Chapter One - Richard Lewis

This time Wendell was less guarded, a note of optimism creeping into his voice.
"We've heard six army generals were kidnapped and killed, but General Nasution
escaped," he said. "It looks like he's getting the upper hand against this September 30 th
Movement, or whoever the hell they are."
"Upper hand? How?"
"How this works is you tell me what you know and not the other way around."
"I'm the dark way over here. I have to be able to tell people things."
A long sigh echoed down the phone line. "Yesterday's red musketeers appear to
have been withdrawn. Last night some armed Communist civilians showed up at the
National Front building but they were quickly disarmed by Nasution's loyal boys."
"Armed civilians? Who were they?"
"Communist youth, Gerwani, who knows. Rabble."
"What happened to them?"
A short silence. "Why do you want to know?"
Wendell was no slouch. He had antenna, did Wendell, antenna that quivered at the
scent of the littlest morsels. Reed quickly changed the subject. "What about Untung?
Aidit? Sukarno, for God's sake. What about him?"
"The coup planners appear to have rabbited. Nobody knows were Aidit is.
Sukarno's holed up in his Bogor palace."
Reed next placed two international calls to Singapore and then paced the waiting
room. It took a while before the phone in the cubicle buzzed. This first call to get through
was to Bob Allison, an attaché Reed knew in the Singapore Embassy.
"You guys in Indonesia are having all the fun," Bob said with fake complaint.
"Coups and counter-coups, and feathers being made for caps. What do you want?"
"Bambang Sastrohartono." Reed spelled it. "Staffer there for Permina. I need a
contact number for him."
"What for?"
"Just do it, would you? I'll take you out for drinks next time I'm in Singapore."
The next call followed an hour later. Reed asked his broker and agent Harry Chen
the same favor. "You've been hearing what's going in Djakarta?" he asked Harry.
"Sure have. Everybody's talking about it." Harry said that the coup had been
staged out of Halim Air Force base. "But General Soeharto's men attacked Halim and the
renegades—"
"General who?"
"Soeharto. Commander of KOSTRAD. He's taken charge of the armed forces.
He's the head honcho now."
Reed knew of the Strategic Army Reserve, but not its commanding officer. "I've
never heard of him."
"He's not much known out of the military."
"Wouldn't Nasution be in charge?"
"He was injured, his young daughter shot during the botched kidnap attempt."
"How do you know all this, Harry?"
"Hey, man, I'm a Chinese businessman, I'm connected into the old boy network.
We have to stay alive in alien countries, so when it comes to that kind of intelligence,
nobody beats us, not even the agency that must not be named."
"Thanks, Harry."
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