Authors: Brian Haig
“Believe me, I know that.”
Manny looked ready to whip out whatever was inside his pocket. “Yeah? Then you better—”
“Slow it down, Manny. Think about it. A man with hundreds of millions, would he be here, in this rotten excuse for a prison?
This is America, land of the free and the brave, of all the justice you can afford. The rich boys are all eating steak and
getting nice tans in the federal country clubs. I’m here, with you. Put two and two together.”
Rather than respond to that, Manny glanced at the man standing to Alex’s left, a large, hairy monster named Miguel. Physical
appearances aside, Manny was the muscle, Miguel the brain. They had been longtime compadres in Cuba, arrived on the same miserable
little boat, and for almost two decades had shared a cramped, smelly cell on the second floor. Manny had the top bunk and
stayed out front. He did the bullying, the enforcement, bought off the guards, and terrified the other gangs. Miguel slept
on the bottom, and spent most of his time in the library thinking up schemes and scams. It was he who researched Alex’s background
after the guard tipped them off. And it was he who devised this coarse plot to shake Alex down.
After a moment, Miguel leaned forward and butted in. “Were you really the cashbox behind Yeltsin?” Not a word about that had
been mentioned in any of the many articles about Konevitch Miguel had read on the Internet.
Sensing the sudden shift in power, Alex turned and faced Miguel. “Seemed like a good idea at the time.”
“But maybe not, eh?”
“You’re perceptive. After all, look where it got me,” Alex replied, shrugging indifferently, as if he’d be as happy here,
among these men, as lounging with a bunch of gorgeous ladies in skimpy bikinis at a Caribbean resort. He was nearly gagging
on indifference. “The same former KGB thugs who stole my money put me here.”
“Why they put you here, man?”
“They want me back in Russia, where they can get their hands on me, or dead.”
“That right?” Miguel leaned his large bulk against the wall and thoughtfully twisted the small goatee at the end of his chin.
With that admission this tall Russian had just made a fatal slip. A dozen questions suddenly popped into Miguel’s mind. Would
the Russians pay to have this guy whacked? Who did Miguel and his friends have to contact? How much was Konevitch worth dead?
That was the big question.
Maybe the situation still held possibilities.
Alex was beginning to feel awkward. He was naked, vulnerable, and dripping wet. Who knew what they had hidden in those pockets?
Any one of these three brutes would happily slit his throat and casually watch his blood spill down the drain. He reached
over and shut off the spigot. “Mind if I get a towel and dry off?” he asked.
“Why not?” Miguel grunted and winked. “Who’s stopping you?”
Alex began edging around him, carefully, in the direction of the towel room. “What do you want with money, anyway?” he asked
over his shoulder. “You’re in prison, what good does it do?”
The Cubans followed about a step behind. “Don’t you know anything?” Miguel answered, wondering exactly how much this Russian,
dead, might be worth. “Money’s everything. Inside the joint, outside—makes no differences. Good lawyers, cigarettes, dope,
smuggled-in girls, even guards.”
Alex seemed to consider that a moment, then, rapidly changing the subject, asked, “Have you ever heard of AOL? America Online?”
Manny and the third, unnamed man exchanged puzzled looks. Totally clueless. Miguel thought he might’ve heard of it, a hazy
recollection at best. But in an effort not to appear dumb, he produced a knowing nod. “Sure. What about it?” he asked, as
if he could write a textbook on the subject.
“It’s the new thing, an Internet company that’s making money hand over foot. The stock could easily quadruple in the next
few years, maybe more.”
Miguel turned to his colleagues. “Advice from a hustler who ripped off millions back in Russia. Does this guy think we’re
stupid, or what?”
“You’re forgetting something. I also made hundreds of millions.”
This got a slight nod. He’d read that on the Internet.
“Point is,” Alex plowed ahead, grabbing a towel and wrapping it around his waist, “you’re losing out. The stock market’s on
a tear. You’re trying to squeeze a few dollars from losers on the inside. The easy money’s outside, the big money. It’s perfectly
legal and above board.”
“Cons in the joint ain’t allowed to buy stock,” Manny chimed in angrily, as if that ended the discussion. From everything
Miguel had told him about this Russian, he had been expecting the once-in-a-lifetime payday all convicts live for. Manny had
lain awake on his bunk the night before, sweating in the intense heat, dreaming of the money and what he could do with it.
Like the rest of the Mariel Boys, Manny had an appeal for release grinding its way through the courts. They had collectively
pooled their resources to hire a lawyer, a distant third cousin of one of the gang. The cousin offered an impressive discount,
bragged about his many legal victories, and made lots of rowdy promises. He turned out to be a total loser. Between booze
and gambling, Mr. Loser lost track of their paperwork with disturbing regularity; the only thing he turned out to be good
at was consistently missing the deadlines for filings.
Mr. Loser had to go.
Miguel had asked around until he found the perfect mouthpiece. Mr. Perfect was a cutthroat from Miami who billed four hundred
an hour and produced miracles. He was owned by the Colombians, a gaudy loudmouth who had earned quite the reputation for keeping
their killers, mules, and pushers out of jail. Legal mastery was part of it; knowing which judges and prosecutors to help
with their home mortgages and kids’ college bills, the larger part. In his spare time, he was allowed to freelance as much
as he wanted.
It was an outside shot, at best. Mr. Perfect was quite expensive. The billable hours would pile up. The case could drag on
for years. And for such a large group, a band of thugs who definitely had not distinguished themselves as model prisoners,
the bribes would be mountainous.
Mr. Perfect, though, was their only hope. The Cubans talked endlessly of walking out the gate and retiring in a small, lazy
southern Florida town. Life would be so good. They would muscle their way into a few strip clubs and pawnshops, drink cerveza
from dusk to dawn, cavort with the strippers, and put the ugly old days behind them.
Alex kept a close eye on Manny, who looked angry and frustrated that their mark turned out to have shallow pockets. He grabbed
another towel and began briskly rubbing his hair. “You mean you can’t invest under your own name,” he corrected Manny in an
even tone. “Have a lawyer handle your money. They represent you, they can’t blow the whistle. It’s in their oath.”
Miguel shot Manny a look that said: This sounds interesting, so cool it, for now. “And how would this work?” he asked.
“It’s simple. Surely you already have money and maybe you already have a lawyer in mind.”
“Maybe we do,” Miguel replied, exchanging looks with his pals.
“I have a friend on the outside who will set up a trading account. I’m assuming you have a way to communicate with the outside.
It needs to be instantaneous. We’ll be buying and selling every day. Throw in whatever cash you have. I can name ten stocks
right now that are set to explode, and the spreads in commodities have never been better.”
“How do we know you won’t lose our money?”
“You know what a stop-loss order is?”
Miguel was through pretending he knew things he had never heard of. A slow shake of the head.
“With each purchase, you designate a trigger price that he programs into his computer. If the stock falls to that level, the
broker is required to sell.” Alex jabbed the air with a finger. “One push of a button and he dumps everything.”
“That’s all we have to do?”
“I told you it’s easy, Miguel,” Alex assured him, leaving Miguel to ponder the interesting question of how Alex knew his name.
They had not been introduced. Nobody had mentioned his name. How much did Konevitch know about the Mariel Boys? The suspicion
struck him that the Russian had been expecting this shakedown, maybe even prepared for it.
No, nobody was that cunning.
Alex walked over to the clothing locker, picked up his underwear and dirty coveralls, and began dressing. “But don’t worry,”
he continued. “The stocks I pick will never trigger a sell order. Tell your lawyer to watch the action for a month. If he
likes what he sees, he can join the fun. Better yet, cut a deal. In return for handling his investments, he’ll handle your
case.”
“And you,” Manny asked. “What do you get?”
“Protection,” Alex told him, tying his shoes. “Also use your influence to arrange a new cellmate. Ernie gets on my nerves.
I’m tired of tearing down pictures of little children.”
“Easy,” Miguel answered for all of them. “One more question.”
“Shoot.”
A nice smile, followed by a quick shift of mood and demeanor. “You know what happens if you lose our money, Mr. Smart Guy?”
“I have a fair idea. Do I look worried?”
He really didn’t. Not in the least.
The end of Elena’s first month in the South Arlington rental apartment and she was beginning to feel at home.
The D.C. housing market was hot as a pistol and her real estate agent had pleaded with her not to drop a hundred thousand
off the asking price. It was the Watergate, after all; why throw away money? Her neighbors would never forgive her; not to
mention the Realtor’s own bitter feelings about the seven grand shucked off her own fee. Elena dug in her heels and stood
fast. Lured by the great discount, inside two days, ten couples lined up for a shot. A brief, vicious bidding war erupted.
The escalation quickly shot through the roof. The dust settled $120K later, at least $20K more than average Watergate prices
for a cramped two-bedroom.
The winners were a young Bolivian couple with no children but plenty of money and an open desire to tell everyone back home
they were part of the la-di-da Watergate crowd. Elena drove a hard bargain. A hundred thousand down, in cash, she insisted,
before the titles were checked and the closing moved along at its usual constipated pace. The young couple hesitated only
briefly before Elena mentioned how much she liked the terms offered by the runner-up bidder. A hundred thousand in cash landed
on the table.
Their business affairs had always been handled by Alex. She was proud she had done so well. She promptly put down twenty thousand
on a top-of-the-line server built by Sun Microsystems, and arranged for furniture from a cheap rental warehouse. MP helped
her locate an apartment, not far from his own shabby home in a run-down neighborhood. At seven hundred a month the price was
right, and Elena signed the lease under the name Ellen Smith. A few of MP’s clients with expertise in such matters swiftly
produced a driver’s license and social security card to match her new name. Charge cards could be traced, and therefore were
too dangerous. She vowed to live on cash.
The landlord wasn’t fooled and neither did he care. Half his tenants were illegal aliens. As long as they paid cash, in American
bills, on time, they could claim to be Bill Gates for all he cared. The phone service, both cellular and home, and Internet
service, were opened by and billed to MP’s firm.
The only remaining trace of Elena Konevitch was her car insurance. She called the company, said she had moved, and gave MP’s
office as her new address.
The killers were out there. With Alex locked up, she was the only one they could reach, she thought. The killers were professionals
with loads of experience. They knew countless ways to find her and would peek under every rock. She was on her own for the
first time; every decision would be hers. She needed to be disciplined and careful.
In her college days, Elena had taken courses in computer language, and had been quite good at it. A fast trip to a local mall
and her apartment quickly flooded with books about programming and all sorts of other computer esoterica.
She had one last thing left to do. Sipping from a cup of tea, she unfolded a note Alex had passed her in court. She dialed
the number he had written out and waited patiently until the connection went through.
A male voice answered, “Mikhail Borosky, private investigations.”
“Hello, Mikhail. It’s Elena Konevitch. Alex asked me to call.”
“Yeah, I just learned he’s in prison,” Mikhail replied. “He okay?”
“Fine. Probably safer inside than out here.”
There was a pause for a moment before Elena said, “From now on, direct your calls and send all your materials to me, addressed
to Ellen Smith.” She quickly gave him her new apartment address, her e-mail account information, and then said, “The materials
you’ve already sent are hidden in a safe-deposit box at a bank. I went through everything three days ago.”
“It’s incredible isn’t it?”
“You’re incredible, Mikhail.”
“No, this is all Alex’s idea. He’s incredible.”
Enough incredibles. “Things have changed,” Elena told him, very businesslike. “I’m handling this now. Alex has kept me informed
of your general activities, but it might be best if you filled me in on all the details.”
“This could take a while.”
“With Alex in prison, I find I have lots of time on my hands. Start from the beginning.”
A
fter an hour of wailing and gnashing, of fruitless attempts at denial accompanied by turbulent rantings and sulfurous threats
directed at the messengers, the long procession of accountants finally packed up their books and spreadsheets and fled from
his office. The door closed quietly, at last. Sergei Golitsin hunched down in his chair and stared at the blank white walls.
He was angry and felt depressed. The number crunchers had been merciless. No punches pulled, no quarter given.
The export-import bank, the flagship of Golitsin Enterprises—and one of its last surviving companies—was careening off a financial
cliff. The priceless monopoly on the exchanging of foreign currencies had long since expired. The competition had swooped
in and undercut his rates with a vengeance. For a few months, the five percent fee he charged had pumped up the profits and
hid the bad news: customers were fleeing in droves.