Middle Man (20 page)

“Does it matter if I laugh? Do you want me to believe in it?”

“Imagine if I let it go. If I pulled Aza away from it and he dropped it and never mentioned it to his children. In a short time, it would disappear, disappear forever. And we would never know if it could have happened. Never know if the kingdom could have been restored.”

“I don't mind the idea of a united Kurdistan. Means nothing to me. As for kings, if the boy is going to be one, it's from his father. You were married to one.”

She took my arm. “You could at least pretend to believe in royalty.”

“Why?”

“Then I would not mind liking you so much.”

We made love, affectionately this time, slow and easy. That was probably the last time. I boarded a plane for Los Angeles in the morning.

T
he stewardess is cute. Send back the wine so I can see what kind of personality she has.”

The flight was Dan time. He belonged in first class much more than I did. I told the stewardess the wine tasted wrong. She said, “I agree. I was waiting for someone to notice.” I don't know if she meant it, but her personality was fine. My mind was leaning toward corpses and royalty. I took the envelopes from my bag. Each came from an investment house in the U.S. Each one started with some version of “JB Limited in cust for Aza Karkukli Bannion.”
The first one I opened listed a current balance of about forty-two million dollars. The next was twenty-six million. The last was thirty-nine million. Aza was a nine-figure man.

“It's a great feeling, leaving money to your child,”
Dan said.

The stewardess asked, “Are you okay?”

I had choked on Dan's comment. I reassured her. She brought me water.

“It would have been more fun to take it away from the kid if he knew it was there.”

“You mean if he knew it was gone,”
I said
.

“Do you think Maya knew about the money?”

“I'm sure she did not know the boy received the envelopes. Bannion would never have let that out.”

“But she knew there was always money. Those rented mansions in Houston. Bannion's large staff of his boys. The supposed effort to obtain the throne for her father. She was around, had to hear talk of Saddam's stolen stash.”

“But if she knew, she would not have looked to me to help get money for the King. She would have just wanted Bannion killed.”

“Well, then.”

Dan did not deliver bad news. Dan allowed bad news to ripple naturally, through silence, preferably in his absence. I did not like thinking that Maya saw me as a potential assassin from the start, though it might have been the case, whether she knew about the money or not. As part of my self-indulgence I had assumed “savior” meant something noble. I was infatuated with an image of Maya, and an image of myself.

Consoling me, Dan said,
“She didn't carry on when Bannion died. If she thought she would be coming into all that money, she would have pretended that his death devastated her. Besides, no one knew but Bannion that the money wasn't in the graves. He loved her. But that's different from trusting her.”

I did not care if she knew or not. She was going to have to pretend that it was all legit money when the legal moves to recover the money hit her. She would consider it her sacred duty to fight for the treasury of United Kurdistan. I settled back in my seat, thinking of the curses and hatred that would be launched in my direction.

“Bannion's only mistake was relying on the consistency of the King. But it was hard to figure that guy would choose martyrdom.”

“If Bannion lived, I had him.”

“Did you? Dead Soldiers? Clever boy? He was going to take you for a tour of grave sites around the country. Oh, look, here's a million dollars. And here is a corpse. Maybe the money was removed. So sorry. And soon enough, you would be distracted enough for him to slip away. You know he had a plan to slip away. And if you handed him over, he would have melted his jailors in the palm of his hand because he would offer them a couple of fruitful graves he had not given you.”

“Stop.”
I knew Dan would see it Bannion's way.
“I would have gotten to the kid though I might have been too late.”
Why argue with him? I sat back and let the voice of one great artist explain the work of the better craftsman.

“I have to admit I'm envious, Rollie boy. I was there. I was there and I let it pass me by. Bannion must have had fun. He must have seen early on that once he pitched the plan to plant the money, everyone would relax their watch. I would bet he pulled a lot out and spread it around as mad money, maybe tens of thousands per, to make them feel big. Everyone had his eyes on the handouts. Then it became a matter of confusing the issue. Twenty-five million in the grave I dug up, and maybe one other, but lower amounts in others. It hypnotized even me. I saw one and closed my eyes to the possibility that there were others, many more. Half the graves that McColl or Frank had marked for money had bodies or who knows what. Same for your DS graves, you'll see. That way, if he had to give some up, he wouldn't lose big numbers. He had a private jet, lent it generously, of course. All the generals felt important. But when they weren't using it, Bannion loaded it up with cash and moved it to Switzerland. And from there to the U.S.”

“Some left in Switzerland? Some to burn in case he had to give it up?”

“Certainly.”

I started thinking about how Dan and Bannion thrived by starting ventures that must come to a bad end. No one could accuse them of being optimists. It wasn't visions of rosy futures that drove them. They were sensualists: slaves to the pleasure of deceit on a scale large and small. They found it irresistible. The inevitable pain was a lightning bolt at the horizon; there was no sense in running inside while the sun still shined.

Dan interrupted, moaning about the opportunity missed.
“I was there. I was there and I did not see the possibilities. I was stealing iPods.”
Dan had gone to hell.

“
But you walked away with twenty-five million dollars. More than anyone else besides Bannion.”

“If it were about the money, I would have spent it. And so would you. And so would you.”

I
received VIP treatment upon landing. An official from Immigration and Customs Enforcement, an ICEman, wearing a badge on his short-sleeve blue shirt, came on board and asked if he could carry my bag. We were first off the plane. One of his equally sour coworkers met us at the end of the ramp and they escorted me down many long corridors to a small room, a private room. I was allowed to enjoy the facilities for two hours. Free. Two different ICEmen came in and asked all about my trip.

“Have you ever seen the Citadel in Erbil? They say it's been inhabited for six thousand years. You really should go,” I said. “Unfortunately, I forgot to take pictures.”

ICEman One said, “Your passport stamps indicate that you entered Russia six months ago and China twice in the last three months. Can you explain this?” He mumbled it, as if he were nervously intruding on a stranger. His face was sallow and thin, and his belly fought with the buttons on his shirt.

“They must have stamped it when I entered there.”

ICEman Two said, “Who are you?”

“Whatever it says on my passport.” They looked at each other for a signal on how to take that. “Look, guys, I know you'd rather be scaring some old woman from India coming in to visit her grandchildren or stopping a couple from Africa from enjoying their vacation. I'm sorry to keep you from your fun. So why don't we agree that you tried your best, but I was uncooperative. And you can go about justifying having an assignment in this air-conditioned airport instead of the Nogales border station. Meet whatever quota you have for tears and fears. When you get the word that it's okay to release me, come and get me. Okay?”

“What did you mean when you said your name was on your passport?” ICEman One asked.

ICEman Two looked at him and stood up. “C'mon. Let's get out of here.” Then to me. “Someone will bring you water.”

ICEman One wasn't sure. ICEman Two waited at the door. ICEman One said, “I hope they keep you in here for days.”

That was the key to everything for that guy. He was stuck there and he wanted everyone else to share a piece of his misery and he hated them because they would all get out before he would. There was no use in rubbing it in. He knew.

Pongo and Perdy, Patterson and Pruitt to the Marines, met me when I came through customs. They were still MPs, still big, and still in uniform. Pongo carried the suitcase I had left behind in Erbil. If the Major intended to draw attention to my arrival, he succeeded.

“Major Hensel arranged for it to be sent,” said Pongo.

“Am I under arrest?”

“Do you want to be under arrest?” That was Perdy coming as close to a smile as he could.

I had not seen them since my last mission, when I learned that a baton pressed across my throat made a convincing argument, but I felt like I was reuniting with old friends. They called me Lieutenant, and with that I could feel Robert Hewitt fading into the background. That was fine, but the tension between soldier and spy welled up. Soldier felt like a cheat because in peace, at home, nothing was easier. And ease was an unwanted visitor. I was afraid of it. Afraid ease would make me wither. At home, time was a nice soft ride on a tram: nap time. Under cover, time became a roller coaster, stretching almost to a halt, careening through fog and darkness, chasing the light. The stuttering current of that life, the unpredictability, was like a puzzle injected directly into my eyeballs. I did not want to stop until I completed it: It could never be completed.

Pongo and Perdy took me to an office building just a few miles south of the airport. I told them what little I safely could about the graves and the money, and they were grateful for the update. I meant it when I said I would try to use them on my next mission.

They ushered me into a room where Major Hensel sat with two CIA men: Thompson and McCoy, late thirties, fit, lean, clear-eyed and ambitious: twins from different mothers. McCoy had a thick head of brown hair. Thompson kept his short. They were the opposite of the ICEmen I had just left. These guys believed they were in a great place and wanted to stay there. McCoy fixated on my bags. “Are those yours?”

The Major made the introductions. We did not shake hands. He ended by saying, “These gentlemen were responsible for your delay at the airport. They felt it was important to meet with you before you slipped away to attend to other matters.” He returned his attention to his iPad.

“We'll have to search those bags,” said Thompson.

Pongo and Perdy left. Major Hensel looked at me questioningly. I shrugged. The two CIA men searched through my bags, which contained the clothing Major Hensel had bought me in Chicago. From a side pouch, McCoy pulled two matching ski masks and held them up like a cop who found planted bags of dope. “And what have we here?”

“Souvenirs.” He set the masks on the desk. “Put them back,” I said. I did not mind them seeing the masks. It was Major Hensel seeing them that bothered me.

McCoy smiled at me, knowing he found a way to irritate me. He left the masks on the desk and so did I. Anger was erupting in me. I was looking at the room to plot my moves: kick McCoy, spin, slug Thompson, and so on. They were so easy to hate. But I decided to fight the anger rather than fighting those guys.

They put me on a couch so I sat low, and they pulled their chairs close. The Major sat in a chair on my right. Thompson showed me a small voice recorder he would be using.

McCoy started right in. “We had the situation in northern Iraq well in hand. You have destabilized the region and undone years of our work. The PKK is a terrorist organization. In the last two days, they have attacked a border station and blown up two oil rigs. They are terrorists and designated as such by the United States government and, let me mention, every European government. Hell, even the Australians hate them.”

“What do you have against Australians?”

“You will give us all the information you have about the PKK. Full descriptions of everyone you met. Locations. Every word of every conversation you had.”

I said nothing. Thompson said, “Start now.”

“I don't know where to start.”

“Start when you first contacted the PKK.”

“I never contacted the PKK.”

They looked at each other like prosecutors at their first trial.

“When you first met them.”

“I never met them.” I breathed deeply and kept my voice calm.

“The PKK assaulted a Regional Government facility and took you with them.”

“Was I at a government facility? Was that where they hung me up and electrocuted me?” Time to huddle again. I got up and repacked my bag. “You guys don't mind, do you?” We all sat down again.

McCoy tried again. “You led a raid on DS Security Services with a group of men suspected of being members of the PKK.”

“No one identified himself as PKK in all my time in Iraq.”

Thompson groaned and said, “You claimed to have given money to the PKK.”

Major Hensel said, without looking up, “That was part of a cover story on a classified intelligence mission.”

They went on, banging into the wall of my equanimity at different angles. The anger had dissipated. I felt refreshed. I kept expecting some mention of Gill, but his name never came up, so I gave it a try. “Do you guys know Gill? Big guy. CIA man. Thought you might know him.”

They denied knowing him. The Major decided the interview was over.

“This is not over,” Thompson said, to prove that he had given up.

Outside, Major Hensel said, “Nicely done. I thought you were going to confess to killing Gill. That's why I ended it.”

Will Panos was waiting for us at The Slammer, another sports bar featuring over ten million beers no one will every taste, near the pier in Manhattan Beach. The Major was as careful there as he had been at the French restaurant in Chicago. We sat at a high-back booth in the rear of the restaurant, far from the windows and the view. The TVs could not be avoided. Loud rock and roll from the seventies and eighties overwhelmed the buzz of basketball fans burping their opinions.

Will Panos and I sat across from the Major, whose choice of beer was called Delirium Tremens from Belgium supposedly.

“They only have three kegs in the back and they pour some flavoring into Bud and call it rare.”

“Maybe. I've been to this brewery, so maybe I'll be able to tell,” he said.

The waitress was young, with blond hair made bright by sun and peroxide or something similar. She was slim, but had chubby cheeks. Her eyes were light blue. Her teeth were white and smooth. At last I felt like I had arrived in Southern California. I wanted to flirt with her. Instead, I ordered a Dos Equis and a hamburger.

I asked the Major about Daisy.

“Casts on both arms and legs. We got her some help. She said she liked working with you.”

“Any investigation into Darrell White's death?”

“I'll get to that.”

“She thinks you're god,” I said.

“She said the same about you. Do you think that devalues it?”

I told the story, only leaving out Victor entirely. The Major opened the bank envelopes and looked over the figures. He put them away without comment.

Will reported that all the goons' names belonged to dead soldiers, but I had already figured that. “One of the graves is at Arlington. Three are in a private cemetery near Bishop.” I liked hearing that. “Will these graves have money in them or not?”

“Some will have money, some won't. Can't tell until they're dug up.”

Will squinted for a moment. The waitress delivered the beers. Will said, “If most of the graves did not have money, then why did they rush to dig one up right after Frank Godwin was shot? Why go after Frank at all?”

“Every lie needs a partner. The best lies are polygamists. Bannion was under pressure from his partners. Even his boys were tapping their feet. They wanted to start their revolution and they wanted to know when the seed money would reappear. Bannion could hardly say don't worry about the government because the money was never in the ground. He had to pretend he was fighting us for it. Racing us to it. It wasn't enough to kill Frank and say he betrayed us. They had to raid one grave and get caught to prove the government was in control. That way, Bannion could say they could carry on with the millions he wanted them to think he had already stashed in Erbil.” I paused to let Will digest that. “What was in that one they tried to raid?”

“Half a million,” the Major said.

“Just in case they managed to get away with it. But the result was that Bannion never had to worry again about anyone, someone like McColl, opening a grave and finding a body where there should have been money.”

Will said, “So Frank's list was a backup to McColl's list, which was a backup to another list, the DS list?”

“Yes. A big circle. All just in case. I rushed back to Wisconsin assuming Frank gave me bad information. Frank had given me what he had.”

The Major went back to Erbil. “When you passed through the tunnel and caught Bannion, why hadn't he run?”

“One of his boys had turned on him. Was waiting outside.”

“Why?”

This was the danger zone with Major Hensel: the simple question. My answer had to shut out further questions because Victor was my problem. I was not sharing him. I sipped my beer and took a bite of the burger and stole a French fry from Will. The short truth—money—would be the worst answer. It opened doors. This called for a long-winded lie, the kind that is transparent to people like Major Hensel.

“Bannion had fired him and never got around to paying him off. The goon had stopped by that night to collect and ran into the attack. When Bannion ran, this guy trapped him, not realizing what was really going on.”

At least the Major didn't laugh. I hoped he understood: What's the use of hiring a liar if you don't let him lie? I handed over the lists of officers and diplomats that Bannion had dictated. The Major pushed his plate away to look these over. I saw him wince a couple of times. “Carl Haberman is a close friend. So is General Wick.”

“With Bannion, it's safe to assume there will be some payback included. Some false leads.”

The Major put the lists in the inside pocket of his sport coat. He shook his head. “We have to treat it as real.” He was not happy. I told him about Colonel Hoyle, too. Nobody was happy.

The waitress cleared the plates and asked if we wanted fresh beers. The Major ordered another round. I watched her walk away.

Will said, “Kristen is coming down to Pendleton for a visit. With her daughter.”

“When?” I was too quick, too tense.

“Why?”

“I might need your help.”

The Major changed the subject. “The FBI thinks you killed Darrell White. The secretary identified you. Said you had visited the office. They want you for a lineup. Someone saw the body being carted down the street. Naked, apparently.”

“He couldn't decide what to wear.”

“Agents Hanrihan and Sampson are going to be looking for you. Expect them. I've managed to make it clear to the FBI leadership that the graves are none of their business. But if you show up at the graves, they will show up and I can't stop them.”

I said, “It would help if you went back to Frank's list and dug those up first and left the DS graves for a little while.”

He leaned forward and stayed that way and stared right at me. The lights bounced off his glasses, keeping me from a good look at his eyes except to tell they were not moving. I thought he was going to reassign me or order me not to pursue any loose ends. My side of the booth sank a few inches into the concrete floor.

“One of the graves on your fake list was dug up last night. Would that be Victor Kosinski doing that?”

I looked daggers at Will, but he was as astonished as I was.

“Will did not tell me. Was Victor the goon shooting at Bannion?”