I carefully reached over and started to turn the dial to the left. The numbers started to go down and the plane banked over to the left.
“Ah, so left and right not so good, huh? Try the other right.”
Feeling stupid, I turned the dial to the right and the plane levelled out and then banked to the right. I kept turning the dial until it read 235 and sat back. The plane continued to bank for a while and then straightened out.
“Good,” he said, “now we need to go higher. Use this to make the height 27,000.”
It was currently reading 22,000, so I turned it to read 27,000. I heard the engines get louder and I felt the plane tilt backwards as we started to climb. The horizon in front slipped away beneath us as the nose of the plane angled up and after a few minutes it settled back straight again.
I won’t bore you with much more aircraft stuff, suffice to say that it was all very exciting and very interesting.
The pilot yelled something back to Roche and he replied in French. The pilot then turned to me. “You may stay here while we land if you like.”
I nodded.
The plane could fly itself but wasn’t much good at landing and so the pilot took control and brought us down safely. The noises I’d heard before were the wheels going up and I got to put them down.
OK, no more aircraft stuff. I promise.
We came to a halt on what looked like a small airfield. Waiting for us were another two guys next to another two black Audis but this time one of them was a sports car.
We climbed down the steps and Roche led me to the sports car and ushered me into the passenger seat, which was on the opposite side to normal.
I could hear him talking in French to the two guys and they said something back, climbed into the other car together and drove off.
Behind us I could hear the plane’s engines wind up as the plane taxied away towards the runway.
As we started to drive off I watched the plane roar down the runway and tip back, climbing into the sky.
Sometimes I think I’m quite clever and sometimes not. Right now I felt that I probably wasn’t that clever as it only struck me now that we were probably in France. Maybe it was the fact that everyone I had seen in the past three hours had been speaking French. Like I say, sometimes I’m clever but sometimes, not so much.
14
For some time we drove through the countryside, slowing down for the occasional small town or village as we rolled through France. The towns seemed nice; small groups of red-tiled homes, dusty streets playing host to street-side cafés and bars.
People seemed to be moving more slowly here. In London everyone seemed to rush around, heading for a destination. When I was in the Lake District everything seemed to slow down and it seemed to be the same way here.
Old men sat and talked on metal seats barely able to support their weight, and others stood around smoking and laughing.
In one small village some men were standing in the centre of a clear area, playing a game with some silver balls.
Everyone seemed content. It struck me that if I came through this alive that maybe I would like to come here again. It seemed like a place I could be happy.
Of course, I couldn’t speak French but I did learn English once when I was just a baby so how hard could it be?
I couldn’t believe I was so calm. The fear that I had felt earlier had given way to an uncertain contentment. Jeremiah, or Roche, didn’t say anything as he drove, apart from a single phone conversation he had about ten minutes into the drive, but I was quite happy to sit beside him and watch the French countryside slip by. I was enjoying the drive but at the same time I was nervous about our destination.
We arrived at a small village and he turned off the main road and pulled up in a small layby near some shops.
“Please wait here,” he said and got out of the car, closed the door and walked towards the shop.
Several minutes later he returned carrying a couple of bags. He placed them onto the back seat, climbed back in and we drove off. I looked at the back seat and saw that the bags were full of groceries.
We drove for perhaps another twenty minutes and then slowed down as we came along a tree-lined road. He reached into the side pocket of the car and pulled out what looked like a TV remote.
Along the side of the road were high walls, at least three metres tall, topped with razor wire. Set into the wall was a tall, wide metal gate. When Roche typed a code into the remote the metal gate slid aside into the wall and allowed us to drive through. As we drove through the gate I noticed vicious metal spikes in the road surface descend into the road, probably activated by the remote to prevent tyre damage. Anyone trying to break through the gate wouldn’t get far.
The drive swept up through some trees towards a large house at the top of a short hill. Topped with a red-tiled roof and smooth cream walls, the house looked to be in the same style as most of the other houses I had seen. However, this house was clearly much bigger than most and resided in large grounds. I couldn’t see walls around the grounds from here but I’m sure they were there.
Roche pulled the car in front of the house and we both got out.
The air smelled spicy; clearly some exotic herbs growing here. At least exotic to me, with my parochial view of the world.
The front door opened and a woman came out. She was black and slim with shoulder-length black hair. She was dressed in bright colours and white trousers which flapped in the breeze as she skipped down the steps to meet us.
She ran at Roche and embraced him. They talked for a few seconds as I stared uncomfortably at my shoes and then she turned to me and in perfect English said, “Welcome, Matthew.”
She placed her hands onto the sides of my face and smiled as she looked deeply into my eyes.
I’m not used to this much physical intimacy and I felt a little awkward. She cocked her head to one side and said, “Aw. So many questions. So much stress. So much sadness and yet so happy. Come!”
She grabbed my hand and led me up the stairs and into the house. When we got inside she walked briskly out of the room, shouting back to Roche something I didn’t understand.
I turned to Roche and saw something in his face I’d not seen before: a hint of a smile. He caught me looking, came closer to me and, staring at the space that the woman had occupied he said, “That was Sandrine, my wife.”
He turned to me. “My black velvet butterfly; full of stars.”
Sandrine returned and showed me upstairs. The long, sweeping marble staircase led to a first floor landing and we walked along cool stone floors until we stopped in front of a light wood door.
She showed me inside to a large, light room with two large glass doors opening out onto a veranda. At the centre of the room was a large bed with white covers. A few other pieces of furniture finished the room off.
“Please use these controls to open and shut the blinds as you want. Also, here is your bathroom.”
She pointed out the controls on the wall and then led me towards my own bathroom. The bath was huge with jets and next to it a walk-in shower, toilet and a low-level bowl with taps that I’d not seen before.
“There are some clothes for you in the wardrobe – Roche checked your sizes – and some bathroom stuff for you in there. Please relax and refresh yourself. I will make some lunch in about one hour. Please come downstairs when you feel you want to.”
She left the room, although to say she left the room wasn’t really doing it justice. I could see why Roche described her as a butterfly, as she seemed to float or flutter from place to place.
A bottle of water stood by the bed and I picked it up, opened it and then opened the sliding doors out onto the veranda. The doors slid into the wall, opening up most of the wall to the air outside. I stood on the veranda and looked out over the hills.
The warm late-morning air was being moved slowly by a breeze coming in from the coast and felt good against my face. It was warmer here than back in England.
I thought about how quickly things can change, from lying paralysed in a bed on the brink of being killed to standing here in near paradise conditions. I felt happy. I also felt guilty for feeling happy when somewhere Claudia was being held, maybe hurt, because of me. Was it because of me? I had no idea what was going on.
After a short while I decided to shower again and I selected some clothes from the wardrobe. Roche had done a good job by getting my sizes, as everything seemed to fit perfectly. So, dressed in a white T-shirt, expensive jeans and some weird-looking trainers, I went down to the ground floor where Roche and Sandrine were sitting outside at a table near a swimming pool.
We had lunch together, with Sandrine doing much of the talking, asking me questions about my life which I tried to answer around mouthfuls of meat, cheese and bread.
I had some red wine, which I’d not tried before. It was a little odd; a bit like drinking sweet vinegar but not unpleasant. I could feel the wine affect my head.
After lunch Sandrine disappeared to another part of the house and I was left alone with Roche, who broke the silence.
“It’ll be safe here for a short while but not too long. I do not want to put Sandrine at risk. So, we will leave here tomorrow. I will leave here this afternoon and return later. You may enjoy the house and I will discuss our next moves with you later.”
The rest of the afternoon I spent sitting outside and swimming in the pool. Sandrine made sure that I had all I needed and kept bringing me coffee and biscuits until I couldn’t eat anymore.
After I’d swam, showered and dressed I took a walk through the grounds. The sun was hot against the back of my neck and a fragrant breeze occasionally tousled my hair. The paths through the garden were narrow and winding, sweeping between borders of well-kept plants and, as I walked between them, the smell of the different flowers, trees and shrubs was almost intoxicating.
I walked up a small rise and found a flattened area with a small wooden bench looking out across the hills towards the sea. I sat here and closed my eyes, allowing the sounds and the sensations from around me to overwhelm me. I could have sat here forever; it was so peaceful and seemed to be everything that my body needed.
The huge blue sky, dotted with just a few scattered fluffy white clouds, played host to a few circling birds above rolling green hills of trees and fields. I could see small white dots on one field which I assumed were sheep and in a neighbouring field, a tractor made its way slowly across a yellow field, too far away to be heard.
I wondered at how peaceful this picture was and how quickly the world could change from fear, death and destruction to a paradise like this.
Eventually, I stood up, slightly light-headed, and walked back down the path to the house.
Later, as the sun began to push longer shadows across the patio, we sat and drank a glass of wine as Sandrine asked me about my history.
She lit up a slim cigarette and told me how Roche had described to her my image of the black butterfly and how it had related to her.
“Roche calls me his velvet black butterfly. He takes care of me very well and says that I flit from place to place, barely touching the ground.”
She laughed and I laughed. She was good company and I felt at ease.
“We laugh about my name because there is a superstition in many parts of the world where a black butterfly in your house comes before death,” she laughed, “but Roche says that everything comes before death so we can pay it no heed at all!”
I laughed too, although I didn’t find it funny. Every time I hear about death it makes my stomach turn. I’ve seen far too much of it and I wonder if I will ever be able to let go of that feeling.
Later that evening Roche returned and we all had dinner together. Roche didn’t speak much and left most of the conversation to Sandrine.
Afterwards, as I was sitting outside watching the stars, he came and sat next to me.
“We’re leaving in the morning. Be awake at 6am as we’ll be having breakfast at seven and leaving here before eight.”
He got up and walked away. I continued to watch the stars for a while longer and then headed up to bed.
The following morning I got up, showered, dressed and was downstairs by 6.30am. We had breakfast and made ready to leave. Sandrine handed me a small duffle bag and told me she had packed it with some things that I might need: some spare clothes and some toiletries.
“Don’t lose this bag, it is a gift from me,” and she smiled and kissed me on both cheeks.
I climbed into the Audi next to Roche and we drove away, through the metal gate and off down the road, leaving Sandrine alone. I wondered for her safety.
15
Again we drove along winding roads, intermittently broken up by small villages. We were heading south and for the first time I saw a sign I recognised: ‘Marseille’. I recognised it because I once had a long, boring conversation with a woman in London about French spelling and she kept complaining about how awkward it was to learn. Marseille was her example.
It didn’t really help me though, as I had no real idea where it was or how it related to the rest of France. I might as well have been in Calcutta (assuming that’s not in France. As I said, my geography is poor.).
We drove in silence for a while until I tried to make conversation.
“Sandrine’s really nice.”
No response.
“Very friendly.”
Jeremiah tightened his grip on the steering wheel and sighed.
“How long have you known her?”
He exhaled loudly. “Mr Hawk, maybe I’ve been unclear. Let me help clarify our relationship. We are not friends. Less than twenty-four hours ago I was prepared to shoot you in the head and throw your body down a lift shaft and I might still decide to do that if the circumstances change. Then I would go and have a sandwich, drink some coffee and read the newspaper. You are with me because the person I work for needs to retrieve Claudia Okeke and you seem to be the target of the kidnapper’s attention. Therefore, I’m protecting you in the same way that a mousetrap protects the cheese. Am I making myself clear?”
I’m not sure what I was expecting but that hit me quite hard. I felt a single tear roll down my face and, despite my better judgement, I wiped it away with the ball of my hand. I didn’t trust myself to speak without my voice cracking so I sat in silence, staring out of the side window to hide my face.
We sat in silence for a while until Roche, under his breath, said, “Merde.”
I turned to look at him. “What?”
“Three years.”
“Sorry?”
“Sandrine and I, we’ve been together for three years. I met her in Morocco and we moved to France three years ago. I like jazz but she prefers folk music. She’s allergic to nuts so I eat nuts in the garden. Is that enough information for you?”
We sat in silence for a short while until I said, “Maybe you should just stop eating nuts.”
He whipped his head around to stare at me but I just looked straight ahead. He turned back to look at the road but, glancing sideways at him, I did notice the corners of his mouth raise with the hint of a smile. Maybe it was just indigestion. Probably from the nuts.
We drove on for quite a while, leaving Marseille behind us. Occasionally I could see the coast on my right and eventually I saw a sign saying Nice.
“What’s nice?” I asked.
“What?”
“What’s nice?”
“What are you talking about?”
“There was a sign that said Nice. What’s nice?”
“Nice. It’s pronounced Nice and it’s a city.”
“Oh, OK. Is it nice?”
> That seemed to be the end of the conversation and we both sat in silence. When we got near to Nice we turned away from the coast and headed up into the mountains. The roads were very winding and often I would look out of my window to see steep drops next to the road. In places, the tatty, metal railings were missing and bent, and I wondered what had happened to bend them and what had happened to the people in the things that bent them. I wondered how many cars had gone over the edge.
However, Roche was an excellent driver and he pushed the car hard through the corners, using the available road to greatest effect.
At the end of the road we turned off and drove into a small village called Gourdon. Roche parked in a small carpark just outside the village and we got out.
He opened the boot and retrieved a couple of black backpacks with metal hoops, gave one to me and told me to wear it.
I slipped it on and did up the straps. He came over to me and tested the straps and tightened them in places.
“A survival pack, just in case,” he said and proceeded to put one on himself.
Leaving my duffle bag in the car, we walked up a lane and towards the village centre. The village was stunning. Old, cobbled streets with small houses and shops built into them and an amazing view straight out over the hills and towards the sea in the distance.
It seemed to be an attraction for tourists as there were many people walking around taking photos. When we got to the village, Roche steered me towards a café.
“We’ll be as safe here as anywhere. We need to talk.”
The café was incredible; perched right on the edge of a cliff at the top of a mountain I could see for miles. I stood by a wall and looked over. Below me was nothing but empty space until the rocks below and I could see hang-gliders circling below me; in the distance the sea. I turned and sat down next to him.
“This place is known as The Eagle’s Nest,” he said. “From here we can see what’s approaching.”
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