Read Online Alan McQueen - 01 - Golden Serpent by Mark Abernethy - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Mark Abernethy
Tags: thriller
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asked Mac a couple of questions and fi gured it pretty quick. ‘Don’t tell me, this place is in Canberra and Jakarta, right?’ Frank upgraded his insult about rugby players. ‘Intel people,’
said Frank, who was infantry in Vietnam, ‘are wankers and ponies.’
Which was what Mac was thinking about as he strode in a crowd across the sticky hot tarmac of Makassar’s Hasanuddin Airport, carrying a black suit bag over his shoulder, a black wheelie bag trailing behind.
In order to get the salesman cover going he wore a short-sleeved beige safari suit, Italian brown woven shoes and a pair of Porsche sunnies. His thin blond hair was gelled straight back and he had a thick gold chain at his neck. The tan was real but it could easily pass for one of those indoor jobs. It was the salesman look he affected for travelling as Richard Davis from Southern Scholastic Books.
If Frank saw his son like this, Mac’s cover would be secure. Frank would ignore him. Stone cold motherless.
Just after ten in the morning and the pilot had warned them that it was already thirty-eight degrees at the airport. To the south, massive cloud formations rose thousands of storeys into the air - black, blue and purple and staring down over the tropical sauna of southern Sulawesi.
There was no wind: the very air strained under the weight of what Mac reckoned was ninety-eight per cent humidity.
Mac glanced back at the Lion Air 737 cooling its wings behind him. Garuda was a nest of spies and informers during Suharto’s era, and no one in the intelligence community had trusted it since. Still, the Lion fl ight was comfortable, unlike what Sawtell and his boys would be going through: Jakarta to Balikpapan by helo and then a C-130
fl ight into Watampone across the peninsula from Makassar. It would look like a military milk run. No fl ags, no Chinese nosey-pokes.
The cabbie who drove him to the Pantai Gapura was understanding about Mac’s requests for a few detours here and there. There was no tail, but that didn’t mean there wouldn’t be. He got the room he wanted at the Pantai, 521, overlooking the pool bar. There were no balconies looking down on his room and there was only one other door on the fl oor. He checked with reception: no bookings in 522.
He threw his suitcase on the bed and opened it: a few loose clothes and samples. The samples were real: history, geography and mathematics high school textbooks in Bahasa. He took a blue Nokia from the bag and made a call to a number in Canberra which was routed through Singapore and into the government/military secured section of the Telstra cellular system in Australia. He confi rmed arrival and good health with his weekly logs.
Shortly before midday he opened the sliding doors onto the patio and clocked the sprawling resort with bungalows scattered amidst stands of old palms and saltwater pools. Nothing untoward, just screaming Malaysian kids in the pool and nagging parents trying to get them to swim in the shallow end.
Mac rubbed his eyes. He was tired, needed sleep. In two days he’d RV with Sawtell’s team and he’d need a lot of energy in the saddlebags.
Mac re-entered the room, locked the balcony door and swept the main bugging points: phone, TV, coffee table, under the bed, mattress, the lamps.
Nothing.
He found a box of matches and tested the mirrors for two-way vision. They looked okay but naked fl ame was not foolproof.
Running the shower hard he positioned himself behind the main door, where he could also see out to the patio. If the Chinese or Indons wanted to move on him, they’d do it while he was showering. Most business hotels in Indonesia were bugged, some of them for video. If he’d missed a comms point, this should fl ush them out.
He waited fi ve, seven, ten minutes.
Steam wafted into the room.
Nothing.
Ringing down to reception, he complained that the bed was broken. Told the girl he was going out for an hour and wanted it fi xed before he returned.
He hung up
said Frank, who was infantry in Vietnam, ‘are wankers and ponies.’
Which was what Mac was thinking about as he strode in a crowd across the sticky hot tarmac of Makassar’s Hasanuddin Airport, carrying a black suit bag over his shoulder, a black wheelie bag trailing behind.
In order to get the salesman cover going he wore a short-sleeved beige safari suit, Italian brown woven shoes and a pair of Porsche sunnies. His thin blond hair was gelled straight back and he had a thick gold chain at his neck. The tan was real but it could easily pass for one of those indoor jobs. It was the salesman look he affected for travelling as Richard Davis from Southern Scholastic Books.
If Frank saw his son like this, Mac’s cover would be secure. Frank would ignore him. Stone cold motherless.
Just after ten in the morning and the pilot had warned them that it was already thirty-eight degrees at the airport. To the south, massive cloud formations rose thousands of storeys into the air - black, blue and purple and staring down over the tropical sauna of southern Sulawesi.
There was no wind: the very air strained under the weight of what Mac reckoned was ninety-eight per cent humidity.
Mac glanced back at the Lion Air 737 cooling its wings behind him. Garuda was a nest of spies and informers during Suharto’s era, and no one in the intelligence community had trusted it since. Still, the Lion fl ight was comfortable, unlike what Sawtell and his boys would be going through: Jakarta to Balikpapan by helo and then a C-130
fl ight into Watampone across the peninsula from Makassar. It would look like a military milk run. No fl ags, no Chinese nosey-pokes.
The cabbie who drove him to the Pantai Gapura was understanding about Mac’s requests for a few detours here and there. There was no tail, but that didn’t mean there wouldn’t be. He got the room he wanted at the Pantai, 521, overlooking the pool bar. There were no balconies looking down on his room and there was only one other door on the fl oor. He checked with reception: no bookings in 522.
He threw his suitcase on the bed and opened it: a few loose clothes and samples. The samples were real: history, geography and mathematics high school textbooks in Bahasa. He took a blue Nokia from the bag and made a call to a number in Canberra which was routed through Singapore and into the government/military secured section of the Telstra cellular system in Australia. He confi rmed arrival and good health with his weekly logs.
Shortly before midday he opened the sliding doors onto the patio and clocked the sprawling resort with bungalows scattered amidst stands of old palms and saltwater pools. Nothing untoward, just screaming Malaysian kids in the pool and nagging parents trying to get them to swim in the shallow end.
Mac rubbed his eyes. He was tired, needed sleep. In two days he’d RV with Sawtell’s team and he’d need a lot of energy in the saddlebags.
Mac re-entered the room, locked the balcony door and swept the main bugging points: phone, TV, coffee table, under the bed, mattress, the lamps.
Nothing.
He found a box of matches and tested the mirrors for two-way vision. They looked okay but naked fl ame was not foolproof.
Running the shower hard he positioned himself behind the main door, where he could also see out to the patio. If the Chinese or Indons wanted to move on him, they’d do it while he was showering. Most business hotels in Indonesia were bugged, some of them for video. If he’d missed a comms point, this should fl ush them out.
He waited fi ve, seven, ten minutes.
Steam wafted into the room.
Nothing.
Ringing down to reception, he complained that the bed was broken. Told the girl he was going out for an hour and wanted it fi xed before he returned.
He hung up
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