by Ian Hamilton
An hour later Ava was ready to leave for the airport. She carried her phone into the kitchen, made a coffee, and sat down while she checked her messages. There was a text from Derek wishing her good luck, but nothing from her mother, Fai, or Jacob. She checked her watch. There was still time for Jacob to call before the limo was slated to arrive.
No more than five seconds later, her phone rang and she saw his incoming number. “Jacob?” she answered.
“We have an appointment tomorrow at noon with the owner of the trading company in Antwerp that was Jasmine Yip’s diamond supplier,” he said quickly. “We are to meet Mr. Jaswa at his office. He’ll take us to the meeting and make the introductions. After that we’re on our own. In fact, Mr. Jaswa told me quite directly that meeting his contact wasn’t a guarantee that he’d tell us what we want to know.”
“It is a foot in the door.”
“A foot that might be aided by the fact that we now know Jasmine Yip is from Singapore.”
“You received the copy of her passport?”
“I did. I’ll send it to you as soon as we finish talking.”
Ava shook her head. “I can’t stop asking myself why Malcolm Muir would send money to an account in Amsterdam controlled by a woman from Singapore who was using it to buy diamonds in Antwerp.”
“It is quite out of the ordinary.”
“Yes, it’s definitely different,” Ava said, and then checked her watch again. “My limo will be here soon. What time and where should we meet tomorrow morning?”
“The Dylan Hotel is close to the station. Why don’t I meet you in the lobby at nine. There’s a train around nine forty-five that will get us into Antwerp at eleven fifteen,” he said. “I’ll keep an eye on your flight. If it’s any later, I’ll reschedule.”
“I’d appreciate that,” Ava said. “Now please send me the copy of that passport.”
While she waited, she turned to her computer and searched “Jasmine Yip Singapore.” There were pages upon pages of links, but all of them concerned Singapore or jasmine flowers; there were a few Yips, but none of them named Jasmine. Ava then entered “Jewellery Circle” and again didn’t find a match.
“After all our luck today, that was too much to expect,” she muttered, and then saw there was an email from Jacob. She clicked on the attachment and saw the passport page with Jasmine Yip’s photo. “At least I can put a face to you now,” Ava said, looking at a middle-aged woman with a long, thin face, hair cut in a bob, a grim smile, and eyes that stared defiantly into the camera. The name on the passport was Yip Meili.
The word meili was Chinese for jasmine, leaving no doubt about the origin of Yip’s English name. That’s understandable, if lacking in imagination, Ava thought as she typed the Chinese name into her laptop. A moment later she closed it in frustration.
(13)
The KLM flight landed at Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport on time, and thirty minutes later Ava walked out into a warm, humid morning. She had managed to sleep for several hours and hoped that would get her through the day without having to nap. For more than a decade she had crossed time zones so often that she had learned to adjust to the local time as quickly as possible. Going to bed at her regular hour was always the best strategy. So her plan when she got to the Dylan Hotel was to shower, change clothes, and have breakfast.
It was ten kilometres from the airport to central Amsterdam and the hotel. Inbound traffic was surprisingly light for that time of day; Ava saw as many buses as cars and far more bicycles than the two put together. At seven-thirty she reached the Dylan, which looked like something from another century with its stone façade and metal gateway crowned by high arches. In fact, it hadn’t been conceived as a hotel; it comprised a number of three-storey brick and stone houses surrounding a courtyard and had been built in the 1600s. While there were only about forty rooms and suites, it had more amenities than most boutique hotels.
Ava had arranged for an early check in, and her room was ready when she arrived. She had requested the Kimono Room. It was entirely black and white, all ultra-modern Japanese minimalism with clean, hard lines. Even the bed’s four posts were thin and reed-like, more for accent than function, more symbol than decoration.
She unpacked her bag and carried her toilet kit to the bathroom. Her room was on the top floor of the hotel, and the bathroom had been built loft-style, with black wooden beams crisscrossing from wall to wall and a glass ceiling open to a bright blue sky. As she stripped to shower, the light from above seemed to accentuate every pore in her body. Rarely had she felt so naked. Ava looked at herself in the mirror and was startled by how pale she looked, even more so when she turned sideways and saw the contrast made by a red scar on her thigh where she had been shot in Macau and the long scar on her arm where a machete had bitten into it during a fracas in Beijing. The arm scar was only a month old and hadn’t reached its final definition, but it was definitely going to be permanent.
She had other scars on her back and shoulders, and, like the one on her thigh, they had been incurred during her days as a debt collector. Debt collection wasn’t a business for the faint of heart. Over her years with Uncle, Ava had been punched, kicked, shot, hit with belts and a tire iron, and forced to fend off knives and machetes. She had always prevailed, but there had been a cost. Still, even in the harshness of the morning light, her body looked like that of a younger woman. A combination of genes, running, and bak mei had helped her maintain a physique that was beautifully proportioned, firm and muscular. Even the scars didn’t detract; actually, as far as Fai was concerned, they added to Ava’s sex appeal.
She turned from the mirror and looked around the bathroom. Like the rest of the suite, it was starkly minimalist, with the exception of an immense porcelain bathtub completely encased in black marble. Ava normally showered, but there was something about the tub that attracted her. She drew water, added bubble bath, and eased herself in.
As she soaked, she focused on two pots sitting on a ledge at the foot of the bath, white ceramic shot through with streaks of electric blue. They were Japanese, she guessed, but she had seen pots like them in Hong Kong. That thought triggered the realization that the last time she’d been in Amsterdam was when Uncle was dying in the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Hong Kong. Had his suggestion that she hunt down Malcolm Muir brought her here again? Was it his way of closing a circle? I have to stop reading so much into my dreams, she thought as she climbed out of the tub.
Ava dried herself and went into the bedroom to dress. She had laid out her clothes on the bed before bathing and now put on the plain white cotton Brooks Brothers shirt, black linen slacks, and a pair of flat shoes. She normally wore mascara and a light touch of red lipstick, but given what Jacob had told her about the Jains, she’d decided to present an understated image. She did, though, brush her hair back and fix it with her ivory chignon pin. The pin was a Chinese antique that she’d bought in Tsim Sha Tsui after her first successful collection job. According to the dealer who’d sold it to her, the pin had belonged to a wife or mistress of a Chinese emperor. Ava didn’t know if that was true, but she did know it had always brought her good luck.
Ready for the day ahead, Ava checked the time and saw it was already 8:40. It was getting late for breakfast, so she decided to forego it. Instead she made a coffee, checked her phone, and saw she had a voice message from Fai.
“I’m getting ready to leave my hotel to go to the set for the first day of shooting. I’m very excited. Andy couldn’t have been nicer yesterday, and I think the cast and crew are first-rate. Good luck in Amsterdam, stay in touch, and please don’t take any unnecessary risks. I want you to come back to me in one piece. Love you,” Fai said.
Ava smiled as she saved the message, and then she opened her laptop. Jennie Lee had sent an email: Ava, I’m worried about you. Is everything okay? You didn’t mention anything about Fai going back to Asia to work, or about you going to Europe when we
had dinner the other night. You know I don’t like surprises, so if something is going on between you two, let me know. Love, Mummy.
Mummy, everything is just fine. Fai had a last-minute job offer that was too good to turn down, and I’m chasing the money that was stolen from Mr. Gregory, Ava wrote. I’ll contact you again in a few days. Love, Ava.
She stood up, thought about making another coffee, and then realized it was almost nine o’clock. She grabbed her Louis Vuitton bag, which already contained her notebook, pens, wallet, and passport, and added the phone and her room card. She rode the elevator to the lobby and exited to find Jacob Smits waiting for her in his usual rumpled brown suit, white shirt, and orange tie. He grinned and stepped towards her.
Ava guessed Jacob was in his fifties; he was five foot seven or eight and had a prominent belly. His hair was sandy brown, thinning, and carefully combed to minimize the encroaching baldness. His face was round, with chubby cheeks, tiny ears with pink lobes, and deeply recessed bright blue eyes that almost sparkled. When Ava first met him, she had thought he had an extraordinarily kind face, and when he smiled that impression was even stronger.
“How was your journey?” he asked, extending a hand.
“Trouble-free,” she said as she shook his hand. Then she pointed at the scruffy old black leather briefcase he held in the other. “That looks heavy.”
“I printed two copies of all the paperwork you sent to me, one for us and one for Mr. Jaswa’s colleague. I thought it would help validate our case with him.”
“That’s good thinking.”
“I’ve also got a Thermos of black coffee and sandwiches. My wife is old-fashioned about spending money on food outside the house. She made a sandwich for you as well.”
“I may take you up on the coffee,” Ava said. “Now we should get going. How do you suggest we get to the train station?”
“We’ll take the tram.”
The tram stop was a block from the hotel. They reached the train station with fifteen minutes to spare. Jacob bought their tickets and moments later they left for Antwerp on schedule.
They sat in economy but were able to find two seats facing each other, separated by a table. Jacob took out the Thermos and placed it on the table with a plastic cup. “Are you ready for coffee?” he asked Ava.
“I only drink it black.”
“So do I, and that’s what we have.”
“Then yes, please.”
He poured coffee into the cup and then filled the lid for himself. Ava took a sip and was surprised by the smooth, rich flavour. “Your wife makes wonderful coffee,” she said.
“She’s also a very good cook. If you ever have time, I’d like you to come to our house to meet her and have dinner.”
“That’s the kind of thing I like to do when I’m on holiday.”
“Have you ever been to Antwerp on holiday?” Jacob asked.
“No.”
“It is an interesting old city, the largest in Flanders. The people speak Flemish, although, curiously, they refer to themselves as sinjoren, which is a bastardization of the Spanish word señor,” he said.
“That is odd.”
“The Spaniards occupied and ran the city in the sixteenth century. The other provinces that made up the territory were also occupied at various times, by the French, Dutch, and Germans. There was so much fighting on territorial soil that it became known as ‘the cockpit of Europe.’ Belgium as we know it today wasn’t founded until 1830.”
“In addition to your other talents, you’re also a history buff?”
“I like to read, and I do have an interest in it, but I have to say my interest in Antwerp is more on a personal level,” he said.
“Your wife is from there?”
“No, she’s Dutch. My grandfather is the one who generated my interest. As a young man he was an exceptional athlete, good enough to qualify for the Dutch Olympic team that went to the summer games in 1920, which were held in Antwerp,” Jacob said. He smiled and patted his belly. “As you can see, I don’t exactly take after him.”
“I’m sure you did when you were younger.”
“No, this has always been my shape. Riding a bicycle around town is the most athletic thing I’ve done in my life,” he said. “But my grandfather was different; he competed in the hardest event of all — the decathlon — and finished fourth, beaten out of a medal by only four points, by a Swede. I can’t tell you how many times I heard him bemoan that he hadn’t gone a tenth of a second faster in a race or a few inches higher in the high jump or a few inches farther in the broad jump. Being that close to a medal haunted him, and it burned the name of Antwerp into my memory.”
“That’s such a sad story.”
“It shouldn’t have been. He had fought in the First World War, and the fact that he survived and was able to compete at all should have been reason enough to make him happy. But being happy wasn’t his natural state. I suspect that if he’d won that bronze medal, he would have been miserable because it wasn’t silver.”
“You don’t take after him in that regard either.”
“My mother was a jolly person. She thought that no matter how bad things were, they could always be worse, and she was grateful they weren’t. Her attitude stuck with me.”
“My mother is a bit like that,” Ava said. “I’m not. I tend to be a worrier.”
“You wouldn’t have lasted too long in your profession otherwise. Taking things for granted is folly.”
Ava looked across the table at Jacob, struck again by how astute he was. She started to say something, but, not wanting to delve any deeper into her old profession, she turned her head towards the window and lapsed into a silence that lasted until the train arrived in Antwerp.
They disembarked into a vast main hall with a huge dome towering over it. Ava was awestruck by the size and majesty of the station. She was still staring upwards when Jacob said loudly, “We’ll exit over there. Mr. Jaswa’s office is only a short distance away.”
They walked out of the station into a day that had turned dreary and overcast. Ava stopped for a second to look back at the massive Gothic structure. As she did, a brisk gust of wind caused her to shiver. “It looks like it could rain,” she said.
“I have an umbrella in my briefcase if we need it,” Jacob said.
“That’s a remarkable briefcase,” Ava said. “I’m almost afraid to ask what else you have in there.”
“I still have the sandwiches if you get hungry,” he said.
“Maybe later,” she said, having to hurry to keep alongside him. For a short, stout man he walked very quickly.
They hadn’t gone more than a few hundred metres when Ava saw a sign on the side of a building that read diamantkwartier. She followed Jacob as he entered a narrow street flanked by rows of nondescript three- and four-storey buildings. There were bollards at each end of the street, restricting access to just pedestrians and bicycles.
A steady stream of people were moving in both directions along the street and making their way in and out of the buildings. On the ground level of several buildings were jewellery stores or, more accurately, stores that specialized in diamonds. Ava had expected the security to be strong, but on the street it wasn’t even visible. Jacob came to a stop at a frosted glass door and then checked his watch. “Good, we’re right on time,” he said, opening the door, and stood aside so Ava could pass.
She stepped into a lobby and was met immediately by a hulking security guard. He held out his arm. “Stop, please,” he said.
“We are here to see Mr. Jaswa. We have an appointment. My name is Jacob Smits and my colleague is Ava Lee,” Jacob said loudly from behind her.
Ava looked past the guard into the lobby. She and Jacob were no more than twenty metres from a set of elevators, but to get to them, their first challenge was to pass through a full-body screening device. It was i
mpossible to avoid, because sheets of Plexiglas ran from it to the walls and from the floor to the ceiling.
“Their appointment is in the register,” a guard sitting on the other side of the machine said.
“Okay, you can go on through. One at a time,” the first guard said.
It took ten minutes to be screened, for Ava’s bag and Jacob’s briefcase to be emptied and the contents examined, for a retina scan, for their fingerprints to be taken, and for their passports to be copied.
“They didn’t have the eye scan the last time I was here,” Jacob said when they were finally permitted to make their way to the elevators.
Ava examined the building directory and did a quick count of the companies listed. If the list was accurate, there were about sixty company offices in a three-storey building that she wouldn’t have thought could house twenty. She mentioned that to Jacob as they rode the elevator to the third floor.
“The entire diamond quarter is no more than a square mile, but, if my memory is accurate, I believe Mr. Jaswa told me there are more than a thousand trading companies operating within its boundaries,” said Jacob.
They exited the elevator into a hallway that extended straight in both directions. It had a black linoleum floor, walls painted a drab brown, overhead lighting that was piercingly bright, and security cameras every three metres on both sides of the hallway. Jacob stopped in front of a grey steel door with a brass number six. He knocked and raised his head. Ava looked up and saw security cameras on either side of the lintel. She heard a loud click, and Jacob turned the handle and pushed the door open.
“Mr. Smits. I didn’t expect to see you again so soon,” said a tall, thin man wearing a crisp white shirt and creased black slacks.
“As I explained on the phone, my associate Ms. Lee represents some people who have been swindled in a most ungodly way by someone who purports to be a religious man,” Jacob said. “It is regrettable that he chose to involve the diamond trading community in his scam, but the facts are what they are.”
