Scorpia Rising (18 page)
Authors: Anthony Horowitz
Tags: #Europe, #Law & Crime, #Family, #Action & Adventure, #Juvenile Fiction, #Orphans & Foster Homes, #General, #People & Places, #Mysteries & Detective Stories, #Terrorism, #Fiction, #Orphans, #Spies, #Middle East
Somehow they fought their way through to the other side. The traffic thinned out a little and they found themselves in a suburb, quieter and less densely populated than the city center but still less than welcoming. Everything seemed half finished. They were driving down a street with palm trees and expensive Arabic-style villas on one side, but piles of rubble and broken-down fences on the other. For the first time, Alex saw the desert. It was there, in the mid-distance, an endless wave of drab yellow sand. It was as if Cairo didn’t dare go any farther. It just stopped. And next to it there was nothing.
“Not much farther,” Blakeway said. He sounded remarkably cheerful. Alex wondered how long he had been here. He turned to the driver and said something in Arabic. The two of them laughed.
And then they drove into a bright, modern complex, the automatic gates opening and closing behind them. It was called Golden Palm Heights, a private community of about fifty bleached-out houses and apartments surrounding well-kept lawns with sprinklers twisting in the sunshine and a good-sized swimming pool. It reminded Alex of a vacation village the sort of place you might rent for a week in the sun. The sedan drew in beside a neat block of apartments with terraces overlooking the pool.
“This is it! Let’s go in. Ahmed can bring up the luggage.”
They followed Blakeway up a staircase to a two-bedroom apartment on the first floor. The door was open and he showed them in to a light, modern space with marble floors, air-conditioning, and an open-plan living room with sliding windows leading onto the balcony. There was a large fridge-freezer, an electric oven and microwave, and a fifty-five-inch plasma-screen TV on one wall. Everything was very clean. After the long journey, Alex had to admit that he was pleasantly surprised.
“I’m going to leave you now,” Blakeway announced. “I’m sure you want to get unpacked and go for a swim. If you need anything, this is my number here.” He took out a business card and snapped it down. “You’re only five minutes from Cairo College and I’m sure someone will turn up to show you around. Quite a lot of the students and some of the teachers live here at Golden Palm Heights. They’ll be here around four o’clock, after school, and there’s usually a rush for the pool. I expect it’ll be quite strange for you, Alex, being the new boy and all that.”
He went over to the window and glanced out, as if to make sure they were alone. When he turned around, his voice was lower and he sounded almost nervous. “I’m told that one of your people will be coming here on Sunday evening,” he went on. “He’ll give you further instructions and see that you’re properly equipped. But that gives you the weekend to acclimate yourselves, see a bit of Cairo. It’s not such a bad place once you get to know it. Well, I’ll wish you good luck, Alex. For what it’s worth, I’ve heard about you, you know. A few whispers, anyway. It’s very good to have met you.”
He called for Ahmed and the two of them left. Jack watched the car disappear through the gate. They were finally alone.
“A swim, something to eat, or a nap?” she asked.
“All three,” Alex replied. “But let’s start with the swim.”
Jack was keen to unpack, so Alex dragged a pair of trunks out of a case, got changed, and went down alone. He dived straight in and did six lengths, pounding through the cold water, leaving the heat and the grime behind him. He was still there, splashing around and enjoying himself, when the first students from Cairo College arrived back at Golden Palm Heights, threw off their backpacks and clothes, and dived in with him. Almost at once he found himself surrounded by two boys and a girl who were all about the same age as him and who seemed delighted to have a new face in the complex.
The two boys were Australian; Craig Daniels and Simon Shaw. Craig was tall for his age—in fact, he was huge. He needed to shave but didn’t. Simon looked like a surfer, from his tanned skin and long, fair hair right down to the bead necklace and brightly colored trunks he wore in the pool. The girl was named Jodie, and although she had been born in England, she had lived most of her life abroad. Her parents were both teachers, fortunately not at the CICAE. She had freckles and straw-colored hair cut short, and Alex liked her at once.
“Cairo College isn’t too bad,” she told him, in answer to his questions. “It’s pretty relaxed and the teachers are okay. I spent two years in Singapore and that was miserable.”
“How come you’re out here?” Craig asked. Like Simon, his father worked in the oil industry. Quite a few of the families at the school were supported by Shell or BP.
It was the moment Alex had been dreading. It was hard enough making new friends, and doing so on the basis of a lie made it ten times worse. But he had no choice. MI6 had given him a false name—Alex Tanner—and had already rehearsed the story of his background with Jack. She would support him if anyone asked her. “I don’t have parents,” he explained. “My uncle works for an international bank and they’ve recently started working in the Middle East. He’s not here right now. I have a sort of guardian who looks after me. Everyone just decided it would be easier for us to be here.”
Like all good lies, the story contained a lot of truth. Ian Rider had pretended to be a banker before he’d died. MI6 were certainly active in the Middle East. And Jack was his legal guardian. At any event, it seemed to make sense to Alex’s three new friends.
“It’s okay,” Craig said. “Once you get used to the heat and the noise . . .”
“And the hawkers . . .,” Simon added.
“And Miss Watson.” The three of them groaned.
“Welcome to Cairo, Alex. You’re going to love it here.”
And over the next few days, almost despite himself, Alex began to relax. He would start at the college on Monday. Until then, he and Jack were tourists, on vacation together, and they could put the rest of it out of their mind. The first thing they did was to visit the famous pyramids at Giza, slipping in as the sun was rising and wandering almost alone around the extraordinary monuments built to house the bodies of dead kings almost five thousand years before. They took a felucca, a traditional wooden sailing boat, along the Nile. They explored Cairo together, strolling through the crowded streets of the souk—the local market—and haggling for things they didn’t even want. They popped into mosques and museums, staying just long enough to say they had been. They visited the place where Moses had supposedly been found in the bulrushes and Jack got a picture taken of the two of them, arm in arm, grinning like idiots.
Craig and Simon had both been right. The heat in the city was almost unbearable, at least one hundred degrees without any desert breeze, and the hawkers never left them alone, trying to sell them everything from spices to pornographic postcards. Cairo had no center and seemed to have no way out. It was as if half of humanity had just piled in there and had decided to stay.
But they didn’t care. They were enjoying themselves, closer than they’d been for a long time. Alex felt as if he had gone back five years, as if Ian Rider were still alive and Jack were looking after him and every day in its own way was fun. He was almost glad that he’d been shot at. This wouldn’t have happened any other way.
They didn’t hear from Blakeway again, but returning home on Sunday evening, they noticed a new car parked outside the apartment and realized that the MI6 agent he had mentioned must have turned up. Sure enough, someone called from the front door, and to his surprise, Alex saw a plump, familiar man waddling slowly toward them.
He had last seen Smithers in his office on the eleventh floor of the Royal and General Bank in London, just before he had broken into the Greenfields research center at Salisbury. Alex had always had a soft spot for the man who had provided him with so many bizarre and useful weapons during his time with MI6. Seeing him now, he wondered how Smithers could possibly manage in this heat. It wasn’t just the huge stomach, it was the three chins, the round cheeks, the neck that seemed to be melting slowly into the shoulders. Smithers was bald with a small mustache that reminded Alex of a comedian in one of those old, silent, black-and-white films. He was wearing a linen suit that billowed around him like a parachute. He was mopping his head with an oversized silk handkerchief, but as he drew up in front of them, he stuffed it back into his pocket.
“
As-salaam alaikum,
Alex,” Smithers chortled. “That’s Arabic for ‘good evening.’ And you must be Jack Starbright. How very nice to meet you.”
As-salaam alaikum,
Alex,” Smithers chortled. “That’s Arabic for ‘good evening.’ And you must be Jack Starbright. How very nice to meet you.”
“What are you doing out here, Mr. Smithers?” Alex asked.
“Believe it or not, Mrs. Jones sent me to look after you.” Smithers beamed. “Let’s go and talk inside, shall we? I’m told you have a first-floor apartment. I hope it’s not too many steps!”
They made their way up and soon the three of them were sitting around the living room table. Alex had a glass of iced grenadine—still his favorite drink. Smithers had a beer.
“So you begin at the Cairo College tomorrow, Alex,” he said. “My job is to help you and also, as it were, to be the interface between you and London.”
“What’s going on in London?” Jack asked.
“They still haven’t found the helicopter pilot or his passenger,” Smithers said. “And no bodies have turned up, so we’re assuming they got away.”
“They tried to kill Alex. You must know who they were.”
“I’m afraid not, Miss Starbright.” Smithers lifted his beer. “Can I call you Jack? I feel I know you rather well, even though we’ve only just met. And I have to agree with you. It’s all rather mysterious. I’m not sure how the helicopter managed to land in the middle of London in the first place. It would have needed a flight plan, and for that it would have had to have a proper license. But so far all the trails have led nowhere.”
“Was it Scorpia?” Alex asked. He didn’t know why he had said that. The name had just dropped into his head.
“I don’t know, Alex, old chap. They haven’t told me. The good thing is that nobody knows you’re here in Cairo. At least you’re safe.”
“You mean, he’s safe until someone tries to blow up the school,” Jack growled. “Then he’ll be right in the middle of it.”
“What exactly am I meant to do?” Alex asked. His face brightened. “And what gadgets have you got for me, Mr. Smithers? I’m sure you’ve got an exploding camel or something.”
Smithers shook his head. For once, he was completely serious. “This is a very unusual situation,” he said. “And we have to be careful. All we know is that the school is a target and a lot of young lives may be at stake. Imagine if the whole place were taken over by armed criminals. Such a thing has happened before, you know. Or suppose some of these teenagers were taken prisoner . . .” He pulled out a list of ten names and laid it flat on the table. “For what it’s worth, these are the ten wealthiest students at Cairo College.”
Alex glanced at the names. The third one down was Simon Shaw. He was the blond-haired boy he’d met on his first day. “I know him,” he said. “He was in the swimming pool.”
“His father is Richard Shaw. He owns about half the gas stations in Australia.” Smithers took the list and folded it away. “Don’t be fooled by the fact that the son is living in an apartment just like you,” he said. “A lot of these young people don’t want people to know how rich their families are.”
That was an interesting thought. Perhaps Alex wouldn’t be the only person at Cairo College with secrets to hide.
“We have to examine all the security systems in the school,” Smithers continued. “Put simply, Alex, we need to be sure that it’s safe. What about members of the staff? Are there any teachers with drinking or gambling problems? Now that I come to think of it, my old history teacher suffered from both. But we want to know about anything that could open them up to blackmail.
“And then there’s this chap Erik Gunter. Now, I’ve seen his file and I find it hard to believe that he’s turned bad. He took six bullets for his regiment while he was in Afghanistan. He spent nine weeks in the hospital recovering. He has no criminal record of any sort. But at the same time, he is their new head of security and it can’t just be a coincidence that he’s turned up now. That’s where you should concentrate your efforts. We want to know everything he’s up to. Who he meets, how much he spends . . . even what he has for lunch.”
Smithers had brought a small attaché case with him and he opened it. The first things he took out were a pair of rather chunky sunglasses and a bright red plastic water bottle, the sort of thing sportsmen might use.
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