Homer Crawford said dully, "What are you doing here?" Elmer looked at the body, then back at his chief. "Bey figured out what must have happened at the mosque there in Timbuktu. We didn't know what might be motivating Abe, but we got here as quick as we could." "He was a commie," Crawford said dully. "Evidently, the Party decided I stood in its way. Where are the others?" "Scouring the town to find you." Crawford said wearily, "Find the others and bring them here. We've got to get rid of poor Abe, there, and then I've got something to tell you." "Very well, chief," Elmer said, holstering his gun. "Oh, just one thing before I go. You know that chap Rex Donaldson? Well, we had some discussion after you left. This'll probably surprise you Homer, but--hold onto your hat, as you Americans say--Donaldson thinks you ought to _become_ El Hassan. And Bey, Kenny and I agree." Crawford said, "We'll talk about it later, Elmer." * * * * * He knocked at her door and a moment later she came. She saw who it was, opened for him and returned to the room beyond. She had obviously been crying. Homer Crawford said, but with no reproach in his voice, "You should have helped me, to be consistent." "I knew you'd win." "Nevertheless, once you'd switched sides, you should have attempted to help me. If you had, maybe Abe would still be alive." She took a quick agonized breath, and sat down in one of the two chairs, her hands clasped tightly in her lap. She said, "I ... I've known Abe since my early teens." He said nothing. "In college, he was the cell leader. He enlisted me into the Party." Crawford still didn't speak. She said defiantly, "He was an idealist, Homer." "I know that," Crawford said. "And along with it, he's saved my life, on at least three different occasions in the past few years. He was a good man." It was her turn to hold silence. Homer hit the palm of his left hand with the fist of his right. "That's what so many don't realize. They think this is all a kind of cowboys and Indians affair. The good guys and the bad guys fighting it out. And, of course, all the good guys are on our side and their side is composed of bad guys. They don't realize that many, even most, of the enemy are fighting for an ideal, too--and are willing to die for it, or do things sometimes even harder than dying." He paced the floor for an agonized moment, before adding. "The fact that the ideal is a false one--or so, at least, is my opinion--is beside the point." He suddenly dropped it and switched subjects. "This isn't as much a surprise to me as you possibly think, Isobel. There was only one way that episode in Timbuktu could have taken place. Abe was waiting for me to pass that mosque. But I had to pass. I had to be _fingered_ as the old gangster expression had it. And you led me into the ambush." He looked down at her. "But what changed his mind? Why did he offer, tonight, to let me take over the El Hassan leadership?"