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• 1:15 P.M.
Marten left the restaurant and crossed the plaza, going back the way he had come in. Other than Beck and the women, Foxx seemed to be have been alone, and maybe he was. After all, this was Montserrat, not Malta, where he had a home and was seemingly headquartered. On the other hand, all Marten had to do was remember Salt and Pepper to appreciate the long reach that the South African had.
Demi remained the puzzle she'd been all along. The shake of her head across the table in her silent refusal to accept blame for Foxx's knowledge of the president's being there hadn't helped. Clearly it had been intended to make him believe her, but there were still too many things unanswered, among them how Beck had found him so quickly. Clearly the reverend hadn't been as indifferent to his arrival in Barcelona as Demi had said. Moreover, they had known he was coming to Montserrat and when, and that was something only Demi could have told them. To that extent she had set him up.
Foxx's sudden and deliberate inclusion of the president, however, changed everything and dramatically elevated the stakes of the game. It made Marten even more curious about what Demi was doing. Unless she was working with Beck and therefore in Foxx's camp, which still seemed probable, what else could be so compelling that she was willing to give up the president of the United States to get it, especially now, under the circumstances, most of which she knew well?
On the other hand, if she was doing something else and her head shake meant she was telling the truth, it would mean Foxx's knowledge of the president's whereabouts had come from somewhere else-Miguel or the president's "friends." Thinking that way he had to assume it was the latter because Miguel had proven himself a man far too honest, humble, and forthright for such things, and because by now the president's "friends" would be fully aware he had been in Marten's hotel room in Barcelona the night before and would assume that since neither had been caught he was still with him. Therefore if Marten was going to Montserrat, the president would be too. It was something they should have considered beforehand and been prepared for, but they hadn't and so they had literally walked right into the "Foxx's lair."
Still, they had one thing going for them, if it could be called that-the president had yet to reveal himself. It meant they still had the chance to get out and away before the Secret Service or CIA showed up and the trap was snapped shut once and for all.
• 1:18 P.M.
Marten left the plaza and turned right, walking past the multistoried building he'd seen as he'd come up from the cable car terminal. At the far end he turned right again, passed under a high archway, and then worked his way back toward the restaurant in a group of tourists, all the while looking to see if he was being followed; as far as he could tell, he was not.
At this point he'd made a complete circle and again approached the Hotel Abat Cisneros and the restaurant, where Cousin Jack should now be ensconced, waiting somewhere near the hallway leading to the men's restroom and the door to the pathway outside. Here Marten had to make absolutely certain he wasn't being tailed. Purposely, he walked past the restaurant's main doorway and entered the Hotel Abat Cisneros itself. Inside, he crossed the lobby, took note of the interior entrance to the restaurant, then walked into a small bar across from it. He waited for the bartender, then ordered a bottle of beer, took it to a table where he could watch the door, and sat down. His plan was to wait three minutes, and if no one suspicious came in, get up and leave, entering the restaurant directly from the hotel itself.
• 1:23 P.M.
Marten took a sip of beer and casually looked around. The only people there were those he had seen as he entered, the bartender and six customers; two each at separate tables and two at the bar itself, where a television was tuned to CNN International and an athletic-looking male reporter was speaking from behind the anchor desk.
"In a video just released by the Department of Homeland Security," he said, "we are about to have a look at President Harris at the undisclosed location he was taken to by the Secret Service after the terrorist threat in Madrid. With him are National Security Adviser James Marshall, Secretary of Defense Terrence Langdon and Secretary of State David Chaplin."
Abruptly the picture cut to the video. It had a ru
"The president wants it known," the reporter said in a voice-over, "that he is safe and well and fully intends to meet with European leaders as scheduled at the NATO meeting Monday in Warsaw."
Abruptly the clip ended and the reporter tied it up with a simple "We'll have more on this later." There was a fade-out and a commercial popped on.
"My God," Marten breathed, "they've got everything covered."
Another sip of beer and he looked away from the television and toward the door. So far no one else had come in since he'd entered. Forty seconds passed, then fifty. If someone was following him, they would have been there by now. Marten put down his glass and started to get up. As he did another television story caught his attention. This time the location was Chantilly, France. Two jockeys had been shot and killed early that morning while working out racehorses at a practice track that ran through a nearby forest. The killer had evidently been lying in wait in the woods and had fired from the cover of the trees, then afterward simply walked away, leaving the murder weapon, a United States military-issue M14 rifle, behind, as if to both taunt and intrigue investigators. What added considerably to the mystery was that both jockeys had been killed with the same bullet, the shot passing through the head of the first man and then penetrating the skull of the second. It was a shot investigators deemed either accidental-there had been only one intended victim-or eerily intentional, as if the killer was deliberately demonstrating his skill. In either case the French police had never seen anything like it. Nor, in all his long-ago days as a Los Angeles Police Department homicide detective, had Marten.
• 1:28 P.M.
Cousin Jack saw Marten come in but didn't acknowledge him. Seemingly unmindful of the noisy group of children and parents crowding a large table nearby, he was sitting as pla
Marten stopped for a moment as he entered, then glancing around, casually crossed to where the president was and took a seat at the table next to him. "Foxx knows you're here," he said quietly. "He's in a private room down the hall. He wants you to join us. How he found out I'm not sure, but I don't think Demi told him and I seriously doubt Miguel did either. That leaves-"
"Only one reasonable answer, and we both know what it is," the president raised his head and looked at Marten, his expression stone-cold. "If there was ever any doubt my 'friends' were in league with Dr. Foxx, that uncertainty has been erased."
"If you want more," Marten said, "CNN just played a video clip that supposedly came from the Department of Homeland Security. It showed you in a rustic cabin someplace, clean shaven and with your hairpiece on. With you were the secretary of state, the national security adviser, and the secretary of defense. The report said the video was made yesterday afternoon and that you would still be in Warsaw Monday as pla