The Maltese Manuscript (LSD, #6)

5. Hurricane

Hurricane

When I open my eyes, it takes me a while to focus. Today is Thursday, the 8th of February, 2018. It's 04:30 AM. We're in the men's dressing room of the public swimming pool of Valletta. We're in a hopeless situation.

Yesterday, while we enjoyed ourselves with our new friends in the park, the local police towed our limousine away. Fortunately, I'd left my luggage in an abandoned storage container in the harbour, and not in the car. I'd needed the toolkit from my backpack to break into this pool. Although the hard wooden benches in the dressing room weren't very comfortable, the simple burglar alarm (there's nothing worth stealing in a public pool), the SSS facilities and the fixed opening hours made this a good hiding place. I change into a swimsuit and do twenty lanes to get the stiffness out of my muscles.

After getting dressed and waking up Malik, we have almost an hour to make plans and get out of here.

We have one clue. On a bench in the park, I found a flyer for another episode of Katie's literary crime series about mafia boss Toni Peroni. After the coincidence of the name of the home for the elderly, after what we found in the Lin-Kin Park, and after getting the information that Khalid El Bullít hates writers, it looks like we have an anonymous informant who shares inside information with anyone who might be interested.

This flyer promotes her book «Death Wish». The cover text says: «When Hurricane Mike, the former lieutenant of mafia boss Toni Peroni, enters his highly secured cell, he swears an expensive oath: "I won't rest until I've killed Toni." To fulfil his death wish, Hurricane Mike has to escape first...»

No clues about where we might find this Hurricane. We've checked the weather reports, but everything is clear: there's no hurricane in the entire Mediterranean area.

Under different circumstances, I would send a message to #2, The Nerd. He would come back with all the info I'd need. But with the LSD looking for me, contacting #2 seems a dangerous idea.

"Perhaps we can have breakfast in a cyber café and see if we can find something about this Hurricane on the Internet.", I suggest.

"Actually, there is an Internet café on the other side of the street. They have fresh coffee and bread rolls. Aren't you hungry?"

I am.

"We need a disguise. Every secret service of the world is looking for us now.", I say.

"An excellent idea, but... how? Most of your luggage is still in that container in the harbour."

No problem. We're in a public swimming pool. People forget things here all the time. Behind the counter at the entrance, we find what we need: two burkas. A woman as small as I forgot the light-brown one. The light-blue one belonged to someone twice as heavy as Malik. Ten towels around his waist do the trick. With some forgotten make-up, we give our eyes a female image. Our burkas hide the rest. With so many members of the Arab community on Malta, we won't stand out.

We leave the pool just in time; the first class of schoolboys are already queueing in front of the door, waiting for their 06:00 class. The Internet café opens at 07:00. We take a walk to kill the time.

Our disguise is perfect. Nobody pays attention to us. Malta is a country where respect for religion is stronger than fear of the unknown. I know the political arguments to prohibit women from wearing traditional Muslim clothes: they should also prohibit Halloween, clowns and Santa Claus for the same reasons. For religious people, the Law of God stands higher than the law of society. Why does the state prohibit people from behaving according to their religion? It will only estrange women in burka from society. Banning burkas won't help women in a burka, and neither will it help society. You'll never take away the fear if you prohibit people from getting to know each other better. The only ones who benefit from causing all that hate are the politicians.