Jericho's Fall, page 14
“Died?”
“A traffic accident. She went off the road into one of these gorges.” A pained expression. “Very tragic.”
CHAPTER 15
The Classmate
(i)
Brian Navarro’s office was in a stucco townhouse on Main Street. He had the entire second floor, but the receptionist said he was out for the day. Rebecca made an appointment for the following morning. She gave a false name and a false story, but only, she told herself, because she did not want word spreading around town; or back to Jericho.
Although why she cared what he knew, she could not precisely say.
With half an hour to kill before Audrey would return to pick her up at Corinda’s, Beck decided to have a cup of coffee and a sandwich. In the late afternoon, the place was nearly empty, so she was able to grab a booth by the front window. Zeelie, the talkative waitress of the night before, was not on duty, and Beck immediately forgot the name of whoever was.
The coffee was cold.
Rebecca sat there, puzzling, as she watched what there was of life passing by. When she had lived out here with Jericho, the town had possessed a thriving factory that manufactured machine tools, and another that specialized in printer’s inks. Now both were shuttered. There were still jobs, mostly in light industry, an hour or more away. Closer to home, there was retail, but not much tourism. Efforts to build a ski resort had come a cropper. But the town hung on, and had recently been discovered by some among the smart set, who were building their Schlösser on the nearby mountainsides. She wondered what would be left when the smart set moved on.
The point was, as Miss Kelly had indicated, Jericho Ainsley’s presence in town was a big deal.
A town like this, that many strangers—you get my meaning.
Beck, pondering, stirred her coffee, and engaged in what Jericho used to call doing her sums.
Fact: Jericho had something he had threatened to disclose, and, whatever it was, people were frightened.
Fact: at the same time, nobody dared harm him, or any of his family, a protective umbrella that evidently covered even Rebecca herself.
Fact: Dak said Jericho had to be working with someone in town.
Fact: it was Jericho who had established the library, and then brought in Miss Kelly as librarian.
Conclusion: Jericho was working with Miss Kelly.
Supposition: if so, then Miss Kelly was in terrible danger. After all, she could not plausibly be considered a member of Jericho’s family.
Yet, having worked her way to this point, Beck could almost see his face, not as it was now but as she remembered from the seminar room at Princeton, and, later, the bedroom, the mocking smile proposing that she had done her sums wrong.
Fine. What had she messed up? Well, for one thing, Miss Kelly was a little obvious. She was practically the only person in town who was neither white nor Latin, and therefore stood out like a sore thumb. Hiding in plain sight was one thing; but imagining Jericho meeting secretly with the librarian bordered on the absurd. Besides, according to Miss Kelly, she and Jericho had not met until last year. Hardly the best qualification for a trusted assistant.
Fine again. Suppose, therefore, that Miss Kelly was telling the truth about everything. Suppose Jericho had met her last year, then brought her up the mountain only because he felt sorry for her, and also because he wanted to strike a blow for—well, for whatever cause he had in mind that week. Miss Kelly said the only person she remembered spending much time with Jericho as he hunted through the library was Brian Navarro, but what if—
“Now, this is a lucky break.”
Rebecca looked up in surprise, but she knew the voice even before she spotted the red mop of hair and fiery matching beard.
“Mr. Clark.”
“Please. Call me Lewiston.” Without being invited, he slid into the booth across from her. “I was hoping to get the chance to talk to you—”
“I have no interest in talking to you, Mr. Clark.”
“Why not? I’m a nice guy.” An infectious smile. “Besides, we’re classmates.”
“I never graduated, as I’m sure you know perfectly well.”
“I do know. Still, I thought it would be nice to catch up.”
“Catch up? We didn’t even know each other.”
“Not sober.” He saw her consternation. The waitress brought Beck her grilled-chicken sandwich and, without asking, put a burger in front of Lewiston Clark. He waited until she had gone. “We got drunk together on Newman’s Day freshman year. There were five or six of us. You don’t remember?”
“No.” But she did. Hazily. Her big breakout from Jacqueline, Miss Goody Two-Shoes allowing her wicked roommates to tempt her into joining the Princeton tradition of downing twenty-four beers in twenty-four hours on the twenty-fourth of April. Before then, she had never attempted more than the occasional glass of wine with dinner.
“Don’t worry,” he said, grinning. He took a largish bite, chewed while she blushed. “You weren’t one of the girls who wound up— Well, never mind what they did. You were so sweet and innocent. You weren’t a sloppy drunk. You didn’t start swearing or kissing strangers or dancing on the tables. You just got quiet and a little sad. I don’t think you made it past eight beers. You fell asleep. You were really cute.” He stopped laughing. “And if anybody had told us that night that mousy little Becky DeForde was the one who would smash Jericho Ainsley’s marriage to bits a year later—”
“I think I get the picture.”
“Not that you weren’t good-looking. As a matter of fact, some of the guys had these little bets going—”
“I said I get it, Mr. Clark. Please, leave me alone.”
But some men are encouraged rather than deterred by firmness. “I can see you’re not that helpless little nobody any more, but I don’t think Jericho is any less obsessed with you now than he was then. I think he wanted you because you were sweet. He wanted you because you were innocent.” Clark’s next bite seemed almost angry: a man with scores to settle. “He’s a corrupter, Beck. That’s what he does. He messes with people the way he used to mess with countries. If he drew you back in after all these years, it’s because he wants one last shot at corrupting you. So, the way I see it, if I keep an eye on you, I’ll figure out what he’s up to.”
“Believe me, I’m corrupt enough already.”
“Maybe not in Jericho’s eyes.” He had lifted the bread to examine the burger. Severely underdone. “So—what did Agadakos want?”
The sudden change in subject threw her, as it was intended to. “I’m sorry?”
He had a notebook open on the Formica. “Philip Bartholomew Agadakos,” the writer said. “Sixty-eight years old. Former chief of staff for the National Security Council, former Deputy Director of Operations at Langley Jericho’s favorite hatchet man. Long talk the two of you had last night in your car. Mind telling me what it was all about?”
“Yes.” She turned her attention to her food. The mention of Dak had reminded her of the stakes. “I do mind. Please leave me alone.”
“Which side is he on? That’s all I want to know. Agadakos. Is he on Jericho’s side?” She continued eating. “Because, you know, Beck—”
“Ms. DeForde.”
“Whatever.” He sipped his water. “Here’s the thing. I’ve picked up these wild stories about what Jericho is cooking up. I hear some pretty prominent people might wind up in prison if he doesn’t get what he wants. The part I don’t know is what he wants.”
This was new to her. Dak had said nothing about prison, or even prosecution. “Which prominent people?” she asked.
“Presumably, the ones who are paying Phil Agadakos.”
She remembered what Dak had said about the man now sitting across from her. “Or the ones who are paying Lewiston Clark,” she suggested.
“Could be,” he agreed, quite unbothered. He turned a page. “So— what did Miss Kelly tell you? Does she know who did the breakin?”
“I would imagine it was you.”
He was unfazed. “Wish I’d thought of it. They won’t let him get away with it. Jericho. You have to know that.”
“I don’t have any idea what you’re talking about.”
“Come on. I bet he has the papers lying around the house somewhere, doesn’t he? Maybe he showed you where. He didn’t invite you all the way out here for nothing.” Another bite. Maybe he liked underdone meat. “Look. If you could maybe find a way to let me have a peek, there might be some money in it for you. A lot.”
Again the money. Everyone she met seemed obsessed with it. “Are you going to leave,” she asked softly, “or do I have to call the manager?”
“You could call your friend. The deputy. People tell me the two of you were pretty cozy last night. Caused him trouble at home, from what I hear.”
Rebecca was impressed. Not with Lewiston Clark, who seemed to her a particularly pernicious dope. With herself. With something that had changed inside her—if not over the past few days, then perhaps over the past few years. Pamela had been largely right this morning. Once upon a time, Beck had possessed a fierce temper, and when she had lived with Jericho, their arguments had been explosive. She could no longer recall the other half, whether the sex had been sufficiently fiery to compensate for the fury. That side of life with Jericho seemed oddly hazy in her memory.
What she did know, however, was that there was a time when she would have been trying to gouge Lewiston Clark’s eyes out. Now she simply shook her head and took another bite of chicken.
“Was there something you actually wanted?” she asked, calmly. “Or are you like a cable host who doesn’t care what he says as long as he gets a rise out of his guest?”
The writer stroked his beard. “Hey, I’m just doing what I do.”
“Spreading rumors?”
“Tracking down the story.”
“And what story are you tracking this time?” She tilted her head toward the window, the mountain, Jericho’s shrinking world. “I doubt there’s fifty people in America who remember him. And I doubt that there’s ten who care.”
Her cell phone rang.
(ii)
They both stared.
“Aren’t you going to answer that?”
She had taken it from her belt. The screen said UNKNOWN NUMBER. “No.”
“You don’t even know who it is.”
“It’s fine.”
“Is it Jericho? Is that why you won’t answer?” He grabbed for the phone, but Beck had learned her lesson from Audrey’s success with the same move. She swept it off the table and into her handbag. “You can’t protect him forever.”
The phone was still ringing. She had pressed the button to kill the call, and it was still ringing. People were beginning to stare.
Lewiston Clark was grinning. “Well?”
With a furious snarl, she pressed the green button and put it to her ear, and, yes, sure enough, the familiar fax whine. Random scatter, my ass.
“Leave me alone,” she hissed, and ended the call.
“It was Jericho, wasn’t it?”
“No.”
“You’re shaking like a leaf.”
Her eyes hardened. “You were about to tell me what story you’re tracking this time.”
The writer sat back. “Jericho isn’t the story. The story is money. Lots of money. Where it all went.”
“What money is that, Mr. Clark?”
He seemed amused. “Know what your problem is? You have Jericho frozen in time. The national-security stuff. CIA. DOD. All of that. It’s what he did after that’s interesting. When he was a partner at—”
“Scondell Bloom,” she said tiredly “The private equity firm. Jericho was cleared of any wrongdoing—”
“I’m not saying he committed a crime. I’m not saying he breached any kind of fiduciary duty. I am interested, though, in how he got involved with a bunch of people who did both of those things.” He took another bite. “Here’s the thing, Beck. Jericho’s an old man. He’s dying. He wants to go out in a blaze of glory.”
About the same thing Dak told her. “So?”
“So I’m saying, whatever happened to Scondell Bloom, there’s more to it than meets the eye. That’s all.” Another sloppy bite. “Beck, look. Here’s the thing. Scondell Bloom Notting was the most powerful private equity shop in the world, and then, just like that, it vanished into thin air. How? Billions of dollars gone. Where?”
“Congress investigated. Grand juries. Jericho didn’t do anything—”
“Anything wrong. I know. You told me. But I’m not writing about Jericho. I’m writing about the firm.” His eyes were glowing with the intensity she now remembered from their college days. The cause did not matter. The intensity itself was his motive. “I think Jericho knows what took the firm down. Where the money went. And I think there are people who are afraid he’ll tell.”
The cell phone rang again. Beck did not even glance at it. The reporter paused in his tale, waiting for her to answer, because the bizarre modern conceit was that it was rude not to interrupt whomever you happened to be with to talk to whoever happened to call.
“Go on,” she said.
“I have sources, Beck. One of them says the firm was washing mob money.”
“Come on.”
“I’m not saying it’s true.” The phone was still ringing. Clark spoke slowly, in measured cadences, as if expecting her to correct her faux pas.
The ringing stopped.
“The mob,” she said, with patent disbelief.
“These days, the mob doesn’t have that much money. Not the American mob, anyway. But overseas? Crime syndicates are big. And Jericho—well, overseas was his specialty, wasn’t it?”
“You’re out of your mind if you think a man like Jericho Ainsley would—”
“Would what, Beck? Lie? Cheat? Manipulate people?” His fury was sudden, like a mountain storm. “You think all his contacts were nice congressionally vetted spies who go to Georgetown cocktail parties?”
Audrey stepped brightly into the restaurant, saving her from the necessity to answer. Lewiston Clark immediately turned his charm on her, but her tolerant smile said she knew his kind of old.
“I’ll get this,” said the reporter, still smiling, reaching for the bill.
“No,” said the nun, snatching it. “If you let him pay,” she told Beck, calmly, “you’ll feel beholden. The next time, it’s easier to get you to talk. That’s how these people work.”
People like reporters. Or interrogation specialists.
(iii)
Deputy Mundy and his partner pulled up outside just as Audrey and Beck were stalking out. Tony winked and walked on past. Pete lingered. “I was hoping to run into you. I heard you were in town.”
She eyed the van. “Hi, Pete. Look. I’m sorry. I have to get going.”
He looked appropriately crestfallen, the boyish earnestness hopeful behind the glasses. She had known that kind at Princeton, too: keep sweet, keep teasing, and sooner or later she’ll come around. “Oh. Too bad. And here I am on my break.”
Beck could not help smiling. “Goodbye, Pete,” she said.
He tipped his cap and started to turn away, the gesture reminding her that he was official. An idea struck her. She touched his hand.
“Actually,” she said, “it might be good if we had a talk.”
“Now?”
“No. Not now. I have my ride waiting.” She hesitated, remembering Garvey’s warning. But she was a big girl, and Pete was a big boy. “I’ll meet you here at eight-thirty”
She walked over to the van and climbed in.
The nun grinned as they pulled away. “I told you he likes you.”
“Stop it.”
“Pete Mundy, Lewiston Clark. I wonder who’ll be next?” She laughed. “You know what Dad says about you, Beck? He says you’re the kind of woman who when she’s seventy and she’s been married five times will still have all these guys lined up. He says you can snare a guy by raising your eyebrow—”
Rebecca slapped the shoddy dashboard with the flat of her hand, startling them both with her vehemence.
“Enough, okay? Enough! I want Jericho to stop. I want all of you to stop. I came here to say goodbye. That’s all. I came here to say goodbye, and I’m sick of being treated like it’s my fault Jericho’s dying.”
“I didn’t mean—”
“Look at me, Aud. No, look at me. I’m nobody. I don’t even have a degree. I dropped out of Princeton, remember? Moved in with your father, moved out a year or so later, spent the next year working hard to pick which drug to get high on every night. Jericho even dropped by to see me, ordered me to clean myself up. Very paternal. Got myself a new boyfriend, another druggie, wandered around Europe and Asia. Read palms in Edinburgh, waited tables in Greece, tended bar in Bangkok, did the Kathmandu trail, what was left of it. Came back, worked at McDonald’s, and nearly gave my mother a stroke. Worked in retail, moved up, and now I’ve reached my level of incompetence.” Audrey, alarmed at what her teasing had unleashed, was making ineffectual shushing noises. “Do you know what I do for a living, Aud? What I really do?”
“You’re an executive at—”
“Right. Some executive. I advise the folks who own my company whether to put the perfumes to the right or the left of the jewelry counter as you walk into the store. That’s what I’ve been doing for six years, and I’m not moving any higher on the letterhead. Along the way I married a total shit who turned out to have another couple of children with another couple of wives he never got around to mentioning. The only thing I care about in this world is my little girl. I don’t have any ambitions, and I don’t have any hopes. So get off my case, okay? I’ll be gone the day after tomorrow. I’ll be out of your hair.”
“I didn’t mean anything. I’m sorry.”
“I’m sorry, too.”
Except she wasn’t. Not really. Audrey was a psychologist who specialized in interrogation. And she was no fool. If she had goaded Beck into an explosion, it would not have been by accident. The nun wanted Rebecca angry. She wanted the engine stoked, fiery hot.
In the chilly silence as they climbed the mountain, Beck wondered why.
