W. Griffin - By Order of the President

No one answered him.

The last person to arrive was Mr. Brian Willis, of the FBI. He held a printout in his hand.

"The bureau just sent me this, General," he said. "Actually, while we were in the conference. Is that what you were talking about?"

Naylor glanced at it. It was Miller's first satburst.

"That's it, but there's already been a second," Naylor said.

"Here," General McFadden said, handing it to him.

Naylor waited until Willis had read it, then said, "Brian, can you get on the horn to the FBI in Philadelphia and see what they have on this Lease-Aire corporation, and the pilot? I think we should have that."

"So do I," Willis agreed, after a moment's thought, and then appeared to be wondering where he was to sit at Naylor's office conference table.

"How about doing that now, Brian?" Naylor asked, hoping his voice didn't reveal his annoyance. "While we're waiting for General Potter? Use the phone booth, if you'd like."

He pointed to the cubicle with the desk, chair, and secure telephone.

Willis nodded, said, "Oh. Sure. Okay," and walked into the small room.

He was still on the telephone when General Potter returned.

"Up and running, boss," he said.

"Okay. Good." Naylor looked around the room. "Everybody's here, and everybody's read the two satbursts from Angola, right?"

Everybody nodded.

"Okay," Naylor went on, "then let's get started."

He sat down, raised the lid of the laptop, and turned it on.

"Let's do two things," he began when all but Willis had taken seats. "Let's do worst-case scenario; and, in the military order, junior man first."

When it came to seniority among the liaison officers, somewhat important for some things, Naylor had used what he thought of as the George Orwell Theory of Seniority. All pigs are equal, but some pigs are more equal than others. All the liaison officers, he had decreed, were to have the assimilated rank of major general, and rank between them was to be determined by how long they had been assigned to CentCom.

That made Brian Willis of the FBI the junior man. He was the fourth FBI liaison officer. Naylor had sent back the first three as unsuitable. Fremont had had only one predecessor.

Willis slipped into a chair at the conference table.

"I talked to the SAC in Philadelphia," he began. "He got the first message from the bureau, but not the second."

"It'll probably be there in a couple of minutes," Naylor said. "Are they going to find out what they can about the pilot, and the company: what is it, 'Lease-Aire'?"

"They already knew something about them, General," Willis said, "and-out of school-Jerry Lowell, the SAC, said we'd give five-to-one that Hartford is somehow going to be involved."

"I'm afraid I don't quite understand that," Naylor said.

"Insurance, General," Willis said, with a sly smile. "This Lease-Aire outfit has been stumbling along for a long time on the edge of bankruptcy. Their airplane is, quote, stolen, unquote, and they get paid."

"You did tell him that the CIA guy said there was no indication that the pilot was checking out of his hotel?" Naylor said.

"That's what they call 'setting the scene,' General," Willis explained patiently. "It looks as if he wasn't planning to leave. We decide he was forced to leave, to fly the plane. He turns up in South Africa, or someplace, and says, 'Yes, that's what's happened.' "

"From our standpoint," Naylor said, "if the airplane was stolen to collect the insurance:"

"He puts it on autopilot and aims it out over the ocean," Willis interjected, "and then goes out the back door. By now, that airplane is probably on the bottom of the sea."

"As I was saying," Naylor said, a little sharply, "from our standpoint that's a best-case scenario. The airplane will not be used in some kind of terrorist activity."

"I know I'm speaking out of turn, Allan:" General McFadden said.

Yeah, you are. Shut up and wait your turn. And don't call me by my first name in the presence of our subordinates.

"You have the floor, General," Naylor said.

"I had a flash Armageddon worst-case scenario as soon as I came in here," General McFadden said. "I mean, think about it. What's missing is an old airplane without the range to make a nuisance of itself anywhere important. With one exception. Think about this: What these rag-heads are really trying to do is get all the other rag-heads united against us, right? And so far they're not doing so hot, right? So what would really piss off all the world's rag-heads? An American airplane crashing into that black thing-whatever it is-in Mecca:"

"They call that the ' ka'ba,' General McFadden," General Potter interrupted. "Muslims believe that it was built by Adam, then rebuilt by Ibrahim and his son Isma'il. It's a brick structure, a ten on the Holy Scale, where the Vatican is maybe a five, if you consider that at least the Catholics let others in to worship:"

": to which," General McFadden said, resuming the floor, "all the rag-heads make a pilgrimage." He paused to glower at Potter for his interruption.

Potter, undaunted, smiled at him.

"Would the rag-heads believe another rag-head had done that? Hell no, they wouldn't," McFadden went on. "Especially when the plane was traceable to us and the body of an American pilot was found in the wreckage."

"George?" Naylor asked.

"It's a little far-fetched, sir," General Potter said. "But it could be done, and I have to agree with General McFadden that it would indeed cause our Muslim brothers to think even less of us than they do now."

"All of them, Potter," McFadden said. "Every goddamned one of them!"

Out of the corner of his eye, Naylor saw activity on the laptop screen and dropped his eyes to it.

(RUSSIAN NATIONAL AND KNOWN ASSOCIATE OF VASILY RESPIN, ALLEGED ARMS

Naylor read it twice. It sounded slightly less far-fetched than General McFadden's worst-case scenario.

And anything is possible. Let's hope this is all it is. Jesus. I hope McFadden's not even close to being right! Naylor laid his hands on the laptop and typed:

Naylor became aware that everyone but McFadden-who was enthusiastically buttressing his "Crash It into the Ka'ba" theory-was looking at him.

"Another theory has come in," he said. "The sergeant major is making everybody copies. While we're waiting for that, would you go on, please, General McFadden?"