Tab handed the T-shirt to the man, who unfolded it. It was dark blue with a red-and-white vertical stripe, and after a moment’s thought Tamara figured it was the uniform shirt of Paris Saint-Germain, the most popular soccer team in France. The man beamed delightedly.
Tamara had wondered why Tab had brought that cardboard box with him. Now she knew.
The man took off his old shirt and pulled the new one over his head.
The atmosphere changed. The soldiers crowded around, admiring the shirt, then looked expectantly at Tab. Tab turned to the car and said: ‘Tamara, pass me the box, please?’
She reached into the rear and picked up the box then handed it through the open car door. Tab gave them all a shirt.
The soldiers looked thrilled and several of them put the shirts on.
Tab shook the hand of the man he had called ‘captain’， saying: ‘Ma’a as-salaama,’ goodbye. He returned to the car with the nearly empty box, got in, slammed the door, and said: ‘Go, Ali, but slowly.’
The car crept forward. The happy gangsters waved Ali to a prepared route along the verge of the road, skirting the parked truck. On the far side Ali steered back to the road.
As soon as the tyres touched the concrete surface, Ali floored the pedal and the car roared away from the roadblock.
Tab put his box into the rear.
Tamara let out a long breath of relief. She turned to Tab and said: ‘You were so cool! Weren’t you scared?’
He shook his head. ‘They’re scary, but they don’t usually kill people.’
‘Good to know,’ said Tamara.
CHAPTER 2
Four weeks earlier Abdul had been two thousand miles away in the lawless West African country of Guinea-Bissau, classified a narco state by the United Nations. It was a hot, wet place with a monsoon season that poured and dripped and steamed for half the year.
Abdul had been in the capital city, Bissau. He was in an apartment with a room overlooking the docks. There was no air-conditioning, and his shirt clung to his sweaty skin.
His companion was Phil Doyle, twenty years older, a senior officer of the CIA, a bald guy in a baseball cap. Doyle was based at the American embassy in Cairo, Egypt, and was in charge of Abdul’s mission.
Both men were using binoculars. The room was in darkness. If they were spotted they would be tortured and killed. By the light coming in from outside Abdul could just about make out the furniture around him: a sofa, a coffee table, a TV set.
Their glasses were focussed on a waterfront scene. Three stevedores were working hard and sweating copiously, stripped to the waist under arc lights. They were unloading a container, lifting big sacks made of heavy-duty polythene and transferring them to a panel van.
Abdul spoke in a low voice even though there was no one other than Doyle to hear him. ‘How much do those sacks weigh?’
‘Twenty kilos,’ said Doyle. He spoke with a clipped Boston accent. ‘Forty-five pounds, near as dammit.’
‘Hard work in this weather.’
‘In any weather.’
Abdul frowned. ‘I can’t read what’s printed on the sacks.’
‘It says: “Caution – dangerous chemicals”， in several languages.’
‘You’ve seen those sacks before.’
Doyle nodded. ‘I watched them being loaded into that container by the gang that controls the Colombian port of Buenaventura. I tracked them across the Atlantic. From here on, they’re yours.’
‘I guess the label’s not wrong: pure cocaine is a very dangerous chemical.’
‘Bet your ass.’
The van was not large enough to take all the contents of a full-size container, but Abdul guessed that the cocaine had been a part-load, perhaps concealed within a hidden compartment.
The work was being supervised by a big man in a dress shirt who kept counting and recounting the sacks. There were also three black-clad guards carrying assault rifles. A limousine waited nearby, its engine idling. Every few minutes the stevedores stopped to drink from giant plastic bottles of soda pop. Abdul wondered whether they had any conception of the value of the cargo they were handling. He guessed not. The man who kept counting did, though. And so did whoever was in the limo.
Doyle said: ‘Inside three of those sacks are miniature radio transmitters – three, just in case one or two sacks get stolen or otherwise removed from the consignment.’ He took from his pocket a small black device. ‘You switch them on remotely with this gizmo. The screen tells you how far away they are and in what direction. Don’t forget to switch off, to save the batteries in the transmitters. You could do all that with a phone, but you’re going to places where there’s no connectivity, so it has to be a radio signal.’