Hilger looked over at the bodyguard, too. And, possessing a set of sharp instincts of his own but without the personal relationship that had perhaps fractionally slowed Belghazi’s own reaction, he shot his hand toward the inside of his jacket.
But too late. The bodyguard had started his own move a second earlier. By the time Hilger’s hand had disappeared under his jacket, the bodyguard had reached into his rear waistband and withdrawn a pistol. He pointed it at Hilger and said something.
Everyone froze. Hilger slowly removed his hand from inside his jacket. It was empty.
Belghazi was looking at the bodyguard, his expression incredulous. He shouted something.
“Holy shit,” I said to Dox. “The bodyguard just pulled a gun on Belghazi.”
“Say what?”
“I think the inside job we were going to simulate is happening for real.”
“I’ll be damned.”
“I want to hear what they’re saying. But if Belghazi shows his head, make sure you drop him. No more chances.”
“Roger that.”
I switched over. Belghazi was yelling at the bodyguard in Arabic, cursing him, from the tone. The bodyguard was yelling back, gesturing with the gun, pointing it from man to man. Everyone else seemed frozen.
“Achille, can you tell me what he’s saying, please,” Hilger said to Belghazi, the words slow and calm. “I don’t speak Arabic.”
“Yes, what in fuck is going on here!” one of the Russians added loudly.
“Take out your guns!” the bodyguard shouted. “Slowly! Put them on the ground! Slowly, slowly, or I will shoot you!”
Belghazi never took his eyes from his man. His lips had pulled back from his teeth, and his body was coiled like a panther about to pounce. It seemed that only the gun prevented him.
“He says that he is stealing the shipment,” he said. Then he let out another hot stream of Arabic.
“Guns on ground!” the bodyguard yelled. “This is the last time I ask!”
The men did as he said. Each of them removed a pistol from a waistband or shoulder holster and slowly placed it on the ground.
“Now hands in the air! Hands in the air!” the bodyguard yelled. Everyone complied.
“Now kick the guns forward. Kick them!” Again, everyone complied.
The bodyguard turned his head to the Russians, but didn’t take his eyes from Belghazi. “I am very sorry about this,” he said in heavily accented English. “Very sorry. We tried to buy the missiles from you. But you wouldn’t sell them.”
“Who in fuck is ‘we’?” the Russian spat.
“It doesn’t matter,” the bodyguard said. “What matters is, we offered you money, and you told us you already had a buyer-Belghazi. We offered to pay you more! But you wouldn’t listen.”
“Because we know this man, we have business with this man,” the Russian said. “With motherfucker we don’t know, bullshit like this! You see?”
Belghazi let out another stream of Arabic abuse. Hilger said, “Achille, please, I need to know what’s going on. Did he say ‘missiles’?”
Belghazi flexed his hands open and closed, as though trying to burn off some surfeit of energy that would otherwise consume him. “Did you send that French piece of shit to Macau?” he said to the bodyguard. “It was you, wasn’t it.”
The man nodded. “I’m sorry, Mr. Belghazi, very sorry. But you were the only reason these men wouldn’t sell us the Alazans.”
Alazans? I thought.
“ ‘Us.’ Who is us?”
The man shook his head.
Belghazi threw up his hands and laughed. The laugh sounded dangerous, almost mad. “You’re right, it doesn’t matter! Because I would have sold you the Alazans! All you had to do was ask!”
The man shook his head again. “These are special, you know that, you know you would have quadrupled the price. Also you would have sold them off in small numbers to many buyers. But we need them all. We had to buy direct, and you were in the way. I’m sorry.”
Belghazi said, “How are you going to move this merchandise off Hong Kong without my help, hmm?”
The bodyguard nodded almost sympathetically, as though he regretted putting his putative employer in such an embarrassing position. “We have made our own arrangements for the Alazans. Everything is taken care of.”
Hilger said, “Achille, what are ‘Alazans,’ please? Are there missiles in that crate?”
Belghazi shrugged. He said, “Jim, don’t ask me questions you don’t want answered, all right?”
“You told me this was another small arms shipment,” Hilger said, more to himself than to Belghazi. I could imagine the workings of his mind: Five million sounded like way too much. I should have known right there something was rotten in Denmark. Damn it, these guys are trying to move some very bad shit. I’ve been had.
The bodyguard turned his head to the Russians and, keeping his eyes on Belghazi, said, “We don’t want the money. You can keep it, it’s yours. It’s the same amount we would have paid you, if you had trusted us. Maybe you will be able to trust us next time, because now we have ‘done business,’ as you say.”
“We keep money?” one of the Russians said.
The man nodded. “All we want is the Alazans. And, for next time, your goodwill.”
I wondered if the man was telling the truth. He might have been bluffing, holding out hope for the Russians as a way of persuading them to acquiesce in what was happening. Even if he was sincere at the moment, though, the Russians would have been fools to trust him. The psychology of a criminal who suddenly realizes his total dominion over another human life is rarely stable. His ambitions grow, his original aims change. A nervous armed robber, seeing his victims cowering before him, realizes that not only can he rob these people, he can do anything to them, and what started as a simple armed robbery escalates to sadism, often to rape. So if this went on for another minute or so, I could imagine the bodyguard thinking, Why shouldn’t I take that five million? It’s for a worthy cause.. . at which point he might also decide that it would be best not to leave witnesses, or anyone who might bear a grudge.
Hilger was watching the bodyguard carefully, his expression somehow dubious, and I thought he might be as acquainted with these less savory aspects of human psychology as I. In which case, I doubted he would remain passive for too much longer.
Also, he had seemed distinctly unhappy to learn that this shipment contained something other than small arms. I wondered if he had decided to try to do something about that.
The Russians started talking to each other, and I realized I had been right: they were using Russian. But again I wasn’t sure of the accent. Were they Ukrainians? Belorussians? Or of some other group in the region?
I watched through the binoculars, amazed. With just a little luck, this really could go perfectly. The bodyguard executes the six men. Dox drops him as he goes to get in the van. Or they all start shooting at each other, and Dox and I take out the “survivors.” I grab the duffel bag and we drive off.
But even as I imagined it, I knew it was too good to be true. Because I saw a new complication: a silver Toyota Camry, approaching from the south end of the access road. Now what? I thought.
The bodyguard glanced over at the approaching car, then back to the men in front of him. He didn’t seem surprised; in fact, I thought I saw a little relief in his expression. I had a feeling the occupants of the car were his compatriots, perhaps having been signaled by the bodyguard through some electronic means that it was time for them to make their appearance.
Hilger was watching closely. I imagined him thinking: He can’t start shooting now because it’s six against one. He couldn’t drop us all before someone rushed him. But if the men in that car are with him, when they get here we’re all dead.