He nodded away. ‘Yep, I hope so too, Nick. Maybe catch up tomorrow.’ His eyes twinkled. ‘I’ll look out one of those little Bosnian ladies for you . . .’
He joined the two BGs and slapped each of them on the shoulder. ‘Come on, boys – let’s go make some juice.’
He disappeared to the final chords of Bonanza and I threw down the last of my Nescafé. Jacob might be right, this was Crazyville, but I’d definitely made the correct decision coming here.
32
Ten minutes for the beers, my arse. I went and joined the Saddam-lookalike competition on the settees; I just didn’t bother trying to smoke myself to death at the same time.
Faces flowed constantly in and out of the hotel, and I recognized one. It was Rob, on his way out. He was on his own, with no ID laminate round his neck but an old semi-automatic on his hip. The Parkerization had worn away, exposing the dull steel beneath. In his hand was an unloaded AK, Para version. It had a shorter barrel than the normal assault rifle and a collapsible butt. Great for close-quarters work or in a car. That, too, had seen a few years’ wear and tear.
He caught my eye and smiled. Things were different now: we were on our own. I hauled myself off the settee. ‘Hello, mate, I thought you were dead!’
His big nose crinkled into a grin. ‘What’s going on, you on the circuit? I thought you’d dropped out years ago.’
‘Sort of. I’m working for an American. A journalist. He’s here for maybe a week to get a picture – a Bosnian guy, here in Baghdad, if you can believe that.’
He could. ‘There’s plenty of weirder stuff going on here – listen . . .’
Three German ex-Paras were singing their regimental song by the newly erected Bedouin tent as two Russians loading AK mags chatted to each other about the noise. Going by their crewcuts, tattoos and scars, they’d spent longer in Chechnya than in Moscow.
‘What about you? What firm you working for?’
‘None of those wankers.’ Rob had always wanted to go his own way. ‘I work for an Uzbek – he’s in the oil business.’
‘Staying here?’
‘No, the al-Hamra. Famous for its swimming-pool, chilled beers and dancing girls. Allegedly. It’s not as well protected as this, but he’s a private sort of guy, and it’s not like he’s not used to a bit of drama, if you know what I mean. That’s why I’ve been looking after him for the last three years. He’s a good man, as it happens.’
‘Even better. How long you here for?’
‘Four, five days? We’re not too sure. But no more than a week. I came to pick these fucking things up.’ He hefted the AK. ‘Three fifty they wanted for this heap of shit.’ His nose crinkled again as he had a thought. ‘What you doing tonight? CNN are having a pool party here.’
‘Without water?’
My fixer arrived with the beer. It had a Bavarian-looking label, and was probably brewed just up the road. There’d never been a problem with alcohol in Muslim countries like this, even in restaurants. You just brought your own and asked if it was OK to drink it.
I gave the guy fifteen dollars instead of the five he’d asked for. The ten was to make sure he came back in the morning with the weapons. As he left I turned back to Rob. ‘What time’s kick-off?’
‘Eightish? You’re here anyway.’
We shook hands and I watched him loading a mag on to his AK as he headed for the door.
The best part of an hour must have passed back on the settee before I heard the sudden sound of a heavy machine-gun, then short bursts of 5.56, both from less than three, four hundred metres away.
Jerry came through the main doors as if his tail was on fire. ‘You hear that? Fuck . . .’
I stood up. ‘Any luck at the mosque?’
‘Nope. Nothing at all. I’ll try again at Maghrib.’ His eyes scanned the activity in the lobby. ‘I got no news from DC either. I’ll keep on calling. I know if he finds out we’ll find out.’
‘So, come on, you can tell me now. We’re here, so it doesn’t matter. What paper does he work for?’
His eyes locked on to mine. This was going to be the last time he told me. ‘Look, Nick, you know the score with sources. I can’t, and won’t, say zip. He’d lose his job, man, everything. We gotta respect that shit.’
He was right, of course. But it didn’t stop me wanting to know.
He had an afterthought. ‘You want to use the phone?’
I shook my head.
‘What are you, Billy-no-mates?’
‘Something like that.’ I held up the beers. ‘Here, for you. I ain’t touching this shit.’
He took the bag off me as we headed for the lifts.
‘You staying in all night to drink those?’ I hit the lift call button. ‘Or you want to come to a party and maybe find Nuhanovic?’
33
There was a knock at the door. It couldn’t be Jerry. He had left ages ago for the mosque to catch Maghrib at around last light. I opened it to find two old boys, cigarettes in their mouths. One handed me a sliver of soap and a hand towel. The other gave me some thin sheets that had gone grey a few hundred wash cycles ago. Everything stank of cigarettes.
I tried the shower tap and got a trickle of cold water, so I jumped under it before it ran out. The 1970s radio set into the Formica bedhead was tuned to American Free Radio and pumped out country-and-western.
The sun was going down when I emerged. I switched off the radio and turned on the steam-driven TV, which was tuned to a snowflaky version of CNN, but at least I had decent sound. The only other channel was showing a football game.
Not wanting to be the object of tonight’s target practice, I turned out the lights before I went on to the balcony and looked out over the thousands of satellite dishes that sprouted like weeds from the rooftops.
The rattle of automatic gunfire came from somewhere in the distance. A few more rounds of heavier automatic fire, probably 7.62 short from AKs, were met by a huge amount of fire from the Americans’ lighter 5.56 ammunition. Then a stream of heavier-calibre stuff was unleashed, probably .50 cals, and this time I saw tracer bouncing up into the last few minutes of dusk from the other side of the Tigris.
It stopped as quickly as it had started, but the lull didn’t last long. Two Apache gunships thundered overhead, their shapes deep black against the evening sky. Somebody was going to wish they’d had an early night.
They swooped over the river and, moments later, one of them opened up, strafing the riverbank. It felt strange to be spectating from the very place that most of the shock-and-awe footage had been shot, watching the same area taking hits all over again.
Below me, preparations for the pool party continued as if no one had a care in the world about what was happening the other side of the rush fence. Either they felt immune to attack or wanted to believe they were. Plastic tables straight from the same B&Q as the garden shed were being dragged into the grass and round the still empty pool, and a couple of big oil-drum barbecues were on the go.
Another brief contact rattled round the city somewhere, followed closely by an explosion. Nobody stopped doing what they were doing. Nothing mattered beyond the garden wall and our American protection. The Palestine was a little oasis, a bubble of safety.
I looked around the sky. There was no tracer, and I couldn’t see any smoke. It was time for a brew.
The lift bounced at every floor as it took me down to the lobby.
From a mug the boys had found behind the counter, I took a heat-testing sip of Nescafé. There were just a couple of Iraqis left in here, maybe because all the eggs and cheese had been eaten. The Casio and guitar stuff was still in place but the player wasn’t to be seen. Shame: Johnny Cash’s dad had grown on me.