Brice’s expression was halfway between a smile and a sneer. ‘You’re welcome to try. Squaddies always overestimate their chances.’
‘I’m tempted, but to be honest, I’d rather spend the evening on the phone with my daughter than down at the local police station explaining why I knocked some drunken arsehole’s teeth out.’ He glanced at the whisky glass; while Brice had raised it to his lips several times, the level of the brown liquid within didn’t seem much lower than when he had first arrived. Lightweight, he thought. ‘And I’ve got a plane to catch tomorrow morning, so think yourself lucky. Be better for you if I don’t see you again, though.’
‘I assure you, I don’t spend all day hanging around in hotel bars. I’ve got business to attend to. Enjoy your stay, though, Chase. Try not to catch anything.’ Another sarcastic toast.
‘Twat,’ was Eddie’s parting shot as he walked out. Nina was waiting at the reception desk, the expedition’s other members having joined her. ‘Hi, love. We all booked in?’
‘Yeah, but who was that in there?’ she asked. ‘You looked like you were having an argument.’
‘Just someone I had a run-in with once.’
‘Small world.’
‘Not bloody big enough. Still, won’t be seeing him again. Thank God.’
Paris glanced into the bar. ‘Is that John Brice?’
‘You know him?’ Eddie asked.
‘I know of him. Not a man I want to drink with. He’s been dealing with some bad people, is what I hear.’
‘Doesn’t surprise me.’
Fisher approached from the desk, holding up his room key. It was an actual piece of metal rather than a swipe card, attached to a large block of wood. ‘Welcome to the nineteenth century! I suppose this is one way to stop people from stealing them.’
Fortune grinned at him. ‘Would you prefer to be locked out of your room when the electricity fails?’
‘The power goes off?’ asked Lydia.
‘Most nights, yes. The hotel has a generator, but not always enough gasoline to run it.’
‘Sometimes the old brute force approach is best,’ said the amused Nina, holding up her own equally bulky key fob. ‘You’d agree with that, wouldn’t you, Eddie?’
He was looking distractedly back into the bar. ‘Hmm? Oh, yeah.’
‘You okay?’
‘Yeah, I’m fine.’ He composed himself, then retrieved their bags. ‘Come on, then. Let’s check out our pad.’
By the time they were installed in their third-floor room, sunset had arrived with equatorial swiftness. They sat on the small balcony to watch. Butembo became more visually appealing in inverse proportion to the amount of remaining daylight, shadows hiding the squalor.
‘So, that guy downstairs,’ Nina asked, ‘who was he? Paris said he’d heard of him…’
‘His name’s Brice. Used to work for the British government.’
She picked up the disdain in his voice. ‘You mean MI6?’
‘Yeah.’
She smiled. ‘You really don’t like spies, do you?’
‘Nope. Bunch of sneaky, lying bastards. Doesn’t matter which side they’re on, they’re as bad as each other.’
‘Well, Peter Alderley’s okay.’
‘Alderley! That tosser.’ But he said it with a crooked smile.
‘How did you meet this Brice, then?’
‘Job I did a while back,’ he said, being deliberately vague. ‘Ended okay from my point of view, but not his, which he was pretty pissed off about. He wound up quitting because of it, and now he’s out here as a private contractor.’
‘Not someone I want to get to know, then.’
‘Nope. Alderley’s a bell-end, but he’s a relatively good guy. Brice is just an arsehole, though. Anyway, let’s not—’
He broke off as the lights scattered across the darkening town flickered, then vanished. The hotel’s own lights briefly dimmed before returning. ‘Whoa. Fortune wasn’t kidding about the power,’ said Nina. The sun was now gone, the sky turning a bruised purple in its wake.
Eddie shook his head. ‘Happens a lot in this part of the world, even in pretty big cities. The only places you can guarantee the lights’ll stay on are the ones with lots of tourists… or the country’s rulers.’
‘Where the money is, in other words.’
‘Yeah. I got cynical about that a long time ago. Even back home in England.’
‘You still think of it as home? Even after living in New York for twelve years?’
‘Always will, because, well, it is home. It’s where I grew up, it’s what made me who I am…’
He trailed off with a small frown. Nina caught his change of expression. ‘What’s wrong?’
‘Something Brice said, that’s all. Made me wonder where I actually belong.’
‘You’ve got a wife and a little girl! You should know where you belong.’
He smiled, then regarded his watch. ‘We should call Macy soon.’
‘It won’t be her bedtime for a couple of hours.’
‘I’m thinking more about our bedtime. It’ll be a long day tomorrow, for both of—’
Eddie stopped mid-sentence again, but this time at the sound of gunfire. He jumped from his seat to shield Nina as he scanned the dark streets below. The shots, he could tell, were from a rifle rather than a handgun, probably a Kalashnikov set on single shot. Shouts reached him from a few hundred metres away, but he couldn’t pick out any activity at ground level. ‘Think we should go inside.’
‘Yup,’ Nina quickly agreed. Even before Eddie had closed the French windows behind them, they heard another gunshot. ‘Who do you think it is?’
‘Militia, probably — maybe this lot Fortune told us about.’
‘I’m glad the hotel’s behind that wall.’
‘Won’t keep ’em out if they really want to come in.’
‘Thanks, honey. You know how to make a woman feel safe.’
Someone knocked on the door. The Englishman cautiously opened it. Ziff was outside, eyes wide. ‘Did you hear those shots?’
‘Yeah,’ Nina told him. ‘Eddie thinks it’s the militia.’
‘They didn’t sound far away! I hope the hotel is safe.’
She looked at her husband. ‘You want to tell him, or shall I?’ He gave her a grim smile.
‘I assume you think the whole town is unsafe, then?’ asked the Israeli. ‘At least we’re leaving in the morning.’
‘The countryside won’t be any safer,’ Eddie told him.
‘Wonderful.’ Ziff put a hand to his head. ‘Still, I suppose it will make your television show more exciting. If we make it back alive, that is.’
‘I’m sure Fortune and Paris will make sure we do,’ said Nina, trying to sound reassuring — both for Ziff’s benefit and her own.
A door opened down the hallway. ‘Did you just hear shooting?’ asked Lydia in alarm. The New Zealander was clad in an oversized T-shirt, clutching it protectively around herself.
‘It’ll be okay,’ said Eddie. ‘If you’ve got earplugs, you might want to put ’em in, though.’
‘Oh, great. We’re in a war zone.’ She retreated and closed the door.
Ziff regarded the doorway curiously. ‘Isn’t that Mr Fisher’s room?’
‘I’m sure they’re just sharing to save the production company some money,’ said Nina, holding in a smile. The director and sound woman weren’t a couple, but it had become clear that they were at the very least friends with benefits.
The bearded archaeologist gave her a wry look, then returned to his own room. ‘I’ll see you in the morning, Nina.’
‘See you then,’ she replied. Eddie closed the door. She saw when he turned that he was deep in thought. ‘What?’
‘I don’t think Fortune and Paris will be enough to look after you all,’ he said. ‘Not with these militia twats running around.’