Honor Among Thieves Read online

  The driver swung off the turnpike and headed for the center of Newark as Al Obaydi’s thoughts returned to what the money was being used for. The idea had all the hallmarks of his President. It was original, required daring, raw courage and a fair degree of luck. Al Obaydi still gave the plan no more than a one percent chance of even reaching the starting blocks, let alone the finishing tape. But then, some people in the State Department had only given Saddam a one percent chance of surviving Operation Desert Storm. And if the great Sayedi could pull this off, the United States would become a laughingstock and Saddam would have guaranteed himself a place in Arab history alongside Saladin.

  Although Al Obaydi had already checked the exact location of the building, he instructed the driver to stop two blocks west of his final destination. An Iraqi getting out of a large black limousine right in front of the bank would be enough of an excuse for Cavalli to pocket the money and cancel the deal. Once the car had stopped, Al Obaydi climbed over the golf bag and out onto the pavement on the curb side. Although he only had to cover a couple of hundred yards to the bank, this was the one part of the journey that he considered was a calculated risk. He checked up and down the street. Satisfied, he dragged the golf bag out onto the pavement and humped it up onto his shoulder.

  The Deputy Ambassador felt he must have looked an incongruous sight as he marched down Martin Luther King Drive in a Saks Fifth Avenue suit with a golf bag slung over his shoulder.

  Although it took less than two minutes to cover the short distance to the bank, Al Obaydi was sweating profusely by the time he reached the front entrance. He climbed up the well-worn steps and walked through the revolving door. He was met by two armed men who looked more like sumo wrestlers than bank clerks. The Deputy Ambassador was quickly guided to a waiting elevator that closed the moment he stepped inside. The door slid open only when he reached the basement. As Al Obaydi stepped out he came face to face with another man, bigger, if anything, than the two who had originally greeted him. The giant nodded and led him towards a door at the end of a carpeted corridor. As he approached, the door swung open and Al Obaydi entered a room to find twelve men waiting expectantly around a large table. Although conservatively dressed and silent, none of them looked like bank tellers. The door closed behind him and he heard a lock turning. The man at the head of the table stood up and greeted him.

  “Good morning, Mr. Al Obaydi. I believe you have something to deposit for one of our customers.”

  The Deputy Ambassador nodded and handed over the golf bag without a word. The man showed no surprise. He had seen valuables transported in everything from a crocodile to a condom.

  He was, however, surprised by the weight of the bag as he lifted it up onto the table, spilled out the contents and divided the spoils among the other eleven men. The tellers began counting furiously, making up neat piles of ten thousand.

  No one offered Al Obaydi a seat, so he remained standing for the next forty minutes, with nothing to do but watch them go about their task.

  When the counting had been completed, the chief teller double-checked the number of piles. One thousand exactly. He smiled, a smile that was not directed at Al Obaydi but at the money, then looked up in the direction of the Arab and gave him a curt nod, acknowledging that the man from Baghdad had made the down payment.

  The golf bag was then handed back to the Deputy Ambassador, since it had not been part of the deal. Al Obaydi felt slightly stupid as he slung it over his shoulder. The chief teller touched a buzzer under the table and the door behind him was unlocked.

  One of the men who had first met Al Obaydi when he had entered the bank was waiting to escort him to the ground floor. By the time the Deputy Ambassador stepped out onto the street, his guide had already disappeared.

  With an enormous sigh of relief, Al Obaydi began to stroll the two blocks back to his waiting car. He allowed himself a small smile of satisfaction at the professional way he had carried out the whole exercise. He felt sure the Ambassador would be pleased to learn that there had been no mishaps. He would undoubtedly take most of the praise when the message was relayed back to Baghdad that Operation Desert Calm had begun.

  Al Obaydi collapsed on the sidewalk before he realized what had hit him: the golf bag had been wrenched from his shoulder before he could react. He looked up to see two youths moving swiftly down the street, one of them clutching their prize.

  The Deputy Ambassador had been wondering how he was going to dispose of it.

  Tony Cavalli joined his father for breakfast a few minutes after seven the following morning. He had moved back into their brownstone on 75th and Park soon after his divorce.

  Since his retirement, Tony’s father spent most of his time pursuing his lifelong hobby of collecting rare books, manuscripts and historical documents. He had also spent many hours passing on to his son everything he’d learned as a lawyer, concentrating on how to avoid wasting too many years in one of the state’s penitentiaries.

  Coffee and toast were served by the butler as the two men went about their business.

  “Nine million dollars has been placed in forty-seven banks across the country,” Tony told his father. “Another million has been deposited in a numbered account with Franchard et cie in Geneva, in the name of Hamid Al Obaydi,” he added, buttering a piece of toast.

  The father smiled at the thought of his son using an old ploy he had taught him so many years before.

  “But what will you tell Al Obaydi when he asks how his ten million is being spent?” the unofficial chairman of Skills inquired.

  For the next hour, Tony took his father through Operation Desert Calm in great detail, interrupted only by the occasional question or suggestion from the older man.

  “Can the actor be trusted?” he asked before taking another sip of coffee.

  “Lloyd Adams still owes us a little over thirty thousand dollars,” Tony replied. “He hasn’t been offered many scripts lately—a few commercials…”

  “Good,” said Cavalli’s father. “But what about Rex Butterworth?”

  “Sitting in the White House waiting for his instructions.”

  His father nodded. “But why Columbus, Ohio?” he asked.

  “The surgical facilities there are exactly what we require, and the Dean of the Medical School has the ideal qualifications we need. We’ve had his office and home bugged from top to bottom.”

  “And his daughter?”

  “We’ve got her under twenty-four-hour surveillance.”

  The chairman licked his lips. “So when do you press the button?”

  “Next Tuesday, when the Dean is due to make a keynote speech at his daughter’s school.”

  The butler entered the room and began to clear the table.

  “And how about Dollar Bill?” asked Cavalli’s father.

  “Angelo is on his way to San Francisco to try and convince him. If we’re going to pull this off we’ll need Dollar Bill. He’s the best. In fact no one else comes close,” added Cavalli.

  “As long as he’s sober,” was all the chairman said.

  Chapter Four

  The tall, athletic man stepped off the plane into the U.S. Air terminal at Washington National Airport. He carried only hand luggage, so he didn’t have to wait at the baggage carousel where someone might recognize him. He needed just one person to recognize him—the driver who was picking him up. At six foot one, with his fair hair tousled and with almost chiseled fine features, and dressed in light blue jeans, cream shirt and a dark blue blazer, he made many women rather hope that he would recognize them.

  The back door of an anonymous black Ford was opened as soon as he came through the automatic doors into the bright morning sunlight.

  He climbed into the back of the car without a word and made no conversation during the twenty-five-minute journey that took him in the opposite direction to the capital. The forty-minute flight always gave him a chance to compose his thoughts and prepare his new persona. Twelve times a year he made the same journe