Tongues of Fire by Peter Abrahams Read Free Book Online

room.
    â€œThey’ve changed exhibits,” he murmured, almost to himself. For a moment Rehv wondered whether he had made some sophisticated joke about modern art; but Harry had given no sign that he had even noticed the man on the floor. Harry smiled at him. “You speak Arabic, don’t you, Mr. Rehv?” he asked encouragingly, like an interviewer trying to coax a lively answer from his guest.
    â€œYes.”
    â€œGood.” He was so brisk Rehv thought he might rub his hands together; brisk the way a man is when things are going his way. Perhaps in his mind this body canceled the two at La Basquaise.
    â€œWe’d better do something, Harry.” He was suddenly very tired. He felt the drug pulling down his eyelids.
    â€œDon’t worry,” Harry said. “I’ll handle everything. There’s just one little detail I’d like you to take care of. It’s really quite simple.”
    â€œThat’s what you said this morning.” He looked out the window. “Yesterday morning.”
    â€œDon’t be so suspicious.” Harry sounded almost jovial. “Where is your telephone?” Rehv showed him. Harry lifted the receiver, took a clean handkerchief from his pocket, and stretched it over the mouthpiece.
    â€œI am going to dial a number and hand you the phone. In a very low voice, as if you are afraid of being overheard, say in Arabic: ‘It is done. There was difficulty. I will be gone for two days.’ Then hang up immediately. Do you understand?”
    Rehv was tired, and tired of Harry, too: “No. I don’t want to play these games.”
    Harry’s briskness sank into his depths, out of sight. “It’s too late,” he said quietly. He dialed the telephone and gave the receiver to Rehv. It was answered in the middle of the first ring. “Yes?” said a man in Arabic.
    He spoke the words he had been told to speak, thinking at the same time that he had heard the voice before. He hung up.
    â€œWho is he?” he asked Harry.
    â€œAbu Fahoum. Did you think your visitor came without orders from him?” Rehv remembered the long black car disappearing in the rain. They must have dropped the bodyguard near the restaurant, to follow him on foot.
    â€œNow do you understand, Mr. Rehv? Abu Fahoum will wait two days before he sends someone else, or comes himself, or talks to the police. He won’t know that anything is wrong. We have given ourselves two days of grace.”
    Rehv shook his head. “I’m very tired.”
    Harry looked at him thoughtfully. Night had now withdrawn, revealing the shapeless brand on his face. And his bright, cold blue eyes.
    â€œI am saying, Mr. Rehv, that we have two days to kill Abu Fahoum. But don’t worry: I’m going to help you.” He bent and picked up Rommel’s head.

CHAPTER FOUR
    Krebs sat in his office, watching the rain try to break through the glass of his little window. He didn’t like the weather in New York. He didn’t like anything about New York. He didn’t like Armbrister, his boss, or Bunting, Armbrister’s boss. He didn’t like Alice, his wife.
    Krebs liked the weather better in Kuala Lumpur, Rio, Lisbon, or Kinshasa. He liked the girl who brought him coffee. He liked her hard little ass and her hard little smile. He daydreamed of being rough with her, but he never did anything about that: It would have meant risking his job.
    His job meant a lot to him. He wanted to keep it, to become better at it, to rise. He ran five miles a day and did one hundred push-ups the moment he got out of bed. He knew two quick ways of killing a man with his bare hands and had employed one of them successfully. In Rio. He had just spent a long lonely year in Kinshasa, finally turning a Chinese engineer who had worked on the nuclear project at Lop Nor and was supposed to know something important. Krebs never found out what it was. He always worked hard, did what