Page 189 of Never

‘You have an answer for everything.’

‘So will you when you’re my age.’

***

After about an hour Abdul saw Yakub’s pickup. It came wheezing up the slope, going ever slower, trailing a cloud of dust. The dust might help conceal Abdul as he jumped into the back.

He remained motionless, waiting for the right moment.

He could see Yakub’s face through the windscreen, concentrating on the track ahead. As the vehicle passed Abdul’s hiding place its dust cloud spread and enveloped him, and he leaped to his feet.

Then he heard another vehicle.

He cursed.

He could tell by the engine note that the second vehicle was newer and more powerful, probably one of the black Mercedes SUVs he had seen in the secure car park. It was moving fast, and its driver evidently intended to overtake Yakub.

Abdul could not risk exposure. The dust might hide him, but it might not, and if he was seen his escape attempt would be over, and so would his life.

He sank back to the ground, pulled his headdress over his face, and blended back in with the desert as the Mercedes roared by.

The two vehicles breasted the rise and disappeared over the hill, leaving behind a tan-coloured fog, and Abdul began to trudge back to the camp.

He could at least try again. His plan was still good. He had just been unlucky. It was unusual for two vehicles to leave the camp together.

He would have another opportunity in a week’s time. If he was still alive.

***

He was made to work through the midday break as a punishment for arriving late at the pit. He guessed that the penalty would have been worse had he not been such a strong worker.

That evening he was tired and disheartened. Another week in hell, he thought. He sat on the ground outside the shelter, waiting for supper. As soon as he had satisfied his hunger he would sleep.

He heard the throb of a powerful engine. A Mercedes arrived and moved slowly through the quarter. The black paintwork was brown with dust.

In the fenced vehicle park opposite the shelter, the guard unchained the high gate with a loud metallic rattle.

The car drove in and stopped, and two guards with rifles got out. Then two more men emerged. One was tall, wearing a black dishdasha and a white taqiyah cap. Abdul’s pulse quickened as he saw that the man had grey hair and a black beard. He turned slowly around, surveying the encampment with a coldly unemotional gaze, showing no reaction to the ragged women, the exhausted men, or the ramshackle shelters where they lived; he might have been looking at bedraggled sheep in a barren landscape.

The second man was East Asian.

Abdul palmed his good phone and surreptitiously took a photo.

Mohammed came hurrying along the path, a look of delighted surprise on his face, and said: ‘Welcome, Mr Park! How pleasant to see you again!’ Abdul noted the Korean name and took another picture.

Mr Park was well dressed, in a black linen blazer, tan chinos, and heavy-duty ankle boots with ridged soles. He wore sunglasses. His hair was thick and dark, but his round face was lined, and Abdul guessed he was about sixty.

Everyone around treated the Korean with deference, even his tall Arab companion. Mohammed kept smiling and bowing. Mr Park ignored him.

They began to walk along the litter-strewn path towards the guards’ compound. The tall Arab put his arm around Mohammed, and Abdul was able to see his left hand on Mohammed’s shoulder. The thumb was a shortened stump with a gather of twisted skin. It looked like a combat wound that had never been properly treated.

There was no further doubt. He was al-Farabi, ‘the Afghan’, the most important terrorist in North Africa. And this was the Hole, Hufra, his headquarters. Yet he seemed to defer to a Korean superior. And the geologist was Korean too. The North Koreans seemed to be running the gold mine. Clearly they were more deeply involved in African terrorism than anyone in the West suspected.

Abdul had to share this information before he was killed.

Watching the group walk away, he noticed that al-Farabi was the tallest, and the cap added another inch or two: he understood the power symbolism of height.

Then he saw Kiah coming in the other direction, toting a plastic demijohn of water on her shoulder, one hip thrown sideways for balance. She was young, and despite having spent nine days in a slave camp she looked vigorous and supple as she carried her burden with little apparent effort. She glanced at al-Farabi, saw the two men with rifles, and moved to give them a wide berth. Like all the slaves she knew that no encounter with guards ended well.