Death on the Silk Road

by Russell Miller

  -- Consolidate operating departments

  -- Restructure production-planning department to make

  it more efficient

  Charlie scanned the men sitting at the table. He had their attention. He continued after Nadia completed interpreting.

  -- Modernize management information system

  -- Divest non-core assets

  -- Establish a more competitive pricing formula

  He finished by telling them they owned a valuable asset at Tekeli, and they should consider providing a new management structure that would enable them to maximize the mine’s profit potential.

  Whenever it is necessary to wait for an interpreter, it lengthens the time involved in the presentation. In order to maintain the men’s attention Charlie kept it as brief as possible, telling them that the printed report would soon be available from Trevor Gunn at the Global Bank.

  “Why won’t the miners work the mine?” It was the first question asked, coming from one of the Kazakh officials at the head of the table.

  “Mining is a dangerous job, under the best of circumstances,” Charlie answered. “There have been a number of unexplained deaths before the study group arrived at Tekeli. That is behind us now. And there should be no problem. If the current management should refuse to go back in the pit, fire them and put in new ones.”

  It was the critical question. Charlie wondered, once more, if some of the men seated around the table might have a greater involvement than he knew. It would be possible with Kazakhstan’s proximity to China and Russia, that some men in the audience might prefer a different outcome in the fate of Tekeli than the ones he had described.

  There were other questions, from the audience regarding the findings, and finally Trevor rose to conclude the meeting. He promised the officials at the table he would soon be providing them with a document containing complete details of the conclusions and recommendations.

  The audience rose to leave. Charlie turned over the last page of the charts and felt a wave of relief that his job was finished. The presentation had never been a problem. He had made many of them, but now he could look forward to catching a flight out of Almaty and home.

  Trevor was delighted with the results of the meeting and congratulated everyone as they got off the elevator. He planned to take them all back to the hotel to rest before their going away party that evening.

  As they piled into the Rover a black sedan slid up behind them, driven by a young marine in dress uniform. “Mr. Connelly,” the marine called out, “Michael Pearlman at the Embassy sent me to get you.”

  Charlie shrugged, and climbed into the car. He recalled the station chief had told him they would talk after the meeting, but he didn’t imagine it would be this abrupt.

  He waved to Trevor as the sedan pulled from the curb, and squeezed into the heavy lunchtime traffic. Charlie was unaware that a second black sedan, carrying two of the Kazakh officials from the meeting followed closely behind them.

  30

  The marine guided his car through the traffic, and eventually pulled into the American Embassy at 99 Furmanov St. on Almaty’s embassy row. There was only one slot remaining in the reserved parking section. The young man slipped the sedan into it, then motioned to Charlie to get out and follow him.

  Once they were inside, the marine nodded to the grizzled desk. He then led Charlie at a rapid clip down a long hallway.

  The office doors were open on each side of the aisle. Charlie peered in at the workers busily engaged at whatever people in American Embassies do. Occasionally one of them would glance-up from their work, and immediately look away. It was not their business to be concerned with visitors—unless of course they were important government officials.

  Charlie and his guide soon came to the end of the hallway, and paused in front of a closed door with a sign indicating that the Cultural Attaché occupied this office. Inside an attractive Asian woman glanced up at the marine.

  “Mr. Connelly for Mr. Pearlman,” the young man announced with as much authority as he could muster.

  “Mr. Pearlman is expecting you,” she smiled, opening the thick office door. The marine turned on his heel, leaving Charlie to enter the large office by himself.

  “Hi Charlie, good to see you again, thanks for coming.”

  “I didn’t know I had a choice,” Charlie replied. “Your young friend didn’t act as though there was an alternative.”

  Pearlman ignored the response. “As you know, I am the CIA Station Chief here. I ‘ve heard a good deal about you from our mutual friend Emmett Valentine. Please sit down.” He motioned to a large leather chair in front of his desk. “We are the ones who arranged to get you out of your igloo up at the mine.”

  “I thank you for that,” Charlie replied, unsure of what might be coming next. He couldn’t keep from looking at the deep scar on Pearlman’s face. The man might have been reasonably good-looking if it was not for that distraction.

  “Young Pembroke filled me in last night. After he dropped off the congressmen over at Tengiz, he was able to get a secure line set up on the chopper. However, I wanted to hear about it personally from you. It sounds like you had one hell of a time up there at Tekeli.

  “Before you begin, I have asked a couple of associates of mine from the security branch of the Kazakh Government, to join us. You may have seen them at your meeting this morning.

  “Mei Lyn,” he shouted through the partially closed door, “I believe there are two men waiting in the lobby for me. Can you retrieve them please?”

  While they waited, the station chief told Charlie how he had known Emmett Valentine during the darkest days of the Cold War. Even though Pearlman was younger than Emmett was, he had great admiration for him. He assured Charlie if the old man had confidence in him it was certainly good enough for Michael Pearlman.

  Mei Lyn retuned, accompanied by two husky men Charlie had noticed seated in the front of the room during the presentation. At the time, he had thought they appeared to have a few more sharp edges about them than the rest of the government officials, but he thought nothing more of it as he concentrated on his presentation.

  Charlie was amused as he watched the two men’s eyes rivet on Pearlman’s assistant as she turned and left the room. Afterward, they grinned at each other, and then at Pearlman.

  He couldn’t blame them, she was an attractive woman. But, there was something, about her that was hard to place. She seemed strangely familiar--a mental itch he couldn’t scratch--but he turned his attention to the two newcomers where it belonged.

  Pearlman used no names, which is unusual anywhere in the world, but particularly in Central Asia where people place great importance on national and family heritage. He did explain that both men were with the KISA--the Kazakh Internal Security Agency, and they had worked together with him in the past.

  The station chief began by telling his local associates a little bit about Charlie’s connection with the Global Bank, which they already knew. But, he also vaguely hinted at a previous association between the American and his own organization.

  While Pearlman talked to the security people, Charlie looked around the office. At one side of the room was a tall bookcase filled with leather bound volumes by American authors that some functionary had decided years ago befitted a man of considerable culture.

  A large oil painting of a Kazakh horseman with a hunting falcon poised on his arm dominated the opposite wall.

  “….and so Mr. Connelly will tell you of the events that occurred while he was at Tekeli.”

  At the sound of his name, Charlie began thinking about what he would say-and not say. He was unsure exactly how deeply he should go into what happened, but decided that he would concentrate on the deaths, the Uighurs, and the motive. He had told the story before, several times. Now, all he had to do was to hit his mental start button, and the tape would begin to play.

  When he got to the part about finding Andre sprawled on the floor of the mine in a puddle of blood it was dif
ficult to continue. He paused momentarily. Then, the recounting of discovering Henry strangled with a leather cord--his face already turning blue--was equally difficult to convert to an unemotional description. He stumbled and paused once again before continuing.

  He would never be able to confront violent death with the equanimity that some professionals were capable of displaying. By the time he got to the circumstances surrounding Sammie’s death it was easier to describe.

  All things considered, Charlie told his story with admirable detachment. The same could not be said for the Kazakh officials. They immediately began to pepper him with questions.

  “So why was Sammie doing this?” It was the obvious question asked by the more heavyset of the two intelligence agents.

  “Yeah why?” Pearlman asked. “I never did understand that.” By now he had risen and was standing behind the two Kazakhs staring directly at Charlie.

  “In a word hatred,” Charlie replied. “Sammie hated the Chinese, who in his eyes occupied the Uighur territory. He believed the Hans were going to take over the mine to acquire the minerals he knew were there. He had somehow learned something else that was not generally known. This was the added element of rare-earth that might also be present.

  “When he learned that, he decided he was going to do everything possible to prevent the damned Chinese from gaining control of the mine. He knew the Middle East has oil, but China has huge supplies of rare-earth, and seems more than willing to put the world over a barrel to advance its competitive position.

  “He felt the best way of preventing Tekeli from falling into the hands of the Hans was to scare the miners out of the mine, and do away with the people who were there to advise your government on its true value.”

  “That was you people? They wanted to do away with you consultants?” the slim Kazakh agent asked.

  “Yes, that’s right. The Global Bank project people. Us. Sammie realized he couldn’t get us out of there, so he decided to kill us instead.”

  “And the hotel manager helped him?” It was Pearlman’s question. He had returned to his desk, and was taking notes.

  “The hotel manager,” Charlie confirmed. “Sammie was her nephew, and she felt obligated to help him—to hide him at least. And feed him as well,” Charlie added as an afterthought.

  “Against the interests of the Kazakh Government?”

  “Yes, I guess that’s correct,” Charlie told the heavyset agent. “Against the interests of the Kazakh Government, and sure as hell against the interests of the hotel’s guests.”

  “And her name was?”

  “I don’t know her full name. I called her Riana.”

  The Agent wrote it down.

  “Anyone else?” he asked looking up from his pad.

  “Well I don’t know for sure. He was very close,” he grinned “to one of the servers. She played the dombra.”

  “Her name?”

  “No idea,” Charlie replied, raising his hands to emphasize his lack of any further information.

  The men rose to leave.

  “Mei Lyn” Pearlman yelled.

  The young woman ducked into the office, almost by the time he finished calling her name.

  On the way out, the heavy set agent sidled up to Charlie and put his arm around his shoulders. “What was the name of the good looking interpreter the mining expert used?” he asked with a nudge. “She is a real deesh.

  Charlie paused, “Magda” he replied. Her name is Magda.”

  There were the obligatory handshakes, and Mai Lyn led the men back to the lobby.

  “Her name wasn’t really Magda was it?” Pearlman asked.

  “Was I that transparent? No her name is Elaina. I should not have done that. I shouldn’t have lied to him.”

  “Don’t worry old man. Lies among spies don’t count.” Michael assured him.

  “I’m not a ...” Charlie began, but stopped when he saw Pearlman’s tilted stare.

  “Your Mai Lyn is a very attractive woman,” Charlie said, rapidly changing the subject.

  “She is that,” Michael agreed. “She and young Pembroke are very close. Very close indeed,” he grinned.

  During the conversation with the Kazakh agents, he had recalled the meeting he had with Trevor Gunn the first day he arrived in Almaty. Trevor had told him then that Sammie’s wife worked for the American Ambassador’ wife, and had been very helpful to the Bank.

  “How did you find her?”

  “I didn’t exactly find her. She worked for the Ambassador’s wife.”

  Bingo. A light of confirmation went on in Charlie’s mind.

  “What is her last name?”

  “I really never thought about it. Mai Lyn is Mai Lyn.”

  “I think you had better check on that,” Charlie suggested.

  Pearlman was already fishing through his desk drawers. “While I look, how about a drink?”

  Charlie nodded, and the station agent pulled two soiled glasses from the same drawer. He wiped the inside of one of them with the wide end of his tie, before filling it halfway with scotch and handing it to Charlie. “Chin-Chin.”

  Pearlman finally found the personnel file he was searching for, and began flipping through it. “Son of a bitch!” “Son-of-a-bitch!” he roared, slamming his fist on the desk. “Her name is Mai Lyn Wang. I never really checked. I just assumed she had been scrubbed by the ambassador’s office.” His face was turning a deep crimson.

  “I thought it might be Sammie’s wife,” Charlie replied. “And Barry Durand? Did you ever find out who gave up Barry Durand?”

  “Son of a bitch,” Pearlman exclaimed, more loudly than before. “It has to be her. I had almost given up on that. I was about ready to send Pembroke back there. We have to turn her---or kill her. We can’t just let her walk away. By now she must have an encyclopedia of information on what we have done, what we haven’t done, and what we want to do.”

  For his part Charlie was satisfied he had put the final pieces of the puzzle together. It turned out that he was the only one who had them all. Now, he wanted to get the hell out of Almaty. He had done his job for the Bank, and coincidentally for Emmett, he only wanted to go home. He finished his drink and rose to leave.

  “Wait a minute—just a minute. You can’t leave now,” Michael told him. “You have to help.”

  “Help what—help how? I’m done.”

  “Look, we have to question her. Have to find out what she knows. Make sure she was the one that turned over Durand. To whom. And Why.”

  “Of course you have to question her, but you can do that without me. I’m not an interrogator. You do it. Have Roger do it if you don’t want to.”

  “He won’t be back until later tonight, and he has been too close to her. Anyway, she knows both of us. Don’t look at me that way Connelly. I don’t mean that the way you think. Well maybe Roger, but I’ve never touched her. It’s just that we have worked together. I’m compromised, so to speak. You’re a stranger to her, and you were up there at Tekeli. Hell, you killed her husband. You can scare the crap out of her with what you know.”

  Pearlman continued. “If something gets screwed up somehow, I’m not saying it will—but if something happens the Ambassador will be all over me like lice on rice. You, on the other hand, if something bad happens, the worst thing will be that you have to fly home in coach class. You get what I mean?”

  Charlie thought about it, and knew the man had made his point.

  “Look,” Pearlman added, “it’s almost quitting time at the Embassy. People will be pouring out of here soon. I’ll have housekeeping snatch her, and everyone will just think she has left for the day. These people know what they are doing—they have done things like that before. I’ll have them set her up for you. They will take care of everything. It will be easy. All you have to do is do some heavy questioning—scare the hell out of her and see if you can get her to come clean. It’s really your duty.”

  Charlie considered what Pearlman had told him. He had to admit
it made sense. He would like to know what she had done, and just how deeply she was involved with everything. If he flew out now he would never know, and always wonder. He finally decided he couldn’t just walk away and leave the job half done.

  “Ok, I‘ll take a shot at it, but I will need help. Get Nadia for me. She is over at the hotel getting ready for the party. Explain that I need her to work with me a little more in order to tie up some loose ends before I leave.”

  31

  The station chief immediately set the housekeepers in motion, and sent the young marine driver for Nadia. After she returned, Charlie took her aside and explained what had developed, and what he needed her to do. They were going to play the good cop/bad cop routine.