Moroccan Traffic: Send a Fax to the Kasbah

by Dorothy Dunnett

  ‘And sucks to you,’ said Johnson viciously, and tumbled flat as the waiter dragged free and set off between tables, running. Johnson got up and, swearing, began to race after him. Against him came the horrified rush of Jimmy Auld’s friends who had just witnessed his son-in-law being shot. I saw Johnson thrust through them, answering nothing. He passed Muriel, who was standing quite still, her face ghastly.

  I scrambled up, and found Charity Kingsley beside me. She said, ‘I don’t know what all that was about, but shouldn’t we help?’

  I said, ‘Mr. Oppenheim!’

  ‘Plenty of people helping him, if he needs it,’ she said; and, taking my arm, began to rush after Johnson.

  It was hard to make any progress. All the cooks and waiters had run out to see what had happened, and guests were standing clutching each other, or crouching in groups under tables, or climbing on tables to see better. A number had fled to the café for shelter.

  The waiter had a clear start, and was better motivated than almost anyone. He darted across the main forecourt followed by Johnson, employing an erratic outflanking technique. We followed. I found myself breathless from sheer fright and anxiety, but Lady Kingsley galloped ahead, wielding her shoulders and elbows like truncheons. I saw, now, what the waiter was making for. In the most obscure corner of the forecourt was a service gate, beyond which was the Place Jemaa and a typhoon of spectators and horsemen. And beyond the present traumatised crowds was the labyrinthine web of the souks.

  Our quarry was almost there, when I saw that his bobbing black head had ceased bobbing. Behind, Johnson put on speed. Realising it, the other man began to run forward. Lady Kingsley and I, battling through the last of the crowds, had a sudden view of the gate, and the waiter and Johnson, and perceived why our villain had paused. Solidly blocking the gate was my mother.

  I heard Johnson shout, telling her to let the man through. Certainly, he had no other chance, outside pole-vaulting. Instead she stood where she was, a pillar box with a fag in its mouth, with her arms folded as near as she could get them. I thought the fellow would hit her, but no. He just took out a knife, laid it against the side of her neck, and backed her through the gate, using one of her arms as a tiller. Behind, driverless at the moment, was the line of horse-drawn barouches we had come in.

  That was where Lady Kingsley and I caught up with Johnson, standing still at the gate. He was murmuring something. Lady Kingsley said, ‘I don’t think I’d follow, if I were you.’ She pushed past.

  ‘But you aren’t,’ Johnson said. He had begun to move, a hand in his pocket. ‘Wendy, it’s all right, she’s safe so long as we stay with her. Charity, you can drive one of these things?’

  ‘Of course,’ she said. ‘I’d take the third lot. They look better goers.’ She paused. She said, ‘He can’t do much damage while driving.’

  ‘Do not,’ said Johnson, ‘worry your elegant head about that.’ His accent was the same as Sir Robert’s, but his style suddenly wasn’t. Running, I saw Charity look at him quickly, as if he were a horse that had surprised her. Then no one spoke, for our waiter hadn’t made for the barouches at all. Instead, he stopped by a Super Bleu bike with a sidecar. He heaved my mother inside, vaulted on to the bike and shot out into the Place, engine roaring.

  We had got to the horse-carts by then. ‘Right,’ Johnson said;

  and taking hold, shot me into the seat of the third, before swinging up on the box beside Charity. She had the reins collected already. He said, ‘Let it rip, lady. If our villain can’t get through the Place, I reckon he’ll try for the souks. Tell you what to do when we get there.’ The horses trampled and fussed, and then suddenly began to move off together. The wheels picked up speed. The cart jolted. Watchful as a traffic controller, Johnson sat scanning the crowds. But the rest of his attention, I saw, was concentrated ahead, on the bike and my mother.

  My biggest burden in life is my mother. I had never seen her scared. Now she must be. If anyone scared her, I wanted it to be me, and not a French-speaking spy from Essaouira. I wondered if he knew, whoever he was, that Sir Robert’s own wife was behind him. I rather hoped that he didn’t.

  Charity Kingsley knew how to handle her horses. She clucked and shouted and wheedled, and their ears started to stiffen. She coaxed them to move into the noisy, dark square after the even noisier bike. In spite of the throng in between us, we could follow the sound of it plainly, and see my mother’s kerchiefed head and broad back, and the knife-arm laid lovingly near it.

  Her captor steered with the other hand until it was clear that the crowd was too thick to be passed. Then he leaned to the right and, pulling away, set off fast back the way he had come. If the Place had been empty, we could have cut him off, but it wasn’t. Charity Kingsley had to follow his arc, or run people under the horses. Johnson didn’t question what she was doing. Only after a bit, he said, ‘Closer, Charity.’

  She said, ‘You’d risk Wendy as well?’

  And he replied, ‘I shan’t risk anything I don’t have to. Do it.’

  She was a powerful lady, and older even than Johnson, but she simply stretched her hand for the whip, and then used it. We raced through vacant patches of darkness, fringed with the lights of stalls which, tonight, had no customers. It wasn’t far, now, to the neck of the principal lane to the souks, and the man ahead was making straight for it. I thought of the packed open markets, and the badger tunnels of workshops that connected them. I said, ‘We’ll get stuck, and we’ll lose him.’

  ‘No, we shan’t,’ Johnson said. ‘He may even get stuck before we do.’ His voice from the box was calm and rather precise. He added in the same tone, ‘Rolly, he’s going for exit three. Look at the map. What’s happening?’

  And, from the air high before me, the voice of Roland Reed answered. ‘They’ve gone. Boarders repelled. We’re all right. What about you?’

  ‘Oppenheim copped it,’ said Johnson. ‘Our man’s got Mrs. Helmann in a passenger Vespa and we’re in a brougham. Where will he take us to jam us?’

  ‘Souk Attarine,’ said the voice. ‘Or I would. There should be someone around where you are.’

  ‘That would be nice,’ Johnson said.

  I stared at his back. Lady Kingsley, her horses dropped to a maddening trot within the busier confines of the souk spoke without taking her eyes off them. ‘What’s going on, Mr. Johnson?’

  ‘Later,’ he said. Ahead, the Motobecane had been forced to drop its headlong speed also. The intermittent lights of the trading stalls gleamed on the driver’s white sleeve and my mother’s shoulder and arm. I couldn’t see even her profile. A laden donkey appeared, plodding across the path of the bike which veered, upturning one of its panniers. For a moment the way was blocked by gesticulating people and faggots of watercress, and I saw the waiter look round as we bore down on him. Then he was through and off, and a moment later, had disappeared down a right turning.

  He was out of sight for only a moment. Quicker than might have seemed possible, the way before us was cleared: the donkey was held hard to one side by men with smiling faces, and our horses raced past, their hooves squelching on greenery. Then we took the same turning, and found ourselves crossing a space strung with lights and heaped with red and blue kitchenware. The bike had already gone through: the bowls and jugs and basins were still spinning and rolling and bouncing under our wheels. No one ran alongside, or stopped us. I thought, but couldn’t believe it, that I heard someone cheering. A voice said, ‘Jay, I have them in view. We’re not alone.’ It sounded, this time, like Oliver; and he was neither smiling nor cheering.

  ‘I was afraid not,’ said Johnson.

  We plunged into the opposite lane and found ourselves this time in near darkness. From caverns on either side fire glared from brazier and furnace where smiths hammered and bent molten metal. Old men looked up as they sat at their burnishing, the dull kettles and pots all about them. Light gleamed green through mint tea and brilliant orange from a bent iron bar and glittered red on the bike, statio
nary in the lane far ahead of us.

  Beyond it, a man was washing a car with a hose, and in no hurry to let anyone pass. We could hear the argument above the rumble of our wheels and the clatter of the eight steady hooves. It was not until the machine was set directly at him that the man leaped out of the way, wielding the hose like a weapon and sending a wavering stream after the bike. We passed, again, without trouble. Johnson said, ‘He’s had three chances to get out and run. Why isn’t he taking them?’

  Lady Kingsley said, ‘If he did, you would lose him.’

  ‘That,’ said Johnson, ‘is the least of it. Do you know the spice market?’

  She said, ‘Is that where he’s going? Ah. He can get through to the carpet souk, and we can’t.’

  ‘Yes.’ Johnson said. ‘So that’s where you stay, when we get there. I’ll call Oliver in to take care of you.’

  She said, ‘Why waste Oliver’s time? We still have the horses.’ I saw him look at her. She said, ‘I assume you know how to ride?’

  ‘After a fashion,’ he said. There had been a slight pause. Then he said, ‘But Wendy?’

  ‘I’ll take her,’ said Lady Kingsley. ‘Tell me when, and I’ll unshackle them both.’

  I didn’t say anything. There was nothing I could say. They were taking these risks for my mother, and I couldn’t do less. Ahead, I could see, the lanes we were following were about to debouch into a place much more open and brightly lit. Yet again, the progress of the bike ahead had been hampered; first by a group playing cards at a lamp lit, inconvenient table, and then by two men bearing a long metal rod which by no means could be angled to let the bike pass.

  That time, we nearly caught up with them, and it was bad; for the waiter’s hand rose from behind my mother’s back, and the knife was still there. I said, ‘No!’ and Lady Kingsley had begun to draw on the reins when Johnson took her wrists and held them. He said, ‘No. He won’t hurt her.’

  Charity Kingsley paused. Then she said, ‘Of course. He’s only keeping the woman to get you to follow. Is that our market ahead?’

  The dark lane had come to an end in a dazzle of brilliance. A large uncovered square lined with stalls lay ahead, busy with people. Below the dusty trees in its centre, the ground was heaped with merchandise and knots of vehement vendors. The Motobecane, slowed to a crawl, was threading through it. Johnson said, ‘All right. Yes. Unbuckle them now, if you want to. Rolly, we’re leaving the wheels in the spice market, and about to try to ride into the souks. Where is everyone?’

  The transmitter crackled, and spoke. The voice this time was neither Rolly’s nor Oliver’s. It said, ‘I don’t know where everyone is, but I know where Mr. Reed is, the poor soul, because someone’s just broken into his van and disabled his microphone. Are you in trouble, JJ? May I help you, now?’

  ‘Who is that?’ said Charity Kingsley.

  I knew, and so did Johnson. He said, ‘Seb? How was the slammer? I’ve got Lady Kingsley beside me.’ He sounded calm; even amiable.

  Seb Sullivan’s voice said, ‘Why else do you think I would bother? Tell her there’s not the least need to worry. If you get her into a mess, Gerry and I will take care of it.’

  His voice in turn sounded earnest, with the merest trace of derision. He was Sir Robert’s employee. He had a score to settle with Johnson, but he wasn’t going to antagonise Lady Kingsley. I could hear myself panting.

  The air was sickly with powerful odours. I inhaled musk and cinnamon and the smells of dung fires and frying fat. Among the crowds in the square and the souks I could see no familiar and powerful shoulders. Among the hanging corpses of foxes and bats and the walls pinned with mystical papers, there appeared no flash of silver or glint of more ominous metal. Johnson’s eyes, like mine, were examining every inch of the square, but he made no effort to explain to Lady Kingsley. He murmured into his mike. ‘Please don’t trouble. We think we can manage.’

  ‘I’m sure you can,’ said Sullivan’s voice. ‘Don’t be offended, me darlin’. I’m not here as your nursemaid. You could call me a neutral observer.’

  ‘He’s on the roof, Jay,’ said the voice which must be Oliver’s. The last word was torn off. Someone had either got to him, or had killed the transmitter.

  The barouche had stopped, and Lady Kingsley jumped down and ran to the horses. Johnson said, ‘No. Stay. This is dangerous.’

  ‘No doubt,’ said Charity Kingsley. ‘But you’ve got that girl’s mother into it, and I’m not going to leave her. And a horse isn’t bad in a tight spot.’

  He vaulted down as if he would stop her. The barouche suddenly staggered. He swore, and reaching up, pulled me out of the vehicle. He said ‘You don’t need to come.’

  I said, ‘Yes, I do.’

  His hands, his painting hands gripped my waist and he stood still for a moment. Then he said, ‘Yes. You do. All right. Charity?’

  She was on the freed horse already, without saddle and stirrups and nothing but the girth to hold on to. She leaned down, and between them, they propelled me up and into her arms. Her big hands, full of rein, settled me in front of her body and the leathers filled my lap as she shortened them. She said. ‘All right?’ to me, and then repeated it over her shoulder to Johnson. She was already moving off when silently he swept up the festooned reins of the second horse and mounting from the barouche, flung himself on its saddleless back.

  He did know how to ride. I saw Lady Kingsley glance, once, to confirm it. Then we were scampering over the square and into the mouth of the souk which had swallowed my mother, and where Sullivan invisibly waited, with a score to settle with Johnson, and maybe with me.

  Chapter 16

  We had been quick, but not as quick, obviously, as the vanishing bike and sidecar. I thought we might just manage to track them through Oliver. It hadn’t struck me that if Oliver didn’t help us to find them, then Sullivan would.

  We had entered the broad, meandering souk that above all the rest, catered to tourists. Between sundown and supper they followed their gowned and elegant guides under the optimistic sequin-strewn rugs of the entrance and into an endless bazaar, paved and roofed and lined with brilliant slots that were shops. The tourists were buying gauzes and djellabahs and lingering before mitred rows of sewn velvet slippers, or tables flashing with jugs and boxes and basins of over-bright brass. The actual and varied subjects of SM the King of Morocco, robed and veiled, turbaned and capped, swirled round the shops and the tourists in pursuit of their own personal buying and selling, and made way for donkeys, and hand-barrows groaning with cress, or beans, or bananas; or men with a rug on one shoulder. On either side, now and then, there would be the entrance to a narrower souk, floored with crumbling tiles and lined with other, more anonymous caverns.

  I said, ‘How can we know where they’ve gone?’

  And Charity said, ‘Where the sidecar can go. This souk. Nothing narrower.’

  We pushed on as fast as we could. We passed camel harness and saddles, and our unhappy mount jibbed, so that Charity had to grab me. Both the barouche horses were nervous. They were used to the road and wheeled traffic, not the sight and smell of hundreds of people pressing around them. I couldn’t see how Johnson was faring. We passed wooden honeycombs packed full of sewing silks, and I thought how much my mother would like them. Would have liked them. Would like them.

  We had to assume she was ahead. Perched high as we were, we could see from one bend to the next, and if there was a bike threading the crowds, we would spot it. We would never hear it in the general din from the crowd and our hooves. It was hot near the roof. Bunting brushed by our faces, and head-carried parcels nudged at our elbows and begging women picked at Charity’s jodhpurs and my tattered dress. The Wardrobe’s tattered dress.

  Lady Kingsley had no dirhams to give, but no one seemed to mind. They even responded, in a leisurely way, to her County voice calling Balek! Balek! Attention! We pressed on round a bend, and still the souk unreeled ahead, and still there was no sign of a scooter and sidecar, or
of Oliver, or of Sullivan.

  I wondered what Sir Robert’s wife thought of Sullivan, and if she believed that he was only here to take care of her. Sullivan hoped that she did, that was sure. He didn’t know, as I did, that she had heard what had happened at Asni. She must know, or guess, that Gerry not only blamed us for Colonel Sullivan’s jailing: he was looking for Johnson. I said, ‘I hope Colonel Sullivan won’t do anything stupid. Or Mr. Owen.’

  I couldn’t see her face. She just said, ‘Not while I’m here.’

  I had wondered.

  I thought that was the end of the subject. It wasn’t. She added, ‘Not that that will help Mr. Johnson. I gather it’s Pymm’s man, there ahead with your mother. One of the party who shot Daniel Oppenheim and has presumably brought us here to get rid of Mr. Johnson. Your mother will be all right, I’m sure.’

  Pymm had spent all day in the company of my mother. All day today. I looked at Johnson, posting in a desultory fashion behind us. He looked uncommonly alert, but not apprehensive. I said, ‘Ellwood Pymm wants to get rid of Mr. Johnson? Why? How do you know?’

  And Lady Kingsley said, ‘The waiter tried to stab him back at the café, and failed. He hasn’t a gun. Johnson thinks that’s why he’s leading us after him. He’s got to get hold of a weapon.’

  The souks were full of weapons. Every other shop was filled with jewelled daggers and swords and knives with plastic handles.

  I saw that you could do little with these when driving a Moto- becane Super Bleu. You needed something with bullets.

  The souk, still covered, had widened now. We were moving more quickly, and you could tell from the dry smell of wool that the carpet stock houses were near. Then suddenly they appeared in the distance, heavy carpets hanging in layers, or lying spread on the ground, or being displayed, upheld by two corners, to groups of spectators or buyers. They reminded me of various things I preferred not to remember. They blocked the passage before us as effectively as a stage curtain. Among the people and machines brought to a halt was a rider on a blue motor scooter with a passenger in a sidecar.