Black Tiger (51 page)

Sya had pressed the button for the second floor. The elevator, with its helpless prisoner, was rising again. Sya stood beside the elevator shaft and glared around at the kitchen. The place was hopping, chefs shouting, the full complement of the staff rushing about. Nobody noticed Sya. At the closest workstation to the elevator, a young sous-chef was cooking a clump of green samphire in a smoking wok. Sya thrust him brutally aside. In one smooth movement he dropped a lighted match into the hot wok, which exploded into orange flames. The boy cowered, screaming, as Sya forced the doors to the elevator shaft open and hurled the blazing wok into the wooden shaft. In a final flourish he scooped a cup of water from the sink and tossed it into the flames.

The fire regurgitated a great fireball; the oil spattered wide, sparking off small tongues of flame that licked hungrily up the wooden pillars. The Chinese kitchen workers were already running for their lives, howling, scattering food and utensils. Terrified, the chef tore off his tall white hat and coat, recalling his cousin, a cook whose wok had recently caught fire at the Imperial Hotel, causing the deaths of three kitchen staff and roasting a family of six in the elevator. Frenzied relatives of the immolated had caught up with the cook in Lumpini Park. Only police intervention had prevented a lynching.

In his blind panic, the Rachanee sous-chef failed to see the burly uniformed figure before he collided with him. Sya tugged the white coat up over the sous-chef’s face and elbowed him viciously in the kidneys, sending him reeling headfirst into the corner of the kitchen counter. The man struck his temple, fell to the floor, and lay still, blood pouring from the wound.

Sya stepped over the body, seized a meat cleaver, and stood in front of the open elevator doors, surveying the raging inferno within the shaft. Smoke and flames were writhing in the vacuum. Satisfied, he allowed the doors to slide shut and ran through the smoke-filled kitchen to the staff stairway. He ignored the stairs leading up to the lobby, heading down instead into the underground garage.

His unmarked military vehicle stood out amongst the limousines. It was serviceable, but he needed more speed. He wrenched open the rear door, tossed aside the canvas cover, and dragged out the powerful motorbike hidden beneath. Swiftly, he donned gloves, goggles, and leathers. Once astride and swallowed up in the city traffic, anonymous in his gear, he let the engine rattle along while he listened attentively for the sirens of the fire department.

It had taken the fire engine three-quarters of an hour to arrive at the Imperial Hotel, by which time everyone trapped in the building was lost. Sya shook his head sorrowfully. The fire chief had been entertaining his mistress when the fire broke out and could not be disturbed. He alone was authorised to commission the fire engine. Ultimately, no action would be taken against him; his wife was the principal mistress of the mighty Field Marshal Praphan.

As for those who found themselves trapped in the elevator: to seek refuge there in the event of fire was foolish. People should make their way without panic to the nearest exit, not leap into elevators. The Rachanee kitchen staff, too, had clearly been negligent. If there were casualties, they had reaped the wages of sin.

Sya sped up, making for the southbound carriageway, revelling in the rush of air, freedom, and the sheer joy of being alive.

Raven

The whole kitchen below me must have been ablaze. The heat in the elevator was overpowering, and noxious fumes pouring up the shaft made me gag. I knew I could not survive here for long. In its wood and steel shaft the lift had become a roasting tin. The oil in the wood of the chair under me smouldered into secondary ignition. The flex that bound me was melting, and though the copper wire burned into my wrists and ankles, the heat made it malleable. Suddenly I found I had greater freedom of movement. I struggled like a madman to bring my body weight to bear as best I could. One lucky twist and my hands were free. I pulled the knife from its hidden sheath and cut though the molten wire.

My face felt seared as if by a blowtorch. I scrambled onto the disinte-grating chair, ignoring the pain in my fingertips, and probed the ceiling until I found what I was looking for: the emergency panel in the roof of the lift. Sliding the tip of the knife behind it, I found the release button. As the chair finally gave way under me, I jumped, clawing and heaving my way through the gap onto the top of the cage.

It had jammed about four feet below the doors leading to the next floor, which I surmised must be the lobby. Sya had forced the shaft doors in the kitchen and jammed them open. The elevator, its electronic brain hopelessly confused, had malfunctioned.

I seized the taut elevator cable in my burned hands; gritting my teeth, I attempted to swing my legs up and kick the doors to the lobby. My legs seemed to be made of lead. My bloodied hands were losing their purchase. I leapt as high as I could, gripping the cable, and swung myself up until my naked toes found the ledge of the doorsill. I released the cable and thrust the full weight of my body against the doors, clinging with slippery fingers to the narrow doorframe.

Without warning, the elevator doors slid open. Accompanied by a choking cloud of smoke, I tumbled out, charred black, bleeding, and breathless, into the hotel lobby. I fell amid a panicked crowd, huddled together like a terrified herd, staring and gesticulating at the fumes rising from the stairwell and from the elevator behind me. Firemen were manoeuvring a powerful hose on a wheeled cart down the stairs to where the kitchen must have become an inferno. I should have known Sunii Lee would have her own private emergency services. Behind me, the charred remnants of the ruined lift I had escaped from gave a violent lurch and plunged down the shaft. There was a distant crash.

As people began to recover their nerve and craned forward to gape, I took advantage of their distraction and hurried off to beat a quiet retreat.

I had no time for explanations. I needed to make all possible speed.

Bangkok is accustomed to the extraordinary, familiar with freaks of all varieties. Unusual sights arouse little comment in Bangkok. Nobody stopped me on the street, despite the kenspeckle and villainous figure I must have cut, limping and lurching with the haste of my errand, smoke-blackened and bleeding. I must have looked like the lowest kind of human flotsam.

I stood on the edge of the street and hailed a passing samlor. The driver, a toothless, wizened sage, was unabashed; he appeared delighted that I accepted his exorbitant first price without quibble, just told him to get me to my destination. He welcomed me like a long-lost and wealthy brother. His chugging machine weaved in and out of the traffic like a hazardous fairground ride. I was too dazed even to cling to the sides and in consequence rattled about like a rotten nut in its shell. It was a relief to both of us when we arrived at the gate and I disembarked. I stuffed every tattered note still in my pocket into his eager, grubby hand.

Then I surveyed the portals of the American Embassy, which looked more like a fortress than a stage of diplomacy, exuding an air of closed and ponderous watchfulness. A respectable stone building, but with the usual trappings: a high spiked wall, formidable iron gates, and a Marine who could have stepped out of a recruiting poster. His pink chin was tilted aggressively. Barefoot and begrimed as I was, I refused to be intimidated when he blocked my path.

‘Your business, sir?’

‘I must see the ambassador.’ I schooled impatience out of my voice.

‘Sorry, sir. The United States Embassy is off limits to unauthorised personnel.’

‘Look,’ I said patiently. ‘I have information regarding a potential international emergency. It would be advisable to allow me to pass.’

The boy was wavering. Perhaps my measured tone, or the drawling aristocratic English accent I employ for such encounters, impressed him; but as he squinted down at me and caught sight of my battered and bloody wrists, the blood which had trickled down from my ankles to cake like rust my bare, grimy feet, his initial distrust returned.

‘Please don’t make trouble, sir!’

‘I’ve no intention of making trouble. My name’s Raven, I’m staying with the Drinkwaters—I’m a friend of General van Hooten, of SEATO. It is imperative I speak with the ambassador on a matter of great urgency.’

At that moment, two more soldiers appeared and, half-lifting me so I had to tiptoe not to fall on my face, marched me across the gravel drive, up two stone steps, and through a side door, ignoring my protests.

I found myself in a small, windowless room. They deposited me onto a narrow bed, turned about, and left. The door slammed and I was alone with my indignation and the chugging air conditioner. I looked round for a washbasin and somewhere to relieve myself, but the room offered nothing.

I fretted silently. The guard had seemed to recognise my name—or had I imagined it? I hammered on the door. It had not occurred to me to question Sya’s account of the threat to Kissinger, as it fitted too well with events as I understood them. Sya’s impassive delivery made it all too plausible. I was convinced he had taken Chee Laan, possibly as a hostage, and these thoughts overwhelmed me. I drummed my fists on the door, shouting spasmodically now, breathless with effort, my lungs still affected by the fumes I had inhaled in the fire.

When I was exhausted, I lay on the bed, despairing. The weight of the building seemed to press upon me. The moment for amateur heroics was past; I needed the assistance of the established order now to tell my tale of national peril, to protect Chee Laan. As I sat on the edge of the bunk and buried my head in my hands, I became aware of a cool blue eye regarding me through the observation port in the door.

I sprang to my feet. The eye disappeared, and the peephole cover fell into place. I waited, but there was no sound, nor did anyone twist the handle of the locked door. I sank back into the bed. Sometime later, the peephole was flicked aside once more, and a very different eye observed me—a lustrous, dark eye.

Laila Drinkwater’s deep-throated cry of indignation jolted me out of my despair. ‘Open this door at once! Of course this man is my houseguest—my dear professor, Dr Raven! Why have you locked him up like a criminal?’

Bolts rattled and shot back, the door swung open, and Laila burst in, golden jewellery jangling, black eyes flashing. ‘Raven, you poor, dear man!’ She seized my hands, then stood back and studied me. ‘No wonder these imbeciles took you for a criminal! Such a state you are in!’ She brushed ineffectually at my clothing.

‘Laila! Thank God! Where is van Hooten? It’s extremely urgent! Can you get hold of him?’

She shook her head. ‘I’m sorry, Raven. That is not possible. He went out of town. But the ambassador is here, and he suggested they send for me, to identify one mysterious English tramp claiming to be staying in my house! It is better you speak to him. First, though, we should clean you up. Then Ambassador Morgan will see you.’

I shook my head. ‘The ambassador will have to take me as he finds me, Laila. What I have to tell him is an international catastrophe in the making.’

Dwight C. Morgan, Minister Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary, Ambass-ador of the United States of America to the Royal Court of Thailand, proved to be a spare, silver-haired Bostonian. As I was ushered into his office, the ambassador rose to greet me with an expression of courteous concern on his handsome features. Behind him, on the wall, Richard Nixon and the First Lady were pictured disembarking from Air Force One, Nixon’s hand extended toward the figure of Ambassador Morgan in much the same gesture of welcome. I glanced from one to the other, and felt a momentary relief that I was dealing with the patrician before me rather than the man in the picture.

‘Dr Raven! Please do sit down, sir, sit down! My apologies for the misunderstanding, it has all been sorted. Now, my dear sir, what can I offer you by way of refreshment? You’ve had quite an ordeal. A fire at the Rachanee Hotel, I understand—terrible business. Fortunately there was no loss of life on this occasion.’

The ambassador gestured toward a sofa upholstered in heavy, thready Thai cotton. The interview was to be informal and professional. I found this marginally encouraging.

‘A little fortification?’ Morgan opened a cupboard in the desk and took out a bottle and two glasses. He poured the bourbon expertly, a two-finger measure exactly. ‘Now.’ Morgan sat back in the sofa, nursing his glass, and studied me amicably. ‘It seems you’ve learned our little secret, that the Embassy has been entertaining a distinguished guest. Dr Kissinger has indeed been here—I won’t say incognito, because that would be impossible, his name and his face are well known throughout the civilised world. But he’s keeping a low profile. No official engagements, no announcements.’

‘I know what he has come for,’ I said.

Morgan smiled broadly. ‘He has come to see how the war progresses. That’s obvious.’

‘So he wasn’t planning on a trip to Red China, from Mae Sod airstrip upcountry, off the record. Is that right?’

Now Morgan frowned, the easy smile abandoned. ‘The State Department has no knowledge of such a trip. Let me state that quite categorically. No such information has been received. What would be the objective?’

‘Making smooth the path for him that shall come after,’ I suggested, and waited for his reaction. I sipped the bourbon. It was as good as I’d hoped. But I was puzzled by the ambassador’s bewilderment. I could have sworn it was genuine.

‘You are suggesting…’ Morgan tapped his fingers on his glass, contem-plated the brownish liquid, ‘that Dr Kissinger is undertaking a preparatory visit to Communist China without the knowledge of the State Department?’

‘Yes. I also have information that this intelligence has been compromised and that if Dr Kissinger were to undertake such a mission, he would meet with an accident. It is possible that his plane would be shot down over the jungle by disaffected elements in the locality.’

Morgan stared at me with a sparkling ice-blue understanding. Apparently convinced, he rose and lifted the receiver of one of the telephones on his desk. ‘Henry?’ He spoke with a low-voiced deference, despite the familiarity. ‘This is Dwight. Good morning.’ He paused and looked at me, as if there were some point he were trying to make, some confirmation he sought. ‘Henry, this trip of yours. Stormy weather forecast. Suggest you postpone. And Henry? Can we talk…?’