A trumpet fanfare sounded from the public address system, followed by an announcement: ‘Ladies and gentlemen, to celebrate the opening of our brand-new Twickenham store we are presenting an amazing free gift each day this week to one of our customers, who is randomly chosen as they step through the door. We decided that today’s winner would be the first customer to come in after three o’clock and he – lucky man – receives a week’s free holiday in the wonderful city of Marrakesh, all expenses paid.’
His new friend said, ‘You’d better hold the balloons. I’m supposed to tie them to your trolley, but you didn’t bring one in.’
Danny decided it was best not to explain why. He’d forget about the night-stocking interview. Holding the balloons high, he allowed his glamorous escort to lead him past the long row of checkouts to the far end of the store, where some people with champagne glasses were waiting to greet him. An important-looking man in a bow tie and suit shook his hand and gave him an envelope. Cameras flashed and there was another public announcement about his lucky win.
Within the week he was in Morocco.
Except for a couple of stag-party trips to Benidorm, he’d not been abroad, so this was an adventure. Finding his hotel bus was the first test. As soon as he got past immigration he was bombarded by locals offering taxi rides. With a sense of purpose he made a beeline across the terminal to the shuttle bus area.
The bombarding was to become the staple feature of his week in the city. If it wasn’t for taxis it was for Berber rugs, leather goods, spices and offers to show him belly dancing and snake charming. He quickly learned how to say no with a firmness that would get you a punch in the eye in Twickenham.
The Marrakesh experience was all a bit much at first – the crowded streets, the noise, smells and strange sights – but as the week progressed he started to get the hang of it. Part of his prize was a pocketful of dirhams – the local currency – and he learned to haggle in the heaving souks and find places to eat and to escape from all the noise and relax with mint tea and sweetmeats.
As a professional burglar he took a particular interest in the architecture. Not the Koutoubia minaret – which you could glimpse from almost any part of the city – but the private dwellings of rich Moroccans. These were mostly villas, pink or ochre, nicely spaced in their own grounds in the Nakheel district just off the tourist beat. The streets were wider than motorways, and almost deserted. Danny did see one Rolls-Royce glide by with a silver horseshoe tied to the front. These people believed in their good luck. They couldn’t get enough of it.
The most appealing thing about the millionaire homes was their construction. True, the exteriors appeared like fortresses – featureless, unforgiving stone walls. But they had one thing in common that would appeal to any burglar: flat roofs.
Even better, they were limited to a couple of storeys because of some local decree that the only tall buildings in the city were minarets. Get up there and you’d be laughing. You’d be spoiled for choice. The villas were evidently planned around enclosed courtyards where the good life was enjoyed in private.
Security? The owners didn’t seem to bother. There wasn’t an alarm to be seen, or CCTV.
One residence in particular was an open invitation. It wasn’t the largest, but it had a well-kept exterior surrounded by shrubs and trees, which don’t come cheap in the desert. Among them was a handsome palm that overhung the roof in a graceful curve.
Danny went back to the hotel and thought long and hard about that palm and how it might be used. He’d seen film of barefoot boys shinning up palm trees with the aid of rope tied loosely around their ankles. They made it look easy.
He weighed up the options.
Lady Luck had got him to Marrakesh but it was up to him to make the experience pay. This night would be his last in the city. Tomorrow he’d be back in Twickenham, living on the social and the small rewards he got from burglary. These Moroccans were so rich they wouldn’t notice if anything was taken. Why not make the most of his luck and collect some souvenirs? He’d happily settle for small stuff, such as banknotes, jewellery and designer watches.
Soon after midnight he set off for Nakheel equipped with a torch and a strip of towelling – the belt of the complimentary bathrobe from his hotel room.
Climbing the tree was harder than he expected because he had to learn the knack of getting purchase against the trunk while bracing his legs with his bare feet held in place by the flannel belt and pulling with the arms.
Eventually he scrambled onto the roof, rubbing his aching biceps. Luckily he’d made no sound. If there was a guard dog here, it was asleep – or smart enough to know it couldn’t reach him.
He crept to the edge and peered over. A heady scent wafted up to him – orange blossom mingled with stale cigars and cannabis. As he’d guessed, the moonlit courtyard was a rich man’s hideaway. Statues, a pool, sunshades and loungers strewn with empty bottles and intimate items of clothing. But no people. They would be out to the world.
All the windows of the villa were within this enclosed area and some were open. Danny had no difficulty descending from the roof to a ledge and from there, inside.
His torch beam showed him some kind of dining room with a large oval table low to the floor and surrounded by cushions. In the centre on a tray was a gleaming silver tea set of the sort he’d seen in the souks: tall, ornate pots and small cups without handles – too large to steal. He couldn’t take items as big as that and he’d never know where to fence them in this alien city. He wanted smaller stuff.
Move on, he told himself. Find the private rooms. The good thing about this stone-built house was that there were no creaking floorboards.
At the far end of a passage was an open door. Danny purred. He’d found some sort of boudoir with multicoloured drapes from the ceiling and huge silk cushions. First he checked that no one was in the bed. Then he started opening the drawers in an exquisitely carved sandalwood unit that stretched right across one wall.
Inside was sexy underwear, fine to the touch – enough for an entire harem. Thongs, bras, basques, camisoles and skimpy nightdresses in profusion.
High quality make-up and perfume lined open shelves under hinged mirrors.
There ought to be jewellery, but where was it? A safe?
Maybe hidden inside the wardrobe. Danny jerked open a door and almost suffered a cardiac arrest.
A pair of beautiful brown eyes was staring at him from between the hanging clothes.
‘Oh, shit,’ he said.
His luck had run out.
He had no idea whether she understood, but he started talking, as much to gain control over his own shattered nerves as hers. ‘I won’t hurt you. It’s not you I’m after. I just dropped in, like. Thought the place was empty. Really, ma’am, I’m not going to touch you. I don’t do violence.’
The woman was crouching at the bottom of the vast wardrobe. As far as Danny could tell, she was dressed in a t-shirt and jeans, definitely a Moroccan woman, but in Western clothes. She, too, was alarmed. She’d started hyperventilating.
‘I’m backing off,’ Danny said, making a calming gesture and taking a step back. ‘You can come out if you like.’
She wasn’t willing to do that, but she seemed to respond because her breathing slowed a little.
‘OK, I’m out of here,’ Danny said.
She spoke – and in English. ‘Who are you?’
As if it made a difference.
‘Just a visitor,’ Danny said. ‘I’m a tourist.’ Then he added, deciding some honesty might be no bad thing, ‘Everyone calls me Danny.’
‘These rooms are kept locked,’ she said. ‘How did you get in?’
‘Over the roof and through a window. Are you alone then – like a prisoner in here?’
‘It is the way my husband decides.’
Husband? A warning bell sounded in Danny’s head. ‘Is he about?’
‘He won’t come in now,’ she said.
‘Aren’t you allowed out?�
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‘Please. I don’t wish to speak of this.’ As if to discourage more questions, she pulled one of the hanging garments partially over her face. As she did so Danny noticed a bruise on her forearm.
‘Does he hit you?’
She was silent.
‘That shouldn’t be allowed. That’s out of order.’ The reason she had been hiding in the wardrobe was now obvious. She was hiding from her brutal husband. ‘Listen, you don’t have to suffer this. You could escape.’
She shook her head, but her eyes showed the suggestion had some appeal.
‘I’m serious,’ Danny said – and he was. He felt genuine sympathy for this abused woman. For the moment, her situation mattered more than the burglary. ‘Listen, this is your lucky day. I can climb out of a window and unlock the door from the other side.’
‘It’s no use,’ she said. ‘I have nowhere to go.’
He took his room key from his pocket. ‘Hotel Splendide in rue de la Liberté. It’s not far. Do you know it?’
She nodded. ‘Do you really mean this?’
‘Hundred per cent.’
She took the key and emerged from the wardrobe. She was larger than Danny had expected. Probably doesn’t get much exercise, he thought, walled up here. Not that her size mattered, but her eyes and voice had made him picture someone frail.
‘I can help you through the window and down to the ground,’ Danny offered, not without wondering whether it was physically possible. ‘Is the main gate locked?’
‘Yes, but from the inside,’ she said. ‘I can open it if I get down.’
‘Let’s go for it. You’d better put a few things in a bag. Do you have money?’
She shook her head.
‘Doesn’t matter. I have some back in the room. I’ll join you later.’ He still hoped to find something of value here.
She stuffed some clothes into a backpack and Danny dropped it from the open window. ‘You next. It’s not far down.’
‘I can’t jump.’
He still had the bathrobe belt. ‘Can you hang on to this? I’ll lower you down.’
‘Are you sure?’
He said yes, but it was easily said. Achieving it would be another challenge. She couldn’t lift her leg up to the window ledge.
‘Do you mind?’ Danny said. He put his hand under her thigh and helped.
By slow stages and with a stomach-wrenching, arm-straining effort from Danny, the descent was completed. If there was a gallantry award for helping ladies in distress he would have earned it, no question.
‘On your way now,’ he gasped.
She needed no second bidding.
After recovering his breath, he got back to the main purpose of his visit. More of the villa awaited his inspection. Was Lady Luck still plotting his destiny from her control room at Twickenham job centre?
He left the boudoir, pushed open another door and got his answer.
This was a sitting room of some kind, with cushions of many colours. Face up on the floor was a dead man with a dagger in his chest. There was no question that he was dead and his murder hadn’t happened long before, because the blood that had seeped from the wound was still wet. In his right hand was a phone.
Danny had never been slow to size up a situation. The man was the jailer-husband, fatally stabbed by the woman before Danny arrived. She had bruised her arm in the struggle. She had hidden in the wardrobe and escaped thanks to the help Danny had given her.
From outside came the heart-stopping wail of a police siren. The victim must have called them on his phone before expiring.
As Danny’s lawyer explained after the trial, ‘It could have been a whole lot worse. The cops really believed you were the killer. You were well advised to stick to your story, and as you didn’t actually steal anything you aren’t technically a thief. Three years for trespass and helping a murderer escape is a light sentence. You’re a lucky man.’
Back in Twickenham someone allowed herself a slight smile.
A Postcard from Iceland
Ragnar Jónasson
Hi Mum,
I’m sorry that it has taken me so long to write to you.
I have really enjoyed the stay in Iceland, but it’s been very cold, like you told me. No one goes to Iceland in January, you said. But you know me, I’m adventurous. The snow is so mesmerising, the darkness is so overwhelming, and I’ve fallen in love with the sea.
No one goes to Iceland alone, you also said.
I needed to go, though, after the break-up. To try to figure out where my life was heading, where I want to go from here.
And it’s been an adventure! I’ve done quite a bit of skiing and hiking, and I’ve experienced the elements; it’s been cold – colder than hell – and it’s been windy, but it’s also beautiful, Mum.
I wish you could see it, the endless wilderness of ice and snow. I haven’t ventured out on the glaciers – the locals tell me it’s not safe.
I want to stay safe. You told me to, and believe me, Mum, I’ve tried. I’ve followed every piece of advice to the letter … or almost.
And I’ve made some new friends, but to be honest they advised me against going up on the mountain here in the north. I did it anyway.
You know how I’ve always needed to challenge myself, and it was going great. Really great. Such beauty, Mum. The silence, the isolation, I’ve never been so alone, but I’ve also never been happier. It’s amazing, I’ve been able to do a lot of thinking. A lot of soul searching.
But now I have to admit I feel a bit scared. You’ve always told me that there is no reason to be afraid, and I’m sure I’m imagining things. It’s just, you know, being alone in this small cabin, in the darkness (writing this by candlelight!) can get the imagination going. (Well, ‘cabin’ is a rather nice word for such a ramshackle building). It’s really, really cold, so I’m glad I’m suitably dressed for the weather, that’s one thing I did make sure to do.
But I could swear I heard strange noises out there, Mum.
I’m pretty far up north, close to the sea, actually. Close to the Arctic Circle.
This one guy I met on my way here, in the village nearby, did warn me. He said that there was always a chance of them appearing. He said it didn’t happen often, maybe every five years or so. I thought he was joking at first, but he looked serious. However, I did like my odds: every five years, you know. So I just went on, regardless. It was a hike I really wanted to do.
But the noises are there, not too far away. Maybe I’m just imagining things, the wind can probably sound like a growl.
One thing he mentioned, this guy, was slightly unnerving, though. He said that when they did make their way inland they were always hungry. Very hungry.
Mum, I hear it again, right now. I’m pretty sure there is something out there.
It’s getting closer.
I wish the cabin were a bit more sturdy, but I think I’m pretty safe here.
I’ll just keep quiet.
You know I love you, Mum.
I’m sure I’ll be safe here.
There is no reason to be afr
A Clever Evil
Sarah Rayne
You don’t expect evil to walk in through your office door in the middle of the afternoon, but if it does, you assume you’ll recognise it for what it is.
I didn’t, though. Not until it was too late.
It was the early-evening shift at the news desk – the shift everyone tried to avoid, because it always seemed to last longer than any of the others. News desk is a bit of a misnomer, because there isn’t actually a desk in here anymore. Once there were several: smart, modern structures of steel and vinyl and wood, each one bearing those three initials that are familiar and instantly recognisable across most of the – well, I won’t say across most of the Western world; I’ll just say they’re letters that are very widely known.
By now, though, all we’ve got left are a couple of trestle tables – which collapse when you least expect it, precipitating you and whatev
er you happen to be working on at the time onto the floor – together with several lopsided chairs. As for modern technology, we’ve managed to hang on to the foreign editor’s laptop, which we share on a rota, although, since it was the foreign editor who drew up the rota, he gets the longest turn.
It does mean we can bash out news stories, although, as the wifi connection is wildly erratic, there’s never any guarantee when we’ll be able to send them. Sometimes by the time they reach their destination the news can be twenty-four hours old. Those nineteenth-century war reporters wouldn’t have had that problem, of course. I’m talking about those stylish gentlemen who camped elegantly on a high ridge to report on the Charge of the Light Brigade, and those earlier ones who sipped chilled wine and scoffed caviar and smoked salmon while the Duke of Wellington routed Napoleon. They wouldn’t have had to bother about wifi or failing batteries. They’d simply have scribbled their stories, added suitable flourishes about death and glory, stressed the victories, skimmed over the defeats then handed the missives to a passing aide. After that they’d have returned to their wine and to cheering on the cavalry and shouting encouraging things like, ‘Onward into the valley of death, boys’, at judicious intervals. I expect it might have been a tad dangerous for them at times, but whatever else they might have had to endure, it wouldn’t be the uneasy boredom of early evenings in a war-torn city like this one.
Sometimes during those long evenings, I even wonder if the world has dropped into a black hole without anyone noticing it. Or whether Earth’s rotation is slowing down and we haven’t managed to keep up with it. I once said that to the interpreter who is part of the news team, to which he replied that he didn’t give a tinker’s toss if the world was slowing down or going backwards or whether it was performing somersaults across the universe, because it wasn’t likely to make any difference to the people in this devastated city, or stop the relentless shelling. And since we would all probably be blown to smithereens by the next round of air strikes, how about breaking out the remaining bottle of whisky. (Alcohol’s forbidden out here, of course, but there are caches of it if you know where to look.)
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