A Certain Kind of Power Read online

  As Mike sat there and waited for the eternally late Alex Harper, he moved past the emotional inventory and begun to count the lost dollars that the Doctor had taken him for. He retrieved all the jobs they had done together, all the dollars that had exchanged hands in cuevas and cafés all over Buenos Aires, always at cost; this what I’m being charged, I can’t get it any cheaper. And all the while the Doctor was putting on fifty percent. Or more, in all likelihood.

  He remembered the times when he confessed to the Doctor how he was struggling to keep his business afloat. How funds were tight. Promising to pay the Doctor up front and in full, even when he had to take it out of his own pocket.

  Mike sat studying the rings of his espresso, lulled by the rippling shadows playing on the tabletop, pockets of light scampering left and right across the checkered cloth as if controlled by invisible strings attached to the branches that swayed outside the window.

  Fifteen thousand dollars. Surveillance job on a mercurial oil trader who had appropriated two tanks of crude from an international client that had made the mistake of trusting his local partner. The Doctor had set up an observation post under the cover of a kiosk selling grilled steak sandwiches. So convincing was the stand that an irate local vendor saw them as unfair competition on his corner and chased them off.

  Twenty thousand dollars. Information on how a small company with only two directors, grandmothers from the southern Buenos Aires suburb of Lomas de Zamora, with no funds, no infrastructure, and no experience could import 70,000 packs of cigarettes over the Paraguayan border and then manage the logistics to resell them on the local black market.

  Thirty-five thousand dollars. Track down a desperate man from Corrientes who had borrowed two hundred thousand dollars to purchase life insurance and then disappeared, presumed dead the following week. A situation that had set off corporate alarm bells from Buenos Aires to Hong Kong until somehow the Doctor had found him living, under his own name, in Curitiba, Brazil.

  Mike terminated his mental accounting. Too painful. He’d considered the Doctor a friend, a consideration that Mike now saw for the weakness it was. Could he blame the Doctor for exploiting that? Not really. Mike knew the rules; he was no Simon Quinn. If he knew the rules, he knew that others would be playing by them.

  “Jesus Christ, what the bloody hell is wrong with you? You look sadder than an empty restaurant.”

  Mike had not seen Alex approach.

  “Problems,” said Mike as way of explanation.

  “Plenty of my own, Mike. First things first,” he said, pointing to Mike’s empty espresso cup. “I see you’ve made a poor man’s start.”

  Alex called over the waiter and in his broken Spanish ordered two glasses of red and asked that the food should begin arriving.

  “And can we get a fucking bread plate, please?” Mike asked the back of the departing waiter.

  Alex ignored the outburst. “I’m in trouble, Mike.”

  “I’m all ears.”

  “This may come as a bit of a shock. For the last few months I’ve been seeing someone here. Not my wife,” he added for redundant clarity. He paused to allow Mike to take in what he thought was news.

  The expat community had spoken of nothing else for the past weeks. Alex’s affair with his twenty-two-year-old secretary had replaced the ambassador’s problems with a light-fingered maid as the number-one topic among the bored expatriates of San Isidro. That Alex was having an affair had surprised very few; to Mike it had even seemed a little contrived. That the young consort was female had surprised many.

  “I had heard rumors, Alex, I must admit,” he said as he looked up to receive the wine and first plates of food that had arrived.

  “Really? Who else knows?” Alex asked, with neither surprise nor concern, just a hint of pride. He didn’t wait for an answer. “Things have taken a bit of a turn in the last week or so. The poor little thing has fallen quite in love with me.”

  Mike had met Alex’s secretary and poor was the only accurate descriptor. She had a poverty of looks that could have justified another Band Aid album.

  “She knows about your wife and family?”

  “I told her everything. I told her about the wife, the children, the marriage, the whole truth. Only some of the circumstances and tenses were false,” said Alex, the last part of the sentence lost to a sharp intake of breath.

  “How very Borgesian of you, Alex.”

  “Perhaps, but your vocabulary prevents me from agreeing with any certainty,” said Alex. “She has been seeing a psychologist. They all are down here, aren’t they? It’s like going out for milk for these people. She’s been making some real progress with her therapist. She feels awful about having an affair. She’s coming to terms with being a homewrecker. I, of course, assure her she is not a homewrecker, that I’m in love with her and that one day, when my boys are old enough to understand, we’ll marry. We’ll have our whole lives ahead of us.”

  Mike swirled his glass of red as he did the math in his head. Based on his vague knowledge of the ages of those involved, by the time the kids left school the secretary would only be 31.

  “Plenty of time,” he agreed.

  “A few days ago she comes to me and says that she wants to have a baby.”

  “With you?”

  “My reaction exactly! She said her bloody psychologist suggested it! Bring us closer together, a life project I think she called it.” Alex gulped at his glass of wine. He looked fearful. “There’s a small problem, though.”

  “You already have a wife and family?” asked Mike, failing to remove the facetiousness from his voice.

  “OK, there are a few problems. Of varying sizes.” Alex leaned in, drawing Mike into the conspiracy though there was nobody to overhear them. The nearest tables were unoccupied at this early hour of the day.

  “I’ve had the snip.” He sucked air through his teeth with more vigor than usual and emphasized his point by imitating a pair of snipping scissors with his fingers, a bit too close to Mike’s face. “Can’t have kids. I haven’t told her that, you see. I said, ‘I’m not sure that it’s a good idea, I’m too old to go through raising a child again’—which is true, wouldn’t be fair on the kid, wouldn’t be fair on her. ‘Couldn’t we just get a dog or a cat?’ Though I bloody hate cats. However, under the circumstances in which I find myself I’m happy to be flexible on the cat.”

  “How was this magnanimity received?” asked Mike, suspecting he knew the answer.

  “As well as could be expected. She said if we don’t have a baby she’ll throw herself into the River Plate.”

  Mike couldn’t prevent a smile forming on his lips, his own troubles forgotten for a while. “What’s your plan?”

  Alex raised his glass above the table. “We’re trying for a baby!”

  Mike shook his head and laughed. “You awful man. How do you think she’s going to feel when she can’t fall pregnant?”

  “What option do I have? I can’t solve this. I must push it forward. I think the best I can hope for is to get that posting in Iraq.”

  “The one you don’t want.”

  “Then I can claim a trauma-induced condition. I’ll be damaged goods, no good for anyone, unable to commit, wracked by fevers and nightmares. It’s a long play I know. I can’t think of anything else. Last night she told me that if I ever left her she would stab me. In her mind that was a declaration of love.”

  Mike let out a low, slow whistle. He couldn’t imagine that this pasty Englishman could evoke such desire in another human being. Conclusive evidence that in matters of love, the grass was always greener.

  “And to top it all off, this morning I had protestors outside the embassy, throwing stones, demanding we give back the Falklands. Luckily it started raining and they dispersed. Doesn’t take much to wash away their political will. Still, not a good look. All this agitation comes from high up.”

  Alex looked around the dining room signaling a change of topic. A few other diners had begun to dri
ft in. The waiter brought more plates of antipasti.

  “So that’s me. Now, what’s got you looking so down at heel? I can only presume its work.”

  “I came into some information yesterday. I went to visit a firm, Consultora Tigre, a new consulting company that has come on the scene. Two guys, one ex-cavalry and the other federal intelligence, I think. He’s disabled, palsy or something. All bent up, walks like a grandfather clock and smokes like a chimney. An odd couple. You know them?”

  Alex shook his head in the negative.

  “I’m there chatting about what they can and can’t do and it becomes apparent that they are the source for another source I have been using for the last few years.”

  “Not your infamous Doctor?” asked Alex.

  “Yes. The Doctor.” Mike had no recollection of ever having told Alex about the Doctor. He made a mental note to drink less at embassy cocktails. He would have to consider acquiring a mental cabinet for the mental notes he was forever producing.

  “That’s good, right? Now you can cut the Doctor out, go down the chain a link.”

  “That’s an option. I also discovered what they had been charging the Doctor. They had no idea who I was or that he has been working for me. My arrangement with the Doctor was that I pay him a flat monthly fee, every month regardless if we do ten jobs or no jobs. The idea was to give him some stability. Any expenses that his sources charged him get passed back to me at cost—at cost, no markup.”

  “Oh dear, really, Mike?” said Alex, not needing to hear the rest.

  “I trusted the guy.”

  “You’re a sailor getting upset at the ocean. What did you expect?”

  “I know,” said Mike, regretting having opened his mouth. But that was what Alex did. Invited you to open up and then used it against you, made you feel humiliated. You then felt the need to defend yourself and ended up telling him more than you wanted to.

  “The damage?”

  “Who knows? Whatever he could take and I was stupid enough to pay. It seems that everyone made money on these jobs except me. I could be in fucking Sicily by now!”

  Alex ignored the emotion, stacked up the antipasti plates and caught the attention of the waiter.

  “I can’t use him anymore,” said Mike.

  “Why not? You can’t blame a man for acting exactly how you knew he would act.”

  “I don’t trust him anymore.”

  “That isn’t the problem. The problem is that you trusted him in the first place.”

  Mike placed his fork on the tablecloth and rubbed his face with both hands. “I know. But that’s it. It’s over. I can’t do the fucking job. Without any information there’s no way Simon will keep me around.”

  Alex lowered his glass from his lips and leant forward. “Mike, I need you on this. You’re the only guy I can trust. You know that. Can’t you just make something up? Get something from the papers. Who cares where it comes from?

  “Make it up? That would be going native.”

  “It won’t be for long, just until I clear this tax office thing for you. Meanwhile, I need you close to Simon. I don’t want to open my paper tomorrow morning and read ‘British Company Caught Greasing the Wheels of Argentine Democracy.’”

  A waiter cleared away the plates and another brought the bowls of pasta, red and white sauce, to share. Alex ordered more wine.

  “Are you making any progress with my AFIP issue?”

  “Yes, yes. All very positive. I have raised a request internally for information on your case. It is sitting on the ambassador’s desk awaiting his signature. He is down south for a few days casting flies. As soon as he is back we will get his autograph on it and send it off. Shouldn’t take any more than two or three weeks.”

  “I’ve been thinking. How about I pay you something for your trouble on this. I know I haven’t come through for you on MinEx.”

  “Pay me something? A British diplomat? Who has gone native now, Mike?”

  “I am in a bit of a rush on this, Alex. You can’t speed it up somehow could you?”

  “Nothing can happen without the ambo’s scribble, I’m afraid. Just have to be patient a little while longer. Don’t worry, you’ll be in Sicily in no time,” he said. “And I do appreciate the job you have done with Quinn. I know it hasn’t been easy. If you can stick to him a little longer, just until I can sort this AFIP stuff for you that would be grand.”

  Mike nodded, more in frustration than acceptance. Nothing was fucking grand on his side of the table.

  “I sometimes wonder what Quinn is trying to achieve here. Why doesn’t he just say, ‘stick it up your ass’ and leave?” asked Alex.

  Mike considered the question before answering. “I’m not sure, to be honest. The problem appears to be that he fudged the tender process. He advanced with only one bidder qualified.”

  “So, he played ball with the Argentines, got the project moving and left himself exposed to accusations of corruption. Not very smart. I do recall asking you to keep an eye on that.”

  “What option did he have? Play it straight, nothing gets done and his boss cans him anyway and he pisses off the Argentines, which I believe you also didn’t want to happen.”

  “Quite the dilemma,” said Alex.

  “If he leaves now, his replacement would realize what has happened. The only way Simon can keep a lid on what he has done is by staying on and playing by their rules. Quietly.”

  “So, he’s fucked,” Alex said. “Good. Does he know this?”

  “No. He has this unshakeable faith that he can bend the world to his way of working. That everything is manageable.”

  “All he needs to manage is to keep his head down. I saw the little incident at the MinEx office out in Cordoba. What did you make of that?”

  Mike shrugged his shoulders. Something told him it was better not to reveal his own involvement. “The usual, environmentalists trying to make a name for themselves. I assume it was just a bit of negotiating pressure being applied.”

  “A little bird told me that Quinn was in Cordoba that day,” said Alex.

  Alex was a box of surprises today. Mike had had enough surprises. He stayed quiet and raised his eyebrows a little to register the news.

  Alex continued. “He went to meet Governor Castelli. He must have then decided to visit the offices. This bird also told me that at 5 a.m. on that same day two busloads of the Truckers Union members left Buenos Aires, headed for Cordoba. They knew that Simon was going to be at the MinEx office that day and wanted to apply, what was the phrase you used? Negotiating pressure? I don’t believe for a second it was the environmental groups.”

  Mike stopped, his fork hovered above his plate, a few skewered fusilli still bouncing, carbonara sauce dripping. Harper was an information iceberg and he enjoyed revealing the depth of his knowledge an icicle at a time.

  Alex continued chewing on a mouthful of pasta, some red sauce making a dash down his chin. He didn’t bother to wipe it away. Mike averted his eyes.

  “Quinn will rightly be upset at what happened in Cordoba. I need you to make sure that he doesn’t go off piste on us. We do not need him playing ball with Planning. The last thing I need is a bribery scandal involving a British company.”

  Alex found time to take up his napkin and wipe his chin. He placed his plate to the side. Personal hygiene completed, he continued. “The president has instructed Planning to draw up a list of companies that are of public interest and suitable for expropriation. Nothing concrete yet, it will still have to go to congress and they will have to go through a few legal formalities, most likely involving changing a few laws. I have been given the tricky task of ensuring that no British companies appear on that list.”

  “How do you propose to do that?” asked Mike, tracing circles around his plate with a crust of broken bread, mopping up the last of his carbonara.

  “By making sure that MinEx, and all the other companies like them, stay below the radar.”

  “That may be too late. I
had a visit from an adviser from the Planning Ministry. He said that if MinEx don’t play ball they could be nationalized.”

  Alex’s face lit up. “There you have it!”

  “Have what?”

  “Your ongoing relevance to Simon. You have heard from a well-placed contact, a person with access to privileged information, a human source asset, whatever the fuck you want to call it, that plans for the nationalization of MinEx are underway. Simon will want to know all about the ministry’s plans.”

  “I suppose so,” said Mike. In truth he had gone back to thinking about the Doctor’s treachery.

  “You suppose so? Cheer the fuck up, Mike. You help Simon steer through these waters and you won’t just be his hero, you’ll be mine too. If any British company gets nationalized, I am fucked. That will be the end of me. Because once these bastards get the taste for one then you can rest assured they will go for the rest.”

  “I’m not sure what MinEx can do, Alex. They can’t go backwards or forwards now. The easiest way to avoid being nationalized is to start greasing every palm they see.”

  “Not an option, Mike. I’ve already told you that.”

  “If they don’t play ball with the government, you’re not happy, if they do play ball you’re not happy. What the fuck do you want them to do?”

  “You remember Greg Stelton? He’s with that oil company Chief Energy, down in Ushuaia.”

  “I remember him.”

  “I had lunch with him a while back when he was up here. I asked him how the bloody hell is Chief Energy making money when the price of oil all over the world is one hundred and forty dollars a barrel and Chief is forced to sell it in Argentina at forty dollars. You know what his answer was? Chief’s got nothing to sell. They’ve stopped producing. They are exploring and discovering and then capping the wells. Stelton is booking the barrels and getting the value on the stock as the Chief’s oil reserves increase. Then they leave the oil in the ground. Stelton’s view is that, sooner or later, things will change and when they do he will just turn the tap on. Brilliant!”