Michael Walters - The Shadow Walker

“You think it was Maxon?”

“It may have been. But he could still be in the camp.”

The thought chilled Drew. If Maxon was the murderer here, then it was likely that he had also been responsible for the previous killings. The thought that he might still be somewhere in the camp behind them was not pleasant. Drew turned and peered into the darkness, looking for any movement.

“We should call for backup,” Drew said.

Nergui pulled out his cell. “I already have,” he said. “But they’ll be a while. All we can do is wait here, I think. We need to watch the scene, and we need to ensure that, if Maxon is here, he doesn’t make a break for it.”

Privately Drew thought that he might not be too worried if Maxon did make a break for it. He certainly wasn’t sure he felt like trying to stop him.

“You said it was strange,” he said. “What did you mean?”

Nergui looked around. “Why should he do this?”

“As you say, maybe he thought they’d said too much.”

“But why do this? Why here? Why now? At the worst, these two might have raised a few suspicions. We were leaving tomorrow, they would soon be gone. We had no evidence to detain them. Maxon wanted to remain low key, that was obvious. So why commit a brutal murder under our noses? Why turn himself into the only obvious murder suspect?”

Nergui was right. It made little sense. “Maybe they had a fight of some sort. Maybe Maxon really is a psychopath. And perhaps it didn’t take much to set him off.”

“It is possible. But there is something else happening here. I feel it.”

Drew felt it, too. He could feel the cold air of the desert penetrating this space, entering his bones. He could feel the cold glare of the empty galaxies above his head. He could feel the blankness of Nergui’s gaze, who stared at these bodies as if he himself had been the perpetrator of their deaths.

This last thought was unexpected and struck Drew almost with the force of a blow. It was ridiculous, of course. The real killer was out there somewhere behind them, perhaps close at hand, perhaps far away. But watching Nergui’s face, Drew was struck once again by how alien this world was, how little he understood. And he realized that out here, anything might be possible.

“I’m very disappointed, Nergui.”

“Of course. So am I. I take full responsibility.”

Anxiety was etched into the Minister’s face as he paced slowly up and down the room. He was a heavily built man, his dark hair thinning. He was wearing an expensive-looking Western suit, but he wore it uncomfortably, as though he would rather be wearing traditional clothes. “Naturally,” he said. He smiled, though there was no obvious humor in his expression.

“I will of course tender my resignation, if you feel that to be appropriate. I should point out that Doripalam carries no responsibility for this.”

The Minister laughed. “Don’t be ridiculous, Nergui. I don’t know that there’s anything else you could have done. And even if there was something you could have done better, I’m sure that no one else could. Let’s face it, at least you were in the right place at the right time.”

“Not quite at the right time, unfortunately,” Nergui pointed out. “And it was only luck that I was there at all.”

“Nevertheless, the truth is, if you can’t put an end to this, I’m sure nobody else can.”

Nergui nodded in acknowledgment. He knew the Minister too well not to engage in false modesty. “You may be right,” he said. “If so, the question is whether I can.”

“And what do you think?”

“I honestly do not know.”

“But you have some ideas?”

Nergui shrugged. “I do not know whether I would even dignify them as such. There are some patterns. Some leads we can follow. That is all.”

“That isn’t much.”

“It is all we have.”

“What about Maxon?”

“Another mystery. He is a Westerner, on the run in our country, potentially accused of a series of brutal murders. But he has vanished from the face of the earth.”

“That’s not possible. Not here.”

“It is not. But it has happened.”

“The US Government has shown no signs of involving itself?” The Minister presumably knew the answer to this already but he waited for Nergui’s response.

“No. I suspect they may be slightly embarrassed.” Nergui allowed himself a small smile. “It appears that Mr. Collins was a dubious character. The FBI had a large file on him, potentially linking him to a whole series of possibly fraudulent deals. Action had been taken against him by the US regulatory bodies in connection with various doubtful business dealings, but he had managed so far to avoid criminal prosecution. He also appears to have connections with organized crime interests. If we had known any of this, he would not have been allowed into the country. I don’t think the US will be rushing to uncover any further dirty linen.”

“Well, that’s one relief,” the Minister said. He slumped himself back down behind his large, virtually empty desk. “And you’re sure we’ve kept the whole thing tightly wrapped up in the media?”

“As best we can. There was no way we were going to keep this completely under wraps, given it happened in the middle of a camp full of tourists. And, frankly, we also wanted to get Maxon’s picture in the media as quickly as possible so he could be picked up. So we’ve implied that this was some sort of bust up between American business associates, with poor old Batkhuyag getting caught up in the middle.”

“With no link to the murders here?”

“No. Those haven’t even been mentioned. Some people may make the connection, but with so little information I wouldn’t expect it.”

The Minister nodded. “Well, that’s something. And what about your Englishman?”

“I’m not sure. His presence here is something of a token gesture. He wasn’t planning to stay more than a few days. But I’m keen for him to stay a little longer, if his bosses can be persuaded.”

“Why?” The Minister frowned. “Do we really want some foreign policeman peering over our shoulders, prepared to embarrass us?”

“I don’t think that’s a risk. He’s a dedicated policeman, not-with all due respect, sir-a politician.”

The Minister laughed. “But he’s in contact with the British ambassador?”

“The ambassador is in contact with him. Which is no surprise. But I don’t think that’s a cause for concern. The truth is, we can make good use of McLeish’s experience and expertise in this case. We don’t have too much of that among our own people.”

“That’s true enough. Okay. I’ll trust your judgment on this one, Nergui, for the moment at least.” The Minister paused, leaning forward over the table. “But, Nergui,” he said, after a pause, “remember-no more disappointments. We can’t afford it. Not again.”

“So what do you think is going on?”

“As I say, I really don’t have a clue,” Drew said. Nergui keeps talking about patterns, but there’s no pattern to it at all.’

“So far as you can see.”

“So far as I can see,” Drew agreed, mildly irritated by the ambassador’s implied superiority. Still, he imagined that the ambassador rarely implied anything else.

“But what about the mining connection? That seems to suggest some kind of link.”

“Well, yes, but I’ve no idea what. There’s not really much to it, when you try to piece it all together. Okay, Ransom was a geologist. Delgerbayar, the murdered police officer, was involved in some supposedly trivial gold prospecting case. Collins and Maxon were both working in the minerals industry. That’s about it.”