Even now, the few answers he did have made little sense and he was far from being ready to offer anything in the way of an explanation.
Heather had stopped probing his armpit for more fragments of aluminium. ‘Aren’t you going to tell me?’ she said.
‘It wasn’t a trap for Hari: It was a trap for me. The guy who was driving that truck at the beach was on board the Pishan. He was standing right in front of me. Whatever the connection is between what happened last night and what happened at Fauzdarhat, it isn’t Hari.’
‘So you’ve decided you’re the connection?’ She looked doubtful.
‘Or you,’ Coburn said. ‘The only three people who have anything in common with last night and a ship-breaking yard thousands of miles away are you, me and that driver.’
‘It doesn’t mean he was on board the Pishan to kill you.’
‘It does if that’s the new job he’s been given. Whoever it is who wants me out of the way must have known the Pishan was going to be raided and somehow or other they knew I’d be part of the boarding party.’
‘How could they?’ Her cheeks started to go red. ‘You don’t think it was me, do you?’ she said. ‘I didn’t tell anyone.’
‘If it wasn’t you or me, and if it wasn’t Hari, that only leaves two other people.’
‘You mean O’Halloran — or Armstrong at the IMB?’
‘Or both of them,’ Coburn said. ‘Which it can’t be — not when it was the IMB that sent me to find you in Bangladesh, and not when it was the CIA and O’Halloran’s Counter-Proliferation Centre who wanted me to check out the Pishan on their behalf. Have you got any more bright ideas like that one?’
‘No. I don’t really trust the Americans though.’
Coburn grinned at her. ‘Because you think they’re paranoid about North Korea?’
‘They are.’ She made him wince by swabbing hydrogen peroxide over his cuts. ‘After you’d left last night a girl called Indiri came to see me. She’s the wife of one of the men who got hurt. I think Hari had asked her to make sure I was all right while you were away. She said that whenever her husband’s out on a raid she stops herself from worrying about him by watching satellite television all night. So I went with her.’
‘And?’ Coburn put his shirt back on.
‘If you’d spent hours watching TV broadcasts instead of getting yourself knocked out in the middle of the Strait, you’d know exactly how paranoid the Americans are. CNN were running a story about Israel intercepting a huge shipment of guns that North Korea had sold to the Palestinians, and FOX TV was going on about how US soldiers had discovered a whole lot of short-range Korean missiles that were being smuggled into Iraq.’
‘I’ve told you.’ Coburn said. ‘That’s how the Americans are since 9/11.’
‘I know. But the media are making things worse. That dreadful Brigadier Shriver from the Free America League was on the news again. It’s crazy putting people like him on TV. All it’s doing is frightening half of America into believing North Korea’s going to launch nuclear missiles at Hawaii or Los Angeles or somewhere.’
‘Plenty of blowhards like Shriver around. Never mind him. How’s Indiri’s husband?’
‘As long as there’s no infection and I keep changing his dressing, he’ll be fine.’ She smiled. ‘And so will you — or you will be when your headache goes.’
‘It’s pretty much gone already.’ It was a lie, but the longer she kept fussing the less time he’d have to figure out what he was going to say to Hari, and the less time he’d have to decide whether, as a consequence of last night, she might be in danger too.
‘I don’t think this is the best place for us to be right now,’ he said. ‘You’ll be safer back in Singapore. I’ll organize a boat for tomorrow.’
‘Not for me you won’t.’ She compressed her lips and put a hand on her hip. ‘You can’t tell me what to do or where to go. I’m not leaving while I’ve got patients here.’
In no mood for an argument he changed the subject, asking if O’Halloran had said anything to her at the beach that hadn’t sounded right.
She shook her head. ‘Not that I can remember. Why?’
‘Armstrong will be expecting to hear from me, but before I call him it’d be handy to know whether he’s involved, or if it’s O’Halloran who’s the problem.’
‘You said you didn’t think either of them were. Anyway, it won’t be Armstrong, will it — not when you’ve known him for so long? Wasn’t it him who got you the job at IMB to start with?’
By a slip of the tongue she’d given herself away. But before Coburn could find out how she’d uncovered the information, Hari appeared in the doorway.
‘Ah. I see you are receiving special attention.’ The Frenchman came into the room. ‘You are feeling better?’
‘Getting there. How about you?’
‘I am more fortunate. On the port side from which I jump only one grenade is dropped into the water. You and I are both lucky, I think.’
‘Luckier than those other three guys of yours,’ Coburn said. ‘Look, I’m really sorry. The whole bloody thing was my fault.’
‘No, no. Your warning saves many lives. You must not blame yourself for what has happened.’
Coburn wasn’t certain whether he was blaming himself or not. Two weeks ago, after he’d returned from Bangladesh, he’d provided Hari with an edited account of what he’d found on board the Rybinsk, but had avoided mentioning his new assignment and, at the time, had glossed over the incident of the truck driver and the children, not believing it to have any relevance. But it sure as hell did now, he thought, although whether that was going to help solve the puzzle of which he seemed to have become a part was a lot more doubtful.
‘So.’ Hari found a chair to sit on and lit up a cigarette. ‘On the Pishan before we are fired upon you promise me an explanation,’ he said. ‘I am looking forward to hearing it.’
‘It’s not much of one.’ On this occasion, with Heather’s help, Coburn didn’t leave out anything, starting with his first encounter with the truck on the road to Fauzdarhat before he went on to describe how the IMB had coerced him in to acting as an agent for the US Counter-Proliferation Centre. When he’d finished he let Heather fill in the gaps and summarize his suspicions about Armstrong and O’Halloran, interrupting her only at the end to point out that his distrust was based on nothing more than guesswork.
‘I see.’ Hari had been listening carefully, drawing on his cigarette from time to time, but seemingly more interested than he was disturbed by what he’d heard. ‘Why had you not informed me of this before?’ he said.
‘Because until last night it was none of your business.’ Coburn was careful not to sound too conciliatory. ‘Why would I want to tell you about it? I don’t ask you who your buyers are, or how much money you make from a raid. I get paid to do a job, and you get paid if you do yours.’
‘And, of course, Miss Cameron is paid to do hers.’ Hari turned to smile at her. ‘Although I am sure not as much as she deserves. My men are grateful for what you do for them. It is good you are here.’
‘I’ve treated gunshot wounds before,’ she said. ‘The ones your men have aren’t life threatening or anything.’
‘For which we have Mr Coburn to thank. Had we been successful, such injuries would have been a small price to pay for two hundred thousand dollars’ worth of zinc ingots, but since we have nothing to show for our trouble it is a pity to have returned with casualties of this kind. I shall see what can be done to rectify the matter.’
‘Cut your losses,’ Coburn said. ‘Leave it alone. It’s not your problem: it’s mine.’