Jack Du Brul - Charon's landing

Seattle. What was Riggs planning to do in Seattle?

Thoughts and ideas rumbled through his head, but nothing solidified enough to give him an answer. Even as he drew together every scrap of information he’d learned about the ship and the terrorists, nothing made Washington State’s port city seem important. He tried to remember which system Patroni had said was so crucial to Riggs. Tank control, that was it. She wanted to be able to shift the tanker’s cargo from hold to hold. The system was normally used to keep the vessel trimmed in rough seas or if she unloaded part of her cargo and then moved to another port to discharge the remainder. Maintaining equilibrium was significant for normal ship’s operation, but it should not be such a high priority.

It didn’t make any sense.

The continental United States’ northernmost port and the ability to shift oil within the monstrous hull… what was the connection? Suddenly Hauser knew. And fear and horror almost made him gag.

“Oh, dear God, they wouldn’t do it. No one would.”

There are two options for London’s weather in the midfall: warm and rainy with a heavy overcast, or cold and rainy with an even darker overcast. In the few moments it took him to duck from a limousine to the lobby of a discreet Belgravia hotel, Khalid Khuddari was chilled almost to the bone, the heavy rain forming camouflage splashes on his Burberry overcoat. He shivered in the marble and gilt lobby for a second, wringing water from his thick hair with one flattened hand. The doorman watched him gravely, taking Khalid’s rush into the lobby as a personal affront, for the umbrella in his hand could shield a family of four.

A concierge led Khalid to the registration counter, actually an eighteenth-century ormolu and teak desk inlaid with mother-of-pearl along its delicate recurved legs and bordering its broad, glossy top. An exact replica of the table shimmered up from the white Carrara marble floor. The receptionist’s smile was almost warm enough to make Khalid forget the miserable weather. “Good afternoon, Minister Khuddari. I apologize about the weather. The telly said it should have cleared by now.”

Khalid wasn’t surprised that she knew his name; hotels such as this knew everything about a guest. “I’ll be sure to take it up with the management.” He grinned boyishly. “I specifically requested no rain for my entire stay.”

“I’ll pass on your request to the BBC weather bureau and see what can be done about it.” She mirrored his smile.

Like the older and more discriminating banks of Switzerland, which looked nothing like a place of business from the outside, the St. James Belgravia didn’t look like a hotel at all. It more resembled a large well-kept private home. Georgian in style with leaded casement windows and stone walls thick enough to turn away cannon fire, it even lacked a sign at the front advertising its presence. The lobby felt more like a grand entrance hall, with the desk and three oxblood wing chairs around a low cherry table. A sideboard hugging one wall under a giltwood mirror held crystal decanters, matching glassware, and the distinctive green neck of a Dom Perignon bottle in a sterling ice bucket.

One had to have money to even know that such hotels existed and even more to actually stay.

Khalid smiled tightly, knowing that Siri had not only booked the first-class flight from the UAE but also arranged for the hotel and the limo from the airport. It was her way of teasing him and demonstrating her affection, of which he was not unaware.

“Minister, I normally wouldn’t ask this of you,” the receptionist said almost apologetically. “However, you have never stayed with us before. I must see your passport for just a moment.”

He slid the document from his breast pocket, laying it open for her. She copied what she needed onto a guest card and handed back the diplomatic passport with another smile. “Thank you very much, Minister. The bellman will have brought your luggage to your room by now and will see to it that it’s unpacked if that is what you wish. You’re in room number seven. Alfred will take you.”

In his suite, Khalid dismissed the two bellmen without letting them unpack his bags. He noted that they didn’t wait for a tip, and he smiled again. Hotels like this never bothered their guests with such plebeian tasks as paying gratuities, but he was certain that having the men lead him to his room probably cost more than his grandfather made during his entire life. After a quick shower and shave to rid himself of the flight from the Gulf, he was back out of his room. The limo was waiting for him, as he had instructed earlier.

“The Savoy,” he told the West Indian driver as he eased into the plush leather of the black stretch Daimler.

Remarkably for such a big car, they managed to bull through the snarled city traffic in record time and were soon edging down the alley that led to perhaps the most famous hotel in the world.

Given his natural good looks and the fact that he could recite ten thousand lines of romantic poetry, it was little surprise that Trevor James-Price was talking to the most attractive woman in the Savoy’s American Bar. James-Price and the woman sat at the long bar angled toward each other with the intimate and exclusionary attitude of illicit lovers. Even as he approached, Khalid heard the woman’s laughter, sweet and clear with a hint of sexual throatiness.

“Ah, there you are, Trevor. The other warders have been looking for you all over town when we discovered you’d left the asylum without your medication.” With Trevor, Khalid could let his long-suppressed schoolboy humor flow.

James-Price looked up quickly, the sandy cowlick hanging over his forehead lifting and falling like a bird’s wing. His eyes sparkled with pleasure. They shook hands warmly.

“Khalid, please meet Millicent Gray. Millie, this is the Thief of Baghdad, Khalid Khuddari.” Trevor paused for a beat while Khalid shook the woman’s hand. “Now, if you will excuse us, I’ve got to talk him out of blowing up Parliament. I’ll meet you at Les Ambassadeurs at nine.”

She brushed her hand along Trevor’s as she stood, then smiled at Khuddari and sauntered through the room. At least half a dozen heads turned to watch her go.

“Les A, huh? I thought you were broke,” Khalid teased.

“What can I say? She invited me.” Trevor knocked off the last of a club soda and nodded for the barman to bring two more. “Glad you could make it to your first OPEC meeting as a Petroleum Minister.”

“I almost didn’t come,” Khalid said darkly.

“So I gather. You want to talk about it?”

“Not really. I think I may be jumping at shadows or I could be facing real darkness.” Khalid shook his head.

Trevor was quiet for a moment. “Well, you might be facing the Abyss after all. I found out about Rufti’s commiserations with the Iraqis and Iranians. If they pull it off, that hundred-thousand-dollar check you said you wrote won’t be worth the paper it’s printed on.”

Before Khalid could react, Trevor continued, “I finally got someone to open up to me, a Saudi prince who says he’s being blackmailed by Rufti and wants to see the fat bastard taken down. Seems the royal personage is tired of being extorted because of his exotic tastes in pleasure.

“Last year, Rufti met with a former KGB agent named Ivan Kerikov in Istanbul aboard this prince’s yacht. I’ve found that this Kerikov has also met with the Iraqis and Iranians on separate occasions since then. I guessed that all of them are involved with something unsavory, so I bribed a waiter at the restaurant where Rufti and his cohorts met last night. He secreted a tape recorder under their table.”