‘You’re such a prima donna. What are the caveats?’
‘I am gunned down in the street and you call me a prima donna? The injustice would confound a man unaccustomed to your barbs. In any case, Natalya, it would be invidious of me to give undertakings on your behalf and I have arranged for you and my client to conclude this matter face to face.’
‘Suits me,’ said Natalya, thinking this was all rather incredible. ‘Aren’t you afraid we’ll cosy up together and do a deal behind your back?’
Claude cleared his throat. ‘It is an unhappy truth that even one’s most valued associates may be rendered cruelly disloyal by the chance to line their pockets at one’s expense. But who can live his life on the basis that friendship and trust mean nothing? I would prefer to die begging for potato peelings in a pauper’s jail.’
‘I rather see you enjoying a dish of pommes dauphinoise and selling the peelings to the highest bidder.’
‘Ha-ha! We’ll not quibble. And my client’s invitation?’
‘Accepted. Where’s the meeting?’
‘In the Southern Provinces, which the locals like to call the Free Zone. It lies about a hundred kilometres east of Smara.’
Was this the place al Hamra had told her about, Zender’s arms cache? What was she walking into? The Moroccan spy’s warning about bombs and terrorists now seemed like a dreadful prophecy.
‘Claude, do we have to?’ she said.
‘The owner of the device you seek is most particular. It’s a magnificently remote location, and one must fly there, unfortunately, and stay overnight. But you will have a splendid opportunity to admire the Saharan landscape. The epitome of desert, one might say. A camel could not ask for more.’
‘If it’s good enough for a camel. . . ’ The Saharan landscape held no attraction and remoteness was not something she craved at all, but before she could raise further objections, Claude had said he would collect her shortly after two and hung up.
Nat sat down on her bed. She tried to muster some feeling of elation at the prospect of setting in train the series of transactions that would net her the best part of four million dollars, but it was quickly displaced by a sense of apprehension that had been lurking in the shallows of her mind ever since Nikolai had gone missing. Why couldn’t the meeting take place in Marrakech? Who was Zender’s client? The government suits who’d so obsessively staked out the IPD400 while it was still under embargo in the Grosvenor warehouse would rather be caught engaging in an act of devil worship than doing a deal with Claude Zender: from what she knew, his customers were blinged-up dictators, coup-plotting mercenaries and warlords who liked to pay for their wares with a couple of dump trucks full of kimberlite. If only Nikolai were around to back her up.
She showered, dressed in a sober outfit of dark blue chinos and a cream linen shirt, then rang Sir Peter. It was a relief to be diverted to his answerphone. I’m not getting anywhere, she said, the little-girl-lost voice sounding all-too plausible in her ears. An awful thing happened last night and I don’t know what to do.
Something had slashed through the side of James’s foot, torn a ribbon of flesh from his shin, and lodged under his kneecap. He couldn’t see it, but he could feel it all right – every time he bent his knee. A sliver of shrapnel, squatting in a net of bloody sinew like a little steel spider.
He dragged himself back to the dirt road, stopping frequently to look for his footprints. The wound had made him thirsty. He was low on water and the sun knew it. The shrapnel had to come out.
All he had was Nazli’s screwdriver, two hooked spoons and Salif’s knife. He tested the five-inch blade with his thumb – it was wafer sharp and had the flat blue sheen that comes from years of grinding. He cleaned up the tools as best he could, then laid them out on the holdall in dismal imitation of a tray of surgical instruments. The steel shard would be small and slippery. He studied the spoons. Like fishing for minnows with a meathook. Why had he got out the screwdriver? It didn’t look useful now. He bent the knee as far as he could, sluiced a little water over it and dabbed away the blood. There was a ragged cut about an inch wide, but no steel protrusion. He could feel the shrapnel in there, plucking at the ligaments. He grabbed the knife and used the tip to probe for the shard. A nerve twanged, making him gasp and freeze. He shoved a wad of canvas between his teeth, and eased the knife-tip under the skin at one edge of the cut. Blood teemed to the surface. He let out an anticipatory groan and swiftly widened the incision by half an inch. The feel of the sharp blade parting flesh made him suck in his breath. He pressed the skin above and below the wound and pulled the lips apart. He thought he saw the shard, but it was immediately swamped with blood. He had to do the same on the other side or he’d never get a spoon handle in there. The sun was high in the sky now, making the sunken plateau of sand palpate like a drumskin. Hunched down in the desert, diligently probing the underside of his knee with a dirty old knife, he felt faint with insignificance. Why go through this? Why not lie down and be obliterated?
Stop fiddling around. Get on with it.
Sweat was streaming over his face. He took a sip of water, positioned the blade. . . Bit down on the canvas and sawed through the skin. He flung the knife aside and it skittered against a rock. He swallowed a wave of queasiness and peeled back the skin-flap, but still he couldn’t see the steel fragment. He retrieved the knife. The blade curved slightly at its tip, away from the sharp edge. If he could get that curve in the right place, he might be able to pull the shard out far enough to reach it with a spoon. It would mean using the cutting edge of the blade as leverage, but hey, who said this was going to be fun? What would Sam say now, the sanctimonious little prick? Why you scared like a baby? Baby scared because he don’t know what happen next. You know what happen. So why you scared?
The pain, Sam. I don’t like it when the pain scoots up the nerves.
Nerves got to tell you when they cut. They can’t speak so they give you a little pain.
Smug little shit!
Why you make it worse with shaking? Why you go so slow?
If you say one more word. . .
Why you—
The blade scraped on something, but he couldn’t see what through the sticky red ooze. He thrust the knife in deeper with a moan of disgust, bent his knee another five degrees, raised the handle to prise open the wound. Panting like a sick old dog. The knee joint pulsed and winced. The sun laid a hissing iron on his neck. There! If he could just get a grip with his forefinger and thumb. . . No. They slid off in the slops of blood. He reached for a spoon and pushed the hook up into the wound below the knife-blade. Sweat dripped over his hand. He felt the edge of the shard and tried to pinch it between the spoon handle and the knife, but it clicked free. Bellowing without restraint, he widened the wound again, drove the two steel instruments as deep as he dared. This time it held. He drew it out by tiny fractions like some hideous conjuring trick. It wasn’t coming easy. He kept tugging, willing his hands not to shake. Blood splashed onto the sand. It was cutting as it came, a live thing, thrashing and lashing its sharp little tail.
When it was done, he held in his hand an inch-wide frill like the paring from a pencil sharpener that twisted off at one end into a ribbon of corkscrewed steel. He flexed his knee gingerly – it felt better, in the grateful way the body does when foreign objects are removed. He finished the water in the second tube. One left. How long would that last? His overalls were sodden with sweat, turning the desert dust to mud that clung to him like pale scabs. He looked down at his leg. It was spattered and streaked with blood from the knee down, and a hank of torn skin flopped from his shinbone. It might be better for him now if the guards caught up and took him back. His face was clammy and his hands shook like a drunk’s. A thin, vomit-like odour clung to him. The odour he’d smelled on Younes, and on Mansour. And many times before when death was about.
Nat made her way to her favourite table in the courtyard of the Riad des Ombres. She was only a few feet away when she looked up and saw t
hat it was already taken. The usurper was lounging in a semi-recumbent posture, one leg stretched out across the kelim-covered banquette, one arm draped across its back. His intention seemed to be to show that he was entirely at ease, but the effect was ungainly. And the grey hair sticking up from his head gave him, she thought, the expression of a startled goat.
‘Natalya Kocharian,’ he said. ‘We’ve not met.’
‘No,’ she replied, and turned away to find another table.
‘Nigel de la Mere. You’ve been liaising with our mutual colleague Clive Silk, but I thought we should cut out the middleman, as it were. Please, sit down.’
She knew who he was – Director of the North-West Africa Office at MI6. A profoundly unwelcome visitor. He had not stood, and was looking her up and down from his inelegant roost. The arrogant manner and blatantly lascivious eyes told her that he knew her reputation for sexual generosity and wished to count himself – a man of status and influence – a potential recipient of her favours; and yet he suspected that she would refuse him, and the prospect of that humiliation filled him with latent hostility.
‘Is Clive with you?’ she asked, then turned in her chair to summon a boy to take her order for breakfast.
‘I’ve already eaten,’ said de la Mere. ‘But go ahead. I might filch some of your coffee. Then you can tell me how you’re getting on with Claude Zender.’
What did he know? That she’d been to Washington to see Grey Tony? If she’d flown from London, he surely would have found out – but from Marrakech? What did he want to know? What should she tell him? Men of de la Mere’s type were unpleasant to deal with, but his low opinion of her would be useful. She’d play the ditzy blonde and get away from him as fast as possible.
‘I’m glad you came, anyway,’ she said. ‘I feel a bit out of my depth with all this, and Clive’s not much help.’
‘There there,’ said de la Mere.
The sarcasm was gratuitous, like being taken suddenly by the throat.
‘I’m told James Palatine’s in town,’ he said. ‘Has he been in touch with you?’
‘Is he? No. I don’t know why he would want to.’
‘Or with Claude Zender?’
‘I’ve no idea, sorry.’
‘When did you last speak to your fat friend?’
‘We had dinner last night,’ she said, realising it would be risky to lie.
‘And?’
‘It’s hard going, Mr de la Mere. He says he’s not interested in handing back the IPD400. In fact, he says he can’t.’
‘A negotiating position, obviously. He’ll do anything for the right price.’
A negotiating position. . . The exact phrase she’d used when she’d called Clive Silk from Marrakech Airport. The thought made her feel claustrophobic.
‘I don’t have the right price to offer him,’ she said.
‘Grosvenor will foot the bill, whatever it is. That I can guarantee. Has he told you who his client is?’
‘He wouldn’t dream of it.’
‘What happened in the souk last night?’
‘We were shot at. Poor Claude was injured.’
‘Badly?’
‘A horrible wound in his side, but he’s not in danger.’
‘Shame. Does Zender have an idea who the gunman was?’
‘I don’t think so. He didn’t tell me, anyway.’
‘He doesn’t tell you much, does he. When’s your next meeting?’
‘I’m waiting to hear,’ Nat lied. Flying south with Zender, even if his place was teeming with terror suspects, now seemed like her best and perhaps only means of escape.
‘Make it today. Use those well-documented charms of yours. Tell me the time and the place and I think I might join you.’
‘Wouldn’t it be better if you made the appointment yourself?’ said Nat, beginning to feel riled. ‘I’m just the salesgirl, after all.’
‘For now you are. If you don’t co-operate with me on this, you’ll be lucky to get a job flogging knickers off a market stall in Kiev.’
Nat was saved from delivering the response this insulting threat deserved by the arrival of her breakfast tray. The boy arranged the dishes before her, his demeanour so graceful and sweet she felt like taking him in her arms. ‘Please bring coffee for Monsieur,’ she said.
‘I’m finding your manner obstructive, Ms Kocharian,’ said de la Mere. ‘I came here to talk to Zender and I don’t intend to be balked by you.’
Al Hamra’s warning, she thought. I’ll tell him. Why not? She could hardly be expected to make serene and rapid progress on restoring the IPD400 to Grosvenor if the Moroccan intelligence service were plotting Claude Zender’s imminent downfall. It would buy her time – and keep this foul man off her back.
‘There’s something I guess I ought to tell you, since you’re here.’ She made him wait while she spooned a helping of yoghurt into a bowl and decorated it with chopped dates and hazelnuts. ‘I was approached by a Moroccan agent called Mehmet al Hamra last night. He said Zender’s in trouble – something I didn’t really follow, about a man called Mansour Anzarane?’
The supercilious expression left Nigel de la Mere’s face so fast it was as if someone had torn it off. Now he looked merely bored, but Nat could see he was struggling not to give more away.
‘What about him?’
‘They think he was responsible for the Agadir Bombing, and they say he’s been hanging out with Zender at his base in the Free Zone. It made no sense to me – what do you think?’
Nat arched one eyebrow and stared at de la Mere, greatly relishing the fact that she’d put him on the back foot.
‘Who told you this?’ he said, declining to meet her eye.
‘Mehmet al Hamra, of the DG something or other. He’s a spy, I think. Like you, Mr de la Mere.’
‘He approached you where?’
‘At the Casino des Capricornes.’
‘You were hoping to bump into the owner, but you ended up with the Gnome of Rabat.’
‘Is that what you call him? I thought he was from Marrakech.’
‘Al Hamra goes where he pleases these days. What else did he say?’
‘Nothing. Oh yes, he advised me not to do business with Zender, which makes things tricky. What do you mean, bump into the owner?’
‘Claude Zender. He owns the casino – co-owns it, rather.’
Nat’s neck flushed hot, adrenalin prickled in her armpits. Aisha had said she’d been paid to set up Nikolai by Rich men who own the casino. . . Could it be true? She stared at de la Mere, her poise completely gone.
‘Another thing you didn’t know about Zender. The special favours are over-rated, clearly.’
What did he mean by that? The SIS man stood up and positioned himself very close to her chair, so he could look down at her.
‘Call me at six this evening, when you have the meeting set up. Don’t tell Zender what you just told me, and don’t say I’m in town. Clear?’
It was several minutes after Nigel de la Mere had stalked off before Nat succeeded in quelling the panic flapping in her stomach. Zender had set up Nikolai at the casino – his casino. She was besieged by spies. James Palatine was in town. In a few hours’ time, she was going to climb obediently into a private aeroplane and accompany Zender to a magnificently remote location in the Sahara desert.
She ordered a glass of brandy and tried to work through everything that had happened since she’d returned to Marrakech from LA three days ago; but her thoughts kept oscillating queasily between Nikolai’s disappearance and the IPD400 deal and refusing to settle or resolve themselves into any kind of order. All she could think of was that Claude Zender had betrayed her. Client, mentor, lover. . . That Zender was gone, but still her mind kept pawing pathetically over the vacated space. She wanted to call the fat arms dealer and scream at him. But it would not be wise to show her hand too soon: he’d slither away into the shadows, leaving her spinning in stark sunlight. I must stay close to him, she thought. Anyway, what else cou
ld she do? Go back to London, leaving Nikolai in Marrakech, or wherever Claude’s men had taken him, if they had taken him at all – which, she now realised, since the casino had more than one owner, she still couldn’t be certain about? Stay here at the Riad answering the questions of spies until the police came to arrest her?
Eventually she calmed down sufficiently to conclude that she was in trouble and needed all the help she could get. Anton and Mikhail. . . The realisation that she had no one else to turn to was dispiriting. Still, Nikolai trusted them, and he was no fool. Anton’s phone was switched off – no doubt he was treating the blonde casino hostess to a festival of lovemaking such as only the star of Bitches of the East could provide. She got Mikhail instead and told him to come with Anton to the Riad immediately.
‘Where is the ree-add?’ he asked stoically.
‘Just tell the taxi driver to come to the Riad des Ombres.’
‘Ree-add domz.’
‘Mikhail, get a pen and write it down.’ She spelled it out for him.
‘I don’t know where is Anton. He’s got this girl—’
‘Oh for fuck’s sake, just find him and bring him here.’
She went down to the courtyard and leafed through a copy of Le Figaro without reading a thing. After half an hour, she was rescued by the arrival of one of the Riad’s bellhops.
‘Gentleman to see you, Miss Kocharian.’
Mikhail was dressed in black tracksuit bottoms and a sky blue T-shirt. He looked as if he had not left his room at the Holiday Inn since arriving, and the thick, rubbery skin of his face was wonderfully pale.
‘Sit down – where’s Anton?’
‘Gonna come soon.’
‘Like soon in an hour or soon next week?’
Mikhail shrugged, then took to massaging the muscles in his left shoulder.
‘What do you think happened at the casino?’
Mikhail shrugged. ‘Got the wrong guy,’ he said. ‘Nikolai got no enemies here.’
Little Sister (A James Palatine Novel) Page 20