“Why do you think they’re real sales?”
“Because the accounting system shows a lot of small orders, mostly between thirty and eight hundred thousand dollars, some a little higher. It also shows partial payments. Odd numbers. The fake payments were big round ones. One million even, two million even. Like those from the dummy Asian companies. The ones that look authentic were in amounts like $246,231 and $513,952.”
Alex Z struggled to stay focused, like a marathoner approaching the finish line.
“And I found another thing. They assigned internal purchase order numbers and used them to track the manufacturing, from ordering parts to the final shipping cost. So they knew exactly how much each device cost to build. But the fake sales didn’t track all the way through.”
Gage nodded slowly, trying to visualize the product flow through SatTek.
Alex Z faded for a moment, then blinked. “And this is interesting. It looks like the fake orders were all for the same kind of device. All digital video amplifiers with the same model number.”
“Is that what SatTek dumped in the storage rooms in China and Vietnam?”
“You got it, boss. Every single one. I can’t find any real buyers in Asia, only in the U.S. and the European Union. England, France, and Germany.”
Alex Z’s mind drifted away as he finished the sentence. He stared blankly at Gage.
“I think you need to get a nap,” Gage said.
“What? What did you want?” Alex Z blinked again and shook his head. “No problem. What country?”
“I said nap, you should get a nap.”
“Oh. I thought you said map.”
Gage came around the desk as Alex Z heaved himself to his feet. “How about I’ll take a look at what you downloaded, while you take a n-a-p.”
While Alex Z slogged off to sleep, Gage worked his way through the SatTek files, troubled by the offshore sales. He located a copy of the hard drive of the workstation used in the sales office, then found the correspondence directory, organized by country.
One stood out. A company in Ukraine, not a member of the European Union, had tried to buy twenty 18-gigahertz, military-grade video amplifiers. The application to export the devices to TeleTron Ukraina had been handled by a SatTek employee named Katie Palan.
The denial notice was blunt: This application is rejected pursuant to the Arms Export Control Act of 2000. The Bureau of Industry and Security, in consultation with the Department of Defense, has concluded that this export would be detrimental to the national security interests of the United States.
Gage wasn’t surprised. There was no way the U.S. would allow the export of military-grade devices to Ukraine; their next stop would’ve been Iran or Syria. Since Ukraine no longer had any enemies, its defense industry now existed solely to generate hard currency for a struggling economy.
He ran an Internet search on TeleTron Ukraina and found the congressional testimony of the director of the Bureau of Industry and Security:
Chairperson: Do you find that dual-use devices are redirected from civilian to military uses?
Director: Repeatedly. And it’s for that reason that we investigate who the real end users of technology are likely to be. For example, we recently discovered that a company named TeleTron Ukraina was merely a front for the Yuzhmash Defense Production Plant in Dnepropetrovsk, Ukraine. This plant conducted most of the research for various Ukrainian radar and missile targeting systems. Additionally, I would point out that the president of Ukraine, the former head of the Yuzhmash Plant, personally approved the sale of a hundred-million-dollar Kolchuga radar system to Iraq in violation of the arms embargo.
Chairperson: Do you know what front company they’re using now?
Director: I’m sorry to say I don’t.
Gage called Robert Milsberg.
“You know how I can contact Katie Palan?”
“You can’t. She died in a car accident eighteen or nineteen months ago on her way to the company picnic.” Milsberg sighed. “She was really a sweet kid. The Highway Patrol figured a deer ran across the road-the area is lousy with them-and she swerved and tumbled down a ravine. It really devastated her parents. They blamed themselves.”
“Why’d they think it was their fault?”
“They fled Ukraine because they despised the corruption and violence, but figured if they’d stayed there, she’d still be alive.”
“The name Katie Palan doesn’t sound Ukrainian.”
“Ekaterina. Palan was her ex-husband’s name. In addition to her native language, she spoke Russian, German, and a little French, so she was involved in most of the European sales.”
After hanging up, Gage sent an e-mail to Alex Z for him to retrieve when he awoke:
“Z: Get me the names of every Ukrainian company that shows up in SatTek records. Market research. Purchase orders. Sales. E-mails. Everything.”
Alex Z answered immediately:
“I’ll get right on it.”
“What happened to the nap?”
“Couldn’t sleep-it must have been the sound of your mind working that kept me awake.”
CHAPTER 40
W hen Gage and his interpreter, Pavel, were invited into the one-bedroom San Jose apartment of Katie Palan’s parents, Gage felt as if he’d been warped back a generation earlier and thousands of miles to rural Ukraine. The living room contained a heavily embroidered couch and matching chairs, a two-door pinewood cabinet painted in vibrant green and red, three flat-weave rugs, and half a dozen egg-shaped Russian Orthodox icons.
Katie’s father, Tolenko Palchinsky, a balding, stocky man still wearing his BIG Security Company uniform, answered the door. His wife, Olena, scurried up behind him, drying her hands on a flowery but threadbare full-length apron. Air wafting from the apartment was still thick with the aroma of beef and potatoes, herring and sour cream, and horseradish. It bore a scent of family and of coziness that couldn’t soften the strained faces of isolation that greeted Gage.
Tears of a sailor daydreaming of home came to Tolenko’s eyes when Pavel introduced Gage and said in Ukrainian, “Ekaterina, we’re here about Ekaterina.”
And after a long, uncertain moment, Tolenko glanced back at Olena and then invited them inside.
“You know,” Tolenko said, after they’d sat down and Olena had brought out tea, “I was a mining engineer in Ukraine-”
“No one wants to hear about Ukraine,” Olena interrupted. “Ukraine is dead.”
Pavel, caught in the crossfire, cast Gage a weak look as he translated.
“Ukraine is not yet dead,” Tolenko said, sullenly repeating the title of the national anthem. “As long as there’s corruption and gangster capitalism, it will live. When there’s nothing left to steal, then it will die.”
“It’s dead for us,” Olena said.
Gage knew it was a conversation they had before. Unlike Tolenko, Olena had apparently resolved that if you’re never going home, don’t look back.
“Where are you from in Ukraine?” Gage asked.
“Lugansk,” Tolenko answered, then glanced at Olena. “We agree about Lugansk. It’s dead. Rotting. Flooded coal mines, slag heaps, sickness.”
“Is that where you worked?”
“As if they listened to me.” Tolenko jammed his fist into his chest, then pointed at a phantom. “They just dug tunnels. Tunnels and tunnels and tunnels. The government didn’t care if miners died as long as they got the coal out before the tunnels collapsed.” Tolenko spoke quickly, almost too quickly for Pavel to keep up. “They only hired engineers so there would be someone to blame.”
Tolenko gritted his teeth and shook his head, a sign of the fury that boiled within, that drove him to flee with bitterness as the lasting taste of home.
“Tell me about Ekaterina.”