"Of the world?" I echoed in a whisper. "But I thought--"

"Oh, our efforts are quite global. Here--come and look at this, Doctor." Tressalian turned and hobbled over to a bank of monitors that was installed on a low table at the center of the observation dome. "It may help you understand."

I soon found myself staring at half a dozen images of a considerable military force on the move. There were ships at sea, planes in flight and a carrier crew loading still more planes with bombs and missiles.

"What is it?" I asked.

"The reason your friend Mr. Jenkins was killed," Tressalian replied. "An American task force, on its way to inflict what will certainly be a massive attack."

"On whom? Where are they going?"

"The same place we are--Afghanistan."

"Afghanistan..." I mumbled, thunderstruck. "But why? And how in hell are you getting pictures of all this?"

"By satellite," he answered simply. "Our own satellites."

My mind made a sudden connection. "Satellites...satellites! Tressalian--the man who devised the four-gigabyte satellite system--the man who created the modern Internet!"

"Wait, now," my host protested. "Don't hold me responsible for that--my father committed that particular sin, among many others. But he paid for his transgressions, in the end--and his money did allow all of us to undertake all this."

"But what in God's name are you doing?"

"The more important question right now," Tressalian answered evasively, "is, What is your government doing? It would seem that it intends finally to eradicate the very impressive underground complex that has been the principal training ground for Islamic terrorists during the past two decades."

I looked at the busy screens again. "Retaliation for Khaldun's killing President Forrester?" I asked.

Tressalian nodded. "Your country is, after all, nearing a national election. But there's a slight problem with the government's decision, one it has begun to suspect but cannot, given the political rhetoric that led to this launch, allow anyone such as yourself to stumble on. You see, Muhammed Khaldun wasn't a terrorist--and he certainly didn't kill President Forrester."

"But the disc--"

"The man on that disc--" Tressalian touched a keypad on the table and brought up the assassination images that Max and I had studied for so many hours "--was in fact an actor of Afghan origin who enjoyed some slight success in the Indian film industry during the last part of the 20th century. We--borrowed his image." Tressalian seemed slightly amused. "Well, how could I know that there was a minor Afghan diplomat in Chicago who might be the man's double? Don't worry, though--we've arranged for Mr. Khaldun's escape. At any rate, the actual killer of the late, lamented President Forrester was--" Another touch of a keypad, and the image before me changed to the second version of the event that I'd seen, the one in which the assassin's face was Asian "--this fellow Hung Ting-hsin, a major in the Chinese external security force."

I paused, now wholly unaware of the dance of fire and death that was going on beyond the transparent shell around us. "You deliberately distorted what happened?"

"I'm afraid so."

"So Price created those images for you--you were the 'private contractor' his wife told me about."

"Correct again. None of us were happy about Mr. Price's death, Doctor--but he'd decided to try to blackmail us. Then, when Larissa and Jonah went to warn him against such a course, he became violent. Actually knocked Jonah against a wall, and would have done worse, but--well, Larissa..."

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