Conspiracy (16 page)

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"You're not an American citizen. An alien can't own a wine business, and that's not all that was illegal about your purchase."

"I didn't purchase anything."

"Good. You can tell that to the judge in Houston who sentenced you for the SEC violation. For a second offense you're certain to go to jail. Prisons in Texas are wonderful places. You'll enjoy yourself, and some of the other prisoners will enjoy you, too."

This time Azziz didn't have a sarcastic comeback. Intimidation usually worked sooner or later, Cady had found over the years.

"I want to talk to my lawyer first."

"I'll give you two hours. I'll be there at nine-fifteen. And don't plan on leaving the house. They have it surrounded, and they will arrest you."

Cady hung up and winked at Gorman. Round one had worked according to plan.

* * *

Precisely at nine-fifteen, Gorman dropped Cady in front of Azziz's house. He was alone when he climbed the stone stairs and passed the statue of a woman with her privates painted pea green, just as Paul Moore had remembered. He had a beeper in his jacket pocket to call for help if someone tried to strong-arm him.

A frightened young Latino woman in a black maid's uniform opened the door. He guessed she had answered the phone this morning. She didn't say a word. Instead she pointed to the vast living room of the mansion. A dapper, distinguished gray-haired man in a blue polo shirt, navy slacks, and a gold chain around his neck was standing in front of the window. Hearing Cady approach, he wheeled around. "What kind of shit is this?"

"You must be Joe Hughes, Azziz's lawyer. I'm C. J. Cady, assistant U.S. attorney in Washington."

"You ever heard of the Bill of Rights, Cady?"

"Rest it, Hughes; your client's scum. You got him off easy once. You'll never be able to pull it off again."

"You mind telling me what this is all about?"

"He's an alien who bought a winery. That's illegal."

"He never bought a winery."

"Maison Antibes was a dummy corporation to hide his ownership. If the corporate people in your firm did the legal work, they could be in trouble as well."

The man wasn't going to back off an inch. "You got my attention, Cady, but I also know you're not into alcohol law enforcement. Now, tell me what this is really about."

Cady decided to go on the offensive, hit them hard first. "Your client paid fifty million dollars for a business worth ten million."

"So he made a bad deal for himself. I didn't realize that had become a federal crime."

Bingo,
Cady thought. Hughes didn't take issue with the fifty-million-dollar figure. That made him believe the information in the file dropped in his office was right, that Boyd had received fifty million. Now all he had to do was nail it down with credible evidence. Perhaps he wasn't out here on a fool's errand, after all.

Concealing his emotions, Cady regarded Hughes as though he were the lowest of scum. "The man he bought Mill Valley from was running for Congress at the time, and the seller needed the money for his campaign. If you require more than that, I'll draw you a picture."

"What do you want from Abdul?"

"Just to talk to him. That's all right now."

"Informally like this? The three of us?"

"Nope. Under oath and with a court reporter present."

"He doesn't have to talk to you. You don't have a subpoena."

"I can convene a grand jury Monday morning if I have to. You'll have your subpoena by noon today. And instead of doing this in the comfort of Mr. Azziz's living room, with you here, we can do it in the U.S. courthouse downtown without you present and with the reporters having a carnival on Temple Street." Cady shrugged his shoulders. "It's all the same to me. It's like shooting craps. I can make my point the easy way or the hard way."

"You really want to get Senator Boyd, don't you?"

Cady bristled. That wasn't his objective, though he realized that would be the inference people would draw. "I'm trying to do my job."

"And I'm trying to do mine. My client will talk to you if you'll give him immunity. Total immunity from any charges growing out of the Mill Valley transaction ten years ago, including the alien ownership business."

Cady hated making the deal Hughes was asking. It meant that to prosecute Senator Boyd, he had to let Azziz escape all charges. Realistically, though, this was where he had expected to end up when he saw Hughes. With somebody less experienced, they would have haggled for a while, and Cady would have been able to cut a better deal for the government. He could turn Hughes down and try to see if he was bluffing.

Before responding, Cady studied Hughes's face. The hard, cold stare that locked eyes with him told him that Hughes wasn't bluffing. In the end, Cady would have to back down. That wouldn't help him in questioning Azziz. Besides, he disliked negotiating when the result was obvious.

"If I give you the kind of immunity you want," Cady said, "then Azziz answers every question I ask. I don't want any claims of privilege or crap like that. And if he lies, the immunity's off and I go for perjury."

"I think we can live with those terms, but I'll have to talk to my client before I can give you a final answer."

"Understood." Cady felt as if he were on a roll. "And one other thing. I get to bring him to Washington, if I need him live before a grand jury."

Hughes hesitated.

"It's a deal breaker for me," Cady said.

"I'll recommend it to my client."

"If he goes along, you've got a deal for immunity. You have my word on it."

Hughes shook his head. "That's not good enough. I need it in writing from Sarah Van Buren, the assistant attorney general in charge of the Criminal Division in Washington. I don't want to hear later that you didn't have authority."

Cady reached into his jacket pocket and extracted the fax of a two-page letter he had received from the assistant attorney general about three hours ago. With Cady's reputation and the fact that it was Sunday morning, he'd been able to obtain the letter from Washington without having to give an explanation about the investigation. He handed the fax to Hughes, who studied it carefully.

"I'll talk to my client," he finally said.

Cady went over to the front window and waved. A redheaded court reporter dressed in a smart beige suit with a short skirt emerged from the back of one of the unmarked black cars. Her name was Kelly, and she was about twenty-five, Cady guessed. She was carrying Cady's briefcase in one hand and a case with a mini-word processor in the other.

She set up in the living room on a hard-backed chair halfway between where Cady told her he would be and where he planned to put Azziz.

"Sorry to drag you out of bed so early Sunday morning," Cady said, trying to pass the time until Hughes and Azziz appeared.

"Ah, don't worry," Kelly replied. "It was a good excuse to stick my husband with the kids."

They both laughed. His eyes strayed to her legs. She had great legs, and with her short skirt hiked up, there wasn't much of them that he couldn't see.

Cady heard footsteps and voices. He stood up and looked toward the door. If Cady had two words to describe Abdul Azziz, they would be
fat
and
ugly.
The thick brown mustache didn't do much to enhance his appearance.

"We have a deal," Hughes said. "Under the terms you outlined."

"Good, let's get started, then. Kelly, swear the witness."

Working from notes on a yellow pad, Cady rolled through Azziz's background. Fifteen minutes into his examination he was ready to ask about the Mill Valley transaction. "Mr. Azziz, did there come a time about ten years ago when you purchased Mill Valley Winery in Napa Valley?"

"No, I never purchased that winery," he answered coldly.

"Did a French company by the name of Maison Antibes purchase Mill Valley Winery?"

"I believe so."

"And what was your relationship to Maison Antibes?"

Azziz looked at Hughes, who said, "You may answer the question."

Azziz coughed and cleared his throat. "I owned all of the stock of Maison Antibes."

"And who was the seller of Mill Valley in that transaction?"

"Mr. Charles Boyd."

"Of Rutherford, California?"

"Yes."

"What was Mr. Boyd's business at the time?"

"He owned the winery."

"What else was he doing?"

"I don't understand."

"Was he running for public office?"

"Yes, he was running for a seat in Congress against Chris Broder."

Cady picked up immediately on the venom in Azziz's voice when he mentioned Broder's name.

"Mr. Broder was then the congressman from that district, wasn't he?"

"Uh-huh."

"In connection with this transaction, did you ever have occasion to meet personally with Charles Boyd?"

"Yes, once."

"When was that?"

"When we agreed on the price."

"Who else was present?"

"No one."

"Didn't Mr. Boyd have a real estate agent?"

"Yes."

"Who was he?"

"A Jew. I don't remember his name."

"Was it Harvey Gladstone?"

"That's the one."

"Was he at your meeting with Boyd when you agreed on price?"

"No, I met with him earlier. Not at the important meeting with Boyd."

"Coming back to that meeting, describe how your discussion went with Mr. Boyd on price."

"He told me that he wanted ten million dollars for the winery, the business and the land. Everything."

"What did you say?"

"I told him that I would pay fifty million."

"Isn't that unusual, to offer five times the asking price?"

"I wanted him to have plenty of money for his congressional campaign."

"Why?"

"That son of a bitch Chris Broder was a tool of the Zionists. He was the ranking Republican on an important congressional committee, and he always agreed to give Israel everything they wanted. It was important for Broder to lose. With money, lots of money, Boyd could win."

"Did Boyd know this was why you were paying so much money? So he could defeat Congressman Broder?"

"He knew."

"What makes you so sure?"

"I told him."

"You told him what?"

"He was surprised by what I was prepared to pay. He said he thought maybe he shouldn't ask why that was. And I told him, 'I want you to win the election. I want Broder to lose. He's a slave of the Israelis.' I wanted Boyd to know this."

"Why?"

"Because I wanted Boyd to know that if he took the money, I expected him to be a good boy and vote against the Israelis in Congress."

"And did he do that?"

Azziz wrinkled up his forehead. "Sometimes yes and sometimes no. It could have been worse without my money, and at least he wasn't in a position of power like Broder on that foreign-affairs committee. So I got something from the deal."

"Did Boyd promise you at that meeting that he would vote against Israel?"

"No, but he knew why he was getting the extra forty million dollars. He's a smart man. He understood."

"Did you ever talk to Boyd after that meeting?"

"No."

"After he was elected, did you ever try to influence Boyd in any way?"

"I didn't have to. He knew what our arrangement was."

"Returning to the one meeting you had with Charles Boyd, did he accept your fifty-million-dollar offer?"

"Not at first."

"What do you mean?"

"When I told him why I wanted to pay so much, he said he had to think about it. He said that because of the campaign laws that limit political contributions, he could have a problem with the transaction."

"What did you say?"

"I told him, 'You must decide now. If I walk out of this room, the offer is withdrawn, and you'll never see me again.'"

"You're a good negotiator, Mr. Azziz."

"Your American elections are like a bazaar. You think only the Jews are good in business?"

Cady paused to look over his notes, making sure he hadn't missed anything.

"One other question. Has anybody other than me or Mr. Hughes ever asked you about the matters we have been discussing?"

"No one," Azziz said firmly.

"Never?"

"Never."

"That concludes the testimony."

Cady turned to Hughes. "I'm finished. The court reporter will print out the testimony. I want it read and signed by Mr. Azziz, right now, before I leave."

"Is that necessary?"

"Why, you have a golf date?"

"As a matter of fact, I do."

Cady shook his head in disgust. "Don't worry; I've got a two-thirty plane to Washington. I don't intend to screw around."

"Okay, okay, don't get huffy. I'll push back my tee time."

Not only did she have great legs, Cady thought, but Kelly was one fine court reporter. Less than an hour later, Azziz was picking up a pen to sign and verify his testimony.

As Cady tucked it into his briefcase, Hughes walked him and Kelly to the door. There he handed Cady his card. "You'll send me a copy," Hughes said.

"First thing tomorrow morning."

"You should be happy. You've got a cold-turkey violation by Boyd. Just what you wanted."

Cady wasn't happy. Sure, the Azziz testimony confirmed what was in the package delivered to his office, but Azziz had no credibility. A jury would never believe Azziz against the word of Senator Boyd. Cady also had the computer printout from the Napa County tax office, but Taylor was a good lawyer. She would tear into it because of the missing backup. Even if the purchase price was ridiculously high, she would argue that a French company desperate for a foothold in America was the purchaser. Foreigners frequently overpaid in situations like that.

Cady knew he needed Gladstone, live and in Washington. Without Gladstone, he didn't have a case he could take to a grand jury.

 

 

 

Chapter 12