Ashanti Gold

by James Crosbie

  Johnstone-Carruthers looked distastefully at him. ‘I’m sorry, Major Akaba. Stand trial for what?’ He spoke in a tone that brooked no argument. ‘Her Majesty’s Government made it abundantly clear that the weight of your circumstantial evidence, on its own, was quite inadequate to justify the extradition of the alleged criminals. The proviso for validating the extradition certificates is quite clear – the gold must be found in the possession of the men you accuse. That, and that alone, would have ensured their speedy return to Ghana. However …’ he looked eloquently at the mass of melting cocoa butter. ‘What we have here is, as Mr Grant has repeatedly claimed, merely cocoa butter. I’m sure that I do not have to tell you that the importation of this substance hardly constitutes an offence. Extradition, therefore, can no longer be considered a possibility. As a matter of fact,’ he continued drily, ‘speaking as a lawyer, I strongly recommend that Mr Grant consults with his solicitors with a view to pursuing a claim for damages against you regarding compensation for his loss and the possible damage to his business through this unfortunate affair. However, that is a matter for his consideration alone. Good day to you, Major Akaba. A pleasure to have made your acquaintance I’m sure.’ He smiled smugly at Akaba, shook hands with Lambert and finally threw Colin a quizzical glance before striding majestically out of the store.

  ‘Well,’ Lambert turned to the devastated Akaba. ‘It looks as if your theory has come unstuck, Major. No gold – no case!’

  ‘They stole the gold! I know they stole it. I want these three criminals arrested and held in custody until the rest of the cocoa butter on board the Lagos Palm has been traced and checked. It is possible that the packages were somehow mixed up.’

  ‘Unfortunately what you know and what you can prove are two entirely different things, Major. It happens to me all the time. You’ll just have to chalk it up to experience. Besides,’ he looked doubtful. ‘I never did think this lot had the nous for that level of villainy. A con job here, a blag there, maybe a bit of breaking and entering; that’s about their strength. But hijacking a plane and ripping off a load of gold bullion …? Nah!’ He shook his head. ‘That’s way out of their league.’

  ‘But the evidence!’ Looking incongruous with blood still pouring down his face, Akaba ticked the known facts off on his fingers. ‘Setting up this shop. Tickets for flight 670 purchased by post from an accommodation address in Takoradi. Car hired by Grant seen in the university car park. The faked death of Docherty, and Grant’s denial when asked if he had known him. Hired car again; this time in the hotel car park. And if that is not enough, the cocoa butter hurriedly despatched to this address the day after the robbery. Surely that is more than enough evidence to warrant an arrest?’

  ‘Sorry, Major. You’re not in Ghana now. And in this country we don’t accept coincidence as evidence,’ Lambert told him. ‘Over a thousand fans travelled from London to see that fight; that’s one coincidence explained. You only got the colour and make of the car at the university, so that’s no use as evidence – not in this country anyway. And there’s no law making it an offence to ship cocoa butter to the UK from Ghana, however speedily it is arranged. Without the gold, all you’ve got is a series of easily explained coincidences.’

  ‘You seem to be going to great lengths to prove that they didn’t hijack that plane.’ Akaba looked angrily at him. ‘How, then, can you explain away Docherty’s injuries?’

  ‘I don’t need to. Your own pathologist’s report blames the fall from the balcony as the cause of death.’

  ‘It was necessary to falsify the pathologist’s report to avoid alerting the criminals.’

  Lambert looked at him and shook his head. ‘I never really believed this lot pulled that job. But you told a convincing story and the Commissioner went for it. Now you’re admitting that you falsified the pathologist’s report. Sorry, Major, but your methods stink to high heaven. Your story too, for that matter. I suggest you get out of here before I run you in for possession of an offensive weapon and attempted murder.’ He picked the flick-knife up from the floor and nodded at two of his men, looking on impassively as they escorted the protesting Akaba to his car.

  36

  ‘You’re actually going to sell cocoa butter?’ Lambert looked at Colin, his face distorted in query.

  ‘That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you all along,’ Colin snapped. ‘I’ve identified a gap in the small, specialist chocolate-makers market. I’m starting small.’

  ‘Very small now,’ Lambert grinned, pushing a melting mound of cocoa butter aside with the toe of his well polished shoe. ‘Right then,’ he signalled the rest of his squad to leave the shop. ‘I’ll be seeing you. And remember …’ he menaced them with a stare. ‘You’re still on my patch. Anything goes off around here and I’ll be checking you lot out, sharpish.’ He halted at the door and turned to give them a long, thoughtful look. ‘Nah!’ He shook his head, coming to a final decision. ‘Hijack a plane! Nah … You lot just don’t have the nous for it.’ He turned on his heel and strode through the broken doorway with a panache that could have earned him an instant Equity card.

  *

  There was a silence as the three of them stared at one another across the debris of the butter.

  ‘Nothing!’ Bert finally broke the silence. ‘Not one bloody pennyweight! What the fuck happened to it?’

  ‘He should be able to tell us that.’ Colin turned to stare at Ray. ‘I bet he knows a lot more about this business than he’s letting on.’

  Bert’s face grew thoughtful and he turned to look at Ray. ‘And that black bastard seemed to know you pretty well. How d’you account for that, Ray?’

  Ray stared back at them, face drawn, as if he had reached the end of some terrible trial. ‘Yeah,’ he said quietly, almost to himself. ‘I guess you are due an explanation.’

  ‘Well?’ Both of them stood waiting.

  ‘That night Eddie sent me round to your flat, Bert, when you propped me about a bit of villainy? I told you then that I wasn’t interested in breaking any laws, didn’t I?’

  ‘Aye,’ Colin agreed for both of them. ‘But you soon changed your tune when a planeload of gold was mentioned.’

  ‘Not just any planeload of gold, Colin.’ Ray turned directly to him. ‘A planeload of gold in Ghana. That was what Doc said. And that was what made me change my mind. You see,’ he said, ‘it was in Ghana that I ran into the trouble that got me tossed out of the SAS.’

  ‘And Akaba had something to do with it?’ Colin anticipated him.

  ‘That bastard had everything to do with it.’ Ray’s voice hardened at the memory. ‘He had four helpless guys shot and killed; murdered right in front of me because they tried to steal his gold. When I interfered and tried to stop him, he laughed at me. So I let him have it. That’s my mark on his eye.’ He smiled with malicious satisfaction at the memory. ‘I was charged with assaulting a senior officer, court martialled, demoted, jailed and drummed out of the regiment. All I could think of was getting my own back on him, and the job you offered me gave me the chance to do just that. I wanted to ruin the bastard, same as he ruined me. I didn’t want to steal the gold – I told you that first night that I wasn’t a thief and I decided that once the job came off I’d see that the gold got back to the Ashanti people.’

  Colin jabbed a middle finger in the air. ‘And that to the three mugs who helped you.’

  Ray had the grace to look shamefaced. ‘Yeah,’ he admitted. ‘That was what I thought at first. All I could see was the opportunity to get back at Akaba. But later,’ he looked at Bert, ‘after Colin went back to Ghana and I got to know you and Doc better, saw the way you treated me. Well, it opened my eyes. We became mates and I began to think about keeping the gold. After all, Akaba would still be in the shit no matter who ended up with it. So I kept my options open. It was Doc’s death that swung the balance. I knew his body would cause complications; especially when the medics got to him. The safest thing then, for all of us, was to get rid of the gold – the
evidence.’

  ‘So you told someone about Hansel of London and left it for them to rip us off.’ Colin guessed the rest of his story.

  ‘Colin, it was the right thing to do. They were on to us. If that gold had arrived here today as planned, we’d all be in handcuffs right now and on our way back to Ghana. Christ!’ He held the tips of his index finger and thumb a millimetre apart and spoke tensely. ‘We came as close as that! Everyone, including you two, was certain the gold was in those packages. You saw Akaba’s face! He knew it was there. In fact he was so confident that I began to wonder if they had got it off the boat in time in Ghana.’

  ‘Aye.’ Colin was forced to agree. ‘My bottle was pouring good style when he stuck his blade into that first block of butter.’ His face twisted in an ironic smile. ‘I suppose that, in a left-handed sort of way, you actually saved us.’

  ‘It worked out, Colin. If Doc hadn’t died I would have let things go the way you planned and taken my share of the gold. As it is, I made the right decision for all of us.’

  ‘One of the things you haven’t told us,’ Colin said as they finished off the bottle of champagne. ‘Just who did you give the gold to? Who did you know out there who could handle that sort of business?’

  ‘I served six months in Ghana before my court martial,’ Ray told them. ‘Part of my job was to meet people, observe and report on the political situation and assess morale. It was obvious that the people weren’t getting a square deal from the politicians. And there were a lot of things happening to the ordinary people that I didn’t like. So I kept my ear to the ground and heard about a group led by some Ashanti chief who seemed genuinely concerned for his people’s welfare. I guessed he would be approachable as long as his people were going to benefit. I was right about him and he arranged to have the gold intercepted en-route for Tilbury.’

  ‘So he got the gold and we got left sucking our thumbs,’ Bert gloomily observed.

  ‘Back to square one again,’ Colin sighed. ‘And I’ve definitely decided to go straight now, especially after what happened to Doc.’

  ‘Yeah. Me too.’ Bert snuffled quietly, as if ashamed of his decision. ‘This life’s getting to be a bit too hectic for me.’

  ‘Just think,’ Colin spoke reminiscently. ‘A couple of weeks ago we were millionaires. Now we’re practically skint again.’

  ‘Maybe not.’ Ray looked pointedly at Colin’s hip pocket. ‘Didn’t the delivery man give you a letter?’

  Colin reached behind him and felt for the envelope, his action silencing the others, as if they sensed the importance of the moment. He read through the letter to himself, shaking his head in disbelief before holding it out to them.

  ‘Here,’ he said. ‘You better read this. It’ll save a lot of explanations.’

  Bert took the letter from him and, with Ray breathing over his shoulder, read:

  PALACE OF KUMASI

  KUMASI

  GHANA

  Dear Colin,

  You have succeeded where others failed and my people salute you. For the first time in many years Ashanti gold has come back to its own.

  I, too, salute you. Your achievement in liberating the gold has done more to unite my people than many years of talk. My people have seen the moguls of Accra humbled. You have destroyed the myth of their invincibility and because of this my task is made easier.

  I must admit that I was taken unawares when Sergeant Quarry approached me in my office at the palace and revealed that he was one of the men responsible for the bullion robbery. But I was totally stunned when he went on to tell me that the gold was being returned for the good of the Ashanti people. Once he was satisfied that it would remain a secret between us, he told me how you conceived the idea and prepared the plan to steal the gold. As we have witnessed, your plan was successful, except for the unfortunate accident to your friend. Please accept my sincere condolences for his untimely death.

  Your reasons for returning the gold will always remain a mystery to me. However, one does not look a gift horse in the mouth and I thank you with all my heart.

  I am also pleased to be able to tell you that arrangements to fly Mr Docherty’s remains to the UK have been satisfactorily completed.

  Perhaps I should also tell you that I attended the annual school prize-giving in Takoradi the other day and met a lady friend of yours – a Miss Lesley Farrell. She spoke about the bullion robbery and seemed disturbed that it had occurred. However, when I told her – in the strictest confidence – that the gold had been returned, she seemed vastly relieved and appeared to be unusually pleased at the information.

  I believe 10% is the usual commission in these matters? Therefore I enclose an International Bankers’ Draft for three hundred thousand pounds (£300,000). I am sure you will see to it that the money is properly divided among your men and that the dependants of Mr Docherty will benefit from his efforts too.

  I assure you that the gold we have here will be put to good use where it is most needed.

  My father, the Asantehene, has decreed that a new link be forged for the chain of Osei Tutu.

  You may be assured that your deed will never be forgotten by my people.

  Yours sincerely

  Yarty Okufu

  Colin took the letter back and read it through again, this time taking in its deeper implications for him; Lesley would be coming home soon, and she knew that the gold had been returned. A glow of pleasure suffused his body as he realised that they would soon be together again.

  There was something else in the envelope, something hard. Curious, he tipped a small twist of paper into his hand.

  ‘What’s that?’ Bert asked, looking on as Colin unscrewed the paper and let a small chunk of gold plop into his curled palm.

  ‘That?’ Colin stared for a moment, then, slowly, a smile of realisation spread across his face. ‘That’s my promotion!’

  ‘Promotion?’

  Both Bert and Ray turned puzzled eyes on him. ‘What d’you mean?’ Bert asked. ‘What sort of promotion?’

  The smile on Colin’s face grew broader as he looked at his two friends.

  ‘The bastard’s made me an Ashanti chief!’ he said, slowly closing his fist over the bright new link of Ashanti gold.

  COPYRIGHT

  First published 2009

  by Black & White Publishing Ltd

  29 Ocean Drive, Edinburgh EH6 6JL

  www.blackandwhitepublishing.com

  This electronic edition published in 2012

  ISBN: 978 1 84502 566 3 in EPub format

  ISBN: 978 1 84502 567 0 in Mobi pocket format

  ISBN: 978 1 84502 251 8 in paperback format

  Copyright © James Crosbie 2009

  The right of James Crosbie to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form, or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

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