Midas Read online

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  Copyright © 2005 by Peter Gethers

  All rights reserved.

  It’s Good to Be King by Tom Petty

  Copyright © 1994 Gone Gator Music (ASCAP)

  All Rights on Behalf of Gone Gator Music (ASCAP) Administered by WB Music Corp (ASCAP)

  All Rights Reserved

  Used by Permission Warner Bros. Publications U.S. INC., Miami, FL. 33014

  Mysterious Press

  Warner Books

  Hachette Book Group USA

  237 Park Avenue, New York, NY 10017

  Visit our Web site at HachetteBookGroupUSA.com.

  First eBook Edition: March 2005

  ISBN: 978-0-446-50964-0

  Contents

  Novels Written Under The Name Russell Andrews

  Dedication

  Acknowledgments

  Eipigraph

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Part One

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Part Two

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Part Three

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  NOVELS WRITTEN UNDER THE NAME RUSSELL ANDREWS

  Gideon

  Icarus

  Aphrodite

  Midas

  NOVELS BY PETER GETHERS

  The Dandy

  Getting Blue

  NONFICTION BY PETER GETHERS

  The Cat Who Went to Paris

  A Cat Abroad

  The Cat Who’ll Live Forever

  TO LEN AND LOUISE RIGGIO

  My heartfelt thanks for your extraordinary generosity—a generosity that pretty much spreads to all aspects of my life. Most relevant, special thanks for Camp Riggio West, without which this book would not have been written. And here’s the official warning: I’ve definitely got my eye on Camp Riggio South for the next book.

  Who lives better than we do?

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  This is getting to be a familiar list.

  Thanks to . . . Esther Newberg for, as always, going way beyond the call of duty, especially when it comes to her newfound culinary skills . . . Bill Goldman for reading, teaching, critiquing, and haranguing . . . the superb and supportive publishing team of Colin Fox, Susan Richman, Larry Kirshbaum, Jamie Raab, and Hillary Hale . . . John Alderman for his insight and willingness to answer any and all questions, and for putting me in a room with financial whizzes Adam Usdan of Trellus Management, Michael Aronstein of Preservation Capital (who basically gave me the solution to the whole puzzle), and D. B. Lifland of Trellus Management . . . Bill Bainbridge, who educated and terrified me about all things explosive . . . Marv Donnaud for teaching me about anything aviation related and for actually being able to make me understand what a manifold is . . . Andy Barzvi and Chris Bauch for their efficiency, remarkably pleasant way of badgering me to finish the book, and willingness to swig alcohol on a moment’s notice . . . Jack Dytman, who amazes me constantly with his hard work and enthusiasm and the fact that he still always calls me back . . . Josie Freedman (this is advance thanks for the work I know you’re about to do as soon as I hand over the manuscript) . . . and, of course, Janis Donnaud for her support during the entire process.

  Banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies.

  —Thomas Jefferson

  It’s good to be king

  And have your own world

  It helps to make friends

  It’s good to meet girls

  —Tom Petty, “It’s Good to Be King”

  PROLOGUE

  1

  From the Houston Chronicle

  Reuters News Service

  September 14

  Environmental Surprise From

  The Anderson Administration

  Led by Vice President Dandridge

  A New Direction in Land Preservation

  IN A MOVE EQUALLY SURPRISING to both foes and supporters, Stephanie Ingles, the Administrator for the Environmental Protection Agency, announced yesterday that over eight million acres in Alaska’s National Petroleum Reserve have been designated as a national monument and have thus become permanently off-limits to oil companies that have been pressing the administration to let them begin drilling in the region.

  The National Petroleum Reserve is not a name that conjurs a vision of pristine space but it is, in fact, the largest expanse of untouched wilderness left in the United States. In 1923, President Harding established the region as a petroleum reserve, stipulating that the oil fields be drilled only in time of pressing national need. Large and influential oil and energy companies such as EGenco and Halliburton have recently been lobbying the administration to open the fields for exploration, saying that if ever there was a national need the time is now. President Thomas Anderson has, in the past, been sympathetic to the needs of such companies, as has Vice President Phillip Dandridge, and environmentalists had been expecting Ms. Ingles to announce that the administration had bowed to the pressure. However, despite the recent rise in oil prices—yesterday’s closing left the price of oil at $44.78 per barrel—Ms. Ingles said that the President was standing firm on this issue. “Despite what is perceived as this administration’s close ties to the oil industry,” Ms. Ingles stated, “Vice President Dandridge is a committed environmentalist. He is well aware of the wildlife that swims in and roams around the Colville River Watershed, Kasegaluk Lagoon, Teshekpuk Lake and the Utukok Highlands, and he has no intention of allowing the ecological balance within those areas to be disturbed. The Vice President took the lead in this initiative and the President wholeheartedly concurs with the stand that’s being taken.”

  Members of the President and Vice President’s party did not offer unanimous support after the announcement. Speaker of the House Lester Swannig said that he was “withholding any final judgment on this decision, but I am dismayed at the potential rise in oil prices it may cause. We have been trying to keep the cost of gasoline down since it affects every American citizen. Shutting off this acreage from drilling will certainly not help that effort and I have to say I don’t understand this shift in priorities.”

  Environmentalists warily applauded the decision. Christine Herr, co-chairperson of the Save the Earth Foundation, said, “I am pleased by the decision although I admit it did rather shock me. Over the past seven years, environmental protection has taken a backseat to just about everything else one could name. However, as everyone knows, Vice President Dandridge is beginning his push to achieve his party’s presidential nomination next year and I imagine his advisers are telling him he needs to make some concessions to ‘kooks’ like us. But even if this decision was made for political reasons, it’s a
decision I’m glad this administration had the courage to make.”

  Vice President Dandridge is the presumed presidential nominee for his party in next November’s election. Heading into primary season, he has a substantial lead in the polls in nearly every state, with very few opponents within the Republican Party. The Vice President does, however, currently trail both of the men competing for the Democratic nomination, Indiana Senator Martin Vance and Georgia Governor Oren Childress. All of his potential Democratic opponents supported this decision on the National Petroleum Reserve and voiced their hopes that in the last year of President Anderson’s final term he will take even more of a lead in protecting the environment.

  2

  From Bloomberg.com

  Bloomberg Financial News

  October 8

  Energy Prices

  PETROLEUM ($/bbl)

  PRICE* CHANGE % CHANGE TIME

  Nymex Crude 48.1 0.4 0.96 13:51

  IPE Crude 43.4 0.5 1.32 14:12

  Dated Brent $ 44.55 0.37 0.95 13:59

  WTI Cushing $ 48.05 0.45 1.08 14:08

  PETROLEUM (¢/gal)

  PRICE* CHANGE % CHANGE TIME

  Nymex Heating Oil 2.12 1.85 1.76 13:53

  Nymex Gasoline 147.3 0.27 0.19 13:52

  3

  East End Harbor

  Long Island, New York

  November 4

  Bashar Shabaan had seen death before. Seen it up close.

  The first time, he had been sitting in a car in Basra, minding his own business. Bashar was just slouched in the front seat, behind the wheel, waiting. He wasn’t waiting for anyone or anything. He was just waiting. It was during the first Gulf War.

  In front of him was a truck. It looked like it was going to fall apart, like it couldn’t drive one more mile. There was a family inside, a mother and a father and some children, two teenaged boys. An American army jeep pulled up alongside and then the broken-down truck started to drive away. One of the boys rolled down a window, put his hand out to wave to the American soldiers, and the next thing Bashar knew there was gunfire everywhere. The tires on the truck exploded and then sagged, and the rickety wooden slats that had been built to hold the truck’s cargo splintered and just disappeared. The truck’s windows shattered and everywhere there were bullet holes. The woman was crying, weeping tears of rage and despair. The man and the two boys were dead, Bashar could see parts of their bodies dangling from the seats. Soldiers were yelling. He heard an officer, angry and loud, saying, “You stupid fuck! It was just a fucking kid! What the fuck were you thinking?” Then more soldiers came and the crying woman was taken away. Then the truck was taken away. Then it was as if nothing had ever happened. Except that Bashar knew that it had.

  Another time, years later, he saw death come when it was not so unexpected. He was across the street when his cousin Hamid stepped onto a Jerusalem bus and martyred himself. Bashar saw the geysers of blood and the severed legs. He saw a little girl with lovely blonde hair, soft and curly, maybe seven years old, get on the bus right before Hamid. He also saw her body on the street moments later, her fair skin charred black, her blonde hair on fire.

  Death did not shock Bashar Shabaan. Or terrify him. Or even make him curious in any way. He did not welcome it or embrace it. He was not like Hamid. But he understood that death was a part of life. And that life was largely about death and dying. There were no surprises to life, Bashar believed, because it always ended the same way.

  Well, perhaps there was one surprise: Bashar Shabaan did not understand why he could not stop sweating.

  It wasn’t hot outside. There was even a pre-winter chill in the air. It was the kind of damp autumn weather that Bashar detested. He liked heat, the baked feeling that came from standing in the glowing sun. He did not care for the American fall or winter. It gave him colds and the flu. For the three years he had lived in this country, he had shivered from November through February, no matter how many layers of clothes he had on. Bashar preferred warmth. The kind of warmth that radiated from his country.

  But on this November afternoon, he felt none of the day’s coolness. He was burning up inside. His stomach was hurting and his mouth was dry and his throat was tight. Sweat was pouring from his forehead and palms.

  And as he walked he suddenly understood the reason. The surprise was not really such a surprise. Yes, Bashar had seen death. But he had never before been the cause of it.

  He had always wondered whether murderers, even ones who believed their causes were just, like Hamid, got nervous before they committed their crimes. Whether any of them, soldiers or martyrs, ever felt guilt or remorse or fear. Now he knew.

  Murderers got sweaty palms and stomach cramps before they killed their victims. Murderers were afraid.

  There was a big crowd of people milling around the street, about two blocks away from the restaurant. At first Bashar thought they were there for him, that it was some kind of giant trap. There were cameras and lights and policemen and suddenly his feet couldn’t move; they refused to take one step. But then he realized they weren’t there for him at all. It was a movie. They were shooting an American movie. There were long trailers and large men with larger bellies drinking beer and yelling into walkie-talkies. The policemen were actors, dressed in costume. He saw one actor, someone he recognized, sitting in a chair, doing a crossword puzzle. Bashar knew who it was, had seen him on television, on one of the late-night talk shows, but couldn’t think of his name. He waited a few moments, tried to remember, finally gave up. By then his feet could move. And they did. One step, then two, and then he was walking again, leaving the movie behind.

  He was almost to his destination. He wiped his hands on his raincoat and, as he’d done at least a dozen times in the past two minutes, reached into his right coat pocket to feel the cell phone and make sure it was there. He ran over his instructions one more time, his lips moving ever so slightly in conjunction with the words in his mind.

  Go inside.

  Give the person at the front the right name.

  Go to the table. Hand the briefcase over. Put it down on the floor.

  Turn and leave. Don’t run. Walk slowly. Be polite.

  Once outside the door, take the cell phone. Call immediately. Say that the job is done. Go to the alley to the left of the building. Then run.

  Run as fast as you can.

  Run like the devil himself was chasing you.

  Bashar thought about running. He thought about his weak legs and fiery stomach.

  He thought about getting paid for his few minutes of work. Fifty thousand dollars. It was a lot of money. More than he had ever seen before.

  He thought about what was going to happen.

  Then he thought about how the devil really would be chasing after him.

  Bashar wondered if he’d have enough money to bribe the old bastard if they ever met.

  He thought that just maybe he would.

  Jimmy Leggett felt uncomfortable.

  The woman across the table from him was looking at the wine list and that was one reason Jimmy felt edgy: he wasn’t used to eating in such fancy restaurants. Harper’s was new, open a couple of months and already filled with money. Hamptons money, which meant direct from Wall Street, Hollywood, or simply handed over from wealthy parents who could afford Long Island oceanfront property as their second, sometimes even their third home. The people eating their Cobb salads on their carb-free diets wore casual-looking sweatshirts made of cashmere and they paid with Platinum credit cards. He wasn’t a total rube, he’d been around some, but this was a little too refined for his taste. They didn’t just have fish, they had fish with a pistachio crust. The steak wasn’t just steak, it was pink peppercorn coated steak. It was like everything on the menu was pretending to be something it wasn’t. The martinis had flavors—apple and caramel and lemon cream—and there wasn’t a bottle of wine on the wine list that cost less than forty-eight bucks. He’d checked it out and even muttered something before the woman he was eating wit
h had removed the list from his hands to take a look herself.

  The second reason Jimmy Leggett was uncomfortable was that he was pretty sure the woman was taking him to lunch because she wanted to have sex with him and Jimmy had been married for twenty-seven years without once having cheated on his wife.

  He glanced at the woman now, as she ordered a bottle from the waiter. She was a weekender. East End Harbor, where Jimmy had been police chief for nearly thirteen years, had a lot of weekenders these days. Not always. Although only fifteen minutes’ drive from the choicer part of the Hamptons, it used to be a year-round community, nicely blue-

  collar and unpretentious. You had kids and they stuck around, they were able to buy a nice house just a few blocks away from where they grew up. It was the un-Hamptons town in the wealthy and chic Long Island beach community. But the past decade had brought prosperity. Even to East End. Things had slowed down somewhat in the past couple of years, along with the economy, but there were still clothing stores that sold hundred-dollar T-shirts and food stores that sold nothing but truffles and caviar and champagne glasses. The next generation was moving upstate or mid-Island, they couldn’t afford to live in their hometown anymore—small two-bedroom Victorian houses were going for seven hundred grand. The burger joint on the corner was now a sushi bar. The take-out Chinese was a creperie. And this attractive fifty-year-old weekender whose ex-husband had paid her a tidy sum of money to get away from her and who’d clearly had a couple of face-lifts and probably a boob job, thought it would be sexy to have a fling with the local head cop. She came into the station the first time to complain about kids with boom boxes. Then she came in again to ask advice about an alarm system for her house—prosperity had brought crime along with expensive T-shirts—and then everyone in the station knew that the next few times she showed up she was coming in to flirt with the boss. Times have changed, Jimmy thought. And he was trying to decide now if he was going to finally change along with them.