The Big Scam (26 page)

At a few minutes past seven, Vanko was still working. He thought everyone else had gone, but when he looked up, Sheila was leaning against the doorjamb. “Garrett said the SAC pretty much gave you a blank check.”

Not used to being watched unnoticed, he involuntarily touched his face. As her eyes followed his hand, he realized what he was doing and let it drop casually. “A Mafia graveyard is a pretty easy sale.”

Sheila sat down. “Can I ask you something?”

“You're asking if you can ask a question? It must be brutal.”

“It is.”

He forced a smile. “Go ahead.”

“No, let's find someplace else to yell at each other, someplace where when we're done, we can leave it. What do you say we go get something to eat? How about Hattie's? I could use a beer.”

“You buying?”

“Didn't the SAC just give you a quarter of a million dollars?”

“From that look in your eye, I'm wondering if that's going to be enough.”

They sat at the same table near the kitchen. “How about a hamburger?” he offered.

Since leaving Iowa, she had given up eating beef. It was not a political or even health decision, but having eaten probably a good-size herd while growing up on a farm, she had become tired of the taste. Unfortunately a lot of men, especially those who gravitated to law enforcement, seemed to equate bloody meat with strength—not necessarily physical strength, but their own version of fortitude, the kind that allowed them to examine a gory crime scene with dark amusement or to charge recklessly through a door. Things that they sometimes found suspect in women; things she did not want to be questioned about. They sometimes looked at her like they couldn't figure out what a woman was doing in their midst. “Sure,” she answered.

He poured beer into their glasses and took a large swallow. He gaveled his glass against the table to announce he was ready. “Okay, fire away.”

She gave him an apologetic smile. “Have you ever seen a plastic surgeon?”

He thought he had girded himself against her unpredictability. He felt a sudden pervasive heat under his skin, which he preferred to attribute to the alcohol. “There's no half speed to you, is there? No, I haven't seen anyone,” he said with a trace of anger.

His lips pronounced the denial with unfamiliar contractions. There was also a quickness to his voice that she found suspect. “Whose fault was the accident?” Her words were flat, clinical, suspicious.

Although she seemed to be shifting directions, he was certain she wasn't. “I don't know.”

“Whose fault do
you
think it was?”

“I could have been more careful.”

“Were any charges brought against you?”

“No.”

“So there was no punishment?” Before he could answer, she said, “Except for what you have decided to do to yourself.”

His anger started to rise again. “I'm
punishing
myself by not going to a plastic surgeon?”

“Why else would you pass up a chance at a decent face?”

He laughed unconvincingly. “Are you saying there's something wrong with my face?”

“Please listen to me, Nick, because this is something I know about. If that's what you were given, then there's absolutely nothing wrong with it. But it's not the face you were born with. If you want to find a way to blame yourself for everything that goes wrong in life, we can all find something to feel guilty about.”

“What do you have to feel guilty about?”

“Not being beautiful. The way people, other than you, don't search my face with any sort of pleasure. Believe it or not, my mother was an extremely good-looking woman. I always thought she loved me unconditionally, but sometimes I would catch her examining my face, trying to figure out what went wrong. You understand what I'm saying. I mean, come on,
the Opera House
? You don't think they call it that because of the architecture, do you? You were out there doing a dangerous job. There's nobility in that. The way I look is more like a birth defect, like a kid in leg braces. My greatest contribution is making people thankful for what they have. I grew up a target. A good day for me, the best I could hope for, was to be ignored. That's a hell of a goal, isn't it? That's what I've had to feel guilty about. And I know what you're going to say—I shouldn't. And that's my point, you shouldn't either.”

“It's not like I'm home hiding in the basement. Since the accident, I like to think my life has been more productive. If my face were all right, that might not be the case.”

“You Greeks, none of you are missing that martyr gene. Nick, guilt is just another way we feel sorry for ourselves. Life is fucked up—end of mystery. Some people are just luckier than others, or as you Greeks see it, some are just
un
luckier than others. But life comes down to just two choices: either you control it, or it controls you.”

“Is that why you moved up to Harlem?”

“That's exactly why. More than my own superficial comfort, I want to solve this case. No compromises. No letting life tell me I can't play because I'm not pretty enough. Every day I get up and look in the mirror and ask myself, Am I larger than what I've been told? Am I better than I've been treated?”

Vanko had failed to confess that he had gone to a plastic surgeon two years earlier. When he was told that the damage could not be corrected, he felt both disappointment and a sense of relief. Until now he had never questioned his response. He had been embarrassed about the vanity that had caused him to go. He studied the crooked index finger on his left hand, the only other injury he had sustained that day. “Actually…I have been to the doctor.” He presented his face to her, cocking his head to expose its maximum damage. “It's official. Me and the mug? We're inseparable.”

She reached up and, with a touch so light he thought it might be his imagination, she traced the scar under his eye. “That's a good thing. I don't need you getting pretty and taking off on me.”

AFTER SUNDAY DINNER, MIKE PARISI AND ANTHONY
Carrera were drinking anisette on Carrera's screened-in porch. Although he still had some paralysis in his left arm and shoulder and needed a cane, the don was beginning to move with an unexpected degree of balance and speed. “It looks like you're mending pretty fast, Uncle Tony.”

“Keep that between us. If DeMiglia knew, he might try to speed things up. He's had a taste of being in charge and won't give it up without a fight.” Carrera watched Parisi for a moment. “I get the feeling that you're learning a lot of this on your own.”

Parisi considered discussing his reservations about continuing in the business, but with the don still recuperating, it would not only be inappropriate, but disloyal. He snorted a single
ha.
“I've learned more than I ever really wanted to.”

“Is he still pressuring you about the diamond robbery?”

“I've got him thinking about other things.”

“Like?”

“I'm sure you've heard the stories about Dutch Schultz's treasure.”

Carrera took a sip of his drink. “Sure. Why?”

Parisi told him about the map and Tommy Ida's seismic imaging idea. He explained how he had recruited an FBI agent and his subsequent Mafia graveyard ruse.

The old don laughed. “You're using the FBI to help? That takes nerve. There must have been more in those walnuts than I knew.” They both laughed now. “That treasure's just an old wives' tale.”

“I know it doesn't seem reasonable, but so far everything fits.”

“Hey, who knows? Stranger things have happened.”

“DeMiglia wants to find that box and at the same time make fools of the FBI.”

“Either one would give him a lot of juice with the commission. I've got to hand it to you, Mike, you've done a helluva job playing his weaknesses. Just remember, the higher he's riding now, the more he'll take it out on you when something goes wrong.”

“I understand,” Parisi said. “How much longer are you going to need?”

“Tomorrow, very quietly, some people are coming to see me. If this goes as I think, a week will be enough. Will your FBI friends and their machines take that long?”

“I'm not sure. We've been lucky to drag it out this long, and as we both know, good luck always runs out.”

“You learn quick. I'm sure you will find a way to give me the week. When this is over, we will send the FBI a thank-you note.”

 

“Chuck, the longer this goes, the more I'm inclined to let someone back at headquarters know. For as much as it gets bad-mouthed, covering your ass has stood the test of time,” Cal Winston said.

Lansing squeezed his hand into a fist behind his back. “Again, sir, there's no one who can guarantee it's not going to trickle back down here and blow up in our face. If that happens, the headline will be ‘FBI Scammed by Organized Crime.' If we make these arrests, it'll read ‘FBI Outscams Organized Crime.' To be honest, I think it's going extremely well. Although we don't know exactly what the mob is trying to dig up, we do know who's involved and where they're looking. Parisi and Egan are both under twenty-four-hour surveillance. We've got to keep going because all we have right now is me eavesdropping and the one surveillance of Egan meeting Parisi, which he could easily explain away by saying he was developing him as an informant. It's a reasonable explanation; his squad is assigned to that regime. Parisi could take the Fifth, and no one would blame him because, if he was an informant, he sure wouldn't want the world to know. No, I think this is the only way it'll work. If it does fall apart at the end, then you and I can walk away. No one knows anything except that the New York office wasted a lot of money believing some OC lightweight's tale about a Mafia graveyard. No one's going to notice a couple of Newark surveillance teams working over here for a couple of days. None of this will be our fault.”

Winston drummed his fingers on the table. “When is this seismic equipment showing up?”

“We're heading up there tomorrow morning. It's supposed to be in place by the time we arrive.”

“I guess the advantages significantly outweigh the risks. But you make sure you keep me posted. If this starts to smell, we're jumping ship.”

“I understand.”

 

Vanko went to the Global Fish office early Sunday to make some calls and double-check the arrangements for Phoenicia. Everything looked ready to go. A half hour later, he was driving through East Harlem. He tried to tell himself it had to do with the murder, but he knew it was because Sheila lived there. Did he think he was going to run into her? Probably some hopelessly adolescent part of him did.

The night before had not ended all that well. Burgers were ordered, which he didn't touch and she didn't finish. The conversation turned stilted and they both drank too much beer.

On the drive back to the office, he said, “I would have bet a million dollars we were going to get along.”

She smiled with her impenetrable confidence. “We are getting along.”

And now it was Sunday, a day designed to consider discontent, to find its cause and pledge its remedy. The traffic was light, and he coasted up to her building. In front of the corner bodega, a man in a suit stood preaching into a microphone. A black woman was dutifully listening while a little girl in a white dress held a tambourine waiting for the next song. He wanted to go up to Sheila's apartment and start over. But ten minutes later, as the minister's group started their song, he turned his Bureau car back toward the cave.

He dialed her number. “Hello,” she answered sleepily.

“Did I wake you?”

“A little. I stayed up late working.”

“Sorry. I don't know if you heard. The police picked up Maria Vargas yesterday.”

“Her parents called me last night,” Sheila said. “How'd you know?”

“T.H. sort of rounded her up.”

“On his own?”

“No.”

“And you couldn't tell me you were going to do that?”

“I was just trying to avoid the argument I'm pretty sure we're about to have.”

“Sounds like you still haven't figured out whether I'm crazy or not.”

“If there are other victims, we need to know exactly who they are.”

“If?
So you do think I'm delusional?”

“I'm on your side, remember?”

“Oh yeah, that's right. I don't know why I keep forgetting.”

“Sheila, you know we had to find out.”

“This doesn't change a thing. Seven girls are still missing.”

“That's right, now you have seven to concentrate on instead of eight.”

She wondered if she wasn't deluding herself. Maybe all the girls were runaways. But all the families had said the girls would never run away, even Maria Vargas. God, she was tired. “Okay, you've made your point. Just let me know up front if there's a next time.”

“I'll see you tomorrow.”

 

By six o'clock the next morning, the squad had assembled. Given the unpredictability of the day ahead, the group was relatively quiet, except for Jack Straker, who couldn't stand the thought of an audience being allowed to go fallow.

“Did I ever tell you guys about the time I was dating a mother and daughter?” Howard Snow looked over the lip of his coffee cup and rolled his eyes. “I'm sorry, Sheila,” Straker said, “it isn't too early for a little sex story, is it?”

“Where's that inspector? I want to change my plea to insanity.”

Straker laughed. “Okay then. This was six or seven years ago on Saint Paddy's Day. A bunch of people from the office used to turn out for the festivities after work. We're up at this Irish place in Queens and as the night wore on, there was this mother and daughter who both worked in the office. The daughter was just out of high school, working in indices, and the mother, a divorcée, who was extremely well-preserved—”

“Not that it would have mattered,” Snow interjected.

“Again with the sniper fire, Howie? Are you trying to break up with me?”

“Jack, it wouldn't have mattered if they were Cinderella's stepsisters. The reason you wanted to—and I'm
guessing
this is what happened—double team them was to add the evening to your fantasy résumé.” Snow started tearing the lip of his cup into a thin cardboard spiral.

“Isn't that why we all get up every day, to add to our résumés?” When no one answered, he said, “Anyway, in the shank of the evening, I find myself out in the parking lot with the daughter in my Honda while the mother's waiting for me in her van.” Straker beamed, Cheshire-like. “Can anyone guess what happened next?”

Sheila said, “You started cursing the Japanese for making your car too small?”

Everyone laughed. “You've never gotten over me kissing your hand that night, have you?”

“Neither me nor my mother.”

“You're dying to hear the end of this story, aren't you?”

“I'm guessing this episode fades to black as some body-shop employee tries to reconcile the excessive damage to your Honda with the story you gave the insurance company.”

Lansing walked in and everyone nonchalantly scattered to their desks. A few minutes later Vanko came out of his office carrying a large canvas utility bag. “T. H., you and Dick are picking up Baldovino, right?”

“In about twenty minutes.”

“Everybody here? Then let's get going.”

Despite the early hour, the heat and humidity were heavy again, and as they drove out of the city, the promise of the Catskills' cooler air seemed a good omen.

Two hours later, when the squad reached the search area, the equipment was in place. Egan hurried over to three men standing alongside the seismic recording truck reading some computer-generated charts. One of them identified himself as Dave Thornton, the retired agent who had set up the search. His voice was full of friendly Texas confidence.

“This is a helluva deal you've brought us in on. We're pretty sure this is going to work.” He introduced Egan to the other two, who were geophysicists. They shook hands with academic aloofness and went back to their charts.

Parked next to the large recording vehicle was an even larger truck carrying the sensors and cables. A third vehicle, off-loaded from a flatbed, had enormous wheels and a large piston suspended from the middle of the truck body. The piston would be raised to its highest position and released, sending a shock wave into the ground, which would then be picked up by the geophones and transmitted along the cables back to the recording vehicle.

Parked off by itself was a New York State Fish and Game SUV. Inside a dog cage in the back, a large black German shepherd prowled restlessly.

Vanko spread maps across the hood of his car and sent Jack Straker over to the officer, a stocky blond woman with a pleasant face.

Thornton said, “We've already fired some test shots and run some charts. We're up and ready to make some thunder. Just tell us where.”

“We'd like you to start about a quarter mile west of here and generally walk your charts in a west-northwest direction for about another two miles,” Vanko said.

He walked over to Crowe and Baldovino in the van. “Manny, have you thought any more about this?”

“All day yesterday. I'm afraid this is as close as I can get you.”

“All right, just sit tight while we see if this is going to work.”

Assuming he had finally accumulated enough camaraderie with Crowe, Baldovino asked, “What happened to his face anyway?” Crowe just stared at him with his heavy, penetrating eyes.

Baldovino watched all the activity with increasing apprehension. The oversized seismic equipment seemed like a tormenting dream, the point of no return Egan had warned against. No longer was this a game of busting FBI balls. Money and man-hours were being spent—retreat was no longer possible. He closed his eyes and summoned his father's image. Manny walked him through the story that had been given to the Feds. The thud of a body hitting the bottom of a hole. He could see his father slapping him on the back after the body was buried and telling him to be careful driving home. Now he could see sound waves snagging on body after body and charts filling up with human-shaped irregularities. He opened his eyes. Now he would be as surprised as anyone when no bodies were found.

Vanko checked to see if anything needed his attention. Sheila was talking to the Fish and Game officer and leaned down to pet her dog. Lansing had ridden up in one of the other cars. Normally managers wanted to be with whoever was in charge, to insulate themselves from the rank and file, their potential targets. He found him standing in a small group of agents, but he clearly wasn't paying attention to their conversation. He appeared to be watching Egan, who was twenty feet away. At one point Egan moved from the recording truck to the dog handler, and Lansing moved, too, to keep within earshot. Finally Vanko walked over to him. “Is something wrong?”