The Theatre - Kellerman, Jonathan

Three interrogations proceeded simultaneously. A marathon.

Al Biyadi in one room; next door his cousin, the phony charwoman. Both of them toughing it out, silent as dust.

But Cassidy had spilled to Nahum. He'd ignored her insults, the anti-Semitic slurs, kept picking and tearing at her resistance until he made her see that she'd been used and demeaned.

When the insight hit her, she did an immediate about-face, turning her wrath upon Al Biyadi, vomiting out her shame and hurt, talking so fast they'd had to slow her down, tell her to speak so that the recorder picked up more than mush.

And talk she did: How Hassan Had seduced her, strung her along with promises of matrimony, a big house back in America, back in Huntington Beach, California. Children, cars, the good life.

Just one more assignment before settling down to eternal domestic bliss. A dozen one mores; a score.

She'd started by composing and distributing PLO literature for him in Detroit, typing and proofreading the English versions, delivering boxfuls at out-of-the-way night drops. Meeting men in cafes, smiling Arab men. In retrospect she realized they'd had no respect for her, had been mocking her. At the time she'd thought them mysterious, charming.

Running errands. Picking up parcels at Detroit Metropolitan Airport. Making coded phone calls and taking down incomprehensible messages. Side trips up to Canada, delivering packages to a row house in Montreal, returning with other packages to Michigan. Serving coffee and donuts to Hassan's friends as they met in the basement of a Black Muslim mosque. All of it in her spare time-going off shift at Harper Hospital and heading straight for her unpaid second job. But reimbursed by love, freeing her lover to complete his medical studies. The lack of romance sometimes painful. But telling herself that he was a patriot with more important things on his mind than movies and dinner dates. A patriot in jeopardy-the Zionists were watching him; he needed to maintain an apolitical stance.

He made love to her infrequently, told her she was a warrior-heroine, the kind of woman he wanted as mother of his children.

They signed up for the U.N. job together, planned to carry their activism to Palestine. Here, too, he doctored while she did the dirty work.

She composed twenty different propaganda pamphlets, found a printer in Nablus who could make them up in English, French, and Arabic. Made contact with the PLO operatives who came to the Amelia Catherine disguised as patients, growing close to one of them-Hassan's cousin, Samra. A pretty, dark girl, also trained as a nurse but working full-time for the liberation of Palestine. Hassan introduced them to each other in one of the examining rooms; an easy bond of friendship followed soon. The two women became confidantes, tutor and student.

Samra coached, Peggy performed well.

In February she was promoted to more important functions: serving as a conduit between Hassan and arms smugglers in Jordan, making payoffs, overseeing early morning transfers of the wooden crates to the big house on Ibn Haldoun.

Samra lived in a flat in Sheikh Jarrah, but the house was hers, deeded to her family-a rich family, like Hassan's. Her father had been a judge in East Jerusalem before escaping to Amman in '

Good friend, Cousin Samra.

In reality she was no cousin at all, but a wife. The one and only Mrs. Hassan Al Biyadi. A Jordanian marriage certificate found in her purse proved it, complete with signature by her father the judge.

Shmeltzer had waved the dogeared piece of paper in Cassidy's face, told her she was a gullible idiot, a stupid, stupid girl who deserved to be deceived.

She screamed denial. The old detective slapped her out of her hysteria and continued to attack her verbally, savagely, to the point where Daniel thought of intervening. But he didn't and finally the denial gave way to a new grasp on reality. Peggy Cassidy sat in her chair, shaking, gulping water, bubbling at the mouth, unable to spill her guts fast enough.

Yes, she'd known the first two Butcher victims were Amelia Catherine patients-Hassan's patients. Had wanted to tell someone-Mr. Baldwin, at least. But Hassan forbade it, said their cover was more important, they couldn't afford police probing around the hospital.

She began weeping: "Those poor women!" Hassan hadn't cared, didn't care about anyone! He was a pig-the Arabs were all pigs. Filthy, sexist pigs, she hoped they all rotted in hell, hoped the Jews killed every single one of them.

One extreme to the other.

An unstable girl. Daniel wondered how she'd cope with prison.

Amos Harel was waiting outside his office, pacing and smoking. Unlike him to show nervousness; something was wrong.

Gauloise butts littered the floor. The door was closed. As Daniel came closer, he saw the look on the Latam chief's face and a flame ignited in his belly.

"One of my men is dead," said Harel hoarsely. "Itzik Nash, strangled in the alley behind the reporter's building. Your man, Cohen, is missing-no trace of the car we gave him. We found his radio near Itzik's body. They were supposed to maintain regular contact-Cohen was probably checking up on Itzik when he got hit. The reporter's also dead, bludgeoned to pulp up in his flat, swastikas painted in blood all over his bedroom walls-his own blood, according to Forensics. They're still there swabbing and dusting. The Canadian, Carter, is the only suspect who was out last night. No one knows where the fuck he is."

Daniel knew Itzik Nash-they'd attended Police School together. A roly-poly guy with a ready arsenal of lewd jokes. Daniel visualized him wearing the thick-tongued idiot's yawn of the strangulation victim. Thought of Avi in the Butcher's hands and found himself trembling.

"God. What the hell happened!"

Harel took hold of the doorknob, twisted savagely, and shoved the door open. Inside his office sat a Latamnik-the man who'd broadcast as Relic. He was staring at the floor. Harel's throat-clearing raised his face, and Daniel saw that his eyes were lifeless, filmed over. He looked withered, a husk of himself. The code name strangely apt.

"Get the hell out here and tell him what happened," ordered Harel.

"He faked us out," said the Latamnik, coming to the doorway.

Harel put his face close to his man's, sprayed Relic with spittle as he talked: "No vidduy, just facts."

Relic licked his lips, nodded, recited: "Carter took the predictable path, Ben Adayah to Sultan Suleiman, walked right by me. I picked up his trail the moment he passed the Rockefeller, followed him up Nablus Road and into the Pilgrim's Vision Hotel. Place was empty, just the night clerk. Carter registered, went up the stairs. I leaned on the clerk; he told me the room number-three-oh-two-and that Carter had ordered a whore. I asked if Carter had ever stayed there before-did he have any particular whore in mind? The clerk said no to both. There was only one roundheels working this late-she was up in one of the other rooms, would be free in fifteen minutes. He was planning to send her up then. I warned him not to let on anything was up, took a house key, and waited in the room behind the desk. When the whore showed up and picked up the key, I followed her to three-oh-two, let her go in, waited maybe fifteen seconds, then went in myself."

The Latamnik shook his head, still unbelieving. "She was all alone, Pakad, sitting on the bed reading a comic book. Not a trace of Carter. The window was bolted, dusty-it hadn't been opened recently. I looked everywhere for him, tried other rooms, the communal lavatory. Nothing. He must have slipped out the back way-there's a rear stairway leading out to Pikud Hamerkaz."

"Didn't you call for backup?" demanded Daniel. His hands were clenched at his sides, his abdomen searing. His body so tense the muscles threatened to burst through the skin.