Indonesian Gold (18 page)

‘I could definitely be there in January, providing this is
acceptable to your party.'

‘Good,' Sharon was relieved, ‘then I will make all the
necessary arrangements as discussed?'

‘That will be fine, thanks.' Kremenchug smiled tiredly,
the look creased with signs of permanent stress. ‘You know,' he began, ‘to be totally honest, I'm
not one hundred percent relaxed about going in without a brief.' His face serious, Kremenchug
reached for a cigarette. ‘Are you in a position to reveal more?'

Sharon
had anticipated the
question. She drew heavily on the cigarette, leaned back on one hand and then softly blew a cloud
of smoke away from his direction, gathering her thoughts. ‘I can tell you this, Alex,' she
slipped off the eiderdown and crossed to the refrigerator, poured a glass of water, sipped this
then returned to the king-sized bed. ‘This project pales by comparison to what you stand to make
with us.' She pointed at the newspapers again, looked up at the ceiling as if to exercise her
neck, knowing that Kremenchug's eyes would drop to her knee-line while she was not
watching.

‘You intimated that funding won't be a problem. Is it all
to come out of the Philippines?' he asked, then lighting his own cigarette.

‘Not all of it,' she replied, deliberately
evasive.

‘Will it involve public companies?'

‘Look, Alex,' she suggested, ‘we agreed to leave the
financial discussions until your visit. There are a few issues that need to be addressed from our
side before we can reveal the offer. But, you can rest assured, your visit will not be a waste of
your time.'

‘Your group will cover my expenses?'

‘Yes. And, as a sweetener, the General has instructed me
to offer you twenty thousand dollars if you don't like what you hear, and wish to walk
away.'

Kremenchug
was impressed, his
curiosity growing by the minute. ‘How much information will you need regarding the Indonesian
gold prospects?'

‘Should we decide to go forward, we will need to have
basic survey reports and full concession documentation. We can't afford to become embroiled in
local litigation. The prospect area is to be clean, not one that's been worked over by any of the
foreign miners. This is a prerequisite. The areas you suggested during our last meeting,' she
paused, recalling the specific location, ‘are in East Kalimantan?'

‘Near the Mahakam River,' Kremenchug confirmed. ‘My senior
geologist in Indonesia has completed a number of surveys within the area.' He glanced across at
the Filipino, then away again as if distracted. ‘I was thinking about taking one or two of these
concessions up for myself,' he lied.

‘If the areas have potential, as you say, then I don't see
any reason why our consortium can't come to satisfactory arrangements with you.' Sharon
deliberately rubbed one leg over the other, sensuously. ‘I see that you have solid connections in
Canada,' she mentioned,
en passant.

Kremenchug
's involvement with
the Vancouver group had not been mentioned in the press. He stole a look at Sharon, something in
the back of his brain warning him not to underestimate this beautiful and intelligent
woman.

‘I've dabbled a little,' he said, wondering where this was
leading.

‘It's preferable to Australia,' she suggested.

‘For mining?'

‘Yes, of course!' she laughed. ‘What did you think I
meant?'

Kremenchug
snorted. ‘I'm not
so sure about that.'

‘But, you would have to agree that it can be a more
rewarding place to raise capital for mining ventures?' And then, before he could argue, she
added, ‘like Borneo Gold Corporation?'

His face broke into a grin.
She really had done her
homework!
‘Sharon, I think I'm going to enjoy working with you.'

Sharon
deliberately displayed
more leg as she stretched, the trouser suit accentuating her lines when she moved. ‘What would it
take to gain control of BGC?' the question asked, almost innocently.

He blinked with mild surprise.
If the Filipinos were
merely after control of a second rate mining entity, why come to him? There were literally scores
of listed companies that would bend over backwards to accommodate new capital, even if it did
mean surrendering control.
‘Why BGC?' he found himself asking.

Sharon
knew when to stop.
‘Just curious,' she smiled, enjoying the intrigue. She could see that Kremenchug's mind was
working overtime. A dossier in her briefcase revealed the results of the company's share registry
search. Sharon knew that Kremenchug's holdings were relatively insignificant based on recent
market value. She was also aware, however, that the prospect of having a major player take a
controlling position in BGC would revitalize interest, raising the value of his portfolio
considerably. Sharon did not think too highly of Kremenchug, finding him vulnerable to close
inspection. Although attractive in a middle-European sort of way, she found his rehearsed manners
and other affectations in no way endearing. From the information she had gleaned, the man was
simply a poser who had few scruples, motivated purely by avarice and greed. Ironically, she
thought, these were just the attributes she had expected to find. Kremenchug was, in short,
perfect for the job she had in mind.

‘I am familiar with other mining companies if that's of
interest?' he suggested.

Sharon
did not want him
running off contacting all and sundry. ‘We could discuss this more in Manila?'

‘Sure,' he agreed, ‘I could make some recommendations once
I

know more about what will be on the table.'

Sharon
smiled insincerely.
‘Then, would you like to pick a date so that we can make the necessary arrangements?'

Kremenchug
nodded in
affirmation. ‘Let's see,' he hesitated, dragging a pocket calendar from an inside pocket. ‘I'll
fly out the day after my wife's birthday.'

She stifled a smile. ‘And what date would that be?' she
asked, coyly.

Kremenchug
wrote it down and
passed the note to Sharon. ‘Let's just say that I'll be there on Tuesday the Eighteenth of
January.'

They concluded their meeting, and, true to his word,
Kremenchug arrived in Manila one month later on the Eighteenth of January, the date recorded as
one of the more momentous in modern, geological history as an earthquake with a magnitude of six
point seven struck the densely populated San Fernando Valley, in northern Los Angeles, killing
fifty-seven and leaving more than fifteen hundred seriously injured. It was an ominous
sign.

****

Once test drilling along the Mahakam River's reaches
showed substantial traces of gold, excitement swept through the villages and, in less than a
year, a flood of prospectors from neighboring provinces inundated the stretches along the
once-deserted riverbanks. The effects had been catastrophic for the Mahakam Dayaks – not least
amongst these, Jonathan Dau's
Penehing
whose lands would soon come under threat. He had
ventured downriver to the provincial capital, Samarinda, to seek the Governor's support in
stemming the flow of illegal miners, his pleas falling on deaf ears. Gold fever had reached new
levels within the corrupt, local Administration, with officials accumulating mining lease titles
via their cronies in Jakarta's Ministry of Mines. As the State maintained ownership of all
natural resources, gold concessions were naturally allocated to vested interest groups associated
with the Central Government. Increased foreign investment activity along the Mahakam reaches
brought an even greater influx of Madurese and Javanese, the Dayak communities becoming
increasingly incensed with these migrant groups' complete disregard over local claims. Although
the Longdamai mining rights originally belonged to Dayaks
,
somewhere along the line
officialdom managed to secure these on behalf of a number of Samarinda Chinese businessmen who,
subsequent to a number of catastrophic forays into the area, abandoned the site. Within weeks,
itinerants had appeared, equipped with the most simple of tools, and started digging, their
numbers so great the Dayak chief believed that it would only be a matter of time before all
Penehing
communities were overrun. Not surprisingly, sprawling shantytowns began to appear
along the Mahakam, Dayak communities in Longbangun and Batukelau already under threat.

The wave of illegal miners not only occupied traditional
land, but brought with them one of the most dangerous of substances known to man – the highly
toxic, liquid metal, mercury. Jonathan visited the Longbangun camp, observing the archaic methods
used by the miners in the extraction process. Shafts, barely large enough for one man let alone
several, had been dug, thirty and forty meters underground, the men unable to swing their
hand-picks more than a few centimeters in the cramped and poorly-lit tunnels. Of course, many had
already been killed, most buried under tons of rock and soil, the result of poorly shored shafts.
But it was the long-term effects of their presence that worried Jonathan most. The ancient
process utilized in the crude extraction of gold was poisoning Dayak lands and, undoubtedly,
rivers and streams.

He observed as the potential, gold-bearing rocks were
crushed by hand and large amounts of mercury were added to small, manually rotated barrels to
separate the gold. Jonathan watched as the mercury was strained, and then burned, the deadly gas
given off going straight into the atmosphere. None, of course, wore any form of protective
clothing such as gloves or masks. Once the precious yellow metal had been extracted, the workers
would then discard the deadly residual along the riverbanks where they took their drinking water,
washed their bodies and clothes, and fished. It was far too soon for the inevitable symptoms to
appear; and, when these did, he knew that the cause of their skin and gum diseases would all be
disguised by ignorance.

Depressed by what he witnessed, Jonathan Dau became
impatient for Angela to complete her studies and return home, where they could work together to
prevent the further spread of devastation to their precious forests and land.

****

Christopher Fielding stared out through the double-glazed
windows in the direction of a wind-chilled Stanley Park, the impulse to jump curbed by the
knowledge that the windows were firmly fixed into the skyscraper's walls. Borneo Gold Corporation
(BGC) shares had plummeted to a new low, the embarrassment eclipsed only by the enormous
financial losses he and other investors had incurred.

Minutes before, Scott Walters had phoned, the conversation
vitriolic, at best. Walters had provided mezzanine capital initially, to kick-start the
operations, his financial backing sufficient to float the company based on a number of Indonesian
mining tenements. He made it quite clear that it had never been his intentions to remain involved
for the long haul.

‘What in the hell are you doing with BGC?' an angry
Walters had shouted, Fielding wincing with every word. ‘Stock in every other Canadian miner with
Indonesian rights has gone through the roof. What are your guys doing over there, for
Chrissakes?'

‘It's only temporary,' Fielding had tried, ‘we have
acquired other properties and these should make BGC stock rise once the reports have been
filed.'

‘And where will you find the capital to fund further
operations?' he demanded.

‘BGC stock will rise when we release our annual report
next month. We have some very attractive prospects in Kalimantan.'

‘Don't give me that crap!' the vehement financier yelled.
‘Look what happened after results of the last survey were released. God-damn it, Chris, I could
have doubled or even tripled my investment elsewhere by now!'

Walters' claim would have been difficult to refute. Over
the previous ten years a rush of new gold mining entities had listed on the Calgary and Vancouver
stock exchanges, most of which had remained reasonably solvent, their Indonesian prospects
enabling the companies to raise additional capital without too much difficulty.

‘You could always vote for a change in the Board's
composition next month,' Fielding challenged, then became concerned as the line went quiet,
worried that the financier may be contemplating going down that path.

‘Don't tempt me!' The menacing voice alarmed the BGC
president. Walters was connected, a point he had often raised when recalcitrant associates
reneged on their commitments.

‘There's not much else I can do, Scott,' Fielding tried
another tack. ‘Kremenchug appears to have lost interest and hasn't been that communicative since
he moved back to Australia. I know he has been negotiating with others over here.' Fielding did
not mind throwing Kremenchug to the wolves. He could hear Walters breathing heavily and guessed
his mind was digesting this information, and what steps he could take to clip their associate's
wings.