Eye of the Cobra

by Christopher Sherlock

  Carlos did not mention the real reason for his interest, the possibility that Emerson Ortega might still be alive, and that a place like Roraima might well be his sanctuary. That he hoped to kill Ortega to avenge the death of his brother.

  ‘But Carlos, what would anyone be doing there?’

  ‘I have a pretty good idea already, but we will find out for sure when we get there.’

  John Tennant studied the contents of a large box-file on his desk, and whistled. It all began to make some sort of sense. After all, South America was a major drug producer.

  Carlos Ramirez. His brother, the former Minister of Justice of Colombia, had been assassinated in the most barbaric fashion by members of the Ortega Cartel. Perhaps, mused Tennant, David Ramirez had been supporting a rival cartel. On that assumption, Carlos Ramirez could well be a major producer and trafficker.

  Wyatt had grown up in England, the son of the great James Chase. Wyatt had developed an early fascination in motor cycles, then moved on to go-karts. He was also a keen climber. Both interests had been encouraged by his father.

  Then had come the accident, with James Chase killed and his son carrying the blame. After that, it got hazy. Wyatt had apparently spent ten years in Japan, studying karate at some obscure dojo. He had reached the level of Seventh Dan. Wyatt Chase was a walking weapon.

  Then, following his sudden departure from Japan, he had been given a seat in a car in his uncle’s Formula One team. This year it was Calibre-Shensu, and Wyatt had been set to win the championship.

  Money might well have been a problem: Wyatt had got next to nothing when his uncle sold the team to Jack Phelps. That was a good enough motive. So could Chase be the drug-pusher he was looking for in the Calibre team? Tennant asked himself. Moving cocaine he’d obtained from his stepfather? It was unlikely that Chase was an addict; he was a fitness fanatic, and rarely even drank. So Chase might well have been selling the coke to raise funds to buy a drive in Formula One. And he might have planted the drugs on Vanessa Tyson, just to shut her up and stop her tirade against Phelps, his employer.

  Wyatt Chase was in very serious trouble. Evidently he had jumped bail and caught a plane to South America. That, and the link with Ramirez, would seem to indicate that he was guilty.

  After all, Chase had the right South American connections.

  Jack Phelps dived into his pool and looked out through the clear blue water at the New York horizon. He rose to the surface, watching the vapour come off the warm water and dissolve into the sky above.

  He was feeling good. Things were working out perfectly. Sartori, as the new number one Calibre-Shensu driver, was firmly committed. Several more teams had also expressed interest in Carvalho tyres, and as a direct result, two of the world’s major tyre manufacturers were making interested noises about buying Carvalho out. Jack stood to make a lot of money on that deal alone.

  He’d never liked Chase; the man could not be bought or controlled, which meant he was dangerous. He was glad Wyatt was out. He was surprised that Aito was cut up about it, but then the Japanese did have some funny ideas about morality and other outdated concepts.

  He pulled himself out of the water and felt the cold air making his skin tingle. He reckoned they’d take the first two places in the Italian Grand Prix. Things couldn’t be going better.

  May

  The plane dropped from the sky and winged its way lazily over the rolling greenness of the thick jungle below. Below them, the river coiled its way through the blanket of dense foliage like a silver snake. Then from the green broke a dirty scar, the isolated town of Manaus.

  Carlos touched Wyatt’s arm and shouted across the noise of the engines.

  ‘You disappear in the Amazon basin and no one will find you. We are going into the unknown.’

  He laughed loudly, and Wyatt smiled. Carlos was always confident . . .

  A day later they were in a motorised launch with two local Indians, travelling up the lazy waters of the Amazon. They had told everyone they came into contact with in Manaus that they were botanists looking for a rare species of plant.

  Wyatt looked uneasily at the crates stowed in the centre of the boat. He hadn’t been surprised when Carlos explained they contained machine-guns, hand-guns and grenades. There were also three huge rucksacks packed with an assortment of climbing gear.

  He let his hand drift in the water.

  ‘Hey, Wyatt, that’s not a good idea. The piranhas like the taste of raw flesh,’ Carlos shouted.

  Wyatt withdrew his hand quickly. He thought about the testing he would have been doing now if he’d still been with Calibre-Shensu. In another week it would be the Italian Grand Prix at Monza. It really didn’t bear thinking about.

  ‘Hey, Wyatt.’ Carlos broke into his thoughts. ‘We get to the bottom of this thing, my friend, don’t you worry.’

  He turned to face Carlos, who was tying up his pony-tail, strands of hair blowing in the breeze.

  ‘I wanted to race at Monza,’ he said. ‘That was where . . .’

  ‘Forget about the accident. Forget about Formula One. If you were in London, you’d be in jail. This way, we might find Suzie. You are in big trouble, Wyatt, don’t forget that.’

  Wyatt lay back and looked at the trees lining the edge of the river. ‘Imagine,’ he said, ‘if someone told you you couldn’t play polo any longer.’

  Carlos flashed him a grin. ‘But no one can! This Formula One racing is a crazy business.’

  Ricardo sat looking out across the Paris skyline. He wanted out, now that he’d got his drive back. Opposite him, Talbot leaned back in his chair and put his hands behind his head, watching the other people in the hotel’s top-floor lounge. The American was always observing, Ricardo thought; he was never completely relaxed.

  ‘Ricardo, good buddy,’ Talbot said, ‘I don’t know why you get so nervous. We’re partners. I think I made that very clear to you in Belgium. There is no going back.’ He was quiet, but firm.

  ‘But I can’t sleep at night. Tennant keeps phoning me. Why can’t we tell him what is going on?’

  ‘Because Tennant is a stupid British cop and he’d blow the whole operation. He’s probably wasting his time trying to work out the truth about the Tyson case, and find out what’s happened to Chase.’

  ‘Tennant told me he’s already been talking to the Carbinari, in preparation for Monza,’ Ricardo replied, looking at a leggy blonde walking past. ‘But if you’re not worried . . .’

  He did not see the muscle on Talbot’s neck quiver.

  ‘Ricardo, I must be on my way. I have some urgent business to sort out.

  Talbot disappeared into the dining-room, breathing heavily. Tennant, he thought, was becoming a nuisance.

  John Tennant walked away from the house in the first light of the morning, feeling very good. The lady he had taken out the evening had proved better company than he’d expected, and coffee at her flat in Holland Park had progressed to cognac - by which stage they had both known they felt the same way about each other.

  The streets were almost empty. It was only after about five minutes that he had the uneasy feeling that someone was tailing him.

  He increased his pace. He was now in an isolated access road, lined with gates and full dustbins.

  He tripped over something - and then felt a cold metal object impact against the side of his head. He rolled over into a ball, and out of the corner of his eye caught sight of a tall blond man. He went for his gun. A kick in his back caught his kidneys and he screamed out in pain, but the gun remained in his hand: the instinct he’d developed during his years in the SAS saved him.

  He rolled over, centred the bead on the blond head, and fired. His attacker staggered back, then recovered. He bounded up onto some rubbish-bins, and vaulted over a concrete wall before Tennant could fire again.

  Tennant dragged himself to his feet. One thing was certain, he was getting a little closer to the men who dealt in drugs. But he still had a very long way to go.

  Ric
ardo lay on the mattress in his hotel room, sweating. It was two days since they’d begun testing, and he was slow, very slow. Charlie Ibuka’s times were always faster.

  He desperately wanted a snort of cocaine, but he knew that was the pathway to death because it would slow down his reaction-times. He had to get back to the level of fitness and concentration he’d been at the previous year. The Shadow Two was extraordinarily fast, and he knew that if he could just get his edge back he could win.

  But the pressure was getting to him. Talbot had insisted that he spearhead the Italian delivery. He’d argued that he needed to focus on the race - but he guessed that Talbot didn’t give a damn what position he finished in.

  At least the publicity was getting better. There was no more talk of drugs, and after the initial furore Chase had been forgotten.

  The general straightened his uniform, looking up at the American flag on the wall and the picture of his President. He felt horrified at what he’d found out.

  He hadn’t liked Talbot from the beginning, but he’d had instructions from the highest level that he was to co-operate with him. The plan was that Talbot could land his planes and dump their cargo at his airforce base, and in return Talbot would ship special cargo out of the country for them. That cargo was guns and ammunition for anti-government forces in Colombia. The objective, he’d been told, was to overthrow the Colombian government, install a pro-American regime and stamp out the drug cartels. The general had thought then that the plan was excellent.

  Only after a few months had he begun to wonder exactly what it was Talbot was exporting from Colombia. It didn’t take him long to discover it was cocaine.

  So he’d confronted the man.

  Talbot had smacked him around. The general had thought he was the one in control till then. As he’d lain bleeding on the floor, Talbot had explained the bottom line: if the general wanted to go public, they’d accuse him of using the money from the sale of the drugs to fund the whole operation.

  The general realised he’d been used. He could not raise any objections - he knew what would happen if he did: Talbot would disappear, and he would be regarded as personally responsible for the whole stinking plan.

  Talbot held the trump card.

  The general pulled his eyes away from the President’s picture and back to the list of men and equipment Talbot had requested for a special mission. The question in the general’s mind was, what exactly was it that Talbot was planning to attack?

  Much to his irritation, the Concorde flight the next morning was fully booked - but then a last-minute cancellation allowed Ricardo to get a place. Two hours, he thought now, and he would be exactly where he wanted to be. He always liked travelling in the sleek-bodied plane that looked more like a giant bird of prey than a supersonic airliner. Inside, it felt quite different from an ordinary passenger plane; not the cavernous interior of a wide-bodied 747, but a narrow fuselage that could only accommodate two pairs of seats on either side of the aisle.

  He relaxed back into his seat and studied the newspaper. The sporting page carried the story of his reinstatement at Calibre-Shensu, his progress in developing the Shadow Two; the writer predicted a win for him at Monza. Ricardo grimaced. If only he could be so certain! At least Charlie Ibuka was not in the same class as Chase - and he sensed that de Villiers thought the same.

  The massive engines hummed as the plane raced down the runway and then leapt into the air with a carelessness that belied the technology beneath its metal skin. The thrust pushed Ricardo gently back in his seat. In two hours he would be in New York. His mind was quite made up: there was only one way for him to proceed.

  Jack Phelps liked to rise early. Lauren would bring him coffee and the morning papers. There would a short dictation session and then Lauren would leave, allowing him time to dress. His suit was always selected the day before and subjected to a rigorous inspection. It was more than Lauren’s life was worth to present him with clothes that were not immaculate.

  He had just started to dress when his intercom sounded. Lauren’s hushed tones announced: ‘You have a visitor, sir.’

  ‘Yes?’ he asked irritatedly. He had told Lauren on numerous occasions that he didn’t like to have his early-morning routine interrupted.

  ‘Mr Sartori is most insistent that he see you.’

  ‘Show him into the lounge, then, and offer him something to drink.’

  ‘Very good, sir.’

  Phelps snickered as he dressed. He knew Sartori’s problems were only just beginning. He was going to pile on the pressure now - that way it would be all the easier to control him. He’d made sure that the Italian Receiver of Revenue didn’t let Ricardo off the hook - and he also knew Ricardo was facing a heavy fine for tax avoidance. And he’d made quite sure that though he paid Ricardo a lot of money, it was never enough to pay off his debts completely.

  Phelps straightened his tie and walked into the room. Ricardo was sitting on one of the hand-made leather couches, looking distinctly ill at ease.

  ‘You bastard!’ he said when he saw Jack.

  Jack looked blankly at Ricardo.

  ‘I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.’

  He selected a thin cigar from a humidor on the table and offered one to Ricardo, who refused it.

  ‘You cannot expect me to take a drop in my earnings because I am driving for Calibre-Shensu!’ Ricardo burst out.

  Phelps inspected the sole of one of his shoes.

  ‘Why not? You are working for Bruce de Villiers. I should think the twenty million dollars we’re paying you is quite adequate. The fine wasn’t that much.’

  Phelps knew that Bruce had renegotiated Ricardo’s contract, but he preferred to pretend ignorance.

  ‘I’m not getting twenty million dollars! Bruce paid my fine, but now he says he’ll only pay for the championship points I score. I need money now! Do you know what it takes to drive a Formula One car? Do you? I tell you, I need to devote all my energy to it. I do not need these problems. I want my original fee.’

  Phelps laughed loudly, then his face turned deadly serious.

  ‘I hate people who waste my time,’ he said. ‘You caused us a lot of trouble, and I’m not going to ask Bruce to pay you any more than you’re getting. And I know there’s no way you can handle my affairs capably if you’re racing, so I’m dropping your salary.’

  He got up and stretched.

  ‘Lauren has booked your return flight,’ he said.

  ‘Bastard!’

  Phelps held his chin between his thumb and forefinger.

  ‘No more money,’ he said.

  ‘Whatever you want, I do it!’ the Italian begged.

  ‘Anything?’

  Ricardo nodded.

  Phelps returned to his desk, sifted through a few papers and then looked up.

  ‘All right, Ricardo. I’ll speak to Bruce about upping your fee. But I want you to sign a new contract for your other services to my company. You will fly to Zurich.’

  Ricardo sat in the small but immaculately decorated room. It had no windows, and he had been assured that it was swept twice a day for bugging devices. A tall, thin man with a receding hairline came in through the door on the left and sat down opposite him.

  ‘Mr Phelps has decided, for reasons unknown to us, to make you responsible for his entire financial laundering operation outside America. Naturally, this arrangement also includes a majority share-holding. All that is required now is your signature.’

  The man pushed the document over to Ricardo.

  ‘I would like to read it,’ Ricardo said.

  ‘That is fine. You can have as much time as you want. Please push the buzzer when you have finished.’

  The man got up to go. Ricardo did not like the Swiss, they were almost as emotionless as the English.

  ‘Hey!’ he said. ‘Hold it! I won’t take long.’

  The man sat down again and folded his arms in front of him, staring at the table while Ricardo paged quickly through th
e document. He couldn’t make head or tail of half the clauses - but still, they didn’t really interest him. It was just the money that mattered. He stopped at the list of the other shareholders.

  ‘Why aren’t there any other names here except mine?’

  ‘This is a typical arrangement,’ the man said. ‘The other interests are held by nominated holding companies. You appreciate the need for secrecy.’

  Ricardo nodded.

  ‘If you would sign here, here and here.’

  Ricardo did as he was instructed. When he had finished, the man gathered up the papers.

  ‘I would like a copy,’ Ricardo said.

  ‘Mr Sartori. Documents of this nature never ever leave this office.’

  Five minutes later Ricardo was walking along the immaculate pavements of Zurich. He felt as if he was walking on air. His financial problems were over, and now he could concentrate on driving again.

  Estelle put down the paper and stared across the empty lounge. It was a large room, the huge terracotta-tiled floor scattered with Persian carpets. Outside, through the beech-framed windows, she could see the rolling grasslands of the estancia that seemed to stretch out endlessly into the distance.

  Emotions tore through her. She had already lost one husband; now Carlos and Wyatt were in the thick of something she did not even want to try and comprehend. She looked at her reflection in the wall mirror. She would be forty-eight in a month’s time. Carlos was two years older than her, and the best-looking man she knew.

  She touched her face. There was nothing the matter with her, everyone said she looked like a woman in her twenties. Her body was still firm from the hours she spent in the saddle every day. But she wanted Carlos to love her with passion; she wanted to exhaust him in bed, so that he would always be thinking of her body. He must always desire her. To hold him through their wedding vows and the memory of what she had been, was not her way and never would be.