Olivia Joules and the Overactive Imagination (21 page)

_p. 230
S
cott crouched beside her, listening through his earphones. He held her gaze, steady, reassuring, just as he had in the underwater tunnel, then cued her to go.

“Hello?”

“Olivia?”

“Yes, it’s me,” she said. There was frantic activity as Scott Rich and the technician attempted to trace the call. She closed her eyes and swung the chair so she had her back to them. She had to relate to Feramo as she had before, or it wouldn’t work.

“Where are you?” she said, to save them the trouble. “Are you still on the island?”

“No, no. I am en route for the Sudan.”

Olivia blinked, confused. Why was he telling her this on a mobile? Surely he couldn’t be that much of an idiot. The old doubts returned. Maybe he wasn’t a terrorist at all.

“Actually I cannot talk for long because my flight is departing soon.”

“To Khartoum?”

“No, to Cairo.”

“How fantastic. Are you going to look at the pyramids?”

“There will not be time. I will simply visit some business associates and then take a plane to Port Sudan. But, Olivia, you will visit me there, as we agreed?”

The quickening of attention behind her was almost tangible.

_p. 231
“Well, I don’t know,” she said. “I’d really like to come. I talked to Sally Hawkins, and she was keen, but I really need to get some more commissions to split the—”

“But that does not matter, Olivia. You will come as my guest. I will make the arrangements.”

“No, no. You can’t do that, I told you. Oh, and thank you so much for your hospitality in Honduras.”

“Even though I had to kidnap you to force you to partake of it?”

“Well . . .”

“Olivia, my flight is about to depart. I must go, but I will call you from Cairo. You will be at this number tomorrow at around the same time?”

“Yes.”

“But wait. I will give you a number. These are the agents in Germany of my diving operation. They will organize your flights to Port Sudan and visas. You have a pen?”

Four separate writing devices shot out in front of her. She selected Professor Widgett’s ancient gold Parker.

“I must go. Good-bye,
saqr
.”

Scott Rich was gesturing at her to keep him talking.

“Hang on. When are you actually arriving in Sudan? I don’t want to arrive and find you not there.”

“I will be in Port Sudan the day after tomorrow. There is a flight from London on Tuesday via Cairo. You will take it?”

“I’ll look into it.” Olivia laughed. “You’re so dramatic.”

“Good-bye,
saqr
.”

The phone clicked off.

She turned to the rest of the group, trying not to smirk.

Scott and the technician were still pressing things. Widgett gave her a fleeting, approving and vaguely lecherous smile.

“Rich?” he roared. “Apologize.”

“Sorry,” said Scott Rich without looking up. Then he finished
_p. 232
what he was doing, spun round on his chair and looked at her seriously.

“Sorry, Olivia.”

“Thank you,” she said. Then, feeling a rush of warmth and release from tension, she expanded. “I like people who apologize straight like that, instead of that sort of double-talking, passive-aggressive ‘I’m sorry that you felt that . . .’ fingers-crossed-behind-the-back non-apology which puts the blame on your own inaccurate understanding of the situation.”

“Right,” said Scott Rich, looking baffled. “What’s
[What]
a
saqr
?”

“Falcon, you fool,” said Widgett. “Now—and this is number one spook question at all times, Olivia—is he for real? Is
it
for real?”

“I know,” said Olivia. “Why would he call from a mobile phone to say he’s going to the Sudan if he’s for real—I mean a real terrorist?”

“Well, I’ve always said he isn’t,” said Suraya. “He’s a playboy who dabbles in smuggling, but he’s not a terrorist.”

“Did you get any further with those photo fits?” Widgett said to Scott.

“No. Nothing. No al-Qaeda fit.”

“There is one thing that I didn’t say,” Olivia ventured hesitantly.

The cool gray eyes met hers. “Yes?”

“Yes. It’s just—You could check out his mother. I think he might have had a European mother, maybe someone vaguely connected with Hollywood. You know, a Sudanese or Egyptian father and a European mother, and I think she might have died when he was young.”

“Why do you say that, Olivia?”

“Well, he mentioned his mother, and it’s just—he reacts in an odd way to me sometimes, as though I remind him of someone. And then, when he said good-bye at Roatán, he . . .” She screwed up her face. “He shoved my finger in his mouth and sucked it, but manically, as if it was a teat and he was a piglet.”

“Oh Christ,” said Scott Rich.

_p. 233
“Anything else?” said Widgett.

“Well, yes. There is just one thing. He’s an alcoholic.”

“What?”

Four pairs of eyes were staring at her again.

“He’s an alcoholic. He doesn’t know he is, but he is.”

“But he’s a Muslim,” said Scott Rich.

“He’s a Takfiri,” said Olivia.

They broke for dinner. As everyone was packing up and leaving, Olivia sat slumped at the table, thinking about the phone call. Widgett sat down opposite her, his mouth slightly twisted. He had an air of permanent disgust with the world which Olivia found refreshing.

“Your integrity—that’s the fly in the ointment,” he rasped. The blue eyes were cold, like a fish. Suddenly they flashed into life. “That’s why you’re a good spy,” he said, leaning across the table, wrinkling his nose. “People trust you, which means you can betray them.”

“I don’t feel good,” she said.

“Bloody good thing too,” he said. “Never feel good. The corruption of the good by the belief in their own infallible goodness is the most bloody dangerous pitfall in the human spectrum. Once you have conquered all your sins, pride is the one which will conquer you. A man starts off deciding he is a good man because he makes good decisions. Next thing, he’s convinced that whatever decision he makes must be good because he’s a good man. Most of the wars in the world are caused by people who think they have God on their side. Always stick with people who know they are flawed and ridiculous.”

_p. 234
T
he clock was ticking now. Suddenly there was high-level involvement on both sides of the Atlantic, and a new air of gravity permeated the operation. Olivia had three days to prepare for her departure. She was being rushed through an intense program of training in tradecraft, weaponry, desert survival and specialist equipment.

They were in what had been the servants’ dining room, the full range of Olivia’s equipment laid out on a long refectory table. She was inspecting a travel hair dryer, which had been doctored with ampoules containing a nerve agent attached to the front of the heating element.

“What about my real hair dryer?”

Professor Widgett sighed.

“I know you’ve gone to a lot of trouble, Professor,” she said, “but the problem is, what am I going to actually dry my hair with?”

“Hmm. I see what you’re saying. Is it conceivable that you might travel with two hair dryers?”

Olivia looked doubtful. “Not really. Couldn’t you make the nerve-gas thing be curling tongs? Or maybe a perfume spray?”

There was a snort. She looked up defensively. Scott Rich was leaning against the doorframe, smirking.

“My dear Olivia,” said Widgett, ignoring Scott, “we’re trying to get the whole female thing right and so on, but this is a desert op
_p. 235
eration. Surely on such an expedition one would normally manage without a hair dryer?”

“Well, yes, but not if I’m supposed to be seducing the head of an al-Qaeda cell,” she explained patiently.

“You’re crazy,” said Scott, straightening up from his leaning pose and joining the discussion.

“Well, it’s all right for you two to say,” she said, looking at Widgett’s bald pate and the cropped head of the smirking Scott Rich.

“Guys like women to look natural.”

“Wrong,” said Olivia. “They want women to look how they do when they’ve finished doing their hair and makeup to
look
natural. I really think in this situation the hair dryer is a more important tool than the nerve-agent dispenser.”

“Take your point, Olivia. We’ll look into some alternative,” said Widgett hurriedly. She had the feeling he was being soft with her because he felt guilty about sacrificing her, which was not an encouraging thought.

“Now,” said Widgett, “I’ve got the list of your usual equipment, and we’ve tried to stick to it as closely as we can.” He cleared his throat. “Cosmetics: lip gloss, lip pencil, lip balm, eye shadow, eyeliner pencil, brushes, blusher, concealer, powder: matte, powder”—he paused slightly—“ ‘illuminating shine,’ mascara: ‘radiant touch,’ eyelash curler.”

“Jesus Christ,” said Scott.

“It’s all in very small containers,” said Olivia defensively.

“Yes, though actually that’s rather a pity,” said Widgett. “We’re trying to keep your normal kit externally identical because his people undoubtedly checked it out in the Americas, but we would actually do much better with normal sizes of all these things. Anyway: perfume, body lotion, mousse, shampoo, conditioner.”

“They’ll have those in the hotel,” said Scott Rich.

“Hotel shampoos make your hair go funny. And, anyway, I’m not going to a hotel. I’m going to a bedouin tent.”

_p. 236
“Then use asses’ milk.”

“Mechanical items,” Widgett continued. “Survival items, shortwave radio, digital micro-camera, spyglass and the usual clothing: footwear, swimwear and—Rich, no contribution required, thank you so much—underwear.”

“And jewelry and accessories,” added Olivia anxiously.

“Quite so, quite so. Now,” he said, striding to the other side of the room and clicking on a light, “we have prepared a pretty extensive armory based on these items. Actually quite interesting preparing a kit for a female.”

“You must have done that before.”

“Not in quite these circumstances.”

The total inventory was scary. She was really going to have to concentrate not to get things mixed up. Most of her existing stuff had been converted into weapons of . . . if not mass destruction, then short-range, specific destruction. Her ring had been fitted with an evil-looking curved blade which would flick out the second she pressed her thumbnail against one of the diamonds. Her Chloé shades had a spiral saw in one arm and a slim-line dagger tipped with a nerve agent in the other. The buttons on her Dolce shirt had been replaced by miniature circular saws. She had a lip salve which was actually a temporarily blinding flash, and a tiny blusher ball, which, when the fuse was lit, emitted gas which could knock a roomful of men out for five minutes.

“Good. Will I get my old things back afterwards?”

“If this goes as they hope it will,” said Scott, “you’ll get a supermarket sweep in Gucci, Tiffany and Dolce and Gabbana at the expense of Her Majesty’s Government.”

She beamed.

One of her Tiffany starfish earrings now contained a tiny GPS locating beacon, which would track her movements throughout the expedition.

“Brand new, top of the range, this,” said Widgett. “Smallest ever produced. Even works underwater to around ten or fifteen feet.”

_p. 237
“What about underground?”

“Unlikely,” said Widgett, not meeting her eye.

The other starfish earring contained a cyanide pill.

“And now the gun,” said Scott Rich. She stared at them aghast. They had gone over the daggers in the stilettos, the Dolce seventies retro belt made of real gold coins for buying her way out of a mess, the slim dagger and tranquilizer syringe made into bra under-wirings. She’d rejected the brooch with the hand-ejected tranquilizer dart on the grounds that anyone under sixty wearing a brooch would immediately look suspicious.

“I’m not going to carry a gun.”

They stared at her blankly.

“It will get me into far more trouble than it will save me from. Why would I be carrying a gun if I’m a travel journalist? And, anyway, Feramo knows I don’t believe in killing.”

Scott Rich and Widgett exchanged glances.

“Let me explain something,” said Scott. “This isn’t a romantic tryst. It’s a highly dangerous, intentionally deadly and extremely expensive military operation.”

“No, let
me
explain something,” she said, quivering. “I know how dangerous this is and I’m still doing it. If one of your specially trained expert operatives could do what you’re sending me to do, you’d be sending them. You need me, like I am. That’s how I’ve got this far with it, by being like I am. So either shut up and let me do it my way, or go and seduce Pierre Feramo yourself in the Sudanese desert.”

There was silence. Widgett began to hum a little song. “Pom, pom, pom,” he went. “Pom, pom, pom. Any more questions, Rich? Any more penetrating insights? Any more helpful comments? Or shall we get on? Good. Now let’s look at how you fire a gun, Olivia, and we’ll make a decision about whether to give you one later.”

_p. 238
S
cott Rich stood behind Olivia, his hands over hers around the gun, easing her body into the right position.

“You’re going to absorb the recoil through your arms without flinching. And then,
veery
smoothly”—he put her finger on the trigger—“without jerking”—he placed his finger gently on top of hers—“you’re going to pull the trigger. Ready?”

The door burst open. It was Dodd.

“Sorry to interrupt, sir.” He always looked as if he wanted to kiss Scott Rich’s feet.

“That’s fine. What’s the problem?”

“We’ve had a repeated caller on Ms. Joules’s mobile number, and Professor Widgett thinks she should call back straight away. He doesn’t want her reported missing.”

Scott gestured at Olivia to take the phone.

“I’ll play you the last message. Have to put it on speaker, I’m afraid, Ms. Joules. That okay?”

Olivia nodded. Scott leaned back against the wall, arms folded.

“Olivia, it’s Kate again. Where the
fuck
are you? If you’ve gone haring off to Honduras after your ‘little fling’ with that ridiculous Dodi al-Fayed-style playboy, I’m going to have your guts for garters. I’ve called you four
hundred
times. If you don’t ring me back by the end of today, I’m going to report you missing.”

“I’ll call the number for you,” said the tech.

_p. 239
“Er . . . okay,” said Olivia. “Could you not put it on speakerphone, please?”

“Sure.”

“Kate, hi,” she said sheepishly. “It’s Olivia.”

A barrage of indignation erupted from the earpiece.

“So anyway,” said Kate excitedly, when she’d finished venting, “did you shag him?”

“No,” said Olivia, glancing at the two men.

“Did you snog?”

Olivia cast her mind back. Did she snog in Honduras? “Yes!” she said. “It was great, only it, er, wasn’t him . . .” She tailed off, glancing embarrassedly at Scott.

“What? You followed him all the way to Honduras and then you snogged someone else? You are literally unbelievable.”

“Shhh,” hissed Olivia. “Look, I really can’t talk right now.”

“Where are you?”

“I can’t . . .”

“Olivia, are you all right? If not, just say ‘no,’ and I’ll contact the police.”

“No! I mean, yes, I’m fine.”

Scott leaned over and handed her a note.

“Hang on a minute.”

The note said:

Tell her you’re having an erotic tryst
—
you’re perfectly all right but you’re in the middle of things and you’ll call her tomorrow. We will pay her a visit to explain.

She looked up at Scott, who raised his eyebrows sexily and nodded encouragement.

“The thing is, I’m having an erotic tryst. I’m perfectly all right but I’m in the middle of things. I’ll call you tomorrow and tell all.”

“You are the worst. What about Osama bin Feramo?”

_p. 240
“I’ll tell you tomorrow.”

“Okay. Just as long as you’re all right.” It seemed to have done the trick. “Sure now?”

“Yes. Love you.” Olivia’s voice wobbled slightly. At that moment she’d have given a lot to sit down with Kate over a couple of margaritas.

“Love you too, you incorrigible slapper.”

Olivia looked down at the note and laughed. Scott had signed it:

Uniquely yours
—
S. R.