Mr. Miller

by Charles den Tex

  Back to the list. Seventy-four names. Still not a single one that was familiar to me.

  ‘What are you looking for?’ Kirsten asked.

  ‘Gijs. Gijs van Olde Nieland. Buddy of mine.’

  ‘Is he in there?’

  ‘I think so, yes. I think he’s being held, in that tower.’ I pointed through the window.

  ‘Held? Doesn’t he have a pass?’

  Vince leaned across the table. Towards Kirsten. ‘What did you want to know?’

  ‘Whether he didn’t have a pass.’

  ‘Interesting,’ he said. ‘That means I should also be able to look for someone without a pass …’ He turned around. His hand on the mouse. Click. Click. Click. ‘A Mr. Gold doesn’t have a pass,’ he said. ‘Room 506. Suite. Extension 506.’ He picked up a phone, entered the number and handed the phone to me.

  Nervously I waited for the connection to be made, but as soon as the call was answered I knew it wouldn’t work. I was put through to the phone exchange and got a polite woman on the line who told me with a musical voice that room 506 was not picking up. I ended the call.

  Still nothing. I didn’t even know whether Gijs was in immediate danger or not. Probably not immediate. The danger didn’t matter anymore. Today, here, I had reached my limit. I wanted my life back. And I wanted the same for Gijs. If I thought about it too long, I’d never get anywhere. The enormous power of the company and of the Larkowl Group was way too much for me. Only by concentrating on people, individuals, did I stand a chance of puncturing their line of defence. By removing Breger I hoped to hit HC&P in such a sensitive spot that it would undermine their confidence. And if the network imploded on top of that, I hoped that enough partners would decide to make a clean sweep of things in order to save the company. It was a one-two punch, and both punches had to hit home or I’d be left with nothing.

  ‘Must be a company outing,’ said Kirsten. She was leaning against the back window, pulling the curtain aside. ‘Look.’

  One by one, in closed formation, five identical, dark blue touring coaches had turned languidly into the street. They continued on slowly until they came to the office entrance. There they stopped. Bumper to bumper.

  ‘Looks like the riot police,’ said Vince.

  After a few minutes the door of the first bus opened and a young man stepped out. Dark blue suit, black shoes, white shirt, red tie. In his hand an attaché case. Blond hair. Searching eyes. He took a few steps to the side and looked around, until he found the camper.

  60 Bug on the move

  I opened the door even before he had a chance to knock. He was somewhat younger than I. Blue eyes looked at me with a cheerful indomitability that I had never seen in anyone before.

  ‘Sorry we’re a little late,’ he said, ‘but before we had everybody in the bus …’ He shook his head. ‘I thought I was losing my mind.’

  ‘Who’ve you got in there?’ I asked.

  ‘Family.’

  I looked outside, at the five buses that were standing motionless along the roadside.

  ‘There were going to be about fifteen of you, you said?’

  Huib Breger 2 laughed. ‘No, I said I needed fifteen passes, but that I was coming with the family. If you take a good look at this company Uncle Huib is with and at everything he’s done, you’d see we had no other choice.’ He paused for a moment. ‘Do you people know Uncle Huib?’ he asked.

  ‘From close range,’ I said.

  ‘Of course,’ he said. ‘But you don’t know who he is. Uncle Huib is an uncompromising white man. You don’t have that here. What you call extreme right is moderate where we come from. And Uncle Huib is not moderate. Never was. Apartheid is in his blood. After the changes he couldn’t live in South Africa anymore, so he left for America. There’s still plenty of room there for the white Christian heart.’ He laughed. ‘So we’re not talking about some two-bit little pimp who’s run off with his niece. That’s why.’

  ‘How many people are in those buses?’ Kirsten asked.

  ‘Two hundred thirteen.’

  ‘Men, women and children?’

  ‘No, just men.’ Huib answered every question with a casualness that continued to astonish us. We couldn’t help but turn our heads to the window, to the enormous numerical supremacy that was peacefully waiting for the signal to take action.

  ‘Uncle Huib is going back to South Africa with us this afternoon,’ said Huib, almost carelessly. ‘The flight leaves at one-thirty. Check-in two hours before departure.’ He looked at me, and the indomitability in his eyes hardened to a deep, unbreakable core. ‘No other flavours available,’ he said.

  ‘Okay,’ I said, ‘the logistics are a little different for more than two hundred people, so …’

  Huib shook his head. ‘Fifteen men are going with you. We’ll do the rest ourselves.’

  ‘That’s just what I was afraid of,’ I said.

  ‘No need. Nothing untoward is going to happen. The whole gang is going to go in and report at the desk, one by one. As visitors.’

  ‘Whose visitors?’ I asked.

  ‘You tell me. Who’s the one most likely to get so nervous that he says the wrong things?’

  I smiled. Some things are suddenly just so simple. I gave fifteen passes to Huib and one to Bernie. I kept all the rest myself.

  ‘Your uncle isn’t the only one who has to be brought out,’ I said.

  Huib nodded. ‘Another bad guy?’

  ‘No, on the contrary.’

  Huib looked at me. ‘Right,’ he said. ‘You know the building, you know where we have to be, so you lead the way. As soon as we have my uncle, there’ll be ten men to bring him and my grandfather back outside.’

  ‘Your grandfather?’ I asked. ‘Is your grandfather going inside, too?!’

  Huib nodded. ‘Willem is coming along.’

  ‘But that’s insane!’

  ‘It’s his son,’ Huib said resolutely. ‘He’s the only one who can get him. The rest of us are here to reduce his options. See you in ten minutes at the entrance.’ He got out of the camper and walked back to the first bus.

  We went inside in groups of two and three. Through the entrance hall, nodding amiably to the receptionists, running passes across the scanner, through the security gate, on to the elevators. I was in the first group of three. As soon as I passed through the security gate, I contacted Karl in Amsterdam by phone.

  ‘Now,’ I said.

  ‘And … click,’ said Karl. ‘Bug is … on the move.’

  ‘Keep me informed,’ I said. ‘At every step I want to know how far we are.’

  The attack had begun. Six men now inside. The virus in the network. There was no turning back. I saw old Willem Breger approaching through the hall. Eighty-three years old, his stark white hair waving in thick locks around his craggy face. He did not walk quickly, but he walked as if the world was his. And it was, I thought. Willem Breger had eight sons and thirty-six grandsons. His seven brothers together had thirty-five sons and a hundred and twenty-seven grandsons. He was the oldest, the pater familias of a family that was big enough to enforce its own values. Willem Breger greeted the receptionist, smiled, showed his pass and walked to the security gate. His walking stick tapped on the smooth marble floor. He held his pass up to the scanner, waited for the beep and kept on walking, as if he came here every day.

  A couple of minutes later Huib came into the entrance hall, the last one to do so. He, too, walked straight to the security gate, pass in hand, and as he greeted the receptionist a wall of men appeared behind him, all of them with friendly smiles on their faces, no pushing or shoving. As Huib joined us we heard the first man reporting to the reception desk.

  ‘I’ve come for Mr. Van Waayen.’

  ‘And you have an appointment?’

  ‘He’s expecting me.’

  ‘And your name is?’

  ‘Breger.’

  ‘Mr. Breger. If you’ll just take a seat, I’ll pass this information on.’ She picked up the phone and made
a call.

  There were already almost a hundred standing in the entrance hall. The area was fully blocked.

  ‘Additional benefit,’ said Huib. ‘Nobody else can come in or go out—until we’re gone.’ He laughed. ‘As soon as we have Uncle Huib, Rob and I will go off with Michael. The rest will bring Uncle Huib and Grandfather downstairs, outside and to the bus. The group stays in the hall until Rob, Michael and I are back. Okay?’ He turned to his grandpa. ‘Everything all right, Grandfather?’

  Breger the elder tapped his stick on the floor and pointed to the elevator. ‘Let’s get going,’ he said.

  We needed two elevators to take everyone up all at once. I held the door of one elevator open until a second had arrived.

  ‘Four,’ Karl’s dry voice sounded in my ear. ‘Add that to the previous steps.’

  ‘And how much is that?’

  ‘The number of the last step minus one.’

  ‘So we’re now at seven?’

  ‘Exactly.’

  The elevator stopped on the third floor. I led the way into the corridor. To the left were the offices of the partners and their secretaries. To the right, around the corner, were the conference rooms, and at the far end of the corridor was the big boardroom. That’s where I expected to find everyone.

  I heard a second signal a few metres away and Huib stepped into the corridor. At the same time a door flew open across from us and a woman came running out, a cell phone in her hand.

  ‘Then just interrupt the meeting,’ she shouted. ‘I’m breaking in on it now. Stay on the line.’

  She went around the corner and I listened to her footsteps fade as she ran down the corridor. I motioned, and all fifteen Bregers came out of the elevators. One of the men took a wedge out of his pocket and slammed it into the channel of the elevator door with a loud smack. I pointed to the right and the group moved off in silence.

  ‘Thirty-two,’ said Karl.

  ‘What happened to eight and sixteen?’ I asked.

  ‘It’s going faster than we thought.’

  The door to the boardroom at the end of the corridor was ajar and sounds of shouting were emerging, Van Waayen’s above all the others. He was hysterical.

  ‘But why is he asking for me?’

  As he spoke, a second secretary rushed toward the room. She gave our group a questioning look.

  ‘Can I help you?’ she asked. At the same moment, Breger’s loud voice came booming from the boardroom.

  ‘DRIES! See for yourself, God damn it! There can’t be a Breger at the reception desk because I’m here. You can see that, can’t you?’

  The secretary reacted with shock. ‘I’m afraid I have to go …’

  ‘Don’t worry about us,’ I said. ‘We’re almost there.’

  She shot into the boardroom closely followed by a third woman. There fell a lull in the tumult. For a moment. Then the deep voice of Caspar van den Vogels broke the silence.

  ‘Huib, what is this all about? There seem to be twenty Mr. Bregers in the reception area, and all of them are asking for me …?’ He paused. ‘And now there are thirty, I’ve just been told. Is this a joke of some kind? Or a test? Or a coup?’

  Uncomfortable laughter could be heard. Not the best time for a joke.

  ‘Apparently you still think I’d need such a thing.’ Breger’s voice was icy, condescending. Unconcealed aggression. ‘There’s only one man here who controls Mr. Miller,’ he said, ‘and without Miller this company is nothing.’

  ‘Two-hundred fifty.’ Karl’s voice in my ear.

  Then I heard the sound of someone standing up. ‘I’m going to go see what this is all about,’ said Breger. ‘In the meantime, no one leaves the room!’

  It was at that moment that I pushed the door open. With fifteen Breger men behind me I stepped inside. Every seat in the luxurious boardroom was filled. Partners from all the European countries were sitting shoulder to shoulder at an immense table. Hanging at the short end of the table was a large screen on which the network was being shown. A few hundred downed computers didn’t make the slightest difference. They weren’t even discernible. Huib Breger was halfway to the door. I held my ground in the doorway.

  ‘It might be better if you stayed as well,’ I said.

  Breger cursed. Loudly. ‘Michael Bellicher! You should have been eliminated three times already!’ he shouted, and for a minute he lost his self-control. He stormed around the table, his hands ready to squeeze the breath out of my body once and for all. Frightened partners began jumping up left and right. Some of them screamed, which was probably what caused Breger to regain his control. In one rapid motion he pulled out a cell phone, pushed a couple of buttons and began speaking into it.

  ‘Security, two men to the boardroom. Now!’ He listened to the answer, and slowly his face drained of all its colour. ‘Then get two from the hall!’ he shrieked. ‘What do you mean, it can’t be done?!’ With a gesture of annoyance he flipped the phone closed and stuck it back in his inside jacket pocket. ‘All right,’ he said, ‘then I’ll do it this way.’ With the same motion he pulled a pistol from a shoulder holster and aimed it at me. No one said a word. The silence in the room was palpable.

  ‘One thousand,’ said Karl in my ear bud.

  On the screen behind Breger’s back I watched the network swing into action in an attempt to neutralize the downed computers and to work around them. A thousand was still nothing, but from now on every successive step would hit harder. No one saw it. Everyone was looking at me. Breger came one step closer and was about to take another step when he seemed to freeze up in mid-movement.

  Behind me his family appeared and came further into the room. His brothers and his cousins. One by one they stood beside me.

  ‘Jesus, Rob,’ said Breger. His pistol hand hesitated. ‘Peter? Chris? Where did you all come from? Hey, come on, fellows, I’m working here. This isn’t the time to …’ All the confidence drained from his voice. With every name he named, he seemed to grow smaller. I was being surrounded by a shield made up of his family. Firing his gun was out of the question. His arms hung limply at his side. ‘Those people downstairs?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes, what about them?’ said Rob.

  ‘So they’re real?’

  Rob nodded. He was more than a head taller than me. A few slight movements were all Rob Breger needed to get someone to proceed with caution.

  ‘Are you all here?’

  ‘Almost,’ said Rob. ‘Niels couldn’t make it.’

  This last comment, the name of the one person who hadn’t come, shattered Breger’s remaining resistance. He shook his head and stared at his family in disbelief. Then pandemonium broke loose all around us, everyone screaming at once, and it seemed as if the situation really was going to get out of hand. The fifteen Bregers blocked the exit from the room, but the blockade couldn’t last long. The partners demanded an explanation. Shouting and screaming, they tried to call each other to order. Without Breger the authority evaporated from the room. Consultants can never accept each other’s leadership. The very idea that someone else knows better than they do themselves is foreign to them. With all these men yelling and jumping up and down around me, I feverishly kept an eye on one individual: Van Waayen. I needed him on my side.

  ‘Four thousand,’ came the voice of Karl. ‘Now we’re getting somewhere.’

  Behind me I felt the closed rank of Breger men open up. In the midst of all the tumult old Willem Breger appeared from behind his sons. He held his stick high in the air and brought it down on the wooden conference table with a jarring crash. He put all his strength into that smack, all his rage. The lacquer sprang from the table’s surface.

  ‘If you all would just shut up for a minute, we could be out of here in no time,’ he said. He didn’t even deign to look at the assembled group, but turned around and walked up to his son.

  In the oppressive silence one man stood up at the other end of the table. A small man, who up until then hadn’t said a thing. It was Herbert Colland,
co-owner and CEO of HC&P, the driving force behind the Larkowl Group and the self-appointed guardian of the interests of the Lord. He allowed the silence to intensify until he alone could break it.

  ‘And who do you think you are?’ he asked. His caustic tone cut through the room with unconcealed aggression.

  Willem Breger didn’t even look at him. The authority that Colland was trying to lay claim to failed to reach the other end of the table. Willem placed a hand on his son’s shoulder.

  ‘Huib,’ he said, ‘that dwarf down there wants to know who I am.’

  It seemed like minutes before Huib Breger could utter any intelligible words.

  ‘This is my father,’ he said.

  Colland changed his approach to accommodate this new information. The look in his eyes softened, his intonation shifted to a higher register, warmer, the vowels longer. ‘Mr. Breger,’ he said, ‘what an honour to meet you. Your son is a phenomenon, a genius.’

  ‘You don’t know anything about it,’ said Willem. He was not impressed by sweet talk. ‘And if you can call this monster here a genius, then I know where you’re coming from.’

  ‘You underestimate him.’

  ‘I don’t underestimate anybody.’ Old Willem had obviously had enough. ‘And now it’s time to go, Huib. Come.’

  Colland wouldn’t give up. ‘But you can’t just walk in here and …’

  ‘Oh yes, I can. This is a family affair. It doesn’t matter where I handle it. Huib, tell him I’m right.’ Willem poked his son with his walking stick.

  Huib Breger nodded.

  ‘Good,’ said Willem. ‘Then that’s taken care of.’ Two brothers stepped forward, took Huib by the arms and dragged him down the corridor behind his father.

  From Colland’s icy stare it was plain to see that he had already taken leave of the man who had provided his security for so many years and had run Mr. Miller for him. Easily replaced.