Dance of Death

by John Case

  “Technically, it’s the Agricultural Age.”

  Kovalenko sighed. “And what is this particular agent of the Great Satan supposed to do?”

  “Well,” Spagnola said. “I already told you the account is at the Cuh-dugg-in bank, St. Helier. Twenty-five K shows up on December 20. Numbered account.” Spagnola dictated the number. “You need to find out who holds that account. And where he is now. ASAP. Get back to me.”

  Spagnola hung up.

  Kovalenko sighed. Jersey. While not actually British (in fact, Jersey was closer to France than it was to England), the Channel Islands fell under Kovalenko’s jurisdiction because they had a constitutional relationship with the U.K. Not unlike the relationship between the U.S. and Puerto Rico.

  Banking was big business in the Channel Islands, but after 9/11, bank secrecy was not as impenetrable as it once was. He could at least hope for a bit of cooperation. Maybe he’d get lucky and they’d give up the name on the account.

  Kovalenko thought about it and decided that he’d handle it in person. If he “rang them up,” he had a feeling he’d be playing phone tag for days.

  But how did you get to St. Helier? He buzzed Jean.

  Ten minutes later, she called him back. “About St. Helier, sir?”

  He’d been trying to seduce Jean, but so far she’d been impervious to the old Kovalenkan charm. His invitations to “have a drink” had so far been turned down. Probably a lesbian. And you had to be careful these days. No physical contact. A friendly hand on the arm and you were laying yourself open for a lawsuit. What a world.

  “Yes, Jean.”

  “How much of a hurry are we in?”

  We? Wasn’t that chummy. Maybe she wasn’t a dyke, after all. “It’s urgent.”

  “Well, there’s a flight from Gatwick. Orrrr … we could have you there in about an hour by helicopter.”

  “Perfect. Let’s do that, then.” One of the bonuses of being in the antiterrorism business these days was that no one had to stint. Five years ago, a helicopter would have been out of the question, but now, no one would blink an eye. And that was good, because with the chopper, he could be back in time for his Pilates class. He’d only recently come to know how important it was to maintain core strength. If you let it go, sooner or later you’d face a whole cascade of musculo-skeletal problems. Which he did not need.

  *

  One thing he disliked about helicopters was the noise. Buckled into his seat, it was like being inside a vacuum cleaner. Terrible for your ears. He made a mental note to buy some of those earmuffs – the Princess Leia type that airport workers wore. Guys who ran leafblowers, construction workers, carpenters – they warranted ear protection, but not the FBI’s legal attachés, who were on the front line of fighting terrorism. He looked out the window. Above, a leaden sky; below, the gray and choppy sea.

  “Guernsey!” shouted the pilot, nodding toward a landmass on the right.

  Then he tilted his head to the left and screamed “Jersey!” Soon, they were yawing toward the painted cross on the helipad and then they were down. Kovalenko ducked under the rotors and ran toward the black Mercedes that was there to meet him. (Jean was a marvel, lesbian or not.)

  The banker, Jonathan Warren, was forty and handsome in that fragile British way. He wore a suit that was definitely “bespoke.” Tasseled loafers. Manicured nails. “Refreshment? A drink perhaps …”

  “I’m all set,” Kovalenko said.

  A faint whiff of citrusy aftershave wafted toward him as Kovalenko eased himself into a leather club chair. “Is this an official inquiry?”

  Kovalenko didn’t reply. He simply reached into his breast pocket and removed the small leather portfolio that held his identification. He flipped it open with a flick of his wrist and slid it across the desk.

  Warren studied the ID without touching it. Then he nodded his head slowly. “I see …” A frown creased his features. “It’s just that, well, you’re an American.” Warren shifted uncomfortably in his chair. Another brilliant smile segued into pained speculation. “If you don’t mind …” He picked up the telephone receiver.

  “If you’re reaching out to Five –” Kovalenko began.

  “Oh, I don’t think we need to bother the spooks. I’ll just call my director.”

  Kovalenko leaned back in his chair. He enjoyed exerting his power, enjoyed the unease he could inflict, especially on a huffy little prick like Warren. Just look at this room – all smoked glass and polished wood, elegant pen-and-ink sketches on the walls. An Aeron chair. The vast expanse of Warren’s desk was occupied by a single blue iris in a slim, cut-glass vase and an iMac. Kovalenko thought of his cluttered metal desk, his battered filing cabinets.

  Across from him, the little prick was explaining the situation to someone with more authority. “Yes, all right, I understand …” He turned to Kovalenko. “I’m happy to say we can accommodate you.” Bright little smile. “Up to a point.”

  “And what point would that be?”

  “If I could see the account number?”

  From his breast pocket, Kovalenko pulled out the plain white index card on which he’d printed the account number. He handed it to the banker.

  The banker tapped a few keys on his computer keyboard, opened the drawer of his desk, extracted a gold pen, and scribbled on Kovalenko’s index card, which he then handed back.

  Kovalenko looked at it: Thomas Aherne & Associates.

  “I’ll need an address,” Kovalenko said.

  “You understand: This isn’t the account holder,” the banker said. “That, I can’t disclose. But Aherne and Associates are the registered agent. Which means they get all the mail, handle the inquiries. I’m sure they’ll be happy to help you.”

  “Of course they will,” Kovalenko told him, “but I’m not asking them, I’m asking you.”

  “I understand that, but … protocols aside, I don’t actually have the information you’re after.”

  “You don’t know who you’re in business with?” Kovalenko asked.

  Warren ignored the question. “A number of our clients have arrangements like this one. Their affairs are handled by registered agents.” He tapped a few keys and a printer whirred into action.

  Kovalenko looked at the paper handed to him.

  THOMAS AHERNE & ASSOCIATES

  210 COPE STREET

  DUBLIN, REPUBLIC OF IRELAND

  “Ireland,” Kovalenko muttered.

  “Are you sure I can’t get you something to drink?” Warren asked.

  “No,” Kovalenko said. “If you’ll let me take a look at the account history – deposits, withdrawals – I’ll be on my way.”

  The banker shifted in his chair. Winced apologetically. “No can do, I’m afraid.” Suddenly, he brightened. “Unless, of course … you’ve letters rogatory?”

  Kovalenko pursed his lips, and groaned inwardly. The FBI had no right to discovery in foreign countries, so the banker was correct in suggesting that letters rogatory would be necessary to compel the release of evidence. Which meant that it was almost impossible. Letters rogatory required fourteen steps, and each step required the attention of a lawyer or judge. Letters rogatory. The idea made Kovalenko woozy. It could take years. He sat up in his chair, and glared at the banker. “This is an antiterrorism investigation.”

  Warren blinked, but was otherwise unmoved by the information.

  Kovalenko would appeal to MI-5 as soon as he got back to London. But he probably wouldn’t get anywhere. Asking a Jersey bank for an account holder’s name, Kovalenko realized, was like asking a priest for a transcript of someone’s confession.

  “I’m sorry,” Warren said, breaking eye contact. “I’m afraid it’s just not on. Our laws –”

  “Your laws protect criminals and terrorists,” Kovalenko hissed. He could feel his face reddening, his blood pressure climbing. He tried to calm down, to “center” himself, but it wasn’t working. It occurred to him that this was just the kind of thing that triggered heart attac
ks.

  The helicopter lifted off the pad, and swung away from the ground. Kovalenko watched the island dwindle beneath him. These offshore banks, he thought, are criminal enterprises. If he had his way, every corporation on earth, and especially the banks, would be “transparent.” That would put a stop to a lot of crime, including terrorism. Just that one step. The only reason for bank secrecy was to wash money, hide money, or steal money. Put an end to funny money and you’d go a long ways toward putting an end to funny business.

  He forced himself to relax. Belly breathing, long on the exhale. At least he had the account number and, even more important, the name of the registered agent. That agent would have received any and all of the correspondence relating to the account, including transaction records. Either the agent forwarded the information to his client, or he held it for him.

  Kovalenko hoped it was the latter. But whatever the agent had, Kovalenko would get. Because, in Ireland, they knew a thing or two about terrorism.

  Twenty-one

  Dublin | March 31, 2005

  IT WAS ALL about which way you turned when you got on the plane. If you went left, you were on some kind of fast track, and if you went right, you were probably paying your own way.

  Mike Burke had turned right, and now he was riding in steerage. Row 38, Seat A, ten rows up from the lavatories, but next to the window. Bound for Dublin.

  He was returning from his sister Megan’s wedding, which had taken place in a picture-postcard, country church in Nellysford, Virginia – Burke’s hometown.

  It was the first time he’d been back to the States since Kate died, and he’d done his best to be cheerful and agreeable. He’d assuaged the worries of his parents, and turned aside their questions. He was doing well, he was fine, the worst was over, it was behind him now …

  Or so he said. In reality, he didn’t fool anybody. To be around Megan and Nate, and give no hint of the way he felt, was … well, impossible. They were luminous with happiness, and he was … what? A walking reminder that “things fall apart; the center cannot hold.”

  Maybe it’s time to move on, Burke thought. With the old man back on his feet, and business beginning to pick up, maybe it was time for Burke himself to get on with his life. If not right away, then soon.

  After all the years he’d spent, going round and round like a ball bearing on a roulette wheel, he’d come to rest in Dublin with Kate. And it wasn’t so long ago that he’d imagined spending the rest of his life there. But with Kate gone, Ireland no longer felt like home, much less like “the future.”

  Yet he was still in the same flat, her flat, with the eclectic furniture and the big sleigh bed they’d picked out together. Her clothes still hung in the closets. Her books stood in the bookcases. Her pots and pans dangled from a pegboard in the kitchen.

  And then there was the old man, who never stopped talking about her.

  It wasn’t that Burke missed America, but somewhere in the back of his mind he’d begun to think of his trip to the States as a trial return. Maybe on his native soil, absent the daily reminders of Kate, he could imagine a fresh start.

  But the experiment was over. He’d been in the States only a couple of hours when he realized there was nothing for him there. He was thirty years old, and he might as well have been the Flying Dutchman. The soft mountains of the Blue Ridge, black against the evening sky, meant nothing to him.

  People kept telling him that it would get better, that his grief would ease. But that was just another way of saying that Kate herself would begin to disappear. They might be right, but it wasn’t what he wanted, not at all. In some ways, his grief was all that was left of her.

  Washington wasn’t any better. He’d arranged to see a few of the people he knew but, once again, they hadn’t known Kate. And so they seemed like strangers. For Burke, everything went through Kate, or it didn’t go at all.

  He couldn’t get over thinking about the way they’d found each other. He’d actually fallen out of the sky – crashed and burned and damn near died, only to be delivered to her doorstep by a man who called himself Colonel Homicide. If that wasn’t fate, what was it?

  He shifted within the cramped architecture of his seat, his eyes on the video monitor overhead, displaying a cartoon Airbus inching its way across the Atlantic toward a map of Europe. He was exhausted by the efforts of the past few days, the strain of pretending he was fine.

  Even so, he took some joy from Tommy’s rebound. He’d had a part in that, a part in keeping the old man from dying of a broken heart. It was good to see him now, going out to the pub with his pals. They were busy again at the office, so much so that they hired a new secretary. These were boom times for Ireland, and now that Tommy was back, the firm would prosper once again.

  Burke had kept the business afloat until the old man was on his feet again. But what really turned the corner for Tommy was a visit from Kate herself.

  “She came to me,” he said, “in the night. Stood at the foot of my bed – Katie herself, mind you. ‘Da,’ she says to me, ‘I canna stand the sadness! Do you understand me? Between you and Michael, I have no peace. You’ve got to stop.’ And then she kissed me on the forehead and made me promise I’d be brave enough to get on with things. She promised that she would always be there, even if she was gone. Isn’t that just like her?” Tommy asked. “Still looking after us?”

  Burke would have given anything for a glimpse of Kate. Even if it was an illusion, a hallucination or a dream, it would have sent a rainbow straight through his heart. After the vision, the old man looked so relieved, so suddenly at peace with himself and the world, that Burke felt a surge of envy. “She hasn’t come to me,” he said, as if Kate’s ghost had betrayed him.

  The old man gave him a warm smile, and touched his arm. “Perhaps in time, Michael. …”

  As the aircraft began its descent, Burke awakened from his reverie to a sense of disappointment. It was one of those brilliant mornings that happen too rarely in Ireland, the bright green fields sweeping toward the Irish Sea, the sea alive with whitecaps under a Windex sky.

  He would have preferred gloom. Darkness and rain. Instead, he found himself descending into a Hallmark card. As the plane banked into its final approach, he saw the flash of a dozen sails beneath the wing, and the long, furling wake of a fishing boat. It did not lift his spirits.

  It was barely nine a.m. when he cleared Immigration, so he collected his car and headed for the M1 that would take him into the heart of the city. To his surprise, he caught himself smiling. There was something about Ireland. Maybe it was the scale of the place, the lilting voices in the terminal, the mischief in the brogue.

  Without realizing it, he was beginning to feel at home in the maze of streets and parks that were Dublin. He’d missed the old man, and the routine of work, the rose-brick building on Cope Street and jogging along the quays beside the Liffey. It was, he grudgingly admitted, good to be back.

  He parked in his spot at the rear of the building and took the steps to the second floor. It was barely ten in the morning when he arrived at the doors to Suite 210, only to find them locked – and a note.

  It was thumbtacked directly to one of the wooden panels, which was a bit like nailing a Vermeer directly to the wall. The panels in the door were solid oak, and gleamed – the brass fittings were rubbed daily with a soft cloth. The old man would have a conniption.

  Burke pried the thumbtack from the door, and read the note. It was an official notice, in Gaelic and English, dated the day after Burke had gone to the States for Megan’s wedding.

  CLOSED BY ORDER OF AN GARDA SIOCHANA

  (INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION UNIT)

  “Why didn’t you call me?”

  He’d gone directly to Dalkey, where he found the old man in the yard, pruning a rosebush. A tangle of thorny branches lay in a heap at his feet.

  “Is it yourself, Michael?”

  “It is.” A quick hug.

  The old man shrugged. “I knew you’d come back the sec
ond you heard – and would that be fair to your sister?”

  Burke shrugged. His sister could take care of herself. “What happened?”

  “Well, I’ll tell you what happened,” the old man repeated. “This shower of cunts came stormin’ in, like it was Ned Kelly they were after! Moira takes one look, goes into a swoon, if you can believe it, and this great eejit steps forward, flashin’ one of them little wallets.”

  Burke looked confused. “What ‘little wallets’?”

  “Like you see on the box. With the badges inside. And it turns out, this one’s not even Irish. He’s one of your lot!”

  “Who is?”

  “The eejit I’m talkin’ about. He’s American! This shiny-faced palooka’s come all the way from London – and the Garda, they’re fallin’ all over him, salutin’ his every fart.”

  “What did he want?” Burke asked.

  “He’s got a bug up his arse about some incorporation you did. I told him to feck off!”

  Burke winced. “What did he say?”

  “Well, he didn’t take that a’tall well. Touchy sort. Reminded me for the third time that he’s some bloody great FBI agent. Called himself a Lee-gut.”

  “Gat.”

  “Puh-tay-to, puh-tah-to … I told him I didn’t care if he was Lord of the Rings. If he wants to look at one of our files, he’d better have his paperwork in order.”

  “Well, yeah,” Burke said, “but – which account was he after?”

  The old man scowled. “The Twentieth-Century Motor Company. Something like that.” He paused. “Ring a bell?”

  Burke shook his head. “No.” He’d set up lots of companies at Thomas Aherne & Associates. Most of the time he didn’t spend more than half an hour with a client.

  “Manx registration?” the old man reminded him. “Jersey bank?”

  Burke made a gesture, as if to say, What else is there? Then he said, “Hold Mail list?”

  The old man nodded. “What else would it be? Totally normal setup. But this Yank, he takes one look at the folder –”

  “You gave him the file?” Burke asked.