“Collins lost his money, and Tony wanted him to pay for it.”
“Not dead, necessarily. But he wanted Collins to feel the hurt.”
“I would think that a guy like Mandretti might enjoy doing that himself.”
“Tony was on parole. If he violated parole, he not only went to jail, he was out of witness protection. The Santucci family has long tentacles. How long do you think Tony Martin would last if it got out that he was really Tony Mandretti?”
“So you gave him the name of Manu Robledo, someone who would put that kind of hurt on Gerry Collins if he knew Collins was a fraud.”
He nodded. “If he knew he was a fraud.”
“Which brings me back to my question: How did you find out about Robledo?”
“That was part of a larger deal.”
“By larger, you mean…”
“Operation BAQ was run out of Treasury. Years in the making. Manu Robledo was the key.”
“How did you find out about it?”
“Tony gave me the analysis showing that Cushman was a fraud. I took it to the SEC, thinking this would be purely a regulatory matter. The hope was to get Tony a whistle-blower bounty for exposing Cushman’s fraud. I heard nothing from them, which was pretty surprising. I started poking around, looking for information on Gerry Collins.”
“That’s how you came across the name Manu Robledo?”
“No. I found out Collins had drawn a lot of attention from law enforcement for business with offshore banks. After twenty years with the bureau, I hear offshore bank and I think organized crime, drug cartels, or both. That’s when I went back to Tony and told him to be careful about bringing down Cushman through Gerry Collins.”
“And that must be when he asked you for the name of someone who would give Gerry Collins a mob-style beating if they knew he was a fraud.”
Another nervous smile. “My goodness, you and Tony did have quite the talk.”
“Yes, we did. He’s a dying man trying to protect his kids.”
Scully said, “I take it that you promised to help him with that.”
“Yes,” she said, turning it right back on him. “Just like you did.” Andie let her words sink in, and her explicit reminder of the role of “handler” that Scully had played for the Mandretti family seemed to strike a blow. She pushed even harder.“I heard you say you were a man of your word, even when dealing with a mobster like Tony. I’m sure you did all you could. But I’ve exhausted every avenue I have inside the bureau. I can’t pick up where you left off-I can’t help Tony or his kids-unless you tell me how you zeroed in on Manu Robledo.”
Silence followed, the former agent and the younger one locking eyes. It took a minute, and finally, without uttering a word, they reached an understanding that what was about to be said would not leave the room.
Scully started talking. “I kept poking around in Gerry Collins’ offshore transactions, deeper and deeper. Too deep. Next thing I knew, I was flying to Washington for a meeting with the deputy secretary of the Treasury and two of his assistants.”
“Joe Barber?”
“The one and only.”
“Are you saying that Barber, personally, saw the analysis outlining all the reasons Cushman was a fraud?”
“I’m saying that Barber and everyone involved with Operation BAQ knew that Cushman was a fraud, and they knew it long before I showed them Tony’s analysis.”
Andie took a moment to absorb that revelation. “Was it Barber who gave you the name Manu Robledo?”
“His name came out in the negotiations.”
“What do you mean?”
“Treasury wanted me to get Tony to sit on the Cushman analysis. I couldn’t promise that Tony would just pretend like it didn’t exist. So Treasury cut a deal with him.”
“A deal?”
“Yeah. It was agreed that Tony would get his analysis into the hands of Manu Robledo. In essence, the fact that Cushman was a fraud would be laid out in black and white for a man who was identified by Treasury as Gerry Collins’ dirtiest client.”
“Dirty in what way?”
“I don’t have that information. But there was no doubt in anyone’s mind that Robledo would go straight to Gerry Collins and, shall we say, confront him.”
“So Tony got exactly what he wanted.”
“And more. Tony was allowed to stay in witness protection, and he also got back the money he lost to Gerry Collins. Two hundred fifty thousand dollars.”
“Treasury agreed to pay him a quarter million dollars if he kept his analysis of Cushman’s fraud to himself?”
“Not exactly to himself. He was allowed to show it to no one but Manu Robledo-who, of course, would then confront Gerry Collins.”
“That’s a pretty sweet deal for Tony.”
“There was one other component-a very important contingency from Treasury’s standpoint. Like I said, there was a substantial risk that Robledo might do more than inflict a bruising on Gerry Collins. Tony agreed that if Collins ended up dead, then…”
He didn’t finish, leaving it to Andie to fill in the blank. “Tony would take the rap.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Tony was terminally ill with cancer.”
“I understand that it might be easier for a man to agree to prison for the rest of his life if he knows it means three years instead of thirty years. But why would Treasury ask Tony to make that promise as part of their deal with him?”
“Clearly, it was important to Treasury that Manu Robledo not land in jail.”
“Why?”
“Pretty obvious, don’t you think?”
“Not to me,” said Andie.
“How could Operation BAQ work if Manu Robledo was behind bars for the murder of Gerry Collins?”
“I can’t answer that,” said Andie. “I have no idea what Operation BAQ is.”
Scully looked at her. “Neither do I.”
“I’m not sure I believe you.”
“Oh, you can believe me on that one,” he said with a mirthless chuckle. “I tried to find out. That got me nowhere… except a ticket to early retirement.”
It smacked of politics and cover-up, and nothing offended Andie more than a good agent getting a raw deal. “Where would someone start if she was interested in picking up where you left off?”
“You really don’t want to do that.”
Andie leaned closer, meeting his stare. “Try me,” she said.
37
L illy and I hoofed it from Puffy’s Tavern, through Chinatown, to Evan’s apartment. The restaurant on the first floor of the old brick building was gearing up for the dinner crowd. Even with the door closed and windows shut, the noise of a busy kitchen spilled into the alley, and enough heat radiated through the walls to melt away the snow along the building’s curtilage. The entrance to the back stairway was unlocked, and as we climbed to the second story, Lilly realized that she had actually eaten at the restaurant below.
“Dim Some Lose Some,” she said. “I love this place.”
The news from Evan-that he’d cracked the code-had us feeling upbeat. I led her past the small window at the top of the stairs, which looked out over the Dumpster. A light was on in the hallway, and the chain-link gate that Evan had installed for added security was unlocked. It was hard for me to imagine Evan-a guy with two peepholes on his front door-leaving anything unlocked. But he was expecting us. I pushed the gate open, and Lilly followed me to the end of the hallway, where I stopped and knocked firmly on the black metal door to his apartment.
“Evan, it’s me, Patrick,” I said.
No one answered.
“Maybe he went out for dim sum,” said Lilly.
“I’m pretty sure quants only eat millennium problems for lunch. More likely he’s in a trance, staring at his computer screen.” I knocked harder. “Evan, please open up.”
I waited, even put my ear to the door, but there was only silence.
Lilly asked, “Are you sure he was callin
g from his apartment?”
“Yes. I told him we were on our way.”
“Try the door.”
I did, expecting the knob not to turn. But it wasn’t locked. I paused, the knob still in my hand, but I hesitated to push the door open.
“Evan?” I called.
I gave him a moment, and when no response came, Lilly and I exchanged glances of concern. I pushed the door, this time expecting the deadbolt or chain to stop me. The door swung all the way open. I stood at the threshold and called into the dark apartment. “Evan, if this is your idea of a joke, it’s not funny.”
Silence.
“Let’s leave,” said Lilly.
“I just talked to him on the phone fifteen minutes ago. Something’s wrong.”
“Like I said: let’s leave.”
“He could be hurt.”
“We could be next.”
I took one step inside and flipped the wall switch. A ceiling light brightened the apartment, and our shadows stretched from one end of the room to the other. Lilly was peering around my shoulder. I’d told her about the flowcharts on Evan’s walls, but she still seemed taken aback.
“Don’t be alarmed. The place always looks like this.” I left the door open and entered the room. Lilly came with me, and we stopped in the middle of the room.
“He lives here?” she said. “How bizarre.”
My gaze swept the room, though my focus was not on the boxes, arrows, and photographs that had drawn Lilly’s attention to the 360-degree flowchart on the walls. There was no sign of Evan; however, the curtain that separated the main living area from the kitchenette was drawn shut. Lilly clung to my arm as I approached, and I feared the worst as I flung it open.
There was nothing askew, no body on the linoleum floor.
“Patrick, I really want to go,” she said.
“Let me check the bathroom real quick.”
“I don’t like this at all. Can’t you put in a call to the FBI agent you’ve been working with?”
I could have, I supposed. But if Evan had wanted the FBI to see his prize project, he would have shown it to them long before now. I crossed the room, peered into the bathroom, and switched on the light. The brightness against white tiles assaulted my eyes. But again, there was nothing out of the ordinary, no sign of Evan. I turned, took another survey of the room, and then stopped.
“His computer’s gone,” I said.
“What?”
I went to the center of the room, where Evan had kept his desktop computer, next to the television.
“It was right here,” I said. “Now it’s gone.”
“Is that the computer that had all the encrypted files on it?”
“Yes.”
“Would that include the BAQ file?” she asked, with even more trepidation.
“That would be correct,” I said, equally concerned. “Probably right along with whatever decryption algorithms he created.”
A shrill scream from the alley gave me a jolt. Lilly and I ran from the apartment, out the open door, and through the gate. I looked out the small window that was at the top of the stairs, down toward the alley below, where several people had gathered around the Dumpster. Earlier, when Lilly and I had arrived, the lid had been closed, but someone from the kitchen had flipped it open to dump the trash. Two men dressed like waiters were consoling the young woman who’d made the discovery. Inside the Dumpster, atop heaps of trash, a man’s body lay faceup.
Even from the top of the stairs, dusk settling in, I knew that orange dress shirt and Mickey Mouse tie.
I knew it was Evan Hunt.
38
B y nightfall Evan’s apartment and most of the narrow alley behind Dim Sum Lose Some was a busy crime scene.
My first move had been to phone Andie Henning. I was able to answer her first question-“Are you sure he’s dead?”-simply by looking into the open Dumpster. The crimson hole between his eyes, where the bullet had entered Evan’s amazing brain, was confirmation enough. Andie had told me to touch nothing and to stay put until she got there, which had taken about ten minutes.
An hour later, Lilly and I were among the onlookers on the sidewalk, standing at the yellow police tape, beyond the outermost perimeter of crowd control. I counted eleven police officers, their uniforms transitioning from dark blue to shades of orange in the swirl of police lights. Portable vapor lights from NYPD turned the buzz of investigative work behind the restaurant into a glowing hive of activity. A second perimeter of yellow tape surrounded the Dumpster, where the medical examiner’s van waited to receive Evan’s body. Two male officers stood guard at the foot of the stairway that led up to the apartment. They looked formidable even from a distance. If ever they lost their jobs with the NYPD, they could easily have found work as bodyguards for rappers.
“What do you think will happen to Evan’s flowchart?” asked Lilly.
“Don’t know, but I wouldn’t count on those two dudes to tell us,” I said.
I spotted Andie coming down the stairs behind the restaurant. She spoke briefly to someone near the Dumpster, presumably a member of the forensic team, and then she started up the alley toward Lilly and me. A cold wind from the street funneled between the buildings and hit her squarely in the face as she approached. She cinched up her coat, ducked under the yellow tape, and told me to walk with her. I followed, and Lilly didn’t seem to know whether to stay or come with me. Andie made herself more clear.
“You, too,” she said.
Andie took us down Mott Street to a Chinese café called Tearrific. I’d heard of it before but had never gone. The name had always struck me as too gimmicky-like heading into Little Italy for real Italian and eating at the Ciao Hound or some such place. A waiter recommended a pot of bubble tea with sesame dumplings and then left us alone at a small table in the corner where we could talk.
“I’m very sorry about your friend,” said Andie.
I thanked her, then asked, “Who is going to tell my dad?”
“I spoke to him by phone already,” said Andie.
“How did he react?”
“Angry. Upset.”
“I meant, who does he think did this to Evan?”
“He doesn’t know.”
Andie poured herself a cup of tea, breaking eye contact, as if she knew the next question I was about to ask.
“Who do you think did it?”
Andie shrugged and tasted her tea.
Lilly had been quiet thus far, but she was suddenly annoyed. “Oh, come on,” she said. “How many more people have to get killed before you arrest Manu Robledo?”
“He’s definitely a person of interest,” said Andie.
“Of interest ?” said Lilly, incredulous. “He was cloaked in bank secrecy, thanks to his numbered account, but we all know that it was Robledo who was giving me the anonymous orders to move his money through BOS/Singapore.”
“Actually, you’re the only one who has confirmed the voice recognition, Lilly.”
“Are you saying I’m wrong?”
“I’m just saying: you’re the only one who heard the voice of the account holder on a daily basis, so there’s no way for me to verify whether you’re right or wrong.”
“It’s not just the voice. Who else but the account holder would have threatened to kill Patrick and me if we don’t find his money?”
“You’ve hit the problem on the head,” said Andie. “The entire case against Robledo is based on the allegation that he was the holder of numbered account 507.625 RR at BOS/Singapore. The Bank of Switzerland has never confirmed that it was, in fact, Robledo; and, according to my contacts at the Department of Justice, nothing short of a court order is going to make the bank budge. It takes time to pierce bank secrecy.”
“Can’t the FBI arrest him and hold him until the court order is issued?” asked Lilly.
“That’s not the way things work in this country.”
“But we were attacked,” said Lilly. “The bank should be required to release that inform
ation if its own bankers have had their lives threatened.”
“Swiss law does allow banks to cooperate with law enforcement where an account is being used to further criminal activity. Unfortunately, even if he threatened you, it’s not clear that we could convince a judge that Robledo is using the account to commit a crime. Even if we get over that legal hurdle, it’s like I told Patrick: Other than your say-so, there’s no evidence that those attacks ever took place.”
“Well, there’s plenty of evidence that Evan Hunt was attacked,” said Lilly.
“That doesn’t mean it was Robledo who did it.”
“Didn’t you see the walls inside his apartment?” said Lilly. “Evan Hunt knew more about the Cushman Ponzi scheme than Patrick and I could ever hope to know. Doesn’t it stand to reason that Robledo made the same threats against him-find my money, or end up like Gerry Collins?”
Andie paused. In my eight months of dealing with her, I’d seen virtually every facet of the bureau side of her personality, so I felt confident in concluding, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that Lilly was not going to get a direct answer to her question.
“Lilly, how closely did you look at the writings on Evan’s walls?”
“Not very. I barely had time.”
“Do you remember seeing the name Manu Robledo anywhere on those walls?”
Lilly searched her memory, but I spared her the effort.
“It’s not there,” I said. “Evan knew a lot about Cushman, but it was clear to me that he didn’t know anything about Manu Robledo. That was one of his holes.”
Andie said, “And by the same token, Robledo had no reason to know about him. Don’t you agree, Patrick?”
“I suppose I do.”
Her gaze shifted toward Lilly. “Or could it be that there was some link between Evan Hunt and Manu Robledo. Something that might have put Evan Hunt in the kind of danger that could get a man killed. What do you think, Lilly?”
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