Dictator

42

They came back for Justus Iluko in the morning. He wasn’t surprised. Even the ignorant apes who ran the local branch of the National Intelligence Organization, the secret police who enforced Gushungo’s never-ending campaign of fear and oppression, would have worked out that if they had a man’s children, they would not be safe until they had him too. Justus let them come. He took it for granted that he was a dead man. And he reasoned that the nearest jail was at Buweku, some thirty miles away. Canaan and Farayi were almost certainly being held there. If he were taken to Buweku too, that would be his best chance of getting close to them, however fleetingly, before they all vanished for good.

All he wanted was to speak to Carver first. Justus knew that there was nothing his friend could do now. But perhaps, if he could only tell Carver what had happened, that might, in the end, give him some hope of revenge.

‘I know you’re a ruthless bastard, Klerk, but I never thought you’d stoop that low.’

‘What the fuck, Carver – what’s this “stoop that low”? What are you talking about, man?’

Carver stopped pacing round his living room and spoke with steely clarity. ‘I’m talking about the message I got from Justus Iluko.’

‘Justus who?’

‘Iluko. He worked for you, remember? You fought together in the war. He helped me get Zalika away from Moses Mabeki.’

‘Ah shit, that Justus. Sure I remember him. Good man, quit working for me a while back. But what’s this about a message?’

‘He called me last night – someone who claimed to be him, anyway. The connection was crap and the guy’s voice was shot to hell, could have been anyone. He said his wife was dead and his kids had been taken by Gushungo’s men. He was begging me to help. So you’re telling me this isn’t some stunt you’re trying to pull, faking some tragedy with a family I know, trying to get me to change my mind? Because it’s a helluva bloody coincidence. I walk out on you and a few hours later, hey presto, there’s one of your old employees calling me up-’

‘Hey, I swear, I had nothing to do with it. And to prove it, I’ll get my guys in Malemba to check this out, find out what the fuck’s going on. All right?’

There was a bleeping in Carver’s ear.

‘Hang on,’ he said, ‘someone on the other line. Shit, it’s Justus’s number. I’ll call you right back.’

‘Samuel, is that you?’

The voice on the other end was tight and high-pitched with anxiety and the reception was terrible, but now that Carver could hear him live he was in no doubt: this was Justus Iluko.

‘Yeah, I’m here. What’s happening?’

‘They are coming for me. They killed my wife and took my children. Now they are here for me too.’

Down the line, Carver could hear shouting and a hammering noise – someone trying to batter down a door. He felt a desperate sense of helplessness and guilt at his inability to change any of what was about to happen.

‘Is there anything I can do?’ he asked, though he knew it was a futile question.

‘Do not worry about me, I am a dead man,’ came the reply. ‘But please, Sam, I beg you, if there is anything you can do for my children… anything… I…’

Justus’s final words were drowned in the crash of the splintering door and a cacophony of heavy boots and raised voices as the room was invaded and Justus was seized.

There was one last despairing cry of ‘Sam, please!’ then a brief burst of feedback and static before the line went dead.

Carver stood alone in his Geneva flat, surrounded by all the possessions and comforts that many years in a lucrative trade had bought him, shamed by the ease of his existence; shamed, too, by his initial scepticism about Justus’s call. While Carver had been tucking into breakfast and shooting at clay pigeons on Klerk’s estate, Justus and his family had been torn apart, their lives destroyed on a madman’s whim. He thought back to the psychiatrist Karlheinz Geisel, who had baulked at the idea of doing something that would cause the death of a few specific individuals, even if it might save many more faceless, unknown people. Now Carver faced the precise opposite situation: people he knew would die if he did not do something. There was a moral imperative to act.

The children whose education Carver had supported and whose father had saved his life were imprisoned, facing interrogation, torture, even execution. Every year Canaan and Farayi had sent him hand-drawn cards at Christmas, along with letters earnestly describing their progress at school. In the past few years, childish descriptions had given way to growing maturity. He had seen them blossom as individuals with minds and opinions of their own, young people of the kind Malemba desperately needed if it had any hope of recovering from the devastation wrought by Henderson Gushungo. How could he stand by and let such promise go to waste?

Justus had begged Carver to do something for his children, but it had to be something effective: no cheap gestures, no grandstanding, but something that would make a difference. He had to give the Iluko kids, and others like them, the best chance of surviving now and prospering in the future. And there was only one way a single individual could do that.

Carver went over everything he had been told about Malemba and its ruling elite. An idea began to take shape in his mind. It grew clearer and more strongly defined as he went online and looked at maps and aerial views of Hong Kong. Then he surfed websites dealing with tropical medicine and marine biology. He took out a notepad and wrote down ‘pyx’, ‘patten’, ‘cruet’, ‘chasuble’, ‘lavabo’.

Finally, Carver called Klerk.

‘Justus Iluko was captured by Gushungo’s men today,’ Carver said. ‘I heard it happen. His wife is dead. His kids are in jail. I need to know which one. Can your people find that out for me?’

‘Sure,’ said Klerk. ‘But are you going to try and break them out? Don’t waste your time, man. You’re good, but one man against Gushungo’s entire security forces? Forget it.’

‘Thanks, but I worked that out for myself. Next question: your mining operations, do they employ chemists?’

‘Of course. The best. We depend on them for a lot of our refining processes.’

‘Excellent. Tell them I need someone to carry out’ – Carver looked at the words on the laptop screen and took a deep breath – ‘a synthesis that relies on the formation of a benzylhydrazide intermediate, subjected to methyl glyoxylate hemimethyl acetal and a Lewis acid, in order to construct a highly reactive azomethine imine which subsequently undergoes an intramolecular 1,3-dipolar cycloaddition reaction, leading to an advanced tetracyclic intermediate. They should end up with a substance that has the molecular formula C 10 H 17 N 7 O 4.’

‘Sam, what the fuck are you on about?’

‘Something that will sort out that issue you’ve got in Hong Kong.’

‘Really?’ said Klerk. His whole attitude had changed in a single word. Suddenly he sounded a lot more interested.

‘Yes, really. I’ve reconsidered my position. Let’s just say I now have a strong personal interest in making sure the job is done as thoroughly as possible.’

‘That’s great news. Zalika will be delighted.’

‘Good for her, but that’s not the reason I’m doing this. I’ll email you that synthesis along with the appropriate diagrams. Tell your people that if they want a full account they can find it in the Journal of the American Chemical Society, 1984, edition 106, page 5,594. They’re also going to need flour, water and a basic guide to unleavened baking. And you’d better tell them to wear protective clothing when they work on this.’

‘Might exposure prove dangerous to their health?’ Klerk asked. ‘Very.’

‘That’s good to know.’

‘Now, I agree that the way to do this is by faking a diamond heist. The robbers come in, get rid of the inhabitants of the house, then take the stones at their leisure. The obvious time to do it is when the entire household is down on its knees taking communion – the one time in the week when their guard is down. The way this plays out, it will look like two separate groups of people taking advantage of a given situation. Gushungo leaves the country, that’s when his opponents mount a coup to seize power. The cat’s away, the mice play. That makes perfect sense. Meanwhile, he and the wife are carting millions of bucks’ worth of diamonds around Hong Kong: frankly it’s a miracle someone hasn’t lifted them long before now. Is it a handy coincidence, both things happening at the same time? Yes. Can anyone prove there’s a connection? No. I’ll make sure they can’t. And that would be a lot easier if your niece wasn’t tagging along for the ride. So give me one good reason, aside from her making life miserable for Uncle Wendell if she doesn’t get her way, that she has to be there.’

‘Two reasons. First, because this is her job. She researched it. She planned it. She has a right to help execute it. And second, because you can’t get the diamonds without her.’

‘Why not?’

‘The safe,’ Klerk replied. ‘It opens via a scanner which is set to recognize Faith Gushungo’s finger and palm prints. They have to align the right way, too. And that requires a woman’s hand. Yours would be too big.’

‘And you know this about the scanner because…?’

‘Because one of the maids, young woman by the name of Tina Wong, is actually a former detective sergeant in the Organized Crime and Triad Bureau of the Hong Kong Police. She’s working for us, been undercover in the house for the past three months. She can get you a set of Faith Gushungo’s prints. She can make sure the front door is unlocked. The one thing she can’t do is get the diamonds for you. She has to be on her knees, saying her prayers, same as everyone else. In any case, the Chinese, very petite. Her hand is too small.’

‘But Zalika’s got Goldilocks hands, I get it. I’ll need to get her trained up first. You say you have plans of the house?’

‘Yes.’

‘You have outbuildings up at that place of yours in Suffolk?’

‘Of course.’

‘Right then. Get the target house mocked up inside a barn or something. Doesn’t have to be anything fancy: chalk marks on the floor, some stairs and a first floor made out of planks and scaffolding. Just so long as the dimensions are right. Try and get a copy of the safe, or as near as dammit, too. We’re not going to go in blasting on this. No guns, no smoke, no bombs. It’s all about timing, and that has to be perfect. If Zalika shows me she can do it, she can come. Otherwise I’ll take my chances with your undercover cop. All right?’

‘Ja,’ said Klerk. ‘But now let me give you my condition for doing the job. I’ve got great things planned for that young lady, so you just listen to me. You brought her back safely once. You damn well bring her back again.’

‘I’ll do my best.’

‘No, Carver, just do it.’