Numbered Account

"Here's how it worked: USB opened a letter of credit on behalf of Goldluxe to a supplier of gold in Buenos Aires for, say, five hundred thousand dollars- that means that when the South American company sends the gold to Goldluxe in Los Angeles, the bank promises to pay them for the shipment. The company in Argentina exports the gold all right, but not five hundred thousand dollars' worth. Oh, no. They only send about fifty thousand worth."

"But fifty thousand dollars' worth of gold is going to weigh a lot less than five hundred thousand worth," Nick protested. He remembered seeing the company name El Oro de los Andes.

"Very good," said Burki, raising a finger as if to say "Point, Neumann." "To make up the difference in weight for our friends in customs, the company in Buenos Aires threw in some lead. No problem. Shipments of precious metals aren't normally examined by customs authorities. As long as the papers match, and the receiving party verifies that the shipment is good, the bank is cleared to make payment of the letter of credit."

"So why does Goldluxe want to pay a company in Buenos Aires five hundred thousand dollars for gold they didn't receive?"

Burki tried to laugh but ended up coughing violently. After a minute he was able to say, "Because Goldluxe has too much cash. They're naughty boys. They need a way to clean it up."

"I don't exactly follow."

"It's actually very easy. Remember what I told you before- Goldluxe is sitting on a million dollars in cash. They start by importing fifty thousand dollars' worth of gold. That's their inventory."

Nick was beginning to catch on to the game. "But on their books they list the cost of inventory as five hundred thousand dollars. Just like the import documents say."

Burki nodded. "Goldluxe has to make it look like their stores are selling a million dollars' retail worth of gold jewelry. So they mark up the value of the inventory to a million dollars and sell it out the door. By selling, I mean they generate a stack of bogus sales receipts a mile high. Remember they only really have fifty thousand dollars' worth of gold at cost. About a hundred thousand at full retail markup. They take the phony sales receipts and record them in the general ledger. With their books showing sales of one million dollars, they can take their cash to the bank and legitimately deposit it."

Nick shuddered, seeing how simple the plan was. "Where was the money coming from?"

"I've only seen two businesses that generate that kind of cash: casino gambling and drugs. I've never heard of Allen Soufi in Las Vegas, have you?"

Nick smiled grimly. "So the idea is to piggyback the laundering operation on top of the legitimate business."

"Bravo," said Burki. "Once the million dollars is in the bank, USB pays off the letter of credit to the company in Argentina- which Soufi, naturally, controls. And the other five hundred grand is banked as Goldluxe's profit. Soufi wired as much as he wanted to his accounts in London and Switzerland twice a week."

"Twice a week?" asked Nick.

"He was a punctual bastard, I'll give him that much, your Allen Soufi."

"And my father?"

"Alex blew the whistle. He asked too many questions. When he figured out what they were doing, he threatened to close the account. Two months after my dinner with Schweitzer, your father was dead." Burki pointed a finger at Nick. "Don't ever tell a man like Soufi, a professional running a very serious operation all over the world, to fuck off."

"His name wasn't really Allen Soufi, was it?" Nick asked, knowing the answer, but wanting to hear it, needing to have another human voice tell him he wasn't crazy.

"What do you care?" asked Burki, pushing himself shakily to his feet. "That's it, kid. Now get the fuck out of here and let me get on with my business."

Nick put a hand on his shoulder and brought him back down to the ground. "I mean you said he was my Allen Soufi. You said I could call him that if I wanted to. What was his real name?"

"Cost you another hundred francs. A man's gotta live."

Or die. Nick pulled out his wallet and gave Burki his money. "Give me his name."

Burki crumpled it up into his left hand. "No one you've ever heard of. A Turkish thug. Mevlevi was his name. Ali Mevlevi."

CHAPTER 59