The shades were drawn, the room cool and in semidarkness. The prime minister was seated behind his large desk, dwarfed by a towering portrait of the Zionist leader Theodor Herzl that hung on the wall at his back. Shamron had been in this room many times, yet it never failed to quicken his pulse. For Shamron this chamber represented the end of a remarkable journey, the reconstitution of Jewish sovereignty in the Land of Israel. Birth and death, war and Holocaust-Shamron, like the prime minister, had played a leading role in the entire epic. Privately, they regarded it as their State, their creation, and they guarded it jealously against all those-Arab, Jewish, or Gentile-who sought to weaken or destroy it.

The prime minister, without a word, nodded for Shamron to sit. Small at the head and very wide at the waist, he looked rather like a formation of volcanic rock. His stubby hands lay folded on the desktop; his heavy jowls hung over his shirt collar.

“How bad, Ari?”

“By the end of the day, we’ll have a clearer picture,” Shamron said. “I can say one thing for certain. This will go down as one of the worst acts of terrorism ever committed against the State, if not the worst.”

“How many dead?”

“Still unclear.”

“The ambassadors?”

“Officially, they’re still listed as unaccounted for.”

“And unofficially?”

“It’s believed they’re dead.”

“Both?”

Shamron nodded. “And their deputies.”

“How many dead for certain?”

“The Italians report twelve police and security personnel dead. At the moment, the Foreign Ministry is confirming twenty-two personnel killed, along with thirteen family members from the residence complex. Eighteen people remain unaccounted for.”

“Fifty-two dead?”

“At least. Apparently there were several visitors standing at the entrance waiting to be admitted to the building.”