by G. M. Ford
Asking, in her reserved way, if things were truly beyond repair. This was as close to schmoozing as Gene Connor got, and although she would never appear to be taking a side contrary to her employer, her face was darkened by clouds of regret.
Kirsten met her gaze. “It’s time, Gene,” she said. “I’m not the person who started out here nine years ago.”
Gene smiled. “You were a bit green in those days.”
“I was fresh from the vine,” Kirsten said. “A lot of water’s flowed under my bridge since then.”
“Perhaps if you—” Gene began.
“No,” Kirsten said quickly. “It’s time.”
Gene looked as if she was going to attempt another reconciliation. Instead, she squared her shoulders and smiled. “You’ll be a success wherever you go and whatever you do,” she said.
Kirsten felt her eyes beginning to well up. She tightened her jaw and swallowed. She met Gene’s gaze. “Coming from you, I’m going to take that as high praise indeed.”
“You should,” the older woman said. “I mean every word of it.”
“Thank you.”
Gene Connor turned and walked back up the aisle. Heads disappeared in a heartbeat. The sounds of office work whirred above her measured footsteps.
Kirsten walked over and closed the door.
She pulled her center drawer open and riffled through a stack of business cards.
Finding the card she was looking for, she picked up the phone…stopped…looked around, and then pulled out her cell phone instead. She dialed, worked her way through three automated phone-service menus until she finally reached an operator. “This is Kirsten Kane of the Queen Anne County District Attorney’s Office,” she said. “Could you please connect me to Special Agent in Charge…”—she looked down at the card on the desk—“Robert A. Moody,” she read.
51
Apparently, torrential rain didn’t improve the sound of bagpipes. The Highland Heritage Bagpipe Brigade’s heartfelt rendition of “Amazing Grace” sounded vaguely Egyptian as they marched up Seventh Avenue in the driving rain.
Both sides of the street were six deep with people, perhaps a few less than could have been expected in more hospitable weather, but an eager and enthusiastic crowd nonetheless. St. Patrick’s Day was seemingly impervious to the weather. Didn’t matter that they could have gotten just as hammered yesterday or tomorrow, this was St. Patty’s Day and by God they were going to party, come rain or come shine.
Standing beneath Scofield’s Furniture’s faded red awning, the gentleman in the trench coat was not among the revelers. A pair of drunken college boys sloshed his way and offered him a cup of green beer. He smiled and waved them off. He watched as the pair disappeared back into the crowd. His face spoke of podiatry and indigestion.
When the garishly costumed leprechaun stopped at his side, he looked the other way, hoping to convey his disinterest in the proceedings and thus avoid any give-and-take. He kept his eyes glued on the Cleveland High School Marching Band as they pranced and postured their way up the street. The leprechaun didn’t seem to be in any hurry to move along. The guy took a step to his right.
The oversize plastic leprechaun head bounced off his shoulder. He turned that way. The character had closed the distance between them. Whoever was inside was looking out through the smiling mouth. The jaunty green hat dripped water. The leprechaun carried a rough bag looped across his shoulders from which he suddenly pulled a white kitchen trash bag.
“Here,” he said, offering the bag to the guy in the trench coat.
The agent hesitated and then took possession of the bag. “What’s this?”
“It’s her diary,” the leprechaun said. “I found it in the bomb shelter.”
“And how did you know about the bomb shelter?”
He told him of spying on Isobel Howard.
“You know where she is now?”
“No idea.”
“Lady at the travel agency where Mrs. Howard worked said she thought maybe Mrs. Howard had some kind of love interest going on the side.”
Randy told him what Wesley Number Two had said about not believing her stories about working late at the agency.
FBI shook the diary. “How do I know this is legit?”
“Because I’m telling you so.”
The agent shook the bag. “This going to clear up all my questions?”
“No,” the leprechaun said. “She didn’t know what was going on either.” He nodded his huge head at the bag. “That’s the story of the seven years she spent in the dark, living with some guy she didn’t know.”
The agent sneered and started to speak. The leprechaun beat him to the punch. He related the story of the real Wesley Howard, of his disappearance and the subsequent substitution of a new Wesley Howard.
“Why would somebody want to do something like that?”
“I think maybe whoever it was had something else big going down and felt like they couldn’t stand the spotlight right then.”
“Seven years is a long time.”
The leprechaun shrugged. “Whatever the reason, I didn’t have anything to do with whatever came down there.”
“Just a tourist, eh?”
“Something like that.”
“We found substantial amounts of Wesley Howard’s blood on the floor of the Water Street house.”
“I don’t think so.”
FBI raised his eyebrows. “Oh?”
The leprechaun removed one of his enormous white gloves, fished a photograph from one of the pockets on the front of his plaid vest, and handed it over. “Unless I’m mistaken, that’s Wesley Allen Howard.”
“Our lab tells me the blood on the bedroom floor matches the security sample.”
“That’s because the people responsible were in a position to see to it that the samples matched.”
“Can’t be that many people with that kind of clout,” the agent commented.
“I’d bet money one of them was this guy Walter Hybridge I’ve been reading about in the papers.”
The fed’s eyes betrayed him.
The leprechaun went on. “I’d also be willing to bet that Hybridge is being set up as the fall guy.”
The fed remained silent.
“Interesting timing,” the leprechaun added.
A pair of beautifully appointed palomino horses preceded the FFA float down the street. “Where do you come into this?” trench coat wanted to know.
“I told you. I don’t.”
“Adrian Hope sure as hell does.”
“Howard’s wife says he went to work and never came home. At first I thought he’d confided whatever he’d heard to someone else in the program. For a while, I thought it was Adrian Hope. But now I don’t think so.”
“What do you think now?”
He related what the killer had told him. “He said he was there making arrangements to kill some guy named Barber when Howard walked in on it.”
The other man’s eyes told the leprechaun that the agent was familiar with the name.
“He said Howard was supposed to have left for the day. Once he got a look at Mr. Mystery, he had to go. Said ‘I just blundered in’ while he was taking care of Mr. Howard.”
The agent abruptly changed the subject. “Speaking of the unfortunate gentleman with the hole in his head…”
“I already told you everything I know.”
“He doesn’t exist. His fingerprints are on file nowhere in the world. His DNA profile likewise. Amazing…huh? A guy could live that long and not leave so much as a footprint.” He pinned the leprechaun with his gaze. “Nothing on his body but a shiny nine-millimeter automatic.”
“Really?” Randy felt the blood rising to his cheeks inside the plastic head.
“You know what’s interesting about the automatic?”
“What’s that?”
“Lab says it was the murder weapon in the shooting of a Wisconsin Teamster official way back in ’73.”
“No kidding.”<
br />
“And also the murder weapon in the death of a captain in the U.S. Border Patrol. Happened in Corpus Christi just last year. Aaaand…”—he stretched it out—“also the possible murder weapon in a double murder in Cleveland back in ’95.”
“Quite a time gap.”
“Quite a career,” he corrected. He waited for a long moment. “And you don’t know anything about any of this?”
“I don’t remember a thing before I woke up in the hospital seven years ago, and most of that’s real fuzzy because my brain wasn’t working right.” The leprechaun anticipated his next question. “All I had was this name floating around in my head…Wesley Allen Howard.”
“Which took you to Water Street.”
“Yes.”
The agent entwined his fingers and cracked his knuckles. “Want to hear something funny?” he asked.
“I’m all ears.”
“Couple of the Water Street neighbors claimed to have seen our mystery man in the neighborhood.”
“Lately.”
“On and off for years.”
“You showed them a picture?”
“Of the stiff.”
“Gotta be a mistake.”
“You think so?”
Randy shrugged. “Unless you’ve got a better explanation.”
The agent waved a nonchalant hand in the air. “And, throughout this whole thing, you didn’t hurt a living soul?”
“No.”
“What about a cop named Chester Berry?”
If he hadn’t been leaning against the building, the leprechaun would have fallen to the sidewalk. “Never heard of him,” he said.
“Not that the world isn’t a better place without Chester Berry, mind you.”
“I’ll have to take your word for it.”
“Interesting thing is…” He waited a beat. “Your fingerprints are all over his car.”
“I stole it from him,” the leprechaun said, and then told him an abridged version of the rest area story, leaving Acey, the dope, and the money out of it.
“How’d he get his car back, then?”
“Musta had friends on the force.”
FBI nearly smiled. “That it?”
The leprechaun thought it over. He reached inside the costume and came out with a prepaid cell phone. “I took this off the nameless guy,” he said.
The FBI guy grabbed him by the shoulder.
“I got a call on it,” the leprechaun said.
The grip lessened. “From?”
“He didn’t give me his name.”
“A call regarding what?”
“He wanted to buy another hit.”
The fed let go. “On who?”
“Robert Reese.”
The name brought the agent up short. He whistled. “And how were you supposed to get close enough to a deputy cabinet minister to do the job?”
“That’s what I asked.”
“And?”
“He’s going to bring him to me.”
The FBI agent tried for nonplussed but came up considerably short. “Where and when?” he wanted to know.
“He said he’d call back with that.”
The agent’s jaw muscles rippled like a snake.
“That name I just gave you,” the leprechaun said.
“What about it.”
“He work for NASA seven or eight years ago?”
The fed’s face stayed blank.
“Quid pro quo,” the leprechaun reminded him. “You want to know when this thing’s coming down, you better humor me.”
“Okay…yeah, he worked for NASA.”
“Which tells you who was on the other end of my phone call, doesn’t it?”
“Pretty much,” the agent admitted.
“You want to enlighten me?”
“Not much,” the agent said. He checked the street in all directions. Sighed and then sighed again. “The third guy in project management was Ronald Jacobson.” He looked around again. “Who, in case you don’t keep track of such things, is presently the deputy director for the NSA.”
“Sounds like Mr. Jacobson is trying to tie up his loose ends.”
“Yeah…it does.”
The leprechaun tilted his oversize head. “The Bureau’s interest in this didn’t just start, did it?” he asked. “How long have you guys been looking into this?”
The agent rubbed the corners of his mouth with his thumb and forefinger. “Before the shuttle ever went down.” He paused to let the news sink in. “The Bureau got a call from an engineer…guy on the space program named Roland Barber…says he sent a letter up the chain of command saying the thermal protection tiles were likely to be a serious problem upon reentry.”
“Sent to who?”
“The guy said he sent it to project management. According to NASA’s records, no such letter was ever sent or received.”
“So?”
“So we went through their records.”
“And found no such letter.”
He shook his head. “Not until it appeared in this guy Walter Hybridge’s papers last week. A copy, of course, but addressed to Hybridge.”
“Just so happens Mr. Hybridge isn’t around to defend himself.”
“Amazing, huh?”
“So…your engineer. That’s all he did? Send a couple letters and then just let it go at that?”
“They transferred him. Next business day. To Iowa. Customer liaison to General Dynamics. That was a Tuesday. Friday morning on his way to the office, Roland Barber was struck and killed by a hit-and-run driver.”
Before the leprechaun could react, the agent asked, “You want to guess who his replacement was?”
The leprechaun nodded his big plastic head. “Wesley Allen Howard.”
“Touchdown,” the agent said.
“What now?”
“We’ll take it from here.”
The leprechaun stepped in as close as the oversize head would permit.
“I can’t just walk away here,” he said.
“You don’t have a choice.”
“Sure I do. He’s expecting me on the other end of the phone when he calls back with the details. You want my help, you’re going to have to let me see this thing through.”
His lip curled. “No way I could let a civilian get involved with this.”
“Remember…they’ve met before.”
The special agent’s eyes wandered over him like wasps. “How do you know that?” he asked in a strained voice.
“He said he’d hoped we—meaning him and Mr. No Name—would never have to meet again.”
“We’ll work around it,” the agent said quickly. “You just—”
The leprechaun cut him off. “Then you handle it without me.”
“I’ll clap your ass in a federal detention facility.”
“Be that as it may,” the leprechaun said.
The agent set his teeth and looked away. When he looked back, his eyes were hard as stones. “This isn’t some damn game here, Mr. Hope. This is a potentially dangerous situation.”
“I’m aware of that.”
“Ronald Jacobson has more potential deniability than practically anyone in the nation. He can refuse to answer questions on the basis that it endangers national security and there’s not a damn thing anybody can do about it. You understand what I’m telling you.” He didn’t wait for an answer. “Jacobson could shoot you in the head in Macy’s window and get away with it. You grasp what I’m telling you here, Mr…. all he’d have to say was that the matter concerned national security or the war on terror or both and that would be the end of the inquiry.” He snapped his fingers. “Just like that.”
The leprechaun twisted his plastic head a quarter turn to the right and then used both hands to lift the brightly painted bucket from his head. The two men stood eye to eye beneath the dripping overhang.
“These people stole my fucking life,” Randy said. “This is identity theft…the real kind, not some unfortunate slob losing his wallet and having
to stop all his charge cards. These guys sidetracked my entire life.” His voice rose above the din. “They pushed me over onto a siding and left me for dead. I have no idea who I am, no idea of who I used to be or how I got there. All I know for sure is I’ve got no intention of being this guy Adrian Hope and…” He shook his finger in the air. “If I’ve got a chance to hang some trouble on the people who did this to me…well then, I’m goddamn gonna do it…period.” The agent started to speak. Randy cut him off. “If Jacobson’s got the kind of deniability you say he does, then you’re going to need a smoking gun. You’re gonna need to catch him in the act of paying me off.”
“Even that might not be enough.”
“All the more reason you need me.”
The agent looked Randy over. “You and Mr. Mystery are about the same size and body type.”
“Mustache…a change in hair color,” Randy said.
“Might work from across the street,” the agent admitted.
“And then you’ve got him.”
“Or he’s got you.”
“I can handle myself.”
“So can Jacobson,” the agent. “He goes down to Quantico and qualifies with a nine-millimeter. He scores better than most of us.”
“Well then, you and your guys are going to have to be Johnny-on-the-spot, aren’t you?”
FBI leaned Randy’s way. “Has it occurred to you that you’re a loose end, Mr. Lucky Charms?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “About the time you kill Reese and Jacobson kills you, he’s fresh out of loose ends and free as a bird.”
“It’s crossed my mind.”
“Okay,” the agent said, as much to himself as to Randy.
The Fort Harrison Drum and Bugle Corps were as crisp as their uniforms were soggy.
“When this is over…” the leprechaun began.
“Yeah?”
“I walk. No questions asked. No strings.”
“Okay.”
“You got a business card?”
FBI produced a gray leather card case, scribbled on the back of one, and handed it to the leprechaun. “Day or night,” the agent said.
The leprechaun held the plastic head beneath his arm as he stepped out into the driving rain. “Erin go bragh,” he said before walking off into the melee.
