Hunt Through Napoleon's Web (14 page)

As Gabriel fell to the ground, he saw Kemnebi’s hands shoot up to his throat, which seemed to have something wrapped around it . . .

Lucy ran up to Gabriel, tossing aside the wicker basket she’d been carrying. It looked familiar—and now that Gabriel took a second glance, so did the thing around Kemnebi’s throat. One of the charmer’s snakes. Another seemed to have sunk its fangs into the back of his shirt, and more were writhing around his feet.

Lucy’s face was bloodless and her hands were shaking. Gabriel had never minded snakes himself, but he knew she hated them—absolutely
hated
them. He knew what it had meant for her to go get that basket.

“Thanks,” Gabriel said, climbing to his feet. “Now let’s get out of here.”

He took her by the arm and dragged her toward an alleyway he’d spotted earlier. It had looked promisingly dark and empty of people. Unfortunately, it also turned out to be a dead end. Gabriel glanced back. If they stayed here, it wouldn’t be long before the Alliance’s men
would find them; on the other hand, returning to the center of the square wouldn’t exactly keep them hidden either.

He looked around. Near the mouth of the alley there was a truck parked half on and half off the curb, with a wooden animal trailer hitched behind it. Gabriel went to the rear of the trailer and peered through the slats.

Inside, animals were quietly bleating.

Goats. At least half a dozen of them.

The doors of the trailer weren’t locked. Gabriel turned the handle, opened the door, and held it open.

“After you,” he said.

“Ah, hell, Gabriel—” Lucy hesitantly put a foot up. The trailer floor was covered in filthy straw and the animals stank.

“If you could handle snakes,” Gabriel said, “you can handle goats.” He pushed her inside, climbed in behind her, and shut the door.

“Gabriel!”

“Shh.”

He pulled her deeper into the trailer and squatted against the back wall. The goats were agitated, milling about in the constricted space and bleating angrily at the intruders. But they’d calm down. He hoped.

The smell really was overpowering. He breathed through his mouth and gestured silently to Lucy that she should do the same.

She started to say something in response, but from outside came the sound of men running into the alleyway and past the truck. The men reached the dead end, swore, and came back. Through the slats in the trailer Gabriel saw Kemnebi pass—apparently he’d gotten the better of the snakes, which must have been milked after all.

Gabriel held a finger to his lips and Lucy nodded. They both knew what was at stake.

A shadow darkened as someone approached the trailer.

Gabriel slid down until he was lying on the foul straw. He pulled Lucy down on top of him, and with the toe of one boot he nudged the leg of the nearest goat. The animal bleated complainingly but walked in the direction Gabriel had prodded it, which put its body between the side of the trailer and where Gabriel and Lucy were lying.

They waited in silence, Lucy stretched out along the length of him, her face buried in his shoulder. He stroked the back of her head with one hand. With the other, he reached slowly for his gun.

But the shadow departed, and with it came the sound of heavy footsteps moving off. They probably hadn’t actually seen Gabriel and Lucy come down this particular alley; they must have had several more to search.

After a minute had passed without their hearing the men return, Gabriel helped Lucy sit up and then rose himself. “Let’s give it just a little longer,” he whispered to her, “then we can get—”

But at that instant someone started the truck’s engine.

They both put hands out against the trailer’s walls to brace themselves as the truck lurched into motion.

“Gabriel!”

“Shh.” Gabriel crept forward and looked out through the slats at the farthest end, but he couldn’t see who was driving the truck, or where they were headed.

The one thing he did know was that they were leaving the Djemaa el Fna.

He returned to where Lucy was half standing and gestured for her to sit again.

“But we’ve got to get out of here,” she whispered fiercely.

“That’s exactly what we’re doing,” Gabriel whispered back.

Sammi was relieved to finally step off the plane at Marrakesh’s Menara International Airport. She was grateful that Michael had put the plane at her disposal; she only wished she could have gotten in sooner. Enough time had passed that she feared she may have lost Gabriel’s trail for good.

Her instructions from Michael were to meet Reza Arif at baggage claim. She had little idea what he looked like, since Michael had given her only a cursory description; and she assumed he’d given a similarly cursory description of her to Arif. Which left her wandering back and forth along the luggage retrieval claim belts, staring questioningly at the solitary men she passed and seeing no sign of recognition from any of them. She was on her fourth pass when she heard a male voice behind her.

“Mademoiselle Ficatier?”

She turned to see a handsome man in his midforties with black hair and a black beard, neatly trimmed. He wore dark sunglasses, and was dressed in well-tailored clothing, a crisp bespoke suit with a crimson triangle of handkerchief showing at his breast pocket. For all that he seemed to be attempting to convey class and sophistication, though, Sammi was instantly struck with a
different impression, one of menace. It was something in his eyes, the way he held himself. This was a dangerous man. She was confident she would have thought so even if Michael hadn’t warned her about him.

“Yes?”

“I am Reza Arif. I am most pleased to make your acquaintance.” He bowed slightly and extended his hand. “You must call me Reza.”

“Sammi.” She took the man’s hand and shook it briefly. He clung to her fingers for an instant before letting her go.

“Are you hungry?” he asked. “Do you want something to eat or drink?”

“No, thanks. I had something in Cairo.”

“Ah, yes. Fine food in Cairo. Not as fine as we have here, but . . . if you are not hungry, you are not hungry. No luggage?” She held up her carry-on, the small gym bag she’d brought along with her from Nice. He offered to take it from her, but she shook her head. “All right. Follow me please.”

He led her to the parking garage, took out a key fob and pressed a button. A black BMW X6 beeped and flashed its lights.

He removed the sunglasses in the car. His eyes were dark, nicely setting off his swarthy skin.
He might be dangerous, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t attractive
. “It is not much of a disguise,” he said as he put the glasses away, “but it is sufficient for the baggage claim at the airport.” He didn’t speak again until they were on the highway headed for the city. “I have been looking into this Alliance of the Pharaohs that our mutual friend mentioned.”

“And?”

“It is a very difficult organization about which to
uncover any information. I have many contacts in the so-called underworld, and I spent most of last night trying to get one of them to tell me something—anything—about this Alliance. I had very little luck. On the other hand, it has only been one night. Perhaps I will find something yet.”

“Nobody knew anything?”

“The only piece of useful intelligence I obtained so far is that the Alliance is believed to use carpet vendors as a front—here, in Cairo, and elsewhere. Their headquarters is allegedly near the Djemaa el Fna—have you ever been . . . ?”

“I’ve never been to Marrakesh.”

“Ah, such a pity. I only wish you had come sometime when you had less on your mind. It is a beautiful city, and you are a beautiful woman.”

Sammi said nothing. No point in encouraging him—but she also didn’t want to make an enemy of him.

“I would have enjoyed giving you the grand tour. Alas, I can no longer enjoy it as I once did myself. I must remain . . . unnoticed.”

“Why?”

“Surely our friend told you.”

“Told me what?”

He shrugged expressively, his hands briefly lifting off the steering wheel. “I am supposed to be an international criminal. At least that is what I have been branded.” He looked over at her and grinned. “Do not worry,” he said. “I am not the villain they make me out to be. It is what you would call ‘guilt by association.’ I think that is the correct term. I happen to know many criminals. I have done business with them. That does not necessarily make me one, does it?”

“Not necessarily,” Sammi said. “Are you one?”

He dismissed the idea with a wave of his hand. “The truth is beside the point. They would gladly imprison me if they caught me, so whatever I am or am not, I must live as if I were a criminal. I make my home in the mountains now.” He pointed toward the horizon. Sammi could see the ruddy silhouette of the range in the distance. “It is a simple life. I have no complaints.”

“Is it dangerous for you to come into Marrakesh?”

“Only if I am recognized by a policeman.” He laughed. “Don’t worry. I visit the city all the time. I just have to be careful.”

Sammi couldn’t see how driving a car this conspicuous and dressing in an outfit that was the car’s sartorial equivalent counted as being careful. But he apparently knew what he was doing. She didn’t see any police cars in the rearview mirror.

Perhaps, she thought, he paid them off, splitting with them the bounty from the Hunt Foundation.

“We will go to the Djemaa el Fna,” Arif said, “and together we shall visit each carpet store. Of course, searching every carpet store in Marrakesh is a bit like searching every boîte and café in your country. A daunting task, eh? But perhaps we will be lucky and find the right one before our friend’s siblings come to a bad end.”

And he smiled at her, in a way that was clearly meant to be reassuring. Instead, it left her with the distinct sense that this man had something up his handsomely tailored sleeve.

But she needed his help.

“Sounds like a plan,” Sammi said,

The truck took the better part of a half hour to get out of Marrakesh. As the road became rougher, the trailer rattled and bounced with increasing vigor, troubling
the goats into louder and more nearly continuous bleating.

“How much longer do you think?” Lucy asked, keeping her voice low.

Gabriel looked out between the slats. “We’re in the desert,” he reported. “Nothing for miles. We’re not stopping anytime soon.”

“What do you say we get out,” Lucy said. “Just kick open the doors and jump. Every goat for himself.”

“Not here,” Gabriel said. They were in the middle of nowhere, with no landmarks he could recognize. Not a place you wanted to wander on foot.

“Remember the food they gave me,” Lucy said, “that rice and hummus?” Gabriel nodded. “It was terrible,” she said. “Practically inedible. But right about now, I wish I’d eaten more of it.”

“There’re some carrots over there.” Gabriel gestured to a trampled pile in one corner. One of the goats was nosing at it.

“Thanks a whole lot.”

“Salad,” Gabriel said. “I don’t think they’ll mind sharing.”

“Want to bet?”

She settled back into the straw and let her eyes slide shut.

An hour later, they felt the truck turn onto a pitted dirt road. The ride became even bumpier. Gabriel peered outside. After several minutes of bone-jarring bounces, the worst of which threatened to overturn the trailer, Gabriel said, “I see something. Looks like a farm.”

The truck pulled to a stop on a barren driveway next to a farmhouse whose walls and roof were made of lashed-together planks of wood with whitish mortar
sealing the cracks in between. An angled roof cast a bit of shadow, just enough to shade one side of the trailer. Chickens wandered freely across the ground, clucking and bobbing their heads. More goats were penned in a wooden corral. A woman wearing a
niqab
stood beside the corral, tossing feed to the birds. She greeted the driver in a language Gabriel didn’t understand—Berber?—when the man got out of the truck.

“I don’t suppose they’ve got a shower,” Lucy muttered.

The driver and the woman had a brief conversation and then the driver went inside the house.

Lucy took the opportunity to rise to a crouch and press her way to the back of the trailer, shoving goats aside. She raised the metal bar holding the doors closed, swung them to either side and dropped to the ground. Gabriel followed close behind.

The woman let go of her canvas sack of feed and called for the driver in a voice that rang with fear. The driver came running out of the house. He grabbed a long-handled hoe that was leaning against the doorframe.

“It’s all right!” Gabriel said, first in English, then in French, his palms extended outward, open and empty. “We’re friendly.”

Lucy said something as well. Gabriel couldn’t understand a word of it, but the driver’s stance relaxed a bit, and he answered her warily in the same tongue.

“When did you learn Berber?” Gabriel whispered.

“Had some time on my hands a couple of years back,” Lucy said. “My cellmate spoke it.”

“Your cellmate?” Gabriel said, but she was walking away from him, toward the farmer and what he could only guess was the man’s wife.

“I’ve told him we’re not goat thieves,” she called
back to Gabriel, in between exchanges in the desert language. “That we’re escaping from a gang of Egyptians who were trying to kill us. They don’t like Egyptians much around here.”

The woman spoke rapidly to the man, who hurried past Gabriel and grabbed hold of a goat that had jumped down from the trailer. He hefted it back up and inside, then shoved the doors closed.

The woman beckoned for them to come inside the house.

“I told her we wanted to get washed, maybe have some food,” Lucy said. “I said we didn’t have much money but that you’d give them what you had.”

“Of course.” Gabriel took Chigaru’s meager store of
dirham
from his pocket and pressed the crumpled bills into the man’s hands. “If you can get their names, when we get out of this I’ll tell Michael to send them—”

Lucy shook her head. “I told you, I won’t touch that money.”

“You wouldn’t be touching it, they would—” But Gabriel stopped when he saw the look on her face. It was a look he remembered well from when she was a girl, a look that said she wouldn’t be budged.