The Red Queen Dies

by Frankie Y. Bailey

  Having Vivian Jessup die here was not going to do much for either tourism or promoting Albany as a bedroom community. Especially since, as McCabe recalled from the bit she’d heard on the news, the mayor had planned to tie Jessup’s play into her “It Happened Here” ad campaign about Albany history and culture.

  Not that some people—including Clarence Redfield in one of his more inflammatory threads—thought it was desirable to have people from the City coming to Albany. According to him—and some cops agreed—enough prostitutes, drug dealers, gang members, and other assorted troublemakers were already taking the train or the Northway up to Albany.

  McCabe opened the door to the third interview room. Baxter was standing there, arms folded, a disgusted expression on his face. He was staring down at their suspect from that morning.

  Mouth open, snorting, the perp was managing to both drool and snore.

  Baxter said, “Ready for me to wake Pigpen up so we can talk to him?”

  McCabe shook her head. “Get someone to put him in holding. We just caught another call.”

  “What’s up?”

  “Female vic. She could be number three.”

  “I thought this was way too easy. Pigpen here walks right into our arms by breaking into the first vic’s house.”

  “It happens,” McCabe said. “Stupid perps. Drug addicts. Except nothing our killer’s done so far would suggest he’s either. And now, if this one’s his, it looks like he’s gone for extra points.”

  “How? What’d he do?”

  “I’ll tell you in the car. I’m going to grab my field bag while you’re getting our friend here stored away.”

  * * *

  Baxter met her at the entrance to the garage.

  McCabe pressed her thumb to the ID slot.

  “Detective Hannah McCabe,” the Voice said. “Please drive carefully.”

  The detectives in the squad room had never agreed on who the Voice sounded like. But someone had decided that the Voice should give his automated safety reminder when they checked out a car. Call them by name just so they knew he knew who they were.

  The turbolift descended from the third-floor parking deck. A blue sedan came into view in its stall. The barrier slid back and the car rolled out.

  “Hey, we got one of the new ones,” Baxter said. “How’d you pull that off?”

  “Luck of the draw,” McCabe said.

  “Want me to drive?”

  “Sure, if you want to.”

  In the car, McCabe shrugged off her thermo jacket, tucked her field bag by her feet, and strapped herself into the passenger seat. Then she looked over to see why they were still sitting there.

  Baxter was studying the console.

  “Mike, it should already be programmed with the location.”

  “I know.” He pointed. “See that? This baby has superenhanced night vision. The guys working vice were really pumped about getting Prowl Vision 240 on the new cars.”

  “I’m sure they were. But we’re the dull cops with the dead body waiting, remember?”

  He grinned. “Right. Let’s roll, Hank.”

  They shot out of the garage enclosure and down the street, merging into traffic.

  “Hannah,” she said.

  Baxter glanced at her. “What’d you say?”

  The collision warning signal on the console beeped. Baxter was driving on manual control. He had to swerve around the commuter shuttle bus that had stopped to pick up passengers.

  McCabe glanced over her shoulder at the car they’d cut off with their lane change. “With an inch or two to spare,” she said.

  “Maybe we should turn on the siren and plow the road.”

  “We don’t want to attract too much attention. The press will probably beat us there as it is.”

  “You mean after what happened last night with Redfield sticking it to Jacoby? I was going to ask if you saw that.”

  “On the news this morning.”

  “Think we’ve got a leak in the department?”

  “Either that or Clarence Redfield is clairvoyant.”

  Baxter laughed. “Nobody I hear talking about it gives the asshole that much credit. Hey, what were you saying about your name?”

  “That I prefer to be called Hannah.”

  “Sorry. I thought I heard your dad call you Hank that day he stopped by.”

  “Yeah, he did. But it’s a family nickname. Hannah’s for general consumption.”

  “Got it,” Baxter said as they reached Lark Street. “Are you sure we don’t want to use the siren? We’re hitting traffic.”

  “Let’s just beep the siren if we get stuck. We have officers at the scene.” McCabe reached for her ORB. “While you’re getting us there, I want to have a look at the terrain around the crime scene. The CO will decide how we deploy to search the area, but it’s always a good idea to be prepared for his questions. He tends to shoot them out and expect answers.” She pulled up the search engine. “And I’d better see what I can find about Vivian Jessup while I’m at it.”

  “Vivian Jessup? That actress with the red hair? British accent? I saw her on one of the talk shows. What does she have to do with this?”

  “It looks like she may be our victim.”

  “Vivian Jessup? You’re kidding me, right?”

  “Completely serious.”

  McCabe filled him in on what they’d seen on the crime-scene cam and about Vivian Jessup’s use of Albany as a setting for her play.

  “What’s this play about?” Baxter asked.

  “I didn’t catch it all. Something about John Wilkes Booth and an actress. They—the actress and Booth—performed here in Albany on the eve of the Civil War.”

  “So she’s writing this play about the guy who assassinated Lincoln and she gets murdered.”

  “If it is her. As Pete said, she could have a clone. A look-alike.”

  Baxter beeped the siren and went around a car waiting to turn. They beat the red light onto Delaware.

  “Would you ever do that?” he asked.

  “Do what?” McCabe said, looking up from her ORB.

  “Get yourself cloned?”

  McCabe was silent for a moment, scanning Vivian Jessup’s bio on her screen. “I’ve never really thought about it. I suppose if I were dying or something.”

  “Yeah, it’d be really handy to have a spare organ or two then,” Baxter said.

  “Except the clone would be another real person and you might have to kill him or her to harvest the organs.”

  “Thought you said you hadn’t thought about it.”

  “I haven’t. I happened to see a science show where they were debating the ethical issues about approving the process.” She glanced over at him. “Why’d you ask about that anyway?”

  “I know this guy who has cancer. My age, but he’s dead if they don’t find him a lung. I went to visit him and he was joking about how convenient it would be if we all had a clone stashed in a room somewhere.”

  “I’m sorry about your friend. That’s tough.”

  “Yeah. But he’s still hoping.” Baxter cleared his throat. “Not that I’m wishing Vivian Jessup dead, you understand. But if she is, this could be really big. Can you imagine the press we’ll get on this?”

  McCabe stared at him as what he had said began to sink in.

  Even with Jacoby, the public information officer, who was in charge of all police department communications, if the case went cosmic and New York City and national media covered it … Reporters always wrote about the cops on big cases. Did background pieces …

  Baxter said, “Hey, sorry if that sounded cold. But I don’t mind admitting that I want to be chief someday.”

  “Nothing wrong with a little ambition,” McCabe said. “Actually, I was just wondering if the CO will keep me on the case.”

  “Why wouldn’t he? We caught it. And if it’s big, a serial killer and Vivian Jessup, they’ll assign as many detectives as they can to it. We’ll have everybody on this. State Police. FBI.
That task force Redfield was talking about.”

  McCabe glanced down at the scratch on her hand, which she had forgotten to cleanse with disinfectant. “Safety in numbers,” she said. “So hopefully I won’t find a camera pointed in my direction.”

  “Why are you worried about that anyway?” Baxter said. “Don’t tell me you’re camera-shy.”

  He was grinning at her, like he was teasing. Did he expect her to believe no one had told him her story?

  Even if the rest of the cops had managed to restrain themselves, Baxter’s godfather was Assistant Chief Danvers. No way Danvers hadn’t filled his godson in on every detective in the unit.

  Her new partner seemed to be trying to blow serious smoke up her ass. “Since I was a kid. Everyone in my family is camera-shy.”

  “Then I’ll jump in front of you whenever a camera turns in our direction. No problem, partner.”

  “Thanks,” McCabe said.

  She turned back to her ORB. “Looks like this terrain is going to be tricky to search with the wooded area and the water. Be interesting to see how the commander handles it.”

  5

  Albany International Airport

  9:27 A.M.

  “Airship captain, you are cleared to land.”

  “Roger, tower. Over and out.”

  Captain Chuck Kessler turned to the man who had joined him in the cockpit shortly after their departure from JFK but who was only now taking off his headset. Even when he wasn’t listening to classical music, or whatever he’d been listening to, Ashby wasn’t much for conversation. After five years of flying for Ted Thornton, first the plane and now the airship, Kessler still wondered why a man like the boss would pick Ashby to take along when he went adventuring. Even if they had been roommates in college.

  The only thing Kessler could figure was that Ashby was loyal and discreet, and he didn’t mind going into caves or climbing mountains or forging through jungles or doing whatever else it was the boss took it into his head to do. Ashby had even gone along on the maiden voyage of this airship, when people were calling it “Thornton’s Folly.” And he seemed pretty good at the business stuff the boss had him handle, too.

  “The boss tell you if we’re going back down to the City today?” Kessler asked.

  “That depends on Lisa. She may want to attend an exhibit at one of the local galleries.”

  “Never thought I’d see the day when the boss would let a woman make his plans,” Kessler said.

  “Lisa is an unusual woman.”

  “Roger that. She’s really something all right.”

  Bruce Ashby slid out of his seat. “I’d better go back and make sure they’re ready to land.”

  “You might want to use the intercom,” Kessler said. “They could be busy.”

  Ashby hesitated. Then he sat back down and reached for the intercom.

  “Ted? We’re going to be landing in about ten minutes. Do you need anything?”

  A woman’s soft laughter.

  “Got everything we need, Bruce, old man,” Thornton said. He sounded distracted. “Give us another … five minutes or so after we touch down.”

  “Right,” Ashby said.

  From his place behind the controls of the airship, Kessler glanced over at Ashby and put a big smirk on his face.

  Deadpan as always, Ashby reached for his headset.

  6

  A police cruiser was parked at the top of the road that led from Delaware Avenue down to the boat ramp where the body had been found. The officer standing by the cruiser watched as they pulled up. Young and solemn, she strode toward them with an e-board in her hand.

  “Good morning, Detectives. If I could see ID and if you would please sign in.”

  McCabe nodded her silent approval.

  Baxter fished out his badge and signed his name. He passed the e-board to McCabe.

  “Thank you, Detectives,” the officer said.

  McCabe glanced at the name tag on the woman’s shirt. “Thank you, Officer Lawrence. Looks like you’ve been keeping out everyone who doesn’t have business here.”

  “Yes, ma’am. I know I’m supposed to do that.” Lawrence’s grin was quick and infectious. “The instructor for that class at the Academy hit hard on that one. Check all IDs and make sure everyone who goes in signs in and signs back out again. No matter who they are.”

  “Keep up the good work,” McCabe said. “The PIO’s on his way, but we’re depending on you if the media beat him here.”

  Lawrence nodded. “Yes, ma’am. Another officer should be here in a few minutes. We won’t let anyone get by us.”

  Baxter drove down the hill on the road leading to the boat ramp. The paved road had been cut out among the trees that stood sentry on each side. The tires crunched over bits of broken branches from the last windstorm.

  “If you didn’t know this road was down here, you could drive right by without noticing it,” McCabe said. “It’s not that obvious from up above.”

  “And even if you saw it,” Baxter said, “would you drive down here?”

  “If you had a body to get rid of, at least it would get you off the street, away from prying eyes.”

  “Unless someone saw you turning down here. Then you’re screwed if they could give a description.”

  “There is that,” McCabe said. “Of course, for all you know, you’re already dealing with the possibility that you’ve been caught on a surveillance cam somewhere along the way.”

  “But maybe you’ve got that body and the most important thing is to get it out of your car.”

  “As the lou pointed out to me, it could be a mistake to assume she was killed somewhere else and dumped here.”

  “Either way, you’ve got a live woman or a dead body and you need to get off the street and finish what you started. So why here? Was this road the perp’s destination, or did he just stumble on it?”

  Whatever Baxter is, he isn’t stupid, McCabe thought.

  He brought the car to a stop in the graveled parking area and they got out.

  McCabe shifted her field bag to her shoulder and glanced around. Nearby there was a cement platform with the picnic tables that Pete had mentioned when they were looking at the crime scene on the cam. Beyond the picnic area, lay the ramp for launching canoes or other small craft into the Normanskill. Sparkling in the sunlight, the creek surged over boulders and pushed at its banks. After the flooding all summer, they had been lucky that September, and the first couple of weeks of October had been drier than predicted.

  McCabe glanced from the creek up toward the bridge where the killer might, if he’d been willing to risk being seen, have stopped his car and looked down here. The nonfunctioning cameras were up there on that bridge. For all he could have known, he might have been on-camera if he had stopped to look. And he would have been blocking one of the two lanes of traffic in each direction.

  The uniforms who had been first at the scene had been occupying themselves walking to the end of the landing and back. Now they were headed toward her and Baxter.

  “So how do we get started?” Baxter asked.

  “We could tramp on into the crime scene and start poking at the body,” McCabe said. “Except that wouldn’t make us popular with FIU.” She took a closer look at his face. “Are you okay?”

  He nodded. “But this would probably be the time to mention my gag reflex. Ever since I was a kid. I know it’s a liability for a cop.”

  Baxter hadn’t been there for the first two victims. She and Jay O’Connell, who was in court this week testifying in another case, had been the lead detectives.

  “So this is your first dead body?” she said.

  “No. I saw an accident victim or two when I was on patrol. And a woman whose husband had carved her up … a dead junkie when I was working vice. But I was always able to keep my distance.” He gave a pained grin. “You know, not get close enough to actually embarrass myself.”

  McCabe opened her field bag and took out two portable masks and a folded plas
tic-lined white paper bag. “This mask should help. But barf into the bag if your gag reflex kicks in. We don’t want to contaminate the crime scene.”

  He took both. “Thanks, partner.”

  “We’ve all been there. Think of this as practice for the autopsy we’re going to have to attend.”

  “Oh shit.”

  “So you didn’t do that … attend an autopsy in the Academy?”

  “We watched on satellite. No smells.”

  “I’m afraid this is going to be up close and in living color.”

  The two uniformed officers reached them.

  McCabe held out her hand to the older of the two. “Officer Curtis? I think we worked a robbery together last year.”

  “Yes, ma’am. Good to see you again. This is Officer Walker.”

  “Officer Walker,” McCabe said, extending her hand. “And this is Detective Baxter.”

  Baxter shook hands with the two officers. So he understood the need to establish rapport.

  McCabe said, “Officer Curtis, would you walk us through this? The usual. What you found when you arrived, how you approached the body.”

  Curtis, an old hand at crime scenes, pulled out his ORB and began to read his notes.

  “Too bad there’s no ID,” McCabe said when he concluded with the notation that no personal identification had been found with the victim. No purse in sight.

  “That would have made it easier,” Curtis said. “We did find some bike tracks.”

  “Where?”

  Curtis pointed toward a patch of dirt. “If the kid who called it in made them, looks like he stopped right over there. Then he must have seen her and turned around and gotten out of here.”

  “I don’t blame him,” McCabe said.

  Baxter said, “The question is, how long had she been down here before the kid stumbled on the body?”

  McCabe glanced up at the sky. “In this kind of heat, it doesn’t take long for a body to begin to break down. But in the close-up we saw on the cam, she didn’t look like she’d been out in the sun for a whole day. Besides, if that kid was down here, this could be a hangout.”