“I am,” I said. “They’re damn uncomfortable.” Our helmets had built-in headphones and a microphone with Bluetooth links to our phones. Chandler connected Robyn to the call.
“I’m testing it’s all working,” he said.
“We tested it yesterday,” said Robyn. “Three times.”
“The devil is in the details,” said Chandler, then ended the call before Robyn could tell him not to sweat the small stuff, which was their standard routine.
“Don’t sweat the small stuff,” Robyn said to me.
“That’s right,” I said. “Keep an open mind and be ready to adapt to changing circumstances.”
I knew how important these little routines were to her. Like the checklists a pilot runs through before take-off, they prepared our minds. She lifted the visor of her helmet so that I could see her eyes, and I marvelled at their clarity.
“You nervous?” she asked.
I lifted my own visor so that she could see my calm sincerity.
“Not a bit,” I said. “What could possibly go wrong?”
Lebogang Madikwe arrived in his stretched Mercedes Benz twenty minutes later. He carried his stomach before him like an enormous balloon that he was struggling to get his arms around. I watched him proceed down the wharf towards us, a bodyguard to each side, and was struck again by the physical similarity he bore to Fat-Boy. Lebogang passed right by my narrow slit of a window, but he didn’t look in – his attention, and that of his bodyguards – was drawn inexorably to the glinting bars being loaded into the back of the truck. He shouted something in Xhosa, and the loading process halted. There followed a stream of Xhosa with its surprising pops and clicks as he probably criticised what they were doing and maybe scolded them for sealing the gold into cardboard boxes where he couldn’t see it. Then the truck rocked on its suspension as he climbed up into the rear compartment, and there was a profound silence as he took in the sight of the boxes and the gold bars being packed.
I phoned Chandler and told him the big boy had arrived and was inspecting the gold.
“Good,” said Chandler. “Let him indulge himself. You all set?”
“Just about, loading the last of it now. The roadblock ready?”
“They’ve ripped the tar up, and are busy digging a great dirty hole in the road.”
“Less than an hour to go,” I said.
“We’ll be ready,” said Chandler, and ended the call. Some people like to end their phone conversations with a closing comment, good wishes, or a reference to the next contact, but Chandler was not one of those people. He preferred a cliff-hanger.
“What’s up?” asked Robyn. “You’re not usually this nervous.”
“Do you think that man has bought Fat-Boy’s act?” I asked.
“He’s loading the gold into the truck, isn’t he? It wouldn’t have gone this far if he didn’t believe him. What’s wrong?”
“It’s been too easy.”
“Things don’t need to be hard, Ben. Sometimes good things are easy.”
She smiled at me, and despite myself, I wished it were true.
Twenty-Six
It took the underlings only another half an hour to complete the loading process under the watchful eye of Lebogang who, having been mesmerised by his glittering bounty, stood on the wharf like an enlarged beach ball and gazed greedily at his men as they worked.
The truck shook as the rear doors were closed, and then a lackey banged on Robyn’s door. She closed her visor, opened a narrow slit of window and looked down at him.
“You can lock it?” he said. “There’s no lock on the door.”
“Sure can,” she said, and pressed a button on the dashboard. Three loud beeps sounded.
“Follow us,” said the lackey, and he pointed to a black Mercedes Benz, which was doing an eight-point turn on the wharf ahead of us.
“No problem,” said Robyn, and she closed the window as the first heavy drops of rain struck. The man ducked his head down and jogged up to the Mercedes. By the time he reached the car, it was coming down in sheets.
“You know where the windscreen wipers are?” I asked as Robyn started the engine with a roar. She didn’t answer, but flicked a switch and the wipers cleared the front windscreen, their motor making a high-pitched whine.
“This will work in our favour,” I said, and Robyn nodded. I realised her adrenalin was up, and could feel the familiar tingling in my fingers that announced the start of the main act.
I called Chandler and told him we were rolling. He started shouting instructions to his team before I ended the call. We were at the top end of the wharf when he called back and connected Robyn to the call.
“The big boy behind or in front?” he asked.
“Behind,” I said, and checked in the side mirror that the stretched Mercedes was following us, two rings of LED lights glittering through the curtain of rain.
“Couldn’t be better timing,” said Chandler. “The rain will work in our favour.”
I smiled at that and whispered to Robyn about my being little more than an echo of Chandler. Robyn didn’t smile. She stared ahead at the road, then twisted her head from one side to the other to ease the tension in her neck.
Chandler kept the call open, and I announced each of the landmarks we had identified on the route. Robyn handled the truck with her usual steady confidence. She kept up with the lead car on the first straight stretch out of the yacht club, then fell back as if the truck was struggling to maintain speed. The lead car took a few seconds to notice that we were falling back, which is what we wanted, and as it slowed down to allow us to catch up Robyn tapped the brake to surprise the car behind us, then accelerated again, easing her foot at the last moment so that we nearly rammed into the back of the car ahead, which gave that driver a nasty surprise and he accelerated away. Both cars gave us a little more space after that.
The first of the road workers was in position eight hundred metres along the straight. He was waving his flag lazily and had his revolving sign turned to the stop position. There was a barrier across the road, and a queue of five vehicles waiting to continue in the opposite direction to us. The lead car slowed to a stop. A hand emerged from the window as the passenger remonstrated with the road worker. He dipped his head to reply and pointed with his flag at the blue arrow and detour sign. Then he made us wait a full three minutes until Chandler gave the call on the radio and he swung his sign around to the go position. The car in front of us swung across the empty lane and bounced down the small alleyway that would lead us to the maze of broken streets, alleys and dead-ends that ran between the industrial warehouses clustered around the docks. The tar was broken and patchy on these roads, and the car ahead kept slowing to crawl around potholes, then sped up again and raced ahead on the sections of good road. That was exactly what we wanted, and Robyn played it perfectly, bouncing like a ping-pong ball between the two cars, gradually expanding the distance in which we were held. Neither of the drivers seemed to notice, and the driver in front was clearly allowing his frustration to cloud his judgement as he accelerated ever more angrily away from the bad spots.
There were two more turns to make, each of them clearly signposted, with a miserably wet flag-waver showing us the way. Robyn’s body tensed as we made the next turn. Then she took a deep breath and let it out steadily, like she was breathing into an alcohol tester. Her body relaxed, she eased off on the speed and I called the distance to Chandler. We had five hundred metres to go.
At two hundred metres, the dirty yellow of the road grader glowed through the haze. Behind it was our hired pantechnicon, already flashing its lights with mock frustration at the slow progress of the grader. Robyn lifted her foot from the accelerator and our speed dropped.
“First car ready to come through,” I said. “Clear the way.”
The indicator light of the car ahead of us was flashing impatiently and I could see the cluster of road workers rush with uncharacteristic enthusiasm into the open, getting drenched by the rain a
s they moved the barriers off the road. They cleared the lane, and the car made the turn, accelerating through the flooded potholes and splashing the road workers. Robyn slowed to a stop, our indicator ticking loudly. I watched the car ahead pass the eighty-metre mark where a truck with a fifteen-metre trailer reversed into the tiny road and wedged itself across it so that our lead car was hidden from view. Robyn waited like a nervous driver as the grader approached, the rhythmic clicking of our indicator filling the anxious silence. The grader was a critical thirty seconds late, but the driver was doing what we had rehearsed, slowing down as if he was going to turn, but not indicating.
“They’ll stay in their car,” I said. “Won’t get out because of the rain. Anyway, they know their big boss is behind us.”
Robyn didn’t reply, she was focused on the approaching grader. It crawled towards us, still not indicating. Then Robyn kicked the accelerator pedal, and we lurched forward as if she had lost patience, and we crossed in front of the grader, our rear fender missing it by inches. Robyn lifted her foot, and we slowed to a crawl. The Mercedes Benz behind us flashed its lights, throwing a line of sparks through the rain like a warning shot. Robyn turned on her hazard lights to acknowledge them, and we crept forwards at a slow walking pace as if we were waiting for them to make the turn and catch up. The long trailer was still wedged across the road ahead, and we were now only in sight of the car behind us. I watched the progress of the grader in the side mirror. It seemed to have developed engine trouble. The huge pantechnicon behind it was flashing its lights and blaring its horn as we’d rehearsed. It couldn’t pass the grader because of Lebogang’s Mercedes waiting to turn. Robyn watched the screen with the rear-facing camera, and I watched in the side mirror. The grader ground to a halt a little beyond our road. The pantechnicon stopped behind it, entirely blocking the sight line of Lebogang and his driver.
“Go,” I said, but Robyn had already kicked the accelerator and turned the wheel. Our truck bucked like a horse leaving the gates, and in three seconds we had bounced through the open gateway of a warehouse and taken the gaping entrance of the building like we were planning on driving through and bursting out the other side. Robyn jammed her foot on the brakes and we aquaplaned across the smooth concrete floor and twisted to the side as she lost directional control. I flung my door open and leapt out before the truck shuddered to a standstill. I sprinted across to the chain that would lower the door in manual override and yanked at it with all my strength. The gears were well oiled, we’d made sure of that. The door slid downward with a whump. As it dropped, I caught a glimpse through the rain of Chandler in the warehouse across the road. An identical Fidelity Cash Delivery vehicle was reversing out of his warehouse, hazard lights also flashing. They would take less than ten seconds to back out and turn in the direction we had been travelling.
Our warehouse had been plunged into darkness when the door closed. Robyn killed the lights of the truck, then the engine died and the sound of the rain drumming on the iron roof swelled to fill the space, accompanied by the clicking and hissing sounds of the hot engine.
Chandler’s voice called for the grader to move on, and I could hear the double-click acknowledgement on the radio. Then silence, and then the growl of a large truck engine passing. The truck that had wedged itself behind the lead car had cleared the road on Chandler’s cue.
This was the critical moment. If the FCD truck sitting between the two cars looked different in any way, or if one of the men in the front car had stepped out despite the rain to look around the truck that had been blocking their view, this was when we would know about it. The men in both cars had AK-47s with them and I didn’t doubt they would use them.
Robyn came up beside me, her Glock held low. The silence extended. Nobody came through the door. Nothing but silence in our headphones. We waited for Chandler’s word. He had sight of the road because there was no need for him to close his warehouse door: the fewer moving parts, the better.
We waited the full two minutes Chandler had specified. Then he spoke into his radio, calling a wrap on the roadworks and repeating the wind-down details. Robyn lowered her weapon, and I returned mine to its holster. Robyn smiled, and I felt the adrenalin ease, although we weren’t done yet.
“You going to make me stand out here in the rain?” asked Chandler’s voice in our headphones.
I unlocked the small pedestrian door, and he stepped inside, remarkably dry beneath a standard issue black umbrella. I closed the door behind him. He folded the umbrella and pulled his phone out of his grey linen jacket pocket and ended our call. We removed our helmets, and both took deep breaths. Chandler’s eyes were twinkling, and his mouth was stretched in the way it did when he was pleased.
“Didn’t notice a thing,” he said. “I told you this rain would work in our favour.”
“Let’s get a box out,” I said. “Fat-Boy will be here any minute.”
Robyn unlocked the rear doors of the truck, then disarmed and unbolted the side compartments. She and Chandler climbed into the back, while I opened the roller door for Fat-Boy.
The rain was still falling, although it looked as if it was easing. Fat-Boy pulled his hired BMW in and I did a quick check for anyone taking an interest in what we were doing. There was nobody out in the rain, and only a few cars in the street passed by as fast as the potholed road allowed. I dropped the door again.
Fat-Boy popped the trunk and pulled the trolley with the scale out. Robyn and Chandler carried one of the cardboard boxes down together and slid it into the locker beneath the scale. The scale itself was light and didn’t need the trolley to support it. But four London Good Delivery bars weigh forty-eight kilograms, and it would have looked very odd for Chandler to arrive with a portable scale that he struggled to lift out of the car.
“Can’t we just show him one bar?” said Fat-Boy who was looking resplendent in an off-white bespoke suit that was imitation Ermenegildo Zegna all the way down to the embroidered gold-thread initials.
“You know we can’t,” said Chandler, as he locked the compartment beneath the scale and pocketed the key.
Fat-Boy pouted at us while we lifted the trolley back into the trunk. Then he climbed into the passenger seat. Chandler settled behind the wheel. I opened the roller door, and they drove off towards the Dark Bizness warehouse. They would take the direct route, ignoring the fake diversion signs we had posted, and would arrive less than two minutes after the other FCD truck with its entourage of Lebogang and his underlings.
Chandler called us again a minute later and reminded us not to move until he gave the all-clear. I confirmed and muted my microphone. Robyn turned the truck around and we sat in the murky dark of the empty warehouse and waited.
“You see that uniform on Robs?” we heard Fat-Boy ask Chandler.
“I did,” said Chandler.
“Damn,” said Fat-Boy. “Is she a sex-bomb, or what?”
“Robyn can hear you,” said Chandler. “I’ve opened the call to them.”
“I know that,” said Fat-Boy. “D’you think I would talk behind her back?” There was a pause, then he shouted, “You’re looking damn sexy, Robsy.”
Robyn shook her head. But I could see a glimmer of teeth in the dim glow of the dashboard instruments because we’d exchanged our helmets for single ear-buds.
“Tell Fat-Boy he needs to focus,” she said. “And later we’ll have a conversation about harassment.”
“I’m not frightened,” said Fat-Boy, when Chandler had relayed this message.
Chandler declared everything looked normal when they arrived at the Dark Bizness warehouse. The two Mercedes Benz vehicles were parked beside the FCD truck in the large space that had been cleared for the inspection. The rear doors of the truck were open. Lebogang and his minions were standing outside, looking up at it. Everything seemed completely normal. Chandler gave the command for us to move.
Robyn started our truck, and I rolled the door open again. We could hear car doors slamming through our ear-bud
s, then a distant call of greeting from Fat-Boy. The sounds of Chandler lifting the trolley from the trunk of the Mercedes, then the voices of Fat-Boy and Lebogang increased in volume as Chandler approached them, the wheels of the trolley squeaking under the weight of the gold bars.
“He hasn’t touched it,” announced Fat-Boy. “Can you believe it? My man Lebo listened to me and hasn’t even touched the stuff.”
“You told me not to,” said Lebogang in his rich baritone. “You told me your man would want to choose one for a spot check.”
“Better that way,” said Chandler.
“This is Colchester,” said Fat-Boy. “Colonel Colchester. He fought in the war.”
“Which war?” asked Lebogang.
“There were several,” said Chandler with reserve.
“Collie is my gold man,” said Fat-Boy. “And my diamond man, pretty much my everything man. I insist we salute each other whenever we get together for a meeting, with him being military and all. Look at this.”
There was a solemn silence – presumably Fat-Boy and Chandler were saluting each other.
“The colonel will be furious,” said Robyn, as I climbed back into the truck. “He told him to drop that shit about the saluting.”
“Perhaps that’s Fat-Boy’s secret,” I said, checking my microphone was muted. “He gets away with all this play acting exactly because it is so over the top.”
“Let’s hope he does get away with it,” said Robyn. Despite her earlier assurance that good things could be easy, I sensed she shared my growing concern that something was not right. She turned onto the road for the yacht club. The saluting performance had drawn no audible reaction from Lebogang. We heard nothing but a potentially awkward silence.
“Get up there, Collie,” said Fat-Boy in a mocking voice. “Stop flapping your arms about. My man Lebo doesn’t care if you’re a war hero. Take your trolley, Collie, and let’s look at my brother Lebo’s shiny stuff.”
Vengeful: A Conspiracy Crime Thriller (The Gabriel Series Book 3) Page 22