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Chapter 75 : An Offer You Might Refuse
The preparation of Basher’s colonial harem was well under way. I was back in the Whitechapel office. I finally got a chance, albeit fleeting, to talk to Clegg.
“How was the meeting with Anatoly?” I asked. “Is there anything I need to do?”
Freddie shook his head. “No,” he said. “we are clean as far as I can tell. Elly had a conversation her contact in the National Crime Squad to try to get a fix on what’s going on. Apparently, in the best tradition of detective novels, the police are baffled. The press have lost interest since as far as they can tell there’s no evidence of any government cover up or incompetence and that’s the only thing they seem to want to write about. Beside the story is all of two weeks old; so what chance is there of anyone remembering it?”
“And how’s Anatoly?”
“Spitting mad - but not at us. I reckon he half thinks there might have been a genuine Chechen plot but he’s also worried because the container malfunctioned.”
“Malfunctioned?”
“Yes. Anatoly’s got his transport containers tricked up so if you open them the wrong way they dump a lethal dose into the veins of whosoever happens to be inside. Tricia should be dead by all accounts. Anatoly’s relieved we think she was completely wiped and worried in case he’s got a bad apple in his own team.”
“What’s your view?”
Clegg looked impassive. He sucked in his breath slowly and shook his head.
“Constanza?” I asked.
“Oh, I’m sure she would never consider such a thing.” It was Elly’s voice. She had come into the office behind me. She managed to say it in a way that made me think that she felt Constanza might well be guilty of considering such a thing and then doing something after the considering.
Freddie took the opportunity to use the interruption to change the subject. “How was the visit to Steve?”
I filled him in on the trip. He actually
seemed a bit more interested than I expected but I didn’t get very far on tying
him down to doing anything about it. I felt a bit frustrated that I wasn’t
getting anywhere with our discussions. Elly just
smiled as I left Freddie’s office. “Don’t worry,” she said, “he’ll take it on
board. He just likes to think things through.
I was back in my office when the phone
rang. “Hi,” said Brad when I picked up the phone. The line was crackly and
Brad’s voice sounded as though there were several socks spliced into the wires
between him and me.
“I wondered if we could have a chat. The
Trade Minister has had some thoughts and he thinks your business could help us.
Why don’t you come over? He’s got some time at the end of the week if you’re
free.”
“When you say come over, you’re not talking
about the Castle are you?” I asked, sensing that even allowing for the usual
problems with telephones here, the British Telecom were unlikely to have found
a way on incorporating a two second time lag between London and Worcestershire.
“Ah, no, Kolin actually. Don’t worry
about the flight, there’s an air force transport leaving Stansted
tomorrow if you can be on it.”
I wasn’t sure that Kushtian military
aviation was likely to be any better than the civil sort but at least there
wouldn’t be any pretence at comfort and security would probably be more than
adequate. “Sure,” I said. I was happy to oblige, particularly if it led to some
more business. I told Sukie and Rachel that I would
be away again for a few days, both of them looked worried. I tried to reassure
them, Elly agreed to keep an eye on them while I was
away and that seemed to comfort them. Ownership is a real responsibility. I
didn’t think I could just send them down to the cells as though they were being
kennelled and besides, Rachel had work to do.
The Kushtian Air Force flight was, well, an
experience. It wasn’t quite as bad as I thought when I walked up the ramp at the
back of the Ilyushin 76 into its cavernous hold, half
empty, half filled with crates of indeterminate origin. I was staring around
looking for something that resembled a seat and beginning to think I’d have to
do the flight standing up or propped against a crate when a voice called from
the front of the hold.
“Mr Ross? This way please.”
I walked the length of the aircraft’s hold.
A woman in the blue serge uniform of the Kushtian Air Force stood at the foot
of a short metal ladder. She gestured for me to climb it.
At the top of the ladder I became more
encouraged. A cabin with some twenty seats in it had been built into the front
of the hold behind the flight deck. It looked a great deal more luxurious than
I would normally have expected for a military aircraft. The reclining seats
looked as if they had been bought by the Kushtians the last time that Virgin
refitted their first class cabin. At least I might get a reasonable sleep. A
smiling officer emerged from the flight deck. “Mr Ross, welcome,” he said.
“We’ll be taking off shortly. Do take a seat. Anywhere you like.”
“Just me?” I asked.
The officer nodded. “Yes,” he said. “Don’t
worry though. We’ll try to look after you. Aerina Kolanka Kuslanis will take care
of anything you need.”
I chose a seat about half way back in the cabin and strapped myself in. Kolanka – I assumed that Aerina was her rank rather than her first name – appeared at the top of the ladder and closed the hatch. She smiled at me and took her place on a fold down jump-seat beside the flight deck door. As she tightened the straps of her harness I could see that beneath her uniform jacket was a body of interesting possibility. The engines fired into life with a cough and splutter that did little to encourage belief that they would keep going until we reached Kushtia. Aerina Kuslanis seemed unconcerned, however, and I took some comfort from that.
The flight was largely uneventful. Kolanka proved immune to such charms as I could muster. Her
uniform remained depressingly well buttoned up for the entire flight.
When I got there, Brad and the Trade
Minister were sitting waiting for me in the lounge. Brad suggested that we go
through to the pool bar. “I hope you enjoyed your trip here,” the Minister
said.
“It was fine,” I said, “the Kushtian Air
Force seems to have its operations well organised.”
“Yes,” he said. “At least
the transport.”
“And how is the economic development
programme going?”
“Quite well, I think. Up
to a point. The Emir here has found a number of companies that it will
prove most beneficial for us to work with and of course our relationship with
your business has worked very much as we had hoped.”
“I’m glad things are working out well,
Minister. Can I ask how the last concubine we arranged for your use has turned
out?”
The Minister chuckled. “Ah,
yes, your diplomatic baggage! Miss Argyll, wasn’t she called?” I nodded.
The last I had seen of Cora Argyll was sitting shackled and gagged in a cell
under the Minister’s House. “She has
proved most accommodating after her initial reservations had been overcome. I
have found her to be a most useful diversion from the cares of office.” I
smiled. “But how are you? You managed to avoid the attentions of those that
were seeking to disturb your operations?”
“I did indeed, Minister. All is resolved.”
I looked across at the pool, two girls, naked except for their collars, were
swimming back and forth with two rather over weight men. “And the Emir’s
facility is proving an asset?”
“Somewhat,” said the Minister. “It has been
useful to get us started but I believe we will be suspending our operations
there. Let us just say we are learning more about the niceties of international
trade and we would not wish to be felt to be trampling on local cultural
differences. Still, I understand you were able to provide some excellent staff.
Those two for example,” he pointed to the girls in the pool, “have been a great
help.” I realised it was Karen and Peta, the two
volley ball players. “Very athletic; most capable entertainers of those we wish
to influence. They are here to learn a little of true Kushtian culture first
hand. They too came by Air Force jet, but with less comfortable accommodation
than your own.” I thought back to the crates arrayed in the hold of the Ilyushin and wondered whether there had been any on my
flight. They hadn’t looked as though they were as well equipped as Clegg and
Anatoly’s cargo containers.
Brad waved to the bar, to get us some
drinks. Greetje Van Bruijn
came teetering across wearing stilt-high heels, her collar and nothing else.
Each of us asked for a beer and she disappeared to get them. “Such a nice
arse,” said Brad appreciatively.
“How’s your engagement present from Kushnati?”
I asked.
Brad gave a self satisfied grin. “Let’s
just say I’m enjoying playing with a doll for the first time in my life.”
“And Lauren? How’s she coping with Kushtia.”
“Ha, more like how’s Kushtia coping with
her,” the Minister interjected.
Brad looked embarrassed. “My daughter has
yet to adopt all of the ways of Kushtian women,” he said diplomatically.
“There are suggestions of terrible
scandals,” the Minister said conspiratorially with a smile. “The corridors of
every council members offices are buzzing with gossip
about her flagrant infidelity. It has quite cheered the place up.”
Greetje reappeared with the drinks. Brad clicked his fingers to indicate
she should kneel between us. He balanced the tray on her back, she made a
convenient table.
“Like you said Brad, daughters are a rule
to themselves. Still what was it you to wanted to discuss?”
Brad looked at the Minister who seemed to
indicate that he should take the lead. “Well Larry,” he began, “There’s three
projects that are going to need support. Firstly Kushtia is now trying to
encourage inward investment from
I didn’t see any problem with that. I was
thinking back to the files that we had found in Cindy’s car. There had been
half a dozen of them that had been young and female buyers of sports cars. From
what I remembered of them they’d be ideal. And Cindy had been meticulous in
building up a profile of each of her clients. Rick couldn’t have done a better
job. She’d also made a note of who it was that was actually paying for the car;
husband, boyfriend, doting father.
“The other opportunity we’ve spotted is the
whole off-shore call centre business. Plenty of British firms seem keen to
outsource their call centre operations. We reckon that we can use girls from there
as a way of providing low cost off-shore resources while still offering native
English speakers as a way of ensuring good customer service. You know how it is
with some of these off-shore call centres, you get to know pretty quickly that
you’re talking to a foreign country and people don’t like it. Of course they’ll
need some fairly heavy preparation, being on the telephone to the outside
world, you see.”
I liked the idea but it seemed completely
reckless to me. Unless they were going to prep their operators to the point of
catatonia the whole thing would be too risky and if they did then the girls
would just sound like robots. On the other hand maybe that wouldn’t be so
different from some of the call centres I’d encountered. Maybe there was
something in it; I’d got irritated myself by talking to people who just didn’t
seem to understand what I was on about. On the other hand it sounded like the
volumes might be greater than we were interested in getting involved in even if
it was feasible. “What’s the third project?” I said.
“Well, it’s an extension of the outsourcing
idea,” Brad began.
The Trade Minister interrupted. “We wish to
make sure that Kushtia benefits from the digital age. Kushtia must build a
knowledge economy,” he said. “There is an explosion in technology.
Unfortunately our universities have been late to recognise this but we cannot
wait. If we do not act we will be overtaken by others in our region.”
“So what do you intend.”
“We will build a software factory. We
intend to provide a software development service based in Kushtia with very
advantageous labour rates. I think there are sufficient companies that will not
ask too many questions about how we provide our resources if they can get the
work done at the cheapest costs. We understand that you have had some
experience in doing something similar.”
I thought back to Sebastian’s collection of
‘web slaves’ and nodded.
“Do you think that Clegg Enterprises can
source the necessary products?”
“Well,” I said, “in principal, yes. I
wouldn’t want you to feel that we weren’t interested in helping with this. On
the other hand, it will depend on the volumes. You know that we are mainly
working with low volume, high value projects these days. We will need to look
at how we deal with this. It might be better for one of our associate companies
to handle this.” I was worried by the idea of high volume / low value work but
I didn’t want to turn them down flat. “I am assuming that you are seeking
females for these tasks?”
“Indeed,” said the Minister. “We understand
how to manage women in Kushtia as you know. These projects simply represent a
logical extension of one of what I believe you marketing people call our core
competencies.” The Minister smirked.
“I am sure you will create a completely
unique working environment for your recruits,” I said. By now I was becoming
increasingly convinced that the Kushtians had gone completely mad.
The Trade Minister smiled. “Yes,” he said.
“That’s why I have another proposition. But for you;
personally.” I looked puzzled. “This programme will create a large pool
of foreign labour within Kushtia,” he said. “We are most anxious to see that
our culture is not diluted, not contaminated, by this influx. There is a
benefit from low cost labour of course but we wish to avoid the problems of
westernisation that could arise from so many of these girls being brought to
our country. We want to appoint someone as Director of Overseas Resources; someone
to take a role in ensuring that our incomers become well adapted to Kushtian
ways. We think you could perform that role for us. You would also have
responsibility for oversight of the UNESCO cultural transfer programme.”
I was flattered and said so, but I was
uncertain about the idea, even if I had been looking for another job. “I’m not
sure I see it as a problem and, in any case, surely a Kushtian would be better
for that role,” I said. “Someone that is clearly identified
with your own culture.”
“No,” said Brad, adding his weight to the
argument. “What this needs is an outsider to champion the Kushtian way. I’d
consider it myself but I’m only just getting things set up here and besides,
I’m a Kushtian really by blood.”
“So many slaves together may find ways to
hang on to their old culture. To cling to dreams of their
previous lives. That will not help our projects. Consider it,” said the
Minister. “You could bring your wife. You do have a wife?” I shook my head. “No matter. Your concubines then.
Perhaps you’ll find a good Kushtian girl.”
“I’ll think about it,” I said. “But I’m not
sure if it’s what I want to do.”
© 2006
Freddie Clegg
Download
PDF copies of my other stories at my Yahoo Group :
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/freddies_tales/
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