The Icarus Agenda (64 page)

“ ‘Screw Carew,’ ” said Kendrick, chuckling. “That was Manny’s comment. We bought some sounding devices that didn’t work, and they still wanted payment after we sent them back.”

“ ‘Drucker Graphics, Boston,’ the representative, a G. R. Shulman. Anything?”

“Gerry Shulman, good man, good service; we worked with them for years. Never a problem.”

“ ‘Morseland Oil, Tulsa.’ The rep was someone named Arnold Stanhope.”

“I told you about him—them.”

“Tell me again.”

“We did preliminary surveying for them in the Emirates. They kept wanting more than they were willing to pay for, and since we were growing, we could afford to drop them.”

“Was there acrimony?”

“Sure, there always is when chiselers find out they can’t do business as usual. But there wasn’t anything silence couldn’t cure. Besides, they found some other jokers, a Greek outfit who caught on to them and delivered a survey that must have been made on the floor of the Oman Gulf.”

“Freebooters; every one of you,” said Khalehla, smiling and lowering her hand on the printout. “ ‘Off Shore Investments, Limited, headquarters Nassau, the Bahamas, contact Ardis Montreaux, New York City.’ They funneled a lot of capital to you—”

“Which we never touched because it was a sham,” interrupted Evan sharply. “It better damn well say that there.”

“It says here, ‘Skip it.’ ”

“What?”

“I wrote it. It’s what you said before, ‘Skip it.’ What’s Off Shore Investments, Limited?”

“
Was
,” corrected Kendrick. “It was a high-class boilerplate operation on the international scale—high-class and international but still boilerplate. Build a company up with large Swiss accounts and hot air, then sell off and switch the assets, leaving the buyers with a balloon full of helium.”

“
You
got mixed up with something like that?”

“I didn’t know it was something like that. I was a lot younger and impressed as hell that they wanted to list us as part of their structure … even more impressed with the money they banked for us in Zurich. Impressed, that is, until Manny said ‘Let’s try to get some, just for the hell of it.’ He knew exactly what he was doing; we couldn’t pull out two francs. Off Shore’s signatures controlled all withdrawals, all assignments.”

“A dummy setup and you were the dummies.”

“That’s it.”

“How did you get involved?”

“We were in Riyadh, and Montreaux flew over and conned me. I hadn’t learned that there weren’t any shortcuts—not that kind.”

“Ardis Montreaux. Ardis.… That’s an odd name for a man.”

“Because it’s not a man—she’s not a man. She’s a lot tougher.”

“A woman?”

“Believe it.”

“With your innate skepticism she must have been very persuasive.”

“She had the words. She also wanted our heads when we
pulled out; she claimed we were costing them millions. Weingrass asked her whose millions this time.”

“Perhaps we should—”

“Skip it,” Evan broke in firmly. “She married an English banker and lives in London. She’s faded.”

“How do you know?”

Showing minor embarrassment, Kendrick answered quickly and quietly. “She called me a couple of times … as a matter of fact to apologize. Skip it.”

“Sure.” Khalehla went on to the next firm on the printout. As she spoke she wrote two words after Off Shore Investments, Limited.
Check out
.

Ardis Montreaux Frazier-Pyke Vanvlanderen, born Ardisolda Wojak in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, walked into the marble foyer of the suite at the Westlake Hotel in San Diego. She threw her sable stole over the back of a velour chair and raised her voice, her speech a cultivated mid-Atlantic, rather more nasal stage British than old-money American, but still afflicted with the harsh tones of Monongahela Slavic in the upper registers.

“
Andy
-boy, I’m home! We’ve got less than an hour to get up to La Jolla, so
move
it, sweetie!”

Andrew Vanvlanderen, heavyset, with stark white wavy hair and dressed in a tuxedo, walked out of the bedroom, a drink in his hand. “I’m ahead of you, babe.”

“I’ll be ready in ten minutes,” said Ardis, peering into a foyer mirror and fingering the curls of her perfectly coifed frosted brown hair. She was closing in on fifty and of medium height but gave the impression of being younger and taller due to erect posture, a slender figure topped by generous breasts, and a well-coordinated face punctuated by large, penetrating green eyes. “Why not call for the car, sweetie?”

“The car can wait. So can La Jolla. We’ve got to talk.”

“Oh?” The Vice President’s chief of staff looked over at her husband. “You sound serious.”

“I am. I had a call from your old boyfriend.”

“Which one, darling?”

“The only one who counts.”

“Good God, he called
here
?”

“I told him to—”

“That was dumb, Andy-boy, just plain
dumb
!” Ardis Vanvlanderen walked rapidly, angrily out of the foyer and down into the sunken living room. She sat in a red silk wing chair and
abruptly crossed her legs, her large eyes riveted on her husband. “Take risks with money—on commodities or futures or your stupid horses or any goddamned thing you like, but
not
where I’m concerned! Is that understood, darling?”

“Listen, bitch—
Dragon
Bitch—with what I’ve paid out, if I want firsthand information I’m going to get it. Is
that
understood?”

“All right, all right. Cool off, Andy.”

“You start a rhubarb and then you tell
me
to cool it?”

“I’m sorry.” Ardis arched her neck back into the chair, breathing audibly through her open mouth, her eyes briefly closed. In seconds she opened them, leveled her head, and continued. “Really, I’m sorry. It’s been a particularly rotten Orson day.”

“What’s Viper done now?” asked Vanvlanderen, drinking.

“Be careful with those names,” said his wife, laughing softly. “We wouldn’t want our all-American gorillas to learn they’re being bugged.”

“What’s Bollinger’s problem?”

“He’s feeling insecure again. He wants a written ironclad guarantee that he’ll be on the ticket next July or we settle ten million on him in a Swiss account.”

Vanvlanderen coughed a swallow of whisky into his glass. “Ten
million
?” he gasped. “Who the fuck does that comedian think he is?”

“The Vice President of the United States with a few secrets in his skull,” replied Ardis. “I told him we wouldn’t accept anyone else, but it wasn’t good enough. I think he senses that Jennings doesn’t consider him a world-beater and would let him go.”

“Our beloved telegenic wizard, Langford Jennings, hasn’t a goddamned thing to say about it!… Is Orson right?
Does
Jennings dislike him?”

“Dislike’s too strong. He just dismisses him, that’s what I hear from Dennison.”

“
That
one’s got to go. One of these days Herb’s going to get more curious than we want him—”

“Forget him,” interrupted Mrs. Vanvlanderen. “Forget Dennison and Bollinger and even your stupid horses. What did my straying, cat-hunting old boyfriend have to say that was so important you had him call here?”

“Relax. He phoned from my Washington attorney’s office; we share the same firm there, remember? But first, let’s
not
forget
Orson. Give him his guarantee. A simple sentence or two and I’ll sign it. It’ll make him happy and happy is better.”

“Are you
crazy
?” cried Ardis, bouncing forward in the chair.

“Not at all. To begin with, he’ll
be
on the ticket or he’ll just disappear … like former vice presidents usually do.”

“Oh, my,” said Ardis, drawing out the word
my
in admiration. “You’re my kind of fella, Andy-boy. You think so clearly, so succinctly.”

“Long years of learning, babe.”

“Now, what did mixed-up old Dimples have to say? Who’s after his sensitive skin now?”

“Not his,
ours
—”

“Which is his and don’t you forget it. It’s why I’m here, lover, why he introduced us and brought us together.”

“He wants us to know that the little group of deluded super people are moving into high gear. During the next three months their congressman will start getting editorials in progressively stronger papers. The theme will be ‘examining his positions’ and he’ll pass all the exams. The point, of course, is to create a ground swell. Our Cupid is worried, very worried. And to tell you the truth I’m sweating a few bullets myself. Those benevolent lunatics know what they’re doing; this whole thing could get out of control. Ardis, we’ve got
millions
riding on the next five years. I’m
goddamned
worried!”

“Over nothing,” said his perfectly coiffed wife, getting out of her chair. She stood for a moment and looked at Vanvlanderen, her wide green eyes only partially amused. “Since you figure to save ten million on Bollinger one way or another—and
my
way is better, certainly safer, than any alternative—I think it’s only reasonable that you bank an equal amount for me, don’t you, darling?”

“Somehow I fail to see the overpowering reason.”

“It could be your undying love for me … or perhaps one of the more extraordinary coincidences of my career floating among the rich, the beautiful, the powerful and the politically ambitious, especially in the area of government largess.”

“How’s that again?”

“I won’t recite the litany of why we’re all doing what we’re doing, or even why I’ve cast my not inconsiderable talents with you, but I will now let you in on a little secret I’ve kept all to myself for, lo, these many weeks.”

“I’m fascinated,” said Vanvlanderen, putting his drink down
on a marble table and closely observing his fourth wife. “What is it?”

“I know Evan Kendrick.”

“You
what
?”

“Our brief association goes back a number of years, more than I care to dwell on, frankly, but for a few weeks we had something in common.”

“Outside of the obvious, what?”

“Oh, the sex was pleasant enough but immaterial … to both of us. We were young people in a hurry with no time for attachments. Do you remember Off Shore Investments?”

“If he was part of that outfit, we can nail him with fraud! Certainly enough to take him out if he climbs on board.
Was
he?”

“He was, but you can’t. He pulled out in loud moral indignation, which was the start of that house-of-cards’ collapse. And I wouldn’t be too anxious to nail Off Shore’s principals unless you’re tired of me, sweetie.”

“
You?
”

“I was the main missionary. I recruited the components.”

“I’ll be
damned.
” Vanvlanderen laughed as he picked up his drink and raised the glass to his wife. “Those thieves sure as hell knew whom to hire for the right jobs.…
Wait
a minute. You knew Kendrick well enough to sleep with the son of a bitch and you never
said
anything—”

“I had my reasons—”

“They better be damned
good
!” exploded the President’s heavy contributor. “Because if they’re not, I may just break your ass, you
bitch
! Suppose he saw you,
recognized
you, remembered Off Shore and put two and two together and got
four
! I don’t
take
those kinds of chances!”

“It’s my turn to say ‘Relax,’ Andy,” countered the contributor’s wife. “The people around a vice president aren’t news or even newsworthy. When’s the last time you can recall the name of any individual on a vice president’s staff? They’re a gray, amorphous group—
presidents
won’t have it any other way. Besides, I don’t think my name’s even been in the papers except as ‘Mr. and
Mrs
. Vanvlanderen, guests at the White House.’ Kendrick still thinks I’m Frazier-Pyke, a banker’s wife living in London, and if you remember, although both of us were invited to the Medal of Freedom ceremony, you went alone. I begged off.”

“Those aren’t reasons! Why didn’t you
tell
me?”

“Because I knew what your reaction would be—take her out of the picture—when
I
realized I could be far more useful to you in it.”

“How, for Christ’s sake?”

“
Because
I knew him. I also knew I had to get current on him, but not with some private investigating firm that could end up burning us later, so I took the official high road. The Federal Bureau of Investigation.”

“The threats against Bollinger?”

“They’ll stop tomorrow. Except for one man who’ll continue here on a special basis, the unit will be recalled to Washington. Those mocked-up threats were the paranoid fantasies of a harmless lunatic I invented who supposedly fled the country. You see, sweetie, I found out what I had to know.”

“Which is?”

“There’s an old Israeli Jew named Weingrass whom Kendrick worships. He’s the father Evan never had, and when there was the Kendrick Group he was called the company’s ‘secret weapon.’ ”

“
Munitions?
”

“Hardly, darling,” laughed Ardis Vanvlanderen. “He was an architect, a damned good one, and did pretty spectacular work for the Arabs.”

“What about him?”

“He’s supposed to be in Paris, but he’s not. He’s living in Kendrick’s house in Colorado, with no passport entry or any official immigration status.”

“So?”

“The soon-to-be-anointed Congressman brought the old man back for an operation that saved his life.”

“
So?
”

“Emmanuel Weingrass is going to have a medical relapse that will kill him. Kendrick won’t leave his side, and when it’s over it’ll be too late. I
want
the ten million, Andy-boy.”

Varak studied the members of Inver Brass, each face around the table reflected in the light of the brass lamp in front of him—and
her. The Czech’s concentration was strained to the limit because he had to focus on two levels.

The first was the information he delivered; the second was on the immediate reaction each had to certain facts within that information. He had to find one pair of eyes that were suspect and he could not find them. That was to say, there were no momentary flashes of astonishment or fear on the faces of the members as he gradually, logically approached the subject of the current Vice President of the United States and his staff, touching ever so lightly on the “innocuous” details he had learned from a Mafia plant in the Secret Service. There was nothing, only blank riveted stares. So while he spoke with conviction and conveyed roughly 80 percent of the truth, he kept watching their eyes, the second level of his mind recalling the salient facts of the life behind each face reflected in the light.