The Intern Affair (70 page)

“Yes.  As soon as we get closer to the ground, we’ll see if we can land on any of them.” His voice was steady and seemingly unaffected by what was happening. 

Talya, on the other hand, couldn’t stop shaking. Samir smiled and turned his face to her. 

How on earth could the man crack a smile at a time like this?

“I will not let this plane take us down to our death. Believe me,
God
will not allow it to happen.  We’re too close to accomplishing our mission.”

“Right now, Samir, I’m too scared to even think of our mission. I don’t want to die like this.”

“You won’t. You’ll see. We had to expect something like this to happen.  It would have been too obvious to have us killed in
Bamako
, but this way no explanation would have been needed.”

“You mean someone tampered with the plane?”

“Oh yes. It’s very easy to do. But fortunately for us, it’s very easy to fix once we get on the ground.”

“But do we have any spare oil to replace what we’ve lost? That is if we make it to earth in one piece.”

“Yes
, we do
.
Since
I often fly where only fuel is available I have a little secret cache in the plane’s belly for just that purpose.”

“Should I wake
Christian
?”

“No. Cats don’t like this sort of disturbance.”

Talya had to laugh at this one. 

Once they were below the clouds, Samir lowered the gear, even though there was no road, tracks, or town in sight.

A few, very long minutes later however, Talya
saw a road stretch
across flat lands to the right of the plane. It was a dirt track, which she presumed led to Siguiri farther south.

“Okay, Princess. Now this is going to be rough, so put your head between your knees and your hands folded across the nape of your neck. The belt will stretch with you and lock itself once you’ve reached the proper position.”

“But, I
—
”

“This is no time to argue; just do it!” 

Talya did as he asked, and her body became one with the seat under her. 

The descent, which was a bit faster than her stomach had expected, was not too bad, but the touch down felt like she was a bouncing ball in the hands of a mad basketball player. 

When they came to a screeching halt in a cloud of dust, the first thing they heard was a series of well chosen swear words from their cat, which had been
disturbed!
  He knelt at the cockpit’s door and looked up at Samir with an astonished look on his face. “Did I miss something during the briefing this morning? Or has
Conakry
changed that much since I’ve last landed there?” He switched his bewildered gaze to the cloud of dust settling slowly over the windshield. 

Samir and Talya had turned to face him and they started laughing nervously.
Christian
’s blond curls had also been
disturbed!
  He had an ‘
accroche-coeur
’ in the middle of his forehead that accented his baby-face’s features, making him look like a doll at the shooting gallery. 

“No,
Christian,
you didn’t miss anything,” Samir replied, still chuckling while unlocking his safety belt, “and I am terribly sorry for
disturbing
your restful sleep but I decided that our plane needed some extra oil to get us to Conakry.”

“What the heck happened? And where are we?”
Christian
was still totally bewildered.

Talya was the one who answered those questions while Samir made his way out of the aircraft to inspect the landing gear and damages—if any—before he would start with the repairs.

Christian
got to his feet, regaining some of his self-control. “Well, I’m glad we’re alive, for one thing. But we need to contact
Conakry
because we won’t be landing in time and they’re liable to call the whole thing off, or at least delay the proceedings for twenty four hours, if we don’t show up on time.”

“We can contact the tower as soon as we cross the Fouta-Djalon, and that should be in four hours,” Samir shouted from outside the plane where his companions joined him to get a bit of fresh, albeit dusty, morning air into their lungs.

“So h
ow does it look?”
Christian
asked when Samir seemed to have completed his examination of the plane.

“Not too bad really; we’ll have to fly at low elevation because I won’t be able to get the gear back into the belly—one of the latching brackets from the undercarriage has snapped when we landed.  Other than that, and perhaps another rough landing in
Conakry
, we should be okay.”

“Will we be able to fly over the
Fouta-Djalon
Mountains
, or at what altitude will we have to fly?”

“Don’t worry,
Christian,
we’ll cross the mountains just fine.  Although I can’t guarantee you a smooth ride, but we’ll make it.”

“You mean I won’t be able to sleep?”

“Sorry. But I don’t think you’ll be able to even sit still for ten minutes on this run.”

“Okay, I get it. This is just one of Talya’s ideas,”
Christian
said, turning to her, smiling. “You just wanted to add a little zest to what was to be a smooth and easy task. You must be an excitement monger, Talya.”

“Why don’t you get me a Coke from the ice box, or I’m liable to show you what real excitement is all about.” Talya’s nerves were all but shattered—she would have said anything—but that got her a Coke anyway. 

117

It took them
another six hours to reach their destination.  Samir had contacted the tower alerting them of the delay.  They didn’t know if they could trust anyone to relay a message to the consulate but they had to give it a shot. 

A stretch limo was waiting for them at the end of the tarmac. The landing had been rough once again, as Samir had predicted, but they made it, as he had promised.

When they got into the car, Talya recognized Khumar immediately. He had been told of her alias and said, “Lady Sarah, it is a pleasure to seeing you again.”

“It is a surprise for me too, Khumar, but I’m glad you’ve been designated for this assignment.  How’s
Alhassan
?” she asked in a rush.

“I believe he was starting to respond to the latest treatment the doctors have administered to him last night. When they discovered the source of the infection it was a cinch to treat it.” 

Talya sank back in her seat, relieved. What had been
the source
of the infection, she wondered.

By this time, Samir had climbed aboard and was sitting beside Khumar, looking at him curiously while already changing his clothes. 

“I’m sorry I haven’t introduced myself or my companion to you. My name is Khumar. I have been at Lady Sarah’s side several weeks ago, when she was in
Bamako
under the Prime Minister’s guardianship. And this is Diallo,” he added, nodding in the other agent’s direction. 

Diallo smiled. “
Your Highness
....” He bowed slightly.

“I’m glad to meet the both of you,” Samir replied distractedly as he was putting on his mishlah, this one white, trimmed of gold and black threads, and fitting the ghutrah and iqal around his head. “I’m sorry
,
gentlemen
,
but you understand that I have to do this.”

“That’s perfectly alright,
Your Highness
,” Khumar said, “we’ll be at the hotel only in a few minutes and everything is arranged.”

Meanwhile, Talya was observing Diallo sitting opposite her. He was a quiet and unassuming fellow. He was as black as charred wood.
If he closed his eyes at night, I wouldn’t see him at ten paces
.  He was wearing the regulation grey suit, white shirt and tie. She didn’t like him.

“I’m
Christian Sylvester
,” said their cat, shaking hands with his new colleague. He had met Khumar when he had visited
Alhassan
in
Dakar
. While he smiled mildly at each of them in turn,
Christian
looked at Diallo strangely. He was sizing him up. He needed to trust Khumar and Diallo implicitly. Talya sensed that
Christian
didn’t feel comfortable with Diallo at all.

When they came down, and before landing, Talya had the chance to survey the Hotel de France and its surroundings from the air. Apart from a fresh coat of paint, the place looked the same as she left it decades ago—a grey and sad looking army barracks.

Christian
led them to the reception desk, once they had crossed the open terrace doors into the centre lounge. The few people sitting in the overstuffed chairs and divans were all staring at them as they entered the hotel. Talya walked her usual three steps behind Samir. She had pulled her veil over her face, allowing her to observe everyone without being observed.  At first glance, their
prey
was nowhere in sight.  Khumar and Diallo walked on either side of Talya. She stood behind Samir and
Christian
as they were filling out the registration cards. She was looking around her appreciatively, noticing that a more practical décor had ta
ken
the place of the one she knew as a child. Flagstones had replaced the white marble floor and green drapes trimmed the terrace windows where red ones had hung all those years ago. It was then that Talya saw
him
com
ing
down the hall.  He was the same podgy little man she had met in Dakar—with a potbelly and a sweaty face adorned of a heavy black moustache—the same man she had grown to loathe. He was wearing a beige safari suit, which made him look fatter than he was. She froze at the sight of him.
Christian
made a quick round about face and glanced at her.

He must have sensed that Talya’s attitude had changed all of a sudden, for
he said,
“Lady Sarah, I will accompany you to your suite now. Please follow me, if you
wouldn’t
mind?” He stretched his arm in the direction of the hallway. Samir went ahead of
Christian
and Talya with Diallo and Khumar in tow. 

As they were walking down the corridor,
Christian
came nearer so that Talya could hear him. “You saw him didn’t you?”

“Yes I did. He’s the little man with the moustache.”

“Okay, let’s get you settled and we’ll go and join him.”

“I don’t trust Diallo,” Talya said in an almost inaudible voice.

“Me neither.”

When they entered her suite, Talya immediately raised her veil to face
Christian.
Samir had gone to his suite and would join them in a moment.

“What are you going to do?  Who is he,
Christian
?”

“I’ll have a few questions for Khumar first, and then if I’m still not satisfied, I’ll put him on ice for the next forty-eight hours.”

Talya didn’t like the sound of that. “What does that mean?” 

“Don’t ask questions that you know I will not answer.”

At that moment, Samir walked in with a majestic stride.
A
moustache was now adorning his upper lip. Talya stared.
Christian
smiled. Neither of them dared say anything. It really did not suit him.

“All right, I know what you are both thinking, but my main concern is to make sure
he
doesn’t recognize me.”

“Take it off, Samir,” Talya said decisively. “It looks fake. You won’t fool him with that, on the contrary it will make him suspicious. Besides, everyone in the lounge saw you without it when you came in—”

“Talya’s right, Samir, better just wear your dark glasses and make sure that your ghutrah is pulled forward.”

“Right.” Samir took off the furry item with a grimace. “
Christian,
would you excuse us for a moment? I need to have a few words with Talya in private, if you don’t mind?”

“Of course.  We’ll be in the lounge if you need us.”

As
Christian
closed the door behind him, Samir said, “I saw him too
,
as he passed the reception desk. And I want to know how you feel about this whole scheme after you’ve seen him again.”

“If you expect me to say that I want to turn around, because I’m scared of him, you won’t hear those words. He disgusts me.”

“Before we go on, I think I should tell you that I had a chance to kill the man when I found him at the mine site. However, when I raised my knife to kill him, something stopped me. And now I’m asking you the question: will you be able to live with yourself knowing that you have lured a man to his death—if it comes to that?”