32

THE ENGINE NOISE was a constant drone in the cargo hold. We were following the coastline, flying low. The lush greenery to the right was Kenya. I was perched between two bundles. Tracy was swathed in a tarpaulin like an Egyptian mummy. The heads were in another. They’d been stowed right at the rear, out of Stefan’s sight.

Genghis was between me and the cockpit. He was either asleep or just lying there, I wasn’t sure. His head lolled on his discarded body armour. The boy was next to Joe, sitting on Mr Lover Man’s lap, being cuddled, cajoled and comforted.

Stefan held a nearly empty bottle of water. Mr Lover Man was fooling about, trying to get him to finish it. He needed to get some liquids down him. There still wasn’t much reaction from the boy at all.

I sat staring at the bundles. Mong dead. Tracy dead. Now even BB. It was as if a part of my life had ended too. Maybe it was meant to be. Anna was the important one now. This situation I knew about; her’s I didn’t. I just hoped we’d be able to pick up where we’d left off.

I pulled the iPhone from my pocket. There wasn’t much power left but there were three bars of signal. To try to find some shelter from the noise, I lay down next to Tracy. It wasn’t much help. Finally, with a finger in my other ear, I called her. No mad Arab women this time, just a long, uninterrupted tone. Maybe the French and Brits had bombed the infrastructure to shit.

I cut off. Then I called Jules and went straight to voicemail. ‘Mate, I’m in Kenya, heading to Anna today. I’ll call when I get some more power on this thing.’

Mr Lover Man turned and shouted at Genghis. The cockpit suddenly became a hive of activity. They both peered out of the pockmarked windscreen and Joe gobbed off to air traffic control.

I got up and moved forward. Mr Lover Man was pointing Stefan’s gaze in the direction of his dad. The G6 couldn’t be missed, even at this distance. The airport was not much more than two tarmac runways, big black scars in the ground that joined each other at a right angle. There were a couple of small buildings and hangars, and light aircraft dotted about. Sunlight flashed on the top left corner of the screen as we began our final approach.

The boy peeped at me over Mr Lover Man’s shoulder. He looked more like Frank by the second. I gave him a smile and a wink but got no reaction. The boy turned, the water bottle still in his hand, and nestled into his godfather’s chest. His hair was plastered with sand.

I looked down at him and realized he was going to be OK. His father loved him; his godfathers loved him. Kids have survived war, famine, even the Holocaust, and still become good, stable people. And, besides, Stefan had something other kids didn’t have. The Frank gene. No doubt even this experience would be turned into an advantage later in life.

I felt a little jealous of him. Both his parents had loved him so much, and Mr Lover Man had given Stefan more cuddles and kisses on the cheek during this trip than I’d ever got in my whole childhood.

The wheels touched down, smooth as silk, and Joe taxied towards the G6 by the junction of the runways.

The boy craned his neck towards the jet. Mr Lover Man took the chance to turn and glance at me. His expression hadn’t changed. Fair one. What the fuck did they care about me? The job was the job. The boy was safe. That was all that mattered.

It wasn’t much of a movie ending, but Frank and the lads had what they wanted more than anything. It was all about the boy.

We stopped behind the G6 and the prop spluttered to a halt. It was a bit of an anti-climax. No bands; no welcoming committee. No mayor to give us the freedom of Malindi.

Joe flung open the cockpit door and climbed straight out to start his inspection. ‘Fucking hell, man. Look at this.’ The Perspex was crazed. The fuselage had a lot of new air-conditioning.

Mr Lover Man left the plane carrying Stefan. I followed Genghis out of the shuttered door. I left them to it and joined Joe. It was very clear that my part in the Frank road show had ended. I just let them get on with it.

Joe pushed a fist into a gash in the aluminium and peeled it back a little more. He peered inside his airframe. ‘What happens now, man? What the fuck’s going on?’

‘I don’t know, mate. All I know is that I’ve got to get to Benghazi.’

His hand shot down to his side as if he’d been given an electric shock. ‘What? You really are fucking crazy, man. Haven’t you had enough of this shit already?’ He nodded towards the hold. ‘Who are they?’

‘Georgians – and a guy who used to be a mate. They wanted the boy. His dad wasn’t on their Christmas-card list, if you know what I mean.’

His hands came up to cover his ears. ‘Don’t want to know any more of that shit, man. Just make sure the dad makes good on my airframe. I’m going to be down the beach very soon, getting some beer and doing fuck-all. While that’s happening, my new machine can be on order. That’s me sorted. What you crazy fuckers do is up to you.’

I heard footsteps behind me. I turned to see Mr Lover Man with Stefan still attached to his hip, and Genghis.

Mr Lover Man kissed the boy on the cheek and murmured to him in Russian. Stefan nodded slowly. Mr Lover Man looked at me. His expression hadn’t changed. He still looked like he wanted that axe in the top of my head.

‘You have given us Stefan back. Now you must hand Mr Timis his son.’

He passed him over to me, and I finally got a smile. ‘Thank you, Nick.’ He nodded and stood aside as Genghis held out a hand. Even he came out with a thickly accented ‘Tank you.’

I finished the handshake and headed for the G6. Stefan rested his chin on my shoulder, looking down at the pan.

As I reached the bottom of the steps, Frank appeared in the doorway. He was still dressed in immaculately creased jeans and a crisply ironed, short-sleeved white shirt, with a pen in the breast pocket. But his face wasn’t in such pristine condition. He was crying.