Ed nodded. In 1973, OPEC had raised the price of oil; the energy crisis and worldwide inflation were the result. Not surprisingly, there had been great anxiety as to whether other cartels might form, whether other producers of such necessities to Western industry as copper or bauxite might collude to form a monopoly and then raise their prices to a level at which whole industries and whole countries would suffer.
In early 1978 the African nation of Zaïre—which produced over half the world’s cobalt supply—reduced cobalt allotments to their customers by 30 percent. The rebel invasion of Zaïre in May 1978 was followed by a minor panic, because the world’s cobalt supply was expected to be drastically reduced. The price of cobalt quickly jumped from $11 to $25 per kilo, and by December (because of panic buying) the price had jumped to $120. Vast fortunes had been made—and probably would be made again, for cobalt resources were expected to be exhausted by the year 2065.
During the mid-1970s, soaring prices of other raw materials started a worldwide rush to buy new mines; this overinvestment resulted in an oversupply of raw materials and consequent low prices, at a time of world recession. This was one of the reasons that Nexus, together with the entire global mining industry, had been in a slump for several years.
Ed said, “Read on, Arthur. It gets even better.”
Arthur read on. Suddenly he sat up and looked at Ed.
Ed nodded. “Yes, the real find is chromite.” All the different, treble-checked tests had shown that the samples contained evenly distributed, high-concentrate chromite.
In the bleak November light, the two men stared at each other. Provided they handled it carefully, the chance of a lifetime might lie beneath the dark-green jungle canopy of the Turtlebacks.
Wonderingly Arthur said, “Not only chromite, but this very high concentrate?”
“Seven to ten. That equals the best in South Africa.”
“We could use a little good luck, for a change,” Arthur said softly. “How many people have seen this report?”
“I brought it straight to you,” Ed said.
“South Africa will be after it.”
Ninety percent of the world’s chromite reserves were in South Africa, so that country was in a position to hold up the rest of the world for ransom. Chromite alloy is used to make stainless steel for the automobile, aircraft and spacecraft industries. If South Africa, for political reasons, decided to withhold its chromite, the result would be a sudden, worldwide recession.
Arthur tapped the report. “If this news gets out, we’ll never get the Paui mining concessions, because South Africa will pay whatever is asked for them. They’ll have to outbid Nexus, to protect their own position.”
“No question.”
“This survey has cost us a helluva lot of money. Why hand them the report on a platter?”
Ed nodded. Together with many senior officials, the Paui Minister of the Interior and Natural Resources had been paid his secret fee, after which permission to survey the whole of the north coast had been given. As was customary, Nexus had also agreed to let the minister read the survey report.
After a brief pause, Arthur added softly, “I think you’d better lose a page or two of this report, Ed.”
Ed looked apprehensive but resigned, for he had expected the suggestion. It meant that he would be aiding and abetting an illegal operation. However, few mining prospectors have the scruples of an archbishop when it comes to staking, registering, purchasing, or in any way hanging on to their claim.
Ed said, “You mean we only mention copper and uranium in the survey report that we show the President, but we hold out for an all-minerals-and-all-metals contract. Of course that will arouse their suspicions. So we allow them to …”
“… find out about the cobalt. You have to sacrifice a goat to get a tiger.”
“Naturally they won’t expect us to tell the whole truth.”
“It never pays to be straight with the crooked. They can’t understand it, it bewilders them,” Arthur said.
“So we plant a red herring for them to discover—and then not mention?” Ed thought a moment, then said, “At least two people in the lab must know that we’re on to chromite—the analyst concerned, and the chief analyst. But of course the samples were coded as usual—so ultimately, Arthur, only you and I know where they came from.”
Arthur waved at the 150-page report on the sofa, which included the maps and photographs. “Get the file copy of the report from Records. Ask Records for all the other copies, then send Records a memo telling them to book everything out to you. Get the negatives and all prints from the studio.”
Ed thought, I’ll be the only person responsible for concealing, falsifying and possibly destroying documents. He said, “Will do.”
“Keep the report locked in your safe at home, Ed, not in the office safe. See that the rock samples are dumped as junk.”
“Sure, Arthur.”
“And of course, the Paui negotiations are now top priority. Tell Harry Scott to handle it personally. It won’t look unusual, will it, if he goes along with the man from his Contracts Department to negotiate with them?”
“Not at all unusual. In fact, Third World presidents sometimes insist on only doing business with the head of an organization, for status reasons.”
They both knew that after a series of meetings with the President and his Minister of Finance and Natural Resources, the Nexus men would hammer out a mining rights contract which would include a profit-participation percentage for the Paui government (which already owned 20 percent of Paui-Nexus Mining Ltd.). Of course, they would also have to make private payments to the Credit Suisse in Zurich, into the accounts of the President and the two ministers concerned—who might go barefoot in their home villages but were pretty sophisticated when it came to Swiss banks.
The special payments would not be mentioned in the contract or at the meetings. Only once would they be allusively referred to, at a one-on-one, short meeting for coffee in the private house of one of the ministers concerned. Eventually, after a certain amount of stilted conversation over coffee, the Heads of Agreement would be signed by everyone concerned, after which it was up to the lawyers to write a contract that would be agreeable to all parties.
In the dusk, Arthur tapped the survey report. “Pity there’s been a change of government.” Unfortunately, in November 1983, Raki had been out of power for several months, and negotiations with the new government had produced no results.
Now, almost a year later, the President of Paui had at last agreed to talk to the president of Nexus, which is why the Nexus top executives were on the island, wearing tropical suits and open-necked shirts, strolling along to the Paradise Bay airstrip, hoping to take the biggest step that Nexus had ever taken….
As Ed turned the bend in the road to the airstrip, he heard running footsteps behind him.
Brett was panting on Ed’s heels; he’d been halfway to the airstrip before he realized that once again he’d forgotten his asthma spray.
“Broke a shoelace,” Brett said.
* * *
Scarlet creepers framed the door of the modest bungalow on the hotel grounds, in front of which the skipper of the Louise, wearing blue jeans and a white shirt, was kissing his wife. He’d met her when he went to her dad’s place to purchase supplies for his boat, and they had been married shortly afterward. Louise was small, slim and dark, with yellow-speckled hazel eyes that slanted up at the corners like a cat’s; people thought she was South American or perhaps Greek, but she was Anglo-Indian, and there was a trace of her Indian mother’s pedantic lilt in her voice.
“Curry tonight, Louise?” He pulled down her turquoise sarong and kissed the top of her breast.
“My goodness, we don’t eat home tonight.” She drew back and pulled her sarong up to a respectable height. “Tuesday night is beach barbecue night and tonight’s going to be the last of the season, with tribal dancing afterwards. So make sure you get those tourists back to me in time for it. We light
the bonfire at seven o’clock sharp. And no flirting tonight.”
This was their private joke. Female hotel guests often made overtures to the wiry, bronzed skipper, but he saw tourists only as a means of paying for his boat. He didn’t dislike them, they probably deserved their holiday. He was always polite, but he kept his distance and never became involved with them, never accepted any evening invitations.
“And the same to you, Lou.” Louise’s official title was Entertainments Manager, which meant that she sat at a desk in the reception area of the Paradise Bay Hotel and arranged all outings, trips, tennis court and golf bookings. The male guests were as much of a hazard for Louise as the female ones were for her husband.
Rather than sitting around being affable with strangers tonight, he would prefer to be snug in his own crib, thought the skipper as he set off down the poinsettia-lined path toward the jetty, but it was no use arguing with Lou. Outwardly submissive to him, she had a mind of her own and he always seemed to do as she wanted, even if it was being agreeable to a bunch of noisy strangers rather than having a quiet dinner at home. Their bungalow had hardly any furniture, because Lou liked to go barefoot indoors and sit cross-legged on the beautiful rugs her grandfather had sent them as a wedding present. The only Western furniture they possessed was a big brass bed that the skipper had bought cheap in Queenstown from a missionary who’d had enough of Paui.
At the bend in the path, the skipper turned again to wave goodbye. He laughed. That bloody goat was chewing her sarong again.
Louise bent down, parted the little pink jaws and gently pried the turquoise cotton from them.
She called out, “Billy wants his breakfast. Goodbye, darling.”
“’Bye, Lou.” As he set off down the path toward the beach, he could not know he was saying that to her for the last time.
* * *
The women climbed aboard the boat with stiff little movements, afraid of losing their balance. As the skipper helped Carey aboard, he noticed her gloved hands and said, “Sore? Well, that was a good catch yesterday. You’ll find the tackle box down below, if you care to try your luck today.”
He shot out a brown arm to steady Suzy, who had jumped down from the jetty and landed off-balance. She wore a pink halter top, skin-tight pink shorts, white wraparound sunglasses with slits like a ski racer’s, and high-heeled white sandals.
The skipper said, “There’s a box of tennis shoes in the cabin, ma’am. Those heels’ll ruin my deck.”
Suzy said, “Is it okay if I go barefoot?”
The skipper nodded, then helped Silvana aboard. She stumbled against him, climbed down awkwardly to the deck and straightened her black cotton Valentino jumpsuit, which had been cleverly cut over the behind.
Slowly, the boat moved from the quay. Roddy, in brief yellow swimming trunks, waved them off. He firmly intended to stay by the pool for the entire day. The women waved back to him. In the bow, Suzy tied up her long blond hair in a pink scarf and settled down carefully to anoint every visible inch of her flesh with suntan oil.
Patty went below to check the snorkeling equipment. “You got spear guns. Great.”
The skipper looked at her short-sleeved navy shirt and white shorts. “There’s a pile of long-sleeved cotton shirts in that end locker, and cotton jungle hats and straw sun hats in the corner. You’ll get a bad sunburn if you stay all day in short sleeves. Please tell the other ladies.” Except for Carey, they were all the same, he thought, no hats, short sleeves, shorts that left their legs bare and hardly covered their bums, and they expected a pair of snappy sunglasses and a suntan spray to protect them from the tropical sun. They’d all get bad burns if he didn’t nurse them.
Carey poked her head out of the cabin and called, “I can’t find the tackle box, there’s such a lot of stuff down here.”
The scrawny black boatboy jumped from the upper deck, landed like a cat and joined her in the cabin.
“Why isn’t all this stored away?” Carey waved at the heap of gear at the back of the cabin.
“Hotel visitors want many things. No room in lockers.” He pointed to the lockers beneath the bench seats on either side of the cabin. Carey tried to open one, but it was locked.
The boy said, “Guns in locker.”
“Guns?”
The skipper poked his head into the cabin. “I keep a rifle in there, in case someone tries to steal the boat or I have to go ashore in strange country. Winston stores a machete there, for the same reason. We lock ’em up because I don’t want my passengers to accidentally chop their hands off or blow each other’s heads off.” He turned to the boy. “Get up to the wheel, Winston, and keep her heading out to sea until we’re level with the headland. Then call me.”
Carey said, “None of these lockers open.”
“No,” the skipper said. At least one of them’s properly dressed, he thought. Carey wore a loose, long-sleeved blue cotton shirt and matching pants. “Lockers are for locking, to keep people away from the contents. We store emergency rocket flares and mini-flares in the first locker. The far locker is the ship’s paint store.”
Carey looked at the heap of gear in the back of the cabin and asked, “Why do you need mosquito nets and a flashlight to fish?”
“It’s an underwater flashlight, and it ain’t for fishing. Sometimes you want to get under your boat and see what’s happening to the keel. And if you ever had to sleep aboard around here, you’d know why I keep the mozzie nets handy.” He fumbled beneath the mosquito netting. “Here’s the tackle box. Now let’s decide what you’re going to use today.” Squatting, he picked among the brilliantly colored plastic lures.
In the stern, Annie tucked her pale green sleeveless shirt into her dark green slacks and said to Carey, “Isn’t this wonderful weather? I love these company trips.” She had firmly pushed thoughts of Harry out of her mind, but at night her body betrayed her.
“You’re meant to love them,” Carey said idly, her eyes on their wake. “These trips are meant to keep us all in line. Once a year, all wives of executives are whisked off to some exotic place, waited on hand and foot, offered tall drinks and orchids, and are expected to forget what they had to put up with during the past year, thanks to the company.”
“You don’t really mean that, Carey.” Annie looked around nervously to check that Silvana wasn’t listening.
“I mean that the first rule of big business is women and children last,” Carey said, firmly. “I’m supposed to sympathize, not complain, if Ed’s exhausted because of jet lag, expense-luncheon lag or entertaining-Arabs-at-the-Playboy-Club lag.”
“Keep your voice down, Carey,” Annie urged.
Carey ignored her. “I’m not supposed to mind if our plans are canceled at the last minute, or if I only see Ed in the evenings at some dreadful business banquet with a smile plastered on my face.”
“That’s part of being a loyal company wife,” Annie chided, “and the company does care about a man’s family obligations.”
“The company is very careful to be seen to care, because that’s good business sense.”
“Don’t be cynical, Carey,” Annie said. “Think of those personalized Christmas gifts to all the kids.”
“Takes no time to tap them out on the computer,” Carey pointed out. “Then even the kids are rooting for the company. We’ve all been brainwashed, Annie.” Carey jerked her head up as her line went tense. But she hadn’t got a bite. “At the last Nexus picnic I met a poor soul whose husband is in Overseas Development. She’d had to move sixteen times in eighteen years.”
“She’s obviously a loyal company wife.”
Carey snorted. “Do you know what being a loyal company wife is? It’s being a dumb woman. And to think that Ed wonders why I hang on to my job.”
There was silence on board as they rounded the southern headland. Carey was fishing, Suzy was sun-bathing and the three other women were gazing hypnotically at the brilliant green strip of shore that was slowly moving past their eyes. They didn’t spe
ak much. Although their manner was friendly, these women had nothing in common. An amicable veneer of politeness covered Annie’s timidity, Patty’s anxiety, Carey’s cynicism, Suzy’s defensive hostility and Silvana’s languid indifference. Because Silvana was Arthur’s wife, the other women felt slightly ill at ease.
“You’ll all need these,” said the skipper firmly, and distributed the shirts.
* * *
NEXUS was printed in black letters on the doors of the yellow Toyota minibus moving slowly through the crowded main street, heading for the Presidential Palace on the other side of town.
The Nexus VPs had flown to town in two loads, because the mine only had one four-passenger helicopter. Usually a mine wouldn’t have even that, because helicopters are only used to search for mine sites and haul in building materials when an operation is being set up. But a helicopter was the only practical way to travel around the difficult terrain of Paui. Nexus also used the Bell to fly executives and key technicians to and from Queenstown Airport and the Mount Ida airstrip, and as a medical vehicle, to get people from the mine to the hospital as fast as possible.
The pilot, an uncommunicative New Zealander, was a pilot-engineer, which meant that no technician was needed for the Bell. She carried normal running spares; otherwise, spare parts had to be flown in from the mainland on the once-a-week Air Niugini flight.
The custom-built, air-conditioned interior of the minibus was a relief after the heat of the airport. As they moved through the town, Arthur peered through a window. There seemed to be one hell of a lot of police around. They wore black boots and camouflage uniforms and across their chests were strips of white tape on which the word POLICE had been scrawled in ballpoint pen.
The mine manager said, “There are always a lot of police around, sir.” As soon as the Australians left, in 1975, the colonial-style constabulary had been transformed into a paramilitary police force, and within a few months that force had transmogrified into the Paui Defense Force, the PDF.
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