The Alexander Cipher Page 0,54
taut.
Chapter Fifteen
ITRUST YOU HAVE GOOD NEWS FOR ME,” said Hassan.
Nessim, even though talking to a phone, closed his eyes as if in prayer. “We’ve had a setback, sir.”
“A setback?”
“Someone else got to him first.”
“Someone else?”
“Yes, sir.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Nor do we, sir. He went into a hotel. He came out again. He walked around to the back and down an alley. Another man followed him. We thought nothing of it until a black car pulled up and he was bundled into the back.”
“You mean you just let them take him away?”
“We were across the street. There was a tram.”
“A tram?” asked Hassan icily.
“Yes, sir.”
“Where did they go?”
“We don’t know, sir. Like I say, there was a tram. We couldn’t get past.” The damned thing had just sat there as he tooted at it, the fat driver smirking at them, enjoying their frustration.
“Who was it? Who took him?”
“We don’t know, sir. We’re working on it now. If we’re lucky, it’s someone who heard what he did to you and thinks they can sell him to us at a price.”
“And if we’re not?”
“According to his file, he has plenty of enemies. Maybe one of them spotted him.”
Silence. One beat. Two beats. Three. “I want him found,” said Hassan. “I want him found as a matter of urgency. Do I make myself clear?”
Nessim swallowed. “Yes, sir. Crystal clear.”
KNOX FELT INCOMPARABLY OLDER as he trudged north, following tire tracks in the sand. When the rope had paid out and stretched taut, he knew he was going to die. It was a qualitatively different thing, knowing you were going to die as opposed to fearing you might die. It did strange things to your heart. It made you think differently about time, the world, and your place in it.
Apparently the rope had been cut clean through, then fixed back together again with duct tape. The tape had ripped free as soon as the rope went taut, so that the two sections of rope had pulled apart, and Knox had flopped down on the sand, his bladder venting, his heart bucking like a terrified steer, bewildered by his reprieve. The driver had come around in a great loop over the sand to collect his comrades, who had been squatting there all the time, filming his reaction, the way he pissed himself. They had all laughed uproariously at that, as though it was the funniest thing they had ever seen. One of them had thrown an envelope out the window, and then they drove off, leaving him tied there to the stake, his trousers soaked, his throat raw with burns from the rope.
It had taken him two hours to free himself from his various bonds. He was shivering by then, full-body tremors. Desert nights were cold. He had dried his trousers as best he could by smearing them with handfuls of dusty sand, then gone over to the envelope. Plain white. No writing on it. When he had opened it, some sand fell out. Ballast to stop it blowing away. Apart from that, it contained only an Egypt Air compliments slip with four words on it: “You have been warned.”
He climbed a small rise. Far ahead, the pinpricks of headlights were headed in both directions on a busy road. He walked at a slow, tired, dispirited pace. It was easy enough to be bold when you faced abstract dangers, but it was different now that they clearly knew where he was. And he had others to think of, too, particularly Augustin and Gaille. He couldn’t risk putting them in danger.
It was time to get out.
NICOLAS DRAGOUMIS was an early riser by temperament, but this morning he awoke earlier than usual, eager as a child at Christmas. He went straight to his laptop to check his e-mail. There was one from Gabbar Mounim, as promised. He downloaded and decrypted the movie file attachment impatiently while he read the message, nodding approvingly as he did so. His father had always insisted that Knox wasn’t to be harmed, and Mounim made it clear that his men hadn’t harmed Knox, not in any real sense. A little chloroform, a tap on the skull, a jolt to his system. That couldn’t count as harm. On the contrary, it would make him appreciate life all the more.
Nicolas played the movie for the first time: Knox abducted; Knox lying unconscious on the floor of the car; Knox dragged onto the desert sands; the look of terror on his face as the car accelerated away! Nicolas