‘The ruse of sending you to New York is interesting,’ said Shah. ‘Quite an elaborate cut-out scheme. If Cesky is behind this, he will be standing well behind. He has much to lose now, being such a prominent figure. I wonder who is acting as his agent, assuming a now respectable businessman would not hold meetings in his office with potential contract killers.’

Jules shrugged. ‘Couldn’t tell you. Maybe the same guy who fronted us on behalf of Rubin. Who knows? But Cesky’s not that respectable. He’s in construction, for God’s sake. My father dealt with a few of them, said they were all crooks. The unions, the bosses, the companies – all of them. And Cesky wasn’t shy about putting muscle on the street in Seattle when Kipper led his little people’s uprising back after the Wave. He made quite a show of it, I heard. Having dealt with him just briefly, Cesky didn’t strike me as being squeamish about using the strong arm to get his way.’

The three heavy vehicles pulled into parking bays on a dirty concrete slab outside a remarkable office that had been constructed from shipping crates. Jules had heard of apartments in Europe fashioned the same way before the Disappearance, but they were high-end architectural experiments. This looked like frontier engineering. Shah’s headquarters was literally pieced together from metal shipping containers like a giant’s Lego set. He’d had doors and windows cut out; one container had been dropped on top of another, which had been joined end-on-end with a third. The old Gurkha saw her examining the unusual arrangement and smiled.

‘We took over this lot when building materials were in very short supply in Darwin,’ he explained. ‘This was cheap and very easily run up. It works well, although the air-conditioning is a heavy power drain.’

‘I can imagine,’ she replied, as they stepped out of the chilled interior of the vehicle. The oppressive, damp heat of the tropical afternoon slammed down and wrapped itself around her in a heavy shroud. The compound covered a few hundred square yards, and three newer buildings, all sheds, were of more conventional appearance. She had half expected to find a small regiment of armoured cars, even tanks in here, but instead she saw only more off-road vehicles. Land Rovers, a few anonymous sedans, and flat-bed pick-up trucks loaded with crates and strongboxes. At least half of the personnel were Nepalese, like Shah, but the rest, maybe a dozen or so that she could see, were a mix of locals and imports.