The Blond interrupted me angrily, "You will speak when we give you permission."

The old man took a sip of water from the cup in front of him, then continued, "From the beginning the Com mittee has put itself at the service of revolutionary objectives, ethical principles, and religious values. Its members have supported everything that would strengthen basic freedoms and expand the democratic process.

"Naturally, we thus aroused the animosity of evil and destructive elements, which did their utmost to resist us. In this connection, let me draw your attention to the carefully manufactured uproar over the methods we use in our work and to the charges, sometimes of sadism and sometimes of demagoguery, that are liberally levied against us.

"These forces have always tried to link us to political coups d'etat, sectarian ma.s.sacres, and limited conflicts happening now in the Arab world, and even to some unexplained suicides, a few sporadic incidents of persons missing without a trace, and other persons who fell from rooftops or were killed in chance traffic accidents.

"However, the attack on our comrade represents a dangerous escalation of these activities, something that requires your special attention. Your duty might seem clear because the criminal stands before you and admits to the heinous crime, but nevertheless, there's more to this than meets the eye, and your job is to get to the bottom of it."

The old man appeared worn out. He leaned back in his chair as if to make room for his colleagues. The old maid, now in uniform, was the first to address me, "You may speak now."

Her voice was gentle, but her allusion to the Blond's response intensified its underlying harshness, since it implied support for his anger.

I'd truly been careful to observe their looks, the way they held their heads, and their tone of voice, in short, all the signs that might predict the fate awaiting me.

This didn't mean I was yielding to despair. Even before I arrived I was prepared for the worst. From the beginning I hadn't denied anything or tried to justify the act. On the other hand, I felt no regret since I was convinced that what had happened was inevitable.

Thus I had prepared my defense as an attack on the Committee. I chose powerful words. Inasmuch as the result was preordained, there was no harm in protecting my dignity and meeting the inevitable with pride and disdain.

However, as soon as I faced the Committee and heard the chairman's words, my resolve vanished. My voice came out shaky and weak, whereas I had intended it to ring firmly through the hall, proud and accusing.

Using the Committee's language, I said, my voice fading away, "Thank you for the opportunity you have granted me to address you. I would like to affirm yet again my awareness of the depth of your loss. It isn't every day the Committee loses one of its members." (I smiled in spite of myself, but they, naturally, did not smile in response.) "I am telling the truth in saying that when I came today, I did not plan to defend myself. I acknowledge what I did and am willing to face the consequences. Because of this, I am hopeful that my story, my good intentions, and the circ.u.mstances will intercede for me.

"I believe you know very well that I have never before committed a violent act. I'm just an ordinary man who prefers as much peace and quiet as possible. The daring acts others speak of and brag about have no connection with me other than as the stuff of stories and novels.

"When I appeared before you the first time, my only goal was to obtain your approval, since I understood it was the only way to develop and demonstrate my talents, especially as the most gifted people had already appeared before you.

"The developments that came afterward were basically due to a desire for knowledge. What I did to your colleague, or to be more accurate, to his chest, was only the natural reaction of a simple person in a situation of self-defense."

The chairman cut me off, "But you stated immediately that he had not attacked you or tried to harm you."

"That's true," I said, "but he carried a revolver. Therefore, from the beginning there was an implied threat of violence. It is certain that if I had not done away with him quickly, he would never have left me in peace. I don't want to defend my position. What I do desire is that you take into consideration the state of my nerves and mind and the fact that I didn't sleep at all while he was with me, not to mention how he dogged my every step."

Staring at me with his merciless light-colored eyes, the Blond leaned toward me and said, "So you want us to buy this picture of a well-intentioned, innocent man you're trying to sell us?"

As I had noticed, he always used-intentionallythe distinctive idioms of the Committee's language. These were expressions which I admired.

I said, "I'm not selling anything, although today anything can be bought and sold, as the study I undertook on the Doctor proved to me. I am simply stating the truth."

He laughed derisively, "Perhaps you think us naive. You must know that from the first moment you stood before us, we realized that you say one thing and think another. Your answers to the questions we posed were pat and precise, which aroused our suspicions.

"If there was one of us who still wavered, he came to a decision when you used the a.s.signed study as a pretext for prying into the Doctor's past and for collecting information on him. You insisted on continuing this study in spite of the various warnings sent your way."

He now directed himself to the Committee members, "All the evidence confirms that we are facing a great conspiracy. For some time its threads have been woven very skillfully and maliciously. The attack on the deceased's life is nothing but another thread in the tapestry."

I got very upset at what the Blond said. Matters were moving in a surprising direction that had not occurred to me, and the result could only be extremely damaging to my position.

Laughing and making every attempt to appear innocent and congenial, not to mention ingenuous, I quickly said, "Your honor possesses an active imagination. Surely you don't take what you say seriously?"

He shot back angrily, "Deviousness won't do you any good. "

"I a.s.sure you I'm innocent."

"Do you also retract your confession?" he asked in reproof.

I replied, "I'm not trying to exonerate myself ... I'm trying to say there is no plot, or if there is, then I don't know about it."

He said triumphantly, "Aha, so you do acknowledge the existence of a plot."

Frightened, I said, "Never. I only wanted to affirm once again . . . "

The Blond signaled to one of the members seated at the end of the table, who then took out a tape recorder and placed it on top of the table.

The Blond addressed the Committee members, "I will now show you, your honors, how, with his own tongue, he admitted the existence of his accomplices."

The member turned on the tape recorder. I heard a strange noise which I soon identified as water falling onto a hard surface. Then a man spoke, expressing his surprise at the black color of the water. I recognized Stubby's voice and began to tremble.

I heard my voice say, "You must use a water filter."

Stubby's voice followed, surprised, "Yes, how did you know?"

And finally my voice, "I have learned many things recently."

The Blond signaled the operator, who turned the recorder off and addressed me scornfully, "Isn't this your voice?"

"Certainly ... But that doesn't mean ..."

He didn't let me continue, but shouted, "How did you come to know this bit of information about our companion that we ourselves didn't know unless you had accomplices who supplied you with information?"

The old maid entered the conversation, "This plot didn't necessarily exist from the beginning. Maybe it was hatched later. His statement that he had learned many things recently indicates this."

She went on to address me, "It would be better for you, because it would mean that your intentions were innocent in the beginning, but that you fell under the influence of deviants, destructive elements. If you tell us their names, it might go a long way toward mitigating the consequences for you."

I wrung my hands hopelessly and said in a voice I tried to make sincere, "Please believe me. Everything happened entirely by chance."

One of the members asked, "Didn't someone provide the knife you used?"

"Absolutely not," I answered, "It was just there-as I stated before-in the kitchen."

Another member asked me, "How did you get to know the things you hinted at?"

"From the newspapers."

The member laughed and looked at his companions as though he did not believe the papers could be a source of information.

I explained, "My research on the Doctor forced me to consult the issues from a twenty-five-year period. This enabled me to examine facts and events in context and arrive at valuable conclusions which made it easy for me to explain many contemporary phenomena."

Ore of the officers suddenly leaned forward and said, "Are you going to tell us about these `phenomena' as you call them?"

Exlausted, I replied, "In view of the sophisticated devices at your disposal, I believe that my answer to this question, which was previously posed by the deceased, is contained in the papers before you."

He leafed through several papers in front of himself and said, "Of course, of course. Here we have um ... mental illness and the Egyptian cigarette ... tap water ... foreign medicines and Coca-Cola. But you haven't explained why you consider these phenomena and these alone worthy of attention."

"I never said that. I cited them as supporting evidence. The phenomena are infinite."

"You also avoided discussing what you discovered about them, as when you hinted at the relationship between them without explaining what you meant by that."

I thought quickly until I reached a decision. Finally recognizing that complete honesty and frankness were the safest means of defense, I said, "I will speak to you openly in order to demonstrate my true intentions and inner feelings. Actually, on one hand, I am the victim of my own ambition, and, on the other, of a pa.s.sion for knowledge. If it had not been for this latter trait, I would not be in this plight now."

The officer interrupted me, "It would be better to get right to the point."

I said, "I only wanted to explain how I was led to think about these phenomena and to search for an explanation for them. However, as I gathered information, I soon noticed that treating one in isolation would not lead me anywhere. The same result awaited me if, without having a sound method of research, I took them as a unit, because of the mutual relations between them.

"Thus I arrived at a starting point-how to determine a method suitable to explain all the phenomena separately and in relationship to each other."

They p.r.i.c.ked up their ears. I understood I had fully aroused their curiosity, so I continued, "I devoted myself to trying out all the familiar approaches without getting anywhere. That very day I was thinking about this when I said to myself, `The problem with these phenomena and mysteries is that they are not related to just one facet of life, but extend through diverse facets. This means that multiplicity is the common denominator.'

"Here I remembered one of the important conclu- sions I had arrived at in my research on the Doctor, that is, his partic.i.p.ation in the development of the Arabic language by coining new meanings from common words, among them the unique term `diversification.' In this I found my goal."

The obese member spoke for the first time. He had been wearing a white jacket at my first interview and had now changed it for one of red velvet. He said, "Could you give us an example of what it means?"

I arswered, "I was just about to do so. As my example, I will take a subject known to us all, Coca-Cola. Many obscure phenomena are linked to the evolution of this well-known beverage.

"For example, I read of a far-reaching crusade launched in 1970 in the United States over the mistreatment of a quarter million migrant workers on farms controlled by Coca-Cola. I mean farms, not factories. This crusade spread to television and from there to Congress. Senator Walter Mondale, at that time a member of the Committee for Migrant Workers, summoned the p_esident of Coca-Cola to answer officially, before the United States Senate, the accusations levied against Coca-Cola.

"Not three years later, the president of Coca-Cola partic.i.p.ated in selecting that same Mondale for membership in the Trilateral Commission I told you about in our first meeting. Then he selected him as vice president to President Carter.

"At the same time as Coca-Cola was accused of the theft of a handful of dollars from its workers, we read that it dedicated vast sums for charitable and cultural works ranging from an entire university budget to an important prize for artistic and literary creativity. It also presented a huge grant to the Brooklyn Museum in 1977 to rescue Egyptian pharaonic antiquities from collapse.

"Coca-Cola, according to statistics for 1978, distributes two hundred million bottles of soft drinks daily throughout the world, leaving tap water as its only rival. So, now we see it sponsoring projects for the desalinization of sea water, relying on the Aqua Chem Company that I bought a few years ago, in 1970 to be precise.

"These contradictions confused me, so I did several studies on Coca-Cola. Its policy was to remain committed to the two basic principles set down by its great founders. The first principle was to make every partic.i.p.ant in the Coca-Cola enterprise rich and happy. The second was to restrict its energies to creating a single commodity: the well-known bottle.

"But the winds of change that blew in the early '60s forced a choice between the principles. In order not to sacrifice the first, Coca-Cola preferred to diversify its products. It began by producing other types of carbonated beverages, then extended its interests to farming peanuts, coffee, and tea. It had extensive holdings in that same state of Georgia where it was founded. Its farms neighbored those of the American president Carter, which perhaps was behind its involvement in public affairs, both domestic and international, and thus its policy of diversification grew all out of proportion.

"Obviously, this policy couldn't help but be successful. In this regard, it is sufficient to mention the return of the familiar bottle to both China and Egypt through the initiative in both countries of brave patriots, who acted on their principles.

"However, this success produced a strange phenomenon. With modern methods and lower production costs gained by relying on poorly paid migrant workers, Coca-Cola became the largest producer of fresh fruit in the Western world. But, sadly, it found itself forced to dump a large portion of the yield into the sea to keep the worlc market from collapsing.

"There was no solution to this problem except to continue diversifying. Coca-Cola exploited its great a.s.sets and expertise in the field of agriculture by sponsoring many nutritional programs in underdeveloped countries, among them a project to farm legumes in Abu Dhabi, undertaken by its subsidiary, Aqua Chem. Likewise, it extensively researched the production of drinks rich in proteins and other nutrients, thereby compensating consumers for the surpluses it had been forced to dump in the ocean."

I stopped a moment to catch my breath, then continued, "Thus, your honors, you see how diversification provides-in the case of Coca-Cola-the key to unraveling most of the phenomena linked to it. Through research, I found that this key can open many other locks.

"Indeed, a single look at the Arab reality is enough to prove I am telling the truth. Right off, this reveals to us the phenomenon of diversification in the outer trappings of regimes (and this is certainly by design, because the essence of these regimes does not differ). It is also revealed in the forms of political partic.i.p.ation and the corresponding slogans and goals.

"At one time all these regimes had applied one unchanging means of persuasion to their people: imprisonment and torture. But diversification added other sophisticated methods, from termination to television to parliamentary councils.

"Once, all these regimes had espoused standard, unchanging slogans. But they finally grasped the importance of changing these slogans and diversifying their goals, alliances, and enmities from time to time.

"Due to the policy of diversification, this country's network of alliances, which were restricted in the past to the rest of the Arab peoples, were extended to now include the friendly country of Australia.

"Because of this policy, the Egyptians received plenty of the American, English, French, Italian, and German armarnents that had long been withheld. In the '60s, the Egyptian market had been restricted to a single car, the Na.s.ser/Fiat, which was a.s.sembled in local plants. Now, various imported makes of cars flooded into the marker, arriving directly from their home factories.

"Formerly, housing projects, uniform in size and design, had been limited to the poorer cla.s.ses. Now, they were offered to all cla.s.ses, and acquired the utmost diversity, evolving into everything from tombs to luxurious high rises.

"The Egyptian cigarette is appropriate as a model for displaying and explaining the various, sometimes obscure, phenomena that accompany very complex processes such as diversification. You know, I'm sure, the strength of habit and the power of addiction. The Egyptians' devotion to their domestic brand reached a peak during the '60s, when imported cigarettes were banned. It was possible to merge several domestic brands into one, known as the Belmont, which satisfied a large proportion of the consumer market.

"This merger was the obstacle diversification faced in the cigarette industry. Overcoming it required exhaustive efforts along various lines. As a result, there were more periods when the Egyptian cigarette suddenly disappeared, and the consumer was forced to search for a foreign subst.i.tute.

"We can easily consider the shock of this sudden forced switch a cause of mental depression, especially since foreign cigarettes sell for twice the price of the local ones.

"Since the consumption of cigarettes in developing countries is more widespread than in other countries (the latter have forbidden advertising in order to alert their citizens to tobacco's link with cancer and now offer a variety of pleasures as alternative), the resulting depression is deeper and harder to treat, which causes foreign drug companies to recommend higher doses of powerful antidepressants for people in developing countries.

"This creates a new problem, which is addiction to these drugs. However, diversification itself offers the solution for this problem, for during a course of treatment, the doctor falls back on a continual change of medication in which the multiplicity of drugs is helpful.

"To consider depression itself, it is usually equivalent to a crossroads whose branches sometimes lead to s.e.xual impotence, religious fanaticism, apathy, slovenliness, or insanity.

"This you see, gentlemen, how the process of diversification leads in and of itself to explaining the many phenomena in our contemporary life and how it joins them as links in a strong chain."

One of the members spoke hesitantly, looking at the Blond from time to time, "You set forth your point of view t--ioroughly and clearly. But there is something I would like to understand. As far as I'm concerned, you haven'- dealt with the matter of tap water."

I answered at once in admiration, "You're right to raise this point, because it holds a special importance for all those engaged in scholarly research. It gives us a cla.s.sic example of the mistakes in which researchers can get entangled.

"I knew the international sales volume of Coca-Cola and also that Egyptians are among the peoples who prefer tap water (in contrast to civilized people generally). This disparity induced me to link the return of this bottle to Egypt with the phenomena of the scarcity of tap water, its almost total disappearance during the day, and its dark, blackish color.

"However, I soon discovered that these phenomena mentioned above preceded the return of Coca-Cola by some years. Through research, I found that the tap had remained the main source of drinking water, from the '60s until the open-door policy went into effect and imported mineral water appeared. The change affecting tap water had begun at that moment, which was consistent with the results I found in similar circ.u.mstances, namely, the fate of the Egyptian cigarette.

"Reaching a conclusion and looking no further is among the perils normally facing researchers. However, continuing the research while guided by the same methodology, I was able to achieve a deeper understanding, which in turn revealed the links between a number of phenomena.

"To go on, for a long time Coca-Cola's desert irrigation projects were limited to a single category: desalinization of sea water. The October War provided a golden opportunity for it to diversify the tools of its trade by using the waters of the Nile to irrigate the Negev, facilitated by huge tunnels dug under the Suez Ca.n.a.l. Naturally, this sort of diversification leads to a scarcity of potable tap water, just as a lowering of the water level, through steadily increasing usage, causes dirt to permeate the water and change its color."

The Blond addressed me victoriously, "And you want us to believe you know all these things by your special effort with the newspapers?"

I answered, "Of course."

The officer-civilian or civilian-officer spoke for the first time. He was obviously wearing a wig. He addressed me firmly, "It would be best for you to tell the names of your accomplices and all the details of the conspiracy at once, before we force you. We are capable of undoing the knot in your tongue. Truly, due to the humanitarian principles that guide us, we are not inclined to resort to such methods, but the end justifies the means."

The old maid leaned toward me and said gently, "I don't believe we will be forced to go that far. He will talk when it's in his best interests."

My heart sank and I said, "I know the methods you refer to. Certainly they would force me to admit anything. But what I would admit in such a situation would not necessarily be the truth. You would always remain in doubt."

Silence fell over the hall and they began to exchange glances. I perceived-as the Committee would saythat this shot in the dark had hit home.

The Blond leaned toward the chairman and began a whispered exchange with him. Finally the latter spoke, "Perhaps it would be better if you withdrew for a little to consider the matter. You can go out now and we will summon you shortly to learn your decision."

I understood they wanted to get rid of me so they could deliberate freely. I left the hall and stood beside the elderly porter. I offered him a cigarette. He took it from me in silence and put it behind his ear. Meanwhile I lit up and inhaled greedily.

The hallway was empty. Light came from a large window in the opposite wall, which looked out on an empty courtyard. I smoked and peeked at the calm, resigned face of the porter sitting beside me. I wished for a moment that I were in his place, enjoying the same peace and tranquility. Then it occurred to me that his condition wasn't necessarily natural, that it could be the effect of some tranquilizer.