Читать книгу Samurai Code - Don Easton - Страница 10

5

Kang Lee checked his watch as he arrived at the Avitat Lounge at the South Terminal of the Vancouver International Airport. The northern windows offered a view of the runway generally utilized by private aircraft. I’m right on time. As it should be. Punctuality is a window to a man’s character and integrity.

He adjusted the Thai-silk handkerchief in the breast of his Liana Lee cashmere silk suit: a suit he’d had tailored for himself last year after a visit to Lee’s store on New York’s Lexington Avenue. It was a gift to himself for his fiftieth birthday. With a price tag of over eight thousand dollars, it was his favourite suit. Displays elegance and grace. He knew he was partially persuaded to purchase it from Lee, because she, like himself, was originally from Korea. That they coincidentally shared the same surname was not important, as Lee is the second most common name in South Korea.

His shoes, made by Salvatore Ferragamo, were a mocha crocodile with a price tag of fifteen hundred dollars. His watch, the Leman model made by Blancpain, with its crocodile strap and eighteen-karat-gold clasp, cost considerably more than his suit and shoes combined.

His head was shaved, further accenting the one-karat diamond stud protruding from one earlobe. Although he was short by Western standards, barely reaching the height of many men’s chests, his confidence and manner exuded a strength that caused most people to instinctively make way for him.

His ensemble helped to make him feel powerful amongst men. Is it wrong to dress in a manner that demonstrates my real power? Of course not!

As he waited, he thought of the reason why his boss was coming to meet him. The number two man in their organization had recently died of a heart attack while being entertained by two women in a thermal hot springs. Not a bad way to die … if you must die. And so it comes to pass that one man’s loss is another man’s gain.

He knew he was being considered as a replacement. His only real competition was a man who worked out of their office in Palermo. Like me, he lords over a few of that country’s top crime bosses. Of course, they don’t realize it. They think we only enable them in their pursuit for wealth and power … when will they realize that we also control the strings that decide their very existence?

He brooded when he thought about his competition. In some ways, it wasn’t fair. Italy had been established with the appropriate networks dating back hundreds of years. Some families there have become multi-generational in their acceptance of graft … or the knowledge of what will happen should you refuse. It is natural that Italy would produce higher revenue. By comparison, Vancouver is brand new … I have only been here four years …

He paused to look out the window and take in the dynamics of the airport. But the potential is astronomic! He smiled. Surely it has been recognized that I have done well? I have seen that our interests are well established with smuggling immigrants, protection, heroin, ecstasy.… It is more challenging to set up new pathways. Any accounting clerk could run Palermo. My assignment demands tact and presence of mind. Convincing local syndicates that I am not competition, but someone with the connections to greatly enhance their revenue by lowering the risk of police or customs interference. It takes time. The boss must understand that?

He glanced out the window and saw his boss’s executive jet touch down on the runway. The jet was a Falcon 50EX. Its three powerful engines were capable of reaching intercontinental destinations while travelling at Mach .80. It was also designed to use backcountry airfields with shorter runways when necessary. Lee had been on the aircraft when his business called for such a backcountry rendezvous — places where customs officials were often no more than hired peasants with uniforms — people who could be bribed for as little as a bottle of whiskey or a carton of cigarettes.

He knew that his boss’s bodyguards; Da Khlot and Sayomi, would be on board the jet. I should have such people. Lee smiled, recalling Da Khlot’s nickname for his boss: The Shaman.

Da Khlot, born into a mountain tribe in Cambodia, really believed that their boss had mystical powers. Control of the spirits. Either for the good of a community … or to wreak terror. Control of anything he desired. Lee knew that shamanism was still popular in Korea as well. Usually a shaman was a woman, but not always. Perhaps Khlot is right …

The jet rolled past, its three engines screaming like banshees, as if protesting their shackled entities to the jet and their subservient existence to the man inside.

Lee caught his own reflection in the glass superimposed over the jet. Having to live in Vancouver … am I really only a big fish in a small pond? When will … The Shaman … allow me to return home and fulfill the destiny that is surely mine to —

He lurched forward as a duffle bag connected with the back of his head. A heavy-set woman hurrying past with the bag slung over her shoulder stopped.

“Sorry, kid. Are you okay?” she asked apologetically, turning around. Realizing her second blunder, she said, “I mean … sir. Sorry, I thought you were … I just caught you out of the corner of my eye. Are you okay?”

“I am quite all right,” replied Lee tersely, while straightening the neckline of his suit jacket. “Perhaps if you were more punctual, you wouldn’t have the need to rampage around the airport like a fat cow with cataracts!”

***

Da Khlot glanced out the window of the Falcon 50EX as it approached the terminal. He was a long way from his birthplace in the jungle of Cambodia.

Life had not been kind to Da Khlot. His fourteen-year-old orphaned mother was raped and he was an unwelcome outcome of that atrocity. He was eleven years old in February 1975, when his mother died after stepping on one of an estimated 5 million landmines left in Cambodia from a host of warring factions. It was the same year the Khmer Rouge came to power and he was promptly taken in as a soldier for that regime.

Over the next four years, the Khmer Rouge, under the command of Pol Pot, were responsible for an estimated 1.5 million deaths of their fellow citizens. A large number for a country that had a population of only 7.5 million.

Along with other newly recruited soldiers, Da Khlot was taken to open pits containing bound and captive people who had been deemed enemies of the country. He and other newly recruited children were given pickaxes and made to kill the prisoners before they were buried in mass graves. Some of these enemies were Da Khlot’s neighbours. People who fell into the category of professionals and intellectuals … or anyone wearing eyeglasses, for that matter, as they were deemed by the Khmer Rouge to be literate and thereby a threat to the new regime.

Da Khlot was told that by using pickaxes they would save bullets. In the beginning, he, along with other children, cried as much as the victims, but fear drove them to obey. Eventually the tears dried up along with any emotion he felt. Obeying came without question.

In December 1978, Cambodian forces invaded Vietnam. They were repressed and Vietnam retaliated by invading Cambodia and seizing the capital, Phnom Penh. As a result, the four-year reign of terror by the Khmer Rouge was toppled, but the resistance movement of the Khmer Rouge continued to fight on in western Cambodia from bases hidden in Thailand. The Khmer Rouge were “unofficially” aided by the Thai Army and the United States Special Forces. Diamond and timber smuggling were used to bring in money to supplement their needs.

In 1996, Pol Pot signed a peace agreement officially ending the movement. By then, Da Khlot had become a high-ranking guerrilla leader with twenty-one years of experience at torture and murder. Although he was an expert marksman, he was particularly renowned for his ability with a knife.

Da Khlot knew the spot on the back of a person’s neck in which to plunge a knife and cause instant paralysis. The victims would collapse in a heap, but their eyes revealed their horror as their brains wondered how long Da Khlot would let them live — sometimes hours, sometimes longer, depending on the impression Da Khlot wanted to make on other prisoners.

To obey and kill without question. It was all Da Khlot really knew how to do, but during the late 1990s his profession was quickly coming to an end. Many of the top Khmer Rouge leaders were being captured and imprisoned for war crimes and crimes against humanity.

It was Da Khlot’s knowledge of the smuggling routes and vital contacts that allowed him to survive in the jungles for nearly seven years. He had a rudimentary knowledge of English — the universal language of understanding in the higher echelon of a trade, where numerous ethnic groups did business together. Heroin was soon added to the smuggling list and the money was no longer being taken by the Khmer Rouge.

For a while, Da Khlot thought fate was smiling kindly upon him. Then, in July 2005, he was arrested near the Thai border by Cambodian Special Forces soldiers. Under armed escort, he was brought to a small airfield to be flown to Phnom Penh, where he knew he would eventually be executed for his crimes.

As he sat handcuffed and in leg irons in a small office awaiting transport at the airfield, he counted the number of Special Forces soldiers guarding him. Six! True, I am a large man. Perhaps even bigger than most Westerners. But six! A child with a pickaxe could do what it takes six of these men to do …

Jubilant, these men knew the prize they had caught and were taking no chances. By tomorrow, he would be front page news. Now it is I who kneels in the pit. Waiting and listening to the screams as my turn approaches. Perhaps I will be lucky enough to throw myself out of the helicopter. Cheat them of the torture of waiting.

He did not hear the expected rhythmic beat of an olive-drab Soviet-made Mi-8/17 helicopter from the Royal Cambodian Air Force arrive to whisk him away. His salvation arrived — in the form of a Falcon 50EX jet.

The impossible was made possible. A man of unlimited influence had arrived. A man capable of changing one’s destiny.

The top soldier bowed when the newcomer emerged from the jet and Da Khlot was taken from the room and paraded in front of the newcomer. Then it happened. This man, this shaman, told the soldiers they had made a mistake. Da Khlot had never been fingerprinted. Confirmation of his identity was strictly visual. At least, that was the official version, thought Da Khlot wryly. I wonder how much was paid for my release?

It was Da Khlot’s first ride in an aircraft, let alone a luxury jet. He was also given a new job. He was told he was to be a bodyguard.

Da Khlot soon learned that he was much more than a bodyguard. He was used to quietly fulfill The Shaman’s wishes in some of the countries they visited. He was of particular use in countries where guns were not available due to the annoyance of certain customs regulations.

Much like my early days as a soldier … bullets are not always available. It does not matter; I am an expert with a knife — or even a pickaxe.

Da Khlot never questioned The Shaman’s orders or why someone was chosen to enter the spirit world. Khlot lived by a motto from his days with the Khmer Rouge: To keep you is no benefit. To destroy you is no loss.

Da Khlot wiped his sweaty palms on his pants. He was seated facing the cockpit at the rear of the plane. Despite his unwavering faith in The Shaman, he was never comfortable in the air. After all, it is I who is mortal …

“Feel better?” asked Sayomi. A stifled smile betraying her amusement.

Da Khlot stared passively at Sayomi, who was sitting in another overstuffed lamb’s leather seat facing him. She is like an annoying mosquito in the jungle who finds a hole in the net over where I sleep. Why does this spoiled young Japanese woman take such delight in my discomfort?

“Ignoring me, are you?” she chided, tossing her long black hair over her shoulder with a flick of her head.

She is beautiful … when she is quiet. Does she think she is better than me? Yes, she has a third degree black belt in kick-boxing … capable, she says, of breaking a man’s neck. But even she admits she has never killed. Who is she fooling? Herself? Her being a bodyguard is only polite address for her real function. That of being The Shaman’s mistress. Any whore could fill that role —

“Perhaps your ears don’t work so well anymore,” suggested Sayomi. “I asked if you were no longer afraid?”

“I am not afraid,” replied Khlot, staring back, his face without expression. You grow older every day. Your beauty fades with the knowledge of who you become. Perhaps soon, another young woman will catch The Shaman’s eye and he will decide that to keep you is no benefit …

Da Khlot abruptly turned his attention to The Shaman, who glanced back from his seat near the front of the plane. A slight nod from The Shaman commanded his presence.

“Don’t forget to bow,” teased Sayomi. “Otherwise the next person you may be ordered to kill for not showing respect could be yourself.”

Da Khlot ignored her as he quickly made his way forward, bowed respectfully, and took a seat across from The Shaman.

The Shaman, eyes focused on his laptop, finished reviewing the latest news posted on the Internet by Canadian newspapers; including the Vancouver Sun. Keeping up to date on the latest news from the countries he visited had become a ritual. Any articles of interest, such as pending court decisions regarding the legality of criminal proceedings or sentencing practices, were kept for reference. Over the last few years, he was constantly encouraged by what he read concerning British Columbia.

The Shaman looked gravely at Da Khlot and said, “This mission is of the utmost importance.”

Da Khlot remained stoic. Are not all of The Shaman’s missions important?

“Your duty as an observer on this mission does not mean that I have lost faith in you. Quite the opposite. Loyalty is what it is all about. Do you understand?”

Da Khlot nodded, although he didn’t really understand.

“I expect that tomorrow night you will need to wear your new suit,” said The Shaman. “Make sure you do not lose a button on the suit jacket,” he added, with a smile.

Da Khlot did not question why his new suit was equipped with a hidden video camera and a lens that looked like a button. I am but a soldier. I obey. Tomorrow night someone will die. It does not matter why.

***

Natasha awoke at the sound of Jack’s key unlocking the front door to their apartment. She leaned over and turned on a bedside light, before quickly brushing her shoulder-length black hair with her fingertips.

“You’re awake,” said Jack, sounding pleased, as he entered the room.

“Couldn’t sleep,” replied Natasha. “Got turned on reading a sexy article and decided to wait up.”

Jack glanced at a copy of Canadian Medical Association Journal on the bedside table. “Pretty hot stuff! Are you going to give me another night class in human anatomy?”

“The thought crossed my mind.”

“Think you can wait until I shower?”

“You’ll need another one when I’m done with — hey! That’s blood on your shirt.”

“Not mine. It’s from that policewoman with the broken nose I told you about. She’s okay, other than looking like a racoon. Now you know why I need to shower.”

“Everything go okay?”

“Yes, it went fine. Some bad guys went back to jail tonight.”

“Good. Go shower. I’ll stay awake, but don’t take too long.”

“Do you mean you’ll stay awake while I’m in the shower … or after?”

Natasha replied by throwing a pillow at him.

Jack chuckled, caught the pillow, and threw it back. Then something else caught his attention. He picked up an imitation red rose off of their dresser. Its stem and leaves were green plastic and the red flower was made from silk. The flower was extremely faded and it was obvious it had spent many years in the sun. “What’s this?” he asked, placing one hand over his heart as if overwhelmed by her thoughtfulness.

“That’s not for you! A man … it was given to me.”

“Is that a fact?” Jack raised an eyebrow and added, “Well, although it is a symbol of love, I think I should warn you, that it is imitation only. Whoever the rogue is, I suspect his feelings for you are likely about as genuine as this rose.”

“Oh, I don’t know,” replied Natasha. “I believe his feelings are sincere.”

“Really?” replied Jack, sounding intrigued as he examined it more closely. “By a small piece of broken eggshell on the underside of one leaf, I would guess that you had breakfast with this new lover of yours?”

Natasha laughed and said, “Okay, I confess. It was under my windshield wiper when I left work.”

“A secret admirer,” said Jack. “This is getting more interesting all the time.”

“Not so secret,” replied Natasha. “A grateful patient who is too shy to deliver it personally. His name is Melvin.”

“Should I be jealous?” asked Jack, pursing his lips in an attempt not to smile.

“Depends on your performance after your shower,” replied Natasha, sounding mischievous. “And how quick you come to bed. Not to mention, as I recall, it is you who tends to fall asleep all too soon sometimes.”

“I’ll be fast,” said Jack, placing the rose back on the dresser. “Laura and I want to be at work by eight,” he added, while setting the alarm clock.

“By eight! That’s only five hours away. Can’t you sleep in a little longer? I thought you were working afternoons on Monday. I don’t go in until after lunch.”

“Sorry, hon,” replied Jack, letting out a sigh. “Our new boss starts tomorrow. Staff Sergeant Rosemary Wood. I should be there to greet her on her first day. I’ll take Tuesday morning off. I promise. I’ll even bring you breakfast in bed.”

“You better.”

Jack undressed and then disappeared into their ensuite.

“What is she like?” Natasha called after him. “Do you think she’s going to be okay?”

“Who?” asked Jack, his mind reflecting back to earlier in the evening and the look of terror on the face of a petrified young woman in the back seat of a car.

“Your new boss. Didn’t you check her out? You said she was coming in from Toronto.”

“Oh, her. I never heard her name until last week. Don’t know much about her, other than she worked on terrorism.”

Natasha heard the sound of the shower come on, but Jack yelled back, “I did hear she got in trouble over an illegal search of some office.”

Natasha caught the tone of Jack’s voice. He sounded happy. Why would that please him? She paused a moment and understood. Birds of a feather …

She rolled over and caught a glimpse of the full moon shining in around the edges of the drapes. She flicked off the bedside light and got up and opened them. It was a clear night and the moon shone brightly into the room. Definitely more romantic.

The moonlight cast an elongated replica shadow of the rose on her dresser. Lying in the shadow was a silver necklace, the moon illuminating its singular large pearl.

Jack had received the necklace as a gift from a man he once helped. Somehow, the two gifts seem to go together. She looked out at the night sky. The world can be a wonderful place. People can be so kind. So much life and beauty.

But within the next twenty-four hours, Natasha’s mood would change — when the man she cared for was beaten, kidnapped, and murdered.