The Gilgamesh Conspiracy

by Jeffrey Fleming

  ‘Be quiet or I’ll blow your head off,’ she ordered, pointing her gun at his face. The man lay still taking short panting breaths. ‘Ok Smith lets bind them up. You’d better wrap a towel around his leg.’

  Dan pulled out his bundle of cable ties and secured their prisoners at the wrists and the knees and ankles. The man with the bullet wound shuddered in pain as he pushed his knees together. Emily glared at them with her gun at the ready.

  ‘Well it seems Mulholland’s not here, so where is he?’ At first none of them seemed willing to answer, but she pressed the muzzle of her silencer against the temple of the most nervous looking one and repeated the question in Arabic.

  ‘Mr Mulholland is gone. His meeting is cancelled! We three just work for the hotel.’

  ‘Bullshit! What did he tell you to do?’

  ‘He told us enemy agents were coming after him. We were to wait in his room and...and hold them.’

  ‘Yeah right! Well we’ve got the bastard!’ she said. Dan was somewhat nonplussed by Emily’s statement.

  ‘Got him how?’ asked Dan. ‘Where is he?’

  ‘Sorry, not Mulholland,’ she replied, ‘the bastard in Muscat who’s been helping him out!’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Dan demanded.

  ‘We knew it was one of two possible people who could have been working with Mulholland. Thirty minutes ago Richard Davies informed someone named Dewhurst that agents were in Fujairah and Dewhurst’s the only one who might have warned Mulholland that we were coming after him today.’ She pulled out her phone and pressed a speed dial number. ‘Hi Richard…it’s Emily. Put Dewhurst under wraps…Yeah.’ She glanced at Dan. ‘Yes he’s here with me.’

  ‘Do you mean Stephen Dewhurst the British army guy?’ Dan asked.

  ‘Yes. He’s been ripping off the Sultan and selling military spare parts on to Mulholland, and now he’s going to be arrested. A local trial I expect. It might be a little uncomfortable for him in an Omani prison but maybe he’ll get lucky and serve his sentence back in the UK.’

  Dan stared at her, trying to sort out all this information. ‘What about Mulholland?’ he asked.

  ‘We’ve got all the ports and airports in the UAE and Oman covered, and I doubt he’ll get away. Besides which Dewhurst should give us enough evidence to seize all his assets and wipe out his operation.’

  ‘A result then,’ said Dan.

  ‘Yup. This lot will give us some leads to the Pakistani side as well, if they want to trade time in jail for information.’

  ‘So what do we do with these three now?’

  ‘I’ll call the local police; they can arrest them for drug dealing, or something.’ She pulled a packet of white powder wrapped in plastic out of her handbag and dropped it on the floor.

  ‘What’s that?’ he asked, although he had already guessed.

  ‘Cocaine. Just enough to make a case.’

  He remembered how Richard Davies had described her as completely ruthless. ‘Rough justice,’ he ventured.

  ‘Huh! I only used a Taser until that bastard tried to shoot me. He’s lucky to be alive.’ She called out sharply in Arabic and Dan saw them stiffen. ‘As you can tell they’re not looking forward to being taken in for questioning.’

  ‘Are we done here then?’ Dan asked.

  ‘Actually I’ve been invited on a Fujairah customs raid,’ she replied. ‘You could come along too if you like. We’re going to visit the Tarrada and see if we can find ourselves some missiles.’

  Four hours later Dan and Emily were sitting in the bar. ‘Well we recovered two dozen Stingers from the boat,’ he said, ‘so that seems to have been a successful operation.

  ‘Yes…yes it does, though we still haven’t picked up Mulholland yet.’ She picked up her drink and took another swig at it and then stared moodily at the empty glass as if it held some secret in the dregs. Dan had been looking for an opportunity to invite her out to dinner, but this evening didn’t seem to be a good time; he decided he would wait until they got back to Muscat. Instead he said ‘Oh I‘ve been meaning to ask…who was the other guy under suspicion for helping Mulholland? Anyone I might know?’ Emily peered at him over her glass and then put it down slowly and looked him in the eye.

  ‘Actually it was you, Dan.’

  ‘What?’ he growled.

  ‘Well it’s as I said when we first met. You have financial problems, only of course they’re not gambling debts. Your sister was cheated by her worthless ex-husband so you helped out her and her kids; your parents’ money is all going in medical expenses and then you were screwed by that investment company and you’ve been left with debts of twenty seven thousand dollars not including the mortgage on your apartment.’

  Dan stared at her for a few seconds. ‘You bitch!’ he murmured, ‘so you’ve spent the last two days waiting to arrest me, or worse!’

  ‘Before I met you I spoke to Dewhurst and he struck me as being very guarded and evasive. You, on the other hand, seemed perfectly natural and open. I was immediately convinced it wasn’t you, and when I outlined the operation to you as we drove to the border my impression was confirmed.’

  ‘Is that meant to make me feel better?’ he demanded

  ‘Well I hoped it would,’ Emily replied with a half-smile. Dan stared at her for a moment trying to control his temper.

  ‘I think I’ll make my own way back to Muscat, thank you.’

  ‘I’m sorry Dan, I didn’t mean…’

  ‘Why don’t you just fuck off and file your report,’ he muttered, staring down at the table. Emily hesitated for only a moment before silently climbing to her feet. Dan watched the sway of her hips as she walked out of sight and berated himself for still feeling attracted to her. He ordered another beer and reluctantly thought over his financial situation which she had summed up fairly accurately. He had been brooding over it for several minutes when a hotel receptionist hurried into the bar and up to his table.

  ‘Mr Dan Hall? Your friend Emily called down for us to find you. She’s asking for you to come to her room. She said...it sounded like man down, and the she said I need help; emergency!’

  Dan stared at him for a couple of seconds and then leapt to his feet. ‘Have you got a pass key?’ he demanded.

  ‘Yes sir, I can get one.’

  ‘Bloody well hurry up then.’

  He made the man run to reception, snatched the key off him and then ran to the elevators. ‘Come on, come on!’ Dan fumed while the doors opened, closed and the lift rose slowly up. He ran down the corridor to her room, swiped the key card and pushed open the door. The man slumped on the floor he recognised from the briefing photos as Barry Mulholland. His head was skewed round at an angle that could only mean his neck was broken and close to his feet a bloody knife lay on the carpet. He heard Emily’s laboured breathing and walked into the bedroom. She was lying on the bed staring at the ceiling holding a blood-stained towel to her abdomen. She turned towards him and closed her eyes with relief and then opened them again.

  ‘Please…I need…help,’ she gasped. These few words seem to cause her a fresh paroxysm because she groaned and Dan saw the sweat break out on her pale face.

  Dan paced up and down the hospital waiting room for an hour and a half until a short, competent figure in green theatre overalls came in and offered his hand.

  ‘I am Suleiman Fawzan, trauma surgeon,’ he declared with a smile that Dan hoped was encouraging. ‘Miss Stevens is no longer in danger, although she has lost some blood. We have had to stitch up her intestine and her abdominal muscles. In view of her pregnancy, and the risk of peritonitis or other infection resulting from the wound, we wish to keep her in hospital for a few days. The knife blade was not close to her uterus and despite the drop in blood pressure it is most unlikely that her baby suffered any ill effects at all, not at her early stage of pregnancy.’ Dan stared open mouthed at the surgeon, relief at knowing she would be alright tinged with a sudden unreasonable regret that she was clearly attached to some man although she
had given no hint of there being anyone in her life.

  ‘Thank you ever so much,’ he managed to say. He held out his hand and the surgeon shook it with a smile.

  ‘It is clearly a surprise to you,’ he said. ‘Very early stages of course but we picked it up on the scan; as a matter of routine we check for pregnancy in cases of abdominal trauma. She’s being taken to intensive care ward two. Just give them ten minutes and then you can go in and see her,’ he said. ‘Oh I must warn you that the police are here as well, but I have told them that she is in no fit state to be interviewed at the moment, but of course they’ll want to speak to you.’

  Dan followed the signs to IC Ward 2 where a nurse led him to Emily who was propped up in bed. She looked pale and had a drip inserted but she managed a smile as he walked in.

  ‘You’re looking good Emily,’ he said. ‘You gave me a hell of a fright.’

  ‘I’m sorry. I should have taken more care going into my room.’

  ‘That could have been my fault,’ he conceded, ‘I’d just told you to…well you were only doing your job I guess.’

  ‘I know, but it wasn’t very nice for you finding out that I’d been delving into your private affairs,’ she admitted.

  ‘Well ok…never mind. Anyway the surgeon tells me you’ll be fine and there’s no danger to your baby.’ Her smile evaporated and she frowned.

  ‘My what?’

  ‘Your baby…the surgeon explained you were pregnant but the knife missed…’ He stopped when he realised that she was staring at him aghast.

  ‘I’m what? How the hell? I can’t be!’ she gazed up at the ceiling in slack-jawed confusion.

  ‘Sorry I thought you’d know; I didn’t think it would come as such a shock,’ he said. She looked at him for a moment and then stared up at the ceiling breathing hard.

  The next day Richard Davies called on him in his hotel and said that he had cleared it with the local authorities for Dan to return to Oman. He went to the hospital to say goodbye. She was quiet and unsmiling but thanked him again for his assistance and they wished each other well. ‘How long will you have to stay here?’ he asked.

  ‘Probably three days in the ICW, then perhaps another two weeks in hospital before the stitches come out. I won’t be fit to travel for a while after that.’

  ‘I’ll come and visit you in about a week if that’s alright,’ he suggested.

  She managed a small smile. ‘Ok that would be nice. I expect I’ll have Richard Davies coming over here demanding a report.’

  ‘He’s over here already. I’ve just come from him.’

  ‘Oh…ok.’ She hesitated, looking uncomfortable. ‘Look I don’t know how to bring this up nicely, but I put a call tracker on your hotel room phone when I checked us in. Could you remove it from underneath; you’ll need a small crosshead screwdriver, and also that mobile phone I gave you; it’s best you hand that to Richard as well’ She looked apologetic but Dan glared at her.

  ‘I suppose those devices reported any calls I made.’

  She gave a small nod.

  Six days later Dan drove from Muscat back to Fujairah and walked into the hospital reception. On enquiring into the whereabouts of Emily Stevens he was told that she had been transferred to a private nursing home and that the hospital was not authorised to reveal its location. He drove back to Muscat in sombre mood and called on Richard Davies.

  ‘Sorry Dan. I can tell you she’s safe and well, but I can’t give you any contact information.’ Davies watched him walk dejectedly back to his car. He shook his head and made a telephone call to a friend in the United States Embassy. Two days later Dan Hall received an airline ticket to Kuwait along with orders to proceed onward to Baghdad where elements of the US Marine Corps were stationed.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  19th May 2003

  Gerry yawned and gazed dully at the message from Richard Cornwall that had appeared in a red rectangle on the computer screen in front of her asking if she could come and see him immediately. Rather than jumping to her feet she took off her headphones, slumped back in her chair and placed her hand where her body was just beginning to swell. She took out her picture of Philip, stared at it for a moment and then tucked it back into her desk drawer while she recalled the occasion two weeks ago when she had last received such a message from her boss…

  It was a week after her return to work after her convalescence. She had been wondering if she should send Phil an e-mail to reveal that she was pregnant or wait until he got home. In general potentially distracting news should definitely not be sent to agents in the field, but then Phil was not really exposed in the front line. Her reverie had ended abruptly when her computer bleeped and she saw that she had a summons from Cornwall. She checked the time: 11:37am. She was sure she was not due to meet him until the afternoon. Damn! She quickly checked her appointments and then picked up the phone and called him. ‘Hello sir,’ she said cheerfully, ‘I’m coming in to see you this afternoon, 2pm.’

  ‘Good, I was just checking you’re ok Gerry. You’re due to report on the Fujairah business. Perhaps if you’re not doing anything you can’t leave, maybe you could come and see me now if that’s alright?’

  ‘Yes of course. On my way.’

  ‘Ok thank you Gerry, I’ll see you in a minute. Thank you very much.’

  She had gazed down at the handset for a moment before replacing it. What an extraordinary call. Although the principle aims of the operation in Fujairah had been met, Barry Mulholland had been expected to reveal a great deal of useful information and his death had been most unfortunate. Now that she had finally returned to the London office she was fully expecting a rebuke for the shambles. She didn’t expect solicitous phone calls enquiring after her health and if it was convenient if she could receive it.

  She pressed the entry button to Richard Cornwall’s office and to her surprise he came to the door and opened it for her and then ushered her towards a chair. ‘Please sit down, Gerry,’ he had said. ‘How are you?’

  ‘I’m fine, thank you. All the stitches have been taken out; I had an MRI scan three days ago and internally everything has healed up.’

  He gazed at her in a considerate way. ‘And your pregnancy? That’s progressing ok?’

  ‘Yes thank you. I had an ultrasound this morning.’ She could see two reports on his desk. Presumably one was her medical report and the other was her report on the operation. Maybe he was going to be less critical because the medical report had revealed that she was pregnant; she couldn’t decide whether to be relieved or irritated.

  ‘I’ve read your Fujairah report. It seems you had no choice but to kill Mulholland. However you should never have got into that situation. It was a basic error assuming your hotel room was safe.’

  She remembered opening the door to her room and finding Mulholland confronting her armed with a gun. She had kicked the gun out of his hand and jabbed him under the ribs and then swung him round and tightened her arm round his neck, not realising he had managed to draw a knife. Because he was facing away from her he had not been able to use his full strength to stab her. She had felt sharp pain and seen the knife in his hand as he raised it to stab her again. Before he could do that she had tripped him over, the sudden movement making her cry out in pain and then she had knelt on his back grasped him around the jaw and the crown of his head…

  ‘You’ll be pleased to know that ex-Major Dewhurst has been singing like the proverbial canary though,’ Cornwall declared, breaking into her train of thought.

  ‘Well that’s good news, then sir,’ she replied. Maybe it wouldn’t matter that Mulholland’s singing days were over.

  Cornwall said nothing for a moment. He shifted in his seat and looked uncomfortable. Gerry frowned. On previous occasions he had reprimanded her he had not behaved like this.

  ‘I have something else to talk to you about.’ He slid a red bordered urgent operational message form out from under her report but then he hid it away again without looking at it. ‘I’m
afraid we have had a report from our North African centre. I regret to say that Philip, Philip Barrett has been killed on duty out there. It was road traffic accident. I’m most terribly sorry to have to tell you this Gerry...’

  Following the devastating news of Philip’s death, she had considered having an abortion, but for reasons she could not resolve, possibly some kind of loyalty to Philip, she had rejected the idea. She had thought about talking it over with a friend, but then realised that there was nobody to whom she felt sufficiently close. And with Philip gone, she suspected that the real reason she had decided to keep her baby was that she felt utterly alone. Yesterday she had undergone another scan and the doctor had inspected the scar and the organs beneath and told her that all was well. This had comforted her to some extent, but there was no other joy in her life.

  Now, two weeks later, she spent a few more moments with her preoccupations before heaving herself out of her chair and walking slowly towards the elevator. Outside Cornwall’s office she pressed his call button and was rather surprised that once again he walked across his office and opened the door for her rather than just sending an enter signal.

  ‘Gerry. Do come in. You’re looking well. Please sit down.’ He ushered her over to the mini conference area rather than the more formal chair opposite his desk. ‘Coffee? Or a soft drink?’ he offered.

  She gazed at him for a moment. ‘I’m off caffeine. Do you have any mango juice, or ice cream?’

  Richard Cornwall stared at her for a moment, wondering if she was joking, but there was something in her expression that dissuaded him from taking her request lightly. ‘I don’t think so…er…I think there’s some orange juice.’

  ‘Just some water then please,’ she said.

  ‘Right!’ He buzzed his personal assistant. ‘Helen, could you bring in some water please?’

  ‘Sparkling if you have it,’ Gerry interposed.

  ‘Sparkling water, Helen; Perrier or something. Thanks.’ He handed Gerry a version of the e-mail he had received, now edited down to essentials. ‘Here, read this,’ he said. ‘Fielding has just sent it over.’