Night Train to Memphis - Elizabeth Peters [90]
‘Hold on a minute. You don’t have money for a cab.’
‘I’ll tell him to wait. Just long enough for me to collect Schmidt and my purse.’
‘I’ll come with you. Wait a second.’
He tossed a few bills onto the table and picked up his briefcase without relaxing his grip on me. I pulled away from him, and he said, ‘I sense you are now convinced of the danger. Come with me to the place I mentioned.’
‘Not without Schmidt.’
There were several decrepit-looking vehicles lined up in front of the hotel. I opened the door of the first one – hoping it was a taxi – and got in. Feisal followed me.
‘I’ll go back for him after I’ve taken you – ’
‘No, you won’t. Driver!’
Feisal enveloped me in a rib-cracking embrace and rattled off a string of directions to the driver. I didn’t understand a word, but I was pretty sure he had not given the order I would have given. I tried to free myself. ‘Let me go, damn you!’
‘Certainly,’ said Feisal, unwrapping his arms. I fell back against the seat and he socked me on the jaw.
* * *
He must have given me an injection of some kind, because it was morning when I woke up. Very early morning; the rosy hues of dawn fell prettily across the floor of . . . wherever I was. I didn’t wait to examine my surroundings, but made a rush for the door. Somehow I wasn’t surprised to discover that it was locked. The single window was blocked by ornate grillwork. It had been there awhile, rusty streaks stained the black iron, but it was still functional, as I discovered when I shook it. Had it been designed to keep people in or keep them out? I wondered. Whatever the original purpose, it would suffice to keep me in.
The rush of adrenaline subsided, leaving me shaking and weak-kneed. I staggered back to the bed and sat down.
After I had surveyed the room I had to admit that I had been shut up in worse places. The furniture looked as if it had come from the local equivalent of a low-budget outlet store, but it was clean and fairly new. In addition to the bed, the amenities consisted of a table, a lamp, and two straight chairs. On the table was a jug (plastic) full of water, a glass (plastic), a bowl (you guessed it), a bar of soap, a towel, and a paperback novel with the cover missing. I picked up the book. It was by Valerie Vandine. I threw it across the room.
There was only one door. I am not without experience. I was raised on a farm. I found what I was looking for chastely hidden under the bed.
After I had paced the room forty or fifty times I retrieved the book and started reading.
Voluptuous Madeleine de Montmorency was fighting off the villain for the second time when I heard a sound at the door. The book and my feet hit the floor simultaneously. There was nothing in the room I could use as a weapon, so I had to rely on craft, cunning, and my bare hands. Which left me, I had to admit, at a distinct disadvantage.
But when I saw the figure framed in the open doorway my clenched fist fell. Nothing my imagination had conjured up could equal that vision.
She was about three feet tall and about a hundred years old and she didn’t have a tooth in her head. Black cloth covered everything except her face and her hands – the standard garb of a conservative Muslim female. She wouldn’t wear a face veil in her own house with only another woman present. Baring her gums at me in what was probably not a smile, she sidled into the room, and deposited a tray on the table.
Where I come from, punching old ladies simply isn’t done. My stupefied stare must have reassured her. Straightening to her full height of three feet six, she gestured at the door and twisted her bony wrist – once, twice, three times. I got the message. Three doors, three locks, between me and freedom.
I was begining to think maybe I could overcome my conditioning about hitting old ladies – not hard, of course, just a little tap – when she gave a sudden backward hop, agile as an Egyptian cricket. (They are black and