The Tangled Webb

by D. P. Schroeder

  Nicolas gave him a pat on the shoulder. “Good luck.”

  He crossed the street and walked into the Baribus Private Bank, affecting a casual air as he stepped over to a security guard who sat behind an information kiosk. He presented his credentials to the guard who made a phone call to the security company. The call was rerouted and answered by a geek—an accomplice of Andre. Satisfied the company had dispatched a maintenance technician to the bank, the guard motioned toward the elevators. Andre took slow, deep breaths and rode the lift down two floors to a secured area where he was met by another guard, this one giving him clearance to enter a room that contained the bank’s surveillance equipment. A Frenchman sat over by a wall of monitors, and he turned and greeted Andre who gave a polite response.

  Andre went to the other side of the room and stood before a bank of database servers. A moment or two later, the Frenchman who was looking at the monitors turned and faced him.

  “Have you seen Gustave lately?”

  Beads of sweat pooled on Andre’s forehead. He suddenly felt grateful; last night, Nicholas had suggested that Andre memorize the security company’s employee records, past and present.

  Andre didn’t look over, and kept his eyes on his laptop.

  “Not since he died last year.”

  The Frenchman nodded, swiveling his chair around and back to the monitors. The threat deflected, Andre began copying the files to his hard drive.

  Ten minutes later, he came out of the building and jumped in the car beside Nicolas.

  “How’d it go?”

  Andre was visibly shaken, saying, “Drive! Please, just drive.”

  Nicolas pulled from the curb and drove away. When Andre’s nerves calmed down, he booted his laptop, sending an email with video footage to Kate. She opened the files, importing them into a software program she had written last night in a sleepless stupor. Videos were extracted that corresponded to the dates and times when the mystery man had made his withdrawals at the bank.

  The time in Georgetown was nearing five o’clock in the morning, and somehow James had been able to get some desperately needed sleep. Hearing the email tone on Kate’s laptop, they both sat up and got in front of her laptop. Looking at the email attachments, they saw images of a man on the screen. He appeared to be in his seventies.

  James put on a pot of coffee before rejoining Kate on the sofa.

  “This is the best it’s going to get,” she said. “I sorted through the footage, made the conversion into photographs and enhanced the ones with the best camera angles.”

  A second attachment had footage of the man walking by two surveillance cameras. Looking at the videos, both of them noticed a slight limp in his stride.

  “I’d say he’s in his mid-seventies, give or take,” James said.

  She played the videos again.

  “That seems about right.”

  James detected a presumption in the man’s carriage: it was unmistakable, like someone who had at one time held a position of high authority. Kate opened the file with the photos and brought up the clearest one, which filled the whole screen. They studied him; about six feet tall, white, a slender but robust physique for a man of this age, and his eyes—they suggested an alert mind.

  James got two cups of coffee from the kitchen, put them on the table and leaned over Kate’s shoulder to inspect the photo again.

  “So, this is the next piece of the puzzle.”

  “What now?”

  “The rest we’ll have to get from Specter.” As he turned to Kate, he saw a look of concern. “What?”

  “Back to New York?”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  “Come on, James. Alec Specter’s life has been turned inside out in the past twenty-four hours. All the probing and investigating, he’s bound to know something’s up.”

  Judging by the look on his face, he didn’t like the idea either.

  “We have to stop the flow of money to the assassins, and find this guy before he kills us. Specter’s the only way to track him down,” he said, pointing to the man on the laptop.

  Kate grimaced.

  It’s moments like this that make me queasy. I know he’s right, but his compulsive attraction to danger is unsettling. I fell in love with a risk junkie.

  CHAPTER 19

  James and Kate rode the fast train to Manhattan as their laptops and secure phones buzzed with activity, and farms in Maryland and the Chesapeake Bay rolled past the window. After the meals were served, James went over the game plan once more.

  As they hopped from the train at Penn Station, Kate observed the mass of humanity on the station platform.

  This place is a zoo!

  The cab driver weaved through the city’s mid-day traffic, covered twenty blocks and dropping the couple at the corner of Park Avenue and East 54th Street. Looking up, a gleaming- bronze office tower soared into a clear blue sky. On two of the uppermost floors were the offices of the notorious law firm.

  Wolfe & Hunt

  This must be where all the stealing is done, thought Kate. Noticing a café down the street, they entered the eatery, slid into a booth in the back and set their backpacks full of gear on the floor. A waitress appeared, jotted requests for sandwiches and drinks on a pad, then turned her attention to other duties. After finishing the meal and leaving the café, they moved through the city, purchasing supplies and provisions for the operation.

  Two hours later Kate received a call from one of the more aggressive private investigators with whom they were working. He went on to tell her about how he had planted an electronic listening device the night before—directly under the nose of Specter’s personal assistant. The P.I. told her of the assistant making a dinner reservation at seven o’clock this evening for Specter and an unknown companion. The reservation was placed at a restaurant inside the Waldorf Astoria hotel on Park Avenue.

  “Excellent,” Kate told the investigator.

  She passed the information on to James. In two hours, the prey would enter the trap. Or was it they who would be entering a trap?

  In his profession, one never knew.

  A solid hour was spent conducting a thorough survey of the hotel and its surrounding environs. When the six o’clock hour arrived, they stood on the sidewalk on Park Avenue, forty yards from the hotel entrance.

  Fifteen minutes later a black stretch Town Car rolled by their position, came to a stop and a valet opened the rear door. Alec Specter emerged, replete with a woman on his arm, and she was not his wife. Attended by three hulking bodyguards, they slipped beneath an awning and disappeared inside.

  For a moment, they paused to review their disguises: classy outfits, easy-to-apply latex facial masks and hairpieces.

  James fidgeted with his tie. Kate looked at him, sensing a misplaced agitation. For his part, wearing the fancy clothes dredged up a painful memory he had been unable to shake. In his pre-teen years, his mother had given him a beautiful suit coat and trousers, hand-me-downs, provided by a generous neighbor. She sent him on his way to church. Strolling along in his spiffy clothes, he reached a halfway point when a pair of neighborhood bullies—three years older—interrupted his peaceful morning walk. They provoked him and one of the boys knocked the younger James to the ground and ridiculed him.

  “What’s with the dandy outfit?”

  Reacting to an impulse to fight, James got to his feet, threw a punch and connected. In a flash, the bullies were on him. They hammered away with their fists and beat him to the ground where the punches turned to kicks to his stomach, ribs, face.

  “What’s the matter? Can’t fight?”

  They kicked and taunted him. Then they backed away. He laid on the sidewalk, beaten and bloodied, his fine clothes ruined. The incident happened at a time prior to James developing his physique, and later the United States government molding him into a lethal weapon. But the deep-seated emotions remained.

  As the couple started along the sidewalk in the direction of the hotel entrance, the memory ate
away at James and his composure.

  Kicking … Taunting … Kicking … Taunting …

  Unknown to James and Kate, a man stood near a window on the third floor of an office building across the street from the hotel: his dark, empty eyes followed the pair. As they went inside, the man spoke into a mobile phone.

  “The Webbs are here,” announced Boris.

  “Are you certain?” replied the Deacon.

  “They’re in disguise. But yes. It’s them.”

  “I suspected as much. Have they entered?”

  “Moments ago.”

  “Send a backup team. Immediately.”

  “Yes, Deacon.”

  James and Kate found the entourage in a lounge near the lobby. Blending into a crowd of power suits and dealmakers, Kate lingered near the lounge tables where Specter and his young companion were seated. James had made his way to the bar, and the bodyguards. As he drew closer, something in his face made Kate feel uneasy.

  The three bodyguards, or assassins, stood in a tight formation around an alluring single woman: she had a hip against the bar, the other jutting out to display the merchandise. James brushed passed one of the brutes—something of a giant, really—on his way into the circle. His elbow connected with the man’s side in a sharp motion, which interrupted a conversation the giant was having with the woman.

  “Why is a pretty lady like yourself talking to this band of cave dwellers?”

  All three of the beasts stood taller than James, his somewhat loose-fitting outfit creating the mistaken impression of someone who was weak.

  This was their first mistake.

  “Hey,” the giant barked, then tapped James on the shoulder. “I was talking to her. Take a hike.”

  James had his back against the bar. One of the men stood directly in front of him, the other two on each of his flanks. Judging the relative threat posed by each of the men, he decided the giant presented the greatest danger: his eyes frightening, he was six-foot-six and weighed 275—easily. James spewed a barrage of choice expletives to the guy in front of him. The man lunged forward, grabbed James by the lapels of his suit, and forced his upper body backward, then held him there.

  Kicking … Taunting … Kicking … Taunting …

  James began to laugh.

  This guy’s crazy.

  This had been their second mistake.

  In a swift, precise motion, James tilted back his head, then reversed direction in a forward thrust, slamming the top of his head into his tormentor’s skull. The thunderous collision sent the guy reeling backward.

  Patrons in the bar turned to see James as his fist crashed into the giant’s throat, which immobilized him. In a split-second, James made a chopping maneuver with his heel: a crack rippled in the air as the leg of the man to his left snapped at the knee.

  All eyes were frozen on James as his fist rocketed upward in a piston-like action, the massive torque of the merciless uppercut shattering the giant’s jawbone. In a thud, he collapsed to the floor.

  Shrieks of agony filtered through the lounge from the guy with the broken leg, the screams quickly silenced as James spun, delivered a vicious chop to the side of his neck.

  In five seconds, it was over.

  Three men lay on the floor—unconscious. No one moved. A silence hung in the air.

  Kate raised a finger in the air.

  “Check please.”

  James grabbed Specter before he could bolt and pulled him by the arm toward the lobby.

  Kate shot the bartender a look.

  “Sorry!”

  She turned and moved ten paces behind James and Specter.

  Someone in the bar shouted out. “Call security.”

  They moved quickly through the lobby, disappeared into a stairway leading to the kitchen.

  “Who the hell are you?” Specter snapped.

  “Remember the Merritt Parkway?”

  A chill ran up the lawyer’s spine. James tugged him toward a stairwell fifty yards away and they descended into the underground parking garage. Here they advanced toward the door to an obscure freight elevator.

  They rode the elevator down to an abandoned railway platform in the hotel basement. Taking out a flashlight, James guided them along the platform, coming eventually to a spot four hundred yards off. James set his pack down, wrapped Specter’s arms around a support beam and handcuffed his wrists.

  “Keep your damn mouth shut,” he said.

  “What do you intend to do with me?”

  His face told the story. I’m a dead man.

  Disgusted by Specter, Kate pulled out a roll of duct tape, bent down and put a piece across his mouth. James then led her away and they covered enough distance to allow for a private conversation.

  He rested his head on Kate’s shoulder—like a lost boy. She ran her fingers through his hair. “You need to express yourself when you’re angry.”

  He managed a chuckle.

  Kate knew about the childhood bullies—and the beating. Her empathy and compassion were a comfort for him.

  “Are you okay?”

  He looked away, feeling self-conscious.

  Kate shrugged it off. “You solved a problem.”

  “What?”

  They both turned and looked down the railway tracks. In the distance, the faint light of a lantern revealed Alec Specter.

  James turned back to her. “You’re right. We’ve got him.”

  Walking back to the encampment, a flashlight beam danced along the railway tracks.

  James ripped the duct tape from Specter’s mouth.

  “Who are you working for?”

  “Anything I say will be of no use to you. This is bigger than you can possibly imagine. You’re in above your heads.”

  “I’ll decide that,” James snapped.

  “Killing me will get you nowhere.”

  James grinned. “Death would be too easy. We have other plans.”

  He replaced the duct tape and they settled in on blankets for the night. Kate looked at Alec Specter.

  My brother is lying comatose in a hospital bed. No thanks to this scumbag.

  James set his watch alarm for 3:00 A.M. and glanced at Specter.

  “Get some sleep. Tomorrow is the big show.”

  The electric lantern switched off, they plunged into a pitch-black tomb. Specter’s mind began to race wildly.

  What had Webb meant?

  The big show?

  CHAPTER 20

  They woke in the morning after the alarm went off, still inside the abandoned rail yard. James walked over to Alec Specter. It was obvious from his haggard appearance and bloodshot eyes that he hadn’t slept all night.

  “Last chance, Specter,” James told him. “We’re going to leave you here to die if you don’t tell us who you’re working for.”

  A silence.

  “I . . . I’ve never actually met him. All I know is a voice on the telephone,” he managed to say. “And the voice was altered somehow.”

  James paused.

  “What about the guy in Paris? You know, the bag man at Baribus Bank?”

  “He was in the intelligence game at one time.”

  Kate looked over at James and they shared a look.

  “Does he have an accent?” James asked.

  “British, and he likes to gamble.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “While talking with him on the phone, I heard voices in the background. He would say things like ‘card please’ as though he was in a casino.”

  “Keep talking.”

  “I met him at a party once.”

  “When?”

  “About ten years ago, I guess.”

  “Go on.”

  “He’s sort of a mystical figure in the British Secret Intelligence. He was running all kinds of covert operations. The man was practically a legend.”

  “Was?”

  “The Brits gave him the boot, sometime after we met.”

  “What for?”

  “He’s
a gambler, an addict. Kept losing his shirt at the tables. He began to cover his losses through mercenary work. The English found out about it, cut him loose. The guy’s immune from prosecution, anyway. He probably knows enough to bury the Queen.”

  “What’s his name?”

  A silence.

  “The name, damn it!”

  Specter took a deep breath.

  “Okay… okay. Baer.”

  “Baer?”

  “Right, Max Baer. At least that was his name at one time.”

  “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

  “He’s been operating in the shadows for the better part of his life. You don’t find him, he finds you. He’s a ghost.”

  “Anything else?”

  “No! Damn it,” Specter shouted. “Now set me free.”

  It was obvious that Alec Specter, together with his law firm, Wolfe & Hunt, had been pawns in something larger.

  Clearly, they had been manipulated—by someone.

  Someone very powerful.

  As for Alec Specter, the trail ended here.

  James unlocked his handcuffs and gave him a shove along the railway tracks.

  “Move it,” he told him.

  The look in his eyes said it all.

  I’m going to die in this crummy, stinking rail yard.

  Coming near a set of rusted out metal stairs, they ascended to street level and walked out into a narrow alley between two buildings.

  “Hold it right there, Specter,” James said, a 9mm in his hand.

  James took his laptop from a backpack and booted it up.

  He sent an e-mail blast to the major media outlets.

  It was basically an “information dump”.

  He had uploaded to the Internet an enormous cache of evidence which they had taken off the servers at Wolfe & Hunt.

  Zip!

  And just like that, the law firm’s dirty laundry went viral.

  It was a public airing of mind-boggling corruption.

  They let Specter know what was happening, and Kate could see him growing sicker by the moment.

  Not long afterward, a spokesperson representing Wolfe & Hunt walked out of an elevator and into the lobby of the firm’s headquarters on Park Avenue.

  A crowd of reporters had already gathered around.