Freddi gave him the ‘Don’t bullshit me ‘ look, with the same slow Javanese blink his President couldn’t help but give to condescending foreign leaders. ‘You got a clean room now, okay mite?’
‘Thanks, Fred,’ he said, slapping the other man’s bicep. ‘So what’s the gig for you guys?’
Freddi shrugged, non-committal. ‘You know – UN shit.’
Mac vaguely recalled something in the brochure about the UN.
‘Which one?’
‘UN DESA, the infrastructure guys. They’re funding this conference.’
‘DESA’s a problem?’
‘Well, someone comes in with UN credentials and our government people start talking because they think it’s okay.’ Freddi gave a big shrug, opened his hands at Mac. ‘But maybe not UN. Maybe they our friends, yeah?’
In spy circles, our friends referred to other professionals in the fi eld.
‘At least you’ll have fun following them, eh Fred?’
‘Don’t remind me,’ he said, looking pained. ‘A tour of Jakarta brothels – Meena gonna love that one.’
Mac laughed at the reference to Freddi’s wife. It had been six years since their failed operation in Sumatra and in a strange way he had wanted to debrief with Freddi about the whole affair, get a few things off his chest. Freddi might want to do that too, but it probably wouldn’t happen. The rule amongst male spooks was simple: you erected a wall around your true feelings and you kept it there with smart-alec humour, gee-ups and mind games. Intelligence agencies didn’t recruit people with confessional personalities.
‘Thanks for the room, mate,’ said Mac. ‘Couldn’t send up a comp bottle of wine or something could you? Keep the little lady happy?’
Freddi shook his head and started to walk away. ‘Later, brother.’
‘Thanks, Fred.’
Freddi suddenly stopped and turned. ‘And by the way, McQueen?’
‘Yep?’
‘If you want a clean room, don’t check into the Lar with MI6 agent. Not how it working,’ he said, then stalked off, mumbling into his suit lapel as he moved across the lobby.
They walked along the Ciliwung River, under palms and in front of some of the restaurants that lined Jakarta’s artery in the south and central districts of the city. The further north you walked, the more the Ciliwung turned into a sewer lined with kampungs – the scavenger communities – rather than the nice boardwalks and greenery of the wealthy south. By the time the Ciliwung disgorged into the Java Sea it was black.
Diane was more comfortable with the silences that opened up between them than Mac was. They had been very close two years earlier and Mac had even bought a ring. He had planned to propose to her and everything, in spite of the social gulf between them. Mac was a Rockhampton Catholic boy with a cop dad and a nurse mother.
Diane grew up in British diplomatic residences and had a walk-up entry into Cambridge. The fact that she was an MI6 spy hadn’t been the big revelation; it was the fact she’d been sleeping with a rogue CIA operative called Peter Garrison while she was supposed to be in love with Mac. Garrison had been trying to kill Mac during this overlap, a detail that had gutted Mac at the time. He wondered if Davidson knew about Diane and him.
They found a park bench overlooking the river and under the shade of a palm. Diane crossed her legs and wiggled the red toenails poking out of her dark blue Birkenstock health sandals.
‘Shall we get the crap out of the way fi rst, darling?’ she asked, her eyes hidden behind tortoiseshell Ray-Ban Wayfarers. ‘The conference starts in a few hours.’
Mac sighed. He wanted to recriminate, tell her off, make her feel terrible. But the truth was he was very happy with Jenny, loved Rachel.
‘Look,’ he said, ‘what happened, happened, right?’
‘Right.’
‘But I don’t hate you. In fact I think we can both count ourselves lucky to have got out from under that wacko boyfriend of yours without getting killed,’ he said, smiling.
Diane laughed. ‘Christ, he was wacko, wasn’t he!’
‘Lunatic.’
‘A complete nutter,’ she giggled. ‘Thought he was the world’s greatest lover.’
‘Just ask him – he’ll tell you.’
‘He did enough of that,’ she smiled, then turned to him, getting serious. ‘I’m sorry.’
‘Don’t have to be.’
‘I know, but I am sorry,’ she said, looking him in the eye.
They were close enough to kiss and for a split second Mac thought she was going to try it on.
‘Accepted, Wilma, now let’s -‘
‘ Wilma? ‘
‘Yeah – Fred and Wilma.’
Diane was blank.
‘You know, The Flintstones? On TV? Fred and Wilma Flintstone?’
Diane shrugged.
‘Don’t worry,’ said Mac. ‘Let’s work up an approach.’
They went through the basics: Vitogiannis was the pants man and Grant the techie bloke. Mac saw it as a double action. Diane would appeal to Vitogiannis’s vanity, especially his narcissistic vision of himself as a man who could take a wife off a husband. If Mac’s knowledge of that personality type was accurate, Diane could get him big-noting himself without even having to get him into bed.
‘We’re looking for an escalation with this guy. The more you’re impressed by the small shit – like the fact he has a company doing business with NIME – the more he’ll tell you.’
‘What are we looking for?’ asked Diane.
Mac thought about that. ‘Either Vitogiannis has engineered this as a way to legitimately sell that enrichment code to a foreign consortium or he’s being gulled by NIME. I just want to know how much he knows, okay?’
‘Sounds fair,’ said Diane. ‘What about Grant? What’s his key?’
‘He’s an engineer, trained in the RAAF, did his MBA at MIT Sloan,’ said Mac. ‘He’s really thorough and I reckon he’s done some probity work on these NIME guys.’
‘Got a lure?’
‘Canberra has held up the loan guarantee,’ said Mac. ‘And by now the two of them should have got word that the NIA needs some tweaking.’
‘NIA?’
‘National Interest Account. It’s when the politicians override our bureaucrats because they have a businessman they want to look after.’
‘Okay.’
‘Well, yeah. My cover can get them that tweaking.’
‘A lobbyist, right?’
‘That’s it. I think I might persuade Mr Grant to write a bullshit end-user description, so the certifi cate on the eventual loan guarantee looks really strong.’
‘Not a real end-user?’
‘Funny thing about telling lies to governments,’ said Mac. ‘You have to establish where the truth is before you navigate around it.’
Diane smiled, put her chin in her hand. ‘That’s very manipulative for a Rockhampton footballer.’
‘I do my best.’
CHAPTER 29
The plan was to get inside the Bennelong Systems cordon as fast as possible and then work out the way into NIME. Mac wanted to make this a fast gig, fi nd out who was behind the power-station consortium, write his report, get back to the Gold Coast and forget that the Fred-and-Wilma thing ever happened. He catalogued old pain as he
