“Christ!” said Morris, “he’ll never make it! Those things need thousands of feet!”
Burnt rubber smoked behind the braking wheels. Some of the tyres seemed to be tearing themselves into strips. The huge plane hurtled down the concrete towards the dunes, bucketing as the pilot fought to hold it steady. A wing tip almost touched the ground. The plane slewed, still doing about eighty mph. When it was sideways on half the undercarriage collapsed, but the machine went sliding along the concrete. The blind, tiny panes of the flight deck smashed all together, blasted out by an inexplicable small explosion. The prince squealed. Morris shut his eyes, though he knew flames would be invisible in that sunlight.
The telephone rang.
Morris opened his eyes again and stared at the scene. The plane lay still, thirty yards from the end of the runway, with its tail towards the dunes and its near wing resting on the concrete. Still no flames. The symbol of the rising sun stared from the tall tail fin. The telephone was still ringing, so he picked it up.
“Morris, old fellow?”
“Yes, it’s me. What the hell was all that about?”
“A slight emergency. I need your help. Would you be kind enough to go down to the runway and greet any survivors?”
“Survivors?”
“Some buffoon was sitting in the cockpit with a live grenade in his hand, but it looks as if he dropped it in the landing. There ought to be somebody alive in the cabin, though, so I’d be terribly grateful if you . . .”
“Me?”
“Pick up a walkie-talkie as you go and tune in on channel A. We had radio contact with them, but its gone dead. The thing is, old fellow, that this is one of those hijack jobs—Palestinians, but they made a mess of it.”
“I’m a zoo-keeper, dammit!”
“By this word we, Pacific Sultan of Q’Kut, Lord of the Marshlands, etc, etc, appoint our trusty and well-beloved companion Wesley Naboth Morris to the office and privileges of Foreign Minister of Q’Kut, for such period as shall please us. Thanks be to Allah!”
“Balls.”
“Look, Morris, I need you. It’s got to be someone who speaks Japanese, for a start. And someone I can trust, to go on with. You won’t need to take any decisions—I’ll be on Channel A.”
“Something’s happening.”
The emergency door at the root of the tilted wing opened, and a figure walked precariously out and down the slope.
“There are survivors, you see,” said the Sultan softly. “Carry on, Morris—Dyal and I will have you covered from here. Don’t get out of sight.”
“Oh, all right,” said Morris.
“I’m afraid you’ll have to walk. Before the radio went dead they said just one man, on foot, to meet them.”
“What! In this sun!”
“Take a brolly-man. He won’t count.”
“Oh, all right! ”
Morris snapped the phone down. He found it hard to compose himself enough to explain in courteous Arabic to the prince that their lesson must be postponed. Before he had finished that Dinah chattered nervously at him from her nest, and he realised that he hadn’t time to dispose of her. He’d have to take her along. He clicked, and she came rushing over. Thoughtlessly, as if for reassurance in this daunting and unwelcome task, he took her hand and led her out.
3
Sweat streamed in prickling rivulets all down Morris’s skin. He walked slowly, to lessen the risk of heat-stroke and allow for the pace of the brolly-man behind him. His sunglasses were not quite big enough to eliminate all the glare from the side. He felt a fool, and frightened.
“Testing, testing, one two three four,” he said.
“My dear fellow, I know you can count,” hissed the expensive gadget in his shirt pocket. “I’ve got her bang in my sights. By Jove, that’s what I call a figure!”
The walkie-talkie smacked its metal lips. Warily Morris peered across the concrete furnace—he still had a hundred yards to go. He wished that the hijackers had allowed him to come in a car—the bullet-proof one would have done fine. The girl posed on the wing had a nasty-looking gun at her hip, which distracted Morris’s attention from what the Sultan considered her finer points. She was dark-haired and brown-skinned, slim in her blouse and jeans. Visor-like sunglasses hid her eyes, but her nose had a hawkish look. Her stance was tired but confident, quite different from the deflated exhaustion of the dozen people who stood grouped before her on the concrete, covered by her gun.
Dinah whimpered and tugged at Morris’s hand to be carried. It was too hot for that—but then he realised how the concrete must be burning her feet and picked her up. She clung to his side, shading her eyes against the glare.
“Stop,” called the girl in Arabic. “That is near enough.”
She had the words right, but her accent was appalling. She called again as Morris came on and waved the gun his way. Then she tried French, which she spoke even worse. Morris became more confident as he approached. It was too hot to shout over distances.
“I insist that you stop,” she said suddenly in perfectly good English, clipped and officer-like.
Morris walked on until he was about ten feet from the wing-tip, where he and the girl and her captives formed the points of an equilateral triangle. He took the sweat-towel which the brolly-man carried, folded it and put it on the ground in the shade of the brolly. Thankfully he dumped Dinah on it, then turned and bowed to the captives.
“His Pacific Majesty the Sultan of Q’Kut conveys his greetings,” he said in Japanese. “He is honoured to receive you in Q’Kut.”
The captives stiffened with surprise and hope. Several of them returned his bow. He turned to the girl.
“Is anybody injured?” he said in English.
“No,” she snapped. “Who are you? What powers do you have?”
“My name is Doctor Wesley Morris, and I am Foreign Minister of Q’Kut. I am also in radio contact with His Majesty.”
“Fine,” she said. “You can tell his nibs I . . . we want a new plane, with a pilot, and food and drink. We demand these things in the name of Arab solidarity, for the liberation of Palestine.”
Morris muttered into the walkie-talkie.
“Yes, yes,” answered the Sultan. “A pilot? See if you can find out what happened to the other one. And there ought to be three guerrillas.”
“Get on with it,” snapped the girl.
“Listen, Morris,” said the walkie-talkie, “I’ll have to back these goons up to keep my Arabs quiet, though privately I say pooh to Palestine. But the oil company is run by a rabid bunch of absentee Zionists. I want no part of any of this. They only landed here because some idiots at Karachi tried to shoot their tyres out and got a fuel pipe as well.”
“Get on with it,” said the girl again. “Or I’ll shoot that chimp to show I mean business.”
“His majesty is an ardent supporter of the Palestinian cause,” said Morris, “but regrets that he has no plane or pilot available.”
“He can have one flown in,” said the girl. “We’ll get back into the plane and wait—I don’t think it’s going to catch fire after all.”
“In that case you will all die of heat-stroke,” said Morris.
“Don’t give me that,” said the girl. “Come on you lot.”
“This is a comparatively cool day,” said Morris. “To-morrow will probably be twenty degrees hotter.”
He turned to the captives and asked in Japanese whether any of them knew whether the air-conditioning was still working. There was a mutter among the group. A square, blue-suited businessman moved to one side and allowed Morris to see that there were two diminutive air hostesses standing among the men, limp little rag dolls in pretty kimonos.
“We think the air-conditioning is now broken,” said one of them. “We think also the pi
lots and two of the attackers are dead. One attacker was holding a grenade with the pin drawn, on the flight deck, when we landed, and there was a big explosion before the aeroplane stopped.”
The she-guerrilla’s gun was now wavering vaguely from the captives to Morris and back again. Morris translated quietly into the walkie-talkie and listened to the reply.
“Christ,” he whispered, “that’s a hell of a risk. Are you sure . . .”
“Quite sure, old fellow. I’m enjoying myself.”
Morris licked his lips.
“His Majesty requests you to stand quite still,” he said to the girl. “He is about to shoot out the window by your left hip—for God’s sake don’t move.”
Her mouth opened. None of them heard the crack of the rifle, only the snap and tinkle when the bullet hit the thick glass. The group on the concrete gasped and closed up, but one of the men clapped his hands. Dinah copied him vigorously.
“You see,” said Morris. “I believe your companions are dead, and two first-class shots have you in their sights. Would you please put that gun down?”
She moved a long, fine finger to touch the bullet hole, as if to make sure it was not a trick one from a joke-shop.
“I must point out,” said Morris, “that even by Arab standards Q’Kutis put a low value on human life.”
Suddenly she crouched, put the gun on the wing beside her and covered her eyes with the inside of her wrists. The man in the blue suit stole quietly forward, reached up and took the gun, but she stayed motionless, stuck in her foetal huddle. The walkie-talkie laughed.
“Stow it,” muttered Morris angrily. “And send us a few cars out, mate, and someone to take charge of the girl. You’re not appointing me chief of police.”
“My dear fellow, you’ve done it beautifully. One of those air hostesses doesn’t look a bad bit of skirt either.”
Morris clicked the gadget off. An absolute monarch has many powers, but he can’t gloat at you if you’re out of earshot. Then he walked across to the passengers, leaving the patient brolly-man to shade Dinah.
“His Majesty is delighted to announce that you are now safe,” he said. “He will be sending some cars to take you to the palace, but there will be a few minutes’ wait. I suggest you move into the shade of the aeroplane.”
The man in the blue suit handed him the gun, which he took unwillingly. Dinah started begging to play with it as soon as he reached the shade of the brolly. He switched the walkie-talkie on again.
“How does the safety-catch on this bloody thing work?” he said.
“Ah, you’re back in circulation, old fellow. What model is it?”
“Don’t ask me.”
“Try pointing it at the sand-dune and pulling the trigger. Hold it firm, though.”
Morris did as he was told. Nothing happened.
“Safety-catch on, then,” said the Sultan. “Now listen, Morris. I’m sending Dyal out with the cars—he’ll take charge of the girl. He’s bringing robes and veils for the women—he’ll be there in a couple of minutes. You’ve just got time to go and see whether there’s anyone alive in the plane. OK?”
“I suppose so.”
With extreme reluctance Morris moved towards the wing. Dinah whimpered at him and he turned. More for reassurance in his grisly task than anything else he handed the gun to the brolly-man and allowed Dinah to climb into his arms. As they went up the wing the girl didn’t move.
Inside the plane the plush tunnel reeked of sweat and hot plastic and something else—fear, Morris thought. Animals can smell fear, old wives say. Dinah was certainly very clinging, and it took him some time to persuade her to let go of him and settle into one of the seats. He showed her the tilt button and left her trying to make it produce bananas.
Fear, he thought as he hesitated by the door on to the flight deck. You’d be able to set up an experiment to check whether the old wives’ tale is true—group of animals with strong sense of smell—raccoons?—sever olfactory nerve of half of them—find human volunteers to be frightened—how? How? Why by putting them one side of a metal door, tell them that there may be an armed man, wounded, dangerous, on the other side, and then telling them to open the door—which, they would note, was out of shape and torn in a couple of places by fragments of grenade casing.
There wasn’t a sound in the plane except for Dinah fidgeting with the unproductive button. Morris found it hard to turn the door-handle, slippery with the sweat from his own palm. When he pushed, something resisted on the far side. He pushed harder and the thing gave, reluctantly. New smells came through the crack, a warm, wet odour mixed with the stink of something burnt; but nothing moved. He put his shoulder to the door and felt the resistance slither away. He looked in, swallowing hard to keep the vomit down, and stared at the mess of blood-spattered instruments and broken glass and shabby leather and smashed men. One, two, three, four, five—five heads, anyway, though one had no face—and two of the wrenched torsos wore khaki shirts.
He pulled the door shut and stood gulping.
Behind him Dinah chattered suddenly, and he turned. She was crouched in the luggage rack, trying to take a picture of him with a miniature camera she had found.
“Morris?” said the walkie-talkie.
“I’m OK. There are five dead men on the flight deck. Two of them aren’t wearing the airline uniform.”
“Splendid, perfectly splendid. The cars are almost there, so you’d better come out. You don’t sound too good.”
“I’m OK, I tell you.”
Morris clicked for Dinah’s attention but she snuggled away from him on a nest of coats, hugging the camera to her crotch. He clicked again, making her twist her head to look sulkily back at him. He spread his hands, palm up, making a slight pushing gesture towards her: the I-give sign. Her expression changed to one of farcical surprise as she stared to and fro between him and her new toy, as though thinking it might be booby-trapped; then she catapulted off the rack into his arms.
Out in the furnace air he saw five of the Cadillacs sliding across the runway. He stood on the wing and gestured at them with his free arm, making four of them circle round to the nose of the plane while the fifth stopped beside the brolly-man. In the group beneath the fuselage one of the passengers was now lying supine on the concrete with a stewardess kneeling beside him and loosening his collar. Morris went hurriedly down the wing, but when he put Dinah back on her towel she scampered straight across the concrete, opened the front passenger door of the nearest car and jumped inside.
“There’s a stretcher in one of those cars,” said the walkie-talkie. “I meant it for the bodies, but you might as well use it for that bloke.”
Morris organised a couple of the chatterbox drivers to cope with the patient, a wizened little Japanese still stertorously breathing. Then he called to Dyal who came striding over, huge and seeming blacker than ever in the hateful sun. Morris took two of the robes from his arm and turned to the air hostesses.
“The Sultan is most honoured by your presence,” he said in Japanese, “and has already expressed to me his admiration of your beauty. So it is with double regret that he requests you to veil yourselves, according to the custom of the country.”
Through all the weariness and disintegration their trained smiles flicked alight, like a cuckoo clock striking in a bomb-smashed house. They even started to giggle as they swathed each other in the robes. Morris walked across with Dyal to the girl on the wing. Her pose was of such abject defeat that he spoke to her apologetically.
“We’re going now,” he said. “We’ll send out men to bring in the bodies of your friends.”
She didn’t move.
“I’m afraid you’ll have to wear a veil till you’re in the women’s quarters,” he went on, a bit despairingly now. But she looked up and reached down her hand for the robes. Below the
sunglasses her cheeks were smeared with tears. She rose to her feet, towering above him, and tossed the robe away with an arrogant gesture
“I’m not wearing that gear,” She declaimed. “That’s one of the things it’s all about. You can shoot me first.”
From the way she spoke there might have been a vast audience gathered on the air-strip, listening to this declaration of a basic human liberty. At any rate she spoke loud enough for the walkie-talkie to pick her words up.
“Beautiful, beautiful,” said the Sultan. “The two male goons arrive dead, and the female one’s first act is to flout local Arab feelings. You may tell her that I have no intention of making her a martyr to fashion.”
But the girl was already stalking down the wing towards the Cadillac, as though it had been ordered for her by some millionaire admirer. She was a bit nonplussed to find Dinah already occupying the front seat.
Morris watched her out of the corner of his eye as the car slid towards the palace. His own nerves were completely shredded, but the other two seemed quite cool, although Dyal’s finger was on the trigger of his gun and its muzzle no more than six inches from her left breast. She seemed to relax and soften in the lovely air-conditioning, lolling against the golden silk upholstery. When she spoke her tone was adjusted to polite party conversation.
“I hope you don’t mind my asking,” she said, “but if you’re Foreign Minister, who’s that? First Secretary?”
She pointed at Dinah, who was playing with the radio controls. “Well, as a matter of fact I’m the zoo-keeper too,” muttered Morris.
“That proves it,” she said. She made an elegant little gesture towards the startling shape of the palace, outlined on its hill against the ferocious sky.
“I’d already decided that whoever built that place must be absolutely giddy bonkers.”
Morris was so surprised by the phrase that he turned and stared straight at her. She returned his stare, lowering her sun-glasses to do so.
The Poison Oracle Page 3