The Samurai Inheritance

XXXV

‘May I tempt you with a glass of champagne? Today we are serving the Dom Pérignon 2002.’ The Japanese hostess hovered beside the secluded booth overlooking Tokyo Bay.

Magda hesitated. ‘No thank—’

‘You should,’ Jamie encouraged her. ‘We might be here for quite a while.’

‘But those men …’

‘Won’t be able to reach us in here.’ He gave her a tired smile. ‘The Saintclair philosophy is that as long as you’re alive you might as well make the most of it.’ He saw her resolve weaken. ‘Two glasses please, and can you bring us the menu?’ Smiling, the hostess poured from the green and gold bottle, the liquid frothing gently into the narrow crystal stem.

‘To life,’ he said, lifting his glass to clink it against hers.

Her face dissolved into a disbelieving grin. ‘You really are the most infuriating, illogical …’ She gave up. ‘To life.’

‘May it be a little less eventful than in recent times.’

‘A sentiment I’d gladly echo.’ She took a sip of the champagne, wrinkling her nose at the exploding bubbles. ‘Except that with Jamie Saintclair around that seems a little unlikely. What time does our flight leave?’

‘The Hong Kong flight takes off in about two hours, but I don’t actually plan for us to be on it.’

‘But the tickets …?’

‘The tickets bought us sanctuary, a glass of champagne and a hot meal, but more important they bought us time. The men in the lobby and at security were here to abduct us if they got the opportunity, but their priority was to track us. By now they’ll know we’re holed up in here and booked on Cathay Pacific CX 6321, departing from Gate 112 at six thirty a.m.. They’ll be relaxed because they have us where they want us.’

‘Trapped,’ she pointed out.

‘Succinctly put.’ The hostess returned with the menus. ‘May we have another glass, please?’ He smiled at Magda. ‘You order for us both while I make a phone call.’

One and a half ring tones before it was answered. ‘Where the fuck have you been?’ An Australian accent; harsh with authority and a touch of threat, but not the mining tycoon.

‘You’re not Devlin. I only speak to Devlin.’

‘Jumped-up messenger boys don’t dictate to the boss. Do you have the head?’

‘Look, old son, somebody should have told you I don’t react well to threats. Why don’t you put Devlin on and go and work out your issues somewhere else? Either that or I can hang up.’

‘You don’t want to be doing that, Jamie boy.’ Keith Devlin’s rasping voice was full of chummy bonhomie, but Jamie felt the hair on the back of his neck rise like an angry cat’s. ‘Just a little misunderstanding.’

‘Sure, Keith. Just a little misunderstanding that’s supposed to remind me you have the heavy squad ready to wade in if I happen to get the wrong idea.’

‘But the question stands, son, and this is important: do you have the head?’

Jamie let the silence lengthen before he replied. ‘Yes.’

‘And where are you?’

‘Let’s stop playing games, Keith. You know exactly where I am. The only reason you gave me the credit card was so you could track it. You know I booked two tickets for the Okinawa ferry about an hour and a half ago and you know I bought two flights to Hong Kong at Haneda airport. The trouble is that the minute I walk out the doors at Lantau it will be straight into the arms of certain people it wouldn’t be healthy for me to meet.’ He gave Devlin the short version of the night’s events.

‘So Madam Nishimura wants your guts for garters, and when she gets it, she’ll take the head back and I can whistle for it?’

‘Well put, except that it would be more accurate to say that she wants my head for a wall lamp. Which is why we’re staying here until you get us out.’

‘And how in the name of Christ do you expect me to do that?’ the tycoon spluttered.

Jamie told him.

‘That’s the craziest thing I’ve ever heard. Why don’t I just send you a bloody magic carpet instead?’

‘Come on, Keith. You’ve got the money. You’ve got the resources. And didn’t I read that the Japanese government were trying to persuade Devlin Metal Resources to invest in a scheme to extract rare earth minerals from under the Pacific? That should give you a few favours to call in.’

Devlin grumbled for a moment before making a grudging capitulation. ‘All right. I’ll give it a go, but it could take a bit of time.’

Jamie smiled. ‘Make it happen, Keith, or maybe I’ll have to negotiate with Madam Nishimura instead.’

‘You’re forgetting about your girlies, Saintclair.’

‘No, I’m not, Keith. But this is my life we’re bargaining over and we both know you won’t touch a hair on their heads.’

‘Don’t be so certain about that, son.’ He heard the hesitation in the Australian’s voice. ‘If you believed that why didn’t you just walk away?’

‘Because I like a challenge.’

He rang off and found Magda studying him with a question in her eyes.

‘We could be here for another two hours or another two days,’ he told her, ‘so make yourself comfortable.’

‘Won’t they call us?’

‘No, I’ve arranged for our tickets to be cancelled without any fuss.’

She looked as if she was about to say something. Thanks? A verbal slap on the wrist for keeping her in the dark again? He’d never know because she thought better of it and wandered over to a shelf scattered with international newspapers. She picked up a copy and began to flick idly through the pages. He saw her stiffen and was on his feet before she turned her head.

‘Jamie? This … I can’t …’

‘What is it, Magda?’ He kept his voice steady because two or three of their fellow passengers had sensed her concern and were looking towards them. Her hand shook as she folded the paper and showed him the headline: Russian oligarch assassinated by bodyguard.

‘Christ,’ he breathed. He took the paper and they went back to their seats.

‘I can’t believe it. He seemed … I don’t know … such a good man. Not like the others. We had tea with him less than a week ago.’

Good. Jamie wasn’t so sure. He supposed your opinion of Arkady Berzarin depended on your definition of good. A good businessman? Certainly, but a good businessman was generally a ruthless businessman. Good to his workers? Probably. Good to his competitors and rivals, definitely not. He remembered the man with respect, but he’d been glad to get out of the house unscathed, without experiencing his generosity or animosity. Still it was hard to believe he was dead.

A shadowy and hitherto unknown Chechen terror organization had claimed responsibility, citing the Russian’s profiteering and abuse of his workforce in the Caucasus … Tributes led, naturally, by the Russian president … We will hunt them down wherever they hide …

Berzarin had feared no one. Not terrorists, not the Mafia, not the unions and not his rivals. Only one person had coveted his power in Siberia. And one person had coveted what he believed was his by right, but which Berzarin claimed he did not have.

Why? Why didn’t matter, except as it affected Jamie and Magda. The deed was done and could not be undone. He felt certain they’d been used in some way, but he couldn’t work out how. Maybe Berzarin had upped his security after their visit and the cryptic warning from Sergei. Maybe … No, maybe didn’t matter either. The question was: is this the end of it? Or was there a further reckoning? He had a feeling his good friend Vatutin was out there somewhere smiling at the mess he’d got himself into. But was the Russian there to protect him? Not much evidence of that, it was true. Or — for reasons he didn’t understand — had his usefulness ended with Berzarin’s death?

He flicked through to the share prices. Devlin Metal Resources was down another five points on the Nikkei and seven on the Dow. No wonder Keith Devlin was getting edgy.

‘Mr Saintclair?’ Three hours after his call Jamie looked up to see a man in a dark uniform and a pilot’s peaked cap looming over him. They’d used the time to take turns at sleeping on the leather couch. Magda opened her eyes, blinking against the bright light, her hand automatically reaching protectively for the backpack beneath the seat.

‘Yes,’ Jamie said warily.

‘Mr Devlin sent us?’

Jamie looked past him to where two other men and a woman dressed in the same smart livery stood waiting. They all had the small wheeled suitcases you saw flight crews dragging through airports the world over. He smiled. ‘In that case, let’s get it done.’

A few minutes later he was sharing the lounge’s male shower room with the corporate jet’s steward, an American called Brett who hailed from New York.

‘You must have some clout, man. We were heading from Seoul to pick up the East Asia director in Manila when we had word to get our asses to Tokyo. You could hear his cusses from the galley when Cap told him about the change of plan.’

‘Well, you know how it is, Brett,’ Jamie said as they exchanged clothes and Brett handed over the neck lanyard carrying his ID badge. ‘Old man Devlin will do anything for his favourite nephew. Sorry about the state of the jacket.’

The flight attendant studied the battered Mets bomber and grinned. ‘Damned if I wouldn’t feel like a traitor if I wore that thing anyway. They’ll have something to fit me in the mall. Be pleased to take that cap off your hands, though.’ Jamie handed it over and studied himself in the mirror as the other man squeezed himself into his black designer jeans. He wore a white shirt and dark maroon tie. The trousers fitted him for length, but the waistline was a little loose, though nothing that a belt wouldn’t fix. He’d borrowed Brett’s shaving kit and looked about five years younger without the stubble he’d allowed to accumulate over the past week. There wasn’t a lot he could do about his hair, but the peaked cap would hide that. The biggest problem was the immaculately shined wingtips. The American was about two sizes larger and they were alarmingly loose. They eventually solved the problem by the age-old fix of stuffing the toes with paper towels. He shrugged on the tailored jacket and pulled the pilot’s cap down at a rakish angle over one eye.

‘How do I look?’

‘Like you’ve been doing the job all your life. Just one thing …’

‘Yes?’

‘When you’re heading for the plane, narrow your eyes, square your shoulders and think like a B-17 pilot heading for a trip to Berlin. I always find it helps smother the crushing knowledge that I’m just an overpaid, mile-high gofer in a snazzy suit.’

He came to stand beside Jamie and ran a comb through his thick dark hair. They were approximately the same height and build, which was fortunate. Jamie wasn’t sure he could have persuaded the pilot to give up his wings. ‘I hope this isn’t putting you to too much trouble?’

Brett’s face dissolved in a dreamy smile. ‘Who wouldn’t swap serving lobster at thirty thousand feet for two nights of expenses-paid R and R in Tokyo? And with Miss Perfect along to add a sporting interest.’ Jamie raised a questioning eyebrow and the other man slapped him on the shoulder. ‘Hell, I’ve got fifty bucks riding at two to one with the Cap that I can’t get her into the sack by Friday night.’

When they emerged from the shower room, Magda was already there, but it took Jamie a second to recognize her.

‘Wow,’ he said. ‘You were born to be in a uniform.’

Miss Perfect was probably a size larger than Magda’s slim figure, but they’d contrived to make the skirt and jacket look as if they’d been made for her. The effect was military, but somehow she managed to give the uniform a softer and more feminine quality. A black pillbox hat perched jauntily on her raven hair completed the ensemble. ‘It’ll take me a while to get used to the idea of you in killer heels, though.’

‘Don’t push your luck, Saintclair.’ She smiled. ‘Though I admit you don’t look so bad yourself.’

‘Are we ready?’ the captain urged. ‘We’ve got the eight fifteen slot and I don’t want to miss it.’

‘Just one more thing …’ Jamie took Brett’s overnight case and swapped the contents with those of the rucksack. As his hands touched the wrinkled ovals something like a mild electric shock ran through him. It struck him he knew more about Magda’s grandfather than the man whose remains had turned his life upside down. For the first time he was tempted to take a closer look, to see if something remained of the features that would give him a clue to the type of human being this Solomon Islander had been. But this wasn’t the time. He looked up to find Brett peering over his shoulder.

‘Hey, that looks kinda like—’ Jamie turned and stared at him with hard eyes. ‘Okay, man, I didn’t mean nothing.’

The Englishman allowed his face to relax. ‘Just a little present for old man Devlin. And Brett?’

‘Sure?’ A nervous smile.

‘Don’t forget to share a bottle of the Dom Pérignon with Miss Perfect before you go. The 2002 is the perfect loosener when you combine it with smoked salmon and scrambled eggs for breakfast.’

The new flight crew marched out of the first-class lounge with the captain in the lead and Jamie at his shoulder. Behind them came the tall co-pilot, chatting to Magda. They made their way through the terminal with the fixed stare of men and women for whom the human sea they traversed was indivisible from any other potential piece of cargo. Not individuals, or even people, just numbers and weights and appetites to be serviced. Neither recognized nor even acknowledged. Eight pairs of eyes saw them leave the lounge, but if they noticed anything it was the female attendant in the tight skirt who moved with all the grace of a catwalk model even on killer heels that looked a size too small.

‘We normally park at the VIP terminal,’ the captain muttered from the side of his mouth, ‘but we have special dispensation this time round. When we get to the security desk just open your passport and wave it airily in the guard’s direction and you’ll find he’ll barely even notice you. If there does happen to be a problem leave it to me to sort out. I filed a flight plan for Brisbane when we landed, is that right?’

‘Brisbane is perfect.’ Keith Devlin had wanted to land Magda Ross in Port Moresby and Jamie to continue in the executive jet to an unspecified meeting place, presumably on Bougainville or somewhere in the Solomon Islands. Jamie had insisted he wasn’t going to be dumped in the middle of nowhere with the Bougainville head and a reception committee headed by a maniac who’d kidnapped his girlfriend and her daughter.

Devlin had eventually agreed he could accompany Magda to Brisbane and take a scheduled flight to the mining boss’s as yet unspecified destination. That way Jamie would be assured that a whole plane load of passengers would witness his arrival and he could insist on a daylight meeting with Devlin and whoever was with him, to make the exchange.

The mining tycoon had only put up a token argument, which made Jamie’s ear tingle in a way he didn’t like. The thing that gnawed at him was why the head was so important and why Devlin needed him to take it to Bougainville. The more he thought about it, the more it didn’t add up. If Devlin was being straight why wouldn’t he fly them direct to Sydney, where Jamie would hand over the head in exchange for his loved ones? The original agreement hadn’t specified a location for the head to be handed over, but there’d been no suggestion he’d have to travel to Bougainville. That meant either some dynamic had changed or Devlin had planned to play him false right from the start. For the life of him he couldn’t believe that. The more likely explanation was that someone, somewhere had imposed a deadline and Devlin needed the head in a hurry.

A face swam into his mind; a genial panda with hidden fangs. Could the Chinese have upped the ante? It had to be a possibility. Mr Lim had hinted there was more to this than a multi-billion-pound copper mine contract, and that was high stakes by anyone’s standards. It would explain the hard case Devlin had put on the phone to try to put the frighteners on him.

Well, two could play that game.