The Trade

by Chris Thrall

  “I’m sorry to hear that,” said Penny, sounding genuinely concerned. “Trouble in paradise?”

  “Ah, you could say that. She’s desperate for a child. We’ve tried for years, but it hasn’t happened. Kinda pushed us apart.”

  At the mention of a child, Penny felt an immense urge to claw Logan’s eyes out but forced herself to remain in character. “And this 4x4 island tour – you’ve been on it?”

  “Ha!” Logan grinned. “I own a jeep, and I know the island like the back of my hand, so I make my own tours.”

  “Hmm.” Penny pretended to read the information on the brochure, buying time while she considered what to say. “It looks fun. I’d love to see more of the island – especially with a guide who knows the sights. Where do I sign up for this tour?”

  “Penny,” said Logan, seizing the moment, “I’ve got tomorrow free. If you like, I can give you the tour myself.”

  “Eddy, that’s so kind of you to offer,” Penny replied, thinking one step ahead. “But I need to run it by my friend.”

  Oh.” Logan looked down at his feet. “Of course. The offer’s open to both—”

  “No!” Penny giggled, sliding a hand down his arm and letting it linger a moment at the wrist. “She won’t want to come. She’s not what you’d call the adventurous type. I mean I need to check she’s okay to spend the day on her own. Do you have a mobile number I can get you on?”

  “Sure.” Logan reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out a business card. “If you can’t get hold of me for any reason, leave a message here at the bar.”

  “Brilliant!” Penny seized the opportunity for a polite hug and a kiss on the cheek. “I’ll call you first thing.”

  - 49 -

  Penny hailed a cab outside Chico’s and asked the driver to take her to the meeting place she’d agreed with Hans, a bohemian joint, Tima Tima, a couple of miles along the seafront. She checked over her shoulder several times, as Hans had instructed, to make sure Logan wasn’t following her.

  “Good effort, Penny.” Hans joined her in the backstreet café bar. “How was it?”

  “Interesting. He certainly thinks himself Mr. Smooth. It was hard to imagine the double life he leads. I wanted to dig my nails into his face and demand where Jessica is.”

  “I bet.”

  Hans scanned Logan’s business card and then caught the waiter’s attention and ordered two Strelas.

  “I feel – urrrh!” said Penny, a feeling of repulsion coursing through her as she began telling Hans about the meeting with the trafficker.

  Not long into their conversation, Hans’ cell phone rang.

  “It’s Enrique. Something’s come up. Can we meet?”

  “Sure,” Hans replied, sensing this was to do with Silvestre. “We’re in Tima Tima. Do you know it?”

  “I’ll be there in five.”

  In no time at all Hans and Penny heard a throaty roar as Enrique’s Porsche pulled up outside. He entered the café bar wearing his smart cream jacket and black Armani jeans. Sporting his permanent grin, he hugged Penny and shook hands with Hans.

  “Small matter of a certain treasure seeker who’s disappeared in his boat.” Enrique gave a theatrical frown. “You did say you planned a dive last night.”

  “Unfortunately, Eddy Logan was there to meet us,” said Hans. “Took out Silvestre and tried to put an end to me.”

  “You are sure it was him?”

  “It was the same model of speedboat, put it that way.”

  Enrique looked down at the table, nodding thoughtfully, then clicked his fingers at the waiter and ordered a glass of white wine and more beers.

  “Your ‘activities’ – if we can call them that – have come to the attention of Praia’s mayor, Senhor Videl Gonzales. He runs a tight ship here on Santiago, likes to know what’s going down in his front yard.”

  “Activities?” Hans raised an eyebrow.

  “People are dying and going missing, and it’s obvious to the police you’re the common denominator.”

  “Why haven’t they hauled me in?”

  “Because it would cause a diplomatic incident, and besides, the mayor pulls the strings around here, and he wants to meet you first. He’s asked me to invite you and Penny to dinner with him at his home tomorrow night. He’s a good man, and he’ll do what he can to help you find Jessica.”

  Enrique took a small white envelope from his top pocket and slid it across the table.

  “La Laguna.” Hans read aloud the mayor’s address, printed in neat gold lettering on the invite.

  “It’s a converted fortress up in the hills a little further around the island from where you’re staying.”

  “I better put on a tie,” Hans joked.

  “Ah, don’t worry,” said Enrique. “He’ll take you as you come.”

  Enrique insisted on paying for the next round of drinks.

  “How’s the investigation going?” he asked.

  Hans thought carefully before answering, not wishing to divulge too much information for fear of having to explain his sources.

  “We’re building up a picture on Logan. Everything indicates he’s trafficking local orphans by speedboat, likely to the Canary Islands to supply the European adoption market.”

  “That figures.” Enrique bit his lip and stared into his wineglass. “What’s your next move?”

  “Tomorrow night I was planning to hop aboard his boat and pull the GPS history from the onboard computer to see if his excursions are to the Canaries. But I guess if we’re meeting the mayor, it’ll have to wait.”

  “You know the location of the boat?”

  “It’s moored on a private dock at his home. I’m figuring if Chico’s shuts at two, then I’ll leave it until three to give him time to get off to sleep. Penny stopped by Chico’s tonight and managed to sweet-talk Logan into giving her his pay-as-you-go cell phone number. If he’s signed up to one of the big network providers, then I’ve got a contact through my detective agency who can run a search on his phone records.”

  “May I see?” Enrique asked. “If you manage to expose this creep, then the agency will want his number for our own trafficking investigation.”

  Hans pulled the business card from his shirt pocket and handed it to the CIA man, who wrote the number down in his small leather-bound notebook with a pullout gold pen.

  “So, Penny, have you ever thought about becoming a special agent?” Enrique winked.

  “Ha! I’m not sure hanging around in bars chatting up sleazeballs is my thing,” she replied, and they all chuckled.

  “What are you gonna do?” Enrique looked to Hans.

  “It depends what we’re able to turn up. There’s no point involving the police if the evidence is circumstantial and inadmissible in court. The most they can do is invite him in for questioning, which will tip off the trafficking syndicate. I’m thinking a spot of surveillance might be in order, see if his movements give us any indication where Jessica’s being held.”

  “And if it doesn’t?”

  “Then it might be time to come clean with what we know to Interpol. See if anything cross-references with the search for Holly Davenport. If we’re still drawing a blank, then the only option is I pay Logan a visit and beat her whereabouts out of him.”

  “Hans, as you know I can’t get the agency involved in this – not unless you’re willing to file a report – but if I can help on a personal level, just ask. The thought of this scumbag laying a hand on a child makes my blood boil.”

  “Thank you, Enrique.” Hans raised his beer bottle. “I’ll certainly do that.”

  - 50 -

  The woman shuffled toward the check-in desk at Banjul International Airport. The air was stifling in the Gambian capital. She mopped her brow with a Kleenex and cursed the flies landing on her golden-brown skin.

  It had been a two-day boat journey from Kankaba, a small city sprawling along the banks of the Upper River, where the All Saints Home for Abandoned Children sat. The woman’s skin itc
hed from the mosquito bites she’d received while sleeping on deck. She prayed she hadn’t contracted malaria again. It would be the fifth time in as many years, and she’d spent enough time lying in sweat-soaked bedsheets with a fever raging so high death seemed the better option.

  In front of her in the check-in queue was a loud, fat, sweating Mandinka wearing white robes and a skullcap, and, dressed in a gold sari and turban, his equally as vocal and ample wife. The woman waited patiently as the Mandinka couple attempted to haggle over the luggage allowance with the pretty Fula behind the desk. Repeatedly she told them that the bulky collection of food and other goods piled high in cardboard fruit boxes on their trolley was eighty kilos over the airline’s limit. Each time the man tried to bluff his way out of the additional fee by handing her his kora, a stringed instrument made from a calabash and cow’s hide, and suggesting she take it as payment.

  Finally the role play ended, and the Mandinka pulled a fat roll of banknotes from a faux-crocodile-skin shoulder bag and slapped down half of what he owed. The petite Fula feigned a polite smile, opting for discretion over valor and the chance to move the annoying couple on.

  The woman placed her passport and ticket on the counter and was soon walking through the departure lounge toward her gate. On the flight she mused as passengers broke out pack lunches of fish, chicken, rice and beans before takeoff, raising an eyebrow at the footprints some confused individual had planted on the toilet seat. The woman spent the flight reflecting on the circumstances that had conspired to put her in this position.

  Born in Mali to Christian missionaries, a Mozambican father, an American mother, she had studied law at the University of Bamako in the capital and had gone on to serve as a junior government official. She fled the country during the buildup to the brutal Northern Mali Conflict, when Tuareg rebels declared war on the government and issued a hit list with her name on it. She had crossed Senegal to seek political asylum in Gambia, settling in Kankaba, where with her university education she was ideally suited to take over the running of the children’s home, a neglected operation surviving on sporadic handouts and UN food parcels.

  Since arriving at the home, she had accessed several funding streams, allowing for a complete overhaul of the building, its dormitories, classroom and kitchen. She’d gotten computers and Internet installed and set up a website displaying staff profiles, pictures of the orphanage and a Sponsor a Child link. In her sole piece of luggage, a sackcloth shoulder bag, the woman carried a cheap laptop storing files on each child, including photographs, personal characteristics and skills, and the circumstances surrounding their orphanment.

  Many of the children at the All Saints Home for Abandoned Children were anonymous, having no traceable histories, and although a humanitarian at heart, she was a businesswoman first. Surely everyone had the right to create a little nest egg for themselves, particularly when it involved trading children no one would miss who were destined for sweatshops or worse anyway.

  When the woman passed through immigration at Cape Verde’s Nelson Mandela Airport and the official asked, “Business or pleasure?,” “Pleasure,” she replied – although in view of the children’s profiles stored on her laptop, the declaration wasn’t entirely honest.

  - 51 -

  Hans drove the jeep ten miles northeast along the coast, following satnav directions leading them inland and up a winding country road. As they came over a brow, the mayor’s magnificent fort crowned a hilltop to their front.

  “Wow!” Penny reached for Hans’ new camera. “Let me get a shot.”

  “Looks like our man’s not short of a few bucks.”

  Hans pulled to a stop a hundred yards from La Laguna. Penny jumped out and snapped a few pictures but immediately felt guilty, reminding herself this was not about tourism.

  “I wonder if our meet will be mutually beneficial,” said Hans, continuing on to cross a vast grit-strewn courtyard lined with antique cannons and passing through a huge stone archway, complete with a raised portcullis, into an inner quadrangle enclosed by the building’s solid walls.

  “How do you mean?” Penny slipped the camera back in its case.

  “What with people dying left, right and center on the islands, I can understand why the mayor’s taken an interest, but I’m wondering what he can do for us.”

  “Good point,” said Penny. “Enrique seems to think this guy’s something of a gentleman with a good grasp on local affairs, so fingers crossed.”

  They stepped out of the jeep and began gazing around at the magnificent refurbished stonework – only two yapping dogs rushing out from behind a huge oak door interrupted them, closely followed by the mayor.

  “Hello!” Penny bent down and petted the excited Jack Russells as they jumped up and pawed her.

  “Senhor Larsson, Senhorita Masters,” a booming voice echoed off the walls. “It is good to finally meet you.”

  “Lord Mayor, thank you for inviting us,” Hans shouted back.

  A dapper-looking gent with slicked-back, white balding hair, the mayor wore duck-green slacks, a navy-blue blazer, burgundy cravat and highly polished wingtips. After ordering the dogs inside, he pumped Hans’ arm up and down with a cast-iron grip but was gentler with Penny.

  “It is my pleasure,” said Gonzales, a glint in his little flitting eyes. “I have followed your story with interest and thought it was time I offered my services.”

  Hans and Penny smiled. However, in view of recent events and the trail of devastation in their wake, they knew Jessica wasn’t the only item on the agenda.

  “La Laguna is quite some place, Senhor Gonzales,” said Penny, turning to take in a glimpse of dazzling ocean through the archway.

  “Thank you, but please, my first name is Videl.” The mayor gave her a warm smile. “The castle was originally called Forte de São Paulo, built to defend the Portuguese from the English after the colony was plundered by Sir Francis Drake in 1582.”

  Penny looked at Hans and winked, for Jessica knew all about Sir Francis Drake, Queen Elizabeth I’s favorite sailor, from the history lessons her father gave her during their stay in England.

  “Only it was sacked by the French in 1712” – the mayor shrugged – “and has undergone extensive renovation ever since.”

  “Why can’t we all just get along, Videl?” Hans joked.

  “Exactly!” said the mayor, chuckling. “Come, let’s go inside.”

  He led them through the oak door, set into the seaward wing next to the entrance tunnel, and into a vast corridor with large maroon-and-white-checked floor tiles and oaken paneling on the walls. Hans and Penny would have loved to have stopped to inspect the suits of armor, gilt-framed portraits and other antiquities decorating the refreshingly cool hall, but Gonzales, pausing only briefly for their approval, continued up a burgundy-carpeted stairway to the next floor.

  “My office away from the office,” Gonzales announced, opening a door on the landing to reveal a suite with a stunning sea view and the pomp and regalia associated with municipal government. “For the days I work from home.”

  “Incredible,” said Penny, rushing across the deep-pile carpet to the window, for the ocean view meant far more to her than antique furniture, rare book collections and photographs of the mayor meeting VIPs.

  “You’ve got your very own city hall,” Hans remarked, taking in the stately desk and gold floor stands supporting poles bearing Cape Verde’s, Praia’s and the mayor’s flags.

  “One must be comfortable.” Gonzales sat down in his throne-like chair, reveling in his own importance. “And how about we get a photograph, the three of us?”

  “Sure,” said Hans, catering to the mayor’s ego. “Only I haven’t got a tripod, so can I set it up on this?” He indicated to a display pedestal holding the warhead of a rocket-propelled grenade. Olive drab in color and biconical in shape, Hans figured it was left over from Cape Verde’s struggle for independence, backed by the Soviets.

  “Yes, yes,” Gonzales replied, dusting d
own his lapels and remaining seated for the shot.

  As Hans set the camera up, a photograph of four soldiers, obviously comrades-in-arms, on the wall behind Gonzales caught his eye, so surreptitiously he zoomed in and focused on it, then joined Penny to stand either side of the mayor.

  “Smile,” said Hans as the self-timer began to beep rapidly. “Perfect!”

  “Excellent! You must send me a copy.” Gonzales stood up and put his arms around them. “Now, how about we eat?”

  The mayor ushered them through the door next to his office and into an impressive dining room, its polished-walnut table long enough to host twenty guests. A thickset Spaniard, who must have been in his sixties, stood waiting to greet them with a tray of bubbly. Bald on top, with his remaining hair pomaded back from the temples, he sported a goatee beard and dressed in a simple black suit and tie. An ugly scar rose above the collar of his shirt. Hans could tell immediately it was a shrapnel wound and that, from the way he held himself, the man had seen some serious combat.

  “Fernando, gracias,” said Gonzales, passing a glass to Hans and Penny before taking one for himself.

  “Senhor Alcalde,” the butler grunted. He half smiled and disappeared, leaving the three of them to seat themselves at one end of the enormous table.

  “Salud!” Penny raised her glass.

  “Ah, hablas español.” Gonzales acknowledged that she spoke Spanish.

  “Más o menos,” she replied modestly.

  “La dos ustedes?” The mayor waggled his finger at both of them.

  “Hans speaks a little,” Penny said, switching to English for his sake. “But tell me, Videl. How does a Spaniard get to be mayor of Praia?”

  “I was born in Madrid to a Spanish father and a Cape Verdean mother, so I have Spanish, Portuguese and Cape Verdean citizenship. Like Hans, I served time in the military, and I came here just as the country held its first open elections. I campaigned for the Democratic Alliance, and when Prime Minister Carlos Fonseca was voted in, he gave me a junior role in his cabinet. I eventually ran for mayor, and several terms later I am still here.”