Graveland: A Novel

by Alan Glynn

  And they keep coming …

  But standing here now, Frank is feeling a little anxious.

  A little anxious? A lot anxious.

  What if he misses his opportunity? What if Craig Howley doesn’t show? What if he got here early and is already inside?

  Every muscle in Frank’s body, every atom, is tensed up and ready for this. It’s all that’s left of himself, he realizes, as he eddies ever farther out to sea, beyond reason or logic, any access to his emotions long since abandoned. But it’s okay, because when the broad-shouldered security guy who’s been standing directly in front of him for the last few seconds moves to the right, it’s like a curtain being drawn back.

  And there he is …

  The door of the limo opens, and out steps tall, balding, moneyed-looking Craig Howley, unmistakable from his TV interview and a hundred magazine and Google images. By his side is the elegant Jessica—the driving force, apparently, behind this whole event.

  Some short, stocky guy in a tux is there to greet them. There’s a little banter, a little glancing around, and then the couple join hands and turn, with Howley on the right, to head inside.

  As they move forward, each second shattering in his mind like a pane of glass, Frank reaches into his jacket pocket for the Glock. He draws it out, inserting his finger right in over the trigger to make sure that he’s ready—to make sure that the various safety mechanisms deactivate when he pulls it.

  He looks up.

  Howley is nearly level with him now.

  Given the crowded, confined space he’s in, it’s sort of an awkward maneuver, but Frank brings his arm up to his chest and then quickly extends it, all the way out, aiming at Howley’s head.

  He fires once, then a second time.

  The loud cracks are followed almost instantaneously by a collective intake of breath, and in the nanosecond before he is mobbed to the ground, Frank sees a streak of something, it’s red and stringy, spurt from the side of Howley’s bare head, which itself jerks and twists awkwardly off to the left.

  Pinned to the ground now, face down, Frank closes his eyes. With both arms yanked back almost to breaking point, with a knee lodged sharply between his shoulder blades, and with voices roaring in his ear, and everywhere, he offers no resistance.

  There is a degree of pain in all of this. He surrenders to it.

  * * *

  Even from three or four blocks away, Ellen can see the revolving lights of the police cars.

  And of an ambulance.

  There’s one crossing Park now, arriving east on Forty-ninth.

  She’s ready to throw up, but fights it really hard, taking deep breaths and rolling down the window.

  After another block, with the traffic ahead starting to get backed up, she thinks … what’s the point?

  “Pull over, please,” she tells the driver. “Now. Here’s good.”

  She pays and gets out.

  At Fifty-first Street, she crosses to the east side of the avenue. The tension in the air here is palpable, and as she moves closer to the scene, the hubbub of a few hundred animated conversations soon begins to overwhelm even the roar of the traffic. She gets to the edge of the crowd, which has extended back now to the corner of Fiftieth, and just stands there, trying to see what’s happening.

  She pretty much knows what has happened, though, doesn’t she?

  No need to be told.

  She makes eye contact with someone, a woman in a business suit, and throws her an interrogative look.

  Woman shrugs. “Don’t know. Some guy got shot?”

  Without turning, someone else, a lanky kid in front of them with a huge pair of cans around his neck, says, “Yeah. One man down. They got the shooter.”

  Ellen nods, still feeling the urge to throw up.

  A few minutes later, the ambulance takes off, followed shortly thereafter by at least three police cars.

  The crowd begins to disperse.

  She spots one or two reporters she knows, already on the scene, notebooks and recorders out.

  Big story.

  She turns around, eye out for a cab.

  If she’s going to throw up, she wants to do it in the comfort and privacy of her own bathroom.

  15

  IT SEEMS LIKE THE LOGICAL SOLUTION.

  To reassume control of the company.

  If he doesn’t step up to the plate, what are they going to do? Bring in an outsider? Pick someone from the Oberon gene pool who’ll cause all sorts of resentments and destabilize everything?

  Nah.

  This is the right thing to do.

  Besides, he’s up for it, and has never felt more motivated or energized.

  From the moment Vaughan enters the Oberon Building early Tuesday morning, he picks up on the reaction—heads turn, there are audible intakes of breath, he hears murmurs, people whispering. The elevator ride to the fifty-seventh floor is a solemn affair and passes in silence, but once he steps into reception—at least as far as he’s concerned—it’s business as usual.

  Craig Howley’s death last night, at the hands of a madman, was an appalling tragedy, and tribute will be paid to him in due course, recognition for his contribution to the company, there’s no question about that—but Craig would be the first to acknowledge that you can’t let your guard down, that the show must go on, and must be seen to go on.

  Back in his office, behind his desk, Vaughan firefights his way through a fairly cluttered agenda. It seems to be just one crisis after another. They’re relatively minor ones, but he works his magic on them nonetheless, mostly over the phone. One key meeting he sets up is with Beth Overmyer, Oberon’s VP of communications. She’s coming in at eleven to discuss how this whole thing should be dealt with from a media perspective.

  On a more personal level, the situation with Arnie Tisch at Eiben-Chemcorp is a real worry for Vaughan. He needs to refresh his supply of this new medication, because he has only two pills left, but the trouble is … he’s been feeling so damn good that he hasn’t given any real thought to what might happen if, or when—and it’s now looking increasingly like when—he runs out.

  So just before Beth Overmyer shows up, he spends a few minutes on the phone trying to reach Arnie Tisch.

  But Arnie Tisch, it would appear, is unavailable.

  Vaughan looks around the office, and over to the window. He hates being thwarted like this. He leaves a message—a message that is unequivocal in its grumpiness.

  Moments later, Beth Overmyer is shown into the office. She approaches and takes a seat in front of Vaughan’s desk.

  Initially, he’s distracted by how attractive she is, in her satin blouse and slim-fitting skirt, with her shapely legs and peep-toe shoes. Her sparkly eyes. Like a young Meredith.

  Like a what?

  Jesus Christ. Did he just think that? He did. Rather than feeling excited by her presence, though, or aroused, he feels irritated.

  He nods at her to go on.

  She starts by expressing her condolences, and shock, on the death of Mr. Howley. Vaughan nods at her again—yes, yes, now go on.

  She outlines the media coverage of what happened last night. The main focus so far, without a doubt, is on the father-daughter angle, the high drama of all that. Howley is getting some attention, but it’s cursory. In a way, he’s little more than a piece of collateral damage.

  “Which is good, isn’t it?” Vaughan says. “For us, I mean.”

  “Sure.” She clears her throat. “But there could be some fallout from … well, from you being here. Today.” She pauses, indicating the desk. “Like this.”

  “What? The man’s barely dead twelve hours and someone’s replaced him already? The unseemly haste of it, is that what you’re talking about?”

  “Yes, but—”

  “Yes, but it’s bullshit. Clearly. Because it’s me.” He pats his chest. “That’s the beauty of it. If it was anyone else, maybe, but—”

  “The beauty, okay, but also, just maybe, the problem. It puts a
spotlight on you, Mr. Vaughan.”

  He freezes.

  “And my understanding is that—”

  “Yes, yes, okay.” He holds up a hand to silence her.

  She’s right.

  Goddammit.

  The “understanding” she referred to there is an unspoken company policy of always striving to protect Vaughan’s privacy, and even, where possible, his anonymity. Coming in like this today was certainly a bold move on his part, but also one that was bound to attract attention. By any standard, therefore, it was a serious error of judgment.

  However, it is perfectly clear to Vaughan, now that he thinks about it, that the real error of judgment here was Craig Howley’s. There’s already been speculation in the papers and online that Howley was targeted because he ran a private equity company, and that this deluded character, this Frank Bishop, was supposedly carrying out the wishes of his own deluded daughter. But if Howley hadn’t gone on television and done that interview, if he hadn’t been so stupid as to place a value on that kind of exposure, on having a so-called high profile, maybe Bishop would have ended up going after someone else.

  Who knows?

  But why take the risk?

  Beth Overmyer drums her fingers on the side of her chair. “Mr. Vaughan, may I be frank?”

  It’s barely perceptible, but he nods assent.

  “I think you should go home. This … visit. We can describe it, if we have to, as a gesture of solidarity with the staff. By the company patriarch. At this terrible time. But any announcement we make about a successor to Mr. Howley, or about whatever temporary arrangements we’re putting in place … it really shouldn’t have your name on it anywhere. In fact, you shouldn’t be here a minute longer than is necessary.”

  Vaughan makes a face, petulant now.

  But she’s right. Again. Maintaining privacy has been a priority throughout his life, partly fueled by a distaste for his father’s flagrant disregard of it, and partly necessitated by certain commercial sensitivities. But it has now reached the stage where it’s probably close to a pathology. So this carelessness of his today, this recklessness …

  It’s taken him somewhat by surprise.

  Maybe it’s due to the medication, he doesn’t know, but—

  “Mr. Vaughan,” Beth Overmyer says.

  He needs to keep his eye on the ball a bit more.

  “Er … yes?”

  “There is one other thing. It has come to our attention that Jimmy Gilroy has resurfaced.”

  Vaughan leans forward on the desk and buries his head in his hands. This is the little bastard who broke the J. J. Rundle story and then spent the next year or so nosing around for a follow-up story on Vaughan himself. He was discouraged gently, and then not so gently. Obstacles were put in his way, incentives, too. Vaughan thought he’d been taken care of.

  He looks up at Beth Overmyer.

  Now what?

  “Well, he has apparently finished this book of his, and although no one seems to want to publish it, which is a good sign, he has just recently met up with Ellen Dorsey again.”

  “Oh, please.” Vaughan slaps his hand on the desk.

  “My concern, therefore,” Beth Overmyer goes on, “is that with this dreadful business of Mr. Howley’s death, there will inevitably be increased focus on Oberon, even on you … and that this might increase Gilroy’s chances of finding a publisher.”

  Vaughan leans back in his chair. Initial intelligence reports on what Gilroy was putting together were pretty horrifying—a full family history, no less. But with confidentiality clauses, libel laws, insiders sworn to secrecy, and so on, he was never going to get very far.

  That was the understanding, at any rate.

  “No,” Vaughan then says, shaking his head. “This situation cannot be allowed to develop. It is not acceptable.”

  Beth Overmyer nods in agreement. “Absolutely.” She pauses and straightens out a crease in her skirt. “What would you like me to do about it?”

  Vaughan thinks about this for a while, swiveling in his chair. But there’s only one thing he can do, isn’t there?

  “Don’t worry about it,” he says eventually, standing up from the desk. “I’ll take care of this.”

  “O-kay.”

  “But in the meantime can you get me a copy of the damn thing? Of this stupid book?”

  “It should be possible, yeah. But Mr. Vaughan, is that really a good idea—”

  “Yes. It is. I want to see what he’s written.”

  “Very well. I’ll send it to you as soon as I get my hands on a copy.”

  “Good.”

  He remains there for a moment, distracted, gazing at her legs.

  “Mr. Vaughan?”

  “Er, yes.” He looks into her eyes. “Thank you. That’ll be all.”

  She stands up, but seems reluctant to move.

  “Okay, okay,” he says to her. “I get it, I get it. I just have one phone call to make and then I’m leaving.”

  * * *

  Ellen spends a lot of Tuesday on the couch in front of the TV, flicking between analysis of the Frank Bishop story and live coverage of the Connie Carillo murder trial. When the analysis becomes unbearable, either too convoluted or just too close to the bone, she switches to the murder trial. And when the trial becomes too much, with its longueurs and its overreliance on trivial detail—Ray Whitestone’s signature technique—she switches back.

  She feels bad for Frank. She feels she should have seen this coming, and done something. She did see it coming, in fact, but not soon enough. And anyway, what could she have done?

  This has all just compounded her general sense of uselessness. The thing is, instead of vegetating on the couch, she should probably be working on her next piece for Parallax, the one on West Virginia congresswoman Jane Glasser. But it’s not happening. There’s nothing in the tank to kickstart that story.

  “Now, Mrs. Sanchez, could you kindly describe for the court the exact layout of the kitchen?”

  Ray Whitestone is getting closer here, finally, to the heart of the matter. This is where the murder took place. Or at least it’s where Howard Meeker’s naked body was found.

  In the kitchen, on the floor.

  A lot of people will be relieved that the prosecution’s case seems to be entering its final phase—though no one is quite sure yet where this massive accumulation of detail Whitestone has built up is leading. So far no motive has been established, no tearing apart of Connie’s character has taken place—there’s been no real drama, in fact. The appeal of the trial, weirdly, appears to lie in its very banality, in this slow-burn, slightly soporific, almost tantric quality. It’s as if the promise of an explosive resolution is what has been carrying everyone forward.

  Appropriately drowsy, Ellen stares at the screen.

  There are only three fixed angles allowed in the courtroom. One takes in both the prosecution and defense teams, with Connie Carillo herself sometimes visible, sometimes obscured, at the far end. The second angle is of the witness box, which provides virtual close-up shots of those giving evidence, and the third angle is of the bench and of the fifty-eight-year-old presiding judge, ex–Olympic shot-put silver medalist J. Shelley Roberts.

  “Well, first off, Mr. Whitestone, let me tell you, it’s a big kitchen, specially when you got to clean it…”

  Ellen flicks over.

  “… to be honest, what this sap did, what his daughter did—and I’m not condoning it, obviously, God forbid—but I don’t understand why there hasn’t actually been more of it, because when you look at the situation, when you consider the scale of what’s been perpetrated on the American people…”

  And back.

  “… the countertop, that part of the island, it’s of marble, I guess, I don’t know, a kind of dark, black marble, and it has these light fixtures hanging over it, they’re made with copper, I think…”

  “… I mean really, were we all asleep at the wheel when these bozos passed the bill in 2000 exempting to
xic assets like CDOs, repos, and swaps from regulation? Were we smoking crack when the ratings agencies declared that junk mortgages were as safe as Treasury bonds? I mean come on…”

  After a few more rounds of this, Ellen has had enough and flicks the TV off. She goes over to her desk and calls up the House of Vaughan file.

  She’s not sure if she’s ready for this either, but she wants to finish it. The last chapter she read was a vivid account of how James Vaughan’s grandfather, Charles A. Vaughan, was one of the seven men who met in secret at a remote hunting lodge on Jekyll Island off the coast of Georgia in 1910 to plot the creation of the Federal Reserve System. The book’s final chapter then takes the reader back to Vaughan’s youth decades earlier and describes how he effectively came out of nowhere and got started in business.

  The really surprising thing, as far as Ellen is concerned, is the detailed account of an incident that Gilroy chooses to close the book with, an incident that seems to identify—and with pinpoint precision—the very beginnings of the Vaughan family fortune. As she’s reading it, fully awake now and engaged, two aspects of this strike her as significant. One, the story is nothing short of incendiary—but kind of deceptively so, as it describes something that happened way back in late August of 1878. And two, in the unlikely event of the book ever being published, and sparking controversy, debate, or even litigation, Gilroy has built a pretty solid and impressive firewall around it in the form of multiple primary and secondary source citations. These include newspaper reports and contemporary eyewitness accounts.

  The incident in question, which was quick and brutal, involved Charles Vaughan himself and Gilbert Morley, a renowned Wall Street speculator, as well as, indirectly, Arabella Stringham, the daughter of dry-goods magnate “Colonel” Cyrus T. Stringham.

  When Ellen has finished the book, she gets on the phone and calls Gilroy up.

  “Hi, Ellen.”

  “Jimmy.” She whistles. “I’ve just finished House of Vaughan.”