by John Muir
CHAPTER 20
THE SEARCHERS ARRIVE
Cagayan de Oro - Day 4
Pater was annoyed by the delayed flight departure time from Manila. It was not that it was not expected; Philippine Airlines Limited had a reputation for delays. Filipinos themselves joked that PAL meant 'Planes Always Late'. Pater still cursed anyway.
When they arrived at the VIP Hotel they all signed in and picked up the keys for the three rooms he had booked the night before.
He decided not to tell the staff at this stage about their link with T.A. That would come later when he needed more information.
He picked up the messages left for him from the reporter and Nilo and they all made their way to their respective rooms.
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near Linamon, west of Iligan - Day 4
Siti and Zahra had taken over once again from their Father, Salim, who had gone out to check the paper for a response to his demands.
The girls admired their handiwork. The swelling had diminished noticeably overnight. There were no more mosquito bites and even the welts from the bites of the previous day were almost gone.
Solid thumping of footfalls on the stairs announced the return of Salim. They knew from the louder than usual noise that he was in a foul mood.
When he stormed in through the curtained entry to the door, he made straight for the comatose figure. He swung his leg back to kick the Hapona, and then stopped just as suddenly. Instead he slapped Siti heavily on the top of the head which made her fall to the floor. She cowered, frightened, and expecting that she would receive the kick intended for the Hapona.
Instead, Salim turned and walked just as quickly out of the room. They heard his steps as he thumped down the stairs and slammed the door as he left. The girls remained silent.
After a few minutes of listening nervously for sounds of the door being noisily opened, they started the cold compact treatment again.
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VIP Hotel - Day 4
Pater's group were all in Pater's room when the receptionist called to advise that a man called Nilo was waiting downstairs. Marivic offered to fetch Nilo because she was the only one of the group who knew him. Immediately she left, Pater reminded Henry and Rangi that although there was a good chance that T.A. might in fact already be dead, not to tell Marivic or Nilo of that possibility.
Marivic introduced a beaming Nilo to Pater, Henry and Rangi.
Nilo looked at Henry and Rangi and started to speak to them in Tagalog. This time Marivic laughed and explained that they were from New Zealand.
"But my friend T.A. is from New Zealand, and he doesn't look like these men."
"No, they're Maoris, the natives from New Zealand."
"They look like big Filipinos."
"Yeah, they probably were a few hundred years back but they eat potatoes not rice," Pater said with a grin.
Henry and Rangi listened with smiles on their faces.
"Did you come all the way from New Zealand to help us?" asked Nilo.
"In a roundabout sort of a way," replied Rangi with a grin.
The phone rang again. After listening for a few seconds, Pater hung up, excused himself and left the room. In less than five minutes he was back carrying a small travel bag.
He put the bag on one of the beds and undid the zip at the top.
"Marivic, Nilo, before we go any further I just want you to know that in trying to find T.A., wherever he is, there could be some danger to all of us. We don't know yet. We have to find out these things as we go along."
Pater paused to make sure his words had sunk in. Satisfied that it had, he went on.
"Therefore we have to be prepared, just in case."
He pulled out four hand held radio receiver/transmitters.
"I originally thought of just using mobile phones, but I have been told that there are many areas not covered. So we will use these to communicate between us. Henry, Rangi, and myself, have all used them before. The spare is in case there is a problem with one of them."
He gave one each to Henry and Rangi and returned the fourth into the bag.
He then pulled out five Nokia mobile phones.
"Three of these are for us." He looked at Marivic and Nilo. "If you don't know how to use one, we'll show you."
Nilo and Marivic both smiled in anticipation.
He put his hand into the bag once more and drew out an oversize bank money bag.
"Lastly, but most importantly Henry, Rangi and myself will carry one of these each." Three Gloch pistols were produced from the bag.
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Paradise Plantation - Day 4
By mid morning, Ueda's need for sleep was making his ability to concentrate on what the workmen were doing difficult. Yamada had insisted on continuing the grid search until the sky began to lighten. Then after returning to the plantation hut, he gave Ueda a list of things to be done.
Yamada complained about being tired, crawled into a hammock and within seconds was snoring loudly.
Ueda was sure a short sleep would have recharged him sufficiently to cope with the tasks Yamada had set him. But Yamada needed him to make regular checks of the area being cleared in case something was accidentally dug up.
Ueda also had to make contact with Yamada's secretary about the ransom demand. That cover needed to be maintained.
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near Linamon - Day 4
Salim Hassan returned again around midday, demanded that his food be prepared, and after eating it, promptly fell asleep on a mattress on the floor.
The girls returned to their task of trying to help the Hapona to recover. Each would spend about 15 minutes dampening the face, then dry it and wait for a further 15 minutes before wetting his face again.
Siti was fascinated with the hairiness of the body. She did not tell Zahra what she was thinking or how she felt. While softly trying to massage some life back into the Hapona's body, she frequently stroked the back of her hand against the run of the hair to feel a greater effect. It had begun to send a pleasant shudder through her body when she did it. So she only ever did it when her little sister was out of the room.
During one of Siti sessions while Zahra was out of the room, she noticed the Hapona's eyelids flicker more than usual. She stopped applying the water and watched, fascinated.
This time, the eyes half-opened briefly several times, yet they were still unseeing. The breathing was becoming heavy and irregular. She began to stroke his forehead and hair with the palm of her hand. The Hapona seemed to settle down quickly and his breathing became regular again. Soon after, his lips began moving again in what she had begun to understand was a need for water. She soaked the clean rag and let the moisture drip. For the first time she saw the Hapona push his tongue out a little to get the moisture on his lips.
Despite the regular drips into the crack between the lips, they were still dry and cracked. The lips though had reduced to almost normal though they did have a few splits and cuts from the beating.
Siti wet her fingers and applied them to the Hapona's lips. When his tongue flicked forward through his lips and touched her fingers, she pulled them away quickly, but she had felt a sudden sharpening of the nerve ends in her stomach.
She wet her fingers again and reapplied them to his lips. This time though, when the tongue touched her fingers she did not withdraw them. She also did not notice that her own breathing had become rapid.
Zahra re-entered the room and noticed Siti's fingers on the Hapona's lips. But she did not see Siti's face blushing as she withdrew her fingers.
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VIP Hotel - Day 4
Nilo retold the group about how T.A. had told him he had met a Japanese and the Japanese was going to take him to a tailor the night before he disappeared.
"I think it's about time we had a chat with the hotel staff and a look inside T.A's room," said Pater.
"I'll get the key," said Nilo.
"No key. If the police do finally get their arses moving, we can't hav
e any problem with the possibility of tampering with evidence. How are the skills Henry?"
"These doors? No worries."
"O.K.," he said looking at Nilo and Marivic, "you two stay here. We won't be long." With that, Pater left the room followed by Henry and Rangi. Within half an hour they were back.
"Marivic, did T.A. only have one pair of dress shoes? maybe two dress shirts and one tie? One pair of dress longs?"
"Yes I think so, only one. I only ever saw one pair of shoes. I think maybe only two dress shirts and one tie. Yes, he had a pair of dark blue longs. They were all hanging up in the room in Manila. I wasn't being nosy, it's just that after T.A. bought me some clothes I hung my clothes up in the wardrobe too and saw what he had."
"A normal well travelled holiday-makers’ basic clothing kit. Well the shoes are missing, same for one shirt and the tie. But his dress longs are still there, one pair in the wardrobe. Strangely, what also look like a brand new pair of brown trousers sitting in some torn wrapping. Perhaps he had already picked up something from the tailors. At least we know he was dressed up when he left. Hang on. He might have carried the shoes, tie and the shirt with him to the tailors. Scratch all that. Back to square one."
Nobody added anything else.
"Did T.A. have some Rayban sunglasses in Manila?"
"I don't know," replied Marivic. "I don't remember him wearing Raybans when he was with me."
"Nor me," added Nilo.
"An empty Rayban sunglasses case was on his bedside table. He must've been wearing them. I guess it's a chat to the staff next. Let's set up a cover story so they'll help us."
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Iligan - Day 4
Ruben Consuelo had been a reporter ever since he had left school. He often thought of himself as a reporter even when he was still at school. Some of his articles had been included in the school magazine. There would have been more, but the teachers were always critical of his grammar.
His parents were poor, and the only way he managed to remain at school long enough to graduate was through working anywhere he could to subsidise his fisherman father's meagre income.
The marriage between his mother and father was also a social disadvantage. His father was Catholic and his mother Muslim. Therefore neither community fully accepted them or their children.
But that was then. As he grew older, matured and gained inter-personal skills, he found he could use his mixed religious ancestry to his advantage. He had a foot in both camps. While not a genuine follower of either religion, he understood the social and moral issues of both religions. After leaving school he had deliberately made an effort to learn as much as any lay-person was able to do without taking the final step of joining the cloth of either.
His knowledge had become respected in both camps. As yet, and already nearly 40 years old, he still had not made a notable journalistic scoop. He still felt in awe of the big names in Manila.
Perhaps this story about the kidnapping of a rich Japanese industrialist in his territory might be the opportunity he had hoped for. He would grab the opportunity, and work with the Devil if necessary, to be the reporting conduit for this story, that Manila, Japan and some of the rest of the world was following. Several Japanese newspapers had been contacting him daily and quoting their reports as being from Ruben Consuelo, their reporter on the scene. Even NKTV wanted him to send a photo of himself to include as part of their TV news bulletins as their reporter. All this sudden fame was making his mind wander from the job in hand.
The first thing he knew he had to do was to stop dreaming of how things might be later. He had to concentrate on the here and now.
To be closer to the possible scene of the action, he had temporarily shifted to Iligan. It was after all his birthplace, so he was home, even if he preferred Cagayan de Oro.
But who was this man Pater O'Reilly who had an interest in what was happening? He had not mentioned any newspaper or TV connection. Ruben Consuelo wondered how he should approach the subject of money for information when he next spoke to Pater O'Reilly.
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VIP Hotel - Day 4
The staff could not have been more helpful even if Pater had given them all large amounts of money. Of course they wanted to help the distraught fiancée of the missing man, and her cousin Nilo, who was helping her. They also thought it was moving that Mr T.A. Cholmondelly-Tapper’s half-brother Pater O'Reilly had been so concerned to fly all the way from Australia, when T.A's fiancée, Marivic, had contacted him to say he was missing.
It seemed the Reception staff and other staff could not offer much more information than that which Pater had already got by phone.
T.A. had been seen talking to Yamada in the dining room and the lobby, but had not been seen after retiring to his room for the night before he went missing. The Japanese had checked out before breakfast, paid his bill and left. The day-shift staff had seen him again briefly with one of his bodyguards after breakfast, though nobody could recall seeing him arrive, only the bodyguard. They had quickly checked with the dining room just in case the Japanese had taken breakfast and not paid. But apparently he had not been in the dining room.
The male clerk managed to get Pater to understand that he wanted to speak to him privately. Under the pretext of showing him the side door where the Japanese had left, he took Pater aside.
The receptionist told him that T.A. had a female with him for the night, but he had not wanted to say anything in front of Marivic. The night staff normally slept on mattresses behind the counter, and he was only aware of it because the sound of the lift opening had alerted him and he had jumped up in case it was the manager. He did not get a good look at the woman, as it was dark, and she went out the side door. He did not take any notice of what time it was.
The security guard had been listening.
"About 5:00 A.M.," he said.
"What?" asked Pater, surprised at the interruption.
"Yeah, about 5:00 A.M. I had to wake up one of the stand-by taxi drivers."
"Is the driver still here?"
"Yeah, well he should be back shortly, he's just taken a fare to Plaza Fair."
"What did the woman look like?"
"Small. She looked more Chinese or Japanese, but she spoke Visayan like a local."
"When did the Japanese leave?
"They left about 6:45 A.M."
"What do you mean they?"
"Him in his flash suit and his two bodyguards. But one of the bodyguards came back around 9:00 to pick up the Japanese again. I hadn't seen the Japanese come back to the hotel, a man's gotta take a break for a pee sometime don't he."
Pater just listened.
"Bloody rich Japanese had changed his suit too, rushed out the door, wearing his flash sunglasses, into his Nissan Patrol and gone."
Pater shook the guards hand warmly and in doing so palmed a P100 note into the guards hand.
"Will you let me know when the taxi driver returns?"
"Sure."
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