The Lacey Confession (9 page)

1920

Warm breezes, the scent of fresh flowers and the sounds of newborn birds ushered in the English spring of 1920, sweeping out the harsh winter that had gone before it. Frederick Lacey thought God himself had written a symphony, rising to a mighty crescendo, all the senses in celestial harmony, and dedicated it to Aminette. On the second Thursday of May, Aminette Lacey went into labor. By most accounts, her baby was not due for another two or three weeks. Her husband had prepared well for the birth of his child, as he did for everything. His wife would deliver their child in a rosewood bed, hand crafted, made in Indonesia and shipped to England to be christened by new life in the Lacey family. It traveled around the world on the flagship of Frederick Lacey's commercial fleet, a vessel like God's own spring, named
Aminette
.

Things did not go well. The doctor, the midwife and the attendants were helpless. Aminette hemorrhaged, uncontrollably. As the lifeblood drained from her slender body, she looked sorrowfully into her husband's eyes. She knew the man who could do anything, could do nothing to save her. A smile as serene as any he ever saw lit up her face as Aminette died holding tightly to her daughter. Lacey pleaded with his young wife, as if by demand alone he could keep her in this world. The last thing she saw before closing her eyes a final time was Frederick's face, racked with misery, contorted in tears. He named his daughter Audrey.

In less than a week Djemmal-Eddin Messadou made the arduous journey from Georgia to London. Lacey waited to bury his wife until her father arrived. Lacey was devastated. He moved on instinct alone. Djemmal-Eddin too was stricken with grief, but he had seen more death than his young son-in-law and was better able to recover his senses. And recovery was necessary. Djemmal-Eddin did not have the luxury of prolonged mourning. He held the fate of his people in his hands. The Bolsheviks had sworn death to him and to the Transcaucasian Federation of Dagestan, Azerbaijan and his beloved Georgia. The unexpected death of his daughter was a terrible blow softened only a little by the birth of his newest granddaughter. Yet, it was a blow from which he would recover. Aminette's was but a single human life. And he, her father—although a direct descendant of the Great Shamyl, the Lion of Dagestan—his pain, cruelly suffered at her fate, was solitary. One woman, one man, they are not that important. The death of his country and his countrymen—those who put their trust, their very lives and the lives of their families in his keeping—would be far worse. He told Lacey he could not stay long. When the time came for him to leave, the two men stood together. With firm resolve they shook hands, then they each broke down and sobbed on the other's shoulder. Those who waited on Djemmal-Eddin waited in respectful silence. No man would interfere at this moment. Two and a half years would pass before Frederick Lacey and Djemmal-Eddin Messadou would shake each other's hand again.

Solly Joel was in London in May 1920. He had recently returned from a lengthy visit to South Africa, to celebrate his true loves—the fifty-bedroom mansion he called Maiden Erlegh House, on the outskirts of Reading, and the sport of kings, horse racing. Through his ownership of the City & South London Railway, Joel knew William Lacey from Liverpool. He had heard stories of the young Lacey and was familiar with his growing reputation and the prestige that came with his victories in The Great War. But it was in tribute to Djemmal-Eddin that he sought an opportunity to pay his respects. Or, that's what he said. The evening before the Georgian's return to his native land, Solly Joel was the only guest for dinner. The three men ate together in Lacey's dining room, a setting that could accommodate three dozen comfortably, and had more than once. Condolences were in order, but there was another, more important purpose to Joel's visit.

Solomon Barnato Joel,
Just
Solly
to the powerful and powerless alike, may have been the richest man in the world. It was hard to tell, difficult to get an accurate reading on matters as personal as that in those days. Following the mysterious death by drowning of his uncle Barney Barnato, the founder of the DeBeers diamond cartel, young Solly Joel assumed total control of that vast enterprise. From his base in diamond mining, Joel branched out to gold mines and soon manipulated and dominated the world market in both stones and precious metals. A flamboyant character, who thrived on bravado and basked in the glory of public attention, Solly Joel was among the first of the great industrialists and entrepreneurs to invade popular culture. With no thought of profit, he bought up the famed Drury Lane Theater in London and established a stable of the finest racehorses in the world.

His most daring adventure, the one deal everyone speculated about, was his strange and unique relationship with the Russians. When the Bolsheviks deposed the Czar in 1917, they found themselves embarrassed to become the world's richest diamond owners. Centuries of accumulation, an act of unprecedented rape of Russian national treasure, had now devolved to and given the Communists the world's largest, most valuable collection of diamonds. Desperate for money, hard currency with real trade value, and ideologically burdened with the Czar's excesses, the Bolsheviks were easy prey to Solly Joel's machinations. In a daring stroke of international hubris, Solly Joel offered to take the Czar's diamonds off their hands and give the Bolsheviks the enormous sum of 250,000 English pounds, the most prized currency in the world. Moreover, Joel made the offer sight unseen. He would take the entire collection,
as is.
The Russians, in a sign that they understood nothing about money and really did mean it when they said they would usher in a new financial age for the world, accepted. They delivered the goods—in fourteen cigar boxes—and Solly Joel dutifully transferred the quarter million pounds. Improbable as it was—a schoolboy's logic dictated otherwise—both sides concluded the transaction with apparent satisfaction. One of them had been had, and it wasn't
Just Solly
. By securing the Czar's entire collection for himself, Joel was able to stymie any possibility of the future sale of phony pieces, paraded as secret jewels from the vault of the late Czar. Had this happened, the diamond market might have spun out of control. As well, he completely eliminated the potential for any damage that might affect worldwide diamond prices had others purchased the collection. In this way, Joel ensured that all the Czar's diamonds would not come on the market at once. Over the coming years, until his own death in 1931, Solly Joel was able to reintroduce, as he called it, piece by piece, some of the most spectacular diamond jewelry ever made. His financial wizardry was such, he did so while increasing prices, not depressing them. Of course, the Bolsheviks had no idea what those stones were really worth. They were the proverbial Christians being tossed to the lions. They were soft food for the predator. Solly Joel bought them sight unseen because he knew their actual value was perhaps twenty or fifty times what he paid. To this day some who know the diamond trade well say that figure was closer to a hundred times what Joel paid.
Just Solly
rightly figured the Russians for patsies. Why not the Georgians too? The purpose behind Solly Joel's approach to Djemmal-Eddin Messadou was to find out about the Czar Nicholas II ten Ruble coins. He'd heard that the nephew of the Lion of Dagestan had tons of them.

The Present

In the last year of his reign, Nicholas II, the Russian Czar, issued a new ten Ruble coin. Of course, it had his likeness on it—a side view, the left, the one he always considered his best side. And it was made of gold, each coin containing .2489 ounces. The international price of gold, in 1917, was fixed at $20.67 an ounce. The Czar's new ten Ruble coin carried a value, in 1917, that Chita had already figured at $3.10 American. At today's prices, each coin was worth about $75. She whistled at the thought of four million of them.

She already had learned that most of these coins were minted in Switzerland. Others in France. None in Russia. When the Bolsheviks overthrew the Czar, they canceled the contracts and asked for their gold back. They had no use for coins showing the Czar's face. Neither the Swiss nor the French were eager to comply. There were costs involved, they said. They were vague about specifics. A halt in production meant expenses would be incurred. They told their Bolshevik clients, things had to be done properly. Procedures had to be followed. The Russians—these new ones now in charge—thought simply by saying stop, they could end the matter and have their gold promptly returned to them. The Englishman, Solly Joel, had shown these Communists knew next to nothing about diamonds. Louis Devereaux delighted in telling her that story. “Well,” he confided in her, “it turned out they knew even less about gold.” So offended were they by the sheer sight of the Czar's face, they ordered the Swiss, and the French also, to melt down all existing coins. Add it to the gold still on hand, they instructed, and ship it all back to Moscow. They had no immediate plans for the use of the raw gold. They had other more pressing matters to deal with. Although they demanded its return, the Bolsheviks failed to threaten those who delayed or refused. How could they have known? They were innocents traveling down an unfamiliar road. None of them had dealt with international bankers before. They had no idea that no one gets their gold back without the threat of bloody, painful death. How could they have been so stupid? Chita thought of herself as much like the Communists who took over the Czar's empire. Was she not forceful, resolute and self-confident? Unmistakably, however, and very much unlike her, the Reds were also totally ignorant about money and the people who controlled it. No banker wants his throat cut. Short of that, they'll do anything to keep what's theirs, and what's yours too. She knew it and feared the loss of her own fortune, the risk to her lifestyle, and had nothing but contempt for the Russians. They had no idea at all what they were up against.

Like water when the temperature dips below 32 degrees, events freeze over just as quickly in the world of finance as they do in the often more chilly realm of politics and government. The Russians could run roughshod over their own. No one else really cared. Revolution here. Revolution there. The Communists had a firm grip on the Russian Bear. But they were impotent to influence the wild horses, the sleek stallions of international finance. By the time the Communists decided to do something, to take strong action, European bankers—Solly Joel was their hero!—had robbed them blind. The Bolsheviks, screwed out of much of their own gold reserves, were reduced to forbidding the use of Czar Nicholas II ten Ruble coins as legal tender at home. A lot of good that did. Gold is gold. Everyone knows it, especially in time of war. The coins were widely circulated and found their way into every crevasse of the Russian Empire, now property of Communists who, in their intellectual isolation, believed the means of production were now theirs.

Devereaux's tales of Frederick Lacey, Lacey's esteemed father-in-law and the notorious gold coins rescued from the clutches of the tyrant, enthralled her. Were the stories of the gold true? Had the Georgians trusted Lacey with that much? She didn't know. She wasn't sure. She couldn't say. She wouldn't rule it out. She wanted it, she told Louis. She wondered, was Frederick Lacey the only one who knew—the only one who knew where the gold was? Did he write that secret down in his private journal, the one Louis told her about? Was that too much to hope for? It hardly mattered, she thought. Louis kept telling her that Lacey's confession was the key to everything. JFK was more than enough. The Czar's gold would be a bonus, he called it, a present from him to her.

He was already on the job. That is what he told Conchita Crystal. But he hardly knew where to begin. He knew next to nothing about Harry Levine and he knew even less about what was going on, what was really going on, what sort of trouble Harry was in. Who might be after him? The guy was walking around with the truth about Kennedy, if this Frederick Lacey was for real. After their talk on the dock, Chita had agreed to meet him at his place later that afternoon.

“Bring me everything you have,” Walter told her. He meant about Harry, but he also meant she should bring the money. “Think about it. I want to know everything you know.”

Now, Walter sat in Billy's thinking back on the events of that day, the day he went to work for Chita Crystal. It turned out she couldn't tell him very much at all about her nephew. She found him, when his mother died, only a couple of years ago. Harry was “pleased,” she said, when he learned she was his aunt. “He was somewhat amused by it all. Not overly impressed,” she told Walter.

“There is a certain . . .” Walter stammered, looking for the right word.

“I know. I know,” Conchita said. “One day, out of the blue, an aunt shows up, an aunt from nowhere.”

“And she's one of the most famous people in the world.”

“One of the richest too. Don't forget that,” Conchita added that with a smile, her trademark smile. Walter struggled once again to keep his concentration.

Harry Levine was a “nice boy.” That's the way she described him. Walter took that to mean he was average. He'd always associated nice with average and saw no reason not to do so here. Chita, as Walter had finally agreed to call her, had not spent much time with Harry. He was a grown-up when they met. They both had busy schedules. Fortunately her work carried her around the world. She told Walter this as they sat in his kitchen watching an afternoon Caribbean rainstorm splatter hard against the seaward side of his hilltop home. She met Sadie Fagan first, in Atlanta, not long after Elana died. She saw Harry in London. She made the trip just to meet him. There was a minimum of publicity, although a complete blackout is simply not possible in England where celebrity is more interesting than the royal family and where Chita was just as big a star as in the United States. She did her best to protect Harry. After a few days of photos, only one of them showing him clearly, she returned to America and he was not bothered further by the press. Her work, she told Walter, took her to Europe frequently, and she managed to see Harry a few times, in London and Paris as well. Once they got together in Spain. All told she had been with him perhaps a half-dozen times. Walter listened patiently, but soon Chita had little new to offer. “I'm sorry,” she said, “that I can't be more helpful.”

The young woman who was Walter's housekeeper brought a pot of tea and a plate of fresh fruits. She put them down on the kitchen counter, at a respectful distance from them, and offered to pour the tea.

“Thank you, Denise,” said Walter.

“She's lovely,” Conchita whispered to him after Denise had gone.

“Clara's niece,” Walter said, with a tone that told Conchita he hadn't considered the fact that she had no idea who Clara was.

“Clara?”

“She was my housekeeper, my cook, my protector, my surrogate mother. She was with me here so long I can't remember when she wasn't.” He had a tender, hurt look in his eyes. Chita wanted to comfort him. This crusty old man, she thought, had a soft, vulnerable side too.

“She died?”

“Yes. Three years ago.”

“You miss her.”

“I miss her.”

“I can see that,” said Chita. “Denise, she does a good job?” Walter just shook his head, yes.

Conchita Crystal looked around her. It was definitely a man's house. The television in the living room—more like an amphitheater, she thought—had the biggest screen she'd ever seen. “I didn't know they even made them that big,” she said to him. The furniture was comfortable and, although Conchita could not pin a name or any particular style to it, it looked like quality merchandise. Perhaps, she thought, this is what they call eclectic. The floors of Walter's house were hardwood, richly stained, gleaming, shiny and spotless. A few throw rugs were scattered about. The room, including the kitchen area, was so huge it was difficult to see it as a single room. The far wall was made entirely of glass soaring all the way to the top of the vaulted roofline. Since the glass stretched at least thirty-five feet from one end to the other, there were three double glass sliding doors that opened onto a wooden deck running the full length of the house. Part of it was covered, she could see, by a slanted roof and under it was a table with six wicker chairs. At the other end was some sort of outdoor stove and, next to it, a hot tub. The tub was covered with a blue tarp. Despite the rain, Conchita could see down the mountainside, out to the sea. She'd been privy to some incredible views, from equally incredible homes—owned a few herself—but this sight was as thrilling as any. She hoped she could stay long enough to see it when the storm passed and the sunshine reappeared.

Walter asked many questions about Harry. He wanted to learn about his character—his likes and dislikes, his habits, tendencies, inclinations, his vices. Conchita told him what she knew, and while it wasn't much, Walter began developing a picture of Harry Levine as they talked. Not a photographic image—that she had already given him—but a psychological profile of sorts. What kind of man Harry was would determine where he went to hide. It had always been so. From decades of experience, Walter understood the more he knew about Harry Levine, the more he could decipher Harry's motives, the easier it would be to calculate his movements and discover his whereabouts.

“Tell me about Tulane University,” he asked. She did, and when she finished, he asked about Philadelphia. But mostly Walter was interested in Roswell, Georgia.

“I don't know that much about Roswell,” said Conchita.

“Harry grew up there.”

“Yes, but I didn't know about my sister then. I didn't know Harry when he was a child. You should really talk to his Aunt Sadie.”

“I will.”

“She'll have much more to tell you than I do. Talk to her.”

“I will.”

“We don't have much time,” said Conchita.

“Well, we're not sure about that, are we?”

Chita reached out with her hand, much as she had done earlier in the day at Billy's. Once again her long, slender fingers, bright red nails flickering in the reflected light, inched toward him, touched his forearm. It was the first time she had touched him since she came to his house. Her eyes caught his and held him straight and tight. Had he been a dog, she could have led him anywhere without so much as a jerk of his leash. Instead, like a fish, she reeled him in.

“It's that I'm worried about him, Walter. You must find him before he gets hurt.”

“You know, of course,” he said, unwilling to breathe with gills, “I don't really know what's going on here—with Harry—what this is really all about. You tell me somebody gave him something, about somebody named Lord Frederick Lacey. Your nephew Harry has some sort of document that says Lacey killed John Kennedy. Harry's got some kind of confession, is how you put it. Who gave it to him?”

“I don't know. He didn't tell me.”

“And you want me to find him before
they
do—but you don't tell me who they are or even who they could be.”

“I don't know,” Conchita said. They'd been through this before, she said. Now, she repeated it with a note of irritation in her voice. “If I knew more I would tell you. Don't you believe me?” He'd tested her patience. She was getting pissed. Even in her anger, with her lips closed together, her mouth tighter than he'd seen it before, a frown creating tiny wrinkles in the lines of her cheeks and in the space just above her nose between her narrowed eyes, taking him in with steely resolve, even then Walter could not keep himself from thinking how beautiful she was—how much he wanted to wrap his arms around her, tell her he would do anything, whatever she wanted, anything, anything. To have her, he'd say anything.

But he said nothing.