I pulled out my cell phone and called Nakayla.
“How did it go?” she asked.
“Very interesting. I’ll fill you in later. But I need you to get me the home addresses for Gordowski and Brecht.”
“Are you going to see them?”
“No. I just saw them enter the Laughing Seed. I want to check out where they live while I know they’re away.”
“What if they’re just picking up takeout?”
“Then I’ll see if one of them invites me in for lunch. But the sooner you get me the information, the less likely that will happen.”
“Back in five.” She rang off.
True to her word, Nakayla called with the addresses and descriptions within the promised time. “Both men have houses, not condos or apartments, and both men live alone. Gordowski has a small house in Brevard. Brecht lives in East Asheville.”
The addresses were about forty-five minutes apart.
“I’d better start with Gordowski,” I said. “Get out there and back. Maybe they’re both working today and Brecht will leave late enough I can swing by his place.”
“Too risky,” Nakayla said. “I have a better idea. You go to Brevard, and I’ll check out Brecht’s house. What are we looking for?”
“Whatever it is we need to find.”
“Wow, Chief Warrant Officer Blackman, brilliant doesn’t begin to describe you.”
I waited for her punchline. Silence. Too late, I realized that was it. Brilliant doesn’t begin to describe me. She disconnected midlaugh.
Chapter 25
Brevard, North Carolina, is the small mountain town that’s the county seat of Transylvania. Once named as one of the top ten places to retire, Brevard now has a heavy population of retirees and second-home owners. But it is a vibrant cultural community, home to the renowned Brevard Music Center and Brevard College.
As I drove past the entrance to the four-year school, I spotted another unique trait of Brevard—white squirrels cavorting on the campus lawn. These creatures aren’t albinos but rather the alleged descendants of escapees from a traveling menagerie of many decades ago. Every year, Brevard holds its White Squirrel Festival to honor these unusual animals and to encourage an influx of tourist dollars into the local economy.
I crested the hill on which the intersection of Main and Broad Streets claimed the high point of the neighboring topography. Seeing the Transylvania County Courthouse reminded me I’d entered Sheriff Hickman’s jurisdiction. I wondered if arsonist Danny Number Two awaited trial in the county jail or had managed bail. I doubted he was free on bond unless he’d passed a thorough psychiatric evaluation.
GPS led me to a small brick ranch on a corner lot within walking distance of the town center. The house faced one street while the driveway connected to the side road. I decided my CR-V would be less likely to draw attention if I pulled into the driveway. The double-wide concrete strip ended at a detached two-car garage. The closed door blocked a view of the inside.
I reached under the passenger’s seat and pulled out my investigative prop—a clipboard. Holding a clipboard gave one purpose and an air of official business. I could be a meter reader, contractor, or inspector.
Stepping out into the sunlight, I heard a dog challenge my arrival with a series of sharp barks. The furry sentinel jumped up against a bordering, chain-link fence, but his stubby tail wagged so vigorously that he was more Welcome Wagon than Neighborhood Watch.
I ignored the pooch and walked to the garage door. Grabbing the handle, I tried to lift it, but whether it was locked or controlled by an automatic opener, the door didn’t budge.
A screened porch was attached to the left side of the garage. A covered walkway provided shelter from the porch to the back door of the house. I tried the doorknob. Also locked. Peering through the mullioned window panes, I saw a tidy kitchen.
I carefully stepped into a weedy flowerbed and looked through an adjacent window. The slats of the blind were open, and I saw a dining table with four chairs. Beyond, a sofa and armchair suggested one end of the front living room. A guitar leaned against the cushion of the sofa. Had Joseph Gordowski taken lessons from Randall Johnson? The men knew each other from work. Could the strings be Martins?
I took out my phone and zoomed the image tighter for a closer shot of the instrument. I could examine the photograph more closely when I returned to the office.
Turning back to the screened porch, I noticed a side entrance to the garage. The porch door was unlocked, and I moved through the outdoor furniture in hopes I could gain entry.
There was a time when folks in a small town didn’t lock their garages. That time had passed. But not for Joseph Gordowski. The door opened, and as I crossed the threshold, a motion detector turned on the lights.
The double garage had a vacant spot were a car had been parked. A few aged oil stains indicated a vehicle with a leaky seal once had been housed there. On the other side, a small lawn mower with a grass clippings bag had been rolled against the wall. A five-gallon metal can sat beside it.
I lifted the can. The hollow slosh of liquid told me it was nearly empty. I unscrewed the top lid and smelled the distinctive odor of gasoline. Five gallons would have been more than enough to engulf Nakayla’s home in flames.
The back wall of the garage held a surprise. A workbench at standing height and a desk with an expensive leather chair demonstrated Gordowski spent a lot of time there. The workbench didn’t have a vise or saws or other tools for woodworking. The pieces scattered on its surface were electronic in nature. Circuit boards, chips, diagnostic equipment, screwdrivers, and soldering irons.
On the desk sat a shortwave transceiver. The gear appeared to be old school with a headset and microphone and a telegraph key. In an age of Facebook and encrypted email accounts, Gordowski stayed within the era of Marconi. Was it low-tech under the radar of a high-tech world?
I noticed a black, shielded cable coming out of the rear of the transceiver and disappearing through a matching diameter hole in the wall near the upper rafters. Outside, I circled behind the garage to where the cable came through the wall and ran up to the roof. An antenna rose from a bracket mounted on the eave. The pitch of the roof hid it from the driveway and from the house.
Again, I used my phone to photograph the antenna, the electronic equipment, and the gas can. Since I’d had no search warrant, they’d be shared only with Nakayla so that together we could formulate a plan to bring Gordowski to the attention of the FBI.
Before backing out of the driveway, I emailed the photos to Nakayla and asked her to call me after she had the chance to review them. Then my mind went into overdrive as I imagined how the history behind this case must have played out.
Frank DeMille became suspicious that his sophisticated software codes were being duplicated and shared beyond the Apollo tracking station. He was hesitant to make an accusation without proof, so he asked his brother-in-law, Eddie Gilmore, for advice. Evidently, Eddie planned to discuss the matter with Chief Warrant Officer Len Axelrod in Saigon. Eddie didn’t realize one of the Kit Carson Scouts close to him, Nguyen Van Bao, had intercepted the information and delivered it to his Soviet handler, Dr. Jean Louis Caron. Once Moscow got wind of the potential investigation, word must have gone out to Bao and Gordowski, half a world apart, to eliminate the threat.
But why kill DeMille at the tracking station? Maybe he caught Gordowski copying his computer program that night? Maybe he spooked Gordowski with his suspicions. Either way, DeMille was murdered, Gordowski remained untouched, and the Soviets must have been delighted when the tracking facility was taken over by the NSA and their mole stayed in place.
The discovery of Frank DeMille’s remains nearly fifty years later shouldn’t have been a concern, especially since the NSA no longer controlled the site. PARI was a public science lab and museum. But Gordowski’s friend, Theo Brecht, had landed a comp
uter job at NOAA, and Gordowski had wormed his way into helping him. Furthermore, backup data storage was tying NOAA and PARI together, and Gordowski was now positioned to work in both. If Gordowski fell under suspicion, his activities would be greatly curtailed.
Although the Soviet Union no longer existed, I felt certain the link still went back to Russia. Inside and outside coordinated hacks might penetrate NOAA’s safeguards, not to mention the value of knowing the air force’s weather and climate priorities.
Yes, the danger of their spy’s unmasking brought out the same response—kill anyone who could be a threat. Nakayla and I for spearheading a more tenacious investigation into Frank DeMille, Loretta for what she remembered the night Frank disappeared, and Randall Johnson to be a ready-made fall guy. The pattern seemed clear, but we still needed hard evidence. Evidence like catching old-school Gordowski transmitting some coded message in the middle of the night. I found myself anxious to be a part of any raid.
My cell rang as I merged onto I-26 for Asheville. It was Nakayla.
“How did you do?” I asked.
“Not so good. The blinds were drawn on all the windows. Brecht has a single garage with rudimentary tools hanging on a pegboard wall.”
“You got inside the garage?”
“Yes. An unlocked side door. Everything in there was very tidy.”
“Any gas cans?”
“No. Just a small lawn mower. Looks like you unearthed more.”
“Gas, guitar, shortwave radio, and no alibi for the night Frank DeMille died. Or the night your house was firebombed.”
“All circumstantial,” Nakayla cautioned. “I’m at the office, and I blew up the photo you took of the guitar. It’s classical. Not the style Randall Johnson taught. And a classical guitar has gut or nylon strings, not the wound steel suspected in Loretta’s murder.”
“But he obviously knows strings,” I countered. “Buy a steel set since Randall played steel.”
“Maybe that’s the question. Ask Gordowski what brand of strings did Randall play. If they both played guitar and worked together for years, they must have talked music.”
“And if he say’s Elixir, why would he use Martins to fake a suicide?”
“Exactly. So if he says Elixir, then it’s more likely he’s innocent.”
“Kind of an odd question for me to ask him out of the blue.”
“Yes, but Newly could, or Sheriff Browder. You might pass it along.”
Nakayla was right. Cops were always questioning a suspect from a multitude of angles and non sequiturs. Or maybe I’d hold that question for the FBI. They had the ultimate say if Gordowski turned out to be a Russian spy.
“OK. You staying at the office?” I asked.
“No. I’m going to pick up some more things I need to replace from the fire. And I thought I’d run by Hewitt’s and get Blue before returning to your apartment. You?”
“I’ll stop by the office and download these photos from my phone. And I’d like to think about how I’m going to approach Lindsay Boyce. I think we need to see her first thing in the morning. Maybe I should call Newly and bring him up to speed before meeting Boyce.”
“What about dinner?”
I glanced at my watch. Five after three. “Where would you like to go?”
“How about the Laughing Seed Café? We shouldn’t have to worry about running into Joseph Gordowski.”
“OK,” I agreed. “Say six? I’ll be the macho carnivore amid all your artsy vegetarians.”
Nakayla laughed. “Yeah, Macho Man. The thing you eat most is crow. But maybe you can sneak down to Jack of the Wood and smuggle up a few sliders.” She hung up.
I stared straight ahead, not really seeing the traffic in front of me or hearing the eighteen-wheeler beside me. “Maybe you can sneak down to Jack of the Wood and smuggle up a few sliders.” Jack of the Wood was on Patton Avenue, the Laughing Seed Café on Wall Street, but it was the same building. A staircase connected the two restaurants. Had the police checked who was in the upper restaurant? Someone who could have come down at any time and seen Loretta? Possibly even heard her song?
I phoned Newly.
He growled at me. “For God’s sake, it’s Sunday afternoon. Don’t you know God wants me to have an uninterrupted nap?”
“Just one question. When you followed up on the diners and drinkers in Jack of the Wood the night Loretta was killed, did you also check the clientele at the Laughing Seed Café?”
Silence. I suspected Newly was embarrassed to say the police had overlooked the physical link between the two restaurants.
“You woke me up for that question? What kind of rube department do you think we are? Yes, we talked to the wait staff the next day and went through the credit card receipts. No tie to what went on in the pub. Why is this question now so urgent?”
I’d planned to wait till the next morning to get into our suspicions about Joseph Gordowski, but Newly asked a legitimate question.
“I think Gordowski might have been a Russian spy all these years.” I quickly summarized the computer programming codes of DeMille, the years inside the NSA, and now the climate data and potential link to the air force.
“When we interviewed Gordowski, he said he was home that evening. No one claimed to have seen him at the pub. Other leads within the Case family or Randall Johnson were stronger.”
“Well, you might want to question him again. At his home. You’ll notice he has a guitar, so it wouldn’t be inappropriate to ask if he knows what kind of strings Johnson played. And you might see if he’ll let you in his garage to check his gas cans. You’ll then notice a shortwave transceiver.”
“Should I ask how you know all this?”
“No.”
“And this can wait till tomorrow?”
“Your call. He was working with Theo Brecht today, but he might be home this evening. That’s after you’ve enjoyed your nap.”
“And what are you going to do?” Newly asked.
“What I do best. Think.”
Newly laughed. “Then, Sam, I’d hate to know what you do the worst.”
Chapter 26
Despite Newly’s teasing me about my little gray cells, as Hercule Poirot would say, I did need time to concentrate on what I’d learned and develop a theory of how the crimes could have occurred. The goal was to create a cogent argument I could lay out for Special Agent Lindsay Boyce and her FBI team.
Arriving at the office, I first brewed a fresh pot of coffee and then took a steaming mug along with a pencil and legal pad to the sofa. I listed the names of all the people who had been caught up in the investigation of the four murder victims—Frank DeMille, Eddie Gilmore, Loretta Case Johnson, and Randall Johnson. I even included intelligence officer Chuck McNulty and Chief Warrant Officer Len Axelrod because of their Vietnam War connection.
In sort of a makeshift Venn diagram, I described how relationships entwined, what alibis existed, and what might be motives.
Joseph Gordowski—worked for Apollo, NSA. Volunteers for PARI, and NOAA. Has no alibi for night of DeMille’s disappearance. Close to DeMille, knew his work. Also has no alibi for night of Loretta’s death or the firebombing. Asked Brecht to bring him onto NOAA-PARI data backup project. Operates shortwave radio and has gas can.
Theo Brecht—came later to Apollo as assistant to DeMille but also worked NSA and now NOAA. Has an alibi for night of DeMille’s death as both Loretta and Randall saw him. Was learning from DeMille and replaced him. No alibi for night of Loretta’s death or firebombing. Agreed to Gordowski’s request for part-time work with NOAA data project. No visible gasoline cans at his house.
Randall Johnson—on-site the night of DeMille’s disappearance. Brecht says Johnson’s overalls were muddy but only remembers that because of potential damage to the equipment. Johnson had a crush on Loretta and would have seen DeMille as a rival. Poss
ibly had enough knowledge to copy files and could have been paid by Soviets. No alibi for night of Loretta’s murder or firebombing. A faked suicide didn’t mean he couldn’t have killed DeMille or Loretta. His death could have been from someone who believed he killed Loretta. The Case brothers most likely. The Martin guitar strings could have been used by them for another reason.
The Case brothers and their sons all heard Loretta’s song, but only her twin brothers were alive at the time of Frank DeMille’s murder. Least likely suspects to have been involved in any espionage connection if that was the underlying motive.
I stopped writing and went to my computer. A quick search showed the Martin strings to be half the price of the Elixirs. Could the Martins have been nothing more than a cheaper option for a murder weapon? I’d witnessed stranger things in my career. I returned to my legal pad and added the sentence, Martin strings don’t necessarily exonerate Case family. It was then I noticed one name wasn’t on the list. Loretta Case Johnson herself. The least suspected person. The one who had written letters to Frank. The one who had written to Frank’s sister. Could all of that have been to cover her tracks? Was she what the spy game calls a honey trap? Seduced Frank and then learned enough about what he did to copy the codings and then send them on to someone who could deconstruct and understand Frank’s genius?
No. On her front porch, her grief had been too real, too raw, too spontaneous when Nakayla and I had told her of the discovery and identification of Frank’s remains. And she’d provided alibis for others. Why do that if you’re the guilty party? Why not sow suspicion elsewhere?
That thought stopped me. Gordowski hadn’t said anything that incriminated anyone else. Just that he had left when the tracking station’s role had ended for that cycle. Brecht had said he’d then waited for Frank DeMille to return to check his programming for slewing the radio telescopes to the next quadrant of the heavens.
Murder in Rat Alley Page 22
