Sea of Gold

by Nick Elliott

  Next she cleaned up the cut on my cheek which still had the sutures and a plaster across it. Then she gave me an anti-tetanus jab. ‘There,’ said the nurse with satisfaction. ‘You see a doctor as soon as you get to GenSan, okay?’

  ‘Yes, nurse.’ I said obediently. She was pretty. I smiled at her through the pain. In return I got that severe look medical practioners reserve for troublesome patients. She gathered up her paraphernalia and left the room, no doubt to attend to some other poor soul.

  The old lady brought me a mug of ginger tea. I drank a little then, turning onto my good side, fell into a fitful sleep.

  CHAPTER 31

  I awoke to a cacophony of sound. Rain was hammering against the tin roof and the wind was trying to rip it off. Flashes of lightning punctured the darkness followed almost instantaneously by ear-splitting thunderclaps. It was 11.20 on Christmas morning.

  My shoulder was throbbing painfully. I dragged myself off the bed and tripped over something soft on the floor. It yelped. The old couple had given up their sleeping quarters for me and my clothes were laid out, still damp, but clean. I went through to the living space to find them. The old lady struggled up from the bench where she was weaving a basket.

  I knew I had to get out of there despite the storm. ‘Where is the nurse?’ I asked.

  My protectress scuttled off. She was gone some time but eventually returned with the nurse who was sheltering them both under an umbrella.

  ‘I need to get to GenSan, to the hospital,’ I said.

  ‘I know. Let me look,’ said the nurse. This time I got a smile. She examined my shoulder. Blood had soaked through the bandages. ‘First I must dress this again.’

  Considering the conditions, she was still immaculately dressed in her crisp white uniform. Only her white shoes and socks were mud spattered. As she unwound the dressings I asked her about transport.

  ‘We have an ambulance going later. We will put you in that.’ With brisk efficiency she cleaned and re-dressed the wound. ‘Back soon,’ she called on her way out, and was gone.

  There were two vehicles – both Fotons, more minibus than ambulance. My fellow passengers were a motley band of villagers – mostly mothers with infants. The other survivors from the mudslide had been evacuated earlier. We crammed in, the driver insisting I sit up front. The nurse sat between us on the bench seat.

  Violent gusts of wind swept across the road rocking the little vehicle. The driver continuously corrected its course, peering forward to see through the windscreen as the wipers struggled to keep it clear. It was over four hours before we drew into the forecourt of General Santos City District Hospital.

  Inside, the corridors were packed. Our nurse led us through and into a ward. The beds were occupied but beside the door was a seating area.

  ‘The doctor needs to see your shoulder,’ she said. ‘Wait.’

  Eventually I was attended to by a young doctor. He unwound the bandage, pulled away the dressings and set about cleaning up the wound again before re-dressing and bandaging it. ‘You are lucky,’ he said.

  ‘Yes, so I’ve been told.’ I’d been shoved over a cliff, nearly drowned in a sea of mud and had my arm almost sliced off. I wasn’t feeling too lucky, but then I was alive. I was worried that my presence was attracting attention but there wasn’t much I could do about it.

  My phone was showing a signal now and eventually I reached Carlos in Davao.

  ‘Don’t leave the hospital. I’m on my way,’ he said.

  Two hours later Carlos walked into the waiting area where I’d been parked in a wheelchair, took one look at me and said, ‘You’re lucky, man. Many people died up there.’

  ‘I know Carlos. You’re right.’

  ***

  I had been lucky. I was alive, and it felt good. Never mind what lay ahead, I’d survived. The B’laan people had rescued me. The hospital staff had cared for me. This country was full of generous, smiling people – whatever their creed. The B’laan with their blend of Christian and animistic beliefs, for the most part wanted what the rest of us wanted: peace and prosperity; respect and protection for their lands; and a system of government that could give it to them. In the hospital, surrounded by others in a worse state than myself, I felt gratitude and a sense of euphoria. It was not to last.

  Ever since Claire had told me that Kershope had been toppled, I’d been wondering what might have happened to him. I couldn’t quite believe that someone who harboured such grandiose schemes and who had after all made a spectacular success of his criminal enterprise, would simply fade into oblivion. In this I was correct. He called me. And he was right here in Mindanao.

  ‘Heard you were in these parts, Angus. Can we get together? One or two things to talk over.’ I could imagine. We agreed to meet the following evening in a bar he’d found near his hotel in Davao.

  CHAPTER 32

  Carlos dropped me outside the Sunset Cocktail Lounge. It was a classy kind of place by local standards. There was even a red carpet rolled out on the pavement under a white canvas awning leading up to the entrance. Two pretty Filipinas wearing big smiles and colourful evening gowns greeted me at the door.

  It took a moment for my eyes to adjust to the soft magenta lighting inside. In the centre of the room was a circular bar with half a dozen girls clustered around it. They turned to check out the new arrival. Off to one side, a pianist was performing a passable rendition of ‘Smoke gets in your eyes’. I wondered if he was sending a health message.

  Around the further edges of the place were semi-circular seating arrangements for customers to enjoy intimate conversation with the girls. It was 7.30 and the place was still quiet.

  A hostess asked me if I’d like to sit with one of the girls. I told her I was looking for a friend, a foreigner.

  ‘He was here,’ she said. She spoke to one of the girls at the bar, then turned back to me. ‘He went to the washroom. He’ll be back soon,’ she beamed. ‘Take a seat.’

  I sat at the bar and ordered a beer. It was the first proper drink I’d had since the lunch with Carlos on the beach at Kiamba. Was that really only three days ago, I wondered. I downed the beer and ordered another. Still no sign of Kershope. I waited another ten minutes then went looking for him.

  The toilet wasn’t as salubrious as the lounge, and it smelt. But it was the man lying face down on the tiled floor that drew my attention. He was dressed in cream trousers and a brightly coloured Hawaiian-style shirt. A pool of blood was spreading slowly across the tiles. I didn’t need to turn him over to see who it was.

  Tentatively, I bent and pulled the collar of his shirt back to see where the blood was coming from: a hole an inch across between shoulder blade and collar bone. Dougal had explained to me back in Leith that whilst a neat single incision-like thrust of a knife into the sub-clavian artery would do the job, ideally the blade should be twisted when withdrawing it to break the suction and tear the wound open wider; and that is what had been done to Viscount Andrew Kershope. I checked his pockets, removed his phone and hurried out into the corridor. At the far end was a fire exit partially blocked by buckets, mops and other cleaning utensils. I pushed the release bar down and the door swung open onto a back street. I walked down the street, passing more bars, and found one called Joe’s.

  I phoned Carlos from outside and told him to meet me there, then went into the bar and ordered a whisky. In a quiet corner I sat down, downed the drink and called over the waitress for another. Then I realised that I hadn’t wiped either of the door handles on my way out of the Sunset Lounge.

  ‘Who did it?’ Carlos asked when I told him what had happened. ‘You think it was the Malatans? It doesn’t sound like their style. They’d gun him down on the street more likely.’

  ‘I agree,’ I said. ‘I got a good look at the wound. I believe he’d been stabbed in the same way as a couple of other people involved in this business. It was a precise thrust into a particular artery, the work of an assassin – perhaps a former soldier, a commando.’


  I’d panicked. I didn’t know where the killer was. He might have seen me. The girls in the bar had got a good look at me. Maybe I should have gone back and told them to call the police. Maybe I should go back now. But if I got tangled up with the local law, I would be questioned. And I wasn’t ready to start giving answers. I needed time to think. And I needed to stay unconstrained.

  ‘Two things, Carlos,’ I said. ‘First, I need to find out whether Malatan has really taken the bait I set him. If he has, then he’ll be looking for a ship to transfer the gold to when it arrives in Greece. He might just buy one, but more likely he’ll bareboat charter something that’s already open in the East Med. To do that he’ll need to go through a broker, and my guess is he’ll use a Manila firm. Can you monitor all enquiries as well as actual bareboat fixtures made by Manila brokers?’

  ‘Sure, I’m in the business, remember.’

  ‘Good. On second thoughts, best check all fixtures in case he fixes something outside the East Med, even here in Asia. He might decide that’s safer – a local ship would be easier for him to control. Do you know anything about his shell companies? He must use them for his tax dodges and other illicit activities.’

  ‘I can find out. What about crew? If she’s on bareboat he’ll need a crew.’

  ‘And what better place than here? He’s got four-hundred and sixty thousand to choose from.’ An estimated one third of the world’s seafarers were from the Philippines, most of them employed through Manila-based manning agents.

  ‘Okay. What else?’

  ‘Much as I love your beautiful island, I need to get out of here. Back to Europe.’

  ‘And you’re worrying you’ll get stopped at the airport if they’re looking for someone of your description in connection with this killing. And if it’s not the police it could be the Malatans who try and stop you, if they’ve found out you survived the landslide. You’re assuming they’ve taken your bait but that doesn’t mean to say they need you. They would feel safer with you out of the way, whatever you want to believe.’

  ‘You’re reading my mind, Carlos, but it’s not just them. It’s whoever killed Kershope,’ I said. ‘He’s a bigger worry.’

  ‘We might get you on a boat to Sabah or even Sulawesi,’ he said, ‘but it would take time to arrange.’

  ‘How about a private plane?’ I asked, and then I realised. ‘I’m not thinking straight, Carlos. Let me make a call.’

  ‘Where the fuck have you been?’ Peter Stark greeted me.

  ‘Never mind. I need help getting out of this place, fast.’

  ‘Where, to Singapore?’

  ‘That’s right, then back to Athens. But I can’t use Davao airport. It’s not safe. Any ideas?’

  ‘Christ! What kind of mess are you in, McKinnon? Let me think.’

  I waited.

  ‘Listen,’ he said after a moment. ‘I know a freelance birdman who might fly you out.’ I smiled at his outmoded vernacular.

  ‘Can you get hold of this guy and call me back?’

  Carlos tapped me on the arm. ‘Tell him there’s an airfield along the bay from Kiamba, towards Maguling. The Japanese built it during the war.’

  I repeated this to Stark.

  ‘Okay, let me talk to my man. I’ll call you back.’

  I had to hand it to Stark. He was back to us within half an hour. ‘Phil, that’s our man, he says that airfield has craters on it the size of a car. The US Navy bombed it in 1944. But he reckons he could land there at a push. He’s flown over it before.’

  ‘Over it?’ I repeated doubtfully. ‘When could he be there?’

  ‘He’s in Kota Kinabalu. Reckons he could get to you by noon tomorrow if he leaves at daybreak. It’s around five hundred nautical miles.’

  ‘Would he have enough fuel to get over here then back to Singapore?’

  ‘No. Says he’d need to refuel in KK. That seems to be where he’s based these days.’

  I had the phone on speaker so Carlos could listen.

  ‘Does this sound doable, Carlos?’

  ‘Better he comes here at night,’ he said.

  ‘I don’t suppose this airstrip has landing lights, Carlos, and even if it does, switching them on would just attract attention wouldn’t it?’

  Stark butted into the conversation. ‘Daylight only my man says. 1200 hours tomorrow your time, okay?’

  I looked at Carlos. He nodded. ‘Okay,’ I replied to Stark. ‘I’ll be there.’

  CHAPTER 3 3

  ‘Just find me an inconspicuous hotel somewhere, Carlos.’ He’d wanted me to stay overnight at his place but I was putting him in enough jeopardy as it was without dragging his family into my affairs. He took me to a little place he used for the ships’ crews when they passed through before joining or signing off. Thank God he still had the bag I’d given him back in Kiamba. It had my passport and wallet in it. Before he dropped me off he reached across and opened the glove box. ‘Take this,’ he said handing me the .38. This time I did.

  The hotel was cheap, quiet, clean and friendly. And they didn’t ask for my passport so I used a false name.

  First thing the next morning Carlos returned. I checked out and once more we headed south back down to General Santos and on to Kiamba where we stopped so he could make a few enquiries. There was much talk of the landslide, but nothing that he could find about it being deliberately triggered.

  ‘I tell you, Angus, even if people know what really happened, they wouldn’t talk. They’re all afraid of the Malatans round here.’

  We pressed on, heading north-west up the coast now until, with half an hour in hand, we reached Maguling.

  Despite the serene beauty of the place, the palm-fringed beaches and the azure sea, I was nervous. The jungle reached right down to the coast here and I caught myself imagining all manner of threats hidden in the trees.

  The airfield was several kilometres north of the village. When we found it my fears worsened. The Japanese had constructed it over seventy years ago and it looked like it hadn’t been touched since. Did Stark’s pilot know just how broken up the surface was, I wondered. Could he make a safe landing, and take off again?

  No sooner had this occurred to me than two things happened simultaneously. Off to the west, I caught the glint of the sun on the plane, coming in low above the line of trees but still too high to attempt a landing. The pilot was doing a dummy run to check it out. I wouldn’t have been surprised if he’d turned round and gone home.

  At the same time, maybe two or three hundred metres down the road we’d just come along, a car was approaching, its form shimmering in the heat. At first I could only make out its colour. It was black. Then as its shape became more defined I could see it was a Range Rover, not your average runabout in these parts. I looked up again. The plane had made a pass right over our heads and was banking round and up in a steep turn. Would he attempt a landing on his next run?

  The car was getting closer. I was sure it was the Malatans. How the hell had they found us? I opened the passenger door and grabbed Carlos’s gun which I’d returned to the glove box. I’d wondered whether all this firepower he carried was pure bravado but I needn’t have worried. Carlos was round the driver’s side pulling his 9mm semi-automatic from under the seat. And so, as the old plane circled gracefully overhead and the car approached down the shimmering road, Carlos and I took our positions, braced for whatever came next.

  ‘I have a message for you.’ It was Malatan Junior accompanied by the big bastard, Sakib. They’d stepped out of their car and were standing either side of it, hands by their sides, twenty metres from us.

  ‘Raise your hands in the air, both of you.’ I called.

  With both Carlos and myself pointing guns straight at them they did as they were told, but I had no doubt that at least one of them was also armed.

  ‘My father sends you his apologies,’ called Junior with a marked lack of sincerity. ‘He did not intend for you to be caught in that mudslide. He wanted those illegal gold panner
s off his land so he told us to remove them forcibly. Your accident was all Sakib’s doing, Mr McKinnon.’ Then his conciliatory manner vanished. ‘But let me tell you, if I had it my way I would do away with you and your friend, here and now.’

  ‘You’re not speaking from a position of strength though, are you Junior,’ I said releasing the gun’s safety lock. I was holding it in my left hand since my right shoulder and arm were still bandaged.

  ‘We do not like being told what to do, being threatened and manipulated by outsiders. My father says he will have that gold and you will do as you promised.’

  ‘Tell your dad I’ll fulfil my side of the bargain and I’ll see him in Greece, but one more thing, Carlos here is the one person you need to rely on. Without him you’ll never hear from me again, and I’ll wreck the deal at the Greek end, for sure. Clear?’

  ‘Very well. I will tell my father.’

  ‘You do that.’ Anger with the arrogance of the little shit had replaced my anxiety so, trusting on my left arm being steady enough, I fired off three rounds at the car’s windscreen for the hell of it. They both leapt out of the way as three opaque spider webs appeared across the glass. ‘I feel like shooting someone, Junior, so you’d best fuck off now before I decide it’s you,’ I shouted. It made me feel better.

  I could hear the plane approaching now, louder and lower than before.

  Junior and Sakib were getting back into the car. I kept the gun levelled at them. They turned round and moved off slowly the way they had come. I looked at Carlos. He was sweating. The gun was hanging by his side.

  ‘Mother of God, Angus. Do you believe them? They’ll go to Greece for the gold?’

  ‘I believe them. Why else go to the trouble of finding us? But how the hell did they find us here?’

  The plane was on its final approach; a battered twin-engined turbo-prop. It touched down and immediately started bumping and rolling around on the uneven surface. He got it down safely though at the far end of the runway then turned back towards us, weaving between the pot-holes.