Olivia Joules and the Overactive Imagination (24 page)

_p. 263
W
ell, at least I’m not alone,
she thought, forcing herself to look on the bright side as she lay in the dirt, struggling to get up, checking with her tongue to see if her teeth were still there. She fumbled at the blindfold.

“Leave it!”

Her heart started to beat frantically in her chest, her breath coming in short, ragged bursts. It was Feramo’s voice, and yet it didn’t sound like Feramo.

“Pierre?” she said, trying to sit up.

“
Putain
!” came the chilling voice again. “
Salope
.” He brought his hand down on her cheek again.

That did it. “Ow!” she said, pulling off her blindfold and blinking furiously in the darkness. “What on earth do you think you’re doing? What’s the matter with you? How dare you? How would you like it if I hit you?”

She pulled the hatpin out of her chinos and was almost on her feet when there was the crack of a whip and she felt the sting of leather across her arm.

“Stoppit!” she yelled and rushed at the dim figure in the darkness, sinking the hatpin into flesh, grabbing for the whip before retreating a few feet.

Her eyes were becoming accustomed to the dark now. Feramo was crouched before her, clad in the colored robes of the Rashaida. His face was horrible, mouth working and twisted, eyes crazy.

_p. 264
“Are you all right?” Her words came out, quite unexpectedly, with tenderness. Olivia always had a problem, close up, with divorcing herself from the humanity of another person. “What’s wrong? You look terrible.” She reached out gently and touched his face. She felt him grow calmer as she stroked his cheek. He reached his hand up to hers, took hold of it, moved it towards his mouth and started to suck.

“Er, Pierre,” she said, after a few moments, “I think that’s enough now. Pierre? Pierre? What do you think you’re doing?” She wrenched her finger out of his mouth and began nursing her hand.

His expression changed dangerously. He stood up, towering over her.

“Lie down, lie down flat, on your face. Your hands behind your back.”

He tied her hands with rope. There was a beeping sound. “Sit up.”

He was sweeping her with a plastic detector stick. He took the hatpin, the belt and the bum bag containing the torch and the survival tin. He grabbed the remaining earring, the one containing the cyanide pill, from her ear, then twisted the hook ring from her hand and tossed it to the ground. He took hold of her blouse and ripped it, so that the circular-saw buttons fell to the ground, rolling in all directions.

“Where is the GPS?” he said.

“What?”

“The GPS. The tracking device. What are your people using to follow you? Do not feign innocence. You have betrayed me.”

She shrank back, cowering. How did he know?

“Your mistake, Olivia,” he said, “was to believe that all beautiful women are as treacherous and disingenuous as you.”

Suraya. It had to be her. Undercover Bitch: undercover double agent.

“And now it is time for you to give us some information.”

_p. 265
Feramo dragged Olivia behind him for a long time through a low, narrow tunnel, shining his torch ahead. Whenever she stumbled, he jerked on the rope as if she were a donkey. She tried to detach herself from the situation and observe it. She tried to remember her training at the manor, but instead she saw Suraya instructing her sneeringly in tradecraft—the art of dead-drops, hiding film in lavatory cisterns, swapping briefcases with strangers, giving secret signals by leaving windows half open and displaying vases of flowers. She must have been really enjoying herself. Olivia turned her mind, instead, to the Rules for Living.

Nothing is ever as good or as bad as it seems. Look on the bright side and, if that doesn’t work, look on the funny side.
She thought back to telling Scott Rich she was Feramo’s falcon and imagined his amused reaction if he could see her now—Feramo’s mule or tethered goat. She still had a chance. She wasn’t dead yet. Feramo was nuts and unstable and therefore things could change. If he wanted to kill her he would have killed her in the cave. Maybe she would kill him first, she thought, as he jerked on her rope again. She had plenty of weaponry in the Wonderbra.

The next moment she hit rock head-on. Feramo cursed and jerked at the rope. The tunnel had turned a sharp corner. There was light and a change in the air. She could smell the sea! As her eyes adjusted to the new light, she saw that the tunnel was widening into a cavern. There was scuba gear neatly stacked on racks and hooks: tanks, wetsuits, BCDs.

On the USS
Ardèche,
Scott Rich was watching the radar, monitoring the approach of a motor launch.

“Rich?” Litvak’s pureed tones oozed over the speaker. “I had a message. What’s the problem?”

“They’ve found the GPS twenty miles west of Suakin. Plus a Rashaida acting friendly who says he’ll take them to Olivia on horseback for fifty K.”

_p. 266
“Fifty K?”

“She’s with Feramo. I’ve authorized it. I’m going in.”

“You need to stay on the
Ardèche.
You’re commanding the intelligence operation.”

“Exactly. I’m commanding the intelligence operation. We need human beings on the ground. I’m going in.”

“Knew you’d come round to my point of view eventually,” came Widgett’s voice.

“Shut up,” said Scott Rich. “You’re supposed to be asleep.”

Feramo had Olivia tethered to him twenty feet underwater with no air. She was reminded of a crocodile which weighs down its prey below the surface and comes back when it’s ready to eat it. Feramo was making her breathe from his spare regulator—when he chose to let her. It was crazy, but good. It took all her mental energy to control her breath, to let it out slowly and not hold it. It slowed her into a rhythm and cleared her mind of panic. She allowed herself a moment to take in the extraordinary beauty surrounding her. Feramo was right. It was the best underwater landscape she had ever seen. The water was blue and crystalline, the visibility astonishing. Even this far down the rocks were red, and towards the open sea she saw coral pinnacles rising from the abyss. She caught Feramo watching her and smiled, making her thumb and first finger into an O to show her approval. There was a look of warmth in his eyes. He held out the spare regulator and gave her more air. He gestured to her to keep it, and they swam forward together, sharing air, following the line of the cliffs, for all the world like a couple on a honeymoon trip in the Maldives.
Maybe it’ll be all right,
she told herself.
Maybe I can turn him round.

A massive coral pedestal rock protruded from the shore supported by a low, narrow stalk, eaten away by the current. Feramo gestured to her to descend and swim underneath the rock. It was unnerving: there were only three or four feet between the rock and the seabed. Feramo swam ahead of her, jerking the spare regulator
_p. 267
from her grasp, and suddenly stood up on the seabed, the top of his torso apparently melting into the rock. Olivia looked up and stared, wide-eyed. Above her was a square opening and a white room, lit by electric light.

Feramo was lifting himself up into the room. Olivia felt for the bottom with her fins, straightened up and broke the surface, pulling off her mask, shaking back her hair, gasping in the air.

There was an Arab boy dressed in swimming trunks whom she recognized from the Isla Bonita. He took the diving equipment from Feramo, and handed them towels.

“It’s unbelievable,” she said. “What is this place?”

Feramo flashed his white teeth proudly. “The air pressure is kept at exactly the same level as the water pressure, and therefore the water will never rise above this point. It is perfectly safe.”

And easy to escape,
she thought, until he led her through a solid-steel sliding door, opened by a punched-in code, and then through another and into a shower room. He left her alone to shower, telling her to change into the white djellaba she would find inside.

He was waiting for her when she emerged. His face was angry again. “And now, Olivia, it is time for me to leave you for a while. My people have some questions for you. I advise you to supply them with whatever information they need without resistance. And then you will be brought to me to say good-bye.”

“Good-bye?” she said. “Where am I going?”

“You betrayed my trust,
saqr
,” he said, refusing to meet her eye. “And therefore we must say good-bye.”

_p. 268
O
livia felt as though she’d been asleep for a long time. Initially, it was a woozy, not-unpleasant feeling, but as she regained consciousness sensation returned. The burnt spots on her hand were agonizing and there was new bruising on her back. She felt as though she had spent a night in a tumble dryer. There was a sack over her head. It smelled of farmyards and barns, incongruously comforting. Her hands were tied, but, hey, she thought, quickly remembering there was a mini circular saw behind the flower on her bra fastener.
I’m going to get out of this,
she told herself.
I’m going to survive.

She made a few attempts to get at the bra with her teeth, realizing how ludicrous she must look, a white-robed creature with a bag on its head trying to eat its own bosom. She gave up and flopped back against the wall. There were voices not far off and the loud hum of the pressurized air supply. She strained to hear the voices. They were talking in Arabic.

She sucked, pulling the sack hood into her mouth, and started to bite. Before long, she had a small hole. Using her tongue and teeth and then her nose, she slowly made it wider, until she could almost see. There were footsteps. Quietly she flung herself down so she was lying on her face, hiding the hole. The footsteps came into the room, inches from her, and then retreated.

I’ve got to get into my bra,
she thought.
I’ve got to get into the bra.
_p. 269
She carried on chewing at the sack, spitting out string and straw. She lowered her head and pushed the hole upwards until it was opposite her eyes. Bingo! She could see! She had to stop herself shouting, “Yessss! Yessssss!”

She was in a passageway, hewn out of rock and lit by fluorescent strips. There were posters on the wall covered in Arabic writing and a Western calendar with, for some reason, a picture of a tractor on it. There was a date circled in red. She heard voices; they were coming from behind a curtain which hung over an archway to her left. Something was digging into her back. She twisted round. A valve protruded from a thin metal pipe running down the cave wall. She looked down inside the robe at her Wonderbra—it was a front fastener, which could be useful.

Very slowly, silently, she shifted herself round to face the valve and ripped at the sack, exposing more of her face. Then she shifted position, pushed the valve against the Wonderbra catch and pressed. Nothing. She tried again, and again, then tried to squeeze her shoulders and boobs together to loosen the pressure and leaned forward again. The Wonderbra sprang undone. It was such a relief not to have all the paraphernalia digging into her from the booster-pad pockets. She eased one cup against the valve to push it upwards and, after only three attempts, she caught the edge of the black lace in her teeth.

Olivia was unbelievably pleased with herself, so pleased she almost allowed herself to grin and drop the bra. She turned around too quickly so that her sandal scraped on the floor. The voices stopped in the next room. She was frozen with one half of a black Wonderbra in her mouth, like a dog holding a newspaper. Heavy footsteps started to move towards her. She shook the sack back over her face and lay down. The footsteps came very close. A foot poked her in the ribs. She shuddered and turned her head slightly, which she thought was a realistic touch. The footsteps retreated. She didn’t move until the voices started again.

_p. 270
The Wonderbra cup was inside out, still held in her teeth. Slowly, she pulled it out from her djellaba and, still using her teeth, twisted round to hook it over the valve. It was awfully uncomfortable, but she managed to twist back and push the rope binding her hands against the saw. It was wretched, slow work. There was a horrible moment when the bra came away from the valve, and she had to go through the whole process of hooking it up there again. But, eventually, the little saw cut through enough fibers for her to break her hands free and untie her ankles.

Glancing anxiously towards the curtain, she opened the lip salve she had stashed in her bra. She set the timer to three seconds, replaced the cap and, aiming carefully, rolled it under the gap between the curtain and the floor. Then she curled up, eyes tightly closed, squeezing her face between her knees and her arms. Even so, the flash was almost blinding. There were shouts, screams and crashing noises from behind the curtain.

She leapt to her feet, ran to the curtain and yanked it open. In that split second, she took in an astonishing scene. Twelve men were clutching their eyes, blinded, blundering in panic. There were photographs and diagrams on the walls. Bridges—the Sydney Harbour Bridge, the Golden Gate Bridge, Tower Bridge, another bridge spanning a wide harbor with skyscrapers in the background. There were seven pictures in all. On a table in the center of the room, there was what looked like the bottom of a round plinth facing towards her, and beside it a jagged piece of metal, gold on the outside, hollow inside, like a piece broken off a chocolate Santa. She thought about grabbing it to use as a weapon. Then, behind the table, sitting cross-legged on a carpet, she saw an unmistakable, tall, bearded figure. He was sitting perfectly still, eyes closed, blinded by the flash like everyone else, but totally calm and totally terrifying. It was only a split second’s sighting. But she could have sworn it was Osama bin Laden.

She had seconds. She photographed the bridges first—realizing halfway through that the flash wasn’t working. Then she tried for a group shot. And then bin Laden. The camera was so tiny you
_p. 271
couldn’t see what you were doing—you had to guess. And it was hard to see anything after the flash. Could it possibly be him?

The man closest to her reacted to the sound of the shutter and turned towards her. She lit the fuse on the tiny gas ball and rolled it into the center of the room, retreated through the curtain and ran. They would be able to see again in a couple of minutes, but the gas would knock them out for five.

Once she was out of the anteroom and round the corner, she stopped, leaned panting against the wall and listened. The corridor was white-painted rock, stretching as far as she could see in both directions. It was hard to hear above the air-pressure system, but the sound to her left seemed to have a different quality. Was that the sound of the sea or of machinery?

She decided to go for it. As she ran up the slight incline, it began to seem familiar and, yes, there was the shower room and, in the distance, the metal door. As she grew closer, she realized it was wedged open by a body, like a suitcase stuck between elevator doors. It was an injured, semiconscious Feramo. He looked as though he had been trying to escape. She stepped over him, then hesitated. She put her face close to his. His eyes were slightly open. He was breathing with difficulty.

“Help me,” he whispered. “
Habitibi,
help.”

She pulled the dagger underwiring from her Wonderbra and pointed it at his throat, as she had been taught, straight at the carotid artery.

“The code,” she hissed, jabbing him. “Tell me the code for the door.”

“Will you take me with you?”

She blinked at him for a moment. “If you’re good.”

He could barely speak. She couldn’t work out what they had done to him. What had he been thinking, bringing her here?

“The code,” she said. “Come on, or you die.” It sounded silly when she said it.

_p. 272
“Two four six eight.” He could barely whisper.

“Two four six eight?” she said indignantly. “Isn’t that a bit obvious? Are both doors the same code?”

He shook his head and croaked, “Zero nine eleven.”

She rolled her eyes:
Unbelievable.

“Take me with you,
saqr,
please. Or kill me now. I cannot take the pain and indignity of what they will do.”

She thought for a second, reached into her bra and pulled out the tranquilizer syringe which formed the other cup’s underwiring.

“It’s all right, it’s only temporary,” she said, seeing Feramo’s frightened eyes. She whipped up the djellaba he was wearing and expelled the air from the syringe. “There we go!” she said, matron-like, sinking the needle into his buttock.

Wow, it worked fast. She punched in 2468 and pulled him out from between the doors. Just before they closed, she had a brain wave, whipped off his sandals and shoved them between the doors, leaving a six-inch gap, too narrow to get through but wide enough to let water in. Dragging a prone Feramo behind her with her good arm, she tapped in 0911 at the next set of doors, feeling a great lightness of spirit as they opened to reveal the brightly lit entry room, the scuba gear and the square of seawater. This time she wedged a pair of fins between the doors.

She pulled off her djellaba and hovered for a second on the brink of the Land of Indecision. Should she just plunge into the water as she was, swim to the surface and wing it, or scuba? She reached for the BCD, weight belt and tanks, and put the whole kit together.

She was just stepping into the water when she glanced back at Feramo. He looked pitiful, crumpled and sleeping like a sad little child. She found herself imagining all the bossy men who try to organize the world—the Americans, the British, the Arabs—as fucked-up little kids: the Americans brassy and bullying, wanting to be stars of the baseball pitch; the British from their public schools priggishly determined to be righteous; and the Arabs, frustrated,
_p. 273
repressed by their parents, blustering incoherently because there is nothing worse than losing face.

“He’ll be more use alive than dead,” she told herself, banishing her feelings of tenderness. Listening out for the sound of anyone approaching, she ripped off his robe, pausing for an essential second to admire the sublime, olive-skinned body, checked him for shark-luring cuts and found him clear, weighted and buoyed him, shoved him in a full head mask and rolled him into the water, leaving him bobbing in the square of the entrance. There was a pressure gauge on the wall. She grabbed a tank and rammed it at the gauge, breaking the glass, then took a piece of glass to pierce the pipe. Immediately there was a change in the hum. She looked down at the square of water where Feramo was floating. It was starting unmistakably to rise. Eventually it would hit the lights and short the electrics, and with all that pressurized oxygen it might even blow the place to pieces. And if that didn’t happen, the water would rush in and they would all drown.

She lowered herself into the water, letting air out of Feramo’s BCD to make him sink, then, taking hold of the tranquilized floating terrorist, she started to swim, heading out from under the pedestal rock, dragging him behind her with her good hand in a gratifying reversal of roles.

I’m quite clever, really,
she said to herself.

Unfortunately, it hadn’t occurred to her that it would be dark. Diving at night, especially without a light and with a rather flimsy dagger instead of a harpoon, was not a great idea. She didn’t want to break the surface too near the shore in case al-Qaeda had scouts. She didn’t want to break the surface too far out because of sharks. She didn’t want to use up her air in case she needed to go down again.

She swam directly away from the shore at a depth of ten feet for about thirty minutes, then surfaced and settled for letting air out of Feramo’s jacket so that he was neutrally buoyant two feet down. Then she pulled her legs in tight and sat on him. If the sharks came
_p. 274
to feed, they could eat him first. All she could see was blackness: no lights, no boats. If the sharks stayed away, she could float here safely until dawn, but then what? She deliberated over whether to cut Feramo loose and swim back to shore, or further out to sea. She was so terribly tired. She felt herself beginning to drift off to sleep, when suddenly the force of a massive, living object burst to the surface from beneath her.