Rodgers wiped his eyes with the heels of his hands. First it was coddling, now he was lying and playing games with his own people. But she was the psychologist, not him. And Rodgers wanted to do what was best for his team, not what was best for Mike Rodgers. Frankly, though, if it were up to him he'd spank a five-year-old who didn't do what he was told, and they'd be better for it. But then, that kind of fathering went out with the sixties too.

"Whatever you say, Liz," Rodgers said. He looked at McCaskey. "Tell me something healing, Darrell."

McCaskey said, "Well, the FBI's pretty happy."

"The Baltic Avenue?" Rodgers asked.

McCaskey nodded. "It went off perfectly. They got the Pure Nation group and their computer. It's got names, addresses, couple of bank accounts, right-wing subscription lists, weapons caches, and more."

"Like what?" Rodgers asked.

"The big catch was their plans to attack a Chaka Zulu Society meeting in Harlem next week. Ten men were going to take hostages and demand a separate state for black Americans."

Liz snorted.

"What's wrong?" Rodgers asked.

"I don't believe it. Groups like Pure Nation aren't political activists. They're rabid racists. They don't demand states for minorities. They erase them."

McCaskey said, "The FBI is aware of that, and they think that Pure Nation is trying to moderate their image to gain acceptance among whites."

"By taking hostages?"

"There was a draft of a press release in the computer," McCaskey said. He accessed a file in the power book and read from the screen. "Part of it said, " 'Seventy-eight percent of white America does not want blacks living among them. Rather than disrupt the white world with dead on both sides, we appeal to that great majority to petition Washington, to echo our demand for a new Africa. A place where white citizens will not be subjected to rap noise, unintelligible language, clown clothes, and sacrilegious portraits of black Jesuses.' " McCaskey looked at Liz, "That still seems pretty rabid to me."

Liz crossed her legs and shook her foot. "I don't know," she said. "There's something not right about it."

"What do you mean?" Rodgers asked.

Liz said, "Hate, by its very nature, is extreme. It's intolerance pushed as far as it can go. It doesn't seek an accommodation with the object of its loathing. Hate seeks its destruction. That press release is just too-- fair."

"You call exiling a race of people fair?" McCaskey asked.

"No, I don't," she said. "But by the standards of Pure Nation, that's downright decent. That's why I'm not buying it."

"But Liz," said McCaskey, "groups can and do change. Leadership changes, goals change."

She shook her head. "Only the public face changes, and that's a cosmetic alteration. It's so right-thinking people give them a little rope so they can hang the objects of their hate."

"Liz, I agree. But some Pure Nationals do want black people dead. Others simply don't want them around."