“We’re ready,” announced Ronan at once.
“Against Pascara, Flamini, and Dukes?” said Rosenberg.
“All three,” confirmed the district attorney.
“What are the charges?”
“Conspiracy, against all three. We’re seeking five separate indictments; objectively I think we’ll get three. Against Dukes and Pascara, willful evasion of taxes …” Ronan smiled toward Knap. “That’s strictly an IRS prosecution.”
“We’re very confident,” said the tax investigator. “We haven’t been able to penetrate either offshore account, obviously. But in Pascara’s case we’ve racked up a total of 3.5 million dollars in canceled checks that have not been declared on any return. In Dukes’ case we’re alleging 2.5 million dollars.…”
“We’re also proceeding against Dukes and Flamini for entering a business arrangement without declaring previous felonious convictions.…” The district attorney smiled toward Franks. “You prepared to testify that no such declaration was ever made?”
“You’ve got to be joking!” said Franks at once. “And even without my testimony you’ve got the company minutes, proving that there was no such declaration.”
“Which is why we’ve included it,” said Ronan. “I have to hear everything from you, in the form of a deposition, to enable me finally to go forward. You’re the pivot to any prosecution we bring, Mr. Franks. So I don’t want anything—no matter how inconsequential—overlooked. If we can complete the deposition today, then fine. But I don’t want it rushed. We’re this close.” Ronan held up a hand with the thumb and forefinger narrowed, closing an imperceptible space. “So I’m not going to blow it. If it takes a week—two weeks—to get everything right, then I don’t care.”
“It won’t,” assured Franks at once. “We can do it this afternoon.”
“I’d like to think you’re right,” said Ronan. “But let’s not be overeager, okay?”
They achieved it in one sitting. But it took much longer than Franks anticipated. By the time he finished, aching as if he’d been engaged in some form of physical labor, there were five completed spools lying beside the tape machine on Ronan’s desk and a further, final tape still in the machine. Waldo led the interrogation throughout, showing by his questioning a still better knowledge of the case than the district attorney. It was dark when the account was finished; looking around the room, Franks knew that everyone else was as physically strained as he was. Ronan summoned a secretary and handed her the tapes for transcription, smiling first to Waldo and then to Knap. “Well?” he said.
“We’ve got a case,” judged Knap at once. “A damned good one.”
“It’ll do,” said Waldo, less enthusiastic.
“When?” said Rosenberg.
“From now on it’s largely a matter of mechanics,” said the district attorney. “Impaneling a jury. Formulating the charges.”
“What about my going to London?” demanded Franks.
“Yes,” agreed Ronan. “It’ll have to be before the hearings start. Right away then.” The man looked at Waldo. “No problem with you?”
“No problem,” said the FBI supervisor. “Whenever.”
“How long do you want?” said Ronan, coming back to Franks.
“Two weeks?” said Franks.
“Right away,” said the district attorney. To Waldo he said, “By yourself?”
Waldo shook his head. “Thought I’d take my partner.”
Franks was glad there would be the other man. He didn’t like the idea of having Waldo’s unrelieved company for so long. He said, “When we last met there was some discussion about my family remaining here?”
“Yes,” Ronan said.
“I’d like to be able to take my wife.”
Franks was aware of the look that went between Waldo and the district attorney.
“No,” said Ronan.
23
Franks told Tina at once that he was going, hoping it might lessen the problem between them, but it didn’t. Not that they argued; maybe it would have been better if they had. Instead they became overly polite and considerate—matadors not wanting to tarnish their suits of lights, he thought—each conceding to the other, each deferring to that concession. Franks endured it because there was a time limit, virtually only hours before he was due to catch the plane. He devoted the final full day to the children, trying to bridge the gap between himself and Tina through them and despising himself for doing it. He’d always been critical of adults who used children to get at each other, for anything. It didn’t work, because she didn’t respond.
He let David beat him at tennis and then had a picnic prepared and walked with them away from the house, to a woodsy area he’d never had cleared. Tina came too, perfunctorily, and so did four FBI men, led by Tomkiss; halfway through the meal Gabby ran screaming from a sound in the trees and one of the bureau bodyguards emerged shamefaced from peeing to say he was sorry. David developed a rash from poison ivy, which none of them saw, and Franks was sorry there was no gin packed in the hamper. He drank most of the wine, instead, and wished there had been a second bottle. As they trailed back to the house, far earlier than Franks intended, Tina said that Gabby had again wet the bed. He asked what she intended doing and Tina said still nothing, not yet. Any more than she intended to correct David for swearing. Franks said he didn’t know about any swearing and Tina said she and the nanny were both aware of the boy cursing—“shit” seemed the favorite, but they’d both heard “fuck”—and thought he’d picked it up from the guards.
“Or us,” said Franks.
“Us?”
“They’re words we’ve been using a lot lately.”
“You mean I have!”
Franks couldn’t be bothered to withdraw anymore; at least they were being honest, arguing outright. “Okay,” he said, “you have.”
“So now I’m guilty of everything since the death of Jesus.”
“It doesn’t suit you.”
“What doesn’t suit me!”
“That sort of brittleness.”
“You anxious to get away tomorrow?”
She’d asked him not to lie, before, Franks remembered. “Yes,” he said.
“I knew,” she said.
“I’m coming back.”
“You told me before.”
“And I meant it before. And I mean it now.” She wouldn’t believe he’d asked Ronan to allow her to go with him, so there wasn’t any purpose in telling her.
“Maria’s coming,” said Tina in a sudden switch.
“Coming where?” said Franks, not immediately following her.
“To the house. For dinner tonight. And to stay. I said you were going away and asked her to keep me company. She called up this morning.”
“You told her I was going away?”
“Not where,” said Tina. “Stop panicking. I just said you had to be away for a few days.”
“I wasn’t panicking,” said Franks. Christ, let this night pass and bring another day so I can leave, he thought. “I would have thought you’d have kept the last night free, before I went away.”
“Is it the last night?” she seized at once.
“I didn’t mean like that! And you know it!” Franks was uncaring that his voice was loud until he saw the children turn back just before the house to stare at them. He waved. They responded halfheartedly.
“Well done!” she said.
“Shut up, for God’s sake!”
“We invited Maria whenever she felt like coming. So today she called. Did you expect me to put her off?”
Franks thought briefly. “Yes, why not? Why couldn’t she have come tomorrow?”
“Okay, so I made a mistake. Is that such a big deal?”
Franks turned and looked behind him. The FBI men were following four abreast. Two were talking to each other and they all appeared sufficiently far away not to have heard. “I’m glad she’s coming anyway,” he said, trying to defuse the mood worsening between them. “It’s good yo
u’ll have company.”
“What about you?”
“What’s the matter with you?” he said. “I told you Waldo and Schultz were coming with me.”
“Sure!”
“You’re being ridiculous!”
At the house Franks announced that he was going to pack—not needing to yet, but to separate himself from her—and David asked if he could help and Franks said of course. Franks made a game out of it, sending the boy to drawers and cupboards and then letting him pack the things, actually enjoying the child’s company. They’d almost completed one suitcase when David said, “Why do you and Mommy shout at each other so much?”
“We don’t,” said Franks.
“Yes, you do. Since I came back from England you’ve always been arguing.”
“Everyone has arguments.”
“You didn’t used to. Not you and Mommy.”
“Mommy’s worried about something,” said Franks. Realizing it seemed as if he were shifting the guilt to Tina, he added, “I’ve been worried, too.”
“Is that why these men are here, with guns?”
Franks winced, glad he had his back to the boy and was bending over a suitcase. He said, “They’re looking after us, for a while.”
“I don’t understand,” protested David. “Why do they need to look after us?”
“There are some bad people who don’t want Daddy to do something; something I’ve got to do. The men are here to stop those bad people coming here and telling me not to do it.” Franks was hot with discomfort; he would have liked the explanation to have been better but decided it wasn’t too bad.
“What must you do?”
“Tell some other people—a judge—just how bad they are.”
“You going to be in a court, like on television?”
“Yes,” said Franks.
“Can I come to watch?”
“No,” said Franks.
“Why not! Please let me!”
“Children aren’t allowed in courts.”
“I think that’s shitty.”
“Those are the rules,” Franks said, refusing to respond to the language.
“Is it in England?”
Franks turned, frowning. “What?”
“The court?”
“No.”
“Why are you going to England then?”
“There’s some business I have to do there; I go back and forth all the time. You know that.”
“You are coming back, aren’t you?” said the boy. “You’re not leaving us?”
Franks sat on the edge of the bed, holding his arms out to the boy. David hesitated and then fell forward into the embrace, clutching at Franks.
“Of course I’m coming back,” he said. Damn the argument with Tina after the picnic.
His voice muffled in Franks’ shoulder, David said, “There are boys at school whose parents aren’t together. I always want you and Mommy to be together.”
“Mommy and I will always be together,” said Franks. “We love each other, don’t we?”
“Promise?”
“Have I ever broken a promise to you?”
“I don’t know,” said David. “I don’t think so.”
“I haven’t,” assured Franks. “And I’m promising you now that Mommy and I will always stay together.” He held the boy away from him, conscious of the effort David was making not to cry. “Okay?” he said.
“Okay.”
Remembering the bed-wetting, Franks said, “Do you and Gabby talk about it?”
“Sometimes.”
“Is Gabby worried?”
“I think so.”
“Think we should get her in on this conversation?”
“I don’t know,” said David.
“Or would it be better if you told her we had a kind of grown-up talk, and let her know what I said?”
“Maybe better if I told her,” said the boy. “If we call her in she’ll think I’ve been splitting on her: telling tales.”
“Aunty Maria is coming tonight. Going to stay with us a while,” said Franks.
“And Uncle Nicky?” asked the child.
Damn, thought Franks again. “No,” he said, “not Uncle Nicky.”
“Why not? Aren’t they together anymore?”
Franks pulled the child into his shoulder once more, unable to go on facing the trusting stare. “He’s had to go away on business, like me,” said Franks. Was it right not to have told him? One uncertainty prompted another. Should he have brought Gabby in, to tell her everything was all right between himself and Tina? He’d avoided—run away from—both questions, and he shouldn’t have done, Franks decided. It was too late now to go back on either.
“Perhaps he’ll come later,” said the boy.
Franks stood abruptly, looking at the suitcases. “Didn’t we come here to do a job?” he said. Still running, he thought.
Franks was relieved when the nanny came to take David away for his bath. He prolonged the packing, not wanting to go down to Tina. But at last he did. He saw she’d changed, which meant she’d visited the dressing room next door to the bedroom, and wondered if she’d heard any of the conversation between himself and David. She made no reference to it. He supposed he’d have to tell her, but not yet; later, so there’d be less time for any dispute. Tina said she didn’t want anything to drink. Franks was finishing his second when Maria arrived. Maybe it was a good idea after all that she’d come tonight instead of tomorrow, thought Franks; it might cut down the bickering between himself and Tina. Then again, it might not. Franks carried her suitcases, and Tina kissed her sister-in-law and took the children up for their baths, promising them they could come back for a visit with their aunt. Tina remained upstairs, to help the nanny with the baths, which left Franks and Maria alone in the small sitting room. She chose a martini and Franks had another one, too.
“How are things?” he asked.
“Kind of suspended, in limbo,” she said. She smiled and added, “Know what I thought on the way here?”
“What?”
“How I wouldn’t like to be a president or a world statesman or something like that, surrounded by bodyguards all the time.”
“I guess you get used to it,” said Franks. She looked far more relaxed than Tina. The grey dress was silk and tightly cut. Franks thought back to his poolside comparison between Maria and his wife and this time didn’t feel embarrassed.
“I’m not sure I would,” said Maria. “How are things with you?”
“Okay,” said Franks.
“There didn’t seem a lot of reassurance in that.”
Franks could have turned the remark aside, but he decided he didn’t want to. He said, “I wasn’t just making small talk at the funeral. Something’s moving, against Pascara and Flamini and Dukes.”
Maria had been sitting with that faint, mocking smile playing at the corners of her mouth but at once she became serious. “For Nicky’s murder!”
Franks shook his head. “In the strictest confidence, right?”
“Of course,” she said.
“I don’t think Enrico should know, not until it starts,” insisted Franks.
Maria hesitated and said, “Doesn’t he deserve to?”
“His was the original association.”
“Do you think that matters, now?”
“I can’t take the risk,” said Franks.
“You?”
“Yes,” said Franks. “It’s all to do with the company.”
“Will they be jailed?”
“Yes,” said Franks.
“How can you be sure?”
“Everyone’s very confident.”
“Will Nicky’s murder be involved?”
“It’s bound to be part of the evidence, I would have thought.”
“You’ll be a witness?”
“Naturally.”
“So it’s going to be dangerous for you?”
How completely would they be removed from everyone they knew when they entered the protect
ion program? The separation couldn’t be absolute. He said, “Yes, it’ll be dangerous.”
The smile came back, an admiring expression, he thought. Maria said, “Aren’t you frightened, after what happened to Nicky?”
Franks realized that he was enjoying impressing her, but thought that to say he wasn’t frightened—which he genuinely wasn’t—would sound too boastful. He said, “Let’s say I’m aware of what it could mean.”
“Are you?” she said. “Fully aware?”
“I think so.”
Maria made a sweeping gesture, to encompass the grounds and the unseen protectors. “It’s going to mean this goes on for some time, surely?”
“For quite a while,” agreed Franks.
“Don’t you find it difficult?”
“Quite a lot,” admitted Franks. “I think it’s getting to Tina more than me.”
“I thought she looked tired,” said Maria.
He saw her glass was empty. She surrendered it to be refilled, their hands touching when he took it from her. With his back toward the woman while he made the drinks, Franks decided that he wouldn’t let the conversation settle upon his wife. He said, “How are things up there?”
“Suspended, like I said. I think Mamma still expects Nicky to walk in, at any time. Enrico, too. They still talk about him in the present tense, like he isn’t dead.”
Franks returned with her drink, careful this time there was no contact between them. She smiled up at him. “That can’t make things easy for you,” he said.
“I’ve sort of turned myself off from it,” she said. “I must say I’m glad to come here for a while.”
“What about later? You’re welcome to stay here for as long as you like. You know that. And I guess with all the protection they’d like us to remain fairly stable, in one or two places. But it’ll have to end, sometime. What are you going to do then?”
“I don’t want to keep the brownstone in New York,” she said, positively. “It’s too big, and anyway I don’t think I want to stay on there. Not sure about Manhattan at all. I don’t think there’ll be the need to work, but I don’t think I can go on doing nothing. If I’m going to work then the city’s the best place to be. Which will mean an apartment there, I guess.” She looked toward the windows and the unseen guards. “How long will this go on?”
To Save a Son Page 23
