Aideen nodded and walked alongside her boss. The younger woman was no longer angry. She was disgusted with herself and brooded, as she usually did when she screwed up. She hadn't been able to screw up much during her four years in army intelligence at Fort Meade. That was paint-by-numbers courier work, moving cash and top secret information to operatives domestically and abroad. Toward the end of her tenure there she interpreted ELINT-ELECTRONIC intelligence-and passed it on to the Pentagon. Since the satellites and computers did all the heavy lifting there, she took special classes on elite tactics and stakeout techniques-just to get experience in those areas. Aideen didn't have a chance to mess things up either when she left the military and became a junior political officer at the U.S. Embassy in Mexico. Most of the time she was using ELINT to help keep track of drug dealers in the Mexican military, though occasionally she was permitted to go out in the field and use some of the undercover skills she'd acquired. One of the most valuable aspects of the three years Aideen had spent in Mexico was learning the ploy that had proved so effective this afternoon-as well as offensive to Martha and the busload of commuters. After she and her friend Ana Rivera of the Mexican attorney general's office were cornered by a pair of drug cartel musclemen one night, Aideen discovered that the best way to fight off an attacker wasn't by carrying a whistle or knife or by trying to kick them in the groin or scratch out their eyes. It was by keeping moist towelettes in your handbag. That's what Ana used to clean her hands and arms after tossing around some mierda de perro.

Dog droppings. Ana had casually scooped them off the street and flung them at the toughs who were following them. Then she'd rubbed some on her arms to make sure no one grabbed them. Ana said there wasn't an attacker she'd ever encountered who stuck around after that. Certainly the three "street extortionists" in Madrid had not.

Martha and Aideen walked in silence toward the towering white columns of the Palacio de las Cortes. Built in 1842, the palace was the seat of the Congreso de los Diputados; along with the Senado, the Senate, it comprised the two houses of the Spanish parliament. Though the sun had set, spotlights illuminated two larger-than-life bronze lions. Each lion rested a paw atop a cannonball. The statues had been cast using guns taken from the enemies of Spain. They flanked the stone steps that led to a high metal door, a door used only for ceremonies. To the left of the main entrance was a very tall iron fence, which was spiked along the top. Beside the fence gate stood a small guardhouse with bulletproof windows. This was where the deputies entered the halls of parliament.