Counterfeit Road (35 page)

Raveneau could.

‘Ben, thanks for everything you did and I should tell you I hear you and la Rosa are also going to get a call from someone else soon.’

La Rosa and Raveneau were at their desks when the President called to thank them. But the call he was really waiting for came about a month later. That was after he’d gone to visit Pagen, though Pagen wasn’t expecting him. He found him at a breakfast spot in Marysville in the foothills of the Sierras. The dry month of January gave way to heavy snow and the mountain peaks off to his right were bright white and floating in the sky in the early sun. The orchards he drove past were sodden. In Marysville sunlight through a window fell on a plate of food and the craggy face of a man sitting alone at a booth. He offered his hand after Raveneau introduced himself.

‘I thought you had forgotten about me, Inspector.’

‘Far from it.’ Raveneau slid into the booth across from him. ‘I just needed to learn more first.’

‘Have breakfast with me.’

‘No thanks, I drank coffee on the drive here. I just want to ask a few questions. Here’s the one that I wonder most about. You were the one Alan Krueger was closest to. Why didn’t you protect him?’

‘I don’t know what you’re saying. I did everything I could.’

‘You and the Canadians thought he was working both sides. You thought he was making himself rich, but he wasn’t. You told Greiston about the planned meeting along the wharf with the Canadians. You’re the only way Greiston could have known to be there.’

‘Greiston told me he never made the meeting.’

‘He not only made the meeting, he shot Alan Krueger.’

‘Greiston did? Your homicide inspectors concluded he was robbed and killed.’

‘You let him down and he was forced to resign. When he went out on his own he kept on being the same guy he always was, but you made him into someone different. He was as true as when he worked under you. You gave him to Greiston. You let it happen because you thought he was double-dealing.’

‘That’s all bullshit.’

‘I can’t prove it, but you and I know it’s not. I’m sure you’ve worried since Greiston’s arrest and I’m sure the FBI has talked with you and everyone else that had any dealings with those supernotes and Greiston. I’m sure you’ve told your story, but I just wanted to let you know that I know what you did. I’ll see you later.’

Raveneau left him staring at his eggs. A few days later he got another call when he was sitting with Celeste at a table after the bar had closed. March moonlight was bright and clear through the windows along the street. On the phone screen he saw Barbara Haney’s name.

‘We took the video to record who he was meeting with. It was spur of the moment. He was supposed to meet us and then suddenly there was this other man so I recorded it. We wanted to figure out later who the other man was.’

‘I thought so.’

‘One night toward the end of last year I was alone here and thinking about what I had done with my life, and where I had failed. I FedExed the videotape from Los Angeles the following weekend. I guess in a way I was trying to make up for what you really can’t.’

‘I understand that.’

‘I know you do, and you take care, Inspector. We’ll meet again someday.’

They both knew they never would, but it was as good a way as any to say good bye.