“To PetroSaud,” she said. “May they rot in hell!” She took a swallow of her drink—far too large—and, eyes watering, set it down.
“I think you had better tell me what’s going on,” said Benson.
“She’s here,” said London.
“Who?”
“Nadya Sukarno.OurNadya Sukarno, Indonesia’s minister of finance, who also manages their sovereign wealth fund. I was walking past PetroSaud’s offices this afternoon and happened to see her arrive.”
“Here in Singapore? I hadn’t read anything about her paying a visit.”
“In the flesh.” London went on to explain how after seeing Sukarno, she’d waited outside the offices until she left, then confronted her with questions about her involvement with PetroSaud.
“What did you ask her…exactly?”
“Exactly? I believe I said, ‘Excuse me, Minister, how long have you been stealing from your own fund by investing in nonexistent oil leases and pocketing the proceeds?’”
“You didn’t!” It was Benson’s turn to take too large of a gulp. His cheeks flushed a violent hue of scarlet.
“Verbatim. And did I mention that there were three security guards posted outside the building’s entrance? Why were they there? I didn’t see guards in front of any other building.”
“How did she take it?”
“She froze. She stopped right then and there and gave me a look I’ll never forget.”
“And?”
“I repeated the question. Did I tell you that I had my phone out? I was filming. I mean, obviously.” London took another sip and noted that she’d finished her drink. She was feeling it, too, but at that moment, she didn’t give a damn. “That was my mistake. The guards didn’t like that. Not one bit. Before Mrs. Sukarno could give me an answer, they took me down.”
“Took you down?” Lord Grantham was gobsmacked. Things like this didn’t happen at Downton. “But you were just standing there.”
“A guard tried to take my phone away from me. I wouldn’t let him. We had a tussle, and a second one tackled me. I’d already shouted my name and who I worked for. He finally let me up after Nadya Sukarno had gone.”
“And you have this on film?”
“Well, no,” London admitted. “The guard erased it before returning my phone.”
She might have gone on. She might have told him about the murderous look on the guard’s face, her belief that he’d been expecting trouble, or the look on Sukarno’s face when London had called out her crimes.
In fact, she was thinking that so far all she had done was corroborate what R had sent her. An Indonesian sovereign wealth fund managed by that country’s minister of finance had, as per R’s message, invested seven hundred million dollars in Saudi Arabian oil leases. She had only R’s word and the copies of bank transfers, none of which would hold up to real scrutiny, to suggest that the fund manager, Minister of Finance Nadya Sukarno, had transferred the entirety of the investment to a personal account at the Bank of Liechtenstein after paying PetroSaud a generous commission.
To be honest, she had nothing.
And yet this was how every story began. Disparate threads bound by some common denominator. In this case, that denominator was PetroSaud.
“I’m sorry you were hurt for nothing,” said Benson, all concern and compassion.
“It wasn’t for nothing,” said London. “I found out everything I needed.”
“What’s that?”
“A confession that she is as guilty as sin.”
“But you said she didn’t answer.”
“She didn’t need to. Her look was everything.”
“And so?”
