Алистер Маклин - Prime Target

‘Do you speak English?’ she said.

He hesitated, then nodded.

‘I’m trying to find the family or the friends of Yaqub Hisham,’ she said.

The man shook his head.

‘You don’t know him?’

He shook his head again and resumed chewing the match.

Sabrina walked on. She counted to ten, then turned and looked back. He had gone from the doorway. Word would now be travelling. She wiggled her shoulders to dispel a sudden tingling along her back. She began walking again.

After a minute she heard someone running behind her, the sound getting rapidly closer. The feet sounded light, not at all threatening, and when she turned she saw a small boy no more than five or six years old.

‘Missy go that place,’ he said breathlessly, pointing. ‘Go Maruf-al-Hakim.’

‘Whoa, there.’ Sabrina knelt by the boy and put her hand on his skinny shoulder. ‘Say it again, slowly.’

He frowned at her, not understanding. She realized he had been told exactly what to say. He didn’t speak English.

‘I go there?’ Sabrina pointed to a door on the corner of two alleys, dead ahead. ‘That place?’

The boy nodded rapidly. ‘Missy go that place. Go Maruf-al-Hakim.’

‘Maruf-al-Hakim.’

He nodded again. Sabrina fumbled in her pocket for change to give him, but he turned and ran back the way he had come.

Sabrina went to the door and knocked. Where so much was unknown it was best to improvise her story, because a fresh ad hoc lie worked better than the stale, all-purpose variety. With no certainty of what she would find, she had no concrete plan to execute after she delivered her opener. But she was ready for the worst.

The door opened a crack. A girl of fifteen or sixteen put her face in the opening.

‘Can I speak to Maruf-al-Hakim?’

The girl shut the door. It opened again a moment later, wide this time. A man stood there, tall and bearded, barrel-chested, dressed in US Army fatigue pants and a dirty green polo shirt. He was barefoot.

‘Are you Maruf-al-Hakim?’

‘That is my name.’

No toothbrush, Sabrina would swear, had ever been near the mouth that lurked behind the fringes of Maruf-al-Hakim’s moustache. She recalled Philpott’s description of teeth like that: If one of them was white he’d have a snooker set.

‘Could I talk to you about Yaqub Hisham?’ Sabrina said.

Maruf shrugged. ‘Who are you?’

‘My name is Mary Smith. Is Yaqub a friend of yours?’

‘We are brothers.’

‘Oh, I see–’

‘We are all brothers.’

She saw a poster on the wall behind him. It depicted a bunch of incredibly healthy-looking Arabs brandishing guns above their heads, the sun blazing behind them as they marched forward with a scarlet-lettered Arabic slogan at their feet.

‘That’s your brotherhood?’ Sabrina said, pointing.

‘What business do you have with us?’ Maruf demanded. He folded his arms, suggesting a stand-off.

‘I know about Yaqub’s business in London,’ she said.

Maruf shook his head firmly. ‘Not possible. Yaqub is in Palestine.’

‘No, he was in London all right. He didn’t use his real name. He was calling himself Kamul Haidar.’

Maruf’s eyes went down to slits. He tilted his head one way then the other. ‘I ask again, what is your business here?’

‘I need to know why Yaqub went to London.’

She was sure these people knew Yaqub Hisham was dead. If they ran true to type, they would have plans for her already. Which was fine. She wanted that. She wanted their full belligerent attention, for that way she would get to know things. Quickly.

‘I see,’ Maruf said.

The hair around his mouth was so dense it was hard to see how he was responding, but as he stepped back now he seemed to smile.

‘You will take mint tea with us.’

‘Thank you, but I don’t feel it’s proper to enter a stranger’s house without a chaperone.’ She watched him scowl. They just hated a woman to show any determination. ‘Can I invite you perhaps to join me for tea or a soft drink at a café?’

Maruf appeared to think about it. ‘One moment,’ he said, and disappeared, pushing the door almost shut.

Sabrina waited, watching the gap in the door. She thought she heard music. Then she heard footsteps and turned sharply because they were behind her suddenly. She felt pain and saw a flash of bright, blinding light as something hard struck the side of her head. She fell back into churning darkness.

She came round with a stink like rotting fish in her nostrils. The pain in her head was so bad she was sure her skull was fractured. When she tried to touch her head something kept her hand from moving.

It was a long time before she opened her eyes. When she did the faint light penetrated like knives, sending a shaft of pain across the back of her head. She shut her eyes, waited a while, then slowly opened them again. This time the pain was only a throb.

She was lying in a filthy little room with broken floorboards and cracked, pock-marked plaster on the walls. It was intensely hot. Beams of light poked through gaps in the boards across the window, illuminating floating particles of dust. When she moved her head even a fraction it hurt, so she took several minutes to understand her position in the room.

It came to her a piece at a time. She was on the floor. She was half sitting, her shoulders against a wall. The smell came from a cracked waste-pipe beside her. Her wrists were held in handcuffs, which were looped through the waste-pipe, which was under a sink.

She was desperately thirsty.

After a few more minutes her training asserted itself. She had to accept her situation calmly. Emotional calm was the only route to a productive frame of mind. She had to put herself in a state of alertness where she could make the most of the slightest advantage.

So she faced facts. Her situation was serious. Probably grave. This was the case because she had failed to take adequate precautions. However, regret for past actions was inappropriate. It was a squandering of spirit. She must concentrate on setting matters right.

If she was left like this for too long she would die of dehydration. If she called out somebody might come, but whoever came could possibly kill her. On the other hand, only another human presence would provide the opportunity to reverse her position.

Sabrina tried out her larynx. As she had suspected, it was so dry she could only croak.

She began moving her legs and flexing her calf muscles. That would stimulate the movement of blood and enliven her lymphatic system, which would in turn create a little moisture in her mouth. With a moist throat she could swallow and, after that, perhaps she would be able to call for help.

The telephone on Philpott’s desk rang as he was preparing to leave the office. He finished buttoning his overcoat and picked up the receiver.

‘Philpott.’

He heard the electronic burble as the scrambler circuit cut in.

‘Glad I caught you,’ Mike Graham said.

‘Only just. I have a Trusteeship Council reception this evening.’

‘Oh, dear.’

‘One of the penalties of high office, Michael. Where are you?’

‘Berlin. The apartment on Husemannstrasse. I got here two hours ago. I’m just calling to touch base.’

‘Fine. Can I just mention – something interesting happened this morning, not far from where you are. An American citizen was barbecued in his hire car minutes after he completed a transaction at a nearby bank.’

‘I was going to tell you that,’ Mike said. ‘The man was Harold Gibson of Waxahachie. He was oil-rich and real-estate-rich, and five years ago he inherited six thousand acres of prime land around Lake Texoma, about sixty miles north of Dallas. This was a seriously wealthy man.’