The Chosen One

58

New York, JFK Airport, Monday March 27, 16.25

Maggie’s thoughts whirled. A bank? What on earth could any of this have to do with a bank? And AitkenBruce speci fically. It made no sense. Forbes had no connection with finance in any form. What possible-

The phone she had bought in Aberdeen vibrated, making her jump.

Restricted.

But no one knew this number. And why would they call the second she had finished speaking to Judd? Had someone been listening in, waiting to pounce?

She picked up the device as if it were coated in poison, pressing the green button to answer the call, but saying nothing. And then she heard that voice.

‘Maggie? Is that you?’

Uri.

Panic flooded through her. She spoke fast, thinking of Stuart and Nick and the curse that seemed to leave all those she touched dead. ‘Don’t call this number again. Give me a number where I can call you.’

Her abruptness shocked him; a sudden wariness in his voice, he replied, ‘I’m in an edit suite. The number is, hang on, what is the number here?’ There was a second voice, barely audible. Hurry. Eventually, Uri gave her the number; Maggie scribbled it down, then ordered him to hang up.

She binned the phone she’d used to call Judd, though the waste of a perfectly good phone went against her entire upbringing, picked another and called Uri back.

‘Maggie, what the fuck is going on?’

‘It’s a long-’

‘Don’t tell me: “It’s a long story.”’

‘Seriously, Uri. Anyone who talks to me is in danger. Grave danger.’

‘Come on, Maggie, that’s a bit melodramatic. There’s-’

‘Remember my friend Nick? He was killed last night.’

There was a beat of silence. ‘Jesus. I’m sorry, Maggie.’

‘I so want to talk, Uri. Just to have a chance to talk. For as long as we like.’

‘Where are you?’

She hesitated. She knew it made no sense to say it out loud. But it was a virgin phone; it should be safe. ‘I’m at JFK.’

‘I’m coming. Right now.’

She tried to argue, insisting it was too far, there was no time, but he bulldozed through her resistance the way she allowed him and no one else to do. By the time she had told him exactly where she was sitting, he was already in a cab.

Her pulse was throbbing now, with a new, gentler kind of fear. How long since she had seen Uri? Not since the inauguration; more than two months. She looked at her reflection in the window: she hardly recognized herself. And there was so much they hadn’t said.

She turned back to the computer, still open at Nick’s Googledocs account. Focus, she told herself. Focus. There was only one thing she was meant to think about now. She went to the search field and typed ‘AitkenBruce’.

She had heard of the bank, of course; everyone had. It was famous for its squillionaire traders and executives, rewarding themselves with telephone number salaries and even fatter bonuses. But how it could be caught up in all this, she couldn’t imagine.

Google led her to AitkenBruce’s own website. It was full of corporate puff: pictures of smiling employees – most of whom seemed to be either young, female or black, projecting an image of perfectly inclusive diversity – and blurbs about the generous philanthropic activity the ‘AitkenBruce family’ was engaged in around the globe. She clicked out of it almost immediately.

A fresh search revealed a long piece in the Sunday Times magazine, headlined: ‘The True Masters of the Universe: Inside the World’s Richest Bank’.

She scanned the first few paragraphs, which revealed an institution with more cash in its coffers than many governments, one whose assets topped a trillion dollars and whose top brass routinely went on to take up posts in the commanding heights of the world’s economies. At any one time, the ranks of the AitkenBruce old boys’ association would include either a US Treasury Secretary, German finance minister or head of the European Central Bank – and sometimes all three at once.

Now there was a chunk of more familiar stuff about mind-boggling pay. ‘Last year, Chairman and Chief Executive Roger Waugh took home a staggering $73m, to add to the $600m he already owns in AitkenBruce stock,’ the magazine reported, before detailing the yachts moored in Monaco and apartments overlooking Central Park, the private islands in Dubai and country estates in Oxfordshire, owned by the bank’s senior management.

The article explained that men this rich used their money in part to insulate themselves from those who were poorer than they were, which essentially meant everyone. ‘Forcefielding’, they called it: never flying commercial, but only by private jet; never stepping in a taxi, still less public transport, but seeing the world only through the tinted windows of a Lincoln Town Car.

Maggie scrolled down, looking for anything which might connect AitkenBruce to Forbes, let alone explain why a Company jet might have been despatched to New Orleans to assist in his murder. Had Forbes, in some earlier incarnation perhaps, been a corporate whistleblower? Or had he been blackmailing the bank as well as the President?

She lingered over the section which detailed how AitkenBruce made its vast fortune. For one thing, these bankers worked all hours, never taking holidays, often staying in the office so late there would be no time to go home before morning. For another, AitkenBruce didn’t waste its time with the little guy: its customers were governments, from Europe to the Persian Gulf, multinational mega-corporations and only the very richest individuals – a reclusive billionaire stashing his fortune in some Caribbean hideaway, a Saudi sheikh or even the reviled rules of an unstable rogue state.

But knowledge was its secret weapon. If an investor was thinking about getting into, say, timber, AitkenBruce could help because it counted the world’s biggest timber companies among its corporate clients. In addition, major investors in the same field were probably also paying the bank for its advice, so the bank knew what they were up to, too. AitkenBruce had every angle covered, which could only help when the bank came to decide how to invest its own money. The article quoted an unnamed critic saying that investing in a world that included AitkenBruce was like gambling in a casino where the house knows every hand at the table: you might pick up a few dollars, but the house wins every time.

She scrolled past the section detailing the stellar career of the bank’s alumni, stopping at a photograph of Waugh, the boss. He was fiftyish, bald and nothing to look at. If the caption had read ‘Accountant living in New Jersey’, it would have been utterly plausible. And yet here was the top man. If anyone knew what connected AitkenBruce to Forbes, it surely would be him.

She skipped back a few paragraphs. ‘No one doubts the extraordinary access and influence of an institution like AitkenBruce. Its links to the White House are solid-’ Maggie glanced at the date: the story had been written nearly a year before Stephen Baker had been elected. ‘And the bank will be watching the coming presidential contest closely. Once again, the moneymen are covering all their bases. Quarterly figures published by the Federal Election Commission confirm that Waugh and his fellow honchos at AitkenBruce gave hefty donations to both Democrats and Republicans.’

Maggie looked away from the computer towards the midafternoon passengers, some flicking through magazines, others mutely watching CNN on the airport screens. Then she moved her cursor to the Search field and typed ‘Stephen Baker + Roger Waugh’.

To her surprise, the first entry was billed as a ‘News’ result, posted a matter of hours ago. It took her to a page on politico.com listing the President’s appointments for the next day. There at 9am was ‘President Baker meets representatives of America’s financial community’, listing the personnel involved.

So that was why Waugh was travelling to Washington tonight. He was going to meet the President.

And yet Waugh was somehow tangled up with the death of Forbes and maybe everything else that had happened in this crazy week. A sudden alarm drove through her like a surge of electricity. It would be madness to let Waugh come within a hundred yards of the Oval Office before the President understood what the hell was going on. And that meant Maggie had to find out.

She opened up a new tab and checked out Teterboro Airport, reading that it was a tiny ‘relief’ airport in New Jersey, but very popular with ‘private and corporate aircraft’ because it was just twelve miles from midtown Manhattan. Slightly farther from JFK, but she could make it if she got going right away.

Just then there was a tap on her shoulder.

She froze. And then she heard his voice.

‘I nearly didn’t recognize you. What’s with the haircut?’

She hadn’t planned it; she’d had no idea how this moment would feel. But the sight of him now, in his trademark dark jeans and white shirt, his full head of lustrous, almost-black hair, made her stand up and close her arms around him.

They stood like that, saying nothing, holding each other like any other couple having an airport goodbye, for a minute or longer. It had been so long since she had felt the warmth of another human being, so long since she had felt his touch. She wanted to breathe in the smell of him, the scent that instantly transported her back to the thousand different moments of love they had shared.

It was Maggie who eventually broke the embrace, stepping back to take a good look at him. ‘This is so crazy. Now they can see you.’

‘I can take care of myself, Maggie. It’s you we need to worry about.’

She smiled, childishly pleased that he hadn’t let go of her hand. ‘So what couldn’t wait that you had to rush over here like a manyak?’

‘I told you, Maggie, that word doesn’t mean what you think it means. But your Hebrew accent is getting better. I’m impressed.’ He smiled. ‘It’s better than your haircut anyway.’

‘Uri.’

He sat on the stool next to hers, so that they were both facing the observation window. ‘You know the Baker film I’m making? I’ve come across something – I don’t know – odd.’

‘What kind of odd?’

‘Maggie, do you know how Stephen Baker became Governor?’

‘Uri, I’d love to get into this, but I’m really under the-’

‘Just listen, Maggie. How Baker became Governor. Do you know?’

‘I know he won big.’

‘Very big. Massive, in fact. Ran against a total nobody who hadn’t lived in the state for twenty years.’

‘OK.’

‘You know why? Because the Republican opponent he was meant to face imploded three months before election day. During the campaign his divorce papers suddenly surfaced; showed he had a thing about watching his wife have sex with other men. He would hide in a closet, filming it with a video camera.’

‘I really don’t see-’

‘But that’s not all. Baker was never even expected to be the Democratic candidate. Everyone thought he’d lose the primary. He was up against a really popular mayor of Seattle. Except someone produced a tape of the mayor talking on the phone, saying there were too many “chinks and spics” in the city. Baker just glided to the nomination.’

‘Where’s this going, Uri?’

‘I don’t know. It just seems that – until all this impeachment stuff – somebody up there really liked Stephen Baker. Liked him a lot.’

There was a time when that would have been enough to make Maggie tell Uri to piss off. When they were going out, Baker had been a constant source of tension: Uri pointing out flaws in his speeches, little missteps in his tactics, Maggie always getting defensive. It seemed ridiculous now, but Maggie had long suspected that Uri had become jealous of this other man in her life – and took every opportunity to do him down.

Now, though, she was ready to hear anything that might help explain the bizarre and lethal chain of events that had unfolded this last week. Not that she could yet work out how this fitted in. ‘Uri, I have to leave here any minute now. If I need to reach you, where will you be?’

‘In the edit suite. I can’t get any work done at home at the moment. My sister’s visiting from Tel Aviv – she’s decided her mission in life is to clean every surface of my apartment.’

A different cog in Maggie’s mind started turning. ‘Your sister?’ So that had been the woman Maggie had heard in the background on that call to the New York apartment. Not a new lover after all. She felt a knot deep inside her – one she had only been dimly aware of until this moment – begin to loosen and unravel.

‘Are you sure I can’t come with you, wherever you’re going? I might even be useful. I have some experience you know.’ He did a little mime suggesting a man of action.

‘I know, Uri. And I’m really grateful. But I’ve drawn too many people into this mess already.’

She could see that he wanted to insist, but stopped himself, aware that he was in no position to do so. ‘OK. But take care of yourself, Maggie.’ They were standing now, close together, with the same hesitation they felt when they would part at Penn Station on a Sunday night before she headed down to Washington. ‘I mean it. Do it for me, if not for you.’ He leaned forward and kissed the top of her head. Then he turned and walked away. She watched for several long seconds, wondering if he would turn around. But he didn’t.

An announcement came over the tannoy, prompting her to look at her watch: she really would have to leave right now if she was to get to Teterboro in time. But she had the guilty, nagging sensation of something she was meant to do, some task left incomplete. She was about to switch off the computer when it came to her: Liz.

Her sister had sent that text hours ago: Call me urgently. Something strange is happening, when Maggie had still been at the airport in Idaho. But then, straight afterwards, there had been that message from Sanchez about the police and she had put everything else out of her mind.

She picked out one of the unused, disposable phones and dialled Liz’s number.

‘Christ, thank God Almighty.’

‘Liz, what is it?’

‘Jesus, when I hadn’t heard from you, I thought maybe-’

‘I’m OK. Liz, calm down.’ She could hear her sister’s breaths coming quickly, as if she were about to cry.

‘You may be able to handle all this, Maggie, but I’m not sure we can. Not if something happened to you. Ma and me-’

‘You haven’t told her anything!’

‘Course I haven’t.’ A loud sniff. ‘But Jesus, Maggie, you had me worried.’ Now the contagion seemed to have spread, as the phone was filled by the noise of a child sobbing. ‘Oh, it’s OK, Calum pet. Mummy’s OK.’ There was rustling and more sniffing. ‘There you go, love. Oh look, Peppa Pig’s on.’

‘Liz, I can call another time.’

‘No! You’ve got to see this.’

‘See what?’

‘Get your computer out, get online.’

‘Hang on. I haven’t any time, I’ve-’

‘This won’t take a second.’

‘Liz, this better be…’ She opened the laptop and waited as it came back to life. ‘All right, it’s on.’

‘OK, go to the Freenet page where…You know what, forget it. I’ve still got remote access, I’ll do it.’

Maggie watched as the cursor moved, apparently by magic, around her screen. From the internet browser it directed itself to the Freenet and from there to the eerie, unsmiling portrait that constituted victorforbes.gov. Maggie could see that Liz was typing in the password – the twelve letters of ‘Stephen Baker’ rendered as asterisks – that transformed that image into the page that glistened with just a single date. March 15, a quarter-century ago.

Now, though, only a vestige of the original image was visible. It appeared to be slowly fading away on the screen, as square by square it was replaced by another.

On an electronic post-it which Liz had somehow thrown up on the screen, the cursor began typing. Look very carefully.

Before her eyes, a photograph was materializing. It was old, grainy and black-and-white but it looked vaguely familiar.

As the pixels filled out, each one becoming more defined, Maggie saw what she was looking at. It was a newspaper shot of the Meredith Hotel, the night it all but burned to the ground. And there in the foreground were the guests, milling around on the street in a state of semi-dress, most in pyjamas or bathrobes.

Another message from Liz: Do you see who I see?

Maggie looked closely at the picture whose resolution was improving with each second. A cluster of three people were in sharpest focus, their faces wearing the panicked expressions of those caught up in a disaster. And now, with a shudder, she recognized him.

There, hugging himself against the cold night, watching the Meredith Hotel burn down was the man whose face Maggie, along with the entire American people and now the world, had come to know. Younger, unlined but undeniably the same person.

She was looking at Stephen Baker.