The Eldridge Conspiracy

by Stephen Ames Berry

  “Ferro battuto!” exclaimed Angie.

  “Okay,” said Jim.

  “Wrought iron,” she translated. “It’s an ancient Tuscan craft. My mother’s side, the Casalis, have wrought iron like this,” her hand swept the fence, “since the Middle Ages.”

  “They are magnificent,” said Jim. “As for having balls...”

  “And they’re all anatomically correct!” said Angie, eyes widening.

  Jim laughed. “I think parts of the gargoyles are anatomically exaggerated.”

  “How do you know, Jim?” said Angie. “Ever met a gargoyle?”

  “I’ve worked for a few. Though we were never intimate.”

  “Jeez,” said Tooky. “Couple of years back and you’d have had the Catholic Mothers Decency League out here with blowtorches.” He jiggled the unmoving brass doorknob on the walkway gate. “He said he’d be expecting us.”

  Reaching past him Angie pressed the buzzer set in the gate pillar and then waited, staring up into the camera lens beside the buzzer.

  “Is he married?” asked Jim as they waited.

  “Nope,” said Tooky. “No significant other. Lives alone. This house, two blocks from Jamaica Pond, would go for a couple of million, easy. And that’s this week.”

  “Four million,” said a voice from the speaker grill. “Angie?”

  “And Jim,” she said. Jim waved at the camera.

  The gate lock buzzed open.

  “Okay, guys,” said Tooky, “the deal was, just the two of you. I’ll wait in the car.”

  “Not bad for a structural engineer,” said Angie as they walked up the path. The flower beds on either side were neatly mulched, ready for winter.

  “I’ve never met any of the other descendants,” said Angie nervously. “I’ve got stage fright.”

  The big front door swung open as they walked up the stairs onto the veranda. “Howdy,” said the young man who came out. “I’m Tim O’Malley,” he said, holding out his hand. “Come on in,” he said after introductions. “I made some coffee.”

  He led them into a perfectly preserved front parlor, furnished with late Victorian period pieces, the morning sun flooding through the tall bow-front windows.

  “Is that a Tiffany lamp?” asked Angie as O’Malley disappeared through the dining room and into the kitchen.

  Jim looked around. “I think they’re all Tiffanies, or very good knockoffs.”

  Angie peered at the painting over the fireplace, overcoming the urge to go over and examine it. “That may be an original Monét over the fireplace, Jimbo,” she whispered.

  “How can you tell? Seen one flower, seen them all.”

  “You’re such a trog, Munroe.”

  “Beauchamp,” he corrected.

  “It’s going to take some time,” she said, moving closer to examine the painting.

  Tim O’Malley came back in, bearing a silver coffee service on a matching tray. “Here we are,” he said, setting the tray down on the marble coffee table. Pouring the coffee into three English bone china cups, he sat down in an armchair. Jim and Angie seated themselves on the sofa.

  “We love your fence,” said Angie, sipping her tea. “Is it new?”

  “The pickets are,” said O’Malley, stirring cream and sugar into his cup. “The figures though are all antique. I roamed Tuscany one summer, fell in love with it—the architecture, the food, the people. And the iron work. I’ve been collecting it for years. Now every pillar’s got one. Guess I’ll have to get a bigger place for a bigger fence.”

  Despite his name Tim O’Malley looked Welsh. He was short and thin and dark, with a narrow face and sharp black eyes.

  “Do you know who made any of those figures?” asked Jim.

  “Most are by several generations of artisans who lived in Camucia, in Tuscany—the Casali family.”

  “That’s my mother’s family!” exclaimed Angie.

  “Really?” said O’Malley, looking at her seemingly for the first time. “Are they still doing ferro battuto?”

  “Don’t know,” Angie shrugged. “We lost touch during the war.”

  “I have probably the largest collection of your family’s work in America.” He shook his head. “Do you know what the chances of your walking in here were? A billion to one?”

  “If you’re what I think you are,” said Angie, “my walking in here was probably inevitable.” Having started, she plunged in. “Did you ever hear tell of your grandfather having served aboard the destroyer escort USS Eldridge, part of a one-day pickup crew, in Philadelphia in 1943?”

  O’Malley shook his head. “No. All I have of him are some old medals and a picture of him as a scrawny kid in a white uniform. But my mother told me he was a submariner. So what would he have been doing aboard a destroyer?”

  “Perhaps we should start at the beginning,” said Jim.

  “I have to be at a construction site by noon,” said O’Malley, glancing at the grandfather clock, all but lost in a corner of the room.

  “Won’t take that long,” said Angie. “We’ll give you the condensed version, okay?”

  “Okay,” he shrugged.

  Philip answered his cellphone. “Yes?”

  “How close are you?”

  “Stuck in traffic, Admiral,” said Philip. “We’re near...” He looked at his driver.

  “The Museum of Science,” said Iceman. “Turning onto Storrow Drive West.”

  Philip repeated the information, adding, “We’re meeting our contractors at Olmsted Park in five minutes, changing vehicles. Say, another fifteen, twenty minutes to Jamaica Plain.”

  “As soon as you get O’Malley here to the island,” said Whitsun, “I’ve got another pickup for you to make. Advise me the minute you have him. And Philip?”

  “Sir?”

  “Don’t screw this one up.”

  Tim O’Malley thought their story a real hoot. Listening as they spoke, his expression slowly changed from one of polite interest to skepticism to outright incredulity. As Angie finished, he started laughing—laughter that grew until he was gasping for breath, his face red. “You guys should do a screenplay!” he gasped. “It has just the right touch of paranoia and government conspiracy to make it soooo good!”

  Jim looked at Angie’s darkening face, then back at O’Malley, doubled over in his chair. “Tim...” he warned.

  “And which one are you supposed to be?” chuckled the engineer. “Oh, of course-you’re the intuitive one, she’s the analytical one!”

  “Tim, I’d cool it if I were you,” said Jim. “She’s got a temper.”

  “Listen,” said O’Malley, recovering, “you two freaks get out of my house, right now.”

  “Enough!” snapped Angie. Untouched, the coffee service somersaulted through the air spewing hot brown liquid that soaked O’Malley’s pants, scorching him. He leaped to his feet amid the broken china, shock, pain and anger mingling on his face.

  “I warned you,” said Jim, sipping his coffee.

  “How’d you do that?” gasped O’Malley, staring at Angie.

  “Sometimes I have trouble controlling my temper,” she said contritely. “Sorry.”

  O’Malley looked down at his ruined pants and the coffee soaking into the carpet. “I believe you. I did from the start. What do you want?”

  “You,” said Jim. “And the truth.”

  “The truth?”

  “How’d a kid like you get so much money so fast? Your parents are average middle-class folks, live in the burbs, nice house, small. They’ve got a mortgage and day jobs. No one ever gave you anything.”

  Tooky Azarian had done his homework.

  O’Malley sat down again, ignoring his pants. “I play the stock market. I’ve been lucky.”

  “You’re a precog, aren’t you?” said Angie. “And unlike me, you can control and channel your ability. But then you’re third-generation. I’m second.”

  “Yeah. I can see things, sometimes. Things that happen later. But most of the time it’s just instinc
t. When I buy and sell stocks, I’m right about ninety-five percent of the time. I just know when to click “Buy” or “Sell.” In the last year I’ve made close to fifty million dollars. The SEC’s always poking around, looking to see if I’ve insider information.” He tapped a finger to his temple. “All my insider trading takes place inside here. I’ve even offered to let them sit here and observe. They’ve backed off for now.”

  No one said anything for a moment. “So what do you want from me?” he asked.

  “We want you safely out of here,” said Jim. “Your life’s going to be very unpleasant and very short if Whitsun and Schmidla get their hands on you.”

  “The two nasties you mentioned?”

  “Yup.”

  “What’s ‘out of here’ mean?”

  “It means staying in a gracious old inn in northern New Hampshire,” said Jim. “Owned by a friend of mine. You have similar architectural tastes.”

  “Jim has lots of friends who own businesses,” said Angie.

  “For how long?” asked O’Malley

  “Until this blows over,” said Jim.

  “Which would be when?”

  “When whatever event Schmidla’s orchestrating fails to materialize and his sponsors pull his plug. Or the whole project’s exposed and the lot of them go to jail. Don’t count on the second scenario, though.”

  O’Malley rose, facing them, his hands clasping the back of his chair. “Okay. Not much of a choice, is there?

  “Not really,” said Angie.

  “How’d you come to trust him?” he asked Angie, cocking his head toward Jim. “He’s not one of us. No offense,” he said to Jim. “It’s just that I don’t think I could ever confide in someone who wasn’t...”

  “A Potential,” supplied Jim.

  “That’s the official government term for us,” said Angie. “Potentials. We’re a much sought after commodity. As for Jim, he’s cool.”

  “How much control do you have over your abilities?” asked O’Malley.

  “None,” she sighed. “My subconscious seems to trigger them. I dropped a tree into Jim’s driveway, apparently so I could be trapped there for the night, then later I whisked away some inconveniently placed corpses.”

  O’Malley looked at them, shaking his head. “You two have had quite a time of it, haven’t you? Disappearing corpses, flying trees, an original Nazi. “Okay,” he said, making up his mind, “I’m with you. When do we leave?”

  “Now,” said Jim. “Trouble may not be far behind us.”

  “Now? Like right now?”

  “Like right now,” said Jim.

  O’Malley was upset. “But there’s this project I’m working on that I’ve got to get out...”

  He held up a hand as the other two both started speaking, “Fine. But I do have to at least email my client some preliminary work before we go. He needs these yesterday and he’s always been straight with me.”

  “Sure,” said Jim reluctantly. “How long will it take?”

  “Oh, maybe ten, fifteen minutes, then another ten to throw some clothes together. And change my clothes,” he added ruefully, glancing down at his pants.

  “Get to it.”

  “‘Not one of us,’” said Jim, walking to a window, looking out on the street. “So, why do you trust me, Milano?”

  “Because you’re an idiot,” she said sullenly as she collected the coffee cups and put them on the tray.

  His cellphone rang. It was Tooky. “Verizon van, big one. This is its third time around the block in that many minutes. Oh oh. He’s pulling up behind me.”

  “I see it,” said Jim, looking out the window at the man who stepped out of the driver’s side, wearing a phone company coverall and hardhat. His right hand was in his pocket. “Tooky! Get out of here! Now!”

  Tooky pulled away from the curb, accelerating down the street and disappearing around the corner. The man in the telephone company outfit gave a shrug then turned back toward the van, giving Jim a clear view of his face.

  “It’s Phil Martin.”

  “Who?” asked Angie, stepping to the window.

  “Former DST agent – French Intelligence. Had some issues back in the Old Country. Went rouge and now works for the highest bidder. Phil’s cautious—rarely goes on an operation without an army. Probably killed Bill Enders.

  “He was one of the thugs in New Orleans,” said Angie.

  “O’Malley!” Jim called. “Get down here! Now!”

  Upstairs, Bill O’Malley finished addressing his email. “Minute!” he called. Attaching a file named “Ft_Strong,” he sent the email to Johnny Kim.

  “Bad guys are here!” added Jim.

  That brought O’Malley running down the stairs, eyes wide with alarm.

  “Where?”

  “Four more just got out of the van,” called Angie.

  “You two go out through back, now,” ordered Jim. He tossed her his cellphone. “Have Tooky pick you up on the next parallel street behind the house. Hurry!”

  “Go on!” he said as Angie looked uncertain. “O’Malley needs you. And we can’t let Schmidla get you.”

  “What about the police?” asked O’Malley, his voice quivering.

  “Show Angie the fastest way out, Tim. I’ll amuse them for a few minutes.

  Hey sailor!” he called. Angie turned at the kitchen door. “Where’s your gun?”

  Taking her Beretta from her jacket pocket, she held it up, clicked off the safety and chambered a round, holding his eyes as she did so.

  “Shoot first,” he said, “and keep moving.”

  “Aye aye, sir,” she said and was gone.

  Drawing his .45, Jim flicked off the safety and stepped to the front window. Two of Philip’s men had just turned from the sidewalk, heading across the lawn toward the rear of the house, silencers screwed into the muzzles of their Glocks. Philip and two others were some distance up the street, hurrying toward the house.

  Stepping to a side window Jim fired at the first yellow safety helmet he saw, sending two rounds crashing through the glass. The big copper jacketed bullets tumbled into the man’s skull, tearing through the soft gray brain tissue. He crumbled to the ground, leaving some of his blood and much of his brain spattered along the grass.

  Jim ran across the parlor into the hallway. Throwing open the front door, he stepped onto the veranda, firing two-handed at Philip and his men as they scattered for cover. Their return fire splintered the veranda rail, plowing into the clapboards, silent except for the faint plop of the pistols and sound of splintering wood. Jim snapped off a shot at one man was working his way up the street toward the van, but the answering fire spoiled his aim and the guy made it, disappearing behind the van.

  Jim tipped over the veranda picnic table with his free hand. Dropping down behind it he ejected his empty magazine as 9mm rounds slammed into the solid redwood planks, an irregular series of overlapping kaachunks.

  Snapping a fresh magazine home, Jim peered over table just as the guy who’d disappeared behind the van reappeared and threw a hand grenade. It rolled along the brick sidewalk, coming to rest almost directly beneath the gate.

  The blast blew the sidewalk gate off its hinges, sending it and a gargoyle spinning into the flowerbeds below the veranda.

  Philip waved his remaining men forward. “Now!” he shouted, firing from behind a big elm.

  They came from behind the parked vehicles, charging past the shattered gate and up the walk, firing. Rising, Jim dropped the lead man with a shot to the chest. As Iceman stepped out from behind a parked car and began running toward the gate, Jim rushed toward the other two, firing. Maybe it was the shock of having their target come after them, or maybe they were just bad shots, but at fifteen paces, they missed and Jim didn’t, sending them down. He felt in his pocket for another magazine. There wasn’t one.

  “Well shit, good buddy,” smiled Iceman, stepping up the walk, pistol leveled. “You’re fucked.”

  Jim looked down the small black hole of Ice
man’s silencer and time stopped. . Forgive me, Emmy, he thought as Iceman cocked the hammer.

  The pistol flew from Iceman’s hand, spinning over the fence to land clattering on the pavement. His startled look gave way to one of pure terror as he followed his weapon, lifted high over the fence, limbs and arms flailing. He started screaming—screaming that rose to a terrified shrieking as the invisible force holding him positioned him with cool precision over the fence, carefully parted his legs and slammed him down, impaling him astride an iron picket.

  It wasn’t the killing, or even the manner of it that sickened Jim, but its calculated, detached deliberateness. He watched as Iceman, castrated, shrieking now in a wavering falsetto, was slowly forced down on the sturdy metal picket, carefully spitted like a prize pig, blood gouting in great choking spurts from his mouth. Only when the point pierced his heart did he stop screaming. And only when it emerged flecked with gore from the top of his skull did the downward pressure on his body cease. Iceman’s body hung there, limbs twitching as a mix of blood, urine and feces oozed down the fence, pooling along the white concrete of the sidewalk.

  Jim vomited into the flowerbed.

  Unnoticed and trembling, Phil Martin slinked away, Iceman’s death and the power behind it indelibly set in his memory. The image of it would haunt him the rest of his life.

  “Come on, Jimbo,” said a familiar voice. “This is no time for a break.”

  He looked up. Angie stood there, gun in hand, a quizzical look on her face. “You okay?”

  “My God!” he managed, straightening up. “Did you do that?”

  “Did you want to die?” she countered. The wail of police sirens drew near.

  “Did you do that?” he repeated, pointing with shaking hand at what hung on the fence.

  “It’s nothing I have any control over,” she said, looking without expression at the corpse. “It’s subconscious. He killed Paul Laval—I saw it in his mind. Killed him and wallowed in it. What a sicko.”

  “It’s your id,” he said. “Your id did that. Someone murdered your friend, threatened your mate and you skewered him like a capon.”