Thirteen

On the sidewalk in front of the library, Carla and I leaned against the still-warm front fender of my Ford.

“She doesn’t exist,” she said. “And neither does he.”

“On the contrary, they both do exist.”

“But there’s nothing out there … nothing.”

“Wrong,” I said. “There’s two things out there. One is my intimate connection to the deceased Kate Salzi, just a few days back, along with the fingerprint hit from that water glass. And the other is my equally intimate connection with George. They’re both real. As real as me.”

Carla said, “Interesting point. As real as whoever the hell you are. Her fingerprint came back, but not the source. Which means she entered the criminal justice system at one time, or was interviewed for a job requiring fingerprints.”

“Then her records were scrubbed.”

“As well as George Windsor’s.”

“By whom?”

“I know you don’t like me bringing this up, Mrs. Pope, but all signs point back to the Department of Justice. Or maybe some other none-such-agency using the DoJ as a cover.”

“If that’s true, then there should have been info on George Windsor being a member of the DoJ.”

“He was scrubbed as well for the purpose of this op.”

“And what’s the purpose of this op? To capture or kill you? Or have that Rembrandt painting verified? The Department could have done it much simpler by setting up a trap to arrest you, and having that painting examined by its own experts.”

“I’m pretty hard to catch,” I said.

She gently kicked my foot with hers. “I seem to recall trapping you in your bathroom.”

“And I seem to recall wiggling free and getting you wet.”

“Don’t get cocky.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it.”

We got back into the Ford and drove slowly through downtown Brattleboro, which was lovingly rebuilt and restored, with lots of trendy shops and boutiques. At the outskirts of downtown, we both spotted the Putney Homestead Bed and Breakfast, a two-story bright yellow building with wraparound porch, lots of bay windows and decorative scrollwork.

“Nice,” she said.

“Only the best for our hardworking … chasers.”

I took a parking spot across the street, near a barbershop and a bakery cum sandwich place called St. Anthony’s. The barbershop and the bakery were both popular and busy. We were maybe seventy-five or so feet away from the inn’s front porch, a quick walk from where we were parked.

“Well,” I said.

“What now? Go inside and find George, guns ablazing?”

“It’s an idea.”

“Not very bright,” she said. “You don’t know if he’s there, or if he’s there, where he might be. He might be in his room with a couple of rough and tough bodyguards, or might be having a late brunch with innocents sitting around him.”

“It was an idea,” I repeated. “I didn’t say it was a good one.”

She swiveled in her seat. “Here’s another idea. I’m starving. Would you mind going into that place and grabbing something to eat?”

“Takeout?”

“Sure. We could sit here, eat quickly, and keep an eye on the place.”

“You paying?”

“No.”

I undid my seatbelt. “Do I need to remind you of that rescue effort back in Manchester?”

“I didn’t need rescuing, and I can still remember it.”

I opened the door. “What would you like?”

“Turkey club and an iced tea.”

“You want sweetened or diet?”

Carla pursed her lips. “Does it look like I need a diet anything?”

I got out and proceeded to the bakery.

Inside it was warm and steamy with conversation and cooking. There were small round tables with wrought-iron chairs, nearly all of the tables occupied. I shouldered my way up to the counter, ordered two turkey clubs and two iced teas, and I was told it would be ready in twenty minutes by a tall, strikingly attractive woman in a black tanktop and whose entire right arm was tattooed with orchids and skeletons.

Any other time, a twenty-minute wait would have been irritating.

I was seeing it as a gift today.

I went back to the entrance, pretended to scan a bulletin board, which had adorable postings about a local ham and bean supper, a knitting collective, a string quartet playing to benefit Tibetan refugees, and a student production of Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar.

While I was pretending, I was also watching what was going on outside. Carla was still in the passenger seat of my new Ford, but she had something held up to her head. It seemed like she was talking into her hand, but I didn’t think that was logical. The fact she had a hidden cellphone with her—okay, that was logical.

Then the door opened and she stepped out onto the sidewalk. She gave the bakery a quick glance. From the angle of the door and where I was standing, I was pretty confident she didn’t see me.

Carla turned again and ran across the street, right up the front lawn, and then to the porch of the Putney Homestead Bed and Breakfast.

The front door of the Putney Homestead swung open, and there was movement. Two men stepped out, the younger one dressed in a dark suit with no tie, white shirt with open collar, and the look of a hungry hunter around his full and curious face.

The other man was considerably older, wearing khaki pants, a gray cardigan sweater, and an Irish tweed cap, and that was the man known in some circles as George Windsor.

“How about that,” I said.

The conversation was brief but animated. Carla was waving her arms around a bit, and George gave it back as good as he got, also with plenty of arm movement. The other man stepped back, as if to allow his two betters to do their business while he did his job, which was to keep his boss safe, if not happy.

Temptation.

I could walk out of this bakery, go across the street by those lilac bushes, and then scoot across the lawn, and in a manner of seconds, start shooting and Get Things Done.

But George wasn’t alone. That hard man was moving his head, looking back and forth, scanning and evaluating. Even if I were to stroll up the flagstone pathway like I was getting ready to check in or review the brunch menu, George’s buddy would immediately zone on the approaching threat and drop me without hesitation.

I could go in a sudden blitz, but if that guy was good—which he definitely looked like he was—he could push George behind him and start ripping off rounds at me. In the subsequent exchange, I might get him, and then George, but only by being very, very lucky would I be able to avoid getting hit myself.

Plus, in the ensuing crossfire, Carla Pope might get hit as well.

She started walking briskly back to our Ford. George and his bulky buddy went off the porch, to the rear, and then a few seconds later, a black Chrysler Escalade exited the rear parking lot of the building and went out onto Main Street.

Carla got back into my Ford.

“Hey, number nineteen,” called out the tall woman with the deadly tattoo. “Your order’s up!”

Carla being shot in the crossfire.

I was surprised the thought didn’t bother me at all.

Back into the Ford I went, grasping two bottles of Lipton iced tea in one hand, and a white wax paper package with our respective and identical lunches.

“Anything happen?” I asked, passing over her lunch.

“Like what?”

“Like George emerging from that house and begging forgiveness?”

“Nope.” She opened her bag. “Where’s the chips?”

“You didn’t ask for chips.”

“That’s part of the agreement when it comes to a sandwich,” Carla said. “It comes with chips.”

“It also comes with napkins, but I didn’t have to ask for napkins. You want chips? You know where to find them.”

We ate quietly after that, the noise of the wax paper and napkins being rustled around. As she ate, Carla Pope had no idea how lucky she was. If she had encountered the younger and angrier me, I would be considering taking her out to another rural Vermont road, not in search of any more leads in this matter, but a place where I could easily dump her body.

But my age was her good fortune. Plus a curiosity in wanting to know what was going on, although at my own pace and speed. I could force the issue now with Carla, but now it seemed like George had left the scene. Perhaps she and he would meet again, at a time when I hadn’t been sent away on a food run. In the meantime, well, perhaps I could figure out what this FBI bureaucrat was really doing. And I’m sure she would be stunned at what I was currently thinking, but I was wondering how much she’d really liked her older brother, and maybe she had something else going on that didn’t involve avenging Clarence.

Maybe something else … like recovering that stolen Rembrandt on her own and giving her major props among her FBI crew.

Maybe.

I ate and looked out at the B&B, running through thoughts, options, and ideas. Nothing settled, just randomly tossing things up in the air and seeing where they land and how they fit together.

“Good sandwich,” Carla announced.

I grunted in reply. I was thinking of other meals past, before I had hired this woman’s older brother. Once I had been on Rue Elgin, in the old town section of Quebec City, a part of the city that looked like it had been transported from a medieval section of France and plopped down on the banks of the St. Lawrence River. The waitstaff was older men and women who took pride in their profession, and the five-course meal was a gourmet’s delight, from start to finish, with three different kinds of wine being served.

Another time soon after that, I was halfway up a remote mountain valley in Afghanistan, eating cold mutton and bread, with cold weak tea, a flickering fire before a circle of men that barely warmed our faces, shivering under a scratchy and smelly wool cape.

I took another bite of the sandwich. Funny thing was, I had fond memories of the cold mutton rather than the medium-rare sirloin steak with sautéed mushrooms and a Merlot reduction on the side. You see, in Quebec City, I was involved in a complicated negotiation between a Montreal motorcycle gang, and another motorcycle gang based in California. The object of their desire was an intricately designed, constructed, and painted memorial Harley-Davidson motorcycle that had enormous sentimental value for each gang.

The dinner was held at this supposedly neutral spot, and the gang members had arrived without their colors, dressed in what I guess passed for their best clothes, yet none of the dressing up could hide the dirt under their fingernails and the contempt behind their eyes. One gang was in one private dining room, and the other was in another. Between courses I shuttled back and forth, and when dessert and café au lait was offered, I skipped out and left, not bothering to even go back to my hotel room to fetch my stuff.

The next day, before I left the city, I picked up a copy of the city’s daily newspaper, Le Soleil, where the lead story was a bloody shoot-out that had erupted the night before, near Rue Elgin, with one dead, three wounded, and enough bullet holes in nearby windows and masonry to outfit a Michael Bay movie.

But the cold mutton, though, that was a more pleasant story. It involved a negotiation between a Pashtun warlord who had a bit of pressed and hammered copper jewelry that may—emphasis on the word may—have belonged to Alexander the Great when he had been traipsing through these very mountains back during 330 bc or thereabouts. The other party was a very tired and frightened woman from the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art, who was covered in a full burqa, and whose voice shook every time she said something to our hired translator. The warlord wasn’t quite sure of the valuable nature of his possession, but he eventually passed it over to us in exchange for two small gold bars, a large herd of goats, and eight cases of 7.62mm ammunition.

The warlord had been a joy to be with, for he went on and on with stories about these mountains and the fights that had gone on for centuries, and I had been so entranced with his talk that I spurned my usual fee and only asked to hold that piece of jewelry in my hand before we successfully returned to Pakistan.

That food was a pleasant memory, as pleasant as the Quebecois dinner was unpleasant.

I crumpled up my sandwich wrapper. The next few hours would determine where this sandwich would go into my memory banks.

“Tell me more about Clarence. Was he popular? Lots of buds? Lots of girlfriends?”

“I told you before and—”

“And I’m not satisfied. C’mon. Give it up. I’ve been extremely clear why revenge is on my menu. But you? Threatening your career, maybe even your life, for a criminal brother?”

She slumped lower in her seat. “He was more than just a criminal … he was … loving. He stood up for me at school, whenever the mean girls tried to make my life miserable, and I paid him back by trying to help with schoolwork. He was also protective. And innocent, almost like a gentle giant.”

I had a series of memories quickly flash by, all of them concerning Clarence and me on a job, from one extreme to the other, from jobs that wrapped up quick and clean, all the way up to jobs that ended with Clarence dragging me out by my collar from a blown meeting place, using his other hand to put down suppressing fire.

“Please don’t be offended, Carla, but innocent isn’t exactly the first thought that comes to mind when you mention your brother Clarence. Not even the fifth thought. Or tenth.”

She sighed. “Clarence was good at what he did. He could be scary. Threatening. Deadly. But he never … he never came up with a scheme or a plan of his own. He was always just the follower, never a leader. He was a loaded weapon, and he was content to be used like that … aimed and forgotten after he got paid. And paid from whomever he was hired out to, no matter the job.”

“How much of an embarrassment was it to you, working for the feds and having a crooked brother in the background?”

“Not embarrassing at all,” she said, “since it’s been three years since I last spoke to him.”

So there you go. And I left my follow-up question unasked: then why are you here?

That took care of the conversation for a bit, and I idly tapped on the steering wheel, thinking of what Carla had just said, and also thinking of what she had done earlier, going out on her own to talk to George Windsor, for whatever reason. I wanted to be suspicious of her background, but I recalled my own fingerprint research on her. She was who she said she was, unless the FBI was very good at hiding folks like Carla in plain sight, making everyone think she was just a lowly bureaucrat.

No offense to the boys and girls at the J. Edgar Hoover building, but I didn’t think the FBI had that particular skill set.

I then stopped tapping on the steering wheel. “Okay, that’s it. We’ve been sitting on our collective butts for too long.”

“You thinking of going away?”

I started up the Ford. “No. In fact, hell no. We’re going to drive over to the Putney Homestead and see if our man George is staying there. I’m tired of doing surveillance, waiting for him to make a move. Time for us to make a move.”

“He might be in there, waiting for us.”

Considering what I had seen of the Cadillac Escalade, I doubted that, but I wasn’t going to let that on.

“Then he’ll be in for a big frickin’ surprise, won’t he.”

She paused. Why? Because I was screwing up whatever plans she and George might be working on?

Finally Carla said, “I don’t like it.”

“I don’t really care,” I said. “Besides, I’m not as sprightly as I used to be. The days of me being on a day-long stakeout and using an empty Pringles can for relief are long over. I need to hit the head.”

“Stakeouts,” she said. “What kind?”

“Mostly the boring kind.”

I parked at the rear of the bed-and-breakfast, where there was one open space available in the tiny paved lot, which wasn’t surprising considering who I had seen earlier drive off. If God was working miracles in this neck of the woods today, it would have been fine if George were to drive up, so we could once meet again, face to face, and get everything settled.

But God must have been busy elsewhere, so Carla and I walked around to the front of the Putney Homestead, unmolested and unbothered. Yet I walked with my hand within easy reach of my holstered Beretta, more to keep Carla thinking that I was being cautious, even though I knew George wasn’t around.

We went up a porch, enclosed by screens, and went through the front door. The charming interior nearly knocked me back. There were two settees on the right, a covering of roses and flowers on a round coffee table, and a small dining room to the left. Before us was a staircase going up, and an ornate wooden desk. A young woman—late twenties, early thirties—got up and extended the both of us a smile. She had shoulder-length brown hair parted to one side, bright brown eyes, and a small nose. From what I saw she had on a gray skirt and scoop-necked yellow sweater, and after exchanging greetings, I said, “Tell me, I’ve missed George, right? He and his friend? He told me he wouldn’t wait for me, the son-of-a-gun.”

Our gracious host hesitated just for a moment, and I laughed. “Oh, that’s my George. He’s so secretive and mysterious, especially when he’s hooking up with his friend.” I added air quotes to the word friend. “You know who I mean, nice older man, about my height, several pounds heavier, looks like a slimmed down Santa Claus that had to shave off his beard.”

The hostess—named Natalie—blushed. “Yes, he left a few hours ago.”

“Checked out?”

Natalie glanced down at an open appointment book on the desk. “I’m afraid so.”

“Dear me,” I said, turning to Carla. “Sorry, honey. I guess we should have left the zoo earlier.” Carla wasn’t sure how to respond, so I went on. “Tell me, the kitchen smells great. Any chance of dinner later on?”

Natalie sat back down behind her desk. “I don’t see why not.”

“Hey, thanks,” I said. “And … okay, I’m pushing it, I know, but do you have any available rooms?”

Natalie ran a cute finger across the book. “Well … since your friend and his friend left, we do have their rooms available. They’re among the older rooms we have, each a single with a connecting bathroom.”

I turned again to Carla. “Gosh, honey, think you can survive a night without snuggling up against me?”

Carla said, “I’ll manage.”

After checking in and bringing up our respective coats and belongings, we settled in our new lodgings. I opened both doors leading into the small bathroom and examined our new home for the night. The rooms were twins of each other, with small beds, a comfortable chair, bureau, armoire, and nightstand with lamp, phone, and digital clock.

Carla said, “What are we doing here?”

“We’re going to be eating, and then we’re going to be sleeping,” I said. “We’re also going to talk to the other guests at dinner, see if anybody can remember George and what he might be up to.”

“That’s a stretch.”

“No, that’s a hell of a stretch, unless you can come up with a better idea.”

She frowned. “No, I can’t.”

Liar, I thought, but I let it slide.

While Carla was in the shower, her side of the bathroom door locked, I took off my shoes and padded around to her door, where a minute or two of lock-picking expertise got me into her room. Using a tension wrench I held the lock cylinder firm, and with a skinny metal lockpick, I quickly moved back five lock pins. Then I rotated the tension wrench and undid the lock with a satisfying click. Door open, I headed straight into her room and to her large black purse, lying on the edge of the bed.

Bingo, I thought as I dug into it. A TracPhone disposable cellphone. I turned it on and saw that I needed a four-digit password to get access.

Suspicious young lady, I thought, and switched the phone off, put it back into her purse. Something else was in the bottom of her purse, and it was bingo squared.

A .32-caliber Smith & Wesson semiautomatic pistol.

“Very suspicious young lady,” I whispered, and then that went back into the purse and I got the hell out.

Dinner was a surf and turf for me—lobster tail and filet mignon—and some sort of salmon dish for her. I ordered a split of a French Bordeaux, and we shared it throughout the meal. The room was small, pleasant, and twice I got up to use the restroom. Both times I struck up idle conversation with three other couples—of various ages and conditions—who were staying at the Putney Homestead. Alas, nobody could tell me anything of interest about George and his muscle man. I passed the time by pretending to be a friend of George’s who had arrived late, but due to the lack of responses to my questioning, George must have holed up in his room, playing cribbage or hearts with his companion.

As Carla examined the dessert menu, she said, “You expect to get anything out of that stupid chit-chat?”

“You never know unless you try.”

“How original.”

“No, it’s not original, but sometimes the old sayings, they still work.”

For a slim-looking woman, Carla had one heck of an appetite, and put away a hot fudge sundae, which sounded so good I had one as well. But she turned down the coffee, and I went with two strong cups.

That caused an eyebrow to rise. “You’re going to be staying up late tonight.”

“Might just be my plan.”

“What kind of plan?”

“To finally finish reading War and Peace. How about that?”

“I’ll believe it when I see it,” she said.

“You looking for a book report?”

She scraped her spoon across the bottom of her dessert dish. “Maybe an oral report.”

That caused me to smile and to sit back.

Maybe I had misjudged her once again.

Time to confront her?

No.

After dinner we sat out in the reception area in front of a roaring fireplace and we both looked through old picture books of Vermont, me having another cup of coffee, Carla having a glass of ice water. We sat, watching the couples either going outside or walking up the stairway. When the room was empty I said, “How about we retire for the night?”

She closed the book she had been reviewing. “I suppose that was going to happen, but what’s next in our chase?”

I checked to make sure we were alone, and I said, “Later tonight, after all the good people and bad people have gone to sleep, I’m going to come back down here and root around the Putney Homestead’s computer system, maybe check the receipts. There should be something there to tell us more about George.”

“That’s it?”

“You got a better idea?”

She stretched her back. “At the moment, no.”

Again, I thought, another lie.

She retired to her room and I retired to mine, and I listened to her wash up and then flush the toilet, and then I knocked on the bathroom door, and not receiving a reply, entered to do my business. I washed up and brushed my teeth and did what had to be done, and then went back to my room.

I had a slight buzz from the Bordeaux and the coffee as I prepared myself for bed. I checked the lock on the door leading to the hallway, which was perfectly adequate for a nice bed-and-breakfast that wasn’t prepared for crime, but which wasn’t perfect for me. I had hoped for a straight-back chair to jam underneath the doorknob, but that wasn’t going to happen tonight.

Darn.

The lock on the door leading into the bathroom was a simple deadbolt, which I secured. I opened up the bureau and the armoire, found spare blankets and a light blue down comforter. It would do very nicely. On the window side of the bed, I spread out the bedding on the floor, and then stretched out on my homemade and quite unofficial bed. I kept my clothes and footwear on, in case I had to move quick.

Not bad. I’ve certainly slept on worse. From a nearby carry-on bag, I slipped out a Petzl headlamp, which I put over my head. I switched it on, reached up, and tugged down a pillow, and then switched off the lamp on the table.

I settled in, pulled out a John Lukacs history of World War II, and read for a bit, my Beretta within easy reach. When my eyes got heavy, I turned off the headlamp. The room wasn’t completely dark, with illumination coming from outside and the nearby streetlamp.

Looking good.

I was reasonably comfortable, well-armed, and I was set for the night. With a dark room like this, if anybody broke in and started blazing away, they’d aim for the bed, and they’d miss me. And in my position, I’d be in a good place to return fire without being hit.

Not a bad plan.

As I fell asleep, I should have recalled that other folks have plans as well.

The ringing phone sat me right up, and I knew instantly it wasn’t one of my burner phones, and that it belonged to the Putney Homestead, and it was three a.m.

I kept my profile low, just in case the call was designed to stir me up and silhouette me against the window.

I grabbed the phone and said, “Yes?”

“Ah,” a man said. “Did I wake you up?”

“No, I was detailing my toes when you called. Who’s this?”

A short laugh. “My, the great negotiator, he draws blank on a moment like this? I’m quite surprised.”

Then it came together.

“Hello, George.”

“And a cheery early good morning to you as well.”