Elephant Song - Smith Wilbur - Страница 10

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And they both laughed.

Ning Cheng Gong stood with one of the black rangers at the foot of the hill and watched Daniel and Johnny disappear amongst the msasa trees.  I do not like the white man being here, said Gomo.  Under Johnny Nzou, he was Chiwewe's senior ranger.  Perhaps we should wait until another time.

The white man leaves this afternoon, Cheng told him coldly.  Besides which you have been well paid.  Plans have been made that cannot be altered now.  The others are already on their way and cannot be sent back.  You have only paid us half of what we agreed, Gomo protested.

The other half when your work is done, not before, Cheng said softly, and Gomo's eyes were like the eyes of a snake.  You to do, Cheng went on.

know what you have Gama was silent for a moment.  The foreigner had indeed paid him a thousand US dollars, the equivalent of six monthssalary, with the promise of another year's salary to follow after the job was done.

You will do it?  Cheng insisted.  Yes, Gomo agreed.  I will do it.

Cheng nodded.  It will be tonight or tomorrow night, not later.  Be ready, both of you.  We will be ready, Gomo promised, and climbed into his Landrover, where the second black ranger waited, and they drove away.

Cheng walked back to his rondavel in the deserted visitors' camp.

The cottage was identical to the other thirty which during the dry cool season usually housed a full complement of tourists.  He fetched a cool drink from the refrigerator and sat on the screen porch to wait out the hottest hours of the noonday.

He felt nervous and restless.  Deep down he shared Gomo's misgivings about the project.  Although they had considered every possible eventuality and planned for each of them, there was always the unforeseeable, the unpredictable, such as the presence of Armstrong.

It was the first time he had attempted a coup of this magnitude.  it was his own initiative.  of course, his father knew about and thoroughly approved of the other lesser shipments, but the risk was far greater this time, in proportion to the rewards.  If he succeeded he would earn his father's respect, and that was more important to him even than the material profits.

He was the youngest son, and he had to strive that much harder to win his place in his father's affections.  For that reason alone he must not fail.

In the years that he had been at the embassy in Harare, he had consolidated his place in the illicit ivory and rhino-horn trade.  It had begun with a deceptively casual remark at a dinner-party by a middle-ranking government official about the convenience of diplomatic privilege and access to the diplomatic courier service.  With the business training that his father had given him, Cheng recognised the approach immediately for what it was, and made a non-committal but encouraging response.

A week of delicate negotiations followed and then Cheng was invited to play golf with another higher official.  His driver parked the ambassadorial Mercedes in the car park at the rear of the Harare golf club and as instructed left it unattended while Cheng l4as out on the course.  Cheng was officially a tenhandicap golfer but could play well below that when he chose.

On this occasion he allowed his opponent to win three thousand US dollars and paid him in cash in front of witnesses in the club house.

When he returned to his official residence he ordered the driver to park the Mercedes in the garage and then dismissed him.  In the boot he found six large rhino horns packed in layers of hessian cloth.

He sent these out in the next diplomatic pouch to Taipei and they were sold through his father's shop in Hong Kong for sixty thousand US dollars.  His father was delighted with the transaction and wrote Cheng a long letter of approbation and reminded his son of his deep interest in, and love of, ivory.  Cheng let it be known discreetly that he was a connoisseur of ivory as well as of rhino horn, and he was offered at bargain prices various pieces of unregistered and unstamped ivory.  It did not take long for the word to spread in the small closed world of the poachers that there was a new buyer in the field.

Within months he was approached by a Sikh businessman from Malawi who was ostensibly looking for Taiwanese investment in a fishing venture that he was promoting on Lake Malawi.  Their first meeting went very well.  Cheng found that Chetti Singh's figures added up attractively, and passed them on to his father in Taipei.  His father approved the estimates and agreed a joint venture with Chetti Singh.  When the documents were signed at the embassy, Cheng invited him to dinner, and during the meal Chetti Singh remarked, I understand that your illustrious father is loving very much the beautiful ivory.

As a token of my utmost esteem I could be arranging for a regular supply.  I am sure that you would be forwarding the goods to your father without too much scarlet tape.  Most miserably the ivory will be unstamped, never mind.  I have a deep distaste for red tape, Cheng assured him.

Within a short time it became obvious to Cheng that Chetti Singh was head of a network that operated in all those African countries that still had healthy populations of elephant and rhino.  From Botswana and Angola, Zambia, Tanzania and Mozambique, he gathered in the white gold and the horn.  He controlled all aspects of his Organization down to the actual composition of the armed gangs who raided regularly into the National Parks in those countries.

At first Cheng was merely another customer of his, but once the fishing partnership on Lake Malawi began to flourish and they were netting hundreds of tons of tiny kapenta fish each week, drying them and exporting them to the east, their relationship began to change.  It became more cordial and trusting.

Finally Chetti Singh offered Cheng and his father a proprietary stake in the ivory trade.  Naturally he asked for a substantial investment to allow him to expand the scope and range of the partnership's operations, and another larger payment for his share of goodwill in the enterprise.

In all, it amounted to almost a million dollars.  Cheng, on his father's behalf, was able by astute bargaining to reduce this initial fee by fifty percent.

Only once he was a full partner could Cheng appreciate the extent and range of the operation.  In each of the countries which still harboured elephant herds, Chetti Singh had been able to put in place clandestine circles of accomplices in government.  Many of his contacts went as high as ministerial level.

Within most of the major National Parks he had informers and officials on his payroll.  Some were merely game scouts or rangers, but others were the actual chief wardens in charge of the Parks, those appointed as guardians and protectors of the herds.

The partnership was so lucrative that when Cheng's original term of appointment as ambassador expired, his father arranged through friends high in the Taiwanese government for it to be extended for a further three-year term.

By this time Cheng's father and brothers had become fully aware of the investment opportunities that Africa offered.  Beginning with the small but profitable fishing venture and then the ivory partnership, the family had been attracted more and more to the dark continent.

Neither Cheng nor his father had any scruples about apartheid and began investing heavily in South Africa.  They were well aware that world condemnation and the policy of economic sanctions had depressed the prices of land and other valuable assets in that country to a point where in sensible businessman could resist them.

Honoured parent, Cheng had told his father on one of his frequent returns to Taipei, within ten years apartheid and white minority rule will have passed from the face of the land.

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