

He sat at a sidewalk table with a Maccabee, watching the people who came out into the evenin g dusk, beginning to relax as he drank the beer, debriefing himself. The waiter came over and said there was a telephone call that must be for him.

"Hello."

"I couldn't believe it," Rosen said. "Jesus, how many shots did you fire?"

"Twenty-eight," Davis said. "Four clips. You made it all right, huh?"

"Looking back all the way," Rosen said. "Jesus, you don't fool around, do you? Where are you?"

"Netanya. I thought I'd stay here tonight and head north in the morning. What're you going t o do now?"

"I just got here a few minutes ago. I'm gonna call Mel first and get a few things straightened out."

"I could go back to Tel Aviv, if you want," Davis said. "Pick up the money for you."

"No, I appreciate it, I really do--everything you've done," Rosen said. "But I'll work something out. It's my problem, something I've been living with. I appreciate it, though."

"I was wondering, driving here," Davis said.

"You think your lawyer--you said he was waiting to see if you stay alive before he delivers the money.

You think he could be helping them in any way? So he wouldn't have to pay you?"

"Well, it's not like he's paying," Rosen said. "It's my money, out of my company."

"Except it's cash, it doesn't have your name on it," Davis said. "I was wondering, what if he's trying to keep it for himself?"

"He's got to account to people in the company,"

Rosen said. "He can't just walk off with it. No, I d on't think so."

"But what if it looks like he delivered it to you and you were killed after?" Davis said. "Nobod y knows what happened to the money. Your lawye r says, 'I don't know, I paid him,' or, 'I sent it to him.'

Only he still has it."

There was a silence.

"I can't see him sticking his neck out," Rosen said. "I don't think he's got the balls to pull something like that. What does he do with it? He'd have to get it out of the country. . . ."

"You've been getting it in," Davis said.

A silence again.

"No, I don't think so."

"Well, you know him better than I do," Davis said. "It was just something entered my mind."

That was about all he had to say. He waited a moment. Rosen didn't say anything. "Well, let me wish you luck. I hope you make it okay." He listened to Rosen again telling him how much he sincerely appreciated everything, and that was it.

Davis got several copies of the Courier-Journal out of the car and brought them to the table. He'd have another beer, check the Kentucky high-schoo l basketball tournament scores--"Tourney Trail"-look at the menu and decide if he wanted to ea t here. Before too long he'd have to see about a hote l room.

Shelby County 74, Apollo 68

Paducah Tilghman 75, McCreary County 60

Edmonson County 77, Betsy Layne 72

Henry Clay 77, Ballard 74

Blue Devils over the Ballard Bruins, last year's state champions . . .

Harrison County 75, Green County 54

If they were on Rosen's ass and he was scared they were going to take him out, why didn't he run?

Christian County 67, Ashland 63

Shawnee 85, Clay County 57

What would you do if you were Rosen?

He sat for several minutes staring at the cars moving past in the dusk, circling the parkway, before he got up from the table, dug out a couple of ten-pound notes for the waiter, and walked away.

He'd get something to eat in Jerusalem.

The deskman at the King David came back and said he was sorry, but there was no Mr. Rosen registered.

Davis gave the deskman his name and said, "I'll be right over there. See those chairs by the window?"

Fifteen minutes passed. Rosen walked up to him in the dimly lighted corner of the lobby, Davis sitting low in the easy chair, his legs stretched out, hi s white cap low on his eyes. Rosen pulled a chair i n closer and sat down, looking out the window toward the illuminated walls of Jerusalem's Old City.

"I thought I was just talking to you on the phone."

"The last time I was in this hotel," Davis said, "Kissinger was here to visit Rabin. Some of us wer e brought over to help with security."

"It was in August," Rosen said. "I remember, they had this place, the whole block, roped off--yo u couldn't even use the pool in case his wife wante d to take a swim. They moved everybody out of th e top two floors, I mean people with reservations--k icked them out. The manager says to me, 'I'm sorry for this inconvenience, Mr. Rosen. We'v e arranged for you to move to a room on the thir d floor.' I said, 'Mr. Fink, come on. Are you serious?

I've been living here two and a half years, spending something like twenty thousand lira a month, thi s guy comes once or twice a year, you want to giv e my suite to some State Department flunkies? Fucking freeloaders?' I said, 'Mr. Fink, is this the worldrenowned King David Hotel or a Howard Johnson's Motor Lodge?' I had a Secret Servic e man in the room all the time Kissinger was here , but I stayed."

"I was in the lobby, over there by the desk,"

Davis said. "Everybody's standing at attention, all the officials and dignitaries. Kissinger came in wit h Rabin's military adjutant and some of his aides. He stood there looking around. Just for a moment i t was very quiet. And right then, in the silence, somebody let a fart."

"Come on--"

"That's my King David Hotel story."

"I bet I know who it was," Rosen said. "You come all the way to Jerusalem to tell me your Kin g David Hotel story?"

"No, I wanted to ask you something," Davis said. "How come you haven't run? Left the country?"

"I would, but I don't have my passport," Rosen said.

"You lost it?"

"In a way. I know where it is, who's got it, but I'm having a little trouble locating the person."

"Go to the embassy, tell them you lost it."

"If I have to. I'll wait and see."

Davis was silent.

"You came all the way here to ask me that? You could've phoned."

"I came to make a suggestion," Davis said.

"Something you might consider."

"Well, I'm certainly open to suggestions," Rosen said. "About all I can see to do right now is get i n bed and pull the covers over my head."

"Did you call your lawyer?"

"We had a nice talk. I told him what happened and he said, 'See?' He said now they'd be comin g back and hitting on him for not letting them kno w I called. I said, Mel, tell them who you work for , maybe they'll understand. Mel was very upset. I s aid shit, Mel, leave the money in the hotel safe an d go home. Tell Shapira, the manager of the Pal, tha t I'll pick it up sometime. But he said no, he wa s gonna stick it out till I got the money. He said, but I w ouldn't be able to come near the hotel withou t them seeing me." Rosen nodded, looking at Davis.

"I know what you're gonna say and I couldn't help thinking the same thing. He doesn't want it out o f his hands. He finds out I'm dead, the money's his.

He goes home and tells them he paid me the day before I was shot. Christ. I don't know--you want a drink?"

"Not right now, unless you want one," Davis said.

"No, I don't care."

"You say your lawyer's nervous. What if they go see him again?" Davis said. "Rashad and . . . whoever they are."

"He's going to tell them what he comes all the way to Israel to tell me in person and ends u p telling me over the phone," Rosen said. "I'm n o longer president of my fucking company. That's what he tells me. They voted me out, these cluck s on the board, guys I brought in. Let 'em buy a piec e of the business. Mel says after three years of carrying me, they voted me a final payment, the tw o hundred grand and that's it, for my stock, everything. I can't bring suit because I'm not there. Two hundred grand, the fucking company's writing a hundred million dollars worth of home mortgage s a year. . . ."

"That's what you're in, the mortgage business?"

"Mortgage broker," Rosen said. "We secure government-approved mortgages, usually on lowcost housing around Detroit, and sell them to outof-state banks at one, one and a quarter percent."

"I don't understand anything about that," Davis said. "I never owned a home."

"It's paperwork. You hire bookkeepers and lawyers like Mel, the sonofabitch. He's gonna tel l them--the guys you were shooting at--that he contacted me, yes, to tell me I'm out of the business, that's all. So he doesn't have anything more to d o with me."

"He explained a little to me about you testifying against somebody in court," Davis said. "But I d idn't understand much of that either."

"Well, I was doing some business with a guy named Harry Manza. He was developing land, putting up these twenty-nine condominiums, you ever read American newspapers you've seen the ads , places with names like Apple Creek. There isn't a fucking apple tree in ten miles. Harry was also int o a lot of other things, the federal government tryin g to nail him for a long time--years."

"This guy," Davis said, "he was in the Mafia?"

"I don't know, that's a word. You remember Al Rosen, you might've seen Harry Manza on TV a bout the same time, the Kefauver Committee, investigating organized crime."

"I think so, but I don't recall the name Harry Manza."

"Well, I knew something about Harry and about a guy that worked for him, Gene Valenzuela, wh o was one of the guys you were shooting at."

"You saw him in the car?"

"No, but Mel said it was Val came to see him.

He's here to do the job on account of I did a job on him. At that time, it was three and a half years ago , the Justice Department wanted to get me on a ver y minor fraud technicality, but it was the kind o f thing could ruin me, put me out of business. They'd drop the indictment, they said, if I'd let them wir e me with a bug so they could listen to my luncheo n conversations with Harry. You know what that's like, fucking wires taped on you, battery in you r pocket? You're waiting for him to say, 'What's tha t sticking out of your shirt?' You say, 'Oh, it's m y new hearing aid.' We'd have lunch, I couldn't eve n finish a plate of cottage cheese. Also, they wante d me to tell a grand jury what I knew about Harr y and Val. They swore, the Justice Department, tha t the two guys would be put away practically forever." Rosen shrugged. "They never even came to trial."

"You were taking a chance," Davis said.

"Sure, I was taking a chance," Rosen said, "but I w as highly motivated, I'll tell you. This guy, Harr y Manza, had been wanting to buy a piece of m y company. My associates said fine, because Harr y scared the shit out of them. I said no fucking wa y I'm letting him in, I'll go out of business first. It wa s only a matter of time, I'm convinced, he would'v e had me killed."

"How do you know?"

"Because I saw it happen. There was a movingand-storage company Harry wanted to buy into where the owner was killed in an explosion, in hi s warehouse. Harry played golf with the guy. He'd say to me, 'See, a man tried to do it all himself instead of cutting the pie. It can kill him.' Things like that. But never any reference to it when I was wearing the bug."

"That's what the police wanted him for?"

"The Justice Department, yes, first-degree murder, no fooling around, man, and I was gonna be their star witness. But as I said, after talking to th e grand jury and all--Harry and Val knowing abou t it--they were never indicted. The only good thin g that came out of it, Harry had a stroke and is practically bedridden. Val, a little later, served a fe w months for bribery, getting an FHA appraiser laid , some very minor rap, and now Val's in Israel for th e shooting season."

"Gene Valenzuela, Kamal Rashad," Davis said.

"How many others?"

"One I'm sure of," Rosen said. "Val had somebody with him when he saw Mel, but it wasn't the colored guy."

"Your lawyer said your car was blown up."

"That's right. Killed a guy from the gas station."

"And you say this other one, in the warehouse, was killed in an explosion."

"Yeah, it could be Val's got a dynamite man with him," Rosen said. "Mel said he was a youn g guy."

"They learn young in the war," Davis said.

"I keep forgetting to ask you," Rosen said, "if you hit anybody."

Davis shook his head. "It wasn't what I had in mind. One thing surprised me a little. Nobody returned fire."

"They wouldn't have come without guns,"

Rosen said, "if that's what you're thinking."

"No, I guess by the time they figured out where I w as, they had to get out," Davis said. "No w they've got to start looking for you again. I imagin e they'll go see your lawyer and ask him about it first.

There's Tali--maybe Tali should stay out of sight for a while. What I'm saying is, they've got to tal k to somebody to find out your habits, where you'v e been living. . . . ."

"Go on," Rosen said.

". . . Where you're likely to be. Say they hire somebody to watch the airport. Or pay somebod y at TWA and El Al to let them know if you're leaving. They don't know you lost your passport."

"No."

"They might know about the money, though.

Your lawyer could tell them. So they could figure to use it as bait."

"Maybe. Shit, I don't know." Rosen paused.

"You said you had a suggestion."

"How about if you called up this guy Val something and told him to get fucked?" Davis said.

"That's your suggestion?"

"Call him up, see if you can reason with him."

"Reason with him about what? Talk him out of it? This isn't an emotional thing with him, it's a score. And scores you settle."

"Well, this idea I've been thinking about," Davis said, "you may not feel comfortable with it, but I b elieve it could work."

Rosen hesitated, running a few options through his head, trying to anticipate the idea. "You'r e thinking, I can't reason with Val but maybe I coul d make a deal with him."

"Unh-unh."

"Pay him off."

"No, I was thinking you could kill him," Davis said. "Turn it around, hit him before he hits you."

THE WOMAN FROM Allentown, Pennsylvania, about sixty, said, "Christ, don't Jews drink? I walked al l the way down Ben Yehuda to Frishman and bac k Dizengolf. If it was New York there'd have bee n two hundred bars."

She told Mel, sitting next to him in the Pal Hotel bar, that she was on the "We Are Here!" tour wit h a seventy-three-year-old woman named Doroth y who didn't drink or smoke and was always bitching and sniffing and fanning the air to rid it of cigarette fumes. The woman from Allentown told Mel she had eight grandchildren, that her husband wa s a steelworker at Bethlehem, and that she had foun d out recently her grandmother was illegitimate--h onest to Christ--and her grandmother's fathe r had been a Jew. It had shaken her up to find out sh e had Jewish blood, she said, and she was over her e to learn something about the Jewish faith and see i f she could buy any of it.

It was a change from sitting in the room. The bartender, Itzak, would say, "Yes, please, Mr.

Bondy," pouring Scotch, and serve up plates of olives, peanuts, and soft potato chips. The woma n from Allentown, on her third VO and Coke, said i f Dorothy didn't quit complaining about her smoking in the room, she was going to tell her to go fuck herself. Mel said to her, "You know who the pian o player looks like? Sadat." He got a kick out o f that, imagining Sadat moonlighting, flying ove r from Cairo each evening to play cocktail piano i n Tel Aviv. The woman from Allentown said, "Who's Sadat?"

When he got upstairs, Mel let himself into 823.

The adjoining room was dark, Tali asleep in the single bed next to the phone. She straightened as h e reached the bed. He could see her face and a bar e arm in the light from 823.

"I thought you were asleep."

"I was for a little while."

"You want me to get in with you?"

"No, I don't."

"I could've had a winner I was talking to at the bar, gorgeous broad. I came back to you." No response. "The Marine didn't come?" No. "Nobody called?" No one. "You want to just, uh, foo l around a little? . . . Well, if you change your mind."

Mel went into 823, undressed, and got into bed.

Maybe they had whores available. He should've checked at the bar. He was pretty sure Tali wa s sleeping naked; or maybe she had just her pantie s on, skimpy little briefs. He imagined the doo r creaking and seeing her naked body in the ligh t from the window, Tali saying softly, with her cut e accent, "Can I come in with you, please, Mr.

Bondy?"

The lamp was on when he opened his eyes. It wasn't Tali. It was the Marine, wearing a white cap , looking down at him.

"What the hell do you want?"

"Mr. Rosen's money. He sent me."

Mel squirmed up against the headboard, pulling the cover with him.

"You come in here, I'm sound asleep--where is he?"

"He said he'd just as soon I didn't tell anybody."

"Well listen, I told him, he wants the money he'd have to come get it," Mel said. "I'm not gonna ge t caught in the middle--those crazy nuts start shooting at each other. What is this, you work for him now? I thought you were on leave."

"I'm helping him out," Davis said.

"Yeah, well, have fun. You must be out of your mind."

"Instead of talking," Davis said, "why don't you give me the money and you can go back t o sleep."

"I told him if he wants it, he can come get it. Until I hand it to him personally, it still belongs to th e company. And if he doesn't pick it up, I take i t back."

"When's that?"

"I haven't decided." Mel was settled again, in control. "Let me ask you something. You seem t o be for hire. What if the guys who want Rosen pai d you more?"

"More than what?"

"More than Rosen's paying you."

"Where are they? I'll talk to them."

Mel was studying him, realizing something for the first time. The Marine could put you on. He wa s low key and seemed to know what he was doing.

"Have they been back to see you?" Davis said.

Mel shook his head. "I don't have any idea where they are, but they're around. You realize,"

Mel said then, "you've got a very good chance of losing everything in this, and I mean your life.

These guys don't fuck around, man. They don't go by any rules of war. They're close now, and they'r e going to stay on him, and I don't see how Rosie's got one fucking chance of making it." Mel paused.

"Which leaves me with sort of a problem. A hundred and ninety-five thousand dollars. How do I get it home? I can find a way if I work on it, I'm sure. But you're leaving in a couple of weeks, I t hink you said. And you're allowed to ship all you r personal gear?"

"Seventy-five hundred pounds," Davis said.

"Jesus Christ, what've you guys got?"

"In case you have a car, furniture, things like that," Davis said. "You're asking, if somethin g happens to Mr. Rosen will I get the money hom e for you? Since I've been handling it, you migh t say?"

"It's an idea," Mel said.

"Deliver it in Detroit to Mr. Rosen's company?"

"Since he's not with the company anymore,"

Mel said, "you'd deliver it to my office."

"That's what I thought," Davis said.

"If there was about ten grand in it for you," Mel said, "what difference would it make where yo u delivered it?"

"Why don't I take it now?"

"Why don't you think about it," Mel said, "and let me know. I'll be here. I'll be very interested t o see how it works out."

As he spoke, Tali appeared in the connecting doorway sticking her shirttail in her jeans, zippin g up. Davis glanced at her.

"Ready?"

She nodded and Mel said, "What is this? Where you going?"

"If you're only gonna sit around and wait to see who wins," Davis said, "you don't need Tali, d o you?"

They came out of the hotel from the lighted entrance to early-morning darkness and walked along the aisles of parked cars looking for the gray Mercedes. She was worried about Mati again.

He had returned about eight o'clock and had acted strange, Tali said, keeping inside himself an d saying very little about his trip to Jaffa with th e package. Yes, they had followed him. Yes, it ha d gone all right. Well, where have you been? Oh, wit h friends. She couldn't stand that air of indifference.

Then she had forgotten about Mati because Mr.

Rosen had called again, from Jerusalem, and spoken to Mr. Bandy for at least half an hour.

"He told you he was in Jerusalem?" Davis said.

"No, he didn't tell Mr. Bandy that," Tali said. "I a ssume it. What he told Mr. Bandy was that he ha d lost his passport and that you were coming to pic k up the money. Then Mr. Bandy spoke for a lon g time."

"Why did he tell him about his passport?"

"I don't know," Tali said. "It was only one of the things. I could hear Mr. Rosen's voice speakin g loud at Mr. Bandy and Mr. Bandy would spea k loud back at him. Then, after that, Mr. Band y asked me questions about Mr. Rosen, about wher e he lived and spent his time. Then I look for Mat i and he was gone."

Mati was gone and so was the gray Mercedes.

She was tense, asking him about Mr. Rosen as they drove in Raymond Garcia's Camaro to he r apartment on Hamedina Square--to pack a fe w clothes--and didn't begin to relax until they ha d fixed coffee and were talking quietly on the terrace , Davis telling her Mr. Rosen was fine, giving her details about his meeting with Rosen and what had happened, where he was now, but not telling he r what they planned to do. Davis wasn't sure himsel f about that part. He had the beginning of an idea.

He could picture a controlled situation, a showdown, and could hope to steer them toward it. But he wasn't sure yet of Rosen, to what extent h e could count on him. It was strange, getting excite d about another man's problem as if it were his own.

He was aware of the darkness beyond the fifthfloor terrace, the dark sky and the dark shapes of buildings. The only lights were the streetlights, below, outlining Hamedina Square. He was aware of the girl also, and of another strange feeling--wanting to hold her and touch her face. He wasn't sure the feeling was sympathy.

"You and Mr. Rosen seem to get along pretty well."

"Yes, I like very much working for him," Tali said. "He's not here, I feel short. Is that what yo u say? I miss him. He's a very nice person."

"Like a father?"

"Yes, in a way. But the relation is different. He's more fun than a father is."

"Fun in what way?" He felt as if he were prying now.

"Fun because he says funny things. He doesn't laugh, but you know he's being funny. Do you understand?"

He understood. He had caught glimpses of it, but hadn't met the all-out funny Rosen yet. Mayb e he never would.

Davis made a swing north out of Tel Aviv, through the empty, early-morning streets, to the Marin e House. Tali waited in the Camaro, engine rumbling, while he ran inside and up to his room. Davis didn't bother with lights. He reached into a drawe r and dug out the shoulder holster with the strap s wrapped around it and the Colt .38 automati c wedged snugly inside. Also a box of ammo. He then crept across the hall to the room of Willar d Mims, the 1st Force Recon Marine--over to th e footlocker in the walk-in closet--and was almos t out again when Willard opened his eyes and caugh t him at the door.

"Who's that?"

"It's just me, Willard. I didn't want to wake you up."

"What've you got there?"

"I just want to borrow a couple of your claymores. I'll pay you back."

"You'll pay me back--how? I brought them all the way from Da Nang."

"Willard, you don't happen to have any grenades, do you?"

"Jesus Christ--" Willard yanked at the sheet to throw it aside.

"Hey, never mind. Trust me, buddy. Okay?"

He was down the stairs, out of there, taking off in the Camaro before Willard got his feet on th e floor.

Tali looked to see what he had thrown on the back seat: the holstered gun and the dull, heavylooking metal objects that were about an inch thick and the size and shape of curved license plates. Sh e thought she recognized them, but wasn't sure.

"Are those explosives?" Surprised.

"Claymore mines. All wired and ready to go."

"You have them at your house?"

"Not officially," Davis said. "This one boy, Willard, keeps some in his closet. I think he's a littl e crazy." They were silent and he didn't add unti l some moments later, "But I'm glad he's on ou r side."

THEY CAME TO JERUSALEM in Rosen's gray Mercedes:

Rashad in front with his buddy Mati, who was driving; Valenzuela and Teddy Cass in the bac k seat; Valenzuela with his map open; the Uzis , Berettas, and plastic C4 explosives in the trunk.

Rashad's idea: what'd they need to spend a grand a week on a car for when Mati had the man's? Brin g Mati into the club along with the Mercedes. The y all had to smile at the idea of using Rosen's own car.

They hoped Rosen would have time to realize it.

At seven a. M. they topped the rise, coming up ou t of the switchbacks of the mountain road, an d coasted down into the city, the street narrowing an d curving, buildings of tan-rose Jerusalem ston e rising on both sides, through an old section of th e city, catching glimpses of modern high-rises in th e distance--clean in morning sunlight--Valenzuel a looking from the blue street signs on buildings to hi s map; then taking a curve off Yafo, the Jaffa Road , past the Hebrew Union College to the King David.

"There," Mati said, slowing down, creeping past the plain, stone, squared-off structure that rose si x stories and was topped off by two additional , newer floors.

"That's it, huh?" Valenzuela said. "It looks like a YMCA."

"The YMCA is across the street," Mati said, a little surprised.

"The YMCA looks like what the King David should look like," Rashad said. "Where they kee p the cars?"

Mati pointed. "There."

"Turn in."

The Mercedes turned left into a side street and left again through the open gate of a chain-lin k fence, past a booth where the parking attendan t sat. There were no more than a dozen cars in th e lot, in two irregular rows, most of them at the fenc e toward the front, facing the street.

"You see his car?" Rashad said.

"That one," Mati said.

"Yeah, I remember it now," Rashad said. "It was out in front of the apartment. Pull in next to it."

When they came to a stop parallel with the black Mercedes, he said, "Who's going in?"

"I am," Valenzuela said. "And you and your friend. Teddy'll wait here."

Mati said, "It would be good, I go talk to him first."

"It would be bad," Valenzuela said. "Teddy, open the trunk."

From the porte cochere of the main entrance they passed single file through the revolving door an d went past rows of tour-group luggage being assembled opposite the registration desk, Valenzuela carrying a black vinyl briefcase, followed by Mat i and Rashad.

"What way?"

"To, that way," Mati pointed.

They turned right, went past the desk to the elevator.

On the seventh floor they turned right again and walked down the hall to 732. Next to it, on th e floor, was a tray on which sat two glasses, an empt y champagne bottle, and an ashtray heaped with cigarette butts. Valenzuela nodded. Mati approached the door, cleared his throat, and knocked lightly , twice.

"Hit it harder," Valenzuela said.

Mati knocked again, rapping quickly with his knuckles. They waited.

"Once more," Valenzuela said.

Mati knocked several more times. Cautiously, Rashad leaned in, pressing his head against the door.

He came away, looked at Valenzuela, and shrugged.

"Okay," Valenzuela said. Moving away, he looked down at the tray. "He was always neat, I remember that. Couple of times we visited him at his office, he was always getting up and emptying th e ashtrays."

In the elevator, Rashad said, "What do you think?"

"I think somebody's in there with him," Valenzuela said. "I don't want to do it that way if I can avoid it. If I can't, if it's a broad, somebody like tha t who's gonna be with him, then it's too bad, ther e isn't anything I can do about it."

"Maybe it's the Marine," Rashad said.

"I hope so," Valenzuela said.

"Didn't you hear it?" Edie said.

"It's the maid," Rosen said. He opened the door to the sitting room and listened a moment. "The y like to come in and make the bed while you're stil l in it."

"You're sure it's the maid?"

"Well, it isn't the guy I'm meeting, the one I mentioned to you. We've got a signal."

"Something's going on," Edie said. "I don't understand at all. Who are you trying to avoid?"

She looked cute frowning, pouting a little. Fortysomething years old, but she could put on a cut e pose and get away with it. She was tanner than before, very tan with the white sheet pulled up around her.

"I told you," Rosen said, "somebody I don't want to do business with's been pestering me . . . a n insurance salesman." That was it. "You kno w the type I mean? Won't take no?"

Rosen was in his light blue nylon Jockeys this morning. He hadn't eaten lunch or dinner yesterday and he felt very thin, with no need to hold himself in. He had jumped up at the sound of th e first knock on the door, calmed himself, gone int o the bathroom, and brushed his teeth. Now he go t back in bed, and, very gently, pushed Edie dow n next to him. She looked good first thing in th e morning.

"You ever wear curlers in your hair?"

"Not when it's short like this. When it's longer I h ave it done."

"I like it. My wife used to wear pink curlers and a hairnet."

"You're mar ried?" She started to sit up and he had to hold her down.

"No, when we were married she wore the curlers. She got a divorce right after I came here.

No-fault, no argument, cash settlement. She wouldn't have lasted here a week."

"I love it here," Edie said. "I feel so . . . different.

I'm in your bed and I didn't even know if you were married or single."

"Swinging singles, that's us. So . . . we'll get to know each other. Let it all hang out."

"After you finish your business." With just a slight edge to her tone.

"I'm sincerely, really sorry," Rosen said. "If I c ould put it off, I would. But I've got to spend som e time with this guy. He's gone out of his way, doin g me a considerable favor. I can't very well tell hi m hey, wait till I get back from a trip I want to take.

You understand?"

"No, I don't understand. You haven't told me anything," Edie said, with the little-girl pout again.

It was cute now and he wondered if it would always be cute. Like things his wife had used to do.

Dumb little things that finally began to irritate him.

The way she used to sit perched on a chair with her back arched and her legs tucked under her, tryin g to look cute. Or the way she used to put on a littl e scatterbrained act being cute and saying oh well , she guessed she was just a little kooky. She wasn't kooky. She was purebred suburban Detroit an d didn't know what kooky was. After a while h e couldn't stand any overweight woman who tried t o act like a little girl. Edie was thin and firm. Ther e was no reason now, at her age, she would ever pu t on weight. She was nice; she was just trying a fe w things on him, a few leftover poses. Maybe the y were all still little girls in there. How old was he?

Shit, about nineteen.

"If I'd wanted to avoid you," Rosen said, "would I have called the hotels, the embassy, you r home . . . talked to your daughter?"

"You just wanted your passport."

"That reminds me. . . ."

"It's at the hotel. God, what time is it?"

"A little after seven. You've got plenty of time."

"They said to be ready by nine. The bus leaves promptly at nine-fifteen for the airport."

"Don't worry, I'll get you to the hotel," Rosen said. "I promise." Softly then, "Edie? Let's not tal k for a while." He began to nibble at her shoulder.

She turned, moving her body against his. She said, "You only wanted your passport," but it wa s a nice tone now, subdued.

"If that was all I wanted," Rosen said, "when I c alled the Dan I would've left a message, leave it a t the desk, I'll pick it up. No, I asked that you cal l me, didn't I?"

"I never wanted to see you again," Edie said. "I r ushed back to Netanya, took a cab. . . ."

"I know, I should've left word," soothing her. "I t hought I'd be right back, but . . . things developed." They had been all through this. Rosen was patient, though; he wasn't going anywhere in th e next hour and a half.

"You don't know how I looked forward to it,"

Edie said, "traveling together, seeing Israel with you."

"I know," Rosen said. "So did I. And we will, I p romise."

Last night, after the Marine had left, Rosen had gone into the bar for a nightcap with Silva, turne d on the stool to leave, and there she was--sittin g right beyond the electric keyboard with thre e women--staring at him.

The first part wasn't easy, even with his enthusiasm, being glad to see her, rushing over and kissing her, smiling as he was introduced to the "Hadassa h Holiday" ladies, then practically forcing her, wit h her clenched expression, to go with him to the garden . . . to talk, to get a few things straightened out.

It was hard work. Women could be stubborn and have to be persuaded nicely to do things they wante d to do. Usually it was a pain in the ass, but last nigh t it had been worth the effort. His passport was in he r room at the Hilton. He had her with him and kne w he'd get his passport. Then showing her his suite, hi s home away from home, and ordering the champagne and two packs of Winstons. He liked very much making love to her. He was himself and it wa s a lot of fun. He told her that and she said she felt th e same thing; she felt free and, for some reason, not a t all self-conscious or inhibited. See? Rosen said. The y were meant for each other and nothing was going t o keep them apart. Except for the few days he'd hav e to spend on business. Her tour was flying south t o Eilat, to visit Solomon's Pillars and the Red Sea.

Okay, he'd meet her there at the Laromme. If for any reason he couldn't make it, he'd call. But they woul d definitely meet somewhere before the end of her tou r and make plans from there.

"The ladies in the group," Edie said, "they're going to give me funny looks when I show up."

"Tell them you're in love," Rosen said.

"I'll tell them I spent the night with you because it was God's will," Edie said. "How have you an d God been getting along?"

"My God," Rosen said. "Tell you the truth, I h aven't been thinking about it lately."

As a matter of fact, he hadn't thought about his Will of God theory since the night of the hotel fire.

It went through his mind: What would God think of him shooting Gene Valenzuela if he got the chance?

The answer was there immediately: He'd probably love it.

Mati came away from the hotel parking attendant to the spot where they were standing behind th e gray Mercedes.

"He said Mr. Rosen always come and get his car himself."

Valenzuela said, "Did he ask you anything? Why you wanted to know?"

"No, I told him, as you said, you hire me to drive you, to see Mr. Rosen. You want to know is his ca r here or did he call to have it brought."

Valenzuela looked at Teddy Cass. "How long will it take you?"

"Few minutes, that's all. But it should look like we're doing something."

"We'll jack this one up." Valenzuela put his hand on the trunk lid of the gray Mercedes. "Loo k like we're changing the right rear. Mati can do tha t for us."

Mati didn't understand. "You want the tire change?"

"Jack it up, we'll do the rest," Valenzuela said.

He turned to Rashad. "Then you and Mati go get a cup of coffee, have a talk. Right?" He pulled th e map out of his coat pocket, unfolded it, looked a t arrows and circles drawn in ink, and said, "We'l l meet you around on Agron Street. Corner of Agro n and . . . Ben Shimon."

Mati didn't say anything until they came out of the parking lot and started up the street past th e hotel.

"They going to blow him up."

Rashad said, "They do that in Jerusalem, man, not in the civilized world of business."

"Yes, they do it in Jerusalem," Mati said. "So another bomb, they think, oh, the terrorists again , trying to kill Jews. They look for Arabs, they don't look for Americans."

"We're gonna have another talk over a cup of sweet Turkish," Rashad said. "Man, I think I ge t through to you, explain how the situation is, yo u still worrying."

"Mr. Rosen never done nothing to me," Mati said.

"He never done nothing to me either," Rashad said, "but he done things to other people--with hi s money, sending people to jail. With his money , frightening an old man till he had a heart attac k and almost died. Man, come on, you see a pile o f shit, you don't have to be sitting in it to know it's shit, do you?"

Mati was shaking his head. "I don't know. . . ."

"I know you don't," Rashad said, "that's why I'm explaining it to you. You want to chang e things, clean up the shit put there by people wh o like to stick you in it. It's the same thing, man, wha t we're doing. You got to scare them a little, don't you? Get their attention? Sure, he sees his fine automobile blow up, he says, 'Hey, maybe I better have a talk with them. They serious.' "

"You not going to kill him?"

"Noooo, man, I been telling you, we gonna talk to him, get his reactions. What we want you to d o is go back to Tel Aviv and keep an eye on the fatty.

You think you can get a bus or something?"

"I have Mr. Rosen's car."

"No, we're gonna use it, buddy. Case we have to be some place in a hurry. What you do, tell Mr.

Bandy you gave Mr. Rosen back his car, he wanted it for something. Then you try and stay close to Mr.

Bandy if you can. See, Mr. Rosen may not be here.

We don't know for sure. And he may call Mr. Bandy and let him know where he is. You understand?"

"Yes." Mati nodded.

"Mr. Rosen wants his money, don't he?"

Mati nodded again. "And his passport."

"Say what?" Rashad said.

"I hear Tali talk to Mr. Bandy about the money and about he lost his passport. When I went bac k last night."

"You don't mean to tell me," Rashad said. "You keeping that a secret?"

"I didn't think of it before."

"Okay. So you stay with Mr. Bandy," Rashad said. "Tell him you'll rent a car for him if he want s to go some place. See, then if we want to get i n touch with you, find out anything, we call the hotel. So you got to stay close, like in the lobby."

"What if he don't need me? The fat one," Mati said.

"No, my man, we the ones need you," Rashad said, putting an arm around Mati's thin shoulder s as they walked along David Ha-Melekh Street pas t the hotel. "You on the team now."

IN THE CAMARO, in the hills west of Jerusalem, Tali said, "Do you miss war? Is that it? You miss th e screechy, the excitement?"

Davis kept his eyes on the road. "No, I don't miss war."

"Then what are you doing this for? You don't want to protect him. You want to have war wit h them."

"I don't think he has a choice," Davis said. "If you look at it."

"He can wait for them to go. Hide some place they never find him."

"He's tired of hiding," Davis said. "He's been hiding for three years. He thinks he wants to g o home, but he's afraid to stick his head out. He's tired of looking over his shoulder and now he sees a chance to end it."

"Why are you helping him?"

"Because he doesn't know how to do it himself."

"That's the only reason? Not for yourself?"

"What do you mean, for money?"

"No, it's why I ask you," Tali said, "do you miss war? Why else do you want to kill someone?"

"Why do you fight wars? Your country," Davis said.

"Because they attack us."

"It's the same thing."

"No, it isn't," Tali said.

Following the switchbacks, in morning shade, he tried to think of things to say and told her about a n Israeli friend of his named Zohar who lived nea r the Marine House and would see them "makin g gymnastics in the morning"--jogging. Zohar ha d lived in Eilat for six years, and when he'd move d north with his family, coming from the Sinai desert , he'd said, "We had starvation in our eyes for th e green." So they'd bought a house in the trees nea r Herzliya Pituah.

He told her about visiting Jerusalem the first time, with Zohar, and Zohar showing him wher e his tank--and the tank of his good friend who wa s now the Hertz manager in Jerusalem--had bee n surrounded by Jordanians during the Six Days'

War . . . showing him an archway that was like a stone tunnel in a gate and asking Davis if h e thought a tank would fit through it--with the Jordanians firing rockets at them--because if the tank became stuck in there . . . but they had to try it an d they did get through, barely, scraping the walls. Zohar showed him, in the side of a stucco house, an S-curve of bullet marks he had put there with hi s Uzi, firing out of the turret of his tank. He ha d brought his wife and three children here severa l times on outings. Davis said if he were married an d had a family it would be like taking them to D a Nang and Lon Thien. He couldn't imagine it.

Tali said, "You're not married?"

"I almost was a couple of times," Davis said. "I w as sort of engaged. But I'd get sent somewher e and by the time I'd get back I wouldn't be engage d anymore."

"When I was eighteen I was in love with an American who was going to dentist school," Tal i said. "Do you know Atlanta? That's where he live.

I visit him there, but"--she shrugged--"we write to each other for a while, but then we don't writ e anymore."

"I don't think you have to worry," Davis said.

"About what?"

"About meeting somebody and getting married."

"I don't know--I think I like to be an air hostess again and travel places."

"Maybe, while I'm still here," Davis said, "you could show me Israel. I haven't seen too much."

"Maybe. I don't know."

He wondered if she understood what he meant: t raveling with him, staying at hotels with him.

They were on Yafo, in the middle of the morning traffic, when Tali saw Mati and told Davis to sto p quick. He couldn't, though, for another half block.

When he was able to pull to the curb, Tali jumped out, ran across the street through the traffic, an d was gone. Davis waited, looking around. About te n minutes passed before he saw her again, recrossin g the street with Mati now, scowling, yelling a t him--that thin, nice-looking little girl--giving hi m hell in Hebrew as they approached the car an d Davis leaned over to open the door.

"Mati and I have to have a talk," Tali said.

"Well, get in."

She pushed Mati into the back seat, got in front, and sat half turned, staring at him. "He says h e drove them to the King David," Tali said, "but Mr.

Rosen wasn't in his room. He says he was with them yesterday, they took him, when you wer e shooting at them."

"How many, three? Three men?"

Mati nodded.

"Where are they?"

"He says he doesn't know. They told him to go back to Tel Aviv. They kept Mr. Rosen's car." Sh e began railing at Mati again in Hebrew, Mati sittin g quietly with the holstered automatic and the claymore mines on the seat next to him, not aware of them, staring back at Tali. He ducked aside then a s she tried to hit him with her fist. Davis caught he r arm.

"Take it easy. Let's find out what happened."

"He's an idiot!" Tali said. "He thinks they only want to talk to Mr. Rosen." She lashed out at hi m again in Hebrew and this time Mati yelled back a t her.

"Where did they go when they left him?" Davis said. "Where were they?"

They spoke again in Hebrew before Tali said, "At the hotel. He went with the black one to a cafe , then the black one left."

"The other two," Davis said, "they waited at the hotel?"

"They were in the parking lot by the car," Tali said. She spoke to Mati again in Hebrew. Mati sai d something to her. "He says they wanted to change a tire. He raised the car for them. . . ."

"Which car?"

"The one he drove," Tali said. "But he says there was nothing wrong with the tire."

Davis had the Camaro in gear, cranking the wheel away from the curb.

"Parked next to Mr. Rosen's new car, the black one," Tali said.

Davis knew that before she told him.

"The Laromme's the best hotel in Eilat," Rosen said. "It's big and flashy and you can get lost looking for the discotheque, but it's a lot of fun--if you don't get taken. A lot of good-looking young Israel i guys prey on tourist ladies, you know. It's lik e Rome."

"It's like anywhere," Edie said. "There was one at the Dan, I told him I was old enough to be hi s mother. Do you know what he said?"

"Just a second." Rosen stepped over to the desk, handed the clerk his key, and spoke to him for a moment. The clerk laughed. Rosen came back smiling at Edie and put his hand out to let her go first through the revolving door.

"What'd he say? The Israeli kid."

"He said . . ."

By now Rosen was talking to the doorman, handing him a lira, and the doorman was laughing.

"I'm sorry, go on."

Walking from the porte cochere down the circular drive to the street, Edie said the young Israeli's reply wasn't that much really. He'd only said h e was in love with her and it didn't matter how ol d she was. Rosen said he didn't care how old she wa s either. What was age? What did it have to do wit h how you felt? Edie said, "Careful. I have your passport, you know. With your date of birth on it."

Rosen said, "Oh . . . that's right."

Eight thirty-five. They'd get to the Hilton and have time for a cup of coffee.

"I have to change," Edie said.

"Then we'll have it while you change. I'll help you dress," Rosen said. "I'll help you undress first."

"You know, you're very sexy for a man your age," Edie said.

"Tourist ladies who stay at the Hilton like that kind of talk," Rosen said. "It excites them and thei r thing gets moist and tingles. You're not really a Hilton lady, though. Did I explain that to you? Th e difference between the Hilton ladies and the Kin g David ladies?"

"No, but I can imagine what you're going to say."

She waited again as he stopped to talk to the parking lot attendant and press something into hi s hand. When he joined her again, taking her ar m and squeezing it, she said, "I'll bet you over-tip."

"Of course," Rosen said.

They could hear boys playing basketball in the yard of the YMCA--voices in Hebrew, the sound of th e ball hitting the backboard--beyond a wall o f bushes and a high chain-link fence. The gray Mercedes was parked next to the fence, on Lincoln Street.

They'd hear it all right, Teddy Cass said. Shit, it would break windows in the Y.

But they wouldn't hear it if it didn't go off, Valenzuela said.

They had picked up Rashad on Agron Street and crept through the area in the Mercedes, studyin g side streets and through routes that Valenzuela ha d marked on his map. They had been here now a little more than forty minutes . . . almost forty-five minutes when they saw Rashad coming towar d them from the front of the YMCA.

"Just leaving the hotel," Rashad said. "Going to the parking lot."

"Alone?" Valenzuela said.

"Has a woman with him."

"Well, there's nothing I can do about that,"

Valenzuela said.

The King David parking lot attendant was always glad to see Mr. Rosen. Especially with a woman.

When Mr. Rosen was alone, he gave him five lira.

But when he was with a woman, he gave him ten lira. It couldn't be to impress the woman; sh e couldn't see the notes. So it must be because Mr.

Rosen felt good and was happy. Why shouldn't he be happy? With money and two cars. One o f the cars was gone now, taken by the Americans; bu t the new black one should be enough for him. He watched Mr. Rosen open the door for the woma n and come around to his side to get in.

The sound the parking lot attendant heard at that moment was like a racing car streaking dow n David Ha-Melekh past the hotel, a roar of power, a screeching sound that made him grit his teeth waiting for the crash. But the sound that came was the engine roar again, higher, much louder, here, a green car power-sliding through the gate into th e yard, raising a wave of dust and throwing gravel a t him as the car swerved and came to a stop broadside. A man wearing a cap was out of the car almost as it stopped sliding.

"Rosen!"

Rosen took his hand from the ignition, looking out the side window at the Marine coming towar d him and now Tali, behind him, getting out of th e Camaro, and someone else. He didn't recogniz e Mati right away.

"That's the guy I was telling you about," Rosen said.

"My God," Edie said, "he makes an entrance."

Rosen grinned at the Marine. "What're you, out hot-rodding?"

Davis said, "Don't touch the ignition. You better get out of the car. Both of you."

"Jesus Christ," Rosen said. Rosen knew. He didn't have to ask questions. "Edie, come on."

"What is it?"

"We have to get out of here."

"Take the parking guy with you," Davis said. He waved to Tali and Mati to move back.

"You know what to do?" Rosen asked him. He was out of the car now.

"If I recognize it," Davis said. "Go all the way out to the street."

He didn't wait for them to leave. Getting down on his back, inching under the car, he heard th e lady with Rosen asking him what was going on.

The lady would have found out if Rosen had turned the key and the car had exploded beneat h them. There were two fist-sized packs of C4 plasti c wedged between the undercarriage and one of th e frame cross members--one pack would have don e the job--like hunks of white modeling clay, wit h wires and blasting caps attached. Davis pulled th e caps out of the plastic material and put them in hi s pocket before he cut the wires with his clasp knif e and pulled the hunks of plastic free.

They were outside the gate on the side street, watching him as he came out from under the car.

He tossed the hunks of plastic in the back seat of the Camaro, got behind the wheel, and drove toward them, seeing them walking into the lot again, stepping out of the way. Rosen hurried toward him.

"Get in," Davis said. "We've got to move."

"Wait a minute--what was it?" Rosen was frowning. It was happening too fast for him. He wasn't used to reacting, not asking questions.

"We don't have time to talk. Get in," Davis said.

"I don't have anything with me. . . ."

The good-looking lady with Rosen was saying, "Will somebody tell me what's going on? What wa s under the car?"

"Wait a minute," Rosen said, his hands hitting the pockets of the light jacket he was wearing. "I don't have any money with me . . . my sunglasses . . ."

With his beard and hair and blue choker beads, his indecision seemed out of character, weakness showing through.

Tali knew what was going on, her eyes on Davis, staring at him. Mati was a little behind her, alert o r asleep, it was hard to tell.

"--Or my clothes. I've got to pack something."

"Mr. Rosen," Davis said, "forget about your clothes. Just get in the car."

Tali said, "What way are you going?"

"South. Stay here till we call you."

"To Beersheba?"

"At least. If we ever get out of here."

Rosen was in the car now, slamming the door.

The lady, through the window, looked bewildered.

Tali was calm.

"Or Eilat," Davis said. "Maybe you can drive down tomorrow, bring him some clothes."

"Where?"

"I don't know. The Laromme, I guess. We gotta go."

Rosen was leaning close to Davis to look out his side window. "Edie--talk to the girl, Tali. Listen , I'm gonna meet you, so be there. Okay?" And hi s parting words: "Edie--don't forget my passport!"

Tali watched the Camaro turn out of the lot, the lime-green screamer revving with a howl, and tur n again, with a sound of squealing rubber, south ont o David Ha-Melekh. She could still hear the car going through its gears, winding up, when it was out of sight . . . and then the gray Mercedes shot pas t the lot, streaking in the same direction.

THREE HOURS SOUTH OF JERUSALEM, somewhere in the Negev, they were keeping the green Camaro i n sight: four hundred yards, whatever it was, ahea d of them, a speck, a dot on the road. Sooner or late r the Camaro would falter or run out of gas or try t o hide and they would have them. Rosen and the Marine. It had to be the Marine driving.

Valenzuela would stare at the road--past Rashad and Teddy Cass in the front seat--at th e two-lane highway that could have been drawn wit h a ruler and seemed to extend into infinity, throug h flat desert landscape, colorless or dry brown an d tinted in washed-out, dusty green. Dead land, wit h the Dead Sea somewhere to the east, left behind.

Valenzuela would look from the road to the map that lay open on his legs.

They'd have them pretty soon.

There were only two roads south. One that followed the Jordanian border, and this one that linked the cities of the Negev. Eighty-five kilometers lined with young eucalyptus trees to Beersheba , where they had twice almost overtaken the Camar o scrambling through traffic, running red lights o n the boulevard and out past the Arab market. Another twenty-seven miles to Dimona, the gray Mercedes continuing east past the mills and potassium works to follow the highway; then not seeing th e Camaro and turning abruptly, realizing the Camaro had taken a secondary road due south out of Dimona, and finally seeing its dust hanging in th e air on the way to Mizpeh Ramon.

They were now two hundred thirty-seven kilometers south of Jerusalem, about one hundred fortyfive miles. According to Valenzuela's map, there were no through roads, nothing, no destinatio n south of Mizpeh Ramon except Eilat, the Israeli por t on the Gulf of Aqaba. Valenzuela liked the way i t was working out, but he was getting anxious.

He said, "This would be a good place, along here."

Rashad raised his face to the side. "On the pavement this thing don't have it. Now it's hard to steer around the holes."

"Needs a tune," Valenzuela said. "The cheap fuck, all the money he's got."

"No, the way it was with medals," Davis said, "it was something you thought about after. You didn't go out to earn one, get decorated, unless you wer e pretty gungy, or crazy. In Vietnam, for instance , some guys were grabbing all the medals they coul d get. But, see, there was an inflation of medals there.

NCOs and field-grade officers were writing them up for each other and you couldn't really tell th e value, you know, unless a guy dove on a grenade , something like that. You see a lance corporal with a Silver Star, a major might've done the same thin g and gotten the Congressional Medal of Honor. It's the way it was."

Rosen was half turned, looking back over the seat rest to the rear window. He was nervous an d excited and had been talkative.

"I think they're gaining a little."

"I see them," Davis said. "We're all right." He was staying approximately five hundred meter s ahead of the Mercedes, bringing them along, making sure they didn't get lost.

The road was no more than four meters wide, narrow strips of patched and broken pavement tha t would end abruptly and continue as rutted track s of gravel for miles before the pavement would suddenly reappear, a roadway, some poured concrete and telephone lines, the only sign anyone had eve r been here. The rest was desert scrub and bleache d rock.

Davis held the Camaro between sixty-five and seventy, both hands controlling the twists an d strains transmitted to the steering wheel. It wa s work, hot and with a high level of wind noise. Stil l half a tank of gas. He felt good, glancing at th e rearview mirror and at the red-brown mountains t o the east--they were the color of Mars--askin g Rosen if he knew why they called it the Red Sea , keeping him from thinking too much.

Why?

Because, see those mountains, the color? Like dull, dirty copper. They go all the way down int o Saudi Arabia and they say their reflection on th e water makes the sea look red.

Within a few miles they'd come to a stone marker and a side road--not a road; a trail--tha t led east, toward the mountains. It wouldn't b e long. He remembered something.

"Look in the glove box," Davis said.

He'd forgotten until now Tali putting a handgun in there as they drove away from her apartment: a .22 Beretta Parabellum. Low caliber, but an effective, mean-looking gun. Rosen held it in his hands, studying it.

"It's loaded," Davis said. "Keep it on you."

The claymores were on the back seat, each wrapped in about three hundred feet of wire.

He'd need a few minutes to set the caps and attach the wires to the car battery. The Mercedes would have to hang back, cautious, suspicious, an d give him time. They could do it, set up a bushwhack and invite the three guys to walk in. This was the place for it. They fought wars here, an d they hadn't seen another car or truck or donke y since Mizpeh Ramon. He didn't want to miss th e road marker or forget details talking to Rosen , keeping him occupied. He hoped the marker wa s still there. Once there had been a sign, Zohar ha d said, but now the sign was gone. The sign with th e name of the village was gone and the people wh o had lived in the village were gone. Driven out b y the tanks.

Rosen said he had to take a leak. Davis asked if he wanted him to stop. He thought of Raymon d Garcia--seeing him in front of the Marine Hous e polishing his Camaro--and told Rosen to go on th e floor if he had to. Rosen said no, he'd wait. He kep t talking.

He said, "Listen, you know what I was? I was a Storekeeper Third. I counted skivvy shirts, fo r Christ's sake. The war was over before I got overseas."

"We don't have time to put you through Boot,"

Davis said, "but you've had all the experience you need. How long you been driving?"

"I don't know, thirty years. Longer 'n that."

"Okay, you know how to start a car. That's all you have to do. I'll throw the switch if you want,"

Davis said, "but then I'm not outside watching if something goes wrong."

"I'll do it," Rosen said.

"Just keep telling yourself those guys back there want to kill you," Davis said. "I'd think you'd b e anxious to have it done."

"Anxious? Christ, I'm anxious, I'm scared is what I am."

"Well, I am too," Davis said. "Those guys back there--everybody's a little scared, I imagine, nervous. But what can you do? Right?"

They talked and Rosen asked about combat, what the feeling was like, people shooting at you.

Scary. And about guys risking their lives. Were they crazy? You don't think, Davis said, you do it.

That's what all the training was about. And medals--Rosen got on medals again. (Is that wha t he wanted?) What did you have to do to win different medals? Did you think at the time if it was worth it or not?

It was a situation you found yourself in, Davis said. "Over there, a Bronze Star was like a goodconduct medal. Win a Silver Star, maybe you held off twenty gooks coming through the wire with a n M-16 and a bayonet. Navy Cross, you held off tw o hundred gooks coming through the wire with th e same thing. And a Medal of Honor, you held of f that many without an M-16 or a bayonet."

"Were you decorated?" Rosen asked.

"Silver Star and two Hearts."

"Really? You were wounded?"

"I got shot," Davis said.

"Jesus . . . and you got a Silver Star? What'd you do?"

The road marker was about fifty meters ahead on the left, coming up fast.

"Hang on," Davis said.

Rashad thought it was a gust of wind blowing sand across the desert. But then Teddy Cass saw it an d sat up, hunched toward the windshield.

"He turned off. You see him? That's his dust,"

Teddy said. "Val, is there a road here, going east?"

"Nothing," Valenzuela said.

"Maybe a kibbutz, or some kind of historic site," Teddy said.

"Nothing's supposed to be there." Valenzuela held the map up, squinting at it.

"Well, there's some thing," Rashad said. He could see flashes of green leading the column o f dust, sun reflections on the Camaro. And beyonds omething. It looked like a rock formation at first.

Rashad slowed the Mercedes and turned at the stone marker, expecting a road and seeing onl y faint tracks through the sand and scrub ahead o f the car. The dust from the Camaro was thinning , blowing away. They could see the shapes of buildings now. Inside the Mercedes, moving at abou t twenty-five now to avoid the rocks and depressions, they were aware of the stillness, the silence outside. There was no sign of the Camaro.

"He's making his move," Valenzuela said. His tone was like a sigh.

It had been a village of immigrant Jews from India, a village of stone and cement houses with flat roof s built around a square where there had been a wel l with a dripping faucet. Ein Kfar. The village ha d appeared in the sights of Israeli and Jordanian tan k gunners in October, 1973, during the Yom Kippu r War, and had been shelled out of existence as a place to live. Fragments of the village remained: th e outline of the square, the dry faucet, walls pierce d by explosives, cisterns blown out of the ground , hollow buildings with open doors, rubble in th e desert sun.

A year ago Davis had passed through Ein Kfar with Raymond Garcia and Zohar, and Zohar ha d told them about the tank battle: how his tank ha d been hit by a rocket, how he had lost his gunne r and loader and had been burned on his hands an d face and had lain for a day in the field hospital tha t was set up in Ein Kfar.

Davis could still picture the village. He remembered a Coca-Cola sign lying in the rubble. He remembered thinking that Coca-Cola in Hebre w looked like Coca-Cola in English upside down.

He remembered the square--it was the same--a nd the narrow street to the right of the squar e where the sign had been. The sign was still there.

And the cement walls with windows and doors blown out.

They would have to move fast now and hope that the Mercedes would hang back, not seeing th e green car, and approach the village cautiously. The y would have maybe five minutes.

From the square, halfway down the side street, Davis pulled the Camaro into a space between tw o buildings. The way ahead was clear if they had t o run; they wouldn't have to back out. Okay, ope n the trunk. Get the shotgun first.

He said to Rosen, "Ready?"

"God," Rosen said, but he was out of the car. He walked out to the street, toward the square.

Davis pulled the Kreighoff out of the trunk, loaded both under-over barrels, and stuffed a handful of shells in the right-hand pocket of hi s jacket. He leaned the shotgun against the side o f the Camaro.

From the back seat he got his Colt automatic first, stuck it into his pants in front; the box of cartridges went into his left-hand pocket. Then the claymore mines.

It took less than two minutes to attach the electrical wires from the claymores to the alternato r under the Camaro's hood, then unreel the wires , carrying the curved, green-painted mines one at a time out to the street, several houses down towar d the square, where Rosen was piling rubble in th e narrow street: old boards, hunks of concrete, piece s of furniture. Davis planted the claymores in th e rubble. When he brought the third one out an d buried it, he dragged the Coca-Cola sign over an d laid it across the heap of debris that now blocke d the street.

Rosen looked at him, tense, his eyes wide open.

He took out a pack of cigarettes and got one lit.

Davis adjusted his cap, looking toward the square in the sunlight. There was no sound yet, no movement.

"We're about ready," Davis said.

They walked back to the Camaro and Davis picked up the shotgun. "I'll be across the street"-he nodded--"in that window. You stand by th e corner of the house. Right here. When they come , they'll see all that shit piled in the road. What're the y gonna think? We're trying to delay them. Mayb e we've got guns, they don't know. I imagine they'l l be careful at first. But when nothing happens--the y got to get out of the car to move all that stuff.

When they do, when they're bending over the pile, you reach into Raymond Garcia's hot setup an d turn the key on."

"You'll be right across the street," Rosen said.

Davis nodded. "I'll be right across the street.

Maybe all three won't get out. Whoever's driving maybe. I'll take that one."

"You think the mines'll do it, huh?"

"They got a punch. They'll do it."

"Then what?" Rosen said.

Davis looked at him a moment. "See if they're all dead."

"Jesus," Rosen said.

The Marine touched Rosen's shoulder and walked away with the shotgun. He walked acros s the street. Rosen watched him. He didn't hunch hi s shoulders or run, he walked.

Davis looked back when he was on the other side, then stepped through a doorway, into a hous e with plaster ripped from the walls and only part o f a roof, a house he had been in before in Phu Ba i and Hue.

Rashad pulled closer to the buildings on the right, still in the square, and stopped. His hand droppe d to the Beretta, 9mm, that was on the seat next t o him. Teddy Cass's Uzi submachine gun lay acros s his lap, the clip sticking down between his legs.

Valenzuela had taken his Uzi out of the attache case and held it so that the barrel stub rested on the bac k of the front seat.

"Go on a little more," Valenzuela said. "Up to the street."

Rashad put the Mercedes in gear and eased it, creeping forward, past the building on the corner.

They saw the pile of rubble halfway down the sidestreet.

"What's going on?" Valenzuela said. "Okay, they went down that way. What're we supposed t o think about it? Does the street go somewhere else?

You see any dust?"

"Looks like a road way down there," Rashad said. "They could be gone by now."

"Or they could still be here," Valenzuela said.

"Maybe that's what they want us to do," Rashad said. "Waste some time."

"Fucking Marine," Valenzuela said. "He's got no fucking business in this."

Davis watched them advancing: the heavyset guy, Valenzuela, on this side of the street, and the thi n guy with the hair on the other side, both with Uzis , banana clips, thirty rounds each, both of them staying close to the walls of the houses, coming to doorways and windows and poking the machine guns in as they took a look. The Mercedes was creepin g along, staying even with them. Half a block, they'd get tired of it. They'd be anxious, realize soon the y were wasting time. Clear the stuff out of the roa d and get moving--look for the car, find the car first , that would be the way to do it.

If he had an M-16 all three of them could be dead in the time he thought about it and picture d himself doing it. They thought they were bein g careful, but they didn't know shit about entering a village.

Across the street, Rosen was watching them, pressed against the wall, inching his bearded fac e past the corner, then pulling it back. Twice Rose n looked over his shoulder at the Camaro, makin g sure it was still there.

Davis held the Kreighoff cradled in his arms, his back to the front wall of the house, looking on a n angle through the open window. He'd have t o shoot left-handed. The shotgun had a nice balanc e and feel--the checkered walnut stock, the delicate , thin little gold-plated triggers. Twelve gauge: i t would hold a shot pattern two fists wide from th e window to the pile of rubble. Put both of the m through the windshield of the Mercedes as th e smoke cleared and go out with the Colt, if it wa s necessary to finish up.

Rosen was peeking again, holding the Beretta at his side. The rear end of the Camaro was shin y though filmed with dust. Rosen was still watchin g them.

They were about three houses from the rubble.

The heavyset one, Valenzuela, was coming out into the street, in front of the Mercedes, saying something to the one with the hair. Now the one with the hair was coming over. Then Valenzuela motione d for the car to come on, follow them. They wer e walking toward the pile of rubble, tired of foolin g around.

Walking into it. Davis watched them. Two houses from the rubble. He glanced over at Rosen , across the street. About thirty seconds more.

Rosen was pressed to the corner of the building.

No--he was turning away, moving quickly to the Camaro and getting in . . .

Davis couldn't believe it. Not yet! Wait!

. . . slamming the door.

Actually slamming it. Christ, he could hear it across the street. They heard it too, both of them , down the street past the pile of rubble, looking up , raising the machine guns this way.

The claymores went off as Rosen turned the ignition key--two of them did--with a hard, heavy, ear-splitting BA-WHAM-BA-WHAM, and th e Coca-Cola sign and the lumber and concrete exploded in gray smoke and fragments of junk and metal, fanning out in the arc-shape of the oval claymores, blowing the shit out of the pile of rubble but missing--Davis knew it--the two guys flat in th e street now and the black guy safe in the car. Shit.

He brought up the Kreighoff and gave them both loads, knowing it was too far, knowing it was tim e to get the hell out--and ran across the street wit h the shotgun, digging the Colt out with his fre e hand, letting go at them, snapping shots as they go t up--one of them still on his knees--firing burst s from the Uzis, trying to catch him, spray him wit h the dry chattering sound, taking out cement fro m the corner of the house as he got past it and lande d hard against the trunk lid of the Camaro.

When he got around to the side, there was Rosen behind the wheel, looking up at him.

"I get 'em?"

"Shit," Davis said. "You got shit."

They drove out of there, straight out across the desert, bounding over holes and washes, tearin g through the scrub, beating the hell out of Raymon d Garcia's hot setup in a wide wide arc that shoul d bring them to the highway.

"Well, for Christ sake," Rosen said. "A noise like that, Jesus, why didn't it kill them?"

Davis hung on to the wheel. He wouldn't say anything to the man for a while. He'd be looking a t the rearview mirror again. Shit. He was tired o f looking at the mirror, but he'd be looking at it no w all the way to the Red Sea.

THEY SAID TEDDY CASS, before he turned freelance, had done beautiful work in the precision application of explosives. He made destruction a work of art.

With Universal Demolition, Inc., Teddy had torn down at least a dozen major structures. He'd tor n down, for example, the Broadmoor Hotel in Atlantic City, twelve stories, in less than twelve seconds, not even rattling the windows in a building twenty feet away--using, Teddy had once said, "a little dynamite and a lot of gravity."

The pay had been good, but it hadn't compared to what he could make working contract jobs o n his own, and he'd done several for Val and Mr.

Manza. (He'd gotten a grand for the first one: letting Val tie up a guy on the top floor of the Huron Hotel in Saginaw before he blew it down.) Thi s one, five grand plus expenses. Good wages. Probably a grand or fifteen hundred more than Clarence "Rashad" Robinson was making. But the contrac t hadn't said anything about taking on the fuckin g Marines.

Teddy told Valenzuela--in the Mercedes again going south--that it was time to renegotiate. He didn't mind discussing it in front of Rashad, because he knew Rashad would be on his side and it would be two of them Val would have to kee p happy if he wanted a job done.

They were somewhere behind the green Camaro.

They knew it hadn't doubled back north, they'd seen enough of its dust trail to be sure of that. Bu t the Camaro wasn't in sight now--even with Rasha d hitting ninety on clear stretches of blacktop--an d they didn't know what the problems would be locating the Camaro in Eilat or at points south.

Valenzuela was not a man who became excited.

He took things one at a time and looked at them.

He said, "I agree, it's different than it was on paper. We told you Ross, Rosen, never packed but was likely to now. Or he might've hired somebod y who packed. But, no, we never saw something lik e this, a guy who carries fucking grenades in his ca r or whatever it was he used. So all right, you fee l you're entitled to combat pay, whatever you wan t to call it. Let me know what you want. Harry o r myself, we're not gonna argue with you. Harr y wants it done, so do I."

Rashad, holding his gaze on the road and the sweep of desert, said, "Something you might consider. The man has money. He's living on something. And we know his lawyer come to give him some more. If we was to get our hands on tha t money and cut it up--" Rashad said. "Hey, sigh t unseen, I'd go for a share, not even knowing ho w much we talking about."

"That's a possibility," Valenzuela said. "When you take Ross, I doubt we'll have time to ask hi m where his money is. But Mel, that's something else.

I'm agreeable to, as you say, renegotiating. The thing is, if we keep after him we're gonna get him, I k now that. We're too close to blow it now and hav e to start over. We're gonna agree--whatever yo u want and think is fair. I just don't want to stop an d talk it over. The other thing--"

Valenzuela looked down at his map. "Where they going? How far? Well, they could go to Eila t and try and hide there--it looks like a pretty goodsize place, a resort town, the Miami Beach of Israel--or they could keep going south, down t o the southern tip of the Sinai. Then what? Go bac k up the other side? They keep going they'll be i n Egypt. So I don't know where the fuck we're going.

All I can tell you is, don't worry about the expense.

Okay? Shit, we're this far. You got something else you'd rather do?"

They passed army vehicles going north and a road that pointed west, to the Timna Mining Company. About three miles from Eilat, they approached a security checkpoint: a shed at the side of the road with yellow markings and two Israel i men in khaki clothes--though not army uniforms--w ith submachine guns slung over their shoulders.

Rashad said, "Uh-oh."

Teddy Cass pushed his Uzi under the front seat.

Valenzuela's lay across his legs, beneath the open map of Israel. He put his hand on the weapon a s the car crept up to the two security men studyin g them, one with his hand raised. The hand move d then, waving them past. Rashad began to accelerate. Valenzuela said, "No, hold on. Stop."

Rashad braked. One of the security men walked over to the open window on Teddy's side. "Ask hi m about a green car," Valenzuela said.

"Yeah, say," Teddy said to the security man, who was middle-aged and weathered and ha d probably been in several wars, "did a green American car go by here a few minutes ago? Some friends of ours, we're supposed to meet them down here."

The security man was nodding, saying yes and waving his arm, yes, it went by.

"Thank him," Valenzuela said.

They came to Eilat feeling better about their prospects--to the desert town on the side of a hill , a boom town of new houses and young trees an d children--young people everywhere--the tow n spreading up the hill from the gulf, down the sout h coast into the Sinai, with its airport right in th e middle.

Valenzuela studied his map and made a plan.

They dropped Rashad off at the airport to wait there, which was fine with him, get out of the ca r for a while. Teddy slid behind the wheel and the y circled around the airport to drive through th e parking lots of the half dozen hotels lining th e curve of the gulf that was called the North Beach.

No green Camaro. Rosen and the Marine couldn't have taken the road east, because it didn't go anywhere. The road stopped at the border, at Aqaba, and you couldn't get into Jordan from Israel without a visa. You couldn't sneak in farther north because of the mine fields. There was nothing west but desert and mountains all the way to Suez.

So they drove south, winding along the shore of the gulf, past the port facilities and oil storag e tanks, slowing down at a couple of motels, stopping at the Laromme to inspect the parking area, and then going on another five or six miles, between the mountains and the coral beaches on the edge of the sea--to another security checkpoint.

Valenzuela, in the front seat now, said, "You wouldn't happen to've seen a bright green American car go by here, would you? With a white stripe?" A Z-28 Camaro? the security man wit h the M-16 asked. "Yeah, that's the one," Valenzuel a said. No, the security man said, he had seen that ca r one time and heard its engine and liked it ver y much, the sound, rrrrrrruuuuum, but he had no t seen it today. He wanted to know if the owner wa s a friend of theirs and how many liters the engin e was and if the owner wanted to sell it. Christ, discussing a hot rod, with the mountains of Jordan and Saudi Arabia over there across the gulf and a Bedouin going by on a camel.

It was worth it. Rosen and the Marine were in Eilat.

"Now what?" Teddy said.

"We'll check with Clarence," Valenzuela said.

He was thinking as he spoke. "We got to station ourselves somewhere, different places, but so w e can get a-hold of each other quick. You know wha t I mean? Say Clarence stays at the airport. You're i n town, or I'm in town. The other one drives around.

You go to the checkpoints a few times a day, shoot the shit with the guy about cars, and find out if a green one happened to go by lately. That's what w e do, keep looking, ask around for our friends. Hey , you know a guy who drives a green Camaro? Prett y soon one of them's gonna go to the store for a sixpack. It's a matter of time," Valenzuela said, nodding, thinking about it. "That's all it is. Time."

OFF THE SOUTH BEACH ROAD, a few miles from the Hotel Laromme, there was a place called Wad i Shlomo where pilgrim caravans from North Africa , on their way to Mecca, would come down out o f the high desert to the sea.

Now, a trail followed the wadi, the dry wash, twin ruts that twisted through the hardpack fo r several miles--a mystery trail that offered littl e hope of leading anywhere--before coming withi n sight of the doctor's residence.

There. A whitewashed adobe, a desert home with a low, flat roof. Not bad in Tucumcari, Ne w Mexico; a dazzler in the Sinai, sitting there with it s patio and carport, a bird feeder on a pole, windmil l and stock tank in back, the house edged with scru b trees and coarse grass, a low stone fence across th e front of the property with a wooden gate that wa s open.

"They're not home," Rosen said. "Both cars are gone."

Coming through the gate, they could see that the carport was empty. Davis drove slowly, lookin g around, staying in the ruts that curved up to th e house.

"Well, I guess it doesn't matter," Rosen said.

"There's supposed to be a key in the birdhouse.

He's something; he goes off into the desert to take care of the Bedouins, he locks the house and tell s everybody where the key is. Says in case he and Fa y are gone, go in and have a drink, make yourself a t home. Reginald drinks some kind of Arab piss, rak i or arak or something. It's awful. But I know Fa y keeps a bottle of Johnny Walker Red in the cupboard over the sink."

Rosen was talkative again, the nervous excitement gone out of him, high now on a feeling of relief. From Ein Kfar to Eilat he had kept shaking his head and saying shit no, hey, that kind of busines s was way way out of his line. He didn't have th e background to stand there and watch them an d wait for just the right moment. Christ, those guy s had machine guns. He could still hear it, the gunfire. He hadn't thought it would be that loud or affect him the way it had. He was sorry, he wasn't making any excuses, it just wasn't his line. Christ , all the time in the Navy during the Great War , Storekeeper Third, he hadn't fired a gun in anger , shit, he'd hardly even fired one at all except in boo t camp, and then the noise, the racket inside th e place on the firing range with the oh-threes goin g off, drove him nuts. Shit, he didn't even qualif y with the oh-three.

Now he felt safe and could relax and tell Davis about the Bedouin doctor who lived in Eilat an d devoted his practice to the Sinai desert Arabs, goin g out in his Land Rover to visit the trailer clinics h e had established during the past twenty years. Reginald Morris and his wife Fay. Reginald very British and proper in his blazer and rep tie, with a sense o f humor as dry as his desert, a leftover colonial fro m the time of the raj, his own man, who grumble d about ineffective governments and saved lives. Fay , Rosen said, was sort of a nutty lady. He loved he r English accent. She chattered, and she could carr y an evening all by herself and keep you smiling. Sh e was comfortable while Reginald pretended to b e gruff. She accepted the desert in the fashion of a colonial wife, and when she felt a little down o r bored or lonely, she could always take a pull on th e Johnny Walker Red above the sink. Rosen had fel t good here, in their company. It was another reaso n he felt safe now--once they'd found a ladder to ge t the key out of the birdhouse and covered the Camaro, in the carport, with a canvas tarp.

There was anything they wanted to drink, except bourbon; even cold beer in the humming refrigerator.

No phone; but electricity, hot water, and a bathtub.

Davis said he'd have a beer and walked through the rooms looking out the windows at the ston e fence and at the scrub growth and desert on fou r sides.

The patio, with its umbrella table and oldfashioned striped canvas beach chairs, was on the left side of the house looking out. Coming i n through the sliding glass doors, the change wa s abrupt: from desert living to country English, a room full of heavy pieces--deep chairs and a sof a slipcovered in floral designs, dark wood tables, an d secretary with china figurines on the shelves.

There was a low roof or ramada that ran along the front of the house to the carport on the othe r side. The two bedrooms and bath were on that sid e of the house. The kitchen extended across the back , with a heavy oak table separating it from the livin g room.

The living room wasn't the place to be if they came from the patio side. The glass doors offere d no protection. Windows filled the front wall. The y opened out and gave a view of the yard and th e stone fence about fifty meters away. One of the m would have to be here, to watch the front and th e patio side of the house. The other one would hav e to be in the back bedroom, to watch the side, pas t the carport, and the whole backyard area. It wasn't a good place to defend.

If they came, he'd have to get Rosen out of here and go up into the rocks, find some high ground.

He'd have to take a look after a while. Rosen, sipping his Scotch now, saying, "Ahhhh," would argue and not want to go. They needed more guns.

"Here are some pictures of them"--Rosen standing by a wall of photographs in the livin g room--"a good one of Fay. Here's Reginald in a Bedouin outfit. He's always Reginald, never Reg o r Reggie. Very formal guy on the surface."

"Does he hunt?" Davis said.

"You mean go hunting?"

"Does he have any guns."

"Well, I don't know if we should nose around in their personal things. Having a drink, well, he sai d to."

"Let's look," Davis said.

He found a Mauser safari rifle, 30-06, five-shot, in the front closet, oiled, in perfect condition.

Rosen came out of the back bedroom with a heavy revolver that had "Enfield Mark VI" s tamped on the side plate. It was at least seventyfive years old, but it was loaded. He made another drink and watched Davis assembling the guns o n the oak table--three handguns now, the shotgu n and a good rifle, with boxes of ammo--and the n slipping on his shoulder rig and putting the Col t automatic in the holster.

Rosen said, "Come on, sit down and rest awhile.

They're not gonna find us."

"Maybe not today," Davis said.

"Fine, then we'll worry about it tomorrow,"

Rosen said. "I'll tell you, the worst thing in any situation is not knowing what you're gonna do. But once you make the decision, the hard part's over.

All you have to do then is do it. I'm not gonna fight those guys. I've got no business even thinkin g about it. So I'm getting out. Fuck the money. I'l l call Mel, have him deliver it some other time. I'm not gonna worry about that now. All I want to do i s get my passport and get out of the country."

Davis said, "That's all, huh?"

"I know, it's gonna take some juking around,"

Rosen said. "But look, Edie's at the Laromme--t hey flew in, she got there even before we got here.

The hotel's right down the beach. Cut across the desert, you could probably walk it in a couple o f hours."

"If you don't get lost," Davis said.

"I'm saying it's a possibility. And Tali'll be here tomorrow with the car."

"Probably tomorrow."

"A day or two doesn't matter now. I fly out of here or drive up to Ben Gurion and get the firs t plane to Athens, either way. I mean when we see it's clear, and that's where we--or I should say I--wil l have to do some finessing around first, I know that.

But I'm going. You guys with the firearms, man, that's way out of my line. I'm not saying I haven't seen any of it before, don't get me wrong." Rose n paused and took a drink of Scotch.

"I understand what you mean," Davis said. "We tried something and it didn't work. Only it isn't a question now of you saying okay, fine, let's forge t about it and go home."

Rosen wasn't listening to him.

"I'll tell you something," Rosen said. "The way I s tarted out, I could've easily been on the other sid e of the fence, I mean working for somebody lik e Harry Manza. Shit, I could've been Harry Manza.

Years ago, the things I was into--but on the fringe, not all the way. I worked for a guy in the loan-shar k business. I was his bookkeeper. I worked for a gu y in the protective insurance business--listen, tha t hotel fire that got my picture in the paper. Yo u think it caught fire? That was the protection business. Even said it in the papers. That's the kind of shit they pull if you don't want to sign up and mak e your payments. They burn down the whole fuckin g hotel. I worked in a guy's office who was in tha t business. I was just twenty-three years old. I wa s with the Teamsters--that's a long story, I won't g o into it, but I was in Jimmy Hoffa's Local two-ninenine in Detroit, back in the Fifties, and you didn't have to go to the movies if you wanted to see som e action. I've had some situations since that tim e where you're dealing with people . . . well, yo u know, I told you about some of that. You get th e Justice Department on you, get squeezed betwee n the bad guys and the fucking good guys, the government lawyers, who don't give a rat's ass what happens to you, leave you standing there with you r yang hanging out. I know about dealing with al l kinds of people. I know what those guys eat fo r breakfast, and I also know when to pull my head i n to keep it from getting shot off. If it was a deal, w e were talking to those guys, shit, I could sell the m anything. How about some development land ou t in a fucking mine field between Israel and Jordan?

They'd buy it. But if I can't get close enough to talk and know they're gonna listen, then, man, I wal k away."

"I'm not arguing with you," Davis said.

"What I am, what you see, is a retired businessman," Rosen said. "I'm getting a little too old for this kind of bullshit. Listen, I'll admit it."

"I don't see that age has anything to do with it,"

Davis said, "if they come to kill you."

Rosen hesitated a moment. "You believe in God?"

Then Davis hesitated. "Yeah, I guess so."

"Well, I'll have to tell you what I think about the Will of God," Rosen said. "You might be interested. Mainly it's accepting things that happen t o you. But it doesn't mean standing there when yo u can move out of the way. I'm too old to be playin g guns," Rosen said. "But I'm not too old to run lik e a sonofabitch."

AT DUSK, Davis took the Kreighoff and went on a recon, down the road that followed the wadi, for almost a mile, then came back and circled th e perimeter of Dr. Morris' house in the gray desert silence. He couldn't imagine people walking across this land, coming all the way from Egypt and th e Suez. He couldn't imagine the Bedouins living ou t there. The first Bedouin he had ever seen--on th e trip with Zohar and Raymond Garcia, west of her e at Um Sidra, the Wadi of Inscriptions--was a bo y of about fourteen; he'd worn a yellow sport shir t and black pointed shoes with thin soles and ha d seemed to appear out of nowhere with a guest register under his arm, asking for their signatures. Visitors, centuries before, had carved their names in the rocks of Um Sidra; now they signed a gues t book. Zohar had asked the boy in Arabic where h e lived. He'd pointed off somewhere at the empt y desert. Zohar had asked him where he got wate r and he'd pointed in another direction. Davi s thought of the tourists who came to the desert i n their hiking boots and safari outfits, and the guidebook warnings to keep your head covered in the sun; and then he thought of the Bedouin boy in hi s yellow shirt and pointy shoes and no hat.

Maybe, as Rosen said, you could walk to the Laromme from here, approach the hotel from th e desert. That would be the way to do it. The y couldn't drive the Camaro. It would be better, too , if he went alone and Rosen stayed at the house.

He'd wait for Tali and bring her back here with Rosen's clothes and passport. Maybe drive hi m down to Sharm el Sheikh. Fly out from there.

He didn't see any high ground or good protection within a mile of the house. But if they came during the night it would be all right. He could sli p out of the house at night and if he located them h e could do some mean and dirty things.

"On that kind of patrol," Davis said, "we'd be dropped in, all camied up, no helmets, equipmen t taped. We didn't even talk out loud. At night we'd sleep, everybody holding hands, with two guy s awake, and if they heard something we'd give eac h other hand signals. We never dug in or left any sig n we'd been there. The time I got the Star we were i n there watching traffic on a supply trail and i t seemed like a whole battalion of NVA got on us th e first night."

"What's NVA?" Rosen said.

"North Vietnamese Army. The regulars, not the VCs."

There were shadows outside on the patio, in a haze of moonlight; the living room was dark wher e they sat in flowered easy chairs: Rosen with a Scotch, Davis with a can of beer and the Kreighof f next to his chair.

"See, sometimes we'd go in, we'd put up posters that said, 'The First Recon Marines are in you r area. Drop your fucking weapons and surrender.'

But this one was a sneak-and-peek mission and I w as the patrol leader."

"How many men?"

"Twelve that time. We lost four. What we'd do, we'd radio our position before we settled in for th e night, give the artillery four coordinates--wha t was called a killing cross--with us in the middle.

We'd key the hand set. Then later on, when the NVA got on us, we'd give our signal, like"--almos t whispering then--" 'Magic Pie Two, this is Swif t Scout,' then click twice and they'd know we neede d artillery cover."

"What happens if they're off a little? The artillery," Rosen said.

"Yeah, some fuck-ups smoking dope lay it on you by mistake," Davis said. "You get fuckin g killed is what happens. That time on the suppl y trail the cover was fine, but there were too many o f them. They kept trying to run over us, and ou r heavy stuff, our M-60 and our grenade launchers , were out, so we called back to let up on one coordinate and we slipped out that way and met our extract. That's the helicopter that pulls you out. I mean it yanks you out. They drop a cable an d you're wearing like a parachute harness with a rin g you snap on the cable and it jerks you out of ther e with everybody on the line banging into each other.

But you're so glad to get out you don't care."

"What'd you get the Silver Star for?" Rosen said.

"For that. I was the patrol leader," Davis said.

"We killed a bunch of the NVA, held them off, and I picked up an NVA field officer, brought hi m along. The guy was hanging on to me, he had a death grip around my neck all the time during th e extract, flying out of there. But you know what th e worst part of it was?"

"What?" Rosen said.

"The guy's breath. All the time he's hanging on me, strangling me to death, he's breathing in m y face with a breath like he'd been eating fuckin g garbage and hadn't brushed his teeth in fiv e months."

"I can't imagine living like that," Rosen said, "doing it every day."

"That time we did a job, I guess," Davis said:

"We brought the NVA officer out and we brought out our dead. That was something you could coun t on. We always brought out our dead."

"You said you were wounded, got a couple of Purple Hearts," Rosen said. "Was one of them o n that patrol?"

"No, it was another time, an emergency extract," Davis said. "This Medevac landed to pick up our wounded and I ran out with a guy over m y shoulder. I got him inside all right, I looked down , there was all this blood pouring out of my leg. I d idn't feel anything at the time or hear anything because of the rotors, all the fucking noise they were making. As the Medevac was rising up, I banged o n the door and yelled at them, "Hey, shit, I'm wounded too! Open up!" Davis shook his head , thinking about it, and had a sip of beer.

"What was the other time?" Rosen said.

"It was practically the same time. We got up in the air and the fucking helicopter was shot down. I h ad my feet caught in something and when we hit I t ore the tendons in the backs of my legs. That wa s my second Heart in about five minutes."

"But you got out."

"I'm here," Davis said.

"And you're worried about what you're gonna do. I mean when you're discharged," Rosen said. "I d on't understand that. All you've been through , situations you've handled, what're you worrie d about?"

"I told you. I don't have a trade. My military occupational specialty is infantry, and I don't think there's much call for infantrymen in civilian life."

"Learning a trade, doing one thing the rest of your life, that's for clucks without imagination,"

Rosen said. "You don't, in the business world, you don't prepare yourself for a certain job and that's it , like a bookkeeper, a tax accountant. You hire thos e people. What you do, you keep your eyes open, yo u use a little imagination seeing how you can fit int o a situation or how you can bend the situatio n around so it fits you. What did I know about rea l estate and the mortgage business? Nothing. But I s aw an opportunity, a chance to get in, talk to th e right people and convince them they should be doing business with me."

"Okay," Davis said. "But I'm not worth a shit at talking to people. They'd see right away I didn't know what I was talking about. I mean if I tried t o fake it, tell them I'm some kind of an expert."

"No, they wouldn't," Rosen said. "It's how you do it, your tone. They're busy thinking about themselves, what hotshots they are. They're thinking what they're gonna say to impress you. If you star t right off, they see you've got confidence, you loo k right at them, you compliment them, bullshit the m a little, they think ah, he's got good judgment, h e must know what he's doing. That's all. Don't b e afraid of people--Christ, I'm telling you not to b e afraid. I mean in a business situation. Don't let people scare you; because nine times out of ten they don't know any more than you do. Or even less.

They got there pushing and shoving, acting, conning, bullshitting. If they had to get by on basic intelligence alone--most of the people I've done business with--they'd be on the street selling Goo d Humors and probably fucking up the change. . . .

How old are you?"

"Thirty-four," Davis said.

"I didn't get into the mortgage business till I was thirty-eight. No, thirty-nine. I didn't even kno w there was such a thing--lining up a shitload o f mortgages and selling them to banks. A hundre d million dollars worth of paper at one percent.

What's that?"

"A million dollars," Davis said.

"You bet it is. A year," Rosen said. "With not an awful lot of overhead, either. Don't worry abou t the type of business, it's all pretty much the same.

Take your time, talk to people, decide what you'd like to do, then start doing it. What I always say is , making the decision's the hard part. All this time, I m ean for three years, I've been thinking I want t o go home, back to the States. Then something lik e this happens, I have to look at my life closely agai n and make a decision. Why do I want to go home?

Or, do I really want to go home? No, it turns out, after I analyze it, I'm happier here than I've eve r been in my life. What do I want to go home for? . . .

You like it here, don't you?"

"Yeah, it's all right. I guess I've had a pretty good time," Davis said.

"Palling around with Kissinger at the King David Hotel, I guess you have," Rosen said. "Tha t reminds me, you never said who it was let the far t that time. Do you know?"

"It was me," Davis said.

"People look at you?"

"A few. There wasn't anything I could do about it, so I didn't do anything. I stood there and looke d back at them."

Rosen liked that. He sat up in his chair and turned to Davis. "See? What do you mean yo u can't handle a situation with people? That's th e whole idea, be natural, be yourself, you can't miss.

Your only problem, as I see it, is making the initial decision. That's why you're here. You know that?"

"That's why I'm where? You mean sitting here?"

"Right. You're afraid to make the decision to go home."

"I'm going home," Davis said. "I just don't know what I'm gonna do."

"Yeah, but this is like delaying it. Also it's a confidence builder, it's something you know how to handle. I couldn't figure it out at first. Why you'd want to risk your neck. What're you getting out o f it? You haven't said anything about money. Now I s ee why you got involved. You're putting off making a decision. You're sticking to what you know as long as you can."

"That's what I'm doing, huh?"

"Take my word," Rosen said. "Also believe me when I say you've got nothing to worry about dealing with people. Forget what I said about bullshitting anybody. In your case, look right at them and play it straight and you'll win. You've got a nic e natural style."

The security man with the green baseball cap and the submachine gun came up to Rashad the nex t morning at about eight-thirty--after he'd spent th e night in the airport--and asked him what he wa s doing here.

Rashad said yeah, he was supposed to meet a friend coming in from Ben Gurion, was suppose d to be yes terday, but shit, he didn't know when hi s friend was gonna get here now. He just had to wait.

He also had to show another security man--d ownstairs in one of the private security booths--h is passport and empty his pockets and explai n again no, he wasn't an Arab, man, he was a Muslim, born in Dalton, Georgia, lived in Detroit, and had never been to any Arab country in his life.

They still watched him. He'd walk over to the Arkia counter and look at the TV screen of arrival s and departures--almost every hour of the day between here and Ben Gurion--and then walk over to the lunch counter and have a cup of coffee and g o look out the window or stand by the stairs goin g down to the lower level and look in the big mirro r mounted on the landing that showed the securit y booths and the departure waiting area.

The arrivals didn't come in through the terminal.

They'd get off the plane, pick up their luggage from the train of baggage carts, and walk through th e gate to the street. At ten o'clock, outside for som e fresh air, watching a group of passengers that ha d just gotten off a plane, Rashad saw a familiar face.

A woman. A nicely dressed woman with a group of women laughing and carrying on, acting like little girls. Americans. Maybe from the Hilton. Or the Pal. He might've seen her in the lobby one time.

Staring at the woman he made himself remember. It wasn't in Tel Aviv, it was Jerusalem. And not in a hotel, but coming out. With the man, Mr.

Rosen. Walking to his car.

All the women were crowded around the entrance of a red-and-white Egged Tour bus while their luggage was being loaded on. Rashad waited.

He was the last one to step aboard, jumping in just as the door was about to snap closed. When th e driver looked at him funny, Rashad handed him a ten-pound note.

"You going to the hotel, aren't you?"

The driver nodded.

"I just want a lift, man. I'll stand right here out of the way."

That was how Rashad got to the Laromme on the south beach road and how he came to be hanging around the lobby, watching the woman friend of Mr. Rosen's, when another friend of Mr.

Rosen's, the Israeli chick with the nice ass, Tali, walked up to the woman and started talking to her.

On the phone a few minutes later, when he heard Valenzuela's voice, Rashad said, "You gonna lik e what I got to tell you."

WHAT GENE VALENZUELA LIKED was the view of all the cement work going on.

At half past ten, when the phone rang in the cafe, Valenzuela was on an upper-level terrace not mor e than a half mile from Rashad. The terrace, whic h ran along in front of the cafe in a clean new complex of mini-mall shops and fast-food places, got the sun directly and was hot at midmorning, but i t gave Valenzuela a treeless view of everything. Directly below him, the road came curving in from the south beach and fingered out in three directions: across open, undeveloped land to the North Beach hotels; to the airport; and up the hill to town.

The cement work was done in a hurry; it didn't have a nice finished look. But it was new and clean.

He'd think about the old, gray-peeling cement at Lewisburg (with the highest homicide rate of an y federal prison), hard motherfuckers fighting ove r the queens. He'd watch the Israeli girls walk by i n their jeans with their Jewish asses. There was a crowd of young stuff here and enough cemen t work--a guy with half a dozen transit-mixer s could make enough to retire in three years.

When the phone rang in the cafe he thought of his wife and pictured her talking on the phone i n her smart-ass voice to her mother--"I don't kno w where he is, the sonofabitch. Who knows? He neve r tells me where he goes and I personally don't care."

She'd never find him, either. She'd never even heard of Eilat. Shit, who had? He'd bet Harr y Manza had never heard of it. But if it was a moneymaker, it wouldn't matter to Harry where it was.

Get some development capital from him. Cash.

Sneak it into the country. Nothing signed with him, no written agreements. Harry had to die sometime.

Valenzuela saw himself sitting here with a growing business. Let his wife keep wondering where h e was. Let her bitch and never have to listen to he r again.

On the phone, talking to Rashad, he said, "Okay, stay there. Teddy's due to call or come b y here in about . . . fifteen, twenty minutes. We'l l meet you outside the hotel."

"Israeli girls are funny," Davis was saying to Rosen at ten that morning, in the kitchen having coffee.

"Or maybe all girls are funny, I mean different, and I don't know how to read them."

"It's a knack," Rosen said. "First you've got to never be awed. Though you're polite, of course."

"This girl I picked up one time at the Shalom Tower," Davis said. "We're getting along fine, having a coffee. She says she's meeting her girlfriend from England at the El Al terminal. So we pick he r up, a really good-looking girl with the long blond e hair and the English accent and all, and we go t o the Israeli girl's apartment. She says she's got a bottle of wine there and some hash. So I'm thinking fine, one girl or the other, I can't miss. We get to th e apartment, the Israeli girl's hus band's there. Liste n to this. I end up talking to the husband about th e West Bank situation while the two broads are off i n the bedroom making out."

He was never sure Rosen listened, because Rosen seldom commented. He would start talkin g right away, saying something that didn't alway s follow.

"I learned a long time ago," Rosen said, "the most overrated thing in the world--you kno w what it is?"

"What?"

"Teenage pussy. That young stuff, you say, oh man--they don't even know half the time wha t to do with it. They're thinking about their hair.

Their minds jump around too much. From my experience--you don't have to believe this, but it's true--the best is a younger middle-aged woma n recently divorced or widowed. By recently I mea n within a couple of years. I'll qualify that still further. Naturally she's got to be good-looking and you don't want a real fat one or one that wears a lo t of makeup to hide her age and looks great only i n the Hilton lounge, but after--you know what I m ean. It's true. Good-looking, stylish, middle-age d broads with some background, you know, somebody you can talk to. Otherwise, if all you want's a jump, get a whore, it's cheaper. No, but you se e stylish tourist ladies--you see them all the time a t the King David, the Hilton, the International. Well , the International, I'm not so sure. But which one s do you think'd be better in bed, the tourist ladie s that stay at the King David or the ones that stay a t the Hilton? You've been to the Hilton, haven't you?

In Jerusalem?"

"Yeah, I've been there."

"And you know what the King David looks like."

"Sure."

"Okay, which you think would be better?"

"What's the difference?" Davis said.

"I'll tell you," Rosen said, in the kitchen of the desert house, seated at the table, looking up a t Davis standing by the sink. "The Hilton lady, usually her clothes are more expensive. She spends a little more on herself, her hair, and she's more likel y to wear designer labels. The King David lady is a little plainer on the average, though in very goo d taste. She's quieter and not as easy to meet. Bu t once you get next to her--you know what I meant he King David lady is better in bed. You kno w why?"

"Why?"

"Because usually it's been a longer time since she's had it. She's more grateful and, hence, sh e gives more of herself."

"That's interesting," Davis said.

"It's a fact, based on research," Rosen said.

"Eight out of ten divorced wives of doctors and orthodontists who stay at the King David are better in bed. Make it sound more scientific."

Davis put his cup in the sink. His hand came up and touched the Colt holstered beneath his jacket.

"Well, listen, I'd like to stay and chat with you some more, but I think I better get going."

"You come back," Rosen said, "bring me some Winstons. Hey . . . and my passport."

Rashad had to look for the gray Mercedes; first, standing in the shade of the canopy over the entrance, then seeing he'd have to walk through the aisles of cars. He found it parked down near th e end of a row. The engine was running and the airconditioning was on. Rashad stooped at the window on Teddy's side, looking past Teddy at Valenzuela.

"You see him go in? The Marine?"

"He's in there?" Valenzuela straightened.

"It was good I saw him first. I'm standing in the lobby. I turn around, he's walking over to the desk."

"Yeah? What'd he do?"

"He got in a elevator, went upstairs."

"How long ago was that?"

"Five minutes," Rashad said. "I just seen him. I c ouldn't believe it, I turn around, there he is wit h his cap on."

"But no sign of Rosen, uh?"

"No, I looked around some."

"How about the girl, Tali?"

"She went up before, with the woman."

Valenzuela nodded. "Then the Marine comes and he goes up. Like they have it arranged." Valenzuela was silent a moment. "You didn't see the girl at the airport. Just the woman."

"That's right," Rashad said.

"So she got a ride or she drove his car. We'll look around for it." Valenzuela was silent again. He shrugged. "Then see what happens."

Edie, sitting on the bed, told them the story of how the charter flight had been cancelled yesterday afte r they'd waited around the airport for hours, of the n going back to the Hilton on the tour bus, anothe r hour, and of waiting again while the baggage wa s unloaded and carried up to the room, of then no t having anything to do yesterday afternoon. . . .

Tali sat there patiently. Davis sat there thinking, Come on, get to the end!

. . . Then this morning doing it all over again, going out to the airport at seven, two hours earlier , waiting some more, going through security, and th e charter finally leaving at ten.

Why is it so important to her? Davis was thinking.

Why didn't she ask about Rosen? She had asked, yes, how he was. But why wouldn't he be the onl y thing on her mind? Tali must have talked to he r yesterday and explained a little of the situation.

Why wasn't she concerned about him? No, people had their own concerns--cancelled flights--tha t were just as important.

He said, "You have his passport?"

"I thought I was going to see him," Edie said, surprised now after all that.

"In case he doesn't get by this way," Davis said.

"I don't know what his plans are."

"Well, if that's the way he wants to be," Edie said. "If he wants to keep on being the myster y man . . ."

Davis looked at Tali as the woman went over to her suitcase and pulled out Rosen's safari jacket.

Tali glanced at him, but her expression told him nothing.

"Tell him we're leaving here tomorrow afternoon at five-thirty," Edie said. "If he wants to call me, I think it would be nice."

"There's no phone where he is," Davis said.

"Maybe you don't understand. He's in a lot of trouble."

Edie came over to hand him the jacket. "Maybe I d on't understand," she said. "According to Tali , some crazy people are trying to kill him. But I kno w he tends to be a little dramatic. The mysteriou s American living in the Middle East. Am I suppose d to believe he's a spy, something like that? I'll sa y one thing, he's entertaining. But I'm afraid I don't have enough motivation or incentive to wai t around while Al Rosen plays his games, or whatever he's doing. If he wants to see me today or tomorrow, fine. If he doesn't, well . . . his passport and sunglasses are in the pocket."

"I'll tell him," Davis said.

Tali brought the black Mercedes up to the front entrance and when Davis got in and they drove off, turning south, she continued to tell him about th e woman, saying she thought the woman had no feeling or the woman had something else on her mind.

"She was very nervous yesterday," Tali said, "when I drove her to her hotel. Then I didn't see he r again until this morning."

"How about Mati?" Davis said. Find that out first.

"He went back to Tel Aviv."

"You're sure?"

"Yes, I drove him to the highway to hitchhike.

The woman . . . I thought she was worried about Mr. Rosen, but now I think she believes I wa s telling her a story. Something Mr. Rosen thought o f to kid her with."

"That's something he can worry about," Davis said, "if he wants to." Davis was half turned on th e seat, watching the road through the rear window.

"Yes, if he wants to," Tali said. "But I think she's too old for him."

"He's older than she is."

"He's not. Mr. Rosen is forty. He told me. That woman is at least forty-five. He'll still be youn g when she's old."

Davis had the jacket on his lap, Rosen's passport in the pocket.

Forget it. People lived in their own world and believed what they wanted to believe. They worried about the wrong things. Little pissy things with bi g problems staring at them. Tali was doing it. She believed in Rosen. She honored him. She was probably in love with the old bullshitter and didn't even know it.

"Have you been to the doctor's house?"

"Yes, once with Mr. Rosen."

"You travel with him?"

"Sometimes I do."

"His idea is to leave Israel for a while and then come back."

"Not go to the States?"

"No."

"He talked about that when I saw him last time in Netanya," Tali said. "About going home, if h e could do it."

"He's decided he likes it here," Davis said.

"Good. I know, the time I'm with him, he can be very happy."

"He thinks they'll get tired of looking for him after a while."

"Yes, why not? If they see it's so very hard to catch him, then they stop and say oh well, neve r mind."

"You and Rosen," Davis said, "you live in a dream world. He's got a friend, or somebody h e knows, guy left home, ran out on his wife and kid s and owed people a lot of money. He said for te n years this guy hid out, changed his name, move d around. And you know what?--this is what Rose n says--nobody was looking for him. They were gla d he was gone. That's the way Rosen thinks it'll b e with him."

"I believe it," Tali said.

"Well, if nobody's interested in him, how come they're here?"

"Because of his picture. But that was an accident," Tali said. "He can be careful; it won't happen to him again."

"We've got to get him out of here first," Davis said. "I was thinking, drive him down to Sharm e l Sheikh and fly Arkia out of there. Maybe go t o Tiberias, some place like that."

"Of course, all the places he can go, he would never be catched." She shrugged, cocking her hea d to one side. "Then they get tired and go home. I'm not worry about that part. If he agrees it would b e easy."

"What part are you worrying about?" Davis said.

"You." Tali glanced at him and brought her gaze back to the road. "I'm afraid you'll talk to hi m about fighting a war with them."

"He can do what he wants," Davis said. "I'm not in this anymore. . . . Here's where you turn."

The security man at the south beach checkpoint came over to the car smiling, shaking his head at hi s friend Teddy Cass. "No, he wasn't by here thi s morning. I know that car. It's a very good car, th e green one, but I still don't see it."

When they had turned around and were heading north again, Teddy said, "Between here and the hotel. That's only about a five-mile stretch. What'd we pass?"

"There was one road," Valenzuela said. "The only one I saw."

"Where?"

"You'll see it."

There was no sign at Wadi Shlomo, only the indication of a road: the two ruts in the hardpack that followed the dry creek bed up into the desert.

Rashad got out with an Uzi and ran ahead of the car, scouting each bend and rise, then waving th e gray Mercedes to come on. It was slow. Rasha d was cautious, but he was also eager and knew i t wouldn't be long.

Teddy Cass and Valenzuela held on through the creeping, jolting ride, staring at the windshield.

They were eager, too, but also patient, waiting for the sign from Rashad. When he was out of sight , beyond a bend and a stand of scrub trees, and wa s gone this time for ten going on fifteen minutes, the y sat listening to the hum of the air-conditioning unit , the sun glaring hot on the windshield, and neithe r of them spoke.

Then Rashad was coming back, approaching from the sandy creek bed, slipping, skinning hi s knee as he came up the bank, but smiling.

TALI SMILED, happy and relieved, as Rosen hugged her and kissed her on the cheek. He took the shortsleeved safari jacket from the Marine, put it on, buttoning one button, set his shoulders and patte d the pockets as they walked past the front of th e house to the patio.

"I'm home," Rosen said. "I put this on I can do anything. Tali, you're the cutest little broad in Israel and I love you. What'd you do with Edie? You talk to her?"

Davis saw Tali's expression change, the light go out of her eyes.

"She's waiting for you at the Laromme."

"She's not exactly waiting," the Marine said.

"She told us you could call her if you wanted." He saw Rosen's frown. "She thinks you're pulling he r chain and she's getting tired of waiting for you."

"Wait ing for me. She's running all over Israel with my passport. All she had to do was leave i t somewhere. She said that? She's tired of waiting?"

"I don't think she understands it," Tali said.

A blue plastic pitcher and four glasses were on the patio table, beneath the umbrella. Rosen put hi s hand in the pitcher and stirred with one finger.

They could hear the ice tinkle, the sound of something cold in the desert sun. The Marine stopped at the edge of the patio and looked back across th e yard to the Mercedes in the drive and, past it, to th e opening in the stone fence. In a few minutes he'd bring the car up closer to the house. Pull up behin d the Camaro and maybe turn it around, pointing a t the road.

"Some broads, I'm telling you," Rosen said.

"They don't go one step out of their way if it's inconvenient. Okay, if I don't see her--it looks lik e I won't have time anyway, if we're going to Shar m el Sheikh."

Davis came over. "Why don't you take Tali with you? Have somebody to keep you company."

Glancing at her. "I don't think Tali'd mind resting awhile, after all the running around she's been doing for you. But let's go inside and talk about it."

When Rosen looked at her, Tali gave her little shrug and said, "It would be fine. Whatever yo u want me to do."

"I was thinking about it," Rosen said. "I'm gonna need a cover, and I'm gonna need somebod y to make contact, call my company, tell them to mai l a certified check--quit screwing around with th e cash idea, take the bank exchange. Listen." He turned to Davis then. "I'm gonna take care of you , too, and I don't want to hear anything about wha t Mel gave you. Okay?"

"I thought we were friends," Davis said.

"Of course we're friends."

"I mean I didn't sign on for pay."

"I know you didn't. But you've got a funny idea about accepting money I want to help you change.

It's nice to stand up and be independent, but you can't be selfish about it. You've got to give me a chance to show off, too, and I do it with money.

Okay, we're gonna make some plans. First, though"--he raised the pitcher and began pouring--

"we'll have a vodka and orange juice in honor, in recognition, of my two best friends saving my ass."

He was saying, okay? Handing a glass to Tali.

Saying, if you need another excuse, think of one, but we're gonna have a drink. Coming over t o hand a glass to Davis . . .

Davis saw the blood coming through the breast pocket of the safari jacket, the red popping out an d sounds, a grunt from Rosen, the wind knocked ou t of him, dropping the plastic glass. He heard th e grunt and the sound of automatic weapons in th e desert and the sound of the glass patio doors shattering with the continuing hard, thin chattering sound of the automatic weapons and Tali's scream , Tali holding Rosen on his feet. Davis thought sh e had been hit as he grabbed Rosen around the body , tight to his own body, and got him inside, into th e near corner against the stucco wall, and eased hi m down gently. Tali was next to him, on her knees , moaning something in Hebrew, staring at Rosen.

Davis brought the Colt automatic out of its holster and began firing past the ragged edge of the glass door into the desert, making out the figure s now lying in the scrub, two of them, as they continued to fire into the room, riddling the figurines in the secretary and the glass in the framed photographs of the Bedouin doctor and his wife, wiping them from the wall. There was a pause, silence.

Waiting for it, Davis ran across the opening and got to the oak table as a burst from the Uzis too k fragments from the glass door and shattered a lamp. He got to the kitchen window with th e Mauser 30-06, jacking a shell into the chamber. He got there in time and squeezed off two rounds a t the figure running through the scrub toward th e stock tank. The figure stopped dead, hesitated, an d ran back, throwing himself behind a low rise. Davi s stepped aside. A burst came through the kitche n window, blowing out the panes of glass.

He picked up dishtowels from the sink and moved back to the table to stuff 30-06 cartridges i n his jacket, then picked up Tali's Beretta and skidde d it across the floor, past the oriental rug to where sh e was kneeling over Rosen. With the rifle, the shotgun, and the old Enfield revolver, he ran back across the wide-open doorway, bringing a quic k burst from the desert.

Rosen was propped against the wall, his chin on his chest, looking down at the blood soaking hi s jacket. The exit wound was just below the righ t breast.

"It went through you," Davis said.

Rosen looked up at him, glassy-eyed, his mouth open, as Davis opened his jacket and shirt an d pressed a folded dishtowel against the wound. A b ad one, a sucking chest wound, percolating ai r and blood. With splintered pieces of his ribs in th e wound. Rosen's expression said he couldn't believ e it. He was perspiring. A cold, clammy sweat. He was in shock.

"Turn over a little."

He helped Rosen roll his body so he could press a dishtowel against the entrance wound, which wa s small and showed very little blood, and the n brought him back gently to lie on his back.

"We'll get you fixed up in a minute," Davis said.

He took Rosen's right hand and laid it on the towel covering the air-sucking hole in his chest. "Here , keep your hand on it and press, just a little."

"I've been shot," Rosen said.

"You'll be okay. Try not to move."

"I can't move. Christ."

That was good, his tone. But he had to calm him down. "Don't fight to breathe. Try and relax."

"I brought them," Tali said. "I made this happen."

Davis glanced at her. "Take your gun, it's on the floor there. Go in the back bedroom and watch th e other side of the house."

"They shoot him, it's my fault. . . ." She was looking at Rosen with an awful expression: pain , anguish, wanting to cry, wanting to lie down wit h Rosen and give up.

"Jesus Christ!" Davis said. "Will you get out in the goddamn bedroom? Go on." He picked up th e Beretta and forced her to take it.

As she finally moved, he rose with the shotgun and fired both barrels past the edge of the doorway--for noise rather than in a hope of hitting them. There was no return fire, and when he looke d he didn't see the figures in the scrub. He reloade d the shotgun and brought the Mauser with him , crawling a few steps to the nearest of the front windows. He had to rise up to push it open. Then he squatted again and laid the Mauser on the windowsill. There was no sign of their car. Nothing moved beyond the stone fence. No sounds from th e other side of the house. He hoped she had qualifie d with a handgun. He hoped she wouldn't choke an d freeze. Jesus Christ, he thought. What are you doing here? He let his gaze move back along the ston e fence, then moved his position to the edge of th e doorway and looked out. Nothing. He'd try them.

When he ducked past the opening to the other side, there was no gunfire. There was no movement.

No sign of anything from the kitchen window. He moved through the hallway to the bedroom.

Tali stood between the side and back windows, holding the Beretta at her shoulder, the barre l pointing up. She looked over at him and seeme d calm now.

"Anything?"

She shook her head. "Is he going to die?"

"I don't know."

"We have to get him to the hospital."

She said it so simply he stared at her and didn't know what to say.

"How're we gonna do that?"

"Tell them he's been shot. Tell them he's dying and they'll go away."

Was she that dumb? No, she was hoping. Or imagining a truce, a cease-fire to collect th e wounded. Maybe they did that in the desert. "The y won't take our word," Davis said. "And if the y come in to look, they'll finish him."

"Then what can we do?"

"See what the doctor's got. There's a medicine chest in the bathroom closet and some pills an d stuff."

"He's going to be all right, isn't he?" Wanting him to say yes.

"I've seen a lot worse. You stay here, okay? But don't show yourself in the window."

She nodded and he turned away, going into the bathroom. He hoped there was morphine, thoug h he didn't think the doctor would leave it in th e house. The rib fragments would be like knife blade s in him. Morphine would help. A goddamn suckin g chest wound. He could tell by the sound, th e wound trying to breathe, that Rosen had been sho t through the lung.

The jacket was ruined, the front of it dyed red in funny designs. The towel beneath his hand felt dry.

With his fingers he had probed carefully beneath the towel and pulled his hand away when he fel t something wet, something sharp and hard stickin g out. Jesus. Something that was part of him. He didn't want to think about it, his body ripped ope n by a machine-gun bullet, blood pouring out. But i t was good that he could think about it. He was her e and able to think. He tasted blood in his mouth. He didn't know where the Marine was, or Tali. He ha d heard their voices before, the Marine yelling something. Not yelling, but his voice hard. It was easier to breathe when he relaxed. Before, he had though t he was suffocating, or drowning. Now it was easie r and he felt less afraid of not being able to breathe , though he was nauseated and afraid he migh t throw up. The sound was still there when h e breathed, like bubbles in a straw, but not that loud.

It was difficult to move. It felt as if a spike had been driven through him, holding him to the floor. He felt the floor moving, someone walking. The Marine was close, kneeling now, looking at him.

"How you doing?"

"Christ, I got shot. You know it?"

The Marine had white towels and some other things in his arms, setting them on the floor.

"Let's get you fixed up," Davis said. "You're gonna have to roll over again, on your left side."

He felt the coat pulling and heard the scissors then.

"You cutting my jacket off?" Somewhat alarmed.

"You can get a new one," Davis said. He raised Rosen's arm to pull the right side of the jacket fro m Rosen's body. "Look at these. See if you kno w what they are." He put several bottles of pills, without labels, on the floor by Rosen's face. "You picked the right house. We've got compress bandages, sulfa powder--what do you see there?"

"Aspirin, tranquilizers . . . halizone tablets,"

Rosen said. "Dramamine, in case we get seasick.

Where's Tali?" Again alarmed, remembering she was here.

"She's all right, she's in the bedroom. Hold still."

He got Rosen's wounds dressed, front and back, and brought him blankets and pillows--a pillo w for his head and one to elevate his feet--decidin g this corner of the front room might be the safes t place in the house.

Rosen felt the Marine walking across the floor again. Then felt more vibrations with sounds tha t went through him. He turned his head to look. Th e Marine was moving furniture around. Christ, rearranging the room. No, he was pushing the heavy couch and easy chairs into the open doorway of th e patio, turning them over to form a flowery barricade of cushions.

"I'm thirsty," Rosen said.

He heard someone calling then, from outside.

"The goddamn Marine," Valenzuela said. "He's in there, he's got no business being there. How much's he paying him? He could've left--you know what I m ean? He sees how it is, shit, he knows. But h e comes back here."

"He's paying him some thing," Rashad said.

"Man ain't doing it for the love of his country. Say he shoots for money. We say to him how much doe s he want to quit shooting, walk away and mind hi s business."

"I don't know," Valenzuela said. "If it's like that, if he's got a price, then maybe we ought to fin d out."

Teddy came in a crouch along the stone fence to the spot where they were sitting on the ground , near the open gate. Teddy had stayed out there , looking for a shot.

He said, "Well, what do you think?"

Valenzuela looked at him. "What do I think?

What do you think, for Christ's sake?"

"I'm pretty sure we got him," Teddy said.

"Didn't you see him? He stumbled, the Marine and the girl, it looked like both of them grabbed him."

"I didn't see him stumble," Valenzuela said. "I s aw the Marine pull 'em into the house. Fuckin g Marine, I'll tell you."

"Listen, I know we hit him," Teddy said, "and I t hink it was me. I had it right on his back. You sai d go, I pinned him, I know it."

"If he was dead," Rashad said, "it would be over. They wouldn't have no reason to stay in th e house."

"I didn't say he was dead," Teddy said. "No, but I'm pretty sure I hit him. You know, it looks like a setup. They're in the hole, nothing they can do.

Trapped. But they got a place. They got food, water, whatever, and we're out here in the fucking rocks. What if somebody comes along? I mean w e don't have time to sit around. If he's still alive, the n we've got to finish it."

"Why don't you rush the house?" Rashad said.

"All he's got is a rifle, a shotgun, and some other shit.

He could even have the place mined. You know it?"

"We got to get him out of there," Valenzuela said.

"Or keep him busy," Teddy said. "Say if I could get up there close enough to plant a charge. One o f you--how about this? One of you go up and talk t o him. See if he'd just as soon go home alive. I'll tak e some stuff, see what I can do. Put a hole in the plac e and we drive in."

"Let's do it," Valenzuela said. He looked at Rashad. "Call him. Tell him you want to talk."

"You want me to do it?"

"You're his buddy," Valenzuela said. "Go on."

Rashad moved to the stone fence on his knees and gradually began to pull himself up.

"Hey, Marine!"

The rifle shot sang off the rim of stone and ricocheted into the desert. Rashad was on the ground again. He looked up at the top of the fence and a t the sky.

"Hey, my man! . . . We not mad at you! We want to talk!"

Rashad was waving something white, a handkerchief. Standing in the open gate now, testing him.

Or testing himself.

Davis put the front sight of the Mauser on Rashad's chest.

Now the skinny one with the hair was coming out, starting up the drive with Rashad, both o f them holding their hands out from their sides.

"No guns!" Rashad called.

Shoot them. It was in Davis' mind.

The third one appeared then, Valenzuela, standing up behind the stone fence that was waist-high on him. Valenzuela held his arms out.

Davis moved the rifle sight to the left a few inches, held in on Valenzuela, then moved it bac k to the two figures coming up the drive.

"Come on out and talk," Rashad said. He began to angle across the coarse grass toward the house , still holding the white handkerchief. The one wit h the hair continued up the drive, looking toward th e house, the three of them becoming more spread ou t as they approached. Maybe armed, but not wit h Uzis. Not Rashad or the one with the hair. Mayb e pulling something, but not, apparently, coming t o shoot.

Rashad said, "How's Mr. Rosen?" He waited.

"If you ain't gonna talk, my man, how we gonna have a talk?"

Valenzuela was still moving along the fence. The one with the hair was approaching the rear of th e black Mercedes, still looking toward the house.

Davis glanced over his shoulder. "Tali! Come here!" He looked at Rosen and saw his eyes ope n with a startled expression, the glassiness gone.

"What is it?" Rosen said. His eyes began to roll back again.

Rashad, in front of the house now, thirty meters away, said, "Hey, David, we got nothing agains t you, man. We got no reason to hurt you."

Tali, coming into the front room, said, "What? Is he all right?" Looking at Rosen, then seeing Davi s at the window with the rifle.

"Watch the one in the driveway," Davis said.

"Take the shotgun." The Kreighoff was next to him, leaning against the sill. "Can you shoot it?"

"I think so."

He watched her as she pushed a window open and raised the Kreighoff, extending it through th e opening.

"Who's that," Rashad said, "Mr. Rosen? No, hey, that ain't Mr. Rosen, is it? Where's he at?"

"Get down," Davis said to Tali.

"Look," Rashad said then, "we got nothing against you or her either. The two of you can get i n the car, man, and leave. But if you stay here . . . s hit, you gonna die. You know that. For what?

Some money? How much he paying you?"

Valenzuela had stopped. Now he was moving along the fence again, almost even with the patio.

Fifty meters to Valenzuela.

Thirty to Rashad.

"David!" Tali's voice. "He's behind the car!"

Davis swung the Mauser. He could see the one with the hair through the side windows of the Mercedes. She should have fired and kept him back, but it was expecting too much. It would have happene d too quickly for her.

Davis aimed at the rear-door window and fired and saw the window and the window on the othe r side fragment in a web of lines, drilled cleanly b y the high-velocity 30-06, the figure back there suddenly gone. Rashad was running. Davis swung the Mauser on him, then went down as the window s exploded with the hard clatter of Valenzuela's weapon and pressed against the wall below the sill , seeing Tali on the floor with the shotgun, embracing it, holding on tight, her eyes squeezed closed.

The sound stopped.

Davis rose up. He saw Rashad running for the gate. He saw Valenzuela behind the fence with th e Uzi. He fired at Valenzuela, squeezing off tw o rounds, seeing him drop behind the fence, swun g the Mauser and tried to nail Rashad with the tw o rounds he had left, but not in time. Rashad wa s through the gate. There was no sign of the thir d one. He had run off into the scrub, beyond the car.

"I took a pretty good look," Valenzuela said. "I d idn't see the hole we're supposed to drive a ca r through in the wall. In fact, I didn't hear any explosion at all."

"I changed my mind," Teddy said. "I think when I saw the rifle sticking out the window, fucking elephant gun. I started picturing what this guy must look like in his uniform with the ribbons an d medals and I figured one of them said 'expert.' No t somebody throwing wild shots, expert. Fuckin g Marines, they got all that shit on them, all th e medals. But wait." Teddy had a cigarette in hi s hand and paused before lighting it, looking fro m Valenzuela to Rashad. "Did I come back emptyhanded? You bet I did."

"What'd you do with it?" Valenzuela said.

"I stuck a wad under the left rear fender. The wire goes out into the bushes over there."

"What's that do for us?" Valenzuela said.

"Blow the car. Show 'em they're not going anywhere."

"Or wait and see if they try and use the car,"

Rashad said. "Thinking they can sneak out across the desert after it gets dark. Man, if we gonna b e here that long--and I don't see why we won't."

It was a good possibility. Teddy left in the gray Mercedes--parked down the wadi from the ston e fence--to run into Eilat and get some supplies , some food and something to drink, like ice-col d beer. They'd never felt the sun press so hot. Go t them cornered, Rashad said, and we the ones dyin g of thirst.

He said to Valenzuela, after Teddy had left, "They can stay in there a week, but we can't sta y out here. We can cut the electric wire, it wouldn't hurt them none. We can mess up their water pump , they probably got something else to drink. You understand what I'm saying?"

"We got to get to the Marine," Valenzuela said.

"Christ, I know that."

"Yeah, but with something he can see," Rashad said. "We tell him we don't want to kill him. Wha t does he think about that? It's not something he ca n see and say yeah, I want that. It's only driving awa y from here, having in his head he left Rosen. Yo u understand? But we offer him something good--h ey, look at this--then he's got something else i n his head when he drives off. Or when he thinks he's gonna drive off."

"Offer him money," Valenzuela said. "What else?"

"No, that's it, money. But how much we got?

You gonna write him a check? But see, we offer him a whole pile of money, then his head start s working and he can give himself excuses for leaving, like, we gonna get Rosen anyway . . . he can't stay with Rosen the rest of his life . . . he's not responsible for the man. Things like that. He can take something from us and say why not, the man's gonna die anyway."

"Where's the pile of money?" Valenzuela said.

"I believe the lawyer's got it," Rashad said.

"How big a pile, I don't know, but the Arab kid said he had money, my buddy. See, after the mone y was supposed to've been delivered the lawyer's stil l here. Least he was yesterday. So I don't believe h e delivered it. I believe the lawyer's still got Rosen's money, waiting for Rosen to come get it."

"We don't know that," Valenzuela said.

"No, but there's a way we can find out," Rashad said. "How long's it take to drive to Tel Aviv, fou r hours?"

Valenzuela pulled the highway map out of his coat pocket and, sitting with his back to the ston e fence, opened it to the mileage chart.

"Three hundred and forty-two kilometers."

Valenzuela began to nod, estimating time and distance. "Yeah, you could be back here in eight, nine hours. It's an idea. Maybe bring Mel wit h you."

"I was thinking that," Rashad said. "Use him to talk, so we won't be exposing our bodies. Standin g out there, man, playing the friendly nigger, tha t ain't my style."

Holding the Mauser on the stone fence fifty yards away, knowing they were there, behind the fence o r maybe in the shade of some scrub, he imagine d telling Master Sergeant T. C. Cox about it.

"See, they came up the drive with their hands held out from their sides, showing they were unarmed. The other one was over behind the wall."

T. C. Cox: The ones trying to kill you.

Davis: Yeah, trying to kill this Rosen.

T. C. Cox: Trying to kill you too, as I understand it.

Davis: Well, at this point it looked like they wanted to talk.

T. C. Cox: What was there to talk about? They wanted to kill you.

Davis: See, the girl was covering the one with the hair, but he got behind the car.

T. C. Cox: He got behind the car. What'd you let him do that for?

Davis: Well, the girl was watching him.

T. C. Cox: I thought you watched the both of them come up the drive.

Davis: I did.

T. C. Cox: Then why didn't you kill them?

Davis didn't hear himself say anything.

T. C. Cox: What were you waiting for?

Davis: All that sitting around the embassy like a bank guard . . .

T. C. Cox: You had the chance. Why didn't you kill them?

It scared hell out of him. How fast you could forget how to react.

DURING THE AFTERNOON he changed Rosen's dressing. There was very little blood now, but the woun d bubbled and sucked air when he uncovered it an d put on another compress. He knew Rosen hear d the sound.

"I'm breathing out of both ends," Rosen said.

He rinsed his mouth with water and spit it in the pan Davis had placed next to him. There was a milk bottle for when he had to take a leak, but h e hadn't used it yet.

"I'm not supposed to drink, how about if I s moke?"

"Your lung's got enough trouble," Davis said.

"I won't inhale. No, it'd be a good time to quit.

You know how many times I've quit in the last year? That goddamn fire--you know, I starte d smoking again right after that. Pack and a half a day . . . hey . . . what's gonna happen?"

"I'm going out when it gets dark," Davis said.

"Get help? The police?"

"It'd take too long, a couple hours or more. I just want to look around. I've got some plastic in m y car, but not much wire and no way to fire it, unles s we hook it to a light switch. But that would be if w e were pretty desperate. Get them coming in. You r car's sitting out there. Tali says she left the key in it.

Maybe that's a way, if we can get you to the car.

Shoot out through the back. But I don't knows hit, there isn't any road back there. It's all rock s and gullies. The other thing, one of them was b y your car and he might've rigged it with a charge. I d on't know, but I better find out."

"Or tell them okay, you'll leave," Rosen said.

"Take Tali and get out of here. I appreciate it--listen, you don't know, but this doesn't have anything to do with you."

"You want them to shoot Tali?"

"That's what I'm talking about, if she stays here.

If you stay," Rosen said.

"You think we walk out there they won't shoot us? Alive, we're witnesses. Dead, we go in the sam e hole you do."

"We're gonna get out," Rosen said. "Right?"

Davis nodded.

"I mean what I said--I'm gonna give you something," Rosen said. "In fact you can name it. Anything I've got, you can have." Rosen was silent a moment. "Listen, if I die . . ."

"If you want to live, then live," Davis said.

"That's what you do. You don't think about anything else."

"It's funny the things you do think about."

Rosen smiled. "Dr. Morris comes home--holy shit, what happened to my house? I keep seeing his face.

Thinking about the expenses I'm gonna have, then it isn't so funny."

"You need a couple of windows in your car,"

Davis said.

"And the other one, the gray one--Christ, how about those guys using my car?--I imagine it's al l shot up." Rosen shook his head. "It's funny wha t you think about. It's funny I'm not more scared.

But I think, well, whatever happens--it's interesting because something like this, you can imagine, has never happened to me before. Like watching i t and not being in it. Is that how you look at it? I wa s thinking how it might be in combat. It's always th e other guy who's gonna get hit, isn't it? Well, okay , whatever happens. It's interesting . . . I know a gu y had a lung collapse on him. He said it hurt like a sonofabitch, something about the lining--I didn't understand that part--but he said they pumped i t back up. I guess I got some broken ribs, too. Well, I h ad that before in a car accident. Rear-end collision, I went into the fucking steering wheel. But they're all broken off, aren't they?"

"The wound's clean," Davis said. "We keep it clean, everything else can be fixed."

"I'm glad you know what you're doing," Rosen said. "You may not feel the same way, but I'm gla d you're here. As I told you once before--Christ, jus t last night, it seems like a week ago--you'll make it.

You've got a nice natural style."

"How do you spell it?" Mel said to the girl sitting next to him at the Pal Hotel bar. She was fairl y good-looking--dark skin, rosy makeup, and blac k black hair. Mel figured she would have a very heav y black bush. He liked that.

When she had spelled her name for him he said, "That's Guela. Ga-way-la."

"No, no," the girl said. "Geh-oo-lah. Say it."

"Gay-woo-la," Mel said. "That's Jewish, huh?"

"Yes, Hebrew."

"I never heard it before. Isaac?"

Itzak, the barman, came over. "Yes, please, Mr.

Bondy."

"Same way. Campari and soda. Give her one."

The girl smiled and thanked him and moved a little closer, hanging her hip off the stool to touc h his thigh.

"Save it," Mel said. "I'm buying a drink. We haven't agreed I'm buying anything else. Ho w much?"

"Four hundred lira." Quietly, close to him.

"Your ass."

"Yes?"

"That means you're high. It's too much."

"Too much? The same as fifty dollar."

"The same as fifty dollar is three hundred lira,"

Mel said. "Today's rate of exchange at the Bank of Israel, determined by the devaluation of th e common-market dollar discount. And if you believe that, we can go upstairs and fall in love."

"All right," the girl said. "Three hundred lira."

"How many times?"

"How many times? One time. How many times you good to do it for?"

That's how it happened that Rashad found Mel with his white ass up in the air, his face buried in a pillow, and Guelah doing her routine, moaning an d gasping with her eyes open.

Rashad pressed the barrel of the Beretta into Mel's left buttock and said, "Now, if you can kee p going, my man, that's savoir faire."

Rosen said to Tali, who was sitting close to him in the darkness, "I'm gonna tell you something I neve r told anybody before."

"Yes?"

"I'm part Jewish." He waited.

Tali said again, "Yes?"

"Well, are you surprised?"

"I always think you are a Jew," Tali said. "What does it mean part? Part of what?"

"You thought I was? Why?"

"I don't know." Tali shrugged. "I always think it. Your appearance . . ."

"Come on."

"Your name . . ."

"My name, I made up the name. You know who I really am? Baptized? James C. Ross. Jimmy Ross.

But most people, even my wife, called me Ross."

"It's a nice name, Ross. It's not Hebrew?"

"I don't know, I guess some people named Ross are Jewish, but I didn't know that, because m y mother was Irish, her name was Connelly, and sh e was always talking about the Irish, like there wa s something special about them, a gift, or talkin g about her people coming from Cork. So I though t Ross was Irish almost all my life. Then when m y dad died--I was nineteen, I came home from th e service for the funeral--I found out our name originally was Rosen. My dad's grandfather changed it when he came over from England. But see, nobod y on my dad's side ever practiced the Jewish faith, s o I didn't know anything about it till I came here.

And you know what? It's interesting. I don't buy all the kosher business, Christ, the diet laws. Wha t does Almighty God care if you eat butter wit h steak? He's got enough to think about, all the fuckups in the world. But the history and all, it's interesting."

"My name, Atalia, is from the history time."

"Is that right? I thought it meant from Italy."

"No, it's from very far back, but I don't read about it in a long time."

"See, you're the new breed," Rosen said. "You can't be bothered with religion, all the ceremony."

"We have our meal together, the family, on Friday evening," Tali said. "I still want you to meet my mother sometime."

"What do I want to meet your mother for? She fool around?"

"No, of course not."

"What do you mean, of course not. You probably don't even know her. You ever talk to her about what she feels and thinks, what you feel? Kid s don't know their parents. They grow up and star t thinking about them as real people after they'r e dead. People waste time, years, playing games wit h each other--who am I?--and never get to kno w anybody."

"Is this true?" Tali said.

"Yes, it's true," Rosen said. "I think I'm getting close to something, a truth about how to live lif e and not waste it or mess up. I'll get it clear in m y mind and tell you about it."

"I would like to hear that," Tali said. "Learn what to do with my life before I get old."

"It's simple," Rosen said. "It's not easy, but it's simple."

When Tali rose and moved away he could hear the Marine talking to her. Then the Marine cam e over--feeling his steps on the floor--and crouche d down next to him. He could see the Marine's fac e in the light from the window as the Marine stare d outside. Looking down at him, the Marine's features vanished in the dark.

"You want to know something?"

"What?" the Marine said.

"I never told anybody this before and you may not believe it, but I'm part Jewish."

"Yeah?"

The Marine didn't seem impressed.

"I don't mean I'm a convert. I mean I was born part Jewish, on my father's side."

"Is that right?"

"You don't believe me."

"I never thought you weren't Jewish," the Marine said. "Listen, I'm going out again. I looked around back, there's nobody there, like they don't think we'd try to leave that way. I don't know if i t does us any good, I've got to see if we might us e your car first. Or see if I can catch them asleep o r looking the other way. I don't think they're muc h for watch-standing. You hang in there and we'll ge t this thing done soon as we can."

"Why'd you think I was Jewish?" Rosen said.

It was not the same darkness as Indochina. The sky seemed wider and closer here because of the desert.

The shadows seemed different, or there were fewer shadows because there was less vegetation. He would have to get used to the shadows. Then h e hoped he wouldn't be here long enough to learn a new set of shadows.

Going out of the doctor's house was not the same as going out of a helicopter after sitting wit h his eyes closed during the fifteen-or twenty-minut e flight, opening his eyes and going out blackface d with a recon patrol. It was different. But he was no t afraid of being alone in dark places. The differenc e here was that he knew what the enemy looked like.

They had faces. And they knew what he looked like and could be expecting him, even dressed in Dr.

Morris' black coat sweater and dark gray trousers.

He had taken his cap off for the first time in two days.

It was three-twenty a. M. when he left the house.

He moved around back, past the dry stock tank that might have been used at one time for goats o r sheep. Or maybe the doctor had kept horses. Th e blades at the top of the windmill structure stoo d motionless. The desert was empty, its shadows motionless. People were close, but there were no sounds and nothing moved. He had said to Tali , "Don't shoot me when I go by a window or when I c ome back."

From the side of the house he moved into the carport, working his way along between the tarpcovered Camaro and the cement wall. He thought about going under the tarp to get the C4 on th e back seat. But what would he do with it if h e couldn't run out a line and explode it? Shooting th e plastic with a bullet wouldn't set it off. It took a n electrical charge. Or what would he do if he got under the tarp and they knew he was there? They'd wrap him up in it. So leave the C4.

The black Mercedes was down the drive about twenty meters, almost halfway to the gate in th e stone fence. (He remembered Tali stopping ther e when they arrived, wondering why she hadn't driven up to the house. But then he remembered sh e had seen Rosen coming from the patio and ha d stopped abruptly and jumped out to run to mee t him.) From the carport he studied the black Mercedes gleaming in the darkness, about forty thousand dollars' worth of car in Israel. Rosen had a pretty good life. It wouldn't be hard to get to th e car. Davis slipped his hand into the unbuttoned to p of the coat sweater and drew his Colt.

On his belly now, using elbows and knees, he moved from the carport to the front bumper of th e Mercedes. He listened. He rolled to his back an d inched under the car, using his heels now, movin g close to the wheels on one side because the spine o f the driveway was high between the wheel ruts. Hi s hand moved over the underbody and frame. He didn't think he would find anything. The one wit h the hair hadn't had time to get underneath. The gu y hadn't opened a door, Davis was pretty sure of that.

He pulled himself out on the desert side of the Mercedes, remained low, and felt along the rocker panel to the rear-wheel housing, feeling inside th e fender above the left rear wheel and there it was, a hunk of plastic with the wire coming down an d trailing out to the side. The guy hadn't tried to hid e the wire; he hadn't had time. The wire was wedge d beneath the tire and led off across the gravel to th e edge of the property, where the detonator woul d be. Or else the wire made a turn there, around th e base of a tree, and continued down toward th e front of the property, to the stone fence. That wa s more likely, so the guy would be there with his buddies and not have to sit off in the scrub. They'd be nervous and want to be together. They were from a city. They'd sit out here in the bush and see thing s and have to be cool in front of one another.

They were somewhere behind the stone fence.

Davis had to assume that. The fence was protection. They weren't spread out the way they shoul d be--the way he would have positioned them--s o they were back there. He hoped they were close behind the fence, near the gate. If they were, there was a good chance of finishing it.

He holstered the Colt, then pried the C4 from beneath the curve of the wheel housing and pulle d out the blasting cap attached to the wire. Bellydown again, with the end of the wire in one hand and the hunk of plastic in the other, he began inching along the driveway toward the stone fence. He hoped there was enough wire. He wouldn't have t o go all the way. . . .

Get close enough. Stick the cap in the plastic again and throw it against the stone fence.

They might hear it, they might not.

He'd be moving then, back to the Mercedes.

Reach in and turn the key.

They'd hear the engine start.

The one with the hair would run to his detonator.

The other two would come to the stone fence.

Davis got to within ten meters of the fence. He waited, listening, pulled the wire toward him , slowly, bringing it across the gravel and coars e grass, then planted the blasting cap in the ball o f plastic. Rising to his knees, he again drew the Col t out of the sweater. He threw the ball of plastic underhand and watched it arc toward the fence. It disappeared in darkness against the stones.

He was moving back toward the Mercedes when he heard the sound, a faraway groaning sound---a car laboring in low gear--coming from somewher e in the desert. He looked back. Beyond the fence an d past a stand of trees, a beam of light was reflectin g off the rocks.

ALL THAT TIME being Jimmy Ross had been a long time. It seemed longer than the twenty-five years o r more he was just Ross. He had been Rosen hardl y any time at all.

Growing up, it was a matter of always looking into the future for something, always hoping o r planning for something, never knowing when yo u would get there and not knowing it when you did.

Jimmy Ross to Ross to Rosen. He wondered what the real Al Rosen was doing, if he was still i n Cleveland.

All right, this Rosen was here. He had finally made it. It had taken him fifty years to learn tha t being was the important thing. Not being something. Just being. Looking around you and knowing you were being, not preparing for anything.

That was a long time to learn something. He should have known about it when he was seven, but nobody had told him. The only thing they'd told him was that he had to be some thing. See, if he'd know n it then, he'd have had all that time to enjoy being.

Except it doesn't have anything to do with time, he thought. Being is an hour or a minute or even a moment. Being is being, no matter where you are. In a house in the Sinai desert at night. But if you have t o be somewhere, why not be somewhere good?

Sitting by the pool at the Laromme. In another few weeks it would be too hot, unbearable, in Eilat.

Netanya, on the Mediterranean.

Or go over to one of the Greek islands. See if there was a difference between Hydra tourist ladie s and Mykonos tourist ladies.

No, he had done that, the tourist-lady comparing. Do something else.

Or don't do anything. Sit. You don't have to do anything, he told himself. You don't have to prov e anything.

"Avoid running at all times. And never look back. Something might be gaining on you." Rule s for success and happiness courtesy of Satchel Paige , who had missed playing with the Original Al Rose n by a couple of years.

Make sense?

Yes, of course. Tali said that. Yes, of course. Tali was nice and it would be nice to tell her things an d watch her nod seriously and then laugh when sh e saw he was kidding. But that was planning and h e wasn't going to plan. He was going to do nothing.

He began to think that it would be better to do nothing in the sunlight than in the dark. Thinkin g was doing something. He wished he could sto p thinking. He wished it wasn't dark. He wished h e wasn't nailed to the floor and could move. He wished he could swallow some water. He wished h e wasn't cold. He wished he didn't feel as if he wer e drowning. He wished he hadn't talked to the government lawyers. No, he thought then, you had to have done all that to be where you are and kno w what you know. Unless he could have learned th e same thing serving a one-to-five at Lewisburg fo r conspiring to defraud the United States Government. With time off for good behavior. Yes, he was pretty sure he could have learned it at Lewisburg.

The point being that learning required a change of attitude and sometimes, usually, pain. He kne w that but wasn't sure how he knew it. He wondere d if it would do any good if he called out for hi s mother. Shit, Rosen thought. Just when he was getting there.

(TWO THINGS WERE HAPPENING at the same time.)

The wheels of the gray Mercedes, Mati driving, had skidded off the wadi trail into deep sand. Th e left rear wheel was spinning as Mati gunned it an d as Rashad and Valenzuela grunted, trying to pus h the car out with their hands. Valenzuela was askin g Rashad why he had let the Arab kid drive, fo r Christ's sake, and Rashad said because he was a driver, it's what he did, and had driven fine all th e way from Tel Aviv. Then Valenzuela blew up, realizing Mel was sitting on his fat ass in the front seat with Mati while he and Rashad were doing th e work. He yelled at Mel to get his ass out here, the n said to Mati okay, hold it, turn it off for a minute.

They were down the wadi trail a short distance.

Around the next bend and past the stand of trees was the stone fence. Valenzuela looked up to se e Teddy, his submachine gun slung over his shoulder , standing in the low headlight beams.

(The other thing that was happening, in the yard of the desert house, was that Davis was reachin g into the black Mercedes to turn on the ignition.) Valenzuela said, "Hey, would you like to come help us?"

"I thought I heard something," Teddy said.

They all heard it then: the sound of a car engine starting.

Teddy turned and was gone.

Valenzuela had to stop and look around for his Uzi lying on the ground and pick it up. And Rasha d hesitated a moment, looking at Mel standing ther e and thinking about Mel's attache case in the bac k seat of the car. So the two of them started off wel l behind Teddy.

They got to the bend in the road and saw Teddy reach the gate and cut left, over into the scrub wher e he had hidden his detonator box. They saw th e black car up in the yard and could hear the engin e rumbling and in that moment Rashad saw something else, a figure, something, moving across the yard toward the patio. He paused to pull his Berett a and began firing as Valenzuela saw the movemen t and opened up with the Uzi, spraying bursts at th e front of the house. The pause saved their lives.

Teddy, looking at the black Mercedes, turned the switch on his detonator box.

A twelve-foot section of the stone fence exploded in a black shower of sand and smoke and rock fragments.

Valenzuela was hit by bits of rock and took Rashad with him over the edge of the cutbank int o the wadi. They tried to cover their heads as th e hard fragments pelted down on them.

Rashad was up first. He found Teddy in the bushes with blood coming out of his dusty hair , streaming down his face, still holding the detonato r box. Now Valenzuela was partway out of the wadi , firing over the bank at the front of the house, raking the windows until the clip was empty.

Rashad said to Teddy, "Say you the explosives expert, huh? Say shit."

Davis waited on the patio until the machine-gun fire stopped. He rose by the tipped-over couch an d reached into the darkness of the room.

"Tali, hand me the rifle." She sat looking down at Rosen and began to turn only when he said , "Come on, give me it!" and reached for the Mause r leaning against the front windowsill.

Handing it to him, she said, "David--"

"Stick the shotgun out and keep watching. I'm gonna try and scare something up, see if we got an y of them."

"David--" Her voice low, subdued.

But he was gone, across the patio and moving in a low crouch into the desert, still hearing her voice , the sound of it--no excited questions about th e explosion--and then she was gone from his min d as he reached patches of scrub growth and made hi s way down to the stone fence, to the place where i t ended and wire strung between posts continued ou t into the desert.

He went over the wall crouched, looking down the length of wedged, fitted stones to the rubble o f broken stones he could see as an outline, a moun d in the darkness. There were shapes he did not wai t to study, something moving. Davis opened fire , squeezing off five solid rounds, hearing them sin g off the rocks, and went over the wall into the yar d and crouched low again as he reloaded the Mauser.

He waited, but there were no sounds, only what was left of a ringing sensation close to his head. He waited a quarter of an hour for some sign fro m them, but heard nothing.

Davis returned to the house the way he had come, crossed the cement patio, and stepped ove r the sofa barricading the doorway.

Tali rose from the corner, coming to him out of deep shadow.

"I try to tell you about Mr. Rosen," Tali said.

Davis looked down, seeing only Rosen's legs in the faint light from the window.

"How is he?"

"He died," Tali said.

MAYBE THEY'D USED TO WAIL and pull their hair. The Marine thought of that. The girl was making herself feel responsible, punishing herself, not crying much but making sounds as though she were i n pain. It wasn't a reasonable laying of blame, it wa s more like a rite: working herself up to feel guilt an d anguish.

The Marine held her and stroked her gently, feeling a little self-conscious, staring out the window and across the yard to the stone line, the boundary.

Finally he sat her on the floor by the window and looked at Rosen, his hands one over the other holding the clean compress bandage. He felt Rosen's throat for a pulse, then closed his eyelids, listening t o the girl string if s together: if she had realized . . . if she had gone to the police instead of the hotel . . . i f she had been alert and not led them here . . . Th e Marine was patient for a while; he gave her time. He sat with her and put his arm around her, bringing he r close to him, as he would comfort a child, occasion--a lly making his own sounds--"I'm sorry . . . I kno w how you feel, but . . . no, don't say that . . ."--tryin g to ease her sounds of pain. She would say things t o him in Hebrew in the mournful tone and it woul d sound even more ceremonial to him, from a tim e thousands of years ago when a man had died in th e desert and the women huddled by a fire. He tried t o think of things to say to her that would help. He r eyes were closed, squeezed closed. He wondere d how long she would keep it up, if she would sto p abruptly or just wind down from exhaustion and fal l asleep. He didn't know what to say that would hel p or what to do other than hold her. She told him sh e wanted to die. She told him Mr. Rosen would b e alive if it weren't for her. She told him Mr. Rosen ha d trusted her and she had failed him and now sh e couldn't live with herself anymore.

He said to her, "He's dead. What you do to yourself doesn't change it."

She wasn't listening to him. She said, "He was going to be safe. Go to Sharm el Sheikh or Sant a Katarina and stay there and be safe with me to hel p him. He said to me, he called me to come and said , 'Atalia, I want you to have something.' He said i n his billfold was the key to the safe box of his bank.

He said he wanted me to have it, to sign his name the way he signed it, with the initials, and take ou t the money. I said, 'Why? It's your money.' He said , 'No, now it's yours.' I said, 'But why?' He didn't say anything more. I went away to look out th e windows--"

"Then he knew it," Davis said.

"I came back . . . I felt him, I breathe in his mouth . . ."

He took her face in his hand and raised it to look at him and waited until her eyes opened.

"He's dead," Davis said. "They killed him." Her eyes closed and she tried to turn her head. "Look a t me. They killed him."

"But it wouldn't have happen . . ."

"Look at me!"

Her eyes opened--her face close enough to see into her eyes and what she was feeling, the little gir l experiencing something beyond her imagination, i n a place she had never been before.

"They killed him," Davis said. "But they don't know it."

She was listening now, beginning to come back into the world. "We tell them?"

Davis shook his head. "No, we don't tell them."

"But if we say we want to take his body with us for burial, they would understand. Everyone respects that."

Davis' hand relaxed and brushed her cheek as he let it drop to her shoulder.

"I think if they knew he was dead they'd leave and wouldn't bother about us. Mr. Rosen said i t was like a business with them. They don't have personal feelings about it. If it's done, then they're no t gonna sit out there in the heat just to get at us. See , I don't think they care. I don't think they're afrai d of what would happen if we told on them. They'd already be gone."

"I don't understand," the girl said. "We don't do anything?"

"I don't want them to leave yet," Davis said.

"Why?"

"I'd like to talk to them again."

"But why?"

He was staring out the window at the first trace of morning, pale strips of light rising beyond th e desert and the sea and the Arabian mountains.

"I've got something to say to them," Davis said.

"Call to them to come out."

"I don't know yet how I want to say it," Davis said. "But I will."

Tali made coffee and sat with her cup, staring at Mr. Rosen, remembering him saying funny thing s to her. At times she would smile. She didn't bothe r the Marine now, who sat with his legs folded an d his back sloping, staring out the window at th e yard and at the opening in the stone fence that wa s wider now with part of it blown away. She let hi m be with himself.

Valenzuela's shoulder hurt where he had fallen on it going into the wadi. His head hurt, too, but not a s much as Teddy's. Teddy needed stitches. He ha d tied a patterned scarf around his head and with hi s hair and bodyshirt he looked like an art deco pirate.

Rashad was the only one who sat on the cutbank of the wash and seemed to enjoy the lukewarm bee r and dry-roasted peanuts they had for breakfast. He was very patient. He had let Valenzuela sleep an d wake up stiffly to see the morning before showin g Val and Teddy all the money in the alligator briefcase. Courtesy of Mel, the little lawyer, sitting over there inside the gray Mercedes that would be lik e an expensive oven pretty soon. Mel inside and hi s keeper, the Arab kid, sitting in the sand outside th e car, playing with the sand, picking up a handfu l and letting it sift through a fist like time runnin g out. Rashad liked the picture.

He said, "What's a little temporary discomfort when it's almost done? This is the number gonn a bring him out, a hundred and ninety-five." And h e tapped the alligator skin of the briefcase, doing a drum roll with his fingers. "Then, I assume, w e gonna cut it? Otherwise, I'll tell you I though t about it seriously, I'd never have brought it."

"We cut it," Valenzuela said. "Comes to what?

Sixty-something."

"Sixty-five each," Rashad said, "a day's wage."

He looked over at Teddy. "Make your head feel better?"

"You want to know something?" Teddy said.

"That fence blew, I got fucking stoned. With real stones, man." Yeah, he was feeling better, grinning , thinking sixty-five and five for the job was sevent y and he wouldn't have to blow anybody up for tw o years. He said to Valenzuela, "We don't have t o renegotiate, Val, I think this'll be fine."

"You like the picture?" Rashad said. "We use the man's car, now we using the man's bread to tak e the man out. It's like he's committing suicide, huh?

Killing himself with his own bread. Lawyer says to me, 'What money? I don't have no money.' Standing there bareass pleading no, I don't have no money, and the whore, she's like this on the bed , leaning on her elbow?"--Rashad placed his ope n palm against the side of his face--"and with th e other hand she's scratching her cooz, listening t o us, don't even know she's doing it."

"That lawyer," Teddy said, "I think he likes to go around naked. Time we went to see him he wa s bareass."

"Cuz of his beautiful body," Rashad said. "He like to show it to people. He saying, 'What money , man?' It's under the bed with his airplane ticket. He say, 'Oh, the comp'ny money.' He was taking tha t back to the comp'ny today."

Valenzuela wasn't joining in or smiling. He was thinking about the money, yes--sixty-five each , that was all right, he'd split with them and i t wouldn't matter to Harry, he'd get a kick out of it , using Rosen's money--but he was also thinkin g about the Marine.

"How much do we offer him?"

Rashad looked over. "All of it. The whole thing."

"He's gonna smell something," Valenzuela said.

"Sure he is, he's gonna smell money," Rashad said. "We let him look at it and feel it. There it is , sitting on the ground. Pick it up, man. Walk over t o your car and drive away."

"Why would we offer him that much?" Valenzuela said. "Don't we want any? I'm talking about what he's thinking."

"Tell him the truth, it's Rosen's money," Rashad said. "We not out anything. See, he knows ho w much there is. What Mel say, he delivered five o f the two hundred grand was sent here. So, we tel l him the truth. Here's the rest of it. It ain't ou r money, he can have it if he walks away. Enough t o retire on for life."

"What if he can't be bought?" Valenzuela said.

Rashad shook his head. "Who can't be bought?

Name somebody. Shit, we got enough here to buy the whole United States Marines."

"He's gonna see it," Valenzuela said. "It isn't, you know, realistic, handing him that much money."

"That's the whole idea," Rashad said. "Make his eyes big and fuck up his head. When we talkin g about that much--look, it's sitting right there--th e man knows he's taking a chance. See, it's got to b e enough to take a chance for."

"No." Valenzuela was shaking his head now.

"It's too much. There's a limit. You go over it and it isn't real or even possible anymore. Something i n his head right away'd say no, don't touch it."

"All right, then don't offer him the whole thing,"

Rashad said. "Offer him what?"

"Half," Valenzuela said. "A hundred grand. It's a big number, but it sounds real, you know? Also i t sounds like we're letting him in on something.

We've talked it over and decided to split with him, like we're partners. We're all in it together. You se e what I mean?"

"Yeah." Rashad was nodding. "I think maybe you're right. Like we're bringing him in. Uh-huh , so he can feel he's in it enough and can trust us, bu t not far enough he's helping to kill the man. Yeah , let his head work out that part of it."

"Gene--"

It was Mel's voice, Mel inside the gray Mercedes looking out at them.

"Hey, can I talk to you?"

"Probably has to go pee-pee," Rashad said.

"Two times we had to stop so he could go in the ditch."

"You want to use him, huh?" Valenzuela said.

"You want to walk up to the house?" Rashad said. "The Marine gets nervous--that's fine, m e and Teddy'll split the money. The lawyer can do i t fine. Tell the Marine whatever we want to say."

Valenzuela waved to Mel to come over. They watched him get out of the car squinting, moppin g his face with a handkerchief, adjusting the crotc h of his light blue trousers, very busy as he approached them.

Rashad said, "Hot enough for you?"

"Man, this is a vacation spot, huh? Eilat?"

"Down closer to the water," Rashad said.

"I know dis ain't de place." Mel was being one of the boys. He said, "You know, I'm supposed t o be on a TWA flight out of here--out of Tel Aviv, I m ean--at nine o'clock. But doesn't look like I'm gonna make it, does it? I gave up trying to se e Rosie. I decided stay out of it; it isn't any of m y business."

"You might see him anyway," Valenzuela said, "but the man we want you to talk to is the Marine."

Mel opened his hands to show his innocence.

"Look, I got nothing to do with this. What do you want to get me involved for?"

"He doesn't ever know nothing. One of those guys who doesn't know anything," Valenzuela said.

"Have I interfered with you in any way?" Mel said. "Have I given you any trouble? No, I've staye d out of it. You've got the money, okay, I can be ver y realistic about that. It's company funds. I gave th e money to Rosie and something happened to it. It's too bad, I tell the company, but it's their problem o r Rosie's. I mean I'm not out anything personally."

"He doesn't want to get involved," Valenzuela said.

"I'm not involved. You know that as well as I d o."

"He gonna tell the comp'ny we took it from him and the comp'ny tell the FBI or somebody," Rasha d said, playing with Mel.

"For what? What good's that do anybody?" Mel said, standing in the hot sun in the Sinai desert wit h two guys who killed people and didn't believe him.

"Look, the company gave it to me to give to Rosen.

Okay, as far as anybody knows, I gave it to him.

That's the only thing I tell. Otherwise, shit, they might think I kept the money and put it somewher e for a rainy day."

"Which was your original idea," Rashad said.

"Okay, you're gonna think what you want," Mel said. "But believe this, because it's true. There's n o way in the world I could finger you or testify agains t you. I mean even if I wanted to. Because there's n o way in the world a complaint could be filed agains t you in court. What court? Here? Who's the complaint? Not me. In the U. S.? No way. Where are the witnesses? The proof? It would be strictly hearsay , my word against yours. But you think I'd ever be irritated enough to make a statement? What do I get out of that? As I said, I'm not out anything personally and I've kept my nose out of it because it's none of my business. So what more can I say?"

Mel raised his hands in a helpless gesture, looking from Rashad to Valenzuela to Teddy Cass and back to Valenzuela.

"Gene . . . how can I help you?"

"You can quit talking," Valenzuela said.

"Clarence'll tell you what you're gonna do."

There had been a car down by the wadi. Davis was sure he had heard a car, and headlight beams reflected on the rocks. Probably the gray car. One of them had gone to get something, a case of Maccabee and three pizzas to go. One of them could've been sleeping by the wall. Or back somewhere.

One of them had triggered the detonator and that one could have also been by the wall. So he migh t have gotten one, maybe two of them. But h e couldn't count on it. There was no way to find ou t except go down there.

It was eight o'clock, a bright, still morning, the sky filled with glare, cloudless.

Tali, sitting by Rosen's body, looked up as the Marine rose from the window and walked away.

He came back unfolding a blanket and draped it over Rosen's body, beginning at his feet, bringing i t up, then stopping as he reached Rosen's hand s folded on his chest. He knelt down across from her.

She watched him turn Rosen's body, reach beneath him, and draw a billfold from the back pocket.

What he was doing gave her a terrible feeling.

She couldn't believe it, the Marine looking in Mr.

Rosen's wallet and bringing out money. When he tried to hand her the money she drew back and sai d "No!" surprised at the loudness of her voice.

"Take it. Five thousand dollars and a little more," Davis said. "Here's the key to his bank deposit box."

"I can't."

"You want to bury it with him? Would that make sense?"

"I can't take his money."

"He's giving it to you," Davis said. "You have to take it."

"But in the safe box he had very much money,"

Tali said. "And this, it's too much for me."

"He told me himself," Davis said, "you have to learn to accept money without your pride getting i n the way. He's giving it to you because he liked you , he loved you, so don't insult him and try an d change things when he's not here. Do whatever yo u want with the money. Buy clothes, take tapdancing lessons if you want. But take it and thank God you knew the man."

He handed her the money and the key, then pulled the blanket up over Rosen, covering his face.

"I didn't know him very long, but I think he taught me a few things." Davis paused, thought fo r a moment, and said, "The wake's over."

Tali was looking at the money, holding it in front of her. "Will you take some of it?"

She didn't get an answer.

The voice came to them from outside; it was the black one, Rashad, calling out, "Hey, Marine!

Here's somebody want to see you!"

"NO SHOOTING, MAN! Time's out!"

Rashad stood up at the wall, testing the Marine, giving him a moment.

"You hear? Man's lawyer wants to come out!

Have a talk with you!"

He dropped behind the smooth stones again and waited. There was no answer from the house. He didn't expect one. All he wanted to do was get th e Marine's attention. He didn't particularly care i f the Marine shot Mel thinking it was somebody else , except then they'd have to talk to the Marine som e other way, directly, and standing out there wasn't any fun. Now he crawled back to the thicket o f dusty trees before rising and moving around th e bend in the road to where they were waiting: Valenzuela and Teddy with their machine guns slung over their shoulders, the scared-looking lawyer with hi s resort outfit on standing between them, holding th e alligator case. Mati, the Arab-looking kid, wa s hunkered down over by the cutbank, watching.

Rashad waved for Mel to come on. "Okay, go on up there and give your speech. But stay in the yard.

You understand? He invites you in the house, you say, 'No thank you.' "

"I tell him and I come right back," Mel said.

"That's all."

"You show him the money," Valenzuela said, "and wait and hear what he says."

Mel nodded quickly. "Okay. And then I come right back."

"Open the briefcase, leave it in the yard," Valenzuela said.

"Right. Leave the case in the yard. I won't forget."

Rashad looked over at Mati. "The kid'll go with you, keep you comp'ny."

Teddy turned, unslinging his Uzi and waving the stubby barrel. Mati got up, wiping his hands on hi s pants, and came toward them. It didn't seem t o matter to him one way or the other.

They held back at the bend in the road, waiting, letting Mel and Mati continue on toward the opening in the stone fence.

"Might as well get everybody in the yard,"

Rashad said. "Do 'em all at one time."

"It's Mati," Tali said, surprised. "And Mr. Bandy?"

Davis watched them come through the gate and start up the drive, Mel carrying his expensive alligator case. The light blue lawyer and the skinny Yemenite in his fake leather jacket. They didn't g o together, wouldn't have anything to say to eac h other. They had both been pushed into this , brought here--the sound of the car last night, th e headlights reflecting in the darkness.

"Did they come here by themselves?" Tali was still speculating. There was no sign of the thre e gunmen.

But Davis wasn't going to get into a conversation about it. He said, "Take the shotgun. Watch the ca r and see if anybody tries to circle around the othe r side. If they do, shoot them. Don't tell me about it , shoot them."

Picking up the shotgun, she looked over at him.

His tone was quiet, but he was concentrating now, not wasting words, raising the Mauser and extending the barrel out the window.

"They don't want to come out," Davis said.

"They send Mel . . . no, there they are." He brought the Mauser to his shoulder but waited.

They were beyond the stone fence, near the gate and the section that had been blown apart. He could see little more of them than heads and shoulders and realized that the ground sloped away toward the wadi.

"I see them," Tali said.

He told her to concentrate on the one nearest the gate opening, the one with the long hair and a scar f or bandana covering his head. Mel and Mati, wh o was dragging behind, were coming over from th e drive now, crossing the grass toward the middle o f the yard.

Mel moved carefully, his gaze holding on the front windows. Mati's hands were in his pockets.

He seemed to have no purpose other than to watch what was going on.

"Sergeant, you in there?"

"Right here," Davis said.

"I can't see you. . . . Where's Rosen?"

"You want to come in?"

"No, I'm supposed to stay here. Is that Rosen--h ey, Rosie, is that you?"

"He's in the can," Davis said.

Mel thought that was funny. "Listen, you mind if I use it after? I've got kind of a nervous bladder. I d on't know what the fuck I'm doing here at all." He glanced over his shoulder, then looked back at th e windows. "I'm sure you understand this isn't m y idea. I'm supposed to be on a plane in half an hour."

"You're not coming in," Davis said, "what do you want?"

"I'm speaking for them, you understand. None of this is my idea."

Davis waited.

"They want to offer you something. A hundred thousand dollars."

The three gunmen were at the stone fence now, not more than a few yards separating them. He would have to squeeze and fire and snap the nex t two shots, though he would be sure of getting th e first one. Davis placed the front sight on Valenzuela, then raised his head to look at Mel again.

"You hear what I said? A hundred thousand. It's in here." Mel raised the attache case.

"For what?"

"If you leave. Get out of here."

"Alone?"

"You can take the girl."

"But leave Rosen, huh? Just a minute." Davis turned to look at Tali. She was staring at him an d seemed more tense than a few moments before.

"They don't know," Davis said to her.

"But if he's already dead? They'll come in to see him, won't they?"

Davis looked out at Mel.

"Rosen says he doesn't like the idea."

"Jesus--" Mel was shaking his head. "Look, tell him I'm sorry, but there's nothing I can do abou t this. You can stay here and see what happens or yo u can accept the hundred grand and leave. That's it."

"Mr. Rosen's money, huh?"

"What difference does it make?" Mel said. "You want to see it?" He went down to one knee, place d the attache case on the grass, snapped it open, an d turned the lid toward him to show Davis the ope n case. "Can you see it? That's a hundred grand , man."

"Where's the rest?" Davis said.

"What rest?"

"We started with two hundred thousand," Davis said. "You sent him five. Where's the rest?"

"Well, see, what they're doing, they're splitting it with you, giving you the bigger half. What do yo u say?"

Davis was silent. He watched some of the hundred-dollar bills blow out of the case as a win d stirred in from the desert. Mel said, "Jesus Christ--" a nd almost fell making a grab for them.

"All right? Come on, before it blows away."

Davis waited. He said then, "Tell them, they want to give me the whole thing, it's a deal."

"Christ, this is a hundred grand here!" Mel said.

"What do you want?"

"I just told you, I want it all," Davis said. "Or I s tay here and they sit out in the sun till the police o r an Israeli Army patrol comes along."

"I'll have to ask them," Mel said. He rose, turning, as more bills blew out of the briefcase, and yelled toward the fence, "He says he wants th e whole thing!" Mel waited. "What?"

Davis held the sight on Valenzuela. He watched him wave for Mel to come back.

Mel turned to the windows again. "I guess they want to talk it over." Mel stooped to close the briefc ase, but Valenzuela called something to him an d Mel straightened and walked off, glancing back a t the money blowing, swirling across the yard, the n motioned to Mati to come with him.

"Watch them," Davis said.

Tali glanced at him, saw him move to Mr.

Rosen's body and pull back the blanket. She looked out the window and then at the Marine again. He was lifting Mr. Rosen's hands now--the bent arm s rising stiffly with the hands--then drawing the Col t automatic from its holster and placing it on th e compress bandage covering Mr. Rosen's wound , making sure the safety was off. It shocked her an d made no sense.

"Why are you doing that?"

"Watch outside."

Davis took another compress from the pack of bandages on the floor, placed it over the automatic , and brought Rosen's hands down to cover the compress. The grip of the Colt, part of it, was all that showed.

"Please, what are you do ing?"

Davis glanced out the window, seeing the five of them at the opening in the fence. He picked up Dr.

Morris' heavy Enfield revolver from the floor and tried it in the shoulder holster. It rested too high beneath his left arm. He pulled the gun out and stuck it into the waist of his trousers.

He said to Tali then, "I've thought of what I w ant to tell them."

"Say, fine, he can have the whole thing," Rashad said. "What's the difference?"

"Watch them," Valenzuela said to Teddy. He motioned Rashad away from Mel and the Arablooking kid and they moved down the road toward the gray car.

"He won't believe it," Valenzuela said. "We're agreeing too quick. Why would we do it?"

"You want to sit here," Rashad said, "wait till tomorrow to make it look real? What's the difference? A hundred, a hundred ninety-five, if he smells something he'll smell it either way. No, I believ e what he's doing, he's putting it all on one roll. Go t nothing to lose. He knows we're playing with th e man's money. He sees a chance to take it all. But tel l me, how's he gonna get out with it? Man, we'r e standing there."

"He's pulling something," Valenzuela said.

"Pulling what? He hasn't had time to think about it. He's seeing how much he can get, that's all. He's got nothing to lose, we got nothing to los e giving it to him."

"Mel said there's no sign of Rosen."

"I agree with Teddy, the man's probably been hit," Rashad said. "But he's in there, isn't he? No place else he could be."

Valenzuela thought about it a little more. Finally he said, "All right. We'll say we'll give him the whole thing. The other half when he come s out."

Mel returned to the middle of the yard, Mati trailing.

"Sergeant!"

He stopped, looking around, and began picking up the bills that were scattered about the grass.

Davis waited, watching from the window. He saw Mati pick up several of the bills and slip one i n his pocket as he walked over to the lawyer with th e rest. Davis glanced at Tali. He was very tense no w and it was a moment of relief.

"You see that?"

"Mati takes care of himself," Tali said. "I hope nothing happens to him."

The lawyer was squinting, looking this way again.

"Sergeant? . . . They said okay. You can have the whole thing."

Just like that, Davis thought. They give away money.

"They said, you come out, get the briefcase here.

One of them will come over and give you the rest."

"Tell them I want to see all three of them," Davis said. "If I come out, I don't want anybody stayin g back there behind the wall. All three of them hav e to come out."

Mel shrugged. It didn't make any difference to him. He looked at Mati and said something an d Mati started back toward the fence. They had give n Mati something to do.

"You understand? All three of them," Davis said.

Mel was nodding. "He'll tell them."

"They give me the money and I'll give them Rosen." Davis waited, making sure the lawye r heard him. "I'll even bring him out."

Mel was alert again, studying the windows.

"You mean when you leave, they won't have to go in and get him?"

"I said I'll bring him out."

"Well--what does he have to say about that?"

"Nothing," Davis said.

Mel hesitated. "I don't quite understand."

"You don't have to. Go tell them."

"Just a minute," Mel said. He hurried back toward the stone fence.

Davis looked over at Tali. "You ready?"

The girl nodded, holding on tight to the shotgun resting on the window ledge.

"There are some other ways," Davis said, "but none that I like. Is it all right with you?"

The girl nodded again, afraid to speak.

"Then let's do it," Davis said.

He lowered the Mauser, resting it against the windowsill next to the girl, and walked over t o where Rosen's body lay on the floor.

They came with the lawyer and Mati walking in front of them: Valenzuela and Teddy carrying th e submachine guns at their sides; Rashad in the middle with a canvas athletic bag. The rest of the money would be in the bag, if Davis wanted to see it.

And a gun, Davis thought, watching them. He was holding Rosen in his arms, the body ben t enough to appear natural from a distance, the hea d stiffly erect against Davis' shoulder. He tried not t o look at Rosen's face. He stepped over the couc h blocking the doorway and crossed the patio to th e yard.

They saw him now. They were looking at him, the five of them coming across the grass from th e fence, Davis approaching them from the deser t house to meet where the money was. The five me n arrived first. Mati walked aside. The lawyer wa s more subtle. He began picking up hundred-dolla r bills as he moved away from them.

Valenzuela, at about thirty feet, said, "What's the matter with him?"

Davis didn't answer. He approached to within ten feet, almost to the open briefcase, before sinking to one knee and lowering Rosen's body to the ground. He remained there, looking up at them. He wished the two with the machine guns were standing together and not separated by Rashad. Their clothes were dusty and stained with sweat marks.

They were dark figures with the sun behind them.

The sun was all right, it didn't bother him. It outlined them cleanly. They had not taken their eyes off Rosen. Davis remained on one knee, his lef t hand resting on Rosen's hands.

"Well," Rashad said, "here we are." He was holding the canvas bag in front of him now, hi s hand inside the opening. Looking at Rosen's face , the closed eyes, he said, "What'd you bother for?"

In the moment before it happened, Davis could see it happening.

He said, "We bring out our dead."

He lifted Rosen's hands, drew the Colt .38 from beneath the compress bandage, and shot Rashad i n the chest as the man's hand was coming out of th e bag. Davis saw him punched sideways, but couldn't wait to see if he was going down.

He shot Valenzuela in the stomach and in the chest as the Uzi was pointing at him, the Uzi goin g up in the air as Valenzuela was socked hard an d Davis knew he was out of it.

Somebody was yelling something, the one with the scarf tied over his hair like a pirate.

He shot Teddy in the face as Teddy was crouching to fire and saw his arms go up with the Uzi, his chest exposed, and shot him again, in the chest.

He had to get to Rashad because he wasn't sure of Rashad, and by the time he put the Colt on him , shit, he was a moment too late, the Colt pointing a t a Beretta. The Beretta fired first and Davis felt i t this time--not like the time getting in the Medeva c with the blood pouring out of his leg--he felt th e bullet tear into his thigh, the same leg, three time s now, leg wounds, three times and out of it, home , as he held the Colt on Rashad with Rashad lookin g at it and shot him four times in the chest. There.

One round left in the Colt and he didn't need Dr.

Morris' revolver stuck in his pants. It was uncomfortable. He pulled it out and dropped it on the ground. He was aware of the silence. He looked a t Valenzuela and the other one, knowing they wer e dead, and shoved the Colt into the shoulder holste r and tried to stand up, then had to try again befor e he made it. His leg didn't hurt yet, it was a reaction , seeing the blood and afraid to touch the leg, afrai d it might shatter if he stood on it; but he was all righ t now, he was up. He was sweating a lot.

Mati came over to him first and tried to help him, offering to hold him up; but he was okay h e told Mati. He heard Mel's voice and heard Tali. Sh e was saying, "David . . ." coming out to them. It always surprised him when he heard her say hi s name.

Mel was picking up the rest of the loose bills, putting them in the briefcase. He took the canvas bag from Rashad, trying to do it without touching him.

Mel said, "Wow," reverently, then said it a few more times. "I don't believe it. Christ, I was standing right there--you know how long that took?

About eight seconds, no more than ten." He walked over toward Davis, looking down at Rosen.

"I'm very sorry about Rosie, but--well, what can you say, uh?" Now he was looking at Davis.

"Are you all right?"

"I will be."

Davis looked at Tali and smiled at her worried expression. He was stooped slightly, holding hi s thigh, pressing his hand against it. In a minute he'd go in the house and take a look and get it cleane d up. The bullet was still in his leg and he'd have t o go to the hospital in Eilat, but it didn't hurt at al l right now. He'd worry about the hospital later.

"When I say the company is gonna be most grateful to you, that's an understatement," Me l said. "And I know they won't question my givin g you this. In fact, we spoke before about gettin g these funds back home, which we can discuss agai n later on. Sergeant, with my deepest gratitude." He extended a pack of hundred-dollar bills to Davis.

"What's that?"

"Ten thousand dollars," Mel said. "You earned it."

Davis said, "All this, it's the money that was sent to Rosen, right?"

Tali stepped in. "You brought it to the hotel yourself. You saw it."

He said to Mel, "So it isn't company money anymore, is it?"

"Well, insofar as it's recovered money," Mel said.

"Recovered from what?" Davis said. "They took Rosen's money from you and gave it to me.

What I want to know is, how come you're offering me some of my own money?"

"Now wait a minute," Mel said. "All we're really talking about is a reward. And I mean ten big ones, not a few bucks."

Davis reached over and took the briefcase from him, brought his hand up bloody from the wound , and took the canvas bag.

"I don't think I need a reward," Davis said.

"Why don't I just settle for what's mine?"

Mel wasn't sure if he was serious and tried to smile. He said, "Hey, come on. You can't just wal k off with a hundred and ninety-five thousand dollars, for Christ sake."

"Why not?" Davis said.

It seemed that simple. Why not?

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