Wilbur Smith's Smashing Thrillers

by Wilbur Smith

  He and Nick had discussed in detail where this preliminary meeting with Christy Marine should be held, and at last they had agreed to go to the mountain, but James Teacher had insisted on arriving in his chocolate-coloured Bentley, rather than a cab.

  ‘Smoked salmon, Mr. Berg, not fish and chips - that's what we are after.’

  Christy House was one of those conservative smoke stained stone buildings fronted on to Leadenhall Street, the centre of Britain's shipping industry. Almost directly opposite was Trafalgar House, and a hundred yards further was Lloyd's of London. The doorman crossed the pavement to open Nicholas’ door.

  ‘Good to see you again, Mr. Berg sir!’

  ‘Hello, Alfred. You taking good care of the shop?’

  ‘Indeed, sir.’

  The following cab, containing James Teacher's two juniors and their bulky briefcases, pulled up behind the Bentley and they assembled on the pavement like a party of raiding Vikings before the gates of a medieval city. The three lawyers settled their bowler hats firmly and then moved forward determinedly in spearhead formation.

  In the lobby, the doorman passed them on to a senior clerk who was waiting by the desk.

  ‘Good morning, Mr. Berg. You are looking very well, sir.’ They rode up at a sedate pace in the elevator with its antique steel concertina doors. Nicholas had never brought himself to exchange them for those swift modern boxes. And the clerk ushered them out on to the top-floor landings.

  ‘Will you follow me, please, gentlemen?’ There was an antechamber that opened on to the board room, a large room, panelled and hung with a single portrait of old Arthur Christy on the entrance wall - fighting jaw and sharp black eyes under beetling white eyebrows. A log fire burned in the open grate, and there was sherry and Madeira in crystal decanters on the central table - another one of the old min's little traditions - that both James Teacher and Nick refused curtly.

  They waited quietly, standing facing the door into the Chairman's suite. They waited for exactly four minutes before the door was thrown open and Duncan Alexander stepped through it.

  His eyes flicked across the room and settled instantly on Nick, locking with his, like the horns of two great bull buffalo, and the room was very still.

  The lawyers around Nick seemed to shrink back and the men behind Duncan Alexander waited, not yet following him into the antechamber, but all of them watched and waited avidly; this meeting would be the gossip of the City for weeks to come - It was a classic confrontation, and they wanted to miss not a moment of it.

  Duncan Alexander was a strikingly good-looking man, very tall, two inches taller than Nick, but slim as a dancer, and he carried his body with a dancer's control. His face also was narrow, with the long lantern jaw of a young Lincoln, already chiselled by life around the eyes and at the corners of the mouth.

  His hair was very dense and a metallic blond; though he wore it fashionably long over the ears, yet it was so carefully groomed that each gleaming wave seemed to have been sculptured.

  His skin was smooth and tanned darker than his hair, sun lamp or skiing at Chantelle's lodge at Gstaad perhaps, and now when he smiled his teeth were dazzlingly white, perfect large teeth in the wide friendly mouth - but the eyes did not smile though they crinkled at the corners. Duncan Alexander watched from behind the handsome face like a sniper in ambush.

  ‘Nicholas,’ he said, without moving forward or offering a hand.

  ‘Duncan,’ said Nick quietly, not answering the smile, and Duncan Alexander adjusted the hang of his lapel. His clothes were beautifully cut, and the cloth was the finest, softest wool, but there were foppish little touches: the hacking slits in the tails of the jacket, the double-flapped pockets, and the waistcoat in plum-coloured velvet, Now he touched the buttons with his fingertips, another little distracting gesture, the only evidence of any discomfort.

  Nicholas stared at him steadily, trying to measure him dispassionately, and now for the first time he began to see how it might have happened. There was a sense of excitement about the man, a wicked air of danger, the fascination of the leopard - or some other powerful predator. Nick could understand the almost irresistible attraction he had for women, especially for a spoiled and bored lady, a matron of thirteen years who believed there was still excitement and adventure in life that she was missing.

  Duncan had done his cobra dance, and Chantelle had watched like a mesmerized bird of paradise - until she had toppled from the branch - or that's how Nicholas liked to think it had happened. He was wiser now, much wiser and more cynical.

  ‘Before we begin!’ Nick knew that anger was seething to his still surface, must soon bubble through unless he could give it release, ‘I should like five minutes in private.

  ‘Of course.’ Duncan inclined his head, and there was a hurried scampering as his minions cleared the doorway into the Chairman's suite. ‘Come through.’

  Duncan stood aside, and Nick walked through. The offices had been completely redecorated, and Nick blinked with surprise, white carpets and furniture in chrome and perspex, stark abstract geometrical art in solid primary colours on the walls; the ceiling had been lowered by an egg design in chrome steel and free-swivelling studio spotlights gave selected light patterns on wall and ceiling. It was no improvement, Nick decided.

  ‘I was in St Nazaire last week.’ Nicholas turned in the centre of the wide snowy floor and faced Duncan Alexander as he closed the door.

  ‘Yes, I know.

  ‘I went over Golden Dawn.’

  Duncan Alexander snapped open a gold cigarette case and offered it to Nick, then when he shook his head in refusal, selected one himself. They were special blend, custom-made for him by Benson and Hedges.

  ‘Charles Gras exceeded his authority,’ Duncan nodded. ‘Visitors are not allowed on Golden Dawn.’

  ‘I am not surprised you are ashamed of that death-trap you are building.’

  ‘But you do surprise me, Nicholas.’ Duncan showed his teeth again. ‘It was your design.

  ‘You know it was not. You took the idea, and bastardized it. Duncan, you cannot send that,’ Nick sought for the word, ‘that monster on to the open sea. Not with one propulsion unit, and a single screw. The risk is too appalling.’

  ‘I tell you this for no good reason, except perhaps that this was once your office,’ Duncan made a gesture that embraced the room, ‘and because it amuses me to point out to you the faults in your original planning. The concept was sound, but your soured the cream by adding those preposterous, shall we call them Bergean, touches. Five separate propulsion units, and a forest of boilers. It wasn't viable, Nicholas.’

  ‘It was good, the figures were right.’

  ‘The whole tanker market has changed since you left Christy Marine. I had to re-work it.’

  ‘You should have dropped the whole concept if the cost structure changed.’

  'Oh no, Nicholas, I restructured. My way, even in these hard times, I will recover capital in a year, and with a five year life on the hull there is two hundred million dollars profit in it.’

  ‘I was going to build a ship that would last for thirty years,’ Nick told him. Something of which we could be proud.’

  ‘Pride is an expensive commodity. We aren't building dynasties any more, we are in the game of selling tanker space.’ Duncan's tone was patronizing, that impeccable accent drawn out, emphasizing the difference in their backgrounds. ‘I'm aiming at a five-year life, two hundred million profit, and then we sell the hull to the Greeks or Japs. It's a one-time thing.’

  ‘You always were a smash-and-grab artist,’ Nick agreed. But it isn't like dealing in commodities. Ships aren't wheat and bacon, and the oceans aren't the orderly market floors.’

  ‘I disagree, I'm afraid. The principles are the same - one buys, one sells.’

  ‘Ships are living things, the ocean is a battleground of all the elements.’

  ‘Come, Nicholas, you don't really believe that romantic nonsense.’ Duncan drew a gold Hunter from his waist poc
ket, and snapped open the lid to read the dial, another of his affectations which irritated Nicholas. ‘Those are very expensive gentlemen waiting next door.’

  ‘You will be risking human life, the men who sail her.’

  ‘Seamen are well paid – ‘

  ‘You will be taking a monstrous risk with the life of the oceans. Wherever she goes Golden Dawn will be a potential –‘

  ‘For God's sake, Nicholas, two hundred million dollars is worth some kind of risk.’

  ‘All right,’ Nick nodded. ‘Let's forget the environment, and the human life, and consider the important aspects the - money.’

  Duncan sighed, and wagged that fine head, smiling as at a recalcitrant child.

  ‘I have considered the money - in detail.’

  ‘You will not get an Al rating at Lloyd's. You will not get insurance on that hull - unless you underwrite yourself, the same way you did with Golden Adventurer, and if you think that's wise, just wait until I've finished with my salvage claim.’

  Duncan Alexander's smile twisted slowly, and blood darkened his cheeks under the snow-tan. ‘I do not need a Lloyd's rating, though I am sure I could get one if I wanted it. I have arranged continental and oriental underwriters. She will be fully insured.

  ‘Against pollution claims, also? If you burst that bag of crude on the continental shelf of America, or Europe, they'll hit you for half a billion dollars. Nobody would underwrite that.’

  ‘Golden Dawn is registered in Venezuela, and she has no sister ships for the authorities to seize, like they did with the Torrey Canyon. To whom will they address the pollution bill? A defunct South American Company? No, Nicholas, Christy Marine will not be paying any pollution bills.’

  ‘I cannot believe it, even of you.’ Nick stared at him. ‘You are cold-bloodedly talking about the possibility - no, the probability - of dumping a million tons of crude oil into the sea.’

  'Your moral indignation is touching. It really is. However, Nicholas, may I remind you that this is family and house business - and you are no longer either family or house.’

  ‘I fought you every time you cut a corner,’ Nick reminded him. ‘I tried to teach you that cheap is always expensive in the long run.’

  ‘You taught me?’ For the first time Duncan taunted him openly. ‘What could you ever teach me about ships or money,’ and he rolled his tongue gloating around the next words, ‘or women?’ Nick made the first movement of lunging at him, but he caught himself, and forced himself to unclench his fists at his sides. The blood sang in his ears.

  ‘I'm going to fight you he said quietly. I'm going to fight you from here to the maritime conference, and beyond.’ He made the decision in that moment, he hadn't realized he was going to do it until then.

  ‘A maritime conference has never taken less than five years to reach a decision restricting one of its members. By that time Golden Dawn will belong to some Japanese, Hong-Kong-based company - and Christy Marine will have banked two hundred million.’

  ‘I'll have the oil ports closed to you.’

  ‘By whom? Oil-thirsty governments, with lobbies of the big oil companies?’ Duncan laughed lightly, he had replaced the urbane mask. ‘You really are out of your depth again. We have bumped heads a dozen times before, Nicholas - and I'm still on my feet. I'm not about to fold up to your fine threats now.’

  After that, there was no hope that the meeting in the panelled board room would lead to conciliation. The atmosphere crackled and smouldered with the antagonism of the two leading characters, so that they seemed to be the only persons on the stage.

  They sat opposite each other, separated by the glossy surface of the rosewood table top, and their gazes seldom disengaged. They leaned forward in their chairs, and when they smiled at each other, it was like the silent snarl of two old dog wolves circling with hackles erect.

  It took an enormous effort of self-control for Nicholas to force back his anger far enough to be able to think clearly, and to allow his intuition to pick up the gut-impressions, the subtle hints of the thinking and planning that were taking place across the table behind Duncan Alexander's handsome mask of a face.

  It was half an hour before he was convinced that something other than personal rivalry and antagonism was motivating the man before him.

  His counter offer was too low to have any hope of being accepted, so low that it became clear that he did not want to settle. Duncan Alexander wanted to go to arbitration - and yet there was nothing he could gain by that. It must be obvious to everyone at the table, beyond any doubt whatsoever, that Nicholas claim was worth four million dollars. Nicholas would have settled for four, even in his anger he would have gone for four - risking that an arbitration board might have awarded six, and knowing the delay and costs of going to litigation might amount to another million. He would have settled.

  Duncan Alexander was offering two and a half. It was a frivolous offer. Duncan was going through the motions only. There was no serious attempt at finding a settlement. He didn't want to come to terms, and it seemed to Nicholas that by refusing to settle he was gaining nothing, and risking a great deal. He was a big enough boy to know that you never, but never, go to litigation if there is another way out. It was a rule that Nicholas had graven on his heart in letters of fire. Litigation makes only lawyers fat.

  Why was Duncan baulking, what was he to gain by this obstruction? Nicholas crushed down the temptation to stand up and walk out of the room with an exclamation of disgust. Instead, he lit another cheroot and leaned forward again, staring into Duncan Alexander's steely grey eyes, trying to fathom him, needling, probing for the soft rotten spot - and thinking hard.

  What had Duncan Alexander to gain from not settling now? Why did he not try with a low, but realistic offer what was he to gain?

  Then quite suddenly he knew what it was. Chantelle's enigmatic appeal for help and advice flashed back to him, and he knew what it was. Duncan Alexander wanted time. It was as simple as that. Duncan Alexander needed time.

  ‘All right.’ Satisfied at last, Nicholas leaned back in the deep leather-padded chair, and veiled his eyes. ‘We are still a hundred miles apart. There will be only one meeting ground. That's in the upper room at Lloyd's. It's set down for the 27th. Are we at least agreed on that date?’

  ‘Of course,’ Duncan leaned back also and Nicholas saw the shift of his eyes, the little jump of nerves in the point of his clenched jaws, the tightening of the long pianist's fingers that lay before him on the leather-bound blotter. ‘Of course,’ Duncan repeated, and began to stand up, a gesture of dismissal. He lied beautifully; had Nicholas not known he would lie, he might have missed the little telltale signs.

  In the ancient lift, James Teacher was jubilant, rubbing his little fat hands together. ‘We'll give him a go!’ Nicholas glanced at him sourly. Win, lose or draw, James Teacher would still draw his fee, and Duncan Alexander's refusal to settle had quadrupled that fee. There was something almost obscene about the little lawyer's exultation.

  ‘They are going to duck,’ Nick said grimly, and James Teacher sobered slightly.

  ‘Before noon tomorrow, Christy Marine will have lodged for postponement of hearing,’ Nick prophesied. ‘You'll have to use Warlock with full power on both to pull them before the arbitration board.’

  'Yes, you're right,’ James Teacher nodded. ‘They had me puzzled, I sensed something – ‘

  ‘I'm not paying you to be puzzled,’ Nick's voice was low and hard.’ I'm paying you to out-guess and out-jump them. I want them at the hearing on the 27th, get them there, Mr. Teacher. ‘He did not have to voice the threat, and in a moment, the exultation on James Teacher's rotund features had changed to apprehension and deep concern.

  The drawing-room in Eaton Square was decorated in cream and pale gold, cleverly designed as a frame for the single exquisite work of art which it contained, the original of the group of Degas ballet-dancers whose copy hung in Golden Dawn's stateroom. It was the room's centre-piece; cunningly lit by a hi
dden spotlight, it glowed like a precious jewel. Even the flowers on the ivory grand piano were cream and white roses and carnations, whose pale ethereal blossoms put the painting into stronger contrast.

  The only other flash of brightness was worn by Chantelle, she had the oriental knack of carrying vivid colour without it seeming gaudy. She wore a flaming Pucci that could not pale her beauty, and as she rose from the huge shaggy white sofa and came to Nicholas, he felt the soft warm melting sensation in his stomach spreading slowly through his body like a draught of some powerful aphrodisiac. He knew he would never be immune to her.

  ‘Dear Nicky, I knew I could rely upon you.’ She took his hand and looked up at him, and still holding his hand she led him to the sofa, and then she settled beside him, like a bright, lovely bird alighting. She drew her legs up under her, her calves and ankles flashed like carved and polished ivory before she tucked the brilliant skirt around them, and lifted the Wedgwood porcelain teapot.

  ‘Orange pekoe,’ she smiled at him, ‘No lemon and no sugar.’

  He had to smile back at her. ‘You never forget,’ and he took the cup.

  ‘I told you that you looked well,’ she said, slowly and unselfconsciously studying him. ‘And you really do, Nicholas. When you came down to Lynwood for Peter’s birthday in June I was so worried about you. You looked terribly ill and tired - but now, she tilted her head critically, you look absolutely marvelous.’

  Now he should tell her that she was beautiful as ever, he thought grimly, and then they would start talking about Peter and their old mutual friends.

  ‘What did you want to talk to me about?’ he asked quietly, and there was a passing shadow of hurt in her dark eyes.

  ‘Nicholas, you can be so remote, so –‘ she hesitated, seeking the correct word, so detached.’

  ‘Recently someone called me an ice-cold Pommy bastard,’ he agreed, but she shook her head.