‘I dunno. Why don’t you ask him?’
‘Why would I do that?’
‘Ask him about sanctions. Ask him: “Aren’t there supposed to be sanctions with Iran?”’
‘What are you talking about?’
Kite had stumbled on something potentially of interest to BOX. Xavier put his arm across his back and let his weight fall on him.
‘Forget it,’ he said. ‘It’s all good. All kosher. Luc Bonnard is a fine man, not a bad man.’ He switched to French and said: ‘Daddy never puts a foot wrong.’
Eskandarian was not quite what Kite had expected. Courtesy of Strawson and Peele, he had seen several photographs of his quarry: corporate mugshots, as well as a video of a speech Eskandarian had given at a conference in Munich. In all these, he was modest in appearance and conservatively dressed. Kite was half-expecting to come face to face with a kind of Persian Obi-Wan Kenobi, a pious holy man dressed in long robes similar to the Muslim elders he had seen emerging from mosques in Ealing and Uxbridge Road. Instead he was confronted by a tanned, jovial Middle Eastern man wearing designer jeans and brown suede loafers. An enormous Rolex glinted on his wrist and there was a Ralph Lauren logo on the chest of Eskandarian’s spotlessly pressed Polo shirt.
‘Ali, this is Xavier’s friend, Lockie.’
Eskandarian scrunched his face up at the name, as thousands of others had done throughout the course of Kite’s life.
‘Lockie? OK. What is that short for?’
There was a slight American intonation to Eskandarian’s accent. They were shaking hands, the grip firm, the eye contact warm. Was this a man capable of coordinating mass murder?
‘It’s from Lachlan,’ he said. ‘Spelled with an “a”. I’m Scottish. North of the border it’s Lack, everywhere else people call me Locklan or Lockie.’
Eskandarian mimed a baffled confusion.
‘Then I think I will stick to Lockie!’ he said. ‘Very good to meet you, young man. And where is Master Xavier?’
Right on cue, Xavier stumbled into the hall behind Kite, his eyes slightly bloodshot, his grin at once wary and provocative, as if he knew that it was impolite to be drunk and stoned in front of his father’s distinguished guest, but that he didn’t much care. Eskandarian was evidently a man of the world and instantly understood that Luc’s son had enjoyed one too many. He made short shrift of the introduction, avoiding commonplace adult remarks about how much Xavier had grown, embraced him briefly, said that he was grateful to have been invited to spend time with the Bonnard family, and invited Rosamund to show him to his room.
It worried Kite that he warmed to Eskandarian on first impression. Without a father of his own, he knew that he had a tendency to lionise older men; he was supposed to be maintaining focus, reporting back to BOX everything he saw and heard about Eskandarian, not what he felt or wanted to believe about him. Kite could feel the after-effects of the hashish, a slow, mellow cloud pillowing his senses as he walked outside to clear his head.
A man in a black suit was pulling suitcases out of an Audi Quattro. Kite assumed that he was a taxi driver, but as the man turned around, he spotted a handgun holstered inside his jacket. Eskandarian had brought a bodyguard. Kite raised a hand in greeting but was ignored. A second vehicle with a taxi light on its roof was coming down the drive. The Bonnards hadn’t mentioned any other guests coming for dinner, but Luc instantly appeared from inside the house to greet the new arrival. Kite was conscious that he was standing around to no real purpose. He lit a cigarette to give himself something to do, keeping his eyes on the taxi. The driver opened the back door. An astonishingly beautiful Asian woman in her late twenties stepped out in high heels and a figure-clinging black dress.
‘You must be Hana,’ said Luc, addressing her warmly in French. ‘Welcome. Ali is upstairs.’
Strawson and Peele had said nothing about a girlfriend turning up, but she was too provocatively dressed to be a secretary. The woman, who appeared to be of Thai or Vietnamese origin, handed the taxi driver a clutch of francs as he unloaded her suitcase from the boot. When Luc introduced her to Kite, Hana offered him a soft, warm hand and a slightly patronising smile before going inside. She was obviously keen to be reunited with Eskandarian.
‘Who’s that?’ Kite asked.
Luc gave him a seedy man-to-man wink. ‘Special friend of Ali’s from Nice. She’ll be staying with us for a few days.’
Kite was not naive. He assumed Hana had been paid for. He had seen adverts for prostitutes at the back of the International Herald Tribune but couldn’t conceive that Lady Rosamund Penley would countenance having a high-class hooker in the house. Luc mistook his silence for young lust and commented on her beauty.
‘Incredible-looking woman.’
‘Yeah,’ said Kite, preferring Martha in every way. ‘She’s … exotic.’
Luc went back inside, leaving Kite alone with the bodyguard. They did not acknowledge one another. It was as though Kite were standing on one side of a wall and the man in the black suit on the other. To his surprise, the bodyguard opened Hana’s suitcase and quickly searched it, like a security guard at an airport. Kite caught sight of a black lace bra and felt a pang of lust. He turned and looked up towards the first-floor windows. Martha was billeted in the furthest of the two bedrooms with a view over the swimming pool. The light in her window was visible as a narrow glow seeping through closed shutters. He extinguished the cigarette in an old oil jar by the door and introduced himself to the bodyguard.
‘I’m Lockie,’ he said, indicating Hana’s suitcase. ‘Can I help you with that?’
He might as well have been addressing the brick wall
