Chapter 7: The Embassy

It was all a mad rush, after the interview on the Tuesday in Kobekistan, but Derek was packed and ready to take the flight back out there on the Thursday to start the work. Evidently he had been marked as a frequent flier in some computer somewhere, since the first thing the stewardess did after take-off was draw the curtains round his seat and ask if there was anything he needed.

That was when he learned that it had been too much to hope that he would see Shafiqa again so soon, and the stewardess confirmed that she was already back in Kobek city and off duty.

"When did you meet her, master?" asked the woman.

"Oh, she was on the flights out Monday and back Tuesday," he said.

The stewardess nodded, "We were told you had been to Kobekistan once this week already. That's as often as we fly; the master must be a very important man."

"Are you always on this route?" asked Derek, storing up the information in the hope that he could work out when he might see Shafiqa again.

"It is complicated, Master. We fly to London on the afternoon flight and back the following afternoon, twice in four days. Then we have a four days off, or five if there is a Friday because we do not fly on Fridays, then we do four morning flights and have four or five more days off and so on. It takes seven weeks to complete the rota and we have eight crews working. But you need never worry, Master; one of the staff will always please you in any way you wish."

And so it proved.

Returning on the Thursday was convenient as he then had the Friday to settle in before starting work on the Saturday, the first working day of the Kobekistan week, or so he thought. In fact he had better acclimatisation time than that, because most of the Kobekistani civil service worked only three days a week, taking both the Muslim and the Christian week-ends off.

This meant that he had three days to wait before he could talk to the Kobekistani end of the project. He asked Sir Ian if he could read up on the project, and a very small pile of papers was passed to him.

"I don't think we have really managed to communicate with London on this one," the Ambassador said, "They don't seem to understand, but you, with your background and command of the language will find it easy, no doubt."

Taking the papers back to his own small flat in the embassy complex, Derek looked at them with increasing disgust and realised that he would have to start again. The Ambassador had been handling the matter and had essentially started to put together a case for London changing to Kobekistani standards of accounting. Then he recalled Sir Ian saying that he hadn't really managed to communicate with London. From his teens he remembered his father complaining bitterly that an ambassador had 'gone native'. When Derek had inquired what he meant, he said the man had forgotten that he was His Britannic Majesty's Government in a part of Great Britain which just happened to be in a foreign country, and had started to think that he was responsible for urging the local country's views on London.

Deciding that there was no profit to be made from studying the useless papers on the Railway Project, Derek wandered down to the mess, where Beryl, the pretty girl he had met on Monday night, was having coffee, alone.

Derek took a coffee himself and walked over to her, asking, "I wonder if you can help me?"

She gave him a look that made him feel as though he could not possibly have a problem she could not solve, and replied, "Perhaps."

"I was wondering what there is to see and do in Kobek. What do people do in their spare time?"

The answer was a distinct put down; as she rose from the table, leaving a half-drunk coffee behind, she said, "I wouldn't know where the commercial people amuse themselves. We on the diplomatic side make our own amusements."

'Well, ' thought Derek as he admired her retreating wiggle, 'That puts me in my place. I take her to mean that there's no chance of her showing me round, and still less chance of a shag tonight.'