Chapter 37

 

 

A little after nine as I’m futzing around with my refrigerator’s ice maker which has a mind of its own when it comes to dispensing ice cubes my cell phone rings. It’s Don calling to tell me that Mrs. Aldrich is on her way to Union Station. “I was going to put a tail on her until she arrives at Raleigh-Durham International where the Raleigh agents will take over. I was figuring it was a good back up plan in case Aldrich gets cute and changes his program somewhere along her route to Raleigh. I wouldn’t put it past him to try something, but he’s smarter and more cautious than the average nutcase and might spot the tail, especially if he has an eye in the sky, and the ball game would be over, so I nixed the idea.”

 

“That was a tough call to make, but I think you made the right one. How did it go with the fireworks? Did they create a 911 incident?”

 

“Surprisingly, none of the neighbors gave the sounds a second thought. What does that say about our society? The surveillance guys played their roles to the hilt, even acting very angry at being distracted when they discovered the remains of the firecrackers in the Coolidge’s backyard. They resumed their stakeout positions acting like they didn’t know they had been duped and Mrs. Aldrich was no longer in the house. If Aldrich had an eye in the sky, he was also duped. I was watching the entire incident unfold from a van parked a few doors down from the Aldrich house and if I hadn’t been in the know I would have been taken in by their performance.”

 

“Well, it looks like we got off to a good start. Let’s hope we have a good finish. Thanks for keeping me in the loop, Don. Don’t forget to pick me up at one tomorrow. I don’t want to miss out on the finale.” Click.

 

I finally get the ice dispenser to spit out some cubes, so I fill the glass with sarsaparilla soda and plop down in my recliner to watch the rest of a NCIS rerun. Ever since I was a kid my favorite soft drink has been sarsaparilla and it’s hard to find. I’ve found a health food store that sells it and I buy it by the case, but invariably forget to put some in the fridge.

 

At ten the news comes on and the lead story has me spilling some ice cold sarsaparilla in my lap which will kick start your engine let me tell you. The anchor opens up with, “Breaking news. This just in. Moments ago the FBI went to the house where the wife of the Crusader has been staying to place her under arrest for complicity in her husband’s killing spree only to find she has flown the coop. The lead FBI investigator, Agent Ericson, is unavailable for comment at this time.”

 

The anchor goes on to summarize the entire Crusader vendetta and finishes with, “We will keep you updated as this latest chapter in the Crusader saga unfolds.”

 

A few seconds later my cell rings. It's Janet. “Have you by any chanced tuned into the ten o’clock news?

 

“Yeah, I just heard the news flash. Where did that come from?”

“The only answer that makes any sense is that there had to be a leak somewhere. I know it wasn’t me and Don wouldn’t say anything because something like this could scare Aldrich off. Right now the last thing Aldrich wants is publicity. He’s got to be hoping that he and his wife will be at their final destination undetected before the media gets its hands on the story. This will put him in a bigger spot light and now it will be on his wife as well. Don wouldn’t’ do something like this just to add another element of believability to our scheme.”

 

My mind is racing a mile a minute and it’s drawing a couple of conclusions, one of them I’m hesitating to voice to Janet because somehow she might blame herself. She’s a bright lady though and it won’t take her long to arrive at the same conclusions, so I blurt out my thoughts to her.

 

“Janet, it’s very reasonable to assume that the leak came from one or more of three places, Don’s office, your office or my office. Mrs. Aldrich’s neighbors can be eliminated because they didn’t have a clue about what was going on since they didn’t even react to the firecrackers going off and stayed inside their residences if they were home. My office can be eliminated because no one in it has any reason to do something like that

 

“I believe it’s also safe to assume that Don, you or I didn’t accidentally let something slip which was overheard by someone who for some unknown reason passed it on to the media. The three of us are just too disciplined to do something like that.

 

“That leaves two persons of interest in my mind, Piedmont or Furious Ferdinand. It would have been relatively easy for them to learn about what we were up to even though they’ve been deliberately kept out of the loop because they didn’t have a need to know until it was history and secrecy was a primary concern of ours. They could have eavesdropped on conversations, caught glimpses of emails, notes, agendas, whatever. Either one of these guys could have spilled the beans for personal reasons, the primary one in my mind being jealousy, believing that it might lead to a failure of the plan resulting in embarrassment to the person they don’t like along with putting a black mark on that individual’s career.

 

“Piedmont because he’s being transferred to the boondocks and not Don and Don is now reporting directly to his boss who looks favorably on him. Furious Ferdinand because his health is forcing him to retire early, leaving you to advance your career probably further along than he did and he won’t be around to try to push you off that track. There’s no love lost between Piedmont and Don and likewise between Ferdie and you and that’s what’s putting them under my microscope.”

 

“Wow! Sherlock Holmes had nothing on you. As Dr. Watson would say, ‘Brilliant deductions, Dawson.’”

 

“And as Sherlock Holmes would say, ‘Elementary, Vanderhill, elementary.”

 

The bantering is taking some of the sting out of this latest development, but not much as is evidenced by Janet‘s next comment.

 

“I don’t see any flaws in your reasoning, Chet, but it really doesn’t set well with me if you’re right on because that means one of them made it possible for the Crusader to both elude capture by abandoning his plan and lengthen his string of killings if he so chooses.”

 

“The leak had to come from one of these two men because either one of them would be considered a credible source to be believed enough for the station to air it and as you know the reporter who got the tip isn’t going to willingly reveal his source. There are journalists who have gone to jail to avoid doing that. Whichever one spilled the beans, he had to tell a convincing lie about why he was doing it or the station wouldn’t have run the story so quickly without trying to check it out. There probably are others who could have learned about our plot, but what would be their motivation to go to the TV station with it. The entire plot wasn’t revealed because that would have quickly pointed us in the direction of the most probable persons of interest and our tipster is jealous not stupid. Don can’t refute the story because Mrs. Aldrich is gone and any denial would arouse Aldrich’s suspicions.”

 

“We’re basing our suspicions on a lot of supposition, but the conclusions we’re drawing make sense. Unfortunately, the person who tried to sabotage our latest attempt to put the Crusader behind bars will probably not have to answer for interfering with an ongoing FBI operation. How do you think Aldrich will react?”

 

“My guess is he’ll stick to his game plan as he has no reason to believe that the authorities know what he’s up to. It’s obvious he still loves his wife and will do everything possible to keep her out of jail. The tipster wasn’t thinking about the Crusader when he shot off his mouth, Janet. Aldrich wasn’t his target. You or Don is the target. The tipster wants to hurt his target and embarrassment and career damage are his weapons.”

 

“Damn! The thought that either of these men would resort to something like this because of their dislike for Don or me never crossed my mind.”

 

“Don must be livid. When he got word that the TV station wanted to talk with him about Mrs. Aldrich’s disappearance, he must have started going through the same mental gymnastics we’ve been going through and has probably drawn the same conclusions we have. If Ericson becomes convinced that it was Piedmont that leaked the story, I can almost guarantee that it will be Piedmont’s career that gets flushed down the toilet not Don’s. From what I’ve learned from working with Don, he doesn’t start fights but he finishes most of them. He’s not a man you want to piss off.”

 

“Well, as mother likes to say, ‘what’s done is done and we have to live with it.’ Good night, Chet.”

 

“Good night, Janet.”

 

Man, life sure can get complicated sometimes. I wonder what other unpleasant surprises are waiting for us around the bend. On that cheerful note, I clean up the mess I made with the spilt sarsaparilla and hit the sack. Tune in tomorrow for another day in the life of PI Dawson. Huh. I sound like one of those old radio programs my dad had tapes of and used to play for my brother and me when he was in one of his good old days moods.