The Jerusalem Puzzle Read online

  We’d been lucky to get a room at all – so the unsmiling man said.

  I pushed the twin beds together. Isabel showered first, coming out of the bathroom in a fluffy white bathrobe.

  ‘You look good,’ I said.

  ‘I don’t feel it. My stomach is acting up.’ She stood by the window looking out over the city. It was dark, 6.30 p.m., and the evening rush hour was filling the streets below us with bright streams of headlights.

  She looked pensive, as if being here was troubling her.

  ‘If you want to go back to London, let me know,’ I said.

  She turned to me, held her hand out. I took it.

  ‘No, we’re in this together. You have your demons to vanquish and I’m going to help you.’

  ‘This feels more like following a thread than vanquishing demons,’ I said.

  She pulled me to her. ‘I think we’re following the right thread,’ she said.

  We held each other, staring out at the endless streams of headlights. It felt as if we were at the centre of an illuminated cobweb.

  While I was showering she set up a meeting with Mark Headsell, her ex-husband. I can’t say I was delighted with the fact that we were going to meet him again.

  It crossed my mind to say something to him about the way he’d treated her. He’d done some stupid things, not the least of which was leaving her behind in a house, while it was being shot up by gunmen in Iraq. I wondered why she’d stayed with him after that.

  When I came out of the shower Isabel had put a black skirt on. It wasn’t short – it came to just above her knee – but it was a totally different look to the black or blue jeans she normally wore. She was applying make-up at the mirror.

  ‘You look good,’ I said, as I towelled my hair dry. ‘Is this for Mark?’

  ‘Don’t be crazy. Mark Headsell is an idiot, but he can help us.’

  She looked me up and down. ‘Can you be ready in ten?’

  ‘That quick?’

  ‘There’s some event going on here which Mark’s attending tonight. If we want to see him we’ll have to be quick.’ She went back to fixing her make-up.

  We were in the Sherlock Holmes pub, one of the features of the hotel, ten minutes later. My hair was still damp and I was tired from the journey. Thirty minutes after that, when Mark still hadn’t turned up, I was feeling for Isabel.

  ‘Did you ever want to kill him?’ I said, turning from the door again, after someone came in who wasn’t him.

  ‘Lots of times. Do you want another beer?’

  My bottle of Egyptian Stella was finished. I was tempted by the thought of another cool one.

  Suddenly, an alarm sounded from the foyer outside the bar. At first it was only a single alarm, then a klaxon joined in. I stood, looking around for the exits. The barman was around the front of his bar, pulling down the shutters. The waiter who’d served us was hurrying around the tables.

  ‘Everybody must go,’ he said, as he reached us.

  We went out to the foyer. People were streaming out of the hotel. It wasn’t a panic, but it wasn’t far off. Isabel stopped, opened her bag, took out her phone and tapped at the screen. Someone was calling her.

  She put her hand up to stop me heading for the main door, then when she’d finished the call, she said, ‘We’re to go up to the Terrace Restaurant. He’s up there waiting for us.’ She put her phone back in her bag.

  ‘What about the evacuation?’ I gestured at the people streaming towards the front door.

  ‘He said we’re to ignore it.’

  ‘You reckon we should?’

  ‘He was always like this,’ she said, sighing. ‘He probably set that stupid alarm off himself. I wouldn’t put it past him.’

  We headed for the elevators.

  Two hotel employees were standing in front of them, blocking people from using them. Isabel went up to the nearest employee, leaned towards him and said something. He waved us brusquely towards the only open elevator, which was right behind him. He smiled at me as I passed.

  ‘What did you say to him?’ I asked, as the elevator went

  up.

  ‘I told him a security manager had requested us up on the terrace immediately.’ She flicked a strand of hair from her forehead. ‘The truth sets you free.’

  The Terrace Restaurant was on the second floor. It overlooked the Nile and a wide concrete bridge carrying streams of cars going each way over the river.

  The restaurant was empty except for an older waiter in a black suit who was tidying up the buffet, covering huge silver platters with their lids.

  In the far corner of the low ceilinged room, with his back to the wall, was Mark Headsell. He waved us over. The waiter didn’t even look at us.

  ‘You guys have a great sense of timing,’ said Mark as we sat down. He shook hands with me. He hugged Isabel. She raised her eyes to heaven as he squeezed her.

  ‘You two are an item now, right?’ he said, after we’d told him we’d flown in from Athens.

  ‘You know we are,’ said Isabel. She sounded surprised that he was asking.

  ‘Since Istanbul,’ I added. I gave him a fake smile.

  ‘How is it being out of the service?’ he said, turning to Isabel.

  ‘It’s good. I like being back in London.’

  ‘You got out very young,’ he said. There was a note of admonition in his voice.

  ‘I should have done it earlier.’ There was a distinct edge to their exchange.

  ‘You would have got what you wanted, in the end,’ he said.

  She didn’t reply. He turned to me. ‘Would you like some water?’

  He gestured towards a water jug with a silver lid that was in the middle of the table. I poured a glass for Isabel, then one for myself. He already had one.

  ‘Did you get anywhere with what I asked you about?’ said Isabel.

  Mark looked at me, smiled. He was enjoying being needed.

  ‘This is a big favour.’

  ‘We appreciate it.’ She smiled back at him.

  He returned it. I wanted to go. We didn’t need this asshole.

  He turned to me. ‘I could never say no to Isabel.’

  ‘What did you find out?’ she asked, very matter-of-factly.

  He stared at her. ‘There is no record of a Max Kaiser or a Susan Hunter coming into Egypt in the past month. If they did come in directly, it could only have been through the Taba border crossing, up by the Red Sea. But they’ve had a few glitches there recently.’ He made a soft snorting sound. ‘Actually, more than a few glitches.’

  ‘You do know she’s disappeared?’ I said.

  ‘It’s unfortunate,’ he said.

  ‘Do you think the Israelis might have a record of her leaving?’ said Isabel.

  ‘I can ask.’

  ‘You used to have connections in the Israeli Immigration service, didn’t you?’ she said.

  ‘You have a very good memory,’ he said, sounding surprised.

  She turned to me. ‘One of Mark’s best friends from Bristol University is high up in the Israeli Immigration service. And I mean high up.’ She raised her hand in the air, than rose it some more.

  His expression gave nothing away.

  ‘What area does he cover these days?’ said Isabel.

  He didn’t reply.

  ‘He’s still friendly with you, isn’t he?’ She had a mock shocked look on her face.

  ‘I’m still friendly with lots of people, Isabel.’

  The sound of a low thud filled the room.

  I rose out of my seat. Two alarms started.

  ‘What the hell’s going on?’ I said.

  ‘Don’t go near the windows,’ said Mark. ‘Unless you want to die.’

  25

  Arap Anach closed his laptop. The villa was in darkness. The only noise he could hear was a car, far away, coming up the valley road. He listened as it passed. He’d employed two local women to clean the villa over the previous few months, but he’d let them go two weeks before.
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  This was his second chance to go down in history. He wasn’t going to make any mistakes this time. There might not be a next.

  Few people had the determination and the willingness to act as he had. He knew that. The vast majority of humans sit like frogs in water as it’s boiled around them. They won’t do anything to save themselves from being slowly cooked to death.

  And being cooked to death was what was happening.

  Islam was the fastest growing religion in Europe. What they hadn’t conquered by the sword they would conquer in the next hundred years through the flaw in the theory of multiculturalism and comparative birth rates.

  How long would they let Islam grow in Europe? Until all those let’s-get-along liberal values were a minority again, and those who espoused Sharia Law began to dictate?

  Because dictate they would. Islam was a religion that sought to govern, to impose. And once they were a majority they would use democracy against itself. Allowing Islam to grow rapidly in Europe was suicidal for Western values.

  But he, and a few others, would be the antibiotic. They would jump-start the Western immune system. And if people had to die on the way, so be it. The end justified the means. There had to be sacrifices.

  He was glad now that his senses had been dulled when he was young. It was a blessing. The priest who’d done it had even called it that, before he’d hurt him so badly he couldn’t walk for days, making the other boys laugh at him.

  But the old priest had been right. There were few blessings more powerful. Arap Anach’s heart had been sliced up that winter, his first in boarding school. The final, deepest cut had come the night he’d cried pathetically on the phone to his father after they’d caught him when he ran away.

  The policeman who’d brought him back had held him by the ear and had told him to be quiet when he’d tried to explain what the priest had done.

  His father had cut off the call as Arap Anach had rushed to tell him what had happened.

  The head priest had ordered him to pray for forgiveness on his knees, by the side of his bed. Later that night the old priest had come back with a thick leather belt. He’d pulled him from the dormitory, down the icy corridor to the chapel. The first thing he did there was to punch Arap Anach, hard, in the side of his head. So hard his skull shook like a bell rattling.

  ‘That’s for causing trouble,’ he’d said. Then he’d punched him again. Arap Anach’s head had snapped to the other side. A tooth had dislodged. Blood had filled his mouth until he had to swallow it. After that the priest used the belt freely. It flew snapping through the air as if possessed.

  That had been the first of the real beatings. Beatings which left him shattered inside, as if his bones and his brain had turned to jelly.

  The strap felt like burning coals being thrown at his skin. He’d measured their number by the gasps he let out as the scorching pain rose and fell.

  As he’d hit him with the strap the priest had shouted, ‘Evil boy. You get what you deserve. Nobody will comfort you but me.’

  When the beating was over the priest had forced him to do other things. Worse things than he’d ever done before. His father’s disinterest had made it obvious that he could do whatever he wanted with the boy.

  Arap Anach had stopped crying later that night. He’d never cried since. Not for himself, and especially not for anyone else. He rarely slept properly since then too. He was always on tenterhooks, waiting, half-sleeping, for someone to arrive, to wake him.

  But it had all made him strong.

  And now he would be remembered too. As the one who had acted to save the West from its self-defeating liberal weaknesses.

  26

  ‘It’s probably a controlled explosion. They found a device in a suspect car, parked on the highway out there,’ said Mark.

  He pointed toward the windows at the other end of the room. Heavy curtains covered them almost completely. The waiter who’d been tidying up was standing by them. He pulled them together the last few feet, then peered through the gap his fingers were making.

  ‘There are a lot of fanatics who aren’t happy with what’s going on in Egypt. This place is an ideal target if you hate foreigners.’

  ‘I didn’t think things were that bad.’

  ‘They are. Just because you don’t see Egypt on the six o’clock news anymore doesn’t mean everything’s hunky-dory here.’

  ‘So it’s getting worse?’ said Isabel.

  Mark shrugged. ‘There’s a whole bunch of new players coming up.’ He leaned over the table, lowering his voice. ‘One new lot have been making big waves, the Wael Al Qahira, the Protectors of the Victorious, of Cairo. Al Qahira is Cairo’s original name.’

  ‘Never heard of them,’ I said.

  ‘You will. They assassinated an imam who’s been preaching tolerance in some of the big mosques in Cairo. They blew him up in front of his mosque.’

  ‘Lovely,’ said Isabel.

  ‘Indeed, then someone went and retaliated yesterday and murdered one of their imams, a chap called Ali Bilah.’

  ‘Not good,’ I said.

  He leaned closer, speaking quickly. ‘Except Ali Bilah deserved it. He had a nasty reputation. He was found with his throat cut almost right through. He’d been stirring things up like you wouldn’t believe, calling for war against Israel.’

  Suddenly, a series of firecracker noises echoed through the room. My insides jumped. Whatever was going on out there was getting a lot more serious.

  The waiter at the curtains turned and waved at us. When Mark put his hand up the man did a thumbs down gesture.

  ‘We should leave,’ said Mark.

  As he finished speaking, more firecrackers sounded and the window behind the waiter shattered. An explosion of glass showered into the curtain, blowing straight through it at the centre. I reached over to pull Isabel down.

  Mark stood up, reaching over to protect her too. The shower of glass was tinkling on the floor. His reaction almost surprised me more than the window being shattered.

  Cool air was rushing into the room. The waiter was crawling over the glass sprayed carpet towards us. Mark had his phone out now, pressing it.

  Isabel stood. She walked towards the waiter. I followed her. When we got close to him our shoes were crackling on glass with each step. We’d been lucky to be at the back of the room. The heavy curtains had caught most of the shards. They were shredded in places now, but mostly still intact. A gust of wind shook the tattered curtains. They swayed, as if they were about to come down. A smell of cordite and smoke hit me as a chorus of car alarms started up.

  Mark was speaking into his phone. He was right behind us.

  ‘Two minutes at the kitchen exit,’ I heard him say.

  We reached the waiter. Isabel bent down. He was kneeling. His eyes were wide, his face a mass of small cuts and blood.

  I bent down. I couldn’t see any other injuries, just the cuts on his face. ‘Can you move?’ I asked him.

  I know you’re supposed to leave people in the recovery position after they’ve been injured, but the window was open to the sky and I could hear shouts from down below, as if someone was calling out to a gunman.

  The waiter nodded. His eyes were wide. His gaze moved from my face to Isabel’s. He must have seen our shock at his appearance, because he touched his face. His fingers came away wet and red, as if covered in paint.

  Mark said something to him in Arabic. The man nodded. Then, with Isabel and myself on either side of him, he stood. He wasn’t steady on his feet, and he kept turning his head as shouts echoed from below, but slowly, as we crossed the room, his confidence grew and by the time we reached the door he was walking almost unaided. Mark had picked up a white napkin from somewhere. He handed it to him.

  The sight of the blood on it when the waiter wiped his hands made him stare, his eyes bulging even more. When we reached the elevators he pushed us away.

  ‘You go. I am good,’ he said.

  ‘You’re coming with us,’ said M
ark. ‘We’ll drop you at the hospital.’ His tone was stern. He wasn’t going to take any arguments.

  We rode down to the basement. Arab music was still playing in the elevator. We headed down a wide corridor with blue tiled walls, and turned into a shiny kitchen. At the back of the kitchen there was a thick steel door. It slammed closed behind us. The only people we’d seen were a few white outfitted kitchen workers who seemed scared of us.

  There was a black four wheel drive waiting outside. It had dark windows. The engine was running as we got in. An African woman, Sudanese or Ethiopian, her hair in ridges and her green eyes sparkling when she turned to look at me, was in the driving seat. She was thin and had a black veil around her neck. It went up a little over her hair at the back, but it was no more than a token gesture toward the full hair covering you find in a lot of Muslim countries these days.

  The car had a Speranza logo on the steering wheel. It looked like a copy of a BMW.

  ‘This is Xena,’ said Mark, as we settled in the back.

  Xena turned, looking at us gravely. Her face was elegant, but it had a hardness to it too. She stared at me for a moment longer than was polite, then looked away. Isabel pushed into my side. The waiter was on the other side of her.

  ‘Are you a friend of Mark’s?’ Isabel said, leaning towards Xena.

  Xena didn’t reply.

  Mark said something in Arabic. Xena swung the car out and headed for a gate in the clean white wall that ran around the small courtyard at the back of the hotel. There were four security guards by the gate, peering out. They were all dressed in black, had black helmets and bulletproof vests on and were carrying machine pistols. They turned as we came up, raising their guns to us.

  Mark opened his window, waved at them and said something to the guard who came to our window. He pressed at something in his hand. The gate rolled open. The guards took up positions behind us, as if they were expecting an attack.

  Mark said something to Xena. We stayed still for a minute, with the gate open in front of us and cars moving past on the street outside.