Kennedy 35 by Charles Cumming

Author:Charles Cumming [Cumming, Charles]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollinsPublishers
Published: 2023-09-15T17:00:00+00:00

22

The night manager was seated behind the reception desk reading a French academic textbook about biochemistry. He was a young, bespectacled Senegalese with an attentive air who did not seem at all startled when the bedraggled Kite walked in off the street asking if he could use the phone.

‘Êtes-vous un client de l’hôtel?’

‘No,’ Kite replied in English. ‘I don’t have a booking. I was going to call you from the airport, but I didn’t have time.’

With an apologetic smile, the night manager explained that he did not speak English and had failed to understand what monsieur was trying to tell him.

Reverting to French, Kite explained that he had come straight from the airport where his luggage had failed to turn up. His father was still at the terminal attempting to retrieve it. They wanted two rooms for three nights, bed and breakfast. And could he possibly use the telephone so that he could call his father at the Lost Property office and direct him to the hotel?

‘Of course, sir.’

Kite registered with the Galvin passport, paying cash for the rooms. He was then pointed to a Bakelite phone on the opposite side of the reception area. The night manager explained that the cost of the call would be charged to his room. Then he went back to his textbook.

Kite dialled the satellite number from memory. He listened to it ring out with the same mounting frustration he had felt six hours earlier in the restaurant. At long last someone picked up.

‘Oui?’

It was Vauban.

‘Philippe?’

‘C’est moi.’

He was the last person Kite had expected.

‘Where’s the boss?’

‘Mike? Right now, I don’t know. What’s up, Locklang?’

There was a strange lack of urgency in his voice, no trace of stress. He might have been lying in bed with a girl, nonchalantly lighting a post-coital cigarette, or smoking a joint on the beach.

‘I need to speak to him.’

‘Like I said, he is not here. He ask me to answer the phone. So that is what I am doing. I am answering the phone. I feel good. I feel powerful.’

‘You feel what?’

‘Where are you, Locklang? Let’s talk about Bagaza. It’s time.’

‘Are you OK, Philippe? You sound stoned.’

‘Moi? Stoned?’ The Frenchman laughed. ‘No. I don’t smoke tonight. But I feel great. I feel like I understand what we all have to do, yeah? I have understood this for a long time. I just didn’t …’ His voice drifted off, then returned to complete the thought: ‘I just didn’t understand. I feel like I finally know God. I can make miracles happen.’

‘Look,’ said Kite, alarmed. ‘I need you to concentrate. It sounds like the Lariam you’ve been taking is still messing with your head.’

‘Don’t fucking patronise me, OK?’ Vauban’s sudden anger was as disconcerting as his mood of mellow tranquillity. ‘I can concentrate. I see things much clearer than you, in fact.’

‘I am not patronising you, Philippe. We have a very serious situation. I need you to call the boss.’

‘Mike? Sure. I can reach him. What has happened? What is your situation, friend?’

‘Just listen to me carefully.

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