Honour Among Thieves (37 page)

when
AL obaydi ARRIVED back in Paris he collected his bags from the twenty-four-hour
storage depot, then joined the queue for a taxi.

He
gave the driver an address, without saying it was the Iraqi annexe to the
Jordanian Embassy – one of the tips in Miss Saib’s ‘do’s and don’ts’ in Paris.
He hadn’t warned the staff at the embassy that he would be arriving that day.
He wasn’t officially due to take up his appointment for another fortnight, and
he would have gone straight on to Jordan that evening if there had been a
connecting flight. Once he had realised who Mr Riffat was, he knew he would have
to get back to Baghdad as quickly as possible. By reporting direct to the
Foreign Minister, he would have gone through the correct channels. This would
protect his position, while at the same time guaranteeing that the President
knew exactly who was responsible for alerting him to a possible attempt on his
life, and which Ambassador, however closely related, had left several stones
unturned.

The
taxi dropped Al Obaydi outside the annexe to the embassy in Neuilly. He pulled
his cases out of the back without any help from the driver, who remained seated
obstinately behind the wheel of his car.

The
embassy front door opened just an inch, and was then flung wide, and a man of
about forty came running down the steps towards him, followed by two girls and
a younger man.

‘Excellency,
Excellency,’ the first man exclaimed. ‘I am sorry, you must forgive me, we had
no idea you were coming.’ The younger man grabbed the two large cases and the
girls took the remaining three between them.

Al
Obaydi was not surprised to learn that the first man down the steps was Abdul
Kanuk.

‘We
were told you would be arriving in two weeks’ time, Excellency. We thought you
were still in Baghdad. I hope you will not feel we have been discourteous.’

Al
Obaydi made no attempt to interrupt the non-stop flow of sycophancy that came
pouring out, feeling the man must eventually run out of steam. In any case,
Kanuk was not a man to get on the wrong side of on his first day.

‘Would
Your Excellency like a quick tour of our quarters while the maid unpacks your
bags?’

As
there were questions Al Obaydi felt only this man could answer, he took
advantage of the offer. Not only did he get the guided tour from the Chief
Administrator, but he was also subjected to a stream of uninterrupted gossip.
He stopped listening after only a few minutes; he had far more important things
on his mind. He soon longed to be shown to his own room and left alone to be
given a chance to think. The first flight to Jordan was not until the next
morning, and he needed to prepare in his mind how he would present his findings
to the Foreign Minister.

It
was while he was being shown round what would shortly be his office looking out
over a Paris that was turning from the half-light of dusk to the artificial
light of night, that the Administrator said something Al Obaydi didn’t quite
catch. He felt he should have been paying closer attention.

‘I’m
sorry to say that your secretary is on holiday, Excellency. Like the rest of
us, Miss Ahmed wasn’t expecting you for another fortnight. I know she had
planned to be back in Paris a week ahead of you, so that she would have
everything ready by the time you arrived.’

‘It’s
not a problem,’ said Al Obaydi.

‘Of
course, you’ll know Miss Saib, the Deputy Foreign Minister’s secretary?’

‘I
came across Miss Saib when I was in Baghdad,’ replied Al Obaydi.

The
Chief Administrator nodded, and seemed to hesitate for a moment.

‘I
think I’ll have a rest before dinner,’ the Ambassador said, taking advantage of
the temporary halt in an otherwise unending flow.

‘I’ll
have something sent up to your room, Excellency. Would eight suit you?’

‘Thank
you,’ said Al Obaydi, in an attempt to put an end to the conversation.

‘Shall
I place your passport and tickets in the safe, as I always did for the previous
Ambassador?’

‘A
good idea,’ said Al Obaydi, delighted to have at last found a way of getting
rid of the Chief Administrator.

Scott
put the phone down and turned to face Dexter Hutchins, who was leaning back in
the large leather chair at his desk, his hands clasped behind his head and a
questioning look on his face.

‘So
where are they?’ asked Dexter.

‘Kratz
wouldn’t give me the exact location, for obvious reasons, but at his current
rate of progress he feels confident they’ll reach the Jordanian border within
the next three days.’

‘Then
let’s pray that the Iraqi Ministry of Industry is as inefficient as our experts
keep telling us it is. If so, the advantage should be with us for at least a
few more days. After all, we did move the moment sanctions were lifted, and
until you showed up in Kalmar, Pedersson hadn’t heard a peep out of anyone for
the past two years.’

‘I
agree. But I worry that Pedersson might be the one weak link in Kratz’s chain.’

‘If
you’re going to take these sorts of risks, no plan can ever be absolutely
watertight,’ said Dexter.

Scott
nodded.

‘And
if Kratz is less than three days from the border, you’ll have to catch a flight
for Amman on Monday night, assuming Mr O’Reilly has finished his signatures by
then.’

‘I
don’t think that’s a problem any longer,’ said Scott.

‘Why?
He still had a lot of names to copy when I last looked at the parchment.’

‘It
can’t be that many,’ said Scott, ‘because Mr Mendelssohn flew in from
Washington this morning in order to pass his judgement, and that seems to be
the only opinion Bill is interested in.’

‘Then
let’s go and see for ourselves,’ said Dexter as he swung himself up out of his
chair.

As
they left the office and made their way down the corridor, Dexter asked, ‘And
how’s Bertha’s bible coming along? I turned a few pages of the introduction
this morning and couldn’t begin to get a grasp of why the bulbs turn from red
to green.’

‘Only
one man knows Madame Bertha more intimately than I do, and at this moment he’s
pining away in Scandinavia,’ said Scott as they climbed the stone steps to
Dollar Bill’s private room.

‘I
also hear that Charles has designed a special pair of trousers for you,’ Dexter
said.

‘And
they’re a perfect fit,’ replied Scott with a smile.

As
they reached the top of the steps, Dexter was about to barge in when Scott put
an arm on his shoulder.

‘Perhaps
we should knock? He might be
...
’

‘Next
you’ll be wanting me to call him “sir”.’

Scott
grinned as Dexter knocked quietly, and when there was no reply, eased the door
open. He crept in to see Mendelssohn stooping over the parchment, magnifying
glass in hand.

‘Benjamin
Franklin, John Morton and George Clymer,’ muttered the Conservator.

‘I
had a lot of trouble with Clymer,’ said Dollar Bill, who was looking out of the
window over the bay. ‘It was the damn man’s squiggles, which I had to complete
in one flow. You’ll find a couple of hundred of them in the waste-paper
basket.’

‘May
we approach the bench?’ asked Dexter. Dollar Bill turned and waved them in.

‘Good
afternoon, Mr Mendelssohn. I’m Dexter Hutchins, Deputy Director of the CIA.’

‘Could
you possibly be anything else?’ asked Dollar Bill.

Dexter
ignored the comment and asked Mendelssohn, ‘What’s your judgement, sir?’

Dollar
Bill continued to stare out of the window.

‘It’s
every bit as good as the copy we currently have on display at the National
Archives.’

‘You
are most generous, sir,’ said Dollar Bill, who turned round to face them.

‘But
I don’t understand why you have spelt the word ‘British” correctly^ and not
with two ts as it was on the original,’ said Mendelssohn, returning his
attention to the document.

‘There
are two reasons for that,’ said Dollar Bill as six suspicious eyes stared back
at him. ‘First, if the exchange is carried out successfully, Saddam will not be
able to claim he still has his hands on the original.’

‘Clever,’
said Scott.

‘And
second?’ asked Dexter, who remained suspicious of the little Irishman’s
motives.

‘It
will stop the Professor from bringing back this copy and trying to pass it off
as the original.’

Scott
laughed. ‘You always think like a criminal,’ he said.

‘And
you’d better be thinking like one yourself over the next few days, if you’re
going to get the better of Saddam Hussein,’ said Dollar Bill as Charles entered
the room, carrying a pint of Guinness on a silver tray.

Dollar
Bill thanked Charles, removed his reward from the tray and walked to the far
side of the room before taking the first sip.

‘May
I ask...?’ began Scott.

‘I
once spilt the blessed nectar all over a hundred-dollar etching that I had
spent some three months preparing.’

‘So
what did you do then?’ asked Scott.

‘I
fear that I settled for second best, which caused me to end up in the slammer
for another five years.’ Even Dexter joined in the laughter. ‘However, on this
occasion I raise my glass to Matthew Thornton, the final signatory on the
document. I wish him good health wherever he is, despite the damn man’s ts.’

‘So,
am I able to take the masterpiece away now?’ asked Scott.

‘Not
yet, young man,’ said Dollar Bill. ‘I fear you must suffer another evening of
my company,’ he added before placing his drink on the window ledge and
returning to the document. ‘You see, the one problem I have been fighting is
time. In Mr Mendelssohn’s judgement, the parchment has an 1830s feel about it.
Am I right, sir?’

The
Conservator nodded, and raised his arms as if apologising for daring to mention
such a slight blemish.

‘So
what can be done about that?’ asked Dexter Hutchins.

Dollar
Bill flicked on a switch and the Xenon lamps above his desk shone down on the
parchment and filled the room with light, making it appear like a film set.

‘By
nine o’clock tomorrow morning the parchment will be nearer 1776. Even if,
because you have failed to give me enough time, I miss perfection by a few
years, I remain confident that there’ll be no one in Iraq who’ll be able to
tell the difference, unless they are in possession of a Carbon 14 dating
machine, and know how to use it.’

‘Then
we can only hope that the original hasn’t already been destroyed,’ said Dexter
Hutchins.

‘Not
a chance,’ said Scott.

‘How
can you be so confident?’ asked Dexter.

‘The
day Saddam destroys that parchment, he will want the whole world to witness it.
Of that I’m sure.’

‘Then,
I’m thinking a toast might be in order,’ said the Irishman. ‘That is, with my
gracious host’s permission.’

‘A
toast, Bill?’ said the Deputy Director, sounding surprised. ‘Who do you have in
mind?’ he asked suspiciously.

‘To
Hannah,’ said the little Irishman, ‘wherever she may be.’

‘How
did you know?’ asked Scott. ‘I’ve never mentioned her name.’

‘No
need to, when you write it on everything from the backs of envelopes to
steaming windows. She must be a rery special lady, Professor.’ He raised his
glass and repeated the words, ‘To Hannah.’

The
Chief Administrator sat and waited patiently until the maid had removed the
Ambassador’s dinner tray. He then closed his door at the other end of the
corridor.

He
waited for another two hours, until he felt certain all the embassy staff had
gone to bed. Confident he would be the only one left awake, he crept back down
to his office and looked up a telephone number in Geneva. He dialled the code
slowly and deliberately. It rang for a long time before it was eventually
answered.

‘I
need to speak to the Ambassador,’ he whispered.

‘His
Excellency retired to bed some time ago,’ said a voice. ‘You’ll have to call
back in the morning.’

‘Wake
him. Tell him it’s Abdul Kanuk in Paris.’

‘If
you insist.’

‘I
do insist.’

The
Chief Administrator waited for some time before a sleepy voice eventually came
on the line.

‘This
had better be good, Abdul.’

‘Al
Obaydi has arrived in Paris unannounced, and two weeks before he was expected.’

‘You
woke me in the middle of the night to tell me this?’

‘But
he didn’t come direct from Baghdad, Excellency. He made a slight detour.’

‘How
can you be so sure?’ said the voice, sounding a little more awake.

‘Because
I am in possession of his passport.’

‘But
he’s on holiday, you fool.’

‘I
know. But why spend the day in a city not known for attracting tourists?’