Patreon or PayPal Me keeps this site and its author alive. Thank you. |
Stories from the Verse
A Dozen Verses
Chapter 143: Kondor 306
Table of Contents
Previous chapter: Cooper 118
Sending an image to London securely and receiving a secure reply was not so simple. Kondor had to go to the British embassy. Despite traveling on his New Zealand passport, he had packed the others, and used the William Conrad Reeves identity. He had been given the name of a contact there, who was able to verify that he was with some agency and to provide the use of a diplomatic FAX transmission system. It was then a few hours of waiting for a reply, but during that time he was able to grab lunch in the embassy cafeteria which, while not quite like home, was closer to American food than what was generally offered here in Saudi Arabia.
Two and a half hours later, a return FAX confirmed what he has assumed, and provided a couple photographs of the scene of a massacre a mere few months ago, the faces matching some in the painting. Thanking his liaison for the assistance, he added these to his file, and asked how he would get an audience with King Fahd. The liaison produced a form, asked a few questions, put the name of William Conrad Reeves on it, and had him wait in the office for a few minutes.
During his absence, Kondor looked at the paintings on the walls. There were three large ones, one obviously London, the second another city he did not recognize, and the third open countryside of somewhere with rolling hills and livestock. Smaller images showed similar scenes. But that there was a portrait of the Queen, there were no recognizable people. He wondered whether this was a safety measure, that if the embassy were attacked, raided, or abandoned, there would be no images of family that might be used to track them.
The liaison returned with the form signed by the ambassador, and told him where to submit it. Kondor thanked him, and departed.
It was a couple more days before the process was completed, complicated by the fact that the form identified him by the name on his British diplomatic passport but the hotel had him booked under his New Zealand name. It had taken them a week to set up, but they were now on the List of Royal Visitors. However, they soon had a formal invitation to an audience, and so organized themselves to visit royalty.
Parking the rental five blocks away, the trio got on a trolley from the parking lot. This time Amanda was dressed as a Westerner.
They were openly surveilled by uniformed men, along with the other visitors to the Royal Palace, as they got on the trolley. It was air conditioned, but with the numerous windows and the opening and closing of doors it never got cool. Rather, the heat abated slightly.
Arriving at one of the entrances, a narrow cleft in a tall, creamy stone wall with a striped awning out over the top of the sidewalk to protect the queued visitors, they joined the line. A public bathroom, separate buildings for men and women, stood nearby in the glaring sunlight. Every thirty minutes a pair of men would come with a wheeled plastic cooler with water bottles inserted on ice inside.
The first time it came by, Kondor asked the robed and bearded watermen, “How much?”
“Oh, no, no, Allah forbid. This is hospitality.”
Kondor did not like it, but Amanda touched his arm, and he took his water. A drawling French man with long, gray hair spoke from nearby.
“The locals make a very big deal of being hospitable. It comes from being a desert culture.”
“Also, it's the honor of the King,” Amanda added.
“Your mademoiselle is correct. I do not like everything about the local culture, but if you passed out, it would shame them all. Whereas in my beloved France, they would shrug their shoulders, and mutter something about a weakling Englishman.”
Kondor wanted to blush. Amanda was not ‘his’, but the knowing look of the older French gentleman seemed to pierce through delusions. Maybe Amanda was his. He wondered what that even meant. Then they moved forward ten feet. An hour later, they entered the palace. The dim light, cool air, and beautiful geometric patterns on the walls and ceilings, and even the floors, all entertained them as they waited.
After another hour they entered the Throne Room. It was enormous. Looking at the far end of the football field sized room, down the long line still in front of them, he surprised himself by feeling a twinge of sympathy for the crowned man in the white turban in the gold chair. He had been sitting there, doing his monthly duty of listening to all comers, for the past four hours. Kondor had only been in line three hours, and he had studied the walls, listened to Amanda chatter in French with several others, talked about art in the building and elsewhere with Amanda, and bit his lip when someone in passing called him a ‘filthy kaffir’. He was tired, and the mission had not really started.
Another hour later they approached the hawk-nosed man who ruled Saudi Arabia, at times with an iron fist, who held an unsheathed sword.
Amanda was to his left, and Zeke to his right.
“Come near, come near; let those who would approach the Defender of the Faithful to receive justice at his hand. Speak now, of your complaint.” A man in a splendid robe, adorned with gold and silver, had stepped up, as he had done hundreds of times that day, and made the same short speech to the next supplicant in line.
Kondor bowed his head, and handed the thumb drive in his hand to the man.
“This is for very private, even classified, viewing by the king.”
He looked up at the king who gave him a heavy-lidded considering stare before whipping a hand off to his right. Most supplicants went to the left. Guards came and escorted the trio to a room with a dozen others waiting. Dates, flavored water, melons, and yogurt were set out on tables, and pastel colored chairs with huge padded pillows were only a quarter filled by other people. The trio gratefully grabbed drinks, and a handful of snacks, and sank their weary legs into the chairs.
After a time a few more joined them. A trumpet was blown, and nothing happened. An elderly lady with steel-gray hair spoke.
“It will be a while. We’re the second waiting room. The first must be emptied, then us.” Thirty minutes later, she was escorted from the room. Five minutes later, another, and then in a couple minutes more another. One by one, two by two, and in one case four at a time, they all left until there were none but the trio.
“No witnesses left, “ Zeke noted quietly. Guards arrived for them, and Kondor waited to see if they would need to fight their way out. Instead, they were taken into a library with a huge map of Saudi Arabia on the wall, the King in a comfortable chair. He had removed his turban and crown to reveal a sweating head.
“I’m supposed to believe you three are just concerned citizens.”
Kondor said nothing.
“Hmmm, what do you want? A reward?”
“We’d like to ensure that Sheikh Fazli Naifeh does not become the UN Secretary General. Perhaps you can give him a job that is prestigious, but moves him out of the limelight?”
The King smiled.
“A trick usable on naive gameplayers, but for someone like the Sheikh, it would be transparently obvious. I do not want to insult you, but compared to Arabs, you Westerners are children when it comes to political infighting. Only your French come close.”
“Well, then what would you do?” Kondor challenged. The King’s eyes flared, and Kondor stared hard back. The King paused.
“Interesting. You look young. You have an American accent, and they are the most naive people, but I see in you age and time. Very well, Mister Reeves, I will treat you as a Man and not a child. I cannot strike against the Sheikh. He has five hundred chosen men, a picked army, well-trained, and because of this monster Lubanzi, they will fight hard because they fear the Devil behind them more than the enemy in front of them.”
“You want to unleash me on someone,” Kondor said after considering for several seconds. The King nodded back, looking pleased.
“Perceptive. Good. In a week’s time, there is a professional-amateur team desert race. Your team could join my team as the amateurs, and the race course, well, at its closest point it passes within two miles of Sheikh Fazli’s tents.”
“Tents?”
“Yes. We, my people, take several weeks every year, and go back to our native home, the desert. He will be less protected there, and I will make some moves of my men. This will draw his eye, and those of many of his men. You three will do the deed.”
There is a behind-the-writings look at the thoughts, influences, and ideas of this chapter, along with eleven other sequential chapters of this novel, in mark Joseph "young" web log entry #535: Character Plots. Given a moment, this link should take you directly to the section relevant to this chapter. It may contain spoilers of upcoming chapters.
As to the old stories that have long been here:
