'I'm up to my eyes the rest of this week,' b.u.t.terworth said, looking down at the blank pages in his diary, 'but the President's away at the beginning of next week, so perhaps we could schedule something for then?'

There was a pause which b.u.t.terworth a.s.sumed meant Marshall was checking his diary. 'Would Tuesday, 10 a.m. suit you?'

the Archivist eventually asked., 'Let me check my other diary,' said b.u.t.terworth, staring into s.p.a.ce. 'Yes, that looks fine. I have another appointment at 10.30, but I'm confident we'll have covered everything I need to go over with you by then. Perhaps you would be kind enough to come to the Pennsylvania Avenue entrance of the Old Executive Office building. There'll be someone there to meet you and after you've cleared security they'll bring you up to my office.'

'The Pennsylvania Avenue entrance,' said Marshall. 'Of course.'

'Thank you, Mr Marshall. I look forward to seeing you next Tuesday at ten o'clock,' said b.u.t.terworth before replacing the receiver.

The President's Special a.s.sistant smiled as he dialled Cavalli's private number.

Scott promised Dexter Hutchins he would be around when Dexter's son came to Yale for his admission inter- view.

'He's allowing me to tag along,' said Dexter, 'which will give me a chance to bring you up to date on our little problem with the Israelis. And I may even have found something to tempt you.''Dexter, if you're hoping that I'll get your son into Yale in exchange for a field job, I think I ought to let you know I have absolutely no influence with the Admissions Office.'

Dexter's laugh crackled down the phone. 'But I'll still be happy to show you both over the place and give the boy any help I can.'

Dexter Jr could not have turned out to be more like his father: five foot ten, heavily built, a perpetual five o'clock shadow and the same habit of calling everything that moved 'sir'. When, after an hour strolling round the grounds, he left his father for his interview with the head of the Admissions Office, the Professor of Const.i.tutional Law took the Deputy Director of the CIA back to his rooms.

Even before the door was closed, Dexter had lit up a cigar. After a few puffs he said, 'Have you been able to make any sense of the coded message sent by our operative in Beirut?'

'Only that everyone who joins the intelligence community has some strange personal reason for wanting to do so. In my case, it's because of my father and a Boy Scout determination to balance the books morally. In the case of Hannah Kopec, Saddam Hussein wipes out her family, so she immediately offers her talents to Mossad. With that powerful a motive, I wouldn't want to cross her path.'

'But that's exactly what I'm hoping you will do,' said Dexter. 'You're always saying you want to be tested in the field. Well, this could be your opportunity.'

'Am I hearing you properly?'

'Yale's spring term is about to end, right?'

'Yes. But that doesn't mean I don't have a lot of work to do.'

'Oh, I see. A happy amateur, twelve times a year when it suits you, but the moment you might have to get your hands dirty. ..'

'I didn't say that.'

'Well then, hear me out. First, we know Hannah Kopec was one of eight girls selected from a hundred to go to London for six months to study Arabic. This followed a year's intensive physical course at Herzliyah, where they covered the usual self-defence, fieldcraft and surveillance work. The reports on her were excellent. Second, a chat with her host's wife at Sainsbury's in Camden Town, wherever the h.e.l.l that is, and we discover that she left suddenly, despite the fact that she was almost certainly meant to return toIsrael as part of the team that was working on the a.s.sa.s.sination of Saddam. That's when we lose sight of her.

Then we get one of those breaks that only come from good detective work. One of our agents who works at Heathrow spots her in duty free, when she's buying some cheap perfume.

'After she boards a plane for the Lebanon he phones our man in Beirut, who shadows her from the moment she arrives.

Not that easy, I might add. We lost her for several hours.

Then, out of nowhere, up she pops again, but this time as Karima Saib, who Baghdad are under the impression is on her way to Paris as second secretary to the Amba.s.sador.

Meanwhile, the real Miss Saib is abducted at Beirut airport and is now being held at a safe house somewhere across the border on the outskirts of Tel Aviv.'

'Where's all this leading, Dexter?'

'Patience, Professor,' he said, relighting the stub of his cigar, which hadn't been glowing for several minutes. 'Not all of us are born with your academic acuity.'

'Get on with it,' said Scott with a smile, 'because my academic acuity hasn't been stretched yet.'

'Now I come to a bit you're going to enjoy. Hannah Kopec has not been placed in the Iraqi Interest Section of the Jordanian Emba.s.sy in Paris to spy.'

'Then why bother to put her there in the first place? In any case, how can you be certain?' asked Scott.

'Because the Mossad agent in Paris - how shall I put it? - does a little work for us on the side, and he hasn't even been informed of her existence.'

Scott scowled. 'So why has the girl been placed in the emba.s.sy?'

'We don't know, but we sure as h.e.l.l would like to find out. We think Rabin can't give the go-ahead to strike Saddam while Kopec is still in France, so the least we need to know is when she's expected back in Israel. And that's where you come in.'

'But we must have a man in Paris already.' 'Several, actually, but every one of them is known by Mossad at a hundred paces, and, I suspect, even by the Iraqis at ten. So, if Hannah Kopec is in Paris without the Mossad sleeper knowing, I'd like you to be in Paris without our people knowing. That is, if you feel you can spare the time away from Susan Anderson.'

'She broke away from me the day her boyfriend returned from his conference. I don't know what it is I do to women.She called me last week to tell me they're getting married next month.'

'All the more reason for you to go to Paris.'

'On a wild goose chase.'

'This goose may just be about to lay us a golden egg, and in any case, I don't want to read about another brilliant Israeli coup on the front page of the New York Times and then have to explain to the President why the CIA knew nothing about it.'

'But where would I even start?'

'In your own time, you try to make contact with her. Tell her you're the Mossad agent in Paris.'

'But she would never believe -'

'Why not? She doesn't know who the agent is, only hat there is one. Scott, I need to know -'

The door swung open and Dexter Jr came in.

'How did it go?' asked his father. The young man walked across the room and slumped into an armchair, but did not utter a word. That bad, eh son?'

'Mr Marshall, how nice to meet you,' said b.u.t.terworth, thrusting out his hand to greet the Archivist of the United States.

'It's nice to meet you, too, Mr b.u.t.terworth,' Calder Marshall replied nervously.

'Good of you to find the time to come over,' said b.u.t.terworth. 'Do have a seat.'

b.u.t.terworth had booked the Roosevelt Room in the West Wing for their meeting. It had taken a lot of persuading of a particularly officious secretary who knew Mr b.u.t.terworth's station in life only too well. She reluctantly agreed to release the room for thirty minutes, and then only because he was seeing the Archivist of the United States. She also agreed to his second request, as the President would be out of town that day. The Special a.s.sistant had placed himself at the top of a table that usually seated twenty-four, and beckoned Mr Marshall to be seated on his right, facing Tade Stykal's portrait of Theodore Roosevelt on Horseback.

The Archivist must have been a shade over six foot, and as thin as most women half his age would have liked to be. He was almost bald except for a semicircle of grey tufts around the base of his skull. He wore an ill-fitting suit that looked as if it normally experienced outings only on a Sunday morning. From his file, b.u.t.terworth knew the Archivist was younger than himself, but he vainly felt that if they hadbeen seen together, no one would have believed it.

He must have been born middle-aged, thought b.u.t.terworth, but the Special a.s.sistant had no such disparaging thoughts about the quality of the man's mind.

After a magna c.u.m laude at Duke University, Marshall had written a book on the history of the Bill of Rights that was now considered to be the standard text for every undergraduate studying American history. It had made him a small fortune - not that one could have guessed it by the way he dressed, thought b.u.t.terworth.

On the table in front of him was a file stamped 'Confidential', and above that the name 'Calder Marshall' in bold letters. Despite the fact that the Archivist was wearing horn-rimmed gla.s.ses with thick lenses, b.u.t.terworth felt he could hardly have missed it.

b.u.t.terworth paused before he began a speech he'd prepared every bit as a.s.siduously as the President had his inauguration address. Marshall sat, fingers intertwined, nervously waiting for b.u.t.terworth to proceed.

'You have, over the past sixteen years,' began the Special a.s.sistant, 'made several requests for the President to visit the National Archives.' b.u.t.terworth was pleased to observe that Marshall was looking hopeful. 'And, indeed, this particular President wishes to accept your invitation.' Mr Marshall's smile broadened. 'To that end, in our weekly meeting, President Clinton asked me to convey a private message to you, which he hoped you would understand must be in the strictest confidence.'

'In the strictest confidence. Of course.'

'The President felt sure he could rely on your discretion, Mr Marshall. So, I feel I can let you know that we're trying to clear some time during the last week of this month for him to visit the Archives, but nothing, as yet, has been scheduled.'

'Nothing, as yet, has been scheduled. Of course.'

'President Clinton has also requested that it be a strictly private visit, which would not be open to the public or the press.'

'Not be open to the press. Of course.'

'After the explosion at the World Trade Center, one can't be too careful.'

'Can't be too careful. Of course.'

'And I would be obliged if you did not discuss any aspect of the visit with your staff, however senior, until we areable to confirm a definite date. These things have a habit of getting out and then, for security reasons, the visit might have to be cancelled.'

'Have to be cancelled. Of course. But if it's to be a private visit,' said the Archivist, 'is there anything the President particularly wants to see, or will it just be the standard tour of the building?'

'I'm glad you asked that question,' said Mr b.u.t.terworth, opening the file in front of him. 'The President has made one particular request, apart from which he will be in your hands.'

'In my hands. Of course.'

'He wants to see the Declaration of Independence.'

'The Declaration of Independence. That's easy enough.'

'That is not the request,' said b.u.t.terworth.

'Not the request?'

'No. The President wishes to see the Declaration, but not as he saw it when he was a freshman at Georgetown, under a thick pane of gla.s.s. He wishes the frame to be removed so he can study the parchment itself. He hopes you will grant this request, if only for a few moments.'

This time the Archivist did not immediately say 'Of course.' Instead he said, 'Most unusual,' and added, 'Hopes I would grant him this request, if only for a few moments.'

There was a long pause before he said, 'I'm sure that will be possible, of course.'

'Thank you,' said Mr b.u.t.terworth, trying not to sound too relieved. 'I know the President will be most appreciative.

And, if I could impress on you again, not a word until we've been able to confirm the date.'

b.u.t.terworth rose and glanced at the long-case clock at the far end of the room. The meeting had taken twenty-two minutes. He would still be able to escape from the conference'room before he was thrown out by the officious woman from Scheduling.

The Special a.s.sistant to the President guided his guest towards the door.

'The President wondered if you would like to see the Oval Office while you're here?'

'The Oval Office. Of course, of course.'

HAMID AL OBAYDI was left alone in the centre of the room.

After two of the four guards had stripped him naked, the other two had expertly checked every st.i.tch of his clothingfor anything that might endanger the life of their President.

On a nod from the man who appeared to be the chief guard, a side door opened and a doctor entered the room, followed by an orderly who carried a chair in one hand and a rubber glove in the other. The chair was placed behind Al Obaydi, and he was invited to sit. He did so. The doctor first checked his nails and ears before instructing him to open his mouth wide while he tapped every tooth with a spatula. He then placed a clamp in his jaw so that it opened even wider, which allowed him to look into every crevice. Satisfied, he removed the clamp. He then asked Al Obaydi to stand up, turn round, place his legs straight and wide while bending over until his hands touched the seat of the chair. Al Obaydi heard the rubber glove being placed on the doctor's hand and felt a sudden burst of pain as two fingers were thrust up his r.e.c.t.u.m. He cried out and the guards facing him began to laugh. The fingers were extracted just as abruptly, repeating the jab of pain a second time.

'Thank you, Deputy Amba.s.sador,' said the doctor, as if he had just checked Al Obaydi's temperature for a mild dose of 'flu. 'You can get dressed now.' Al Obaydi knelt down and picked up his pants as the doctor and the orderly left the room.

As he dressed, Al Obaydi couldn't help wondering if each member of the Security Council went through the same humiliation every time Saddam called a meeting of the Revolutionary Command Council.

The order to return to Baghdad to give Sayedi an update on the latest position, as the Amba.s.sador to the UN had described the summons, filled Al Obaydi with considerable apprehension, despite the fact that following his most recent meeting with Cavalli he felt he had the answers to any questions the President might put to him.

Once Al Obaydi had reached Baghdad after a seemingly endless journey through Jordan - direct flights having been suspended as part of the UN sanctions - he hadn't been allowed to rest or even given the chance to change his clothes. He'd been driven direct to Ba'ath headquarters in a black Mercedes.

When Al Obaydi had finished dressing, he checked himself in a small mirror on the wall. His apparel was, on this occasion, modest compared with the outfits he'd left in his apartment in New York: Saks Fifth Avenue suits, Valentino sweaters, Church's shoes and a solid gold Carrier watch. Allthis had been rejected in favour of the one set of cheap Arab clothing he retained in the bottom drawer of his wardrobe in Manhattan.

When Al Obaydi turned away from the mirror, one of the guards beckoned him to follow as the door at the end of the room opened for the first time. The contrast to the bare, almost barrack-room surroundings of the examina-tion room took him by surprise. A thickly carpeted, ornately painted corridor was well lit by chandeliers that hung every few paces.

The Deputy Amba.s.sador followed the guard down the corridor, becoming more aware with each step of the ma.s.sive gold-painted door that loomed up ahead of him. But when he was only a few paces away, the guard opened a side door and ushered him into an ante-room that echoed the opulence of the corridor.

Al Obaydi was left alone in the room, but no sooner had he taken a seat on the large sofa than the door opened again. Al Obaydi jumped to his feet only to see a girl enter carrying a tray, in the centre of which was a small cup of Turkish coffee.

She placed the coffee on a table beside the sofa, bowed and left as silently as she had come. Al Obaydi toyed with the cup, aware that he had fallen into the Western habit of preferring cappuccino. He drank the muddy black liquid simply out of a nervous desire to be doing something.

An hour pa.s.sed slowly: he became increasingly nervous, with nothing in the room to read and only a ma.s.sive portrait of Saddam Hussein to stare at. Al Obaydi spent the time going over every detail of what Cavalli had told him, wishing he could refer to the file in his small attache case, which the guards had whisked away long before he'd reached the examination room.

During the second hour, his confidence began to drain away. During the third, he started to wonder if he would ever get out of the building alive.

Then suddenly the door swung open and Al Obaydi recognised the red-and-yellow flash on the uniform of one of Saddam's Presidential Guards: the Hemaya.

'The President will see you now,' was all the young officer said, and Al Obaydi rose and followed him quickly down the corridor towards the gold-painted door.

The officer knocked, opened the ma.s.sive door and stood on one side to allow the Deputy Amba.s.sador tojoin a full meeting of the Revolutionary Command Council.

Al Obaydi stood and waited, like a prisoner in the dock hoping to be told by the judge that he might at least be allowed to sit. He remained standing, well aware that no one ever shook hands with the President unless invited to do so.

He stared round at the twelve-man council, noticing that only two, the Prime Minister, Tariq Aziz, and the State Prosecutor, Nakir Farrar, were wearing suits. The other ten members were dressed in full military uniform but did not wear sidearms. The only hand gun, other than those worn by General Hamil, the Commander of the Presidential Guard, and the two armed soldiers directly behind Saddam, was on the table in front of the President, placed where other heads of state would have had a memo pad.

Al Obaydi became painfully aware that the President's eyes had never left him from the moment he had entered the room.

Saddam waved his Cohiba cigar at the Deputy Amba.s.sador to indicate that he should take the vacant seat at the opposite end of the table.

The Foreign Minister looked towards the President, who nodded. He then turned his attention to the man who sat nervously in the far chair.

'This, Mr President, as you know, is Hamid Al Obaydi, our Deputy Amba.s.sador at the United Nations, whom you honoured with the responsibility of carrying out your orders to steal the Declaration of Independence from the American infidels.