'Like you.'

She took out the shining pink sapphire ring and slipped it on her finger. 'Are you buying me?' she said, trying to smile. 'You don't need to, you know.'

'I'm adorning you.' He smiled. 'You don't need it, you know.'

She held up her hand with its pink sapphire. 'I love it,' she said. Her arms went around him. 'I love you.'

'Show me,' he said as they parted.

She clasped his hand tightly and walked him to the bedroom. He undressed quickly, and when he was naked he saw that she was naked lying on her back on the bed, arms outstretched.

'Let's not play,' she said. 'Let's love.'

She lifted her legs and spread them apart, and he was atop her immediately. She clutched him tightly as he pressed between her legs and entered her.

She gave a throaty outcry, and he groaned.

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He quickened the pace, thrusting hard, pushing her against the headboard. He rose and fell as she held on, gradually rolling her hips, until he was in a frenzy.

They went on and on, for long minutes, until their mutual eruptions.

He came off her, on his back, wet and panting. She dropped her legs, brushing her corn-silk hair from her eyes, trying to catch her breath and even it out.

Side by side, they lay in silence.

'Never stop loving me,' she said.

'It's all I want to do,' he promised.

Later, when she was breathing regularly again and sound asleep, and he had raised himself on an elbow, ready to get out of bed and leave her, he knew that his last words to her had been a lie.

Loving her was fantastic, a small fulfillment, but it was not all that he wanted to do, or intended to do.

s.e.x was not first-best but second-best.

Power was first-best.

Power to manipulate, control, dominate - everything, everyone, the world.

It had come to him with clarity after he came, what to do, how to do it. It was dangerous, very dangerous, this bigger seduction, this rape of life. But he would attempt it. He would enjoy the ultimate o.r.g.a.s.m.

CHAPTER FIVE.

Tempting as it had been to bask in another morning of sunshine, Edward Armstead had firmly adjusted the blinds to minimize the brightness. He wanted no relaxing atmosphere in his office. He wanted the tone to be somber and businesslike.

When Nick Ramsey and Victoria Weston answered his summons to see them, Armstead greeted them curtly. After gesturing them to places before his desk, he went behind it, sat down, and picked up the sheaf of typewritten notes that Ramsey had left for him yesterday.

Although he had read the notes twice, Armstead reviewed them once more.

'You can smoke,' he said without looking up. Ramsey immediately extracted a bent pack of cigarettes and lit one. Victoria remained with her hands folded in her lap.

Presently Armstead put down the sheaf of notes. He was ready to tread the path - a trailblazer's path - toward which the Yinger affair had directed him. He would have to ascend it cautiously, a step at a time, conscious always of the possibility of fatal pitfalls.

First step.

'Nick, I've been reading the notes you originally made for our Special Project, the one we called "The Time of the Terrorist,"' said Armstead. 'It's still good stuff.'

'I really enjoyed digging it up,' said Ramsey. 'I wish it had worked out.'

'It may yet,' said Armstead. 'I have something in mind. Something that would require cooperation from both of you. First, I want to find out more about these notes from you, Nick. For the time, 63 Victoria need do no more than listen. Then we'll see. You ready to discuss your terrorist researches, Nick?'

Ramsey came out of his slouch, more alert. 'I'll be glad to tell you anything that's not in my notes, Mr. Armstead, anything I can remember or help you with.'

'I want an evaluation from you, Nick,' said Armstead. 'There are so many of these terrorist groups running around, I was wondering - well, simply put, which ones are the most important?'

'The most important in what sense?' inquired Ramsey.

'Relatively, a lot of these groups must be fly-by-nighters or Mickey Mousers. Ignore them. Which are the most powerful and effective?'

'Of those currently in existence?'

'Right now,' said Armstead.

'The most powerful, the most effective...' repeated Ramsey. 'Easily the biggest, the best trained, the best financed is the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, known as the PFLP. They're a Marxist organization directed out of Damascus. Saudi Arabia gives them $25 million a year.

Colonel Qaddafi of Libya gives them at least $50 million a year. One of their cadres pulled off the Munich Olympics ma.s.sacre in 1972.'

'Name some others.'

'Others who are powerful?' mused Ramsey, giving it some thought. 'Without ranking them exactly, I'd say the best disciplined and most active after the PFLP are the Red Brigades of Italy, the Baader-Meinhof gang in West Germany, the j.a.panese Red Army, the Irish Republican Army or IRA, the Turkish Popular Liberation Front, the ETA Basque separatists in Spain and - down in South America - the Tupamaros in Uruguay.'

'Any common bond?' wondered Armstead.

'Revolution in our time, down with capitalism,' said Ramsey. 'Most of them are supported with money, weapons, training, by the Kremlin, the Soviet Union. I suppose the one person who's had something to do with a majority of the groups is the leading terrorist hitman, the man known as Carlos.'

'Ah, Carlos,' said Armstead, touching the research folder. 'The Venezuelan playboy turned killer. I saw several of the photographs you had of him. A fat, soft, moon-faced young man. He looks harmless.'

'Don't let his looks fool you,' said Ramsey. 'Carlos is ruthless. Human life means nothing to him. Before Carlos was well known, he was living in a third-floor apartment in the Rue Toullier in the Latin Quarter of Paris. A friend of his, a Lebanese named Moukarbel, was forced to turn informer, and he led three French intelligence detectives to Carlos.

During his interrogation, Carlos got permission to go to the bathroom. He came out with a 7.65mm Russian automatic blazing, killed two of the detectives, seriously wounded the third, shot the informer in the head, and escaped. All in ten seconds. His other credits are in my notes.'

'I don't recall the details,' said Armstead. 'There's so much.'

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'Carlos helped organize the j.a.panese Red Army ma.s.sacre at Israel's Lod Airport,' said Ramsey. 'He tossed a grenade into Le Drugstore in Paris, killing two, injuring twelve, burning the store down.

He drove a Peugeot to a runway at Orly Airport and unleashed a hand rocket launcher against a Boeing 707 El Al plane with 136 pa.s.sengers. That was a miss. He set up the hijacking of an Air France plane in Athens that led to the Entebbe rescue by the Israelis. I personally think his most successful caper was the one in Vienna in 1975, when he and five comrades took a streetcar to OPEC headquarters in the Texaco Building. Carlos and his group walked in and murdered three security guards, took eleven oil ministers hostage, flew them to Algiers where they were released-once he had his payoff. That took planning and guts. He's a tough one.'

'You speak as if he's still around. Is he?'

'I don't know,' said Ramsey. 'He was when I researched the story for you in Paris. That's the last I heard.'

'You don't know if he's alive?'

'I really don't know. But I'd guess so. There's been no word of his death. He was alive in 1982 when he sent a threat, with his thumbprints, to the French Interior Ministry from somewhere in Holland.'

'Where would he be now?'

Ramsey shrugged. 'Could be in London, in Bonn, in Damascus. But he's probably in Paris.'

The publisher stared past Victoria reflectively, then engaged Ramsey again. 'Nick, tell me what this is all about. This Carlos, is he a Commie?'

Ramsey shook his head. 'Oddly, I don't think he is. From his background in my notes, you might believe so. His father was a Colombian who moved to Venezuela and made millions in real estate.

The father had three sons and he named them after Lenin. The father was a rich Marxist. He gave his son Carlos the name Ilich after Lenin's middle name. Carlos was Ilich Ramirez Sanchez, born in 1949. He got Communist training at Camp Matanzas, outside Havana, under a KGB colonel. Later, Carlos attended Patrice Lumumba Friendship University in Moscow. He was thrown out for drinking and womanizing - probably a KGB ploy to get him underground. But I don't think he was a Communist. You know, when he did that OPEC caper in Vienna, one of his hostages was Sheikh Yamani, the oil minister from Saudi Arabia. Yamani talked to Carlos a great deal, and had no sense that Carlos believed in either the Communist or Palestinian cause.'

Armstead remained puzzled. 'Why has he been going around kidnapping and shooting people?'

Ramsey lifted his shoulders. 'Not certain. He is supposed to believe in international revolution, Maoist variety. Don't bet on it. Maybe he likes the adventure. Maybe he likes the money. Maybe he likes the power. He's supposed to have his own group, hand-picked German and Arab a.s.sa.s.sins. All the other groups are purely political. Carlos's group may or may not be.'

The publisher busied himself unwrapping a fresh cigar. After a few moments he inquired, almost casually, 'How'd you get all this material on Carlos and his gang?'

'Many sources,' said Ramsey. 'The best one was an informant in the Carlos group. A minor member who mostly did errands, but a member. I was in Paris, spreading money around, and met this Middle Eastern type who had a girl friend in the Carlos group and did errands for her. I asked Mr.

Dietz for a thousand dollars, and I paid off the informant for the information you've just read. It was all I could get.'

65.

'I want more,' said Armstead, standing up and lighting his cigar.

Ramsey showed his surprise. 'On Carlos?'

'On Carlos and his group.'

'I'm not sure that's possible,' said Ramsey.

'Anything is possible,' said Armstead. He made a meandering tour of his office, talking as he walked. 'I want to reactivate the terrorist series, now that I'm in charge. I want Carlos to be the focal point, at least to start with. I want you to go back to Europe, Nick, to Paris - you and Victoria Weston together; you'll need all the a.s.sistance you can get.'

Ramsey met Victoria's eyes, and frowned. 'I'm not sure this is woman's work -' he started to say to the publisher.

'Nick, stop it,' Victoria interrupted. 'Male chauvinism went out with bloomers, or should have. I can speak French. I've been to Paris, to every part of France, three times. I can be of real help, and you know it. I'm not afraid.'

'I am,' said Ramsey.

Armstead intervened. 'I agree with Victoria,' he said. 'I want her on this series. For two main reasons. One is, I want you to continue to break her in. Another is, I want the female touch, stories that can appeal to women as well as men.'

The other main reason, the one he had mentioned to Dietz, he now left unspoken. He wanted to do something for Hugh Weston's daughter, because he wanted to please Hugh even more. After all, he had told Dietz, Hugh Weston was now press secretary to the President of the United States. It would help to have him grateful to them. Someday a favor could be needed. Besides, Victoria might do well on the a.s.signment. She was capable, even if relatively inexperienced. Armstead felt that his was a smart move.

'Also, there's a lesser reason I want Victoria along on this a.s.signment,' he went on smoothly. 'I want a good facade in Paris. With both of you there, you can pose as married tourists, at least while working on the outside. In the hotel, I'll register you as separate individuals. I want the Recordleh out of this investigation. You're not journalists. You want to see the Eiffel Tower, have duck at the Tour d'Argent.' Armstead returned to his desk. 'I think, Nick, you might start off by reviving your Carlos contact. What's his name?'

'Ahmet.'

'Okay, Ahmet. Learn if he's still in Paris. Can you do that?'

'I had a bartender who used to be able to reach him.'

'Try to reach him,' said Armstead. 'Mainly, I want to know if Carlos has some action coming up.'

'That's asking a lot,' said Ramsey, doubtfully.

'I'm paying a lot,' said Armstead. 'You can pay that informant of yours, Ahmet, ten thousand dollars to find out. I'll pay others more to find out even more. What do you say?'

There was concern in Ramsey's expression. 'I can't say what we'll learn from Ahmet about Carlos. I can say you'll find money won't buy you anything from the other terrorist gangs. They can use money, but they are not after it. Their interests are purely ideological.'

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