Judgment

39

Raymond Marshak had made his fortune in something called risk arbitrage, though the real secret to his success was illegal insider trading. It was an open secret. For years he had gotten away with it. Until Juliana Brody came along.

As a young assistant US Attorney, Juliana had heard the rumors and decided to do something. But Marshak was a slippery bastard. Getting anything on him seemed impossible. Everyone was afraid to testify against him. He went around in a low-hanging fog of suspicion, yet he repeatedly eluded prosecution. Finally Juliana was able to nab him on a technicality: he’d sent confirmation slips through the mail that didn’t disclose the fact that a commission was included in the price. Piddling, but that constituted mail fraud. A felony.

Her boss, the US Attorney, Kent Yarnell, wanted her to drop the case. She couldn’t win, it would look bad; Marshak was too high-profile, too well connected. Yarnell was always most concerned about his scorecard. Better a guilty man go free, he probably believed, than be embarrassed by an acquittal. He wouldn’t go ahead with a case unless he had 95 percent certainty that it would result in a conviction. And Juliana admitted there probably was only an 80 percent chance she’d win.

So instead of going up against Kent and getting fired, Juliana reached out to a law school friend in the Justice Department in Washington, Aaron Dunn, who worked in the Securities and Financial Fraud Unit. Dunn’s unit was supremely interested in bringing down the notorious Ray Marshak, however they could do it. Hell, they got Al Capone on tax evasion; if mail fraud was what it required to take down Ray Marshak, go for it. Now she had the air cover to pursue her case against Marshak, no matter how Kent Yarnell felt about it. Kent was pissed off, but he’d been neutralized. He couldn’t stop her.

Going above your boss’s head was normally a firing offense, but Juliana got the conviction. Her boss wouldn’t dare fire her for cooperating with Main Justice, with headquarters. So she kept her job — and even though he got to take some of the credit, she’d nonetheless made an enemy in Kent Yarnell.

And, of course, Ray Marshak, who went to prison for five years. When he came out, he returned to his wife, his mansion in Chestnut Hill, Mass., and a good chunk of his ill-gotten fortune. And an abiding animosity toward Juliana Brody, who by then had gone into private practice.

So it was no surprise that he kept her waiting for almost fifteen minutes in his front sitting room, a space as large as the entire downstairs of her house. The bigger surprise was that he’d agreed to see her in the first place. She sat on a hard sofa that was probably a valuable antique and anxiously checked her iPhone. At last a petite young woman in black-and-white livery sidled into the room and asked Juliana to follow her.

The housekeeper walked out into a harlequin-tiled hallway, Juliana close behind, her heels clicking on the floor.

Ray Marshak’s study was lined with leather-bound books he’d never read or even opened. He sat at a delicate antique secretary in a cone of light and looked up as the servant knocked at the open door. He raised his hands like a priest offering a benediction, but he didn’t get up. “Why, Judge Brody, how long has it been?”

“Thank you for seeing me, Ray.” The housekeeper left, and Juliana sat in a chair facing Marshak.

“How could I possibly resist?”

Five years in prison had aged him ten. He had never been a good-looking man, with his moon face, pockmarked cheeks only partly camouflaged by a scraggly gray beard. Now he looked frail, his shoulders humped. He was in his midseventies but looked much older.

“I was intrigued to hear from you, Judge Brody. You’ve come to ask a favor. It almost sounds like a joke, does it not?”

She noticed a cluster of framed pictures on the desk, facing the visitor, of him with George Bush the younger, golfing with Trump.

“I suppose it does,” she said.

“But I’m honored by your visit. I’ve always admired your pluck.”

“My pluck.”

“Against all odds, you’ve managed to climb the greasy pole, haven’t you?”

“I wouldn’t say the odds were against me. Not at all.”

“Well, you certainly made an enemy of Kent Yarnell.”

“That I did. But Kent wasn’t on the Governor’s Council. He wasn’t able to blackball me.”

“Lucky you. You were quite clever, the way you went after me.”

“Just doing my job.”

“Well played. You probably imagine you’re on the side of the just and the righteous, don’t you?”

“I wouldn’t say that,” Juliana said.

“I think you do.” She could see anger tighten his face. “You had a career to make. Another check in the win column. You didn’t care what it might do to a family, the shame it would bring to my wife. And to my son. That didn’t figure in your moral calculus at all, did it?”

Juliana didn’t reply.

“And using that absurd technicality to prosecute me. Because you couldn’t make an honest case. How is that justice?”

“I did what was right,” Juliana said. “If I could have gone after you with bigger weapons, I sure would have.”

“The United States versus Ray Marshak,” he said. “Does that sound like a fair fight to you?”

“It’s not meant to be.”

“You’re here because you want something from me, and — even stranger — you actually think I’m going to give it to you.”

“All I can do is ask,” she said.

“So, Judge Brody, I am all ears.” He folded his arms and smiled.

“Yes, I’m here to ask your help.”

“Me?”

“There’s no one more qualified,” she said.

“I’m listening.”

“Do you know anything about a company called Mayfair Paragon?” she said.

He shook his head. “Should I?”

“What about Harrogate Capital Partners?”

He paused. “Aren’t they some investment firm in the north of England?”

“Right. They bailed out a company called Wheelz, and now they own most of it.”

“And Wheelz is one of the cases you’re presiding over, am I right? One of your cases?”

“It is.”

“I vaguely remember — Wheelz was almost declared dead; then this English firm shows up and saves it. I remember wondering what lunatic would sink a billion dollars into a failing Uber competitor. Insanity. I mean, in a world with Uber and Lyft, who needs Wheelz?”

“Here’s what I want to know,” she said. “Whose money was behind it?”

“Behind Harrogate Capital Partners?”

“Right. Who’s the investor?”

“Why do you want to know?”

“I have my reasons.”

“And what makes you think I have the answer?”

“I don’t. But I think you know how to find it.”

“Do I?”

“You know how money is hidden. You’re a master of financial engineering.”

“You flatter me.”

“It’s not flattery, Mr. Marshak. In this realm you have no equal.”

“I’m fascinated,” Marshak said. “This is so inappropriate — for a judge to be conducting a private inquiry like this.”

She shrugged, said nothing.

“I wonder what they have on you.”

She immediately blushed and hoped it wasn’t too visible. She shook her head slowly, disapproving.

Marshak continued that line of thought. “Probably a hell of a lot more substantial than what you had on me. In fact, I have a feeling that you’re walking on the dark side yourself. I’m speculating that you’re no longer quite so high and mighty. Those pretty little hands of yours, with that pink manicure — there’s dirt in those nails, isn’t there? Sure, you like to pretend that you’re better than me, but I can tell those hands aren’t quite clean.”

“I understand,” she said. “You don’t know the answer, but you can’t bring yourself to admit it. That’s all right. If you don’t know, you don’t know.”

For a brief instant, he looked stung, but he quickly recovered. He sighed with exasperation, then laughed. He was being manipulated, and he knew it.

“Tell me, Judge Brody,” he said after a moment. “How much do you know about the money behind Harrogate? Do you know anything?”

“Very little. I know the financing for the Wheelz deal was done by a bank in Cyprus.”

“Ah.”

“And a bank in the British Virgin Islands.”

He gave a crooked grin. “I see. Well, here’s the first thing to know. There’s no such thing as total anonymity,” Marshak said. “Everyone leaves tracks.”

“What sort of tracks?”

“For instance, if they’re the lead investor in Wheelz, you can be certain of one thing: they will certainly have installed their janissaries.”

“Their what now?”

“Janissaries. The sultan’s bodyguards.”

“Bodyguards. I don’t understand.”

“A lead investor will insist on placing two or three of their own people — his janissaries, I call them — in key positions throughout the company. To make sure things are done right. To report back. His people.” He nodded a few times. “So the rumors are true,” he said, almost as if to himself.

“Rumors?”

“It’s the Russians. That’s the Russian pattern. The Cyprus-BVI structure — that’s classic oligarch. Their offshore havens. How these Russian billionaires keep their honeypot away from the Russian bear. The tax collectors. You are dealing with an oligarch. Quite likely chorniy krug.”

“Which means—?”

“Hell if I know. It’s what they call Putin’s inner circle, the oligarchs who remain directly connected to the Kremlin and the Russian security services. Most slavishly loyal to Putin. The ones who’ll do the Kremlin’s dirty work when asked, without hesitation. This is the sort of people you’re going up against.”

“Okay.”

“If your plan is to go bear hunting, be my guest. I’d love to see you try.” He smiled tightly. “Because I know how it ends.”

“Do you.”

“Oh, yes. I can see the glistening red viscera around the bear’s mouth.”

“So how do I find out the name of my oligarch?”

“Go for the soft underbelly in their security. The weak spot. It’s always the lawyers. Law firms have the worst IT security. It’s laughable.”

“But what can the lawyers tell me?”

“The lawyers have to fill out all the tedious paperwork.”

“Like the accredited investor form?”

Marshak’s eyebrows shot up. “Very good. I’m impressed, Your Honor. Yes, find the lawyers and you’ll find the names of their clients. Of course, if you had any sense, you’d just let this thing lie. But that’s not your way. You are not the type to ever back down. Which I’m counting on.”

“Why is that?”

“Because it’s a throne of blood, and I’m happy to take you to it. Because when you go up against some of those chorniy krug oligarchs, you’re putting your life on the line.”

“That right?”

“If I were a betting man, and I am, my money would not be on you. You’re playing Russian roulette. But I rather enjoy the prospect. Because sooner or later that bullet is going to wind up in the chamber. Click. And I won’t shed a tear.” A thin smile. “Your Honor.”