'We have already decided you'll be part of the final team,' Kratz said, as if antic.i.p.ating her question. 'But, as so often happens in our business, an opportunity has arisen which we feel you are the best-qualified person to exploit at short notice.'

Hannah leaned forward in her chair. 'But I thought I was being trained to go to Baghdad.'

'You are, and in good time you will go to Baghdad, but right now we want to drop you into a different enemy territory. No better way of finding out how you'll handle yourself under pressure.''Where do you have in mind?' asked Hannah, unable to disguise her delight.

'Paris.'

'Paris?' repeated Hannah in disbelief.

'Yes. We have picked up information that the head of the Iraqi Interest Section has asked his government to supply him with a second secretary. The girl has been selected and will leave Baghdad for Paris in ten days' time. If you are willing to take her place, she will never reach Charles de Gaulle airport.'

'But they'd know I was the wrong person within minutes.'

'Unlikely,' said Kratz, taking out a thicker file from a drawer of his desk and turning a few pages. 'The girl in question was educated at Putney High School and then went on to Durham University to study English, both on Iraqi government grants. She wanted to remain in England but was forced to return to Baghdad when student visas were rescinded just over two years ago.'

'But her family...'

'Father was killed in the war with Iran and the mother has gone to live with her sister, just outside Karbala.'

'Brothers and sisters?'

'A brother in the Republican Guard, no sisters. It's all in the file. You'll be given a few days to study the background before you have to make up your mind. Tel Aviv is convinced we've a good chance of dropping you in her place.

Your detailed knowledge of Paris is an obvious bonus. We would only leave you there for three to six months at the most.'

'And then?'

'Back to Israel in final preparation for Baghdad. By the way, if you decide to take on this a.s.signment, our primary purpose is not to use you as a spy. We already have an agent in Paris. We simply want you to a.s.similate everything around you and get used to living with Arabs and thinking like them.

You must not keep any records, or even make notes. Commit everything to memory. You will be debriefed when we take you out. Never forget that your final a.s.signment is far more important to the state of Israel than this could ever be.' He smiled for the first time. 'Perhaps you'd like a few days to think it over.'

'No, thank you,' said Hannah. This time it was Kratz who looked anxious. 'I'm happy to take on the job, but I have a problem.''What's that?' asked Kratz.

'I can't type, and certainly not in Arabic'

The young man laughed. 'Then we'll have to lay on a crash course for you. You'd better leave the Rubins' immediately and get yourself moved into the emba.s.sy by tomorrow night.

They won't ask you for an explanation, and don't offer any.

Meanwhile, study this.' He pa.s.sed over a manila folder with the name 'Karima Saib' written across the top in bold letters. 'Within ten days you must know its contents by heart. The knowledge you retain may save your life.'

Kratz rose from his side of the desk and walked round to accompany Hannah to the door. 'Just one more thing,' he said as he opened the door for her. 'I believe this is yours.'

The Councillor for Cultural Affairs handed Hannah a small, battered suitcase.

In a car on the way to Georgetown, Cavalli explained to his father that within a hundred yards of the gallery the sirens would have been turned off and the limousines would peel away one after another as they reached the next six intersections, losing themselves in the normal morning traffic.

'And the actor?'

'With his wig removed and wearing dark gla.s.ses, no one would give Lloyd Adams a second look. He'll be taking the Metroliner back to New York this afternoon.'

'Clever.'

'Once their licence plates have been switched, the six limos will return to the city in a couple of days with their original New York plates.'

'You've done a highly professional job,' said his father.

'Yes, but that was only the dress rehearsal of a single scene. What we're planning in four weeks' time is to put on a three-act opera with the whole of Washington as our invited audience.'

'Try not to forget that we're being paid one hundred million for our troubles,' the old man reminded him.

'If we deliver, it will be good value for money,' said Cavalli as the car drove past the Four Seasons Hotel. The chauffeur turned left down a side street and came to a halt outside a quaint old wooden house. Angelo was waiting by a little iron gate at the top of a small flight of stone steps. The chairman and chief executive got out of the car and followed Angelo down the steps at a brisk pace, withoutspeaking.

The door at the bottom was already open. Once they were inside, Angelo introduced them to Bill O'Reilly. Bill led them down the corridor to his room. When he reached the locked door he turned the key as if they were about to enter Aladdin's cave. He opened the door and paused for just a moment before switching on the lights, then led his little party to the centre of the room, where the two ma.n.u.scripts awaited their inspection. He explained to his visitors that only one was a perfect copy of the original.

Bill pa.s.sed both men a magnifying gla.s.s, then took a pace backwards to await their judgement. Tony and his father were not quite sure where to start, and began studying both doc.u.ments for several minutes without uttering a word. Tony took his time as he went over the opening paragraph, 'When in the course of human events...', while his father became fascinated by the signatures of Francis Lightfoot Lee and Carter Braxton, whose colleagues from Virginia had left them so little room at the foot of the parchment to affix their names.

After some time, Tony's father stood up to his full height, turned towards the little Irishman and handed back the magnifying gla.s.s, and said, 'Maestro, all I can say is that William J. Stone would have been proud to know you.'

Dollar Bill bowed, acknowledging the ultimate forger's compliment.

'But which one is the perfect copy and which one has the mistake?' asked Cavalli.

'Ah,' said the forger. 'It was also William J. Stone who pointed me in the right direction for solving that little conundrum.'

The Cavallis waited patiently for Dollar Bill to continue his explanation. 'You see, when Timothy Matlock engrossed the original in 1776, he made three mistakes. Two he was able to correct by simple insertions.' Dollar Bill pointed to the word 'represtative', where the letters e and n were missing, and then to the word 'only', which had been omitted a few lines further down. Both of the corrections had been inserted with a A.

'But,' continued Dollar Bill, 'Mr Matlock also made one spelling mistake which he did not correct. On one of the copies, you will find, I have.'

HANNAH LANDED AT Beirut airport the night before she was due to fly to Paris. No one from Mossad accompanied the newagent, to avoid the risk of compromising her. Any Israeli found in the Lebanon is automatically arrested on sight.

Hannah had taken over an hour to be cleared by customs, but she finally emerged carrying a British pa.s.sport, hand luggage and a few Lebanese pounds. Twenty minutes later she booked herself into the airport Hilton. She explained to the receptionist that she would only be staying one night and paid her bill in advance with the Lebanese pounds. She went straight to her room on the ninth floor and did not venture out again that evening.

She received just one phone call, at 7.20. To Kratz's question she simply replied 'Yes,' and the line went dead.

She climbed into bed at 10.40, but couldn't sleep for more than an hour at a time. She occasionally flicked on the television to watch spaghetti Westerns dubbed into Arabic. In between she managed to catch moments of restless sleep. She rose at ten to seven the following morning, ate a slab of chocolate she found in the tiny fridge, cleaned her teeth and took a cold shower.

She dressed in clothes taken from her hand luggage of a type which the file had indicated Karima favoured, and sat on the corner of the bed staring at herself in the mirror. She didn't like what she saw. Kratz had insisted that she crop her hair so that she looked like the one blurred photograph of Miss Saib they had in their possession.

They also expected her to wear steel-rimmed spectacles, even if the gla.s.s in them didn't magnify. She had worn the spectacles for the past week but still hadn't got used to them, and often simply forgot to put them on or, worse, mislaid them.

At 8.19 a.m. she received a second phone call to let her know the plane had taken off from Amman with the 'cargo' on board.

When Hannah heard the morning cleaners chatting in the corridor a few moments later, she opened the door and quickly switched the sign on the k.n.o.b outside to 'Do Not Disturb'.

She waited impatiently in her room for a call saying either 'Your baggage has been mislaid,' which meant she was to return to London because they had failed to kidnap the girl, or 'Your baggage has been retrieved;' the code to show they had succeeded. If it was the second message she was to leave the room immediately, take the hotel minibus to the airport and go to the bookshop on the ground floor, where she was to browse until she was contacted.A courier would then arrive at Hannah's side and leave a small package containing Saib's pa.s.sport with the photograph changed, the airline ticket in Saib's name and any baggage tickets and personal items that had been found on her.

Hannah was then to board the flight to Paris as quickly as possible with only the one piece of hand luggage she had brought with her from London. Once she had landed at Charles de Gaulle she was to pick up Karima Saib's luggage from the carousel and get herself to the VIP carpark. She would be met by the Iraqi Amba.s.sador's chauffeur, who would take her to the Jordanian Emba.s.sy, where the Iraqi Interest Section was currently located, the Iraqi Emba.s.sy in Paris being officially closed. From that moment, Hannah would be on her own, and at all times she was to obey the instructions given by the emba.s.sy staff, particularly remembering that in direct contrast to Jewish women, Arab women were subservient to men.

She must never contact the Israeli Emba.s.sy or attempt to find out who the Mossad agent in Paris was. If it ever became necessary, he would contact her.

'What do I do about clothes if Saib's don't fit?' she had asked Kratz. 'We know I'm taller than she is.'

'You must carry enough in your overnight bag to last for the first few days,' he had told her, 'and then purchase what you will need for six months in Paris.' Two thousand French francs had been supplied for this purpose.

'It must be some time since you've been shopping in Paris,' she had told him. 'That's just about enough for a pair of jeans and a couple of T-shirts.' Kratz had reluctantly handed over another five thousand francs.

At 9.27 the phone rang.

When Tony Cavalli and his father entered the boardroom, they took the remaining chairs at each end of the table, as the chairman and chief executive of any distinguished company might. Cavalli always used the oak-panelled room in the bas.e.m.e.nt of his father's house on 75th Street for such meetings, but no one present believed they were there to conduct a normal board meeting. They knew there would be no agenda and no minutes.

In front of each of the six places where the board members were seated was a notepad, pencil and a gla.s.s of water, as there would have been at a thousand such meetings across America that morning. But at this partic-ular gathering, in front of every place were also twolong envelopes, one thin and one bulky, neither giving any clue as to its contents.

Tony's eyes swept the faces of the men seated round the table. All of them had two things in common: they had reached the top of their professions, and they were willing to break the law. Two of them had served jail sentences, albeit some years before, while three of the others would have done so had they not been able to afford the finest lawyers available. The sixth was himself a lawyer.

'Gentlemen,' Cavalli began, 'I've invited you to join me this evening to discuss a business proposition that might be described as a little unusual.' He paused before continuing, 'We have been requested by an interested party to steal the Declaration of Independence from the National Archives.'

Tony paused for a moment as uproar broke out immediately and the guests tried to outdo each other with one-liners.

'Just roll it up and take it away.'

'I suppose we could bribe every member of the staff.'

'Set the White House on fire. That would at least cause a diversion.'

'Write in and tell them that you won it on a game show.'

Tony was content to wait for his colleagues to run out of wisecracks before he spoke again.

'Exactly my reaction when we were first approached,' he admitted. 'But after several weeks of research and preparation, I hope you will at least grant me an opportunity to present my case.'

They quickly came to order and began concentrating on Tony's every word, though 'scepticism' would have best described the expression on their faces.

'During the past weeks, my father and I have been working on a draft plan to steal the Declaration of Independence. We are now ready to share that knowledge with you, because I must admit that we have reached a point where we cannot advance further on this project without the professional abilities of everyone seated around this table. Let me a.s.sure you, gentlemen, that your selection has not been a random exercise.

'But first I would like you all to see the Declaration of Independence for yourself.' Tony pressed a b.u.t.ton underneath the table and the doors behind him swung open. The butler entered the room carrying two thin sheets of gla.s.s, a parchment held between them. He placed the gla.s.s frame on the centre of the table. The six sceptics leaned forward to studythe masterpiece. It was several moments before anyone offered an opinion.

'Bill O'Reilly's work, would be my guess,' said Frank Piemonte, the lawyer, as he leaned over to admire the fine detail of the signatures below the text. 'He once offered to pay me in forged bills, and I would have accepted if I'd got him off.'

Tony nodded, and after they had all spent a little more time studying the parchment, he said, 'So, allow me to reword my earlier statement. We are not so much planning to steal the Declaration of Independence as to replace the original with this copy.' A smile settled on the lips of two of the previously sceptical guests.

'You will now be aware,' said Tony, 'of the amount of preparation that has gone into this exercise so far, and, indeed, the expense my father and I have been put to. But the reason we have continued is because we feel the rewards if we are successful far outweigh the risk of being caught. If you will open the thin envelopes in front of you, I believe the contents will make my point more clearly. Inside each envelope you will find a piece of paper on which is written the sum of money you will receive if you decide to become a member of the executive team.'

While the six men tore open the thinner of their two envelopes, Tony continued, 'If you feel, on discovering the amount involved, that the reward does not warrant the risk, now is the time to leave. I trust that those of us who remain may have confidence in your discretion because, as you will be only too aware, our lives will be in your hands.'

'And theirs in ours,' said the chairman, speaking for the first time.

A ripple of nervous laughter broke out around the table as each of the six men eyed the unsigned cheque in front of him.

'That figure,' said Tony, 'is the payment you will receive should we fail. If we succeed, the amount will be tripled.'

'So will the jail sentence if we get caught,' said Bruno Morelli, speaking for the first time.

'Summing up, gentlemen,' said Cavalli, ignoring the comment, 'if you decide to join the executive team, you will receive ten per cent of that payment in advance when you leave tonight, and the remaining sum within seven days of the contract being completed. This would be paid into any bank of your choice in any country of your choosing.

'Before you make your decision, there's one further thingI'd like you all to see.' Once again Tony pressed a b.u.t.ton under the table, and this time the doors opened at the far end of the room. The sight that greeted them caused two of the guests to immediately stand, one to gasp and the remaining three to simply stare in disbelief.

'Gentlemen, I am happy that you were able to join me today. I wanted to a.s.sure you all of my commitment to this project, and I hope you'll feel able to be part of the executive team. I'll have to leave you now, gentlemen,' said the man standing next to the chairman in the Ozark accent that had become so familiar to the American people during the past few months, 'so that you can study Mr Cavalli's proposition in greater detail. You can be confident that I'll do everything I can to help make the change this country needs. But for now, I have one or two pressing engagements. I feel sure you'll understand.' The actor smiled, and shook hands warmly with everyone around the table before strolling out of the boardroom.

Spontaneous applause broke out after the door had closed behind him. Tony allowed himself a smile of satisfaction.

'Gentlemen, my father and I will now leave you for a few minutes to consider your decision.'

The chairman and chief executive rose without another word and left the room.

'What do you think?' asked Tony as he poured his father a whisky and water from the cabinet in his study.

'A lot of water,' he replied. 'I have a feeling we may be in for a long night.' 'But did they buy it?'

'Can't be certain,' replied the old man. 'I was watching their faces while you were giving the presentation, and sure as h.e.l.l, they didn't doubt the work you've put in. They were all impressed by the parchment and Lloyd Adams' performance, but other than Bruno and Frank they didn't give much away.'

'Let's start with Frank,' said Tony. 'First in then out, as Frank always is, but he likes money far too much to walk away from an offer as good as this.'

'You're that confident?' said Tony.

'It's not just the money,' replied his father. 'Frank's not going to have to be there on the day, is he? So he'll get his share whatever happens. I've never yet met a lawyer who would make a good field commander. They're too used to being paid whether they win or lose.'

'If you're right, Al Calabrese may turn out to be a problem. He's got the most to lose.''As our trade union leader, he'll certainly have to be out there on centre stage most of the day, but I suspect he won't be able to resist the challenge.'

'And what about Bruno? If -' began the chief executive, but he was cut short as the doors swung open and Al Calabrese walked into the room. 'We were just talking about you, Al.'

'Not too politely, I hope.'

'Well, that depends on . ..' said Tony.

'On whether I'm in?'

'Or out,' said the chairman.

'I'm in up to my neck is the answer,' said Al, smiling.

'So you'd better have a foolproof plan to present to us.' He turned to face Tony. 'Because I don't want to spend the rest of my life on top of America's most wanted list.'

'And the others?' asked the chairman, as Bruno Morelli brushed past them without even saying goodnight.

HANNAH NERVOUSLY GRABBED the ringing phone. 'This is Reception, madam. We were just wondering if you'll be checking out before midday, or do you require the room for an extra night?'

'No, thank you,' said Hannah. 'I'll have left by twelve, one way or the other.'