by David Pepper
My family had owned a small cabin near Geneva-on-the-Lake since my childhood, and after both my parents passed away, I inherited the property. It had been my getaway ever since.
As many ups and downs as my family endured over the years, this setting brought back the ups. The positive memories. The old family photos on the wall, back when all were healthy, happy and hopeful. The pencil marks on the door tracking my growth spurts over the years. Trophies on a bookshelf, still boasting top achievements decades later. And some of Dad’s favorite political paraphernalia and photos, hung before we all became so disenchanted. Even the old photos of Meredith brought a smile.
Anywhere else but here, memories of Meredith brought anguish.
She was born four years after me. As the photos (and her own pencil marks, not far beneath mine) captured, she too was tall, with long brown hair, hazel eyes, and high cheekbones. People always said she could’ve been a model. In her 34 years, she always was the apple of Dad’s eye. Mine too.
We called her the family angel. Full of life, she made us all laugh from the time she hit seven months old. If I mimicked Dad’s political interest and intensity at a young age, Meredith inherited the interpersonal charm that made him such a good campaigner in the first place. Her intense, uninterrupted gaze, warm smile, and gentle manner lifted everyone lucky enough to be on the receiving end.
Her disposition anchored the family when times got tough. When Dad lost his election, when my own life fell apart, when Mom succumbed to breast cancer, Meredith kept the family going. She was the rock.
But she made one terrible mistake—she married the wrong man. As much as we loved her, and communicated with her on a regular basis, neither Dad nor I had detected the signs. Years of abuse hidden beneath her pleasant exterior. Years of bruises and broken bones masked by makeup, creative explanations and misleading assurances that all was okay. A complete mirage, we would later find out.
When we got the call, Dad and I were together, watching an Indians game in his living room.
“Mr. Sharpe, we need you to come to the Clinic right away. It’s an emergency.”
Meredith and her husband had moved to Cleveland six years before. She now lay in the emergency room, horribly beaten.
We raced up I-77, arriving at the hospital shortly after she fell into a coma. We could hardly recognize the bruised, disfigured body lying in the hospital bed. Almost every inch of her face presented a horrific hue of deep purple or blood red. Her broken nose twisted unnaturally to the left, her swollen right eye sealed completely shut. Her arms and legs were tattooed with additional dark blue and purple bruises as if baseballs had been flung at her repeatedly. We both grasped her right hand because her left hand was mangled, fingers splayed in opposite directions—only possible because bones beneath were fractured.
She stopped breathing shortly after midnight, overwhelmed by the internal bleeding. The doctors were amazed she had held on that long.
The homicide detectives later pieced together the crime scene. Spurred on by a disagreement over money, her husband had beaten her for hours, at first with his fists, and then with other household items he had picked up during his rage. The autopsy also revealed a history of broken bones, including an eye socket and a collarbone in recent years. And Meredith had never told a soul. In hindsight, I wasn’t surprised. She never asked for help, she was always the one helping others.
The jury sentenced her husband to life in prison. But for us, it didn’t assuage a personal sentence that felt far more painful.
Dad passed away four months after the trial. I never doubted that the heartbreak of his daughter’s brutal death—blaming himself for not being there for her—drove Dad’s health downhill quickly.
I felt equally guilt-ridden. The big brother, who physically towered over the monster who killed her, had failed to protect her. I rarely spoke of Meredith again.
In one place in the world, Geneva-on-the-Lake, Meredith’s spirit remained. There, and only there, the photos of Meredith beaming from the walls overwhelmed the vivid image of my dying sister otherwise cemented into my memory.
So after arriving at Geneva-on-the-Lake, I did what I always did. Grabbed a Yuengling, sat back in my dad’s old rocking chair, faced the lake, and took about twenty minutes to soak it all in. A few moments to recall the good old days. To feel the way I did back then.
But this time, as I glanced up at the photos of Meredith, the framed photo of Joanie Simpson in the Capitol Hill office also flashed in my head.
* * *
Back to work.
I took out my notebooks and began to review all I had gathered. Made a quick list of what I knew:
1.Abacus altered the outcome of the congressional elections.
2.Thomas Stanton aware of the plan; campaigned in the Abacus districts.
3.Simpson, aide to Stanton, discovered the plan and revealed it to him directly; killed within days.
4.Stanton’s chief of security framed Rutherford for Simpson killing.
5.Lee Kelly ended up dead after discovering the Abacus plot; had called Stanton and visited his home.
6.Stanton repeatedly lied about all aspects of the plan.
In sum, I had made enormous headway, far beyond even my first story. But so much of it was off the record. Unsourced. It would be a struggle to piece together what I could actually write.
Even worse, there were still so many loose ends. So I made a list of those as well:
1.Who did Stanton work with? Abacus plan required major investments—beyond what a single congressman, even powerful one, could manage.
2.What role did Ariens play? Did he know of Abacus? Was he the connection back to the investor(s)?
3.Who sent the information on Stanton?
(If it was someone inside Stanton’s operation—his chief of staff, Dennison, Brown—then Stanton simply had a leak. If it was someone beyond his office, then another party knew a whole lot about it all, and that carried much larger consequences.)
4.Who was following me?
Just as I finished jotting down my list of unknowns, my cell phone rang. A Pennsylvania area code.
“Mr. Sharpe?”
“Yes. This is he.”
“My name is Jim Mason. I’m the CEO of Marcellus. I understand you want to talk to our company. When can we meet?”
* * *
It took me two hours to get to Titusville. A sign at the run-down town’s entrance boasted the town motto: “The Valley That Changed the World.” Certainly couldn’t tell from looking at it. But then it occurred to me that the slogan was accurate. The world had indeed changed—the change just hadn’t benefited Titusville itself.
The Marcellus headquarters was located south of town, only a few miles from where oil was first discovered and drilled more than 150 years before.
At the security gate, the guard waved me through. I had expected a nice new building, but not an entire campus of them. Five silver buildings, each eight stories tall, spaced out in a semi-circle and all facing the same pristinely landscaped green in the middle.
These people were printing money.
“Mr. Sharpe, I assume.”
An Indian-American man in his mid-thirties greeted me inside the doorway.
“Is it the clothes?” I asked, laughing aloud. My cabin attire of ratty jeans and old polo clashed with everyone else’s business casual.
“No, your story,” the man responded, entirely ignoring the joke. “It had your picture in it.”
Fair enough. The paper had started adding photos next to each reporter’s byline a few years back.
The man didn’t say another word as we walked through a lobby entrance as grand as the outside grounds. We both stared straight ahead as we ascended to the top floor in the quietest elevator I could remember. After the door opened, my anti-social greeter stepped out and turned right as I follow
ed only two feet behind. We walked twenty feet to a large corporate suite.
“There it is,” he said, then turned and walked away.
A woman at a reception desk greeted me. She led me into a large conference room and promptly left. I looked out the large window to see the impressive campus from above. Further in the distance, tiny Titusville sat humbly in view. And a few miles west of town, a large fracking pad burst skyward, taller than any structure in the town itself.
On the far wall of the room was a large map of Ohio, New York, and Pennsylvania, the contours of the Marcellus shale formation marked in red. I approached it. As I studied the Ohio portion of the map I drive so often, a warm greeting interrupted from behind.
“Jack, thanks for coming so quickly. I’m Jim Mason.”
I turned around.
This guy took slick to a whole new level. Mason was my height, wore a perfectly fitting dark suit, light blue shirt, and cuffs monogrammed with “JSM.” His hair was combed straight back. His teeth shone white, his face a deep tan.
The photos I had seen failed to capture the man in his full CEO glory. Couldn’t decide if he looked more like Mitt Romney or Gordon Gekko. Actually, he was a perfect hybrid of the two.
I reached out and shook Mason’s hand. You can tell a lot from a man’s handshake. His did not impress. It was both physically weak and emotionally cold.
“Thanks for calling me back. I called your communications person. I was surprised you were the one who returned the call.”
“Given what you’ve been writing, I thought it best if we talk directly. Must be important.”
Odd answer. Entirely inconsistent with how most corporations respond to press calls.
We sat down across the table from one another. Mason leaned back, lifting his hands to the back of his head, angling his elbows out, and crossing his legs. They must coach these guys on arrogant, obnoxious poses.
“Mr. Mason, now I’m a political reporter and not a business reporter, but let me tell you how impressed I am by what Marcellus is doing. You are changing the face of eastern Ohio, bringing hope back to so many communities that had lost it, hiring local, and sharing resources so generously. I have never seen anything like it.”
A guy like this loves buttering up, so why not indulge him. Plus, I meant every word.
“Thank you. We have worked hard to become a good community member and corporate citizen. It’s been our pleasure every step of the way.”
“I’m sure it has,” I said, looking at Mason’s gold cufflinks and white-gold Rolex. “But I’m interested in digging deeper into our political story about last November’s election.”
“I figured, but I have no idea why you’d be calling us.”
He sounded completely sincere.
“We have come to believe”—“we” made my assertions sound far more conclusive, and also provided a blanket of protection from anyone tempted to think that eliminating me would make a nettlesome story go away—“that your lobbyist Oliver Ariens may have known or been part of the vote-stealing plot.”
This greatly exaggerated what I knew, but an earth-shattering statement such as this might throw Mason off his game.
“Are you joking?” Mason asked.
Laughing heartily, he looked genuinely surprised.
“I am not. Can you tell me about your relationship with Mr. Ariens?”
“Oliver was a great friend of Marcellus and the best in the business. I’m sure you know that he was the leader of the Energy 2020 effort that is so critical to our long-term success.”
“Yes. I can only imagine how important that November election was to you so the pipelines could finally move forward.”
“It was absolutely critical. The American people finally woke up and got rid of those knuckleheads who were standing in the way of progress. We were thrilled with the outcome.”
Apparently, Mason didn’t think much of my Abacus theory. But even if willfully ignorant, Mason’s words were disarmingly honest. He had just volunteered Ariens’ Energy 2020 leadership role and then embraced the tainted election outcome with glee.
His answers left little room for follow-up questions.
“Were you concerned when Ariens died?”
“Of course we were. Ariens was the key to the whole plan. We were sick to our stomachs when he died.”
“I mean, did you find his death at all suspicious?”
“Oh. Not at all. He was huge. So out of shape that I wasn’t surprised. Had it coming. But it was a real setback for our efforts.”
What a heart.
“Mr. Mason, wasn’t the Energy 2020 strategy a complete failure until the surprise of last November’s elections? Nothing happened until that unexpected outcome.”
“Jack, I’m not a politician, I’m an oil and gas man. Whether it’s in the ocean, the dessert, or here in the Midwest, I care about making investments that lead to outcomes. It took a while, but we got the job done. And now we’re changing this place, just as you said at the outset.”
He was shooting straight. No bullshit at all.
But as I looked at the map on the wall, glanced out the window, and recalled the systematic Marcellus rollout in eastern Ohio, its deep investment in communities, something didn’t feel right with this guy. Something didn’t add up.
“How long have you been in charge at Abacus?”
“Excuse me? What’s Abacus?”
Confused momentarily, I realized I had asked about the wrong enterprise. But Mason’s answer was telling. He honestly sounded as if he had never heard of the company.
“Sorry, I meant, how long have you been in charge at Marcellus?”
“Since our founding,” Mason replied. He sounded defensive, as if I had questioned his manhood.
“And what did you do before this?”
“I worked at Shell Oil, Vice President in charge of new source development. So it lent itself perfectly to this role.”
“Where did you work at Shell?”
“All over the world. The Middle East. Texas. Worked in the Carolinas as we expanded our offshore work. And I traveled a ton. How is this relevant to your story?”
“Just curious. Always want to know folks I talk to. How did you end up here?”
“I was recruited by the private investors that formed Marcellus. They wanted the best, and they got it.”
Add Donald Trump to the list of people this blowhard reminded me of.
“And you run the show?”
“Of course. What about the words “chief executive officer” do you not understand?”
A question worth ignoring.
“What’s next for the company?”
“We will keep growing. With the new pipelines in place, we will finally be able to ramp up to full capacity and get our products to market quickly and efficiently. Our prior growth will look small compared to what we’re about to experience.”
“And what’s been the key to your success?”
“Hmmm. Many things have been critical. Can’t say one in particular sticks out.”
“Well, you’ve certainly done about everything right.”
“Thank you.”
“So you don’t think Oliver Ariens was trying to change the outcome of an election to help make Energy 2020 happen?”
“That’s the most absurd thing I’ve ever heard.” Mason laughed as he said it.
The thought had never occurred to the man.
“And you mentioned Marcellus’ private investors. The ones who hired you. Who are they?”
“They’re private for a reason. And they want to keep it that way.”
It was clear this was all that would come from our time together.
“Thank you for your time, Mr. Mason. Big weekend plans?”
“Back to the city!”
“Which city is that?”
“New York. Still get home almost every weekend.”
“Good for you.”
Mason escorted me back to the main desk.
“Good luck with your story. Hope the visit was worth your time.”
* * *
The trip home allowed me to gather my thoughts. And I came to three conclusions.
First, Mason answered forthrightly about Ariens, Abacus, and last year’s election. He knew absolutely nothing. Didn’t even recall the company’s name.
Second, this didn’t surprise me, because Mason appeared entirely incapable of pulling off the Abacus scheme.
Third, for the same reason, Mason was neither the architect of nor the brains behind Marcellus.
The Marcellus rollout in eastern Ohio displayed a combination of strategic thinking, cultural sensitivity, and raw efficiency the likes of which I had never seen. The company developed an enormous technological advantage, moved into the area swiftly yet quietly, and devised a bottom-up identity that eclipsed companies that had operated there for generations. It was a household name—a positive one.
This planning and execution could only have been orchestrated by an authentic visionary leader, a master strategist, armed with a broad set of skills and deep array of talents.
And the man I sat with for an hour was most certainly not that leader, for any number of reasons.
Mason no doubt gained solid experience at Shell Oil, working steadily up the ladder of a large, bureaucratic corporate culture. But that would not lend itself to the stealthy, entrepreneurial but ultimately overwhelming rollout that Marcellus executed so effectively.
Mason’s answers on the reason for the company’s success, and its future after Energy 2020, appeared entirely sincere. But shallow, not at all impressive. He failed to display any of the strategic thinking that the leader of such a revolutionary enterprise would undoubtedly possess. Like he said, he was an “oil and gas guy” who made investments and watched them pay off. But Marcellus operated in a far more sophisticated and aggressive way than that.
And while Marcellus had shown an ability to meld with the culture of the old Midwest, nothing about Mason suggested he himself could pull that off, or could devise a strategy to do so.
