“When was this?”

“When I was in Paris and you Americans bothered me there. I said leave me alone.”

Dunne chuckled. “We Americans are not all the same. This has nothing to do with that. Let’s sit down there”—he gestured toward the third-base dugout—“and have a little talk.”

He shoved Al-Fusah, and the Moroccan stumbled down the stairs. No one was on the field, and the dugout was shielded from the view of anyone on the street. Dunne pushed Al-Fusah on to the bench and continued to stand.

“A friend of yours got into trouble with an American girl the other night. He said something to the police officers that interests me.”

Al-Fusah jumped to his feet. “That was not me. I know nothing about that.”

Dunne slammed his fist into the man’s stomach. He had pulled the punch—it was more to shock than hurt Al-Fusah. Still, the Moroccan’s head heaved over his knees, and when he returned to an upright position, his face was red and his breathing quick.

“I am a diplomat,” Al-Fusah said between breaths. “You cannot … demand you return …”

“Listen, I’m not going to explain everything to you. But take my word: I’m a desperate man. Worrying about getting into trouble with the State Department is the last thing on my mind today. Answer a few questions and you can be on your way—and nobody, including the fundamentalist opposition back home, will have to know about your friendly relations with certain Americans. Understand?”

The Moroccan was silent.

“It would be very easy,” Dunne said, “to leak a police report on that episode—which also would note you are a regular at the Riviera Bar, which features the loveliest of naked ladies—to the international news service in town that is a front for an intelligence service unfriendly to your government.”

Playing the role of the heavy, Dunne told himself. He never liked it—mainly because he had known too many who relished it. But it usually worked. And now more than ever he cared only about results. He waited and looked at the baseline dust on the concrete floor.

“So what do you want me to say?”

“Your friend, the one who was sent home. He told the police that he knew the girl in the papers. Was he talking about the one in the hotel?”

“Yes.”

“The one found with the reporter.”

“Yes.”

“Allison Meade was her name.”

“I do not know.”

“How did he know her?” Dunne asked.

“From the service.”

“What service?”

The Moroccan was staring at his feet as he talked. Dunne grabbed him by his short black hair and yanked up his head.

“I’m going to take a wild guess here,” Dunne said. “Escort?”

Al-Fusah nodded.

“And you knew her, too.”