Indonesian Gold (62 page)

‘Doesn't sound like she has too much of a choice,' the
Jakarta-based expatriate said, ‘I'll need something in writing to take with me.'

‘Fine, we'll have your authority sent tomorrow. There's
not much we can do to empower you, Stew, until the announcements are all made. You're there as
the Baron rep, nothing else. We can't give authority that is not yet ours to give. You'll be
needed on site for around two, max three months. Does that fit your schedule?'

‘That suits me fine, Phil.'

‘Great. We'll pay double your usual rate seeing we're
taking you out of circulation for so long.'

Campbell
silently thanked his
friend for bumping his fee, so generously. ‘Seems fair,' he said, a grin spreading from ear to
ear. Their conversation finished, Stewart Campbell remained in high spirits as he went about
reorganizing his life to accommodate the contract, the thought of being reunited with Angela Dau
at the Longdamai site, foremost in his mind.

The next day Stewart visited BGC's Jakarta offices where
he asked to be patched through to the Mahakam River site. His request was granted. However, when
he terminated the radiophone conversation with Angela, he was left deeply depressed with her
unenthusiastic response.

****

Hong Kong

‘I'll need your signature on these as well, Miss Dau.' The
manager for new accounts smiled admiringly at Sharon Ducay, impressed not by her elegant style,
but with the size of the account. He had served his apprenticeship as an expatriate banker in a
number of Asian capitals, and still never ceased to be amazed at the size of individual, private
transactions that often exceeded the tens of millions of dollars. Although many of his colleagues
who had worked in Singapore and Hong Kong frequently related stories of Indonesian citizens
carrying suitcases filled with cash into their banks for deposit, the banker was smugly confident
that none of his associates had ever opened a new account of this magnitude. His stocks would
rise with management, and he could expect a most favorable review to be included in his annual
assessment report. He looked on, admiring the new client's choice of clothes as the attractive,
young Indonesian woman signed the remaining documents and declarations, then witnessed her
signature on these forms.

‘The transfer will be made within the month,' she smiled,
seductively. Sharon wore a
jilbab
-styled headscarf over her head, the delicate material
wrapped also around her neck and off one shoulder. And, with eyes hidden behind Christian Dior
sunglasses, it was virtually impossible for the banker to distinguish between the woman sitting
across the desk, and the face in the passport photograph.

The bank was required to report unusually large
transactions as was required by international agreement, in an effort to stem the worldwide flow
of laundered funds. Later in the day when senior management was made aware of the size of the
pending transfer, the senior executive examined the bank's photocopy of Angela Dau's passport and
Mines Department identification then merely shook his head. ‘They're getting worse and worse,' he
muttered under his breath and sanctioned the new account, assuming that the substantial transfer
was just another case of funds being siphoned off by another corrupt Indonesian official. He
believed, that if he and the other bankers were to report all such transactions to the
authorities, the entire Hong Kong banking system would collapse.

****

Longdamai Gold Site

When Angela first learned of Stewart Campbell's
appointment, she was deeply troubled, and used all of persuasive powers to discourage him from
accepting the position. When this failed, she even challenged his loyalty in accepting the
position of caretaker to those who would ultimately continue with the desecration of the
Penehing-Dayak,
sacred site. Passionate when expressing her position, Angela accepted
responsibility for the heated radiophone exchange that followed, accusing Stewart of compromising
his principles. He had hung up, cutting her off in mid-sentence. Now Angela was anxious that she
would be burdened with the responsibility of orchestrating for him to be away from the camp, when
it came under attack.

Then there was the matter of how her own security had been
compromised, Angela discovering that her passport and identification documents had been removed
from her quarters – when this might have happened, a complete mystery to her. Although she could
easily have these replaced, the violation had weighed heavily on her mind, added to which, she
would now have to contend with Stewart's imminent arrival. With concerns compounding over the
deteriorating security situation and the knowledge of her father's hostile intentions, Angela
fell into a rare, and ugly mood.

****

Philippines

Sharon
had told Alfredo that
there would be no wake, the ageing manservant relieved that they would be permitted to grieve
alone.

Dressed in a long, black column dress, Sharon had attended
her uncle's funeral, whispered a final farewell as the coffin moved slowly along the conveyor and
through the velvet curtains into the crematorium, ignored the congregation that had gathered to
offer their respects to Narciso Dominguez, then retreated under their astonished whispers, and
stares. She had exited the Manila Memorial Park Cemetery as quickly as circumstances provided,
then climbed into the Mercedes and urged Alfredo to hurry, concerned that she would miss her
flight to the southern Philippines. Sharon gently raised the laced, net veil that had shrouded
her pale features during the ceremony, removing the wide-brimmed hat cautiously so as not to
disturb her hair, then discarded these accessories. She would finish changing at the airport
before flying down to Cebu and onto Zamboanga on the southernmost coast, where Alfredo had
arranged for her to meet with an expatriate boat captain, who had been known to her
uncle.

She completed her business in Zamboanga and, in less than
twenty-four hours Sharon returned to Manila, placed her calls to Dominion Mining's registered
offices in the British Virgin Islands, and warned her nominees to expect revised, written
instructions within that week.

Sharon
briefed Alfredo again,
then gave him a sealed, manila envelope containing her confidential papers and Angela's passport,
kissed him affectionately and caught the next flight to Singapore, before boarding the direct
service for Balikpapan, where the Kalimantan Gold charter helicopter was on standby to take her
back to the site. Relieved, when she recognized the familiar face of the
Kopassus,
Special
Forces pilot, Sharon flashed her widest smile and, an hour into their return flight to Longdamai,
at her request the UH-1H, Iroquois put down in a clearing, and she laid the foundations for the
most crucial part of her revised plan.

****

Vancouver

Kremenchug
's relief was
immeasurable. In answering the Stock Exchange's query with respect to speculation that BGC had
entered into formal negotiations with the Commercial Asian Pacific Banking group, Fielding had
been obliged to reveal that there was, indeed, substance to the rumors. BGC's shares rose sharply
on the back of that response, reaching fifteen dollars as the bell rang, ending trading for the
day. When Fielding secured the CAP Bank's approval to issue a more formal release and posted this
with the Exchange the following morning, BGC's shares climbed even further.

Although the company's stake in the Longdamai venture had
been cut back to twenty percent of its original holding, stockbrokers traded frantically once it
became known that Baron Mining would develop and operate the mine. Then, James Salima, the
Commercial Asian Pacific Bank president released his own press statement, advising that his bank
had no plans to take P.T. Kalimantan Gold public, and confirmed that the Longdamai gold reserves
had been revised to a figure of sixty million ounces. The Chinese-Indonesian's Jakarta-based
family had plundered the stock when it plummeted the month before, the not-so arms' length
manipulation and insider trading creating a massive windfall for the Salima Family as a whole,
netting more than half a billion dollars in profits. Realizing that their only access to this
wealth was through the publicly listed, Borneo Gold Corporation, institutional investors
commenced taking positions, driving the BGC stock through two hundred dollars before the week was
out.

Kremenchug had tried to raise Sharon by radiophone as he
wished to keep her appraised of the situation, keen to have her instruct Dominion Mining to
commence offloading stock, so that he could realize on his share of their arrangement. But, for
one reason or another, Sharon Ducay had refused to come to the phone. Now he could only imagine
what might be going through her mind, bewildered as to why she even bothered to remain in
Indonesia, as her personal wealth surely now exceeded some hundreds of millions of
dollars.

****

Jakarta

P.T. Subroto & Associates

Eric Baird's senior associate, Subroto sat quietly,
considering the decision he had made as a result of his luncheon meeting with Brigadier General
Sukirno – and the possible consequences for his niece's husband. He shifted his huge body around,
favoring one side, the specially designed chair groaning under his tilted weight as an ominous
explosion of air ripped from between his legs, and fell heavily into the room. Subroto waved his
hand back and forth dispersing the invisible cloud, then tossed another handful of antacid
tablets into his mouth, grinding these with determined motion as he visualized beating upon
Baird's not-so-secret playmate, Mardidi.

General Sukirno had revealed details of the military's
imminent move against what he termed,
‘subversive elements within the Dayak communities',
Subroto's informal briefing delivered by his former classmate as the latter was aware of
Subroto's vested interests in the Mahakam mining areas. When asked if the Longdamai operation
might come under threat, the General had suggested that the Longdamai operations would not be
disrupted, but if Subroto could discreetly arrange for any of the company's expatriate staff to
avoid further travel to the area over the coming weeks, then he should do so immediately. Subroto
had been surprised when Sukirno explained the extent of the military buildup throughout the
Mahakam area.

‘The President wants the issue settled, once and for
all,'
Sukirno had whispered conspiratorially,
‘and you know
what that means! We've got both Kopassus and Kostrad troops ready to sweep the entire province,
if necessary. The Palace is preparing the ground for a massive increase in trans-migrants to meet
growing demands for plantation labor. The military operation is designed to pave the way for
dozens of new settlements along the Mahakam, but with recent Dayak skirmishes, it's becoming
increasingly difficult to get the migrants to settle anywhere in the province.'

Subroto had returned to his offices and instructed the
staff to get Baird on the radiophone, deciding this would be an opportune time to recall Pipi's
husband and at least get
her
off his back. His niece's pestering calls complaining of
Baird's extended absence and apparent false sentiment had to be addressed, and Subroto felt the
timing appropriate, considering what he had just learned. When the Longdamai site operator
innocently disclosed that the geologist had trekked off somewhere but his assistant, Mardidi was
available, Subroto was filled with rage at the deceit. Then, as the overly spicy beef
rendang
he'd consumed during lunch revisited, sending sharp, stabbing pains across his
chest, Subroto remained rock still, his only movement that of jowls opening cautiously to suck in
shallow gasps of air until the pain gradually receded. Slowly, his hand edged to the desk and,
with puffy fingers, managed to extract a sheet of antacid tablets from the well-stocked drawer,
and stuff these into his mouth.

All too familiar with heartburn attacks, Subroto knew that
relief would take some minutes and he used the time to reflect on his junior partner's betrayal.
It was not Baird's sexual indiscretion that stung him so, but an irrational sense of betrayal
that Eric Baird had continued his liaison with Mardidi, having given his word that the
relationship had long been terminated. Mocked by their behavior, when he finally recovered from
the excruciating attack, Air Vice Marshal (retired) Subroto made a call to General Praboyo's
offices and arranged to meet with the
Kopassus,
Special Forces Commander, whose troops
maintained a small contingent at the Longdamai site. Within twenty-four hours his unusual request
had been relayed to the field, and immediately, Mardidi's future on this planet became very gray
indeed.

****

Chapter Twenty-two

Longdamai Gold Site

 

Within days of Sharon's return to the Longdamai camp,
Stewart Campbell arrived, his presence splitting the site management into two, distinct, hostile
camps. An atmosphere of gloom enveloped the expatriates, Sharon refusing to accept Stewart's
letter of appointment as an authority to remain on site – the belligerent expatriate drillers,
and Eric Baird, immediately choosing sides, fueling the acrimonious scene.