Rotten Gods (13 page)

The cell door opens and the three men leave. When they have gone she picks herself up off the floor and wipes her face, aching in a dozen places, uncaring of the crowd who regather at the doorway.

Day 2, 11:00

Faruq Nabighah has been at work since before dawn, yet down here sun and moon are irrelevant. The roar of the tunnel boring machine is continuous. He is a big man, with long, shaggy hair over his neck and broad shoulders. His most noticeable feature, however, is a set of porcelain-white false teeth, legacy of a
blasting accident as a young man that left him with a broken jaw and a mouthful of fragmented molars and incisors. A full beard hides the scar that stretches down from his lower lip and across his chin. Even now he remembers the six months he needed to conquer his new fear of the underground. Months when he trembled with each step into that nether region of artificial light and earthy, unfamiliar scents.

That, however, was long ago, and now he is more at home down here than on any city street. He turns to Kamal.

‘Go, get the geo reports. Run.'

Faruq watches him move — good workers are hard to find, and just when he has them trained to perfection, they leave, worn down by the dust and the noise. In the heavy engineering industry, even in these tough times, there is still work in Dubai and the wider Emirates. The days of wealthy Sheikhs vying with each other to perform miracles are over, but there are still road tunnels and underground walkways to build. Faruq is a rich man. He has an apartment that overlooks al-Mamzar beach, and a red car with an Italian name, yet still he loves his work, drilling tunnels so perfect he could, if he chose, start at either end, two kilometres apart, and join them up to within a metre. This is the environment he thrives on; his office and his passion.

Faruq walks to the cage, opens the door and steps inside, pressing a buzzer on a brushed aluminium console. The door rattles closed, and moments later he hears the whine of an electric motor. The cage hurtles up towards the surface. The sun is bright and hot as he steps out. He slips a pair of dark sunglasses from his pocket, walking towards the transportable shed that makes up his office.

Almost there, he stops and squints at a pair of unfamiliar cars that sit in the dusty car park, both neat little Nissan hybrids, both
new, and both dark silver. He crinkles his nose and sniffs the air like an animal sensing … not danger, but something unusual that might threaten his routine.

Continuing to walk, he sees men waiting, and the smell of officialdom becomes as strong as that of offal. Faruq dislikes rules and red tape. They cost money and time, and he values both.

The group walks towards him, led by a tall man with hair greying at the sides. ‘My name is Abdullah bin al-Rhoumi, may peace be upon you.'

 

They fill the site office to capacity, the air-conditioner rattling away on the wall. For a minute or two, as custom dictates, they make conversation, including polite inquiry as to the health of each man.

Faruq has heard of Abdullah, for his name features occasionally in the
al-Bayan
newspaper he reads each day. ‘I am honoured by your visit,' he says at last, ‘yet remain at a loss as to how I can help you.'

The visitor unrolls a chart on the desk. ‘This is the Rabi al-Salah Centre near the port. You do, of course, know what has happened there?'

Faruq glances at his watch. ‘God has blessed me with sufficient intelligence to grasp the affairs of the world.'

‘We want to dig a tunnel from here, near the Interchange Number Seven, to beneath the centre itself. How do you assess the feasibility of such a plan?'

Faruq studies the map for a full minute. The work would entail burrowing under built-up streets and even industrial sites. Dredging up what he knows of the area he leans back in his chair, understanding at last why they have come to see him. ‘Everything is possible, but how do you intend to dig the tunnel?'

‘That is a question I will address to you. How will
you
dig the tunnel?'

‘No, not me. Impossible. It would take several days just to move my machines and equipment. By the time it is done your crisis will be over.'

‘Can you move your operation in twelve hours?'

Faruq mulls through the machinery, the consumables, the portable toilets, and the low loaders necessary. Then he considers the distance from here to the new site. The region of greater Dubai exists in his head as a grid of one-kilometre squares. Eighteen kilometres as the crow flies, he calculates. ‘No. I am sorry. Perhaps seventy-two hours if we work like ants … But this is academic. I am committed to a project. We are running on time. I will not abort it — a contract is my law, and these days they are hard to come by.'

Again the tall man seems not to have heard this last comment, instead mumbling to himself. ‘Seventy-two hours. That is too long, and we could move heavy gear only at night. Many eyes will be watching.'

Faruq folds his arms. ‘I will not do it. There is no use in discussing the logistics.'

‘You
have
to do it.'

‘I will not.' Standing, he brushes down the crease in his cotton work trousers. ‘Thank you, gentlemen, but I have work to do.'

Still Abdullah makes no effort to move, but produces a cell phone and punches a few buttons. ‘This is Abdullah bin al-Rhoumi. Head of GDOIS. Put me through to Sheikh Mohammed al-Rashid, Vice President of the UAE and Prime Minister of Dubai.'

Faruq sits down, feeling like a gambler who is about to lose to a card cheat. His visitor, it seems, has contacts.

‘Hello. Abdullah here. It is necessary to requisition the assets of a company. Yes; yes; good.' He puts the phone down and
turns to the young Frenchman beside him. ‘We can take all the machinery. You have researched some men who can direct the work for us, haven't you, Léon?'

‘Certainly — Pierre Dauphin, in Paris, and James Lloyd in London. Both are happy to fly across at a moment's notice.'

Faruq glares at the young man, bristling at his obscene good looks and obvious arrogance. He explodes with anger. ‘You think I would let Dauphin place one filthy hand on my TBM? Or James Lloyd, the philanderer? Never, may God curse them both. Neither man could ever do what you want — they are like bulls rushing in and making noise and blasting when they do not have to blast. They do not know the soils here in Dubai and I will not let them near al-Moler. You will have to kill me first.'

The Frenchman continues as if he has not heard. ‘Dauphin said he could get the gear on site and ready to roll in eighteen hours.'

Faruq scowls. ‘I could do it in sixteen if I had to …'

Abdullah smiles, seizing the chance he has orchestrated. ‘Then
you
will need to do it for us. You will be paid, of course. Paid well.'

Gritting his teeth, Faruq places both hairy arms on the table, callused palms open. ‘I would want a thirty per cent bonus over my usual rates — I will have to placate my client, and pay the men overtime.'

‘That is acceptable. I will have someone make contact, and you can work out the financial details with them.'

Faruq heaves a sigh in his throat and leans over the map, eyebrows beetling as he studies it. ‘This tunnel, what is the point? We cannot bore our way up through the floor of your conference room. That is ludicrous.'

‘No. There is a bunker, twenty metres beneath Rabi al-Salah, designed to shelter the leaders of the world from war and,' Abdullah
clears his throat, ‘terrorist action. Even from a nuclear blast. That is where we must drill to. The most practical access point.'

‘Then we should start the tunnel here, at the base of the hill of Ut-la. You know the one? It has many satellite dishes on the top, beside the new housing development?'

Abdullah nods. ‘I know it.'

‘The hill will shield us from view and the subsoil is sand all the way to the centre. We will be able to drill very quickly — I realise that you are ignorant of the mechanics of this business, but al-Moler is a double-shielded machine, and therefore fast. Yet because we are passing under an urban area it is important that there is no surface subsidence. Our system uses the latest bentonite slurry techniques to negate such problems.'

‘The details we leave to you, but if you need anything, just pick up the phone and ask.'

Faruq points at the site. ‘This is public land. Anyone could wander in.'

‘No longer. We'll have it fenced off by dusk.'

‘Good. Please leave now, I have many things to do.'

‘Sixteen hours, are you sure?'

Faruq grins so that his false teeth shine white in the fluorescent light. ‘I am a man of my word. By dawn tomorrow al-Moler, the mole, will be diving below the earth, eating soil like the subterranean beast she is.'

Even as the car doors slam, Faruq presses a switch on the intercom set.

‘Hello, Rahul?'

‘Yes.'

‘Call the men in and get al-Moler out of the tunnel.'

Silence, then: ‘Truly? But that will cause delays, cost much time. I mean no disrespect in asking, but why?'

‘We have another job to do — one week. It is worth it, trust me.'

His next act is to pick up the phone. Other men need to be mobilised, some of them outside contractors: truck drivers, road escort services. The TBM is carried on a custom-built low loader, but there are many other items to be moved: a site office, earthmoving machinery. Within an hour, the calls are made, the orders issued. Now Faruq steps outside. The first task is the safe loading of al-Moler.

 

With a flash of his security card, Simon moves through the gate and into the staff cafeteria. It is past noon and the tables are full. The room smells of spicy meat and starchy rice.

Buying a meal, he takes the plate back to a table, its peeling laminex surface in need of hot water and detergent. The meat is fatty and stringy — old mutton or goat — and the rice grains congealed as if with glue. Even so, he eats, watching and listening to everyone who comes and goes, hearing snatches of conversation, all of it innocuous, mundane, most of it from an adjacent table where four men are eating together, obvious friends.

For countless hours, Simon has walked the corridors, listened outside doors and passed in and out of the security area, using his British Airways ID like a skeleton key, surprised at how invisible it is possible to become when you hide behind an official badge. For an hour, perhaps two, he slept on a toilet seat in the men's bathroom, woken by a pair of cleaners whose loud banter announced their arrival.

The group of diners beside him laugh together. The moon-faced individual in the centre appears to be the butt of some teasing, and Simon chews slowly, listening to the theatrical whine
of a thinner man, who uses widened eyes and head lolling to accentuate his words. ‘So now,' he says, ‘our friend Mu'ayyad is boastful that he is rich, merely for making certain that one item of luggage went on the carousel without incident.'

Simon stops chewing. Turns in time to see Mu'ayyad's frown of annoyance, then a finger held lightly over his lips.

‘I wish they had asked me,' the other says, ignoring the warning. ‘I spent last month's wages by yesterday.'

Strange things happen at airports, Simon is well aware, much of it related to the importation of drugs. Baggage handlers of all nationalities are involved in the trade. He is interested enough, however, after the meal, to follow the group from the cafeteria and outside. Here they disperse, moving off to different parts of the terminal. Mu'ayyad and two others walk through a door near the carousels.

Simon pushes through before the lock clicks shut. The group turns and looks at him, but without real interest. Airports, even regional ones, are big places with many employees, often from different nations.

As he walks through the area, not yet convinced that the conversation he heard is of interest, he approaches Mu'ayyad, who has just returned to work, lifting bags onto a trolley. ‘Assalam alaikum,' he greets the man. ‘I'm Simon Thompson, from British Airways. We've been sent over to see how you chaps do things over here. Help you out with efficiency … you know what bosses are like.' He smiles, hoping to develop a feeling of camaraderie.

The man continues his task, not making eye contact. ‘I'm sorry. You will have to speak to my supervisor.'

Without missing a beat, Simon follows up on what he heard in the cafeteria. ‘The other men were telling me that you had some good luck last week, that you made some easy money.'

Mu'ayyad's eyes focus on his, wide and suspicious. ‘Are you police? Security?'

‘Security? Hah. No, I am just crew. I do what I am told like everyone else.'

The man stops working, a scowl deepening across his face, eyes narrowing. ‘There is no money, now why don't you leave me alone, eh? I do not like being questioned.'

The man is hiding something, Simon is sure. ‘Now come, talk to me. I am curious, and no harm will come from the telling. What happened last week that helped make you some money?'

‘Neek rasi,' the man hisses.

Simon is familiar with the insult, translating into English as, literally, fuck my skull. ‘You have a way with words, but you have not yet answered my question.'

‘Move on — foreskin of a goat — or I will call my friends and we will help you to move on.'

Simon stops, deflated, turning to the sound of footsteps. Another baggage handler, yet not one who was in the cafeteria, walks towards them.

‘Mu'ayyad,' he says, ‘Abu Sherid says that we must …'

Seeing Simon, he stops. He too, is a tall man, and thin, with a bony nose and cheeks. A patterned shemagh hangs loosely over his shoulders, clashing with his workmanlike overalls, but this is not what catches Simon's attention. Around his neck he wears a chain, and nestled in the hair of his chest is a charm — a St George's cross. Simon has seen it before — threaded onto Hannah's charm bracelet. He remembers the day he made the purchase, at a stall on the Campo de Fiori markets in Rome.