Free Djibouti by Elmore Leonard Page B

preparing meals for the hijacked crews. Goat, on a spit.”
    â€œGoat wouldn’t be bad,” Xavier said, “they called it something else.”
    The screen showed Eyl from the beach and streets of flat, tin-roof structures, some framed from scrap lumber, doors open to show the entire store, and rubble in all the streets, a junkyard, houses rebuilt over crumbling remains; but a human feeling in the colors, a cement house painted yellow, another blue. The camera moved up a street of hovels and beyond, to homes among palm trees.
    â€œThe upper end,” Dara said, “Idris Mohammed’s digs, a tan brick California bungalow that goes on and on, with a patio. The sound of the generators must drive him nuts.”
    â€œThe man has enough power,” Xavier said, “to light New Orleans. Look at the big TV dish up there.”
    â€œIdris said, ‘Shake a leg with your shooting so you have time to come to my home, please.’ He always says please.”
    â€œYou sound like him,” Xavier said. “You gonna shoot the man in his house?”
    â€œYou are,” Dara said, handing Xavier her cotton bag. “Get the cars in the drive, a Mercedes and a Bentley—Harry must be here—four, no five Toyotas, all of them black.”
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    A S OMALI WITH AN AK slung from his shoulder stood close to the open doorway. He stared at Xavier. Then at Dara. Then at Xavier again, looking up at him as he stepped aside.
    Watching the picture on the screen, Dara said, “Remember this guy?”
    â€œEverybody starin at us like we movie stars.”
    They watched Dara enter the house, the camera holding on her as Xavier followed to sweep the room in a pan, close to dark in here, low-watt bulbs in the ceiling fixtures. Daylight from the open doorway helped.
    â€œI shot those blue walls tryin to make out the pictures hangin there. I think they were bare-naked ladies, but it was hard to tell.”
    â€œI thought they were landscapes,” Dara said.
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    I DRIS AND H ARRY B AKAR were watching an Al Jazeera newscast on the flat screen across the room, the boys having a scotch, smoking cigarettes and sucking khat, the bottle, the bouquet and a bowl of ice on the stone coffee table between them. They knew Dara was in the room.
    Dara knew it.
    But they stood up to watch the news for several moments before Idris muted the Arabic words with the remote and came for Dara grinning, telling her she made him so happy to see her, took hold of her and kissed both cheeks. He said, “Look who I have, your travel companion, Harry Bakar.”
    Harry was grinning too. He took her hands but kissed only one cheek. He smelled of cologne.
    In the suite watching the computer screen she said to Xavier, “The big grins. Was it the news or were they glad to see me?”
    â€œI think it was the herb.”
    â€œDid you talk to Harry much?”
    â€œJust enough to think he’s okay.”
    â€œWe have to work on the audio, try to clean it up.”
    â€œI can bring it up. But for now…” Xavier reached over and turned off the sound.
    â€œI liked Harry’s kaffiyeh,” Dara said, “the way he does desert wear, draped over his hair and around his shoulders, a casual British look with the bush jacket.”
    â€œHas that way about him.”
    â€œYou think he puts it on?”
    â€œTakes it to the edge any more he’s over the line.”
    Dara said, “‘Call me Harry, if you will.’”
    â€œYou got him down, Mr. Harry Baker from Oxford.”
    â€œI said to him, ‘Isn’t it pleasant to relax with a scotch while you make a pitch to end piracy?’”
    On the screen Harry was smiling. So was Idris. Idris glancing at Harry.
    â€œI had the feeling,” Dara said, “there was something between them they were dying to tell me. But Harry surprised me, started talking about a new president of Somalia, elected by the legislature