Dark Clouds (31 page)

‘I don’t regret meeting you, Rudi ... you have a few good points,’ he concedes. ‘But I have nothing else to say ... so goodbye ... and take care.’

Chapter 24

I don’t want to leave him. But Khalad has already withdrawn his hand and turned to face a brick wall. I’m not welcome any more in the cell, so I turn towards the door. Earl is waiting with Carla when my escort takes me back. I shake my head and shrug.

‘He wouldn’t tell you anything?’ Carla asks.

‘No – ’

‘Very well – there’s only one other option.’

‘Can I leave?’

‘Not yet ... we may need you to speak with him again.’

She makes a call and we’re joined soon afterwards by an Army officer and two placid looking guys in blue shirts and ties. They could be undertakers or pen-pushers in a redundant office.

‘This is Brigadier Featherstone,’ Carla says, ‘and these two gentlemen are Brian and Calum from the Police Service of Northern Ireland.’

The Brigadier gives me one of those under-stated English handshakes with an intense nod. I’m thinking of a confused academic I once knew at Berkeley, who used to move his head up and down earnestly and say ‘
yes
’ to everything. Brian and Calum however are like a pair of clockwork automatons. They say ‘
aye
’ in unison, followed by ‘
grand
’ when we are introduced. They are scary in their ordinariness. I can see each of them sitting down to tea in the evening with almost identical wives, although I can’t imagine either of them fathering children.

‘Very well,’ the Brigadier says when we’ve finished with the social preliminaries. ‘Brian and Calum have a lot of experience with terrorists, although there is of course a difference between the Irish and Islamic variety.’

I like the English, but I start to seethe when they denigrate the Irish and a part of me wants to kick this cod academic soldier.

‘My understanding, Miss Hirsch, is that your main interest in this chap Khalad is to try and unravel what exactly it is he and his chums might be up to, or are planning, here?’

‘That’s it,’ Carla says encouragingly. ‘He may not be directly involved in anything, but we have reason to believe his associates are planning something along the lines of our Twin Towers disaster here in the UK ... but with a nuclear element. We think Khalad is aware of this, and we’re hoping you gentlemen may be able to persuade him to give us precise information ... or frankly, anything at all.’

She’s doing her best to give the impression she appreciates Brian and Calum’s professional expertise as interrogators. They both respond with sage nods and Brian rolls his hands around each other before responding. ‘We’ll do everything we can of course, ma’am ... although there are never any guarantees in these matters, I’m afraid.’

I’d be worried if I was an Irish Republican and these guys got me in a chair or on a table. They’ve each got a fair amount of surplus fat around their waists. Their hair has almost completely disappeared and I can sense an antipathy to Fenians. So where does that leave a helpless Arab like Khalad. ‘
Ah well so, son ... ye’s want to disrupt our way of life – is that it? Aye ... but ye can’t really do that see. It’s not appropriate ... and if ye don’t co-operate, Ahmed, we’ll give ye a heart attack ... can ye understand that now?
’

I notice shiny patches on the back seats of their trousers as they leave and the Brigadier has a persistent twitch on his left shoulder.

‘I’ve got to make a few calls,’ Carla tells us. But I thought you might like a drink, Rudi, and we can have sandwiches later.’

Earl’s grinning as she leaves. He’s got whisky and red wine in a
Fresh and Wild
carrier bag, along with a corkscrew and plastic cups.

‘What will you have?’ he asks.

‘Whisky, please.’

He gives me a generous measure and we sit facing each other across the bog standard Army issue desk.

‘Are you not joining me?’

‘Later, perhaps,’ he says. ‘But to be honest, I prefer rum.’

‘Is this the sort of job you always saw yourself doing?’ I ask and he grins again.

‘Maybe not, Rudi – maybe not. The thing is though, my parents always wanted us to work hard and try our best to succeed ... that’s all I’ve done.’

‘Right – ’

There is a dismissive note in my tone. So he reaches into the
Fresh and Wild
  bag, takes out a plastic cup and pours himself a modest measure of the budget category
Teachers
whisky.

‘Let me tell you something,’ he says when he’s once again facing me from across the desk. ‘Many people denigrate this country, man. They’re usually comfortably off and they like to see themselves as liberals ... which is fine. We’re all different. But I see it as a great place with all sorts of opportunities for advancement. I live in St Albans, Rudi. It’s an agreeable town. My wife is a lawyer. We don’t have children, but we’re buying a holiday home in Tobago. Do you think any of this would have been remotely possible if I had stayed in Jamaica?’

Two homes, maybe not. But kids? Yes – lots of them.

‘So you feel we need to hit people like Khalad hard?’ I ask.

We’re not going anywhere fast. Earl’s committed to his career with Her Majesty’s security service. He wants to secure his second home in Tobago, and he sees my Tunisian contact as just another bad or misguided person, who needs to be stopped or turned around before he or his associates do any damage in
The Green and Pleasant Land
that is England.

I’m thinking of a second whisky when Carla Hirsch returns and says we need to talk about Sulima.

 ‘Sure ... but can I go to the washroom first?’

She’s reluctant to let me leave, but I’m getting up, and when she nods Earl speaks with the soldier outside our door. The male lavatory at the end of the corridor smells of bleach and my escort tells me he’ll wait outside until I’m ready to return.

I choose a cubicle that’s furthest away from the door and when I get inside I take out both of my phones. I put the one I recently purchased on the lavatory cistern. I then bring up Sulima’s number on my original mobile. There isn’t any recognisable sequence in the numbers, but by splitting them up, I’m able to arrange them in a way that, hopefully, will allow me to remember them. It’s a bit like a bank ID code, and when I think I’ve got it, I delete Sulima from each phone.

I don’t know where she is, and I could go through a lie detector on this. Although I’m not sure if I could continue to hold her phone number in my head if Carla Hirsch resorted to water-boarding with me, or if Brian and Calum were instructed to treat me like a Fenian Irish suspect. They’re each on their mobiles when I get back. Carla’s talking with her Homeland Security boss in Washington, while Earl fields a call from his assertive wife who wants to know if he’ll be back for dinner in St Albans.

The desk phone then rings and Carla indicates that I should pick it up.

‘Mr Connors?’ the Brigadier asks.

‘No – this is Rudi Flynn ... Earl’s on another call.’

‘Very good ... we’re in the infirmary wing, and I think you’d all better come up here. The trooper outside your door can show you where we are.’

I don’t like the sound of ‘
we
’ in the infirmary wing at the Regent’s Park barracks, and especially so if Brian and Calum are the main men. Earl and Carla have each got the gist of what we’re talking about and they quickly end their own conversations.

‘What’s happened?’ Carla asks.

I don’t know, but a part of me is welcoming the fact that we may not now have to talk again about Sulima, at least for a while.

‘The infirmary is on the other side of the barracks square,’ our escort tells us. ‘So if you’d like to follow me.’

There are soldiers in camouflage gear getting into trucks when we go outside. They are big guys and most of them are carrying serious looking riot sticks. We’re an incongruous quartet, I’m thinking, and we get puzzled glances and a few shaking heads from the troops who look like they’re on their way to assist the civil power. ‘
There’ll always be an England ... but at times like this we have to forget about being civilised and understated. Why? Because our enemy is ruthless and a lot of misguided people think it’s a good idea to side with the Islamists. They’re deluded of course ... there’s a fierce fight ahead, but one hopes that decent, civilised values will prevail eventually.
’

Our escort’s boots reverberate ahead of us as we walk across the tarmaced  parade ground. Then it’s into another sanitised corridor and up in a lift to the top floor of the barracks complex. There is a smell of disinfectant as the lift doors open, and there are more clinical odours as we approach the infirmary. The Brigadier is waiting for us in what looks like a doctor’s office.

‘Brian and Calum are still interrogating your subject,’ he says. ‘But something has come up I felt you ought to know about straightaway.’

I’m scanning book titles on a medicine cabinet shelf. They seem to be mainly about the effects of certain drugs on the brain, which is disquieting. Carla has already sat herself down on a chair behind the desk. She crosses her long, elegantly trousered legs and then smiles invitingly for the Brigadier’s benefit.

‘It appears that there is going to be an explosion,’ he tells us. ‘And Mr Hassan seems to think there is a train involved in the proposed incident.’

‘So they’re going to blow up a train?’ Carla says.

‘Possibly – ’

‘Big deal ... I don’t think that takes us very far, does it?’

‘Brian and Calum are still questioning your suspect,’ the Brigadier answers defensively. ‘But I have to tell you they’re not optimistic about getting any more information from him.’

‘Why?’ Carla asks impatiently. ‘I thought you said they were experts, who usually get results. Otherwise ... what’s the point of using them?’

The Army officer is uncomfortable. He’s not used to being spoken to in this way by anyone, and certainly not by pushy American women with sexually ambivalent hair styles.

‘Frankly,’ he says after a pause, ‘I don’t believe your Tunisian knows anything else. He’s been thoroughly dealt with, and I can assure you that Brian and Calum are very experienced in assessing subject responses in these circumstances.’

Carla Hirsch is shaking her head. She’s had it with the Brits. Ok, they may be all right out in the field or marching down Pall Mall in funny hats. But the situation is serious and she has a suggestion.

‘I think you should take him out to Northolt,’ she says. ‘Or to one of our bases in Suffolk or Norfolk ... and we’ll take it on from there.’

‘
You see, we know how to do this sort of stuff, bumpkin ... we’ve got the experience and the contacts. If it was down to me, I’d have this guy flown straight to Cairo. That’s the place, buddy. The Egyptians can get just about anything out of a recalcitrant’s head ... and they are our friends
.’

‘I’m afraid we’d have to get clearance from the MoD to do anything like that, ma’am – and I’m not sure if ... ’

‘Oh for fuck’s sake, man!’ Carla spits it out. ‘You don’t know your ass from your fucking elbow on this, and I’ve had it with your wimpy attitude ... you got a senior officer here ... and I mean the head guy. I want to see him, now!’

The Brigadier has finally been stirred out of his understated mode. His neck is red and he’s about to answer Carla when a medical orderly with a Sergeant’s stripes appears.

‘Beg pardon, sir,’ he says in a Scottish accent. ‘But something’s happened.’

‘What?’ the Brigadier asks sharply.

‘It’s the prisoner, sir ... he’s had a turn. We’re not sure yet what it is ... only it could be his heart.’

*  *  *  *  *

Khalad survives, but I’m not happy about what I’ve got him into. I keep thinking of Mohammad Atta and his friends. What was it, I wonder, that propelled them into our World Trade Centre on 9/11? I’m going back to Egypt, Morocco and Tunisia. I’ve got a lot of friendly welcoming guys in traditional dress: Little kufi hats, long jellabas and mischievously endearing smiles. Laurence of Arabia comes to mind with Peter O’Toole careering across the North African desert on a camel. He’s got hundreds of loyal Berber tribesmen following on behind him.

We got along all right with Arab and other Muslims for quite a few years. OK – maybe there was some disharmony between Allah and Jesus in Laurence Durrell’s Alexandria, but relations were generally good between us. The Saudis and others enjoyed their wealth in the West and in return for our hospitality, they kept a lid on their more excitable and radical thinkers. I’ve got this photograph of Osama and his extended family posing proudly in front of a Western Villa and they all look shyly content. So where did we go wrong?

I take a couple of Diazepam tablets when I get back to the hotel in Islington. It’s a stark, impersonal place and I’m missing my bedroom in Crowndale Square with the blue Persian cat, just like Maya’s, who used to meow at me from across the rooftops. The pills help though, and it’s almost midday when I wake the next morning. I got my phone with the tracking device back before I left the Regent’s Park Barracks on condition that I kept it switched on. ‘
We need to know where you are, Rudi
,’ Carla said. But I don’t think I’m on duty any longer for either Her Majesty or my President, so I switch it off.

I’m trying to remember the correct sequence on the number I’ve deleted for Sulima, but I’m missing out on a couple of digits when the news comes up on my TV.

‘
President Armadinejad of Iran is warning the West not to provoke the Muslim world any further
,’ the newsreader says.
‘... Meanwhile, from Israel, we have reports that Air Force units have bombed suspected nuclear installations in both Iraq and Iran ...
’ I switch off the TV when I finish my coffee. I’ll call New York later and pitch a few ideas on what’s been happening in London. Now though, I want to get away from my impersonal hotel. I can’t see Robson or anyone else looking out for me in the lobby area. They could still be tracking me discreetly, so I slip out quickly and then try to lose myself in the busy little streets around the Angel. It doesn’t take long to get through to the Upper Street, although I do avoid Crowndale Square, which is almost certainly under surveillance.