The sum of all fears - Tom Clancy [287]
"Commander, I saw your doctor," Achmed said in the far corner.
"And - you still look ill, my friend." Qati noted. "What is the problem?"
"He wants me to see another doctor in Damascus."
Qati instantly did not like that. Did not like it at all. But Achmed was a comrade who had served the movement for years. How could he say no to someone who had twice saved his life, once stopping a bullet himself to do so?
"You know that what goes on here "
"Commander, I will die before I speak of this place.
Even though I know nothing of this - this project. I will die first."
There was no doubting the man, and Qati knew what it was to be seriously ill at a young and healthy age. He could not deny the man medical care while he himself regularly visited a physician. How could his men respect him if he did such a thing?
"Two men will go with you. I will select them."
"Thank you, Commander. Please forgive my weakness."
"Weakness?" Qati grabbed the man by the shoulder. "You are the strongest among us! We need you back, and we need you healthy! Go tomorrow."
Achmed nodded and withdrew to another place, embarrassed and shamed by his illness. His commander, he knew, faced death. It had to be cancer, he had so often visited the physician. Whatever it was, the Commander had not let it stop him. There was courage, he thought.
"Break for the night?" Ghosn asked.
Fromm shook his head. "No, let's take another hour or two to assemble the explosive bed. We should be able to get part of it in place before we're too weary." Both men looked up as Qati approached.
"Still on schedule?"
"Herr Qati, whatever arrangements you have in mind, we will be ready a day early. Ibrahim saved us that day with his work on the explosives." The German held one of the small, hexagonal blocks. The squibs were already in place, the wire trailing off. Fromm looked at the other two, then bent down, setting the first block in its nesting place. Fromm made sure the block was exactly in place, then attached a numbered tag on the wire, and draped it into a plastic tray that held a number of dividers, like the trays of a tool box. Qati attached the wire to a terminal, checking three times to make sure the number on the wire was the same as that on the terminal. Fromm watched also. The process took four minutes. The electrical components had already been pre-tested. They could not be tested again. The first part of the bomb was now live.
CHAPTER 27
Data Fusion
I've had my say, Bart." Jones said on the way to the airport.
"That bad?"
"The crew hates him - the training they just went through didn't help. Hey, I was there, okay? I was in with the sonar guys, in the simulator, and he was there, and I wouldn't want to work for him. He almost yelled at me."
"Oh?" That surprised Mancuso.
"Yeah, he said something that I didn't like - something plain wrong, skipper - and I called him on it, and you should have seen his reaction. Shit, I thought he'd have a stroke or something. And he was wrong, Bart. It was my tape. He was hassling his people for not cueing on something that wasn't there, okay? It was one of my trick tapes, and they saw that it was bogus, but he didn't and he started raisin' hell. That's a good sonar department. He doesn't know how to use it, but he sure likes to kibbitz like he does. Anyway, after he left, the guys started talking, okay? That isn't the only bunch he gives a hard time to. I hear the engineers are going nuts, trying to keep this clown happy. Is it true they maxed an ORSE?"
Mancuso nodded, despite the fact he didn't like hearing this. "They came within a whisker of setting a record."
"Well, the guy doesn't want