I added, "From 1990 through 1991, you were a student at Balliol College at Oxford. On your entrance exam, your English was rated as excellent. In fact, you wrote your first-year essay on the poetry of John Milton."

He did not acknowledge this revealing insight either.

I needed to get a rise out of this guy and said, "I read it. Let me be frank. I found it immature, pompous, and presumptuous. You don't know the difference between iambic pentameter and a pizza pie. And you totally misunderstood Milton's intent. About what I expected from an ignorant, backward camel jockey."

I was sure this crude cultural aspersion was irritating for him-it was meant to be-but his expression was immutable.

Bian's turn. She said, "The colonel has lost friends here. He… well, he's not a big fan of Arab cultures."

Women have a sixth sense for what gets on a man's nerves, and Bian was cueing me to stay on this path. I said to her, "People who wipe their asses with their hands don't have culture. They can make chemical weapons and bombs, but can't figure out how to produce toilet paper?" I looked down at Ali bin Pacha and asked, "Hey, how do Arabs practice safe sex?" He wasn't going to touch this, and I said, "They put marks on the camels that kick."

A choking sound came from bin Pacha's throat. It sounded like he was trying to clear it, or was pushing words through a dry windpipe. Bian bent forward and said, "Oh… you must be parched." She found a glass and a water pitcher by the bed, filled the glass, and held it to his lips. "Here. Drink."

He took a few shallow sips and coughed. Bian placed the glass back to his lips and he drank more heartily. She removed it, bin Pacha turned his eyes to me, and he found his voice. "You will rot in hell."

Now we were getting somewhere.

"Only by the grace of Allah do you still breathe."

"Allah-my-ass. You were too slow on the trigger, pal. Any American kid could've gotten off that shot."

"If there is a second chance, I will kill you. I promise you this."

I laughed. He did not like this, and his eyes sort of narrowed.

Bian said to bin Pacha, "Don't let him goad you. You've just been through a traumatic operation. Don't let him get you worked up."

He ignored her and informed me, "I do not speak with American whores. Do not let her touch me again. Order this infidel bitch to leave my presence."

Bian leaned toward him and said, "Fuck you." Her arm drew back but I grabbed it before she laid one on him.

Well, so much for good cop, bad cop. Now it was bad cop, bad cop, bad prisoner. Obviously, he had a problem with American ladies. This could be a religious or cultural thing, or maybe Ali bin Pacha had some of those icky Freudian issues with his mother, or he liked boys, or girls had never reciprocated his affections because he was a murdering terrorist asshole.

I informed bin Pacha, "American prisons are filled with female guards. They're going to order you around, watch you do potty, and occasionally will strip-search you and do those nasty cavity searches up your butt. Get used to it."

He looked at me. "You are in Arab lands. I will tell you how to behave, and you will conform to my customs. Send her away."

This guy needed to come down a peg and I knew how to do it. I bent toward him and said, "You know what, Ali? You and I, we were in Mogadishu together." This brought a spark of interest to his eyes. "Hey, maybe you and I can join the same veterans' organization. Wear those goofy hats and sit around all day trading bullshit war stories. What do you think?"

He stared at me. I don't think he got the funny hat part.

I continued, "I bring this up… only because… well, I have this amazing story. Small world and all that. See, a close pal of mine was a helicopter pilot over there. You remember the Apache helicopters? Big ugly things bristling with all those missiles and machine guns that just mess up your day."

Ali bin Pacha was now staring at me with interest bordering on intensity. I continued, "Anyway, one day Mike-that's my buddy's name, Mike-well, one day he came back from this mission and we were sitting around, knocking back brewskis, joking about how many assholes we just killed. And he swore he saw an Arab… and he claimed-hey, look, you know how pilots are, okay? Well, maybe you don't. Just trust me, bin Pacha, those guys, they're such bullshitters, they even make up even bigger sins to tell their own priests… So, where was I? Oh, yeah, Mike-anyway, he swore he fired a missile and blew off this Arab guy's leg."

I smiled at Bian. "Boy, for a week that's all everybody talked about. Ahab the Arab… Ali Baba and the forty one-legged thieves… the sheik of where's-a-my-fuckin'-leg."

Bian laughed.

Bin Pacha looked a little upset.

I asked him, "Hey… you don't think that was you down there?… I mean, Mike amputated this Arab jerkoff, and you're missing a leg, and… What are the odds, huh?" I smiled at him.

With typical Arab nonchalance, he replied, "Allah arranges our fates as he wishes."

"Allah-schmalla. He didn't cripple you, pal. It was the United States Army. Come on, how about a little credit?"

He examined my face a moment. "When my leg was injured, I knew it had to be cut off. I ordered my men, saw it off, no anesthetics.

Listen, American-I wanted to feel this pain, to savor this feeling, to remember it always."

"Believe me, I understand. We were drinking warm beer over there. That sucked, too."

He smiled. "And am I incorrect in recalling that we drove the American crusaders out of Somalia, that you ran home after we killed your soldiers? I think maybe you should not be boasting about Mogadishu." His smiled widened. "I personally killed one American soldier, and… I enjoyed it so much I decided to kill more."

Asshole.

He turned and looked at Bian. He asked, "You are Vietnamese, yes?"

"I'm an American soldier."

"No, you are Vietnamese. From the south, I am sure. So I think that makes you twice the whore. You give yourself to American men, and you serve the American Army that betrayed your people."

"I serve the American Constitution. And who I sleep with is none of your fucking business."

"You spread your filthy legs for these white men who murdered your people. Our Arab women would never do this."

I could feel Bian heating up beside me. I squeezed her hand.

"I have studied this Vietnam War," he continued, sounding just like an arrogant college professor. "Millions of your people died. Your country was bombed, your forests poisoned, your rice fields mined, your cities obliterated. And once the Americans lost too many soldiers, they ran like cowards and left your people to suffer and despair. So it will happen here. Inshallah. You will see."

After a moment, Bian replied, "Have you been to Vietnam lately?"

"I have no interest in visiting infidel lands."

"That explains your ignorance. Today, the streets of Vietnam are lined with McDonald's, American luxury hotels, American movies, and American businesses. Guns, dollars… whatever it takes, we always win in the end." She smirked at him. "Always."

Whatever he thought about this, he kept it to himself. He turned to me and observed, "You wear the collar insignia of a lawyer."

"Hey, very good. I understand that you study our military manuals." I pointed at the crossed dueling pistols on Bian's collar. "Crossed spoons. She's a cook."

Somebody kicked my leg.

He replied, "I find it curious that your army sends women and lawyers into battle."

"Really? Is it more curious than your movement using one-eyed cripples?"

"I have read your newspapers on the Internet. I think your army can no longer attract young men to become soldiers. Here we have no trouble finding mujahideen willing to martyr for the jihad. Your young are spoiled, decadent, cowardly. They play their video war games and have no interest in real battles where they might die." He added, "Your President lied, and now he cannot find enough new soldiers to come to Iraq to die."