Ramada Inn, Manilla, and Leitz

The rainy season -- the monsoon -- was coming.

In my bedroom in the Ramada Inn in Manilla, I thought of Sean. He was a natural, a trained and experienced survivor in all terrains and regions, but I wondered how the rainy season would affect his "operation".

From the mini-encyclopaedia acquired at the hotel shop, I looked up "monsoon" and read a few paragraphs. After that, I slept fitfully.

*

A storm was also brewing in the boardroom of Leitz Pharmaceuticals. Sitting around the executive polished mahogany table were Horst Weitz, Jason Gould and a third man.

Standing by the ornate fireplace, Karl Weitz leaned on his cane. "Well, what do we know?"

The man opened his briefcase with two clicks, placed a blue folder on the table and opened it. Karl Weitz sat down. The table seated 20 comfortably, but the man sat a few feet away from the plush velvet-covered wing chair of the chairman of the board and CEO.
Horst and Jason sat opposite the third man, their backs to windows that extended from the floor to the ceiling. On the fireplace shelf, a clock ticked. Above it on the wall were framed certificates from various business organisations.

"Well?" the old man asked.

"OK first, Tim Mann was buried today," the man began, taking a sheet from his pile, "I visited his family and gave them your cheque."

"Good. At least someone is doing something right," Karl snarled with a scowl.

"He did go over the top, Poppa," Horst said. "He was too enthusiastic."

"He had some fire in his belly, for sure," the chairman chuckled. His face changed as he realised he had used the word "fire". He thought of Simeon and his injuries. He muttered under his breath, "He was a Jew, for God's sake. OK, and what about the punk?"

"The damage is done there," the man with the papers said, taking a second sheet. "We think he told the police about the van. But how they traced it to the farmhouse we don't know."

The old man stood up and leaning on the table with his left hand, he swung his cane and hit the table. "Don't tell me what you don't know. I want to know what you do know." He struck the table again, causing the glasses to topple and spilling water.

"The kid is not the problem now, Pappa," Horst intervened. "He told them what he knows and that's the end of it."

"So finally we get to the problem," the Leitz CEO said. "What about this Hans person. This drug-dealing son-of-a-bitch."

The man with the papers took a third sheet, stapled to a fourth, and sighed, "Hans Kestelmann could be a problem. Up to now he has kept the law of silence, but if he faces trial he may blab. We don't have the law of silence here like some of our Colombian friends, and I think he will talk."

"I assume bribes have failed?" Karl asked. The other three men nodded. "OK, can we get to him while he awaits trial? How safe is the remand centre?"

If he was in jail we could certainly get to him," Horst said, "but remand is not easy."

Jason coughed. "Can I speak?"

The old man groaned.

"I've made some friends in an extreme right-wing group," Jason said. "For a price they would get to him."

"Shaven-headed tattooed thugs in bovver boots?" The old man banged his cane on the floor enthusiastically. "Let me hear it."

Jason said, "These people are nasty thugs, I know, but one of their leaders is on remand, awaiting trial for armed robbery. For a price, he will get to our friend, making it look like a suicide or an accident."

"Do it! For God's sake, do it!" the old man yelled. "We don't want our stakeholders getting nervous."

"Stakeholders? Like shareholders?" Jason asked, immediately regretting his ignorance.

"Stakeholders, you cretin!" Karl snarled. "Our retailers like Walmart and your Boots. Government officials in South America where we're clearing acres of trees to grow bushes that give us laxatives, and regulatory bodies that can close us down. If Leitz is shown in the media cavorting with murderers, we could be in deep shit. Our stakeholders would run a mile." Turning to the man with the papers he asked, "Did you do what I asked?"

"Of course," the man replied. "A cheque for 7.5 million Euros was donated to a new burns unit at Tel Aviv Hospital."

"And it's to be named after us," Horst smirked, "can you believe it?"

For the first time, the old man smiled. The smile became a chuckle and then a belly laugh.

He pointed his cane at Jason. "Now find those leaves!"