by Jack Higgins
Her English seemed halting and strained, and Sara took a chance and said in very fluent French, “And I, you. We’re a little late. This is Monsieur Dillon.”
Bibi was delighted and the French flowed. “It does not matter, not at all. This way.”
The lift passed through five floors to the penthouse apartment. Sara took in the blue-and-white awnings, the staggering view over the city to the harbor, and Simon Husseini himself, wearing linen slacks and a deep blue shirt, and now moving to meet Sara, arms outstretched.
“You’re here.” He drew her to the couch. “I can’t believe it. Champagne, Bibi, I put a bottle in the icebox. Mr. Dillon, we only met briefly in Paris.”
Bibi moved to the kitchen and left them alone to talk, taking her time over the champagne and listening to the conversation, which she could hear perfectly. Sara was doing the talking.
“My senior pilot, Don Renard, flew jet fighters in Desert Storm, he knows that kind of country well. He’ll plot a course tomorrow for Qatar and put down at al-Shaba, using the old Saudi emergency landing strip.”
“Which wasn’t there when I knew it,” Husseini said.
“After the end of the war, when the Saudi Air Force vacated the place, they left an energy system in the hospice powered by the sun, also a satellite phone. My Codex mobile is so advanced that it can link with it, and we managed to hunt the number down online. The trouble is it hardly ever works, due to desert weather. On the way over from London, I got my pilot to try dozens of times without success, and then we had a hit.”
“And you managed to get in touch?” Husseini demanded.
“Yes, but the reception was very bad and eventually cut off, and it proved impossible to get back. However, it was with a monk emailed Father Andrew, whose English was basic, but spoke Greek, which I speak a little myself. He told me there are only fifteen of them serving the hospice these days, but they actually have a doctor, aged seventy-five. Father Mikali is at present in the infirmary with a chest infection. I don’t suppose that’s too good for a ninety-year-old man,” Sara said. “There’s always the danger of pneumonia.”
“There would be if we were in dear old Ireland with the rain constantly intervening,” Dillon said. “But I wouldn’t have thought that would be such a problem with desert conditions.”
“That’s true,” Husseini said. “So let me make a suggestion. Speak to the desk at the Tropicana, ask them to find a doctor who could prescribe the best drugs for the infection, and we could take them with us.”
“I’ll drink to that,” Dillon said.
“And so we shall.” Husseini reached for the champagne bottle.
Bibi made her move, found her linen shopping bag, and came in from the kitchen. “I need a few things from the market.”
“Tonight my friends and I dine at the Tropicana, Bibi,” Husseini said. “Tomorrow we fly out to the backcountry for a few days. You’ll be all right, won’t you?”
“But of course,” she said, hurried out, and they heard the lift descend.
“So where were we?” Sara asked.
* * *
Declan Rashid had come awake with a start, instantly aware, the mark of a true soldier. He lay there on the bed, thinking of the situation. There was Emza Khan to look forward to, although he had no knowledge when that would be. Of course, Khan wouldn’t realize that Declan knew of his al-Qaeda link, which would make for an interesting situation. In the meantime, it seemed to him a good idea to go in search of Husseini’s place in Rue Rivoli. He got up, tidied himself, slipped the Colt .25 into his waistband, and left.
Early evening, the sun going down, still crowded. An obliging doorman indicated a street on the other side of the square that climbed up through the old quarter and told him he would find Rue Rivoli at the top. Declan thanked him and walked away, and the doorman nodded to two men seated at an adjacent pavement café. They might have been twins with their sunglasses, white T-shirts, and jeans, except for the fact that one had shoulder-length hair and the other’s skull was shaved.
They got up and followed him through the crowds, to the narrow alley on the left climbing up through the old quarter. The one with the shaved head said, “So Omar said to rough him up.”
“That’s right,” the other replied. “That’s a great suit he’s wearing. Egyptian linen, I’d say. It might be worth stripping him.”
“I know one thing,” his friend said. “I smell money here.” They increased their pace as Declan moved faster.
He paused at the end of the street, looking up at a sign with Rue Rivoli on it and an arrow pointing across to a small square. He saw a taxi parked in a corner and the deep blue tower that must be Husseini’s.
“Isn’t that a grand sight,” he said to himself in English and with a pronounced Irish accent. “Sweet Jesus, but my mam would have liked that.”
So they rushed him, the one with a shaven head, slightly ahead of the other because of the narrowness of the alley, reaching out. Declan grabbed the right wrist, locking the arm so that the man bent over, then ran him face-first into a nearby doorway. He bounced back, nose squashed, blood on his mouth.
His friend paused, pulled a knife from his pocket, and sprang the blade. Declan pulled the Colt .25. “If you’re good, I won’t shoot you in the kneecap, because I need you to help your friend down the alley.”
His use of Arabic caught the men by surprise. “I thought you were a Westerner.”
“You thought wrong. My father was Bedu from the Empty Quarter, and his family before him.”
The man closed the blade and put the knife into his pocket. “A Bedu.” He shook his head. “A bad-luck day for me indeed. What happens now?”
“You’ll tell me who put you up to this, I’ll let you go and you’ll take this fool with you.”
“And if I don’t?”
“I’ll cripple you,” Declan said calmly. “Leave you both here to crawl.”
“I guess you leave me no choice. All right — his name is Omar Kerim. He’s the greatest thief in the city, and he paid us to follow you if you went for a walk and rough you up.”
Declan put his Colt away, took out his wallet, and extracted an American one-hundred-dollar bill, which he held out. “Take it, and take this worthless idiot with you. Tell Omar Kerim that if he doesn’t stay out of this affair, he’s a dead man walking.”
“Aren’t we all, Colonel? But I’ll tell him.” He pulled his friend up, pushed him in front, and followed him down the alley.
Declan turned away, heard voices, and the door of the house opened. Dillon stepped out and whistled to the driver. Declan was amazed to see him and stepped back as the taxi moved toward Dillon and then Husseini joined him. There was laughter, the voices clear, and then the greatest shock of all, as Sara Gideon appeared. For a wild moment, he thought he was delusional, but only for a moment.
Sara laughed again and said clearly to the driver, “You can take us to the Tropicana now.”
Declan backed away, allowing the alley to swallow him up, turned, and started to walk down toward the harbor, trying to make sense of what he’d seen. Dillon and Sara together in Paris made perfect sense, because they’d both represented the Ministry of Defence, but surely if they’d had any other kind of contact, he’d have noted it.
He was thinking so hard that he almost missed Bibi sitting at a coffee table outside Café Marco with two men, neither of whom he knew. He noted a large advertisement for what was described as Omar Kerim’s Special Cabaret Night, the photograph on it matched exactly one of the men sitting with Bibi. It seemed highly probable that this was the same Omar his attacker had mentioned.
He hurried on to the Tropicana, approached reception, and inquired if Sara and Dillon were staying. They confirmed it for him, and also the fact that they were expected for dinner in the main restaurant in half an hour.
He went to his suite to freshen up and give himself time to decide how to handle the situation, but decided there was only one way, which was head-on. After all, unless
he was greatly mistaken, he had some extraordinary information for all of them.
* * *
They were in the bar area, he saw that at once, because to his surprise Dillon was sitting at the piano, feeling out a few chords while the maître d’ looked on approvingly. Satisfied with the piano, Dillon eased into an upbeat version of “As Time Goes By” and called out, “Remember the Paradise Club, Sara? Let’s see if you can still strut your stuff.”
Laughing, she got up, mounted three carpeted steps, and joined in, her voice deep and rich. The regular drummer came running, and a moment later, a double bass player. People were clapping, shouting their approval, and Dillon kept it going, another chorus, and then the moment came when she saw Declan in the entrance starting to clap, hands high. The look of astonishment on her face was something to see. She stood looking at him.
Someone shouted, “Get on with it, kiss him, then let’s have another chorus.”
So she did, on the cheek, and ran back to Dillon, calling, “One more time, and give it all you’ve got.”
He did, the sound echoing up to the roof, while Declan went and dropped into a chair next to Husseini and grinned. “Haven’t we met before somewhere?”
Husseini smiled. “What is this, Colonel, have you come to arrest me?”
“How on earth could I?” Declan asked. “We’re in a foreign country.” He reached for the champagne bottle in the ice bucket. “Can I have a glass?”
“You can have two if you like,” Husseini told him, and they started to laugh.
* * *
Later, the three of them listened as he explained what he was doing there. “So you see,” he said to Husseini, “I have my orders, but what can I do about it? Lebanon isn’t Iran. In the last few words I had with Vahidi as he lay dying, I told him that if I did catch up with you, I might well suggest you keep running. He then offered me the information that has led me here so quickly.” He looked serious now. “I believe he was murdered. Pushed into the next world.”
“And who do you think did it?” Sara asked. “This General ben Levi you’ve mentioned?”
“Oh no, but al-Qaeda would,” Declan told her.
Dillon said, “To what purpose?”
“To help get their hands on that bomb of Simon’s. And here’s a question for you and Sean, Sara. What would you say if I told you that Emza Khan is up to his neck in al-Qaeda?”
Sara turned to Sean and smiled savagely. “I knew it, Sean, I damn well knew it. It’s what I was trying to suggest to Ferguson, and he knew I was right.”
“Just hang on.” Dillon turned to Declan. “Where’s your proof?”
“To start with, I have a spy in his household, but you can ask Khan himself. He’s due to join us on the spurious excuse of visiting Cyrus Holdings in Beirut. He’ll be expecting to see me, but not you.” He took an envelope from his pocket. “Rather than explaining it all, I’ve written everything down. Read this. You’ll find it very revealing.”
“Give it here,” Dillon said. Declan flicked it across, and Sara and Husseini squeezed in to read what was inside.
Declan waved to the wine waiter. “Another bottle of champagne. I think we’re going to need it.”
* * *
When they were done, Dillon said, “I never liked him, but his business success seemed to speak for itself. I mean, he’s a billionaire, for God’s sake.”
“The epitome of the man who had everything,” Sara said.
“And threw in his lot with al-Qaeda,” Declan said. “The act of a maniac.”
“And one of incredible stupidity,” Declan said. “To put yourself in the hands of such people is an act of suicide.”
“Well, I’ll drink to that,” Dillon said, reached for the bottle, and refilled the glasses. “So where does this leave us?”
“With the fact that Emza Khan is to arrive soon to supervise the kidnapping of Simon Husseini and arrange his onward passage to wherever the al-Qaeda council decides.”
“And what about the rest of us?” Sara asked.
“Oh, the rough stuff will be carried out by gangsters, Omar Kerim and his men under the direction of Jemal Nadim.”
“So they could get nasty,” Sara said.
“Already have,” Declan told her. “I took a walk up toward Rue Rivoli earlier and was followed all the way from the Tropicana by two of Omar’s men, who attacked me.”
“You don’t look damaged.”
“I’m a paratrooper. They were clowns. The first one broke his nose falling into a door, the second was persuaded by my suggestion that I put a bullet in the kneecap to inform on Omar.”
“The kneecap? That’s a ritual IRA punishment,” she said.
“For God’s sake, woman,” Dillon told her, “his mother was Irish. Now, enough of this. What’s our next move?”
“I’ve already been through that when we were at Simon’s,” Sara said. “Don Renard plots a course for Qatar. On the way, we put down in the desert on the emergency landing strip at al-Shaba and visit St. Anthony’s.”
“And then what?” Dillon asked. “I mean, what next for Simon Husseini? Does he decide to be a novice and end his days in the desert?” He turned to Husseini. “I hope you don’t mind me raising the point.”
“And don’t think I’m unaware of it,” Husseini told him. “To be honest, I’ve just taken this odyssey step by step. As you know, the beginning just happened, and I’m not sure about the ending now.”
“And none of us will be until we experience it,” Declan put in. He turned to Sara. “Am I right that you discussed the flight plan for the trip to St. Anthony’s while you were at Husseini’s?”
“That’s right,” Sara said. “Why do you ask?”
“Was Bibi present?”
Husseini said, “Yes, she met Sara and Dillon, served us drinks, then left to go to the market.”
“Then we’ve got trouble. When I was walking back to meet you at the Tropicana, I saw her sitting at a table outside Café Marco, deep in conversation with two men. One of them was definitely Omar. The other had steel glasses and an Arab head cloth.”
“Jemal Nadim,” Husseini said.
“So it’s looking as if al-Qaeda has their hooks in her,” Declan told him.
Sara said, “But let’s accept that’s the way it is and leave it alone. Don’t let Bibi know we’re on to her. You can tell her we’re not leaving until eleven o’clock in the morning, while I check with Don at the airport and arrange a six a.m. start, or something like that.”
“That sounds good to me,” Dillon said. “So Emza Khan and his crew find out we’re not around for kidnapping or murder, but as they’ll know our destination, thanks to Bibi, they’ll simply follow us.”
“We’ll sort that out when it happens,” Declan said. “For the moment, am I the only one who realizes we haven’t eaten? Can we go in now?”
There was laughter, they went up the stairs into the dining room, and Sara half turned to him. “It seems it was right what you said to Vahidi. That if you caught up with Husseini, maybe you’d tell him to keep on running.”
“Yes, it must be confusing for you.”
“More so for you, I think. It must be very difficult.” She took his right hand and squeezed it. “We’re on your side, Declan.”
“Yes, I know that.”
“Well, you guys get started. I don’t want a first course anyway, but I want to call Don at his airport hotel. I’ll join you later.”
* * *
She found Renard with no difficulty, he and Jane Green comfortable enough at the airport where they could keep an eye on preparations for the onward flight. Sara had been frank in warning Don that they could expect hazardous duty. She’d left open what that entailed, but what was developing — that was something else again.
“Is Jane there?”
“She sure is.”
“Well, put this on speaker and listen well. Both of you are still serving officers on the reserve?”
“That’s correct,” they choru
sed.
“Then as an operative of the Secret Intelligence Service, I can invoke the Official Secrets Act. Do you agree to be bound by that?”
“Of course,” Don said as Jane joined in with, “Absolutely.”
“All right. As you’ve known for some time, Don, I work with Sean Dillon under the command of General Charles Ferguson directly for the Prime Minister. Anything we touch is of prime importance.”
“That’s what I’ve always understood.”
“We’ve joined up with Colonel Declan Rashid of the Iranian Army. Our task is to get Simon Husseini in one piece to this St. Anthony’s Hospice I’ve mentioned. The problem is, I’ve just heard there’s a Falcon coming in from the UK carrying Emza Khan, chairman of Cyrus Holdings.”
“We know him well,” Don said. “Often flies out of Northolt. Just let me check, there’s a screen in the room. Yes, it’s due in an hour, and a couple of right bastards in the cockpit.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Because they are,” Jane called. “They’re ex — Russian Air Force. Ivan Kerimov and Dimitri Lisin. Good pilots, but they’re all hands, if you follow me, and drink like fish. It’s said they’re something to do with Russian intelligence, but that could be gossip.”
“So, in a way, they’re like you two, up for hazardous duty.”
“I suppose there could be something in that,” Jane agreed.
“To cut to the chase,” Sara said. “What would an old Afghanistan hand say if I told her that we have positive proof that Emza Khan is seriously involved with al-Qaeda?”
“That would sound absurd coming from anyone else,” Don said. “But from you, I’ve got to believe it. Does that hold for you, Jane?”
“Of course it does,” Jane said. “Where is this going?”
“He could make a lot of trouble for us. We’re making sure that people think we’re flying out at eleven tomorrow. How early could we make it if we wanted to catch them napping?”
“Six o’clock is good,” Don said. “We could just hang in there, with everyone on board, then suddenly decide to go.”
Jane cut in. “Once they know we’ve gone, though, I’m sure they’ll get their act together fast. Those Russians are good, I’ve got to admit that.”
