I stopped. This wasn’t going to help. It might piss him off so much he stitched me up with al-Shabab or dropped me in it by running away. Or it might make him too frightened to function. Neither was going to help me.
‘OK, Awaale, listen. I’ll pay you. I’ll pay you twenty-five thousand US if you help me get the three of them to Mog airport. That’s all you need to do. Just help me and do what I ask.’
Now I had his attention. His expression changed immediately.
‘Fifty.’
‘No. I said twenty-five. That’s a lot of cash to send to your dad, isn’t it? More than you’d ever earn back there in McDonald’s — and more than the cut you get from Erasto.’
‘Thirty-five.’
‘I’ve told you. Twenty-five. Take it or leave it. I’m going in, mate, and you’re going to be with me, one way or another. Decision time.’
I still had the iPhone in my hand. I started to dial Frank.
It rang just once. I hit the speaker-phone and jumped in before Frank could say anything.
‘I need you to guarantee twenty-five thousand dollars for some assistance. I’ve got a guy here. I need his help. Explain how it would be paid. He’s listening.’
Frank didn’t even take a breath. ‘Twenty-five thousand US, guaranteed. It will be flown into Mogadishu airport in time for the hostage exchange. Now, are we done?’
I took it off speaker-phone and brought it back to my ear. ‘Yes, we are. I’ll call you when I have anything.’
I closed down the iPhone and tucked it back into my day sack. ‘You ready?’
He stood up. ‘I would have come with you anyway, Mr Nick. I just needed you to know how dangerous it is.’
‘Do you want to pray before we go? We’ve got a couple of minutes before sun-up.’
He thought about it and nodded. He turned towards Mogadishu. Qibla was north in this part of the world.
Awaale stood in his Western gear and bling and raised his hands up to his shoulders, feet slightly apart, in preparation for takbiratul ihram. He mumbled away gently to himself. Maybe he did it every day, in between the beer and the girls, or maybe he was just getting a quick one in to hedge his bets.
‘Allahu-akbar.’
God is great.
Maybe. But so was the AK on my shoulder, and I knew which one I trusted more.
19
My Timberlands sank into the sand. Awaale was slowly catching up.
‘Why are you scared, Awaale?’
‘I’m not.’
‘That’s good. We have work to do. A lot of work.’
He took a couple of quicker steps to draw level with me. I kept my eyes on the way ahead. I was a white man on the East African coast. That kind of news would travel like wildfire if I was spotted.
‘The man on the cell, Mr Nick?’
‘He’s the one who sent me. Like I said, I’m here partly for friendship and partly for work. The mother and the man who’s in there with them — I know them really well.’
‘But who is he? On the cell?’
‘He’s the father of that child. So that’s how it works. I must help them. And I’m getting paid, like you.’
‘The man with them is not the husband?’
‘No.’
With the sun now up I could see more clearly. Four big commercial cargo ships rode at anchor, dwarfing even the largest of the yachts beside them.
We started moving through scrub. The sand here was mixed with sticky seed pods and bits of twig and stone. As we approached the outskirts of Merca I went into a stoop, using the brush as cover. The town was waking. Cockerels went berserk. Dogs barked. Nearly all the buildings were one-storey concrete or breezeblock structures with tin or flat roofs, arranged on a grid. There was a lot of cobalt blue going on, on the roofs and walls as well as the clothes-lines.
Long shadows appeared as the sun rose from the sea. The narrow streets would keep the shade for a while longer. Nearly every dwelling had its morning fire burning. Smoke curled from stubby chimneys. High walls sheltered the compounds. Some were crumbling, but so far everything here seemed in much better nick than in Mogadishu. The sand tracks between the houses were compacted by years of foot and vehicle traffic. There wasn’t a scrap of litter in sight.
Sunrises in this part of Africa are brilliant and come on fast. The eastern sky had turned tangerine above low grey night clouds. The sun burnt the left side of my face. We walked down into an area of dead ground and up the other side. Ahead, a short, open stretch led to the edge of the town. I lay down in the cover of the last of the thorny scrub.
I kept my eyes screwed up and shaded with my left hand as Awaale collapsed beside me. ‘Over there …’ I indicated our half-right. ‘Third house down, about forty metres. See the clothes-line?’
He nodded.
‘We need the burqas. The blue ones.’
Awaale’s head jerked round. He squinted in the sun. ‘Steal them?’
‘What else? Go into town and buy a couple?’
‘It’s not that.’
‘It’s no drama, mate. Just put the fucking thing on and walk like an old woman.’
‘Do you know what happens to people who steal, under Sharia law?’
I managed not to laugh. ‘Mate, if we get caught, having your hand chopped off is the last thing you’ll need to worry about. Go and get them, there’s a good lad. We need to get ourselves to that jail.’
He didn’t budge.
‘We must pay for them.’
‘You can’t start talking to anyone. It’ll compromise us. Just go and get them.’
‘No, Mr Nick. Women who do not wear hijab in al-Shabab areas are not allowed to leave their homes. No part of their body can be seen in public. Jalaabiibs and burqas cost at least fifteen dollars. If these women don’t wear them, they’ll be punished. They stoned a thirteen-year-old girl for this, even though she was not right.’ He tapped his temple with a finger. ‘She was walking in the main square. They stoned her to death. If these women don’t cover up, they can look for their head in the sand. We cannot just steal them, Mr Nick. We have to pay for them. These people cannot afford to buy these things.’
I rolled over onto my side and dug in my American tourist pouch for the fold of goodwill cash. ‘Here’s fifty. I don’t care how you give it to them, but be quick. Shove it under the door or some shit. I don’t care. Let’s just get these fucking things on and get moving.’
In the mid-distance, heading away from us down one of the wider streets, I could see three men patrolling, with black and white shemaghs and wild beards.
I grabbed Awaale’s ankle. ‘Make sure they’re big ones.’
20
I watched him set off across the open ground. As he approached the building, chickens bomb-burst out from behind a wall. He walked past a big cone of dried ox-dung cakes. It kept their ovens burning. I wasn’t sure what it did for the food. He knocked on the door.
For a long time nothing happened. A woman would never appear at the threshold. Maybe the men and children were out. He knocked again. An old guy in a grey dish-dash finally appeared. His grey hair was as long as his beard. Awaale gestured at the clothesline. The old man stared at him for a long time before answering. There was more chat and the old guy kept stroking his beard. Awaale kept nodding away, reached into his jeans pocket and handed him the cash. The old man took it, turned back into the house and closed the door behind him. He reappeared in the back yard seconds later and took two burqas off the line.