Byzantine Gold by Chris Karlsen Read Free Book Online

safe house somewhere in the city.”
    Atakan took a beer from the refrigerator and set it on the counter. He scooped out a handful of ice cubes from the small freezer and dropped them into a rock glass then poured her three fingers of scotch.  Not a good sign. She liked scotch but didn’t often drink it. Import taxes made indulgence expensive. Obviously, whatever he had to tell her required stronger liquid courage than wine. With dread, she took the drink from him.
    “What’s on your mind?” she asked, taking a healthy swallow.
    “I stupidly reacted the way Tischenko expected, yet he didn’t shoot when he had the opportunity.”
    “Yes...so?”
    “He’s waiting.”
    “But, for what?”
    “That’s the question. What did he say to you on the phone?”
    “He said the name of the flowers, then added ‘everything in time,’ and hung up.”
    “I understand the message but not the bouquet.”
    “When you were surgery, I sat in the hospital’s garden. The flower beds were filled with those types of tulips. I stopped to admire one. The bastard was there, watching me.”
    “He watches us even now.”

Chapter Eight

    Alexandria, Egypt-May
    Darav gazed out of the tram enjoying the scenery. His side offered the best view of the Mediterranean. Expensive hotels and sidewalk cafes with colorful umbrellas lined the eastern harbor.
    He’d seen the Mediterranean once before, in Marmaris, with Omar and Havva. They left him in a seaside café similar to the ones in Alexandria while they rigged three rubbish bins with percussion bombs. His table had a large blue umbrella advertising Dubonnet. Another, a red and black one, advertised Cinzano. It was the first time he’d seen umbrellas over tables. In his village, there was a small café attached to a fruit market. A rusted aluminum awning covered the few tables. He liked the bright umbrellas. They were cheerful.
    He could read and write; most in his tiny village couldn’t. He understood the letters in Dubonnet and Cinzano but didn’t know what they meant. He asked the waiter who took a superior tone with him for mispronouncing the words. The man referred to Dubonnet as an aperitif. Darav didn’t know what that was but refused to ask the arrogant waiter. He wished the waiter worked at a café near the bomb sites. The terror attack injured twenty-one people, half of them British tourists. The waiter should’ve been among the victims.
    The tram turned toward the western harbor. The next station was Ras el-Tin, his stop. Nassor Jafari, the Egyptian diver on MIAR’s project lived a few short blocks from the stop in the Al-Anfushi District. Of all the divers on the team, Jafari was the only one physically suitable for him to impersonate. 
    Darav spoke broken Arabic. If stopped by any residents in Jafari’s neighborhood, they’d know he wasn’t Egyptian. Before the uprising and change of government leadership, he’d pass himself off as a wayward tourist. After the upheaval, he worried the lack of visitors to the country might affect his plans, make him more noticeable. He’d listened to BBC News on the radio and kept abreast of the news regarding Egypt. To his relief, the tourist trade had begun to slowly recover, Alexandria faster than Cairo.
    As he stepped off the tram, his anxiety faded. Clusters of tourists roamed the square, mostly European from what little he knew of the foreign languages spoken. They’d come to visit the famous Anfushi Tombs and the museum at Ras el-Tin Palace. He never heard of either or why they generated interest. Obviously important to tourists, both sites were circled on a pamphlet he’d taken from an airport kiosk. He’d mingle with the throng for awhile and then break away.
    Darav found the building Jafari lived in without difficulty. He opened a tourist map he bought from a vendor and walked to the immediate vicinity, occasionally checking it like he was lost. He used the presence of a parked delivery van to slip into the alley entrance