Cold Frame

by P. T. Deutermann

The McGavin thing. Then he tried to make sense of it. He couldn’t. He mentally recited his mantra of protest: I’m just a drone in the Metro PD’s Briar Patch. So why the hell am I sitting here, waiting to be reintroduced to some maniac on the National Security Council?

  A cold sensation settled over him. You know exactly why, he realized.

  * * *

  The intruder pulled a length of white rope out of his backpack, fastened a loop around his chest under his arms, and then tied one end off to a tree near the edge of the pool.

  “Good thinking,” Thomas said.

  “That won’t save him,” Hiram said. “Look at the IR signature from the pool.”

  “Oh, boy,” Thomas said. “I must say, boss, that I’ve never quite been able to get my head around the concept of a plant having a brain, but this one…”

  “Is hungry, unless I miss my guess,” Hiram finished for him. “Ah—showtime.”

  The intruder advanced across the footbridge, which had been built with a slight arch. His weapon was no longer in evidence, and he had both hands on that rope as it uncoiled behind him. He stopped a few feet from the top of the gentle arch in the bridge.

  Hiram’s eyes gleamed as he watched. One sentient being—on the bridge—had just sensed another sentient being—under the bridge. He was convinced of it.

  Then the bridge broke in half and dropped him into the water.

  The man disappeared for a moment but then surfaced in a froth of water between the two segments of the bridge, which were sagging out of sight in the water. The piece of the bridge nearest the intruder’s start point snagged his rope, broke it, and pulled it underwater.

  The man frantically tried to clear it, but not before the bridge had pulled him almost underwater. Then the rope snapped clear, but it was too late. The great mass of vines, sensing prey, had uncoiled a sponge of sticky tendrils.

  The green man struggled in the water, pulling hard on his rope, but the mass of vines beneath him far outweighed his efforts to escape. He pulled harder, and then, taking a deep breath, dropped beneath the surface to get some leverage on whatever had his legs and then resurface and pull himself out.

  He did not reappear. The two of them watched, waiting for the tell. Finally it came—a mass of bubbles surfaced on the pool. After that, nothing moved.

  “Okay,” Hiram said. “Another bad guy returned to the biomass. Let’s go.”

  Hiram checked the front-gate cameras before going down to the lab. The circus out by the gates had wound down to the point where only two Fairfax County cruisers were parked out front, and the cops appeared to be doing paperwork. The federal posse had decamped when the second news chopper showed up, and now both helicopters were also gone. Thomas had done one final perimeter scan and found no more intruders. One of the hydroponic lines was losing pressure, possibly from that burst of gunfire out in the defensive gardens.

  Down in the lab Hiram went to one of the glass-fronted refrigerators and pulled out a short-stemmed white carnation that was standing in a solitary test tube. There was a clear plastic bulb at the base of the stem, filled with an amber fluid. He picked up the test tube and then he took the elevator back up to the main floor, where he went to the hall closet. There he shed his tweed jacket for a black frock coat that had been tailored for his towering frame. Steadying his hands, he extracted the flower and slid that stem into the boutonniere slit in the coat’s lapel He picked up a walking stick and a black homburg and then walked down to the front doors.

  Out front was what they called the Batmobile—a specially configured Class B recreational vehicle made by Mercedes that could accommodate Hiram’s extra-tall frame just behind the two captain’s chairs in front. The roof was raised and there was an electric sliding door on the side that he could use to enter the vehicle, as well as handrails so he could position himself in the oversized middle seat without too much discomfort. All the windows except the front windshield were tinted. The living quarters furnishings in the back of the vehicle had been removed; that area now contained communications equipment that fed a small television screen set, facing aft, between the two captain’s chairs up front. The vehicle was painted a shiny black, hence its nickname. Two finlike communications antennae on the back of the roof added to the image.

  Hiram carefully pulled himself into the center of the vehicle and then Thomas closed the electric sliding doors. He got into the driver’s chair and punched some data into the navigation device on the console.

  “Drive the indicated route,” the robot finally said.

  “How long?” Hiram asked.

  “Thirty minutes,” Thomas said. “Assuming the Beltway is moving.”

  “Very well,” Hiram said. “Let’s go.”

  They drove down the big front drive out the gates past the two cop cars, and headed out onto Deepstep Creek Road toward the Georgetown Pike.

  “Your meds are in the cup holder on the console.”

  “And thank God for that,” Hiram said.

  “Thank Thomas, too.”

  * * *

  Av had started to fall asleep when suddenly he heard another vehicle approaching. The cigarette smoke seemed to disappear, and he now could hear people around him, gathering themselves.

  Showtime, he thought.

  Someone approached and removed his hood. He took a deep breath and looked around. He was indeed sitting on a wooden park bench. It wasn’t any kind of large park, but more of a scenic overlook pull-off. The helicopter was sitting quietly to his left, its blades drooping over the grassy spot where it had landed. There were three crewmen in flight suits and helmets standing under it, looking at him. The vehicle he’d heard approaching was a black Expedition, stopped now in the small parking lot. All of its doors were open and there were armed men getting out. A hundred feet beyond, another vehicle was coming down the lane with only its parking lights on.

  The approaching vehicle appeared to be an armored sedan, if the heavy crunching noise of the gravel was any indication. It pulled into the spot next to the Expedition and shut down. A man jumped out of the driver’s seat, hurried around to the right rear door, and opened it respectfully. The imposing figure of Carl Mandeville materialized and then headed toward the bench. He stopped about three feet away, looking down at Av like an eagle looks at a fat rabbit.

  Av resisted an impulse to shout out a, Hey, Carl, what’s shakin’, dude. Instead, he cleared his throat, hawked up a presentable goober and spat it at Mandeville’s shoes. All the men around him looked at him as if he was insane. Somehow Av found that satisfying.

  Carl Mandeville did not. He came closer, leaned down, and slapped Av in the face.

  “Big, brave man,” Av said through stinging lips. “Pretty good when your target is handcuffed to a bench. They call that Chicago style up there at the White House?”

  Mandeville straightened up. He pulled a handkerchief out of his trousers pocket and wiped his hand, as if to remove any contamination. “I hear they call you ‘average’ Smith,” he said. “Average asshole would be more like it, I think.”

  “Better than average murderer,” Av said.

  Mandeville stared down at him for a moment. “Well,” he said quietly, “in for a penny, in for a pound.” He turned to the operators standing near the Expedition. “Where did they pick him up?” he asked.

  “Out on the river,” one of them replied. “Just above Little Falls Dam.”

  “Good,” Mandeville said. “I don’t want him anymore. Tell the pilots to go put him back, right where they found him.” Then he turned to Av. “You know about the Little Falls Dam of the Potomac?” he asked.

  Av shrugged. “Great Falls, Little Falls, all waterfalls look alike to me,” he said. Some of the men behind Mandeville seemed to have disappeared. Didn’t want to watch this? Or hear it?

  “Well, this one’s different. It’s called Little Falls Dam because it only drops about five feet. Man-made, a long time ago, to divert water to the Washington city reservoirs. But here’s the thing, Detecti
ve. There’s a rotor on the downstream side. That means that anything, or anyone who goes over those little falls ends up underneath them, rolling and rolling for just about forever. The rotor never lets go once it takes somebody, and there have been dozens of people lost there. Dozens. You’re going to be next.”

  Av didn’t say anything. What could he say to this lunatic? Please?

  Mandeville stepped back and looked at Av with a satisfied smile. “My specialty, Detective. Loose ends.”

  Then Av saw one of the pilots walking toward them. He called out to Mandeville by name.

  “What do you want?” Mandeville said, obviously annoyed. “My instructions should have been perfectly clear.”

  “Not going to do that, Mister Mandeville,” the pilot said.

  “What did you say?”

  The second pilot walked up. “He said we’re not gonna drop a guy into the river just above Little Falls Dam,” he announced. He was older than the first pilot and had the air of command about him. “In fact, we’re leaving now. You want us, you can find us over at Bolling. Good night.” A pause. “Sir.”

  Mandeville was obviously stunned by this development. Then he realized that the people who had come with him were also leaving. The Expedition was backing up as the helicopter’s turbines began to turn. The man who had driven Mandeville here was walking toward the Expedition, which was now waiting for him, the right rear door held open.

  Hey, what about me, Av wanted to shout out, but the only one who could hear him now was Carl Mandeville, who was becoming almost apoplectic. The Expedition made a wide turn and then went up the lane toward the parkway, its taillights flickering through the shrubbery that lined the lane. The helicopter spooled up to full power, lifted off, turned in place, blowing a whirlwind of leaves everywhere, and then dipped down into the river gorge.

  Then it was just Av and his tormentor.

  “What’s going on, big shot?” Av asked. “Rats abandoning the sinking ship?”

  Mandeville glared at him, then looked around again to make sure that everyone had indeed left. The armored sedan was still there.

  “Do you know where you are, Detective?” he asked, seeming to get himself under control.

  Av lifted his tethered arm, yanking gently on the cord that held him to the bench. “Right here on this bench,” he said.

  “This is Fort Marcy Park,” Mandeville said. “This is where the Clintons’ lawyer killed himself. Right on that bench, in fact. Shot himself in the head. Right side, as I recall, even though he was supposedly left-handed. I think he was also a man who knew too much.”

  “So I’m going to be a suicide?” Av asked.

  “An ‘apparent’ suicide,” Mandeville said. “Know the difference?”

  “No.”

  “An apparent suicide is one which doesn’t get investigated too closely. If it looks like a suicide, then, well, it probably was. Lots of cops eat their guns. You were suspended, accused of all sorts of strange behavior, detained in a federal penitentiary, from which you managed to escape. But then the authorities tracked you down, went to your home again, but you did a runner. And now here you are, alone, in the dark, obviously distraught at how your life has gone right off the tracks.”

  “Is this what’s called spin?”

  “Oh, yes, Detective. That’s exactly what it’s called. And people who work at the White House are masters of it. Trust me on that.”

  “You really kill those guys, those two assistant secretaries?”

  “Me?” Mandeville said. “Absolutely not. They were terminated by a professional, for the crime of treason. I simply lit the fuse, so to speak.”

  “Treason? For what, disagreeing with you?”

  “Hell, no,” Mandeville said, vehemently. “I am a servant of the state. I am the keeper of the DMX, which is one of the few remaining sharp arrows in the quiver of national security that can actually do some good. Those men were determined to take it all apart. Two of them have been dealt with, and the third, I am told, has gone, let me see, on vacation. As if that will make any difference.”

  “You’re going to get him, too?”

  “I am going to purify the DMX,” Mandeville said, the gleam of certain madness in his eyes. “The whole DMX, if necessary. Whatever that takes. But first, I need to take care of the insolent loose end sitting in front of me.”

  Mandeville took a deep breath and looked around again. The park was quiet and dark. The river made its eternal rushing sounds down below in the gorge. The hum of traffic up on the parkway competed with the night breeze lifting up the rock walls of the Potomac gorge, annoying the trees.

  “Good-bye, Detective,” Mandeville said. Then he pulled out a pistol from his suit coat pocket, approached Av from the right side, and lifted the gun to point at Av’s temple.

  Av took a deep breath, tried to think of something really clever to say, and drew a panicked blank.

  Then there was a loud snap, followed by a yelp from Mandeville as the gun went flying out of his hand, which was now spurting blood. The big man whirled away, clutching his bleeding hand, but looking for the gun. He saw it and bent down to pick it up with his other hand. He raised it, weaving a little from the pain in his right hand, and turned back toward Av.

  Snap!

  This time the gun itself was hit, along with one of Mandeville’s fingers. He screamed this time, trying to hold one bleeding hand with the other. He bent over at the waist, grunting in pain. Av watched in amazement as the big man finally sat down on the ground, almost weeping, his two bloodied hands held tight to his stomach, his breath getting ragged. The gun and one finger were on the ground right in front of him.

  Then Av heard a wonderful sound, an earsplitting kiyai as Wong Daddy stepped out of the woods, stamping his feet on the asphalt and shaking the trees as he walked up to the huddled bleeding figure of Carl Mandeville and smacked him on the head so hard that Mandeville’s head almost came off. His body rolled to the right and out into the parking lot, where it lay very still.

  Wong came over to the bench, took a deep breath, and then hand-chopped the board to which Av’s arm was tethered. The board shattered and Av was free. He looked up into the big and very pleased moon face above him.

  “Took you long enough,” Av said, rubbing his wrist. “Who’s your sniper?”

  “Miz Brown,” said a familiar voice. Mau-Mau and Ellen Whiting were approaching. “Told you he had two special talents. Uses an old, single-shot Remington model 513T with a sling. Sucker can shoot the eye out of a fly.”

  As Av absorbed this revelation, two more federal-looking vehicles came down the narrow lane leading in from the parkway. Av eyed them warily, but Ellen was already talking to one of the SUVs on a small radio.

  “Them’s the white hats,” Mau-Mau explained. “Your old buddy Tyree Miller is in one of them.”

  “Somebody going to explain all this weirdness?” Av asked. His left cheek was a bit swollen after Mandeville’s love tap, and a part of him was still ready and willing to take off into the bushes if people became sufficiently distracted. He saw Miz Brown coming down to the parking lot with a stainless-steel scoped rifle held casually across his chest. For once he wasn’t talking, but he did wave.

  Several FBI agents got out of the two SUVs, including Miller, who walked over to where Mau-Mau and Av were standing. He offered his hand to Av with an apologetic smile. “No hard feelings, I hope,” he said. “Anyone told you what’s going down here?”

  Av took the proffered hand warily. “Not yet,” he said.

  “Ever heard the term ‘stalking horse’?” Miller asked.

  “Nope,” he said.

  Two of the agents had roused Mandeville and had him standing up while a third was opening a first-aid kit. His bloody hands were clenched into quivering fists and his face was one big glare. Not at all like in the movies, Av thought, seeing a flash of exposed bone. Hands do bleed.

  Ellen Whiting had been on her radio but now approached. “He’s actually coming,” she
announced. Miller nodded and then walked over to where Mandeville was standing unsteadily, trying not to cry.

  “Carl Mandeville, you are under arrest for the murders of Francis McGavin and Hilary Logan. You have the right to remain silent. You—”

  “In your dreams,” Mandeville spat, wincing as the agent bandaged his ruined hand. “You can’t touch me. I am special—”

  “We know who you were, Mister Mandeville,” Miller interrupted. “Right now, however, you are the prime suspect in two murders of senior federal officials. We’re still looking for your hatchet man and anyone else he used, but for the first catch, you’ll do just fine.”

  “Never happen,” Mandeville said. “No matter what you think you know, you have no case. Nor do you have a venue, because everything to do with my job is classified way beyond even the almighty Bureau.”

  “We can get around all that, Mandeville,” Miller said. “We have two people right here who can make a pretty good case that you were the mastermind here. And why.”

  Mandeville’s face contracted as a spasm of pain went up his arms. But then the glare reappeared. “A good case?” He snorted. “Bullshit. You have nothing but hearsay. You have no evidence because there is no evidence.”

  “How would you know that, Carl?” Ellen asked coolly.

  “I know lots of things and, even better, lots of important people,” Mandeville said. “Tell me something, Mister G-man: you say I had a hand in killing those two people? Tell me how I did that? Can you do that? Do you know what killed them? How they died? No, you do not.”

  “But I do,” said a deep voice from just beyond the perimeter of the parked cars. Several of the agents jumped when they caught sight of the towering, gaunt figure walking down toward them. One of the agents started to draw his weapon but then reconsidered.

  Av felt the need to sit down. This had been the strangest day of his life, and he suspected it wasn’t over yet, as the larger-than-life figure of Hiram Walker stopped in front of the gathered agents.

  “What the fuck are you?” Mandeville croaked. His heavily bandaged hand looked like a white blob now, but it wasn’t completely white anymore.