assassins frequently don’t use their own automobiles.”
“Quite so. But your security guy isn’t a bad shot.”
“Meaning?”
“A patrolman just called in to the APD a report of a man dead in a stolen Ford Taurus. I must say, these people have no taste in automobilia. I wouldn’t be caught dead in a clunker like that.”
Lang was wondering if there might be a teeny-weeny little bit of coffee left in the pot after all. He held up the cup, motioning to Gurt, who was at his elbow, listening as best she could to the conversation. “I suppose you’re going to tell me the deceased is the would-be arsonist.”
“According to what my guy heard on the police scanner, the back window of the car appeared to have been shot out, the dead guy bled out from a bullet wound in the back of his neck and there was a can half-full of gasoline in the backseat. I doubt he was on his way from the filling station to top off his lawnmower. Oh yeah, one more detail. He appears to be Asian, no ID on the body.”
Gurt stood in the kitchen door, Manfred still draped over one arm, the other hand holding a demonstrably empty coffee pot.
“That’s interesting to know, Miles.”
“I thought a few facts like that might speed your decision on my little proposition.”
“It does Miles, it does.”
“Well?”
“I’m definitely leaning in that direction.”
“Lang, do something! Think of your family. They may not miss next time.”
“The thought had occurred to me. You’ll have your answer before the day is out.”
With parting salutations, the conversation ended.
Gurt was facing Lang. “Wherever you have to go, whatever you have to do, make them stop it before one of us gets hurt.”
That was a decision Lang had already made, Gurt’s agreement or not. He just wanted her blessing before he called Miles back.
El Nozha Airport
Alexandria, Egypt
Three days later
The Gulfstream 550’s tires met the runway with a satinlike kiss, a tribute to the piloting skills of its flight crew. Lang was pushed forward in his seat as the engines howled into reverse thrust and the plane came to a near stop before turning sedately onto a taxiway like an elderly dowager leaving the dance floor.
He took his BlackBerry from his pocket and called home. It would be far too early in the morning, eight hours earlier, for Gurt to have hers turned on, but the “missed call” message and his number would let her know he had arrived safely.
Lang had been watching the city as it spread out beneath him on final approach. Mostly sand-colored buildings surrounding green spaces, hardly the sophisticated international metropolis of ancient history. He rubbed eyes, gritty from the lack of sleep that always accompanied air travel. The main terminal, a low squat building, suckled aircraft of Air Arabia, Olympic, Austrian Airlines and Lufthansa. Thankful he would not have to transit what he remembered as the tiny, crowded, ill-smelling and generally filthy arrival lounge, he settled back into his seat to await the arrival of the inevitable officialdom.
The customs and immigration crew had apparently been waiting on the private aviation tarmac. The Gulfstream’s door had hardly wheezed open when two khaki-clad officials climbed the short staircase and began reviewing the general declarations proffered by the plane’s copilot. The deference with which the aircraft’s crew and passengers were treated was far different from the arrogance that Lang recalled being shown across the field in the passenger terminal. But then, the occupants of a sixty-million-dollar private jet were more likely to be powerful people than, say, a merchant arriving from Cairo to visit relatives. Powerful or not, the language of international bureaucracy-paper-was inspected, exchanged and slipped into folders from which it likely would never emerge. Lang purchased the requisite visa stamp for the passport Miles had furnished along with matching Visa card, Mastercard and driver’s permit while explaining the two immunologists with him would not be leaving the aircraft but would depart for Sudan as soon as he left the plane. The disappointment shown at the lost revenues mostly dissipated when Lang thanked the two uniformed men for their prompt and courteous service, slipping an American twenty- dollar bill into both open hands.
With a minimum of luck, these two would be satisfied that the passports did not contain a stamp from Israel, a real problem requiring Higher Egyptian Authority, and be gone shortly.
“We’re in a bit of a hurry.” Lang smiled. “I am expected at an archaeological excavation that is waiting for me before further exploration can take place. I hope you can speed the customs inspection process.”
For another pair of twenties, indeed they could. The “inspection” consisted of brief glances about the aircraft’s cabin without moving a step farther.
Lang had learned long ago that in this part of the world, government officials expected to supplement their salaries. In fact, the value of political appointments in the Arab world had little to do with the pay attached; it had to do with the opportunities to extract baksheesh. Customs inspectors, particularly those along the Sinai’s border with Israel, became wealthy men.
Walking back to the small bedroom at the rear of the plane, Lang picked up a single suitcase. He reached under the mattress on which he had mostly tossed and turned the night before and pulled out the Browning HP in a leather holster. Clipping the holster to the belt in the small of his back, he probed the bedclothes again, this time producing a box of 9 mm ammunition, which he dumped loose into a jacket pocket before tossing the box into a waste basket.
Suitcase in hand, he walked to the aircraft’s open door, surprised at the blast of heat that met him even at this time of year. He was thankful he would not be here in July or August. At the bottom of the steps a sleek Mercedes glistened in the midmorning sun. He gave the briefest of waves to the pilot and copilot standing at the cockpit door and then to the pretty flight attendant who had served him and his two companions three meals since departing Atlanta.
Twenty minutes later, the Mercedes was purring along the Eastern Harbor. To his left, Lang could see turreted Fort Qaitbey, built at the tip of the western edge of a peninsula in the fourteenth century on the site of the famed Pharos Lighthouse with recycled stones from the ruins of the wonder of the ancient world. Between the road and the water, a golden crescent of beach framed colorful fishing boats gently swaying at their moorings. Lang noted there were a great deal more empty anchor buoys than ships. The bulk of the fleet must already have been at sea.
To Lang’s right, three- and four-story limestone buildings lined the waterfront, none of particular interest until the car eased into a parking spot in front of Le Metropole Hotel. The facade looked like the sort of North African fortress Gary Cooper, assisted to a small degree by the French Foreign Legion, might have defended in the 1939 version of Beau Geste.
As a uniformed bellhop opened the back door and Lang slid out, the driver, a swarthy man with a neatly manicured beard, spoke the first words of the trip. “Tell the concierge when you need the car and it will be here in five minutes. Here is my card with my cell-phone number. The service is available 24-7.”
“Thanks.” Lang proffered several bills as a tip.
Without looking at the money, the man shook his head. “Not necessary.”
Stunned, Lang watched the car merge into the brown haze generated by a mix of cars, trucks and scooters. In his travels, he rarely could recall a professional chauffeur declining a tip. In this part of the world, unheard of.
Unless…
Miles.
Miles had insisted on making the hotel reservations at Agency expense and arranging for a driver. A grin crept across Lang’s face as the realization dawned. Miles had arranged for much more. Lang was not alone here.
“Your only bag, sir?” the bellhop wanted to know.
Lang’s attention returned to the hotel. “Yeah, I’ll take it, thanks.”
Pressing a few dollars into the bellhop’s hand to atone for what would be viewed as unwarranted stinginess,
