Chapter Three
The extravagant plane of the Sheik, known as Heir Schmooze One, Heir Doze One, because of the long naps taken by Hari inside it, or Heir Force One, depending on who was gossiping on it, was a legitimate Boeing 757-200 painted white with a gold color stripe spanning the whole fuselage, its cabin divided into several sections. It took off from Macau airport and headed towards the British Virgin Islands, a twenty hour flight. Behind the pilot cabin was a chit-chat area where Clarity had settled with Nives Celsius and Julia Flaminia. The teleoperator from Malibu straightened her legs on the curved sofa of the plane, which buckled into a U, and turned to Nives, who was busy opening a bottle of Perrier Jouet champagne, known as the 'flower bottle', due to the flower patterns painted on the outside of the bottle.
"Who exactly is this Sheik?" Asked Clarity.
"Prince Haroun Al-Najib is well known in the circles of the money elite. Of course he rarely makes money, but his wealth reaches billions of dollars. He is a golden bachelor to many women out there, women who think they can do a good job advising him on the way he does business, and would like to share his affluent lifestyle. And he is one of the heirs of a large fortune belonging to his family."
Clarity glanced in the far distance towards a throne made of hard plastic and gold, whose back wall, curved, was emblazoned with the initials SRA-199, which stood for Sheik Royal Assets 199, the name of the company owning the plane. On the right armrest, a small box made of lacquer wood filled with emeralds, rubies and pearls, served as hand-exercise for the Sheik while he waited for his morning cappuccino served by Yergat Ghazakian, the personal commissary and cook of Hari. The left armrest of the throne boasted a computer screen linked to the world's stock market indices. Meaningless to the Sheik, but appropriate.
Clarity glanced through the see-thrrough partition of their live-in area at the luxurious cream color curving couches of the living room area across from them, watching Hari talk loudly with Plum about slot machine gambling strategies.
"I like to beat the odds," said Hari.
"Slot systems are scams, but there are some ways to play smarter."
"All right, teach me, I like smart, and not hard."
The right hand man of Hari, a retainer named Hakeem Moghadam, in charge of press releases, communications, high level deals, and all things money, walked in front of the Sheik. He was carrying his passport and other official papers, all of them certifying Hari's lack of credentials, giving full power of attorney and administrative powers to Moghadam.
"Everything is random in a slot machine," said Plum, "each spin is unrelated to the previous one, you gotta get into a position of loving this thing called the random number generator."
Hari scratched his chin several seconds and began looking for a pillow with his right hand. A pillow near him comforted his insecurities, where the random number generator generated additional ones.
"The reels you see displaying the symbols, the bar, seven, the cherries, are not real, they don't decide anything when they spin, the combination that wins is decided by the RNG before the reels you see start spinning."
"So what should I do when I place my bet? Because I have to press on the bet one credit button."
Hari waved at one of his security guards, Siarhei Lubachko, who threw him the bean bag purchased from the VIP area of the Florentia Moenia casino in Macau. Lubachko was a quiet man from Bielorussia, in charge of plane maintenance, fuel, due diligence, front man signatures, and keeping track of things to do. He'd been drafted as guard by Hari's father, from the security team of convicted former Ukraine Prime Minister, Pavlo Lazarenko, and he viewed the lifestyle of the Sheik with a distant eye, thinking the guy was crazy, but of course, not telling him or pointing out that he was. Some emperors liked to be without clothes, and Hari was one of them. Hari caught the bean bag, which crashed against him, turning him into a white furry blur moving as bean bag. Plum shook the bean bag off him and the Sheik regained composure.
"That's different," said Plum, "my point is that some things are hidden from plain view, and it does not mean that they are not real, they are still there, you just don't see them."
Clarity watched Hari hold in his hands the Mauboussin ring she'd been told to bring to Macau. His eyes settled on a letter and set of numbers on the inside the ring, L67680.
"So you say that the L on this ring means or stands for Lodge."
"It is a lodge, a lodge of knowledge, hidden but real, for you."
"My girlfriend would like this?"
"Possibly."
Hari looked closer at the ring, noticing the letter v in small caps, on one of the diamond baguettes. He showed it to Plum.
"And this?"
"You don't need to know that or what it means," said Plum "it is simply there."
That made sense to Hari, because he was seeing the letter with his own eyes. It was like his own money in a sense, he had no idea where it came from, but it was available to him.
Hari was not married, and he was considering that possibly, he might not be 'built' for or adapted to monogamy. He had an official girlfriend and a live-in girlfriend for times when his regular girlfriend was away. With the push of a button located behind the curved sofa where he was sitting, Hari turned on the local camera placed inside the solarium of the plane. A large television screen lowered from the ceiling and showed the backside of a woman with light blondish hair, hair tucked in a ponytail, thin strip of her thong not visible along her round bum crack.
"Who is that?" Asked Clarity.
"Lohvia Maowey," said Nives, "the current live-in of the Sheik. She likes to reflect on her arousal a lot, and she likes to walk around naked without any tan lines showing on her. She began to work for the Sheik after she became bored with her job in a clothing store in Prague. The Sheik met her while doing some shopping for her official girlfriend, Nora Oakleyn, a well known journalist working for Vanity Gloss, the gossip magazine."
The pretty, young woman, was reading copies of several tabloids and newspapers on her tablet, papers such as The Prague Monitor, the Sun, the Daily Mail, Sun Herald from Australia, Kabrain from Pakistan, the Super Express, from Poland, or the Argyris wealth magazine, which offered its billionaire ranking every year, along with the Bloomberg billionaire index. All of the publications labeled Sheik Al-Najib as the poorest, dumbest manager and businessman of the Emirates, and explained that his family often sent him away from the region on 'business trips' aboard Heir Force One, to avoid damaging the reputation of the whole family.
A naked maid with dark brown hair and a thin landing strip along her Venus mound offered some beluga caviar from Gourmet House to Clarity. Laina Mathels was a sassy woman who was careful to avoid risk in her professional career. She loved others making decisions for her, and she also loved being subservient, and compliant with authority, finding that part of her job suited her personality well. She was so submissive that she liked to kneel naked on all fours, letting her back act as table for those enjoying a cocktail or snacks. Hari liked women who were comfortable being themselves, and all of the women around Hari were comfortable being themselves. Hari was more comfortable being naked than being clothed, in order to be himself, and he was also more comfortable when Moghadam was somewhere else. But his family had mandated an advisor, and he had not been able to find a way to dismiss the retainer.
"You know, maybe I should abandon monogamy all-together," said Hari.
"There is no need to consider monogamy. The Lodge that this ring shows will allow you to relate to many women, not only one."
Hari returned the Mauboussin ring to Plum. The videographer grabbed the ring and smiled inwardly. She was happy to be leaving Macau. One of the girls dealing at the live dealer tables had taken her spot, and Plum was glad of having left her job as gambling pit boss, and not having to look at a camera for hours anymore, ensuring that floor dealers delivered the same angles and shots of video to viewers, with the same monologue over and over, created to attract online gamblers. With se
venty thousand dollars in her account and the ring in her possession, Plum knew that she could find her way to Lady Mulham, and the Honorable Sorority of Ancient Freelayers which the old woman headed. Using the connections of the Sheik, she knew it was possible to find her. And from there, she could begin a new life as member of the sorority.
"All right, maybe some other time you can show me some of this knowledge, I need to think about something else, taking care of my investments."
Clarity observed Hakeem counting cardboard boxes set aside on one of the curved sofas across from Hari. The boxes held workstations loaded with trading computer software, and a technical marvel of investment advice, a new 'robo advisor', programmed by those working for the Sheik, using a book called 'Robo advisors for loss-making dummies', which purportedly showed the user the most appropriate investment for a particular risk tolerance or profile, after a few simple questions were answered.
The Persian personal coach of Hari, Merhab Iskandar, who was in charge of mentoring, facilitating the talent development of Hari, providing Dubai duty-free gadget use or acquistion, and making sure the internet connection used by the Sheik was working, wanted Hari to learn about stock picking. The software was there to ensure his student knew about stock picking and trading stop-loss signals. With a person treading in losses like Hari, the stop-loss signal was one of the keys to sustaining the wealthy lifestyle he was living, for him and all those around him living off of it.
Melchior Van Williggen opened the angel wing gleaming doors leading to the office area of the Sheik and lifted the two arms of a gleaming wood table. The Dutch pantryman adjusted his round glasses and walked towards Hari, telling him what was on his mind.
"You should be a self made Sheik, start from the bottom, get in touch with regular people. Dealing with paper assets likes stocks turns you into a Sheik of clay." Hari did not like the idea of being portrayed in clay.
"What should I do then?" Asked Hari. Clarity began to see that asking a question was a recurrent theme in the life of Hari. He was a new reference for clueless people in general, available to everyone in the plane, the Sheik was the embodiment of comfortable lack of initiative.
"Get a job as waiter in the British Virgin Islands," said Melchior.