help.”
“Arnie.” Wirth’s anger was building. “That’s the same as telling them we can’t control our own goddam business. Contractually we’re in bed with them for years on down the road. We can’t have them wondering what the fuck’s next or they’ll chop us off at the knees. Once that happens, forget ever having them go to bat for us again. And I mean ever! And it won’t make a longhorn’s-fucking-ass difference what party or administration’s in power.”
Moss smiled delicately. “Sy, you pay me for advice. This time I suggest you take it. Washington is not a group we can ignore and then apologize to later. We’re not buying land or oil rigs here, we’re helping facilitate a revolution. They need to know what’s going on and understand that we would very much appreciate their help in resolving the situation. There are times in life when honesty really is the best policy. This is one of them.”
Wirth stared at him. He hated all this. Hated that it had happened. Hated to have anything go this far out of his control. Especially when it revolved around something as simple and stupid as a few photographs snapped by a nosy priest. On the other hand, he knew he had to consider the counsel of Arnie Moss, a man he had known for years and to whom he had entrusted Striker’s legal wrangling ever since he had become chairman of the company.
Finally he looked to Truex. “Get in your Gulfstream and go back to Washington. Call them from the plane, tell them you’re coming and that it’s important they wait for you. You should be in their offices by seven, maybe eight their time. When you get there, tell them what’s happened and make me the bad guy, say that I wanted to go after the photographs on my own. That I hoped we’d retrieve them before anything came of it. But you disagreed and came here to talk me out of it because you felt it was important they know what has happened, not just because we’re all partners in this but because you value who they are and what they believe in and want their muscle and help. You convinced me you were right and went back to meet with them. That will explain the time delay if they already know what’s going on.” Wirth turned to Arnold Moss. “You okay with that?”
“Yes.” Moss nodded.
Wirth looked to Truex. “You?”
“Yes.”
“Call me when it’s done.”
“You bet.” Truex looked from one man to the other, then started for the door.
“Loyal,” Wirth said, and Truex turned back. “Dracula Joe Ryder in is Iraq with a group of other congressmen looking for any dirty crumb he can lay to us.”
“I know.”
“After you’re through with Washington, go there. Find Ryder and hold his hand. Be as gracious as you can be. Kiss his ass without looking like it. Show him anything he wants. Make him feel we have absolutely nothing to hide.”
Truex grinned. “There is no dirt, Sy. No cakes or crumbs, either. Never has been. We all know that, don’t we?” With a glance and a nod at Arnold Moss, he pulled open the door and went out.
15
Sy Wirth and Arnold Moss watched the door close behind Truex. When it had, Wirth looked to his general counsel. “I agree with what you said about SimCo. We set up to distance ourselves from it and Conor White as quickly and quietly as possible. At the same time, we have to distance ourselves from Hadrian and Truex. Even if it means opening the door to Joe Ryder and his congressional commission and inviting them in. Even if it means giving back every penny of the nine-hundred-plus million we’ve made in Iraq. It’s nothing compared to what we stand to make in the future.”
Wirth crossed to the window and looked out at the garish midday brightness of the city. “We needed a private security contractor for our expanded operations in Equatorial Guinea,” he mused out loud. “We felt Hadrian was already stretched too thin in Iraq. Also, there were some questions concerning our partnership there. Still, we trusted Hadrian and asked Loyal Truex to recommend a reliable contractor.”
Wirth turned and looked at Moss directly. “SimCo was a small subcontractor to Hadrian in Iraq. Truex liked the company and its honcho, Conor White, who he’d worked with before and who had outstanding credentials. Because of that he introduced us. We liked what we saw in White and hired his company. How could we know SimCo was a front for Hadrian, which was trying to expand its operations into West Africa without the questionable stigma of Iraq? What Hadrian, through SimCo, was attempting to gain in firing up the insurgency in Equatorial Guinea we had no idea whatsoever. As you said, Arnie, AG Striker is an oil field management and exploration company, nothing else.
“Hadrian could try to deny it by saying we have a contract that says we helped create SimCo and why. But if they did, they would have to produce the contract itself, the hard copy of which, as we all know, is locked in a great big Mosler safe in one of the most secure buildings in the world. If they wanted to produce an electronic copy from Washington’s database, they would have to have Washington’s approval, and that is something that would never happen. If Truex were to complain to them privately later, his going there now, and then on to meet with Ryder in Iraq, would only make it look as if he knew there was trouble all along and was trying to get everyone on his side before it blew up.
“If somehow the photographs are made public before we get them, it won’t be AG Striker that’s under Joe Ryder and the Justice Department’s laser beam, it will be Hadrian and SimCo.”
Wirth went to the mesquite-topped bar in the corner, poured himself a shot of Johnnie Walker Blue, and drank it in one swallow. Then he locked eyes with Arnold Moss and swore an oath.
“I am not going to lose the Bioko field, Arnie. Not to Hadrian. Not to Conor White or Joe Ryder. Not to Washington. I’m not going to lose it to anyone.”
16
AIR FRANCE FLIGHT 959, MALABO SAINT ISABEL AIRPORT
TO PARIS, CHARLES DE GAULLE AIRPORT.
STILL THURSDAY, JUNE 3. 10:30 P.M.
The seating in the economy cabin of the Airbus 319 was three and three divided by a center aisle, and the four-man army patrol that had escorted Marten and Marita and her people to the airport had commandeered one complete row for them. Window to aisle on the far side were Marita, Rosa, and Ernesto. Window to aisle on the other were Marten, Luis, and Gilberto. The flight had taken off during a lull in the storm, and the cabin lights had been lowered shortly after that. Save for the occasional passenger using an overhead light to read or work, most of the passengers slept, more out of relief to have escaped a long weather-related delay in Malabo than anything else.
Of them all, probably none was more thankful than Marten. Emotionally drained and enormously relieved to be airborne out of the army’s grasp, he only now realized the depth of his exhaustion. He’d been on Bioko for barely five days, but it seemed a lifetime. Still wired and restless, he tried to sleep, but it was impossible. Across the aisle, he could see the red-haired Ernesto awake, too, listening to something over a headset. A deep exhale and he turned to look out the window in time to see the Airbus break through the lingering cloud deck into a clear, moonlit night.
10:38 P.M.
