He put the hat and glasses back on. He’d disappeared many times in his life, sometimes while in the employ of others, including the government of the United States. Other times he’d been on his own, his shooting skill and nerve purchased by the highest bidder. But as he’d told Hemingway, his next disappearing act would be his last.
He drove out of town to the ceremonial grounds, barely ten minutes from downtown, and yet a lot could happen in ten minutes.
Captain Jack didn’t stop at the grounds but instead drove past them slowly, eyeing certain landmarks he’d long since committed to memory. The ceremonial grounds were framed by white rail farm fencing with only one vehicle entry point and numerous pedestrian entrances. Six-foot-high brick columns framed the car entrance, and the motorcade would have to pass through there going in and out. The Beast would find it a tight squeeze.
He eyeballed the surrounding tree lines, guessing at the placement of the American countersnipers that would be posted along this perimeter. How many would there be? A dozen? Two dozen? It was hard to tell these days, even with the best intelligence. They would be wrapped in their camouflage suits, blending in with their surroundings so perfectly you would step on them before you ever saw them. Yes, his men would most certainly die on these hallowed grounds. At least it would be quick and painless. Supersonic long-range ordnance, particularly to the head, killed you faster than your brain could react. The fedayeen’s death, however, would not be nearly as painless.
Captain Jack envisioned the motorcade coming in and the president exiting the Beast. He would wave, shake hands, pat some backs, give some hugs and then be escorted to the bullet- and bombproof podium as “Hail to the Chief” was played.
The reason the song was used when a U.S. president entered a room originated with President James Polk’s wife, who was furious that her diminutive, homely husband was often totally ignored when making an entrance. Thus, Sarah Polk ordered that the song be played whenever her husband came into a room. All presidents since had followed this imperious woman’s lead.
However, the origin of the song itself was even more amusing, at least to Captain Jack’s thinking. Set to the words of Sir Walter Scott’s epic poem The Lady of the Lake, it described the demise of a Scottish chieftain who was betrayed and then put to death by his archenemy, King James V. Ironically enough, the song that was used to herald the coming of the president of the United States actually chronicled the assassination of a head of state. In the last part of Canto Five, the poem summed up, in Captain Jack’s opinion, a query that all would-be politicians should give serious thought to: “O who would wish to be thy king?”
“Not me,” he muttered to himself. “Not me.”
The ex-National Guardsman settled himself in the chair and looked at his new hand while the two men watched him carefully.
“Now that we’ve added the pouch, let’s begin practicing the movements,” the engineer said.
The American moved his hand and wrist as he had been shown, but nothing happened.
“It takes practice. Soon you will be an expert.”
Two hours later they had made considerable progress. Taking a break, the men sat and talked. “So you were a truck driver?” the chemist asked.
The former soldier nodded, holding up his hook and fake hand. “Not an occupation you can really do with these because I also had to help unload the cargo.”
“How long were you in Iraq before it happened?”
“Eighteen months. I only had four more months to pull, at least I thought. Then we got orders extending our tour another twenty-two months. Four years! Before all this happened I was married with a wife and family and holding my own in Detroit. The next thing I know, I’m scrambling to get the money to buy my own body armor and GPS because Uncle Sam didn’t have the cash. Then a land mine outside of Mosul takes both my hands and a chunk of my chest. Four months in Walter Reed Hospital, and I get back home to find my wife’s divorcing me, my job’s long gone and I’m basically homeless.” He paused and shook his head. “I did my tour during Persian Gulf One and sucked in all the shit Saddam was chucking at us. After my discharge from the army I joined the National Guard so I could at least have some income until I got back on my feet. I did my Guard duty and then resigned and started driving trucks. Then after all those years the army knocks on my door and tells me my Guard resignation was never ‘officially’ accepted. I told them not so politely to go to hell. But they literally hauled me kicking and screaming away. Then a year and a half later boom, there go my hands and my life. My own country did that to me!”
“Now it’s your turn to repay them,” the engineer said.
“Yes. It is,” the very ex-National Guardsman agreed as he flexed his hand.
Adnan al-Rimi strode through the hallways of Mercy Hospital, his observant gaze methodically taking in all details of his surroundings. A minute later he returned to the hospital’s front entrance just as an elderly patient was wheeled in, a portable IV hooked to her arm.
Adnan stepped outside and breathed in the warm air. To the left of the hospital’s front steps was a ramp for gurneys and wheelchair-bound patients. Al-Rimi walked down the steps to the sidewalk that ran in front of the hospital. There were fourteen steps. He turned and walked back up them, silently counting time as he did so. Seven seconds at a normal pace, perhaps half that if someone was running.
He went back inside the hospital, his hand sliding down to his sidearm. It was an old .38 revolver, a piece of American crap, as far as he was concerned. Yet that was the only weapon the security firm he worked for had to offer. It didn’t really matter, he knew, but still, weapons were of paramount importance to Adnan. He had required them virtually his whole life simply to survive.
He walked back down to the nurse’s station and stopped at the fourth tile over from the exact center of the station. Then he turned around and walked back toward the front entrance. Anyone watching him would just assume he was making his rounds. He counted off his paces in his head, nodding to a pair of nurses who walked by as he did so. Near the front entrance he turned right, counted his steps down this hallway, turned, pushed open the door to the exit stairs, counted his steps down two flights and found himself in the basement corridor on the west side of the hospital building. This corridor ran into another that carried him north and then emptied out into the rear exit area. A wide asphalt drive was located here that sloped upward to the main road running behind the hospital. Because of the grade and poor drainage, it often flooded here after even a moderate rain, which was another reason why everyone preferred entering through the front.
As he stood there, Adnan visualized several times a particular maneuver in his head. Finished, he went over to a pair of double doors, unlocked them and stepped inside, closing the doors behind him. He was now in the hospital’s power room, which also housed the backup generator. He’d been coached on the basics of this room by the security firm, in case there was an emergency. He’d supplemented that coaching by reading the manuals for every piece of equipment in the room. There was only one that he was really interested in. It sat on a wall across from the generator. He opened the box with another key on his chain and studied the controls inside. It wouldn’t be difficult to rig it, he decided.
He locked up the power room and went back inside the hospital to continue his rounds. He would do this every day, until the day came.
A little while later Adnan’s shift ended, and he changed out of his uniform in the hospital’s locker room and rode his bicycle to his apartment about two miles away. He prepared a meal of flat bread, dates, fava beans, olives and a piece of halal meat that he cooked on the stovetop in his tiny kitchen.