Part 7 (1/2)
Within moments they were all standing around one of the desks, staring at the screen of t.i.tus's computer, reading the incredible message.
Following is a list of enterprises in which you will want to invest and/or contribute. I suggest you begin immediately with 15% of the $64 million you wanted to utilize.Please complete that transaction within 48 hours of this message.Follow that with an additional 32% investment of the total within 72 hours.Marcello Cavatino Inversiones, S.A., in Buenos Aires will be happy to provide you with the professional services necessary to execute these transactions.
The list of businesses and charities followed. One in Mexico, two in Brazil, one in Lebanon, one in St. Kitts, two in Monaco. t.i.tus stared over the Mayan girl's shoulder and gaped at the computer screen.
”Bonnie, see if you can find them, ”Burden said to the Asian woman, who was now wearing jeans and a Oaxacan embroidered huipil. huipil. She went to work on another computer. She went to work on another computer.
t.i.tus stared at the screen and sat in one of the chairs without saying a word. He was shaken. How many times could he be surprised like this? He didn't know what he'd thought Luquin's first message would be, but he hadn't expected this.
”What's the matter? ”Burden asked. ”Liquidity?”
t.i.tus was oblivious. The money. Jesus. He should have written it down on a piece of paper and looked at it. The whole thing had been so unreal that he hadn't yet focused on what it would mean to divest himself of $64 million-a quarter of CaiText's net worth. Seeing the beginnings of the process on the computer screen was unnerving.
”That's nearly ten million dollars in two days, ”Burden said, ”and then nearly twenty-one million three days after that.”
”Yes, I can get the ten. I'll have to work on the twentyone.”
”Okay. Well, we have to move fast now, ”Burden said, glancing at his watch. ”It's three-thirty, for all practical purposes.”
Mattie turned to t.i.tus.
”Luquin's job here is a lot easier than laundering money,” she said. ”With laundering you're trying to cover up where the money came from. In this case that's not a problem. Luquin wants to hide where it's going. So when Cavatino disperses your investments among these seven enterprises, that'll probably be the last time we'll really know anything for sure about it. From those places it'll be buried under an avalanche of trade.”
”Garcia, ”Bonnie said from her computer, ”the companies are coming up. All of them. No, wait, one of the charities, the one in Monaco, isn't showing yet. All the companies are less than a year old. Marcello Cavatino Inversiones, S.A., has been around three years.”
”Good. Do some work on them.”
But Burden was waiting, still staring at the computer screen with Mattie and the Mayan girl, as if they were all expecting another message. The room was silent except for Bonnie's fingers snapping on the keys across the room.
The ping of another message was like a gunshot.
”Here we go, ”the Mayan girl said, and the screen flashed a short, terse message.
Charlie Thrush has paid for your stupidity. You should have lived with the surveillance.
t.i.tus was standing again, again staring over the girl's shoulder. It took him some time-he had no sense of dura tion-to make the two words fit into the context of the moment. Charlie Thrush?
Then Burden asked, ”Where did Thrush live?”
The past tense of the question hit t.i.tus like a blow to the stomach. Suddenly he had no moisture at all in his mouth. ”On a ranch west of Austin.”
”Where? Exactly.”
”Fredericksburg. Near there. ”He thought he was going to be sick.
”Rosha, ”Burden said, and the Mayan girl swiveled to another computer and began typing furiously.
t.i.tus saw Charlie talking, his lanky frame sprawled in a chair in front of one of his computer screens, his long fingers flapping on the keys as if he were playing the piano, his head half turned as he talked, explaining the theory behind the calculus and the quantum mechanics on the screen. He saw him with his head buried in a book in a small pool of light in a dark room. He saw him handing Rita a wicker basket of his own peaches with a crooked grin, telling her that t.i.tus still didn't have the knack to grow anything as sweet as these.
”Here it is, ”Rosha said, reading a paraphrasing. ”A little over three hours ago the Gillespie County Sheriff's Office got a call to the Thrush ranch on Schumann Creek. It just says that they responded.”
t.i.tus experienced a sensation of being somewhere else. He felt a hand on his shoulder, and then the seat of a chair touched the back of his knees. He sat down. He heard the computer keys snapping snapping snapping. He was weak. Shaky. He listened to them talk as if he were not in the room. He wasn't aware of looking at anything or even of seeing anything. He wasn't aware of himself at all, in any kind of context.
”Here it is, ”Rosha said again. ”Speer Funeral Home. Accepted the body of Charles Thrush from the Gillespie County EMS half an hour ago. Cause of death: ranching accident.”
There was an awkward quiet in the room. They didn't know the man. They didn't even know t.i.tus. What did he expect from them? Weeping? Charlie's death was as removed from them as a weather report from the Azores.
Burden was the one who broke the silence, his voice soft and edgy at the same time.
”You see how this is going to work, ”he said.
t.i.tus could feel his face burning. His emotions were indescribable, a swarm of embarra.s.sed fear and anger and panic. There was nothing here he could identify with. The indictment of his responsibility in Charlie's death was unavoidable. Burden had even asked him if Luquin had forbidden the security sweep. t.i.tus remembered his feeling of claustrophobia at imagining he would have to live with Luquin listening to every word he spoke. He remembered saying, I can't live like that. Well, apparently he could have. And should have. But now, how in G.o.d's name was he going to live with this?
He worked his mouth for moisture.
”Rita's with Louise Thrush in Venice, ”he said. ”I've got to get them back here. ”Then, before he had the last word out of his mouth, he looked at Burden in panic. ”Jesus Christ. Luquin knows that, doesn't he.”
He listened to the connections going through, then the phone ringing. It was two-thirty A.M. in Venice. After their conversation she wouldn't go back to bed.
Burden's women had made themselves busy, turned away to terminals or absorbing paperwork, a gesture of privacy that he appreciated even though it was only symbolic. Burden himself waited in a chair at the next desk. He had not turned away; he wanted to hear the conversation.
”It can only be you, t.i.tus, ”Rita answered from the edge of sleep.
”I'm sorry, ”he said.
”I know you know what time it is here, ”she said huskily, and he imagined her looking at her watch on the bedside table. ”You know, hon, if you'd waited just a few more hours, I would've been awake anyway.”
He didn't really know how to try to make himself sound. It didn't much matter. In a few more words she'd pick up on it anyway, hear it in his voice.
”I've got some bad news, Rita, ”he said.
Pause. He imagined her going suddenly still in the dark, factoring in his words, his tone of voice.
”What's the matter? Are you okay, t.i.tus? ”Her voice was calm, her ”I won't panic no matter what he says ”tone of voice. Firm, prepared. She would be sitting up in bed now, frowning in the dark, straining to pull the words out of him.
”Yeah, I'm fine, ”he said. ”It's Charlie.”
”Oh, no ... ”She was holding her breath.
”He was in an accident today, out at the ranch. He's dead, Rita.”
”Oh, no! no! ”She repeated it. And then she repeated it again. And then again. ”She repeated it. And then she repeated it again. And then again.
He hated this more than anything, doing this to her at so great a distance, handing to her the responsibility of telling Louise, of getting them both packed and on a plane, comforting her for thousands of miles on the way back home.
They talked for half an hour, and he told her the truth: He didn't know much. He'd try to get more information. He didn't tell her he was in Mexico, of course. He'd work all that out later. He lied to her, comforted her, planned with her. Rita was best if she was planning. It calmed her; it helped her deal with the unknown, with the unavoidable but frightening unravelings of life.