"Can I come over for a quick visit?"
I looked at my small collection of gear. “Pam, I'm about to—"
"Karen,” she said firmly, “it's about Stephanie. I'll be there in ten minutes."
So ten minutes later, I was in my driveway, waiting, when Pam drove up in a battered Toyota pickup truck, colored black except for where rust had chewed up on it some. She stepped out and I said, “Pam, I really don't have that much time."
"Whatever time you have, you'll have some for me,” she said, leaning back against the truck cab. “Stephanie did her magic work on the Internet this afternoon. Found some things out. Told me what she learned."
"And why did you have to come here to tell me? Why couldn't you have called?"
She frowned. “Because Stephanie told me it'd be better to tell you face to face. And not over the phone. So here I am. And none too pleased that I volunteered my daughter this morning."
"Pam, I'm sorry if I—"
She held up her hand. “Nope, my deal, not yours. And I'm sure nothing will come of it. But look, can you give me ten minutes so I can tell you the ins and outs of that farmhouse's owner?"
I checked my watch. Tight but manageable. “Ten minutes will be fine. Want to go in the house?"
"No,” she said. “Let's do it here."
Which is what we did.
* * * *
So, fifteen minutes after Pam arrived, I was alone again, not counting Roscoe, of course, and back into my house I went. There, amidst my pile of gear, was the special encrypted cell phone that Agent Carr had given to me. I picked it up, made sure it was on, and then dialed the number on his business card.
I also wrote the number down on a pad of paper.
I put the phone up to my ear, listened. One ring and then it was answered, “Carr."
"Karen Dunbar here."
"You're early, and you're not where you're supposed to be,” he said, his voice frosty. “What the hell do you mean by calling? I said you were only to call if there was a sighting."
"You certainly did,” I replied. “But I wanted to make sure the phone worked. I didn't want to be in the middle of the woods at two A.M. and have a dead phone in my hand if somebody showed up. You see, what you get for when you pay me, Agent Carr, is my professionalism. And my professionalism demanded that I check the phone before I depart. Is that all right, Agent Carr?"
His reply was crisp and to the point. “Call again only if there's a sighting."
I said, “You got it,” but by that time, I was speaking into an empty phone.
No matter.
I left shortly with my gear, and left the special phone behind as well.
* * * *
Surveillances.
In moderate-sized towns and cities, it takes guile and patience, and finding a nice place to hang out for a while. Preferably a parking lot, a busy street, or someplace where a car parked all day doesn't bring much attention.
Sure. Try that on some of the roads around my town and surrounding towns, and after a half hour or so, somebody will stop by—probably somebody you know—and say, “Need some help?” And within an hour, a bunch of people will know that Karen's on the job, and within another hour, the whole town will know what you're doing.
So my best friend in doing surveillances is the U.S. Geological Survey. They make wonderful topographical maps marking, among other things, roads and elevations, and with a bit of work, you can find a nice quiet spot that gives you a view of what you're looking at.
Which worked well for me this Friday afternoon. I backed my SUV up an abandoned logging road—and thanked Detroit again for four-wheel drive—and did a small hike up to a hill that overlooked Dutton Hill Road. There was a nice large maple tree and some low brush that offered some concealment, and within twenty minutes or so, I was set. I had a low-slung and comfortable camp chair that I settled into, and with my spotting scope at a sweet angle, I had no problem keeping an eye on at least half of the house. Maybe the mysterious he or she would approach the house from the rear; if so, there wasn't much I could do about that, but at least I had the road, the driveway, the front and part of the side yard in clear view. Among my collection of stuff was a down sleeping bag, which I unrolled for later use. I had water, instant coffee, some Coke in a beverage cooler, and some freeze-dried food to cook up on a small gas stove. For a bathroom I had the woods and a well-placed log. It wouldn't be perfect, it wouldn't be luxurious, but it would work.
Probably not as exciting as working a surveillance in midtown Manhattan, but I was outdoors and I was on my own, which situated me fine. Years earlier I had been a newspaper reporter for the state's largest newspaper, and a pretty good one at that. I found I enjoyed poking around and finding things out, and after a few years suffering under some editors, I decided to go on my own. About ninety percent of what I do now—records research, tracking people down, so forth and so on—is identical to newspaper work. But for the most part, I get to choose my clients and my own schedule, and that is nice indeed.
* * * *
Surveillance.
Sounds so mysterious, so sexy.
So here's what it's like.
Sitting and watching. Taking a picture of the house. Listening to music on your iPod. Watching some birds fly by, deciding they're crows: They're always crows. Looking through the spotting scope. Feeling your heart race just a bit when a vehicle approaches, the letdown when it passes the house. Yawning. Scratching. Tiring of music, trying something else. Listening to a book-on-tape, which really isn't on tape anymore, since you're using an iPod, but it's a book about FDR that sounded interesting. Drinking water. Snacking on pretzels. Pulling the sleeping bag up over your legs and lap as it gets cold. Watching again as another vehicle approaches. Another bust. Drinking a cup of coffee from a Thermos, knowing you'll have to make a fresh batch later on. Another photo of the house. Racing to the nearby log to do your business, coming back to find no lights on at the target house. Good. Listening to nature for a while. Yawning. Scratching.
It's now dark, as the stars and at least one planet slowly come into visibility. An owl hoots out there, hunting, and I think to myself, well, I'm here alone, unarmed. Maybe I should have packed the Ruger. It's too late now. I turn back to the spotting scope. Nothing. I murmur a few words into the cassette recorder, tracking the time and place of vehicles that went by. I figure on another cup of coffee in an hour, another photo of the house. It would be easier if I'd been born a pervert, for they get off on being voyeurs, but most times, surveillances are boring as hell. A vehicle approaches, my heart rate increases. Another bust. I check the time, pick up the digital camera, and take one more photo of the empty house.
Two hours have passed.
Thirty-four to go.
And so, at hour thirty-six and one minute, I stumbled back to the SUV, carrying my gear, stumbling, yawning, and feeling dirty and worn and used. No one showed up, no one at all, and if I wasn't so tired, I suppose I could have thought it through some, but no, it was time to go home.
I drove slowly, blinking my eyes, yawning hard, until I got home, and I decided the gear could stay right where it was, in my SUV. I unlocked the front door and Roscoe was there, bumping and rubbing against my legs, his meows no doubt stating, “Where in hell have you been?"
I knelt down for a moment, scratched his ears. “Later, pal. Later. Right now, Mama's gotta get some sleep."
In the kitchen I filled both his food and water bowls, and then half ran, half stumbled upstairs, where I unplugged the phone and dragged the sheets back, and I know it sounds like hyperbole, but I'm certain I fell asleep before I could even be bothered to pull the blankets up.
* * * *
On Monday, I took a few more hours off, and I was at my office at eleven A.M. I had worked some from home, so I had my unrequired report ready, and I really wasn't surprised when Special Agent Carr came into my office, face set and reddened. For some reason his expression reminded me of something I had read once about Admiral Ernes
t King, head of the U.S. Navy during World War II. His daughter supposedly said that her father was the most even-tempered man she had ever known: He was always in a constant rage.
So went Agent Carr, it seemed, for the first words out of his mouth were, “We've placed a stop-payment order on the check I presented to you last Thursday."
"And good morning to you, Agent Carr,” I replied. “Have a seat."
He took the seat and said, “There's a lot of fraud and abuse in government contracts, Karen, but don't think you're going to get your share by cheating us."
"Cheating you how?"
"Cheating us by not being at the farmhouse, that's why."
"But I was there,” I said, looking at him steadily. “For thirty-six hours. Friday evening to Sunday morning. Just like you ordered. And I expect full payment."
"For what? Sitting at home, watching television?"
"And what makes you think I was staying at home?"
A thin little smile. “We know, that's why."
In my open side drawer, I picked up the super-dooper encrypted cell phone that he had provided me and tossed it at him. I caught him by surprise, for he used both hands and fumbled it a bit.
"There you go,” I said. “Your special cell phone. Very special indeed. More than just a phone, it was an active tracking device, even when it wasn't being used. You wanted to make sure I was on the job. Well, I was. I just didn't bring your Dick Tracy piece of equipment with me."
"Karen—"
And I interrupted him, saying, “Remember last Friday morning? I tested the phone. You chewed me out for not using the phone as directed, but you also let something else slip. You said I wasn't at the farmhouse yet. How did you know that? Because a tracking device in the phone told you where I was calling from."
Well, so far the highlight of my day was this little moment, getting an FBI agent to shut up. I tossed three more things at him, which he caught this time with more ease.
"First, I know you didn't want one, but here's my report of what went on, or didn't go on, during my thirty-six hours. The highlight was when a couple of deer came by at about four P.M. on Saturday."
Thump.
"Item number two. Seventy-two photographs of an empty house, taken every half hour, proving I was there."
Little thump.
"And in this envelope, item number three. The memory card from my digital camera. I'm sure your tech boys can analyze those photos, make sure they were taken at the time I said they were taken, and that I just didn't take seventy-two photos in a row, to cheat you and Uncle Sam."
He kept quiet, looking at what I had tossed toward him, and then he looked up at me and smiled. “Very good, Karen. You passed."
"Didn't know I was being tested, and don't particularly care. I did my job, and I want the second half of my payment. Now."
A pause. Decided to cut him some slack and smiled in return. “Please."
And surprise of surprises, the second check came out of his briefcase and was slid across the desk, and I promptly squirreled it away and said, “There. Anything else?"
"Don't you want to know what you passed?"
"Of course I do,” I said, “but based on prior experience, why should I trust anything you say?"
"Because what I told you was the truth,” he said. “I just left some things out, that's all."
"Like what?"
"Like the fact that we are short staffed, we are underfunded, trying to do too much with too little. Which is why I was here, looking at you, to see how good you were, to see your talents at work. That was the test. To see if you would stick with a boring surveillance for that period of time."
"Really? A boring surveillance on a house that you fine fellows own, is that it?"
His face flickered a bit, like the internal battery in that brain had just gotten hit with a power surge. “What ... how did you find that out?"
With the help of a neighbor girl, about fifteen years old, I thought, but instead I said, “We're not as dumb out here as you think. The place is supposedly owned by Grayson Corporation, out of Pennsylvania, which doesn't officially exist. The state exists, of course, but Grayson is a fake. A front for something else that's a front to something else that's a front for the Department of Justice. What's up there is a spare safehouse, to be used when you folks need it, to hide people, interview subjects, so forth and so on. That's all."
Yet one more smile. “Congratulations. You passed with honor."
"With honor, then? And what does that get me? A gold star on my check?"
"No. An offer."
"What kind of offer?"
"A job offer, that's what. And here's our offer. You work for us as a contractor, perhaps doing an assignment here and there, keeping an eye on things, reporting anything suspicious to me, or whatever contact person is set up. Retainer of, oh, say, about five hundred a month."
"Why me, and why a private investigator? Thought you'd go through local law enforcement for something like that."
"Because local law enforcement means oversight, means paperwork, means bureaucracy. Working with a P.I. makes it that much more simple. And you in particular, Karen, because you've proven your abilities, and also ... your location. You're less than fifty miles from the Canadian border. People of interest, illegally passing across, may end up in Purmort for a bit before heading elsewhere. And you'll be our contact."
"Your snitch,” I said.
He shook his head. “No. A cooperative citizen, that's all."
I thought for a moment and then crossed my legs underneath my desk. “All right. The price for this citizen's cooperation is one thousand a month. Not five hundred. And I report to you anything I think may be of interest. That's my call. Not yours. I'm not going to rat out someone because they're holding a one-person protest in the town common against the government or something like that."
The cheery Agent Carr had now been replaced by the earlier Agent Carr, the one I had gotten to know and ... well, had gotten to know.
"Impossible."
"Nope, quite possible. One thousand a month, and my call. And that's the deal."
He gathered up the paperwork, pictures, and envelope I had sent his way, and he said, “No. There's no deal."
"Oh, yes there is. Or else."
"Or else what?"
I leaned back, pointed up to my award certificate from the New England Press Association. “Or I contact some old friends of mine in the news media. At the TV station in Manchester. Or the Associated Press bureaus in Concord and Portland. Tell them what just went on, tell them what you just told me. How does that sound, Agent Carr?"
His hand was clenched tight on his briefcase handle. “We had ... had an agreement. With express mention of confidentiality. You signed it."
"I surely did, and under false pretenses. And you know it. Come on, Agent Carr, what are you going to do? Shoot me? Arrest me? Threaten to ruin my business? Here, in a small state that distrusts government so much that we elect our governors just for two years?"
He glowered at me, like a rabid pit bull, deciding whether to go for the throat first or the groin. I gave him my best smile, usually reserved for Roscoe. “You know it's a good deal, best you can get."
"All right,” he breathed. “Deal."
I felt some tension just ease away. House painted and a new roof before winter. Not a bad deal. “Delighted to hear it."
He stood up and went to the door and then looked back at me. He stood there for what seemed to be a long time.
"You know, some would call what you just did extortion,” Carr finally said.
I thought of what he had put me through, how he had lied to me from the very start. I smiled and made an expansive shrug.
"Think of it as country manners,” I said.
Copyright (c) 2007 Brendan DuBois
[Back to Table of Contents]
THE PALACE ROXY by Jas. R. Petrin
* * * *
Linda Weatherly
* * * *
&nbs
p; The logo faded and the music started: a jarring attack of nerve-racking violins.
The creepy thing about the old movie house, even a little scary, was that the small, dim, shrouded usher lights were glowing near the floor in the aisles. Maybe, she told herself, it was some sort of security effort—leave a light on and frighten the lowlifes away. And that was laughable; she was here, wasn't she? Or maybe the lights had been burning for ages because the last person to trot home to bed had forgotten to shut them off. Whatever. It was just as well. She had a flashlight somewhere in her pack, but it was dead—dead as the grave.
She'd got in through the unlocked emergency exit on the alley. Unlocked, hell! The door had been standing slightly ajar. And with the rain pouring down like crazy it might as well have had a motel vacancy sign blazing over it. A short dark corridor had led her to this room, the auditorium. So there was security for you.
She shrugged out of her sodden backpack and set it down at her feet. She needed shelter, a place to crash for the night, and this ought to do just fine. She wondered if there was a working toilet here. She'd feel more at ease if she could make out something of her surroundings.
The room was big. She could feel the size of it. She had the sense of floating in a great, black immensity. All that the feeble lights revealed were the broken outlines of two aisles rising toward the back of the room. She couldn't make out anything else; the banks of seats were a featureless mass.
But if that direction was the back of the room, then—she turned and peered over her shoulder—the screen had to be right up there behind her. She couldn't make it out, though. It was just part of the contiguous darkness.
Still, it was better than the street. There might be rats, of course. There often were in derelict buildings. But she would spread out her sleeping bag, burrow down deep, pull the rain flap over her face, and they would leave her alone.
But spread it where? It was so darn dark!
She turned away from the barely visible aisles and the indistinguishable seats. If she moved in the direction of where the screen ought to be, she ought to come up against the edge of the stage. Old theaters always had a stage. What had they called it in drama class? A proscenium? Or was that the arch over the stage? No matter. Climb up on that and she'd be safe from rats. Well, she'd feel safer, anyway.
AHMM, July-August 2007 Page 21
