Lynn slapped some coins on the table and we joined them, hanging back but close enough for me to cut him off if he had second thoughts.
We followed him for several hundred metres down the main thoroughfare, then left into the maze of alleys. The ground was dry; the sun had done its stuff.
I grabbed Lynn's arm. 'You stay with him and I'll parallel and try to cut him off.'
I picked up my pace, walking another thirty metres along Sharia Hara Kebir before taking the next left turn. There were no shops here, only houses – I was back in the labyrinthine streets with the whitewashed facades and interior courtyards we'd passed by earlier.
Off the main drag, there were fewer people around, too – in winter, Arabs tend to finish working at 1 p.m., then go home for a siesta, returning to work at four and finishing for the day at around six thirty.
With no one behind or in front of me, I quickened my pace down the alley until I picked up the first junction. I took a right – no one there either – and ran down it. As I approached the alley where I'd left Lynn and Lazy-Eye, I slowed to walking pace, took some deep gulps of oxygen, regulated my breathing and listened.
Sure enough, there were footsteps ahead – the distinctive clip-clop of Cuban heels echoing off cobbles. They were coming from the alley that cut across mine.
Darting into a doorway, I shrugged off my day sack and unzipped the side pocket. I reached in and pulled out the knife, then peered around the brickwork just as Lazy-Eye's cherry-red shirt moved across my line of sight. I put the knife in the pocket of my cargoes and hooked the bag back over my shoulders.
As I reached the junction, Lazy-Eye rounded a bend in the alley, but I could hear the sound of his heels. He was no more than ten metres away.
I glanced to the left. Lynn was making his way steadily towards me. There was no one behind him. The street was still free of people – as empty as it was ever going to be. It was time to close this thing down.
I rounded the corner. Something made Lazy-Eye turn and he looked right at me. For a moment, he was frozen to the spot. Then he turned and ran.
He was never going to outrun me in those heels. The day sack bounced up and down on my sweaty back as I closed in on him, and I caught him before the next intersection. I grabbed his shoulders, pulled him hard up against the brick wall, clamped one hand across his mouth and pressed the flat of the knife against the skin under his right ear with the other. He needed to see the blade as well as feel it.
The good eye stared right at me, big and wide; the other swivelled in its socket like a compass in a magnet factory. I could smell the smoke on his clothes and the rancid odour of his skin.
'English? You speak English?'
I could feel Lazy-Eye's heart thumping against his ribcage as the weight of my body clamped him in place. He wasn't even going to shake his head too much to tell me he didn't.
An interpreter would be handy. Where the fuck was Lynn?
The good eye bulged and looked like it would jump right out of its socket. The bad one was in freefall. It looked like a fruit-machine wheel that wouldn't stop spinning.
Lynn strode into view at last. He took a few moments to tune in – and he didn't seem to like what he saw.
'Tell him what I'm going to do unless he complies.'
Lynn spoke to him low and fast. I watched for signs that the Arab was taking it in, but his body remained as stiff as a board.
Lynn gave him more hubba-hubba and Lazy-Eye spat into my hand in his rush to say yes. His good eye shuttled between me and Lynn. The blade moved a little as he did so, to give him an even better view.
The alley was still clear, but there would be unseen eyes. There always are. Somebody, somewhere might already be calling the cops or rustling up a lynch mob.
Lynn gobbed off again. Then, taking my knife-hand, he pulled it clear of the Arab's face. I felt Lazy-Eye's body give a little.
'You can take your hand away from his mouth, Nick, and start walking towards the main street. He won't give us any trouble.'
'How do you know?'
'Because he has information for us. He wants to do business. He was looking for us . . .'
'You established all that in thirty seconds?'
'Start walking, Nick, or somebody is going to round that corner and we're screwed.'
I pocketed the knife, but kept a sound grip on the handle.
I gave Lazy-Eye a shove in the back and pointed him in the direction of Sharia Hara Kebir. As the heels started to click, Lynn fell into step beside him. I took up position behind.
I just hoped we looked like two dickhead tourists accompanying a Libyan on our way to the market to buy a dodgy watch.
84
There were still plenty of people on the main street as we hit Sharia Hara Kebir and made a left.
Lynn leant towards Lazy-Eye and asked him something.
