Kingsman Helms just stared. “That is ridiculous. The man was a lunatic.”
“He told me that Amber Dawnwas secretly exploring for oil.”
“I already admitted that to you.”
“Two minutes ago. But since the doctor was killed, I’ve spoken with people who were in the rebel camp. It seems that the FFM fighters who murdered her crew were executed by Ferdinand Poe’s son as punishment for going rogue.”
“The least they deserved.”
“But they swore with their dying breath they had been orderedto murder the crew.”
“That’s as bloody and contradictory a story as daily events in the Niger Delta.”
“But if it is also a true story,” said Paul Janson, “then the question is, if the FFM fighters were tricked into murdering your crew, who set them up?”
“Who’s to know?” Helms shrugged. “Poe’s son died in the final battle and our doctor was assassinated in Australia—on your watch. And now, if you’re done telling dead men’s tales, I’m going to bed. I’ve been flying all night.”
“Sleep tight,” said Doug Case.
Kingsman Helms strolled out of the Union Bar without another word.
Paul Janson said, “Doug, you look surprised.”
“I never heard it laid out quite that way before.”
It struck Janson that the last time he had seen Doug Case genuinely surprised—the only time—was in Ogden, Utah, when he kicked a Glock 34 out of his hand before Doug could shoot him. He studied Doug’s face, trying to read him. “You weren’t surprised that Flannigan no longer worked for ASC.”
“I learned it recently.”
“After you hired CatsPaw?”
“After.”
“What about Amber Dawn’s mission?”
“That came as fucking news.”
“No wonder you don’t look happy.”
Doug stared. Then he said, “Stop me if I’m wrong, but Helms essentially said, ‘No witness, no crime.’ ”
“That’s how I heard it—Hold on; he’s back.”
Helms rushed into the bar. “Almost forgot. Janson, we’re cutting CatsPaw a check for a million dollars. You didn’t exactly rescue the doctor in the end, but you tried hard. Fair enough?”
“Fair enough,” said Janson.
Again, Doug Case looked surprised. Janson explained, “It will help with expenses.”
Helms grinned. “Good. That way you won’t feel obliged to overcharge next time we hire you.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it.” Janson smiled back.
Helms said, “I wouldn’t want you to take what I said about the new world the wrong way.”
“Passing me by?”
“I may have stated it too forcefully. I’m passionate on the subject of the future. I learned when I was seven years old that leadership is not about now, it’s about then. Not about the present, but the future.”
“That’s a big lesson at seven.”
“I observed a failure of leadership when my dad took me to Greenan Oldsmobile to pick up a new car. Remember that little Olds called a Cutlass?”
“Inspired by an oil crisis.” Janson nodded.
“Dad was real excited. He ordered it specially built from all the best options in the brochure, including a powerful new V-six that Oldsmobile had borrowed from the new Cadillac. We get in for a test drive with old Harry Greenan—a cagey New England Yankee. Harry gets all tight-lipped and he grumps, ‘They won’t build any more of these.’
“My dad asked why not: ‘Wonderful car, feel this ride. Quiet, smooth, fast as heck.’
“Old Harry says, ‘But you bought a big car for little-car money.’
“It was like my father had disturbed the social order, the way things had always been done. Instead of selling the blazes out of it, Olds took all the options out of the brochure. To buy such a good car you had to spend more money on a German or Japanese import.
“Oldsmobile Cutlass had been the biggest-selling car in America. Sales plummeted. Now they’re out of business. It taught me that leadership is not about now; it’s about the future. The future was smiling on Oldsmobile and they turned around and looked at the past. I vowed I would never make that mistake.”
He turned on his heel and left.
Janson waited until he was sure Helms wasn’t coming back again and said to Doug Case, “You were listening like you knew the punch line.”
“Last time it was a Pontiac.”
“Tell me, what did you mean, you never heard it laid out that way? Never heard what laid out that way?”
“The global corporation as buccaneer. Don’t you love Helms’s ‘They don’t mind taxing us, but they won’t protect us’?”
“Gives him a lot of latitude.”
“Total.” Case covered his face with his hands. After a while he spread his fingers and stared between them. “A million people work in U.S. intelligence. Right?”
“Give or take.”
“Do you think there’s room for another?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, do you suppose that with my credentials and your help explaining my checkered past I could go back to government service?”
“ What?” said Janson. Now he was the one surprised. “What do you mean?”
“I’m thinking of going back to serving my country.”
“And kiss good-bye flying First Class in six-thousand-dollar suits?”
“That’s just stuff. I don’t care about stuff. I never have— Don’t get me wrong; I love my ‘superchair.’ ” He patted the wheelchair’s controls-studded arms with deep affection. “You have no idea what it means to bop around so freely when you can’t. But I’ll bet the Phoenix Foundation would keep me in wheelchairs if I weren’t earning ASC bucks.”
Janson nodded. “Count on it. Are you seriously considering leaving ASC?”
“Yes.”
“Mind me asking how long you’ve been thinking about it?”
“Never considered it until ten minutes ago.”
“Why?”
“It’s a new world, like Helms said. But not one I particularly like. Our government, most governments, at least the democratic governments, are completely distracted by their new main job—propping up collapsing economies. They’ll be coping with going broke for decades. That leaves a huge power vacuum. Global corporations are jumping in with all four feet.”
“We’ve seen this building,” said Janson.
“Yeah, but you and I came up in simpler times. Rogue government agencies were our villains. Bureaucrats with agendas using us like tin soldiers. Now governments are fading. The shift of wealth in our country from ordinary folks to rich people—and internationally from us to China—puts the globals in the driver’s seat. I see a world coming real soon where rogue corporations are more dangerous than rogue government agencies.”
Janson nodded, silently pondering a far more sinister threat: How long before rogue global corporations partnered with rogue government agencies? How long before a covert agency helped a global corporation hire mercenaries like Securité Referral to dispatch a Harrier jump jet? How long before ASC and Cons Ops swung a deal to call in a Reaper drone missile attack? If they hadn’t already.
“Why don’t we go next door?”
“What’s next door?” asked Case.
“The Tanglin Club. We can get a better lunch than here, talk about your plans.”
It was a short walk in the Singapore heat, but even Doug riding his electric chair was perspiring when they reached the cool sanctuary of the Tanglin’s lobby.
“Fancy or pub?” asked Janson.
Case peered longingly into the formal Churchill Room with its plush banquettes and tables set with linen, silver, and crystal. “Pub. Something tells me I better get used to scaling down.”
Janson led the way to the Tavern Bar.
Dark beams, framed prints of dogs and horses, foxhunt horns hanging from the ceiling, and a crowded bar of dedicated drinkers all spoke “England.” Janson chose a table near the buffet. Chinese waiters and Malay busboys whisked away a captain’s chair to make room for Case. Janson sat diagonally from him so they could speak quietly. Case looked around at the men and women arriving for lunch while Janson ordered beers.