Malik had told him, "Twenty years ago, an Arab might have been noticed in an American city, but today, you might not even be noticed in a small town. The only thing an American man notices is a beautiful woman." They had both laughed at that. Malik had added, 'And the only things an American woman notices are how other women dress and the clothes in shop windows."

They exited the highway onto another highway, heading south. The taxi maintained a safe speed and soon Khalil saw another bridge rising to his front.

Jabbar said, "There is no toll from this direction on this bridge. On the other side of the bridge is the state of New Jersey."

Khalil didn't reply. His thoughts went back to his escape. "Speed," they had told him at his intelligence briefing in Tripoli. "Speed. Fugitives tend to move slowly and carefully, and that's how they get caught. Speed, simplicity, and boldness. Get in the taxi and keep going. No one will stop you as long as the taxi driver does not go too fast or too slow. Make the driver assure you that there are no problems with his brake lights or signal lights. The American police will stop you for that. Sit in the rear of the taxi. There will be an English language newspaper there. All our drivers are familiar with American driving and laws. They are all licensed taxi drivers."

Malik had further instructed him, "If you are stopped by the police for any reason, assume it has nothing to do with you. Sit in the taxi, let the driver talk. Most American policemen travel alone. If the policeman speaks to you, answer in English with respect, but not fear. The policeman may not search you or the driver or the vehicle without a legal reason. This is the law in America. Even if he searches the taxi, he will not search you, unless he is certain you are someone he is seeking. If he asks you to get out of the taxi, he intends to search you. Leave the taxi, draw your pistol, and shoot him. He will not have his gun drawn, unless he is already certain you are Asad Khalil. If that is the case, may Allah protect you. And be certain to have your bulletproof vest on. They will give this to you in Paris to protect you from assassins. Use it against them. Use the Federal agents' guns against them."

Khalil nodded to himself. They were very thorough in Libya. The Great Leader's intelligence organization was small, but well financed and well trained by the old KGB. The godless Russians had been knowledgeable, but they had faith in nothing, which was why their state had collapsed so suddenly and so totally. The Great Leader still made use of the former KGB men, hiring them like whores to service the Islamic fighters. Khalil himself had been trained partly by Russians, some Bulgarians, and even some Afghani, who the American CIA had trained to fight the Russians. It was like the war which Malik had fought between the Germans and Italians on one side and the British and the Americans on the other. The infidels fought and killed one another and trained Islamic fighters to help them-not understanding that they were sowing the seeds of their further destruction.

Jabbar crossed the bridge and turned the taxi off the highway onto a street of houses that looked, even to Khalil, like poor homes. "What is this place?"

"It is called Perth Amboy."

"How much longer?"

"Ten minutes, sir."

"And there is no problem with this automobile being noticed in this other state?"

"No. One may drive freely from state to state. Only if I go too far from New York might someone notice a taxi so far from the city. To journey a long distance by taxi can be expensive." Jabbar added, "But of course you should pay no attention to this taxi meter. I leave it on because it is the law."

"There are many small laws here."

"Yes, you must obey the small laws so you can more easily break the big ones."

They both laughed.

Khalil pulled out the wallet in the breast pocket of the dark gray suit jacket that Gamal Jabbar had given him. He checked his passport, which had his photo showing him wearing glasses and a short mustache. It was a clever photo, but he was concerned about the mustache. In Tripoli, where they had taken the photo, they told him, "Yusef Haddad will give you a false mustache and eyeglasses. It is necessary as a disguise, but if the police search you, they will test your mustache, and when they see that the mustache is false, they will know that everything else is false."

Khalil put his fingers to the mustache, then tugged on it. It was firmly fixed, but, yes, it could be discovered to be false. In any event, he had no intention of letting a policeman get close enough to pull on his mustache.,

He had the glasses, given to him by Haddad, in his breast pocket. He didn't need glasses, but these were bifocals so that he could see with them on, and they would also pass as legitimate reading glasses.

He looked at the passport again. His name was Hefni Badr and he was an Egyptian, which was good, because if he were questioned by an Arab-American who worked for the police, a Libyan could pass for an Egyptian. Khalil had spent many months in Egypt and felt confident that he could convince even an Egyptian-American that they were countrymen.

The passport also gave his religion as Muslim, his occupation as schoolteacher, which he could easily impersonate, and his residence in El Minya, a city on the Nile that few Westerners or even Egyptians were familiar with, but this was a place where he'd spent a month for the explicit purpose of reinforcing what was called his legend-his false life.

Khalil checked through the wallet and found five hundred dollars in American money-not too much to draw attention, but enough to meet his needs. He also found some Egyptian money, an Egyptian internal identification card, an Egyptian bank card in his assumed name, and an American Express card, also in his assumed name, that Libyan Intelligence told him would work in any American scanner.

Also in his breast pocket was an international driver's license in the name of Hefni Badr, with a photo similar to the one on his passport.

Jabbar was glancing in his rearview mirror and said to him, "Is everything in order, sir?"

Khalil replied, "I hope I never have to discover if it is."

Again, they both laughed.

Khalil put everything back in his breast pocket. If he were stopped at this time, he could probably deceive an ordinary policeman. But why should he bother to be an actor just because he wore a disguise? Despite what they'd told him in Libya, his first reaction-not his last-would be to pull both his pistols and kill anyone who posed a threat to him.

Khalil opened the black overnight bag that Jabbar had placed for him in the back seat. He rummaged through the big bag, finding toilet articles, underwear, a few ties, a sports shirt, a pen and a blank notebook, American coins, a cheap camera of the type a tourist might have, two plastic bottles of mineral water, and a small copy of the Koran, printed in Cairo.

There was nothing in the bag that could compromise him-no invisible writing, no microdots, not even a new pistol. Everything he needed to know was in his head. Everything he needed to use would be provided or acquired along the way. The only thing that could connect him, Hefni Badr, to Asad Khalil were the two Federal agents' Clock pistols. In Tripoli, they had told him to dispose of the pistols as soon as possible, and his taxi driver would give him a new pistol. But he had replied, "If I'm stopped, what difference does it make what pistol I have with me? I wish to use the enemy's weapons until I complete my mission or until I die." They did not argue with him, and there was no pistol in the black bag.

There were two items in the bag that could possibly compromise him: the first was a tube of toothpaste that was actually gum for his false mustache. The second was a can of foot powder, an Egyptian brand that was in fact colored with a gray tint. Khalil twisted the cap and sprinkled the powder in his hair, then combed it through as he looked at himself in a small hand mirror. The results were amazing-turning his jet-black hair to a salt-and-pepper gray. He restyled his swept-back hair into a part on the left side, put on his glasses, then said to Jabbar, "Well, what do you think?"