Elizabeth Lowell - Innocent as Sin

For now.

“Naturally, you are impatient to-” Bertone cut in.

Fouquette kept talking. “-more than a quarter of a billion dollars American must be laundered to pay for the arms. The money is coming in from France, Liechtenstein, and Dubai. I counted on you to-”

“And I’ve never let you down,” Bertone interrupted. “Relax, my friend. All is well.” Besides, asshole, half of it is my own money.

A big gamble, but Bertone hadn’t gotten where he was by being timid.

“All is not well,” Fouquette insisted. “Neto hired St. Kilda Consulting.”

“What? I thought Neto was ours.”

“He was until he found out who we really backed in the revolution five years ago.”

Bertone shrugged. Allies were people you hadn’t screwed yet, and peace was bad for business. “I assume that’s why he refused to extend the oil contracts with us.”

Fouquette didn’t bother to respond to the obvious. “There will be a rise in oil prices soon. We want to sell Camgeria’s output at the new level. We’ve moved up the timetable for revolution. Do your connections have the arms we need?”

“As soon as they see the money, we see the arms. Arms are easy to find. The only problem comes in transportation and distribution.” That was Bertone’s area of experience. He’d seen the choke points in the arms trade, bought planes and pilots, and got very rich transporting cargoes no one else would touch.

“Whatever you do, don’t use the old laundry,” Fouquette said. “St. Kilda is probably watching LuDoc, waiting to pounce.”

“LuDoc is dead.”

Fouquette laughed. “So you finally discovered how much he was skimming.”

All Bertone said was, “I have been developing a new conduit. A true naïf.”

“You have a day to transform your naïf into a whore. The arms exchange must be completed immediately.”

“What? You gave me four weeks to-”

“Complain to Neto,” Fouquette cut in. “He’s the bastard who brought in St. Kilda. I have to move the money fast and get the arms to Neto’s enemies faster.”

“When will you have all the money transferred to me?” Bertone said.

“As soon as you set up an account, each participant has agreed to put in his share within forty-eight hours.”

“By Saturday?” Bertone grunted. “I can’t guarantee weekend bank-”

“Don’t tell me your problems,” Fouquette said over the complaint. “Since he has become president, my sponsor has lost all patience. Get that account set up immediately.”

“Perhaps Brazil needs a new president. It could be arranged, yes?”

“Not soon enough. If the arms aren’t on the way to overthrow Neto’s New Camgerian Republic very quickly, I’m out of a job. And you, my Siberian friend, you are dead.”

Manhattan

Thursday

12:15 P.M. EST

Former ambassador James B. Steele rolled into the conference room on the fifty-seventh floor of the UBS Building as if he owned the television network headquartered there. He was fifteen minutes late and he didn’t apologize. He had more to bring to this meeting than the five people he’d kept waiting.

“Good afternoon,” Steele said to everyone and no one.

He guided the electric wheelchair over to the rosewood conference table. An overstuffed leather armchair blocked him from taking his place.

“Oops. Okay, I’ll get that,” Ted Martin said quickly.

“Thank you.”

The field producer had been Steele’s principal UBS contact for the past two months of research and negotiations. As Martin scrambled to shove the armchair aside, Steele rolled forward. His position put him opposite the most important man in the room, Howard Prosser, executive producer of The World in One Hour.

Steele greeted Prosser and nodded to the most famous face at the table, Brent Thomas. Being the best-looking guy in a war zone drew a television audience, but Steele had seen his own war zones. They hadn’t been nearly as pretty as Thomas, who was one of the network’s hottest correspondents. And the most ambitious. Fortunately for Steele’s plans, Thomas was as smart as he was camera-ready.

“Deb Carroll is our senior researcher,” Martin said, gesturing toward a woman who hadn’t attended any of the previous meetings. “She’ll be in charge of fact-checking all material before it hits the air.”

Steele nodded. “I’ll look forward to your questions.”

Carroll’s smile said she doubted it.

“Stanley Carson is our corporate counsel,” Prosser said. “He insisted on attending the meeting.”

Steele’s eyebrows, nearly black despite his silver hair, lifted. “You’re wasting your time, Mr. Carson. Truth is an absolute defense against both libel and slander.”

“We prefer to forestall suits rather than defend them.”

“St. Kilda Consulting has no such aversion to conflicts, legal or otherwise,” Steele said pleasantly. “Mr. Thomas may be a pretty face, but he’s not stupid. He has documented the leads we gave him very carefully, as I’m sure Ms. Carroll will discover.”

“I ran up thousands of miles on some of the worst airplanes that ever got off the ground,” Thomas said, his trained voice a mixture of rue and enthusiasm. “All to track down those former rebel commanders you recommended. Great tape on all of them, great interviews. It puts human faces to the arms traffic. That’s why Mr. Prosser is thinking about giving us the whole hour for the piece.”

Prosser grimaced. “The final decision hasn’t been made to air the segment, short or long. There are crucial elements missing, including an interview with our subject, Mr. Bertone.”

Steele shook his head slightly. “When we’re certain of his location, we’ll tell you, so that Thomas and a camera crew can confront him. But Andre Bertone won’t give you an interview. It isn’t in the man’s nature.”

Prosser grinned. “No problem. Our audience sees silence as an admission of guilt.”

“Hold it,” Carson said. “Before I allow this network to air an attack on a man who is an extremely wealthy businessman-and a United Nations diplomat, according to Thomas-I want to see proof.”

Steele already knew about Bertone’s diplomatic credentials, but he was surprised they did. He looked at Thomas.

“Nice work,” Steele said. “If you ever want to leave television, come see me at St. Kilda.”

“Actually, St. Kilda Consulting is what we wanted to talk about today,” Prosser said quickly. “We’re a little, um, concerned about some aspects of your organization-”

“And how your company’s rather unsavory international reputation might impact ours,” Carson cut in. “There are reports spreading in the European press that St. Kilda Consulting is a private army that hires itself out to the highest bidder. This network can’t afford to associate itself with mercenaries. Period. That sentiment comes all the way down from the sixty-first floor.”

Steele looked at the researcher, who was examining her nail polish with great interest. “So you read Le Figaro,” he said to her in French.

Surprised, she put hands over the folder in front of her almost protectively.

“I assume you brought the article,” Steele said, switching to English.

After a moment the researcher shrugged, opened the folder, and said, “It’s one of Europe’s leading newspapers, not some rag.”

“Pass the article around,” Steele said. “Everyone should see what is being used in an effort to discredit St. Kilda Consulting.”

She slid the single sheet of paper toward Prosser, a copy of the article. He picked it up and looked at it. “I don’t read French,” he said.

“The pertinent section is about halfway down,” Steele said, taking the paper from him, “between the two typographic devices this particular gossip columnist uses to break up items in his screed. Correct my translation if you wish, Ms. Carroll.”

She pulled a second copy of the article from the folder and read while Steele translated.

“‘The American-based mercenary security organization St. Kilda Consulting, a group well known for collecting extortionate fees from private clients all over the world, is expanding its activities into central Africa, according to well-placed intelligence sources.

“‘It is reported that the group, which outwardly operates as an independent investigative and security consulting firm, has been retained to cripple legitimate commercial intercourse between various French firms and customers in the French sphere of influence in Africa, which includes several countries on both sides of the equator.

“‘It is not known if St. Kilda’s efforts are endorsed or perhaps even secretly sponsored by American interests or even the government itself, but various international investigators are pursuing all leads.’”

Steele glanced toward the researcher and waited.

“That’s an honest translation,” she said, faintly surprised.

“That’s not how this article was represented to me,” Carson said. “It may be a respected newspaper, but this is a gossip column, not an investigative piece.”

Carroll went back to looking at her nails.

“The correspondent is a well-regarded journalist,” Steele said, “although that designation has different meanings in different places. He has excellent sources in the French political and security establishment, which is why his attack is so interesting. He has no particular reason to run the item, no news hook, as I believe you in the business call it. He’s just throwing mud.”

Prosser winced.

Martin began to relax.

Carroll decided that she’d redo her nails in bloodred.

“The attack on St. Kilda,” Steele said, “most likely comes from one of France’s largest energy companies. The company is seeking oil concessions all over Africa. In the past, the company has paid for such concessions with guns, bullets, aircraft, even machetes like the one that was used so many years ago to chop off John Neto’s hand.”

“Wait a minute,” Brent Thomas broke in. “You’re saying that some French oil company is pulling strings behind the scenes, trading guns for oil with one hand and planting rumors with respected and influential journalists with the other?”

“Yes.”

“That’s either crazy or the best damned news story I ever heard.”

“It’s both,” Steele said.

Carson leaned forward. “All I care about is Andre Bertone. He’s the man we’re putting in the UBS spotlight. He’s the one who’ll sue our balls off if he doesn’t like what we say.”

“Bertone is the cutout for the oil company,” Steele said. “If you’re a multibillion-dollar multinational corporation with direct political connections, you don’t openly buy planeloads of guns and then hand them over to rebels who in return will give you multiyear oil concessions when they come to power.”

Carson started taking notes.

“Andre Bertone is brokering the deal for the oil company,” Steele continued. “He used to be an ordinary middleman. Rebel groups would siphon barge loads of oil out of transnational pipelines and trade them to Bertone for cases of assault rifles. From there he bought planes and pilots. Now he’s an international energy broker who, if Neto is overthrown, will control millions of barrels of potential Camgerian production, which he’ll sell to the French for a long-term profit of a billion dollars.”

Everyone sat up straighter.

“Billion?” Prosser asked. “As in a thousand million dollars?”

“Profit after bribes and kickbacks are paid, yes,” Steele said. “That’s why some very powerful and influential people in Paris are unhappy. They don’t want St. Kilda to interfere in a revolution that will enrich them so well.”

“You can prove this, I suppose,” Carson said skeptically.

“Not at all, Counselor,” Steele said, “which is why I advise you not to include any of this in your program. These kinds of charges are made only in intelligence briefings and later, much later, in history books. But that doesn’t matter.”

“It does to me,” Carson said.

“Why? All your station has to prove is that Andre Bertone is, or has been, an international arms dealer, a ‘merchant of death,’ as Mr. Thomas calls him. Your reporter has already laid the groundwork for the story. Now I’m offering you the centerpiece for that program.”

Steele reached into the leather saddlebag that hung beside his wheelchair and pulled out a heavy manila folder. He sent it sliding down the sleek table. The folder came to rest directly in front of Prosser.

The executive producer hesitated, then opened the folder. Inside were computer copies of color photographs. They had about the same resolution as pictures printed on the inside pages of a newspaper. The first photo showed a burly Caucasian man in a white safari suit standing in the doorway of a transport aircraft on a dirt strip somewhere in a scrubland. The man was scowling directly into the lens.