The Secret Servant

are now numbered. And when it falls, the entire Middle East will change overnight.”
    Strauss put the file back into his briefcase. “I’m not an expert on the Middle East, but something tells me you have miscalculated. Issue the fatwa, Sheikh Abdullah. Save Elizabeth Halton’s life. Do the decent thing. God will reward you.” He hesitated, then added: “And so will the president.”
    “Tell your president that America doesn’t negotiate with terrorists and we don’t negotiate with tyrants. Tell him to comply with the Sword’s demands or he’ll be standing at Andrews Air Force Base soon, watching a coffin coming off an airplane.”
    Strauss stood abruptly and looked down at the sheikh. “You’re making a grave mistake. You’re going to die in this prison.”
    “Perhaps,” the Egyptian said, “but you’ll die before me.”
    “I’m afraid my health is better than yours, Sheikh Abdullah.”
    “Yes, but you live in Washington and someday soon our brothers are going to turn it to ashes.” The sheikh turned his face toward the blackening sky. “Enjoy your flight home, Mr. Hamilton. And please give my regards to the president.”

35
     
    C OPENHAGEN : 1:15 P.M. , W EDNESDAY
     
    Y ou were right about the call coming from Germany,” said Adrian Carter.
    They were walking along a gravel footpath in the Tivoli gardens. Carter was wearing a woolen greatcoat and a fur ushanka hat from his days in Moscow. Gabriel wore denim and leather and was hovering dourly at Carter’s shoulder like a restless conscience.
    “NSA determined Ishaq was just outside Dortmund when he made his call, probably somewhere along the A1 autobahn. We are now working under the assumption that the kidnappers managed to get Elizabeth out of Britain and are moving her from hiding place to hiding place on the Continent.”
    “Did you tell the Germans?”
    “The president was on the phone with the German chancellor two minutes after NSA pinned down the location. Within an hour every police officer in the northwest corner was involved in the search. Obviously they didn’t find them. No Ishaq, no Elizabeth.”
    “Maybe we should consider ourselves fortunate,” Gabriel said. “If the wrong sort of policeman had stumbled upon them, we might have had a Fürstenfeldbruck on our hands.”
    “Why is that name familiar to me?”
    “It was the German airfield outside Munich where our athletes were taken in seventy-two. The terrorists thought they were going to board an airplane and be flown out of the country. It was a trap, of course. The Germans decided to stage a rescue attempt. We asked them if we could handle it, but they refused. They wanted to do it themselves. It was amateurish, to put it mildly.”
    “I remember,” Carter said distantly. “Within a few seconds, all your athletes were dead.”
    “Shamron was standing in the tower when it happened,” Gabriel said. “He saw the entire thing.”
    They sat down at a table in an outdoor café. Gabriel ordered coffee and apple cake, then watched as Sarah drifted slowly past. The ends of her scarf were tucked into her coat, a prearranged signal that meant she had detected no signs of Danish security.
    “Munich,” said Carter distantly. “All roads lead back to Munich, don’t they? Munich proved that terrorism could bring the civilized world to its knees. Munich proved that terrorism could work. Yasir Arafat’s fingerprints were all over Munich, but two years later he was standing before the General Assembly of the United Nations.” Carter made a sour face and sipped his coffee. “But Munich also proved that a ruthless, merciless, and determined campaign against the murderers could be effective. It took a while, but eventually you were able to put Black September out of business.” He looked at Gabriel. “Did you see the movie?”
    Gabriel shot Carter a withering look and shook his head slowly. “I see it every night in my head, Adrian. The real thing—not a fantasy version written by someone who questions the right of my country to exist.”
    “I didn’t mean to touch a nerve.” Carter stabbed at his cake without appetite. “But in a way it was easier then, wasn’t it? Eliminate the leaders, and the network dies. Now we are fighting an idea and ideas don’t die so easily. It’s rather like fighting cancer. You have to find the right dosage of medicine. Too little and the cancer grows. Too much and you kill the patient.”
    “You’re never going to be able to