by Brian Cain
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Stanton had been in the lair for two days. At times he suffered information overload. He had Masters’ and Mahun's lap top computers, the lap top Jacob’s father Al Ahmadi had given him and email streams and satellite facts coming in all the time. He broke down the information into key areas being location sourced, age of information and if linked to Tali Mahir and a trend emerged. Tali Mahir was operating out of Karachi which is a long way from Islamabad where all the action is, this indicated it could be for ease of access from the sea or that Mahir found it easier to operate out of the limelight where radicals could move around with ease. Hadar could have given him any name but Tali Mahir was in Karachi and worked out of the government office complex.
Stanton had made direct contact by means of messages from Marshall and Tucker’s many email addresses, some successful in receiving return messages all from the same source in Karachi. Mahir must know that Tucker and Marshall are both dead so does he assume one of their direct cohorts have picked up the cause or is it someone other than Mahir, not so well informed? No matter what Stanton mulled over in his mind it came up with the same thing, Mahir thought to be Kadeem Levi must have information and it is worth going after.
Aeroplanes Stanton did not like, in harms way with no defence, but the time had come to run the risk. Stanton had no contacts in Karachi and selected an identity from his passport collection, one of which belonged to Masters, acquired in his brief case. If Stanton went into Karachi on Masters’ passport it could be they would come to him. Masters would be a target due to all the missing money and Stanton knew Mahir would be very keen to talk to him.
He changed the passport photo to one of his own, wearing plain glasses and dying his hair black. Stanton had also been allowing his beard to grow and was now well past the stubble phase. He resealed the passport with sophisticated equipment in his possession. He checked to see if Masters’ credit cards were still active and had no problems in paying for a first class flight to Jinnah International Airport Karachi. A handy spin-off was that Masters had a Pakistan visa in his passport for multiple business visits. From Masters’ records he found he always flew to Karachi from Hong Kong taking a Qantas flight from Australia as Pakistan Airlines did not operate from Australia.
Stanton would touch down in Karachi at 7.00 am Saturday the 9th of October. He summoned Cadiche and informed him he was leaving the country and his only contact would be the satellite phone; he gave little information on his quest. Stanton, caught up in his quest, listened for a while as he received family updates and felt things had fallen back to being as they were. Jodi had been asking questions but seemed to know Stanton would return when no one could harm her. Stanton put the safety of his family in the hands of the Cadiche Man and Cadiche accepted. Cadiche informed Stanton he had been involved in the underworld sanctions with Wu Farr. With the assistance of Robert and Anthony there had been a spate of unfortunate and sometimes nasty accidents.