“Please, General, call me Farouq,” Al-Fadil interrupted.

“Very well,” Perkasa continued, “as you have pointed out, Farouq, Indonesia, because of her geography, possesses a greater geo-strategic importance to the world than Pakistan. Control of those sea lanes means billions of dollars to America. You cannot do in Indonesia what you did in Pakistan. The Americans did not step in there. Here, if you moved against Santos, they would send their navy. Perhaps their marines. They would use force. And remember that President Williams likes to play John Wayne with the US Navy.” His cigar had gone out. With a single flick, a blue-and-orange flame leapt from the lighter.

“Ahh, the all-powerful Americans.” The smiling Arab sipped more wine. “Good. Our thinking is congruous.” He put the glass down and motioned for more. “What if I told you, General, that we have a plan for Mack Williams and the Americans? What if I told you that we have a plan to make you the most powerful Indonesian in the world? And what if I could show you a plan that will work to make Indonesia the first Islamic superpower, with you at the historic forefront of this great awakening?”

Perkasa glanced at Dr. Budi, who was raising an eyebrow and sipping a glass of water.

He looked back at the Arab.

Silence.

“You know, Farouq,” Perkasa said, “you have succeeded in piquing my curiosity. I will have that drink now. Red wine will be fine.”

“Excellent,” Farouq said, motioning the servants to attend to the general’s request. “Let us drink, General, to a new alliance…a new strategic alliance that will change the history of the world.”

“That,” General Suparman Perkasa said, “I will drink to.”

One year later

New York Mercantile Exchange

1:04 a.m.

The headquarters of the mammoth New York Mercantile Exchange, located in New York’s World Financial Center and fronting the Hudson River, was sixteen stories high and more than five hundred thousand square feet.

From his office on the eighth floor, in the dark hours of the morning, Robert Molster enjoyed sipping cappuccino and watching the lights on the river and the sparkling shoreline across the way in New Jersey. The clear, cold night, even more biting because of the six-inch snowfall that had blanketed the city earlier in the day, leaving mounds of snow piled up along the concrete barricades down by the waterfront, seemed to magnify the lights shining on the other side of the river. A few boats, barely visible under blinking red-and-green navigation lights, glided back and forth along the dark river. Molster shook his head, still amazed that he sat here, in this job, at this very moment.

Two years ago, Molster was finishing his MBA at the University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business. He had hoped to land a job with a midsize brokerage firm in downtown Richmond. Any regional firm would do, he had thought at the time, as long as he stayed in Virginia.

He’d already decided that he had no interest in becoming either a broker or a trader. But the thought of being a stock analyst had intrigued him since his days as a junior in college, when a business professor had introduced him to The Wall Street Journal. Becoming a stock analyst would have been prestigious and would have guaranteed excellent pay. Plus, in Richmond he could’ve bought a decent-sized home, perhaps in the prestigious West End or fashionable Shockoe slip. He had thought he would meet a nice, well-bred, well-mannered young Southern belle from Sweet Briar College, or the University of Mary Washington. Either would do. Then he would raise a family in a town with lots of history, without the hustle and bustle of big-city life.

All that changed one day just before graduation, when a young woman, a recruiter from the New York Mercantile Exchange, appeared on the Charlottesville campus.

“Ever think about being a commodities analyst?” she questioned him.

Commodities had never crossed his mind.

“You’d work the night shift, watch commodities trading on the overseas markets, and feed data to the media, the wire services, and then to floor traders who start work at 9:00 A.M. But-and this is where you’ll make contacts that will help you write your own ticket-you’ll give a daily briefing to the chairman of the Mercantile Exchange or one of his assistants about overnight trading activities. You’ll learn everything there is to know about oil. You can become an analyst for one of the private commodities firms and make so much money you can retire before you’re forty.”

She reviewed his résumé, and raised a huge selling point.

“I see that you’re an officer in the navy reserve. If you’re worried about your navy obligations, don’t be. Our chairman, Mr. Goldstein, is ex-navy. You’ll have no problems doing reserve duty on the weekends or in the summer.”

Some high-paying employers were against his naval reserve obligations, which required him to be in Washington one weekend a month and who-knows-where in the world for at least two weeks each summer.

“Lieutenant Robert Molster. What does this J-2 mean?”

“That’s the intelligence section of the Joint Chiefs of Staff,” he responded. “It’s in the Pentagon. I go one weekend a month and help them sort through boring data.” He figured that would blow over her head.

“The Pentagon”-a look of awe crossed her face-“Impressive, Lieutenant Molster.” She smiled. “Come to Manhattan for an interview. All expenses paid. Overnight at the Waldorf-Astoria.”

Three weeks later, he got the job. And he got an added bonus.

The young lady who interviewed him, the intriguing Wellesley graduate named Jane Morgan…well…she had accepted his invitation to dinner upon his arrival in New York. Two years later, they were still dating.

A Virginia gentleman and a Connecticut Yankee.

So much for settling down in Richmond with a debutante and a membership in the Country Club of Virginia.

At the Exchange, “Janie,” as he later learned that she was called, held the same job that he did. Except Janie worked the day shift. He worked nights. Then there was his time away in the reserves. Sometimes that made dating a challenge.

Somehow, they managed.

Overall, life was good. Plus, he was still able to keep his toes in the waters of the US Navy.

Enough reminiscing.

The cappuccino was gone now. His five-minute break was over.

No rush.

Trading in light, sweet crude oil futures had been halted at 1:00 A.M. due to a limit move upwards of ten dollars in the market. That would slow things down for about five minutes before trading resumed. He had to get back to his screen. Probably, he’d see a big sell-off of profit taking after the move, with prices dropping back down. He’d need to document the data for his morning briefing.

Back to work. He tossed the paper cup in the wastebasket and walked across the hallway to his monitor.

He sat down and a cacophonous buzz rang from his computer speakers. What now?

Limit Alert…Limit Alert…Trading in January Light, Sweet Crude Calls halted due to limit move of $10.00. Trading to resume at 130 A.M., EST, 630 A.M., GMT.

A second trading halt in less than fifteen minutes? He’d never seen this before. Somebody would make billions in short order.

What was going on out there?

Should he call the chairman? Would waking the chairman make him look like an overanxious greenhorn?

He flipped out his cell phone and hit “1” on the speed dial.

“Good morning,” Janie Morgan’s velvety, if sleepy, voice said.

“Sorry to call so early. Something’s up.”

“Mmm.” The sound of sheets fluffing. “What?”

“Crude oil. Two limit moves in an hour. Light, sweet crude. Just got a second trade halt in the last fifteen minutes.”

A second passed. “Wow.” Janie sounded wide awake now. “Two in fifteen minutes? I’ve never heard of that.”