"Are you sure you wouldn't like to see the doctor first?" the man asked. "There is one in residence."

"Gracias, no," she said with a grateful smile. She wasn't going to let the attacker claim a second victim. She was going to get through this, even if it were one second at a time.

The sergeant smiled back warmly and walked with her slowly toward the open gate.

As Aideen was being led away the palace doctor rushed by. A few moments later she heard an ambulance. The young woman half turned as the ambulance stopped right where the getaway car had been. As the medical technicians hurriedly unloaded a gurney, Aideen saw the doctor rise from beside Martha's body. He'd only been there a moment. He said something to a guard then ran over to the mailman. He began opening the buttons of the man's uniform then yelled for the paramedics to come over. As he did, the guard lay his jacket over Martha's head.

Aideen looked ahead. That was it, then. It took just a few seconds, and everything Martha Mackall had known, planned, felt, and hoped was gone. Nothing would ever bring that back.

The young woman continued to hold back tears as she was led into a small office along the palace's ornate main corridor. The room was wood-paneled and comfortable and she lowered herself into a leather couch beside the door. She felt achy where her knees and elbows had hit the pavement and she was still in an acute state of disbelief. But a countershock reflex was going to work, replenishing the physical resources that had shut down in the attack. And she knew that Darrell and General Rodgers and Director Paul Hood and the rest of the Op-Center team were behind her. She might be by herself at the moment, but she was not alone.

"You may use that telephone," the sergeant said, pointing to an antique rotary phone on a glass end table. "Dial zero for an outside line."

"Thank you."

"I will have a guard posted at the door so you will be safe and undisturbed. Then I will go and see about your guide."

Aideen thanked him again. He left and shut the door behind him. The room was quiet save for the hissing of a radiator in the back and the muted sounds of traffic. Of life going on.

Taking another deep breath, Aideen removed a hotel notepad from her backpack and looked down at the telephone number printed on the bottom. She found it impossible to believe that Martha was dead. She could still feel her annoyance, see her eyes, smell her perfume. She could still hear Martha saying, You know what's at stake here.