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coming," Corley said. "State is going to thank the ambassador. Our ambassador in Tel Aviv is going to thank Yigal Allon."
    "You're welcome, now what are you going to do?"
    "Damn little," Corley said, lighting his pipe. "Fowler brought a stack of tapes recorded off Radio Cairo and Radio Beirut. He said they were all threats of various kinds that came to nothing. The Agency is voiceprinting your tape against them."
    "This tape is not a threat. It was made to be used afterward."
    "The Agency is checking its sources in Lebanon."
    "In Lebanon the CIA buys the same shit we do, from a lot of the same people," Kabakov said. "The kind of stuff that's two hours ahead of the newspapers."
    "Sometimes not even two hours," Corley said. "In the meantime, you can look at pictures. We've got about a hundred known Al Fatah sympathizers on file, people we think are in the July 5th movement here. Immigration and Naturalization doesn't advertise it, but they have a file on suspicious Arab aliens. You'll have to go to New York for that."
    "Can you put out a general customs alert on your own authority?"
    "I've done that. It's our best bet. For a major job they probably would have to bring in the bomb from outside, that is if it's a bomb," Corley said. "We've had three small explosions linked to the July 5th movement in the past two years, all at Israeli offices in New York. From that---"
    "One time they used plastic, the other two were dynamite," Kabakov said.
    "Exactly. You do keep up, don't you? Apparently there's not much plastic available here or they wouldn't be lugging dynamite around and wouldn't blow themselves up trying to extract nitroglycerine."
    "The July 5th movement is full of amateurs," Kabakov said. "Najeer would not have trusted them with this. The ordnance would be separate. If it's not already here, they'll bring it in." The Israeli rose and walked to the window. "So your government is making its files available to me and telling customs to watch out for fellows with bombs and that's all?"
    "I'm sorry, Major, but I don't know what else we can do with the information we have."
    "The U.S. could ask its new allies in Egypt to pressure Khadafy in Libya. He bankrolls Black September. The bastard gave them $5 million from the Libyan treasury as a reward for the Munich killings. He might be able to call it off if Egypt pushed him hard enough."
    Colonel Muammar Khadafy, head of Libya's Revolutionary Command Council, was wooing Egypt again in his drive to build a solid power base. He might respond to pressure from the Egyptians now.
    "The State Department is staying out of it," Corley said.
    "U.S. intelligence doesn't think they're going to strike here at all, do they, Corley?"
    "No," Sam Corley said wearily. "They think the Arabs wouldn't dare."

Chapter 4
     
    At the moment the freighter Leticia was crossing the 21st meridian en route to the Azores and New York City. In her deepest forward hold in a locked compartment were 1,200 pounds of plastique packed in gray crates.
    Beside the crates in the total darkness of the hold, Ali Hassan lay semiconscious. A large rat was on his stomach and it was walking toward his face. Hassan had lain there for three days, shot in the stomach by Captain Kemal Larmoso.
    The rat was hungry, but not ravenous. At first Hassan's groans had frightened him, but now he heard only shallow, glottal breathing. He stood in the crust on the distended stomach and sniffed the wound, then moved forward onto the chest.
    Hassan could feel the claws through his shirt. He must wait. In Hassan's left hand was the short crowbar Captain Larmoso had dropped when Hassan surprised him at the crates. In his right hand was the Walther PPK automatic he had drawn too late. He would not fire the gun now. Someone might hear. The traitor Larmoso must think him dead when he came into the hold again.
    The rat's nose was almost touching Hassan's chin. The man's labored breathing stirred the rat's whiskers.
    With all his strength, Hassan