Olives (15 page)

Lynch smiled
at us both and sat down again. He looked up at Anne, standing with
her arms crossed.

‘
I just need
two minutes with Paul here, if you don’t mind. Maybe you’d like to
freshen up a bit after your trip or something?’

Anne gasped.
I saw her out of the corner of my eye, looking at me and waiting
for me to defend her right to stay but my eyes were on Lynch. She
snatched the keys from my hand and marched over to the door,
unlocking it with a savage twist before slamming it behind
her.

‘
You rude
fucker.’

Lynch smiled.
‘Do you actually like her? She doesn’t seem your type.’

‘
That’s none
of your business.’

He leaned
forward, his smile fading fast.

‘
We need your
help. Dajani’s confirmed to a journalist from one of the Arabic
rags he’s going to be bidding for the water privatisation and he’s
claiming he has the solution to Jordan and the West Bank’s water
supply problems. We’re deeply concerned about what he’s up to,
Paul. The West Bank’s none of his business and it isn’t part of the
privatisation as far as we are aware. The Izzies are screaming blue
murder already and asking the Jordanians for clarification – and
they’re saying nothing, not confirming, not denying. Your Minister
has clammed up tighter than a shark’s arse at fifty
fathoms.’

‘
So what am I
supposed to do?’

Lynch cast
his eyes briefly to heaven. ‘Find out what he’s up to, Paul. Find
out why the Ministry’s gone quiet.’

‘
And why
should I do that? Don’t you have the contacts there to do that?
Since when did Israeli reaction to newspaper reports become a
problem for the Foreign Office?’

Lynch
relaxed, his hand on the table and his arm hooked over the back of
the chair. ‘Why should you help me? Because you and I are great
pals, Paul. Because I can help you and you know it. My friends
across the border have confirmed the Arafi boy was the Jericho
bomber, by the way. Thought you might like to know
that.’

‘
What Arafi
boy? Who’s Arafi?’

Lynch counted
on his fingers like a child. ‘Rashid Arafi. Son of Ghaith Arafi.
Brother of Nancy Arafi. Wife of Ibrahim Dajani, brother of Emad
Dajani, father of Daoud Dajani.’

He reached
the seventh finger. ‘Brother of Aisha Dajani. You’ve got to get
used to these Arab families, Paul. They’re spread out. Rashid Arafi
was family and he worked for Ibrahim Dajani and the Israelis shot
him running towards the checkpoint in Jericho set up next to the
police station. Remember Jericho, Paul? Rashid Arafi killed nine
people. He was wired up with enough explosive to bring down a
house.’

I was still
trying to make sense of the family tree. I bought a little time to
think. ‘So what does that change, Gerald?’

Lynch leaned
forwards again, peering intently into my face. His cold gaze was
fixed on me, his voice a Northern Irish rasp.

‘
Rashid Arafi
was no innocent bystander. He was a bomber and he’s tied into the
family you are so buddy-buddy with. He’s part of whatever Daoud’s
up to, and it’s a problem for Her Majesty’s Government precisely
because we don’t like terrorists or the people who fund them. Any
more than we like people stirring up trouble with wild schemes
driving wedges into one of the most divisive political issues in
this part of the world – the fucking water. Dajani’s a two for one
deal. He’s up to his neck in both.’

He glared at
me for a second, then rocked back on his chair, stretched his legs
and got up with a small grunt. ‘Tell me what’s going on there. Find
out from the Ministry. They’re covering his arse, I know
it.’

‘
I’m on
leave.’

‘
Go off
leave.’

‘
I
can’t.’

Lynch leered
at me. ‘Yes, you can. By the way, your case will be heard by a
judge called Ayman Khasawneh. He’s a powerful man, very respected.
A reputation for upholding the law. A hardliner.’

Lynch stood
by the garden table, flicking the flaky-varnished surface with his
fingernails. ‘He’s a big pal of ours, actually. Big Anglophile.
Loves coming over to the Ambassador’s house for roast beef, so he
does. The Ministry of Justice assigned your case to Khasawneh
because there’s a clampdown on public order offences right now and
they don’t like foreigners taking swings at their police. They even
brought the case forward. It’ll be heard next week. So you’ve got a
deadline.’

‘
What if I
don’t make the deadline?’

Lynch looked
straight at me, his blue eyes totally devoid of emotion. ‘Find out
what’s happening with Dajani and the Ministry, Paul. The sooner you
do, the sooner we can help you. Don’t put anything in writing. You
don’t have to be James Bond. We just want to know what’s going on
and you just happen to be the boy to tell us.’

My heart
raced, the anger and fear in me making my skin prick with sweat
despite the cool evening air. I had a sudden urge to flee, to
strike out at him, to take any action to affirm my right to a
choice. But choices were a luxury denied little people like
me.

Lynch patted
my arm before he walked away down the steps to the road, leaving me
standing by the garden table trying to contain my growing sense of
horror and hopelessness.

I went into
the kitchen looking for Anne, but found her in the bedroom, sitting
on the bed by her packed bag. She had been crying. She got to her
feet clearing the damp hair from her face as I came into the
room.

‘
I’ve checked
into the Hyatt, Paul. I’m leaving. I’ve had enough.’

The relief I
felt was like slipping into the warm, gloopy waters of the Dead
Sea, an almost sensuous feeling of enveloping calm. I’d paused
outside the house before coming in, dreading telling her I had to
go back to work. Standing alone in the garden with the city spread
out below me darkening from the spectacular roseate glow of its
sunset, it had been a huge effort to push open the door and face
yet more of Anne’s palpable disapproval of everything I had come to
enjoy, of my new life in this city that had won my
heart.

‘
I’m sorry,
Anne.’

She sat back
down again. Her face crumpled and reddened. I stepped towards her
but she waved me away.

‘
No. Leave me
alone. You’re not sorry, Paul. You’re not. You didn’t want me here
in the first place. You’ve changed and I don’t like it. I don’t
want it. You’re happy here, I can see that, but you were happier
before I came. I’m no fool, Paul. This was all an awful
mistake.’

She started
sobbing, drawing heaving breaths, her nose blocked and her eyes
streaming. I stood watching her snivel in front of me. She gushed
simplicities, almost childlike, a jarring contrast to Anne the
smart, hard international contract lawyer who negotiated like a pit
bull. She reached across to the box of tissues on the bedside table
and wiped at her face.

‘
I can’t like
this place, Paul, but you do. I don’t want to be part of this. I
should never have come.’

‘
Then you
have to go,’ I heard myself say to her, an awful finality in my
voice I didn’t mean to let out.

She hunched
in on herself as if I had hit her, looked around the room slowly
before looking at my feet. Her voice was small, quiet as she said:
‘So that’s it, then.’

I looked down
at her.

Jericho. A
checkpoint. Rashid Arafi running, little clouds of dust kicking up
under his heels. Shouts. Shots. A fat, greasy-faced Ambassador
wearing his napkin tucked into his collar, cutting into Yorkshire
pudding and red beef, gulping down claret as the slight, neat
Englishman with the blue-striped shirt sitting across from him
laughed at his own joke. The cell, cracking paint in my fingers.
Aisha smiling at me, playing with her lighter and her lips soft on
my cheek, the coolness of a gold earring tapping my lips as I
smelled her hair.

‘
Yes,’ I said
with someone else’s voice. ‘I suppose it is.’

I drove Anne
to the Grand Hyatt in silence, getting out to help the concierge
take her bags from the car. We stood by the open boot. I took a
step towards her, but she shook her head. ‘No. Don’t come near me.
Goodbye, Paul.’

The revolving
door glittered with the lights from the street, spinning to release
a party of young revellers in coats and scarves, their breath
showing in little puffs as they chattered and laughed. Anne watched
them with a thin smile. She turned to me as I reached up to close
the boot.

‘
I hope she
makes you happier than I did.’

I wrenched at
the lid of the boot, bringing it smashing down.

‘
Who? Who’s she? What she are you talking about, Anne? Does
there have to be a
she
for you to rationalise it’s
over?’

Anne stepped
back, clutching her bag to her chest. ‘Forget it, Paul. You do what
you think is right.’

‘
What I think is
right
? Who the fuck
do you think you are? You fly in here expecting the world to be
ordered just as it suits you, you swan around the place sniffing at
every fucking thing you see, you bitch at me for days on end until
every waking fucking moment is nothing but a space for you to fill
with your disapproval then you justify it all by inventing someone
else to carry the can for your own shallowness and intolerance. Get
real, Anne. Smell the coffee. You fucked this up by yourself, it
didn’t take another woman.’

She stared
back at me, her tearful blue eyes wide and her fingers pressed into
the soft brown bag. Her shoulders slumped as I looked around to see
the cars piling up behind us.

The valet
touched my arm. ‘
Khalas,
sidi
’ – ‘Enough, stop, sir.’
I rounded on him but there was nothing more than an expression of
gentle, genuine concern on his face. I saw several hotel staff
standing around us, stilled by the commotion. I turned to
Anne.

‘
Goodbye,
Anne.’

She said
nothing, looking at me blankly before she turned and strode into
the hotel, the bellboy with her bag following. He glanced at me
over his shoulder, his expression as they went through the door,
making it clear he thought I was a shit.

He had a
point.

I drove home
and drank whisky, wandering around the house and missing Anne
terribly, the misunderstood tyrant mourning his loneliness. Ibrahim
called and told me the court date had been brought forward and my
hearing would take place next week. More good news, except Lynch
had beaten him to it and Lynch knew more than Ibrahim.

I dutifully
pretended it was, indeed, news to me and thanked him, hung up and
poured more whisky into my glass, walking through the house into
the garden, where I stood looking over the lights of the city. I
went back and poured more until eventually, quite drunk, I held the
heavy-based tumbler between my two fingers above the flagstone
floor in the kitchen and let it fall, bright and scintillating in
the halogen spots as it twisted through the air, shattering on the
stone. A thousand reflective shards skittered across the floor. I
went, unsteady on my feet, to bed where I lay in the darkness,
trying to stop the room from spinning.

TWELVE

I cleaned up
the glass in the morning before going outside to gaze out over the
city and get some fresh air. The leaves in the garden were
glistening wet under the soft drizzle, the rolling clouds a
patchwork of grey highlights and shadowed depths. I stood by the
kitchen door and felt the freshness of the moisture, shivering in
the cold and letting the water fall onto my face. My mind wandered
over Paul Stokes and where he found himself.

The cold
finally drove me inside and I took a warm shower before driving to
the Ministry, feeling sick and wretched. I tried to call Anne but
the hotel operator said she wasn’t taking calls. I left a message
for her to ring back.

I’d come to a
decision standing in the rain, accepting I couldn’t fight Lynch
anymore, or perhaps just deciding it had all got so bad it didn’t
matter how much further I went down the path of deceit and
self-loathing. I scanned my email over a coffee and went upstairs
to the Secretary General’s office suite with the vague notion of
seeing if there were any papers of value lying around. It was early
and there was nobody in as I strode through the small reception
area where his PA sat, past Aisha’s office into the larger office
beyond. I hurriedly riffled through the papers on the big teak desk
but found nothing exceptional or interesting.

I left in a
cold sweat, closing the door quietly behind me and crept out
through into the main corridor, my hand clammy against the cold
metal handle. I pulled the outer door shut behind me with a sigh of
relief, turning to find Aisha walking towards me with a colleague,
chatting and laughing and carrying their Starbucks paper cups. She
was as surprised to see me as I was to see her.

‘
Paul. Hi.
What are you doing here?’