Frank Bowen Conspiracy Thriller Series

Chapter 10

Chapter 10

Theo left his rented condo overlooking the beach in a short-sleeved white shirt and slacks. A Toyota pick up truck stood outside, its engine purring as Theo climbed in. He nodded at the driver and they pulled away.

The Toyota moved fast down the Mapusa-Anjuna road towards the town of Mapusa inland.

“Take it easy,” said Theo, in Chinese Mandarin.

The truck paused at a crossroads while a herd of goats were shepherded across, and Theo leaned and spat from the window. His mirrored sunglasses glinted against the hot sun, turning towards an old man who was sitting outside a makeshift wooden snack stop. His watery eyes glanced up at Theo briefly, considering him for a moment before looking away. He reminded Theo of photographs he had of his late father, Daaruk Kumar.

Daaruk had come from Southern India and had always wanted to help people throughout his life. Born in the Bengaluru region, he had moved to study at Mumbai University and made the decision to join the International Red Cross. The war in Vietnam had begun and Daaruk found himself based in Saigon at the Red Cross Vietnam Southern branch where he met Theo’s mother, Pham Thi Qui, a Vietnamese nurse. Eighteen months later, Theo was born – as Amith Kumar – in 1968, just as the combined forces of the North Vietnamese Army and Viet Cong launched the Tet offensive against U.S. army positions.

Daaruk’s work required him to be based up towards the war zone for a while, just as the war intensified. On a particularly humid hot day in May 1969, Daaruk and his small team entered a village to bring medical supplies. A passing U.S SeaCobra attack helicopter sweeping the area mistook them for Viet Cong and attacked them with machine gun fire. There were no survivors.

The young Amith and his mother weathered the storm until 1975 when Saigon fell to the Communists. The bitterness at his father’s death stayed with Amith throughout his youth and he was won over by the communist cause, joining the party and becoming an active member.

At the age of twenty, Amith travelled to Hanoi in northern Vietnam and worked for the administration of the party. Being mixed race, Amith had to work extra hard to prove his loyalty, but he didn’t care. His aim was to make a difference in the way he saw the world, his motivation was a kind of vengeance.

After a few months, Amith got an opportunity to visit the Hong Kong branch of the Chinese Communist Party with his boss, for a strengthening of ties between the two parties. Amith was amazed at the wealth he saw on display there but equally disturbed by the hidden poverty embedded in the urban concrete jungle that was shown to them by the local party leader, Hu Lam.

“See how Capitalism divides and pushes down the poor here. They never show you this side of Hong Kong, do they?”

Amith had seen his share of poverty but had to agree it didn’t make any sense considering Hong Kong’s high per capita wealth. He was then introduced to a tall man from Beijing called Peng Quan. Quan told him, due to his cultural background, he would be a useful asset to the mainland’s cause. China was soon to take back Hong Kong from the British and there was a lot of preparation required. And so Amith’s involvement with the 5th department of Ministry of State Security had begun.

The truck negotiated the swarms of tuk-tuks, beaten up cars and scooters as they entered the town. It was market day; stalls and traders peddled their wares selling everything from fresh fruits, vegetables and livestock to carved wooden monkeys and fake branded clothing. The main street thronged and heaved with a mass of locals and the odd traveller checking out the offers.

The truck turned off and parked up in a quiet street, scattering a group of street dogs.

“I’ll call you in a few hours and you can take me to the airport,” Theo said, jumping out of the truck. The driver nodded and drove off. Theo unlocked a door that led through a garment shop, nodding to the owner, who impassively sat staring out toward the front. He then proceeded to climb a creaky stairwell and unlocked another door to a sparsely furnished office. There was a single desk, a filing cabinet with a fan on top and a table with a few papers scattered across it. Theo switched the fan on and removed a painting on the wall which revealed a safe door. He dialled the combination and pulled out an M-125 Fialka electro-mechanical cypher machine, which was the size of a typewriter, and placed it on the desk.

Theo then plugged it into a socket in the wall and connected it to the phone line before typing in the words: Frank Bowen.