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‘This is taking insane to a whole new level, Ped. You can’t be serious.’
‘Deadly.’
‘This is ... not just unorthodox. It’s ... well ... plain rude. And the media will roast you for it.’
Garland smiled at his press secretary.
‘Let them. It’s a free country.’
It was the day before the New York primary, and Ped and Hunter had long-standing invitations to a black-tie lunch organized by Don Francis, a reclusive property developer and the Big Apple’s most deep-pocketed Republican benefactor.
‘Jesus F. Christ. What do I tell Fox and CNN? This is the first time the Don has let media anywhere near an event like this.’
‘Tell them the truth.’
‘Which is?’
‘I had better things to do.’
‘What could possibly be better than a check for half a million?’
‘I’m gonna head down to East Village, have a good ol’ chat with a store owner about the real deal when it comes to the economy.’
Exasperation summed up the look on Amanda’s face, and Ped couldn’t help feeling sorry for her. The right hand must find it frustrating not knowing what the left was up to. The Ciph and Jin were pigeon-holed away from the public face of the campaign.
‘You realize how many cameras will cover your authentic little chat at such short notice? A big fat...’ She completed the sentence with her thumb and index finger forming a circle.
We’ll see.
The only cameraman present during the blink-and-you’ll-miss-it with the owner and seven customers at a bagel joint near Tompkins Square Park had been hired by Jin to capture seven specific sentences.
From there, Ped and the cameraman were driven across town to a warehouse in Chelsea, where Jin and the rest of the crew had constructed prefabricated settings around a central lighting rig.
For the next few hours, they filmed versions of a post with Ped wearing a suit with red tie, yellow tie, blue tie, a blazer over an open-necked shirt, one with the black t-shirt and Levi’s, from his front, left side, right side, lit or shot from angles to amplify authority, inferiority, toughness, concern. Even the background music changed to suit each target demographic.
The only common ingredients in each post were a clip of bagel man and his customer, and Ped ripping up a check.
The messages were variations on a theme: People who bankroll candidates’ election campaigns always expect – and usually get – something in return: a federal contract, less regulation, lower taxes, a nudge here, a wink there. They have zero interest (Ped used Amanda’s thumb and index finger symbol) in tackling drugs or improving healthcare or schools or making communities better places to live.
‘And in return for having our TVs and phones bombarded with contrived poll-driven or AI political spin, bad-mouthing opponents, we have to pay more to visit the doctor, appliances catch on fire because safety checks have been outlawed, and gazillionaires like Don Francis flip the bird at the IRS.’
Ped was then shown ripping up the check for five hundred thousand dollars only as he pledged not to accept another dime from a corporate or special interest and repeated his promise not to run negative ads.
Jin and a platoon of content strategists and creators then got to work producing thousands of personalized versions of posts which would land in targeted newsfeeds, email accounts and text conversations in the hours before the voting centers opened in New York City and the counties of Nassau, Suffolk, Westchester, Rockland, Orange, Putnam and Erie.
*****
Jay recognized the look. More specifically the pause. The point in the conversation where a bribe was required to move things along. It was the same the world over. He’d seen it at roadblocks in Tanzania and Myanmar, border posts between Afghanistan and Pakistan, East and West Timor, in the guardhouse of a prison in South Africa. The only thing that changed was the color and denomination of the currency.
This time he was at the Kuta police station, a multi-story affair behind a large billboard featuring the head of the Indonesian Police and the police minister. Both were decked out in military-style uniforms and towering over a menacing row of helmeted men with riot shields, body armor and batons.
Jay’s requests to find out what happened to his friend Lompok had been stonewalled, until now.
Two million rupiah. $280 give or take.
Lompok was at Kerobokan Prison.
*****
The American Consulate in Denpasar was tucked behind a retail center near the Soldier Statue roundabout. Bec would have missed the entrance if it wasn’t for the orange cones in front of a white wall crowned with razor wire.
She showed her passport at the little blue security box, which got her through the gate.
The consulate, according to its website, handled passport applications, witnessed legal documents, processed birth reports of American citizens and helped with absentee voting. It also gave permission for tourists to visit Americans in Kerobokan Prison.
Online searches had shown at least eight current American inmates. Bec zeroed in on Seth Crichton, a Californian doing four years for possessing cocaine.
From social media accounts managed by his family, comments and posts from friends and former inmates, and a web forum run by a prisoner support group, Bec gleaned enough personal information to convince a distracted consular officer she was Seth’s cousin.
As she was leaving, she ran into Evan Henley, the Drug Enforcement liaison officer she’d met at the nightclub.
‘Ms. Corelli, I hope everything’s ok?’
‘Yeah. Thanks for asking. Was just arranging to meet a distant... someone... in Kerobokan Prison. Thinking it might give an interesting perspective for my story.’
‘Fair enough.’
‘I’m also hoping to find out about an Indonesian guy who might be able to help with our story. Ever heard of someone called Lompok?’
Henley shook his head.
‘Indonesians are mostly kept in the main part of the prison, as opposed to the foreigners’ block. They’ll only let you talk to your... distant... cousin?’
*****
Jay rode up to the traffic cones when he saw Bec come out of the consulate.
He handed her the helmet.
‘All sorted?’
‘Yeah. I guess.’
‘What is it? You either got the permission or you didn’t.’
‘Sorry, yes, I’m allowed to visit. It was just something Henley, the DEA guy... He seemed to know Lompok was at Kerobokan. There was this spark of recognition – it was his eyebrows – when I mentioned the name.’
‘It’s his job to know that stuff, Bec.’
‘I guess.’
They were hungry by the time they got back to Ubud, so instead of returning to their room Jay parked the scooter outside the Little Banana and they walked across the road for lunch.
The restaurant was perched on the hillside above the Camphuan Valley, named after two sacred rivers that met beneath the bridge into Ubud. They were led to one of the tables on the terrace decorated with clay pots filled with marigolds, and decided to share the Betutu Smoked Duck Feast.
Bec looked up from the menu. ‘It says here the duck is baked under coconut coals and rice husks for eight hours. The cook must have got up early. I also like the sound of the lime tart with vanilla bean ice cream, if I’ve got any room left.’
As they ate, they watched a procession of people anting along the famous Camphuan ridge track, passing in and out of view between lush swathes of vegetation obscuring the bustle of the town.
The duck was good. Jay asked the waitress what spices they used.
‘Cook use Balinese spices. Little bit secret.’
They paid the bill and were about to head out the door when Jay noticed a police car parked outside the Little Banana, a cop looking at the scooter.
‘Bec, I think you should go back and try that lime tart. I’ll come and get you once I’ve checked everything’s OK.’
He ducked through a side entrance, skirted the rear of neighboring properties, coming back to the road beside a guy setting up his mobile food stall. He watched him unpack baskets of noodles, eggs, vegetables, a wok, green gas bottle. A woman walked by on the other side of the road, carrying a basket of crackers on her head.
The cop was still standing beside the scooter, two hundred feet away. Jay stepped back into the shadow of a tree when he heard a siren approaching. It was a fire engine, with two guys in blue uniforms standing on top waving their arms to clear traffic ahead of them.
Jay chose his moment, then used the distraction to dart across the road into an empty lot beside the Mini Mart. A rough track led past the remnants of a temple being swallowed by the jungle, joining up with the path through the rice paddies at the back of the guesthouse.
Everything looked normal. The four-poster day bed with mosquito nets on the patio of their room. Clothes drying on a rack. Plastic hot water flask for all-day coffee and tea. Was he being paranoid?
He scaled the stairs two at a time and pushed open the ornate wooden doors, realizing an instant too late they were unlocked.
The spicy-vinegar smell of rice wine hit him the same time arms seized him from all sides and pinned him on the bed. His hands were pulled behind his back and roughly tied with a cord, before he was yanked to his feet, spun round.
Three of his attackers wore the brownish-gray outfits of the Indonesian Police, not that that meant much. Jay had heard the uniforms, badges, epaulettes and batons sold for a song at markets in Indonesian cities, although the car out front suggested they could be for real.
The fourth guy didn’t bother – or need – cop regalia. His bright yellow t-shirt matched the traditional udeng wrapped around his head, and distinctive rings on the two fingers holding a cigarette to his mouth had black stones set in gold heads. He had a Saddam Hussein moustache, and the nails on both thumbs were long and sharp, like his cocksure expression. In his right hand he held up a plastic bag of white powder, but it was the tattoo on the inside of his wrist that got Jay’s attention. A black circle bordered by yellow, with black dots spreading outwards like some contagion. He’d seen similar markings on the arm of Dreads, the drug peddler at Canggu beach.
Two-Rings blew a cloud of smoke into Jay’s face, dangling the bag that no doubt contained drugs.
‘Look what we found in your safe.’
Jay looked through the open doors of the closet, to the safe on a shelf below Bec’s clothes. Even if he’d known the room had a safe, he wouldn’t have used it. Never trusted them.
He smiled back at Two-Rings.
‘You and I both know what’s going on here. Let’s cut the bullshit. How much do you want?’
Another foul blast of smoke swamped his face, forcing Jay to cough.
‘Can’t buy your way out of this, Duggan. Bawa dia ke lubang.’
Jay had come across the word lubang before. It meant hole, or pit. Which at least made things clearer. This wasn’t about money. And they knew his name. They could have got it from the lobby at the Little Banana, but Jay thought that unlikely. The tattoo pointed to retribution for picking on the wrong guy at Canggu.
He considered Two-Rings and his uniformed sidekicks, assessed his immediate prospects of escape with his hands tied behind his back at somewhere between negligible and zero, so settled in for the ride.
