And now Chandler chimed in. “You should call Smokey the Bear, then.”
And now it was my turn: “She's right, Igor. Smokey the Bear would be all over you if he knew you could make fire impossible.”
Carter said, “Why is your name Igor? It's a monster's name.”
KGB, who had somewhat rebonded with Carter via Crash Bandicoot, said, “Igor is like Gary. It is Russian name.”
Carter shrugged, unimpressed.
Igor asked Chandler, “Who is this Smokey Bear you speak of?”
“He's a bear who fights forest fires,” she replied happily. “He's on TV.”
Igor nodded in understanding, then lifted a $250 Baccarat brandy snifter filled halfway to the top with 80-proof Stolichnaya vodka and downed it like it was air. Then he put the snifter down with a determined thud. “You must understand!” he declared. “Fire—may—not—exist—without—oxygen. So—he—who—control-oxygen—control—fire.”
After a few moments of silence, Chandler picked up a noise-maker, stuck it in her mouth, stared down Igor, and then blew into it as hard as she could. Igor clenched his jaw and cringed. Then he poured himself another glass of vodka and downed it.
Later that evening, before he left, Igor promised to give me a demonstration of his fire-controlling abilities, but not now. First he needed to know me better; then he would prove his point to me. And with that, New Year's Eve came to a close.
The next morning, the problems started when it was time to say good-bye. In truth, I had planned on having a private talk with each of my kids before they left, but I just couldn't seem to find the words. Carter, I figured, would be easier; his age, his gender, his genetic makeup—for whatever reason, things seemed to slide off his shoulders with no ill effects.
Chandler, of course, was the opposite. She was a complicated young girl, wise beyond her years. I knew that saying good-bye to her would be difficult and that tears would be shed. What I hadn't counted on, though, was how many.
I found her upstairs in her bedroom, alone. She was lying on the bed facedown, her nose pressed deep into the pink comforter. Unlike when she arrived, when she had gotten herself all dressed up for Daddy, she was now dressed more practically, in light-pink sweatpants with a pink hoodie.
With a heavy heart, I sat down on the edge of the bed and reached beneath her sweatshirt and began stroking her back gently. “What's wrong, thumbkin? Gwynnie told me you're not feeling well.”
She nodded without speaking, her face still pressed into the comforter.
I kept rubbing her back. “Are you too sick to fly?”
She nodded the same way, although a bit more forcefully.
“Ahh, I see,” I said seriously. “Do you have a temperature?”
She shrugged.
“Can I feel your head?”
She shrugged again.
I stopped rubbing her back and placed the back of my hand against her forehead. She was cool. “Well, you feel normal, thumb -kin. Does something hurt you?”
“My tummy,” she muttered, in the tone of the infirmed.
I smiled inwardly. “Ohhhh, your tummy. I see. Well, why don't you turn over and let me rub it for you, okay?”
She shook her head no.
I placed my hands on her shoulders, and, with great care, I gently turned her over. “Come here, sweetie; let me take a look at you,” and I brushed back her hair and took a moment to regard her. What I saw I would never forget: the utterly anguished face of my daughter, her eyes red and swollen, her lower lip still quivering. She had been crying into her pillow, because she didn't want me to see.
Fighting back my own tears, I whispered, “Oh, Channy, it's okay. Please don't cry, my love. Daddy loves you; he'll always love you.”
She compressed her lips into a tight line and shook her head quickly, trying to fight back the tears. But it was no use. Little streams began trickling down her cheeks. And that was when I lost it. “Oh, God,” I said softly. “I'm so sorry, Channy.” I grabbed her forcefully and held her close to me. “I'm so, so sorry. You have no idea, sweetie; it's all my fault. Please, don't cry, honey.” I completely broke down, unable to get any more words out.
After a few seconds, I heard her tiny voice:
“Don't cry, Daddy; I still love you. I'm sorry for making you cry,” and then she broke down too, shaking uncontrollably in my arms.
And just like that we collapsed onto the comforter, father and daughter, crying in each other's arms. I felt like the world's greatest failure, the ultimate cautionary tale for a man's life. I was born with all the gifts, all the advantages. I could have had it all, yet I destroyed everything. My own greed and excess had gotten the best of me.
After a few minutes, I was finally able to collect myself. I said, “Listen to me, Chandler. We need to stay strong for each other. We can get through this—we can! One day we'll be together again all the time. I promise you that, Channy. From the bottom of my heart.”
Through tiny snuffles, she said, “Come back to California with me, Daddy; please come back. I'll live with you there.”
I shook my head sadly. “I can't, honey. As much as I'd like to, I can't.”
She started snuffling again. “Why not? I want it the way it used to be.”
I hugged her gently, gritting my teeth and shaking my head in anger. I had to make this right somehow. There was no way I would allow my children to grow up without me. I would figure out a way to move to California. That would be my sole mission in life, nothing else.
I took a deep breath and steeled myself. “Listen to me, Chandler; I want to tell you something.”
She looked up.
I wiped the tears from her cheeks with the back of my hand. “Okay, sweetie; now, a lot of what I'm going to say might not make sense to you right now, but one day it will, when you're much older.” I paused and shook my head, wondering if it would be better if she never realized what a scumbag I'd been. “A long time ago I did some things in my business that were very bad, and people lost money because of it. That's where I was over the last few months: I was busy paying them back. You understand?”
“Yes,” she said softly. “But how come you can't move to California now?”
“Because I'm not done paying them back yet. It's gonna take me some time, honey, because there were a lot of people who lost money.”
“I have twelve dollars in my piggy bank. Will that help?”
I smiled and let out a tiny chuckle. “You keep that twelve dollars, honey. I'll pay them back out of my own money. But listen to me, Channy, because I'm going to make you a big promise here. Are you ready for it?”
“Yes,” she murmured.
“Okay: I promise you that no matter what happens, no matter what I have to do—even if I have to walk there!—I will move to California. You have my word on it.”
Her smile lit up the room. “When are you moving?”
I smiled back. “As soon as I can, thumbkin. But you're gonna have to have some patience. But I promise I will get there.”
She smiled and nodded eagerly. “Okay, Daddy.”
“And no more crying!” I added with a smile.
“Okay,” she said, throwing her arms around me. “I love you, Daddy.”
“I love you too,” I said quickly, and odd as it seemed, in that very instant, despite the odds being stacked so heavily against me, I knew I would accomplish my goal.
CHAPTER 27
THE BUZZWORD IS IRONY
he next morning I was lying in bed watching the Financial News Network, when a blond anchorwoman mentioned something about a severe “down opening” for this morning's NASDAQ. There was a massive order imbalance, apparently, with an unfortunate bias toward the sell side.
No big deal, I thought. The blonde is probably overreacting, and even if she's not, it doesn't matter anyway. After all, markets rise and markets fall, and a savvy trader can make money in any market. My plan was foolproof:
With the quarter million dollars I still had left, I would trade the high-flying NASDAQ with Wolf-like precision and make a small fortune in the process. The NASDAQ had more than doubled over the last twelve months, and who better than the Wolf himself to take advantage of the greatest speculative bubble since 1929? It would be like shooting fish in a barrel.
Alas, fate had different plans.
By 9:30 a.m., the NASDAQ was down more than four percent, and two days later it was down another five. By April Fools’ Day, it had lost more than twenty percent, and the joke was on me. The dot-com bubble had finally burst, and it would continue to deflate (at an unpredictable rate) for the foreseeable future. And, yes, while it was true that a savvy trader could make money in any market, he couldn't do it with limited resources, lest he be wiped out with a single bad trade. So I abandoned my foolproof plan before I started it.
Meanwhile, KGB and I had gotten along fine and dandy while I “sit in jail,” as she so phrased it, but now that I was out, things had become tenuous. Of course, the sex was still great, but the conversation was minimal. By the third week in April, I was certain that we had no future together. It was plainly obvious; in fact, it was so plainly obvious that on April 17—which was KGB's birthday—I got down on one knee and proposed to her. With a sinking heart, I said:
“Will you marry me, maya lubimaya, and be my third lawfully wedded wife?” What I didn't say (but what I knew would be true) was: “And do you promise to torture me and drive me crazy, and to make sure that I remain the most miserable man on the planet until death do us part?”
Not being able to read my internal thoughts, she quickly answered, “Da, maya lubimaya, I will be wife,” to which I slipped a seven-carat, yellow canary diamond in a platinum setting on her slender Soviet ring finger and took a moment to regard it. Oh, it was gorgeous, all right, and it was also very familiar; in fact, it was the Duchess's old engagement ring, which I'd managed to maintain possession of during the split.
Was it bad luck? I wondered. I mean, it wasn't every day a man asked a woman to become his third wife and then slipped the ring from his last failed marriage onto her finger as a sign of his love and affection and commitment to permanence. Still, I had my reasons, not the least of which was that I hadn't been sure what to get her for her birthday. (Not to mention the fact that a birthday present would have set me back a pretty penny, and I was trying to play things close to the financial vest.)
But when I called George and tried to explain all this to him, he blew up at me. “What the f**k is wrong with you?” he sputtered. “You could have sold the thing for a hundred grand, you numbskull!”
Blah, blah, blah! I thought. KGB had stuck with me through thick and thin, so I owed it to her to get married, didn't I? Besides, what about her status as the first, last, and only Miss Soviet Union in that now-defunct nation's history? That counted for something! Then George said, “Anyway, she doesn't even get along with your children, so it'll never work.”
Whatever. Worse came to worst, I would just get divorced again.
Meanwhile, the Duchess was being unusually nice. Within three weeks of the kids leaving New York, she already had them back for another visit. Moreover, she had agreed to let me have them for the entire summer. The only problem was: How could I keep them entertained in a Eurotrash-infested Manhattan apartment building while I was locked up under house arrest with an emotionally disconnected fiancée by my side who couldn't say the word the? It would be difficult. What with no front lawn to run around on or swimming pool to swim in or beach to build sand castles on, they would be bored to death. Not to mention the fact that on the island of Manhattan it would be a hundred ten degrees and a thousand percent humidity! How could the kids survive in that? They would wilt like tiny sunflowers in the Gobi Desert.
The city was no place for children—especially in the summer! Everyone knew that—especially me. All their friends would be in the Hamptons. How could I disappoint them again? I had put them through enough hell as it was. Yet it would be obscenely expensive to rent a place in the Hamptons, and I was trying to conserve funds. If only the NASDAQ hadn't crashed!
Once again, however, George had a solution. He called me from his cell phone while standing in a sand trap on the sixth tee of Shinnecock, and he said, “I got the inside scoop on a fifteen-acre estate in Southampton. The owner is some pint-size German prince who's long on title and short on cash, so he's looking to rent the place cheap.”
“What's the place look like?” asked I, the choosy beggar.
“Well, it's not Meadow Lane,” he replied, “but it's still nice. It's got a pool, a tennis court, a huge backyard. It's perfect for the kids. You've even got deer running through your backyard!”
“How much?” I asked cautiously.
“A hundred and twenty grand,” he answered. “It's a steal, considering. The place looks like a Swiss hunting lodge.”
“I can't afford it,” I said quickly, to which George even more quickly replied, “Don't worry; I'll pay the lease up front for you. You can pay me back when you're rolling again.” Then he said, “You're like a son to me, Jordan, and you could use a break right now. So take it, and don't look a gift horse in the mouth.”
At first, my masculine pride urged me to resist George's generosity, but only for a second. The place would be perfect for the kids, and George was, indeed, like a father to me. Besides, to a man as rich as he (a man as rich as I used to be), a hundred twenty grand was nothing. At that level of wealth, money was merely a book entry on a balance sheet; you got more joy from helping people with it than watching it collect four percent in the Bridgehampton National Bank. All you wanted in return was love and respect and, of course, gratitude, all of which I already felt for George. Besides, one day I would pay him back, after I became rich again.
So I packed my bags and moved back out to the Hamptons. I felt like a f**king Ping-Pong ball! Then I received an astonishing phone call from Magnum. It was early June now, and I took the call in my new sprawling living room, which, as George had indicated, looked like a hunting lodge. Magnum said, “I thought you'd like to know that Dave Beall got indicted today for securities fraud. He was arraigned this afternoon in front of Judge Gleeson.”
With a sinking heart, I sat down on a distressed leather love seat. Above me hung a giant dead moose's head. The dead moose looked outraged. “Indicted?” I muttered. “How could he get indicted, Greg? I thought he was cooperating!”
“Apparently not,” Magnum answered, and then he went about explaining how Dave Beall hadn't actually ratted me out; rather, he had gotten drunk as a skunk and then told one of his buddies about the note. His buddy, as it turned out, was a rat in OCD's ever-expanding rat stable. And the rest, as they say, was history.
The kids spent the summer in Southampton and had a ball, and then, the day they left, Elliot Lavigne was indicted for securities fraud. He blamed it all on me, of course, which was rather ironic, I thought, considering that I had once saved his life in what I now considered a momentary lapse of judgment. In truth, I was still glad that I had saved his life, because for the entire week afterward everyone was calling me a hero, but now, half a decade later, Elliot was facing five years, and I didn't give a shit.
The Chef, however, was a different story; I did give a shit about him.
In what would seem like the greatest irony of all, the Chef decided to defy the conventional logic and wisdom and take his case to trial. But why? With the videotapes, the audiotapes, my testimony, Danny's testimony, James Loo's testimony, and the airtight paper trail of my Swiss cover-up—which was laden with the Chef's slippery fingerprints—as well as his two spectacular renderings of his submarine, the SS Money Launderer, he had absolutely no shot of being acquitted. He would be found guilty as charged and be put away for the better part of a decade.
For my part, I would suffer the public humiliation of having to testify in open court against a man whom I had once called a friend. It would be in the newspaper, in magazines, on the Internet, everywhere. And how ironic it was that what I had done with Dave Beall would go down in history as nothing more than a tiny footnote, a minor offset to a dozen acts of betrayal.
At this moment, I was sitting in the debriefing with Alonso and OCD, laughing inwardly after OCD had just said, “You know what, Alonso? You got the worst case of OCD I've ever seen!”
“What are you talking about?” snapped Alonso. “I'm not OCD! I just want to make sure the transcripts are accurate.”
“They are accurate,” OCD shot back, shaking his head in disbelief. “I mean, do you really think the jury gives a shit whether Gaito said, ‘Badabeep, badabop, badaboop’ or ‘Badabop, badabeep, badabing’? They're both the same, for cryin’ out loud! The jury knows that!”
Alonso, who was sitting to my right, turned his head toward me ever so slightly and flashed me a knowing wink, as if to say, “You and I both know this is important, so pay no mind to the sputterings of this FBI thug!” Then he looked at OCD, who was sitting on the other side of the conference table, and said to him, “Well, Greg, when you go to law school and pass the New York State bar exam, then you can be in charge of the tape recorder!” He let out a single, ironic chuckle. “But, until then, I am!” Then he pressed the rewind button again.
It was close to eleven p.m., and the Gaito trial was less than a month away. For six weeks now, since just after Labor Day, we'd been working into the wee hours of the morning, trying to “nail down” the transcripts. It was a painstaking process, during which the three of us would sit in the subbasement of 26 Federal Plaza and listen to the tapes and make corrections to what were rapidly becoming the most accurate transcripts in the history of law.
Alonso was, indeed, a good man, despite being so tightly wound that I was certain one day he would take one too many deep troubled breaths and simply stop breathing. Everyone called him Alonso. For whatever reason, he was one of those people who were never called by their first name. While I had never had the pleasure of meeting Alonso's parents (wealthy Argentine aristocrats, according to Magnum), I was willing to bet that they'd also called him Alonso since the moment he emerged from his mother's loins.
Alonso hit the stop button and said, “Okay, now turn to page forty-seven of transcript seven-B and tell me what you think of this.”
OCD and I nodded wearily, and we leaned forward and began thumbing through our four-inch-thick transcripts, while Alonso did the same. Finally, when we were all on page forty-seven, Alonso hit the play button.