The Legacy

by Stephen W. Frey

  Bennett stood behind the living room wall around the corner from the bottom of the main staircase. He licked his lip and tasted the blood trickling down his face from the gash in his forehead. He raised the knife he had taken from the kitchen. He had noticed one missing from the block and realized that Cole was armed as well, which was fine. Cole had no chance of winning a knife fight with him.

  Bennett gripped the knife tightly. Cole was coming down these stairs right now. Coming down blind, unaware that the enemy was waiting at the bottom. He sensed Cole’s presence. He sensed the kill, as he had in Bryant Park when he’d tailed Agent Graham, then smashed the young man’s head with the pipe and recovered what he’d assumed was the first Dealey Tape. A tape that had turned out to be nothing more than a presentation about some company Gilchrist was going to take public.

  Suddenly Bennett heard glass shatter upstairs.

  “Dammit!” Instantly he broke from his hiding place. Cole must be trying to escape through an upstairs window by crawling out onto a porch roof, climbing down a support beam, then running into the woods. Bennett turned the corner and limped up the stairs. He reached the second-floor bathroom through which Cole had hurled the chair at the same time Cole reached the front door.

  Having thrown the chair through the window, Cole had retraced his steps down the corridor and the back stairs. He waited only long enough to hear Bennett running down the second-floor corridor before he quietly opened the mansion’s front door, then sprinted through the snow toward the woods.

  21

  “Where the hell have you been?” Tori was up off the couch as soon as Cole burst through the front door and into the great room of Billy Threefeathers’s lodge.

  “Where haven’t I been?” he muttered under his breath, heading straight toward the television located against the cedar wall directly in front of the couch.

  “Cole, answer me!” She tossed her hair back and put her hands on her hips. “We were worried about you.”

  “I wasn’t,” Billy offered calmly from the kitchen adjoining the great room, where he was cooking an omelet. “You sure you two ain’t married, Cole? You act like it.”

  “That’ll be the day,” Cole muttered again, kneeling down in front of the television and turning on the set and the VCR on the shelf below.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” Tori asked curtly.

  “Nothing.” Cole withdrew the tape from the case and inserted it carefully into the VCR.

  “What’s that?” Tori suddenly forgot her irritation as she noticed the case.

  “Beauty and the Beast,” Cole retorted. “With all this snow, I figured we’d need some entertainment today.” He held his breath and prayed. In the time that the tape had been on the beam it would have been subjected to intense cold, heat and dampness. It might be blank and worthless by now. Finally, the tape began to play.

  “Oh my God,” Tori whispered as the black open-top limousine appeared. She sank back onto the sofa as the vehicle drifted down Elm Street away from the Texas School Book Depository.

  Billy put down his spatula and moved to the counter separating the kitchen from the great room, his gaze riveted to the screen.

  Cole smiled. It was the same footage he had watched in the Gilchrist screening room and the quality looked good. Just let there be a rifle, he thought to himself.

  The limousine moved into view and out of nowhere the bullet tore into the president’s back.

  “He’s shot!” Tori screamed as Kennedy hunched over. “My God!” She screamed again, gesturing at the television, her hands trembling.

  “Sweet baby Jesus,” Billy murmured quietly, mesmerized by the images.

  Cole pointed to the place on the screen where the rifle lay over the fence. “There it is.” His fingers were shaking, too.

  “I see it, I see it,” Tori yelled. She was down on her knees, crawling toward the television.

  Suddenly the puff of smoke burst from the rifle barrel and the president’s head snapped back toward the camera.

  Tori put her hands to her mouth as Kennedy’s head exploded. “Oh my God. That’s horrible.”

  “How many VCRs do you have, Billy?” Cole asked over his shoulder as he stopped the tape and rewound it. “You saw the gun, right?” This time he directed his question at Tori.

  “Yes, yes. There’s no doubt where the killing shot came from,” she answered. “It came from behind the fence.”

  “I just have one VCR, Cole.” Billy could barely speak. He was awestruck by what he had just seen. He could still remember coming out of the woods that day in 1963 after shooting a big buck deer, heading to the Kro Bar for a posthunt drink and hearing that John Kennedy was dead.

  “Are there any in the outer cabins?” Cole asked. The Dealey Tape in the VCR was almost certainly the last one, and there could still be plenty of land mines out there to avoid before the cassette was safe. It seemed like an excellent idea to make another copy while he could.

  “No.” Billy was still reliving that day in 1963.

  “Cole, I’m prepared to offer you ten million dollars for that tape right now,” Tori said, kneeling beside him, breathing hard.

  Cole looked steadily at Tori. He knew what she was thinking: that this tape would be the centerpiece of one of the biggest television events in history. NBC would advertise the tape for weeks before broadcasting it on one of their prime-time newsmagazines, and make millions when they finally aired it. “See the Proof,” the trailers would announce. Maybe the network would show a snippet of the tape during the trailer just to whet people’s appetites. It would be a two-hour special, beginning at nine eastern, and NBC wouldn’t actually show the tape for the first time until ten-thirty at the earliest. The network would keep a nation on the edge of its seats while it interviewed key players from both sides—those who had claimed conspiracy all these years, and those who had scoffed at the notion. Christ, the advertisers would pay through the nose, probably millions for a thirty-second spot, because the world would stand still for a night. It would be bigger than the Super Bowl or Princess Diana’s funeral.

  “Ten million, huh?” Cole made certain his tone projected ambivalence, even as the dimple appeared in his cheek.

  “You’re always negotiating, aren’t you?” she asked.

  “Always.”

  “I know my people will pay that much,” Tori assured Cole. “But you have to make a commitment to me right now,” she pushed.

  He stared at her for several moments before responding. “You put that note under my door.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Someone shoved a note under my hotel room door the day after I got back to New York.” He had been absolutely convinced all along that it had been Bennett, but now he realized he’d been wrong. “It was you who put the note under the door,” Cole murmured. “You’re the only one it could have been.”

  “You’re crazy.”

  But Cole saw the truth in her eyes. “No, I’m not.”

  “All right,” she admitted softly. “You aren’t.”

  “No—” Cole stopped short. He hadn’t been prepared for her to admit to it so quickly. “How did you get the note?”

  Tori glanced at Billy, then took Cole’s hands in hers. “I’ve known your father for fifteen years.” There was no telling how he was going to take this, but she had to let him know. “I love your father very much.”

  “What?” Cole laughed nervously. “Are you serious?”

  “Yes.”

  “You and he are…” Cole’s voice trailed off. He couldn’t finish the sentence.

  “Lovers,” she finished the thought. “Yes.” It was her turn to laugh. “What a relationship. I met him fifteen years ago in East Germany while I was covering a story, and I bet I haven’t seen him more than thirty times in all those years. I sure know how to pick them.” She smiled apologetica
lly at Cole. “I didn’t mean that the way it sounded.”

  “It’s all right.” Cole shook his head. Jim Egan certainly was a man of many surprises. But now, as he thought about it, Cole realized the relationship with Tori made a great deal of sense. His father wouldn’t have had many people to trust, so he had spent fifteen years getting to know Tori. Making certain he could trust her. “My father gave you the note?” he asked.

  “Yes, about three weeks ago—”

  “Three weeks ago,” Cole interrupted. “Then my father is alive.”

  “Yes.”

  He had been right after all. The exhilaration was incredible, like nothing he had ever experienced. “You’re sure?” Cole asked.

  “Absolutely.”

  “Keep going,” Cole urged. “He gave you the note, and…”

  “And he said to watch the New York Times for his obituary. When I saw it, I was to make contact with you and deliver the note. He told me he wasn’t really going to be dead, that the obituary was just a signal.”

  Placed by a son who had no idea what was really going on. “Why didn’t he just give me the note?” Cole asked.

  “He was certain people were watching you and looking for him. He was in hiding. He couldn’t risk leaving his ‘lair,’ as he called it.”

  “Where did he give you the note, in New York?”

  “No, in a little town in Montana. That’s where he was hiding. I flew out there and met him in a greasy diner. It was all prearranged six months ago, the time I saw him before Montana.”

  Cole snapped his fingers. Six months ago was about the same time his father had shown up at the Gilchrist trading floor.

  Tori laughed. “You should have seen his disguise in Montana. He looked like the Unabomber or something with his long hair and beard and mustache. I would never have known it was him if he hadn’t tapped me on the shoulder. He made me wait there an hour after the scheduled time. He told me it was because he was making certain I hadn’t been followed. I thought maybe he was losing his mind at that point.” She nodded at the VCR. “Now that I’ve seen the tape I can understand his paranoia.”

  Incredible, Cole thought to himself. His father had planned the whole thing for years. “Did he ever tell you about what he does for a living?”

  “He told me he’s an intelligence agent, but that’s all. Of course, that’s our entire relationship in a nutshell. There’s always lots of mystery. I see him once every six months if I’m lucky. And we always arrange our next meeting on the last day we’re together. I never hear from him in between. He’s enigmatic, but I guess I kind of like that. It’s wild. We meet in crazy places like Australia, the Swiss Alps, Rio.” A smile crossed her lips. “It’s so romantic. We have three or four days of incredible excitement, then he disappears and I have to wait until the next time. One time a few years ago he didn’t show up at our prearranged meeting place in Tahiti. I was devastated. I was looking forward to seeing him so much. I stayed on the island for two days waiting at the hotel where he said he would meet me, but he never showed up. I thought he was dead. I cried all the way back to New York on the plane. A few days later a note showed up on my desk and gave me the next coordinates. That’s what he calls our meeting places, coordinates. He’s always naming things.” She giggled like a schoolgirl. “He never apologized for not showing up in Tahiti, never even mentioned it again, but that’s him. He never apologizes for anything.”

  Cole stared at her, unable to speak for a few seconds. “He’s always naming things?” he finally whispered.

  “Always,” Tori confirmed. “He says he can never write anything down because of what he does, and naming things helps his memory.”

  So his father really was always naming things. Bennett hadn’t been lying about that.

  Tori sighed. “I didn’t tell you all this, because he made me swear I wouldn’t. He said he didn’t want you distracted. He wanted you to get that tape and sell it.”

  “He told you that he had a tape of the Kennedy assassination?” Cole asked. “One that was different from the Zapruder film? He told you that was what he was sending me after?”

  “Yes.” She looked down at the floor.

  “What is it?” Cole sensed Tori’s mood changing.

  She took his hands in hers again and looked back up at him. “Jim told me everything when I saw him six months ago. He told me that he had kept this film of Kennedy’s assassination all these years, and that he couldn’t release it because he felt he would be killed if he did, although he wouldn’t tell me by whom.” She hesitated.

  “What’s wrong, Tori?” Cole could see the pain in her eyes.

  “I’m ashamed of myself.”

  “Why?”

  “For the way I acted at lunch that day in New York, holding back on your grandparents’ address the way I did. But you see, your father told me that you might already have the first tape at that point. I figured I would have heard something through the grapevine if you’d already made a deal with one of the other networks, but I hadn’t heard anyone talking.” She pursed her lips. “I really wanted to make certain that I got my hands on it. I really do want to impress my people at NBC, that’s on the level. Your father told me the tapes existed, but he never told me where they were. I guess he trusted me to deliver a note to you, but not to hold the tape.”

  Just as he had trusted Bennett to deliver the envelope, but not to hold the tape, Cole thought to himself.

  “But, Cole, I wasn’t his lover just so I could get my hands on the assassination tape. You have to believe me about that,” Tori pleaded.

  “I do,” Cole said gently.

  “I didn’t know anything until six months ago.”

  “I believe you. And don’t worry about holding back on my grandparents’ address. Ultimately you gave it to me.” He smiled. “So all that stuff about finding the marriage certificate in Dallas and the ticklers in the NBC computers, that was all—”

  “All made up.”

  “But you did visit my grandparents.”

  “It was the one way I could check out your father’s story. Remember, I am in the news business. I like to get confirmation when I can.”

  Cole was puzzled. “But those other news agencies called me at Gilchrist just a day after our lunch.”

  “People have been looking for your father for a long time, in exactly the way I described, with computers scanning periodicals and publications looking for tickler words. Even people at NBC. The ones who called you obviously saw the obituary and got your name from the Times.” She laughed. “I didn’t need to do all that because I had inside information.”

  Cole smiled back. “You sure did.” It was beautiful. His father had organized two completely separate methods by which to convey the Dealey Tape to his son, using his two most trusted confidants in the world—Tori and Bennett. He’d used two because he didn’t completely trust either one. It wasn’t in Jim Egan’s nature to trust anyone unconditionally, as it wasn’t in his own. Suddenly Cole felt the loneliness that came with never fully trusting anyone, but he quickly shook it off. After all, his father had been right. Bennett Smith, his lifelong friend, had betrayed the trust.

  “I’ve got to get going,” Cole said firmly. “I don’t want to stick around here.” He glanced out the window, half expecting to see Bennett coming up Billy’s driveway.

  “Huh?” Tori was instantly alarmed. She hadn’t heard the word “we” in his sentence.

  Cole stood up. “I’m going after my father. You said you met him in a small town in Montana. Which one was it?”

  Tori stood up as well. “First let’s get the tape to New York City. Let’s get it someplace safe where NBC can have it guarded around the clock. Let’s get you your ten million dollars, and then go after your father.”

  “No, it might be too late at that point,” Cole countered. “I’m sure they’re out there looking for hi
m as we speak. I’d never forgive myself if I didn’t get to him.”

  “Why would it be too late?” she wanted to know.

  “It doesn’t matter,” Cole answered quickly.

  “You Egans make me so mad sometimes. You don’t tell anyone anything.”

  “Where in Montana did you meet him?” Cole demanded.

  “I’m not telling you,” she said defiantly.

  “You’re not going to pull this on me again.” Cole grabbed her upper arms.

  “It’s for your own good, Cole. It’s what your father wanted. He wanted you to sell that tape first and foremost.”

  “I don’t care what my father wanted,” Cole yelled, shaking Tori hard.

  “You’re hurting me!” she screamed.

  “Easy, Cole!” Billy yelled, moving out from behind the island counter.

  “Hey! Don’t get in the way, Billy.” Cole pointed a finger at his friend, then took Tori by her upper arm again and stared into her eyes. “My grandparents are one thing.” His voice was trembling slightly. “My father is another. One way or another, you will tell me the town you met him in. Do you understand what I mean by that?”

  She understood completely and wanted no part of what she saw in his eyes. “Powell. It’s located halfway between Helena and Great Falls on the Missouri River,” she said quietly.

  “Okay. Is there anything else you can tell me?”

  “He met me at a little diner in town. He didn’t tell me where he was hiding.”