Джозеф Файндер - Vanished

“I see,” I said. “So you convinced Leland Gifford to restructure his company after he acquired Paladin, right?”

“You been going to night school, Nick? You got it. I told Gifford he had to create another layer of offshore insulation, in order to shield himself from liability. He knew about all the kickbacks Paladin gave the Pentagon. He was smart enough to see that, with a new president in the White House, the worm was turning. He knew he might have to take the fall. He could be facing Congressional hearings, maybe even prison time, if he wasn’t protected. So he did what I urged him to do. He temporarily transferred beneficial ownership.”

“‘Beneficial ownership,’” I said. “In other words, the title to the company. To all of Gifford Industries, which included its new subsidiary, Paladin. Am I right? Since Gifford’s privately held?”

“And I always thought you had no interest in finance.”

“Just the bare minimum,” I said. “Just enough to catch the assholes.”

“Just enough knowledge to be dangerous, huh?”

“Guess that makes me dangerous, Roger. So – what, you had to disappear until the transfer became permanent? Until the mandatory waiting period had expired?”

“And everyone always said I was the smart one.” He smiled with what could almost pass for admiration.

“But you couldn’t have pulled this off without the RaptorCard,” I said. “Having your name on the paperwork was only part of it. You also had to transfer the company’s assets to your own personal accounts, right? Which is why you needed me to break in there and steal it.”

“Not quite,” he said. “You almost screwed the whole thing up.”

“Sorry to hear it. How so?”

“I gave Koblenz’s admin a boatload of money to go into his safe and get me the RaptorCard. Would have gone much more smoothly if you hadn’t broken in and stolen the damn thing. So I had to improvise.”

“Well done,” I said, and I meant it. I continued leading him along: “But I’m still not clear about something. That fake swap-trading you for the RaptorCard – how’d you know for sure I actually had it?”

Roger hesitated, but only for an instant. “Koblenz.”

“I see.” I saw the lie at once, but I didn’t pursue it. I knew the truth. “Well, you finally got your payback, didn’t you?”

“Payback?”

“Leland Gifford never really respected you. Never promoted you. I guess you got the job you deserved all along. So what happens to Leland Gifford now? You’re going to park him in a nursing home somewhere? Give him a monthly allowance?”

“Don’t worry about Leland Gifford. I paid him off handsomely. He’ll retire an extremely wealthy man. But I’m keeping him on. I’m not really an operational guy.”

“And he’s not going to talk anyway, is he? It’s not in his interest.”

“Very good. You got it. If the details of Paladin’s kickback arrangements with the Pentagon ever became public, the spigot would get turned off. The Defense Department would be forced to cancel all of its contracts. Paladin would be worthless. Gifford would lose his multibillion-dollar investment in his own company. So he’s better off with some money than nothing. It’s win-win.”

“You seem relaxed and calm,” I said. “Secure, even. You really think you’re safe?”

“Who’s going to come after me? Gifford? Granger? Koblenz? They all work for me now.”

“Tell that to Allen Granger. He lives in fear of his own employees.”

“That’s why I’m keeping him on. Let them all think he’s still their boss. Some of these ex-military guys are crazy.”

“I’m an ex-military guy. Don’t forget.”

“But you’re not crazy.”

“Not everyone would agree with that. Anyway, bear in mind, people aren’t always rational when they get angry. And you’ve got a lot of enemies.”

“Why do I get the feeling you’re talking about yourself?”

I shrugged.

“What are you going to do, kill your own brother?”

“No,” I said, after waiting just long enough to make him nervous. “I’d never do that. But some courts might consider what you did theft. Criminal, even. Crazy as it might sound.”

“Who’s going to charge me with theft? Leland Gifford? He doesn’t want to go to prison. He’d be liable for all of the kickbacks Paladin made, because he knew about them. From the due diligence I did. I made sure to let him know.”

I nodded slowly, felt for the cell phone in my pocket, looked up. “For all the due diligence you did, you’re entrusting your entire financial empire to some fleabag offshore bank? Really, Roger. That’s where you really blew it. Don’t you realize how quickly those offshore havens fold when the U.S. government puts the squeeze on them? Look what happened to Nauru.”

Roger always hated it when I knew more than him about anything. “Yeah?” he said. “You consider Barclays, B.V.I., fleabag? Come on, bro. Nothing but the best.”

“Barclays in the British Virgin Islands?” I said. “That’s in, what, Tortola? All right. I underestimated you.”

He smiled. “You know, Nick, there was an ancient Chinese philosopher who once said that battles are always won or lost before they’re fought.”

“Someone told me that,” I said. “You know a lot about war, Roger?”

“Just theoretically. And just enough to be dangerous. So are we done here, bro? Because I have a lot of work to do. I’ve got a conference call scheduled, and we don’t even have phones yet.”

“Almost,” I said. “Hold on a second.”

I pulled out my BlackBerry.

“Can you repeat that again?” I said.

Roger looked at me, bewildered. “Repeat what?”

“Sorry,” I said. “I was talking to my phone.” The cell phone in my pocket had been on and transmitting our conversation to Dorothy the whole time. It took her just a few seconds to pull up the SWIFT code for Barclays’ British Virgin Islands branch. As she read it to me again, slowly, I typed the numbers into a message field on my BlackBerry.

I’ve always hated Bluetooth headsets – I don’t like walking around with a thing clipped to my ear like an extra in a Star Trek movie – but the one I was wearing was nonstandard. It was one of Merlin’s government-grade miniature earbuds. Roger’d never noticed it.

“There we go,” I said, this time to Roger. I smiled, held up the BlackBerry. “The cool thing about the RaptorCard,” I said, “is how easy it is to build in a backdoor, if you know what you’re doing. Every single transaction you made, it sent me a copy. Right here.”

Roger didn’t seem to know how to react. I could see the skepticism mixed with anxiety. “Yeah,” he said. “Like you know what you’re doing.”

“Oh, not me,” I admitted. “But one of my colleagues. Comes in handy to have friends sometimes. Now, watch closely. Nothing up my sleeve.”

“What do you think you’re doing?” A tendril of panic had entered his voice. Slowly he came around to my side of his desk. “What’s this all about? Because I did what you were too much of a candy ass to do?”

“Shhh,” I said. “Never interrupt a magician in midact. And now–”

“You understand that I fully intend to share this with you, right?”

“–Watch as I click this ordinary-looking button on this very ordinary-looking BlackBerry, and your entire digital trail is sent, by the magic of the Internet, to FinCen. The U.S. Treasury’s financial-crimes enforcement network–”

Roger leapt at me. “You’re a Heller !” he thundered. “ This is the life we were meant to have! ”

I sidestepped his lunge.

“And… abracadabra!”

With an unnecessarily theatrical flourish, I clicked the send button.