“I’ve got cheerleading practice at ten, Mom.”
“Fine,” her father said. “We’ll be back in a little while.”
“This is most kind,” the old man said. “Most kind. I had heard that Americans were so full of—how do you say it? Hospeet-al…”
“Hospitality?”
“Ah yes, hospitality.”
“We’re happy to help. Are you from Israel?”
The old man was instantly surprised and pleased. “Yes, how did you know?”
Taggart grinned. “The synagogue helped.”
“But of course.” He bowed with great grace and dignity.
Taggart held out his hand. “My name is Jonathan Taggart, and this is my wife, Mildred, and my daughter, Charlene.”
Again there was the slight bow, which was somehow both quaint and stately at the same instant. “My name is Yaacov—Jacob in English. Jacob Shoshani.”
Alex leaned far back in his chair, his mood expansive. “I guess the primary question is, why should Saudi Arabia work with us anyway? Obviously they know where to purchase jet fighters.”
“I was wondering that myself,” Derek said. “Surely Northrup or General Dynamics, or whoever, would be happy to deal directly with them and save the commissions.”
“For sure!” Alex took a sip of coffee, enjoying his role as instructor. “There are various names given to what I do. Some call me a middleman, others say we are agents or sales representatives. I like to think of myself as a marriage broker. But whatever the name, we become critical in a contract such as this for a couple of reasons. One of the most obvious is that governments are very big entities. They move slowly. There is a horrendous amount of bureaucracy and red tape.”
He began drumming his fingertips together slowly. “Another reason is, though at first it may seem to contradict what I just said, governments are in some ways very much like children. They are naive in the ways of the world. They can be ripped off like any individual. Worse, because of the size of the purchases involved. So the middleman becomes a protector to them, helping them negotiate the shoals of shallow water.
“A third reason. Remember the Lockheed scandal of a few years ago?”
Marc looked a little puzzled, so Derek broke in. “Lockheed executives were paying huge sums of money in bribes to get orders in foreign countries.”
“Oh, yes.”
“It wasn’t just Lockheed,” Alex continued. “Everybody was doing it. When all of the dust and fooforah settled, Congress had passed the Corrupt Foreign Practices Act, outlawing all such practices. Today, an executive of a corporation can end up in jail if he tries to influence the sale of his products through illegal payments.”
He took a deep breath. “Now, you need to listen to this part very carefully so you understand the fine line we have to walk. A bribe is one thing, but a ‘commission’ is something else again. What many Americans would call a bribe is really a way of life in most of the world. Everyone has their hand out for a piece of the action. I call them the five-percenters. Everywhere you go—Latin America, the Orient, the Middle East—anyone who helps wants a cut of the action. It’s part of the culture, and I’m sure Saudi Arabia is no different.”
Marc was nodding. He had seen it in South America, but the Middle East had raised it to an art. Someone had once said that the favorite biblical passage in the Middle East was, “I was a stranger, and ye took me.”
“If a corporate executive or a government official pays someone a commission,” Alex was saying, “it may be interpreted under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act as a bribe, and then the man’s in trouble.”
“But a middleman is different,” Derek finished for him. It was not a question. Derek had followed the discussion perfectly.
“Right. We’ve got to be very careful, and I want it perfectly clear. We will not be bribing anyone. But I expect to pay out something like three or four million dollars in commissions before we’re through.”
Jackie did not seem at all surprised at the figure, but both Marc and Derek were suitably impressed. “Another way to look at it is this: An agent becomes an arbitrator between life-styles. In the Middle East the payment of commissions is a life-style. In America it is not. Both parties know the realities of life, but can’t change—or won’t. So I become the arbitrator between the two life-styles. That’s why I call myself a marriage broker.
“This deal is a case in point. Here we have two parties who want a marriage—namely the sale of sixty high-performance jet aircraft. But there are obstacles. Some years ago, the Saudis passed a law against paying commissions on the purchase of military hardware. But they know this deal is so hot and so sensitive, normal channels will fail. America on the other hand, also has a problem. No executive of the aircraft company can pay the necessary ‘grease money’ required to make things work. And yet they know that without it, the deal will bog down completely. So, both governments say, ‘We want the marriage badly. We’d better get a broker.’”
“And brokers have to be paid,” Jackie concluded for him.
“That’s right,” Alex added with a beatific smile, “and if so, why not let it be us? The challenge will be to bind the Saudis to us and no one else. We’re not the only ones who’d like to sew this one up. So we’ve got to put together a package that the Saudis can’t get anywhere else.” He turned to Derek. “Do you have your passport yet?”
“Yes, it came last week.”
“Good. I want you to fly to Jakarta day after tomorrow.”
That surprised everyone but Jackie. “Jakarta?” Derek echoed.
“Yes. I think we’ve found a way to leverage the Saudis to us. If this Gerritt Industries radar system proves to be all they’re claiming it will be, that will be our biggest selling point. But every other thing we can do will put it in concrete.”
“So what’s coming down in Jakarta?” Derek asked.
“A few months ago, I worked a deal in Indonesia. I didn’t make a dime on it. In fact I nearly lost my shirt. But it was a great favor to a very important general.”
He saw the look on Marc’s face and smiled. “Everything was perfectly legal. The president had given the army a certain percentage of the oil being pumped from one oil field. The general needed money, not oil. So he called us for help in marketing it. Oil is not my line, but I decided to do him a favor.” He grinned more broadly at Marc. “Remember the lecture at UCLA?”
Marc had already been thinking about that very thing. “How one goes about selling widgets and all that?”
“Exactly! Well, Mr. Indonesian General is now in the market for some widgets.”
Jackie turned in surprise. “The arms deal is going through?”
Alex nodded smugly.
“But I thought they couldn’t get the funds.”
“They can’t.”
She waited, knowing Alex well enough to sense when he had pulled off another coup.
“The army is willing to pay off one hundred percent in a countertrade transaction.” He turned to Derek and Marc. “That’s what common folk would call bartering.”
“What’s the product?” Jackie asked.
“Bauxite ore.”
She sat back, nodding with understanding. “Very good.”
Marc and Derek were still baffled, and Alex laughed out loud. “So what does Barclay Enterprises want with several thousand tons of bauxite?”
“The thought had crossed my mind,” Derek said.
“Do you know what bauxite is used for?”
“It’s used in making aluminum,” Marc answered.
“Right.” He paused, savoring the moment. “A couple of months ago I heard that several companies, including Reynolds and Kaiser, have been asked to submit preliminary proposals for building an aluminum foil factory in the Middle East. In Jeddah, as a matter of fact.”
Marc sat back. The complexity of it all was almost breathtaking. And Alex thrived on it. He was a master at it.
“If we could promise a cheap source of ore, we co
uld make a few bucks on the side and at the same time get one more peg nailed down around the Saudi tent.”
“That’s great, Alex,” Jackie said, almost as pleased as her boss.
“I know. That was good news at the right time.” Suddenly he was all business. “Derek I want to brief you on exactly what has to be done in Indonesia. The groundwork is all laid, but there will be contracts to write and get signed, details to work out. That’s where you really shine.” He swiveled in his chair. “Jackie, I want you and Marc to put some real thought into Gerritt. I don’t want him slipping out from under us.”
“Gerritt?” Marc asked. “I thought you already had an agreement with him.”
“Oh, we do. But if that prototype performs next Monday like he says it will, Quinn Gerritt will move from starving industrialist with hat in hand to the hottest item on the defense industry circuit. Right now, he needs us. We’re a guaranteed market for his product, and that keeps his financing secure. But once he’s got a pocketful of chips, you can bet he’ll start looking to see if there are any other games in town.”
“But haven’t you signed a contract?”
Alex hooted. “Sure I have. But to a man like Gerritt, a contract is like a napkin at the dinner table. You use it so folks will think you’re polite, but once the food is served, you forget the paper and go for the meat.”
“Then maybe somebody ought to teach Gerritt what table manners are all about.”
It was said so calmly that for a moment Alex just blinked. Then he recovered and leaned forward. “Are you serious?”
Marc nodded, meeting Alex’s gaze.
Derek snorted in disgust, and Marc caught Jackie’s quick glance of warning. He ignored both of them. Alex sat back, his expression still incredulous. “Without Gerritt’s radar system, we’ve got nothing with the Saudis. The whole deal goes down the tubes.”
“So you let Gerritt do whatever he wants?”
“Look!” Alex exploded, “I don’t like Quinn Gerritt any better than you do, but I’m not about to lose the biggest opportunity of a lifetime just to make some point about who’s right and who’s wrong. There’s too much riding on this one.”
“It’s your game, Alex,” Marc said evenly.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You hired me to help you deal with the Saudis, not tell you how to run your business.”
“I was beginning to wonder,” Derek murmured.
Alex spun around. “That’s enough, Derek!” Then he was back to Marc. “It’s my game, but I’m doing it all wrong, right?”
“I didn’t say that, Alex. I simply said that I don’t think you have to take Gerritt on his terms.”
Alex threw up his hands, but Jackie cut in smoothly, smiling kindly to ease the sting of her words. “Aren’t you being a little naive, Marc? This isn’t a class on ethics where you can debate what ought to happen. This is the real world.”
“You’d better believe it!” Alex said, jabbing his finger at Marc. “Sometimes what ought to be and what you’d like to be gets bulldozed under by what is. Sometimes you have no choice.”
“I guess that’s where we differ. I think there’s always a choice.”
Chapter Fifteen
The pull out of Redlands, up and over Beaumont Pass, is not particularly dramatic, but enough that the thunderous roar of the six diesel locomotives shattered the quiet before dawn of the late January morning. A hundred and twenty-six cars were strung out over a mile behind the engines in a serpentine trail of black and silver, glinting dully in the moonlight. Formed the previous day in the sprawling Southern Pacific yards at Colton, every car was loaded to capacity. Even with eighteen thousand horsepower pulling it up the grade, the speed had dropped to less than twenty miles an hour.
Two men lying flat in the brush alongside the track felt the train before they heard it. A powerful, throbbing vibration pulsed through the ground. Both men were nearly invisible, even in the light of the half moon. Their faces were blackened, and dark caps and clothes covered everything else. The smaller of the two men came up into a low crouch. He was motionless for almost a full minute, then gave a low grunt of satisfaction. Three quarters of a mile away the swinging beam of the lead locomotive had rounded the hill.
The second man pulled a walkie talkie up. Though they were several miles from the nearest dwelling, he still spoke in a low murmur, and he spoke in Hebrew. “We’ve got it in sight. Is this the one?”
The radio crackled softly. “Affirmative. We have visual confirmation on the engine number.”
The radio was clipped onto a belt. Canvas bags set to one side were lifted and quickly tied to the belts as well. There was a quick, last minute check of equipment. Gloves were pulled on. Then they moved deeper into cover as the first rays of the engine’s searchlight caught the tips of the sagebrush.
They let all six engines lumber past them, the deafening roar and stench of diesel fuel filling the sagebrush and the air. Only after the engines had passed did they come up, peering at the box cars towering over them, both of them counting as the cars rocked slowly past. The thirty-fifth car was the first of a whole string of flatcars carrying truck-trailers piggy back. Still they didn’t move.
“Forty-six!” the lead man yelled suddenly. “Let’s go.”
They were up and running. Twenty miles an hour seems pitifully slow for a moving train, but for a running man it can be fatally fast. The smaller man grabbed the steel ladder and swung up. His partner missed the car behind, nearly stumbled, caught himself, then dropped back slightly. He looked over his shoulder, gave a sudden burst of speed and swung up onto a flat car two back from the first man.
He was still hunched over gasping for breath when the first jumped the gap between the swaying cars and ran to his side.
“You okay?”
“I’m fine. Let’s go.”
The second man reached in his bag and pulled out a powerful flashlight.
“If I counted right, this is car fifty-three or fifty-four. We want sixty-one.”
They moved swiftly down each flat car, leaping the gaps between cars easily. They started checking registration numbers on the truck trailers on the sixth car back and found what they were looking for three more beyond that.
Each knew exactly what to do. They circled the trailer working swiftly. Small globs of plastic explosive were slapped around the half-inch steel eyelets where the chains holding the trailer were snubbed down tight. Bolt cutters snapped the locks on the back of the trailer, and the doors were swung open to bang free. A small sledge hammer battered away the chocks beneath the wheels.
“Ready?” They had moved one full car away. The smaller man held two wires and a square battery. The second man grabbed onto a rail and leaned far out, peering forward into the night.
“All clear!”
The wires touched the terminals on the top of the battery. There were four flashes and a muffled explosion. Both men darted back to the trailer. The chains were swinging loose now, doing a slow dance in rhythm to the swaying of the train.
“Let’s go!”
They moved to one side, watching ahead. The first man’s arm raised up to point. “There’s the crossing!” They turned their heads so the flashing red semaphores would not destroy their night vision. As it passed, they jerked back around. A pair of headlights, back fifty or so meters from the crossing, flicked on, then off again.
The man in the rear tapped the other on the shoulder. “Watch yourself.”
Canvas bags were dropped over the side, then they leaped, one after the other, out into the night.
Some fifteen minutes later, as the engineer passed the point where Highway One Eleven leaves Interstate Ten and angles off toward Palm Springs, he had all hundred and twenty-six cars over the top of the pass and pushing at his back. He laid on the whistle as they rocketed past a crossing at close to seventy miles an hour. The first of the engines laid into the sharp curve that turned the line into the long, flat run to Indio. One after ano
ther the cars behind followed suit.
As car sixty neared the curve, the chains on the trailers snapped tight with a sharp crack. But the sixty-first trailer had no such restraint. There was a screech of metal as the prop beneath the front of the trailer tore loose. Forty thousand pounds of trailer and cargo careened sideways, then hurtled off the flat car. Six tamarisk trees lining the track, planted to hold back the eternally blowing sands of the desert, were sheared off like twigs beneath the blades of a power mower. The thin aluminum shell of the trailer exploded, and as the nose of the trailer hit the earth, boxes and crates flew in every direction.
The caboose flashed by the clouds of dust and the shattered truck a few seconds later. There was a quick impression of a startled face at the window, followed almost instantly by the shriek of metal against metal as a thousand steel wheels locked against brake shoes and the mile-long monster fought to bring itself to a halt.
The wind off the pass quickly cleared the dust and the fine layer of sand particles from above the wreckage. In the moonlight the carnage was everywhere. Here and there, amid the smashed boxes, which carried the red and white circular logo of Gerritt Industries, small cloth bags could be seen. Some had split open, and a fine white powder trickled out to mingle with the sands of the Mojave Desert.
Rod Bigelow came out of the diner next to the truck stop in Tucamcari, New Mexico. He stopped for a moment, took a deep breath of the frosty morning air, then headed for the line of eighteen wheelers. He popped a piece of chewing gum in his mouth, considering the day ahead. He could easily make Tulsa by nightfall, maybe even push on to Springfield. Then the run on into St. Louis would be an easy half day.
He came around the cab of his White Freightliner, whistling softly. He had started it idling before he went in for the shower and breakfast, and it was ready to roll. But his whistling died instantly as he saw the man waiting at the door of his cab. He stopped, wary, but before he could move, someone stepped in quickly behind him, and he felt a sharp jab against his neck.
“We don’t want to hurt you. Get in.”
As they climbed up and into the cab, the muzzle of the pistol was kept firmly against the back of Bigelow’s neck. He slid over beneath the wheel, and the man climbed up into the sleeper behind him. The second man moved without haste across the parking lot to a blue Ford sedan.
Gerald N. Lund 4-In-1 Fiction eBook Bundle Page 71
