by Ian Andrew
Again he got no response and decided to give up on trying to establish some rapport with the surly Frenchman. Instead he focussed on being as natural and relaxed as he could for the moment he would hand over a completely fake passport in the middle of a declared state-of-emergency, when border controls in France were as tight as anytime in recent memory.
A yellow line marked where each passenger had to stand until called forward. Jacob looked ahead but tried not to stare. He swept his gaze over the four immigration officials behind their glass partitions. He thought it unusual. He couldn’t remember passport desks in the UK having glass, but he couldn’t be sure as most recently he’d used the E-Passport gates. Then he realised that most times he had been abroad in the past few years, he had travelled courtesy of military transports. He hoped that seat Twenty-L would be an improvement on them.
The green light on the counter to his far left blinked. He took a breath and walked over. The official’s position was raised so that the already tall and lithe black man loomed large over Jacob’s head. With his best smile, Jacob slid his passport and boarding card through the small gap at the bottom of the glass. The check was swift, the passport was scanned, the photo was held up to compare and without a word of acknowledgement, a question or a smile of recognition, the documents were handed back to him and he was waved through.
The security checks, metal detectors and X-ray stations, although slow, and with a cordon supplied by French paratroopers, were equally non-events.
Thierry was waiting for him on the other side. Jacob hoped that the ninety minutes they had before boarding might give him a chance to get a message out to Tien and Kara, but Thierry once more gripped his elbow and led him off. This time to the Air France Business Lounge. Thierry, it turned out, could speak more than monosyllables, and he did so to the Air France representative on the front desk. They were ushered inside to what Jacob thought was an extremely plush area and one that he realised afforded his minder the best prospect of monitoring his every move. This was no sprawling departure gate concourse with cafes and fast food outlets surrounded with duty free and gift shops. This was a controlled, quiet, refined space with limited numbers and a small, albeit not cramped, footprint.
“You have before been in place like this?” Thierry asked in passable English, while directing him to sit down at a table.
Jacob shook his head. “No. Never.” It was the truth. He reckoned the departure lounge at RAF Brize Norton, although definitely an exclusive lounge, didn’t quite come up to the same standards.
“You drink and eat?”
“Sorry?” Jacob asked.
“You drink and eat. You want to?”
“Umm, yeah. I could eat something.”
Thierry waved a hand in the direction of a long counter running almost the length of the room. “It is all, umm, how you say? Eh, gratis, free. You go, help yourself. But, do not get drunk.”
Jacob went to rise but Thierry’s hand gripped his arm, “Also, do not leave where I can see. And do not go near them,” he said pointing to a long row of computer terminals, half of which were in use.
“Why would I go near them?” Jacob asked, trying to sound offended.
“I am sure you do not, but I just tell you. That is all.”
“What if I need to go to the toilet?”
“You come tell me. Like in school, with the teacher. Yes?”
“Right. Okay, got it.”
Jacob grazed up and down the length of the buffet table and the open bar, taking his cues from the other diners. He knew he was on a potentially dangerous mission, he knew it was likely he would mix with more people that would sicken him, but just here and now, he was impressed with his surroundings. He liked the exclusivity of it. He liked the ability to have free wine and spirits, served by smart waiters and waitresses. He could see why those with power and money found it intoxicating, but as he looked around him, at the slightly bored looking customers with their matter-of-fact’ness expressions, he also realised how quickly anyone could become inured to anything. He had a tiny inkling of why, once used to their surroundings, they would continue to push for more. Quickly becoming dissatisfied by this lounge and jealous of First Class exclusivity. The vaguest thought teased him. He wondered if it was the same for those men in Amsterdam. Did their need for new experiences, evermore reckless pleasures, mean they constantly had to push and stretch the boundaries of what they were prepared to do? Until they stepped over the line. The line that, once crossed, surrendered their right to be called men.
ɸ
The ninety minutes passed quickly and when their flight was called Thierry led them to the departure gate and stepped back to allow Jacob to go first. Handing his boarding pass over, he was directed by the ever-smiling flight attendant to the far aisle of the aircraft. With a quick glance into the luxury of First Class, he turned right and made his way through Business Class before entering a separate section of seats. Not quite as luxurious as the business ones, but certainly more upmarket than normal economy class. He looked up at the seat numbers on the bulkhead and was surprised to find himself staring at Twenty-L. It was the window side of a pair of, what he thought, looked more like upright shells than seats. Thierry nudged him to move in from the aisle and then sat down next to him.
As the rest of the passengers embarked, Jacob took the time to examine his surroundings. The little area was a midway point between business and economy. He took out his boarding pass stub and for the first time noticed the words Premium Voyageur. ‘Premium economy?’ he thought. Turning around like he was examining the seat he was in, and stretching up to turn the airflow on, he noticed the discreet little cabin had tied back curtains that he guessed would be drawn as soon as the flight departed. It had its own toilets and only twenty-two seats in total. He figured only First Class would have been smaller. It was like the business lounge they had been in. Comfortable, plush, giving Thierry the most control of his charge. Jacob would have no excuse to wander thirty or forty rows to get to a toilet when there was one in reaching distance. He sighed inwardly and knew that if this continued for the rest of the flights, he was never going to get a message out.
ɸ
The Air France flight left the ground twenty minutes after its scheduled departure time of seven-forty at night. It touched down in Singapore a little early, some twelve hours and twenty minutes later, but at a local time of three-twenty in the afternoon of the following day.
The only conversation Jacob and Thierry had throughout the flight was in regard to the disembarkation cards handed to them by the cabin staff. Jacob was told that he was visiting Shu Ying Tan, his girlfriend of one year. She lived at 22 Lor Batawi, Hougang, Singapore and he would be staying with her for two weeks. Shu Ying was a twenty-six year old school teacher he had met when she had been on a six-month exchange program in his home town of Grays, Essex. This was his first time visiting her, or Singapore. Jacob filled in the disembarkation card with the corresponding details.
Once happy he had memorised the backstory sufficiently, Thierry ignored him and began to watch a movie. Jacob did likewise and patiently waited for Thierry to go to the toilet. He thought that would provide his best chance to slip a message to one of the flight attendants. It would be a long shot but worth trying. They might just pass it on for him on landing.
But when Thierry finally stood and ambled up to the toilet, Jacob was immediately aware that he would have no such opportunity. The big Frenchman had timed his absence right to the start of the first in-flight food service.
The flight attendants were all busy, their attention focussed on the quick and efficient delivery of food to the masses. When Jacob ducked his head through the curtains to look down the aisles of Economy, he saw multiple trolleys blocking any hope of making it to the rear galley, where there might have been some spare staff. He turned back and sat down. His last hope was to pass it to the Premium Economy flight attendant who was making her way slowly down the aisle towards him, but by the time she arr
ived, Thierry was back. Jacob’s only consolation was being served the best airline food he had ever tasted.
After the meal he was sure Thierry wasn’t likely to doze off, so he decided to take the chance to rest. Reclining the shell-like seat he managed to grab about five hours’ worth of fitful sleep. The rest of the long flight he watched more movies and listened to music. As they landed, Thierry leaned over to him, “You stay with me all the way through. We go through immigration together, get our bags together, we go through customs together. I will take you out to meet the people who will look after you tonight.”
“Tonight? Am I not just flying straight on?”
“No. You have to leave the airport, then come back later. You use a different passport. It’s safe-”
“Yeah, I get it. Safer that way,” Jacob said.
Waiting for the aircraft doors to finally open seemed to take longer than the passage through the vast arrivals terminal of Changi Airport. Jacob knew the reason for the swift and simplified path he followed was because the Frenchman had no need to refer to signs or directions. He wondered just how many people this man had escorted on the Flight Path. Relieved of the responsibility to navigate, Jacob noticed the numerous Christmas decorations on display. They surprised him as he hadn’t expected massive trees and frosted, crystal reindeers pulling wooden sledges inside an Asian airport. As he took in the stars and holly wreaths, huge baubles and garlands he admitted to himself that he had no idea if Singapore was Islamic, Buddhist or whatever. He figured that by the decorations on show, there must have been some Christians. Or maybe just some commercialism.
At the top of an escalator Thierry stopped and pointed down to the ground floor. A series of eleven lanes, marked out by standard security barriers, but with tinsel twisted around them, led up to eleven passport control desks. Numbers ten and eleven were marked for aircrew and diplomats only.
“We go into lane four. Both of us. You behind me. Clear?”
“Yes. Clear.” Jacob stopped, then thought he had nothing to lose, “Umm, why exactly?”
“Because she has some of your money,” Thierry said and tilted his head in the direction of the female immigration officer sitting behind desk four.
“But I thought the passport was good enough.”
“It is, but we like to have, eh,” he struggled to find the right word.
“A guarantee?” Jacob offered.
“Yes, une garantie. That is it. Come along.”
Chapter 25
Changi Airport, Singapore. Thursday 26th November.
Passport control, baggage reclaim and customs were uneventful and Jacob followed Thierry out to the waiting faces of a large crowd standing along the edge of a wide walkway. Jacob had always considered the passage through waiting crowds at an airport arrivals a strange experience. Even when he knew there was no one waiting for him he couldn’t help but look at the faces and read the printed names on cards. Just in case. This time, although he knew someone was waiting, he still had no reason to scan the faces or read the cards. He wouldn’t be recognising anyone. So he didn’t try. Instead he watched Thierry and saw him give a subtle nod to a pair of smartly dressed, middle-aged, Asian men near the end of the greeting line. Both men walked towards the exit door at the furthest corner of the terminal building. Jacob followed them, and Thierry, outside.
The wall of heat and humidity hit him like a physical blow. There was a smell that he couldn’t identify. It somehow reminded him of smoke, but he could taste it, like a bitter-sweet heaviness in the air. By the time he walked the modest distance to the short-term parking and the silver Nissan Teana the two Asian men were standing beside, he was drenched in sweat. He remembered the heat of Kandahar and Basra, but it had never felt this oppressive. A weight of hot dampness was pressing down on him. He looked across at Thierry, who had removed his heavy sweater on the plane. He may well have escorted lots on this journey, but the big Frenchman’s face was beaded with perspiration and dark stains were already showing under his arms.
The man on the driver’s side, dressed in a business suit that Jacob thought would have melted him to a puddle had he been wearing it, leant in and released the boot catch.
“Put your bags in there Jacob, then get in the back please,” he said in an accent that surprised Jacob as much as the man’s ability to wear a shirt, tie and jacket in this climate. There was no trace of Chinese, or other stereotypical Asian pronunciation. The man spoke like he had been born and raised in Surrey, or Hampshire.
The other man, on the passenger side of the car, who also wore a suit but with no tie, held the rear door open for him. Jacob did as he was asked. Outside, he could hear the driver speaking to Thierry in French. He twisted around and saw Thierry hand over a single piece of paper. There were a few more words in French then Thierry walked over to a taxi rank on the other side of the road. Jacob guessed that his part in this was over.
The driver got in and turned to face him. “Good afternoon Jacob. My name is Gerard and this,” he held his hand towards the passenger who was just taking his own seat, “is Lim. You will be staying with us for a short time. Then I shall accompany you on your next flight.”
“When will that be?”
“Tomorrow morning, very early. We shall be back at the airport by ten tonight.”
“Can I ask where we’ll be going?”
Gerard just smiled, “All in good time. What I would like you to do now is two things. In the door compartment next to you is a black hood. Do you see it?”
Jacob held the heavy cotton material up.
“Good. Now I’d like you to lie down on the back seat and slip that hood over your head, if you would be so kind.”
Jacob considered it the most polite and potentially most threatening thing ever said to him. He stared back at Gerard, who must have easily read the astonishment on his face.
“I assure you, my dear chap, you are in no danger. We are simply the latest steps on the Flight Path. It is a necessity that we keep things as isolated as possible. There are only a few links, like our French friend there,” he gestured in the direction of the taxi rank, “who know people at either end of a step. Even then it is limited. I do not know his name, he does not know mine. But, the men who pass from one end of the Path to the other, men like you, get to see all of us. We need to have safeguards if we can. One such safeguard is that you do not know where you will be staying for the next few hours. It is safer for everyone. Do you understand?”
“Right, of course. That’s a good idea. Much safer.”
“Good. I am glad you agree. Hood on then, and lie down please. I shall turn the air conditioning up to full so you will be more comfortable.”
In reaching up to slip the material over his head, Jacob managed to get a quick glimpse of his wristwatch. It was 16:10. The car pulled away, but never having been to Singapore, he had no concept of a mental map to refer to. The little he knew of the place was the circumstances of its surrender in the Second World War, the fact it once had an RAF base and that there was a bar called Raffles; somewhere.
He decided to start a count of lefts and rights, but other than the initial right turn out of the car park and another long sweeping right-hander that Jacob reckoned felt like an on-ramp to a major highway, the rest of the journey, for a long time, was without any noticeable deviations. Eventually, the car decelerated and stopped. He heard the tell-tale ticking of an indicator and the noise of other cars around him. ‘Traffic lights’ he thought and then the car moved off again, turned right, drove a short distance, turned right again, stayed straight for another few minutes, and went up a considerable incline. As it levelled out, it took a pair of left turns in quick succession then slowed and stopped, before reversing back and left. He felt the bump of the wheels as the car mounted a low kerb, heard the handbrake being applied, the engine switched off and sensed Gerard and Lim step out of the car. The rear door was opened and a hand was placed on his arm.
“Now, Jacob, please keep your hood on, but si
t up and shuffle this way,” Gerard said and helped him out. He was guided forward, told to step up and guided forward again. He immediately felt the coolness of air-conditioning. He heard a door close behind him and the hood was removed.
Blinking rapidly, he ran his hands through his hair. His wristwatch told him it was twenty-seven minutes since he had put the hood on. He considered the information he had gained about the journey was likely worthless.
As his eyes adjusted he could see he was standing in a small open plan living area with two steps leading up to a kitchen on his left, a dining table with six chairs to his front and a lounge area with a red leather sofa and matching armchairs, two steps down to his right. A coffee table was in front of the sofa and triangularly offset was a low television unit on top of which was a flat-screen TV that Jacob thought was twice as big as the room needed. Other than it, an electric kettle that sat on the kitchen bench, and a white fridge jammed into the corner next to the sink, he noted a lack of any other appliances, pictures or ornaments. The three windows, one for each section of the space, looked out onto what he assumed was a high-walled courtyard. He could hear nothing of interest and neither could he smell the tang he had at the airport. He felt a waft of cool air pass across his head and looking up, saw two air-conditioning vents in the ceiling.
Lim and Gerard, both standing behind him swapped a few sentences in what Jacob assumed was Chinese. He turned to see Lim carrying the suitcase and backpack up a flight of stairs that rose from the right hand side of a small hallway.
“Come, Jacob,” Gerard said with a sweep of his hands towards the stairs, “I will show you your room. I am sure you are tired and would like to have a shower, then some rest perhaps?”
Jacob was suddenly aware of how tired he was. He hadn’t had a proper night’s sleep since before Amsterdam and a flight to the other side of the world hadn’t helped. He nodded and followed behind Lim.