Official Privilege

by P. T. Deutermann

  On his fourth try, he listened to Grace’s call to Dan.

  Vann’s message had revealed that he wanted all three of them to meet with a Mrs. Hardin in District Heights.

  Malachi knew that had to be Lieutenant Hardin’s mother, but that wasn’t what interested him. This Captain Vann, whoever he was, had also said he had more information on Ward for them. The mention of his name confirmed his suspicions that Snow might be a hitter. He wondered if this Captain Vann was an EA, some new player in the Navy system. It was also bad luck that Snow had made a call out after this captain had called in: The monitor had a callback feature that would dial the last number it had monitored, but Grace’s call had deleted the incoming phone number.

  But whoever Vann was, he was passing them information on him, targeting information no doubt. But it was also clear they were assuming Malachi didn’t know anything about them, which gave him an enormous advantage.

  He made his move right after sunset. They would probably allow an hour to get out to District Heights from Georgetown, which meant a 6:30 departure. District Heights—he doubted that either of those two had ever set foot in that part of Washington. He almost prayed they would have a flat tire, so that they might get to enjoy a unique intercultural experience. Dressing in dark clothes and wearing his black windbreaker, dark leather gloves, and a dark gray fedora, he took the Metro down to Rosslyn and then walked down past the Key Bridge Marriott and across the Key Bridge into Georgetown. It was shaping up to be a dark, moonless night, and the lights from the ornate streetlamps on the Key Bridge completely obscured the waters of the Potomac River beneath the high arches of the bridge.

  Everything he would need tonight was already stashed inside Snow’s house, which allowed him to enter the Cloisters neighborhood without any satchels or otherwise suspicious-looking bags. He walked purposefully, as if he belonged there, and when he got to Snow’s house, he let himself in through the wrought iron gate, ignored the car parked on the apron, walked right up to the front door, and let himself in with the key. He closed the door, pulled the curtains on the front windows, and turned on a table lamp, then he went into the kitchen to see if she kept any decent whiskey in the house. He would have to remember to retrieve that monitor; he wouldn’t need it after tonight, and the damn things were actually hard to get.

  dan took pennsylvania Avenue all the way through town until he could see the Capitol building, at which point he cut down on 7th Street to Independence Avenue to get around the Capitol. Turning left on Independence, he was able to rejoin Pennsylvania behind the Library of Congress and proceed into Southeast Washington.

  Neither of them spoke much as he piloted the big Suburban through increasingly more dangerous-looking neighborhoods, both of them keenly aware of the openly hostile stares they were getting from the street corners every time they had to stop for a red

  light. This was one of the times Dan wished he had owned a gun, because a lot of the people out on these streets looked like they did. When they finally hit the District line, Pennsylvania Avenue widened out into the four-lanes of Maryland Route 4.

  “We’re looking for Silver Hill Road now,” Grace said. “We’ll go left.”

  With Grace reading from a three-by-five card with Vann’s directions, Dan got them to the Hardin’s house ten minutes early. He found a parking place big enough for the Suburban in front of what looked like an unmarked cop car. He pulled in and shut down. The address they were looking for, number 1117, was the third house in a row of four two-story brownstones joined together. There was a wrought-iron fence running in front of all four units, with a banked front yard that required two sets of steps to get to the front porch of each house. There were lights on in the downstairs of number 1117, and the front porch light was also on.

  Only one of the other four had any lights showing.

  There-did not seem to be any people or even very much traffic on this street. They looked at each other and then got out of the car.

  Dan had decided to wear his service dress blues.

  While it was true he was no longer officially on the case, Mrs. Hardin would remember him in uniform from Philadelphia. He left his cap in the car, however.

  Grace was wearing a subdued gray wool ankle-length jumper over a deep V-neckline, long-sleeved white blouse. He almost took her arm as they went through the squeaky gate and up the steps, but he didn’t. She caught his hesitation and smiled at him, and he suddenly felt a lot better about being here. When they arrived at the front door, Moses Vann, dressed in a three piece charcoal gray suit, opened it for them and invited them in. He took them into the living room, which was to the right of the front door.

  The house was warm and smelled of fresh coffee and flowers, of which were was a great abundance stationed in vases and glass pitchers all around the room. The living room was larger than Dan expected, with a piano in one corner, a couch with end tables, three upholstered chairs, and a small fireplace with flowers in it at one end. On the mantel above the fireplace, there were two eight-by-ten black-and-white photographs, one a full-figure picture of a very pretty young woman in a Navy ensign’s service dress whites. She was standing with a beaming Mrs.

  Hardin. The other photo was of a bright-looking young man dressed in what Dan thought was the shirt, tie, and coat of navy service dress blues.

  He swallowed as he recognized who that was.

  Mrs. Hardin was seated in the chair nearest the fireplace, and Vann showed them to the couch before sitting down in one of the other chairs.

  There was a dining room off the living room, and a swinging door led to what Dan figured was the kitchen. It sounded like there was someone in the kitchen. Mrs. Hardin gave them each a reserved greeting but did not get up, and it was obvious that she was looking to Vann to steer the conversation.

  Before he could begin, a very pretty teenaged girl came out of the kitchen with a small tray that contained three cups of coffee, spoons, and cream and sugar in silver serving pieces. The girl brought the tray over to the couch, put it down on the coffee table, and left without a word or without looking either one of them in the eye. Dan thanked her retreating back.

  “You find it okay?” Vann began, shucking his jacket.

  “No problem, Captain,” Dan said. “We took Pennsylvania all the way from Georgetown.”

  “Ah,” Vann said. “The scenic route. Have some coffee.

  You probably need it.” He helped himself to a cup.

  Mrs. Hardin looked into the middle distance, her face set in a motionless mask, as Dan and Grace leaned forward to fix their coffee.

  Grace was closer and took over, then had to ask Dan what he liked in his coffee, making him realize for an instant that they still had a lot to learn about each other. Grace passed him a cup as the silence in the room built, but as soon as she had fixed her own, Vann started.

  “Angela here,” he said, speaking almost as if Mrs. Hardin was not in the room, “she’s agreed to talk to us tonight. It’s not something she wants to do. But I’ve told her it’s important, that there’s a chance that one or both of you might be able to find out who’s responsible for what happened to her children.”

  Dan looked at Vann. “Does she understand that both of us are working unofficially at the moment?” he asked.

  Vann nodded. “All three of us are working unofficially.

  That’s why she agreed to talk to us. I told her about the heat you’ve been getting, and the fact that Miss. Snow here lost her job because of this case.” He glanced over at Grace to make sure that she wouldn’t contradict him, but Grace apparently understood the gambit. She nodded and looked down at the floor. “I’ve shared with her informally some of the aspects of the case as we know it so far. So what I’d suggest is that you go ahead and ask your questions, Commander.”

  Dan put his coffee cup down and looked directly at Mrs. Hardin for the first time. She continued to stare straight ahead.

  “Mrs. Hardin, again I want to extend my condolences.

 
; I won’t sit here and try to tell you that I can appreciate your losses, because I lost my wife before we ever got the chance to have and raise some kids.”

  Mrs. Hardin looked over at him with a flicker of interest.

  Dan pressed ahead.

  “My questions center on your daughter.”

  “My ‘Lizbeth.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “She was a good girl, the best girl,” Mrs. Hardin said.

  “Yes, ma’am,” Dan said. “But did she ever reveal to you that she might be seeing someone, someone fairly senior, or important, in the Navy?

  Dating him even?”

  Mrs. Hardin shot a look at Vann but then shook her head.

  “No,” she said defiantly. “Never did.”

  Vann leaned forward. “Angela,” he said with a hint of exasperation.

  Mrs. Hardin looked down at the floor for a long minute and then sighed.

  ” ‘Lizbeth never did,” she repeated.

  “But Wesley, he told me something’. Right after the funeral, he told me something’.”

  “Mrs. Hardin, did he tell you who it was?” Grace asked, speaking for the first time. “Did he tell you a name?”

  Mrs. Hardin shook her head slowly. “Only that he knew who it was and that he was gonna go see the man, find out some things. He was hot on it.”

  “Why was he hot about it?” Dan asked.

  Mrs. Hardin looked over at Vann, who nodded. For the first time, she looked right at Dan.

  ” ‘Cause he was white,” she declared. “Wesley thought that was about the wrongest thing she could do, be seem’ some white guy.” She paused, took a deep breath, apparently somewhat embarrassed by her outburst.

  “I’m sorry, but that’s what it was.”

  “I can understand that, Mrs. Hardin,” Dan said. “But did he suspect or did he say anything that would make you think he suspected that Elizabeth’s accident might be related to her relationship with this white man?” Dan asked.

  “What do you mean?” she asked, looking first at Dan and then again to Vann for guidance.

  “Did he say anything that would lead you to believe that what happened to your daughter might not have been an accident?” Grace asked.

  Mrs. Hardin’s expression changed to one of alarm.

  “Moses?” she cried. “Moses, what’s this girl sayin’?

  What’s she sayin’ here about ‘Lizbeth?”

  Vann bit his lip and looked fixedly at the floor. Dan realized that the two of them must have talked long and hard before they arrived but that Vann had not raised this possibility.

  “Angela,” Vann said finally, “the police have no concrete evidence that what happened to Elizabeth was anything but an accident. But we’re trying to figure out why someone would want to kill Wesley. Because of some tips we’ve had, it’s possible, just possible, now, that Wesley thought her death was not an accident and that maybe he braced somebody up about it. That somebody might have had something to do with what happened to Wesley.”

  “The connection is Navy, Mrs. Hardin,” Grace said.

  “Wesley was probably killed on a Navy installation.

  Elizabeth was seeing someone senior in the Navy. Both of them were in the Navy themselves.”

  “And what’s the Navy doing about all of this?” Mrs. Hardin asked, looking directly at Dan.

  Dan glanced over at Grace before replying. “That’s part of it, Mrs.

  Hardin. We—and we’re on the outside now, remember—we think some people in the Navy don’t want anything done about it. We were the original investigation team, and now Miss. Snow here is no longer with the NIS, and I’ve been told to stay out of it by some pretty powerful people in the Navy Department.

  That’s why we need your help, because if there’s anything at all you can tell us that would identify Elizabeth’s … friend, we can give that to Captain Vann here, and he can come at it from outside the Navy.

  Once that happens, I think the rest of the Navy, the people who aren’t involved in this, will do the right thing.”

  “Do the right thing?” She sniffed. “Tell me something: You get caught messing around with this thing, you gonna get in trouble?”

  “That’s what they tell me,” Dan said.

  “So why you doin’ this?”

  “Because I want to know who killed your son. Especially if it was someone in the Navy.”

  “Seems to me, your Navy isn’t doin’ too good these days, tellin’ right from wrong.”

  “Yes, ma’am. But the Navy’s a big outfit. A lot of the bad things seem to have happened here in Washington, but there’s a whole hell of a lot of Navy out there around the world, thousands of men and women serving their country and doing it honorably. That’s the real Navy, not the Washington Navy, and I guarantee they have a clearer picture of what’s right and what’s wrong than a lot of folks in this town seem to.”

  Mrs. Hardin stared at him and then looked over one more time at Captain Vann. Then she got up. “I got one thing. Maybe it’s something; maybe it’s nothing.”

  When she had left the room, Dan looked over at Captain Vann. “How much have you told her?” he asked. Vann shrugged.

  “Enough,” he said. “She’s felt all along that there was a cover-up of some kind, but there was nothing to go on. The past two years have been exceedingly … difficult.”

  Mrs. Hardin came back into the room, carrying a small white envelope.

  She gave it to Dan.

  “That was in her things, her personal things. You can see the date—it’s about a week before … before what happened over there in town.”

  Grace moved closer as Dan opened the envelope and drew out what appeared to be a Valentine card. There was a large red heart on the front panel, with the words Be My Valentine in silver writing across the bottom.

  Inside there was a message: “Don’t shut me out—I love you too much to just stop now,” it read, written in longhand in the black felt-tip pen.

  It was signed with the initials W.T. Dan turned the envelope over and noted the postmark: Foggy Bottom. The envelope had been mailed in her own neighborhood. He handed it over to Captain Vann, who studied it carefully before putting it down on a side table.

  “And we have no idea who W.T. is?” Dan asked.

  Mrs. Hardin shook her head. “That’s the only thing, the only personal item in her papers. The rest were bills and a bunch of Navy paperwork about leave, and some forms.”

  She went back over to her chair and sat down, then seemed to sag. Dan saw a look of concern in Vann’s face, so he nudged Grace.

  “Mrs. Hardin, we thank you very much for seeing us.

  We’re going to keep working it, see if we can find out who this is. I hope we don’t have to bother you again.”

  The look in Mrs. Hardin’s eyes was bleak, but she didn’t say anything, just gave them a small wave and turned in her chair to stare at the wall. Vann got up as Dan and Grace did and walked with them out the front door to the porch. He pulled the front door to but did not close it. Inside, Dan saw Mrs. Hardin walk slowly into the kitchen.

  “I told you,” Vann said. “Way I see it, she’s been trying to erase all of this stuff from her mind so that she can just get on with what’s left of her life. That’s why I didn’t want to do this. You saw her.”

  Dan nodded and Grace pulled her jacket around her shoulders. It was considerably cooler and there was a hint of rain in the air. Two teenagers strolled by, slowing to give the Suburban the once-over. Then they recognized the cop car, looked up at the porch, and sauntered away.

  “Had you known about the Valentine card?” Dan asked.

  Vann shook his head. “Not until tonight. It wouldn’t have meant anything until now—if it does mean anything.”

  “It does to me,” Dan said. “The one guy in the Pentagon giving me the most heat about staying away from all this is the VCNO’s executive assistant, one Captain, soon-to-be Rear Admiral, Randall.”

  “Yeah, so
?”

  “So his boss, the Vice Chief of Naval Operations, a four-star admiral and the number-two guy in the whole Navy, and soon to be number-one guy, his name is Tor ranee. William H. Torrance, Admiral, USN.” Vann stared at him. “As in W. T.,” he said softly.

  “Yeah, as in W. T.”

  Vann looked out over the front yard, chewing on his lip again as a car went by. Grace stood there quietly, watching Vann.

  “I suggest we do some more thinking,” Dan said, turning to go down the steps, taking Grace’s arm this time. Vann came with them. “It’s a big jump from tips about admirals to making some accusations. Oh—your message said you had some more on this guy Ward?”

  Vann nodded and fished a notebook out of his vest pocket. They stopped next to the Suburban.

  “This guy is apparently one of those security consultants or contractors—take your choice—who specialize in doing trash hauling for important clients in this town.”

  “Trash hauling?” asked Grace.

  “Yeah, well, a combination of strong-arm, discreet muscle for hire, surveillance work, bodyguard, some PI stuff, bagman—all the not-so-polite scut work that goes on behind the thousand-dollar-a-day guys in the silk suits. I talked to a buddy at the IRS who ‘lent’ me a ten ninety-nine printout—shows who wrote him or his PI agency some checks, those who bothered to file. Then I talked to some of those people. They all knew him, but they got real vague real fast when I asked what he did for them. They all said he was a big motherfu—guy, so if he’s the dude was following you, Miss. Snow, you need to take care.