Moonlight spilled between the curtains. The night was silent.
The rapping came again. An ominous sound in the stillness. Doors that were knocked upon in the middle of the night seldom opened onto anything pleasant.
“Uh,” he said, and pulled himself to his feet. Fumbling in the wardrobe, he found a freshly starched shirt — even Destiny might balk at Mary’s starch — and fumbled into it. Found a pair of pants and stumbled into those. Then shuffled out the door and across the moonlit sitting room, an obstacle course of dump trucks and racing cars and tiny spiked motorbikes. He stepped on something hard and sharp, and he jumped.
He bent down, picked it up. An item called an action figure, a futuristic soldier of indestructible plastic. Another diabolical invention of the United States.
He reached the door, unlatched it, pulled it open.
On the moonlit landing, Constable Duhanni. Standing at stiff attention, looking himself rather like an overgrown action figure awaiting orders. New, of course: only three weeks in the constabulary.
“Sorry to bother you, sir,” said Constable Duhanni.
Andrew waved away the apology and discovered that he still held the plastic figure. Frowning, he tucked it away in his shirt pocket. “All right, constable. What is it?”
“They want you at the station, sir.”
“They? Who?”
“The Assistant Minister, sir.”
Andrew stopped in mid-yawn. “The assistant minister of what?”
“The Interior, sir. And his assistant, sir.”
“The Assistant Assistant Minister?” His mind foggy, Andrew briefly wondered if he were asleep still, and dreaming, and doomed to play insane word games until he awoke howling in terror. “Why do they want me?”
“I don’t know, sir. The chief only told me to come fetch you, sir.”
“The chief is there?”
“Yes, sir.”
The presence of assistant ministers, and their assistants, meant it was something serious; the presence of the chief, at any time after five o’clock in the afternoon, meant it was something earthshaking.
“These ministry people,” Andrew said. “When did they arrive?”
“An hour ago, sir. They came in by helicopter from the capital, sir.”
Something serious indeed.
Constable Duhanni said, “I’ll wait in the car, sir.”
“That’s all right, constable. You go on ahead. I’ll take my moped.”
The constable’s eyes blinked. “Sorry, sir. Orders, sir. I’m supposed to bring you in the car, sir.”
Andrew frowned. “What, am I under arrest?”
“Oh no, sir,” said Duhanni, blinking some more. “No, of course not. It’s just that the chief, sir, he was very firm about it, sir.”
About what, in fact, was the chief not firm?
“All right,” Andrew said. “I’ll be out in a moment. And, constable?”
“Sir?”
“There’s no need to call me sir. Sergeant will do.”
“Yes, sir, sergeant.”
“Ah, sergeant,” said the chief from behind his desk. “Please come in. This is Bwana Nu, the Assistant Minister of the Interior. And this is his associate, Bwana Teggay. Gentlemen, Sergeant Mbutu.”
The two men stood. As protocol demanded, Andrew shook hands first with Bwana Nu.
The chief was a big man, but Minister Nu was huge. Gigantic, enormous: looking like nothing so much as an extremely well fed cartoon cannibal who had been polished to a high gloss and then stuffed into a black suit several sizes too snug. Towering over Andrew, his teeth gleaming like a piano keyboard through his grin, he jerked Andrew’s arm up and down as though he were trying to pump water up from thirty meters below ground.
“Pleased to meet you, sergeant,” he beamed. “Pleased to meet you. The chief here, he’s been relating some of your adventures. Amazing stories, too. And you’re one of his most excellent men, isn’t that right?”
He let go of Andrew’s hand; with difficulty, Andrew bit back a hiss of relief. “Well, minister,” he said weakly. “There are many fine officers in the constabulary.”
“Ha ha ha,” boomed Minister Nu, and clapped him on the shoulder. Andrew staggered slightly to the side. “And modest, too,” said Nu. “I entirely admire a man with the modesty. Maybe because I don’t have any myself.” He boomed again: “Ha ha ha. We’re gonna get along just fine, sergeant. You say hello now to my assistant here.”
Bwana Teggay was an altogether different order of being. Slim, slight, Andrew’s height, he wore a suit of tropical weight charcoal-grey wool, its pinstripes so subtle they might have been imaginary, its tailoring so sleek it might have been devised by the man’s own genes. He was young, in his early thirties, Andrew’s age. His small brown eyes were clear and sharp; his smile was as trim and taut as the man himself.
“How do you do, sergeant,” he said crisply, and crisply he shook Andrew’s hand. “Sorry to drag you out like this in the middle of the night. Have a seat, please, and the minister will explain why we called you in.”
After Teggay and Nu had seated themselves, the minister taking a few moments to settle his bulk comfortably within the chair, Andrew sat. He glanced at the chief. The chief’s face was empty. The chief’s face was always empty.
“Well now,” said Nu, beaming as he leaned forward and planted heavy forearms atop knees the size of pineapples. “That man you found this morning in the hotel room. Who do you think that man was?”
“Quentin Bradford, you mean?” Andrew said.
“Ha ha,” said the minister with a great grin. “Well, sure, my friend, that’s what his passport says. You bet you. That’s what his driving license says. But that’s not what the Ministry of Records says. No sir.”
“The Ministry of Records?”
“That’s right, my friend,” Nu grinned. “That man in the hotel room, that man was Robert Atlee.”
Andrew hesitated. “Robert Atlee,” he said blankly.
Minister Nu frowned: puzzled, perhaps, to find himself in anticlimax when he had so obviously been promoting high drama. “You don’t know this name? Robert Atlee?”
“No, minister, I’m sorry I... oh. Atlee? Robert Atlee? The Englishman friend of Abraham Mayani?”
Minister Nu sat back with a satisfied grin, order having evidently been restored to the universe. “That’s the one. You bet you.”
“But — why? That was over thirty years ago. Why would he come back here now?”
“Ha ha ha,” boomed the minister happily. “That’s what we want you to find out.”
“Me?” He glanced at the chief. Nothing.
“We’re gonna take you out of the police for a while and put you to work for us. You’re gonna be like a private detective, eh? Like Mike Hammer. You ever read this Mike Hammer?”
“No. I am afraid not, minister.”
“Very good stuff, my friend. One time this Mike Hammer chap, he’s gotta go somewhere, see, and he doesn’t wanna leave the villain alone. So what he does, he nails that villain’s hand to the floor! With a sledgehammer!” Gleefully, he slapped his massive thigh. “Ha ha ha. Very good stuff. The best. I’ll send you some of these books, okay?”
“Yes,” Andrew said. “Thank you, yes. But I do not entirely understand what you wish of me, minister.”
Nu held up a hand as big as a flounder. “Don’t you worry. Jimmy here’s gonna fill you in with all the details.” He hauled himself to his feet. “Right now I’ve gotta go and utilize the phone. Chief, you wanna come and have that drink?”
“Of course,” said the chief, and stood. “But if I might add something, minister?”
Nu waved expansively. “You bet you, chief. Absolutely.”