Liquid Gold Read online

  Liquid Gold

  A Lachlan Fox Thriller

  James Phelan

  Copyright

  Diversion Books

  A Division of Diversion Publishing Corp.

  443 Park Avenue South, Suite 1008

  New York, NY 10016

  www.DiversionBooks.com

  Copyright © 2009 by James Phelan

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  For more information, email [email protected]

  First Diversion Books edition April 2014

  ISBN: 978-1-62681-268-0

  More from James Phelan

  Fox Hunt

  Patriot Act

  Blood Oil

  Liquid Gold

  Red Ice

  New York Gazette

  HOSTILITIES MOUNT BETWEEN INDIA AND PAKISTAN

  The UN Security Council is considering sending a peacekeeping force to the mountainous India–Pakistan border in an attempt to stave off escalating tensions between the two countries. The decades-old trouble in this region over the disputed area of Kashmir has a new angle, as both nations lay claim to the natural water resource beneath Siachen Glacier. Artillery exchanges at the Glacier have stepped up dramatically, with two hundred military personnel on each side killed in the past week alone. Both India and Pakistan have nuclear capabilities and both countries have stated they will use whatever force and weapons necessary to protect the resources they consider their own.

  A recent feature article in Vanity Fair magazine by investigative reporter Lachlan Fox brought the issue of fresh-water scarcity to worldwide media attention. Fox’s article identified Russian businessman Roman Babich as being behind plans to build and operate one of the world’s largest hydro-engineering projects, in northern Pakistan. While Babich and his Umbra Corporation claim the proposed water extraction plant will “boost the Pakistani economy and lift the standard of living significantly,” Fox’s article revealed the cost this project will have for neighboring India, where the underground water table is already lowering at an alarming rate, and millions are suffering through a crushing drought that is fast on its way to becoming a humanitarian disaster.

  It hasn’t taken long for the sparks of war to ignite as these two countries flex their muscle and claim sole right to a resource both need and refuse to share. The UN Security Council will vote early next week on whether or not to act.

  Prologue

  BELLAGIO, LAKE COMO, ITALY

  He rested the espresso cup on its saucer and looked out over the multimillion-dollar view. He faced a large window that formed the northern wall of the café; the long wooden table, like the building, had seen better days, but it would serve its purpose. The overcast day gave him a good reflected view of the movement behind him.

  He looked around, casually surveying the scene, his senses on high alert. As he turned back to the view he caught his reflection in the window: he was already getting used to his short dark hair, parted without being neat. His deep tan could be from any country around the Mediterranean. His clothes were casual, Milan-fashion smart, too slick for him to be important, too creased to be average: muted tones, no stark blacks and no bright colours. He could be part of the new Lake Como crowd, or he could be part of the establishment. He could be any well-to-do Italian or western European. He could be a simple guy enjoying a coffee at his local café. He could be a nightclub owner. He could be a killer. He could be anyone.

  His eyes fell on the fresco of Mary to his left. He looked at her, unflinching, as his hands moved quickly under the table, positioning the C4 explosive device—no bigger than three cigarette packets end-to-end—in the recess where the table met the wall. The explosive packed enough punch to take down the front section of the old brick building—anyone within twenty metres would be vaporised. He sat back and took one last look at the view before casually tossing a five euro note on the table.

  He put on his sunglasses as he exited, the door’s brass bell jingling in his wake. His eyes were immediately drawn to a passing woman and he turned to watch her walk, with that certain sway of the hips that the women in this part of the world knew how to do so well. She looked over her shoulder, clocked him, smiled: Thank you for noticing.

  He paused amid the busy winter morning, technicolour all around him. Locals finishing their morning espresso and pastry, tourists parading flesh in an attempt to keep up with the effortlessly stylish locals. He strolled down the main street and melted into the crowd. He had time to kill.

  PART ONE

  1

  NEW YORK CITY

  The anchor of NBC’s Dateline leaned towards the camera.

  “The UN has called this the decade of Water for Life,” he said. “This is fitting when we consider that countries like the United States use up to four hundred litres of fresh water per person, per day, compared to some of the most populous regions of the world where people have to get by on less than twenty litres per day. Lack of access to fresh water, and compromised sanitation of existing supplies, results in millions of preventable deaths every year. This is a big issue, but it’s not a new one, and it doesn’t look like it’s going away anytime soon. Our guest tonight is an investigative reporter with news agency GSR, Lachlan Fox, whose recent articles have focused world attention on this increasing global problem. Lachlan is here with me in the studio in New York. Lachlan, welcome.”

  “Thank you, Matt.”

  “Our guest on yesterday’s program was Roman Babich, the resources tycoon listed by Forbes 2009 as Russia’s second-richest man. His company, Umbra Corp, has significant business interests in oil, natural gas, metals and the automotive and television industries—and is also one of the world’s biggest suppliers of fresh water, servicing water to some 900 million people in four continents, including the United States. Mr Babich joined us via satellite from our London studio to explain his company’s activities in his newest water venture, in northern Pakistan. Lachlan,” said the anchor, turning to Fox, “you have written a lot about this issue. What’s your take on the consequences of this new endeavour?”

  Fox straightened in his chair and took a deep breath. “Water is not just a political issue or a money-making venture,” he said. “It is the key to life. Pakistan shares a ground water resource with India, and this new water plant will significantly impact how much water can flow into each country.”

  “Via rivers and irrigation canals?”

  “And the underground water table. Mr Babich has said that this project will be a boon for Pakistan, but the flipside to that is the impact it will have on India. India’s drought is dire, and their underground water table is already disappearing faster than it can be replenished. I don’t believe the full consequences of this project have been adequately thought through. Over a billion people rely on an agricultural area affected by this project, and as water grows even more scarce, so too do the livelihoods of those billion people. I fear that with the broader issue of fresh-water scarcity, one day we are going to wake up and it will be too late. But the point here is, it’s not too late yet for this region.”

  “So do you see this as Pakistan having the potential to take unlimited water from this shared resource?”

  “They are already—before this plant has even gone online—extracting water at a quicker rate than it’s being replenished,” Fox said. “The UN is working on a treaty that would facilitate all countries having appropriate access to the water
from natural sources—”

  “But it’s not in place yet?”

  “No. What we have to realise, even here in America, is that underground water is not a limitless tap. The central issue here is responsibility.”

  “Since your first story was published,” said the anchor, checking his notes, “we have seen mass rallies and protests in India against the project. Let’s take a look at some footage.”

  The monitors in the studio showed the streets of Punjab: residents protesting, rioting and looting; locals demanding access to fresh water and calling for retaliation against Pakistan.

  Fox took a sip of water and watched the monitor. An image of windswept plains of dust gave way to one of thousands of farmers walking in protest to Delhi, reminiscent of the land reform marches of 2007.

  “This is shaping up to be a bigger security issue for these two countries than the 2008 Mumbai terrorist attacks,” the Dateline anchor said. “India and Pakistan have long jostled and postured about their nuclear capabilities—is this new crisis inflaming an already volatile situation?”

  “Absolutely, Matt,” said Fox. “India and Pakistan have fought over Kashmir for more than fifty years, and the location of this water plant has only added to the issues in the region.”

  “No other newspapers or networks were covering this, but following your articles it is now headlining news everywhere viewers turn.”

  “Well, we are living in a time when knowing the world is not a trivial luxury—it’s of vital urgency,” said Fox.

  The anchor turned a page in his notes. “Roman Babich made mention of his water project helping to keep Pakistan together. What do you think he meant by that?”

  “It’s a fragile state, it could collapse any day. Due to our military presence in Afghanistan, Taliban numbers in Pakistan are up, many areas are lawless at best, and the political situation is tenuous—”

  “And with that in mind, did you consider how your stories might impact the region? I mean, the UN Security Council is now considering sending in peacekeepers…” The anchor ran through a list of statistics about the growing death toll from the long fought-over region of the Siachen Glacier.

  Fox nodded, listened. He had heard these stats and clichés so many times since his first article appeared in Vanity Fair and the shit storm between India and Pakistan made it to the front pages of newspapers round the world.

  “Listen, Matt,” Fox said. “I spent over five weeks investigating and writing that first piece, and more time since for the articles that followed. I wrote it for the same reason I signed on to be an investigative reporter in the first place: I want the world to know the truth—we need and deserve to know it. We need to take risks and report on issues and events that matter.”

  Sitting under the Dateline studio lights was like sitting in a sauna fully dressed, and Fox felt sweat beading across his forehead and dripping under his arms. He imagined he looked like Nixon in the debate with Kennedy, when the poor old SOB was practically melting. After seven years in the Australian Navy’s Special Forces and then the last two years on the road as an investigative journalist, Fox was used to tight situations, but he wasn’t used to wearing a suit—or make-up. He drank more water as the anchor spoke:

  “Do you think your article could lead to a war between two nuclear powers?”

  “Matt, India has been a nuclear power since ’74, Pakistan since ’98 and, not to sound blasé, nuclear war has been a risk ever since.”

  “But clearly it was your—”

  “I didn’t chase this story to create a diplomatic stand-off; I chased it because we need to know what is really happening and have public debate about the consequences.”

  “Every commentator says your articles, Lachlan, kicked off two countries on a path to one irrepressible place: all-out war between two—”

  “The bottom line is,” interruped Fox, irritated now, “that the issue of fresh-water scarcity is a global one, a fundamental one. This story would have broken one way or another. Yeah, sure, what we’re seeing in Pakistan—what Roman Babich and Umbra Corp are doing—could well be the beginning of a whole new reason for warfare in the twenty-first century. I’ve been trying to talk to Mr Babich for weeks now and he has refused to sit down with me. But this story isn’t going away, and I’m going to keep asking questions.

  “Make no mistake,” Fox said, “water, like air, is a necessity of human life. It’s liquid gold.”

  2

  MOSCOW, RUSSIA

  “It certainly is…” Roman Babich murmured as he leaned back in his Aeron office chair, then flicked off the television after the Lachlan Fox interview ended. He had just witnessed what he had hoped to dissuade with his appearance on the program, part of a campaign to appear more often in the Western media since his new London-based PR team handled Umbra Corp’s expansion into Western Europe and the Americas. He had even flown to London for the studio interview before returning to Moscow to do some real work.

  He needed, apparently, to make himself more visible, more accessible; to project an image of himself and Umbra Corp as a pillar of stability in a shaky global marketplace. He had poured significant cash into advertising, buying time with networks and wire execs, in order to shape Umbra Corp into another Coca Cola or Apple or Sony or Exxon and to present himself as a figure of old-school industrialist who understood new-tech wonders and had resource control bigger than most countries. The New York Times once put him at the top of a list of ‘What’s wrong with corporate Russia,’ but now Time magazine had called him ‘Russia’s Rockefeller’. It was a start.

  Becoming the recognisable face of the company, in a decidedly new-Russia way, took money and patience: he had ample of the former, less so of the latter. His PR people were focusing on glamour, strength and stability—he now had manicures, dyed his hair to cover the grey and was considering a facelift. Fox News recently described him as ‘more Berlusconi than Yeltsin,’ which made him laugh. He wondered if he should get hair plugs too. His wife wouldn’t notice or care, but his mistress in St Petersburg would love it, and his PR people would approve. All this and he had just turned fifty-nine.

  Babich opened a folder on his desk. The Dateline interview with Fox hadn’t gone as he had hoped. He scanned the contents of the folder a second time, more carefully, considering yet again a way of doing business that he had hoped was no longer necessary, but one that he revisited because it worked so well; a smooth, dependable way to rid himself of an annoyance, be it legal, commercial or even personal. It was affordable and decisive. Fuck Dateline.

  Fox’s reportage from the Kashmir region had singled out Babich and Umbra Corp as the cause of the area’s water woes. Babich couldn’t allow this: in the last year alone, that division of Umbra Corp brought in 1.2 billion euros—profit—from Colombia to Colorado, Western Africa to Wyoming. This new water plant in Pakistan—he wasn’t interested in the decades-old border scuffles over Kashmir or where the water actually originated—would contribute 200 million per year, rising at least five per cent every year for the next fifty years. The World Bank had even footed some of Pakistan’s capital investment through a no-interest loan—why didn’t Dateline make more of that?

  The total cost of the project was around US$20 billion; all done from his end without external financial support, which meant he had been forced to cut every cost he could, including labour. Local men had been contracted to work on the drilling and concreting equipment under his own workforce’s supervision; men he didn’t know but who journalists like Fox could get to.

  Truth be told, he had halved the bill another way, a very fortuitous way, through the aid of another government backer; but that would never come out. This water project would reap billions of euros for Umbra Corp, annually and in perpetuity. The project had already added almost 4 per cent to the share price of the parent company, not to mention the 2 per cent spike after Lachlan Fox’s articles first appeared across Western news agencies—all that press had helped
put Babich and his company more decidedly on the map.

  There was a sharp knock and his executive secretary entered, followed by two division heads. He motioned for them to sit in the armchairs by the fireplace; they would not begin the meeting without his GM, who handled everything in a management committee of CFOs and division heads—a system Babich had modelled on the workings of the old Politburo. Putin was right about that at least—he, too, missed some of the old ways of running things.

  Babich tapped the folder as he watched his computer screen update the company’s stock price: it had risen another 0.5 per cent since the Dateline episode screened. Babich owned a controlling stake in Umbra Corp, and Fox’s reportage equalled money in his pocket.

  But Fox was heading back to snoop around further. If he got hold of the right people he might just find the source of the other income stream to this water project; cold, hard cash delivered via their diplomatic transport services—the only way to courier, he often joked—to Italy. That further income would equal more power and, most importantly, the beginning of a business relationship that would bear much fruit for as long as he wished to harvest it. He had worked hard to cultivate that relationship—many years’ worth of luxury gifts and wining and dining—and he could not let Lachlan Fox jeopardise it. Not after all this work, not now.

  His GM entered and took a seat with the others. Babich motioned he would be over in a moment.

  He knew Fox would not leave this alone, not until he was waist-deep in affairs that didn’t concern him; there was no telling what Fox might uncover, despite all their precautions. He well knew what the reporter had managed to do in Nigeria just a few months ago, how a plan years in the making had come undone so quickly, so resolutely, all in the name of chasing his story. And what a story this would be. But enough was enough; no more investigating, no more articles.