Her return to Sweden was not many days away. In fact it was approaching all too quickly. It had been her original intention to round off the long trip with a few days of holiday sunshine down in Cha Am, but circumstances beyond her control had put paid to the plan, and she realised the most practical thing now was to stay in Bangkok until it was time to go home.
What’s more, her father’s latest email had made her uneasy:
You must be careful. Don’t extend your stay. Be discreet in your investigations. Dad.
Once the last meeting of the day was over, she asked to borrow a phone.
‘I have to ring the airline to confirm my flight home,’ she explained to the man she had just interviewed, taking out the plastic wallet with the electronic tickets she had printed out.
The phone rang several times before the operator answered at the other end.
‘I’d like to confirm my flight back with you on Friday,’ she said, fiddling with a Buddha figurine on the desk in front of her.
‘Booking number?’
She gave her booking reference and waited as the operator put her on hold. Tinny music began to play in her ear, and she looked idly out of the window. Outside, Bangkok was on the boil, getting ready for the evening and night ahead. An unlimited choice of discothèques and nightclubs, bars and restaurants. A constant din and a never-ending stream of people going in all directions. Dirt and dust mixed with the strangest sights and scents. Hordes of shopkeepers and street vendors, and the occasional huge elephant in the heart of the city, although they were prohibited. And between the maze of buildings, the river cutting the city in two.
I must come back here, she told herself. As a proper tourist, not for work.
The tinny music stopped and the operator was back on the line.
‘I’m sorry, miss, but we can’t find your booking. Could you give me the number again?’
She sighed and repeated the number. The man who had lent her his office was clearly losing patience, too. A discreet knock at the door indicated his wish to reclaim it.
‘Won’t be a minute,’ she called.
The knocking stopped as the endless loop of music resumed. She was kept waiting longer this time and was deep in reverie, imagining future tourist trips to Thailand, when the operator’s voice broke in.
‘I’m really sorry, miss, but we can’t find your booking. Are you sure it was with Thai Airways?’
‘I’ve got my e-ticket right here in front of me,’ she said irritably, looking at the computer print-out in her hand. ‘I’m flying from Bangkok to Stockholm with your airline this Friday. I paid 4,567 Swedish kronor. The money was taken from my account on the 10th of January this year.’
She could hear the operator working away at the other end; he had not bothered to put her on hold this time.
‘May I ask how you travelled to Thailand, miss?’ he asked. ‘Did you fly with us?’
She hesitated, recalling the earlier stages of her trip, which she did not want to refer to.
‘No,’ she replied. ‘No, I didn’t come with you. And I was not travelling from Stockholm when I entered Thailand.’
The names of a string of cities flashed on and off in her mind. Athens, Istanbul, Amman and Damascus. No, it wasn’t information anyone else needed to know.
The line went quiet for several minutes, and the man knocked on the office door again.
‘Will you be much longer?’
‘There’s a bit of a problem with my airline ticket,’ she called back. ‘It won’t take long to sort out.’
The operator came back on the line.
‘I’ve made a really thorough check and spoken to my line manager,’ he said firmly. ‘You have no booking with our company and as far as I can see, you never did have.’
She took a breath, ready to protest. But he pre-empted her.
‘I am very sorry, miss. If you would like to make another booking, we can help you with that, of course. Not for Friday, I’m afraid, but we can fly you home on Sunday. A single ticket will cost you 1, 255 dollars.’
‘But this is ridiculous,’ she said indignantly. ‘I don’t want another ticket, I want to fly on the one I’ve already bought. I demand that you…’
‘We’ve done everything we can, miss. The only thing I can suggest is that you check your email account to make sure it really was our airline you booked with and not someone else. There are sometimes false tickets on sale, though it’s extremely rare for that to happen. But as I say, check that and then contact us again. I’ve reserved a seat for you for Sunday. Okay?’
‘Okay,’ she answered in a weak voice.
But it was not okay. Not at all.
She felt weary as she hung up. This was the last thing she needed just now. The whole trip had been dogged by administrative hitches. But it had never occurred to her to worry about the flight home.
She strode out of the room into the corridor.
‘I’m sorry to have taken so long, but there seems to be a problem with my flight home.’
He looked concerned.
‘Is there anything I can do to help?’
‘Is there a computer with internet access I could borrow? Then I could get into my email and double-check my booking.’
He shook his head.
‘Sorry, miss, I’m afraid we haven’t got one here. Our internet connection was so bad that we decided we’d be better off popping to the internet café round the corner when we needed to go online.’
She took her leave, thanking him for his help and all the important information he had been brave enough to entrust her with, and went to the café he recommended.
There was a spring in her long-legged step as she entered the café and asked to use a computer for fifteen minutes. The proprietor showed her to computer number three and asked if she wanted coffee. She declined the offer, hoping she would be on her way back to the hotel very shortly.
The fan inside the computer whirred as the processor tried to upload her inbox onto the screen. She drummed her fingers impatiently on the table, sending up a silent prayer for the system not to crash so she had to start all over again. She knew from experience that the internet abroad was not what it was in Sweden.
The café’s air conditioning was as noisy as a small tank rumbling along, reminding her of the region she had visited before her trip to Thailand. Her hand went automatically to the chain she wore round her neck, under her blouse. Her fingers closed round the USB memory stick that hung on it, resting against her chest. There, encased in that one little bit of plastic, were all the facts she had collected. She would soon be home and all the pieces of the puzzle would fall into place.
‘Sure you’ll be all right?’ her father had asked with an anxious note in his voice, the evening before she left.
‘Course I will.’
He stroked her cheek, and they said no more about it. They both knew she was more than able to look after herself, and anyway, the trip had been her own idea, but the question still needed asking.
‘Just ring if you need any help,’ her father said as they parted at Stockholm’s main airport.
But she had only rung once and the rest of their communication had been by email. She had deleted the emails as she went along without really knowing why.
The computer had finally accessed the site and something came up on the screen.
‘You have entered the wrong password. Please try again.’
She shook her head. This was clearly not going to be a good day. She tried again. The computer growled as it laboured away. And again: