Andrew Gross - The Dark Tide

She felt she had to get out of there. Now.

Karen clasped the box shut and called outside. In a moment Megan Walsh came back in.

“I’d like to just leave this here if I could for now,” Karen said, brushing the perspiration off her cheeks.

“Of course,” Ms. Walsh replied. “I’ll just give you my card.”

Karen asked her, “Did anyone else have access to this box?”

“No, just your husband.” The bank official looked back quizzically. “Is everything all right?”

“Yes,” Karen lied. She took her purse but before running out requested a copy of the activity sheet. “I’ll be back in a few days to decide what to do.”

“That’s fine, Mrs. Friedman, just let me know.”

Out on the street, Karen sucked a breath of cooling air into her lungs. She steadied herself against a signpost. Slowly, her equilibrium began to return.

What the hell is going on here, Charlie? She turned away from people passing by on the sidewalk, afraid they would think her a lunatic to be reeling around in such a distraught state.

Didn’t I take care of you? Wasn’t I good to you, baby? I loved you. I trusted you. I mourned you, Charlie. It tore me fucking apart when I thought you were dead.

How can you possibly be alive?

Saul Lennick’s office was close by, on the forty-second floor of one of those tall glass office towers on Forty-seventh and Park.

Karen hurried over, without even calling, praying he was there. His secretary, Maureen, came out and immediately saw the distress and nerves all over Karen’s face.

“Can I get you anything, Ms. Friedman?” she asked solicitously. “A glass of water?”

Karen shook her head.

“Please come on back. Mr. Lennick’s available. He can see you now.”

“Thank you.” Karen exhaled with relief. Thank God!

Saul Lennick’s office was large and important-looking, filled with a collection of African masks and Balinese burial artifacts, with a view of the Manhattan skyline and, to the north, Central Park.

He had just hung up from a call, and he stood with a look of concern as Maureen rang Karen in.

“Karen?”

“Something’s going on, Saul. I don’t know what it is. But Charlie’s done something…in his business.”

“What?” Lennick inquired. He came around and pulled out a chair for her in front of his large desk, then sat back down.

She was about to blurt out everything she knew and had discovered-starting with seeing Charlie’s face in the documentary. And that he was alive!

But she managed to catch herself at the last second, worried that maybe Saul might think he was talking to a raving lunatic, and decided to tell him only what she’d seen today.

“I came across something, Saul. Something Charlie wrote out before he died. I don’t know how to even begin to explain, but I do know it fits into all these crazy things that have been happening. Those people from Archer. Samantha. I didn’t know what to do with it, Saul.”

“With what?”

Agitated, Karen told him about finding the safe-deposit box. The cash and bonds. The passport. Charlie’s photograph next to the fake name.

“At first I thought maybe it was another woman, but it wasn’t another woman, Saul. It’s worse. Look at me, Saul, I’m a goddamn wreck.” She took in a breath. “Charlie’s done something. I don’t know what. He was my husband, Saul. And I’m scared. I feel like those people are going to come back. People are coming after us, and now I find this box full of cash and a false ID. I’m not going to put my kids in danger, Saul. Why would Charlie be hiding this stuff from me? I know you know something. What the hell’s going on here? You owe that much to me, Saul-what?”

Lennick rocked back in his leather chair. Behind him the vast skyline of New York spread out like a giant panoramic photo.

He exhaled.

“All right, Karen. I was hoping I’d never have to bring this up. That it had somehow all gone away.”

“What, Saul? That what had gone away?”

He leaned forward. “Did Charles ever mention someone by the name of Coombs? Ian Coombs?”

“Coombs?” Karen shook her head. “I don’t think so. I don’t recall.”

“What about an investment outfit called Baltic Securities? Did he ever mention them?”

“Why are you asking me all these things, Saul? I didn’t exactly get involved in my husband’s business. You of all people know that.”

“I do know that, Karen, it’s just that…”

“It’s just that what, Saul? Charlie’s not here. All of a sudden, everybody’s making these innuendos about him. What the hell has my husband done?”

Lennick stood up, dressed in a navy pinstripe suit with gold cuff links at his wrists. He came around the desk in front of Karen and sat back down on a corner of it. “Karen, by any chance did Charlie ever mention any other accounts he might have been managing?”

“Other accounts?”

Lennick nodded. “Completely separate from Harbor. Maybe offshore-the Bahamas or the Cayman Islands, perhaps? Things aren’t governed by the SEC or the U.S. accounting laws down there.” His gaze was measured, serious.

“You’re scaring me a little, Saul. Charlie was a stand-up guy. He didn’t keep things from anyone. Least of all you.”

“I know that, Karen. And I wouldn’t have brought it up. Except…”

She stared. “Except…?”

“Except you found what you found, Karen. The cash, that passport. Which together don’t look exactly stand-up to me.”

Karen tensed. Her thoughts flashed to the face on that screen. Their entire lives together, they had shared pretty much everything. Stuff with the kids, their finances. When they were angry with each other. Even what was going on with the dogs. That was how they did things. It was a matter of trust. Now, in the pit of her stomach, Karen felt this doubt. Chilling her. Over Charlie. It was a feeling she’d never had before.

“Whose money are we talking about, Saul?”

He didn’t answer. He simply pressed his lips together and brushed back his thinning gray hair.

“Whose money?” Karen stared at him directly.

Her husband’s mentor let out a breath. His fingers drummed on the top of his walnut desk like a funeral dirge.

He shrugged. “That’s the trouble, Karen. No one’s exactly sure.”

Karen was frantic. The next few days, she barely dragged herself out of bed, not knowing what the hell to do. Samantha was starting to act concerned. It had been almost a week since Karen hadn’t been herself, since she’d seen Charlie on that screen. Her daughter’s eyes reflected that they knew that something wasn’t right. “What’s going on, Mom?”

As much as she wanted to, how could Karen possibly tell her?

That the person she admired most in the world, who had always provided for her and kept her strong, had deceived them in this way. What had Saul said? Setting up accounts. Running money, for people she didn’t know. Offshore?

What kind of people?

All that money, it terrified Karen. What was it for? She began to think that maybe Charlie had committed some kind of crime. Did Charlie ever mention any other accounts he might be managing?

No, she had told him. You know Charlie, he was an honest guy. He fretted over nickels and dimes for his clients.

Had she been kidding herself all these years?

A few more days went by. Karen was driving herself half crazy, thinking about Charlie being out there somewhere, what all this meant. It was late one night. The kids’ lights had long been turned off. Tobey was asleep on her bed. Karen went downstairs to the kitchen to make herself some tea.

Charlie’s photo was on the counter. The one from the memorial: in his white polo shirt and khaki shorts, Topsiders and aviator Ray-Bans. They had always thought it was vintage Charlie, kicking back on a boat in the middle of the Caribbean -a cell phone stapled to his ear.