“Habib, please, just a little… so I can pass.”
“Here you are, Dorika.” Habib got up from his seat.
Chapter 68
At that moment Raul was napping in his seat. The telephone in the inside pocket of his jacket vibrated twice and fell silent.
“Who’s calling me now?” wondered Raul. He didn’t feel like talking on the phone. This nap was doing him well, this semi-sleep after all the stress that he had been under that day. “And everything ended well. The people are calm… and they are happy, because of all that support for Pascal. They are proud… I see, how proud they are… there… there… and they deserve it…”
“But that’s not my telephone… mine is at my waist… ah, yes… it’s Pascal’s. Forgive me, my friend… I know that you’ll forgive your friend Raul. I even stole your telephone today… So that Kaella, even if he can locate it… he isn’t all-powerful… thinks that you are with us. It doesn’t matter… some journalist got a hold of your number, Pascal, and he’s being a drag.
“Wait, wait… that’s not your telephone. I gave it to Margot… and she placed it in her bag… Yes, I saw her, when she put it in…”
Raul rose up suddenly in his seat and opened his eyes. “Seneca’s telephone! With the secure line. Raul, remember what Seneca said when you were going into that tube! He’ll call me only in the event of an emergency. Pascal! What has happened?!” Raul panicked.
“Seneca didn’t betray him! He didn’t! Why would he call me if he did?
“Pascal, you must be causing problems! You’re awake and you want to into the street. To be killed. Like, you’ll be more useful dead than alive. Tell that to someone else. That won’t fly with your friend Raul. But, you were scared today, my poet, so you think that the Kaellas will calm down if they kill you and that they won’t take revenge on the people. You can’t stand people suffering because of you.
“It’s not suffering, Pascal. There’s been enough suffering. An entire century. The struggle for freedom is starting. And the people need you, alive. Not just as a symbol. Not as an idea in people’s minds, which will be passed on for generations, and which will topple the Kaellas through nonviolent resistance.
“You’re wrong, my friend. When people such as yourself disappear, then those around them craving power ride that wave and pervert the idea, transform it into the opposite. They become the same or even worse than those they were fighting against.
“You tried to trick me this morning that Svetlana left you. The secretaries laughed at me. Seneca will put you on the telephone and you’ll pay for that, Pascal.” Raul looked at his watch.
“Hurry up, Raul. You’re getting chatty… What did Seneca say? First two vibrations, and then exactly five minutes later — a call. To give me time to find privacy, to get away from the staff. Where can I be alone? The toilet is… I can’t go through the salon, people will get suspicious.
“I’ll go to the back, to the tail of the airplane… Hurry up, Raul. The man’s going to call.”
Raul got up and walked towards the toilet in order to take the Mayor’s call and to make it clear to Pascal that he should stop causing problems.
“If need be I’ll also put Margot and Liam… and Jagdish on the telephone… The entire staff, each and every one of them… so that they can tell him the same.”
Chapter 69
“I thought we were going to have another drink at the bar, Gloria,” said Habib, sitting down next to her. “To talk a bit more.”
“About what? About work? Like at the club? I’ve really had enough talk about work.”
“No, no… it was noisy there, you can’t talk properly.”
“Then about what?”
“About you, Gloria… about us.”
“Why then didn’t you invite me for a drink?”
Habib waited for Raul to pass by them and then said
“How could I when you immediately ran for the elevator? And while you were running… that hair of yours…”
“You could have gone after me, you know where my room is.”
“I wanted to… but you are not alone in the room.”
“And you visit girls only when they are alone in their rooms, Habib? You can only dream about that. I’m not that kind of girl.”
“No, no… I didn’t want to wake up Dorika. It wouldn’t be right.”
“If you really wanted to talk to me, you wouldn’t have even considered of. But you obviously didn’t.”
“I did, Gloria… I didn’t sleep a wink all night…”
“Why?”
“I was only thinking of you. Do you ever think of me?”
“Habib, this isn’t the time for such talks. The elections are coming soon…”
When he had finished the conversation with Mayor Seneca in the airplane’s toilet, Raul placed the secure telephone on the sink, looked at himself in the mirror, turned on the tap, wet his palms and briskly passed them across his face.
“I’ll tell Liam to give me a gun. I’ll tell him it’s just in case, if I get caught… because only I know where Pascal is. So that I don’t give him up, if they torture me… or if they give me a truth serum. Liam will give me a gun, he’ll give me one… I just have to be convincing.”
Raul wiped his face and hands, took the telephone from the sink and put it in his right jacket pocket. He heard the muted sound of the telephone hitting something.
“The syringe. The second syringe… Seneca gave me two. In case one dose wasn’t enough… If Pascal didn’t go down immediately. I won’t need your gun, Liam.”
Raul left the toilet and went towards the front of the airplane.
“Raul,” Citra called out to him as he passed by her.
“Yes, Citra?”
“Does she know that he eats only spicy food?”
“Does who know? I don’t understand.”
“Well that woman. The new cook.”
“Pascal’s?”
“Whose else, Raul?”
“She knows, Citra. I told her that straight away.”
“You sure?”
“I’m sure. Don’t worry.”
“Does she know that she has to add chili to every dish?” Citra burst into tears. “A lot of chilly…”
“She knows, she knows… Come on, Citra, calm down, please.”
Raul leaned down and wiped Citra’s single tear with his thumb.
“Raul,” Liam called out as he passed by him.
“Yes, Liam?”
“I have three recommendations.”
“What recommendations?”
“What do you mean ‘what’? Three cities that we could land in.”
“Excellent, Liam… I too have some cities I was thinking of.”
“Well let’s talk.”
“OK… in a moment. I’m going to see Aslan.”
“To who?”
“To our pilot. His name is Aslan.”
“Why?” Liam asked.
“To check the weather situation with him. You know… that there isn’t a sandstorm somewhere, and that we can’t land.”
“Ah, smart. It’s good that you thought of that.”
“Margot,” said Raul while passing by her.
“Yes, Raul?”
“Margot…”
“What is it, Raul? Are you alright? Has something happened?”
“No, Margot, it hasn’t… it’s Citra… she’s still crying, she can’t calm down. Please go be with her a bit… so that she’s not alone…”
“I will, of course” said Margot and started walking towards the middle of the airplane.