The Aisha Prophecy

by Maxim, John R.

  “I believe he’s reconsidered,” said Leland to Haskell. Haskell turned once again to observe. They couldn’t hear what the prince was saying to the banker, but the banker flashed a brief thumbs-up signal at Haskell. Haskell replied by rotating his fist. The gesture meant, “Keep twisting that knife.”

  Leland said, “Well… best of luck to you all. Now if you don’t mind…”

  “Sorry. Let’s get to why I asked you to stay.”

  “Oh, I wouldn’t have missed it,” said Leland with a yawn. “This was better than The Jerry Springer Show.”

  “Kidding aside, this girl, can you find her?”

  “I doubt it. On the other hand, why should I?”

  “You seem to know so much about these Nasreens. You must have some way of contacting them.”

  “I might. Indirectly,” said Leland.

  Haskell’s eyes narrowed. “Through Elizabeth Stride? Wasn’t she involved with that group at one time?”

  “She’s known some of its founders. But she’s not a Nasreen.”

  “Even so,” said Haskell, “she’d know who to ask.”

  “Not for you, she wouldn’t. And not for me either. In any case, I’ve never met her.”

  “Okay, then,” said Haskell. “Through your man, Roger Clew.”

  “Through whomever, Charles, but what if I did? They certainly wouldn’t surrender the girl.”

  Haskell shook his head. “Not the girl, that disk and that new set of passwords. They’re welcome to keep the prince’s daughter. In return, I guarantee that he’ll leave her alone. I’ll put up a cash bond if that will help.”

  “You didn’t answer my question. Why should I?”

  “Because,” said Haskell, “I’d then owe you a favor. You didn’t let me finish on that membership business. Blackballed? Not a chance. You’re too highly regarded. There is, however, a waiting list of almost two thousand who’d give anything to join. Most are just as well-regarded as you are. My friends and I can vault you to the top of the list. Once in, you’ll be able to accomplish many things that you can’t in your current position. No more rivalries with Defense, Homeland Security and Justice. No more taking stupid orders from the president’s minions. No more taking positions with foreign leaders that you know they can never accept. You’ll be able to do what ought to be done and you’ll have our total support.”

  “Because Bohemians run the world,” Leland answered. “I got that.”

  “I regret that exchange. I know it sounded overbearing. But it really isn’t far from the truth.”

  Leland asked, “My contribution would be…?

  “Your integrity. Your knowledge. And your contacts, of course. We also deal in favors. We scratch each others’ backs. You’d be free to say no to any request. All we’d ask is that you hear us out.”

  Leland paused. He said, “This business with Kessler…”

  “Fair enough. I drop it. Forget that I asked.”

  “The world will rest easier. Thank you.”

  Haskell watched as Leland bent to pick up his loafers. He said, “Howard, I’m asking you, humbly, as a friend, to help me with some damage control.”

  Leland smiled. “Now we’re friends? Charles, I don’t even like you.”

  “Fine,” said Haskell. “Let’s skip all the bullshit. What will it take for you to help?”

  “I’d need to know what you intended to do. What were your plans with the Saudis?”

  “Pretty much what his daughter is doing to this one. We intend to blackmail certain key Saudis to make sure they play ball with Trans-Global. Yes, it’s extortion; don’t wince at the word. They’ve been doing it to us since the seventies. We’ll benefit, sure, but so will this country. So will every driver who stops to pump gas. On that, I can give you my word.”

  Leland chewed his lip. “These key Saudis. Who are they?”

  “I’m not going to give you any names just yet. For one thing, I only have a small sampling because that’s all the prince would let us see.”

  “As a tease?”

  “Exactly,” said Haskell. “Until we’ve made a deal. That’s why he’s here. To make the deal.”

  “And you recognized these names?”

  “Every one of them, sure. The prince also dangled their current cash balances, some in the hundreds of millions. But no account numbers or access codes. The disk would have those numbers and codes. Without them, we can’t get at the money.”

  Leland asked, “They’re all in oil?”

  “One way or another.”

  “You say you’ve seen a sampling. How many in total?”

  “More than twelve hundred,” Haskell answered. “The prince says that half the oil ministry is listed. That’s a couple of hundred right there. Also on the take are top security officials, a few hundred assorted colonels and generals, plus – and I trust this won’t come as a shock – four of their most rabid Wahhabi clerics, including his daughter’s intended.”

  “I see.”

  “If our friend, the banker, can get into that system, end of story; we don’t need the daughter. If he can’t, however, we must have that disk. Wherever she is, she has the mother lode with her. There has to be a deal we can make.”

  “You understand, don’t you, that if I should retrieve it…”

  “You’ll want something in return. Name your price.”

  Leland’s eyes hardened. “I don’t want their damned money.”

  “Of course you don’t, Howard. You’re an honorable man. What you’d want is to have a few aces up your sleeve the next time the Saudis try to jerk you around.”

  Leland folded his arms. He said, “Go on.”

  “Tell you what. We’ll share. I’ll give you some and they’ll be biggies. There are only about a hundred that I need for my purposes and those I will keep; you can’t have them. You can put the squeeze on yours for any purpose you like. In return, you must agree to sit on them for a while. No sharing them with anyone else until you get the green light from me.”

  “Charles, I did take an oath. It wasn’t to you.”

  “You swore to uphold. You want something to uphold? If we don’t keep this quiet, that flight money’s frozen and they’ll hang the prince by his nuts. Keep in mind, these are thieves. That money should have gone to charity. Tell you what. Most still will. It’s not the money that’s important. It’s knowing who stashed it and blocking their access and blowing the whistle if they don’t play ball. Either way, they’re not getting it all back.”

  Leland thought for a moment. “Which charities? Do you know?”

  “No, but that kid would. One more reason to find her.”

  Leland was still thinking. “Some will be legitimate. Food and medicine and such. But some will be a cover. Some always are. Who would get to decide where that money goes?”

  “Would you like to? You got it. Build a hospital. Build ten. The Howard Leland Pavilion in Gaza.”

  Leland hesitated. He was rubbing his chin.

  “Howard, I can put the hammer to some of these bastards in a way that you can’t as long as you’re in that job. We both know that they have it coming.”

  “I will sleep on it,” said Leland. “Goodnight, Charles.”

  NINE

  “The Howard Leland Pavilion?” asked the media mogul as he watched Leland climb toward the cabin they shared. “If that doesn’t seduce him, what will?”

  “Don’t be smart.”

  “And in Gaza, no less. Want a better way to help all those poor Palestinians? Myself, I’d use the money to build them a few casinos. Look how our Native Americans have prospered. Right now, most of Gaza is inhospitable desert, but so, of course, was Las Vegas. See that? In a stroke, I have solved the Mideast conflict. No more fighting because they’re too busy getting rich. Instead of tanks, we’ll have busloads of blue-haired old ladies coming in to play the fifty-cent slots.”

  Haskell closed one eye. “Are you through?”

  “By the way, you said ‘humbly.’ You were asking him
‘humbly.’ I’m surprised you know the meaning of the word.”

  “I did overstep. I had to back off a little.”

  “The word ‘humble,’ by the way, would also apply to your description of our intentions. Extortion? Re-embezzling? Giving some of it back? And where’s the grandeur in picking a few Saudi pockets? This is the Bohemian Club, after all. We’re expected to reach for the stars.”

  “Well, I had to say something. We were caught off guard. Anyway, it was the truth. Those are our intentions. Are you saying that I should have laid out the whole plan? He’d be on the horn to the White House right now. By tomorrow, we’d find ourselves dragged off to Leavenworth for planning to control Saudi Oil.”

  “Not controlling,” said the mogul. “I prefer the word ‘managing.’ Western governments won’t do it, so we must. Leland needs to be brought around to our way of thinking. However, Leland said it himself. It’s always best to reel them in slowly.”

  “That’s what I was doing. Until that damned phone call.”

  “No, until then you were fixated on this Martin Kessler fellow. You’ll recall that I’ve urged you to get over it.”

  “He’s in this. He’s part of it. I can feel it.”

  “Because he knows this woman, Stride? And Stride knows some Nasreens? You see this as a ‘gathering’ of Arabic-speakers? Leland’s right. You’re grasping at straws.”

  Haskell moistened his lips. He said nothing.

  “And there you were with Leland, making a hash of it. You thought you knew all the right buttons to push. Let me try. We’ll meet for breakfast. Just the two of us.”

  “Why might you do any better?” asked Haskell.

  “Because I speak his language,” said the media mogul. “Leland’s from an old family. So am I. You are not. It’s not a language that one learns in just one generation.”

  “Good breeding?”

  “Don’t knock it. All you know is raw power. Social standing is quite something else.”

  Haskell snorted. “I’m not in the mood.”

  “I know. You’ve told me. You’ve no patience with nuance. But that’s because you still don’t understand it, you see. May I offer you a couple of examples?”

  Haskell shook his head. “Some other time, please. Right now I need to go take a leak.”

  “I’ll be brief,” said the mogul. “You’ve had people killed who need not have been killed. Subtlety is not your long suit. Would it surprise you to learn that I’ve destroyed a few myself just by scratching their names off a guest list? In my circle a snub can be worse than a bullet. Not inviting them to an important event tells the world that they no longer matter.”

  “Do any of the people in your circle have bladders? Please. You can educate me later.”

  “Another weapon of choice – and it’s a dandy – is ridicule. That’s where the media come into play. I could make a man like Leland look like a fool if he should decide to go against us. Or a liar, or a puppet, or a sleaze ball; you name it. I could fatally damage the man’s credibility.”

  Haskell had started to turn away. He stopped. He said thoughtfully, “And not only Leland’s.”

  “Um… don’t tell me. Are we now back on Kessler?”

  “Of course not. You couldn’t hurt Kessler that way.”

  The mogul yawned. “Okay, what’s left? The State of Israel? Been tried. Yitzhak what’s-his-name, the head of the Mossad? He’d probably frame it and hang it on his wall. Oh, I know. Harry Whistler, correct?”

  “Say it is,” said Haskell. “What could you do to him?”

  The mogul winced. “Will you forget about Whistler? You’ve been burned. Take your lumps. You’re letting these people become an obsession, and obsessions almost always turn inward.”

  “Don’t worry about me. I’m on top of it.”

  “Are you? I’m hearing troubling whispers about you. I hear you have the hots for Elizabeth Stride.”

  Haskell bridled. “Who the hell told you that?”

  “A little bird. We all have our little birds,” said the mogul. “You’re enamored of a woman who you’ve never laid eyes on. You’ve heard that she’s a knockout and very much a lady except when she’s slicing people up into bait. The sort of woman who belongs on Charles Haskell’s arm and not in the bed of some German who bested you. Sometimes I fear for your sanity.”

  Haskell’s color had risen. “Look, wherever this came from…”

  “You’ve researched her. Exhaustively.”

  “I research all opponents.”

  “Friends as well. Never hurts. But this woman especially. Every tidbit you could find. Adopted by a family that worked for Aramco. Family moved back to Texas where she grew up. Returned after college to find her birth parents. Disappeared into a Saudi prison where she was probably raped within an inch of her life. Rescued then recruited by the Mossad. I forget how and why she hooked up with Kessler, but I bet you’ve got it all charted.”

  Haskell’s eyes had grown cold. He said, “Enough.”

  “Birth parents were athletes. Romanian, I think. Northern Romanian. Good Aryan stock. That’s where she got it. Name a sport, she’s good at it. I bet you have a list of every trophy she’s won and…”

  “Hey,” snapped Haskell. “Did you hear me? Get off it.”

  The mogul paused for a beat. He softened his voice. “I was hoping to hear a denial.”

  “You wouldn’t understand. So shut up about it. Back to Whistler. Indulge me. What could you do to him?”

  The mogul sighed. “Well, you know what they say. Bright light is the best disinfectant.”

  “They also say he’s untouchable. No one wants to take him on. Everybody I’ve asked says he’s too well connected.”

  “Untouchable by whom? The authorities, correct? Not by a relentless free press. He’s a man who lives large, almost riotously, as well known for his charity as his wealth, unsuspected by most of all the blood on his hands. Shine a bright enough light on the right kind of scandal… kidnapping young boys for sex, for example…”

  “He does that?”

  “Of course not,” said the mogul, “but you get the idea. True or not, the whispers would be with him forever. Those with whom he does business will distance themselves. Certainly a straight arrow like Leland.”

  “An interesting idea.”

  “You see? You can learn.”

  Haskell’s eyes took a shine. “When can you start?”

  “Alas, there are one or two flaws in that plan. Harry Whistler has resources. He’d track it down. A libel suit would be the very least of our worries if we should make him an enemy.”

  “He’s already…”

  “An enemy? No, he isn’t. Or at least he’s not mine. Which brings me to the most grievous flaw in that plan. I would then have an enemy I needn’t have had, one who has a very long reach. I would soon be awakened in the middle of the night by a shadowy figure standing over my bed. To keep my throat from being cut, I would of course rat you out. I would say that Charles Haskell made me do it. Shall I tell you what his… or her… first question would be?”

  “It wouldn’t be why. He’d know why.”

  The mogul shook his head. He said, “I can hear the words even now. I’d be asked, ‘Charles Haskell? Who the hell is Charles Haskell?’”

  “He… knows very well who I am.”

  “He might. He might not. The question is, does he care? Your world and his don’t intersect often. Would he even recognize you if you passed him on the street?”

  Haskell darkened. He made no reply.

  “Get over it, Charles. We have enough on our plates. Let’s deal with that damned Saudi princess.”

  TEN

  Haskell’s bladder didn’t make it to nearest relief. He decided that a shrub would serve his purpose. That media mogul. Talk about arrogance. Haskell should have whizzed on his shoes.

  His own apparent smugness had put off Howard Leland, but he hadn’t meant it quite the way it came out. What he’d felt when he made that
“we run the world” remark was more a sense of wonder at how far he had come. Talk about breeding. He had breeding in spades. And none of it cost anyone a dime.

  His father had been a chauffeur for the rich after failing to succeed as a boxer. That experience in the prize ring, such as it was, became an asset; he could double as a bodyguard. And he’d earn extra money giving boxing lessons to the sons of his employers and their friends. He saved his most useful lessons for his own son. Not so much how to box as how to fight.

  Haskell’s inner voice said, “No, how to win.”

  Well, yes, of course. Why else would you fight? It was street-fighting, really. No gloves. No referee. And never use a closed fist. Skulls are hard. Knuckles break. Use the heel of your hand. Or your thumb for soft tissue. The eyes are the softest. Use the heel of your shoe if they try to get up. Not the toe. Toes break, too. Use the heel.

  “Charles, he was no thug. You make him sound like a thug.”

  Sorry. Didn’t mean to. No, he was no bully. Tough when he had to be. Easy-going on the whole. But he knew what he knew and he taught what he knew. He’d tell his son, “Don’t you ever pick a fight. But if you’re faced with one that you can’t walk away from, hit fast and hard, no talk, no warning. If someone has to get hurt, make sure it’s him and get it done within ten seconds, max.”

  The other reason for the ten second rule was that when it happens fast, no-one’s sure of what they saw. Let them hear you asking, “Oh my gosh, are you all right?” This does two things, said his father. One of them is, you don’t get a reputation. Your skills remain a surprise. The other one is that if the cops are called, you’re a little less likely to be cuffed.

  “Now you’re making it sound…”

  As if he’d had a fight a week. He didn’t. Just a few. Enough to practice what he’d learned. But the lessons still applied to later situations such as those he would encounter while building his career. Lull them into thinking you’re no imminent threat. Then hit fast and hard. Good advice.

  His mother, however, saw his father as a loser. She’d always thought that she was the one who should have had a chauffeur and limo. If not as the wife of a champion fighter, then in her own right as a movie star. His mother had dreamt of an acting career, probably since she was in grade school. She finally walked out when he was only fourteen. She’d decided to give it a shot.