The Bancroft Strategy (37 page)

The deputy minister gave him a hard stare, which softened after a few seconds into something like approval. “I wish I could train my fellow nationals in the virtue of discretion. Greatly to my regret, they are not all so tight-lipped as you, Roger.” His eyes darted around, making sure that no one could overhear, and then he prompted, “But you somehow supposed I could be of help.”

“I was given to understand that you might be able to facilitate the kind of arrangement we require. I need hardly say that it would surely be profitable for all concerned.”

Belknap recognized the quickness of greed in the deputy minister's face; it seeped through his veins like a drug and hurried his speech. “You said it was a substantial order you required.”

“Substantial,” Belknap repeated. Andrus Pärt was seeking reassurance about his kickback. “Which translates to substantial benefits and finder's fees for the…matchmaker.”

“We are a small country, of course.” The man was testing him, tugging at the line.

“Small, yet rich in its customs, I had thought. If I am mistaken, if you do not have a vendor such as we seek, say so at once. We will look elsewhere. I should hate to waste your time.” Translation: Don't waste mine.

The deputy minister waved to a tall, cadaverous dignitary across the room. He had spent too much time with the Grinnell director; it might become conspicuous, which would not do. “Roger, I do want to be of help. I do. Let me brood for a few minutes. We will talk again shortly.”

With that, the Estonian plunged into a crowd of chorus directors and music enthusiasts. Presently Belknap was able to hear Pärt's voice exclaim, “A boxed set of highlights from the festival—what a marvelous idea!”

There was a rustling followed by admonitory hushing. On a raised, stepped platform on the far side of the room, the Empire State Chorus had assembled. Grinning from ear to ear, the baritones began snapping their fingers, and then singing. After a few bars, the room quieted enough to make them audible:

Belknap felt a shoulder tap, and turned to find the deputy minister at his elbow.

“Our national anthem,” Pärt whispered with a fixed smile.

“You must be very proud,” Belknap replied.

Through gritted teeth, the minister reproved, “Don't be unkind.”

“Not unkind, I hope. Merely impatient. Can we do business?” Belknap spoke in murmured tones.

The deputy minister nodded, then gestured with a head tilt to the room off the main hall. They would speak there, out of view.

“Forgive me,” the Estonian said in a low, confiding voice. “It's all very sudden. And irregular.”

“As it has been for us,” Belknap said. The deputy minister was still being coy; it was time to ratchet up the pressure. “I seem to have caused you more inconvenience than I had intended. There are other avenues for us to explore, and perhaps we should do so. Thank you for your time.” A curt bow.

“You misunderstand,” Pärt said, with a shade of insistence but not panic. He understood that the Grinnell director was doing what all
businessmen do: threatening to walk out in order to hasten matters to a conclusion. “I do wish to help. Indeed, I may be able to.”

“Your mastery of the subjunctive is admirable,” Belknap said in hushed reprimand. “I still fear that we waste each other's time.”
Now it is for you to win me back
was the unspoken subtext.

“Earlier, Roger, you made a point about confidences and discretion. You observed that they are a mainstay of your business. Just so, caution is a mainstay of mine. You must indulge me in this respect. There may be occasions on which you are grateful of it.”

Drifting in from the banquet hall, in three-part harmony, came the words
Forever may He bless and wield / O graciously all deeds of thine…

“Perhaps we will both need to compromise in our adherence to our cherished principles. You asked about our regular suppliers. I am sure a man of the world such as yourself understands that there can be upheavals in this business as in all others. No doubt you have heard reports of Khalil Ansari's death.” He studied the Estonian's expression as he pronounced the name. “No doubt you understand that established distribution networks can fall into disarray, while new ones establish themselves.”

Andrus Pärt looked uncomfortable; he knew enough about what Belknap was speaking about to realize that it was not an affair to be casually discussed—certainly not by a career politician like him. He needed to dig enough to be sure of his hunches; he did not wish to dig so far that his hands were soiled. Those would have been his calculations.

Belknap was weighing every word. “I know you are a man of taste. I am told that your country house in Paslepa is a thing of beauty.”

“It is a humble place, but my wife enjoys it.”

“Then perhaps she will enjoy it twice as much when you buy her a place that's twice the size.”

A long, lingering look: This was a man pulled in different directions by avarice and uncertainty.

“Or perhaps not.” Another jerk on the fishing line, to set the hook: “I enjoyed my conversation with you immensely. But, again, perhaps it is time for me to look elsewhere. As you…cautioned me, Estonia is a very small country. I believe your message was that large fish seldom appear in small ponds.” Another curt bow, and this time Belknap really did walk toward the exit, where he heard the mass voices belt out
This native country of mine!

A warm round of applause broke the silence, though it was muffled somewhat by the one-handed clapping from those holding glasses, napkins, canapés.

A hand on Belknap's shoulder, a word whispered in his ear. “Estotek,” said the deputy minister. “On Ravala Puiestee.”

“I could have gotten that from directory assistance.”

“I assure you, the real nature of this entity is closely guarded indeed. I have your word that you will divulge it to no one.”

“But of course,” Belknap replied.

“The principal goes by the name Lanham.”

“An odd name for an Estonian.”

“But not so odd for an American.”

An American.
Belknap's eyes narrowed.

“I think you will find that your needs can be met,” Pärt went on. “We are a small pond. But some of our fish are sizable indeed.”

“Impressive,” Belknap said frostily. “This native country of yours. Shall I send Lanham your regards?”

The deputy minister looked suddenly uneasy. “The most intimate relationships are sometimes conducted at more than arm's length,” he said. “Let me be clear. This isn't someone I've ever met face-to-face.” He held himself stiffly, as if suppressing a shudder. “Nor do I care to.”

Tallinn's business district was scarcely featured in the tourist brochures, yet many considered it to be the authentic heart of the city. The heart of the business district, in turn, was where the building where Estotek had its offices, a twenty-story erection sheathed in mirrored glass, was. A full mile outside the Old Town, it was just a block away from such contemporary landmarks as the Reval Olümpia and the Stockmann Shopping Center, not to mention the Coca-Cola Plaza Cinema and the neon-lit Hollywood Nightclub. The district was, in short, a city that looked like every other city, which was precisely what made businessmen feel at home. WiFi Internet access was beamed from eateries, hotel lobbies, and bars.
We are modern, just like you
was the message that was being transmitted, though with an edge of desperation that lessened its credibility. At this hour of night, the Bonnie and Clyde Nightclub—another peculiarity of Tallinn, Belknap noticed, was that the nightclubs actually, and doggedly, called themselves “nightclubs”—was still well lighted. Immediately adjoining the tallest hotel was an Audi and Volkswagen dealership: The locals were no doubt proud to have assembled the equivalent of a strip mall in the middle of their financial district.

The building was blocky and dark, each facade set in a white enameled facet of steel. It could have been airlifted into any one of five hundred cities and looked equally at home. Belknap got out of the taxi and wandered around on foot. In case anyone was watching, he made his gait slightly unsteady; he would look like a drunken businessman trying to remember which building his hotel was.

It was Gennady Chakvetadze who had found the address for him.
Even in retirement, he retained his tendrils of influence, and made a few discreet phone calls to the municipal record keepers.

The real nature of this entity is closely guarded indeed,
Arvo Pärt had said, and he had not exaggerated. Estotek, it emerged, was an Estonian corporation with an offshore charter; its registration records listed only its domestic assets, which were negligible. It was a firm that had no active operations and no significant holdings; it rented space on the tenth floor of an office tower in the business district, paid its registration fees in a timely manner, and was otherwise a phantom. A shell corporation, in short, configured in such a way that it was not required to disclose its subsidiary offshore business entities.

Belknap had been puzzled. “Don't they at least have to list officers, principals?” he had asked Gennady.

The Russian sounded amused by the question. “In the civilized world, certainly. But in Estonia, the securities regulations and the financial codes were drafted by the oligarchs. This will amuse you: The listed principal is the name not of a person but of another company. Who's the listed principal of that company? You may well ask. It's Estotek. It's like something out of M. C. Escher, yes? And in Estonia, it's perfectly within the law.” The retired KGB man chortled. The crooked timber of humanity was, for him, a source of solace.

Now Belknap hunched up his jacket as a wind gusted through the glass and steel canyon that was downtown Tallinn. It was helpful that it was dark outside; mirrored glass became transparent at night. But an assessment of the building's security was still difficult. Hooded closed-circuit video cameras were mounted at the corners of the lower part of the building, providing security guards with a view of the sidewalk and the mollusk-shaped parking garage that it shared with another office building. Yet what sort of measures had been implemented inside? One thing was certain: This night was his best chance to enter unobserved. By tomorrow, the deputy minister might well have communicated with his contacts at Estotek, have told them about the Grinnell director; if so, the chances were good that they
would see through the ruse and be alerted. But the deputy minister would not do so now; he would be listening to tedious goodwill performances from the world's finest choral groups. He would be squeezing hands and smiling. He would be fantasizing about his new country estate, and thinking about how he would explain it to his friends and associates.

Belknap crossed the street, withdrew a small flat pair of field glasses, and squinted, trying to make out the security guard on duty in the lobby. He saw nothing. He saw…a curling wisp of smoke drifted from an interior pillar. There was a guard in that lobby all right. He was smoking. And he looked tired.

Briskly, the American checked himself in a reflective window. His dark suit fitted the part he was playing; the black leather Gladstone bag—it and its contents came courtesy of Gennady—was somewhat bulkier than the usual corporate briefcase but otherwise nothing very noticeable. Now he took a deep breath, approached the entrance, flashed his ID, and prepared to sign himself in.

The guard gazed at him sleepily, pressed a buzzer that released the front door. He had the widening girth that most Estonian men had acquired by their early middle age, the product of a diet of pork, fat, pancakes, and potatoes. He took a last drag on his cigarette and resumed his place behind a granite counter.

“CeMines,” Belknap said. “CeMines Estonia. Floor eleven.”

The guard nodded stolidly, and Belknap could guess what he was thinking. A foreigner, but then Tallinn was overrun with them. It was doubtless unusual for CeMines, a medical-science company, to have visitors at this hour, but Gennady had placed a call to the guard bank, letting him know, in his Russian-inflected Estonian, that a visitor was en route. Some sort of system failure requiring the attentions of some sort of technician.

“You come to make fix?” asked the guard in halting English.

“Sensors indicate a refrigeration-coil malfunction in the biostorage
unit. No rest for the wicked, right?” Belknap spoke with a confident smile.

The guard had the perplexed look of someone whose English had been overtasked. But the import of his thoughts was plain enough: Making trouble for a rich foreigner might be more than his job was worth. After a long moment, he had the visitor sign in, jerked a thumb toward the elevator bank, and lighted up another cigarette.

Belknap, for his part, felt his apprehension level rise with the elevator. The hard part was ahead of him.

Research Triangle Park, North Carolina

Gina Tracy fingered a curl of black hair next to her ear as she spoke to the others. “There's been a screwup. Really regrettable. Apparently the guys we sent to South America removed the wrong Javier Solanas. Can you believe it?” South America seemed so far away from the lacquered slate floors and frosted glass of the Theta facility, and yet this was where the critical decisions originated. Sometimes Tracy felt as if she was at an aerospace mission-control center, guiding probes on other planets. “They were supposed to take out the Ecuadorian trade representative.” She glanced at the instant message that had flashed on her computer screen. “Instead they got some harmless rancher with the same name. I mean, shit.”

There was a moment of hushed silence; only the white-noise purr of the climate-control system was audible.

“Oy, gevalt,”
said Herman Liebman, the loose folds of his neck quivering with frustration.

“And these are supposed to be our top guys,” Tracy went on. “Total A-listers. Maybe we should've used people in-country. Something to be said for local talent, you know?”

“These things happen,” fluted George Collingwood, spreading his
fingers across his beard, his short curly hairs neatly trimmed. Someone had once remarked that his beard looked almost vaginal, and Gina sometimes smiled when she looked at him, thinking about it. She did so now.

He tilted his head. “You think it's funny?”

“In a dark and bitter and blackly comic sort of way,” Gina assured him.

John Burgess's watery, pale eyes caught hers. “You have a recommendation?” Filtered daylight picked out comb tracks in his white-blond hair.

“We need to think hard about how to prevent this kind of thing from happening again,” she said. “I really hate when this happens.”

“We all do,” Collingwood said.

“I've got to learn to be philosophical about it,” Tracy said. Some might consider them bloodless technocrats, she knew, but the truth was, they really cared about their work, and it was a struggle not to take it personally when things went wrong. “George is right. We're going to slip up from time to time. Get too caught up in it and you lose the bigger vision. That's what Paul would say.” She turned to the savant. “Isn't it?”

“I regret this,” Paul Bancroft said. “Very much. We've made errors in the past, and there will, inevitably, be errors in the future. Still, there's solace in knowing that our error rate continues to be well within the parameters that we've established as acceptable—and our error rates have been improving over time. That's a heartening trend-line.”

“Even so,” Liebman persisted grumpily.

“What's important is to situate these lapses in the larger context of success,” Bancroft went on, “and to look forward, not backward. As you say, Gina, we need to learn from our mistakes and determine what additional safeguards can protect against such errors in the future. The calculus of risk produces an asymptotic curve. Which means that there's always room for improvement.”

“Think we should send our boys back to get the right one?” Burgess asked.

“Forget about it,” Collingwood said. “That would be too much of a coincidence. I mean, in the unlikely event that someone were keeping track of the deaths of people named Javier Solanas. But still. A risk-assessment analysis will tell you it's not worth pursuing. Any developments elsewhere?”

“I'm sure you've heard the news story about a woman in northern Nigeria who's about to be stoned to death,” said Tracy. “Apparently a village court found her guilty of adultery. I mean, how medieval is that?”

Paul Bancroft furrowed his brow. “I hope you're not forgetting the larger view here,” he said. “We can have the boffins confirm this, but I'd project that this intensely publicized event has a highly beneficial effect on HIV transmission rates. It's the baby-in-the-well syndrome all over again. The world media focuses on one woman with mournful eyes and an infant in her arms. The plangent iconography of the madonna and child. Yet the medieval law of these unlettered mullahs is probably going to prevent thousands of AIDS cases. Which is to say, thousands of painful, lingering, ravaging, costly deaths.”

Collingwood blinked. “It's a no-brainer,” he chimed in, turning to Tracy. “Why do you think HIV seropositivity rates are so low in Muslim countries? When you penalize and stigmatize sexual promiscuity, transmission rates plunge. Look at the map. Senegal has one of the lowest rates of HIV in sub-Saharan Africa. It's ninety-two percent Muslim. Now look at its neighbor, Guinea-Bissau, which has half the percentage of Muslims that Senegal has—and an HIV rate that's
five
times higher. Stone away, I say.”

“Anything else in that continental sector?” Bancroft asked.

Burgess scanned his console for an electronic list of items. “Well, what about the minister of mines and energy in Niger? Isn't he blocking important aid projects?”

“That got nixed, remember?” Gina Tracy looked annoyed. “Too many knock-on effects. We already went over this.”

“Remind me of the play here,” said Collingwood. “I've been meeting with the systems people all morning.”

“Executive summary? I'll break it down into broad strokes.” Burgess paused, collecting his thoughts. “First, Minister Okwendo is too high-profile. Second, he's likely to be replaced by Mahamadou, the finance minister. Which is fine, but then the question is, Who's in place to succeed Mahamadou? If he's replaced by Sannu, that's fine. But it's even money that he'll be replaced by Seyni. And ultimately that could make things even worse. Instead of removing the minister of mines and energy, it would be better to remove Diori, the assistant minister involved. Diori's number two is a relatively benign character, all our intelligence suggests: His father was a kleptocrat, but the result is that the son has enough money that he's not in government to make more.”

“Interesting,” Dr. Bancroft said pensively. “Diori would appear to be the strategically sound choice. But let's be sure to take it to the second-team boffins to see whether their calculations accord. An independent assessment is always valuable, as we've learned the hard way.” The look he gave Liebman spoke of their shared history.

“Running a fresh set of models could take a few days,” Burgess warned.

“A country like Niger, with a relatively tiny ruling elite, is extremely susceptible to wide output variances given minuscule input variances. We'll want to be safe, not sorry.”

“No argument here,” said Liebman, tenting his liver-spotted hands beneath his chin.

“All right, then.” Bancroft gave Burgess a grave look.

“Meanwhile, how's the absorption of the Ansari network coming along?” Liebman asked. “After all the effort we spent in taking it over, I certainly hope it proves its worth.”

“Are you kidding? It's turning out to be another one of Paul's masterstrokes,” said Collingwood. “Proper integration will take a while, the same as with a corporate acquisition. But there's every reason to
expect that it's going to enable us to gather really valuable intelligence on its clients. And knowledge is—”

“The power to do good,” Bancroft put it. “Everything we learn goes to support the larger cause.”

“Absolutely,” Collingwood said, nodding vigorously. “The world is awash in munitions. Right now, they flow toward the highest bidder. Even worse is when the bidding is split, and you've got both sides of a civil war armed to the hilt. There were thirty years of that in Angola. Totally irrational. Now we're going to be able to guide the firepower to the states and factions that
ought
to get it. We'll be able to pacify provinces that had been making themselves miserable for decades, because they've been given just enough arms to wage war and not enough to win. That's always the worst state of affairs.”