The Last Monarch td-120

by Warren Murphy

  The soldier seemed surprised. "Is this true?" he asked.

  "Oh, there were other factors to be sure-" Aruch waved "-but this contributed to their victory." The PIO leader's face took on a faraway look. "Of course, they did not go far enough. Had I been there to guide them, the Americans could have fought a real war of terror. With my knowledge, London would now be the capital of the United States. I could have been a colossus in another era, straddling the globe. But thanks to an accident of birth, I am a man out of time."

  A morose expression on his face, Aruch turned away from the much younger man.

  The FPA chairman wore the plain olive drab fatigues that had become his sartorial trademark. They were so wrinkled it looked as if he balled them up and stuffed them under his mattress every night.

  A deep gray mustache scuttled from beneath his large nose, fading into a scruffy white beard.

  His eyes bordered on psychotic. They were so wide they gave the impression of a man who didn't blink. Dark irises floated in circular seas of white.

  A black-and-white-checked kaffiyeh adorned his head. To foreign observers, it seemed to get larger with each passing year. This was obviously a false impression. The fact was, Nossur Aruch had been shrinking for much of the past thirty years. By his calculations, if he lived longer than another decade, he would disappear into his black army boots.

  Many people thought that he was an uglier, hairier, dumpier version of Beatles drummer Ringo Starr. Not Nossur Aruch, however. When he looked at himself in a mirror, he saw a Palestinian matinee idol. Although, granted, a depressed matinee idol.

  Lost in thought, Aruch sighed deeply at the growing dusk. His forlorn exhalation of air seemed almost like a recrimination. Knotted hands rubbed the rough concrete of the balcony rail. Tangles of grapevines ensnared the railing. He stared off into the distant twilight.

  Less than thirty miles to the north of his secluded balcony sat Jerusalem, a fat target waiting to be struck. Yet it was out of reach.

  Actually, that was only true in the metaphorical sense. In point of fact, it was infinitely reachable. Nossur pushed away from the rail.

  Fatang stayed at silent attention just outside the French doors that led into the PIO leader's office. He watched as his superior squatted near the edge of the balcony's sturdy inner railing.

  In the early nineties, the Nobel committee had awarded the former terrorist its coveted Peace Prize.

  To Nossur Aruch, the million-dollar award had been found money. Splurging, he had blown it all on a single special item.

  A vast section at the center of the balcony seemed to be overgrown with vines. Aruch grabbed hold of a chunk of what appeared to be branches, tugging them aside. They folded with a plastic-sounding crinkle, exposing a heavy black base hidden beneath.

  Aruch pulled back farther, exposing a single white fin.

  The young soldier wasn't surprised by what he saw. Often on nights like these, Aruch's trips to his balcony would end in a maudlin moment like this. The ex-terrorist would pine over the road not traveled.

  The camouflage netting Aruch peeled back revealed the rocket boosters of a slender missile. Nossur had used the "mad money" granted him by the Nobel Committee to purchase a surplus British long-range Bloodhound MK2 missile.

  It was aimed at the heart of Jerusalem.

  Obscured by trees and vines, the balcony was set back in an alcove at the center of the private courtyard. The yard itself was surrounded by a high wall. The missile was well hidden from prying eyes.

  Aruch had bought the missile on the black market and had it smuggled into the West Bank piece by piece.

  An impotent gesture. For, although Nossur Aruch loved terrorism almost more than life itself, he would never use his weapon. He had employed terror tactics in his younger life, but he was a diplomat now. And diplomats did not drop bombs on the heads of their enemies. No matter how strong the desire to do so.

  Tears welled in the corners of his crinkling eyes as he studied the magnificent lines of his beautiful prize.

  It was a giant paperweight. Nothing more.

  He drew in a mucousy sniffle as he pulled the camouflage back across the missile's exposed tail section.

  As he headed across the balcony to the open French doors, Nossur blew his big nose on the sleeve of his fatigues. A honking, wet bray. By the look of the splotches up and down the arm, it wasn't the first time.

  Fatang marched in behind him.

  The leader of the Palestine Independence Organization stepped over to his cluttered desk. The weight of the world on his drooping shoulders, he slumped into his chair.

  Although the desk was a jumble of half-crumpled papers, Nossur knew where everything was. He spotted an unfamiliar sheet atop the pile the moment his gaze fell upon the desk.

  He scooped up the note.

  "What is this?" the PIO leader asked.

  "It came while you were napping," the soldier said from his sentry post near the open balcony doors. Sounds from the deepening Hebron night filtered in across the dark yard.

  Aruch frowned as he quickly scanned the paper. He groaned before he'd even finished.

  "Yahrak Kiddisak man rabba-k," he cursed softly.

  "Is something wrong, sir?" Fatang asked. Aruch glared up at the young man, a sour expression on his face.

  "Things could not be better," he spit sarcastically. He crushed the paper in his hand, dropping it to the clutter on his desk. "I am to meet with the American secretary of the interior tomorrow morning."

  "The Americans?" the guard asked. He seemed disgusted at the very prospect.

  "Not the Americans. An American. The fool contacted me several weeks ago. He said something about a secret mission that only I would appreciate. The man is irredeemably stupid. He is what is called an environmental activist."

  "Ah, I have heard of these." The soldier nodded. "Is it not their desire to have men live in caves like beasts?"

  "That is true," Anuch said. "And I am told this Bryce Babcock is one of the worst. In settling their West many years ago, the Americans slaughtered every last wolf in an area known as Yellowstone Park. Babcock actually had wolves flown in from Canada and set them loose in the preserve. This is a spot where families vacation, mind you, Fatang." The young soldier was incredulous.

  "Were the people not outraged?" he asked, stunned.

  "Americans are apathetic," Aruch explained with a wave of his hand. "As long as it is not their child that is mauled, they do not care."

  Fatang shook his head in disbelief. "Americans will forever remain a mystery to me, sir."

  Aruch nodded. "To me, as well. But I must deal with them, for such is the life of a diplomat." As he spoke the contemptuous word, he cast a longing eye beyond the soldier at the shadowy contours of his precious Bloodhound. His eyes grew watery as he studied the tangle of vines painted on the plastic sheet that concealed his balcony missile.

  The truth was, he didn't really care what Babcock had to say. The meeting was just another in a long line of pointless summits he had attended since renouncing the use of terror.

  "More of the same," he muttered, thinking of the following day's meeting with Bryce Babcock. "The fool mentioned something about ushering in a new era of peace. The Palestinian people are doubtless about to be asked to capitulate once more."

  Fatang smirked. "The Americans still believe that Muslim and Jew can live together in harmony." Aruch tore his eyes away from his beloved missile.

  "They can," he said softly. "As long as the Muslim stands above the ground and the Jew lies below it."

  The former terrorist rose to his feet. Shuffling wearily on his black boots, he headed out the office door.

  He didn't cast a backward glance at his cherished Nobel missile. The thought that it would never be launched against Jerusalem brought him far too much pain.

  Chapter 20

  The plane touched down at the airport that had been constructed on the mile-and-a-half-long sandy isthmus that separated the crown colony
of Gibraltar from the Spanish mainland.

  The complaints had started the instant the pilot announced that they were being rerouted. They had continued unabated throughout the flight and were still going strong even as the passenger jet taxied to a stop in the shadow of the great limestone mass that was the Rock of Gibraltar.

  Before the plane had stopped, Remo and Chiun rose from their seats. They waded through an ankledeep pile of unopened peanut packets on their way down the aisle. At the front, Remo's flight attendant was just opening the door when they arrived.

  "Oh, now you're up." She pouted as the ramp was rolled to the side of the plane. "I tried to wake you a bunch of times."

  "Peanuts make me sleepy," Remo explained.

  The woman's eyes widened. "You said they put you in the mood," she accused angrily.

  "Yes." Remo nodded. "The mood for sleeping. But if it's any consolation, I dreamed only of you."

  "Fat lot of good that did me," she snapped. She practically shoved him onto the ramp.

  The air outside was cooler than Remo expected. The airport extended out into the Bay of Gibraltar. A stiff wind blew in across the bay, causing the wisps of hair above the Master of Sinanju's ears to twirl madly around his bald scalp.

  "Smitty was gonna call," Remo said as he and Chiun descended the ramp.

  "I do not even see a telephone," the old Korean commented. The tarmac was deserted. A few buildings speckled the distance in the direction of the Rock.

  "Guess we walk till we find one." Remo shrugged.

  They struck off together toward the control tower. "He could have at least had a car waiting," Remo said as they strolled across the windswept field.

  "Add it to the list of insults heaped upon us by our current employer," Chiun replied. "A true monarch would have arranged for proper transportation."

  "A while back you were saying you liked working for Smith," Remo said.

  "Bite your tongue," Chiun retorted. "I merely said I work for Smith, not some temporary occupant of the Eagle Throne. The madman provides the stability of a paycheck. That is all. In spite of our association with the lunatic Smith, a true king is always preferable to any alternative."

  "Not for me, Little Father," Remo said. "I kind of think Smitty's okay."

  Chiun struck a bony fist against his own chest. "Go ahead, Remo," he insisted. "Stab the knife farther into your poor, poor father's heart."

  Remo was surprised to detect the shadowy flicker of a light undertone. Barely perceptible. He didn't have time to press it.

  He'd been aware of the great mechanical cry of a helicopter almost since they'd deplaned. The aircraft was sweeping toward Gibraltar from the harbor. Remo had assumed it was part of some routine British naval operation, until the helicopter slowed to a hover above their heads.

  "You order a chopper?" he asked the Master of Sinanju over the roaring wind of the downdraft. As displaced air swirled around them, the bluishgreen Westland Naval Lynx settled on three fat wheels to the tarmac before them. The main rotor didn't stop its chopping whir as the side door slid open.

  A British Royal Navy officer stuck his head out. "Gentlemen, I've been sent to collect you!" he shouted.

  Remo glanced at the Master of Sinanju. The old Korean's face was blandly curious.

  "I don't think so," Remo called back to the RN officer.

  The man shook his head firmly. "Your Aunt Mildred sent us," he yelled over the wind.

  Remo recognized it as one of Smith's code names.

  "He came through after all," Remo commented to Chiun. "This make him a true monarch?"

  "Not at all," the Master of Sinanju replied. "And in spite of that, he is still head and shoulders above any mere President." Hiking up his kimono skirts, he scurried inside the belly of the Lynx, slapping away the offered hand of the British officer.

  Remo climbed in behind him.

  The door slid shut. A moment later, the helicopter was pulling up into the sky, screaming a metallic protest.

  Nose dipping, it soared away from the airport, flying over the small isthmus and out across the brilliant blue waters of the Mediterranean Sea.

  "OUTBREAK OF PEACE." In death, Remo's Earthpeace contact had provided Harold W. Smith with the posthumous clue that had finally revealed the frightening power in the hands of the environmental group.

  Smith had ignored the enigmatic phrase for much of the past two days, but with the Radiant Grappler located and Remo and Chiun's plane rerouted to intercept it, he had finally found time to investigate its possible meaning.

  The time spent researching Earthpeace while the CIA was locating the missing boat had yielded much information.

  Earthpeace had been founded in the late 1960s by a group of Canadian environmentalists whose credo was confrontation. The group was active in its approach, whether it was blocking fishing boats, stopping Eskimos from hunting seals or blowing the whistle on companies for illegal ocean dumping.

  It seemed clear to Smith that, as a group, Earthpeace thrived on both confrontation and sympathetic media attention. That sympathy had reached its peak when, in 1985, French agents had sunk the first Radiant Grappler in the harbor at Auckland, New Zealand, while it was on its way to protest nuclear testing in French Polynesia.

  Earthpeace representatives screamed bloody murder, and as a result of this blessing in disguise, donations to the group had risen along with its public profile. The infusion of cash allowed them the opportunity to hire more high-profile spokesmen. One of these mouthpieces was none other than Bryce Edmund Babcock.

  At the time, Babcock was between positions. He had been governor of Arizona for a number of years, but had recently left office to pursue other career opportunities.

  Everyone knew that Babcock had an eye on the Oval Office. With his days as governor behind him, it was important for him to find a position that kept him in the public eye. Earthpeace came with its offer at just the right time. The joining together of the two-term governor and the environmental organization had been a perfect fit.

  Babcock was a firm believer in the rights of the state over those of the individual. If you had an endangered rat in your cornfield, you plowed somewhere else. If you had a slug living on the basement walls of your waterfront home, you vacated the premises to the invertebrate. If you had a slimy, mosquito-filled puddle in your backyard, it was an untouchable wetland.

  The former governor and presidential hopeful relished his Earthpeace power. When he shook an admonishing finger in the Northwest, hundreds of lumberjacks were thrown out of work. When he frowned in New England, generations of fishermen were forced to scuttle their boats along with their livelihoods. Men who tilled the soil or toiled at sea shuddered and swore when they heard his name.

  When the 1988 presidential race came along, there was no question that Bryce Babcock would throw his hat in the ring. The two years he'd put in at Earthpeace had been but a stepping-stone to the ultimate position of power to all environmentalists. The presidency of the United States.

  Bryce Babcock ran. Bryce Babcock lost.

  His showings in Iowa and New Hampshire had been pathetic. In both contests, he limped in as an also-ran.

  The loss was devastating to Babcock, as well as to the rank and file of Earthpeace.

  The timing couldn't have been worse for Earthpeace. The group's influence had waned in the years following the sinking of the Grappler. The public had begun to view its rolls as a bunch of hempworshiping loons. And on top of everything else, the world had maddeningly started to adopt the organization's message.

  The whaling industry was dead in most parts of the world. Toxic dumping was nearly extinct. A moratorium on atomic testing was accepted by almost every nation on Earth. The Russians and Americans had even begun to roll back their nuclear stockpiles.

  The fact of the matter was, Earthpeace needed a sympathizer like Babcock to win the presidency in order to boost its waning celebrity. When he lost, the group lost, too.

  It was touch and go for a few years af
ter the former governor's primary loss. Fortunately for Babcock and Earthpeace, all politics were cyclical. The party that had gone on to beat Babcock's in 1988 found itself on the outside looking in in 1992. With his impeccable liberal environmental credentials, Babcock was tapped by the new President to head up the Department of the Interior.

  During the two terms of the current President, Babcock made his allegiance to Earthpeace clear in both attitude and policy.

  Since Babcock's ties to Earthpeace had remained strong throughout his tenure as a cabinet secretary, Smith had decided to try a more private search. In perusing the interior head's e-mail, the CURE director had found a note from the Treasury secretary, under whose auspices the Secret Service fell. In it was mention of the former President's horseback-riding accident.

  A red flag instantly went up for Smith.

  The note had been sent before the event had become public knowledge. A follow-up letter from Babcock to the Treasury secretary very casually questioned the whereabouts of the old President, including hospital and room number.

  Certain of the link now, Smith had checked the rest of Babcock's outgoing e-mail. Sure enough, the information had been forwarded to the Earthpeace cell in San Francisco.

  Babcock was involved.

  Further checking revealed that the interior secretary had purchased a plane ticket to Panama more than a month before. His arrival time coincided with the passage of the Radiant Grappler through the canal.

  But surely Babcock could not have known about the ex-President's accident a month before it happened. There had to be yet another explanation for his trip.

  Smith had uncovered the reason, once more, in Babcock's e-mail.

  Dr. Ree Hop Doe. When Smith saw the name, he blinked in shock. The name was infamous in intelligence circles-should have been despised throughout the country.

  Doe was a naturalized American citizen of Taiwanese birth. A scientist at Los Alamos National Scientific Laboratory, he had been indicted on charges that he had betrayed his adopted country by selling decades' worth of nuclear secrets to the Chinese. Thanks to Doe, the People's Republic of China had leaped a generation ahead in its offensive nuclear capability.