by J C Ryan
Henri had coached her, before leaving to fetch the man, that it was critically important for Margot not to do anything that would make this man suspicious that it could be a police sting. Difficult as it was, it meant suppressing her nerves and acting as if this were any other legitimate business transaction.
“Yes, that would be appropriate,” she said, in English, affecting cool indifference. She inspected the documents. She had no expertise in forged passports or any forged official documents for that matter, but she couldn’t see any flaws. Without saying a word, she handed them to Henri for his opinion.
Henri looked at them nodded and handed it back to her.
After the forger had debarked and been driven away in the waiting taxi, she and Henri reverted to French. He declared, “These papers are serviceable, but perhaps not the best quality I’ve ever seen. It might have been dangerous to say so in his presence, however.”
“I only need them to get me into Vietnam without raising eyebrows,” she said.
“Then they will do fine.”
“Thanks for your help with this, Henri. I appreciate it very much.”
“My pleasure, mademoiselle. We should be on our way to Vietnam in a few hours.”
Six hours after arrival in Singapore, the yacht had been refueled, supplies had been stocked, and they were on their way again.
Next stop: Ho Chi Minh City. Another day and a half at sea. Then waiting for Henri to let Bert know about our arrival and his contact to pick me up and transport me by land to the convent in Da Nang, my temporary home for the next six or so months.
She sighed, lay back on her bed, and closed her eyes.
Chapter 32
Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport, Mumbai, India
AFTER THE MAD rush to get on the plane, the usual wait between check-in time and boarding was welcome. He had time to take a deep breath, grab a bite to eat, and secure a bottle of water for the flight.
He had about ten minutes before the boarding call when his satphone rang.
“Ruan, I’ve got some good news. Margot, if that’s her on the yacht, has not left it. She’s heading for Vietnam.”
“Explain quickly, please. I am about to be called to board the plane.”
“I overheard a conversation between Henri, the guy who we think could be the captain and the man who he called earlier to announce their arrival and a woman. They spoke English while the man who came aboard was there, but they reverted to French after he left.”
“I didn’t know you spoke French,” Rex interjected.
“I don’t. I ran it through automatic transcription and then through Google’s translation program.”
Rex shook his head in admiration.
“Okay, what did they talk about?”
“Well, they didn’t use the word passport, but from the context of the conversations, I got the impression that was what this man brought to them and what he was paid for.”
“Passport you say… hmm that makes sense. She left hers in Vanuatu, and she can’t get off the yacht without one. Okay, no time to wonder about that now. So, you also overheard that they’re heading for Vietnam now?”
“Yes, that’s what I gathered from the translation between the woman and this Henri guy. Something to the affect that she needs it to get her into Vietnam without raising suspicion. But I’ve made a recording of the whole conversation and sent it to your phone.”
“Rehka, you’re a star. Thanks for that. Okay, I guess there’s no sense in trying to try and cancel my flight now. I’ve checked in and cleared customs, Digger is probably already on the plane. I guess the best is for me to go to Singapore and from there to Vietnam. At least that’s only two hours flying.”
“I agree. I have already started looking for flights from Singapore to Ho Chi Minh City.”
Overhead, he heard his section number called for boarding.
“Thanks, Rehka, I’ve got to go now. I’ll call you after I’ve landed.”
“Okay, Ruan have a safe trip. I’ll keep on listening.”
***
ONCE THE PLANE had reached cruising altitude and the hostess had served him with a packet of snacks and a soft drink, he retrieved his earphones from his bag and plugged them into his satphone.
The sound quality was poor, and it was difficult to say with one hundred percent certainty it was Margot’s voice he was listening to. He’d heard her French accented English and the way she pronounced certain words when they were speaking English for Ida’s benefit, and that was the one thing that made him at least ninety percent sure it was Margot’s voice.
Other than that, Rex reached the same conclusions as Rehka; the meeting on the Java Princess in Singapore was about a passport or some kind of papers that would help this woman get through Vietnamese customs, and that they’d soon be en route from Singapore to Vietnam.
Vietnam? Ah, it’s a former French colony. That makes some sense.
However, the big takeaway of the conversation between Henri and this woman was the tone thereof. There was no indication of antagonism between them. On the contrary, it sounded as if they were good friends. And that immediately had him in doubt about his assumption that Margot had been abducted or was even on that yacht against her wishes. Thinking about it, he had to admit that it fit much better with what he thought earlier about the way she said goodbye to him and Ida the last night they saw her.
But that meant she’d planned her disappearance.
Of course, those conclusions immediately unleashed another barrage of unanswerable questions. He sighed, pushed the button in the armrest of his chair to recline his seat, leaned back in it, and closed his eyes.
Many questions and no answers.
Chapter 33
Singapore
IT WAS PAST midnight in Singapore when his plane arrived. He called Rehka on the secure satphone for an update immediately and asked for the status of the yacht as he walked toward the cargo area to get Digger.
“The Java Princess left port two hours ago, they’re going to Ho Chi Minh City. Do you want to go straight there or wait until we’re sure?” she asked after the usual security routine.
“Digger needs a break from air travel, and I could use a good night’s sleep. Let’s wait. I’ll call you when I get to a hotel.”
“Way ahead of you, boss. I assumed you’d want to wait and booked a room. The hotel has a dog walking area. Their restaurant is closed now, though. You’ll have to grab a snack there at the airport.”
Rex thought, not for the first time, what a jewel he’d found in Rehka. “You’re the best,” he told her.
He could hear the smile in her voice as she thanked him. It took so little to make her happy. Her life now was charmed, compared to the circumstances in which he’d found her at first, enslaved in a Saudi harem. No wonder she was always so cheerful, at least when she interacted with him.
“Keep me in the loop,” he added. “It will be at least another hour before I sack out.”
“I will,” she promised.
By the time he’d walked Digger, found something for them to eat, and reached his hotel room, Rehka had reported that there was virtually no SIGINT coming from the yacht. Everyone aboard, except whoever was piloting, was probably asleep. Rex told her to grab some sleep herself and call him when she woke up in the morning.
***
MUMBAI WAS TWO and a half hours behind Singapore, so Rex didn’t expect a report before he and Digger left the hotel room. Nevertheless, he got a wake-up call only five hours after he’d gone to sleep.
“She’s definitely aboard,” Rehka reported. “Now that we know her cell signal, I’ve been monitoring that. She called someone in France just a few minutes ago.”
“What did they say?”
“Well, here is a piece of new information. They had a long discussion about her pregnancy and…”
“What! Did you say pregnancy?”
“Yes, Ruan, that’s what I said. This woman is pregnant. Erratic as the Google
translations are, it’s clear that she’s pregnant and that she’s going to Vietnam to have the baby there…”
“Pregnant. How the hell…”
Rehka started giggling. “Ruan, don’t tell me you’ve never had a lesson about the birds and the bees. Unless it was done artificially, there’s just one way…”
“Yes, yes, that much I know, but…”
“Ruan, you’re not perhaps…”
“No, Rehka you don’t have to spend another second on that thought. My friendship with her is purely platonic.”
“Don’t worry, I believe you. Notwithstanding, she is pregnant and apparently going to book into a convent in Da Nang and stay there for the rest of her pregnancy.”
“Okay.”
“The translation software isn’t very good, you know. Sometimes it comes back with something that makes no sense. But I’ve sent you the audio file—you can listen to it.”
“Well, it’s very resourceful of you to use it at all. Go ahead and get me a flight to Saigon.”
“You do know it’s called Ho Chi Minh City now, yes?” she asked.
Rex knew the city was renamed from Saigon to Ho Chi Minh City after the Fall of Saigon in 1975, in honor of Hồ Chí Minh, the first leader of North Vietnam. However, the informal name spelled, Sài Gòn, remained in daily speech both domestically and internationally.
“Yes, I know, just a slip of the tongue. That’s the name I learned in school when we did the history of the Vietnam war. Ho Chi Minh City it is then.
Rehka said she’d get back to him with flight plans.
Rex tried to go back to sleep—it was impossible. His brain was teeming with a whole new scenario and what felt like hundreds of new questions.
Pregnant? That explains her nausea on the boat trip… and abstaining from alcohol.
He checked his phone; the audio file was there. He plugged his earphones in, sat down on the chair next to his bed, pushed the play icon on the sound app, closed his eyes, and listened.
Because this file was directly recorded from a phone, the quality was much better than the previous file. He heard her say to the man who answered the call, “Hi, just letting you know that I got my new passport, and we are on our way to Vietnam.”
After listening to the first few sentences uttered by the woman on the phone, he knew with hundred percent certainty it was Margot.
Okay, that box has now finally been ticked and firmly so—she is alive.
The other box that’s also been ticked firmly now is that she’d not been abducted.
He continued to listen as the man assured her everything would be okay, and they discussed the arrangements he’d made for her to go to a convent in Da Nang to have the baby.
After a few more minutes of discussing arrangements, the call ended when Margot told the man that she’d just remembered she was not supposed to use her cellphone at all.
That left Rex in frustration that he still didn’t have the slightest clue as to why she was hiding her pregnancy from the world.
What could the reason be? Well, she is a famous and high-ranking person in the French government. But she never mentioned a boyfriend to me. Could it be that her pregnancy might cause some sort of scandal in France and that’s what she’s hiding from?
Chapter 34
Changi Airport, Singapore
AFTER MISSING THE yacht in Singapore and cooling his heels overnight, Rex woke before dawn the next morning with a sense that the chase was about to end. He and Digger had a flight to Ho Chi Minh City to catch, and according to his calculations he’d be there several hours before the yacht arrived. He’d have time to take care of Digger’s needs, scout, maybe get something to eat, and then be on the spot as Rehka kept him up to the moment on exactly where it would dock.
He didn’t count on the string of minor disasters that began the moment he stepped out of his hotel room. There was no one at the desk, and ringing the bell several times didn’t produce a person either. He could have walked out without settling the bill, not that he would ever do so. At the last possible moment before he would have had to leave to make it to the airport, a sleepy desk clerk appeared, scowling and scolding Rex roundly in Mandarin.
Rex apologized in the same language and explained quickly that he had a flight to catch. The desk clerk gave a slight bow, but not before the look of astonishment crossed his face that this báirén understood and addressed him in his mother tongue. He immediately switched to Singlish, the informal English-based creole spoken in Singapore, for the rest of the transaction. Rex had to suppress a smile at the clerk’s embarrassment.
It was also too early for any place to be open for breakfast. Rex could handle the hunger—after all, it was only a short flight, and in any case, there’d be vending machines at the airport. However, he didn’t have kibble or anything else suitable for Digger’s meal. Digger was already beginning to show confusion and impatience for why his breakfast hadn’t materialized as usual.
There was nothing to be done about it but head for the airport and hope a solution would present itself. But, when they arrived, the delay at the hotel had left Rex with no time before Digger had to be handed over to the baggage area. As Rex ordered Digger into the crate, his furry companion let out a mournful howl which could only have meant, “Damn, Dalton, you put me on a plane without feeding me first. What’s gotten into you?” This protestation from Digger not only raised the hackles on Rex’s neck, it also set two or three other dogs barking in a crazy frenzy—probably in sympathy for Digger.
Rex muttered, “Sorry, boy. I’ll make it up to you, I promise,” as he beat a hasty retreat from the frowns of the baggage clerks. He didn’t envy them trying to settle their charges after that. He had no time to placate them, and he already felt terribly guilty about Digger’s hunger and sense of abandonment.
Looking over the unappetizing selections in the first vending machine he came to, Rex was visualizing trying to find a juicy steak or roasted chicken, whichever he could find first in Vietnam to make it up to the dog when an overhead announcement made a bad situation worse. His flight was delayed because of a mechanical problem. Rex hurried to the information desk and asked if they knew how long. The answer wasn’t reassuring, in fact, unhelpful would have been a more accurate description as the shoulder-shrugging clerk said, “No, sir, we have no information at this time. And we don’t know when we will know more. Perhaps an hour, perhaps two… could be more.”
Rex quickly realized that throwing his toys out of the crib wouldn’t fix the plane, so he turned his thoughts to Digger. An hour wouldn’t give him time to retrieve the dog from baggage. In fact, there was a chance he was already aboard the plane. He asked about that, and again got noncommittal, vague, and unhelpful answers—frustrating.
This is not going well.
He requested to speak to someone who could tell him whether the animals were aboard the plane yet, whether they would be given water at least, and whether he could be permitted to feed his dog during the delay. Every question was met with a blank stare or one of what felt to him like at least five body language variations of “I don’t know.”
But every person has a limit to their patience, and for Rex, anything that could impact on Digger’s well-being was the no go zone. He slammed a closed fist on the counter, causing the two airline employees behind it to jump. He looked the woman he was speaking to straight in the eyes and started speaking softly and measuredly, “Listen carefully. My dog is a service animal. I demand the opportunity to see to his safety. If he’s sitting in his cage inside a hot aircraft for much longer, his life is in danger.”
The two clerks spoke to each other rapidly in a language Rex didn’t know. Tamil, perhaps—one of the three official languages of the island nation of Singapore. Then the woman turned back to him and spoke softly. “My co-worker will call down and ensure that your dog and the other animals aboard have water and ventilation. I’m sorry, sir, but that is the best we can do. You are forbidden to return to the area.”
>
Rex was still anxious about Digger’s safety, but he wouldn’t help the situation any if he got himself arrested. He worked to control his anger and frustration, pacing it off while he waited for the overhead announcement to inform him how much longer the flight would be delayed.
He paced for two hours, growing increasingly worried about Digger and about beating the yacht to the finish line—the dock in Ho Chi Minh City’s port. At last, the announcement came. There would be another two-hour delay. Passengers were advised to enjoy the airport’s restaurants and duty-free shops before checking in again.
That was the last straw for Rex. He stepped away from the nearest person and called Rehka on the satphone, despite the early hour in Mumbai. “Rehka, I’m sorry to wake you, but are there any other flights leaving here in the next two hours? My plane has mechanical issues, Digger’s been in baggage for hours without food, and I’m concerned about him. If I can get him out of there, I’ll just take another flight.”
“Good morning to you, too, Ruan,” she said. “I will see what I can do.” She ended the call before he could apologize for his abruptness.
Shit, on top of all this, I’ve now blown it with Rehka, as well. You better get a grip on yourself Dalton, you’re acting like a spoiled brat.
Thankfully, the restaurants were now open. He secured half a dozen McDonald’s egg and sausage biscuits, downed two himself with a cup of coffee, and headed to the baggage area, despite having been told to stay away. On the way, he composed himself. He was convinced that if he could make nice with the employees, he wouldn’t be arrested. Fortunately, that proved to be true. Perhaps his low blood sugar because of an empty stomach was part of his earlier grumpiness.
Rex found a baggage clerk whose ethnicity looked to be Chinese and asked politely in Mandarin if he could arrange to have some food delivered to his dog. He explained the dog hadn’t had any food today, and because of the delay was probably suffering from hunger.
