By the same author

FICTION:

Give Me Liberty (co-edited with Martin H. Greenberg)

Visions of Liberty (co-edited with Martin H. Greenberg)

Freedom! (co-edited with Martin H. Greenberg)

NON-FICTION:

Understanding Inflation

How To Get A Second Passport

The Nature of Market Cycles

The Winning Investment Habits of Warren Buffett & George Soros: Harness the Genius of the World’s Richest Investors

When God Speaks for Himself: The Words of God You’ll Never Hear in Church or Sunday School (with George Forrai)

My enormous thanks and gratitude go to
Jo Ann, who saved it, and
Raquel, who helped make it

TRUST YOUR ENEMIES

Copyright © 2012 by Mark Tier

Published by Inverse Books, GPO Box 9444, Hong Kong

www.inversebooks.com

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner.

Cover design: Leo Agtuca

AUTHOR’S NOTE: This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to any person, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

Contents

PART ONE: “Trust Your Enemies . . . ”

Those whom the Gods would destroy,
they first make mad with power.
— Greek proverb

CHAPTER

1 A Truckload of Monkeys

2 Between Heaven and Hell

3 “Vengeance Shall Be Mine . . . ”

4 “For A While . . . ”

5 The Long Arm of Paradise

6 A Woman from Mars

7 Shark Bait

8 Fallout

9 “Wish Me Luck . . . ”

10 “Value Added”

11 Murphy’s Law

12 The Siren’s Song

13 Night Vision

14 The Frosty Lady

15 Tinkle, Tinkle, Little Star

16 Fairy Tales?

17 “Mum’s the Word”

18 Pillow Talk

19 Pendulum of Fear

20 Virginity Hill

21 Without Notice

22 Sly Grog

23 A Man of Influence

24 Hobson’s Choice

25 Rolling the Dice

26 The Ice Queen

27 Fingers of Fate

28 The Lion’s Den

29 Sixth Uncle

30 The Girls from Issan

31 Merchants of Death

32 Hollow Idol

33 Chains of Love

34 Hacker for Hire

35 Collision Course

PART TWO: “. . . But Not Your Friends”

“Take what you want,” said God,
“and pay for it.”
— Spanish proverb

Cast of Characters and Glossary of Terms

PART ONE

“Trust Your
Enemies . . .”

“Those whom the Gods
would destroy they
first make mad
with power.”
— Greek proverb

1 A Truckload of Monkeys

SENATOR FRANK MCKURN’S EYES roved over Alison McGuire’s body as if it were a Playboy centerfold in 3-D.

“I have a proposition for you, Alison.”

“I can’t imagine how any proposition from you, Senator,” Alison replied, her sapphire eyes cold and hard, “could possibly interest me.”

McKurn grinned, his thick, stubby fingers snapping the corner of the only item on his desk, a fat manila envelope.

“Oh, I do believe I’ll be able to change your mind.”

Alison was startled by McKurn’s tone of absolute certainty; she tucked a curl of her jet-black hair back into place to cover the slight trembling of her hand.

In her fourteen years in Parliament House, Alison had dealt with McKurn many times—but carefully avoided being alone with him.

Until now.

McKurn had insisted on this meeting and she couldn’t find a way to refuse.

A lanky, imperious six foot five, Senator Frank McKurn towered over every other Senator and Member of the House. In his mid-seventies, he wore his age well. But thanks to his crooked nose, bushy, unkempt eyebrows, leathery skin, and the pinkish cast to the whites of his eyes, even wearing an impeccably tailored suit and a $200 tie he looked like a laborer, talked like one, and was built, people whispered, like a brick shithouse: solid, tough, smelly, and slimy.

“It’s really very simple,” McKurn said with a smile—a smile that did nothing to improve the look of his face. “When Kydd stands down as Prime Minister, everyone expects Anthony Royn to step into his shoes—but I intend to make sure Cracken knocks Royn out of the ring.”

“And I, Senator, will do everything I can to make sure your little weasel loses.”

McKurn’s eyes danced with merriment, as if Alison’s response had been an especially funny joke. He grinned wryly; a crooked grin that sent cold, tingling fingers of fear shooting up and down Alison’s spine.

“I think not, Alison,” McKurn said, his grin broadening, his fingers idly tapping the envelope. “I think not.”

McKurn picked up the envelope, leant back in his chair, pulled several sheets of paper half out, gazing at each one with obvious satisfaction for a long moment. His eyes flicked to Alison as if he was gauging her reaction . . . or making some kind of comparison. Alison couldn’t tell. But she could feel his eyes lingering for brief moments on her full lips, on the shape of her breasts, and following the outline of her body as it curved into her waist and then flared to her hips.

Alison found her gaze glued to the back of papers, frantic to know what was on the other side.

“You know, Alison,” McKurn said with a broad smile that made Alison’s stomach quake, “I’ve admired you from the moment I first saw you.”

“Do you expect me to take that as a compliment, Senator?”

“And I’ve always thought you had a great body,” McKurn continued, as if Alison hadn’t spoken. “Until recently, I didn’t know how stunning it really is.”

Alison’s long fingers stiffened, her fingertips turning white as stone, gripping the edge of the desk for support. She struggled to speak, but felt as though the muscles of her throat and neck were no longer connected to the rest of her body. “Wh-what do you mean?”

“Very simple.” McKurn tossed a single sheet from the envelope onto the desk in front of Alison.

Not a document but a full-color printout. Of her. Naked.

A scream welled up from deep inside her, but she found she could hardly breathe. She was looking at her own face, consumed with ecstasy, framed by her black hair spilling in all directions over a downy pillow. Her pale skin, which the sun reddened but never tanned, was flushed, her deep blue eyes glowed, her nipples were taut, a man’s hand on one full breast. A hand she recognized.

Her face turned to ice as she glared at McKurn, half-rising from the chair as words struggled with each other to spill out. After a moment, her mouth opened in the beginning of a yell, but instead she growled: “You—you bastard.”

“Sit down. And shut up.” McKurn’s face was hard, his lips tight. He leant forward, his eyes narrowed into pinpoints. He was breathing heavily; Alison flinched as the faint but sour taste of his breath floated towards her. Against her will, she felt herself transfixed as she sank back into the chair, avoiding his eyes by focusing on the broken lines of the bulbous, crooked nose jutting from his craggy face.

Alison shuddered. Long ago, McKurn’s nose was broken in a street brawl and hadn’t been set properly afterwards. When people remarked on it McKurn would comment, with a malicious laugh, “You shoulda seen the other guy.”

The “other guy” had died in hospital.

“No one talks to me like that.” McKurn didn’t raised his voice, but he spat his words through narrowed lips. “No one, you understand?”

Alison clamped her mouth tightly shut. I won’t give him the satisfaction of a reply, she thought.

McKurn shrugged faintly and threw another picture on the table, then another.

“They leave nothing to the imagination, do they?”

She held her lips tight, but couldn’t prevent her eyes from widening as each picture showed a different part of her naked body.

“I must apologize for the quality,” McKurn said matter-of-factly. “They were printed off a video.”

“A what?”

“A video. Complete, I might add, with sound effects.”

Alison’s eyes flew wildly around the room. Was she really in Parliament House? Was she listening to the president of the Senate—in his own office? To the most powerful politician in Australia after the prime minister? For a moment, she felt as though she were looking down on herself from somewhere near the ceiling, observing but coldly ignoring the undisguised terror and disgust surging through her body. And she could hear a voice, an ageless voice, responding to her questions: Yes, Alison. And you’re seeing how he became so powerful.

Holy Mother of God, I’m having hallucinations. As that thought came, the strange vision disappeared.

McKurn tossed the last one on the desk. Alison saw a grainy blow-up of herself passionately kissing Derek Olsson.

“Convinced yet?” McKurn asked, now watching her with satisfaction and undisguised lust.

Alison became aware of how she was hunched down in the chair like a frightened rabbit. She began to straighten up—but recalled a lesson from Machiavelli. Keep your enemies continually off guard: Make sure they always underestimate you.

So she didn’t move. Let him think I’m beaten, she decided, and just making futile protests.

“Convinced,” she said slowly, straining with the effort to effect a normal tone of voice, “of precisely what?”

“Alison,” McKurn said with a sigh, “I’ve always thought your intelligence matched, if not exceeded, your beauty. Don’t disappoint me now.”

“Why should I give a damn whether I disappoint you or not?” Alison replied, her teeth clenched.

McKurn shook his head like a teacher whose favorite student had just let him down. His fingers tapped loudly on the pictures strewn across his desk as he watched Alison, waiting.

Alison tried to move her gaze away from the pictures, to look anywhere else, even at McKurn. But she felt as though she no longer had any control over all the little muscles around her eyes.

“Just think,” said McKurn. “I can make you famous. All I have to do is post this video on the internet, and you’ll be a worldwide sensation. The latest sex bomb, the newest femme fatale. The world’s paparazzi will follow your every move. There’ll be pictures of you everywhere—and double-page spreads of the juiciest ones in the sleazier tabloids.”

Leering at her, McKurn picked up the phone. “One phone call, Alison. That’s all it will take.”

Alison’s skin crawled at the thought of people everywhere drooling at the most private parts of her body—at the most private parts of her self. Just walking down the street . . . I’d feel violated again . . . and again . . . knowing that every man would have seen me. I’d have to move to the middle of the Sahara. Or join a nunnery. I’ll never be able to show myself in Parliament House again.

And her mother. Just knowing that her only daughter’s naked body was cavorting in pornographic Technicolor for anyone and everyone to see would give Mum a heart attack.

“NO!” Alison said angrily, glaring at McKurn. “You can’t.”

“Really?” McKurn laughed. Not a laugh that invited her to join him. “Why on earth not?”

Somewhere in the background she heard that strange yet familiar voice: Take note, Alison. This is how he operates. This is a lesson in power you’ll never get from Royn—or even Kydd.

Though her heart seemed to be hammering in her ears, and her stomach churned with rising panic, she forced herself to speak.

“So?” she said, still unable to look up. “I had a romantic weekend with Derek Olsson. So what? Who gives a damn?”

“You didn’t go to bed with just anybody, Alison. You had a dirty weekend with Derek Olsson, who’s now in jail and about to be convicted of a brutal drug murder.”

“Derek is no murderer.” He just can’t be.

“Really?” McKurn chuckled, a thick eyebrow rising in a question mark. “You must be the only person in the whole country who thinks that.”

“I know,” Alison said under her breath, her eyes dropping to focus on the edge of the desk.

McKurn shrugged, and waved a picture of Olsson’s face under her eyes. “And he’s obviously up to his eyeballs in the rackets.”

“That’s completely ridiculous.”

“Get real, Alison. Whether he’s a racketeer or not doesn’t matter. It doesn’t even matter if he’s innocent of the murder he’s charged with. This is politics, Alison. What has truth, or right and wrong, got to do with it? Absolutely nothing. Most people will believe whatever the media tells them to believe. As far as the press is concerned, the famous Derek Olsson, the business sensation they once drooled over, is nothing but a gangster and a hoodlum.”

When Alison said nothing, McKurn added in a quiet, hissing voice, “And you, Alison, will be nothing but a gangster’s moll.”

He’s turned the tables on me, she realized.

Three months ago when her boss, Anthony Royn, asked her to “Get the goods on McKurn,” she’d leapt at the assignment. Now he’s “got the goods” on me instead.

She lifted her head stiffly against the strain of the locked muscles of her neck, forcing herself to look McKurn straight in the eye. But the room was spinning. The vision that had driven her since she was sixteen flashed into her mind: Alison McGuire striding through the corridors of power, dispensing justice and righting wrongs—a crusading Joan of Arc. As McKurn’s face came into focus, her vision seemed to shatter in front of her eyes, like a fragile crystal being smashed into a thousand pieces.

“No!” she cried, involuntarily.

“Yes, Alison.”

McKurn’s face morphed into the image of the Devil Incarnate Father Ryan painted in one Sunday morning sermon when she was a mere six years old. An image which gave her nightmares for weeks afterward.

With an effort, she forced herself to look deep into the pinkish pinpoints that were McKurn’s eyes . . . and decided that Father Ryan had never experienced and knew nothing of the depth of evil he’d been trying to portray.

“So this is how a slimeball like you,” she hissed, “gets people to do your bidding.”

“Wake up, Alison,” McKurn’s voice boomed across the room. He stood halfway out of his chair, leaning across his desk, his face looming over her. “From now on, when I tell you to jump through hoops, you ask ‘how many?’”

Alison tensed her muscles against McKurn’s onslaught—but felt herself cringing back in her chair. I should walk out of here, she thought to herself. But her shaking legs refused to move.

“That’s better,” McKurn said as he lowered himself back into his chair, his eyes glinting with satisfaction.

“I see,” Alison sighed thoughtfully, as if to herself. Straightening her body, she forced herself to look directly into McKurn’s eyes. “So,” she shrugged, “you can run me out of politics. What good does that do you?”

McKurn seemed amused. “Really, Alison. If that’s all I achieved. . . . What do they call you in the Press Gallery? Oh yes, The Power Behind the Throne. Knocking you out would kick away Royn’s main prop. He’d be easy game.”

Alison shook her head. “I’m not indispensable. Royn’s still Kydd’s favorite. You can’t get around it.”

“You’re not thinking clearly. As former ‘Drug Czar,’ Anthony Royn has built his political career around a take-no-hostages anti-drug program.” McKurn picked up the picture of her and Olsson kissing passionately and waved it under her nose. “But it turns out that all along his chief political adviser, the much-vaunted Alison McGuire, was really a gangster’s deceitful moll who gave Olsson the inside dope on every move the great ‘Anti-Drug Crusader’ was about to make.” McKurn chuckled. “Royn will be seen as the witless dupe he really is, whose every move was orchestrated by the gangster’s strumpet. Who’s going to believe Royn has the balls to occupy the highest office in the land then? He’ll be laughed out of politics. Not even Kydd would stand up for him.”

“You make it sound very plausible.” Alison spoke with a coolness she did not feel. “But Royn could easily surprise you.”

“I don’t want any surprises,” McKurn said. “That’s why you’re going to help me make Cracken, not Royn, the next prime minister.”

“What? You mean. . . . You want me to be your spy in Royn’s office? Is that what you’re proposing? You must be out of your mind, Senator.”

“Am I?” McKurn laughed, fingering the pictures.

“So, let me get this clear,” she said slowly. “You want me to give up everything I’ve worked for, betray my principles, deceive everyone who trusts me and pimp on them just so you can put that little weasel Paul Cracken into power?”

“It seems we understand each other.”

“And what am I supposed to get out of this?”

“Why, Alison, you’ll be on the winning team of course.”

“That’s hardly something to look forward to—if it’s your team.”

“And, of course, I won’t post that video.”

“You think that’s enough incentive for me to do what you want me to do?”

McKurn grinned, his bushy eyebrows peaking into two inverted Vs. Like horns, Alison thought.

“It’s your choice, Alison. But do you really want everyone in the world to watch you and your boyfriend fucking like rabbits?”

“He’s not my boyfriend.”

“I suppose not—since he took up with that pesky Karla Preston who writes for his newspapers.” McKurn shrugged. “More grist for the mill: Olsson’s just a heartless womanizer who dips into the company store, and Alison McGuire, so-called ‘power behind the throne,’ was mere putty in his hands.”

Oh, Derek, she thought, feeling tears in her eyes, how could all this be happening? But Olsson was now doubly out of reach: he was in jail, though she didn’t believe for a moment that he was a murderer. And she hadn’t seen him since—since that weekend.

She shook her head. I can’t think about that right now. Dabbing the corner of her eyes with a fingertip, she took a deep breath and looked as steadily as she could at McKurn.

“I’ve got a better idea,” Alison said heatedly. “Why don’t you just go ahead and post the damn video. If you’re right, that will get you what you want.”

“What would be the fun in that?” McKurn exclaimed. Idly picking up a picture he murmured, “I wouldn’t get everything I want.” Picking up another he added, “Not quite everything.”

Breathing heavily, McKurn placed the pictures he was admiring in front of Alison. Gently stroking one of them with his finger he said, “Did anyone ever tell you, Alison,” McKurn asked, “that you have a great arse?”

Somewhere deep down, Alison felt that some part of herself knew and understood the real meaning of McKurn’s words—but she clamped down tight, refusing to let that awareness rise into her consciousness.

He moved his finger to the erect nipple on the other picture, covering Olsson’s hand as he did. “And your breasts, Alison. One rarely sees such perfection.”

McKurn looked up from the picture to focus on her breasts. Alison shivered as though she was being caressed by his ice-cold hands rather than his eyes.

Her throat dry, Alison had to swallow a couple of times before she could speak. “I thought young girls were more your style,” she spat, her voice tinged with contempt. “Preferably under the age of consent.”

“For beauty such as yours, Alison, I’ve made an exception.”

“Dream on.” Alison tried to push herself up, to leap across the table to physically shatter McKurn’s leering grin. But her legs were trembling; she had to thrust with her hands on the desk to find the leverage to heave herself into a standing position.

Now looking down on McKurn she felt momentarily in command. One day, she silently swore to him, we’ll meet in a dark alley and only I will come out. She heard her own voice repeating her Sensei’s words: “The purpose of the martial arts is self-defence.” Well, it would be, she thought in reply—and smiled at the image of McKurn’s arms, legs, and neck twisted in impossible angles.

“I’m glad you find this amusing,” McKurn said with surprise.

“I’d rather walk under a bus.”

“That,” said McKurn coldly, “can be arranged.”

He means it, Alison thought. I should be shocked. But she felt a strange, if hollow, sense of triumph as the pieces of the jigsaw puzzle that was McKurn fell into place: Everything I’ve thought about you, McKurn, is true—but can I prove it? “You mean like the guy you put in hospital?”

“That was self-defence.”

“Oh, come on, Senator. You expect me to believe that now? That was Sydney in the nineteen-fifties. Just about every cop in town was for sale back then. And witnesses can always be intimidated, can’t they?”

“You’d better be careful what you say, and who you say it to, Alison.”

“Or what? You’ll sue me for slander? That would be fun.”

“You obviously need some time to mull over everything I’ve said. I’ll give you a week. If you haven’t accepted my offer by this time next Friday, that video goes up—and we can all say ‘Goodbye’ to Alison McGuire.”

Glaring fiercely at McKurn she shook her head. “Never.”

Gathering the shreds of her dignity around her she walked out of his office without looking back.

McKurn laughed, calling after her, “One week, remember.”

In the corridor, she slammed the door behind her. Heart racing, head spinning, she grabbed at the wall for support and leant breathlessly against it. One week, she thought between gulps of air. What can I do in one week?

It was late Friday afternoon. Parliament was already half-empty; in offices all over the country people were getting ready for their weekends—if they hadn’t taken off for the beach already.

McKurn chose this time on purpose.

The week wouldn’t start till Monday—and what could she do over the weekend?

“Are you all right, Miss? You look terrible.”

She lifted her head to see people looking at her strangely as they hurried past. A security guard was standing in front of her looking concerned—and, no doubt, checking the ID hanging around her neck at the same time.

“I’ll be fine. Thanks. It must be something I ate.”

She pushed off from the wall and walked slowly in the direction of Royn’s office. Remembering the guard’s comment she turned into the first bathroom she passed.

“You do look terrible,” she said to her image in the mirror. Somehow, the ritual of washing her face and re-applying her makeup made her feel a little better.

“Well, Alison,” she said to her reflection, “what are we going to do?” As if in answer, the thought came to her: Never lay all your cards on the table. “He’s overconfident,” she muttered. “He’s told more than he should have. He was boasting.”

He’s made a mistake . . . but how can I use it against him?

“I need some help, don’t I?” she said to the mirror. Her thoughts turned to Olsson—but she shook her head. What could he do, even if he wasn’t stuck in jail?

She sighed, stretched to her full height, and looked herself in the eye until she saw the fire and determination come back.

No, she vowed to her mother. Never, she pledged to her younger self, and to the vision that fuelled her since she was sixteen. “No, McKurn,” she swore, “I won’t do anything you want,” she said to herself. But how, the voice in her head responded, can you refuse? “There’s a way—and even if it’s the dark alley, I’ll find it.”

But her stomach chose that moment to rebel. She stumbled into the nearest cubicle where she threw up.

*****

WHEN ALISON REACHED HER office, she went straight to the safe and pulled out her file on McKurn. But everything in those pages was etched in her memory. No facts. Sydney, she thought. He grew up in Sydney. I could visit Mum and Dad. I could visit Derek. In jail? Alison shuddered. I could talk to his partner, Ross Traynor.

“Stop kidding yourself, Alison,” she said sternly. “You could phone Ross and ask him how Derek’s doing.”

Still, there might be something I can do in Sydney. She quickly tidied up, closed the safe, folded up her laptop . . . and stopped.

“My enemy’s enemy. . . .” she muttered to herself with a glint in her eye. Of course. Randolph Kydd—McKurn’s most powerful enemy. “Yes,” she said out loud. “That’s who I should talk to.”

She’d always looked forward to her meetings with Kydd. He treated her as if she were a favorite granddaughter; she always felt a tinge of awe, as if she were sitting at the feet of the Master. But those meetings, when they weren’t with Royn as well, were always arranged by or for him.

I should call Royn first, she thought. And shook her head. Then I’d have to tell him why. She looked at the phone. This is an emergency. He’ll understand.

She picked up the handset—and put it down again. The phone. If I could tap McKurn’s phone.

But a court order would be needed. She knew several Federal Police officers—but none of them owed her enough favors to risk his job doing something as patently illegal as that. “Pity,” she said as she dialled Kydd’s office.

“Larry, it’s Alison,” she said as she got through to Kydd’s personal assistant. “Is the Prime Minister still here?”

“Yes, but he’s about to walk out the door for the airport.”

“Oh. Any chance of a quick word before he goes? I’ve got something to ask him that really can’t wait till Monday.”

“Hang on, I’ll check.”

A moment later she jerked the handset away from her ear as Kydd’s voice boomed at the only volume setting he knew: extra loud. “Yes, my dear, what’s so urgent?”

Alison stopped her hand from leaping to her mouth.

“Well, Prime Minister.” She paused. What am I going to say? she asked herself. I can’t tell him the truth—I’m going to have to lie to the Prime Minister. “I need some advice . . . about Senator McKurn, Prime Minister.”

“Pah—McKurn.” Kydd spat his words. “Always trouble. What now?”

“I’ve been digging into his past—”

“And how’s it going?”

“Not too well. I’ve collected lots of rumors. But no facts, no evidence.”

“He’s a clever bastard—trickier than a truckload of monkeys. Covers his tracks too well, damn him.”

“Now, he . . . he’s. . . .” Alison felt herself freezing up, as if something was stopping her from uttering the words she was about to say.

“I can tell that something is bothering you,” Kydd said kindly. “But please get to the point, Alison. I’ve got a plane to catch.”

“Sorry, Prime Minister,” Alison said with a silent moan. “The problem is—” she took a deep breath, and her words tumbled out “—I’ve just discovered he’s got wind of what I’ve been doing, and I need to come up with something concrete fast to head him off. I thought you might have some idea, some suggestion, someone I could talk to. . . .”

“This is a distressing development, Alison. One I don’t like at all.”

“No, Prime Minister.” Alison made no attempt to hide the shakiness in her voice.

“Talk to Sidney Royn, Anthony’s father. Back when he was attorney-general, he started an investigation into corruption, mainly targeting the New South Wales state government—McKurn’s home territory.” Kydd’s voice turned thoughtful. “You know, I’ve never completely understood why Sid quit politics. He was at the top of his game. Maybe, just maybe—”

“Maybe McKurn had something to do with it?”

“That’s what I’m wondering.” Kydd looked at his watch. “I’d better get moving. Call Sid. If I come up with something else you’ll be the first to know. And remember, my door is always open to you, Alison.”

“Thank you, Prime Minister.”

SHE GRIPPED HER HANDS to still them and felt the calluses from years of Aikido and Karate. She chopped the edge of one hand into the palm of the other, imagining she was smashing McKurn’s neck.

Yes, I’ve got enough time before the flight, she thought, looking at the clock. I’ll call Sidney Royn on the way.

Right now, I’m going to go and break some bricks.

2 Between Heaven and Hell

“HEY, TOFF. WHYDJA DO it?”

“Forty-six, forty-seven, forty-eight. . . .” In one corner of the exercise yard at Long Bay Penitentiary, Derek Olsson counted push-ups.

“Hey! Toff! We’re talking to ya.”

From the corners of his eyes, Olsson noticed five pairs of feet in a rough semicircle around him.

“Do what,” he said, without breaking the rhythm of his pushups.

Everyone doing time here seemed to have a nickname: Olsson’s was the “Toff” because of his wealth. These five were known as the “Rollers,” partly because anyone who got in their way got rolled. Their leader was “King Kong”: to the other prisoners, he was unquestionably the king, and he was bigger, meaner, and had more murders to his credit than the other four members of his gang. Wherever the Rollers moved they were surrounded by a meter or two of empty space as the other prisoners kept a respectful distance.

“Whydja kill that guy?” said the King. “You were livin’ rich, ya got all the money in the world, hot and cold running girls, I’ll bet. Whydja do it?”

“I didn’t.”

“Come on. You’re gonna get life, same as us. We ain’t gonna tell anyone anyways, so ya might as well be straight with us—and come clean.”

“I am being straight with you.”

The King rolled his eyes.

“Anyways, we gotta message we have to give ya.”

“I’m listening,” said Olsson.

“From someone called Luck Suck,” said one of the other men.

“Lock Sook, you dummy,” said the King.

“Whatever,” said the other man with a laugh.

Olsson stopped at full stretch and looked up. “Perhaps you’d better make sure you know who the message is from before you deliver it,” he said. He’d chosen this spot because it was shaded from the heat of the afternoon sun. But he became aware the five men stood to block his view of the prison guards—and their view of him.

“I don’t think he gives a shit about our pronunciation.” The five Rollers all thought this comment was extremely funny.

While they laughed, Olsson continued his push-ups. But his rhythm was slower, his motions shallower; he inched his feet forward a little; though he still appeared to be looking at the ground, his eyes were turned so he could study the men in his peripheral vision.

They stood with their hands in their pockets and expectation on their hard, unforgiving faces. The King grunted, and in unison the five men pulled out their hands. Olsson saw a piece of wood sharpened to a point in one man’s hand, a nail protruding from a small block of wood in another’s, a jury-rigged knuckleduster on a third. At the same moment the King lunged with his foot, aiming to kick Olsson in the gut. Ah, thought Olsson without surprise, it’s that kind of message.

Olsson pushed up with his arms and legs, turning his body at the same time. His awareness seemed to shrink to the tips of his fingers and toes. The five men became five shifting shapes in space, connected with him and to each other by faint lines of movement, like a three-dimensional geometric puzzle.

When the King’s foot arrived, Olsson’s stomach was no longer there.

As Olsson’s body left the ground he saw his hands slice sharply upwards, connecting one two three four with the back of the King’s ankle, transferring the inertia of his body to the King’s leg at the same time. The foot flew up in the air, forcing the King off balance. He fell backwards, groaning as the back of his head cracked onto the hard pavement. The other four Rollers looked stunned as they watched the King’s foot come to rest on the ground at an impossible angle.

Olsson landed gracefully on the balls of his feet, his knees slightly bent, his hands held like straight knives in front of him. In the background he was aware of faint yells of “Fight! Fight!”

“Well, gentlemen,” he said amiably. “Why don’t we just agree you’ve delivered your message—and now you can all fuck off.”

The faces on the four remaining shapes crystallized in Olsson’s vision. They hesitated, flashing glances at each other. But his words, Olsson noted, had made them angrier. Sure enough, as one of the shapes moved onto the attack, the other three followed and they rushed Olsson—but as a straggle, not a team.

The faint connecting lines in Olsson’s mind turned into arrows of motion so when the nearest shape arrived, its fist in full swing, Olsson was already gliding out of its way. In one fluid, twirling motion one of his hands arced out, touching the shape’s shoulder, nudging the man in the direction he’d been moving so his head slammed into the wall where Olsson had been doing his pushups just moments ago.

The man’s head hit the concrete wall with a sharp crack and he collapsed in a heap, but he’d already disappeared from Olsson’s awareness. His twirl turned into a ballet-like pirouette as one foot sailed out in mid-air and connected to a kneecap with a crunch. The third shape fell into the path of the fourth.

Olsson seemed to swirl faster into a second pirouette as his other foot floated up and into the fourth shape’s crotch, his knee then continuing the upward arc to meet the man’s head as he doubled over, groaning loudly.

“Jesus H. Christ,” a voice nearby said breathlessly, and Olsson suddenly realized he’d lost track of the last shape, only to feel an arm go around his neck and something sharp resting none too gently on the right side of his throat just under his jaw. His eyes did a fast scan of the other four men. Must be the wooden knife, he concluded.

“Looks like you got me,” Olsson said. He let his body relax as though he was admitting defeat, and felt the man’s grip around his neck slacken just a touch.

“Yeah, looks like I do.”

“Oh well,” said Olsson despondently, “what—”

Olsson never finished his sentence.

As he spoke, his feet lifted from the ground, his left elbow jabbed deep into the man’s stomach while his other hand pushed up on the wrist of the hand holding the makeshift knife. The last Roller staggered against the unexpected weight of Olsson’s whole body now hanging from his arm, grunted with surprise as Olsson’s elbow dug deep into his stomach, and collapsed on Olsson’s back.

Olsson’s body seemed to rise as if his legs were springs. The man’s struggling body rolled off Olsson’s back and to one side as Olsson used the wrist he still held as a lever to roll him onto his stomach. Then Olsson dropped, leaning his weight on one knee just above the man’s hips, twisting the man’s arm behind his back, pushing his hand towards the back of his neck.

“Youch. My arm, my arm,” the man yelled.

“Oh, I’m hurting you, am I?” Olsson said. “Isn’t that a shame. Now, you were saying you had a message for me?”

“Seems like we’re the ones who got the message.”

“Quite,” said Olsson, only now breathing hard and fast.

“Jesus H. Christ,” said the same voice again.

Olsson looked up to see a weedy man—the “Rat”—gaping at him in awe, and staring at the five bodies lying on the ground, two of them unconscious, the other three groaning in pain. “How the hell did you do that?”

With a crooked grin, Olsson shrugged. “Practice.”

The Rat shook his head in disbelief. “You’re bleeding,” he said.

Olsson put his free hand to his ear. It felt warm and sticky; and now he was aware of it, it hurt. “Thanks,” said Olsson with a smile. He pulled out his handkerchief and held it to the side of his head.

Olsson now saw the other prisoners crowded around, looking at Olsson with a new respect: in the prison hierarchy, he’d just taken the place of the alpha male.

But quite a few of the prisoners seemed disappointed. They missed out on the show, Olsson chuckled to himself. By the time they got here, it was all over.

“Out of the way. Move out of the way.”

A prison guard, swinging his truncheon in the direction of anyone who didn’t move fast enough, squeezed his way through the crowd, followed by three more.

“You,” he shouted at Olsson. “Stand up and let that prisoner go.”

Olsson rose slowly and carefully to his feet.

“Well, well, well,” the guard said, beating one hand with his truncheon in time to his words. “What happened here?”

“He—” the Rat started to say.

Olsson looked at the weedy man quizzically.

“Self-defence, swear to God,” the Rat said to the guard. “It was like something out of one of those Kung Fu movies. Unbelievable.”

Bob. That was the guard’s name, Olsson remembered. Bob the Swagman—because he swaggered rather than walked.

“Sheesh.” Shaking his head, the Swagman looked down at the five toughest men in the prison yard. He took a step back, as if to keep himself as far away from Olsson as he could. “You and you,” he said to two of the guards, “handcuff him and lock him up tight. And you,” he said to the third one, “call an ambulance—and tell them to bring five stretchers.”

“What about the Toff?” said a prisoner. “He’s bleeding.”

“Nothing less than he deserves, I’m sure,” the Swagman grinned.

A rumbling sound came from behind the Swagman; the prisoners didn’t approve.

The Swagman realized where he was standing. “And they’ll need a first aid kit,” he said. But he glared at Olsson. I’ll get you later, he seemed to be saying.

As the “Toff,” as something of a celebrity, Derek Olsson was known to everyone in the prison, including the guards. A broad-shouldered man of average height and a ready grin, Olsson’s hazel-green eyes always sparkled with amusement as they did now, as if everything he looked at were some kind of a joke. Women felt he was just a warm and friendly, grown-up teddy bear waiting to be cuddled; men, while aware of a restrained power, that he was someone they could unreservedly trust.

The two guards hesitated, eyeing Olsson as though he was not the tame puppy he had seemed, but a wild, deadly, even feral wolf.

Olsson stood relaxed, as though he was lounging in his living room rather than standing in a prison yard with blood oozing from the gash on his ear, the only sign, other than the five bodies at his feet, that he had been in a fight.

Truncheons at the ready, the guards met no resistance as they each grabbed a muscled arm and roughly handcuffed his wrists behind his back. As they led him away, the prisoners cheered.

Olsson collapsed onto the hard bed as the door swung shut and the locks clicked into place. And you figured having the police convinced you’re a murderer was as bad as it could get, he thought, staring at the ceiling. How wrong you were. Now Luk Suk believes you killed that man—and it’s not his style to waste time with a trial before executing his judgement.

*****

HER TAXI FROM SYDNEY airport was driven by a dour Russian or Ukrainian of very few words, which suited Alison just fine. But her mood lifted the moment it turned into the familiar streets of Balmain where she’d grown up. Where, much to her mother’s distress, she’d zoomed around the roads on her bike even before the training wheels had come off.

Everything was so much simpler then, Alison sighed as the taxi pulled up in front of her parents’ home.

The McGuire home was an old, nondescript, three-bedroom brick house that looked just like all the other houses on the street. But as Alison stepped through the gate, she felt like she was going back to heaven. The front door opened and her parents crowded in the entrance, smiling broadly.

Alison dropped her bags and ran into their arms. For a long moment, enfolded by them both, her head nestling against her father’s broad chest, she felt five years old again without a care in the world.

As a child, Alison McGuire was loved as no other child had ever been loved. When she was born, her sparkling sapphire eyes wide open, her father, Joe McGuire, had collapsed to his knees with relief. For nine long months he’d lived in the shadow of constant fear: at forty, with Maggie McGuire’s history of miscarriages, pregnancy could be a sentence of death for the woman he loved.

Even though Alison was now thirty-four, Joe and Maggie McGuire still treated their only child as if she was a gift from God.

“You look tired, Alison,” Maggie said after a while. “Go freshen up. Dinner’s almost ready—your favorites.”

“Of course,” said Joe, beaming.

AS SHE DID WHENEVER she came home, Alison stood in the middle of her bedroom and breathed the air of her childhood. It was the smallest room in the house—cramped to her friends, but to Alison it was warm and cozy. And safe, with bars on the windows and a bolt on the door.

The room was just as she’d left it when she’d moved to Canberra a few weeks after graduating from Sydney University. Her English, history and political science textbooks were still on the shelves, along with the tennis cup she’d won in the inter-school competition; and pictures . . . her smiling, impish face at around three, clutching a stray kitten she’d brought home from one of her expeditions around the neighborhood . . . with her parents, who were making no attempt to hide their pride in their daughter, standing by the organ in the church where she played on Sundays . . . her body caught in mid-leap above the Aikido mat, her black hair streaming like wings buoying her in space as she flew through the air with unstoppable motion, arms and legs outstretched.

She turned to look at the picture dominating the opposite wall. She stepped closer to study herself, aged sixteen, standing radiant—and all too innocent—on the steps leading up to the main entrance of Parliament House, a constant reminder of her dream and her goal: to be working there, at the center of power, where it was possible to change the world.

Shrugging away the tears that came into her eyes, she sat down at her desk and opened a drawer. At the bottom, underneath papers and odds and ends, was a large picture, face down. She gingerly pulled it out of the drawer and stared into the soft hazel-green eyes of Derek Olsson. She smiled back at his wide grin, his tousled brown hair that grew, it seemed, in all directions at once and was the despair of barbers everywhere. She reached out a finger to touch the deep dimple that appeared on his cheek whenever he smiled. To look at him at seventeen was to see the face of a Greek god fallen to earth, of joyous possibilities untouched by pain or suffering. But his face was turned slightly to one side; she knew that hidden from the camera’s lens was the faint shadow of a bruise. He’d got it playing rugby, he told anyone who asked. But Alison was one of the few people who knew where it really came from.

Her mother’s voice calling from the dining room interrupted her thoughts. “Dinner’s on the table, Alison.”

“Coming, Mum.”

She roughly pushed the picture back into the drawer, face down as she’d found it. As she headed to the bathroom to wash her hands and face, she passed the closed door of the spare bedroom without seeing it.

“TELL ME ALISON,” her mother asked as they took their places at the table. “Do you think Derek Olsson is really a murderer?”

Alison shook her head. “I just don’t understand what’s going on, Mum. It’s got to be a mistake. Derek couldn’t have done anything like that. I’m sure of it.”

“He was such a nice boy. But maybe he’s changed. It happens, you know.”

“He has, but not in that way.”

“Oh, so you’re still seeing him?”

“From time to time.”

“He was the one I liked best of all your boys. And he’s been very successful, hasn’t he?”

“Oh, Mother. You’re not going to start trying to marry me off again, are you?”

“Well, Alison, your clock is ticking. And we’re not getting any younger you know.”

“I know,” she sighed.

“Given he’s in jail,” her father said gruffly, “it’s just as well you didn’t marry him.”

Alison looked at her father with a wry grin. “You’re probably right, Dad,” she said. But for other reasons, she added to herself.

Her father, Alison knew, would be scandalized by her association with anyone accused of a crime, even if he was proven innocent later. Unless, of course, that person was a striker or a union organizer. Such were her father’s loyalties that he’d always stand by a union man, regardless of the crime, if his actions could be viewed as furthering the workers’ cause. Though not, of course, a union man who’d done something like run off with the members’ money. “Capitalist turncoat,” he’d say of such a person. “A traitor to the working class.”

Silence reigned for a few minutes as they polished off the roast lamb, onions and potatoes. Without having to ask, Alison knew her mother had dashed to the supermarket the moment after Alison had called to say she was coming and had spent the rest of the afternoon in the kitchen, preparing this feast.

“You didn’t say how long you’re staying this time,” Maggie said as she and Alison cleared the dishes.

“Till Sunday morning.”

“So you won’t be coming to church with us?”

Alison smiled and shook her head. “I have an early flight to Melbourne.”

“Melbourne?” Joe said. “Going to see that primped up popinjay you work for?”

“No, Dad. His father, Sidney Royn.”

“Why him?”

“He has some information I need. At least, I hope he does.”

Alison and Maggie disappeared into the kitchen and returned a moment later with dessert.

Eyeing her husband, Maggie said, “So what would you like to do tomorrow, Alison? We could all have lunch at the Fish Market. You always loved that place.”

“That would be fun,” Alison said as she sat back down. Looking at the large bowl of white, fluffy semolina snow, the red raspberries beside it, and the huge jug of fresh cream, she added, “And I’d better go to the dojo sometime tomorrow, to work off this dessert.”

Maggie laughed; Joe just downed the rest of his whisky and said,

“Every day when I think of you working for those capitalist lackeys, I feel I’ve failed as your father.”

“Oh, Daddy,” Alison said, her face melting. “You’re the bestest Daddy in the world.” She smiled as she spoke as she had when she was five years old.

Joe’s face softened. “Well—” he started to say, momentarily lost for words.

“And yes,” Alison continued quietly, “we have our differences. But not on what’s right and what’s wrong—just on the best way to make things better.”

“Electing a Labor Party government—a workers’ government,” Joe replied, “is the best way to make things better.”

“You could be right,” Alison said softly, “and I’ll be the first to admit it. But after all, the Labor government started the whole process of deregulation and freeing up the markets that you so detest.”

“Thatcherites,” Joe snorted. “Every damn one of them. But at least they had the support of the unions. Your Conservatives are out to destroy the working man.”

“I know,” Alison sighed. “Unions have certainly declined since the Conservatives came to power.”

“Declined?” Joe glared. “The union movement has been gutted.”

Alison nodded. “But, just the same, you—and lots of working men just like you—are millionaires today.”

“Only if we sold our home,” Joe grunted. “Which we’ll never do.”

As a young couple—Joe loading and unloading ships at the nearby docks, Maggie working in a supermarket—they had scrimped and saved to buy their proudest asset: their home. Today, the docks were slated for redevelopment. The Dockworkers’ Union, of which Joe was a lifelong member, was a shadow of its former self, hit by the Conservative government’s workplace legislation—which Joe, unsurprisingly, loathed as “anti-union.”

Balmain, once a sleepy semi-industrial area, had been “gentrified” along with the neighboring inner western suburbs a short bus ride from the city. As property prices soared, many members of the McGuire family and their friends had cashed in their unexpected wealth, sold their homes and retired to cheaper properties strung along beaches from the Central Coast north of Sydney as far as the Sunshine Coast past Brisbane. Every winter, Joe and Maggie packed up their car and visited them, but always returned home after a month or so with a sigh of relief. Alison chuckled—very quietly—to herself. Her father would never change his ways: he was, without doubt, the most conservative person she knew.

“And only,” Joe added, “because the Conservatives have ridden on the back of what Labor achieved.”

Alison knew her father’s words were true, and that if she said anything she would have to agree with him. So, staring at him without blinking, she kept her mouth tightly shut.

“So,” Joe McGuire said, scenting victory, “what are you going to do about the Sandeman Islands?”

“Daddy! That’s hardly fair.”

“Is it? Or do you think more Australian boys should die just so your lah-de-dah boss and that pompous ass Randolph Kydd can continue sucking up to the Americans?”

“Joe,” Maggie cried.

“Well,” said Joe, turning on his wife, “it’s true, isn’t it?”

“Daddy . . . ” Alison breathed. But she found she could no longer look her father in the eye.

Fifteen months before, a routine meeting of the Pacific Islands Forum agreed to send troops, police and aid to help the government of the sleepy, tropical Sandeman Islands bring various separatist movements under control.

Not long after soldiers from Australia and New Zealand, along with token contingents from Fiji, Papua New Guinea and other Forum members had begun operations, an Australian wildcatter struck oil off Jazeerat el-Bihar—Arabic for “Spice Island,” the western-most island of the Sandemans. It was the first time the Sandemans had been world news since the battles of the Coral Sea and Guadalcanal in 1942 and ’43.

Oil was something really worth fighting about.

Papua New Guinea to the west and the Solomon Islands to the north both claimed part of the presumed under-sea oil lake was theirs. While Toribaya, the capital, prospered, grumblings of discontent in the outlying islands at their neglect and poverty was turning into a full-scale guerrilla war to grab control of the oil windfall.

To the public, Australian forces in the Sandemans had been a non-issue—“the sort of ‘Good Thing’ we should do,” those few people who ever thought about it said, “to help a poor country get its act together.” That all changed earlier in the week, when three Australian soldiers were killed in an ambush—in a country Australians knew only as an idyllic, tropical holiday resort. Alison had known for days that at its next meeting Cabinet was going to authorize the sending of more troops to the Sandemans.

“So tell me, Alison,” Joe demanded, “that Jeremy’s regiment isn’t going to be sent up there.”

Alison’s cousin, newly minted army lieutenant Jeremy McGuire, was part of the regiment next in line to go. As her father spoke, Alison couldn’t help but see Jeremy’s smiling face, shattered by a bullet. With a jerk she remembered: I was involved in making the decisions that led to our troops’ being in the Sandemans. When someone dies I’m partly responsible.

“I don’t want anyone to die,” Alison said, her eyes downcast.

Seeing her expression, Joe shook his head and sighed.

“So when something really important has to be decided, a matter of life and death, where’s the power and influence you were after? Looks to me like your strategy isn’t working.”

You might be right, Daddy, Alison thought weakly. More right than you’d ever want to imagine.

“Sometimes. . . .” Alison looked helplessly at her father, reluctant to concede anything to him at all. “Sometimes. . . . It’s just . . . it never pays to step in front of a speeding train.”

Joe leaned back, relaxing in acknowledgement of his daughter’s concession. “Better to live and fight another day than be a martyr to a lost cause.”

“True,” Alison nodded in agreement, her eyes brimming. “After all, I’m still your daughter, Daddy.”

“That’s right,” said Maggie. “Stubborn as a mule.”

Even Joe joined in their laughter.

“Joe,” said Maggie quickly, pointing to the clock on the wall, “you go and watch your favorite show while Alison and I clean up.”

“I’LL READ FOR A bit,” Alison said a while later when her parents went to bed. But in the warmth and comfort of the living room, she quickly started nodding off until she imagined—or was she dreaming?—her mother’s voice cooing, “Bedtime, Alison.”

She laughed, and ambled slowly towards her room. About to enter, she stopped, looking at the closed door of the spare bedroom. Should I? she asked herself. She reached for the doorknob. . . .

Dare I?

Trembling from the memories, Alison yanked her hand away from the doorknob as if it was a hot stove. Using the wall for support, she stumbled into her bedroom and shot the bolt on the door, something she hadn’t done for a long, long time.

3 “Vengeance Shall Be Mine. . . ”

ALISON WOKE, BATHED IN sweat.

Have I even been asleep?

Her body trembling, she threw back the sheets to feel the coolness of the morning air, and opened her eyes to try and shake the imprint of the nightmare that terrorized her as a teenager . . . except, now, the faces in her dream were no longer indistinct: every one of them had the pink eyes and bulbous nose of Senator Frank McKurn.

The room was bathed in a soft, rosy pink glow as the light of the sun filtered through the curtains. It was a warm, comfortable feeling to wake up to. But even with her eyes wide open, on this morning she hardly noticed it: the afterimage of her nightmare seemed fixed in her field of vision.

She sat on the edge of the bed, imagining a long, hot shower. But that would only make her feel clean on the outside. She dug into the cupboard for an old T-shirt and a worn tracksuit and pulled on her running shoes. She stopped to wash the aftermath of the dream from her face, and tied her long black hair back into a ponytail before striding into the corridor.

Halfway to the front door, Alison stopped and looked back over her shoulder to see her parents sitting at the dining table. “Morning Mum, Dad,” she said. “I’m going for a long bike ride. I’ll be back in an hour or two.” And she was gone.

AT AN INTERSECTION SHE waited for the light to change, the bike shuddering slightly as she rested her weight on the front pedal while gripping the brake levers to rein it back. As the light turned green she relaxed her fingers and the bike sprang forward at the release of coiled energy. She grinned when she crossed the intersection ahead of the car accelerating beside her. She leaned the bike hard into a turn, skidding around the corner without slowing, like a Grand Prix racer. As a car in front blinked a turn, she spun the bike to the center of the road and slid at speed along the double yellow line through the small gap between the turning car and an oncoming truck. She caught a glimpse of the truckie’s wide eyes glaring at her, his mouth an “O,” as she flew past.

Nearing a hill she stood on the pedals and pumped faster; at the crest without the slightest pause to catch her breath she leant into the wind and accelerated downhill, knowing without seeing when she flew past her old primary school, the corner store where she had counted out her pennies for a candy, the familiar houses of school friends where she’d spent many happy afternoons, at this moment not even aware of their names or faces. Her mind was filled with the rhythm of the whirling balls of her feet on the pedals, of the strain in her leg muscles and the tension between her shoulder blades as her fingers clenched the handlebars to the sound of her breath coming hard and deep. Every crack and pothole in the road ahead jumped out at her in sharp relief, and here and there a slight unevenness in the road appeared to her as two different shades of black. The dashed lines painted on the road, with the little cats-eyes that twinkled when the sun was at the right angle, formed a boundary on her right; the wheels of parked cars on her left; the red and yellow blinking lights of a car ahead were just an obstacle to be surpassed without any letup in effort.

As she reached the crest of another hill she was momentarily surprised by the glare of the sun’s light bouncing from Sydney Harbor below her. She drank in the sudden sight of sea and sky, skidding her bike to a halt. Her breathing, hard and fast, slowed as she stopped, the pounding ache in the muscles of her legs now energizing her body and permeating it with warmth.

Her eyes were attracted by a mass of color packed into a tiny garden nearby. She saw roses, rhododendrons, bougainvillea, primroses, blooms she didn’t recognize. The branch of a eucalyptus tree rustled at the edge of her vision. I never noticed that before, she thought as she saw that leaves along the same branch could be subtly different shades of the same green. Her eyes swivelled slowly from tree to tree as she searched for the birds twittering in the background. And somewhere far away was the raucous laughter of a kookaburra.

With a faint smile, she became aware that the sense of her nightmare and the feelings that had haunted her since awakening had now faded into the distance.

Good morning to you, Mr. Kookaburra, she thought to herself. I wish I had something to laugh about, like you.

As she let herself coast down the hill towards the bay she caught a glimpse of her deep blue eyes in the bike’s tiny mirror. Dull when she woke, they now gleamed again like sapphires.

She pulled to a stop at a tiny coffee shop towards the end of the main shopping street which ended, at the bottom of the hill, at the water. From one of the small tables crammed onto the narrow footpath outside, she could see the bay below. The sun shimmered across the deep blue expanse of water; the soft breeze cooled her as it stirred the leaves of a nearby tree with a soothing rhythm. She ordered a cappuccino and croissant, and took a jug of water and a glass to the outside table. She sat, gulping the water, looking at glittering yachts and cruisers crawling towards the sea. When her order came, she sat back contented at last, the sun warming her face, the muscles of her body luxuriantly tired, sipped her cappuccino—and nearly dropped it in her lap as a new thought flashed into her mind: McKurn. That’s how he got the video.

Carefully putting the cup back down, she thought back to when she and Derek had arrived at the Sandview Hideaway Hotel. There was some mistake in their booking, they were told. As compensation, they’d been upgraded to the Honeymoon Suite.

The Honeymoon Suite. . . . It must have been wired. By who? McKurn? Some independent operator who sold it to McKurn? And just how many copies of that video are there?

“McKurn could even own the hotel,” Alison muttered to herself. He’d been living on the fringes of society since he was fourteen—some sixty years. In his late twenties, he’d weaseled his way into politics. It was impossible to tell how much money he’d skimmed in that time, so he must have money stashed all over the place.

A hotel like that . . . a perfect investment for a bastard like him.

Innocent newlyweds could end up in McKurn’s private library of porn. Not-so-innocent businessmen or politicians on a weekend fling away from their wives would be vulnerable to McKurn’s grisly methods of persuasion.

Ownership, she realized, is something that can be traced.

My God, she thought, jerking to attention. Did McKurn just get lucky? Or did he know we were going to be there? She looked at the other people sipping coffee and at the passers-by, trying not to be obvious. Am I being followed? she wondered. She shook her head. It could be anybody . . . or nobody.

She’d been toying with the idea of visiting Olsson in jail, but now firmly rejected it, just in case. “I’ll call Ross instead.”

She pulled her cellphone halfway out of her pocket—and stopped. She knew, from the Federal Police briefings she’d attended, that just about anyone with some technical knowledge could build gadgets to monitor mobile phone calls. I must be going paranoid, she thought. Nevertheless, she checked there was nobody within hearing distance before she made the call.

After a few rings an answering machine kicked in. Alison hung up, thought for a moment, called again and left a message asking Ross Traynor to call her.

She eyed the weekend sailors scattered across the bay, all looking forward to a pleasant and uneventful day of sailing around the harbor or fishing out to sea. Damn you, McKurn, she thought, clenching her fists. I should be doing something like that, not worrying about what could happen in one week. No . . . only six days left. . . .

She stood up angrily, almost knocking over the table as she did. She glared at the couple nearby who were now looking at her strangely, and jumped onto her bike. Pumping the pedals hard up the hill, she suddenly slowed as a police car cruised by.

Of course, she thought. The police. Time to see how many favors I can call in.

*****

“I CAN HAVE OLSSON’S solicitor here in thirty minutes.”

Ross Traynor glared at the overweight, uniformed clerk at the visitor’s entrance to Long Bay jail, waving his cellphone under the man’s nose at the same time.

“As I told you, sir,” the clerk said, now speaking defensively, “the prisoner has been in some trouble and is temporarily off-limits to visitors.”

“Really? I’ve been through all your red tape and I have a pre-arranged appointment to see Derek Olsson now,” Traynor said firmly.

“We have our procedures, sir.”

“And will they stand up to legal scrutiny? Let’s find out,” Traynor said, opening his phone to dial a number.

“If you just wait a minute, sir,” he said, glowering at Traynor, “I’ll ask my superior to talk to you.”

“Go right ahead—but I’m going to talk to Olsson’s solicitor, just the same.”

A few minutes later another man, with pips on his shoulders, came to the desk. Before the officer could speak Traynor said, “Olsson’s solicitor is ready to jump in his car—and you know what that means. He also wants to know what kind of trouble Olsson was in, why he hasn’t been informed, whether the police were called to investigate and, if so, was Olsson at fault?”

“Ah, well I’ve only just come on duty,” the officer said hesitantly, reluctantly adding, “sir. But I will ensure that the prisoner’s solicitor is informed. If there’s anything to inform him of.”

Traynor repeated the officer’s words into his cellphone, and after listening, nodded. Turning back to the officer, he asked, “So, do I get to keep my appointment? Or will we need to disturb a magistrate’s peaceful Saturday morning for a ruling? It’s your call.”

The officer scowled at Traynor. “Okay, you can come in,” he said gracelessly. And then he smiled as he said, “Keep in mind that we’ll be seeing a lot more of you in the years to come.”

“I wouldn’t count on it,” Traynor said with a conviction he didn’t feel.

“ARE YOU HURT?” Traynor asked, as he saw the plaster on Olsson’s ear.

“Nothing serious,” Olsson smiled. “Just a scratch.”

They sat on opposite sides of a long, wide table that made touching, although permitted, difficult. Prison guards stood around the room, supposedly out of hearing distance. At another table, a woman was crying as a prisoner tried to comfort her; further along, a child was showing her father some pictures she’d drawn. Like Olsson, all the prisoners wore white overalls with no pockets.

“What happened? They said you were in some trouble,” Traynor asked anxiously.

“Nothing significant,” Olsson said, waving a hand dismissively. “More importantly, how’s everyone holding up?”

“Well, we’re losing a few people, but InterFreight hasn’t lost any customers. Lynette’s job running your newspapers is a lot tougher than mine. Circulations have dropped a bit; and morale, especially among the journalists, is a problem. But Karla, apparently, has been doing a great job of convincing people you’ve been framed. Anyway, Lynette will tell you more herself. She said she’d come to see you sometime next week, before the trial.”

“Ah yes,” Olsson leaned back. “The trial. What have the lawyers and private eyes come up with?”

Traynor shrugged. “Lots of maybe useful background information. But nothing we can wave in court come Friday.”

“Tell me in a nutshell.”

“A lot of people, it turns out, could have a motive to kill the guy you’ve been charged with murdering. Vincent Leung’s gang was encroaching on just about every other gang’s turf, so we’ve got a long list of possible suspects. But that’s all we’ve got at the moment—suspects.”

Olsson nodded. “Well, I’d hoped for more—but I can’t say I’m surprised.”

“They’re working on developing contacts and so on in those gangs—but God knows how long it will take to dig up anything we can actually use.” Traynor emphasized his words by slapping his hand on the table. The noise drew the prison guards’ attention and Traynor’s skin crawled. He hated these visits; he couldn’t stand seeing his best friend and business partner locked up like some kind of animal in a zoo. He felt claustrophobic the moment he came anywhere near the jail; once he was inside he was desperate to get out again. Yet Olsson, who couldn’t just get up and walk away, sat comfortably relaxed, projecting an unearthly calm. Perversely, Traynor found that made him feel even more nervous.

“Maybe I just got unlucky,” Olsson said.

“Or maybe not.”

“Yeah, that’s a possibility too.” Olsson leant forward, his face suddenly turning serious. “Well, I’ve got some news. Bad news.”

“What’s that?”

“I found out yesterday that, like the police, Luk Suk is convinced I did it.”

“Holy cow,” Traynor breathed. “That really sucks.”

“So it’s time for Plan B.”

Traynor nodded. “Okay,” he sighed. “I guess I figured it would come to that anyway, one way or the other.”

*****

THE SHRILLING OF THE phone in her pocket startled her.

Alison had been growing edgier all morning. She’d gone through the contacts she’d made in her fourteen years in politics, noting who might have information or be able to find it, trying to figure out how she could get it from them without tipping her hand, without telling anyone what she was after or, especially, who she was trying to nail.

When Royn was Minister for Justice and Customs—his portfolio prior to becoming Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Foreign Affairs—Alison had made hundreds of contacts in the Australian Customs Service and the Federal Police, both at that time areas of Royn’s responsibility.

But midway through making her list, the memory of the many investigations she’d been associated with made her stop.

Police and Customs could throw hundreds of people into an urgent investigation. Even then, they wouldn’t expect to find the culprit by the end of next week. And the average criminal actually helped the police in some way, by leaving something at the scene of the crime—a fingerprint, a hair, a witness—that would eventually lead the police to his door, or by making some dumb mistake.

McKurn had to be in a completely different league—how else could he have survived for so long without ever being caught?

How am I, acting entirely on my own, going to be able to nail this bastard by Friday?

NOW, SHE WAS ONCE again sitting in the sun, having lunch with her parents at the Fish Market on the waterfront. The fresh calamari, scallops, and fish and chips were delicious, but she had to force herself to just nibble a bit here and a morsel there.

“Are you all right, Alison?” her mother had asked. “You look like you didn’t get enough sleep.”

“I’m fine, Mum,” she’d said. “I’ve just got a problem at work that’s really bothering me.”

Joe began to say something but Maggie, putting her hand on his, said, “Not now, love.”

When her phone rang, she pulled it quickly from her pocket to turn off its disturbing sound. But when she saw it was Ross Traynor calling she stood up. “Excuse me a moment,” she said, “I need to take this call.”

She walked along the promenade packed with families having a Saturday afternoon out, heading towards the parking lot where there were hardly any people. Sleek, well-fed seagulls scattered out of her path. An adventurous ibis grabbed a stray piece of fish from a table with its long beak. A couple of pelicans perched nearby, their cavernous lower beaks hanging open, waiting for one of the many children to throw something their way.

“Alison,” Traynor said, a smile in his voice. “How are you doing?”

“I’ve been better. And you?”

“I’ve been much better.” Ross Traynor laughed sourly.

“How’s Derek?”

“Holding up amazingly well. I saw him this morning, and his aura of calm is unnerving, like he didn’t have a worry in the world.”

“That sounds like Derek. Meditation and martial arts. You should try them some time.”

“Yeah, maybe,” Traynor said doubtfully.

“Anyway, Ross, can you tell me what’s going on? I don’t for one minute believe Derek is a murderer.”

“It’s a frame-up, Alison. We’re both sure of it. But why? Who can tell.”

“But the evidence?”

“That’s the problem. It’s a very good frame-up. The police have no doubt Derek did it. No doubt at all.”

“So when it comes to the trial?”

“We’ll find the real culprit . . . eventually. But by Friday, when the trial is scheduled to begin? I don’t know.”

Friday, Alison thought. “I surely hope so,” she said.

“Do you want me to tell him anything?”

“Yes,” she breathed. “Tell him I’m thinking of him.”

“I will.”

“And Ross,” she said, hesitating, “this may sound like a silly question, but do you know of any private investigators, someone who’s good at digging up information—who can maybe even tap phones.”

“Haven’t you got access to a whole bureaucracy devoted to that sort of thing?” Ross asked in surprise.

“Well, yes. But this is . . . how shall I put it . . . unofficial.”

Traynor was silent for so long that Alison thought she must have lost the connection. “Are you still there?” she asked.

“Yes. Just thinking. Look, I don’t know any private detectives I can recommend. But there’s one option. Very expensive, though.”

“That’s okay,” Alison sighed, “so long I get results.”

“Oh yes,” Traynor replied. “You’ll get results all right.”

“How do I get in touch with him?”

“Are you really sure you want to do this, Alison?”

“Absolutely.” Right now, she thought desperately, I’d even consider selling my soul to the devil.

“Okay. Meet me in one hour at the place where . . . where the four of us used to go after school. Do you remember?”

“Of course. I’ll see you there.”

JOE AND MAGGIE’S ADOPTION of modern technology was limited to a mobile phone they carried for emergencies—but almost never turned on. So after seeing Ross Traynor, Alison set up her laptop on the dining table and connected through her mobile phone.

What did Ross say? Ah yes. . . . She logged into a free, web-based email program and set up an account.

I need a handle—a codename, she thought when she was asked for her name. She smiled wryly as she remembered a Bible quotation: Vengeance shall be mine, saith the Lord.

“Saith” it shall be. “Saith Lord.”

Typing in the email address Traynor had given her, she wrote:

Hi. I’m Saith. The Jackal sent me.

She started wondering how long she’d have to wait when an email appeared in the inbox.

whats the color of the jackals shoes

I know the answer to that.

Blue and white with purple polka dots—but he doesn’t wear shoes, they’re thongs.

ok. do you have pgp

No. What’s that?

google it. when youve installed it send me your public key. u home office internet cafe where? own computer someone elses?

Home. Own laptop.

ok c u l8er

It took her about an hour to install the encryption program on her computer and figure out how to use it. Then she encrypted a short message and uploaded it to the “Saith Lord” email address. Five minutes later she had a reply: a long, encrypted, laundry list of instructions using terms like “anonymizers” and “tunnels” that she didn’t understand, along with three new email addresses.

Whenever she logged onto the internet, she learnt, she left a trail pointing back to her. The purpose of the complicated instructions was to eliminate that trail. A “tunnel,” she discovered, was a program that established an encrypted link between her computer and an internet site. Once the “tunnel” was in place, not even her own internet service provider could tell where on the internet she was going.

All internet traffic is sent in small “packets” of information, and reassembled at the other end. Between computer A and website B, her data could be retransmitted from up to a dozen different web servers as it travelled around the world. Each of these web servers might keep a copy, making it easy for a snoop to read. By going through the encrypted “tunnel,” those data packets were rendered meaningless to outsiders.

The “anonymizer” was the final layer of protection. Websites automatically keep a log of information about every visitor: how long they stayed, which pages they looked at—and the IP address of the gateway where they connected to the internet. Every IP address is unique. Just by knowing it you can tell what city and country a person is connecting from, and which company—often, the person’s email provider—owns the gateway. The anonymizer would disguise her real location.

Police and security agencies—and talented hackers—could, if they so wished, piece all this information together and find out who was looking at what pages on which websites at any particular time of day—and even read their emails and know who they’d sent them to or received them from. But these techniques—which, it turned out, were used in places where all internet traffic was monitored and censored, like China and Iran, so people could keep their activities hidden from the authorities—made such snooping impossible.

But . . . why do Ross—and, presumably, Derek—know a guy like this? What are they up to?

IT WAS WELL AFTER dinner when she’d thought she had it all worked out. To be sure, she read through the instructions again. They concluded:

this is how we communicate in future. every message u send MUST be encrypted. u save it as a DRAFT at email address A. u send me an innocuous message “molly was wondering if youd be free for dinner friday nite” whatever FROM email address B TO email address C

whenever i have something 4 u process reversed. i save message encrypted as DRAFT at address A and send vague message TO address B FROM address C. content of message irrelevant. the message is the signal you need to check the draft folder in email address A

so u must check address B regularly DO NOT FORWARD ANY MESSAGES wud leave tracks no tracks understood?

whenever u access above email addresses go via tunnel site and anonymizer

finally whenever you send or receive messages must WIPE messages off disk when done DON’T SAVE ANYTHING NO TRACKS NO TRACKS NO TRACKS

Here goes, she thought. She typed:

All done. I’m ready. What next?

After encrypting it, she went through the tunnel and anonymizer and logged into email address A. And stopped, frozen, her finger above the key that would save it to the Draft folder.

So I have no idea who I’m dealing with, she thought. And if all this works, he—whoever it was had to be a computer geek so 99-to-1 it was a “he”—he won’t know who he’s dealing with either.

“Can I trust this guy?” she had asked Traynor. “As far as we know, yes,” he had replied. As far as we know . . . what kind of guarantee is that?

The ageless voice inside her head chose that moment to ask: What choice do you have, Alison?

None, she thought in answer.

And hit the key.

Then she remembered she had to send some meaningless email from address B to address C. She typed:

I’m ready to talk—Saith.

How long will I need to wait for an answer? she wondered.

She sat staring blankly at the computer screen, suddenly aware of her aching shoulders and sore back. When she saw a reply in the inbox, she had no idea how much time had slipped by. She looked at the clock. Eleven o’clock on Saturday night. Definitely a geek, married to his computer.

so what do u want she read.

Can you tap phones?

sure but depends

On what?

who where etc

What a cumbersome way of communicating. Better to give him the works.

Senator Frank McKurn. And any of his associates, like Paul Cracken. But what I’m really after is to nobble the bastard, preferably something that will put him in jail for a very long time. So I need hard evidence that will stand up in court. Short of that, something that will emasculate him.

sounds like fun. u buying exclusive?

Exclusive? Please explain

means for your eyes only or can i sell info over and over exclusive costs more

Tell you what: the more you can spread it around, the more I’ll pay you

mckurn eh? yum yum lots of dirt but wont be cheap

Like how much?

to put mckurn away? well into six figures if i can find the info

My God, thought Alison, where will I get that kind of money? . . . I’ll worry about that later.

I need FACTS. Stories I have; stand-up-in-court facts I don’t—and they’re worth paying for. But if we’re talking that sort of money I’m only willing to pay on results.

fair enough no honey no money but you have to cover basic costs and i start only when i have a retainer in hand

How much is that? And how do I get it to you?

$10,000 to start with in a swiss bank account your problem to get it there

Okay. Send me the account information and so on.

in a mo. u send me names addresses phone numbers home office girlfriends whatever plus anything else that would save me time and u money. and remember banks must tell mr plod about every t/t of 10 grand or more so send in 2 lumps pref from 2 different banks and best not yours

“Mr. Plod?”

police cops feds fuzz

Okay, understood

check draft folder in a mo for a/c info wl b in touch after $$$$s in hand bi 4 now

Keeping only the bank account information and passwords, Alison carefully closed everything down. I have an early flight to Melbourne, she reminded herself. But she felt exhausted, unable to move. When she eventually fell gratefully into bed, even though she was dog-tired, it was some time before she finally drifted off into a troubled sleep.

THE SUN HAD BARELY risen when Alison slipped quietly from her parents’ home to catch a taxi to the airport for her early morning flight to Melbourne.

Three hours later she swung her rental car onto the kilometer-long driveway of Sidney Royn’s Mount Macedon estate to the thought: Mum and Dad are probably going to church about now.

The two-storey, ivy-covered Tudor-style house, surrounded by manicured lawns, sculptured flowerbeds, smartly clipped hedges, mature oak and poplar trees looked, as it was meant to look, like an ancient manor house that had been transported, stone by stone, from a British aristocrat’s country retreat. In reality, the oldest part of the house dated from barely a hundred years ago.

Opening the solid oak front door as Alison stepped out of the car, Sidney Royn exemplified the patrician image the Royn family had so successfully fostered since Max Royn had become accepted into the Melbourne establishment in the 1880s.

The Royn family’s wealth was a consequence of the Victorian gold rush. Not from anything as messy as sweatily grubbing for gold nuggets in the dust and dirt of the goldfields, but from their ancestors’ being in the right place at the right time.

Though they did their best not to remember it, the seeds of that wealth were planted by an ex-convict, Malcolm Royn, known as “Blackie” for his jet-black hair, the black eyes he sported from his many brawls, and because he was widely despised as a blackguard.

He’d left Sydney in 1837, barely one step ahead of his creditors, for the newly established village of Melbourne, then merely a handful of wattle and daub huts and a few dozen tents housing, at most, a few hundred people. He arrived in time to participate in Melbourne’s first land sale. For £15—using money, it was later said, that rightfully belonged to a number of Sydney establishments—Malcolm Royn bought two of the hundred half-acre lots on offer.

Malcolm Royn tried his hand at a number of businesses, all of which failed. Finally, he opened a pub, which was, at last, successful. But as he drank most of the profits he was forced, from time to time, to sell off a small chunk of his land to stay afloat.

Then, in 1851, gold was discovered at Castlemaine, 120 kilometers away, quickly followed by even bigger finds in Ballarat and Bendigo. The Victorian gold rush was on. In just three years Melbourne’s population skyrocketed from 29,000 to 123,000. Land once sold for £15 an acre could only be had for £35,000 or more. Malcolm Royn’s no-questions-asked pub became a favorite watering hole for gold miners who’d struck it rich and wanted to celebrate with whisky, champagne, and high-class whores.

The land Malcolm Royn had purchased for £15 was, today, prime downtown property in the City of Melbourne, now developed with hotels, shops, and offices worth hundreds of millions of dollars. Most of it still belonged to the Royn family.

The family fortune was consolidated by Malcolm Royn’s son Max, who speculated wildly in the land boom of 1880s, but wisely paid down his debts before prices peaked. After the crash, he turned around and picked up swathes of prime property in the city and suburbs for a song—including a large parcel of land fronting the Yarra River which, as the suburb of Toorak, would become the favored home of Melbourne’s rich and famous. Max Royn became a member of the Melbourne Cricket Club, an honor brusquely denied to his father; his children went to the exclusive Melbourne Grammar School. In the boom-time atmosphere, where few people wanted their past to be scrutinized too closely, his ancestry was quietly forgotten.

Before he died, Max Royn tied up his legacy in a maze of trusts, companies, and charitable foundations to protect his wealth from the two deadly enemies of all such fortunes: taxation, and profligate great-grandchildren. As a result, the Royn family remained one of the city’s biggest landlords to this day.

At the dawn of the twentieth century, it was inevitable that the Royns—now paragons of virtue in Melbourne society—turned their attention to politics and charitable works. Some, of course, became gentlemen farmers, playboys, or wastrels living off their allowance. One was even forced into bankruptcy by the steely-eyed trustees’ refusal to come to his rescue—just as Max Royn had intended. But a Royn was involved in the movement to unite the Australian colonies into a federation; Royns were active in state and local politics; and when Sidney Royn was elected to the federal parliament, it was the third time a Royn had been sent to Canberra from the safe, blue-ribbon Conservative Party seat of Higgins—which included the wealthy suburb of Toorak.

“I trust you had a comfortable flight, Alison,” Sidney Royn said as, with a graceful flourish of his arm, he ushered her into the wide corridor.

“Passable thank you, Mr. Royn,” Alison smiled. In fact, she’d dozed fitfully most of the way from Sydney, unable to get comfortable no matter which way she squirmed, feeling sad she’d been too preoccupied to spend much time with her parents. And the drive from the airport, though only forty minutes long, hadn’t made her feel any better.

Even though he was at home on a Sunday morning, Sidney Royn wore grey slacks, a crisp white shirt and a blue blazer. His only concessions to informality were his tie less shirt, and a pair of well-worn leather slippers on his feet. He was tall; his height emphasized by a thinness bordering on the gaunt that was typical of some people in their eighties, as he was. “Let’s sit on the verandah out the back,” he said. “It’s my favorite spot at this time of day.”

When Alison was seated comfortably in a soft armchair, Royn asked, “And could I offer you something—tea, or coffee?”

“Coffee, please. Strong. And how is Mrs. Royn?”

“Nancy? She’s fine. She’s gone to church but she’ll be back before lunch. I hope you can join us.”

“I would be delighted,” Alison said.

As she waited she felt herself sinking deeper into the soft cushions, idly admiring the gardens, the tennis court, and the nearby swimming pool.

When Sidney Royn returned with the coffee, he noticed how Alison was gazing at the pool. “If you’d like to go for a swim first,” he said, “I’m sure you’ll find a bathing suit that will fit in the changing room over there.”

“Thank you Mr. Royn. But I really don’t want to impose on your hospitality.”

“Alison, it’s no imposition at all,” he said, smiling warmly. “At my age, as you’ll one day discover for yourself, time is something I have too much of, and charming visitors are far too rare.”

“Well, thank you again,” she said. “Very enticing. But that would mean I’d have to get out of this comfortable chair, and leave you alone. And that wouldn’t feel right.”

“You youngsters,” Sidney Royn said, grinning, as he sat down opposite her. “All work and no play. So tell me more about what brought you here today.”

Alison took a deep breath and tried to speak in a normal tone. “McKurn.”

“Ah yes,” said Sidney Royn, leaning back in his chair. “Dear old Frank—speaking for myself, I can’t say I’m sorry to have seen the last of that bastard.” Then he looked at Alison sharply. “So what’s he done now?”

“A few months ago, the minister—Tony—asked me to see what I could dig up on McKurn’s activities. ‘Get the goods on McKurn,’ was the phrase he used. I think the idea came from the Prime Minister.”

“Ah yes—Randolph Kydd.” To Alison’s surprise, a look of distaste flashed across Royn’s face. “So what did you come up with?”

“Stories. Rumors. Whispers,” Alison said. “Lots of them—but nothing concrete. No evidence.”

“You did this all on your own?”

Alison nodded. “Yes, we kept it confidential, just between me and the minister.”

“Then I’m not surprised. Did you know that while I was Attorney-General we started an investigation into corruption? It wasn’t stated openly, of course, but McKurn was the main target.”

“Yes. The Prime Minister told me, and suggested I talk to you.”

Royn’s eyes narrowed. “So when you called me you’d just spoken to Randolph?”

Alison nodded.

“So, my dear, what’s the urgency?”

Alison’s head jerked back slightly and her eyes blinked rapidly. How did he guess? she asked herself. She took a deep breath before replying, “McKurn seems to have found out I’ve been digging into his past, so I need something to hang over his head, and quickly too.”

Sidney Royn nodded thoughtfully. “I’ll be right back,” he said.

A few minutes later he returned carrying two thick ring binders, stuffed with paper.

“I kept a copy of the investigation—strictly off the record, you understand.”

Alison nodded, her eyes fixed on the files, a flicker of hope stirring in her breast.

Royn opened one of the binders, and began turning the pages rapidly. “Ah, yes, here it is,” he said, stopping to scan one of the pages.

Alison leant forward, assuming he was about to show it to her. But instead, he looked at her in a sad, compassionate way. “This,” he said intently, indicating the files, “resulted in several arrests—but as far as McKurn is concerned . . . ? Almost nothing but rumors, the same sort of thing you have. And we had dozens of investigators all over the country working on it night and day. Do you see what I’m getting at, Alison?”

Alison nodded mutely.

“And here,” he said, stabbing the document with his fingers, “is a statement from a man, a Sydney gang leader, who swore he’d made payoffs to McKurn. A couple of weeks later, he simply disappeared, and no one’s ever seen or heard from him since.”

Royn flicked through the file, looking for another document. “This is the transcript of an interview with a well-known member of the New South Wales state government. He admitted to all kinds of minor graft—fixing parking tickets, building permits and the like. He had no choice: we had him cold. But when the subject came to McKurn. . . . This is the interviewer’s comment: ‘When we asked him about McKurn, he just clammed up. He was obviously terrified—and couldn’t even bring himself to say he knew nothing.’”

Royn closed the file and sat back in his chair. “McKurn’s tracks are all over this file. But they’re like the Abominable Snowman: lots of people claim they’ve witnessed its passage—strange footprints and the like—but no one’s ever actually seen it.”

Alison nodded again, her heart sinking. “But maybe there’s something there. . . .”

“There could be,” Royn conceded. “Perhaps something you could correlate with more recent information. But this is twenty years old, so maybe it’s completely useless. But if you want to take it, you’re welcome to it.”

“Thank you. Yes.”

“It’s probably best if I keep the original. I have a photocopier in the study, though, and you’re free to copy anything you want.”

I’ll take a later flight, Alison thought. “I’m sure I’ll find something I can use,” she said, looking at the thick files hopefully.

“One thing I do recall,” said Royn. “After I resigned from Parliament, the task force on corruption I’d set up was wound down. Right at the end, a senior Sydney police officer agreed to be interviewed. But he never was. His name’s in here somewhere. If you can track him down—he must be retired by now—he might talk to you.”

“Do you know why he was never questioned?”

Sidney Royn shrugged. “McKurn has long fingers is all one can presume.”

“And did he—” Alison hesitated “—did McKurn have anything to do with your resignation?”

Royn shook his head half-heartedly. “That’s not why I left politics. Well—not the main reason. . . . But I’d certainly prefer you didn’t mention to anyone that you got this file from me.”

“I understand.” I understand too well, she thought, her eyes shrouding as she unwillingly remembered the look on McKurn’s face as he’d leered at her.

Royn cleared his throat, a sound that interrupted Alison’s thoughts. She looked up to see that he was gazing at her sadly again. “I see,” he sighed. “There’s something else, isn’t there.”

“Something else?” Alison stared at him, a lance of fear stabbing in her stomach.

“Something you haven’t told me.”

Alison looked into his kind, concerned but resolute eyes—and felt her composure beginning to desert her.

“Isn’t there, Alison,” he said firmly; a statement, not a question.

Alison tried to speak, but her mouth wouldn’t move. She had trouble breathing, and her stomach froze. She gave the briefest of nods as she turned her head away so Royn wouldn’t see the tears streaming down her face.

Sidney Royn disappeared and returned with a box of tissues that he placed at Alison’s side.

“With McKurn,” he said understandingly, “there’s always something else.”

Alison tried to stop the sobs welling up inside her. But they overcame her every effort. “Where’s a bathroom I can use?” she asked.

WHEN ALISON RETURNED HER face was dry but her skin was clearly wan and pale beneath her makeup. She smiled weakly at Sidney Royn as she sat down.

After a few moments of silence, he said softly, “This is not a burden you can carry alone, you know, Alison. I trust I’ve already made that clear.”

Alison said nothing.

“You need to talk to someone,” Royn said, “and I’d be honored if it was me.”

Alison shook her head violently. “I—I can’t—”

“And it affects Tony, too, doesn’t it?”

She nodded wordlessly, her eyes pleading with him to stop asking her questions.

“And you told him the same story you told me? About McKurn finding out what you were doing?”

Alison nodded again. “And the Prime Minister,” she muttered, so softly that Royn had to ask her to repeat it.

Alison felt a rising nervousness at the warm and understanding look on Sidney Royn’s face. Her deep need to confide in someone battled with her fear, with the shame she would feel if anybody else knew. After long moments of agonizing, almost stuttering, she began to speak.

“McKurn has a video—”

“Of?”

Alison shook her head again. “. . . he threatened to release it if I didn’t. . . .”

“Didn’t . . . ?”

“. . . didn’t spy for him . . . if I didn’t alert him to everything we’re doing and thinking so he could ensure Cracken becomes Prime Minister when Kydd goes.”

“And the video is so bad that—”

“—it would destroy me, and probably Tony as well.”

“What could be that deadly?”

“I can’t say—I won’t say. I’m sorry Mr. Royn, I just don’t want anyone to know.”

“I see,” said Royn, nodding thoughtfully. “So tell me, instead, who else is in the video.”

Alison looked at him fearfully. “Derek Olsson,” she whispered.

Sidney Royn was leaning forward, listening carefully, so this time he heard her.

“Ah, the drug murder.”

“He’s innocent,” Alison said fiercely. “He’s . . . the whole thing is a frame-up.”

Royn held up his hand. “All I know is what’s in the papers. And, of course, at the moment he’s only the alleged murderer—though that’s not what the press would have you believe. So even if what you say is true, John Q. Public won’t buy your story for a second.”

“I know,” Alison groaned.

“That bastard,” Royn said suddenly. “The doctor should have strangled him at birth.”

“I agree,” Alison said fiercely. “I could even do it myself.”

“I hope you’re not serious,” Royn said with concern.

“Sometimes, I just feel that way.”

Royn nodded. “Putting that thought aside, pleasant though it is, you must tell Tony.”

“I—I don’t know how I could.”

“You need his help. You can’t fight McKurn alone. And it’s Tony’s fight too. He needs to know.”

Alison’s mouth was open but she made no sound.

“Promise me, Alison, that you’ll tell him.”

She looked at him appealingly, but it was clear he was determined. And he’s right, she thought to herself. And I can certainly use the help.

She nodded.

“Tomorrow,” Royn said, a hint of steel in his voice.

Alison sighed deeply. “Okay,” she said reluctantly. “I will.”

She bowed her head as she spoke, studying the patterns the tiles formed on the floor.

How am I going to face Anthony Royn tomorrow morning? Alison asked herself.

The only answer was the gnawing knot of apprehension in her stomach.

4 “For A While . . . ”

TOWERING OVER THE SANDEMAN Airlines flight attendant, Karla Preston stepped out the door of the 737 into a furnace. Mingled with the heat were the smell of smoke and the stench of rotting garbage coming from the shantytown beyond.

WELLCOME TO TORIBAYA
CAPITAL OF THE SANDEMAN ISLANDS
TROPICAL PAR DISE

“Some paradise,” she muttered, grimacing at the faded sign hanging crookedly above the terminal building.

Yet as the plane had descended the Sandeman Islands were strung out below her, glistening, white-haloed emeralds in a cobalt sea. The white rims of the islands grew into wide, pristine, inviting beaches, sparkling rolls of surf lapping onto the shore. The emerald-green resolved into trees dotted with what looked like the thatched roofs of small villages, and tracks and narrow roads making random, crisscross patterns through the greenness. It was easy to feel herself floating on one of those beaches, the grains of sand on her back, bathing in the sun as the waves lapped over her feet. . . . Ah, she thought to herself, what bliss that would be. . . .

It was almost impossible to grasp the reality: that perhaps in those trees right there, she thought as the plane flew lazily over one shimmering island, right now, Australian soldiers and rebels were shooting at each other.

Then they were flying over dense jungle, which seemed to be rising up to meet them. Suddenly, the ground dropped away sharply and the jungle and the dazzling beaches disappeared from view. Karla jerked upright, her hands gripping the armrests tightly as she stared, wide-eyed, down on densely packed buildings that seemed to have been jammed, higgledy-piggledy, into every available square millimeter . . . wrapped in a low blanket of grey, smoky haze . . . hardly a trace of greenery to be seen.

As the ground came closer Karla shuddered as she saw that the buildings were shacks and lean-tos made, it seemed, from corrugated iron and cardboard . . . and one, more solidly built building, the only one looking as if it would not blow away in the next storm: a small church. She caught glimpses of barefooted children playing in the dirt, of an old woman bent low under a huge bundle, of tiny shops with crude signs, of a narrow, twisting street clogged with bicycles.

Towards the sea, a few tall, glassy buildings jutted out from the haze rolling out over the water. And on the other side of a muddy-grey stream, protected from the shanties by fences, walls, and wide, grassy strips that made her think of moats, was an area that could have been a transplanted Sydney suburb, complete with manicured lawns, swimming pools and several cars in every driveway.

And then they were over the runway, a tall fence at the edge of the airfield now hiding the shanties from view. As the plane touched down with a mild bump, and eventually came to a halt a short walk from the terminal building, Karla played the images back in her mind. It’s a different world, she thought, like I’m on another planet.

Over the intercom, a flight attendant announced, “Welcome to the sunny Sandeman Islands. If you want to set your watches, it’s still Sunday afternoon, but the time is now 5:23 pm, one hour ahead of Sydney time. Thank you for flying Sandeman Airlines, and we hope you enjoy your stay.”

“So do I,” Karla said to herself. “So do I.”

HALFWAY DOWN THE STEPS, she was already feeling sticky from the heat. As Derek Olsson had promised, there was someone here to meet her, a man carrying a sign with her name on it standing at the bottom of the steps. Quite unnecessary, she thought. But Olsson had insisted. “It’s a dangerous place, Karla.” She agreed, reluctantly. Perfectly capable of looking after herself, to her own surprise she rather enjoyed Olsson’s protectiveness.

At the thought of Olsson, she shook her head. When police armed with a search warrant had woken them up at some ungodly hour in the morning a couple of weeks ago, Olsson had treated it as some kind of joke. “It’s not April Fools’ Day today, is it?” he’d asked the humorless detective-inspector.

But the police proceeded to turn Olsson’s penthouse apartment upside down—and then found the knife, wrapped in one of his shirts, wedged underneath the spare tire in the boot of Olsson’s car. For an instant she found herself believing he was a murderer . . . a thought which disappeared at Olsson’s look of total surprise, of frozen shock, his inability to utter a sound.

But there was a hidden, secretive side to Derek Olsson, so now and then she wondered. . . .

“Miss Karla Preston?”

Karla stood five feet nine inches in her bare feet, nearly a head taller than the short, dark, elegantly dressed man waiting for her at the bottom of the steps. His black trousers and crisp, white shirt seemed oddly out of place amongst the handful of casually dressed Australian tourists, a couple of them wearing just shorts, T-shirts and thongs, and airport workers in well-worn, greasy overalls. With a touch of jealousy she noticed that although he was also standing bareheaded in the hot, tropical sun, there was not a bead of sweat on his face.

“That’s me,” she said, wiping her brow, feeling a little strange that she had to look down to make eye contact. “And you are . . . ?”

“My name is Uqumagani,” the man said, speaking English with an Australian accent. And switching to a broad Australian accent, he added, “But me mates call me Uqu.”

Karla laughed. “Mr. Uqumagani,” she smiled warmly, reacting to her usually reliable first impression that this man would become a good friend. “I’m pleased to meet you,” she said as she stretched out her hand, “. . . and I hope I pronounced your name correctly.”

Uqumagani grinned broadly. “Indeed you have,” he nodded, “and as you’ve probably guessed, I’m to be your guide while you’re here.”

“I’m looking forward to it already, but I’m roasting. Could we get out of this heat?”

“Of course. Please follow me.”

Karla didn’t walk daintily but strode like a man, and while her hips swung as she walked, so did her arms in a rather unfeminine way. With just a few steps she caught up with Uqu, and slowed her pace to walk beside him.

“I’m wondering, Miss Preston,” Uqu asked, “if you speak like you write.”

“Pretty much,” Karla replied.

Uqu stopped, and turned to face her. “In that case,” he said, “while you’re here, and especially in there—” he indicated the terminal building “—when an official has a question or something, please let me do all the talking.”

“That bad, eh?” Karla laughed.

“It can be,” Uqu said. “Especially for a westerner who is too . . . direct.”

“Like me, you mean.”

“Exactly.”

“Okay,” said Karla. “I’ll try to keep my mouth shut. So how do you know how I write? Are my columns published here?”

“Oh no.” Uqu shook his head, laughing. “I read them on the internet. A local newspaper that published one of your articles would probably be shut down the same day.”

“Really?” said Karla with surprise.

“Oh yes,” said Uqu.

Shaking her head, Karla followed Uqu into the terminal. The Sandeman Islands, she recalled, were peopled by Melanesians, who’d spread from the Philippines to Malaysia, Indonesia, and across the Pacific as far as Hawaii in just the past thousand or so years; and Papuans, who’d arrived tens of thousands of years earlier in Papua New Guinea, the Sandemans’ closest neighbor to the west. Uqu, she thought, with his chocolate-brown skin, must have ancestors in both camps.

RELIEVED TO BE IN the air-conditioned coolness of the terminal, Karla nervously eyed the submachine gun-toting soldiers who seemed to outnumber the passengers as she followed Uqu to the lane marked diplomats only.

The uniformed lady behind the immigration counter flicked through her passport idly—and stopped. Karla noticed it was open at the page with the visa which journalists, though not tourists, required.

The other passengers, to her annoyance, were moving through quickly; and she saw that Uqu was fidgeting nervously. She was about to ask him why when the lady immigration officer abruptly said, “For a while,” and walked off with Karla’s passport to a glassed-in office to the side of the immigration hall. The woman handed the passport to the portly man behind the desk. He was carrying on an animated conversation on the phone and seemed in no hurry to acknowledge the woman’s presence.

“For a while?” Karla asked Uqu.

“Ah,” said Uqu, “that’s local parlance for ‘wait’.”

“And what’s happening?” Karla asked.

“I’m not sure,” he answered with a forced smile. “Yesterday, the government announced new restrictions on journalists. Maybe it’s something to do with that.”

“You don’t like it, do you?”

“No, I don’t. Captain Irgi’s ego,” he said, indicating the official in the office, “is bigger than his stomach. He’s the chief today, and he can be difficult to deal with. Be better if someone else was on duty.”

Captain Irgi smiled broadly, almost licking his lips in anticipation as he waddled towards her, his belly straining at his jacket and flopping over his belt in time with his steps.

Karla was used to men reacting to her in that way, though she didn’t quite appreciate why every male eye turned to look at her whenever she walked into a room. She was muscular, not unattractively so—and nowhere near enough to get her picture in a bodybuilding magazine. Just muscular enough to disqualify her from ever thinking of being a model, a movie star, a pinup girl. She knew she was no beauty—and that she wasn’t ugly either. She was neither: but looking at her own face in the mirror she knew it was the kind of face you could easily forget the moment you looked away, framed by straight, nondescript, mousy brown hair. She considered herself so plain she wondered why her parents hadn’t called her “Jane.”

Yet the name “Karla”—meaning “strong and womanly”—fitted her like a glove. And, coming from somewhere completely outside her own awareness, she radiated a sexuality that triggered some dormant sixth sense in even the most insensitive of men, drawing their eyes like moths to a flame.

Seeing Irgi’s slight swagger and his self-satisfied smirk, Karla saw an officious little man who too obviously enjoyed the power he exercised, and took an instant dislike to him. And although she’d pledged to Uqu to keep her acerbic, razor-sharp tongue sheathed, she made no attempt to otherwise disguise how she felt.

Too late, she realized that Irgi had seen her reaction. His smile turned into a frown, and he loudly slapped her passport on the counter as he reached it, the female official following a few paces behind him.

“Oh dear,” said Uqu, “this doesn’t look so good.”

Karla saw Uqu surreptitiously pull out a wad of bills, keeping them carefully out of Irgi’s sight, peel some off and fold them into his hand. Seeing Karla’s puzzled look he said an almost silent “Shhh” as a scowling captain Irgi glared at them both.

“Good afternoon, captain,” said Uqu, with a slight bow.

Irgi nodded at him brusquely, and turning his attention back to Karla. “Miss . . . ah . . . Preston is it? Visa issued week ago, yes?” he said.

“Yes, last week. That’s right.”

“Well, new regulations yesterday, as maybe you don’t know already. So visa not valid today.”

“Really?” she said, pulling herself up to her full height so she towered over Irgi. “That’s totally ridiculous.”

Irgi bristled and opened his mouth to speak when Uqu broke in, nudging Karla quiet.

“Indeed, captain,” Uqu said with another slight bow, speaking in a calming, almost obsequious tone. “I heard about those new rules. So I’d appreciate, with your permission, sir, if I may have a look at that visa?”

Irgi eyed him with a touch of disdain, and then shrugged. “Here.”

Uqu seemed to study the passport intently, and then snapped it shut with a flourish. If Karla hadn’t been watching closely, she would have missed the moment when Uqu, moving his hands like a magician, slipped the banknotes inside. Then he handed it back to Irgi with the comment, “You know, captain, I thought those new rules came into effect tomorrow, so I’m not so sure. Perhaps you’d like to take another look at the visa.”

Irgi raised an eyebrow, but opened the passport and made a pretence of studying the visa again. After a while he nodded at Uqu saying, “Yes, I see what you mean. Okay—this time. But,” he added, glaring at Karla as he handed the passport back to her, “you better register with police tomorrow.”

“It shall be done,” said Uqu.

As they headed for the baggage carousel Karla looked inside her passport. The money had, of course, gone—but Irgi was a better magician than Uqu: she hadn’t seen a thing.

“THAT IMMIGRATION LADY WILL be upset,” Uqu said as he wheeled the baggage trolley out of the terminal.

“Oh? Why is that?” Karla asked.

“I put in enough money for both of them. But I doubt she’ll ever see even one tingi of it.”

“And when you said Irgi was ‘difficult,’ you meant ‘expensive,’ right?”

Uqu laughed. “You catch on quick.”

As they walked out of the terminal back into the sweltering heat, they were surrounded by men, pushing against each other to be the closest, shouting “Taxi?” “Hotel?” “Taxi?” “Cheap,” “Best ride, mum.”

“No go no go,” Uqu told them in a lilting voice, waving them away. Smiling at Karla and admiring her at the same time, the drivers quietly stepped back to let them through, and slowly drifted back towards the taxis parked by the kerb.

“Most of those taxis should be in a junkyard,” Karla said to Uqu.

Uqu glanced at them and shrugged. “This way,” he said.

Karla was stopped by a soft tug at her skirt. She turned to see a little girl looking up at her with big, pleading eyes, her arms and legs looking like sticks. “How old are you?” Karla said; not more than five, she thought. “And what are you doing here?”

Without making a sound, the little girl held out a cupped hand, and then brought it to her mouth. “You’re hungry . . . ?”

“No, she’s not,” said Uqu, turning back from the kerb; but if Karla heard him, she took no notice.

Tagging behind the little girl was an even smaller, barefoot boy, whose only piece of clothing was pair of tattered shorts way too big for him. A dirty piece of string tied tightly around his waist kept them from falling down. His nose was runny and flies darted around his face.

Pulling a tissue from her handbag, Karla knelt down and wiped his nose. “Boy, you could do with a bath.” He seemed as indifferent to her touch as he had been to the flies’. The girl had grabbed the boy’s hand, as if to protect him, but when Karla looked at her she smiled tentatively. “Here,” Karla said, handing the small pack of tissues to the girl, “take these.” The girl took the packet and felt the soft texture of a tissue like child with a new toy.

Karla was about to reach into her handbag when she realized she only had Australian currency. “Uqu,” she said, standing up, “could you lend me some tingi please?” As Karla stood she saw half-a-dozen other children, all in a similar condition, eyeing her inquisitively from a safe distance. They broke into smiles as she looked in their direction.

Uqu was frowning impatiently. “I don’t think that’s a good idea, mum,” he said. At the sound of Uqu’s voice, the children scattered, stopping a few meters further away, watching him warily.

“And why is that?”

“Because it doesn’t go to them.”

“What do you mean?”

“They’re trained to be beggars. They have a quota—ten or twenty tingi a day—they have to hand over to their minder.”

“And if they don’t?”

“They’re beaten.” Karla noticed a bruise, partly covered by his shirt, on the shoulder of one of the boys.

“Why don’t they run away?”

Uqu shook his head sadly. “Where to? There’s nowhere for them to go.”

“Why not back to their parents?”

“The ones who aren’t orphans were probably sold to the minder by their parents.”

“You can’t sell people—that’s slavery.”

Uqu shrugged. “We’re not in Australia, mum.”

“Jesus,” she said. “This is straight out of Charles Dickens. . . . So what can I do?”

“Nothing.”

She looked sharply at Uqu, a fiery look in her eyes. “This is normal to you, isn’t it?” she said.

Uqu held his expression blank, but nodded, almost imperceptibly.

“Well, it’s not normal to me.”

Towards the end of the terminal building were some carts selling drinks and snacks. “Let’s go, Uqu,” she commanded, motioning towards them. “At least I can give these kids a decent meal. Tell them all to come down there with us—and they can eat and drink as much as they can.”

“All of them?”

“Right. And any others who turn up.”

“You’ll be late,” Uqu protested.

“For what?” Karla retorted. “Tonight, as I recall, all I’m going to do is hang out with a bunch of other Aussie journalists staying at the hotel. They’ll still be in the bar . . . even if we don’t get there till midnight.”

Uqu shrugged. “As you say, mum.”

“And one other thing,” Karla said. “Give each of them twenty tingi. What’s that . . . about one Australian dollar?”—Uqu nodded—“At least tonight they won’t get a beating.”

AN HOUR OR SO later, when Uqu finally persuaded Karla to get into the waiting car, sitting beside her in the back seat, they were fare-welled by a delegation of nearly a dozen kids who’d all clearly eaten too much. As the car pulled out of the parking lot, Uqu said, chuckling, “Those kids will probably all be sick.”

Karla looked at him sharply. “You disapprove?”

Uqu turned his head away, gazing into the distance. “Not exactly,” he said slowly. “You . . . make me feel . . . ashamed that such things should be happening here.”

“You see that sort of thing so often don’t even notice it any more, right?” Karla said, looking into his eyes.

Uqu nodded. “I guess so.”

Karla slumped back into the seat. “Do other people here feel the same way?”

Uqu nodded again. “Inshallah. That’s what we say.”

“Inshallah? Are you a Muslim, then?”

“No. Catholic. But before the westerners came and brought Christianity, the islands were mostly Muslim.”

“I see. ‘As Allah—or God—wills.’ Yes, I guess it works for anybody.”

“There’s no word like it in our language—or yours.”

“Nothing can be done,” Karla mused, “but it’s much stronger than that. Nothing can be done . . . so nothing will be done.”

“That’s right,” said Uqu. “So nothing is done.”

The car swerved to avoid a pothole, and crawled to a stop as it passed through the airport gate. Beyond the high wall that shielded the airfield from the rest of the town was a narrow road jammed with cars, motorbikes, trucks, buses, bicycles—and people. The sidewalks were crammed with stalls selling snacks, clothes, brightly colored fabrics, pots and pans and every imaginable kind of bric-a-brac; and the stalls were crammed with people—mostly, Karla thought, looking, chatting, and generally having a good time, but not buying much of anything. Pedestrians spilled out onto the street, ignoring the honking cars and beeping bikes.

“Very traffic,” the driver commented. Seeing a small gap he accelerated sharply, gaining a couple of meters, and seconds later hit the brakes, throwing Karla and Uqu forward.

Uqu leaned forward and exchanged a few harsh words in Pidgin English with the driver, which ended with the driver shrugging.

“What was that about?” asked Karla.

“I asked him to drive more gently, and he said, ‘Sure . . . if you want to be here till morning.’”

Karla laughed. “It looks like they’re having a party,” she said, pointing to the crowded footpath.

“It’s the Sunday market.”

Behind the stalls were shanties like those Karla had seen from the air. Before the car jerked forward again, she could see down a dim, narrow, muddy laneway, hardly wide enough for two people to pass.

A cloud of dark, oily-looking smoke engulfed the car as the battered pickup truck in front of them moved forward another meter.

“So that’s where the smog comes from,” Karla said.

“Yes, and from cooking fires in the shanties. Normally, the winds blow the smoke away. Right now, though, it’s still.”

“They don’t have electricity?”

“Some do. Most don’t.”

Karla shook her head. “And that truck in front of us . . . don’t they have any regulations here?”

“Oh yes,” said Uqu, and chuckled at Karla’s puzzlement. “All those vehicles are certificated emission-free.”

“Then how come all these buses and trucks are belching smoke?” Karla asked.

“That’s simple. It’s cheaper to pay a hundred tingi for the certificate than fix the exhaust system.”

“You mean, to the officials? Like Captain Irgi?”

“Right.”

“So how many Captain Irgis are there in the government of the Sandeman Islands?” Karla asked.

“Oh,” shrugged Uqu, “about all of them.”

“Even the top officials? Like the prime minister?”

“Of course,” said Uqu. “He’s the worst of the lot.”

Sirens suddenly cut through the air above the babble, music, and noise of the crowd. Helmeted police on motorcycles, blue lights flashing, edged along the road, waving cars, motorcycles and bicycles alike towards the sides of the road; people started melting away. In moments, the street was clear of pedestrians and bicycles as they squeezed onto the already-crowded sidewalks, leaving just enough room for the police to clear a narrow lane down the center of the street.

Creeping down the road behind the police was an army jeep, loaded with soldiers carrying submachine guns, leading two stretched limousines with darkened windows, and finally another army jeep bringing up the rear. They all had flashing lights and sirens blaring.

“What’s going on?” Karla asked.

“Some big wheel is coming. I think it’s the foreign minister who’s leaving tonight for Canberra.”

“Why all the soldiers and police?” Karla asked. “These people seem so friendly.”

“The police escort is normal. The army jeeps are new,” said Uqu.

“So why—?”

“Since those Australian soldiers died last week, the guerrillas have been making all sorts of threats. So I guess they’re taking extra precautions.”

The driver hunched down, creeping slowly forward. Not far down the road, Karla could see a bridge where the crowded market came to an end. The tall buildings she’d seen from the plane, one of them no doubt being her hotel, began just a few hundred meters past the bridge.

Something flew in the air, an arc of flame—a spinning bottle alight at one end—and shattered on the leading jeep. There was a small explosion and flames spread over it, engulfing the soldiers.

“My God,” said Karla, leaning forward in her seat and pulling her camera out of her bag. “That smells like petrol burning . . . it’s a Molotov cocktail.”

Seconds later, another one hit the roof of the first limousine, and in moments it, too, was covered in flames.

“Get down,” Uqu screamed, squeezing himself as best he could on the floor behind the driver’s seat. “Get down!”

Soldiers, some with tails of fire, jumped off the jeep and began shooting in all directions. Guns from the rear jeep joined in.

Karla opened the window and leant out, taking pictures as fast as she could.

“No, no!” shouted Uqu, yanking her back inside the car.

There was a loud crack and a small hole suddenly appeared in the windscreen. The driver slumped over the wheel and the car’s wheels spun, squealing, as his weight pushed down on the accelerator. The car gathered speed and weaved across the road, scraped against the burning jeep and slammed into the burning limousine, throwing Karla forward.

Her head hit the back of the seat in front of her, and that was the last thing she remembered.

5 The Long Arm of Paradise

A FEW MINUTES BEFORE eight on Monday morning Anthony Royn, Minister for Foreign Affairs, Deputy Prime Minister, and Deputy Leader of the governing Conservative Party, stormed into his Parliament House office in Canberra.

His staff looked up with fond anticipation, expecting to see the boyish grin, the soft, twinkling, hazel eyes framed by the halo of golden hair that had won untold thousands of votes—and not a few hearts—for the Conservative Party nationwide.

But their smiles died at the sour scowl on Royn’s face, and their cheery greetings of “Good morning, Minister,” trailed off to nothing.

Instead of ambling through the outer office, smiling, chatting, and cracking a joke or two as he normally did, Royn ignored his staff completely. He headed straight for his private office walking so fast he was almost running, and slammed the door behind him.

A moment later, his door swung open.

“Alison—now!” Royn shouted.

And he slammed the door shut again.

WHEN ALISON MCGUIRE HEARD Royn call her name, she buried her head in her hands. “It’s the damn headlines,” she muttered to herself. “No wonder he’s in such a foul mood.”

Dominating the morning headlines were Sunday’s terrorist bombing in Toribaya, an Australian journalist’s brush with death at the hands of government troops, and Karla Preston’s eye-witness story in Sydney’s Mercury which threatened the government’s—and Royn’s—credibility.

Next to a dramatic, front-page picture of flaming soldiers jumping from a burning jeep, Karla Preston flatly contradicted the Sandeman government’s official statement that some twenty terrorists had been killed, and many more wounded, in a vicious (but fruitless) attack on their foreign minister as he headed for the airport. Alison didn’t need to read Karla’s commentary again to recall her accusations. . . .

The Sandeman government’s claim they killed twenty terrorists is a flat-out lie.

I was there. I saw their troops—supposedly trained by Australians—fire their guns in panic, shooting randomly into a crowded street market. The so-called “terrorists” who died or were wounded were all innocent bystanders, who wanted nothing more than to enjoy themselves on a sunny Sunday afternoon.

What’s more, the driver of my car was knocked unconscious by a random bullet. The car ran out of control and rammed into the foreign minister’s limousine. If I hadn’t been rescued by Australian soldiers—a ready reaction unit that was helicoptered in—I’d now be languishing a Sandeman Islands’ jail, along with my driver and guide, as one of the so-called “terrorists.”

From what I’ve seen and experienced so far I can only conclude that Australian policy here is a shambles, and that the three Australian soldiers who died here six days ago died for absolutely nothing.

I have to tell him about McKurn today, she thought. And now this has happened.

The phone on her desk rang. “Yes, Minister . . . sorry Minister,” she said. “Just getting my files together. I’ll be right there.”

Slamming the phone down, she wearily pushed herself to her feet. The previous evening, she’d taken the last flight from Melbourne back to Canberra; and then stayed up till three in the morning reading through the two thick files Sidney Royn had given her . . . the third night in a row she hadn’t had enough sleep.

Grabbing the pile of papers she had ready for her regular morning meeting with Royn, she hurried out of her office.

AS ALISON CAME INTO Royn’s private office, a phone on his desk rang: his direct line.

“What is it?” Royn snapped as he answered it. “Oh, sorry Prime Minister.” He was silent for a moment. “Yes Prime Minister . . . yes Prime Minister.”

He slammed the phone down. “Darn it. I haven’t been here five minutes. . . . The man must be telepathic.”

“What did he want?” asked Alison as she sat down opposite Royn.

“When I got off the plane in Canberra I was ambushed by the press,” said Royn, as if he hadn’t heard her.

“About . . . ?”

“That journalist who was almost killed yesterday in the Sandeman Islands by government troops. ‘Minister, what can you say about our training program in the Sandemans when Australian-trained troops are shooting randomly into crowds?’” Royn mimicked a reporter’s voice so well Alison knew who’d asked the question. Changing his tone completely, “‘Minister, how do you react to the comment that Australian policy in the Sandemans is in a shambles.’ I tell you, if that Karla Preston woman had been there I might have strangled her on the spot.”

“And how did you handle them?” Alison asked.

“Not very well.” Royn scowled as he spoke. “Basically, I said something like: ‘This is certainly a very worrying report—if it is true. When we’ve been able to establish the facts, I’ll have something more to tell you.’”

“And did that keep them quiet?”

Royn shook his head. “Not really—but it was better than ‘No comment.’”

Alison nodded. “So tell me Minister,” she asked, pointing towards the phone on his desk, “what did the Prime Minister want?”

Royn’s face darkened. “After making an unprintable comment about journalists and how we shouldn’t let them out of the country, he said that as well as deciding about troop levels in committee this morning, we had to come up with a unified stance that will kill these ‘scabrous and irresponsible reports,’ as he put it. And he’s depending on me to get us out of this mess.”

“What if the reports are true?” Alison asked.

“We’ll smother it.”

“It might be too big to smother.”

“What do you mean?”

“I talked to Captain Peter McMurray this morning. He led the team that rescued Karla Preston. He confirmed everything she said.”

“I see,” said Royn thoughtfully. “Including the bit about Australian policy being a shambles?”

“In a way, yes. The Sandeman troops escorting the convoy were elite forces.”

“You’re joking.”

Alison shook her head. “The prime minister up there grabs the soldiers who top our training courses, and adds them to his own personal guard unit. So those soldiers who shot into the crowd yesterday. . . .”

“. . . were the pick of the bunch. If that gets out it will be a disaster.”

“Too right. The first time they see any action they go to pieces. That could make a total mockery of our entire operation there. Anyway, McMurray said it was total chaos, bodies everywhere. As McMurray tried to restore some order, the foreign minister—who, he said, was ‘scared shitless’—ordered his soldiers to arrest the occupants of the journalist’s car. Then he demanded that McMurray use his helicopter to take him the rest of the way to the airport.”

“What did McMurray do then?”

“He radioed the helicopter pilot and told him to rush back to base and come back with every medic and spare soldier he could find.”

“I bet that made the minister happy.”

Alison grinned. “McMurray, unfortunately, is no diplomat. You know you’re meeting Sandemans’ foreign minister today at eleven, after Cabinet committee.”

Royn groaned. “I forgot.”

“It was just a courtesy call. But now, instead of spending five minutes exchanging meaningless pleasantries, you’re going to have to smooth some feathers.”

“What do you mean?”

Alison chuckled. “McMurray said after he’d radioed the helicopter crew the minister cursed him and tried to order him about as if he were some lackey. So McMurray told him: ‘You’ve only got a few hundred meters to go to get to the airport. If you’re in such a hurry you can bloody well walk.’”

Royn burst out laughing. “He said that? To the minister?”

“Yes,” said Alison, chuckling. “And then, when McMurray saw there was an Australian woman in the car, he said he’d take them into custody—and medivaced them out right under the foreign minister’s nose.”

Royn groaned. “It’s not going to be a pleasant meeting. How come none of this was in that woman’s story?”

“She was knocked unconscious when her car rammed into the foreign minister’s limousine.”

“Thank God for small mercies.” Then his face turned serious and he sighed deeply. “I see we’ve got a big mess to clean up.”

“Right,” said Alison, looking at her watch. “And we’ve got an hour and a bit to get you ready for the National Security Committee at nine-thirty.”

“Okay, why don’t you huddle with Doug and whoever else you need for about thirty minutes. And then we’ll all get together for a council of war.”

“We’re already on it,” said Alison. “And we’ve come up with one possibility: this could be an opportunity to bring the Sandemans into line. Instead of trying to smooth the Foreign Minister’s feathers, you could read him the riot act instead.”

Royn looked at her in surprise. “So I could,” he said, brightening up. “And Defence has been pushing for more command and control up there. Give me some options, and I’ll bring them up in the Cabinet committee.” Royn looked at the pile of newspapers on the corner of his desk. With a sudden thrust of his arm he swept them onto the floor. “I certainly won’t be reading them this morning.”

“One other thing,” said Alison, handing him a report from the Ministry of Justice and Customs. “I’ve highlighted the relevant paragraphs.”

Since becoming Minister for Foreign Affairs, Royn made sure he was kept informed of anything of interest in his previous portfolio. He quickly scanned the paragraphs Alison had marked. . . .

At the same time as a turf war is brewing between local drug dealers and gangs connected to the Chinese Triads, the street price of heroin has plummeted some 20-25% compared to a year ago as a new supplier has come into the market with a much higher quality product.

Little is known about this new entrant in the drug market, beyond the underworld nickname for him (or her): “The Candyman.”

“The Candyman, eh?” Royn said looking up. “Curious.” He threw the report on his desk. With a nod towards Alison he turned to read a file, but looked up as he realized Alison was still standing there.

“Yes, Alison?”

“Minister,” she said, breathing deeply. “There’s something I need to tell you.”

“To do with the Sandemans?” he asked.

Alison mutely shook her head.

Royn looked at her with annoyance. “Not now, Alison. I’ve too much on my plate as it is.”

Alison seemed to deflate. “Later, then,” she said softly.

But Royn was once again absorbed in the open file, and didn’t hear her.

*****

“LOOK!” SHOUTED A DEEP male voice. “It’s Karla Preston.”

Karla turned towards the sound and saw a group of men sitting at a table on the far side of the hotel coffee shop. Recognizing two of them, she knew they were the Australian correspondents stationed in Toribaya. One of the journalists was standing, beckoning to her. As she headed in their direction, one by one they stood, calling out: “Well done, Karla.” “Congratulations.” “Good on yer luv.”—and applauded.

Alan Massey, a pudgy, balding man wearing horn-rimmed glasses, shook Karla’s hand vigorously.

“Hi Alan.” Karla leaned over and gave him a peck on the cheek. “Good morning, gentlemen—” she said to the three journalists she hadn’t met before “—and Robin. I see you’re all up at the crack of dawn, in hot pursuit of tomorrow’s news,” she grinned. “Or are you waiting for it to fall in your laps?”

“At least we’re not making it,” one chuckled.

Robin Cartwright, a grey-haired, red-faced man, growled, “Yeah, you’ve really set the cat among the pigeons.”

“Well, Robin, I see you’re full of good cheer as usual.”

“Scotch, actually. Like to join me?”

“At this time in the morning?”

“You haven’t been outside yet?” Cartwright asked. Karla shook her head. “The hotel’s been cordoned off by government troops. ‘For your own safety, sir.’ We can’t go out and no one’s taking our calls. An enforced day off, so we might as well all get pissed. Why wait till lunchtime?”

“Hmm,” said Karla. “I have a stack of interviews scheduled for today, including one with the Prime Minister.”

“That wily old fart,” said Cartwright. “Never talks to the press, so that’s something of a coup. Waste of time, though. He speaks in clichés and answers questions in circles. So you’re not going to miss anything.”

Karla knew he was right. But I’d miss is my impression of him. That would be a shame.

“We’ll see,” she said.

“The bastards are restricting our movements ‘for our own safety’ eh?” said a beefy man. “Balls. They’re tightening the screws. They’ve heard of freedom of the press—and they don’t like it one bit.”

“Seen the Toribaya Pravda?” asked another, waving a copy of The Sandeman Times. “‘Vicious terrorist attack foiled by brave soldiers.’ I liked your story better.”

“Miss Preston,” a somewhat nervous young man asked. “I’m Will Sanders from News24/7. Could I interview you?”

“Will,” Karla beamed at him, reaching across the table to shake his hand. “Call me ‘Karla.’ Sure. Any time.”

“It must have been terrible, being shot at and all that,” said Sanders.

“It all happened so fast the idea of danger didn’t really occur to me.”

“What happened after that?” Alan Massey asked.

“I was knocked out. The next thing I remember I woke up with a headache and one of the handsomest men I’ve ever seen looking over me. I thought I must have died and gone to heaven.”

“Heaven?” said Cartwright. “Last time I heard you were an atheist.”

“I was speaking metaphorically, Robin. If I had gone to heaven I probably would have died—of a heart attack.”

“That’s another metaphor, is it?

“Yes, Robin,” she said patiently. “It’s in the dictionary, under ‘M’.”

“So who was this guy?” Massey asked, scowling at Cartwright.

“Captain Peter McMurray, who led the team that cleaned up the mess. After the doctors looked me over, they drove me over here to the hotel. Thankfully, they’d rescued all my luggage along with us.”

“You were lucky,” said Will Sanders.

“Yes,” said Karla gravely, “we all were.”

After a moment of uncomfortable silence, Massey said, “Karla, my apologies. Let me introduce these other reprobates. Robin you already know—and the less said the better.”

“Up yours,” said Robin Cartwright, lifting his glass in a fake salute.

“This is Gary Hunt from the Melbourne Gazette, and Dick Erin, ABC.”

“Please to meet you all, gentlemen,” said Karla as she gazed deeply into the eyes of each one in turn. Gary Hunt was the round, beefy fellow with a deep voice. “I like your articles—especially the think pieces,” Karla said to him. Dick Erin was a thin, lanky man who seemed to flop everywhere. “I’ve seen you on TV,” she said. “You have a great presence.”

“Thanks,” he grinned. “Can I interview you too—a more sober, thoughtful discussion,” he said, taking a dig at Will Sanders, who winced slightly.

“Which hardly anyone will listen to, being on the ABC,” cut in Cartwright.

“Just the elite—the people who count,” Dick Erin shot back. And turning to Sanders he said, “Why don’t you interview Karla now, live?”

“That’s a good idea, Dick. Thank you.”

“My pleasure,” said Erin.

“Would that be all right, Miss Preston—I mean, Karla?” Will Sanders asked.

“Sure,” she said. “After I’ve had my breakfast.”

“Great. Thank you,” he gushed, and moved away to make a call.

“What’s going on with Derek Olsson?” Alan Massey asked.

Karla turned somber. “It’s a frame-up,” she said. “That’s the only explanation that makes any sense.”

“But the evidence seems solid.” said Cartwright.

“That’s the problem,” Karla said. “It’s too damn good.”

“Couldn’t make head or tail of it myself,” Massey said. “But then, I don’t know him as well as you do.”

“Ah,” said Cartwright, “the age-old story—the boss getting into the pants of the hired help.”

“At least he’s got something worth putting there—unlike you,” Karla grinned.

“I tell you, my fearsome reputation precedes me wherever I go. When the ladies of the night see me coming, they all run and hide.”

“It’s your face, mate, not your equipment that scares them.”

“It’s pickled anyway,” said Erin.

“What, his face or his equipment?”

“Both,” said Erin.

“I think I’ll go and talk to the bartender. At least I’ll be able to have an intellectually stimulating conversation,” said Cartwright; but he made no move to leave. “Babes in the woods,” he confided to Karla, smiling. “They’d be lost without me.”

“You’re incorrigible, Robin—but I love you nevertheless,” she said.

“So what are you doing tonight? Or, considering our choices for the rest of the day, what are you doing right now?”

“Right now,” she said, laughing, “I’m going to have breakfast.”

“Later, then,” he said, waving his empty glass at a passing waitress.

“Don’t get your knickers in a twist waiting up for me, Robin.”

“Miss Preston?” said a voice behind them.

Karla turned to see a uniformed hotel concierge with some envelopes in his hand. “That’s me,” she said.

“I have some mail and messages for you.” He handed her the envelopes. Three were computer-printed hotel messages—phone messages, presumably. The other two were letters, both in heavy, parchment envelopes with impressive insignia. One, she saw, was labelled Ofis Prime Minister. She tore it open. Inside was a brief letter:

Dear Miss Preston:

We regret that due to unforeseen circumstances, the Prime Minister will not able to interviewed with you this morning, as previously scheduled.

It was signed by the Prime Minister’s personal assistant.

Quickly, she ripped open the others. “Look at these,” she said, throwing them onto the table. “Every government official I was scheduled to interview has expressed their ‘regrets.’”

“They all say the same thing,” said Dick Erin as he scanned them. “Even the ungrammatical wording is almost identical.”

“Payback time, perhaps?” said Massey.

“No great loss,” said Cartwright. “What would they have told you anyway? Just more lies.”

“Most likely,” she sighed. “But I’ve still got a couple of businessmen to interview.”

Cartwright leaned forward with a serious look on his face. “Betcha ten bucks there’ll be two more messages for you within the hour.”

Karla had a witty comeback on the tip of her tongue when she saw Cartwright lay a ten dollar bill on the table in front of her.

“Well, Robin,” she said eventually. “You might be a lecherous old bastard, but you’re a perceptive lecherous old bastard. So if it’s all the same to you, I think I’ll go and sample the breakfast buffet instead.”

FORTY MINUTES LATER KARLA sat with Will Sanders at a quiet table on the far side of the coffee shop. Sanders gave her a headphone and mike which, like the one Sanders wore, was plugged into his cellphone.

As she put her headphone on she heard the announcer back in Sydney, “. . . and here’s Will Sanders up in the Sandeman Islands. Over to you, Will.”

“Thanks, Dave. And good morning Australia.”

As he went on air, Sanders seemed to grow a couple of centimeters taller, his voice deepened, commanding authority, and all traces of his previous nervousness disappeared.

“I’m with Karla Preston who writes a column in the Sydney Mercury and other papers. Karla witnessed the terrorist attack on the Sandemans’ foreign minister last night. Karla, were you injured in the attack?”

“Not seriously. Just a bump on my head. The car I was in plowed into the foreign minister’s limousine and I was knocked out cold.”

“In your column this morning, you accused the Sandeman Islands government of lying. That’s a serious charge.”

“Damn right it’s serious—and it’s true. I saw the attack. Two Molotov cocktails were thrown at the convoy. I couldn’t tell exactly where they came from, and I certainly didn’t see—couldn’t see—who threw them. The footpaths were too crowded with people and street stalls.”

“Didn’t the soldiers go after the bombers?”

“No,” said Karla. “They just stood in the middle of the street and fired in all directions. Not even targeting the area the bombs most likely came from.”

“But the government claimed that twenty terrorists were killed—”

“Dead bodies can’t talk back. Twenty people, blameless people died. So the government calls them terrorists and claims a victory. If I hadn’t witnessed it, no one would have questioned their blatant—”

“Wait, wait,” said Sanders urgently. “We’ve been cut off . . . I think. Hullo. Dave. Are you there? . . . Anyone there . . . ?” He picked up his cellphone. “No signal,” he said. “That’s strange.”

“Indeed it is,” said Karla. “Let’s see. . . .” Karla sped at a fast walk across to the other journalists; Sanders gathered up his equipment and trailed after her. “Have any of you got a signal on your cellphone?” she asked.

Almost in unison, the four other journalists pulled out their cellphones and shook their heads. “Just the phone company,” said Cartwright. “Totally unreliable.”

“Has this happened to you before?” Karla asked. They all nodded.

“I’m not so sure,” she said. Karla went to the coffee shop reception counter and asked to use their phone. When the hotel operator answered she asked for an outside line. “I’m sorry ma’am, the lines have just gone down. It happens now and then.”

When Karla came back to the table Dick Erin had his laptop open. “No internet access,” he said, looking up at her. “I can get on the hotel wireless network okay, but no further.”

“So three different networks—mobile, landline and internet—go out at the same time,” Karla said. “What are the chances of that being a phone company ‘glitch’?”

“Not very high,” said Erin.

“We’ve been cut off,” said Karla.

“So, Karla,” Cartwright asked, “what were you saying on radio that the authorities here didn’t want anyone back in Oz to know?”

“They listen in . . . ?” Karla said with muted surprise.

Cartwright shrugged. “Who knows? I wouldn’t put it past them—but it assumes a level of efficiency I’ve yet to see in this place.”

“Whatever the reason is, I don’t like it one little bit,” said Karla.

They were interrupted by the same concierge as before, who handed Karla two envelopes.

Cartwright looked at her and smiled. Raising his glass he said, “Pity. About the only thing I like about this godforsaken country is that the booze is cheap. Ten bucks would have refilled my glass quite a few times.”

Karla slowly opened the messages and, shrugging, threw them on the table. “So much for that.”

“Cheer up, Karla,” said Cartwright. “Look at it this way: you’ve got a free day in paradise with good company and cheap booze. What more could you ask for?”

“How about . . . freedom? Thanks, Robin. Another time, perhaps. Right now, I think I’ll go up to my room.”

“To do what—write an article you can’t file?”

Karla grinned. “Maybe. See you guys later.”

As she neared the elevators a businessman stepped out and strode across the lobby towards the hotel entrance. A hotel security guard stopped him, pointing at the soldiers outside. Karla could hear the angry tone of the businessman’s voice. Then the guard said something and after a moment the businessman sat down in a nearby armchair and pulled out his cellphone.

Karla began walking towards the entrance. As she neared the security guard the businessman jumped up and cut in front of her.

“There’s no signal,” he said angrily to the guard. “How can I arrange a pass if I can’t phone out?”

The guard just shrugged. “Inshallah,” he said, his face blank.

The businessman growled and turned on his heel, nearly bumping into Karla.

“Scurvy little country,” he said as he saw her. “They couldn’t organize a piss-up in a brewery,” he added as he stormed back towards the lifts.

“Do you have a pass, mum?” the guard asked Karla.

“No,” she said. “Why would I need a pass?”

“If you don’t have a pass, you can’t go outside.”

“Are you going to stop me?”

The guard shrugged. “They will,” he said, indicating the soldiers.

As Karla opened the door and stepped into the heat three soldiers turned and blocked her way. She took another step and one of them moved directly in front of her, vaguely waving his submachine gun in her direction.

“Where’s your pass?”

An officer, looking like he’d just come off a parade ground, strutted towards her. The three pips on his shoulders indicated he was a captain, and Karla smiled at the “fruit salad” of ribbons adorning his chest. To look her in the eye, the captain had to tilt his head up, which seemed to make him angrier.

“Why would I need a pass just to go for a walk?” Karla asked.

“You need a pass just to step outside that door.”

“Why? What sort of a place is this?”

The captain barked an order and the three soldiers stiffened, brought their submachine guns to the ready, and pointed them at Karla.

Karla shivered as she eyed the wrong end of three gun barrels, nervously aware that each soldier had his finger on the trigger. “You’re making a big mistake,” she said, hoping the captain didn’t notice her shaking knees.

“I don’t think so,” the officer said. “This hotel, and the area around it, is under martial law, so either you get back inside now, or. . . .” He negligently waved one hand in the direction of the guns.

Karla nodded slowly. “That,” she said, looking at the gun barrels, “is an argument I understand.”

She backed slowly inside, and walked as calmly as she could towards the lifts without a glance back.

“Where the hell is Uqu?” she growled as the lift doors slid shut in front of her.

6 A Woman from Mars

RANDOLPH KYDD LOOMED LARGE, both in Australian politics and in person. One opposition wit claimed Kydd’s circumference, according to his tailor, equalled his height. “The tailor is a solid Labor Party man—one of the workers.”

“That’s right,” Kydd replied. “He’s a worker and I provide the work. Lots of it.”

True or not, no one doubted that—excluding the four letter and other unprintable words most commonly attached to his name—Randolph Kydd was best described by the word round. His appearance was a study in circles and ovals. His torso looked like a water-filled balloon held from above: much wider at the bottom than at the top. His head, which began with not a double but a triple chin, seemed to sit on that torso without the intervention of a neck. His face was a smaller replica of his torso, his massive jowls folding over his chins, topped by a shiny, round and completely bald head. His fleshy lips jutted out slightly from his face, a pair of semi-circles when viewed from the side. And as his dark, penetrating eyes, two small circles turned into bright pinpoints by yet more folds of flesh, darted from face to face along the table and came to rest on an empty seat, his expression turned into a glowering frown.

As his bulk lumbered into the Cabinet room, the second hand on the wall clock a few ticks short of nine-thirty, the chatter of the four men and the one woman assembled at the long oval table for the meeting of the Cabinet’s National Security Committee was replaced with a chorus of “Good morning, Prime Minister.”

“Good morning, ladies and gentlemen,” Kydd boomed sourly at the one empty seat. “I see we’re not ready to begin.”

Kydd’s voice began in the pit of his stomach, rumbled through his throat like gravel in a cement mixer, and erupted from the slash of his mouth with the force and latent energy of lava spouting from a volcano. When his words were directed at an opponent, they could demolish him with the accuracy and explosiveness of a laser-guided missile. In his conversational mode, his words would merely bounce around the walls, as they did now, even in the plushly furnished, thickly carpeted, sound-deadened Cabinet room.

As Kydd levered his weight into his chair, set at the center of one side of the long table, Anthony Royn stepped through the door. “That damn Preston woman was being interviewed—” he said as he entered, and stopped in mid-sentence and mid-motion as realized Kydd’s censorious gaze was fixed on him.

“Morning Prime Minister, everyone,” he muttered as he scurried to his seat, Kydd’s glowering eyes following him the whole way. As Deputy Prime Minister, second in the chain of command, his position at the table was facing Kydd. In the long moment it took him to reach his place, sit down, and arrange his papers in front of him the only noise in the room was the sound of his movements.

To Kydd’s left Treasurer Paul Cracken, a wiry man of average height, sat slightly hunched over like a vulture ready to pounce at the slightest weakness, his deep-set eyes smirking at Royn. Though just two years older than Royn, Cracken’s dark brown hair was already receding noticeably. Out of Kydd’s sight, Cracken waggled a claw-like, tobacco-stained finger at Royn and mouthed the words, “Naughty boy.” Royn felt his hackles rise, but with a conscious effort calmed himself and gave Cracken a quick, mocking smile.

Kydd’s voice broke the silence. “I don’t think we have much to smile about this morning.” He spoke to the room but everyone who’d seen Royn’s grin knew who the comment was for. “So, if we may now begin,” he continued, frowning at the wall clock, “originally this meeting had just one item on the agenda: whether we should send more troops and police to the Sandeman Islands. Now, thanks to ‘that damn Preston woman,’ as Tony so aptly described her, we have a few other items as well.” Looking quickly from face to face he said, “Now, you’ve all read Victor’s Sandeman Islands Situation Report”—and from the tone of his voice it was clear Kydd meant “you’d all better have read it”—“so Victor, perhaps you could give us a quick summary, to make sure we’ve all grasped the implications.”

Victor Bergstrom, Minister for Defence, was a gentlemanly, soft-spoken, grey-haired man in his early sixties. To everyone’s surprise, including his own, he’d risen slowly through the ranks in the Conservative Party to his current position of fourth, after the Treasurer, in Kydd’s hierarchy. With his courtly, old-world manners, even he agreed he didn’t have the chutzpah to succeed in the rough and tumble of today’s politics. But by being everybody’s friend and a threat to none, he’d assumed the role of peacemaker within the Parliamentary Conservative Party. Often, when there was a fiercely contested fight for a position and neither of the front-runners could gain a majority, Bergstrom was drafted as a compromise candidate, one who guaranteed the restoration of consensus. The warring parties could retire, gracefully, without either side feeling they had lost the battle. And without resentment: nobody resented Bergstrom’s success, in significant part because they knew that because of his age, he’d retire from the scene in a couple of years at most.

As Bergstrom cleared his throat everyone leaned forward slightly to be sure they’d catch his words.

“Since the three Australian . . . ah . . . casualties last week, we think the situation in the Sandemans has deteriorated markedly. The various guerrilla groups have been crowing at their success and issuing threats left, right and center. As yesterday’s . . . ah . . . incident demonstrates, they’re stepping up their terror tactics.”

“How many . . . ah . . . incidents as you call them,” Cracken cut in sarcastically, “like this have there been in the capital?”

“A few,” Bergstrom admitted. “A bombing in a shopping mall a few months ago. And a couple of low level officials, like town councillors, have been assassinated or kidnapped in the past year. But this is the first time they’ve attacked a high official, and one surrounded by police and soldiers.”

“Soldiers?” Cracken spat. “More like a gaggle of trained monkeys.”

“Yes . . . ah . . . well,” said Bergstrom stumbling. “Unfortunately, we’ve investigated yesterday’s incident, and the soldiers who were guarding the foreign minister were the elite of the Sandemans’ forces.”

“The elite?” Cracken said. “Sounds like we’ll have to—”

“Paul!” Kydd spoke sharply at his usual volume—directly into Cracken’s ear; Cracken’s head jerked. “Let Victor finish before you bring out your knives.”

“Yes, Prime Minister,” Cracken mumbled, glowering when he saw Royn flash him a victorious smile.

“Well,” Bergstrom continued, seemingly unruffled, “as you know our forces are there in a peace-keeping, advisory and training capacity. We don’t have command authority over Sandeman troops. It turns out the prime minister has used the troops who did best in our training programs to form his own, personal guard. The other troops, who are actually out in the field, are doing okay when Australian advisors accompany them.”

“And when they don’t?” asked Kydd, gently.

“Well, they do as little as possible. Stay in a village guarding it, but never run patrols in the surrounding area to flush out guerrillas, that sort of thing. And the desertion rate of these troops is quite high. Unlike our soldiers, they lack commitment.”

“This is indeed distressing news, Victor,” said Kydd. “Pray continue.”

“It’s not quite so bad as it seems. As I said, Sandeman troops are fair to medium when supervised in the field, and get better as they gain experience. The prime minister’s guard unit, however, has basically been parading around the palace in formation, practicing their spit and polish—but no exercises, not even firing practice. Hardly a surprise they fell to pieces when push came to shove.”

Bergstrom paused, but when Kydd said nothing he continued, “The best solution, we believe, is to significantly increase the presence of Australian troops, carry out more Australian-only and Australian-commanded combined operations, and seek some sort of joint command over the Sandeman army—a face-saving formula that actually puts us in the driver’s seat.”

“So,” said Cracken cautiously, eyeing Kydd to see if he’d react, “it seems the Sandeman troops have no interest in dying for their prime minister. So why should we send our young men up there to die in their place?”

“Your concern for our young men’s lives is extremely moving,” Royn sneered. “I’m touched.”

“Well, that too,” Cracken mumbled sheepishly. “Of course no one wants anyone to die. But with the. . . . I’m talking about body bags—which may not be an issue today. But it’s an issue that could kick us in the balls sooner or later—most likely at the next election.”

“Well, Paul,” said Victor Bergstrom, trying to inject a tone of calm into the discussion, “what are our other options?”

“Well, we could send the Papuans in. They’d make mince-meat of the terrorists in no time.”

“Hardly an election-winning alternative, Paul,” Helen Arkness, the Immigration Minister, said softly in a chiding tone of voice. Her gentle, motherly bearing was deceptive: in the male-dominated arena of politics, Helen Arkness usually gave better than she got.

“Or perhaps you’d rather we brought our boys home,” Royn snapped, “and have a hostile, government of separatists and terrorists sitting on an oil lake up there instead.”

“Of course not,” Cracken barked in reply. “Don’t be ridiculous.”

“Enough!” Kydd roared, glowering at Royn and Cracken alternately. “Let’s keep to the point.”

“Yes, Prime Minister,” said Royn. “We do have another option—at least, another string to our bow.” At Royn’s words, six heads turned to look at him in anticipation.

“Do go on, Tony,” said Kydd.

“I’m meeting Sandemans’ foreign minister at eleven. He’ll be in a very bad mood. Aside from surviving a Molotov cocktail yesterday, when he demanded he be helicoptered the rest of the way to the airport, the Australian captain in charge apparently told him, ‘If you’re in such a hurry you can bloody well walk.’”

The Cabinet room echoed with laughter. “So either I could work to smooth his ruffled feathers. Or I could read him the riot act. What do you think?”

Kydd nodded thoughtfully. “Victor, what’s your reaction?”

“Well,” said Bergstrom turning towards Royn, “if you can get him to agree to Australian command of all forces in the Sandemans—under some sort of face saving measure of course—Defence would be eternally grateful.”

“At least for the next ten minutes,” said Cracken scornfully.

Bergstrom looked at Cracken sourly, and shrugged.

“I guess I could make the point that the only alternative, due to the delicate political situation here in Australia—”

“You mean body bags,” Cracken interjected.

“Quite,” said Royn, nodding. “Anyway, due to the. . . . I could say instead of adding to our troop commitment there we’d invite the Papuans to increase their peace-keeping forces instead.”

“He’ll never agree,” said Bergstrom.

“Indeed,” said Royn.

“But he wants to save his little brown arse—” said Cracken.

“Paul,” said Helen Arkness, shaking her head. “Sometime I wonder how you ever got to be a minister, let alone Treasurer.”

“Elbows,” Cracken said with a smirk.

“He certainly will want to save his. . . .” Kydd scowled at Cracken as he spoke. “So, Tony, if you and Victor can set up the options so he has to agree to what we want, I say give him hell.”

Kydd looked around to see everyone nodding. “So are we agreed?” he asked.

There was a chorus of, “Yes, Prime Minister.”

“Good,” said Kydd. “Now, we have question time at twelve-thirty, and no doubt all the questions will be on the Sandeman Islands and that damned Preston woman—”

“Dead bodies can’t talk back,” Royn muttered to himself.

“What was that, Tony?” Kydd asked.

“Dead bodies can’t talk back,” Royn repeated. “That’s what she—the Preston woman—said on the radio this morning.”

“Ah,” said Cracken. “So how many of the other ‘terrorists’ the Sandeman government claims to have killed were actually bystanders who got in the way of a bullet by mistake?”

“Exactly,” said Royn.

“And how long before the press ask the same question?” Cracken said.

“Not long enough,” Kydd growled. “And—”

He stopped at a loud knock on the door. After a moment, the door opened and one of Bergstrom’s assistants stood there.

“Excuse me, Prime Minister, Ministers,” he said. “I’m sorry to interrupt, but I have an urgent message for my minister.”

“Deliver it, then,” said Kydd, “and be quick about it.”

“Yes, Prime Minister.” The assistant scurried into the room and handed the message to Bergstrom.

“Thank you,” he said, waving his assistant away. As the door closed again, Bergstrom said, “It seems the . . . ah . . . Sandeman government has cut all the phone lines and so on with the outside world. The hotel where the Australian journalists—including Miss Preston—are all staying, has been placed under martial law. It’s surrounded by troops who aren’t letting any Australians, or Caucasians, out.”

“Just what we need,” said Cracken. “Another . . . ah . . . incident.”

“We’re still in satellite communication with our troops there?” Kydd asked.

“Of course, Prime Minister,” Bergstrom nodded.

“Better get a detachment of our soldiers down to that hotel, then. Personally, I’d rather let those damn journalists sink or swim on their own. Politically, though. . . .”

“We’ll protect them,” said Bergstrom.

“Good,” said Kydd. “Anything else?”

“Three different guerrilla groups,” said Cracken quickly, “have claimed responsibility for yesterday’s attack. Presumably, at least two of them are lying.”

“This better be relevant,” said Kydd sternly.

“It’s very relevant,” Cracken replied forcefully. “What do we actually know about all the guerrilla groups up there? Is it some coordinated conspiracy? Or are they just disparate groups of dissatisfied citizens who, like the Sandeman Islands soldiers who desert, simply have no respect for their government and want something better?”

“The Muslims are the biggest group—” said Bergstrom.

“Perhaps that’s just because they’re the biggest minority.”

“—and they’re the only ones who seem flush with money.”

“And where does that money come from?” Cracken asked.

“Well, we say it’s al Qaeda—” said Royn.

“I know that, Tony. I wasn’t born yesterday, for Christ’s sake. Look, al Qaeda is the convenient, catch-all, Big Bad Wolf of international terrorism. Saying al Qaeda is behind everything keeps the gullible John and Jane Q. Citizens quaking in their boots. There’s no need to repeat the spin we put on this in here, for heaven’s sake. What I want you to tell me is: what the fuck do we actually, unequivocally know? Are you—” Cracken stabbed his finger at Royn “—or you—” he pointed at Bergstrom “—willing to stand up in Parliament and swear the Muslim terrorists are part of the international jihadist conspiracy, who just take orders from some international puppet master running everything from behind the scenes?”

“Well,” said Bergstrom, “when you put it that way. . . .”

“Victor,” Cracken said, slapping his palm on the table, “this is the kind of thing Defence should know. Do they?”

“Well . . . ah. . . .”

“So our soldiers are going in blind, and we don’t really have any idea what the fuck is really going on up there. Is that the case, Victor?”

“Sometimes, Paul,” Helen Arkness cut in, “you almost carry your weight—even though you talk like an illiterate hoodlum.”

“Thank you, Helen,” Cracken smiled.

“Victor,” said Kydd, “it seems that whatever else we do we’d better beef up our intelligence-gathering up there. Throw everything into it—military intelligence, the Federal Police, ASIO’s spooks, the lot. Anyone objects or proves obstructive, tell the bastard to expect a call from me.”

“Yes, Prime Minister,” Bergstrom said.

“Anything else?” Kydd asked. When no one spoke he slapped the table and said, “Twelve-fifteen, then.”

*****

KARLA ANSWERED THE KNOCK on her door to see a somewhat bedraggled Uqu standing in the hotel corridor, a bandage on his head and a backpack hanging on one shoulder.

“What on earth has happened to you?” she asked.

“I wasn’t hurt. So after the doctor looked me over, they sent me home. When I got out the gate of the Australian base, I was picked up for a little ‘questioning.’”

“I see,” Karla said slowly. “Come on in.”

Uqu wore a rumpled shirt and baggy pants that looked like they needed a laundry. He doesn’t look like the same person today, she suddenly thought.

“Were you hurt much? That bandage looks pretty bad.”

“A few sore muscles, that’s all.” Uqu broke into a big, toothy smile at Karla’s puzzled look, and pulled the bandage off his head. Underneath were just a couple of Band-Aids.

“What?” she said.

“You’re going to be deported. The police will be here soon to put you on the next flight back to Sydney.”

“They will? Why? A silly question. They don’t like me, right?”

“The other journalists have pretty much abided by the restrictions. I guess you didn’t even know there were any. As far as they’re concerned, you’re a troublemaker.”

Karla grinned. “That’s not the first time I’ve been called a ‘troublemaker’.” She sat down and then stood up again. “Damn it,” she said angrily, “I only just got here. I’m not ready to leave yet.”

“There is another option,” said Uqu.

“There is? You mean . . . get out here somehow? . . . But the hotel’s surrounded by troops, right? How do we escape—through the kitchen or something?”

“No,” said Uqu, still smiling. “We walk out the front door.” Pulling something out of his backpack he said, “Excuse me a moment.” He turned his back and pulled off his shirt. Karla had time to notice a small bruise on his muscly back as he pulled another garment over his head. He turned around to face her, putting on a Muslim-style cap as he did.

Karla gasped. “You’re completely different. Unrecognizable.”

The shirt he was now wearing, collarless, made from thin cotton with a couple of faint, embroidered gold stripes was, she realized, the kind of native-style dress she’d seen in some of the tourist brochures.

“Good, it will work then. They won’t connect me with the man with a bandaged head who came into the hotel. And this hat,” he said, tapping his head, “is worn by Muslims who’ve made the pilgrimage to Mecca—the hajj. So I’ll get respect, even from the Christians.”

“I see.”

“And you,” said Uqu, pulling a black, shapeless garment from his backpack, “wear this.”

“What is it?”

“A burqa.”

“A burqa? Like Muslim women wear?” Karla held it to her shoulders and it nearly reached the floor.

“That’s right. It’s the biggest one I could find.”

“I’ll die of heat stroke wearing that.”

Uqu shrugged. “It’s your choice—but this is the only way I can think of to get you out of the hotel. Dressed like this, we can walk out the front door and nobody will question us.”

“I see. Yes . . . it should work. So it’s that—”

“—or let them put you on the plane back to Sydney. After, no doubt, a little ‘questioning.’”

Karla shuddered. “I see.”

“And where will we go?”

“To the one place where you’ll be safe. But there’s a condition: you say nothing about this place to anyone.”

“I can’t agree to that.”

“If you don’t agree, I can’t take you there,” Uqu said. “Anywhere else we go—” Uqu shrugged helplessly “—people will talk and the police will find us in a week or less.”

“You’re not giving me a choice, Uqu. But never? That’s a hell of long time.”

Uqu grinned. “Not never. When the time comes, you’ll have a great story. An exclusive.”

“That sounds a lot better than a ‘little questioning.’”

“I need to go to ground for a while, too. Right now, the authorities think I’m under Australian protection. But in a few days they’ll figure the Aussies will have forgotten about me, and I don’t want to be here then.”

“No—I wouldn’t want you to be here either.”

Uqu looked at Karla with surprise at her expression of concern, and then his look hardened. “Something else you should think about is that you’d be a fugitive, having evaded a deportation order.”

“And I haven’t registered with the police, either.”

“No. Two offences they can throw at you. So there’s no telling what might happen to you if they catch up with us.”

“I see,” she said. “And how would I get back to Australia? I won’t be able to turn up at the airport and get on a plane.”

“Where we’re going, that can be arranged.”

Karla thought for a moment—and felt a boiling anger rising up inside her. “Damn them,” she spat. “I’m not going to be shoved around by some tinpot little tyrant.”

“That’s what I thought you’d decide.”

“Getting to know me, huh? . . . Okay, what about my luggage?”

“I’m afraid you can only bring what will fit in this backpack,” Uqu said.

“How about a small carry bag as well?”

“That’s okay too.”

Karla stood. “All right,” she breathed. “Should I bring my laptop? Will I be able to recharge it . . . ?”

“Sometimes,” said Uqu.

“—I’ll bring it anyway. Do I have time for a shower?

Uqu shook his head. “I don’t really know, but let’s not take the chance.”

“Fair enough.”

Karla emptied her suitcase onto the bed, threw some clothes into the backpack, and added a few items from the bathroom, her laptop, and a few other valuables.

“Okay, that should do it. What about the rest?” she said, pointing at the remaining clothes on the bed.

“I’ll throw them back in the suitcase.” Noticing Karla’s cellphone on the bed, Uqu said, “Turn off your cellphone so they can’t trace us.”

“Okay” she nodded. Studying the clothes strewn across the bed she added, “I guess I’ll miss a couple of those dresses, but I’ll live. Uqu, I’d appreciate if you went into the bathroom while I change.”

She stripped off her clothes and, eyeing the burqa with disdain, pulled on a T-shirt and shorts, and finally her sturdy walking boots. Knocking on the bathroom door, she said, “Okay, Uqu, you can come out now.”

Karla held the burqa at arm’s length while Uqu repacked the suitcase. “Okay,” she sighed, “let’s see if I can get into this.” In a few minutes a tall figure in black stood before her in the mirror, with just a thin slit through which she could make out her eyes.

“It works, Uqu,” she said in a muffled voice. “You can hardly tell what color my eyes or skin are.” Noticing her hands, she hid them behind the long arm-folds of black cloth. “How’s that?” she asked, turning towards Uqu.

“Great. No one would think you’re a westerner,” Uqu said, “but you’re tall—too tall. It’s the only thing we can’t disguise. So can you sort of hunch down or something—anything to make you seem shorter than you are.”

“You mean, like this?” Watching herself in the mirror she bent forward slightly, dropping her shoulders and looking down towards the ground. She was still tall compared to Uqu, but somehow she gave the impression of meekness and submission and no longer seemed to tower over him like some giantess.

“Will that do it?” she asked; and straightened up, flexing her shoulders and throwing back the veil. “I’ll get a backache. And I’m already suffocating in this outfit and we’re still in air-conditioned comfort. How do those Saudi women stand it? It gets really hot there. Forty-five degrees or more.”

“A lifetime of submission and obedience,” said Uqu seriously. “And one thing to keep in mind: until we get to safety I’m your lord and master. When I tell you to do something, you say ‘Yes, Massa.’ And you never speak unless spoken to.”

“That’s two things, Uqu—no, three.”

Uqu grinned. “We Muslim males don’t have to be consistent or logical—certainly not to women.”

“Got it, your lordship . . . though that’s not an attitude restricted to Muslim males.”

“Whatever,” he said picking up the carry bag. “You wear the backpack and follow me—always a pace or two behind.”

“I don’t seem to have any other choice, do I?” Karla mumbled to herself.

KARLA SQUEEZED HERSELF INTO the back of the lift, nervously eyeing the alien figures reflected into the infinite distance in the lift’s mirrored walls. God, she thought, I look like—I feel like a woman from Mars.

The lift stopped at an intermediate floor and a Caucasian man stepped in. He gave her a strange, searching look and he frowned as his eyes fell on Uqu. He seemed uncomfortable, Karla thought. But then he just stared into the distance trying to ignore them both.

When the lift arrived at the ground floor the man stepped out first. Karla shuffled behind Uqu, feeling like she was trying to disappear. The lobby’s width to the hotel entrance seemed to stretch forever; through the doors she could see the same soldiers standing guard outside. An Australian—the man’s voice seemed to echo across the lobby into her ears—was having a heated discussion with one of the soldiers. Eventually, a couple of the soldiers simply herded him back inside the hotel.

She’d hardly walked more than three steps from the lift when she heard raucous, off-key singing coming from the direction of the coffee shop. She turned to see a clearly drunken Robin Cartwright staggering in her direction, supported by an almost equally drunken Alan Massey, both completely oblivious to the sour looks of the other guests, annoyed at the racket they were making.

Under her veil Karla smiled, thinking how really outraged the other guests would be if they were able to understand the pornographic ditty the inebriated pair were butchering.

Suddenly, their off-key singing was drowned out by the sound of sirens. Karla looked up cautiously to see two trucks screech to a halt outside the hotel. Soldiers and police piled out and ran through the entrance, fanning out to encircle the lobby. She heard a commanding voice demanding, “Kanda b’long Karla Preston ka? Wikwik.”

Karla stopped in her tracks, and felt herself quaking uncontrollably. My God, she thought, eyeing the two drunks as they stumbled closer. This burqa won’t hide me from them. And they’re so drunk, God knows what they’d do. . . .

A few paces ahead Uqu turned and barked something at her in Pidgin English. All she could make out was “nogood wimmen”—but she understood his tone of voice. “At least he hasn’t lost his cool,” she mumbled under her breath. She started shuffling after him, trying to shrink, hoping to make herself invisible, as the sound of hobnailed boots thumping on the parquet floor came closer and closer . . . and stopped in front of her. She froze as she saw the snouts of two submachine gun barrels swinging in her direction.

7 Shark Bait

DIGNIFIED AS IT WAS, the imposing main entrance of Parliament House was mainly used by the public. Side and rear entrances were used by staff, journalists, Members, Senators, and Ministers.

The Prime Minister had his own, personal entrance, and was the only person who could enter Parliament House without going through a metal detector.

Randolph Kydd, Anthony Royn and Victor Bergstrom formed a greeting line as a stretched Cadillac flying the Sandeman flag pulled up in the Prime Minister’s courtyard.

“At least he’s not running on Sandeman time,” Royn said with a smile, knowing Kydd would be furious if he was kept waiting for even a couple of minutes.

“Just as bloody well,” Kydd growled.

Abdullah Nimabi, the Sandeman Islands Foreign Minister, slowly emerged from the limousine, followed by the High Commissioner, as ambassadors between members of the British Commonwealth were called. A second car, a nondescript Toyota, stopped behind the limo and half-a-dozen aides, all men, loaded with files and briefcases piled out. Two of them were dressed like Nimabi, in long, white, flowing robes with fez-like hats, while the others wore suits and ties.

“Foreign Minister,” Kydd boomed, his face assuming a warm expression as he waddled up to Nimabi to vigorously shake his hand. “Welcome, and I’m so glad you’re safe. High Commissioner,” he added with a nod.

“Thank you, Prime Minister,” Nimabi said with a slight bow. “It is indeed a pleasure to be here.”

Royn judged that Nimabi’s expression didn’t match his words, and he gained the impression their meeting was not, after all, going to be a pleasant experience. But he hadn’t buried himself in drama at school and university for nothing. Summoning his winning smile, and injecting his well-known charm into his voice, he took Nimabi’s hand in one of his and clasped his shoulder with the other. “Abdullah. What a pleasure to see you. . . . It must have been a terrible ordeal.”

Nimabi’s face brightened. “Tony,” he said. “Indeed, it was. But as you can see, I’m all in one piece.”

“Inshallah,” said Royn, “as I believe you would say.”

“Indeed,” Nimabi nodded, his smile widening.

Suppressing a shudder, Royn had the sense that, to Nimabi, “Inshallah” also applied to the dead and wounded bystanders and the Sandeman soldiers now in hospital with third degree burns.

Turning to Bergstrom, Royn said, “Victor, of course, you know. And Victor, I’m sure you’ve met the High Commissioner before.”

“Indeed,” said Bergstrom. “Welcome.”

“Good to see you again,” said Nimabi, shaking Bergstrom’s hand.

“I’ve invited Victor to join us,” said Royn as he gently shepherded Nimabi inside. Nimabi just nodded.

“I’ll look forward to talking to you later, then,” said Kydd as Royn and Nimabi moved past him.

“An honor, as always, Prime Minister,” Nimabi said, inclining his head.

As they walked through the corridor to the conference room, Royn chatted gaily to Nimabi as if he were a long-lost brother, slowing his pace to keep time with the shorter man, and hanging back slightly so Nimabi would feel that he was in the lead. Behind them were Bergstrom and the High Commissioner, followed by Nimabi’s aides, who were, in turn, discreetly trailed by a couple of plain-clothed guards aware that none of the visitors had passed through security before entering Parliament House.

*****

ROBIN CARTWRIGHT, SUPPORTED BY Alan Massey, continued to reel through the hotel’s lobby, too absorbed in their duet and in staying upright to notice the soldiers and police storming in.

Cartwright lurched and Massey stumbled under his weight, almost bowling over one of the soldiers standing in front of Karla.

A great sense of relief flooded over her as the soldiers’ submachine guns turned to point at the two drunks. She began to straighten herself up—stopping herself in mid-motion. Furtively, she looked around through the eye-slit, having to turn her head as her field of vision was restricted. Like every other part of me, she thought. But nobody seemed to have noticed anything. She bit back on a comment she would have made at any other time. Nearly blew it, she thought. But they didn’t recognize me. It’s working.

“Shorry,” Cartwright muttered, vaguely in the direction of the soldier. Massey grunted something unintelligible, and they moved to continue their stagger in the direction of the bathroom.

But the two soldiers stood in front of them, blocking their way.

“Shcuzhe ush,” said Cartwright, starting to push between the soldiers. But he stopped short, surprise on his face, as one of the soldiers poked his submachine gun in Cartwright’s belly.

“Careful where you poke that thing, mate,” said Massey. “He’ll throw up over your shiny new boots if you keep doing that.”

Frozen in place, Karla wondered if the soldiers had understood a word Massey had said—and nervously expected them to turn back to her at any moment. Uqu barked something and she shifted her gaze back to his feet. He was beckoning at her impatiently. She took one tentative step, and then another; Uqu strode ahead confidently, even a bit cockily, but she couldn’t really tell. Not without dropping her meek, submissive pose. That’s more of a straitjacket than the damned burqa.

Behind her, Cartwright’s and Massey’s voices rose in complaint, but she resisted the impulse to look back to see what was happening. She kept her eyes on the hotel entrance which, thankfully, was slowly coming closer, along with shiny boots arrayed to her right and left. She continued to shuffle along, her back aching from the uncharacteristic pose when suddenly Uqu stopped. She came to a halt a step behind him. He and a man she couldn’t see were exchanging words in Pidgin, but she recognized the voice . . . the captain.

Karla’s knees started shaking again and with an iron will she steadied herself without having to reach out for support.

Uqu laughed and so did the other man. Uqu, goddammit, move. That captain will recognize me. She tensed her body, waiting for the hail of bullets she was convinced would come at any second.

Uqu spoke for what must have been just a few minutes but felt like hours, and then both he and the captain laughed again, long and loudly. At last, she saw Uqu’s feet move and she almost tripped over her own feet as she tried to follow in step and work out the kinks in her leg muscles at the same time. The wheels of a car pulled up in front of her, and she almost groaned when she saw flakes of rust peeling off the bottom of the car’s body: it was another heap that shouldn’t be on the road, like the jalopies she’d seen at the airport. She looked up cautiously and saw Uqu motioning impatiently at her. Of course he’s not going to open the door for me, or anything civilized like that, she thought.

As she scrambled slowly into the car, trying not to expose any skin, Uqu held a finger to his lips. She nodded mutely and sank back into the seat with a sigh of relief. But she remembered to keep her eyes fixed to the floor.

The upholstery was torn and tattered; the taxi shook and rattled as it moved. They seemed to spend most of the journey sitting, waiting for the traffic to move; when the car was stationary Karla could hear a nasty clunk-clunk-clunk sound coming from the engine.

Uqu sat in the front seat next to the driver, engaging him in animated conversation. Karla felt they must have had enough time to tell each other their life stories when the taxi finally stopped and Uqu opened his door.

She levered herself out of the taxi with a feeling of relief, and wonderment that they’d arrived in one piece. To her surprise, Uqu was standing in front of an alley leading inside a shanty town, saying something to a couple of boys standing idly on the chipped footpath. What are we doing here?

She saw the two urchins nod and scamper away; she followed Uqu as he picked his way along the alley, the mud squelching on her boots, people pushing against her as they passed each other on the narrow path. I wanted to see this—but I can’t even look.

Uqu stepped through a doorway and she looked up to see where he’d gone. He was inside a dark room beckoning her to follow. “We made it,” he said as he closed the door behind her, turning on a light, a naked bulb hanging from the ceiling. He took off his hajj cap and Karla noticed it was slightly discolored by beads of sweat.

“Can I relax now?” she asked. “And put down this backpack?”

“Of course, but keep the burqa on,” he said in a soft voice. “We won’t be here for very long. And speak quietly. There’s no real privacy here at all.”

Karla became aware of some neighbors chattering, the noise of people walking along the path, and a couple of radio stations and somebody’s boom box competing with each other to be heard, and nodded. And no peace, either. “Can I at least take this damn veil off for a while?”

“Sure.”

She put down the backpack and yanked off the headgear, breathed deeply, and shook her hair out gratefully. But as she stood up to stretch, she bumped her head against the roof.

The floor was packed dirt; the walls were bare corrugated iron. Instead of a window there was a narrow opening between the roof and the top of the outside wall that barely brightened the room. Whether it was there for light or ventilation, or simply as a result of poor construction, Karla couldn’t say.

Spying a stool in a corner of the room she set herself down and stretched. Uqu was busy packing things into a large, shabby backpack. “What are you doing, Uqu?” she asked.

“Just getting together stuff we need,” he said.

“What’s that?” as she saw him put a rather large box into the bag; it looked new, unlike everything else she could see.

“A satellite dish,” he said, holding up the box.

“A what?”

“So you can stay in touch while we’re out in the middle of nowhere.”

“You’ve thought of everything.”

“Well, it wasn’t me, exactly,” he replied.

“Derek Olsson, then?”

“One of his assistants.”

“Have you ever met him?”

Uqu shook his head.

“So what do you actually do for a living—and what do you do for him?” she asked.

“I offer liaison services.”

“Meaning?”

“I smooth the way between westerners and the local people they want to do business with. Another term for my job is fixer.”

“Ah, I see. Taking care of bribes and that sort of thing.”

“That sort of thing. Right. Or, as my sociology professor might have put it,” he said with a smile, “‘negotiating the sliding interface between two incompatible and mutually incomprehensible cultures.’”

“I had a professor like that once,” Karla laughed. “So tell me Uqu, do you work for Olsson?”

“Mostly, but not exclusively.”

“And what business does Olsson have here?”

“Freight. They only have a small office, a couple of people. But every year, there are licences to renew, permits, and so on. There’s always some customs problem to be sorted out. And then there’s the occasional visiting fireman, like you.”

“I think I get the picture,” Karla said measuredly.

“Okay,” said Uqu zipping the backpack shut. “We’re nearly ready to go.”

“And where are we going?”

“We’re going to take a boat trip.”

“So I need to put this back on?” said Karla, holding up the veil.

“Yes,” said Uqu, pulling off his shirt, “and I need to change.” He put on an ordinary T-shirt, kicked off his shoes and put on sneakers instead, and replaced the hajj cap with a black, fez-like hat of the kind Muslims in Malaysia and Indonesia wore.

“So you’re still posing as a Muslim, I see,” said Karla.

“Right, but not the one who left the hotel. While you, of course—” he giggled uncomfortably “—are still one of my, uh, four wives.”

Karla laughed. “I’d make your life such hell you’ll be dying to say ‘I divorce thee’ three times.”

Uqu smiled. “Well, I might as well enjoy being Muslim while I can. After all, I can look forward to those seventy-two virgins waiting for me in heaven.”

“I wonder what the virgins think of that arrangement.”

“I doubt anyone ever bothered to ask them their opinion.”

“You’d be right about that,” Karla said sourly. As she put the veil back on she asked him, “How long will I have to wear this?”

“I’m afraid you’ll need to keep it on till we get where we’ll be spending the night.”

“And how long will that be?”

“Probably till sunset.”

“Great,” Karla groaned.

At that moment there was a knock on the door and one of the urchins poked his head into the room. “P’lis come wik-wik,” he said. “Look b’long you.”

“Police?” said Karla. “Is that what he said?”

The urchin looked at her strangely, and a hand flew to her mouth: she knew he’d recognized that, under her disguise, was some foreigner.

Uqu glared at her briefly; and spoke quickly to the urchin. The boy seemed to like whatever Uqu had said to him: he grinned broadly and stood straighter. When Uqu pushed a wad of notes into his hand, he looked like he would burst, and disappeared out the door.

“Come on,” said Uqu. “And keep quiet,” he hissed.

“What did you ask him to do?”

“Create a diversion. Which won’t be hard: no one here likes the police. Now, shush.”

Karla followed close behind Uqu as he wound through the narrow, twisted alleyways. Behind her, she could hear shouts of “P’lis-p’lis, p’lis-p’lis,” which were taken up around the shanties. People poured into the alleys clogging them, slowing their progress to a snail’s pace.

*****

“WE DON’T HAVE MUCH time,” Randolph Kydd said as he entered the committee room, smiling when he saw that everyone was present. “So, Tony, tell us what happened with Nimabi.”

“Unfortunately,” Royn said, shivering as he recalled the coldness that had fallen over his meeting with the Sandeman’s foreign minister, a chill not caused by the air conditioning, “the short answer is nothing—yet. I raised all our concerns—”

“Conditions, you mean,” said Cracken.

“Precisely,” Royn nodded, “and he claimed they were all new to him.”

“Which I doubt,” said Bergstrom. “Our commanders have made our concerns about Sandeman troops’ incompetence very clear to their counterparts up there.”

“The only thing which was really new,” said Royn, “was the lousy performance of their elite troops.”

“Which he blamed on our training,” Bergstrom said in disgust.

“Anyway,” said Royn looking at the clock. “He promised to ‘convey your concerns to his colleagues,’ as he put it, and we’ll meet again at five. But in my estimate, he doesn’t want to agree to anything we want.”

“I think you’re right,” said Cracken.

He’s agreeing with me? Royn wasn’t the only person in the room who looked at Cracken in surprise.

“Treasury has been investigating the Sandemans’ finances,” Cracken continued. “It’s a total shambles. What’s relevant here is that we’ve traced some of the millions of dollars people like Nimabi have been raking off the top and salting away in Swiss bank accounts and the like. My sense is the only thing Nimabi and his so-called ‘colleagues’ really give a damn about is preparing for their retirement in some luxurious bolt-hole, and if their country collapses around them, so be it.”

“Their value-system . . . ” said Royn, thinking of his sense of Nimabi when they met in the courtyard, “it’s very different from ours.”

“You’re saying,” Kydd rumbled, “that we’ve been mistaken in assuming their priorities and ours are the same: to stabilize the islands.”

“That’s what I’m coming to believe, Prime Minister,” said Cracken.

“I want to see that report. Now.”

“I can have a preliminary summary ready this afternoon.”

Kydd nodded. “Good.”

“So where does that leave us?” said Helen Arkness. “The real question is: are we going to send in more troops if we don’t get concessions from the Sandemans? And if we don’t send more troops, is our whole mission up there going to fall apart?”

“I couldn’t have put it better, Helen,” said Cracken.

“I have the feeling,” Kydd rumbled, “that if we’re not careful this could blow up in our faces. So cancel everything else you have for the rest of the day. After question time, we’ll continue until we have very clear answers to Helen’s well-put questions.”

“And if the opposition tries to maul us in question time,” asked Helen, “how will we respond, given that we have no ammunition to blast them with?”

“We’ll fudge it, like we always do,” Kydd growled.

*****

AS ANTHONY ROYN LEFT for the Cabinet committee meeting, Alison McGuire checked her email. There, in a message from one of her Federal Police contacts, was the phone number of the senior Sydney policeman who was now in retirement. She recognized the area code: somewhere on the coast north of Sydney.

“Here goes,” she said, picking up the phone.

And put the phone down again. No tracks, she remembered with a smile. And I have to go to the bank.

“I’ll be back in an hour or so,” she told Mary as she left the office.

Ten minutes away from Parliament House she found a payphone, and dialled the number.

“Am I speaking to Mr. Roger Kelly?” she asked when a man’s voice answered.

“That’s me. And who are you?”

“I’m—” Alison hesitated. I guess I have no choice, she thought. “I’m Alison McGuire, and I’m calling from Parliament House, in Canberra.”

“Parliament House? What on earth for?”

“Well, Mr. Kelly, you’ll recall that some twenty years ago, you agreed to talk to an Attorney-General’s inquiry, but the inquiry wound down before you could be interviewed. I’m wondering if—”

“—if I’d answer some questions now? Is that what you’re about to say?”

“Yes.”

“Look lady, I don’t know you from Eve—”

“You can easily check,” Alison said.

“—but even if I did, I went fishing this morning. I want to go fishing tomorrow morning—and the morning after, and the morning after that. I don’t want to go out to sea one day and end up as shark bait, you understand? So goodbye, and don’t ever call back.”

Alison held the phone’s handset, staring at it in disbelief as it went dead. She thought of the hours she’d spent going through the files Sidney Royn had given her. Just one lead, one decent lead in all those piles of paper—and he’s slammed the door in my face.

8 Fallout

IT TOOK FOREVER—OR so it felt to Karla—to make their way through the crowded alleys to the edge of the shanty-town. Her nervousness grew whenever she lost sight of Uqu, which happened frequently, and she wondered what she should do if she ever saw a soldier or a policeman heading towards her.

After a while she noticed that while the narrow paths were full of people, they were mostly children and teenagers. Why aren’t they in school? she wondered. Most of the adults she could see were standing in doorways, peeking out nervously. She was dying to ask Uqu what was going on, but could see that, for whatever reason, no one here seemed to have any affection for the police.

They emerged into a narrow street bustling with vehicles belching black smoke, honking incessantly at the pedestrians and tricycles that never seemed in any hurry to get out of anyone’s way. Uqu flagged down one of the tricycles and Karla gratefully squeezed into the narrow seat. As the driver pushed down on his pedals he grunted in surprise—presumably, Karla thought, at my extra weight. They crawled interminably through the slow traffic; despite the heat, Karla was thankful for the first time for the veil covering her face, which filtered out some of the ever-present exhaust fumes.

Eventually they arrived at a jetty, set midway between the airport and a power station with a tall chimney spewing fumes and coal dust into the air. Karla spent an uncomfortable ten or twenty minutes sitting on a bench, sweating in the full glare of the afternoon sun, while Uqu wandered up and down the jetty, negotiating with the dozens of boatmen who all tried to get his attention at once. “Hurry up,” she murmured, nervously twitching every time she saw someone who looked like a policemen; anxiously listening for the sound of police sirens which she was sure would come at any moment.

At long last, Uqu waved her over to one of the boats. Unfortunately, it was one with no awning to shade the passengers. I guess it’s cheaper, she thought. No—if Olsson’s paying, money’s not a problem. This must be the kind of boat the locals use. As if to confirm her guess, she saw a couple of tourists getting out of a covered boat.

Uqu indicated that Karla should sit in the front, which was thankfully at the other end of the boat from the noisy, belching engine. Uqu sat behind with the boatman, a respectable distance separating this supposedly devout Muslim woman from the strange man in the rear.

The boat, known locally as a banca, had a knife-like bow turned upwards from the long, narrow and open hull. On each side hung bamboo outriggers which acted as stabilizers, making the boat look like a trimaran. Depending on the wind or the direction they were travelling in, one of the outriggers dug into the water while the other lifted into the air.

The seat was nothing but a hard, narrow plank with nowhere to rest her back. Still, once they were out on the water, the steady sea breeze took the edge of the heat, and she welcomed the times when the bow smashed into a wave and cool seawater splashed over her. Occasionally, she could hear voices over the chug-chug-chug of the motor, but she didn’t turn around to see what Uqu was doing.

THE SUN HAD SUNK nearly to the horizon by the time their banca pulled up on a deserted beach.

While Uqu paid off the boatman, Karla stood on the beach with her backpack and carry bag. As the boatman pushed off, Uqu began walking towards one end of the beach. Karla looked at him angrily; then, realizing the boatman could still see them, picked up her bags, resumed her hunched persona, and trudged slowly after him. When she reached the trees she saw Uqu sitting on a fallen log watching the boat chugging away.

“We can relax now,” he said. “And you don’t need to wear that any more.”

Karla pulled off the black robes as fast as she could. As the sea breeze brushed her skin she stood tall, breathed deeply, and spread her arms wide. “Aah, that feels so good.”

Uqu, she saw, was no longer wearing the fez. “What shall I do with this?” she asked, holding the bundle of black cloth at arm’s length.

“Better keep it,” said Uqu. “It might come in handy.”

“Okay . . . but I hope I never have to wear it again.”

Karla looked longingly at the surf lapping up on the beach. “I’d love to go for a swim.”

“Tomorrow,” said Uqu, looking at the angle of the sun. “It will be dark soon.”

“Okay. . . . So tell me,” she demanded, “what happened back there? Those yells of ‘P’lis-p’lis, p’lis-p’lis’?”

Uqu laughed. “Simple,” he said. “The police aren’t welcome in the shanties, will only ever go in during the day—and only in pairs. Probably half of the people in the shanties are breaking the law if only in petty ways. Stalls that don’t have a licence—all of them, I’d guess. Illegal stills; moonshine parlors—that sort of thing. So people love to crowd the alleys and make life difficult for the cops . . . and give whoever they’re looking for a chance to get away.”

“I see,” she said. “Neat. But it sure slowed us down too.” Karla shuddered at the memory. And her shoulders still ached from trying to keep her head down to the same level as the locals. “Never again, I hope.”

She sat down on a thick tree root growing horizontally from the trunk. “Now where to?”

“There’s a village a couple of kilometers that way,” he said, pointing inland in the direction they’d walked. “But we’re not going there. Five kilometers or so the other way—” he pointed towards the other end of the beach “—is another village. That’s where we’re going.”

“You, Mr. Uqumagani,” she said with a strange glitter in her eyes, “have a very devious mind.”

“I do?” Uqu said, puzzled.

“Yes,” said Karla, catching his eyes with hers, “you do. First, you walk into the hotel with a prominent bandage on your head. You walk out as a well-dressed Muslim who’s been on the hajj with a Muslim lady in tow. When we leave the shanties you’re yet again different—and we take a different path out. We ride a tricycle, not a more expensive taxi, just as a poor man from the shanties might. At the jetty, you spend time negotiating the best price, right?—” Uqu nodded “—and if anyone asks our boatman he tells them a Muslim couple went in that direction; but in fact two different people are going the other way. How am I doing so far?”

“It seems I am an open book to you,” he smiled.

Karla shook her head. “I’m not so sure. I have the feeling I’m just beginning to sense the labyrinth of your mind.”

“Labyrinth? Oh—maze.” Uqu smiled happily. “That’s a good description.”

“Of the incomprehensible culture?”

Uqu nodded. “That sort of thing.”

“So what kind of people are we from now on?”

“You’re some kind of Australian tourist, and I’m your guide.”

“Ah, good: we get to switch roles.” Uqu’s face went blank and Karla nodded understandingly. “Up to a point,” she said.

“Right,” Uqu smiled. “You have your camera, right? Can you hang it round your neck?”

“Okay. But if I’m a tourist, why am I trekking around in the boondocks instead of lazing on some pristine beach eyeing cute young guys like you?”

Uqu grinned and shrugged. “You’re a crazy Aussie. To people here, that will go without saying.”

“Okay,” Karla said skeptically. “You’re the expert.”

“There’s one thing we should do.”

“What’s that?” said Karla skeptically, noting the gleam in Uqu’s eyes.

“Disguise you somehow.”

“I’m still going to stand out.”

Uqu nodded. “All I can think of is give you a haircut.”

“What?” she said, her hands going to her head. “No you don’t.”

Uqu laughed. “Okay, but think about it,” his voice taking a serious tone as he added, “and there’s your name.”

“What’s wrong with my name?”

“Nothing. Except that every official and half the population are going to be looking for one Karla Preston. So it might be a good idea if you used a different name.”

“Makes sense,” said Karla. “How about . . . ‘Katya’? I’ve always liked that name.”

“Fine, but Katya who?”

“Hmm. Peters . . . Paddington . . . Pelham . . . ”

“How about trying some other letter of the alphabet,” Uqu suggested.

Karla nodded. “Good idea. . . . Okay, Horton. And if I’m asked to show an ID, what do I do then?”

“Nothing . . . provided you let me do all the talking.”

“Okay,” Karla nodded. “I’ve learnt my lesson.”

“Good,” said Uqu. Standing up he added, with a slight bow, “So, Miss Katya Horton, we’d better get going.”

“Why did you choose this village?” Karla asked as they walked along the edge of beach, careful not to leave any footprints in the sand. “Do you know people here?”

“No,” Uqu replied. “It’s about as far as we could get today without arriving after dark. And the people here will be delighted to have visitors. I have some small gifts in this bag to repay their hospitality.” Uqu stopped at the end of the beach. “Okay,” he said, “I’m pretty sure that track leads to the village.”

“And if it doesn’t?”

“The village is right on a beach, so all we have to do is follow the coastline.”

“Okay,” Karla nodded.

“Follow me then,” said Uqu. “And no more talking—just in case.”

“Just in case of what?”

“Actually, wild pigs and snakes are the worst dangers here. But who knows? Maybe there are some guerrillas—or police—around.”

“Now you tell me,” said Karla.

With a last look at the pure white sandy beach and the sinking sun, she followed Uqu along the rough, narrow track into the gloomy, deepening shadows of the jungle ahead.

*****

“WHAT I’M TRYING TO impress on you, Abdullah,” Royn said, clamping down on his rising anger and irritability, “is that the situation in the Sandemans has changed dramatically since we first came to your government’s assistance.”

“I’m afraid, Tony,” Nimabi said coolly, “that I don’t see how any of the fundamentals are any different.”

Royn suppressed a sigh. Seven o’clock already, he noticed. The two hours they’d been meeting felt more like two days. To his right, along the long conference table, were ranged Victor Bergstrom and his staff who were all clearly irritated that nothing had yet been achieved. Aside from himself, he thought—and, perhaps, the Foreign Affairs department head, Kieran Fairchild—only Alison on his immediate left was doing a better job of keeping command of whatever she was feeling.

Or is she? he thought. On the other side of the table the Sandemans High Commissioner and Nimabi’s staff seemed to spend most of their time casting side-long glances at Alison, the only woman at the meeting, as a way to relieve their boredom. Alison’s aura of icy calm and her mechanical movements as she passed a paper to him might be more in reaction to the male looks than an expression of control.

“We have to consider the fallout from yesterday’s attack on you,” Royn said, a little more sharply than he’d intended. “You know what happened in question time.” He wondered how much longer he could hold onto his diplomatic tone of voice. King Lear was easier than this, he thought.

“Yes,” Nimabi said, with a faint smile. “You got mauled.”

“Indeed. But more to the point, why? Because we’ve been supporting a government whose troops randomly kill innocent people and call them ‘terrorists’.”

“That damn journalist—” Nimabi said angrily.

“She certainly blatantly contradicted your official press release, didn’t she?” said Royn, knowing that what Nimabi was complaining about was that the truth had gotten out. “And do you know what we’re asking ourselves now?”

Nimabi shook his head.

“How many of the other dead bodies your government claims were terrorists were actually innocent bystanders.”

“I imagine there may have been the occasional one,” Nimabi allowed.

“And how long do you think it will be before other people—like Australian journalists—start asking the same question?”

“We’ve managed to restrict their movements quite effectively,” said Nimabi, “so they might ask—but they won’t get any answers.”

“Except for one, who seems to be roaming around freely at the moment.”

“She’ll eventually be found and deported,” Nimabi said with an air of assurance that, somehow, made Royn feel even more uncomfortable.

“She happens to be a real and persistent pain in the neck, who is extraordinarily popular here. So it might be a . . . politic idea, Abdullah, if you remind your people they can’t point to her body and claim she was a terrorist.”

“The very idea,” Nimabi protested. “You can’t imagine we—”

“Of course not,” said Royn with a conviction he didn’t feel. “But I’m sure lots of other people would assume exactly that.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Nimabi said icily.

“And then, there’s the fallout from the discovery of oil off el-Bihar.”

“The problems all lie at the Papuan’s and Solomon Islands’ doors, as you very well know, Tony. They’re just trying to grab the riches that are rightfully ours.”

Tiny as it was compared to world oil production, the recently discovered oil field would in one fell swoop increase the Sandeman’s GNP by fifty percent; royalties would triple the government’s annual revenue and would (so the islanders believed) eliminate the country’s unemployment problem almost overnight by providing thousands of high-paying jobs.

Suddenly courted by the world’s oil majors, the Sandeman’s government had auctioned dozens of exploration licences, and promised a “New Era” for the islands—and a “New Deal” for the islanders.

“Well,” Royn said carefully, “the Papuans and Solomons have certainly put a spanner in the works—”

“Is that how you’d describe it?” Nimabi demanded, his underlying anger showing on his face for just a moment. “They’re threatening our entire economy.”

Two months ago, the government of neighboring Papua New Guinea claimed the oil fields extended into its territory, demanded a percentage of oil royalties, and sent one of its coastguard vessels to patrol what they claimed was the dividing line in the ocean between Papua New Guinea and the Sandeman Islands—a line several kilometers east of the one drawn on Sandeman maps. The next day, the Solomon Islands followed suit—even though the oil field was so far away from its territory the Solomon’s claim was dubious at best. All exploration stopped, as did the construction of oil rigs and pipelines on the original field, as the oil companies waited to see how the dispute would be resolved.

“We don’t believe,” said Royn, “that either the Papuan or Solomons governments can be blamed for the fact that your government borrowed millions of dollars from the world’s banks—at outrageous interest rates, I might add—on the promise of future oil revenues to fund massive new infrastructure projects.”

“Ours is a very poor country, as you very well know. Our people deserve to benefit from our windfall as quickly as possible.”

“I quite agree with you, Abdullah. And it’s now a much poorer country, loaded with new debts it may not be able to repay—and you’re asking us to come to your rescue.”

“Mere temporary bridging finance, that’s all we’re asking for.”

“As I’ve already pointed out, the view of our Treasury is that the best thing for the Sandemans to do is get the oil money flowing again by wrapping up negotiations with Papua New Guinea and the Solomons as quickly as possible.”

“Well, you know our position on that,” Nimabi said emphatically—Royn stifled a groan—“but I will certainly ask our Treasurer to study your proposal in detail.”

“As you say, Abdullah,” Royn shrugged. “But it does leave everything rather up in the air while your people—not to mention our soldiers—are the ones who are suffering.”

“I realize that. Unfortunately, my hands are tied.”

“Which brings me to the next issue: the el-Bihar Islanders are saying it’s their oil—and demanding their ‘fair share’ of the monies.”

“It’s a national asset,” Nimabi said gruffly.

“What I’m getting at, Abdullah, is different: namely, that oil is fuelling their separatist tendencies, and leading other outlying islands to follow suit.”

“This is severely increasing the terrorist problem,” Bergstrom interjected.

“Which is why we’re asking for increased assistance.”

“As we’ve made clear,” said Bergstrom heatedly, “we’re willing to provide that assistance, but only with the assurance of joint operational command of all forces in the Sandemans—”

“As a cover for Australian command,” Nimabi protested. “We are an independent, sovereign government—”

“—a government that’s bankrupt,” said Bergstrom, glaring at Nimabi, “and depends on the Australian voter for its survival.”

“Gentlemen, gentlemen.” Royn said, trying to inject a note of calm he didn’t really feel. “It’s getting late, and I’m sure we’re all rather tired. But Victor does have a point, Abdullah. It’s really the Australian voter and taxpayer you and your colleagues have to consider. Right now, they’re not in the mood to send more soldiers or more money to the Sandemans without some assurance they’ll be used wisely.”

“I hear you, Tony—but as I trust I’ve pointed out, there are some things we feel are too onerous for us to bear.”

Royn nodded. “Yes, I can see that, Abdullah. But—” he smiled wryly “—our hands are also tied. We all live in the awareness that every three years we have to face the voters, and at this juncture there are certain courses of action which, we feel, would be electoral suicide.”

“We all have those concerns to worry about,” Nimabi said woodenly.

“I’d really appreciate if you could convey the intensity of our feelings on these concerns to your colleagues so that, one would trust, we can finalize these discussions as quickly as we can.”

“I’ll see what I can do, Tony. But I must say that at this juncture I’m really not in a position to make any promises.”

“I understand.”

“NIMABI DIDN’T GIVE AN inch,” Royn muttered to Alison as they slowly walked back to their office.

“I wonder what or who they expect will bail them out?” she asked.

“You’ve read the Treasury report?”

Alison nodded. “Pretty gruesome reading.”

“So it may be they’re simply prepared to desert a sinking ship.”

“Well, if Treasury’s right, they certainly all have nice little nest eggs hidden away.”

Royn opened the office door and ushered Alison through first. “Indeed they do,” he said.

“Minister,” Alison said quietly as they stepped into the outer office, “I need to talk to you.”

“SO LET ME SEE if I’ve got this right.”

Anthony Royn stood looming over Alison McGuire, glaring at her, clenching and unclenching his fists. “McKurn wants you to be his ‘mole’ so I lose the contest for party leadership to Cracken when Kydd retires. And if you don’t agree, he’ll destroy us both with that video he’s got.”

“Minister,” Alison said softly, straightening up in her chair, “it’s not me you should be angry with.”

Royn looked down at his hands, noticed how close to her he was standing, and sheepishly took a step backwards. “Yes,” he mumbled guiltily. “I suppose you’re right.”

He turned and walked unsteadily around his desk and collapsed in his chair. “Sorry,” he groaned, his head in his hands. “As if it wasn’t bad enough already—this must be the worst day of my life.”

He looked up to see Alison nodding understandingly. “Pretty much,” she agreed. “And yes, that’s what McKurn told me.”

“I didn’t even know you knew Derek Olsson.”

Alison smiled wistfully. “We met in high school, Minister.”

“And you’ve been . . . lovers ever since?” Royn asked, feeling disoriented—and strangely disappointed. “I can’t understand why you’ve never told me before—especially after he was arrested.”

“I had no reason to mention it—and I haven’t seen him for over a year.”

“Oh, well—any more bad news I should know?”

“Only that I have to give McKurn my answer by Friday.”

“Blimey. That’s no time at all. And to think,” Royn said angrily, “just one more step. . . . If I lost to Cracken in a fair fight, that would be bad enough. But to lose—no, to be pushed out of the race. . . . No,” Royn said, shaking his fist. “No,” he said more quietly, “we have to get McKurn before he gets us. That’s what it boils down to.”

“Yes,” Alison agreed, “but how? So far, I seem to have hit a brick wall. There are still a few possibilities in your father’s file—but I don’t know how to follow them up. And I don’t really have the skills or resources. We need an investigator of some kind—a private eye, perhaps.”

“That sounds like a good idea,” Royn said thoughtfully. “But the time—” He shook his head. “Wouldn’t produce any results by Friday. But there’s the legal angle.” Royn leaned forward excitedly. “After all, it’s blackmail. We could probably get an injunction, something like that. I’m pretty rusty on this aspect of the law. . . .”

“I don’t know if that would work, Minister,” Alison said with a shake of her head. “He could just put up the video anyway and claim someone else did it. God knows how many copies there are.”

“Maybe,” Royn conceded. “But I’ll check. You never know what might be possible.”

“I’d offer to resign, Minister . . . ” Alison said in a rush, “if I thought it would be of any help.”

“Resign?” Royn seemed astonished at the idea. “That would be admitting defeat. We haven’t begun to fight yet, Alison. . . .”

“No, Minister, I’m not offering,” said Alison, visibly relaxing at Royn’s use of the word we. “If I quit, everyone would believe the drug connection was true.”

“I thought you were serious for a moment,” said Royn, visibly calming. “It’s bad enough around here when you’re on vacation.”

Alison smiled, inclining her head at his implied compliment.

“How has McKurn survived all these years,” Royn said, his voice barely louder than a whisper, “without being caught out?”

“If I knew that, Minister, we’d have the bastard.”

Royn nodded, surprised at the sound of steel in Alison’s voice, and at the violent way she slapped the edge of one hand into the palm of the other. “We’ll find a way, Minister,” she said, a hard edge to her voice. “You can’t do whatever McKurn’s been doing for fifty-odd years without leaving tracks somewhere.”

“I suppose so.” Royn’s eyes narrowed as he studied her. “You’ve got something up your sleeve, I think.”

Alison laughed hollowly. “Only breaking his neck. And right now,” she added coldly, her voice menacing and her eyes hard, “I’d do just that—if I could get away with it.”

“I think I’d join you—” Royn stopped in mid-sentence, feeling appalled as he relished the thought at the same time.

ROYN SAT BACK IN his chair, staring into space, thinking of the ruthlessness he’d never seen Alison exhibit before. It was as if—for just a moment—she had turned into someone else, he thought, someone I don’t know.

He had to fight back. How? His mind wandered at the impossible question as he sank further back into the leather cushioning. His phone rang a couple of times. He ignored it. There was a knock on his door. He ignored that too.

Suddenly the division bell rang, signalling there was about to be a vote in the House and he had four minutes to get there.

“Blast,” he said, pushing himself awkwardly to his feet. He walked quickly into his bathroom to see a ghostly reflection looking back at him in the mirror. Splashing water on his face he muttered, “That’ll have to do.”

“Your wife phoned Minister. Twice,” Mary called out to him as he ran through the outer office and into the corridor towards the House. Mary couldn’t tell whether Royn had even heard her.

Royn had no idea what the vote was about, and at that moment he didn’t care. He joined the line of Members entering the House and simply followed the Party Whip’s directions, returning to his office as quickly as he could. The other Members who said “Hi, Tony,” or directed some comment at him were puzzled when Royn ignored them or merely vaguely nodded his head in their direction.

BACK BEHIND HIS DESK, Royn looked at the phone for a long moment before picking it up and dialling.

“Hi Mel,” he said when the phone was answered.

“Tony,” Melanie Royn’s voice was edged with anger and suspicion. “I called and called. Mary said you were in your office—but you didn’t answer. What on earth were you doing?”

“Digesting . . . trying to digest some awful news. Ghastly news.”

“Uh-huh.” Melanie’s grunted comment was larded with skepticism.

“I really need to talk to you about it.”

“Okay. I’m listening.”

“Oh, Mel,” Royn said despairingly, leaning into the phone as if that would bring them closer. “I—it’s something—I wish you were here.”

“Well I’m not! It will have to wait till Friday, then, won’t it. That’s when you’re back home next, isn’t it?”

“It can’t wait. Mel . . . I was hoping you could fly up tomorrow—”

“You know I don’t like Canberra.”

“Please, Mel. I really need you.”

“And I don’t need you? All this time I’m here looking after the kids by myself. It’s like they don’t have a father any more.”

Royn winced guiltily, as he always did whenever she reminded him of how much of his time he’d had to spend away from the family. At the same time, he felt an angry response rising within him: “For heaven’s sake Melanie, they’re not kids any more—”

But he stopped himself from speaking those words: the last thing he needed right now was another shouting match. “Oh, Mel,” he said contritely, “I’m sorry—”

“You’ve said you’re sorry. I don’t know how many times you’ve said you’re sorry. But you never do anything about it.”

“Mel, that’s hardly fair. . . .”

“Really? Anyway, tomorrow night is Zoë’s parent and teacher night—another one you’re going to miss. So there’s no way I could go to Canberra, anyway.”

Royn jerked back from the phone at the cool indifference in her voice. “Okay,” he sighed, knowing he had to appease her, “you remember Senator McKurn?”

“How could I forget that bastard.”

Royn thought of the time Melanie had first met McKurn, how she’d wrinkled her cute, turned-up nose in disgust and pulled her hand away from his a little more quickly than was polite.

“And you know that bastard, as you so aptly describe him, is backing Cracken against me—”

“Little Dick,” Melanie interjected, using the nickname she’d given him in high school.

“—indeed,” Royn smiled. “Well, he’s blackmailing Alison in a way—”

“Fire her, then. I’ve always said she was trouble.”

Really? Royn remembered the time, quite a few years ago now, when Melanie and Alison had been the best of friends.

“I wish it were that simple.”

“And why isn’t it?” Melanie demanded.

“Because McKurn is just using Alison as a way to get to me. And if he succeeds . . . I’ll be booted out of politics. Laughed out. And Cracken will be the next Prime Minister.”

“Surely not,” she said. “Won’t Kydd stop McKurn?”

“Kydd’s loyalty runs only skin deep—”

“That’s true,” Melanie sighed.

“—and this is so devastating he’d freeze me out in a second.”

“You’d better tell me all about it, then.”

As Royn spoke he became more relaxed, feeling like they’d gone back in time, to the days when they’d been inseparable. As teenagers, they’d gone door-knocking, hand-in-hand, to help in his father’s election campaigns. The first time he and Paul Cracken had battled, for the presidency of the Young Conservative Club at Melbourne Grammar School, Cracken, a “scholarship boy” literally from the other side of the tracks, had exaggerated his impoverished background and mocked Royn as a “Silver Spoon.” When Melanie heard about it, she had breathlessly confided—to a bunch of Grammar School boys—that she had it on good authority from one of her girlfriends that Cracken was “woefully under-equipped in the . . . ah . . . nether regions.”

Much to Cracken’s annoyance, the nickname “Little Dick” spread around the school like wildfire. In the changing room, a few weeks after his crushing defeat, Royn saw that Melanie’s information was dead wrong—and he’d realized she must have made it up on the spot.

He smiled at the memory; they’d been allies in everything.

When his father resigned from Parliament, it was she who’d masterminded his victory over Cracken for preselection. While Royn knocked on doors, spoke at meetings, phoned party members, and generally charmed as many people as he could, Melanie worked long hours to counter Cracken’s unashamed branch-stacking, uncovered the dummy names he’d added to the party’s rolls, and persuaded some key party functionaries to switch their support from Cracken to Royn.

Royn recalled fondly that being eight months pregnant—and so much sexier than usual—hadn’t slowed her down one bit.

But then. . . . Their second son, Richard, decided to come into the world on polling day. So instead of being at her side, as he had been for the birth of their first son, Max, Royn was out on the hustings and didn’t get to the hospital until thirty minutes after Richard was born.

“I SEE . . . ” SAID MELANIE when Royn had finished. “This is worse than any stunt Cracken ever pulled.”

“Far worse,” Royn agreed.

“I guess if you quit, the problem would go away—”

“But I’m so close . . . ”

“I know,” she sighed. The change in her tone of voice made Royn wonder whether, if he became Prime Minister, he’d end up living in the Prime Minister’s Lodge alone.

“If you did,” Melanie continued, uncertainty in her voice, “maybe we could have a life again. But to give into a scum like McKurn? No way. Quitting would be the coward’s way out.”

“Exactly my feeling.”

“So, what are you going to do?” she asked.

“I’m going to fight.”

“But—hang on. Zoë!” Melanie shouted, “where on earth have you been? I’ll have to go, Tony. Your daughter has no sense of time whatsoever. And God knows what she’s been up to.”

“She’s eighteen,” Royn mused, “so she’s probably up to the same things we were up to at her age.” Royn smiled at the memory.

“That’s what I’m worried about. Call me later.”

“Melanie, I love you—” he said.

But the phone was dead.

*****

ALISON SAT HUNCHED ON her sofa, a near-empty glass of wine in her hand, idly watching TV. It’s still a dumb show, she thought, even with the sound turned off.

She emptied the glass and looked at the bottle of wine sitting on the coffee table in front of her. This isn’t going to solve anything, she chided herself. Shrugging, she poured the rest of the wine into her glass and took another sip.

Friday, she thought, eyeing the thick files of Sidney Royn’s investigation stacked next to the wine bottle. Nothing there . . . not now the cop turned me down. Three days to Friday—and what can I do? Just wait for the computer geek—“Mystery Man.”

She’d sent him a message when she got home—The money’s gone.—along with McKurn’s and Cracken’s phone numbers, and the other related information she could find. Shortly afterwards, she had a reply: got it i’m on it

Her laptop sat open on the dining table. She thought of checking again to see if there was another message. “What’s the point?” she mumbled. “He’s not going to solve my problem in a couple of hours. Probably not even in three days.”

There must be something else I could be doing. But her mind felt like a blank slate.

She drained the wine from the glass in one long gulp. Well, she thought, maybe I’ll get a good night’s sleep for a change.

She let herself fall back into the soft cushions, feeling her exhaustion and tiredness, willing herself to give in to it. But it seemed the more she tried to relax, the tighter the knot of tension in her stomach became.

On the TV screen, a man looked lustfully at a girl. Alison sat upright. Sometimes, men think with their penises. . . .

She stood up and walked quickly, almost running, into her bedroom. It took her but a moment to find the sheer silk blouse she’d had in mind. Perfect, she thought.

She put it on and observed herself in the mirror, studying the blouse’s effect. “You don’t fight your opponent,” she remembered her Aikido Sensei saying. “You don’t resist. Instead, you help your opponent go wherever he wants to go, so you control where he ultimately ends up.”

She gathered some of the silk fabric beneath her breasts, noticing how that emphasized their shape and prominence. A little invisible mending will do it, she thought with satisfaction.

“Okay, McKurn. . . .”

She straightened her posture, pulled her shoulders back, and smiled at her reflection in the mirror.

9 “Wish Me Luck . . . ”

On the Run . . .
“For A While”

By Karla Preston

OlssonPress Syndicate Exclusive

Monday: Somewhere in the Sandeman Islands

I’m on the run.

This afternoon I slipped out of my hotel minutes ahead of soldiers and police who were about to drag me off to the airport and put me on the next plane back to Australia.

It seems the prime minister of this country and his cronies didn’t like my story yesterday exposing his government’s lies. So they decided to eliminate the source of their discomfort: me.

But no primped up, would-be dictator who believes freedom of the press might be okay so long as it doesn’t happen on his watch—which is how this prime minister increasingly looks to me—is going to push me around.

I’ll be okay, at least for a while—but I am worried about what might have happened to the other journalists here. This morning, we woke up to find our hotel surrounded by government troops. “For your own safety,” we were told, no Australians were allowed out of the building.

Later, in the middle of being interviewed on News24/7, the phone connection suddenly went dead. We thought it must have been the phone company dropping the line. After all, this is the country where somebody once said that ninety percent of the people are waiting for a telephone, while the other ten percent are waiting for a dial tone.

It wasn’t the local phone company this time. Nobody in the hotel could get a cellphone signal, the hotel’s landlines didn’t work, and no internet either. Maybe someone in authority here had been listening in and didn’t like what I was telling you guys back in Oz—or maybe they were planning to do something else they didn’t want any Australian journalists to know about.

Whatever the reason, I scarpered out of there PDQ (pretty-damn-quick), so I’ve no idea what happened to my colleagues. Maybe they’re all still having a wild party in the hotel bar—or maybe the Australian government will have to send in our troops to rescue them from God knows what.

I can’t say. All I can say is that if you haven’t heard from anyone in the Sandemans in the last 24 hours, now you know why.

I was lucky to find a working internet connection—a rickety one that keeps cutting out—so I’ve no idea when (or, for that matter, how) I’ll be filing my next report.

Till then I’ll be out of touch “for a while” as they say in this country. Which basically means you’ll have to wait anything from a minute or two till God knows when.

Meanwhile, wish me luck (I may need it)—and may your God go with you.

Alison gasped, imagining Karla Preston somewhere alone in a strange place where armed terrorists could be lurking anywhere in the shadows. That woman has guts, she thought admiringly.

At the same time, she was computing the story’s likely political fallout, grimacing as she imagined how the press would leap on the news of one of their own being persecuted by a supposedly “friendly” government—as Australian soldiers were dying in its defence.

With a sigh she closed the newspaper, and immediately turned it over to hide the headlines. “I’ve had better days,” she muttered, “and it’s only eight o’clock.”

She heard Royn’s “Good morning, Mary,” and looked up to see him coming towards her office with a big smile on his face. Wait till he sees the papers, she thought.

“Alison!” Royn strode into her office, bouncing with energy, pausing only to carefully close the door behind him.

“Remember that J&C report you gave me yesterday,” Royn said as he sat down opposite her, leaning forward eagerly, “about this mysterious ‘Candyman’? How about we persuade Bruce—” naming Bruce Spring who’d succeeded Royn as Minister for Justice and Customs “—to set up a task force to find out just who he is. We could use it as a cover to dig up stuff about McKurn. And wouldn’t it be something to put that Candyman bastard out of business?”

“A wonderful idea. Shall I set up a meeting?”

“Please do,” said Royn. “As soon as possible.”

“I will. Now, sorry to spoil your mood,” she said, turning the newspaper over to show him the front page, “but you’d better take a look at today’s headlines.”

KYDD WAFFLES ON
SANDEMANS CRISIS
“We’re having discussions”
INSIDE: Opposition wipes floor in Question Time

One of the papers had a front-page editorial headlined:

Democracy and Freedom?
Sandemans say “No thanks, not for us”

“Holy cow. That’s worse than I imagined it would be.”

“It doesn’t get better.” Alison opened the paper to Karla’s column. “You’d better read this. And today’s editorials uniformly describe our stance as ‘rudderless’ and ‘gutless,’ and demand to know why we’re letting the Sandemans get away with pillorying our journalists for telling the truth.”

Royn groaned as he read Karla’s column. “If anything happens to that Preston woman, we’ll be crucified.” A moment later he looked up and asked Alison, “Are the phone lines to the Sandemans still cut, do you know?”

“Yes,” she answered. “I tried making a call this morning.”

Royn leaned back in his chair, drumming his fingers on Alison’s desk. “Okay,” he sighed after a moment. “When we meet with Nimabi later this afternoon, I’m going to have to throw the book at him.”

“But first, remember, you’re chairing the foreign ministers’ meeting this morning on the Sandemans’ oil deadlock.”

“I know,” Royn groaned, “and I thought yesterday was a bad day.”

“It’s about to get even worse,” Alison said as she handed him a thin file.

“How?” Royn gasped, his fingers gingerly taking the document as if it could turn out to be explosive.

“This is an early warning from the Attorney-General’s department. One of the companies which paid for an exploration licence in the Sandemans will file a case this morning before an adjudicator in Singapore, to seek a refund of the money it paid the Sandemans, plus damages.”

“Oh no.” Royn flicked the folder open and began reading. “On what grounds?”

“The right term is ‘fraudulent conveyance,’ I think—the company is claiming the Sandemans sold them something they had no right to sell.”

Royn nodded and moaned at the same time. “If the Sandemans loses that case,” he said, looking up, “their position on the oil negotiations gets pretty much blown out of the water.”

“And if the Treasury’s right about their finances,” Alison said, “where would they find the money if they have to pay the company back?”

*****

“A PRIVATE WORD, ABDULLAH, if you will, before we begin,” Royn said, his arm gesturing behind his back to indicate that Alison and Doug Selkirk should go ahead into the conference room.

Royn had met Nimabi and his assistants at the entrance to Parliament House, and beyond Royn’s cheery “Good afternoon, Abdullah,” and the curt nod of Nimabi’s head in reply, they walked along the corridors towards the conference room in stony silence.

Nimabi looked up slowly in reaction to Royn’s words, his eyes narrowing in suspicion, his face a glowering stone mask. It was the same expression he’d worn when he’d walked out of the morning’s negotiations: in what appeared to be a coordinated move, the Papuan and Solomon Islands foreign ministers had leapt on the Singapore case to harden their own demands, and deadlock turned into gridlock.

“A private word, if you would be so kind,” Royn repeated softly, his face friendly but intense, when he noticed Nimabi’s assistants standing behind them, waiting for instructions. Nimabi stared doubtfully at Royn, and then nodded his head. At an impatient wave of his hand, his assistants filed dutifully into the conference room.

“This Singapore business is very worrying, Abdullah,” Royn said quietly, after he’d made sure the door was firmly shut. “Very worrying indeed . . . for us all.”

“They’d have to get an order from a Sandemans’ court to collect anything—if they win,” Nimabi growled.

“Quite probably, I’m sure,” said Royn, almost failing to keep his smile in place. “But the ramifications. . . . What I’d like to suggest you and your colleagues think about, Abdullah, is how crucially important it is for you to either win this case, or find some other way to bring it to an agreeable settlement.”

“Settle? Never—”

Royn raised his hand. “Please hear me out, Abdullah. I’m not speaking as Minister for Foreign Affairs, but as a friend—a friend who is also a qualified lawyer. Much as I would like to, I really can’t give you legal advice of any kind. But I do strongly urge you to get the very best legal counsel you can find, and carefully consider all the possible outcomes and implications . . . not just the legal ones, if you know what I mean. I wish I could say more, but. . . .”

“You’ve said—” Nimabi began, anger in his voice. And stopped as though it had taken him a moment to listen between Royn’s words to appreciate their subtext. His face softened slightly as he nodded. “Thank you, Tony. I do understand.”

“And one other thought, Abdullah.”

Nimabi looked at Royn with a mixture of curiosity . . . and suspicion.

“Only when, or indeed, if you’re ready, it might be a very . . . ah . . . diplomatic idea if your office were to suggest a resumption of this morning’s negotiations in some neutral place like . . . oh, say . . . Singapore. That way you could, potentially, kill two birds with one stone.”

After a moment Nimabi replied, “As you say, Tony . . . if. . . .”

“Quite,” Royn nodded. “And we never had this discussion,” Royn added with a grin.

Nimabi nodded but did not return the grin. “Mutual deniability.”

“Quite.” Royn opened the door of the conference room, standing back to allow Nimabi to enter first. “Shall we . . . ?”

NIMABI’S HEAD DIPPED A millimeter or two as his eyes stopped on Bergstrom’s face; but he came to a halt and frowned when he saw Paul Cracken at the table. He turned towards Royn, his glowering mask back in place.

“I invited Paul along at the last minute,” Royn said quickly, “since finance is one of the topics for discussion.”

When Nimabi looked at Royn skeptically he turned to Alison and said sharply, “Alison! I’d asked you to talk to the Foreign Minister’s assistant about this—” As Royn spoke, he turned his head towards Alison and, with the eye hidden from Nimabi and his associates, slowly winked.

“Oh yes, Minister,” Alison burbled as she caught Royn’s hint. “I called and couldn’t get through, and then—” she bowed her head in mock shame “—I forgot.”

Royn felt like applauding her performance—and laughing at the same time at the thought that Alison, who had a memory like an elephant, had forgotten a thing.

“My apologies, Abdullah,” Royn said to Nimabi as they both took their seats. Nimabi just nodded, seeming mollified.

Royn had been nervous when he asked Cracken to join the meeting. “Paul, just remember to be diplomatic—if you can,” he’d said. “You think you’re the only one who can put on an act?” Cracken had snapped in reply.

To Royn’s surprise, Cracken followed his lead, keeping his mouth shut while, for almost an hour, Royn and Nimabi, with an occasional comment from Bergstrom, did little more than calmly restate their positions of the day before. The only difference, Royn thought, was that with Cracken and a couple of members of his staff also at the table, the room felt rather crowded.

Royn could feel Cracken’s growing impatience as it became increasingly clear—although not stated it in so many words—that neither side was willing to concede an inch to the other.

When Alison passed him a note, Time to break the log-jam?, Royn realized he’d been repeating himself. He paused to gather his thoughts. He felt like saying to Nimabi: Wake up, for heaven’s sake. The worst thing that could happen to us is that we lose the next election. But you and your precious prime minister could be strung up on lampposts.

Instead, Royn said, “Here’s something I think you should take a look at, Abdullah,” and pushed a sheet of paper across the conference table. “These are figures taken from our Treasury’s analysis of the Sandemans’ finances.”

Nimabi studied it carefully, and then looked up. “I don’t see the significance of these numbers,” he said coldly, “or how they relate to our discussions today.”

But, Royn noticed, a look of concern crossed the Sandeman high commissioner’s face as he Nimabi’s other associates craned their eyes to look at the paper. Nimabi scowled at them and flipped the sheet over.

“If I may, Tony,” said Paul Cracken.

“Of course,” said Royn, leaning back in his chair.

“As you can see, Minister,” Cracken was saying, “the numbers show the oil companies paid over a million dollars more in licence fees, according to their accounts, than your government received, according to your Treasury’s records. Quite a discrepancy.”

To Royn’s ear, Cracken’s tone was hardly soothing, sounding brittle like a schoolteacher instructing an errant student. But perhaps, he reflected as he watched Nimabi for signs of a reaction, that was just his own, almost Pavlovian response to his rival’s voice.

“What’s the point of all this?” Nimabi demanded. “You can’t hold us responsible for an oil company’s accounting mistakes.”

“I’m sure you’re aware, Minister,” said Cracken, “of the severe penalties western governments like ours have enacted for company officers who file inaccurate information. So we’re quite satisfied the company figures are correct. It’s not as though these numbers are estimates: they wrote you cheques, after all.”

Nimabi shrugged. “No doubt our Treasury figures are preliminary, or something.”

“That’s what we thought at first,” said Cracken, now with a smile on his face. “But it seems the monies actually received in the Sandeman government’s bank accounts match the oil companies’ figures. . . .”

“There you are,” said Nimabi with obvious relief. “Quite obviously a mistake.”

“I’m afraid, Minister,” said Cracken—who, Royn thought, seemed to be clearly enjoying himself—“this is hardly the first time this kind of discrepancy has appeared when your Treasury is accounting for international receipts.”

“What do you mean?” said Nimabi, now showing signs of anxiety. “And how could you know?” He suddenly rose to his feet. “You’ve been sending spies into our country?” he said angrily. “That’s unconscionable.”

Royn braced himself for Cracken to leap to his feet and respond to Nimabi in kind—or for Nimabi to simply walk out, as he had done this morning. But Royn noticed that Nimabi’s fingers were nervously clutching the list of figures as if it were a chain holding him in place. Cracken merely tilted his head back to look Nimabi calmly in the eye, saying, “Not at all, Minister. The very thought.” Cracken shook his head in disbelief—and Royn chuckled quietly to himself: So I’m not the only one who can put on an act.

“It’s simple. The world’s anti-money laundering laws,” Cracken continued, “make just about everybody’s bank account an open book—if you receive cooperation from the American, British and other authorities, as we usually do. So we can see the actual amounts wired into your accounts, and where they came from.”

“Well,” said Nimabi uncomfortably, slowly settling back into his seat, “I suggest you should take up this is a matter with our Treasurer rather than with me.”

“Perhaps,” said Cracken. “We’d certainly appreciate if you’d pass this information on to him. But,” he added, taking another sheet of paper from the file, “your Treasury has also been making payments which don’t seem to be reflected in the government accounts.”

“We don’t have the resources,” said Nimabi frostily, “you have available within your Treasury department. Such errors are quite understandable.”

“Except this list of . . . ah . . . errors is rather unusual,” said Cracken, “Significant payments to bank accounts in places like Switzerland, the Cayman Islands, Bermuda, and similar places. Payments that have been going on for many years.”

“I have no doubt our Treasurer will be happy to explain what these were all for,” said Nimabi shrugging nonchalantly, an effect, Royn noticed, that was undercut by the way he briefly glared at Cracken before he could bring his expression under control. And where Nimabi’s self-control was almost iron-clad, Royn could see that the junior members of his staff, ranged to Nimabi’s right and left, looked puzzled, worried, and were whispering to each other.

“Though I hardly see,” Nimabi said, giving his associates such a fierce glare that they did their best to turn into wooden statues, “what business it is of yours.”

“Abdullah,” said Royn gently, a look of compassion on his face directed towards Nimabi, “I’ve been through this report. There’s more, and it’s very worrying. One aspect, however, you may not appreciate.”

Nimabi looked at Royn suspiciously. “What could that be?” he demanded.

“The danger is that someone in our Treasury department, or someone else who’s seen the report, might believe—erroneously of course—that this information deserves a wider public.”

“Are you threatening me?” Nimabi asked angrily.

“Threatening you, Abdullah?” Royn projected an air of being misunderstood. “Most certainly not. This hazard, unfortunate and illegal as it is, is one of the problems we face in a democracy such as ours. If that were to happen. . . .” Royn shook his head sadly, and paused.

“Yes,” said Nimabi, “it would be very . . . unfortunate.”

“Very,” Royn agreed. “For all of us.”

Bergstrom, who’d kept his counsel for the most of the meeting, broke the short silence. “If I may make a suggestion.”

“Please do, Victor,” said Royn.

“Paul, you could classify this report at the highest level. Numbered copies, that sort of thing. Then, if any of this report were leaked, it would be easy to find out who did it. And under the Crimes Act, the penalties for divulging classified information are far more severe.”

“Yes,” said Cracken, “I suppose we could. . . .”

“That,” said Nimabi, “sounds like a very good idea.”

“I agree,” said Royn.

“It would, however,” Cracken said doubtfully, “be very unusual to classify such a routine document.”

“But it could be done,” Nimabi said anxiously.

“I’m sure it could be done,” said Cracken. “But I’ll have to check with my head of department first.”

Nimabi looked at Cracken skeptically and nodded slowly.

“I see it’s time for dinner,” said Royn. So, with your agreement Abdullah, could we adjourn at this point, and reconvene tomorrow? Hopefully, then, we could wrap everything up.”

Nimabi’s eyes flicked from Royn, to Cracken, to Bergstrom, and back. After a moment he nodded. “Okay,” he said sourly.

“I’D COUNTED ABDULLAH AS a friend,” said Royn sadly as he, Alison and his department head, Kieran Fairchild, left the meeting. “As much of a friend as you can have in this line of work.”

“Yes,” said Alison in a neutral voice, “but something had to be done.”

“I know,” Royn sighed. “I just wish it could have been done by someone else. Quite likely, we—I’ve now turned Nimabi and maybe the whole Sandemans cabinet into enemies.”

“Were they really our friends to begin with?” Alison asked. “Or just fair-weather friends?”

Royn sighed again. “Probably the latter.”

Alison nodded. “And Minister, tomorrow I bet he’ll agree to everything. But when it comes to implementation . . . the people up in the Sandemans will prove highly uncooperative, managing to find countless obstacles that just can’t be easily overcome.”

“And if you’re right,” said Royn uncomfortably, “we’ll be left holding the ball—with more Australian boys’ lives at stake.”

10 “Value Added”

“CAN WE STOP HERE?” Karla asked. “That’s the most beautiful beach I’ve ever seen—but what happened to it?” The beach was a gentle, extended crescent-shaped arc of pure, white sand, nearly a kilometer wide. It was protected, at the two tips of the crescent, by rocky promontories jutting into to sea.

Uqu spoke to the boatman and the banca chugged towards the shore, rising and falling with the swell. Karla saw waves racing to shore to crash with a loud roar and an eruption of spray at the far end of the beach, while nearby the waves lapped gently on the shimmering sand. The banca turned its nose towards the calmer end of the beach, sheltered by one of the peninsulas from the raging seas, Karla could imagine little children playing happily in the gentle swell while exhilarated surfers slalomed to shore towards the other point of the sandy arc.

“This is amazing,” Karla shouted into the whistle of the wind.

Gripping the banca’s bow for support she rose to her feet and leaned into the wind. Her hair, now bleached blond at Uqu’s insistence, with a few strands of grey to make her look older, blew around her face; her body swayed in time to the banca’s rocking motion.

Her gaze roved in delighted wonder from the spray-kissed rocks at one end, across nearly a kilometer of unbroken sand to a ring of low jungle-covered hills, and along the white crescent to its center, where her eyes came to an abrupt halt.

In the dead center of the beach stood a derelict construction site: ugly concrete pillars, some blackened and broken, poked from the ground, bent and rusted metal rods protruding from their ends.

As she slowly fell back to the bench, she turned to ask Uqu, “Who would desecrate such a wonderful place with an ugly building like that?”

“An Australian resort company, as it happens,” Uqu said, “in partnership with some local interests—all fronts for politicians. It was going to be a multi-storey hotel.”

“But . . . will it be finished? Not that I’m complaining.”

“El-Bihar Islanders are nearly all Muslims. They protested at having an establishment serving alcohol with semi-naked western women cavorting in bikinis on their territory. They boycotted the site, and wouldn’t let any local people work on it.”

“But surely, the people here need jobs, don’t they?” Karla asked as the banca came to rest on the sand of Jazeerat el-Bihar with a soft thump.

Uqu smiled. “Actually, not so many Bihar islanders,” Uqu said as he helped Karla down from the boat.

Karla pulled off her boots and flopped down on the sand. “This is wonderful,” she said, stretching her arms and legs and wriggling to imprint the shape of her body in the sand, relaxing with a loud “Aaaah,” as she felt supported at every point. “But surely—” she lazily waved her hand to indicate the lush greenery behind her “—there’s no industry here. And surely they don’t grow spices any more.”

“You’ll see soon enough,” Uqu said with a knowing smile.

Karla’s eyes narrowed, and then she laughed. Lying back spread-eagled on the soft sand she chuckled, “Have it your way, then, Mr. Mysterious. Okay . . . but there must be plenty of people from the other islands who’d be happy to work here.”

“Indeed,” said Uqu, squatting down beside her. “So the Muslims organized, drove them away, sabotaged equipment, and raised a stink in Parliament. One of the project’s sponsors was Abdullah Nimabi, whose constituency is right here. I think the decisive factor in stopping the project was that Nimabi would have lost his seat at the next election if he hadn’t withdrawn his support.”

“So are those ugly concrete blocks just going to sit there till they fall apart?”

“Inshallah,” Uqu said with a smile. “The Australians sold out to a company from Dubai, which pledged to turn it into an alcohol- and bikini-free Muslim resort, and a Dubai airline even promised to fly into Toribaya. That got everyone excited . . . until the majority, mostly Catholics, realized the islands would be crawling with Arabs and women in black. So its ultimate fate is still up in the air.”

“Don’t Muslim women wear burqas here?”

“Only a few. Most just wear a scarf covering their hair—a gaily colored one at that. And some don’t even go that far. Islam here is nothing like it is in Saudi Arabia. Though,” Uqu added sourly, “that’s beginning to change.”

“I see,” she said thoughtfully.

Karla wiped the sweat from her forehead. She was all too aware of the almost intense heat of the afternoon sun, and the way every bone and muscle in her body seemed to ache from their long journey.

For three days and three nights, Karla had played tourist, island-hopping by banca and ferry along the coral atolls of the Sandeman Reef stretching the full length of the southern side of the islands. They’d avoided the resorts dotting the atolls, stopping at tiny villages where they were welcomed and fêted with banquets of blackened or roasted freshly caught fish, cooked on the sand. Tiny villages where, it seemed, tingi were met with shrugs of incomprehension, while the villagers eagerly accepted the gifts Uqu had brought: candies, chocolates, mirrors, needles, thread, and the like.

In the mornings they’d waken, like the villagers, with the sunrise. At dawn, it was blessedly cool, but the sun appeared all too quickly over the horizon and, even at that early hour it felt like a ball of fire focused on her. In just an hour or two, she’d be sweating even while standing in shade—and she was all too aware that every item of the few clothes she’d been able to carry were now sodden with sweat, salt-spray, or both. She’d washed herself, awkwardly, standing by a barrel and splashing herself with scoops of cool water; each night she’d fallen into an exhausted sleep on a thin reed mat on a hard dirt floor. She was a spoiled westerner, she thought, taking for granted luxuries the happy, smiling villagers had never even heard of—smiling people who didn’t even seem to know they were poor. Despite the warm, carefree hospitality she’d never experienced before, there were moments when she longed for a piping hot shower, a thick, juicy steak, clean, crisp clothes—and a very soft bed.

As there was no awning on the banca they’d hired for the last stage of their journey, after five hours sitting on a hard bench in the hot sun she felt bleached, patches of her skin were bright red, and her hair had become so dry she imagined strands would just break off. She sat up and looked longingly at the waves lapping onto the sand. “I’ve got to go for a swim,” she said.

“Um . . . ” Uqu stood up and looked around. “Well,” he said doubtfully, “there’s no one in sight. . . .”

“Oh—no bikinis?”

“Right.”

“That’s all I’ve got,” she shrugged, standing to get her backpack from the banca.

“I think,” said Uqu carefully, “it would be a good idea to respect the islanders’ sensibilities—for your own safety.”

“But there’s no one around.”

“Not now. But that could change at any time.

Karla nodded, and smiled. “I hate being told what to do . . . but you make your point. I’ll wear a T-shirt then, okay?”

“That would do it. And tomorrow,” said Uqu looking at his watch, “will be Friday. . . .”

“Friday? I’ve completely lost track of time. . . . Tomorrow?”—Karla squinted at Uqu, a question in her eyes—“What do you mean by that?”

“It will be the Muslim day of prayer—their Sabbath. We should lie low so we don’t unwittingly offend anyone.”

“I see. I could spend the whole day here.”

“A good idea.” Uqu nodded, and rose to his feet to pay off the banca still sitting on the beach. “And Inkaya, the village where we’re heading, is just over the ridge,” he said, pointing to where a track cut through the tangled jungle. “We could walk there in half-an-hour if you like.”

“Sure. I could use the exercise.”

FROM THE TOP OF the rise they could look down the small village of Inkaya nestling by the ocean—a scattering of thatched or tin roofs and quite a few larger buildings, one shining whitely through the trees. Beyond it was a long pier, crowded with bancas, a couple of larger vessels, fishing boats Karla thought, were tied up at the end. A sea of green carpeted the hillside down to the water’s edge.

As they walked down the gentle slope Karla saw women working in the forest of shrubs covering the slope right and left. They wore scarves, long skirts, and loose blouses which covered their arms to their wrists, and were pulling leaves from the shrubs, piling them into wide wicker baskets. As the baskets filled, men brought empty ones and dragged the full ones down towards the village. The women looked at her with interest, as did the men they passed on the path—except their looks were tinged with suspicion.

“Those shrubs look familiar,” Karla said, going up to one taller than she was, and smelling it. “I’ve seen it before—or maybe a picture—but I can’t remember what it’s called.”

She turned to see Uqu smiling at her.

“Ganja,” he said.

“Marijuana?”

“Right. That’s why so few of the islanders were interested in working on a construction site. And that’s what makes el-Bihar Island the richest place in the Sandemans.”

“I see. And they sell it—”

“—in Australia—”

“—of course. I bet I’ve had some of it myself.”

She looked around again with renewed interest, noticing the shrubs were planted in between much taller trees. “I see,” she said. “It would be hard to spot from the air, but it’s not hidden from close scrutiny. So I bet this is the real reason the locals didn’t want that hotel on their island.”

Uqu just smiled.

“But surely, all this,” she said, waving at the marijuana plants stretching as far as the eye could see, “can’t be a secret from the locals.”

“Of course not,” said Uqu. “Everybody knows—and everybody benefits.”

“Everybody? On the island?”

“And everybody in power.”

“Everybody . . . ?” Karla held up her hand before Uqu could speak. “I’m beginning to believe the picture you’re painting.”

As they came nearer to the village the wide track made a dog-leg. Beyond it was a clearing with two large structures, partially shaded by large, drooping trees. The roofs of both were made of tin and covered with camouflage-style netting. One had no walls, like a large gazebo, and the space under the shelter was filled with leaves all the way to the ceiling, hanging out to dry. Men and women were busy adding the newly harvested leaves from the baskets. The other building was enclosed, with air-conditioners poking through the walls, the sound of a diesel engine fracturing the natural sounds of the jungle. The smell of marijuana hung heavily in the air. “What’s in there?” she asked. “The smoking room?”

Uqu laughed. “That’s the hash factory, and where they press the marijuana into blocks and wrap it for shipment. This is the main industry on el-Bihar, and making hashish and hash oil is ‘value added,’ as economists would say. Many more dollars per kilo shipped.”

“I presume all this is highly illegal.”

“Not exactly. It’s a grey area of the law,” said Uqu. “But, anyway, in the Sandemans, laws are made to be broken.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“No one would work for the government just for the salaries they get.”

Karla’s mouth fell open. “I’m being a bit slow on the uptake . . . I shouldn’t really be surprised by now, should I?”

Uqu smiled.

“I’d love to look in there,” Karla said, pointing at the hashish factory.

“They might let you—if they trust you to keep your word.”

“Of course I will,” Karla protested. “I don’t see anything wrong with what they’re doing. But the moment the Australian government got wind of this they’d have crop-dusters up here spraying weed-killer everywhere. They’d destroy el-Bihar’s economy completely.”

“Which is why they want to keep it quiet for as long as they can.”

A hundred or so meters further along the path they came to the outskirts of the village. Men and women alike looked at Karla curiously as she passed; and as they walked on towards the village square, she felt like the Pied Piper as a growing number of small children followed her excitedly.

Inkaya looked more affluent than the villages where they’d spent the last three nights, but otherwise not too different. The houses, even those with walls of logs and roofs of thatch, were better built, and here and there were some made of concrete. Unlike the other villages, nearly all had a TV aerial bolted to the roof. The main path—hardly a street—was wide, but just grass and dirt that would surely turn into mud when it rained.

They stopped at the edge of the village square, a wide-open expanse of trimmed grass dotted with a few large trees and benches, with one corner given over to colorful playground equipment which looked brand new. On one side was a shining, domed building made of white stone. “That’s the mosque,” said Uqu. “Partially financed with Saudi money. And over opposite us is the school.” Uqu pointed to several wooden buildings, some large, some small, and Karla became aware of the sound of children’s voices drifting across the square.

“A vast improvement,” Karla said. “Schools” in some of the other villages were little more than a teacher standing under a thatched roof with no walls.

“It’s the best-equipped school in the country, outside of Toribaya,” Uqu said.

He led the way to the other side of the square, to a large, open roofed-over area with lots of tables and chairs and several small stalls along the sides offering different foods and drinks. In the center, a group of older men sat around a table chatting, drinking tea, and smoking, and Karla breathed in an aroma that was a mixture of cigarette smoke and ganja—and a fainter smell of fish wafting from the pier.

“Well, there are certainly some things I like about this place,” Karla smiled. “Not Amsterdam, perhaps—but way cheaper, I’m sure.”

As they walked towards the open area Uqu said, “In a moment, I’ll introduce you to Inkaya’s headman. His name is Tungi. He speaks some English. And you should address him as Tungi-ga.”

“‘Ga’?”

“It’s is like ‘sir’ in English. The feminine is ‘gaat’.”

Uqu signalled Karla to wait and went up to the men and said a few words. One of the oldest stood up, and when he smiled at Karla she could see he had only three front teeth, all black. She smiled back sensing that, despite the way he shambled slightly as he walked towards her, he was a man of authority used to receiving respect.

“Ah, ’Orton-gaat,” he said, dipping his head in a slight bow, “our village welcome you.”

“Tungi-ga,” she said, inclining her head in return at Uqu’s silent urging. “Thank you. I’m pleased to be here.”

A loud, angry voice came from the other side of the village square. A slight young man wearing white robes strode out of the mosque. Karla realized he was glaring at her bare arms and legs, her uncovered hair, and her prominent breasts. Behind him, she could see two heads covered in black peering out from behind the door.

The chatter of the old men ceased, the smiles disappearing from their faces. The village headman turned and said something sternly to the young man.

“Who is he?” Karla asked Uqu.

“If he’s who I think he is, his name is Gurundi—and he’s probably the most dangerous man in the country.”

“Him?” Karla asked in surprise. He’s hardly more than a boy . . . with two chips on each shoulder. The young man waved his hands in emphasis; his stick-like arms, so thin as though tendons without muscles held his bones together, were briefly outlined in the long sleeves of his robe. “But he looks so—so frail. So weak.”

Uqu nodded. “Too many people underestimate his potential, just as you have.”

Karla shook her head. “And what’s the headman saying to him?” she asked.

“That we—and you in particular—are honored guests, protected by Allah in the Muslim tradition. And he’d better watch his step. But I wouldn’t trust him one inch.”

11 Murphy’s Law

“WHAT’S REALLY GOING ON in Sandemans?”

Alison, who’d been thinking what a good job the seamstress had done as she fastened the last button of her silk blouse, turned up the TV’s volume. She recognized Robin Cartwright, from the Melbourne Examiner, next to the familiar face of Rowena Watson, host of the morning talk show Good Morning Australia.

He’s in the studio, she realized. I thought he was in Toribaya.

“The fact is, we don’t really know,” Cartwright was saying.

“But you were on the spot—”

“Yes and no. We’ve been pretty much confined to the hotel and treated like mushrooms: kept in the dark and fed manure.”

“Meaning . . . ?”

“—we get official press releases, which are about as informative as toilet paper and half as useful. The government up there is trying to freeze us out, to impose a news blackout. The people I used to be able to squeeze a little information out of just won’t talk to me any more. The Aussie soldiers would give us some of the lowdown on the side—unofficially, of course. But since Sunday’s attack they’ve clammed up tighter than a gnat’s arsehole.”

“Mr. Cartwright,” said Rowena. “This is a family program.”

“Sorry,” Cartwright grinned, winking at the camera.

“But there is one journalist on the loose up there somewhere, right? Karla Preston.”

“Right,” Cartwright nodded, his face turning serious. “Yesterday I learned the Sandeman government has ordered its soldiers to find her and bring her in. I figured it was safer for me to be here when I broke the news.”

“Why is that?”

“Simple. Our hotel was placed under martial law and surrounded by trigger-happy soldiers with submachine guns. This news will drive them crazy, so I didn’t want to file the story from up there.”

“What do you think will happen to Karla Preston now?”

“I’m not sure,” Cartwright said gravely. “But you know what happened last Sunday so I, for one, wouldn’t want to be in Karla’s shoes when the Sandeman soldiers catch up with her.”

“Nor would I,” said Rowena, shuddering as she turned to face the camera. “We’ll be right back in a moment. . . .”

Half-dressed, Alison sat shakily on the bed and hit the mute button as the program went to a commercial break.

“My God,” she breathed, wondering if anyone in the Sandeman government cared whether Karla Preston was captured dead or alive. It looks like our deal with Nimabi is already unravelling, she thought, and it’s only two days old.

She thought furiously, and picked up her cellphone. “Doug?” she said, when Royn’s press secretary answered. “Have you got your TV on?”

“You mean Cartwright?”

“Exactly. There’s going to be hell to pay.”

“I’ll be on my way in about ten minutes.”

“See you there. I’ll call Justin.”

She punched another number. When Victor Bergstrom’s PA, Justin McWinter, answered grumpily, she said curtly, “You’d better turn on Good Morning Australia right now.”

“Alison?” he said sleepily. “Why?”

“Just do it, Justin. Sandeman soldiers have been sent to find Karla Preston and bring her in. What should we do, if anything? We have to come up with some options for our ministers pretty damn quick.”

“We’re getting situation reports from TV now?”

“It seems your sources up there leave a lot to be desired.”

“Our sources . . . ?”

“Justin, I suggest you get to your office in about ten minutes. I imagine your minister will be pretty pissed off with you if you don’t have your head around this issue by the time he arrives.”

“I suppose you have a point—if this journalist can be trusted.”

“Justin!” said Alison, finally losing her patience. “That’s something you’d better be in a position to tell him.” She irritably punched END CALL and, seeing that Cartwright was talking again, turned up the TV.

“. . . hard for westerners to really understand what countries like the Sandemans are like. So, Rowena, let me ask you a question.”

“I’m supposed to be the interviewer,” she said with a smile.

Cartwright grinned. “Where were you born?” he asked.

“Here in Sydney.”

“So, do you think of yourself as a Sydney-sider first, or an Australian first?”

“Australian, of course,” Rowena said.

“Of course,” said Cartwright, nodding. “In the Sandemans, it’s the other way around. And you know the old joke, first prize is a week in Melbourne, second prize is two weeks . . . ?”

Rowena Watson laughed as she nodded.

“In the Sandemans they mean it. It’s like . . . ” Cartwright groped for words. “If we were Sandeman Islanders we’d hate, or at least despise each other just because you’re from Sydney and I’m from Melbourne.”

Rowena shook her head. “You’re pulling my leg! That makes no sense.”

“No to us. But it does to them. The Sandemans isn’t really a country at all but a bunch of warring clans and tribes. Another question: if somebody wanted to get rich, what would you recommend they do?”

“Oh, become a doctor or a lawyer, or start a business.”

“How about a career in government?”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Rowena said.

“I assure you, Rowena, I’m deadly serious. The Sandemans is one of the most corrupt countries on earth. That means bribery. You get pulled over by a cop, you give him about a dollar and he forgets to write the ticket. The cops come to arrest you—pay them enough and they go away. You want to build a house, start a business, even register your car or get a passport . . . every permit or licence needs a payment under the table. Government contracts don’t go to the lowest bidder but to the contractor who kicks back the most money. A courtroom isn’t a place where justice is done, or even seen to be done, but a bidding war between the contestants which is won by the person who pays more to the judge. And getting elected is like winning the lottery. Since they auctioned off all those oil exploration licences, the traffic there has slowed to almost a halt with all the new BMWs, Audis, Jaguars and the like clogging the roads—driven by politicians and senior bureaucrats.”

“Even the prime minister?”

“Ah yes,” Cartwright smiled broadly. “Aruma Bagambi. That old devil has a garage full of them: BMWs, Cadillacs—even a Ferrari. There’s nowhere in the whole godforsaken country where you can drive a Ferrari fast enough to get out of third gear. How on earth can you afford a Ferrari on a salary of about twenty thousand dollars a year?”

“You just can’t.”

“Of course not, if that’s your only source of cash. We westerners naïvely go into places like the Sandemans—or Vietnam or Iraq—and think that because they have a parliament, police, and law courts, their society is pretty much like ours.” Cartwright shook his head. “They’re not. They might be wearing clothes that look like ours, but they’re not even made of the same fabric. So we always end up making a pig’s breakfast of things.”

“It’s hard to imagine. . . .” said Rowena.

“That’s right—which is why we keep on screwing up.”

Rowena Watson seemed at a loss for words, but recovered almost instantly. “Thank you Robin.” As she spoke, the camera moved into a close-up. “Derek Olsson’s murder trial starts today. Is he guilty, as everyone seems to think? And if he is, what’s his motive? More after the break. . . .”

Derek, Alison thought, if only I could be there. . . . She shook her head. I’ll send him a message through Ross, she decided, and after a moment’s hesitation flicked the TV off. Got to get moving. . . .

*****

ANTHONY ROYN UNLOCKED THE main door to his office, unable to recall the last time he’d arrived before anyone else.

He was up early not because he was full of energy and raring to go, but for the exact opposite reason: he’d tossed and turned all night long and gave up trying to get to sleep before the sun rose.

He made himself an extra-strong cup of coffee and sat at his desk waiting for the caffeine to hit. He gazed blankly at his diary to remind himself of what he had to do today, but his thoughts kept returning to McKurn . . . and Melanie. The only good thing about today, he thought, is that it’s Friday, and I’ll be flying back home to Melbourne tonight . . . and Melanie.

His eyes locked longingly on a picture of Melanie set prominently on his desk, her face lit with a brilliant smile, directed at him as he’d taken the shot . . . some twenty years ago.

But his thoughts returned to the question, How is Alison going to answer McKurn’s so-called proposition? He groaned. That had been their incessant topic of conversation for the whole week, and they still had no lever to fight back with.

Perhaps the Candyman inquiry might produce something on McKurn in a few weeks. Months, more likely. Too late. What was left? The legal option—charging McKurn with blackmail—which would probably result in everything coming out anyway. That would mean he could look forward to the satisfaction of seeing McKurn sent to jail—from the torment and shame of dishonorable retirement.

Looking again at Melanie’s photo, he asked himself: Would you stand by me then?

Vaguely aware of a sound on the edge of his consciousness, he looked up to see Alison McGuire walking across the silent carpet to his desk.

He began to say “Good morning, Alison,” when he saw that she was smiling. And then he stared, open-mouthed. She wasn’t dressed in the usual way that downplayed her femininity. She wore clothes that, while perfectly proper office wear, emphasized and even amplified her raw animal magnetism. His eyes were drawn by the sheer fabric of her blouse to slide over the outline of her breasts, and admire the curves of her waist and hips, her shapely legs, and the way her skirt swayed with the rhythm of her motion.

“Have you got a hot date tonight, or what?” he asked.

Alison’s only reaction was to smile even more broadly; and as she moved to sit down opposite him she seemed to grow a couple of centimeters taller, projecting an air of confidence and control that made no sense to him whatsoever.

“A hot date?” Alison said, her sapphire eyes sparkling with amusement. “No, only McKurn.” She placed her laptop on his desk as she spoke.

“McKurn? You’ve dressed up for McKurn?” He felt embarrassed at the hint of envy in his voice.

Alison’s eyes narrowed, and she laughed. “Of course. Don’t you think his reaction will be the same as yours?”

“Oh, I guess.” Bewildered by her inexplicable confidence, impatiently he said, “Alison! I don’t get it. What’s to smile about?”

“You’ll see. Listen to this,” Alison said, pushing a button on the laptop.

“Gladys?”

“Yes . . . ah, John. Your usual?”

Royn leant forward. “That’s McKurn!”

Alison nodded.

“Of course,” said McKurn.

“It’s your lucky day. We have a new one, almost virginal. Inexperienced but hot.”

The woman’s voice sounded like she was cooing in McKurn’s ear.

“You’ve tapped his phone?”

Alison smiled happily.

“That’s illegal!”

“Very,” Alison agreed.

“Okay.” McKurn’s voice was enthusiastic. “I can hardly wait.”

“You realize, of course, that she’s. . . .”

“It’s worth the risk. Send her over.”

“And who’s the woman?”

“That would be easy enough to find out,” Alison said as she closed the lid of her laptop. “He was calling a call girl agency—Aphrodite’s, it’s called—here in Canberra.”

“Heaven’s above. So the rumors are true.”

“So it seems.”

“How did you get that?” Royn asked.

“Through a friend—” no need to mention it was Olsson’s partner, she thought “—who recommended someone who seems to know what he’s doing.”

“So now I understand what you’re smiling about. With this, we could nail him.”

“Unfortunately, this can’t be used as evidence.”

“No,” said Royn emphatically. “Of course not. But imagine, to catch him in flagrante delicto. . . . Wouldn’t that be something.”

“Yes it would,” Alison agreed. “And at his age, he wouldn’t last very long in jail, either,” she added happily.

“But if the . . . tapping can be traced to you . . . ?” Royn asked worriedly.

Alison shook her head firmly. “There’s no link. No tracks.”

“You’re sure?”

“As sure as I can be.”

She’d found this file—along with half-a-dozen others, mostly mundane calls like ordering pizza, all headed by the phone number called—when she’d checked her encrypted email account the previous evening. Along with another email:

it begins. you’ll get these files automatically. voice activated so you get everything up to you to find the gems. happy listening!

“So who is this guy, this tapper?”

“I actually don’t know. All contact is through cutouts. He—and I’m only assuming it’s a he—doesn’t know who I am and I don’t know who he is. There is one other thing, though.”

“Which is?”

“His services are not cheap. He said information to nail McKurn to the wall would probably run well into six figures. I’ve sent him a ten thousand dollar deposit, but I certainly don’t have hundreds of thousands of dollars to spare.”

“If he keeps producing material like this,” Royn said cheerfully, “no problem.” As he spoke, he felt a warning at the edge of his mind: he could be implicated as an accomplice to illegal activities. With a frown, he resisted the urge to push the thought aside and said, “This puts me in a difficult position, you realize?”

“In what way?”

“As a member of the bar, I’m required to report any evidence of a crime to the police. And as a former Minister for Justice and Customs—effectively, Assistant Attorney-General—if this ever came out I’d have to resign. I might be disbarred as well.”

“I see,” said Alison, studying Royn intently for a sign of where he was heading. “Which is the same as your future if McKurn wins.”

Royn nodded, his face taut with strain.

“What McKurn’s doing is illegal,” Alison said. “Unfortunately, the only way we can fight him is with the same means.”

“I know,” said Royn. “And I also know it’s not as though we have any real choice. But—” Royn leaned forward to emphasize his words, his face solemn “—no one must ever know.”

“No one else will,” Alison said.

“Aside from you and I, there’s only one other person we can trust: Melanie. She has to know. Okay?”

“Certainly, Minister.”

Royn leaned back, the strain disappearing from his face as he nodded. “Good.”

“Thank you, Minister.” She dipped her head in apparent appreciation—to hide any reaction she might show as the memory of a familiar voice flashed into her mind saying, “Does it, Alison? Does the end justify the means?”

“We can feed ideas to the Candyman Inquiry,” said Royn.

“And to the police,” said Alison. “I’ve also asked him if he can trace the ownership of the hotel where the . . . ah . . . video was taken.”

“Good. But it doesn’t solve the problem of what you’re going to say to McKurn when you meet him today. You can’t walk in and play that recording to him as you just did to me.”

“That would be premature,” Alison said. “Here’s what I’ve got in mind. . . .”

*****

FELIKS ILYICH NAZAROV LIKED to say he was named after Lenin and the founder of Lenin’s Cheka, predecessor to the MVD, NKVD, and KGB (his first employer), Feliks Dzerzhinsky. In reality, the patronymic he shared with Vladimir Ilyich Lenin came from his father, as Lenin’s had from his, and his grandfather was named Feliks. Trained as a Spetsnaz assassin, the KGB sent him to Afghanistan where he rose to captain and spent the five happiest years of his life.

The collapse of the Soviet Union left Nazarov at a loose end. After a couple of boring, low-paying, dead-end jobs and a short stint with the Russian mafia, he’d hired himself out as a mercenary, fighting in a variety of African brushfire wars. That’s where he’d teamed up with Mats de Brouw, a young South African Boer who regretted the end of apartheid, and Nick Shultz, an older American, a tough sergeant who’d been cashiered from the U.S. Marine Corps.

The three former mercenaries had moved to Australia where they were hired, five years ago, by a man they’d never met. All contact, including all instructions, was through encrypted email or via mobile phone—never the same number twice. Aside from a few soft “no casualty” standover tactics, usually to get information, they had spent most of their time shadowing, taking pictures or making recordings of people making drug sales, cops and other minor officials accepting bribes, and members of various underworld gangs plying their trade.

Today’s mission was different: to liberate Derek Olsson from the prison van taking him to court. To complicate matters, their instructions came with the usual caveat from their unknown employer: no casualties. So Nazarov armed his team with tranquilizer guns of the kind usually used to capture wild animals.

De Brouw trailed the van along Anzac Parade from Long Bay Jail on a motorbike, giving a running commentary via walkie-talkie. Nazarov, dressed as a policeman sitting on what looked like a police motorcycle, was parked on the median strip at the intersection where they planned the ambush. Also on the median strip, Shultz waited in the “wrecker”—a tractor with a jack-hammer on its long front arm that could pound its way through the prison van’s weak point: the bullet-proof glass. Four “young punks” (as Shultz described them), also on motorbikes, carried chocks to immobilize the van when it stopped at the red light. They were also armed with tranquilizer guns.

Nazarov, Shultz, and de Brouw all carried pistols as well—despite the “no casualties” instructions. Assuming a tranquilizer gun scored a hit, it could take fifteen minutes for the sedative to take effect.

“Roadwork ahead,” de Brouw’s South African-accented voice crackled over the radio. “The van’s slowed to a crawl.”

“Okay,” Nazarov replied.

“Holy shit!” De Brouw was now shouting. “The road workers are fakes. It’s a setup. They’re after the van. Surrounded it. They’re wearing masks and carrying guns—not popguns! A truck is blocking the intersection.”

“Where are you?” Nazarov said. “Exactly.”

“Anzac Parade. Middle of a block, three, maybe four lights from you. There’s a railing along the center strip blocking the van from getting to the other side.”

“Not far. Everyone. Get there as fast as you can. Two, dump the wrecker and take the getaway van down there.”

“Two, on the way,” said Shultz.

“Everyone else, count off so I know you’ve heard me.”

A straggle of “Seven,” “Five,” “Six,” crackled over the air.

“Four!” Nazarov screamed. “Wake up.”

“I’ve had a problem—”

“Who gives a damn? Just get your arse moving.”

“Where do we have to go?”

Jesus, Nazarov groaned to himself. This sure isn’t a crack Spetsnaz team. “Just head south till you see a truck blocking the other side of the road.”

“Okay, got it.”

Nazarov revved up his motorbike and switched on his siren. Blue lights flashing, he weaved across the traffic heading to the center of Sydney and when he got to the other side of the road he twisted the accelerator hard.

“Just remember, you guys,” Nazarov said as he expertly skidded the bike around a car moving out of his way too slowly, “I’m the cop on the BMW motorcycle with the sunglasses. The real cops are probably on the way. Shoot me by mistake, you don’t get paid. Got it?”

This time, they counted off almost in unison.

“Three,” Nazarov said to de Brouw. “How many are there?”

“Eight or nine.”

“Weapons?”

“Shotguns. And a couple of AK-47s.”

“Oh, shit.”

“They’re standing guard around the van. Two of them are doing something under the back door.”

“Can you get under cover and start picking them off?”

“No problem. Plenty of stalled cars.”

“Okay. But wait till at least two more of our guys are there. Otherwise they’ll all come after you.”

“They’ve shot a cop,” de Brouw yelled. “A cop came up on a motorbike and they just gunned him down.”

“So now you know who we’re dealing with,” Nazarov said.

“What do you mean?” someone asked.

“They shoot to kill—so keep your heads down.”

“They’ve got the back door open,” De Brouw said, his tone now measured. “They’ve thrown something in and are leaning on the door.”

“Gas, I bet,” said Nazarov. “Aside from Three, who’s in position?”

“I am—Five.”

“Seven, almost there.”

“Five and Three, line up on a target. Seven, as soon as you’re in position—and make it quick—give the order to fire. Report.”

“Three, ready.”

“Five, ready.”

The radio crackled again. “Seven, fire.”

Unlike rifles and pistols, the single-shot tranquilizer guns, powered with compressed carbon-dioxide gas, were noiseless. If the men got their heads down fast, their targets would have no idea what hit them, or where the shots came from.

“Two hits, I think,” said de Brouw. “One guy’s having trouble standing up. They’re all looking around, puzzled, as though they can’t figure out what hit them.”

“Good,” said Nazarov. “Reload—fast. Two, Four, Six, report when you’re in position.”

“Here,” said someone.

“Identify yourself, goddammit.”

“Four.”

Of course.

“They’re opening the back door of the van. They’re pulling someone out.”

“Six, ready.”

Nazarov could see a truck slant-ways across the opposite lane, just past the intersection ahead—and heard sirens in the distance coming, it seemed, from every direction. He switched off his siren and braked sharply to a crawl, coming to a halt just across the intersection, about fifty meters from the truck. A wide, grassy median strip divided the three lanes in each direction. He jumped the bike across the kerb onto the median strip where a handful of trees gave him some shelter. The other side of the strip was blocked by a chest-high railing, which began just past a pedestrian crossing. He could see one broken headlight of the van, which looked as though it had smashed into the side of the truck; three figures wearing road workers’ orange tunics were clearly visible. He fixed their positions firmly in his mind and began to reach for the tranquilizer gun strapped to his back.

I don’t think the “no casualties” order applies to these thugs, he thought.

He pulled his 17-shot Glock semi-automatic from its holster.

“Two,” Shultz’s American-accented voice drawled, “I’m in position right across the road from the van.”

Nazarov looked up and could see the getaway van parked near the pedestrian crossing opposite the truck.

“Two, stay put and wait for my signal to move. Everybody else, select a target and wait for my instruction. Three, what’s happening now?”

“They’ve got someone unconscious and look like they’re ready to carry him somewhere.”

“Which direction?”

“Across the median strip, I think.”

“Okay.” He crouched forward to lie on top of the bike, his pistol at the ready. “Ready . . . ” he ordered, “. . . aim . . . ” With his other hand he gunned the throttle. “. . . fire now.” The BMW surged forward through the trees and as it accelerated he guided it towards the beginning of the railing, squeezing off shots which went wild but forced the thugs to keep their heads down.

“Some cop has just shot at them,” de Brouw said in his ear. “One of them’s down.”

“That’s me,” Nazarov said.

“We hit one more . . . no, two more.”

Nazarov was too busy to reply. As he closed in on the prison van he planted one foot hard on the brake and pushed upwards with both feet, letting go of the bike as it smashed into the railing. He cleared the railing to see that he was flying straight towards one of the gunmen, who was swinging his shotgun in his direction. Nazarov squeezed off a couple of shots and smashed into the man, using the man’s body to cushion his landing. He continued his forward movement into a roll, which ended with him squatting on the ground, his pistol aimed at the thug. One more shot finished him off.

“Anyone behind me? Three, can you tell?”

Inside the van, two uniformed prison officers lay, unmoving, on the floor.

“They’ve seen you,” said de Brouw. “They’re turning back to fire at you.”

Without looking back, Nazarov dived into the back of the prison van, pulling the door half-closed behind him. As he moved he could hear the thunk of bullets and the peppering of buckshot around him, followed by a rattle of impacts on the door. He kept his head down as a stray bullet ricocheted around the inside of the van.

“Three. What’s happening now?”

The airwaves were silent, but he could hear the faint sound of sirens in the distance.

“Three. Three. Come in.”

He realized the thick metal of the van’s body was blocking radio contact. He carefully peeked out the back of the van. “. . . come in, come in . . . ” De Brouw’s voice cracked with static.

“I can hear you now. What’s happening?”

“Four of them are carrying the prisoner across the other side of the road.”

“Two, can you see what kind of car they’re taking, and the number plate?”

“Two, will do.”

“Watch out,” said Three. “There’s one coming to the back door. And he’s got an AK-47.”

“Everyone, pick him off if you can. Two, use your pistol.”

He transferred the Glock to his left hand and as he saw the end of an AK-47 poke into the van he fired a few shots low, underneath the door.

“He’s down. I got another,” said de Brouw.

“Any others still up and about?” the Russian asked.

“Not that I can see.”

“Take a closer look.”

After a moment, de Brouw said, “All clear.”

“Okay.” Nazarov stepped carefully out of the van. “The cops are on the way. We gotta get out of here fast. Three, get on your bike and follow their car. Stay back.”

“No problem,” said de Brouw.

“And dump the dart gun.”

“Okay.”

“Four, Five, Six, Seven, pick up two of the unconscious bodies—not the dead ones. And carry them to the median strip. And run.”

“Two here,” Shultz said. “They’re in a blue panel van. AY-something—number plate’s dirty. They’ve just taken off.”

“Three, I see it.”

The other four members of his team picked up two orange-clad “road workers” and carried them the to the median strip. “Two, get moving.”

The getaway van’s engine screamed as it accelerated across the road with a squeal of tyres, braking to a halt in the middle of the pedestrian crossing. Nazarov ran across the grass and opened the back door. “Throw those scum in the back,” he ordered. “And get in too.”

He jumped into the front seat beside Shultz. The others piled in after him, and the van accelerated down the street as a policeman on a motorbike came roaring towards them, more police cars a few hundred meters further along the road.

“Slow down,” Nazarov ordered. He leant out the window and fired three shots in quick succession as the policeman turned his bike towards the van, aiming for the motorcycle’s tyres. One bullet grazed the rear tyre; the policemen skidded out of control, smashed into the kerb where he was thrown to a reasonably soft landing on the grass of the median strip.

“Go.”

“We’ll be followed,” said Shultz as he accelerated down a side street with a screech of tyres skidding on the tarmac.

Nazarov nodded, and turned to look at the four men behind him. “Leave the dart guns and strip off to your shirts and we’ll drop you off up the road so you can disappear.”

“When do we get paid?” asked one of them.

Nazarov took four envelopes from the glove box and handed them to the four “young punks.” “That’s part payment. The rest in a day or two, at the usual place. I’ll call you.”

“This is only about a quarter of what we agreed,” said one of the men as he riffled through the bills in the envelope. “Why should we trust you for the rest?”

Nazarov shrugged. “Look, nothing went according to plan, including the final payment. Sorry, but I’ve got some other business I have to take care of first.” He jerked his thumb towards the back of the van where the two bodies lay.

The van turned another corner and jerked to a stop in the middle of the road, a car coming up behind them honking as it, too, pulled to a halt. Nazarov turned his head to glare at the four men, who were muttering to each other, eyeing their employer with suspicion. “If you like, we could sit here all day and argue about it . . . and let the police catch us. So I suggest you get moving now.”

Grumbling, the men got out. Now dressed indistinguishably from people wandering along the sidewalk, they melded into the crowd and disappeared from view.

“Wait,” said Nazarov. Still in his full policeman’s uniform and helmet, he pulled the visor down, stepped out of the van and walked slowly towards the car behind. The driver’s angry expression disappeared, to be replaced with a worried, fawning look. Nazarov calmly pulled out his Glock, shot out the car’s front tyres, and jumped into van’s back seat.

“Go! That will stall the cops for a few minutes.”

Shultz nodded.

“And can you remember this number?” He reeled off the number plate of the car he’d just turned into a roadblock. “The boss will, no doubt, want to compensate the driver for the damage.”

“Strange man,” the driver drawled.

“Indeed,” Nazarov agreed as he leant over the back of the seat. “Let’s see what we’ve got here.”

He tore the masks off the two unconscious men.

“Ah,” he said as he took off his helmet. “Asians, both of them—Chinese maybe? . . . Let me know if Mats calls in.”

Shultz nodded.

Nazarov turned the two men face down and tied their hands behind their back. “No ID, no nothing,” he said as he ran his hands over their bodies and checked all their pockets. Then he threw a blanket over the two bodies to hide them from prying eyes and pulled out his cellphone to dial a number. A muffled voice answered after one ring.

“Somebody else snatched him,” said Nazarov. “We’re following them.”

“Any idea who?” The voice was hard to understand, mainly from the distorter the man at the other end was using to make sure his voice couldn’t be identified. Nazarov knew the number he had just called was a pre-paid SIM card which would be thrown away after this operation, just as his would be.

“We grabbed two of them. Chinese most likely.”

There was a long pause at the other end. “I see,” said the man slowly. “Find him.”

“We will. And when these bodies talk I’ll let you know what they say.” Turning to Schultz, he asked, “How much further till we get to the garage?”

“About a click and a half. These damn Sydney streets though—nothing in a straight line. We have to go back on the main road for about two blocks, which will put us right in the middle of the traffic heading for the city.”

“No other way?”

“Nyet, tovarisch,” Shultz grinned.

Nazarov knew from long experience that when Shultz said there’s no other way, there was no other way. “We’ll just have to chance it, then.”

“We’ll pay them guys off, just like we promised?” asked Shultz.

“Of course,” said Nazarov, “but not in the way they expect.”

“That’ll be fun,” Shultz laughed. “We’ll be doing a public service. We should get a medal.”

Nazarov joined in his laughter. “Well,” he said, “that little exercise sure beat taking pictures.”

“Damn right. Almost like being back in Africa—for ten minutes.”

“Not as young as I used to be though.” Nazarov rubbed his shoulder as he spoke. A thick, heavy-set man in his mid-forties with hardly a gram of fat on his body, he been leading a sedentary life compared to his time as a soldier. “Bumped my shoulder when I landed.”

“I’m glad I got the soft, air-conditioned job,” Shultz, ten years older than his captain, said with a smile. “You did damn well, considering.”

“Yes, it went well . . . considering we were beaten to the punch.”

12 The Siren’s Song

BREATHING DEEPLY, ALISON MCGUIRE stretched out her hands and examined them carefully in the mirror.

They weren’t shaking. . . . Well, she thought, not noticeably.

She finished retouching her makeup, added a whiff of perfume behind her ears, and straightened her skirt for the third time. She again practiced a few movements—a minute, almost imperceptible flutter of the eyelids; a slight wettening of her lips that made them glisten; a sway of the hips that made her skirt swing and lift just above her knees. She admired the way her black, high-heeled shoes emphasized her shapely legs and ankles; at the same time she evaluated her reflection in the way she imagined a man would look at a woman.

I’m as ready as I’ll ever be, she thought.

With another deep breath she walked slowly out of the bathroom and into the corridor; although she’d just washed and carefully dried her hands, her palms were already damp with perspiration.

As she walked through the palatial suite of the President of the Senate into McKurn’s office she replayed in her mind the words of her tennis coach: “Anyone can hit a ball, Alison. Good players control the ball. But great players use the ball to control how their opponent moves.”

“ALISON,” MCKURN SAID WITH a smile, his eyes widening as he looked at her with undisguised appreciation.

With a nod of her head, Alison walked towards the visitor’s chair, while McKurn came out from behind his desk. “Let’s sit over there,” he said, indicating the armchairs in one corner, “where it’s more comfortable.”

“Thank you, Senator,” Alison said with the warm smile she’d practiced in the mirror, continuing to move towards the same chair she’d sat in the week before, “but for the moment I’d feel more comfortable here . . . if that’s okay with you.”

“As you wish,” McKurn said, his tone of voice indicating disappointment. As McKurn turned back to his desk he said, “Well, you’ve had a week to consider my proposition. Do you have your answer?”

“Indeed I do, Senator.”

“And it is . . . ?”

“Yes . . . but.”

“But?” said McKurn, his voice rising in surprise. “You’re in no position to make any conditions, Alison.”

“On the contrary, Senator,” Alison said with as much conviction as she could muster, “you’re in no position to refuse them.”

“Really?” McKurn said with a laugh.

“If you really want what you say you want.” As she spoke, she sat slightly straighter, pulling her shoulders back as she moved; at the same time she slowly crossed her legs. As one leg moved over the other, her skirt slipped up to expose her knees.

Captured by the flash of her skin, McKurn’s eyes caressed Alison’s legs at the same time as his face reddened with anger at her words.

But Alison smiled invitingly as she moved her body—showing no response to his festering rage—and McKurn’s anger faded as his eyes followed Alison’s movements. He shrugged. “It will, at least, be amusing to hear whatever you have in mind.”

“First of all,” said Alison, surprised the nervous flutter in her stomach didn’t color her tone of voice, “I’ve reserved one of the smaller conference rooms. I’d really prefer to continue our discussion there.”

“I certainly don’t think so,” said McKurn firmly.

Alison shrugged. “It’s your choice.”

McKurn laughed. “Why on earth should I move from here?”

Alison leant forward slightly, pleased to note how McKurn’s eyes followed the movement of her breasts. “A short walk along the corridor is all I’m asking, Senator,” she said in an inviting voice, her eyes looking at him warmly. “Such a small matter, Senator, to indulge me in. Hardly worth losing everything over, is it?”

“Alison,” McKurn said, chuckling. “You don’t trust me. I should be offended.” He spread his arms wide. “I assure you, there is no recording equipment of any kind in this office.”

Alison smiled. “You see right through me, Senator,” she said as she slowly, languidly, uncrossed her legs and rose to her feet. “Allow me to lead the way, Senator.”

She could feel McKurn’s eyes on her back as she walked towards the door, her skirt swaying with a slightly exaggerated movement of her hips. With a hand on the doorknob she half-turned so McKurn could see her body in profile, and tempted him with her gaze. “Come,” she said, softly.

“And if I don’t?”

“You should remember that the moment you post that video,” she said calmly, “I’ve got nothing to lose.”

“And what is that supposed to mean?”

Alison smiled modestly. “I assure you, Senator,” she said matter-of-factly, as if she were talking about the weather, “that you really don’t want to find out.”

McKurn settled deeper into his chair. But as Alison opened the door and took a slow but determined step through, she could see that his gaze was transfixed. After a moment of indecisiveness, his eyes won his internal debate and he said, sourly, “Okay, have it your way. But we’ll use a different conference room.”

“I’M LISTENING,” MCKURN SAID irritably, as he shifted his body this way and that, trying to find a comfortable position in the creaky conference room chair . . . and failing.

Alison sat calmly on the other side of the glass-topped conference table, her legs crossed to expose her knees, the chair set back a little from the table to ensure they would be in McKurn’s field of vision.

“Certainly Senator,” she said meekly. “First of all, there’s a serious obstacle relating to the video. . . .”

“You mean,” said McKurn chuckling, “that I have it?”

“Aside from that, Senator,” Alison smiled. “Just how many copies are there? Who, aside from you, has one? Who else has seen it? And how can I be certain there aren’t any other copies floating around?”

“I have absolute trust in the people working for me,” said McKurn coldly.

“Unfortunately, Senator, that is not a good enough reason for me to also trust them. I can’t agree to anything if there’s the slightest danger someone else might release that video just for kicks.”

“I’m afraid, Alison, you’ll just have to accept my word.”

“I’m sorry, Senator, but you’re asking far more than I can give. But if that’s your final decision. . . .” Alison shrugged indifferently.

McKurn leaned forward, his eyes focusing on her face rather than her body, searching her expression, trying to gauge her intent.

Alison sat calmly, waiting.

“You know what will happen if you leave now,” McKurn exploded.

Observing him distantly, Alison smiled at him coldly. “Indeed I do, Senator. And I’ve had a whole week to think about it.”

Then she leaned forward, gazing girlishly into McKurn’s eyes. “Is what I’m asking so unreasonable, Senator? And in fact,” she said, slowly straightening her body while holding his gaze, “what I’m asking is as much for your own safety as it is for mine.”

“Really?” McKurn laughed. “It’s hard for me to believe you’d have the slightest concern for my safety.”

“This happens to be a matter where our interests coincide. For example, if I were to accuse you of blackmail now, who’d believe me?”

McKurn grunted. “No one, of course.”

“Right,” said Alison. “But if the video is released after I’ve been acting as your . . . spy, it would be a very different story. Then you could be implicated in far more than just blackmail . . . and everything you’ve spent your whole life building would come tumbling down.”

McKurn was listening intently, Alison noted with a feeling of quiet satisfaction, as if she’d come up with an angle that hadn’t occurred to him.

“And I’m sure,” Alison continued, “that jail is not where you plan to while away the last years of your life.”

“Most certainly not,” said McKurn forcefully. “Okay,” he snapped. “I’ll think about it. Anything else you want?”

“Thank you, Senator,” Alison said with a demure nod of her head. She took a moment to collect her thoughts. “Yes, just one other thing: if you want me to be instrumental in making your side the winning team—which is, after all, what you’re asking—I want to be rewarded commensurately. I’m not interested in being treated like . . . say, a secretary, who merely follows instructions.”

“And what kind of reward do you have in mind?” McKurn asked, a hint of eagerness in his voice.

“You’re in your seventies, Senator, so when you retire I’ll still be in my prime.” Alison leaned towards McKurn, her eyes intense, one hand outstretched as though she were grasping for something. “So I’m asking you to make me the number two in your organization.”

The tone of her voice hardened as she added, making a statement of fact rather than request, “When you retire, I will take over.”

McKurn jerked back in surprise and laughed, a long and deep jovial belly laugh that invited Alison to join in. As his laugh died into a wide smile he wiped a tear away from one eye. “So I was right,” he murmured so softly that Alison had to strain to catch his words. “We are cut from the same cloth.”

Alison felt herself beginning to relax, and quickly stopped herself. But she nodded her head in a small, almost imperceptible movement, as though she was indicating her agreement.

McKurn leant one elbow on the table and rested his chin on his hand, gazing at Alison as if he was seeing something in her he had not expected to find. “There’s just one problem with that, my dear.” He now appeared relaxed and at ease. “Once you become familiar with my operations, how can I be sure you won’t turn on me?”

“You’ll just have to trust me, Senator,” Alison said with a wide grin, leaning forward slightly and straightening her shoulders as she spoke.

McKurn laughed. “I didn’t get here,” he said seriously, but with no menace in his voice, “by trusting anybody. And I’m certainly not going to start now.”

“Of course not,” Alison agreed.

“If I agree—if, mind you—how can you be sure I won’t get what I want, but freeze you out at the same time?”

“That’s a chance I’m willing to take,” Alison smiled, watching the way McKurn’s eyes followed her as she leant deeper into her chair. “After all, who else in your organization, aside from you, is any match for me? Cracken? Don’t make me laugh.”

“You certainly have the potential,” McKurn said admiringly. “Yes, Alison, I have to grant you that.” He nodded as he spoke. “That’s certainly an interesting idea, one I’ll give some thought to.”

“So if my two requests are agreeable, Senator, then I will become your . . . informant, and your willing assistant.”

McKurn nodded, as if he were indicating his asset. “But, Alison,” he said, “aren’t you forgetting something?”

“I think not,” Alison said, suddenly turning cold.

“Oh yes, my dear,” said McKurn. “There’s one crucial part of my proposal you’ve omitted to mention.”

Alison shook her head. “That’s not something I can . . . bring myself to do.”

McKurn spread his arms on the table. “At my age do you really think I care deeply whether or not Cracken becomes prime minister? Or what happens to Royn—or you, for that matter? Or that I really give a damn who steps into my shoes when I’m gone?” McKurn shook his head sadly. “It’s just a game, Alison. It didn’t start that way, of course, but when you’ve been playing the same game as long as I have, it loses most of its excitement.” He leaned forward as if to emphasize his words, a smile on his face as his eyes seemed to catch fire. “Do you understand what I’m saying? What really keeps me going?”

Alison nodded, recalling the sound of McKurn’s voice on the recording she’d played for Royn earlier that morning. Yes, you bastard, she thought, I understand all too well.

“So you see, Alison, my offer to you is a seamless whole. It’s all or it’s nothing, capisce?”

Alison had prepared herself for this moment . . . so she’d thought. But her muscles refused to respond to her commands and she cringed away from him fearfully. As she desperately tried to regain her self-control, she was aware that McKurn had begun to breathe heavily, his eyes glittering, his expression face a study in intensity as it seemed that, for a brief moment, the primary focus of his attention had become her emotional reaction.

Though she already knew how she was going to respond, she felt the words choking in her throat.

She forced herself to speak. “Okay, Senator,” she said, her eyes downcast, “if you agree to my two conditions.”

For the first time, McKurn’s six-foot-five frame seemed comfortable in the too-small chair. His face lit into a self-satisfied smile as he gazed at her approvingly.

“But once is all you get.”

McKurn raised an eyebrow, but nodded slowly.

“Then I believe we have what lawyers would call ‘Heads of Agreement’.” Alison said, her self-control slowly returning. “Would you like me to type them up so we can both sign off?”

McKurn roared with laughter. “I hardly think that will be necessary.”

“Since we are agreed, in principle,” Alison said, her mouth in a wry smile as her eyes studied McKurn coolly, “let me know when I can inspect your security procedures. A week from today, perhaps?”

McKurn chuckled. “If not sooner,” he said rising to his feet and stretching his long arm across the table, “and it will be a very pleasant change to be working with someone as quick and as charming as you.”

“Thank you, Senator,” Alison said with a tiny flutter of her eyelids. As she also stood, she covertly wiped the palm of her hand on the back of her chair and, willing the muscles in her arm to stay rock-steady, she reached across the table to shake his proffered hand.

*****

NOT FAR FROM THE intersection where Nazarov had planned to ambush the prison van, Shultz had rented a double garage. The SUV, which Shultz and de Brouw had stolen that very morning, was now parked there next to a Volvo station wagon.

“Where will we take them?” Shultz asked as the two men transferred the still-sleeping bodies of the two Asian men into the back of the Volvo.

“Good question,” said Nazarov. “What’s the latest from Mats?”

“Still heading south.”

“Why?” Nazarov asked himself. “They have a hideout, or they’re going to move him somewhere. Boat or plane. I can’t think of anything else—can you?”

“Nope.”

“And these guys?”

“Pump them for information and get rid of them as fast as we can.”

Shultz nodded, and seeing Nazarov suddenly deep in thought, he began vacuuming the inside of the SUV; then carefully wiped all the vehicle’s surfaces to remove any trace of their presence. As Shultz was replacing the fake number plates on the SUV with the originals, Nazarov announced, “We’ll leave them here, along with the dart guns—if we can wake them up now.”

Shultz was looking in the back of the Volvo. “One of them’s stirring.”

They levered the younger Asian man out of the Volvo and propped him up on a rickety stool. Using water from a dirty basin at the back of the garage, Shultz poured it over the man’s face, and his eyes slowly opened.

Still dressed as a policeman, Nazarov lounged on the side of the Volvo as Shultz stood near the man. “I thought we should have a little, private chat before taking you down to the station.”

Breathing heavily, the man’s head twisted left and right to take in his surroundings; his eyes flicked warily at Shultz and came to rest on Nazarov. He opened his mouth and mumbled something incomprehensible as though he had trouble controlling his voice.

“Sorry,” said Nazarov. “What did you say?”

With a deep breath, the man tried again. “Lawyer,” he spluttered. “Wanna lawyer.”

“There’s plenty of time for that,” Nazarov said with a smile. “A policeman has been murdered. When that happens, we use everything we can to find the culprit.”

“I had nothing to do with it.”

Nazarov nodded kindly, noting the Chinese man’s Australian accent.

“We think it was one of the others,” he said gently. “Ballistics, of course, will tell the story, won’t they? But, you see—” he leant forward and spoke more softly “—you were a member of the gang, no question of that. So you could still be charged with aiding and abetting murder. What’s the penalty?” he asked, looking to Shultz. “Seven to ten years?”

“Something like that,” Shultz drawled. As Shultz spoke, a puzzled look crossed the man’s face.

“On the other hand, you could turn state’s evidence, and we could arrange a deal where you get off with a light sentence—perhaps just probation.”

The man shook his head violently, his eyes fearful. “No!” he said emphatically.

Nazarov shrugged. “How old are you? Mid-twenties?”

The young man nodded. “Twenty-six.”

“All those years ahead of you. Pity to spend the next ten of them in jail, wouldn’t you say?”

The man just shrugged blankly, appearing indifferent to the choice.

“So,” Nazarov continued conversationally, “which triad gang do you belong to?”

Again, the man shook his head violently. “I want a lawyer,” he demanded. “I know my rights.”

“Of course,” said Nazarov. “When we get to the station. Right now, the only right you have is the right to answer my questions.”

“You’re not really policemen.”

“What makes you think so?” Nazarov asked, a pained expression on his face.

“You’ve got rules you’re supposed to follow, and this ain’t in the rules.”

“Quite so,” Nazarov agreed. “But there are times when we, ah—bend the rules a little. And hunting for a cop-killer is one of those times. Don’t worry. When we get down to the station, no one will believe you if you tell them about our little diversion. There’ll be no evidence—no bruises, if you know what I mean—to support it. So . . . which triad?”

The man’s mouth tightened and he shook his head.

Nazarov nodded to Shultz.

With a quick, sudden movement, Shultz stuffed an oily rag into the Asian man’s mouth as the fist of his other hand swung down hard on the man’s crotch. Muffled as he was, the man’s scream still echoed through the garage. Panting hard through the gag, tears came into his eyes as he struggled to pull his hands free. Failing to loosen his bonds, he shifted his position and crossed his legs to protect himself.

“As I was saying,” said Nazarov, appearing not to have taken any notice of Shultz’s punch, “which triad do you belong to?”

Shultz pulled the rag away from the man’s mouth and held a fist near the man’s face. Gulping for air, he cringed away from Shultz, and turned to look at Nazarov with a silent appeal for help. As he saw the faint smile on Nazarov’s face his shoulders slumped.

“The Golden Dragon,” he sighed

“And where were you going to take the prisoner?”

“I don’t know. No! Don’t hurt me,” he sobbed as Shultz brought his fist to within an inch of his eyes. “I’m just a foot soldier. Nobody tells me anything except to give orders—and I follow them. That’s all. I don’t know anything else, honest.”

“Would your friend know?” Nazarov asked, motioning with his head to the back of the Volvo.

“He might.” The man was babbling now. “But he doesn’t speak much English. He came here from Hong Kong just a week ago.”

“Any others from Hong Kong?”

“Yes. Four. Real tough guys, every one of them.” He shivered as he spoke. “They were in charge of the operation. Like I said, I just did what I was told.”

Nazarov nodded but said nothing. The prisoner looked alternately at Shultz grinning at him and Nazarov deep in thought, their silence more unnerving than Shultz’s sudden violence. “Ask me anything else you like,” he said to fill the vacuum with sound. “Anything you want to know I’ll tell you—if I can.”

“Who’s your boss?”

“Ultimately, some guy in Hong Kong. I’ve no idea who. The Sydney boss was Vincent Leung.”

“Was?”

The man nodded. “He was killed a couple of weeks ago. Murdered. By that Olsson character. You know, the one in the van.”

“We’d need an interpreter to talk to the other guy?”

“That’s right,” the man nodded vigorously.

“Chinese?”

“Yes. Cantonese.”

“Well, thank you,” said Nazarov with a smile as he stood upright. “I guess we’ll have to wait until we get to the station where we’ll have a translator available.”

Nazarov looked at his former sergeant and nodded his head slightly. Alerted by the movement, the man lifted his head to look at Shultz. At the same time, Shultz grabbed the man’s hair and jerked his head back. Shultz’s other hand reached into his boot and came out with a thin knife lovingly and painstakingly sharpened to a needle-point, both edges sharper than razors. A look of realization flashed on the man’s face but his scream turned into a gurgle as Shultz rammed his knife upwards into the man’s throat, penetrating the brain.

“Where shall we put them?” Shultz asked as he wiped his knife clean on the man’s clothes.

“In the van. Keep the smell down so no one will notice it for a few weeks.”

“Of course, tovarisch.”

*****

DETECTIVE-INSPECTOR RUDI DURANT closed his cellphone with a sharp crack that rang out like a rifle shot in the silent corridor outside the courtroom. At the sound his assistant, Detective-Sergeant Simon Lee, sitting on the bench beside him, looked up with surprise but kept his face blank, saying nothing, when he saw Durant’s expression. Durant stood and, as Lee began to follow suit, Durant indicated “wait” with a vague wave of his hand.

A solidly built, barrel-chested man in his mid-fifties, Durant moved with surprising speed into the courtroom where he leant down to exchange a few whispered words with the crown prosecutor. A few moments later he charged out at the same speed with the quick, long steps of a long-distance marathon runner.

“Let’s go,” he said as he passed Lee.

“Where?” Lee asked as he jumped up to follow, running, despite his longer legs, to catch up to his boss. Durant didn’t answer, but dialled a number on his cellphone as he sped through the corridors which connected to the police station behind the court building and into the parking lot on the other side, Lee always a couple of steps behind.

Durant’s steely-grey hair was cropped short like a new army recruit’s, and the suit he wore had clearly seen better days. But one look from his cold, hard eyes was enough to make even a hardened criminal flinch. His bearing was one of a man of authority, used to command; senior police officers found themselves automatically moving out of his way as he tore through the corridors as if he was the only person in the building.

“Anzac Parade,” he grunted to Lee as they got into their car. “And pull out all the stops.” Lee grinned as he switched on the siren and gunned the engine.

“Super,” Durant said into the phone. “Durant. Olsson’s been grabbed, out of the prison van on the way to court. . . . Right. And a constable has been murdered. . . . Yes, that’s exactly what I was going to ask you. Thanks. I’m on my way.”

“Olsson’s been what?” Lee asked in surprise as Durant closed his phone.

“Snatched,” said Durant angrily. “Right out from under our noses.”

“And a policeman’s been murdered, you said?”

“Right. There was some kind of gun battle and now you know everything I know. The Super’s agreed to put our names down for the task force that will be set up to get Olsson back where he belongs.”

Lee nodded as he punched a long blast from his horn at a car ahead, which was too slow to get out of his way.

“Bastards,” Durant said irritably, smashing his fist on the car’s door as he spoke. “But we’ll find them.”

Lee knew why Durant was boiling: they’d been waiting in the court to give evidence in Derek Olsson’s trial and now, when it looked certain Olsson was about to be put away for a long, long time, Durant’s most high-profile arrest in a lengthy and distinguished career had slipped through his fingers at the last moment.

Anzac Parade was a long four- to six-lane divided thoroughfare starting at Centennial Park near the outskirts of the city which ran past Long Bay Jail to the south. The pile-up of traffic ahead was the first sign they were nearing the crime scene: despite the siren—and theirs was not the only one, as all officers who could be spared converged from all over the city—it took them some fifteen minutes to cover the last few kilometers. They walked the last couple of blocks—past so many cars, vans, motorcycles, and other police vehicles it looked like a parking lot for a police convention.

The whole block along the carriageway where the stationary, and now empty, prison van still stood had been cordoned off. Cars trapped behind the van were still stuck there as untangling the traffic was not at the top of the list of police priorities.

Four ambulances had been called. A paramedic from the first one to arrive was directed to the policeman whose motorcycle had been shot out from under him. His bike had skidded into the median strip as a bullet shredded the rear tyre. But apart from feeling slightly dazed and suffering from a few minor bruises and a severely damaged pride, he was unhurt.

The other paramedics surrounded an Asian man in black who lay on the asphalt behind the prison van. He was semi-conscious and breathing with difficulty. Blood was oozing from his chest and the bicep of his left arm. After a police photographer took pictures for the record, the medics quickly established that his blood pressure was low and cut away his clothing, exposing bullet wounds in his chest and arm. Covering his nose and mouth with an oxygen mask, they taped sterile gauze bandages over the wounds and gently lifted him into a stretcher. In moments the ambulance was speeding, its sirens blaring, in the direction of the nearest hospital.

The second ambulance slowly carried away the dead policeman, its lights flashing silently as though in tribute, while the third one carried a man who seemed to be coming out of some drug-induced coma to hospital, and the fourth took three dead hijackers to the morgue with no ceremony whatsoever.

Meanwhile, senior police officers interviewed the prison guards—including the two from the back of the van who, though groggy, insisted they were all right—while others fanned out to collect any evidence they could find and interview bystanders and drivers and record contact information in case they were needed for further questioning or, at some time in the future, as witnesses in court. One driver described the gun battle—admitting he hadn’t seen everything as he’d ducked down under the steering wheel of his car when the bullets started to fly. When another bystander confirmed the story of a motorcycle policeman shooting two of the men attacking the prison van, police radios across the city called for the policeman in question to come forward.

None ever did.

Simon Lee was directed to join the team of officers interviewing witnesses while Durant’s eyes roved over the scene, examining every detail as he walked slowly towards the police van where Superintendent Norman Bates, the local area commander—lac for short—had set up a temporary headquarters.

“Ah, Rudi,” Bates said as he saw Durant. “Your man, I believe.”

“He was. And he will be again.”

“You’ll be on the task force then?”

Durant nodded. “The Super said he’d get me on. So mind if I look around?”

“No worries.”

“I’ve never seen a gun like this,” Durant said, pointing to the tranquilizer gun that, along with a couple of shotguns, an AK-47, shell casings, and the baker’s dozen of darts gathered from around the van, were laid out on the roadway encased in plastic evidence bags. “What is it?”

When a constable who’d been born on a farm explained Durant simply shook his head in disbelief. “Inaccurate, unreliable—and silent, you say?” The constable nodded. “What’s the point?”

Shrugging, and shaking his head, the constable indicated the darts. “That’s far too many darts for one of these guns to fire in a short time, so there must have been more than one shooter.”

“Thanks,” Durant nodded. Turning to Bates he asked, “Any idea yet how they got him out of the van?”

“Too early to say,” Bates replied, “but it looks like an inside job.”

“And no sign of this mysterious policeman?”

Bates shook his head. “He must have been a fake—no real cop would have left the scene. At least, not without calling in.”

“Right,” said Durant, and turned to survey the whole area. After a moment, he walked slowly back and forth through the parked cars trying to reconstruct the sequence of events in his mind based solely on what he could see: he’d get the interview reports later. Drivers whose progress to the city and their jobs had been blocked for more than an hour glared at him as he walked by; Durant ignored them as he committed the position of the van and the roadwork ahead signs to memory, and studied the remains of a BMW motorcycle wrapped around the now-bent railing.

Half an hour later, alternately nodding and shaking his head, he returned to the police van where the evidence was being packed up for transport to the labs. “Any chance of a preliminary report tomorrow?” he asked one of the ballistics team.

“We’ll rush it, sir,” said a sergeant who recognized Durant, “but it will still take a week or more, especially considering how much there is to analyze.”

Durant nodded, imperfectly masking his impatience. The sergeant smiled. “I know, sir, you want instant results; we want to make sure we have everything a hundred percent right first.”

“That’s the way it is,” Durant agreed.

“I doubt we’ll have time to write anything up by tomorrow. Give us a call and we’ll tell you whatever we can.”

“Thanks, I’ll do just that,” Durant said.

*****

THE PRESSES IN THE basement rumbled to a stop. On the fifteenth floor, Sir Philip French felt the faint vibration cease. His eyes flicked to the clock on the wall. On cue, his door flew open and a messenger sprinted in and dropped the afternoon edition of Friday’s Sydney Today on his desk. The messenger was grinning like he’d just broken the four-minute mile, and French returned the grin.

French liked to think his was the last copy off the press. He insisted his staff saw the last-printed, not the first, of each edition. “If you can’t get it right in the type,” he would say, “you can’t get it right and you won’t be working for me.” French’s were the best-proofed newspapers in Australia. He knew it only saved a moment, but when those moments were added together. . . .

Sir Philip French made every moment count.

But as he turned to focus on the paper’s headline his smile turned into a scowl:

DEREK OLSSON SNATCHED
Prison Van Hijacked on Way to Trial
COP KILLED IN GANGLAND SHOOTOUT

When his afternoon paper, the News, was the number one-selling Sydney daily that headline would boost circulation by 30,000 or more. But the News had died along with most of its afternoon counterparts around the world some two decades ago. He’d started Sydney Today—one of those thin, free papers handed out at bus stops and railways stations—in a fit of nostalgia to recapture the “good old days.” A vain attempt: printing tens of thousands of extra copies of a free paper and rushing to get them on the streets held no thrill for him at all.

“The bastard’s on the loose again, damn it,” French grumbled. A few years ago Derek Olsson, self-made road transport millionaire, had unexpectedly branched into country newspapers, put French’s Wagga Wagga Morning Mail at the bottom of a deep red hole and almost wiped out the profits of several others. The streams of cash his regional papers kicked off was drying up—just when he needed it for the on-going circulation battle between his morning Express and Henry Sykes’ Mercury, and to finance other parts of his publishing empire, including the expense—and extravagance—of the new French building.

Not that the French publishing group was in dire straits. French’s son Nicholas ran the magazine, radio and TV divisions, and they were all healthy. But French had kept his son away from his newspapers, his first love. Probably a mistake: he was better suited to the old days of newspapering, when the press was king of all media and competition was ruthless, no holds barred. He’d been slow to adapt, especially to the internet which was taking away newspapers’ readers, advertisers, profits—and French’s major source of excitement.

Maybe it’s time to hand everything over to Nicky, he mused. And do what—play golf?

With a last look at Sydney Today, he threw it in the bin and turned back to the numbers he’d been going through: columns of red ink—mainly caused by Olsson.

Olsson had started his papers with the newest four-color presses and non-union labor. French’s regional papers, overstaffed at union rates, immediately looked like dowdy and old-fashioned dinosaurs compared to Olsson’s bright, breezy and crusading publications.

French groaned at the bottom line: the millions of dollars—tens of millions—he’d have to invest just to match his competitor’s products. And he’d still be stuck with the cranky, obstinate, and high-priced unions, so Olsson would still have the low cost operation. Closing his losing papers down—the only real alternative—was something he just couldn’t face.

Well, not today anyway.

And Olsson, with his Sydney and Melbourne Weekends, and his financial weekly MoneyWeek, had started nibbling at the advertising revenues of French’s mainstay city publications.

Worst of all, though the circulations of Olsson’s papers had dropped a bit since Olsson’s arrest, people hadn’t returned to reading French’s papers. And as Olsson had built a superb team—including a slew of his own best journalists and executives hired away at salaries French just couldn’t afford to match—the OlssonPress juggernaut hadn’t slowed one bit.

Where would it all end?

AS WAS HIS HABIT, at six o’clock French headed for his small apartment on the penthouse floor for a pre-dinner nap. Like the boardroom next to it, the apartment had walls of glass and was surrounded by rooftop gardens. When it was first built, French could see the whole sweep of the city of Sydney, from the Heads at the mouth of Sydney harbor all the way to the Sydney Harbor Bridge and beyond.

His view had been built out over the years, and now the gardens wilted at the bottom of a man-made canyon. The latest addition to the city skyline—which would be Sydney’s tallest building—was growing next door, casting the gardens into daylong shadow. In a few months, new gardens would be planted atop that building, seventy-nine storeys in the air, just above the neon signs at the four points of the compass which would spell one word: FRENCH.

He smiled at the thought that the sight of his name would dominate the Sydney skyline for years, if not decades to come.

“Sit down, Phil.”

“What?” French looked in surprise at the figure lounging in an armchair, set in a dark corner of the apartment’s living room. He flicked on the light.

“What are you doing here?”

“You haven’t kept your part of the deal,” the man said. His voice was deep, and although he spoke calmly, almost nonchalantly, French couldn’t help but be aware of the threat behind his words.

“And how did you get in?”

“Really, Phil, don’t be so naïve. An amateur could pick those locks. I’d be happy to recommend a locking system that would stop even me. For an extra fee, of course.”

“You haven’t delivered in full,” French replied, sitting down shakily.

“You got what you wanted. I framed Olsson for you, fair and square. So he escaped? So what. Not my problem. You owe me, and I want the rest of my money. Now.”

“He hasn’t gone to trial—and that’s the real test of whether your frame stands up. He’s on the loose again. God knows what’s going to happen. I’ve paid you half already—and the job’s only half-done. That seems fair to me.”

“Olsson’s on the run, Phil,” the man said in a tone appropriate for a wayward child. “Cops all over the country will be after him—he’ll be Australia’s Most Wanted till he’s caught. His escape will merely prove to everyone he’s guilty. I don’t see any difference between that and twenty-five years to life.”

“There’s a big difference,” said French. “In jail, he’s locked up, effectively dead to the world. On the loose, anything could happen.”

“It won’t.”

“Maybe not,” French allowed. “But Olsson on the run wasn’t part of the deal. He’s a smart, devious bastard, so I sure don’t trust him to lie down and play dead.”

“You’re saying you want me to wait for the other fifty grand? No way.”

“You’re being paid on results. You get paid when you deliver those results, not before.”

“I don’t think so Phil.” The man stood and loomed over French, clenching and unclenching his right fist under French’s nose. French could see his muscles rippling under his shirt as he moved.

“I’m a frail old man, as you can see,” French smiled, leaning back in the armchair with an air of serenity he didn’t really feel, “so you’ll have no trouble beating me up any time you like. Go ahead—if you’d like the cops to arrest you for the murder they now think Olsson committed.”

“Ha. They’re not going to take any notice of a tip-off from you—especially one from the grave.”

“Do you think I’m stupid?” French snorted. And leaning forward slightly he said, “If anything happens to me they’ll receive a recording of our conversation—the one where we set up this deal. They’d believe that, don’t you think?”

The man’s thick hand closed tightly around French’s throat. French tried gasping for breath—but couldn’t. He struggled futilely until the gangster relaxed his hand without letting go of French’s neck.

“Just a little sample of what’s to come—if you don’t pay me and give me that recording.”

French breathed hard and pulled a tiny MP3 player from his pocket. The man grabbed it out of his hand. “Is this the only copy?” he asked with a glare.

“There’s something else you should think about,” French said as he slowly shook his head, “now Olsson’s out and about.”

“What,” the man said scornfully. His hand tightened again.

“Something that could mean life or death for you,” French said quickly. “Sit down and I’ll tell you.”

Suspiciously, the man released his stranglehold and pulled a chair over from by the small dining table to sit less than an arm’s length from French.

“I’m listening.”

“What’s Olsson going to do now?”

“Try and get the hell out of the country as fast as he can, I guess. So what’s the problem?”

French smiled. “Maybe,” he said, looking the man hard in the eyes. “But if you asked me, I’d say it’s more his style to find out who really murdered Vincent Leung.”

13 Night Vision

THE LAST FLIGHT FROM Canberra was nearly an hour late, so it was nearer ten pm than nine when Anthony Royn arrived at the family’s Melbourne home—a stately, three-storey, seven-bedroom mansion nestling by the Yarra river at the end of a cul de sac in the most exclusive section of Toorak. He’d called Melanie to let her know; when she didn’t meet him at the front door, he was convinced he was in for a frosty reception.

He called her name but the house was silent. He padded across the thick carpet of the reception area, went past the staircase and into the large living room, and stopped when he saw her curled up on the big armchair by the fire, sound asleep.

He smiled. She was still as breathtakingly beautiful at fifty as she had been when they had first fallen in love: love at first sight, according to family legend, when they gazed at each other across the playground in primary school. She was nine and he was ten when she made up her mind he was the man she was going to marry. His memory of that moment was a little fuzzy (not that he ever admitted it)—but Melanie’s, so she said, was crystal clear.

It was quite a few years since she’d retold that particular story.

She was tiny then and tiny now, like an imp or a pixie, who could stand five feet tall only wearing high heels. She was so short that once, after they’d had an argument while on vacation, she’d disappeared from their hotel room. He searched high and low but couldn’t find her . . . only to see her, when the sun peeked through the curtains, peacefully asleep, curled up in their suitcase.

She stirred, as though she’d felt his gaze. “Tony,” she said with half a smile, her enormous brown eyes studying him distantly, stretching her body in a way Royn found enticing. “Hi, sleepy-head,” Royn smiled warmly, his eyes twinkling, as he knelt down by the chair and gathered her into his arms. He kissed her ear and whispered, “How would you like to go to Singapore. You and me?”

Melanie smiled at him, and Royn felt his temperature rising. “Sure,” she said. “When?”

“Monday.”

“Monday?” A puzzled look replaced the smile as if a light had been suddenly switched off, and then her lips pouted in understanding. “Oh, you mean for work . . . you, me, and Alison, right?”

“Well . . . that’s the excuse.”

“What’s the occasion?” she asked, her voice dull, almost without interest in the answer.

“Nimabi offered to resume negotiations on the oil deadlock . . . on Tuesday in Singapore.”

“I see. So I suppose you’d want me to join you in all those boring ceremonial dinners and stuff.”

Royn nodded glumly.

“Well . . . ” she said thoughtfully, a spark on interest in her eyes, “I suppose I could work on the wives for you.”

“What do you mean?”

“If everything I’ve heard about the Sandemans and those other places is true, they’ll all want to keep going on shopping trips to Singapore and the like. And they can only do so if the money keeps flowing. Nothing like a bit of pressure from your wife to get you pointed in the right direction, is there?”

“Ah,” said Royn with a grin, “that would probably do it . . . the woman’s touch, especially your touch.”

Melanie wasn’t sure whether to smile or frown. “Okay then,” she said flatly, without committing herself one way or the other.

“Great.”

“And let’s take Zoë—and the boys if they want to come. A real Royn family outing with Dad so busy we’ll hardly ever see him.”

“What? Take them out of school?”

“They’re on holiday next week, mid-term break . . . or have you’ve forgotten already?”

“I—well, it’s been a tough week.”

“It certainly has.” Melanie yawned. “I was asleep . . . I was so tired. Oh, and your dinner’s in the oven.”

Royn nuzzled closer, tightening his loose embrace. “I’m hungry for something else right now.”

“Tony,” she giggled. Melanie wriggled her body in a way that excited him even more—but somehow ended up with her sliding out of his embrace. With a peck on his cheek she slowly stood up. “I’m too tired,” she said. “And the reason I’m tired is Zoë.” Her voice rose as she continued. “She’s completely out of control. She went out somewhere tonight with some friends dressed like a call girl—and she wouldn’t tell me where she was going or who she was going with. She’s supposed to be home by midnight, but I’ll bet she’ll be late. Again. It really is time her father had a serious word to her.”

“I see,” said Royn, making no attempt to hide his disappointment.

Melanie shrugged helplessly. “I just don’t know what to do with her. So I’d really appreciate if you could stay up and wait for her this time, and read her the riot act when she gets home . . . and let me get a good night’s sleep for a change.”

Royn frowned, his eyes downcast.

Melanie stepped closer to him, resting her hand gently on his arm. “Please, do this for me, Tony,” she said, appealing mutely with her eyes, her body sliding ever closer to him. “And for Zoë.”

Royn nodded. “Okay,” he said half-heartedly.

“Thank you.” Melanie smiled. Her movement toward him ended with another quick peck on his cheek.

She yawned. “I’m sorry, Tony, but I must go to sleep.”

Royn nodded again. “Okay,” he sighed. “I’ll be up—later, I guess.”

He watched her wistfully until she had disappeared up the stairs and then stomped into the kitchen where he pecked at his dinner. Eventually, he sank into the deep armchair by the fire—still warm from Melanie’s body—with a novel he’d been meaning to read for some time. But his thoughts were racing and he could hardly focus on the words in front of him. Slowly, almost against his will, the warmth of the fire and the comfort of the cushions slowly relaxed him until he began to doze fitfully.

HE WOKE WITH A START, and shivered, suddenly feeling the cold: the fire had gone out and the thermostat for the central heating had automatically ratcheted down before midnight.

A glance at his watch told him it was after two. I must have missed her, he thought. But then he heard another creak on the stairs—that must have been the sound that woke him—and the scampering of feet.

“Zoë!” he called, letting the book slide onto the floor as he pushed himself up. Peering around the side of the high-winged armchair he saw his daughter standing sheepishly three-quarters of the way up the stairs.

“Hi, Daddy.” Zoë smiled coyly at him. “Goodnight. See you in the morning.” With a little wave of one hand she turned to run the rest of the way upstairs.

“Zoë,” he said a little more sharply than he’d intended.

“It’s late, Daddy,” she said with an impish smile making her look so like Melanie when she was younger that his heart melted. Though she had the same turned-up nose, she was taller than her mother. And her dark brown hair, in some weird, spiky hairdo, was dyed bright red, something Melanie had never done. She was wearing a tight pair of jeans that hugged her hips, strapless evening shoes and a skimpy tank top that left a wide gap of skin around her waist and her shoulders bare. Her lipstick—what was left of it—was smeared around her mouth. He had thought Melanie’s remark about her being dressed like a hooker was a bit over the top—but it wasn’t far off the mark after all.

“Yes, it is late, isn’t it?” Royn said. “In fact, it’s after two.”

“Right, so I’d better be getting to bed—hadn’t you?”

Royn shook his head. “I think that you and I, just the two of us, should have a little chat. And right now, while your mother is still asleep, is the perfect time, don’t you think?”

Zoë shrugged and moved to continue up the stairs, one eye watching for her father’s reaction.

“Your mother said you’d promised to be back home by midnight,” Royn said sternly, “and you’re over two hours late.”

Zoë stood still. “We got held up.”

“Really? It wasn’t the traffic, was it?” Royn said sarcastically. “Look, Zoë, if you had a good reason for being late you should have called to let us know. Or asked if you could stay out later. But you did neither of those things. And it seems this is far from the first time you haven’t kept your word.”

“Gawd,” Zoë said nervously. “Living in this house is like living in a convent.”

“Really? I didn’t know nuns dressed up like that and hung out with boys till way past midnight.”

“Daddy.”

“Come and sit down please, Zoë.”

“Daddy, please—can this wait till morning?” she pleaded. “I’m so tired.”

“No,” Royn said, frowning while Zoë reluctantly—and very slowly—came down the stairs.

As she sat down, she looked up at Royn defiantly and asked, “Why is there one rule for me and a different one for you?”

“What do you mean by that?”

“I’ve heard the stories about you and Mummy. Very romantic and all that—but you were way younger then than I am now. That’s hardly fair.”

Royn coughed, covering his mouth and turning his face as he did. But when he turned back Zoë was smiling at him, knowing she’d scored a point: he hadn’t been able to disguise the deep flush that covered his cheeks.

“Things were very different then,” he said.

“Really,” Zoë laughed scornfully. “Do tell.”

“Really. First, there was no AIDS to worry about. And no drug-resistant strains of STDs either. And then—” He recalled the rare occasions he’d met Zoë’s current boyfriend, always a different boy “—your mother and I were inseparable from the very beginning. So there were no chances of either of us catching anything.” Well, almost none, he thought guiltily. “And third, we kept to our parents’ rules—and we certainly didn’t break them outrageously as you seem to be doing.”

“So you lied to your parents, did you?”

Royn shook his head. “No. We never lied to them. They just never suspected a thing . . . so they never asked.”

“So you’d prefer that I—that I deceive you? Is that what you’re saying?”

“Why—is there something you feel you need to deceive us about?” Royn asked with a smile.

Zoë glared at her father, but didn’t answer.

“And did you know,” Royn continued, “that you can get an infection from oral sex too?”

Zoë’s jaw dropped.

“So tomorrow we’d better take you down to a VD clinic for a check-up—and a pregnancy test.”

“No, Daddy. You can’t. I won’t.”

“Why ever not?

“It would be so—so embarrassing. So humiliating”

“Better to be embarrassed than infected, don’t you think?”

“You’re punishing me when I haven’t done anything wrong.”

“It’s not a punishment, Zoë. It’s a precaution.”

“And do you think Mummy will agree to this?” she demanded.

“Of course. Indeed, she told me to read you the riot act—which I guess I’ve just done.”

Zoë sighed. “Mummy’s so unreasonable. She just doesn’t understand.”

“I think she understands all too well. That’s why we both worry about you so much.”

Zoë slumped in the chair, her eyes glistening. “There’s nothing to worry about,” she muttered—but Royn felt sure he heard a hint of doubt in her tone of voice.

“Well, we’ll know tomorrow, my dear.”

Zoë glared at him. “I can hardly wait.”

AS HE WATCHED ZOЁ trudge dejectedly up to her room, Royn stood and stretched. I did exactly what Melanie asked me, he thought, feeling very pleased with himself. After a few moments he, too, went up the stairs, but with a new spring in his step. When he climbed into bed he cuddled up close to Melanie, one hand gently holding her breast. She wriggled a bit closer to him without waking up—and in just a moment Royn was sound asleep as well, dreaming happy dreams.

*****

“THERE’S A LIGHT FLASHING out to sea.”

Nazarov woke like a cat, fully alert, when he heard de Brouw’s voice. “What’s the time?” he asked.

“Two am.”

“Let’s see what’s happening,” Nazarov whispered as he pulled himself out of his sleeping bag.

They’d set up camp on a rise half a kilometer from the house where the Chinese gang had taken Olsson. They overlooked a small, isolated weekender set on top of a rocky promontory jutting out to sea on the coast about a hundred and fifty kilometers south of Sydney. A verandah hung out over the cliff giving the occupants an uninterrupted view of the sweep of the ocean, and the coastline for kilometers in each direction.

There was no moon. A few stars glittered through scattered, wispy clouds floating high above. Land, sea, sky, rocks, and trees were a kaleidoscope of blacks and dark greys. Light splashing from the house on the promontory was the sole patch of brightness, the only visible sign of other people nearby. Nazarov peered out into the darkness, but could see nothing.

De Brouw passed him the night-vision binoculars and indicated where to focus them. In the middle of the blackness the infrared goggles turned the heat of a ship’s engine into a patch of faint brightness; small, moving stick-figures were people walking around on the deck.

Putting down the binoculars, Nazarov could now make out the outline of the ship as a slightly different shade of black.

Then a brilliant point flashed twice from where the ship lay in the shadowy pool of the ocean.

“There it is again.”

De Brouw and Nazarov quickly moved their focus back to their faintly lit surroundings: they knew from bitter experience that keeping their night vision intact would give them a decided advantage over men coming from bright light into the darkness of night.

“I thought ships were supposed to show lights at night,” said de Brouw.

“Right,” said Nazarov. “So that ship must be here for Olsson. Wake Shultz. Time to move.”

“THERE WERE FOUR OF them,” de Brouw reported when Nazarov and Shultz arrived late the previous afternoon. “The three who carried the man across the divider, plus the driver. About half an hour ago, four more came.”

“All armed?”

“Yes, with the same weapons as far as I can tell. I saw them unloading shotguns. I saw one man with a pistol on his belt, and there could be others.”

They’d spent the rest of the afternoon and evening surveying the ground. To the right of the house, a track with steps cut into the hillside led down to a wide beach, a scattered handful of weekenders on the slopes behind it.

To the left of the promontory the coastline formed a small, V-shaped bay. As the surf rolled into the bay from somewhere across the Pacific Ocean, the waves surged, accelerating as the V narrowed, so even when the ocean was quiet the waves reached the tip of the V so fast they smashed into the rocks with a spectacular explosion of sound and spray.

“You could climb that slope,” Nazarov reported after he’d scouted it, “but no boat could get in there, except in daylight when the sea was absolutely still.”

Every hour or so after the sun went down, a man loosely carrying a shotgun came out the side door of the house, walked around it peering into the bush as he did, and then went back inside. Otherwise, all was quiet except for the pounding of the sea, the rustle of the wind in the trees, and the chirps of birds and crickets. In the brief silences between waves, they could hear occasional voices, and, now and then, a faint but perturbing click-click-clat sound. De Brouw volunteered to see if he could find out what was causing it.

He moved so silently that in the muted starlight Nazarov and Shultz could only follow his progress through the infrared binoculars. He appeared like a shadow in the light spilling from the verandah, crawling down the left-hand side of the house, carefully peeking into windows as he passed.

“They’re drinking tea and playing that Chinese game, Mah-jong,” de Brouw told them on his return, grinning widely. “Don’t worry,” he said. “I wasn’t seen. They have lookouts on the verandah. Otherwise, they’re all busy gambling.”

“Any idea where our man is?”

“I didn’t see him. The back rooms are dark, so most likely in there.”

“We’ll take them as they come out.”

They settled down to wait, two of them sleeping with their weapons at hand while the other stood watch.

Nazarov and Shultz had brought a small arsenal with them, selected from the cache of weapons they’d had smuggled into Australia over the years. Each man had an AK-47, and in holsters on their belts were Glock-17s. In addition, Nazarov and de Brouw each had U.S. Army issue M24 sniper rifles, along with the latest American telescopic and laser sights, equipped with night vision, bought brand-new on the black market in Baghdad. A box of grenades had come from the same source.

THROUGH THE NIGHT-VISION binoculars, Nazarov could see human figures moving slowly from the ship towards the shore. “A boat’s coming in. Time to go.”

They began crawling towards the house. De Brouw made for the two vehicles parked behind the back of the house. He plunged his knife into the sidewalls of the tyres, the whoosh of escaping air drowned by the pounding of the surf. When both vehicles were disabled, he crawled back to stand behind a large tree about fifteen meters behind the house from where he had a clear view of the side door and the top of the path down to the beach.

Carrying a couple of grenades, Shultz crept through the bush until he was hidden beside the path leading down to the beach, where he, too, had a clear view of the side door.

Nazarov lay behind some shrubbery about ten meters further back from de Brouw, his sniper rifle at the ready. Each man had a clear view of the target area and of each other; and they were positioned so it made no difference whether the Chinese planned to take Olsson down the path or to a car.

About ten minutes later, the side door of the house opened and figures came out in silence, clearly illuminated by the shaft of light splashing from the open door. The first man walked out carrying a torch, a shotgun slung across his back. The second man, holding an AK-47, was followed by two men holding a Caucasian man in a prison uniform; his feet were hobbled and hands tied behind his back. Nazarov and de Brouw tracked the two men holding the prisoner with their laser sights; as the fifth Chinese man stepped out into the light they opened fire almost simultaneously. The two men holding the prisoner both dropped followed a moment later by the man in front and the man behind. As he heard the crack of the M24s, Shultz threw a grenade through the open door, followed a moment later by the rattle of his AK-47 as he fired a burst into the open doorway.

The man who’d been leading the file dropped his torch and grabbed for his shotgun. As he began to swing it towards the sound of the AK-47, three bullets tore into his body almost simultaneously.

Olsson stood on the path looking dazed. “Get down,” Nazarov shouted at him as he de Brouw began running, alternately, in short spurts toward the doorway. They’d dropped the M24s and now carried their AK-47s. Shultz fired another burst from his AK-47 into the doorway as Nazarov and de Brouw approached.

Without looking at Olsson, de Brouw sprayed bullets through the doorway while Nazarov stood behind him. After listening for an instant and hearing nothing he peeked through the door. “All quiet,” he said. A moment later he added, “One missing.”

He sprinted in a crouch towards the verandah while Nazarov moved to the back of the house. “Get out of the light,” he hissed to Olsson as he moved.

From behind the house came the sound of a motor starting. One of the vehicles lurched forward on its flat tyres and Nazarov sprinted around and emptied his magazine through the car’s rear window as it bumped away. It slowed to a halt, stalling with a couple of jerks. Changing magazines, Nazarov crept forward, and seeing the driver slumped over the wheel, opened the driver’s door. The man wasn’t moving, but Nazarov fired one bullet into his brain just in case.

“All clear,” de Brouw said as he came walking out the side door. The three converged on Olsson. Shultz pulled out his knife and cut through Olsson’s bonds.

“That’s better,” Olsson said as he rubbed his wrists and stamped his feet. As he looked at the Chinese men sprawled across the path, he clearly felt sick.

“Are you okay?” Nazarov asked.

“Just hungry, thirsty, and tired,” Olsson said with half a smile. “I should thank you gentlemen, I presume,” he added, his face losing even more color as his eyes scanned the bodies.

“They won’t bother you again,” Shultz grinned.

“No,” Olsson agreed, shivering as he spoke. “They won’t.”

A light flashed in the surf near the beach below. “They’ll be disappointed,” Shultz grinned.

“Somebody’s heard us,” Nazarov said, peering towards the far of the beach where light from a window suddenly streamed through the trees. “Follow me,” he said to Olsson. As he jogged towards the car, Olsson trudged slowly behind.

“Where are we?” asked Olsson as he caught up with Nazarov who’d stopped to scoop up his M24.

“About one-fifty clicks south of Sydney.”

Olsson nodded. Looking strangely at the M24 he said, “Overkill?”

“No such thing.”

Nazarov could tell that Olsson’s gaze was fixed on his, but Olsson’s face was shrouded in shadow so Nazarov couldn’t make out his expression. It occurred to him, though, that Olsson had probably never seen a dead body before, let alone eight.

THE FOUR MEN WERE silent as Shultz drove the Volvo slowly, without lights, along the dirt track to the main road. He let the car coast the last few meters, the engine no more than a quiet purr, using the handbrake to bring the car to a stop. The Volvo was half-hidden by the tall trees lining the road, but he had a clear view of the road in both directions. They waited while a car whizzed by, followed by a semi-trailer. When the road was clear, and there was no sign of headlights in the distance, he planted his foot on the accelerator. The wheels spun in the dirt and the car slid onto the highway and he flicked on the headlights. In moments they were speeding along the highway, just another car travelling through the night. Shultz set the cruise control for 98 kph—no point in getting a speeding ticket, especially with that armory in the back.

They all breathed a sigh of relief as they topped the next rise. Nazarov pulled out his phone and made a call. “We’ve got him,” he said. He listened for a few moments and then passed the phone to Olsson. “He wants to talk to you—but don’t say anything, okay?”

Olsson nodded, listened, and passed the phone back to Nazarov. “He wants to know if you got everything,” he said.

“Yes.”

“Any questions?”

“No.”

“No questions,” said Nazarov into the phone. After a moment he said, “We’ll be an hour and a half or so,” and put the phone back in his pocket.

“Here,” he said to Olsson, pulling a bag from the back of the wagon. “You’d better get out of that prison uniform. Not the sort of thing to be wearing wandering around Sydney, even in the dead of night.”

IT WAS NEAR FOUR AM when the Volvo stopped at a deserted corner in a mostly industrial area not far from Sydney airport.

Olsson waited until the car disappeared from view and then walked quickly down a side street. Though he only had to walk one block, his step was light as he revelled in the unfamiliar freedom to breathe the night air and move where he wanted, when he wanted.

At the corner he saw Ross Traynor standing nervously half in shadow. “Thank God,” he said as Olsson reached him.

“Never been happier to see you,” Olsson said with a smile.

“IT WAS LUK SUK’S men, you know, who grabbed me,” Olsson said. Traynor nodded his head as he drove. “They’re all dead.” Olsson paled at the memory. “Bodies everywhere. Sickening!”

Traynor shrugged. “It was you or them, Derek—”

“But they didn’t deserve to die,” Olsson said angrily.

“They would have happily killed you, right?”

“Yes. But—”

“But what? They live by the law of the jungle. Kill or be killed.”

“Yes—but I don’t have to live by their rules.”

Traynor looked at Olsson quizzically. “You expect them to live by yours?”

Olsson shook his head. “I . . . suppose not. But there must have been a better way.”

“Derek! Why do you have to make what’s simple so complicated?”

Olsson sighed. “Maybe,” he said doubtfully. “Anyway, Luk Suk is sure going to be madder than hell now.”

Traynor nodded.

“Half of them were from Hong Kong. The other half locals.”

“How do you know?”

“By their accents, the way they spoke Cantonese. A couple of the younger Australian guys could hardly speak the language at all.”

“So we should assume that Luk Suk has lost some of his best men.”

“Exactly. If Luk Suk can’t find me, he might come after you—or Judy and your kids. So take them on a long holiday somewhere far away.”

“So,” Traynor said with a grin, “we both need to live by the law of the jungle for a while.”

“I suppose so,” Olsson admitted reluctantly.

“What about the businesses?”

“They’ll be all right—or they won’t. What’s more important: your business or your life?”

Traynor looked at Olsson and nodded. It was question that didn’t need an answer. “And what are you going to do?”

“Look after some . . . things.”

“Okay,” Traynor laughed. “Be secretive then.”

Traynor slowed the car as they drove past a motel. Then he went around the block and swung into the motel’s parking lot. “Just making sure there’s no one around,” he commented.

He unlocked the door of a room and handed the key to Olsson.

The only imprint of Traynor’s presence on the motel room was a battered suitcase and a large backpack sitting by the bed. Olsson grabbed the backpack, carefully took out a laptop and then upended the bag so the rest of its contents fell onto the bed. He fiddled with the fabric on the bottom and opened a hidden compartment. Inside, there were five envelopes. He sat on the bed while he slowly examined their contents.

The first four contained passports—two Australian, one British, and one from New Zealand—together with matching driver’s licences, credit cards, and other IDs in four different names, none of them “Derek Olsson.”

The fifth envelope, much thicker, held a dozen SIM cards, several more credit cards in yet different names, all issued on foreign banks and each accompanied by a driver’s licence, half Australian and half from other countries, and a large stack of $100 bills.

Olsson’s eyes flicked to the suitcase.

Traynor grinned. “I already checked. It’s all there.”

“And some clothes I presume.”

“Of course. They’ve been there a while though, so I hope they still fit.”

“The least of my troubles.”

Traynor handed Olsson a key chain. “It’s the old, burgundy Toyota we parked next to.”

“Who owns it?”

“Registered in a company name,” Traynor said. “A dummy of course.”

“Okay,” Olsson nodded, and picked up one of the envelopes at random, checking the name on a credit card. “Okay. So I’m Joe Schuster for the moment.” He closed his eyes and stretched. “Boy, do I need a shower. And sleep.”

“Not here, I hope.”

Olsson shook his head. “I’ll drive for an hour or so and then crash. Thanks, Ross,” he said, standing up to embrace his friend. “You need to get back home to look after Judy and the kids.”

AFTER LEAVING THE MOTEL, “Joe Schuster” stopped at the first fast-food place he found open where he ate two hamburgers washed down with coffee and Coke. He then drove for two more hours and checked into a nondescript roadside motel.

He was so tired that his head had hardly hit the pillow when he collapsed into the first deep, untroubled sleep he’d had in several weeks.

14 The Frosty Lady

WHEN A MAJOR CRIME was committed the State Crime Command established a task force, headed by a detective-superintendent, which could draw specialists as needed from different police units in the city and, if need be, from anywhere in the state or even further afield. TASKFORCE OVERFLOW had two major crimes to investigate: the kidnapping and recapture of Derek Olsson and the murder of Constable O’Reilly.

As requested, Rudi Durant and Simon Lee were members. While the team was assembled they’d spent the previous afternoon, evening, and early hours of Saturday morning preparing a report to present to the first gathering of the task force, which was scheduled to begin at noon. Lee collated the faxed and emailed transcripts of interviews and other reports gathered at the crime scene by police officers who had now—mostly—returned to their original stations around the city. Durant worked the phone, cajoling information from the overworked ballistics, lab, medical and other teams.

Durant’s desk, like every other available surface in his cramped office in the Surry Hills police station, gave the impression of creaking beneath the weight of neatly stacked piles of files, folders, reports, and papers. On one side of the desk, Durant made notes in handwriting which reflected his personality: precise, to the point, and well-organized; on the other side Lee read through the transcripts of interviews, police reports, and his and Durant’s hastily scribbled records of phone conversations, reorganizing them as he did.

The dead motorcycle policeman was riddled with AK-47 bullets, fired from two different guns; Ballistics didn’t think the bullets came from the abandoned AK-47.

The two dead Chinese gang members, however, had been shot with a different caliber altogether, both bullets having been fired from the same gun . . . the gun which had shot out the back tyre of the police motorcycle, and the front tyres of a car found later in a side street blocking traffic. A 9mm, probably fired from a Glock or similar weapon, the lab scientists thought.

The BMW they found at the scene was not a missing police bike, but one painted and modified, complete with false number plates, to look like one. When the engine numbers were matched to the registration records, it appeared the BMW belonged to a seventy-year-old pensioner in a wheelchair with no criminal record who protested he’d never ever ridden, let alone owned a motorcycle. Four other motorcycles, all stolen, were also found abandoned.

The darts contained the same anaesthetic vets used to bring down wild animals. As far as the lab could estimate at this stage, the dosage was set for an animal with the same body weight as a man.

The prison van was an armored truck similar to the ones banks used to move money and valuables around the city. The tiny windows were all bullet-proof, the exterior was armor-plated, the doors double-locked and bolted from the inside. It was like a bank vault on wheels, supposedly impossible to open . . . unless you had the key.

According to the prison guards with Olsson, a whiff of some irritant gas had been pumped—somehow—into the back of the van. They were then warned that if they didn’t open the door, a different gas would be pumped in—and they’d all die. “So we opened it. Then the bastards gassed us.”

The team that had gone over the van had found a hole drilled in an inconspicuous place through the armor plate; since the guards had not reported the sound of drilling, the assumption was it had been done beforehand by, presumably, someone on the inside. When they inspected the other vans, they found tiny holes drilled in the same place in each one. A week earlier, one of the mechanics—a new hire—hadn’t turned up to work and hadn’t been heard of again. The prison authorities were embarrassed to discover his identity was fake.

The previous afternoon, Lee and Durant had interviewed one of the prisoners in his hospital bed whose only words had been “I want a lawyer”—in Cantonese at that. His solicitor, one they both knew well from previous cases involving triad members, advised his client to refuse to answer any and every question he was asked—and scowled silently when Lee, who had emigrated to Australia from Hong Kong as a child, questioned him in Cantonese. The second prisoner was still in intensive care. They’d be able to interview him soon—but he’d have the same solicitor so they knew they’d get the same result.

However, it turned out that both the Chinese men in custody had arrived from Hong Kong less than a week ago. The Hong Kong police were very efficient, and less than three hours after he’d send his request for information via Interpol, Durant had an email detailing everything they knew about these two men, which turned out to be a lot.

Both were, according to the Hong Kong police, known members of the Golden Dragon gang, the same triad whose Sydney boss had been Vincent Leung. Both had prison records for violent crimes; and both were suspected to have been responsible for several murders.

The two dead Asian men had not been identified, but one of them matched the description of a known member of the Sydney branch of the Golden Dragon.

It was after ten AM when Durant finished going through his notes—which, Lee knew, could now be typed up for filing without further editing—and he fixed his eyes on Lee and asked him:

“What do you think, Simon?”

In the two years Simon Lee had been Durant’s assistant, he’d become used to Durant’s style of grilling him about a case. For the first few months Lee had felt extremely nervous, especially when Durant mercilessly chewed him out for overlooking some essential part of the available evidence. But he quickly realized that Durant’s Socratic practice of initially concealing his own conclusions and forcing Lee to voice his first was the best training in police methodology and logical thinking he’d ever had. Perhaps that was why so many of Durant’s previous assistants had gone on to spectacular careers of their own.

But before Lee could answer, the door opened and a constable walked in waving a couple of sheets of paper. “Excuse me, sir, you’d better look at this.”

Being closer, Lee grabbed first for the papers the constable was carrying, but with a smile, Durant held out his hand and Lee passed them over. “A bloody graveyard,” Durant said as he finished the first page and handed it to Lee. Looking up at the constable still standing by the door Durant said, “Thanks. I presume the LAC has called the experts in?”

“Yes, sir,” replied the constable. “Officers from Ballistics and Homicide have already hot-footed it down to the south coast. Nice day for it, eh?”

Durant grinned. “I don’t suppose they’ll have much time to enjoy it.”

“I guess not, sir. Anything else?”

“Not right now.” As the constable left he turned to Lee, “Well, Simon, do you think this is connected in any way?”

“Well,” said Lee thoughtfully, “it looks like two gangs were after Olsson. One we now know about: the Golden Dragon Triad. The second one—with someone masquerading as a policeman—tried to snatch Olsson from the Golden Dragon gang. It appears they’re the ones who killed two triad members—and immobilized the others with tranquilizer guns.” Lee shook his head. “That I just don’t understand.”

“So what’s the connection?”

“I’m hypothesizing of course,” Lee said carefully, “but the triad had to take Olsson somewhere. Why the south coast? Beats me,” he shrugged, hastily adding, “at the moment. But this report says they found eight Asian bodies, all dead, all riddled with bullets. Shotguns and AK-47s were found there too, the same kind of weapons as at the ambush. It seems a logical assumption they were also Golden Dragon members.”

“But remember,” said Durant, “what seems obvious is often dead wrong.”

Lee smiled. “I realize that, but I haven’t had time to think up any other possibilities yet.”

“So the next—obvious—question: why are they dead and who killed them?”

“Again,” said Lee, “the logical culprit is the second gang. Perhaps they were tailed from Anzac Parade.”

“Or maybe Olsson escaped on his own . . . you’ve seen that report about the fight in the prison yard?”

Lee nodded, and studied the fax. “Possible, I suppose. I guess we’ll have to ask the medical examiner if there are any wounds or bruises on the bodies other than bullet wounds. Added to which there’s a big difference between a one-against-five fight in the prison yard, and one man against eight armed men.”

Durant nodded. “There’s another possibility: aside from some third outfit spiriting Olsson away, some of the triad members took him somewhere else and killed the rest to eliminate any evidence.”

Lee shook his head. “No boss, I can’t buy it.”

“Remote, but—”

Lee leant forward to emphasize his words. “A triad member will be executed for, say, betrayal. But wanton killing like that? No way—there’s too much loyalty in the triad, up and down, for that to happen. Anyway, you see how all the guys in hospital simply clammed up. Their boss wouldn’t fear exposure that way.”

“You’re probably right,” Durant conceded.

“Anyway,” Lee said, “at the moment I’m willing to bet that some of those bodies down there will be identified as members of the Golden Dragon, and we’ll find the gun that killed Constable O’Reilly.”

“I only bet on sure things—is this one of them?”

“Aaah . . . virtually a sure thing.”

“Not good enough. Though I agree, it’s certainly the leading hypothesis. Anything else, Simon?”

Durant grinned as Lee searched through the piles of paper.

“I’ll put you out of your misery. Is there anything strange about this second gang?”

“Well . . . we don’t know who they are, so. . . .” Lee shrugged helplessly.

“Assume it’s the same gang—at both Anzac Parade and the south coast—and read that fax again.”

“The number of bodies . . . ” Lee murmured as he read, “. . . some kind of explosion, possibly a grenade . . . the man who called the police from the beach house at three am said he thought he was having a dream, reliving his time in Vietnam . . . but it turned out to be a real gun battle. The scale of the violence, of the killing. . . .”

“Damn right—gun battles on Sydney streets followed by a St. Valentine’s Day-style massacre. You’d think we were in Chicago, not Sydney,” Durant said angrily, shaking his head. “And shotguns I can understand. There must be hundreds, possibly thousands of them that were never registered or turned in when guns were banned a few years ago. AK-47s, unfortunately, are too easily available on the black market. But a Glock—and grenades? Where did they get them?”

“Stolen from the army, perhaps? Or even . . . the police. Except for the grenades, of course.”

“If it was police issue, we’d know about it. Unless some quartermaster is sitting on his thumbs. Be a good idea to check—and with the army too, to see if they’re missing any munitions. But that’s not the really strange thing.”

“It’s not?” said Lee. “Then what is?”

“Why haven’t we heard about this gang before? There’s no shortage of murderous bastards in the underworld. But these guys take the cake for violence. So where have they been all this time? And why haven’t we ever heard of them—until now?”

“I see . . . ” said Lee. “But then, if they’re such a violent gang, why the tranquilizer guns? That makes no sense whatsoever.”

Durant nodded, sighing. “I can’t figure that out either. Too many damn puzzles.”

“But the Hong Kong angle is looking more solid,” said Lee.

While they were searching Olsson’s penthouse apartment in the Rocks area of Sydney, just before they arrested him for murder, Olsson’s answering machine picked up a call and a man left a message in a menacing tone of voice in a language—Cantonese—only Sergeant Lee understood. Translated, it went:

Ah-son. I sure as hell don’t like the line your newspapers are taking—what’s gotten into you? And I’ve just heard you seem to be branching out on your own. That’s not the deal and it’s not on. You’d better explain yourself and it better be good . . . if you know what’s good for you. I expect to see you Thursday in Bangkok at the usual place.

Olsson had merely shrugged when Durant asked him about the message; and his solicitor had advised him he was under no obligation to answer any of Durant’s questions, so he didn’t.

Durant nodded. “Right. But does that mean Olsson was connected to the Golden Dragon Triad—or some other outfit . . . or what?”

Lee shrugged. “Or, maybe, Olsson was involved with the Golden Dragon and ‘branched out’ on his own—if we can believe that message.”

“And why meet in Bangkok?”

Lee shrugged. “Could be dozens of reasons—including, of course, that the guy calling was from Thailand. But there’s something else I’ve dug up which points more firmly to Hong Kong. Olsson dropped out of Sydney University when he was nineteen, near the end of his very first semester. He bought a round-the-world-ticket, and his first stop was Hong Kong.”

“What was his second stop?” Durant asked skeptically.

“I don’t know. Airlines don’t keep records that long. I talked to his mother and his sister. His mother seems to be a bit gaga, and his sister refused to talk to me when she found out I was a policeman. Said we were persecuting him.”

“That merely moves the pointer one degree closer to Hong Kong. Not enough.”

“I agree. But there’s something else. Now, I don’t know where this is all leading—if it goes anywhere. But it makes me suspicious.”

“Okay,” said Durant. “What have you got?”

“Seven years after he flew out of Sydney for Hong Kong, he came back and partnered with Ross Traynor who had a struggling freight operation that basically ran a few trucks between Sydney and Brisbane—and that’s when InterFreight started to take off.”

“And in between?”

Lee shrugged and spread his hands. “At the moment, I have no idea what he was up to.”

“Continue—but make it quick.”

“I spoke to an executive at one of InterFreight’s competitors, who said they must have been exceptionally well-financed to expand as quickly as they did: all the trucks, warehouses, and other equipment they purchased would have cost tens of millions of dollars. But InterFreight is only capitalized at one hundred thousand dollars.”

“So where did all those millions come from?”

“Exactly my question. Presumably, it was loaned to InterFreight but no bank would lend that much money to a hundred-thousand-dollar company—and certainly not on a personal guarantee from two guys with not much more than their shares in InterFreight between them. Twenty-five and a half percent of the shares each, by the way. The other forty-nine percent is owned by a Swiss lawyer in Zurich, presumably as a nominee for somebody else.”

“I don’t really see how that explains anything.”

“No—but it raises an interesting question: how could a nineteen-year-old university dropout gain access to or accumulate tens of millions of dollars in seven years? It’s not impossible, I know—just very unlikely.”

“Could his family have staked him?” Durant asked.

Lee shook his head. “He grew up in Balmain. His father, Sven Olsson, was a car mechanic who turned into a drunken bum. Sven’s been picked up for vagrancy and disorderly conduct quite a few times over the last fifteen years.”

“Could Olsson have inherited some money?”

“Unlikely. His father came to Australia from Denmark in his early twenties—assisted immigration.”

“One of those ten quid, one-way ticket jobs?”

“Right. Olsson’s maternal grandfather, Jack Dent, is still alive. Quite an upright citizen by all accounts. He has some money—he sold his garage when he retired—and his own house in Annandale, fully paid off. But one of the local policemen remembers there was some kind of bad blood between grandfather and grandson, so it seems unlikely Olsson would get anything from granddad.”

“I see,” said Durant. “All very interesting . . . but where does it take us?”

“At the moment, nowhere. But I would like to go to Hong Kong myself and see what I could dig up.”

Durant chuckled. “It’d be pretty tough to squeeze the money out of the super for what he’d suspect was an all-expenses-paid holiday for you.”

“You know, it’s been a long time since I’ve been to Hong Kong anyway—and quite a while since I’ve taken any leave. . . .”

“You think there’s something there, do you?”

Lee nodded. “Just a gut feeling—but a strong one.”

“Sometimes they pan out. Do you know anyone in the Hong Kong police?” Lee shook his head. “Well, worth emailing them a few questions, see what they can tell us.”

“I will.”

“Anything else—?” Durant paused for a second but Lee shook his head. “So, since it’s a sunny Saturday afternoon, what do you say to a drive down to the south coast?”

“To Ulladulla, I presume,” Lee said, his smile disappearing.

“Exactly.”

“You didn’t have something planned this evening, I trust?”

“Nothing that can’t be put off,” Lee grumbled.

“Okay . . . so let’s get this Task Force meeting over and done with. I’ll have a quiet word with the Super and then we can take a leisurely drive.”

“Great,” said Lee.

*****

IN THE ENORMOUS, FOUR-POSTER bed in the master bedroom on the top floor, Anthony Royn slowly stirred from a deep but restless sleep. Without opening his eyes he moved his hand slowly towards the other side of the bed, rolling over as he did. When his hand reached the other edge of the mattress he realized he was alone.

With a soft sigh he half-opened his eyes to check the time: after ten. Hardly surprising then, considering Melanie had gone to bed several hours before him . . . but he felt let down nonetheless.

On the other hand . . . , he thought, brightening as he remembered just why he’d stayed up last night. . . . He grinned. Bouncing out of bed he dived into the shower.

“GOOD MORNING,” HE SAID cheerfully as, fifteen minutes later, he walked through the kitchen door. And stopped: Zoë was sobbing breathlessly, her head nestled to Melanie’s chest; Melanie’s arms hugged her tightly, protectively.

And Melanie was glaring at him.

“How could you do such a thing?” she growled. “And to your own daughter.”

“You said—”

“I certainly did not,” she said, cutting him off. “Anyway, I called Dr. Bristow and Zoë has none of the symptoms. But since you’re so suspicious—though there’s clearly no reason to be—I’ll get one of those pregnancy test kits down at the chemist, just to make you happy.”

Royn stood with his mouth hanging open, fighting the burst of anger surging inside of him. He glared back at Melanie and strode towards the coffee pot, his mouth now tight. The coffee was lukewarm, but he poured himself a cup anyway.

He turned, intending to walk straight back out the door—and paused. “Well,” he muttered, “I’m glad to hear there’s nothing to worry about after all.”

As he left the kitchen he glanced back to see Zoë looking at him, a triumphant smile on her face.

Women, he thought as he slowed his pace, wondering what he was going to do with himself now. Doesn’t matter what you do; you just can’t win.

His thoughts were interrupted by the sound of a dog yapping from the street outside. Sheesh, he sighed, if we had a dog it’d be a bitch.

He started to amble towards the stairs and slowed almost to a halt; then he began to run up the stairs, slowing when he realized he was spilling coffee all over the carpet. Too bad, he thought.

He made a phone call from the bedroom and then, smiling, went to his dressing room and changed into a patched pair of jeans, a T-shirt, a worn pair of running shoes, adding his tatty old gardening hat for effect. He dumped the rest of the now-cold coffee in the washbasin and ran down the stairs, two or three steps at a time. “I’m going to see a man about a dog,” he said to Melanie with a smile as he dumped the coffee cup in the kitchen sink.

“Will you be back for lunch?” she asked in surprise.

He shrugged in answer and disappeared through the side door leading from the kitchen into the garage. He passed the Bentley, the Porsche, the Mercedes, the BMW—and opened the door of the old VW which, when new, had been his first car. It needs a spin anyway, he thought. I hope it starts.

The engine whirred a couple of time before roaring to life. He drove out of the garage, driving off without a backward glance.

“GIMME A PINT, MATE.”

Anthony Royn stood drumming his fingers on the bar, his eyes searching for Collin Renfrew. Renfrew stood six-and-a-half-feet in his socks, his legs like two rakes supporting a torso not that much thicker. He stood out, as another student in their law class had put it, “like a thin streak of Pelican shit.” So when Royn didn’t see him, he didn’t need to look twice.

“Here you are, mate.”

“Thanks,” Royn said. He took a long swallow and carried his beer outside into the pub’s beer garden, but Renfrew was still nowhere to be seen.

Shrugging, Royn sat down at an empty table, half-shaded from the warm autumn sun by an old oak tree casting its leafy arms like a giant umbrella across a baker’s dozen of tables. He stared blankly into his glass, his mind bubbling like the foam with memories of Melanie . . . the way she’d looked at him once, summoning him with her eyes, and how he’d walked helplessly across an empty street . . . the day they went horseback riding to a distant, isolated hill where, with the rising excitement of slowly exploring each other’s bodies, discarding one piece of clothing at a time, and fumbling with mutual intent, they both lost their virginity on the soft, sun-kissed grass . . . of her wondrous smile, shrouded in white when—twenty-seven years ago—she had replied, “I do” . . . and the wonder he still felt that she would say it . . . and the way he’d looked at Melanie last night, curled up asleep, knowing those memories, those feelings, were still real today. . . .

Yet now, there were also arguments, anger, and the harsh words that had driven him away that morning . . . where had they come from? When did it all begin? Images floated through his head . . . of how children made their simple life complicated . . . of how their lives had changed when he gave up law for politics . . . of how, as Minister for Foreign Affairs, he spent even more time on a plane. . . .

At each memory he shook his head, until he remembered the day they’d proudly accompanied their first-born son, Max, to his first day at school; and the night the Conservative Party swept into government. . . .

BY SEVEN-FORTY THAT SATURDAY night, less than two hours after counting began, it was clear the Conservatives had an unassailable lead. On Sunday morning, Kydd called to make him Special Minister for State; he and Melanie—pregnant for the third time, though it hardly showed yet—bundled Max and Ricky into the car to celebrate with Royn’s parents.

Anthony Royn had been in federal Parliament for six years, an opposition shadow minister for five of those years. Easy years. He was in Canberra only when Parliament was sitting, and Melanie and the children usually travelled there with him.

He became a minister with the never-ending responsibilities of running a department in Canberra, a month before Max started school . . . in Melbourne. As he progressed up the political ladder he spent more and more time in Canberra or on a plane while Melanie, he thought, became more mother than wife—and revelled in her social standing in Melbourne society as Mrs. Royn.

But it had all happened so slowly neither of them had noticed it, like two pulsing rivers joining into one . . . becoming divided by larger and longer islands as it grew wider and shallower, until it was no longer clear whether there was one river, or two.

He took another gulp of his beer, looking around vaguely—but still no sign of Renfrew. He let his thoughts drift back to the Monday, the second day after the election.

He’d been sitting in his electoral office grappling to understand the issues he would face as a minister of state. Running through his head was his father’s advice—“The important thing, Tony, is to take charge immediately from Day One. Or those public servants will run rings around you”—well-meaning advice that somehow made everything more difficult: he’d now be in charge of thousands of career public servants, experienced administrators and managers who knew all the ropes while he, the new kid on the block, had only ever “commanded” secretaries and a handful of assistants.

Feeling overwhelmed, he welcomed the interruption when he heard a strange voice saying:

“Mr. Royn?”

He looked up in surprise to see a very attractive young woman—or a teenager?—standing on the other side of his desk.

“And you are . . . ?” he’d asked while his eyes admired the curves of her waist and breasts.

“Alison McGuire.”

He felt a brief moment of desire—as he still did when he saw her unexpectedly, along with the thought, Yes, I would like to sleep with her. That thought was nowadays replaced with a feeling that gave him even greater satisfaction: the knowledge that every other male in the Parliament had the same desire, while he was widely believed to be the only one who’d ever achieved success. “I don’t recall having any appointments this morning.”

“I just . . . walked in, Minister.”

His keen ears picked up the slight quaver in her voice, and he noticed there was no sign of that hint of nervousness in her confident stance, in the way she held her body loosely erect.

“Not ‘Minister’ for a week or so yet,” he smiled, wondering whether he should throw her out . . . but she looked vaguely familiar. If she was a constituent with a problem, sending her away would be a bad idea. At the same time he was astonished she had gotten past his formidable assistant, Mrs. Willow.

“Miss McGuire,” he said in a slightly deeper tone, a touch of severity in his voice. “How can I help you?”

She sat down, taking his words as permission—or maybe, the feeling came to him, as if it were she who was handing out the favors. “I wish to apply for a job—” she paused, as though permitting his thoughts to catch up with hers “—as your personal assistant.”

He hesitated, resisting the urge to shout “But I have one . . . and how the hell did you get past her?” followed by the urge to run into the next room to see if she was still there.

“Mr. Royn,” she continued, taking his silence to be permission to speak, “with your new responsibilities, you’ll need someone extra to help you in Canberra . . . and you won’t be able to spend so much time in the electorate. . . .”

Exactly some of the issues he’d been thinking about this morning, Royn thought. Momentarily lost in the cadence of her voice and the brilliant sapphires that were her eyes, Miss McGuire—that is, he hastily corrected himself, someone like Miss McGuire—would be the perfect complement to his new position.

“So, Miss McGuire,” he had said, determined to reassert control in his own office, “why should I hire you?”

Alison smiled demurely. “Aside from the fact that I can type and answer the phone and do all the other things a personal assistant needs do, I can get into places where I’m not expected.”

“So it would seem.”

“And places you would never be allowed.”

“What kind of places could they be?”

“The ladies’ room, for example. Amazing the useful gossip you can pick up there. More importantly,” she added, holding his eyes with hers and subtly shifting her body, “while I know I have a lot to learn about politics—though I’ve spent the last four summers as an intern in Parliament House, so I do know my way around—most politicians and officials in Canberra are men. I can guarantee they’ll tell me things they’ll never tell you. Things you’ll need to know.”

“Interesting points. So tell me, Miss McGuire, if I were to hire you, what would be the first thing you’d advise me to do?”

Alison McGuire studied him before saying, “Get a new wardrobe.”

“What? Why?”

“To control the impression you make, and because your tie doesn’t go with that shirt, which doesn’t go with your suit, which is clearly very expensive—”

“Of course. It’s from Savile Row.”

“That’s the problem. Not many people in this country are as wealthy as the Royn family. Australians like to think they live in a classless society. It’s a bad idea to remind them they don’t.”

“I see, I never thought of it that way—although my wife has said something similar, about stuff not matching.”

Alison nodded. “It’s the sort of thing women are more likely to see than men—and women are more than fifty-one percent of the voters. . . .”

“True,” Royn nodded. He’d gained the impression she had set her mind on working for him—and he was impressed by the matter of fact way she all but disguised it. “I should be doing other things right now. So why don’t you leave me your resume and I’ll—”

“Certainly.” She pulled a thick file from her shoulder bag and handed it across the desk.

Royn opened the file and riffled through the pages. “What’s this?” he asked with a puzzled look. “It’s fifty-something pages long.”

“It’s a case study of a new development in the States on using polling to fine-tune political messages. I tested it in the New South Wales state election back in March and wrote up the results.”

“And you think it’s something I can use?”

“I think it’s something you should use. In fact, I’ve had a very lucrative offer from a major polling company to help create this very service for them to market . . . to any politician who wants to use it.”

“I see. How old are you, Miss McGuire?”

“Twenty.”

“Rather young for such a position, don’t you think?”

“I believe my youth will prove to be an asset for you, rather than an obstacle. But for that reason I’m certainly willing to work as an intern for you . . . until the end of this summer.”

“Why not take the offer you already have?”

“I’d prefer to work in Canberra . . . Minister . . . and in Parliament House.”

“Hmm. So, were I to ask you to be an intern, when could you start? Tomorrow?”

“Wednesday, Mr. Royn. I have my last exam tomorrow morning.”

“Exam? In what?”

“Political Science,” Alison smiled. “The last exam of my last year at university.”

“I see.” He looked at the file. “Your contact information is here—Balmain, I see. Sydney University, I presume?”

Alison nodded.

“So let me give it some thought and I’ll get back to you. But while you’re here, I’d like you to have a talk to my wife . . . I’m sure she’s still at home. Since you both seem to think I have no dress sense, I’ll be intrigued at her reaction to your ideas.”

When Royn returned home later that afternoon, he discovered Melanie and Alison deep in conversation, with Max and Ricky both demanding Alison play with them again. Melanie had arranged—“If it’s agreeable with you, of course, my dear”—that she and Alison would go and study clothes, fabrics, styles, tailors and accessories on Wednesday. As a result, he now had pasted on the inside of his wardrobe—and suitcases—a chart telling him what ties, shirts, suits, socks and even shoes went with each other, and what he should wear depending on the impression—somber, light, authoritative, and so on—he wanted to give that day. He was now regularly listed in the women’s magazines among the best-dressed men in Australia. Looking back, he was now unsure whether it was he or Melanie who had made the final decision to make Alison McGuire his personal assistant.

Melanie and Alison had been the best of friends, always conspiring together until . . . what? Nothing had happened between them that he could remember. Yet Melanie’s attitude to Alison had cooled, seemingly in lockstep with the growing problems in their marriage, reaching the point where . . . what had Melanie said about Alison on the phone the other day? “Fire her, then. I’ve always said she was trouble.” Royn shook his head.

That’s a course that should be in all universities, he thought: How To Understand Women. But, perhaps, no one was qualified to teach it.

“TONY, TONY? IS THAT you?”

Royn raised his eyes see the smiling face of Collin Renfrew towering over him. “I nearly didn’t recognize you—what’s with the hat, for heaven’s sake. Want another?”

Royn looked at his glass, surprised to see it was nearly empty. “Sure,” he said, tipping the glass back and chugging down the remainder of his pint in a couple of short gulps.

“Another pint?” Renfrew raised one eyebrow as he asked.

“Sure,” Royn said again.

Renfrew shrugged and came back a few minutes later, a foaming pint in one hand and a smaller middy in the other for himself.

“Cheers,” Royn said, clinking Renfrew’s glass.

“So tell me, Tony,” Renfrew said as he sat down opposite Royn, “when will you send out the invites for the booze-up at the PM’s Lodge?”

“Booze-up?” Royn frowned as he looked at Renfrew through puzzled eyes. “The Lodge? What on earth are you talking about?”

“The Great Conman, of course. All your old mates are waiting for you to give him a nudge—though some of them think you’re just going to cool your heels until he keels over.”

“Conman?”

“Christ, Tony.” Renfrew shook his head in mock sadness. “You’re a bit bloody slow this morning. I’m talking about Kydd—Kydd, Kydding, Conman.”

“Is that what you call him?”

“Fits doesn’t it?” Renfrew smiled. “The randy old goat could sell ice cubes to an Eskimo, you gotta admit.”

Royn smiled. “I suppose he could.”

“So when are you going to make your move? Or has the old bastard got you conned too?”

Royn shrugged. “I don’t know,” he groaned. “I don’t even want to think about it right now.”

“I see,” said Renfrew. “Well . . . you’d better tell me about your problem, then.”

“Women. Tell me, Collin, what you know about women.”

“Mate, you’re asking me?”

“Sure, you always seem to have some pretty bird in tow.”

Renfrew shrugged. “But never the same one. Anyway, you know I tried marriage twice, so whatever you want to know about marital and divorce law, I’m your man. But relationships? With women? You should know better than to ask. ‘Slam, bang, thank you, ma’am’ is more my style.”

“No complications, either.”

“Only getting them into bed. That’s complication enough.”

“What an easy life you have,” Royn shook his head, and took another swig from his beer. “Sheesh. And now my daughter’s ganging up on me as well.”

“That’s a problem I don’t have. . . . Well, not so far as I know, anyway.”

Royn laughed.

“So what was it you wanted to see me about that you didn’t want to talk about on the phone—or in the office?”

Royn took a deep breath. “I need a recommendation,” he began slowly, “a . . . private eye.”

Renfrew looked at him sharply. “What for?”

“I’d . . . rather not say.”

“That much trouble, eh?”

Royn nodded gravely and handed him a folded sheet of paper. Renfrew’s eyebrows wrinkled quizzically as he scanned it. “This is weird—let me get it straight. You want me to find a good private detective and tell him to send an email to this address. That’s it?”

Royn nodded, and—remembering Alison’s careful instructions—craned over the table to look at the list again. “But he has to send it from a dummy email address, not his real one. That’s crucial.”

Shaking his head, Renfrew said, “And then he’ll be asked a question, and he has to give this answer.”

Royn nodded. “Right. And do NOT email or fax these instructions. You must hand them over in person—and then forget about it.”

“This is so bizarre, Tony, how could I forget it? But I can certainly keep my mouth shut.” Renfrew smiled. “That, after all, is one of the things lawyers get paid for.”

“Good.” said Royn. “Because one other requirement is my name is never mentioned—to anybody, ever. Okay?”

Renfrew nodded. “Okay. Legal privilege and all that. But,” said Renfrew, his face clouding over, “a judge can set that aside in certain circumstances, as you very well know. In which case—”

“I can live with that.”

“You’ll have to.”

Royn nodded resignedly. “I guess so. . . .”

“And what about payment?” asked Renfrew. “They’re certain to ask me about it.”

“I suppose . . . could that go through you? Keep me out of it?”

Renfrew nodded.

“Discretion,” Royn said. “That’s imperative. And an outfit with national coverage would be best.”

“Okay. I can think of two possibilities. . . . It would help if you could give me a little more—hell, some detail about what you’re after.”

“I’d . . . rather not.”

“Okay,” Renfrew grinned broadly, “so when she’s been caught in the act, so to speak, do I get the case?”

“Huh?” Royn said, masking his surprise with a smile. “Maybe . . . but no promises.”

“Fair enough. . . . How about a game of darts then—bet you ten bucks I can still beat you.”

“Sure,” said Royn. Picking up the two empty beer glasses, he added, “My shout, I believe.”

*****

THE FROSTY LADY. A neon mermaid with pendulous, dripping breasts rose from a frothy glass of beer above the wide door.

Alison McGuire stared at the sign in disgust. Why, of all the bars in Canberra, had he chosen this one? Overriding the powerful impulse to turn and walk away, she opened the door, wondering if she was doing the right thing.

Half in and half out of the doorway of the gloomy bar, her nose assaulted by the odor of stale beer and sweaty bodies, she peered through her sunglasses, toying with them nervously, seeing only a darkness of grey shadows made even bleaker by the contrast of bright sunlight streaming from behind her. A drunken male voice shouted over the tinny sound of an old jukebox turned up too loud for its ancient speakers, “Hey, luv, shut the bloody door, would ya,” followed by another, “Yeah, make up your bleeding mind.”

Alison let the door swing shut, leaving the sunglasses in place.

She made her way slowly along the long bar to her left. As her eyes adjusted she could make out the white splotches of singlets on broad, muscled, sun-bronzed shoulders, of tables weighed down by jugs, pints and schooners of beer, of men’s eyes lingering on her as she passed. She returned glance for glance . . . but saw no one looking even vaguely like Derek Olsson.

Her worn T-shirt and faded jeans fit the bar’s tone perfectly, but her dark red leather handbag and the silver and jade bracelet on her thin wrist—a long-ago present from Olsson she’d added on a last-minute impulse—made her look completely out of place. As one of the few women in the bar, she realized that how she’d dressed would have made no difference whatsoever.

Sliding into an empty booth in the far corner, she glanced at her watch: five after five. “He said he’d be here at five. I’ll give him five more minutes,” she muttered, her discomfort and annoyance rising with every male look passing her way. She drummed her fingers on the table as she waited, asking herself why he wanted to see her—and whether she really wanted to see him again. And if he shows up, should I tell him about the video? Two minutes, then three, then four ticked by as she stared into space, arguing with herself. It concerns him, too. . . . Maybe he can help. . . . I wouldn’t ask him. And what could he do? . . . Are you trying to protect him, Alison? Don’t be ridiculous!—and still no sign of him.

A rather pudgy, unshaven man, who looked like he’d been holding up the long bar for quite some time, shuffled towards her, a glass in each hand. He shambled closer; he seemed vaguely familiar. But his clothes were shabby and she smelt a faint odor of something rotten, like someone who hadn’t had a shower for a while, except worse.

His eyes were obscured by tinted spectacles.

“Vodka and tonic, right?” the man said, his speech slurred, as he placed a drink in front of her and sat down opposite.

“You’ve got the wrong person, bud,” Alison snapped.

“I don’t think so,” the man said quietly with a wide grin, the slur gone from his words.

Alison gasped. Pushing up her sunglasses she peered closely at his face. His hair was the same shade as her own: jet black, as was the stubble of his beard. His face seemed chubby from a distance, but close-up she saw it was actually lean, except for his bulging cheeks. He wore a jacket and pants not even the Salvation Army would want, she thought; so baggy she couldn’t make out the shape of his body.

But there, in the middle of his cheek, was that very familiar dimple.

“It can’t be you.” Her eyes went from the dimple to his hair: tamed—lying flat against his head, nothing like Olsson’s unruly brown locks—and back to the dimple. Her hand began to reach out to touch his cheek. “It just can’t.”

“Why not, Alison?”

“Derek!”

Olsson nodded. He took off his glasses to clean them with a napkin; Alison found herself smiling at the warmth and memories of his soft eyes.

“Are you all right?” she asked urgently, one hand tightly clutching his. “I couldn’t stand thinking of you locked up like an animal in a cage. How could you take it?”

“I survived.” Olsson returned her grip, caressing her wrist gently with his fingertips.

“Is it safe for you to be here?”

“Possibly not. So I shouldn’t stay too long.”

“And what’s that awful smell?”

Olsson patted the side pocket of his jacket. “A small piece of a rotting fish,” he grinned. “Very effective, eh? But I don’t think I’ll be wanting to wear this jacket again.”

Alison laughed. Then her shoulders dropped, her hand on Olsson’s relaxed its grip, the muscles in her arms loosened, as though a tension that hadn’t been apparent was draining from her body. A single tear rolled down one cheek; her laughter stopped as suddenly as it had begun.

She jerked upright and pulled her hand from his. “But if you’re going to ask whether I’ve forgiven you, the answer is no.”

Olsson dropped his eyes; the spectacles slipped from his fingers with a faint rattle that could barely be heard above the background chatter and slurps of beer.

Olsson shook his head.

“So why did you want to see me? And here of all places.”

“Why did you come?” Olsson asked softly.

“Just answer my question, Derek.”

“I was worried about you.”

“Do you really expect me to believe that?”

Olsson leaned forward, his forearms digging into the table’s edge, his hands clasped in front of him. He gazed silently into her eyes, his face serious, and then as he spoke he was weighing his words carefully, “You’re in danger, Alison?”

Not hearing his question mark, Alison flinched at his words, covering her reaction with a forced laugh and a puzzled expression. “Me?”

Olsson sighed, leaning slowly back into the cushions of the booth. But his eyes would not let hers go.

“Yes, you,” he said. “Ross told me he gave you a referral.”

“He shouldn’t have.”

“I disagree.”

“It’s none of his business—or yours.”

“I’m making it my business.”

“I haven’t asked you to.”

“You have the entire federal bureaucracy at your disposal—thousands of cops and spooks you can call on. So just tell me, Alison, why you need to do something . . . ‘unofficially’?”

Alison’s lips twisted into a smile. “To gather ‘unofficial’ information.”

“On who?”

“On . . . potential troublemakers.”

“Who’d make trouble for whom?”

“Royn,” Alison said firmly, adding in a slightly softer tone, “mainly.”

Olsson breathed long and deep, nodding his head slowly. “I see,” he said. “So you’re not going to tell me.”

“What’s to tell? Anyway, as you pointed out I have a whole government bureaucracy to protect me from danger—should I ever need it.”

“Alison—your answers only leave more questions.”

“Do they?” She laughed at her own words. “Anyway,” she said, a flash of anger behind her eyes, “what can one man—on the run from the law—do that thousands of professionals can’t?”

“Nothing—if he doesn’t know what the problem is.”

“Well,” Alison said, standing up and reaching for her handbag, “it’s very sweet of you to offer, Derek, but I don’t see why you’re trying to make me believe you care.”

“I’ve always cared, Alison,” Olsson said softly.

“You have a strange way of showing it.”

“By offering to help you?”

“You know that’s not what I mean.”

Olsson bowed his head. Slowly looking up, speaking hoarsely in a whisper Alison had to strain to hear, he said, “I know I’ve given you enough reason—”

“Enough reason? A thousand times enough.”

Olsson squirmed uncomfortably, as if her words were waves of raging surf shattering him on a rocky shore.

“I should never have come here.” Her eyes flashed as she spun on her heel, and took a quick step towards the entry door.

“Wait.”

Alison turned at the insistence in Olsson’s voice; she hesitated at the mute appeal in his eyes; her hand went to the silver and jade bracelet on her wrist.

“Take this,” he said, offering her a slip of paper, his eyes going to the bracelet, wondering if she was thinking about throwing it back at him.

“What’s that?” Her nose wrinkled at the paper as if it had been wrapped around the rotten fish; she made no move to accept it.

“An email address. If you ever need me.”

Alison’s body swayed back, away from him, but her feet wouldn’t follow. Her eyes gleamed with fury—and glinted in the faint light as if beads of condensation were forming on an ice-cold glass. She said nothing, her lips tight.

In one swift movement Olsson stood and stuffed the paper in a side pocket of her handbag.

Alison stepped back, letting her hands drop. “Another promise you’ll break, I suppose,” she said. With a shrug she turned away towards the door.

Olsson stood watching her as she stormed out of the bar, hoping she’d look back. Alison, her glass untouched, nonetheless reeled slightly, like someone who’d had one drink too many.

ANOTHER PAIR OF EYES, belonging to a nondescript man who’d been nursing a beer at a darkened, corner table, followed Alison’s progress with veiled interest. As she passed him he dialled a number on his cellphone, listened, and then dialled another. “She met a guy I don’t recognize. He looks like a bum—not her type. But somehow . . . I got the impression of a lovers’ quarrel. Very strange. Too dark here to get a decent picture. She’s leaving now. Do you want me to follow her—or him?”

As he closed the phone he watched admiringly as the harsh sun highlighted the shape of Alison’s body before the door swung shut behind her. He then turned back to his beer, waiting patiently, as he did most of the time, to see how long the bum would stay—and where he would go after that.

*****

MELANIE LOOKED AT THE clock when she heard the buzz of the doorbell. Six thirty . . . and he’s still not home.

With a sigh, she stood up and walked out of the living room into the foyer. The doorbell buzzed again and again, repeatedly. Who could it be?

She saw Zoë coming down the stairs in a dressing gown. “I’ll get it,” Melanie called. “Are you expecting anyone?” Zoë shook her head and turned back up the stairs.

“I’m coming, I’m coming,” Melanie yelled. The buzzing didn’t stop, even when she opened the door to see Anthony Royn leaning, slumped against the door jamb, his eyes and face red, his finger stuck to the door bell button.

“Hi, beautiful,” he said with a big smile.

“You’re drunk,” Melanie glared, wrinkling her nose at the strong, sour smell of his breath. She slapped his hand away from the buzzer.

“You too?” Royn laughed. He leaned forward, grabbing for the doorway as he half-stumbled, and said in a low, conspiratorial voice, “They wouldn’t let me drive anywhere. Made me get into a taxi—shaid I’d had too much to drink. Foolsh.”

“Just as well, ” she said contemptuously. “Deputy Prime Minister Anthony Royn picked up for drunken driving would make a great spread in the Sunday papers.”

Royn smiled. “Made some new friends,” he giggled. “Somebody said I looked like Anthony Royn and I said, ‘Curse of my life, being compared to that bastard.’ They all thought I was a good Labor man, then. Fooled ’em, didn’t I?” His giggles came almost hysterically—until they turned into a fit of hiccupping.

“Did I ever tell you, Mel,” he said, his eyes roving slowly over Melanie’s body, “how mush I love you?”

Holding onto the doorway with one hand, Royn reached out with the other towards Melanie’s shoulder. Melanie’s nose curled up and her mouth wrinkled into a frown as she took a step backward; Royn’s arm hit empty air and continued to swing around, his fingers slipping off the door jamb and, stumbling, he fell in a heap. “Whatcha do that for?” he asked looking up in surprise. “I’m your husband.”

Royn, slowly and awkwardly, picked himself up, moving a little closer to Melanie in the process. “I have rights . . . ” he mumbled to himself. “. . . I think . . . shomewhere in marital law. . . .” His eyes were screwed up as he tried to remember. “Shomewhere. . . .”

“Not in that state, you don’t.” Melanie took another step back, and raised her voice as she spoke with rising contempt. “You’re nothing but a liquid lunch.”

“Lunch? I—I think I ate shomething . . . I can’t remember.” From his position halfway off the floor, Royn angled his head up, looking hurt and puzzled. Melanie glared at him, making no attempt to hide her obvious distaste.

Grunting, Royn finally managed to get himself up, wobbled slightly and, breathing hard, edged his way backwards to lean on the wall behind him.

“You’ve been gone over eight hours without a word. You wouldn’t answer your phone. You’ve been drinking yourself to death by the looks of it. With who?—” her eyes narrowed in suspicion “—so what do you want me think?”

“And with damn good reason.”

“Good reason—?”

“Damn right. You asked me to do shomething and I did ’zactly what you wanted. Next day you bawl me out—and not in private, either. And Zoë got ’zactly what she wanted . . . how can we expect to have any control over her now? Every day I’m away I miss you terribly. Whenever I phone you always find shomething to bitch about. When I come back home, dying to see you, you make me feel it would be better if I hadn’t. So I went and had a beer or two, jusht what I needed.”

“I’m always bitching—?”

“Damn right.”

“—when you leave me all alone in this enormous house—”

“Thash your choice—”

“And who’d look after the kids then?”

“They’re not kids any more.”

“—while you’re up in Canberra—”

“Jush an hour away.” Royn raised his voice, his eyes glaring redder. “Yet shomehow going with me to New York, London and Paris is never a problem for you.”

“That’s different.”

“Really.”

“And God knows what you’re up to up there . . . especially when you don’t even take my calls.”

“What are you accusing me of now? Working my guts out, thash what I’m doing in Canberra. . . . Hell! I don’t even need to work. No Royn needs to work.”

“What would you do then—sit around here all day?”

“Why—would that be a problem for you?”

“It wo—” Melanie’s voice stopped in the middle of the word, her face frozen as if in fright about what she might have been about to say.

“Jush tell me one thing, Melanie.” Royn made to take a step towards her and as he began to lurch, changed his mind. “Jush when did you stop loving me?”

Melanie’s big eyes grew even larger. “I—I—” she stuttered, her hand flying to her chest. With an effort she stilled her lips, as if to arrest any other sound in mid motion, although no sound was stirring in her breast other than the thumping of her heart.

“Stop it. Stop it. Stop it.”

Royn and Melanie turned as one to see Zoë standing halfway down the staircase, her fists trembling by her thighs, blinking back tears. “You’re never here, Dad—”

“Yesh I am and . . . ” Royn protested mildly, his voice trailing off when he remembered where he’d spent the day.

“—and you pushed him into politics—” Zoë turned to face her mother “—you and Grandpa. And you’re always clucking around me like an old mother hen—it drives me up the wall.”

“Me?—it’s all my fault?” Melanie said, turning her glare to her daughter.

“And the way you’re always bickering and arguing and shouting at each other,” Zoë continued as if no one had spoken, “why don’t you get a divorce? You might as well—at least life would be peaceful around here for a change.”

Royn and Melanie stared at their daughter open-mouthed. Zoë’s cellphone rang. “Tom! Yes. Come and pick me up now. . . . Yes, right away . . . I’ve got to get out of here.”

She glared at her parents. “I’m going out—now. I can’t stand it any more.”

“Tom? Who’s Tom?” Royn mumbled.

“Zoë. . . .” Melanie started to say plaintively.

“And I’ll be back when I’m good and ready and not before.” Zoë’s tears smeared her makeup into black lines under her eyes; she stormed out the still-open front door, slamming it loudly behind her.

Melanie stared at the closed door, her body shaking with uncontrollable sobs, wet rivers racing from her eyes to her chin. She slowly turned to look at Royn.

“Why are we doing this to each other, Tony?” she asked, her voice trembling between gasps for air. “Why?”

Royn took a half-stumbling step towards her, hugging her tightly, partly leaning on her for support, awkwardly dabbing her eyes and cheeks with the end of his sleeve. He swayed slightly, losing his balance and they both sank awkwardly to the floor, hugging each other for support as they slowly collapsed. They sat looking into each other’s tear-streaked eyes.

“I jush don’t know, Mel. But I wish to God it would stop.”

15 Tinkle, Tinkle, Little Star

A WHOLE SUNDAY MORNING with nothing to do . . . but worry, Alison thought as she opened her eyes to stare blankly at the ceiling. She burrowed back under the blankets . . . but it didn’t make any difference: even with her eyes closed, even though she still felt sleepy she was, nonetheless, wide-awake. Reluctantly, she threw back the covers and sat on the side of the bed as though considering the blank expanse of the day before her. After a while she came to a decision: Go for a run.

An hour and a half later, she jogged towards her favorite coffee shop in Manuka, a small complex of trendy boutiques, restaurants, and cafés little more than one city block in size. To Alison, it was one of the few places in Canberra with any real personality of its own. The main street was lined with tables along the footpath. It was the sort of place where, if she closed her eyes, the smell of coffee and croissants, the bustle of people and the soft sound of music in the background, could make her think she was sitting at a sidewalk café in Paris, not Canberra . . . for just a moment.

As she ran by the tables, a couple of young men, barely out of their teens, seemed to be undressing her with their eyes. She glared at them so severely that they both turned away, embarrassed.

But when she reached her destination she stopped, cold, as she saw her reflection in the plate glass door. Her thick black hair was plastered to her head; the T-shirt she’d grabbed in haste was old and tattered; and the loose tracksuit pants made her look shapeless from the waist down. Maybe I should feel complimented, she thought. After all, how often do kids like them give any 34-year-old woman, let alone a dishevelled one, “The Look”?

“Morning, Louie,” she said to the swarthy, elderly man behind the counter as she stepped inside.

“Morning, Miss McGuire,” Louie replied. “The usual?”

“Thanks,” she nodded, putting a twenty-dollar bill on the counter. “I think I’ll sit out in the sun.”

“Okay, I’ll bring it out to you. And you look like you could use this,” Louie said, handing her a large bottle of water.

“Most definitely,” said Alison. After a long gulp she asked, “And what have your customers been talking about this week?”

“Aside from the weather, and who’s divorcing whom?” Louie’s eyes twinkled. Alison said nothing. They played this game every Sunday morning. “The Sandemans, of course. They all want to nuke the terrorists who killed those soldiers. And most of them wonder why the hell we’re involved in this no-account little country, don’t think we should be sending more troops up there—and reckon our forces oughta all come home so there are no more deaths.”

“Ah, I see. A perfectly balanced sample. And what do you think?”

Louie looked at Alison intently before he spoke. “I saw enough death and destruction in the second world war to last me several lifetimes. First Mussolini’s fascisti—” he spat the word “—and then the Germans and the Americans. I was lucky.” He rolled up the sleeve of his left arm. “See that,” he said, pointing to a ring of faint scars on his upper arm. “Over sixty years ago. American bullets—which saved my life. They shattered my arm—but I spent what was left of the war in hospital. And I never saw any of my comrades again. I’m sure they all died. You know, we would have all melted into the hills except for one thing: the Germans were behind us and we knew they’d shoot us if we tried to run away. So we shot at the Americans instead. But not too well . . . the war was over for us by then, but we were still stuck in it.

“So if you really want to know what I think I’ll tell you.”

“Yes, Louie, I really do.”

“I think if people like your puffed up peacock of a boss want to send young kids out to die, they should at least have the decency to lead them into battle themselves.”

Alison burst out laughing.

“I’m not being funny,” said Louie, irritably.

“I know,” said Alison, speaking between giggles. “But you’ve got to admit, the picture of Anthony Royn and the rest of the wheezing, overweight Cabinet stalking through the jungle or jumping out of foxholes and trying to duck bullets is pretty hilarious.”

Louie chuckled. “Make the bastards think three times, though.”

“That it would,” she agreed.

Alison gathered up the five Sunday papers from the newspaper rack—two from Melbourne, two from Sydney, and the local Canberra Sunday Guardian—and took them out to a sidewalk table. With a sigh, starting with the newspaper on top of the pile, she flicked through the pages rapidly, scanning the headlines, occasionally reading a couple of paragraphs, looking for any mention of Royn, or any comment or article relevant to him in some way, before moving on. By the time Louie brought her order, she’d already dropped the first paper in the nearby garbage can.

“Do you ever actually read the papers?” Louie asked as he wedged a small tray with her cappuccino, croissant, and change onto the small table.

Alison laughed. “Hardly ever.”

“I can tell you there’s no need to read the local one. Your boss didn’t rate a mention today.”

“Ah,” she replied. “Well, I want to see what’s on at the movies.”

“Nothing worth watching.” Louie said. “Unless of course you’ve got a hot date. Then any movie will do.”

“Louie,” she laughed, reaching for her coffee, “you’re probably right.”

BACK IN HER KINGSTON apartment, she threw the two unread Sunday papers, with a few pages torn from the others, on the table and saw the message light flashing on the phone. It was from Royn, who answered when she called back.

“I’ll be taking the morning flight to Singapore tomorrow, along with Melanie and the kids. We’re all going,” he said.

“Anything you need me to do?”

“Just let the Australian High Commission up there know—and arrange a courtesy call on the Singapore Foreign Minister late that afternoon, if possible.”

“Certainly, Minister. What about hotels and so on?”

“All taken care of.”

“Okay. I’ll get a midnight flight tomorrow so I’ll be there Tuesday morning.”

“See you there.”

Putting down the phone, she opened her laptop—and grimaced. Screening the growing volume of the geek’s phone taps was taking more and more of her time. Aside from some interesting gossip between McKurn and Cracken, only one, so far, had been of any direct use. It was the sort of work that should be delegated—but she couldn’t think of anyone she could entrust it to. Except, maybe, the computer geek . . . but then, he’d probably miss some connection only she could make. Shrugging, she set up the connections and went to have a shower while the emails downloaded.

Her hair still wrapped in a towel, she saw a message from the geek thanking her for the information—her summary of Sidney Royn’s report—she’d sent him the previous day. And then she scrolled through one phone call after another, discarding most of them, until, half an hour later, she came to a man’s voice she hadn’t heard before:

“She met a guy I don’t recognize. He looks like a bum—not her type. But somehow . . . I got the impression of a lovers’ quarrel. Very strange. Too dark here to get a decent picture. She’s leaving now. Do you want me to follow her—or him?”

After a pause, McKurn’s voice replied, “Very odd . . . so follow the guy. Find out who he is. We can pick up the girl any time. And use the other number in future, dammit.”

“I did. But you haven’t switched the bloody thing on—and I can’t wait.”

“He looks like a bum,” the man had said. Could he be talking about Derek? she asked herself in surprise. She looked at the time on the message—We were in the bar—and played it again.

“Is McKurn having me followed?” she muttered, looking unseeingly at the screen. “I wouldn’t put it past him. . . . Or is the timing just a coincidence? And what’s “the other number”? I should warn him anyway. . . .”

She picked up her cellphone and scrolled through the incoming calls, but Olsson’s call yesterday morning to arrange their meeting yesterday was marked unknown.

She went to her wardrobe to get his email address, still stuffed in the side pocket of her red handbag. Holding the scrap of paper in her hand, she stopped in the doorway of her bedroom, feeling a rising anger and frustration. Why should I? she asked herself. He could be in danger, came another voice. “As if he’s not!” Uncertain steps carried her back to the laptop. Hesitating, her fingers resting on the keys, until she muttered “Whatever,” quickly typed You may have been followed out of the bar yesterday . . . and clicked the send button.

“Damn it all, Derek,” she said to the silent computer, “if you hadn’t. . . . Well, maybe we could have had a life.”

*****

“TINKLE TINKLE LITTLE STAR,” the children sang, “how I wonder wot you are.”

Karla stood next to the teacher, grinning broadly at the thirty-odd children, aged nine and ten, who smiled hesitantly back at her. At Uqu’s insistence, she wore an ankle-length skirt, a shirt with long sleeves, a flowery scarf partly covering her hair. The only way to find something that would fit was to have them tailor-made, a process which took all of two-and-a-half hours. Made of thin cotton, the clothes—even with sleeves that covered her wrists—were surprisingly cool. And so cheap—a mere 125 tingi, six dollars something—she’d ordered two more sets.

“Stop, stop,” she said, raising her hands.

“Very good. But it’s not ‘tinkle, tinkle, little star.’ It’s ‘twinkle twinkle. . . .’ Everybody, say ‘winkle.’”

“Winkle,” the children chorused.

“Good,” Karla smiled. So it’s the ‘tw’ sound that’s the problem, she thought.

Karla had been apprehensive when Arang’anat, one of the school’s teachers had invited her—implored her—to help teach the children English. Karla had protested, “I’ve never stood in front of a class of children before.”

“But your English speak, ’Orton-gaat.” Arang’anat said. “Have no problem teach.”

“And I’m not a teacher either—what would I do?” When she realized Arang’anat was an English teacher, she agreed.

Karla had met Arang’anat in the women’s dormitory complex at one edge of the village where she had been billeted for the past three nights. Arang’anat was one of the many unmarried women—almost all young—who lived there. For the most part, they had come from other parts of el-Bihar to work in the fish-processing plant, ganja fields or hashish factory. The dormitory was presided over by elderly, unsmiling ladies and was surrounded by a high bamboo fence, with a gate that was locked a couple of hours after sundown. The old ladies griped when ’Orton-gaat refused to abide by those rules and sat smoking ganja and drinking mint tea with the men till late evening, grumbled when Karla returned and they had to unlock the gate, and even after they were reminded in no uncertain terms that Karla was an honored guest of the village, continued to nag the village elders incessantly at every opportunity.

But to the fifty-odd young women in the dorm, Karla was the object of endless fascination. She slept, as they all did, on a mat on the hard, packed-dirt floor. The first night she was hardly spoken to, but there were sporadic giggles and some “oohs” and “aahs” when Karla took off all her clothes in the dim light to change into her pajamas. As she bent, naked, to dig her pajamas out of her backpack she became aware of a dozen pairs of enormous eyes staring at her in surprise. Karla thought nothing of it until, waking the next morning, she realized the other women had all slept in their ordinary clothes. And the next morning, in the showers, they were fascinated by Karla’s pale skin, her light pink nipples, and the strange light reddish color of her pubic hair—and shocked, as Karla showered naked. To Karla’s surprise all the women showered in a long, shapeless, shift-like dress which covered them from under their arms to their ankles.

Few words were spoken that morning as the women sang their way to the mosque in answer to the call for dawn prayers. Karla spent the daylight hours at the beach with Uqu—which, the next day, raised many giggled questions. An unchaperoned, unmarried woman alone all day with a man, Karla discovered, was the stuff of scandal.

Meals were served at long tables sheltered by a thatched roof but otherwise open to the elements. At breakfast on the second morning one woman—who introduced herself as Arang’anat—boldly brought her tray over and sat down opposite Karla. Shyly, haltingly she began to ask seemingly innocuous questions like “Where you from?” “How old?” “Married?” and, gesturing politely towards Karla’s shorts and T-shirt, “All women in Australia your clothes wear?”

Slowly, as they talked, the women at the other end of the table edged closer and a few more drifted over. Karla became the center of a circle of breathless eyes and questioning mouths as each young woman competed with the others to persuade Arang’anat to translate their question next, giggling or oohing as Arang’anat translated Karla’s answer until the elderly woman who’d supervised the meal barked something and they all, except for Arang’anat, leapt up guiltily, picked up plates and trays and carted them off to the kitchen.

“We now tables must clean, dishes must wash,” Arang’anat explained as she stood.

Karla noticed that apart from the women who’d been sitting with her, the canteen was empty.

“Where is everyone else?”

“To work. Our day off.”

“I see,” said Karla, “a woman’s day off.”

Arang’anat said nothing but looked puzzled.

“Is there a men’s dorm?” Karla asked.

“Dorm?”

“A place like this where men workers sleep.”

Arang’anat nodded.

“So do the men clean up the dishes on their day off?”

“Oh no,” said Arang’anat, looking as if Karla had just pronounced a heresy.

Karla gathered some plates and stood. “I can help.”

“No no, Arang’anat protested. “You guest.”

Karla smiled. “I’m a woman, too, right?”

Afterwards, they gathered again and, shyly, Arang’anat produced a scrap of newspaper and a pouch of ganja and began to roll the leaves into a thin tube. “You like?” she asked Karla, a worried look on her face.

“Sure,” said Karla with a smile, resisting her automatic reaction to turn up her nose at the use of newspaper. She searched in her pockets and found the packet of cigarette papers she’d bought in a village store. “A bit early, I would have thought,” she said as she passed the small packet across the table.

Arang’anat smiled broadly. “Here okay. Outside no can.”

For the next couple of hours, Karla was grilled—very politely, guardedly, and circuitously but with single-minded determination, despite continuous giggling interrupted only by shocked silences—about the mating and marriage habits of the Australian female; about the clothes she wore; whether it was true that a western woman could choose any job she liked and go anywhere she liked . . . by herself; if it was really true that Australian women all went to the beach and lay in the sun with no clothes on—and how were the women punished after they’d inevitably been raped by any and every passing male.

“TE’WINKLE, TE’WINKLE, little star,” the children sang, “how I wonder wot you are.”

“Very good,” Karla clapped, surprised at how much she was enjoying herself. “Now—”

The classroom door was pushed open forcefully, swinging all the way to the wall with a loud thunk, and Gurundi, stepped into the classroom. He strode up to Karla, demanding angrily, “You ’ere wot do?”

“I’m helping teach these children English,” said Karla, taking a step towards him. “More to the point, what are you doing here?”

Gurundi’s eyes widened as Karla moved; his mouth hung open, for a moment speechless. Karla noticed that the children, who a moment before had been smiling and happy and were full of energy had now shrunk into their seats. A few were even shaking. She saw that Uqu, who had positioned himself discreetly just outside the classroom, had silently followed Gurundi inside, a worried look on his face.

“Well?” Karla demanded, her hands on her hips, her gravelly voice sounding like a monarch questioning an errant courtier. “Explain yourself.”

The boys’ eyes were riveted, waiting apprehensively on Gurundi, who took half a step backwards, his pale China face turning rapidly into deeper and deeper shades of red. The girls, sitting on the other side of the room, watched Karla nervously . . . and with guarded awe. Karla felt a light tap on her elbow and looked back to see Arang’anat’s fingers barely touching her, her shoulders drooping, her body meek, her eyes flicking fearfully towards Gurundi as she softly pleaded, “Please, ’Orton-gaat, no more—”

“You!” Gurundi shouted, his voice strangely high-pitched. “You now stop. . . .” His halting English failed him and he turned on Arang’anat and unleashed a stream of invective in the local dialect. Arang’anat cowered away from him, hiding herself behind Karla’s body.

Uqu was gesturing wildly to attract Karla’s attention—but Karla didn’t see him, or chose not to. She took one stride closer to Gurundi so she towered over him. “You are an ill-mannered, miserable excuse for a man,” she growled. “You have no business here. And you should be ashamed of yourself—no honorable person treats any human being, male or female, like that. Now, get out of here before I throw you out.”

Gurundi, his head awkwardly tilted back to look up at Karla, seemed frozen in place, his only movement a slight quivering in his shoulders.

Behind her, Karla heard Arang’anat whisper, in a fragile voice, “’Orton-gaat, please, no more trouble.”

But Karla herself was beyond listening. After a long moment glaring at Gurundi who refused to move—or was incapable of doing so—she grabbed his arm in a tight, painful hold. Fuming, Gurundi struggled to release her grip, but Karla held tight and marched him out of the door, half-lifting him to help him on his way. In the hallway she released her grip, and pointing imperiously towards the exit, commanded him, “Now, go.”

Gurundi’s eyes blazed at her—but, slowly, he turned and slunk way.

Karla was unaware that Uqu had stepped out behind her and quietly closed the classroom door until, when she saw Gurundi reach the outdoors, she spun around to continue her English lesson.

“You have just made an enemy,” said Uqu quietly.

“Someone had to bring him down a peg or two—and I was happy it could be me.”

“But you’ll soon be gone from here while, unfortunately, that nice young lady teacher will not. And it’s she who will bear the brunt of his anger.”

“Oh my God . . . you’re right.” Karla tried to push past Uqu, but he held his ground, blocking her way.

“Do you know what he was saying to her?”

Karla shook her head. “Only that it was awful, whatever it was.”

“He told her she was corrupting the village’s children by bringing an infidel into the classroom, and she’d probably end up in hell or worse. There was more, much more, I’m sure, if you hadn’t cut him short.”

“I should—”

“Another time would be better. Let’s hope Gurundi is licking his wounds so we can talk to the village elders first.”

“We need to do that?” Karla asked.

“Do you understand what actually happened in there?” Uqu asked as he nudged her along the corridor.

“I chewed out a despicable runt of a man who—” Karla stopped when she noticed Uqu was shaking his head, smiling sadly. “So, tell me, what actually happened in there?”

“The village’s current spiritual leader, the most influential young Muslim in the country, was just humbled, even disgraced in public—”

“Nothing more or less than he deserved.”

“Perhaps,” said Uqu. “Tungi, the village headman, has the authority to chew him out—but even he would do it politely. Now, though, Gurundi has just been manhandled by a woman—which, given his position, is a sacrilege—in a culture—”

“—where women are seen and not heard.”

“Right,” said Uqu. “And when they are seen, they do exactly what a man orders them to do.”

AS THEY WALKED ACROSS the square Karla noticed gratefully that Gurundi was nowhere to be seen. In the restaurant, Tungi-ga listened without comment, and with several quizzical, sidelong glances at Karla, as Uqu related what had happened. “Matalam,” was all he said when Uqu finished.

Karla took a table while Uqu went to order tea. The school bell rang. Tungi stood and walked slowly in the direction of the school.

“What do you know about Gurundi, anyway?” Karla asked as Uqu sat down, passing her a cup of tea. “You seem to think he’s important and influential—why?”

“A few years ago, he came first in a Saudi-sponsored competition. The winner was the one who best-memorized and recited chapters from the Koran in Arabic.”

“So he speaks Arabic, then?”

Uqu shook his head. “He memorized passages without understanding their meaning. The prize was a scholarship: two years at an Islamic school in Indonesia. He came back as a celebrity—and one of the few Sandeman Muslims who has had any formal schooling in Islam. So when the local imam became ill and died, he was offered the position of Khatib—who delivers the sermon at Friday prayers, a sort of assistant-imam if you like—until a trained imam could be found. Young men from all over the islands come to listen to him, to learn from him. Unfortunately, most of them are now out in the hills somewhere, toting guns.”

“I see. So he’s preaching . . . ?”

“Fire and brimstone. Death to America. Expel the infidels . . . and so on.”

“So that’s what he learnt in Indonesia then?”

“So it seems.”

“But if he doesn’t speak Arabic,” Karla said slowly, “and his English isn’t much good. . . .” She stopped. “Is there a translation of the Koran in the local language?”

Uqu shook his head. “Not as far as I know. The Bible, yes, but the Koran . . . I don’t think so. But in his two years in Indonesia he’s been taught what it all means—by Saudi-trained Wahhabists.”

“I see,” said Karla thoughtfully. “So he’s hardly had a balanced education.”

“Quite the opposite,” Uqu said sourly.

*****

IT HAD BEEN uneventful flight, except for the bitching when, about an hour out of Sydney, the chief steward had regretfully announced that the plane had completely run out of alcoholic drinks. Someone in the back started singing The Pub With No Beer, to be joined by over a hundred voices.

But Lieutenant Jeremy McGuire—sitting with the other officers and the senior sergeants in the business class section of the Qantas 767—noticed there was no similar shortage of soft drinks and snacks, so he wondered if the supply of booze had been limited intentionally.

As the most junior officer, Jeremy had the job of checking that all other 253 soldiers had safely disembarked from the plane before it was his turn. As he stepped outside, his nose wrinkled at the smell—and he stifled a grin as he saw that the other officers and the men, even in summer uniform, were already sweating in the glare of the tropical sun.

At the bottom of the steps he smartly returned the straggled salutes of the dozen soldiers waiting to board the plane. Unlike the soldiers who’d just arrived who, though standing easy, stood in neat, orderly rows on the tarmac, these veterans were lounging and chatting. Their uniforms were clean but wrinkled, their boots needed spit and polish, their floppy hats were stained with sweat and dirt. They came to a sloppy sort of attention as they saluted him—but then he noted one man with an enormous bandage on his head and another with his arm in a sling, and decided to make no comment.

“Good luck, sir,” said one of the men as he made his way up the steps.

“Thank you. I hope we won’t need it.”

The soldier smiled knowingly but said nothing.

Looking up at the crooked sign, WELLCOME TO TORIBAYA, he wondered what sort of welcome he and his men would be receiving.

16 Fairy Tales?

DEREK OLSSON STARED AT his laptop, yawning as he read: You may have been followed out of the bar yesterday. “What a nuisance,” he muttered.

Thanks, he replied; and on an impulse attached his public key to the message so Alison could send him encrypted messages.

“If I was followed, I guess ‘Joe Schuster’ is going to have to go into retirement for a while.”

He padded over to the suitcase and rummaged inside it until he found a floppy beach hat. “Good.” Pulling it down over his hair as far it would go, he checked the result in the mirror, and nodded. He pulled out two envelopes from the bottom of the small suitcase, took the passports from each envelope, studied the pictures, and then put one of the envelopes back. Taking out what looked like a tube of toothpaste he went into the bathroom and sat down in front of the mirror, wet his hair, squeezed the tube over the hairbrush and proceeded to brush the ointment into his hair.

“Half an hour to dry,” he said, reading the instructions. Looking in the mirror, he decided to leave the stubble of beard till later.

Padding back to the laptop, he finished drafting the email he’d been working on, checked for other messages, packed everything up, and when the thirty minutes were up, got into the shower. As he dried himself, a face with reddish hair stared back at him from the mirror.

Shortly afterwards Derek Olsson, still masquerading as “Joe Schuster,” walked out of the motel room wearing a loud pink shirt and jeans, tinted glasses, and a hat to conceal the changed color of his hair. He threw his luggage into the back seat of the Toyota and wandered over to the reception office to check out.

He spent the night in a nondescript motel in Goulburn, a little over an hour’s drive from Canberra, where he’d gratefully crashed for twelve solid hours of sleep. As he slowly drove out of the parking lot he heard an engine come to life; as he turned the next corner, in the mirror he saw a grey Holden Commodore nosing out onto the street and, grinning, wondered whether the driver had had any sleep.

He drove carefully through the unfamiliar streets of Goulburn until he turned onto the highway towards Sydney, where he slowly accelerated until the speedometer reached 135 kph, as if he was in a hurry to get somewhere . . . but stuck to that speed as if he had no idea someone might be on his tail. Too bad if “Joe” gets a speeding ticket, he thought.

Sure enough, he could see the grey Commodore sticking a kilometer or so behind him, the driver trying to pretend he wasn’t really there by staying in the outside lane except when he had to pass another car. “Joe Schuster” relaxed back in the driver’s seat, doing his best to look like a speeding driver who wanted to avoid getting a speeding ticket—slowing down at the tops of hills, for example, as one place the police liked to hide in waiting was at the bottom of a steep descent.

Okay, so I’m definitely being followed. How to throw him off the scent?

*****

“HAS THIS SCURRILOUS WEBSITE got anything to do with you?” Through the earpiece of the phone, McKurn’s angry voice burned in Alison’s ear.

“Senator?” Alison asked, as calmly as she could. “What on earth are you talking about?”

“McKurnWatch.com. Some bastard—” he spat his words “—has put up a website filled with scandalous rubbish libelling me. Better for you if you own up right now—if it’s something you have done.”

“McKurnWatch.com, did you say? Just wait a moment, please, Senator. . . .” As she spoke, her fingers danced over her keyboard and in a moment the web page flashed up, the sole illustration a famous cartoon of McKurn, his eyebrows devil’s peaks and his bulbous nose bigger, and much uglier, than Pinocchio’s:

McKurnWatch.com

Hi there Boys & Girls!

In the mood for a not-so-fairy tale? Poor boy makes good—with a twist?

This is the saga of how a poor boy from a rich and exclusive neighborhood rose against all odds to become one of the nation’s most honored and powerful people through skullduggery, corruption, drugs, prostitution, intimidation and murder . . . and no one really knows anything about how he did it. (Mainly because most of those who did know something are now wearing concrete boots.)

So sit back, put up your feet, and “listen up.”

Once upon a time, not so long ago and certainly not so far away, a young kid named Frank (who never lived up to his name . . . but I’m getting ahead of myself) grew up in a rich family in one of Sydney’s more exclusive eastern suburbs. Daddy was a businessman who’d made some really good investments so the family lived high on the hog, in a big mansion in Bellvue Hill with a wonderful view of the harbour, maids, gardeners, cars, drivers, the lot . . . the whole box and dice.

Every day the family driver took the young Frank to kindergarten—at Cranbrook, no less. Nothing but the best for young Frankie you see. It was a good life.

But Daddy had been hit hard by the Great Depression, though he managed to hang onto his money for a while. However, just before World War II—which bailed everyone else out—Daddy (not to mention Frank) was broke, bankrupt, kaput.

Not quite totally: he did manage to save a small shop in Rose Bay with an apartment above (mainly because it was in his wife’s name).

Still, Daddy scrimped to keep his son (the apple of his eye—though God knows why) at Cranbrook (but what a comedown—poor little Frankie had to give up the mansion with the swimming pool for a pokey little flat, and had to take the tram to school . . . while the rich kids who were still rich kids still arrived in limos . . . a formative experience, perhaps, especially at such a young age?) and in pocket money which, once he entered high school, he mostly spent on gambling and girls.

It wasn’t long before the school authorities became aware that young Frankie had got a couple of girls pregnant—but of course he denied he was at fault. He’d also become rowdy, rebellious, and uncontrollable—the exact opposite of the “goodie-goodie” Cranbrook boy they were trying to mould. (Wrong material with young Frankie.)

Anyway, at the tender age of 14 (that’s right, he was a quick learner) Frank decided to quit school, mainly to deny the school the pleasure of expelling him.

In any case, aside from arithmetic (to count his money) what else did the school have to teach him that would be useful in his life to come of blackmail, standover tactics, and schmoozing with “ethically challenged” cops, bureaucrats and politicians?

Much to his father’s disappointment, Frank then disappeared, presumably into the underworld. While we don’t know for sure, it’s a good guess since when Frank surfaced a few years later it was thanks to a gang fight that resulted in Frank almost being charged with manslaughter.

News to you? I’ll betcha—but he wriggled out of that one, you see. His real education was going gangbusters.

More about that (and lots of other good—well, better—stuff) to come. So hang onto your seats for our next installment.
—The McKurn Watcher

With great difficulty, Alison stopped herself from bursting into laughter.

“Yes, Senator,” she said with a straight face, “I see what you mean.”

“Filth.” McKurn spat through the phone. “So . . . answer my question.”

“You think I . . . ?” Unable to continue restraining herself, her laughter echoed through the outer office.

“Goddammit, Alison,” McKurn growled. “This is not funny.”

“Quite so, Senator,” she replied, still chuckling and dabbing her eyes with a tissue. “But what is hilarious is why you think I’d do something as stupid as that.”

“I suppose you wouldn’t . . . maybe.”

“No maybe about it. . . . Why don’t you take some legal action to close it down?” Alison asked.

“The damn site is set up in the U.S., where the libel laws are a lot weaker than they are here.”

“Presumably, though, whoever set it up is an Australian—so you could take legal action here.”

“If we could find out whose it was—but the ownership is cloaked.”

“Oh dear,” Alison replied, hoping her smile was not reflected in her voice. “Well, I’m afraid I don’t have any more suggestions. And, uh, Senator, unfortunately I won’t be able to meet you until Friday at the earliest—maybe not even till next Monday.”

“Whyever not?”

“I have to go to Singapore tonight with the minister—the Sandeman oil negotiations. I won’t be back until Thursday or Friday night.”

“I suppose that will have to do then,” McKurn said gracelessly. “Till Monday.” And the phone went dead.

Alison turned back to her computer where the McKurnWatch page was still showing. Noticing an option to sign up “for further thrilling installments of Frankie’s life story,” she entered an email address and clicked SUBSCRIBE NOW.

*****

HALFWAY TO SYDNEY, OLSSON pulled into a diner set in the center of the freeway. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed the Commodore pull into a parking space on the other side of the parking lot.

He rummaged around in the backpack until he found what he was looking for, and then pulled a dull grey T-shirt from the suitcase.

At a leisurely pace, making sure he could be seen, the T-shirt bunched up in his hand out of sight, he strolled into the diner and went into the bathroom. In a cubicle, he took off his shirt, put on the grey T-shirt, and put the pink shirt back on over it. He was washing his hands, whistling, when another man strolled in and went to the urinals. Their eyes met for just a moment; Olsson smiled pleasantly but the other man quickly looked away.

He stood in line for a while, bought a coffee, and sat drinking it for a few minutes. The other man had come out of the bathroom a moment after he did, and spent a while looking sideways at the menus pinned to the wall behind the counter as if he were deciding what to order, yet positioned so he could also see Olsson without having to turn his head. When Olsson sat down with his coffee, the man stood in line. But when Olsson stood up, carrying his coffee out of the diner, he saw the man tense up, and as Olsson walked outside, the man sprinted for another exit.

Back on the highway towards Sydney, Olsson took out his cellphone and made a call. He had to wait a minute or so for an operator, but soon closed the cellphone with a satisfied smile, and accelerated until he was, once again, speeding along at a steady 135.

*****

ONLY TWICE, ON THE long boat ride from Toribaya, had Karla been able to hook up her laptop to the satellite dish Uqu carried. Inkaya, Karla was pleased to discover, had a small internet café where she could check her email and talk to the office—at any time of day.

“Have they lifted the communications blackout, do you know?” she asked Uqu.

He shrugged in reply. “I don’t know. But we’re a long way from Toribaya. Maybe el-Bihar connects direct into the Papua New Guinea network, just a few kilometers across the water.”

Karla remembered standing on the pier, looking at the island just a stone’s throw away, it seemed, across the narrow strait. Now and then, a banca made the short crossing without any apparent hindrance—at least, not from the uniformed official sitting or, more likely, sleeping at the end of the pier.

Seeing the internet café was empty, except for the cashier at the front, Karla whispered to Uqu, “The people back in Sydney told me Australian troops are trying to find me as well.”

“I’m more worried about Sandeman soldiers showing up here,” Uqu murmured softly in reply. “But even if they don’t, any day now a picture of you will get to the local police station—I doubt your blonde hair will do you much good then.”

“Meaning . . . ?”

“It’s not going to be safe for you to stay here much longer.”

Karla nodded. “Then—”

“Not now,” said Uqu. “Let’s talk about it later.”

“Okay,” said Karla, looking at her laptop blankly She closed it, put it in her backpack, and said, “Let’s go for a walk.”

They walked slowly past the school where children were playing—too quietly, it seemed to Karla. Or was it just her imagination? She shook her head as she thought again of Arang’anat, and how everybody’s attitude towards her had changed since she’d marched Gurundi from the school. She was still welcomed at the elder’s table but more coldly, out of politeness now, she thought. And the grouchy old ladies who ran the dormitory had made it clear that she, too, must now abide by the curfew—and Karla saw that, for the first time, they were really happy.

There were no more giggling, ganja-smoking chats. Many of the other women in the dorm avoided her, some even eyeing her disdainfully. Others looked at her longingly, and a few even came up to her when no one else was around, whispering “Matalam, matalam”—“Thank you, thank you”—with a quick smile before nervously scurrying away.

But what really hurt was how Arang’anat trudged around lethargically, the red, frightened wetness of her eyes now seeming a permanent feature of her expression, and the way Arang’anat avoided her.

Late the previous evening, Karla couldn’t stand it any more and walked up to her saying, “I’m sorry.” Karla was relieved as Arang’anat allowed herself to be folded into a tight embrace. “I had no idea. . . .”

“How much I wish like you I could be,” Arang’anat said, shaking in Karla’s arms. Looking up at Karla she said tearfully, “But, I no can; I no can.” A few minutes later she shuffled away muttering, “Inshallah.”

“Inshallah,” Karla thought angrily. Damn that attitude. She wondered if there was some way she could spirit Arang’anat off to Australia. At that idea, depressing thoughts came into her mind: Would she want to go? And: If she were in Australia, would she change? And if so, how much and how quickly?

“YES,” SAID KARLA AS they reached the beach, “I think I’ve worn out my welcome, sad to say.”

“Time to go?” Uqu asked.

“Right,” said Karla. “But where—and how?”

“Back to Australia? Or—”

“Or where?”

“Well, you wanted to meet some separatists. We could go for a trek up in the hills.”

“And then?”

“Australia.”

“How? Just take a banca over there?” Karla asked, pointing towards the nearby tip of Papua New Guinea.

“Not a good idea. The Papuans might send you back here, intern you, or let you go. We’re not sure how they’d react.”

“What then?”

“The fishing boat at the end of the pier.”

“Take that? To where?”

“North Queensland.”

“How long would that take?”

“It’s fast, but it would still be quite a while.”

Karla looked at the boat, her eyes narrowing. “That’s how the ganja and hash get to Australia, isn’t it?”

Uqu nodded. “It’s all been arranged. You can take the next boat whenever you want.”

“The next boat?”

“One goes every day or two.”

“Makes sense.”

“The village elders agreed long before you got here—and they’re men of their word, no matter what might have happened.”

“You mean Gurundi?”

“Exactly. And I can tell you, few of the elders disapprove of what you did, only that you, a woman, did it.”

“I see. So we could go for a trek, as you put it, and then I can take the boat . . . ?”

“Right. But, perhaps we should leave in the morning?”

“Okay,” Karla nodded with a feeling of relief. “Now that’s decided, let’s go back to the internet café. I still have some things to do.”

*****

WHEN HE REACHED THE outskirts of Sydney, Olsson turned off the Sydney-Melbourne highway onto the M5 toll way, which went past Sydney Airport to the eastern suburbs.

The traffic was now heavier, so the Commodore stayed closer to him than it had on the open highway. And Olsson now stuck to the speed limit, as most other cars did on this road. He took the exit to Sydney Airport and a few minutes later drove up the ramp to the departures level of the international terminal, the Commodore still on his tail, just half-a-dozen cars behind.

He drove all the way to the end and swung into an empty parking space. He leapt out of the car, grabbing his suitcases from the back seat, and walked through the glass doors. As they closed behind him, he heard a voice calling, “Hey, mister. You can’t leave your car here.”

“Be just a moment,” Olsson shouted back.

As he turned right, as if heading for a check-in counter, he could see the Commodore stop beside his Toyota, the driver hesitating before stepping out, only to be accosted by an airport parking policeman. Olsson grinned: drivers were supposed to stay with their cars and a car without a driver would be quickly towed away.

Once out of sight of the door he ran towards the escalators, wheeling the larger suitcase behind him, and went down towards arrivals. As he stood on the escalator, to the surprise of the people nearby he ripped off his shirt, grimacing slightly as a few of the buttons flew off, and stuffed the pink shirt, beach hat, and tinted glasses into the side of the suitcase.

On the arrivals level, fluffing up his now-reddish hair, Olsson stopped at the rental car counter. Waving his gold card and driver’s licence, he was handed a set of keys with the words, “All ready for you, Mr. Brewster. Have a nice day.”

A few minutes later, he pulled out of the parking lot and headed back towards the highway. He grinned when he noticed the man run out of the arrivals door near the rental car counters, looking around frantically for a black-haired man in a pink shirt . . . who was nowhere to be seen.

*****

ON MONDAY AFTERNOON, THE NSW Police announced a reward of $200,000 for information leading to Olsson’s arrest.

Durant was disturbed and puzzled to learn the underworld’s grapevine had been abuzz since the previous Saturday with the news that someone else was also offering a reward for Derek Olsson: $100,000 dead; $500,000 alive.

Who? Durant wondered. And why?

*****

ALISON LEFT THE OFFICE earlier than usual that afternoon, to have time to pack before her connecting flight to Melbourne. When she got home she sent a message:

You have anything to do with McKurnWatch.com?

An answer arrived a little while later:

like it?

Never thought of you as a writer.

nor did i. no extra charge by the way

Thanks. Keep it up.

When she checked the email address she’d given Royn she found a message from the private investigators Royn had arranged to hire: You have some kind of work you need done?—and she sent the question she’d already prepared.

COMFORTABLY ENSCONCED IN THE Singapore Airlines first class lounge at Melbourne airport, with several hours to wait for her onward flight, she went through her email address book and prepared a list of the email addresses of all the federal parliamentarians, press gallery reporters, and any other similar contacts she could think of, after making sure each one she added was publicly available—like those from a parliamentarian’s home page on the web. Then she trawled through websites of state parliaments, newspapers, TV and radio stations, and other likely looking websites for email addresses to add to her list, collecting close to three hundred she’d send to the geek, suggesting he add them to the email list for “Frankie’s saga.”

Just as her flight was called, she spied the private eye’s answer in her inbox, and quickly sent the same message she’d received from the geek:

Next step: install the encryption program, and send me your public key.

17 “Mum’s the Word”

ARANG’ANAT HUGGED KARLA TEARFULLY. “I know you to go have to . . . but I wish you stay.”

Karla was dressed for a trek: T-shirt, shorts, and walking boots, covered by a long skirt over her shorts, and a headscarf she’d take off when she was out of the village. “I’d like to stay too, if I could,” Karla replied. “But we can stay in touch.”

“How?”

“Do you have an email address?”

Arang’anat shook her head. “About them I’ve heard. . . .”

“I’m sure if you just go to the internet café, they’ll show you how to set one up.”

“Maybe. But . . . wot then ka?”

“You send me an email.” Karla said, handing her a slip of paper, “and we can write to each other.”

Arang’anat nodded uncertainly.

“And I want you to have this,” said Karla giving her another piece of paper . . . a $100 bill.

Arang’anat looked at it and shook her head, looking offended. “No can, no can. Not from you,” she protested, trying to push the bill back into Karla’s hand.

“I want you to keep it,” said Karla gently. “Save it, put it away for a rainy day.”

“Rainy day?”

“In case something happens, some emergency . . . just in case.”

“Too much. Too much.”

“If you never need it,” Karla said, folding her hands over Arang’anat’s, “you can give it back to me.”

“You one day come back?” Arang’anat asked, her eyes hopeful.

“One day, I promise. And if we stay in touch by email then I’ll be able to tell you when I’m coming—and you can tell me where to find you.”

“Thank you.”

With a last embrace, Karla slung her backpack over one shoulder and walked towards the gate, Arang’anat walking beside her.

Shyly—and to the obvious disapproval of most of the other women waiting to see Karla leave—two younger girls came up to Karla to shake her hand. “Matalam. matalam.”

“May Allah be with you,” Karla replied.

As Karla went through the gate to where Uqu was waiting for her, Arang’anat stood watching her walking down the path, waving as Karla waved back before she disappeared from view around a corner . . . and stood looking down the empty path for a long while afterwards.

AT THE VILLAGE SQUARE, Karla stopped to say “Goodbye” and “Matalam” to the elders, while Uqu packed several large bottles of water and packets of food.

“Do we have far to go?” Karla asked, eyeing the water bottles.

In the center of Jazeerat el-Bihar was a hill, called K’mah, some three hundred meters high, shaped like a cone. Probably—hopefully, Karla thought, an extinct volcano. Uqu pointed to the peak. “Up there somewhere. It will probably take most of the day.”

“A long way,” Karla said, in the tone of someone more used to walking to the corner store than climbing a mountain.

A couple of kilometers from Inkaya, Karla stopped in surprise as a man dressed like a soldier but in worn clothes that didn’t match, a pistol at his belt, sprang out of the jungle into the center of the narrow path in front of them. She grabbed Uqu’s arm. “What are we going to do now?” she asked.

Uqu smiled. “He’s our guide.”

He was a small, wiry man, his dark brown face leathery from years of exposure to the sun. Karla had discovered that people here were often a lot younger than the age they looked. This man could have been around forty, so she figured he was really in his early thirties.

He certainly had the energy of a much younger man. The way he moved, in short spurts, always alert, sometimes skipping from one rock to another, reminded her of the motion of a mountain goat. As she hadn’t been introduced, and didn’t even know if Uqu knew his name, she decided to call him Mountain Man.

He led the way, followed by Karla, with Uqu bringing up the rear. As the sun rose in the sky the path kept getting steeper, and the track narrowed as the jungle thickened. After a couple of hours of walking, with just one very short break for water, Karla found herself losing her breath as she tried to keep up with Mountain Man’s pace, his quicker, surer steps outpacing her longer legs. He stopped and when she caught up with him, he silently offered with a couple of gestures to carry her backpack. After a moment, she gratefully took it off and passed it to him. Relieved of the weight, she found the going a lot easier, but her backpack could have been a feather for all the difference it made to Mountain Man’s nimble steps.

Whenever she could see the peak of K’mah through the jungle—so thick that in places it grew tangled over the track, turning the sun’s light into a dim shade of green—their destination didn’t seem to be getting any closer. A while back, she had hoped they had passed the halfway mark; now, she was sure, night would fall before they arrived at wherever they were going.

The track made a dogleg and for a moment she lost sight of their guide. When she reached the bend he was nowhere to be seen—but she gasped when she saw, instead, half a dozen soldiers, real ones she realized, blocking the path. They all carried submachine guns. The men stood relaxed, smiling; they held their guns loosely, their fingers not on but near the triggers. But there was no mistaking where they all pointed: at her. To Karla, they looked very different from the soldiers in the hotel lobby. It wasn’t that their uniforms were dirty and well-worn, some torn in places, or that they all needed a shower and a shave. It was something about the way they stood that made the soldiers in the hotel’s lobby, with their shiny boots, sparkling buttons, and fresh, starched clothes ironed to a knife-edge seem like toy soldiers, as though they were big kids playing at war; these men looked as if they’d seen death and meted it out themselves.

Karla stifled a scream and spun about, looking for Uqu. A voice behind her yelled, “Stop!” as she saw what must have been Uqu’s shoes and ankles disappearing through a small opening in the undergrowth. “Damn you, Uqu,” she shouted.

Two men came up behind her and grabbed her arms. One of them saw the movement of Uqu’s disappearance and raised his submachine gun. As he pressed the trigger Karla leant her weight into him, pushing his arms up at the same time. The burst of fire sprayed the sky. As the soldier recovered, he pushed her angrily out of the way and said something to the group behind him.

Karla noticed that the soldiers were all dressed and armed the same way, and none wore any insignia of rank. But one of them stood out when he barked something to one of the soldiers who’d spoken. From the way this man spoke and held his body Karla concluded he was an officer, or, at least, the group’s commander. Her supposition was confirmed with the imperious gesture that followed his words, and the immediate actions of the two soldiers who let go of her and disappeared into the jungle after Uqu.

The officer stood studying her; Karla cringed away as his eyes took an inventory of her body. “Fancy that,” he said. “I do believe we have found Miss Karla Bloody Preston.”

The Australian-accented voice—another product, Karla figured, of the Australian effort to upgrade the quality of the Sandeman army—wasn’t the same voice as the captain’s at the hotel; but from the self-satisfied, smirking way he was looking at her, it was clear they’d both come from the same mould. “Your lucky day,” he laughed. “Tomorrow, you’ll be back in Toribaya.”

Two other soldiers came up to her, roughly grabbed her arms and tied her wrists together tightly behind her back. “In a moment—as soon as my two men come back with your cowardly friend—we’ll be going for a little walk,” the officer said with a broad smile.

But five minutes passed, then ten with no sign of the two men. The officer sent another man to investigate; he went fearfully, but returned a few moments later. “They b’long sleep, suh,” he said, “head knockknock.”

The two unconscious men, who’d been stripped of their guns, ammunition, belts, and boots, were dragged unceremoniously onto the track. The officer poured water from his canteen in their faces and they both opened their eyes, groaning, their hands going to their heads. The officer kicked them and they scrambled slowly to their feet. “Fools,” he spat. “Go—you lead.”

He pointed along the track in the direction Karla had been going. The two men got to their feet and took position at the head of the group, one turning to say to the officer, “No guns. We no guns.”

“Move,” the officer replied, swinging his submachine gun vaguely in their direction. As the two men started gingerly picking their way along the track with their bare feet, he shouted, “Wikwik, wikwik,” and roughly pushed Karla to get her moving.

*****

THREE TIME ZONES WEST, Alison McGuire flung herself onto the wide, comfortable bed in the Four Seasons Hotel in Singapore. She lay there, looking blankly at the ceiling, thinking that the day’s packed schedule would hardly give her a break until late evening, knowing she should be getting ready for work, but wondering where she’d find the energy to move.

There was no question: first class was wonderful. And she’d thoroughly enjoyed it—except, despite several stiff drinks and a real bed, she felt as though she’d had no sleep until just before the plane landed. I’ve had better flights sitting up all night in the back of a packed, cramped 747.

Standing, she slowly did a series of exercises to stretch the kinks out of her muscles. She plugged in her laptop, sent Royn a text message telling him she’d arrived, and went and stood in the shower, luxuriating as the hot, pulsing jets of water massaged her body . . . until, sooner than she’d hoped, the phone rang.

Sighing as she turned off the shower, she picked up the bathroom extension. “Good morning Minister. . . . Okay . . . how about in thirty or forty minutes?”

Wrapped in a towel, knowing she didn’t have much time, she scanned her emails, deciding to leave them all for later—except the one from the Melbourne private eye. She quickly rewrote the geek’s instructions about tunnels, anonymizers, and communicating, set up three email addresses, encrypted her message and sent it. Checking the clock again, she decided it was more important to get the investigator moving than to be on time for breakfast with her boss. She wrote a second message to tell the investigator that the assignment was Senator Frank McKurn.

A THICK FILE UNDER her arm, Alison walked through the ornate, plushly furnished living room of the Presidential suite at the top of the Four Seasons Hotel and into the separate dining room where a sumptuous buffet-style breakfast lined one wall. Two waiters stood unobtrusively at attention, and a chef was poised to meet any special order on the spot. Alison filled her plate more out of duty than hunger, and as she and Royn talked about the day’s agenda she forced herself to eat, papers strewn across the long table, hardly tasting the food, just so she’d have the fuel to last to the end of the day.

“So,” said Royn as he stood to indicate their meeting had come to its end, “we’re going to meet Nimabi and the rest in . . . ninety minutes.”

Alison nodded, but did not follow Royn’s hint. “Minister,” she said sharply, “I’m not sure how much longer I can take it, this . . . pressure.”

“Pressure?” Royn asked, slowly sitting back down. “Perhaps you’d better explain.”

“McKurn,” she said with quiet anger, her eyes flicking to the hotel staff standing nearby.

Royn stepped across to the buffet and after a few words the hotel staff filed out of the room. Royn shut the door behind them. Taking his seat again he said, “Okay. Tell me what’s on your mind.”

“McKurn will give me his answer on Monday. I’ve been in touch with the private eye and if he accepts, then maybe he can start this week . . . but how long before he gets results?” She shrugged despondently. “Who knows? And no new incriminating phone conversations—not a thing. I think McKurn has a phone number we don’t know about—and, as you know, the geek hasn’t been able to tap into his Parliament House phones. If he did then—God help me—I wouldn’t have time to do anything except listen to phone messages. As it is, there’s probably two, maybe three hours of messages piled up I haven’t had time to get to.” She lifted the day’s agenda and waved it in front of Royn. “And with all this, when will I be able to start? Midnight?”

Royn nodded sagely. “It’s definitely too much. If only we could get you an assistant.”

“Yes—but who could we trust?” Alison shook her head, her eyes glistening. “And the geek hasn’t come up with anything new . . . says he’s still working on it. The Candyman Inquiry is progressing with the speed of a leisurely government bureaucracy. They’re still arguing about the terms of the inquiry, for heaven’s sake. I feel like we’ve run out of options.” Alison’s words tumbled out faster and faster, slurring together, her voice level and pitch both rising the longer she spoke. “I’m worried I’ll have no choice but to accept McKurn’s answer on Monday, that we’re not going to get him, that we’re never going to get him. I can’t sleep. I can’t focus. I’m . . . afraid.”

“We will get the bastard,” Royn said forcefully. “But . . . playing double agent for a while will certainly be tough to pull off.”

“Yes,” she muttered. And more. As a tear rolled down one cheek, Royn leaned forward and laid a comforting hand on top of Alison’s.

“But we can—”

“We can what?” a woman’s angry voice cut in. “You’d better explain what’s going on here?”

Royn and Alison turned their heads to see Melanie standing in the doorway, her face a red mask of anger, her shoulders tight as though she was restraining herself. Royn sheepishly withdrew his hand.

Alison glowered at Melanie. “Senator Frank McKurn,” she said, spitting the words like bullets, “that’s what’s ‘going on’.”

“Really,” Melanie said sarcastically, taking a few steps closer towards Alison.

“Yes, Mel,” Royn said with a sigh. “Really.”

“Too much for you, is it?” Melanie said, her eyes focused on Alison, speaking as if her husband wasn’t present. “Or is it just that time of the month?”

“You have no idea what you’re talking about,” Alison said coldly, and gathering up her papers stomped out of the room, pushing rudely past Melanie as she opened the door.

“Alison. Find Kieran,” Royn said loudly, naming Kieran Fairchild, Secretary of the Department of Foreign Affairs. “Fill him in and tell him to meet me here in one hour—or less. Call the office and get them to put Doug—or whoever you like—on the next plane. And then take the rest of the day off. I can call you if I need anything.”

“Thank you, Minister.” Nodding at Royn and glaring at Melanie, Alison closed the door with a little more force than necessary.

MAX AND RICKY ROYN were battling each other on the PlayStation in the living room, the game projected onto an enormous screen. As Alison strode through, they called, “Hi, Allie,” in unison, using the name Ricky had given her when he was five years old.

Alison turned and stopped, surprised she had failed to see them—or Zoë, who sat curled up in an armchair deep in conversation, her laptop on her knees and headphones covering her ears.

“You sick?” Ricky asked.

Alison shook her head. “No, but I’ve been better.” Max and Ricky were so alike they were often mistaken for twins—especially now when, at nineteen and twenty, they were about the same height. They enjoyed adding to the confusion by dyeing their hair—Max’s black, Ricky’s blond—the same color. Alison studied the two young versions of their blond father sitting together on the sofa. “Sorry, Max,” she grinned, “your hair’s not the right shade of blond.”

“Ah, well,” said Max with a smile, “guess I can’t fool you, eh?”

Hearing raised voices leaking out of the dining room, Ricky said, “At it again, are they?”

“Yeah,” said Max sadly. “Hey, Zo,” he shouted across to his sister. Holding one of the headphone’s earpieces away from her head, Zoë looked up. “What?” she said impatiently.

“Wanna have breakfast by the pool?” Max asked.

“Yeah,” said Ricky, “before it gets too hot.”

“But there’s that buffet in the. . . .” Her voice trailed off as she heard her mother’s angry voice through the thick door. “Good idea,” she said. And with a conspiratorial smile that invited her brothers to join in, added, “And let’s turn off our cellphones and not tell them where we’re going.” Then she noticed Alison still standing by the main door.

Before she could speak, Alison smiled and said, “Don’t worry Zo. Mum’s the word.”

“Thanks, Allie,” Zoë said, grinning back.

*****

THE ROYAL ARMS HOTEL.

Derek Olsson stood looking up at the sign before walking in.

In Sydney’s Rocks area, the “ye olde British-style” pub was a regular hangout for journalists and staff who worked in the OlssonPress offices just a few hundred meters away along George Street. This was where he’d come to know Karla, on those evenings when he joined his staff members for a drink on the way to his penthouse apartment, just around the corner. As he walked up to the bar he—as expected—recognized several OlssonPress employees sitting around a table. He took his beer to a small table near them, one of the few empty tables in the crowded pub. But over the loud babble of conversation he couldn’t make out what they were talking about.

He smiled as one of them—someone he’d often shared a beer with—gazed his way . . . and his eyes kept moving without a pause. Good confirmation that his glasses, beard, and slicked-back reddish hair were doing their job.

He looked at the beer glass, turning it through 360 degrees. There’s no question. It’s the same. . . . But does that mean anything?

BEFORE COMING TO THE hotel, Olsson had made a list. He shredded it when he’d finished, but he remembered it all too clearly. At the top he’d written:

WHO framed me?

WHY?

HOW?

I’m playing amateur detective, so what should I look for? he asked himself. . . . Motive. And Opportunity.

MOTIVE:

Revenge

Revenge? Who could have a grudge against me only murder would satisfy? Try as he could, he could think of only one name:

Luk Suk

But why would Luk Suk kill Vincent Leung, his own man? If his purpose was to set me up, he would have chosen someone else for me to “murder.”

He thought about that for a moment and then shook his head. Not his style, he decided. Luk Suk could be devious, but he preferred the simple and the straightforward. In Sydney, it would be so easy to walk up to someone in the street, especially at night, put a bullet in his head or a knife in his gut and slip silently away. If Luk Suk wanted to get rid of me, that’s HIS way of doing it.

He crossed off Luk Suk’s name.

To divert suspicion

Somebody had a reason to kill Vincent Leung—and wanted to get away with it. Hence . . . make the police think someone else did it. Me.

So, who might want to kill Vincent Leung, and why? He wrote:

Me

Luk Suk

One of Leung’s henchmen who was after a quick promotion

A competing gang

Somebody else

What was his motive for killing Vincent Leung? That was the big, gaping hole in Durant’s case which could be overlooked because the evidence was so solid. Break the evidence, and the case would collapse.

He looked at the other four categories; while none could be ruled out, a competing gang seemed the logical suspect.

Olsson sat back and pondered what he knew about Sydney’s underworld. The Golden Dragon Triad was heavily involved in the drug business. Knocking Leung out of the picture might slow them down—if only for a while—to another gang’s advantage. If it was obviously the work of another gang, the Triad would, presumably, go on the warpath. Every reason to divert suspicion.

The complexity of the frame-up argued against one man acting alone, though it couldn’t be eliminated completely, so he put a large red “X” with a question mark next to “henchman.” Luk Suk? He shook his head. Too many people would be involved; too easy for Leung to get wind of it. Again, Luk Suk’s style would be to send a hit man from Hong Kong. He repeated his “X?” notation.

Somebody else? Olsson shrugged. Too many possibilities. Only an investigation ruling out a gang would produce evidence or hints leading in some other direction.

Next question: Was I chosen intentionally or randomly?

INTENTIONALLY: someone wanted to get Vincent Leung AND me out of the way.

What possible connection could anyone make between him and Vincent Leung? He recalled the series his papers ran on how the drug trade corrupted police, politics, and the law, and Karla’s articles advocating drug legalization. Politicians, especially Royn, condemned the idea. Letters to the editor ran three to one against legalization. The campaign gained no traction and posed no danger to the underworld’s most lucrative business.

His papers’ exposés of petty corruption . . . policeman on the beat taking bribes to waive a speeding ticket, town councillors implicated in fixing building permits, and the like. All petty, local stuff—and nothing to do with drugs or the Golden Dragon Triad.

So that couldn’t be the connection, he thought. But my papers. They’re a weapon I could use.

RANDOMLY: Why choose ME? Surely there are easier targets. . . .

He asked himself who he’d select if he were planning a frame-up. The intricacies of the frame-up argued in favor of going after someone easier . . . yet that very complexity made the evidence against him more compelling, especially in the absence of a motive.

He shrugged. He couldn’t strike either possibility out. All that was left was his gut feel, which leaned towards INTENTIONALLY, so against it he wrote: Seems more likely. And next to RANDOMLY: Can’t be ruled out.

He turned to his laptop and found his lawyer’s summary of the crime scene and the evidence:

Vincent Leung was found dead in his apartment by the cleaning lady about 11am. He’d been knifed. Estimated time of death: between midnight and 3am.

Later, the traces of blood on the knife discovered in the boot of Derek Olsson’s car turned out to be the same type as the victim’s; DNA analysis confirmed it was the victim’s.

The doorman on Leung’s building swears he saw Olsson enter the building, with Leung, around 11pm the night before.

One strand of hair and two flakes of skin were found caught in the victim’s fingernails. The DNA test matched them to Olsson.

A nearly empty bottle of beer and two glasses were found on the coffee table in Leung’s apartment. Olsson’s fingerprints were on one of them.

The only other fingerprints found in the apartment were Leung’s and the cleaning lady’s. Several doorknobs had been wiped clean. The only fingerprints found on the front door knobs were the cleaning lady’s, indicating they must have been wiped clean before she arrived.

The frame-up was well-organized, and cleverly done. Someone had gone to a lot of trouble to collect bits of Olsson’s hair and skin and a beer glass with his fingerprints on it. They’d also had to find someone who looked like Olsson, someone who Vincent Leung would willingly take to his apartment—and at eleven o’clock at night, hardly the time a casual acquaintance drops by. Was Leung gay? Olsson wondered, or did Leung think they needed somewhere private to discuss something . . . ?

Or . . . Vincent Leung had come home by himself, and the doorman had been paid to identify Olsson.

Too dangerous, Olsson thought, shaking his head. What if the doorman turns out to be an unreliable witness or breaks down in the witness box under pressure . . . ?

Or . . . he was someone recommended to Leung by Luk Suk or a trusted sidekick.

Too many logical possibilities, he thought. But the glass with my fingerprints. . . .

Was that the key?

He’d secured a picture of the beer glass by asking Ross Traynor to request their lawyer to get one from the police. With the picture had come a note:

There were over a dozen beer glasses of different shapes and sizes in his apartment. It looks like he collected them from different pubs.

Or they were planted to give that impression?

It was the kind of glass brewers supplied to thousands of pubs and bars all over the country, a standard size with a brewery’s logo—but nothing to identify which bar it came from.

Exactly like the glass he was now holding in the Royal Arms Hotel.

Olsson preferred wine, and rarely drank beer, one glass at this pub being the main exception.

He drank his beer slowly, watching the waiters move from table to table and the barmen pour drinks. They were all too busy to notice what the customers were doing.

The OlssonPress group began drifting out the door and in a moment their table was deserted, except for the empty glasses. He could reach out, pocket one now, and no one would ever know.

As his eyes followed a waitress’s progress towards the bar they stopped, fixed on the back of a man’s shoulder. A few white flakes of dandruff littered the dark fabric of his suit . . . and a hair. Hair falls out all the time, he thought, one hand touching his head. He tried to grab a single hair with his fingers . . . it was easy to grab a clump of hair but difficult to take hold of just one strand. He tried jerking out several strands of hair at once. He stopped when it hurt, without pulling anything out.

And the flakes of skin? He dragged the fingernails of one hand over his cheek. If Vincent Leung had tried to defend himself from his murderer, why just two flakes of skin? Wouldn’t there be more?

And then . . . there was putting the knife in my car. Whoever had done that had been able to get into his high-security apartment in a high-security building without setting off any alarms, open the boot of a locked Mercedes and then get out again without leaving any trace. Which, he thought as he drained the rest of his beer, puts every underworld gang on the list of suspects.

DEEP IN THOUGHT, OLSSON left the bar and trudged along George Street without any particular destination in mind.

“Hey, mister,” a voice wheedled, “can you spare the price of a hamburger?”

Olsson would have taken no notice, except the voice seemed vaguely familiar. He turned to see a balding, grey-haired bum sitting in a doorway. The bum’s red-lined eyes looked vaguely in his direction without hope; several days’ stubble sprouted from his face like dark fungus; both he and his clothes needed a long, hot bath; a paper bag in the shape of a bottle poked out of the bum’s jacket pocket.

But the shape of the bum’s jaw, and the bushy eyebrows. . . .

“Dad,” he stopped himself from saying and cringed away shaking, his stomach threatening to revolt. It had been—how long?—some eighteen years since he’d last seen his father, and at least seventeen since he’d given him more than a passing thought. He took two long fast paces, intending to get himself past the stomach-churning sight and long-buried memories as fast as possible.

You, Olsson thought, who pride yourself on being unable to hurt a fly. . . .

He turned back. “Here,” he said, pulling a wad of notes from his wallet and dropping them towards his father’s outstretched hand. The bum’s eyes lit up like a Christmas tree as fifty and twenty-dollar notes floated down in front of him. The breeze scattered a few along the footpath; he scrabbled for them.

“Don’t drink it all at once,” Olsson added as he thrust his wallet back in his pocket.

Sven Olsson was leaning forward, reaching for one of the notes; when Olsson spoke he stopped in mid stretch and his bleary eyes looked at his benefactor strangely. Had he recognized Derek’s voice? But an instant later Sven Olsson’s eyes. glinting. turned to the scattered bills. “Thank you, sir. Thank you, thank you,” the bum babbled as he scrambled to pick them all up. As Olsson walked away, his father was unsteadily pulling himself to his feet, turning in the direction of the nearest pub.

Instead of hailing a taxi, he decided to walk. He wasn’t surprised his father had turned into a drunken bum, but to actually see the reality was like opening a memory vault he’d thought was securely locked.

He stopped in mid pace, halfway across a side street, frozen in place until the angry honk-honk of a car made him realize where he was. His father must have known of his son’s success, he was thinking. It was not the sort of story anyone could avoid. Yet, he’d never come asking for money or help. Because he knew what the answer would be? Pride? Or . . . perhaps . . . fear. . . .

DEREK OLSSON WAS BORN with a question in his mouth.

Whenever his mother snapped “You mustn’t go out on the street alone,” he’d reply “Why not?” Told “You’re not old enough to do that,” he’d answer, “Why not?” When his father growled, “That’s not allowed,” he’d say, “Why not?” A question he kept repeating until he’d accumulated sufficient cuffs and bruises to learn to avoid his father’s presence as much as possible.

Sven Olsson had come to Australia from Denmark in his early twenties. Instead of finding the new life and prosperity he’d dreamed of, he ended up in a dead-end job and felt he’d been pressured into a shotgun marriage with a woman he didn’t love who was pregnant with a baby he didn’t want. His bouts of heavy drinking became more frequent and his unpredictable temper more violent, targeted at the focal points of his resentment: his wife, and the children he referred to indiscriminately as “your brats” or “the goddamn bastards.”

Derek was born two years after his brother, Lars; his sister Jessica arrived fourteen months later. A year after that, Sven unintentionally made sure there were no more: bowing to her husband’s drunken and far from gentle demands, Molly Olsson wheedled $500 from her mother for an abortion. But Sven found the money, drank most of it and with the rest paid some back street quack who botched the job. Molly Olsson spent a week in hospital and no longer had any need to take the pill.

Derek Olsson couldn’t remember a week going by without his suffering a bruise, a welt, or worse. If not from his father, then from Lars who, whenever beaten by his father, turned around and got his revenge by beating up his younger brother. Whenever his father threatened his sister, Derek would attempt to protect her. When he was young, Sven would just laugh and push him out of the way. As Jessica graduated from being a tomboy trying to keep up with her brothers to a curvaceous adolescent, his father threatened her more often and his threat seemed more malicious; Derek became more determined to protect his sister . . . which just made Sven Olsson madder and more dangerous.

Molly Olsson retreated from her husband by walking around the house like a ghost pretending to be invisible and bowing wordlessly to her husband’s every demand. Derek Olsson stayed at school late, played with friends afterwards or retreated into his room where he dreamed of being the knight in shining armor, the rags-to-riches slum boy who became a mover and shaker on Wall Street or the heroes of the other myths and fables he devoured.

When he was seventeen he discovered Aikido. When Lars went to hit him some ten weeks after his first lesson he found himself unconsciously following an Aikido routine. Much to his surprise, Lars ended up falling flat on his face. “You tripped me up,” Lars complained as he pulled himself to his feet. “Fight fair, you goddamn bastard,” he yelled, and launched himself at Derek again, his fists pumping.

“You’re the bastard,” Derek replied as he consciously stepped out of Lars’ way and, in textbook fashion, took one of his wrists as it flew by and twisted it painfully so Lars ended up kneeling with his head touching the floor.

“Want me to break it?” Derek asked.

“You wouldn’t dare!”

“Why not?” Derek laughed. “I’ve been wanting to do this for seventeen years.”

When Lars was silent, Derek said, “I tell you what, I won’t break your arm if you promise you’ll never touch me again.”

After a moment Lars said, “Okay.”

“Promise?”

“Promise.”

As Derek released him Lars sprung up and around and tried to pummel him. A moment later he was, again, kneeling awkwardly on the ground. This time Derek kept twisting until there was an audible snap.

When their father came home, he gave Derek a black eye, but Lars spent the next six weeks with his arm in a cast. Now and then Lars would wave his cast in Derek’s direction, threatening to “smash your head in.” Derek simply smiled and calmly replied, “Want me to break your other arm too?”

When the cast came off, Lars’ arm never regained its full strength and Lars never hit his brother again.

A few months later Derek came home late to be greeted by his father’s angry voice: “It’s after eleven—where the hell have you been?”

Damn, Derek Olsson thought to himself as his father’s bleary eyes glared at him, a shot glass and a nearly empty bottle of Aquavit on the table. He’s still awake—and drunk as usual. Derek, who’d been tiptoeing towards the kitchen in his bare feet, froze and let his shoes and his Aikido bag drop to the floor.

It’s now or never. He allowed his pent-up resentment and anger to surge through his muscles. Taking a deep breath to steady himself, he said, “Since when have you given a shit where I am or what I’m doing—except when you want someone to beat up on.”

Sven Olsson’s face turned a brighter shade of red as he pushed himself off the sofa. “You little bastard,” he snarled, shaking his head in disbelief. “Seems I’ll have to teach you a little respect—speaking to your own father like that.”

“Respect?” Derek spat back. “You don’t deserve respect—from me or anybody else.”

As his father lurched towards him Derek tensed to counter the ingrained reaction of cringing away from his father’s hand as it came swinging towards his face—a reaction instilled from the untold hundreds of times his father had slapped him in the seventeen years since he’d been born.

Derek Olsson had dreamt of this moment for almost as long as he could remember. No longer a defenceless child, he now stood a shade taller than his father; but Sven Olsson was almost twice his weight. Most of that extra weight, however, was in his belly, while Derek, though lighter, was all hard muscle. And sober.

Since discovering Aikido, he’d practiced this movement in his mind and on the mat countless times. On the mat with a friendly “opponent,” he smoothly blocked the blow and glided out of the way. Every time.

But now facing his father, reflexive fear in his stomach slowed him down. Instead of blocking his father’s blow, aimed at his cheek, he deflected it so the fist connected with the tip of his nose.

Nevertheless, for the first time in his life he’d stood up to his father, and Sven Olsson faltered in shock. With a roar, Sven bunched his hands into fists and lunged at Derek’s belly. But Derek had time to recover and whirl out of the way, nudging his father as he turned to send the older man crashing into the wall.

Dazed, Sven Olsson pushed himself off the wall and lunged again. But Derek’s life-long fear of his father retreated in the face of his overpowering determination to win, and in a moment Sven Olsson was on the floor pinned by Derek’s body in a painful arm lock.

“Let me go, goddamn you.”

Derek slightly increased the pressure of the arm lock, and his father screamed in pain. “Shut the fuck up, or I’ll do to your arm what I did to Lars’.”

“What’s all the noise about—?”

Derek glanced behind him to see his mother standing in the doorway of the living room, shivering as she rubbed the sleep from her eyes, staring at her son in disbelief. “Derek. Wh-what are you doing?” she shrieked.

“I’m teaching Dad a much-needed lesson—in respect.” Derek squeezed his father’s arm as he spoke.

“Bullshit,” his father yelped, struggling for release. “When I get up I’m going to beat the living daylights out of you.”

Derek leant closer to his father’s ear, pressing down with his weight on his father’s back. “If you get up.”

“Derek,” said his mother, “you wouldn’t.”

“Why not?” asked Derek, in his trademark reply. When his mother said nothing he asked, “Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t.”

“You might go to jail,” she gulped.

“Yes—and that’s about the only thing stopping me from breaking his bloody neck right this minute.”

“You don’t have the guts,” his father snapped.

Derek squeezed the arm again. “You’re hardly in a position to argue right now, Dad.”

“You—” his father spluttered between yelps of pain. “You can go to hell, and good riddance.”

“No,” Molly Olsson screamed in a voice that sent shivers through the spines of both father and son. “Never. You’ll not take my son away from me. If anybody leaves this house it will be you, not Derek.”

Distracted by his mother’s scream, Derek slightly loosened his grip and Sven Olsson lunged for Molly’s ankle, knocking her off balance. Derek smashed his fist into the side of his father’s head, saying, “There’s ten thousand of those punches still to come before we’re even”—and pinned his father to the floor again.

Dazed, Sven Olsson’s eyes flicked uncomprehendingly between his wife and his son.

“Now it’s your turn to listen to me,” said Derek. “Promise you’ll never touch me or Lars or Ma or Jessica again.”

Sven Olsson shrank limply from his son’s glare.

“I’m not going to let you up till you promise me that,” Derek demanded. “And if you break that promise, I will break your neck.”

His father opened his mouth to speak—and froze at the menace in his son’s face, and the fist clenched in easy swinging distance from his nose.

“No,” said Molly Olsson, as she picked herself up. “Even if he gives his word, he’ll never keep it. You, of all people, should know that. He’s got to go.”

The tiny, mousy woman who crept around the house like a shadow burned with a fury Derek had never seen before: her hands tensed into fists, her blazing eyes and rigid mouth transforming her normally sallow, hollow-cheeked face. As she stepped forward into the dim light to stand looming over her husband, Olsson saw a red welt on the side of her face that hadn’t been there in the morning, just above a faint bruise his father had planted there the week before.

Derek looked at his father’s face and knew his mother was right. Sven Olsson was not a man to be trusted.

“You’re right, Ma,” said Derek, nodding. “Why don’t you go and pack a few things for him and we’ll throw him out right now.”

But his mother was shaking, her face drawn and pale as if she’d seen a ghost. Her eyes slowly turned towards her son, but at first she didn’t seem to recognize him. She’s overwhelmed, scared of what she’s done, Derek thought. “Ma,” he ordered, “move.”

“You can’t,” his father sputtered.

“Why not?” said Derek. “It will be like heaven to come home and know you’re not here.”

“Yes,” his mother muttered at last, shuffling out the door, “it will.”

“How will you pay the rent?—you’ll get nothing from me.”

“We get bugger all from you anyway—you spend all your money on booze.”

“I’ll get even with you—all of you—if it’s the last thing I do.”

Derek picked up the small bag Molly had placed on the floor, threw it at his father and slammed the front door. He felt his rush of energy drain away, leaving him with a hollow emptiness tinged with unaccustomed guilt. “He’s gone, Ma. And I’ve got his keys,” he said, waving them, “so he can’t get back in.”

Molly now seemed deflated, uncertain, and pleading with Derek as if he was now in command asked, “Oh, Derek, what are we going to do now? What’s going to happen to us all?”

What’s going to happen . . . ? Derek asked himself. The absence of his father, something he’d dreamed of for as long as he could remember, suddenly took on several new aspects he’d never considered before. He was about to respond, “I don’t know, Ma,” but stopped himself just in time, telling his mother, instead:

“In the morning we’ll call Grandpa. He’ll know what to do.”

AS A CHILD, DEREK Olsson had always looked forward to visiting his grandparents. His grandmother, Jennifer Dent, was a warm, loving person who doted on him, and always prepared his favorites dishes. And his grandfather, he felt, was the exact opposite of his parents. For one thing, whenever Derek said “Why?” or “Why not?” Jack Dent would answer patiently and at length. If he didn’t know the answer he’d simply say, “I don’t know . . . let’s see if we can find out.” So they’d go to the local library and consult the encyclopedia, or ask one of the many people Jack Dent seemed to know.

One day Dent returned home to see his grandson on the floor attempting to put back together a clock he’d taken apart, the pieces spread all over the carpet. Derek looked at his grandfather with a flash of fear—but Dent crouched down on the floor and said, “If you need some help, just let me know.”

Several hours later, when neither of them could get the clock working, Dent took Derek and the clock down to the local watchmaker who quickly showed them where they’d gone wrong. And he’d take Derek with him to his service station, where Derek was allowed to pump petrol, serve behind the counter, and “help” the mechanics fix the cars.

“Maybe I could make a car one day,” seven-year-old Derek said.

“Why not?” his grandfather laughed.

It was a dark day for young Derek when Jack Dent had a mild stroke and was forced to sell the business he’d built from a tiny garage on a back street into a thriving service station on Sydney’s busiest thoroughfare, Parramatta Road. The first thing the new owner did was fire Sven Olsson, who Dent had kept on mainly as disguised charity for his daughter. Still, from time to time, his grandfather would take him there, but the new owner looked at Derek Olsson skeptically. Eventually, Jack Dent persuaded him to give Derek a part-time job on a trial basis—and he had worked part-time at the service station ever since.

Jack Dent did know what to do; the following morning Molly and her three children moved to live with the Dents.

Derek soon discovered that living with his grandparents was a very different proposition from occasional morning or afternoon visits. For all his seventeen years, he’d pretty much come and gone as he’d pleased. Now, he had to be sitting at the dinner table at one minute to six every evening. Breakfast and lunch were similarly scheduled. At ten o’clock every morning, rain or shine, Jack Dent would go for his daily walk. At five pm he’d have one careful measure of whisky; and at seven he’d watch the news. Everything had its place in his grandfather’s house, which was so clean and tidy he came to feel he was living in a museum, and he got into trouble every time he left something lying around.

His grandmother almost never protested the way her husband ruled with an inflexible iron fist. But once in a while, when Jack Dent started to chew his grandson out for some transgression she’d interject, “Now, now. Jack. Derek’s had a terrible time. Let him adjust.”

Dent would glare at her—but relent.

His mother, however, glowed in a way he’d never seen before, looking more and more like the photographs of the pretty young girl scattered around the house. But she refused to leave the house after dark and would never go out during the day alone. And when Derek vaguely wondered when they’d move back home, she replied, “Oh, Derek, I’m sorry but I really can’t think about that sort of thing just yet.”

His sister Jessica felt right at home, grateful that Jack Dent’s rules and regulations brought a much-needed order to her life. Lars, like Derek, chafed under those rules. But he’d been working since he’d dropped out of school a couple of years ago and quickly decided the time had come for him to move out on his own.

To regain his lost freedom, Derek quickly found tasks to keep him out late—duties Jack Dent found he couldn’t argue with. “We’re studying at the library tonight—exams are coming up, you know.” “I’m going to work more shifts at the service station, starting Sunday morning. Now we have nothing at all from Dad, I have to help Mum out.” “We have extra rugby practice—I’m the team captain, so I have to be there.”

In this way, he achieved a balance between the freedom he’d always cherished and the order he’d never had. And though he would never admit it, with his father gone, his mother peaceful, his sister happy, and his elder brother no longer beating on him, this was the happiest period of his life. For when Derek did follow Dent’s rules, his grandfather treated him with the same respect, love and attention he always had. Derek found he lived for those moments: Jack Dent was the only person he had ever loved and idolized.

HIS FATHER'S EYES, DEREK Olsson thought as he walked the streets of Sydney, hadn’t changed in eighteen years. The fat had gone from his body; he now looked gaunt, underfed. His eyes were redder, blearier . . . but the look, the mind behind them, he sensed, was unchanged. The memory of his youthful guilt faded and all that remained was the revulsion he’d felt when he’d recognized what his father had become.

When he reached the guest house he staved off sleep long enough to send Traynor an email:

Ask the lawyer to see if he can find out whether the Royal Arms Hotel—that pub in the Rocks—has any gangland connections. Also, I’d like to know exactly where the hair and flakes of skin were found—which fingers of which hand. And whether just TWO flakes of skin seem unusual or suspicious in any way.

He threw himself on the bed and collapsed, drained, feeling sleep welcoming him . . . only to jerk upright, his arms pushing him into a sitting position on the bed.

Lars, he thought, now wide awake. It couldn’t be . . . or could it?

As teenagers, he and Lars were occasionally confused. He recalled a shopkeeper once saying “Hi Lars” as he’d walked through the door. As he reached the counter, the man said, “Oh, you’re not Lars, you must be his brother.” That had happened from time to time, though never from someone who knew them well.

In the line-up at the police station, the doorman studied him for nearly a minute before stating “That’s him.” His long look made sense if he’d seen Lars with Leung.

Would Lars bear a grudge for eighteen years? Yes . . . every time he used his weaker arm, he’d remember.

There were probably hundreds of people who looked enough like Derek Olsson to fool the doorman . . . but only one you could trust to keep his trap completely shut.

He had no idea where Lars was. His mother treasured the Christmas card Lars sent her every year, his only contact with his family. Molly Olsson would study the postmark on the envelope and rush to the atlas to see where her oldest son was: almost never the same place twice, as if Lars had turned into a tramp.

“I’ll just have to find him,” Olsson mumbled. He drifted off to sleep shuddering at the uncomfortable thought: And when I find him, will he confess . . . or will I have to break his other arm after all?

*****

BEYOND THE FACT THAT she was lying on hard ground inside a small tent, out of sight of lustful male eyes, guarded by two soldiers standing outside, Karla had no idea where she was.

The sun was on the way down by the time the two stumbling men, their feet bleeding and sore, led them into a small camp, set on a rise somewhere in the middle of the jungle. It had been slow going, not just because of bare feet, but because the other soldiers moved nervously, their guns at the ready, jumping at the sound of every bird whistle, every movement of some unknown animal in the jungle, and even—until they were chewed out by the officer—letting loose a few bursts of fire at nothing Karla could see.

Her hair was plastered to her head from the long, hot walk, every exposed patch of skin had been burnt a painful red by the sun, her now dirt-streaked, sweat-stained clothes were glued to her skin, and she itched everywhere she couldn’t reach. She shuddered helplessly at the way the soldiers all looked at her . . . but she was simply pushed into the tent and left there.

She found that thoughts of what would inevitably come were pushed away by small irritants that grew larger and larger. An itch on her nose she could do nothing about with her hands tied behind her back. Continual sniffles as if she was getting a cold, caused by something she’d always taken for granted: she couldn’t blow her nose. The urge to do so began to overshadow her desire to go to the bathroom. Unable to do more than roll over, and to awkwardly move her legs and neck, it felt as though her body had turned into a network of aching, screaming muscles. She was equally aware of every drop of dried sweat on each square inch of skin, of the scratches on her legs and knees, of the twinges that felt like incipient cramps rippling through her feet and toes, still imprisoned in her walking boots—and of the many blisters on her soles.

Eventually, the tent flap opened and a man stepped through. She braced herself, but the soldier merely put a bowl on the floor, along with a plastic spoon. Karla waved her arms behind her, saying, “Can you untie me, please? Otherwise, how can I eat?”

The man looked at her and disappeared. She groaned, thinking she would have to assuage her hunger was lapping at the bowl like a dog. But a moment later, two soldiers came in, untied her, and re-tied her wrists in front of her. Now, at least, she was able to flex her aching arms. “Water, please,” she rasped through her dry throat, and water was brought a moment later.

She drank deeply, and greedily, and, with her wrists bound together awkwardly, spooned the thin rice gruel into her mouth. Some vegetables and a few unidentifiable pieces of meat floated in the soup; the vegetables she ate, the meat she left behind. She was still hungry, though no longer starving, and still a little thirsty although all the water was gone. Now, however, she had only one thought: a bathroom. She poked her head through the tent flap, saying “bathroom” to the soldier outside. He looked at her uncomprehendingly, and said something to another soldier passing by. A few minutes later the officer came back.

“I need to go to the bathroom,” she said to him, “rather desperately, in fact.”

“Is that so?” the officer said condescendingly. “Well, I suppose we can’t have you messing up our lovely tent, then, can we?” and laughed at his own joke. The two guards joined in half-heartedly, although they clearly hadn’t understood what he’d said.

Karla was led to a shallow, smelly hole in the ground near one edge of the camp. She wrinkled her nose and looked around, aware the makeshift toilet was in full view of the camp.

“Can you please untie me?” Karla asked. “Otherwise—” she looked at the hole in the ground “—I don’t see how I can.”

The officer said something to the soldiers who removed the rope.

“And would you kindly turn your backs while I. . . .”

The officer shook his head. “We will have to look. We can’t have you running off somewhere, now can we?” He laughed again. “But we promise, we won’t enjoy looking.”

Karla glared at him briefly. Turning her back on the officer gave her small satisfaction as she pulled down her shorts. At least afterwards, as she was tied up again and bundled back into the tent, she felt a whole lot better.

Lying down again she reflected on what she’d been able to see. A few soldiers, their guns in their laps, sat around on the edge of the camp looking out. But most of the soldiers had parked themselves around a small fire in the center, talking and chatting as if they didn’t have a care in the world—until she emerged from the tent. She still shivered at the vivid image of two dozen men eyeing her shamelessly in the sudden silence.

The officer strutted around as if he’d just won the lottery—which, in capturing her, Karla thought, perhaps he had. And though she couldn’t be sure, it seemed, from brief glints reflected from the light of the fire and the way a man here or there would hold his head back, an arm up, that they were passing a bottle around.

What she knew of military procedure came from reading a couple of novels and seeing a few B–grade movies which—if movies on subjects she knew something about were anything to go by—had little to do with reality. Still, she felt certain that lighting a fire at night and advertising your position was not the best strategy, and letting your soldiers sit around it having a party in potentially hostile territory was hardly a good idea.

She was tired and dying to go to sleep. No matter which way she turned she could not get comfortable on the hard dirt; every time her mind began to drift, it focused on her anger at Uqu and Mountain Man for abandoning her to this uncertain fate. As the night deepened, the soldiers’ noise grew in volume as they drank more and more, and she was sure she’d have stayed wide awake even if she’d been lying on a soft mattress rather than a mat covering the unforgiving ground. Although she couldn’t understand a word they were saying, she was convinced the songs they sang were lewd and their raucous laughter had more to do with dirty jokes and ganja cigarettes than any sense of happiness. And all the while she imagined against her will what was going to happen when those soldiers had finally had enough to drink. . . .

18 Pillow Talk

KARLA WASN’T AWARE SHE had drifted off into a fitful sleep until she felt a hand go over her mouth and a voice whispering, “Quiet,” in her ear. She struggled and tried to bite the hand until she heard, “’Orton-gaat, it’s Uqu. Thanks for saving my life back there, by the way.”

Another man appeared—holding a long knife. Karla began to struggle again.

“It’s our friendly guide,” Uqu said. “He’s going to cut those ropes.”

Mountain Man, she thought, and relaxed as the bonds were finally gone.

Soft, indistinct sounds drifted through the wall of the tent. Suddenly, there was a burst of gunfire; a moment later it seemed guns were being fired from every direction. Uqu and Mountain Man threw themselves on top of Karla, covering her. The firing stopped as quickly as it had begun, and a few moments later she could hear voices. Uqu and Mountain Man slowly sat up, and somebody poked his head through the tent flap, his thumb flashing up, grinning “Okayokay. . . .” followed by a few words Karla couldn’t understand.

“We can go out now,” said Uqu. Haltingly, Karla followed the two men into the outside air. The embers of the fire still glowed a dull red, and the moon, three-quarters full, cast its eerie light from halfway into the starry heavens. She could see dozens of men moving around the camp—while others were laying still on the ground.

Karla gasped. “Are they all dead?”

“Just sleeping—I think,” said Uqu. “I’ll ask our guide to find out, shall I?” After a couple of words, Mountain Man disappeared into the gloom.

“What’s the time, anyway?” she asked.

“Getting on for two in the morning.”

As Karla walked slowly around the camp, flexing and stretching her stiff, sore muscles, it was easy to tell the soldiers from the rebels—separatists? Terrorists? What were they, exactly?—from their motley uniforms. None, as far as she could tell, wore anything that matched in the way the Sandeman soldiers’ uniforms did.

They were pulling boots from unconscious men, tending wounded from both sides—seemingly indiscriminately—collecting weapons and all the other equipment they could find. She saw the officer sitting, cringing away from three men looming over him menacingly, all trace of his imperiousness gone. Being questioned, perhaps?

She turned away. Maybe he deserves it, she thought. But she didn’t have to watch someone being humiliated.

“Just one dead,” Uqu said, breaking into her thoughts. She saw Mountain Man standing next to Uqu, grinning, his teeth a moonlit flash in his dark, shadowy face. She stretched out her hand to shake his; after a moment he understood the gesture and eagerly grasped her hand in his. “Matalam,” she said. “Very much.” He said nothing, but grinned even more broadly, dipping his head slightly.

“We crept into the camp. Most soldiers were asleep,” Uqu told her. “The others we simply knocked on the head. Until someone—maybe the officer over there—started firing. But by then it was all over—only a couple of the Sandeman soldiers were still up and about.”

“I’m glad to be free—very glad,” she said. “But I’m sorry someone had to die. It seems such a waste.”

“This whole thing is a waste,” said Uqu.

Karla just nodded tiredly and sat down on a fallen log. Uqu squatted nearby.

“So where did you go,” she asked, “when the soldiers appeared?”

“I made a split-second decision. I figured there was nothing I could do to help you by staying, but maybe something I could do by getting away. Plus, I didn’t think they’d too careful about my safety. I had a feeling I’d probably end up being reported as shot, trying to escape.”

Karla remembered the way the officer had treated his soldiers. “Quite possibly.”

“Had you been anyone else, I’m sure you’d have been in great danger. But I was also pretty certain they had orders you had to be delivered in one, unbroken piece.”

“I think you’re probably right,” Karla said, remembering that none of her deepest fears had been realized. “But you stopped them from delivering their ‘package’—me.”

“I didn’t,” Uqu laughed. “We were being shadowed by a few of the separatists all the way from Inkaya. It was they—and our guide—who took care of the two soldiers sent after me. Then our guide and I trekked back to their base for reinforcements, while the others trailed you to the camp.”

“I see.”

All of a sudden, Mountain Man stood in front of them, seemingly appearing from nowhere. “Now go. All go. B’long house.” he said.

“B’long house?” Karla asked.

“Home,” Uqu said. “Including you.”

“Me? Oh, you mean—?”

“Right. We’re going to put you on a boat. Now. It’s waiting just a few kilometers from here.”

“How can you . . . ?” She stopped as she saw a man outlined in the embers speaking into a cellphone. “Of course. Modern technology. Okay then, let’s go . . . who should I thank?”

“Their leader . . . but you just thanked him.”

“Mountain Man?” she said.

Uqu looked at her in surprise. “Yes, I suppose that’s a good name for him.”

“So what are they going to do to the soldiers—kill them all?” she shuddered.

“Oh no. Look.” Uqu turned and pointed towards the fire, which was now burning more brightly: someone had thrown some more logs onto the coals and they were catching alight.

Karla saw the Sandeman soldiers sitting in a circle around the fire. Taking a few steps closer she could see they were roped together.

“Won’t they raise the alarm?” she asked.

“Eventually, yes. But I don’t imagine they’ll be in much of a hurry. Anyway, it will take them a while to get free, and by the time they do we’ll be long gone. They’re not going to chase us. All their weapons and supplies—and boots—have been confiscated.” Uqu chuckled. “That’s how Mountain Man resupplies his men.”

As they all began to leave the camp Karla estimated there were thirty to forty men altogether. Then she thought she recognized the two men who’d been forced to walk all the way back to camp in bare feet. She stepped closer to be sure.

“Are they prisoners?” she asked Uqu.

Mountain Man overheard her. “No, no,” he grinned. “Join up.”

“What?” Karla asked.

“They’ve switched sides,” Uqu explained. “It happens all the time, though there’s not much traffic in the other direction.”

Karla noticed some of the soldiers tied up by the fire were wearing bandages. “Ah . . . ” she said. “They treat the soldiers well, do they?”

“The enlisted men, yes. They get a lot of converts that way . . . and a lot of soldiers who are reluctant to shoot at them.”

“Makes sense.”

“Not all the separatist groups behave this way, unfortunately.”

The bulk of the men, all carrying something extra—a second weapon, a radio, a backpack full of supplies—turned towards the inland peak. Uqu, Mountain Man, and a few others guided Karla in the opposite direction. It was slow going with just the light of the moon to guide them, and while Karla stumbled from time to time, the separatists moved as though they could find their way even in complete darkness. Although it might have been only a few kilometers, it was something like an hour and a half before the jungle gave way to a small beach. An inflatable rubber dinghy was pulled up on the sand, a couple of men standing by it, smoking. In the distance, out to sea, Karla could see the shape of the fishing boat, like the one moored at the village pier, outlined in shadow against the horizon.

Taking Uqu by surprise, Karla took hold of his face in both her hands and kissed him on the cheeks. “Thanks for everything. You’ve been wonderful.”

Karla felt sure Uqu was blushing—though she guessed she wouldn’t have been able to tell, even in broad daylight.

“It was my pleasure . . . Karla.”

Mountain Man touched her shoulder, pointing at the dinghy waiting on the small beach.

“Time to go,” Uqu said.

“Matalam, matalam, for everything.” She planted a kiss on Mountain Man’s cheek, much to his astonishment, and they walked down the beach towards the boat. As she stepped in, Uqu said, “They’ll look after you. Just keep your head down so to speak—they’re a bit nervous about having you on board and keeping you safe if they’re ever stopped by the Australians.”

Karla nodded. “Thanks again, Uqu.” And turning to the sailors said, “Matalam,” with a smile.

The boatmen smiled back as they pushed the dinghy into gentle waves and jumped in behind her. A powerful outboard motor revved up, sounding strangely muffled, and the little boat flew across the tips of the waves towards the fishing boat half a kilometer offshore. Karla looked back at the two dim figures on the beach, waving until they were out of sight.

Uqu and Mountain Man stood watching the boat head out to sea until Karla was a dim stick figure in the distance. The men who’d accompanied them turned inland; Uqu and Mountain Man walked silently along the coast towards Inkaya.

*****

AS MUCH AS HE wanted to do nothing more than just lie there until he could fall back to sleep, Derek Olsson forced himself awake. I have to find Lars, he thought. He could be the key.

Splashing water on his face, he spent several hours going through the online phone directory, calling every “Olsson” he could find anywhere in the country—without result. He tried all the variations he could think of—Olssen, Ollson, Olsen, Olson—with only aching ears to show for all efforts. Finally, he emailed his partner, Ross, asking him to get the lawyers and private investigators to dig up his brother’s whereabouts. Pull out all the stops, he wrote. He may be the key we’re looking for.

*****

AS “NEUTRAL TERRITORY,” THE Four Seasons was the venue for the Foreign Ministers’ meeting. The other Foreign Ministers and their staff were staying in other hotels scattered the length of Orchard Road, Singapore’s main shopping street. Alison stood outside the conference room waiting for Royn. She nodded and smiled as the Papua New Guinea and Solomon Islands delegations filed in, idly chatting with Kieran Fairchild and other members of the Australian contingent. She stifled a grin at the number of Australians present, considering that Royn was merely to be the neutral chairman. When Royn had challenged the numbers Fairchild proposed, the Secretary of the Department of Foreign Affairs had answered, “But Minister, you never know when some last-minute drafting or certain expertise will be urgently required.” Alison had considered asking whether Fairchild had ever heard of the internet—or the telephone. But she’d held her peace.

“Good morning, Alison,” Royn said woodenly as he reached the door. Alison hadn’t seen Royn since Melanie had interrupted their discussion the previous morning.

“Good morning, Minister,” Alison replied. “Everyone’s here except for Nimabi and company. They’re running quite late.”

“Shall we . . . ?” Royn asked, gesturing towards the door.

“A quick word first,” Alison said quietly, continuing before Royn could comment, her voice dropping to a whisper. “They’ve accepted, but they want a deposit of a hundred thousand first, before they’ll start.”

“Good work . . . but a steep price. How do we . . . ?” Royn stopped as he saw Nimabi leading the Sandemans’ delegation along the corridor. “Good morning, Abdullah,” he said, grinning broadly.

“Good morning,” Nimabi said softly with a wry smile as Royn held the door open for him.

“My God,” Royn breathed, surprised to see Nimabi’s face wasn’t the same stony, unyielding mask he’d worn the previous day. “He looks . . . different,” he mumbled. “Strange . . . I wonder why.”

“What happened yesterday?” Alison asked.

“Absolutely nothing,” Royn said quietly, gesturing for Alison to precede him. “Everybody stonewalled. I figured we’re in for another day of the same.”

Royn and Alison took their places at the round table, rather like the tables Chinese restaurants use for large parties, set in the center of the room. One foreign minister sat at each point of the compass, each flanked by two of his aides, one on either side. Other staff members sat behind.

When Royn declared the meeting open he was surprised when Nimabi, who’d hardly said a word other than “No” the previous day, spoke first. “I was wondering, gentlemen, if, just perhaps,” Nimabi said tentatively, “we could agree, in principle at any rate, to let the geologists decide the extent of the oil deposits.”

Royn’s eyes widened at Nimabi’s words. But to hide his astonishment he had to quickly appear as if he was going through some of the papers in front of him when the Papuan Foreign Minister chimed in, “You know, Abdullah—” addressing Nimabi by his given name for the first time in the past few weeks “—that makes eminent sense to me.”

“A very good idea,” added the Solomons minister.

The logjam had broken, and Royn had no idea how, why, or what had happened for all three ministers to turn, overnight, from irreconcilable combatants into the best of friends; after weeks of fruitless negotiations, they reached a Heads of Agreement covering all areas of their dispute in less than two hours.

“Well, gentlemen,” said Royn when everything seemed decided. “May I suggest we adjourn while our appropriate staff members remain to draw up the necessary papers?” The three foreign ministers nodded in agreement. “And,” Royn added, “since yesterday’s meeting was so . . . arduous . . . may I suggest we resume at the same time tomorrow morning?”

Royn’s proposal was accepted unanimously and such camaraderie pervaded the room that the four ministers decided to have a private lunch together.

ROYN LOST COUNT OF the number of bottles of vintage wine they’d imbibed—a pleasure which Nimabi enjoyed just as much as the others. By dessert, the stiff formality of foreign policy had disappeared, replaced with uproarious laughter at bawdy stories and dirty jokes, often mangled by slurred tongues.

After a pause while waiters cleared the table and served coffee and liqueurs, the Papuan minister turned to Nimabi and said, “I’m curious about something, Abdullah. My wife said a number of things last night that have been bothering me, to say the least.”

“Really?” asked Nimabi with obvious interest. “What?”

“Well, to start with, she said she had a headache.” All four men laughed. “But then she added she’d made some kind of pact—though she didn’t say who with—and that her headache probably wouldn’t go away—”

Royn watched in surprise as the other two Foreign Ministers both tried to speak at once—and then argued as they each tried to give way to the other.

After a moment of laughter, Nimabi was given the floor. “Very strange,” he said, “because my wife and I had a blazing row last night. Very unusual for her.”

“What about?” the Papuan minister asked.

“About . . . how it would be my fault if we simply couldn’t afford make any shopping trips like this one for a long time to come, among other things,” Nimabi replied. “And she was certain she could convince all the other Sandeman minister’s wives—even the prime minister’s wife—to take the same stand as her.”

“. . . and my wife got all upset,” the Solomons foreign minister added, “saying ‘You stupid men. What are you all fighting about when there’s obviously so much money to go around?’”

The three ministers turned on Royn as one. “Our wives had lunch together with yours yesterday,” Nimabi said accusingly. “So, Tony, did you get your wife to plant this little stratagem?”

“Me?” said Royn with unfeigned innocence. “I can assure you, gentlemen, that only a woman’s mind could be so devious as to come up with something like this. When it comes to scheming, I’m just not in the same league.”

*****

MOUNTAIN MAN DISAPPEARED INTO the jungle as they neared Inkaya, leaving Uqu, hot, sweaty, and tired, to trudge alone into the village square.

The elders were, as usual for that time of day, smoking, drinking tea, and talking around a table in the restaurant. They looked up in surprise as Uqu came in and sat down, unasked, at the table. Drinking endless cups of cool water, he spoke for a long time. He answered questions, and when he finished he went and sat alone at another table while the elders talked and argued with each other. After about fifteen minutes, Uqu heard Tungi speak sharply in a raised voice and the others fell silent. One by one, they all nodded. Tungi stood up and led the other elders towards Uqu, who stood as he saw them coming.

Without a word, Tungi nodded gravely. With Uqu in the lead, the entire village council walked out of the village the way Uqu had come. Uqu stopped where Mountain Man had disappeared and heard a voice calling him. The elders followed Uqu into a small clearing in the overgrowth where Mountain Man was standing.

Apparently, no introduction was needed as they all smiled at each other and Tungi just said, “Please, speak.”

As Uqu had done, the Mountain Man spoke for a long time and answered many questions. When the elders were satisfied, Tungi said, “Matalam,” and Mountain Man disappeared.

Tungi led the elders, Uqu in tow, back to the village. When they reached the canteen, Tungi ordered a young man, “Tell Gurundi the village council wants to see him. Now.”

TUNGI WAS ABOUT TO send one of the elders across the square when Gurundi finally emerged from the mosque and ambled nonchalantly across the square. “Tungi-ga, gentlemen, you asked to see me?” he said as he walked towards the table where the elders were sitting, waiting, stopping a couple of meters away.

The elders sat on one side of a long table, Tungi at the center, and Uqu at one end. Nobody stood behind the counter, and there was nobody else in the seating area. Gurundi stood, facing Tungi, behind the sole chair on the other side of the table. His eyes moved from one elder’s stony face to the next until his gaze reached Uqu.

“What is the meaning of this?” he asked in the local dialect, his gaze fixing on Tungi.

“Sit,” said Tungi, gesturing impatiently at the sole chair facing him.

“I demand to know—”

Tungi cut him off angrily. “You will demand nothing. You will speak only when spoken to. And only when you have taken your seat will we begin.”

“Begin what—?” Gurundi stopped, his mouth frozen open in mid-sentence, as he saw Tungi’s brilliant eyes fixed on his face. In slow motion, he stepped over to the chair and sat down.

Tungi leaned forward. “Tell me, are you aware of the tradition of diyafah handed down to us from the very lips of the Prophet Mohammed, peace be upon him?”

“Yes,” Gurundi said hoarsely.

“Then perhaps you’d care to remind us of the details, Gurundi-ga.”

Gurundi licked his lips. “The Prophet, peace be upon him, enjoins us to welcome strangers into our midst.”

“And when such a stranger is welcomed, how are we enjoined to treat him?”

“With respect.”

“Quite. But isn’t there more?

“Yes,” said Gurundi quietly.

“Which is . . . ?”

“The stranger—” Gurundi now spoke as if he were giving a lecture “—is to be protected from harm.”

“Exactly,” said Tungi with a nod. “And is it not true that the hadith says, ‘If you believe in Allah and his Prophet, be hospitable to your guest’?”

“That is my understanding,” Gurundi said guardedly.

“And being part of the hadith,” Tungi continued, “it is part of the Islamic law, is it not?”

Gurundi nodded silently.

“And what is the penalty for a member of the community who transgresses those rules?”

“In the Prophet’s days, peace be upon him, humiliation, even banishment.”

“And who decided?”

“The punishment?” Gurundi asked. When Tungi nodded he said, “The tribal chieftain.”

“And in our community, who is the equivalent of the tribal chieftain?”

“You are, Tungi-ga.”

“Thank you, Gurundi-ga. Also my understanding. So, we would appreciate—” he spread his arms to include the other elders “—if you would be so kind as to explain to us what happened in the school the other day.”

“I stopped the infidel woman from corrupting our children.”

“A laudable aim indeed,” Tungi said; Gurundi relaxed. “So in the process,” Tungi continued, “would you say you treated ’Orton-gaat with respect?”

“The infidel woman?” Gurundi’s body stiffened.

“The stranger to whom we offered diyafah,” Tungi said. When Gurundi made no reply, Tungi asked, “Did you, for example, understand the English words the children were singing?”

Gurundi shook his head.

“Did you ascertain exactly what our guest was doing in the classroom?”

Gurundi shook his head again.

“Did you ask the teacher, Arang’anat-gaat, for an explanation?”

“You would consider a woman’s word the equal of mine?” Gurundi asked with an air of surprise.

“We are not asking for her word,” Tungi said, his voice hard, “but for yours. . . . And we are waiting to hear them.”

Gurundi glared at Tungi. “I did what needed to be done, in the name of Allah and the Prophet—peace be upon him—for the good of our community and our children.”

“There were also thirty young children present,” Tungi said with hardly a pause. “Do you think your behavior set a good example for those impressionable young children to follow?”

“Yes,” Gurundi said fervently.

“Including the words you said to the teacher herself?”

Gurundi looked for support towards the elder who had first championed his appointment as stand-in for the village imam, but the elder turned his face away. “I—I admit,” he said softly, looking back towards Tungi, but at his hands rather than his face, “that I may, perhaps, have overreacted.”

“You may be interested to learn that the song in question was a harmless children’s nursery rhyme. ’Orton-gaat was using it to help our children improve their pronunciation, vocabulary, and understanding of English—and doing it very well, apparently. Indeed, until yesterday I was not aware our English teachers’ command of English is less than perfect. With that knowledge, would you say that in your treatment of ’Orton-gaat you also overreacted?”

After a pause, Gurundi replied in small voice, “Perhaps.”

“And would you say you treated ’Orton-gaat with respect?”

Gurundi’s eyes flicked from one elder’s face to another, looking for some sign of support. Finding none, he turned back to Tungi in stony silence.

After waiting another moment for Gurundi to reply, Tungi said, “Well, it is quite clear to all of us that you did not. Furthermore, we do not agree you have set a good example to our young children—quite the opposite. And even worse: the reaction your actions provoked are an example of behavior none of us want our children following.”

“What the infidel woman did—”

“We’re not here to discuss what she did, only what you did.”

“What I did,” Gurundi said slowly, “I did as a representative of Allah in this community.”

“Breaking the rules handed down to us by the Prophet from Allah in the process?” Tungi asked, a skeptical expression on his face.

A long silence settled over the table as Tungi and Gurundi glared at each other.

With a sigh of resignation, Tungi turned towards the end of the long table, where Uqu was sitting. “Uqu-ga,” he said, “would you be so kind as to tell us what you know.”

“Certainly, Tungi-ga,” Uqu said with a bow of his head. “Yesterday, about noon—” as he spoke, he turned to face Gurundi “—’Orton-gaat was captured by Sandeman soldiers. Last night, separatist forces raided the soldiers’ camp and freed her. Under interrogation, the officer in charge swore they had been tipped off as to ’Orton-gaat’s whereabouts by someone in this village.”

“Would you have any idea,” Tungi asked Gurundi, “who the person in our village might be?”

“Someone doing his Islamic duty,” Gurundi said with a smile.

“And who might that be?”

Gurundi shrugged.

Turning to Uqu, Tungi asked, “Did the officer identify the person who tipped them off?”

“Yes,” said Uqu. “The village’s religious leader.”

Tungi turned to Gurundi. “Is this true?”

“No,” Gurundi said, an involuntary quaver in his voice.

“You’re lying,” Tungi said; the other village elders all nodded at Tungi’s words.

“You prefer the word of an infidel to mine?” Gurundi said angrily.

Tungi glared at Gurundi, and tersely announced, “Uqu-ga’s account has been verified by an honest and devout Muslim we all know and trust. Some thirty others stand ready to come forth and tell us the same story.”

“I demand these men be brought forward—if they exist.”

“Are you doubting my word?” Tungi asked angrily.

“This is not a court of infidel law,” another elder interjected.

“Quite so,” said Tungi. “It is not necessary to bring others here to merely repeat what we have all heard from their mouths—and what you have been told they said. . . . To repeat the question: was it you who told the infidel soldiers where they could find ’Orton-gaat, thereby causing harm to the guest I welcomed into our midst in Allah’s name—and who you were duty-bound to protect, as it is spoken in the hadith?”

Gurundi stood up, standing tall to look down on the village elders. “Yes,” he declaimed. “And I’d do it again.”

“Sit down,” Tungi said coldly.

Gurundi’s nerve deserted him as he slowly sank back in the chair.

Tungi’s head lifted higher as he let his body lean into the back of his chair. “It is the unanimous decision of this village council that you be banished evermore from our community and Jazeerat el-Bihar, with immediate effect.”

“What?” Gurundi cried, his shoulders shaking, his eyes shifting nervously without pause. “You can’t—”

“It is done,” Tungi said coldly. He stood, and an instant later the other elders also stood as one. “Come. Get whatever you can carry. There is a banca waiting to take you away.”

THE NEWS SPREAD THROUGH the village at the electronic speed of text messaging, and a small crowd gathered near the playground chatting and speculating with each other about what was going on and why. Led by Arang’anat, the teachers and staff of the school left their duties and drifted out, one by one, to join the crowd.

As Gurundi stepped out of the mosque, his head held high, his face angry, his eyes fierce, a hush fell over the square. The two black-shrouded women followed behind, each loaded with luggage. A couple of the village elders then emerged to join Tungi and the remainder of the council who were waiting outside. With Tungi leading the way, the other elders surrounding Gurundi and the two women like an escort, the group moved in the direction of the pier.

As Gurundi passed near where Arang’anat was standing, she heard him say, “You’ll regret this,” to Tungi, a pace in front of him. Tungi ignored him.

The procession filed down to the pier, the crowd ambling silently behind, Arang’anat among the first to move. As they reached the pier, one of the elders looked back and made a gesture like a stop sign; a few children ducked through and scuttled along the pier, hiding behind whatever cover they could find, but the other villagers stood still.

Except Arang’anat, who gingerly took three steps onto the pier, from where she could have a better view.

She saw Gurundi climbing into the banca, and stood watching as it headed out to sea, a tentative smile on her face. Her heart leapt as Tungi neared her, inclined his head briefly in her direction, and said respectfully, “Arang’anat-gaat.”

“May Allah be praised,” she breathed softly, smiling, to herself.

Only when the banca disappeared from view did she turn for the short walk back to the school—and her waiting class. No longer trudging, she walked with an uncharacteristic, almost masculine air.

*****

WITH HER AFTERNOON NOW free, Alison cleared her backlog of emails, sent the geek some more names to add to the ones for the McKurnWatch list she’d sent the previous day. Then she informed the private eye that payment would be handled through their original contact in the normal way—with complete, detailed invoices, and so on. She also sent them a copy of her summary of Sidney Royn’s report, asking them to advise her how they planned to proceed.

Finally, though not with relief, she turned to the stack of waiting phone messages. As she played each message her hopes drooped further until she seriously thought of just deleting the remaining ones without even checking them. She thought of going to the gym, or for a walk or a swim. “Afterwards, Alison,” she told herself. “Not many left.” Five minutes later, only half-listening, she straightened up in her chair in disbelief, replayed the message—and called Royn’s suite.

“There’s something you should hear, Minister.”

“Fine,” Royn said. “Why don’t you bring it up?”

“Okay . . . is Melanie there?”

“She’s gone shopping—celebrating with the other ministers’ wives, I believe.”

“I’ll be right up, then.”

PLACING HER LAPTOP ON the dining table in Royn’s suite, she clicked play. When the phone was picked up, McKurn’s voice spoke ominously:

“Your payment’s late.”

“Frankie—”

“No names, you imbecile.”

“Mate, it will just be a couple more days. I promise.”

“It had better be . . . or you know what’s going happen.”

“Don’t worry F—mate. Two days, that’s all.”

“I’ll be waiting.”

“That voice sounds familiar,” said Royn.

“Does the number mean anything?” Alison asked, pointing to the phone number at the head of the email.

“That’s a parliamentary number,” Royn said. “New South Wales Parliament. Play it again.”

Royn listened carefully as Alison replayed the message. “It’s a state politician. A Conservative member of the New South Wales state Parliament . . . I’ve met him . . . I’ll think of his name in a minute.” He grinned at Alison. “Maybe we’ve hit the jackpot.”

“Maybe,” said Alison, a touch of reservation evident in her voice. “A second string to our bow in any event.

“At least,” said Royn excitedly. “I know—how about getting your geek guy to tap his phone too?”

Alison shook her head vigorously. “No, no, Minister. I’ve already got too much to handle. Better if we get the private eye to tail him. This is more up his alley . . . find out what rackets this member is involved in, and what, if anything, is his relationship to McKurn.” She looked questioningly at Royn.

Royn nodded hesitantly. “Okay.”

“Thank you. So when you remember his name—no, wait a minute.” Alison’s fingers flew across the laptop’s keyboard and in a moment she was looking at a list of all NSW state parliamentarians. She turned the laptop so Royn could see the screen, and scrolled down the list slowly until Royn said, “Harry Weinbaum . . . ?” His voice was unsteady, and as he turned slowly to look at Alison his face was frozen, his mouth half-open, his eyes unfocused. Shaking his head he added, “But it can’t be him. Surely not.”

Alison clicked on a link that went to Weinbaum’s page on the New South Wales parliamentary site. A picture of a ruddy-faced man with a shock of grey hair stared at Royn.

“I can’t believe. . . . Play his voice again, please.”

Royn listened to the conversation for the third time. Halfway through he said, “That’s him all right. Harry Weinbaum of all people. Who’d have thought it? He’s one of the last people I’d have ever suspected of having anything to do with McKurn.”

“A dark secret.”

“Indeed.”

“I wonder how many other people like him are in McKurn’s pocket.”

“Sheesh,” said Royn. “It could be anybody.”

“It certainly seems so,” said Alison. “Is it okay with you, then, for me to go ahead and tell the private eye to check him out?”

“You bet,” Royn said.

19 Pendulum of Fear

AT THE END OF her last lap, Alison let her muscles relax and her body glided slowly to the edge of the hotel pool. She floated before letting her feet sink to the bottom; her eyes scanned the mass of pink bougainvillea and oleanders surrounding the third-floor pool. Eventually, almost against her will, she realized she’d lost track of time, and there was probably only a couple of hours left before she had to leave for the airport.

Royn had persuaded the foreign ministers to wait till Thursday afternoon to issue a statement to the press to make it seem it took three tough, tortuous days of negotiation to reach an agreement. Alison was grateful: the extra day in Singapore made it impossible for her to meet with McKurn until Monday at the earliest. Still too soon, she thought, wondering how she could postpone it again while knowing she couldn’t. As she pushed herself up out of the pool, her mind wandered in the early morning heat to imagine what his answers could be—and how she might respond.

She forced McKurn from her mind as she strode to the table where she’d left her towel, oblivious to the admiring male glances following her bikini-clad movements. Wrapped in the hotel’s soft dressing gown she ordered breakfast and, with a sigh, opened her laptop and began scanning the accumulated emails, more appearing in an apparently endless stream as the wireless connection cut in. She decided to begin with the poll results from Conservative Party headquarters.

On the surface, they seemed confusing: seventy-three percent of voters answered yes to the question, “Should Australia withdraw its troops from the Sandeman Islands immediately?” while sixty-four percent answered no when asked, “Should Australia abandon an ally in the middle of a fight?” To Alison the meaning of these and the responses to the other questions were very clear but potentially double-edged: the way to sell (or, she shuddered, “spin”) the Sandemans to the voters today was as “keeping our word” and “sticking with our friends.” But that most voters wanted to pull the troops out now was more worrying: polls taken before the army’s casualties in the Sandemans demonstrated that most people hadn’t even known Australian troops were there. She didn’t have to take a survey to know how voters would answer the question, “Should Australia abandon an ally we know we cannot trust?”

The Sandeman involvement, previously under the voters’ radar, was now a hot issue; in war—as in politics for that matter—if today’s promise didn’t produce the expected results, it could easily turn into tomorrow’s boomerang.

The results of a poll Royn’s office took every month or two was more encouraging: “if an election were held tomorrow” the Conservative Party would actually increase its vote with Royn as leader—but lose seats if Cracken were, though still beating Labor.

But Cracken was seen as the leader who would be “most decisive” in a crisis. Royn trailed a poor second as he had every time this topic was polled. Royn needs to appear more decisive, Alison thought—although, too often, “decisive” decisions turn out to be unpopular ones.

A few minutes before she had to get ready for her flight, she received an email from a friend: have you seen this? She clicked the link and was directed to the Sydney Mercury’s widely read gossip column:

“Lies! All Lies!” says Senator McKurn. A new website claims to be telling the “real” life story of the Conservative Party’s senior Senator, Frank McKurn. Fascinating reading. But McKurn’s lawyers made it very clear it was “All lies, defamatory lies”; and that if we repeated a single word from this website—or even mentioned its name—we’d be sued for libel and slander.

“So why haven’t you sued them?” we asked. “We’re working on it,” was the only answer we were given.

Who put up this site? Despite the best efforts of our techie friends here at the Mercury, we have no idea—and we get the impression McKurn’s lawyers don’t either.

We have been told—off the record, of course—that similar rumors about McKurn’s past have been circulating for years; now there are now some [very quiet] rumblings from some Conservative party higher-ups to the effect that McKurn better get his act together, and quick.

We can say no more except . . . Happy Googling.

At last, she smiled happily, some good news. Clearly, the list she’d sent to the geek had already begun to pay off. And McKurn would be under a lot of pressure on Monday, which could only be to her advantage.

Her arm, stretched out to fold down the laptop’s screen, froze in mid-motion as she became aware that the small knot of tension in her stomach had dissipated, replaced by a warm, if faint, glow. Her eyes were caught again by the mass of colorful flowers, her attention drawn to the oleanders . . . poison, she thought, wrapped in beauty. . . .

“It is better,” Niccoló Machiavelli had once said, “to be feared than to be loved.” Her fight with McKurn, she realized, hinged on a balance of fear. Perhaps, she thought, the pendulum of fear is beginning to swing the other way.

*****

THREE TIME ZONES EAST, a helicopter flew over the south-eastern peninsula of Jazeerat el-Bihar. Jeremy McGuire, thankful for the cooling wind from the chopper’s blades that blew away some of the heat rising from the ground just twenty meters below, sat by the open door, studying the island where he and his platoon would be spending the next few weeks . . . or months. This part of the island looked like a great spot for a vacation: just a couple of small villages along the coast on an otherwise uninhabited peninsula; from time to time, he was sure, they’d be able to dive into the thundering surf racing up the empty white beaches. But most of the time, he thought, we’ll be there . . . tearing his eyes away from the pristine sand to the thick, green jungle covering much of the island, thinning only towards the peak of the volcanic cone of K’mah in the center.

But just the same, he felt lucky. . . .

From a briefing he and other officers attended, he learnt that every one of the Sandeman Islands had its own, seemingly home-grown, separatist group. Some were little more than local bandit gangs, using a political umbrella to claim some legitimacy. On some islands there were more than one . . . like el-Bihar’s eastern neighbor, St. Christopher’s Island. That island’s population was evenly split between Muslims, who mainly lived on the el-Bihar side, and Christians to the east. The two groups hated both each other and the government in Toribaya. They even disagreed about the island’s name: the Muslims resented the official name, St. Christopher’s Island, demanding it should be called by its original Arabic name, Jazeerat el-Misk—Fragrant Island—a demand which the Catholic population unsurprisingly denounced. With not two but three separatists groups, all fighting each other as well as government troops, St. Christopher’s was the most violent of the Sandeman Islands. Jeremy felt sorry for his fellow officers who were to be sent there.

On Jazeerat el-Bihar, by comparison, the sole separatist group known as Islamic Purity—which had mobilized the islanders to stop the construction of the beach resort near Inkaya—seemed to follow a peaceful, Gandhi-style strategy in preference to violence.

Maybe that was about to change. According to Captain McMurray, one Sandeman soldier was shot two days ago—the very first casualty on el-Bihar. Why, though, were their Sandeman counterparts keeping their mouths clammed tightly shut about what, “if anything,” they’d been doing on the island?

The Australian army was setting up a small base on what promised to be a very pleasant location at the end of the peninsula, with beaches on three sides and jungle on the other. The base was intended to support, resupply, and reinforce operations on St. Christopher’s Island. Jeremy’s platoon’s job would be, initially, to defend the camp’s perimeter. As the helicopter flew towards the base low over the shore, giving Jeremy a final bird’s eye view of the surrounding terrain—and the pier the army engineers were constructing at one end of a wide, enticing beach—he thought it wouldn’t be long before his platoon would be sent scouting inland. Or, worse, rotated onto St. Christopher’s to give the troops there a break at what, from the air, looked more like a holiday resort than an army outpost.

*****

IN SYDNEY’S UNDERWORLD, THE Greek’s headquarters was no secret: a raunchy Kings Cross nightclub colloquially known as the “Bare Bottoms Club.” It was in the center of the Greek’s home turf: a long strip of such nightclubs lining both sides of Darlinghurst Road, a third of them also owned by the Greek.

Nazarov, Shultz, and de Brouw stood before the ornate double entrance doors in the first stop of their latest assignment: find out which underworld gang was behind the murder of Vincent Leung.

Some five minutes after Nazarov knocked, one of the doors opened slightly, a chain holding it in place, an eye looking out from the darkness behind. “Yeah?” a voice said skeptically. “Whadya want?”

“We’re here to see ze Greek,” said Nazarov, exaggerating his Russian accent.

“He sure won’t see you if you don’t learn a little respect first.” The man moved to push the door closed, but Nazarov’s foot prevented the door from moving.

“We’re full of rezpect for ze Greek,” said Nazarov with a smile. “His name is known far and wide, which is why we’ve come halfway around ze world to see him.”

“Is he expecting you?”

“No. But he will want to see us.”

“I doubt it. Have a nice flight home.” But Nazarov’s foot still prevented the man from closing the door.

Nazarov took a small packet from his pocket. “Just give him zis. A small sample of what we can offer. And tell him we can match ze ‘Candyman’ on price and quality.” Nazarov poked it through the small gap and the man took it gingerly and slammed the door.

A few minutes later the door partially opened and the same man, pointing at Nazarov, said, “You can come in.” He pulled the door fully open to reveal a wide staircase that would be glittering when the lights were turned on, but now just seemed dull and grimy.

As Nazarov stepped through, the man walked a few rungs up the stairs—and the door was closed behind him. Nazarov turned to see two other men, both with bulges under their jackets, grinning by the door. “Up against the wall,” said one of them, “and spread your legs.” Nazarov complied and was efficiently, and none too gently, searched.

“He’s clean,” the same voice said. “You can go up. We’ll be right behind.”

The nightclub above was littered with glasses, some half-empty; ashtrays spilled onto the tables. The air smelt of stale beer, stale smoke—and the aroma of an expensive cigar.

The Greek—Demas Chrysanthopoulos—sat puffing a thick cigar at a dimly lit, circular table near the bar with three other equally beefy looking thugs. Nazarov’s packet lay in the center of the table. Chrysanthopoulos was a broad-shouldered, heavily muscled man in his mid to late forties, a few streaks of grey in his otherwise black hair. His thick fingers drummed the table as his dark black eyes, set wide above a long, prominent nose, studied Nazarov skeptically. “And who the hell are you?” he demanded in a deep, rumbling voice.

“Anatoli Sergeyevich Borzovsky,” Nazarov said with a slight bow of his head, “at your service, Mr. Chrysanzopoulos.”

Chrysanthopoulos shook his head. “Never heard of you.”

Nazarov moved to take a seat opposite Chrysanthopoulos but one of the bodyguards grabbed his shoulder. “You’ve been invited in,” said the voice behind him. “I didn’t hear any invitation to sit down. Did you? Mr. whoever-you-are?”

“Borzovsky,” said Nazarov, shrugging, letting go of the back of the chair.

Chrysanthopoulos motioned and one of three men at the table passed the packet back to Nazarov. “I don’t know what this is,” Chrysanthopoulos said, “and I don’t want to know. I don’t take gifts—or samples—from strangers.”

Nazarov shrugged as he dropped the packet into the side pocket of his jacket. He couldn’t tell whether it had been opened, but he felt certain it was now a bit lighter.

“You may not know me, Mr. Chrysanzopoulos, but I’m not a total stranger.”

“Really?” said Chrysanthopoulos.

“And I have somezing for you zat will prove it.”

“I can’t imagine what that would be.”

“If I may,” Nazarov said, patting his jacket pocket.

Chrysanthopoulos nodded. “Okay. Just take it out slowly.”

Nazarov reached into his pocket and—aware of the two men standing watchfully behind him—carefully withdrew a crinkled scrap of paper, unfolded it and leant forward to drop it on the table in front of the Greek.

Chrysanthopoulos looked at the piece of paper without touching it. Handwritten, in both Russian and English, it read:

TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN
Anatoli Sergeyevich Borzovsky is a trusted friend.

It was signed—also in Russian and English—Andrei Mikhailovich Kuznetsov.

Nazarov, Shultz and de Brouw had decided to try the frontal approach first, posing as drug suppliers offering a good deal as a way to, they hoped, meet the heads of the various Sydney gangs. Late the previous evening de Brouw had purchased a packet of heroin, which was carefully repackaged to remove any traces identifying its origin, while Nazarov, with Shultz’s assistance, had forged the letter and spent several hours “aging” it.

Looking at the letter’s signature, Chrysanthopoulos said, “I haven’t seen you before.”

“No,” Nazarov laughed. “I was on . . . holiday in Siberia, all expenses paid courtesy of ze government, ze last time Andrei visited Sydney.”

“And how is Andrei these days?”

“Not too good. But, hopefully, he’ll be feeling a whole lot better in a few weeks.”

“How’s that?”

“We’re working on springing him from jail,” said Nazarov. “Ze operation should go off shortly after we get back to Moscow. And I don’t zink we’ll need to be quite as imaginative as whoever it was who grabbed zat Olzon guy from ze prison van ze ozer day.”

As he spoke, Nazarov kept his eyes fixed to Chrysanthopoulos’ face. At the mention of Olsson’s name, Nazarov was positive he saw the Greek’s eyes narrow fractionally, and his mouth begin to twist into a sour look . . . which became a sour smile.

“Good luck then,” said Chrysanthopoulos. “And when Andrei’s out, perhaps you can ask him to give me a call so he can vouch for you in person.”

“Sure,” said Nazarov. “Just give me a number where he can reach you.”

“Give him the number,” Chrysanthopoulos said to his men at the table. One of them man went behind the bar and came back with a sheet of paper; he passed it to Nazarov.

“Zank you,” said Nazarov. “And would you like my contact number so you could—“

“Sure,” said Chrysanthopoulos grinning. “Why don’t you ask Andrei to give it to me when he calls.”

“Fine,” said Nazarov. And he reached out for the letter.

Chrysanthopoulos slid it away from him. “I’ll hang onto this so I can remember what Andrei wrote . . . for when he calls.”

“Fine,” said Nazarov.

“So have a nice trip home,” Chrysanthopoulos said, waving his thick fingers in a gesture of dismissal.

“SUSPICIOUS BASTARD,” SAID NAZAROV, as he sketched his meeting with the Greek. “But I get the feeling he’s mixed up with this Olsson business somehow.”

“So what next?” asked Shultz.

“Let’s try the same trick on a couple of other gang leaders before we start interrogating their minions,” Nazarov replied.

“Have to be quick, though,” said de Brouw. “We could walk into trouble if the word gets around these Russians are showing up with multiple copies of the same letter.”

“Indeed,” said Nazarov. “So the South Americans . . . or the Lebanese?”

*****

DEREK OLSSON READ THE solicitor’s reply to his questions and went for a walk around the block to think through his next step. Returning to his room, he began to write. . . .

Hi Ross:

Please send this email to our solicitor (delete any reference to me so that, as far as he’s concerned, it comes from you); ask him to rewrite it in his own words and send it to Inspector Durant.

He may object to giving the prosecution key elements of our case, but at this stage in the game that doesn’t matter. I want Durant to question his own evidence and think about other suspects. It’s a long shot, I admit—but we’ve got to try every angle.

Here it is:

There are serious problems with your case against Derek Olsson:

What’s his MOTIVE for killing Vincent Leung? Where’s the evidence or history that might support any motive you care to come up with? This is a big hole in your case.

Some of the evidence against him is questionable.

If my client was framed, all the evidence you have against him was planted. This would mean someone entered Olsson’s apartment and planted the murder weapon wrapped in one of his shirts—without setting off any alarms or otherwise leaving any trace. Given the security systems in place this would obviously be a difficult task, but not totally impossible.

By your office’s own admission the placement of the hair and TWO flakes of skin, found under three different fingernails of the victim’s left hand, are highly unusual, to say the least. This lends weight to the thesis that my client was framed.

Can you think of a scenario that would produce just this result, and no other? My associates and I cannot.

The beer glass with my client’s fingerprints may have come from the Royal Arms Hotel in the Rocks, the only place he drinks beer from a glass. One of the owners of this hotel, via nominees, is Demas Chrysanthopoulos, otherwise known as “The Greek.” If this is a fact you don’t already know, I’d be happy to provide you with the evidence.

Chrysanthopoulos has a very powerful motive for getting Vincent Leung out of the way—and an even more powerful motive for getting someone else to hang for it.

My client would appreciate, in the interests of justice, that you carefully consider these questions.

Secondly, of course, if Olsson was framed, it means the real murderer—whether Chrysanthopoulos, one of his gang, or someone else—is right now walking around like a free man.

After encrypting it, Olsson saved it in the “draft” folder of a web-based email address, and sent a dummy message to a different, also dummy, email address.

*****

THE FISHING BOAT'S CAPTAIN had graciously offered Karla his tiny cabin which, like the rest of the boat, smelled overpoweringly of fish. Between the smell and the never-ending rising and falling and rolling and yawing and bobbing of the small boat on the Pacific Ocean waves and the itching aftermath of her sunburn, Karla spent the first two and a half days of the voyage lying miserably on the narrow bed, with only occasional forays onto the deck. She still had some of the marijuana and hashish she’d bought in the village, and she tried smoking a joint as a way to calm her stomach. But it only gave her the munchies, which made her feel even worse.

When she finally, unsteadily, emerged, she stood on the deck for a long time breathing the fresh, salty air, revelling in the sight of the open sky. Seeing only endless ocean in every direction without land or even another vessel in sight, she hoped the captain knew where he was and where he was going. She was surprised to see the waves were nowhere near as big as her stomach had insisted they had to be.

After she finally ate something that actually stayed down, the captain led her to the wheelhouse, the highest structure on the boat, and spread out a large chart.

“We here. Now,” he said, a gold front tooth glittering in the middle of his smile. Karla wondered how he could smile as widely as he did with his apparently continual cigarette still hanging from one corner of his mouth.

She looked to where his stubby, tobacco-stained finger pointed: in the middle of the Coral Sea.

“And here,” he said, pointing near Cairns on the north Queensland coast, “we you take.”

“Matalam, captain,” Karla said. “How long—how many days?”

“Days?” He stubbed out the cigarette stub and immediately lit another one. The aroma of cloves from the Indonesian-style cigarette overwhelmed the ever-present smell of fish. “Four, five, six,” he said, shrugging. “We first stop, then go.”

Stop? Where? Why? And for what? Karla wondered, noticing that this time the captain—Captain Gold, she decided to call him—had not pointed to the map.

Most of the time, the crew who weren’t busy in the engine room seemed to have little to do but sluice down the deck and polish (or re-polish) the fittings. Whenever a plane was sighted or another vessel came near, the boat slowed and the sailors busied themselves castings lines and nets into the water. Alone again on the high seas, the sailors brought in the nets and cleaned and gutted the fish. Sometimes, though, they simply emptied them back into the sea.

“Way home, fish. Lots,” the captain grinned when Karla asked him. So they’re just keeping up appearances, she thought.

She often walked around the deck—but carefully and not too often, keeping Uqu’s admonition in mind. She talked to the sailors and smiled with them but either their English was limited or they’d been warned not to speak to her, or both. With nothing to read—and no English-language books or magazines on board—she typed an article until her laptop’s battery ran out, and then switched to pen and paper. But mostly she lay on the narrow bed or stood on deck watching the sun, the clouds, the rolling sea, pondering what she’d learnt in the Sandemans—and what she hadn’t learnt.

To begin with: Uqu. Despite his obvious friendliness and apparent openness, he really was a Mystery Man, she decided . . . his mind indeed a labyrinth. Urbane and educated, he finished high school in Australia, and graduated from the University of Queensland. He came home to a country where most kids went to schools (if they went to school) nowhere near as well-equipped as the one in Inkaya with teachers, presumably, who weren’t even up to Arang’anat’s standard. A man who spoke English like a native in a society where most people spoke broken English at best. A Catholic—who was welcomed as a friend by Muslims on el-Bihar, from Tungi to Mountain Man. A man who worked just part-time for InterFreight—who, nevertheless, seemed to be readily available whenever Olsson’s people called . . . she’d had no sense that his role as her guide had any time limit. A man from a family wealthy enough to educate their son abroad—who knew the intricate details of the marijuana trade on the Sandeman backwater of el-Bihar, a place producing nothing that could be exported by his employer. A place, she guessed, few people in Toribaya knew anything about and even fewer ever visited.

The more she reflected on Uqu’s seeming contradictions, the more obvious the gaps in her knowledge of the Sandemans became. She regretted her exposure to the country had been so—albeit necessarily—brief. She’d seen some of the poorer and more isolated areas, places that tourists, foreign diplomats, businessmen, and even foreigners working on the oil field on el-Bihar’s northern shore probably never went to except on the way to somewhere else. She’d spent the bulk of her time in a Muslim village, one hardly typical of the rest of the country—and probably totally different from other Muslim villages.

Why, she asked herself, had someone with Uqu’s obvious talents decided to stay in a backwater like the Sandemans when he could have worked in Australia—or even have gone to the States or anywhere else in the world he wanted? His work, as he’d described it, didn’t seem like a full-time occupation.

She was convinced there was something, probably many things, he hadn’t told her. For example, she wondered: what did he really do for Derek Olsson?

*****

“SERGEANT LEE HAS COME up with something interesting,” Durant said as he and Lee were ushered into the office of Superintendent Zimmerman, commander of TASK FORCE OVERFLOW.

“Go ahead,” said Zimmerman.

Lee explained his suspicions about Derek Olsson’s possible connection to the Golden Dragon Triad, his questions about how he’d amassed the money to start InterFreight—and what had he been up to for seven years in Hong Kong.

“All very intriguing,” Zimmerman said dismissively, “but I don’t see how answering any of those questions will help us recapture Derek Olsson.”

“Right now, I don’t know, sir,” said Lee. “But the Hong Kong police report stated Olsson’s passport, wallet, ticket, and money were all stolen. The date indicates it happened within a week of his leaving Sydney. What’s more, he gave his address as Chung King Mansions.”

“I assume that address is significant in some way,” said Zimmerman.

“Yes, sir. It’s a real flophouse, the place you stay in Hong Kong if you’re strapped for cash.”

“You realize, Sergeant, that if Rudi hadn’t brought you here I’d have stopped listening a long time ago. So if you have a point, you’d better get to it now.”

“Yes, sir. Now we know that Olsson was completely penniless in Hong Kong—yet seven years later he returns to Australia with oodles of money at his disposal. I want to go up there and find out how he did it.”

“And you’re about to ask for expenses—?”

“No, boss,” Durant cut in. “Sergeant Lee wants to take some of his leave, and intends to buy his own ticket.”

“When?”

“Tonight, sir, if I’m allowed.”

Zimmerman glared at Durant. “You asked to be put on the task force,” he said, “and I got you both on. Now you’re proposing that Lee goes off on a wild goose chase in the middle of one of the biggest operations the New South Wales police has ever put on? With all due respect, Rudi, you must be out of your mind.”

“Perhaps,” said Durant nodding. “But Sergeant Lee has a hunch his trip will pay off—and I’m willing to back it.”

As Lee came under Zimmerman’s gaze he shifted uncomfortably in his chair. “And how long do you think you’ll be away?” Zimmerman asked.

“If all goes well, sir, I could be back Tuesday or Wednesday night.”

“‘If all goes well . . . ’” Zimmerman said sarcastically. “As far as I’m concerned, if it doesn’t go well, it means there’s nothing to find. Can you spare him for a couple of days, Rudi?”

Durant nodded. “I’ll work twenty-six hours a day if I have to.”

“I see,” said Zimmerman doubtfully. “Okay, Sergeant. But I expect to see you back here, on the job, bright and early on Wednesday morning.”

“Thank you sir. I will be.”

“But it seems to me,” said Zimmerman with a sigh, “you’re going fishing without a rod, let alone any bait.”

“Quite possibly, sir,” said Lee.

As Durant and Lee stood up to go Zimmerman smiled for the first time. “But if you do come back with something, Sergeant Lee, I want to be the first to know.”

20 Virginity Hill

MONDAY IN CANBERRA DAWNED clear and bathed in sunlight as if to reflect Anthony Royn’s sunny mood. From his window seat, he gazed across the uninterrupted cityscape—no trace of cloud, no sign of the mist that often shrouded the city on winter mornings impeded his view—to the white mass of Parliament House. Behind it, a near-full moon was sinking to the horizon. Before the plane banked towards the runway, Royn felt McKurn’s face leering down at him from a perch far above.

But not even that discomforting thought could impact on the Cheshire Cat grin he’d worn since a giggling Melanie, naked under her dressing gown, had hugged him “Goodbye” on the steps of their Melbourne home.

It had been a long time since she’d done that. . . .

“I’M NOT GOING TO that dinner tonight,” Melanie announced in a loud voice as she opened the door to their suite at the Four Seasons. Behind her, a bellhop dutifully wheeled a trolley loaded with packages, the fruits of her afternoon shopping expedition. “Tell them I’m sick or something.”

As she tipped the bellhop she glowered towards the darkened corridor leading to the bedrooms and in an impatient voice yelled even louder, “Tony? Are you here? Did you hear what I said?”

Royn shuffled along the corridor, touching the wall for support as he moved. “Hi, Mel,” he croaked.

“You look awful.”

Royn coughed violently. “It works,” he whispered, gasping for breath as he spoke, “doesn’t it?”

“What works? You should be in bed.”

Royn suddenly straightened up and grinned widely. “I used your makeup,” he said, his voice now normal.

“This is no time for theatrics,” Melanie glared.

“On the contrary, my dear,” Royn said. Still grinning, he carefully wiped away a dark ring under one eye with a tissue. “I just had a drink with the Singaporean Foreign Minister.”

“Don’t you have an official dinner with him and a whole bunch of other boring officials?”

“Did,” Royn chuckled. “But I pleaded illness.” He finished wiping the reddish pallor from his nose. “He took one look at me and it was a very quick drink, I can tell you. He didn’t want to catch whatever I had.”

“Why?” Melanie demanded.

“Because I don’t want to be bored either,” he said, stepping closer, “and I’ve got a better idea.”

“You do?” Melanie whispered. As she felt Royn’s arms go around her she let herself be pulled gently to his chest.

“Yes. A quiet dinner, just you and me.”

“What about the kids?”

“Oh, they’ve gone nightclubbing or something.”

“Have they now. And whose idea was that?”

Royn shrugged. “I really can’t say.”

Melanie sighed. “Okay, then,” she said guardedly.

“There’s just one catch. I shouldn’t go gallivanting around town, seeing as how sick I’m supposed to be. So dinner here?”

Melanie laughed. “You’ve missed the other eye.”

The weight of their argument over Alison felt like a third, increasingly unwelcome presence at the dining table. Those concerns soon melted away from the candlelight, the champagne, and the way Melanie allowed Royn to lead their conversation into the happiest times of the past.

Afterwards, they snuggled on the couch and idly watched a movie. When they heard a scrabble at the door and Ricky’s, “You’ve put the key in the wrong way, you schmuck,” it was Melanie who placed a finger to her lips and, tugging Royn off the couch, led the way to their bedroom.

ON THEIR LAST DAY in Singapore the Royns took a boat ride, toured the island—stopping at a park where Zoë shrieked as a cheeky monkey dropped from a branch and yanked a bag of peanuts from her hand—and crossed the causeway to look at the markets in Johor Bahru, Malaysia. “Shopping,” Ricky moaned. “Who wants to go shopping?” But he ended up spending the most money—on pirated computer games and DVDs. At the end of an indolent day filled with laughter—the most contentious issues being “what’s for lunch?” and “where will we go next?”—Melanie was half-dozing as they sipped champagne from the limousine’s bar, her head resting on Royn’s shoulder.

That night, about halfway to Melbourne, Royn tugged Melanie awake and dragged her, hushing her questions, from the flat, first-class seat, past the mostly sleeping passengers all the way to a bathroom at the back of economy. She quickly grasped his intent and giggled; he had to clamp his hand over her mouth as they joined the Mile High Club. As they walked off the plane they smiled and touched each other constantly.

“Why can’t you two be like this all the time?” Zoë demanded sourly.

“Yeah,” Max and Ricky chorused.

Melanie shrugged; Royn, squeezing her hand, said, “That’s a good question, Zoë. Could you give us a little time to work on the answer?”

“Okay,” Zoë said skeptically. “But don’t take too long about it.”

The boys returned to their university dorms, Zoë went to stay with a friend, so Royn and Melanie were alone when they sat down to lunch. The vastness of their empty Toorak mansion suddenly weighed on Melanie’s shoulders. “Back to reality,” she grumbled.

“Meaning?” Royn prompted.

“Yesterday and last night,” she giggled, “were a wonderful but brief fantasy, Tony. But now—” her shoulders slumped “—we’re in the real world.”

“Do you want it to always be like that?”

“No.”

“Let’s go horse-riding,” Royn said, a sudden glint in his eye.

“What?”

“Mum and Dad are away for the weekend. We can have Mount Macedon to ourselves.”

“I don’t understand.”

“You will, Mel. You will. Scout’s honor.”

ANTHONY ROYN SPURRED HIS mare to a gallop. Pointing to a gnarled oak halfway up a hill about two kilometers from the Mount Macedon stables, he shouted back to Melanie, “I’ll race you to that tree.”

“Hey, no fair,” Melanie shrieked.

Royn laughed. “What do you expect, my love?” he shouted over the thrumming beat of the horse’s hooves. “You married a politician.”

Melanie’s head kissed her stallion’s neck as she pushed her horse for every ounce of speed, and her larger horse with the lighter load swiftly shrank the gap. As Royn neared the oak, he slowed to a canter so they reached the tree at the same time.

“Beat you,” Melanie said.

“How do you figure that?” Royn asked.

“You stole a head start—and I caught up. Anyway,” she grinned mischievously, “I always win.”

Royn laughed. “Let’s keep going.”

“Where to?”

Royn just smiled. “You’ll see.”

They rode up a narrow trail off the dirt track, over one hill and up another, going deeper into the bush. The ground grew rockier and the vegetation sparser until they reached the bottom of a small, steep hill where Royn dismounted.

Melanie sat rock-steady in the saddle, her nose wrinkling as she eyed the bare, stony ground. “Hardly the spot for a picnic.”

Royn’s eyes twinkled with suppressed laughter. “Don’t you recognize this place?” he asked, a crooked, cheeky grin on his face.

Melanie’s face suddenly turned bright red. “Oh my God—how could I forget? It’s been so long.”

“Too long.”

Melanie leapt off her horse and threw her arms around Royn’s neck. She pulled his face down to hers. “What a brilliant idea, Tony,” she said through her kiss.

“It hasn’t changed,” Melanie exclaimed as they reached the small, grassy plateau at the top of the rocky trail.

“It has—a bit.” Royn was looking over the edge of the plateau, the boundary of the Royn’s Mount Macedon estate. Melanie stepped beside him. Here, the crown of the hill ended abruptly; a craggy cliff-face plunging almost vertically to what had once been open country, inhabited only by sheep, cows, and kangaroos.

Melanie wrinkled her nose at the once pristine bush, now a transplanted suburb. She pulled him back to the center of the knoll. “It looks the same from here,” she grinned, pulling him down on the blanket she had spread on the ground.

“It’s a bit colder today,” Royn grinned.

“We can take care of that.”

The first time they’d climbed to this spot it was mid-summer, a merciless sun smoldering in a cloudless sky. Melanie was fourteen, he fifteen. It was a day of fumbling exploration, of mounting excitement, of pain and ecstasy—and the temperature rose with each piece of discarded clothing despite the cool and welcome breeze.

They called it Virginity Hill in honor of what they’d left on its peak. They came again and again—until marriage, children and Canberra overwhelmed their private moments.

“We should build something here,” Royn said afterwards as they snuggled against each other under the blankets. “A little hut. Or a gazebo. For our old age.”

Melanie laughed. “And how would we get here—when we’re too creaky to ride a horse . . . or do anything else for that matter?”

Royn shrugged. “We’ll manage, somehow. But that’s what I want, Mel—to grow old with you.”

“That’s what you said when we were here, like this, when you asked me to marry you.”

“It’s still true.”

“Is it? Monday, tomorrow—”

“I don’t have to go.”

“What do you mean?”

“I can quit.”

Melanie’s body tensed in surprise. “And let McKurn win? No way.”

“The hell with McKurn, and Canberra, and everything else—if that’s what it takes.”

“But you can’t,” she said, a hint of desperation in her voice.

“Why not?” Royn said, clasping her naked breast, her nipple responding immediately to his touch.

“Tony.” Melanie pushed herself up to glare down on him. “I’m being serious.”

“So am I.”

Melanie sighed, kissed him lightly on the lips and rested her head again on his shoulder. But at the same time, she gently pushed his hand away from her breast. “Don’t you want to be Prime Minister?” she asked. “You’re so close.”

“Sure,” Royn said. “It would be nice. But if it means going to back to the way we’ve been, you and I, the price is too high. I’d rather stay right here.”

“I love you, Tony,” Melanie said. “I’ve never stopped loving you—though there were times when I forgot. But I don’t want you to give up.”

“I won’t—if we’re back together as a team. It’s not worth it any other way.”

“I’m sorry, Tony. I feel like I abandoned you.”

“No, Mel. We just forgot what’s really important. We took us for granted—and look how we ended up.”

“We did, didn’t we?”

“Do you want to live in the Prime Minister’s Lodge . . . ?”

“The fun part is getting there.” Her eyes sparkled.

“Then let’s get there. When we get bored with it, we quit.”

“But if Kydd won’t go—?”

“Well . . . ” Royn shrugged.

“We’ll have to push him out.”

“I guess so.”

“One more election. If he doesn’t go and won’t be pushed—”

Royn grinned. “We build that hut.”

Melanie laughed. “Deal.”

“Done.”

“Let’s seal it, then,” Melanie said, holding out her hand.

“I’ve got a better way,” Royn chuckled, his mouth closing over her breast.

“Tony, you’re not fifteen any more.”

“I am today,” he said. “Give me an hour and I’ll prove it.”

“When you were fifteen, you didn’t need an hour.”

THE AUSTRALIAN CAPITAL SITS 300 kilometers southwest of Sydney—a three-and-a-half hour drive if you stick to the speed limit. The city arose on land where the main inhabitants, since 1825, had been sheep. Even further away, about 650 kilometers to the south, lies Australia’s second most populous city: Melbourne.

The capital’s odd location in the middle of nowhere was the result of a deal between the six British colonies covering the Australian continent when they united into a federation. Politicians from New South Wales wanted their state capital, Sydney, to also be the national capital. Victoria’s representatives felt the same way about Melbourne. The other four colonies, already feeling overshadowed by Sydney and Melbourne, preferred the new capital to be almost anywhere else. So it was agreed that the capital would be within New South Wales, but at least a hundred miles from Sydney. In exchange, until the new city was built, the interim capital of Australia would be Melbourne.

The Chicago architect Walter Burley Griffin won a worldwide competition held in 1911 to design Canberra, as the new capital would be known. He predicted it would be “unlike any other city in the world.”

As indeed it is.

In cities that grew helter-skelter, like London, streets go every which way, or follow the ups and downs and skirt the obstacles of the land. Cities laid out in advance often follow a grid pattern, like New York north of 14th Street. Even Brasilia, another capital city built miles from anywhere, is designed on a grid pattern, though its grid curves like a boomerang.

Canberra is a study in circles. The plan is dominated by a large circle south of the lake with Parliament House in the center, and a second to the north which encloses nothing but a park of grass and trees that hardly anyone ever uses. Suburban streets curve away from the main avenues, with connecting streets often—and, for drivers, annoyingly—shaped like an S to preserve the theme. The only exceptions are the major thoroughfares between different parts of the city, though a few are semi-circular, making them about the only roads in the city where it’s possible to drive more than a few blocks in a straight line. Burley Griffin’s subconscious aim, some wit once claimed, must have been to make Canberra the ideal environment for politicians and bureaucrats.

Parliament House hugs a low hill in the center of the largest of Canberra’s circles, State Circle. The building’s main entrance looks across the artificial lake, named after the city’s architect, towards Anzac Parade, a wide avenue leading to the War Memorial beyond. It’s built in the shape of two boomerangs joined at the center, capped by an enormous spire flying an oversized Australian flag. The arms of each boomerang slope upwards from the ground, covered in grass. It was possible to walk from one side of the building to another over its roof—until access was blocked off for fear of a terrorist attack. Much of the building, which has 4,500 rooms, is buried under the hill. But the chambers of the House of Representatives and the Senate, together with parliamentarians’ offices and meeting rooms, are free-standing buildings, the House within the arc of one boomerang, the Senate within the other.

As Parliament meets sixteen or seventeen weeks a year, most MPs and Senators fly into what the Duke of Edinburgh once called “a city without a soul,” and leave as soon as possible after Parliament rises. So at Canberra airport that morning the parking lot overflowed with white government limousines and their uniformed drivers, waiting patiently for their arriving passengers.

Elsewhere in Canberra, nobody took much notice of the budding hive of political activity that sunny Monday morning. The main exceptions were political staffers in Parliament House and journalists in the parliamentary press gallery, who were all sharpening their pencils at the prospect of the jousts and fireworks they knew would come—and the city’s call girls, who were anticipating a very profitable week.

ROYN’S LIMOUSINE SWUNG AROUND the circles and disappeared into the mouth of the ministerial wing’s underground parking lot. Absorbed in the memory of Melanie’s warmth he hardly noticed the car had come to a stop until the driver prompted him.

His smile drooped as he stepped through the metal detector into the inner sanctum of the Parliament. But I’m no longer alone, he reminded himself, and strode along the corridors with the sense Melanie was beside him, grinning broadly at everyone he passed.

“Morning all!” he said as he walked in his office a few minutes after eight. Alison, as always, was in her office, but only a couple of other members of his staff were also there this early. “Good morning, Minister,” they chorused in reply.

When Royn’s door swung shut, Alison glanced at her reflection in a small mirror and grimaced. The dark rings under her eyes seemed to be peeping through the thick makeup she’d applied this morning. The faint flush of pink in her cheeks she’d achieved from her early morning run had long gone and now her skin tone was more grey than pale. With half an eye on the clock, she touched up her face. I hate heavy makeup days, she thought distastefully.

With an effort she turned to her laptop to reread the geek’s latest email:

hotel you asked about managed by a Hong Kong-based boutique management company very up market resorts seems legit. is owned by a swiss company address c/o swiss lawyer Zurich. . . .

Interesting. Suggestive. But useful . . . ? She still couldn’t decide.

wired mckurn’s canberra apartment sydney home too risky voice activated

“Voice activated” turned out to mean “noise activated.” The recorder switched on every time McKurn walked across the room; an extra-large file turned out to be a neighbor practicing the piano.

Only one of the recordings from the new tap held any interest: a phone shrilled—the kind of ring tone suggesting a mobile—and she heard McKurn saying “. . . we’ll have a mole in Royn’s office soon, probably from tomorrow. . . . You’ll find out who in good time. . . . That’s right, make life a lot easier. . . .”

With a last—reluctant—glance in the mirror she picked up her files and walked into Royn’s office. As she took a chair she was aware that Royn’s eyes were on her face, almost as if he was a doctor performing an examination. “Looks like you haven’t slept too well,” he said after a moment.

“Is it that obvious?” she asked, her voice tight.

Royn laughed. “I doubt anyone else will notice. I can see you’re wearing some kind of cosmetic mask. Covering up lack of sleep, given what’s on the agenda today, is my guess.”

Alison nodded, her shoulders relaxing.

“So . . . anything in the papers this morning?”

“Not much. Just a couple of reports that several backbenchers—on both sides of the house—will have some nasty questions for Senator McKurn today.”

“So . . . ” Royn said with a smile, “question time should be fun for a change.”

“Indeed,” Alison grinned, but the expression in her eyes did not match the one on her lips.

“Have our . . . snoops . . . come up with anything new?” Royn asked.

“The geek says the hotel where . . . where that video was made is owned by a Swiss company. The ‘snoops’ have a twenty-four hour watch on McKurn, they’re looking into Weinbaum, and investigating Aphrodite’s call girl agency here in Canberra. I’ve also got the geek to tap the agency phone . . . but the recordings go to them, not me. I’ve also passed them as much information on McKurn as I have, and they’ll see what they can confirm. The only real news from them is that expenses will mount up really quickly.”

Royn nodded. “I can handle it for a couple of months without a problem—let’s hope that’s enough.”

“Thank you, Minister.”

“Alison,” Royn said, his body leaning forward to emphasize his somber tone, “we’re in this fight together—aren’t we?”

“Of course, Minister,” Alison replied. Up to a point. “It’s just that. . . .”

“I know,” Royn said, raising his hands and shaking his head, “you couldn’t do this alone. Nor could I, Alison.”

If it wasn’t for me, the words formed in her mind, you wouldn’t be in this trouble. But she stopped herself from uttering them. Alison couldn’t look Royn in the eye; she bowed her head, dropping her gaze to the desk.

“You’ve seen the polls, I presume?” Royn asked. Alison looked up to see Royn now relaxed back in his chair, smiling again as if nothing had happened. “Pretty good, eh?”

“The polls?” Alison said. “Oh, yes. They do look good—if you don’t read between the lines.”

Royn frowned. “What do you mean?”

“The public’s mood will shift the moment there are more casualties—or other bad news. And then, the Sandemans could blow up on us . . . politically.”

Royn nodded. “I see what you mean.”

“And what do you think could happen when Karla Preston finally resurfaces?”

“Still no news?”

Alison shook her head.

“That woman is trouble,” Royn said. “When she turns up, the chances are all hell will break loose.”

“That’s my guess, too.”

“And if she doesn’t turn up . . . ?”

“That could be worse,” said Alison.

“Especially if they find her body.”

“God forbid.”

Royn leant back in his chair, idly tapping the desk with one finger. “So you’re convinced,” he said slowly, “the Sandemans will cause us more problems, sooner or later, one way or another.”

“That’s right, probably sooner. The word from Defence is they still haven’t ironed out an agreement for ‘joint command’—the Sandeman officials are still stalling.”

Royn sighed. “I’d better have a word with Nimabi.”

“And you know what he’ll say. . . .”

“Well, I’m sorry, Tony, but I’ve done everything I can,” said Royn, mimicking the lilt of Nimabi’s voice, “and so on and so forth. . . . I know,” his eyes brightening at his thought, “I’ll tell him we’ve come across some ‘possibly insuperable obstacles’ to classifying the Treasury report.”

“That should help.”

“When we’re finished here, please get him on the phone for me.”

Alison nodded.

“But the other poll results . . . me versus Cracken. . . .”

“Yes, they’re much better.”

“Right,” said Royn with a smile, and taking a deep breath he added, “I think we should set up a meeting of the Push.” Named after the gangs that controlled the Sydney Rocks area before the First World War, the “Push” was an informal committee of Royn’s closest, most loyal supporters within the party room.

“Really?” said Alison, her eyes widening. “To what end?”

“To spread the word,” Royn replied, “and to get a sense of the party room—how they’d feel about a leadership spill.”

“Are you seriously thinking of challenging Kydd?”

“I don’t know,” said Royn. “But I would like to know whether it’s an option—or whether the party room would be dead set against it.”

“And if Kydd gets wind of it, what then?”

Royn shrugged. “I can say . . . it was over-enthusiasm on the part of my supporters.”

“And do you think Kydd will believe that?”

“Probably not,” Royn grinned.

“I don’t understand, Minister,” Alison said with a puzzled look. “In the past, you’ve simply been willing to wait for Kydd to retire. What’s changed your mind?”

Royn shifted his weight uncomfortably. “Melanie.”

“Melanie?”

“Yes. She seems to think that Kydd won’t go by himself, and will have to be pushed.”

“She’s probably right.”

“So Melanie and I agreed. . . .”

“Sorry, Minister,” Alison said, “but you’ve lost me. Last I heard you two were arguing . . . viciously, it seemed.”

“True,” Royn grinned. “But this weekend . . . since Friday in Singapore. . . .”

Royn gazed into the distance, his face flushed; Alison eyes widened at the sudden glow on his face. For an instant the light behind him turned his hair into a golden halo.

“Anyway,” Royn continued, “we came to an agreement.”

“Which, I presume, has something to do with Kydd.”

“Yes, well . . . in part . . . ” Royn fidgeted with a pen as his voice trailed off. “Well,” he repeated, “it concerns, you, too I suppose. . . . In a nutshell, I get to be PM soon after the next election . . . or I quit politics and Melanie and I go and sit on the beach. Or something like that. And on that basis—” Royn let go of the pen, his hands now resting on his desk, and his eyes began to twinkle again “—Melanie will pitch in again. It will be like the old days. Frankly, I’m looking forward to it.”

“And if Kydd keeps hanging on . . . ?”

“He’s sixty-nine now. Surely he can’t hang on for much longer.”

Alison shrugged. “Who can say? Look at your father . . . eighty-something and still going strong. And if you do push him out, who do you think he’ll throw his weight behind in the election for the next leader? It won’t be you, Minister.”

“I guess not—but surely he wouldn’t support Cracken.”

Alison shook her head. “I doubt it. But he has so much influence in the party room, if he backed some dark horse he would probably throw the leadership succession wide open. You’d no longer walk it in.”

“I see what you mean.”

“Don’t get me wrong, Minister. If you want to go for it, I’m right behind you. But we should think all the angles through, first.”

“We should.”

“Do you still want me to set up a meeting of the Push?”

“No . . . just make sure they all see the poll results.”

Alison nodded. “I’ll take care of it. One other thing, Minister: we shouldn’t make any moves while McKurn’s threat is hanging over us.”

Royn nodded glumly.

“And speaking of McKurn,” Alison said, her fingers tightening and her gaze falling as she spoke, “I have to meet him this afternoon. Based on one of the phone taps, I think he’s confident of reaching an agreement today.”

“So he must be ready to meet your conditions, then.”

“Presumably,” Alison said softly, her throat tight.

“That’s good,” Royn said; as he noticed Alison’s eyes dropping as her head turned away he added, “I suppose. . . .”

Alison looked up suddenly. “I’m not looking forward to the role of . . . double agent.”

“No . . . but it shouldn’t be for too long.”

“We can’t know that. I feel I’ll be entering a race—without any idea of where the finishing line is.”

“We’ve got so many irons in the fire something will pay off, sooner or later.”

“It’s the later I’m worried about.”

“It will be a strain . . . but what’s the alternative? Lie down and give in?”

Lie down? Give in? Alison shuddered at the thought. “Never!” she said fiercely, her eyes glaring, thinking, I wish you hadn’t used those words. With a sigh, she continued, “The problem is, the longer it takes to come up with something, the more information I’ll have to give McKurn. And it will have to be real: he’d quickly know if I was giving him disinformation. Initially, I’m sure I’ll be able to string him along. But if we don’t ‘get the goods’ on him sooner, then I’ll have to feed him information that could seriously damage us.”

“What else can we do?”

“I don’t know,” said Alison helplessly. “Except: put a bomb under the Candyman Inquiry, otherwise it won’t produce anything useful in time to do us any good. They’re in motion, but they’ve decided they’ll begin by collating and cross-referencing information on the drug trade. They’re not treating investigation as a priority.”

“That’s not a bad idea, I guess,” said Royn, “but—

“—it’s not what we want.”

“That’s for sure,” Royn agreed. “I’ll have a quiet word with Bruce today.”

“But please do me a favor and make sure it’s a firm word.”

“I certainly will. Bruce needs a bit more spine—so I’ll have to give it to him.”

“Good idea,” Alison said, with a quick smile. “And . . . I think I should have some little nugget of information to give McKurn, if need be.”

“Why?”

“To prove my supposedly ‘good intentions.’” Alison laughed sourly as she spoke.

“Makes sense,” Royn said. “But what?”

“Why don’t I tell him about the Candyman Inquiry? It will be common knowledge. Whenever it gets moving. There’s no reason to hide that the impetus to set it up came from you, is there?”

“Quite the contrary, I’d have thought.”

*****

“DO YOU HAVE THE sense we’re being watched?”

“Can’t say I have, Sarge,” Jeremy McGuire whispered back as he glanced around the small jungle clearing where his platoon had stopped for a short break. “What have you seen or heard?”

“Nothing. That’s the problem. I just have this prickly sensation that someone’s watching me—us. I wouldn’t even mention it, but it’s what saved my life in Afghanistan.”

Like everyone else, Jeremy had heard the story of how Sergeant “Paddy” Byrne had yelled “Get down!” to his platoon and ducked behind a rocky outcrop just seconds before machine gun fire raked their position. Everyone had attributed his yell to pure dumb luck—and Byrne had never said anything to correct them. Jeremy imagined it was probably the first time Byrne had mentioned the real cause to anyone.

“So it wasn’t the ‘luck of the Irish,’ eh?” Jeremy smiled.

“No, sir,” said Byrne.

As a second lieutenant, Jeremy outranked Byrne. But Jeremy was fresh from Duntroon—the Australian equivalent of West Point and Sandhurst—while Byrne was a veteran of campaigns in Afghanistan and East Timor. Jeremy quickly gained the respect of his Sergeant and the platoon by asking for and listening carefully to his Sergeant’s advice. “Who do you think it might be?”

“Well, if somebody is shadowing us,” Byrne replied, “I don’t think it’s Sandeman troops. From what I’ve seen of them, they’d have given themselves away by now. So my guess is it’s the guerrillas.”

“Makes sense,” Jeremy nodded. “After all, this is supposed to be where they hide out.” They had reached the bottom of K’mah, the conical peak in the center of el-Bihar. They both looked up towards the top.

“Jungle all the way,” said Byrne.

“Solid, too.”

TWO DAYS BEFORE, JUST when his men had settled into their newly constructed barracks (with a crudely drawn sign reading BEACH VILLAS hanging over the entrance, while someone else had put up a sign next to the helicopter pad reading: WELCOME TO SURFER'S PARADISE NORTH), Captain McMurray sent Jeremy’s platoon to sweep the island for any sign of Karla Preston. “We’ve traced her path and it looks like she went to either St. Christopher’s or el-Bihar,” he’d told Jeremy. “And there are rumors floating around Toribaya that she’s with the guerrillas, she’s being held by Sandeman troops somewhere, and she’s been spirited off to Papua New Guinea. So God knows where she is.”

“It’s a big island, sir.”

“More troops are on the way.”

“Sir, will this be joint operation with the Sandeman forces?”

“No,” McMurray replied. “They’re busy doing something on el-Bihar but won’t tell us what. Report anything you learn about their activities.”

“Yes, sir. But—we won’t have a translator with us.”

“I’m afraid not.”

“SO WHAT DO YOU think of going up there, Sergeant?”

“The guerrillas know this ground and we don’t,” said Byrne. “We don’t even have any idea how many there are, what weapons they have—or anything else about them. We could end up walking straight into a trap.”

“I’d say you’re right,” Jeremy nodded. “No point in going for the Victoria Cross,” he added, referring to a medal rarely awarded to anyone who hadn’t died heroically in action. “Let’s have a look at the map.”

Byrne unfolded his map of the island. “We’re here,” he said. “I suggest we skirt around the bottom of K’mah, taking note of any paths or trails, and head for here instead.” Byrne pointed at the village of Inkaya.

Jeremy nodded. “Makes sense,” he said. “In any case, that’s another of our objectives. No doubt we’ll be shadowed there too.”

*****

“NOT A TRACE,” DURANT said with disgust. “It’s as though the bastard’s disappeared off the face of the earth.”

“And the sightings?” Superintendent Zimmerman asked.

“Dozens of them. Olsson’s been ‘seen’ all over the county. Even in New Zealand. False—every damn one of them. What’s more, his business partner, Ross Traynor has scarpered too. He pulled his kids out of school and the whole family took off to the U.S. a couple of days after Olsson was snatched. He hasn’t been heard from since. No one in the company knows where he is—or they aren’t talking.”

“Presumably,” Zimmerman said, “Traynor’s involved too, somehow.”

Durant nodded.

“And the butchers?” Although TASKFORCE OVERFLOW had yet to establish any connection between Olsson and the mystery gang of murderers, their nickname for the mysterious gang was “Olsson’s Butchers.”

“Nothing there either. Except the bodies. Our informants tell us no one in the underworld has ever heard of them either. A complete blank. It’s incredible.”

“So, Inspector, what do you make of it all?”

Durant shook his head. “I’ve never come across anything like this before. Normally, there are enough hints, rumors, and evidence, however flimsy, so we have some suspects. But nothing? Either we’ve been incredibly unlucky, or there’s someone behind this outfit who’s very smart.”

Zimmerman nodded. “Let’s hope it’s just bad luck . . . so far.”

When Durant returned to his office he found the email from Olsson’s solicitor. He read it dismissively and was about to delete it when something in the back of his mind made him read it again, slowly and more carefully.

He turned back to the files he’d been working on, but the irreverent thought kept entering his mind like an itch that needed to be scratched: There just MIGHT be something unusual about the placement of the hair and flakes of skin. . . .

“I’ll have a chat to the pathologist,” he muttered, “next time I see him. If I remember. . . .”

21 Without Notice

“A QUESTION WITHOUT NOTICE for the Prime Minister.”

Alison sat glued to the screen of her desktop computer, watching as the camera focused on Ian Nash, the gruff, stocky Leader of the Opposition, whose unruly shock of red hair added a lively splash of color to the rows of dark grey and blue suits filling the benches of the House of Representatives.

She could have walked down to the House and watched from the gallery. But by tuning in over the internet she could monitor the Senate on her laptop at the same time—and no one would become aware of her interest.

“Serious allegations have been made,” Nash was saying, “that a senior member of the other place—and your colleague for countless decades—” from the angle of Nash’s gaze, Alison knew he was glaring at Randolph Kydd “—has been engaged in corrupt and illegal practices for some fifty years. This may be the first time such allegations have been made in print, but it’s not first time such allegations have been heard. Some twenty years ago, the Attorney-General set up an inquiry ostensibly to investigate corruption in government. The unstated focus of that inquiry was the very same person who stands, once again, accused of corruption and other practices dishonoring the sacred trust he has so lightly assumed. This previous inquiry, I might add, was wound down under mysterious circumstances and never issued a report.

“So I ask the Prime Minister if he will immediately establish a Royal Commission to look into these allegations—unless, of course, he is willing to stand up in this place and state, unequivocally and for the record, that these accusations are baseless, and that the honor and reputation of the target of these accusations is, in fact, beyond question.”

Question time—like the dominant green of the House (as in Britain’s lower house, the House of Commons) and the Senate’s red (as in the House of Lords)—is just one of many British inheritances incorporated in Australian parliamentary procedure. It’s a time when members of the opposition get to ask questions which, they hope, will surprise a minister, catch him off guard and cause enough embarrassment or controversy to make headlines in the next day’s papers. It’s also a time when government backbenchers can plant “Dorothy Dixers,” leading questions that allow a minister to push some government achievement or savage the opposition. Aside from divisions, when members vote on bills, it’s the only time when the House or Senate is full. At other times, there are usually just enough members present to ensure a quorum.

Alison waited as the picture switched to another camera showing Kydd lumbering to his feet, his mouth an enormous semi-circle of a smile. His eyes glinted mockingly in Nash’s direction as he stepped to the lectern set on the long table running down the center of the House floor, dividing the government from the opposition. He coughed as if he was clearing his throat.

“I’m surprised that the honorable member and Leader of Her Majesty’s Loyal Opposition is so gullible,” Kydd’s familiar voice rumbled, “that he would believe what he sees on the internet . . . even if his assistant has printed out a copy for him to read. Does he still believe in the Tooth Fairy and the Easter Bunny as well? And has the honorable member forgotten the timeless principle of English law—and of basic Aussie fairness—that the accused be confronted by his accuser? So why, may I ask, is the honorable member repeating, in this place, unsubstantiated rumors from person or persons not only unknown but who have gone to great lengths to hide their identities from public scrutiny?

“Someone is accusing Australia’s most senior Senator of corrupt and illegal behavior. Someone who hasn’t got the guts to stand up and be counted. So I say him, whoever he or she is, and to you, sir, when you have some facts, some evidence to lay upon the table, present them to the Attorney-General for action. And if the honorable member can’t put up, then the best thing for him to do is shut up.”

A chorus of “Hear! Hear!” was heard from the Conservative Party members on the government side of the House. To Alison’s ears it was muted, even perfunctory, with none of the yelling and thumping that often accompanied Kydd’s demolition of an opponent.

“As I recall,” Kydd continued, “the inquiry referred to by the honorable member did not issue a report because there was nothing to report. It seems to me there’s nothing mysterious about it. And if there was an ‘unstated focus’ to that inquiry—another unsubstantiated rumor the honorable member chooses to repeat in this place—there can’t have been anything in it either.”

McKurn’s angry face appeared on Alison’s laptop, which was tuned to the Senate proceedings. Alison turned up the volume to hear him saying, “. . . nothing but lies—and I challenge Senator Tyndall to repeat his question and his allegations outside this building. But I know he hasn’t got the guts to do so.”

Seeing a vein almost popping on McKurn’s forehead—That’s the word . . . livid, she thought—she knew Senator Tyndall certainly would not repeat his question outside Parliament. Whatever was said in the House or Senate was protected by parliamentary privilege; if the Senator was foolish enough to repeat his question anywhere else, McKurn’s lawyers would paper him with writs for libel and slander from here to Thursday.

On her desktop. Kydd was speaking again, answering another question—presumably a planted “Dorothy Dixer.”

“. . . our Great Traditions of Freedom of Conscience and Freedom of Speech,” Kydd was saying, looking up slightly as he spoke, sounding as if he was reciting a litany, “enable anyone to say anything they like, no matter how stupid. And if something be libelous or scandalous, remedies already exist through the courts so no further government action is required. In any event, surely anyone so credulous to take any notice of such uncorroborated and—until some evidence is produced to the contrary—baseless rumors is, I submit, at least three sandwiches short of a picnic.”

Leaping to his feet, Nash’s “A point of order, Mr. Speaker” thundered over the shouts of “Hear! Hear!” from the government side and “Shame!” from the opposition members.

“Order! Order!” The Speaker’s gavel rapped sharply until quiet returned to the House. “The Leader of the Opposition has the floor.”

“I demand the Prime Minister apologize for his last remark and withdraw it.”

Alison smiled as Kydd’s voice boomed, “I see no need to withdraw my previous remark. But I will certainly apologize to the honorable member if he—clearly, mistakenly—was under the impression that it referred to him.”

The government benches erupted into gales of laughter, overwhelming the cries of “Shame!” from the opposition side. Nash stood glowering at Kydd for a long moment, his face the same shade of red as his hair. He looked towards the Speaker and then back to Kydd—and slowly resumed his seat.

*****

ATTACK, ALISON THOUGHT AS she entered McKurn’s office, is the best form of defence.

Without waiting for McKurn to offer, she took the seat on the other side of his desk, saying, “So in question time you flatly denied everything.”

McKurn watched Alison with approval as she moved across the room. At her words, his eyes narrowed and focused on her face. “But of course.”

Alison snuggled comfortably into the office chair, letting her arms relax on its wooden arms, as she replied, “And you had the Prime Minister’s support in the House.”

“Do you think so?” McKurn asked. “Did you hear him?”

Alison nodded, matching McKurn’s gaze, breathing slowly to maintain her appearance of calm—and to hold down the rising tension within her.

“But did you listen carefully to what he said?”

“I thought I did.”

McKurn waved a couple of sheets of paper. “A transcript.” He placed the two sheets in front of him, scanning them as he spoke. “Kydd attacked whoever who put up that damn website, casting very effective aspersions on whoever-it-is’s character. The randy old goat is good at that sort of thing. But the bastard uttered not one word of actual support for me.”

“I suppose he didn’t, now you mention it.”

“He even broadcast an invitation for people to come forward with evidence. As though he was mocking me . . . challenging me.”

“Do you think anyone will?”

“Come forward?” McKurn’s asked, his lips slowly curling into a cruel grin that made Alison spine tingle. “I doubt that very much.”

“I see . . . but do you think anyone really believed your denial?” she asked, keeping an eye on the vein on McKurn’s forehead.

“Of course.”

“A majority? Most people would say that when there’s a stink there must be something rotten behind it.”

The vein on McKurn’s forehead pulsed. “Let the bastards—who the hell give a rat’s arse what the hoi polloi thinks?”

Alison controlled her response to McKurn’s outburst, merely raising one eyebrow and letting her mouth show the beginnings of a smile. “Really, Senator? That’s the opposite of what you were telling me last time we met.”

“It is?” McKurn leant forward slightly, squinting at Alison’s expression. “Whose side are you on anyway?” he growled.

“The same side as you, Senator,” Alison said with a demure smile. “My side.”

McKurn’s eyes widened, his lips twisted into a grin—and then he laughed, a deep belly laugh that shook his whole body. “Fair enough,” he said, pulling out a handkerchief to wipe his eyes. “But in your case, Alison,” he added, still chuckling, “instead of whispered rumors there’ll be incontrovertible visual evidence for people to focus on. And they will focus on it . . . in the millions.”

“No doubt,” said Alison, her lips compressed as she spoke, “if they ever get the opportunity.” Looking McKurn hard in the eyes, she continued, “I’m looking forward to you telling me how you can guarantee that can’t happen.”

“Without my say-so.”

“Indeed,” Alison murmured without moving.

“Since you insist . . . down to business. There are four copies of the video. A DVD and a hard drive in a safety deposit box. The others are on a DVD and a hard drive in secure storage in our . . . computer center.”

“From where they can be easily copied.”

“Only by people with access to the storeroom . . . and the right passwords.”

“Passwords? Plural?”

“Right. One to gain access to the drive, a second to decrypt the file.”

“And how many people have the passwords?”

“Only two: me and one other.”

“And how many people have seen the video—or parts of it?”

“The same two people.”

“And who can access the safety deposit box?”

“Only me.”

“That all sounds very secure . . . and you’ve personally checked all these arrangements?”

“Of course not. I have other people for that.”

“So this is what they’ve told you.”

McKurn nodded. “I’ve no reason to doubt they’re telling me the truth—and every reason to believe they are.”

“How can you be so sure?”

“Because I know the loyalty of my people; they’re handsomely paid for it—and they know what would happen if ever they betray me.”

“But unfortunately,” Alison replied, leaning forward a little to give McKurn a better view of her cleavage, “I don’t know that.”

“You don’t believe me?” McKurn said, a pained expression on his face, which was undercut by the way he grinned at her.

“Oh, I imagine you’re telling me what you believe. But even if you’d checked all those arrangements personally, I still wouldn’t be satisfied.”

“You don’t trust me?”

“I think we’ve already covered that question, haven’t we, Senator?”

“I suppose we have,” McKurn chuckled.

“For me to be convinced, I need to see the entire setup—from recording to safety deposit box—and talk to all the people involved.”

“I’m willing to indulge you up to a point, Alison. But no further.”

“That may not be enough for you to . . . get what you want. And if I’m to be your successor, what difference does it make anyway?”

McKurn shrugged. “As I said, I don’t really care who takes over after I’m gone. But you seem to be expecting access to crucial parts of my operation as a condition.” McKurn shook his head. “That kind of access is something you’ll have to earn.”

“So, Senator, we seem to be at some kind of impasse.”

“Not really,” McKurn smiled, placing one hand on the phone. “One phone call, remember—that’s all it takes.”

“Go ahead, Senator. Make it.”

“You’re daring me?” McKurn asked. His hand rested on the phone as his eyes searched Alison’s expression. When Alison just held his gaze in silence he said, “Is that what you’re doing?”

“Go ahead. Make your choice.” Alison looked steadily at McKurn, and then turned her head and pointing at the phone, she added, “Who would you rather have? Me—or Cracken?”

McKurn laughed again, looking at Alison with appreciation. He nodded slightly and, his eyes twinkling at her, picked up the phone and dialled.

Alison tensed. Letting her hands fall below the edge of the desk, out of McKurn’s line of sight, she stiffened her right hand, turning it into a blade, the muscles in her right arm hardening. At the same time, she shifted her weight so she was poised to leap to her feet. Even though he was leaning towards her as he reached for his phone so she could see dandruff and glimpses of his scalp where his white hair was thinning, his neck was slightly out of reach. So her eyes watched McKurn’s hand as he pushed the buttons on the phone. Loose skin hung from his flabby wrist and the veins stood out on the back of his hand . . . the wrist of an old man with weak, frail bones . . . it would take me less than a second. . . .

“Ivan. . . . I’m going to send someone to see you—” Alison suppressed a shudder at the risk she’d taken, holding herself rigid so McKurn would not notice her state “—You’ll recognize her. . . . That’s right, Alison McGuire. . . . So, Saturday morning . . . ?” Turning to Alison he said, “He can’t this weekend—anytime during the week is okay though.”

Alison slowly shook her head. “How about the following Saturday morning instead?”

McKurn covered the phone’s mouthpiece with his hand, his eyes turning to scowl at Alison. “This week, Alison,” he growled.

“Parliament’s sitting. I have to be here.”

“But it’s not sitting on Friday, is it?”

“No,” Alison said. “But that doesn’t mean I won’t need to be here.”

“Friday evening then.”

Alison appeared to consider the option, and then slowly nodded her head.

“Friday evening or late afternoon,” McKurn said into the phone. “I’ll confirm the details later.”

As he finished the call, McKurn turned to Alison who now appeared to be lounging, relaxed like a cat, as if she were taking it easy by a pool rather than sitting in an office. “One good turn deserves another,” he said, all signs of his earlier humor gone. “So you’ll start working for me today. I expect daily reports. And secondly, you’ll be taking a risk commensurate with mine: should anything you learn from Ivan leak out, then releasing the video will just be the first step in your demise. . . . Do I make myself clear?”

“Crystal clear, Senator.”

“And assuming your meeting on Friday with Ivan is satisfactory,” McKurn smirked, eyeing Alison’s breasts as they slowly rose and fell in time with her breathing, “then the next step will be to consummate our agreement.”

*****

IS MCKURN STILL HAVING me followed?

That question had been plaguing Alison since she got back from Singapore. Every time she drove home, as she was now, she varied her route slightly and kept checking the rear view mirrors to see if she could tell. Even on her pre-dawn run, she’d cautiously eyed the occasional jogger or passing car, and felt a jolt of fear when she thought she saw the same one twice.

When she reached her apartment, she leant against the closed and bolted door, taking a few deep breaths until she felt more relaxed. Safe. As she cleared a space on the table for her laptop by pushing a couple of piles of paper out of the way, her eye stopped on the phone. “My God,” she gasped, and quickly covering her mouth with one hand she thought: If I can arrange to tap McKurn’s phones, he can surely tap mine.

She shook her head—I’m being paranoid. Nevertheless, she decided as she poured herself a vodka and tonic, I’ll have it checked for bugs. About to throw herself onto the sofa, she grabbed the bottle and brought it with her. The vodka calmed her but a few moments later her stomach started growling. She’d had no lunch—she hadn’t wanted to eat before seeing McKurn—and afterwards she’d forgotten about food altogether. Without looking, she pulled a packaged dinner out of the freezer and put it in the microwave. She picked at it while checking her emails.

McKurn had given her a cellphone number she hadn’t known about for her “daily reports.” She was typing a message to the geek to add that new number to the list of taps, when she was interrupted by the buzz of the doorbell.

“What are you doing here?” Alison asked, when she saw who it was.

“I thought it’s time we had a chat, just you and me,” Melanie Royn said. She stood in the hallway, a small, wheeled suitcase behind her.

“Why?” Alison scowled, taking half a step into the doorway to block it completely.

“I—” Melanie faltered at Alison’s movement; resisting the urge to step backwards, she lowered her head. “I . . . I’m sorry I lost my temper in Singapore,” she said softly. “And I’m hoping,” she continued, raising her eyes to look at Alison again, “that even if we can’t be friends again, at least we can be allies. We are on the same side, after all.”

“If we are,” Alison said skeptically, “where have you been lately?”

“You’re not making this easy, are you?”

“Why should I? Whatever’s been going on between you and the minister has nothing to do with me. So tell me,” Alison said, stretching her body so she seemed to tower over Melanie, “do you still think I’m sleeping with the minister?” When Melanie didn’t answer, she added, “That’s what you thought, isn’t it?”

Melanie trembled. “You know how he is with women—and how they flock to him as if—”

“To the best of my knowledge,” Alison snapped, “the minister has remained totally faithful to you, even on those trips where visiting dignitaries are offered geishas and the like to keep them warm at night. Though I can’t imagine why.”

Teardrops formed in the corners of Melanie’s eyes, hanging there before rolling down her cheeks. “Alison . . . ” Melanie spoke softly, and then threw back her head saying, “I wish I could believe that.”

“It’s true!”

Melanie sighed. “Don’t tell me you have never been in a situation where your mind has raced with all kinds of suspicions?”

Alison nodded slowly. “Yes,” she breathed, her face softening, “I have.” The two women stared into each other’s eyes, and Alison stepped back from the door. “I think we could both use a stiff drink.”

“Thank you, yes.”

Leaving her suitcase by the door, Melanie let herself sink into one of the armchairs. With a sigh of pleasure, she closed her eyes and rested her head on the soft cushion.

“What would you like?” Alison asked.

“Rum and Coke—if you have it,” Melanie smiled, her eyelids fluttering open. “A strong one, please.” Her gaze moved from watching Alison and rested on the half-empty vodka bottle on the coffee table. Her lips tightened, and she quickly turned her head to look around the room.

“Cozy,” she said as Alison put a glass in front of her. “I’ve always liked what you’ve done to this room.” But she saw files and papers heaped on the dining table in unstable stacks surrounding an open laptop—next to what must have been the half-eaten remains of Alison’s dinner. Her now-critical eye decided the room was long overdue for vacuuming, and the coffee table hadn’t been wiped down in a while either. Her gaze returned to Alison’s face and she saw what she hadn’t noticed before: the pale skin, the dark rings under Alison’s eyes which were unusually dull and slightly bloodshot.

“Thank you,” Alison said warmly as she sat down on the sofa, splashed some vodka into her own glass and topped it off with tonic water. Melanie sipped at her drink as she watched Alison take a long gulp from hers; when she put her glass back on the table, it was half-empty.

Alison kicked off her shoes and sat cross-legged on the sofa. “You know the minister’s at an official dinner tonight.”

“Yes,” Melanie said, “for some visiting bigwig. I’ll see him afterwards at the townhouse.”

“He didn’t mention you were coming up tonight.”

Melanie smiled. “He doesn’t know. Yet. I came here straight from the airport. You won’t tell him—I hope.”

Alison paused and, smiling, shook her head. “I hope he doesn’t die of shock as I almost did.”

Melanie giggled. “Of excitement, more likely.”

Alison’s smile faded, to be replaced by what Melanie felt as a deep melancholy. Speaking softly, Alison said, “I hope you and the minister get back to where you used to be. Did I ever tell you,” she added wistfully, “that yours is the kind of relationship I wanted to have with somebody?”

“Wanted?” Melanie shook her head, and leant forward. “Why use the past tense?”

Alison spread her hands as she shrugged. Her eyes dropped. “Did I?” she said, leaning back, her hands now gripping her knees.

“Yes, Alison, you did.”

Alison sighed. “I guess . . . it just doesn’t seem possible . . . right now. . . .”

“But surely, you’ve come close. You must have. . . .”

“Once. Briefly. A long time ago.”

“With . . . Derek Olsson?”

Alison stared at Melanie, her mouth an “O.” She inclined her head slightly: half a nod. “Anyway,” she said, leaning back again, trying to get comfortable, “that’s over.”

“Is it?” Melanie said without thinking.

Alison looked at her blankly for an instant. “But you didn’t come here to talk about me,” she said, “. . . did you?”

“No.” Becoming aware she’d been intensely studying Alison’s reactions and of the tension in her arms and shoulders from leaning forward for so long, Melanie let herself sink back into the softness of the armchair. “McKurn.”

“McKurn?” Alison repeated, emptying the rest of her glass.

“That’s why I’m here. To help.”

“Good.” Alison’s eyes turned to her laptop. “Let me fill you in,” she said.

“I’D BETTER CALL A taxi,” Melanie said a while later.

“No need. I’ll drop you off.” As they both stood up Alison noticed Melanie’s glance at her empty glass. “Don’t worry,” she said. “I haven’t had that much to drink. But maybe . . . if you hadn’t come . . . I might have finished off the whole bottle.”

“If I were in your shoes,” Melanie said with a shudder, “I probably would have.”

“I just hope this business with McKurn is over soon.”

“So do I,” said Melanie, “long before the next election.”

*****

IT WAS LATE WHEN Royn returned to his Yarralumla townhouse. He whistled as he unlocked the door and automatically reached for the light switches—and froze when he saw the glare of the living room lights.

Burglars?

Gently placing his briefcase on the floor, he hesitated, wondering if it would be better it he backed off, went outside and called the police. Don’t be silly, he thought. But he was positive that when he’d left that morning the lights had been off—that he hadn’t even turned them on. I must have. Just the same, he grabbed for the only possible weapon at hand: a long, furled umbrella from the stand by the entrance.

Holding his breath, he tiptoed soundlessly into the living room. It was empty. He looked around and noticed a wine glass—one he certainly hadn’t used—on the counter separating the kitchen from the main room, that the cushions on the sofa had been rearranged, and that the little red light on the TV set was on. From the small bathroom under the stairs he heard the sound of a toilet flushing. He crept silently towards the bathroom door, his umbrella raised, when the door opened and Melanie stepped out—wearing a translucent nightie.

“Melanie!”

“Is it raining?” Melanie asked, her laughter shaking her body.

“B-burglars,” he stuttered, feeling silly all of a sudden; the umbrella fell to the floor. “I thought maybe there were burglars in the house.”

“Just me.”

Melanie stepped towards him at the same moment he moved towards her. She threw her arms around his neck, lifting her lips towards his. Royn enfolded her, lifting her off the ground as his hands caressed her at the same time. She tightened her embrace around his neck and pressing her body to his kissed him hard and long.

“What’s that smell?” she asked when they came up for air.

“What smell?”

“Perfume.”

“Really?” Royn shrugged. “I was sitting between two old women at dinner—one of them an insufferably dreary British dowager.”

“Poor Tony. All those boring functions you have to attend.”

“Indeed,” he said as he lifted Melanie to carry her up the stairs.

“Don’t you think you should shut the front door first?”

22 Sly Grog

McKurnWatch.com

“The website that must not be named”

Good morning Boys & Girls!

Ready for the next thrilling installment of the “Frankie McKurn Saga”?

Light a fag, roll a joint, take a snort, inject some caffeine . . . whatever turns you on . . . and listen up.

Frankie McKurn has had several run-ins with the cops—and has even spent some time in jail (though never for very long. Just as well for old Frankie: a convicted felon with a year or more’s “porridge” [jail time] can’t be a member of parliament).

His first appearance on the police blotter was at the tender age of 17. One evening, the police raided a “sly grog shop” in Balmain, arrested staff and patrons alike, and carted them—and the liquor—off to the cop shop.

What, you may wonder, is (or was) a “sly grog shop”? A little history.

Back in the First World War (1914-18 for the history-challenged reader), to reduce drunkenness and increase productivity, the government ordered all pubs to close at 6pm. This was a “temporary wartime measure” . . . which lasted until 1955 in New South Wales and longer in some other states.

But just because the pubs were shut didn’t mean there was any slump in demand for late night drinking. The underworld was quick to fill the gap and pretty soon there were “sly grog shops” scattered all over the country.

Why didn’t the cops shut them down? There was no great public outcry and no political mileage in doing so. The reverse, if anything: the average Aussie certainly saw (and still sees) nothing wrong with having a drink pretty much anytime he or she likes. And in New South Wales, in particular, the Labor Party opposed the occasional tentative move against the sly groggers as an infringement on “the working man’s rights” . . . and to the benefit of party funds (no doubt the more important consideration).

Every now and then, of course, the cops had to make a show of enforcing the law . . . which is how young Frankie got caught in the net.

Had he stopped by for a quick beer after work? No. He was at work. Illegal businesses need enforcers, big, strong men who are quick with their fists. Just like young Frankie.

At the cop shop, the police went through the ritual of recording everyone’s name and then let them all go. The press announced the police raid the next morning and the cops could bask in the glow, the “proof” that they weren’t corrupt and that they had enforced the law by closing down an illegal bar.

Which they had . . . for one night.

(What happened to the liquor, you may well wonder? Simple: what the cops didn’t drink themselves they sold back to the underworld.)

Since this was the first time young Frankie had been through this charade, he made a mistake: he gave his real name, unlike the “regulars” who all treated the experience like the joke it really was.

Of course, no one was actually charged. That hardly ever happened.

The “sly grog” spawned by 6pm closing was the underworld’s first big cash cow, followed soon thereafter by off-course betting shops. By the time young Frankie came onto the scene in the late 1940s, these underworld businesses were well-established and proved fertile ground for our young “hero.”

As we shall see in future installments.
— The McKurn Watcher

PS. Memo to Kydd: ask and ye shall receive.

“That’s the geek’s work?” Melanie asked when she finished reading the issue of McKurnWatch which had just arrived.

“That’s right,” Alison replied.

They were sitting together behind Alison’s desk, the office door closed, speaking in hushed whispers.

“So he’s been in jail, eh? McKurn will be furious,” Melanie giggled.

“Maybe he’ll have a heart attack,” Alison chuckled.

“We should be so lucky.”

We can but hope, Alison thought.

“So,” Melanie said, turning to look at Alison. “How do we divide up the work?”

“I really appreciate your help,” Alison said as she switched the screen to the list of audio files.

“You’ve already said that,” Melanie said with a smile, touching Alison’s arm.

Alison smiled back. “I guess I have. It’s just such a relief.”

“I don’t know how you’ve managed.”

“Nor do I.” Pointing at the screen, Alison continued, “I guess we just take half each. I’ll set up a new email address, get the geek to send some of the files there, and show you how it all works.”

“I tried to follow what you were doing last night—you’re using programs I’ve never even heard of.”

Alison nodded. “Some I’d never heard of before.”

“Well, I don’t know,” Melanie said. “I’m no computer whiz. In fact, I’ve never even installed a program. Any time I need something more complicated than spell check, I ask Zoë or one of the boys to do it.”

“I see. . . . Do you have a laptop?”

“No. I just use the family computer at home.”

“In that case, the best thing would be to buy one today so I can set it up for you and show you how to use it. It wouldn’t be a good idea to use the family computer in any case.”

“Why not?”

“If you use the same computer as your kids do, they could easily get into your files.”

“Why would they?”

“Because they’re computer-literate and insatiably curious.”

“But if they know something—”

“They might let something slip to someone else. Not intentionally. At the moment, only three people know about this: you, the minister, and me. And it must stay that way.”

“You don’t trust my children—is that the issue here?”

“No, it’s not,” Alison said. “I trust them to be fully behind us. But if one of them finds something, the others will know in no time flat.”

Melanie nodded.

“They’ll feel part of something important, some sort of spy game, right? One of them is bound to let something slip to one of their friends—quite innocently. Then, who knows who else will find out?”

“Maybe,” Melanie said, unconvinced.

“And, Melanie, would you really want them to know what this is all about?”

“No,” Melanie said with a start. “Definitely not.”

“Okay, then,” Alison sighed. “Laptop . . . ?”

As Melanie nodded Anthony Royn opened the door. “I’m off to see Kydd,” he said.

“You are?” said Alison. “I didn’t know you had a meeting with him.”

Royn smiled. “Well, you two have been closeted together all morning.”

“Good luck, dear,” said Melanie. “I’m going shopping . . . to buy a laptop.”

“A what?”

“Alison’s instructions.”

“Oh. Got to go—you know Kydd doesn’t like to be kept waiting.”

As Royn left her office, Alison turned to Melanie. “Why is he going to see Kydd?”

Melanie shrugged. “He’s going to raise the succession issue—”

“Oh my God,” Alison gasped. “He mustn’t.”

“Whyever not?” Melanie asked. “Anyway, he’s going to do it very obliquely.”

Alison shook her head. “Kydd’s paranoid. Remember his first rule of politics?”

Melanie looked up at Alison and slowly nodded, her eyes and mouth wide.

“So how do you think he’s going to react?” Alison ran to the door—and stopped. “I’ll never catch up with him now.”

She turned back to the desk and dialled a number.

“Larry? It’s Alison. . . . Yes. Is the minister, Tony Royn, there? . . . Oh. . . . Okay, thanks.”

She sank into the chair, opposite Melanie, her head in her hands. “He’s just gone in.”

*****

THE FOUR WALLS OF Randolph Kydd’s office recorded his fifty years in politics through the luminaries he’d met: pictures of Kydd with the Queens, Kings, Princes, Emperors, Presidents and Prime Ministers of thirty-nine different countries (at last count). Not forgotten were famous people like Nobel Prize-winning economists and best-selling authors, and the not-so-famous people who were politically important, like the Mayors of Sydney and Melbourne and other major cities, and all the current state Premiers. Those pictures were centrally displayed whenever one of them visited Canberra but otherwise—as now—were tucked in corners and other out-of-the-way places as befitted their lesser prominence.

The prime minister had a large office with walls to match—and every square inch was covered with pictures of Kydd with somebody. Hundreds of them.

Kydd settled his bulk into the wide chair behind a desk which was incongruously small, given the spaciousness of the room. It was a frail, feminine table, with flecks of gilt peeling from the ancient woodwork, far too small to be a desk for a prime minister . . . or anybody else. A gift from the Queen—to the government, not Kydd, even though he treated it as his prize possession—it had once belonged to Queen Victoria, making it so valuable it really belonged in a museum.

In front of Kydd was what he thought of as The Phone, which he felt gave him direct, puppeteer-like control over a hundred thousand bodies at the other end . . . layers of secretaries, bureaucrats and functionaries whose only purpose was to serve him.

With a smile he picked up The Phone and dialled a number.

“Frankie,” he chuckled when McKurn answered, his jowls wobbling. “I see you’ve got a problem or two.”

“Nothing for you to get excited about, you randy old bastard.”

“Oh, I don’t know, Frankie . . . ” Kydd wheezed as he spoke. “Did your Dad really call you that?”

“None of your fucking business.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure. Feels to me like it might be a good time for you to be thinking seriously about enjoying that stash I’m sure you’ve got tucked away for your retirement . . . before it’s too late.”

“Over your dead body.”

“I’d say, me old mate, it’s more likely to be your body than mine.”

“Mate?” McKurn laughed. “That’ll be the day. Anyway, you worry about your problems and I’ll worry about mine.”

“Unfortunately, it looks like you are turning into a problem for me—not to mention for the party.”

“Are you suggesting I retire for the good of the party?”

Kydd laughed. “I know better than to appeal to your better nature.”

“I’m surprised you’re appealing to me at all.”

“Appealing? To you?” Kydd chortled. “You must be joking. I’m just giving you a friendly warning that you’d better kill these rumors permanently or my guess is little Frankie will get his just deserts . . . at last.”

“I’m working on it.”

“The problem is, Frankie, mud sticks.”

“You should know. You’re the expert at throwing it.” As McKurn slammed down the phone Kydd heard him mutter, “Arsehole.”

Kydd laughed.

AS ANTHONY ROYN ENTERED his office, Randolph Kydd’s dark eyes, two small circles turned into bright pinpoints by overlapping folds of flesh, flashed a glance at his watch and darted back to Royn with a slight look of censure. “I realize,” he boomed, “you no doubt have immaculate reasons for your slight delay. . . .”

Royn’s step faltered, his sense that this office would inevitably, one day, be his disappearing under the glare of Kydd’s censorious eyes. “Ah . . . yes . . . I—”

Kydd dismissed his excuses with a wave of his fingers. Though he gestured a great deal as he spoke, his gestures began and ended at the wrist. And rather than shaking his head, he would wobble his jowls—as he did now. “Time, my boy. Time. I never keep people waiting, mainly because people expect to wait around here.”

As a politician, Royn recognized when another one massaged the truth. Wisely, he kept those thoughts to himself.

Wrinkling his nose at the stale smell of cigar smoke permeating the room, Royn strode towards the chair in front of Kydd’s desk, but Kydd’s fingers waved him in the direction of the sofa. “Over there, Tony, over there. Let’s be comfortable.”

A Churchillian cigar clenched between his teeth, Kydd levered his massive body upright by gripping the arms of his chair and heaving with all four limbs at once. As Royn sank gratefully into a soft armchair he watched breathlessly—as he did every time he saw Kydd do this—waiting for him to make some slip that would send his massive weight crashing on the weak, fragile Victorian desk and shattering it to smithereens. Royn felt a touch of disappointment when Kydd’s manouver was successful. He waddled across the room to plonk himself down the sofa in the place where he always sat: in a large concave depression where the springs had almost given out.

“So, Tony,” Kydd rumbled, coughing as he placed his cigar in the nearby ashtray. “What was it you wanted to talk to me about?”

“Well . . . Prime Minister . . . ah . . . it’s these damn press stories that keep popping up from time to time. . . .”

Royn passed a newspaper clipping to Kydd, who scowled at the headline, “Tired Old Party” Needs New Blood.

“I saw that,” he spat. Then, scowling at Royn, he added, “You’re not about to suggest it’s time for me to pack it in, are you Tony?”

“No, no, Prime Minister. But I think it is time we killed these stories somehow.”

“Who cares what these so-called ‘opinion leaders’ chatter on about?”

“In the electorate at large? Almost nobody. But here in Canberra? Everyone.”

“So what?” Kydd shrugged, his sour expression making it clear this was not a topic he wanted to think about.

“These stories sow uncertainty within the party. And they could give Nash the idea to make an issue of our leadership—and the uncertainty about the succession. That’s what I’m getting at.”

“Hmmm. Maybe. . . . But . . . this is not like you, Tony. Who put you up to this—Alison?”

“No, no, Prime Minister. Actually, it was my wife, Melanie, who mentioned it.”

“Ah, women,” said Kydd. He paused to relight the cigar; Royn held his breath as a cloud of smoke floated in his direction: smoking was actually verboten in Parliament House, but who was going to stop the Prime Minister? Not me, Royn thought.

“A woman in politics is like a snake in the grass,” Kydd was saying. “You never know when it’s going to jump out and bite you.” Kydd’s laugh boomed at Royn’s expression of disbelief. “Look, Tony,” he continued, taking a sip from a glass of water on the side table, “this is just between you and me. I’d never repeat this in public—those damn feminist bitches would be jumping all over me. But if I’ve learnt anything in my sixty-nine years it’s this: no man will ever understand a woman completely. Men. They’re simple. Sex, money, power, or all three. That’s about it. Easy to figure out. Easy to manipulate. Predictable. It’s women—” he seemed to spit out the word “—who always do the thing you least expect when it’s going to hurt you most.

“And no question, Melanie is a superb backroom operator and numbers man . . . ah, woman. And Alison—your right hand, so to speak, very capable and damn sexy too . . . a dangerous combination, I might add. She’s the best man who wears skirts I’ve ever come across. But they’re still both women. Remember that, too.”

Melanie? . . . Alison? thought Royn. Not to be trusted? But he knew better than to disagree with Kydd whenever he had a fixed opinion . . . or at any other time. So he just nodded his head and said, “Very good point.”

Royn felt his stomach clench as, frowning, Kydd squinted at Royn for a long moment.

“I suppose . . . ” Kydd wheezed eventually, his gaze unmoving, “. . . it’s something to think about.”

“Anyway,” Royn said, forcing his voice into a light tone as his stomach tightened, “with ten months to go before we have to call an election, there’s no rush.”

“True,” Kydd muttered, his mouth an upside down semi-circle. Royn felt as though Kydd’s eyes were slicing into him as Kydd added, “Have you . . . or Melanie . . . come up with any ideas for handling this?”

“Well . . . to kill these stories we need to remove any doubt.”

“And how could we do that?” Kydd took another puff on his cigar, which was followed by a deep, liquid cough.

“Well . . . I haven’t really given it a lot of thought, Prime Minister.”

“But,” said Kydd, doubt written all over his face, “something must have come to mind . . . ?”

Royn sighed. “Ah,” he said, trying and failing to look Kydd in the eye as he spoke, “only the two obvious things, Prime Minister.”

“Which are?”

“Announce a timetable of some kind, or something to make it clear to all and sundry that you have plenty of years to go—” Royn’s voice trailed off as he concluded “—like a medical. . . .”

“Damn doctors,” Kydd coughed, “always fussing around.” Kydd leaned forward slightly, his body still as his eyes seemed to burn into Royn’s flesh. “Or a leadership spill . . . was that on your list?”

“Prime Minister. How could you think such a thing,” Royn protested. “I’ve looked up to you since I was a kid—when you and Dad used to sit around and discuss politics. Nothing will change that.”

“Hmm.” Kydd slowly sank back in the sofa, looking unconvinced. “You’ve got to remember, Tony, that in this position, ultimately you can’t fully trust anyone. Loyalty in this business is always conditional. But I’ve always thought of you as the exception that proves the rule. I’d be very disappointed if it were to turn out I’d made a mistake.”

“Prime Minister!” Royn lifted his head so he was sitting tall, his back straight. His face solemn, he spoke with all the persuasion he could muster. “I swear that will never happen.” But at the sound of his own words, he wondered if, by raising the issue at all, the mistake had already been made.

*****

FOR A GANGSTER, THE Colombian, Jorge Gonzalez, seemed to be a man of reasonably regular habits. For example, no matter how late he got home, he left his apartment a little after noon to pump iron at the gym. At least, he had for each of the three days Nazarov, Shultz, and de Brouw had been shadowing him.

Which is why, just before noon, the three men trudged up the stairs of the apartment building until they reached a fuse box on the wall outside the Colombian’s front door.

After visiting the Greek, Nazarov and his associates had paid similar calls on the South American and Lebanese gang leaders—with similar, inconclusive results. So they switched strategy to “squeezing” second-level gang members for information. Gonzalez was their first target.

When Gonzalez opened his door, wearing gym shorts and a singlet that displayed his well-muscled arms, shoulders, and legs, he saw three men from the electric company: one was doing something to the electrical box while the other two, caps low over their foreheads, stood around smoking cigarettes.

“Hey,” said Gonzalez said angrily. “Smoking’s not allowed.”

“Really?” said Nazarov, blowing a mouthful of smoke in Gonzalez’ direction, “I didn’t know that.” Turning to Shultz, he asked, “Did you?”

“Nah,” Shultz replied, blowing a smoke ring.

Gonzalez stepped closer to Nazarov and flexed his muscles. “I’ve got a good mind to complain to the electric company.” The tendons in his neck stood out as he spoke, his black eyes glaring coldly at the two smokers.

“You do that,” said Nazarov.

“I think I will,” said Gonzalez, turning to go back inside.

As he stepped through his door Nazarov and Shultz dropped their cigarettes and rushed him, knocking him face down onto the carpeted floor. They both held him down as he kicked and tried to punch them with one hand and push himself up with the other while Shultz covered his nose and mouth with a pad soaked in chloroform. After a few moments, his struggles weakened.

“That should do it,” said Nazarov.

De Brouw came in carrying the toolboxes they’d brought as part of their disguise, closing the door behind him. Instead of a cap, he now wore a stocking over his head. Nazarov and Shultz let Gonzalez go and quickly pulled stockings over their heads as well.

Gonzalez groaned, and tried to get up.

“We’ll help you,” said Nazarov. He and Shultz picked him up and threw him on the sofa. As Gonzalez fell, a wild swing from one of his powerful arms caught Shultz in the stomach.

Shultz grunted and pulled out his knife, waving its sharp tip a hair’s breadth from Gonzalez’ nose. “I wouldn’t do that again,” he said. Gonzalez tried to escape the knife by pushing himself deeper into the sofa. “Agreed?”

Gonzalez nodded his head drunkenly as Nazarov and de Brouw clipped a pair of handcuffs over his wrists.

“Ssso,” Gonzalez said, slurring his words, “you’re not here to fix the lights.”

“Smart man. For a muscle man,” said Shultz.

Gonzalez glared at him and lashed out with one foot.

“Not so smart after all,” Shultz smiled as he dug his knife into Gonzalez’ bicep.

“No,” Gonzalez shrieked.

“I thought we had a deal,” said Shultz, showing Gonzalez the bloodstained tip.

“Bueno. A deal. That’s right.”

“Good,” said Shultz, placing the blade of his knife just above Gonzalez’ elbow. “Now you already know how sharp this knife is, right?”

Gonzalez’ head bobbed up and down quickly, his eyes unable to move from the glittering blade.

“Do you know what happens when a tendon is cut?” Shultz asked.

Gonzalez shook his head, his eyes trying to look at Shultz and the knife at the same time.

“Would you like to find out?” Shultz asked, pressing the knife a little harder.

“No,” Gonzalez shrieked again in deep gasps, his head swinging violently from side to side. “No. Please, no!”

De Brouw sat on the other side of Gonzalez, while Nazarov pulled up a chair and sat in front of him. “Now,” he said, “there’s no need to be difficult. We’re just here to ask you a few friendly questions—”

“You’re not being very friendly, then,” Gonzalez said, lifting his bound wrists and eyeing the knife.

“—and show you a few pictures.”

“Of what—your holiday snapshots?”

Nazarov just grinned as de Brouw passed him a thick envelope from one of the toolboxes. Nazarov pulled out a picture and admired it before holding it in front of Gonzalez. “This one came out rather well, don’t you think?”

“What’s this?”

“You mean, you don’t recognize yourself?” Nazarov asked.

Gonzalez looked at the picture as thought he was studying it carefully before answering. “I suppose it looks like someone who looks a bit like me,” he said. “Big deal.”

Nazarov took out a few more pictures, glancing at them briefly until he found the one he was looking for. “You’re quite photogenic actually, didn’t you know?”

“Fuck you,” Gonzalez said, spitting at the picture.

Nazarov flipped the picture around. “Good shot,” he said, grinning at Gonzalez. “You hit yourself right in the eye.” He leant over and wiped the spittle off the print on Gonzalez’ singlet, and studied the result. “Oh dear. These prints cost about a dollar each. We’ll have to ask you to pay for a new one.”

“Go fuck yourself,” said Gonzalez. Shultz applied a tiny pressure to the knife. “Okay, okay, who gives a shit about a lousy dollar.”

“Now, José—”

“My name is Jorge,” Gonzalez protested, pronouncing it Hor-hay, the Spanish way.

“He sounds like a horse,” Shultz laughed.

“Listen, spic,” Nazarov said, his hard, dark eyes glittering, “you’re in no position to argue.”

Gonzalez turned his head towards Shultz, the knife, and back to Nazarov. He shrugged . . . carefully.

“That’s better,” said Nazarov. “As I was saying, José, if we were to give these pictures to the cops, what do you think would happen?”

Gonzalez pursed his lips but said nothing.

“Not sure? Well, you see this guy here,” Nazarov said, pointing to the other man in the pictures, “the one you’re selling the dope to—”

“Dope?” said Gonzalez. “Could be talcum powder for all we know.”

Nazarov grinned. “From what we know about you spic arseholes, it probably was. Most of it anyway. But if you keep interrupting we’re going to be here all day. And I’m sure you don’t want to disappoint your boss by showing up late for work. He has a pretty short temper, I hear.” Nazarov paused, but Gonzalez just kept his mouth shut. “Now, this other guy, he’s well-known to the police as a minor pusher. Been arrested a few times but somehow managed to get off. Connections, I suppose. I don’t think his connections would help against this kind of evidence. My guess is, the cops will do a deal with him: he dobs you in and in return he gets a reduced sentence. Fair guess?”

“I’m just a businessman—”

“Save your spiel for the cops,” Nazarov snapped.

Narrowing his lips, Gonzalez stared back at Nazarov, his twitching facial muscles betraying his attempt to keep his face expressionless. And as hard as he tried, he couldn’t prevent his gaze from now and then flicking to the blade pressed against his skin.

Nazarov sighed, and waved the envelope at Gonzalez. “We’ve got lots more . . . ah . . . holiday snapshots.” He selected another picture and shoved it close to Gonzalez’ face. “Caught in the act,” he said. “Good camera work if I say so myself.” The light in the picture was poor, but it clearly showed Gonzalez crouched over another man, his fist embedded in the side of the man’s head. “You know what happened to this guy, don’t you?” Nazarov asked.

Gonzalez shrugged, as if the question held no interest for him.

“He spent a day in a coma and then died.”

“Is that so?” Gonzalez asked. “If I’d known, I’d have sent flowers.”

“Very funny,” said Nazarov without smiling. “Did you know that when you punch someone like that you leave lots of little flakes of skin behind? . . . No? . . . No doubt the police found those little bits of your skin and analyzed them. Then they’d have tried to match them with the DNA samples they have in storage. But you’re still walking around like a free man, so I presume you don’t have a record. Not in this country, anyway. The cops will keep those skin samples till Judgement Day. So if we give them this picture, along with your name, address, and phone number, they’ll come calling. And you, my friend, will be looking at a long, all-expenses-paid vacation as a guest of the government.”

Gonzalez sighed, his shoulders drooping and his body deflating as if all the air inside him was whistling out through the hole of his mouth. “Okay,” he said at last, “what do you want?”

“Information.”

“What kind of information?”

“Like . . . when—and of course where—you’re expecting drug shipments, where you store it, who you sell it to, how you move it around. To start with.”

“Not asking much, are you?”

“Well, we’re not asking for anything you don’t know.”

“And what do you do with this information?”

“We’re traders. We sell it to the highest bidder.”

“The cops?”

“Nah,” Nazarov shook his head. “They don’t pay enough.”

Gonzalez looked puzzled. “Who else would be interested?”

“Let me give you an example. Say the Greek or the Lebanese or someone else was expecting a large shipment of high quality smack. Say we knew when and where they were going to pick it up and make the trade. Do you think your boss would be interested in picking up a couple of kilos—and the money for it—for free?”

Gonzalez nodded. “Damn right he would.”

“How much would he be willing to pay to know the time, place, and how many of the opposition would be there?”

“No idea,” Gonzalez shrugged. “Ten or twenty grand, maybe.”

Simultaneously, Nazarov, Shultz and de Brouw burst out laughing.

“You really are a funny fellow,” said Shultz, still chuckling.

“We think a fairer split,” Nazarov smiled, “would be you keep the smack, we get the money.”

“I don’t know if my boss would go for it.”

Nazarov shrugged. “If your boss won’t, some other gang boss will.”

“So . . . if I tell you something, you’re going to auction it off to some other outfit? Is that it?”

“You’ve got it.” Gonzalez was about to protest when Nazarov went on. “But it’s a two-way street. You will be our exclusive contact in your mob—so you’ll be able to get the credit for bringing lucrative opportunities to your boss’s attention.”

“I don’t know. . . .” Gonzalez shook his head slowly. “They’d cut my throat the moment they suspected anything. I don’t think so.”

Shrugging, Nazarov held up one of the pictures. “You always have a choice.”

“And you’re such a pretty boy,” de Brouw said, softly stroking Gonzalez’ arm. “I’m sure you’ll be in great demand behind bars.”

Gonzalez shrank away from de Brouw and stared at him wide-eyed; he didn’t even flinch as the point of Shultz’ knife dug into his side. His face contorted, and he made strangled sounds as if he was choking. Then he bent over the way he was facing and brought his bound hands up to his face.

“He’s going to throw up,” de Brouw said, quickly standing up to get out of Gonzalez’s way.

Gonzalez’ body shuddered, he coughed and gasped for air and then sat up, slowly beginning to breathe again normally.

“So,” said Nazarov as if nothing had happened, “what’s it to be?”

“Whatever you like,” Gonzalez yelled. “Just so long as. . . .” De Brouw sat back down. “Keep away from me, you—you goddamn poofter.” With a shudder, his eyes flicked between de Brouw and Shultz. They both sat unmoving, and Gonzalez slowly turned his head back to Nazarov.

“What can I tell you, then?” As he spoke, his shoulders slumped, his head dropped, and he buried his face in his hands.

“You spics sell a lot of coke as well as heroin. First question, then: where’s your factory?”

Gonzalez raised his head, his mouth open, but no words came out. Nazarov fanned a few of the pictures.

“Okay,” he sighed. “It’s over in Redfern.” Groaning, he gave Nazarov the address. “There are lookouts all over the place, though,” he added with a smile. “And they have a whole arsenal in there: sawn-off shotguns, AK-47s, pistols, the lot. Good luck.”

“Good boy,” said de Brouw. Gonzalez glared at him and began to pull away until he remembered the knife still pressing against his elbow.

“What about drug shipments?” Nazarov asked. “Anything planned?”

“Something’s coming in a couple of weeks. The details aren’t set yet, though.”

Nazarov took out a pen. “Give me your arm,” he said.

“Why?” Gonzalez asked, looking frightened.

“I need something to write on.”

Tentatively, Gonzalez extended his arm; Nazarov leaned over and wrote a phone number on his skin. “There,” he said. “When you know the details, send me a text at this number. Okay?”

Gonzalez slowly nodded, swallowing hard against the bile threatening to rise in his throat.

“Good,” said Nazarov. “That’ll be enough to keep us busy for a while.” As he stood, de Brouw and Shultz also began to rise.

“What about these?” Gonzalez asked, lifting the handcuffs.

Nazarov stood unmoving.

“You’re not going to leave me like this, are you?”

With a grin, Nazarov pulled a key from his pocket. Gonzalez eagerly lifted his hands. But with a frown, Nazarov sat back down. “Oh yeah,” he said, “one other thing. We’re curious about this Vincent Leung guy.”

“Who?”

“You’re trying to tell me you don’t know who he was?”

“Was?”

“The triad chief who was killed recently.”

“The Dragon man?”

“Yeah.”

“Why didn’t you say so? He’s dead. What else so do you want to know?”

“Who killed him?”

“They arrested the guy who killed him, didn’t they?”

“That’s what they say. He a member of your gang?”

“I don’t even know the man’s name.”

“Derek Olsson, I believe.”

Gonzalez shrugged.

Shultz ran the tip of his knife over Gonzalez’ bicep, the slight pressure leaving a scratch that slowly oozed blood.

“What are you doing?” Gonzalez shrieked, a hand, its range of movement constrained by the handcuffs, making the sign of the cross. “I swear on my immortal soul I know nothing about it.”

“Your gang had nothing to do with it?”

Gonzalez’ head bobbed left and right vigorously, his eyes looking in horror at the red lines on his arm. “No. Dios mio, you’ve got to believe me!”

“I believe you,” said Nazarov as he bent to unlock the handcuffs. But he grabbed Gonzalez’ wrists instead, leaning with his weight to pin them on Gonzalez’ knees. Simultaneously Shultz pushed Gonzalez’ shoulder into the sofa while de Brouw jerked Gonzalez’ head back by the hair with one hand and slapped another chloroform pad over his nose and mouth. He held it there until Gonzalez’ body went limp.

*****

“MCKURN,” ALISON MUTTERED AS she saw the number on her cellphone. What does he want?

Taking a deep breath, she answered. “Yes, Senator?”

“Alison. A little birdie told me Royn met with Kydd this morning. Tell me what they discussed.”

“He . . . ah . . . went to show Kydd those poll results I told you about yesterday, Senator.”

“Is that all?”

“He’s been in meetings or in the House ever since, so he hasn’t had a chance to tell me anything about their discussion.”

“I see. . . .” McKurn paused. “And the moment you know what they talked about, you’ll tell me, right?”

“Of course, Senator.”

Aware she was visible through the glass wall of her office, she forced her hand to put the cellphone down slowly and naturally on the desk. She pulled a tissue from the box, wiped her sweaty palms, and let them lie in her lap until they stopped shaking.

*****

THE SUN WAS LOW on the horizon as Jeremy’s men—two of the three sections of his platoon—reached the outskirts of Inkaya. They’d stopped for a quick but welcome swim on the beach near the unfinished hotel. They passed what looked like two more derelict buildings as they neared the village: one was just a roof without walls, the other was enclosed with holes in the wall where once, presumably, had been air conditioners.

“Seems like a strange place for buildings like that,” Jeremy observed.

“Something to do with the hotel construction, perhaps?” Sergeant Byrne replied.

Jeremy shrugged. “Maybe. We’ll take a look in the morning.”

For the past two days they’d moved slowly and carefully through the jungle and seen . . . next to nothing. Two more trails led up to the conical peak which they marked on the map, a clearing which had, probably, once been a campsite.

And they’d seen nobody.

“It’s eerie,” Byrne had commented, “as though people had been warned to keep out of our way.”

As the platoon filed into the village, the soldiers attracted a growing number of smiling, skipping children. The soldiers smiled back, some letting their weapons drop from the ready position. “Keep your guard up,” Byrne snapped. “We’ve no idea what to expect.”

As they reached the village square they saw a group of elderly men standing in front of a cabana-like building—a roof with no walls—with a dozen or so long tables scattered around the dirt floor.

“Looks like we have a welcoming committee,” Jeremy said.

“Seems they knew we were coming,” Byrne replied.

“The kids could have warned them, I suppose.”

“Maybe,” Byrne replied, his tone laced with skepticism. “And see that playground—new equipment. This place looks a bit more prosperous than other villages I’ve seen here.”

“Fishing, perhaps?” Jeremy said, indicating the fishing boat being unloaded at the end of the pier and wrinkling his nose at the strong fishy smell that drifted towards them, brought by the soft, cooling breeze from the water.

“Could be,” Byrne grunted.

A gnarled old man took a step towards them. He spread his arms and smiled; Jeremy stifled a gasp as he saw that he had only three, black, front teeth. “Welcome,” the man said. “Aussie soldiers, first time see.” As he spoke, his smile stretched even further towards his ears.

“Thank you,” said Jeremy.

The man started to reply, then turned his head to one side saying, “Arang’anat-gaat.”

A young woman wearing a headscarf stepped forward from where she’d been waiting, unnoticed, behind the men.

“To Inkaya, welcome,” she said, smiling briefly at Jeremy before lowering her eyes. “My name Arang’anat. I for you translate.” With a slight bow, she turned towards Tungi. “Tungi-ga,” she said, “village leader.” Indicating the other men she added, “Elders council.”

“We are honored,” Jeremy replied. “I am Lieutenant McGuire. This is Sergeant Byrne.”

“M’gire-ga,” Arang’anat replied, inclining her head again. “Byrne-ga. Tungi-ga you invite to talk. And drinks for your men—tea, water, juice, all can offer.”

Jeremy looked at Byrne whose eyes had been scanning the growing group of villagers standing at a respectful distance in a wide circle, smiling as they watched. Byrne nodded briefly. “Suggest by sections, sir,” he said softly.

“A good idea, Sergeant,” Jeremy nodded. Turning to Tungi, he said, “Your offer is most welcome.”

Arang’anat spoke a few words to the elders who all smiled at Jeremy and Byrne and began walking towards a large table set near the counter.

“Please, come,” Arang’anat said.

“After you, ma’am,” Jeremy said with a flourish of his arm.

Arang’anat looked at him in bewilderment until his words sank in.

“Here,” Byrne whispered, “women follow behind.”

“I see.”

Arang’anat took a tentative step—but then waited for Jeremy to go ahead.

At Byrne’s order, the men dropped their knapsacks in a pile and half of them took seats while the other half, standing at ease, formed a loose cordon around the building. A moment later, several young girls brought out trays laden with cups of tea, glasses of water, and juice. The men gaped at them, and as soon as they had placed the trays on the table the girls disappeared as quickly as they could.

“Mind your manners,” Byrne growled as he took a seat next to Jeremy. The elders sat along the opposite side, Tungi in the middle, with Arang’anat at one end. As Byrne sat down they, too, were served with refreshments.

They all sat in silence, studying each other as they sipped their drinks. Then Tungi said something to Arang’anat.

“Tungi-ga asks if we can some way help you,” she said. “If you anything want to know.”

“Thank you.” Jeremy inclined his head towards Tungi as he spoke. “Indeed there is,” he said, taking a photo of Karla Preston from his shirt pocket and placing on the table opposite Tungi. “We’re looking for this woman. Have you ever seen her before?”

As Arang’anat strained to see the picture she gasped—and looked guiltily at Tungi.

Tungi’s expression remained stoic as he slowly nodded his head. “Preston-gaat,” he said.

At Tungi’s signal, Arang’anat said, “She here, two, three days.”

“How long ago?” Jeremy asked.

“Seven days. One week.”

“Do you know where she went?”

Arang’anat turned to Tungi, translating Jeremy’s question. Tungi looked searchingly at Jeremy, frowning, as if he were carefully considering his answer.

After he’d spoken, Arang’anat turned to Jeremy, her words catching in her throat. “She to K’mah went.”

Jeremy frowned. “Do you have any idea why?”

Arang’anat smiled. “She a writer, yes?”

“Yes,” Jeremy nodded. “A journalist.”

“She talk to—” Arang’anat paused, searching for a word “—dissidents want.”

“But . . . seven days ago? That’s a long time. And you’ve heard nothing about her since?”

Arang’anat shook her head, tears appearing in the corners of her eyes. “I pray to Allah every day she safe.”

23 A Man of Influence

KARLA WOKE, HALF-OPENING her eyes. It was pitch black and the boat was rocking from side to side. Was that what had woken her? The slap-slap-slap of the waves against the hull was unusually loud; gone were the engine’s steady throb and its comforting vibration which lulled her to sleep each night. Straining her ears she could just make out the faint tone of the engine as it idled.

The boat must have stopped. Why?

Now wide-awake she knelt on the narrow bed and peered through the tiny porthole. All she could see were the endless, rolling waves, the night sky filled with stars as the boat rocked one way and dark water as it rolled the other. Then there was a thump and a jar that rattled everything in the room, followed by the sound of feet scrabbling above her.

Had they hit something? Were they going to sink?

She went to open the door. It was locked.

She pounded on the door and yelled—but nobody came.

She peeked back through the porthole. The boat was now just rocking gently; no longer was the glass momentarily covered by the waves, and no longer was the small circle of the porthole alternately filled just with stars. She studied the waves for a long moment and decided everything seemed stable. We’re not sinking. If we were, surely they wouldn’t leave me here. Holding her watch close to the porthole she could make out the time in the faint starlight: around three in the morning.

She beat on the door again. Again, there was no response. She wondered if anyone had heard her. From the bumps and thumps coming from above, she doubted it.

When she’d looked at their position on the chart they were still days away from land. What’s more, if they stayed on the same course for much longer, they’d pass by Cairns several hundred kilometers out to sea. Was the captain just being cautious? Or was there another reason? For the next half-an-hour, she sat in silent thought contemplating the possibilities.

IN THE FISHING BOAT’S hold, the sailors had been working fast. First, they hauled the iced plastic buckets of fish on the deck. From underneath, they pulled out big boxes heavily encased in a thick plastic wrap, and levered them up onto the deck where they were stacked by a second group of sailors.

A sleek, clearly expensive yacht was coming closer, gliding silently alongside until the two boats touched, beam-to-beam, with a thump. Without a word from either crew ropes were passed between the two boats to join them together. Then the boxes were passed across to the yacht where they quickly disappeared below decks. After about thirty minutes of hard, sweaty work, the ropes were released and the two vessels pulled apart. The fishing boat headed south, staying well in international waters; the yacht turned northwest towards the Australian coast.

AS THE ENGINE SOUNDS returned to normal and the boat got under way, Karla lay back down, soothed by the vibrations—but stayed alert. Sure enough, about fifteen minutes later there was a click from the direction of the door.

They’ve unlocked it, she thought, slowly, silently, sitting up on the bed. So they were doing something they didn’t want me to see—and they don’t know I woke up.

Why, she wondered, had they had stopped?

The fishing boats at the village pier . . . the marijuana plantation and hashish factory—“And they sell it . . . ?” In Australia, Uqu had told her.

A rendezvous? In the middle of the night, in the middle of nowhere, had another boat come to take the cargo on the last leg of its journey?

What other reason could there be?

*****

“SIR,” ASKED SERGEANT BYRNE, “how long ago do you think that construction site on the beach was abandoned?”

“A year,” Jeremy said. “Maybe longer.”

“This padlock is new.”

Jeremy leaned down to look at the lock on the door of the abandoned building. “So it is. What do you think that means, Sarge?”

“Well,” said Byrne, scratching his head, “if these buildings had something to do with the construction site—storage, say—then the padlock should be old too.”

“It’s not exactly convenient to the beach, though, is it?”

Byrne shook his head. “Or to the village, either.”

Jeremy looked up at the hole in the wall above, just the right size and shape for an air conditioner. “If this building was air conditioned,” he said, “there must be power. But there are no power lines.”

“A generator, then.”

Jeremy nodded. He walked around the building, trying to find a chink in the wall he could look through. “Can’t see inside anywhere,” he said.

“Well-built—better than just about anything we saw in the village,” said Byrne. “But maybe we can get a look-in through there.” He pointed at the hole above.

Jeremy nodded, and a few minutes later one of the soldiers was standing on the shoulders of two others. “It’s blocked, Sarge,” he reported. “A sheet of plywood by the looks of it.”

“Can you push it aside?” Byrne asked.

“—without breaking anything,” Jeremy added.

The soldier managed to push one corner of the plywood out of the way. “It’s too dark inside, sir.”

“Mac,” Byrne ordered. “Could you send someone back to the beach to get a torch.”

“Sure, Sarge,” Corporal MacDougal replied.

They’d spent the night camped on the beach. Half the platoon was packing up the camp while Jeremy, Byrne, and the other men had come to look at the abandoned buildings. Jeremy had politely turned down Tungi’s suggestion they spend the night in the village, but could not refuse Tungi’s hospitality completely. After protracted negotiations—which revolved around Tungi’s refusal to accept payment (“It’s against our traditions”) and Jeremy’s insistence that he was unable to accept Tungi’s invitation without payment (“It’s against our customs”)—Jeremy made a donation to the school’s funds, and the village put on a feast which the men all agreed was “the best feed we’ve had since we left home.”

A torch was soon brought from the beach and the same soldier clambered back onto the shoulders of his fellows. “Looks like some sort of machinery, Sarge.”

“What kind of condition is it in?” Byrne asked.

“Like new, Sarge. At least, well maintained. But no idea what it’s for.”

“Lemme have a look,” said Byrne.

“It’ll take four of us to hold you up, Sarge,” one private groaned.

“It’s all muscle,” Byrne said with a grin.

“That’s the problem,” said another.

It only took two, but they pretended to be about to collapse under Byrne’s weight until he ordered, “Hold still, damn you.” After a moment, he jumped down and shrugged. “Can’t tell what it’s for either. ” Turning to Jeremy he asked, “Do you think it’s worth going back to the village and asking Tungi-ga what these buildings are for?”

Jeremy shook his head. “If they are hiding something, he wouldn’t tell us the truth, would he? And by going back and asking, we’d only be showing our interest in them.”

“I think they already know.”

“Being watched again?”

“I think so, sir.”

“I wouldn’t be surprised,” Jeremy said. “We’re finished here, then.”

Byrne nodded. “Let’s go,” he ordered.

“Sarge, wait a moment,” Corporal MacDougal said. He was standing a few meters up the path to the beach staring into the jungle.

“What is it, MacDougal?”

“You see all these plants.” MacDougal pointed at the meter-high shrubs covering most of the ground under the trees.

“Weeds?” said Byrne.

“Maybe,” MacDougal said. “But they’re all around the same height, and it seems to me they’ve been planted in rows. Not straight, but rows just the same.”

Byrne and Jeremy went to stand near MacDougal. “Could be rows,” Jeremy said.

“In Toribaya,” MacDougal said, “you can buy marijuana just about anywhere—”

“Is that so, Mac?” said Byrne sharply.

“So I’ve been told, Sarge.”

Byrne smiled. “You think that’s what these plants are?”

MacDougal shrugged. “I’ve no idea, Sarge.” He pointed to the trees. “You couldn’t see these from the air, so if it’s something they want to hide . . . could be.”

Jeremy took a few pictures with his cellphone, and pulled off a branch from one of the shrubs. “Good work, Mac.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“Someone will know what they are,” Jeremy said.

“Okay men,” Byrne said. “Let’s get moving. Back to home cooking.”

*****

“SORRY,” ALISON SAID AS she walked towards her office after her morning meeting with Royn. “My mind must have been somewhere else.”

“I just asked you,” said Mary, “if you know whether Melanie will be coming in today.”

“Not as far as I know, Mary,” Alison replied as she entered her office.

As she dumped her files on her desk, she heard Mary’s voice saying to someone else in the front office, “Seems like Alison has been in some other world this past week or so.”

How true, she thought, her gaze freezing as it reached the cellphone lying on her desk. Can’t put it off any longer.

She went to the bathroom and, as she came back into her office, she closed the door behind her. She took a moment longer than necessary to get comfortable before reaching for her cellphone to dial what she thought of as McKurn’s “unlisted” cellphone number . . . and stopped when she saw that her fingers were shaking. It’s just a phone call—what’s happening to me?

She’d felt on top of the world all morning . . . until she left Royn’s office knowing she had to call McKurn. Though Royn knew what she was doing and what she was going to tell McKurn, she still felt a gnawing sense of betrayal.

Her optimism came from the private eye’s summary of everything they knew—whether true or rumored—about McKurn, and how they planned to proceed.

They’d done their legwork, coming up with information that would embarrass McKurn: at sixteen, he’d spend nine months in reform school, the result of a knife fight with another gang member, and three different stretches in Long Bay Jail of up to four months. Grainy photos photocopied from old Sydney newspapers of the nineteen-sixties and -seventies showed McKurn with known underworld figures like Perce Galea, Abe “Mr. Sin” Saffron and “Stan-the-Man” Smith.

And then there was the story that McKurn was part-owner of an office supply outfit, Paper Supplies Pty. Ltd., that had become the exclusive supplier to the New South Wales government for mundane items like pens, pencils and paper in the early seventies—a contract the company still held. More recently—a year after Paul Cracken became Treasurer—the same company had gotten a nice chunk of the federal government’s stationery business.

What really lifted Alison’s hopes was the news that Leon Price—the Sydney politician mentioned in Sidney Royn’s report—was willing to make a deathbed confession. Dying from pleurisy, kidney failure, and an assortment of other ailments of old age, he agreed to “tell all”—provided his life would be protected until he died from natural causes.

Royn had agreed to the expense, saying excitedly, “McKurn’s goose is going to be well and truly cooked.”

Perhaps I’m not going to have to play double-agent for much longer after all, she thought as the highlights of the private eye’s report flashed through her mind; her fingers no longer shook as she dialled McKurn’s “unlisted” number.

“Senator?”

“Good morning, Alison,” said McKurn. “You have some information for me, I trust?”

“Indeed, Senator. As I thought, the minister discussed the poll results with the Prime Minister yesterday. You know, the ones that show he’d be streets ahead of Cracken.”

“I know what you’re talking about, Alison,” McKurn said irritably. “Tell me something I don’t know.”

“Kydd was not very happy with the minister,” Alison said, “especially since the poll showed Royn would top Kydd’s record at the last election.” McKurn chuckled in her ear. “He immediately became suspicious that Royn might be considering a spill. Royn came back from that meeting with his tail between his legs.”

McKurn laughed. “That’s nice to know. Maybe we can help sow a little more discord there.”

“There certainly seem to be possibilities in that direction, Senator,” Alison said as she thought: Blast. I didn’t mean to give him any ideas.

“Royn’s basic strategy at the moment is to do whatever’s necessary to keep Kydd’s support while making sure the MPs—especially those in marginal constituencies—all know they should hitch themselves to him, not Cracken, if they want to keep their seats.”

“Alison—that’s been quite obvious all along,” McKurn growled.

“Indeed, Senator. But I’m confirming it for you—isn’t that the sort of thing you want?”

“Quite so, Alison. Quite so. And that’s all?”

“That’s it. Since Kydd’s retirement doesn’t seem imminent, we haven’t given it serious thought. So there’s no real plan, as such.”

“I see. Good. Anything else?”

“Only that the Candyman Inquiry will finally get under way today.”

“That should be fun to watch,” said McKurn.

Let’s hope so, Alison thought.

She slumped back when the call ended, massaging the tension from her shoulders on the back of the chair. How much longer can I take this? she asked herself, not knowing the answer.

*****

RUDI DURANT OPENED HIS office door to see Simon Lee grinning at him, his luggage piled up in a corner.

“How was the flight?” Durant asked, his voice deadpan.

“Tiring,” said Lee.

“Find out anything?”

Lee nodded, his grin looking like a permanent addition to his face.

“So tell me!” said Durant as he took his seat.

“The Super said he wanted to be the first to know. I could be run out of the force if I disobeyed a superior officer’s direct order, couldn’t I?”

Durant chuckled. “Or—if he thinks what you’ve come up with is a complete waste of his and your time—sent back to being a local Detective. How embarrassing would that be?”

“True enough,” Lee laughed, pulling out his notebook. “But I couldn’t resist. Remember the seven-year gap in Olsson’s history, his seven-year absence from Australia? He spent most of that time in Hong Kong, ending up as an assistant manager at an investment bank—one of those boutique things. The Hong Kong police believe the bank in question is a front for the Golden Dragon Triad—money-laundering and the like.”

“I see,” said Durant. “But ‘believe’ doesn’t sound bankable . . . ?”

“We knew Vincent Leung was head of the Golden Dragon Triad here—but couldn’t take it to court. That’s what they mean when they say ‘believe’.”

Durant nodded. “Fair enough. So there could be an Olsson connection with the Golden Dragon lot. What else?”

“You’re overlooking something . . . sir,” Lee said, grinning as he shook his head. “Banks don’t hire people for management positions without at least a university degree; better yet an MBA. And it’s very unusual for small, Chinese-owned and run outfits in Hong Kong to hire an unqualified gweilo—a foreigner—for such a position.”

Durant looked at Lee in surprise. “You’re right, Simon,” he said slowly. “Very suspicious.”

“About a year after Olsson’s arrival in Hong Kong, he was making so many entries and exits at the airport—almost once a week—that his name appeared on an Immigration Department watch list.”

“Did they ever pin anything on him?”

“Unfortunately, not.” Lee shook his head. “He was often searched. A couple of times his suitcase was full of cash—”

“And he wasn’t arrested?”

“That wasn’t illegal in Hong Kong then, or even reportable. So the immigration officer I met said he was a courier of some kind. And he gave me this.” Lee pulled a computer printout from his briefcase and passed it over to Durant.

“What’s this?” Durant asked as he scanned it.

“That’s a printout of Olsson’s entries and exits since Hong Kong Immigration computerized their arrival and departure records. It seems he’s been going to Hong Kong about twice a year.”

“Well . . . he could afford it, couldn’t he?”

“True . . . but why?”

“Visit old friends?”

Lee shrugged. “Maybe. But InterFreight doesn’t have an office there, and you don’t go to Hong Kong to buy equipment for a freight company. But it is a place full of rich people with money to invest. Perhaps that forty-nine percent investor in InterFreight is the Golden Triad gang, or someone related to them.”

“So,” said Durant, “we still come back to the same question: where did he get the money?”

“And if it was Triad money,” said Lee, “why?”

“What’s in it for them?” Durant mused.

“Exactly.”

“A good question, but I see what you’re getting at. And I’ll have a quiet word to my mates in the Drug Squad and ask them to keep their eyes and ears open for any connection, including rumors, between drugs and InterFreight.” Durant grinned. “You know, we’ll make an investigator out of you yet.”

Lee smiled broadly: from Durant, faint praise was a major compliment.

“I’d say there’s no question the Super will be interested in what you’ve dug up,” Durant said as he picked up the phone. He let the phone ring until he was transferred to the voice-messaging prompt. “Durant here, Super. Sergeant Lee is back and says he has some interesting information.”

As Durant hung up Lee asked, “Anything come up while I’ve been away, sir?”

“No breakthroughs. No sign of Olsson. But there are some disturbing developments. Remember that the place near Ulladulla was sprayed with bullets? They were identified as coming from three different AK-47s. But two of the Chinese gang died from a single shot between the eyes: those bullets were not fired from AK-47s.”

Lee’s mouth hung open. “Single shots . . . a sharpshooter?”

“That’s what they think,” Durant nodded. “Maybe a military sniper rifle.”

“Where the hell would that come from?”

“God knows,” Durant sighed. “The Army says none of their weapons are missing. No missing grenades, either. But that’s not the worst of it—”

“It’s not?”

“Nope. Just yesterday we found two more dead Chinese, both killed with a knife. Throats cut. They were in the back of a SUV in a garage a couple of kilometers from where Olsson was snatched. The stink—” Durant’s nose wrinkled at the memory “—somebody complained about it, which is how the bodies were discovered. The SUV fits the description of the vehicle seen fleeing from the ambush with members of the second gang—the one that shot out the tyres on the police motor bike.” Seeing Lee was about to say something, Durant held up his hand. “It gets worse. Over the weekend four more bodies were found—”

“That’s eighteen bodies altogether?”

“Right. They’d been dumped in the bottom of a hole in the ground at an abandoned building site. Like the two bodies found in the SUV, these four had also been knifed. But they’d been tortured first—genitals, fingers cut off, chests and arms slashed, that sort of thing.” Durant shuddered. “It was like they’d been played with—gruesome.”

“Do we know who they were?”

“Young punks. Aussies, not Chinese, with records of petty theft and the like.”

“Any leads?”

Durant shook his head. “None! But my gut tells me the same thugs sliced them, killed the two Chinese in the SUV, and are responsible for the massacre in Ulladulla.”

“Jesus Christ,” Lee breathed. “Do we have any leads to these murderous bastards, any idea who they are?”

“Not a thing,” Durant said sourly, “except this.”

He passed Lee a printout of the email from Olsson’s lawyer. “What do you think?” he asked when Lee finished reading.

“Eighteen bodies aren’t evidence?”

“In the absence of a connection with Olsson, I’m afraid they’re not. After all, Maybe Olsson was rescued by a gang of Good Samaritans.”

“Do you believe that?”

“Of course not. Olsson is up to his eyeballs in . . . something.”

“But what?”

“That’s the problem. And there’s another problem: there were no signs that Leung struggled with his murderer before he was killed.”

“That doesn’t mean he didn’t.”

“It doesn’t,” Durant said sourly. “But that damned ambulance-chaser has a point about the hair and—”

Durant’s words were cut off the shrill of his phone. “Super? . . . Right, we’re on our way.”

*****

“ZULU, THIS IS CHARLIE ALPHA, over.”

“Zulu” was the call sign of the base, and “Charlie Alpha” was Jeremy’s call sign as commander of the “Charlie” platoon. Had Sergeant Byrne been speaking, it would have been “Charlie Bravo.” And—much to his regret—Corporal MacDougal had the honor of being “Charlie Charlie.”

“This is Zulu. Go ahead Charlie Alpha, over.”

“Charlie Alpha. Can you patch me through to Hotel and scramble, over.”

“Zulu. Wait one, over.”

A couple of minutes later another voice came through the radio’s headphones. “Charlie Alpha, this is Hotel, over.” Jeremy recognized Captain McMurray’s voice.

“Charlie Alpha. We’ve just visited Anakaya, a village halfway between Zulu and Inkaya, and have some news, over.”

“Hotel. Go ahead, over.”

“Charlie Alpha. A week ago a group of Sandeman soldiers arrived from inland, carrying the body of one of their men. The villagers were told he’d been shot by guerrillas. They also learnt that these soldiers had captured a white woman, and that the guerrillas had attacked them and spirited the woman away, over.”

“Hotel. I see. Anything else? Over.”

“Charlie Alpha. The soldiers were taken off by boat and about two days later a larger force of Sandeman soldiers landed, over a hundred of them according to the villagers, and went inland, over.”

“Hotel. Did you see any sign of those soldiers while you were scouting around? Over.”

“Charlie Alpha. Negative, over.”

“Hotel. Good work, Charlie Alpha. Over and out.”

*****

ALISON YAWNED AS SHE followed Royn through the entrance of his townhouse.

Melanie sat at the dining table, hunched over her new laptop, headphones covering her ears. Royn glanced at Alison with a smile and a finger to his mouth, and tiptoed until he was standing behind Melanie. He placed his hands on her shoulders and ran them down towards her breasts.

Melanie yelped. “You gave me a fright,” she said as she turned to smile at Royn, her lips held up to him for a long kiss.

As she usually did when she saw her boss and his wife acting like aging lovebirds, the picture of Derek Olsson at seventeen flashed into Alison’s mind, and she grieved for what-might-have-been.

When Royn stood again, his hands still caressing her shoulders, he asked, “How are you, Mel?”

“Better now,” she smiled. “But my ears are sore—” she let the headphones drop on the table “—and my head hurts from listening to McKurn’s voice all day.”

“Time for a drink,” Royn said, heading towards the bar. “How about you, Mel? Alison? Vodka and tonic?”

“Thanks,” Alison said as she joined Melanie at the table.

“Wait,” Melanie said with a grin. “Listen to this first and tell me what you make of it.” She unplugged the headphones and turned up the laptop’s volume.

Voice: Senator. These approvals are taking far too long. And I had it on good authority that you were a man of influence.

McKurn: I told you there are no guarantees.

Voice: These damn blackfellas—someone should line the bastards up and shoot ’em. They’ve held us up for so long we’re close to running out of cash.

McKurn, laughing: I feel your pain.

Voice: You will if you’ve put any money in our stock. You can kiss it goodbye.

Royn whistled as he slowly sat down next to Melanie.

“I see why you didn’t want me to do this in the office,” Melanie said.

“Indeed,” Alison nodded. “Any idea who he’s talking to?”

Melanie shook her head. “I was hoping one of you might know.”

“No idea,” said Royn with a shrug.

“So what do you make of it?” Melanie asked.

“A company needs a permit of some kind—and will go bankrupt without it,” Alison said. “McKurn promised to help get the permit—and would make a killing when the company’s shares hit the roof. That’s my guess.”

“The . . . ah . . . Aborigines are holding up their project,” said Royn. “A mining company, perhaps?”

“Could be a mining concession,” Alison said. “Or timber—even a factory. Pretty wide choice.”

“That’s what I was afraid of.” Melanie’s shoulders slumped. “If only we knew who he was talking to—”

“There is a way to find out,” Alison said, her sapphire eyes sparkling once again. “All we have to do is ask people.”

“How can we do that,” said Royn, “without blowing our cover?”

Alison smiled. “Ask the geek to put it on McKurnWatch with the question: ‘Who is McKurn talking to?’ If the press picks it up, the voice is sure to be identified.”

“But then McKurn would know someone’s listening to his phone conversations,” Melanie objected.

“That call was on his cellphone. Anyone could have picked it up out of the air.”

“Is that true?” Royn asked.

“According to a Federal Police briefing I attended, yes,” said Alison.

Royn nodded approvingly. “Seems worth the risk. . . . What do you think, Mel?”

“I’d like to be there to see McKurn’s face,” Melanie grinned mischievously, “when the geek’s email hits.”

24 Hobson’s Choice

“THEY LIED TO US, Prime Minister,” Victor Bergstrom was saying. “Brigadier Thierry—our commanding officer up there—agrees. In fact, those were his very words.”

Anthony Royn sighed. “I’m neither surprised nor shocked.”

“They had this Karla Preston woman,” Cracken said, “lost her—and told us they knew nothing about her whereabouts.”

“Exactly,” said Bergstrom.

“General,” Kydd said, “can we send some of our troops to get her back from the guerrillas?”

“We could, Prime Minister,” said General Arthur Riddell, Chief of the Defence Force and the only additional face at this hastily called meeting of the Cabinet’s National Security Committee.

“Better do it, then,” said Kydd. “Now, let’s get back to the main business at hand.”

Each committee member had a copy of the confidential, top secret report. In his summary, General Riddell concluded, “The separatists’ strength appears to be growing. The situation on St. Christopher’s Island, in particular, is deteriorating. In our judgement, the forces are there to deal with the situation—but only with a unified command. Only then can we follow a unified strategy and concentrate forces where they’ll do the most good. Without that, or a dramatic increase in the number of Australian troops, the outlook for getting the separatists under control is bleak.”

“To put it another way,” Randolph Kydd rumbled, “two weeks ago we had a deal—and they’ve reneged.”

“They insist they’re fully committed to our agreement,” said Bergstrom. “They just haven’t delivered.”

“What’s the difference?” Cracken snapped.

“In effect,” said Bergstrom, “none.”

“So, Victor,” Kydd asked, “what are our options?”

Before Bergstrom could speak, Cracken cut in: “Sending more troops so Sandeman forces can go back and lounge around in their barracks isn’t one of them. The public wouldn’t stand for it.”

“Quite so,” someone said, and several heads around the table nodded.

“With soldiers in Afghanistan and East Timor, as well as the Sandemans,” General Riddell said, “we don’t have much room for manouver.”

Nodding towards Riddell, Kydd said, “Victor?” His slightly impatient tone commanded silence from everyone else.

“If the Sandeman authorities aren’t coming to the party,” said Bergstrom, “our military options are basically three: do nothing, and hope we can muddle through; increase our strength there; or withdraw.”

“Hobson’s choice,” said Cracken.

“Indeed,” said Bergstrom. “And with your kind permission, Paul, I’ll conclude my remarks.”

“Of course, Victor,” Cracken mumbled, his cheeks flushing.

“If we do nothing now, we’ll only have to make one of the other two choices later. Sending in more troops, aside from being unpopular, has no guarantee of success. We need the Sandeman troops at our side and the Sandeman authorities behind us to be most effective.”

“Could you explain that a little more, please Victor?” Kydd asked.

“Certainly, Prime Minister. If large numbers of Australian troops go in, we could be seen as an occupying army, which would only fuel the resistance. Secondly, whatever their failings, the ordinary Sandeman soldiers are reasonably effective in joint operations They’re very cooperative at the platoon and company level—none of this obstructionism we’re experiencing at the top. They respect and tend to look to our soldiers for leadership. More importantly, we gain the cooperation of the local villagers, and so our intelligence—and I emphasize at the local level—is much better. Without Sandeman assistance, we could be flying blind, and be resented rather than welcomed.”

“Each separatist group is local,” said Riddell. “There are few signs of unity. If we don’t nip them in the bud, that will change. They’ll be much harder to dislodge if they present a united front. They get minimal support from the islanders—at the moment. Strategically, now is the best time to go after them. Yesterday would have been better.”

“And tomorrow will be worse,” said Helen Arkness.

“Exactly so, madam.”

“So your preferred option, General,” Kydd’s voice boomed before anyone else could speak, “is to have all forces under your—or should I say Brigadier Thierry’s command.”

“Precisely, Prime Minister. End this interference from their ‘fruit salad’ generals.” Riddell’s voice dripped with sarcasm.

“Are you referring to the Sandeman Prime Minister’s brother, by any chance, General?” Royn asked.

Riddell nodded. “The man has no military knowledge or experience—couldn’t tell one end of a howitzer from another. That doesn’t stop him from thinking he’s a general and issuing orders left, right, and center. The only thing he’s any good for is strutting around in his uniform, with every medal the Sandemans can offer hanging off his chest and a bunch of others he probably picked up at a flea market.”

“I take it you’re not very impressed,” Kydd chuckled, his jowls wobbling.

Riddell made no comment; he didn’t seem to find the subject in any way amusing.

“Do you have the joint command structure already worked out, General?” Kydd asked.

“We do,” said Riddell. “We can put it into action tomorrow—there are no operational difficulties. Only political ones.”

“Give me an example, Victor,” said Kydd.

“It keeps coming back to the . . . ah . . . ‘fruit salad’ general,” Bergstrom said. “As a general he supposedly outranks Brigadier Thierry, and under the ‘joint’ operational command structure we envisage, he’d have nothing to do. But if we overcame that objection, they’d find something else.”

“I see. It looks like we need a battering ram to break the logjam,” said Kydd.

“That seems to be the only solution, Prime Minister,” said Bergstrom.

“The problem is, now that you—” Cracken looked at Royn as he spoke “—have got the oil money flowing again up there, they’re going to feel less beholden to us. That reduces our leverage over the bastards.”

“And what,” demanded Kydd, “is our leverage?”

Cracken replied immediately: “Cut off the money, pull out our troops—and leak the Treasury report. And there is a fourth possibility—though I’m hesitant to mention it.”

“You?” asked Royn, pointedly raising one eyebrow. “Hesitant?”

“Which is?” asked Bergstrom with interest.

“A more cooperative government up there might certainly make a difference.”

“What are you suggesting,” Royn said sarcastically, “a coup?”

“I suggested nothing. But maybe that’s not a bad idea.”

“And where, Paul,” Royn said slowly, “would you find a Sandeman politician you could trust?”

“I’d say,” said Cracken, smiling mischievously, “that’s your department, not mine.”

“And I’d say,” said Kydd, “we drop this topic right now. And if anybody asks, it was never discussed at this table—is that clear?” Kydd’s eyes moved from one face to another, finally coming to rest on Cracken with an expression of unmistakable disapproval. He waited until everyone said, “Yes, Prime Minister.”

HALF AN HOUR LATER Anthony Royn, his face drawn, strode straight into Alison’s office. “Alison, get me Nimabi on the phone immediately . . . please.”

“Bad meeting?” Alison asked.

Royn nodded. “And I’m the hatchet man.”

“We’re considering our options, Abdullah,” Royn said fifteen minutes later. “We’ve yet to make a decision, but I thought I should let you know that withdrawal is at the top of the list.”

“You can’t. I mean—”

“I know exactly what you mean: how long do you think the Sandeman army will last without us to give them spine? Especially on St. Christopher’s Island? We estimate three to four weeks.”

“And if the Papuans were to make a lighting raid on el-Bihar—which is effectively defenceless—to grab all the oil, what then?”

“You should have thought about that before.”

“This—it’s just blackmail.”

“Really, Abdullah. Two weeks ago we made a deal. We’ve already kept our side of the bargain and sent reinforcements. We’ve been waiting and waiting for you to keep your word—and we can’t wait any longer. Is that clear?”

“But, as I understand it, there are all kinds of issues still to be resolved. For example, Thierry is only a brigadier. He can’t be in overall command—our generals outrank him.”

“That’s exactly the kind of foot-dragging tactic we’re totally fed up with,” Royn said impatiently. “We’ll send someone of higher rank, set up a separate task force under Thierry—or promote him to Field Marshal. Use your imagination. The simplest thing would be for your so-called commander-in-chief to retire.”

“This is outrageous—”

“No, Abdullah, failing to keep your word when people are being killed is outrageous. Anyway, check your watch. Exactly twenty-four hours from now, if you haven’t agreed to our proposed joint command structure and put everything in place for its implementation, that Treasury report will be, sadly, leaked to the press.”

“This . . . this is pure extortion.”

“Call it whatever you like. We’ve all had enough. We’re giving you a straightforward, either-or, black-and-white, yes-or-no choice—and you’ve got twenty-four hours to make it, Abdullah.”

*****

“HEY, NAZIR. . . . IT’S PASHA you dummy—wake up. . . . Yeah, well take an aspirin. . . . I blew my cash last night, so why don’t we pick up some pocket money at a corner store first? . . . . Then? Well, what about a bit of snatch—a nice, young, firm schoolgirl, say. . . . Yeah, a lunchtime snatch, ha, ha, . . . Okay, I’ll pick you up in about half an hour.”

When Pasha Kuri walked out his front door, he saw an electric company van parked by a telegraph pole. A ladder was propped up against the pole and three workmen stood around the bottom, looking up. As he reached his car, parked behind the van, one of the men began to climb the ladder.

He shrugged and turned the key. The starter motor whined but the engine didn’t catch. “Damn.” He tried again with the same result. On his third try the starter motor turned over sluggishly. “Damn battery’s giving out,” he muttered.

He opened the bonnet and went to see if he could figure out what was wrong.

“Won’t start, mate?” one of the workmen asked.

“No,” Kuri said, shaking his head.

“Maybe I can help,” the workman offered.

“Please do.” Kuri frowned as he looked at his watch. “I’d appreciate it.”

The workman leant over the engine, poked here and there, and within a couple of minutes stood up saying, “See that connection? It’s come loose.”

As Kuri bent his head over the engine, the workman slammed the bonnet down hard on the back of his head. “Oops, sorry about that, mate.”

KURI CAME TO LYING on an unfamiliar bed, a gag in his mouth. His hands automatically tried to hold his throbbing head—but they were chained to the bed.

He strained hard against the bonds but all he achieved were sore wrists. The room suddenly brightened and he heard a voice with an accent he couldn’t identify saying, “At last. Our Lebanese sleeping beauty is awake.”

Three men came into the room through the now-open door, their faces hooded.

“And who the fuck are you?” he growled.

“I’ll do the asking and you’ll do the answering,” said de Brouw.

“You bastard,” he spat, recognizing de Brouw’s voice. “Like hell I will.”

De Brouw’s fist smacked onto the side of his chin. Kuri yelped at the pain.

“If you hit him that hard, you schmuck,” said Shultz, “he won’t be able to talk. Hit him somewhere else. And you—” Shultz poked Kuri’s forehead “—he likes hitting people, so it would be a good idea to answer his questions.”

“Fuck you, too.”

De Brouw punched him hard in the stomach.

De Brouw stepped to one side as Nazarov pulled up a chair by the bed. “Sorry about that,” he said. “My associates tend to get overzealous from time to time.”

Kuri’s eyes flicked warily between the three hoods.

“We’re just after a little information, and then we’ll drop you back home—or anywhere else you like.”

Kuri said nothing.

Nazarov made the same proposition to Kuri he’d made to Gonzalez. Kuri just listened in sullen silence until Nazarov finished.

“That’s it?” he asked.

Nazarov nodded.

Kuri spat at Nazarov’s face.

Nazarov stood, wiping away the spittle trickling down his hood, shaking his head sadly. “You shouldn’t have done that.”

Kuri rolled over to face the wall.

Shultz came forward and roughly forced him back. De Brouw stood by him, holding a needle.

“What’s that?” the Lebanese asked, fear showing in his eyes for the first time.

“Heroin,” said Nazarov. “Poetic justice, don’t you think?”

“No. Please. No!” Kuri tried to shrink away from de Brouw, but Shultz held him firmly in place.

“Rather talk?” said Nazarov.

Kuri looked at him, shuddering for a long moment, and shook his head.

“As you like it,” Nazarov said, nodding to de Brouw.

De Brouw grabbed Kuri’s arm roughly, thrust the needle into a vein and squeezed the plunger home.

“No no no no no!”

*****

SENATOR FRANK MCKURN, the most senior figure in the governing Conservative Party in both age and length of service, could, in theory, have had any ministry of Cabinet rank he desired. One insuperable obstacle stood in his way: Prime Minister Randolph Kydd. After a brief stint as Minister for Mining and Energy in the first Kydd government, Kydd kicked McKurn “upstairs” as soon possible, where he became President of the Senate.

McKurn objected bitterly to Kydd’s decision—in public. Privately, he was perfectly happy with the arrangement. He avoided the burdens and pressures all ministers faced—and the prominence which could have led to undue scrutiny of his activities. Much better, he knew, to work through proxies like Cracken.

As Senate President, McKurn had a plushly appointed office with its own dining room and garden, duties that were light, often ceremonial, and occasionally tedious. He had the responsibility, shared with the Vice-President of the Senate from the opposition party, of running the affairs of the Senate, presiding over its meetings, and meeting heads of state and other prominent visitors as the Senate’s representative. And in his hands were certain jealously guarded powers, such as control over the Senate’s agenda.

A few minutes after noon McKurn, sitting in the President’s chair, acceded to Labor Party Senator Felix Haughtry’s request for permission to introduce a private member’s bill.

McKurn’s ruling was met with considerable surprise. The senators expected the next item on the agenda would be the last: a motion to adjourn.

Haughtry proposed an extension of the libel and slander laws to expand the definition of “publish” to include the conduits for libellous information, including internet service providers and even the owners of the wires and cables that browsers used to access websites around the world.

“It should be clear,” Haughtry was saying, “from the recent slanderous and anonymous attacks on one of our most senior members—the kind of cowardly and vicious attack that could happen to any one of you, to any person of any station in life, prominent of not—that the libel laws were written for another age, and need to be updated to meet the realities of today’s world of instantaneous, electronic communication. . . .”

Haughtry’s words were greeted with gasps that onlookers took be ones of amazement. They were, but from three different impulses: appreciation, for the sneaky and audacious way in which McKurn was clearly demonstrating his power; disapproval from the freedom-of-speech champions present, at the outrageous extension of the libel and slander laws into areas they were never meant to go; and fear, as Senators, journalists and visitors in the galleries who understood what was going on looked at Haughtry with the question in their minds: What has McKurn got on him?

*****

WHILE SENATOR HAUGHTRY WAS presenting his private member’s bill in the Senate, a McKurnWatch email landed in subscribers’ inboxes:

McKurnWatch.com

“The website that must not be named”

We must interrupt the fascinating “Frankie McKurn Saga”—even though we’re still in the “prologue” stage of this riveting historical drama—for the very latest (though not, sad to say, concluding) installment.

But . . .

Roll out the champagne, Boy & Girls. Not-so-young-any-more Frankie has been caught in the act!

There can be no doubt that Frankie’s still up to his old tricks, and that he’s risen up the rungs of corruption from sly grog bouncer to the rarefied level of corporate crime.

A loyal reader—one of those techie people (I presume) who builds gadgets to listen into other people’s cellphone conversations (naughty, naughty) was kind enough to send in a recording of Frankie on the phone. Just click on Frankie’s nose in the cartoon (you can’t miss it) to hear Frankie’s liquid tones for yourself, talking to . . . WHO?

That’s the question . . . though everything else is clear (as you’ll find out for yourself when you “listen in”): Frankie’s up to his eyeballs in a scam with some shady stock promoter to fix permits and permissions so they can both make a killing in the stock market.

But, as I mentioned, there’s still the question: WHO is Frankie talking to? If you think you can identify Frankie’s partner-in-crime, just nominate your candidate in the comment box below.

The first person to correctly identify this mystery voice will be the first person honoured in “The McKurnWatch Hall of Fame.”

Naturally, you may prefer NOT to use your real name—no problem: no names, no pack drill (and when dealing with a sleaze like Senator Frank McKurn, that’s a good policy to follow).

Of course, if you use a pseudonym you won’t be able to bask in the glory of blowing the whistle on young Frankie. Beats wearing concrete boots, though, don’t you think?

Happy guessing.
— The McKurn Watcher

PS. My apologies if you’ve had any problems reaching McKurnWatch.com recently. Somebody (it’s not hard to guess who) has been attacking the website, flaming it, trying to overburden the servers and shut us down. They did succeed—but not for long. Now, with mirror sites all over the place and other defensive measures, future access won’t be a problem (tough luck, Frankie).

Within two hours, 179 people had nominated seventeen different candidates as “The Voice”—some of them clearly frivolous. Shortly afterwards, a reporter from The Western Miner phoned Lester Edleton, a Perth-based stock promoter with a shady reputation, and asked whether he had ever spoken to Senator Frank McKurn.

“Yeah, I have. So what?” Edleton said—and, as the reporter recorded the conversation, his words were broadcast nationwide ten minutes later on News24/7.

“And you talked to him about the problems you’ve had getting permits for your Metal Mountain Exploration company?”

“I did—and what’s wrong with that?

“Depends what you talked about. For example, did you offer him stock to ‘fix’ the problems for you?”

“Don’t be ridiculous. I just assumed he’s a smart bastard and knows a quick buck when it’s staring him in the face.”

“So Senator McKurn is not one of your shareholders . . . ?

“Look, mate, the share register’s an open book. McKurn’s name isn’t on it—you can check for yourself.”

“Do you stand by your statement that Aborigines should be lined up and shot?”

“I was angry—I am angry,” said Edleton. “This native title business has tied the mining industry hand and foot. It’s totally unreasonable—did you know that over fourteen thousand applications to mine are held up because of it—just in Western Australia? Every Australian is poorer because hundreds of millions, maybe billions of dollars of minerals under the ground can’t be exported—not to mention the thousands of jobs that haven’t been created.”

When the News24/7 announcer came back on the air, he tersely added that “Senator McKurn was unavailable for comment.”

The implication was: “Senator McKurn doesn’t wish to comment.” But McKurn was at that moment discharging his duties as President of the Senate. It wasn’t till an hour later, when the Senate had adjourned, that a reporter managed to get through to McKurn.

“What if some people think this Edleton guy is a sharp operator?” McKurn said, his anger muted but still evident. “So what? He’s a voter too and last time I looked he’s still entitled to talk to his representatives in Parliament. And if he thinks everyone else is like him, that’s his problem, not mine. My finances are an open book. I own no shares, only investment trusts—which are all invested in blue chips.”

“And do you agree with him that Aboriginals should be lined up and shot?”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” McKurn snapped. “But there’s no question some of these native title restrictions go too far.”

“The implications of that phone call—”

“You realize it’s illegal to tap a phone conversation without a court order. I’m going to insist the police find out who this hacker is and that he suffers the full consequences of his illegal—and unconscionable—action.”

Good luck, Alison McGuire chuckled: she was lounging comfortably in her office, the grin on her face larger than the Cheshire Cat’s.

“What promises did you make to Lester Edleton, Senator?”

“Promises?” McKurn laughed. “All I said I’d do is look into it, and if I thought he had a case I’d submit my opinion to the appropriate regulators.”

“So what did you tell the ‘appropriate regulators’?”

“As it turned out, the area he wanted to explore is mainly on Aboriginal land, so it was up to the leaders of that Aboriginal community to say ‘yea’ or ‘nay,’ not the state or federal government. So there was nothing for me to do.”

Alison McGuire switched the radio off as the announcer’s voice replaced McKurn’s.

He’s rattled, she thought with a smile, but she couldn’t help but admire the way McKurn had persuasively protested his innocence—and subtly brushed off every question. Polished . . . but will it convince anyone? Where there’s smoke. . . .

With Melanie’s help reducing her burden, Alison felt much lighter. With pressure mounting on McKurn from more and more fronts, maybe he’d make a fatal mistake. And the taps of McKurn’s “unlisted” cellphone held out the promise of a breakthrough.

She heard McKurn’s all but abusive anger as he ordered someone to find whoever was behind McKurnWatch.com.

And when we find him, what do we do?

I don’t give a shit, so long as he’s stopped.

There were a few conversations with Cracken and other of his supporters in the party room, discussing the numbers. “We’ve got to be prepared,” McKurn had said. “Royn hasn’t got a post-Kydd plan; we have, so we have one advantage. And who knows what Kydd’s health is really like? What if he drops dead tomorrow? It pays to be prepared.”

And an unknown voice asked, “How much longer are you going to be able to protect me, Frankie?”

*****

“YOUR APARTMENT’S CLEAN, ALISON.” Federal Police Sergeant Jason Kowalski grinned suggestively as he packed up his debugging equipment.

“Thanks, Jason,” she said, smiling wanly in return. “I appreciate it.”

“No problem,” he said. “I still don’t understand why you think someone might be bugging you.”

“Put it down to paranoia,” Alison replied. “But—there are ways of bugging besides putting a listening device on a phone, aren’t there?”

“Oh yes. If you have authorized access to the phone company’s computers. That’s how we do it.”

“I see. . . .”

“Time for a nightcap?” Jason asked, looking puzzled.

“Sorry, Jason. Not tonight. I’m too tired.”

“You know, Alison, it seems like you’ve been very antisocial this past few weeks.”

“I’ve just been so busy,” she said, giving him a peck on the cheek. “You’re still as sweet as ever, Jason. But it’s time for me to go to my bed—” Jason looked at her hopefully as she pushed him gently on his chest in the direction of the door “—and for you to go to yours.”

It was true; she had been busy. Every Wednesday night, staffers from Parliament House gathered at restaurants and bars in Kingston, a short walk from her apartment. On weekends were barbecues and parties. For the past two weeks she’d turned down every invitation. She frequently saw Jason at such get-togethers and, occasionally, they’d meet for a quiet dinner or a drink. Jason always, not so subtly, attempted to revive the brief relationship they’d once had.

When she’d first come to Canberra, journalists, other staffers, even politicians—not all of them single—had invited her on dates. She’d found that simply fluttering her eyelids was an easy way to loosen a man’s tongue. There was a journalist in the press gallery—witty, urbane—who, she later realized, reminded her of Derek Olsson. Their shared idealism had initially drawn them together; as he became jaded and cynical, they drifted apart until their interest in politics was all they had left in common.

At the next election a tall, blond, handsome man entered Parliament as its youngest member. Just a few years older than she, Bruce Spring had won his seat as a “new breed of Conservative.” In his maiden speech he elegantly declared that “government per se is not the problem; too much government is. Nor, as the members of Her Majesty’s Loyal Opposition would have it, is government the solution. Government has its proper role: to provide the basic legal, security, and infrastructure framework which enables society to flourish. And to always stand ready to help. Not to interfere, not to command or deny, but to assist people to lift themselves up by their own bootstraps—especially those among us who are disadvantaged in some way. Ultimately, happiness comes from self-actualization and the fulfillment of one’s own dreams. That, of course, is something no one—and certainly not government—can give another person. What government can and definitely should do is limit itself to building, as it were, the scaffolding that makes possible and fosters individual and community achievement.”

With Bruce Spring, she found a unity of purpose she’d never experienced before. She brought him into Royn’s circle and they enthusiastically championed each other’s policy ideas; Spring, within the party, Alison, to Royn and sometimes Kydd. Her memories of Derek faded into the background, as if that part of her life was over, done and dealt with.

But as Spring jockeyed for position within the party hierarchy, Alison began to get the uncomfortable feeling that Spring’s commitment to any cause other than the cause of Bruce Spring was little more than skin-deep. That feeling flourished into an open break come the next election, three years later. With the polls favoring Labor, Kydd announced a slew of what he called “give-backs”—little more than using the government’s budget surplus to buy himself the election. Tax cuts were promised; welfare was handed out to groups thought to favor Labor; hospitals, schools, roads, bridges, and police forces—mostly in marginal electorates tipping towards the opposition—suddenly received new largesse. Spring enthusiastically championed Kydd’s proposals, and merely shrugged when Alison pointed out that most of them went against his declared political philosophy. “To achieve anything, Alison, we have to win.”

“No matter what?” she replied. From his answer she concluded he was just another political opportunist.

That was all before Derek Olsson suddenly came back to complicate her life after a seven-year absence . . . that he still hadn’t fully explained. She shook her head. Never mind that now.

25 Rolling the Dice

A HELICOPTER SWUNG AROUND K’mah, the cone-shaped hill at the center of Jazeerat el-Bihar. At a leisurely pace, it made a full circuit twice before landing on the peak. A single Australian soldier stepped out. As the helicopter lifted back into the air and turned towards the Australian base the soldier unfurled a white flag, sat down . . . and waited.

For some forty minutes the soldier sat unmoving, hearing and seeing nothing, until three men stepped silently out of the brush like ghosts, guns at the ready and trained on him. He eyed them carefully, part of his brain admiring their clear military discipline which contradicted their motley dress, a mixture of cast-off uniforms, jeans, T-shirts, military boots, sandshoes, and flip-flops. But their AK-47s, if not new, all looked clean and well oiled, and the men held them as if they knew exactly how to use them. Moving very slowly, the soldier raised his hands above his head and rose to his feet.

More men appeared, making not the slightest sound, surrounding the soldier. The first three moved forward until one stood in front of him, the barrel of his gun a mere meter from his chest. The second man opened the flap of his holster. It was empty. The third emptied his knapsack, kept the radio and cellphone and put everything else back.

The soldier studied the man in front of him in mutual silence. At least a head shorter, he was a small, wiry man, with a leathery dark-brown face and a huge white grin. His intelligent eyes exuded a sense of authority the soldier could almost touch.

“Matalam,” he said when the third man finished repacking the knapsack, slung his AK-47 over his shoulder, and indicated with a gesture that the soldier should sit.

“Mata—?” the soldier repeated. “Oh. . . .” He nodded. “Thank you.”

They both sat, the small, wiry man sitting comfortably balanced on his heels.

The others relaxed too, but the soldier noticed their eyes were fixed on him.

Another guerrilla, looking as if he should still have been in school, asked, “Who you?”

“Lieutenant Jeremy McGuire.”

“What want?”

“I came here to ask you if you could tell me anything about a woman by the name of Karla Preston.”

The man Karla had named Mountain Man smiled. “Ah, Presdon-gaat.”

THE DAY BEFORE, JEREMY had told Captain McMurray: “I’d like to go in alone, sir. Unarmed.”

“Why alone? Why not in force?”

“They know the ground and we don’t. There’ll be casualties, most of them ours. If we go in shooting they won’t be any mood to give us any information later on. If I go in alone, they might talk to me.”

“And they might just shoot you.”

“That’s a possibility,” Jeremy said. “But I don’t think they will.”

“Why not? They shot a Sandeman soldier not so long ago.”

“That was the first, and only casualty ever on this island. Sandeman troops went all the way across without a challenge. As you know from Lieutenant Sanders’ report, they found the guerrillas’ hideout in the mountain, but they never saw one of them. My guess is the guerrillas simply melted away and came back in behind them. If it had been any of those groups on St. Christopher’s it would have been a different story. Everything indicates this group favors Gandhi-like tactics.”

“Can you prove that, lieutenant?”

“No, sir.” Jeremy spoke stiffly, reacting to McMurray’s “lieutenant.” “But that’s my considered opinion from circumstantial evidence.”

“You could be right, Jeremy. If you’re wrong, what then?”

“You can send in a force to retrieve my body.”

“Okay,” said McMurray after a long pause. “Put it in writing.”

When McMurray approved his plan, he added, “You’ve got twenty-four hours. If you haven’t come out by then, we’ll come in and get you.”

*****

THE INTENSE OPPOSITION TO Senator Haughtry’s proposed extension of the libel and slander laws was a major story on that morning’s TV and radio news: the media, the phone and cable companies, even supermarket chains, all fearing they’d be caught in Haughtry’s wider net, were forming a united front to shoot it down.

The media hadn’t picked up that McKurn was the real motive force behind Haughtry’s bill. Alison sent the geek a message: Haughtry is in McKurn’s pocket. Can’t prove it at the moment—but am positive.

But it was the page one headline on Business Day, the national financial daily, that grabbed Alison’s attention: Lester Edleton’s Chequered History: Metal Mountain, His Latest Questionable Venture.

She snatched it up and started reading the article before sitting down.

Yesterday’s revelation that Lester Edleton had talked to Senator Frank McKurn about securing mining permits for his company, Metal Mountain Exploration NL [No Liability], is not the first time the Perth stock promoter has been a center of controversy.

He first came to the mining industry’s attention ten years ago as “Manager, Investor Relations” for high-flying Kalgoorlie Nickel Ventures, whose stock went from a few cents to more than $100 a share in a matter of months, and then collapsed back under a dollar. Edleton’s explanation at the time: “We drilled here and found nickel, and the price went up. We drilled half-a-mile away and found nickel and the price skyrocketed. We drilled in between and found nothing, and the price collapsed.”

In the subsequent ASIC investigation, several of the company’s officers, who’d dumped their shares just before the last drilling report was released, were convicted of insider trading. Edleton was under suspicion, but was never charged: although he sold most of his shares between $90 and $100, his selling took place before the third drill hole was completed.

After being involved in several speculative mining ventures which never got off the ground, he aggressively promoted Grubstake Mining NL: its stock price rose from 45 cents to a high of $5 based on several promising drilling reports. Accounting irregularities led to an ASIC investigation which revealed that, among other things, Edleton had used Grubstake Mining NL as his personal bank account. Trading in Grubstake Mining NL’s shares was suspended. Under pressure from ASIC, Edleton resigned as managing director and the company was placed in voluntary administration. When the administrator demanded Edleton repay the money he’d “borrowed,” Edleton, whose main asset was his now-unsalable shares in the company, filed for bankruptcy. ASIC then banned him from being a director of an Australian company for life.

He reappeared a year ago as CEO of Metal Mountain Exploration NL; Edleton’s wife is the major shareholder and managing director. Metal Mountain’s share price zoomed when it announced the discovery of a rich gold deposit 250 kilometres north of Coolgardie, WA. The indications were the main deposit lay outside the boundaries of his tenement.

“We applied for permits next door,” Edleton told Business Day, “but when news leaked out about the expected size of the deposit, eight different Aboriginal groups claimed the area was sacred ground. Negotiations have proved fruitless.”

Edleton believes the gold deposit is “enormous,” and freely admits he talked “to anybody and everybody who might be able to help us get all the necessary permits.”

His first call to Senator McKurn was made about a month ago, when Metal Mountain was close to running out of cash and its share price had sunk from a high of $3.20 to 17 cents. Three weeks ago, two Zurich-based companies filed notices that they each owned more than 5% of Metal Mountain. As the share price continued to fall, these investors’ holdings have risen to 10% and 8.2% respectively. A third company, whose address is given “care of” a lawyer’s office in Vaduz, Liechtenstein, has accumulated 6.5%. As Edleton’s wife owns 53.5% of Metal Mountain, the remaining free float is now just 21.8% of the total shares.

The identity of the beneficial owners of these shares is veiled behind Switzerland’s and Liechtenstein’s tight secrecy laws. Of course, these new investors may be entirely legitimate. But it would not be the first time Australian investors have hidden behind a Swiss front to profit from inside information.

Holding the newspaper, Alison ran through the outer office towards Royn’s closed door. “He said he wasn’t to be disturbed,” Mary called, but Alison didn’t hear her—or ignored her cry—and rushed in breathlessly to stand in front of Royn’s desk.

Royn was talking on the phone; he glared as the door swung open; his face softened when he saw who it was. Nevertheless, he waved Alison irritably towards a chair, but she remained standing.

After a moment he said, “Can I call you back in ten or fifteen minutes? Something’s come up. . . . Thanks, bye.” Turning to Alison he said, “I instructed Mary I wasn’t to be interrupted,” Royn said.

“Sorry, Minister. I didn’t realize.”

“Okay,” he sighed, “what’s so important?”

“Did you see this morning’s Business Day?” she asked, waving the paper in his direction.

When Royn shook his head, she retold Edleton’s chequered history, concluding, “. . . and you’ll recall that while the Sandview HideAway Villas is managed by a Hong Kong-based boutique hotel operator, the property is owned by a Swiss company.”

“You’re thinking it could be the same owner as a shareholder in this gold company?”

Alison nodded. “But I don’t know how to find out.”

“I’ll call my broker,” said Royn. “He’ll know.” A moment later Royn turned to Alison, “He’s going to look it up now on the internet.” Royn repeated an address; Alison shook her head. “What’s the other address, Fred?” he asked. When Royn repeated it, Alison shrieked, “It’s the same. It must be—” She stopped when she saw Royn raise a finger to his lips.

“Thanks, Fred,” he said, putting down the phone. “So it’s the same address, huh?” he said to Alison. “But that doesn’t prove it’s the same ultimate owner.”

“No,” said Alison, suddenly looking deflated. “But a couple of weeks ago one of the Aboriginal leaders negotiating with Metal Mountain complained to the police he’d been threatened with violence if he didn’t come to an agreement.”

“Really?”

“Yes! And then all the Aborigines went walkabout leaving Metal Mountain with no one to negotiate with.” Alison laughed. “This has McKurn’s fingerprints written all over it—and it’s nice to know he’s not invincible.”

“It’s highly suggestive. But what can we do with this information?”

“I don’t know.”

“It looks like McKurn’s behind the scenes—but I can’t take it to court.”

“No, we need more information—but from Switzerland of all places?”

“Why don’t you ask the geek? You never know. . . .”

“I will,” said Alison. “Thank you, Minister.”

“I’d better get back to my phone call,” Royn said.

But Alison was already halfway out of his office.

*****

THE SHADOWS WERE LENGTHENING when Jeremy McGuire walked into the clearing at the bottom of K’mah where Sergeant Byrne and his platoon were waiting for him.

Mountain Man and his men had guided Jeremy down the hill, returned his radio and cellphone . . . and disappeared. Jeremy shook his head, wondering how they could do that—and how he and his men could learn to do the same.

“They claim they rescued Karla Preston from the Sandeman troops and put her on a boat, indicating the direction of Papua New Guinea,” he told McMurray later. “They were very courteous, very polite and friendly, and told me and showed me nothing. They’re excellent soldiers. Totally disciplined, extremely well-trained. On their home ground, definitely much better than we are. I think they know every rock and tree on that whole hill. You want their troops fighting with you, not against you. I saw about twenty in all, but I’d say there were more. And somewhere on that hill they have an excellent cook.”

“Did you get any sense of what they were after?”

“All they said was that everyone on the island wanted to be left alone to mind their own business, and if everybody else did the same it would be a much better world.”

“Hard to argue with. What did you say?”

“I said I could understand, but unfortunately I’m only a lieutenant, not a general.”

*****

IT WAS SEVEN THIRTY in the evening. Alison McGuire walked past a pub in central Sydney overflowing with the noise of happy drinkers. She passed a café, also busy, on the corner where she turned into Bridge Street where the traffic was light and she felt she was the only pedestrian on the street—though for a moment she had the impression someone ducked into a doorway behind her.

Halfway along the block, she stopped in front of an office building. Except for the reflections of streetlights and the few neon signs still flashing, the building’s sleek glass wall rising into the sky was completely dark. In the lobby, a doorman sat, bored, behind his small counter.

She pulled her overcoat tighter as a defence against the sudden gust of cold wind. The doorman looked at her quizzically, and she forced her feet to carry her up the wide marble steps into the lobby. She hesitated when she was asked to sign in, scribbled Andie Merton—not very imaginative—almost illegibly in the column headed name and took the lift to the seventh floor.

The offices of Andrews, Zolisky & Smythe, Solicitors, occupied the entire seventh floor. Behind glass doors at one end of the lift lobby was a lavish but dimly lit reception area. Alison pressed the buzzer next to the keypad and waited, shifting her weight from one foot to the other, her eyes glued to the second hand on the clock on the wall behind the counter. It seemed to stick for so long at each mark before jerking to the next that, she thought, its battery must be running down.

But only twenty-four seconds passed when a flabby, pasty-faced, balding middle-aged-looking man scurried into the lobby, eyed her sideways, leant over the counter—a movement which was followed by a click from the lock in front of her—and continued his scurry across the lobby to pull the door open.

Alison realized her initial impression of him was mistaken. He was not middle-aged but probably a bit younger than she was. No grey or white was visible amongst the thinning, nondescript brown of his hair, which was brushed carefully over the bald spot on top of his head. She decided he must be one of those men who go prematurely bald, a conclusion confirmed when she noticed the clumps of hair, like rows in a plantation, across the front of his receding hairline. He was also taller than she’d thought at first glance—or would be if he didn’t walk with a permanent stoop: his shoulders hunched and his head looking in the direction of the floor rather than straight ahead.

“You must be Ivan,” she said.

The man nodded. “And you are . . . ?” he asked.

“Alison McGuire.”

“Oh yes,” Ivan said sheepishly, turning his eyes away. “Of course.”

She suppressed a grin at the realization that Ivan had been looking at the outline of her breasts under the coat and not her face, as if it were them he recognized.

“Follow me, please.”

Through another door protected with a keypad lock, Ivan led her into a large space crowded with a maze of empty legal cubicles inhabited only by eyeless computer screens, past a conference room and wood-panelled partner’s office to what appeared to be a blank wall at the end of the kitchen area. As Ivan ran a card through another keypad and then punched a code, Alison saw the door: it was embedded into the wall, a thin line that could easily be mistaken for decoration.

Ivan pushed the door open saying, “Welcome to the inner sanctum.” Alison walked through and felt a shiver as the door swung noiselessly shut behind her.

She stood in a long narrow room. Cupboards and shelves untidily stacked with books, papers, printers and computer supplies lined the wall behind her. As if by way of contrast, the counter under the windows was scrupulously neat, except for one dirty coffee cup. The windows were heavily barred, frosted glass, letting in light but not sight. Three desktop computers sat on the counter, one with two enormous screens.

“Now,” said Ivan. His voice squeaked as though it needed oiling; he gazed at her ankles, with occasional sideways glances at her body. “The Senator said to show you anything you wanted to see. Not that there’s much to see.”

Alison grasped that in this effectively windowless, locked room, Ivan was at home. He can deal with computers—but not people. And women? Has he ever had a girlfriend . . . one who cared for him, not his money?

“Well,” Alison said, the hint of a purr in her voice, “it may not look like much, but appearances can be deceptive, can’t they?” She took a slow step towards the counter, letting her handbag fall on the countertop.

Ivan’s gaze move upwards from her ankles to her knees. “I suppose so. But, what do you mean?”

“Only that—” She stopped. “It’s nice and warm in here. Is it okay if I hang my coat on this chair?” Her hand reached out to touch the fabric on the back of one of the chairs, almost a caress.

Ivan nodded without a word.

“From what little I understand—” as she spoke, she slowly removed her overcoat, one arm at a time, with exaggerated movements “—it all sounds so complicated.”

Ivan seemed to stand a little straighter; Alison smiled, and draped the coat carefully over the back of the chair. “That’s better.” She unbuttoned her cardigan so it hung around her loosely.

Ivan’s eyes were now fixated on the plunging neckline of Alison’s blouse. “I suppose it is fairly complex,” Ivan said, a touch of pride in his voice.

“Oh yes,” Alison purred admiringly, especially to “poor little me,” she thought to herself, stifling her desire to laugh. “So, Ivan,” she asked, “where do you keep the videos?”

Ivan looked at another door, set at the right-hand end of the narrow office.

“The Senator did say to show me everything, after all.”

Ivan nodded, turning reluctantly to unlock the door which required a key on top of a card swipe and a code. Alison followed Ivan into a small windowless room, goose bumps covering her arms and legs at the gust of cold air coming from the open door.

“It’s cold in here,” Alison said, pulling the cardigan around her. Her eyes were held by the DVD boxes and hard drives, stacked three or four deep, on the shelves lining most of the four walls of the small room. There must be hundreds and hundreds, and on one of them. . . .

“Yes. These servers,” said Ivan, pointing to what looked like two ordinary computers that were a bit larger than desktops, “have to be kept cool all the time.” He paused while Alison’s gaze slowly reacted to his voice. “One of them’s a backup—a fail-safe. They’re continuously recording, twenty-four hours a day.” Between the two servers was a rack of hard drives, their lights flashing.

“You keep everything?”

“Oh no,” Ivan said. “They automatically overwrite the oldest file until I instruct otherwise. We’re linked to the hotel’s reservation systems, so I know who has a booking, and I’m notified whenever someone checks into the honeymoon suite, and who they are.”

“Do the hotel people know that?”

“Oh no,” Ivan smiled, looking pleased with himself. “It all happens automatically, and they have absolutely no idea.”

“I see,” said Alison. “So how do you decide which ones to keep?”

“Well, I might recognize the name. But you’d be surprised how many times ‘Mr. and Mrs. Smith’ and ‘Mr. and Mrs. Jones’ check into that suite.” His cheeks went pink, his voice level dropping so Alison had to strain to hear his words. “So quite often I have to look to decide whether to keep it or not.”

“And some names are flagged for an upgrade to the honeymoon suite, is that right?”

“Ah . . . quite so,” Ivan said as he studied the interlinked strands of different-colored fabric in carpet.

“What happens next?” Alison asked.

Ivan pointed to a regular desktop computer next to the servers. “The videos files are compressed and transferred to DVDs and external hard drives through this computer. The originals, of course, are being overwritten all the time by the next recording.”

“What happens to the copies?” Alison asked.

“One set of DVDs is kept here, along with an external hard drive.” Ivan waved at the crowded shelves. “The Senator takes the other DVD, and the second hard drive. When I’ve made the copies, I play one on the two-screen computer outside.”

“That could take hours—days.”

“It could, but I don’t really watch them. I just run them through at high speed until I see what looks like one of—”

“—the juiciest bits.”

Ivan blushed again and nodded. “Right,” he mumbled. “And when I’ve made about a dozen prints, I stop, and put everything back in here.”

“So no one really watches the whole video?”

“Oh no. Even though the cameras are set so they don’t transmit anything when the room is dark—there’d be no picture,” he explained, “most of what’s recorded is just an empty room.”

“So if the couple turns off the lights when they go to bed . . . ?”

Ivan shrugged. “There may not be anything worth seeing. One se—” Embarrassed, Ivan stopped and started again. “One guy did that, but there were plenty of torrid scenes on the sofa in the other room his wife would find highly persuasive. The only time I might go through the whole recording is when I have to make an edited version. But the prints nearly always do the trick—at least, that’s what I assume.”

Alison gritted her teeth to stop herself from nodding in agreement. “But when you’re editing, or making prints,” she asked, “someone else could see what you’re working on it.”

“Oh no.” Ivan shook his head vigorously. “I only do it at night or weekends, when no one else is here.”

“So the only copies are the ones in this room and the ones the Senator has.”

“Right,” Ivan nodded.

“There’s just one thing, Ivan,” she said, edging slightly nearer to him. “You’re here all alone, so you could make as many copies of these—” her arm swept the room “—as you care to.”

“Oh no,” Ivan protested. “I could never do that. I—I wouldn’t, I . . . couldn’t betray the Senator.”

For the first time, Ivan lifted his face to look directly at Alison, except his eyes kept flicking every which way, rolling around like those of a snared rabbit. He shook his head in sharp, short, violent movements. “Never.”

Ivan’s the weak link in McKurn’s security, she thought, wondering what kind of leverage would be needed to change his mind. She could feel the waves of helpless fear emanating from his shaking body, and it came to her that he was completely defenceless, that she could immobilize him in one swift movement—and remove the copies of her with Olsson from the shelf. If I can find them, she added mentally as she noticed the boxes were identified only by number.

What good would it do me? McKurn still has a backup.

Alison reached out and placed her hand gently on his arm, just above the elbow; he flinched, as though her fingers carried an electric shock. “I understand, Ivan,” she said softly, gripping his arm a little harder in emphasis.

Then she stepped back and asked, “How does the signal come from the cameras to here? Over the internet?”

“Oh no,” he said, relieved to be talking about bits and bytes again, “over a dedicated high-speed line. These servers are not connected to the internet.”

“Who set up the cameras in the honeymoon suite? You?”

Ivan nodded.

“And all the wiring?”

Ivan nodded again.

“Didn’t the hotel staff suspect something?”

“No. It was done while renovations were in progress. Nobody noticed a few extra workmen.”

“But, to get here,” Alison said, gesturing towards the servers, “the signal travels from the cameras through a phone company’s wires, right?”

Ivan smiled serenely as if he knew what she would say next.

“So someone could tap into that line anywhere along its route?”

“Of course. Quite easily done.” Then Ivan grinned broadly, reminding Alison of a little boy who just put something over on you. “But the signal’s encrypted—you know, scrambled—so it wouldn’t do them any good.”

“It seems you’ve thought of everything,” Alison said admiringly.

Ivan beamed at her compliment. “I believe I have.”

“I suppose, then, I’ve seen everything there is to see in here.”

“That’s right.”

Stepping into the other room she asked, “What goes on in here, then?”

“Oh—other stuff,” Ivan said noncommittally as he closed the door behind him. He pointed at the two large screens. “That’s where I do the editing.”

Alison nodded. “But that computer’s on the internet, isn’t it?”

“Yes, but I always take it offline first.”

Except when you forget, Alison thought as she spied a faint flush on Ivan’s pale cheeks. “So why have all this here, tucked away in the back of a solicitor’s office?”

Ivan shrugged. “That’s where it is. That’s all I know.”

Or all you’ll tell me. The words “legal privilege” flashed into her mind. An extra layer of protection against prying eyes—and camouflage.

As Alison retrieved her jacket and her handbag, she saw a label with a printed number affixed to a phone. She leant closer to read it, repeated it to herself silently several times while tracing the numbers on her palm as an aid to memory.

“That’s it for now then, I guess,” she said, taking one last look at the room.

Ivan shepherded her back to the lift lobby. Waiting for the lift, she saw him take out his cellphone as he disappeared into the interior offices of Andrews, Zolisky & Smythe.

SHE WAS BUTTONING HER coat against the cold when her cellphone rang.

“What’s the verdict?” McKurn asked.

“Ah, Senator,” she said. He didn’t waste any time. “Well . . . your security looks pretty good—but not quite good enough, I’m afraid.”

“Naturally, I’d welcome any suggestions for improvements—but I’ve done as much as I’m able and willing to do to reassure you. So it’s time for your final answer. Yes, or no.”

“You mean—right now?”

“That’s exactly what I mean.”

She felt her whole body protesting—and heard the cold, unfeeling words of the ageless voice inside her mind, What choice do you have, Alison?

“I—I’ll call you back in an hour.” She closed her phone without giving McKurn the opportunity to respond.

She stopped in the first pub she came to and ordered a double brandy at the bar. For medicinal purposes, she thought. She swirled the brandy in the snifter and brought it to her lips. She spluttered slightly at her too-large a gulp, but she could feel the warmth sliding down her throat and beginning to spread through her body. Slow down, Alison, she thought to herself.

As she made herself sip the rest of the brandy at a leisurely pace she forced herself to focus on the whirlwind of thoughts, options and possibilities competing for her attention. But in the foreground of her mind was an image she couldn’t push away, no matter how hard she tried: the flabby folds of flesh on McKurn’s grotesque, naked body.

She drained the last drop of brandy and stared at the empty glass. “Same again, Miss?” the bartender asked.

Alison began to hand the glass across the bar but said, “No,” in a tone more suitable for McKurn than the bartender. She didn’t notice his strange look as she stood and walked outside in the refreshingly freezing air.

I’ve got to think, she told herself. She began walking aimlessly along the mostly deserted streets of central Sydney’s office district, telling, willing herself to Think, Alison. Think, think, think.

Time, I need more time. It’s as though nothing has really changed—except time is running out.

The geek . . . McKurnWatch . . . the Candyman Inquiry . . . Royn’s private eye . . . she thought of everything she’d put in motion, of all the possibilities they held out . . . provided there was enough time for those possibilities to become real.

If she could just put McKurn off somehow . . . but how long did she need? A week? Two? A month? There’s no way of knowing. She had to agree—and then delay, delay, delay.

The shock of her cellphone interrupted her thoughts. It can’t be an hour. She looked at her watch: over an hour had passed.

There’s never enough time.

“Time’s up, Alison.”

“It is? I suppose it is,” she said.

“What’s your answer?”

“Tell me, Senator, what have you got on Ivan?”

McKurn chuckled. “I said no more questions, Alison. But maybe I’ll give you an answer tomorrow night.”

“Tomorrow night? You must be joking, Senator.”

“No, Alison, I’m not. Either we have a deal or we don’t. And if we do, you’re in Sydney, I’m in Sydney, so why wait to consummate it?”

A thousand and one reasons, she thought. “If my answer is ‘Yes’,” she said.

“And what is your answer?”

What choice do I have? Delay . . . delay. “I can make tomorrow night—but I doubt you’d enjoy yourself, Senator.”

“Oh—why?”

“It’s that time of the month.”

“Hmm,” McKurn grunted doubtfully. “Next Saturday, then.”

I can’t do this, she thought, again imagining McKurn’s grotesque, naked body.

“Are you still there?”

“I guess you leave me no choice.”

“Is that a ‘Yes’?”

I can’t say “yes,” and I can’t say “no.”

“Alison?”

“Yes,” she said weakly, fumbling as she put her cellphone back into her handbag.

Before she could take a step, Alison’s vision blurred, everything turned black, the world began to spin. A funeral march beat upon her ears, to the sound of cackling laughter. She felt herself beginning to fall and reached out to a wall. Leaning against it, she squeezed her eyes shut; slowly, the dizziness started to fade. When she felt able to let her eyes flutter open, she saw the music and laughter was coming from a bar two doors away.

As soon as she felt able to move, she flagged down the first passing taxi and collapsed into the back seat.

THE DARK WINDOWS AND the light over the front door were signals her parents had long ago gone to sleep. Just as well, Alison thought when she saw her reddened eyes, pale cheeks, the tortured reflection of a ghost in the bathroom mirror. She felt tired—wrung out but unable to sleep. Tiptoeing back to the living room, she poured herself a large helping of her father’s Scotch and sat sipping and brooding on the sofa until she felt herself nodding off.

Her feet dragged behind her like ingots of lead as she turned towards her bedroom. Halfway she stumbled and stood, gazing blankly into the dullness of the corridor ahead, unable to remember which way to go. As she was standing in front of a door, she opened it. But I’m sure I left the light on, she thought groggily. About to step into a musty lightless room, she knew she’d opened the long-closed door of her old bedroom by mistake.

Without her conscious volition, with the feeling but not the words of the thought it’s now or never, the muscles in her arm impelled her hand to reach out and flick on the light.

Her old bedroom had become a storeroom, filled with memories . . . her memories. . . . Books, mostly dog-eared, having first passed through her many cousins’ hands; dolls and cuddly toys missing arms or legs, or covered in patches; half a Meccano set; a box of Lego made from the remains of an unknown number of hand-me-downs; a dollhouse her father had painstakingly and lovingly rebuilt from the remains of three others.

A raggedy one-armed teddy bear her mother had sewn together from two others sat atop the dollhouse. “Ted!” she exclaimed with delight as she stepped inside to pick him up and clasp him to her chest. “So this is where you’ve been all this time.”

Hugging Ted, she slowly turned full circle, remembering her life as a galaxy of flashing sparks stretching into the far distance. . . .

But no longer. . . .

Now, bent under the weight of her present, she stood on the edge of the universe beyond where there was—not the black darkness that comes from an absence of light but a blank nothingness.

Assailed by the smell of mothballs and dust, she let her eyes stray slowly from her old desk to the bed. I guess hardly anyone comes in here. And with a sharp, indrawn breath she remembered: I haven’t been in here since . . . since. . . .

Alison screamed.

Squeezing Ted hard she ran out of the room slamming the door behind her.

She leant trembling against the wall, her breath coming in deep sobs.

“Alison.” Maggie McGuire stepped into the corridor, tying her dressing gown around her with Joe, rubbing his eyes, his face twisted with fear and concern, close behind her.

“Alison,” Maggie cried. “You didn’t go in there, did you . . . ?”

Alison collapsed into her mother’s arms. “Oh, Mama, Mama,” she cried.

26 The Ice Queen

“IT’S OUR LUCKY DAY.”

Three youths stood in the doorway to her bedroom, their eyes glinting and roving over her body with delight. Their look was not the shy longing and poorly disguised desire of the boys at school but shameless, naked lust.

The sound of the door being smashed open still rang in her ears, drowning out the loud music she’d been playing . . . the music, she now realized, which masked every other sound.

Alison leapt up from her desk where she’d been buried in her books. Glaring at them she snapped, “Get out of here,” and sprung at them, her fists aiming at the nearest face.

They laughed.

They caught her arms as she moved to punch them, threw her on her bed and ripped off her clothes. She struggled, she kicked, she scratched—wishing for the first time her nails were long and sharp so they’d leave bloody tracks on their faces and arms while at the same time trying to use her hands to hold her bra in place. She twisted her legs into a knot to protect herself and they roughly pulled them apart. When a hand came close to her face she bit deeply, smiling for a brief moment at the bitter taste of blood. Then sharp daggers of pain covered her scalp as a hand yanked her hair hard, snapping her head down. Her face was slapped once, twice, three times, leaving deep red and blue welts on her pale cheeks. She screamed, she yelled, she swore, she prayed for God’s help. They turned the music up even louder; nobody heard her screams.

They held her down on her bed, her arms and legs locked in bruising grips, while they took turns raping her. She screamed even louder as she felt herself being penetrated, torn, shredded; again and again. Unstoppable tears streamed down her face, her body wracked until she was overcome by a terrifying numbness as though her body had disappeared. She cursed them until her throat was so hoarse her words became the meaningless, unintelligible sounds of a tortured animal. Only God could help her now; she pleaded to Him desperately to send them all to hell, unable to understand why He was taking so long to rescue her. . . .

A DAZED, LIMP BAG of skin, the act of gasping for air, like a corpse coming back from the dead, brought back the pain in waves of razor-like slashes. I’m being punished for the crime of . . . what? The pain went so deep she could feel it pounding in her very soul. Her favorite CD—she hated it now—still played at full volume. But she had no energy to move. . . .

But no hands gripped her arms; no weight held her down. They’re gone—and the pain hasn’t stopped! She touched herself and pulled her hand away, her fingertips wet. Blood.

I’ve been raped. I’ve been raped. I’m dirty, filthy, fallen . . . I want to die. . . . Like a sound from a distant horizon she heard Father Ryan’s voice, a fragment of a Sunday sermon . . . “. . . and God puts us here on earth to suffer so that through our suffering we will come to know His infinite love and the love of his Holy Son Jesus Christ and the Holy Ghost. . . .”

I have suffered, she thought. I am suffering . . . with my whole being . . . can this be what I deserve?—part of God’s Plan for me? With a last shudder she lapsed into merciful darkness, unable to grasp how this could be God’s way of showing His Infinite Love. . . .

MUSIC WAS BLARING THROUGH the shattered glass of a front window when Joe and Maggie returned from the movies: Alison’s music. While Joe fumbled for the front door key in seeming slow motion Maggie, shouting “Alison! Alison!” as if her voice even at its highest pitch could penetrate beyond the wall of throbbing sound, struggled to lever herself between the shards of glass in the open window. When Joe finally got the door open she shot under his arm as if she’d been blasted from a cannon.

She screamed: a long, hard piercing scream of woe that could be heard across the street as she found Alison naked on her bed, covered with dark bruises and stains of half-dried blood, curled up in a fetal ball, seemingly dead to the world.

“My baby, my baby!” she sobbed, trembling with the fear they’d come home far too late, the blood pounding through her veins with guilt at their laughter in the movie theater and the time they’d lingered on afterwards over a slow coffee. As she gathered Alison tightly in her arms, the flood of relief enveloped her as she felt the warmth of Alison’s body and saw the faint flutter of breath on her lips; relief which turned into a flood of tears at the wide, grisly wounds smeared across her once-pristine cheeks. At the same time, Maggie tried to cover her daughter with the bedspread as if she had four hands not just two.

Joe stood in the doorway, stunned into motionlessness. “My God! What the f— . . . what happened?” As if waking from a nightmare, he ran to help Maggie cover their daughter. His hand dragged the bedspread and brushed against Alison’s shoulder; her eyes fluttered briefly open; she cringed away from her father’s touch—her face a sculpture of terror.

Joe remained standing, mutely frozen in place but shrinking—as if his bones had turned to rubber. He started to shake, tears rolling one after another down his face.

Suddenly feeling like the only tower of strength, in a drill sergeant’s voice Maggie ordered, “Joe, make yourself useful. Turn that music off. Call Dr. McTavish. Get some blankets. And hot water—and towels. Now. Move!”

As Joe made the supreme effort to drag himself out the door he looked back to see Alison’s body shivering as if gripped by a nightmare, a picture that would never fade from his memory for as long as he would live.

Warmed by blankets and Maggie’s embrace, Alison’s breathing was coming more strongly by the time Dr. McTavish arrived, though in sudden pants, as if she were holding her muscles in chains against the pain of any movement until she had no choice but to hungrily gasp for air. Maggie talked to her softly, not knowing what to say and not sure of what she’d said, her mind in a whirl, cursing her impulse to go to a movie tonight of all nights, praying to God that Alison’s bruises would heal without leaving any scars as she wiped them as gently as she could with a warm towel while Alison whimpered quietly at the slightest touch.

Alison had yet to speak a word, but Maggie didn’t need to ask: the broken window, the smashed door of Alison’s room, her torn and mangled clothes strewn across the floor and the tracks of Alison’s blood spoke with heartbreaking silence. “I don’t understand,” she heard Joe say as Dr. McTavish stepped into the room. “This sort of thing just doesn’t happen around here. I’ve always thought it was such a safe street.” Maggie wondered if she’d ever feel safe in this house again.

From time to time, Alison’s eyes would open and look at her mother’s face through red waves of mist. Alison’s wide eyes held hers as they had when she was a baby but they were now dull, more black than blue, her sparkling life nowhere to be found; on her face was the expression of a hurt kitten and an unanswerable question, “Why me?”

As McTavish’s large body and craggy face loomed over her, Alison gave out a dry sob and burrowed her head deeply into Maggie’s breast. Maggie looked at him with a mute plea for help. McTavish took everything in with a glance, nodded his head and stepped backwards out of her room, grabbing Joe by the shoulder as he moved, pushing him towards the living room.

“This will pass—eventually,” McTavish said, with as much conviction as he could muster.

“God, I hope so.”

“Joe, get yourself a whisky or something. And one for me too. And sit down while I make a couple of calls.”

The clock on the mantelpiece said 11:30. “I hope she’s still awake,” he muttered to himself as he dialled a number. A sleepy voice answered. “Dori, Mac here. There’s been a rape—can you come over right away? Please. She needs you.”

Then he called the police. “This is Dr. Graham McTavish. There’s been a rape and a break-in—certainly looks like that, anyway. Could you send someone over—but for Christ’s sake, whatever you do don’t send any men. . . . Please, get a policewoman out of bed if you have to. . . . No, this can’t wait till morning—and if you send a guy it will just make everything worse. Much worse. And one other thing: if you can, for God’s sake send a woman who’s really simpatico, if you know what I mean. . . . Yes, it’s that bad.”

A moment later Maggie came into the room. “She’s sleeping, thank God. If you can call it sleep,” she said, and as she collapsed next to Joe all her strength and apparent coolness deserted her.

“Quiet, Maggie,” McTavish said gently as she started to wail. “You’ll only wake her.” He handed her his Scotch. “Here, drink this.”

“Wha . . . wha . . . what are we going to do?”

“It’s going to be tough. You know that. For a while—maybe quite a while. But let’s think about it tomorrow. You know Dori—I mean, Dr. Doreen Hart? She’s on the way. Alison has to be examined. She’s been hurt. She bled, and she may have been damaged. The police are coming. Policewomen I hope. There’ll have to be samples taken, tests made—you know, things like that.”

“My God,” Maggie screamed, inconsolable. “She’s only fifteen. Oh, Heavenly Father,” she moaned, casting her eyes to the ceiling as if she could see beyond, “why did this have to happen? Why did this have to happen to her?”

ALMOST HIDDEN UNDER THE pile of blankets, Alison half-listened to Doreen Hart’s comforting voice as it droned steadily, hypnotically, the fingers glued to her mother’s hand slowly loosening their grip—only to tighten violently at words like “hospital,” “test,” and “examination.” No, she screamed in silence. No one will touch me again. Ever.

Dr. Hart’s gentle but unrelenting pressure ultimately swayed Alison to sigh in resignation, and nod her head. Ice cold air bit into her skin and soft fingers delicately touched her body; Alison, her teeth clenched, willed her body into acceptance—but her body seemed to have a mind of its own and every touch came with a different, stabbing memory.

Covered again, tucked in by her mother’s hands, she drifted into a restless sleep only to awaken at a strange new voice. Through heavy eyelids she saw a young woman’s pale face, framed by tousled hair, her expression a study in concern, while her fingers fidgeted with nervousness—or irritation. “Miss McGuire,” the woman said hesitantly, “I’m constable Annabelle Myers.”

As a novice constable and the lowest-ranking person at the local police station, it was Annabelle who had received the midnight call. Described by one of her instructors as “too emotional for the job,” she was unable to completely disguise the annoyance she’d felt at being brusquely ordered from her comfortable bed.

“I—I’m—I wish I didn’t have to disturb you right now, but I would like to ask you a few questions, if I may.”

Alison burrowed deeper under the blankets, saying nothing.

Alison was the first rape victim Annabelle had ever met; the first she’d had to question; and as her male partner, at Dr. McTavish’s insistence, scoured the house for evidence, it was the first time she’d had to handle anything entirely on her own. As she took in Alison’s reaction, she desperately tried to remember how she was supposed to behave in situations like these. But her coolness evaporated as her words erupted like a stream of lava boiling from a volcano’s peak, “I want to catch the animals who did this to you and put them where they belong—behind bars.” She dug her fingers into the edge of the mattress to stop her unconscious reaching out to Alison. And with an effort to control her voice added, “But I can only do that with your help.”

Maggie and Dr. Hart both gasped in surprise, but Alison’s eyes seemed to reflect the constable’s fire for a long moment as if they were the only two people in the room until, slowly and deliberately, she nodded her agreement. But as Annabelle asked her questions, Alison’s mouth would open but no answers would come—until Annabelle turned her interview into a grisly game of twenty questions. “How many? One?” Shake. “Two?” Shake. Her eyes widened, “Three?” Nod. “Oh, my God.”

As the wordless answers continued, the gaps between her questions lengthened as she seemed to match Alison’s terror with an inner terror of her own. After a longer pause, she said, “I—I—think I can make a preliminary report. But maybe I could talk to you again tomorrow?”

Alison mouthed a silent “Yes,” and her free hand inched across the bedspread to clutch Annabelle’s fingers in a surprisingly powerful grip.

ALISON AWOKE TO THE blinding glare of hot, harsh, unforgiving lights, to something piercing the skin somewhere between her legs. Her piercing wail shattered the unfamiliar voices chattering indifferently in the background into a hushed silence. She looked down to see herself covered in something blue; her eyes stopped on Doreen Hart who was leaning over her lower body; Alison glared at her accusingly.

“No, Alison,” Dr. Hart said, looking up with a sad smile, “it’s just a local anesthetic to take away any pain.”

A memory of a violent shudder drifted into Alison’s mind, her answer to the doctor’s distant voice when she had made the offer. Alison could feel a warm numbness spreading over her loins and a jumble of half-formed images . . . of being carried . . . of a siren that wailed without end . . . of phrases like “permanent damage” and the soft sound of her mother’s cry . . . tumbled through her mind.

“Can you feel anything?”

Dr. Hart’s soft voice jolted her back into the glaring light. She tried to make sense of what she was being asked, aware of something—as though her nerves were transmitting messages to her brain, messages that were empty of meaning or sensation. She continued to be aware that things were being done to her, but the more meaningful feeling was the warmth of her mother’s hand; with a brief look into her mother’s concerned eyes she let herself drift, only recalling, later, a fragment of sound she could not believe:

“. . . some bruising, some tearing that need a few stitches . . . nothing really serious. . . .”

When Maggie brought her home the following afternoon, she reached the door of her bedroom and stopped. She sat in the living room, wrapped in a blanket, while Maggie made up the empty room, half the size, and Joe moved as many of her possessions there as he could fit in. Later, at Alison’s insistence, he added bars to the windows and a bolt to the door. She insisted the sheets from her bed be burned. She lit the bonfire herself, throwing the hateful CD on the roaring flames, watching it twist and curl in the flaming heat.

She would wake at ten o’clock, eleven o’clock, even noon, after ten or twelve hours of sleep—without any rest—afraid, every night, to let her eyes close and take her to where the nightmare was waiting for her . . . not that the morning sun would drive it completely away.

She wouldn’t go outside the house for weeks, not even to go to church. Especially not to church, though she said nothing to her parents about that. Father Ryan called, often, to bring comfort to Alison if he could . . . but he only managed to comfort her mother: he and Maggie would often pray together. Point blank, Alison refused to see him or, except for Annabelle and Doreen Hart, anyone else.

Her friends would knock, phone, send flowers, chocolates, or cards Alison wouldn’t read. Once, as Maggie accepted delivery of yet another bouquet, she heard Alison mutter, “You’d think there’d been a funeral.”

She glanced at Alison’s listless body and lifeless eyes, her hand leaping to her mouth at the horrifying realization that something had died; in her prayers she pleaded with God to bring her daughter back to life.

At night, they wordlessly watched TV until Maggie led her husband off to bed. She’d return a few minutes later to sit with Alison a while, after throwing out the empty bottle of Scotch.

In time, Alison was persuaded to talk to one of her friends. First Lorraine Adams, her oldest friend from just two blocks away, then others, one by one. The day came when Alison announced she was going out with them—and Maggie breathed a great sigh of relief.

Alison started running, running hard and long so that by the time she got home she was dripping with sweat and so limp from exhaustion she felt a great sense of relief. One day she declared she was ready to go back to school.

She found it really hard to concentrate in class. But the break times were the worst. Everybody knew what had happened to her. Nobody knew how to act towards her. Everyone was nervous and looked at her strangely. And in some circles was the belief that if a girl was raped, she must have encouraged it somehow.

On the third or fourth day back at school, three boys sniggered as she walked past. One of them made a lewd comment.

Her face froze. She turned back and walked towards them, looking so fierce that the boys physically shrank back from her. Her eyes had narrowed and were cold and piercing. She walked straight up to the boy who’d spoken and slapped his face with all the energy and resentment stored up within her. She dimly noticed an ugly red handprint on the boy’s face. “In your dreams, arsehole,” she spat. “And all you could look forward to is a sore hand.”

Fanning out like a ripple cascading across the surface of a pond, a stunned silence descended over the playground, one student whispering to another until all the chatter stopped and heads turned to Alison with disbelief. Sure, everybody had heard things like that on TV or at movies you were supposed to be eighteen to see. But who’d have believed someone like Alison would know them—let alone use them. And in school, too.

Nobody bothered her again.

ONE SATURDAY MORNING, in the park near the local shopping center, curiosity pulled her towards a crowd of people watching something on a makeshift stage. It was a martial arts demonstration. Something called Aikido. She watched with vague interest as an old man who seemed to hobble rather than walk demonstrated various holds and throws with other people dressed in the same strange garb as his.

The stage cleared and a skinny girl about Alison’s age stepped into the center. The old man picked up a loudspeaker.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” he said. “This is Larissa. She’s fifteen years old and she weighs just forty-five kilos. As you can see,” he smiled, “there’s not much of her.” A few giggles came from audience. “She’d like to invite anyone to come up and hit her. To try and hit her. You, sir—” he pointed at a big beefy, man “—how about you?”

“Oh, come on,” the man in the audience said. “That wouldn’t be fair.”

“You’re quite right, sir. But I promise she’ll be gentle with you.” Laughter rippled through the crowd. Sheepishly, the man took a step forward. “Come on, you can do it,” someone in the crowd shouted.

“Give it a go, mate.”

“Afraid or something?”

“Who, me?” the man said. “Course not.”

“Great. Just take your shoes off before you get on the mat. Now, run at her as hard as you can, hit her, do whatever you like.”

“You’re joking.”

“No, I’m serious.”

The girl bowed towards him.

“You do the same, please. It’s part of the Aikido ritual.”

The man returned the bow and walked slowly up to the tiny girl and made an ineffectual jab towards her, more pat than a hit. All of a sudden, he was face down on the mat, the girl sitting on top of him, his arm twisted in an odd-looking way. Alison had no idea how he’d gotten into that position—or how the girl had done it.

Alison found herself walking up to the stage without volition, as if some unknown force had taken command of her body. “Me. I want to be next,” she told the old man.

He gave her a puzzled look, thinking she’d said, “Me. I will be next.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he answered.

She took off her shoes at the edge of the mat on the stage and she and the girl bowed to each other. They looked at each other for a long moment. “I can’t do this,” she said. “I mean, I can’t do this to you. Why would I hit you or whatever? Is it okay if I pretend you’re someone else?”

The girl looked at her for a minute and then nodded her head. But Alison noticed she tensed her body slightly and seemed to become a little more alert.

Alison closed her eyes, imagining her tormentors . . . and the memory of her pain suddenly sharpened in her loins. She leapt at the girl with a blood-curdling scream that sent shivers down the bystanders’ spines.

The next thing Alison knew she was flying through the air. She thought the girl had touched her, but she wasn’t sure. She landed on her back and the thump forced all the air from her lungs.

“Ouch,” she said, “that hurt.”

“Sorry,” said the girl, “but you were serious. Wild.”

Alison turned her head. The girl was behind her now, looking towards her. But other than turning about, she hadn’t seemed to have moved at all.

“You did that to me?” Alison looked around, but the old man and the other people in the funny robes were exactly where they’d been before.

The girl nodded.

“Wow.” Alison picked herself up and started to walk towards the old man. She stopped, turned and bowed to the girl. “What’s your name again?” she asked.

“Larissa. But you can call me Ris.”

“Thank you . . . Ris. I’m Alison. Thank you.”

To the old man she said, “Can you teach me something—now?”

She felt his searching gaze—but the wild animal he’d seen the moment before she’d leapt had gone back to wherever it had come from. Standing before him now was just a young girl who was obviously troubled about . . . something.

“My name is Edward Tozen. But when you’re on the mat, Alison, you address me as Sensei. That’s Japanese for teacher.”

“Yes . . . Sensei.”

“I tell you what. We’ll demonstrate something for you—” as he said “you” he swept his arm around the audience to include them all, though he kept his eyes fixed on Alison’s “—and then maybe Ris or one of the others will teach it to you. So long as you agree not to scream at them.”

Alison smiled and her face seemed to light up. She bowed to Tozen. “Thank you . . . Sensei.”

Tozen waved her to the side of the stage and waddled over and said a few words to the group of what must have been his students. Two of them walked onto the mat as Larissa retired. One of them, a girl, stood in the center of the mat. The second, a man, stood at the edge.

“Fiona, here in the center of the mat,” said Tozen through the loudspeaker, “is in a bar with a few friends. Jack has had a few beers too many, making him God’s gift to womankind. He notices Fiona and takes a fancy to her.” Jack walked across the mat to stand in front of Fiona. “We’re not interested in listening to Jack trying to convince Fiona he’s God’s answer to all her prayers. We’ll just fast-forward to the point when Jack tries to give her a kiss.”

Alison waited for Fiona to throw Jack across the stage—exactly what he deserved. But as Jack moved closer Fiona acted as if she wanted him to kiss her. She reached up and put her left hand behind his head, inviting him in. The other hand grasped his chin as if to pull him down. But then she pushed his chin up quickly with her right hand. Jack’s head flipped back; she gave him a nudge, and Jack lost his balance, falling to the floor flat on his back.

“Whew,” said Alison. “I want to learn how to do that.”

EDWARD TOZEN WASN’T SURPRISED at the passion and intensity Alison brought to Aikido. If he’d given classes every day instead of three times a week, she’d have been at every one. When somebody told him her story he finally understood—and knew where the wild animal had come from. From then on he was careful to say and do nothing she could misinterpret.

Aikido became Alison’s release, and she revelled in the growing control she had over her body. But there was one difference: Aikido was not a game to win, like tennis; or a sport, like running; or a pastime, like playing volleyball on the beach with her friends. For Alison Aikido was life—and survival. Aikido became her protection, her armor, and she quickly mastered enough to sense she need never feel frightened and helpless ever again. As she found herself walking boldly towards someone who reminded her of her rapists instead of crossing to the other side of the road, she slowly relaxed and let people get just that little bit closer.

Even so, she still lived with the knowledge that the pain was still with her, somewhere inside. Dr. Hart had gently suggested—once—that it might help if she saw a therapist. But she wasn’t crazy—was she?

Now and then, the pain would come back, usually when some boy tried to touch her. Even when she wanted the boy to touch her. But the wild animal, thankfully, seemed to have gone at last.

One day a new student joined the Aikido class. She’d seen him around the school. He was a year ahead of her. His name was Derek Olsson.

She’d heard a lot about him. He was one of the guys all the girls talked about: a straight-A student—and captain of the football team. He seemed to swagger a little when he walked. “Sure fancies himself,” Alison remarked one day to her friends.

They stared back at her blankly. “What do you mean?” one asked.

“He’s so handsome,” sighed another.

Alison just shook her head.

Tozen’s students worked mostly in pairs. One would practice a movement with a partner, and then they’d reverse roles. So Alison often practiced with the male students. She found it didn’t bother her . . . while they were on the mat.

So now and then she was paired up with Olsson. She felt he was the kind of guy who’d never had a girl turn him down. So whenever he tried to be friendly, she cut him dead.

But she had to admit he was good. He picked up Aikido almost as fast as she had. But he wasn’t as good as he thought he was.

Some three months after he joined the class, they were working together on a movement ending with the “attacker” being held flat on the floor with the body weight of the “victim.” Olsson was a bit clumsy and landed on top of her a bit too hard. Suddenly, she felt suffocated and trapped. Without conscious thought, she lashed out with her foot, kicking him hard in the crotch. “God,” he screamed—and let go. She whirled from under him and a moment later their positions were reversed: she pushed his face into the floor with an arm lock that, she knew, hurt.

“Enough,” he cried, slapping the mat with his free hand. She obeyed the signal to release, and let him go.

“What was that?” he asked as he rolled on his back, rubbing his arm. “Christ, you’re like a wildcat who needs to be tamed.”

It was his grin that prompted her to spit, “If that were true, it won’t be done by a mere boy.”

Tozen was about to scold Alison. But then he asked himself, was it Olsson who should really be chewed out? So he began talking about control, how Aikido meant not just controlling your opponent by using his movement to turn him the way you wanted him to go. It also meant control and restraint of your own movements.

He was talking to the class, but Alison knew he was talking just to her. Her ears burning, she bit back on the temptation to say “Sorry” to Olsson. No . . . she didn’t regret what she’d done. Not one bit.

THE STORY OF OLSSON’S fate at Alison’s hand spread through the high school with the speed of a bushfire at the end of a dry, scorching summer. A second story was being was whispered breathlessly, in hidden moments, from ear to eager ear: “Have you heard that someone said to Olsson: ‘Alison McGuire. Now there’s a chick I bet you’ll never get into bed.’ And you know what Olsson said? . . . ‘Melt the Ice Queen? Why not?’”

When finally . . . nervously . . . whispered to Alison, she spied Olsson sitting on the end of a bench, alone, on the opposite edge of the playground; she marched in a straight line towards him, a group of boys in her path melting out of her way, eyeing her with a new respect.

“So that’s how you think of me?” Alison demanded as she came to a halt in front of Olsson, breathing hard. “As a challenge to your questionable manhood?”

Olsson was sitting hunched down, his back to the playground, his head bowed, an elbow on his knee cradling his chin, his eyes on the ground as if they were studiously counting blades of grass or crumbs of soil. As Alison’s angry voice shattered his thoughts, he looked up in surprise. “Huh?” he asked, his head shaking in puzzlement. “What on earth are you talking about?”

“Deny it then—deny that you accepted a challenge to get me into bed.”

“Ah,” he said, finally understanding.

“Well?” she demanded, when Olsson said nothing more.

Olsson’s face softened. “So tell me, Alison,” he said quietly, “why do you care what I think of you?”

“What?” Alison almost shouted. “What makes you think I care about you in the slightest?”

She spun on her heel and stalked away. Over her shoulder she threw back the words, “You’re so arrogant, so . . . presumptuous.”

27 Fingers of Fate

AROUND MIDNIGHT, CAPTAIN GOLD came scurrying down from the bridge, the ever-present cigarette still in his mouth. “Time,” he grinned, pointing in the direction of the Australian coast. “You now home, eh?”

Karla nodded, looking longingly towards a dim, dark line in the distance—across a wide, black expanse of water.

After ten days at sea, the motion of the fishing boat had come to feel quite normal; but one look at the small, inflatable dinghy bobbing up and down at the bottom of the ladder and Karla felt seasick again. The coast was some ninety kilometers away. That rubber dinghy had to get her there—and through the Great Barrier Reef. She tightened the straps of her life-jacket and hugged her orange oilskin closer, shivering as if Neptune’s cold, wet fingers were already climbing up her back in welcome.

Captain Gold’s eyes sparkled as he held up a small PDA-like device that was nearly all screen. “GPS,” he said, waving one arm towards the distance coast. “No worries, mate.” His gold front tooth flashed in the light from the GPS.

Karla couldn’t even fake a smile in return. From el-Bihar they’d stayed well outside Australia’s two hundred kilometer “exclusive economic zone.” Now, they had to drop her off and clear Australian waters . . . between sunset and sunrise. The tiny dinghy was fast but not fast enough to spare her four, even five hours of splashing across the ocean in almost total darkness—and then the reef. She wasn’t convinced a GPS would guarantee they’d ever reach the deserted beach, some thirty kilometers north of Cairns, where they planned to take her. If they reached land . . . in the right place . . . she would be able to walk a few kilometers inland to a road where she could thumb a ride from a passing car. Passing through the islands and sunken reefs had seemed straightforward enough back then, when the sun had been shining. But now? With not even the moon to light their way? She shook her head.

Captain Gold handed the GPS to a sailor who was wearing knee-high rubber boots and, as she was, a bright orange oilskin. The sailor scuttled down the rope ladder into the dinghy, indicating she should follow.

Captain Gold slapped her on the shoulder again. “Happy trip,” he grinned.

With an effort, Karla managed to partially match his smile. “Matalam,” she said, shaking the captain’s hand.

“No worries.”

“No worries indeed,” Karla muttered as she began to gingerly back down the swaying rope ladder. Captain Gold leant on the rail watching her, smiling and waving. As she reached the dinghy, her last glimpse of the captain was of him shielding his lighter from the wind in an unsuccessful attempt to fire up yet another cigarette.

Karla sat in the middle of the dinghy, opposite the oilskin-wrapped bundle containing her few possessions. The sailor with the GPS, who seemed to be in charge, sat in the back along with a second sailor who held the rudder. A third was in the bow.

The sailors pulled the hoods of their oilskins over their heads; she did the same. She was handed a plastic scoop with a short handle. The sailor made baling motions at the small puddle of water sloshing around the bottom. We haven’t even started yet.

Karla slid backwards as the dinghy surged forward. She grabbed for the rope running down the side to steady herself. The dinghy’s bow had risen up in the air as the helmsman twisted the throttle, and with a muffled roar, two fountains of spray spread behind them like wings. The dinghy seemed to spend half the time in the air before slapping down on the water with a thump, jarring her spine. Beyond the white bubbling wake were the fishing boat’s dim lights. Karla watched them getting further away, far too quickly for comfort. It wasn’t long before the lights bobbed below a wave and never reappeared.

Now the only light came from the screen of the GPS, faintly illuminating the sailor’s face, and from a torch held by the sailor in the bow. He pointed it forward to help light the way, Karla figured—but the light was so weak the torch’s batteries must be almost dead. She peered ahead but beyond a few meters was total blackness. The perfect night for not being seen, and the perfect night for crashing into something equally unseen . . . what kind of debris would be floating around the ocean? Soft drink cans, bottles, bits of wood, all kinds of junk dropped overboard . . . what would happen if they hit a sodden, half-sunken log at this speed? Even if the lookout spotted it, it would be too late.

Water slopped around the bottom of the boat no matter how hard she scooped it over the side. Her boots were soaked; the wetness crept up her jeans; her face and hair were damp from the continual fine spray. Her arm ached from baling; her bottom ached from sitting in one, cramped position; her back ached from the endless thumping of the boat.

How accurately would GPS pinpoint their position? Within ten meters? Ten feet? How good was its map of the Barrier Reef? Its sharp fingers of coral could rip out the dinghy’s cushion of air in seconds. Her life-jacket would keep her afloat, but what was left of the boat would be stuck on the coral or dragged into the depths by the weight of the outboard along with her laptop and everything else.

Karla felt helpless—like a prisoner of Fate whose life is determined by unseeable, unknowable, invisible and angry beings in the sky. Ahead was the blackness: the unseeable, the unknowable. Fate, personified.

She now looked at the GPS with a wave of relief . . . technology making the unknowable known. She watched how the sailor holding it seemed to take no notice of the boat or its progress but kept his eyes fixed to the screen. Every now and then he’d touch the helmsman, gesture, and the dinghy’s course would alter ever so slightly. The helmsman was intent on the sea, the waves, and the lookout in front who leaned forward and never looked back.

They were skilled men; they knew what they were doing. For the first time she felt her destiny was in their competent hands rather than Neptune’s unpredictable fingers of fate.

The question of how and why they’d gained their expertise was pushed from her mind when, without warning, the boat slowed, coming almost to a halt as the motor quieted to a dull purr. Karla had no idea how much time had passed, and no way of telling. But from the sound of waves crashing nearby . . . from both sides . . . she knew where they must be. The Reef . . . we must be nearly there.

Ahead was still the familiar blackness, but it seemed to loom higher. The lookout swung his light slowly left and right . . . it seemed so much brighter now that when she looked around she could see so much more. My eyes have adjusted, she thought.

The light caught white breakers. Too close . . . or are they? It was impossible to gauge the distance.

The dinghy crept forward, surging as it was caught by the swell, accelerating unpredictably as it rode the surf, the helmsman suddenly swinging the boat one way and then the other. The boat’s eyes, Karla thought, were those of the sailor holding the GPS, not the lookout in the bow. Like a plane coming in on an instrument landing in a fogbound airport.

For the first time, the lookout waved. The dinghy slowed to a crawl, lifted by a wave which crashed down in a spray of surf as the dinghy thumped once more. But this thump felt harder and then . . . it didn’t rise again.

Land.

The lookout jumped out of the boat and hauled it further up the beach. Grinning, the sailors helped Karla stand and step out onto the sand, a wave lapping over her boots halfway up to her knees. A moment later one of the sailors brought her backpack and shoulder bag and, at his gesture, she pulled off the life-jacket and oilskin.

“Matalam,” she said, resisting the urge to kneel and kiss the ground of home.

The sailors grinned, the whiteness of their teeth caught by the starlight. They pushed the dinghy back into the water. In a moment, all Karla could see was the faint light of the torch and then . . . nothing.

It was two, maybe three in the morning, she estimated. What time did the sun rise at this latitude? For that matter, what day of the week was it? She’d completely lost track.

Out to sea was an occasional faint brightness. The torch must be intentionally weak . . . anyone who saw it from the shore would write it off as luminescence—or an overactive imagination. The outboard couldn’t be heard over the roar of the surf. The perfect smuggler’s boat, she thought with a smile.

Her boots squelched with every step as she trudged slowly and carefully away from the sea, squinting to make out rocks or other obstacles in the sand. Soaked from the waist down and the neck up, the breeze made her feel like she was inside a refrigerator.

She found the sandbank at the edge of the beach by bumping into it. Tired, her back still aching from the boat ride and her knees creaking as she slowly sat down, she gratefully rested her back against the sandbank and heaped a blanket of sand over herself. As she warmed, she began to feel more comfortable.

She hadn’t even known she’d fallen asleep until the light of the sun rising above the water startled her eyes open.

“COFFEE, STEAK AND EGGS—and a long shower,” she said to herself as she stepped into the room of a small motel on the outskirts of Cairns. “And some new clothes.” But as she closed the door, the soft bed, its clean sheets, the plumped up pillows all beckoned to her almost irresistibly. Every ache in her body chose that moment to compete for her attention, as if demanding she lie down. She shook her head; there were things she needed to do first.

Plugging in her laptop and cellphone to recharge, she stripped off the clothes that earned her a wrinkled nose from the truck driver who’d given her a ride and stepped into the shower. She felt mildly guilty when, quite some time later, the hot water ran out. She mentally apologized to any other guest who, at this moment, was about to use the shower.

An hour later, dressed in clean and—with relief—dry clothes, she walked towards a shopping center about two kilometers away, calling Lynette McPherson, the OlssonPress managing director, on the way.

“Karla, you’re back! How are you?”

“Worn out but glad to be home,” said Karla.

“Where are you now?”

“Cairns.”

“When will you be back in Sydney?”

“I desperately need sleep. So I’ll get a flight to Sydney tomorrow. And I’ve never been to Cairns before.”

“We’ll have one of our legal eagles meet you at the airport.”

“Lawyers? What on earth for?”

“Did you show your passport at immigration or go through customs when you landed?”

“Ah—I guess not.”

“That, my girl, is an offence under sub-section something-or-other. Strangely enough, as an Australian citizen you haven’t done anything illegal—so long as you present yourself to Immigration within two working days.”

“I see. Why don’t I do it here in Cairns and get it over and done with?”

“It’s not that simple. While you haven’t broken the law—provided, of course, you didn’t bring in anything you shouldn’t have—” Oops, Karla thought, remembering the little stash of marijuana and hashish in her backpack “—whoever brought you in did. Our lawyers are positive the Federal Police—and who knows who else?—will want to question you. The best strategy is to visit them instead of waiting till they come knocking.”

“Okay then. Have you heard from Derek? How is he?”

“We know he’s all right,” said Lynette, “but not where he is. Nor do the police.”

“That’s something at any rate.”

KARLA PRESTON LAUGHED. HER laugh was loud and penetrating; all eyes in the small café turned towards her. Her laugh was also deep and contagious: in a moment half the people the café were laughing or giggling too, though they had no idea why. Perhaps, some thought, spying the open newspaper on her table, she was reading the comics.

It wasn’t a cartoon that had prompted her laughter:

Sandeman Government
Lies—Again

By Robin Cartwright

Sykes Media exclusive

Friday: Toribaya, Sandeman Islands

For three weeks Sandeman authorities have denied any knowledge of missing OlssonPress journalist Karla Preston’s whereabouts. But Sandeman troops found her ten days ago—and failed to inform the Australian government.

Villagers in Ankaya, a small village on the Sandeman island of Jazeerat el-Bihar, reported that a woman identified as Karla Preston was found by Sandeman soldiers—and then captured by a band of guerrillas in a midnight attack which left one Sandeman soldier dead.

Australian officials refused to answer any questions, other than saying they were doing “everything we can to find her.” In private, however, they’re fuming. “The Sandeman’s behavior is inexcusable,” was one of the few comments I heard that is suitable for publication in a family newspaper. . . .

Karla skimmed the rest of the article, her laughter stopping when she read: Karla Preston hasn’t been seen since and more and more people are doubtful she is still alive. I had no idea. . . . And the whole time I was feeling very safe . . . except last night . . . while hundreds of people are looking for me afraid I might already be dead.

She felt a stab of anger at Lynette—but what should she have done instead?

Shrugging, she polished off the rest of her steak and eggs. Now more energized, she headed back to the motel, her laptop—and sleep.

*****

“ALISON,” EDWARD TOZEN SMILED broadly as Alison entered the dojo. “Welcome back.”

“Sensei.” Alison smiled in return as she bowed.

“Would you like to lead the class, Alison?”

“Thank you, Sensei, but I’d rather just work out today.”

“You’re just in time,” Tozen said, waving her towards the mat. “We’re about to begin.”

She’d woken less than an hour ago, her head throbbing with a violent hangover, as tired as if she hadn’t slept at all. A coffee and two aspirins was all she could manage for breakfast—and she was still waiting for the aspirins to have an effect.

“I’m glad I made it,” she said as brightly as she could.

Stepping into the dojo felt like travelling back in time. Even though he must be eighty-something now, Tozen was still there, looking unchanged, like the dojo itself, still teaching, the pillar holding everything together. Even the schedule was the same: an intermediate class at ten on Saturdays.

As she stepped onto the mat, the connections she’d associated with the dojo from her very first lesson came flooding back. She felt wrapped in a cocoon of safety, her energy level shot up as if she were standing on a recharger, and her movements quickly returned to the graceful arcs of easy flow. But as she buried herself in the exercises, as the strength surged back into her muscles and her head slowly cleared, she had a vague, hollow sense that something was missing—but what? When she’d given up trying to figure it out, the memory of the teenage Derek Olsson flashed into her mind—that he, like her, had always been at every class—that even though she had, then, despised him, she missed his presence just the same.

Derek? she wondered, shaking her head. Why should I think of him . . . now?

She smiled at the memory of the class where—Let’s be honest—she had kneed him in the groin. He’d waited for her at the door afterwards and had the gall—the impudence—to ask if she’d like to stop for a coffee. “You must be joking,” she replied coldly as she strode past him without a pause or a backward glance.

They had both mastered Aikido quickly, though Alison was the first to wear a black belt. After a few more months, Tozen first asked Alison, then Derek, to lead classes from time to time. At one point when the number of beginners had ballooned, Tozen persuaded them to lead the classes together.

Alison was surprised to find she enjoyed the joint teaching and even began to look forward to it. It was rather like Aikido practiced at a higher mental level. They responded smoothly to each other’s cues; when one moved in a new direction the other automatically followed, and Derek made no attempt to impress her or overreach his ability. He deferred to her superior skills and was happy to follow, just as she was when he led.

But off the mat, Alison turned back into the “Ice Queen.” She continued to make a point of ignoring him; he seemed indifferent to her. There were times when he’d walk past her in a corridor at school as if she simply didn’t exist. Yet at other times she’d turn to see him gazing at her across the playground; he made no pretence that he’d actually been looking somewhere else and continued to look at her as though he had every right to—the mere hint of a smile the only reaction to her glare of disapproval. At a school dance Alison couldn’t understand why she felt a touch of jealousy when he came in with some other girl, or why she felt annoyed that while he partnered many girls he never asked her for a dance. I suppose, she thought afterwards, to deny me the pleasure of refusing him.

One day she accepted his invitation to “buy you a cup of coffee.”

“For here or takeaway?” the server asked as she took their order.

“Here,” Derek said; “Takeaway,” Alison said at the same time.

Derek looked at her quizzically.

“I agreed to let you buy me a cup of coffee,” she said, her voice cold, her face taking on the unfriendliest expression she could muster. “I didn’t say I’d drink it with you.”

She waited for the inevitable angry or offended reaction—but Derek just laughed. She glared at him thinking, He’s always so infuriating.

They waited in silence until the coffees were ready. “Thanks,” he said, grinning as he passed Alison her cup. “I never make the same mistake twice.”

Now, what did he mean by that? she asked herself as she stalked out of the coffee shop.

He continued the occasional invitations; she continued to reject them. After one particularly smooth joint session, as she stepped out into the dark, wintry evening, pulling her jacket around her to protect her from the wind that felt like it had blown all the way from Antarctica without gaining any warmth along the way, she heard her voice saying “Okay.” When he seemed neither surprised nor pleased, she almost told him she’d changed her mind.

Only in the café around the corner did she notice the dark bruise on his cheek. “What happened to you?” Her hand began to reach across the table as if to wipe the bruise away, but she angrily jerked it back to her side. “In a fight, I suppose,” she added brusquely.

“Yes. With my father.”

“Your father did that? To you? Why?”

“He was drunk. As usual.”

“My God,” she breathed, her hand going to her mouth. “You hear about that sort of thing—but I never thought—was it bad?”

Derek nodded slowly. “But it’s not going to happen again.”

“What?”

“That’s why I took up Aikido: to protect myself—and my little sister.”

“Jessica? Where is she? I didn’t see her at school today.”

Derek gently touched his bruised cheek. “No. And you won’t see her for a few more days.”

“You mean—?”

Derek nodded.

“Oh, my God,” she said involuntarily, her body trembling as she thought: Once was bad enough. . . . Her voice stuttered. “And did he—has he—?”

Derek looked puzzled, and then slowly shook his head. “Not yet.”

“To live with that sort of terror every day . . . ” Alison said quietly as they carried their coffees to a table. “How can she stand it . . . how can you?”

“I don’t know,” Derek said softly, his eyes looking into the distance. “You don’t even know there’s a choice, not to begin with. And then—any option you can think of is even more frightening. . . . You feel so helpless. . . .”

“But now?”

“I’m . . . not sure. . . .”

His eyes suddenly focused on hers, and he leant forward slightly and asked, his voice now solemn, “Alison, do you believe in God?”

“What?” Alison stared at him, trying to make sense of his words. “I—I—I don’t know any more.” And she thought: I’ve never said that before, to anyone. Why did I have to say it to him?

“If there is a God, what sort of being must He be to sit by and watch while you and I are being made to suffer? For what—original sin? For the crime of being born?”

“I—I’ve never thought about it.”

“So if there is a God and you’re standing in front of Him one day, what are you going to tell Him?”

“What a question.” Alison shivered, watching Derek nervously. “What would you say?”

“I’d tell Him to go to hell.”

“You’d say what?”

Derek, his eyes intense, did not respond to her question but asked, “And would I be wrong?”

Alison’s eyes widened, her mouth hung open—but she couldn’t speak. Her muscles turned rigid with shock at Derek’s blasphemy, yet a part of her felt like cheering him on. She tried to make sense of her confusion—but all that happened was her head began to ache. Eventually, she managed to stutter, “I—I—don’t want to think about.”

“I’m sorry, Alison. I didn’t mean to upset you.”

“I’ll . . . be okay. And it wasn’t really you that upset me.”

Derek nodded, his soft eyes kind and somehow calming—and understanding. And yet, she suddenly felt, discomforting: eyes that seemed to peer directly into her soul.

“I need some air—I think I’d best go.”

She avoided him for the next few days. But she couldn’t stop herself from thinking about him—and his infernal questions—and looking at him from time to time from the corner of her eyes.

She saw the muscled frame of the football player—the rugger bugger—but there was no sign of the boyish grin of the strutting ladies’ man who fancied himself so much. She slowly became aware that when he looked at her, Derek’s eyes weren’t roving up and down her body or flicking to her breasts or hips but were firmly focused on her eyes and face. Eyes, she noticed, that were green—or were they hazel?—with no trace of the pity that so many others showed her. Soft eyes projecting such a well of compassion and understanding that, without thinking, she reached out hungrily. No words were needed for her to sense that even deeper within him was a recognition of her inner strength, a connection that, at fleeting moments, made her feel ten feet tall. Could this really be the same person she’d humiliated on the mat?

*****

“COME BACK SOON, ALISON. Any time. And don’t leave it so long,” Tozen said as she left the dojo.

“Thank you, Sensei.”

Her eyes sparkled, her muscles flowed with energy, her headache was gone—but her stomach was still a hollow knot, and something in the back of her mind was nagging at her, something she needed to do—but it wouldn’t rise to consciousness. And just as Olsson’s ghostly presence had seemed to haunt her on the mat, wherever she looked was a memory . . . we walked there . . . we argued there—I was so mad at him . . . and around that corner. . . .

She tried to push the memories of Derek out of her mind—but began to think of McKurn instead. Simple choice . . . and, almost without her conscious intention, she let her steps carry her around the corner to the café where, so often, she and Olsson sat and talked.

FOR A WEEK AFTERWARDS, Derek didn’t repeat his invitation for coffee, so Alison asked him if he could help her with her maths.

“What I like about maths,” he said as he effortlessly untangled her problems, explaining everything so clearly she felt, for the first time, that she finally understood, “is that the rules are all clear and logical. Either two plus two equals four—or it doesn’t. If it doesn’t, the whole of mathematics just falls apart. So two plus two must equal four. It’s a self-contained reality where everything makes perfect sense.”

“Even weird things that make no sense—like imaginary numbers?” Alison asked. “The square root of minus one?”

“Sure. They follow the rules. What’s really weird is that imaginary numbers have applications in the real world—which makes you wonder about the real world, doesn’t it?”

“I don’t know,” Alison shrugged, feeling that now he wasn’t making any more sense than imaginary numbers. “I’m having enough trouble with real numbers as it is.”

She began to look forward to her talks with him as much as she looked forward to their teaching Aikido together. Eventually, they spent so much time in each other’s company that Alison felt sure she and Derek were the only people at school who didn’t think they were a couple, an “item.” As they talked, Alison learnt that Derek was a voracious reader, had a part-time job in a petrol station and was the proud owner of a Mini he’d bought for peanuts from a junkyard and rebuilt himself—and that his grandfather was the only person he truly admired and revered. And no matter how lightly they chattered about books and movies or what had happened at school, inevitably Derek would come up with one of his questions.

“What’s your purpose in life?” he asked her one day.

“Revenge.” The word came out of Alison’s mouth instantly. She had no need to think, to reflect. But now the word was out there, in front of her, it felt so right. Yes, she’d thought of it before. Many times. But until now she’d never uttered it—and somehow saying it made it feel far more real. Damn it, she thought, that’s the second time I’ve told him something I’ve never admitted to anyone else.

Almost unwillingly, her eyes moved back to Derek’s face. She saw him nodding with a smile of understanding. Suddenly, she felt her very soul had been stripped bare, that he could see into her deepest, innermost secrets and desires, and even those parts of her self she was barely aware of. She felt giddy, being pulled towards him like iron filings to a magnet, while recoiling backwards to escape the sense of his X-ray eyes even as she was glued to the chair, unable to move. She took a deep breath and gripped the table’s edge to steady herself.

“Doesn’t it say in the Bible,” Derek asked quietly, “‘Vengeance shall be mine, saith the Lord’?”

“The Lord had His chance—and He didn’t show up. So it’s up to me.” Alison’s gaze dropped to his hand: his fingers were long, like a piano player’s, but there were traces of grease under his fingernails. If I don’t look at his eyes, she thought, he won’t be able to see me . . . and I’ll be safe.

“Ah. . . . I see. And when you have your revenge, then what?”

Derek had a frustrating way of leaving her speechless.

One day she felt so angry with him that she missed cues and stumbled in front of the Aikido class. Derek smoothly stepped in to make it look as if nothing had happened—which didn’t improve her mood one whit. Afterwards, she stalked outside and waited, accosting him when he emerged. “So what’s this I hear about you going to movies and hanging out with that slut, Marian? She’s an airhead.”

“True,” Derek grinned. “but she’s fun to be with—in small doses.”

“And I’m not?”

“I didn’t say that, Alison.”

“Keeps you warm at night, does she?”

Derek blushed.

“You take her out but you’ve never invited me to go to a movie.”

“So . . . would you like to go the movies with me?”

“With you? Never!”

Derek shrugged. “Why do you think I never asked you?”

A week or so later her mother said to her when she got home, “Some nice-looking boy brought some flowers for you, Alison.”

“You keep them, Mum.”

“There’s a card.”

Alison shrugged—but opened it. There was just the one word: TRUCE? He can stew for a while, she thought.

Maggie put the flowers on the dining room table. But that night, as Alison went to bed, she took them to her room. Maggie smiled knowingly in the morning; Alison lifted a warning finger and said, “Don’t say it, Mother. Not a word.”

“LIKE ANOTHER COFFEE, LUV?”

Alison looked up to see the motherly face of the café’s owner smiling at her. She looked at her cup: it was empty, and she had no memory of drinking it. She turned her wrist to check the time . . . but she never wore her watch when she worked out.

“Do you know what time it is?” Alison asked.

“It’s just gone noon.”

“Heavens above,” Alison said, leaping to her feet. “I’ve been sitting here daydreaming for nearly an hour.”

STEPPING THROUGH THE FRONT door of her parents’ house was like entering a cocoon; the feeling wrapped around her warmly, and she felt protected from the world outside. Alison leant again the door, breathing in the familiarity, the sense of . . . I’ve been in Canberra all these years, she thought, but this still feels like home.

“Mum. Dad. I’m back,” she called.

Maggie came out of the kitchen and they hugged. “Are you okay, Alison?” Maggie asked.

“I’m fine, thanks, Mum,” she said, except for the tension in my stomach. . . .

“Dad’s in the garden.” Maggie looked at her daughter as if she knew something wasn’t right, but she said no more.

“I’d better have a shower.”

As she was soaking in the steamy water, the thought that had been nagging in the back of her mind all morning came to her fully formed. Excited, she dressed quickly, went online and sent a message to the geek:

Have located where McKurn keeps sensitive computer records. Security seems pretty tight, and I’m wondering if you might be able to break it.

In response to his describe all relevant details, she sent him a long email, outlining all the security and other arrangements in as much detail as she could recall. A while later she received the geek’s reply: doesn’t sound promising but wl check it out and let you know. wl cost extra

Understood. Thanks.

Her mother’s voice interrupted her thoughts. “What do you feel like for lunch, Alison?”

“Oh—anything, thanks, Mum,” she said without looking up and turned to the mountain of waiting emails.

She stopped. Glancing at her mother in the kitchen, the rattle of plates and cutlery signalling she was already busy, Alison snapped the lid of her laptop shut and followed her mother into the kitchen.

“It’s a bit chilly outside today, Mum—but sunny. Shall we have lunch at the Fish Market again, instead? No phone calls, I promise.”

And at least I never went there with Derek.

28 The Lion’s Den

THE OLSSONPRESS’S FIRST SHOT had been fired the previous Friday afternoon: its Sydney and Melbourne Weekends—chatty entertainment guides to the respective city’s bars, clubs, bands, theaters, and movies—both published a Guide to Buying Drugs. Each Guide came complete with a “location map” of the drug dealers’ “supermarkets,” and was illustrated with pictures of packets of heroin and marijuana (they claimed) and cash (quite obviously) exchanging hands.

The buyers’ faces were blacked out. The dealers’ faces weren’t.

That Friday evening, the parks and street corners where drug dealers usually gathered swarmed with disappointed sightseers: having also seen the Guide, the dealers decided to stay home.

At the same time a national, wall-to-wall TV and radio campaign advertised that, starting Sunday, the Sykes’ and OlssonPress papers would reveal how the underworld reached out its tentacles to corrupt police, bureaucrats, and politicians with gobs of cash. “Names will be named,” the ads promised. “In Sunday’s first installment: a well-known politician caught red-handed taking money from known gangsters.”

The OlssonPress was a chain of small-town dailies, mainly scattered across the countryside of New South Wales and Victoria, plus some suburban giveaways in Sydney and Melbourne. Its exclusives—like Karla Preston’s articles—were syndicated to Henry Sykes’ chain of city papers, which included Sydney’s Mercury and the Melbourne Examiner. At first, although impressed with the supporting evidence, Sykes was concerned about libel and slander suits, and so refused to carry the drug exposé. Only when OlssonPress executives signed an agreement to assume liability for all and any damages Sykes and his papers might suffer did he order the stories to run.

With front-page headlines like BRIBED! (BRIBED? in the Sykes’ press), every OlssonPress and Sykes’ Sunday newspaper hit all-time sales records (while, much to his disgust, Sir Philip French’s Sunday sales fell to an all-time low).

Underneath the headline was a slightly fuzzy picture, taken in dim light, of Harry Weinbaum, a member of the NSW state parliament, sitting with a well-known member of Sydney’s Lebanese gang, counting a pile of cash. The picture was captioned: Caught in the act! A streamer across the bottom of the page promised: TOMORROW: Melbourne’s Bent Copper.

The OlssonPress’ only national publication MoneyWeek, also published on Sundays, carried a lengthy investigative analysis of the connection between drugs, cash, and corruption.

Late on Saturday night, a package was delivered to the Surry Hills police station in Sydney. It contained enough evidence there to convict Harry Weinbaum several times over. But, somehow, Weinbaum had gotten wind of the scoop and had fled the city. Acting on an anonymous tip, the police in Dunedoo—a small country town three hundred and sixty kilometers northwest of Sydney—arrested Weinbaum at a petrol station where he’d stopped to fill up. It was pure coincidence—so the OlssonPress spokesperson later claimed—that an OlssonPress reporter and photographer happened to be at the same petrol station in the middle of nowhere at the right time to record the arrest in living color.

In the furor these stories created, the return of Karla Preston’s column was almost buried:

Abducted by Soldiers;
Rescued by “Terrorists”

By Karla Preston

OlssonPress Syndicate Exclusive

Saturday: Cairns, Queensland

I’m back in Oz—and glad to be back. Though I had a wonderful if, on occasion, terrifying time in the Sandemans.

Having spent the last week literally at sea, I have been unavoidably out of touch. So first, I want to say a big “Thank you” to my friends and associates in the media, government, and elsewhere who were concerned for my safety—and even to those readers who just wanted to see my articles back so they could shake their heads about how wrong-headed I am. (You’re mistaken, naturally—but keep reading: maybe, one day, I’ll get you to change your mind.)

I deeply appreciate your concern. And there is, in fact, a lot to be concerned about—though not so much about me.

I was surprised, for example, that my disappearance had become something of a cause celèbre. But I’m even more surprised the Sandeman authorities seem to have been unable to tell the Australian government anything about what had happened to me.

You see, they knew exactly where I was. At least, until I was rescued by “terrorists”—from the Sandeman troops who had captured me and imprisoned me, tied up, under guard. (I spent an evening in a state which, had I been somewhat younger, I’d describe as “being terrified of losing my virginity.” The “terrorists” were gentlemen compared to the soldiers . . . but more about that tomorrow.)

So, once again, the Sandeman government reveals itself as devious, deceptive, dishonest, and completely untrustworthy.

Is this the kind of government the old farts in Canberra, thousands of kilometers from the front lines—who’ve never faced a danger greater than being chauffeured across a busy intersection—want to support? Is this what they consider an objective worthy of the expenditure of other people’s lives—your sons’, your nephews’, and your brothers’? Is this the kind of policy you, as a voter, support and approve of . . . and, through your taxes, want to prop up?

What do you think? Why not let your member and senator know.

After all, they’re supposed to be your representatives. Which means they’re supposed to push our demands in parliament, not meekly follow the instructions of some party apparatchik.

About time—don’t you think?—that we remind them that we pay their salaries and lush pensions, that we fund their lavish expense accounts including free (to them) first-class air tickets and all the rest, that they work for us.

*****

KARLA’S BACK.

Derek Olsson chuckled as he read her words.

His first impulse, when he’d seen her column in the Sunday Mercury, was to rush out of the coffee shop to her apartment a few kilometers further along Glebe Point Road. He immediately restrained himself. In fact, he thought as he looked along the street, I’ve been here too long. It’s time to move on.

This was the street where Karla shopped. Her bus to the city and the OlssonPress office stopped some ten meters away; he found himself watching each one that stopped in case Karla was a passenger.

Karla was back—but he couldn’t see her. Although constantly by himself since his arrest, he now felt alone. He missed her sparkling wit, their deep, philosophical conversations, the way their minds moved in lockstep: when one changed the subject one hundred and eighty degrees in mid-phrase the other would effortlessly follow along . . . all beyond reach.

He sat looking vaguely at the headline, BRIBED? They’d done a good job. That story and those to follow would stir up a hornet’s nest. Something would give. . . .

So would he if he didn’t do something.

He took one last look along the street that had become so familiar. Time to find some place else to stay, he decided, where no one has even heard of Derek Olsson; change your look, hair color and identity.

HE HAD FILLED HIS days by reading the newspapers, going through his businesses’ daily financial and sales reports, making the occasional phone call and sending the occasional email—their paths over the internet suitably disguised—to various managers. His businesses ticked over without needing much of his or even Ross’s attention. They’d built a good team.

He kept pestering Ross for information from the lawyers and private eyes about Lars; nevertheless a week passed before it finally arrived:

Sorry it’s taken so long, but Lars Olsson seems to have spent most of his time with no fixed address, leaving very few traces.

But we found him.

He’s living at 3 Avoca Street, Noosa Heads in a house he bought two weeks ago. He put down a deposit of 10% of the house’s value of $350,000. He currently works as a waiter in a Noosa fast-food restaurant.

As far as we can tell, over the past eighteen years he has worked at a wide variety of unskilled jobs all over the country—roustabout, waiter, builder’s laborer, dishwasher and the like.

While we have not compiled a complete record—just let me know if you want more—it would appear he has rarely held the same job for more than six months.

There is no record of his ever being married.

Noosa Heads, an expensive resort town a few hours north of Brisbane. Where, Olsson wondered, did Lars get the money? He typed an email:

A man called Lars Olsson lives at 3 Avoca Street, Noosa Heads. He bought a house there just two weeks ago. Could you get a look inside his bank accounts? No idea what bank or banks. I want to know what has come in and gone out over the past few months—amounts and sources if possible.

He encrypted and sent the email; a while later receiving an answer:

probably can do wl take time tho cant say how long wl make priority but v busy right now ok?

He was now certain Lars was involved. He was torn between jumping on a plane to twist a confession from him and waiting until he had evidence which would make it easier to get him to talk. Fighting his impatience, he decided to wait: After all, he told himself, if he’s just bought a house he won’t be going anywhere.

Having learnt “The Greek” was a part owner of the Royal Arms Hotel, Olsson spent some time shadowing him and his operation. One evening he’d gone to the Bare Bottoms Club as a customer, watching the Greek, noting who he was with and who he talked to, assuming automatically the thuggish-looking ones were thugs while the average-looking people were customers . . . until he recognized a prominent state politician who obviously knew the Greek well, by the way the Greek was plying him with girls and champagne. The politician looked more like an archetypical thug than the Greek himself.

He chatted to the bar girls who lined up to have their palms read. It was a trick he’d learnt from a friend who believed in palm reading, astrology, auras, past lives, fortune-tellers—and just about every other superstition. By watching his friend’s routine for a while, Olsson found he could easily replicate the patter: just make a few vague statements and follow the cues of the credulous who immediately believed he had some kind of “psychic” power.

Palm reading was the perfect icebreaker: it took but a moment for each bar girl to start spilling out her life story. Even the most hard-bitten whore—who should have known better—was delighted to be told that when she turned thirty-one, or whatever age in the near but sufficiently distant future, some rich and handsome guy would fall desperately in love with her and she’d live happily ever after.

Like many a gangster, Demas Chrysanthopoulos—“the Greek”—was superstitious; but when he sat down opposite Olsson asking for his palm to be read, Olsson’s heart nearly stopped. The Greek was all smiles, but Olsson froze as their eyes met. Cold, jet-black eyes. The eyes of a killer.

Just like Luk Suk’s.

Physically, there was no comparison. Chrysanthopoulos was a tall, broad-shouldered man, with a gold chain resting on a hairy chest exposed by a silk shirt unbuttoned halfway to his waist, his muscles rippling under the fabric as he moved, broadcasting his power. Luk Suk was slightly built, shorter than Olsson, and favored carefully tailored suits with padded shoulders and elevated shoes to disguise the weakness of his physique. But Luk Suk stood and moved in a way that oozed confidence and authority, an impression reinforced by the two musclemen who trailed him everywhere: a pair of Rottweilers ready to spring into action at his slightest command.

As if to confirm he’d noticed Olsson’s reaction and approved of it, Chrysanthopoulos nodded his head slightly. Fear, Olsson thought. He’s used to invoking fear in others—like Luk Suk.

Olsson took the Greek’s hand to hide his momentary confusion and studied it in serious silence for a while: broad, beefy, and strong, it was a hand powerful enough to snap a neck with one quick movement. And probably has. More than once.

Olsson turned the Greek’s hand this way and that, looking at the lines and folds on the side of his hand as well as the palm. Through the corners of his eyes he studied his options. He was hemmed into the booth by the girls surrounding the table, now fascinated to see what he’d tell the Greek. A couple of thugs stood lazily behind Chrysanthopoulos. There was, presumably, an exit behind the bar but he didn’t know where it led. The club was now fairly busy, leaving no clear path to the front door. And, of course, there were a couple of doormen at the bottom of the stairs leading to the street. One slip, he thought, and I’d be done for. Only one way out, then. . . .

Noticing the Greek’s growing impatience, Olsson launched into his well-honed routine, breathing deeply to control the tension in his neck and shoulders. “Here,” he said pointing at a line on the Greek’s palm. “You see, your heart line is broken. So you’ve had several troubled relationships and probably left a trail of broken hearts.” And who hasn’t?

The Greek nodded, clearly pleased.

“But now. . . .” Olsson paused as if to study the heart line more closely. “You’re in a stable relationship—” the Greek nodded, totally unaware that Olsson only needed to look at the chunky wedding ring on his finger to know that “—but you can’t help straying from time to time.”

The Greek nodded again, delighted to have his masculine prowess confirmed.

“Four children. . . .”

“Three,” the Greek corrected.

Olsson shook his head. “There must be one you don’t know about, then.”

The Greek roared with laughter. “Maybe more than one.”

Olsson just nodded, careful not to let his sense of relief affect his heightened awareness. It’s so easy. He felt not the slightest bit guilty at capitalizing on the way people fell prey to their own superstitions, to their own desire to believe.

“So what does my future hold?” the Greek asked.

He’s hooked. “Well, although your Fate is written in your hand,” Olsson said, “the future is not fixed in stone, despite what some people say.” Nothing like a little pompous mumbo jumbo to lull the “mark.”

“You always have a choice. I can’t see it clearly right now—I’m feeling a bit drained—read too many palms in one go. And your aura is so powerful. . . . ” Flattery will get you everywhere. “But it involves travel . . . or perhaps, moving. Yes. If you were to live somewhere else, you could look forward to a long and uneventful life. If you stay here, though, I see some kind of danger hovering around you. . . .”

“Excitement or boredom? Is that what you’re saying?”

Olsson nodded. “That’s one way of looking at it, I suppose.”

The Greek smiled broadly. “True enough,” he said. “I like to live dangerously.”

Olsson let the Greek’s hand go and fell back into the cushions of the booth as if he was exhausted. He wiped his forehead with a napkin. “I need a break.”

The Greek waved to a waitress. “Champagne!” he yelled. “Champagne for our friend here. And I don’t even know your name,” he added, looking at Olsson.

“Joe,” said Olsson. “Joe Brewster.”

“For Joe!”

The Greek stayed long enough to drink one glass of champagne with Olsson before moving to talk to someone else. Olsson took the opportunity to extricate himself from the bar.

As he sucked in the cool midnight air he told himself sternly that he had taken far too many risks to merely “take the measure” of the Greek, and gain the impression that the Greek was perfectly capable of killing Vincent Leung or anyone else without a second thought—something Olsson already knew.

TO KILL A WHOLE day, he’d ridden his motorbike around Balmain, choosing a weekday when he knew Parliament was in session so there’d be no chance of bumping into Alison by accident. The ghosts of his memory took on flesh as he circled past everywhere he and Alison had spent time together . . . Alison’s house . . . the dojo . . . the Traynors’ place. . . . He slowed as he came to their old high school, grinning as he remembered catching up to her one morning, asking if he could ride with her the rest of the way to school.

“It’s a free country,” she had shrugged, indifferently, otherwise ignoring him.

“Is it?” Olsson asked.

She’d glared at him. “Do you question absolutely everything?”

“Of course. Don’t you?”

Her answer had been to accelerate her bike away from him.

He remembered how alive he’d felt whenever they were together, and how tormented he’d been when she became angry with him, usually as a result of one of his “infuriating” questions. Suspecting—no: certain—his affection was not returned, he tried to stay out of her way . . . and failed. Except on those occasions when she sought him out first, as though there was some invisible force pulling them together.

Without conscious planning, he ended up at the coffee shop around the corner from the dojo where they’d so often sat and talked. And just as he had sat here aged eighteen in this very same seat, wondering why he loved Alison—if indeed it was love he felt—so now, thirty-five, he again asked himself the same questions.

Was it love? Or a strange obsession?

What is love, anyway? He couldn’t answer that question then—or now. Why do I turn everything into a philosophical question? he asked himself—chuckling when he realized that, in itself, was a philosophical question.

It was her fiery nature that had first attracted him; her unyielding determination; her fixity of purpose. That, and being bested—humiliated—on the mat, turned her into a challenge as well. His “Melt the Ice Queen?” remark—something Alison threw back in his face every now and then—was a “macho” response made at an age when all boys exaggerated their masculinity to each other. “Macho Man,” he smiled grimly: his mask, hiding the reality underneath. It had been automatic, not a matter of conscious choice: a sensitive, caring, touchy-feely teenage boy wouldn’t survive the locker room mentality of the strutting male teenager.

He’d regretted his remark almost as soon as he’d made it. But it added to the challenge, made him persistent, and when that persistence, all so slowly, paid off, his feelings changed dramatically.

He found he could talk to her about anything, even his deepest, most private thoughts and fears. He had baited her with his “infernal questions” even while speaking from the heart. But she responded—yes, with anger. But she took him seriously. In time it seemed as if he were stretching her mind, that she enjoyed it—and stretched his in turn. He knew that she also felt safe enough with him to tell him inner thoughts she’d confided to no one else.

That she’d been hurt appealed to his male protectiveness. What other boys saw as her overwhelming strength provoked his admiration; the sense that, even so, she was fragile, made him cautious. They hardly ever touched, he never made a pass at her, never responded overtly to her sexual appeal until one day she complained, exasperated, “What do you think I am? A mind without a body?”

The door to the coffee shop swung open; he saw Alison coming towards him and was gripped with the same excitement, anticipation, and flood of desire he always felt when he saw her. And the unconscious sense of harmony which developed from their teaching Aikido together, which persisted off the mat even while being denied. Even now, just one look was enough to know the other’s mood, and sometimes the other’s thoughts as well.

But it was just someone who looked like Alison; he felt overcome with disappointment. Never mind that seeing her here, now, was a very bad idea . . . if she walked through the door, nothing else would matter.

He shook his head sadly. A gulf still loomed between them. She still remembered the way he’d scorned her aim of being “in the center of power”; she knew that in the years since he hadn’t changed his mind. But—there were things he hadn’t told her . . . couldn’t tell her. And somehow she knew, as if she could now see inside him a place that was locked, bolted, and shuttered to her, with no clue as to what was hidden inside.

If only I’d never taken that plane—

He looked glumly into his empty coffee cup: too many what-might-have-beens. All water under the bridge now.

He wandered idly past the dojo, feeling as though he sensed her presence; as if, should he walk inside, there she’d be. . . .

Love? Obsession? Seventeen years later he was no closer to an answer except . . . when they were together, even when they argued, the world seemed brighter, crisper; he felt more himself than at any other time. And he missed her.

But Alison, he thought, was like a surging, unpredictable river: oases of calm pools turning into spinning whirlpools, unexpected waterfalls and rapids forming treacherous undertows and pounding into glistening, rocky walls. While Karla was self-sufficient, like a wide lake, its calm waters stirring in a wind barely touching the deep stillness beneath.

Yet . . . while he was remembering Alison all thoughts of Karla disappeared from his mind. What does that tell you? He smiled to himself at the question which answered itself.

*****

“IT’S CALLED THE THREE Little Wolves and the Big Bad Pig.”

“No, no, no,” the children cried. “That’s not right, Alison,” a serious little girl said sternly. “You’ve got the story backwards.”

Alison smiled. “Look,” she said. She held up the book. The children craned to see the cover picturing three cute wolves taking a break from building a house. “See? This is a different story.”

Alison sat on the floor of the playroom, three-year-old Billy sitting on her knee, sucking his thumb and resting comfortably against her; half-a-dozen other young children crowded the space in front of her.

“Want to hear it anyway?” Alison asked.

“Yes, Alison,” the children chorused happily.

“Once upon a time,” she read, “there were three cuddly little wolves with soft fur and fluffy tails. . . .”

For over ten years, when she was in Canberra and had a free Sunday afternoon, she’d come to this Children’s Shelter to play with, read to, and just be with the children—all orphans. The orphanage was originally located in an old house needing renovation. The children slept two, three, even four to a room; the furniture, books, toys, and most of the clothes the children wore looked like the cast-offs donated to charity that they were.

Now, thanks to Alison, the orphanage was in a brand-new building. Except when there was a sudden influx of new children, each kid had a room to him- or herself. Hundreds of children’s books lined one wall of the playroom with which now had about every kind of toy and gadget a kid could desire.

WHEN SHE’D FIRST PRESENTED the idea to Royn he’d protested, “A good idea, but . . . orphans? I don’t mean to seem insensitive,” he added hastily, “but how can we sell it to people. . . ?” He looked embarrassed as his voice trailed off awkwardly.

“You mean,” said Alison, “how can we make it a vote-winner?”

When Royn nodded she said, “Simple. Call it . . . ‘Humane Conservatism.’ Be the ‘Caring Conservative.’ We’re not out to regulate everybody’s life, create more dependents, or set up more self-perpetuating government programs. We want to help people pull themselves up by their own bootstraps. We want to make it easier for people who are already helping others, not replace them.

“We’ll do it economically by recognizing the magnificent work of charities like St. Vincent de Paul, and offer them additional support. No government orphanages: there’s no way a government department can hope to replicate the caring and compassion of the wonderful people who dedicate their lives to looking after the unfortunate children who have lost their parents. What the government can do is remove some of the disadvantages these children suffer. Provide the books and toys that parents buy for their kids, for example. Computers. Funds for schoolbooks and after-school activities—ballet classes, piano lessons, and so on. Even some pocket money for the kids. Grants to improve facilities so every orphan could have his or her own room. That sort of thing. Sit down first with the charities and find out what they need and where we can—and can’t—help.

“Then, we can use the same approach with rape victims, battered women, abused children and other disadvantaged groups . . . and steal the ‘social conscience’ vote away from Labor. And after all,” she added with a broad smile, “what politician is going to oppose giving books to orphans?”

“That’s brilliant, Alison!” Royn said with admiration. “There are times when I think you should be sitting in this chair, instead of me.”

“God forbid. Then I’d have to kiss babies and shake hands and make speeches and fend off all those pesky reporters trying to find out who I was sleeping with. And be nice to people I can’t stand to be anywhere near. I’m much happier where I am.”

“If you ever change your mind,” Royn grinned, “I’m sure we can find you a nice, safe electorate—just so long as it’s not mine you want.”

Helping orphans became the first Conservative Party initiative that could have come straight from the opposition Labor Party’s playbook.

But there were times when Alison thought the result of her idea had turned into a mixed blessing. It had spawned a new government department—or, rather, a small agency to administer the program . . . which seemed to grow larger with every passing year as the bureaucrats came up with new schemes for grants, assistance and so on that increased their staff and budget. And worse, while the program’s original purpose had been to supplement the charities’ work, as the program’s budget rose the agency slowly increased its interference in orphanages’ operations, pointing out they now provided the bulk of the orphanages’ funding.

And to Alison, the children didn’t seem to be any happier. Indeed, they now seemed to spend much of their time fighting over which TV channel to watch, or whose turn it was to play on the computer, while most of the books stood unread on the shelves and the toys gathered dust in their storage boxes unplayed-with—a few still in their original, shrink-wrapped packaging. The occasional child—usually an older one—actually resisted being adopted if it meant going to a home whose facilities didn’t compare with the orphanages’.

But she didn’t keep coming back to see the results—especially the imperfect ones—of a government program she’d initiated. What drew her to the orphanage initially were the children and the sense she could pass on just a little of what she’d been lucky enough to receive from her parents. What kept her returning—especially after her thirtieth birthday when she began casting long, wistful looks at mothers walking along the street with their toddlers—was that here she could gain some sense of what it meant to be a mother.

From time to time, Alison wondered if she’d ever succumb to “baby hunger,” some kind of primeval instinct that afflicted some women in their late thirties and early forties—not all of them childless. Two career women she knew had simply stopped taking the pill and one of them didn’t even know who the father of her child was. But both were delighted to be mothers regardless of the cost—and it wasn’t difficult for Alison to imagine herself following their example.

SHE HUGGED ALL THE children “goodbye,” wiped away Billy’s tears, and shook her head sorrowfully when the children asked hopefully, “See you next Sunday, Alison?”

“They all love your visits, Alison,” said one of the nuns as she left, “and really look forward to them—it’s a real pity you can’t come every Sunday.”

“I wish I could, Sister,” said Alison.

“Especially little Billy. He clings to you, and gets really upset when you don’t come back. It’s as if you remind of him of his mother.”

The nun’s subtext, she realized, was: “If you can’t come every Sunday, it might be better if you didn’t come at all.”

She’s an expert in creating guilt, Alison thought. But . . . she could be right. And when she thought about her real reasons for coming, she wondered if she was really doing the children—or herself—any favors.

And she drove home . . . slowly, tears blurring her vision . . . trying to make sense of a world where you set out to help others and end up being rewarded with induced guilt . . . and wondering whether someone like McKurn was the true product of the establishment you’d committed your life to.

*****

THREE MEN IN SUITS descended on Karla Preston as she strode out of the gate at Sydney airport. Two, who seemed to be together, were wearing sturdy shoes, nondescript grey suits and white shirts, looking as if they’d both come out of the same mould, even though one of them looked Eurasian. The word Police popped into Karla’s mind of its own accord. The third man looked like he’d just stepped out of an Armani advertisement.

“Are you Karla Preston?” the Eurasian man asked officiously.

“Perhaps you would be so kind to identify yourself,” the man in Armani asked the grey suit.

“Just hold your horses,” Karla said, raising her voice and one commanding hand, stretching herself to her full height so she stood eye to eye with the Eurasian man. Her deep, authoritative tone caused the three men to look at her in surprise as the heads of other deplaning passengers turned to see what was going on. “Perhaps you’d all be kind enough to tell me just who the hell you are—” she turned to look at the Armani man who was now smiling at her wryly “—starting with you.”

“Miss Preston,” he said with obvious appreciation, handing her his card. “I’m Mike Rubin from the law firm of Butler & Taylor. Lynette, I believe, said you’d be expecting me.”

“She did,” Karla said. “But I didn’t expect two welcoming committees.”

“Me neither,” Rubin grinned as he handed his business cards to the two men in grey. “And you two gentlemen are . . . ?”

“Sergeant Ramon Clarke, Federal Police,” said the Eurasian man who’d spoken first.

“Fallow, ASIO,” the second man grunted.

“Could I see your ID please gentlemen?” Rubin asked.

“Miss Preston,” said Clarke, “are we to assume that Mr.—ah—” he looked at Rubin’s card “—Rubin acts for you?”

“That’s correct,” she said.

“We were hoping we could ask you some questions,” Clarke said.

“Did you receive my message,” Rubin asked, “suggesting we make an appointment tomorrow or Tuesday?”

Clarke nodded. “But when we saw Miss Preston’s column this morning, we decided we couldn’t wait. Especially Mr. Fallow, here.”

“And what possible questions can ASIO want to ask me?” Karla asked

“Perhaps we could move somewhere a little more private first,” Fallow said quietly, eyeing the departure lounge now crowded with passengers waiting for their flight.

“Sure,” said Karla. “I, for one, could use a decent cup of coffee.”

“We have an interview room available,” said Clarke, “and coffee we can certainly do.”

“Let me just clarify something first,” said Rubin. “Do you have a warrant to arrest or detain my client? Is she a suspect of some kind?”

Clarke and Fallow shook their heads. “As I already said, all we want to do is see if Miss Preston can help with our investigations,” said Clarke.

“Excuse me a moment then, gentlemen, and I’ll confer with my client.”

Rubin and Karla moved away and talked quietly for a few minutes while Clarke and Fallow eyed them uneasily. When they came back Rubin said, “My client is perfectly happy to cooperate with both of you, although another time and place would be far more convenient. But since you’ve come all this way let’s see what we can cover in thirty minutes.”

Declining Clarke’s suggested interview room, Rubin led a search for a quiet table in the terminal which, on a busy Sunday afternoon, was not easy to find. The two grey suits eventually agreed to a booth which, though surrounded by customers at other tables, was relatively private. Rubin placed his recorder in the center of the table and switched it on. “First of all, gentlemen,” Rubin said, “we admit that my client has entered the country without passing through Immigration, but that is not a criminal offence.”

“Provided,” Clarke said, “she fronts up to Immigration within two working days.”

“Which she will do tomorrow,” said Rubin.

“The crew of this boat,” Clarke said, “have almost certainly committed an offence by entering Australian waters without permission. And there’s always the possibility, of course, that they’re smugglers.” He began questioning Karla about the boat and the crew—“What kind of boat?” “Do you know its name?” “The names of any of the crew?” But Karla, grateful for the risks they’d taken to bring her back, immediately felt protective of them, and while she answered the rest of Clarke’s questions truthfully, he ended up frustrated at how little information he’d obtained—and clearly doubtful she’d told him everything she knew.

“And is this all the baggage you brought with you into Australia?” Clarke asked her, pointing at her backpack and carry bag.

“Except for the things I bought in Cairns, which I’m mostly wearing, yes.”

“May I take a look?”

“Any objection?” asked Rubin.

Karla shook her head—relieved that Lynette had remarked, “provided, of course, you didn’t bring in anything you shouldn’t have,” which had prompted her to mail the marijuana to her apartment instead of carrying it on the plane.

Clarke reached for her bags but Rubin stopped him. “I’d appreciate if you would sign a statement afterwards that you have searched her bags. She can take it with her to Immigration tomorrow.”

“And if I find something?” Clarke growled.

“Then I imagine you’ll arrest her, so it won’t matter.”

Clarke nodded sourly, and began to go thoroughly through every pocket and corner of Karla’s bags.

“And you, Mr. Fallow,” Rubin said, “have been very quiet. What brings you here?”

“My interest, Miss Preston,” he said in a voice so soft it barely carried above the background chatter, “is in the terrorists. I’d appreciate whatever information you can give me about them.”

“There’s not much I can tell you,” Karla said. “But you could have saved yourself the trip—it will all be in my column tomorrow. In fact,” she said pulling out her laptop, “why don’t you read it now? Save time—and I don’t know that I can tell you much more than what I’ve already written.”

Fallow scowled briefly, but scrolled quickly through her words. “What about the casualty—one Sandeman soldier died.”

“I didn’t see anything—I kept my head down until the shooting stopped. But just between you and me, it wouldn’t surprise me if the Sandeman captain shot the soldier himself—for not shooting back or something like that.”

“You expect me to believe that?”

“I’m not saying that’s what happened. But from what I saw of the captain and the way he treated his troops, that would be perfectly in character.”

“How many terrorists were there? Where was their base of operations? What weapons did they carry?”

“Look, Mr. Fallow, I was with them for just a few hours. It was the middle of the night. They took me to a beach where this boat picked me up. They were simply much nicer people than the Sandeman soldiers—well, certainly nicer than the captain, who was a real arsehole. I was overjoyed to be rescued. I felt safe, something I didn’t feel the whole time I was with the Sandeman soldiers. What else can I tell you? It’s all in the article—including the fact that their weapons seemed to all come from the Sandeman Army’s arsenal.”

“Well, gentlemen,” said Rubin, “thank you for coming. If there’s nothing else, I’m sure we’ve all got things we’d rather be doing for what’s left of our weekend.”

*****

IT TOOK THREE DAYS to break the Lebanese.

Every three or four hours, for two days, he was injected with heroin laced, unknown to him, with a trace of crack. On the third day of his confinement he was left alone, shaking for hours with withdrawal symptoms and screaming endlessly for relief. Eventually the three hooded men came in. His eyes were fixed on the needle in de Brouw’s hand.

“So,” said Nazarov pulling up a chair, “are you ready to talk?”

Kuri nodded desperately, and began to talk. He’d say one thing and then plead for the injection. Nazarov would shake his head. “Tell me more first.”

Finally, when Nazarov seemed satisfied, he nodded to de Brouw who took his arm. Kuri’s expression of gratitude as he looked at de Brouw almost masked his pain.

“Wait,” Nazarov said sharply, pushing de Brouw’s hand, and the needle, away. “One other thing.”

Kuri’s eyes pleaded with Nazarov. “Anything,” he croaked.

“What do you know about the Vincent Leung murder?”

“Nothing,” he sobbed. “Nothing at all.”

“It wasn’t your gang who killed him, then?”

“No.” His head shook back and forth violently, but his wild, blood-red eyes never left the needle. “We had nothing to do with it.”

Nazarov nodded and de Brouw administered the injection. Kuri relaxed as the drug hit him.

As he calmed down Nazarov handed him a copy of that morning’s Mercury. “Looks like you’ve just become famous,” he said.

Kuri gasped as he saw his face on the front page next to Weinbaum, his face a mask of terror.

“We were planning to take you back home—” said Nazarov.

“No,” Kuri shrieked. “The cops will be waiting for me.”

Nazarov shrugged. “So where would you prefer?”

“Anywhere else. I don’t care. Just not home!”

“Okay.”

Kuri continued to grow calmer until he fell into a peaceful, drugged sleep.

Later, in the middle of the night, they gave him another injection and dumped his unconscious body in an alleyway. Some twenty minutes later, the police found him there. “Jesus, what a stink,” said one policeman, holding his nose. “Too right,” said another. “We’ll have to hose this poor bastard down as soon as we get him back to the station.”

29 Sixth Uncle

AT NINE AM ON Monday morning, claiming libel by McKurnWatch.com on behalf of their client, Senator Frank McKurn, the firm of Andrews, Zolisky & Smythe, Solicitors, sought and were granted a temporary ex parte injunction which ordered all internet service providers in Australia to block access to the website McKurnWatch.com.

The suit named as defendants the unknown owners and writers of McKurnWatch.com, the American company that hosted the website and every internet service provider in the country, from the major phone and cable companies to the smallest “mom and pop” outfit.

The judge gave them two weeks to serve a libel suit against the website’s actual owners, or his order would expire.

*****

“MELBOURNE’S BENT COPPER”—FEATURED on the front pages of Monday’s Sykes’ and OlssonPress papers—turned out to be a senior Superintendent who was a favored candidate to become Victoria’s next Police Commissioner.

When the Melbourne police received a packet of information from the OlssonPress on Sunday afternoon, they went to arrest him. But by then he’d flown the coop: after seeing the Sunday papers, he’d rushed to the airport to grab a flight to Los Angeles where he was detained before he could take an onward flight to Brazil.

Tomorrow, the papers promised, Australia’s most corrupt Mayor.

“It seems they’ve learnt their lesson,” said Royn.

“What do you mean by that?” Alison asked.

“They’re giving no indication of which city or even which state has the dubious honor of hosting the country’s most corrupt mayor.”

“I see,” chuckled Alison. “So I wonder how many mayors are making hasty travel plans as we speak.”

“Indeed,” Royn laughed. “I guess we’ll find out tomorrow.” His laughter came to an abrupt halt as his eyes turned to the copy of the Mercury sitting on his desk. “Depending on who it exposes, this corruption series could be very damaging,” he said, slamming his fist on top of the newspaper. “But we can capitalize on it.”

“The Candyman Inquiry?”

“Exactly,” said Royn. “Set up a meeting with Bruce this morning. We can use these exposés to create a sense of urgency. And beef up the enquiry, broaden it, and even go public. We’ll show we’re already on top of it, and if Bruce goes on TV promising action, those damn foot-draggers will have to fall in line.”

“Don’t be too optimistic,” Alison grinned. “They should also interview Weinbaum, and see if they can get advance copies of the OlssonPress’ evidence at the same time as the police. Okay, now . . . have you spoken to Mary yet this morning?”

Royn nodded. “Briefly. She gave me this,” he said, the smile disappearing from his face as he picked up a sheet of paper from his desk. “Nine hundred and thirty-seven emails, thanks to that damned Preston woman. And only ten percent of them support our presence in the Sandemans.”

“They’re still coming in,” Alison said.

“Gawd,” Royn groaned. “And she really savaged the Sandeman troops this morning. She’s making us look so bad I sometimes wish she’d been lost at sea.”

“So . . . ” Alison said hesitantly, “why don’t you invite her in for a chat?”

“Now, why would you suggest that?” Royn asked, looking puzzled. “Isn’t she Olsson’s current girlfriend?”

“So it seems,” Alison said sourly. “But she does have a completely different perspective on the Sandemans—one we’re not getting anywhere else. And since she’s so hostile, you might be able to do what you’ve done with other opponents: disarm them with your charm.”

“Maybe,” Royn said doubtfully. “Though I have the sense it won’t work with her.”

“You’re probably right,” Alison said. “From what I hear around the press gallery, her bite is worse than her bark.” She passed Royn a sheet of paper from her file. “Take a look at this. It just came in from the geek.”

paper supplies received its first new south wales government contract in 1972. just a few months afterwards there was a change of ownership: mckurn’s wife had a 45% interest, now owned by the same swiss company that owns the hideaway hotel.

of particular interest: as you can see from the enclosed accounts of the company (which, of course, you should not have access to without a court order) the company has just two customers: the federal and nsw state governments. and its profits are surprisingly low considering that everything they sell is much cheaper down at the supermarket or the big office supply stores.

the most likely reason: a lot of what they sell (pens and pencils for example) is imported from cheap-labor countries like china. by “re-invoicing”—that is, the goods are first sold to a tax haven company, which then on-sells them to the australian company at a significant markup—the REAL profits are banked tax-free in the cayman islands or somewhere like that. if the fuzz were sent in to look at their books, i’m sure that’s what they’d find.

“Now, that’s very interesting,” Royn said as Alison took the sheet from him and fed it into the shredder by his desk. “Looks like a boondoggle to me. But we don’t have any proof that McKurn’s behind this Swiss company. We can’t just go and ask that Swiss lawyer.”

“Not much point,” said Alison. “But closer to home there’s the Cracken connection.”

“Ah yes,” said Royn, with a broad smile. “If Paul had something to do with that company getting the federal government contract—”

“That would be the end of him.” Alison’s eyes glittered as she spoke. “And I’m working on two, maybe three avenues of attack.”

“The Auditor-General would be one,” Royn said.

“Quite so,” said Alison. “But we can’t just send him a copy of the geek’s email—I have to figure out the best approach. Hopefully, I’ll have it all worked tomorrow.”

“Good,” said Royn. “But there’s no question in my mind, now, that McKurn’s involved in all kinds of shady deals and questionable practices.”

“All we need is some bankable evidence,” Alison said.

“It will come,” said Royn. “After all, just one of our leads needs to pay off.”

“We’re getting closer,” Alison agreed. But quickly enough? “The private investigators will begin interviewing Leon Price today, but it’ll be a slow process. He’s weak, and pleurisy affects the linings of the lungs so he has great trouble breathing, even with oxygen. And even more trouble talking.”

“Confession, they say, is good for the soul,” Royn chuckled. “so let’s just hope he names some names.”

*****

“DEREK. DEREK! MAKE THEM stop. Oh please, make them stop!”

Derek Olsson stared open-mouthed at his sister’s tear-streaked face on the screen of his laptop. She screamed, the tip of a knife nicking her throat, drawing a single drop of blood.

“Ah-son,” a voice he knew all too well chuckled in Cantonese, “if you’d like to see your little sister again in one piece, you’d better give me a call immediately. You know my number. And you know I don’t like to wait.”

The video clip ended, Jessica’s head thrown back, away from the knife-point, her mouth wide open in mid-scream, frozen tears glittering in the harsh light.

Olsson stood, his eyes watering and his stomach heaving as he turned away from the screen; he could feel bile creeping up his throat. “Damn you, Luk Suk,” he swore, smashing his fist at the wall . . . but he forced himself to stop in mid-motion, the skin of his knuckles just brushing the target, for fear his fist would go straight through to the other side, and the noise would attract unwanted attention from the other residents of the guest house. He glared at the locked muscles of his arm, feeling the accompanying lines of stress across his shoulders. He willed his arm to relax; slowly, it fell back to his side. But his shoulders didn’t follow suit. Aware of a headache beginning at the bottom of his neck, he forced himself to return to the laptop.

Turning off the sound he ran the video again, stopping it frequently to study the picture carefully. Shaking his head he ran through it a third time: there was simply nothing in the background giving any clue of where in the world Jessica might be. Information from the email’s header showed that the message had been sent from Bangkok. But the video itself could have been taken anywhere.

He stood again, and paced the room, four steps each way, back and forth, again and again, until he came to a decision. Opening another program on the computer, he donned a set of headphones and dialled a phone number.

“Hullo?”

Damn, he thought, remembering the day he’d stormed out of his grandfather’s house in anger at the man he’d once idolized, never to return, it’s him. Slurring his voice, he asked, “Is Jessica there, please?”

“Ah . . . no.”

“Could I speak to Molly, then.”

“Wait a moment.”

Olsson slumped back in the chair, his body limp. Speaking to his grandfather had sent his tension level notching several rungs higher than his reaction to Jessica’s torture.

“Hullo.” His mother’s voice was faint, hesitant.

“Hi, Mum,” he said. “It’s Derek.”

“Derek? Are you all right? What’s going on?—I don’t understand any of it.”

“I’m fine, Mum. Where’s Jessica?”

“Jessica? I don’t know.”

“When did you see her last?”

“I’m not sure, Derek. A while . . . I think.”

“And nobody’s gone looking for her?”

“Derek, you’re not angry with me are you?”

“Of course not, Mum. But I am worried. About Jessica.”

“Worried? Yes, I suppose so. Dad,” she said, her voice level in Olsson’s ear falling as she turned away from the phone, “where is Jessica, do you know? . . . He doesn’t know either Derek.”

“Ask him when he last saw her.” Olsson could hear a touch of anxiety in his mother’s voice as she spoke to her father, though he couldn’t make out the words.

“Two days ago, he says,” she told him when she turned back to the phone.

“Two days? Has he tried to find her? Has anyone?”

“Well . . . I don’t know . . . really Derek, why are you so angry?”

“Jessica’s missing, Mum. She’s in trouble. I’m sure of it. I want you to do something for me—and for her.”

“If I can. . . .” Molly Olsson’s voice faltered as she spoke.

“I want you to tell the police that Jessica is missing. Then the police will go looking for her and bring her home.”

“That would be nice. I miss her you know. Where could she be?”

“That’s why I’d like you to go and tell the police, so they’ll find her,” Olsson said patiently.

“Well, I don’t know if I can do that, Derek. I don’t go out very much you know,” she said doubtfully. “I don’t really like going out any more. . . .”

“Okay, Mum. You can call them. Do you have a pen or pencil handy?”

“Let me see. . . .”

While he waited, Olsson scrabbled through the phone directory until he found the number he was looking for.

“Yes, Derek,” his mother said, “I have a pencil.”

“Write down this number then. . . .”

“Oh. Wait. I’ll have to find something to write on.”

Olsson felt his eyes dampen and grabbed at a tissue. Has she been taking her medicine? he wondered. Without Jessica to make sure, maybe not. One thing at a time, that’s all she can handle . . . I’ll call back later to check. . . . I guess I should be glad that Mum doesn’t—can’t—really understand what’s going on. Small comfort.

“Okay, Derek. Now what do you want me to do with this?”

“Write down this phone number.” He repeated the number, slowly, twice, and then made his mother read it back to him. “That’s the phone number of the Annandale police station. I want you to call them and tell them about Jessica, okay? They’ll know what do to.”

“All right, Derek. . . . And when are you going to come and visit me again?’

“In a while, Mum. I can’t right now, I’m afraid.”

“I know . . . you’re always so busy. . . .”

“I’m sorry, Mum. I’ll come as soon as I can. Now, could you tell Grandpa I need to talk to him, please?”

“Do you think that’s such a good idea, Derek?”

“It’s important, Mum. About Jessica.”

“Wait a moment, then.”

Olsson breathed deeply while he waited for his grandfather, Jack Dent, to come on the line. He felt just a slight tremor when he heard the familiar, grating voice. “Your mother insisted I talk to you. I can’t imagine why.”

“Jessica’s been missing for two days. . . .”

“It’s happened before,” Dent said disapprovingly.

“For two days?”

“Well . . . no . . . now that you mention it.”

“And did she tell you she’d be away?”

“Ah . . . not this time, no.”

“Jessica’s missing. I want you to take Mum down to the police station now, this minute, and file a missing persons report on Jessica.”

“And if I don’t, what then?”

“Jesus. Just what sort of a grandfather—or father—are you?”

There was a wheezing silence on the other end of the phone.

“Well, just remember,” Olsson said angrily, “when you get to the Pearly Gates—” and the sooner the better, he thought “—your sins of omission will be weighed just as heavily as your other sins.” He cut the line and yanked off the headphones.

I’m sorry, Jess, he thought as he looked at her image still dominating the screen. This has nothing to do with you.

Feeling his mind drifting he did a few pushups and stretches to get himself focused again. “Okay,” he muttered to himself with a sigh, “I know what I need to do next—so do it.”

Putting the headphones back on, he made another call.

“Inspector Durant?” Olsson asked when his call was put through.

“That’s right. Who is this?”

“Derek Olsson.”

“Olsson? I find that hard to believe.” He covered the mouthpiece of the phone. “Trace this call,” he said urgently to Simon Lee.

“Today is not April Fools’ Day, either, Inspector,” said Olsson.

“Okay.” Durant drew his words out into a drawl. “So it is you. I must say, though, you’ve got a nerve.”

“I’m calling to report a kidnapping.”

“Really,” Durant said sarcastically.

“That’s right, really. And oh, by the way, go ahead and trace the call by all means. It won’t do you any good.”

“We’ll see. . . . So tell me,” Durant asked skeptically, “who’s been kidnapped—and what’s the evidence?” Durant asked.

“My sister. The evidence is a video I have just received. She’s being held by the Golden Dragon Triad. But I’ve no idea where she’s being held. She may not even be in Australia any more.”

“Is that the outfit that has put a half-a-million dollar reward on your head?”

“That’s right.”

“Why?”

“Because they, like you, mistakenly believe I killed Vincent Leung.”

“If that’s the case, why didn’t they simply kill you on Anzac Parade?”

“When you see the video of my sister, I think you’ll have an idea of what they had in mind for me.”

“What do you plan to do—drop it off at my office?”

“Hardly, Inspector. Give me your email address and I’ll send it to you.”

“I really don’t have time for this sort of thing.”

“Call the Annandale police station. Within the hour, you’ll find that she’s been reported missing.”

“I’m rather busy right now, so if I remember, I might give them a call in the morning.”

“There’s no need to string me along. You’ll have plenty of time to trace the call without resorting to tactics like that.”

Durant grunted. “Well . . . I’m willing to play along. For a minute or two anyway. So, do you know who’s holding her?”

“Yes. His name is Wong Sui-hung, but everyone calls him ‘Luk Suk.’”

“Look Sook?” Durant repeated. “What sort of name is that?”

“It’s a title, like Godfather. It means sixth uncle—he’s the sixth leader of the Golden Dragon Triad. El Supremo—of the Hong Kong gang, which makes him leader of the triad world-wide.”

“Does he identify himself on the video?”

“No. But I recognize his voice. The Hong Kong police, I’m sure, will be able to confirm that.”

“Really, Olsson, I have enough on my plate without going off on another wild-goose chase.”

“I’ve called you, Inspector, because I know you’re a straight-shooter. Jessica’s been missing for two days and no one knows where she is.”

“So why hasn’t she been reported missing before now?”

“Because I only just learnt about it. She lives with my mother and grandfather. My mother has Alzheimer’s and hardly knows what day of the week it is and my grandfather is an arsehole. I just put a bomb under him . . . metaphorically speaking, I hasten to add. Call him. One phone call will confirm what I’ve been saying.”

“Hmm,” said Durant doubtfully. “Well, give me the number . . . maybe there’s something in what you’re saying.”

“There’s no ‘maybe’ about it, Inspector.” After dictating the phone number, Olsson continued, “Jessica’s life is in danger. Luk Suk is using her as bait to get me. If he gets wind that the police are looking for her, he may simply have her killed.”

“Why don’t you just make the trade—if that’s what he wants? Solve everybody’s problems.”

“I don’t trust him to release her, for one thing—would you?”

“I’m in no position to judge . . . I don’t know him as well as you obviously do.”

Lee pushed a note into Durant’s hand. It’s a Sydney number used by one of those voice-over-the-internet phone services, he read.

“So where in the world are you?” As Durant spoke he wrote: See how far you can trace it.

They’re working on it, Lee wrote. Durant nodded and indicated that Lee should pick up an extension.

Olsson laughed. “I told you it would be a waste of time. By the time you find out, if you ever do, I’ll be long gone.”

“Don’t count on it,” Durant growled.

“So will you give me your email address?”

“Okay,” Durant said, a shrug in his voice.

“Check your email shortly.”

“I’ll find you sooner or later, you know.”

“I doubt it, Inspector. I’d say the next time you’ll see me will be when I bring you the real murderer of Vincent Leung.”

“I already know.”

“You’ve been very cleverly misled, Inspector . . . as my solicitor’s email pointed out. You’ve read it by now, I presume.”

“Of course. Speculative questions, not evidence.”

“But, as I’m sure you very well know, such evidence can be validly interpreted in more than one way.”

“Not, I think, in this case.”

“One day, Inspector, you’ll have to eat your words.”

TEN MINUTES LATER, DURANT’S eyes widened as Jessica Olsson screamed and Lee’s expression froze at the Cantonese words. At Durant’s impatient glance, Lee hastily translated them.

“Seems like Olsson was telling the truth,” Durant growled.

Lee nodded and pointing at the email, “I’ll go look for someone who’s computer savvy. He may be able to tell, by looking at Olsson’s email, where in the world it was sent from.”

In another ten minutes Durant had a transcript of Luk Suk’s words, learnt that Olsson’s call couldn’t be traced beyond the Sydney number, and that Olsson’s email had been sent from what looked like a web-based email service in Colombia. But it didn’t follow that Olsson was in South America. “He could be anywhere in the world, sir. We’d have to get a look at the email service’s records to find out where.”

“Colombia,” Durant groaned as he picked up the phone. “Super, can I see you immediately? It’s urgent.”

*****

AFTER TWO DAYS, JESSICA could be anywhere.

Olsson checked the date on Luk Suk’s email: it had been sent late the previous evening. I’ll have to call him soon, Olsson thought. In a day or two . . . ? He recalled Luk Suk’s words, “And you know I don’t like to wait,” and shook his head; the muscles on his back tightened uncomfortably as he imagined what Luk Suk could do to Jessica. No . . . tomorrow . . . or would that be too late?

He paced the room again, in long, impatient steps, spinning on his heels as he reached the wall, back and forth, back and forth, clenching and unclenching his fists as he strode. After a few minutes he stopped, grabbed his helmet and ran down the stairs. Outside, he leapt on his motorcycle and wove through the traffic along Glebe Point Road, heading in the direction of Annandale. “Slow down,” he muttered to himself as he noticed the angry glare of a driver he’d cut in front of. “The last thing you want right now is too much attention.”

When he neared his grandfather’s house in Annandale he slowed the bike to a crawl. Good, he thought with a smile at the police car parked in front. As he passed it the bike was almost wobbling from the lack of momentum. He turned at the next corner, looped around the side streets and, a few minutes later, headed towards the house again from the other direction. He could picture his mother inside, probably spooked by the arrival of the police, panicking as she fully realized for the first time that something terrible must have happened to her daughter. He noticed that the bike was slowing, as if of its own accord, so that it would come to a stop behind the police car. What am I thinking? he asked himself. He pushed away his urge to go in to comfort his mother and gunned the motorcycle’s engine so that it roared along the street with a sharp burst of acceleration. As he heard the squeal of the back tyre and the throbbing growl of the engine, he let the accelerator grip go and looked quickly right, left, and behind . . . but no one had taken any notice of the sudden noise.

Back in his room, he donned the headphones to make another phone call, which was answered by the surprised voice of Lew Campbell, head of InterFreight and OlssonPress security. “Is that really you, boss?”

Olsson smiled. “That’s right, Lew.”

“You’re taking too many chances, aren’t you? And are you sure this call can’t be traced?” Campbell asked.

“No. At least, not in time.”

“Okay,” Campbell said, stretching out his words, “I sure hope you’re right. . . . I suppose there’s something you want me to do.”

“Right. My sister Jessica has been kidnapped by the Golden Dragon Triad. I want you to see if you can trace her—pull out all the stops.”

“Okay . . . ” Campbell drawled, as if lengthening his words would give him time to think. “Isn’t this more a matter for the police?”

“They’ve already been informed—I called Durant—”

“Jesus, boss, you shouldn’t be let out without a minder.”

Olsson laughed—but his laugh left a bitter taste in his own mouth. “Just see what you can do, okay Lew?”

“Okay, boss, but. . . .”

“Yes, Lew. What?”

“I used to be a cop, as you know. I’m obliged to tell them about your call.”

“I see. . . .” Olsson paused. “Well, go ahead. Let’s keep on the right side of the law.”

“Very funny, boss,” Campbell sighed. “All right, then. I’ll do whatever we can to find your sister, though we’re not really set up for this sort of thing. First, you’d better tell me everything you know. . . .”

Afterwards, Olsson stared blankly at the computer screen, unaware of the incessant drum roll of the fingernails of his right hand as they click-click-clicked on the tabletop. Lew’s probably right, he thought. “So if he draws a blank, what then?”

His eyes turned to his backpack, sitting on a chair by the table. “Just one thing left, then.” He rummaged through the backpack until his hand closed around an external hard drive. He plugged in into the computer, typed the password for access and began going through the files.

“Time to cash in some chips.”

30 The Girls from Issan

“CHANGE OF PLANS, GUYS,” Nazarov announced.

“What now?” asked de Brouw.

The next target on their list was one of the Greek’s henchmen, and they were ready to make the snatch later that day.

Nazarov shook his head. “I don’t get it. We’ll have to grab the Greek’s guy later. We have to pick someone from the Golden Dragon Triad. Here.” Nazarov handed Shultz and de Brouw a printout of the email he’d received that morning. “He’s even given us a list of their names and addresses—and their pictures.” He paused while Shultz and de Brouw read their new instructions.

It will be tough to make these bastards talk—“omerta” and all that—so you’ll probably need to lean on several just to get one to answer. And I’m after this info desperately—preferably yesterday—so please pull out all the stops.

“If they’re going to be tougher than the Lebanese—” de Brouw began.

“—we’d better pick up two or three of them at once.” Shultz finished.

“Right,” said Nazarov. “But at the moment we’re only set up to accommodate one at a time.”

“It won’t be hard to make some alterations,” said Shultz.

“True,” Nazarov agreed. “But it will take time.”

“Which he’s not giving us,” said Shultz. “I don’t like it. We’ve always been able to plan everything carefully before. That’s what’s kept us out of trouble.”

“And if we stretch ourselves too thin,” de Brouw added, “the greater the risk we’ll be running that something will go wrong.”

“We can take advantage of the ‘opt out’ clause in his instructions,” said de Brouw, looking more cheerful.

“What’s that?” the other two asked simultaneously.

De Brouw spread his hands, smiling. “If these Dragon guys are hard to break, they’re hard to break. Can’t get around that. He’s already admitted that up front. So I suggest we hurry—slowly. If he gets impatient we just tell him—‘like you said, Boss, it sure is hard to make these bastards talk.’”

*****

“IS THIS KARLA PRESTON?”

“Yes. Who am I talking to?” Karla asked.

“I’m Alison McGuire, from Anthony—”

“Well . . . hullo. This is a surprise.”

“Yes,” said Alison, “for both of us, I imagine.”

“And for some reason,” said Karla, “unlike some politicians I could name, I don’t think you’re calling to complain about something I’ve written.”

“No, I’m not,” Alison chuckled, “but I could if you like.”

“It’s hardly a good investment of your time—or anyone else’s.”

“Miss Preston, I had already figured that out.”

“Good. And call me Karla . . . Alison.”

“Okay . . . Karla. I’m calling because my boss—”

“Anthony Royn.”

“Right. . . . And he’d like to talk to you—”

“Talk to me?” said Karla. “What on earth for?”

“To get more background on the Sandeman Islands. A different perspective.”

“Okay. Let me suggest you also invite Robin Cartwright.”

Alison laughed. “That’s a good idea—though I’m not sure how the minister will take to meeting both of you at the same time. Anyway, he might still be in Toribaya. I’ll check. When would work best for you?”

“Later in the week would be fine.”

“So where should I send your ticket?” Alison asked.

“Ticket?” Karla replied.

“Airline ticket. Since we’ve invited you, you’re entitled to expenses at least, plus an honorarium for your time.”

“If you make the meeting in the afternoon I’ll drive down in the morning.”

“Those kind of expenses are covered too.”

“I guess I’m not making myself clear,” said Karla irritably, “so let me put it this way: I’m not a receiver of stolen goods.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“I mean that all the government’s money is extorted from the people by force, without their consent—”

“‘Without their consent’? Alison said heatedly. “This is a democracy, after all.”

“So it is,” Karla sighed. “But if taxation were truly voluntary, do you think enough money would be collected to pay your salary? We can talk about it some other time if you want to. In any case, I won’t be coming to Canberra just to talk to your boss. So I’ll pay my own way, okay?”

Strange woman, Alison thought as she put down the phone and turned back to skimming the newspapers. She chuckled at an item in the Mercury’s gossip column:

Conservatives to Dump McKurn? We hear mutterings from Conservative Party members and bigwigs that Senate President Frank McKurn may be turning into a liability the Conservative Party can’t afford. As yet, no one is willing to speak for the record, but a small group of CP senators are sharpening their knives and counting heads to see if a motion to eject McKurn from his comfortable sinecure of President would succeed. If it did, the next move could be to drop him from the CP Senate ticket altogether.

But with his hard core of supporters and his take-no-prisoners style, any move to oust McKurn will end up as a venomous battle royale on the Senate floor.

Watch this space!

Turning to another article, she grinned as she read that the same coalition that had formed to fight Senator Haughtry’s bill to extend the libel laws was debating whether to attack McKurn’s ex parte injunction. The smaller companies were taking the lead, but it looked as if they’d be outvoted by the bigger ones, one spokesman being quoted as saying “it’s no skin off our nose.”

In another article, a lawyer described McKurn’s injunction as being “against every known principle of law, justice and plain common sense,” and warned it was the “thin end of the wedge” that could lead to the unrestricted censorship of the internet.

McKurn, she decided, had made a strategic error. Civil libertarians would be up in arms; as “McKurnWatch.com” had been now been named in McKurn’s application, “McKurnWatch.com” was now freely mentioned in both the press and on radio and TV, some of the more daring talkback radio hosts even quoting a few juicy paragraphs from the website’s emails. The net result, Alison felt sure, was that tens of thousands more people would flock to the website before access was cut off to see what the fuss was all about.

But. . . .

The smile disappeared from her face as she faced her reality: none of this will be of any help to me.

Just five days left before. . . . She didn’t want to think about it. But I must.

Dragging her feet, she gathered her files together for her regular morning meeting with Royn.

*****

“AH-SON. WHAT A PLEASURE to hear from you.”

“I got your message,” Olsson replied in Cantonese.

“Just in time, too,” said Luk Suk.

“Just in time for what?”

Luk Suk laughed. “I was getting ready to send you another message. Since nobody knows your current address, I was thinking of sending it to your mother instead.”

“What kind of message?”

“Good question. We hadn’t actually decided. Some of my boys were in favor of sending a finger or two. Personally, my preference was an ear.”

“Jessica’s ear—?”

“Not mine, that’s for sure.” Luk Suk laughed uproariously at his own comment.

“You’d give my mother a heart attack, you bastard.”

“Ah-son, such language,” he chuckled. “If you want to see your sister again, alive and in one piece,” Luk Suk growled, his voice sounding as though it was dripping with ice, “you’ve got till Thursday to meet me in Bangkok.”

“That’s impossible,” said Olsson. “But there’s something else we need to settle before I even think about meeting you in Bangkok—or anywhere else.”

“And what, Ah-Son, could that possibly be?” Luk Suk’s tone was that of a parent patiently humoring a small child.

“I’m willing to trade places with Jessica. But I will not simply walk into your arms while she’s still in your possession.”

“Naturally, I’ll release your sister—when you give yourself up to me,” Luk Suk said smoothly. “I’m simply not going to discuss anything else with you.”

“And why should I trust you?”

“Maybe you can’t,” Luk Suk chuckled. “And after all, what’s one little sister compared to all the fine men you have cost me. But I’m not giving you any other choice, Ah-Son. Is that clear? So Thursday—”

“I can’t just wander down to the airport and jump on a plane—I’d be arrested.”

“You’ve got a fistful of false passports, so what’s the problem?”

“Sure I do—and I can’t get at them right now without alerting the cops. It will take me time to make other arrangements.”

“I can get one to you tomorrow.”

“Sure you can—if I give you my address. Don’t make me laugh. Today is Tuesday. This is not Bangkok or Hong Kong. It will take me a few days to get a false passport that’s quality work. So Sunday or Monday is the earliest I could be in Bangkok.”

“Thursday, I said, and Thursday I meant,” Luk Suk growled. “We can make all the travel arrangements . . . even pay your airfare.” Luk Suk laughed.

“That’s not very funny. And the answer is no.”

“In that case, maybe your mother will have a heart attack.”

“No,” said Olsson, raising his voice. “You listen to me. You touch one hair on my sister’s head—”

“Threatening me is hazardous to your health.”

“If you can find me—and if you could we wouldn’t be having this conversation. On the other hand, I can find you easily, any time I like. You’ll never see me coming. I can wait years, if necessary. You’ll spend the rest of your life looking over your shoulder, wondering when the axe will fall.”

“Assuming you live long enough.”

“My death will make no difference. That’s already taken care of. Think of it this way: whatever happens to Jessica will happen to you—with interest. Don’t make the mistake of underestimating me: if you keep losing your goons at the rate they’ve been disappearing, there’ll be nobody left to stand in my way.”

Luk Suk was silent for a moment. “You’ve got till Sunday. If you’re not here on Sunday, the first package goes to your mother.”

Before Olsson could reply, the line went dead.

*****

“WILL YOU LOCK UP?”

Alison looked up to see Mary standing in the doorway. “Am I the last one then?”

“That’s right,” Mary smiled. “See you tomorrow.”

“Bye.”

Alison watched Mary all but skipping out the door . . . to go back home to a husband and her little boy. It made her aware that all she had to go home to was an empty apartment, so she decided to stay where she was for a while longer. Not, she thought as she gazed through the glass wall at the vacant desks, that an empty office is much of an improvement.

Now she was alone, however, she could at least get the day’s backlog of phone taps out of the way. But she turned to her laptop a new email caught her eye:

McKurnWatch.com

“The website that must not can now be named” [Thanks, Frankie!]

Good evening Boys & Girls!

Excuse me for taking a moment to blow my own trumpet, but have I hit a nerve or what?

Poor Frankie! He must be losing his marbles. Since he sent his tame legal eagles into court yesterday to try and block access to this website, visits have gone off the scale. They’re up so much that McKurnWatch.com could even hit the top one hundred in the next website rankings.

Thanks, Frankie. I owe you one .

Unfortunately (for him) Frankie has completely lost the plot.

Sure, McKurnWatch.com will be “off the air” for a couple of weeks, once the internet service providers get around to blocking it. But I’ve already set up three alternative websites (listed below) and can just keep setting up more if necessary.

Worse—for Frankie—there’s simply no way he or anyone else can stop me sending you continuing installments of his life story. Just to be on the safe side, though, why don’t you forward this email to every friend you think would enjoy it, so they can sign up for future installments now, avoiding any possible obstacles they might face later on.

Finally, the judge gave Frankie his injunction on the basis that I’m libelling him.

Am I? Granted, I’ve made the occasional snide remark that might not get past the editor of your family newspaper, but libel assumes I’m telling fibs.

As Frankie well knows, every fact I’ve published is true—and I can and will prove it.

Meanwhile, perhaps we should all spare a thought for poor Frankie: instead of lighting that next joint or popping that next pill, why not drop it in the mail to him? (Senator Frankie McKurn, Parliament House, Canberra ACT 2600 will get his attention). After all, he needs it more than you do right now, don’t you think?
— The McKurn Watcher

PS. If you do decide to make a small contribution to relieving poor Frankie’s angst, remember this: it would be MOST unwise to put your return address on the envelope.

Alison laughed, long and loud, as much with relief as from the imagined sight of a large pile of envelopes addressed to Senator Frankie McKurn. I wonder how many will come in. That will be an interesting statistic.

McKurn’s phone calls were, as usual, mostly routine, salted with the occasional intriguing hint or implication that, if it could be untangled, might lead to something solid—as Melanie, hoping to come across another “nugget,” sometimes complained when she and Alison compared notes each day.

And then, Alison reached a call McKurn had made to someone called “Phil”:

“Phil, this anti-corruption campaign in the press is damaging—”

“You’re not kidding. My circulations have gone through the floor.”

“I’m not talking about your fucking newspapers, Phil. I want those goddamn presses stopped.”

“You’re not the only one.”

“Why do you think I called you?”

“Your main problem is Sykes—his papers are the heavy hitters.”

“Sykes I can take care of—he knows when to play ball. It’s this Olsson bastard I can’t touch.”

“He’s immune to . . . ah . . . pressure, eh?”

“At the moment, yes. So—got any ideas?”

For a long moment, all Alison could hear was the breathing of the two men.

“Maybe. I’ll get back to you.”

“Make it snappy . . . okay?”

Who was “Phil” . . . and at a Sydney number? Alison wondered. Newspapers . . . circulations . . . gone through the floor. “Not Sir Philip French, surely?” she said in surprise.

But no one else named “Phil” owned any Australian newspapers . . . well, maybe in some country town, but none that would lose circulation to the Sykes’ dailies. She had met French a few times—but wasn’t sure if that’s who McKurn was talking to. If it is French, Royn or Melanie will recognize his voice.

On a second phone call, made a couple of hours later, Alison heard the same two voices:

“Frank, it’ll cost you two hundred grand, half up front.”

“Worth it—if it happens. But where’s the guarantee? Twenty-five percent down, no more.”

“Sorry, Frank, he says it’s a take it or leave it offer.”

“What the hell. And what, exactly, do I get?”

“You wanted the presses stopped. They’ll be stopped.”

“And when will this happen?”

“Saturday at the latest, maybe Friday.”

“Okay, Phil. That’ll have to do.”

I should tell Derek. But anger toward him, rising from within, held her back. All that really matters, she finally decided, is that if I can stop McKurn from getting something he wants, I MUST do it.

Derek: I have wind that McKurn and French (I think it’s French) are going to somehow “stop your presses” by Saturday or maybe Friday night. I have no idea how, but the “why” is simple enough: your papers’ corruption exposés—Alison.

She encrypted her text with Olsson’s public key, and sent it to him. Just as she finished with her emails, she saw a reply in her inbox:

Hi Alison: Thanks for the “heads up”—but what exactly are you involved in to be getting such information? Listening to their phone conversations? Or what? My offer to help is still open—and always will be. But from Thursday I’ll be out of touch for a week or so—so if there’s ANYTHING you think I might be able to do, please let me know right away—Love, Derek.

Love, Derek.

She felt tears forming in the corners of her eyes, losing herself in the remembered feeling of being enfolded in his powerful arms, everything bottled up in her heart spilling out. He’d listen. He’d understand . . . in a way no one else ever does. . . .

No memory of the disputes and sometimes-bitter arguments that often followed their previous separations entered her mind. Only the thought, He does care about me, as she looked at his email, and she fondly savored the memories of those moments when she’d been overjoyed to see him. . . .

DEREK OLSSON HAD SKIPPED school and Aikido for three or four days. To her own annoyance, Alison missed seeing him around. As she stepped out of the dojo that evening so many years ago, she was surprised at the stab of pleasure she felt when she saw Derek Olsson lounging by the door.

Derek seemed to snap to attention as he saw her. “Alison,” he said, his voice urgent. “Can I ask you something?”

“So long as it’s not another one of your infernal questions,” she grinned, making no attempt to disguise her pleasure.

“No. It’s about my mother. A favor. I wonder if you could talk to her.”

“Why? And why me?”

“Remember I told you I signed up for Aikido to defend myself from my father?”

Alison nodded, her eyes focusing on his cheek as if to see whether his bruise was still there.

“I threw him out of the house.”

“You did what?” she said.

“I threw him out. Tuesday night. And we haven’t seen him since.”

“My God—you’re full of surprises.”

“We moved to my grandparents’ house—but Mum’s in a fragile state.”

“But—what could I do?”

“A lot. I hope. If you have time, can I tell you about it now?”

It seemed so natural to go with him to the coffee shop around the corner, to enjoy the sudden warmth of his closeness and to listen as much to the cadence of his voice as to his actual words as he explained, leaning forward, earnestly, “. . . so you see, Ma’s happier than I’ve ever seen her. And she feels safe—but it’s like she’s gone back to being a child again. I get the feeling she doesn’t ever want to leave her parents’ home again. What’s worse, though, is that she never does anything, never initiates anything. She’s so passive it’s like. . . .” Derek waved his hand, groping for a word. “It’s like she not all there.”

“You really love your mother, don’t you.”

“I—I . . . don’t know.” Derek’s eyes gazed unfocused into the distance. “When I was little—” his voice was almost whispering as if he were talking to himself rather than her, and Alison had to lean closer to hear him “—Ma would sometimes try and protect me when Dad got angry. But all that meant was that she got beaten up too. And more and more . . . well, she just wasn’t there. Most of the time I wished I was an orphan.”

Alison jerked back in her chair. “I. . . . I just can’t imagine feeling like that.” Slowly, her hand reached out to gently touch the shadow of the bruise on his cheek. “But you do care for her—I can see that.”

“Yes,” said Derek softly, clasping her hand tightly, “I do.”

Breathing heavily, he slowly straightened up, lowering her hand to rest on the table as he moved. “Your skin is so soft.”

Alison gently loosened his grip, but her warm expression didn’t change as she asked, “I’d be happy to talk to your mother. But—why me?”

“Well . . . it’s because . . . Aikido. It’s the only thing I can think of. Ma’s so afraid. She’s afraid that Dad will come around one day when everyone else is out. She won’t go outside by herself—even to the shops nearby—because she’d afraid Dad might be lurking around a corner. So I was thinking, if she picked up just a few defensive moves, she might stop feeling so frightened. Grandpa and I suggested it, but she wouldn’t hear of it. So I thought you—I mean, with your strength. . . .” He shrugged helplessly. “I can’t persuade her, but you could. . . .”

“I know what you’re getting at,” she said, an edge to her voice. “But—maybe I can.”

“Thank you,” he said with a sigh of relief. “So any time you like, just let me know.”

Alison stood up. “Let’s do it now.”

“Now?” Derek looked up at her in surprise. “Sure,” he smiled. “My grandparents’ home is over on the other side of Annandale. I can drive you.”

ALISON AND DEREK’S MOTHER disappeared into Molly’s room, so Derek randomly grabbed a few books from his desk. As he carried them back to the living room, he put his ear to his mother’s door, but all he could hear was a faint murmur of conversation.

He was idly flicking through one book after another, without any of them engaging his interest, when he heard a grunt. He looked up to see his grandfather glaring at him.

“Oops,” he said, and quickly moved to the sofa: without thinking, he’d sat in Jack Dent’s favorite chair.

Dent glanced at Derek’s books as he sat down. “What are these—Kant . . . Wittgenstein . . . Karl Marx? What on earth are they teaching at your school—communism?”

“Hardly, Grandpa. They’re philosophy books, not schoolbooks—I’m trying to make sense of it all.”

“Philosophy,” Dent snorted. “A waste of time. You know, I left school when I was fourteen and never regretted it—and never looked back. Guts, that’s what you need. All this highfalutin’ nonsense they teach kids these days. . . .”

Dent stopped in mid-flow, his face lighting up with a smile. Derek turned to see Alison standing in the doorway, tears in her eyes. “I’m sorry, Derek.” She shook her head. “In time . . . maybe. . . .” she shrugged. And then noticing Dent, she smiled, “Oh, you must be Derek’s grandfather.”

“That’s right,” he said, standing up. “I’m Jack Dent.” He held out his hand with a slight bow, eyeing Alison appreciatively as he moved.

“This is Alison McGuire, Grandpa,” said Derek. “She came to talk to Ma.”

Derek noticed the warmth draining from Alison’s face at Dent’s look; she took his hand and shook it coldly.

“Welcome to our modest home. Could I offer something—tea, or coffee, or a soft drink?”

“Thank you, Mr. Dent,” Alison said thoughtfully, looking at him with a new interest. Then, she smiled sweetly at him. “I’m afraid I have to get back home now, so perhaps another time, okay?”

“Certainly,” Dent said, his smile broadening. “And call me Jack.”

“I’ll drive you back, of course,” said Derek.

“A good idea, Derek,” Dent said. “You can never be too sure these days, young lady.”

Alison smiled at Dent demurely with a slight flutter of her eyelashes. “Goodbye, then . . . Jack,” she said.

“Bye, Alison.”

“That’s a relief,” Derek sighed as they stepped outside. “I had to get out of there—sometimes Grandpa just drives me up the wall,” he growled.

“Oh, I don’t know, he seems rather like a puppy,” she said distastefully.

“So that’s what you were doing.”

“What?” she asked innocently.

“Charming Grandpa—and turning him into a puppy.”

“It was so easy,” she laughed.

Derek shook his head. “What were you going to say about Ma?—he didn’t even ask!”

Alison’s face turned serious and the tears came back to her eyes. “She’s so frightened . . . I don’t think it would matter what she had—a black belt, a shotgun . . . she’s so scared of your Dad she’d just freeze up and let him do whatever he wanted.”

“I see,” said Derek thoughtfully. “She’s always been afraid of Dad, for as long as I can remember.”

ALISON FOUND A SUPPORT group for battered women. “But it’s in the evenings,” Molly protested. She agreed to go only if Alison and Derek escorted her there and back. After a few meetings Alison told Derek, “She just sits there, hardly saying a word. I think the only reason she goes is that she likes to see you and me together.”

“She likes you, Alison. A lot. She’s always talking about you.”

“And hinting . . . ?”

Derek blushed. “Yes, I must admit, she does that.”

*****

“YES, THAT’S RIGHT. YOUNG—and Asian. Thai if you can. . . . Okay, I’ll be here.”

Hanson McLeod stretched out on the bed of his room at Canberra’s Lakeside Hotel and waited. He hadn’t known what to think of this particular assignment to begin with. Everything was so mysterious, so hush-hush. Except in an emergency, all communication was by encrypted email; instructions came the same way. They had no idea who their client was; they’d been hired by a lawyer who’d refused to tell them. “As far as you’re concerned,” he’d said, “I’m your client.”

The target of the investigation was the powerful federal senator, Frank McKurn, making him wonder if they were unwittingly involved in some complex political back-stabbing operation; the extent of the investigation, tying up over half their investigators nation-wide, combined with the client’s “money no object” mentality, made him think that their real client might be a government department . . . in which case it was possible everything they were doing could be illegal. The high-quality phone taps they were being sent reinforced that hypothesis.

But as they learnt more about McKurn, McLeod ceased wondering about the client’s identity and became keen to put McKurn away for bonking underage girls. Even if all they could prove was that he frequented prostitutes, the resulting scandal would force him to resign.

About half an hour later, his reverie was interrupted by the doorbell. A young Thai girl stood timidly in the corridor, entering the room reluctantly with a fearful glance behind her.

McLeod just nodded without saying anything and went to open the connecting door to the next room. To the girl’s surprise, a middle-aged Asian woman came through. The girl looked confused and a little frightened, as though she assumed she was going to be required to participate in some kinky group sex.

Smiling warmly, the Asian woman said in Thai, “Please come in. Take a seat.”

The girl froze and gasped; only after a long moment did she partially regain her composure and clasp her hands together, bow her head, and diffidently utter the respectful Thai greeting, “Sawadee-ka.”

The older woman returned the traditional Thai wai with the same bow. “My name is Orawan,” she said, and began talking quietly in Thai.

The girl listened, perched on the edge of a chair, a bird ready to fly away at the slightest hint of danger. Now and then she nervously eyed McLeod, sitting quietly on the other side of the room practicing invisibility, following the conversation as best he could in his broken Thai.

It took fifteen to twenty minutes for Orawan to gain the young girl’s trust. The girl began to relax, responding in short, curt sentences—and forgot about McLeod. When Orawan promised her, “You’ll never have to go back, and I’ll keep you safe,” the young girl burst into tears, became demonstrative, and talked non-stop for quite a while.

At one point, McLeod saw Orawan gesture towards him and he understood she was telling the girl, “he’s my husband.”

“Hanson,” Orawan said, “this is Lawan.”

Lawan turned towards him with a broad smile and bowed, saying, “Sawadee-ka.”

“Sawadee-krap, Lawan,” McLeod replied, returning Lawan’s wai.

Then the two women continued talking as if he’d ceased to exist.

Orawan came from Issan region of Thailand, bordering Laos and Cambodia. In addition to Thai, she spoke Issan, a Laotian dialect, and passable Khmer. Almost half the girls in the bars in Bangkok came from Issan, but Orawan was not one of them. Her father was a shopkeeper who was prosperous by Issan standards; she had won a scholarship to Mahidol University in Bangkok; on graduation she had joined the police force. She’d been among the Thai police who’d attended a criminology course in Melbourne, which is where McLeod, then a member of the Victorian police, had met her.

After their marriage, Orawan made a name for herself in Melbourne by becoming the first Thai policewoman in the Victorian police. She and McLeod had broken up several prostitution rackets built on sex slavery. From the nature of Orawan’s occasional glances, McLeod knew they were on the verge of breaking up another.

Orawan showed a picture of McKurn to Lawan, who immediately giggled uncontrollably. When she’d calmed down she spoke to Orawan so rapidly that McLeod could hardly make out a single word. But whatever she said caused Orawan to laugh raucously. McLeod continued to wait, knowing he’d share in the joke later on. When nearly an hour had gone by since the girl had come into the room, McLeod pointedly looked at his watch several times until Orawan caught his hint and turned to face him.

“Lawan is from Issan,” Orawan told McLeod. “She is eighteen and has been here for about three months. Same old story—lured by stories of riches, passport and all ID’s taken and effectively imprisoned when she arrived. She was repeatedly raped and beaten into submission—and turned into a heroin addict to keep her on the leash. And beyond a few dollars, she’s yet to see any of her earnings—all sorts of bills and fees she has to pay back first. So she was told.”

“Any other girls like her?”

Orawan nodded. “Two more from Issan; a Cambodian and a Vietnamese. But she doesn’t know where they’re housed. She can describe the house, but it could be just about anywhere in Canberra. A minder takes the girls to the client and brings them back.”

McLeod nodded. “Let’s think this through. Do we have enough to nail this so-called agency?”

“I’d say we have enough for the police to get a warrant to raid it,” Orawan said.

“Quite likely,” McLeod agreed. “But in terms of the evidence we have, it will be her word against everybody else’s. So—”

“I know what you’re going to say next and the answer is ‘No,’” Orawan said sharply, her eyes suddenly on fire. “She can’t go back. I’ve already promised her that she won’t have to. And if she did, could she keep a secret like this?” Orawan shook her head. “If the word gets out, the girls will all be in Perth or Adelaide or somewhere before we can move in.”

“Agreed,” said McLeod, knowing there was no point in debating with Orawan when she’d made up her mind. “Lawan will be okay. In the worst case she’ll be deported back to Thailand—”

“Penniless. We have to make them pay.”

“We’ve done that before,” McLeod smiled. “But we need one more witness.”

“I almost forgot,” Orawan said. Scrabbling inside her handbag, she found the picture she was looking for and showed it to Lawan.

“Phuong!” Lawan shrieked, throwing a series of questions at Orawan.

“It’s the Vietnamese girl,” Orawan told McLeod, placing a quieting hand on Lawan’s arm. It was a dim picture they’d taken late last week of a girl entering McKurn’s apartment building.

“Good,” said McLeod. “Unfortunately, it doesn’t prove that she was going to visit McKurn.”

“I know,” said Orawan, her voice downbeat. “But we basically have no choice. It’s a condition of your investigator’s licence that you inform the police the moment you have any evidence of a crime.”

“What about the minder?” McLeod asked. “Does she know where he is?”

“He’ll be downstairs, waiting for Lawan,” Orawan said. “Prostitution is legal, but forcing girls into prostitution isn’t. Maybe he’ll squeal to save his own skin.”

“Can she describe him?”

“She already did. Big, muscled, light hair, and a tiny scar on the side of his forehead.” Orawan traced a short line on her own forehead, near the hairline, and Lawan nodded eagerly.

“Okay then. It’s up to me to persuade the police to act immediately. But first, what was so funny about McKurn?”

Orawan smiled. “The girls apparently liked him—at least, as much as you can like a john. He was a big tipper, but the best part was that it was all over in five minutes.”

McLeod chuckled. “If that gets out, McKurn will never live it down.”

The day he arrived in Canberra, McLeod paid a courtesy call on an old friend, Inspector Zack Latham of the ACT (Australian Capital Territory) Police. “Let’s hope Zack will come to the party,” he said as he picked up the phone.

“If you can persuade my father to agree to our marriage,” Orawan beamed, “you can persuade anyone.”

Thirty minutes later, the ACT police took Lawan’s minder into custody. “We know him quite well,” a police sergeant said to McLeod as the minder was taken into an interview room after they’d heard Lawan’s testimony with Orawan translating. “I think he’ll sing.”

An hour later, the police raided the offices of Aphrodite’s, arresting the woman known as “Gladys” and carting all the paperwork away for further investigation.

*****

ALISON LEARNT ABOUT THE raid the next morning, spying the headline splashed across the top of the Canberra Guardian while she was out jogging. When she returned home, she found a report from the Melbourne private investigators in her inbox.

Now, all she had to do was wait until McKurn’s name was discovered in the agency’s records.

31 Merchants of Death

TWO DAYS BEFORE, SANDEMAN troops on St. Christopher’s Island suffered heavy casualties in a coordinated attack by two Islamic separatist groups which had, previously, spent their energy fighting each other.

Australian and Sandeman troops poured into St. Christopher’s Island and Zulu base in the first major operation of the new “joint” operation command. The coastal towns were easily secured; troops were now moving inland to encircle and flush out the guerrillas.

Five helicopters sat on the pad at Zulu base: two Tiger helicopter gunships, known as “Firebirds”; two Sikorsky S-70s transports; a third Sikorsky, large red crosses painted on its sides, waited for a call that had yet to come. A Navy patrol boat was moored at the end of a makeshift jetty, and a frigate patrolled off the shore of St. Christopher’s Island as a floating artillery base. Two unmanned Predators circled St. Christopher’s 24 hours a day.

Jeremy McGuire sat in the Zulu base command center, one eye on the LCD screens showing the Predators’ surveillance, the other on the clock. His shift would end soon and he intended to go body-surfing on the beach before breakfast.

As part of the face-saving compromise that made “joint” operations possible, all Australian officers were bumped up a rank so Sandeman officers with less training and experience didn’t outrank them. Brigadier Thierry was now Major-General, Jeremy a captain—the equal of his Sandeman counterpart, Captain Ranga N’gaandi, sitting to his left.

Jeremy’s reverie was rudely interrupted by the radio. “Zulu, this is Alpha One. We’re under fire. Request a Firebird ASAP, over.”

Jeremy looked at the map of St. Christopher’s Island. Alpha Platoon’s position was marked about a third of the way to the center of the island.

In moments “Firebird One” was lifting off; a series of flashing red dots on the LCD screen indicated targets where “Marauder”—the Navy’s floating artillery base—would lay a barrage around Alpha platoon’s position.

Colonel Lucas Cantrell came striding into the room. Except for his slightly puffy eyes, dark stubble of beard, and the fact that he was still doing up the top button of his shirt, Cantrell looked as though he’d just walked off the parade ground. “Jeremy, Ranga,” he nodded. “Please bring me up to date.”

Cantrell briefly studied the map as he listened to the situation report and then asked, “Has Major . . . uh, Colonel Raymond asked for anything?”

“Not yet, sir,” said Jeremy.

“Okay, I’ll have a word to him.”

Cantrell sat behind and talked to Raymond—the officer commanding the forces on St. Christopher’s Island. “He says he has everything under control—at the moment,” Cantrell called out. “But get two platoons ready to go and warm those choppers up so they can take off at the drop of a hat.”

“Yes, sir,” Jeremy and N’gaandi said in unison.

The radio crackled again: “Zulu, this is Alpha One. Got one of those toy birdies on standby?” A flashing red cross appeared on one of the screens near Alpha platoon’s position, as the coordinates were flashed across from the platoon leader’s laptop. “That’s a machine gun nest. Appreciate if you could get rid of it for us, over.”

On a second screen, infrared imaging from a Predator showed the outlines of four human figures as red blobs. Streaks of bright flashes streamed from a bright red outline—the heat of a machine gun barrel—from a point in front of one of the figures.

On his laptop out in the field, Jeremy knew, the platoon leader was seeing the same picture. Jeremy looked at Cantrell, who nodded. “Pass him over to Sarge,” Jeremy said, indicating Sergeant Bowman at the console behind him. “He’s itching to try out his new toy.”

The red cross moved to just behind the infrared shapes and the camera zoomed out so that Alpha Platoon’s position was visible. A line appeared overlaid on the picture indicated the distance was 193 meters.

“Alpha One,” said Bowman, “this is ToyBird One. Howzat? Over.”

“Perfect. Over.”

Jeremy turned his head and nodded to Bowman. “Alpha One, you’d better duck now. Over.”

“We’re already ducking. . . . Shit a fucking brick. You got the bastards. . . . Uh, over.”

“You’re most welcome. ToyBird One, over and out.”

“That,” said N’gaandi, “is abso-bloody-lutely amazing,” as everybody in the control room applauded and Sergeant Bowman took a bow.

“Captain,” Colonel Cantrell’s voice boomed from behind them, “you are abso-bloody-lutely right.” Turning to the two Predator operators he said, “Let’s see what else your babies can do.”

“Sir?” asked Bowman, slightly puzzled.

“Those bastards are going to be running away now. That’s my guess. See if you can find them—and give those Firebirds some target practice.”

“You bet, sir.”

As a figure was caught by a Predator’s camera, the operator spoke into his microphone. A moment later the figure stopped moving. “Eerie,” Bowman said, “like watching a movie with the sound off.”

Cantrell had moved to stand behind the two sergeants operating the Predators. One of the screens now showed a file of three figures moving rapidly up a hill. The operator was about to pass the location to a Firebird when Cantrell said, “Wait. Let’s see where those bastards are going.”

The screen followed the three figures until, one after the other in rapid succession, they disappeared. “Can you zoom in on that spot, Sarge?” Cantrell asked.

“Sure can,” said Bowman.

The screen showed nothing. Then Bowman switched the resolution to regular light and the screen turned grey-green in the early morning sun with a black patch in the center.

“What do you make of that?” Cantrell asked.

“I’d say,” said Bowman, “it’s a cave—or a tunnel entrance.”

“That’s what I figured. So why don’t you two flyboys each put one of your zingers right down that hole.”

“Yes, sir,” both sergeants said enthusiastically.

The LCD screens on both sides of the map now showed the same picture. Red crosses appeared over the tunnel mouth and a minute later there was a tiny, momentary streak of red followed by some flashes of light. Thirty seconds later was another flash of light, and the grey-green above the tunnel mouth seemed to slide downwards. “You’ve caused a landslide by the looks of it,” said Cantrell.

“I don’t think there’ll be anyone coming out of that hole again,” Bowman grinned.

“Good work. Some toys, eh?”

“Sir. Colonel.” Jeremy’s weak voice floated under the loud yells of agreement of the Predators’ operators.

Cantrell had been aware that the radios had been going nonstop while he’d been watching the Predators. He turned in response to Jeremy’s unusually weak voice to see both captains looking at him. Jeremy’s face was pale.

“What’s up, son?” Cantrell asked softly.

When Jeremy, appearing frozen with shock, didn’t speak, N’gaandi said, his voice and his body shaking, “They took some prisoners, and one of them blew himself up, taking three of our guys with him.”

“A fucking kamikaze,” Colonel Cantrell growled. “Right. We’re going to go in and wipe those bastards out.”

*****

“JUST ANSWER ONE QUESTION,” said Nazarov, “and you can go back to your buddies in one piece.”

The Chinese man was handcuffed and tied to a bed in a second room of the “safe house” that Nazarov, Shultz, and de Brouw had hastily converted into a prison. He looked at Nazarov incuriously, without any reaction.

“All we want to know,” said Nazarov, “is what you did with Jessica Olsson.”

The man’s name was Kung Chee-wah. Now that Vincent Leung was dead, he was third in the hierarchy of Sydney’s Golden Dragon Triad. They’d grabbed him earlier that morning in the parking lot of his Rushcutters Bay apartment building, leaving his bodyguard unconscious on the concrete floor.

“Of course, we do give you a choice,” said Nazarov, pointing to de Brouw who held up a hypodermic needle. Kung’s eyes moved to the needle and then back to Nazarov. He didn’t appear to be the slightest bit interested in either the question or the needle.

“Do you know what’s in that syringe?” Nazarov asked. Kung’s face stayed a study in blankness. “Heroin. A couple of days of that and you’ll be hooked for life, you understand. Of course, if you just tell me where Jessica Olsson is, then we’ll drop you back where we found you.”

Kung didn’t move.

Nazarov nodded; de Brouw grabbed an arm and emptied the syringe.

“I’ll go and check on our other guest,” said Shultz.

Nazarov and de Brouw heard Shultz’ scream and ran into the room where they’d imprisoned Alvin Chong, the first member of the Golden Dragon Triad they’d picked up just the previous day. He was a short, stocky Chinese man built like a Mr. Universe contestant. Shultz was pinioned on top of him, one of Chong’s arms squeezing Shultz’ throat. Blood poured from a wound on the side of Shultz’ head. Shultz was breathing hoarsely, his eyelids fluttering, almost unconscious.

Chong was still chained to the bed: chains bound his ankles together and tightly to each side of the bed. His wrists were chained separately to allow him a little freedom of movement. Nazarov and de Brouw could see that the chain on the arm pinning Shultz was still firmly fixed to the railing of the bed. But as de Brouw, who was ahead of Nazarov, neared Chong his second arm lashed out and the chain swung unerringly toward de Brouw’s head. De Brouw ducked just in time for the swinging end of the chain to miss his ear, but he staggered as it grazed the top of his head. Chong yanked the chain back, wrapping it around de Brouw’s neck, pulling de Brouw so he fell on top of Shultz. The bed creaked under the sudden weight, De Brouw struggled, but Chong managed to pin one of de Brouw’s legs with his knees, and his other hand gripped de Brouw’s head, turning it hard.

“Want me to break your buddy’s neck?” he asked Nazarov.

Nazarov shook his head.

“You’d better undo these chains then.”

Nazarov hesitated. Chong’s cold black eyes just looked distantly at Nazarov, but there was a faint smile on Chong’s lips as he slowly twisted de Brouw’s head a little further towards breaking point.

“Okay, okay. You win,” said Nazarov. He pulled a bunch of keys from his pocket and leant down by the Dragon man’s ankles. “Feet first, okay?” he said.

Nazarov’s body obscured the Dragon man’s view of his hands. With one hand Nazarov jangled the keys near Chong’s ankles while his other hand reached into Shultz’ boot and pulled out the thin, sharp blade Shultz always carried there—and jammed it up to the hilt into Chong’s scrotum.

Chong screamed, his fingers loosening their grip on de Brouw’s head for just a second. That was long enough for Nazarov to slap de Brouw’s head out of the way, bring up the knife and plunge it into the side of Chong’s neck, upwards, into the brain. Chong spluttered, his eyes looking at Nazarov in defeat, and then his body went limp.

Nazarov unwound the chain from around de Brouw’s neck. De Brouw slumped to the floor beside the bed, rubbing his neck with one hand and the top of his head with the other. “Boy, that was close.” he grunted. “Too damn close.”

Nazarov nodded. “Shultz looks in a bad way,” he said.

While de Brouw recovered, Nazarov went for the first aid kit. “It’s only a surface wound,” he said as he bandaged it while Shultz still lay on Chong’s still and now smelly body. “But he’s going to have a sore head for a while.”

“Just as well he has a thick head,” de Brouw said.

“I heard that,” Shultz moaned.

“Mats is right,” Nazarov grinned.

“Fuck you, too,” said Shultz, groaning as he tried to lift his head.

“AS I CAME IN HE just whipped up that damn chain,” Shultz said later, woozy from the pain-killers he’d taken, “and almost throttled me. If you’d come in a minute or two later, I’d have probably been dead. Jesus, he was strong.”

“He sure was,” said de Brouw pointing at the broken wooden leg in the middle of the bed against the wall to which his wrist had been chained. “That’s how he got free. He must have yanked on it till it gave.”

“Amazing,” said Shultz. “And pumped full of drugs too.”

After a moment of silence, when they marvelled at Chong’s strength, resistance, and their lucky escape, Shultz said, “So we’re down to one.”

“I don’t think he’ll talk either,” said Nazarov.

“Doesn’t look like it,” said de Brouw. “We’d better get ready to pick up a third Dragon guy.” Pointing at Chong’s body. “And what do we do with him?”

“Make him disappear,” said Nazarov.

*****

KARLA PRESTON STRODE INTO Anthony Royn’s office suite displaying none of the diffidence or hesitancy of the first-time visitor—nor was there the slightest touch of the awe that even successful businessmen and popular celebrities usually exhibited in the inner sanctums of power. Rather, Alison thought, she moved as if she were the owner and had every right to be there, or with the indifference of someone walking along the aisles of a supermarket. Alison couldn’t quite make up her mind which impression was the more accurate.

Unusually, as Alison came out of her office to greet the visitor, it was she who felt slightly hesitant—and strangely apprehensive. Was it the knowledge that she was about to meet Olsson’s current girlfriend? Or was she nervous about confronting the person whose writing was so unforgiving, so scornful and belligerent, so . . . opinionated? Alison searched for some sign of the acid tongue, the sardonic wit and the mocking tone of her columns—and failed to find it.

Karla Preston was smiling, stopping to chat gaily with each person she passed. Alison overheard Mary talking about her little boy as though Karla were a long-lost friend. Nor did she bear the slightest resemblance to a harridan or a harpy. On the contrary, she looked surprisingly plain, ordinary and unmemorable, except for her uneven suntan—bronzed arms and face but pale white shoulders—and her outrageous dress: a flowery, multi-hued shock of bright colors that, if more subdued, was the sort of design you’d expect a grandmother, not a young woman, to be wearing. It was a simple shift, gathered with a chain at the waist, more suitable for wearing to the beach than to an office of any kind, topped off by an equally outrageous wide-brimmed straw hat. Although her clothes seemed impertinently out of place, the overall effect was, Alison had to admit, surprisingly elegant, spoiled only by the battered, nondescript carry-all slung over one shoulder.

Karla Preston’s only physical attribute that was in any way unusual was her height, but unlike many tall women she made no apology for being tall. Rather, she emphasized this by wearing sandals with high heels.

And then, there were her eyes. . . .

It was an unusual sensation, Alison thought, to have to tilt her head up to look at another woman’s face. As she did, she felt Karla’s eyes searching hers as if they were X-rays, and she had the cold sensation that Karla was looking directly into her, inside her, without asking permission, with the sense she wasn’t going to take “No” for an answer. The last time Alison remembered feeling as exposed as she did now was with Derek Olsson. His look was warm and understanding; Karla’s was razor-edged and invasive.

“Who twisted your soul?” Karla said to her softly, in a voice that no one else could hear.

“Wh-what?” Alison found she couldn’t move, as though Karla’s eyes held her pinned, until Robin Cartwright’s voice broke the spell. With relief, she turned away with the feeling that, at some level, she knew exactly what Karla meant.

“Very nice,” said Cartwright as he ambled into the office. “Plush. So . . . this is what you get for our money, eh?” Spying Karla, he planted a kiss on her cheek, all the while looking appreciatively at Alison. “Karla, I insist you introduce me to this gorgeous creature.”

“Alison McGuire, this is Robin Cartwright,” Karla said.

“Miss McGuire,” Cartwright said, taking Alison’s hand with both of his, “this is such a pleasure. And as I’m a stranger to Canberra—”

“You’re such a liar, Robin,” Karla laughed. Turning to Alison, she said, “He’s been coming to Canberra since before you were born—probably since before your father was born. So just ignore him, Alison. Unfortunately, he’s so thick-skinned that doesn’t make him go away.”

“You’re such a spoilsport, Karla,” Cartwright protested.

“I don’t think I’m telling Alison anything she hadn’t already figured out the moment she saw you.”

“If I can interrupt this love fest,” Alison said with a wooden smile as she gently took her hand back from Cartwright’s grip, “perhaps we can get down to business.”

As if on cue, Anthony Royn stepped out of his office. “Minister,” said Alison, “this is Karla Preston . . . Robin Cartwright.”

“Thank you for coming.” Anthony Royn’s smile encompassed both his visitors, but his eyes focused on Karla. “Miss Preston,” he said. As he held out his hand and Karla shook it, some sort of electricity seemed to pass between them. Royn looked at her appreciatively—a little longer than was polite—and Alison had the fleeting impression that if they’d been rabbits, they’d already be over in the corner.

Then Alison noticed the way Doug Selkirk’s eyes, and those of the other men in office, followed Karla wherever she went—when there was nothing in her plain looks, her almost-masculine, dominating demeanor, and her gravelly, unfeminine voice that should attract a male’s attention. Karla, she realized, had an effect on men similar to Royn’s effect on women: when Royn looked at a woman whom men would dismissively describe as “an old bag” her eyes would light up as though she just been given the honor of being recognized as the sexiest creature on earth.

“Mr. Cartwright,” said Royn. “I’ve heard a lot about you. . . .”

“None of it good, I’m sure,” Karla smiled.

Alison stifled a grin at Royn’s expression: he was clearly unsettled at the direct, almost contemptuous way these two journalists were treating him. She toyed with the impulse to sit back and let this meeting take its natural course but decided she really should come to Royn’s rescue. “Would you like some tea or coffee?” she asked Karla and Cartwright as she took a step towards Royn’s office. “And shall I hang up your hat, Karla?”

“Yes, come on in,” said Royn as he took the hint.

“Tea, please,” said Karla.

Alison’s eyes narrowed slightly in surprise as Karla took off her hat and she saw that the reporter’s faded blonde hair was mousy brown at the roots. Is she really a fake after all? she asked herself.

Karla caught her reaction, her free hand automatically touching her head, and chuckled. “Disguise,” she said. “In the Sandemans.”

“I see,” Alison nodded, feeling as though Karla had read her thoughts.

“I’ll have a Scotch, thanks,” said Cartwright.

“At this time in the morning?” Alison asked in surprise.

“You want me to talk?” Cartwright grinned. “Talk requires lubrication.”

“I’ll see what we can do.”

As Karla and Cartwright settled into the sofa, Royn opened a cabinet containing an array of bottles and glasses. Spying a bottle of Black Label, Cartwright said. “Black Label, thanks. And make it a triple while you’re at it.” At Royn’s raised eyebrow, Cartwright added, “Think of it as a tax refund.”

Royn shrugged, splashed a large measure of Scotch into a glass and, after a moment’s hesitation, brought both the glass and the bottle of Black Label over and placed them on the coffee table in front of Cartwright. At the same time, Alison and Mary came in with the other drink requests.

“Ah,” said Cartwright, saluting Royn with his glass, “a man after my own heart.”

“Not exactly,” Royn smiled. “Cirrhosis of the liver will remove one small annoyance from the daily mountain of newsprint.”

“We’d miss you, Robin,” Karla said, placing a hand on his knee. “But not that much.”

Cartwright groaned, Royn chuckled, and Alison grimaced as she took a seat at one end of the coffee table, Royn on her right and Karla to her left.

“Miss Preston—” Royn began.

“Karla. And I don’t know if you’re aware of this, we’ve actually met once before.”

“We have?” Royn said with surprise. “If we had, I’m sure I’d remember you.”

“Just after you became Minister for Justice and Customs, you gave a talk at Sydney University. And afterwards a young girl asked you a very pointed question—”

“And you—?”

“—asked the question.”

SYDNEY UNIVERSITY’S GREAT HALL was packed when Anthony Royn walked up to the podium, throwing his jacket on a chair and loosening his tie as he began to speak. “To put it in a nutshell, as Minister for Justice and Customs it’s my job to protect Australia’s borders and to protect you from criminals. . . .”

Unlike too many politicians, who gave a dry-as-dust talk from a perspective of self-righteousness, Royn tailored his message to the audience and didn’t take himself too seriously. Or, at least, he didn’t appear to. After talking about how his duties affected the people on the room for all of thirty-five seconds, he turned to the drug trade, his voice becoming stronger, his movements passionate, with a fire in his eyes that hadn’t been there before.

“. . . and as you may be aware,” he concluded, “I have a very personal interest in coming down as hard as I can on drug smugglers. Just a few weeks ago, my older brother Sam died from an overdose of heroin.” Royn’s eyes were glistening, his breathing rough. “Sam and I were very close. . . .”

Royn stopped to dab his eyes with his handkerchief. “I’m sorry,” he said after a moment, “but it’s still hard for me to talk about his death.”

After a deep breath, he continued, “In one sense it wasn’t a surprise. Sam had been an addict for a long time. It was terrible to see him fall apart. He became thinner, lost energy, lost his interest in life. He’d been an artist. Modestly successful. He had a few exhibitions and many people in the business thought he had a great deal of promise. But as the addiction took hold, his paintings became weirder and projected stronger and stronger feelings of depression until no one really wanted to look at them. They were the last thing you’d want to wake up to in the morning.

“Our family did everything we could. He dried out several times. But, every time, he went back to it. And you know, it was strangely a relief when he did. His addiction had such a strong hold over him that in those brief times when he was clean, he was even more unbearable than when he was injecting poison into his veins.

“Heroin changed him from someone who was living his life at full tilt from the moment he woke up in the morning to someone who was dying before our very eyes. He told me the drugs gave him artistic visions. And there’s no question that—at first—some of his paintings were stunning. And he was sure he could stop any time he wanted to.

“But he was wrong.”

Royn paused, looking searchingly at the audience, using the pause to take several gulps of air.

“Sam thought he was immortal, invulnerable. When I was twenty, I felt the same. But he wasn’t. He was human. And for the last ten years I’ve been watching him die.

“It’s not something I want to see happen to any of you. It’s not something you want to see happen to anyone you love—or even to someone you know.

“While I can’t bring Sam back to life, I can promise you that I will do everything within my power to stamp out this poisonous trade once and for all. Make no mistake about it: the people who will sell you drugs are callous thugs. They have no respect for human life; they’re selling powdered death. They know it—and they don’t care. They intentionally turn impressionable people into heroin, cocaine and ecstasy addicts who must then turn to crime or prostitution to support their addiction. Most Australians want them locked up. So do I.

“I pledge to you to put these merchants of death behind bars where they belong so that every one of you here today, and everyone you know, can lead a long, healthy, and drug-free life.”

As an eerie hush blanketed the room, a younger Karla Preston wiped her eyes, and tears streamed down the face of a girl sitting near her. After a long instant, when the silence seemed to stretch uncomfortably, someone began to clap and almost instantly applause rolled like thunder across the hall.

Anthony Royn stood firmly in the center of the stage, his arms slightly akimbo, his golden hair radiant—perhaps a trick of the light, Karla thought—his eyes warm and glowing as they moved slowly to scan the room; there were instants when it seemed he was holding her eyes, as if they were alone. She imagined he was soaking in the applause, drinking the energy that was flowing towards him in waves.

As the volume of the applause began to fall, he slowly raised his arms. “Thank you,” he said, as the applause died and chairs scraped as people took their seats again.

“It’s hard for me to express how deeply I appreciate your response.” Royn paused, looked at his watch and said, “But I’m afraid I’ll have to leave in about fifteen minutes. Until then, though, I’d love to hear any questions or comments you have.”

After Royn had taken a couple of questions, Karla’s hand shot up and she raised her body slightly to lift her head above the level of the audience. She fixed Royn with a warm gaze that looked adoring and sorrowful at the same time. As she had hoped, Royn turned to her—gratefully she thought. Indicating his watch said, “Madam, yours will have to be the last question.”

“Mr. Royn,” she said, standing to her full height. “I’m sure I am not alone in saying how deeply moved I have been by your talk today. How I wish there was something more I could do than just say how sad I feel about the tragedy of your brother’s death, and extend my condolences to you and your family in your time of grief.” Her gravelly voice carried easily and clearly across the room. A number of voices shouted, “Here, here,” accompanied by a ripple of applause.

“Thank you,” Royn said. “I appreciate that.”

“Yet, I have a question. People have certainly died from an overdose of sleeping pills or other regulated drugs—by choice. But not from impurities or unpredictable variations in a prescription drug’s strength. So surely, if heroin had been legal and regulated and of constant quality in the same way as prescription medicines, wouldn’t your brother still be alive today?”

Royn seemed to rock backward on the stage, as if from the force of Karla’s words, his face frozen, his eyes glistening, clearly overcome by a deep sadness while flashing anger towards her. His answer was stumbling, and he left the podium with no sign of his normal panache.

“THAT QUESTION WAS CRUEL,” Alison said.

“So I was told at the time.”

“And there’s something you wouldn’t know,” Alison continued. “According to the police, Sam Royn had been given heroin of a purity normally never available—almost a hundred percent heroin instead of the usual fifty percent, plus or minus. The police concluded that Sam had been given it intentionally, so that when he took what he thought was a normal amount, he would in fact overdose. The underworld, in other words, sent the minister a gruesome message.”

“That’s terrible.” said Karla, clearly shocked. “Awful. But it simply makes my question even more compelling—a question that the minister still hasn’t answered.” Karla spoke evenly, now looking openly at Royn.

Anthony Royn was glowering at Karla with the same mixture of sadness and anger he’d displayed all those years ago. “My answer,” he growled, his face reddening, “is the same today as it was then: lock the murdering bastards up.”

“A great idea,” said Cartwright as he splashed more Black Label into his glass. “Bring on Prohibition, I say.”

“That’s different,” Royn snapped.

“Really?” said Cartwright. “You were talking about cirrhosis of the liver a moment ago.”

“And alcohol kills brain cells,” said Karla with a smile, “which explains a lot about your state of mind, Robin.”

“The minister’s views on this issue are exceptionally clear,” Alison said severely before Cartwright could frame a riposte, “and this topic is not on our agenda today.”

“Ah . . . quite so,” Royn said, slowly regaining his composure, turning in Karla’s direction but avoiding her eyes. “It would seem you have quite an influence,” the tone of his voice making it perfectly clear that he totally disapproved of Karla’s influence. “The mail system in Parliament House has been a bit strained since your column on Sunday—quite an achievement.”

“And what have they been saying?”

“Overwhelmingly agreeing with you.” Royn shook his head. “Some of them actually ordering us to get our act together. Kydd read a few of the ones from his constituents, addressed to him, and became apoplectic.”

“I’m glad to hear it,” Karla grinned. “Reminding you of your proper place in society just once every three years is not nearly often enough.”

Seeing Royn’s anger beginning to rise once again, Alison distracted his attention with a gesture and, raising her voice slightly, said to Karla, “We’ve read what you’ve written about the Sandemans, so what we’d appreciate is what else you can tell us. Even your impressions would be valuable.”

“I’ll do what I can,” Karla said, “but I didn’t see nearly enough. In retrospect, far too little. What I can tell you is that the Sandemans is a very class-conscious society, where everyone seems to know his station and no one is expected to rise above it.”

“Do you mean that nobody can?” asked Alison.

“Oh, no. Just that such an idea wouldn’t even occur to most of the people there. By the same token, the people in the upper strata feel they have the divine right to rule. I don’t know if you’re aware that almost all the politicians and top bureaucrats come from the same twenty-odd families, and that seats in parliament are passed on like private property from father to son or nephew.”

“Surely not,” said Royn, now sitting back in his armchair, glancing at his watch from time to time.

“Karla’s right,” said Cartwright. “Each island has one or two dominant, land-owning families who run the place like feudal fiefdoms. By and large, when the so-called separatist groups aren’t outright bandits, they see themselves rather like Robin Hood, taking from the local rich and giving back to the poor—minus a huge cut, of course. And they get a lot of popular support when they call for the break-up of the large estates.”

“They’re socialists?” asked Royn.

“Labels like that are meaningless in the Sandemans,” Cartwright chuckled. “A few people have the land and the wealth. The rest don’t. Even if the dominant families had gotten their land fair and square in the first place—which they didn’t—both the landed and the landless agree that the only rule of ownership is who can grab what and then stop anyone else from grabbing it back. Property rights, to the extent that they exist at all, just enable the landowners to use the police power of the state to stop anyone else stealing what their ancestors stole in the first place.”

“And would you agree with that, Karla?” Alison asked.

“Much of what Robin is saying is new to me. But then, I spent most of my time on the Muslim island of Jazeerat el-Bihar—and most of that time in the village of Inkaya. Ownership there seemed mostly communal. The fishery and the plantations seemed to belong to the village and the money was ploughed back into the community—the school in Inkaya, for example, was much better equipped than others I’d seen. And there was no conspicuous wealth, no hacienda on the hill, so to speak. In a sense, the way it was organized seemed more like an Israeli kibbutz than anything else. These are my impressions, I hasten to add. But I’m sure they’d be easy enough to confirm.”

Remembering his conversations with Nimabi, Royn responded, “So it’s a very different culture, then.”

“Exactly,” said Cartwright, “with rules and customs that are totally alien to ours.”

Karla nodded. “That’s true. I got to know the villagers reasonably well, especially the women. They were all subservient, and all fully accepted and fully believed that they were, compared to men, second-class beings. I also talked extensively with the Elders, a kind of village council made up of the eldest males, though I don’t know if age was the only qualification. They didn’t quite know how to take me, and I was treated as a kind of honorary man. Up to a point, anyway. Their main problems were trying to stop the politicians and bureaucrats in Toribaya meddling in their affairs. They said they were quite capable of taking care of themselves without any outside help . . . or interference. They were also very concerned about the influence of militant Islam, which, apparently, had caused a few young hotheads to head off to the hills to join the separatists.

“They joined that terrorist group in the hills there?”

“The ASIO man who talked to me on Sunday made the same mistake: not all the separatist groups in the Sandemans are terrorists. The group on el-Bihar is a case in point. They’re terrorists in the same way Mahatma Gandhi was a terrorist. In other words, they’re not. But if you label them terrorists and send the army in shooting . . . well, of course, they’ll shoot back. Then you’d be able to say, ‘See what I told you?’ Except, of course, they’d just be defending themselves.”

“How can you be sure of that?”

“First of all, the village Elders seemed to have no beef with the separatists—not that they said so in so many words. Quite the opposite, in fact, and I gained the impression that they knew them well and wanted to shield them from any outside scrutiny. But second, and more telling: most of those young hotheads who went to join them were rejected. So they ended up on St. Christopher’s Island, where you do have a real terrorist group—two or three of them, in fact.”

“Rejected? Why?”

“Because the hotheads saw their main purpose as converting or killing infidels, while the Mountain Men, as I called them, have the same objective as the village elders: to be left alone.”

“With the discovery of oil off that island,” said Alison, “they’ll be fighting a losing battle.”

Karla nodded. “With just the internet, and contact with the outside world, they’re fighting a losing battle. For example, I think I gave a few of the women there some very un-Islamic ideas about what a woman could and should be.”

“I can imagine,” said Alison with a smile.

“And one other thing: the Sandeman captain who captured me treated his soldiers as if they were cattle, not people. I only met one other Sandeman officer, but he was from the same mould. As Robin said, they see themselves as superior and made no bones about it—and their men, by and large, seemed to accept it as normal. But the Mountain Men interacted with much greater camaraderie, almost democratically—and they follow their leader from respect, not fear.”

“What you’re saying, in effect, is that our information is incomplete—”

“—or just plain wrong. I’ve met just one of the groups ASIO labels as ‘terrorists.’ How many such groups do their agents have first-hand experience of?”

Royn nodded. “That’s a good question. Possibly . . . none at all.”

“Quite likely,” said Cartwright. “As far as I can tell, your spooks sit in Toribaya and compile other people’s reports—not to mention rumors—with little if any fieldwork for direct corroboration.”

“Perhaps,” said Royn doubtfully. “But I’m beginning to think, Mr. Cartwright, that you’re a bit too cynical to be taken completely seriously.”

“Is that so,” said Cartwright. “Well, I take it you know Nimabi is visiting Saudi Arabia?”

Royn nodded.

“Do you know why?”

“Some sort of routine visit, I imagine. And after all, he is a Muslim.”

Cartwright shook his head. “The ‘courtesy call’ story is just a cover. The real reason, from the scuttlebutt I’ve managed to pick up, is money.”

“Money?” said Royn. “I don’t get it.”

“At the moment—at least until the oil starts gushing, assuming it ever does—they’re almost entirely dependent on us. Our troops are propping them up; our money is paying their government’s bills . . . what little of it is left after all the sticky fingers it passes through. They feel as though they need our permission to go to the bathroom. They’re under our thumb—and they don’t like it one bit. They see another source of financing as freedom from our imperialism.”

“Imperialism? We’re just trying to help them—”

“I know that. You know that. But they bitch that we’re always telling them what to do, and all that tired old ‘white colonial’ rhetoric is being muttered—very quietly—in some circles. If they can get money from somewhere else—”

“But the Saudis—” said Royn.

“Exactly,” Cartwright agreed. “Money never comes without strings attached, and Saudi money is worse than most.”

“How can that be?” Royn said, shaking his head. “They have so many charities, do so many good works—”

Cartwright chortled. “Really, Mr. Royn. I suppose that’s the sort of thing your department tells you, is it?”

“Now that you mention it. . . .” Royn said quietly, with a slow nod.

“Do they tell you that many of the Saudi ruling class are alcoholics?”

“What?” said Royn, dropping his eyes as he remember Nimabi’s considerable consumption of wine at the lunch in Singapore.

“Are you sure?” Alison asked.

“I have it on good authority. But all you have to do is get on a British Airways flight out of Jeddah, and if you’re in first class you’ll see all the bigwigs scoffing down the Scotch and champagne faster than even I can manage. And the ladies take turns in the bathroom to junk the burqa and come out looking like Parisian fashion plates.”

“I can’t say I blame them,” said Karla, shuddering.

“What do you mean?” Alison asked, noticing Karla’s reaction.

“I escaped from the hotel in Toribaya dressed in a burqa. Walked straight through the lobby and out the door just as Sandeman soldiers and police showed up to arrest me. I had to wear the damned thing nearly the whole day. It was so constricting and so hot—even in the air-conditioned hotel. I’ll never understand why those Muslim women who are free to give it up choose to keep wearing it.”

“Brainwashed,” said Cartwright.

“They’d have to be,” said Karla.

Like Derek’s mother, Alison thought to herself.

Looking at his watch, Royn interjected, “So what if the Saudi leaders are alc—I mean, drink—”

“—aside from being hypocrites?” Cartwright shot back. “Drunkards and dodderers at the top aren’t the only similarity between Saudi Arabia and the old Soviet Union. They’re both totalitarian societies, closed to outsiders. But the Saudis have two great advantages the Soviets never had.”

“You can’t be serious,” said Royn.

“I’m deadly serious,” said Cartwright. “And before you ask, yes, I’ve been to Saudi Arabia, but no, I haven’t seen inside Saudi society. No outsider can—except a male, Arabic-speaking Arab who’s accepted as an equal.”

“Okay. So what are these two advantages you’re talking about?” said Royn irritably. “But I have another meeting in about ten minutes, so make it quick.”

“Sure,” Cartwright shrugged. “No one ever had qualms or second thoughts about criticizing communism, right? It was only politics or economics, after all. But Islam is a religion. That shields it from criticism. Christ. It’s even protected by anti-hate-speech laws in many places, including some of our own states. The Saudi’s second advantage is money. All that lovely oil that gushes out of the ground at a cost of just a dollar or two a barrel. They use it to spread their own brand of Islam, Wahhabism, throughout the Muslim world. Just as every Soviet embassy had a commissar under the cover of diplomatic immunity whose job it was to support local communist parties and front organizations, so every Saudi embassy has a religious commissar whose job is to spread Wahhabism. They fund mosques, support all kinds of Islamist groups, offer scholarships, run conferences, and train imams. And when those imams come back to, say, the Sandemans, they spruik the same Wahhabist vitriol that Saudi kids learn in school: kill the Jews, death to the Americans, jihad against all infidels.”

“I know about all that sort of thing,” said Royn impatiently. “But it’s mostly funded by various Saudi charitable organizations.”

“Ha,” said Cartwright. “You can’t set up a charity, let alone raise money without the Saudi government’s permission. And where do you think all those rich Saudis get their money in the first place? From government contracts, of course. They’re just pulling the wool over your eyes—there’s no difference between Saudi government money and money from a charity. But the important point is this: Wahhabism is not Islam. It was once a tiny, militant, isolated, desert, anti-almost-everybody sect that today, thanks to Saudi oil money, is spreading like the Black Death. At its current rate of expansion, in ten or twenty years it will become the primary form of Islam. And if you think we’re having problems with Islamic terrorism now, just you wait.”

“But the Saudis are our friends,” Royn said.

“Really?” said Cartwright. “They’d as soon stab us in the back. But why should they, when they’ve got you conned into thinking like that. But don’t take my word for anything I’ve said. Check it all out independently. Because the important thing is this: if I’m right, once the Saudis get their hooks into the Sandemans, in no time at all we’ll have a bunch of militant suicide bombers on our very doorstep.”

Royn and Alison looked at each other uncomfortably. “Better tell them,” Alison said. “It’ll be announced shortly anyway.”

Royn turned to the two journalists. “This morning, our soldiers took some prisoners on St. Christopher’s Island. One of the prisoners blew himself up, taking three of our boys with him.”

“So it’s already too late,” said Cartwright. “You know those two Islamist groups on St. Christopher’s who were at each other’s throats have joined forces? Some self-described mullah appeared from the next island, Jazeerat el-Bihar—he was banished by the elders of the village, Inkaya—”

“Was his name Gurundi?” Karla asked.

“Sounds about right, I think,” said Cartwright.

“He was banished? Any idea why?”

“Something to do with violating the Muslim rules of hospitality—”

“That was me,” Karla squealed. “Oh my God. If I hadn’t offended him, then—I feel as though I’m responsible for the deaths of those soldiers.”

“What makes you say that?” Alison asked.

“I was the honored guest. Gurundi—an odious little man, a stand-in for the village imam. I manhandled him. Apparently, that’s a serious offence . . . for a woman to lay a hand on a Muslim holy man. And if I hadn’t, he’d still be there, and those two Islamist groups would never have gotten together.”

“But Karla,” Alison protested. “You can’t blame yourself for someone else’s actions.”

“Maybe not. But if you give a murderer a gun, don’t you have some responsibility?”

“I—don’t know,” Alison replied, thinking: That could have been one of Derek’s “infernal” questions.

“The two terrorist groups probably would have gotten together sometime,” said Royn. “If not now, then later.”

“Maybe,” said Karla. “But Gurundi had spent two years studying in Indonesia . . . at Saudi expense.”

“Unintended consequences,” said Cartwright, almost as though he was speaking to himself.

“What do you mean by that, Robin?” Karla asked.

“All our actions have consequences—but how often are the results of our actions the ones we intended or expected? Hardly ever. Your little run-in with Gurundi is the perfect metaphor for our presence up there. To be reasonable, how could you have expected that by manhandling the so-called holy man, he’d end up uniting two factions, which led to this morning’s attack? So don’t blame yourself, my dear.” Cartwright put a hand on Karla’s knee as he spoke. “The history of the world is the history of unintended consequences. Especially when you’re making judgements on the fly, in situations where you don’t know all the rules or have all the information. Which is just about all the time.”

“You’re quite the philosopher,” said Alison.

“What you’ve been saying about the Saudi influence would make a good article,” said Karla.

“So it would. Thanks, Karla. I wonder if it will get past the lawyers, though.”

“Lawyers?” Royn asked. “What would they have to do with an article in a newspaper?”

“Victoria is one of those places with pretty restrictive anti-hate-speech laws.”

“So it is.” said Royn. “There was a case—” he searched his memory “—‘speaking the truth is no longer an acceptable defence,’ I think the judge ruled.”

“More unintended consequences,” said Karla. “And bizarre ones, too.”

“Possibly,” Royn said as he stood up. “Now, our time is past up. I appreciate your coming—”

“My pleasure,” said Cartwright, hoisting the nearly empty bottle of Black Label.

“—maybe I’ll ask the department to see if there’s anything in what you’ve been saying.”

“They’ll just tell you the Saudis are our friends and allies and we can’t afford to offend them because they have all that oil,” Cartwright said, his voice scornful. “And then they’ll drag their heels until, if you haven’t forgotten about it altogether, they’ll produce a whitewash. If you really want to get at the truth, do it independently.”

“An . . . interesting perspective,” Royn said.

As Alison ushered the two journalists out of Royn’s office, she turned to Karla and said, “Inviting Cartwright was a good idea. Thank you, Karla.”

“My pleasure,” Karla replied. “Next time you’re in Sydney, give me a call. We have a lot to talk about, don’t you think?”

“Maybe,” Alison said doubtfully.

“SO, ALISON, DO YOU think Cartwright has a point?” Royn said. “About the Saudis?”

“And the department?” Alison grinned.

Royn nodded.

“I don’t know,” Alison replied. “But I think we should find out.”

“Let’s do this: draft a memo to Fairchild directing him to prepare a report on the relationship between Wahhabism and Saudi society and Saudi foreign policy. Also ask him to identify the, ah, ‘religious commissars’ in the Saudi embassy here in Canberra, and the extent of Saudi funding of activities of any kind in Australia—and, of course, in the Sandemans. Naturally, this report will be highly confidential.”

“And if Fairchild ‘drags his heels’?”

“We’ll keep reminding him,” Royn chuckled. “Which won’t make him at all happy.”

Alison laughed. “And what about Cartwright’s other point—about doing some digging independent of the department?”

Royn was thoughtful, and then nodded. “Could be an interesting test. Why don’t we look into putting some researchers together?—academics and the like. But under the umbrella of some think tank.” Royn grinned. “For deniability.”

“Okay,” said Alison, nodding, and passed Royn a document marked confidential. “This just came in from Defence.”

“It seems,” said Royn as he skimmed it, “that a certain Lieutenant McGuire—a relation by any chance—?” Alison nodded “—took some samples and pictures of a plant near a village call Inkaya that’s been identified as marijuana. They conclude that marijuana is being grown there in commercial quantities.”

“I wonder if that’s the ‘plantation’ Karla mentioned.”

“If it is, then where are they selling it? And that Preston woman came back from the Sandemans on a fishing boat that simply dropped her off on the coast without being challenged or even noticed.” Royn leapt from his chair and leant on his desk, glowering as he spoke. “Our shoreline is wide open—they could smuggle it in anywhere.” He began to pace impatiently around the room. “Make sure Bruce sees that report. Get him to find out if there’s any evidence of marijuana coming into Australia from the Sandemans.”

“And if there is?”

Royn looked at Alison, and smiled bitterly. “What I’d like to do is destroy it,” he said, returning slowly to his seat. “So any evidence could give us the pretext, don’t you think?”

“It just could,” Alison nodded. She had reservations about whether Royn’s desired action was wise, given the current state of their relations with the Sandemans. But she would raise them later, when Royn was in a calmer mood. “And Bergstrom wants to see you as soon as possible.”

“Do you know what about?”

Alison nodded. “The terrorists on St. Christopher’s Island used a machine gun in the attack this morning. They traced the serial number and it was a new one we’d supplied to the Sandeman Army.”

“And how did the terrorists get it?”

“According to one of the prisoners, they bought it from a Sandeman quartermaster. The Sandeman Army denies this, saying it was lost in action—”

“And we don’t believe them—is that what you’re about to say?”

“Right,” Alison nodded. “Apparently, items like rifles have been sold to the terrorists—usually by individual soldiers who desert and turn their weapons into cash. But Bergstrom says Thierry is convinced a lot more weapons like machine guns are missing. He suspects organized theft—and wants instructions on how to handle it.”

“Sheesh,” said Royn, jumping to his feet. “I’ll go and see him now.”

“One other thing first, Minister.”

Seeing Alison’s broad smile, Royn sank back into his seat and said, “Better news, I presume.”

“I certainly hope so. I got one of my friends in the Federal Police assigned to the Candyman Inquiry, and I’ve been passing him the names and information the private eye’s been getting from Leon Price.”

“How that going?” Royn asked.

“Far too slowly,” Alison said. “They’re lucky if they get five or ten minutes with him before the doctors demand that he rest.”

“It sounds like he’s on his last legs.”

“Possibly. They say he’s clearly in no condition to testify in court—though if it ever gets that far he’ll probably be long dead and buried.”

“If I was McKurn’s lawyer,” said Royn, leaning back in his chair and pursing lips, “I would challenge any statement Price makes as the blathering drivel of an embittered old man who probably wasn’t in his right mind at the time. So whatever he says might only be useful if it can be corroborated, or lead to other lines of investigation.”

“I’m afraid so,” Alison said. “My Federal Police friend is also pushing the ACT Police’s investigation of those agency records to get at McKurn’s name as fast as possible.”

“Did you mention McKurn specifically?”

“To my contact, yes. But he will only tell the police he’s interested because he has information that federal politicians could be implicated.”

Royn sat up straightened his shoulders and smiled broadly. “Alison, we’re that close—” he closed his finger and thumb so they almost touched “—to nailing him. I can smell it.”

32 Hollow Idol

USING THE PSEUDONYM “STUART Wrench,” Derek Olsson booked a flight to Bangkok via Singapore in case flights direct from Australia were being watched. He’d had a moment of tension as the immigration officer at Sydney airport compared the face in front of him, with its greying hair and neatly trimmed goatee beard and hairline moustache, to the photo in the British passport which had none of that facial hair. “You should get a new photo, mate,” the officer said, his tone disapproving.

“I will most certainly do that, sir,” Olsson replied in the British accent he’d been practicing with a voice coach all week. Olsson held his breath as the officer checked the visa and ran the passport through the computer. A moment later he stamped the passport and returned it to Olsson: apparently the computer records were in order, as promised.

As he walked away, Olsson heard the immigration officer say to a companion, “Sometimes these Pommie bastards can be a bit arsty-farsty, eh?”

He smiled, thinking he’d passed the first test—and his tutor should be proud of him. Though she might have a stroke if she knew his real reason for practicing the accent; she’d been under the impression he’d been preparing himself for a role in an amateur performance. Not entirely untrue.

He settled back into the wide business class seat that promised a reasonably good night’s rest. Instead of drifting into sleep he found himself thinking that his life had moved in an ironic circle: initially, he had come to admire, even look up to Luk Suk as a man who made and lived by his own rules . . . but he’d moved back to Australia to get out from under Luk Suk’s thumb—which hadn’t worked, because he was now flying to Bangkok to confront him. And now growing in the pit of his stomach was the gnawing sense that the world was too small a place for both of them.

IT HAD BEGUN, HE thought as he looked back, the day when Alison, ashen-faced, had come almost stumbling down the stairs from his mother’s room in his grandfather’s house. She failed to return Jack Dent’s greeting, refused to look at him and walked straight outside, a jerk of her head signalling that Derek should follow. When Alison finished telling him what she’d just learnt from his mother, he stormed back into the house.

“So you stood by,” Derek snarled at his grandfather, “knowing what was going on, letting Dad beat up my mother—your very own daughter—and me.”

“No, it wasn’t like that at all,” Dent pleaded, his head in his hands.

“Really? Ha! You mean, you saw Ma’s bruises, and mine and Lars’ and Jessica’s—and just closed your eyes? That’s even worse.”

“No—I wasn’t certain.”

“But you made damn sure you never found out, one way or the other. Right?” Derek demanded, standing over his grandfather, his fists clenched, the tendons on his neck taut.

“That’s exactly how it was,” said Jennifer Dent. Derek, Dent, Molly, Jessica—and Alison, who was now standing in the background by the front door—turned in unison, all surprised at the hard edge to her voice.

“Jenny—” Dent said in a pleading tone, his eyes glaring at her.

“I’ve been too quiet for too long,” said Jennifer Dent, taking two quick steps to her daughter’s side and enfolding her in her arms. “How many times did I plead with you to do something? You, who always told me I’d never have to worry about anything, that you’d take care of it. You, who knows the mayor, the police commissioner, with your lawyer who you only ever had to ask . . . but never did.”

“You knew?” Derek asked her.

“Molly never said anything to me. It was always some accident or another. But, I knew that something was very wrong—but your grandfather here refused to take any action. ‘They’re married now,’ he’d say, ‘and let no man tear asunder what God has made.’”

“God?” Derek turned on his grandfather, more furious than ever. “What’s God got to do with it? You’re the one who forced Ma into a marriage she didn’t want, not God. How could you do such a thing to your own daughter? A marriage that he didn’t want either. You’re the one who saddled us with a man you knew was shiftless and couldn’t be trusted. . . .”

“But I never knew he was violent. And the . . . shame. . . .”

“Shame? Yours? Or Ma’s?”

Dent said nothing.

Derek went over to his mother, taking her hands. “I love you, Ma, but I’m sorry. I can’t stay here another minute. I don’t want to see Grandpa ever again.”

“Derek—no.”

“Ma,” he said, getting down on his knees so they were eye to eye, “come with me. Let’s both get out of here—not back to the old house. Somewhere else. Just you, me, and Jessica. And Lars, if he wants.”

“I—I can’t, Derek.” Tears ran down Molly’s face, unconstrained. “Not right now.”

He bowed his head. “I understand—and I hope you do, too.”

DEREK WENT TO LIVE with his friend, Ross Traynor, moving into the room Ross’s elder sister vacated when she married. Ross’s parents listened quietly as he told the story, his words tumbling out so fast they tripped over each other.

“You’re welcome to stay here, Derek, as long as you need to,” Ross’s mother said. His father nodded his agreement.

“And I’ll pay rent.”

“There’s no need for that,” Ross’s father protested. “And how can you afford to—you’ve got your final exams coming up in less than two months. You have to have time to study.”

Ross laughed. “That’s not true, Dad. Derek never needs to study, damn him.”

“Thank you,” Derek said. “But I insist on paying my own way. I can do it too—I’ll just have to do a bit more tutoring or put in a few more hours at the service station. And I can work there full time over the summer holidays.”

“How could he do such a thing?” Derek asked Alison one day, pleading with her to make sense of it for him.

“Look on the bright side, Derek,” Alison said, desperately grasping for something positive. “If your parents hadn’t married, you wouldn’t be here.”

“Does that make what he did right?” Derek demanded.

“Of course it doesn’t.”

“And I should thank him for what he did?”

Alison shook her head. “And your mother—” Alison stopped when she saw Derek frown at her critical tone.

“What about Ma?” Derek gazed at her accusingly.

“You’ve got to face it Derek. She’s responsible, too. She never stood up to her father—or her husband.”

“I know,” he groaned.

“So tell me, what do you have that she doesn’t?

“What do you mean by that?”

“You stood up to your father—and your grandfather. You’re still at school but already you’re paying your own way. You’re independent—not just financially but with all your damn questions too. Molly’s not. She’s passive; you’re active. Maybe Molly had her will beaten out of her as a child—but why did yours survive? Why did you fight back, and she didn’t? Why the difference?”

He just shrugged helplessly. “All I know is that I looked up to him, I loved him, Alison. He was my hero—and it turns out he was nothing but a hollow idol. I feel betrayed.”

“THE PROBLEM WITH SHAKESPEARE,” Derek said one day in his English class, “is that every one of his protagonists is flawed and comes to a tragic end. Where can I find someone I can look up to, someone I can admire?”

“Myths and fairy tales,” the teacher replied. “That’s where. In real life every one of us is flawed—which Shakespeare dramatizes to perfection. That’s our fate—there are no heroes.”

“Why not?”

The teacher just shook his head wearily. “I guess you’re just not old enough to understand.”

Derek leaned forward intently on his desk. “Maybe I’m not old enough to have given up.” Or have I? he asked himself silently.

The teacher glared at him. “What’s that supposed to mean . . . ? Never mind. We’re wasting time on meaningless frivolity. Turn to page 112. . . .”

But Derek had stopped listening. He opened his book and pretended to follow the teacher’s words, but in his mind he was listening to another voice: Have I given up?

“THAT’S WHERE I WANT to be,” Alison told Derek excitedly after she returned from a class outing to Canberra. “We saw Parliament in session, and the Prime Minister—”

“In Canberra?” Derek asked skeptically. “You want to be in politics?”

“I don’t know. I don’t think I want to be a politician. But I do want to be in Parliament House, in the center of power, where I can make things happen.”

“Really?” he asked. “Why?”

“Why? Because that’s where I can make a difference. I’m going to work there over the summer holidays.” Noticing that he was looking at her somewhat distantly, she challenged him, “What’s wrong with that?”

Olsson shrugged. his eyes seeming to stare through her into the distance as he spoke. “That’s just something I’d never do, don’t want to do . . . in a place I don’t want to be.”

“So why are you looking at me that way?” She waited an instant until she could hold his gaze and said, softly, “There’s more to it than that, isn’t there, Derek?”

He nodded, moving slightly backwards in his seat, which made him look more, not less, uncomfortable.

“So tell me,” she demanded.

“Everybody’s always telling me what to do. Parents—grandparents—teachers, cops, talking heads on TV and radio,” he said heatedly. “But the worst of all are preachers and politicians—and you want to be one of them?”

Alison was clearly hurt and angry at the contempt in his voice. “All I want to do is help people like me, and Molly—and you,” she glared. “And that’s where I can do it best. Whether you like it or not, I’m going to spend the Christmas holidays in Parliament House as an intern.”

“Tell me, then. Can you pass a law to turn my grandfather into what I used to think he was?”

“That’s hardly fair!”

“Really?” he challenged her, his cheeks flushing. “What are you going to end up doing in Canberra, Alison? Making laws—more rules telling people like me what do to. Of course no law can change my grandfather—or give spine to my mother either. So you can cross me and her off your list. And there are already laws against rape—do you think more laws would have given you any more protection?”

Slowly, shakily, Alison rose to her feet. “You know that’s not what I want to do. You’re so unbelievably . . . nauseating.”

Fuming, tears streaming down her cheeks, Alison stalked away. For the next couple of weeks, she rebuffed his attempts to talk to her; turned and headed the other away whenever she saw him in school; walked out of the dojo after Aikido without a word; and joined Molly at the battered women’s group meetings, instead of talking with Derek—while he waited outside, alone.

But Derek didn’t seem to care. For the first time, without a word of explanation to Sensei Tozen or anyone else, he began missing Aikido classes. His grades at school were slipping, and the MG he and Ross Traynor had been rebuilding sat unfinished and untouched in the garage. One day Ross even cornered Alison at school to tell her, “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but Derek seems to be going to pieces. Even my parents are worried about him. Do you think there’s something you could do?”

“I don’t know, Ross,” Alison replied. “But I’m not going to talk to him—not till he apologizes.”

“For what?” Ross asked.

“He knows.”

Ross shook his head. “He just doesn’t seem to care, Alison. About anything.”

ALISON HAD VOLUNTEERED TO take calls at a Rape Crisis Hotline—and often left in tears. Desperate to talk about it, after an Aikido session when Derek actually showed up, she reluctantly asked him if he’d join her for a coffee.

Ross was right, she thought when Derek merely answered “Sure,” with a shrug—as if her invitation made no difference to him one way or the other—and followed her listlessly around the corner.

“They’re so afraid, so depressed,” she told him, “so ashamed—as if it was their fault. And helpless. Some want to fight back but don’t know how. Most are like your mother, Molly, and can’t lift a finger in their own defence.”

“Teach them Aikido,” Derek suggested, a faint glimmer of life behind his eyes.

“Brilliant,” said Alison, looking at him warmly in appreciation, her face glowing at the possibilities.

“What would have happened if you’d known Aikido when . . . ?”

“I’d have broken their goddamn arms,” she growled happily. “Teach with me. I can tell my story and you can tell yours—and we can show them how easily they can learn to defend themselves. We can really help people like us . . . and your mother.”

Alison was leaning forward excitedly, but Derek had just slumped back into his chair, his eyes blank. “I—I’m sorry, Alison, but I just can’t.”

“Why not?” Alison demanded.

Derek’s mouth twisted into a wry grin as Alison turned “his” question around. “That’s my question,” he chuckled half-heartedly. “Why not? I don’t have the energy, for one thing. And this is your crusade, isn’t it, Alison? It’s not mine. I . . . I don’t have a cause. You have the passion to do it; I don’t. But I will make one suggestion: our school would be a good place to start.”

To everyone’s surprise—except Derek’s, who watched incuriously from the sidelines—the school hall was packed for Alison’s first demonstration, which lasted nearly three hours instead of the allocated ninety minutes. Tozen’s Aikido classes overflowed, and despite vociferous opposition from a vocal minority of parents—who either felt personally threatened or thought such topics were better dealt with in private or not at all—once or twice a month she was invited to put on her “road show” at high schools across the city.

As reports trickled in of would-be rapists who’d ended up with broken arms or worse, Alison told Derek excitedly, “You see, you can change the world.”

“And you didn’t have to be in government to do it.”

“But wouldn’t it be better if schools were all required to run self-defence programs?”

“Maybe,” he replied skeptically.

Derek continued to help her—when she asked for his help. He talked to her—when she initiated a conversation. But he never volunteered anything or asked any more of his infuriating questions. He was, Alison thought, like one of her girlfriends who’d been jilted—except that he didn’t snap out of it a week or two later like her friends who quickly fell in “love” with some other boy, but was sinking deeper into a gloomy depression. So the day he asked her, “Like to come with me and see this American evangelist?” she felt a flicker of hope, overwhelmed by surprise—and incredulity bordering on shock.

“You? You want to listen to a preacher? I can’t believe it.”

“He’s supposed to be some kind of a saint,” Derek shrugged. “I just want to see for myself.”

“Derek, I can’t believe my ears. After everything you’ve said about God . . . and preachers?” she shook her head. “Count me out. I’ve heard more than enough from Father Ryan.”

But she didn’t speak the words she was thinking: Are you losing your mind?

“He had a wonderful presence,” Derek told her later. “I guess ‘saintly aura’ is the only way to describe it. Quite breathtaking. But he preached about Adam and Eve being thrown out of the Garden of Eden. By eating the apple, he said, they rejected morality and were doomed thereafter. Our only hope for salvation is to return to their original state of mindlessly obeying the edicts of God as he, being God’s messenger on earth, interprets them. Yes, he says, we have free will—to accept God’s word or reject it. Choose between hell—being a rational human being—or heaven—and become an unthinking vegetable. What a choice.”

A few weeks later, Derek showed Alison a story he’d ripped out of a newspaper: the evangelist had been charged with having sex with underage girls—and not one, but several. “He convinced me the path to God was through his bed,” said one of the girls who’d come forward to testify.

“So much for him,” Derek said with a touch of glee that Alison found disturbing.

As though the evangelist had been the first stop on some kind of warped quest, hardly a week went by without Derek telling her a similar story in the same cynical, mocking tone . . . of a businessman said to be a model of honesty—who turned out to have been cooking his company’s books . . . a famous philanthropist who’d been caught dipping his fingers into his charity’s till . . . a professor held up as an exemplar of moral integrity who was discovered, by his wife, in bed with one of his students . . . a priest who’d abused little boys in his congregation and the archbishop who shielded him—who was now a Cardinal, safely out of reach in the Vatican . . . a champion athlete who’d filed for bankruptcy, the millions of dollars he’d made in prize money and endorsements having disappeared in profligate spending and dumb investments. . . .

“Being good at one thing doesn’t mean you have to be good in everything,” Alison said. “And failing at something doesn’t make you a bad person.”

“Doesn’t it?” was all he would say in response.

“Who or what are you looking for, Derek?” she asked him softly, her eyes sad and concerned.

“I am looking, aren’t I? For what? I guess . . . for someone—anyone—I can look up to.”

“Someone to replace your grandfather, you mean?”

“Yes,” he replied hoarsely. And projecting a sense of desperation he whispered, “. . . maybe my English teacher was right.”

Alison shook her head vigorously. “No. What about the people who don’t appear in the papers?”

“You mean, the ones who don’t get caught? They probably beat the kids or cheat on their wives.”

“No.” Alison said angrily. “I mean the ones who have never done anything wrong.”

Derek shrugged. “I’ve just about given up expecting I’ll ever find one.”

“What about . . . Mother Teresa?”

“Maybe,” he said, skeptically.

A little while later he looked more hopeful. “As far as I can tell, everyone says she’s wonderful, a living saint.” But the following week, he excitedly thrust an article he’d found in an obscure magazine in the library into Alison’s hands and demanded, “Read this. Mother Teresa’s no saint after all. She takes sick people in, yes. But then she won’t even allow their friends and relatives to visit, or give them any medical treatment—just prayer. And she gets millions of dollars in donations every year and nobody knows where it goes.”

“That’s terrible,” Alison said as she read.

“Isn’t it. She’s a vampire feeding on other people’s suffering.”

“But that’s not what’s really terrible.”

“What is, then?”

“You,” Alison replied. “You’ve become so cynical it’s depressing. Being around you used to be—infuriating, yes, but exciting, challenging. You used to be so alive. Now, you’re like a walking black hole of despair. You’re not looking for someone to admire—you’re determined to find fault with everyone and everything and prove that no such person exists. That Shakespeare was right. There are lots of people you can admire if you’d just look around you.”

“Like who?”

“Like . . . my parents, who battled all their lives to make a home for themselves—and my mother, who risked death to create the one thing they both desperately wanted: a child. Or what about Ross’s parents, who happily took you under their roof with love and understanding. They may not be giants, like the people you keep trying to tear down, but they’re wonderful people just the same. And what about looking into your self? What are your admirable qualities? And if you’re so concerned about flaws, about imperfections, isn’t the most important thing to overcome them, not give into them? So why don’t you concentrate on conquering your own defects instead of focusing on people who failed?”

For a change, it was Derek who was speechless.

DEREK PASSED ALL HIS finals—but for the first time he did not get straight As.

“What the hell,” he said. “I don’t want to be a doctor or a lawyer anyway,” naming the two courses that needed almost perfect scores for entry, “so what difference does it make?”

“So what do you want to do?” Alison asked.

Derek just shrugged, as listless as ever. “I guess I’ll go to university—why not?” He enrolled at Sydney University, taking “maths, physics, and chemistry for fun,” he told Alison, “and philosophy for the meaning of life.”

“You’d make a great teacher,” Alison said, recalling the way he’d explained everything to her so clearly. “Or, with all your damned questions—” she grinned, her voice enthusiastic as though, by projecting it, she could transfer the feeling to him “—a great scientist.”

He shook his head wistfully. “I really don’t know. In fact, I have no idea what I want to do when I grow up. Be stuck in a lab all day? No thanks. Teaching? Not as a career. I couldn’t do the same thing year after year, even if all my students were there because they were desperate to learn. It’s like building cars. I’ve done it, so it’s time to do something else.”

“What else?”

“I wish I knew, Alison. I wish I knew.”

Derek spent the December/January summer vacation pumping petrol, working nights as an assistant waiter, deputy bartender, and all-round gofer in a seedy Balmain bar where, after he’d stopped a few fights, he also became the unofficial bouncer, teaching Aikido and, in what little spare time he had left, reading philosophy. He found himself holding imaginary conversations with Alison, storing up things to tell her when she returned from Canberra.

Alison returned bubbling over with excitement. “It was great,” she told Derek. “I met lots of people—politicians, journalists, members of staff, and that’s definitely where I want to be. And in the July holidays, I’m going work in a Senator’s office.” Seeing that Derek was about to speak, she held up her hand. “I know you don’t approve, but please don’t say anything that would spoil my mood.”

Derek smiled. “I was about to say . . . I owe you an apology.”

Alison nodded, looking suddenly hopeful. “Have you . . . changed your mind?” she asked softly.

He shook his head with a quiet laugh. “Not exactly. I mean. . . . Canberra. I know I don’t want to do what you want to do. It still feels wrong to me . . . but now, I’m . . . confused, I guess.”

“Confused? About what?”

“What’s right and what’s wrong. I’ve been reading different philosophers all summer long—and they all disagree with one another. Some say ‘black is white,’ while others say ‘no, it’s red.’ Someone else says ‘it can be black to you and red to me’—but they all agree that truth is relative. Then another guy says ‘since the word “real” doesn’t really mean anything, all this talk about “black, white and red” is completely meaningless’.”

“But surely,” Alison protested, “what’s right and wrong is just . . . obvious. Isn’t it?”

“Apparently not. Except to those philosophers who say morality is handed to us from God. Otherwise,” he shrugged, “there’s no standard of morality . . . or it’s relative, or arbitrary. . . .” His voice trailed off.

“That all makes no sense to me.”

“I know,” Derek said fervently. “That’s why I’m looking forward to uni—hoping this philosophy course will make sense out of it all. So while what you want to do still feels wrong to me, I just don’t know any more.”

“Thank you,” Alison said, glowing at him warmly.

Derek dipped his head in acknowledgement. “While I can’t prove I’m right, I hate people telling me what to do. I’m never going to do to anyone what my father did to me. According to Nietzsche—one of the philosophers I’ve been reading—the choice is to rule others, or to be ruled.” He shrugged again. “I won’t let anyone rule me . . . and I don’t want to rule anyone else, either.”

“Poor Derek. It seems to me you’re making something simple really complicated.”

“Maybe,” he admitted. “I just have to make sense out of everything, that’s all. My head spins just thinking about it. Whereas you—” he leant towards her slightly to emphasize his words “—seem to know exactly where you’re going. I wish I could feel that way.”

“I . . . guess I do,” Alison smiled awkwardly, feeling slightly embarrassed. “And I even know . . . well . . . I sort of know who’d I’d like to work for. After uni of course.”

“Who?”

“I don’t know, exactly. But if I worked for the right politician, I could have a lot of influence.”

“What do you mean by the ‘right’ politician?”

“Well . . . for example . . . Anthony Royn.”

“Who’s he?”

“You really don’t know, do you?”

Derek shook his head. “You know me, Alison. I couldn’t give a stuff about politics or politicians. As far as I’m concerned, they’re all liars and cheats. Remember that minister who had to resign because he’d padded his travel expenses? And that senator who hadn’t fully disclosed his investments and was busted for buying stock on the sly just before government approvals were announced? They’re all the same.”

“That’s not true,” she protested.

Derek pointedly raised one eyebrow, but simply said, “Okay. Maybe not all of them. Anyway, tell me about this Royn character.”

“He was elected only a couple of years ago, but already he’s Randolph Kydd’s favorite. . . . You know who he is, don’t you?”

“The leader of some party or other.”

“He’s the leader of the Conservatives, and they’re in opposition.”

“So Royn’s a Conservative?” When Alison nodded, Derek laughed. “You’ll give your father a heart attack.”

“I know,” she said miserably.

“Why not a Labor politician, then?”

“I want to work for someone who’s got a good chance of getting to the top—”

“Hitch yourself to a star, you mean?”

Alison scowled at him. “You have such a way with words,” she said sarcastically. “But . . . yes.”

“Sorry to interrupt,” he grinned, not looking at all apologetic.

“As I was saying,” she glared, “I learnt—mainly from the journalists, who were all very helpful—”

“You mean, you charmed them, turning them into puppies, like you did with my grandfather?”

“Derek!”

“That was a compliment, Alison.”

“Really?” Alison said skeptically. “It didn’t sound like one to me.”

“Sorry,” he shrugged. “Please, go on. . . .”

“Okay. So . . . the Labor Party is rife with factions so you never know who’s going to end up where. While Royn stays in Kydd’s favor, he’ll keep moving up in the Conservative Party hierarchy.”

“But Labor’s in government.”

“They won’t always be. The Conservatives’ structure is also a lot looser, and their ideology. According to most of the people I talked to,” she giggled, “their only ideology is winning votes.”

It was Derek’s turn to frown. “How’s that significant?”

“If I can persuade whoever I’m working for that something I want to get through is a vote-winner, I won’t have to also fight an ideological battle.” Derek seemed about to say something, but when he hesitated she went on, “Royn’s also young; he’s going places; he’s really popular—I met him, briefly, and he’s such a nice guy, not like some of them—and he’s got movie star looks—”

“Oh, I see.”

“That’s got nothing to do with it. I mean, with me.” But she averted her eyes as she felt the flush of warmth flood her cheeks. “It means—he wins votes. Anyway, he’s happily married too.”

“What are his beliefs, his aims?”

“I—don’t really know, yet. But he strikes me as a kind of Little Boy Lost.”

“I see,” he said.

“What do you see?” she demanded. “Out with it.”

“If you insist. You’re telling me that you’d rather work for a Conservative because the Labor Party is too hidebound by its principles, while the Conservatives don’t really have any. And you want to pick someone like this guy Royn because he seems to be on the fast track to the top, a vote-winning hunk of no fixed ideals—a moral vacuum—who’s the most malleable shooting star you can find. Alison!”

“I’m not. . . . Well, maybe I am, but that’s what you have to do. What I want is to be in a position where I can get more support and protection for people like . . . for victims. And if I have to play by their rules to beat them at their own game, okay, I can do that.”

“I thought you wanted to make the rules, not follow them.”

“I will. But you have to know the rules first.”

“Maybe. I’d rather just make my own rules . . . for myself.”

“Which are?”

“Aside from hurt no one, I don’t know—yet.”

“But you hurt your father. And Lars. Didn’t you?”

“True,” he said. “. . . in self-defence.”

“What about your mother? You hurt her when you walked out on her—was that in self-defence?”

“I don’t know, Alison,” he cried, his head falling into his hands, his body shaking. He raised his face, twisted in pain, to look at her, tears dripping from his eyes. “I . . . I had to leave. . . .”

She reached out her hand to hold his. “I’m sorry, Derek.”

PARTLY BECAUSE SHE WAS somewhat intrigued herself, Alison decided to accompany Derek to hear a visiting Indian guru for “an evening of meditation and spiritual uplift.” There must be something in it, Alison thought when she saw the guru, a lady with an aura of peace who looked to be in her late twenties but was actually forty-five.

The sounds—om, mane, padre, hum—plus the monotonous beat of the Indian music were strangely soothing. Little books were passed around and they began chanting transliterated Sanskrit words. After a while, Alison vaguely noticed that Derek had stopped chanting. Afterwards he almost shouted, “Look at this. It’s right here in black and white.” Pointing to the English words under the lines of Sanskrit he read: “‘The Guru is wise . . . always look up to the Guru . . . even when the Guru is wrong the Guru is right.’ There’s more, all like that.”

“I was just listening to the sounds—they’re so enchanting.”

“Let’s go,” he said.

“You go. I’m enjoying this.”

Derek shrugged. “Okay, I’ll stay.”

After the break the guru gave a talk, and afterwards it was time for something called “darshan,” to be blessed by the guru. With an impish grin at Alison, Derek jumped up and joined the line of devotees.

“So what did you ask her?” Alison asked when Derek sat beside her again.

“Remember how she was saying that someone becomes a guru by being appointed by the previous guru? So I asked her: ‘Who appointed the first guru?’”

“And what did she say?”

“‘In our tradition, the Lord Krishna.’ Meaning, of course, that the first guru in the chain appointed himself.” He smiled at her—a bitter, twisted, smile that made her shudder. “You see Alison, they’re all the same.”

Alison kept returning to the meditation center; after a few weeks, Derek joined her despite his reservations. “You’re right,” he said eventually. “If you ignore the meanings and just listen to the sounds, it works. But I can’t ignore the meaning completely, so I made up my own sounds, meaningless ones . . . and they have the same effect.”

Over time, Derek became calmer and more centered. But as Alison started her last year of school and Derek began at university, his cynicism, far from subsiding became, if anything, more entrenched.

Almost from the first day, the philosophy lecturer had dashed Derek’s hopes. “He says he’s a deconstructionist,” he told Alison.

“What on earth is that?” she asked.

“As far as I can tell,” Derek replied, “someone who tears things apart so they can’t be put back together.

“Truth?” the lecturer had said. “Consider science—you’d expect to find absolute truths there, right?” When the class agreed he continued, “You’d be wrong. There are no truths in science—not ‘Truths’ with a capital ‘T’. Just hypotheses that have yet to be falsified. So Newton’s so-called ‘laws’ were superseded by Einstein—and now we have quantum mechanics and something called ‘string theory’ which merely goes to show that science is ‘proving’—and I put that word in quotes intentionally—what many philosophers have been saying for centuries: that the universe is essentially incomprehensible.”

When Derek told Alison what he’d been “learning,” Alison stared at him in horror. “That . . . can’t be true,” she said. “How can anyone believe such things?”

Derek shrugged. “Lots of people believe in invisible men in the sky so—why not?”

“I suppose,” Alison said, unconvinced.

“But it gets worse. For example, he says the eye has a blind spot where the optic nerve connects the eye to the brain—so how can we be sure that what we think we’re seeing is really there?”

“So how does he know the eye has a blind spot?” Alison asked.

“Good question.”

TOWARDS THE END OF his first semester at university, Derek Olsson stood outside his old high school lounging by a bright red, two-seater convertible MG sports car with its roof down, circa 1960s, that looked brand new. As the students in their uniforms streamed out of school they crowded enviously around Derek, who was wearing just torn shorts, a battered T-shirt and thongs—and gaped at his car.

“You’ve finished it,” Alison said as she saw him. “It’s . . . beautiful.”

Derek nodded. “Can I drive you home, ma’am?” he grinned, opening the passenger door.

“Yes—but my bike . . . ?”

“Let’s go for a spin, stop for a coffee, and pick up your bike later.”

Alison laughed as Derek accelerated the MG and the wind whipped her hair back in a tail behind her. But her laughter stopped when Derek said, “I’ve quit.”

“You’ve what?”

“Quit university. Dropped out—”

“. . . given up . . . ?” Alison said softly.

Derek glanced at her sharply, and with an indifferent shrug and a bitter smile said, “Maybe.”

“But Derek, you can’t. Don’t you care? About your life and yourself? . . . ” In a faint voice Alison added, diffidently, “. . . and about me?”

Alison struggled for breath as Derek suddenly swung the car into a vacant parking space, braking violently as he did, the car behind honking angrily at his unexpected movement. Switching off the engine he turned to study her, saying somberly, “Yes, Alison. I do care—about you. As for the rest . . . ?” He shrugged again.

“But . . . Derek. . . .” Alison stared at him, her face frozen in shock, gasping for words and unable find a single one.

“Let’s get a drink,” he said, pointing to a nearby café and leaping out of the car without opening the door.

“Tell me, then,” Alison said as they took a table, “what made you decide to quit? And why, for heaven’s sake?”

Derek grinned impishly. “You know this philosophy course has been driving me crazy—it’s such a relief to know I’m never going back to it. Anyway, I really put the boot into the lecturer today. . . .”

“SO,” SAID DEREK RISING from the back of the lecture hall. “What you’ve been telling us is that you don’t exist—or that I’m merely a figment of your imagination.”

“Well,” said the lecturer with surprise, “rather badly put—but in essence, yes.”

“Thank you,” said Derek, “I just wanted to be clear.”

“Well,” said the lecturer doubtfully, “true clarity in these matters is a childish expectation. So-called reality is essentially unintelligible and unfathomable.”

“Perhaps,” said Derek, pulling a rifle out of his bag. “But I think a little demonstration might prove educational.”

“What are you doing?” the lecturer asked with a flash of fear.

“Simple,” said Derek. “You just said you don’t exist, or that I’m merely a figment of your imagination. So this rifle is just another figment, right?”

Derek aimed the gun at the lecturer.

“This can’t be happening,” he shouted. “Somebody—HELP!—call the police.”

“Now why should anybody do that—assuming they exist—just to bring more illusions into the room . . . which is, itself, another construct of your imagination.”

The lecturer was frozen, cowering behind the lectern.

“And if I were to pull this trigger, an imaginary bullet might come out and might blow your brains out, but what earthly difference could it make to you—since you don’t really exist?”

“But . . . but. . . .”

“But what?” demanded Derek. “After all, you’ve told us there are no moral absolutes, so if I do pull the trigger, on what basis would I be doing anything wrong?”

The lecturer stood like a petrified statue, his face a mask of terror, his mouth open, his vocal chords frozen.

“You see, you have no answer,” Derek said, and squeezed his finger.

There was a loud explosion and the lecturer dropped out of sight. A couple of people screamed as the entire class turned to look at Derek. After a moment’s stunned silence, the room broke up in laughter.

The lecturer peeked over the lectern, ducked down again, and slowly stood up. He looked aghast at Derek: hanging from the rifle’s barrel was a large flag with the word BANG! in bright red letters, and the lecturer’s face turned deep red as the students’ laughter ricocheted around the hall.

When hall became silent again, Derek said, “I think we’ve just proven that your philosophy is full of shit.”

ALISON HOOTED WITH LAUGHTER till tears streamed down her cheeks. “You . . . did . . . that?” she spluttered between laughs.

“It was only a toy gun—but it sure looked real.”

“But . . . I don’t understand.”

“Look, I never wanted a philosophy degree—what would I do with that? I just wanted to make sense of the world. That lecturer just made everything worse. Take the MG,” he said waving a hand to where it was parked on the kerb, a couple of passers-by admiring it. “I rebuilt it, with my own two hands. Is it an illusion? Was I dreaming the whole time?”

“Of course not,” Alison said heatedly, taking his hand. “And I’m not a figment of your imagination either.”

“No,” Derek smiled wistfully. “If you were. . . .”

“If I was . . . what?”

His cheeks flushing, Derek shook his head.

“Go on. Say it,” Alison demanded. When he pressed his lips together, his eyes glistening, she said angrily, “If you won’t, I will.”

“I . . . can’t, Alison.”

“Because I’m not a virgin any more, is that what you mean?” As she spoke, she couldn’t prevent her gaze from lowering.

“No,” Derek protested. “That’s not what I . . . was thinking.” And then he smiled mischievously. “But you are . . . metaphysically speaking.”

“Metaphysically?” Alison spluttered, pulling her hand away. “From the way you treat me, you must think I’m a mind without a body.”

“No, Alison,” Derek said, his lips trembling and his eyes pleading, “I’ve never, ever thought that.”

They sat in uncomfortable silence until Alison sighed, and asked, “Why quit? There are dozens of other courses you could take.”

“True,” he answered, “except they don’t really interest me.”

“So what now?”

“I really don’t know.” He spoke uncertainly. “The only idea I’ve come up with is to see the world. Sell the MG and buy a round-the-world ticket. I can work in England and Canada. And I’m sure I can stretch my money by picking up the odd job here and there.”

“No, Derek,” Alison pleaded. “Please don’t go.”

“Only be for a few months. Then I’ll be back.”

“Stay here—with me.”

“Oh, Alison . . . I—I would love to. But I’m afraid.”

“Afraid of what—” Alison’s voice trembled, and she seemed on the verge of tears. Of . . . me?”

“No. Afraid . . . because everything I ever care for always turns into dust.”

“No, Derek. It doesn’t need to be that way.”

“And right now, I feel like I’d be a millstone round your neck. I can’t—I can’t hold you back.”

33 Chains of Love

ALISON PARKED HER BIKE on the footpath, chaining it to the Victorian-style, iron lace railings of the fence. In place of the pocket-handkerchief lawns of the other houses on the street was a lovingly tended jungle of color, complementing the burnt orange of the walls and bright yellow of the window frames. A path paved with yellowish bricks led from the gate to the front door.

She had been here before, many times. But this time. . . . She shook out her wind-blown hair and combed it with her fingers. She felt strangely exposed without her handbag with its brush and mirror, with nothing on her shoulder or her arm . . . while a tingle of excitement raced up her spine.

As she opened the gate she hesitated. Her hands fluttered as they reached for the handbag that wasn’t there . . . for what? She couldn’t be sure. Her teeth trembled against her lips as she brushed invisible creases from her dress.

One thought filled her mind: In a few days he’ll be leaving. . . . and she felt herself being pulled by a desire she couldn’t resist towards the front door.

Just moments after she rang the bell she heard steps and the door opened, yet in those fleeting seconds the tension of anticipation in her heart had swelled to become almost unbearable.

“Alison!”

Derek Olsson wore a ragged T-shirt and a pair of shorts, his feet bare, his hair untamed, his mouth open like a freeze-frame caught in mid-sentence. Yet his hazel-green eyes seemed strangely bright as they locked on hers, smiling in welcome, as if to let her know that she was not unexpected.

Alison took a step towards him. “Aren’t you going to invite me in?” she asked, her excitement catching in her throat.

“Do you think it wise? With the Traynors on holiday till next weekend?” Derek said softly, his eyes leaving her face to flash up and down the street.

Noticing his glance Alison laughed, the tension in her throat making her laugh sound more nervous than gay. “I know,” she said, taking another step so that mere centimeters separated them. “Since when have you cared what other people think?”

Derek seemed cemented to the doorway. One corner of his mouth twisted into half a smile, while his gaze became solemn. “I don’t care what other people think,” he said, “about me.”

“I don’t either.”

Alison raised her lips and let herself lean towards him, feeling as if she were falling. But as she kissed him she felt his arms gently enfolding her. She let her lips press closer, parting them as if to relieve the pressure. The tips of her nipples hardened as they thrust into his chest, sending an electric shock through her body. She could feel her heart racing and her body felt weak as Derek turned his head slightly, welcoming her tongue, and her arms went tightly around his neck, as if afraid to let go. Derek began to angle his lower torso away, but Alison clutched the small of his back to keep his excitement close. Unhurriedly, the almost invisible touch of his fingers ran slowly down her back, her body trembling at a tender force she had no desire or ability to resist. She felt herself being cocooned by the power of his hard muscles and pressed herself closer into the warmth of his embrace. The edge of her mind sparkled briefly at the slight hesitation of his fingers as they reached the bra strap that wasn’t there, but her consciousness was lost in his closeness, in the oneness of melding lips to lips and flesh to flesh, their breaths coming in a single rhythm.

As if by mutual agreement their lips parted. His eyes glowed with the warmth of fierce passion; as they searched her face she felt herself opening to him, like flower petals unfurling in the early morning sun, no longer afraid of what he might see but, rather, wanting him to see everything. And she saw his eyes glowing with an intense feeling of love that was almost impossible for him to bear, one that mirrored her own.

She smiled, feeling this must be what it meant to be blessed, and gently leant harder on his body, as if to signal to him that it was time they moved inside.

“Hold me tight,” Derek whispered. One arm gripped her hard around the waist; the other reached down, and she shrieked with surprise and delight as he swept her off her feet. She clung to his neck, letting her head fall back, laughing at her feeling of weightlessness, of the sense that at this moment she was completely at his mercy . . . and always had been. Derek carried her through the doorway, turned, one foot kicked out to nudge the door closed, as his mouth folded around her breast. Her arms hungrily pulled his head closer while her body arched and shook with pleasure so intense she was sure she was about to explode.

“Don’t stop,” she murmured inaudibly as Derek lifted his head, brushing his lips against her neck, her ears, her eyes, to stand erect, lifting her body higher as he did. She gripping him tighter, wanting to repeat her words but unable to find either breath or energy. Already feeling drained, exhausted, she let her head rest, nuzzling on his shoulder, breathing in his heady masculine scent. Her eyes were closed, but she was aware of his every step, his every movement, the tiny caress of his fingertips, and she let herself relax into the arms supporting her in the air. Only when she felt herself being laid on something soft, his grip loosening, did she allow her eyes to open.

It was a girl’s room; Traynor’s elder sister’s room before she was married. Frilly curtains lined the windows; the doona on the wide bed was edged with lace. A computer, piles of books, and scattered male clothes which didn’t belong and made no impression on the room were the only signs of a male presence. And over Derek’s shoulder she saw one picture. . . .

A large blow-up of a girl in a bikini caught at the beginning of a perfect swan dive dominated the wall opposite the bed. Alison knew the girl had just jumped from the springboard though no board was in sight; her arms spread like wings holding her in space, her body straight, her toes pointed and legs so close together she was a shapely mermaid floating on fluffy white clouds scattered across a sapphire sky.

Alison roughly pushed him away and stepped closer to the picture. As she studied the figure, her fists relaxed, the tension in her shoulders dissipated. She slowly turned around, her face a radiant smile, her cheeks flushed, to gaze warmly at Derek sitting on the edge of the bed, watching her with a knowing grin.

“That’s me! All this time you’ve had this here. . . .”

Derek inclined his head; Alison felt as though it was a salute.

“Did you take it?

Derek nodded.

“When? How? I had no idea. . . .”

“You didn’t notice me in the water with my camera,” he said, his eyes laughing. “You were too busy . . . making the perfect dive.”

She stood, feeling naked and defenceless as Derek sat on the edge of the bed, his eyes openly admiring her. Her eyes drank in his gaze, but the tingles on her skin where his eyes touched her body only made her yearn for his hands. The gap of a few steps suddenly yawned between them, and as she moved towards him he stood and they ran into each other’s arms.

“Do you know what a torture you’ve put me through . . . waiting . . . for you?” Derek asked, his lips on her ear.

“Oh, yes,” she said happily, at his open acknowledgment that he was hers to command. “But you didn’t have to wait.”

“But you felt it too, didn’t you.” He was not asking a question.

“Of course.” She pulled her head back to look at him; laughing. Reaching under his T-shirt, savoring the feeling of his skin on her hands, she demanded, “Am I still a mind without a body?”

Derek shook his head. “No. Now you’re a body without a mind.” As if to demonstrate, his fingers ran down her spine as he unzipped her dress, and she shivered as her skin lay exposed to the cool air.

“Really?” she whispered. “And where’s your mind gone?”

“It’s . . . a slave to your touch—” he said; his hands slipped under her dress and she gasped with unendurable pleasure in response “—as yours is to mine.”

As if in submission to her desire, she felt the fabric of her dress falling away; she gripped his warmth tighter, closer, kissing him hungrily. A faint fear began to form in the pit of her stomach; she clamped down on it but her skin crawled nevertheless at the cold memory of other hands, of other fingers, touching, invading her body.

She felt as though she was floating, with just the vague memory of being lifted again and laid on the soft mattress, lost in the electric sensations of his fingers and lips and tongue as they touched and kissed her neck, her shoulders, her breasts, even her knees and toes, and the insides of her legs. As his mouth moved between her legs she felt her body arch; shuddering, she pushed his head down harder. This, came the fleeting, irreverent thought, must be what it feels like to be in heaven.

His lips inched across her skin back to hers. She opened her eyes and smiled into his as their lips and bodies kissed. She opened her legs to welcome him, her hands gripping his thighs, her arms clutching him tighter. But as he moved to enter her, the pressure of his body seemed to turn into a leaden weight expelling the air from her lungs. She felt as though she couldn’t breathe, and the small knot in her stomach turned into the panic of terror as her nightmare, now feeling real, filled her mind. Her eyes now unseeing, the knowledge of where she was and who she was with fled from her consciousness as she felt she’d gone back in time; every muscle in her body froze rigid in shock, her vaginal muscles becoming a steel wall. Her body turned into a lever pushing him away, throwing him to one side of the bed.

Her knees curled, her shoulders hunched, her muscles turning into rubber with relief as quickly as they had frozen into ice to insulate and protect her from an invader.

She focused back into the present and for half a heartbeat she looked uncomprehendingly at the person beside her, then burst into tears. “I’m sorry, Derek,” her voice frightened, sorrowful. “I can’t.” She shivered on the bed, her eyes pleading, sobbing mindlessly. “I want to but I can’t,” she said through a rush of tears.

He moved to cradle her head in his hands, to gently kiss her eyes and cheeks. But with a swift, sudden movement she jerked back from his touch, reached for the duvet and tucked it protectively around herself so that just her head remained exposed. “No,” she cried through her tears, burrowing her face into the duvet. “No.”

“But . . . I love you, Alison,” Derek wailed. “I love you.”

Alison shook head slowly. “You . . . can’t,” she whispered, so softly that he couldn’t hear her words. Struggling to make the muscles in her legs obey, she stood, swaying slightly, hugging the duvet around her shaking body, stumbling to pick up her dress from the floor. Holding the dress in one hand, she fumbled until she realized she couldn’t put it on while holding the duvet protectively in place, and began to walk to the bathroom to change.

“Alison. . . .” Derek’s voice entreated her, begged her to stop, to listen.

At the doorway she turned to look towards him, unable to lift her eyes from the floor. “I . . . have to go,” she said quietly. Derek began to speak but Alison forced her eyes to look at his, pleading, “No. Don’t say a thing. Don’t . . . make it any . . . harder.”

Wordlessly, he waited until she emerged from the bathroom, her face pale but clear, her eyes still red, and followed her to the front door where he stood, frozen, watching the lengthening shadows through sad eyes long after she had ridden away.

*****

“THERE’S A NOTE FOR you, Alison.”

Maggie stood in the doorway to her bedroom holding a small envelope. Alison was lying listlessly on the bed, and made no move to take it. Maggie had the impression she’d been gazing at the picture of Derek Olsson on the shelf above her desk. “He’s waiting outside for your answer,” she said softly.

“Just tell him—” she stopped to choke back tears “—just tell him ‘no,’ please, Mum. Whatever it is. . . .” She shook her head.

Maggie sighed and sat down on the bed beside her daughter. She’d expected to see her daughter return from her tryst with Derek Olsson looking bubbly, radiant, and glowing. But she’d returned timid and fearful, as though she was in a state of shock. For two whole days, there’d been no sign of her sparkling eyes or her relentless energy, and she’d spoken no words more significant than “pass the salt, please.” Derek had called—often—and she’d simply refused to speak to him.

“Alison,” Maggie asked awkwardly, “did he . . . do something to . . . hurt you the other day?”

“No, Mum.”

“Then . . . I don’t understand.”

“I did something that hurt him,” Alison said, her eyes glistening. And me.

As Maggie had done when Alison was a child and in pain, she took Alison’s hand in hers, only to be surprised at the way Alison clutched it, as if in desperation. She slowly nodded, even though she couldn’t make sense of Alison’s reply, and asked, “Would he forgive you?”

Alison nodded numbly. “He already has.”

“And he’s going away . . . ?”

“Tomorrow.”

“Then—” Maggie looked at Alison for a long moment, gently stroking her forehead. “Alison, I really can’t imagine what’s going on between the two of you. But you’ve been moping around for two days like—even worse than—”

She couldn’t bring herself to say the words “after you were raped,” but Alison nodded, as if she had heard them. “I know, Mum,” she said softly.

“—and I’m not going to ask you to explain a thing. But let me ask you just one question: Do you love him?”

Alison gasped, replying in a low, solemn voice, “Yes, Mum, I do. Very much.”

“And he loves you.”

“He does?” Alison said. How can he? she thought. “How do you know?” she asked.

Maggie face lit up as she beamed at her daughter. “My darling daughter,” she chuckled, “you must be the only person who can’t see it. And no, he hasn’t told me—not in so many words.”

“What do you mean by that?”

Maggie chuckled again. “You’d better ask him.”

Alison turned her head away, murmuring, “I can’t . . . face him.”

Maggie gave no indication of whether she’d heard Alison’s words or not. “If you love him, and he loves you, why aren’t you together? The poor boy’s beside himself, you know—he looks like he’s hardly slept for the past two days. Why don’t you at least go and talk to him?”

Alison shook her head. “I—can’t, Mum. I just can’t.”

“He’s leaving tomorrow, so don’t you at least owe it to yourself to read what he has to say?” Maggie asked, tearing the envelope open and handing it to her.

Alison held the envelope gingerly, as if it was about to explode.

“Go on,” Maggie urged. “It won’t bite you, will it?”

Slowly, awkwardly, her fingers all feeling like thumbs, Alison pulled Derek’s note from its envelope. As she read, she could hear the pleading tone of his words:

Dearest Alison: I MUST see you before I go. Please please please. I love you. I love you. Derek.

Looking away to hide her tears, Alison let the note fall. Maggie couldn’t bring herself to pick it up, but by turning her head she could make out Derek’s words. Measuring her pace, she said softly, almost as if she was talking to herself, “You know, I expected to see you so unbelievably happy when you came back from seeing him the other day—”

Alison turned her head, her eyes narrowing. “What do you mean by that?” she demanded.

Maggie just smiled. “Do you think I didn’t know what you intended to do—”

“But how could you know?”

“I was seventeen once,” Maggie said grinning, “and I can remember what it felt to be seventeen and in love. And then . . . there was what you were wearing . . . and not wearing . . . when you left to visit him.”

Alison gasped, looking at her mother in amazement. “So why didn’t you stop me?”

“Could I have stopped you?”

To Maggie’s relief, Alison laughed, shaking her head.

“But I wouldn’t have stopped you, even if I could have.”

“You mean . . . you approve?”

“Not really,” said Maggie. “But your happiness comes first.”

“Oh, Mama,” Alison said, sitting up on the bed to hug her. Suddenly making up her mind, she said, “Okay, Mum. Would you ask him to wait while I get ready?”

“Of course I will,” Maggie said. And with the look of a girlish co-conspirator she added, “And tonight, if you’re late getting back, I won’t stay up waiting for you.”

“But . . . ?” Alison’s mouth formed an “O.” Her eyes widened, and she looked at her mother as if she couldn’t be meaning what she’d just said. “What will Dad say?”

Maggie’s look was strangely calculating. “He’ll never know.”

“How—?”

“Leave it to me, okay? Just promise me one thing: take care.”

Alison nodded gravely. “Yes, Mum. I will.”

“I’M SORRY, DEREK,” ALISON said as she closed the front door behind her.

“It’s okay,” he said. “You’re here now. That’s all that matters.”

Derek seemed to grow an inch or two taller when he saw her coming towards him, his face lighting up, his eyes and mouth smiling in delight. But he stood awkwardly, restraining his hands and arms from reaching out to her. So Alison stepped close to him and, looking up into his eyes, said, “I love you, Derek. Very much.”

His face blazed as if warmed by an inner glow, and his arms wrapped around her, gently but firmly pulling her close against his body. He smiled at her wonderingly, his eyes suddenly glistening, and she sank gratefully into the soothing warmth and strength of his embrace.

“So what is your pleasure, my lady?” he asked, whispering in her ear. “Dinner? Coffee? What would you like?”

Alison tilted her head back to look at him. “Surprise me,” she said, laughing as she snuggled closer to him and kissed him hard.

He took her hand and led her onto the footpath, opening the door of the MG for her with a flourish. She had the sense that he couldn’t quite believe she was really there, or that he was afraid she might disappear, or break like fine porcelain. “Hungry?” he asked as he jumped into the driver’s seat.

“Starving,” she replied as her stomach reminded her how little she had eaten over the past two days.

“SOMETHING SMELLS REALLY GOOD,” Alison said as they came into the dining room of the Traynors’ house. “Nothing too complicated,” Derek said, going to the stove in the open kitchen. Alison stood at the other side of the counter, eyeing the two places set opposite each other on the long dining table covered with a crisp white tablecloth. Two unlit candles stood in the center.

“That looks like the Traynors’ best silver,” Alison said. “Are you sure it’s okay to use it?”

“Yes—but only for special occasions.”

Alison felt herself glowing at his compliment and turned away to hide her embarrassment at being so openly happy—and her disbelief that such happiness was possible. But as she looked at the table settings again and turned to see Derek stirring a pot on the stove while water heated in another, her smile faded. Frowning at him through narrowed eyes she said, “I feel like I’ve been set up.”

“Huh?” Derek said, looking up in surprise.

“You and Mum—you’ve been conspiring together. Haven’t you?”

“No—well . . . not exactly.”

“What do you mean? You’d better explain yourself.”

Measuring his movements, Derek turned down the heat on the stove, placed the ladle carefully on its rest, put the lid back on the pot, took two wine glasses from the rack and carried them across the to counter, setting one in front of Alison. She noticed her fingers were drumming on the countertop and she forcibly stilled her hand.

“I hoped,” he said, opening a bottle of red wine and half-filling the two glasses. “I called three times this morning, you know.” Alison dropped her eyes in acknowledgement. “Maggie suggested I write a note and said she’d see what she could do. ‘But I can’t promise anything,’ she said. That’s all.”

“So she’s on your side, is she?”

“You know better than that, Alison. The one she most cares about is you.”

“That’s true,” Alison muttered, taking a long sip of wine, aware of the growing warmth in her cheeks. She’d always taken her parents’ affection for granted. But now, remembering the impact of her mother’s words, and intensely conscious of the way Derek was looking at her, she wondered why the almost overwhelming sense of being loved should make her feel awkward and embarrassed.

She lifted her eyes slowly, a flicker of excitement and a flutter of nervousness taking hold of her stomach in a bizarre chorus as her gaze reached his face. “Mum said she knew that you loved me,” she said, breathing softly. “But how did she know?”

Derek chuckled. “Maggie has known—or suspected—for a long time. From the way we look at each other whenever she sees us together, from the questions she asked me when I came to dinner.”

“But . . . Dad was the one always grilling you. I don’t remember Mum asking you any questions.”

“Ah . . . that’s because she’d ask them when you’d gone to the bathroom or something, and Joe was watching TV.”

“What did she ask?”

“Oh . . . things like ‘What do you think is most admirable about Alison?’”

“And how did you answer?”

“Your powerful spirit—and your perceptive mind. And the way, once you’ve made your mind up to do something, you become an irresistible force. Getting in your way then is like standing in front of an express train.”

“You really think so?”

“Oh, yes,” he said, his eyes twinkling, lifting his glass to clink against hers.

AS HE CARRIED A salad and two bowls of spaghetti, he saw Alison moving the table settings. “Didn’t I set it properly?” he asked.

“No,” she said with mock disapproval. “You put us too far apart.” She had moved one of the place settings to the head of the table, next to the other instead of opposite.

He nodded. “You’re right.”

She felt giddy as Derek held her chair with a flourish; sitting next to him seemed to make her even more lightheaded, as though she were connected to the world only through the overwhelming brilliance of his two soft eyes, the faint, fluttering light of the two candles, and the aroma and taste of the meal he had prepared so lovingly . . . for her. Now and then she had to reach out to touch him as if to reassure herself she wasn’t dreaming.

“This is great,” she said through a mouthful of spaghetti. “Let me guess. You ordered from Giovanni’s.” She named a popular Italian restaurant nearby.

“They don’t deliver.”

“It was . . . in the freezer.”

“Nope.”

“You made it?” He nodded. “And I didn’t even know you could cook. How can you—?”

He untangled her maths, built cars, beat her at tennis, made her look at the world differently—and cooked like a gourmet chef. Whatever he turned his mind to, it seemed, he did expertly and effortlessly while whatever she’d achieved had taken struggle, practice, endless toil, and buckets of sweat.

“What is it, Alison?” His fingers were locked with hers, his voice was warm with concern—and the way he was looking at her now, the way he always looked at her . . . how can I doubt him?

“It’s just that . . . everything seems to come to you so naturally, so effortlessly, that now and then I just feel inadequate.”

“It’s hard for me to imagine that you’d ever feel like that. When it comes to determination, who can hold a candle to you? No one. When you decide to do something, you set out to be the best—and you succeed. When you want something, Alison, you’re unstoppable—and I’m in awe of you. And—because I always feel like I’m leaning on you for your strength.”

“You do?”

“You see,” he said with delight, “you don’t even notice it.”

She was suddenly aware of their differences with a strange clarity. Despite his protestations, he was smarter and more talented, able, it seemed, to learn and do anything—and do it superbly. But it was she who had a direction, a purpose, while he was aimless. His decision to leave, she realized, was an admission of that, and at the same time the hope that he might find a path, a reason . . . a mission. Without that, all the intelligence and ability in the world was essentially meaningless.

Feeling calmer, more able to accept that tomorrow he would be gone, she reached out to clasp his hand and, keeping her thoughts to herself, simply said, “Have I really been your pillar of strength?”

“Yes,” he said, leaning across the table to kiss her. “Just don’t try and carry all the burdens of the world,” he whispered. “Nobody is that strong. Not even you.”

THEY TOOK THEIR WINEGLASSES to the verandah at the back. They snuggled on the soft cushions of the wide wicker lounge, gazing at the buildings of the city of Sydney strung out across the water as the sun’s last rays faded. Now, the only illumination came from the windows behind them and from the moon when it peeked through scattered clouds.

The verandah—open to the view beyond, yet cocooned by vine-covered trellises of luxuriant green, the faint, sweet perfume of the last hibiscuses and frangipanis hanging in the air—felt like a private arbor in the sky, as though they were floating unseen over the city beyond, absorbed in the sense of each other’s presence.

“I love you, Derek,” Alison sighed. “And I want you with me always.”

His eyes glistened. “That’s what I want, more than anything.”

“Then never leave me.”

“I’m not leaving you. It’s something I need to do—”

“But couldn’t you do it here? I’ll miss you so much.”

“Maybe,” he conceded. “I just don’t know. But . . . you know where you want to go, and where you want to be—and I just can’t follow you there. You know I love you, and I know you love me—but if you bind me with chains of love they’ll just end up choking both of us.”

“But—”

“—if I insisted you came with me, demanded that you gave up the idea of Canberra and politics and changing the world, would you drop everything and come?”

“Yes.”

“And would you be happy?”

Alison was silent for a long time. “No,” she said softly, shaking her head, the lights of the city beyond blurred by her curtain of tears.

“I’ll be back in a few months—even with odd jobs, I doubt my money will last much longer than that.”

“And if it does?”

“Then . . . we could have Christmas together in London. Or New York.”

“Yes . . . ” she said doubtfully. “London. I want to see the Houses of Parliament. And Washington. Congress.”

“You just have a one-track mind.”

“I guess . . . sometimes I do,” she said, smiling to herself, thinking of express trains . . . and of Derek standing in front of one.

She gently pried his glass from his hand, placing it on the end table beside hers. He raised his lips in the expectation of a kiss, but she threw him roughly across the cushions. Her weight on his thighs pinned him to the wicker lounge, which creaked with the rhythm of her motion.

“What are you doing?” he asked in surprise, though she was all too aware that he had made no move to resist her—that his only movements guided and stabilized hers.

“I’m taking my revenge.”

He smiled in understanding, and she leaned down to kiss him roughly on the lips. He struggled weakly to bring up his arms to embrace her; she growled, “Just lie back and think of England.”

“I guess I have no choice.”

“That’s right. None at all,” she replied, knowing that was true, while knowing at the same time that with a flick of his body he could turn the tables and pin her helplessly to the floor below.

He made no movement as she yanked his jeans and underpants down to his knees, hobbling him. She stared at his upright penis, mesmerized and fascinated but not without a sense of trepidation. But the knot in her stomach was now just a diffuse edginess. Gingerly, she reached out to touch it and with a deep breath held him tightly, smiling to herself as he shuddered and groaned.

She tore off her jeans and slowly lowered herself onto him, waiting for the reaction . . . daring it to come. But all she felt was the tension of her muscles gripping him as she welcomed him inside her. Almost instantly she was rocked by an explosion and then another as his warmth spread inside her.

She collapsed onto him, releasing his arms which instantly wrapped around her. They both shuddered again and again as if from the aftershocks of a massive earthquake. They looked into each other’s eyes, the only sound their gasping breaths. No words were needed for her to know beyond doubt that she was enfolded with his love.

“HAVE YOU HAD ENOUGH REVENGE?” he asked.

Time seemed to stop before she could find the energy to form a reply, and the control over her muscles to utter it. “Never,” she said weakly.

“So how long are you going to keep me shackled like this?”

“Always,” she whispered.

When he just grinned at her happily, she commanded him, “Kiss me again.”

“Where?”

“Everywhere.”

ACROSS THE WATER, THE city had gone to sleep. Alison let her hand stroke his chest, feeling his goose bumps and suddenly aware of her own . . . and the chill of the cool night breeze. With one hand she reached down to pick up her clothes; with the other she clutched his hand and pulled him to his feet.

“It’s late,” he said, embracing her, all too aware of her naked body against his. “I’ll take you home.”

Alison laughed. “I’m not going home tonight—if you’ll let me borrow your toothbrush.”

“That, and anything else you want. But your parents? What will they think? And won’t you be in hot water—”

She stopped his flow of words by pressing her lips to his mouth and clasping him tightly. “It’s all taken care of,” she said at last. “It won’t be a problem.”

“Really? Joe will hit the roof.”

Alison laughed. “I was right. I have been set up—it was a conspiracy, masterminded by my mother, God bless her.”

“What do you mean?”

Alison laughed again. “Never mind . . . you can ask her yourself one day. Come on.” She stepped out of his embrace and pulled his hand. “I need some more warmth. . . . And one other thing.”

“What’s that?”

“You can sleep on the plane.”

WHEN THEY FINALLY STOOD in the airport’s departure lounge, Alison couldn’t hold back her tears nor Derek his.

“It won’t be so long and I’ll be back.”

“Derek, I’m afraid. . . .”

“Afraid?”

“Afraid I’ll never see you again.”

“You will, I promise. We’ll write, and I’ll call you whenever I can.”

“It won’t be the same. . . .”

“And remember, Christmas in London—or New York.”

“Maybe,” she breathed, nodding but not fully believing.

ALISON STOOD WATCHING THE doorway to immigration where Derek had disappeared at the last possible minute. After a long time she stumbled, her vision blurred, to get the bus home, hearing planes taking off, wishing desperately she was on one—the one—right now.

34 Hacker for Hire

CARNAGE! WAS ONE OF the less-venomous banner headlines, as Friday morning’s papers reported that four Australian soldiers had been killed in the Sandemans, three of them by a suicide bomber—or kamikaze attack, in Major-General Thierry’s words—and seven more wounded.

The headlines were more or less what Alison had expected, and, although she wasn’t surprised, she was once again overcome by the anguish she’d felt when she’d first heard the news. As she did whenever she thought of the Sandemans—which, these days was far too often—she worried for Jeremy, wondering how much longer he’d be safely away from danger. Not that she’d know if he was in any danger until it was too late; not that there was anything she could do about it. And she grieved for the dead soldiers—and their wives, girlfriends, parents, friends, and cousins . . . and the poor people whose job it was to tell them the awful news. Thank God I’m not one of them.

And how, she asked herself, am I going to face my father tomorrow? And also tomorrow: McKurn.

“BE WITH YOU IN a minute,” Anthony Royn said as she came into his office, without even looking up, so missing Alison’s sour expression.

He was engrossed in something in a newspaper which caused him to alternately, growl, smile, grimace, chuckle, and pause briefly in puzzlement. Alison composed herself as she waited, suppressing a smile as she noticed what he was reading.

Nice Guys
Finish Last?

By Karla Preston

OlssonPress Syndicate Exclusive

Thursday: Canberra

It’s easy to appreciate why Anthony Royn has become so popular. Just to begin with, shaking hands with him is an orgasmic experience. And then there’s the way he looks at you and listens as if you’re the only important person in the world. Yet, when he’s talking to someone else you don’t feel excluded.

(I’d love to know how he does it. If he could bottle it, he’d be rich. Or should I say, in his case . . . richer.)

And we don’t need to mention his movie-star looks.

Anthony Royn is a really nice guy. That’s great for winning votes. But does he have what it takes—the steel, the mettle, the ruthlessness a politician needs to get to the top—and stay there?

In politics, don’t nice guys finish last?

It’s no secret that Anthony Royn and Paul Cracken are the two main contenders for the post-Kydd Conservative leadership, and they’re circling the Conservative party room waiting to butt it out like a pair of randy young goats when the cantankerous old one keels over. Well . . . Cracken is. What’s Royn been up to? Aside from securing the support of Conservative Members from marginal constituencies by taking polls which regularly show a whole bunch of them would lose their seats with Cracken as leader, not a whole lot.

It’s also no secret that Royn is Kydd’s favorite, and no one in Canberra believes Royn would be where he is today if Kydd hadn’t pulled him up there. But one reason the wily old Kydd has held onto the prime minister’s office for so long is that any potential challenger is offered a plum job like Ambassador to France, sidelined, or finds that his local party branches have mysteriously switched their support to some brash neophyte come preselection time. One can only conclude that the only reason Royn isn’t enjoying long lunches at Maxim’s de Paris is because Kydd sees him more as a lapdog than a bull terrier.

Cracken, by comparison, is a poor-boy-made-good—something he never lets anyone forget—and levered himself up through the ranks with his own elbows (with the odd push from Senator McKurn, not something anyone wants to shout from the rooftops these days). He’s certainly “got what it takes” in spades, and would grab Kydd by the throat yesterday—if he had the numbers, which he doesn’t. But with the personality of a decomposing rattlesnake and the sex appeal of a decrepit Mafioso chieftain, the wonder of it is that Cracken’s even a member of parliament, let alone in the race for the next leader.

So the nice guy may finish first after all. That appears to be the consensus view in the Conservative party room: they’ll go for the charming vote-winner, even though he may be all show and no substance, if only so they can turn their backs (carefully) on the guy you’d hate to have as a neighbor who needs a decade or two in charm school to convince his fellow party members he’s not going to lead them straight to the opposition benches.

Of course, this speculation is really all academic. I expect to be an old maid long before Randolph Kydd walks away from the leadership of his own free will—and who knows who’ll be hanging around in the Conservative Party waiting room by then?

“Decomposing rattlesnake,” Royn chuckled as he looked up to face Alison. “And the sex appeal of. . . .”

“Yes,” said Alison, “I read it too.”

“I’ll bet Paul’s in a bad mood this morning,” Royn smirked, clearly relishing the thought.

“I’m surprised you like backhanded compliments,” Alison said.

“Back-handed . . . ? Oh, right, I see what you mean. She sure knows how to twist the knife in exactly the right spot.”

“Thankfully, she’s not saying anything that’s particularly new,” Alison said. “To us, anyway: it’s simply what our polling has shown.”

“You mean . . . decisiveness and so on.”

“That’s right,” Alison nodded. “One of the few metrics where Cracken comes out ahead. But the way she says it—”

“That I ‘haven’t got what it takes’? Is that what you mean?”

“That—plus her whole tone is so disparaging of you—and of Cracken, for that matter—that I don’t think her article will do you any good whatsoever.”

“Maybe not,” Royn shrugged, his eyes twinkling. “But my kids—when they were kids—had a plastic snake. I think I’ll give it to Paul.”

“And give him another reason to be angry with you? Wouldn’t it be better to commiserate with him?”

“He’d die of shock,” Royn laughed. “Worth a try, though.”

“Can we turn to business, Minister?”

“Yes, of course,” Royn said, becoming serious without quite fully succeeding.

“Defence says they’re moving in force into St. Christopher’s Island with the aim of clearing out all the rebel groups.

“Which will mean more casualties.”

“Inevitably. Let’s hope it’s worth it,” Alison said, wondering if any casualties could be justified, even by success. “There’s a meeting of the National Security Committee at eleven thirty where you’ll be briefed.”

“What else?”

“I’ve wangled for the Auditor-General’s office—both Commonwealth and state—to take a quiet look at the stationery contract. But God knows when they’ll get to it. And Leon Price has admitted he and McKurn were ‘bagmen’ for the Premier and other higher-ups in the in the NSW government back in the seventies. He and Price collected wads of cash each week from policemen, contractors, kickbacks from businesses and so on, and distributed it to various politicians and bureaucrats. He’s identified almost two dozen people by name so far.”

“That’s great,” said Royn. “If just one of them talks—”

“But Jason says—”

“Jason? Who’s he?” Royn asked.

“My Federal Police contact. He says that the police need something at least semi-official—a signed deposition, for example—before they’re likely to act. And that it would be better if Price was interviewed by the police—which would give his evidence a lot more weight.”

“So, why don’t they?”

“Time, and other priorities. This was all twenty and thirty years ago, so they don’t see any urgency. Jason says he’ll arrange to interview Price after he’s signed something, so all he needs to do is get direct confirmation.”

“But the private eye will follow up on the people Price named, I trust.”

“Yes. But we’ve stretched their resources pretty thin.”

“Cheer up, Alison. We’ll get there.”

“I know,” Alison said wearily. But not soon enough.

*****

DEREK OLSSON TRANSITED SINGAPORE and passed through immigration and customs in Bangkok without a hitch. After freshening up in a modest hotel on Soi 7 off Sukhumvit, Olsson bought a SIM card and, back in his hotel room, dialled a number.

“Sawadee-krap,” he said when the phone answered. And continuing in Thai, “General Vanich? Derek Olsson. . . . Yes, thank you. . . . An early lunch would be fine. . . . Noon? I’ll see you there.”

Later, he decrypted an email which he read with mounting excitement:

lars olsson has two bank accounts that i can trace. four weeks ago $20,000 was deposited in one account and $10,000 in the other. prior to those deposits the balances were $11,273.27 and $36,833.45 respectively. two weeks ago $35,000 was withdrawn from the two accounts by cheques payable to a real estate agent

anything else you want to know?

“The bastard,” Derek Olsson said to himself as he typed a reply:

Please trace the source of the two payments if at all possible. Pull out all the stops.

“He took a payoff to set me up. Well, Lars, I guess I’ll be seeing you again when I get back.”

IF I get back.

*****

ALISON HAD DECIDED TO postpone facing her father by staying in Canberra overnight and flying to Sydney on Saturday morning. Pity I can’t put McKurn off the same way.

When she reached home she fixed herself a salad and trolled through the phone taps until she found one that sounded intriguing.

“Henry.”

That, she knew, was McKurn’s voice.

“Frankie! What an unpleasant surprise.”

“Henry’s” voice, though obviously male, was high-pitched and squeaky—and very familiar. After a moment, she realized that McKurn was talking to Henry Sykes.

“My name is Frank, goddamn it.”

“More and more people are calling you ‘Frankie’ these days, you know . . . Frankie.”

“Well, bugger them all.”

“So tell me, Frankie, to what do I owe this honor?”

“I’m calling to ask you to stop publishing these corruption exposés.”

“Now, why on earth would I want to do that? They’re great circulation builders.”

“I could say that they’re having a destabilizing influence, bringing into question the integrity of the government and our political institutions—”

“Don’t make me laugh, Frankie. The only reason you’re calling me is that you have a personal stake in this.”

“Think what the hell you like. And as a matter of interest, who’s this prominent federal politician whose mug, your ads are promising, will be splashed across the front pages on Sunday?”

“It’s not you, Frankie, I can tell you that much. Though maybe your name will appear later in the series.”

“You mean there’s more?”

“There’s certainly another week’s worth after Sunday. For all I know, though, they might have an unlimited supply.”

“Make Sunday the last one, then.”

“Why the hell should I do that, Frankie?”

“Consider it an investment in your health and longevity.”

“Threatening me, are you? Now that would make a good headline in tomorrow’s Mercury, don’t you think?”

“You wouldn’t dare.”

“Wouldn’t I just? You realize, Frankie, that you’ve become a lost cause.”

“And what the hell do you mean by that?”

“Simple. From what I hear from my Conservative Party mates, you’ve got a better chance of getting to heaven than you do of being on the Party’s Senate ticket at the next election. Your days are numbered, Frankie my dear.”

“So if you’re not in the mood right now to consider my very reasonable request? Why don’t I give you twenty-four hours to think it over.”

“I don’t need twenty-four hours, Frankie. I don’t even need twenty-four seconds. Let me put it this way: if anything happens to me, whether you’re behind it or not, the gist of this phone call will be blasted across the next day’s Mercury. And, of course, the police will get a copy.”

“You recorded this? You fucking arsehole. After all I’ve done for you. . . .”

Henry laughed. “I can’t think of anything you’ve done for me, Frankie. Only to me. It’s payback time. How do you like it?”

All Alison heard, by way of McKurn’s answer, was a click as he ended the call.

So whatever might happen to Derek’s papers—had he acted on her warning? And been able to stop whatever McKurn and French planned?—the Sykes’ papers would hit the streets on Sunday, and next week, as scheduled.

“Good for him,” she mumbled. “More people ought to stand up to McKurn. . . .”

Like me.

Angrily, she thrust McKurn from her thoughts and spent another hour going through the rest of the recordings.

But there was nothing else.

Hoping for a break in the Aphrodite case, she called Jason—but his mobile phone was off. After injecting calm into her voice, she left him a message, and then wondered what she could do next. Her eyes stopped at the liquor cabinet—and moved on. I need a clear head, she decided, and sleep. I need sleep.

About to close her laptop, she noticed a reminder from the Victims’ Self-Defence League. Their annual conference was this coming weekend in Sydney. She was to give the closing address on Sunday afternoon. It had been in her schedule for nearly a year. And it wasn’t that she’d forgotten about it; she’d just had too many other things on her mind for the past few weeks to give it any thought.

“How can I do it now?” she moaned—the day after her “date” with McKurn. But she knew she had no choice: Alison was the keynote speaker—as the League’s Founder. . . .

A few months after she’d begun giving talks at high schools around Sydney, Alison became a regular on several talkback radio shows, was interviewed on TV and by the press, and was even written up in one of the leading women’s magazines. Her example proved to be an inspiration, and it wasn’t long before other people were giving similar talks at high schools and universities all over the country.

They all came together in a loose federation which was eventually formalized as the Victims’ Self-Defence League with Alison, almost against her will, acclaimed as its founder—and its first president.

By then, Alison’s nightmare was coming more often, and with added power: continually talking about her experience kept her memory of her rape fresh. So she stepped slowly into the background, and eventually resigned altogether.

“Founder” was not a title she ever claimed herself: it had been given to her by others. The idea had been hers—or, perhaps, it was really Derek’s. Others had pushed for and actually set up the organization but she knew that hers was the inspiration and the passion that led to its creation.

Turning her back on the League was unthinkable. . . . Yet, already feeling drained, she wondered if by Sunday there’d be any shred of her passion left for her to find.

Even before she crawled under the blankets she could feel her nightmare lurking in the darkness of her subconscious . . . but instead of the familiar feeling of terror and helplessness she could sense the dread and foreboding that her nightmare was about to become reality. She resisted sleep until, exhausted, she seemed to crumple into unconscious, so tired that her sleep, while restless, was also, mercifully, dreamless.

*****

THEY’D GIVEN KUNG CHEE-WAH his last injection early in the morning, and then let him dry out. He’d been given neither food nor water since the previous evening. If he’d become addicted in the short time he’d been drugged, he’d now be desperate. If not . . . now they had no choice: they’d been instructed to get that night’s flight to Bangkok.

“It’s time,” said de Brouw, standing up.

Nazarov and Shultz followed him into the room where their prisoner was held. Kung was a slightly built man, but after being assaulted by their previous Dragon gang prisoner, Kung was so securely tied down he could hardly move.

“W-water,” Kung said weakly. His face was pale, his cheeks gaunt, and his eyes ignored the needle de Brouw carried to fix on the bottle Nazarov held in his hand.

“Sure,” said Nazarov, sitting on the edge of the bed. He made a show of opening the bottle of water, holding Kung’s head up so he could drink, and bringing the bottle close to his lips. As Kung’s lips reached greedily for the mouth of the bottle, Nazarov let a little water splash on this chin, pulled the bottle away and let Kung’s head fall back to the bed.

“Just one thing, my friend,” he said. “You still haven’t answered my question: What did you do with Jessica Olsson?”

Kung ran his tongue around his lips, reaching for any drops of water within range. Nazarov held the bottle above his head and emptied it over Kung’s chest.

“Jessica Olsson . . . ?” he said.

Kung said nothing and Shultz handed Nazarov another bottle of water. Nazarov looked at Kung and drank half the water in the bottle himself.

Kung’s mouth hung open, his eyes pleading. He seemed to be trying to speak, and after a couple of grunts he said, “B—. B—.”

“What was that?”

Kung shook his head violently, fear now written on his face.

“Talk to me,” Nazarov said, waving the open bottle near his face.

When Kung said nothing, Nazarov nodded to de Brouw. “No,” Kung screamed, doing his best to struggle away from de Brouw as he brought the needle closer.

“So you can talk . . . just answer my question,” said Nazarov, “and you can have all the water you want.”

Kung looked from de Brouw to Nazarov and back. With a small shake of his head he seemed to shrink, his body going limp, his eyes turning to stare blankly at the ceiling in resignation.

Nazarov shrugged. Kung was so tightly tied his struggles in no way hindered de Brouw from thrusting the needle into a vein.

“Last chance,” said Nazarov.

Kung tiredly turned to look vacantly towards Nazarov, and then turned his gaze back to the ceiling.

“Okay,” Nazarov said, and de Brouw pushed the plunger home.

“What do you think he was about to say?” Nazarov asked in the corridor as Shultz closed the door and locked Kung in the room.

“Some place beginning with B,” said de Brouw.

“Bangkok being the obvious candidate,” said Shultz.

“I agree,” said Nazarov, “though it could be Brisbane.”

“That wouldn’t make any sense,” de Brouw said. “But Balmain would.”

“Or Boondocks,” Shultz chuckled.

They all laughed. “I’ll tell the Man,” said Nazarov, “and let him worry about it.”

They spent the next hour packing everything they’d brought into the SUV, parked in the enclosed garage, carefully wiping every surface to remove any fingerprints or other signs of their presence. By the time they’d finished, Kung was unconscious and de Brouw injected him twice more with a heroin-crack cocktail. He then wrapped Kung’s fingers around the syringe and let it fall to the floor. They removed the ropes and chains so it would now look as if Kung had died from a self-inflicted overdose.

Once in the SUV, they removed the surgical gloves they’d been wearing and, as they drove away, de Brouw announced, “Three hours to flight time.”

“No worries, mate,” Shultz drawled, in a poor imitation of an Australian accent.

*****

GOTTLIEB ALTEN THOUGHT OF himself as a ferret who dug out information thought, by its owners, to be securely protected. Like a ferret, he was thin, so scrawny in fact that you wondered if he had any muscles at all. He looked like a pale, wimpy schoolboy; a wallflower whose proper place was on the shelf—or, where he was happiest, behind a computer. “You can get everything you want on the internet these days, ’cept pizza,” he once said. “What about girls?” “Plenty of them on the internet too. But okay, sure, like pizza, sometimes I’ll order room service.”

On a dare, Alten hacked into CIA, U.S. Department of Defense, and MI5 computer systems; just for fun, he altered the university records to give the Vice-Chancellor’s dog a Ph.D. in nuclear medicine. As computer security improved, he skulked around the city’s wireless networks with his laptop so he could get into networks that were tough to break—without a password. “It’s amazing,” he once told a fellow hacker. “Companies spend a fortune on network security—and then hand out passwords to every Tom, Dickhead, and Blondebrain,” who, unknowingly, passed them onto Alten. Initially, he did it just for fun, but it didn’t take him long to find there was a ready market for such passwords.

His future path was clear.

For a short time, Gottlieb Alten worked as an analyst for a prestigious investment management outfit. By poring through old records, newspapers, documents, and accounts he’d reconstruct information a company thought was lost forever. He could pull apart financial statements to reveal embarrassing facts and long-hidden skeletons the company’s management itself couldn’t even remember. And, by hacking into their computers, unearth information the company didn’t want anyone else to know. In the course of his work he’d be invited to boardrooms and CEO’s offices where—unbeknownst to both his employers and his hosts—he’d plant bugs so that, later, he could listen in on what the management was sure were private conversations.

Alten’s employers put his seemingly magical insight into companies’ next moves to very profitable use. They once loaded up on an obscure mining stock at around fifteen cents a share—just days before it announced the discovery of a major nickel deposit. They sold their stake a few days later at $2.50. Another time, Alten’s boardroom bugs gave him early warning that a major industrial company was about to announce a massive increase in profits. The company’s stock price jumped after the announcement—and Alten’s employers banked profits of twenty percent in just over a week.

The regulators became suspicious and investigated. But they could never pinpoint any connection between Alten’s employers and anyone who was in a position to pass on inside information.

Gottlieb Alten was the connection.

And although that connection was never discovered, after only ten months at the firm Alten quit: he realized the information he could unveil was worth far, far more than the handsome salary and bonuses he was being paid.

In just another ten months, Alten was independently wealthy and set himself up as a freelance hacker-for-hire . . . hidden behind every firewall and dummy front he could think of. Given his talents, those protections were formidable.

As was his habit on a Friday evening, Alten had ordered “room service.” So he was whistling through his teeth as went to answer the doorbell. But—as he always did—he checked the hidden video monitor showing who was standing in the corridor outside his front door. Instead of two sexy girls—he’d ordered a blonde and a redhead—there were three beefy, mean-looking men. They carried large hammers—and were wearing guns on their belts.

Oh-oh.

“I heard something,” a man said. “The bastard’s there.”

Alten saw one of them beating his fist on the door. “Open up, in the name of the law.”

Yeah, right, Alten thought. As he scurried into the large room he thought of as “Information Central,” a louder noise came from the door: They’re going to break it down.

To anyone walking into the living room of his harbor-side apartment it seemed just like any other luxury residence in Sydney’s posh suburb of Potts Point, a thirty-minute walk from the city. But the large back room, made by combining two already-large bedrooms, looked completely out of place, as though it had been transported from a computer warehouse in some grotty industrial area.

Alten sat in front of one of the half-a-dozen active computers lining the walls, opened a window and typed a command. Just more thing. While he waited to make sure the routine started properly, he called the emergency number to report the break-in. “They’re armed with pistols so I suggest you send the SWAT team.”

The computer screens shut down, one by one. The program he’d set in motion was doing its job: his hard drives were backed up to a server installed in a locked cupboard; the computers then wiped their hard drives clean and turned themselves off. By the time those thugs broke through, they wouldn’t even find an operating system. Meanwhile, the server was copying everything to two remote sites over the internet. Once done, the server would also have empty disks.

Meanwhile, an encrypted email was sent automatically to his clients:

if you’re receiving this email, it means ive been put out action temporarily. wl be back in touch as soon as possible tho have no idea when that wl be. to be on the safe side, do NOT communicate with me until you hear from me again

Alten looked up as the hammering on the front door was now accompanied by the sound of wood breaking and metal groaning.

“Time for me to get out of here,” he muttered.

He picked up what looked like a TV remote control and tapped out a seven-digit code on the number pad. A portion of a bench in the back corner of the room slowly rose along with a slab of the concrete floor. Keeping hold of the remote and grabbing his two laptops, he strode across and carried them down an iron ladder screwed onto the wall beneath. He tapped the code again and waited for the hole in the ceiling to close. When it did, he collapsed on the narrow bed with a deep sigh of relief.

Gottlieb Alten was all too well aware that no protection could ever be one hundred percent unbreakable. So under another name, he’d also purchased the apartment below his and rented it out. But first, he’d carved out this small room with a hidden exit to the back stairs, a bolthole with the only other access from above. The work had been done so skillfully that his tenants never realized that their apartment was a tiny bit smaller than it should have been.

It was not a pretty room. It had no windows, the machinery that lifted the square in the ceiling occupied one corner, and the iron rungs up the wall were another scenic blot. The room was also cramped, just large enough for a narrow bed along one wall, a bench and a wash-basin along the other, and only enough room for a stool in between. There was no toilet: Alten hoped he wouldn’t need to stay there long enough to need one. Ventilation came from the building’s central air conditioning system—one of the reasons Alten had chosen these apartments over others he had checked out.

On the bench was a computer. Alten turned it on and noted with satisfaction that it immediately began downloading his information backups from the internet—over a different connection from the one in his “Information Central” above. He put on the headphones and opened another program. In a moment he could hear the sounds of the men upstairs, and the computer’s screen divided into half-a-dozen windows, each one showing a different view of the apartment he’d just vacated.

“There’s no sign of the bastard,” one of the intruders said.

Another man was unlocking the apartment’s back door. As he opened it a fourth thug came through. “Anyone come out here?” he was asked.

“Whadda you think?”

“That sound you heard,” someone said, “must have been your imagination.”

“The hell it was.”

“Where the fuck is he, then?”

A fifth man was sitting at one of Alten’s computers. He’d turned them all on, it seemed, but the six screens remained blank. While the thugs were all muscle, he was all flab; pasty-faced, he looked more like Alten than one of the muscle-men, who called him “Professor.” He put a CD into one of the computers and rebooted it. Alten smiled. The man was booting the computer from the CD drive and in a moment he’d be able see that the computer’s hard drives were blank.

Another, different, muffled noise came through the headphones. Through the camera in the living room Alten saw four policemen wearing bullet-proof vests and carrying submachine guns run, crouching, into the living room; two stood either side of the corridor that led to the bedrooms, the other two ducked down behind sofas and armchairs for cover.

One of the thugs wandered into the room—to be welcomed by a barrel in his gut. A moment later, two more policemen came in through the back door. The two thugs in the kitchen froze, and raised their hands. A few minutes later, Alten chuckled silently as the intruders were all handcuffed and led away without a shot having been fired.

Putting down the headphones he lay back on the bed, wondering how much time he should let pass before leaving his “priest hole.” But he didn’t wait aimlessly: he began to figure out how he’d go about finding who had rumbled him and what chink in his armor they had discovered. He’d have to fix that up before he could resume business as usual.

35 Collision Course

ALISON GASPED AS SHE read the geek’s email: . . . ive been put out action temporarily. . . . What has happened to him? . . . to be on the safe side, do NOT communicate with me until you hear from me again. . . . When will that be?

The time-stamp showed it had been sent around ten PM last night—but looking at the inbox she could see the phone taps were still all functioning. But he can’t do anything new until . . . when? she asked herself.

She sat at the dining table in her apartment, her head in her hands, staring blankly at the laptop screen. She thought of Leon Price’s confession . . . McKurn’s stationery scam . . . the links to Weinbaum . . . French . . . every possibility she’d uncovered that led to McKurn’s demise was still . . . a possibility.

But tonight she had to give McKurn his pound of flesh . . . unless. . . .

She snatched at her cellphone and dialled. “Jason. It’s Alison. What news do you have?”

“Hi, Alison. Some . . . but not much I’m afraid.”

“You mean,” Alison said despondently, “you can’t link ‘John’ to McKurn?”

“No. Well . . . not yet, anyway. Aphrodite’s had a number of clients referred to by a first name only—like ‘John.’ But there was John One, John Two, and John Three . . . just to start with. They’re working on putting names to the nicknames—tracing the agency’s payments and receipts through the banks, for example. But that will take time. And for them it’s not a high priority: they have an open and shut case of sex slavery, intimidation, and so on. So they’re not terribly excited about identifying customers. In any case, hiring a prostitute is not illegal, so even if they can put names to the customers, there’s no crime they can be charged with. So their attitude is, Why bother?”

“What about underage girls?”

“There were none on the books—”

“Which doesn’t mean there weren’t any.”

“I know that, Alison. And by the same token, prostitution is mostly a cash business, so there may not be a money trail back to McKurn. I assure you, they will figure out the money trail . . . eventually. But there is one thing—”

“What?” Alison demanded.

“Thanks to that Thai lady—she’s a real tiger—the five Asian girls have all identified McKurn as a customer.”

“They have? That’s enough to hang him with.”

“Hold your horses, Alison. McKurn can simply deny it as mistaken identity. And the girls’ ID of McKurn may not stand up in court—not that it would ever go to court since—”

“I know. I know. McKurn hasn’t done anything illegal, just immoral.”

“Exactly.”

“I wish you’d told me that before.”

“I only just learnt it myself.”

“I’m sorry, Jason—I really appreciate your help. It’s just that—”

“I know—you want to get him.”

“Damn right,” said Alison heatedly. And if not yesterday, then by lunchtime. “And what did they get out of Weinbaum?” she asked. “Anything?”

“A little, but not what you’re after.”

“Jason, I know he’s in league with McKurn.”

“But we don’t have any evidence,” Jason protested.

Yes we do, she thought, remembering the McKurn-Weinbaum conversation. But it was acquired illegally. . . . “I guess,” she sighed, “you’ll just have to put it down to woman’s intuition.”

“Sorry, Alison. You may be right, but I need more than that.”

“I know. . . .”

To calm herself down and clear her head she went for a short, but fast run. It helped, but not enough: she needed something she could hold over McKurn’s head—something she could trade, something she could threaten to release if McKurn didn’t hold back the video of her and Derek.

One possibility, she decided. She found the recording she had in mind and played it back:

“Gladys?”

“Yes . . . ah, John. Your usual?”

“Of course,” said McKurn.

“It’s your lucky day. We have a new one, almost virginal. Inexperienced but hot,” The woman’s voice sounded like she was cooing in McKurn’s ear.

“Okay,” McKurn’s voice was enthusiastic. “I can hardly wait.”

“You realize, of course, that she’s. . . .”

“It’s worth the risk. Send her over.”

Would that do the trick? she asked herself. Undecided, she copied the “John-Gladys” phone conversation to her MP3 player, and then typed an email to Royn’s private eye:

I have learnt that the five Asian girls you so wonderfully liberated have all identified Senator Frank McKurn as one of their customers. I wonder if they would be agreeable to being interviewed about McKurn, and if so whether you would be kind enough to make a “home” video, with appropriate translation, and send it to me.

Even if I can’t stop him dead, I’ll make him pay.

She looked at the list of phone taps. A moment ago, the prospect of going through them all had felt as appealing as pulling herself up a vertical cliff by her fingernails. Now, she attacked them, and less than an hour later she closed the last one. She marked the ones that were suggestive or hinted at possibilities worth following up; none were directly incriminating, but that didn’t dent her mood. There was only a slight tremble in her fingers when she phoned for a cab to take her to the airport . . . and her flight to Sydney.

*****

INTRODUCING HIMSELF AS “STUART Wrench,” Olsson met Nazarov, Shultz, and de Brouw at the airport and took them to breakfast at a rooftop café at a hotel which overlooked Luk Suk’s compound.

“That,” Olsson said in his best British accent, “is most probably where the Jessica girl is being held.”

“Lots of guards,” said Shultz. “And nasty-looking dogs, too.”

“Right,” said Olsson. “Along with uniformed guards are others, not in uniform but obviously armed, patrolling the grounds.”

“And plenty of barbed wire and glass on top of the walls too,” said de Brouw.

“They’re armed,” said Nazarov who was looking through pair of binoculars. He passed them first to Shultz and then to de Brouw.

“So what’s our assignment?” Nazarov asked as they took a table near the edge where they could keep an eye on the compound below.

“Basically, rescue me, probably from there,” Olsson said, indicating Luk Suk’s house below, “and then snatch this guy.” He passed them three photographs of Luk Suk. “He’s the Golden Triad boss.”

The three mercenaries studied the photo. “Okay,” Shultz drawled after a while, “but I don’t get it. You’re here—how are you going to get there? Just walk in? And why.”

“I’d better lay out the whole situation. What will happen tomorrow,” Olsson told them, “is that I’m going to meet Luk Suk at police headquarters. . . .”

“Where?” Nazarov and Shultz chorused.

Olsson smiled. “Neutral territory. We’ll both be detained there until Jessica Olsson is released, unharmed, into the hands of Inspector Rudi Durant of the New South Wales police in Sydney.”

“How long will that take?” de Brouw asked.

Olsson shrugged. “It all depends on where she is now. If she’s in Sydney, just a few hours. If she’s here—as we think she is—it might take a day or more. We’ll just have to wait and see.”

“How will we know when she gets to this Inspector?” Nazarov asked.

Olsson handed them each a SIM card. “Use these. Someone in Sydney will call you to let you know.”

“Why should this Luk Suk guy agree to be holed with the Thai police?”

“I’m sure he won’t agree,” Olsson chuckled. “But he’ll have no choice. Don’t worry, it’s all taken care of.”

“Worry is one of the things we’re paid to do,” said Nazarov. “So please give me all the details.”

Olsson nodded. “Fair enough. Tomorrow morning Luk Suk will receive an invitation from a police general to pay him a visit—immediately. He’ll agree to that. In fact, one of you could watch from up here to confirm that he does. At headquarters, the general will make him a proposition—me, in exchange for the Jessica girl—and we’ll wait there until we know she’s safe.”

“A police general?” de Brouw asked in surprise. “Now why would someone like that be involved in what’s, basically, a gang dispute?”

“Connections,” Olsson replied. “That’s one of the things I’m paid for. Unfortunately, after the exchange, I’ll have used up all my credit, so we’ll be well and truly on our own.”

“What if Luk Suk doesn’t agree to make the exchange?” asked Shultz.

“Then I’ll walk out of the police station, and so will he—twenty-four hours later.”

“So we’ll have twenty-four hours to figure out Plan B,” said Nazarov.

“Precisely,” Olsson agreed. “I don’t think it will come to that—but it could.”

“Okay,” said Nazarov. “What happens after the girl is delivered to Durant?”

“Then I’ll leave police headquarters with Luk Suk as a prisoner. No doubt I’ll be handcuffed, shackled, God knows what. Your job is to follow me wherever I’m taken, spring me, and grab Luk Suk—in that order, of course.”

“How many exits does this police place have?” de Brouw asked.

“Uh . . . I don’t know,” Olsson admitted. “I’ve always gone in through the front door.”

“We need to know,” said Nazarov. “We’ll check it out. Now, where will he take you?”

Olsson shrugged. “There, I imagine,” he said, pointing to the house. “But I really can’t say.”

“I wouldn’t take you there,” said Nazarov, “because that’s where you’d expect to be taken. And if this Luk Suk guy has half a brain, he’ll know you’ll have back-up of some kind arranged.”

“He’s nobody’s fool,” said Olsson, “but is he a battle-hardened strategic thinker?”

“He must be,” said Nazarov, “in his own way.”

“And in his own field.” Olsson pointed to Luk Suk’s compound. “That looks pretty well guarded to me—from attack by a bunch of gangsters. But from a former Spetsnaz . . . ?”

“Maybe,” Nazarov conceded. “But the first thing you learn in our business is never take anything for granted.”

“Of course,” Shultz drawled, “there’s just one minor problem. A lot of those guys down there look like Thais. There are only three of us, and not one of us speaks Thai or knows our way around the back streets.”

“That’s where Suchart comes in.”

“Your driver? What help could he be?”

“You’d be surprised,” Olsson chuckled. “But he does rather blend into the background, wouldn’t you say?”

“You'd better tell us more, then,” said Nazarov.

Olsson leaned over the railing and pointed at the heavy traffic snarled along Sukhumvit. “See all those motorcycles?” he asked. “With a few phone calls, Suchart could put a fleet of two or three hundred of those bikes at your disposal, all of them with cellphones, naturally enough.”

“I’m not sure I see how that could help,” said de Brouw.

“See how the motorcycles are just zipping between the cars? Luk Suk will take me in a car or van. If you follow him in another car, you’ll stand out like a sore thumb. But if a hundred motorcycles follow him, with you on the back of three of them. . . .”

The three mercenaries nodded. “You’re talking sense,” said Nazarov. “What else could Suchart do?”

Olsson smiled. “Say you’d like a dozen experienced hit men for backup. Give him a couple of hours’ notice and you’ll have Bangkok’s finest.”

“Do you mean that literally?”

“Indubitably,” Olsson grinned, “some of them will be policemen, but not all. And if you want weapons of any kind, he’s your man.”

“We’ll have to pay for all this, won’t we?”

Olsson shook his head. “Suchart will handle that. And before you ask, he effectively has an unlimited line of credit.”

Nazarov nodded doubtfully. “We’ll sit down with him after this.”

“One question,” Shultz asked. “Why don’t we just grab the Luk Suk guy now?”

Olsson shook his head. “After the Jessica girl is freed, by all means. But not before.”

“Why not?” Shultz asked.

“I’ve been led to believe you’ve already had some conversations with some of his men. Did they prove fruitful?”

The three men shook their heads. “Not a word,” said Nazarov, “unless you count ‘B—. B—.’ as a word.”

“Would the Luk Suk character be any different?”

“He might be,” said de Brouw.

“But he probably won’t,” said Shultz.

“Precisely, dear boy,” said Olsson.

“So why,” drawled Shultz, “are you willing to trade places with Jessica Olsson?”

“Because,” said Nazarov, “he’s really Derek Olsson . . . aren’t you?”

“What makes you think that?” Olsson asked innocently.

“It’s the way you move,” said Nazarov. “You can change the color of your hair, grow the funny beard, and talk different—but you can’t change your physique or your underlying manner.”

“And sorry,” said de Brouw, “but your Pommie accent, dear boy, is as phony as an old whore’s promise.”

“And,” said Shultz, “we already know that the Chinks want Derek Olsson. Why would they agree to swap Jessica Olsson for anyone but him? And why would you, if you’re not Olsson, agree to be traded?”

Olsson shrugged. “Think what you like—what difference does it make?”

“We like to get paid,” said Shultz, “so if you’re the Man—”

“The Man?”

“Yeah . . . the boss, the big cheese, honcho numero uno—”

“I’ve got your drift,” said Olsson, holding up his hand. “I can only presume, gentlemen, that, like me, you get paid by results. So if you have to get me out to claim your reward, and I am numero uno, as you so quaintly put it, you’d better make bloody sure you succeed, don’t you think?”

*****

THE CRYSTAL GLASSES AND silver cutlery glittered in the low candlelight; the dark, highly polished wood of the long dining table glowed with flickering reflection.

“Let’s go riding tomorrow—can we Gramps?” Zoë asked.

“Zoë!” Melanie said. “Don’t talk with your mouth full.”

“Oh, mother,” Zoë glared. She turned to Nancy Royn. “Grandma, did you tell Dad to keep his mouth shut and all that stuff all the time too?”

“Yes,” Nancy Royn smiled. “But it was a total waste of time.”

“Mother,” Anthony Royn spluttered, a fork full of food in his mouth.

“Yeah, Dad,” said Zoë, glaring again at her mother.

“Of course you can go riding in the morning, Zo,” Sidney Royn said gently. “In fact, I’ll join you.”

“Want to have a race?” Zoë asked.

Sidney Royn shook his head. “A slow canter is all I’m good for these days,” he said. “But maybe Max and Ricky will.”

“Nah,” Ricky said. “Horse-riding’s for sissies.”

“That’s not what you said the weekend my girlfriends came up to Mount Macedon.”

“That was different,” Ricky growled.

“You just know you’d lose,” Zoë shot back.

The phone rang; while sister and brother continued to bicker Sidney Royn went to answer it. “It’s for you, Tony,” he said.

Anthony Royn wiped his mouth and folded his napkin before walking over to the phone. His words didn’t carry above the loud table chatter, and only Melanie noticed that, as he listened, Royn seemed shaken, the color slowly draining from his face.

He stared vacantly into space as he slowly replaced the handset, missing the cradle at his first try. He stumbled back to the table rather like a drunk having trouble standing up straight—even though his first glass of wine sat on the table, more than half full.

“What is it, darling?” Melanie asked as Royn resumed his seat.

“Kydd’s had a heart attack.”

Six heads turned to look at Royn; all conversation ceased.

Royn raised his head slowly, looking blankly towards Melanie. “A massive one, apparently,” he said woodenly, his eyes slowly focusing on Melanie’s face. “He’s in intensive care. . . . It’s touch and go whether he’ll make it. . . . Fifty-fifty they say. . . . But the way they spoke, it sounded to me as though they don’t really expect him to recover.”

“He will,” said Sidney Royn, everyone turning in surprise at the venom in his voice.

“I . . . don’t know,” said Anthony Royn. “He’s overweight, he smokes too much—and he’s ignored all his doctors’ advice.”

“We’ll see,” said Melanie, reaching her hand across the table to take Royn’s. “I guess that means we should go to Sydney . . . in the morning. The last flight’s already gone.”

“Morning will be fine,” Royn said. “He’s not conscious now anyway.”

“Tony,” said Sidney Royn. His words were crisp, businesslike. “The first thing you need to do is inform the Governor-General. His protocol officers will know what to do next. But I really don’t think they’ll need to do anything . . . unless Kydd dies. You’re automatically Acting Prime Minister, and while Kydd’s incapacitated that means you’ll be Prime Minister, both de facto and de jure.”

“Thanks, Dad.”

“So here’s your opportunity to show everyone what you’re really made of—and throw that Preston woman’s words back in her face.”

Royn nodded, looking at that moment nothing like prime ministerial material.

“Hey, Dad,” said Ricky excitedly. “Since you’re Acting PM, does that mean we can all go to Sydney with you in the VIP jet?”

“Technically, Ricky, yes,” Sidney Royn said severely. “But if your father’s first act was to grab for his privileges like a greedy youngster I can think of, how do you think the press and the voters might react?”

“Ah—yes, Gramps,” Ricky said sheepishly, his ears turning red. “I suppose you’re right.”

“Of course he’s right, you bonehead,” said Max.

“Enough, you two,” said Melanie.

“I don’t know about the rest of you,” said Nancy Royn, “but I’ve lost my appetite.”

Sidney Royn nodded. “I think we could all use a stiff brandy,” he said as he rose to his feet.

“Can I finish your steak, then, Gramps?” Ricky asked.

Zoë wrinkled her nose. “Ricky, you’re disgusting.”

“Ah . . . never mind then.”

Grinning, Max dug his elbow into Ricky’s side. “We’ll clear up, okay, Grandma?” he said.

“Thank you, Max.”

Sidney Royn put a tray with a bottle of cognac and seven brandy snifters on the table and began pouring, handing the first—large—one to his son.

“Thanks Dad,” Anthony Royn said. Turning on his mobile phone he added, “I’ll call Alison and get her to handle all the minutiae.” He punched Alison’s mobile number but there was no answer and he left a message. “It must be off,” he muttered. He called her home phone with the same result. “Damn it, Alison,” he growled, “where the hell are you?”

“Do you have her parents’ number in Sydney?” Melanie asked.

“Somewhere here. . . .” Royn punched another number, and after a brief, if somewhat tense discussion, he asked “. . . if you would kindly ask Alison to call me urgently. . . . Thank you, Mr. McGuire,” he said as he shut his phone. “Alison’s father is not one of my fans,” he grinned. “He said she’s out for dinner.”

“Why don’t you go into the living room where we can all be more comfortable,” said Sidney Royn, “and I’ll call the Governor-General on your behalf.”

“Thanks, Dad,” Anthony Royn smiled.

WARMED BY THE GLOWING fire and mellowed by a second bottle of cognac, the conversation drifted lazily, guided mainly by Sidney Royn’s reminiscences of his days in politics.

A while later, when the color had returned to Royn’s cheeks and the vitality to his manner, Melanie leant towards him with undisguised anticipation, saying softly, “You know what this means, Tony, don’t you?”

Royn looked puzzled. “What?”

“This could be the perfect time for Cracken to make a move—or, at least, to stake out his position. You’re going to have to beat him to the punch.”

“Which means,” Royn said, “we’re going to have to put McKurn out of action first.”

*****

DEREK OLSSON’S FIRST NEWSPAPER was The Twin City Times in Albury-Wodonga, two towns lying astride the Murray River which defines most of the border between the states of New South Wales and Victoria. It met the established Albury-Wodonga Independent head on. Founded in the 1890s by Alexander Houghton, a dynamic local businessman, the Independent quickly became the region’s leading daily. But by the turn of the 21st century, the Independent was a tired monopoly fought over by the baker’s dozen of Houghton’s great- and great-great grandchildren whose main interest was the fat dividend cheques their cash cow threw off.

Olsson’s Twin City Times was a wake-up call for Alexander Houghton’s heirs. His state-of-the art, computerized Goss Uniliner presses could print an all-color Twin City Times with twice as many pages three times as fast with a fraction of the labor it took to produce the Independent. The only place the Independent ran a tighter ship was in the editorial department. Olsson had lured away some of their best journalists, managers, and ad salesmen with salary offers that made the Independent’s remaining managers shake their heads in despair. Indeed, even in the opinion of other publishers, Olsson’s editorial department looked to be grossly over-staffed.

The regional press, Olsson had discovered, was really a local press. National news, except the most significant, ran a distant second to just about anything local; world news was buried somewhere inside—and in some regional papers hardly appeared at all. An observation from the editor of a tiny country weekly glued itself into Olsson’s mind. “The reason people buy my paper,” the editor had told him, “is that everyone in town knows their name and picture will be published at least once a year. They just don’t know when.”

The Twin City Times’ clean, modern layout made the Independent look like an aged dowager. And from its first issue, it published far more local news than the Independent, and every local bridge club, dog lovers’ society, primary school football team—you name it—had its “day in the Times” at least once a year, even if it was only on page 52.

The Times was also a crusading paper, and its favorite crusade was against corruption. Some unlucky policeman was photographed taking $50 for not writing a traffic ticket. When it turned out that the driver was a reporter for the paper some people felt that wasn’t “fair play.”

But the following week, the same policeman was in much hotter water when the Times revealed he’d fixed a large number of tickets for a certain local councillor—and the councillor’s prominent friends. The policeman, the councillor, and most of his friends spent some time in jail or paid heavy fines.

Every month or two the Times uncovered another corrupt official, and questions were even asked in Parliament as politicians tried to jump on the anti-corruption bandwagon. But behind the scenes were questions like “How did these bastards find out?” and “Shit, who’s next?”

In just a few months the Twin City Times overtook the Independent as the circulation leader. A year later, Alexander Houghton’s descendants threw in the towel and shut their newspaper’s doors.

About six months after he’d launched the Twin City Times, the reason for the seemingly bloated editorial staff became clear: Olsson started his second daily, the Wagga Wagga Bulletin, a clone of the Times in almost every respect. Printed on the same presses, it was shipped in InterFreight trucks from a brand new freight terminal shared with the OlssonPress plant to Wagga, just over an hour away. But for French’s deep pockets, his former cash cow the Wagga Morning News would have shared the same fate as the Albury-Wodonga Independent.

Within two years, Olsson had repeated the same formula on the outskirts of Melbourne and then near Liverpool on the edge of Sydney, publishing two to four dailies from each central plant, each of which shared a modern, computerized InterFreight terminal. Even with MoneyWeek, the Sydney and Melbourne Weekends and some suburban and country weeklies, his three Goss presses still had plenty of spare capacity to print for other publishers all over the country.

At nine pm that Saturday evening, the five gleaming towers of the Goss Uniliners were silent as the printers came back from their dinner break. The magazine sections of the Sunday Twin-City Times and the Wagga Wagga Bulletin had been printed at the beginning of the shift. They were carefully stacked, ready to be automatically inserted when the news sections were printed later. First, though, they would print the few thousand copies of MoneyWeek to be delivered along with the Sundays.

Ever since Lew Campbell, the OlssonPress and InterFreight security chief, had told him about the threat to “stop the presses,” printmaster Hugh Matson had spent every waking moment at the plant, watching over the presses as if they were his babies—as, in a very real sense, they were. No visitors had been allowed; extra security guards were present at all times; all employees, especially recent hires, had been vetted again; everything was checked and rechecked; and as a final precaution, Matson had ordered that the presses be run slower than normal.

So far, nothing had happened and nothing suspicious had been discovered, either here at the Twin Cities’ plant, or at its Sydney and Melbourne counterparts, where similar precautions were taken.

Matson’s anxiety was increasing at the approach of the “Friday or Saturday night” deadline specified in the warning. He ordered the presses to roll at a slow 10,000 copies per hour compared to the presses’ maximum speed of 75,000 copies per hour which could print the full run of both daily newspapers in under sixty minutes. Even though the presses smoothly turned rolls of paper and tubs of ink into finished copies of MoneyWeek, with everything working perfectly, Matson could not relax. He walked around the towers as they rumbled, listening for any out-of-place-sound, watching for any undue spray of ink or unusual wrinkle in the paper. He hovered over the console in the glassed-off control room, his eyes glued to the screen, dials and warning lights that looked nearly as complicated as the cockpit of a jet. So when the alarms sounded and the presses were automatically shut down, he didn’t see until afterwards that the paper, fed from an enormous roll at the bottom of one tower, had torn, and the sudden release of tension had jammed the point where the five streams of paper from the five towers came together to be folded and cut into single newspapers.

Paper breaks like this happened occasionally, but the cause of this break was not some weak spot in the paper. The bearings carrying the plate that, when inked, transferred the image of the page to the paper had, literally, ground to a halt. In the moments before the presses shut down automatically, the sudden seizure of one roller had caused a second one to screech to a halt. It was immediately clear that one of the five towers was out of action, but it took much longer to determine why: fine grit had been introduced into the lubricant on the roller’s bearings, ruining them completely.

After informing Olsson’s security chief, Lew Campbell, Matson called the printmasters at the Melbourne and Sydney presses. They checked all the lubricants of their Goss presses, but after a couple of hours of painstaking scrutiny, found nothing out of order.

Press breakdowns, while infrequent, did happen, and newspapers—even the fiercest competitors—had an informal arrangement to help each other out. So Matson called the printmaster at French’s Wagga Morning News—and immediately afterwards spoke to Lew Campbell again. “Doesn’t have enough paper, he told me—the lying bastard. I told him: ‘I can ship you plenty of paper.’ He tells me it’s the wrong size for his presses. Bullshit. We go way back. I could tell from his tone that he was really embarrassed, as though he’d been ordered not to cooperate with us.”

Two hours behind schedule, the presses in the Melbourne and Sydney plants began to roll. The Melbourne Goss had barely started up when the computer control system crashed and everything stopped. Attempts to reboot the system failed. It wasn’t until the next day that engineers discovered that a computer worm, which must have been introduced into the system by someone on the premises with authorized access, had wiped the system clean.

Half an hour later the Sydney presses continued to print as normal, the papers coming off neatly folded and stacked—with pages that were half blank. The black ink was contaminated with a thickening agent that blocked the ink jets on most of the towers.

In Melbourne and Sydney, the Sykes’ presses came to the rescue—after they’d finished printing their own papers. In the Albury plant, it was nearly three am when the lubricants had been completely flushed from two of the five towers and replaced, and Matson began to print the Sundays’ news sections. With just forty percent of normal capacity, it would take several hours to complete the run. Worse, though, it had to be printed in three sections instead of one, and then those sections put together along with the previously printed magazine sections. To complement the inserting machines, journalists, office staff, their spouses, elder children, and any friends they could round up were drafted to assemble the finished papers by hand. It was eight am before the last of the 40,000 copies of the Wagga and Albury-Wodonga papers were ready to be trucked out.

The presses had been stopped. But, if late, the Olsson Sundays still reached most of their readers . . . with the face of the latest in their line-up of corruption, Federal Labor Senator Felix Haughtry, grinning in full color on the front page.

*****

ALISON’S HANDS WERE COLD as the door to the hotel suite opened to reveal a smiling Frank McKurn, a scattering of grey and white hairs showing though his open-necked shirt. His eyes glinted in anticipation.

“Ah, my dear,” he said, taking Alison’s hand and kissing it in emulation of a man of chivalry. “Come in, come in.”

Alison stayed the impulse to pull her hand back, hiding the revulsion she felt at his touch by letting her arm hang limply from his fingers. She shivered at the touch of his lips, and as he let her hand go it fell to her side as though her arm were lifeless.

“That’s hardly the right attitude, you know,” McKurn said

“I’m not one of your good-time girls, Senator,” she said icily.

“So I see,” McKurn said sourly as his eyes ran up and down her body. Alison wore a loose black sweater that concealed her curves, black slacks that shapelessly covered her legs, low-heeled shoes and no makeup. McKurn shrugged. “Come in.”

As she stepped into the room McKurn let the door swing shut and, waving his hand at the sofa, said, “Take a seat. Can I offer you a drink?”

“Vodka and tonic. Light on the tonic,” she said tonelessly.

Alison gingerly sat at one end of the couch, sitting as though she was attempting to shrink her body to disappear between the cushions. A part of her self was cringing in the expectation that McKurn was about to sit next to her, screaming for her to get out of here now.

But McKurn wasn’t watching her, and made no move towards her. He picked up the TV remote from the coffee table, which was tuned into a news program with the sound off, and fingered the volume control saying, “There’s something on the news I’ve been waiting for.”

What had sounded like a low background whisper became the announcer’s voice. “. . . the government’s environmental policy came under attack today from an unexpected source.” A freeze-frame of McKurn appeared to one side of the announcer’s head and suddenly expanded to fill the screen, McKurn’s voice filling the room.

While Alison watched she was aware that McKurn had moved behind her and heard the sounds of cans being popped and of ice tinkling against glass.

“Many of you, no doubt, will accuse me of being very slow to accept the danger of global warming,” McKurn was saying. He stood behind a lectern marked saving the planet. “But people who know me well know that I am the cautious sort who must first be convinced by facts, by scientific evidence, especially before supporting the kind of sweeping government measures required to counteract global warming—measures that would radically affect the lifestyle of every Australian. Having extensively studied the issue, I have become convinced that today, except for nuclear weapons, we as a species face no greater danger than environmental catastrophe. As a member of the Conservative Party, and as President of the Senate, it is incumbent on me to do everything I can to change our party’s and government’s insensitive dismissal of this issue. . . .”

McKurn sat down and placed a glass in front of her; Alison hungrily took a long swallow. “You?” she said, her eyes darting to his face and back to the news. “Turning into a greenie?”

McKurn chuckled. He lounged in the middle of the sofa, his long legs spreading under the coffee table, his arms outstretched right and left along the back of the sofa—without touching her. “Don’t be ridiculous. The ice-caps on Mars are melting,” McKurn said contemptuously, “and I suppose the greenies will claim the Mars Rover did it. Just six thousand years ago Sydney Harbor was almost twice as big as it is now, and half of Brisbane and Melbourne were underwater—caused, no doubt, by all our ancestors’ camp fires.” McKurn’s words were dripping with unconcealed contempt. “But I sure know a bandwagon when I see one.”

“For a moment,” Alison said, equally contemptuous, “I thought you were taking a stand on principle.”

“Ha,” he grinned. “And there’s nothing I enjoy more than adding to Kydd’s discomfort.”

McKurn flicked off the TV and Alison drained her glass, continuing to watch the now-blank screen, but against her will focusing on McKurn’s every movement in her peripheral vision.

“Well, my dear,” McKurn said, shifting his position to face her, “they have a superb Chateaubriand. . . .”

“I’m not hungry.” Indicating her glass, she added, “But I could use another drink.”

McKurn had hardly touched his own glass. He looked at her reflectively, his lips pursed. “Suit yourself,” he shrugged. A few minutes later he returned and placed it in front of her. As Alison reached for it he sat down beside her and put an arm around her shoulders to pull her closer to him. She automatically resisted, moving her body in the opposite direction. But already squeezed next to the arm of the sofa, she could only lean over it. The fingers of her hand had immediately straightened, en garde, her arms and shoulders becoming rigid as she fought against her impulse to move onto the attack.

McKurn sighed, shaking his head. “That won’t do, Alison.”

“If you want willing cooperation,” Alison snapped, gulping her drink as she spoke, “or the appearance of it, you’d better call someone else, Senator.”

“I had a feeling you might react like that,” McKurn said coldly, his eyes glittering at her in a way that sent a shiver of fear crawling up Alison’s spine. He leant over to the laptop sitting on the coffee table and pressed the enter key. “There’s something I thought you’d like to see . . . in full.”

Alison’s face appeared on the screen, her lips slightly open as they met another pair of lips in a long, slow kiss. Derek’s face was turned towards hers but she could easily recognize his jungle of hair. The picture changed to his hand caressing her breast, her nipple lengthening as it hardened.

Her eyes glazed over, unseeing, but she couldn’t tune out her voice saying, “Oh, Derek, Derek, more . . . ” and she frantically groped into her handbag until her hand closed around the MP3 player.

The argument she’d had with herself in the taxi flashed through her mind. She had listened again to “John” and “Gladys,” and knew that its release would certainly embarrass McKurn, and maybe even force him out of politics. But it did not live up to Niccolo Machiavelli’s advice, that “if an injury has to be done to a man it should be so severe that his vengeance need not be feared.”

McKurn’s video was in a different league. It would devastate her and wreck her life. Be better just to walk away.

So, why don’t you? The cold, ageless voice somewhere inside pulled her up short.

Because I can’t throw away everything I’ve worked for.

And if you go through with it, you’re not? the voice asked.

Alison found she had no answer to the question.

“Turn it off, damn you,” Alison yelled.

McKurn stopped the video; Alison’s face, tipped back—her mouth open in mid-scream, her eyes rolled back, frozen in mid-ecstasy—filled the screen; McKurn turned to look at her admiringly, staring, almost gaping at her breasts half-outlined by her sweater as he had looked at her naked breasts on the screen.

“One phone call, remember, Alison,” McKurn growled as he leered at her.

To continue, order your copy of Trust Your Enemies from Amazon right now.

Cast of Characters and Glossary of Terms

ABC. Australian Broadcasting Commission. Australian equivalent of the BBC.

Abdullah Nimabi. Foreign Minister of the Sandeman Islands.

ACT. Abbreviation for Australian Capital Territory. Formerly a part of NSW, it is now the site of Canberra, the Australian Capital.

Alex Herzog. Governor-General of Australia.

Alison McGuire. Chief Political Advisor to Anthony Royn.

ALP. Abbreviation for the Australian Labor Party.

Annabelle Myers. Constable, NSW Police.

Anstalt. A Liechtenstein entity which is a hybrid between a company and a foundation. It has a “founder,” not shareholders, whose identity can be hidden.

Anthony Royn. Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs. Deputy Leader of the Conservative Party. Married to Melanie Royn.

Arang’anat. Teacher in the Sandeman village of Inkaya.

Arthur Riddell. General; Chief of the Australian Defence Forces.

Aruma Bagambi. Prime Minister of the Sandeman Islands.

ASIC. Australian Securities and Investments Commission. Regulatory body equivalent to the American SEC.

Australian Army Ranks follow the British system. For example, Brigadier-General was retitled Brigadier in 1922. Otherwise, officer ranks are the same as in the US Army, except that the insignia are different so terms like “2-star general” do not apply. The structure of other ranks in the British system is, again, different from the American. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_Defence_Force_ranks_and_insignia for more.

ASIO. Australian Security and Intelligence Organization. Equivalent to the CIA and MI5.

Barry Easton. Economics professor who becomes a CP candidate for parliament.

Bruce Spring. Minister for Justice and Customs; leading member of Anthony Royn’s “push.”

Candyman, the. Nickname for the mysterious underworld drug lord who is taking over Australia’s supply of heroin and marijuana.

Cantrell. Australian Army colonel.

Chuasiriporn. General, Royal Thai Police.

Collin Renfrew. Anthony Royn’s lawyer.

Conservative Party. Australia’s two major political parties are the Labor Party, and a coalition of the Liberal and National (formerly Country) Parties. The Conservative Party of Trust Your Enemies does not exist: for all practical purposes it can be considered an amalgamation of the Liberal and National Parties, its structure and procedures based on those of the Liberal Party.

CP. Abbreviation for the Conservative Party.

Demas Chrysanthopoulos, aka “The Greek.” Major figure in Sydney’s underworld.

Derek Olsson. Owner of the OlssonPress; partner with his high school chum Ross Traynor in InterFreight.

distribution of preferences. See preferences, distribution of.

Doug Selkirk. Anthony Royn’s press secretary.

Edward Tozen. Aikido Sensei.

Feliks Ilyich Nazarov. Ex-KGB Spetsnaz assassin; former mercenary; leader of a gang consisting of him, Nick Schulz, and Mats de Brouw.

Frank McKurn. Federal Senator from the state of New South Wales; President of the Senate.

French Publishing. Media group owned by Sir Philip French.

go for a row. Get caught and probably punished.

Golden Dragon Triad. Hong Kong based triad.

Gottlieb Alten. Computer hacker.

Greg Cannon. Private investigator.

Gugamti. Sandeman Army colonel.

Gurundi. Khatib in the Sandeman village of Inkaya.

Hanson McLeod. Former policeman, now a private detective. Married to Orawan McLeod.

Helen Arkness. Immigration Minister; chair of the parliamentary Conservative Party.

Henry Sykes. Owner of media group Sykes Media.

Herbert Flint. Justice of the High Court.

High Commissioner. Title for ambassadors between members of the British Commonwealth.

Ian Nash. Leader of the Federal Australian Labor Party and so also Leader of the Opposition.

InterFreight. Road transport company 51% owned by Derek Olsson and Ross Traynor.

Jack Dent. Derek Olsson’s grandfather.

Jack Quigley. Conservative Party MP.

Jake Meldrum. CP candidate for parliament.

Jason Kowalski. Sergeant, Federal Police.

Jazeerat el-Bihar. Arabic for “Spice Island,” the westernmost island of the Sandemans. Population almost 100% Muslim.

Jazeerat el-Misk. The name (Arabic for “Fragrant Island”) preferred by Sandeman’s Muslims for the island officially called St. Christopher’s Island.

Jennifer Dent. Derek Olsson’s grandmother.

Jeremy McGuire. Lieutenant in the Australian Army; cousin of Alison McGuire.

Jessica Olsson. Derek Olsson’s “kid sister.”

Jim Williams. Chair of the NSW division of the Conservative Party.

Joe McGuire. Alison McGuire’s father.

Karla Preston. Columnist for the OlssonPress. Derek Olsson’s current girlfriend.

Khatib. Delivers the sermon at Friday prayers in the mosque; senior Muslim figure in the absence of an imam.

Kurt Jenkins. Member of the MYOBB Party.

Lars Olsson. Derek Olsson’s older brother.

Leon Price. MLA, retired.

Lester Edleton. Western Australian mining stock promoter.

Lew Campbell. OlssonPress security chief.

Luk Suk. Title of the chieftain of the Golden Dragon Triad.

Lynette McPherson. Managing Director of the OlssonPress.

Maggie McGuire. Alison McGuire’s mother.

Mats de Brouw. South African; former mercenary; member of Nazarov’s gang.

Maureen Hendrickson. President of the Victims’ Self-Defence League.

Max Royn. Son of Anthony and Melanie Royn.

Melanie Royn. Married to Anthony Royn.

Mike Rubin. OlssonPress lawyer.

MLA. Member of the Legislative Assembly, the lower house of the NSW state parliament.

Molly Olsson. Derek Olsson’s mother.

MP. Abbreviation for Member of Parliament; refers to members of the lower house of Australia’s federal parliament.

MYOBB Party. Read on . . . 

Nancy Royn. Anthony Royn’s mother.

Nick Schulz. American; ex-Marine (cashiered); former mercenary; member of Nazarov’s gang.

NSW. Abbreviation for the Australian state of New South Wales, capital Sydney.

OlssonPress. Small newspaper publishing company started and owned by Derek Olsson.

Orawan McLeod. Former policewoman; now assists her husband Hanson McLeod.

“Paddy” Byrne. Sergeant in the Australian Army.

Paul Cracken. Treasurer.

Peter McMurray. Captain in the Australian Army.

Philip French, Sir. Owner of media group French Publishing.

Poonchit. Bangkok bar girl.

porridge. Jail time.

preferences, distribution of. When no candidate has 50% of the vote plus one, the candidate with the lowest number of votes (first preferences) is eliminated. That candidate’s second preferences (2’s) are then counted, being added to the first preferences (1’s) of the other candidates. This process is continued until one candidate is the winner. (See preferential voting.)

preferential voting. Also termed “The Australian Ballot,” all candidates must be numbered in order of preference (1, 2, 3, 4, and so on) for the vote to be valid.

push. Australian slang for a gang.

Pty. Ltd. Abbreviation for “Proprietary Limited,” signifying a privately-held company.

QLD. Abbreviation for the Australian state of Queensland, capital Brisbane.

Randolph Kydd. Prime Minister of Australia; Leader of the Conservative Party.

Ranga N’gaandi. Captain in the Sandeman Army.

Richard (“Ricky”) Royn. Son of Anthony and Melanie Royn.

Robin Cartwright. Journalist for the Melbourne Examiner.

Ross Traynor. Partner with his high school chum Derek Olsson in InterFreight.

Rowena Watson. TV anchor.

Rudi Durant. Detective-Inspector in the NSW Police.

Sam Royn. Anthony Royn’s older brother.

St. Christopher’s Island. Immediately east of Jazeerat el-Bihar; population approximately half Muslim (to the west) and half Catholic. The Muslims demand it should be called by its original Arabic name: Jazeerat el-Misk.

Sandeman Islands. A fictitious country located in the Coral Sea northeast of Australia, with the Solomon Islands to its north, Papua New Guinea to the west, and Vanuatu and New Caledonia to the southeast. (Note: there are, in fact no islands there at all as the ocean in that area is some 11,000 feet deep.)

Stanley Chow. Minister for Trade.

scarper. Flee, disappear, beat it—but with more haste.

Sean Reynolds. Inspector, Federal Police.

Shaun Bernstein. Member of the MYOBB Party.

Sidney Royn. Anthony Royn’s father.

Simon Lee. Detective-Sergeant in the NSW Police; assistant to Rudi Durant.

SP Bookie. Abbreviation for Starting Price Bookmaker. Usually means an illegal, off-course bookmaker.

spill. The term used when the parliamentary members of a political party vote to oust the current party leader.

standover. Extortion. Standover tactics: using power or the threat of force to obtain property, money, &c. Standover merchant: someone who uses standover tactics. Usually (though not exclusively) applied to gangsters.

Suchart. Thai associate of Derek Olsson.

Sven Olsson. Derek Olsson’s father.

Sykes Media. Media group owned by Henry Sykes.

TAB. Totalisator Agency Board. State government betting monopoly.

Thierry. Brigadier. Commander of Australian forces in the Sandeman Islands.

toff. Rich, well-dressed, upper-class person, usually male. Can be used as a term of respect, or as an insult (e.g., “rich bastard”).

Toribaya. Capital of the Sandeman Islands.

two-party-preferred vote. Projection of the winning party after the estimated distribution of preferences (See also: preferential voting, preferences, distribution of.)

Tungi. Chief Elder in the Sandeman village of Inkaya.

Uqumagani, aka Uqu. InterFreight employee in the Sandeman Islands.

Vanessa Strezlecki. Independent Senator from the state of Tasmania.

Vanich. General, Royal Thai Police.

VIC. Abbreviation for the Australian state of Victoria, capital Melbourne.

Victor Bergstrom. Minister for Defence.

Vincent Leung. Chief of the Sydney wing of the Golden Dragon Triad.

Vuong Lam Tho. Head of Sydney’s Vietnamese gang.

Zimmerman. Superintendent in the NSW Police and Rudi Durant’s immediate superior.

Zoë Royn. Daughter of Anthony and Melanie Royn.