Midas

by Russell Andrews

  “So why are you calling me, Martha?”

  “Because I don’t like to be threatened. And because she was lying to me, Jay. She was lying to me from the very beginning. And you were telling me the truth, weren’t you?”

  “Yes, I was,” Justin said.

  “Is this . . . is this helpful to you?”

  “Extremely helpful, Martha.”

  “Well then, I’m glad I called.”

  “Me too,” Justin said. “I’m very glad you called.”

  And I take back everything I’ve always thought about bureaucrats, he thought. Every last damn thing.

  He didn’t call his parents. Instead he dug out a yellow legal pad and a pen. They’d taken his computer and his files, but he could still write.

  It struck him that he should be scribbling in the dirt, this felt almost too clean. But it all came so easily this way. He didn’t need a computer for this. Everything was in his head. He wondered if it would be there forever. He hoped not. But he was glad it was there now.

  The names and organizations flitted across his memory as clearly as if they were on a movie screen. He was able to conjure up every list, every variation. He remembered his near breakthrough at Gitmo. And where he’d come up short.

  Stephanie Ingles.

  She was now in the mix, but what the hell was her role? What was her connection to the others and to what he suspected was going on? He’d overlooked that connection before, but Martha Peck’s phone call made it as clear as could be that there was one. But what could it be?

  Slow it down, he thought. Go back to the process. Take a deep breath. And another. You’re just at another plateau. So think this through. Be logical.

  The EPA. Start there. That’s where the connection must be. What was their function? To protect land, water, and air. Protect wildlife. Pretty nonthreatening. But what the hell had he been reading about it lately? What had he heard? Something. He’d read a newspaper story . . .

  His mind was racing. Environmental protection. Land preservation. Yes! That’s what he’d read. He’d discussed it with Roger and his dad. The EPA and President Anderson had declared a huge mass of land in Alaska off-limits to the oil companies. Stephanie Ingles had pushed for the resolution. Dandridge had supported it. A surprise to everyone. Halliburton was livid. EGenco was furious. But how the hell did that fit? It didn’t. It was the opposite of everything else that was beginning to add up. It made no sense.

  But it had to. It had to . . .

  Go slowly, he told himself.

  Think clearly. Everything has a reason.

  Just get to the next plateau.

  It had to fit . . .

  Millions of acres unavailable for oil drilling.

  He began scribbling furiously on the pad.

  What was the result of that decision? Environmentalists were thrilled. The permanent preservation of land and wildlife. Possible political gain, a nod to a constituency that wouldn’t normally vote for Dandridge.

  What else? The oil companies were up in arms. Less drilling. Less potential for domestic oil. More dependence on overseas oil.

  So what? So what? What did it mean?!

  Less oil, prices go up . . .

  Higher prices were bad for the administration. It was harmful to their normal constituents, which meant it was politically damaging . . .

  But when oil prices rose, someone was making a lot more money.

  Bad politically. Very good personally.

  He remembered Roger Mallone, lecturing him in the living room of his East End house. “SPEs,” he’d said. “A great way to hide a lot of crooked things.”

  EGenco. Midas. Special Purpose Entities.

  He jumped up and ran out to the front lawn. His newspapers had never stopped being delivered, and he scrounged through the several dozen papers that were scattered around, found that morning’s New York Times. Justin turned to the business section, found that day’s oil prices.

  Sixty-four dollars a barrel. A record high.

  Justin swore at the guys who’d stolen his computer—he no longer had access to his computerized address book—then called Rhode Island information, asking for the number for Roger Mallone. A minute later, he had Mallone on the phone.

  “Jay, Jesus Christ, what the hell’s been going on? Are you all right?”

  “Roger, I don’t have time to explain. I need some information and I need it now.”

  “All right, all right. Go ahead.”

  “EGenco. Remember we were talking about their Special Purpose Entities?”

  “Sure.”

  “Well, what kind of entities would they be likely to set up?”

  “Depends on who they were being set up for.”

  “Government officials. High-up government officials. And Saudis. A combination of the two.”

  “That doesn’t narrow it down much.”

  “Okay,” Justin said. “Go with me for a second, Roger. Is it possible that oil prices could be manipulated—”

  “What, to go down? You mean to help these guys win the next election? Sure. There’s been a lot of speculation that, when the time comes, that’s what’s going to happen—”

  “No. To go up. How could the partners in a company benefit if oil prices go way up?”

  “Are you kidding? If you’re a supplier, you make a fortune.”

  “Tell me.”

  “Well, several ways. A company like EGenco has the government contacts to get huge contracts to rebuild Iraq and Afghanistan and anyplace else over there we might invade.”

  “Keep going.”

  “So they have to provide oil and fuel to rebuild the factories and infrastructures there. If oil prices go up, the government has to pay more. The company could make tens of billions of dollars extra.”

  “Okay, that’s the company as a whole. How about something smaller? An SPE now.”

  “Well . . . you mean if I were being really devious about this?”

  “Be as devious as you possibly can.”

  “Well . . . a company like EGenco doesn’t really explore anymore. They’re so big, they’re in so many other areas, it’s not cost-effective for them. So what they do is they buy from small and medium companies. If they wanted to, they could set up an SPE that’s a small or midsize oil drilling company. If they had to, they could justify it legally by saying that they’re taking a percentage of the findings, which they would—probably fifteen to twenty percent. Then the company—and the partners set up in the SPE—take the other eighty to eighty-five percent of the profit.”

  “What kind of profit are we talking about?”

  “Well, the partners’ve got to put up some dough, but it’s something relatively minimal. The way it works, when it’s really sleazy, is guaranteed money up front. That’s the suspicion about Dandridge right now, that’s where some of the lawsuits are headed, and it’s why people think he’s being so secretive. He could have put up a million bucks and gotten a deal where his share of the SPE guarantees him ten million—no matter what the SPE’s profits are. In exchange, he arranges the sweetheart deal for EGenco to rebuild the Middle East for billions and billions. That kind of shit goes on all the time.”

  “Now let’s say the partners also want the SPE to be profitable, over and above that guarantee. What kind of money could we be talking about for a midsize oil exploration company?”

  “If oil prices go up? Huge. Let’s say EGenco says, ‘You put up a million bucks each to be a partner.’ The Saudis generate about eight million barrels of oil per day. Three years ago the price of oil was twenty bucks a barrel. Now it’s sixty-two, sixty-three, or some unbelievable thing. So their gross has gone up from about a hundred and sixty million a day to around five hundred a day.”

  “Five hundred million dollars a day?”

  “Hey, it’s why it’s nice to be a Saudi royal. You pick up a nice chunk of change from that.”

  “Three years ago it was almost a third of what it is now,” Justin said. “That was around the ti
me of Dandridge’s big secret energy conference.”

  “You got it.”

  Justin shook his head in amazement. “How about a medium-sized American company?”

  “Well, if EGenco puts these guys in a midsize company that’s working, that’s a success, that kind of company can generate about a hundred thousand barrels per day.”

  “Which they’re selling for sixty-plus dollars a barrel.”

  “Yup. Comes out to six million dollars a day. Of course, that’s not profit. EGenco takes their percentage, there’s operating costs . . .”

  “You know what, Roger? It’s still a shitload of money left over.”

  “No question about that.”

  “And one more thing: give me a simple rule of thumb about how to manipulate oil prices.”

  “It’s actually pretty easy. Especially if you’re someone like Dandridge where everyone would expect him to manipulate downward to benefit the administration and make himself look good politically.”

  “Well, explain it to me both ways, up and down.”

  “There’s just one way, Jay. Once you have production in place, there are only two components: volume and price. The more volume, the lower the price. It’s just simple supply and demand. Less volume, the more people have to pay. And vice versa.”

  “And the way you alter the volume?”

  “You lower the number of producers and producing sources. If you want to be really paranoid, you can say we blew up Iraqi oil wells in the various Gulf wars so the Saudis got a bigger share of production.”

  “How about declaring oil-producing land off-limits to drillers?”

  “You mean American land? Sure. Anything that limits production is going to raise prices. You know, you’re starting to scare me, Jay. This doesn’t sound so hypothetical.”

  “Do me a favor, Roger. Call my folks and tell them I’m okay. Tell them I’ll call them as soon as I can.”

  “Want me to wish ’em a Merry Christmas for you?”

  “I’ll do that myself, thanks.”

  “Did I give you what you need?”

  “You gave me exactly what I need. I’ll make it up to you.”

  And when he hung up, he knew he had it. Not every detail. Not every piece of the puzzle. But the overall scheme. It was crystal clear. He had it cold.

  And then he began to write. He no longer cared about his missing computer and the lost information. He remembered the last two lists he’d scrawled into the floor of his prison cell and quickly jotted them down on his pad. The first list was Dandridge and the various ways he was connected to the pieces of the puzzle.

  DANDRIDGE

  Midas

  EGenco

  Cooke

  Anderson

  Stuller

  Ingles

  Mishari

  The next list was one where he’d split all the names into two categories—people and companies.

  Cooke Midas

  Anderson EGenco

  Stuller

  Ingles

  Mishari

  Cooke was a victim. The others were survivors. The others formed the core group. So he rewrote the list, eliminating Cooke’s name. He stared at what he’d written, realized that Dandridge was missing. He was the link to everything and everyone else and he belonged in this grouping. So he quickly scrawled the name at the bottom.

  Anderson Midas

  Stuller EGenco

  Ingles

  Mishari

  Dandridge

  He didn’t have to stare at it for long before it came to him. Before it hit him like a sledgehammer on the back of the head. He turned to a new page. He wanted this clean and clear. And he rewrote the names in the left-hand column so it read:

  Mishari

  Ingles

  Dandridge

  Anderson

  Stuller

  Shaking his head, he underlined the first letters of each name on the list, first just one line, then two, then three. Each time he drew a line, he slashed down harder and more furiously with his pen.

  Mishari

  Ingles

  Dandridge

  Anderson

  Stuller

  There it was. In angrily underlined black and white.

  “Son of a bitch,” he whispered.

  Who was Midas? That question was answered.

  What was Midas? He was pretty sure he knew the answer to that one, too, now.

  A hundred thousand barrels of oil per day. Over sixty dollars per barrel.

  Over six million dollars a day.

  Follow the money, his father had said.

  Follow the goddamn money, Justin thought. Everything else is a mirage.

  But the money gets you there every time.

  32

  He was just missing a couple of pieces of the puzzle. And by the time Bruno Pecozzi showed up in the late afternoon, he was certain he would have one of them.

  Gary Jenkins arrived back at Justin’s house around 3 P.M. with a sullen-looking blonde girl in tow. She was lugging a large leather case. When she took off her coat, Justin saw she was wearing the usual uniform of fifteen-year-old girls everywhere: jeans that were cut way too low on her hips, a tight shirt that didn’t cover her midriff, platform shoes that looked like refugees from the ’80s, and a lit cigarette hanging out of the corner of her lips.

  “You’re my artist?” Justin asked.

  “So what is this, some kind of deal where I draw you naked?”

  “I’m the chief of police of East End Harbor,” Justin said. “I’m asking you to help me solve a serious crime.”

  She sounded almost disappointed. “Yeah, that’s what Gary said.”

  “Officer Jenkins,” Gary said sternly.

  “Yeah, whatever,” the girl said.

  “Will you help me?” Justin said. “It’s important.”

  “I liked it better when I thought you were gonna be naked,” the girl said.

  “I don’t blame you,” Justin said. “What’s your name?”

  “Darla,” the girl told him.

  “So you gonna help me, Darla?”

  She turned to Gary. “Did you tell him what I want?”

  “How could I tell him? I’ve been with you, haven’t I? Don’t worry about it.”

  Darla turned back to Justin. “A year’s membership at the Museum of Modern Art. In New York.”

  “That’s what you want?” Justin asked, surprised.

  “For a whole year.”

  “I’ll make it two years,” Justin said. “If you can draw what I need.”

  “Whatever it is, I can draw it,” the girl said. “So let’s get goin’. I don’t, like, have all day.”

  While Justin stayed with Darla, he sent Gary off on one more errand, handing him a credit card and giving him instructions. Gary was back in an hour with a brand-new laptop computer.

  By that time Darla had gotten it right.

  No, Justin thought, more than right. Perfect.

  “Remember me when you’re hanging in MOMA,” he said. “I’m your first patron.”

  “Whatever,” she said. “Can I go now?”

  A few minutes after she’d gone, the doorbell rang. It was Bruno.

  It was a strange moment for Justin. He didn’t particularly like Bruno Pecozzi. He was not immune to his charm or his easygoing, entertaining manner, but he understood that the man was a killer. Your basic sociopath. Justin had always expected that, one day, he’d have to arrest the man, and he had to admit that up until now, he would have said that would be a day he looked forward to. But there was a good chance this man had saved his life. Certainly, he’d saved his sanity. And there was one other thing: he needed Bruno now. He needed something done and he didn’t have the strength to do it himself. Arresting Bruno was the last thing on Justin’s mind now. He had something quite different he wanted to discuss with the strong-arm hood turned movie consultant. Something much more in keeping with Bruno’s particular talents. Justin was about to cross a line and he didn’t really car
e. He had crossed this line before. So he stuck out his hand, and when Bruno took it, Justin simply said, “Thank you.”

  Bruno didn’t say a word, just shrugged. Finally, as they stood in the living room, Bruno said, “You got a beer?”

  Justin brought him one and they sat down.

  “How?” Justin said, sipping from his own bottle of Sam Adams. “How the hell did you do it?”

  “You know, Jay, people in my profession, we’re like magicians. We don’t like to give away our secrets. Makes it look less impressive, you know?”

  “Bruno,” Justin said, “it’s gonna be pretty hard for me to not be impressed. You got through maybe the most secretive government installation we have.”

  “Without goin’ into too much detail, you gotta keep in mind what my business associates specialize in. Remember I told you I was good at judgin’ when people were afraid?”

  “I remember.”

  “Yeah, well, I’m not too bad either when it comes to pickin’ people who are . . . how shall I say . . . greedy.”

  “Corrupt?”

  “That’s another way of puttin’ it, sure.”

  “I’m still not following.”

  “All right. I use this lawyer, she’s good people, Shirley Greene. She’s saved my bacon a coupla times.”

  “She represents the guy who contacted me down there.”

  “She represents a lotta those guys. It’s what she does, you know? She’s one of those liberal do-gooders. You know, I told her, I don’t approve. I mean, all those Arab fucks, who knows what the fuck they’re doin’ to our country, but hey, she helped me out enough times, who am I to say no when she needs a favor.”

  “What kind of favor did she need?”

  “She couldn’t talk to her clients. It’s the way things work now. They got ’em in a place like that, there ain’t too much you can do. So she asked if I could help.”

  “And you could.”

  “Jay, here’s the thing. You got a basic honest point of view. You can’t help it, it’s just who you are, the way you was raised. Me, I see things a different way. And the way I see it, wherever there’s any kinda hierarchy . . . good word, right? . . . there’s gonna be somebody who’s gettin’ shafted. Someone’s makin’ more money than someone else, someone’s not gettin’ the promotion he thought he should get, someone’s not gettin’ the girl he thinks he deserves, you know what I mean?”