She scanned it and passed it back to me with just a cursory glance at the personal details. She certainly didn’t see anything odd about a guy with a British accent presenting with Russian travel docs. I know people who’ve travelled the world on their wife’s passport. You just have to show a bit of front.
‘How would you like to pay, Mr Sinitsin?’
‘US dollars, please.’
She checked her tariff. ‘That will be ninety.’
She gave the keyboard a really good hammering and a ticket eventually clattered out of the printer beside her. She passed it across the counter, giving me the opportunity to admire her green wristband and immaculate manicure.
‘You are boarding at gate ten. Air Astana do not allocate seats, but that is no problem – the flight is nearly empty. Please hurry. The gate is closing in fifteen minutes.’
Immigration and security were a piece of piss. They were there to tag foreigners coming in and nationals going out, not the other way round. The camera had lost its memory card; it was now in my mouth. My James Manley passport was in Tattoo’s wallet.
A stewardess looked at my boarding pass and waved towards the hundred or so empty seats. As I moved down the aisle I heard the door close behind me. I spat the memory card into my hand.
The aircraft was relatively new, much better than the ropy gear that former Soviet Union countries used to fly. There were three seats either side of the aisle. I spotted Anna about three-quarters of the way back, on the right-hand side, hunched over her netbook. Judging by the expression on her face, she was using the last few minutes before take-off to spit teeth and feathers at her readers about the misdeeds of M3C. She had a silk scarf tied loosely around her neck. I knew she was going to be wearing it for a good few days.
I didn’t know where the Falcon was headed, and Julian wasn’t going to be of any help. I had to get out of the country. So here I was, with the only person who could help me find out what the fuck was going on.
I carried on down the aisle and took the seat next to her.
Anna looked up, eyes like saucers. She opened her mouth to speak, but I silenced her with a finger to my lips. My other hand swivelled the netbook towards me. I hit the keys with my two middle fingers.
Nowhere is safe from surveillance, especially on an aircraft. Even the toilets can be bugged. State-of-the-art systems can screen out the sound of running water.
People were still thronging the aisles and waffling away on their mobiles, but the plane had started to taxi.
I slotted in the memory card. Spag’s picture filled the screen.
She shook her head and typed.
I didn’t need to tell her anything that didn’t help me.
I nodded.
She smiled.
She smiled again.
I tried again.
There was a commotion behind us. The stewardess had started bollocking people big-time. She spotted the netbook so we got a verbal slapping as well.
Anna turned and nodded.
We touched down in Astana at 12.15 local. Once we’d left the plane, Anna scrabbled around in her day-sack and pulled out a mobile and battery. Good drills: no tracing. Once she’d reunited them and found a signal, she started dialling. It wasn’t long before she was mumbling away, her hand covering her mouth to hide the sound.
It took no more than a minute. As she closed down and removed the battery again, we exchanged our first words since I’d sat down next to her.
‘Well?’
‘He will help us.’ She raised a finger and tugged her scarf far enough down her neck for me to glimpse a bruise that was pretty much the same colour as Tattoo’s prize tattoo. ‘At least until he sees this, you bastard.’
We transited through for the 13.25 flight to Moscow.
Astana airport
IKIA had been a palace compared to this dump. The transit lounge was old-school Communism back with a vengeance – drab, dirty, full of cigarette smoke and people lying on top of crushed cardboard boxes because there weren’t any seats.
Anna toyed with her plastic coffee cup and looked at the empty tables all around us. I asked her the question again. ‘Why are you so fixated on just one man?’
She took a big pull on her cigarette.
