A look of horror came over the girl’s face. She scuttled away to find a mirror. No one could have resisted a ploy like that, the Scorpion thought, going back to the kitchen knives. It took only a second to slip a heavy-bladed butcher knife under his veil. Now the prey becomes the hunter, he thought, heading towards the appliances section.

One of the Arabs from the BMW was standing next to a refrigerator in the home appliances section, his hand around a bulge in his jacket pocket. He began to walk towards the Scorpion, who backed modestly out of his way, as a well-bred Arab woman should. The Scorpion stared blankly at a microwave oven with enough dials to fly a space shuttle, his back prickling with sweat. The Arab walked right by him as if he wasn’t there. Fortunately for him, women were truly invisible in Arabia, the Scorpion thought, hesitating as he tried to decide whether to take the Arab out or save him for information.

In theory, as Harold Gallagher used to say in Nam, when you have two subjects to question, you intimidate the weaker by making an example of the stronger. Harold invented the technique which became the most widely used by the Special Forces. They would take VC suspects up in a chopper. When they reached an altitude of about 8000 feet, they would question the toughest suspect at gunpoint. If he didn’t talk, they’d throw him out without a parachute. It was important to wait till he had fallen all the way, so that the full impact would register before you questioned the next one, Gallagher told him.

Except that the other Arab wasn’t in sight and the Scorpion had no idea which of them was tougher. But this one’s back was towards the Scorpion and he had to cut down the odds. Before the Arab took another step, the Scorpion struck.

He grabbed the Arab’s mouth with his left hand to prevent a cry as he thrust through his veil with his right. The knife slid into the man’s back with only a fraction of resistance as the knife glanced off a rib. He felt the Arab’s body stiffen and shudder. Although he thought he had pierced the heart, to be sure he sawed with a savage wrench between the sixth and seventh thoracic vertebrae, cutting the spinal cord, as the body slid silently to the floor. The Scorpion wiped the blood off the knife onto the Arab’s trousers and hid it back under the veil. He left the body in the aisle. If it caused a commotion, so much the better, so long as he found the second Arab before the police arrived.