‘Smartwire,’ Haran said. ‘One of the first benefits of Chaga research, so we are told. Coiled long-chain molecules that contract dramatically under an electrical charge. Not quite dramatic enough to guillotine a head right off, but enough to sever the carotid arteries if I press the button. But Mombi has her own necklace on one of my boys, so everyone’s arteries will be staying unsevered, I think.’ The possegirl poured coffee. Milk was offered, sugar, sweeteners. Gaby waved them away. The coffee was exquisite. She expected no less of Haran.
‘So, Gaby, not only are we menaced by the Chaga, we now have this Hyperion event as well. I understand you have a nickname for it already, what is it, the BDO?’
‘The Big Dumb Object,’ Gaby said, noting the switch to her forename. Haran was like the Chaga, he moved slowly, but inexorably. He reached his points, disclosed his informations, changed the landscape of his relationships at his own speed, in his own time and none other. ‘From the same anonymous NASA wit who named the Iapetus probe after the author of The Lord of the Rings. This one is from the Encyclopedia of Science Fiction.’
‘My education must be incomplete,’ Haran said. ‘I have read neither of these volumes. Perhaps I should. The times are changing, Gaby, and I must change with them, or history will run me down like a chicken on the highway. There is a time for war, and a time to make peace. There are too many new faces on the street and they have grown up hungry and vicious. Their means are dishonourable: virtual sex parlours, VR-dildonics, videodrugs; their methods distastefuclass="underline" blackmail, extortion, addiction, kidnapping. They place no value on human life. You can understand, my friend, that they must be shown who is the power in this town if we are to avoid general anarchy. In such times, your oldest enemy is to be more trusted than those who catch at your coat-tail and call you friend, friend.’
‘You’re putting out diplomatic feelers?’
‘We have exchanged embassies.’
‘Or hostages.’
Haran glanced at the PDU on the table-cloth. UPI NetServe menus scrolled down the screen. The hypertext expansion point blinked on the liquid rollscreen.
‘My net is coming apart in my fingers, Gaby. Every day I lose connections. People; my people, who trust me to protect them. Against the police, against my rivals and enemies, like Mombi was once, who would snap them up like a leopard a dog; yes, I can protect them from these, but against the Chaga, against those who serve it…’ Haran took a flexible minidisc from the breast pocket of his jacket. ‘Leave us, Esther. This is a private matter between myself and my client.’
She had the adolescent scowl nicely. Gaby envied her her firm ass.
The video sequence was appalling. There was no syntax, no narrative. The camera veered from side to side, faces were out of focus, or upside down or loomed to fill the screen. The soundtrack was shouting and hard breathing and the constant shatter of a hovering helicopter. You saw swooping panoramics of a dusty Kenyan town, you saw jolting images of military vehicles, as if taken by a running man. You saw white soldiers shot from expressionistic angles, you saw sun-burned faces beneath blue helmets swim into extreme close-up. You saw lines of people, and armoured personnel carriers. You saw town and soldiers and sky whirling madly around, then you heard raised, shouting white-man voices, heavily accented, and saw something that looked like a zipper, and the dark interior of a sports bag, and heard running footsteps, and heavy breathing, and the sequence ended.
‘They took his deck, all his equipment, they took the camcorder on which he shot this secretly, they even took the expensive shoes off his feet,’ Haran said evenly. ‘But they did not take the disc, and now I have it, and will make them pay for what they did to one of my posse.’
‘Who are they?’
‘Azeris. Ex-Soviets. It does not matter. They all do it. Especially the ones from the countries that are as poor, or poorer, than this. What they do not keep for themselves, they sell in the Nairobi markets. If you go down to Jogoo Road or Kariokor, you will find it all laid out on the stalls. If they do not have what you want, you can place an order and the soldiers will loot it for you from the next village they evacuate in the name of the United Nations. But you must pay more for this premium service.’
‘Haran, why are you showing me this?’
The Sheriff laid his fly-whisk on the table.
‘I am asking you as a favour to expose the ones who did this to my boy. I do not care about the others, but no one, not even the UN, touches one of Haran’s. I will not have it said that I cannot protect my own.’
‘You want me to do a report on institutional corruption in the United Nations forces.’
‘Listen well, Gaby McAslan. This is what I want. I want the men who did this to my man exposed and humiliated in every nation on Earth. I want their own sisters and mothers to close their doors to them when they go back to their homes; I want their fathers and brothers to turn away and spit when they pass for the shame they have brought their families.’
Sip your coffee, Gaby McAslan. Do not let this smooth bastard see the value of this thing he is giving you, for he has the eyes of a Shanghai jade-seller, who sets his price by the dilation of his buyer’s pupils. Already, she was listing the Must Knows and the Must Never Knows, the Faithfuls and the Faithlesses. Tembo and Faraway; she would take them, they knew the country, they knew their job, they knew discretion. They would not tell the troll bitch-queen from hell Santini, or T.P., who would give it straight to golden boy Jake. No, she would keep it secret until the moment she rolled it for Thomas Pronsias Costello in his little glass office and when syndication deals lit up the East African teleport like a stained glass window, then she would see who was talking Junior East African satellite news correspondent. Already she was rehearsing the little doxology: Gaby McAslan, SkyNet News, Kenya.
‘This does me as much of a favour as it does you,’ she said.
‘Is this not then the most excellent way to do business?’ Haran said. ‘This way, I know I can trust you to do what I ask. I will have one of my boys deliver details of the unit in question and their current location. I presume you will be at the Sondhai woman’s for the foreseeable future?’
‘For the foreseeable future.’
‘Good. I have detained you long enough. I would not want to make trouble for you with your employers, when I am in need of their good graces. I am most glad you can do this little favour for me.’
He extended a gloved hand. Gaby did not take it.
‘Haran. I need to ask a favour in return of you.’
‘You are aware that what I have asked you to do is in repayment for the favour I did you in the Independence Day thing. This will be a fresh account.’
‘I am aware of that.’
Haran folded his hands in his lap, like a priest awaiting a confession.
‘What is it you would ask me?’
‘Peter Werther.’
‘I gave you him as a token of our relationship.’
‘Dr Daniel Oloitip says he’s disappeared.’
‘One does well not to pay too much attention to what Dr Oloitip says.’
‘He says he hasn’t so much disappeared as been disappeared. By the UN. A joint US/Canadian airborne force hit the What the Sun Said community up at Lake Naivasha and took him.’
Haran studied the outspread fingertips of his gloves.
‘These are serious allegations Dr Oloitip is making.’
‘Haran, I want you to find out if this is true, and if so, where Peter Werther is.’
‘Are you asking me as a favour?’
He was looking right at her. She had never seen his eyes so clearly. They were like two spheres of lead.
‘I am asking you as a favour.’
‘Finding out and finding where are two favours.’
‘Then I am asking you as a favour, twice. And I will owe you, twice.’
Haran snapped his hands shut. The lemon-yellow leather gloves made a soft, rustling snapping, like a lizard trapping an insect.
‘I shall do what I can. I can promise no more than that. You understand that things are not so simple with the UN, or I would not have had to ask you the favour I have. My boys must be discreet if they are not to be discovered. It may be that they will find nothing. But you will still owe me the favour. Two favours.’
‘Haran, I knew from the moment I met you I would always be owing you.’
He smiled. Like his lead eyes, she had never seen him smile before. She wished she had not seen him smile now.
‘I shall have one of my boys escort you back to SkyNet. The streets are no longer as safe for visitors as they were, especially for white women. I am afraid there are thieves and conmen on every street corner.’
Gaby got up from the table. Mombi’s handsome envoy had returned with fresh coffee. Haran gently ran his gloved right hand along the possegirl’s jawline. Gaby shuddered.