Don't Know Jack (35 page)

She said, “You need to decide if you really want to hear this. It ain’t going to be pretty. It’s going to be a train wreck.”

“But you’re sticking with it.”

“You don’t have to.”

“Because I’m not Zorro.”

“You have a family. And twenty years to go.”

“Tell me what you know.”

“You sure?”

“You deaf?  How many times do I have to say it?”

“Sylvia’s mail tells the story,” she said. Then she hesitated. She took a deep breath. “And Finlay confirmed it for me.”

Gaspar said nothing. He just headed for one of the upholstered chairs.

“Don’t get too comfortable,” Kim said. “We’ve got an appointment in thirty minutes at the Swiss Embassy and a flight to Zurich at 1:12.”

“Fill me in, Susie Q,” he said.

She pulled the redwell’s contents, and divided them into three batches. “We were right about the laundering. Harry figured out a way to exchange the Kliners for real money. Caribbean casinos.”  She tossed the first group into his lap. “Photographs of Harry and Sylvia at blackjack tables in four separate establishments over four years. Tried and true. They bring the Kliners out of Atlanta in small batches. They buy chips, they gamble a while, they cash in the chips for real money. Pretty simple, even with Harry’s full time job. Short flights from Atlanta to the Caribbean. Easy enough to confirm by flight records.”

He asked, “But what did they do with the clean money?  Stupid to bring it back and hide it in the closet.”

Kim tossed him the second set of redwell contents. “Bank records. Deposits to Caribbean banks.”

Gaspar thumbed through the half dozen statements. “They run for slightly less than five years. Stop abruptly three months ago. Offshore, like we thought.”

“But then they screwed up.”

“How?”

“Two ways. First, they never claimed any of their gambling winnings on their income taxes to get the clean money into the paper trail. Fraud would have been a lot harder to prove when the IRS got on their tails. Bought them extra time.”

He shrugged. Tax issues had never impressed him much. She figured he’d never been on the wrong side of the IRS. Those bastards were meaner than the FBI by a long shot.

“Second?”

She held paper in each unsteady hand. Raised Finlay’s contributions in her left first. “The Caribbean bank statements are fakes, too. Meant to comfort Harry, maybe. The money wasn’t there. It was deposited somewhere else. Might still be there.”

Gaspar lifted his eyebrow. Didn’t reach out for the paper. Touching meant plausible deniability destroyed.

Kim raised Susan Kane’s mail from box 4720 in her right hand. “These confirm.”

“Where is the money, then?”

“Empire Bank of Switzerland.”

Gaspar smiled. “Of all the gin joints in all the world.”

She smiled back. “Poetic, isn’t it?”

CHAPTER FORTY THREE

Washington, DC

November 3

11:25 p.m.

The Swiss embassy was alight and active inside when they arrived slightly ahead of a developing storm. Temperatures had dropped and lightning flashed in the distance. The wind had picked up. No rain yet, but Kim could feel dropping atmospheric pressure in her bones. The cab driver said, “I’ll wait, but if you want to make it to Dulles in an hour, you’d better hurry. They’re predicting hail the size of golf balls.”

Kim tried to ignore everything she knew about flying through thunderstorms as she rushed ahead of Gaspar into the glass enclosed center connecting the two brick wings. There was more lightning, followed by deafening thunder, and then wind-whipped rain started to fall. The effect of standing inside the storm while totally shielded and feeling none of nature’s outrage was surreal.

They were escorted quickly to Finlay’s contact, deep in the north wing. The office was decorated as if by ancient financiers. Teak floors, worn orientals, ancient vases. Likely real. As was Wilfred Schmidt, according to his desk nameplate.

Schmidt offered two hard chairs on the other side of his desk. He clasped manicured hands together on a burgundy desk blotter. He had gold links in his starched white cuffs. He spoke precise English, clearly not his first language, and maybe not his second.

“Please excuse the necessary abruptness,” he said. “My schedule is quite full as it is about to be tomorrow in Zurich. I have been instructed to disclose certain information. I am allowed to answer no questions. Agreed?”

Kim nodded because she had no power to demand more.

Herr Schmidt prompted, “Yes?”

Maybe there was an audio recording.

Gaspar said, “Agreed.”

Schmidt launched into rote speech he’d likely delivered to countless customers over the past twelve months. “As you know, Empire Bank of Switzerland will provide a list of depositors and amounts on deposit to U.S. Internal Revenue Service pursuant to new treaties signed by our respective governments. Understand?”

Kim nodded. He waited. She said, “Yes.”

Everyone knew the IRS was salivating like a starving Rottweiler before dinner. Negotiations with Swiss banks and treaties executed the previous year were well publicized all around the world. Looming deadlines for disclosing tax cheats had been preceded by a period of tax amnesty about to expire. Tensions on Wall Street and Main Street and in every criminal enterprise that touched the country had led to panic among legitimate and illegitimate alike.

If Kim’s theories were correct, the same panic had led Sylvia Black to murder her husband. Panic that could lead to solid testimony against Cooper.

Schmidt noticed Kim’s preoccupation. He cleared his throat to bring her back.

He delivered a rehearsed disclaimer next, with appropriate emphasis. “Swiss privacy laws demand
strict
secrecy. Penalties for privacy violations are severe. Accounts will be revealed
precisely
as required. Individual depositors are permitted six remaining days to complete satisfactory asset arrangements and agreements with respective governments.
We have no information on the status of such activities.
Understand?”

“Yes,” Kim said. She understood. The Swiss remained as politically neutral as possible. A policy necessary, some said, to maintaining the most opportunistic country on earth. A friend to everyone is a friend to no one, in Kim’s view, stacks of money regardless.

Schmidt reached the red meat. “Four individual depositors are relevant here. Four numbered accounts and two safety deposit boxes. Contents of boxes are not disclosed to the bank. Understand?”

Gaspar said, “We understand. Who are the four depositors?”

Schmidt passed another sealed redwell across the desk to Kim.

She tore off the shrink wrap, removed the elastic band, pulled out four account statements and two small brass keys affixed to numbered tags. She checked the account names. Susan Kane's on one box made sense. But the others? She blinked. Again. The names didn't change. Charles Cooper, Carlos Gaspar, and Kim Otto. How could that be?

She felt the stomach snake begin to uncoil.

Nothing is ever what you think it is.

Gaspar asked, “Where are the safety deposit boxes located?”

Schmidt said, “Zurich. They’ve been alerted to receive you. Your taxi is waiting.”

CHAPTER FORTY FOUR

Zurich, Switzerland

November 4

4:00 p.m. local time

A delayed departure at Dulles due to weather meant they missed their appointment in Zurich. But they had a chance to make it to the bank before it closed. She jogged and he limped through the spotless terminal, all the way to a spotless cab at a spotless curb. He asked, “Doesn’t it worry you that Finlay is doing this?”

“Should it?” Kim asked back. She watched Zurich pass by out the side window.

“Cooper is a ruthless guy.”

“Clearly Finlay is just as ruthless.”

“Exactly. Two ruthless guys battle, other people die.”

She shrugged. Useful gesture, she’d concluded. Conveyed everything and nothing. Economical, too. “Everybody dies.”

#

The cab pulled up in front of an imposing grey brick skyscraper thirty minutes late, but still thirty minutes before closing. They climbed out together into dry but overcast twilight. The EBS logo was prominently displayed on the building. It was identical to the logos on the envelopes they’d found in box 4720, and on the four bank statements and the two keys in the second redwell.

There were patrons milling around inside the bank. Kim was slightly surprised. Who made personal visits to banks any more?  Kim’s paychecks were automatically deposited, her withdrawals made at ATMs, and her bills paid online or by draft.

There was a very formal male receptionist in the lobby, seated behind a mahogany desk. He asked, “Do you have an appointment?”

“Herr Gartner is expecting us.”  Kim showed regret and her driver’s license. “Our flight was a bit late, I’m afraid.”

The receptionist looked down at a print-out with the day’s appointments discreetly listed and unreadable from Kim’s viewpoint. “Yes, I see,” he said. He sounded like a bad guy in a bad movie. “Perhaps it is possible to accommodate you. Please be seated. I will contact Herr Gartner.”

Five minutes later a middle-aged man entered the lobby through one of the heavy wooden doors on the left hand side. He said, “This way, please.”  They followed him down a narrow carpeted hallway. There were grey steel doors placed ten feet apart on both sides. Twenty feet in, he stopped. He unlocked a door into a carpeted eight-by-eight windowless room. The room held a wood parson’s table and four unforgiving chairs.

Inside, he asked, “May I see your identification, please?”

They produced badge wallets. He photographed their ID first, and followed with head shots. Then he extended his device to each of them in turn. “Please.”

Both agents pressed an index finger onto the screen. A green light signaled success. The man seemed satisfied.

“Please wait here. The boxes will arrive momentarily.”

Kim marked the time. Tested the lever when he left. They were locked in. A surveillance camera was mounted at the corner ceiling joint opposite, with a red light indicating that it was operational. Kim suspected clients turned their backs on the camera while other hidden lenses created indelible records. If they failed to follow instructions, consequences would be immediate and unpleasant.

Precisely eight minutes later, the middle-aged man returned with a sturdy cart upon which rested two bottles of water, two glasses, a silver-plated coffee carafe, two cups, two saucers, two spoons, and cream and sugar.

And two heavy metal boxes.

Maybe fifteen inches by twelve by fifteen.

Each box had two locks.