“Dad? Aren’t we going swimming?” Bradley asked. He was obviously more concerned about not going to the pool than he was about being carried protectively by his father like a slippery football through onrushing linebackers.

“Shh,” Patrick whispered. He crouched as low as he could, almost duckwalking through the locker room.

He saw the second guy’s knees before he saw the rest of him, and he prayed it wasn’t an innocent sailor—because Patrick lashed out with his right foot, snapping out in a driving thrust against the stranger’s left knee. The knee buckled outward at an unnatural angle.

“Dad? Why did you kick that guy?” Bradley asked amid the stranger’s animal-like howling. “Is he a bad guy?”

Patrick wasn’t sure how to answer—until another automatic pistol clattered to the tiled floor. “Yes, he’s a bad guy,” Patrick replied as he picked up the gun. “We’re getting out of here.”

“Good job,” Bradley said.

Patrick decided not to go to the front door but try for the equipment manager’s office, which had an exit into the gymnasium. He heard footsteps sliding around the tile floor behind him. He kicked a chair over toward the front door to try to make it sound as if he was headed in that direction, then ran as hard as he could to the equipment manager’s office. Good—no one around. He tried the door—even better, it was unlocked. Patrick dashed in ...

... and immediately a fist rapped him on the side of his head. He went sprawling. Bradley screamed. Patrick raised the gun, but he couldn’t make his eyes focus, and he didn’t dare try to aim at any shape he saw in front of him, fearful it would be his son. “Get the hell away from me!” he shouted over Bradley’s screaming. “Get away or I’ll shoot!” But at that instant a large blur raced across his eyes, and the gun was knocked from his hand. “Bradley!” he shouted. He curled himself over his son, pressing him into a comer up against a file cabinet, shielding him as best he could. “Stay down!”

“It’s all right, General, it’s all right,” he heard a familiar voice say. ‘Tell your son to calm down. You are in no danger.”

“Who . . . who is it?”

“Just relax, my friend. Relax.” His vision did clear a few moments later .. .

... and when it did, he saw the smiling, boyish face of King Idris the Second of Libya, Muhammad as-Sanusi, hovering over him. “You ... Your Majesty, what in hell are you doing here?” Patrick said. He got Bradley up and calmed him down.

“Whatever I’m doing, I don’t think I’m doing it very gracefully,” Sanusi said. He gave commands in Arabic, and his two men disappeared. “I need to speak with you immediately, General McLanahan. It is most urgent. Where can we meet?”