by Otho Eskin
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
I’M IN AN unfamiliar part of town. I’m not even sure whether I’m still in Washington. I could be somewhere in the Maryland suburbs. Across the street there’s a small strip mall. I go into a store and I call Officer Bonifacio. The store owner tells me where I am and Bonifacio says he’ll pick me up in fifteen minutes. When Bonifacio arrives, I can see his patience with me is wearing thin.
“How did you get way out here, Detective?” I notice he doesn’t call me Marko. “I was supposed to pick you up at the theater.”
“I was hijacked.”
He looks at me with genuine concern.
“It won’t happen again.”
“I hope not.”
“Me, too. Now take me to National Airport.”
“Sir?”
“I’m going to leave town for twenty-four hours. I’ll be back tomorrow afternoon. I’ll call you as soon as I know when my return flight arrives and you can pick me up at the airport.”
“Are you going to be safe where you’re going? I promised Captain Townsend I’d keep a watch on you.”
“I’m going to the safest place on the planet.”
My plane lands and we’re informed by a member of the cabin crew that the local time is six forty a.m. That’s about the time I usually go to sleep. We’ve arrived at our destination: a town in Colorado called Pueblo. The passengers on my plane struggle to get their luggage from the overhead bins. I’m traveling light with no luggage and I join the other passengers as they shuffle up the aisle. Eventually, we enter the airport waiting room. The flight had been smooth; I was actually able to get a couple of hours of sleep, which I badly needed.
I had a contentious talk with Janet yesterday evening when I called her from the airport and told her I had to be out of town for the better part of the next day. She protested, reminding me of the responsibility the Secretary of State had given me. She seemed to forget she’d thought I was mostly in the way. She finally relented and added additional agents to Nina’s security detail and said I could go.
I pick up a container of coffee and a bun drenched in sugar at a concession stand before I find the driver I’d reserved before I left Washington. He’s leaning against a late-model Chrysler parked in the airport pickup zone. The car looks comfortable enough for a long drive.
The driver holds a handwritten sign reading “Cooper.” I use the name Cooper when I travel and don’t want my identity advertised. It’s a common name and one easy to remember. There’s nothing more embarrassing than inventing a secret cover name and then forgetting it.
“Good flight?” the driver asks. It’s a greeting, not a question, and I climb in without answering.
“The dispatcher said a long drive. There and back. Where we headed?”
“ADX Florence.”
The driver turns and studies me. He wants to know who he’s got in his back seat. He must conclude I don’t look like a terrorist or a mass murderer. Then again, terrorists and mass murderers don’t look much like terrorists or mass murderers.
Satisfied I’m not going to kill him, he starts the engine, turns on the AC to full blast, and pulls out of the airport pick-up zone.
“You a lawyer?” the driver asks.
“A friend.”
“I didn’t know the guys in there had friends.”
“One does.”
When we reach the outskirts of the town of Florence, I ask, “Do you get a lot of passengers coming here?”
“Sure. All one-way, of course.” He laughs at what must be his standby joke for passengers headed to Florence. He’s probably told it a hundred times.
“There it is.” The driver points to a group of low, brick buildings ahead of us. Nothing particularly unusual except for the watchtowers manned with machine guns and double, twelve-foot razor-wire fences that surround the complex.
It really does not look like much from the outside. Not like some fortress prisons you see in the movies: black and storm-battered. But this is the US’s Super Max prison, the most secure prison in the country. Maybe the world. The home to the worst, most dangerous, men in America.
The outside is not especially intimidating. Not much worse than your average Holiday Inn.
Inside, it’s hell.
Behind a thick, bulletproof plastic barrier are two uniformed guards, heavily armed: one, a beefy man, and the other a slightly less beefy woman. Above me is a narrow slot through which I make out two more guards inspecting me carefully.
I’m in a kind of lobby area except there are no chairs or couches to sit on. The walls are painted a soothing color of mud brown and there are some photographs of Colorado mountains. The floor is covered with a nice floral-pattern linoleum.
I slip my DC driver’s permit and police ID through a narrow slot in the plastic barrier. One of the guards takes my ID’s and immediately makes copies and, I assume, transmits facsimiles to the US Bureau of Prisons in Washington.
“My name is Marko Zorn. I’m here to see Warden Cousins.”
One of the guards studies his clipboard. “You’re not on the visitors’ list, sir.”
“This is a kind of last-minute thing. I didn’t have time to go through your bureaucratic chicken-shit routine.”
“No visitors are allowed without prior authorization from the Bureau of Prisons,” the guard announces officiously.
“Could you manage to inform Warden Cousins that Detective Zorn wishes to see him?”
“That’s not allowed.”
“That’s not allowed?” I exclaim in feigned outrage. “Are you not permitted to speak with your own warden?”
The guards are losing patience with me. It’s time I bring out my secret weapon.
“Norm Cousins and I are old friends. He will want to see me. Otherwise …”
“Otherwise what?”
“Otherwise I will be obliged to deploy the nuclear option.”
The two guards step back from the barrier, hands on their weapons.
“What do you mean, nuclear option?” the male guard asks, his voice a bit shaky.
“I’m going to piss all over your pretty floor.”
“What did you just say?” the female officer demands, swallowing hard. Her companion is speechless.
“I said, unless I receive satisfaction to my request to see my old friend Norm Cousins, I will be obliged to piss on your lobby floor. It will be an awesome sight, I guarantee.”
The lady guard’s immediately on the phone. There’s a lot of urgent back-and-forth behind the plastic barrier.
“Stay where you are,” the male guard shouts at me. “If you make any move, any move at all, you will be arrested.”
“For what?”
“For showing disrespect for the Bureau of Prisons.”
I stand reasonably motionless for what seems like an endless wait. Finally, the inner security door behind the reception desk opens and another guard appears with lots of fancy stuff on his visor. He’s accompanied by two more armed guards.
I step through the security door that closes with an ominous clang behind me. The officer with the fancy hat leads me along a brightly lit corridor. We pass rafts of cameras and motion detectors.
“I like your cap,” I say, to be friendly. “Are you a general or something?”
“You’re on thin ice, sir. Very thin ice. Don’t push your luck.”
We stop at a large door above which is a sign reading “Warden,” Another smaller sign reads: “Mr. Norman Cousins.” My escort knocks and we step into an office with large windows overlooking a parking lot. The windows are covered with heavy steel mesh.
The office is furnished with a standard government-issue metal desk, several steel filing cabinets, a couple of uncomfortable-looking metal chairs in front of the desk. A large color photograph of a middle-aged woman wearing an evening gown hangs on the wall behind the desk. A series of smaller headshots of what I assume are senior officials of the Bureau of Prisons adorn the walls.
Sitting at the desk is a
small, nervous man: Norman Cousins.
“Did you just threaten to urinate on my lobby floor?” he demands.
“I was provoked.”
I decide to take one of the uncomfortable chairs facing the desk even though Norm didn’t invite me to.
“Welcome to the Florence Federal Correctional Complex,” Norm says. “What the fuck do you want?”
I met Norm Cousins years ago when I was a young detective newly assigned to the NYPD narcotics unit. There’d been an infestation of drugs at Rikers Island and I was part—a very small part—of a task force assembled to “take care” of the problem. Norm was the warden there at the time, and we got to know one another. Not friends. Just law enforcement officers assigned to do an impossible job.
It soon became clear to me that Norm was part of the problem. He wasn’t selling drugs or anything. Just turning a blind eye to what was going on in return for some cash bonuses. When the DEA and the NYPD broke up the organization supplying drugs, Norm kind of slipped through the cracks. And maybe I had something to do with that. I think I may have misplaced his file. Norm owes me big-time.
“What do you want?” Norm repeats. “Why are you here in my prison? It can’t be for anything good.”
“I’m here to see Asa Forest.”
Norm stares at me for a long moment. Then announces: “No.”
“I’ve got to speak to Asa.”
“Our rules are very clear on that. No visitors. Except attorneys and medical personnel. When absolutely essential. You’re not in the least essential.”
“How long has Asa been here?”
“Five years, I think. Go away.”
I wonder what it must feel like to achieve the highest station in his chosen profession. In a dreary office with a view of a parking lot surrounded by the most dangerous men in the world. I can’t help thinking of Satan in Milton’s Paradise Lost: “Better to reign in Hell, than to serve in Heaven.”
Was it worth it, Norm?
“Why is Asa here?” I ask. “Why is he in a maximum-security prison? I thought your SuperMax was designed for men who’d committed the most horrendous crimes: terrorists and mass murderers, people who would be a threat to our national security and the general population if they escaped. That doesn’t fit Asa Forest. He’s a mild-mannered bookkeeper.”
“Did you ever hear the inside story of his sentencing?” Norm answers. “After you guys arrested Asa he told the DA he’d plead guilty and agreed to turn state’s evidence and testify against the Mafia families. His testimony sent a lot of guys to Attica. But Asa made one condition—that he be sentenced to a SuperMax federal prison. Weird, don’t you think? Most people go to great efforts not to be sent here. But here he is.”
“I want to talk to Asa.”
“Request denied,” Norm announces. “You may leave now.”
“Do you ever hear from the old crew?” I ask. “Is Darren keeping in touch? I lost track of him when he left prison. And how about Foley? He was due for release last March.”
Mention of these names from the past, all members of the gang distributing drugs at Rikers, all of whom served serious prison time, all of whom worked with Norm at Rikers—fails to cheer Norm up.
“Go to hell.”
“Contact Asa and tell him I’m here. Tell him I need to talk to him. Then I’ll leave quietly. If I run into Darren or Foley, I’ll give them your best wishes.”
Norm sighs and picks up his desk phone.
The room is small; the walls are gray concrete; here there are no windows. The room is lit by fluorescent bulbs secured into the concrete ceiling and covered by thick plastic.
There’s a single table in the center of the room, on two sides of which are facing seats. The table and the seats are concrete and are bolted to the floor.
I sit for almost ten minutes alone in the room, waiting. It’s eerie. There’s no sound at all; not from the corridor outside or anywhere else in the prison complex. I could be on the surface of the moon although I expect the moon surface would be more inviting.
There’s a click at the door lock, and two guards usher in a man, handcuffed and shackled, wearing a blue jumper. The man is old and frail, stooped, his once luxuriant hair now mostly gone.
The guards guide the prisoner to the table, where he sits on the concrete seat. They release his handcuffs but leave the shackles on his feet. They secure the foot shackles to an iron ring in the floor. They then step away and stand near the door, but close enough to hear what the old man and I say to each other.
Asa Forest and I study one another for a long, silent moment. I think of asking him how he’s doing but decide that’s a pretty stupid thing to ask under the circumstances. Finally, it’s Asa who breaks the silence.
“How is Laura?” A simple question, asked without emotion.
“Laura is fine.”
“She must be out of high school by now.”
“She’s in college. At Oberlin. She’s studying music.”
“Is she happy?” Asa asks.
“I haven’t spoken to her in three years. I thought it best to keep my distance. She knows how to get in touch with me if she’s ever in trouble: if she ever needs anything.”
“Will you see her?”
“When she graduates from college, I may go for the graduation ceremony.”
“Does she ever ask about me?”
“She does. There’s not much I can tell her.”
“Does she know where I am?”
“She knows you’re somewhere.”
By mutual agreement with Asa, I stay away from his daughter. I was able to get her a new identity, but her life is still at some risk. Laura saw Domino’s face once and that’s normally a death sentence. As long as Domino’s alive, she’s in danger. I’ve never told her about the danger, except in general terms. She understands she must never tell anybody who her father is or anything about her early life or what she saw that evening. Her foster parents know nothing about her past or her father.
I’ve never talked to Laura about what happened although she must remember the night she and Domino stood face-to-face. Maybe when she’s older I’ll tell her more. For the moment, she’s safe. No one can find her. Not even Domino can find her.
Asa never asks about money. There’s a fund for her in a bank in Rochester in a numbered account; Asa knows I’ll see his daughter is taken care of. He knows he can trust me to do what’s right for Laura.
“Are they treating you okay?” I ask.
“The mattress is too thin. It gets too hot in summer. The food’s all right. I have terrible neighbors. Ted Kaczynski, the Unabomber, is in the cell on my left. Zacarias Moussaoui, one of the guys who planned the 9/11 bombing, is on my right. Some neighborhood!”
Asa and I met when I was still with the NYPD. We got to know each other in the course of one of my investigations and we both took a liking to one another, although he was a thief and I was a cop. I keep telling myself, there is a difference. I was pretty sure Asa was working for the Genovese family and I was pretty sure he was ripping off the mob. Asa was playing a dangerous game. One he eventually lost.
When someone ratted on Asa to the mob, he was as good as dead. The Genovese family sent two hit men after him and they nearly got him, but he managed to get them first and escaped. That’s when Asa came to me. He knew his time was up and the family would send someone else. For reasons I still can’t explain to myself, I agreed to help him, and I found him a place where he and his daughter could stay.
Then Domino appeared.
At that time, I’d never heard of an international assassin named Domino. It turned out the Genovese mob used him for special jobs. As did some of the other families. Not to mention others around the world. The Genovese family was by then in a panic mode. They knew if Asa turned on them, they were screwed, so they brought in Domino to fix things up.
“Tell me what happened that evening you saw Domino,” I ask.
“It was a long time ago. What does it matter now? It’s
ancient history.”
“It’s not history to me. I need to know exactly what you saw.”
“I was living in the apartment you’d found for me and Laura up in Spanish Harlem. It was about six thirty in the evening; I was in the kitchen cooking spaghetti and tomato sauce for dinner. Laura was in her bedroom doing her homework.
“Suddenly, I became aware I was not alone. I turned and a man was in the kitchen. A man I didn’t recognize but I knew absolutely he was there to kill me.”
“Describe him for me.”
“He was ordinary-looking. A slight build, maybe about five feet seven. I didn’t pay much attention to his appearance. I was preoccupied by the gun he was pointing at me.”
“How old was he?”
“In his thirties. I only saw him for a second, you know.”
“Describe his face.”
“Nothing special. Except …”
“Except what?”
“He smiled. A sort of sweet smile. And his eyes—I’ll never forget his eyes. He had large brown eyes.”
“What happened when you saw him?”
“I was holding the pot of boiling tomato sauce and instinctively threw the pot at his head. At his smirking smile. I hit him hard. ‘Scheisse!’ he screamed, and he grabbed at his face.”
“You’re sure that’s the word he used?”
“That’s what he screamed. ‘Scheisse.’ He stumbled out of the kitchen, trying to wipe the boiling sauce from his eyes. There was blood on his face. I think I must have cut his head badly with the pot.”
“What happened next?”
“I heard him stumbling down the stairs. Then I turned and saw Laura.”
“Are you sure she saw the gunman?”
“She saw him. Why else do you think I’ve chosen to live out my life in a SuperMax penitentiary? It was either here or suicide and I knew I’d never have the courage to kill myself. But I also knew if that man ever found me, he’d force me to tell him where Laura was, and I could never allow that to happen. Never.”
It’s obvious now why Asa insisted on being sent here. The Super-Max is so secure no one can ever escape from it. By the same token, it’s so secure no one can ever get in. Asa has placed himself in the safest place to hide on earth. The one place even Domino can’t get at him.