George sighed and picked up the file, walking slowly back to his desk chair and sitting down, as he continued. “Alright then. He didn’t leave the office prior to 5:00 PM. He didn’t return to the tower after 6:00 PM. He may have left after 5:00 PM, but he would’ve had to return before six. That means he stayed in his office without informing security of his intentions. All he had to do was call down to the front desk in the lobby. They would have sent a rover up to his office to get the sign-in. He held a pretty good rank, after all, and he was known to work late rather often.”
I jumped in again. “But he didn’t make the call.” It was a statement, not a question. George had just told me that he didn’t call. I carried on. “How about the more obvious question then? How did he die George? You left that part out." I leaned forward on the couch, and waited for the punch line.
He made a sour face and sighed. "Ok, he was poisoned with a toxin so rare they're still working on the exact chemical analysis. The lab boys tell me it's one they've never seen before, and they're supposed to have seen everything."
I interjected. "How did it get ID'd as a murder right off the bat if it was poison? How was it administered? Isn't that one of the borderline calls? A SUSPICIOUS DEATH, IT'S UNDER INVESTIGATION. This was called murder before he hit the morgue."
"Well Jeff, that was the easy part. He had a flechette, or a dart I guess you could say, sticking in his neck when he was found, sitting at his desk, by the cleaning team at 3:45 AM. It was made of strange materials. A bone shaft, with a hollow point for the toxin, and feathers from a bird we can't identify. Handmade for sure, but where from…? And it was small. Really small. About three eighth of an inch long, including the feathers. There wasn’t much room for the toxin payload, which means that it must have been pretty potent.”
I responded appropriately with a momentary stunned silence. The whole thing was overwhelmingly strange. The volume of information that George had put together in so short a time reflected the sentiments I had been expressing to Marsh just the day before about the efficiency of the modern-day police. And I was being dragged deeper into the middle of it even as we spoke. I shook off the odd feeling and started talking.
"George, I would normally say you're putting me on, but I know you’re not. This is right out of the movies. What's going on here? This case is only one day old and already it's getting too weird. I think we'd better get started. We need to get more information on Dawson. If you can work on the Crassberg files, and anything related to them, I'll head home and get some background on Dawson himself and the team he was working with. Use Dawson's account. We'll touch base at 3:00 PM latest, and exchange info. My meeting with Marsh’s PA is at four, and I think I had better be prepared."
He smiled slowly. "I was hoping you would feel this way Jeff, lets' do it."
I got up and headed downstairs as George’s hands started moving across his keyboard. I felt confident that I had the right man on the job. What we were looking for on the Crassberg files should all be financially oriented. That was something that George was particularly good at. I would find out what the public databanks had to say about Marsh, Miss K., and our Mr. Dawson, before I went into the bank's system.
When I got downstairs I looked around for Sarah, and found her on the couch in the living room with Katy, both of them looking like angels, wrapped in a pink flannel bunny blanket and sleeping with their mouths open. Like mother, like daughter. I left quietly.
The drive home was much like the drive out. I began to hate the rain. Three weeks was enough. A little respite was deserved by all, but there never has been a lot of justice in the world that I had noticed. The rain kept falling, and I kept jumping between the case and Cynthia. I guess I would have to talk to Sarah about it. Maybe tomorrow. For now, I would try to put it out of my mind.
~
Chapter Three
O
nce I got back to my place, the work I had in front of me seemed to grow in complexity with each passing moment of contemplation. The only solution was to dive in. I began by changing into my natural attire. Blue jeans, t-shirt and moccasins. I put Van Morrison’s Tupelo Honey on the CD-ROM drive on the computer, for a little background music while I worked.
The first thing to do was to check out what the bank’s own people had to say about Marsh and his crew. I logged onto the bank’s computer, using the guest account and access codes Miss K. had given me, and spent the next hour rifling through the personnel files, finding out absolutely nothing that I couldn't have gotten by asking a direct question to the persons involved. Annual salary, years of employment, recent bonuses, etc. None of which was untoward, or shed any light on the issues at hand: who had killed Dawson and why, where had the missing files gone and why, what was in the missing files, why were they irreplaceable. It was going to take a little more time than I had first anticipated to ferret out the answers to these mysteries.
I began calling up all references to the name Crassberg. I quickly lost myself in the ocean of information that flowed onto my screen. Time flew by.
My eyes were twitching with the strain before I finally gave up in disgust. It was two forty-five, and I was only slightly ahead of where I'd been when I started. Sure, I now knew who, or more rightly what, Crassberg was. As it turned out, any European version of a fortune five hundred list would have given me that. Crassberg AG, was a company the size of Texas, apparently. They didn't seem to do anything directly, but they seemed to do everything, nonetheless. It all went through subsidiaries. Almost any type of business venture that could be conceived of, they were involved in. The sheer number of their business deals was mind-numbing. All manners of global banking institutions were tied into this company in all manner of ways. All of which left me absolutely unenlightened regarding the one project I was interested in the most. Every time that I requested information on the most recent series of entries related to Crassberg, the file list came up empty. The main file reference was there, but the files didn't seem to be. I had the dates and times that the files were originally authored, updated or modified, but not the files themselves. I didn't believe it for a minute. Obviously, I was doing something wrong. What, I had no idea. It was time to take a break. Miller time. I dumped all of the various snippets of info I had picked out while I was online into a holding directory, and named it ‘BIGMONEY’. One has to have hope, doesn’t one?
I went to the refrigerator and picked out a target. Perfectly chilled, and a lovely colour of green. I retired to the living room with my Heineken, and stretched out in the recliner. Putting the cool bottle against my forehead and breathing deeply, I waited for a flash of intuition or brilliance, or whatever. It didn't come so I drank the beer. At least that went well, so I got another. About this time, George called.
"Hello Jeff? George here. What a hell of a time I've had on that system. I've got more useless information than I know what to do with. None of it came from Dawson's account by the way. I had to use the guest account, because I couldn't log in on the other."
"Are you telling me the access to Dawson's account is shut down?"
"That's what I'm telling you pal. The amount of info available on the Guest account is still enough to keep an army of auditors busy 'till Christmas though."
"Which would be great if any of it was relevant to our search. I think It's time to have a chat with our Miss K." I glanced at my watch. It was three thirty. "Actually, it really is time to have a chat with Miss K. Gotta go George, call you after the meeting." I hung up, and then dialed for a cab.
Ten minutes later I was dressed and on the street in front of the apartment. The cab came around the corner just before I began to pace up and down. He pulled up to the curb and I jumped in.
"Nag's Head, on Bennington" I said and settled back in the seat.
The cabbie spoke into his rear-view mirror at me as he pulled out, "Right you are mister Claxton." There was a big grin on his face.
I gave him a puzzled look. "I'm sorry, I don’t remember you. Have I
taken your cab before?"
"Now, I remember you from that time at Doc's place, when I got robbed last summer? I was up on the east side an' these guys, you know, just like, cut me a little. Well I came down to see Doc, 'cause I can't take no more insurance hikes, right? An' he fixed me up pretty good. You were jus' leavin' when I come in, an' Doc was tellin' me about how you an' him were buddies an' all. I never forget a face. My name's Billy Santers. So, how you doin'?"
"Not bad Billy." I laughed. "Now I remember. It's good to see you made out ok."
"Hey, I make out pretty good Mr. Claxton. I got friends in this town."
Billy settled back to driving, and I began to focus my mind on the meeting. There were more questions in my mind now than when I had set the time and place. As usual, the streets were wet with recent rain, and the tires of the cab made a hissing sound as we wound our way into the city core. The traffic was surprisingly light for the time of day. We pulled up in front of the Nag's Head at four on the nose.
"There you go Mr. Claxton. That'll be seven bucks even."
"Thanks Billy, I'm right on time." He beamed as I handed him a ten. "Thanks muchly Mr. Claxton, I'll be seein' you."
I stepped out of the cab and into the bar. The Nags’ Head was a fairly rustic version of a typical English pub, with dark wood trim everywhere. They had brass rails along the length of the bar, low yellow lighting, and aged oak tables and chairs. The booths at the back of the room had forest green leather upholstery, with tiffany style lamps hanging over the tabletops. A quick look around told me that I was the first one there. That suited me, and I walked to the back and slipped into a booth facing the front door. Good habits are as hard to break as bad ones sometimes. The waiter flashed by a couple of times with a loaded tray before coming back to take my order. He hadn't returned with my Heineken yet when she walked in the door.
Chameleon was a word that came to mind. Among others. The transformation was complete, and astounding. The only concession to banking or business was her briefcase, which I'm sure wasn't being noticed. She had on a red suede bolero jacket, white blouse with lace down the front, and high-cut black satin pants banded by a black shiny silk sash at the top, cummerbund style, and flaring out at the bottom into honest-to-god bellbottoms, which covered the tops of red Cuban heeled western boots. Topped off with a pony-tail. The whole affair was form-fitting, and the form was fine indeed. We kept our eyes on each other as she walked across the room.
I’m basically a pretty self-confident guy. Mostly because I don’t much give a damn what other people think, unless it relates directly to business profit. I found myself in a peculiar situation just then, conscious of what I had chosen to wear for the meeting. Not self-conscious, mind you, just conscious of it. It felt strange. I had chosen a casual approach, with a dark blue linen sports jacket, with a white pocketed t-shirt. Eddie Bauer blue jeans, white sport-socks with blue and white Nike Air Max joggers completed my ensemble. I had thought I looked fine before leaving the apartment. I caught myself, and decided that I still looked fine. I slipped out of my seat and stood as she approached the booth.
"Good afternoon Mr. Claxton." She smiled and gave her hair a little toss. The pony tail swished as I regained my composure.
"Good afternoon Miss Kuwabara. Thank you for coming. Please have a seat." I gestured towards the booth.
We both settled in as she slid the briefcase onto the tabletop. I was beginning to have a problem focusing on the issues around our Miss K., and that wasn't good. I made a mental note to chastise myself later.
The waiter appeared like magic, before either of us started off the conversation. He took her order and trotted off, without having brought my beer. Priorities I guess.
"Well Miss K…”
She jumped right in. "Please, call me Midori, that's more reasonable, considering that we'll be working together on this project, don't you think?" There was a twinkle in her eyes as she said it. Or in my imagination. It was too hard to tell just then.
"Midori, it is then, and you can call me Mr. Claxton." There was dead silence. "I'm kidding of course, please, call me Jeffry." I was losing my touch with the ladies, without a doubt. I decided to play it by the book.
"Well, where shall we start, Midori?" I gave her one of my 'It's time to tell me what you know' looks, and sat back to see if it would work.
She smiled at me smugly, and reached for her briefcase. Her attitude was positively perky, and I began to wonder exactly where she stood in this affair. I'd assumed that I had no friends on the inside with this one, but Midori’s reaction to my unspoken challenge was totally opposite to what I had expected from our original meeting.
She flipped open the briefcase and patted an oversize file folder, then closed the case, relatched it and nudged it my way across the tabletop with barely suppressed anticipation.
She smiled as she commented, “You can keep the briefcase too.” Then the smile went away and she got down to it, all business. "This file contains all the recent information about the work John was doing in the two months before.” There was a discernible flagging in her mood, but it dissipated quickly. "Before he was killed. There, I've said it. It's been hard for me to acknowledge the fact that John was murdered, you know. This sort of thing has never happened to me before. No, not to me, I mean, to someone I know." She sighed and put her hands on both sides of her face, with her elbows on the table. She looked adorable. I looked at the files. Adorable, but seemingly very efficient.
"It's understandable. This is something that will make you stop and think about your own mortality for a long time to come. The best thing you can do is come right out and face it head on. Whether we like it or not, violence is a part of the modern world we live in and all that we can hope to do is to deflect it when it comes our way, we can't shut it out completely." I was being a fine counselor, but I wasn't getting much work done here. Back to the issue at hand.
"Let's take it one step at a time, OK? Show me what you've brought, and I'll ask the questions I have so far. Deal?" She brightened up at the prospect of being a detective, and nodded her agreement.
"First of all, let me explain what I have for you in the way of background." She was all business. "The last deal that John… was working on, was one that involved several different companies, all controlled by the Crassberg Group. The background file on them is marked as such. There was a complicated financial structure to the backing for the deal, that involved some big players in the Middle East, and the deal was initiated by the Brazilians. I haven't had a chance to delve into all the specifics, but it appears as if Citecorp was negotiating to underwrite a thirty-five-percent share of the financing for a major undertaking on the part of the Brazilian government. The overall financial backing arrangements were being negotiated by the Crassberg Group. They were the ones who approached us with an offer of involvement. The deal looked pretty solid, even though the South American countries in general aren't doing that well right now. The revenue from the proposed iron ore mine and steel mill projected over the next five years shows a return of twenty seven percent per annum. It's based on a rich find of iron ore in Amazons. That's in the north-east section of Brazil. The close proximity of natural gas fields has made the whole operation very sound, from the perspective of overhead. They already have confirmed export quotas set up with several neighboring countries, as well as Japan. Crassberg has generated most of the money required to float the deal in Riyadh, that's the capital of Saudi Arabia. The additional thirty five percent had to be shopped around. That's how they came to us."
The waiter finally showed with the goods. A Bacardi and Coke for the lady, and a Heineken for me. I poured the cold beer into my glass, coming up with a perfect head. We silently toasted each other and took our respective swigs. I set down my glass. It was time to do what I do.
In a very level tone, I asked, "Midori, who was John?" I gazed at a point just above her eyebrows and waited for a response.
"Who was he? I don't understand. You know who he w
as, he worked for the bank. He was just killed, for God’s sake. I know you don't mean it in that way. What is it you do mean?" She seemed to be genuinely puzzled, and I took it at face value.
"What I mean is, who was he as a person. What did he do when he went home? Who loved him? Who did he love? What did he love? Did he have any enemies? What was it that made our boy John tick? Hmm?" I was beginning to think the way I should have been thinking from the start. I didn't know this woman, any more than I knew John Dawson, but Dawson was dead and she wasn't, and they both worked on the same projects. The murder of Dawson may have had nothing to do with his work, except that his boss Marsh had led me to believe that it did, all the while assuring me that it did not. The missing files were key to this whole affair, I was sure. The problem was I didn't know what was in the files, and I didn't know how deeply Miss K. was involved, if at all. There were too many things I didn't know. The only thing I could do was to ask questions and see what happened.
Midori fidgeted with her glass, and stared at the table for a moment, but only a moment. Lifting her head, she began to talk openly, in a quiet voice.
"You ask me what made him tick? Well that one is easy. It's not easy for me to say it, but the answer is an easy one. He wanted it all. His entire life was focused on one thing. The 'Brass Ring'.” She paused, staring at the table again. I began to get a feeling for what was happening here. I prompted her gently.
"Why is it hard for you Midori? Was there something special about your relationship with John?"
I signaled for another round as she drank the last of her drink. I felt that my sixth sense was on the right track, and I waited for the revelation. She marshaled her thoughts, and started to speak.
"It was about ten months ago that it happened. It was purely accidental, and we both knew it, but it was much easier for him to forget than me, apparently. We were working late one night, on a foreign exchange deal for the next morning’s market. Mr. Marsh had asked us to see to it personally. Oh god… this sounds so clichéd. 'we were working late one night', I don't know if I can ever forgive myself for being so naive." She paused dramatically, but I didn't rise to it, so she continued. "Well, we finished after midnight, and both of us were hungry as wolves. There's nothing like counting other people’s money to work up an appetite. John suggested we go to his apartment for a steak. At the time, it seemed to be a good idea. As it turned out…, well, I felt very differently about it the next day. Only, every time I tried to talk to him about it afterwards, he would change the subject, or just walk away. It was like he wouldn't acknowledge it had happened at all. It made our business relations quite difficult for me. It didn't seem to bother him, but that just made it more irritating to me."
The Diamond Dust on Dragonfly Wings: A Jeffry Claxton Mystery Novel Page 7
