Westermann paced around Headquarters, working off nervous energy. He’d called out to Fort Deposit and asked McIlvaine to track down James Symmes, Boyce Symmes’s crippled son. Westermann would come out that night to talk to him. “Too late,” McIlvaine had said, “he’s already coming your way. Hopped on a bus less than an hour ago.” Kraatjes had authorized a tail team for Koss and a couple of uniforms were dispatched to meet Symmes at the bus station and bring him in. Things were moving fast, picking up an end-of-the-road momentum.
Westermann found Grip smoking a cigarette at Westermann’s desk.
“I heard your father was in the room with Maddox.”
“Yeah.”
Grip shook his head. “Jesus.”
“Where’s Morphy?” Westermann asked, changing the subject.
“He went to get us lunch. Look, I need to talk to you about something.”
“Okay.”
“You see”—Grip struggled for the right words, worrying, for once, about nuance—“you know my political views, that I’m concerned about—”
“The communist menace,” Westermann said, semi-ironically.
“That’s right. I know you don’t share my … enthusiasm for the politics of it.” Grip paused, not sure how to proceed.
“Where’s this going?”
“You know Ed Wayne. From what he says, sounds like you two got into it a little.”
Westermann’s mouth went dry. He found himself licking his lips, trying to work up some moisture like a punk on his first bust.
Grip squinted a little and Westermann got the feeling he was getting a read. “He’s an asshole, Wayne, but he’s also with the cause, and we run into each other because of that. Anyway, he’s got it in his mind that maybe you’re Red, and he starts getting on me about it. ‘Your lieut’s a commie bastard,’ stupid shit like that. And I know it’s because he doesn’t like you and that’s just the kind of asshole he is. But last night he gets one of the guys down at the bar,” Grip said, technically not lying, “to shadow you; see what you got up to.”
Westermann, his pulse pounding in his ears, stared at Grip.
“I don’t know how to say this, but he says you went to a meeting with Frank Frings, the reporter, and Carla Bierhoff. And I was going to say I don’t believe that shit, but just a couple nights ago I ran into those two exact same people—together—when I was looking for Mel Washington. That makes me think maybe it isn’t bullshit. It makes me wonder if Mel Washington was there, too, and that gets me thinking about this investigation—and don’t take this wrong—but how you’ve been playing down the Uhuru Community angle the whole way. You know? I don’t know what to think.”
Westermann’s voice sounded strange coming out. “We’re getting close on this—the Maddox angle.”
Grip grimaced, not enjoying this conversation. “Are we? Is this a better angle than the bodies being found right by the shanties?”
Westermann felt the sweat on his face. “Twenty-four hours. If we don’t have this nailed down in twenty-four hours, we’ll go after the Uhuru Community as hard as you want.”
Grip nodded, thinking. “You still didn’t answer me about Mel Washington.”
Westermann had found his footing again. “You really want to push this, Torsten?”
Grip frowned and shook his head. “I know enough. This isn’t a conversation I wanted to have.”
Westermann could see that. “Okay.”
“But there’s another thing. That guy, the one Ed Wayne got to follow you, he didn’t just leave after your meeting. He kept following you.”
Westermann knew what was coming next.
“He says he followed you to a certain address and that you entered that address and didn’t come out again by the time he’d left, he said, maybe about an hour later.”
“Okay.”
“You know the address I’m talking about?”
“Sure.”
“I know that Morphy was working a security gig last night.”
The energy drained from Westermann’s body, the excitement he’d felt just a few minutes before displaced by a type of dread. It was hard for him to register what was happening, the stress was too much. He asked the big question, feeling like an observer, watching this happening to someone else.
“Does Morphy know?”
Grip nodded.
“What do you think he’ll do? You think he’ll try to kill me?”
Grip sighed. “Lieut, you ever have a clue what Morphy will do? I talked to him. I’ll talk to him some more. But I’d watch it, if I were you. He might not do anything. He’s just … it’s Morphy. I thought you should know.”
Grip left. Westermann sat back in his chair staring blankly ahead. Nothing seemed real, yet the weight of all these things seemed almost too much to bear.
Morphy.
Wayne and Deyna.
Big Rolf.
Maddox.
Lenore slowly swirling downstream.
Westermann closed his eyes and his head swam; the Holiness Church nipped at the edge of his thoughts—the complete release he’d felt there, release from his worries. He stood and walked to his window, watching the street traffic below, clearing his head. Because it was the easiest thing to think about, he wondered why James Symmes was coming to the City.