Dedi had been unsurprised to learn Randall was a police officer – he was used to people not being what they claimed to be. Last night they’d left Piri harbour within minutes of Randall’s call to Maxwell, jolted by his warning that Sumoto was now in Kutu on a killing spree. They’d crossed from the Morning Glory to the powerboat alongside, a fifteen-metre craft called Timini which Dugdale kept filled with fuel and tinned food. They’d upped anchor and puttered out of Piri Bay without lights.
During the night Dedi had talked to keep himself awake. Rambled about Kutuans he knew who’d been taken by the police and disappeared. And of mountain people seeing helicopters drop bodies into Jiwa’s molten heart.
Myth or truth, Randall had been chilled by his words. Charlie was in the hands of these men. The minutes, the hours were ticking past. He hoped to God Maxwell had pulled his finger out in getting wheels turning on her behalf.
To reach Kutu from Bali, the ketch Berkat Amanat with the kidnapped minister on board would have to navigate a channel that had been carved through the large island of Manda by an earthquake in a previous millennium. A few hundred metres wide, it was a natural choke-point. And now it lay ahead of them. The ketch, they assumed, was still on the other side of it, heading their way.
Daylight had brought a feverishness to the Kutuan, a restlessness that verged on mania. Dedi sat hunched over the helm, staring into the lightening haze, brooding about his sister’s arrest, Brad’s disappearance and his powerlessness to do anything about any of it.
Randall sat next to him on the bridge, locked in his own thoughts. He knew that the mission he’d been given defied common sense. A job for the marines, not a lone, unarmed copper. Saving Bowen would mean getting on board the Berkat Amanat unseen or unopposed, then surviving the attention of his captors. Madness, yet he’d been ordered to try.
‘You must judge,’ Maxwell had said. ‘Up to you, old boy. But if it’s possible, then do it.’
‘Nick!’ Dedi jabbed a finger to port.
‘What is it?’ He saw the outline of a small ship about a mile off.
‘ABRI,’ Dedi growled fearfully. ‘Gunboat.’
Pinisi Berkat Amanat
The British minister of state for foreign affairs lay on his side, left cheek on the floor sticky with sweat. The poison in his blood had taken hold and drained him of the strength to lift his head. The thrumming of the diesels throbbed through his jaw like an abscess. On the other side of his head, the stump of his ear burned beneath a stinking bandage.
For twelve hours he’d drifted in and out of consciousness as the fever took its grip. The scalpel they’d cut him with had been dirty and sepsis had infected his blood. His mouth was paper dry. They’d stopped bringing food or water. In moments of lucidity he knew they meant him to die.
His pulse pounded, his breath rasped. He wanted to scream at that devil Copeland who’d done nothing to save him. The bastard was letting him rot. Because of the money.
Bowen feared death. No solution for a gambler. There always had to be a way out. But not through the tiny bloody porthole that had been his only link with the outside world for the past nine days. The shaft of sun streaming in mocked him by dancing circles on the floor as the boat rolled and rocked.
For the first few days of his confinement – hands chained to his feet, feet chained to a ring on the floor – he’d believed they’d all been taken. General Sumoto, Selina too. Three of them. He’d worried about the abuse Selina’s sweet, salty body might have been subjected to by these thugs. Then it had sunk in. He was alone on his prison ship. Just him and his guards. Slowly, a dripping tap of suspicion had led to the realisation it was Sumoto who had duped him – Sumoto who’d used his own whore to seduce him for some purpose that could only be guessed at.
Bowen watched the beam of light from the porthole brush back and forth on the floor in front of him as the boat ploughed purposely through the waters of the Pacific. Then a slight change of course swung it away from him so that it lit up the foot of something black and metal. The tripod. The video camera was still there.
It had been his enemy, that camera – an ogling witness to his pain. He focused his hate on the blurry blue of its lens. Then he softened as a thought came to him. A way in which he might yet win a trick.
He knew the odds on his survival were worsening by the minute, but if he was to go under, then it shouldn’t be him alone. Keith Copeland should perish with him. If not in the flesh, then at least in reputation. The world would know by now of his own personal failings. What it didn’t know, but should, was that the British prime minister was no better.
The camera.
In his mind a mist rolled in. He felt himself slip into sleep. He tried to hang on to his thread of thought. Some scheme to redress the balance … The camera. It could yet become his friend.
He summoned all his remaining strength to pull his body towards it, extending the links that chained him to the floor. In his delirium he imagined that if he could reach the switch, prop himself up and speak into the lens, his message might get out like it had before. In the confused swirl of his mind, the camera became a living being, a conversation partner.
He reached out. Nowhere near close enough. His heart thudded with the exertion. A few inches more.
Then he heard the key in the lock. He lay flat again.
The door opened. Feet in trainers close to his face. He knew the man was looking down at him, wondering. He cringed, expecting a kick. Then the feet turned away, hands snatching up the tripod like driftwood for a bonfire.
Bowen let the mists roll over him. In amongst them somewhere was Sally’s face, smiling. Smiling at his plight.
The Manda Channel
07.50 hrs
The Timini had anchored halfway up the channel, thirty metres from the mangrove-choked northern shore. Randall sat on the canopied deck at the stern pretending to be fishing, a red baseball cap on his head, a plan of action cementing itself in his mind.
The naval patrol boat they’d seen had ignored them and motored on. They’d been half an hour at anchor already and only one craft had passed, the weekly Pelni Line ferry from Flores to Kutu.
The water was the colour of mud. There was a stench of decay from the mangroves covering the banks. Beyond, the land mass rose gently in a tangle of fig and scrub. Insects buzzed about his head and large, dark birds swooped over the stumpy growth.
He glanced up at the bridge. Dedi sat, chin on his fist, watching the ribbon of brown that stretched to the west, his brooding face like a threatening squall. Dedi was a worry – an unknown quantity. The risks in what Randall planned were huge. He needed the Kutuan. Needed him to be on his side one hundred per cent.
Randall rested the fishing rod on the stainless-steel guard rail and stood up. Last night, back in the dark of Piri harbour he’d explained the bones of his mission, but suspected it was Dedi’s own fear of arrest that had spurred him into agreeing to help.
Randall stepped up to the bridge.
‘How’re you doing, Dedi?’ he mumbled.
‘Nothing. Not see nothing yet,’ Dedi mumbled back, frowning. He looked Randall up and down as if expecting to see something about his person, but not finding it. He frowned again, then asked sharply, ‘What ezactly we doin’ here, mister?’
‘Trying to save a man’s life …’
‘You got a gun, mister?’ Dedi prodded.
‘No,’ Randall admitted, sensing his credibility with the Kutuan evaporate. Dedi stood up and pushed past, down into the main cabin.
Shit, thought Randall. He’s giving up on me.
Suddenly from below there was a crash and a splintering of wood. Randall slid down the companion-way into the saloon. Dedi was on his knees, smashing open a locker with a hammer and a screwdriver.
‘What the hell …?’
The Kutuan ignored him.
‘Dedi, what the fuck are you up to?’
A corner of the door came away, but the rest held. Whatever its contents, the locker had be
en designed to keep it secure.
‘You gonna need gun, mister,’ Dedi grumbled, swinging at it with renewed vigour. He smashed the timber around the lock and levered the door open.
Inside was a hunting rifle.
‘Brad keep for crocodiles,’ Dedi explained with childlike seriousness, holding it out.
Randall took the weapon in his hands, a heavy calibre rifle of a type he didn’t recognise, fitted with an optical sight. It changed things. For better and for worse. A gun meant more of a chance of boarding the ketch. But a gun also meant shooting and killing, and he’d not wanted it to be like Malaysia again.
‘You know how to use?’ Dedi asked over his shoulder as he swung up the companion-way to the bridge.
‘I think I can work it out,’ Randall snapped.
A few seconds later there was a shout from above. Dedi had binoculars to his eyes, pointing westwards. A masted vessel with a high prow was rounding a headland a few hundred metres away.
‘Pinisi!’ Dedi shouted, feverish with excitement.
‘Can you read the name?’ Randall breathed, pounding up to the bridge.
‘Too far. But is pinisi-type boat.’
Randall took the binoculars and adjusted the eye-piece. The approaching craft was small and white, with a stumpy main mast forward of the hold, but no sails up despite a useful breeze from the north. Its bow churned the brown water into yellow froth.
‘How fast can a boat like that go?’
‘Maybe twelve knots.’
‘And this one, the Timini?’
‘Twenty-five.’
He raised the binoculars again. He could see lettering on the bow. Two words. First letter B. ‘Shit! I think it’s her!’ He pushed the glasses back to Dedi.
Dedi looked hard. ‘Mmmm. I don’t think,’ he cautioned. ‘Berkat, but not Amanat. Many boats called Berkat something.’
Deflated, Randall watched idly as the small ketch motored past, its decks stacked with baulks of reddish timber.
Dedi put down the binoculars. ‘OK, mister. Maybe next time you lucky,’ he declared earnestly.
Randall dropped back down to the saloon, leaving Dedi to keep watch. He’d seen a portable short-wave radio there. He took it to the stern and sat in the chair, spinning through the frequencies in search of the BBC.
It was thirty seconds past the hour when he found it. The news had just started.
Africa was the lead. Massacres, and refugees dying of starvation. Then a story on middle east peace.
Finally, a report on Bowen. Randall held the speaker to his ear. Soundbites from the House of Commons – the PM’s credibility under pressure – allegations of key information being withheld about aid for some power station on Kutu. Then a brief line that stopped his heart.
Fears are growing for British journalist Charlotte Cavendish who has been reported missing on the island of Kutu, where she’d gone to investigate the kidnap of Minister Stephen Bowen. Reports that she was arrested by the Indonesian military are being strenuously denied by officials in Jakarta who maintain she had entered the country illegally and was last seen in a dangerous area where Kutuan resistance fighters are active.
Randall squeezed shut his eyes, the ambush as vivid to him now as if it had only just happened.
He knew what it meant. Sumoto had her.
Jakarta
08.05 hrs (01.05 hrs GMT)
The embassy chauffeur sat straight-backed and tense for the drive to police headquarters. In the rear slumped Harry Maxwell, his fawn suit in need of a press. Beside him, Selina Sakidin trim in her pink business suit but shaking with fear. He thought of holding her hand to comfort her, but suspected the gesture mightn’t be welcome.
Last night after their talk in her car, he’d taken her to his own apartment for safety, before returning to the embassy to report. Several hours later, in the small hours of the morning, he’d gone home, his conscience heavy with the ambassador’s orders to hand her to the police.
He’d broken it to her gently, explaining there was no alternative. She’d been involved in a crime and no British official could help her flee the country. Selina had sobbed pitiably, certain she would be killed. His avowal that Brigadier General Effendi was as honest a policeman as any in Indonesia had been of little comfort.
He’d given her his bed, but she’d not slept much. Maxwell had stayed up typing the dossier which he was to present to Effendi. The ambassador’s driver had collected a copy for Bruton to give to the minister of foreign affairs at nine.
Maxwell felt deeply uncomfortable. He had no idea how far Sumoto’s web stretched and what side Effendi was on. If he was handing Selina to her executioner he would never forgive himself.
At POLRI headquarters they were expected. Maxwell had phoned Effendi at home at 6 a.m. A smartly uniformed guard glared in through the windscreen, then raised the security pole. At the entrance they were escorted to the sixth floor – the intelligence and security departments.
Brigadier General Effendi’s round face smouldered with anger at the sight of Selina Sakidin. She wilted under his gaze, having to be helped to a chair.
‘So,’ Effendi began. ‘What is it you want to tell me?’
Maxwell took a deep breath.
‘Last night Miss Sakidin came to the British Embassy with information about the kidnapping of Stephen Bowen …’ He spoke in a voice that contrived to sound calm and analytical. ‘What she told us supported other information we had that implicated Major General Sumoto in the crime.’
He saw Effendi bristle. No policeman liked being told what to believe by a foreigner.
‘The details are in here.’ He laid a folder on the table. ‘Miss Sakidin came to us instead of to you because she was afraid. She’s been an intimate friend of General Sumoto for the past twelve months. She’s afraid he will try to kill her. I assured her that you would guarantee her safety.’
Effendi blinked. Maxwell waited.
‘You do, I take it?’
‘Miss Sakidin has nothing to fear if she tells the truth,’ Effendi answered chillingly.
Maxwell nodded. He knew it was the best he would get. He glanced at Selina. Her face had turned the colour of wet paper. Then he leaned forward and touched the folder.
‘A copy of this dossier is about to be handed to your foreign minister by my ambassador. It provides proof that Stephen Bowen was kidnapped in Indonesia and that Indonesian citizens were the perpetrators. We are requesting that POLRI takes immediate steps to deal with General Sumoto in a way that’s appropriate, and that it does all in its power to find Stephen Bowen, alive or dead. Oh, and on the matter of Miss Sakidin, we’ll be making frequent enquiries to ensure she’s being well cared for.’
Brigadier General Effendi smoothed the thin line of his moustache with a thumb and forefinger. His eyes burned. He reached for the folder and opened it.
‘Oh. There’s something else I need to bring to your attention,’ Maxwell continued, heart in mouth. ‘There are two British citizens currently in Kutu for whom we are seeking guarantees of safety. One, the journalist Charlotte Cavendish – we have reason to believe she is in official custody, despite the denials from ABRI. The other, Nick Randall, was in the same area of the jungle as Miss Cavendish when she was picked up by troops from KOPASSUS, but he escaped capture.’
‘Mr Maxwell!’ Effendi exploded. ‘We only guarantee safety of foreigners in Kutu when they stay in place where foreigner allowed. If they break law by going to terrorist area, then …’ He shrugged and spread his hands. ‘Journalists – they not welcome in Kutu. They always break our law. They tell lies about us.’
‘Nick Randall isn’t a journalist,’ Maxwell announced.
Effendi’s eyes hardened into beads.
‘He’s a British police officer.’
Effendi’s face drained of expression. The mask again. The impenetrable Javan mask.
‘Well, well,’ Effendi said after a long pause. ‘You are man of surprises, Mr Maxwell.’
The Manda
Channel
‘Nick!’
The shout from the bridge jolted Randall back to the present. His mind had been filled with Charlie, her soft, brown eyes trusting him to keep her safe. If Maxwell’s efforts failed, he would have to get her free. He propelled himself from his chair at the stern and scrambled up to the bridge.
Dedi pointed. Another pinisi, heading up the channel from the west.
Randall jammed binoculars to his eyes. He’d found a second pair in the saloon.
Berkat Am … Yes! Or was it? The last letters were obscured by a loose tarpaulin that flapped over the side.
Dedi steadied the glasses. The tarpaulin lifted. Randall heard a sharp intake of breath beside him.
‘Yessir!’ Dedi gulped. ‘This it!’
Randall’s heart leapt to his throat. Bowen’s floating prison was motoring towards them. Amidships was a hold covered by the green canvas that had temporarily obscured the name. At the stern a pale awning gave shade to a square superstructure topped by a wheelhouse with a balcony each side. Inside it, the shapes of two men could be seen behind large rectangular windows.
‘When they’ve passed, we up anchor and follow,’ Nick snapped, scrambling back down to the deck.
‘Yes, mister.’
Fighting back his fear, he pretended to fish again as the ketch neared, then rested the rod and focused his binoculars on the wheelhouse. One man emerged on to the bridge gallery. Big and burly, with a square, hard face, he put binoculars to his own eyes – watching Nick, watching him.
Ten minutes later the Timini sprinted from the Manda Channel at fifteen knots. The Berkat Amanat was half a mile in front, on an arrow-straight course for the distant smudge of Mount Jiwa. The ketch would make Kutu in four hours if they let it. Just two hours in the powerboat – once they’d got Stephen Bowen safely on board …
The sea was clear, the ABRI patrol boat nowhere in sight.
‘OK. Let’s go for it!’ Randall snapped.
Dedi opened the throttle. The diesels churned the wake to cream as the Timini rose on the plane. The log on the console crept up to twenty-six knots. Randall steadied the binoculars against the buffeting of the boat. The thrumming of the diesels had a calming effect on his innards. Action at last.
Java Spider Page 35
