Disorder (Sam Keddie thriller series Book 1) (20 page)

Chapter 53

Marrakesh, Morocco 

‘I don’t understand,’ said Sam.

   They were back in the room with Eleanor, to whom Maalouf had briefly repeated the explanation he’d given Sam in the basement cell, of the assassin’s attempt on their lives in the midst of the protest. Sam’s mind was reeling with questions.

   ‘How did you know he was following us, let alone trying to kill us?’ he asked

   Maalouf shrugged. ‘We were following you.’

   Of course, thought Sam. After Kamal had spoken to them in the medina that first time, explaining his surveillance of them as concern for his old friend’s daughter, Sam hadn’t expected – or bothered to look for – any further tails. How would they have known there were other men watching them?

   Eleanor, who’d seen the pale look on Sam’s face on his return, was subdued, taking a back seat as more and more confusing and distressing information was revealed.

   ‘We’d seen the man pursue you in his car to the medina that morning, then watched him as he followed you into the crowd. We knew that he wasn’t here to protest. He was not a Berber and he was also moving with too much…’  Maalouf seemed to struggle looking for the right word.

   ‘Intent?’ suggested Eleanor flatly.

   Maalouf nodded. ‘We may have been suspicious of your actions, but we didn’t want you killed. The repercussions of the daughter of a British Cabinet minister being murdered in Marrakesh would have been a headache to resolve.’

   Eleanor laughed dryly, Maalouf’s cold analysis of their near-miss with an assassin clearly adding to the absurdity of the situation they found themselves in.

   ‘Given what you have said about the attempts made on your life in Britain,’ said Maalouf, ‘we must conclude that this man – a Tunisian, it turns out – was hired by the British Government, or select elements within it, to kill you.’

   Eleanor let out an enormous breath, the air escaping with an audible tremor. Suddenly, it had been spelt out. Even out here, in North Africa, they were still trying to kill them.

   ‘You have rattled them,’ said Maalouf, ‘which means you are close to the truth.’

   Sam, who had been struggling with the idea of helping – for this was clearly what Maalouf required of them – a man who could oversee a brutal torture like the one that had just been meted out in the basement of the very building they were sitting in, now realised that they had little choice. Maalouf was their new ally. They had to work with him. But the prospect revolted Sam.

   It was as if Maalouf could read his mind. ‘You do not approve, do you?’

   Sam shook his head.

   ‘What you saw in the basement is what your Government has frequently asked other countries to do on your behalf since 9/11 and your invasion of Iraq. You may choose to be disgusted, but you are complicit.’

   He leaned across the table, his bulk blocking some of the feeble light coming through the window. ‘The march going on today – I imagine you think I’d like to crush them. This is not true. The people out there have a right to justice. One of their own was murdered. Unfortunately the police have mishandled this by arresting the wrong man. So now we have a bigger problem. The Berbers mistrust us. The next man we arrest must be the right one.’ He paused, clearing his throat again. ‘For now we must contain their anger – but with restraint.’

  He leaned back in his chair, stretching out his burly arms to reveal damp patches under his armpits.

   Sam closed his eyes. He heard the ceiling fan’s rattle, another far-off cry for justice from the marchers.

   He didn’t buy Maalouf’s talk of the crowd’s legitimacy. He suspected the man would, if he had the chance, pound every last protestor into the ground. This wasn’t about justice, but about maintaining order.

   ‘OK,’ said Eleanor.

   Sam looked at her. She nodded back. She’d clearly been on her own journey, weighing up the moral difficulties of working with Maalouf, and had come out the same place as Sam.

   ‘So, if you’re right,’ she said, ‘and we are close, how do we finish this?’

   Maalouf cleared his throat again. ‘Fingerprints.’

Chapter 54

Marrakesh, Morocco 

Maalouf held up a finger, pausing proceedings, and made a quick phone call. A moment later, the door opened and a small, slight man with bulging eyes and pock-marked skin entered the room. He hastily pulled up a chair and sat down next to Maalouf, letting out a noisy sigh, as if this meeting were something he was trying to cram into an already busy day.

   ‘This is Badaoui,’ said Maalouf.

   The smaller man nodded at Sam and Eleanor.

   There then followed a brief discussion between Maalouf and Badaoui in Arabic, during which it was clear the larger man was bringing his colleague up to speed.

   The conversation was over and Badaoui opened a manila file on the table before them and began lifting out various documents. The first was a colour photograph of the knife. There was a sharp intake of breath from Eleanor when she saw the weapon. Sam leaned in to examine the picture and saw immediately why Eleanor had reacted the way she had. The blade, a long, curved piece of tapering metal, was almost entirely covered in blood.

   Sam swallowed hard. Above the blade, the dark handle appeared to be made of hardwood. It was smooth and bulged at the far end where it was clad in engraved silverwork. Sam stared hard at the wood, imagining the secrets its surface contained. Who had last used it?

   He turned to see Eleanor giving the photo the same scrutiny, a frown now replacing the initial horror she’d expressed.

   ‘The fingerprints are good,’ said Badaoui, his voice deep, with a hint of a French accent. ‘We just need to find a match.’

   ‘What do we know about the attendees at the dinner that night?’ asked Maalouf.

   Badaoui sifted through the documents he’d pulled from the file and placed a sheet typed with what appeared to be a list of names in Arabic over the photo of the knife. He and Maalouf then studied the list. They weren’t quite putting their arms in front of the list, as a child might to avoid someone copying their work, but there was a sense that this part of the investigation was for their eyes only.

   Badaoui muttered something to Maalouf. The large man grunted in response and then looked up.

   ‘It seems your Prime Minister is in the clear,’ he said.

   ‘Philip Stirling could not have killed her,’ said Badaoui hastily, as if Maalouf was stealing his thunder. ‘The Prime Minister was in the restaurant all evening.’

   ‘What about the other guests?’ asked Eleanor, her voice anxious. ‘Did any of them leave?’

   Badaoui sighed. ‘All evening there were people coming in and out. It was an informal dinner and the business of Government – on both sides – continued all night. People got up to answer their phones or go outside into the alleyway to have mini meetings. There were numerous small details to be tied up after the intense discussions of the last few days –.’

   At this point, Maalouf interrupted Badaoui with a few short, terse words in Arabic.

   ‘Can we look at the list?’ asked Sam, at the same time wondering why Maalouf had cut short Badaoui so irately. ‘See if any of the names seem significant?’

   Badaoui looked at Maalouf, who had paused to consider this request, rubbing his jaw with one of his outsized hands. The larger man nodded.

   Badaoui reached into his file and pulled out a sheet of paper – another list, this one in English – then placed it on the table before Sam and Eleanor, who began poring over the names. Maalouf then gestured to Badaoui and the two men got up, went over to the window and began a conversation in hushed tones.

   Sam watched the two men for a moment, wondering what they could be discussing. In all likelihood, it was the amount of information that could be revealed to two British nationals. What was happening, Sam suspected, was as unusual for the Moroccans as it was for them.

   ‘God,’ whispered Eleanor suddenly, ‘there’s a blast from the past.’

   ‘Who?’ said Sam.

   ‘Him,’ she said, her finger pointing to a name on the list.

   ‘Aidan Stirling,’ said Sam.

   ‘You remember those family holidays I mentioned when we were in that restaurant?’

   Sam nodded, happy to give Eleanor something else to think about.

   ‘Well in addition to Charlotte Stirling hitting the bottle in spectacular fashion, the other strong memory I have is of Aidan Stirling. We had about three, maybe four, holidays with them in Cornwall before my Mum cracked and said enough was enough – she and Charlotte didn’t really get on.’

   Eleanor’s eyes drifted as she was momentarily lost in recollection.

   ‘I quite enjoyed the holidays. A big gang of families took cottages in the same village, so it was quite good fun. But the first year was different. It was just us and them, so Aidan and I were the only children. It was a typical British summer, pissing down non-stop. I must have been about 15 then, Aidan around five, and we were kind of flung together. We used to play games to keep the boredom at bay. I liked him. The thing was, he seemed overjoyed, as if no-one had ever given him that kind of attention before. Poor guy, on the day we left, he got incredibly upset. It was as if I was leaving him forever – when all I was doing was going home. I remember Philip and Charlotte Stirling had to hold him back while we got in the car. Otherwise he’d have jumped in and come home with us.’

   ‘Clearly not a fan of his own family,’ said Sam, who felt an instant kinship with Aidan Stirling. ‘What was he doing at the dinner?’

   ‘It was a celebration to which our Prime Minister had invited both his family and Philip Stirling’s,’ said Maalouf, who had clearly overheard their conversation – or certainly the latter part of it. ‘Should we view him as a suspect?’

   Eleanor took a sharp intake of breath, suggesting horror that she could have fingered someone so easily in Maalouf’s eyes.

   ‘For now,’ said Sam, keen to diffuse her concern, ‘surely everyone on this list, except Stirling, is a suspect until proven otherwise.’

   Badaoui suddenly clapped his hands together. ‘The table at the ministry!’ he cried.

   For once, Eleanor, Sam and Maalouf were united in their expressions, all turning to Badaoui with bewildered looks.

   ‘Most of the people at the restaurant that night also came to the ministry for the final meeting,’ said Badaoui, his voice filled with excitement. ‘The table they sat at will be covered in their fingerprints.’

   ‘But hasn’t the table been used since – or cleaned?’ asked Maalouf.

   ‘It has been used once,’ said Badaoui. ‘A short meeting – a formality more than anything – to welcome the new Iranian consul. But it was only a handful of people and it has not been used since. Of course the room has been cleaned. How well, who knows? It is certainly worth a try. We have a table plan which will give us the exact seating position of all the British delegates. If we can retrieve any fingerprints from its surface, we can then compare them with those on the murder weapon.’

   Maalouf looked unconvinced, but nodded at Badaoui. ‘Get on to it now. We need answers. Quickly.’

   As he watched Badaoui rush from the room, Sam felt oddly relieved that Maalouf was actively pursuing this. It would have been only too easy to nail Scott at this point – to implicate a man who was already dead, someone who could easily be disowned by the country he’d once served.

   He glanced at Eleanor – saw her eyes sweeping the table’s surface, her brain clearly working through a series of similar outcomes – and hoped to God that her father, who she already felt had abandoned her, wasn’t about to be destroyed in the cruellest way imaginable.

Chapter 55

Marrakesh, Morocco 

Sunlight was now pouring through the dust-covered window panes. The weak ceiling fan did little to prevent the air slowly cooking, bringing the room’s stale aroma to life. Sam could smell Maalouf’s body odour, cigarette smoke and a distant hint of acrid cleaning fluid. God knows what it had been used to clean up.

   Maalouf had moved to the window and was staring through the dusty panes into the courtyard below. He clearly had no intention of speaking, at least for now. The fan continued to circle noisily, never quite managing to drown out the muted din of the protestors.

   ‘Can I get some water?’ asked Eleanor.

   Maalouf turned in her direction but his response was interrupted by his mobile phone ringing. He answered with a grunt.

   Sam and Eleanor watched Maalouf’s face slowly lose colour as he listened to the voice at the other end, a breathless avalanche of Arabic loud enough for them to hear. The large man intermittently muttered a few words, catching brief moments in the rant to respond. Seconds later he had a chance to speak at greater length and used it to bark down the phone. Ending the call, he then dragged a chair to the wall. 

   Maalouf had positioned himself beneath the solitary window and now stood, the chair groaning beneath him, as he took in the view. When he got down moments later, his face was ashen.

   ‘I must go,’ he said.

   He then stormed from the room, the door slamming behind him.