In the Company of Liars

by David Ellis

  “But ‘more than anything’ does not mean everything,” Mat says.

  She doesn’t respond to that. She knows what Mat’s thinking, and he’s right. Ron McGaffrey immediately focused on the one potential opening. Things were amiss with Sam Dillon. Word trickled out, not long after Allison’s arrest, that federal prosecutors were probing a potential bribery scandal in the state legislature. Opponents of House Bill 1551, placing Flanagan-Maxx’s product Divalpro on the state’s list of prior-approved Medicaid drugs, had cried foul when three senators—Strauss, Almundo, and Blake—suddenly flipped their positions during veto session last November, and the bill quickly made its way to the governor’s desk.

  Of course it raised red flags. The local paper, the Daily Watch, ran articles and editorials critical of the hasty, back-room shenanigans. Opponents of the bill, who had felt completely ambushed by the maneuver, began to take a closer look at the fact that one of the proponents of the bill—a very curious one at that, the Midwestern Alliance for Affordable Health Care—had for the first time in its history hired an independent lobbyist, Mateo Pagone, and had paid Pagone a hundred thousand dollars to help get the bill passed out of only one chamber, the Senate. That, combined with everything else, including the sudden changes of heart of three senators, led to a cry for an investigation. No one knows when, precisely, the U.S. attorney’s office began its probe, but the papers reported that federal prosecutors were presenting evidence to a grand jury as early as this past February, only about six weeks ago.

  And in the midst of all this, the man principally responsible for the passage of House Bill 1551, lobbyist Samuel Dillon, was found murdered in his lake home just outside the city.

  “Ron isn’t going to point at you, Mat.” She says it bluntly, to get it over with.

  “I was stupid,” Mat says, perhaps only to himself. “Really stupid.” Mat has a tendency toward self-flagellation when things are rough. He is a tough man but his self-esteem is thin.

  “You got away with it.” What he did was stupid. There is no rationalization, in the end, though Allison has created some. Every politician takes bribes, in some form or another, except they are usually countenanced by the law. No one will ever convince her that a state representative who takes $10,000 in perfectly legal contributions from a company, then supports legislation on that company’s behalf, has not been “bribed” in some sense of the word. There is, in some twisted way, at least some element of forthrightness in simply stuffing the money in a legislator’s pocket. The only difference, in her mind, is disclosure. Legal contributions go on the books, are reported publicly, but who really cares? Who really pays attention to disclosures from the state board of elections?

  Which is not to say that what Mat did was okay. But given the murky land of political contributions, and knowing this flawed man for over two decades in a way probably no one else ever has, Allison can at least give some context to what he did. She believes, in her heart, that no good would come from putting Mat in prison for this crime. She can forgive him this transgression. It is not the bribery of three senators that really bothers her, anyway.

  It’s the fact that he was too cowardly to do it himself.

  ONE DAY EARLIER

  THURSDAY, MARCH 25

  McCoy reads over the message sent yesterday, Wednesday the twenty-fourth, by Ram Haroon to the web address pakistudent@interserver.com. She sees now what she always suspected, that this operation will not be ending as soon as she would like:

  The work is nearing completion. It should be ready within six weeks. However, transfer cannot be made until the legal proceeding is completed, or the matter is terminated in other ways. Target of mid-May, at the latest.

  She feels a chill down her spine. Haroon is referring to Allison’s trial, the “legal proceeding,” which has a trial date in late April. He is saying that they will not be confident enough to make their move until they are sure that Allison Pagone has said nothing, or knows nothing.

  Or until the matter is “terminated in other ways,” meaning, she assumes, the termination of Allison Pagone.

  ONE DAY EARLIER

  WEDNESDAY, MARCH 24

  I am thirteen,” Ram said to his father. “I am old enough to understand whatever it is you are doing.”

  His father didn’t respond at first, looked at his son suspiciously.

  “I am a carpet merchant,” he insisted.

  “You talk about weapons,” Ram said, accusingly. “You talk about the Americans. You talk about bombs and jihad and the Liberation—”

  “Enough!” his father exclaimed. And so it went for three weeks. Ram hardly spoke to his father. Ram’s bitterness was not directed at what he was sure his father was doing, but at the fact that he had been shut out. He still missed his mother and Beni desperately, even several years later, and now he was beginning to feel as if he did not know his father, either.

  And that, finally—after Ram explained this very thing to Father—was what led to their conversation.

  “I will tell you,” Father began. “Because you are right. You are old enough. But I want you to understand one thing, Zulfi.”

  Ram recoiled. It was the first time in years that Father had called him by his given name.

  “I want you to understand,” he said, “that just because I am doing this does not mean that you should as well.” And then he carefully placed his hand on Ram’s shoulder and sat him down in a chair. When he finished explaining it to Ram hours later, he left him, again, with this same qualification. And then he told him one more thing.

  “There are many people who would kill us if they knew,” he warned his son.

  Ram Haroon types in the web address pakistudent@interserver.com and sends off his message:

  The work is nearing completion. It should be ready within six weeks. However, transfer cannot be made until the legal proceeding is completed, or the matter is terminated in other ways. Target of mid-May, at the latest.

  Ram stretches his neck and decides to go for a run in the cool winter air. Is it late winter or early spring? He doesn’t even know. He pays little attention to such things. Between schoolwork and this mission, he scarcely has had time to enjoy his stay in the United States. He has found the country to be a nice place to live, on the whole. The people are relatively friendly and generous. Yes, there are those who look at him askance based purely on his racial makeup. But that is the small minority of people. The pace is astonishingly quicker here than back home, with considerably more emphasis on material possessions, but Ram has come to the conclusion that the Americans and his people, generally speaking, are not very different at all. He was surprised to learn this upon arriving in the Midwest two years ago. His friends overseas do not see the U.S. as he does, just as the Americans do not see his homeland the way he does. To the Americans, he assumes, his people are camel-riding, gun-toting extremists. The problem with the Americans is that they simply don’t understand the fundamental concept that people—his people and any others—aren’t born to hate. They are bred to hate.

  And that is a problem that Ram Haroon simply cannot control. He is just a small part of a greater machine, trying to reconcile competing interests. To some he is evil. To others he is heroic. He will leave the labels to others. He will focus on his task and complete it, like a good soldier. And the only thing he hopes for, after all of this is over, is that he will be alive.

  Another thing he cannot control.

  ONE DAY EARLIER

  TUESDAY, MARCH 23

  Roger Ogren greets McCoy when she gets off the elevator at the county building.

  “Agent McCoy,” he says. “Thanks for coming to me. I could have made the trip.”

  The trip being a walk of three blocks from the federal building, where McCoy works.

  “No problem. And call me Jane.” She follows him into his office. The fact that he has an office separates him from several of the prosecutors on the floor, who are gathered in two large rooms she passes, each assigned a chair.
>
  Roger Ogren’s office is uncommonly neat. There is a tray for incoming mail that has only two pieces of paper in it, folded neatly. Law books—the local court rules, attorney indices, the criminal statutes—are lined up precisely on a row of low, black metallic shelves on the back wall. One of that kind, she thinks to herself. She never trusts someone who cleans up every day. If he says pardon the mess, she’s leaving. On principle.

  Ogren takes his seat behind the desk. Behind him, McCoy sees family photographs that she assumes do not include a wife. Lack of a wedding ring confirms it. It’s her instinct. Look at the finger. She has been hit on by more married men than she can count.

  She could see him as single. He’s overweight, not ridiculously so but enough to add a second chin, a puffiness beneath his eyes, a stomach that covers the front of his belt. She can see it in the way he carries himself, too, not the typical authority she sees in most law-enforcement types. This guy has a chip on his shoulder, a wariness to his eyes, like he’s wondering what everyone’s thinking about him. This is not a personality trait she would expect from the man who has been handed this highly publicized prosecution.

  But there are explanations for that. One of them is seniority. He has the word lifer all over him. He has probably never held another job and probably would not care to. So he’s up there on the chain, regardless of merit. But she senses another reason, and she knows these types, too. He’s a pit bull. Put him on someone and he doesn’t let up until they’re bloody and lifeless.

  “We’re aware that you’re looking at the Senate,” Ogren says. “Aware from the newspapers, that is.”

  Oh, a rebuke, right out of the gate. The feds have not been sharing, he is saying.

  “I assume,” he continues, “that this is the reason for your sophisticated eavesdropping device in her house.”

  McCoy smiles at him, not pleasantly. Roger Ogren has been sworn to silence on this point, yet he raises the subject every chance he gets.

  “I’ve done my homework,” Ogren says. “And if I’m right, you can hear absolutely everything that goes on in her house.”

  “Not quite everything,” McCoy answers. “But yes, it’s been a good device.”

  The Infinity transmitter allows the eavesdropper to not only listen in on and record phone conversations; it also serves as a microphone that permits the recording of all room sounds. Ogren has read up on it, apparently, and he’s thinking that McCoy must have some solid information from hearing every conversation that Allison Pagone has been having in her house—in person or on the phone.

  “We didn’t bug her house to learn about your case,” she says, not for the first time. “And I can tell you, based on what I’ve heard, that she doesn’t talk about your case in her house. I assume she limits those conversations to her attorney’s office. There hasn’t been a word about whether she killed Sam Dillon, or anything like that. Really, Roger.”

  “But you can confirm for me,” he tries, “that you’re investigating this bribery. This pharmaceutical drug bill.”

  “I can’t confirm anything.” She smiles, not warmly. “And you’re not supposed to ask.”

  Surely, Ogren knows there is more to it than that. If this were just about a public corruption scandal, the feds wouldn’t be so hush-hush.

  “Well.” Ogren opens his hands, smiles plaintively. “Sam Dillon was killed just before he was going to testify in Operation Public Trust. Am I wrong about that?”

  “No, you’re not wrong.”

  Ogren pauses a beat, blinks his eyes and looks away, makes a face. Finally he leans forward, laces his hands. “Sam Dillon was expressing concern to people in his office. There was a problem. An ‘ethical dilemma,’ he called it. The obvious thought is that Sam Dillon discovered something, and we’re thinking that this ‘something’ is this bribery thing you’re investigating. And if we think that, the defense is going to think that. We need to be ready. So I was hoping that you might give us a look-see at what you have.”

  “Our operation,” McCoy says, “has nothing to do with Dillon’s murder.”

  “I don’t think that it does, either. I know my story and I like it. But the defense is going to make hay.”

  “The defense can’t look at what we’re doing,” she says. “It’s sealed information.”

  “I know that, Agent.” Agent, he is emphasizing, not lawyer. That is his point here. Don’t you tell me about the law governing grand-jury secrecy.

  Ogren hands her a sheet of paper, a printout of the e-mail that was sent from Sam Dillon’s computer at one-eighteen in the morning, early on the Sunday following Sam Dillon’s murder. “I wonder if you can make sense of this for me,” he requests.

  “I’ve heard about it, sure,” McCoy says. “Everyone has.”

  “She must have sent this.” The prosecutor points at the document. “We have her returning to Dillon’s house around one. She came back and sent that e-mail. Why?”

  “To throw off time of death,” McCoy says, like it’s obvious. “She killed him at seven, but she wants people to think he was alive well after that time. Just in case anyone saw her there at seven.”

  “That’s a big risk to take. That’s hard to believe.”

  “That’s what makes it smart.” McCoy stares at Ogren a moment, to see if this is registering with him. Apparently not. He doesn’t know. She picks up the paper and flaps it. “This doesn’t look familiar to you, Roger?”

  “Familiar.” That stops Ogren. His eyes move to the ceiling, then back at her. “No.”

  “You guys have her laptop, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you’ve searched it—”

  “We’ve looked at it, sure.” Ogren’s eyes zero in on her. “Help me out.”

  “You haven’t read it.”

  “Read what?”

  “That story she was writing,” she says easily. “A new novel. Something called ‘Revenge Is a Dish Best Served Cold’ or something like that. There’s a part in there about an alibi.”

  “And it will look familiar to me.” He reaches for a pen and paper.

  “Very.” McCoy opens her hands. “You guys don’t check the documents that are deleted from the hard drive? That’s the best place to look.”

  “She deleted it.”

  “Yeah, hell, yeah. Wouldn’t you to try to get rid of it? You kill someone and try to manufacture an alibi, something you’re taking right out of a novel you’re writing? First thing you do is get rid of any trace of that novel. The only problem being, these days, we can find anything.”

  “Jesus. ‘Revenge Is a Dish—’ ”

  “I can’t remember exactly. I think the chapter was literally called ‘Alibi,’ though.”

  “I don’t know how that was missed,” he murmurs, his jaw clenching.

  “Oh, in fairness, it’s buried in there. You’d have to read the entire manuscript. Or maybe your techies haven’t gotten to it yet.”

  Ogren, who has been writing notes, stops suddenly, his head slowly rising to meet her stare. “How do you know about this?” he asks. “You know the contents of her computer?”

  “We were at her house, Roger. Remember? When we planted the bug.”

  “Yeah, but that was without her knowledge. Obviously.”

  “Obviously.”

  “You can’t conduct a search without her knowledge,” he says. “At least after the fact.”

  McCoy shrugs. He has her there, or so he thinks. He is assuming that the federal agents broke the law, because he isn’t thinking it through. It’s not his area.

  “Oh. Oh, shit,” he says. “You went in under the Patriot Act.”

  Under the Patriot Act, the federal government can search certain suspects without their knowledge, even after the fact. This is confirming something Ogren probably already suspected, that this operation involves terrorism on some level.

  “Sam Dillon wasn’t murdered because of anything related to terrorism,” McCoy says with confidence. “I like your story. The jilte
d lover.”

  “I have to take your word for that.”

  “Listen, Roger, if terrorists murdered Sam Dillon, we would be all over you to take a pass on this prosecution, for now. Think about it. We would have been in your office, the day after Dillon’s murder, begging you to hold off. Or we would have assumed jurisdiction.” She opens her hands. “We’re not doing that. The two aren’t related. The only reason I ever came to you is because we were afraid you would detect the bug in Allison’s home, and word would get out.”

  That makes sense, and the explanation seems to sit well enough with the county prosecutor. He sees that he doesn’t have a choice, in any event. The only thing he could possibly do is drop the charges against Allison, and he won’t do that.

  “If Allison Pagone is a terrorist of some sort,” Ogren says, wincing at how ridiculous it sounds, “I have to know that. She could ambush me at trial.”

  McCoy shakes her head. “It’s not like that. You won’t hear her say a thing like that at trial. If she discloses a single witness that makes your hair stand up, let me know. But she won’t, Roger. She won’t do that.”

  “She won’t,” he says, “because she wouldn’t be dumb enough to admit to something like that at trial?”

  McCoy doesn’t answer.

  “Or she won’t,” Ogren continues, “because she doesn’t know?”

  McCoy smiles. A quick study, this one. “She won’t, period.” She gathers her bag and heads for the door. “You’re on the right track with your case,” she says. “The rest of this is way out there, totally peripheral. It has nothing to do with your prosecution. Okay?”

  Ogren seems to be temporarily placated, but overall, he is still probably feeling very much in the dark.

  “Pull that deleted document off her hard drive,” she says. “You’ll like what you find.” She shows herself out. It is a bit troubling to her that she is getting good at this.