Now it was time for business. After updating each other, they decided that a meeting with Ernie, Francisco, and Leon Goddard was necessary because they were setting in action a plan that would put a lot of pressure on the opposition. They also decided that it was convenient that Marco have a face-to-face talk with Special Agent Delany; there was nothing to lose and much to learn.
Francisco Lujan left Bogotá for New York making a short stop in Miami to meet with a Russian Diplomat. He arrived in Teterboro, and boarded a chopper into downtown. Ernie was at the heliport to meet him. Francisco’s security people had stayed in Miami because in NYC he was in the very capable hands of the Carducci. The two had been notified by Airy that a substitute for Sun E had been chosen by their board and would be inducted and then introduced at the next meeting. They both felt the loss of a good friend but life and the show must always go on.
Marco and Ian Carlo were sitting in the library of the old house talking about Leon Goddard.
“I’ve gotta tell you that this guy is solid gold,” said Ian Carlo as he poured more coffee into his cup. “I see things going as well or better than before and there is no amount of work that he won’t take on. You really know how to pick them!”
“Leon was better at most things in school. He has the best analytical mind that I have ever met and has great imagination that makes him creative. This is a combination that few people have. Thank goodness he’s not entrepreneurial, otherwise we wouldn’t have him.”
“We had the talk by the way” said Ian Carlo, “even though he doesn’t see my side of the business now he knows where the seed money to all those kosher businesses came from. So far he hasn’t gone squeamish on us, which is good.”
“I hope not. That’s an area that worried me to some degree. He’s always been a straight arrow, which is why I hired him. I never expected all this shit to happen and having to put him in this position.”
“What position would that be?” asked Leon Goddard as he entered the room in the company of Patricia. He saw the faces of the two men and added, “I am expected, right?”
“Oh, yes you are, Leon, take a seat,” Marco said as they all shook hands, “and you are most welcome. Now as to what I was saying, is that too many unexpected things have occurred in the last few weeks that have placed you in what might be an uncomfortable position….”
“You hear me complaining? I’ve never had so much fun in my life and on top of which you’re paying me a shit load of money to do it,” laughed Leon. “This is like a good chess game. You wanted me to block every move that the Meredith do and that’s just what we’re doing. By now Ana must be really pissed, which means she must be giving hell to poor Edward.”
“Ana…Edward?” asked Ian Carlo surprised.
“Oh yes, I’ve known them for years. They offered me a job when we finished school. I even spent a weekend at their place, but after seeing how that old lady treats her son, I ran. That’s about when you offered me a job and here I am,” said Leon affably.
The five turned their discussion to the plan that they had come up with, each of them contributing with details and different points of view. It became a plan both strategic and tactical, and decisions were made to put it all into effect.
Earlier, Ana Meredith, her son Edward, Lord Humphrey, and Sheik Faruk Al-Enezi were looking at Senator Archibald Mason pour himself a large whiskey. The others, with the exception of the Arab, were drinking the fine Chianti from the villa’s winery.
“So you think that all our transactions managed through the network set up by His Eminence have led our opponents to compromise our efforts. Correct me if I’m wrong,” said Mason without turning around. “And furthermore, you think the sheik here is going to offer us a better deal and not be exposed to the beady little eyes of Lujan and company?”
“In sum, yes. That is the gist of it,” said Edward Meredith. “I’m tired of the bullshit. Yesterday Dupree told my mother and me that things had been solved in Colombia and that it would only be political posturing. Well, today the Attorney General indicted our manager in Colombia and put a government lien on all our properties acquired after the first of January of last year. That’s more than half our holdings there.”
“And,” said Ana, boiling inside, “the significant part is that other governments are watching and this could become a landslide. If we cannot transact in secrecy most of our business would deteriorate.”
“I concur,” said Humphrey, “too much is at stake here and Dupree doesn’t keep that crazy priest of his on a short enough leash.”
“What priest” asked the sheik?
Nobody answered.
Across the ocean and in the few seconds before the edge of the sun began to dim the stars, M&M sat in a skiff off a small key south of Cuba. His boatman and guide was a rail-thin man of undeterminable age who wore a dirty old straw hat and a shirt washed so many times you could never guess what color it had been. The skiff was as old as the shirt, made of wood with planks for seats and an old but serviceable cooler that stored the drinks and served as a casting platform. The engine was a Johnson 20 HP that probably powered Washington across the Potomac. M&M was particular about his guides and Vicente was by his judgment the best tarpon guide in all the Caribbean. As they sat quietly for the day to break both sipped on Cuban coffee, strong and sweet like most of the people of that island. The ever-present cigar went to and left from Vicente’s lips, lighting up his wrinkled face as he sucked in the velvet smoke. When there was enough light to see the silver-blue water of the flat, Vicente stood on the cooler and looked north, toward land, toward Cuba. He stood there in perfect stillness as if to see who upon that land was looking back. Time passed slowly, like the clouds that drifted west, fleeing the rising sun. An hour passed and Vicente never moved. His cigar clenched between his teeth had probably died by now.
Suddenly he said only one word “Vienen!” – “They’re coming” – and got off the cooler. M&M got on and stripped line from the reel until about sixty feet lay loosely coiled on the floor of the boat. Then he made a couple of slow casts, leaving about thirty feet of line out the tip of the rod and laying in the water in front of him, and looked at where Vicente was pointing. There in the clear water, over the uneven sand, long shadows that looked almost like torpedoes moved quickly toward him. About twenty feet to the east of the shadows he saw the fish, a line of six large tarpon.
They were suddenly only about a hundred feet away and he would have time for just one cast. Holding the loose line in his left hand he raised the rod up and back with his right arm and gave the line a strong but steady pull, loading the rod off the tension of the water into an energy-laden back cast. At the point when the line was nearly fully extended in the air behind him he pulled down hard on the line in his left hand to increase his line speed and reversed direction with the rod, driving the cast forward on the haul and letting the energy release through the entire length of the rod into the fat belly of the line. It shot forward in a powerful, tight loop, feeding its length from the excess line on the floor of the boat and unfurling into a straight seventy-foot extension of flyline, leader, tippet, and fly, all touching the water at the same time with barely perceptible disturbance. It was a perfect cast and M&M smiled in satisfaction as he felt the few remaining joules of energy from the effort stop at the reel with a solid jerk. He dropped the rod tip to the surface of the water and made sure he was tight to the line, letting the fly at the other end sink for a few seconds to reach the same depth as the approaching tarpon. He then began a slow, steady retrieve, drawing the fly – a pattern tied to imitate a small shrimp or other crustacean – into visual range of the lead fish, which instantly surged forward and engulfed the tiny offering into its dinner-plate sized maw.
As the tarpon turned back into the line of fish M&M struck. Keeping his rod low and parallel to the water he grasped the line just in front of the reel and in several violent strip strikes yanked it away from the fish as hard as he could, driving the razor-sharp 1/0 tem
pered steel hook of the fly into the tough, bony mouth of the tarpon. Instantly the silver king erupted, going airborne in a trademark explosion of water and scales, its huge gaping mouth trying to swallow the sun while light fractured off his frantically shaking body tossing rainbows in all directions.
M&M bowed to the King. He extended his arm forward and bent from the waist to lessen the tension on the line in anticipation of the huge fish landing back on the leader and snapping the thin 16-pound line class tippet. His experience and skill paid off and the still tethered tarpon took off like a freight train bound for Chattanooga, scattering the other tarpon and causing M&M’s reel to resonate with the high-pitched wail so beloved by big fish anglers everywhere. The tarpon’s frenzied retreat was punctuated by several more leaps and each time, with trained humility, M&M bowed and bowed again, rendering upon this king of fish the honor that it deserved.
M&M used the strong butt of the rod to dominate the beast, knowing that if the battle did not end quickly and decisively the tarpon would begin to gulp air at the surface and would slowly regain its strength, resulting in a battle that could go on for literally hours. Every time the tarpon ran to the right M&M pulled to the left, and vice versa, never letting the leviathan lift its head. Fifteen minutes later he felt the fish finally give up against his pressure and roll in the direction he pulled. He knew the contest was over.
He reeled in as quickly as possible, steering the tarpon to the boat where it lay docile on its side in exhausted silver splendor, its large eye the only part of its magnificent body still denying the defeat. As Vincent grabbed the fish by its huge lower jaw and popped the insignificant fly from the armored mouth, M&M and the tarpon fixed each other in a stare reminiscent of knights in the jousting arena. Then the fish quivered, righted itself, and with slow kicks of its tail swam away from the boat. The fish gone, M&M sighed and looked up at the horizon. It was going to be a great day.
The meeting in Italy was going well.
“I don’t want to pry into your affairs unless they may be of significance to our transactions,” said the sheik.
“No problem,” answered Mason curtly, “our current banker has some eccentric associates that we rather not comment on.”
“Then to our business. I understand that you will be making substantial land purchases and investing in mining, oil, and pharmaceutical research and that you want that investment to be untraceable to your group. Is that a correct statement?”
“Yes, very precise indeed. Obviously the most important detail is missing. All the deposits your bank will receive will be in cash, and those must appear as normal business transactions within your banks.”
“Yes, naturally; and I’m sure you are aware of the fees entailed. Am I correct?”
“A fifth of the cash and it becomes immaculate,” said Ana, with her usual directness.
“We understand each other very well,” said the sheik.
“Yes, but are you sure your banks can handle all that cash? We are talking of container loads of dollars and euros,” said Ana brashly.
“I will explain this once to set your mind at ease. Our banks, all based in the Middle East, are not interfered with by Western regulators. The West has few friends in the Middle East and they do not want to aggravate the few they have. You should know this to be a fact, Lord Houghton.”
“That is why we’re here,” answered Humphrey, raising his glass.
“Your shipments of so many items to one or more of our nations will no doubt be laced with the cash and it will be instantly credited to your accounts, less our fee, naturally. What you want us to do with that money is entirely up to you and other than making it untraceable, we hold no further responsibility. The accounts can be managed by one point of contact and will be coded and encrypted to your satisfaction. The banks are spread out from Lebanon to Tunisia, but you can operate as a single account and we will do the juggling.” The sheik looked briefly toward the sky. “Now I must retire to privacy as it is time for prayer. Discuss this among yourselves and I will return later.”
Vicente released a second tarpon of the day and M&M was feeling light as a kite and relishing every moment when his sat-phone buzzed his attention away from the fish. He picked up and grunted a hello; he listened for about three minutes, said thank you in Farsi, and hung up.
“Que día más bueno, Vicente!” (“What a good day, Vicente!”) said M&M with a bright smile. The prince had just given him an update of the meeting the sheik had with Ana Meredith and her group. It was time to collect on his good deeds. Later that day he would get in touch with Francisco Lujan, but right now he was going to jump another tarpon.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Special Agent Delany shivered with the thought of what he was about to do. Was he betraying his sworn duty? This meeting with Marco Carducci was not going to be according to FBI protocol. He did not tell his superior, he did not take backup; he was winging this, but he needed to know more about his father’s murder and apparently Carducci could tell him something. He entered the lobby of the Ambassador Hotel and headed for the quiet lobby bar. There in one of the booths was Marcus MacKenzie and his wife. What were they doing here? From behind, a voice called “Joseph” and he turned to see an older man, about five-foot-six dressed in a dark blue pinstripe suit, white shirt, school tie, and very polished burgundy wingtips. He put out his hand.
“I’m Ernest Goldman. I’m an attorney for Mr. Marco Carducci and it was I who arranged this meeting. Why don’t we join Marco and we can get on with it.”
“Sure but where is he?”
“Right here,” said Ernie pointing.
“No, that’s…Oh, I see,” said Delany. He wasn’t always the brightest star in his family, he thought disappointedly, sitting down.
Marco stood up politely.
“Hello Special Agent. I’m Marco Carducci and this is Ms. Patricia Lujan. I’m sorry about the small deception. We borrowed the personas of some dear friends because we were concerned for our safety. There have been three attempts on our life including the one on the Toscana and we had no way of knowing who you really were.”
“I came to talk about those attempts,” said Delany with only a nod to Patricia. “My parents were murdered recently and I was told by an informed source that it may be the same person who has tried to kill you.”
“That source told you something else, Agent Delany. He told you that a close friend of your father was involved in the murder.” This was Patricia talking.
“How did you know that?”
“Probably the same informed source. He is an international fixer of the very highest caliber. If he said it, you can count on it. He trades in information and as far as we know, never tells a falsehood; it would destroy his credibility.”
“Why did he tell me this? I have nothing to offer him.”
“That may be now, but he trades long term. Maybe you are an investment. Rest assured that he did not do it out of altruism and that sooner or later he will collect.”
“Mr. Carducci, you are aware that until recently I was the head of an investigation focused on organized crime and that the Carducci family has been a significant target of that investigation?”
“That is of no concern to Mr. Carducci, as he is nothing more than a legitimate and very successful businessman,” interrupted Ernie Goldman. “He is here with you to help solve murders and attempted murders of which you and he have been victims, but if you have any legitimate questions and not intimidations, I’m sure Mr. Carducci will be glad to answer in my presence.”
“No, I’ve been re-assigned and that is not my case anymore.”
“I’m surprised, what happened?”
“My father died, that’s what happened. It appears that his absence affected my status within the agency. And since it appears that Uncle Archie…I mean Senator Mason, had something to do with it, my influence in Washington not only vanished but has turned against me.”
“Why would that be?”
“I don’t rea
lly know.”
“Well, here is where we can join forces,” said Patricia. “We know about Mason, Meredith, Dupree and some priest that’s his henchman, but we know little else. There are people in the US government that are involved in this and others in Europe and maybe the Middle East, but we have yet to pinpoint whom. We know that they are trying to centralize wealth and corner fundamental natural resources. We know that they are doing all this under subterfuge and if they succeed we will see a dreadful combination of the Third Reich, Stalin’s Russia, and Victorian Britain dominating most of the world.”
Patricia waited for her words to soak in to the young agent. She was skewing his previous worldview and she knew it. “We saw what they can do in 2008 and that was just a test. Think what a total collapse of the world’s monetary system would mean when just a few can control water and food for most of the western world. Look at Detroit, for example. At this moment Meredith or another conglomerate can walk in and buy 100,000 properties for practically nothing. This can become pervasive if somebody doesn’t stop these people – and don’t count on the government. They owe their positions, their income, and their lives to those who are building this trap. These are the same people who killed your father and your mother.”
Delany was silent for a few seconds. Finally he whispered, “How can I help? What can I do? I feel so impotent. Most of my clout at the agency is gone and my new job is a dead end.”
The Carducci Convergence Page 17