The Search for Yaser Abdel Said (Part 35

Printer-friendly versionSend to friendPDF versionThe men seated around the conference table stared at Jimmy Carter. Richard the Lion-Heart could have parachuted into the middle of their séance from the siege of Acre with a crossbow strapped to his back and would have caused less alarm. Mouths gaped open; eyes flickered with fear. Che Guevara was the first to recover. He smiled. He was Alfonso Bedoya in Treasure of the Sierra Madre. :”Ah, Senor Carter,” he said. “Mi amigos tell me you were Presidente of the United States. It is an honor to meet you.” The peanut farmer from Plains, Georgia, seemed embarrassed. He smiled self-deprecatingly. “I hope I am not disturbing anyone,” he said. “I seem to have taken a wrong turn somewhere.” “No, no,” said White Robe “You are not disturbing anyone.” He stood up, gestured at the conferees. “The meeting has just adjourned.” “We were discussing the lack of burial space down here,” said the Keeper who looked like Telly Savalas. There was an evil glint in his eye. “Burial space?” echoed Carter. “Why on earth would you want to bury someone down here? Is seems such an odd place.” The man in the military uniform sighed. “To avoid an International Incident,” he said. “It’s a joke! It’s a joke!” someone said. The portly little fellow who had been in a hurry, stood up, stuffed some papers in an attaché case. “Well, Allahu akbar,” he said. “I have business to attend to.” And so did everyone else. There was a rush for the exit. No one wanted to be the last person to see Jimmy Carter alone and alive with Che Guevara in the conference room and in a matter of minutes the chamber was cleared—save for White Robe, Che, and Bernard Piffy. And, of course, Jimmy Carter. “You have a nice room here,” said Carter. “But you could do something about the lightning.” Then he noticed the long-barreled pistol lying on the table. “Is that the gun John Wayne used in True Grit?” he asked. He was making a joke. Che Guevara chortled. “Si, John Wanye,” he said. “Cock-a-doodle do.” Alfonso Bedoya could not have done it better. White Robe had grown exceedingly uncomfortable. “You really shouldn’t have come down here, Mr. President,” he said. “It’s too dangerous.” “It was the rabbit,” explained Carter. “I didn’t want to disturb the rabbit so I took the long way and got lost.” “Rabbit?” said White Robe. “There are no rabbits down here.” “Oh, but there are,” said Carter. “I have seen them. They usually come out after I’ve been here an hour or so. They can be quite aggressive.” He paused. “Do you mind if I tell you a story? So help me God, it’s true. I was attacked by a killer rabbit…yes, a killer rabbit. It happened a long time ago. I believe the rabbit was God’s messenger bearing some unfathomable warning. Something undecipherable. It was in 1979. I was in a canoe. I was fishing when somehow a rabbit appeared in the water. It swam toward me, hissing and snarling and baring its teeth. I hit it with a paddle and then I ran. My press secretary said I threw water at it so the animal rights people wouldn’t get after me. A rabbit…a killer rabbit…can you imagine that?” If Carter expected any sympathy he was disappointed. “You are one great big coward to be afraid of a rabbit, Senor Presidente,” scoffed Guevara. He grinned a Piffy. He would end it right now. He reached for the long-barreled gun lying on the table. One shot and it would be over—but Piffy beat him to it. The private eye snatched the pistol from the table so quickly Che’s mouth dropped open! It was a Redhawk 357 and it was fully loaded. Piffy spun the cylinder, smiled a Guevara, bowed and then looked at Carter. “Mr. President,” he said, “ you being a former military man, you might want to look at this thing,” “Well, I would like to,” said Carter, “but I must be getting back to the Embassy…they will be worried about me. The rabbit is probably gone by now. They never stay long. I thank you though.” He nodded at White Robe. “You really ought to do something about the lights in here. It makes everyone look like Che Guevara…creepy.” And then he was gone as suddenly and as mysteriously as he had come. Guevara glared at Piffy. “You bastardo!” he hissed. “If you want to kill an unarmed man,” said Piffy, “I’ll give you a chance.” He walked toward Che, laid the Redhawk on the table so that it lay equally distant between them. “I’ll count to three,” he said. “When I get to three, we’ll both go for the gun—the two of us—if you want, you can go before I get to three—loser dies.” Che licked his lips. “One…” said Piffy. Che glanced nervously about the room. “Two…” said Piffy. Che swallowed but made no effort toward the gun. “Three…” said Piffy. Che had not moved a muscle. “I thought so,” Piffy said contemptuously. He turned away and Che grabbed the gun, aimed it at the back of Piffy’s head and pulled the trigger! And nothing happened! Nada! Zilch! Piffy had emptied the gun. It was a trick he had practiced a thousand times while sitting in his office his first year in the private eye business with nothing to do except wish he was Mike Hammer. He could empty a gun in three seconds, load one in four and no one would notice—not even Hammer when Piffy pulled the trick on him at a private eye convention. “Allah akbar!” muttered White Robe. This was too much for him. He groped for a chair. He was not accustomed to this type of horseplay. He was a man of culture, a man of science. Piffy walked over to Guevara, took the gun from his hand and cuffed him across the face. “Now get the hell out of here!” he said. Guevara sank down in a chair. He wasn’t going anywhere. He was terrified. It was Columbia all over again. His frightened eyes raced around the room like a rat looking for a way off a sinking ship. Was this the greatest revolutionary hero of the 20th Century, the idol of thousands of undereducated and overindulged college professors and college students from Berkeley to Belarus? Say it wasn’t so, Noam Chomsky! “You have made a terrible enemy,” said White Robe. “And you?” challenged Piffy. “Oh, I am not one of them,” said White Robe. “I am a scientist. I am their expert on fleas. I do their bidding for which I am well paid. When they want to know something about fleas they call on me. Left on their own, they wouldn’t know one of the little rascals from another. They wouldn’t know a Sufi from an al-Qaeda, though I must admit Sufi fleas are very rare and hard to identify.” “Is there such a thing?” asked Piffy. White Robe smiled. He picked up his brief case and set it on the table. He produced a key, unlocked the case and laid it open and Piffy, never one to miss an opportunity, caught a glimpse of what must have been a ‘flea’ monitor wrapped in some kind of paper that must have been a roadmap. In the time it took White Robe to gather up a sheaf of papers and arrange them into a coherent mass, Piffy stole the monitor. White Robe shut the brief case. “Well, that’s that,” he said. “Suppose I should want to get in touch with you later,” said Piffy. “Is there some place we could meet?” “I am not allowed to meet any of the Keepers privately,” said White Robe. “It would be a gross violation of my contract.” He nodded at Guevara. “If you want to talk to me for any reason, you will have to go through Ahmad.” “Too bad,” said Piffy. “I think we could do business.” “Yes,” said White Robe. He looked nervous. “I am sorry but I have to run. I will see you at the next meeting.” As White Robe made his exit Piffy remembered the caretaker he had left gagged and hogtied in the closet. He was helping the poor wretch to his feet when he heard White Robe call from the turbine room. Good grief! What now? “Mr. Carter was right!” shouted White Robe. “There is a rabbit in here! And, Allahu akbar, such a large one! I had thought Mr. Carter was fleeing from something in his past and the rabbits were a symbol of some sexual repression, probably his association with Chairman Arafat but there may be more to this than I had imagined…” There was more but White Robe’s voice was soon absorbed in the wheezing of the ancient turbines. Piffy stuffed a wad of dinars in the angry caretakers hand and hastened after White Robe. He left the Redhawk lying on the floor of the closet. White Robe must have been in a hurry for Piffy never did catch up with him but he found Jimmy Carter in the main office of the Fuhrerbunker. The lights were on and the peanut farmer from Plains, Georgia, was pacing back and forth in front of Yasser’s chair. There was a wild look in his eyes and his hair was mussed. This must have been the way he looked the night he lost the election to Ronnie Reagan. “It’s here!” he said. “It’s here!” “What’s here?” asked Piffy. He should have known. “The rabbit,” said Carter. Piffy took Carter by the elbow. “Look, Mr. President…” he began. “I’ll be alright. I’ll be alright,” insisted Carter. “We’ll have a recount and someone will shoot the rabbit.” “Don’t you wish!” chortled Che Guevara. The words bounced across the room like a string of firecrackers. Noam Chomsky’s favorite revolutionary had made a remarkable recovery. Alfonso Bedoya was riding again! He had retrieved the Redhawk and he was moving straight toward Piffy, the gun out in front of him at an arm’s length as if it were Beelzebub’s lightning rod. “Don’t be afraid, Mr. President,” said Piffy. “He doesn’t have any bullets.” “Bullets?” chortled Guevara. “Of course I have bullets, you Capitalist simpleton. I always carry a few spare rounds in my anal arms room.” “You’re crazy,” said Piffy. “Only a total one-hundred percent registered idiot would stuff bullets up his butt.” “Well…”chortled Guevara. The Redhawk barked and a bullet tore a lock of hair from the back of Piffy’s head. Only a total one-hundred-percent registered idiot… Jimmy Carter clutched at Piffy’s sleeve. “Make him stop,” he wailed. “He will make the rabbit angry!” “On the count of three—Mr. Bernard Piffy…”chortled Guevara. (To be continued)