Florence of Arabia (19 page)

FLORENCE
CALLED
GEORGE
and Rick into her office and shut the door, then r
aised Bobby on the phone and put
him on the speaker.

"Bobby, I
want you to get George and Rick out of the country right away."

"Why?" A
fter a
pause, he said. "I thought you told Unc
le Sam you weren't... What's goin' on, Florence?"

"Bobby, please, just for ten minutes, pretend that you work for me? I want them both out of here tonight. Can you arrange for that water-taxi service of yours?"

"Aw. hell, girl, 1 can't just order up a nuclear submarine like it's Chinese takeout."

"Submarine?" George said, paling. "Stop
right
there. I don't do submarines. I'm claustrophobic."

"It's a big submarine, G
eorge," Florence said.

"It would have to be as big as the
Queen M
ary 2
and
St
av
on t
op of the water."

"G
eorge," Florence said sternly, "twelve hours from now, the most beautiful sight in the world to you might just be the conning tower of a U.S. fucking submarine. Bobby?"

"What?"

"Get them out of here. Sub. camel, hot-air ballo
o
n. I don'
t care. This is a high-priority exfilt
ration. Al
l right? Can I count on you? H
ello. Bobby?"

"I'm
here,
goddammit." After a few moments, his voice came back over the speaker. "You boys there?"

"We're here," Rick said, speaking for the stricken-looking George, who had clearly begun running the horror movie in his mind, starring himself, descending the ladder deeper, deeper...

"Okay, listen up. You know the Cafe Winston, o
n the E
splanade by the open-air fish restaurant? It's three-fifteen now. Be there in one hour. No later, understand? Do not go to your apartments. Do not take anything from the office with you. Just walk out the front door. Leave separately, ten minutes apart. Each of you carry a newspaper or magazine under your arm. It'll make you look casual. Walk, don't run. Don't look over your shoulder. If you see someone followin' you, it's probably one of
my people. Everything will be fine. When you get
to the cafe, order a coffee and sit tight. Pay for the coffee when it's put down. Leave a normal tip. You'll see two white Mercedes Amo taxis pull up, a few minutes apart. Each will have a strip of yellow tape on
the radio antenna. George, you take the first cab. Re
nard, the second. Take your newspaper with you. Have you got that? You want me to repeat it?"

"No, we've got it," Rick said.

"George, you there?" Bobby said.

"What?"

"It's gonna be all right. You're gonna be all right. Do you have some Valium or somethin' on you? Never mind, I'll have some in the cab. You'll be all right. Hey, there's lots of, uh, people like you on subs."

"Claustrophobes?"

"No, you k
now, uh— Never mind, you'll be f
ine." "Bobby?" Florence said.
"What?"
be snapped. "Thank vou." Bobby clicked off.

"I
le's not really thrilled
with me at the moment." "For G
od's sakes. what's going on?" George said.

"You're both going on R and R. You've both done a spectacular job. I'm proud of you." She felt herself choking up but managed to swallow it. "Firenze." George said,
"what
is going on?"

"It's about to get messy. I'd rather not have to worry about you two."

"H
ey hold on, I can handle it." Rick said. "You're talking to the man who put on a golf tournament in North Korea with O.J. Simpson."

"Rick, we're beyond spin. Look, we're about to lose the backing of whoever the hell it was who sent us over here. That makes our situation here, as they say at the old
State
Department, nonviable. This is when you evacuate non
-
essential personnel."

" 'Non
-
essential'?" Ri
ck said. "Is that
what I am?"

"You're the most brilliant—and t
wisted—mind in the business. And you're leaving in fifty-five minutes."

"Why can't we all leave?" George said.

Florence looked at her two boy
s. "I'm coming, too. I'll meet y
ou on the beach, but
l have t
o take care of some things."

They left. On the way out,
she heard George telling Rick. "I'm not going on a submarine. There's not enough Valium in the world."

When they were gone, Florence burst into tears, but, efficient girl that she was. she briskly got it over with and plunged back to work.

CHAPTER
EIGHTEEN

Good evening. I'm Falima Sham
for
TV
Matar,
and
this is
the
six
o'clock
report. Princess Hamzin, second wife
of King Tallulah of Wasabia, h
as been sentenced to death by stoning. Her crime: petitioning her husband and his ministers for basic women's rights. 1 spoke this afternoon by telephone with Prince Jerbil al
Jakar,
minister of Wasabi external affairs."

A still photograph of the minister appeared on-screen, accompanied by a recording of the telephone conversation.

"This is a monstrous lie! There is no truth at all to it. It is lies. All lies! Who has told you this terrible lie? Some villain."

"Will you make the princess available for an interview with us?"

"The royal household does not give interviews. No, this is a gross provocation. This is an attempt to interfere in our sovereign af
fairs. This will not succeed. N
o. no."

"Can you produce proof that the princess is alive?"

"Of course she is alive! Everyone is alive! Everyone is ha
ppy. G
ood night to you, madame."

There followed the sound of a phone being slammed down.

"That was Prince Jerbil al
J
akar, minister of Wasabi external affairs," Fatima continued. "The Wasabi practice when stoning women to death is to match the size of the stones to the severity of the offense. In
cases of adultery, small stones
are used to prolong the execution. It is not known what size stones might be used on a royal wife for the crime of petitioning to improve the situation of women. I spoke with Grand Mufti Adman Ilkir, one of Wasabia's leading religious authorities."

The tape rolled. "Grand Mufti Ifkir.
thank you for speaking with TV
Matar." "Yes, I am here. God be praised."

"This sounds like a very serious offense Princess Hamzin has committed." "Oh, most serious, most serious. There can be no punishment severe enough."

"What about stoning? That's pretty severe."

"Only if you use very small stones."

"Why not just cut off
her head?"

"No,
no, no. That is too quick. Too quick."

"So what size stones would you recommend?"

"The smallest, l
ike this. These are the best. Like the ones we throw at Satan in Mecca during the hajj."

"Those
are
small. Wouldn't it take a very long time to kill a woman with stones that small?"

"Yes. That is the point. It's a mercy. It gives her time to repent of her crime."

"Thank you for taking the time to speak with us."

"You are welcome."

Florence said through the intercom into Fatima's earpiece. "That'll get their attention. Good interviews."

"Florence" said a control-room assistant. "The sheika Laila. Line two." "Christ, Florence," Laila said, "what are you
doing?"
"What 1 came here to do."

"Does that include destabilizing the entire region?
Giving Wasabia an excuse to inv
ade us? And you, you'll be long gone, won't you? Last seen climbing aboard an American helicopter." She hung up before Florence could answer.

FLORENCE STAYED AT
her post in the control room through the night and into the next morning, monitoring developments. There's no better place, really, to monitor developments. All the world came to her on dozens of screens. On the one in front of her was a grim-looking man identified in the Chyron as
prince bawad, wasabi foreign minister.
Florence watched the husband of the late princess Nazrah, whose midnight dash to freedom had set off this chain of events. He looked distinctly unamused as he made his way past a scrum of bawling reporters outside the United Nations. "There is not one word of truth in this libel." He scowled, before disappearing into a limousine, surrounded by nervous security men.

On another monitor, Florence watched a crowd of women outside the Wasabi embassy in Washington, holding signs saying
wasabi pics
and
release
princess hamzin.

Well Nazrah,
Florence thought,
look what a great fuss you've created.

Another monitor showed a press briefing in progress at the State Department in Washington.

"I
have nothing for you on this at this point in time," the spokesman said, more lugubriously than usual, to a forest of raised hands in front of him.

"H
as the secretary spoken with the Wasabis about this?"

"Not to my— As I said, I
have nothing for you on this."

"What is the princess's current status?"

"You're free to ask their foreign ministry."

A French reporter asked, "What can you inform us about the relationship between the U.S. government and TV
Matar,
which has broadcast this provocative story?"

‘I’m
not aware of any connection."

"But the funding, it comes from the CIA, no?"

"1 wouldn't have any comment on that."

Florence found herself thinking about George and Rick. She imagined them all on the rubber boat, on their way out to the waiti
ng submarine, guarded by Navv SEAL
s with black faces. George would be complaining. She smiled, thinking of Bobby telling him about all the hunky sailors he'd meet.

She decided to check in. She dialed Uncle Sam on the secure cell. It rang several times, and a recorded voice told her she had reached a nonworking number. They were destroying the connective tissue. She was alone now.

Toward four in the morning, she got exhausted and needed to rest for at least an hour or so. There was an escape hatch in the ceiling of the bathroom off the control room. Bobby's people had installed it. She opened it and climbed up onto the roof of TV
Matar, which had a view of the city and the Gulf. She lay down and looked up at the night sky
over Matar. She knew that on any
given night in the Middle East, many people were sleeping on their roofs—to escape the heat, or the secret police. In a part of
the world where they come for y
ou in the middle of the night, it is a sensibl
e sleeping arrangement. The only
problem is that sometimes, along with the stars falling, come bullets raining down. Arabs love to fire joy shots into the air to celebrate life's victories: a wedding, the birth of a son, the news that a new martyr has ascended to heaven.

Florence drifted in and out of restless sleep until dawn, then climbed back down to the cont
rol room to the news that the W
asabis had produce
d evidence that the Princess H
amzin was alive and well.

Triumphant evidence. The princess was not only alive and well but slumping for jewelry, in Paris, no less. French television was showing footage of her. taken through the front window of Hermes
. The images showed Princess H
amzin handing over an American Express card for a $150,000 diamond bracelet. The news announcer came on with a smirk and said, "Evidently, the princess prefers to
wear
stones."

Florence scanned the other monitors. They were all showing the same footage. It was followed by Prince Bawad, a picture of smugness.

"The world can plainly sec," he said, stroking his goatee, "what an oppressed life our royal princesses lead."

For the next hour. Florence watchcd a succession of talking heads on dozens of television shows. One. an anthropology professor at the University of Chicago, said that the U.S. had no business trying to impose feminist values abroad, for the reason that many, perhaps even the majority of Arab or Indian or African women, "don't want to be liberated." "How would
we
feel," he asked thoughtfully, "if one
of those
countries tried to impose
its
values on
us?"

Florence was pondering whether the majority of, say, Arab women were content with the status quo when her cell phone rang. It was
Laila
.

"I shouldn't have said what I said."

"You don't have any apologies to make to me," Florence said. "I take it you've seen the images? From Paris?"

"Yes." "Well?"

"There are two possible explanations." Florence said. "The first is that the information was wrong. The second is that we saved her life."

"I must say, it wasn't quite my idea of Arab suffrage, forking over an Amer
ican Express card for a hundred-and-fifty-thousand-dollar bracelet at H
ermes."

"You saw the expression on her face. She looked doped." "Is that what you're going to say on television?"

"I don't know." Florence
wished
Renard, master of spin and counterspin, were here. "I've been outmaneuvered."

"Would yo
u care to know where the New Sal
adin stands? I think he's about to institute lapidation in
Matar
—for TV
Matar
executives. Will we be issuing an apology?"

"To those bastards? Over my dead body."

"I wouldn't say that in the Middle Fast, if I were you. Better issue
something. I'll try and fend off the New Saladin, but you'd better get
cracking."

Florence stared at the bank of glowing TV screens in front of her and summoned Fatima.

"Fatima," she said, "the day will come when you practice legitimate journalism. But that day will not be this day."

"GOOD
AFTERNOON
FROM
the TV
Matar
newsroom in Amo-Amas, I'm Fatima Sham.

"A source close to the Wasabi royal family has confirmed to TV
Matar that the princess Hamzin was in fact sentenced to death by stoning for the crime of disrespect. He further confirms that because of negative world reaction to this news, along with mounting international outrage, the royal household is attempting a cover-up. Last night, according to the source, the princess was drugged and put aboard a Royal Wasabi Air Force plane and flown lo Paris, where a staged shopping expedition was mounted to make it appear that she is thousands of miles away, buying expensive jewelry, and not facing a horrible death. We bring you this ex
clusive interview with the Kaff
a palace insider.

Because he fears for his life, we agreed not to show his face and to identify him only as 'Abdul.'