The Cairo Code (23 page)

“Good to see you again, Baldy. And what do you have for me this time? Something interesting, I hope?”

“Two forty-gallon drums of petrol, a dozen bottles of the best claret, and four sides of beef.”

“And who did you have to murder to get those?”

Reed laughed. “A man's got to live. Are you interested?”

“How much?”

“Forty quid.”

“You're a bigger thief than I am. Thirty, and not a penny more.” Salter grinned. “But just to show there's no hard feelings, I'll throw in a bottle of Scotch.”

“Done. You want me to drop the stuff off at the usual place?”

“I'd appreciate it.” Salter slapped a hand on the sergeant's shoulder and led him to the door. “And do it after midnight, as always. Good to do business with you again, Baldy.”

•  •  •

The day Reggie Salter deserted from the Eighth Army, his life changed for the better. It had made him a wanted man, but also a wealthy one. When the North African campaign had begun in earnest, thousands of frightened young troops had fled from their units and hid low in the Nile delta and cities, anxious not to invite a German bullet between the eyes. In Salter's case, it wasn't fear that made him steal away from his foxhole in the middle of the night, but simple common sense.

As many as twenty thousand Allied deserters were in Egypt at the height of the war, not a fact the army liked to admit. The more hardened among them, numbering at least a hundred, had set up very lucrative rackets, using organized groups of renegades to rob civilian warehouses and military stores. Salter had become one of them, and probably the most successful, hardly surprising considering he'd already had a career in petty crime in London before being conscripted. Now he led a gang of twenty armed and dangerous deserters, English and American, aided by a handful of Arabs, operating one of the sharpest and most profitable black-market operations in Egypt.

The door opened as Salter sat perched on the edge of his desk, and a swarthy-looking man with a black mustache appeared. Costas Demiris was the son of a Greek merchant, and like Salter, his business partner, a deserter. His dark eyes were constantly on the move, missing nothing. “What's the problem, Reggie?”

Salter lit a cheroot from a pack on his desk. “Deacon's here.”

Costas grinned. “So, your chickens have finally come home to roost. Are you going to pay him the two hundred quid you lost on his roulette table? It's been over a month now.”

Salter meshed his fingers together and cracked his knuckles, a sudden vicious sneer on his face. “Like bleeding heck I am. Those wheels of his are as bent as a dog's hind leg. He mucks with me and I'll have his bollocks for bookends.”

Costas's grin widened in anticipation of trouble, as the bodyguard opened the door and Harvey Deacon stepped in, followed by Hassan. Salter walked calmly across the room and stuck out his hand. “Good to see you again, Harvey. Drink? I've got a ten-year-old Scotch to die for.”

Deacon shrugged. “Why not.”

“Pour Harvey a drink, Costas.”

The Greek took a bottle from one of the desk drawers, wiped a couple of tumblers with his shirt, filled them, and came over with the glasses. Salter clinked Deacon's tumbler. “Well, what can I do for you, Harvey, old son?” He nodded at Hassan. “Your boy here said it was urgent.”

“I'm not his boy.” Hassan glared back.

“I wasn't talking to you, sunshine. So why don't you shut your mouth until spoken to?”

Salter skewered the Arab with a dangerous look, then turned back to Deacon. “What's the trouble, Harvey?”

“No trouble. Some business, if you're interested.”

“I can always do with that. Well, I'm listening. What are you stuck for, a couple of cases of black-market Scotch?”

“Not this time.” Deacon went to sit in one of the chairs. He ran a finger round inside the collar of his shirt—the heat in the warehouse office was stifling—then looked with wry amusement at the crates and sacks of black-market goods packed floor to ceiling. “You know, it never ceases to amaze me how you haven't been caught yet by military intelligence. You move about the city with impunity, and with a bounty on your head. You must have balls of brass, Reggie. Or a guardian angel looking over your shoulder.”

Salter grinned and raised his glass. “My secret, old son, but the military has bigger fish to catch than Reggie Salter. Uncle Adolf, for instance.”

In truth, Salter's warehouse was one of several he had around the city, almost every one of them a warren of tunnels below ground, with lookouts and runners posted up to three streets away, and he rarely slept in the same bed for more than one night. He also had a line of informers that stretched right to the top at the provost marshal's office, a costly service he willingly paid for, since it ensured that he managed to avoid capture and a firing squad after eighteen months on the run, despite a price on his head.

Deacon said quietly, “That gambling debt you owe me. How would you like to keep it, and make some extra money into the bargain?”

Salter glanced at Costas and raised his eyes with a faint smile. “I'd like that very much, sweetheart. But what's the catch, as my old granddad used to say?”

“I need a Jeep. American Army type, with military police markings.”

Salter was still smiling. “Is that all?”

“I haven't finished. I'll also want an American army captain's uniform, two MP uniforms, sidearms to go with them, along with a couple of M3 machine guns. And three army trucks, American, in good mechanical condition. Plus all the right paperwork for the vehicles.”

Salter looked amused, and laughed out loud. “What are you going to do, Harvey? Start another bleeding war?”

Deacon took a large envelope from his breast pocket and tossed it to Salter. “That's a thousand pounds on account. Sterling. Just so you'll know I'm not wasting your time.”

The smile vanished from Salter's face and he nodded to Costas, who picked up the envelope and riffled through the contents. “It looks kosher, Reggie. A grand sterling, like he says.”

Salter checked the money, then studied Deacon. “Who's the stuff for? Not yourself, surely? It's a bit late in the day to start playing soldiers.”

“Some customers of mine.” Deacon smiled. “Who wish to remain nameless.”

Salter grinned back. “In for a dealer's fee, are you?”

“You might say that. The question is, can you supply the necessary?”

“You know me, I can provide anything your heart desires. But it'll cost.”

“How much?”

Salter's grin widened. “A lot more than a grand. A Jeep, three trucks, uniforms, and weapons? That's a lot of hardware. Let's say three thousand, sterling, the lot.”

“A considerable amount of money.”

“It's the best I can do.” Salter shrugged. “My lads could get shot stealing that kind of gear. Widows-and-orphans fund to take care of, and all that. Take it or leave it.”

“There's just one problem. I'll need to know you have the Jeep, uniforms, and sidearms within forty-eight hours, by Friday night at the latest. The trucks I'll need a day later.”

Salter whistled. “That's a rush job, Harvey, my mate.”

“But can you do it?”

Salter shrugged, and finally smiled. “I don't see why not.”

“I'll want you to garage them for me until I can pick them up.”

Salter frowned. “For how long?”

“Probably no more than a day.”

Salter nodded. “So long as you pay storage, not a problem. Say a hundred quid a day for the lot.”

Deacon stood. “Agreed. We've got a deal.” He stuck out his hand and Salter shook it.

“Don't you need to consult with your friends first, about the price?”

“No need. They trust my judgment.”

“Fair enough. I'll want another five hundred when the Jeep, uniforms, and weapons are ready for inspection, the rest when I have the trucks. You pay the storage when you take delivery. Where do you want to do that?”

“We can decide later.”

“No sweat.” Salter tucked the envelope of money into his pocket.

Deacon looked him in the face. “I'm depending on you, Reggie. Don't let me down.”

Salter slapped him on the back and walked him to the door. “Don't you worry, I'll see to everything. Just make sure you bring the cash on Friday and everything will be hunky-dory, old son.”

•  •  •

Reggie Salter splashed Scotch into his glass, then stood watching from the grimy warehouse window as Deacon and the Arab left the building and disappeared into the bazaar.

He rubbed his jaw. “I wonder what old Harvey's up to?”

Costas joined him. “You think he's telling us the truth?”

Salter sipped from his glass, shrugged, and wiped a film of greasy sweat from his brow. “Could be. But as far as I know, he's not the kind to get mixed up in naughty business. Sure, he'll come to us for a couple of crates of stolen booze when he runs short, but that's about his lot.”

“MP uniforms, a Jeep, weapons, and three trucks. That's a lot of ordnance, Reggie.”

“And three grand is a lot of shekels. There has to be a return for that kind of investment. A bloody big return. So I ask myself, what are these mates of his up to?”

“Any ideas?”

Salter put down his glass. “A payroll heist, stealing valuable artifacts, robbing King Farouk's jewels, who knows? Remember some cheeky sods did the naval paymaster's office in Port Said three months ago and walked away with a cool ten grand? Deserters, dressed in navy uniforms and driving stolen navy trucks, and good luck to them, I say. It smells to me like it could be something along those lines.”

Costas frowned, rubbed his mustache. “I could never imagine Deacon getting involved in anything like that.”

Salter looked round. “And that's the point. There's got to be much more to all this than meets the eye. Sure, someone could be using Deacon to do their shopping. Only they're not hardened criminals, or they'd deal direct with the likes of me. But whatever's going on it definitely must be something big, especially with all that hardware involved.”

There was a sudden noticeable glint in Salter's eyes, and Costas looked at him with a lopsided grin. “I know that look on your face, Reggie. You're up to something.”

Salter winked deviously, cracked his knuckles. “Not yet, old son. But I've got a funny feeling we could be on to something interesting here. And it might be worth a lot more than three grand.”

Weaver studied the faces of the two Arab men standing in front of him. They had been picked up that evening by the Egyptian police and delivered to the provost's office at the Kasr-el-Nil barracks. One of the men was clean-shaven, the other had a ragged beard, and they looked like pathetic creatures as they stood there in handcuffs. Finally, Weaver turned to Sanson and shook his head.

“You're sure?”

“Positive.”

Sanson nodded to the two sergeants waiting at the door. “Right, you can take them outside for now.”

Weaver had known as soon as the suspects were led into the room that neither was the man who stabbed him. Their faces bore no evidence of bruising, but even so he carefully studied both men, especially the bearded one, to be absolutely certain. When the sergeants led the men out, Sanson sat down with a sigh, removed his cap, and opened the folder in his hand.

“As regards the other four suspects you picked from the lists of sympathizers, the police say one of them—the Turkish businessman—moved back to Istanbul almost a year ago, another's been serving a sentence in Luxor for theft, and a third had a watertight alibi.”

“What kind of alibi?”

“He's dead and buried. Stabbed three months ago in a fight he picked with a British marine.”

“What about the last one?”

Sanson referred to the folder before looking up. “Don't hold your breath. The police have been trying to arrest him for at least five months. He's a Muslim Brotherhood extremist, wanted for attempted murder and arson—he took a pot shot at a Guards officer and stabbed another, set fire to a couple of army trucks, and he's made himself scarce ever since. The police have his home under watch and the word's out that we want him, but the feeling is he's hiding out down south, in Assyut or Luxor. They could be wrong, of course, he could still be somewhere in the city.”

“Is there a chance he might be our man?”

“Difficult to say. He's definitely a Nazi supporter, and he's fond of using a knife. But Cairo Special Branch are really a bit doubtful that he could be a German spy.”

Weaver slumped into a chair. “So we're back at square one.”

“It looks like it,” Sanson said, dispirited, and slapped the file on the table.

Weaver was beginning to despair. Three days had passed without any leads turning up, and he was exhausted, his neck still hurting. He tried to ignore the pain, needing to keep his senses focused, but he knew they were fast running into a dead end.

The landlord had been interviewed and told them that the tenant who rented the apartment had given his name as Farid Gabar, and had moved in almost nine months ago. He had always paid his rent on time, but the only information he had offered about himself was that he worked for a well-known cotton merchant in the Old Town, and came from Luxor, but the landlord thought his accent sounded Cairene. When questioned, the merchant and his staff claimed they had never heard of Farid Gabar. A close watch was being kept on the premises just in case he made an appearance, every cotton merchant in the city was being visited by the police, and Gabar's details had been passed on to the authorities in Luxor, in the hope that something might turn up.

“Not that we should hold out much hope,” Sanson had admitted. “The name's probably an alias and he's unlikely to have told the truth about coming from Luxor.”