“Don’t you think somebody’s going to catch on eventually?” Max pressed. “Some ambitious prosecutor? Scandal-sheet reporter?”
“We’re protected,” Avery said.
“From everybody?” Max burst, looking amused and skeptical at once. At this, Avery and Volkov struggled to suppress self-satisfied grins.
“I told you he was a genius,” Vokov said. “Jim knows how the game is played.”
“We had our own rider,” Avery confided, “in the Homeland Security Bill. Our work is national security and classified top secret-anything we do, no matter who the client or even if there is no client. We can’t be prosecuted.”
“Can’t even be charged,” Volkov crowed. “No congressional oversight, no subpoenas, no grand juries. Offer that to a client and see them light up. It’s beautiful.”
“What congressman proposed that?”
“Well, no one’s name is on it,” Volkov answered. “But the Majority and Minority Leader both think they put it in, so no one is going to ask questions.”
“This is Pietr’s territory,” Avery said and there was a medal and a caution in the phrase.
Max stared at Avery for a long moment. “And you really think you can keep this quiet? Over time? With all the people who’ll know? With all the people who’ll be watching?”
Volkov rose instantly at this. He wasn’t a tall man, not next to Avery but he pulled himself up to his full height and there was fire in his eyes. “How do you think Bush won in Ohio?” he said, his voice rasping. “All those precincts where the exit polls said Kerry won-exit polls that are dead accurate, time after time, suddenly all wrong? Those people told the pollsters who they meant to vote for. Once they got inside the booth, that’s not the button they pushed.” He glowered at the bunch of us skeptics. “Of course people were watching. There were articles in high-profile publications, preaching to the choir. They were roundly ignored.” He leaned over the table and rapped on it with his forefinger. “People need to feel secure to challenge power. When they’re frightened, they have their own problems to worry about.” He paced back and forth a few more times before finally acknowledging Avery glaring at him. Then he took his seat again sullenly.
“That all might change after the next election,” I said. Volkov looked at me like he hadn’t considered I could speak on my own. But he answered the point, though he answered it to Max.
“We work for both parties. Everyone wants us deep and dark.”
“The point,” Avery concluded, “is that we’re protected. From the top down.” He jumped up to the whiteboard, eager to change the subject.
“We recruit on college campuses, smart kids who need some extra money or want to start paying off their student loans. Who complains about getting paid for meditating on different subjects a few hours a day? Most of our persuasion targets require no more than twenty minutes at a clip, so we can service fifty clients a day just out of this office. Our work is all billable hours, like lawyers and accountants. We’re all over the world and, as you can see, growing fast.”
Max was smiling now, not a happy smile-he didn’t seem to have a happy smile-but an intrigued one. “Okay, I’ll bite,” he said. “It’s brilliant. You’ve got the world on a string. What do you need me for?”
Volkov started rubbing the side of his nose, as though he’d suddenly developed a boil. “We have…other work,” he said. “Sensitive jobs, the kind you can’t give to drones. Some of which you’ve already figured out, some of which you know nothing. I have built a small crew I can trust. I know what they’re capable of and I know they will be discreet, they will not act rashly and they will not be caught. You are the Crown Jewel of the Soviet system, Maximka. You could choose your own jobs.”
“I’ll get Bin Laden for you,” Max said. “I could do that.”
“Come on, Max,” Volkov moaned. “It has to be something they’ll pay us for.”
“No one would pay you to find Bin Laden?”
“Finding him isn’t an issue,” Avery sighed. “He’s off-limits.”
“C’mon, Max, think like a grown-up,” Volkov urged. “When there was that whole flap about wiretaps without court orders, we cleaned up-they farmed out all the important cases to us. Remember-no oversight.”
“More to the point,” Avery said, “is it so terrible to help Company A get Company B’s peanut butter recipe? Or to find out how much they plan to bid for that big contract? To tip off the cameraman when and where Angelina and Brad are getting married? Or where they’re arguing? You’d be amazed at the return on smalltime stuff like this.”
“Or it might be a little more…gritty,” Max said, his expression dark. “Yes?”
Avery wanted to settle the waters, to smooth the room but Volkov was squirming, full of energy and fight, though it wasn’t at all clear who he was fighting. “Max,” he said, rising as though he couldn’t remain in his seat another second, “you don’t have to be a miserable stunted monk running from the world, hiding in back alleys and paranoid about everyone who wants to speak to you. You could be a consultant to a major corporation, with a nice house in the suburbs and a wife and kids, a Mercedes, vacations-a normal life.” I must have snickered-Volkov turned on me as though I’d pulled a gun out of my pocket. “Don’t laugh unless you know what it means to never be normal, to never be able to be normal!” and the anger and frustration in his voice were close to the bone. “You wanted that once, Max, you wanted it badly-I haven’t forgotten how badly.”
“I made a mistake,” Max said gravely. “I haven’t forgotten either.”
“Maybe you couldn’t do better at the time,” Volkov’s voice softened. “I’m not judging. But now-” he glanced at Avery, who nodded, “-now Max, twenty jobs a year. Twenty! You choose! Some of them, you’ll probably come in here or to one of our other centers, control someone for twenty minutes at a distant location or send out a suggestion and be finished. Sometimes there’ll be a little travel, first-class, on us, with layovers. Three quarters of a million dollars a year plus an expense account and bonuses for jobs we particularly want your help with.” Volkov tried to muster a look of sympathy, without quite putting it across. “I remember your scruples, Max-that’s not a problem. Surely there are twenty jobs we could all agree on?”
The two men stood across from one another, leaning over the table like rams about to butt horns. I don’t think either of them was aware of it. Max bit his lip; he was doing a slow burn and I started looking for the storm cellar. “Twenty jobs,” he mulled. “And not Bin Laden.”
“I told you, he’s-”
“Off-limits, yes, you said that. What kind of job were you doing in Florida two days ago?”
“We had no job in Florida,” Avery added.
“Yes, you did,” Max continued, voice rising. “They were your guys. Same van, same guns and headsets, same feeble-minded approach.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Avery insisted. He glanced at Volkov but received no glance in reply.
“Your men killed Dave Monaghan, two days ago in Florida. If there’s any chance of us working together, I need to know why.”
“Who’s Dave Monaghan?” Avery asked, now staring hard in Volkov’s direction, still without response.
“I’m sorry,” Max said, turning toward the door. “We can’t do business on this basis.” He looked over at me. “Time to go,” he said quietly.
Volkov finally found a way to look Avery in the eye, fleetingly. “Let us talk a few minutes, Jim,” Volkov said. “Privately.”
“You said he-”
“We’ll come to your office. Just a few minutes,” Volkov was the one trying to soothe things now. Avery, glaring at Volkov, stepped deftly between Max and the door.
“We’re doing great things here, Max,” he said. “I want you to be part of it.” He clapped him on the shoulder, reassuring and turning him away at the same time. Then he went out, closing the door behind him with a resounding thunk.
Volkov watched the door close and seemed to expand in the chair. He had been solicitous and respectful, second banana, with Avery around; now he was filling the empty space, the man in charge.