‘Such rubbish!’ Eskandarian again looked out of the window, as if the distant hills would offer him respite from Kite’s misapprehensions. A wood pigeon echoed in the garden. ‘All revolutions take time to bear fruit,’ he continued quickly. ‘Look at France after 1789! In our case, the Iranian state has developed at the expense of the public. This is true. A battle of ideas is taking place between religious figures in Tehran and what you might call technocrats like myself, republicans who have a slightly different view of the country’s future. But to say that my countrymen are murderers, well this is nonsense.’
Kite did not fully understand what Eskandarian had said about republicans and technocrats, partly because he was concentrating so hard on what he might ask next. Peele and Strawson would be able to extract a fuller, more contextualised meaning from what Eskandarian was saying. Kite’s job was just to keep him talking.
‘Are you in danger here?’ he asked.
‘Me?!’ Eskandarian inflated his chest, squared his shoulders and smiled broadly in a display of mock courage. ‘No, of course not. Don’t you worry, Lockie!’ He picked up a sheaf of papers from the desk and tapped them into a neat, square pile. ‘Of course there are allies of the shah, his followers and admirers, who wish to see Iran return to the bad old days. And why not? They were getting very rich while millions starved! Men like this Bijan hold men like Ali Eskandarian responsible for the collapse of their dreams. He saw me on the beach in Cannes – perhaps somebody in his network recognised me at the airport – and he decided to resort to desperate measures. I am sorry that he filled your head with lies and propaganda. I have also read Papillon and I can tell you it is a much better story than the one Bijan related to you!’
Kite smiled a crocodile smile, beginning to feel that Eskandarian was trying to wriggle off the hook.
‘But you need Abbas,’ he said, pointing towards Abbas’s bedroom. ‘You need a bodyguard.’
‘This is just for show!’ Eskandarian gave another puffed-up, sweeping gesture of omniscience. ‘Who is to say that Abbas is not keeping an eye on me, eh? Protecting me from myself!’ The Iranian broke into uproarious laughter. Kite played along, still as far away from knowing what, if anything, Eskandarian was up to in France.
‘Well I definitely hope that no harm comes to you,’ he replied. ‘It’s been so interesting meeting you and spending time with you here at the house—’
‘Thank you,’ Eskandarian replied. ‘I have also very much enjoyed meeting you and Martha, seeing Jacqui and Xavier again after so long.’ A sudden seriousness came over him. He leaned forward. ‘He drinks too much, no?’
‘Maybe.’ Kite gave an equivocal shrug. He didn’t want anything on tape that would make him sound disloyal or lead to concerns about Xavier.
‘Tell me.’ Eskandarian offered Kite another cigarette, which he declined. ‘Did Bijan ask you to contact him? Did he give you a telephone number, an address?’
‘No.’ The lie sat as easily inside Kite as smoke from a cigarette. ‘No number, no address.’
Eskandarian pondered this for a moment. ‘So he just left you alone, you walked out of the café?’
‘That’s right.’
What was the exact nature of Eskandarian’s concern? Was he worried that Bijan had followed the taxi back to the villa? Kite was hardly in a position to be able to put the Iranian’s mind at rest.
They were interrupted by a noise on the stairs. Abbas appeared on the landing and peered into the room. He seemed both surprised and annoyed that Kite had penetrated the inner sanctum. Eskandarian said something to him in Farsi. Abbas stared at Kite, mumbled something and went back downstairs.
‘He is in a mood today,’ said Eskandarian.
‘He seems to be in a mood every day.’
The Iranian laughed. ‘Oh, do not mind Abbas!’ He rubbed his hands together expectantly in a manner that reminded Kite of Billy Peele at the start of a history lesson. ‘I must get back to work. Thank you for coming to me and telling me this. I appreciate that it must have been unsettling for you. I hope that I have at least put your mind at rest?’
‘Absolutely,’ Kite replied.
He stood up with the dismaying sensation that he had failed adequately to draw out enough information for BOX 88. What else could he have asked about? Lockerbie? Malta? The plane tickets to New York? It was all off limits. What else was left to say? Kite’s mind was blank as Eskandarian started tidying the papers on his desk. He appeared to place them in order of importance, sliding certain documents to the top and moving others to the bottom, like a card dealer shuffling in slow motion. Kite made a private vow to return to the room and to photograph as many of the documents as possible.
‘Hana is leaving tonight,’ he said, as Kite turned towards the door.
Kite was stunned. He could only imagine that her departure was a direct consequence of what had happened with Xavier.
‘Really? Oh no. Why?’
‘It had always been her intention to stay only for a few days. She has a job to go back to in Nice. We may reconnect in Paris on my way home.’
Was he lying? Eskandarian smiled to himself, possibly at the thought of more miniskirts, more lingerie, more French perfume in Paris; the expression on his face might equally have been pleasure at the prospect of taking his revenge against Xavier. It was impossible to tell. ‘Well, I’ll be sorry to see her go,’ he said. ‘She’s great company.’
Eskandarian took a moment to respond. It was not clear whether he agreed with Kite’s assessment of his girlfriend’s character or was distracted by something on his desk.
‘You think?’ he replied. ‘How nice. Yes. I’ll be sorry to see her
