Official Privilege

by P. T. Deutermann

  “Yes, sir. He made an unhappy reference to my command tour.”

  “The one in Argentia, no doubt. Well, you probably did the right thing up there. Miss. Snow, I apologize for your getting have out of the meeting, but it’s probably for the best that neither of you were there, given what they ended up talking about.”

  “How’s that, Captain?” Grace asked.

  But the captain shook his head. “No. You two just proceed. What you don’t know can’t hurt you, at least not for a while. It will depend upon what the press does with this. But Dan, if I were you, I’d do a memorandum for the record on the meeting today. Miss. Snow, you, too.

  Write down your version of what happened, then bury it in your files.

  What time is it? Oh, almost eighteen hundred. Now, if you’d close my door so I can fumigate in peace. Oh, and Dan?”

  “Yes, sir?”

  “Take the rest of the day off, if you please.”

  “Aye, aye, sir,” Dan replied with a straight face. He closed Summerfield’s office door, and they went over to the back room. Grace fired up her portable while Dan sat down to one of the PCs to construct his MFR.

  Grace was finished first, having been the first to be ejected from the meeting. Dan was a bit more verbose.

  When he was done, he looked up, to find Grace watching him. He thought he caught a speculative look in her eyes, and for a moment, he did some speculating of his own about what she might be like in bed. The thought surprised him.

  “So what do we do now, Mr. Holmes?” she was saying.

  “We call it a day, I think, Dr. Watson. The powers that be are gonna power around for a while, covering their stern sheets and their principals’ position. Tomorrow, I’d suggest you call into NIS and smoke out their copy of that original investigation, and then call Santini and get a progress report on his purported interviews with Shop Seventy-two.

  After that, we’ll meet with your Detective Captain Vann.”

  “And you?”

  “I’m going to start building my final report, getting the paperwork in order. I have this funny feeling that they, whoever they might be, may come down here soon and instruct me to turn over all investigation materials to a new, more politically pliable boy investigator—one who has the confidence of his executiveship, my lord Captain Randall.”

  “Can they just do that?”

  “Sure. If they really want to mess around, they could, for instance, write me a set of orders and then, regrettably, due to the exigencies of my unexpected transfer, appoint a new guy to run the JAGMAN.”

  She sat back in her chair, being somewhat careless about her skirts.

  Well, my goodness, Dan thought, trying to keep his eyes in the boat. If she saw him looking, she gave no visible sign of it.

  “I guess I’m a little naive,” she reflected. “If somebody tried that in NIS, there’d be hell to pay.”

  “Would there? It wouldn’t stun me to find out that the passive resistance going on at NIS, if that’s what’s going on, isn’t the result of some fairly high-level guidance —or even collusion with someone high up in

  Opnav. Remember, this thing’s gone public, and the Navy hates public.”

  She slumped a little at that.

  “What would you do” she asked, “if they took you off the investigation, gave you orders?”

  “Truth? I’d take those orders, clutch them to my heaving bosom, and run, not walk, right out the door.

  I’m due for sea duty and a command of my own. Throw me in that briar patch, Br’er detailer.”

  “And what about the Lieutenants Hardin?”

  Dan took his time with that one. “The Lieutenants Hardin are dead. From what I can see at this juncture, there’s not a snowball’s chance that I—that we—can somehow achieve justice for the one who was murdered.

  It’s been two years. Any trail in Philadelphia is stone-cold. Any trail here in D.C. probably leads into a part of town where you and I would be neither welcome nor effective. I’m beginning to think that some reasonably big bosses would like this thing to go down-scope for a while. If I had to wager, I’d say that’s what Sum merfield’s talking about. They’re going to kill it.”

  “And now?”

  “For now, I follow my last legal order: Captain Sum merfield said to proceed. That’s what we’ll do: proceed until something changes. But not tonight. Tonight, I have a date with a rowing machine, since daylight on the river has long gone. See you tomorrow, Miss. Snow.”

  malachi eased himself into an upright position in his bed and tried unsuccessfully to get the room to stop moving. It wasn’t exactly spinning, but there were suspicious indications of movement in his peripheral vision whenever he cracked open either of his eyes. It was still dark outside, and his head felt like a lumpy sponge that had soaked up a few gallons of pulsing pain. His stomach was queasy, and his mouth gave new meaning to the words whiskey sour. He tried to concentrate, trying to remember how much he had had to drink last night.

  Or was it the past two nights? And maybe a day in between? What the hell day was this? With his eyes still pretty much closed, he reached for his cigarettes. He found only one left. He felt both ends of the cigarette, pinched off the filter, and then lit up, wincing at all the noise the lighter made. He started to shake his head to clear his mind, but pain central got wind of it just in time and threatened to take his head right off. Might be a blessing, he thought as he gingerly swung one leg at a time over the edge of the bed and tried to get approximately vertical before staggering into the bathroom. So what happened to all that self-control, Ward? Was there some reason behind our going through a couple of quarts of hundred-proof? What little worm is squirming in your mind, you have to drown it like that?

  He sat down heavily on the throne in the darkened bathroom, closed his eyes, and let his chin settle down on to his chest one degree at a time.

  Each degree hurt.

  His insides felt as if they were settling, too, perhaps all the way into the toilet. A tiny flick of hot cigarette ash landed on his chest. He ignored it and took another drag. The Hardin thing—that’s what this was. He had seen the evening network news—when, last night? Must have been. Body in the battleship. Officer missing for two years. Government investigation. “Just wanted you to hear it from us first,” the captain had said. Fucking wonderful. He had wanted to call the captain, ring the number, say the code name, find out what was really happening, but of course he couldn’t do that. They would think he was getting scared.

  And the call from Angelo hadn’t helped. Apologizing for the body being found. Thought a sealed-up, nitrogen-filled, inactivated battleship was a pretty secure place. Reassurances of what a stand-up guy he was, nothing to worry about; likewise for the hard hats who had been involved. No problem whatsoever. Except for maybe one thing. About the need for Malachi to start watching his own back, because the people who had hired him might be getting antsy now, and they could, of course, always hire somebody else. “Way I see it, Malachi, you’re the guy who can finger your client. This federal beef grows some hair and teeth, your client might be tempted to eliminate the connection between the ‘body in the battleship’ story and himself, which is namely you, am I right? Feel like I own a piece of all this shit, so I thought I’d better call, and say: watch your ass, paisan. You need some help, let me know.

  We have some guys in D. C., can arrange some shit, you need it.”

  Thank you, Angelo. Make my fucking day, Angelo.

  He remained perched on the John like a stone gargoyle, listening to his heart beat and his lungs breathe, waiting until the light coming in from the bedroom grew stronger and the day became unavoidable. He finally heaved himself up, washed his face and hands, and then decided to take a shower, after which he went out to the kitchen to get a Coke to settle his stomach. With maybe the slightest dollop of Harper to really settle it.

  He looked around inside the icebox, but what little food there was revolted him. Aspirin, that’s what drunks have for b
reakfast. Aspirin, a Coke to get some caffeine running, and a little hair of the dog to take the edges off the Coke. He sat down gingerly in a kitchen chair and reached for the sugar bowl, which he kept full of aspirin tablets.

  Thanks a heap, Angelo, that was just what I needed to think about. Of course the captain could hire somebody else, although he wasn’t too sure that the captain would know that many guys in the business. On the other hand, he’d hired him, hadn’t he? And there were certainly other contractors in the business in this town; Malachi even knew a few of them. Hell, everybody was a contractor of some kind or another in Washington— contractor or a consultant. Same difference: talent for hire. But it was so damn simple: If everybody just kept their damn cool, sat still, kept their mouths shut, the feds would be stymied. There just wasn’t any trail. It was a no-brainer, as all the modish bureaucrats liked to say.

  He swished the Coca-Cola around in his mouth to get rid of the sour taste of the aspirin tablets, the noise sounding like a wave breaking in his ears. Maybe the thing to do was to hit the road, just disappear.

  Retire.

  He had a nice fat cash stash from the sergeants’ Mafia days in Vietnam and Germany, and another couple of hundred grand in bank accounts and safe-deposit boxes around town after all these years of shoveling shit for the bigs. He thought about it as he waited for the caffeine to work.

  Go down south somewhere, get a little farm or something, and settle into the weeds, drinking bourbon under a willow tree somewhere. What damn near every sergeant he had ever known had talked about doing when the big three-oh came along. Except that not that many had actually done it.

  Health problems, a wife who was settled finally into a good job and tired of moving, grown kids who were still hanging around, the fear of being too far away from the almighty exchange and the commissary and the Army hospital. Basically, the habits of three decades of Army life.

  That’s probably what would keep him here, too— habit.

  He finished half the Coke, found some bourbon, topped the can back off, and then deliberately drank it down. Screw these people. He was not going to get run out of town because of some rinky-dink investigation, and if the bigs tried to take him out, he just might throw some shit in the game in reply. Shit, he was in the business, wasn’t he?

  He left Capitol Hill that morning on the Metro to check on his bolt-hole apartment in the Randolph Towers and also on the Ford. He came out of the Ballston Metro, walked through the Ramada Renaissance lobby, across two streets, and into the Randolph Towers building by way of the deli, where he topped off his cigarette supply, grousing at the Lebanese proprietor over his prices. Once in the building proper, he took the elevator directly down to the third level of the garage and walked to the corner where his Ford was parked. Finding a small pool of what looked like power-steering fluid under the car, he decided to run it down to the nearest Ford dealer, which was on Wilson Boulevard.

  As he pulled the sedan out onto Quincy Street and turned right, he thought he saw a car swing into traffic from a street parking place a half a block behind him, next to an abandoned car dealership.

  He had begun watching his back, just like Angelo had recommended, even doing a little fancy stuff on the Metro trains, ducking in and out of newspaper shops and convenience stores to see what might be going on behind him or even ahead of him, but there had been nothing. Just the stone-faced commuters and the first of the spring tourist hordes on the Metro, and all the politicians, bureaucrats, and other great men whizzing down the avenues in their official cars. But as he bounced along the potholes by which Arlington County controlled speeding on Wilson Boulevard, he noticed that the dark-colored car seemed to be staying with him, three, maybe four cars back. Single driver, but he couldn’t see much in the vibrating mirror, and he didn’t want to turn around and look. So he drove past the dealership and went one more block, accelerating into a left turn and going through a yellow light that went red as he made the turn. He circled the block, coming back out on Wilson, headed back toward the dealership. He drove down the next three blocks slowly, staying in the right lane as if looking for a parking place, his turn signal blinking, scanning the ranks of parked cars and the aprons of two gas stations, looking for a dark sedan.

  But there was nothing. He’d either lost the guy or spooked him. Or maybe there’d never been a guy in the first place.

  He turned around in a gas station and drove back on down to the Ford dealership, where they told him it would be a three-hour wait, he wanted to wait for it. He told them he’d leave it, be back tomorrow, but then he stood for a while in the corner of the front showroom, looking out the big tinted windows on Wilson, waiting to see what might show up.

  Nothing did. After thirty minutes, he walked out of the dealership and headed down the street toward the Clarendon Metro station, stopping briefly in the entrance of a Vietnamese grocery to scan the street again, keeping his eyes open. Still nothing. He decided to go back to Capitol Hill.

  He thought about it during the subway ride home. If a guy had been following him, and thought maybe Mal achi had made him, he’d break it off, wouldn’t he? Just drive on down the line. Your target speeds up and turns off the main drag, he’s made you, right? On the other hand, there was no way a guy could know where he had been bound that morning, certainly not in advance, and no way the guy could have had a car waiting out there on Quincy, because Malachi had taken the subway.

  Unless they knew about the apartment in the Randolph Towers. But even then, the garage had two exits. Two watchers? Shit, he was getting paranoid. Well, yeah, but even paranoids have enemies.

  He stared at the darkened train window as they rolled through the tunnels under Pennsylvania Avenue.

  Jesus Christ, you’re working yourself up over jackshit, he told himself.

  He hadn’t heard from the captain since the last call, and he was determined not to call in like some panicked teenager. There had been nothing else in the Washington papers about the case. You’re spooking yourself, man, he thought. But when he got back to the town house, there was a message on the machine from the captain: “We’re taking steps to neutralize the investigation. Two years is a long time. One of the principal investigators has been ours all along. You can relax.”

  That was it, no instructions to call in, get in touch, “we need to meet”

  stuff. Malachi quickly saved the message and then replayed it a couple of times, listening to the captain’s voice carefully, trying to strain any nuances from the mechanical words. “Neutralize the investigation”

  —what the hell did that mean? “Two years is a long time.” Right, we’re all counting on that. “One of the principal investigators has been ours all along.”

  Was he no longer on the case? “You can relax.” Yeah, relax. Let down your guard. Forget about it, so our guy, our new guy, can maybe solve our new little problem for us.

  He left the message on the tape, lit a cigarette, and walked around the ground floor of the town house as he thought about it. He needed to do something, not just stay hunkered down inside the perimeter. Anyone who’d done time in Nam knew that rule. Only targets stayed inside the wire. Survivors got out there in the weeds in onesies and twosies and did unto Chuck what Chuck was trying to do unto them. But he needed a face, some names. Okay, so he’d start by finding out who’d been doing this investigation that was now going to get “neutralized.” He went to his desk and got out a yellow legal pad, took it back into the kitchen, and fixed up some coffee. He sat down at his kitchen table.

  The news had said the Navy was conducting the investigation.

  That meant that bunch of clowns at NIS. So he had to find a way into NIS to ferret out who had the Hardin case. What was the worst thing the NIS could find out? That there was a connection between the Hardin sister’s little accident and the Hardin brother’s killing.

  So where would they start working on that? In the D.C. Metropolitan Police Department. So he’d call them, maybe dig out who from NIS had been
pulling on that string. He sipped some coffee, thought about maybe slipping a little whiskey sweetener into it, then shook his head. Mr.

  Harper could wait—but not too long.

  He walked to his desk in the dining room. So who would he be today? The lawyer. Cops wouldn’t give a journalist the time of day, but a lawyer, they had to sweat a lawyer just a little bit. But they’d check him out first. So he wouldn’t talk to cops; he’d talk to their clerks. Go after the paper—that’s what the NIS would have to do. He looked up the number, set up voice program six for Lawyer Greenberg, called the main police department’s number, and asked which division would handle a hit-and-run. Hit-and-run division, in the Traffic Bureau. Well, no shit.

  But how about the records?

  The records office at Municipal Center. The sullen operator made him call back on a different number, but he scored on the first call when a little-old-lady voice answered the phone. She’s old. Be polite, he thought.

  “My name is Farrell Greenberg, ma’am. I’m an attorney at Lyle, Spencer, Watkins and King, out here in Bladensburg. I have a question, but I’m not quite sure where to go with it, so I’m taking a wild shot and calling the records office. Perhaps you can assist me.”

  “What you lookin’ for?”

  “Our firm has been retained by the Naval Investigative Service down at the Navy Yard to do a large-scale records search on hit-and-run accidents in the District of Columbia. The Navy’s had some people attempting veterans claims fraud based on what the Navy thinks are an exceptional number of hit-and-run cases here in Washington, D.C. What we need—”

  “Well, why don’t you just ax the lady?”

  Lady? “I beg your pardon, ma’am, I don’t follow.”

  “That lady, she workin’ for the same folks you workin’ for, that Navy investigation service, what’s her name, Miss. Snow, yeah, I remember it, ‘cause she come over here, lookin’ at a file, and then she have to come on back, get her a copy of it, on account she forgot to get her a copy the first time. Everybody looks at a file here, they usually takes a copy, you know what I’m sayin’? She done forgot it, had to come all the way back from the Pentagon, she said. Nice lady, didn’t hassle me about it none, like mos’ folks.”