The Rose Conspiracy

by Craig Parshall

  Then he began.

  At each shop he stopped in and met with the proprietor. He would pull out the photo of Agent Johnson that Tully had e-mailed him. Then he asked the same question:

  “I am looking for a man named Ralph Johnson. He is with the FBI. Here is his picture. Have you seen him?”

  When they would give him a concerned look and shake their heads, then Blackstone would add, “If you do see him, just let him know that I will be walking along the river here, or else up by the little park at the end of Drayton Street. Will you tell him that if you see him?”

  By two in the afternoon, he had canvassed most of the shops in the Old Town along the river.

  He grabbed a sandwich and then sat down on a park bench on the edge of a small park. Blackstone clicked open his cell phone and called his office for his messages.

  By three o’clock, he was still seated on the park bench, watching passersby and horse-drawn carriages. He was beginning to wonder whether he had just wasted a plane ticket and an entire workday.

  Then he turned and saw someone standing next to him. Blackstone looked up and saw a broad-shouldered black man, dressed in a dark suit and tie, eating an ice cream cone.

  “Agent Johnson,” Blackstone said with mock surprise. “How strange we should run into each other like this. And in old Savannah, no less.”

  Johnson didn’t speak at first, but sat down on the bench next to him. Then, when he had nearly finished the ice-cream cone, he began to speak. But when he did, he never turned his head. He kept looking straight ahead.

  “You know as well as I do that there are limitations,” Johnson said quietly, “on a defense attorney’s right to speak to an investigating federal agent without first getting permission from the AUSA prosecuting the case.”

  “But that is assuming that I would have intentions to question you about the Smithsonian case,” Blackstone said.

  “You announced your intentions to half the tourist shops in Savannah,” Johnson said. “You even waved a printout around with my picture on it. I would have pegged you to be more sophisticated than that.”

  “Time’s short,” Blackstone said. “Trial date’s fast approaching. I’m down to the slapstick shtick. The vaudeville routine. Really broad stuff. It’s not my first choice of methods…but then, what’s a guy to do?”

  “I’m really not sure why I ought to be talking with you, Blackstone,” Johnson said.

  “I am,” Blackstone shot back. “First, I know that you have been dealt a rotten hand by someone in Henry Hartz’s prosecution team. Second, and this is the important part—I think that you know something important about the Smithsonian crimes, and you’d like to tell somebody. Maybe you’ve already tried, and it was all in vain. Anyway, you would like to share what you know, but you can’t quite figure out how you can make that happen.”

  “You understand I can’t talk to you about your client’s case,” Johnson said.

  “Of course.”

  After some silence Blackstone spoke up.

  “Nice picturesque river town, Savannah,” Blackstone said. “Only bad thing about a river, though, is that you get rats.”

  “Rats?” Johnson asked.

  “Sure, rats,” Blackstone said. “I’ve seen rats—seen how they scamper up a rope onto a ship. They’re quiet. Blend into the corners. Hide in the shadows. The point is this—if you’re trying to find out who the rat is, and where he is, where do you start looking?”

  Johnson paused for a moment.

  “I think it can be a matter of timing,” he said.

  “Oh?”

  “Yeah, timing,” Johnson reiterated. “Sailors are supposed to be on the ship. But the rat isn’t. I’ll tell you something pretty amazing, too. Sometimes a rat can fool you and even blend in like a sailor. So, you have to figure out when the sailors arrived—and when the rat got there—and you compare the two. That’s how you find the rat.”

  “How would a person go about doing that?” Blackstone asked, thinking hard on the FBI agent’s metaphor.

  “Oh, you start with paperwork, I suppose,” Johnson said. “You look at the obvious, the records you looked at a dozen times before, but this time with a different eye. See if you can see the tracks…a rat leaves tracks, you know.”

  Then he added, with a bitter smirk on his face, “Little rat tracks. And rat droppings.”

  Special Agent Ralph Johnson had finished his ice-cream cone. So he stood up from the park bench, wiped his hands on a little paper napkin, and tossed it in an outdoor wastepaper basket.

  Then he reached inside his coat pocket and pulled something out.

  Blackstone stood up next to him.

  Johnson held out a little colored brochure of the historical spots in Savannah.

  “Too bad,” Johnson said, handing the brochure to Blackstone, “that I won’t have time to see more of the historical sites in this city. Some of them have real significance.”

  With that, Agent Johnson looked around and then walked away, with Blackstone still holding the brochure.

  Blackstone opened it up. One historical spot had been circled with a pen.

  It was the location called “The Cotton Exchange.”

  Blackstone looked at the map to figure out where the Cotton Exchange was located. Then he realized that it was about one hundred feet directly in front of him, toward the river. Blackstone crossed the little park and strode up to the old, red stone building. The front door was locked and bolted shut. The windows were shuttered tight. At the top were the words Savannah Cotton Exchange etched in the stone.

  But something else caught his attention. In an aged, arched sign stretching over the doorway of that same building there was another sign.

  It read, FREEMASONS’ HALL.

  CHAPTER 52

  After landing back in Washington, while he was driving back to the law office from the airport, Blackstone used his cell phone to call Jason.

  “I’ve got some more work for you,” he told his paralegal. “Go into my office and grab the black notebook marked ‘U.S.A. v. Vinnie Archmont—Gov’t Report Summaries.’ Then go to the big black notebook in Vinnie’s case where I have indexed all the FBI reports, crime lab reports. When you have both of them in front of you, check my summaries of the crime scene investigation and match it with the actual FBI 302 report of the initial evaluation of Langley’s office. I want to make sure that my summaries are absolutely accurate in condensing the activities of the crime scene team.”

  “Gotcha,” Jason said.

  “Second,” Blackstone said, “and this is critical—go through the whole FBI crime scene report, as well as all my summaries, and create a timeline chart for me. I want you to list each person who had access to Langley’s office for the twelve-hour period before the murder, and then the twelve-hour period after he was killed, including the crime lab team members, the agents, and the District of Columbia police. I want to see who they were, and what time they would have entered and exited his office.”

  “I can do that, sure,” Jason said.

  “But before you do that,” Blackstone said, “check the Internet. Do a Google, then hit the local library if you have to. Check into the history of Savannah, Georgia, and the history of the early Freemasons in that city.”

  “Will do,” Jason said. “Anything in particular?”

  Blackstone pondered that, as he started going over in his mind Reverend Lamb’s dissertation in his office.

  “Check for anything,” Blackstone said, “that mentions ‘speculative Freemasonry.’ Look for that.”

  “By the way there is a phone call that just came in for you. Wait a minute while I grab it from Frieda.”

  After a few minutes Jason returned to the phone.

  “Here it is,” Jason said. “A guy from the U.S. marshal’s office called. Said it’s important that you call him right away.”

  Blackstone scribbled down the number.

  Then he called the federal marshals service. He waited on the line while his c
aller was located.

  “Mr. Blackstone,” the caller said. “I’m one of the agents here with the United States Marshal Service.”

  “What can I do for you?” Blackstone asked.

  “I wanted you to know that we now have custody of your client, Vinnie Archmont.”

  “I don’t understand,” Blackstone said.

  “Counselor,” the U.S. marshal said, “she was caught trying to abscond across the United States border into Canada.”

  For just an instant, Blackstone’s brilliant, polymath mind went numb. All he could do was fixate on the marshal’s use of the criminal justice nomenclature, the pejorative loaded with sinister innuendos—abscond.

  But then, a second later, Blackstone was already calculating the devastating damage that Vinnie had done to her own legal defense.

  “Where is she now?” Blackstone asked, trying not to sound frantic.

  “Here at the marshal’s office, at the Federal Building,” he answered. “She will be here for the rest of the day before they decide what facility they will ship her to. I think the AUSA will be filing something with the judge right away.”

  Yes. I bet he will, Blackstone thought to himself. And he knew exactly what Henry Hartz’s next move was going to be.

  But he didn’t have to wait long to find out for sure.

  His call-waiting beeped on his cell phone. Blackstone cut the call short, told the marshal he was on his way over to see his client, and then clicked onto the call-through.

  It was Henry Hartz.

  “Did the U.S. Marshal’s Service give you the bad news?” he asked.

  “I just got off the phone with them,” Blackstone said, trying not to sound shaken.

  “Just filed an emergency motion with Judge Templeton,” Hartz said.

  “Let me guess,” Blackstone shot back. “Asking for jail detention for Vinnie without bail.”

  “This is exactly why I thought when this case began—that she couldn’t be trusted being out on bail, facing a death penalty charge,” Hartz said. “The hearing is set for 5:30 p.m., today. After the end of the judge’s regular docket. You know now, after she pulled this stunt, he’s going to lock her up until trial. No question about that.”

  “I’ll be there at 5:30,” Blackstone said.

  “One other matter,” Hartz said. “I’m also filing a motion with the court asking that, at trial, I be allowed to introduce evidence to the jury of Vinnie’s attempted escape out of the country as evidence of implied guilt.”

  “You don’t have any idea what she was trying to do up there at the Canadian border or why she did it.”

  “Do you?” Hartz barked back.

  “I’m on my way to talk to her right now,” Blackstone shot back.

  “Well, I know one thing,” Hartz said. “The judge’s clear terms of bail required that she not leave the borders of the continental United States while her case was pending. She has committed attempted bail-jumping. But more important than that, proof of flight from the authority of the court is proof of a guilty conscience. A criminally guilty conscience.”

  “Save it for the court this afternoon,” Blackstone said.

  “Have a pleasant day, Professor,” Hartz said, ending the conversation with an arrogant attitude, and leaving the defense counsel for Vinnie Archmont in a suffocating cloud of pessimism.

  Blackstone caught a side-street, put his car into a quick U-turn, and then headed to the federal court building. He needed to confront his client immediately. The question plaguing him now was why she had risked the defense of her entire case in a foolish act that looked very much like an attempt to escape from the jurisdiction of the U.S. District Court.

  Blackstone parked his Maserati and hurried into the federal building. After clearing the metal detector and the security guards, he reported to the U.S. marshal’s office. The agent there took Blackstone’s identification, checked it, and blandly advised him to wait until he could be escorted to the interview room.

  Thirty minutes later, the lawyer was taken to the room where Vinnie Archmont was waiting for him, sitting at a metal table. She was still in handcuffs.

  Blackstone saw in her face a dark realization. The recognition that both she, and her legal defense, were now in a perilous state.

  “Why?”

  Blackstone’s tone was harsh.

  “Are you prepared to believe me?” Vinnie asked, her face anguished and her eyes full of tears.

  “It depends.”

  “On what?” she asked.

  “On whether you give me facts worthy of belief,” Blackstone replied.

  “All right then. What I am going to tell you,” Vinnie said, “is the truth.”

  “Fine,” Blackstone said. “Why Canada?”

  “Because Magister Dee was on his way to Canada. To Quebec. I heard he was meeting with some members of the Canadian Parliament. I planned on seeing him in Quebec…I just didn’t tell him in advance about my plan. You can check with him to verify his trip to Canada.”

  “Don’t worry, I will,” Blackstone snapped. “But you haven’t answered my question. Why?”

  “I intended to meet with Magister.”

  “To accomplish what?”

  “I’ve been very scared. I needed to talk with him.”

  “About your case?”

  “Of course. Wouldn’t you be frightened? Wouldn’t you want to be comforted by a close friend if you were facing murder charges and the death penalty?”

  “Why now—one week before trial?”

  “Because,” she said, “as the trial gets closer, I am growing more frightened. Why is that so hard to understand?”

  “And why not avoid violating your bail and have Lord Dee come to visit you here?”

  “That’s obvious, isn’t it?” Vinnie shot back, her voice indignant. “Magister Dee is basically an unindicted suspect in the Smithsonian crimes. You know that. So does Magister. While he has never been charged, he understands that the prosecution is eyeing him very closely. If he enters America, he could be seized. Arrested. Charged. As long as he stays out of the United States he knows that as a member of the House of Lords he could fight extradition very effectively. I’m surprised that with all your legal intelligence you couldn’t figure that one out. Maybe you are not as brilliant as you think you are.”

  Vinnie was enraged and insulting.

  But Blackstone was unmoved by that.

  “So,” Blackstone said, “you haven’t said anything about the restrictions placed on you by the Court. The Court required you to stay within the continental United States.”

  “I didn’t recall that being the case.”

  “Vinnie,” Blackstone said. “I explicitly instructed you about that.”

  “I really don’t believe you did,” Vinnie said coldly. “Besides, the Court took my passport. Which means that I was restricted from leaving the country for any destination that required a passport. I was under the impression that Canada still did not require a passport for entry from the United States.”

  “Up to now,” Blackstone said, “it didn’t. Canada is now transitioning to a passport system for Americans. But in a world of security concerns, it wasn’t too hard for the border agents to check you out and find out that you had federal murder conspiracy charges pending. And that you were violating bail.”

  “What happens now?” she asked, with a quaver. Her voice was showing that her initial anger was giving way to fear again.

  “A court hearing,” Blackstone said. Then he glanced at his watch. “Any minute now.”

  “What will the judge do?”

  “First, he will address your bail. And as much as I hope against it, I see no way that he will not revoke your bail and put you in jail until the trial. I know you don’t want that. But there is something much more damaging than that.”

  “What is it?”

  “The prosecutor, Henry Hartz, is also asking the court to advise the jury during your trial that you had attempted to flee the country in viola
tion of your bail. And that the jury can, if they want, interpret that act as an admission by you that you were escaping because you know you are criminally guilty.”

  “That’s ridiculous!” she cried out. “I am innocent. If you will simply do your best and do your job I will be acquitted.”

  “I suggest that you keep that opinion to yourself,” Blackstone said. “The judge is in no mood, I’m sure, to get a piece of your mind after you have violated his bail order.”

  Then Blackstone added his honest assessment.

  “You have no idea, Vinnie, how impossible you have made your legal defense.”

  But she didn’t have the chance to respond.

  Just then, a U.S. marshal entered the room.

  “The judge is calling your case, Counselor,” he said. “Ms. Archmont needs to come with me. We’ll take her up the prisoner’s elevator. She’ll meet you in the courtroom.”

  Then the marshal led her away.

  Vinnie did not look back.

  Blackstone was studying his client as she left. She was a beautiful yet shadowy enigma in a case full of dark mysteries.

  But despite that, the criminal law professor was now starting to see the essence of the case before him more clearly, as if illuminated by a light whose source was still uncertain. And he was beholding the shape of the Smithsonian crimes in ways that he had not disclosed to anyone else. Not to his client, nor the staff at his own law firm. And certainly not to Henry Hartz, the aggressive, career-climbing federal prosecutor.

  It would only be a matter of time, now. To see if his theory was proven true. Even though he was not quite sure how such an astonishing state of affairs could have ever taken place.

  CHAPTER 53

  In court, Henry Hartz made a dispassionate but detailed description of Vinnie Archmont’s travel from the District of Columbia to the state of Maine. Where she then rented a car and attempted to enter Canada, with her driver’s license and birth certificate as identification. She was stopped for questioning by border agents. After a short computer search and discovery of her pending federal charges and bail restrictions, they took Vinnie into custody. The “clear terms of her bail release required her not to leave the borders of the United States,” Hartz told the judge. The court had no other alternative, he argued, but to vacate bail and place her into jail confinement pending her trial date.