THEY DROVE DOWN Boulevard Harry Truman, a wide, palm tree–lined, and surprisingly smooth stretch of road that ran alongside the coast. To the left, Max could see a tanker and a warship on the horizon, while ahead of him, some distance away, he could make out the port, with its rusted and half-sunk ships clogging up the waters. A procession of blue-helmeted UN troops passed them by, heading along on the other side of the road.
The Banque Populaire d’Haïti, the Carver family’s business nucleus, was an imposing, cream-colored cube that might have been better suited for a library or a courthouse. It vaguely reminded Max of pictures he’d seen of the Arc de Triomphe in Paris.
The bank was set back from the road, built on top of a gentle slope, and surrounded by an expanse of lush green grass. A sandstone wall ran around the building, topped with bright pink and white flowers half-hiding stiletto spikes and razor wire. A high metal gate stood between the bank and the street. Two armed guards sat on either side of it. One of them spoke into a radio when Chantale drew up, and the gate opened back from the inside.
“This is the special entrance,” Chantale said as they drove in and started up a short path that split the surrounding grass into two squares. “Only the family, certain staff, and special customers are allowed to use it.”
“Which are you?” Max asked, noticing a silver Mercedes SUV with tinted windows following them in.
They followed the path around to a half-empty parking lot. A steady stream of people were entering and exiting the bank through a revolving door.
As they got out, Max saw the Merc parked a few spaces behind them. Max glanced over, long enough to take in the scene and break it down, but not long enough for someone to notice him staring. Four men got out—heavy Hispanic types. They walked around to the open hatch.
Max had seen all he needed to. He knew what would come next, even before they overtook him and Chantale on the way to the bank, run-walking two very heavy suitcases apiece toward the entrance.
“Special customers?” Max asked.
“Money doesn’t know where it came from. And neither do my employers,” she said without a hint of embarrassment or surprise or worry, like she’d had to deal with this sort of remark before—or been trained to deal with it.
Max said nothing. He expected plenty of drug money had gone through the Banque Populaire. Since the early eighties, at least ten to fifteen percent of the world’s cocaine was being distributed via Haiti and most of the major players in the South American cartels had built up strong links with the country, many using it as a place to lie low for a year or two. He was sure the Carvers never actively solicited drug business—Gustav was way too shrewd an operator for that—but they didn’t refuse the custom when it came knocking, either.
Max had wanted to start his investigation at the bank, on the Carvers’ home turf. It was the way he’d always worked, from the client outwards: the more he knew about the people who were paying him, the more he knew how their enemies thought; he saw what they hated and coveted and wanted to take away and destroy. He’d first establish motive, then he’d throw a net around the likely suspects and haul it in. He’d eliminate them one by one until he found the culprit.
They followed the case-carriers through the doors. The inside was predictably magnificent, a cross between an aircraft hangar and a corporate mausoleum where dead CEOs might be laid to rest under brass plaques embedded in the ground for future generations to ignore and tread on. The frescoed ceiling was almost a hundred feet high, suspended by huge, dark granite Delphic pillars. The fresco depicted a light blue sky with fluffy clouds, and God’s hands opening up and showering down all of the world’s major paper currencies, from dollars to rubles to francs to yen to pounds to pesetas. The Haitian gourde was conspicuous by its absence.
The counters were at the far end of the bank. There were at least thirty of them, separated into numbered cubicles, built of granite and bulletproof glass. Max noticed how well dressed all the customers were, as if they’d all made a special trip to the clothes store and hairdresser before they came to do their business. He guessed that having a bank account in Haiti gave you a certain social status, made you part of an exclusive circle, and the whole ritual of withdrawing and investing money was the social equivalent of taking communion and giving to the collection on a Sunday.
The men with the cases were ushered through a door to the right of the counters. Two security guards stood by the door, pump-action shotguns draped casually across their arms.
The center of the highly polished dark granite floor was inlaid with the national flag, which took up half the total space. Max walked around it, studying it: two horizontal bands, dark blue on top of red, with a crest depicting a palm tree flanked by cannons, flagpoles, and bayonet-fitted muskets. A blue-and-red cap dressed the top of the tree, while L’UNION FAIT LA FORCE was written on a scroll at the bottom.
“It used to look a lot better, when it was the Duvalier flag, black and red instead of blue. It meant business. The flag was changed back to its original colors ten years ago, so the floor had to be redone too,” Chantale said as she watched Max walking around it, taking in its detail. “It’s a very French flag. The colors—the blue and the red—were basically the French tricolor with the white symbolizing the white man torn out. The slogan and the weapons all symbolize the country’s struggle for freedom through unity and violent revolution.”
“A warrior nation,” Max said.
“Once,” Chantale replied sourly. “We don’t fight anymore. We just roll over and take it.”
“Max!” Allain Carver called out as he crossed the floor toward them. A few heads—all female well-to-doers lining up for service—turned and stayed turned, eyes focused on him as he crossed the floor briskly, heels clicking, hands extended a little in front of him, as if anticipating a catch.
They shook hands.
“Welcome!” Carver said. Warmish smile, suit crisp and well-fitting, hair plastered back; he was in control once more, lord and master.
Max looked around the bank again, wondering how much of it had been built from drug money.
“I’d love to give you a guided tour,” Carver apologized, “but I’m going to be tied up with customers all day. Our head of security—Mr. Codada—will show you around.”
He took them back the way he’d come, ushering them through a guarded door and into a cool and long, blue-carpeted corridor that ended, some way down, at an elevator.
They stopped outside the only office in the corridor. Carver rapped twice on the door before opening it brusquely, as if hoping to catch the inhabitant off-guard, in the middle of something embarrassing or forbidden.
Mr. Codada was on the phone, one foot on his desk, laughing loudly and making the tassels on his patent-leather loafers rattle in time with his outbursts of mirth. He looked over his shoulder at the three of them, waved vaguely, and carried on his conversation without changing his posture.
The office was spacious, with one wall dominated by a framed painting of a modern white building overlooking a waterfall, and another traditional painting—also framed—of a street party outside a church. His desk was bare, apart from the telephone, a blotter, and some small, black, wooden figurines.
Codada said, “A bientôt ma chérie,” blew a couple of kisses into the receiver, and hung up. He spun his chair around to face his new guests.
Without moving from his spot near the door, Carver talked to him brusquely in Kreyol, motioning to Max with his head as he spoke his name. Codada nodded without saying a word, his face a mixture of professional seriousness and leftover jollity. Max understood the dynamic right away. Codada was Gustav’s man and didn’t take Allain at all seriously.
Next, Carver addressed Chantale, far more gently, smiling, before turning on the surface charm a little more as he took his leave of Max.
“Enjoy your tour,” he said. “We’ll talk later.”
Maurice Codada stood up and walked around his desk.
Codada air-kissed Chantale on both cheeks and pumped her arms warmly. She introduced him to Max.
“Bienvenu à la Banque Populaire d’Haïti, Monsieur Mainguss,” Codada gushed, bowing his head and showing Max an odd-looking freckled, pink, bald spot on his crown, before taking Max’s hands and also shaking them vigorously. Although he was a slender little man, shorter and narrower than Max, his grip was strong. Chantale explained that she would have to translate, as Codada didn’t speak English.
Codada took them back outside to the main entrance and immediately started showing them around the bank, running a rapid-fire commentary in Kreyol, which seemed to rattle out of his mouth like telex script, as he walked them across the floor.
Chantale packaged up his verbal geysers into one-liners: “The pillars come from Italy”—“The floors too”—“The Haitian flag”—“The counters come from Italy”—“The staff do not, ha, ha, ha.”
Codada moved about the line of customers, shaking hands, slapping shoulders, air-kissing the ladies, working the crowd with the gusto of a politician campaigning for office. He even picked up a baby and kissed it.
Codada resembled a lion made up as a circus clown—a cartoon character looking for a comic strip. He had a flat, broad nose, round ginger afro, and redhead’s naturally pale complexion pocked with a heavy spray of freckles. His lips were red—the lower one rimmed purple—and permanently moist from where he darted the pink tip of his tongue all around them like a praying mantis chasing and missing a fleet-footed bug. His stare was hooded, roasted-coffee-bean irises peering out from under eyelids crisscrossed with a spaghetti junction of fine veins and arteries.
Max thought Codada lacked virtually every personality trait needed for working in security. People who worked those jobs were introverted, secretive, and above all discreet; they said little, saw everything, thought and moved quick. Codada was the opposite. He liked people or liked their attention. Security personnel blended into the crowd but thought everyone in it a potential threat. Even his clothes were wrong—white duck pants, a navy blue blazer, and a maroon-and-white cravat. Security staff favored dull tones or uniforms, while Codada could have passed himself off as a maître d’ on some gay cruise liner.
They took a mirrored elevator up to the next floor, the business division. Codada stood to the left of the door so he could get the full three-dimensional view of Chantale his position allowed. Max had thought he was gay, but Codada spent all of the few seconds the ride lasted tracing the outline of Chantale’s bust with his gaze, slurping up the detail. Just before they reached the floor, he must have felt the intensity of Max’s stare, because he looked straight at him, then flicked the briefest look at Chantale’s bosom, and then went back to Max and nodded to him very slightly, letting him know they’d broached common ground. Chantale didn’t seem to notice.
The business division was tile-carpeted, air-conditioned, and reeked faintly of plasticine. The corridors were lined with framed black-and-white, dated photographs of all the major constructions and projects the bank had financed, from a church to a supermarket. Codada led them past various offices, where three or four smartly dressed men and women sat behind desks furnished with computers and phones, but none of them were actually doing anything. In fact, nothing seemed to be happening on the entire floor. Many of the computer screens were blank, no phones were ringing, and some people weren’t even bothering to disguise their inactivity. They were sitting on desks and gossiping, reading papers, or talking. Max looked at Chantale for an explanation but she offered none. Codada’s tones cut straight through the silence. Many looked up and followed the guided tour, some laughing out loud at some of the things he said, but whatever it was was either lost in translation or left out altogether.
Max was beginning to understand Gustav’s mentality, his attitude toward people. There was something to hate about it, but then again there was much more to admire.
It was slightly livelier on the next floor—mortgages and personal loans. The setup of the area was the same, but Max heard a few telephones ringing and saw that some computers were on and being worked at. Codada explained through Chantale that Haitians tended to build their homes from scratch rather than buy them from previous owners, so they often needed assistance to buy the land, hire an architect and a construction crew.
The Carvers had their offices on the upper floor. Codada used the elevator’s walls to straighten himself up and pat down his hair. Chantale caught Max’s eye and smiled at him with a what-a-jerk-this-guy-is look. Max patted down his bald head.
The elevator doors opened onto a reception area manned by a woman sitting behind a tall mahogany desk, and a waiting area of low black-leather couches, a coffee table, and a water cooler. Two Uzitoting security guards in bulletproof vests hovered about at opposite ends of the area. Codada led them out of the elevator to a set of heavy double doors on the left. He typed in an access code on a keypad in the frame. A camera eyed them from the right. The doors opened onto a corridor that led to another set of double doors at the end.
They walked down to Gustav Carver’s office. Codada spoke their names through an intercom and they were buzzed in.
Gustav’s secretary, an imposing Creole woman in her late forties, greeted Codada with next to no warmth and almost as much in the way of a greeting.
Codada introduced Max to her but not the other way around, so Max never caught her name. She didn’t have it on her desk either. She shook Max’s hand with a curt nod.
Codada asked her something and she said “Non.” He thanked her and led Max and Chantale out of the office and back down the corridor.
“He asked if we could see Gustav Carver’s offices, but Jeanne said no,” Chantale whispered.
“What about Allain?”
“He’s VP. His office is on the first floor. We passed it.”
Codada took them back downstairs to the ground floor. Max handed him two hundred bucks to change for him into Haitian currency. Codada glided off toward the tills, glad-handing and air-kissing a few more customers on his way there.
He came back a few fast minutes later, holding a small brown brick’s worth of gourdes between his thumb and index finger. The currency had been so hopelessly devalued by the invasion and Haiti’s parlous economic state that a dollar was worth anything between fifty and a hundred gourdes, depending on which bank you went to. The Banque Populaire had the most generous exchange rate in Haiti.
Max took the pile of money from Codada and flicked through it. The notes were damp and greasy and—despite their blue, green, purple, and red colors—all were varying shades of gray-brown. The smaller the denomination, the smallest being five gourdes, the more obscured the value and design by dirt and grime, while the notes of the highest denomination, five hundred gourdes, were only mildly smudged, the bills’ details completely discernible. The money reeked strongly of unwashed feet.
Codada walked them through the revolving doors and they said their good-byes. As they were speaking, the men with the cases—now empty—came out through the doors. Codada broke off his farewell to greet them, embracing one of the men warmly.
Max and Chantale walked back to the car.
“So what do you think?” Chantale asked.
“Gustav’s a generous man,” Max said.
“How so?”
“He’s keeping a lot of people on the payroll with nothing to do,” he said. He wanted to throw Codada into the mix too, but he didn’t. It was never good to judge based on appearances and instinct alone, even if they’d yet to let him down.
“Gustav understands the Haitian mentality: do something for someone today and you’ve got a friend for life,” Chantale said.
“I guess that cuts both ways.”
“Yes it does. We go an extra mile to help a friend and an extra twenty to bury a foe.”