A Box Full of Trouble

by Carolyn Haines

  The noise downstairs is louder now. It’s evident someone is going through Julia’s desk and file cabinet. I streak ahead, taking the stairs as silent as a panther stalking his prey. In an instant I’m out of Julia’s sight and have picked my way across the shattered glass from the French doors that open from the foyer and are the entrance into the detective agency’s office.

  Two thugs are hard at it, one going through the files in the file cabinet and dumping folders unceremoniously onto the floor, while the other is at her desk trying to access her computer records.

  I make my way unnoticed under the desk as the crunch of glass beneath Julia’s bare feet and her cry of pain alerts the intruders that they have been discovered. Both men look up and the one at the desk immediately kills the lamp light. I spring at him and catch his trousers’ leg in my claws. By this time both men are headed for the door. Julia thinks to turn on the flashlight just as both of them barrel into her, knocking her to the glass littered floor. I am unable to maintain my grip on the trousers’ leg but I dig my claws into the intruder’s calf. But as they slip out into the night, all I have left is a scrap of fabric.

  Torn between pursuit and the fallen Julia, I reluctantly give up the chase and go to her aid.

  * * *

  Sargent Gibbons arrived on the scene as Julia picked the last glass shard from her foot. He pushed his hat onto the back of his head and sighed. “Your father isn’t going to like this Julia.”

  “Do you have to tell him?”

  “It wouldn’t be right if I didn’t.”

  Julia bit back the response that was on the tip of her tongue. She hadn’t lived at home since her return to Savannah after college but that hadn’t prevented her father from keeping a watchful eye over her. At twenty-eight she was more than an adult, more than capable of taking care of herself, but she knows she will always, in her father’s eyes, be daddy’s little girl. And all the cops who patrol the historic district of Savannah know it too. Sometimes her father’s social standing and political influence were maddening.

  Julia lifted her hands in a gesture of surrender. “Fine. But don’t make it sound worse than it is.”

  Sargent Gibbons looked about at the mess in her office and the broken pane of glass in the French door. Finally his gaze came to rest on her arm. “But you’re bleeding.”

  “You would be too if you walked barefoot in the dark over broken glass.” She saw the furrows of concern on his forehead deepen. “But it isn’t that bad. Really.”

  “What about your arm? How did that happen?”

  Julia looked away from Sargent Gibbons and surveyed the disaster in her office. “I cut it on the door. It’s just a few scratches.”

  He sighed and glanced down at his notepad. “So there were two of them, both wearing ski masks, about five ten to six feet tall.”

  “Yes.”

  “And you can’t say what they were after?”

  “I can’t say because I don’t know. As far as I can tell they were searching for something in my files. I won’t know until I sort through this mess.”

  He slapped the notebook closed. “So there was nothing distinctive about either of them that you remember?”

  Julia lifted her shoulders in a faint shrug. “I only saw them for less than a minute. When I stepped on the broken glass the one at my desk turned off the lamp.”

  “Well, we’ll dust for prints but I doubt we find any. Crooks these days know how to cover their tracks. Too many cop shows on TV.

  He was about to turn into the office when he spotted Trouble sitting on the third step of the stairs. “I didn’t know you had a cat.”

  “I don’t. I’m cat-sitting for a friend.”

  Trouble raised his hackles and growled low in his throat.

  “Not very friendly, is he?”

  Julia laughed. “Trouble has a superiority complex.”

  With that Trouble turned his back on the two of them and began to groom himself.

  Julia laughed again. “As you can see.”

  After Sargent Gibbons finally left, taking the young policeman who spent more time ogling her than collecting evidence, Julia surveyed the mess in her office. What could the two men have been searching for? Except for a discreet plaque with gold lettering beside the outer door of the building there was no way of knowing this house was any different from all the other mostly residential houses on the square. This wasn’t a random break-in, then. What were they searching for?

  She thought back over the past few weeks and months. All her cases were in the end stages of resolution. The information from her research had been reported to the insurance company that employed her, the conclusions already on file. She had a court hearing in two weeks on one of them and an arbitration hearing scheduled next month on another. A lot of money was at stake in the arbitration case but not so much on the court case. How would her files benefit either of them?

  Well, there was no way to know until she established some sense of order.

  As soon as the policemen left the premises Trouble began a circuitous inspection of the room. He pawed a couple of manila folders on the floor, sniffed the drawer pull on the file cabinet, but quickly moved on. The desk chair peaked his interest. He placed his nose to the seat of the chair and sneezed. Next he inspected several items on the desktop: a stapler, a letter opener, the lamp, and finally the keyboard of the computer. He sat squarely in the middle of the desk blotter and blinked slowly three times.

  Julia looked up from the floor of the room where she was sorting sheets of paper into various piles. She sat back on her heels and watched the cat.

  “What?” she said. “Don’t tell me you sniffed out the perp.” Trouble’s owner, Tammy Lynn, believed the cat had uncanny abilities, that he somehow knew things when there was no logical reason why he should.

  Trouble yawned hugely and continued to sit on the desk. His eyes blinked slowly once again and he said, “Yeow.”

  Julia smiled and returned to sorting receipts, photos, claim forms, and other bits of information. After a couple of minutes she paused and looked up at Trouble. She watched him patiently waiting then she got up from the floor. “All right, Sherlock, let’s see what’s so interesting up here.”

  She pulled the chair up to the desk and sat, moving Trouble to the corner of the desktop as she did. It took a few seconds for the computer to boot up. She scrolled through her documents file, hoping a name would catch her eye. After about ten minutes she sat back and drummed her fingertips on the desk. “I give up. Nothing stands out.”

  She started to return to the mess of files on the floor then decided to check her email. As soon as she opened Outlook, Trouble stood and walked across the keyboard.

  “Trouble!” She lifted him down to the floor and shook her finger at him. “Bad kitty!”

  Trouble arched his back and walked away on stiff legs, disdain radiating throughout his body.

  Julia turned back to the computer screen and discovered the cat, in his prance across the keyboard, had opened an email from Sandra, a long time friend and the receptionist at her new client’s insurance agency. Staring at her from the computer was a handsome man with dark brown eyes and a strong chin.

  “Hello. What’s this?” She clicked on the image and reduced it from full screen. The photo was on a dating site. Single, thirty-two, relatively new to the area, antique car enthusiast.

  She studied the image. There was something familiar about that face. Douglas Heinz. Who was Douglas Heinz and where had she seen him before?

  * * *

  Mitch Lawson stood in the shadow of the Federal style building. The cone of light from the wrought iron lamppost on the corner created night blindness for anyone who might glance in his direction. He had been standing there for well over two hours, his stance relaxed, unmoving. It was a stance learned from years of surveillance duty and one he could maintain for hours if necessary. The alleyway leading down the side of the Georgian house across the street was lit by low lights on the side o
f the main building, their design not meant for security but rather for their historical aesthetic.

  His attention was focused on the carriage house at the end of the alley. It, too, was lit by a gas carriage lamp but the illumination was sufficient for him to determine that no one had come or gone from the building since his arrival.

  He glanced down at his watch. It was two o’clock in the morning. He looked up and down the street, alert to any movement. Nothing. He stepped out of the shadows, his head down, the collar of his sports coat turned up, and crossed the street and down the alley, his presence nothing more than another shadow.

  There was only one way in or out of the carriage house. Mitch took a pick from his pocket and soon the lock on the dutch door opened. He slipped into the main living space and stood for a minute, allowing his eyes to adjust to the deeper shades of darkness. There were pinpoints of green light coming from the modem of the computer on a desk to the left of the door. Three blue lights from what was probably the television and stereo set-up were visible at the end of the room, and from the open door of the bedroom, another faint light source, probably a clock of some kind.

  Mitch did a quick reconnoiter of the apartment using a pen light sparingly. The bed had not been disturbed and the bathroom was neat and tidy. He found nothing in the closet out of the ordinary. There were no signs of a meal prepared or eaten in the kitchen. All was spic and span. At the desk he stood and looked out along the alleyway, his eyes searching every shadow. Finally, he hit the power button and booted up the computer.

  He went immediately to the browser history. The Bank of Savannah was the only notable site to show up. Nothing unusual there. Under documents he found three files that had been accessed repeatedly over the past thirty days. The activity had been more pronounced in the past week but when he checked into each file, there was nothing that indicated changes to the documents.

  He sat back in the chair and stared into the darkness, thinking about this. Why monitor these three cases so closely?

  From the inner pocket of his sports coat he took out a notepad and pen. He jotted down the names on the files. He started to close out the files and noticed an annotation at the bottom of two of them. They were both assigned to Peter Ryder, a claims adjustor with The Weatherby Insurance Agency, but he, in turn, had requested the involvement of The Hampton Detective Agency.

  Mitch closed the documents file and turned off the computer. He sat in the dark letting his vision readjust to the night then stood and left as silently and unnoticed as he had come.

  * * *

  Julia spent another half hour restoring order to her files then gave up. She yawned, turned out the lights, and went upstairs with every intention of going back to bed but by the time she dressed the cuts on her left foot and right arm, it was almost five o’clock in the morning. Her day usually started at six with yoga and copious amounts of coffee. Today she decided to forego the yoga and head straight for the coffee pot.

  The phone rang just as she finished her shower. It was six-fifteen.

  “Hi, Mom. Right on time.”

  “Good morning, Julia. Your father is beside himself as I’m sure you’re aware. He has Gibbons down in the study grilling the poor man like a defense attorney. You’d better tell me what happened so I can calm the waters.”

  “I was hoping he wouldn’t tell Daddy.”

  “You know your father worries.”

  “Yes, Mother, I know. It was nothing really. Someone broke into the office and went through my files.”

  “Sargent Gibbons said they trashed the place.”

  “I prefer to think of it as a very thorough search of my files.”

  Her mother sighed. “Well, you realize Woodrow will insist on that alarm system now.”

  Julia groaned. “Mom.” The word was a drawn out plea.

  “I’m sorry, Julia. I confess this incident makes me have second thoughts about this new scheme of yours.”

  “It’s not a scheme, Mom. It’s a profession.”

  “Snooping into other people’s lives isn’t a profession.”

  Julia chuckled. “No, it’s Aunt Ethel.”

  “Julia!”

  “Sorry, Mom.”

  “Well, you’d best come to breakfast. Better to go ahead and beard the lion and get it over with. Besides, you left your briefcase here last night.”

  Julia smacked her palm against her forehead. Of all the times to forget her briefcase, this was the worst. She needed it for her meeting with the insurance adjustor later in the morning. All the documents and policy information on a new case with a new client were in it. She would have to face her father at the height of his fright over the break-in.

  * * *

  The charcoal grey linen sheath struck just the right note. It was cool for the September heat, elegant yet professional enough for a business meeting. Julia struggled over the shoes but since she needed to look as grown-up and capable as possible for her encounter with her father, she chose the sherbert orange sling backs and a black envelope handbag. She put her hair up and the gold orb earrings were just enough with the single strand pearl necklace. She checked her appearance in the mirror. “Okay,” she said, closed her eyes, and took a deep breath. As she slowly let it out, she opened her eyes. She was ready.

  She went in the back of her parent’s home, through the kitchen, and snitched a grape from the fruit bowl. Rosetta gave her a sympathetic look as she headed toward the door to the dining room.

  Woodrow Hampton looked over the top of the newspaper and his reading glasses when she entered the room.

  Julia hoped the flesh tone of the Band-Aids on her right arm would go unnoticed. She rounded the table and kissed his cheek. “Good morning, Daddy.”

  “Good morning? Just what, pray tell, is good about it? Amos Gibbons tells me you could have been killed in your sleep.”

  “Oh, shush, Daddy. You of all people know how dramatic he can be. It was nothing more than a broken pane of glass, someone looking for the office cash, or more likely some kids up to mischief.”

  “Don’t you shush me, young lady. Do you think I just fell off the turnip truck?”

  “Now, Daddy, your blood pressure.”

  “And don’t ‘your blood pressure’ me. I wouldn’t have to worry about my blood pressure if you hadn’t gotten the fool notion into your head that you could meddle in other people’s business without any consequences whatsoever.”

  From the sideboard Julia poured a cup of coffee and put a slice of toast on a plate. “I don’t meddle, Daddy. All my job amounts to is research and a lot of paperwork.”

  “Hah! You think Rocco Sullivan is best pleased that the Mark Rothko he sold to the museum has been declared a fraud on your say so?”

  “Not on my say so, Daddy. On the say so of the art curator of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.” She sat at the table and began to spread marmalade on her toast.

  “Yes, but only because--”

  “Woodrow,” Audrey Hampton entered the dining room and interrupted the heated conversation between her husband and her daughter, “you’re going to be late for the board meeting if you don’t get yourself to The Bank.”

  He rose from his chair. “You needn’t think you’ve heard the last of this.” He threw his napkin onto the table and looked from mother to daughter. “Either of you.”

  Julia stood and her father took her by the upper arms and gave her a gentle shake.

  “You gave us a scare, Little Bit. What would we do if anything happened to you?”

  His use of her childhood name was almost her undoing. “Oh, Daddy.” She lowered her chin and began to straighten his tie. “Nothing bad is going to happen to me. Savannah is a sleepy little town, not a den of intrigue and high crimes. It was just a random act of mischief. You’ll see.”

  “Obviously you don’t read the newspaper. We’re installing that security system.” When she started to open her mouth in protest he held up a warning finger. “I’m not budging on this.”

 
Julia knew when and how to pick her battles so she smiled sweetly and kissed his cheek. “Of course, Daddy.”

  Audrey Hampton waited until her husband’s footsteps had receded before she launched her own campaign.

  “I think we’ve seen the worst of it. The security system will appease him for now.” She poured herself a cup of coffee and took a chair across the table from where Julia had resumed her seat. “But something has come up and I think it’s important, for your father’s sake, that you attend.”

  Julia put the last bite of toast back on her plate. She knew this strategy and her mother wasn’t a foe so easily vanquished.

  “Okay, let me hear it.”

  Her mother smiled and launched the battle of wills they both knew her seemingly innocent comment initiated.

  “The Bank is acquiring Low Country Securities. The merger has been finalized and there needs to be a suitable recognition of the occasion.”

  Julia tried to detect any ulterior motive in this opening salvo. It seemed innocuous enough on the face of it. That was why she knew to be doubly vigilant. Nothing with her mother was ever so benign.

  “How suitable?”

  “A party at The Club, formal attire, I should think.”

  “Lots of pomp and circumstance.”

  Her mother inclined her head slightly. “Exactly. The Bank will absorb the primary executives, give them some title and a nice office.”

  “And a golden parachute for the dead weight.”

  “Something like that.”

  “And why is it important that I be there?”

  “Well, this was a hard won takeover. There’s some animosity on the part of one or two of the majority owners so we need to show a united front. Welcome them into the family, so to speak.”

  “But I have nothing to do with The Bank.”

  “It’s important to your father. Besides, Vincent Richlieu will retain his position as Second Vice-President of Acquisitions.”