THE TAINTED TRUST (Volume 2 of The King Trilogy)

CHAPTER 2

 Washington, D.C. April 24, 1980. Nine A.M.

John Hill, head of the Criminal Investigation Division of the I.R.S., relaxed uncomfortably in his Washington, D.C. office on Constitution Avenue, his mind struggling with a multitude of trivial problems. The silence was rudely shattered by the shrill sound of his telephone. He lifted the receiver. "Hill," he barked.

The call was from Alex McDowell, Deputy Head of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police Security Services in Ottawa. He and Hill met as students at Dartmouth College in the early fifties, Hill at the outset of his career and McDowell, a retired R.A.F. pilot, as a mature student.

"To what do I owe the pleasure of your call?" Hill asked.

"Would you believe Jim Servito is dead?"

"You're kidding!"

"I kid you not. I just received a call from one of our External Affairs people. She told me he was killed in Venezuela. Evidently he kidnapped his son in Toronto and flew him to Caracas. King and Servito's wife followed them there to try to get the boy back. There was a messy confrontation and Servito ended up with the short stick."

"King killed him?"

"Nope. Servito's wife did. She messed up his face with a tire-iron and then pushed him over a railing into a three hundred foot canyon."

"Wow! Sounds like she really wanted him dead. How the hell did she and King get out of the country? I thought you had them locked up."

"They shocked us by posting a million dollar bail, then they disappeared. Both have refused to disclose how they did it, but we're amazed they were able to pull it off."

"Where are they now? You got someone on them?"

"Nope. We had to drop the charges. The Toronto Police got a full confession out of Jerrold Allison, one of Servito's slaves. He was involved in a nasty automobile accident in Toronto about two weeks ago. He told the police everything they wanted to know before he died in the hospital. His statement cleared our friends and implicated Servito in everything we thought we had on them."

"That's just fucking wonderful!" Hill bristled. "Everybody lives happily ever after and we get the shaft. Dammit, Alex! Servito stiffed us for hundreds of millions. Now tell me how the hell we're going to get it back."

"I can't, but we have a pretty good idea where it is."

"Where?"

"The Caymen Island branch of The Banco International Venezolano."

"Why am I not surprised? Have any of your people talked to anyone there?"

"Exercise in futility. Short of torture there's no way we can get tax haven bankers to tell us anything about client activities."

"So where do we go from here?"

"Several options. One is to put pressure on the Venezuelan government, and the other is to talk to King and Servito's wife. We think they know where Servito hid our money."

"You must be joking. They won't give you the time of day. In fact, I'll be shocked if they don't sue our asses."

"I wouldn't blame them if they did, but the Minister of Finance is breathing fire. He's ordered me to put a full-court press on this thing, and not to stop until we get every dime of that money back."