by D C Macey
It was very hard to get through the recruitment interview process at Franz’s bank, but once in, staff were rewarded well and treated properly, and staff turnover was very low. People left because they were retiring or leaving Zurich. To leave for any other reason was considered quite remarkable.
After a few minutes’ conversation, Franz took Helen and Elaine in the lift up to his penthouse office. There, they all sat and, shortly afterwards, coffee and cakes appeared. Helen shared her East African experiences and explained why she now needed the cash quickly.
Franz took the hint and called in his chief cashier who was delighted to be introduced to Helen. He took great pleasure in telling her that for several years, since his promotion to chief cashier, he had held personal responsibility for day-to-day oversight of her accounts and he hoped there would be many years still to come.
He disappeared and, shortly afterwards, returned to announce the money was counted and ready. He just needed to recount it with Helen and have her sign a receipt. She thanked him and asked if he might do the recount with Elaine. There was something else she needed to attend to.
Alone, Franz looked at Helen inquisitively. ‘Is there something else I can help you with?’
‘Well, I mentioned I had some contact with the bishop from Ethiopia. He showed me a picture of an artefact he has in Addis Ababa, something of interest. I think they have a link to John Dearly’s past, another one of his secrets that I never got a chance to learn about before he died. If it’s possible, I’d like to go down to my security deposit box and check something.’
‘Of course. Please go straight down now. You know which button to press. I will telephone ahead and alert the security detail that you are on your way.’ He guided Helen from the door of his office and stood with her until the lift came. As the doors closed, she smiled to herself in response to Franz’s strict adherence to traditional European form. He bowed his head very slightly, and just as happened months before, she was sure she heard his heels clip together.
Following a rapid descent, the doors opened to reveal a familiar corridor, the glazed wall at the end and the security detail watching her from beyond the bombproof glass. She reached the doors and waited, knowing the guards could not open their security doors until the lift had returned to reception level.
After a few moments, once the lift had gone and the security requirement had been met, one of the guards opened the doors and welcomed her by name. Then he guided her into a private room. It had rich wood panelling, cut from the same tree as the table that sat in the centre of the room. Helen sat at the table and waited while watching the spot on the wall where she knew a discreet panel would open shortly to reveal her security box.
It took only a few moments for the panel to drop and there it was. She caught her breath, remembering the first time she had come here. Innocent and unknowing. Those days were long gone. Recalling how heavy the box was, she crossed to the door and pressed a buzzer. One of the guards entered and carried it to the table for her. The man did so in silence then immediately left the room and closed the door behind him.
Alone again with her security box, Helen let her hands glide over its surface. She allowed herself a minute to think of her predecessor, John Dearly, and of all those that had gone before him. Now it was just her. Pulling out her keys, she selected John Dearly’s old key and unlocked the box. She lifted the lid and felt a shiver run down her spine. What was she about to find? Just as importantly, how would her box link with the box in Ethiopia?
She carefully unpacked items, each one triggering reminders of her agreement with Sam that he would come and properly appraise the contents. She needed to get Sam back here - she needed to get him out of jail first though.
Helen reached in for the ornate wooden box and lifted it out. It was just as she remembered, like a jewellery box, polished, the sides worked with an intricate marquetry pattern. Just as when she first saw it, she felt its design owed more to Islam than Christianity. No sign of any openings, but by its weight, she knew it was not solid. After satisfying herself there was no doubt that her box was the same as the bishop’s she put it back. On an impulse, she took it out again. Putting it aside on the table, she packed everything else away and locked the security box. Then she pressed the buzzer to call the guard who quickly transferred the security box back to the open wall panel. As he left the room, the panel slid shut and Helen stood alone with the ornate artefact.
Arriving back in Franz’s office, she saw that Elaine now held a neat little briefcase. Elaine promptly placed it on Franz’s desk and opened the lid to show Helen a thousand one hundred-dollar bills, all neatly bundled. Helen smiled at her and then tried to squeeze her ornate box into the briefcase too.
Franz stopped her; he made a phone call and requested bubble wrap and a larger briefcase. His requests were delivered almost at once. Helen transferred the cash and then, carefully wrapping the box, she placed it beside the cash. Franz leant in to pack more bubble wrap over everything and then she closed the case, locked it and looked up at her friends. ‘Well, time to go.’
‘Won’t you stop for an early evening meal?’ said Franz. ‘Just a little something. Sara is keen to see you again.’
‘No, but thank you. There’s no time, and anyway, Xavier’s plane is always stocked with eats. Now I must fly.’ She smiled at her own joke. Franz gave a polite laugh and Elaine remained her usual impassive self.
Franz bowed his head very slightly. ‘Now Helen, if I may …’ He lifted his perfectly tailored overcoat down from a coat stand and draped it around her shoulders.
16.
Monday, 28th October - AM
Helen carried her shoulder bag and briefcase as she stepped down from the plane at Mount Kilimanjaro Airport. The case was a little lighter now since she had taken out the box and had the cabin crew lock it in the plane’s safe. The sun was already illuminating the eastern sky. Helen looked at it with some anxiety, hoping she had returned in time.
The airport was quiet, and her pilot had been able to taxi to the most favoured executive landing spot. Here, the airport was used to VIP arrivals, rich people dropping in for safaris and other private business. The ground staff had long been schooled in the art of not delaying VIPs, and a member of the incoming flight crew would invariably leave a little something in return for the airport staff’s considerate treatment. Not leaving something would result in a very difficult and protracted exit process.
Consequently, Helen’s route through customs and immigration was smooth and unhindered. She exited the executive arrivals doors and walked quickly into the main passenger hall. This area was single storied with white walls and what appeared to be marbled floors. Cleaners were dotting about, preparing for the new day and a smattering of passengers were arriving for the early morning flight down to Dar es Salaam.
Angel met her at the exit and pointed towards the car park that was immediately adjacent to the airport entrance. A Land Rover sat in the nearest space, engine revving. No colours showed up in the predawn monochrome, but she knew it was orange. Angel opened the front door and she got in. He climbed in behind, and immediately, Mauwled manoeuvred out of the parking bay, allowing a chocolate wrapper to flutter out of his open window as he pulled away. They headed in the direction of Arusha.
‘Did you manage to get the money?’ said Angel, leaning forward, hands gripping the front seat headrests.
Helen half turned her head and raised her hand holding the briefcase. ‘It’s all in here.’
‘Praise God,’ said Angel. ‘Praise God a hundred times.’ He leant further forward and prodded Mauwled’s arm. ‘Faster, we must not be late.’
‘Will we make it?’ said Helen.
‘No problem.’ Mauwled glanced quickly at her then back to the road. It was a good road, properly built, but it never paid to take your eyes off it. Anyone and anything used these roads, and most did not bother with lights, meaning there was always the threat of unlit carts or stock-laden bicycles appearing out
of nowhere. ‘We’ll be there before eight.’
‘Where are we making the transfer?’ Helen turned to look at Angel in the rear seat.
‘I have arranged to meet our solicitor in the town, at the clock tower. We will go to see the police chief’s cousin outside his office building and then do the handover in there. Then we must drive to the police headquarters where he will go in and the police chief will release Sam. Simple.’
‘It sounds it,’ said Helen.
Angel leant forward again. ‘For you, this is a dirty business, frightening, worrying for you and your friend. But I think the police chief and his cousin are naughty men. For them, this is just another day’s work. If they get their money, all will be well’
‘Let’s hope so.’
The drive to Arusha continued in silence, Helen deep in thought, the others reluctant to disturb her. With each passing minute, the darkness lifted a little and the start of morning business got nearer. She wished they had made better time but knew everyone had done their best.
The Land Rover slowed a little, and she watched absently as they passed a pickup truck, half off the road, its front buried in the rear of a donkey drawn cart. The collision had dislodged part of the cart’s enormous load. At the front, the donkey had regained its footing and stood quietly between the shafts, quite happy with the break from dragging its near impossible load. On the road beside it, the drivers haggled and, as always seemed to happen, a crowd had formed from the empty landscape to jostle and argue or just to enjoy the spectacle.
• • •
The traffic had proven slower than normal, and Mauwled had been obliged to drive faster and more aggressively than was safe. They needed to meet with Angel’s solicitor by eight o’clock if the transaction was to be completed in time. At a couple of minutes after eight, the orange Land Rover finally pushed through the traffic on Old Moshi Road and the Arusha Clock Tower came into view. Here, at the centre of old Arusha, the buildings were low-rise: two, three and four floors.
Helen heaved a sigh of relief. ‘There’s the clock tower,’ she said. Mauwled nodded in acknowledgement of what he already knew and kept the engine revving slightly more than he needed, trying to unnerve the driver in front.
‘I don’t see our friend said Angel. He’s not at the clock.’
‘Look again, he has to be here,’ said Mauwled, focusing on keeping the Land Rover going around the broad sweep of the grass-verged roundabout, at the heart of which sat the Arusha Clock Tower. To keep on the inner lane of the roundabout, he forced the Land Rover into an impossibly small gap between a van and a commuter’s car. The car driver gave ground and hooted in frustration. Mauwled ignored the protest and kept turning. ‘Look! Can you see him?’
Angel was shaking his head disconsolately while peering out of the side window at the clock tower.
They would soon be making a third circuit. ‘Where exactly did you say you’d meet him?’ said Helen.
‘At the clock tower, right here.’ Angel pointed frantically through the window. ‘He’s not here.’
Helen looked about. ‘Could he be anywhere else? Where else might he be?’
Angel gave up staring at the roundabout’s clock tower and began desperately to look about. And almost at once, he saw his friend standing in the petrol station forecourt on the junction of Old Moshi Road.
‘There, there,’ he said, leaning into the front and pointing across Mauwled towards a small man in grey flannels and a neatly pressed, open-necked, white shirt. ‘In the petrol station.’
For the second time, Mauwled generated a tide of bad feeling from his fellow drivers as he forced the Land Rover across lanes and directly into the garage forecourt.
Angel hurried out to speak with his friend whose displeasure at their lateness was equally matched by Angel’s annoyance that the solicitor had not stood where he had said he would.
Helen witnessed the bickering exchange through the glass windscreen; saw the mime of mouthed recriminations and the arm gestures. It all came to an abrupt halt when Mauwled rested his finger on the horn and pressed. He kept it sounding until the two men stopped arguing and turned to see why the horn was sounding. Mauwled beckoned them to get in the Land Rover and they both hurried to get aboard.
Angel was quick to introduce his friend Mr Kasanda as Helen leant round and shook his hand. She wished there was more time for her to speak with him before the plan was implemented, but that wasn’t to be.
‘Change of plan, take the Boma Road exit. We’re picking up our man at the Palace Hotel. I’m worried that we will be late,’ said Mr Kasanda.
Mauwled bullied his way back through the traffic and right round the clock tower for the third time, now taking the exit before the petrol station. ‘We’ll be there in two minutes,’ he said.
‘We collect the police chief’s cousin from the front of the hotel and drive to the police chief’s home. We’ll count the money there; he’ll take it in and phone his cousin at police headquarters. Then he’ll release Sam.
‘Will we get all that done before nine?’ said Helen.
Nobody answered; it was going to be tight.
As they drove along Boma Road, Helen scanned each side in her search for the Palace Hotel. She noted how many of the building heights were beginning to rise. The properties here seemed newer, higher, and brighter. And then they were at the Palace Hotel. Disregarding the parking restrictions, Mauwled stopped directly in front and immediately a man approached. He was smartly turned out, similar to Angel’s friend but with a necktie neatly fixed around his neck.
Angel opened the nearside rear passenger door and got out, holding it for the police chief’s cousin. The man climbed in beside Mr Kasanda while Angel got into the front, squeezing beside Helen.
‘Where to?’ said Mauwled. There were no introductions or small talk. The man gave directions and Mauwled followed them; otherwise, silence.
Pressing through the rush hour grind it took more than thirty minutes to reach their destination. Helen noted they were in roughly the same district as Jeanie Albright’s guesthouse, driving up a similar long and winding dirt track fringed with trees. Here too, occasional walled compounds dotted along its length while elsewhere between the trees, were patches of cultivated land and clusters of shanty style houses for the local poor.
‘Turn off at the next turning on your left; it opens into a small clearing. Drive across the clearing and stop directly outside the compound gates.’
Mauwled followed the instructions and in the quiet of the clearing, Helen felt vulnerable. This was the perfect spot for a double-cross.
‘Mr Kasanda and I have some business to transact. I wonder if all of you in the front seats of the vehicle might like to get out and take a stroll around the clearing. We will let you know when we’re done.’ The man spoke with a perfectly structured English accent that really would have been quite at home in any court in the UK. He smiled politely, but for all his nice phrasing, it had been an instruction that did not brook resistance.
Helen looked at her watch. ‘It’s getting close to nine o’clock. There’s not much time.’
‘I am aware of the time, young lady. Now, if you wish we lawyers to conclude the transaction you must go and allow us to do our work.’
Helen passed the briefcase and key to Mr Kasanda and then got out. She wanted to slap the police chief’s cousin for his arrogance and for his crookedness. She contained herself. Time was all that mattered now. When the law offices opened, the police chief would be obliged to have Sam’s detention processed into the system.
Getting out with Mauwled and Angel, Helen threw a final worried glance towards Mr Kasanda before walking quickly away from the Land Rover. They headed for a spot that was still shaded from the new morning sun and stopped there. Helen and Angel turned and looked back at the Land Rover. Mauwled concerned himself with the possibility of things he couldn’t see in the undergrowth beyond the clearing. It all seemed quiet.
‘They’re taking too long, we’
re not going to make the deadline,’ said Angel.
‘There are a thousand bills to count, that takes time,’ said Helen, forcing herself to believe there was time. She couldn’t let Sam be transferred to Kenya.
As the minutes continued to tick away, all they could make out were little movements in the rear of the Land Rover. She glanced at her watch. It was after five to. They were going to run out of time.
With just a minute to go, the two men climbed out of the Land Rover. There was no shaking of hands. The police chief’s cousin held the briefcase. He waved to Helen with his other hand and called out. ‘It’s been quite the pleasure to do business. Thank you, and goodbye.’ Then he banged on the compound gates. A round of barking went up, it was quickly silenced by shouts from the watchman who pulled open the gate and the police chief’s cousin stepped through. The gate banged shut behind him.
Helen and her two companions broke into a run, crossing the clearing in seconds.
‘Was the money okay? There’s never going to be time for him to make a call now,’ said Helen. ‘It’s nine o’clock.’ The frustration in her voice was clearly audible.
‘Then I’ll be going in there to get your money back. I’ll take him and the dogs. Don’t worry, he won’t get away with it,’ said Mauwled. He rested both arms high up on the compound wall and pressed, exercising his frustration.’
Mr Kasanda was looking a little perplexed. ‘Please, there is nothing to be concerned over. It is done.’
Helen stood in front of him, just managing to restrain herself from jabbing a finger in his chest. ‘No, it’s too late. He had to phone before nine. That didn’t happen so Sam will be sent to Nairobi.’
Mr Kasanda waved his hands in front of him. ‘No, no, I said it is done. As soon as I opened the briefcase, he flicked through your bundles of notes. He was happy you weren’t cheating him and then made his call, even before we counted it. Your friend will be free already!’
