On McNab's head was an Arabian headdress, circled with two gold cords, which Naylor had recently learned indicated the wearer was an Arabian nobleman. The white cape of whatever the headdress was called hung to McNab's shoulders. In the center of it, barely visible between the two gold cords, was the silver eagle of a colonel. An Uzi 9mm submachine gun hung from leather straps around his neck. A spare magazine for the Uzi protruded from an upper pocket of the shooting jacket and the outlines of fragmentation grenades bulged both lower pockets.

He saluted.

"Thank you ever so much, General, for granting me your valuable time."

Naylor returned the salute.

"Close the door, please, Colonel," Naylor said.

"Yes, of course, sir. Forgive me," Colonel McNab said and went and closed the door. Then he turned and smiled at Naylor. "I was hoping that you would not be overwhelmed to see me. But for old times' sake, you may kiss me. Chastely, of course."

Despite himself, Naylor laughed and smiled.

"It's good to see you, Scotty," he said and came around his desk and offered his hand. McNab wrapped his arms around him in a bear hug.

"How the hell did you get into the building dressed like that?"

"Easily. For one, I was on the list of those summoned to the Schwarzkopf throne room. For another-perhaps as important-to whom do you think Stormin' Normal's bodyguards owe their primary allegiance?"

"I wondered where they came from," Naylor admitted.

"Nurtured to greatness by my own capable hands. You've noticed, I'm sure, that he's still walking around? Despite the many people-most of them on his staff-who would love to kill him?"

"What did General Schwarzkopf want? Did someone tell him about your uniform? Using the term loosely."

"To answer that, I have to overcome my well-known modesty," McNab said. "I got another medal, and General Schwarzkopf wanted to tell me himself that, terribly belatedly, the powers that be have recognized my potential and sent it to that collection of clowns on Capitol Hill known as the Senate, seeking their acquiescence in my becoming a brigadier general."

"It's overdue, Scotty," Naylor said.

"There are those, Allan my boy, who are going to beat their breasts and gnash their teeth while shrieking 'the injustice of it all' Infidels are not supposed to get into heaven."

Naylor thought: He's right. A whole hell of a lot of colonels who have spent their careers getting their tickets punched and never making waves are going to shit a brick when they hear Scotty McNab got his star.

"When you pin the star on," Naylor said, "you'll find that it's anything but heaven."

"I told Powell I would just as soon stay where I was, thank you just the same. He talked me into it, saying it was the price I had to pay for being right again."

He means that. I am in the presence of the only colonel in the U.S. Army who would tell the chairman of the Joint Chiefs he didn't want to be a general.

"Right about what?"

"Who do you think won this war, Freddy Franks and his tanks? Chuck Horner and his airplanes?"

"I think they had a lot to do with it."

"I am a profound admirer of Generals Franks and Horner and you know it, but Special Ops won this war. We took out the Iraqi radar and communications. The only airplanes-with a couple of exceptions-Chuck Horner lost were due to pilot error or aircraft failure and he admits it. The greatest loss of life was caused by that one Scud we didn't take out and that hit the barracks in Saudi Arabia. By the time Freddy drove across the berms, the Iraqis had no communications worth mentioning and thus no command and control."

"The one Scud you didn't take out?"

"Or render inoperable. Or bring back with us. I understand the Air Force was really disappointed to learn how primitive those things are."

"What decoration did you get?"

McNab reached in his jacket pocket, rooted down beside the Uzi magazine, came out with a Distinguished Service Medal, and dangled it back and forth for a moment.

I can't imagine Schwarzkopf pinning the DSM on that khaki jacket, but obviously that's exactly what just happened.

"I gather the presentation ceremony was rather informal," Naylor said. Then he asked, "You do have some reason for being dressed like that?"

"Aside from I like it, you mean?"

Naylor nodded. "You want some coffee, Scotty?"

"I've got a footlocker full of booze on my dune buggy outside," McNab said. "Formerly the property of the U.S. embassy in Kuwait City. I thought you might like a drink."

"Against the rules."

"You haven't changed, have you?"

"If I drink, other people will want to and think they can."

"They don't have to know. You don't have to stand in your door and shout, 'Hey, everybody. Fuck the Arabs, I'm going to have a snort.' "

"And you haven't changed, either, I see," Naylor said.

"You wouldn't love me, Allan, if I did," McNab said.

"I wouldn't love you no matter what you did," Naylor said.

"You just want to see me cry," McNab said.

"Now, that's a thought," Naylor said.

McNab smiled at him.

"You know where you're going when you get the star?" Naylor asked.

"Bragg. Deputy commander, or some such, of the Special Warfare Center. What I'm going to be doing is writing up what we did right in this war so we can do it right when we have to do it again."

"You think we're going to have to do it again?"

"Yeah, of course we are. MacArthur was right when he said, 'There is no substitute for victory,' and so was whoever said, 'Those who don't read history are doomed to repeat it.' "

"I guess what the president was worried about was a lengthy occupation with a hell of a lot of guerrilla warfare," Naylor said.

"Freddy Franks told me (a) he could have had his tanks in Baghdad in probably less than forty-eight hours and (b) he was really worried about a lengthy occupation with a hell of a lot of guerrilla warfare. I had the feeling he was more than a little relieved he didn't have to make the decision."

"You really think we're going to have to do this again?"

"The only question is when," McNab said. "Next year. Two years from now. A decade. But we'll be here again. Saddam Hussein is a devout student of Stalin's Keep the People In Line techniques. A real sonofabitch. We're going to have to take him out sooner or later. Christ knows that if I could have found the sonofabitch, I would have taken him out myself."

"I hope you're wrong," Naylor said.

"The cross resting so heavily on my manly shoulders for all these years has been that I rarely am wrong," McNab said.

"Jesus Christ, you're impossible!" Naylor said, laughing.

" 'It is difficult to be modest when you're great,' " McNab said. "Frank Lloyd Wright said that."

"I'll try to remember," Naylor said. "Is there something I can do for you, Scotty? Or is this just a visit?"

"I thought you'd never ask," McNab said. "First, I want to thank you for sending me Second Lieutenant Castillo. Which I just did. He almost restored my respect for Hudson High."

"Let me have that again?"

"You haven't heard my speech? 'What's Wrong with West Point'?"

"I got a copy of Donn Starry's speech. The one he gave to the Association of Graduates? The one that began, 'I have many memories of my four years as an inmate of this institution, none of them favorable'?"

"Ah, yes. But General Starry has always hated to say anything that might in any way offend anyone. Mine wasn't so polite."

"I can't imagine you being anything but polite, Scotty. But that's not what I was asking. You 'just heard' that I sent you Castillo?"

"I went to Oz Young and said, mustering up my best manners, 'Thank you for sending me Castillo. And now I want to keep him.' Whereupon Oz said, 'I can't do it. See Allan Naylor. He's the one who sent you Castillo.' "