Between the Frames

By Terence G. Nicolson

During the summer of 1998 Thomas Martin encounters his former friend Stephen Parker and conveys how, despite the outward appearance of a good job and an attractive wife, he feels like an observer, waiting for his life to happen,  Thomas travels to Riyadh on a work assignment and there, and during a stopover in London on his return, becomes entangled in what appears to him to be a form of game with constantly evolving ground rules.

 

Thomas encounters two women, Deshna and Lynn, who entrance him and as he is drawn deeper Stephen once again surfaces.  The story moves between Montreal, Seattle, Vancouver and London.  The June 1999 Carnival Against Capitalism in London and the 1999 Battle in Seattle provide a backdrop as Thomas and his wife Donna pursue the truth behind the actions of a small group of players who seem intent on manipulating Thomas's life.  Following the Seattle protest, as the millenium approaches, Thomas comes face to face with the mystery of what has been happening and who the players really are.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tapyrret Publishing
• Release date: Aug 1, 2023
• ISBN: 9798223005650

Terence G. Nicolson

Terence Nicolson worked in systems engineering for a multinational for several years .This is hs first novel

Book preview

There are always two dramas in life. In the foreground there’s the intimate story that you know by heart – the one in which you are the main character who’s been given all the lines. In the background, an overarching historical story unfolds out of your control, a grand backdrop of events against which those intimate moments are played out. For most of us, the life of the world and the world of our lives rarely, if ever, compete for attention.  

Kelly Grovier

Chapter 1 OPENING MOVES

Chapter 2 RIYADH

Chapter 3 THE DESERT

Chapter 4 MEETING IN THE PARK

Chapter 5 PROPOSALS

Chapter 6 SECOND TRACK

Chapter 7 THE CELL

Chapter 8 ROMANTIC INTERLUDE

Chapter 9 STEPHEN’S SETUP

Chapter 10 THE DISAPPEARANCE

Chapter 11 THE PHOTOGRAPH

Chapter 12 LONDON, J18

Chapter 13 CHANCE ENCOUNTER

Chapter 14 HALLOWEEN TRICKSTERS

Chapter 15 MARKET VIGNETTE

Chapter 16 LYNN LEAVES

Chapter 17 THOMAS’S DREAM

Chapter 18 A HEART ATTACK

Chapter 19 BATTLE IN SEATTLE

Chapter 20 AFTER

Chapter 21 DILSHAD

Chapter 22 INTERROGATION

Chapter 23 THE TUNNEL

Chapter 24 CLOSING TIME

Part One

Those in authority fear the mask for their power partly resides in identifying, stamping and cataloguing: in knowing who you are.

‘Carnival Against Capital’ masks.

Chapter 1 OPENING MOVES

When the G8 leaders met on a sunlit May Saturday in the spring of 1998, an estimated seventy thousand people converged on Birmingham to form a human chain that ringed the city center. They demanded that the richer countries cancel the debts owed them by the poorer countries. Within the ring of protesters, the main conference center lay abandoned for the day, while the leaders sojourned in the nearby countryside. Amusing, I thought, symbolic of the new world order, but nothing to do with me. 

I was born in Montreal in 1962 during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Fifteen years later, as part of the migration of the English community, I left for North Carolina when my father found a job in Raleigh. I returned on my own to Montreal four years later to take engineering at McGill and then worked for ten years, mostly in Toronto, before moving to Seattle with my wife, an American.

I had met Donna while she was a graduate student in philosophy. We married a year later. At twenty-nine she received her Ph.D. and subsequently took a series of contract teaching jobs. She planned to spend the upcoming fall back in Montreal working on a project with a former mentor.

Although I got along with most people, I met my conversations were for the most part limited to banalities. Did others, I wondered, desire this talk without substance, or like me was it a product of years of training? Fatigue from acting a role for years led to a kind of resignation and I feared I might soon become the character I outwardly pretended to be. When an opportunity arose at work to spend six weeks in the Middle East, I jumped at it.

My trip to Riyadh was scheduled for the end of September just prior to when Donna was due to begin work in Montreal. I arranged a two-week London vacation on my way back from Riyadh, followed by a stopover in Montreal to see Donna, before my return alone to Seattle. She would remain working in Montreal until at least Christmas and after that our plans were uncertain.

Late that August I entered an office building elevator full of suits and my eyes met those of the nearest, by appearance a businessman in his mid-thirties.

Thomas, he exclaimed.

I heard myself reply, Stephen Parker. The elevator reached the main floor and we both exited.

It’s been years, he said in the richly modulated voice I instantly recalled. Do you live in Seattle?

Yes, and you? I asked.

I still work in Ottawa with a think tank but I’m in Seattle for the week. Look, I’m on my way to a meeting at the moment, but let’s get together for lunch later this week and catch up on each other’s lives. Here’s my hotel and room number, he said, writing on the back of a business card. Give me a call this evening and we’ll set something up.

When I called, he was out, and following an exchange of missed calls and messages I answered the phone a couple of nights later. Contact, said Stephen. We arranged to meet for lunch that Friday at 11:45 A.M. Let’s take our time, he said.

Entering the restaurant, the feeling came over me that I had wandered into a drama already underway. Music played in the background while a large slow-moving fan cooled the restaurant entrance and bar.  Stephen was not yet there and I was led to a table outside in the patio. He arrived a few minutes later and for the next hour, over salad and Riesling, in glorious sunshine, we brought each other up to date with our lives. Flowers graced each table, the women nearby looked alluring, and for the first time in years I found myself saying what I thought. The entrées arrived. 

If I understand what you have been saying, you wish to break free from the situation you find yourself in but you’re unclear about what it is you want to escape to, he said.

Yes, I enjoy my work, it pays well, my wife is attractive, I’m healthy; these should be the best years of my life yet I always seem to be waiting for some missing thing that never appears. I laughed, It’s not as grim as it sounds. I do enjoy lots of routine things: time with Donna, walking the city streets, the sun, nature.

Perhaps the problem is failing to look properly at your life rather than anything missing or mediocre about it, he said. You haven’t created the right framework within which to view events, a good enough story. That is what you are searching for.

We switched topics to talk of the boys and girls of our youth most of who had disappeared from our lives. They remained, still for us, as we had once known them. After two hours we finished with chocolate cheesecake dessert and coffee. Stephen paid for lunch, claiming he could expense it, and we agreed to keep in touch. I felt better than I had in a long time.      

YOU SEEM BORED, DONNA said.

No, just tired, I lied. In fact my upcoming trip preoccupied me. My visa and tickets were in place and at last the departure date arrived. For certain administrative reasons I was flying out of Vancouver so Donna and I drove up and checked into a hotel there the evening prior to my flight.

We got to the airport early the next morning. After I checked my luggage, we wandered the International Terminal and then went outside and found a small park hidden away amidst the roadway, parking lot, and terminal buildings, an atoll of nature amidst the sea of concrete.

Do you realize that since we met we’ve seldom been apart for more than a few days? she said.

You could join me in London after, for a holiday, I offered.

No, it will do us both good to be on our own for a while, she said.

So, this is a sort of ending, I said half in jest.

I think in a way it is, she concurred.

The sound of jets coming and going reverberated in the background. We wandered back to the terminal building, a different world. Time to say good-bye, she said. Take care of yourself, Thomas, and have a good time. We lightly kissed and she parted.

I escaped the prison of my old life in stages flying first to London and a five-hour stopover before my flight to Riyadh. Heathrow felt like a waiting room for a different world. I changed some money in Terminal Four. As I was putting the Saudi riyals in my wallet a ten-pound note landed on my shoes. Sorry, said a flustered tallish blond in a black outfit behind me. I returned her money smiling. Later, when I arrived in the waiting room for the Riyadh flight I noticed her sitting alone.

Hello, I ventured, taking the seat next to her.

What takes you to the Kingdom? she asked.

I’m going for six weeks to do some work on the implementation of a new phone system.

Is this your first trip there? she inquired.

Yes, have you been there before?

Several times. We chatted until the boarding call.  Look, my name is Lynn Jaynes and here’s my phone number in Riyadh. I’m staying with friends at the Sahara compound.  Why don’t you call me if you like. I can always use a driver if you have a car. I can show you some of the more interesting sites. 

Sure, I’ll call you, I promised.

Chapter 2 RIYADH

Riyadh was a surprise . Building cranes and construction proliferated along with traffic and a modern freeway system. My first week and a half was spent working twelve-hour days at an office in the Olaya area, a main business section. I soon became accustomed to male secretaries and maids. Because I had a relatively brief stay I decided to reside at the hotel as opposed to one of the compounds. I thought it would force me to absorb more of the local culture.

Weekends were Thursday and Friday and on the Friday I drove down to Dira Square in central Riyadh. This was a city without a tourist business. Sites that elsewhere would be isolated from their surroundings were there to be stumbled over. There might be a small plaque describing the significance of a place or thing but for the most part there was nothing. I later realized I had missed a beheading at the square a short time earlier and after wandering there and the nearby streets I decided to drive to the diplomatic quarter.

I stopped at a red light and then cautiously turned right onto a deserted cross street. A policeman waved me over to the side and when I got out of the car began railing at me in what I assume was Arabic. I stood uncomprehending swearing silently to myself. Suddenly he waved over a passing cyclist and it dawned on me that he wanted a translator. The cyclist was a foreign worker judging from the bike and clothes. It turned out there were certain types of red lights where a right turn was not allowed and I had stumbled onto one of them ignorant of the sign indicating this. The cyclist said he made the case that I had only been in the Kingdom for a week and that the policeman should have pity on me and let me go. Some more arm waving ensued and it was decided I would be pardoned this time. I stood by the car door, the cyclist facing me, as the policeman walked back to the corner of my indiscretion. Can I give you some money for your help? I asked the cyclist.

No, no, a smiling reply. I am from Bangladesh, you know it? I have some relatives who are living in Canada, in Toronto. You have to be careful with these police. You never know what they will decide to do. With that he was on his bike and continued on his way. I thanked providence for the man on a bicycle from Bangladesh and set out for the diplomatic quarter.

DONNA AND I WERE COMMUNICATING more apart than we had in the last few months of living together. She started sending me daily emails at work and I responded describing the mostly uneventful things I was doing. Maybe the secret was that we had to listen before speaking instead of tuning each other out or interrupting, or perhaps it was just the separation. Whatever the cause, I eagerly anticipated her daily email.

The following weekend I phoned the number Lynn had given me. Thomas, I’m glad you called. Have you seen Dir’aiyah, the original city?

No.

Do you have a car? she asked.

Yes, I can pick you up tomorrow at 9 A.M. if you like. She gave me directions to the compound.

She waited for me, in a full-length abaya, at the entrance to the compound. Nice outfit, black suits you, I remarked as she got in the passenger seat.

So, you do have a sense of humor. How are you finding Riyadh so far?

Like a stranger who has stumbled over some place that is both marvelous and mundane, unsure what is beneath the surface, but enchanted with the mixture of images.

Little of what you see in Riyadh today is older than fifty years and a great deal is less than twenty. You will enjoy our trip to Dir’aiyah. It is a partially restored oasis town first settled in the fifteenth century that was the capital of the first Saudi state in the eighteenth century and was destroyed by forces of the Ottoman Empire in the early 1800’s.

Dir’aiyah was on the northwest edge of Riyadh twenty miles from the center of the city. When we arrived there were only a handful of cars in the parking area. As we entered the maze of the abandoned town we saw a sign warning that no video or moving photos were permitted. Strolling among the mud-walled buildings, the morning sun blazing, the place mostly deserted except for the two of us, I found myself vividly picturing the streets teeming with people two hundred years earlier. We entered a ruined house and climbed the stairs emerging on a roof that overlooked what had once been a busy street. In the distance the mud walls ran around what had been the town limits joining watchtowers that looked towards the desert. The white building towers of modern Riyadh shimmered, visible in the distance.

What exactly is it that you do when you are in the Kingdom? I asked. It must be very restrictive for a woman.

A good friend of mine in London often visits here on government business and he arranges for my visa. I have some acquaintances at the compound so I can get about all right and I like the desert. I’m also fascinated by the politics of the place. It’s not a nation state in any standard sense but a giant estate owned and managed by a feudal monarchy of a few thousand princes and their cast of family members. There is no constitution, no parliament, no political parties, no individual rights and government is by decree.  To eliminate dissent, large sums are provided to schools and charities run by Wahabis’ fundamental Islamic organizations both within and outside the Kingdom. A crucial question is whether the monarchy can maintain control over the Wahabis. Since roughly a quarter of the world’s proven oil resources are here it does matter to the West. Like you I find Riyadh fascinating, akin to the Middle Ages with fast food restaurants and freeways.

She had avoided a direct answer to my question. As we wandered the deserted setting Lynn asked, Do you believe elites control things such that we are brainwashed into becoming willing servants of the way they want our society to operate? 

Astonished, I looked to see if she was serious. She stared at me intently, waiting for my response. A conspiracy that we don’t recognize because it includes us without our knowing, I said laughing. I’m not very good at abstractions. I doubt it’s a productive way of viewing things. I wasn’t going to give her a direct answer either.

She smiled, We should head back. I have an appointment I couldn’t get out of later this afternoon. 

The following week, Lynn rang me at the hotel early Wednesday evening. Hello Thomas, something has come up. Is there any chance you can come out here tonight?

Sure, I can make it. Shall I bring anything, any hints?

How about 7 P.M.? she sounded rushed.

The compound gate security had been informed I would be visiting and waved me through. I pressed the buzzer to Lynn’s front door. A veiled woman in an abaya who could have been Arabic, I couldn’t be certain, opened it.  I was looking for Lynn, I garbled, taken aback.

Come in, she led me to the living room and motioned me to sit on the sofa. Out of the corner of my eye I noticed a man standing at the hallway entrance and another blocking the other exit from the room towards the dining area. Both had dark glasses and a ghutra headdress worn such that it hid most of their faces. The woman who had let me in exited the room as a third man entered and stood facing me. His face was hidden similar to the others.

There is nothing to worry about Thomas, the spokesman said, and I thought I detected a trace of an Indian accent.  We simply want a half hour of your time to listen to a proposition.

Where is Lynn?

She is leaving the Kingdom but allowed us the use of her place for this meeting. I noticed a second woman in an abaya in the shadows of the hallway behind the guard. There was something familiar about the figure that I couldn’t pin down. Thoughts of up and leaving entered my mind. My interrogator seemed to sense this and said, It would be better if you heard us out. Would you like anything to drink before we begin?

Water would be nice, I replied. The woman who had answered the door appeared with a glass and bottled water. I poured some in the glass and took a long drink trying to collect myself.

We represent a government agency, although not a Saudi one. His English was impeccable but the accent was there. We are interested in information on a coworker of yours named Kenneth Damaris. He is staying at the same hotel as you. He leaves the Kingdom in two weeks and we would like you to find out about his plans. We think he is being set up by a subversive group to become an innocent pawn in one of their operations. We want you to seek him out, find out all you can about his plans.

Why would I agree to spy on an associate?

We appeal to your good judgment. It is not Kenneth we are after but those planning to use him. We would rather not approach him directly until we identify those manipulating him without their being scared off. The whole thing seemed far-fetched to me although I could envision Kenneth getting tricked into something over his head.

What happens next? I asked.

You simply walk out the door, drive back to your hotel, and resume your life. We will stay in touch. Here is a number you can use to leave us a message at anytime, he said handing me a Riyadh telephone number written on yellow paper. He motioned to the man standing by the hallway and he backed away. The woman I had glimpsed there earlier had disappeared. We do trust your judgment Thomas Dismissed, I stood and walked to the hallway, the guard, if that was what he