No, I’m not angry.”
“You sound angry, Brianne.” And she did, even through the cell phone.
“I’m hurt. Why do you do this to me, leaving me on my own? You’ve been gone for over two hours.”
“I’m trying to wrap things up as quickly as I can.” I’d already secured Lewis’s document at the safe-deposit box used by Black’s. Now en route to the downtown library, I took the Broadway exit. Only a few blocks to go. “Has Johnny Ray been helping you? He’s still there, isn’t he?”
“Of course he’s here, you doof.”
“Doofus.”
“You are so not funny. It’s been crazy, everyone wanting their precious coffee for the first chilly day of fall. People’ve been asking about you. A couple of days ago they seemed worried. Now it’s like they’re a little annoyed. At least Johnny’s kept them entertained with his guitar. He’s been taking requests and passing the hat around.”
“Johnny Ray to the rescue.”
“I suggested it. He did try to help behind the counter—I’ll give him credit for that—but the man doesn’t know the first thing about what goes on back here.”
“Like our kiss by the freezer?”
“Would you stop? I know what you’re trying to do, and it won’t work.”
“I’m just trying to say I’m sorry.” I paused. “You’ve stuck with me since all this craziness started. I really appreciate it. I do. Sometimes I get so focused on my own stuff that I end up comin’ off like a jerk.”
A tearful tone entered her voice. “You know, the only reason I came to work this morning was to be near you. After last night … I’ve got all these thoughts running through my head. I’m so scared about what’ll happen.”
“The detectives said you had every right to protect yourself.”
“Self-defense.”
“Exactly.”
“But it feels like it’ll still be there, like this mark on my record. What’ll people think of me?”
“They’ll think you were a brave girl who—”
“Girl?”
“Lady. A brave, beautiful lady who defended herself at all costs. You’re strong. That’s part of what drew me to you.”
“Really?” Her voice lightened.
“You don’t let things stand in your way. Think of how you took the job in the first place, even after the shooting. Not to mention how you kept insisting that I have dinner with you.” I slowed and put on my turn signal. “Not that I’m complaining.”
“Better not be.” She was sounding more playful.
“I didn’t know how to deal with it at first, the whole employer-employee thing. We still need to be careful, I guess. But your persistence broke through.”
“As if it was all my doing. Who was it, mister, that threw me against the wall and kissed me, huh?”
“You know you liked it.”
“I’m leaning against that very wall now.”
In midturn, I caught the curb of the parking garage and nearly dropped the phone as the Honda bucked.
“Aramis?”
“I’m trying to drive here.”
“Are you coming back this way anytime soon? Did you already have your meeting with that detective?”
“Not yet. A quick detour and then that’s where I’m headed.” As I pulled into a spot beneath the concrete structure, the phone crackled. “I’m about to lose you.”
“Just don’t stay away too long, or I’ll have to see what your brother’s plans are for the evening. He is kinda cute in his hat.”
“Yeah? Well, he tans twice a week. Mine’s real.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.”
Since the beginning, Lewis’s letter had been the catalyst. An American icon defending his country against treason, a secret trickling down through generations, and then a chance discovery by a parolee in his mother’s Davidson County attic.
The ghosts of our nation’s past had stirred.
Did it still exist, this old riding crop hiding a map to a cache of gold? Was the Spanish bullion still out there? And did my mother’s handkerchief contain a similar map, embroidered the day before her death?
I’d held the material to my cheek many times, rubbed the silk between my hands, and traced her initials with my fingertips. The other pattern was intricate, with indigo thread winding about a thicker, turquoise one; yet I’d never seen anything like a map in its details. This was heady stuff. If true, it would give deeper meaning to Mom’s death.
And my own survival.
The Nashville Public Library system includes a first-rate collection of reading and research materials. If the twenty branch libraries throughout the county are glittering crown jewels, then the downtown branch is the practically flawless diamond at its center.
The resources are extensive: the Metropolitan Government Archives, with more than five million records on microfilm; the computer lab; the Center for Entrepreneurs; the Civil Rights Room; and the Nashville Room, with its numerous genealogical materials. Many library visitors take their lunches from the downstairs café into the center courtyard where a fountain flows in the midst of the shade trees.
At a computer I investigated the genealogy of Meriwether Lewis, from past to present, then did the same with the Black family, starting with Kenneth S. Black and moving back. In the middle, I hoped to find intertwining branches.
No such luck. Two hundred years leaves time for lots of offshoots.
I did learn that Lewis’s mother was a famed explorer, with medical training, culinary skills, and a fearless disposition. His decision in his letter to leave such grave matters in her hands was calculated and wise.
It’s a matter of record that Mr. Pernier did indeed visit her after Lewis’s death, but Mrs. Lucy Meriwether Lewis Marks declared that he must’ve killed her son, and she ran him off with a rifle.
Did Pernier give her the letter and riding crop? No one knows.
As my confidence in solving this mystery was building, so was my bitterness toward Uncle Wyatt. In a few weeks, we would confront each other once more, making an attempt at getting The Best of Evil by doing good.
“Just got word,” said Detective Meade. His Titans clock by the door said it was 3:11 p.m. “The incision and residue pattern on Ms. Tyner’s hair specimen match the scissors.”
“Which scissors?”
“The ones Frederick Chipps was carrying.”
“Frederick Chipps.”
I chewed on that, having a hard time accepting it as the man’s full name. For the year I’d been friends with Freddy C, I’d held on to some romantic notion that the C stood for Crusader, wanting to believe the best about the man.
“We’ve already contacted a former employer of his in the state of Illinois, as well as the school where he served as custodian. Court and police records will be sent to us to help establish patterns and build a case.” Meade leaned forward on both elbows, linking his long fingers as he gazed at me. “Is there something wrong?”
“Are you sure about all this?”
“The incision patterns, Aramis. His are the very blades that cut Ms. Tyner’s hair, implying related and far more serious crimes.”
“What about Leroy Parker?”
“He was a public servant, caught up in suspicious activities that are now under investigation. The man’s dead. I’d say he paid the price for his impropriety.”
“I watched him chase Brianne with a pair of scissors.”
“A different pair than those matching the Tyner specimen.”
“He was chasing her. He cut a chunk out of her hair!” I pushed back in my chair, causing it to thud against the detective’s bookcase.
“Mr. Black, I understand you’ve been under a great deal of stress.” Detective Meade rose from his seat and made a quarter turn to adjust a framed photo of his wife on the wall. He was establishing authority, while softening its confrontational aspects. When his coal black eyes reached mine, he showed no fear or hesitation or prejudice—a man I’d rather have on my side than not.
“Stress? Yeah, you could say that.”
“But,” Meade said, “you must maintain your objectivity, even as I must.”
“I’m just a cranky man who’s had a very long week. Sorry. Don’t mean to take it out on you.”
“My mother used to say, ‘If you’re truly sorry, Son, you’ll change your ways.’ ”
I rocked my neck to the left, to the right. Heard it pop.
“And,” he continued, “I’m willing to change mine. For reasons I’m sure you can understand, I’m not presently free to discuss the record of Parole Officer Leroy Parker. I am, however, open to being wrong. In fact, I think it’s an attribute of any detective worth his salt.”
I looked past his shoulder at the photo of his family in front of the Parthenon.
“You’re a good dad, I bet.”
“Do my best.” He rapped his knuckles on his desk. “Okay, Aramis, let’s have you take a look at that video. There’s no mistaking Frederick Chipps in the footage, but you might pick up something we missed.”
I followed his upright stride into a small, darkened room.
“The tape’s been touched up by our digital department,” he told me as footage of the brownstone’s parking lot filled the monitor on the table. “Still not the greatest, but we can play it over if need be.”
Freddy C was a primary suspect in the Rasputin Rapist case. If he’d planted the hair specimen in my mother’s ebony box, I guessed it would have been to frame me. I doubt he would have known the value of the handkerchief.
Where was the handkerchief now? Was it another one of his trophies?
The thought of his salty hands on it made me queasy.
“Detective, wait.” I jerked upright in my seat. “Pause it right there. Yeah. Now zoom in to the left.”
“What do you see?”
I stabbed my finger at the screen. “That car, the one Freddy’s climbing out of—that’s not his. I don’t think he even has a driver’s license.”
“Maybe he was sleeping in it, staying warm.”
“It’s a white Camry,” I said. “Same car Leroy Parker drives.”
“Drove,” Meade corrected me.
“So what was it doing in our lot?”
Detective Meade zoomed in, creating a large image of the car’s rear bumper. Together, he and I read the license plate aloud.
“BHT 588.”