Carte Blanche

number. I’m beginning to feel a bit like Lehman Brothers, he thought. My debts vastly outweigh my assets.
    Bond placed a call.

Chapter 24
    The limousine bearing Severan Hydt, Jessica Barnes and Niall Dunne pulled up at the Intercontinental Hotel, situated on broad, peaceful Dubai Creek. The solid, stern driver was a local man they’d used before. Like Hans Groelle in England, he doubled as a bodyguard (and did a bit more than that from time to time).
    They remained in the car while Dunne read a text or an e-mail. He logged off his iPhone, looked up and said to Hydt, “Hans has found out about the driver of the Bentley. It’s interesting.”
    Hydt tapped his long fingernails together.
    Dunne avoided looking at them. He said, “And there’s a connection to March.”
    “Is there?” Hydt tried to read Dunne’s eyes. As usual, they remained utterly cryptic.
    The Irishman said nothing more—not with Jessica present. Hydt nodded. “We’ll check in now.”
    Hydt lifted the cuff of his elegant suit jacket and regarded his watch. Two and a half hours to go.
    The number of dead will be ninety or so.
    Dunne stepped out first; his keen eyes made their usual scan for threats. “All right,” came the Irishman’s slight brogue. “It’s clear.”
    Hydt and Jessica climbed out into the astonishing heat and headed quickly into the chill of the Intercontinental lobby, which was dominated by a stunning ten-foot-high assembly of exotic flowers. On a nearby wall hung portraits of the United Arab Emirates’ ruling families, gazing down sternly and confidently.
    Jessica signed for the room, which they’d taken in her name, another of Dunne’s ideas. Though they would not be staying long—their onward flight was this evening—it was helpful to have somewhere to leave the bags and get some rest. They handed the luggage to the bell captain to have it taken to the room.
    Leaving Jessica beside the flowers, Hydt nodded Dunne aside. “The Bentley? Who was it?”
    “Registered to a company in Manchester—same address as Midlands Disposal.”
    Midlands was connected to one of the bigger organized-crime syndicates operating out of south Manchester. In America the Mob had traditionally been heavily involved in waste management, and in Naples, where the Camorra crime syndicate ruled, refuse collection was known as Il Re del Crimine . In Britain organized crime was less interested in the business but occasionally some local underworld boss tried to bluster his way into the market, like a heavy in a Guy Ritchie film.
    “And this morning,” Dunne continued, “the coppers came round to the army base site, showing pictures of somebody who’d been spotted in the area the day before. There’s a warrant on him for grievous bodily harm. He worked for Midlands. The police said he’s gone missing.”
    As will happen, Hydt reflected, when one’s body is commencing to rot beneath a thousand tons of wrecked hospital. “What would he have been doing up there?” Hydt asked.
    Dunne considered this. “Probably planning to sabotage the demolition job. Something goes wrong, you get bad publicity and Midlands moves in to pick up some of your business.”
    “So whoever was in the Bentley only wanted to find out what happened to his mate yesterday.”
    “Right.”
    Hydt was vastly relieved. The incident had nothing to do with Gehenna. And, more important, the intruder wasn’t the police or Security Service. Merely one more instance of the underbelly of the discard business. “Good. We’ll deal with Midlands later.”
    Hydt and Dunne returned to Jessica. “Niall and I have some things to take care of. I’ll be back for dinner.”
    “I think I’ll go for a walk,” she said.
    Hydt frowned. “In this heat? It might not be good for you.” He didn’t like her to stray too far afield. He wasn’t worried that she’d let slip anything she shouldn’t—he had kept all aspects of Gehenna from her. And what she knew of the rest of his darker life, well, that was potentially embarrassing but not illegal. It was just that when he wanted her, he wanted her and Severan Hydt was a man whose belief in the inevitable power of decay had taught him that life is far too short and precarious to deny yourself anything at any time.
    “I can judge that,” she said, but spoke timidly.
    “Of course, of course. Only . . . a woman alone?” Hydt continued. “The men, you know how they can be.”
    “You mean Arab men?” Jessica asked. “It’s