The 13th Tablet (41 page)

‘Tell him we have a picture with us,' she whispered.

He was about to ask why, but she seemed so resolute, ‘OK. We don't have the tablet here, but we have a photograph of the inscription with us.'

Wheatley didn't answer. Jack waited for a few moments, then blurted out, ‘Listen man, that's the best I can do for the moment. When my family is safe, and we've all returned to the US, you'll get the real tablet.'

Oberon still didn't answer.

‘I want,' said Jack, ‘
we
want out of this whole business. It was a terrible mistake to get involved any deeper than we already have with this tablet. I just want my mother and sister safe and sound. You won't hear from us ever again.'

Wheatley broke his silence, ‘Tomorrow morning, nine o'clock. Bring the photograph in person.'

‘Where will we meet?'

‘I will text you the meeting place tomorrow morning,' he answered and hung up.

 

Jack immediately looked over Mina's jottings. The coordinates had changed quite a bit during the phone conversation. Oberon had been moving. But where? The first coordinates located the phone near Hat Kamala, a beach they had passed on the way from the airport. Then, the signal moved to another beach, Hat Surin, further north.

‘It doesn't make any sense, Jack!'

‘He's calling from a boat,' Jack answered. ‘That settles it. There's no way of finding him before tomorrow's meeting.'

‘At least we have our bargaining chip now,' said Mina.

‘Yes. But how are we going to produce the photograph?'

‘I'll make a fake one of the Mosul tablet. I know the damn thing by heart,' said Mina.

‘But how?'

‘I'll download a few images from the web and then use software to alter them, and produce a photograph that will look like just like the tablet Oberon stole in the first place.'

‘Wouldn't he remember what it really looked like?' asked Jack.

‘I can't see how. I don't imagine he took the pictures himself. With any luck he's never even looked at them properly,' she replied.

‘OK. What do you need?' asked Jack.

‘Download good image editing software. I'll take it from there.'

An hour later. Kamala beach. A luxury hotel.

Oberon's suite Oberon, wearing his favourite monogrammed bathrobe, was sitting comfortably in a wicker armchair. A beautiful Thai girl was massaging his shoulders. Natasha entered the room accompanied by a man built like a wardrobe.

‘So, did you get a lock on their location?' asked Oberon.

‘Yes sir, but he was using scrambling software.'

‘He's still in Patong, but we don't know exactly where.'

‘Clever Jack. I wish he worked for me,' said Oberon.

‘I'm not sure he'd feel the same way, Sir,' replied Natasha.

‘Everyone has a price,' he replied cuttingly. ‘Never mind. We'll have to wait until tomorrow. Where are our guests?'

‘Ong-Tha delivered them to the yacht. We'll bring them to the beach in the morning. We'll anchor the yacht at a safe distance and have a small motor boat ready. Sir?'

‘Yes Natasha?'

‘I think you should have stayed on the yacht. It's safer,' she said.

‘God I miss my own yacht,' he replied.

‘This one suits our purposes, sir. It's faster and although we won't go unnoticed, it is less conspicuous than your usual yacht.'

‘It's tacky,' he replied stubbornly. ‘I'll stay at the hotel until this matter is over.'

‘Just don't use your mobile phone while you're here,' said Natasha.

‘Fine. You know how to reach me if need be. We'll meet in the restaurant on Patong beach but I want you to be close by, with both women there. I must have line of sight from our table.'

‘With binoculars you mean?' she asked.

‘Yes. That Hillcliff is dangerous. We have underestimated him,' said Oberon.

Natasha thought to herself, ‘I never did,' but said, ‘At least we know who he is now, and he knows we can get to his family at any time.'

‘As long as he doesn't ask for help from Intelligence.'

‘He hasn't before, he probably won't in the future,' she answered.

‘We have our man there anyway. Isn't it amazing what one can do with a little lubricating money?' said Oberon, cheerfully. ‘What I still don't understand is how Hillcliff managed to steal the tablet from inside the vault.'

‘Maybe the same way he got into the New York office unseen. Miss Dawson reckons he used a powerful electro-magnet to wipe out the CCTV data.'

‘Yes, but how did he avoid the two teams at the mansion? They were real enough,' said Oberon.

‘It seems that one of the men from team Beta…' Natasha started to say.

‘Spare me the code names,' snapped Oberon.

‘Sorry, the man guarding the main entrance was sick most of the night and may not have been at his post the entire time.'

‘Sick was he?' Oberon asked white with anger.

‘Hillcliff probably made him drink or eat something without him knowing.'

‘Make sure you put the guard on an indefinite leave of absence.'

‘Done. He'll never be sick again,' answered Natasha.

‘Good. Still, I don't understand how he managed to approach the mansion unnoticed.'

‘The CCTV footage had been wiped clean,' said Natasha.

‘Never mind. Tomorrow, I might just ask him how he did it before you terminate his involvement, as well as that of his family and Miss Osman of course.'

‘Yes Sir.'

‘I'm glad that's all settled,' he said, ‘now Natasha, would you mind leaving us?'

Natasha flashed a deadly look at the girl and left the room.

Same evening. Patong beach restaurant.

Mina was trying to swallow her food, a Thai green curry with chunky king prawns. Jack was going on and on about Thai cooking and its diversity in an attempt to keep her mind off their worries. She tried playing the game, thinking it had to be even harder for Jack, as it was his family that was missing, not hers. They spoke of their shared experiences in Iraq and back home, their successes and failures. But, all the while, they both felt as if they were avoiding the real conversation, made up of muted fears of what awaited them the next day. Mina was beginning to understand Jack's ways, his military stoicism, how he lived in the present. He didn't waste his thoughts or strength on what-ifs. But she was different. Under the circumstances, she couldn't enjoy the food or even Jack's company. Every good thought was marred by anxiety over tomorrow's impending disaster.
What if
things went wrong?
What if
Oberon realised the photograph was not real? She had spoken about this at length with Jack and they had agreed that one frontal photograph of the main inscription would probably do the trick. As she herself had found the tablet and had an intimate knowledge of its measurements and appearance, she had been able to fabricate a good digital fake. She had downloaded numerous high-resolution images of cuneiform tablets from the internet. After copying, cutting and merging them one into the other, she had obtained a final picture, which was very similar to the original tablet in all aspects except one, the most important: it's content. She suspected that Oberon couldn't read cuneiform. All in all the result was pretty good and they had decided to print it out in blackand- white the next morning when the main shops opened.

 

Later that evening, they walked silently along the beach, side by side. Jack had rolled his linen trousers halfway up his calves, and Mina wore a long, orange and red dress, the hem of which trailed in the slow ebb and flow, as they treaded the wet sand. After a while, they returned to their bungalow and sat under the palm tree. They looked out at the shimmering sea and held each other under the star-filled sky. Deep down, they both felt the next day would be like nothing they had ever experienced before.

 

Chapter 32

 

December 26th, 2004. Phuket

 

 

 

Jack woke up at two a.m. He'd had a horrific nightmare. Although in life he was constantly in control, dreams were beyond any man's rule and they often revealed his innermost fears. The last image branded in Jack's mind was that of Wheatley, laughing madly from the edge of a crater, Mina in chains, looking on helplessly as Jack fell backwards into the volcano's roaring magma. He sat up, sweating heavily and trembling at the idea of losing Mina. He stroked her long, dark hair delicately. He got out of bed, turned on his laptop and started the scrambling software. He then turned on his mobile phone, but there were no new messages from Wheatley. He needed a drink. He puts some clothes on and sat down on the edge of the bed to tie his shoelaces. Mina stirred in her sleep.

‘Jack?' Mina asked, ‘what time is it?'

‘Two a.m.,' he answered and kissed her softly, ‘I'm just going out for a drink to wind down. I need to clear my head. I'll be back before you know it.'

‘Any news?' she asked.

‘No, not yet. I think Wheatley's going to wait until the last minute to let me know the meeting place.'

‘That can only mean the meeting will be in Patong. We'd never have time to get anywhere else on the island,' she said.

‘Yeah. I'm pretty sure it's going to be here somewhere. But it doesn't change a damn thing. After all I can't scout the whole town, hoping to find my mother and Jen.'

‘Hmm,' she muttered.

‘OK,' he said as he took the small rucksack containing the laptop with him, ‘I'm off. Don't open the door to anyone. You know the drill.'

‘Night Jack,' Mina said, before falling back sleep.

 

Jack left the bungalow quietly. His mind raging with thoughts, he walked slowly, twisting left and right through narrow alleyways. The only noises in the night were the muffled beat of dance music, the dying laughter of drinking parties and his rucksack brushing past coconut trees. He chose a bar in a slight recess, off the main street. It was less flashy than other places, but wasn't seedy. He was no moralist, but he couldn't stand the way prostitution was flaunted in tourists' faces as if it were something Thai people were supremely proud of, ‘check out our temples, our great culture and our ping-pong banana shows!' He sat down at the bar, and ordered a drink. ‘Poor mum and Jen,' Jack thought to himself ‘their first trip outside the US and I've got them into this dangerous mess'. If only he could get his hands around Wheatley's neck, he'd crush his windpipe and every bone in his body. He asked the barman to hit him again with another shot of Jack Daniels. ‘I'm feeling worse than before,' he thought to himself. Now he was assailed by even darker thoughts, morbid images of Wheatley's twisted face, covered in his own blood and guts. He opened his rucksack and pulled out the laptop. He looked at the JPEG file Mina had produced. She was quite the artist, Jack whistled in admiration. He'd never have thought it was a fake photograph. It looked like the tablet he'd seen himself. He copied the JPEG file onto a small digital USB storage key and called the barman.

‘Are you the owner?' he asked him.

‘No, but I can get her,' the barman answered.

‘Maybe you can help me, I need to print a good quality photograph right now.'

The barman looked at him thinking Jack was a lunatic.

‘At this time? All closed Mister!'

‘I'll pay good money,' said Jack.

‘OK. OK. I call my friend and take care of everything.'

‘Thanks, here's the key. There's only one document on there, it's the image I need to print in high resolution,' said Jack, handing him the USB stick.

The barman asked a girl working there to take care of the bar, and he left. Jack wondered if he really was going to call a friend or just go home and print it out on glossy paper on his own printer. In the end, he didn't care one way or the other. He'd have the photograph in hand before the morning. He suddenly remembered his conversation with Mina half an hour ago. He'd said he wasn't going to scout the whole island to find his mother and sister. Maybe he'd been wrong?