The Protocols of Carstairs
Copyright© 2021 by Ron Dudderie
Chapter 4: We Have Lift-Off
K-T was waiting for me in the almost empty car park of a mall. Riyadh had gone to sleep. They leave the lights on, but the roads go very quiet after the last prayer. I wouldn’t miss this place, but I had become quite at ease here. They drive like maniacs, sure, but I can handle that. The heat was annoying and the air quality a disgrace, but nine months of rain and three months of heatwaves back home weren’t all that great either. I wished my escort good night, got into K-T and drove back to the palace. The Ford Focus would be fine. I’d leave a note with the keys telling them where it was parked.
K-T was surprisingly quiet.
“No messages?”
“There are no new messages.”
I took it slow, so my watch would have a chance to recharge. I could make it home in under five minutes if I wanted to, but now that I had a second chance to say goodbye to Saudi Arabia and this weird but undeniably amazing car, I took my time. Another ten minutes would see my watch charged almost fully, so I broke my own rule against fast food, pulled up at a Burger King and got myself a meal. It was bland, disappointing and unhealthy, but at least it put a stop to the hunger pangs. I ate it in their parking lot, my watch dangling from the wheel so it would continue to charge. And then, reeking of chicken, fries and mayonnaise, I passed through the two checkpoints of the Royal Palace, parked K-T behind the Guest Palace and made my way to the third floor. It was quiet. Everyone had gone to bed, or at least restricted themselves to their private residences.
I’d miss this room, though. I didn’t have a room to myself back home, as that was now Edwin’s nursery. I’d spent more than a few pleasant hours here, drinking tea and reading books or preparing lessons. Nobody minded if I played jazz, or sat behind my laptop until two a.m.
I got to sleep late as well, or at least late by recent standards. Edwin was usually awake before seven a.m. but here I’d sometimes stay in bed until well after eight. Bliss! And then I’d get breakfast delivered to my room, take a leisurely shower and go and talk about economics for just under three hours. Not a bad life at all, really.
Strange, how I managed to put away all thoughts of my family while I was here. I do love them, all of them. In fact, the last time I had to face the prospect of leaving them, my stomach decided to try and straight up murder me. Not now, though. I missed them, sure. But I managed not to dwell on it, somehow.
I brushed my teeth, undressed and got into bed for the last time. My phone was charging on my desk. There probably wouldn’t be time tomorrow, but the day after I’d make a point of visiting Diana’s grave, and tell her I’d done as much as I could. Over three hundred dead ... That’s something, isn’t it? That is vengeance by anyone’s standard. Time to pack it in, Carstairs.
September 10th, 2015. Guest Palace.
I slept very well that night, for the first time in about a week. You see, before my stint in prison I’d slept on an airbed in a garage for a couple of nights. This was infinitely better. As soon as I woke up I phoned the kitchen with my breakfast order and then I went into the bathroom and dyed the worst of the greyness out of my hair for the last time. It didn’t matter all that much, but it would be funny to see how Kelly and the others reacted to it. I’d probably pretend I was going to keep this circle beard for a week or so, just to get a rise out of them. I’d have to time it carefully, because if I kept it up for too long I was probably going to get ambushed and tied to a chair by Katey Todd. (I’ll give you this one, as I’m in a good mood. It’s a reference to Sweeney Todd, the demon barber. You’re welcome.)
At a quarter to nine there was a knock on the door, and the familiar trolly was wheeled in by one of the staff. I was just buttoning my vest.
“Good morning, Mr. Carstairs. Nice to have you back with us.”
Damn! I’d forgotten this guy’s name again...
“Thank you. It’s good to be back.”
And that was the entire conversation. Look, I can’t be friends with everyone. I checked my phone, but there were no messages. As I had no way of contacting Caroline directly, since I didn’t know her number, I reached out to K-T.
“The number you have...”
“Hi, it’s me. Any messages?”
“You have no new messages.”
“Oh. I’m expecting a message from Caroline Keller, about my departure today. You wouldn’t have her number, would you?”
“I can transfer an audio recording to her email. It will be encrypted.”
“Okay, let’s do that.”
“Recording.”
“Caroline, it’s Reginald Carstairs. It occurred to me I don’t have your direct number. K-T will have mine, so please send me a text and let me know our departure time. Thank you. Stop recording.”
“Recording ended. Would you like to review your message?”
“No. Send to Caroline Keller.”
“Message queued for encryption and delivery.”
“Don’t queue it, do it now.”
“I will do so once this conversation ends.”
“Okay.”
...
“K-T, was there anything else?”
“You have no new messages.”
“No, I mean ... Never mind. If she reaches out to you, inform me at once.”
“I will do so. Have a nice day, Reginald.”
This was awkward. It seemed as if I actually had to prepare a lesson now, but what if Caroline called me while it was in progress? I’d have to make an excuse to Alexandra. We should have discussed all this, but there simply hadn’t been time.
Coming up with a lesson wasn’t a big deal. The Swiss academy Alexandra attended had listed the topics of her next exam, including extensive teacher notes. She was also supposed to give a brief biography of some influential economist and I was going to tell her the story of Edith Penrose, an American-born British economist whose best known work is The Theory of the Growth of the Firm, which, get this, describes the ways in which firms grow. Hopefully that would get her interested and if not, I had Sadie Alexander lined up, the first African-American woman to get a Ph.D. in Economics. She’d be a tougher sell, because Arabs are quite unashamedly racist. Sadly nobody calls them out on it, because for some reason racism is only bad when white people do it. I’m not saying whitey should get a free pass, but there is a lot of work to be done outside rural America and that doesn’t seem to have sunk in yet.
As I had half an hour to kill, I ventured out into the corridor. Stein had asked me to take a few pictures, so I made sure nobody was around, whipped out my phone and took half a dozen shots around Omar’s office door, and a close-up of the lock. As I did so, Amina suddenly wheeled her cleaning cart out of a supply closet. I didn’t see that coming and dropped my phone. It landed unharmed on the carpeted floor
“MISTER CARSTAIRS! YOU ARE HERE!” she squealed. And for a second it seemed like she was going to hug me, but neither of us felt like getting decapitated so we didn’t.
“Hello, Amina! You startled me!”
“I was told you were back! You were in prison!”
“Ah, yes, I was. Shall we continue this in my room?” I asked, and picked up my phone.
“What were you doing?”
“Just ... texting my...”
I drew a blank. Who in God’s name would I be texting?
“My ... fff ... friend...”
“No, I mean, why are you here? This is Prince Omar’s office.”
“Oh! Yes! Ah ... I thought he might be in.”
“At half past nine?!” she laughed.
“Well, you see, I knew that he probably wouldn’t. I just wanted...”
I switched to a conspiratorial tone.
“I wanted to have a peek in his office. You see, I wanted to get him a present for securing my release from prison, but I have no idea what he likes! We never really talk, and I’ve never visited the residence.”
“Oh, I see! But the key is with the Khafama. I can only clean His Highness’s office when he opens it up for me. And he keeps the key in his own room, in his desk. So I’m not supposed to get it myself.”
“Yes, no, of course not! Do come in. My room, I mean. So good to see a friendly face.”
Amina and I were friendly. Not too friendly, because that can literally get you killed in Saudi Arabia, but she sometimes visited me in my room for a chat. Well, three times so far. She’d always have an excuse, usually involving laundry. Or we’d chat for a while if I was still in my room when she came to clean it. I had entrusted her with the only key to the extra lock I had fitted, even though I kept all of my suspicious spyware in Asim’s house. He had so many empty rooms with walk-in closets he’d never even notice my suitcases were there.
Amina was a local girl, which immediately makes her sound like a peasant, but she wasn’t. Her English was very good and she’d clearly been educated to at least GCSE level.
Although she wouldn’t tell me anything about her family or her background, Saudi women generally don’t work. Sometimes they’ll teach (girls only) or have a job in a government office that serves women (after all, men can’t talk to strange women), but you’ll hardly ever see one doing physical labour. Desk jobs, sales, sure. But nothing too strenuous. The fact that Amina was a maid here probably meant her family had no links to the royal family whatsoever, and had perhaps harboured a few too many alcoholics or supposed witches to maintain its connections with what passes for civilised society in Saudi Arabia.
Single women aren’t supposed to exist in Saudi, you see. They do, obviously, but they shouldn’t. Women are always supposed to be someone’s property, or at least responsibility. They can’t own property, they can’t drive, in fact they can’t even have their own bank account without male supervision.
And so my guess, from what little she revealed as we spoke about mundane things like movies and life in other countries, was that she had somehow fallen by the wayside and had become the problem of some far removed uncle or cousin. There being no monasteries, he had pulled some strings so that this stain on the family honour would be gainfully employed and out of his hair. The Khafama was now her mahram, the man who determined what she could and could not do. She lived here, in the Guest Palace, together with some other female staff members. She shared a room with them and was expected to attend all the prayers. She didn’t have a car and was hardly ever allowed to leave the grounds.
I suppose having a chat with a British gentleman, who made polite jokes, poured her tea and would tell her anything she wanted to know about life in London, the sights of Paris and the way his wife, sister and nieces lived their lives in freedom was an escape for her. A few minutes every day, the odd cup of tea, provided her a window into the world that Saudi TV simply didn’t. Her biggest wish was to visit a pub in England, where men and women mingled freely, and take part in a pub quiz. That was something magical to her. It would never happen, of course. Eventually whoever owned her would be stuck with a retarded son or a handless nephew, and she’d be taken away, married off, locked into a house with a wall around it and expected to start producing babies. As Allah wills it.
“Why were you in the prison?” she asked, breathlessly. As soon as the door shut behind her, she took off her hijab. Black, somewhat mousy hair appeared.
“A misunderstanding. I was supposed to go on leave for a few days, but I was detained at the airport. Shortly after there was some sort of explosion in a mosque, and the people who were notified about my arrest had their hands full. It was a rather unpleasant experience, but I’m none the worse for wear.”
“Where were you going? You didn’t say!”
“I was going home, but I wasn’t aware I needed permission to leave the country. So I’m afraid I missed aunt Beatrice’s funeral.”
Lies came suspiciously easy to me these days...
“Your aunt? She died? I’m so sorry.”
“I’m sure she’s not, she was in her nineties and riddled with cancer. She’s in a better place now. Don’t worry about it. If I’m honest, I was quite happy to go and see my family again, if only for a day or two. Would you like some tea? I have some time before I’m due in my classroom.”
“Yes, please. You make tea, I clean your bathroom. If I can find anything that needs to be cleaned.”
“I deliberately left a toothpaste stain on the basin, just so you wouldn’t get bored.”
She giggled and fetched her gloves from the cart in the corridor. Right at that moment, the Khafama passed by. He noticed I was still in my room and burst in.
“Why are you here?” he demanded, in Arabic. “With a man? I can see your HAIR!”
“Excuse me, this is my ROOM. And she’s cleaning it. I walked in on her.”
“She can’t be in a room with you. It’s haram.”
Amina needed less than two seconds to cover her hair again, with movements that were practically muscle memory. She looked ashamed, as if we’d caught her squatting stark naked in a cucumber patch.
“Well, am I supposed to wait in the corridor?” I asked.
“No, SHE come back later. Go. GO!”
He quite literally chased her out and then looked around as if I were hiding any other chamber maids. I quietly positioned myself in front of the door. He nearly bumped into me.
“That is all,” he snarled.
“Just a moment, Uncle Fester. If I find out this young lady is in trouble for doing her job, merely because I was still in my room to prepare for class, I am coming to see you. And buddy, you do NOT want me coming for you. No guard, no prince and no God will be able to save you from my wrath if that girl faces any negative consequences. Is that clear?”
“I ... don’t ... YOU can’t...”
“No guard. No prince. No God. I’ve already been to prison once. I’m fully prepared to go there again, but it will be with your testicles clutched in my bloodied fist. Do you understand?”
I think he did, because even though he muttered something in Arabic, he nodded and turned slightly whiter than usual. I raised my left arm and he stooped to duck underneath it and leave my room.
“Nice chat!” I yelled after him.
Amina was long gone.
I left my room at the usual hour for what I assumed to be the last time and made my way to the classroom. I’ve described it before, but just to remind you: it wasn’t a real classroom. It was just a fairly comfortable sitting room with an interior window to an adjacent space. There was no glass in the frame, but only a thick, black curtain. That’s how I communicated with Princess Alexandra. I never saw her. At most we’d slide a piece of paper back and forth under the curtain. In fact, I had only seen her once and that was in the company of her uncle.
“Good morning, Your Royal Highness, are you there?” I asked. There came no answer, so I picked up the phone and ordered tea from the pantry. A few minutes later I heard a door opening on the other side.
“Professor?”
I’m not a professor, but the guy I killed to get this job was and I sort of inherited the title.
“Good morning, Your Royal Highness. I’m here.”
“OH! Hello.”
She sounded surprised.
“I trust you’re well?” I asked, as I heard her placing some books on the desk she had on her side.
“Oh yeah, I’m fine?”
Alexandra preferred to be called Lexy and had a ‘Valley Girl’ accent, copied from shows such as Beverly Hills 90210 and God knows what else. Almost every sentence sounded like a question and her cadence went up and down like a roller coaster.
“I’m pleased to hear that.”
“So, like, I hear you were in prison?”
“I was, briefly. Four nights.”
“Why?”
“A misunderstanding.”
She giggled.
“The app, right?”
“Yes.”
“The Khafama was standing next to me when his phone chimed? He was so pleased? I thought you’d be back sooner?”
“When did he receive this notification, if I may ask? Do you recall?”
“Uhmm ... Like, a few hours after Uncle Omar was taken to the hospital? You know about the explosion, right? We were all here, waiting for news? It was like really late?”
“So that would be ... Saturday evening?”
“Yah. So, I texted you on Thursday? But your message came back, because it couldn’t be delivered or something?”
“Oh, right. I tend to misplace my phone. What did you text me about?”
“I was just making sure which chapters you wanted me to read from McAfee?”
Preston McAfee has written a wonderful ‘open source’ textbook as an introduction to Economic Analysis. It delves into modern micro-economics and game theory, which is a perspective I enjoy. I had assigned her to read a few chapters.
“Five, seven and eight. Six was just graphs.”
“Okay, that’s what I remembered? But I couldn’t read chapter eight because on Friday my uncle decided we would all come home and he was really upset about that thing in the desert? You know?”
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