The Pirate (33 page)

“I still don’t know who these people are.”

“You’ll find out,” she said, suddenly secretive. “Soon enough.” She smiled and changed the subject. “Would you like me to make some coffee?”

“That’s very kind of you. But I don’t want to put you to any trouble.”

“It’s no trouble at all. Besides, I’d like a cup myself. American or Turkish?”

“Turkish,” he said, though he much preferred American.

“Good,” she said, starting for the door. “I’ll be right back.”

He stared at the door after she had gone. She was strange. If only he could discover what she was really thinking. Idly he picked up the next folder from the pile of paper. If was the report Baydr had asked him to get on Arabdolls Ltd. His vision blurred and he put it back on the desk. He was more tired than he had realized. It could wait until after he’d had coffee.

It was almost a quarter of an hour before she came back with the coffee. When he saw her, his mouth almost fell open in surprise. She did have other clothes. Instead of the perennial blue jeans, she was wearing a white caftan with gold piping which led down the front and followed the lines of the buttons that joined the two sides of the garment. Flashes of her golden, tanned body, visible through the spaces in the caftan revealed that she wore nothing beneath it.

She placed the silver coffee tray on a small table in front of the couch. The white steam rose in curlicues as she slowly poured the coffee into the small cups. She looked up at him. “You can come out from behind that desk for the coffee,” she said. “I promise not to tell my father.”

He smiled and got to his feet. “Something tells me you wouldn’t anyway.”

“Right.”

He sat down on the couch beside her. She picked up a cup and handed it to him. “Taste it.”

Obediently, he sipped at it. The sweetness almost gagged him. He took his coffee without sugar.

“Sweet enough?”

“Perfect,” he said with a straight face.

She smiled, pleased. “I love my coffee extra sweet.”

“It’s very good.”

She sipped at her coffee. “Do you smoke?” she asked.

“I have cigarettes on the desk,” he said, beginning to rise.

Her hand stopped him. ‘I don’t mean that kind.”

“Oh,” he said, looking at her. “Sometimes. But not when I’m working.”

She opened the small silver box which was on the tray next to the coffee pot. “Don’t you think you’ve worked enough for tonight?”

He looked down at the neatly rolled joints.

“Jabair gave me these,” she said. “He’s got the best hashish in the world. He rolls them especially for my father.”

“I know,” he said.

She took a cigarette and struck a match. The flame glowed for a moment as the sulfur burned off, then she held it to the cigarette. After she had taken a few puffs, she held it out to him.

He looked at it, without moving.

“Come on,” she urged. “Relax. Loosen up a little. The work will still be there in the morning.”

“Oh, okay,” he said. He took the cigarette from her hand and dragged on it. After a few tokes he gave it back to her. “It is good,” he said.

“That’s better,” she said, dragging on the joint again. She smiled. “You know, for the first time you’re beginning to look human.”

He took the cigarette from her and puffed on it. He began to feel a buzzing in his head. “How do I usually look?”

She leaned back against the couch. “Very serious usually. Very businesslike all the time. No expression. You very rarely smile. You know what I mean.”

“I didn’t realize that.”

“Most people aren’t aware of how they look.” She looked at him. “You know you’d be kind of handsome without those glasses.” She reached out and took them from his face. “Go look in the mirror and see for yourself.”

“I don’t have to. I know what I look like. I shave myself every morning.”

She began to laugh. “That’s very funny.”

He smiled. “Is it?”

She nodded. “You know you’re not too bad for an American. I usually don’t like Americans. But you seem different. Maybe it’s because your parents were Arabs.”

He didn’t speak.

She stared at him silently for a moment, then leaned forward suddenly and kissed him on the mouth. He was caught by surprise and held very still.

She drew back and looked into his eyes. “What’s the matter? Don’t you like it?”

“That’s not it,” he said awkwardly. “After all, I’m a married man.”

“I know that, but your wife is at the other end of the world.”

“Is that supposed to make a difference?”

“Does it?” she asked looking at him.

He didn’t answer. Instead he took another drag on the cigarette. The buzzing suddenly left his head, leaving it extraordinarily clear. He felt as if all his senses had been sharpened. He was no longer tired. “What is it exactly that you want from me?”

She met his eyes. “I want to learn everything about my father’s business. And you can help teach me.”

“I would do that without you having to sleep with me.” He didn’t tell her that Baydr had instructed him to encourage her interest in the business.

Her eyes were steady. “But I want to sleep with you.”

He reached for her but she held out a hand, stopping him. “Wait just a minute.”

He watched her get to her feet and cross to his desk and turn off the light. It seemed almost as if she were floating. She went around the room slowly turning off the lights except one lamp in the far corner. Then she came back to the couch and, standing in front, slowly undid the buttons down the front of her caftan and let it fall to the floor around her.

He held out his arms toward her and she came down into them. He pressed his mouth to her lips almost roughly.

“Take it easy,” she whispered. “You still have your clothes on.” She began to undo the buttons on his shirt. “Relax. Let me undress you.”

Later, when she was moaning beneath him, when he was marveling at the firm strength in her young rounded body, when he felt the power of her clutching loins drawing him into her like a vacuum, he heard her begin to whimper almost inaudibly.

He forced his mind to clear so that he could listen to her words. They were the same word over and over as she was caught in the throes of strange physical and mental orgasm.

“Daddy! Daddy! Daddy!”

CHAPTER 4

Despite the late November chill and rain that covered Paris like a gloomy gray wrapping, Youssef felt good as he walked up Avenue George V, turning past Fouquet’s into his offices on the Champs-Élysées. He entered the narrow French elevator, closed the gate and pressed the button for the top floor. Slowly the iron cage climbed toward the roof.

He smiled to himself, thinking about his new little friend, a Greek boy, slim and young, with dark black ringlets around his face and enormous dark eyes. The boy was in love with him. He was sure of that. It had to be the real thing. When he had offered him money, the boy had been hurt, his eyes filled with tears. He apologized quickly and kissed away the tears. The boy had smiled radiantly when he promised to see him the following evening.

The iron cage creaked to a stop at his floor. He left the elevator, closing the gate carefully behind him, so that it could respond to another summons. In true French style the office door was wooden with the company name stenciled in black lettering on the large pane of opaque glass: MEDIA (FRANCE) SA.

His secretary, who also served as the receptionist, looked up as he came in the door and smiled. “Bonjour, Monsieur Ziad.”

“Bonjour, Marguerite,” he answered, walking past her into his office. He closed the door behind him, took off his raincoat and went to the window. Despite the rain the Champs-Elysées was crowded. Already tourists were buying tickets for tonight’s performance at the Lido on the other side of the boulevard, and the stores were filled with customers.

The door opened behind him and, without turning around, he held out his raincoat. “Anything new?” he asked, as the woman took the coat from him.

“There was a telex from Genéve on the machine when I arrived this morning,” she answered.

“Where is it?”

“In the folder on your desk. I put it on top of the other papers.”

He opened the folder, picked up the yellow telex sheet and read it quickly.

He felt a clutch of pain in his bowels. He sank into his chair, and the sweat broke out on his forehead. Thoughts raced through his brain. Something had gone wrong. Somehow he had been discovered. He felt the nausea in the back of his throat and barely made it to the bathroom.

After he had thrown up, he felt better. He took a glass of water from the carafe on his desk and sipped it slowly as he reread the telex. His stomach began to settle down. Maybe it wasn’t at all what he had first thought. It had been his own guilt and fear that had choked him. Baydr could have had a thousand valid business reasons for his decisions other than the ones he feared.

He had to remain calm, so that he could think and determine the true reasons for Baydr’s actions. Then he would know what to do. He lit a cigarette and turned the telex face down on the desk. Right now, he had to execute the orders he had received. He picked up the telephone. “Locate Michael Vincent for me,” he said to his secretary.

“Oui, Monsieur Ziad,” Marguerite answered. “Do you wish to speak with him?”

“Not just yet,” he replied. “First I want to speak with Monsieur Yasfir. You will have to locate him also.”

He put down the telephone and started trying to get his thoughts in order. He had received four hundred thousand dollars on Vincent’s account already but he had only disbursed half of that amount to him. He wondered if he could make a deal to close at that figure. They would then be out only for what they had already paid. Baydr could not help but be impressed by that. He began to feel better. Maybe things were not as bad as they had seemed.

The telephone on his desk buzzed. It was his secretary. “I Have Monsieur Yasfir on the telephone for you.”

“Where is he?”

“In Genéve.”

He punched the button, and spoke in Arabic so that if anyone overheard they would not understand. “I have received instructions to stop shipments for Arabdolls. Do you have any idea why?”

Yasfir’s voice was calm. “No. Did they give a reason?”

“Not really. All they said was that they had the company under investigation.”

Yasfir was silent.

“I will have to cable our office in Beirut,” Youssef said.

“No.” Yasfir’s voice was cold. “We have shipments scheduled twice a week until Christmas. This is the most important season of the year for us.”

“I can’t help it,” Youssef explained. “If I do not comply it will mean my job.”

“Then you have a problem, my friend. If those shipments are not made my associates could lose more than twenty million dollars. And that is something they would not care to do.”

“I can’t help it,” Youssef repeated. “I don’t like to lose my commission either. But I must keep my job.”

“You are missing the point,” Yasfir said. “To be unemployed and alive, or to be employed—and dead.”

Abruptly the connection was broken. The French operator came on quickly. “Avez vous terminé, monsieur?”

Youssef stared at the telephone a moment. “Oui,” he answered quickly. Again he felt the pain in his bowel, and the sweat came out on his forehead. He placed his head in his hands. He had to think. He had to find a way to make Baydr change his mind.

The telephone buzzed again. He picked it up. His secretary’s voice was annoyingly cheerful. It was amazing how the French considered each successfully completed long-distance call a personal victory. “Monsieur Vincent has just left London for Paris,” she said. “He is expected at the George V at one o’clock.”

“Leave word that I must see him for lunch. It is most important.”

He put down the telephone and picked it up again almost immediately. “Bring me two aspirin,” he said. “And then get Monsieur Carriage in Genéve.”

The aspirin didn’t help much and now the circuits to Geneva were busy. Youssef looked at his watch. It was after eleven o’clock. Ordinarily he was not a drinking man but this time he could make an exception.

He got to his feet and left his office. “I will return in a few moments,” he said to his secretary.

Marguerite was puzzled. “Are you all right?” she asked in a concerned voice.

“I’m fine,” he snapped. He went out into the hallway and got into the iron cage, which slowly took him down to the ground floor. He walked out of the doorway of his office building and turned left into Fouquet’s.

He walked up to the bar. The bartender came forward immediately. “Bonjour, Monsieur Ziad. What is your pleasure?”

“What do you have to settle a nervous stomach?”

The bartender looked at him. “Alka-Seltzer. I find that very effective.”

“No.” Youssef was abrupt. “Something stronger than that.”

“Fernet-Branca, monsieur,” the bartender said quickly. “It is an old remedy but still the best.”

“I will have that. And make it a double.”

“A double, monsieur?” The bartender looked at him strangely.

“Yes. And be quick about it.” Youssef was annoyed. Why did everything have to be so difficult?

“Oui, monsieur.” The bartender turned and took down a bottle. A moment later the dark brown liquor was in an old-fashioned glass in front of Youssef. “Je pense que c’est trop, monsieur,” he said. “Va doucement.”

Youssef looked at him with contempt. The French always insisted that you had to do things their way. He picked up the glass and threw the drink back. For a moment, he stood paralyzed as the horrible-tasting liquor burned its way down his throat. Then clapping his hand over his mouth, he turned and ran up the stairs to the washroom.

***

Michael Vincent was relaxed as he opened the door for Youssef. He smiled and held out his hand. “I have good news,” he said warmly. “I’ve completed the first draft of the screenplay.”