by Bud Crawford
"Well, for the record, I don't like it. I think you're fishing. But to save time, go ahead. I must get home and get back to my responsibilities in Charlotte. I plan to leave this afternoon, as soon as possible. Right now, in fact."
Sprague looked at him without answering for several seconds. "I'll let you know about that when we've finished our search, Mr. Ickes. Should be no problem. I'll get back to you. Anyone else, comments, objections? Okay. Ms. Billings, have you keys we could use?"
"Use the master, it opens everything." Toni handed a ring of keys to Apple, one key pinched between her fingers.
"Upstairs first, I think, Apple." He turned back at the landing, looking down into the parlor. "We'll go as quickly as we can, for everyone's sake. Jonas, Martinez, give me a call if you need me, and send Feather and Stuart up, when they get done outside."
chapter forty-first
Dr. Alan Ward, the neurologist on call, watched first Geoff's eyes, then his head and eyes together, track the horizontal motion of his hand. He probed Geoff's neck, running his fingers lightly over the bruised area, then pressing more firmly against the skin. When Geoff winced he stopped. "Tender right there? Certainly should be. Looks like a baseball bat came down hard. You're extremely lucky to have your neck intact. All this along the top of the shoulder, yes, tender there, too, I'm sure. That's the part that may have saved your life. It looks like you closed around the object, whatever it was, and drew a good deal of the impact away from the cervical vertebrae it was aimed at."
Geoff had been leaning on his left side. Dr. Ward helped him to roll down onto his back and adjusted the pillow under his head. He straightened. "Let's do a little cognitive checking. You know the year? Today's date? Who buried Grant in his tomb?" He chuckled. "That's my favorite. And who's president of the United States?"
Geoff pressed the button that raised the upper part of the bed until he was half sitting. "Ok, doc, stop me when I get off track. 2007, April twenty-third, Sunday. On Grant's tomb, I suppose the answer is a grateful nation, though somewhat belatedly. Or maybe John Duncan, the architect, copying the tomb of Halicarnasus, one of the seven wonders of the ancient world. Or third shot, Grant's wife, Julia, she's in there, too, but she outlived him by a dozen years. There was some unseemly scuffling with the body. The embalming was botched, they kept him on ice awhile, something like that. For the president now, I remember Dwight said yesterday, it wasn't Kerry. I'm hoping you'll tell me we're wrapping up Al Gore's second term."
The doctor chuckled again. "It's okay, Mr. Fletcher, some of my best friends are Democrats." He laughed more loudly. "Come to think of it, they all are. Those were excellent answers, best I've ever got, A+ with extra credit. Do you have any questions for me?"
Geoff cranked the bed up a little higher. "One thing. I remember where I intended to ride my bike and I remember pulling out onto the street. Then I don't remember anything until I looked up and saw Ellen's face." He shook his head, gingerly. "Two hours, more or less, that's just not there. I understand why I wouldn't remember anything after getting hit, but what happened to the time before that?"
"There are basically two possibilities. One, you'll never recover memory of that period. Two, it will come back, in whole or in part, sooner or later. I'd say, just wait and don't worry. If you had lost speech, or all memory, or years of memory, we'd be looking at possible therapeutic paths. For those couple of hours, unless you spent them hiding winning lottery tickets, let it be. If you recover them, it won't be from worrying about it. If you don't, the more time goes by the less it matters. Yes, I know. You don't like the gap. I shouldn't either, if it were me. I hope I would take the good advice I just gave you."
"Mrs. Fletcher," said Dr. Ward, "you had a lot of questions for me, when we talked a little while ago. I think your husband has answered most of them, just now. Yes? Okay. I sense we don't have an automatically compliant patient. So I'm telling this to you. I want him here tonight, and to examine him first thing tomorrow. I'm not ordering up any more tests than we've already done, for now. If he looks this good in the morning, I'll discharge. But make him stay tonight." He put out his hand to Geoff. "Very, very lucky sir. Excuse me going behind your back, just now, seemed like it would save time." He shook hands with Ellen. "Will you be staying with him?" When she nodded, he said, "Excellent. Mr. Fletcher, I'll tell that Detective a brief interview is possible, if you feel up to it?" Geoff nodded, and the doctor left.
"You saved my life," Geoff said to Ellen.
"Make me proud, make me never regret it." She leaned down and kissed his forehead, she allowed him to pull her lips down to his. After a minute she stood up. "You've really just blanked? No pictures, sounds, smells, no nothing? What about brunch? You can't have lost brunch. Truffles in the tomato juice, the Crème Glacée à la Truffe, the omelets?"
"No, none of that. Just one faint thing. Like waking up from a dream sure you've solved Fermat's last theorem with a three-line proof, but can't retrieve the details."
"You mean you've solved all this, including who conked you, but now you can't remember?" Ellen spun in a circle and snorted.
"I had a start, a sense things were sliding into place. I think I knew what the key questions were and who to ask. But maybe that's the dream."
"Well let's go therapeutic after all. I'll say a name, and you free-associate: Madison Markey."
"Not especially sexy, not really."
Sprague knocked on the open door. "Excuse me, folks, but I'd love to hear what comes next."
Ellen turned to him. "Hello, Detective Sprague. I was hoping you'd have something to tell us."
"No, ma'am, sorry. We've been three hours searching every room, every outbuilding and the grounds at Juniper House, as well as the trail your husband was dragged along. We've got so little I could save time by just calling it nothing. Okay, not exactly nothing. There was a pair of galoshes, I guess you'd call them, rubber boots, in one of the sheds, that were dirty inside and out, which is odd and suggestive. They kind of matched some of the muddy prints along our little trail, we'll try to pin it down. They echo the dirtied pole. But they just confirm what we already know. A crime, probably four crimes, happened here. We can't say how or who or why." He pointed to one of the visitor chairs. "Mind if I sit down?"
Ellen said, "Please." Sprague sat, his hands folded on his lap. Ellen perched beside Geoff on the bed.
"Well," Geoff said, "if you were counting on me for help, I've got less than that. I remember getting on my bike. I had an idea which way to head, but I was going to improvise. Where I actually went, I have no idea. Then I remember Ellen yelling. I looked up and there she was. I couldn't move and my entire body hurt like hell. The neurologist says this kind of blanking out happens. I might eventually remember some of it. There's a hole for now about two hours wide."
Sprague leaned forward in his chair. "Forgive my eavesdropping, but what were you talking about as I came in?"
"It isn't a memory, because there's no content. Just a feeling I'd figured something out. But whatever it was, it's gone now, into that two-hour hole." Geoff leaned back and closed his eyes. "Wish I had something, an odor, a voice, an impression of any kind." He opened his eyes and looked at Sprague. "Doctor says, just wait, don't worry about it."
"Well, the doc told me I had to be brief. And he said you'd be released tomorrow. I'll catch you then. We did turn up some oddments in our search, none of them clearly pieces in this puzzle, but I'm inclined to share. Maybe one'd be a trigger for you. Mrs. Fletcher, let's trade cell phone numbers. I want you both on speed dial. There's going to be a uniformed officer in the hall tonight. Dwight Vance is four doors down. Somebody tried to hurt him and you, but we don't know who to watch for, or who else may be in danger. I've got a car parked outside Juniper House. We're a small department, and I've only been medium successful convincing my superiors all our events are connected. We'll be up late trying to fit together what we've got. Call me, anytime, if you remember something, if either of you does. You're in critica
l condition, by the way, according to us and the hospital desk. Just a precaution, the worse off you seem, the safer you are, we hope. Please don't break cover if you talk to anyone else."
Sprague watched while Ellen entered his cellphone number into her phone and Geoff's. She wrote their numbers on the back of one of his cards. She watched him enter them and pocket the card.
"Good night, Fletchers. Get some rest. Follow orders. One eye open, figuratively. See you tomorrow." He turned and left.
Ellen followed him to the doorway, watched him walk down the hall, watched him nod to a uniformed cop sitting in a chair a couple doors away. He stopped and gave the cop one of his cards. He turned back and waved at Ellen.
.
chapter forty-second
Mary-Beth Farley sat at the table in her room at Juniper House, staring at the screen of her laptop. She was trying to wrap up the franchise sale so that they could all go home. Her sisters were in the parlor. She blind-copied Beth-Ann on all the emails, and Beth-Ann told Mary-Ann what was happening. They were being extra careful at the final stages, as they always were, but in truth the terms were well within their normal parameters and the people and the premises had been thoroughly vetted. But the success of their operation was founded on exhaustively running down every aspect of a deal, and on being willing to tailor pricing and payment terms to each particular case.
It was unusual for them all to be in the same building, it seemed almost a wicked thing, certainly it felt like a dangerous one. Even at home they were careful. No one alive knew about the three of them. There had been many close calls, in the forty-two years and seven months of their lives. The Stephens knew, of course, the couple that had raised them, that had gathered all three together from the horrible separation policies of the Tucson social services agency, and had adopted them, so they could never be separated again. Until high school, they were home-schooled, a very uncommon thing in those days. Then they had started the game.
It had been just a game, to start with, and that was what they still called it. A way of entertaining themselves through high school, and then college, never intended to be permanent. But there'd never been a clear stopping place. It came to be the way things were, the basic structure they lived by. A few inconveniences off-set by several advantages. Dating was a minefield, though they'd had a lot of fun. Best girl friends were harder, and less fun. You had to take the girls more seriously.
She had come in round the back, tonight. There was a police car parked out front, she had been warned there would be. Mary-Beth thought that the pretty girl policeman was getting suspicious. Just a feeling, of course, but they relied on each other's feelings, always had. And that pesky little man, Ross, he was becoming way too nosy. They would have to get Mary-Beth out, in the morning, without the meeting-on-the-sidewalk thing. Or, she could hide under the bed while the girl made it up. Mary-Ann always said the intrigue kept them young. But, they'd be altogether tonight. Mary-Beth shivered, that was always special. She hoped Alistair had made good dessert cakes, and that Beth-Ann had pocketed some for her.
~
Ross hunched over the desk in his room, long-sleeved blue pajamas pushed up over his elbows. He typed a message into his Blackberry, and pressed "send". He didn't expect an answer until morning, and by then most likely he'd already be going at it. Depended on how things played out tonight. Which way would take him the farthest? What would be the cost, in each case, of looking away? He'd leave all the tapes running, all the intercepts in place, especially now, so he could catch up later. But with events jumping off in real time, faster and faster, he couldn't afford a bad pick.
He scrolled down his list. Farley, weird setup there for damn sure. If he was right about their scam, they flipped from always having a cover story to never having one. Two big questions. Does it connect with the main business? Does it have some independent importance? But they were here, now; that fact keeps the door open. A too-big pile-up of coincidences.
The Fletchers. Busybodies, he'd say, sticking their fingers in the wasp nest, then all surprised when they get stung. Not the first time they'd pushed themselves into dangerous situations, according to the backgrounds he'd pulled. Probably harmless, just not very bright in the real world. Still, here they were, with the others, playing out their nosiness.
Dwight and Jerry, the gay boy sparkies. Why stay here to work a job thirty miles away? Don't have anything on them, but the setup is perfect. Off to work every day, just like him; like him, maybe not. Plenty of chance for delayed departures and early returns, no one to tell. Off that balcony was nothing, somebody knew how to take a fall. Heck, he'd made the same jump getting down, to cut time on the trellis. He had them checked out, first thing. They did run a contracting company, but you had to have a legit operation to run stuff through, so that's not conclusive. Not completely in-the-closet, but not quite out, professionally. That might give somebody leverage. They could be agents, willing or unwilling. Not primary players.
It was Alden brought him to Asheville, but the more that's happened, the less anything seems to have do with that. Dead a week almost, and events roll on. Ickes now, he's all over the spider-web, not getting stuck, which tells you something. But I think he's been getting gamed since he got here. Maybe by Ms. Madison. That one gets whatever she wants, a truly sirloin slut. Smart enough to make trouble, too. Damn it, everything's crossing up. Some of this bunch arranged to meet up here, has to be. All their damn lunches and dinners and walks and runs and drives, plus time in the rooms without a mic, including the public rooms downstairs. Too many to watch. It's crazy-making.
The old broad surprised me, and I usually peg 'em right the first time. She's another one with a lifestyle tailor-made for a cover story. Go anywhere, meet whoever she wants, just hang around looking helpless. It'd be too fantastic if she turned out to be the brains of the whole show.
The romantic triangle between the skulky boyfriend, the chocolate missy in her mini-skirts, and all the rest of the male world, that can't be central. But it bumps into things, over and over. Put it down as a distraction. Probably.
Can't rule out Alden's widow, either, she gains directly from all this. She pulls a fortune in life insurance. Of course that's chump change if she's really in the game. There sometimes really are innocent victims, less often innocent beneficiaries. It's about following the money, always. Don't forget Alden, and Richter for that matter. Still don't have their connections nailed. Bit players, probably, but it's too bad they got killed before he'd found out more.
Ok. Get some sleep. Tomorrow's going to go long. Chances get better and better somebody's going to give it away. Trick is to be in the right place. He set the alarm for five, to give him an hour or so in the morning to check overnight intercepts and decide which way to take it.
~
A good attorney, Sprague thought, could still cast doubt on admissibility. He poured a couple more ounces of whiskey and leaned back into his chair. But Apple had done an excellent job this afternoon interviewing Spence about Harper. Without giving away anything she'd overheard at the Starbucks, she got pretty complete confirmation of all of it, independently. Plus the nugget about Vance from a year ago, knocking Harper down. She was a pretty conflicted little biddy. She didn't want to believe her boyfriend was a murderer, for all sorts of reasons. But she couldn't rule it out, either. Possibility scares the shit out of her. She's afraid what he'll do if he thinks she'd given him up, guilty or not. What's the British phrase, grassed him out? So young Harper has motive and opportunity and a temper. Means as well, ex-bike racer, lean and strong, even if he's out of shape currently. Pretty clear he's a doper, probably dealing. Check tomorrow with the cowboys at the drug task force.
But why attack Fletcher? Why now? Had he found something? Doesn't remember, if he's telling the truth. Somebody thinks he has? A few hours after the argument with Harper at the Starbucks. That didn't get violent, according to Apple, but kind of menacing. Grounds for picking him up tomorrow, asking some probers. Deve
lop the same stuff Apple heard without referencing it. That would erase the doubts, no matter how smart the lawyer.
Going to lose most of them, tomorrow, almost did today. Only Fletcher's injuries kept the gang intact. Alden was ready to go, Ickes right on her tail. Yuck, bad phrasing. Hollier and Vance, soon as Vance is released. Ross, maybe already gone, who can tell? His house is supposed to be ready and loaded with his furniture. The twisty sisters, within twenty-four hours, they say. Only Staedtler-the-astonishing is sticking into next week and just for a couple days. Vingood, Billings, Spence, Harper, and Markey, they all live here. But the rest will be a lot harder to talk to, a day or two out. And it's not clear Captain Huff is going to back up the investigation, despite what happened to Fletcher. Whole thing sucks.
Twenty-two days and Sara will be here. How's that going to go? Spend a little time with his daughter, no big deal, right? Yeah. Sooner go into an alley, knife against a gun. Your odds are bad, but at least you have odds. Kids? No bookie would lay against that. He could ask Apple for help. He shouldn't. Probably will. Loving the child so much is what takes his fear from simmer to boil. It matters, and he hasn't a clue how to do it.
