Shapes came quickly out of the night. A snarl sent Zhanna’s heart racing. The feet beat faster, the monkey twisted, looking frantically left and right.
‘Let him go!’ Zhanna gasped.
Anatoly laughed.
‘Why stop the fun?’ he said. ‘You wanted to see monkeys didn’t you?’
Fur flew. Drops of urine sprayed against the glass. A shape beat against the trapped creature. The screams reached a new high.
‘The others are biting it!’ Anatoly laughed. ‘Teaching it a lesson for being so stupid.’
Zhanna pushed against her father’s hand, hit the button to bring the window down.
The monkey pulled free, and ran howling into the night.
‘Law of the jungle,’ Anatoly said. ‘Pretty funny eh?’ He went back to his phone.
Zhanna felt tears prick her eyes, then Anisa’s warm hand on hers. Dawa looked back at her with a sympathetic frown.
‘Let’s go home,’ Zhanna said. ‘I don’t want to do this any more.’
Zhanna’s Story: A birthday surprise
Breakfast the next morning.
‘You still moping about that stupid monkey?’ Anatoly regarded Zhanna over his newspaper.
Zhanna did not respond. She could not look her father in the eye. She pushed the muesli mush around the bowl.
‘It was just a few bites,’ he continued. ‘It’s probably perfectly fine.’
Zhanna crossed to the sink. The dish crashed in. Anisa placed a soothing hand on her shoulder, then quickly gathered up the broken pieces.
‘You should learn to get your emotions under control,’ Anatoly snapped.
Zhanna went to her room. And there she stayed, the door locked, sleeping only fitfully and refusing food for the rest of the weekend.
‘You’ve let yourself go,’ Anisa admonished her when she finally emerged. ‘Your hair’s all greasy. Why don’t you have a nice long bath and I’ll brush the knots out.’
Zhanna did as she was asked, the tangles of stress unravelling as the kindly Indonesian maid worked gently on her long hair.
‘Dawa and I are making some plans for your birthday,’ Anisa told her. ‘But it’s top secret.’
Zhanna smiled, her eyes welling up a little at the words. She was lucky to have Dawa and Anisa, she knew. Sometimes she thought, they cared for her more than her own father.
As for her real mother, all Zhanna knew was that she had died in childbirth. Apart from that brutal and disturbing fact, her father had refused to tell her more.
Zhanna’s twelfth birthday came up three days later. The house filled with the aroma of baking as Anisa made the girl’s favourite chocolate cake.
Zhanna wasn’t surprised when her father did nothing to mark the day. There wasn’t even an email.
‘Never mind that,’ Dawa said when she told them this bleak fact. ‘We’re taking you on a mystery trip.’
‘You’d better bring your trekking boots and your camera,’ Anisa added with a mischievous wink.
They got a nasty look from the security guard on the gate as they drove out. Excursions were supposed to be agreed by Anatoly and this one certainly hadn’t been. Dawa drove them out of town, east again with the dawn, but to a different area of rainforest in a more remote spot.
‘No litter on the ground here,’ Anisa smiled as they parked up. ‘And just listen.’
They got out and stood in silence as the sun rose over the forest canopy, breathing in the musty scent of composting leaves, relishing the curious buzzes and tweets and zitherings of birds and insects.
‘Let’s go!’ Zhanna whispered.
They packed some water and sandwiches in their rucksacks and entered the magical world of the rainforest.
Zhanna was sharp-eyed and observant, often spotting things that Dawa and Anisa had missed: a profusion of smoky grey caterpillars coating the bark of a magnificent old tree – thousands of them huddled together head to tail, the spiky black hairs on their backs a warning to predators.
A hummingbird hovered at the mouth of a vivid scarlet flower; seen for a second or two then gone in a feathery flash of luminescent green light.
They began to climb, the heat of the day starting to bite as they ascended a jungle ridge. A spectacular valley opened up beneath them, the canopy rippling like the surface of an ocean, a thousand shades of green stretching to the horizon.
‘A wasps’ nest!’ Zhanna had spotted a smooth, almost plastic-looking oval object high in a branch.
‘I’m not sure …’ Dawa said.
They watched for a while but no insects were buzzing about.
Then, most bizarrely, the plastic shell began to shift, a dark, moist eye emerging to scrutinise them.
‘What is it?’ Anisa gasped, stepping back.
For a few moments they stood dumbfounded. A second eye was revealed, blinking in the light. Then came a sharp furry snout.
‘I know!’ Zhanna exclaimed. ‘It’s a flying fox! He’s hanging upside down with his wings wrapped around him.’
‘Awesome!’ Dawa murmured. ‘Get a picture of him before he flies away.’
Zhanna framed a shot, taking it just as the flying fox stretched out leathery wings, gave an extravagant yawn and launched himself off the branch. He glided elegantly across the valley, disappearing into the foliage on the far side with a faint rustle of leaves.
‘Magical!’ she whispered.
Zhanna walked ahead, lost in the wonder of the place, enchanted by the whole experience and taking countless pictures as she went. When she turned to check Anisa and Dawa were following, she noticed that Dawa was handing the maid a flower. Anisa blushed, hiding the flower behind her back, causing Zhanna to smile.
She had wondered for a while if those two were romantically connected.
‘You didn’t see that!’ Dawa laughed.
Zhanna knew that the servants were forbidden in their contracts to have anything more than a professional relationship, but she cared not a fig for her father’s strict rules. Who was he to deny these gentle people happiness?
Another hour of trekking followed. The heat became even more intense, the air thickening as it warmed. The trail petered out until they were moving through what felt like virgin forest. Zhanna loved the thought that they were treading in no man’s land. It was thrilling to think that nobody had been in that exact spot before them.
Then they came across a pack of monkeys, a rare species, notoriously shy and difficult to spot.
‘Banded leaf monkeys,’ Zhanna whispered to the others as she pointed her lens. ‘Hardly ever seen.’
The encounter was everything that Zhanna had hoped it would be. The monkeys settled down after a while, seeming to become used to the presence of the humans. Sitting on the roots of a great yellow flame tree, enveloped in the vanilla scent of the pollen, Zhanna watched as the creatures groomed and socialised, bickered and foraged for fruits.
It was the best photographic opportunity she had ever had.
‘I think this will be your job when you are older,’ Anisa said proudly. ‘Working with wildlife.’
Zhanna nodded. It was an intoxicating thought.
The three of them returned to the house at sunset, bitten by mosquitoes, but happy with the adventure. The security guard on the gate didn’t say much but he looked a bit surprised at their muddy and sweaty state.
Zhanna embraced both Dawa and Anisa as soon as they were in the house.
‘You’ve given me the best birthday ever!’ she told them.
Later Dawa showed them both pictures from Everest, the mountain that dominated his homeland and which he had climbed on two occasions. Zhanna was spellbound by the shots, her imagination fired by the extraordinary beauty of the scenes, but also by the savage power implicit within them.
‘One day I will go back to mountain-guiding work,’ Dawa told them. ‘I miss having Everest in my life.’
Falling into bed later, Zhanna sleepily scanned through her photos, ecstatic with what she had got.
It had been, she reflected, a really wonderful day.
Zhanna’s Story: An inconvenient truth
Zhanna went to school the next morning, hoping to show some of her pictures of the trek to her classmates. But her geography teacher’s very first words of the day made the young Russian girl’s palms begin to sweat.
‘We’re going to continue our climate change studies,’ the teacher said, ‘by looking at the negative effects of mining operations in the Indian Ocean.’
Zhanna chewed on her fingers. She knew her father was right at the heart of this dubious business and so did a lot of her friends. She bit her lip hard. The only reason the teacher didn’t make the connection was that she was new.
‘Are you feeling unwell, Zhanna?’ the teacher asked. ‘You can go to the sick room if you like?’
Zhanna clutched a tissue to her face.
‘No. It’s OK,’ she replied. ‘Just got a bit of a cold.’
The teacher nodded kindly, putting up a map of Asia and the Indian Ocean on the wall.
‘Two monsoons have failed,’ the teacher said. ‘The summer rains that have happened like clockwork for thousands of years have stopped and we have to ask why? Many environmental groups believe the undersea mining activities of the Azkmine corporation from Russia are to blame.’
Zhanna blushed to her roots as the name of her father’s company was mentioned. A few of the other students glanced at her.
‘Azkmine is raking millions of tons of nickel off the seabed,’ the teacher said. ‘The side effect is a 2,000-mile-wide plume of methane right across the Indian Ocean. It is this gas cloud that has caused the monsoon to be diverted.’
Zhanna ran to her father’s office as soon as she got home. She crashed in without knocking on the door.
‘I had geography today,’ she said breathlessly. ‘And the name of your company came up.’
‘Ah.’ Anatoly closed the lid on his laptop.
Zhanna took a deep breath and continued.
‘The teacher said it’s all your fault,’ she gushed. ‘That your mining operations have plunged millions of people into poverty and starvation.’
‘Rumours!’ he snapped. ‘There’s no proof. Besides, if my company didn’t mine there some other company would.’
Zhanna felt her cheeks flush hot.
‘That’s your answer? To the fact that millions of lives are threatened? That if you didn’t do it someone else would?’
‘You know nothing about business,’ Anatoly hissed. ‘Now concentrate on your studies and stop worrying about these crazy theories. I’ll be having words with this geography teacher of yours.’
Zhanna simmered for the rest of the week, and then the Easter break came around. She was hoping to stay with a friend but her father had other plans.
‘Pack enough things for a week away,’ he said. ‘I have a business trip and you’re coming along.’
Zhanna frowned. Long experience had taught her just how tedious her father’s business trips could be. Often was the time he had left her stewing in a hotel room in some far-flung corner of the world while he entertained his contacts.
‘Do I have to?’ she moaned.
‘It’s Kathmandu. Nepal,’ her father said. ‘You might even see Everest.’
‘Really?’ Zhanna’s eyes widened. She felt a shiver run down the back of her neck.
She ran back to her room and brought an image of Everest up on her iPad. She stared at the deadly looking fortress of rock and ice, wondering how it could be possible for any human being to dare to dream of the summit.
‘Everest,’ she whispered, reaching out and tracing the ridgeline with her finger.
That night she hardly slept.
Zhanna’s Story: Everest calling
Anatoly’s private jet was fuelled up and ready to go at Singapore airport the next morning. Zhanna was delighted to discover that Anisa and Dawa would be accompanying them on the trip.
The flight took them over South East Asia and across the vast interior of India. Zhanna was glued to the window all the way, loving the glittering vastness of the Bay of Bengal, the rolling view of India’s dusty plains as they passed beneath them, mysterious cities just visible through the sandy haze.
Then came the Himalaya, distant and enigmatic, stretching to the far points of the horizon. One peak soared above the rest.
‘Everest!’ Anisa was every bit as excited as Zhanna.
‘We’re coming in to land at Kathmandu,’ the pilot announced later. ‘Anyone who wants to come up for the view is more than welcome.’
Zhanna and Anisa rushed to the cockpit, smiling at each other, grateful for the privileges of being on a private jet.
The vision was an intoxicating one, but the scars of earthquake damage were still visible in the city. Some of the squares were filled with the rubble of collapsed buildings and temples. The odd delicate spire did rise up though, soaring with elegant grace from the confusion of Kathmandu’s streets.
As a backdrop to the scene were the mountains, just as formidable and impressive as Zhanna had imagined.
‘That’s Everest dead ahead,’ the captain told them. ‘Hard to miss, really.’
Zhanna stared in wonder at the triple ‘crown’ of peaks: Everest, Lhotse and Nuptse, a banner of ice crystals pluming from their summit ridges. She wanted the moment to be preserved forever in her mind. Then she remembered her camera, taking a shot with the telephoto lens.
‘Can’t we fly closer?’ she asked.
The pilot laughed. ‘Sorry, we’re on final approach. You need to take your seats.’
Ten minutes later they were on the ground. The aircraft was parked up in a discreet part of the airport.
Anatoly had friends in this corner of the world. A delegation of Nepali businessmen ushered them through the airport without so much as a passport check.
‘Why are there so many soldiers around?’ Zhanna asked.
‘Better not to ask,’ Dawa said. His face was glum.
‘Aren’t you happy to be back?’ Zhanna asked him.
‘This is not a good time for my country,’ he replied.
Zhanna could tell he didn’t want to say more.
Mercedes limousines whisked them through the congested traffic of Kathmandu, barging rickshaws and motorbikes and wandering cattle out of the way in a series of arrogant manoeuvres that had Zhanna clutching the edge of her seat.
‘Slow down, please!’ she cried. The driver took no notice.
A boy with a begging bowl had to leap for his life as the convoy raced past.
‘Many people without a home,’ Anisa whispered.
Zhanna nodded. She had seen poverty on her travels with her father but never so many people camping out in the alleyways and pavements of a city.
At one crossroads they were forced to slow. Next to them were hundreds of people in a food hand-out line, many with bare feet and some dressed in little more than rags.
‘Some of them are just children,’ Zhanna said. ‘Where are their parents?’
‘Many have died,’ Dawa muttered. ‘The famine has hit hard.’
‘It’s a natural cycle,’ Anatoly snapped. ‘These countries have always had periods of plenty and periods of drought.’
Dawa and Zhanna exchanged a look.
They arrived at a glitzy hotel, a five-star monument to bad taste, gilded with mirrors and bling. Sharply dressed porters rushed to open the limousine doors, ushering them into a foyer which was a palace of polished marble and tinkling fountains.
Zhanna thought about the dried-up wells out in the countryside, the crops withering from drought.
Anatoly had booked the biggest suite in the hotel. Zhanna felt ill when she opened a fridge and saw it was filled with exotic cheeses, meats and champagne. She asked the butler to remove the lavish bowls of fruit; it all felt so wrong when people were struggling with malnutrition or worse just a stone’s throw across the street.
Plans were made at breakfast the next morning. Zhanna and Anisa would
be free to tour the city markets and temples while Anatoly attended business meetings connected with an oil-drilling operation he was hoping to set up in Nepal.
‘I’d rather go to the mountains,’ Zhanna told her father. ‘See Everest close up.’
‘Too dangerous,’ Anatoly replied. ‘I’ve heard rumours about bandits in the highlands.’
As they left the dining room a voice suddenly called out.
‘Anatoly Kuzkin? Mr Kuzkin?’
An earnest-looking young Indian man with a beard approached their party. Anatoly’s face looked like thunder.
‘It is you, isn’t it?’ the man said. ‘I’m Sunjay Chopra from the Delhi Times. What brings you to Nepal, Mr Kuzkin? Would you be kind enough to give me a quote? Perhaps a short interview?’
‘No comment.’
Anatoly ran for the lift, pulling Zhanna after him. The journalist wasn’t giving up, however, and he squeezed himself into the lift beside them as the doors were closing.
‘Are you here to apologise, Mr Kuzkin?’ the journalist asked. He brought out a smartphone and turned on the mic as he pushed it towards Anatoly’s face. ‘Perhaps you have decided to donate some of your billions to the people of Nepal? It seems the least you can do after your company has destroyed the country.’
‘Leave us alone!’ Anatoly hissed. He pushed the phone away.
The journalist was ejected from the lift at the next floor but the incident had put Anatoly in a cranky mood.
The next day it further worsened when his assistant produced an iPad and showed him the diary piece the Indian reporter had written.
ECO-VANDAL ANATOLY KUZKIN JETS IN TO KATHMANDU
The man once named and shamed as the boss of the world’s most polluting company is on a secret business trip to Nepal.
This alarming news will come as a shock to the Nepali people; far from attempting to make amends for the misery his industries have inflicted since the monsoon has failed, Kuzkin is instead seeking to wreak even more havoc. Sources have revealed he is negotiating to buy up cheap land destroyed by drought and planning to drill for oil.
Killer Storm Page 8
