Night Watch

THIRTY-NINE

There was no conversation in Mercer’s car on our way to my apartment. Luc and I were in the backseat, as far apart from each other as it was humanly possible to be.

The doorman came to help me out as I said good night. Mike and Mercer were going to take Luc to the Plaza Athénée and talk to him there. I had told them Luc had more information he needed to give them, both about Brigitte’s drug history and the new frontier of the West African world of narco-trafficking.

My comfortably appointed home, always my refuge, had never seemed lonelier. From my window on the twentieth floor, I could see the view south to Luc’s hotel. Any other time I would have longed to be there with him, but tonight I was knee-deep in self-doubt.

I followed my usual late night routine. First I soaked in a practically scalding bath, scented with lavender oils, to remove the day’s tension and debris. I poured a stiff nightcap of Dewar’s before slipping into my favorite silk sleep shirt. When I got into bed, I balanced my laptop on the pristine D. Porthault duvet cover, then settled in to search for the latest news stories on MGD. I entered the search words, and dozens of brand-new articles popped up instantly. The French and British papers had headlined the stories about Lille and prostitution, some with links to Baby Mo himself, and others naming businessmen who were wealthy but not so well-known abroad.

The first three pieces were short. The fourth one mentioned the drug trade. It made no link between Mohammed Gil-Darsin and illegal substances but said that some of the parties paid for by prominent men using this sex ring were fueled by cocaine.

The fifth piece played off the previous one. It identified the disgraced French police officer who had traveled to Washington to deliver one of the escorts, speculating that both he and the Belgian hooker carried drugs as part of the expensive transaction.

By the time I reached the third page of stories, the theme had shifted to the drug connection. The World Politics Review cited tightened U.S. drug enforcement, coupled with a weak dollar and surging demand for coke in Europe, as leading to political and economic chaos across West Africa.

I punched in Mohammed Gil-Darsin and cocaine but got no result. I tried a variety of entries, but all that came back were the old stories about Papa Mo stealing all the money from the lucrative Ivorian cocoa trade.

Brigitte Rouget was on my mind, for no good reason. I Googled her and found a string of articles that showed her at social events, openings and parties. The latest pictures featured her solo, always with a champagne glass in one hand and a cigarette in the other. Jumping ahead four pages, there were endless snaps of her with Luc, both at Le Relais and other restaurants, all over Europe.

I scrolled back up the page and studied some of the photographs. In at least five of them, Gina Varona was pictured with Brigitte. One went back to Brigitte’s single days-from the caption beneath-when it appeared she was an almost anorexically thin runway model at a designer show in Milan.

Maybe Gina had been into the happy dust with Brigitte. I was as creative in my search as the late hour and double Dewar’s allowed me to be, but all the references were either to the fashion and cosmetics business, or to Gina’s philanthropic generosity.

I moved on to Peter Danton. There were pages of stories about him, many of them in art magazines-foreign and domestic-about the gallery he and Eva owned, about their personal collection, and about his quest to hunt down the finest African art by traveling to the most remote regions of the Dark Continent.

He, too, seemed to be entirely aboveboard.

There were far too many articles to absorb tonight, so I made a note to ask Laura to download more of them tomorrow.

I was yawning now, just about ready to close up shop. I punched in Josh Hanson’s name and was not surprised to find a very long string of references to his advertising position, crediting him for major campaigns for junk food that won awards for Super Bowl 2010 and the last Olympics.

Several pieces paired his name with Gina Varona, all of them related to new perfumes being introduced to the market. I added Peter Danton to the quest and came away with obligatory photos of both men-Peter and Josh-sponsoring black tie events at the Temple of Dendur or soaring over some minor Alp in a hot air balloon at a birthday party for a dot.com billionaire.

When the phone rang shortly before midnight, I assumed that it was Luc.

“Am I getting you too late, Alex?”

“Ryan?”

“Yeah. I’m just too nervous to let this fester till morning.”

“It’s never too late. What have you got?

I pushed my glass away from the edge of the night table and sat up.

“First of all, Citibank got the papers that Mercer subpoenaed down to us.”

“At this hour?”

“Nope. I called there just before closing. They had a rush job going on it and told me if I waited at my desk until ten, they’d get them to me.”

“Good man.”

“Five bank accounts, Alex. Blanca has more than half a million dollars collecting interest in her name. Six hundred twelve thousand and thirty-nine cents to be exact. On a hotel maid’s salary, she must be a very thrifty woman.”

“It’s not possible.”

“I’m looking at the statements right this minute. That’s either a boatload of counterfeit pocketbooks the boyfriend is selling, or enough drugs to keep the rest of Guatemala on a permanent high.”

“Is it possible she never did anything else but sign the signature card, Ryan? That the lover-the guy in the slammer-is running the scam and she’s just an ignorant dupe?”

“Hardly. Looks like she withdrew a nice chunk of change-more than ten thousand dollars-about three weeks ago, long after the boyfriend was carted off to jail. I suppose the bank will be able to match up the time on the slip to a photograph of Blanca grinning at the camera when the teller counted out the money.”

“We need to get her back into the office first thing in the morning,” I said. “We need to take one more hard run at her.”

“Do you think it’s weird that she’s got all that money in the bank but still works as a maid?”

“She knows that money is likely to evaporate the minute the feds get around to reclaiming it, Ryan. Blanca needs the day job.”

“I hope you don’t mind that I used your name, Alex.”

“Maybe you’ll have better luck with it than I do. Why?”

“This bank stuff made me crazy, so I called the IRS tonight. What’s the point of waiting another two weeks for their news?”

“You got past the switchboard after hours?” I laughed.

“Got shuttled along to some bigwig in their law division who was at home in the middle of dinner. Told him I was Alexander Cooper, Manhattan DA’s Office. Gave him some of that ‘don’t you know who I am?’ crap and he folded like a deck of cards. He vaguely remembers reading the profile of me-‘Coop’s Crunches’-in last month’s Men’s Health.”

“Remind me not to believe anything you ever tell me again.”

“Believe this, Al. Blanca hasn’t ever paid income tax. Not a cent.”

“The jury will probably applaud her for that.”

“Maybe as a housekeeper, but not with half a million bucks on ice.”

“Okay, I’ve got a plan.”

“I’m not done. I’m working on a trifecta,” Ryan said.

“Why’s that, Mr. Blackmer? You planning to make a run at my job?”

“Hey, Al-no way. I’m-”

“’Cause there may be an opening at the top of Sex Crimes this time tomorrow night.”

“You’ll be fine, Al. I’m just totally into the nuts and bolts of all this. Here’s the last piece you’ll want to know. I’m in Queens now, in a tiny shithole of a place off Roosevelt Avenue.”

“What are you doing, Ryan?” I was scribbling notes on the only Post-it I could reach.

“Did you know the Guatemalan Consulate has a mobile van? That there are so many undocumented Guatemalans in the five boroughs that this little sucker drives around night and day, trying to find these people and help them?”

“And you’ve commandeered it in my name, right?” The image did make me laugh.

“Actually, you’re off the hook on this one. I told them I worked for Senator Schumer, and they-”

“What? Are you trying to get us all locked up?”

“No, no. I did work for him, Alex. Past tense. I interned for Chuck when I was in law school. They love him in Queens. He’s totally the man to know out here.”

“I’m afraid to ask what you’re doing there. That’s not where Blanca is now.”

“Do you know how many Mayan dialects there are?” Ryan asked.

“Oh, jeez. You have a copy of the phone call from Blanca to her jailbird.”

“So, Mayans are Amerindians, and there are twenty-one freakin’ different dialects. My global mobile consulate van has its pulse on the people of Queens, Al. We’ve struck out five times, but I’m very optimistic. I’ve got all night for someone to translate what Blanca said to him after her encounter with MGD, and these folks just don’t seem to sleep. They’re eating, drinking, dancing, gambling. Viva Guatemala!”

I was trying to process Ryan’s information.

“Talk to me, Al. You’re not happy with what I’ve done.”

“You’re amazing. Of course I’m pleased with everything, and better to find this stuff out now than on the eve of trial. It’s just that your position on this case has been clear from the outset. I’m afraid you’re trying to squeeze the shoe onto a foot that doesn’t fit.”

“But-”

“Let’s assume that Blanca is in on the counterfeiting games her boyfriend has been running and that she doesn’t pay taxes. I’ll even go the next step and bet she, too, lied on her asylum application. It doesn’t change the fact of what Baby Mo did to her in the hotel room.”

“Maybe it does. You know that, Alex. Maybe she’s incapable of telling the truth about anything.”

That was the bottom line in all this. How could we ask a jury to find MGD guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, if everything his accuser said cast more doubt on her? Maybe Blanca had lived on the margins for so long, she wouldn’t recognize the truth if it hit her squarely between the eyes.

“Okay, then you keep your global mobile van out on the streets. I have the unpleasant duty of calling Pat McKinney at this hour.” I stretched my arm out for another shot of Scotch to ready me for that task. “He needs to light a fire under Byron Peaser and make Peaser bring Blanca to the office at nine A.M.”

Ryan was pumped up with his own sense of accomplishment. “As they say in the hood, she got some ’splainin’ to do.”

I was already making my list for the morning. “I want to thank you for all this, Ryan. You know that most prosecutors in this country would just leave all this dirt for the defense to dig up. Throw it against the wall in the middle of a trial and see what sticks. I’m so proud of you for running this all down.”

“Where do you think it will go, Alex?” Ryan asked, the tone of his voice much calmer now.

“That depends.”

“On what?”

“I think we have to have another shot at Blanca in the morning. Confront her with her lies and go back at her about the events in MGD’s room.”

“Worst case scenario?”

“We ask Judge Donnelly to hear us again in the afternoon. I have the prisoner produced. I let Lem dress me down for ten minutes. I tell Donnelly I was wrong-”

“It wasn’t you, Al. It was the whole team.”

“I tell the judge I was wrong and that we need to reconsider the bail status of Gil-Darsin so we can sort everything out-cool, calm, collected.”

“You’ll let him walk, even though you know he’s a pig?”

“He might well walk, Ryan. And Paul Battaglia will have my head.”