The Matarese Countdown (3 page)

Quiet conversations began haltingly, as though none of
the guests understood the reason for this gathering. Yet, again, there was a common denominator: All spoke English and French, so both languages were employed, finally narrowed down to the former, as the two male Americans were neither especially quick nor sufficiently comfortable with the latter tongue. The badinage was inconsequential, reduced to who knew whom and wasn’t the weather glorious in St. Tropez, or the Bahamas, Hawaii, or Hong Kong? None dared to ask the essential question:
Why are we here?
Six men and one woman were frightened people. They had reason to be. There was more in their individual pasts than the present suggested.

Suddenly, the music stopped. The massive chandeliers were dimmed as a small spotlight emerged from the railing of the balcony, growing brighter as it shone down on the lectern at the head of the table. The slender man from Amsterdam walked out of an alcove and moved slowly into light and the lectern. His pleasant if dismissible face looked pale under the glare, but his eyes were not to be dismissed. They were alive and steady, centering briefly on each person as he nodded to each in turn.

“I thank you all for accepting my invitation,” he began, his voice an odd mixture of ice and repressed heat. “I trust your traveling accommodations were in the style to which you are accustomed.” There was a murmur of affirmatives, although hardly enthusiastic. “I realize,” continued the man from Amsterdam, “that I interrupted your lives, both social and professional, but I had no choice.”

“You have it now,” interrupted the lone woman coldly. She was in her thirties and dressed in an expensive black dress with a string of pearls that bespoke at least fifty thousand dollars, American. “We’re here, now tell us why.”

“I apologize, madam. I am well aware you were on your way to the Rancho Mirage in Palm Springs for an assignation with your current husband’s partner in his extortionist brokerage firm. I’m sure your absence will be overlooked, as there would be no firm had you not financed it.”

“I
beg
your pardon!”

“Please, madam, I’m uncomfortable with beggars.”

“Speaking for myself,” said a middle-aged, balding Portuguese, “I’m here because you implied that I could be in serious difficulty if I did not appear. Your coded allusion was not lost on me.”

“My cable merely mentioned the name ‘Azores.’ Apparently it was enough. The consortium you head is fraught with corruption, the bribes to Lisbon are blatantly criminal. Should you control the Azores, you control not only the incessantly excessive airline fees but the excise taxes of over a million tourists a year. Well thought out, I’d say.”

There was an eruption of voices on both sides of the table, some hinting at various questionable activities that might have been the bases of the seven coming to the hidden estate in Porto Vecchio.

“
Enough
,” said the man from Amsterdam, raising his voice. “You mistake why you are here. I know more about each one of you than you know about yourselves. It is my legacy, my inheritance—and you are
all
inheritors. We are the descendants of the
Matarese
, the font from whom all your wealth derives.”

The seven visitors were stunned, a number glancing at each other as if an unspeakable thing bonded them to one another.

“That’s not a name we use or refer to, I shouldn’t think,” said an Englishman in the sartorial splendor of Savile Row. “Neither my wife nor my children have ever heard it,” he added softly.

“Why bring it up?” asked a Frenchman. “The Matarese is long gone—dead and forgotten, a distant memory to be buried.”

“Are you dead?” said the Hollander. “Are
you
buried? I think not. Your riches have enabled you to reach the pinnacle of financial influence. All of you lead, by name or in absentia, major corporations and conglomerates, the very essence of the Matarese philosophy. And each of you was chosen by me to fulfill the Matarese destiny.”

“What goddamned destiny?” asked one of the Americans, his accent from the Deep South. “You some kinda Huey Long?”

“Hardly, but your casino interests along the Mississippi River might suggest that you are.”

“My operations are as clean as they have to be, buddy-boy!”

“I relish your modifier—”

“
What
destiny?” broke in another American. “The name Matarese never appeared in any legal documentation relative to the real-estate interests bequeathed to my family.”

“I’d be appalled if it had, sir. You’re the leading attorney at a major bank in Boston, Massachusetts. Harvard Law School,
magna cum laude
 … and part of the most bribery-prone institution that ever sucked money by way of compromising state and federal officials, both elected
and
appointed. I commend your talents.”

“You can’t
prove
any such thing.”

“Don’t tempt me, Counselor—you’d lose. However, I did not bring all of you to Porto Vecchio merely to parade the thoroughness of my inquiries, although I concede they’re a part of the whole. The carrot and the stick, as it were.… First let me introduce myself. I am Jan van der Meer Matareisen, and I’m sure the last name has meaning for you. I am a direct descendant of the Baron of Matarese; he was, in fact, my grandfather. As you may or may not know, the Baron’s liaisons were held secret, and whatever offspring resulted were also kept secret. However, the great man in no way abandoned his responsibilities. His issue was sent to the finest families throughout Italy, France, England, Portugal, America, and, as I can attest, the Netherlands.”

The visitors were again dumbstruck. Slowly, gradually, their eyes strayed around the table. All stared at one another briefly, penetratingly, as if some extraordinary secret was about to be revealed.

“What the hell are you gettin’ at?” said the large, coarse American from Louisiana. “Spell it out, boy!”

“I agree,” added the man from London, “what’s your point, old man?”

“I believe several of you are already ahead of me,” said
Jan van der Meer Matareisen, permitting himself the trace of a smile.

“Then
say
it, Dutchman!” demanded the entrepreneur from Lisbon.

“Very well, I shall. Like myself, you are all children of those children. We are the products of the same loins, as the English bard might have phrased it. Each and every one of you is a blood descendant of the Baron of Matarese.”

The audience exploded as one with phrases such as “We’ve heard of the Matarese, but nothing like
this!
” and “That’s
preposterous!
My family was wealthy in its own right!” and “
Look
at me! I’m a natural blond, not a trace of the Mediterranean in me!” The protestations grew in volume until the protestors ran out of breath, finally subsiding as Jan Matareisen raised his hands under the shaft of light.

“I can answer your assaults specifically,” he said calmly, “if you will but listen.… The Baron’s appetites were fierce and varied, as he was. Your grandmothers were brought to him as if they were the whims of an Arabian sheikh; none, however, was defiled, for all accepted him for the extraordinary man he was. But I, and only
I
, was the legitimate child in the eyes of the Church. He married my grandmother.”

“What the hell are
we?
” yelled the American from New Orleans. “
Bastards
goin’ back two
generations?
”

“Have you ever lacked for funds, sir? For education or investment.”

“No … can’t say that I have.”

“And your grandmother was, and is still, an extremely beautiful woman, a model whose face and figure graced such publications as
Vogue
and
Vanity Fair
, is that not so?”

“I reckon, although she doesn’t talk about it much.”

“She didn’t have to. She quickly married an insurance executive whose company expanded to the point where he was made president.”

“You’re not only suggesting, but you’re also actually stating, that we’re all
related!
” cried the attorney from Boston. “What proof do you have?”

“Buried six feet in the earth on the northeast acreage of
this property was a small vault, an oilcloth packet inside. It took me five months to find it. In the oilcloth were the names of the Baron’s children and their new homelands. He was, if nothing else, precise in all things.… Yes, my Bostonian guest, we are all related. We are cousins, whether we like it or not. Collectively, we are the inheritors of the Matarese.”

“
Incredible
,” said the Englishman, his breath suspended.

“My
Gawd!
” said the American from the Deep South.

“It’s
ridiculous!
” shouted the blond woman from Los Angeles.

“Actually, it’s rather comical,” said a man from Rome in the clerical garb of the Vatican. A cardinal.

“Yes,” agreed Matareisen, “I thought you might appreciate the sublime humor. You are a rogue priest, in favor with His Holiness but loathed by the Collegium.”

“We must move the Church into the twenty-first century. I make no apologies.”

“But you make a great deal of money from banks controlled by the Holy See, is that not so?”

“I recommend, I do not profit personally.”

“According to my sources, that’s debatable. I refer, of course, to a mansion on the banks of Lake Como.”

“It is my
nephew’s.
”

“From his second marriage, the first having been illegally annulled by you, but let us move on. I really don’t care to embarrass anyone. After all, we
are
family.… You are all here because you are vulnerable, as I am most certainly vulnerable. If I can uncover your various enterprises, so can others. It’s merely a question of provocation, time, and curiosity, isn’t it?”

“You talk too damned much without sayin’ a damn thing,” said the agitated American from the South. “What’s your agenda, buddy-boy?”

“ ‘Agenda,’ I like that. It tallies with your background, a Ph.D. in business management, if I’m not mistaken.”

“You’re not. You can call me a redneck and you wouldn’t be far wrong, but I’m not a stupid one. Go on.”

“Very well. The agenda—
our
agenda—is to bring to fruition the cause of the Matarese, the vision of our grandfather, Guillaume de Matarese.”

All eyes were riveted on the Dutchman. It was apparent that despite reservations, the seven inheritors were intrigued—cautiously. “Since you’re far more familiar with this ‘vision’ than we are, might you be clearer?” asked the subdued, fashionably dressed woman.

“As you’re all aware, international finance is now globally integrated. What happens to the American dollar affects the German deutsche mark, the English pound, the Japanese yen, and all the world’s currencies, as well as each in turn affecting the others.”

“We are well aware,” said the Portuguese. “I suspect that many of us profit considerably from the fluctuating exchange rates.”

“You’ve suffered losses, too, haven’t you?”

“Minor compared to our winnings, as my ‘cousin,’ the American, might say of his casinos’ profits, as opposed to his players’ losses.”

“You’ve got
that
right, Cousin—”

“I believe we stray,” interrupted the Englishman. “The agenda, if you please?”

“To control the global markets, to infuse discipline on international finance—that was the cause of the visionary known as the Baron of Matarese. Put money in the hands of those who know how to use it, not governments, who know only how to waste it, pitting one nation against another. The world is already at war, a continuing economic war, yet who are the victors? Remember, whoever controls a nation’s economy controls its government.”

“And you’re saying?…” The Portuguese sat forward.

“Yes, I am,” the Hollander broke in. “
We
can do it. Our collective assets are over a trillion dollars, sufficiently excessive seed money and spread out geographically to influence the power centers we represent. Influence that will spread across the world as rapidly as the hourly transfers of millions from one financial market to another. Acting in
concert, we have the power to create economic chaos, all to our individual and collective benefit.”

“That’s wild,” cried the entrepreneur from New Orleans. “We can’t lose ’cause we hold the cards!”

“Except a few,” said the Matarese grandson. “As I mentioned before, you were all chosen because I found vulnerabilities that served my purposes, the carrots and sticks, I believe I said. There were others I approached, perhaps giving away more than I should have. They were violently opposed to my supplications, stating that they would instantly expose any moves the inheritors of the Matarese might make.… They are three, two men and one woman, for the Baron had ten grandchildren outside of the Church. So we go from the abstract, the global, to the personal. To those three extremely influential individuals who would destroy us. Therefore, we must destroy them first. Here, you can all be of service.… Gentlemen and dear lady, they must be eliminated before we make our moves. But killed ingeniously, leaving no traces whatsoever to any of you. There was another, not of our bloodline, an old man but so powerful he could have crippled us the instant we started to rise. He is no longer an obstacle, the others are. They are the only ones left who stand in our way. Shall we get down to basics? Or are there any who care to leave now?”

“Why do I have the feeling that if we did, we’d never reach the road to Senetosa?” mused the woman.

“You ascribe to me more than I ascribe to myself, madam.”

“Go ahead, Jan van der Meer Matareisen, visions are my business,” said the cardinal.

“Then envision this, Priest,” said Matareisen. “We have a schedule, a countdown, if you like. Only a few months away, the beginning of the New Year. That is our target for global control, Matarese control.”

The Hamptons, New York. August 28.

T
he East End of Long Island is less than an hour from Manhattan, depending upon the type of private aircraft involved. The “Hamps” will forever remain the imaginary province of the novelist F. Scott Fitzgerald, at least certain sections where private aircraft
are
involved. It is rich and pampered, replete with grand mansions, manicured lawns, glittering blue pools, tennis courts, and serrated ranks of English gardens in stunning bloom under the summer sun. The exclusivity of decades past has been swept away by the wealth of the meritocracy. Jews, Italians, idolized blacks and Hispanics—all previously excluded—are now the grandees of the East End, peacefully, even enthusiastically, coexisting with the still-shocked WASP inheritors of ancestral prosperity.