Betrayals (19 page)

“What man? Where?” demanded Janet, disinterested in rhetoric.

“Nicos,” said the man. “He called himself Nicos.

“What family name!” said Janet, with intense urgency.

The Lebanese shook his head. “Just Nicos. Nothing more than Nicos. He's careful, you see.”

“Where?” persisted Janet.

The Lebanese gestured behind him, towards Athens Street. “There is a hotel, the Four Lanterns,” he said. “At night there is a discothèque. He is often there.”

Practically on Zenon Square, remembered Janet: on one of the side roads, leading towards the sea. “Will you take me to him?”

Uncertain looks passed between the couple. The man said: “It is not good: I don't think we should get involved.”

“Just an introduction!” pleaded Janet. “Not even that: just point him out to me!”

Looks were exchanged again. The woman said: “Why not?”

“We'll point him out,” conceded the man.

“Thank you,” said Janet, swallowing. She felt full-up, ballooned, with satisfaction.

Janet offered more drinks but they chose coffee instead: Janet joined the woman with
glykos
, the sweetest of the Turkish preparations, but the man took
sketos
, without sugar. Janet sat patiently through the production of photographs, admiring the skycraper before its destruction and pictures of the couple's summer home, in the Lebanese mountains. The lack of formal introduction between them appeared to register at the same time. With some small ceremony the man took a card from his wallet identifying himself as Mohammed Kholi and Janet repeated her name, apologizing for not carrying cards: Kholi said he remembered her name, from the accounts of herself and Sheridan. At Kholi's suggestion they left the Marina bar and wandered along the harbor. Janet asked about their yacht and Kholi pointed to one of the furthest arms of the marina and said it was blue, with a white superstructure, and could she see it? The boats seemed to be predominantly blue but Janet thought she isolated it. Politely she said it looked very nice.

“So completely different from what I've always been accustomed,” complained Mrs. Kholi. “Like living in a box. I hate it.”

“You'd better become accustomed to it,” remarked Kholi, realistically.

Kholi said they were too early for the discotheque and invited Janet to be their guest for the rest of the afternoon, and although she did not want to drink or eat anything more she said she'd be delighted to accept. Kholi bundled the two women into a taxi and sat beside the driver before giving a destination that Janet did not hear. They drove away from town, with the sea to their right, and at the junction with Timayia Avenue Janet saw the direction to Dhekelia.

“Best hotel in Larnaca,” assured Kholi, when they arrived at the Palm Beach. The man chose their seats in the covered balcony overlooking the sea and insisted upon a bottle of Arsinoe white wine. Janet sipped it and said it was excellent, managing to control any facial reaction to its sweetness. On the second glass, Kholi pressed Janet upon what she hoped to achieve. Janet replied, honestly, that she was not sure.

“Just information,” she said. “Anything more than the sort of silence—the not knowing—that there is now.”

“Don't expect too much from this man Nicos,” warned Kholi. “All he had to do in my case was walk along a street and look at a building, to see how badly damaged it was.”

“I won't expect too much,” promised Janet.

Kholi offered dinner but Janet refused, anxious to get to the club, and the other woman said she was not hungry either. Kholi said it was a pity, because he thought the Palm Beach did the best lamb on the island.

It was eight before they moved and Janet thought abruptly—wondering why it had taken so long—that she was still wearing the same jeans and flat shoes in which she'd left Nicosia that morning, and she had not even washed her face or repaired her minimal makeup since then. There was nothing she could do about it now, apart perhaps from rinsing her face in the lavatory. But that would mean making up again. So why bother?

Janet recognized the route on the return journey, deciding she had oriented Larnaca in her mind now. Kholi stopped the cab near the Sun Hall Hotel, waving away Janet's offer to settle the fare, and led them protectively into the nightclub entrance of the Four Lanterns, where again he insisted on paying.

It catered very much to tourists, realized Janet, the moment she entered. There was a disc jockey booth alongside a deserted stage. In front was a circular dance area over which hung the sort of multi-faceted revolving glass dome that reflects light from variously aimed and colored spotlights. There were oases of tables, illuminated by candles in round pots and hedged by tub seats; and around the wall, which dipped and undulated into the room, were bench seats that met other tables around each of which, on the room side, were more tub seats. The bar was the brightest area in the discotheque, with more lights and more multifaceted reflecting glass. Behind the barmen bottles were racked directly in front of long, highly polished sheets of further reflecting glass. Kholi led the way to the bar and three adjoining stools. Janet examined herself in the bar mirror and decided that in this light the fact that she had been away from a wash basin and a makeup bag all day was not as noticeable as she had feared it would be.

Janet declined any more alcohol, grateful at seeing Perrier but wishing it had been iced when it was served. The club was only half full, but the music was stridently loud, more to attract waverers outside in the street than for the immediate enjoyment of those who'd already paid their entrance fee. Janet and the Kholis attempted conversation but the volume defeated them and eventually they abandoned the effort, remaining side by side and out-of-place in their surroundings. Janet felt distinctly uncomfortable.

It was ten o'clock when Kholi nudged and gestured towards the far end of the bar, nearest the door. The man standing there was young, not much older than twenty, Janet guessed, and very aware of himself, preening to the mirror's reflection. The deep and even suntan was accentuated by the way he was dressed, tight yellow shirt smooth around his flat waist, white trousers matchingly tight around hips moving in time to the music. His hair was very long and curled low over his neck, around which was looped a thin gold chain. When he gestured for a drink—Perrier, Janet noticed—the light struck off a stone in a ring on his left hand. The smile of thanks flashed almost as much as the ring stone.

“Nicos,” whispered Kholi unnecessarily.

“Introduce me?” urged Janet, despite their earlier agreement.

The Lebanese hesitated, looking for guidance to his wife, who grimaced with the corners of her mouth down, in a “so-what” expression.

Kholi moved, cupping Janet's arm to move her with him. She followed the man around the crush of the bar and saw Nicos turn and look without any recognition at Kholi's touch to his arm. The man's face remained empty despite Kholi's mouth-to-ear explanation, only opening in recollection when Kholi took the earlier department store photograph from his pocket and offered it to the man.

“She wants something out of Beirut, too,” said Kholi, indicating Janet.

For the first time Nicos looked at her. Janet's impression of being mentally undressed was strong. Closer, the self-assured smile was even brighter.

“What?” demanded the man.

“Somewhere quieter,” Janet said.

The smile widened. “Sounds interesting.”

Janet felt herself sweating with the sort of discomfort she'd known talking to the arrogant crewman. “You interested in a business deal?”

An explosion of music kept the answer from her. Realizing she had not heard, Nicos repeated: “I'm interested in everything.”

“Business,” Janet repeated, in further insistence.

“There's a quieter bar upstairs, in the hotel,” the man suggested. “We can get a return ticket for here.”

“I shan't be coming back,” said Janet.

14

N
icos led the way into the upstairs bar and to a table overlooking the now-darkened sea and announced: “I will take
zivania
.”

Janet order the brandy for him and another Perrier for herself, conscious of his changed attitude. There had been a swagger when he had left the downstairs club but here, without an audience, there was no pretense. She was glad.

As if in confirmation of her thoughts he said, seriously: “What is it, this business in Beirut?”

Janet talked intently, alert for his reaction. He sat with his hands around his glass but not drinking and not looking directly back at her, either, his eyes down to the table as if he were deep in thought. When she finished he did not speak immediately.

“Well!” she demanded. “Can you help?”

His eyes came up to her at last. “I don't know,” he said, simply.

Janet frowned at the unexpected honesty. “You do have contacts in Beirut, don't you?”

“Some,” he said. “I don't know if they could help on this, though.”

“Will you try?”

Nicos shrugged and said: “Before it was just to look at a building: take a photograph. This is different”

“I accept that.”

“Dangerous.”

“How much?”

The smile flashed, briefly. “Just information, right? If he is OK? Whereabouts in Beirut he's being held?”

“The whereabouts particularly.”

“Nothing,” declared the man.

“Nothing!”

“Payment on results,” he said, in another announcement. “I will try to find out where he is being held. See if I can get a photograph to prove it. If I do that, then I get £10,000. If I discover nothing, I get nothing.”

Janet smiled tentatively. “I did not expect that,” she admitted.

“It is fair?”

“Very fair.”

“So we agree?”

“Oh yes!” Janet said, urgently. “Very much we agree. When can you go?”

Nicos held up his hand, stopping her. “There is more to discuss,” he said. “I have to find someone to take me across. Make arrangements to get in.”

“Yes,” Janet said cautiously.

“There will be expense.”

Janet hesitated. “How much?”

The shrug came again. “I do not know how much they will ask. There is always the risk of losing the boat: of getting shot even.”

“You must have some idea.”

Nicos's eyes were fixed on the table again. “I will need to make a deal on the spot: not be able to go back and forth to discuss it.”

“Of course.”

“How about this?” suggested the man. “I take £5,000. Trust me to be honest. I will tell you what the boat costs and what the bribes cost and what is left over comes off the £10,000 we've agreed. If I can't find out anything, I give you back what's left. Fair again?”

“Fair again,” Janet agreed.

“How long, to get the money?”

“Tomorrow.”

The man nodded. “Then tomorrow I start.”

“I am very grateful,” said Janet.

“I haven't achieved anything yet.”

“For agreeing to try,” said Janet.

They arranged for him to come to the hotel at ten the following morning and Janet left. She tried to think objectively—he was right, he hadn't achieved anything yet—but she found it difficult to control the euphoria. Everyone had sneered and laughed and dismissed her but she'd done it! She'd made a contact and he was going to go into Beirut and find something out about John. She just
knew
he would.

It was near midnight when she got back to the hotel and Janet sagged with tiredness. Despite which, she bathed, wanting to relax as much as remove the dirt of the day, but when she went to bed she still found it difficult to sleep, managing little more than to catnap throughout the night. She got up just after it was light, staring out over the gradually awakening city, impatient for the hours to pass until Nicos arrived.