Death is Forever (13 page)

She watched while his intent, nearly silver eyes measured distances and catalogued possibilities. The speed and decisiveness of his work suggested an intelligence that was as impressive as his physical strength.

Watching him, she had to admit just how drawn she was to him—and never more so than now, when the intelligence and discipline in him were real enough to touch.

Don’t even think about being his lover.

She wasn’t the kind of person who did anything by halves. If she gave herself to him physically, it would be impossible not to give the rest of herself as well. There was no guarantee he wanted anything more than her body. It was a recipe for disaster.

Yet the lure of him sank into her more deeply each moment she was with him.

Without warning, Cole looked up and caught Erin’s luminous green eyes admiring him. When she realized it, she looked away hastily.

“Well?” she asked, gesturing to the map.

He shrugged. “About two-thirds of Australia can lay claim to being the burial ground of a dead sea’s bones.”

“Oh,” she said, disappointed.

“On the other hand, when it comes to checking existing claims, I’ll concentrate on the areas with limestone outcroppings first.”

A smile transformed her face. “Then I helped?”

He grinned. “I hope so. We’ve got a hell of a lot of land to cover any way you look at it.”

“Is there a river?”

“Not the way you mean it. There were paleo-rivers, though. They drained into the shallow sea where reefs formed. There were beaches, too, maybe like Namibia’s beaches, where every time you dig down to the oyster line you come up with diamonds running out of both hands.”

“Where are the old rivers on Abe’s claims?”

“I never saw any sign of them,” Cole said, “but they’re there. They have to be.”

“Because of the diamonds?”

“No. Because the Kimberley Plateau has always been there, and a sea was usually there, and water always runs down to the sea.”

Unconsciously, she worried her lower lip with her teeth, something she often did when nervous or thinking hard. “What about your maps? Do they show old rivers?”

“No. The only maps I can get my hands on are of the tectonic sort. They’re useless if you’re looking for something that’s smaller than a hundred square miles.”

“How big are diamond pipes?”

“Most of them are only a few hundred square acres on the surface. A lot of them are smaller. A few are huge.”

“Talk about a needle in a haystack…”

“I’d settle for that,” he said sardonically. “If it was a needle, I’d whistle up an industrial-strength magnet and suck that baby out in nothing flat.”

His eyes went back to the maps. Instantly he was absorbed, pursuing some line of thought Erin could only guess at. She watched him openly, wishing her cameras were lying on the table instead of on the chair next to her bed. Though she rarely did portraits, preferring the timeless beauty of wilderness to the transient faces of humanity, she wanted to photograph Cole. Like the land, there was more to him than his harsh exterior.

Hugo van Luik passed down the long hallway like a ghost. The lush green wool carpeting, the tapestries, and the heavy curtains soaked up every sound his steps made. A closed-circuit television camera mounted on the woodpaneled wall tracked his progress. Depending on the time of month, this office was the repository of anywhere between two and three billion dollars in rough diamonds.

When he reached the heavy, hand-carved wooden door at the far end of the hall, he stopped and tapped a four-digit code into the security key pad. The lock retracted, allowing him to push the door open and pass into the next long hallway to the next electronic locks, until finally he was inside the conference room.

Although meetings of the “steering committee” of the Diamond Sales Division of Consolidated Minerals were “unofficial,” “advisory,” and never publicized, such gatherings were crucial to the economic expectations and requirements of the nations that attended. Individual diamond sight-holders always made their needs known to the DSD through formal channels, but what happened in this room today would determine how—or whether—those needs would be met. To an extent startling to outsiders, DSD enhanced or diminished the economic health of nations.

Van Luik checked his own watch. Given a choice, he would have put this meeting off for five weeks, until the next sight. By then the monsoon season would have started in Western Australia and the matter of Abelard Windsor’s dangerous bequest would be moot for another six months. But putting off the meeting wasn’t possible.

Abruptly he turned to the majordomo who was hovering by the half-open door.

“Send them in.”

The representative from Israel strode in first. Moshe Aram was lean, wiry, and fit. He was a member of the Israeli secret service, Mossad. The diamond trade was too crucial to Israel’s economy to be left in the hands of diamantaires or politicians. That was how the troubles had begun back in the 1970s.

The United States representative, Nan Faulkner, followed on Aram’s heels. Faulkner sat down, poured herself a glass of ice water, drank it, and poured another. Then she lit a cigarillo and balanced it on the lip of a heavy crystal ashtray that had been put at her place.

Van Luik nodded at the woman but said nothing. Although Faulkner was an old hand at DSD meetings, van Luik always maintained his distance from her, believing her to be a political token rather than a real player in the game of international power.

He went to his own chair at the head of the table and watched calmly while the others took their places. There was little polite talk. Each person was there to ensure that his country’s interests in the diamond trade were presented to the diamond cartel.

The Soviet representative, Boris Yarakov, looked un-usually surly. Attar Singh, India’s representative to the cartel, was as politic as Yarakov was boorish. Singh had no choice but to be accommodating. India no longer produced diamonds, so it no longer commanded the attention it once had. What India brought to ConMin and DSD was a bottomless well of cheap labor willing to spend its hours and its eyesight on the task of shaping and polishing diamonds so tiny they would once have been sold for industrial use at a quarter the price of polished goods.

The Continental diamond trade was represented by Nathaniel Feinberg. As with India, the Continental interests were cutters and polishers rather than producers of rough diamonds. They had less power in the diamond cartel than the owners of the gem-producing diamond mines themselves. Those mines were the treasure and bane of the diamond cartel’s existence: There were more than enough mines to fill the world demand for gems.

Australia had used its own geologists, rather than ConMin’s, to explore the vast Kimberley Plateau. The Argyle diamond mine had been the result. Because the remote Argyle strike was monstrously expensive to develop, Australia sought outside capital. Once the banks learned that Australia wasn’t a member of the diamond cartel and thus had no guaranteed market for the Argyle’s output, development money dried up.

The power games hadn’t stopped there. India, unhappy with the cartel, had offered to guarantee a market for Argyle’s melee diamonds. The banks were approached again, guaranteed market in hand. Before the loan went through, the Indian government was privately informed that DSD would undercut India’s markets by flooding them with below-cost stones of the same size, quality, and cut as India would produce from the Australian mine. DSD and ConMin were rich enough to absorb the losses indefinitely.

India wasn’t.

No single diamond-producing country could survive a pissing contest with the contents of DSD’s London vaults. India withdrew its offer to finance the development of the Argyle mine, and Australia did what every other individual or nation with a diamond mine had done.

Australia cut a deal with ConMin.

Ian McLaren was Australia’s representative to DSD. He watched van Luik warily, and with good reason. ConMin had a long memory.

Van Luik opened the Moroccan leather folder in front of him, signaling that the session was open. Immediately everyone began passing single sheets of paper to the head of the table. Each month the mining countries put forth a projected production figure, and each month the cutters and polishers stated their expected needs for raw material. It was up to van Luik to reconcile those two sides of the diamond equation.

He collected the “prayers” of each cartel member, but the papers were a formality. The same figures had been faxed to van Luik the previous day. In any case, the prayers were useless. He’d known for the past week how the next three months’ output of DSD diamonds would be distributed.

Swiftly van Luik lined up sheets from producers opposite those from buyers and compared amounts with the agenda in his head. There would be some very unhappy people leaving the building today. It wouldn’t be the first time, and van Luik wasn’t fool enough to believe it would be the last.

“Mr. McLaren,” van Luik said abruptly, “DSD can’t at this time provide a guaranteed market for the undeveloped Ellendale pipes. As you know, the gem content of Ellendale was very high for a pipe mine. Somewhere in the neighborhood of sixty to eighty percent, was it not?”

“Yes, but—”

“Are you not aware,” van Luik interrupted, “that the market has barely recovered from the disaster of 1980? This most definitely is not the time to bring a new gem mine into production.”

“Then could we anticipate a price increase on our industrial diamonds?” McLaren asked curtly.

“Regretfully, no. If the price of industrial diamonds goes much higher, Japan would be tempted to begin mass-producing them in their labs, and then Australia would be left with a hugely expensive, hugely unprofitable mine and no way to repay the cost of its development.”

“But—”

“I will be at the Argyle mine shortly to discuss long-range planning for its product. Be assured Australia’s interests are DSD’s interests as well. For the moment, the last thing either of our interests need is one more gem diamond mine.”

Without waiting for a response, van Luik slipped McLaren’s prayer to the bottom of the stack and addressed the problems created by the next sheet in line.

“Mr. Singh, you will receive two-thirds of the melees you requested,” van Luik said.

“My cutters would be most grateful if a greater proportion of our sights were made up of larger rather than smaller melees, which are the dregs of the diamond trade.”

“You have the only workers capable of turning a profit on the smaller melees,” van Luik said. “However, if India would like its allotment reduced, DSD will do so. China has made inquiry about the melee trade recently. We told them our entire output of rough was allocated at present. Naturally we assured them that we would keep their interest in mind, should the situation change.”

Singh’s face went very dark beneath his stark white turban. Yet when he spoke, his voice was flat and calm. “India has no objection to the kind or quantity of diamonds it will receive in the next three months from DSD.”

“Excellent. Your cooperation will be remembered. Mr. Feinberg, your associates’ requests will be met in full.”

Feinberg nodded.

“Mr. Yarakov, the market for larger gems is just recovering from the disastrous speculation of 1980 and 1981,” van Luik said. “We regret that we can handle no more of your output.”

Yarakov looked angry but didn’t open his mouth.

Van Luik paused, obviously expecting an argument. When none came, he went on to the next prayer. “Mr. Aram, your requests are unreasonable. If we allocated you that many melees, India and the Soviet Union would have little work for their own polishers.”

Van Luik’s dry, soft voice carried easily through the big room, because none of the people moved or muttered among themselves. Even Moshe Aram was quiet. In the 1970s, Israel had cut eighty percent of all melees. But in the early 1980s, Israel had been instrumental in the diamond speculation that had nearly broken DSD’s hold on the diamond market. ConMin hadn’t forgotten. Or forgiven. The cartel had cancelled the valuable sight invitations of 150 diamantaires, thereby gutting the diamond industry in Tel Aviv.

Soviet and Indian markets now received the majority of the melees.

“You will receive thirty-seven point six percent of your melee request,” van Luik continued. “The Soviet Union will receive eighty-nine point eight percent of its request. Those amounts will be evenly divided among the next three sights in London. How you divide it among your diamantaires is, as always, a matter of your own discretion.”

“You have punished us long enough,” Aram said roughly. “We have done as you wished. We have altered our banking regulations and raised the margin requirements on sight boxes. Our cutters can no longer speculate. What more do you want from us, that we tear down Ramat Gan? What gives you the right to bleed the economy of a small, struggling, democratic nation and send our lifeblood to men who persecute Jews in the Soviet Union?”

“DSD trades in diamonds, not ideologies,” van Luik said neutrally, shifting Israel’s prayer to the bottom of the pile as he spoke. “You may, of course, ask for an increase in your allotment at this group’s next advisory meeting.”

“But—”

“The neutrality of DSD is well known,” Nan Faulkner said dryly, cutting off another angry eruption from Aram. “Somehow, both sides in World War Two managed to get their hands on industrial diamonds. Nothing has changed since then.”

Faulkner stubbed out her cigarillo and gave van Luik a level look.

“It’s also well known that what happens in these advisory meetings has a ripple effect that goes far beyond the diamond market,” she said. “You may not consider ideology, but each government represented at this table does. If the Israeli cut stands, I’ll be forced to recommend that our American sight-holders substantially lower their requests.”

Van Luik was surprised, but he didn’t show it. “You may naturally do as you wish. However, in your country the sight-holders are also free to go against your recommendations. In that case DSD would naturally cater to the requests of its most immediate market—your retail jewelers.”

Faulkner’s smile was as cold as the glass of ice water she drained before answering. “Yeah, that’s the problem with a real democracy,” she said, lighting another cigarillo. “But I tell you, it wouldn’t take much effort to raise the taxes on diamonds at each stage—imported rough, loose polished stones, and finally set stones. In a year or two, diamond jewelry would go up in price, say, sixty percent in the American marketplace. Luxuries are just that, babe. Luxuries. If they get too pricey, people go without.”

Van Luik opened his mouth.

Faulkner was quicker. “As for the sentimental trade,” she continued, “lots of Americans would follow Princess Di’s example and have colored gems in their engagement rings, especially if the jewelry manufacturers launched a campaign based on treating your loved one like royalty. At the same time, there might be a grass-roots political movement to boycott apartheid’s diamonds.”

“No aspect of Consolidated Minerals, Inc., has ever supported apartheid,” van Luik said flatly, “and that most definitely includes DSD.”

“Tough shit, babe. People associate diamonds and the diamond cartel with South Africa. Within five years at most, fifty percent of your American market would dry up. Maybe even seventy-five percent.”

Faulkner smoked her cigarillo and said no more. She didn’t have to. U.S. sales accounted for more than a third of all gem transactions in the world—the most profitable third.

“There is always Japan,” van Luik pointed out.

“There sure is,” Faulkner agreed, her voice hearty as she picked up the pitcher of ice water and began to pour. “The U.S. led them into buying diamond engagement rings. We can lead them right out again. That leaves you with half your former world market, which means that every country at this table just took a fifty percent cut in pay. Hardly worth it just to yank Israel’s chain one more time, is it?”

“Remember, Ms. Faulkner, Consolidated Minerals controls more than diamonds.”

“Which is the only reason there hasn’t been a grass-roots campaign against diamonds in the U.S. before now,” Faulkner shot back, setting down the water pitcher with a thump. “You need our diamond markets, and we need your strategic minerals. So let’s cut the bullshit and find a more generous compromise than you’ve suggested so far.”

Van Luik could count his heartbeats in the stabbing pain behind his eyes. He’d warned his superiors that the United States might be difficult if ConMin squeezed Israel too hard. No one had listened.

Now they would have to.

“Perhaps the loss of jobs and foreign exchange in Israel could be compensated for in another way,” van Luik said, looking toward Singh.

“Forget it,” Faulkner said. “Israel doesn’t need any favors at India’s expense. Why not take it out of the Bear’s thick hide? The Soviet share of the melee market has gone up by about ten percent every six months for the last nine years.”

Yarakov turned on Faulkner and spoke before van Luik could. “As a result of recent political changes in our country, the Soviet Union has employment and foreign exchange problems of its own. Your country supports glasnost in the world press, but we still have to pay for American wheat with American dollars.”