By Order of the President (Presidential Agent 1)

The president gestured toward the steward and asked with a raised eyebrow if Beiderman wanted anything. Beiderman shook his head. The president signaled to the steward that he should refill his and Hall’s glasses.

Beiderman looked between the president and Hall. The president touched his ear, which Beiderman understood to mean that he was supposed to listen to Hall’s end of the conversation.

He didn’t hear much.

“The secretary of defense just came in,” Hall was saying. “I’ll have to get back to you, Charley.”

He looked at Beiderman as he replaced the handset in its cradle.

The president smiled at Beiderman.

“What an unexpected pleasure, Mr. Secretary,” he said. “Actually, Matt and I were just talking about you.”

Secretary Beiderman was visibly not amused.

“All your righteous indignation should be directed at me,” the president said. “Everything that’s been done—or should have been done and wasn’t—was at my orders.”

Beiderman didn’t say anything.

“No comment?” the president asked.

“Mr. President, are you going to tell me what’s going on?”

“Two things of importance

,” the president said. “The first, and this comes from a source that so far has been right on the money, is that a group of Somalian terrorists stole the 727 in Angola to crash it into the Liberty Bell. The plane made a stop in Abéché, Chad, to change its markings and install fuel bladders and now—right now—is apparently en route from there to someplace unknown on its way to Philadelphia.”

“May I ask why I have not been informed, Mr. President? ” Beiderman asked, coldly.

“The second thing,” the president went on, ignoring the question, “is that the police commissioner of Philadelphia— who had to be told of the possibility—intends to inform the mayor of Philadelphia at four-fifteen tomorrow afternoon. The ramifications of that are obvious: It will be received by the public with a yawn as just another elevation of the terror threat color code—or with mass hysteria. Matt and I have been waiting for you so that we can set up a conference call between here and Natalie Cohen, so that we may chew the situation over between us and decide what we should do.”

“How reliable is your source?” Beiderman said. “The Liberty Bell? Jesus Christ, why the Liberty Bell?”

“That’s everyone’s reaction, frankly. We really don’t know why it’s a target. Matt was just on the telephone with Major Castillo, who is in Philadelphia, and who hopes to have an answer to that later tonight.”

“Who the hell is Major Castillo?” Beiderman blurted.

“The man I charged with finding out who among the intelligence community knew what about the missing airplane and when they knew it,” the president said. “He’s Matt’s executive assistant.”

“I don’t understand, Mr. President.”

“I know, and it’s my fault you don’t,” the president said. “I’m sure you may have a question or two . . .”

He chuckled.

“Am I missing something?” Beiderman snapped. “Is there something funny here that I’m missing?”

“It’s not funny at all,” the president said. “Levity, flippancy, is often the outward reaction of people who are terri fied.” He paused. “And I am, Fred.”

Beiderman looked at him intently for a moment.

“How reliable is your source, Mr. President? That someone intends to crash that airplane into the Liberty Bell?”

“On one hand, he apparently is not the kind of source in which the CIA, the FBI, the DIA, etcetera, etcetera, would place much credence, as they have chosen either (a) not to tap him for information or (b) to ignore him. He’s a Russian arms dealer. Perhaps the most infamous of that breed. A fellow named Aleksandr Pevsner . . .”

“I know that name,” Beiderman interrupted.

“So far, as I’ve said, what he’s given us has been right on the money.”