The Key

by Jennifer Sturman

  “Read this,” I whispered to Peter, tugging at his sleeve with one hand and pointing with the other to the Washington Post article on the screen before me.

  He pulled up a chair and scrolled quickly through the article. It didn’t take him long to put the pieces together. “Unbelievable. They had the entire thing rigged.”

  “But we still can’t prove it.”

  “There’s got to be a trail, somewhere. Something that will prove what Gallagher and Perry and Brisbane were all up to.”

  “They’ve probably covered their tracks pretty well. We really need someone on the inside, somebody at Thunderbolt who can help.”

  “Well, if we’re lucky, Man of the People will be that somebody. Assuming we can figure out who he is. Which reminds me—I had an idea while I was on the phone. May I?” he asked, reaching out his hand for the mouse.

  “Sure.” He sent a copy of the Washington Post article to the printer and then returned to the search bar. I watched as he typed in “Man of the People” and “Thunderbolt.”

  “Oh. I should have thought of that.” Two heads were definitely better than one, especially when that one was mine.

  “It probably won’t lead anywhere,” he said, pressing enter. A long list of results filled the screen, but they were for sites about Greek and Norse gods interspersed with a few for evangelical groups. “At least, not anywhere useful. I had a feeling it was a long shot.”

  “But it was a good idea.”

  He shrugged. “Ready to get going?”

  I nodded and reached for my jacket. He moved the mouse to close out of the search engine, but then he hesitated.

  “Maybe I’ll just try one more thing.” He added “Industries” to “Thunderbolt” in the search bar, pecking at the letters with his index fingers. Peter’s business revolved around computers, but he had never thought that sufficient reason to learn how to type.

  I was expecting that the search engine would return with no results this time, instead of too many about things we didn’t care about, but a short list appeared on the screen. They were all links to the Web site of a Pittsburgh newspaper.

  “That’s more like it,” I said approvingly.

  “Unless it’s an exposé on Thor.” Peter clicked on one of the links and an article popped up in the browser.

  Union Threatens Walk Out at Thunderbolt

  Talks continued into the early morning as Thunderbolt Industries management and union officials struggled to reach agreement. At stake are the terms for the new labor contract.

  “Management is asking for cuts in health care and pension benefits for our hardworking members. Meanwhile, they reward themselves with big bonuses and fancy cars. I’m going to keep fighting until I have something that I can feel proud to present to our union members,” said union chapter president Frank Kryzluk. “We’re not going to just lie down and let the military-industrial complex steamroll right over us little guys.”

  “New union troubles?” I asked, momentarily confused. Then I checked the article’s date—it had been posted weeks ago.

  “No, just the same old union troubles, I guess.”

  “Well, we know how it ended. Perry and his executive team extracted some concessions on benefits, but not as many as they’d hoped. The union held pretty firm. On Monday Perry said that they’d wrapped up negotiations over the weekend.” I scanned the rest of the article. “I wonder why this even came up in the search results. There’s no ‘man of the people’ reference in here.” I pushed my chair back and stood to put on my coat.

  I had collected the Washington Post article from the printer and was stashing it in my pocket when I heard Peter’s shout.

  “Aha!”

  This time the librarian’s shushing was even more emphatic, but when Peter gave her his own apologetic look, instead of continuing to glare at him she made a “don’t-worry-about-it” face. I knew from experience that Peter’s apologetic look was very convincing, but her easy capitulation seemed unfair. However, I had more important things to worry about than battling the librarian’s double standard.

  “Aha what?” I asked.

  “Here.” He pointed to the screen. A sidebar ran alongside the main article.

  Pittsburgh’s Own Michael Moore

  Union president Frank Kryzluk was a local celebrity even before he assumed his prominent role in union affairs. His weekly talk show on public access television, Frank Talk with Frank, is a runaway hit with viewers and has earned him comparisons to activist filmmaker Michael Moore (although critics contend that Kryzluk, like Moore, occasionally lets conspiracy theories get the better of him).

  As one fan explains, “Frank’s just a regular guy, you know? A real man of the people—”

  “Aha!” I cried.

  This time even Peter couldn’t soothe the librarian’s ire.

  It was nice to finally know who we were looking for. Unfortunately, while Frank Kryzluk may have been a regular guy and a real man of the people, his democratic leanings didn’t extend to listing his number or address in the local phone book, nor could we find it on the Web. This was probably a wise precaution if he was as much of a local celebrity as the article claimed, but it was a bit frustrating for our purposes.

  So we were back to our original plan, albeit with far more focus than we’d had initially. Now we had a name, and even a picture from the paper. It showed a shaggy-looking man in his fifties. His expression was good-humored beneath a trucker’s cap.

  “See,” said Peter, pointing to the cap. “Everyone’s wearing them.”

  I left him making amends to the librarian and returned to the pay phone to call Luisa.

  “Didn’t I just talk to you?”

  “Yes, but I have a new assignment for you.”

  “Goody,” she said dryly. “What do you want this time? Everything Oprah’s worn in the past month? The personal challenges facing the guests on Dr. Phil? Or how about that Judge Judy person? Do you want me to investigate her?”

  “Close. Sort of.”

  “You mean, you actually want me to do legal work?” she asked when I’d explained what I needed.

  “You are a lawyer,” I pointed out. “If anyone can connect Gallagher and Brisbane to Perry’s investor group, it’s you, right? There have to be legal records of front companies and partnerships and stuff like that.”

  “I guess it’s better than watching more television.”

  Peter was surprisingly good at chatting up the librarian, and she turned out to be surprisingly useful once she got over the glaring thing.

  “The Tick Tock Tavern,” she told us with certainty. “That’s where you want to go. They have a special on Fridays: two-dollar pitchers from five to seven. And it’s practically across the street from the Thunderbolt plant. You can’t miss it.”

  Because I had formally relinquished my navigating responsibilities to Peter, we didn’t miss it. At exactly 5:00 p.m., we were standing in front of a low cinder-block building adorned with a neon sign welcoming us to the Ti k ock Tav rn. Another sign, which was either better cared for or more resilient, assured us that we would find Iron City beer on tap at this establishment.

  “Ready?” asked Peter, settling his trucker’s cap more firmly on his head.

  “I hate that hat.”

  “Maybe it’ll grow on you after you have a few brewskies.” He pushed open the outer door.

  “Brewskie?” I asked, following him inside.

  The interior was dimly lit and furnished with the expected assortment of Formica tables with faux-wood finish and chairs upholstered in cracked and peeling vinyl. A man was perched on a stool behind the bar. He’d been reading but looked up as we approached.

  “What can I get you folks?” he asked.

  “Iron City?” suggested Peter, raising an eyebrow at me.

  “Why not? With a Diet Coke chaser?”

  The bartender closed his book and placed it on the rear counter next to the cash register. I made a mental bet—either The DaVinci Code or T
he Illustrated DaVinci Code—before stealing a glance at the title. It was Edith Wharton, House of Mirth.

  “How are you liking Lily Bart?” I asked as the bartender poured our drinks. He glanced over from the tap in surprise. The economics half of my double major may have proved more lucrative over the years, but the literature half occasionally came in handy.

  “She’s something,” he said, his tone admiring. “I just hope she ends up with that Selden guy.”

  Half an hour later, the bartender and I were debating Wharton’s use of symbolism, we were on our second round of drinks, and the place was starting to fill up.

  Half an hour after that, the bartender was our new best friend, we were on our third round of drinks, and the place was packed.

  And a half hour after that, our new best friend was personally introducing us to Frank Kryzluk. Apparently, he’d managed to come in and seat himself in the back without us even noticing, probably at some point between rounds three and four.

  chapter twenty-eight

  A s far as I could tell, Peter and Frank Kryzluk had nothing in common beyond both being males of the human variety.

  Peter was the son of a lawyer and a doctor and had been raised in an environment of enlightened liberalism, complete with whole-grain baked goods, organic vegetables, fervent recycling, and family vacations that involved hiking, cross-country skiing, and other healthy and ecofriendly pastimes. When he left his parents’ comfortable Bay Area home, he didn’t go far, earning his degree at Stanford and then returning promptly to San Francisco. In fact, before his recent move to New York, he’d never lived anywhere but northern California. He was handsome in a boy-next-door kind of way, and his quiet charm sometimes made it easy to forget just how smart he was. He also seemed to have been spared the gene that was responsible for interest in professional sports, golf, and cigars, and, until the advent of the trucker cap, he had never dressed in a way that embarrassed me.

  Frank Kryzluk had a couple of decades and more than a couple of pounds on Peter, and he wore his flannel and relaxed-fit denim ensemble as if this was his customary attire. He’d never attended college but had gone directly from high school to his first factory job. “I got my union card the same day I got my diploma,” he told us proudly in a booming voice, after insisting that we toast to the Steelers.

  Given their differences in background and interests, I could come up with only one explanation for why Peter and Frank hit it off so well and so fast: the hats. Frank’s trucker cap was almost identical in style to Peter’s, albeit more worn and adorned with a Steelers logo. And, to my eye at least, Frank’s hat looked like it belonged on his head, whereas Peter’s didn’t quite seem to fit.

  But it was as if wearing the hat had changed more than Peter’s usual fashion statement. His voice was louder, and his manner was practically gregarious. He was also exhibiting a taste for draft beer—and belching—that was completely unfamiliar to me and more than a little disconcerting. I only liked to drink beer with spicy food, so after a few sips and in the absence of a decent Pinot Grigio or Shiraz, I’d focused my attentions on Diet Coke. Peter, however, had been sucking down glass after glass of beer, and he didn’t stop when we joined Frank at his table. Watching the two men bond over Iron Cities, I made an executive decision that once it had fulfilled its current mission, Peter’s favorite new accessory was going to mysteriously disappear.

  Kryzluk’s initial reaction when we introduced ourselves was a mix of surprise, concern, embarrassment, and curiosity. Surprise because he thought he’d warned us off, concern because of the dangerous turn events had taken, embarrassment because he’d both enjoyed and recognized the absurdity of his cloak-and-dagger shenanigans, and curiosity because he was eager to hear if we’d turned up any new info.

  “Why didn’t you just tell me that you thought Perry had Brisbane manipulating the contracts?” I asked, trying not to sound impatient.

  Frank rubbed his nose, which was on the large side and reddish in color. “I didn’t have any way to know for sure. I had a hunch, but that was it. I was worried that you’d think I was some sort of crank, or not trust my motives, being the union president and whatnot. I thought I could give you some hints and get you interested. Then you’d start digging around.”

  “Why me?”

  His nose grew redder. “Well, I don’t know if you’ll like the answer to this one.”

  “Try me.”

  “I had my daughter call that Gallagher guy’s office and pretend she was Perry’s secretary. She got a list of all the folks who were working on the buyout, and I thought you’d be the best person to contact, being a female and all. I wasn’t trying to be a male chauvinist. It’s just that sometimes women care more about these things.” I had been a pretty soft touch as it turned out, so I probably couldn’t blame him.

  “Dahlia gave you my name, but how did you get my e-mail?”

  “That was my daughter’s doing, too.” The pride in his voice was almost tangible. “She’s only fourteen, but she’s a real computer whiz. She figured that a young urban professional lady like yourself would probably have that fast Internet thing—”

  “Broadband?” interjected Peter, popping a potato chip into his mouth. I brushed ineffectually at the crumbs that dropped on his sweater.

  “Broadband, right. She figured out which companies offer that service where you live, and then she called them pretending to be you. After a couple of tries she found the right one. That’s how she got your e-mail, and then she got me all set up to write to you. Wasn’t that smart? She’s a real pistol. She does all my research for my show, too. Did you know I’m a TV personality? FrankTalk with Frank it’s called. Every Saturday morning on public access channel fifty-five.”

  It was a bit unsettling to learn that an adolescent girl in another state was successfully able to impersonate me and access my various service provider accounts, but I would worry about that later. Instead, with Peter’s help, I brought Frank up to speed on our theory about Jake and Annabel being responsible for Gallagher’s murder and the ways in which I had been set up to take the blame. “But not only do we not have any proof about what Perry and Brisbane and Gallagher were all up to, I’m wanted for murder and the real murderer and his girlfriend are about to make a mint.”

  “That’s a real pickle,” Frank agreed.

  “My friend Luisa is checking for any sort of legal paper trail that can show that Brisbane and Gallagher were invested in the deal, but I doubt she’ll be able to find anything before the shareholder vote tomorrow morning.”

  “Well, I have a plan for that. I had to do something, and I didn’t realize you two were going to show up when you did, so I hatched a plot of my own. But now that you’re here, I could sure use your help.”

  Frank told us his plan over more Iron City and in between greeting the steady stream of “buddies” dropping by his table to toast to the Steelers. He also insisted that we join him in playing a few rounds of a game that involved trying to throw miniature basketballs into miniature rings in order to make different bells and buzzers go off. Apparently, the bells and buzzers also indicated points accumulated. I wasn’t very good at this, but Peter was a natural. Frank was enthusiastic about his new protégé, and a great deal of high-fiving, back-slapping and beer-glass-clinking ensued.

  “Where are you kids staying tonight?” he asked. “Nonsense,” he said, when we told him we were going to find a motel. “You’ll stay with us. There’s one of those pullout beds in the rec room.” He checked his watch. “But we should get going. Little Frankie—that’s my daughter—she’s got her band practice on Friday nights, but I like to be there when she gets home.”

  I insisted on driving. I might be a little near-sighted, but at least I wasn’t drunk, and I wasn’t sure I could say the same for Peter. When all was said and done, Frank had probably had two or three beers, and I was practically afloat on a sea of Diet Coke, but Peter had gone through the better part of a keg on his own. He boozily extolled Frank’s v
irtues from the passenger seat as I concentrated on the taillights on Frank’s battered minivan.

  The Kryzluk residence was a modest ranch house on a street lined with similar houses. I parked Luisa’s car at the curb as Frank pulled the minivan into the attached garage. Peter grabbed the small athletic bag that held our limited collection of belongings, and we followed our host inside.

  For dinner, Frank had promised to whip up a batch of his homemade pierogies, which, according to him, were famous. Peter volunteered to help him out while I called in a quick update to Luisa. She had little new to report, except Hilary’s frustration—apparently both Jake and the mysterious stranger had slipped her trail.

  I’d finished the call and was trying to convince Peter and Frank that I could be sufficiently trusted with a knife to chop something when Frank’s daughter arrived. From the way he’d spoken of Little Frankie, I’d automatically pictured a teenage-girl version of Frank in a polyester band uniform and befeathered hat lugging a tuba and a zip drive. Little Frankie, however, defied all expectations. She may have been a band member and computer whiz, but her fashion inspiration seemed to come from Gwen Stefani rather than Bill Gates, and she had more jewelry protruding from more piercings than I’d ever seen on one person’s face.

  Her behavior, however, was straight out of Emily Post. She greeted her father with affection and his guests with friendly welcome. When Frank suggested that she fetch clean linens and make up the bed in the rec room while he prepared dinner, she readily agreed. I offered to help, and she chattered on about her band and her blog as we carried sheets and blankets down into the basement.

  The rec room appeared to serve many functions. A ping-pong table with a broken net was pushed up against a wet bar, and a classic Barbie town house sat on a cardboard box. “I had the same one,” I said approvingly, pausing to admire it.

  “I haven’t played with it in years.”