you supposed to send human bombers into the streets to murder civilians. And on a more Zen-like note, if they did not speak English, they did not understand the threat, and it's not a threat. I hoped that circuitous logic would sound as good in court as it sounded to me at that moment. We had reached the top of the stairwell and as a precautionary measure, I called out, "Drummond coming down with two prisoners."
I had the prisoners lead the way down the stairs. They moved like sheep, passive, completely clueless. Neither of these clowns had the slightest idea what was going on.
Finder was standing at the base of the stairs and he asked, "Who are these guys?"
"Object lessons."
He looked at me closely. "Meaning what?"
"She's using the shock treatment. Divide and conquer. We culled these two out to be shot."
"For real?"
"No . . . not for real."
"You're sure? No extra charge."
I stared at him.
He laughed. "That's a joke, Drummond. Lighten up."
I left him with the two prisoners and returned back upstairs. When I reentered the room, Bian was still loudly haranguing the prisoners in Arabic. They were paying rapt attention to her and ignored me.
She halted her monologue and glanced at me.
I told her, "That second guy, the naked one, took three slugs. Boy, was he hard to kill." After a moment, I added, "He kept screaming in Arabic, begging to be put out of his misery."
A bit subtle, maybe, but I could see from her expression that she picked up the message--neither man spoke English.
She glanced again at her prisoners and commented to me, "I'll give you one or two more in a second."
"No hurry." I leaned casually against the wall. "Finder's guys are busy castrating them, and finding a place where their bodies face west. A good hidey place where nobody will ever find their corpses." I laughed.
Bian also laughed.
This coarse allusion referred, of course, to the dual Muslim and extremists' beliefs that a corpse must be cleansed and buried, facing east, soon after death for a suitable entrance to heaven; and those who enter as martyrs are met and pleasured by a flock of beautiful virgins, which, without your equipment, falls into the category of an empty blessing.
And, through the corner of my eye, I noted that the second prisoner from the left registered an expression of mild outrage. He heard, and more important, he clearly understood, what we were saying.
Bian picked up on it as well. She pointed at the man. "You . . . step forward."
He stared straight ahead, as if she was talking to somebody else.
Bian stepped directly to his front and positioned herself maybe two feet from his face. Joe Cool stood to the man's right, and the relative complacency and indifference on his face made this man's anxiety all the more palpable: Nervous Nellie.
Bian stared into Nellie's eyes and said, "Well . . . ?"
He shrugged like he was clueless. Then, out of the blue, Bian's weapon went off. In such a confined space, the loud bang sounded like a cannon, and we were all, I think, surprised and stunned.
I took a step toward Bian, but she turned to me and said, "Oh, shit. It was an accident."
"Accident?"
"My weapon . . . it was off safe, and . . . I . . . well, I guess my finger . . . Oh, shit."
Nellie Nervous had crumbled to the floor, and he lay there gripping his left knee, writhing, bleeding, and moaning something in Arabic.
I took a step toward the wounded man, but Bian said, "Sean, please, what's done is done--let me handle this."
I looked at her, and she did appear surprised and shocked that she had shot the man. She looked down at him and pronounced something in Arabic. But her tone sounded a bit harsh for an apology; in fact it sounded like a threat, and he quickly muttered something in reply that resembled a wounded animal mewling.
I said to Bian, "Whatever you're doing . . . stop now."
She ignored me and prodded the man on the ground with her boot. She said something with a harsh undertone in Arabic.
He said, "Okay . . . yes, yes . . . I speak English. Not good, though. Do not shoot me again, please."
Bian stepped back from him and asked, "Which of these men is Ali bin Pacha?"
"Uh, oooh, you have ruined my knee . . . Ow, I am in great pain . . . I--"