Paull was careful not to let his concern show. "They're a legitimate organization, sir."

The president's face darkened. "Goddamnit, in this day and age we no longer have the luxury of allowing terrorists to hide behind the banner of free speech, which is for good, honest, God-fearing Americans."

"It's not as if they're being funded by a foreign power."

The president whirled. "But maybe they are." His eyes were gleaming, always a dangerous sign. "President Yukin, who, as you well know, I'll be seeing in a few days, has just announced that he wants to stay on in power." The president grunted. "Lucky bastard. They can do that in Russia." He waved a hand. "With the evidence in the Black File you've provided me, I think I can get more out of him than concessions on oil, gas, and uranium."

Paull, truly alarmed, stood. "What do you mean, sir?"

"I think Yukin is just the man to provide whatever evidence we need that the Chinese are funneling funds to these missionary secularists."

Paull smelled the National Security Advisor all over this. The president didn't have the mind to come up with such a scheme.

"I mean, what could be more obvious?" the president went on. "You yourself told me that Beijing is in the process of setting up a Godless state. Americans have a long history of bitter antipathy toward mainland China. Everybody will be only too willing to believe that Beijing is attempting to export that Godlessness to America."

JACK HAD tried Egon Schiltz's cell, but it was off, and he knew better than to leave a message on his friend's voice mail.

Egon Schiltz was not an old man, but he sure looked like one. In fact, give him a passing glance and he might be mistaken for seventy, instead of fifty-nine. Like a hairstylist, he was round-shouldered, with prematurely gray hair so thick, he preferred to wear it long over his ears. In every other way, however, Egon Schiltz appeared nondescript. One curious thing about him: He and his wife had tied the knot in the ME's cold room, surrounded by friends, family, and the recently and violently departed.

He and Jack had become friends when Jack was asked to investigate missing cartons of fry, as embalming fluid was known on the District's streets, where it had become one of a number of increasingly bizarre drugs illicitly for sale. On anyone's list of bad drugs, fry was near the top, one of the long-term side effects of ingesting fry being the slow disintegration of the spinal cord. Certain bits of evidence were leading the police to suspect Schiltz himself of trafficking in fry, but after a long talk with Schiltz, Jack didn't like the ME as a prime suspect. Jack went looking for the middle man, in his experience usually the easiest to latch on to, since he was usually less off the grid than either the thief or the pusher. Using his contacts, Jack found this particular fence, put the hammer to him, and came up with a name, which he gave to Schiltz. Together, they worked out the way to trap the thief, a member of the ME's staff too impatient to wait for his state pension. Schiltz never forgot Jack's faith in him.

Schiltz's offices, sprawled on a stretch of Braddock Avenue in Fairfax, Virginia, were in a low, angular redbrick government building in that modern style so bland, it seemed to disappear. Using mostly the Innerloop of the Capital Beltway, it took Jack just over twenty minutes to drive the 16.7 miles from Langley Fields to Schiltz's office.

"Dr. Schiltz isn't here," the diminutive assistant ME said.

"Where is he?" Jack demanded. "I know you know," he added as her lips parted, "so don't stonewall."

The AME shook her head. "He'll take my head off."

"Not when he knows I'm looking for him." Jack leaned in, his eyes bright as an attack dog's. "You're new here, aren't you?"

She bit her lip, said nothing.

"Call him," he said now, "and tell him Jack needs to see him, stat."

The Indian woman picked up a cordless phone, dialed a number. She waited a moment, then asked to speak with Dr. Schiltz. In a moment, he came on the line, because she said, "I'm so sorry to bother you at dinner, sir, but-"

"Never mind," Jack said, hustling out of the office.

EGON SCHILTZ was an Old Southern type. His meals were sacred time, not to be interrupted for anyone or anything. A creature of habit, he always ate his meals at one place.

The Southern Roadhouse, set back in a strip mall as nondescript as Schiltz himself, was fronted by gravel ground down over the years to the size and shape of frozen peas. Its mock Southern columns out front only added to the exhausted air of the place. At one time, the restaurant had had a platoon of white-gloved attendants, all black, to greet the patrons, park their Caddies and Benzes, wish them good evening. It still had two sets of bathrooms at opposite ends of the U-shaped building, one originally for whites, the other originally for blacks, though no one connected with the place spoke about their history, at least not to strangers. Among themselves, however, a string of ascendingly offensive jokes about the bathrooms made the rounds like a sexually transmitted disease.

Jack walked in the kitchen door, showed his ID to the chef, whose indignation crumbled before his fear of the law. How many illegals were in his employ in the steamy, clamorous kitchen?

"Dr. Schiltz," Jack said as they made room for the expediter, bellowing orders to the line chefs. "Has he finished his porterhouse?"

The chef, a portly man with thinning hair and watery eyes, nodded. "We're just preparing his floating island."

"Forget that. Give me a clean dessert plate," Jack ordered.

One was produced within seconds. The chef nearly fainted when he saw what Jack put on the center of it. With a squeak like a flattened mouse, the chef turned away.

Holding the plate up high in waiterly fashion, Jack put right shoulder against the swinging door, went from kitchen to dining room with snappy aplomb, and immediately stopped so short, the hand almost slid off the plate. Egon Schiltz sat at his customary corner table, but he wasn't alone. Of course he wasn't. He made it a point to have dinner with at least one member of his family even when he was working late. Tonight was his daughter Molly's turn. Same age as Emma, Jack thought. Look at them talking, laughing. Is that what it means to have a daughter? All at once, his eyes burned and he couldn't catch his breath. Jesus God, he thought, it's never going to get any better, I'm never going to be able to live with this.

Molly, catching sight of him, leapt up, ran over to him so quickly that Jack had just enough time to raise the tray above the level of her head.

"Uncle Jack!" she cried. She had a wide, open face, bright blue eyes, hair the color of cornsilk. She was a cheerleader at school. "How are you?"

"Fine, poppet. You're looking quite grown up."

She made a face, tilted her head. "What's that?"

"Something for your father."

"Let me see." She rose on tiptoes.

"It's a surprise."

"I won't tell him. It's in the vault, I swear." She put on her most serious face. "Nothing gets out of the vault. Ever."

"He'd tell by your reaction," Jack said. You can say that again, he thought.

She waited a moment until she was sure Jack really wouldn't let her in on the surprise. "Oh, all right." She kissed his cheek. "I've got to go anyway. Rick's waiting for me."

Jack looked down into her shy smile. She still had her baby fat around her jawline and chin, but she was already a handsome young woman. "Since when have things become serious between you and Rick?"

"Oh, Uncle Jack, could you be more out of the loop?" She caught herself then. "Oh God, I'm so sorry."

He ruffled her hair. "It's okay." But it wasn't. He heard a sharp sound, was sure it was his heart breaking.