The entire U.S. diplomatic delegation, along with its support personnel, lay baking in the unforgiving desert sun. The Ebla Arab Army colonel who was Sultan Omay's personal aide stood watch over them.
The secretary of state was nearest the edge of the tent. Her makeup faded, Helena Eckert's face was blistered with bright red lesions. Her sunburned eyelids were closed tightly, and her head lolled to one side, jowly cheek pressed into the sand.
Pathetic moans rose up from the surrounding field. Omay thrilled to the sound as he stood over the dying form of the American secretary of state.
"Our friend al Khobar is ready by now." Omay smiled down at Helena. "Today will see the end of Israel and the beginning of the end of your nation." The secretary of state only groaned.
Omay turned to his attending Eblan colonel. "Give the female water," Omay barked, weak eyes flashing anger.
The colonel quickly knelt beside the prone form of the American diplomat. He poured a little warm water from a canteen onto the secretary's cracked lips and mouth. She coughed at first, throat rebelling at the liquid, but then greedily accepted the meager gift.
When she spoke, her words were barely audible.
"You don't know America at all," Helena Eckert breathed. She didn't open her swollen eyes.
Omay smiled. He looked approvingly at his colonel.
"And you, woman, do not know what I have in store for your country," he said. "By this time tomorrow the place that produces the filth that is your culture will lay in ruins. Your nation will not recover. And the man who engineered it all will return to Ebla. A hero to Islam."
"Al Khobar will never get out alive," Helena Eckert said weakly. She'd heard this madman's scheme before.
"Though only a Saudi, he is as cunning as a fox. Assola al Khobar will have his hero's welcome. Perhaps when he returns I will introduce you to him." A wicked grin. "That is, if you are still alive."
"You'll die first, you cancerous old bastard," the secretary of state hissed, abandoning the final vestiges of her diplomatic self.
Above Helena, Sultan Omay bristled at the remark. Scowling, the old man stood more erect. He wanted to spit on the American secretary but found to his intense displeasure that his mouth could form no more saliva.
Tasting the sandy dryness of his tongue, Sultan Omay turned to his attending soldier.
"Spit in this cursed female's face," he commanded
Snapping to attention, the colonel drew up a thick wad of sand-fueled saliva. He expelled it dutifully onto the face of the secretary of state.
It had no effect whatsoever. Helena Eckert was delirious.
"You're going to die, you cancerous bastard," she uttered in a distant, rasping whisper. It was as if she were in a world all her own. "You're going to die and rot in hell. Rot, rot, rot..."
The saliva rolled down her cheek, dripping onto the scorching desert sand.
"Die and rot in hell," Helena continued, oblivious to all that was around her. "Eaten by cancer and maggots."
The meager drops of water had returned her voice. It grew stronger, more mocking as the words flowed out. She perspired madly through the heat, through the pain. The groans in the field of torment where she lay dying grew louder. Others joined the derisive chorus.
"Cancer and maggots ...cancer and maggots... cancer and maggots..."
Sultan Omay's eyes grew wild as they swept the area. The Americans continued their scornful wail. Furious, the sultan was on the verge of ordering violence against the insolent Americans, but before the order could be given, the young communications soldier raced up bearing the sultan's small cellular phone.
"Sultan," the soldier cried, "the Saudi, al Khobar, is not available."
Rage distracted, Omay wheeled away from the murmuring Americans. His wrinkled hand clasped the hilt of his dagger threateningly.
"What! Why?"
The Eblan soldier swallowed nervously.
"They say he is 'taking a meeting,'" the soldier replied fearfully.
Omay's hand left the dagger.
The chorus of defiant groans from behind him had begun to subside. Some of the men were losing consciousness.
The sultan's brow pulled gravely over his watery dark eyes.
"That is not one of our arranged signals," he said.
"Do you wish me to try again?" the soldier volunteered. He held up the phone, finger poised on Redial.
"No," the Sultan said somberly. "Brave Assola is dead. The Americans have bloodied their infidel hands on yet another hero of Islam."
And privately Sultan Omay knew that his great hope for destroying Hollywood had died with al Khobar. The Americans had been stronger than he thought. He was certain they would have waited for a diplomatic solution, giving Omay time to spring both ends of his trap. And he had come so close. Al Khobar had been nearly ready.
Now there was nothing to wait for.
"Colonel, ready your army," Omay intoned ominously. Legs wobbling, he turned back to his tent. "Yes, 0 great Sultan," the colonel replied crisply.
"But what of these vermin?" He spread a hand out over the numerous sun-tortured bodies.
Omay looked down at the prone forms of Secretary of State Helena Eckert and her entourage. "Leave them to the desert sun," he sneered. "If any are left alive after today's glorious battle, tell them that they lived to see the end of Israel. Then kill them."
And with that the Great Peacemaker shuffled away from the vast field of torture.
Chapter 26
Bindle and Marmelstein nearly danced into their office. The workmen were on their latest coffee break, so the room was almost empty. Almost but not quite. However, even the sight of Remo sitting on their couch was not enough to put a damper on their joyful mood.
"What are you two pinheads so happy about?" Remo asked as the Taurus executives breezed through the door.
"Oh, nothing," Hank Bindle sang. He grinned at Bruce Marmelstein. Marmelstein grinned back. Remo shook his head. Obviously the two men thought they shared some great private joke. "Before the pair of you lapse into Prozac comas, you want to tell me where your little buddy al Koala is?"
The smiles vanished so quickly they left white creases in the movie moguls' salon-tanned faces. "Who wants to know?" Hank Bindle challenged. Remo knew immediately something was wrong. He got slowly to his feet. Without even a single word to either man, he crossed over to their desks. The latest matching desks ordered by the two executives were huge mahogany affairs that weighed almost a thousand pounds each. Near Bindle's, Remo bent at the waist, gripping the fat middle section of one of the curved legs.
He stood. Bindle and Marmelstein were shocked to see the desk rise with him.
Remo stood there for a moment, the thousand-pound desk held away from his body in the same casual manner he might have used to hold a squirt gun. The huge desk did not waver one millimeter in his outstretched arm.
When he was certain he had their attention, Remo flicked his wrist. The desk rocketed away from his hand as if yanked on a line. It cracked straight through the ceiling-to-floor window at the rear of the office.