He was immediately rushed by two salesgirls, neither of whom could have been more than sixteen years old.
"Sawasdee! Welcome, special friend!" One of them held out a mango drink, with a flower and umbrella. "You come for last-day Thai government export special to buy gems, sir?"
Ford ignored them.
"Sir?"
"I want to see the owner." He spoke to the air about a foot above their heads, hands in his pockets, shades still on.
"Gentleman wish welcome drink?"
"Gentleman not wish welcome drink."
The girls went off, disappointed, and a moment later a man appeared from the back room, dressed in an impeccable black suit with a white shirt and gray tie, hands clasped together, making several obsequious half-bows as he approached. "Welcome, special friend! Welcome! Where do you come from? America?"
Ford gave him a hard stare. "I'm here to see the owner."
"Thaksin, Thaksin, at your service, sir!"
"Fuck this. I ain't talking to a lackey." Ford turned to leave.
"Just a moment, sir." A few minutes passed and a very small, tired man came out from the back. He was dressed in a track suit and he walked stooped, with none of the hurry of the others, bags under his eyes. When he reached Ford, he paused, looked him up and down with an inscrutable calmness. "Your name, please?"
Without answering, Ford removed an orange stone from his pocket and showed it to the man.
The man took a casual step back. "Let us go back into my office."
The office was small and covered in fake wood paneling that had warped and detached in the humidity. It stank of cigarettes. Ford had done business in Southeast Asia before and knew that the shabbiness of an office, or the poor cut of a man's clothes, was no guide to who that person was; the most dilapidated office might be the den of a billionaire.
"I am Adirake Boonmee." The man extended a small hand and gave Ford's a neat little shake.
"Kirk Mandrake."
"May I see that stone again, Mr. Mandrake, sir?"
Ford removed the stone but the man did not take it.
"You may place it on the table."
Ford put it down. Boonmee eyed it for a long moment, moved closer, then grasped it, held it up to a strong point light shining from a corner of the room.
"It's a fake," he said. "A coated topaz."
Ford feigned a moment of confusion, recovering quickly. "Naturally, I'm aware of that," he said.
"Naturally." Boonmee placed it down on a felt board on his desk. "What can I do for you?"
"I have a big client who wants a lot of these stones. Honeys. Real ones. And he's willing to pay top price. In gold bullion."
"What has led you to think we sell this kind of stone?"
Ford reached into his pocket and pulled out a stack of American gold eagles and let them fall to the felt, one by one, with a dull clinking. Boonmee didn't even appear to look at the coins. But Ford could see the pulse in his neck quicken. Funny how the sight of gold did that.
"That's to open the conversation."
Boonmee smiled, a curiously innocent, sweet expression that lit up his small face. His hand closed over the coins and slipped them into his pocket. He leaned back in his chair. "I think, Mr. Mandrake, that we will have a good conversation."
"My client is a wholesaler in the U.S. looking for at least ten thousand carats of raw stone to cut and sell. I myself am not a gem dealer; I wouldn't know a diamond from a piece of glass. I'm what you might call an 'import facilitator' when it comes to, ah, getting shipments through U.S. Customs." Ford allowed a certain braggadoccio to creep into his voice.
"I see. But ten thousand carats is impossible. At least, right away."
"Why's that?"
"The stones are rare. They're coming out slowly. And I'm not the only gem dealer in Bangkok. I can start you off with a few hundred carats. We can work up from there."
Ford shifted in his seat, frowned. "You aren't going to 'start me off' at all, Mr. Boonmee. This is a one-shot deal. Ten thousand carats or I walk down the street."
"What is your price, Mr. Mandrake?"
"Twenty percent higher than the going rate: six hundred American dollars an uncut carat. That's six million dollars, in case math isn't your strong suit." Ford gave an appropriately stupid grin.
"I will make a call. Do you have a card, Mr. Mandrake?"
Ford produced an impressive, Asian-style card on heavy card stock with stamped gold embossing, English on the front, Thai on the back. He handed it to Boonmee with a flourish. "One hour, Mr. Boonmee."
Boonmee inclined his head.
With a final handshake, Ford walked out of the shop and stood on the corner, looking for a cab, waving off the tuk-tuks. Two illegal cabs came by but he waved those off as well. After ten minutes of pacing about in frustration, he took out his wallet, looked through it, and went back inside.
He was immediately rushed by the salesgirls. Bypassing them, he went to the back of the shop. He rapped on the door. After a moment, the little man appeared.
"Mr. Boonmee?"
He looked at him, surprised. "A problem?"
Ford smiled sheepishly. "I gave you the wrong card. An old one. May I--?"
Boonmee went to his desk, picked up the old card, handed it to him.
"My apologies." Ford proffered the new card, slipped the old one into his shirt pocket, and hustled back out into the hot sun.
This time he found a cab right away.
8
Amazing how places like this always look the same, thought Mark Corso as he walked down the long polished halls of the National Propulsion Facility. Even though he was on the other side of the continent, the halls of NPF smelled just like those at MIT--or Los Alamos or Fermilab for that matter--the same mixture of floor wax, warm electronics, and dusty textbooks. And they looked the same, too, the rippled linoleum, the cheap blond-wood paneling, the humming fluorescent panels spaced among acoustic tiles.
Corso touched the shiny new identity badge hanging on a plastic cord around his neck almost as if it were a talisman. As a kid he'd wanted to be an astronaut. The Moon was taken but there was Mars. And Mars was even better. Now, here he was, thirty years old, the youngest senior technician in the entire Mars mission, at a moment in human history like no other. In less than two decades--before he was fifty--he would be part of the greatest event in the annals of exploration: putting the first human beings on another planet. And if he played his cards right, he might even be mission director.
Corso paused at an empty glass case in the hall to check his reflection: spotless lab coat casually unbuttoned, pressed white cotton shirt and silk foulard tie, gabardine slacks. He was punctilious with his dress and careful to avoid any suggestion of the nerd. Gazing at his reflection, he pretended to be seeing himself for the first time. His hair was short (read: reliable), beard (unconventional), but neatly trimmed (not too unconventional), his frame thin and athletic (not effete). He was a good-looking guy, dark in the Italian way, chiseled face, big brown eyes. The expensive Armani glasses and tailored clothes reinforced the impression: no geek here.
Corso took a deep breath and knocked confidently on the closed office door.
"Entrez," came the voice.
Corso pushed open the door and entered the office, standing in front of the desk. There was no place to sit; the office of his new supervisor, Winston Derkweiler, was small and cramped, even though the team leader could have gotten himself a much bigger office. But Derkweiler was one of those scientists who affected a disdain for perquisites and appearances, his blunt manner and sloppy look broadcasting his pure dedication to science.