by Neil Gordon
2.
It was, however, a short celebration that took place in the offices of the NAR. For one thing, the NAR was rushing the transcripts to press that evening. But more important, in the steadily accelerating pattern of events that now set themselves in motion, there was little time for partying.
At nine o’clock that night, as Nicky and Jay proofed the type of the NAR ’s publication of Allison’s transcripts, the New York Times Saturday edition came over the fax.
This time, the story of Esther Rosenthal’s arrest had a large-point headline, but it was column two on the left.
Center of the page, the banner headline was devoted to Nicky’s press conference about the Eastbrook revelations.
Underneath this, a second article reported that the U.S. attorney had moved for a directed conviction in the Rosenthal prosecution.
But the right-hand column—the column reserved for the most important news of the day—held the story of the hour, and it was a story that, Nicky thought ruefully even as realization flooded over him like a cold shower, was absolutely impossible to predict.
For it detailed that during her extradition hearing in state court, while discussing her diaries, introduced as evidence for the records they contained on her fraudulent rentals of her father’s vacation properties, Esther Rosenthal had addressed the provenance of the transcripts and photographs that Nicky had revealed that day.
Esther Rosenthal, who is known as Allison, stated that the Special Counsel to the U.S. Attorney David Treat Dennis had told her about the videotape last summer on Martha’s Vineyard, where the families of both hold property. She did not know where Mr. Dennis had obtained the videotape, which implicates Senator-elect Gregory Eastbrook in the illegal sales of military equipment and technology, ranging from cluster bombs to nuclear know-how, to Iraq prior to the Gulf War. In so doing, they also undermine Ronald Rosenthal’s defense against Arms Export Control Act violations, probably fatally.
Ms. Rosenthal, who was visibly upset, then went on to say that throughout the summer she had been coerced into providing Mr. Dennis with evidentiary material from her father’s secret files, which Mr. Dennis then introduced in court in a series of surprise maneuvers that virtually assured the directed conviction of Mr. Rosenthal. Questioned as to the identity of the person who had coerced her, Ms. Rosenthal, pointedly ignoring her lawyer’s attempt to intercede, informed the court that she had been coerced by Mr. Dennis himself. She then went on to say that Mr. Dennis and she had been involved sexually during the entire pretrial period, as well as during the trial. This relationship, Ms. Rosenthal said, dated from their childhoods, including a brief period of sexual involvement while Ms. Rosenthal was under age and Mr. Dennis was in college. Given their long-standing relationship, she had been shocked when Mr. Dennis had failed to recuse himself from her father’s prosecution, and only later come to understand that he intended to use that relationship to further the prosecution’s case. Finally, she added that Mr. Dennis had been moved to the U.S. Attorney’s office due to the influence of his father, currently serving as White House Counsel, and that the case was expected to launch Mr. Dennis’s political career. This, she thought, was surprising given Edward Dennis’s long-standing enmity toward Mr. Rosenthal over Mr. Rosenthal’s development of his Martha’s Vineyard property, as well as the unethical, if not illegal, nature of the White House involvement in a criminal trial.
During the exchange, Ms. Rosenthal’s lawyer, Robert Stein, who also represents Ronald Rosenthal in his current prosecution, listened, visibly in the same shock as the rest of the court. Ms. Rosenthal was then remanded into custody pending the organization of a separate hearing, which is presumed to be scheduled for tomorrow.
Ms. Rosenthal’s Greenwich Village apartment was sealed this afternoon by the FBI, which has refused comment on the case. A source close to the investigation who spoke on the condition of anonymity revealed to the Times that a first investigation had found both evidence of Mr. Dennis’s presence, ranging from fingerprints to court documents and clothes in the apartment, as well as Ms. Rosenthal’s diary, in which Mr. Dennis figures heavily. According to this source, the diary documents Esther Rosenthal’s daily provision of material from Ronald Rosenthal’s private files to Mr. Dennis, as well as the pressure Mr. Dennis exerted to ensure that provision, including physical violence. This same source confirmed that Edward Treat Dennis had indeed used his influence to place his son in the U.S. Attorney’s office, and that Mr. Dennis Senior is prominent in the Washington circles behind the prosecution of Ronald Rosenthal.
In a telephone interview, Mr. Stein was prepared only to comment that he had entered numerous objections to the prosecution’s leading of a key witness, and that his exceptions to key elements of the prosecution’s evidence were a matter of public record.
Following the article, Max Holtz, just returned to New York, had been considerate enough to fax the front page of the New York Observer, which had rushed to press an issue containing photographs of David Dennis and Allison Rosenthal in conversation at a dusty Little Italy bar.
One set of neural controls was sufficient to govern both Jay and Nicky as they read the story, so precisely did their eyes move in unison. When they reached the end, their eyes met.
“What the fucking hell is up with this?”
Nicky, wonderingly: “She is trying to disbar David Dennis.”
He saw the realization dawn in Jay’s eyes as he spoke the words. Jay turned to the editorial assistant who had brought the fax, then stayed to watch the reaction.
“Deb, call the press and tell them we’re holding the issue for a few days. They give you trouble, tell me.”
She left, unwillingly, and Jay and Nicky returned their attention to each other. Jay spoke first.
“You didn’t tell me this girl was brilliant.”
“Is she?”
Jay answered at once. “Oh, yes. She’s not disbarring Dennis, Nicky. Fucking him was enough for that. She’s scuttling the entire prosecution.”
Nicky’s voice rose. “She’s going to scuttle a federal prosecution? She is going to have to prove everything she says. She is going to have to face David Dennis in open court.”
“Never. Never in a million years. They’re never going to court over this.” Jay was holding a hand to his forehead as he talked, tipping back in his chair. “Where the fuck did she learn how to do this?”
Nicky, flatly: “I don’t get it.”
And Jay, brought to himself by the question, turned to his associate editor, his face so full of wonder that he did not even bother noting Nicky’s noncomprehension. “Nicky, this was supposed to be a nice, quiet little vendetta against a rich Jewish arms merchant. It was not meant to be a goddamn bloodbath. Christ, man, look at the body count: one senator-elect, a White House counsel, a deputy U.S. attorney. I’ll give you dollars to dimes that before this is over the attorney general resigns, and if Sid Ohlinger weren’t the oiliest bastard in the universe, I’d have said his ass is out of Washington too.”
“Then why’d they start the damn trial?”
“Man, they started it in Clinton’s first year. They needed it to keep NATO in the Bosnian peacekeeping force, and it seems they had a personal vendetta to boot. October surprise, I don’t doubt. Back then, these guys were drunk with power anyway. Now it’s midterm, their approval ratings are in the fucking garbage. This is not the kind of publicity they were looking for.”
Jay shook his head, once, decisively. “I don’t think they’ll see Allison Rosenthal in court, I don’t think there’s any way in hell. I think, they get a chance at a mistrial, they’d drop the case. And you know what? I think Allison Esther Rosenthal, whatever the fuck her name is, understands all this and more.”
The dawning wonder of understanding was overtaking Nicky now. “That’s crazy.”
“I don’t think so.”
A long silence, staring at each other. Then Nicky tried another angle. “That might be true, but an admission from David
Dennis is still the only thing that could kill the prosecution.”
“No. The evidence is still inadmissible. Dennis dumped the case they’d prepared, based the whole case on new evidence, and now every bit of it is inadmissible.”
“What evidence?”
“The evidence David Dennis coerced from her. You see? She gave him a line of prosecution that convicted her father, and he went for it. Now he’s been shown to have coerced it from her. It’s all inadmissible, and Rosenthal’ll probably have double jeopardy on his side, too. That must be what she’s doing. It’s the only thing that makes sense.”
“Dennis didn’t coerce anything from her.”
“No? That may be, but they still got his tighty-whities on her bedroom floor. And there’s no way that tomorrow morning he won’t stand accused of it.”
Nicky blanched as he realized the truth of that. Still, he went on:
“That doesn’t mean he coerced anything from her. Dennis’ll fight it in court.”
“And while he’s doing so, everything he’s introduced into evidence from the girl’s information is inadmissible. She’s made the truth—the fucking truth!—legally inadmissible. She sticks to her guns, they’ll be months in court over this, and the fact remains, this guy was fucking that girl. Where’s their prosecution during all this? Jesus Christ Almighty, by the time they get back to trial—if they get back to trial—Rosenthal’ll have a Knesset seat, and you can’t extradite a Knesset member even if you convict him in absentia.”
But Nicky’s stomach was plummeting, plummeting. Deep in his belly, he absorbed how profoundly, how utterly he had been betrayed. Then, with a real effort of mental will, he managed to say: “But she’ll still face prosecution on Ocean View. Even paying back the money won’t matter. Jail time for interstate wire fraud.”
“Is that right? Are you sure? Do you know what she has in mind?”
There was something penetrating in Jay’s question, and Nicky registered the sureness of his instinct. He answered quickly, before Jay figured it out.
“No. But in any case I don’t think she cares.”
“No. I don’t either. Maybe she’ll serve some jail time. But she’s scuttled a federal prosecution long enough to save her father. You know what this is? This is desperation. This is genius. It’s a covert operation of the soul.”
But still Nicky was not done. He thought, eyes direct on his boss, for another moment. Then, as if completing the description: “It’s the most shocking abuse of the system. It’s the most shocking betrayal.”
Jay was unconcerned. “Bullshit. It’s the way the law works.”
“No. It’s a shocking abuse. What is this—post-Iran-contra law? Does someone teach this shit somewhere?”
“Hey, Nicky. You teach this shit. You teach this shit every time you write a fucking article. You think your readers in D.C. share your outrage when you write about sleazy deals in the arms trade? Boy, they read you to find out how to do it. Come on, Nicky, you telling me you’ve never fucked some Paris air show hostess to get to a source? The law? The fucking law? I’ve seen you break the law on four continents.”
“I broke bad laws for good reasons.”
“Oh, come off it. Everybody’s got a greater fucking good that lets them do what they want.”
Nicky was nearly shouting. “I never did anything nearly this cynical!”
“Really?” Jay looked at him, suspiciously, and again, Nicky felt his boss on the edge of understanding his role in this. “You call it what you want. You ask her, she’ll tell you her father’s the Jew being scapegoated for a government vendetta. She has overturned an unjust prosecution of her father. If the law is subservient to the truth for you, then it is for her too. You can’t have it both ways, pal. And in any case, fuck Rosenthal, and why? Because we get to indict a very bad man, a man who has only slightly less contempt for the Constitution than he has ignorance of it, a man you yourself called ‘a radical enemy of democracy.’ That’s justice, and it’s reason enough for anything else that happens.”
So that, thought Nicky, watching Jay with open eyes, is justice.
And then he thought, with a sinking heart, how unfair it was that he should, right this minute, just after losing everything else, lose Jay too.
3.
In a conference room in the Manhattan County Minimum Security Detention Unit, Allison Rosenthal sat at a long table. Around her were a deputy U.S. attorney, his assistant, and Bob Stein, who, at her father’s orders, was continuing to represent her. The U.S. attorney was deposing Alley gently in questions designed less to find out what she knew than how far she was prepared to go, as if aware of the power that a pretty woman, especially one in tears, brings to a courtroom.
“Did you start renting Ocean View before, or after, you met Mr. Dennis?”
She had looked away out the window, hiding her expression—or rather, her lack of expression.
“After. My dad was in jail. I had tuition due on my last year of law school. I was broke.”
Bob listened without expression: her father’s many checks to Allison had been issued out of his office. The deputy U.S. attorney made some notes, then looked up again, silently inviting her to go on.
“I thought . . . I thought that if I had enough money, I could get away from him. But . . .” She dropped her eyes now, and finished simply. “But I couldn’t.”
“Why?”
She answered simply. “He told me he could get Daddy off. If I cooperated. I believed him. I don’t know why, but I believed him. My brother died two years ago, it nearly destroyed my father. And Iran-contra, they nearly crucified him. And then the arrest, and losing our house. I was panicking.”
“When did you start doubting him?”
“Oh, God. I guess in mid-September. The Times said that conviction was certain, and then he asked me to find out about Falcon’s role in the Iraq thing. I knew my dad had done a lot to stop the arming of Iraq. And I suddenly realized he was looking to show that Falcon had acted against U.S. interests over Iraq, and I got suspicious. I mean, I’m in my third year of law school. So I refused to tell him and . . .”
She stopped, her chin trembling, and with horror the deputy U.S. attorney realized that she was very convincingly on the verge of tears. He wondered, briefly, if a jury would be able to see the contradiction between the trembling chin and the observant green eyes and decided, with regret, that they would not.
“Take your time, Alley.” Bob speaking now, directing a look of calm challenge at the deputy U.S. attorney, accentuating the threat of tears.
“Okay.” Wiping her nose. “Then he showed me the transcripts.”
“Did he say where he got them?”
“No. He wouldn’t say.”
“And?”
“And he threatened to release them to the press if I didn’t help him.”
“Where did you go for information about the Israeli attempt to stop the Iraq trade?”
“My father has his files hidden in my grandfather’s apartment out in Brooklyn. Dee knew that. I’ve known him since I was a kid.”
“You went to your grandfather?”
“My grandfather is dead. I went to his apartment.”
“Why didn’t you get help?”
“I was afraid. I’ve known Dee for years. He is an extremely violent man. Ask anyone: he got suspended from Exeter for fighting. He was on probation at Cornell twice for fag-bashing. He just nearly got kicked out of the bar by my house for threatening a guy half his size.”
“And what made you keep the diary?”
At this, she had looked straight across the table at him, then slowly at each of the men at the table.
“I was hoping this day would come.”
There was a silence in the room. Then, clearing his throat, the attorney spoke dryly. “You seem to know the system well enough to know how to go about getting help from blackmail, Ms. Rosenthal.”
She looked away. And then she looked back and spoke in an even, controlled voice. �
��We were having a sexual relationship, counselor. I first slept with Dee Dennis when I was fifteen years old and he was eighteen, which I now understand is statutory rape. What agency should I have gone to for recourse for that?”
And Bob Stein watched with an emotion that, if it weren’t so completely bedazzled by the performance he was witnessing, might well have been called pride, as the other two men showed just how appalled they were.
That was Saturday morning. Saturday afternoon, something even more astounding took place, something that would keep the story in the right-hand column of The New York Times and give it a large-point headline too.
In the World Trade Center offices of the U.S. attorney.
When Dee Dennis announced his intention to enter a plea of nolo contendere to Allison Rosenthal’s charges.
4.
Edward Treat Dennis, White House counsel, slammed shut the door of the U.S. attorney’s office’s conference room with a force that sent two secretaries scurrying after papers swept from the table by the draft. Present were the attorney who had deposed Allison Rosenthal, Daniel Edelson, Beth Callahan, and Shauna McCarthy, as well as Wayne Barlowe, the deputy attorney general just arrived from Washington, several paralegals, numerous secretaries. And Dee himself.
Then Edward Treat Dennis paused, and seated himself somewhat more quietly, as if he had expected to enter a war zone and found instead an armistice council. What his father was experiencing, noting the tension in the room, was evident to Dee, and for a brief, intense moment, it hurt his heart with a physical pain. The meeting had been going on already for fifteen minutes.
Shauna McCarthy spoke, from the head of the table. “Now, Ed, we all understand your concern. Let me start by assuring you that there is not a soul in this room who does not know these allegations to be entirely without substance. And I have just informed the attorney general of my intention to defend David in court.”
“I’ll serve as associate counsel.”
Wayne Barlowe cleared his throat and spoke, somewhat apologetically. “Ed, the decision of whether or not to fight will be taken in Washington. You don’t need me to explain the dice game there.”
