His second fresh intention: after the diplomatic trip to Denmark, a further trip to Afghanistan. He’d heard worrying reports of depleted harvests, and of crops and fields being burned by suddenly efficient soldiers. He’d asked an associate in Chicago what the hell they thought was going on.
‘Blame our fucking dick-dipping President. He’s trying the same shit he pulled in South America. “Be my friend,” he tells them. “Let me loan you money, billions of dollars of clean government money. Use it to rebuild your infrastructure or line your private Zurich bank vault. But just get rid of all the shit you grow.” It’s all politics, as usual.’
The voice from Chicago was distorted – a side-effect of the scrambler. At least no one would be listening in.
‘I don’t understand,’ Franz had said – though he did. ‘I thought we had arranged for friends to be placed where they could help us.’
‘What can they do? CBS go prime-time on a field of burning poppies, then up pops the Prez to say he did it. His ratings jump a couple of points, Franz, this guy would do his dear departed grandma in the ass for a couple of points.’
End of conversation.
Sad really, to think that decisions taken a continent away could affect one so much, but thrilling too. Because Franz saw himself as part of a network which embraced the globe, and felt his importance, his place in the scheme of things. If they ever set up colonies in space, he wanted to be supplying them. Dealer to the universe, by appointment to infinity…
Mozart silent now. He hadn’t realised, but midnight had come and gone. Then a buzzer sounding: the guardroom, one of his men informing him of intruders entering the compound.
It was not yet quite dawn, and Kejan lay in the darkness, as he had for the preceding five hours, his eyes staring, ears attuned to his wife’s light breathing. Three of their children slept in the room with them. Hama, the youngest, coughed and turned, made a slight moan before relaxing again. Kejan didn’t know if he’d ever relax again in his life, ever sleep again on this earth. Would the soldiers fulfil their promise and return to torch the shacks by the side of what had once been fields full of crops? Those fields had been Kejan’s future. Not that he’d owned them: the owner was a brutal man, a slave-driver. But Kejan had mouths to feed, and what other work was there? Now, with the fields reduced to cinders, he could only wait and wonder: would the soldiers drive the families away? Or would the Bossman chase them off his land, now that there was no work for them?
It was a matter of time. It was for the future.
He tried to envisage a future for his wife, his three children. He had more than once caught the Bossman staring at his wife, running his tongue over his bottom lip. And talking to her once, too, though she would not even admit it, kept her eyes on the ground as she denied and denied.
Kejan had slapped her then, the bruise a lasting smudge against her cheekbone. It didn’t seem to want to go away.
There were so many things Kejan didn’t understand.
The soldiers passed around lighted torches. Their commander, arguing with the Bossman. The Bossman saying that he always paid, that he always kept everyone sweet. The commander not listening, the Bossman persistent. Soldiers fingering their weapons, noting that the Bossman’s men were better armed with newer, gleaming automatics.
‘Orders,’ the commander kept saying. And: ‘Just let us get on with it for now.’
‘For now’: meaning things might be okay later, that this had some deeper meaning which the commander felt unable to share.
But later… later there would be other workers, willing workers. New people could always be found later. Now was what mattered to Kejan. He lived from moment to moment in this dark, overcrowded room. He waited for the moment he knew was coming, when the future would become the present and he would be consigned to the road with his family.
Or perhaps – please, no – without them. He had hit his wife. The Bossman had smiled at her. The Bossman would take her, and Kejan couldn’t be sure she wouldn’t go. Would she take his children? Would the Bossman want them? Would he treat them right?
His wife’s breathing, so shallow. The room a little lighter now, so he could see the outline of her neck, the way it was angled against the stem-filled sack she used as a pillow.
Slender neck. Brittle neck. Kejan touched it with the tips of his fingers, heard a child cough and pulled his fingers away like they’d been too close to a torch.
He sat up then, looked down on the dark, curved shape. Twisted his own body around so that it was easier to reach down with both hands.
And heard the sound of lorries on the rough track outside, coming closer.
An aggrieved Hell’s Angel sat in Franz’s study, and it was all Franz could do not to reach into his desk drawer for the pistol and blow the man’s brains all over the walls. Defilement: that was what it felt like. Engine oil and cigarette smoke had invaded his most private space, and even when the man had gone, those taints would remain.
The rest of the gang was outside. One on one: Franz had demanded it, and the leader had agreed. A dozen of them. They’d scaled the perimeter wall. A dozen of them armed, and Franz with only three guards on duty. But now more were on their way: calls had been made. And meantime the three guards faced off the leather-clad bandits, while their leader and Franz sat with only the antique rosewood desk between them.
‘Nice place,’ the Angel said. His name was Lars. Well over six feet tall, hair stretched back into a thin ponytail. Denim waistcoat – all-important ‘colours’ – worn over leather jacket. And his jackboots up on Franz’s desk.
He’d grinned when Franz had stopped short of telling him to take his feet off the desk. But Franz was biding his time, waiting for his other men to arrive, and wanting to rise above all this, to be the diplomat. So he’d offered Lars a drink, and Lars now rested a bottle of beer against his crotch, and looked relaxed.
‘You’re financing our rivals,’ the gang leader said, getting down to business.
‘In what way?’
‘We’re in a war, no room for neutrals. And you’re funding their side of things.’
‘I pay them to act as my couriers, that’s all. I’m not financing any conflict.’
‘But it’s your money they’re using when they buy guns and ammo.’
Franz shrugged. ‘And whose money are you using, my friend? Are your mortal enemies at this very moment confronting your employer?’ He smiled. ‘Do you see the absurdity of the situation? I’m not happy, because here you are invading my privacy, and I don’t suppose your employer will be feeling any different. I’m a businessman. I am neutraclass="underline" business always is. What you’re doing, right this second, is fucking with my business. My instinct naturally is to get out, which is what you want, yes?’
He had lost the biker, who nodded slowly.
‘Exactly. But what if the same thought is going through your employer’s mind? Where does that leave you? With no money, no prospects.’ Franz shook his head. ‘My friend, the best thing you can do for all our sakes is to begin discussions with your rivals, settle this thing, then we can all get back to what we want to be doing: making money.’
Franz reached into a drawer, held one hand up to let Lars know nothing tricky was coming. He produced a fat bundle of Deutschmarks and tossed it to the gang-leader.
‘See?’ he said. ‘Now I’m funding both of you. Does that make me neutral?’
Lars studied the notes, stuffed them into a zippered pocket.
‘Let me set up a meeting,’ Franz went on blandly, ‘get all sides together, anyone who has an interest. That’s the way business works.’
‘You’re full of bullshit,’ the biker said, but he was grinning.