Chapter 8

 

The howl from a mosque brought an earth-shattering halt to Milton’s sleep.

Such was the volume of the rant that Milton thought someone had broken into his hotel room and placed a megaphone next to his ear. It gave him an almighty shock.

He sat upright in his bed and looked at his clock, which revealed it was still only 4.30 a.m.! He slouched back on the bed and placed a cushion over his head.

He promised himself that the first thing he would do that morning would be to buy earplugs, as the drone of the air conditioning unit ensured there was no let up between the melodic efforts.

He had noticed on his way in that the mosque was quite a way from the hotel, but had failed to notice that it had hired Ozzy Osbourne’s sound system. Dubai, Milton concluded, would take some getting used to.

He wondered how Muslims must feel in the UK on a Sunday morning when the church bells are ringing out at the crack of dawn. The local vicar would probably be forced to stop or ring them later in the day by some whacky local council.

But then again, he thought, he was in someone else’s country after all and, despite Britain deciding it would bend over backwards to allow people to do whatever they wanted, there was no reason why other countries should.

When in Rome do as the Romans do, he thought. Or, more appropriately, when in Arabia, do as the Arabs do. He decided he would just accept the culture rather than become a part of it.

If only people would do that when arriving in England, he pondered. Then there would be a more harmonious melting pot of religions and nationalities rather than the splintered mess it had become.

Milton eventually needed his alarm call from the young female voice on the other end of the phone to wake him at 10.00 a.m. It was pushing 6.00 a.m. before he had finally got back to sleep so he had enjoyed four uninterrupted hours. He was sure he would have been there until the next mullah’s offering had the phone not rang.

It was Sunday morning. Milton looked through his curtains into the bright sunshine and was shocked to see the roads outside alive with traffic. It was, after all, a working day in Dubai with Friday being the holy day of rest in the Middle East, as a frustrated Sergeant Waite had discovered two days earlier.

There were cars, bikes, buses and lorries jostling for the best positions on the roads and honking their horns at nothing in particular. The Pheasant Hotel wasn’t exactly sitting in the quietest part of town or overlooking a bronze beach, but at least it was centrally located. The chaotic traffic outside told him that.

There was a thud at the door, and an Asian-sounding “Room Service” followed as a young waiter steered the trolley through the narrow entrance to the centre of Milton’s decent-sized abode.

“Eggs on toast, sir, and the top English paper here, the Gulf News, as ordered,” said the smart waiter, who shared the same head-wobbling foible as Gopal had displayed the previous evening.

Milton gave the boy a couple of crisp notes and tucked into his first square meal for some time. His last day had been a rush and food had been only an afterthought. Airline food was airline food - it filled a small hole, but eggs on toast - the single man’s banquet - was what he really needed now.

The index on the front of the Gulf News indicated that the UK news was on page 11, so he flicked directly past the opening pages.

Despite it now being almost two weeks since the match in Switzerland, even papers as far away as Dubai hadn’t forgotten those disgraceful scenes.

‘Police arrest hooligans following paper’s appeal’ said the page lead.

The story described how The Sun had published pictures of the troublemakers and asked people to ring the hooligan hotline to reveal their identities. In doing so, those people were awarded 100 pounds.

The Sun’s patriotic editor was quoted as saying: “We know how important it is to stop this mindless football violence. We want the World Cup in England in 2006 and we will do our bit to blitz Fritz and ensure that happens.”

Milton appreciated help from any quarter, but knew he was on the strongest trail yet and the media back home hadn’t got a whiff of it.

Milton made a call back to the UK but had forgotten that London was three hours behind and so caught Waite in bed at 7.10 a.m. on a Sunday morning. Well, he had gained revenge on Waite for the previous Sunday when he had enjoyed a few pints down the local himself.

“Glad to know the mice aren’t at play while the cat’s away,” Milton said sarcastically before hanging up. Revenge was sweet.

He was still feeling exhausted and was in no mood for trawling through the streets of a new city. He had picked up plenty of literature from the hotel’s amply stocked information booth and had purchased a couple of magazine guides from the shop in the lobby.

He also knew that if he were to fit in he needed to look as though he had been in Dubai for some time, so he retired to the hotel’s rooftop swimming pool to do some reading.

As the sun belted down, Milton became engrossed in how Dubai had become the city it was today.

For centuries, the Arabs of Dubai had been dependent on the seas. Fishing and pearl diving were their two main lifelines, but the discovery of oil in the 1950s changed everything. Its people moved from shanty Bedouin villages to plush properties supplied by the Government and the Europeans moved in as the promise of tax-free riches brought Western expertise to the desert.

Road systems and bridges led the structural revolution that was to launch Dubai into a modern-day city. Buildings followed and, as the ruling family realised the country couldn’t survive on oil forever, so came business and tourism.

As a result, Dubai soon became the leisure, tourism and business hub of the Middle East and the crossroads between East and West, North and South.

Its current population was estimated to be over one million, with around 100,000 of those coming from the West. Most of these were of course young and single professionals, and where there are young and single people, nightlife must flourish.

Dubai had managed to create a vibrant night scene and one guide to a night out said it was home to 1,000 pubs and over 50 nightclubs. The majority of those were located in hotels across the city.

As Milton delved deeper into the almanacs of Dubai, he realised that he was reading about one of the world’s best kept secrets and couldn’t wait to get out there and discover it for himself.

A flick through the local yellow pages, or blue pages just to be different, gave him the phone number of Expatriatedotcom and his undercover work would start early the very next morning.

First though, he thought to himself as he smothered more sun oil on his chest, he must discover whether Dubai really was the place that the brochures and magazines had promised. But that could wait, so he pushed his sunbed backrest parallel to the floor and lay back under the clear blue sky.

It was now 9.00 p.m. and the guest liaison manager told Milton of a few watering holes that would be popular choice to visit on a Sunday night.

Milton wanted a feel for the nightlife, as he thought it could be helpful later on. Nothing would be worse than if he managed to infiltrate Jacks and his men only for one to ask, “So where do you do your drinking?”

He had to know Dubai like a regular, and while he felt he had a good grasp of the tourist daytime routes, thanks to the pamphlets, he must scratch beneath the surface to discover the nightlife.

“So what exactly are you looking for?” asked the guest liaison manager.

“Well, somewhere lively. Somewhere to get a beer and …” He was almost embarrassed to say.

“Somewhere for women?” finished the smiling man who was sitting behind a desk covered in pamphlets.

“Yes, that’s right, somewhere where the ladies go,” added a more confident Milton.

The manager jumped up from behind his desk and signalled the valet parker over. In turn he led Milton to the door, flagged down a taxi and uttered some instruction, which was probably in Hindi, to the driver.

Milton had been in Dubai for a whole day and had hardly seen an Arab. Indians and Pakistanis were everywhere and it underscored the theory that Gopal had shared with him the night before: that Dubai was kept ticking by expat labour.

“Why don’t I see any of the Arabs working?” enquired Milton to the bearded taxi driver, who looked like an Afghan or Iranian.

“They take the jobs in banks and government ministries. It is left to us to do all the hard work,” was the reply. “Sometimes, sir, your path in life depends solely on the place of your birth. I sometimes wonder if God meant it that way or whether somewhere along the line he has simply turned his back on humans to let us just get on with it.”

As the car weaved through the busy traffic, Milton could tell from the driver’s accent that he was another well-educated man who, like Gopal, had probably been duped into working in the Middle East by some rogue employment agent operating on the subcontinent.

After no more than ten minutes, Milton was dropped off at a white building which was covered in bright orange lighting in what looked like a whirlwind blowing up and down its wall.

“This is the Cyclone Club, sir. You will find everything you are looking for in there,” said the taxi driver as Milton uneasily edged himself out of the car.

He paid the driver and walked towards two burly white doormen who asked for his membership card in what sounded like Russian-English. When Milton replied that he was a tourist the men let him through and ordered him to pay the equivalent of five pounds to a petite Filipino woman behind a till.

He could hear loud music inside and walked through a thick swing door to be confronted by a sight that could have been anywhere in the Western world.

It was only 10.00 p.m., but Milton had walked into a scene from The Rocky Horror Picture Show.

Dance music was pumping, the dance floor was full and the bar was lined by an assortment of women that could easily have made up the United Nations.

Rubbing his hands, Milton headed towards the bar.

He wedged himself between two well-developed, top-heavy black women and called up a Budweiser from another Filipino woman behind the bar.

Before the drink returned, he felt a hand move down his back and towards his bottom.

Turning to his right, he was faced by a wide toothy smile from one of the ladies who said in broken English. “You looking for lady, handsome?”

Milton was shocked and took a step back from the bar, politely refusing.

He walked around the huge circular bar and noticed that he was being watched by literally dozens of pairs of eyes. He felt like a hunter in a forest, with his prey watching his every move from the relative safety of the scrub, only here it seemed as if the prey was doing anything it could to be caught.

As he stood by the corner of the dance floor to take it all in, another beauty took him by surprise.

“I could love you long time tonight, mister.”

This time the girl was lighter skinned and was caressing the back of his hair in circular motions with her index finger.

She was a cracker and Milton, accepting he was no Mel Gibson, knew something had to be up. He had either stumbled across ‘MiltonWorld’ where every woman was in love with him or, which seemed more probable, the Cyclone Club was a hooker bar.

“So what do you do here in Dubai?” asked Milton.

“I am business lady,” she replied in easy-to-understand English.

“What sort of business?”

“Whatever you like. Two hundred dollar and I give you good business all night.”

She finished her sentence with a girly laugh.

Milton had found a part of Dubai that had certainly not made its way into the tourist guides but, judging by the number of people there, it was a thriving side of the city.

“I will give you ten dollars if you spend five minutes chatting to me, and I’ll even throw in a drink,” said Milton.

She agreed and walked with Milton to a quiet corner of the club where he would not have to shout over the music.

The prostitute told Milton that she had been working in Dubai for two years and was looked after by a local man. He ensured that the authorities turned a blind eye to her activities in return for a share of her profits and free sex. She said the local man looked after 30 girls who worked a number of bars across the city.

She had escaped war in Eritrea with her sister and lived in a one-bedroom flat with three other girls. She was earning a good living. Dubai has a major port and there were no shortage of sailors and servicemen willing to pay for her services. Not to mention unsuspecting businessmen and, of course, the expatriates living in the city - generally the married ones too, she had added.

“I sometimes make up to two thousand dollar a month,” she said.

Milton was shocked. He presumed that many a businessman looking for a club for beer and ladies must end up there. The only way the wife would ever find out is if they returned home with the sort of gift that would require a joint visit to the local clap clinic.

The information was an eye-opener once again and, looking around the club, he exclaimed to the girl, “I just cannot believe I am sitting in the Middle East!”

There was only one word to describe it … seedy!

He was surrounded by men groping women, women groping men and, in one case, a woman groping a woman. There was dancing on tables, in fact dancing anywhere a space could be found, and the beer seemed to be flowing in huge amounts.

He decided, though, that this was more a place for visitors and that he needed to tap into the social route taken by Dubai’s residents.

He finished the last of his Budweiser with two gulps, slipped the prostitute the money he promised and headed towards the exit. She had told him of a few other places to try that were ‘hooker-free’, as she put it.

He had ended up spending an hour talking to the girl, but the night was still young. He had read that everywhere in Dubai was open until 3.00 a.m. every night of the week, so there were still five hours of adventuring to be done.

The now familiar site of an Asian-driven taxi took him to another splendid hotel and the smartly dressed doorman took one look at him and informed him that the ‘Old Vic’ was located on the third floor.

As the name suggests, the Old Vic was a typically English pub and it was full of British expatriates playing darts, pool or just having a pint.

This is more like it, Milton thought. He didn’t want to start asking questions just yet; that could wait until the following day. No, tonight was for finding his feet and he felt he was doing well so far.

His tour took him to three more bars frequented by British drinkers and he made notes of each one to keep them fresh in his mind.

Now if he was asked, “So where do you do your drinking?” he could reel off a list of four pubs and finish off by saying, “And if I’m desperate I’ll pop down for a last dance at the Cyclone!”

It was almost 2.30 a.m. by the time he arrived back at the Pheasant Hotel. The same valet driver was standing by the hotel entrance and seemed surprised when Milton climbed out of the taxi alone.

“You not like the lady?” he enquired.

“No, lady fine,” he replied, brushing past him and heading through the lobby semi-drunk.

“Lady very fine, just John not too fine, very sleepy,” Milton found himself replying in broken English too as he pointed to himself.

He had enjoyed a fruitful first day. He may even have seen Jacks in one of those pubs, although he had studied the picture on the driving licence well and, even though it was black and white, he was confident he would recognise Jacks if he saw him in the flesh.

The serious surveillance work must begin the next day and he had secured the services of the one man in Dubai he could rely on the most.