Jimmy was explaining the layout of the Shah Medicals site as I drew a rough plan on a sheet of paper. He also wanted to explain each of the six different keys he’d obtained from Luther Jasman.
“We use this key to open the main gate. We use this key to unlock the rear entrance. Inside, we’ll probably find a forklift truck and a van.
This key unlocks the cupboard where Lucky kept his brushes and mops. This key opens the door leading into the room with the boxes of medicines and machinery and where I found the boxes marked Malthus A. This key opens the office where Luther and the Pakistani men worked - the room I cleaned. I think this is the key that opens Dominique Lunneau’s office. I’ve not been in there.”
I told Jimmy to go home and return at 2 am. We were at the hotel room door when he turned. “Can I suggest something very important?” He sounded a little embarrassed, so I asked him what it was. “Wear black clothes,” he said. “There is no moon tonight, but white people make everything shine.”
I lay on the bed and thought about Anna.
When we had been together in Thailand and Singapore, I had found myself constantly looking at her - the way she dressed, the way she walked, the way she glanced over her shoulder and smiled when she knew I was looking at her. So, I called her number again, but there was no reply.
I must have drifted off to sleep when my phone rang and made me jump. I thought it might be Anna, but it was Jimmy, and he was whispering. “Mr Dobson?”
“What’s up, Jimmy?”
“Shhh! I couldn’t sleep so I’m already outside Shah Medicals. The lights were still on. Three people are working outside. They are using the forklift truck and putting boxes into the van. But that’s not all, Mark. Three other men arrived in a big Mercedes. Two were white, and one is brown. I think he is Arab. One of the white ones is Dominique Lunneau, but I don’t know the other one.”
I got off the bed. “Stay right there, Jimmy. I’ll get a taxi.”
“Don’t come close, Mr, Dobson. Ask the taxi to take you to Splendid Chicken and Chips on Kangundo Road. I will wait for you.”
Jimmy was as good as his word. He was there, waiting, and even opened the taxi door. Then he led me into the darkness. “I told you to wear something black, Mr Dobson. I can still see your face, and there’s no light here.”
“Black doesn’t suit me,” I said. “And I didn’t pack a balaclava.”
He led me through an obstacle course of piles of old tyres and wooden pallets and then stopped. “There,” he said, pointing. “See the lights?
Shah Medicals. Come.”
Then he stopped again, pointing at a dark shadow. “My car. As you can see, it’s a black car.” He opened the door. We both got in, and he then pointed towards the lights behind a high wire fence. “Shah Medicals,” he said excitedly.
The building was lit by three spotlights fixed to the outside walls.
Windows along the side wall were lit from inside and a big Mercedes was parked outside the front entrance. Alongside it was a smaller car.
“Whose car is the Toyota, Jimmy?”
“Lunneau’s. See the van at the back and the forklift truck? It must be full now. I think it’s the boxes marked Malthus and ampoules.
They’ve been working for an hour. There are only three of the Pakistani men left here. The others have gone.”
“Are you sure they’re from Pakistan, Jimmy?”
“Oh yes, they have a beard, white trousers and a waistcoat.”
We watched the van until the driver’s door was opened and a man got in. Two men then closed the rear door of the building and got in. The van’s engine fire, it moved to the front entrance and then stopped again. The driver got out, went to the front entrance and a light came on inside.
“Glasses,” Jimmy said and handed me a pair of binoculars that had been lying on the floor.
I trained them on the building. Jimmy was probably right about the nationality of the men.
“Camera.” Jimmy said, putting a cheap Sony digital camera on my lap. “Keys,” he added, smiling and jingling a set on a ring.
“What time is it?”
“Twelve forty-seven.”
“Describe the Arab-looking guy you saw, Jimmy.”
“Medium. I was focussing on the white man.”
“Not much to go on, Jimmy.”
“Sorry, but he was medium- not big, not small.”
“Wearing a suit? A dishdasha? A kameez? A hat? Swimming trunks?
Carrying an umbrella?”
“Suit.”
“Describe the other white man.”
“A light-coloured suit.”
“Another one who didn’t take your advice then, Jimmy. Do you think he’s on a safari holiday?”
“He didn’t have the matching hat.”
“Tall, short, fat, thin?”
“Tall - like you and me.”
“Fat? Thin?”
“Fatter than Lunneau.”
“Did you watch him through these?” I pointed at the binoculars.
“Yes, but he was moving around.”
I fished in my pocket for my phone and pulled up the photos.
“Change the dark suit for a light one. Could this be him?” I held the phone up in the pitch blackness for Jimmy to see.
“Could be,” said Jimmy.
“How about this one?” It was another shot of the same man.
“Yes,” Jimmy said, pointing excitedly at the screen. “That’s his white head. If the moon had been out, there would have been no need for the security lights.”
I had to smile. Jimmy was often very funny, but he never laughed at his own humour.
“I last saw this guy in Bangkok,” I said. “Unless I’m badly mistaken, Greg O’Brian has come to inspect his warehouse stock at one in the morning. Nasty piece of work, Jimmy. Just as well you weren’t inside when he turned up, especially if there was a garden fork handy.”
Jimmy’s eyes widened. “There’s a gun in there, though. I saw it through the keyhole of Lunneau’s office. It was on the floor beneath his desk. I forgot to tell Colin that.”
“Perhaps they’re planning to go on safari after all, then Jimmy.”
Jimmy grinned. Perhaps he liked my jokes better than his own. “But what do we do? Wait till they’ve gone?”
“Are we going to learn anymore by going inside, Jimmy? It’s risky, and you’ve already found enough.”
“I also forgot to tell Colin I’d photographed the boxes.”
“Are the photos on the camera?”
“Yes.”
“Can I borrow the camera to transfer the photos?”
Jimmy looked embarrassed. “Uh, yes, I, uh. Let me delete some first.”
He grabbed the camera and, as I watched, flicked through a backlog.
The camera bleeped about twenty times, but I didn’t tell him I’d caught a glimpse of a woman in a short skirt. “My aunty in Mombasa,” he said, handing it back to me.
“Instead of going inside again, I think we’ll follow them, Jimmy. Find out where they’re staying and get some more photos. What do you think?”