“How can I help you, Miss Jamison?”
I obviously didn’t need to introduce myself. Dr. Richard Maas was a man who made sure he knew whom he was speaking with and why. I’d resolved on the drive up to be frank. I’m naturally secretive, never giving anything away without a purpose or a price. In the case of these murders, I felt I endangered the people I told, and increased the danger to myself. But I badly needed this man’s cooperation. I was gambling that he’d be candid when he understood the urgency.
“Thank you very much for meeting with me. I’ll try not to take up too much of your time. Would you give me ten minutes to tell you why I’m here?”
He agreed, and invited me to sit in a comfortable, leather-bound chair; he returned to his own seat behind the huge desk.
For the second time that day, I related the events as concisely as I could. I omitted only my piece of research into Wellex itself.
On first mention of the white striations I watched him closely for a reaction. There was none. He heard me out more or less expressionlessly, making small tsk-ing sounds and headshakes when I described the deaths. I appealed for his immediate aid because of Lucy and the off-chance that she was still alive.
“I’m not sure what you want from me,” he said.
“Do you have any idea why Nandrolex would be in a tranquilizer dart?”
“None at all. It may not be Nandrolex. Other substances might cause the striations.”
“Do you know of any?”
“No, but they may exist nonetheless.”
“I don’t suppose you’d be willing to give me a list of buyers of Nandrolex?”
He made a harumphing sound. “I can’t do that, Miss Jamison. Such information is proprietary.”
“Can you give me any idea of how widespread the drug is? Do you sell a lot of it, or a little?”
He shook his head. “Confidential information. No can do.”
“In a police investigation there’ll be a search warrant.”
“Legal can deal with it.”
I was fed up with his laconic replies. I know when I’m being stonewalled. Later, I might appeal to Mr. Wolfe, the president. He’d be more attuned to the public relations issue. I gave Maas one more chance.
“Dr. Maas, Wellex manufactures and holds the patent on Nandrolex. They also hold patents for various anesthetics. An anesthetic was used to commit two murders. A third person’s in mortal danger, if she’s even still alive. Nandrolex’s signature side effect was present in the bodies of the murder victims. There’s a logical connection here. Are you sure there isn’t a way you can give me something to go on?”
“I’m sorry. We’re a highly competitive industry. There’s no way I can share sales information with you or anybody who walks in here. Frankly, Miss Jamison, I think you ought to turn the matter over to the police. Murder, if murder it is, is their purview. So’s missing persons, for that matter.”
I bit my tongue. Technically, he was right. What ticked me off was that I’d explained carefully why the police weren’t yet involved. It was an hour wasted. Only in retrospect did I realize that not having to conduct a tedious investigation of Nandrolex buyers was a disguised blessing.
His tone of voice had essentially dismissed me. Maintaining my cool, I said goodbye. Maas was the gentleman, escorting me to the door and handing me over to Greg, with another patently insincere apology.
I turned in my badge and signed out. Outside, I called U.C. Isla Vista on my mobile. I asked for Dr. Akrich and got his secretary. “He’s on the board of his temple and they meet every Wednesday from three to five. Can I make you an appointment for tomorrow? He doesn’t usually come back to the office.”
“Could I catch him there, at the temple, do you think, after he’s done? Would that offend him?”
“You wouldn’t be the first person to do that. It’s not a religious thing on Wednesday, just business. The synagogue’s on Church Street, where it crosses Roman Road.”
I knew exactly where that was. I had some time to kill, so called the Worthingtons. They hadn’t heard anything from or about Lucy. Nor were there any relevant phone messages at the office or at home.
As I powered off the flip-phone it occurred to me that I might learn something if I could poke around the office of Julius Akrich in his absence. Pangs of guilt about the illegality of such an action were allayed by my gut feeling that he had information that would help me to unravel the tangled threads of the two murders and of Lucy’s kidnapping.
Breaking and entering is a useful skill for the private investigator, and my training under the tutelage of my brother John included a short course in picking locks. This particular job wouldn’t be easy. Akrich’s office was in a main corridor on the third floor of a busy building. I doubted I could pick the lock without attracting attention. On the other hand, maybe I’d find the door unlocked. Or maybe a cooperative secretary would give me a key to fetch my, uh, backpack, which I remembered leaving in his office. Or maybe I’d win the lottery. I was grasping at straws, but it gave me something to do with the time.
Once more I was on a university campus. It was like being back in school again. I dug my lock picks and a pair of thin, tight-fitting gloves out of my handbag and slipped them in the pockets of my jeans. I locked handbag and pistol in the trunk and, feigning the air of a student, trekked across campus to Akrich’s building. I climbed the two flights of stairs to his floor and walked over to his office. He wasn’t supposed to be there, but just in case, I knocked, waited, and knocked again. I tried the door. No way. The hall was empty for the moment. I knelt down to examine the lock. Lock-picking has an element of luck. Sometimes you can do the job in a minute; sometimes it takes half an hour. I was reaching into my pocket for the picks when I heard someone coming up the stairs. I resumed knocking.
It turned out to be the person who occupied the office two doors down. When he saw me knocking, he told me that Dr. Akrich took Wednesday afternoons off. I thanked him and tried out the “I left my backpack in there” story. He said that one of the secretaries would probably let me in. They had master keys. He directed me to the main office on the first floor. I thanked him and started to walk back to the stairwell. I took the stairs slowly, trying to formulate a story that would end with something like “I could just nip up there with the key, you needn’t bother.” A simple handover of the key seemed improbable, though.
I was about to enter the main office when the fire alarm on the opposite wall caught my eye. Inspiration struck. I returned to the stairs. I climbed to the fourth floor and located the women’s restroom. It was unlocked and unoccupied. I walked back up the hall so that I was standing three floors above the main office entrance. There was a fire alarm here, too, same wall, same place. Engineers, bless them, are so regular in their designs. I scanned in both directions. No one. Quickly I donned the gloves. I took a deep breath, held it, and broke the glass.
A shrill tone filled the air. Light bulbs in wire cages blinked on and red lights flashed up and down the hallway. I darted into the restroom, disappearing from view just as office doors began to open. I locked myself in a stall, sat down on the commode, ready to pull my legs up if anyone entered.
People were walking to the stairs at a clip, some shouting to others: “Is this a drill?” and “Hey, is this the real thing?” I stayed in the stall until I no longer heard footsteps, plus one full, measured minute. I had a narrow window of time in which to work and I needed to balance the risk of discovery with immediacy of action.
I left the stall and opened the door to the hallway a smidgen. I listened intently. A few sounds floated up the stairwells from below but they quickly faded.
I wasn’t sure how much time I had before the fire department and cops showed up. They’d go directly to the alarm that I’d pulled. If I hadn’t picked my way into Akrich’s office by the time I heard them coming up the stairs, I would duck into the third-floor ladies’ room.
I moved quickly down to the third floor and over to Akrich�
�s office door. Sirens wailed in the distance. I took a few shallow breaths to slow the adrenaline. My heart flip-flopped like a freshly caught mackerel on a wooden deck.
It was a Best lock, commonly found at institutions because they could be keyed for various levels of mastering. It’s not a particularly difficult lock to pick, unless your hand is shaking.
My piano teacher, when I was a kid, had a relaxation technique that she’d taught her students for those scary days that we had to play in recital. It was a combination of breathing, and subtracting backwards by sevens, and, surprisingly, it got the shakes out.
I started at Akrich’s office number, 305: breathe, 298; breathe, 291; breathe, 284. At 256, I’d become calm and I inserted the pick into the keyhole, much as I might have played the opening notes of a piano piece. I no longer heard sirens. The voices threatening revocation of my P.I. license were silent. There was only the lock and me, connected by the coercing shiv of stainless steel.
I was unaware of the passage of time when the music I was making came to its final measure: jiggle, jiggle, jiggle, click. The knob turned just as boots scraped up the stairwell. I slipped inside, silently shutting and locking the door. Outside, sirens sang a descending scale. I became aware of driblets of perspiration trickling from my armpits down my rib cage. I sat down and took stock.
The office was as I remembered it, full of artifacts both freestanding and hanging, piles of books and papers spread about the floor, tightly packed bookshelves, several filing cabinets, a desk, and a credenza. I needed a search strategy. I decided to assume that anything vital would be locked up. I was so pleased with my success at the door that I was itching to pick another lock.
My eye caught the telephone answering machine. It was an archaic tape machine that keeps old messages until overwritten by new ones. The message tape was about one-quarter used. I punched the rewind button. When the tape was rewound I punched play, turned down the volume, and pressed my ear against the speaker. The first message, a lunch invitation, conveniently mentioned the day of the call. It was Wednesday, exactly a week ago. There were several messages from Mrs. Akrich, and several from students, judging by the deference in their voices. About a dozen messages into the tape was a voice with which I was familiar.
Chapter 20
Dr. Akrich. This is Lucy. It’s Friday morning. I just wanted to tell you, I’ll be going to La Jolla until Monday, late. I’ll be back on campus Tuesday. I’ll see you then. Thanks. Bye. Oh, it’s Friday morning—Oh, I already said that. Okay, bye.
There was nothing else of interest on the tape. Lucy’s message gave me hope that Akrich might be able to help me find her. I needed to speak with him today, as soon as I was done here. I could hear me now: “Hi, Professor Akrich. This is Dagny Jamison. I just finished breaking into your office. I wonder if you could answer a few questions.”
I looked around, trying to decide which lock to pick first. All but one of the filing cabinets was unlocked. The locked one should be simple. In five minutes I had it open. Aha! Two drawers were full of hanging files of student records. I removed one labeled ‘Judy Raskin.’ It contained forms announcing academic milestones such as ‘Preliminary Examination for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy.’ In a separate folder within the file were grade transcripts dating back to her first semester at UCIV. She had straight A’s. There were also expense reports for trips to the Churok reservation, and several letters of commendation for her services to the Churok community. Nothing seemed related to her fate, except a memorandum announcing the date of her dissertation defense—which would turn out to be the last day of her life.
Troy Stanton’s file wasn’t as thick. His grades were spotty and he didn’t have any complimentary letters. What was there looked normal to me. I pulled Lucy’s file just for comparison purposes. It contained the same kinds of paper work. Other files checked at random were similar.
The bottom two drawers contained stacks of exams, some dating back twenty years. I pulled the drawers out as far as they’d go and slid my fingers around and under the piles. Nothing.
I looked around for my next task. Akrich’s office was a veritable junkyard, at least to my eye. On top of the credenza, between two piles, was a familiar-looking object. During my first visit I'd thought it was a typewriter under a dust cover. Uncovered, it turned out to be a microfilm spool reader. Some of Akrich’s research material must be on microfilm, but another thought occurred to me.
I tried the sliding doors of the credenza but he kept them locked. Credenzas are designed to keep out the casual snooper, not the professional. I could have jimmied the doors in less than five seconds but that would leave traces. I didn’t want to raise suspicion. The lock, as it turned out, was easy pickin’s.
I parted the doors. On the top shelf were canisters of microfilm as I’d expected. I picked one up. It had an official-looking label bearing the title and author: On the Practice of Cranial Surgery among the Native American Tribes of Central California, by Jason Philip Brainard, Ph.D. The next few I picked up were similarly labeled. Finally, I found what I was looking for—one without a label.
The reader was similar to the one I had used earlier that day in the library. I turned it on. The motor that drove the spools hummed softly and the backlight illuminated the screen. I removed the microfilm from the unlabeled canister and threaded it into the projector. I pressed the forward button until something appeared on the screen. I adjusted the focus.
The page contained lines of carefully hand-scripted words in a foreign language written in English letters. The lines of writing were straight and uniform, written between the rules from a page of notebook paper. I fast forwarded a bit and refocused. Same writing. I repeated the process until I was sure I was looking at copies of Starry Night’s notebooks.
I continued to fast forward until the film went blank. There was still about a fifth of the spool left. He had got the contents of all seven notebooks onto a single reel. That added up. A reel this size would hold two weeks’ worth of the Los Angeles Times, including advertisements. That would be a thousand-plus pages.
I wondered why he hadn’t photocopied the notebooks. The answer was simple. In the mid-seventies xerography was not as widespread as it is nowadays. There probably wasn’t a Xerox machine within a hundred miles of the reservation. It would have been cheaper and more convenient to photograph each page with a special camera. The microfilm format was easier and safer to hide and to store.
I rewound to the first page. Starry Night had been no dummy. The little ‘c’ with a circle around it had been drawn in, followed by what I remembered to be her actual Churok name. Now there was no doubting the source. Duplication of the material was a copyright infringement, apart from the ethical lapse it represented. I returned the empty canister to the shelf and pocketed the spool. I wasn’t sure what Akrich’s role was in Lucy’s kidnapping, if any, but the microfilm was a worthy bargaining chip, never mind my own ethical lapses.
Footsteps came from outside. The ‘All Clear’ had been given and people were returning to the building. I had to hope that Akrich wouldn’t find some reason to return to his office, and that none of the secretaries needed to get in. Fortunately it was late in the afternoon. I knew the janitorial crew was done for the day. My guess was most of the staff went home rather than hang around waiting for the authorities to declare the building safe. Anyway, I was ‘in for a penny, in for a pound,’ as I once heard Charles say.
I turned my attention to the desk. On top was a computer surrounded by stacks of papers, books, magazines, and a week’s worth of mail. As I was looking through this detritus, I inadvertently bumped the computer’s mouse. The pattern of lights that had been moving lazily around the computer screen disappeared, revealing a message. “You have new mail: Press
. I tapped on the space bar. The other stuff went away leaving the message body:
sltovj.
yjrtr od s [tobsyr ombrdyohsypt mpdomh stpimf/ esyvj upitdr;g/ jrt ms,r od fshmu ks,odpm/
=,ssd
I’d carelessly let the header slide by. It would contain information about the sender. There was probably an easy way to bring it back, but I wasn’t familiar with this particular e-mail system, and I didn’t have time to hack. The message itself was encoded in some way, presumably by the sender’s computer. All I could do was copy it carefully and try to figure it out later—it might well be a simple substitution code, like the Jumble puzzle in the daily newspaper.
This was the only new mail. Akrich had most likely checked his e-mail just before leaving his office. It wasn’t immediately clear how to read his old, saved mail, but I assumed that anything incriminating would have been deleted. I thought at the time, with the twenty-first century just a few months away, that I’d have to add hacking skills to my repertoire as a P.I.—or at the very least learn the ins and outs of all commonly used e-mail systems.
I didn’t want Akrich to know someone had been tampering with his computer. There was no way to make old mail new again, but I could at least obscure my tracks. I unplugged the computer as if the electricity had cut off. That probably happens from time to time, and the confusion of the fire alarm would make it plausible. The computer’s drone ceased and when I looked up the screen was black. I waited a couple of seconds and plugged it back in. The whirring started up again, joined by an assortment of beeps, clicks, and chattering sounds. After half a minute it quieted down and the screen displayed Akrich’s desktop. In a few minutes the screen saver would kick in and the computer would appear normal to the unsuspecting eye.
The Evil That Men Do Page 18
