In early November (2003) Robert Eringer, spymaster to Prince Albert, learned that the Prince's senior aide-de-camp was instigating a plan for the Prince to visit Azerbaijan. By this time, Eringer knew that the aide-de-camp abused his position by befriending the Prince's personal friends.
The danger, it seemed, was that the Prince's personal friends-in association with the aide-de-camp-would use access to the Prince as a means to make business deals, from which they stood to profit, and from which the aide-de-camp might also profit financially.
In this instance, Eringer looked at two such friends with whom the aide-de-camp had become close: Robert Munsch, an American eye doctor from St. Louis, and Preston Haskins, a Moscow-based Texan businessman. Munsch (known by the nickname Dr. Mooch among Albert's inner circle) was overheard to say--in the Bar Americaine of Hotel de Paris--that he needed to "get Albert to Azerbaijan" so he could make a lot of money in an oil deal.
Thus, when Eringer next met the Prince, on the morning of November 21st in suite 905 of Hotel Columbus, he had some questions:
Would it bother you if close personal friends of yours were making money by taking advantage of their relationship with you?
Would you want to know about it?
Would it bother you if persons in your employ abused their positions to receive commissions, kickbacks or silent partnerships?
Would you want to know about it?
The Prince answered yes to all.
With Albert's explicit permission, Eringer added Messer's Munsch and Haskins, along with the Prince's own aide-de-camp, to his ever-widening radar screen.
Prince Albert then broached a subject that he said was of deep concern to him: The influence of French and Monegasque Freemasons in Monaco's government and police department. He was, he said, particularly troubled by the notion that promotion within the principality's government ministries and police force was being based not on merit but on Masonic membership. He added that he had recently been invited to attend a Freemason event in Cannes, and declined.
Eringer concurred with the Prince's wisdom, recommending that, as royalty, Albert should remain above and beyond such attachments.
At the Prince's behest, an investigation of French Masonic lodges became Eringer's next requirement.
Coming Next: Ming, Again