Frederick Ramsay_Botswana Mystery 01 (4 page)

Chapter 6

Henry Farrah took the call even though he couldn’t imagine what Bobby Griswold’s wife wanted from him.

She told him.

“What you’re asking for is confidential lawyer-client information,” he protested. “Now wait a minute, Brenda…” He clenched his jaw, his face turned a bright, first-day-at-the-beach red. “Okay, okay, I hear you, but this has got to stop. Remember, you may embarrass me, but, if I have to, I can destroy you. What happened at that club is history and don’t forget, I didn’t interfere with you and Robert when I could have, so we should be even.”

He held the phone away from his ear and sighed. “No need to use that kind of language. Very well, but I can only give you a rough outline—only what concerns your husband. That will have to do for now. Is that clear? Good.” He ran his fingers through his still thick hair. It had once been red but with the years had turned muddy, the red fading into gray.

“This is the last will Mr. Painter executed as far as I know. Since I am his attorney, you may assume it is definitive. There is a 25 percent share in the company’s stock that is held in trust by Leo until Robert turns thirty-three. What?…I don’t know. Leo must have been genuinely fond of Robert’s mother, Brenda. That fondness doesn’t extend to Robert, by the way. Anyway, if Leo dies before Robert turns thirty-three, he inherits it immediately.”

Farrah wasn’t sure how much of what he related would register with the woman whom he’d first encountered in the Golden Cage night club. Just another gold-digger who, he believed, would milk whatever assets Griswold had and then dump him.

“The what?” Farrah’s expression switched from condescension to alarm. “How did you hear about the public offering? It’s supposed to be a secret…Bobby told you? I, we, the company, that is, could get into big trouble with the SEC if they find out…Okay, but don’t say anything to anyone else, you hear? I mean it. If it comes out, the wrong people know the sale could be canceled.”

A new problem to aggravate his ulcer. He reached into a desk drawer and retrieved a package of antacids, shelled one out and placed it on his tongue.

“No, if the offering goes through, Bobby’s stock converts to preferred stock. Since he is not top management, it confers no stock options to him.”

This conversation had drifted into areas the woman could not possibly grasp, he thought, and wished he had never begun.

“What?…Well, it means that combined with his mother’s share he received at her death he’d have a very nice income stream. Preferred stock is paid dividends before common stock. That’s pretty much it.”

Farrah listened as Brenda summarized her understanding of what he’d said. To his surprise, she had it right. When she’d finished, he acknowledged it as correct and hung up. With the news about the possibility of the IPO leak, he had a full day ahead. It had used up all his favors, and then some, to convince the board to force an IPO on Leo. This leak could ruin everything. The SEC needed to be queried—discreetly. He had contacts there. And the firms he’d contacted needed to be warned that there might be other parties in play when the offering was announced, if it made it that far.

***

While Henry Farrah fenced with Brenda Griswold and fed his ulcer antacids, Travis also placed a phone call. He’d used Dalton Inquiries frequently in the past. His continued climb in the corporate world required that he know as much as possible about his rivals, subordinates, and employer. Andrew Dalton supplied that information for a price. A high price, in fact, but one Travis paid without question. Dalton’s data was always reliable.

“Andy, I have an assignment for you and I need a report by Thursday.”

“That’s not much time, Mr. Parizzi.”

“I know, I’ll pay—”

“Of course you will. What is it you need?”

“Everything you can find out about a man named Yuri Greshenko. It’s important.”

“Hell, Mr. Parizzi. I don’t need to wait until Thursday, I can give that to you right now. The word on the street is Yuri Greshenko is Russian Mafia.”

“Russian Mafia? I didn’t know Chicago had—”

“They’re not big here, not yet, anyway. Greshenko is what you might call their advance man.”

“Russian Mafia. Jesus, what is Leo thinking?”

“Your boss is dealing with this guy?’

“I don’t know. I guess he must be.”

“I’ll send some stuff over to you today. A word to the wise, Mr. Parizzi: give Greshenko a very wide berth. He could be poison.”

“I’ll be careful. Send the ActiVox file over as well.”

The board had discussed ActiVox when the revolutionary process had been announced. They had authorized Leo to bid on it when the Australians had indicated a willingness to sell. The chemical leaching process could restore played-out mines, particularly nickel, to profitable production again. To their consternation they were quickly outbid by a Canadian group who, in turn, before Earth Global had a chance to counter, sold it, at an enormous profit, reportedly in the billions of dollars, to a Russian syndicate. Travis knew from Leo’s personal secretary, to whom he paid substantial bonuses, that Leo had not given up on ActiVox. Earth Global had options on several played out mines and controlled vast holdings where they continued mining. They were barely profitable and Travis intended to see them shut down so the company could pour its resources into sectors with a better return on investment.

But who was Greshenko? More appropriately what was Greshenko, besides a Mafioso? What were Russians who dealt in that business called anyway? Was he the Russian connection Leo needed to close the ActiVox deal? He needed to know more about him. Timing, it all came down to timing.

***

Brenda stared unseeing at Lake Michigan through skeletal tree branches. The sky had turned darker, grayer. It would snow soon. Bobby had gone out, God only knew where, and she had some serious thinking to do. If Farrah had told her the truth, there would be some huge changes if and when the IPO thing went through. On the other hand, if Leo’s heart were to crap out, this time for good, her—well, Bobby’s—options were considerably brighter than she’d imagined. She could raise the money to redeem Bobby’s shares from that slime-ball Travis Parizzi. Frankie at the Golden Cage could arrange for the funds, if she explained it to him right. She’d have to pay a pretty high vigorish to the sharks, probably, but it would be worth it. Anyone wanting a major stake in Earth Global would jump at a chance to buy them out—for really big bucks. But that would have to be before the IPO, or with Leo dead.

“Income stream,” Farrah had said. Crapola. That might appeal to the congenitally lazy Bobby, but not to her. Leo was a tough old bastard, though. He was just contrary enough to live another ten years. And Farrah said if the wrong people…or was it the right people? If they found out the IPO had been leaked, it might be canceled. She needed to think about that, too.

***

Leo Painter settled behind his desk and steepled his hands. He considered lighting a cigar. Smoking was strictly forbidden in the offices, and by his doctors, but Leo ignored those dicta as he did most others. RHIP, he would say whenever someone called him on it, rank has its privileges. He rolled the cigar, one smuggled in from Cuba, between thumb and forefinger next to his ear. Perfecto. He decided to wait. It would taste better after lunch with his second martini.

Telling Bobby Griswold about the IPO had been a stroke of genius. When Farrah found out, and he was sure the idiot boy would let it slip eventually, it would give Farrah a double duck fit. The greedy bastard would then have to square it with his new friends, his “partners,” the guys who wanted to take over the company, and then, who knew what the SEC would do if they found even the hint of possible insider trading? Farrah should have taken the early retirement offer, the proverbial “golden parachute,” when he had the chance, but apparently he couldn’t resist the thought of a big payoff. Now, he could end up with nothing. Served him right, the disloyal son of a bitch.

Leo swiveled around to contemplate an angry Lake Michigan again. Clouds piled in from the north. Waves crashed against the seawall, where some of the spume began to freeze. What, he wondered, should he do about Travis Parizzi? If only the guy would learn patience. Leo liked Travis; well, not liked, exactly, Leo didn’t dare to like anyone, but he recognized talent when he saw it, and Travis had it. He had what it took to step in as his successor. The company needed an insider to finish the projects currently on the table. Travis could do it. A new management team, AMG Partners, Freeport McMoran, the group that bought out Phelps-Dodge or, whoever else might be in play, would take too long to settle in, and the process would engender too much infighting. The moment would be lost. Continuity was the answer. And then there was the real estate division, soon to be a spinoff if everything went as he hoped. It needed capital, though. Leo wondered if he’d be better off sharing his plans with Travis.

Perhaps, he thought, in Africa they’d have a chance to talk.

Chapter 7

Kgbo Modise waved his hand at the second-hand smoke drifting in his window. It was summer in Gaborone, the windows open, and on the whole he’d much rather be somewhere else having a cool drink and admiring the young girls bustling about their business. Instead, he reread the thick file in front of him. There were two parts: a cursory and not very helpful summary from Interpol and several older, more detailed documents from the predecessor agencies of the Directorate of Intelligence and Security, the DIS. Yuri Greshenko had had his fingers in many pies in his day.

Modise thought all those old
apparatchiks
were gone and forgotten, whiling away the time in their dachas with pensions or shaking down the new generations of capitalists in the mother country. But now this one turns up like a counterfeit thebe to disturb his day. Back when Botswana was in its infancy and all the major players were attempting to establish hegemony on the continent, Greshenko and people like him were busy. They were part of the back channel creating the uneasy triumvirate of the DeBeers, Russia, and Botswana cartel, which would exert control over most of the world’s kimberlitic diamonds. Efforts to break the cartel by the CIA, Zaire, Australia, and some other players, had occupied Modise’s predecessors for years.

So, what was this aging Russian operative up to now? And how did he fit in with Earth Global? His acquaintance with Botlhokwa worried his boss. The government was eager for Earth Global to come and invest but was understandably chary of Yuri Greshenko. His past was problematic.

***

When Sanderson arrived back at the station, Mr. Pako, puffed with the newfound importance his imminent promotion gave him, called her into his office.

He stared at her rudely. He often did that. Sanderson thought he was a dirty old man. He had once had asked her for sexual favors. She had fended him off by reminding him of her late husband and that he had died of AIDS and perhaps she too…She did not need to finish the thought. Mr. Pako quickly changed the subject, but he was never polite to her again.

“I have been on the line with the headman in Kazungula and he wishes that this lion which has taken that boy from Zimbabwe be found and shot. In this, the managers of the lodges agree. It is bad for business if the guests have to worry about a killer lion. You must see to this.”

He assumed she would not be able to comply, as he believed, along with Police Superintendent Mwambe, that a woman could not operate a firearm, much less shoot down a four-hundred-kilo lion. He looked extremely smug when he gave her this order.

In truth, Sanderson agreed with him. She did know how to load and fire the rifle. And in years past, had had some success hitting targets with similar pieces. Her late husband, before he took to visiting that woman in the village who had infected him, had shared this skill and many other happy times with her. But shooting targets under the watchful eye of the police and hunting a lion were very different things.

She asked if tranquilizing the animal and relocating it would not be a better idea. He scowled at her in a way that clearly indicated he considered any suggestion that contradicted his orders a great affront. He brushed the notion of tranquillizing away with his hand.

“No, it must be killed. It has tasted human blood. It will be a man-eater from now on. It must be removed.”

Mr. Pako authorized the use of the old Land Rover, but only during the day. She must return it every evening, he said. She also received a note to draw ammunition. How she was to track this lion, which had tasted human blood, and kill it he did not make clear. Mr. Pako’s desire to see her fail and perhaps be mauled by that lion in the bargain was eminently clear.

She would not give him that pleasure. How she would complete this duty, however, seemed less certain. She would ask in the village. The old men would know. They had once hunted
ditau
, the lions, in their youth, and the older men without firearms but with spears. They would know what to do. However, she could not be sure they would share that knowledge with a woman, with her. Perhaps, she thought, she could recruit them to do the hunting. That would make it all right. They would like to do that. Hunting the
ditau
had been taken from them years before. How could a boy grow up to manhood, they asked, if he cannot hunt the lions?

Becoming a game ranger had been her ambition since she was very small. It had not been easy to pass the tests and wait for an opening. But she had done it and all the Pakos in the world were not going to take it away from her. She nodded her acquiescence. Mr. Pako smiled, confident of her inevitable failure, and then, with a superior smirk, told her he had been transferred to Maun. It was, he declared, a promotion. He would leave at the end of the week. Much to his amazement, she congratulated him profusely.

Her luck had changed.

***

By late afternoon, Sekoa had traveled five more kilometers and needed a place to rest. The river seemed a long ways away. To his right he heard the rustle of feathers. He crouched and managed to flush a guinea fowl from its nest. He couldn’t bring down the bird, and the hatchlings darted away from him. He chased them for a few yards and then stopped, exhausted. A pack of hyenas trotted out of the bush and stopped a few meters away. With lunatic eyes, they contemplated their traditional enemy, measuring his strength. A rush of adrenalin enabled him to stand, tall and whole. He opened his jaws wide, yawned, let out a low growl, and feinted toward them, claws extended. The hyenas backed away, hesitated. A small herd of Thompson’s Gazelles minced across an open area behind them. The hyenas, long incorrectly thought to be mere scavengers, wheeled and gave chase, disappearing in a cloud of dust. The lion trotted after them. If they missed, but crippled one, he might eat again. Perhaps, if they parted and fed separately, he could intimidate one of them into giving up the kill. If his pride were with him, he could do that. But he had no females anymore.

He trotted on. He could smell fear. A small, very young impala, a “lion snack,” they would say of it at the Safari Lodge, bolted into his path. It did not expect a lion to be hunting so close to hyenas and, with panicked eyes rolled back at its pursuers, bounded directly at him. He swatted it down with one paw and clamped his jaws on the poor beast’s neck. Sekoa would eat. It amounted to no more than a few mouthfuls, but he would live another day.