Under Siege

CHAPTER FIVE

Jack Yocke stared at the words on the screen as he worried a fingernail. This was America as he saw it, a deliciously mad, pragmatic place. Americans want justice, but not too much. They want order, but not too much. They want laws, but not too many. Now, into this cauldron of free spirits had been introduced Chano Aldana and his four billion dollars.

$4,000,000,000. The amount of murder, mayhem, treachery, and treason that four billion dollars would buy was almost beyond comprehension. And Aldana was just the man to make the purchase. What did he care if the foundations cracked and the house came down? He had his. And he had served notice.

“Your style is atrocious.” Ott Megenthaler was reading over his shoulder.

“Not right for the Post, eh?”

“Definitely not.”

“Aldana can’t win.”

“You know it and I know it, but apparently he doesn’t.”

“A little licentiousness, Americans enjoy that. A little illicit pleasure to apologize for on Sunday morning, what’s the harm? But Aldana will sooner or later be crushed like a gnat if he tries to intimidate people here like he did in Colombia.”

“No doubt Liarakos tried to tell him that.”

“His best defense is to play the underdog. David versus Goliath.”

“Chano Aldana is Goliath,” the columnist said dryly and pulled a nearby chair around. “He made that pretty plain this afternoon.”

“We’re going to have to legalize dope, Ott. Right now nobody wants to make it legal, yet nobody wants to live in an America that is so well policed that it can’t be sold.”

“If more-efficient police are what it takes, I’m for it,” Mergenthaler said.

“Aww, bullshit. You haven’t thought this through. You despised J. Edgar Hoover. You thought the House Un-American Activities Committee was a cancer on the body politic.” When Mergenthaler tried to reply, Yocke raised his voice and overrode him. “I’ve read some of your old columns. Don’t try to change your spots now.”

After making sure Yocke had really shut up, Mergenthaler said, “I’ve been to Holland and seen the kids lying in the public squares, whacked out on hash, scrambling their brains permanently while the police stand and watch, while the world walks around them. I’ve been to the Dutch morgues and seen the bodies. I’ve been to the D.C. morgue and seen the bodies there too. This shit ain’t tobacco and it ain’t liquor. Two crack joints will make an average person an addict. Legalize it? No! A thousand times no.”

Jack Yocke threw up his hands. “Medellín had four thousand and fifteen murder victims delivered to the morgue in 1989. Those were the bodies they found. Medellín has a population of two million. That’s a murder rate of over two hundred per hundred thousand people.” Yocke’s eyes narrowed. “Our rate here in the District is around eighteen or nineteen. That’s four hundred and thirty-eight murders in 1989. When our murder rate is ten times worse than it is now, Ott—ten times worse—then I’ll ask you how much sympathy you feel for all those addicts who knew better and took their first puff anyway.”

“It won’t get that bad here.”

“You think the black militants and liberals who run this town are gonna fix things? You met Aldana this afternoon. Like hell it won’t get that bad!”

“Didn’t you just say that Aldana would get his sooner or later?”

“It isn’t Aldana I’m worried about. It’s all the other flies that kind of money will attract.”

When Mergenthaler left and went back to his office, Jack Yocke tried to write some more and found he couldn’t. He was fuming, irritable. His eye fell on the front page of today’s paper with its photo of George Bush sailing off Kennebunkport, Maine. Bush was waving, wearing a wide grin. Jack Yocke threw the paper into the wastepaper basket.

Rock Creek Park is Washington’s attempt at Central Park. Unlike that vast expanse of trees and grass in New York City, Rock Creek Park is not a pedestrian’s paradise. Part of the reason is geography.

The park begins a dozen miles north of the Potomac River in Montgomery County, Maryland, as an undeveloped stretch along a modest creek meandering southward toward the river.

For several hundred yards after the creek flows under the eight-lane beltway, houses and yards come right to the edge of the water. The gentle trickle soon reaches the grounds of the Walter Reed Army Hospital, however, with its vast expanse of lawns. South of the hospital grounds the park is about a quarter mile wide for several miles. Here it is a pleasant oasis of trees and greenery on the steep banks of the creek ravine.

Crossing into the District, the green belt finally assumes parklike dimensions. For the next four miles the park is about a mile wide and provides a site for a golf course and numerous scenic stretches of two-lane blacktop that wind through the wooded, boulder-choked ravines of aptly named Rock Creek and its tributaries.

The park narrows at the National Zoological Park, which occupies its entire width. South of the zoo, the park along the creek drainage is only several hundred yards wide, merely the sides of the steep Rock Creek ravine, and is crisscrossed by bridges that carry the major streets and avenues of Washington.

Two miles south of the zoo the creek deposits its saline solution of street and lawn runoff into the Potomac. The creek mouth is directly across the Georgetown Channel from Theodore Roosevelt Island. The park there provides a modest accent of green near the water, a mere foreground for the vast urban skyline behind it.

For most of its length the park consists of uncomfortably steep, rock-strewn hillsides densely covered with hardwood trees. In spite of the mild autumn, by early December the trees had lost all their leaves and transformed themselves into a semi-opaque wilderness of gray branches and trunks that gently muffled some of the city noise.

Henry Charon automatically adjusted the placement of his feet to avoid fallen branches and loose rocks, yet the thick carpet of dead, dry leaves rustled loudly at every step. A good soaking rain, he knew, would leave the leaf carpet sodden and allow a man to walk silently across it. Not now, though.

Below him, on his right, cars hummed along Ross Drive, one of the scenic lanes along Rock Creek that functioned as an alternate commuter route during rush hour. Charon strode along the hillside in a tireless, swinging gait with his eyes moving. He paused occasionally to examine major outcrops of rock, then resumed his northward movements.

This type of terrain he knew well. It would be a wonderful area in which to hide, if he could find the right place. These sidewalk warriors would be on his turf if they hunted him here.

He consulted his map again, then changed course to top the ridge. This ridge wasn’t high, only a hundred feet or so, but it was far too steep for casual urban walkers and hikers. Accustomed as he was to scrambling up slopes in the Rockies, Henry Charon didn’t even draw a deep breath as he climbed to the top of the narrow ridgeline and paused to examine his surroundings.

Just before dusk he found it. He was exploring along the foot of an outcropping from the formation that formed the caprock of the ridge. A gap in the rock led into a small sheltered cave, more of an overhang, really. A large boulder obscured most of the opening. In the gloom he could see several pop cans and cigarette butts. The dirt of the floor was packed hard, no doubt from the feet of teenagers or derelicts. Many footprints and shoe marks. This place would do nicely, if he ever needed it.

He examined the place carefully, paying particular attention to the cracks and crevices that rose off to one side. He pulled some loose rock from one. Yes, he could put a gun and some other supplies in there and pile the rock back in, just in case.

Henry Charon left the cave and paused outside to examine the setting again. He was sure he could find it again. After a last look around in all directions, Henry Charon set off down the hillside.

About a half hour later Thanos Liarakos arrived at his home in Edgemoor and parked the Jag in the garage.

His wife, Elizabeth, was in the kitchen putting the finishing touches on the canapés. The guests were supposed to arrive at seven. She gave him a buss on the cheek as he poured himself a drink. “How’d it go today?”

“You wouldn’t believe it. The man is certifiably insane. At the press conference he claimed he was the devil.”

She looked at him to see if he was kidding. “An insanity defense?”

“I suggested it, and he didn’t say anything one way or the other, until I mentioned the psychiatrists and psychologists, then he just said no. That’s it, one word. ‘No.’ End of discussion.”

“Your mother called this afternoon.” Elizabeth had her back to him and was spreading cream cheese on the celery.

“Umph.” Elizabeth’s birthday had been last week. She had just turned thirty-nine. As he stared at her trim waistline and the way her buttocks shaped her dress, Liarakos decided she could pass for ten years younger.

“She just heard on the news that you’re representing Aldana.”

“And she was unhappy.”

“She had a fit. Wanted to know how you could defend scum like that. ‘All those years … my little boy … no honor.’ It wasn’t a pleasant conversation.”

Liarakos turned his attention to the backyard. They had almost an acre here. The hired man had raked the leaves three times this fall but at least a bushel had collected on the top of the pool cover and in the hot tub. He would have to clean up the leaves again when he had time.

“I told her,” Elizabeth was saying, “that every man is entitled to a defense, but you know her.”

“Yeah.”

“I tried to be nice to her, Thanos, I really did. But I am so sick of hearing her whine and bitch. Honest to God, I have completely had it with her ethics lectures.”

“I know.”

“Why don’t you explain it to her one more time?” She turned to face him. “It’s not fair that I have to be the one who keeps explaining the Constitution and the American legal system to her. When she starts that how-can-my-Thanos-do-this crap, I just cringe. She doesn’t listen, she won’t listen.”

“I’ll talk to her again.”

“Promise?”

“Yeah, promise.”

She turned back to the celery.

“Where are the girls?” he asked.

“Upstairs. They’re going to be doing homework while the guests are here. And I bought them a new CD today. They’re listening to that for the eleventh time.”

Liarakos wandered into the living room. Elizabeth had the crystal out, the wine open, and the cheeses and crackers already arranged on the white damask tablecloth. At least she understood what he did professionally. She had been a new associate, a Harvard Law grad, when they started dating. Six months later they spent a long ski weekend in Aspen and returned home married. She had had to resign her position with the firm of course, but he had just made junior partner.

It had been rocky along the way, but they were still trying, still hanging in there.

His mind turned to his new client, turning over possible defense tactics, reviewing the charges yet again. Aldana’s case was going to be difficult. The government had two turncoat witnesses and enough circumstantial evidence to sink the Titanic. Aldana’s little press conference performance this afternoon hadn’t helped.

He would tape the network news at six. Tomorrow he would put the associates to researching pretrial publicity issues. Perhaps the press conference hadn’t precluded such a motion, considering the overwhelming publicity Aldana’s extradition had received.

He checked his watch. The network evening news would come on in ten minutes. He should probably set up the VCR now.

When that chore was completed, he wandered back to the kitchen for another drink. “When did the maid leave?”

“About five. She helped me with all of this.”

“You want me to help?”

“No. Go relax. I’ve got everything under control.”

Everything under control. A defense lawyer never had everything under control. The concept was foreign to him. About all you could do was anticipate the thrusts and jabs of the prosecution and attempt to parry them. And have a few surprises of your own up your sleeve. The name of the game was damage control.

How could he control the damage the government witnesses would do? And the client, Aldana? Could he be controlled? Would he listen to good advice? Liarakos snorted. He already knew the answer to that. Oh well, it was Aldana’s ass on the line, not his. Still, he hated to lose. He never fought gracefully in a losing cause, which was why his defense team was bringing in two million dollars a year in fees to the firm.

He snapped the television on in the living room and stood watching it as Elizabeth set the last of the hors d’oeuvres on the table.

Aldana’s press conference was the lead story. “Come watch this, Elizabeth.”

The anchor said Aldana’s statement spoke for itself. He fell silent and looked off to one side, at the monitor no doubt, waiting. Aldana came on the screen. As his voice filled the living room—“To me has been given the key …”—Liarakos heard his wife’s sharp intake of breath. “My God!”

“He has an effect, doesn’t he?”

After the questions, the network replayed the statement three times. The consensus of the “experts”—a lawyer, a psychiatrist, and a college instructor in South American voodoo culture — was that Aldana was a criminal megalomaniac.

The phone rang and at the same time the door chimes sounded. As Elizabeth went to the front door to admit the guests, Liarakos went to the study to take the call. The firm’s senior partner was on the line:

“I just saw our newest, most famous client on the news.”

“Yeah, I watched it too.”

“Thanos, you’ve got to figure out a way to shut him up. In one performance he managed to convince half the people in America that he’s guilty as hell. And that was the half that was undecided.”

“I strongly urged him not—”

“Thanos, he’s one man. Our firm has fifty-two partners and one hundred twelve associates who represent over a dozen Fortune five hundred companies and about a hundred fifty smaller ones. The heart of our business is regulatory matters and commercial litigation. Now it’s one thing, represent run-of-the-mill criminal defendants, but it’s quite another to represent a man who’s out to prove he’s the Antichrist, beyond a reasonable doubt.”

“He’s innocent until proven guilty.”

“You know that and I know that, but the general public may not. I’m laying it right on the line, Thanos. We have never told you whom you could or couldn’t represent. But this firm is not going to bankrupt itself for the privilege of representing the most notorious criminal since Al Capone. Now you shut that man up or tell him he’ll have to get another lawyer. Have I made myself clear?”

“You have, Harvey.”

“Stop by my office tomorrow.” The connection broke.

Thanos Liarakos sat for a moment with the telephone receiver in his hand, then slowly lowered it onto its cradle.

Harvey Brewster was something of an ass. If he thought the firm could get rid of Chano Aldana by just throwing his file at him and filing a notice with the clerk of the court, he was in for a rude surprise. The judge would not let Liarakos or the firm out of the case unless and until another competent, experienced attorney had agreed to represent Aldana and not delay the proceedings. The pressure on the judge to proceed expeditiously would be excruciating, and the judge had the tools to transfer that pressure squarely onto counsel for both sides.

Liarakos knew the judge would not hesitate to use his authority. Liarakos knew the judge. Gardner Snyder was in his early seventies and had been on the bench for over thirty years. He was the frostiest curmudgeon wearing a judicial robe that Liarakos had ever run into. No doubt that was why the Justice Department had maneuvered so adroitly to ensure that this case went onto Snyder’s calendar.

Perhaps tomorrow the prosecutor would move for an order gagging both sides. Liarakos suspected that just now the prosecutor’s phone was also ringing. Perhaps he should make the motion himself. It was indisputable that Aldana would have to be silenced one way or the other or the man wouldn’t get a fair trial.

The door opened. Elizabeth’s head appeared. “Thanos, come visit with our guests.”

The guests were buzzing about Aldana’s news conference. Those who hadn’t seen the news show were being briefed by those who had. Liarakos was bombarded with questions, all of which he shrugged off with a smile. The smile was an effort.

He had finished his third drink of the evening and was telling himself he didn’t need and probably couldn’t handle a fourth, when he saw Elizabeth motioning to him from the kitchen.

“Your mother’s on the phone. She’s really revved.”

“I’ll take it in the study.”

Jefferson Brody and a woman Liarakos knew only vaguely were in a serious discussion in the study, but he made his excuses and closed the door firmly behind them.

“Hi, Mom.”

“Thanos, Thanos, what have you done?”

“Well, I—”

She wasn’t interested in his answer. She steamrollered on: “I saw that horrible man—your client—on the news this evening. I meant to call you immediately but my friends have been on the phone for over an hour. I called you as soon as I had a chance.”

“Mom, I’m a lawyer. I—”

“You don’t have to make a living representing dope-peddling scum like that! My God, your father and I scrimped and saved and did without to put you through college and law school so you could represent filth like Alda … Alda-something. Have you no honor? Have you no morals? What kind of man are you, Thanos?”

“Mom, I’m a lawyer — no, let me finish! I’m a lawyer and this man is entitled to be represented by a lawyer no matter what crimes he is accused of.”

“But he is guilty!”

“He isn’t guilty until a jury says he is. And guilty or not, he must have a lawyer.”

“I hope to God you lose and this man pays for his crimes, Thanos. He has murdered and assassinated and bribed and done God knows what-all and he must be put somewhere so he can’t keep hurting innocent people. Thousands of innocent people. Thanos, you pervert your talents and your religion by helping such a man.”

“Mom, I’m not going to keep arguing this.”

“He says he has the key to hell. And he does. You are helping this scum stay in business. You are helping him murder innocent people. How in the name of your dead father do you sleep nights?”

“I’ve heard all of this I’m going to listen to.”

“No, you haven’t! You are going to listen to your mother who loves you and wants to save your soul. You are going to stop helping these people. Thanos! My Thanos. You are breaking my heart.”

“Mom, we have a houseful of guests. I’m not going to insult them by staying here in the study listening to you rant about something you don’t understand. Don’t you have any faith in me?”

“Faith in you? When you prostitute yourself for criminals such as Aldana? You make me nauseous.” She slammed her phone down.

Is there anybody who didn’t watch the news tonight?

His baseball glove was lying on the table. He picked it up and kneaded the soft leather. He smacked the pocket with his fist. Damn! Damn, damn, damn.

He turned off the lights and sat in the darkness. After a moment he loosened his tie and stretched out on the couch. The hum of voices through the door, the gentle background of the furnace fans, the noises reached him and he listened for a while, then didn’t listen. The noises became background, like an evening crowd in the grandstand at Tinker Field in Orlando, buzzing and sighing in rhythm with the game.

The crowds were never large, maybe fifteen hundred people on a good evening. But all the hot, muggy evenings were very good, regardless of how many people came to watch. The fastballs only came in about eighty miles per hour, plenty fast if you were forty-one years old and trying to get the bat around on one of them. On those all-too-rare occasions when you slapped the ball with good wood you strained every tendon charging for first. Occasionally you even surprised yourself and beat the throw.

That summer now seemed like a dream time. Liarakos could still smell the sweat, still feel the earth under his spikes, still see the ball leave the bat and float toward him as he charged it. Even then he knew he was living a fantasy, the sublime pinnacle of his life. The sun and the sweat and the laughter of his teammates …

Someone was shaking him. “Daddy. Wake up. Daddy.”

The lights were on. “Huh?”

It was Susanna, his twelve-year-old. “Daddy, it’s Mommy. She’s locked herself in the upstairs bathroom and won’t come out.”

Thanos Liarakos uncoiled and rushed from the room. Through the living room and the guests staring, up the stairs two at a time with Susanna in her nightie running behind him, trying to keep up.

He tried the handle on the door. Locked! He pounded on the door with his fists. “Elizabeth? Elizabeth, can you hear me?”

Nothing.

Not again! Please God, not again!

“Elizabeth, if you don’t open this door now, I’m going to break it down.”

Susanna and her younger sister were standing there in the hallway, watching. They were sobbing.

“You girls go to your room. Do as I say.” They went.

He kicked at the door. The girls were standing in their doorway, watching and crying. He braced himself against the wall and smashed at the door with his right foot. It splintered. Another kick and the lock gave.

She was on the floor. A trace of white powder around her nostrils. Some powder on the counter. A rolled-up dollar bill clutched in her hand. Her eyes unfocused, the pupils huge. Her heart going like a racehorse.

Damn!

“Where did you get it, Elizabeth? Who gave you the cocaine?”

He shook her vigorously. Her eyes swam.

“Can you hear me, woman? Who gave you the coke?”

“Jeff, uhh, Jeffer …”

He lowered her to the floor and went to the girls’ bedroom. “Susanna, call an ambulance. Dial nine-one-one. Your mother’s sick.”

The child was crying freely. He held her at arm’s length and stared into her face. “Can you do this?”

She nodded and wiped at her tears.

“Good girl. Dial nine-one-one and give them our address and tell them to send an ambulance.”

Down the hall past the bathroom to the staircase, and down them two at a time. T. Jefferson Brody was standing by the far wall.

Brody put up his hands as Liarakos charged at him. “Now, Thanos—”

“Get outta my house, you son of a bitch.” He hit him with all he had. Brody went down and two men grabbed Liarakos’ arms.

“Out! All you people get out!” He jerked his arms free. “Party’s over. Everybody get the fuck outta my house.”

He gestured toward Brody, who was sitting on the floor rubbing his jaw. “Drag this piece of dog shit out with you or I’ll kill him.”