A Murder of Justice (24 page)

 THIRTY-TWO

F
rank stirred two Equals into his coffee. “Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men?”

José shut his notebook and tucked his pen in an inside coat pocket. The only other customer in the Starbucks was a thin kid with a ponytail, sharing a table at the back with his parrot. The kid was busily writing in a journal, stopping to feed the parrot chunks of a sweet roll.

Frank sipped at the coffee. He’d read somewhere that during World War II, the Germans had had to make coffee from burnt acorns, and he often wondered if they’d sold the recipe to Starbucks. It was awful stuff, but at least Starbucks was consistently awful. You knew what you’d get wherever you went.

“The lady pulled your chain, didn’t she?” he asked José.

José nodded. “Señorita’s got
cojones
. A true believer.” He stared out the window at the gray stone building across P Street. “Helluva thing,” he said wistfully, “older I get, the more I wonder . . .”

“About?”

“Oh, things I used to know were so . . . rock-bottom certain.”

“She got you thinking, didn’t she?”

“Made me remember,” José said, “something my daddy once told me about Jackson, Mississippi, back when he was a kid.”

“Yeah?”

“Dry state then. No hard booze. Only three-two beer. You wanted hard stuff, you saw the local bootlegger. Night and day, trucks ran the stuff into Jackson from over in Louisiana, ’cross the river to Vicksburg. Folks finally got fed up and got wet/dry on the ballot. Preachers came out for dry. Raised hell on Sundays. Just before the elections, papers carried the story that the bootleggers were paying off the preachers.”

“What happened?”

“Mississippi went wet. Bootleggers lost their asses.”

Frank was about to say something, when José’s cell went off.

José answered, listened, then flipped his cell shut. “R.C.,” he said. “Has a show-and-tell down at impound.”

W
e’d finished dusting for prints,” Calkins said. He stood beside Skeeter’s Taurus. Everything that would open was open: hood, trunk, all four doors, even the gas-filler hatch. The seats had been taken out. Halogen droplights illuminated every crevice.

“Nothing but Skeeter’s and Pencil’s. Then, when we were vacuuming for fibers . . .”

Calkins paused and stepped nearer to the car, picked up a yardstick, and pointed inside.

“. . . we found this.”

“This” was a heavy insulated cable running from the engine compartment, along the floor of the car, and disappearing into the trunk.

Calkins led Frank and José around to the trunk.

“Comes in here.” He motioned with his chin.

Frank saw the cable snaking along the inner fender, then disappearing under the mat that covered the trunk floor. Calkins lifted the mat. The spare tire had been removed from the storage well. The cable ran into a curved section of the well. He reached down into the well, and with a metallic snap, the section popped loose to reveal a small compartment with a black box inside.

“Guts of a top-end Nakamichi cassette recorder.” Calkins tapped the box with the yardstick. “Microphone pick-ups in the floor, headliner, headrests.”

José examined the box. “No buttons.”

“Remoted to the car’s regular sound system,” Calkins explained. “Do some trickery like turning off the music, and you turn on the recorder.”

“Skeeter and Pencil knew it was there?”

“Oh, yes,” Calkins said. “Their prints all over it. I’d say they were the ones who installed it.” He stepped to a workbench and picked up a brown paper bag, then held it open to reveal a cassette to Frank and José. “Skeeter’s prints are on the cassette.” He anticipated the next question: “But the tape itself is blank except for you, José.”

“Me?”

Calkins smiled. “Has you asking, ‘Who was the nine-one-one?’ You must have keyed the recorder when you turned off the rap at the scene.”

“Yeah,” José said, “about a million years ago.”

Calkins regarded the recorder in its hiding place with admiration. “They went to a lot of trouble.”

“Car was his office,” Frank said. “He had had more time, he’d probably have had a fax and a computer rig in there.” He stared at the car, Skeeter’s office, trying to work out the permutations, the possibilities, trying to catalogue what was in front of him, integrate it into the jumble of fact, supposition, and downright hunches.

After this’s over, we’ll look back and wonder why it was we didn’t see how everything fit and why we didn’t understand it right away. And we’ll tidy it up. We’ll discard the implausible theories, get rid of the dead ends we screwed
around with, forget about the rabbits we went chasing after. And maybe Hoser and I will lecture at the academy about how this led to that and that led to this and finally to how it all ended up with a closed case. And we’ll screw up the rookies’ minds, because they’ll think that’s the way things really happen.

 THIRTY-THREE

B
ack in the office, Frank measured the Folger’s into the coffeemaker. José had loaded the CD player, and Ella Fitzgerald launched into “Someone to Watch over Me.” Leon Janowitz tilted back against the wall in the straight wooden chair, a bottle of Poland Spring in one hand, a dart in the other, surveying the Ipswich Fives board on the wall.

“Okay,” Janowitz said, “Skeeter had a recording studio on wheels. Why?”

“You know, Leon.” José eyed the dart in his hand warily. “Some guy in Watergate once said this’s a great town when you’re the one askin’ the questions.”

“Better question, Leon,” Frank said. “Let’s go back to the Bayless Place shell casings. If Pencil killed Gentry, why’d he do it?”

Janowitz threw. Three pair of eyes watched the dart
thock!
into the board. A double eighteen. Janowitz grinned triumphantly.

“You’re losing your touch, Leon,” José said. “You missed the wall.”

“This a test?” Janowitz asked. “Okay, try this. If Pencil killed Gentry, it was because he and Skeeter found out that Gentry had gotten the goods on them.”

“Or he was getting close,” José added.

“Second question, Leon,” Frank said. “How might Skeeter and Pencil have learned that?”

Janowitz picked up a second dart, studied the tip, lofted it experimentally, then looked at Frank. “Suppose they tumbled to Gentry’s source?”

“And if they did,” Frank came back, “what do you think they’d do about the source?”

Janowitz threw the dart, whipping it hard. A double twenty.

José got up from behind his desk and turned to the whiteboard behind him. From a beer mug he selected a red felt-tip marker. “A little profiling exercise,” he announced.

He drew a round bullet on the board. “Okay,” he asked Janowitz, “the ideal source . . . first attribute?”

Janowitz didn’t hesitate. “Proximity. He’s gotta be close to Skeeter and Pencil.”

José jotted “Prox” by the first bullet. “Why ‘he’?” he said.

“These guys don’t buy PC. It’s a boys-only club.”

A second bullet, and “Male” next to that.

“Age?”

“Within several years of Skeeter and Pencil.”

José entered “Mid-30s” against a third bullet.

“Fourth bullet’s this,” Janowitz said. “A longtime buddy. Somebody they’d trust. Been through the mill with them.”

José capped the marker and ran his eyes down the board. Then he asked, “And how’d they tumble to the source?”

“Probably caught him in the act. Maybe meeting with Gentry, being in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

“So they’d milk him for what he had.” Frank picked up the lead. “Then what?”

“They’d pop him,” Janowitz replied. “Look, guys,” he said, “you tiptoed me through the tulips like a rookie. Where’s this finger exercise heading?”

“Glad you asked, Leon,” Frank said.

From a cabinet, José produced Eleanor’s printout and handed the thick sheaf to Janowitz. “Given that profile, you might want to start here.”

Janowitz got a put-upon expression as he took the printout. “So we find the needle in this haystack . . . then what? I mean, shit, we aren’t going to be bringing Skeeter and Pencil into court.”

“If we have to close the Gentry case administratively, we want it solid. Nobody’s going to buy the fluff they did first time around.”

“And then there’s the matter of Skeeter, Pencil, and Pencil’s woman,” José said. “Somebody might just be around who did them.”

“And maybe a Colombian connection?” Janowitz ventured. “Skeeter and Pencil made one bad deal too many? Or the cartels found a better outlet somewhere else?”

Frank gave Janowitz a sunny smile. “Like Hoser said, Leon, this is a great town for questions. Now we need to work out a few answers.”

Janowitz hoisted the printout. “Take this back to my cubicle?”

“Yeah. By the way, how’s your audit turning out?”

“Slow. Library of Congress archives just found the subcommittee’s bank records and Gentry’s personal files. I probably got a stack thicker than this”—he waggled the printout—“waiting for me. I’ll run a quick scan tonight.”

“Don’t get wrapped up in too much night work,” José said. “Department’s cutting down overtime.”

Janowitz grinned. “Mrs. Janowitz and I got some night work planned, and I won’t put in for overtime.”

Janowitz left.

José shook his head wonderingly at the closed door.
“Kid sees the world through his dick,” he said.

“Probably better than some other ways of looking at it,” Frank said, beginning his end-of-the-day desk-clearing routine.

 THIRTY-FOUR

H
aving woken early, Frank took a longer run: down Thirtieth to the river, then up the river path. Four miles past Fletcher’s Boat House, he reversed course. Back home, Monty waited for breakfast. That taken care of, Frank showered, twisting and stretching under the needle spray, first hot, then cold, then hot again.

Finished shaving, he inspected his face. The eyes still clear, the gray still holding at the temples. The slightest ropiness along the jawline, the hint of puffiness beneath the eyes. Good for another day.

A stand-up breakfast at the kitchen counter: coffee made a bit stronger than usual, bran flakes with blueberries and skim milk. He opened the
Post.
The sad-sack Wizards had just hired Doug Collins, Michael Jordan’s former coach with the Bulls. Collins and Jordan, reunited to re-create the old Chicago magic in Washington. Frank shook his head.

Second acts in American lives
.

His eyes drifted to the masthead. Somewhat surprised, he found it was already Friday.

Two weeks since Bayless Place? Two . . . weeks?

Searching his closet, he found a favorite suit, a J. Press spring-weight navy wool that had the feel of cashmere. The phone interrupted him as he picked through his ties.

“Frank? This’s Leon.” Janowitz had an upbeat of excitement in his voice.

“You’re up early.”

“Yeah. I was driving in, thought you might still be home. Mind if I drop by?”

“Got some coffee left.”

“I don’t know if I can handle that. Be there in five.”

S
eated at the breakfast room table, Janowitz pulled out a folder, opened it, and handed Frank a booking mug shot.

“Who’s this?”

“Likely prospect for Gentry’s source.”

A good-looking African-American kid stared back at Frank. Strong mouth and jaw, but a hint of fear in the dark almond eyes.

“Martin Moses Osmond.” Frank read off the sign the kid was holding.

“Eleanor’s pulling his file out of inactive storage,” Janowitz said, “but here’s what I could get from the abstracts: born ’sixty-eight. Conviction grand theft auto, ’eighty-six. Three other guys tried for the same offense.” Janowitz paused for effect. “James ‘Skeeter’ Hodges—”

“Tobias ‘Pencil’ Crawfurd and Zelmer Austin,” Frank finished.

Janowitz nodded. Rapping the printout for emphasis, he went on. “All four together at Lorton. That’s where Skeeter made the connections that got him in tight with Juan Brooks. Skeeter, Pencil, Austin, and Osmond got out the same time, and got a franchise from Brooks. Osmond was picked up later, two charges possession intent to sell. Beat both. His P.O. noted that he warned Osmond about continued association with Skeeter and Pencil.”

“The P.O.,” Frank asked, “was . . . ?”

“Arch Sterling.”

Frank knew Sterling. Too many parole officers got co-opted by what the PC establishment now called “clients.” Sterling still thought of them as parolees.

“What else makes Osmond a likely?” he asked Janowitz.

“Had access, had a history with Skeeter and Pencil. Didn’t quite fit one element of the profile, though.”

“How do you mean?”

“He’s dead, but it wasn’t ruled homicide. His grandmother found him in his car. M.E. ruled it a heroin overdose. Interesting timing, though.”

“Oh?”

“Died Monday night twenty-two February ’ ninety-nine . . . about two hours after somebody popped Kevin Gentry.” Janowitz sat quietly, watching Frank take that in.

Frank registered Janowitz’s expectant look. “You’ve got more, don’t you?”

Janowitz gave a low whistle. “I’m not going to play poker with you.”

“You’re an easy read. You wouldn’t be here if the profile was all you had. And besides, you got your hand ready to pull another rabbit out of your L. L. Bean bag.”

Grinning, Janowitz thrust his hand into the briefcase and came out with a yellow ledger sheet penciled with notations.

“I worked through the subcommittee’s administrative expenditures—a real rat’s nest. Anyway, starting in June ’ninety-eight, Rhinelander authorized Gentry to set up an account, something called ‘Hearing Research and Analysis.’ A lot of money went in, but no details of disbursements; no vouchers, no receipts. No documentation of any kind. Rhinelander closed out the account on twenty-four February ’ninety-nine—two days after Gentry bought the farm. No funds returned. Money disappeared.”

“How much?”

“Best I could estimate, hundred twenty thousand. More than I make in a week.”

“That’d be a nice payout for a source,” Frank said.

Janowitz was peering into the depths of the bag. “Ah, yes,” he muttered, pulling out a small manila envelope, which he handed to Frank.

Someone . . . Gentry? . . . had printed “Rch/Analysis” across the envelope flap. Frank shook out a key and a slip of paper.

“Receipt for a safe-deposit box at Riggs,” Janowitz explained.

“Opened June 15, 1998,” Frank said.

“Might be interesting to get a look. I checked the bank. We’re gonna need a court order.”

Frank returned the key and receipt to the envelope and slipped it into his shirt pocket.

Janowitz trailed a teaser, “Funny thing about Osmond,” he said softly.

“Funny ha-ha?”

“He lived on Bayless Place with his grandmother,” Janowitz said. “About half a block from where Skeeter bought the farm.”

From the rising inflection and the look in his eyes, Frank could tell Janowitz was holding on to yet another card.

“A small world, Frank . . . Arch Sterling’s background report on Martin Osmond? Martin and his grandmother were members of José’s dad’s congregation.”

M
inutes later, Janowitz stood on the sidewalk, holding his overstuffed canvas briefcase, watching Frank lock up the house.

“Where’d you park?” Frank asked, when he had joined Janowitz.

Janowitz pointed down Olive, toward Twenty-ninth. “Just in front of you.”

The two had gotten midway down the block when Frank’s cell phone rang. He stopped to answer. It was Kate. He waved Janowitz on. Janowitz nodded and continued down the sidewalk.

“Catching the first shuttle out in the morning,” Kate said. “Dinner still on?”

Charlie Whitmire and Murphy appeared down the street, returning from Murph’s morning walk.

“I’ll pick you up at National, and dinner’s still on. You learn how Giuliani benched the squeegee men?”

“I learned that sometimes a mayor has to kick ass,” Kate said. “Take care of yours.”

Frank closed the phone and continued toward his car.

Up ahead, Janowitz had left the sidewalk and was in the street, stepping along the drivers’ side of a line of parallel-parked cars. He was just passing Frank’s.

On the sidewalk opposite, and farther down the block, Charlie Whitmire had stopped to let Murph sniff around the base of a maple.

Frank felt in his pocket for his keys, found them, pulled them out, and pressed the remote to unlock his car.

The world vanished in a blinding flash. A massive rippling sound, as if the earth had split under the impact of a cosmic jackhammer. A dirty cloud engulfed the street and shut out the sun.

For the thinnest slice of a second, Frank lost all orientation. Up, down, night, day, who he was, where he was, where he’d been going—all stripped away by the shock wave that threw him to the street.

Reflexively he struggled to his knees. A red blackness everywhere. Security alarms from nearby houses and cars screeched and warbled. Panicked by his blindness, he felt a wetness on his face. He wiped his eyes with his hands and cleared away the blood. The street blurred into focus.

Litter and leaves stripped from the trees pinwheeled lazily down through the dusty haze. An odor of ash and scorched fabric. A green and white canvas awning hung from its frame, swinging back and forth in the secondaries from the shock wave. Frank’s car leaned drunkenly nose first into the street, tires flattened, steel skin peeled back in all directions from the driver’s seat.

A dark figure lay crumpled in the middle of the street.
Frank got up. Pressing his palm against the gash over his eye, he staggered toward what had to be Janowitz.

From the opposite direction, Charlie Whitmire was running toward Janowitz, Murph barking in chase. In the distance, sirens. Up and down Olive, people began opening doors and venturing out onto front steps.

When Frank reached Janowitz, Charlie Whitmire was already there, kneeling in a pool of blood, tightening Murph’s leash around what was left of Janowitz’s right arm.

T
he ER doors crashed open as José pushed through.

“Frank! You okay?”

Frank sat with his legs dangling off a gurney, head tilted back. Sheresa Arrowsmith, examining flashlight in hand, peered into his eyes.

“Okay, Hoser,” Frank whispered.

“He’s had a concussion, multiple contusions of the chest, and enough stitches to make a quilt,” Arrowsmith said, still checking out Frank’s eyes.

“Leon?” José asked.

Charlie struggling with the blood-slicked leash. “He’s bleeding,” Charlie was saying. “He’s bleeding,” Charlie kept saying, over and over, and Frank knew what he was saying but he couldn’t hear the words.

“Bad. Real bad.”

Irritably, Arrowsmith lowered the flashlight and turned to José. “Mr. Janowitz is in surgery. I’m with a patient, and you’re in the way,” she said abruptly. “Go wait outside, José.”

Behind her, Frank eased himself off the gurney, rocking slightly.

Arrowsmith whirled, and put a restraining hand on his shoulder. “We’re admitting you, big boy.”

Frank got his feet under him and gently pried her hand loose. “Not today, Sheresa. Just get me something for this goddamn headache.”

Arrowsmith jammed the flashlight in her jacket pocket.
“If there’s anything worse than treating cops, it’s treating men cops. You’re too old to think you’re bulletproof, Frank.”

“I want to see Leon when he gets out of surgery.”

Arrowsmith gave a surrendering shrug, and in a nearby cabinet found a small pill bottle and put it in Frank’s hand. “They’ll be bringing him into ICU.” She waved the back of her hand at Frank and José as though shooing away two troublesome little boys. “Go on, get out of my ER.”

F
rank began feeling better in the corridor as they made their way toward the ICU.

“Who’s handling the scene?”

“Hawkins has the place nailed down,” José answered, and before Frank could ask, added, “and R.C.’s there too.”

“Leon’s wife?”

“I called her.”

“And . . . ?”

“She’s on her way over. Didn’t waste any words. Just ‘Thank you’ and hung up.”

“Emerson?”

“Typical . . . First thing, he wanted a press release.”

The ICU waiting room, small, windowless, and wall-scarred, had been a storeroom before the growing ICU business necessitated a place for relatives, friends, and police. Frank and José took two of the four hard plastic chairs, across from a battered rack filled with medical journals, pharmaceutical sales literature, and a handful of dog-eared travel magazines. To their right, the nurses’ station was visible through a glass door.

José watched as Frank dropped deeper into a brooding silence. He let him go until it got too much for him. “You want some coffee? A Coke?” he asked.

It took Frank a second or two to register. “What?”

“Coffee? Coke?”

Frank shook his head.

“You need one of those pills Sheresa gave you?”

“Pill?”

“Headache?” José prompted.

“Oh,” Frank said it slowly, as though he had to take inventory. “Yeah. I still have it.”

José got up, stepped into the hall, and returned with a paper cup. Frank was back to wherever he’d been.

“Water,” José said louder than he had to, and thrust the cup at Frank.

Frank took it and looked at José.