Yes, there bloody well was. He could have been properly searched on arrest, had goons in his cell and his hands manacled behind his back.
T h e autopsy will be tomorrow,' the staffer intoned emptily, like he thought it was his failure. 'Don't know what they'll find.'
Wroughton could have reeled off a list of poisons, right for self-administration, that were quick but painful while they did their work.
He turned away. He had no more need to look down at the trolley and the body. The man was late fifties, or perhaps early sixties, but his age would be confirmed over coffee in the policeman's office. His name and occupation were paramount, particularly the occupation, which had brought Wroughton scurrying off the plane. His last sight of the man was his fat fingers and the width of the two gold rings, one on each hand, over which the flesh bulged.
They walked along the corridor towards an office.
'It was a rumour, Mr Wroughton, from information we received.
We acted on it immediately,' the police officer said, ingratiating and ashamed. 'We heard that this prominent hawaldar had travelled a few days ago up-country. He was a wealthy man, prominent in his trade, and he had gone to a place where there is only poverty. We said, and I discussed this with your young colleague, that he must be arrested immediately.'
The staffer flinched because now the blame was shared…
Wroughton understood. The western members of the Financial Action Task Force regularly and predictably targeted the Gulf states for the movement of money that benefited Al Qaeda. There had been a gesture of action, and the action had led to catastrophe. The hazval system was the nightmare, money moving without paper or electronic trace. And big sums were not needed – an investment of $350,000, wisely spent on flying lessons, simulators and cheap motels, would cost the Americans $200 billion, for the rebuilding of the Twin Towers and the economic losses post the hijackings. What was required was money to follow, to track. Breaking into the hawal networks was as big a priority as existed in Eddie Wroughton's life – and the man was dead, the bastard was a stiff. Guilt was proven. A man who took a pill after only cursory questioning was a man harbouring a big secret, a man who would die rather than face in-depth interrogation.
'I'm sure you did the right thing,' Wroughton said, without charity.
There would, of course, be mobile and landline telephone records to work on, but he doubted they would show up anything beyond inconsequential dealings.
They sat. The first coffee was poured into a thimble cup. He sensed a nervous energy building in the staffer. They talked of the hawaldar' s connections, his links, they hacked at his Special Branch file… It was nearly an hour before the staffer's energy burst out.
'There is something else you should know, Mr Wroughton. An American Navy helicopter came in here recently with a CasEvac. A crewman needed facilities they didn't have on board the carrier. I met the navigator off the helicopter. He just told a silly story – we were talking smuggling. You know, cigarettes going from here to Iranian fishing villages – fast speedboats. Maybe it wasn't much of a story.'
'Well, if it's 'silly', keep it short, please.'
'Yes, of course. The navigator explained how they regularly track the speedboats, keep them on radar – because of suicide attacks.
They were following this formation when it broke. One speedboat detached from the main group and took a line that was going to bring it close to the carrier. The navigator's helicopter was put on immediate intervention alert. It was all armed up, missiles live for firing. They didn't have to take off. The single speedboat headed away, and they tracked it. It went right in to the Omani coast, then up the shoreline and rejoined the others. On the return trip there was the same number of them as with the original formation. Have I explained that? Well, it was the day before the rumour put the money-lender up-country, where there was nothing for him that we can identify. I thought you ought to know.'
Wroughton didn't thank him, did not praise him. He hid the increased pulse beat in his heart.
He asked for a map. It was spread across the table. He asked where the speedboat from Iran had hit the Omani coast, and he made a cross at that point with his pencil. Then he asked where rumour had put the hawaldar up-country, and he made a second mark. Could they, please, bring him a ruler? When the ruler was given him, Wroughton made a line that linked the coast and a road junction, took the line on and traced it right to the Saudi border.
He was in a good humour. The corpse and the frustrations were forgotten. He told the police officer and his staffer what he wanted from the morning, and at what time they should leave. In the privacy of his hotel room, Wroughton would manage a large drink, damn sure, he would study the map and dream of what the line told him.
The guide, Rashid, had set a forced pace. Caleb had thought, when they came to the dune wall, rising in front of them, an almost sheer slope, that they would rest there for the night. The sun was low, the half-light treacherous. Soft-spoken, but harshly, Rashid gave his orders. His son sulked, but obeyed. Only Tommy was the exception, but for this one evening only. The camels were unloaded. The waterskins and the crates were lifted down from them. Two at a time, Rashid led the camels up the near vertical slope with their hoofs kicking for, and failing to find, a grip, and Tommy scrambled after him on hands and knees.
Fahd carried waterskins. Hosni struggled with food pouches.
One at a time, Caleb and the boy took the boxes. With ropes, they dragged them to the dune's ridge line, gasped for air, were glowered at by Rashid and went back down for more. There was no encouragement from Rashid, only contempt at his thin and bloodless lips.
Three times, Caleb heaved a box to the ridge, then slid back down the slope. The last time he went there were no more boxes at the base of the dune, but Hosni was there with the last two of the food pouches.
He did not think Hosni saw him until he was beside him. Caleb lifted the last two pouches on to his shoulder and snatched at Hosni's hand, put it against the belt of his robe and felt the fingers tighten.
They went up together – it was family, they were brothers. He would not have done it for Fahd, or for Tommy, only for the Egyptian.
Twice, on the last climb, the dune's sand cascaded away from under his toes and he fell back, cannoned into Hosni and felled him. Twice he picked himself up, each time realizing that the fingers still gripped his belt, and they went back up. He took Hosni to the ridge.
He flopped, and Hosni collapsed beside him. Only a quarter of the sun was left and the desert, darkening, stretched away beneath them, below, at the base of the gentler slope of the dune, Tommy held a tangle of the camels' reins, and Rashid was loading the boxes on to their backs.
They started down.
Rashid, again, set the pace.
The boy, Ghaffur, was beside Caleb. Caleb walked, dead, saw nothing. He did not know from where the boy found the cheerful laughter.
'Look, look.'
The boy had hold of his sleeve, tugged it for attention, then pointed.
Thirty yards from where they walked, to his left Caleb saw the crazily formed white shapes. In the half-light, he could not identify them, but the boy dragged on his arm and led him from the path made by the camels' hoofs.
'You see them? Yes, you do.'
He could make out the backbones, skulls and ribcages, half buried in the sand. The leg bones were covered where the sand had drifted, but the four sets of bones were clear. Flattened empty skins lay on the ribcages, the same size as those holding water that Fahd had carried up the dune. The black leather of the skins lay on the bones' whiteness.
'Shall we find the bones of the men?'
'No.' Caleb pulled himself free of the boy's hand.
'If the camels died, the men died – don't you want to find them?'
'No,' Caleb grunted over his shoulder.
'After the camels died, the men would have finished their water.
At first they would have hoped another traveller would find them.
