Homer Crawford's face worked. "My plans right at present are to stay
alive, and you finding me so easily isn't heartening. However, it
brings to mind some other problems which need solving, too."
The rest of them fell silent, looking at him. His usual casual humor
had dropped away, and his personality gripped them.
He stopped his pacing, and frowned down at them.
"El Hassan is going to have to remain on the move. Always. There can
be no capital city, no definite base, and it's going to be a poor idea
to sleep twice in the same place." He shook his head emphatically as
though to deny rebuttal, which they hadn't actually made. "El Hassan's
enemies mustn't know his location within twenty miles."
"Twenty miles!" Cliff blurted.
Crawford stared at him, but unseeingly. "Yes. At least half a dozen of
our opponents possess nuclear weapons."
Donaldson demured, sourly. "A nuclear weapon hasn't been exploded for
donkey's years and--"
"Of course not," Homer snapped. "Nor would anyone dare, anywhere else
except in the wastes of the Sahara. A nuclear explosion in the Ahaggar
would not go undetected and a controversy might go up in the Reunited
Nations. But who could prove who had done it? And who, actually, would
care if in the explosion a common foe of all was eliminated? But let
the Arab Union, or possibly the Soviet Complex, or even others, learn
definitely where El Hassan is and a bomb could well devastate twenty
square miles seeking him out." Crawford shook his head. "No, we've
simply got to keep on the move."
Donaldson said, even as he nodded agreement, "And what other problems
were you talking about?"
"Oh?" Homer said. "Well, keeping on the move will serve to add mystery
to the El Hassan legend. It isn't good for this Tuareg encampment,
for instance, to see too much of El Hassan. A leader claiming
domination of half a continent looks small potatoes in a desert camp
of a few score tents. On the move, showing up here, there, the other
place, for only a day or two at a time, is another proposition."