Indonesian Gold (58 page)

Years of dealing in Indonesia had taught Kremenchug that,
corporately speaking, such action would be suicidal as not only would BGC have to deal with a
corrupt judiciary, but the threat of having a Presidential Decree simply override any judgment
which conflicted with the Palace's position.

‘We couldn't win,' he responded, dejectedly. ‘At the risk
of being pedantic, Chris, they really have us over a barrel. The General knows it, Mines &
Energy obviously believe this is the situation, and I think what they're saying is that we should
go quietly and, if we do, they'll leave us with something.' Kremenchug suddenly frowned, wincing
as bugs struck through his clothing where he sat in the louse-ridden chair. He jumped to his
feet, scratching furiously around his crotch. ‘What the…?' he looked down, disbelievingly, at the
double-layered, infested seat. ‘Let's go and ask the General what's on the table,' he suggested,
‘and then take it from there?'

Reluctantly, Fielding agreed. ‘You know that the
shareholders are gonna have our guts over this?'

But Kremenchug had already left the room, his priority
then to locate a washroom where he could drop his trousers, and dislodge whatever it was that
continued to savage his buttocks, and groin.

****

When the meeting reconvened, Kremenchug sat unhappily,
inconspicuously dropping his hand from time to time to scratch the persistent, and painful itch,
which, by now, had spread across his entire, lower torso.

‘General, there was some mention of compromise?' Fielding
muttered unhappily through partially clenched teeth.

‘Well, the Indonesian Government only wishes to be fair.
It is not my place to make BGC any official offer, you understand, but in the interests of
achieving a mutually acceptable solution to your dilemma, I am prepared to offer you some
suggestions, if you wish?'

The General's subtle approach did nothing to alleviate
their despondency.

‘Are you able to shed some light as to who the other
players might be?' Fielding asked.

Sukirno suppressed a laugh. ‘Not at this time,' he
answered. ‘But, I can tell you that if you were to consider, say, some sort of internal
arrangement which would accommodate all parties, then my government would be most
supportive.'

‘Such as?' Fielding pressed, abandoning any pretence that
he was less than happy at BGC's interests being so brazenly hijacked.

‘I'm sorry, it is not my place to say,' the Chairman
replied, enigmatically.

‘Then whose place is it, General, ‘cause I'm getting the
feeling that this is going nowhere?' Fielding said, frustration raising his ire. Then, directing
his annoyance at his colleague he added, ‘What am I missing here? I'm totally at a loss as to
what's going on.' The company president ran a hand across worried brow. ‘You're supposed to be
the expert on local affairs. What the hell is he trying to say?'

Kremenchug
resisted scratching
further, anger also evident in his response. ‘General, BGC was one of the first foreign mining
companies to risk substantial capital on exploration in the Kalimantan areas. The company entered
into agreements with your government in good faith. We need to know clearly, what it is that you
are asking of us. At this point it would seem that you are suggesting that BGC, through its
ownership of the operating company, P.T Kalimantan Gold, will only be given the development
rights to the Longdamai discovery, conditional on some further arrangement being arrived at
between our company, and others. If this is correct, we need to know who these parties are, in
order that we might consider our position, and what the bottom line will be.' Unable to constrain
himself further, Kremenchug's hand returned to scratching the penny-sized welts below his waist,
while General Sukirno looked on in quiet amusement.

‘It is only relevant that we establish here, today, your
company's willingness to establish dialogue with other parties whose interests parallel those of
my government's.'

‘I'm sorry, General,' Fielding blurted, ‘but can't we cut
the crap and get right to it? How much will it cost us, say, for you to get this problem
fixed?'

Blood flooded the Chairman's face and he blinked, stunned
at the foreigner's impudence. He rose to his feet, angrily jabbing the button that summoned his
aide.

‘It would seem that our meeting is over,' he offered,
tersely, ‘I trust you understand that I will be recommending that the Ministry of Mines &
Energy review any application made by P.T. Kalimantan Gold, to develop the Longdamai gold
reserves. You may expect that any review will take into consideration the original applicant's
submissions with respect to its financial capacity to develop the prospect, before any decision
be made as to whether the company be even accepted as the general contractor to develop our
country's natural resources.' The aide had entered, poised in his office doorway. ‘See the
visitors to their vehicle,' he ordered.

‘But, General…!' Kremenchug pleaded, ‘please be
reasonable!'

The Chairman stood erect, the hushed atmosphere electric
as he viewed Fielding, his glare traveling across until resting upon Kremenchug. ‘Our business is
finished, here, gentlemen,' he said, articulating each word slowly, then nodding at the officer
to usher the pair outside.

****

‘Let's go directly to the embassy,' Fielding growled as
they climbed into the Toyota Land Cruiser.

‘No, we'd do better to go to the office and see if we can
raise Eric by radio. Also, I think it's time we had a long talk to our erstwhile associate,
Subroto. He's sure to have had advance warning of all of this, probably the reason he wasn't
available before. He knew we were coming over and is obviously avoiding us. Now we know
why.'

‘I still believe we should make contact with our
commercial counselor at the Canadian Embassy. Who knows, they might be able to shed some light on
what's happening?'

‘Wouldn't count on it,' Kremenchug's unenthusiastic
response was a result of earlier dealings with the embassy Trade section, where he was
unofficially considered,
persona non grata
. ‘Besides, it's Friday. We're not going to get
much done today.'

‘We're to stay the weekend?' Fielding asked, with growing
agitation.

‘Tomorrow, at least,' Kremenchug announced, ‘if we fail to
get hold of Eric and Subroto by tomorrow afternoon, we should consider flying across to the
site.'

‘Why, what would be achieved by going to Longdamai. Surely
our problem lies here, in Jakarta?'

Kremenchug
pondered the point
as he fidgeted with well-manicured nails. His suggestion that they fly to East Kalimantan had
been made more out of desperation than logic. ‘You're right, of course,' he agreed. ‘Best we give
Eric another try from the office now, and again tomorrow if we need to. Who knows, we might get
lucky and collar Subroto while we're there?'

He gave the driver an address and, swept with fatigue from
the long journey and the stressful meeting with General Sukirno, fell into a somber mood as they
made their way through the traffic-snarled capital. Perplexed as to what recourse would be
available to the Borneo Gold Corporation when its subsidiary, P.T. Kalimantan Gold, lost the
right to mine the Longdamai deposit, Kremenchug's ulcer started to burn.

****

‘Ah, Mister Kremenchug!' Subroto clasped his visitor's
hand then, in turn, Christopher Fielding's before revolving his huge frame and waddling back into
the company office. ‘You were fortunate to catch me here!' he smiled widely; Kremenchug
uncomfortable with Subroto's unusually, warm reception. In the past, the two men had exchanged
but few words – their mutual contempt for each other concealed under masks of necessary civility.
Subroto's name had been added to the P.T. Kalimantan Gold Board when the company had first been
formed, the suggestion at the time coming directly from the Ministry of Mines & Energy during
the official signing of the Longdamai Contract of Work. At the time, Eric Baird had also actively
promoted the idea, the appointment pleasing Baird's senior partner immensely. ‘In fact, we were
about to send a search party out looking for you!' his attempt at levity lost on the mentally
bruised executives.

‘We dropped by earlier in the day, but you weren't here,'
Fielding complained.

‘Did we have an appointment?' Subroto responded curtly.
‘Friday is not a good day to be visiting, as you should well know.'

Still stung by General Sukirno's earlier treatment, the
BGC President refused the admonishment. He took a step forward and pointed into Subroto's jowled
face. ‘Look, I've just about had enough of Indonesia and how you do business over here,' he
started. Kremenchug was unable to prevent the boil-over as Fielding brushed him aside. ‘We just
flew twenty hours to learn that we're about to be screwed, and you're instructing us on business
etiquette? Fuck you, and your manipulating associates. You can take this fucking country and
shove it, as far as it takes to hurt.' Fielding turned, his face covered with rage. ‘Fuck you,
too, Alex,' he cussed, ‘I should have known from the outset we'd end up like this!'

‘Think you'd better leave,' Kremenchug's voice was cold.
‘You're screwing up any chance we might have of recovering our position!'

‘It's a little too late for that, don't you think?'
Fielding's sarcasm-filled voice carried through the partitioned office walls where anxious staff
listened, mouths agape. Nobody had ever raised their voices to Bapak Subroto in this manner
before.

Kremenchug
seized Fielding's
upper arm firmly. ‘Let's go!' he snapped, pulling him towards the door. But the BGC President was
not about to surrender that easily. Twisting away from Kremenchug's grasp, he half-raised his
fists, defensively, Kremenchug caught off guard by the sudden movement. Tense moments passed
before Fielding, sensing the recklessness of his actions lowered his arms, glared at both men,
then stormed out of the office, his exit followed by astonished stares as he slammed the outer
door behind, leaving half-muttered obscenities in his wake.

‘I'm sorry,' was all Kremenchug could muster, lost as how
he might recover the situation.

‘He must apologize, not you!'
a flabbergasted Subroto spluttered, the words lost on the foreigner.

‘We've had a bad day,' Kremenchug offered, weakly, his
mind racing.

‘He will never work in this country again!'
Subroto threatened.

Kremenchug
quickly realized
that Subroto would not be easily pacified. He wanted to go after Fielding before the man did
something
really
stupid, but abandoned that idea in favor of remaining there to appease
their local director, on whom so much now depended.

‘Again, I can only offer my apologies for his behavior,'
he said, ‘I will have him return and do so in person, once he has cooled down.'

With great difficulty, Subroto slowly regained some
measure of his earlier composure – never, even during his days in the armed forces, had he been
subjected to such vitriol. ‘Your friend is a very ignorant man,' he said, the caustic comment
doing nothing to allay Kremenchug's concerns that Fielding had pushed them all over the
precipice, and that the situation may now be irrecoverable.

‘May I sit down?' Kremenchug asked. Subroto, who now
seemed to be lost in another world, ignored the request. Awkward moments passed before the
foreigner tried again. ‘I'll come back tomorrow, if you'd prefer?' And then, ‘
Pak
Subroto
?'

Subroto's eyes refocused as he was dragged back from dark
depths, a place in his mind where Fielding was being considered for punishment.
‘What?'
he
asked.

Kremenchug
repeated his
suggestion. ‘Would it be better if I came back later?'

Subroto's phone came alive – the abrupt signal snuffed by
the man's pudgy hand as he grabbed the handset, growled then dropped the receiver back into its
cradle, and went back to staring into space.

Kremenchug
welcomed the
interruption when it came, a concerned secretary appearing, half-hidden in the doorway to inform
Subroto that the caller had insisted on speaking to him, directly. Kremenchug, unaware of what
had transpired, remained standing, a sense of inadequacy eating away at his confidence while
Subroto wafted on in his own dialect. When the conversation terminated, Kremenchug was
overwhelmed at the sudden change of demeanor that greeted him.

‘Alex,' Subroto asked, almost pleasantly, ‘in which hotel
are you staying?'

‘We booked into the Mandarin,' he answered, cautiously.
‘But we haven't registered yet. We came directly from the airport.'

‘Then you should find your friend and go there now,'
Subroto advised. He then spoke into the office intercom and relayed a message via his
secretary.