At the boarding call, the young man fell in line with the others booked on Midwestern Flight #247. Presenting his ticket, he hustled along the bridge. A smiling stewardess welcomed him aboard, “No overcoat or briefcase? You must’ve left that meeting in a hurry.”
“I had to get out of town before they read the fine print,” he winked.
“That drawl,” she asked her handsome passenger in the charcoal suit. “What is it?”
“Pure Virginian.” He teased his friends that he hadn’t lived in Georgia long enough to have it tarnished. Claiming his window seat, he gazed out to see baggage being loaded and equipment checked. Was this a wild goose chase? He’d asked himself this when he left Atlanta and now again, hours later, at O’Hare. This last leg of the journey hopefully would get him closer to an answer.
The cabin noise soon faded and the mammoth jet climbed into the northern sky. His thoughts returned to the circumstances that had so quickly sent him flying off to Minnesota, instead of driving to Virginia for the holidays. The call to his Atlanta real estate office that morning as he wrapped up a dozen pressing matters before leaving for Virginia had changed everything. “We have a live one on the line,” his secretary had said, her head poking through the door.
“I’m running late. Give it to Betty.”
“He insists on speaking with you.”
“Who is he?” he’d looked up to ask.
“Dick Jessup. He’s moving his car business here from Dallas and needs a new house.”
This was a layup he’d normally jump at, one that promised a fat commission if Jessup was like most Texans. Only he couldn’t have picked a worse time.
“Good morning,” he grabbed the phone. “I understand you’re moving your business and need a new home.”
“That’s right,” Jessup drawled. “And I don’t have time to waste with a bunch of negotiatin’.”
“I understand. And I have the perfect agent for you. I’d handle it myself but...”
“Let me put it plainly,” Jessup interrupted. “I hear you’re the best real estate man in Atlanta. And I have this rule, you see, of dealin’ only with the best; cars, homes, whatever. When money’s on the line, it don’t make sense to go to anyone else. Say for example, you’re the quarterback in a football game. The score’s tied, time’s running out and you’re twenty yards from pay dirt. You call a pass play; a hitch and slant, let’s say. Who do you go to? The receiver who gives you the best chance of scoring, right? Well the same logic applies...”
Matt froze as the Texan’s meaning sunk in. “I... see your point and may have a new listing you’d be interested in. It looks like South Fork, if you remember the show ‘Dallas.’ I’m heading there now in fact. Could you call me in twenty minutes?”
“Sure. You got that number handy?”
Relaying it, he hung up and started out. “South Fork?” the secretary followed. “Which listing are you talking about?”
“The Bergin’s place,” he replied.
“But it doesn’t look anything like South Fork.”
“Jessup doesn’t know that,” he said, throwing on his coat. “Besides, I promised Ned Bergin I’d check on his place before leaving town. This way I can kill two birds with one stone.” Heading for the door, he turned back and said, “Ask Betty to dig through our listings for the closest thing to South Fork - oh, and Merry Christmas.”
Twenty minutes later, Matt stared at the kitchen phone in the Bergin’s recently abandoned North Atlanta home, happy he’d remembered Ned hadn’t cut off the service. Where else could he have safely taken the call? He quickly grabbed the phone now as it began ringing. “Hello?”
“So you still remember the old hitch and slant?”
Matt laughed. “I’d be damn stupid not to, considering how many times I bailed you out with it.”
“Bailed me out? All you had to do was shake some lead-footed safety long enough for me to stuff the ball in your gut.”
“Waddill to Culpepper,” Matt smiled. “That connection won a bushel of games for the Academy.”
“And a state championship, don’t forget.”
A patrol car suddenly passed the window, snapping him out of his trance. “Goddamnit Tyler, we’ve been worried sick about you! It’s about time you called.”
“I wouldn’t have risked it if the situation wasn’t life or death.”
“Then you had no choice. And by the way, that Texas drawl was pretty good.”
Tyler sighed heavily. “Man, I really fucked up Travis’s career.”
“Tyler, you didn’t fuck up anything,” Matt snapped. “Dad’s happy to be out of the Longbridge administration and I know Mom is. So tell me about Corelli? Is she nice?”
“A royal pain in the ass,” Tyler laughed. “So how’s Kelly? And those two little farts? I guess you have big Christmas plans.”
Ones that might change, Matt sensed. “We’re going to York - this afternoon, as a matter of fact.”
“I see... Well, that’s great.”
“Tyler, our plans can be changed. That’s what this call is about, isn’t it? Don’t bullshit me, man. If you need help, ask for it.”
“Matt, it’s not like that. I just... What I mean...”
“Will you shut the fuck up and tell me what I need to do?” Grabbing a leftover listing, he jotted notes as Tyler finally relented and explained the plan. He’d been right. The York trip was screwed. But if the plan worked, it could be the best Christmas they’d had in a long time.
“Matt, you’ve got nothing to gain by sticking your nose into this,” Tyler said. “It could be a complete waste of time, and if caught you’ll be lucky to get prison. The odds favor a swiftly executed death sentence.”
“I could also be a national hero,” he said, slipping the notes in his jacket. “All I can say is you’d make a shitty real estate broker. But even you can’t talk me out of this.”
“I’d do it myself but there’s just no way to move,” Tyler said. “Cops are everywhere, the snow just gets deeper and deeper and Mayson’s getting worse by the minute. If I don’t get her to a hospital soon...”
“She’ll die,” Matt filled in the silence. “Then she’s different. Like...”
“I’m not sure, Matt. I mean, I don’t have time to think about it right now. So does my plan sound feasible? I’ll understand perfectly if Kelly vetoes it. Any wife in her right mind would.”
“She won’t. Now, can I tell your family we’ve talked?”
“Sure. But we can’t again.”
“No big deal. If I hit the jackpot, you’ll know. Now take good care of Mayson. We both know she’d want you to.”
“Who?” Tyler asked.
“Kara, of course,” he said, hanging up.
Minutes later, Matt pulled into the driveway of his handsome Colonial home. Kelly quickly emerged to greet him, with Little Bets and Trip trailing behind. “You always manage to arrive just in time.” She nodded at the Land Cruiser, crammed with luggage and Christmas presents. Her smile faded as she detected his anxiety. “Matt, what’s wrong?”
Turning away from the children, he revealed the morning’s startling developments. “Tyler said he’d understand if you vetoed the plan,” he told her. But veto or not, his hard eyes explained that he was determined to help. And in the same predicament, there was no question Tyler would do the same. Reluctantly, Kelly nodded her consent.
“You’ll do fine on the road,” he said. “Eight hours, tops.”
Her eyes locked gravely with his. “Matt, please be careful.”
After seeing them off, he drove to the airport and caught a flight to O’Hare, then a second one which had just touched down on Duluth’s frozen tarmac.
Bracing against the cold, he left the terminal minutes later in search of his rental car. Soon he was creeping east over Duluth’s icy roads, a map beside him. The stranded vehicles he passed were grim reminders of what could happen if he got too cute. Patrol car sightings increased as well, as he left the city and burrowed deeper into the wilderness.
The first roadblock he encountered was just west of Northwood. Creeping with the traffic, he watched a fleet of choppers simultaneously patrolling the night sky. How many cops did it take to catch two lawyers, anyway, he wondered as the line crept past Lacey’s Truck Stop. One vehicle after another was released. Soon he was able to observe the troopers as they snapped up driver’s licenses and stuck flashlights into the faces of helpless travelers. Their motions were brisk, their expressions hard. Was their mission to capture the fugitives or execute them? Need he look any farther than the Halos’ mass suicide at Green River?
Did Longbridge know the true nature of the men around him? Was he blinded to their conspiracy, or its central figure? Travis believed Longbridge, if pathetically naive, was without question an honorable man. Incorruptible.
A jeep was released and a Lexus waved forward. Following it, he watched another chopper streak across the sky. Again he thought of Longbridge’s refusal to guarantee the fugitives’ safety and his repeated votes of confidence in Chapman and Streeter, a confidence Matt didn’t share.
As the Lexus rolled on, the trooper waved Matt forward. “Your license and registration, please,” the trooper asked. Quickly the doors flew open. Flashlights scanned the interior and brisk hands searched the floor and seats, as he passed his documents to the trooper. “You’re headed for Copper Harbor?” asked a trooper as he studied the map beside him.
“I’m looking at property there.” Matt offered his broker’s license. “To develop, if the price is right.” The trooper at the window was now joined by a Fed, who studied Matt’s documents carefully before returning them. “Why does a Georgia broker travel all the way to Wisconsin to buy real estate?”
“I’m not particular about where my profits come from,” Matt smiled.
The Fed clearly wasn’t amused as he flashed his badge. “I’m Agent Dilman. Let’s see those keys. We need to inspect your trunk”
Giving him the keys, Matt waited anxiously as the trunk was searched. Dilman returned to the window. “You always travel across the country without a suitcase or overcoat?”
“I’m going home tomorrow. Is that a big deal?”
Dilman studied him closely as angry horns began blasting. Matt turned to see the lengthening string of lights. “Sir, I’d be grateful if you let me pass. These people are getting impatient.”
Culpepper, Dilman groped. Not Georgia, but...
“Fred!” Agent Kirby now loped over. “The traffic’s really piling up. What you got?”
Unable to make the connection, he waved Matt on. “Nothing, Jim, nothing at all,” he replied.
Nevertheless, Culpepper remained on Dilman’s mind as the night sky suddenly exploded with choppers. He watched a dozen or more converge on Northwood as Kirby rushed over to grab him. “We just got orders! Come on!”
“What the hell’s going on?” Dilman asked.
“You remember the trucker’s call that sent us scrambling from the Kennesaw? We just found out where it came from.”
“Where?”
“The Kennesaw; Waddill made it. Nicholas just arrived in Northwood for an emergency briefing.”
As they squealed off seconds later, Dilman asked, “What do you know about the plan?”
Kirby shrugged. “Clear the State guys out, then stage the shoot-out. The rest is just details.”
“It’ll take place at the Kennesaw,” Dilman predicted. “The .38s will be fired and placed next to the bodies. There’s not much else for Nicholas to plan.”
Kirby glanced at him as they reached the Sheriff’s Office. “You mean Leopold, don’t you?”
Dilman laughed. It didn’t take a genius to figure out who was actually calling the shots.
As they crossed the lot, Kirby relayed the rest of the report. “Franklin and Benoit were sent to Copper Harbor an hour ago. I wonder what’s so damn important up there, if the fugitives are here in Northwood?”
Dilman stopped abruptly as he suddenly made the connection. “That’s it!”
“What the hell are you raving about?” Kirby shrugged.
“Travis Culpepper. I bet he has a son Waddill’s age. A kid named Culpepper passed through our checkpoint earlier, claiming to be a Georgia broker looking for property.”
“Christ, Jim, who the hell flies across the country to look at real estate without baggage or overcoat!”
“Do you know where he was going?” Kirby asked.
He nodded gravely. “Copper Harbor.”
Matt reached the Copper Harbor Marina at one a.m. Its long cinderblock building had been abandoned for the night, the windows secured — except for the one rattling in the breeze. So where were the boat storage units?
Crawling from the car, he hurried across the empty lot, then down to the docks. The icy breeze sliced through him. If only he’d remembered his damned coat.
He finally spotted the framed storage units beyond the last pier and reaching them, moved quickly down the first alley, then up the next, until coming to Unit #36. The door’s plate provided the lessee’s name: R. Hunter. This was it.
The chilling breeze rattled down the dark alley as he groped for the scrawled equation - a lock combination, phone number or something else? Did the storage unit hold a secret that would rock a nation, or just rob the fishing boat of a few insurance geeks, he wondered as he turned the dial in obedience to the numbers. The lock didn’t respond. Had he written down the wrong numbers? He tried again, and again it refused to cooperate. What should he do now? Find a goddamned hammer and break it open? Again he tried the combination. This time the lock clicked.
Lifting the door, he switched on the light and surveyed the unit. It was ten feet wide and twenty deep, plenty big for the Boston Whaler it housed. Deck chairs, rope, buckets and rags cluttered the floor.
His scanning eyes snagged on the dry sink in the corner, a box of folded canvas sitting on top. Going over, he inspected the sink’s interior cabinet and quickly moved on to the wall racks, which held a hodgepodge of fishing gear and accessories. Turning next to the boat, he lifted the tarp and climbed inside, carefully examining every compartment from bow to stern. Scowling, he crawled out. He was missing something; he could feel it.
Again his gaze stopped on the dry sink. What was he missing? Yes, it suddenly jolted him. The boxed canvas was oddly folded and crookedly shaped - as if packaging a large, rectangular object. Quickly, he stripped the canvas away, shivering at his discovery — a rusted metal chest, its seal sliced. Carefully he opened it to examine the contents – large manila envelopes and brittle, plastic evidence bags labeled Pine County Sheriff’s Department. May 5th, 1954.
Shocked seconds passed as he absorbed the monumental dimensions of his discovery - a chest, the forty-year-old contents of which promised to shake the very foundation of the United States government and save Tyler’s and Mayson’s lives, but also bring a quick end to his own, unless it got into the right hands. Putting the items back, he carried the chest outside, then secured the unit and returned down the alley.
Arms aching, he reached the parking lot a few minutes later and locked the chest in the trunk. Opening the car door to leave, he froze as headlights suddenly broke the darkness. A patrol car reached him, the trooper parking and climbing out as a Fed emerged from the passenger side. “Is that your car?” the trooper asked.
“My rental, yeah,” he nodded.
“I’ll need to see the lease, along with your license.”
Heart pounding, he handed over the documents. The trooper studied them carefully, then gave them to the Fed. “You’re a long way from home, Mr. Culpepper. What’s the nature of your business up here?”
“Real estate development. I met with some people earlier to discuss a project, only I didn’t expect to be this late.”
“Where are you going now?” the Fed asked.
“To my hotel in Duluth.”
The Fed’s face relaxed as he returned the documents. Sliding into the driver’s seat, Matt cranked the engine. It clicked unresponsively. Pumping the gas, he tried again. Again it clicked. Shit, not now! he thought.
“It’s the cold,” the trooper nodded. “You got jumper cables?”
“All rentals have them,” said the Fed, who started for the trunk.
Desperately Matt tried the engine again. Sputtering, it finally chugged to life. “I guess it’s the cold, like you said,” he shrugged with a heavy relief. As they stepped back, he crept from the ice-patched lot.
Crawling over the slippery roads, he tensed each time the tires spun. Copper Harbor was an eerie, desolate place, a ghost town submerged in deep snow and with few phones, he discovered. Travis had been expecting his call hours ago and it was beginning to appear he’d have to risk using his cell phone.
Reaching the highway, he turned west towards the bridge. One patrol car, then a second and third, passed east in the direction of Copper Harbor. A fourth zipped by as he finally spotted a service station, a coveted phone booth in its darkened corner. As he turned into the icy lot, his tires suddenly spun, angling the car into the station’s wrecker. The collision hurled him against the door.
His head spun painfully as he crawled from the floor. Warm blood trickled down his neck. Groping for tissues in his jacket pocket, he pressed them to his burning temple. Then turning the key, he groaned at the familiar click. Pumping the gas, he tried again and again. Now what, he thought, as he crawled out to inspect the damage. Then he remembered the call he had to make. As he hurried for the phone booth, choppers suddenly lit the western sky. A dozen or more, they converged on the same point. Northwood? Had something happened? Slipping into the booth, he quickly placed his call.
Ten, eleven, twelve... Tyler counted the choppers as they crossed the night sky, all headed for Northwood. What had brought them? Had Matt reached Copper Harbor? Had the lock combination proved to be their salvation — just too late to save them?
He turned at Mayson’s soft moans. Her leg had gotten worse since moving up to the inn. After settling her in this second floor room, he’d returned to cover his tracks, then spent the next hours nursing her and waiting. Kennesaw’s liquor cabinet had been quickly cleaned out as he plied her with bourbon and vodka for the pain. She’d languished in a drunken stupor as the pain faded, then tossed and moaned as it returned. The codeine pills had smoothed out the cycle, but only two were left.
As the choppers landed, his vigilant gaze returned to the empty sky. Had they discovered the origin of his calls? Was a raid being planned? His eyes closed with the collapsing situation. With choppers in Northwood, police cutters in the lake and a massive land force closing in, wasn’t the chase finally over?
As Mayson’s moans grew more urgent, he went to the bathroom for water, then gave her the last codeine pills. “They know we’re here. We have to leave.”
She shook her head in protest. She was so confused, in so much pain. The chilling darkness, the running, hiding, spending every second either cheating death or battling pain that only got worse... she couldn’t take another minute. As she began crying, he held her tightly. “Mayson, we can’t give up. Not when there’s a chance.”
“What chance?” she cried. “Even if Matt finds the chest, it won’t be in time to save us.”
It wasn’t the tears, but her eyes’ jaggedness and the tightness of her mouth that sent shivers through him. Her pain was brutal, but getting worse. “We can’t waste another second. They’ll be here soon,” he said. He began slipping her socks on, then the boot. Bundling her in coat, cap, and gloves, he retrieved a blanket from Kennesaw’s quarters. “All right, let’s get out of here.”
Wrapping her in the blanket, he lifted her over his shoulder and descended the back stairs. Pushing out the door, he hurried past the storage shed and started across the ridge on what would very likely be the last leg of their journey.
Travis Culpepper stood at the York mansion’s bedroom window as the Land Cruiser glided up the lane. His smile quickly faded as his daughter-in-law parked and climbed out with the children. Where was Matt? He dropped the curtain and hurried downstairs where Betsy waited in the entrance hall. As Kelly came through the door, her urgent eyes quickly found him. “Tyler called this morning and asked Matt to help him find some mysterious chest.”
“Where does he think it is?” Travis asked.
“Copper Harbor, Wisconsin. He believes it’s hidden in a marina storage facility. Matt flew up there this afternoon.”
Travis detected the fear in her eyes. “He’ll be fine,” he said. “And he’s done the right thing.”
“I know,” she nodded. “But I’m so frightened.”
“We all are,” Betsy refrained, although in full agreement with the action taken.
“What happens next?” Travis asked.
“Matt will call at midnight with a report,” Kelly explained. “If he’s late, he said not to worry.”
“Doesn’t he know our phones are almost certainly bugged?” Travis said. “And if you didn’t notice, there’s a Federal agent posted near the entrance to our estate.”
“He won’t call here,” Kelly said. She revealed the rest of the plan.
At eleven that evening, Travis left the mansion in his Mercedes. Passing through the stone archway, headlights quickly appeared in his mirror, sticking to him as he covered the dark, winding lane. Soon the forest surrendered to his club’s darkened fairways, tennis courts and riding stables. Matt had been smart to realize this trip wasn’t unusual. He often swam his laps at night; just not quite this late.
Reaching the Tudor clubhouse, he grabbed his gym bag and started across the lot, waving cheerfully as the tailing lights appeared. In your face; isn’t that what the kids said these days? He hurried downstairs to the men’s locker room. Usually a place where stress was released, tonight the quiet chamber trembled with enough to shake the walls. He sat at the card table, not to play his beloved gin, but to wait in anxious vigil over the phone.
Midnight passed quietly. At one, he called the mansion to report he’d heard nothing. At two, Kelly called to confirm he still hadn’t. Three slipped by in a sharpening silence. Surely the Fed remained outside, his suspicion rising. Had he somehow managed to establish surveillance of the locker room, too?
His weary eyes glued to the phone, Travis drifted back in time... Matt’s Academy years; the long-awaited driver’s license. He’d seen enough of his son’s boat piloting to know their world would never be the same again. While his friend, Tyler, had also been a hellion, the ubiquitous Kara had kept him in check. But Matt, not blessed with such a tempering influence, had destined his parents to camp by the phone on weekends until he returned safely from his whirl of social engagements. Countless times his curfew had passed as they waited first for his call, then the police and finally, God forbid, the hospital. But always his headlights had broken the darkness. Would their fears also prove unfounded on this cold, dark night? Four o’clock arrived. Damn it Matt, where the hell... He lunged for the suddenly ringing phone.
“Dad, I’m sorry to be so late.”
Travis sighed heavily with relief. “Matt, where are you?” he asked.
“Copper Harbor. My rental car just died. But I see some lights up the road that may be a motel. When we hang up, I’ll check it out.”
“You can’t wait for a patrol car?”
“Dad, this place is crawling with patrol cars. They’re probably looking for me by now. Either way, I can’t risk being spotted.” He paused. “Dad, I have the chest. It was hidden in that storage unit just as Tyler said. I examined it long enough to confirm it proves who murdered that girl forty years ago.”
Travis quietly absorbed this stunning news. “And who is the murderer?”
“Murderers. Three, all sitting on the United States Supreme Court. So what do we do now?”
“I have a friend in Washington who’s rather sore at me for the moment, but not enough he can’t be trusted. I’ll contact him immediately. And you, son, head directly for that motel.”
A once-whispered admonition now played in his mind as he hung up: Memorize the number, Travis, because I can’t have it found some day on a scrap in your wallet by some robber, good deed-doer, or your sweet wife, Betsy. And don’t use it unless you’re absolutely convinced we have a national emergency.
I’ll most certainly never have to, sir.
Maybe not. But if the time comes, don’t pussyfoot around. Make the call. And when it comes, I’ll know before you tell me that we have a national crisis on our hands.
Do we ever, he thought, as he dialed the number.