She looked round the room, at the little lamps in the windows, the throw that Thomas’s mother had given him for Christmas, the disks from Kalle’s video game. ‘So it’s political,’ she said. ‘A political kidnapping. You said those were worse.’
‘It’s political,’ Halenius said, ‘but there may be another opening. The second message came to Alvaro Ribeiro’s home phone number. His boyfriend took the call and received a short, concise message, in East African English, that Alvaro had been kidnapped and that he would be released in exchange for forty million dollars.’
Annika gasped. ‘Forty million dollars? That’s … what? In kronor? Quarter of a billion?’
‘Something like that.’
Her hands started to shake again – alien hand syndrome the whole damn time. ‘Oh, fuck …’
‘Annika,’ Halenius said. ‘Calm down.’
‘Quarter of a
billion
?’
‘It looks like there might be a number of different motives behind this kidnapping,’ Halenius went on. ‘There’s the political aspect, as indicated by the video, and then there’s the demand for money, which suggests a standard kidnap for ransom. You’re right about the second being preferable.’
‘But a quarter of a billion? Who’s got that sort of money? I certainly haven’t.’
Kidnap for ransom?
The words triggered something inside her, but what? She pressed her shaking hand to her forehead and searched her memory. An article she had written, an insurance company she had visited during her first year as a correspondent, in upstate New York: they were specialists, K&R Insurance – Kidnap and Ransom Insurance …
She jumped to her feet. ‘Insurance,’ she yelled down the line. ‘The department must have insurance! Insurance that will pay out the money and everything’s sorted!’ She was practically laughing with relief.
‘No,’ Halenius said. ‘The Swedish government has nothing like that. On a point of principle.’
She stopped laughing.
‘Insurance of that sort offers a short-term and dangerous solution. It increases the risks and drives up ransom demands. Besides, the Swedish government doesn’t negotiate with terrorists.’
She could feel the ground opening beneath her and struggled to cling to the doorframe.
‘But,’ she said, ‘what about me? What do I do now? What happens next? Are they going to call me as well, on this number?’
‘That would be an excellent starting point.’
She could feel panic rising and her field of vision shrank. She heard the under-secretary of state’s voice from a long way away.
‘Annika, we need to talk about your situation. I know you don’t want me in your home, but right now I think that would be the most straightforward solution for you.’
She gave him the code to the front door.
* * *
The Frenchman was protesting again. He was shouting relentlessly to our captors, and ordering Catherine to translate his words into Swahili, which she did in a subdued voice with her head lowered. Now he wasn’t just raging about the wound to his head, but also our sanitary predicament. None of us had been allowed to go to the toilet since we were captured two days ago. Urine and excrement were stinging our skin and making our clothes stiff.
The German woman was crying.
I could see irritation and anxiety rising among the guards. They were nervous each time they opened the wooden door of the hut, and would explain quickly and angrily that they didn’t have the authority to let us out. We had to wait for Kiongozi Ujumla, the leader and general, but we had no idea if this was one person or two, but only he/they had the right to make decisions about prisoners, they said. (The prisoners were us,
wafungwa
.)
When I heard a diesel vehicle pull up outside I actually felt relieved. The Frenchman fell silent and listened, along with the rest of us. We could hear muttering.
The sun was going down. It was almost completely dark inside the hut.
It seemed an extremely long time before the door was opened again.
‘This is completely unacceptable!’ the Frenchman cried. ‘You’re treating us like animals! Have you no decency?’
The black silhouette of a short, thick-set man filled the doorway. He was wearing a turban on his head, a short-sleeved shirt, loose trousers and heavy shoes.
His voice was high, like a young boy’s. ‘You no like?’ he said.
The Frenchman (I had stopped using his name: I was trying to dehumanize him, distance myself) replied,
c’est vrai
, he didn’t like our situation.
The short man shouted something we didn’t understand at the guards. When he turned round I saw a large knife, curved like a scimitar, hanging from a strap across his back: a machete.
Fear, which had settled like a lump in my stomach, exploded with a force I had never experienced before. All the guards were armed, so it wasn’t the half-metre blade itself that had provoked my reaction, but something else about the short man, something in the way he moved, or his ice-cold voice. He must be Kiongozi Ujumla.
Two of the guards came into the hut. It was dark and cramped and they trod on us. They went over to the Frenchman, picked him up by the feet and shoulders and carried him to the door. The German woman screamed when the tall one put his foot on her stomach and almost lost his balance on her soft bulk. They carried him out through the doorway and, for the first time, the view through the opening was clear. Fresh air swirled through the hole, and I breathed deeply, blinking up at the light. The sky was red and yellow and ochre, incredibly beautiful.
They stood the Frenchman on the ground immediately in front of the doorway, and his feet were quickly covered with the billowing dust. The opening was so low that we could only see up to his shoulders, even though we were lying on the ground. The short man went and stood in front of the Frenchman in the twilight.
‘No like?’ he asked again.
The Frenchman started to tremble, either from fear or the effort of having to stand upright after lying down for so long. His feet and hands were still bound with cable ties, and he was visibly swaying. ‘This is a crime against international law,’ he began once more, in a shaky voice. ‘What you’re doing is a breach of international rules and regulations.’
The leader and general stood with his legs apart and folded his arms over his chest. ‘You say?’
Catherine, who was lying to my left, pressed closer to me.
‘I am a French member of the European Parliament, the EU,’ the Frenchman said, ‘and I demand that you release me at once from this situation.’
‘EU? Work for EU?’ The short man smiled a broad but stiff smile. ‘You hear?’ he said, turning towards us. ‘Work for EU!’
With an agility that was surprising, considering his bulk, the short man reached back with his arms and, with a sweeping gesture, swung the machete down in a wide arc to the left side of the Frenchman’s groin.
Catherine screamed and hid her face in my armpit. I wished I’d had the sense to hide my face in an armpit, but I looked on wide-eyed as the Frenchman collapsed, like a sawn-off pine-tree, letting out a wheezing sound as the air went out of him.
It was rapidly getting dark outside.
Annika was standing by the window in the living room, staring up at the concrete sky. She was empty inside, just a shell, fumbling for some sort of reality. Part of her still thought the whole thing was a terrible misunderstanding, a communications breakdown in Africa. Soon Thomas would call her mobile, annoyed that his flight hadn’t taken off on time. Another part of her was worrying about little things, such as the fact that she would be alone with Jimmy Halenius again. And what would she say to Thomas’s mother? Who would write about the dead mother in Axelsberg?
Jimmy Halenius was on his way. Perhaps her anxiety could be traced back to the photograph that had been taken outside the Järnet restaurant a few years ago. She had gone for dinner with the under-secretary of state to pump him for information, and as they were leaving the restaurant a paparazzo had snapped a picture as Halenius was demonstrating to Annika the Spanish way of air-kissing. When Bosse from the rival evening paper had confronted her with it, she had been scared. She knew what could happen once the media had got its claws into you.
When the bell rang she hurried into the hall and opened the door. Jimmy Halenius walked in and stumbled over her boots. Annika turned on the ceiling light, kicked her boots towards the bathroom and snatched up her jacket from the floor.
‘So what have you done with Hansel and Hansel?’ she asked. ‘Have you left them at home?’
‘Yep, busy making gingerbread,’ Halenius said, putting down his briefcase. ‘Have you had any calls?’
She hung her jacket on a coat hook and shook her head.
‘Are the children at home?’
‘They’ll be back at five. That’s when I normally leave work. They don’t know I’m at home.’
‘You haven’t told them anything?’
She turned to him. He took his own coat off and reached for a hanger, surprising her. She wouldn’t have thought him the sort of man who used hangers for his outdoor clothes.
She shook her head again.
He stood in front of her, and she was struck by how short he was. Only a few centimetres taller than her, and Thomas called her a pygmy. ‘It’s good that you haven’t said anything so far, but you’re going to have to tell them now. The story will be in the media this evening, tomorrow morning at the latest, and the children have to hear it from you.’
She put her palms over her eyes. They smelt of salt. When she spoke her voice sounded flat. ‘What can I say?’
Her hands dropped to her sides. Halenius was still standing there.
‘Be as vague as possible. Don’t mention any details about where they went missing, how long they’ve been gone, who the others are. You can say that a group of men are holding him captive. That’s what the man in the video says, and that’s what the media will spread.’
‘What was it he said again?’
‘That Fiqh Jihad have taken seven EU delegates hostage as punishment for the decadence of the Western world, more or less.’
‘Fiqh Jihad?’
‘A group nobody knows anything about. We haven’t had any intelligence about them before now. “Fiqh” means the expansion of Islamic law, the interpretation of the Koran and so on, and you probably know what “Jihad” means.’
‘Holy war.’
‘Yes, or just “struggle” or “striving”, but in this case we don’t believe the words themselves have any literal meaning. They’ve been chosen for their symbolic value. There are a couple of things I’d like to go through with you. Can we go in and sit down?’
She felt her cheeks turn red – she really was a hopeless host. ‘Of course,’ she said, gesturing towards the living room. ‘Would you like coffee?’
‘No, thanks.’ He glanced at his watch. ‘The call to the Spaniard’s home number came precisely one hour and nine minutes ago. Just before I left the office I heard that the Frenchman’s family had also received a call, on his wife’s mobile.’
He’d said ‘the office’ rather than ‘the department’.
‘We don’t have a lot of time,’ he added. ‘You could get a call at any moment.’
The room lurched. She glanced at her mobile and gulped. ‘What did they say to the Frenchman’s wife?’
‘She was so shaken she couldn’t remember the amount of the ransom they wanted. Unfortunately she made several fundamental mistakes during the call. Among other things, she promised to pay the ransom at once, no matter how much they wanted.’
‘Isn’t that good?’ Annika said. ‘Being co-operative?’ She sank into the sofa.
He sat beside her and looked into her eyes. ‘We don’t have kidnap insurance,’ he said, ‘but we’ve spent time with the FBI, learning how to handle a hostage situation. Hans and Hans-Erik have more experience of this sort of situation, but we didn’t feel that you and they had made much of a connection. So I was asked to come and talk to you.’
She suddenly felt freezing, pulled her knees up under her chin and wrapped her arms round her shins.
‘We still aren’t entirely sure what sort of kidnapping this is,’ Halenius went on, ‘but if it’s about business rather than politics, then things usually follow a particular pattern. If the ransom is the key demand, you might be looking at a fairly protracted period of negotiations. Do you speak English?’
She cleared her throat. ‘Yes.’
‘What sort? Where have you done most of your talking? Were you an exchange student somewhere, have you worked abroad, have you picked up a particular accent?’
‘Washington correspondent,’ she said.
‘Of course,’ Halenius said.
After all, he had arranged for Thomas to have a research post at the Swedish Embassy while she was there.
‘Speaking the language is incredibly important for anyone negotiating in a kidnapping case,’ he continued. ‘Even minor misunderstandings can have serious consequences. Do you have any recording equipment here?’
She put her feet on the floor. ‘What for? The telephone?’
‘I was in too much of a hurry to find anything in the department.’
‘So I’m supposed to sit here, at home in my living room, and talk over the phone with the kidnappers? Is that the plan?’
‘Have you got a better suggestion?’
She wasn’t the one who’d sent Thomas to Nairobi, or made him get on the flight to Liboi, but she was having to deal with the consequences.
She stood up. ‘I’ve got a recorder for interviews but I don’t use it much. It takes too long to listen to the files afterwards so I prefer to take notes.’ She went into the bedroom, poked about on the top shelf of the linen cupboard, and eventually found the antiquated digital recording device, which could be plugged into the phone and directly into a computer through one of the USB ports.
Halenius whistled and stood up. ‘I haven’t seen one of those for a while. Where did you get it? The Historical Museum?’
‘Funny,’ Annika said, pulling her laptop closer and plugging it in. ‘Now you just have to attach the phone or mobile and it’s ready to go.’
‘Do you want to take the call when it comes?’
She held on to the back of the sofa. ‘You’re sure there’s going to be one?’
‘If there isn’t we’re stuffed. Our only option is to negotiate, and someone has to do it.’