The Hidden Target (34 page)

Ahmad and Shawfield were tense, too, their eyes on the road ahead. It was empty enough: one car, occasionally visible when the road straightened and the small hills—sand dunes, actually—no longer interfered with the view. For once, Tony Shawfield wasn’t trying to pass the car in front of them: he let it draw well away, eventually be lost from sight. Ahmad looked at his watch, spoke to Tony, who nodded and put on his usual speed, and began watching the wind-moulded desert on the left-hand side of the road.

“There are cars behind us,” Kiley warned. “I make out two.”

“How far behind?”

“Difficult to judge. These damned sand hills—” He broke off, noticing Nina’s strange mixture, of interest and dejection. “You don’t look too happy, Nina. Didn’t you see enough carpets at Kerman?” he teased.

She nodded. But in our two days there, I saw no sign of my Turkish friend who had a French mother and an English education. Near Kerman, he had said. “It’s all this emptiness,” she told Kiley. “No one lives here. Not one real village.”

“Only caravan routes. Actually, this road used to be one of them. We’re in luck, the north wind—the Wind of a Hundred and Twenty Days, as Ahmad calls it—has blown itself out.” That diverted her attention, as he had guessed it would.

“Is it the wind that causes all this erosion?”

“Lifts sand out of one place, builds it up in another. It can be violent. So we’re in luck,” he repeated. Good management, he told himself, and waited for her to notice that. But the barren land had silenced her completely. A signal from Ahmad caught his attention. At last, he thought with a surge of relief: this shouldn’t take long—not much talk to be exchanged, just a packet of money. He would be glad when he had got rid of the bulky envelope strapped to his waist. This country was too lonely for a feeling of safety.

“Look!” called out Guido Lambrese, and had Henryk Tromp reaching for his camera.

“What is it? A fort?” Sven Dissen suggested.

“It looks empty,” Madge said. “Couldn’t we stop?”

All of them were too startled by the sudden appearance of the solid, strong, unembellished building, rising squarely from a stretch of flat sand, to notice that Shawfield had already slackened speed. The camper came to a halt. There was a rush to get out. “Hold it!” Kiley warned them. “Let’s make sure it’s deserted. Safety first.”

“Safety? What’s dangerous in an old fort?” Madge asked.

“It may not be deserted,” said Nina. There were fresh tyre marks leading from the road towards the silent building. Cars might be parked out of sight behind the towering bulk of hewn stone. “What
is
it, Jim?”

Ahmad said, “A caravanserai. A place where caravans stopped for the night. Their camels and donkeys went inside also, and slept beside the women. The men protected them from any attack.”

“How?” Madge asked. “Through those slits in the walls?” There were no windows.

Ahmad, as was his way, didn’t answer the obvious. With his usual disdain for all foreigners’ ignorance, he descended on to the road and waited impatiently.

Damn him for a know-it-all, thought Kiley: he has said the one thing that will make them determined to get inside the place. Its vast door, high enough for a fully loaded camel to enter, was wide open to show gaping darkness. An invitation to explore. He cursed under his breath. “It may not be empty. So we’d better find out who is inside before we walk into something we can’t handle. Tony—you come with me. And we’ll need Ahmad to speak the language and get us out of there—if we meet any sign of trouble.”

“Trouble?” Madge was excited.

“You want to lose that little Kodak of yours?” he joked, and dampened her enthusiasm. It also ended Tromp’s. His Japanese camera had cost eight hundred American dollars. “Wait here,” Kiley told them. “Guard the camper. Don’t leave it, remember! We’ll signal you if we find only a couple of camel drivers having a midmorning rest.”

“Where are the camels?” Madge asked.

“Inside with the women and children,” Nina said. “Watch out for those slits, Jim. There’s a home-made rifle pointing at you right now.”

He looked at her sharply, and then laughed.

“A funny sense of humour that girl has,” Shawfield said sourly as he walked off with Kiley and Ahmad. The distance ahead of them was short, barely a hundred yards.

At the camper, the group gathered together. Lambrese studied the uncompromising shape of the caravanserai. “Pathetic,” he said. His taste ran to the Parthenon, or at least Doric pillars.

Tromp said, “It was built for defence, Guido.”

“Even so—just think what the Knights of Rhodes could have made of it.”

“Grim,” Dissen agreed. “What’s that lying outside its threshold?”

“It doesn’t move,” Marie-Louise said. “Something dead?” She took a step forward. Then another. Her husband followed her, so did Lambrese and Tramp. All four were soon walking slowly towards the caravanserai. They halted as Kiley looked round, waved them back.

Nina watched them. Madge still indefinite about staying beside her or joining the others. We aren’t meant to see inside that place, Nina thought. Jim and Tony and Ahmad were now skirting the motionless object to step into the yawning blackness beyond the entrance.

Curiosity drew the others another twenty yards nearer the caravanserai. Again they halted. “It’s a dead donkey,” Marie-Louise cried out.
“Affreux!”

At that moment, a car from Kerman passed the camper, travelling rapidly. Behind it came another—a grey Fiat. It slowed down, stopped. “Have you trouble?” a man called in halting English. “We help perhaps?” Pierre got out, raised his eyebrows. “Ah, the young lady who wish to see carpets. You like them?”

“Damn!” said Madge, looking a the rest of the group, who were now half-way to the caravanserai. Henryk was busy photographing. “We’re missing all the fun.”

“I’ll guard everything here. Go ahead.”

Madge needed no urging. Kodak in hand, she left at a run.

Quickly, Pierre came forward, took cover at the side of the camper, placing its body between him and the caravanserai, beckoning to Nina to follow. She watched in astonishment as he bent to feel something underneath its rear fender. Whatever he had checked there pleased him. He gave a broad smile and forefinger salute to Fahri, who sat at the Fiat’s wheel, then began speaking rapidly. “You’ll stop at Zahidan for lunch. I’ll be watching for you. Make some excuse; leave them, and follow me. To a car—not this Fiat; it goes to Pakistan. We’ll drive back into Iran and then head south for the Hormuz Strait. We’ll get a boat easily and sail—”

“No.” That whole terrain was a wasteland. The map the kindly Swedish couple had given her in Tabriz showed only hundreds of miles of nothingness. “I am not leaving. There’s no need. I’m safe enough.”

“Your friend? Is she still—”

“Still determined to stay. Besides, there’s too much risk for you. You’re putting yourself in danger.”

He could agree with that, but it was worth a try. “Who, me?”

“You,” she said firmly. “I can’t leave. Later—”

“It would have to be much later. In Bombay.” He shook his head.

“Another month. The last week in October—so Jim Kiley told me. I think it was the truth. This time.”

The date agreed with the one he had overheard in the Tabriz courtyard. He stared at her. She was obdurate. “Do you know Bombay? have you a map of it?” There was a quick shake of her head, a look of momentary fear in those blue eyes. “One of the big hotels—they’re close together, central; you’ll find them easily; any taxi driver can get you there—is the Malabar. You’ll see its name—in big letters.” He had taken out a small pad and pencil, was jotting down some figures. “Ask for Mr. Roy—A.K. Roy. Give your name: Nina. That will be enough.” He tore off the sheet of paper and handed it to her. “That’s his private number.”

“Roy,” she repeated. “The Malabar Hotel. Is he English?”

“Indian. Someone at that number will take your message and arrange a meeting at the hotel with me or with—” He stopped short of saying Bob Renwick. Why promise what might not be? “With someone you can trust. We’ll get you safely out of Bombay. I can’t risk meeting you before then, but don’t be surprised if you see two Australians around. The red Ferrari—remember it?—well, it needs repairs. So if you have learned about any further stops on your journey, tell them. If you sense danger to yourself, tell them. They will improvise. And remember—” Fahri had a fit of coughing. Pierre moved towards the Fiat. “Destroy that number” were his parting words. He stepped into the car. It left.

For a moment, Nina wished she hadn’t been so firm in her refusal. She slipped the piece of paper into the deep pocket of her wide skirt. Later, she’d memorise its numbers and then drop it, in a dozen small pieces, down the horrible hole in the floor of some abominable bathroom. Now, she must walk around the camper and face the caravanserai. Kiley and Shawfield were in view, their heads turned to watch the departing Fiat. Ahmad was shouting at the Dutchman, who had taken a photograph of the donkey just as the three men had emerged. The others were protesting: why couldn’t they go inside—they wouldn’t take long—just a quick look? But they listened to Kiley, as they always did, and he shepherded his flock of straggling sheep back to the road.

He repeated his explanation to Nina. “There are a couple of men inside there, ugly-looking types. Ahmad had to do a lot of fast talking to get us out. They looked as if they’d slit our throats for our shirts and shoes.”

“Couldn’t we risk a crowd of us going in?” she asked.

“They’re armed. We are not.”

“I wish I could have seen it.” That seemed the expected remark.

“Not much to see. An empty space with a well in the centre— silted up. It’s dark—has a roof over it, probably to keep the sandstorms out.”

“Was that all?”

“There’s a stone staircase—no guard rail—leading to a small gallery around the walls. They must be four feet thick. Once that place was as strong as a fortress. Now—just piles of refuse. And the smell! The dead donkey was no help. Its belly was swollen, bloated—enormous. I thought it would explode any minute.”

She looked at him in horror. “Just left to die... Oh, Jim, let’s get away from here.”

“I agree. Sorry to leave you by yourself. The others shouldn’t have deserted you. You weren’t feeling lonely, were you?”

“I was,” she admitted. “Then a car stopped—they thought we might need help—had run out of gas or something.”

“That was the grey Fiat?” he questioned.

He recognised the car, she realised: he knows who was inside it. She managed a smile. “Yes. Our ver’ good Turkish friend— remember? At the inn near Tabriz? We talked carpets until his English ran out.”

“Absorbing topic,” Madge said as she brushed past Nina to climb into the camper. “Never mention ‘carpet’ to me again. I’ve had it.”

So have I, thought Nina, aware of Shawfield’s sharp glance, first at her, then at the camper’s interior, as he held out a hand to pull her up its steep step. At this moment, she again wished she had listened to Pierre, gone with him, left Shawfield’s constant scrutiny. He frightened her: there was something hard, unbending in his expression. He just didn’t like people—he was too absorbed by mechanics and his own efficiency. See, Tony, she told him silently, nothing has been disturbed: I guarded the camper well. She mustered a steady hand as he helped her mount the step. Unusual gallantry: did he think he could feel her nervousness? “Lunch at Zahidan?” she asked, her voice as steady as her hand had been.

“No. We’ll wait until we reach the Baluchistan frontier. There may be a wait for customs and inspection. The Pakistanis worry about arms; the Iranians worry about drugs. The Baluchis on both sides of the border live on smuggling.”

“Drugs?” Lambrese asked, exchanging a covert glance with his friend Tromp.

“Sure. The stuff is manufactured in Pakistan—something half-way between opium and heroin.” That should catch their attention, thought Shawfield.

“Morphine sulphate tablets,” Syen Dissen informed them all. His friendship with Pakistani medical students in Paris made him an authority on the subject. He needed no urging to enlighten everyone. He did so at length as they settled in their seats and the camper started forward. The poppies grew in northern Pakistan, but the tablets were manufactured all over the place. Now, the old Turkish-Marseilles connection had become interested: they were organising the drug trade from Pakistan to Amsterdam, Zurich, Copenhagen, Frankfurt.

“But never to Russia,” Nina murmured.

Kiley heard that small remark. He said, “Perhaps your Turkish friends aren’t so interested in carpets after all.” As she stared blankly at him, he added with a smile. “If they meet us again, better keep clear of them. Which reminds me—” he raised his voice for all to hear—“no smuggling from Pakistan across the Indian frontier. Prisons in this part of the world are no health resorts. So don’t try smuggling, anyone. Remember!”

Lambrese and Tromp exchanged a second glance. “No one is interested in smuggling, James,” Lambrese assured him with perfect truth.

Just in pleasant dreams between frontiers, thought Shawfield. “Traffic is increasing,” he called, and pointed to a slow file of five heavily laden camels, three overloaded donkeys, four men and two boys wrapped in odds and ends of old clothes. Bulky head scarves were wound loosely around their heads to form rakish turbans, then twisted around their necks to cover half their faces. “Baluchis, I think.”

“Stop!” Henryk Tromp called out. “Just five minutes for a photograph.”

“No time,” Shawfield told him. “You’ll see plenty of caravans in the next three weeks. Caravanserai, too.” Under his breath he said to Ahmad, “That bloody camera.”

“Do not worry,” Ahmad told him quietly. No one took photographs of Ahmad coming out of that caravanserai. His brows came down, his lips tightened, his heavy moustache bristled. He looked at the passing Baluchis with contempt.

Shawfield nodded. “You deal with it.” He glanced over his shoulder. Kiley was talking with O’Connell, had started her laughing. Everything was under control. The grey Fiat was not even in sight on the longest stretch of this goddamned road.