Authors: Steven Gore
Power Blind (25 page)
G
raham,” Tansy Amaro said into the intercom, “Senator Meyer's office is calling.”
“I guess the pipsqueak went running to his big brother,” Gage said. “I'll take it.”
Gage punched the flashing button on his desk phone.
“This is Graham Gage.”
“This is Landon.”
“Sorry, I thought I was speaking to your secretary.”
“Since when do we have people running interference for us?”
“I assume you're running interference for your little brother this time.”
“Interference?”
“He didn't call you?”
“This concerns him, but not because he called. It was something else. A call from a maniac in San Francisco.”
“Which maniac?”
“The poisoner. Porzolkiewski. He called my office ranting about Brandon. That Brandon killed his son or covered up for the TIMCO people who killed his son. He threatened to go to the press. My secretary promised him I would look into it personally and I'd ask someone to visit him in jail by this time tomorrow.”
“Why me?”
“Brandon said you've gotten to know Porzolkiewski.”
“How did he find out?”
“He didn't say, but I need to put a lid on this thing. I can't have this kind of grief right now, assuming the media listens to him.”
“Trust me. They'll listen to him. Maybe not now, but eventually. Do you know the DA's theory about the case?”
“Only what's been in the press. I heard a couple of reporters were trying to find a connection between Charlie Palmer and TIMCO, but I assume they gave up. The only story recently was about Porzolkiewski saying he wanted time to hire a lawyer.”
“I'll tell you the answer, as long as you keep it to yourself.”
“What about Porzolkiewski ?”
“I'll quiet him down.”
“Okay. Just between you and me.”
“I think Brandon and Anston have been involved in a few things that may slop backâ”
“Maybe we should talk in person.”
“Where?”
“I'll be in Des Moines tomorrow.”
“W
hat did you think you were going to accomplish?”
“I don't know,” Porzolkiewski said, “I don't know what I was doing. Maybe it was a substitute for not having a gun to blow my brains out.”
Porzolkiewski stared down at the table, as if embarrassed by his own weakness.
“Just listen to the noise in this place,” Porzolkiewski said. “I don't understand why more people aren't committing suicide in here.”
Only then did Gage's mind register the yelling and clanging that composed the relentless gray background noise of the jail.
Porzolkiewski finally looked up. “You're the reason I'm locked up in this joint.”
Gage shook his head. “Like I planted the poison in your storeroom?”
“No. You got them to search for it. How do I know you're not in it with them?”
“In with who?”
“Brandon Meyer and Marc Anston. You sure as hell aren't doing anything to get me out of here.”
“Tell me what I should be doing.”
Porzolkiewski spread his arms. “How should I know, you're the investigator.” He tapped his chest. “I'm just the schmuck who pushed his kid too hard.”
Gage squinted at Porzolkiewski. “Now you're blaming yourself because he took the job at TIMCO?”
Porzolkiewski's shoulders slumped, and then he exhaled and said, “Now that you repeat it back, it sounds stupid.”
Gage leaned forward, resting his forearms on the table.
“Look,” Gage said, “everything in life could've turned out differently. Just because you think back and one thing seems to have led to another, doesn't mean everything was inevitable and you're responsible. That applies to Brandon Meyer, too. And threatening his brother just makes you look like a paranoid lunatic.”
Porzolkiewski rose and stared out through the wire mesh window of the visiting room door.
“This place is unreal,” Porzolkiewski said. “It makes everything unreal. There's no way to control your thoughts, they just fly around with nothing solid to hold on to. Then they start to hook together in weird ways.” He turned back toward Gage. “I don't know what I was thinking when I called the senator's office. Everything just seemed like a huge conspiracy.”
“You want to talk to a psychiatrist?”
Porzolkiewski shook his head. “Jailhouse shrinks just want to drug people up because they know there's nothing they can do about this place and the way it makes you go crazy.”
“Then let me give you a few things you can to hold on to when things seem to start spinning.”
Porzolkiewski sat down.
“Lieutenant Pacheco is having toxicology tests done on every liquid or powder that was in Charlie's room. We're also checking out the background of the physical therapist. How he got hired by the agency and how he got assigned to Charlie. Spike says they're stonewalling, but we'll keep pushing. If we can prove he was planted there, the case here will look weaker and maybe we can get you transferred out to Contra Costa County. There's no law that says you have to go to trial in the county where you were first arrested.”
“How does that help?”
“It's a quieter jail and close enough for your lady friend out in the Delta to visit you every day.”
“They have conjugal visits out there?”
“Sorry. You'll have to get convicted and sent off to state prison for that.”
Porzolkiewski winced. “I think I'll pass.”
T
hanks for bringing dinner,” Faith said to Gage as they sat on the edge of the circular fountain near the Hearst Anthropology Museum on the UC Berkeley campus. It was at that spot decades earlier that an ex-cop chanced to offer a napkin to a graduate student who'd splashed coffee on her blouse just before her first meeting with her dissertation committee.
Between them now lay sourdough French rolls and paper take-out boxes of grilled vegetables, olives, mushrooms, and tuna salad. Both were sipping on sodas and watching students and staff flood from the buildings and separate into streams, some heading to the garages, some to the buses, some up or down the sidewalks to dorms or frat houses or the apartments surrounding the campus.
“How's Porzolkiewski?” Faith asked.
“Off the deep end.”
“There's a student group here that visits prisoners. You want me to give them his name? Maybe some outsiders would keep him in contact with reality.”
Gage shook his head. “I can't take a chance he'll start ranting about Brandon and TIMCO. Next thing you know one of them is running to the press, either because it would be a big story or because Porzolkiewski looks like the victim of a conspiracy. They're good-hearted kids and too likely to believe everyone is innocent. And once they get a glimpse of that hangdog face of his, they'll be marching on San Francisco City Hall. That's the same reason I told him not to hire a lawyer. I didn't want to lose control of the case.”
“What do you think?” Faith peered at him. “Is he innocent?”
“I don't know. I can see him losing control and committing a manslaughter, but premeditated murder, I'm not sure.” Gage opened the grilled vegetables and handed Faith a plastic fork. “On the other hand, he was on a mission for years trying to prove TIMCO lied about the explosion and that Brandon was involved. He was damn methodical about that.”
“He had to have been furious when Brandon got appointed to the bench. It must have felt like a betrayal, like the devil being appointed God.” Faith smiled at Gage. “As I recall, he wasn't the only one who felt that way.”
“I don't know what Landon was thinking when he put in his brother's name. It was like opening the door to the henhouse and laying out a red carpet for the fox.”
“But I thought you said you can't link any of the premium payments into Pegasus to any decisions he's made in cases.”
“None of those companies really thought they were buying insurance. Charlie Palmer didn't run an insurance company and the Pegasus money we've traced came back as payoffs to witnesses, not as payments on insurance claims.”
A car backfire rocked Bancroft Avenue as it bounced off the concrete façade of the building behind them. They both glanced over to see smoke envelop an early-seventies Suburban as it rolled to a stop.
When it cleared Gage noticed a familiar brown Taurus with a man in the passenger seat. Unlike everyone else on the street, he didn't watch the spectacle. He kept staring down toward the bay. He was also too old to be a student and too tough to be staff or faculty.
Gage lowered his eyes. “Look away from the street.”
Faith reached for the vegetables and made a point of picking through them. “What's going on?”
“I'll try to find out.” Gage pulled his cell phone out of his shirt pocket and called a number in its memory.
Viz answered on the first ring. “What's up?”
“I'm in Berkeley with Faith, near her office. Boots Marnin just showed up across the street. When can you get here?”
“I'm at the Federal Building waiting for Brandon to come out. So about a half hour.”
“We're by the fountain. Call me when you get close and we'll figure out a plan.”
H
ow long did he hang around our house after Faith and I got home?” Gage asked Viz in a late night call.
“Couple of minutes, then he followed the ridge and took Snake Road down to the freeway. I think he's been to your house a few times, he drove those winding streets like a local.”
“And after that?”
“He was all over the place. I couldn't tell whether he was doing countersurveillance or what. He hit about eight different restaurants and warehouses in San Francisco. Inside for fifteen or twenty minutes, then on to another one.”
“Did he make you?”
“Me?” Viz's voice rose. “Make me?”
Gage laughed. “Sorry I asked.”
A
message was waiting on Gage's voice mail when his plane touched down in Denver on the way to Des Moines to meet Landon Meyer.
“Boss. I listened to the recording Viz made of Brandon Meyer outside of the Tadich Grill and then did what you said. It looks like money from Landon's Silicon Valley group just showed up in the Ohio and Massachusetts senators' campaigns. Each got a million-dollar loan from a San Jose bank called Mann Trust. Three members of the Silicon Valley group are on the board. I'll e-mail you a list of all of the money I've traced.”
Gage stared out his window as the other passengers deplaned, still stunned by the cynical opportunism of Landon Meyer, whose campaign he'd saved from internal sabotage just two years earlier. Gage tasted the bitterness of Brandon's snide comment about him believing in the purity of the process.
Since candidates couldn't accept contributions directly from corporations, Landon had deposited the Silicon Valley Group money into Mann Trust, and then the bank used it to secure the loans to the candidates.
Nothing more or less than political money laundering.
T
hanks for flying out,” Landon said. “It's not exactly a short hop from San Francisco to Des Moines, but I didn't want to talk on the telephone.”
Gage walked across the thin blue carpet in the Super 8 Motel toward the east-facing window with a view of Interstate 35. The afternoon sun gave an orange glow to the aluminum-sided semis grinding their way along the highway.
“I figured you for the Savery Hotel downtown,” Gage said. “Georgian Revival in the prairie.” He turned and scanned the child-sized desk, the winter scene print nailed to the wall, the stain-disguising green, blue, and yellow kaleidoscopic bedspread, and the television bolted to the dresser. He then took in a breath infused with an overdose of air freshener. “A tenth floor suite, not a second floor walkup.”
“This is Iowa. Folks here keep an eye on how you spend the money when you've got your hand out.” Landon spread his arms to encompass the room. “Sixty-three dollars a night, including breakfast.”
“Folks?”
Landon smiled.
“Of course. And I even eat at the Flying J Truck Stop.”
“Country fried steak and mashed potatoes?”
“What else?”
“Sounds like the Heartland Inn across the street would have been a better choice.”
“They were booked up. It's the start of pumpkin season, and everybody in Washington, D.C., who has even the faintest hope of becoming president is out here kissing babies and thumping squash.”
“Just be careful you don't do it backward.”
“Sometimes I'm so tired I can't tell the difference.”
Gage glanced back toward the hallway. “Aren't there supposed to be a bunch of underlings from Washington scurrying in and out of here?”
Landon shook his head. “I've got one guy next door, but otherwise I use local people. They're not as efficient, but they help get the message across.”
“Which is?”
“That I was never a Washington insider who got cash from Jack Abramoff and from the K Street gang leaning on people.”
Gage resisted the urge to reveal what he had just learned from Alex Z. It wasn't the right moment to talk about money.
“How many times have you flown solo on the Iowa circuit?” Gage asked.
“Altogether? Ten in the last two years. I'm a helluva lot more popular here than I am in California.”
“Especially after the Supreme Court nominations.”
“I better win the presidency.” Landon pointed west. “I don't think the people of the Golden State are going to elect me again.”
“You've got four more years. Voters have short memories.”
Landon shook his head again. “Not this time.” He reached toward the automatic coffeemaker sitting on a tray on top of the dresser. “Want some?”
Gage nodded. Landon poured two cups, then directed Gage to a cloth-covered chair at a table next to the window. Landon sat down across from him.
“What were you going to say yesterday after âI think you need to know what Brandon has been up to'?”
“You really think your cell phone is being tapped?”
“Politics is brutal these days and the technology can be bought on the Internet. That'll change if I become president, but there's nothing I can do about it now except be careful.”
“Especially about Brandon.”
“Only because he walks a fine lineâ”
“Between the legal and illegal?”
“No. Between his role as a judge and his role as my closest political adviser.” Landon raised his palm toward Gage. “Don't give me that look. Abe Fortas was practically part of Lyndon Johnson's Cabinet. Roosevelt didn't make a move without checking with Justice Frankfurter. Scalia used to chat up Cheney during their hunting trips.”
“At this point I'm more concerned about Brandon's role as an attorney.”
“That's ancient history.”
“Only as ancient as John Porzolkiewski.”
Landon leaned back in his chair and folded his arms across his chest. “Maybe you better tell me how the sentence you began on the phone was going to end.”
“How about I'll start over with the punch line.”
“Shoot.”
“Marc Anston hired an investigator named Charlie Palmer to pay off the OSHA inspector and a welder at TIMCO to cover up the cause of the explosion.”
“Was Brandon involved?”
“I think so, but I can't prove it.”
“I wouldn't be shocked by anything Anston did. He believes in winning, only in winning. But I don't think he would involve Brandon. He needed Brandon's coattails to build the firm. Owed him too much.”
“It always struck me that their relationship was upside down,” Gage said. “The younger man bringing business to the older. But I was looking at it from the outside.”
“It was a difference in background and career path and temperament. Anston went from Skull and Bones at Yale to law school and then into the CIA for twenty years. He needed Brandon because he never developed the personality to become a rainmaker on his own.” Landon chuckled. “You know where the Book of Genesis talks about âevery creeping thing that creeps upon the earth'? That's Anston, the creepiest. But he had a talent for offshore finance. That's part of what he did in the Agency, setting up surreptitious ways to fund covert actions.”
Landon leaned forward in his chair. “Did you follow the Iran-Contra hearings?”
“Some.”
“You know who set up the Cayman Island account used to funnel private contributions to the Contras?” Landon didn't wait for an answer. “Anston. By using 501(c)(3) organizations.”
“As though they were charities like the Red Cross?”
Landon smiled. “Fund a war, get a tax break.”
“What about the money from the Iranian arms sales?”
“He did those through Switzerland.” Landon settled back in his chair again. “See? Anston was the perfect guy to set up the offshore TIMCO payoffs. There was absolutely no reason to involve my brother in anything.”
“I think he may have involved Brandon at least in this one. The payoff money for the OSHA inspector and welder came from a Cayman account somehow connected to Brandon.”
“Is that true?”
“Are you asking whether it's true or whether anyone can prove it?”
“Both.”
“I don't know,” Gage said. “There's no way to force the Cayman lawyer who runs the company to disclose anything. But I'm at least sure Charlie Palmer managed it.”
“For Brandon or Anston?”
“I don't know that either. Probably both. And I do know that TIMCO wired money to that company. It's called Pegasus.”
Landon shrugged.
“About a million and a half went in and out of Pegasus to take care of the TIMCO witnesses,” Gage said.
“That looks bad. I received money from TIMCO executives in my first senatorial campaign, but it wasâ”
“Before the explosion. I checked.”
“Why?”
“Why what?”
“Why did you check? You don't think I was somehow mixed up with what they were doing?”
“It crossed my mind.”
Landon shook off the implication.
“So TIMCO is the reason for the mugging?”
“It wasn't a mugging.”
“But Brandon saidâ”
“I'm pretty sure Brandon got into a scuffle with Porzolkiewski and the wallet just fell out of his pocket.”
Landon narrowed his eyes toward Gage.
“So there really is a connection between Brandon and Porzolkiewski? Why did Brandon lie to me about what happened?”
“My guess is there was something in the wallet that would give away the scheme.”
“Do you know what was in there?”
“I've seen it all,” Gage said, “but I don't know what it all means. Some of it's a little bizarre.”
“Like what?”
“A list of star names and dates that seem to match Cayman Exchange Bank transactions in Palmer's account.”
“So Brandon has some connection to whatever Anston is doing.”
Gage could hear Landon's breathing start to accelerate.
“I may have to get ahead of this one. If it's true Brandon was involved in hiding witnesses and suborning perjury in TIMCO, I'll probably have to go to the press first and he'll have to take his chances.”
“Not probably. You'll have no choice. It's all going to come out in Porzolkiewski's trial and it'll slop over onto you.”
“I know that. But I can survive it. Robert Kennedy survived Ted Kennedy leaving that poor woman in the Chappaquiddick River. George W. Bush survived his brother's involvement in the savings and loan scandal, Bill Clinton survived Roger's cocaine conviction, Jimmy Carter survived his brother becoming a lobbyist for Libya.”
“I see you've thought about this.”
“With a brother like Brandon, you have to think about every possibility.” Landon paused for a moment, then asked, “How much of this is in the search warrant affidavit?”
“You mean how much is going to come out before trial?”
“To be specific, between now and when the Supreme Court nominations go to the full Senate.”
“Not as much was in the affidavit as I know now.”
“But what you think you know is only what Porzolkiewski believes.”
“I know a lot more than he does. And part of that is in the affidavit, but it's still sealed.”
Landon rose and interlaced his fingers on the back his neck and paced back and forth between the bed and dresser. He finally stopped and lowered his hands to his waist.
“So that's how it started.”
“How what started?”
Landon squinted up toward the ceiling. “Who said it?”
“Said what?”
“ âEvery empire was founded on a great crime.' ”
“Is that what your presidency is supposed to be, some kind of empire?”
“You wouldn't understand.”
“I'll tell you what I do understandâ”
“TIMCO would have done that whether or not they'd contributed to my campaign. They didn't do it for me.”
“But you were the beneficiary and I'm sure it was in Brandon's mind when he set it up.”
Landon flared. “You keep saying Brandon, but your evidence says Anston.”
“Do you really think anything went on in the firm that they didn't discuss during their lunches at Tadich Grill? My guess is that most of the strategy was hashed out over those crisp white tablecloths.”
“But you can't prove it.”
“No. I can't prove it.”
Gage heard a cash register ring in his head.
Every empire was founded on a great crime.
He remembered Landon's shrug and silence when he'd mentioned the name of the offshore company.
He stared into Landon's eyes, and said, “You've heard of Pegasus.”
Landon looked away, then back.
“It's called capitalism. The logical political conclusion in a capitalist society.”
“No, Landon. It's called fraud.”
Landon glared down at Gage. “You just don't get it.”
Gage felt a shudder through his body. Landon was wrong. He got it. He got every bit of it and he said it aloud:
“All the money you're putting into these campaigns is from fake insurance premiums corporations paid into Pegasus.”
“Why do you think they're fake?”
“None of those companies needed the extra insurance, and Brandon and Anston sure as hell never paid out any claims.”
Landon drew himself up and squared his shoulders.
“First, it's not Brandon, and second, companies buy insurance year by year, whatever isn't paid out in claims is profit.”
“Well, has Pegasus ever paid out on an insurance claim?”
“It's not insurance. It's international reinsurance. It only pays out once a company exceeds its domestic insurance limits.”
“That's not an answer. The question was whether Pegasus ever paid anything out.”
“I wouldn't know. It's not my company.”
Gage then began to see Pegasus though Anston's lens: Pegasus was simply a political replica of the CIA front companies Anston set up in the 1970s to fund covert actionsâ
Except this time it wasn't the leadership of a foreign country that was at stake. It was all three branches of the U.S. government.
Then more came to him.
“And the millions you put into those campaigns to get the last two votes for the Supreme Court nominees came from Pegasus.”
Landon shrugged. “Sort of.”
“I had thought the money came from the Silicon Valley Group.”
“How did you get that idea?”
“Somebody overheard Brandon talking.”
“They got it wrong. That was just bundling individual hard-money contributions. I put all of it into my political action committee. I've got copies of the checks to prove it.”