The Gun Runner's Daughter

by Neil Gordon

  The thinnest of light showed in the sky over Jane Street, a great October moon hanging low over the city. At this angle, the street below was in its shadow, but its thick yellow light fell upon her face, upon the white of her nightdress. She waited, holding her arms up to the light, as if to bathe them, despite the cold air that penetrated the windowpanes. Then an alarm went off in her bedroom, and after a short pause, Dee emerged.

  Naked, he crossed the room to cradle Alley from behind, briefly. Then he left her to step into the shower. By the time he had dressed, casually, for a Sunday morning meeting, poured coffee from her Krups, and returned to her, the moon was nearly gone in the rising gray of morning. Standing behind her again, his shirtsleeved arm holding the coffee around her neck. Now she put a hand behind her to rest on his hip.

  “McCarthy said again she wants to call for a directed conviction.”

  “You going to do it?”

  “I don’t know.”

  She considered. “You got the burden of proof.”

  “I know. But I don’t see Thomas going for it that quick.”

  “Maybe.” She paused now, feeling her heart. Then:

  “You want a directed conviction?”

  “Of course I do.”

  “Then get Levi to tell you about a meeting between him, my father, and Greg Eastbrook in my father’s house in 1985.”

  Nothing surprised Dee anymore. She felt him nod. “I introduce Eastbrook as?”

  “NSC liaison in charge of facilitating Cardoen’s supply route. Then ask if my father ever directly met with him. Don’t stop till he tells you about a late-night meeting in my father’s house.”

  “Okay. Alley.”

  “Yes?”

  “I got to call Andy Speigel in San Francisco. I got to tell him yes or no.”

  With wonder, she realized how completely he had missed the significance of what she had just told him. Then she forced her attention to the other question. “You want the job?”

  His answer was immediate. “I don’t give a fuck. None of this has any meaning unless you come with me. There, or somewhere else. In two weeks I’m going to be able to pick my job. I don’t care.”

  “Yes.”

  “Will you come with me?”

  She turned in his arm now, and leaned her head up to face him squarely.

  “Yes.”

  And as she lied, she felt entirely, intensely, alive. More alive than she could ever remember feeling before.

  “It’s weird not to know the future.”

  “Then everyone’s weird.”

  “Nonsense. You know your future.”

  “Do I? What is it?”

  “You go back to the NAR. You write a book. In twenty years Nicky Dymitryck’ll sound like I. F. Stone.”

  “Right. And you?”

  She laughed softly, cherishing his voice. “In twenty years, Allison Rosenthal’ll sound like Robert Vesco.”

  He said nothing.

  “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to tease.”

  “When can I know?”

  “Soon.”

  “When?”

  She paused. “Don’t ask me how I know this.”

  “Okay.”

  “The prosecution’ll call for a directed conviction late this week.”

  “How do you know?”

  5.

  On Tuesday, the eighth of November, Oliver North was defeated in Virginia, and Gregory Eastbrook was elected in California. When the results were in, Jay called Nicky.

  “He’s in.”

  Nicky, in his living room, turned off the TV.

  “I know.”

  “Sorry to hear you sounding so broke up.”

  “A few more days, Jay.”

  That afternoon, in New York, Allison Rosenthal called Martha Ohlinger at work from a pay phone in Columbus Circle. When the switchboard finally connected them, she said: “Martha.”

  “Hey, baby. What’s going on?”

  “Nothing. I need a favor.”

  “Anything.”

  “Can I come up and use a typewriter?”

  “Sure, Alley. Come on up.”

  Upstairs, Martha took her into a busy office looking out over Sixty-fourth Street. A blond man who needed a haircut sat at a messy white desk, smoking and poring over a manuscript. After Martha introduced them he stepped out, as if by arrangement, and Alley sat down at his IBM. While Martha waited, she withdrew from her bag the FedEx slip with Dee’s signature, and, reading from a scrap of paper, typed Nicky’s address at the NAR into the correct boxes of the form.

  6.

  On November 9th, under direct examination by the prosecution, a surprised Michael Levi told the story of a late-night meeting in Ronald Rosenthal’s house between Mr. Rosenthal and a member of the National Security Council staff called Colonel Eastbrook.

  “Mr. Levi, what was the point of the meeting?”

  “Ron told Eastbrook that the state of Israel would put even its relationship with the United States in jeopardy to stop Cardoen.”

  Stein, rising. “Your Honor, this is the fourth time Mr. Dennis has posed questions for which the witness is clearly unprepared. What is the source of his evidence?”

  Dee: “Your honor, the witness has just given yet another example of the defendant’s willingness to oppose U.S. government interests.”

  “Overruled, Mr. Stein, it’s relevant.”

  “I wish particularly to enter an exception at this point, Your Honor.”

  “Noted, Mr. Stein.”

  Allison hurried home after court. Without removing her coat, she crossed her apartment, passing through the kitchen and into the little back bathroom, where she removed her package from under the pedestal sink. At her desk, standing, she unwrapped the material she had taken from her father’s safe and packed it carefully into a FedEx box. Then she placed the FedEx slip, addressed to Nicholson Dymitryck in Los Angeles, preprinted with the U.S. attorney’s return address, and holding Dee Dennis’s signature in the lower right-hand corner, and put it into the FedEx box’s plastic envelope. Then she ran to her bedroom to change. Emerging in bicycle tights and a sweater, she put the box into a saddlebag and shouldered her bicycle out the door. Outside, in the falling evening, she sprinted on her bicycle, right downtown to the FedEx office at the World Trade Center, where she dropped the package addressed to Nicky at the NAR in the outside box.

  Late that night, Dee asleep in her bed, she called Nicky from the phone on Hudson Street.

  “Your FedEx left this morning. You’ll get it tomorrow.”

  “What do I do?”

  “Is Diamond’s lawyer ready?”

  “Yes. Her name’s Gillian Morreale. She’ll file for an interstate warrant at the same time. She has a friend in Giuliani’s office. You should see the police tomorrow afternoon.”

  “Good. Tomorrow’s Thursday. If you see my name in the paper Friday morning, then you can open the package. Otherwise, wait till you see it. Chances are, it’ll be tomorrow though. Okay?”

  “Okay.”

  A long silence. Then Nicky: “When will I speak to you again?”

  Standing at the phone, watching the traffic stream south. She had hoped to avoid this. At last, she spoke slowly.

  “I doubt you’ll want to.”

  He answered immediately. “I’ll want to.”

  “Nicky.”

  “Yes.”

  “I warn you to think the worst of me. Don’t say I didn’t.”

  “I won’t. I won’t say that. And I will want to see you.”

  “Nicky.” The word, now, was like a breath, a long exhalation.

  “Yes.”

  “If you change your mind, I’ll understand.”

  When they hung up, Alley paused in thought for a long time. Then she went back home. She had to go through her apartment with a microscope, now, removing everything she didn’t want the police to find. Such as the uncashed checks from her father. Then she had to go out to La Guardia Airport. She needed to know what the airport ba
r looked like. The plan was vague in her mind, but she knew it had to happen at La Guardia, and she knew that she’d need to call on Drew—Peretz—again for help.

  Still, she didn’t move. La Guardia, that trip was needed only to figure out how to escape. And suddenly, a vast exhaustion swept across her. Escape: the thought was nearly irrelevant.

  CHAPTER 16

  November 10, 1994.

  Los Angeles.

  1.

  On November 10th, a Thursday evening at eight o’clock, Nicky Dymitryck stood smoking in his office, watching the fax print a page.

  Outside, night had fallen, and against its black canvas Nicky showed in an attitude of concentration, a tableau in which it could be plainly seen that the material being faxed was from a newspaper, the small type smudgy and irregular.

  Still, it was legible enough to recognize from the headline and dateline that what was being faxed to Nicky was an article from the front page of the New York Times, Friday morning edition, just back from the printers in New York and being faxed by a friend of Nicky’s straight from the newsroom. When the first page dropped out of the roller, Nicky picked it up and read the headline from page B1, Metro Section.

  DAUGHTER OF RONALD ROSENTHAL

  ARRESTED FOR WIRE FRAUD

  And underneath, the subhead:

  Charge Is Fraudulent Rental of Father’s Vacation Property

  The article led with:

  NEW YORK, Nov. 10—Esther Rosenthal, daughter of Ronald Rosenthal, the American representative for the Israeli arms dealer Falcon Corporation and a central figure in the Iran-contra hearings, was arrested in her Greenwich Village home this morning. The charge was interstate wire fraud, stemming from an investigation mounted by one of her alleged victims, Stanley Diamond, founder of Organic Communications. Ms. Rosenthal, who is known by the first name Allison, was served with an interstate warrant originating in the Massachusetts State Attorney’s office at 8:30 this morning, and currently awaits ruling on the Massachusetts State Attorney’s extradition request at the Manhattan Women’s Detention Unit. The ruling is expected

  Nicky pulled the second page from the fax, page B7, he noticed, and continued to read

  to be handed down tomorrow morning.

  Ms. Rosenthal is the only surviving child of Ronald Rosenthal, a figure who gained national attention when he was named as key supplier of arms to Iran as the Israeli liaison to Oliver North. Currently, Mr. Rosenthal is in the national eye due to his trial in absentia by the U.S. Attorney in New York for what Emily Harden, in the New Yorker, called “the most shameless practice of arms export violation since Edwin Wilson did business with Libya.”

  In Boston, the State Attorney for Massachusetts announced his intention to prosecute Ms. Rosenthal for “the fraudulent lease of her father’s Martha’s Vineyard property to an unknown number of tenants, in full awareness that the property was shortly to be held under federal escrow pending seizure.” The exact number of the renters of the property is still unknown, although informed sources place it at “eighteen and counting.”

  At one o’clock this afternoon, in a press conference held at his office, Robert Stein of Stein, Goldman & Driscoll announced his intention to represent Ms. Rosenthal. Mr. Stein, who has represented Ronald Rosenthal for twenty years, both appeared with Mr. Rosenthal before the joint committee on Iran-contra, where he was credited for negotiating a blanket congressional immunity for his client, and currently represents Mr. Rosenthal’s defense against federal charges. Esther Rosenthal, he announced, “would fight the extradition to Boston and, should that fail, would enter a not-guilty plea in Massachusetts court.”

  A source close to the State Attorney’s office in Boston however, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said that Mr. Stein’s defense will need to be grounded in legal technicality, as the evidence presented by Gillian Morreale of Stockard, Dyson, a prominent Boston legal firm, is “rock solid.”

  Such an estimation is not unlikely: the resources behind Gillian Morreale are substantial. Ms. Morreale, who last year negotiated the surrender of Mimi Luria, the last Weatherman remaining at large, and for twenty years on the FBI’s most-wanted list, told the New York Times that her investigation was undertaken in partnership with Jay Cohen, the editor of the North American Review. Mr. Cohen became suspicious that Mr. Diamond was being defrauded during a casual conversation and put the services of his office at Mr. Diamond’s disposal for a preliminary investigation. When that investigation revealed evidence of fraud, Mr. Cohen said this afternoon by telephone, he put the matter before the attention of Ms. Morreale.

  Finished, without a pause Nicky picked up the telephone and dialed.

  “Max. I got it. Did you send Jay a copy at his home? Thanks.”

  Now he listened for a moment. Then: “All I can tell you is that what you want to do is get on the next plane for Los Angeles. Take the midnight plane. Be in Jay’s office at ten tomorrow.”

  He hung up, and, rereading the article, waited for Jay to call.

  That day, Nicky had taken the trouble to drive into Westwood and have his hair cut. When he woke on Friday morning, he showered, washing his hair twice and conditioning it, then blow-dried it and shaved, very carefully. He put on a thick swipe of deodorant under each arm, then walked in his underwear to his closet and dressed in a white shirt, a black English suit, a powder-blue tie. He drank coffee and smoked in the kitchen, reading the Los Angeles Times ’s version of Alley’s recent past. It, too, took the trouble to point out that her real name was Esther, as if it were significant that she did not use that name. Finished, he put on a black cashmere overcoat, and left the house.

  He arrived at the NAR at nine-thirty to find his usual parking place taken by a white Lincoln Continental, in which waited a uniformed driver. Nicky parked behind a bar on the street, then walked back around the corner to the door and ran up the stairs. In the office, which someone had actually tidied, Jay sat behind his desk. Wooden chairs were arranged in front of him, and in them sat the two lawyers who represented the NAR; Max Holtz, just a rrived from the New York Times; and two congressional aides, to Patty Murray and Carl Levin: the first on the Senate Ethics Committee, the second on Senate Intelligence. An aide from Torricelli’s office was also present, although this was a courtesy, as Torricelli served in the House and Eastbrook would serve in the Senate. Finally, an FBI technician from the state office was there, sitting uncomfortably in the armchair beside Jay.

  Jay performed introductions and, at a nod from Nicky, turned on a video camera on a tripod next to his desk. He lifted, next to the camera, a sealed FedEx box with a return address of the U.S. attorney’s office in New York and the signature of David Treat Dennis. He handed it to the FBI investigator, who examined it carefully, then rose to photograph it, front and back. The three congressional aides performed their own examinations, then Jay’s lawyers repeated the photographing. While this ceremony took place, Nicky removed his coat and took his seat by the window.

  When they were done, the lawyers handed the box back to Jay, who in turn held it out to Nicky. Nicky stepped forward to the side of the desk and pulled the box’s tab. Inside were a short stack of transcripts, some photographs, and a videocassette. He removed them by the edges and laid them on the desk to be photographed twice, front and back. He gathered them and, standing next to the desk, read through the transcripts. Then, expressionless, he handed them to Jay, responding to Jay’s raised eyebrows with an affirmative nod. Jay read—or more properly, devoured—the pages, and then looked up, his eyes shining, his black beard split by a boundless smile.

  “Gentlemen. We have high crimes, and we have misdemeanors.”

  Then he turned to Nicky and nearly lifted him off the ground with a hug.

  When the papers had made their rounds, Nicky, accompanied by the aides, copied them on the office Xerox. Meanwhile the videocassette was duped on four VCR decks. Then the aides took the originals; one placed them in a locked briefcase with a slim gold handcuff closing the
lock and wrapping around his wrist, hidden by the sleeve of his overcoat, and the three left the office. Nicky then handed out copies to interns, who collated them with cover letters and began to fax, from the five machines Jay had installed for the purpose, copies of Allison Rosenthal’s transcripts and photographs to a list of ninety-five fax numbers Jay had compiled, ranging from President Clinton’s office and that of the Senate leaders to the country’s top newspapers and the state’s top legislators.

  While the faxes went off, Jay saw his other visitors out, then stood next to Nicky, wordless. Once, he reached his arm around Nicky’s shoulders and squeezed his arm, hard.

  That, Nicky thought, looking up at Jay, is pure joy.

  The faxes took a couple of hours. Then it was time for Jay and Nicky to leave for Stan’s offices, where, before the virtual entirety of the American news media, Nicky was to give a press conference to announce that he had received unimpeachable proofs, that morning, from the office of the U.S. attorney, Southern District of New York, currently engaged in the prosecution of Ronald Rosenthal, detailing the central participation of Senator-elect Gregory Eastbrook in the illegal sale of military equipment and technology to Saddam Hussein throughout the eighties, sales that resulted finally in the necessity for an American military engagement that cost the country some half-billion dollars a day. And, in the opinion of the NAR ’s lawyers, the criminal action it detailed would, if taken seriously, require nothing less than the resignation of Senator-elect Eastbrook. Finally, Nicky Dymitryck would say, in his opinion, and the opinion of the four other people who had read the documents, that there was no way on God’s green earth that these documents would not be taken seriously, because they were supported by memorialization in the form of photographic evidence.

  Or, as Jay Cohen put it later that day, over a bottle of champagne, poor Mr. Eastbrook was about to take the ride of his fucking life.