I nodded and made a note.
“Was your fath—sorry—grandfather named Albert Henry Murchison?”
“Umm, I think so. I just always called him Granddad, you know?”
“Sure, and your father, also named Albert, correct? So I guess that makes you Al Junior, yes?” I grinned disarmingly, I hoped.
“That would be my uncle. He’s Albert, son of my grandfather and brother to my father, of course. My name, however, is Clem Albert Murchison. It does get confusing for some folks, I guess. The name goes back on my father’s side for many generations.”
Clem. “Would that be short for Clemenceau? I just want to be correct here. I hope I’m not prying.” Was I being too obsequious?
“That’s correct. I’m surprised. Few people make the connection. My mother’s family is French and I guess there’s a family connection.”
“Well, your grandfather was in the army during World War Two and he was in the signal corps, and if my information is correct, he spent most of his active duty in the European Theater.” I paused for a reaction. Murchison just looked at me. He didn’t nod, or frown or anything. So I barreled on.
“Can you recall what unit he was attached to? Was it the U.S. Eighth Army Group?”
Again, a small error. It could take some digging but most servicemen’s duty assignments, right down to the squad, if they were infantry, can be traced. The name of the unit I gave was wrong. It wasn’t in Europe until after the surrender of all German forces. I hoped Murchison would correct me and save me the trouble of a long search. It would have been better talking to the old man, this one’s grandfather, but sometimes you take what you can get.
“These are details I’m not really up on, Mr. Sean, but I think he was part of a signal corps unit that landed in Europe well after D-Day and he worked in northern France and, I think, Belgium. For quite a while. Always in liberated territory, you see, after the Germans had been pushed out.”
“Some time in 1944 he was transferred with a small unit to Poland, is that not correct?”
Murchison frowned as if my question might have made him a wee bit uncomfortable. It should, if he knew his granddad’s entire history in the late stages of the war in that theater.
“Yes, that’s correct. But he was only there a short while before Berlin fell and the war was over. Then Russian units replaced his and he came home. He was discharged soon after.”
“Was he stationed near Lodz, do you remember?”
Deeper frown. “I really can’t recall. But I don’t think—oh, wait, in fact, Granddad was stationed for a few weeks in a small town outside of Warsaw. Northwest of the city, I think. I’m afraid I can’t tell you the exact name.” Right. We sparred about a few more bits of information and I never asked him about how his grandfather had suddenly come up with the money to buy a share in the manufacturing operations I could faintly hear going on behind the walls that surrounded us.
Finally, about the time I was running out of seriously useful questions, Murchison glanced at his watch and said, “I’m afraid I have some pressing business, Mr. Sean, so we’ll have to end this meeting. However, if you have additional questions, be sure to contact us again. In fact, I’ll pass along your card to my father. He might have more useful knowledge for you than I do.” He smiled, we stood and shook hands and I left.
I left wondering why Murchison was as conversant as he was about his grandfather’s service in the World War. I was pretty sure most grandkids had only vague knowledge of their elder’s military service. Was Murchison a World War buff? Or was there another reason?
Chapter 24
My interview with Clem Murchison was not one of the most productive I have ever conducted. That wasn’t because Mr. Murchison was not forthcoming or because he was good at deflecting my probes. It was because once again in this case I felt the earth moving beneath me. Metaphorically, of course. I didn’t know why but I sensed I needed more background information that I could piece out as needed, in order to rattle the cages of some of these people. If my clients had been more forthcoming in the beginning, we might have made faster progress and things might have turned out differently. As it was, I just wasn’t ready to expose some of them to possible harm by talking about them. I needed a serious face to face with both Gehrz and Market and probably with Aaron Gottlieb as well. I was almost ready to put down a serious bet on the proposition that all of these people were somehow connected.
I stepped out of the entrance to Murchison Manufacturing into the darkness of a late February day. It had gotten colder and my breath bloomed in front of my face. Snow fell more thickly. The parking lot now held only a few scattered cars, including mine. The Taurus started okay and I pulled slowly into a mostly deserted street. The buildings along the street, all commercial and small business places, were internally dark, except for an occasional night light. I didn’t notice anybody on the street.
The intersection sported a four-way stop sign. After I followed the rule, I accelerated peacefully into the space. I figure I was two thirds of the way across when headlights exploded in my left side window, highlighting snow in the air. The vehicle was maybe thirty feet away and already coming fast. My reflexes took over.
My foot bottomed out on the accelerator and the engine wound up. I’m sure the wheels spun on the pavement. There was a crash behind me and the rear left window disintegrated in just the way it would if struck by a large caliber bullet. I never heard the shot. An instant later the onrushing vehicle skidded into the rear fender of my car. The impact sent me and the Taurus rocketing on two wheels into a large snow bank up almost on its side. Had the snow bank not been there, the car would have gone over on its side or top. My head snapped back at the impact, and now I fell forward and instinctively jammed myself low toward the empty passenger’s seat. The lunge took me below the top edge of the seatbacks and put my left hand within easy reach of the .32 caliber Chief’s lightweight Special I kept in a quick release holder under the dashboard. It’s not the weapon I favor. A short barrel makes accurate shooting problematical. I released the seatbelt and grabbed the gat, sliding down toward the right-hand door. The revolver was loaded. It was always loaded with six slugs.
My passenger-side door didn’t work well and it took me a few seconds to lever it open, pushing against the piled snow. When I wedged it open far enough to slide out, I took a swift gander back over my shoulder. The vehicle that had slammed into me had careened into another snow bank across the street. It appeared the driver had intended to drive up beside me and gun me down, then disappear, but slippery streets and maybe a nervous trigger finger had changed the scenario. Despite its size the driver had lost control of his truck for just long enough, shooting at me and then smashing into my poor car. Now he was snow-bound, gunning the engine, trying to get unstuck. Smoke billowed from the spinning tires of the white unmarked box truck and it shuddered and bucked but seemed to be well-stuck.
I half fell farther out of my car into the dirty snow and crouched by the rear wheel. The truck’s driver-side window was half way down and suddenly a flash of light bloomed just above the top edge of the window. I instantly recognized a muzzle-flash. The bozo was shooting at me. Again.
I returned fire. Twice. Bullets cost money and I didn’t have an unlimited supply in my ride so indiscriminate shooting was not on the agenda. In addition, bullets flying about a populated neighborhood could do serious if unintended damage to innocent bystanders. I hoped anybody in the nearby buildings behind me was ducking for cover. So was I. The truck engine revved to a brief scream and then coughed and died. I rose to one knee and bolted across the pavement, almost slipping on my ass on frozen snow in the middle of the intersection.
I slid to a stop by the side of the truck. The Taurus was still idling away there in its own snow bank behind me, but all I heard from the box truck was the ticking sounds characteristic of a hot engine cooling down. In the d
istance and drawing closer, police sirens came to my ears. Putting a gloved hand on the side of the truck, I scuttled cautiously closer to the door. I panted, my breath loud in my ears. When the door handle was in reach I half-squatted and yanked with my left hand. Right hand steadied the revolver trained on the dark entrance to the cab. Not graceful and not orthodox but it got the job done.
Nothing happened except the door swung open, helped by the fact that the right side front wheel was up off the pavement in the snow. I peered around the door jam and saw the guy. He was slumped back with his chin on his chest. In his lap rested one hand with a big semi-auto—it looked like a ruger .45. The sirens were closer now, a mere block or two away. Somebody’d been Johnny-on-the-spot with a 911 call. Not much time for a search.
The driver was dead. Damn it. I might have learned something significant, like why had he tried twice to run me over? And who was paying him? I ran my hand over his coat and pants pocket, trying for a wallet or any sort of ID. Nothing. I forced my concentration on the job at hand. I’d just killed a man, not something I did very often and I didn’t like it at all.
A patrol car skidded into the intersection as I stepped back and dropped my revolver onto the pavement beside me. Then I turned around and faced the young officer who sprang out of her ride and came toward me, one hand on her holster.
“Stand still,” she barked.
I wasn’t moving, just stood there, both hands palms out at shoulder height. I tried hard to control the tremors running down my arms. Other patrol cars arrived in a flurry of engine noise, sirens and flashing lights.
“My weapon is on the ground at my feet,” I told the officer. “I shot the driver of the truck. He was armed and he shot at me first. His weapon is in his lap. I’m pretty sure he’s dead.” I stared into her eyes and it appeared she understood what I was saying, that the danger was over and weapons weren’t a threat anymore. These situations are always fraught because adrenalin is running and itchy fingers sometimes twitch.
I shifted my gaze from the closest officer to a big cop leaning on the other side of his vehicle staring at me. That was all right, but he was idly stroking his shotgun. The barrel was pointing at the sky, but if he threw down on us in a panic, he’d take both me and the officer out of this life in an instant.
The cop slipped her cuffs off her belt and her eyes sought the weapon at my feet. “Who are you?”
“Name’s Sean Sean. I’m licensed to carry.” My legs were starting to tremble. “I need to sit down before I fall over,” I said.
She nodded and hollered for help. Now units swarmed around the intersection and then a big black Ford showed up with a pair of detectives I didn’t recognize. After that, things got calm and quickly organized. Several cops set about securing the scene, doing the routine procedures required at a shooting. A forensics team arrived and I sat in the back seat of a cop car and shook a little. Most of the rest of the cops took off back on routine patrol to protect and serve. It was determined that my battered Taurus was still drivable and somebody pushed it into a small parking lot next to a building that professed to house a print shop. A cop locked it and handed over my keys.
I eventually was taken downtown to give a statement, get reports sorted out and tell my story again several times. Most of my physical reactions to the shooting had departed by the time Catherine showed up to claim me, much to the obvious envy of a few cops, and we went home.
Chapter 25
Later that evening, sitting on the couch wide awake, I wasn’t much good for anything. The trembling had subsided, but I was still pretty nervy. In spite of what’s found in novels and on television programs, cops don’t engage in shoot-outs very often. PIs almost never. I couldn’t remember the last time I shot at something other than a target at the range. The scotch in my drink helped. So did the calming, understanding, presence of my good friend, Catherine McKerney.
She returned to my side on the living room couch after changing the CD in the stereo. The music filled the room and my head. Symphonic. Something by Schumann, I thought. “Do you want to talk about it,” she said softly.
“No,” I said, but then I did talk about it. “Killing is so irrevocable. It’s so final. You can’t step back from that edge, find another route. Once you’ve killed someone that door is closed.”
“You sometimes tell me that even with a death, we are so good at finding information or clues, that no door is really closed.”
“That’s true, of course,” I said. I laid my open hand on her thigh as if to reassure myself of her nearness. “But this guy leaves so many questions unanswered. We’ll learn who he is and who he worked for. But why did he try to run me down last week, if it was even the same guy? And who was he working for then? How much did he get paid to take me out? Does he leave a family behind?”
“So many questions,” Catherine murmured. “Did I tell you how very glad I am that we’re here together right now and I’m not visiting you in a hospital. Or the morgue?” We looked at each other. Then Catherine picked up the thread of our examination. “Will the answers to those questions help solve your cases?”
“Some of them might. One of the questions with possibly an important answer is how he knew where I was this afternoon. Did he follow me from the office? Or was he lying in wait? Did somebody at Murchison call him in to try to rub me out?”
I stopped and stared at the living room wall opposite. Then I stuck out my right hand and looked at the back. No tremors but my gut was still signaling me I was upset. A faint ache.
“Do you want another drink?”
“No, thanks. I’m as certain as I can be the truck was the same one that almost ran me down the other night downtown. That means I’ve been targeted for a while. I wish I could be sure it’s related to the murder of Gottlieb.”
“You seem pretty sure,” Catherine said.
I looked up at her. She’d stepped into the kitchen to refresh her glass of wine.
“I’m not sure I get you.”
“Ever since we got home and you’ve started talking about these cases, you’ve used the singular. You haven’t referred to the cases, plural, as I just did. I think, unconsciously, your analytical brain has decided the murdered Gottlieb, the mysterious Ann/Anne, and the missing Market woman are all connected.”
I favored her with a long stare, recalling bits and pieces of our evening’s talk. “Huh. I think you’re right. And that means Gehrz is also part of it. Why didn’t I see that?”
“Oh, you would have, I’m sure. Pretty sure. Just like I’m pretty sure you’re almost convinced that Gottlieb, Gehrz, Ann/Anne, and Tiffany Market are all connected to something else.” She smiled and sipped.
I understood this was serious and she wasn’t laughing. “All right,” I agreed. “Let’s say for the moment, you’re right.” I paused and thought.
“We already know the Ann/Anne person says she saw Gottlieb murdered on the bridge.”
“Why was she there, if she wasn’t part of the murder?”
“Good question. My instinct says she’s telling the truth and that the murder shook her up. At least, she’s telling me some of the truth. I’m sure she’s holding back something, and it has to do with why she was on the bridge.”
“I think,” Catherine said, “Your Ann/Anne person is connected in some other way to the guy looking for his lady friend. What’s his name again, Gehrz?”
“You do. Huh. Okay, let’s run with that a minute. Ann/Anne shows up in my office and wants me to hustle the cops about Gottlieb, explaining she won’t get involved. Gehrz shows up at about the same time looking for a woman named Market, at least so he says that’s her name and he gives me pictures of the lady. At least one of which—the pictures—is doctored.”
“I didn’t know that.”
I nodded and sipped my own drink. Then I lunged out of the sofa and started pacing. “Wa
it a minute. This Ann/Anne person insists she needs to remain in the background with me as her cut-out, and Gehrz is looking for a woman who faded into the background. Suppose for the moment Gehrz’s inquiry is both camouflage and diversion?”
“I think you lost me. Please be careful with your drink. Put it down if you’re going to wave your arms like that.”
“I can’t believe either Gehrz or Ann/Anne came to me out of the blue. Picked me out of the phone book. No way. Somebody knew about me and my connections to the cops.”
“A leap in logic?” Catherine was always the more cautious.
“Wait. Let me test this. Gottlieb’s murdered. Ann/Anne knows about it, why, because she’s already hooked to him somehow. She didn’t just ‘happen’ to be on the bridge that night. Now she wants the murderer caught, but she needs to stay out of the picture to protect others or maybe cover an investigation of some sort. Gehrz, also involved with Ann/Anne and Gottleib, approaches me to keep track of the woman’s cover, to be sure she’s secure. He feeds me a bogus search for his supposed girl friend, the Market woman. That takes time and alters my focus. Son of a bitch!” I don’t like to be played, though I admit that playing games with clients, especially felons and other bad guys, is part of my stock in trade. In my DNA, some would say.
“I understand what you’re saying. You think this Gehrz is using you to be sure the cover for Ann/Anne stays intact. That’s because you have a stellar rep in town for finding lost folks, especially perpetrators of dark and illegal deeds.”
“I love it when you use street talk,” I smirked. “I bet that’s the explanation for those two. That would mean I can stop looking for Tiffany Market, because she’s Anne, or Ann is she. Her?
The Case of the Purloined Painting Page 12
