Flight of the Scarlet Tanager

by Bevill, C. L.

  There was a small voice from beside him. “I stayed up here for two days,” she said, tiny and restricted. “Until they would have stopped looking for me locally. After all, who would be hiding in the attic in the middle of summer?”

  Fitch picked up a photograph with his index finger and thumb. It was her at perhaps ten or eleven years. A tiny girl, all legs and arms, with a gamine smile, and not even a hint of the darkness that would follow. Behind her were her parents. All three were smiling, sitting in another pirogue in the bayou. He looked at it a long time and then he put it into the back pocket of his jeans, hoping that it wouldn’t get bent. Teddy was brushing her jeans off with stinging hands and did not see.

  Taking the flashlight out of his hands, and keeping to a constrained crawl, she gingerly traversed the entire length of the attic. Following her, Fitch was diligent to keep his feet to the studs, placing himself squarely on each. Long, dusty minutes later he found himself braced next to her as the roof started to angle back down, one hand on an angled roof support, the other holding himself steady on a stud. With one hand she moved aside a length of insulation and Fitch discovered that she had carefully cut the ceiling in such a way that she could lift the piece straight up. She had reinforced the edges of the piece of ceiling with bits of clothing, so that it wouldn’t fall apart. It seemed like some kind of paper-mache project constructed in a POW camp, and Fitch winced with the mental comparison. She clicked the flashlight off.

  He could hear the sounds of her impromptu door being lifted out and then placed aside. Tentatively, she made herself move through the pit of darkness. She was lowering herself down and he couldn’t see anything at all. There were only the sound of Teddy’s motions to let him know what was happening. The attic was as dark as the deepest night, with nothing to refract any kind of light. Fitch leaned forward and looked downward, but all he saw was nothingness.

  From the sounds he guessed Teddy was clambering down the shelves on one side of the walk-in closet, he guessed. She made her way to the bottom, her feet settling on a wood-paneled floor, and then there was more silence. There was a chill inside him as he listened, cocking his head to the side to hear as well as he could. She would open the door, and what would she find in her old rooms? The blonde-haired man waiting for her, the man who murdered in cold blood, without emotion, without any kind of conscience, or would it be her uncle, who had been prevented from the monies he so desperately desired?

  There was silence. Fitch tilted his head even more, listening, tried to understand what she was doing. There was the click of the closet door as it opened and fear surged over him. They had changed the systems. They knew that she might return. They knew and they were waiting.

  But there was no one in the bedroom. Teddy opened the door just a crack and looked into her old room, her eyes seeking out every nuance, attempting to understand if changes had been made. She stared for a long time, her silhouette barely seen below Fitch, and then she shut the door again. The flashlight clicked on, and she said, “It looks clear, Fitch.”

  Fitch looked down and saw the man before Teddy did. He’d been standing on the interior wall of the closet, waiting for them. He had stood in the blackness of the little room, listening as the pair fumbled their way across the structure of the attic, and then as Teddy made her way down into her old stomping grounds, checking the area to see if it were safe for them. It was the blonde-haired man. Tall, impressive, handsome, and coldly evil, he expected them to enter the house. Another Glock was held capably in his hand, pointed directly at Teddy.

  Teddy fell back against the closet door and she made an incoherent noise, the flashlight fell to the floor but the other man could still clearly be seen.

  Fitch even jumped back from the edge, saying, “Jesus Christ!.”

  “Not hardly,” answered John Gower. And he smiled hugely. “Just me.”

  There was a loud crack and the ceiling split as Fitch crashed through the Sheetrock ceiling, in his startled state, having put his entire weight on the thin, unsupported material.

  •

  There didn’t seem to be a lot to share between the two men. John Henry and Bishop analyzed the old Chevy truck like the military men they were. John Henry had driven the pair, followed by two green Army sedans, to the edge of Twilight Bayou to see the vehicle.

  One of the sheriff’s deputies protested, “But I done sent Fred Chavez out to impound it.”

  John Henry replied, “Fred will take two days. Bring a crime kit, and meet us out there.”

  Bishop stared at John Henry. “There isn’t a lot of time here, sheriff. We need to get to the Howe residence, before...”

  John Henry had interrupted coldly, “You’re saying your son and Miss Howe stole the plane, or hijacked to Louisiana, and then stole this man’s truck. You think they wiped their prints off it? You want proof that your son is in the Howe mansion? I’ll bet you a dollar to a donut that you’ve got a copy of Fitch’s fingerprints. Maybe you’ve even got a copy of Miss Howe’s.”

  Bishop had capitulated and agreed that perhaps that kind of proof would get them into the mansion much quicker. But on the inside he was seething with anxiety. If he knew when his son had shown up then he might have been able to calculate an arrival to the mansion. But the man he had counted on to call him, had not, had not followed through with the impromptu plan that had been ill conceived, and the general was frankly frightened.

  The deputy, a man named Elvis Brandt, who liked to talk about famous artists that he was investing in, spent only a little time getting several good sets of prints from the vehicle. He expertly brushed dust over the likeliest area and grunted with pleasure as he hit the jackpot. He used a special tape to transfer the prints to white cards. “This one could be Homer Chenier’s or maybe the young fella’s.” His eyes flickered up as he did a quick comparison using a magnifying glass and the compares that Bishop had provided and he added, “Now mind you, this ain’t exactly the thing that’s going to get O.J. Simpson off the chopping block.”

  John Henry sighed. “Just tell us, Brandt.”

  “It’s the kid’s. Got a bunch on the passenger side that looks like a smaller hand’s. Prolly a female’s prints. If you’ll give me a minute...” his voice trailed off as he watched John Henry, Bishop, and several Army men rush to their respective vehicles and climb in. After a moment he was alone, holding several fingerprint cards in one hand and a magnifying glass in the other.

  “Well, shit,” Brandt said.

  In John Henry’s Bronco, an eighties era vehicle with a powerful engine under the hood that would outrun and catch most typical speeders on the road, he was driving toward the Howe mansion, saying, “The mansion is only a few miles away from here. Through the bayou. I’m betting that if I talked to the proprietor of the grocery store back there we’d find out that they got a pirogue from him, he rents ‘em out to tourists, and went the back way through the bayou.”

  “So let’s talk to the proprietor,” said Bishop.

  “It’s closed, General Lee, in case you didn’t notice, and I know that Mr. Scott ambles his way up to Shreveport most weeknights. So we’re making a quantum leap here. That sound like something young Master Lee would do?”

  Bishop snorted. “Of course, it does. And yes, he’s smart enough to take the back way into the residence if they’re planning on breaking in to retrieve something.”

  “And what, exactly, are they trying to retrieve?” asked John Henry irritably.

  “If I knew that, then I would be putting another star on my uniform,” snapped Bishop. “Why else would they go back there? To have a friendly chat with the man who probably killed her parents, and tried to kill her to boot?”

  They pulled up to the gate and John Henry turned to Bishop. “I’m going to send my boy, Elvis, with the fingerprints, to get a warrant. I know a judge who goes to a bar about this time every night, and he loves to sign warrants after he’s gotten crocked. But it might take the deputy a little while to find which bar the judge has
wandered into, so you rein your horses and get a handle on your emotions. We’re doing everything we can and if your boy is in there, chances are we’re going to get him out.” He hesitated. “Then he’s going to have do some hefty explaining about his newly acquired habit of stealing things. But and here’s the big but, sir, don’t run off half-cocked, or I’ll hogtie you to the back of this vehicle.” And his voice became serious, “And just because you’re a three-star general, don’t think I won’t do it.”

  Bishop raged silently. He said, at last, “All right, have it your way, sheriff. But if he’s dead, and I could have done something to prevent that event, but was precluded by you, you should be warned. There will be repercussions.”

  John Henry nodded grimly. He rolled down his window and pressed the electronic keypad button, calling the main house. There was a slow buzzing, and he looked up to see that the camera had rotated around to observe who was in the vehicle. A tinny voice finally said, “Yes?”

  “This is Sheriff John Henry Roque,” he announced. “I need to speak with Deputy Director Theron. It’s a matter of some urgency.”

  “One moment,” replied the faint voice, betraying nothing in its answer. John Henry glanced at Bishop as he moved uncomfortably around in the passenger seat.

  Both men alternated looking at the camera above them and at the twisting driveway beyond the large, solid, cast-iron gate. They couldn’t see the Howe mansion from their position and they were both filled with a certain amount of anxiety. John Henry could feel the waves of tension rolling off the other man and it impacted him as well. Something is wrong here, something terrible. I can feel it down in my gut. And God knows I hate having that feeling.

  •

  Gower watched as Fitch collapsed through the ceiling and then another man entered the closet, turning the light on and grasping Teddy’s upper arm so hard that it would leave bruises. She recognized him as one of her uncle’s employees, Lapeaux, one of the men who had been paid to watch her, and who had failed. He lightly slapped her face and admonished her in his heavy Cajun accent, “So the little chere returns. Silly little mamselle. She has no friends in this place, non? We’ve added a few new security features, ma p’tite. Sensors all along the back edge of the bayou. M’su Theron was most curious about his two p’tite lapins. How they leap and jump.”

  Gower took her arm out of Lapeaux’s hand, and motioned at an unconscious Fitch. “Take him downstairs.” Then he smiled down at Teddy, and said, “And you’ll come with me.”

  Teddy dove for the flashlight, intent on using the heavy instrument to batter his twisted, amused face, but the tall, blonde-haired man hauled her up against his body with frightening ease, brushing her flailing limbs away as if they were made of cotton-candy. She jerked in his inexorable grip, fighting against him, and he was as solid as a granite statue. Within moments she was panting and hanging helplessly in his steely grasp, knowing that she couldn’t fight him this way. “Calm down, Theodora,” he told her implacably. “There’s no reason to get hurt...now.”

  She found herself in the library. Her father’s library, with rows of books dealing with birds, and his impeccable desk against one wall, a nineteenth century bookkeeper’s desk who had worked for the King of Spain. The desk was situated so that he could use his binoculars to peer out the window when he needed a break from business, and observe the wild birds he had found so enthralling. Ornamental, antique birdcages lined the top of the library’s bookshelves. Several oversized versions hung from the ceilings, some large enough to enclose a human being. They were gold, gilt cages that her father had never enclosed an animal within. All the instruments of his hobby lay as they had been placed years before; Theron had no use for the mansion, and left things alone.

  Teddy could smell the distinct aroma of leather and cigars, and it was almost as if she had returned to the home before her parents’ deaths. She wanted to reach out and touch the items that had only existed in her sparse, fragmented memories of them, but the large FBI agent, his hold unbreakable, held her.

  Gower pushed her into a leather sofa, not ten feet away from her father’s desk and told her not to move. Minutes later, Lapeaux and another man carried in Fitch, and dumped him unceremoniously at her feet. Teddy didn’t move at all. She was afraid for herself, but she was more afraid for Fitch. She knew that if she showed him any kind of regard that it would be used against her, but in particular it would be used to hurt Fitch.

  With an abject expression on her face, Teddy watched Fitch come back to consciousness. A little thread of blood wound its way from somewhere above his right ear, past his cheek and dripped off his lower lip. His limbs jerked spastically and then his eyes blinked. He shook his head once and raised it up off the floor. She saw comprehension dawn there and she shook her head shortly, a quick movement that told him that they weren’t safe. But it’s worse than that, she thought. It’s so much worse.

  Fitch slowly regained consciousness and brought himself to a sitting position with his head cradled in his hands. His gaze fastened on Teddy as she sat as still as an ancient megalith. There was a look on his face that bothered her but she was so frightened by the reversed circumstances that she didn’t take a moment to try and understand what was causing it.

  When Jackson Theron and Robert Wren walked into the library, Teddy and Fitch automatically glanced in the direction of the oversized oak doors that opened with a great rattle. Teddy blinked in confusion. Then, she understood and the pain that billowed through her was unbearable.

  Teddy made a strangled noise and tried to sink into the couch. She looked at F-Bob with his serious face, and then looked at Fitch, who wasn’t looking at Bob anymore, but at her with sorrow in his strangely colored eyes, and she knew that she had been used again.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  August 18th

  An excerpt from Routen’s Birds of North America, edited by Houston Routen, Cacky Press, 1992, pg. 78: The Turkey Vulture, Cathartes aura, is one of North America’s largest birds of prey. Reaching a length of almost three feet, with a wingspan of six, its overall color is brown, exhibiting two-toned blackish wings. Ranging over most of the United States, it resides year round in parts of the south. It possesses a distinctive featherless red head, a white bill, and yellow feet. A generally silent animal, this bird will emit a soft hiss upon occasion. An interesting characteristic about the Turkey Vulture is its amazing olfactory sense; the vulture is apparently able to find its prey by odor, whereas most other birds are thought to have a poor sense of smell. These fascinating birds are well known for their pattern of feeding off dead animal carcasses, but are also known to attack young and frail animals as well, using the most of any opportunity given to it...

  Theron chuckled at Teddy’s bleak demeanor. He soundly patted F-Bob on his back as they stood together. Theron chuckled again when he observed Fitch sitting on the floor with one hand on his head and his eyes firmly fixed on Teddy. Theron said, “My goodness, if it isn’t my long, lost niece. Gracious me. I haven’t seen you in, well, years, my dear. But let me say that rescuing the little boy from drowning, well, that was a heroic act.” He signaled behind him and Lapeaux closed the large oak doors of the library. The sound echoed through the large chamber, the last vestige of freedom springing away. “A pure act of selfless gallantry, worthy of your father. He would have been proud.”

  Teddy attempted to squelch the churning fury and sense of betrayal she felt. Upon seeing F-Bob with her uncle, his face calm, she lost most of her ability to control her raging thoughts. Bob stood there with some silly T-shirt from the sixties that proclaimed, ‘Ban the Bra!’ and looked discerningly at Fitch. Then Fitch looked at her, his eyes locking on her features, unable to look away. And she couldn’t help the turbulently bitter anger that boiled through her body.

  Teddy directed her eyes to another part of the room before she threw herself at the young man and throttled him on the floor. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid, she stormed mutely. If you think Uncle is going to give you a cash re
ward and send you on your way, you’re as stupid as a box of rocks. Big, dumb, idiotic, stupid rocks the size of icebergs. She would have stared the message at Fitch, but she thought it was too late. And there was another question there, Why would Fitch do it? His family has money. Lots of money. Not as much as I do, but a lot, all the same.

  Trust was now absent, and it was Fitch who must have called F-Bob. Perhaps at the airport in Texas, perhaps at the airport they’d stopped at when Teddy had been deep asleep. One way or another, he’d contacted Bob, and Bob had contacted Theron. She could hear the words: ‘Your niece is going to be at a certain spot. I believe you have a reward. Gimme.’

  Staring at her father’s desk, looking at gold-plated binoculars sitting beside one of Thomas Howe’s favorite bird books, she writhed internally. Idiots, the both of them. Jack is lower than a snake’s belly in a rut in a canyon. Teddy took a deep breath and returned her virulent gaze upon her uncle. “I had to make a choice,” she said calmly, more calmly than she felt. “You understand about choices, Uncle Jack?”

  Her uncle stared at her for a moment. “I like your hair, my dear. Scarlet red. Perhaps a little hidden humor, the scarlet tanager? Or just an unconscious action on your part. I don’t think that we would have ever caught up to you, if you’d kept your silly little face off CNN.” He waved absently at Gower. “Good old John there was pulling his hair out by the roots. A month behind you. Sometimes three months behind you. I was running out of excuses of why he had to be in the places that you had been in.” Theron sighed. “The director, he doesn’t understand the need to eliminate the only living thing standing between myself and billions of dollars.”