Disappearance (33 page)

"Makes sense," she said and looked anxiously at her watch. They had been there for six minutes. She could not stay much longer.

Mikki took a piece of paper out of his breast pocket and unfolded it, showing it to her.

"These are the names and car license numbers.   Check 'em out.  Pay special attention to Cascade Realty.  That may lead us somewhere.  Oh, and don't forget Mr. Campour, though I doubt that's his real name."

"Shall we just go on as if nothing happened?" she asked.

"Yes, that's exactly what we should do.  We may have gotten a leg up on these guys after last night, and with this information we may uncover even more.  I'll disappear for a while, while you follow up on this.   That'll give me a little freedom to follow up on whatever you find out."

"Are you sure you got rid of them?"

"I think so.  I never went back to the inn.  I called Larry, the night attendant, and asked him to bring my luggage to the Burger King when his shift was over.  I gave him a nice fifty dollar tip for his trouble and he didn't ask any questions. Then I came here."

"Where did you spend the night?" she asked.

"In the car at the Burger King."

"My poor hero," she teased him and patted his cheek.

He caught her hand and brought his forefinger to his lips signaling her to hush.  They both heard footsteps approaching their cubicle.  Someone entered the adjacent cubicle.  They held their breath, smiling silently as the invisible lady relieved herself.  Lisa checked her watch again.  She was cutting it close.

They heard the lady leave.  The sound of her footsteps diminished then halted and the sound of running water emanated from a distant faucet.

"They'll track me down eventually," Mikki said.

"What'll we do then?" Lisa asked.

"We'll become a diversion and bring in the troops."

"Sarah?"

"And possibly Eitan; can you afford it?"

She waved her hand in dismissal.  

"Small change," she said then added: "and stop concerning yourself with my money. I'll let you know when it becomes an issue."

"Better go," he said to her, gesturing at his watch.

"You are sticking with the plan?"  she asked.

"Yes! San Jose. I'm meeting Eckert's man tomorrow."

"Call me," she said.

"Not at your apartment or office. You have any ideas?"

She considered the problem a moment twisting her lips to one side.

"Call Eckert's secretary and leave a number.  Give me fifteen minutes to call you from a pay phone."

He nodded.

"Take care," she said squeezing his hand, then slipped out of the cubicle.

Twenty minutes later he made his way toward the parking lot and watched the heavy L-1011 take off for New York.

CHAPTER 33

Carl G. Johnson was a tiny man who had a peculiar way of addressing people taller than himself.  Since most were, he would address them in short, muddled spurts, never quite looking at them but rather at a point somewhere beyond one of their shoulders.   That caused people to want to lower themselves to his level.

His height deficiency intensified his need to be in control and he made a point of being extra assertive in his encounters with people.

Mikki met him at a Hamburger Hamlet in downtown San Jose.    Johnson, his puny physique immaculately dressed, moved around with an aura of authority.  The hostesses all seemed to know him and treated him with respect.   He muttered a few sentences to Mikki while they waited to be seated, but it was not until they sat directly across from one another that Mikki could comprehend what he was saying.

"Know the ground rules?" 
he asked after they had ordered their drinks.

Mikki nodded, took out a sealed envelope and passed it to Johnson who discreetly checked its contents under the table. Satisfied, he stuffed the envelope inside his suit pocket and took a long gulp from his iced tea. Then he began talking.

He and Langone had worked together, twelve years back, when Langone headed his department at a major Wall Street brokerage firm. Johnson, just out of business school and eager to prove himself, attached himself to Langone and quickly became a favored son of sorts.  Three years later, when Langone left to form his own investment banking firm, he offered Johnson a position which Johnson politely turned down thinking he could do better on his own.  He became an independent broker and later collaborated with Langone on various lucrative financing deals.

When one of their combined deals went sour, Johnson lost two major clients and, shortly after, his entire business. Johnson convinced himself that Langone, who had a reputation for holding a grudge, never forgave him for turning down his job offer, and had set him up for a fall.  He confronted Langone in the presence of his
clients, accusing him of rigging the deal for revenge.  But Langone irreverently dismissed the accusations making Johnson seem the fool, stripping him of any shred of respect in the eyes of his two most important clients.

Johnson never forgave him for that. With two young boys and a pregnant wife he could not afford to stay unemployed for long so he accepted the accounting job.

That all happened five years ago.  Since then, Johnson had made it his personal business to follow Langone's movements, waiting for an opportunity to avenge his humiliation. Through old contacts and by his own personal knowledge and experience, he kept score of Langone's dealings, the questionable ones in particular.

It was at that point that Mikki brought up Matlock and the name indicated by Sarah as the one noted on the office building Glass had visited in Paris, Krausse-Hauser.

Johnson's eyes lit up at the mention of the latter.  He dug into his filet mignon and ordered some more iced tea before going on.

Krausse-Hauser was an Austro-German company based in Paris with offices in every European city with a major stock exchange.  One of the largest and most influential investment banking firms in Europe, they helped finance projects ranging from underground train systems to telecommunication enterprises to old folks homes, using sophisticated joint ventures and mergers that left them healthy profits and a large share of the business.

Langone's company, Barons Investments, which operated in similar fashion in the US, was stoutly tied to the European conglomerate through a series of cooperation agreements and financial commitments which essentially rendered each company as each other's representative in their respective continents.

Their primary collective business interests were financing arms deals to third world countries.

"There were a host of rumors and speculations as to the nature of their arms business,”   Johnson explained. “In the arms business no one can operate strictly by the book, but no one has yet to prove any wrong doing.   Both companies employ a capable staff of attorneys, lobbyists, and ex-government personnel from appropriate disciplines, who so far have managed to curb the attacks.

"Their toughest adversaries were US export regulators, the people who hand out export licenses for all restricted goods leaving the United States, covering the entire spectrum from toys to fighter aircraft.   Defense items are heavily regulated and a rigorous course of approvals had to be surpassed before any item would be cleared for export.  If an item or technology has the potential to threaten the
Unites States or any of its allies, chances were, the request would be denied.

"Neither Barons nor Krausse-Hauser, being strictly the financing medium, were the ones required to obtain licenses. The onus would fall on companies like Matlock.  But since an entire deal could depend on obtaining an export license for a specific item, the financing companies were investing much effort and were acutely involved in the process.

"But despite the scrutiny," Johnson reflected, "these types of dealings remain mostly industry-specific and are not common knowledge.   The two companies have, for the most part, managed to keep their association out of the limelight with a tight policy on contacts with the media."

He wiped his plate clean, scraping up the remains of mash potatoes and gravy with pieces of whole wheat bread.  As he looked back up at Mikki the expression on his face turned cunning.

"About two years ago," he continued, an outline of a cruel smile forming on his lips, "an article appeared in the
Wall Street Journal
linking Barons to a European partner involved in arms sales to the Middle East.  The article never mentioned the partner but sources confirmed it was Krausse-Hauser.  Officially, the episode never amounted to anything,  but  it  did  shed  some  light  on  the  nature  of Langone's arms dealings and it was rumored that among his customers were Libya and certain terrorist factions operating in Lebanon."

Mikki struggled to keep a straight face, acting as if what he was hearing did not impress him much.  But inside, his stomach knotted with excitement and his mind whirled to contain the information.

"In the intricate world of speculative finance, rumors are everything," Johnson reasoned, "and a respectable businessman like Edgar Langone can’t afford to have such rumors associated with his company.   He worked hard to convince his valued clients and the industry that things had been blown out of proportion.  He even threatened to sue the
Journal
, denying he had anything to do with arms sales to the Middle East.

"As it turned out, the industry and most of his clients actually accepted his denials and stuck with him.  But the rumor did put a dent into Baron's character.    Langone lost some credibility and quite a bit of money."

"Is he currently involved in any weapon projects in the US?" Mikki asked, a little too eagerly.

Johnson shook his head.

"Following that affair," he said, lowering his head to dig into the chocolate mousse that had just arrived, "his foreign ties expanded. He de-scoped in the States and began putting more emphasis on dealings across the Atlantic."

"It'll be pushing his luck to become involved with another arms venture in the US" he concluded.

Mikki hesitated with his response.   The man had just given him valuable information but his final analysis seemed incorrect.

They had established that Glass was involved with a single, major project that had weapons written all over it.   He was, unquestionably, working with Matlock and it would have been ludicrous to suspect they were collaborating on something other than a weapons project.

Langone was certainly involved with both Glass and Matlock. Mikki had seen it himself.  They had no hard evidence linking Langone to Krausse-Hauser but Glass was certainly linked and from everything described by Johnson, so was Langone.

Considering a different angle only led to the same conclusion. It was safe to assume that the Mossad was concerned with this same project, enough to assign an agent and risk a quarrel with the US.   Since the Mossad would be mainly concerned with the security of Israel, it was reasonable to assume the project would be threatening Israel in some way.   Considering everything, it would not have been far-fetched to deduct that Matlock was involved in the development of a weapon which was being financed by Langone and his European partners, and was most likely intended for the Middle East, to a country or an organization considered a threat to Israel.  Therefore, Langone had to be involved with an arms project whose origin was the US and evidently Johnson was not aware of it.

Mikki decided to end the meeting, feeling he had obtained important information and not wanting to risk revealing any more than he already had.  He took out a second envelope and handed it to Johnson who looked at him mildly surprised.

"Is that all?" he asked accepting the envelope.

Mikki nodded.

Johnson smiled and checked the contents of the envelope under the table again.  "And I thought you wanted to know about his Madison Avenue mistress and insider trading violations," he said half joking, stuffing the second envelope in his other suit pocket.

"Well, now that you've mentioned it why the hell not?"  Mikki said, signaling for more coffee. "It may come in handy someday."

A look of triumph appeared in Johnson's eyes and his cruel smile returned once again.

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Mikki drove his rented Cavalier into Las Vegas three days after his meeting with Johnson.  He had driven from the Bay area using remote highways across the Sierras, the beauty and vastness of the landscape helping ease his mind, providing him ample time to think and make assessments.

He had remained at a motel in Santa Clara waiting for Lisa to make the necessary inquiries before deciding on their next move.  It had taken her two days to reorient herself back in New York, before establishing that Cascade Realty was a legitimate business, incorporated in Delaware, with corporate offices in Las Vegas, Nevada.

The Carson brothers, Steve and Phil, turned out to be small time hoods, with local police records at their hometown of Willow, Nevada.  Phil had spent four months in a state prison for getting into a brawl at the local grocery store and was also on probation for driving under the influence, injuring an elderly man in the process.  Steve had recorded his six months in the slammer for injuring a gas station attendant in an altercation over an unpaid gas charge.  He was on
a two-year probation for not bothering to pay his state income taxes for the last four years.

Both were registered real estate brokers with Cascade Realty. The license plate number of the LeBaron Mikki had followed was registered to Phil Carson with an address in the San Fernando Valley.  The second car however, belonged to a William Devon who seemed to have no clear connection to Cascade Realty.  Devon, who Mikki presumed was the frail white haired man he had seen enter the Thunderbird with Steve Carson at the shopping center the night he had followed them, had neither local nor federal criminal records.

He and Lisa agreed that he would head to Vegas to further investigate Cascade Realty.

Driving alone in the open country he had felt a sudden urge to see Karen, clutch her in his arms and make her real again.  The feeling became almost physical and he began to fantasize, anticipating seeing her standing along the road, her blonde curls fluttering in the wind.

It had been three and a half years since anyone he knew had seen or heard from her. In that span of time he had graduated high school, completed his military service and was a civilian once again, while she remained missing.  She could have already completed her Bachelor's degree and gone on to get her Masters or found a suitable job. She could have decided to stay with him and they could have gotten married and had a kid...

Mikki knew they were operating on borrowed time.  Their
followers would not stay idle for very long.   He thought of Johnson.   The tiny, orderly man had managed to tie a few loose ends for them.  Langone and his European partners were selling arms illegally to hostile countries, obviously having found a way to bypass the US Government, and were keen on protecting that distinct privilege. They were financing an arms project involving Glass and Matlock, doing whatever necessary to ensure success, including the abduction of their partner's daughter in Israel, most likely to get the Israeli Secret Service off their backs.

It now seemed quite reasonable to assume Glass's company had been salvaged by this nasty group of people who had pushed him into sacrificing his daughter for their sake.

It was a genius plan, Mikki reflected.  Langone's people had the Israelis trapped both ways.  They had performed their deed on their home turf, leaving all kinds of indications that could easily trace guilt back to the Israelis themselves, and they no doubt held that caveat over their heads.   The kidnapping was made to look like a Mossad job trying to pressure Glass into abandoning the Matlock project.  The Israelis, for their part, could not even attempt to repudiate their involvement because that would have revealed their illicit covert meddling in US business. Their only recourse had been to bow out silently and do whatever they could to keep the Americans from discovering the truth.