by K J Griffin
Chapman could see his own Ali Babas’s cavern in all this. Concerned though he was about the sexual implications, he couldn’t bear to pull Sophie out of the gold mine just yet. Even while she leant her head on his shoulder walking back up Little Clarendon Street, as he stared into those hazel eyes, salivated over that sensuous mouth, and felt the rich texture of her lustrous, dark-brown hair nestling underneath his chin, he knew he had to get her to hang on a couple of days more, while together they teased out the big splash that he sensed was locked somewhere inside the Ramli’s mansion.
They made for the taxi rank on St Giles, Sophie lurching unsteadily against the journalist’s arm. He tried for a kiss, but by now, she was talking too much, even flirting with Carl when the security guard opened the door and escorted them to Sophie’s apartment. Both Mr Hasan and Mr Al-Ajnabi were upstairs, Carl told Sophie. No, regrettably, he could not disturb them.
Inside the apartment, Chapman switched on the stereo and made coffee. Sophie was sprawled on the sofa, gushing more anecdotes about her host’s behaviour. But the journalist could see that she was past making analytical sense. Instead, he brought coffee to her on the sofa and tried to slide a casual arm around her waist, which she slipped surprisingly nimbly.
The alcohol had made Sophie restless.
‘Come on, Darren. Let me show you around the house. Perhaps you can put a stake through the vampire’s heart for me!’
He protested, she insisted. The house was empty; even Carl had disappeared.
‘Not even any sign of those computer nerds,’ Sophie laughed, her words echoing loudly down the empty hallway. She stopped outside each door bordering the downstairs corridors, hammering on them with drunken fury. Nothing.
Embarrassed enough for two, Chapman tried to catch hold of Sophie, but she slipped his arm again and skipped up the staircase instead. She was already listening outside upstairs doors by the time he drew level. They were standing at the end of the corridor that overlooked the front of the house. Sophie crouched outside the last door, then pounded it with all her drink-fuelled frustration.
There was a long silence. Chapman looked on as Sophie stood arms akimbo in the hallway, panting hard. He had read her wrong. She wasn’t playful, as he had first thought. No, something really was troubling her. There were more questions to ask and to do so he needed her alone and downstairs. He made a lunge towards her and tried to grab her elbow.
But just as he did so the door in front of him swung back sharply. ‘Miss Sophie, what a pleasant surprise!’ Al-Ajnabi smiled coldly. ‘And?’
Darren Chapman introduced himself, his embarrassment swiftly overcome by curiosity.
‘To what do I owe the pleasure?’ Al-Ajnabi asked defensively, still blocking the doorway. Sophie felt triumphant. It was the first time she had seen him wrong-footed.
‘I’ve come to tell you that I’ll be leaving your house,’ she announced, cheeks puffed out haughtily.
Al-Ajnabi assessed Sophie coolly for a second, then pulled back the door.
‘I see. Then I think you’d better come in. Both of you. We were just finishing our meeting.’
Chapman was first inside, Sophie prancing more warily behind. She spotted Hasan helping a Japanese man to shuffle some papers into a notebook computer carrying case.
‘This is Mr. Yamaguchi of Sakura Bank,’ Al-Ajnabi explained. ‘He has been helping me to finalize the details of our new Ramli investment bank.’
Yokochi turned round from his packing to give them the briefest of unsmiling nods.
‘Unfortunately, Mr. Yamaguchi has a plane to catch,’ Al-Ajnabi explained. ‘Perhaps you will see him another time.’
Hasan led the Japanese banker from the room. Sophie flopped down on a sofa, her anger matured to quiet dejection. Suddenly confronted with Omar face to face, she started to regret her rash entrée, and now they were sitting there just the three of them, she wasn’t even at all sure why she had been so angry with him in the first place. The mood-change left her sullen and taciturn.
But Chapman was quick to take advantage of the lull in the conversation.
‘There was a lot about your activities in our morning edition, Prince Omar,’ he began, intrigued by the strangely un-Eastern look of the Gulf sheikh. ‘Those are some very large contracts your country has placed—a big boost for British business, I’m sure.’
Al-Ajnabi nodded laconically. He was looking intently at Sophie, almost sadly, she thought.
Chapman picked over the details of some of the contracts and companies. Al-Ajnabi’s replies were mostly monosyllabic.
‘I hope you won’t mind my asking you one more question,’ Chapman continued in the tone of voice that suggested he was damn well going to ask it anyway. ‘It’s about some problems we ran into while writing up the story of your British business dealings.’
‘Oh yes?’
‘Yes. You see, we couldn’t get much information from your embassy in Mayfair. They would only give us the names of the companies with whom you were placing contracts, then referred us to an Oxford number, presumably here, for more information. Trouble is, we can never get a reply.’
‘My assistants are so busy,’ Al-Ajnabi smiled challengingly. ‘I’m afraid we do not have time to answer press enquiries just yet. But I assure you that this situation will change later on.’ He smiled at this remark, as if he had said something privately amusing.
‘Also, Prince Omar,’ Chapman carried on regardless, ‘no one could get hold of a photograph of you, let alone arrange for an interview. We contacted every other daily and news magazine, tried your Embassy here, searched on the Internet, but we couldn’t come up with anything. It seems that there just isn’t a single photo of you on file anywhere—no film footage, nothing. That’s very strange for a man of your rank, wouldn’t you say?’
‘Not at all,’ Al-Ajnabi shrugged. ‘Photography, especially media photography, is frowned on by certain sections of the Islamic community. There is a holy injunction against the depiction of the human form, you see. In my home country it is officially banned, though of course, we have to make certain allowances. That is why you will not find any photos of me, Mr Chapman, nor would I want any to be taken. Such anonymity is a rare blessing for a man like me. I’m sure you will understand.’
‘Although at dinner the other night you sounded hostile to all religions, including your own.’
Sophie’s interruption was met only with a nod and an ironic smile.
Chapman decided to concede the point. There was a lot more he wanted to ask but instinct restrained him. His nose smelt a bigger story in all these threads and he sensed that both Sophie and Prince Al-Ajnabi were withholding too much from him at present. First, he needed to check the leads he had already gained back at his Docklands office. Something would emerge later on to point him in the right direction.
A miserable silence had descended upon the room, broken finally by Al-Ajnabi.
‘So when do you wish to leave, Miss Sophie?’ he asked.
‘Er… this evening—maybe tomorrow morning, if that’s all right?’
Indecision had reduced her voice to a mumble.
‘As you wish. But I urge you not to make any hasty decisions. You look tired. Why don’t you sleep on it? We can talk about this later.’
His voice was gentler than Sophie could remember, almost hypnotic. She got up, craving the sleep he had suggested, and agreed to talk the situation over in the morning. Chapman followed Sophie to the door.
‘Oh, before I forget,’ said Al-Ajnabi when her hand touched the door handle, ‘Your invitations, Sophie.’
He handed her two cards, the outside covers ornamented with Arabic calligraphy.
‘It’s a formal dinner I am hosting on the twenty-second,’ he explained. ‘There will be a couple of MPs, some businessmen and diplomats—people who will have some connection with my business projects.’
Noticing Chapman’s curiosity, Al-Ajnabi walked across the room to a bureau and returned to offer the journa
list a similar invitation, which he presented with his compliments.
Sophie looked down blankly at the invitations. She had assumed that the second invitation was for Darren. But when she read the name on the inside, she stopped abruptly.
‘Wait a minute. I think you’d better explain how you know about Marcus?’ she demanded indignantly. ‘I’ve never mentioned his name to you before.’
‘Mr Easterby, you mean?’
‘That’s right—my boyfriend, Marcus Easterby. Who gave you his name?’
‘Maybe Hasan told me,’ Al-Ajnabi answered absent-mindedly, then paused for a moment, giving her that cold smile. ‘Or maybe you talk in your sleep, Miss Sophie.’
He passed off this latest outrage just as he had casually slipped in mention of the ‘arrangement’ back at the interview. Sophie stared at him, momentarily speechless, before impulse sent her walking huffily towards him. She took hold of his hand and thrust the invitations into his palm, scrunching them up without a word. Apparently unconcerned, Al-Ajnabi watched Sophie’s back as she stormed out of the room in silent fury.
‘What was all that about, Soph?’ asked Darren downstairs in her apartment. She had thrown herself face down on the sofa. ‘There’s something you’re not telling me about, isn’t there?’
But Sophie wouldn’t answer any of his questions and Chapman had to get back to London. Conflicting ambitions battled in his mind. When he hoped that Sophie would be safe in the Ramli’s mansion without him, it wasn’t so much her physical safety he considered to be at risk. No, those temper tantrums were signs of something else. Surely she couldn’t be…? …with that man? Chapman had never seen Sophie so un-cool before, and, wait a minute, what the hell had Prince Al-Ajnabi meant about Sophie talking in her sleep? The implication was too absurd to be literal. Or was it? Christ! Surely Sophie couldn’t have...?
Judging from her breathing, Sophie was already asleep. Chapman took a blanket from the bedroom and put it around her, kissing the top of her hair in silent devotion. It was neither the time to go nor the place to stay. But the decision wasn’t his to make, anyway. He had to get back to the newsroom, and once he got there, he swore he’d have a good look at the Ramli special envoy’s background. He would also phone Joanna and ask her to check on Sophie.
Chapter 14: Ramliyya: October 15: p.m.
Like a fucking fishing holiday in hell, thought Goss. There was no bloody limit to the amount of time you could spend dangling your rod, catching bugger all. And meanwhile, Satan had turned the sodding heating up and confiscated all the booze.
Though he had only been there two days, Goss was impatient for the catch Easterby wanted him to make. Only two days, but that was long enough. Christ, Ramliyya was a God-awful place! At noon the sky and horizon were indistinguishable, both smudged by the heat to a dirty yellow. You couldn’t even make out the hills to the east of the coastal plain, veiled, like the Ramli women, in a thick, black haze. And the sand, the wretched sand! It wasn’t like sand he had ever known—more like slime. If you got it on your fingers, you couldn’t wipe the sodding stuff off. The stifling air was acrid with its salty smell.
He hadn’t stopped sweating since he had stepped off the plane. Only when he sat in his office with the AC full on did the sodden sweat patches make any effort to dry out of his shirt. But as soon as he had to go inside the hangars or out onto the tarmac, they reformed larger than ever.
Easterby had arranged for him to replace the chief stores officer at the airbase next to the airport at Madinat Al-Aasima on temporary assignment, while the regular incumbent was recalled to Britain. But that hadn’t gone down well with the British Defence Systems boys working the airbase. Some bloody secret his mission now was! The Colonel might just as well have announced in the company newsletter that he was sending a spook to watch the storesmen, for they had given him a wide berth since his arrival, restricting their conversation to the bare minimum. And Sergeant Phil Goss wouldn’t forget their bloody welcome when the time came to pounce on a few of these flabby army dropouts. This lot of pussies hadn’t a clue what they were in for.
Sitting in his office, Goss glanced at his watch for the hundredth time that day. He was short on ideas and long on frustration. Nearly 5:30 p.m. The late shift was over. Time to take the company bus back to the compound, where he could look forward to another night holed up in his Portakabin doing bugger all, without so much as a bloody shandy to drink. He cleared some papers from the top of his desk, then came a knock on the door. It opened immediately without waiting for a reply.
‘All right, Chief?’ asked a Brummie voice.
‘What do you want, son?’ Goss snarled back. If they thought the cold-shoulder treatment would send him snivelling back to England, they’d picked the wrong man to fuck with.
‘The lads sent me over,’ the young man explained. ‘Wanted to know if you fancy coming over for a couple of jars later?’
Goss stared hard at the young lad, his ginger moustache quivering with overripe irritation.
‘All right, sunshine. I’ll have a few jars with you lot. It’s about time we got a few things sorted, like.’
Sensing that he had enlisted his first recruit, Goss commandeered the young lad, Johnson’s, ear for the duration of the walk to the bus and the journey back to the British Defence Systems (BDS) camp.
Goss knew that men like himself smelt of army authority even in forty degree heat, and he made sure that Johnson was quick to recall the scent of a sergeant’s stripes. Forget about the officers—senior NCOs were the true gods worshipped by the men; they were father and brother, comrade and enemy, punisher and provider all rolled into one.
Back at the compound Johnson led Goss straight to a shack near the dining hall. The makeshift bar had its name, The Happy Sandman, daubed over the door in pub-style lettering. The inside was a passable imitation of the sort of boozer back home that had plastic oak beams and ran cheap lager promotions. At the end of the room, Goss admired a proper counter with English beer mats, schooners racked on an overhead shelf and a draught pump.
There were eight other men sitting or standing around the counter, most of whom Goss recognized as storesmen from the earlier shift.
The bar looked on in silence while Johnson explained the intricacies of the drinks menu to the newcomer—homebrewed beer or the moonshine, siddiqi. Goss chose the latter while Johnson paid the barman; the rest of the customers feigned interest in an interminable news update on CNN.
Goss swigged the vile-tasting siddiqi, grateful for the sharp hit from the alcohol, while Johnson sensed a duty to introduce the sergeant-turned-head-of-stores to the regulars of The Happy Sandman. The men questioned Goss about his army days; Goss answered them mainly in grunts, evaluating them one by one while he drained the rest of his glass and told the barman to line them up again.
He had a tame lot here, like. Most of the guys looked too young—first-wave rejects from the forces, no doubt. But at the corner of the bar stood a grizzled balding Scot that Goss recognized as a bulldog of his own breed. Yea, old Scotty over there was where the battle would be won or lost—for there could only be one Sultan of Ramliyya. Either the old git would submit to Goss’s authority, or one of them would end up outside picking broken glass from his face.
Catching Goss’s eye, Scotty nodded to the barman and began to stride slowly round the counter towards the newcomer. The other men edged imperceptibly away while Goss stayed firm, leaning one chunky pink elbow on the counter and keeping his eyes trained on Old Jock. Goss trusted himself to look the part; for he’d played this game many times before in other bars, in other places.
When Scotty reached him, Goss put his glass calmly on the counter and waited, both hands at the ready. But Scotty ignored his posturing, nodding to the barman instead. The barman rustled around in a cupboard, found whatever he was looking for, then thumped a bottle on top of the counter, next to Goss’s glass: Johnnie Walker Black Label.
‘Ever drink this stuff, pal?’ Scotty asked.
&n
bsp; ‘Any day you want, any number you want,’ Goss replied, the muscles in his jaw stiffening.
Scotty carried on unimpressed.
‘I’ll put it a different way for you, Mr Chief Storesman: do you know how much this wee bottle would cost you in downtown Madina, assuming of course you knew where to look for it?’
This kind of smart-arse, those-in-the-know questioning made Goss’s pink cheeks flush an angry red. Time to cut the bravado and get straight down to business.
‘I suppose you’re going to fucking tell us, like?’ he scowled.
Scotty’s face was still impassive and methodical.
‘Twenty Ramli riyals,’ he droned on, articulating every syllable laboriously. ‘Or one hundred and twenty-one quid sterling to you, Sergeant.’
Goss shrugged, still an expletive or two short of the provocation he was looking for.
‘That means a case of twelve of these wee fellas would cost you over fourteen hundred quid, though you’d probably get a discount for quantity,’ said Scotty, absorbed in the detail of his own thinking. ‘Now supposing a fella, could get his hands on two hundred cases of wee Johnny here, and deliver them to a certain Ramli friend of his acquaintance—do you know what sort of cash he’d be looking at then?’
‘Go on,’ said Goss less aggressively. This was getting interesting.
‘Allowing our Ramli friend to take his cut, a fella would be looking to collect about two hundred and fifty thousand sterling, cash in hand.’
Goss took a large swig of his drink, eyes opening wide with greed, as if the cash were sitting there on the counter in front of him.
Scotty seemed to be encouraged.
‘The trouble for our wee friend,’ he continued, ‘would be the pay-offs. The three Ramli customs guys would want ten grand each, and the Paki loaders and drivers would take a couple of grand between them. Then, there’s the cost of the material at source in the UK. That’d be at least forty odd grand. Still, after all these costs, our wee friend would be left with over one hundred and eighty grand. Not bad, eh, Sergeant?’