Phoenix Rising

by Nance, John J. ;

  Hudgins was in the elevator lobby now, pausing, probably scanning the elevator “up” lights. She heard him take two more steps. He stopped mere feet away. She realized he was punching the call button angrily.

  “Come on, dammit!” His voice echoed from the stone walls.

  Please close, please! Her thoughts seemed loud enough to be heard. Somehow he hadn’t seen the open elevator. He was just standing there impatiently facing the other bank of elevator doors.

  Silence seemed to stretch for minutes, but in a matter of seconds the doors began closing.

  She heard his shoes scrape on terrazzo as he heard the door and turned, surprised that an open elevator had been waiting just behind him. She heard him move toward the closing door, knowing he would calculate the possibility of stopping it without hurting his hand.

  As she feared, Harold Hudgins lunged for the closing door with his hand outstretched. Elizabeth saw his fingers enter the airspace of the elevator for a split second, then just as quickly pull back as the doors came together and the elevator cab began moving upward with only her on board.

  She slumped against the wall, adrenaline filling her bloodstream, knowing he hadn’t spotted her.

  She reached up and punched the button marked 44, and the elevator seemed to get there instantly, the doors sliding open on a deserted hallway.

  She got off and searched for the nearest fire exit. She saw one in clear view of the elevator lobby. She slipped her high heels off and carried them as she tested the door, verifying that she could get back in from the stairwell.

  Quickly she scampered one flight up to the forty-fifth floor, knowing the door would have a clear view of the elevator lobby. She heard the sounds of elevators moving in the distance, and ever so slowly turned the knob and pulled just enough to let her peer out.

  The glassed-in entrance to the Bannister offices was on the opposite end of the hallway, within view. Creighton was standing there, hands deep in his pockets, watching the elevator as the doors opened and an agitated Harold Hudgins stepped out.

  She opened the door a bit more to hear.

  “You’re Fairchild’s man, right? MacRae?” Hudgins’s voice.

  “That’s right.” Hudgins opened the door to the offices of Bannister Partners and they moved inside, leaving Elizabeth to monitor a quiet hallway.

  The glass doors swung closed, but Hudgins had not stopped to lock them. The fact was not lost on Elizabeth.

  Creighton had mentioned Fairchild! Hudgins had called Creighton Fairchild’s man! The phrase sent chills up her spine, testing her faith in him.

  What on earth was Creighton doing? And how had he suddenly become Fairchild’s agent in Hudgins’s estimation? She couldn’t be sure, and she couldn’t stay hidden in a stairway, nor could she fail to walk out of the building before or at least at the same time as they did. The guard would spot that in a second, and say something in Hudgins’s presence.

  She wedged the heel of one of her shoes in the door so that she could monitor any sounds in the hall, and turned to sit on the top step of the stairway to think. She should go down one flight, take the elevator back down, and leave.

  She should, but she couldn’t.

  Elizabeth stuffed her shoes in her purse and checked the hallway again. It was clear, and the unlocked door to the Bannister offices beckoned.

  Creighton had turned on the tape recorder in the hallway as he heard the elevator approach. Hudgins was agitated and upset, but he wasn’t suspicious. He motioned Creighton through the labyrinth of desks and into his corner office, gesturing to the couch as he paced around like a caged tiger.

  “Why don’t you tell me what’s happened?” Creighton began with casual concern.

  “The goddamned SEC, that’s what’s happened! An investigator called tonight—tonight, for God’s sake—and questioned a friend of mine.”

  “What do you mean, questioned?”

  Hudgins related with admirable accuracy the conversation with his friend and the questions the friend had been asked by the SEC inspector.

  Creighton feigned alarm and sat forward on the couch.

  “Oh jeez, they’re apparently trying to build a case against you.”

  “Why? Why me?” Hudgins was anguished and panicked. “You know this business!” he told Creighton. “You know what happens when someone develops an odor in this community. You don’t have to be indicted and convicted, or even charged. All you have to be is accused in the rumor mill! The fucking SEC could ruin me, just making a call like that!” He paced back and forth two more times before continuing. “Who else have they talked to? Who else have they poisoned against me?”

  Creighton shrugged. “The important question is, how protected are you?”

  Hudgins whirled on him as he’d hoped. “Me? The question is, how protected are we! I’m not in this alone, I guaran-damn-tee you! I go down, Irwin goes down!”

  Creighton raised the palms of both hands. “Okay, okay. Our deal. I didn’t mean to imply you were being abandoned. Now, I need some details. Irwin didn’t fully explain his deal with you, and I’ve come in a bit late as the troubleshooter. I’ve been working on some of the European aspects of the Pan Am thing for him, so I’m trying to spin up here on what’s what. Let me ask some questions, some of which are going to sound naive, but they all have a purpose.”

  “Okay.”

  “This SEC snoop asked about an under-the-table payment, you said. But I didn’t think there was anything traceable in the way of a payment that Irwin gave you for dropping the Pan Am loan, was there? Is there something I don’t know about?”

  “There wasn’t! I mean, you guys didn’t pay me anything. You just bought my bonds. That was the deal. I told Pan Am we weren’t interested, and in return, Irwin buys twenty-five million of the bond issue I was having trouble moving. I save your bacon, you save mine. He was frantic to block Pan Am from getting that loan!”

  “Okay, so, just as I figured, there were no payments under the table that could be uncovered at a later date, right?”

  “Of course not! I mean, there was my commission, but that’s normal. What scares me are the dates.”

  “Tell me,” Creighton prompted.

  Hudgins had his right hand out, palm up; his face looked as though he had a migraine. “I didn’t listen. Irwin warned me that we should wait a week or so after I sent Pan Am packing before he bought my bonds, but I was under the gun and the bond issue was dying. But now, don’t you see, the dates coincide, if the SEC really looks closely. The same day I toss that blonde out the door—”

  “Blonde? What blonde?”

  “Oh, Elizabeth … ah … Sterling, I think. Pan Am’s CFO. She was the one trying to get the loan. She’s blond and sexy, you know, so I remember the hair.”

  “Okay. I know who you mean.”

  “The same day I toss her out and say no, Irwin transfers twenty-five million to us for the bond issue.”

  Creighton smiled and waved his hand in dismissal. “I don’t think we’ve got a problem.”

  “You don’t? If they’re asking about bribes—”

  “It’s not a bribe, okay? I mean, the basics are these. You dropped the Pan Am loan in return for that twenty-five-million bond subscription, right?”

  “That’s exactly right, and that’s another thing. They asked about my firm’s reaction. I’d be instant history around here if Bannister found that out.”

  Hudgins looked at the door suddenly. “Did you hear something? Did anyone come with you?”

  “No,” Creighton replied with a genuinely concerned expression as he watched Hudgins dart through the office and around the corner to check the entryway.

  Hudgins had barely disappeared when a small movement to one side of the office caught Creighton’s eye. He turned in horror to see Elizabeth’s head pop up from behind a desk. She smiled a nervous smile, mouthed the word “Hi,” and submerged again, leaving him completely off balance.

  Had he really seen Elizabeth? What in heaven’s nam
e was she doing here? Hudgins was coming back!

  Hudgins was agitated that he couldn’t locate the source of the noise. Creighton jumped to his feet and came out of the office door to meet him. Elizabeth was safely out of view, but how the hell could he give her an escape route without Hudgins spotting her? And if he did, would she take it?

  “Anything?” Creighton asked as they stood outside his glassed-in office.

  “No.”

  “I think you’ve let that phone call get you spooked, my friend. Now look, Irwin asked me to look into this and advise you, and I’m advising you to relax.”

  Hudgins was not happy. “Goddammit! I want to know what to do!”

  Creighton flared his eyebrows and grabbed Hudgins’s shoulder. “Hey! Get a grip on yourself! I’m the specialist in these matters, that’s why he wanted me to come. You’ve got no worries. We’ll work on the SEC, but if you panic, you’ll blow it. Right now, there was nothing but a legitimate business deal. It’s Irwin who’s exposed because of what we’re trying to accomplish for another client.”

  “Yeah,” Hudgins said. “I asked him. He told me Nick Costas was behind the project to scrap the new Pan Am.”

  “I know, but forget you heard that, okay?”

  Hudgins nodded.

  “By the way, may I use your copier for a second?”

  Creighton had seen nothing resembling a Xerox machine on the way in. With any luck, it was around a distant corner. Elizabeth needed a clear path of escape.

  “Sure. This way.”

  Hudgins led him in the right direction and Creighton followed, certain he had seen a flash of blond hair move toward the exit as they rounded the far corner.

  Downstairs, Elizabeth tried to sound nonchalant as she breezed past the guard and out the front door.

  “Thanks for the help!”

  “Long time to get keys, lady.”

  With a wife like that, the guard thought, perhaps they’d taken time for something else. She looked a bit ruffled.

  Elizabeth climbed behind the wheel of the rental car and ignored the ticket on the windshield. She started the engine and pulled away from the curb, circling the block as fast as she could and coming in view of the building again. From a safe distance she watched as Creighton and Hudgins emerged and shook hands, then blessedly went in opposite directions. She tracked Creighton as he approached on the far side of the street and spotted her. She saw him check to make sure Hudgins was out of sight, then cross the street. He got in the car, a furious scowl on his face.

  “Drive, damn you!” he said, ducking down below the dashboard until they were at least a mile away.

  “Creighton, I—” she began, trying not to flare up in anger over his greeting.

  He exploded at her, sitting sideways, speaking in a low growl, the restrained power making her cringe inside.

  “What in heaven’s name did you think you were doing in there? How long have you been following me?”

  He continued sputtering until she slammed on the brakes and maneuvered the car to a curb in an open spot between a line of other parked cars along an unlighted and deserted street. She put the car in Park and looked at him with equal anger, both their voices rising in a full-volume exchange, neither fully hearing the other, their faces inches apart and barely illuminated by the glow of the dashboard lights.

  “Who the hell do you think you are? James Bond? You accepted this assignment to work for us, not play secret agent!”

  “You want your bloody company alive?”

  “I’ve got a federal judge to satisfy, I—”

  “The sonofabitch will be satisfied, I guaran—”

  “Ever heard of inadmissible evidence? It’s a little quirk we have in the colonies, and—”

  “—have the evidence right here in case you weren’t close enough to—”

  “—good mind to …”

  They both stopped cold as Elizabeth stared at him, and saw the anger change to a small smirk.

  “You … what did you say about evidence?”

  Creighton pulled the tape recorder from his shirt and rewound it.

  “Under your laws, the rules of admissibility of evidence in a federal court for the purposes of issuing an injunction are much more lenient than for a full hearing or a trial. In any event, the federal courts adhere to the laws of the state they find themselves in. We’re in New York. A recording of a conversation, when at least one party knows about it and agrees to it, when that person is recording to gather evidence of a crime, is admissible.”

  “I couldn’t hear what you two were saying to each other in there,” Elizabeth told him. “I couldn’t get close enough.”

  He punched the button, and his recorded voice filled the car, followed by Hudgins’s response.

  “… That was the deal. I told Pan Am we weren’t interested, and in return, Irwin buys twenty-five million of the bond issue I was having trouble moving. I save your bacon, you save mine. He was frantic to block Pan Am from getting that loan!”

  Creighton fast-forwarded the tape a few feet, and started it again.

  “… I mean, the basics are these. You dropped the Pan Am loan in return for that twenty-five-million bond subscription, right?”

  “That’s exactly right, and that’s another thing. They asked about my firm’s reaction. I’d be instant history around here if Bannister found that out.”

  Creighton turned the recorder off and looked at Elizabeth, whose large eyes had grown enormous.

  “That’s admissible?”

  “That’s admissible!”

  “My God, that’s the proof we need!”

  She threw her arms around his neck on impulse and hugged him. “Creighton, I love you, and I’m sorry I yelled!”

  She had caught him by surprise. She could feel it in his physical response, and she pulled away now to look at him just as the thunderstorm overhead unleashed a massive downpour. A series of lightning flashes spotlighted his face clearly, and she was startled to see his eyes boring into hers with a disturbing intimacy that caused her spontaneous smile to begin to fade. Slowly, his eyes never wavering from hers, he put his arms around her and drew her to him, kissing her gently as his arms enfolded her hesitantly. She felt herself melting against him, willing him to go on. The rain was a wall of water now sealing them off from the city, the urgent drumbeat of the downpour sealing the privacy of the little world the front seat had become, but she felt him move away.

  “Not here, Elizabeth.”

  32

  Sunday, March 26, 5:00 P.M.

  Federal Courthouse, Manhattan

  When the tape recording of Harold Hudgins’s conversation with Creighton MacRae from the night before had ended, Judge Walter Hayes leaned forward in his chair and fixed MacRae with an inquisitive stare. Jack Rawly, Elizabeth, and the two local Pan Am attorneys held their breaths.

  “Mr. MacRae, you have told me that Mr. Hudgins, whose voice we just listened to, mistook you for an associate of Irwin Fairchild. I am still unclear, though, as to how, exactly, Mr. Hudgins agreed to this meeting and this conversation.”

  “Your Honor, I purposefully misled him. I sent him a fax earlier in the day that, although it was unsigned, he would have believed to have come from Irwin Fairchild. The fax asked that he, Hudgins, call Fairchild’s associate—me—at nine in the evening, and gave as the phone number the number of my cellular phone. When he called, I did nothing to dissuade Hudgins from the mistaken belief that he was talking to Irwin Fairchild’s associate. He agreed to the meeting and suggested his office. He was very concerned that the Securities and Exchange Commission was investigating his involvement with Fairchild. As you’ve heard, it was due to this misperception that Hudgins revealed the truth about what he’d done. I knew Fairchild had somehow compensated Hudgins for dropping the Pan Am loan, but I didn’t have the details. Pan Am needed those details to convince this court that they’ve been the victims of a sabotage campaign by their own lenders.”

  Judge Hayes sat back, pulling
his mustache again. “If this were a criminal matter, such revelations of how you manipulated this man to make these statements could jeopardize the case. It would raise the question of whether this constituted a confession or self-incrimination, extracted by fraud or deception. Of course, there is information here that can be independently verified—that is, the dates of when the Pan Am loan application was rejected and when Mr. Fairchild suddenly purchased the twenty-five-million-dollar bond issue Mr. Hudgins was selling.”

  The judge hesitated a full minute before continuing.

  “Very well.” He turned toward Jack Rawly. “Mr. Rawly, the unsuccessful efforts made to serve notice on the lenders I find to be sufficient under Rule 65. I’m going to rule that your evidence and representations establish a prima facie case that Mr. Fairchild, acting on behalf of, and perhaps by direction of, the lenders, compensated Mr. Hudgins for maliciously interfering with Pan Am’s ability to raise funds. Therefore, given the previous affidavit and statements of counsel, under the doctrine of estoppel, Pan Am is entitled to a temporary restraining order blocking any attempt by its lenders to declare Pan Am in default until a full hearing for a temporary injunction can be held. I assume you have the order, Mr. Rawly?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Slide it over here and I’ll sign it!”

  Elizabeth relayed the news to Ron Lamb and Brian before going to an instantly called victory dinner. They were all profoundly relieved. But Jack Rawly sternly cautioned them all that the battle would be joined within twenty-four hours when the lenders, under the name of Intertrust Bank et al., would be formally served with the restraining order.

  “At eight A.M. sharp, I’ll slap it in the hand of their general counsel in person, with copies to the aircraft lessors. We’ll also fax a copy to each of our station managers around the world, just in case someone tries to seize an airplane by local court order.”

  Elizabeth paused over a second glass of wine and searched his eyes. “How will they respond, Jack? They won’t just roll over, will they?”

  Jack Rawly looked down at his Scotch for a moment, in a gesture Elizabeth could easily read. It was a milestone they were toasting, not their arrival at a destination.