by Scott Turow
It was from his personal banker at First Kindle, who announced that yet another grand jury subpoena had been served on the bank more than a month ago. According to the letter, agents had visited the bank and briefly reviewed the statements for Dixon's checking accounts. Then, pursuant to the subpoena's command, they had required copies of all items Dixon had deposited and the checks he had written over the last year. This was an exhaustive task, requh-ing clerks to search through reels of microfilm, but the bank was scheduled to finally produce these items next week. The FBI, as usual, had requested confidentiality, yet the banker, after consultation with his lawyers, had determined to advise Dixon should he wish to venture any objection. The letter portrayed this gesture as an act of heroic defiance in behalf of a valued customer, but it was, in truth, routine.
"What does it mean?" asked Dixon.
Many things, Stern knew. Certainly that Dixon was the target of th9 government's inquiry; and that somehow they had figured out where Dixon banked. At this point, a few months ago, Stern would have lit a cigar as a way to gather a moment to think. His fingers still wandered toward the handsome crystal ashtray on his desk, as if the nerves had some instinct of their own. It was twenty-nine days, by his calculation, since he'd had his last cigar, the day he flew off to Chicago. This was a lugubrious South American notion, he knew, the idea of a penance, moth-eaten Catholic baggage he was still lugging around from his adolescence, and he a Jew at that. It was typical of the entirely unpredictable ways that Argentina would episodically haunt him.
"It means, I would think," said Stern, "that the government is attempting to trace money. They believe, Dixon, that you somehow unlawfully profited from these enormous trades they are scrutinizing."
Dixon was quiet.
"It's a bunch of crap," he said finally. "What do they think? I stole all fhis money and mailed it right into my checking account so I could be sure someone would notice?
How stupid am I supposed to be?"
Stern did not answer. In his indignation Dixon was convincing, but the sequence of events described'by the banker-the fact that the agents had reviewed the statements first-gave every indication that they believed they were on the right track. Dixon had admitted last time that the orders the government was investigating were large enough to significantly alter market prices. Perhaps Dixon had been paid off by traders on the market floor for informing them about his customers' plans. That would fit.
The prosecutor would want to examine any personal checks Dixon had received from other members of the exchanges.
"And if they're tracing money I deposit, what do they need my goddamn canceled checks for?" Dixon asked.
"Generally, your checks are desired not for what is on the frOnt but on the rback." Dixon did not seem to under stand.:'By examining the endorsements, Dixon, they are able to identify other accounts, other financial institutions with whom you have dealings. If they do not find what they are seeking in this account, they will move on to the others."
"Great," said Dixon. He went quiet again/Stern, in the interim, scribbled a quick draft of a letter to the bank, asking for copies of the subpoena and whatever they produced to the government. As the bankers' lawyers well knew, there were no grounds to prevent the bank from complying.
"This gal is really a pistol," Dixon said. He was speaking apparently of Klonsky. "She wants everything. Margy told me the records they subpoenaed already take up half a room." A few boxes, is what Margy had said to Stern, but he would see for himself. He was going to Chicago next week to review the documents before turning them over to the government. "You know what they call her, don't you?" Dixon asked.
"Klonstadt? Have you heard this? The Titless Wonder." Dixon laughed.
On Friday nights at Gil's, within whose mock-elegant foil walls the federal practitioners gathered to pass information about ongoing trials and the tribulations of practice, Stern had heard the nickname.
That kind of emel humor had never been much to his taste.
Dixon was deeply aggrieved. Aggravated. Hounded. Ms. Klonsky's resourcefulness exceeded his expectations. And in his gruff effort to insist that this vulgarity was funny, Stern, for the first time, detected a familiar tone. Stern had listened to it for decades. The willies or the creeps.
Call it what you like. It was the sound of incipient internal corrosion, of inner fortifications giving way.
That abandoned edge in Dixon's voice touched Stern himself with the cold trickle of something close to fright.
Clearly, given his new knowledge of the prosecutor's nickname, Dixon had found himself unable to obey Stern's advice not to' talk about the investigation. Instead, in the steam bath at the club, or in some corner of the locker room where he usually talked grain prices or the girls on the floor he'd like to screw, Dixon had bellied out his troubles to somebody-a lawyer probably, given the information he had retrieved. One could only hope it was someone discreet.
"Do you know what the latest is?" Dixon asked. "I'm not supposed to have heard this, but two FBI agents have been up at Datatech all week looking over records on one of the MD accounts. I picked that up today."
Stern made a deeper sound. No wonder Dixon was feeling surrounded.
Datatech was Dixon's data-processing vender, Which prepared the computer tabulations on all of MD's accounts.
"Which account, Dixon?"
"The house error account."
"What is that, please?"
"Just what it sounds like. Where we clear up mistakes.
Customer wants to buy two cars of herons and we buy him corn instead.
When we notice what we've done, we'll buy him beans and move the corn into the house error account, so we end up owning the corn instead of the customer."
"And the government wants the records of this account?"
"Better than that. The jokers asked Datatech to Put together a special computer run. They just want errors made on trades on the KCFE." The Kindle County Futures Exchange.
"Kindle?" asked Stern.
"Right. It doesn't make sense, does it??"
"No," answered Stern simply. The customer trades about which the government had been subpoenaing information previously had all been executed on the Chicago Exchange.
The errors which the government now wished to examine arose, according to Dixon's information, from trades placed on the smaller exchange here.
It was like investigating transactions on the New York Stock Exchange by requesting records from the Pacific Stock Exchange in San Francisco.
Baffling. But there was something in Dixon's uneasy tenor which suggested to Stern that the government was on the right trail. "From whom do you hear these things, Dixon?
About the FBI at Datatech?"
"I got that on the QT. They fouled their britches over at Datatech when they saw the subpoena. I pay those jagoffs three hundred thousand dollars a year, and now they promise to keep this a secret from me."
"Just so," said Stern. "But you have reason to believe in the accuracy of this information?"
"A young lady," said Dixon finally. "I've known her for some time. She wouldn't give me any malarkey. I promised this wouldn't come back on her. I don't want Titless hearing about it."
"Of course." For Dixon, like the others on the exchanges, his word given was exalted. To someone's back a knife could be freely applied, but a deal made eye to eye could not be broken.
"How long is she going to keep this up, anyway," Dixon asked,
"what's-her-name, Kronstadt?"
"Klonsky," said Stern. "There is no telling."
"Months?"
"Years, in theory."
"Jesus. And they can just go on sending out one subpoena after another?
Even to me?"
"If there is any legitimate investigative purpose, yes."
Across the phone lines, Stern heard the little metal click of Dixon's lighter. "Do I take it you have a particular concern, Dixon?"
"It's nothing," he said. He emitted a heavy breath.
"Can they get anything with a subpoena?"
"I am not following, Dixon."
"Suppose I have some personal stuff. Can they subpoena that?"
Stern waited. What was Dixon telling him?
"Where are these private items housed, Dixon?"
Stern could hear his brother-in-law drawing on his cigarette, weighing how much to admit.
"My office. You know. There's a small safe. It fits in the bottom of my credenza."
"And what is in it?"
Dixon made an equivocal sound. "Generally," said Stern.
"Personal," said Dixon. "Stuff."
Stern ran his tongue along his mouth. Dixon needed no education in being less chatty. At times, there was a peculiar fellowship between Stern and his brother-in-law.
Dixon was a clever man with a winning sense of humor; it was easy at moments to enjoy his company. He and Stern attended ball games together; engaged in such athletic competitions as Stern could manage.
Both men were lovers of gadgets, and there were two stores on East Charles which they visited only. together, one afternoon a year. And yet there had always been absolute boundaries, guarded by some rumbling unspeaking rivalry, disapproval, distrust. Stern was content to let Dixon leave him often in the dark. He did not want a rundown on Dixon's illicit rendezvous or his borderline business practices. Over the years, this relation of lawyer and client had proved more agreeable to both of them than some jovial effort to feign any kind of filial intimacy. Stern asked only what the law in its rigors and proprieties demanded, and Dixon listened carefully and answered narrowly, and as he liked.
"Are we speaking of truly personal materials,. Dixon?
Items which are yours alone and not the corporation's, which were prepared outside the corporation and to which you do not give corporate personnel access?"
"Right. Can they get that with a subpoena?"
Stern pondered. He never liked providing these kinds of saddleback opinions. The client was always holding on to some detail which changed everything.
"In general, you cannot be compelled to produce personal items, absent a grant of immunity. That is not likely to occur at this point in the investigation. A search warrant, of course, is another matter."
"A search warrant?"
"These investigations of brokerage houses are sometimes most unpleasant.
Depending on what the prosecutors are seeking, they may find it convenient to attempt to grab up all your records at once. If they start in the office and believe items are missing, your home would be next."
"I better move this stuff?. Is that what you're telling me?"
"Only if you're concerned about it falling into the government's hands.
If that thought troubles you for some reason, you might think about storing your safe somewhere less likely to be searched."
"Which is where?"
"How big is it?" Stern asked.
A foot quare, Dixon said.
"You could send it here, then. Federal prosecutors are more reluctant, even these days, to search attorneys' offices.
The warrant requires special approval from the Justice Department in Washington, and the conduct smacks of a violation of the right to counsel. It is very unfdy, from their perspective."
"And how do I get to the safe, if I need something?"
Stern declined to state the obvious. Dixon had already made it clear that he had no wish to share the contents.
"I shall give you a key to the office. Come and look as you like. Or better yet, what about another lawyer Who is not involved in this present matter? Wally Marmon's office would serve excellently." This was the large firm which represented Dixon on the routine business matters that Stern declined to handle, but Dixon grunted at the notion.
"He'll charge me rent," Dixon said, "by the hour. And he'd get too nervous. You know Wally."
On reflection, Dixon was probably correct about that. "If this arrangement makes you uncomfortable, then leave the safe where it is, Dixon. Or take it home. As your lawyer, I prefer to see it here."
It would be best to have Dixon's zone of privacy clearly bounded. Lord only knew where they'd end up if Dixon had continuing access to some black box into which he could stuff any document the government sought whose contents made him uncomfortable. Both the client and the lawyer, could come to substantial grief that way.
Dixon at last said that he would send the safe next week.
"Handle the arrangements yourself," said Stern. "If no one but you knows where the safe is, no one can tell the government where to search for it."
"What does that mean?" asked Dixon.
Stern waited again. He did not want to alarm him. On the other hand.
"'Dixon, I must tell you, I am convinced the government has an informant."
"An informant?"
"Someone close to you or the business. The government's information is too precise. The trades. Where you bank. Who your dataprocessing vender is. And there is an odd order to what they are willing to have known. I suspect they are interested in misleading you about their sources of:information."
"I think they're interested in showing how fucking clever they are," said Dixon.
"You must reflect on this matter, Dixon. The identity of this informant could be of great significance to us."
"Forget it, Stern. You don't have the picture.. Every jackal at the Kindle Exchange that's ever wanted to sink his fangs in my hindquarter is probably feeding stuff to those guys." Dixon's tone was bitter as he spoke of his critics and competitors. "And I'll have the last laugh.
You mark my words. Just wait," he said. "I'll keep my mouth shut now, because you say I've got to. But when this thing is done, I'll still be standing here. And there'll be some bills coming due."
Dixon was unaccustomed to being vulnerable-or restrained.
The need for both enraged him. He hung on the line a moment longer, with the heavy breath of a bull. His bold promises of triumph and revenge behind him, he seemed to have no more to say. Perhaps he recognized their futility. The government would go on, notwithstanding, demanding his records, scaring his clients, courting his enemies, prying into exery worldly connection he valued. Across the distance of two counfles, Dixon seemed to consider his world of dwindling secrets. That was what had always protected him-not his friendships or alliances; he had few-not even his wealth or the power of his personality.
Dixon was like Caliban or God-unknowable. The insult of his present circumstance was profound.
"Just wait," said Dixon once more before he put down the phone.
"DON'T do anything," the woman said at the other end of the line. "I'm bringing you dinner."
"Who is this?" asked Stern. "Helen?"
"Yes, of course, it's Helen. Will that be a bother?
I'll just drop it off and go. I have a meeting."
She must have been calling at fifteen-minute intervals, for he had been home only moments.
"You are most kind," said Stern, eyeing the unidenfi-fiable casserole dish already thawing on the counter. "Come ahead."
So, thought Stern, the female nation heard from, once again. Helen Dudak, of course, probably had no interest in being forward. The Dudaks and the Sterns had been exchanging favors for twenty years. As couples, they had been connected principally by their children. Kate, through most of her life, was the best friend of Helen's oldest, Maxine.
The two families had the same ideas about things that seemed to matter substantially when you were rearing a family: about asking to be excused before leaving the table; the number of sweets allowed in a day; the right age to drive alone or to go out for the evening with a boy. The Dudaks were fine people, principled, with reasonable values, and concern for their children. So the relationship had stood on this solid, if narrow, footing. His knowledge of Helen's inner realm was nodding, at best. Clara had never seemed to regard Miles and Helen as an interesting couple, and in the last few years, in the face of many changes, relations had drifted a bit. Maxin
e had gone to business school, married, and worked in St. Louis; and Helen had been divorced from Miles Dudak for three years now. She had a wised-up, funny, independent air, resolved to exceed the bathes and humiliation of the sad circumstance in which her husband of twenty-odd years, the wealthy owner of a box-manufacturing concern, had moved out and, only a few months later, married his thirty-year-old secretary.
From the kitchen window, Stern observed her arriving with a large purse and an armory of aluminum-foil containers. Buy bauxite, Stern thought as he watched her under flag, proceeding to' the front door with the trays pyramided beneath her chin.
"Helen, my Lord, I am one person." Stern unburdened her and showed her to the kitchen. "There's enough here for six.
Sixteen." Peeling the foil wrapper back from a tray of chicken, he was braced by the aroma. Garlic and thyme. Had he been required to wager, he would have bet that Helen Dudak was a good cook. It was part of her image of substance. "You must join me. It would be a pity to see all of this consumed from the freezer. Do you have time for dinner before your meeting? Please stay. I would welcome your company."
Helen faltered, but eventually was persuaded to surrender her coat. Had this been planned? Stern doubted' it. Helen was not a schemer, although she was clearly pleased to be asked. He took her raincoat to the closet, a fawn-toned garment with a famous label-Miles had not bought his freedom cheaply. She'd already found plates and flatware and was setting the kitchen table when Stern returned. He admired Helen's good sense in not promoting this into a more auspicious encounter in the dining room, but, notwithstanding, there was a certain animated excitement as Helen traveled from the cabinets to the table. Here. they were, people in their middle years. His wife was five weeks dead. But he was single, she was unattached, and because of that, they both seemed strangely, almost painfully enlivened.
And he was interested; there was no concealing that from himself. Since his evening at Fiona's, he was aroused in some measure by every woman he saw. For Stern, it was a disconcerting fixation. As he put it to himself, he had not recently tuned in this channel. Oh, he thought, of course.
He admired a hundred women in a day, just moving about downtown. But he had practiced such deliberate oblivion. He was one of those men glad for middle years, the settled portion of life, when sexual preoccupation could comfortably be left behind without some slur on masculinity. Now he received, almost in spite of himself, an eager, exhilamnt message from his own systems. He could not truly envision himself as the companion of another womanwit was much too soon-but he nonetheless cast a somewhat naughty eye on Helen when he went down the corridor to draw a bottle from the wine, closet.