Game of Revenge

by Charlotte Larsen

  He does. Francis looks around the sparse room and considers his latest phone call with Benedict Hardley. Benedict had called him the morning after the party. With suppressed sobbing, he had told Francis how his wife Louisa had run off to live with a young Egyptian man, which was a culmination of their long, built-up dissatisfaction. He wanted her back, if not for love, then to save face. Would Francis help?

  Francis had agreed, and as the conversation moved on, he came to value Benedict’s quiet dignity and old-fashioned chivalry, and he came to loathe Louisa Hardley for her immaturity in accepting her age and role in society. Francis had promised to bring her back, and they had gone on to discuss mutual acquaintances, something that Francis habitually did in almost any conversation. It was an effective way of keeping himself abreast of social movements, and occasionally a means to inside information of great value.

  Francis also learned that Camilla Bang-Henriksen’s family was having a rather bad time. He himself had rescued Camilla, if not from her own folly, then at least from the press. A month ago, Benedict was telling Francis that Camilla’s cousin, Mads, had been accused of child molesting and only yesterday had been dismissed from his post as headmaster of a private school. A more damaging accusation is hard to think of. Furthermore, there had been a small and obscure article in the Washington Post that had hinted at Camilla and Mads’ grandfather as having been a bit too cozy with the Nazis during the Second World War. All in all, Benedict concluded that the family’s name was being damaged at the moment and he was upset by it, as he had worked with Niels, Camilla’s father, when they were both young and ambitious. The two men had kept up the friendship, and Niels had called Benedict late last night and told him all. Francis had stored the information away as something for his agency to look into if no better projects came along.

  Louisa Hardley returns after twenty minutes in a tight white dress, much too short and low cut for her wrinkly knees and obvious silicone breasts. But at least her hair and make-up looked civil.

  When they pull up at the mound of the original Tutankhamun grave, two unmarked police cars are waiting.

  “What are the police doing here?” she snaps.

  “They have to keep guard while we visit the grave. That was the deal I could get. Come on. They won’t bother us.”

  She crosses her arms and looks out the window, away from him. “I’m not sure I want to see the grave after all. Take me back, please.”

  It had nothing to do with the police, he thought. It was just her usual charming self that needed to contradict everything and make people jump about, a trait that had been charming about fifty years ago. She was beginning to irk him.

  “Okay, Lou. I will take you back.”

  “Thank you, Francis,” Louisa says. She could afford to be kind now.

  “Just allow me to take a quick peek, Lou. It seems a waste to drive away without at least taking a glance at the grave.” He begins to get out of the car, and just as he had hoped, she follows.

  “All right, just a quick peek,” she acknowledges.

  The stars are beginning to find their place in the darkening sky. The grave opening is lit from behind, beckoning the living to enter death’s long, cold silence. Francis is conscious that he is entering sacred ground with the unfaithful, spoilt wife of an indulgent and besotted husband.

  Does he find it sordid? He does. Go ahead. by all means, he thinks, be unfaithful, have fun, seek your indulgences—but for God’s sake, be discreet. Don’t run off to bloody Luxor and fall in love with a twenty-five-year-old gigolo. That is just plain pathetic.

  A series of connected corridors, each one descending slightly, leads to a large antechamber and then the actual burial chamber with the sarcophagus. The wall murals, with images of dark-skinned, slender people, are amazing, and the ochre and terracotta colors so rich and deep, and yet Louisa takes it all in with a jaded air of having seen it all. Francis fumes on the inside while he is the perfect gentleman at her arm. He points there, explains that, explains all.

  When they enter the burial chamber, Francis surreptitiously pushes a button on a small device connected to a screen in one of the police cars. He has twenty seconds to get out. With a jolt, he stops, lets go of Louisa’s arm and exclaims, “I simply must have a photograph of the sarcophagus. It is the opportunity of a lifetime. I’ll just dash back for my camera.” He doesn’t give Louisa the chance to argue or come along as he leaves the burial chamber and is back in the antechamber. A heavy fire door slides shut with a reverberating thump. He hears her muffled voice shouting to him, but the door is four inches thick.

  In the unmarked car, the split screen shows four angles of the anteroom and two from the burial chamber. The images are slightly blurred and sepia-colored from the light, which is sparse to protect the murals, but Francis can easily see the expression of Louisa’s face as she looks around the place. Confusion, fear, and anger rapidly wash over her expression. He settles back for a long wait.

  Chapter 17

  Louisa is on her knees, incongruously praying to a God. A Christian God, Francis assumes. Praying to a Christian God in a sacred space of a more than 3000-year-old grave dedicated to Ra, the superior Sun God. Francis smiles. It never hurt anyone to learn a little humility.

  He has watched her gradual collapse for the past two-and-a-half hours. She has cried, yelled, beaten at the ancient walls, clawed at the steel door, and paced the parameters of the small space like a scared dog. He can only imagine her suffering, her fear, her claustrophobia. And her thoughts about how she would die—from starvation, thirst, a violent panic attack, or the dead coming to rip her life apart, the mummy that may or may not be in the sarcophagus. He is certain that Louisa, when she is again a free woman (and well behaved, he adds to himself), will never again enter a small space.

  It is time to get her out. He doesn’t want to bring back Benedict Hardley’s errant wife a mental wreck. Hardley might not feel inclined to pay the finder’s fee then. He signals to the two plainclothes policemen to open the door.

  Ten minutes later, they come out of the tomb, a distraught and disheveled Louisa between them. Francis is waiting in the back of the Mercedes separated by a glass partition from the chauffeur who sits silently and almost motionless in the driver’s seat. His is a sensory universe of cool air-conditioned air, the smell of leather and cologne, and Wagner’s “Valkyries” low on the car stereo. His is a rather different sensory experience than the one Louisa has just been through.

  Louisa stumbles into the car.

  “They said…they said it was a malfunction in the door. Francis, I was so scared!” she clings to him, crying. A distressed, scared woman without a shred of dignity in that moment.

  He lets her cry for some time, then he passes her his handkerchief with some regret, as he will never use it again. Wasting a good silk handkerchief on a woman like Louisa seems to Francis almost like casting pearls before swine.

  He turns to her, his voice now icily cold, “Louisa, darling. Don’t ever waste my time again.”

  She looks up, stunned, her hand with the handkerchief stops in midair.

  He continues, “You see, you can do anything you like, as long as you keep up the façade of Mrs. Hardley, wife of the most prominent foreign financier in Alexandria. Your job is, simply put, to make Mr. Hardley look good. This means you’ll look after yourself and you’ll dress appropriately to your age and circumstances. You will keep your affairs in the dark.”

  She has pulled away from him now, pressed herself against the car door. “But, Francis…” she begins, a whine in her voice.

  He interrupts her, “It is very simple really, darling. If you don’t do as I say, you and I will spend some time together, which you really, really don’t want to experience. I can be such a painful bore, you see, leaving you alone by yourself in scary places. Am I making myself clear?”

  She nods.

  “I can’t hear you!” Francis shouts.

  Louise looks completely done for by now. “Yes,�
�� she whispers, “you are making yourself clear.”

  “Good!” He taps the window and the car moves.

  “Where are you taking me?” she asks, her voice still tremulous.

  But he notes that she is not sitting upright, and tears have stopped flowing. Her mind is quite capable of doing the math, he thinks. She is actually a rather clever woman.

  “I am taking you to hubby Benedict.”

  Chapter 18

  The traffic noise is deafening, the muezzin calls plaintively, vendors are shouting, and tinny Arab music plays loudly in every shop and café. A few women and most men are wearing Western clothing. Greek and Arab cultures blend distinctly in Alexandria. But there is no forgetting this is an Arab country, even though Europeans have lived and loved and traded here for a long time. Some women are covered, so that only dark, assessing eyes peer out of the small slit in their full niqab. And yet sex has a prominent place in Alexandria, witnessing the many shops with grotesquely sexy lingerie displayed for all the world to see. Alexandria does not boast many tourists, as its fame has disappeared in fire, war, and plunder. Now, it is just a busy city, trying to be cosmopolitan and modern, yet not quite succeeding in either.

  The white front of the Cecil Hotel with its mass of tall, Arab-inspired windows and balustrade balconies painted in the palest blue with square towers at either end of the building had been a familiar landmark of Alexandria since the 1920s.

  The doorman greets Francis like an old and highly valued guest while ignoring the woman at his side, taking her to be a casual affair—which she is. So casual, in fact, that he hopes never to see her again.

  Francis has booked two adjoining rooms, and Louisa promptly mistakes that for an invitation. “I am flattered, Louisa,” he says when she knocks on the connecting door, clearly naked under the hotel bathrobe. “But I have work to do, and you should get some rest before we meet with Benedict.”

  Her smile wobbles.

  “I’ll get you a warm drink that will help you relax,” he says in a gentler voice and decides to spike the drink with something that will make sure he isn’t disturbed before morning.

  Francis feels stifled in the room, despite the air conditioning. The only two colors in upholstery, curtains, and carpets are crème and burgundy, with the furniture Louis XV style. The décor is as heavy as his own past. Unbearable. He escapes to the Montgomery Bar, which is kept in exactly the same colors but at least he can get a decent drink in the westernized hotel bar.

  He has just ordered his second drink when someone attracts his peripheral attention. His body goes cold, and his mind sharpens. Head slowly turning, he stares into the pale, watery eyes of a pale man whose hair is so blond, it is almost white. The man’s stare is cold and assessing as if he were measuring Francis for a suit of concrete. The murmurs and music recede into the background as Francis concentrates on controlling his fear. He knows that face. He saw it only yesterday. And he knows that glare, as he has seen it in the eyes of his agents and in the mirror. It is a glare that signals imminent death.

  The man nods imperceptibly as if he were confirming what he already knows. Then he turns around and leaves the bar.

  Only pride keeps Francis from escaping to his room straight away. When he does, he checks in on Louisa, who sleeps on her back, mouth open, emitting a low, throaty snore. The drugs will work for at least another two hours. Francis closes the door softly behind him and turns the key.

  In his code-protected bag, he digs out his phone and sends a text to Dhammakarati.

  Get here imm. Incognito. Cecil’s, Alexandria. Having a shadow. Pale, whitish-blond h. 1,9 m, 94 kg. Take him out if nec. Leave for airport Tues 2 pm.

  It suddenly occurs to him that George Schwartz may be out of prison by now. Schwartz, whom Francis brought down a few years back, had a cold look of revenge in his eyes when he was led away by the police. A look that had been directed at Jo. But Jo had changed her identity since that time, and there was no way Schwartz and his thugs could get to her.

  But they could get to him. And maybe that was exactly what they were doing.

  Hoping Dhammakarati will arrive soon, Francis sleeps fitfully until the sunrise prayer call.

  After breakfast, he asks the concierge for the best beauty parlor and bundles Louisa into a hansom. He stays just long enough to see her being pinned down in a reclining chair and being beautified at the hands of several women simultaneously, one at her feet, another doing her nails, and another is deep cleansing her face while a male hairdresser is hovering in the background, waiting his turn. Francis sneaks out, uncomfortable at viewing such underground work of female beautification.

  He visits the City Centre and finds, to his relief, a Debenhams, where at least he knows he can get something that won’t stand out. He is sure Louisa never shops at Debenhams, but she will bloody well have to accept it, he says to himself. A gorgeous Arab beauty with eyes as dark as coal and voluptuous lips assists him, and by the time he exits the shop, with huge shopping bags bulging with a selection of dresses and shoes, lingerie, sunglasses, and bags, his mood has been mellowed by the obliging woman and the knowledge that it will be only a matter of hours before he can finally hand Louisa over to her husband.

  Louisa is subdued as they drive to the airport. She almost looks her usual self in a decent knee-length flowered dress and dark glasses, her hair and face repaired. She might be hurt, Francis reflects. One young lover drops her like an unwanted leper for money and another man—me—won’t touch her with a pole. That would put some perspective into any woman.

  But her husband is touched to tears to see her, and she does meet him with grace and with a kind of pretended love. Francis watches as Hardley escorts his returned wife up the stairs of his private jet, where a smiling, none-too-pretty stewardess greets her with a warm smile. Hardley disappears for a short while before he comes down the stairs again, this time with an onboard trolley in his left hand.

  “Thank you, Francis.” He slaps Francis on the shoulder and pushes the roll-on toward the younger man. “Gold. As we agreed. Man, I can never thank you enough.”

  “It’s all good, Benedict. Where are you taking her?”

  “Ah, just out of town for a few days. To the house in Lausanne. Thought it best that we spent a little time together.”

  “Good idea.”

  The two men shake hands before Francis turns around with the rather heavy trolley in his hand. Then he recalls something, “Oh, Benedict, I forgot. Remember what you told me about the Bang-Henriksen family? Have you heard anything else?”

  Benedict hesitates. “No. Nothing concrete, but Niels is pretty worked up. He suspects James Hampton to have played a role. But…well, I don’t know; Niels doesn’t seem quite rational these days.”

  “I don’t know Hampton personally; do you?”

  “No. I have never met him. Just read about him in the papers. Heard bits and pieces through the grapevine. Seems a decent fellow. Capable.”

  I wonder whether there might be a connection between Niels and James Hampton, or even Camilla and Hampton, Francis muses, as he watches the small plane take off. By the time he exits the airport, he has decided that his next case will be James Hampton.

  Chapter 19

  The monk arrives in Alexandria by dusk, as the city is once again readying itself for the evening. He enters the city softly, inconspicuously, like the shadow that he is.

  The voices of the food vendors are scratchy like seagull screams, worn out by another long day of yelling and shouting to attract customers. It is a sound he knows all too well, except it had been the landowner’s assiduous overseers who shouted themselves hoarse every day, just like they made their arms sore by hitting the rubber-workers with long whips every day.

  For him, it was never a question of how to spend his life, having been born into a desperately poor family on a rubber plantation of the Northern Province. He was destined to continue the longstanding tradition of workers bending their heads and breaking their backs to sur
vive in a world in which all important decisions are made by somebody else.

  Then one day, when he was about five, an elderly monk wandered into the village. And without Dhammakarati’s knowing how it happened, he was walking next to the monk right out of the village, not to return for the next twenty years. The older monk turned out to be a grand master of the ancient and secret martial arts system of bando.

  Over the years, the boy and then young man practiced stilling his mind and shaping his body. He was naturally strong, but he needed to learn how to bend his body to the fluidity of the bamboo and to enhance his speed to that of lightning.

  One day, Francis showed up at the monastery. Over the course of a long evening, Dhammakarati began to understand the dynamics of the business world and the influence and power it yields, even in far-away rubber-tree plantations like the one in which his parents had worked. That night, he was given a disturbing insight into the dark side of this moneyed, greedy realm that Francis had vowed to fight. By the time the sun rose, Dhammakarati had given his word to Francis. He had found his new master. But he had also suspended himself between Buddhism and the Western world.

  From that night on, Dhammakarati spent part of his time on missions under Francis’s leadership and the rest of his time in a monastery not open to stray visitors. Over the years, he established a community of mentally trained fighters who easily blended in with the other monks and nuns.

  Killing, as he has to do tonight in Alexandria, is a craft for him. And a spiritual self-flagellation.

  Chapter 20

  “Francis Scott-Wren.” He smiles at the pretty young girl in the front office.

  “Welcome, Francis. I'm sorry, but Niels Bang-Henriksen is a bit late.” She smiles back.

  “Niels Bang-Henriksen is late,” repeated Francis slowly. “Do you know by how much?”