A Hologram for the King (9 page)

Alan rubbed the knob on the back of his neck.

—Alan, you getting this down?

Hell, he could pretend it was a mistake. Alan pressed a button on his phone and hung up.

A
T EIGHT O'CLOCK
in the morning, Alan was on the shuttle again, with the same young people. They chirped about the hotel, and things they had done the night before.

—I swam in the pool, Cayley said.

—I ate a whole pie, Rachel said.

Alan had not slept. A circus of worries kept his mind darting all night long, taking in the action. By the end it was almost funny. When the sun broke over the sea, his face heavy on the pillow, he'd chuckled to himself. Goddamn, goddamn, goddamn.

When they got to the new city, there was a note on the tent door:
Reliant: welcome back to the King Abdullah Economic City. King Abdullah welcomes you. Please make yourselves at home and we will be in contact after the lunch hour.

Inside the tent, all was the same. There were the many white chairs
amid the gloom. Nothing had been touched.

—They left us some water, Rachel said, pointing to a half-dozen plastic bottles, lined up on the rug like artillery.

Alan and the team sat in the dark cool tent. The young people had brought food from the hotel. They sat around one of their laptops and they watched a movie most of the morning.

After lunch, no one from the Black Box arrived.

—Should we go up to see them? Cayley asked.

—I don't know, Brad said. Is that customary?

—Is what customary? Alan asked.

—Is it customary to show up uninvited like that? Maybe we should just wait here.

Alan left the tent and walked up to the Black Box. He was soaked when he arrived, and again he was greeted by Maha.

—Hello Mr. Clay.

—Hello Maha. Any chance of seeing Mr. al-Ahmad today?

—I wish I could say yes. But he is in Riyadh today.

—Yesterday you said he'd be here all day.

—I know. But his plans changed last night. I'm so sorry.

—Let me ask you something, Maha. Are you absolutely sure that we shouldn't be meeting with anyone else here?

—Anyone else?

—Anyone else who might be able to help us with the wi-fi, and might be able to give us some prognosis about what will happen in terms of the King, our presentation?

—I'm afraid not, Mr. Clay. Mr. al-Ahmad really is your primary contact. I'm sure he's very anxious to meet you, but has been unavoidably delayed. He will be back tomorrow. He has guaranteed it.

Alan walked back down to the tent, his ankle aching.

He sat in the darkness on a white chair.

The young people were watching another movie.

—Should we be doing something else? Cayley asked.

Alan couldn't think of anything else to do.

—No, he said. What you're doing is fine.

After an hour, Alan stood and went to the plastic window.

—To hell with it, he said.

He left the tent, was struck dumb by the heat, recovered, and walked to the Black Box, soaked in sweat.

When he arrived, he did not see Maha. There was no one at the reception desk. Good, Alan thought to himself, and strode quickly across the vast lobby.

He took the elevator up, the doors parted, and he was in the middle of what appeared to be a very busy workplace. Men in suits walked past him, carrying papers. Women in abayas, heads uncovered, hurried by.

He walked down the hallway, seeing no numbers or nameplates.

Alan hadn't thought of exactly what he'd say if he came upon a decision maker here. There was the nephew. Mention the nephew. And of course Reliant being the largest in the world, a company built for a job like this. Money. Romance. Self-Preservation. Recognition.

—You look new.

A female voice, deep and sonorous. He looked up. A caucasian woman, blond, about forty-five, stood before him. Her head was uncovered. With the black gown dropping from her shoulders like a curtain, she looked like a judge.

—I'm supposed to meet someone, he said.

—Are you Alan Clay?

That voice. It was tremulous, as if someone had strummed the low strings of a harp. An accent from Northern Europe.

—Yes.

—You're supposed to meet with Karim al-Ahmad?

—I am.

—He won't be here today. I work in the office next to him. He told me to look out for you.

Alan assembled himself and put on a glossy smile. —No, no. I'm just surprised. I understand completely. Busy times here, I'm sure.

She said her name was Hanne. She had an accent. Alan guessed Dutch. Her eyes were ice blue, her hair cut with a slashing severity.

—I was about to have a smoke, she said. Join me?

Alan followed her through a glass door and onto a wide balcony, where other KAEC employees and consultants were smoking, talking, drinking tea and coffee.

—Watch the step, she said, but it was too late. He'd tripped on the runner below the door, and his arms flew forward as if attempting flight. A dozen pairs of eyes saw it happen, and a dozen mouths smiled. It was not a simple trip. It was comical, wild, theatrical. The sweating man
entering, his arms shooting everywhere, yanked by invisible puppeteers.

Hanne smiled sympathetically and motioned for him to sit across from her, on a low couch of black leather. Her eyes seemed almost flirtatious, but that was impossible. Not so soon after he'd embarrassed himself. Probably not ever.

—You're from Reliant? she asked.

—Recently, yes.

Alan rubbed his ankle. He'd twisted it further.

—And you're here to present?

—The idea is to supply the city with IT, yes.

They went on this way for a bit as he glanced around. None of the women, Saudi or not, were covered. There was a black plastic barrier on either side of the balcony that prevented them from seeing anything but the sea ahead. And, he assumed, prevented anyone below from glimpsing the world, egalitarian and free from restrictions, within the Black Box. This was the cat-and-mouse game being played in the Kingdom. Its people were forced into the role of teenagers hiding their vices and proclivities from a shadowy army of parents.

—So how are things at Reliant? she asked.

He told her what he knew, which was very little. He mentioned a few projects, a few innovations, but she knew it all anyway. She knew everything, it turned out, that he did, about his business and all others related to his. In a few minutes of introductions, of assessing where their paths might have crossed, they covered a handful of consulting firms, the plastics business in Taiwan, the fall of Andersen Consulting, the rise of Accenture.

—So you're here to get the lay of the land, she said, putting out her cigarette and lighting another.

—I'm really just trying to get an idea of the timeline. When we could expect to have some news about the King, that kind of thing.

—What were you told? I hope they didn't make a promise to you.

—No, no, he said. They explained things pretty clearly. But I've been holding out hope that it might be soon. I was led to believe that our chairman knew the King somehow. That this was something between the two of them and would be, you know, fast-tracked.

Her eyes registered new information. —Well, that would be good for us all. The King hasn't been here in a while.

—How long is a while?

—Well, I've been here eighteen months, and he hasn't been here yet.

H
ANNE NOTICED WHAT
must have been the visible decline and fall of Alan's face.

—But listen, she said. You're with Reliant. I'm sure your people know more than I do. I'm just a consultant. I do payroll. I'm sure your presentation is the reason he's coming soon, right? Even if the King were coming tomorrow, I wouldn't be high on the list of those in the know.

She stubbed out her second cigarette and stood. —Shall we?

She led him inside. They passed through the lobby and into a hallway lined with glass-box offices and conference rooms. A few dozen men and women whisked by in various directions, equally split between those in Western business attire and local garb. The offices and cubicles were almost entirely blank, free of all signs of anyone taking root or assuming longevity. Some desks were bare but for a monitor, the computer having been disconnected and removed. There were phones with no owners, projectors pointing at windows. The whole thing had the look of a startup,
which perhaps it was.

Hanne's office was a ten-by-twelve glass cube and looked as if she'd moved in minutes before. There was a cheap desk of particle board and walnut veneer, two silver file cabinets. Nothing on the walls but a piece of paper taped behind her desk with the words STE CONSULTING. Reading his thoughts, she said, —I work with employment contracts, all the contractor salaries. I can't have paperwork lying about.

There were no pictures of any kind of family, any human attachments at all. When she sat down, her hands clasped before her, the look of a judge was complete.

—So is everything okay out there? she nodded toward the window, and now Alan could see the tent, far in the distance.

—Yeah, I wanted to ask about that. Why does the King want these presentations in a tent? Wouldn't this…

—Well, this building has only so many finished rooms, and we can't have the presenters occupying them for the time it might take. If you were to set up in one of the conference rooms, then we couldn't use it for weeks or months.

—And the wi-fi? Our signal is weak to nonexistent.

—I'll definitely ask around.

—It's integral to the presentation.

—I understand. I'm sure it'll get worked out. This is your first day?

—Second.

—Been to Saudi before?

—No.

—Well, things work at a certain pace here. And on top of that, you're in the middle of nowhere. You've had a look around?

—I have.

—Wi-fi is the least of our problems.

Alan managed a smile. He had no idea if this whole thing was some elaborate joke on all of them.

—Should I come back later?

—Why would you do that?

—You said Karim al-Ahmad would be back later.

—Maybe, maybe not. Better just to check in tomorrow.

The idea seemed at once exasperating and alluring, knowing there was absolutely nothing he could do the rest of the day.

She smiled. —You're from the East Coast?

He nodded. He'd been trying to place her face and her accent and now he thought he had it. —You're Danish.

She squinted, tilted her head. A reevaluation.

—Not bad, she said. Have you adjusted yet? The time change?

—I haven't slept in sixty-two hours.

—Tragedy.

—I feel like a pane of glass that needs to be shattered.

—You have pills?

—No. Everyone's asking me that. I wish I did.

She blinked meaningfully at him. —I have something.

She retrieved a key, opened a drawer in her desk, and arranged something on the floor. With her foot, she pushed it till it met his shin.

—Don't look down.

But he had already glanced at it. Inside a book bag there appeared to be a thin green bottle, tall and with flat sides.

—Olive oil? he asked.

—Sure. That's what you tell anyone who asks. Just have a taste when
you get back to the hotel. I'm pretty sure it will shatter your glass.

—Thank you.

She stood. The meeting was over.

—Here's my number, she said. Call if you need help with anything.

He returned to the tent and inside, he found the young people in three different corners. Each was sitting cross-legged, computers on their laps, checking their signals.

—Any news? Brad asked.

Alan tucked his bottle behind a fold in the tent.

—Nothing solid, he said.

He explained that their man al-Ahmad was not in that day, but would be the next. —Tomorrow all will be known, he said.

—Did you eat? Cayley asked. The tone of her voice implied that he, Alan, had just finished a wonderful meal in the Black Box, but had brought nothing back for those suffering in the tent.

He hadn't eaten since breakfast. The young people seemed satisfied that Alan was as powerless as they had previously assumed.

—So today, should we set up? Rachel asked.

Alan had no idea.

—Let's hold off till tomorrow, he said.