The sum of all fears - Tom Clancy [150]
"Scary sons of bitches." Ryan observed, standing in shirt-sleeves at a corner. American tourists snapped pictures. Jews still looked a touch resentful. Arabs smiled. The Christians who'd largely been driven out of Jerusalem by increasing violence had barely started to return. Everyone got the hell out of their way as the five men moved briskly down the street, not quite marching, their helmeted heads turning left and right. They really do look like robots."
"You know," Avi said, "there hasn't been a single attack on them since the first week. Not one."
"I wouldn't want to fool with them," Clark observed quietly.
In the first week, as though by Providence, an Arab youth had killed an elderly Israeli woman with a knife - it had been a street robbery rather than a crime with political significance - and had made the mistake of doing so in view of a Swiss private, who'd run him down and subdued him with a martial-arts blow right out of a movie. The Arab in question had been taken to the troika and given the choice of a trial by Israeli or Islamic law. He'd made the mistake of choosing the latter. After a week in an Israeli hospital to allow his injuries to heal, he'd faced a trial in accordance with the word of the Koran, chaired by Imam Ahmed bin Yussif. One day after that, he had been flown to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, driven to a public square, and, after having had time to repent his misdeeds, publicly beheaded with a sword. Ryan wondered how you said pour encouiagei les autres in Hebrew, Greek, and Arabic. Israelis had been amazed at the speed and severity of justice, but the Muslims had merely shrugged and pointed out that the Koran had its own stern criminal code, and that it had proven highly effective over the years.
"Your people are still a little unhappy with this, aren't they?"
Avi frowned. Ryan had faced him with the necessity of expressing his personal opinion, or speaking the truth. They'd feel safer with our paratroops here man-to-man, Ryan?" Truth won out, as it had to with Avi.
"Sure."
"They'll learn. It will take a few more weeks, but they will learn. The Arabs like the Swiss, and the key to the peace on this street is how our Arab friends feel. Now, will you tell me something?" Clark's head moved fractionally at that.
"Maybe," Ryan answered, looking up the street.
"How much did you have to do with this?"
"Nothing at all," Jack replied with a neutral coldness that matched the pace of the soldiers. "It was Charlie Alden's idea, remember? I was just the messenger boy."
"So Elizabeth Elliot has told everyone." Avi didn't have to say any more.
"You wouldn't have asked the question unless you knew the answer, Avi. So why ask the question?"
"Artfully done." General Ben Jakob sat down and waved for the waiter. He ordered two beers before speaking again. Clark and the other bodyguard weren't drinking. "Your president pushed us too hard. Threatening us with withholding our arms "
"He could have gone a little easier, I suppose, but I do not make policy, Avi. Your people made it happen when they murdered those demonstrators. That reopened a part of our own history that we wish to forget. It neutralized your congressional lobby - a lot of those people were on the other side of our own civil rights movement, remember. You forced us to move, Avi. You know that. Besides -' Ryan stopped abruptly.
"Yes?"
"Avi, this thing just might work. I mean, look around!" Jack said, as the beers arrived. He was thirsty enough that a third of it disappeared in an instant.
"It is a slim possibility," Ben Jakob admitted.
"You get better intel from Syria than we do," Ryan pointed out. "I've heard that they've started saying nice things about the settlement - very quietly, I admit. Am I right?"
"If it's true." Avi grunted.
"You know the hard part about "peace" intel?"
Ben Jakob's eyes were focused on a distant wall as he contemplated - what? "Believing it is possible?"
Jack nodded. "That's one area where