The Sun King

by David Ignatius

  “You can’t buy the team,” she said. “The sports editor will quit if you do.”

  “Let him go. He may be a good editor, but he’s a pain in the ass.”

  “He says it’s bad ethics—a newspaper owning a sports team. We’d be tempted to write puff pieces, just because we owned the team. Then all the other team owners would demand that same break. He feels strongly about it.”

  “Screw ethics! I’m sick of ethics. These people should all become priests if they care about ethics so much. All I know is that buying a sports team is good business. It’s a good fit for a communications company. That’s why Turner bought the Atlanta Braves. He wanted product for his TV stations. That’s why Murdoch bought the Dodgers, and Disney bought the Angels. It makes business sense. And besides, this town wants a winner! I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but Washington’s other teams are pathetic. That’s bad for circulation.”

  Candace put her arm through his; she didn’t say anything for a while. They walked arm in arm along the grassy path that bordered the riverbank. The wind was forming small whitecaps on the dark water, like swirls of frosting atop a cake. Across the river was the still, dense forest of Roosevelt Island—a bit of wilderness that had survived amid the builders and wreckers. She let them walk on like this. She wanted him to feel the December sun on his face.

  “You have to decide,” she said after a while, “what kind of a newspaper publisher you want to be. We can’t keep having these fights every few weeks. It’s no fun. The sports editor is right. We shouldn’t buy the team. It may be good business, but it’s bad journalism. When those two conflict, journalism should always win.”

  She didn’t threaten to resign, although she told me she was prepared to do it, if it had come to that. But she didn’t have to. The problem just went away. Galvin didn’t even answer her directly. He kissed her on the cheek and held her tight.

  “I love you,” he said.

  THEY SAT DOWN ON a bench by the river. It was battered, missing half of its wooden slats, so they had to sit close together. Galvin gathered her in his arm; she snuggled tight against his side, as if she were burrowing into the warmth and bulk of him. They sat there for a long while, so long that they lost track of time. He whispered little jokes and memories from long ago. She sang to him in a sweet, thin soprano voice—something she was usually too self-conscious to do. They were folks songs and show tunes, the same ones she had sung to him in the months when they were first dating. Her lips were next to his ear; no one could hear her but him.

  The airplanes roared overhead; the joggers glided past; the pigeons wheeled along the riverbank. But they were alone. He looked to be the happiest man on earth on his rickety bench, surrounded by noise and people but with all his attention focused on the lovely woman next to him. And she felt a sense of peace and joy that day too, she said. It was one of the last times they were alone together. The safety catch was off, and she was letting herself be in the moment with him—although from time to time, a neuron would fire somewhere and she would look over her shoulder to see if anyone was watching.

  TWENTY

  I MADE MY WAY DOWN A LONG CORRIDOR OF THE RAYBURN House Office Building. The marble floors had been waxed to such a high gloss, it was impossible not to imagine that I had walked onto a movie set. That was the problem with Congress—it was an extreme cinematic version of itself. Every detail was so right: the ornate buildings glistening in the sun as if the studio water truck had just hosed them down to get the right sheen; the vacant-looking congressional aides promenading in the halls like extras—some even with speaking parts (“Congressman Jones! You’re needed on the floor!”); the B-list actors who played the members of Congress, speaking lines written for them by B-list screenwriters. No wonder people didn’t vote on Election Day; they were waiting for it to come out on video.

  My heels clicked on the marble floor like John Travolta’s as I made my way to see the deputy chief counsel of the House Commerce Committee. This was an “informal” visit to prepare for the January hearings, he had stressed, not a sworn deposition—which meant that I didn’t have to answer questions. Even as I approached his office, I wasn’t sure why I had agreed to come. I certainly knew I was doing something naughty as far as the paper was concerned. It wasn’t necessarily a desire to harm Galvin; in some ways, I imagined I might be protecting him—by gathering intelligence about his tormentors. My strongest motivation was probably simple curiosity. I had never visited the Rayburn building on official business, never been interrogated by a congressional aide, never had even a bit part in this movie. The Savant wanted to know what it felt like.

  The deputy chief counsel was named Ewan Buzby. He was a semi-intelligent young man—probably too smart to run for Congress himself, but not quite smart enough to get a real job with a law firm. Congress had hundreds of these people—the well-scrubbed, protectively dumb. They were drawn to Washington as irresistibly as young stage actors are to New York. Ask yourself: What kind of young person today would dream of making a career in government?

  Ewan Buzby insisted on taking me into a private office where nobody could see us, which made me uncomfortable—he acted like I was his star witness. He had a long list of questions written on a yellow legal pad. “You don’t mind if I tape-record this?” he asked as we were about to start, and I said yes, I certainly did mind—how could it be informal and off the record if it was all on tape? So he turned his recorder off, but I wondered if there was another machine somewhere, spooling away.

  “I’m going to ask you some questions about Carl Galvin,” he said. “Although you’re not under oath, I expect you to tell me the truth.”

  “No problem,” I answered. “I’ll let you know if I decide to lie.”

  He didn’t smile. Humorlessness was another essential feature of Capitol Hill culture. “How long have you known Mr. Galvin?” he began.

  “Not long. About nine months.”

  “Who introduced you?” He had the slick, taut face of someone who spent too much time at the gym. A disagreeable wholesomeness.

  “Nobody. I called Galvin up and asked him if he wanted to be profiled in my magazine. Reveal. Quite well known in its day, but it’s dead now.”

  “Did he pay you for the profile?”

  “No! Of course not.” I laughed, but then wondered if perhaps Galvin had done just that. “Not directly, at least. He did give me a job later.”

  “Were you aware when you met Mr. Galvin that he was in financial difficulty?”

  “No. I’m not aware of that now, really. Except for what I read in The Wall Street Journal, and a few things that people have said. Is it true?”

  Mr. Ewan Buzby didn’t answer. I wasn’t supposed to ask questions, clearly. He fiddled with his tie. It had little elephants on it—very loyal of him; they were probably printed on his boxer shorts too.

  “In the course of interviewing Mr. Galvin for your magazine, I assume you talked to him about his past.”

  “I tried to. He didn’t tell me much.” That probably sounded damning. “He did tell me a few things later, after I got to know him better.”

  “Did he ever tell you that he worked for the CIA in Asia?”

  “No. But I’ve always been curious. Was he really a spook?”

  “Sorry. I can’t answer that.”

  I assumed that meant he had indeed worked for the agency. Son of a gun! You had to admire that, in a perverse sort of way—a young Harvard dropout in the early 1970s going to work for the Big Boys. That explained how he’d gotten such a fast start as a commodities trader.

  “Did Mr. Galvin ever tell you about his business dealings as an oil trader?”

  “A little. I gather he was good at making relationships with people. Someone told me he operated at the margins—that he would go into dicey places and do whatever it took to get the deal done. He told me once that the commodities business was tricky, because it involved inherently untrustworthy people.”

  Young Mr. Buzby fixed me with his
semi-intelligent eyes. That last bit was probably beyond him. “Did anyone ever tell you that Mr. Galvin has paid bribes to obtain business?”

  Now this was getting interesting. I’d never heard anything about bribes before. “That’s a hard question to answer, in such general terms,” I said. “Which countries are you talking about?”

  “Angola, for a start. Do you know anything about bribes he might have paid to the rebels there, to obtain contracts to sell oil?”

  “Nope. I heard he was active there after the Portuguese left, but that’s it.”

  “How about Nigeria?”

  “Nope. Nothing about Nigeria. Why? Did he pay bribes there too?”

  “Did he ever talk about selling oil to South Africa?”

  “Now, let me think.” I rubbed my forehead. This was fun. “I know I heard about that somewhere, but I can’t remember if Galvin told me or someone else. Refresh my memory about that one.”

  “The question is whether Galvin smuggled Russian oil into South Africa during the eighties, in violation of sanctions. He supposedly made a commission of ten dollars a barrel. That ring any bells?”

  “Faintly. Sorry, but my memory is so bad.”

  “What about Iran? Do you know anything about his lifting oil from Bandar Abbas, despite sanctions?”

  “Yes. I heard about that. Definitely. But I can’t tell you any more than that.”

  “Heard about it from Galvin?”

  “No. From someone else. But that person sounded pretty confident.”

  Ewan Buzby was frowning. He was beginning to wonder if his leg was being pulled, but he was too serious and trusting a person to believe that anyone could really take an interview with a congressional committee so lightly. He pressed on.

  “What about Iraq? Did Galvin ever say anything about buying Iraqi oil, in violation of sanctions?”

  “Not in so many words. But I heard about that from the other people too. That he went into Iraq and did that business when nobody else wanted to, and made a lot of money.”

  “What did they tell you, these other people?”

  “Just that he did it. They didn’t have a lot of other information. It sounds like you already know what they told me.”

  “Who are these other people you keep mentioning?”

  “It’s actually just one person. He’s a broker in town. He gave me his card, but I lost it.”

  “You’re not being very helpful. We can subpoena you, you know.”

  “Fine. Do that. Then I won’t tell you anything at all.”

  He sat back peevishly. He looked upset, like a kid whose playmate won’t share the toys. He wanted to get through the list of questions on his yellow pad.

  “How about Russia? Did anyone tell you about Galvin’s activities there?”

  “Which activities are you referring to in Russia? Maybe I can help you on that.” It was worth another try, to see if I could bluff a bit more out of him. Perhaps I had been wrong about Mr. Buzby. Possibly he was stupid enough to run for Congress.

  The interrogator’s eyes clicked into focus again. “Specifically, did you hear anything about Galvin buying oil and other commodities from former Soviet officials who were privatizing natural resources and converting them to private use? We’re also interested in any information you might have about whether Galvin helped these Russians set up private banking relationships in Switzerland.”

  “Nope. Sorry. That’s new to me. I guess I don’t know much about Russia. I was mistaken.”

  He was pissed now. He thought I was making fun of him. His tone grew testier.

  “Do you know someone named Ted Amara?”

  “Yes. He works at the Sun. He’s a lawyer. A tough guy, acts like a gangster. I’ve seen him around the building.”

  “Are you aware that he has been making cash payments to the mayor of Washington?”

  “No. I’ve seen him with the mayor, and I assumed something was going on between them. I mean, the mayor doesn’t play ball with white newspaper owners for free. And everybody knows Galvin was pumping a lot of money into the city for his scholarships and the Howard Theatre restoration. But I don’t really know anything.”

  “Are you aware of any other places where Mr. Amara has acted as Mr. Galvin’s intermediary?”

  “I know he used to live in France. But you’ll have to be more specific if you want my help.”

  “We’re curious about Mr. Amara’s activities in Russia, Switzerland and Iraq. Any information about those places?”

  “No. I’m sorry. I know he went to Tysons Corner to talk about buying a soccer team. And I know he travels a lot for Galvin. But I don’t think I have what you’re looking for.”

  Buzby shook his head. I was a disappointment. He flipped a page in his yellow pad and started on what appeared to be a new list of questions. “Now, Mr. Cantor,” he said firmly, “I want to talk to you about your role in the purchase of The Washington Sun and Tribune.” He made a point of using the paper’s full name, as if that made it more sinister.

  His tone made me nervous. He wasn’t just fishing now; he had something. “I didn’t have any role,” I answered, “except to carry Galvin’s bag.”

  “That’s not my understanding, Mr. Cantor. I’m told that you played an important part in the takeover. Is it true, for example, that you informed the Hazen family that a holding company called PalmTrust was secretly buying shares of the Sun?”

  Oh shit, I thought to myself.

  He was smiling, watching my discomfort.

  “Galvin brought me along to a meeting with Ariane Hazen. He made it seem like I was the person who dug up the information on PalmTrust, but I wasn’t. It was one of his games. That’s all.”

  “And I believe you accompanied Mr. Galvin when he made his presentation to the Hazen and Crosby families, as well.”

  “I was his sidekick. That probably sounds strange, but I came along for the ride, as an observer. This is Washington. People do that here. This is a city of voyeurs.”

  He ignored my cultural commentary. “Were you aware at the time that Mr. Galvin had extensive business dealings with Melvin Wolfe, the owner of PalmTrust?”

  “No. I didn’t know that.”

  “Did you know that Mr. Wolfe had extended more than two hundred million dollars in credit to Mr. Galvin? And that Mr. Wolfe and Mr. Galvin were secretly collaborating on the supposedly competing bids for the Sun?”

  “No, I didn’t know any of that. I had suspicions, I guess. But I didn’t know anything.” I could feel the color draining from my face, and the beads of perspiration beginning to form on my forehead. This seemed like a good moment to call my lawyer, or eat the pages of my address book, or do whatever guilty suspects do. “I wonder, Mr. Buzby, if I could take a bathroom break.”

  He smiled. “I’ll be done in a minute, if you can hold on. I have just one more question, actually. Did you ever ask Mr. Galvin during the last few months whether he was in financial trouble?”

  Was that a trick question? I couldn’t tell anymore.

  “Yes. I asked him several times whether he had money problems. I was getting concerned about what might happen to him. Regardless of what you may think, I didn’t know anything about his finances—I don’t know anything now, in fact. But I was worried.”

  “And what did he say, when you asked him?”

  “He told me that everything was okay. He said to stop worrying. It was all just short-term. Everything would turn out fine in the end.”

  “And you believed him?”

  He asked it in such a callow way, I couldn’t very well say that of course I had believed him—that I had trouble doubting Galvin even now, after what I’d just heard. That was the problem when the rules of ordinary life intersected with the mercurial and ephemeral. It was so hard to explain to the enforcers why the rules had been suspended. It was like trying to explain “special” to “ordinary.”

  IT WAS OBVIOUS TO me, as I left Mr. Ewan Buzby’s office, that I was in a potentially awkward positi
on. That view was confirmed when I replayed the conversation for my lawyer friend. He wanted to know more of the details himself—especially about my knowledge of Galvin’s collusion with Melvin Wolfe. But I put him off. There would be enough time later to attend to the petty business of escaping legal jeopardy. My immediate problem was emotional jeopardy.

  I returned to the office to write my column, which I was supposed to have delivered the night before. The Savant was never late, but unfortunately The Savant that week was experiencing an intellectual capital shortage. I scanned the folder of ideas that I kept for the proverbial rainy day, but they all seemed too heavy or too light. I wondered: Could I get away with a column arguing that the baby boom generation’s most important contribution to American life was the popularization of oral sex? Before roughly 1965, nice girls wouldn’t do it; after that, well . . . you know the story. But no, that column probably wasn’t a good idea.

  Finally, in desperation, I decided to update an old Russell Baker column (steal would be a better word, actually) about presidential character, pets and children. I observed that presidents who had dogs and daughters tended to make serious errors of judgment—Baker had pointed to Nixon, a dog and daughter man all the way, but the same could be said of the current incumbent—because of all the uncritical affection they received. The Savant, by comparison, was affection starved; that was what gave him his edge.

  I HAD AN APPOINTMENT to meet with Candace’s investigative team that evening at a bar near my apartment. It was a bitterly cold night. Snow and freezing rain were forecast for the next day, and it was altogether an evening to stay home and curl up with some strong spirits and an affectionate, uncritical dog, if one could be located. I wondered whether to cancel the meeting with the two reporters and decided that it might look odd—I was becoming concerned with appearances, a dangerous sign—so I went ahead with the rendezvous.