Murder at Union Station (37 page)

“I—I suppose so.”

“Now? I can come right over.”

“No. I have things to do. I’ll call you.”

“Kathryn, I don’t think you understand the gravity of this.”

“Oh, I do, I do, Ellen. I have another call coming in. Are you at your office?”

“Yes.”

“I’ll call you there.”

She pushed Flash on the phone and heard Rich’s voice. “Hold on a second,” she told him, switching back to Ellen: “I have to take this, Ellen. I’ll call.”

She didn’t wait for Ellen to say anything, simply switched back to Rich on the other line.

After waking that afternoon, Marienthal had felt a need to get out of the apartment and to walk. Wearing sunglasses and a floppy tan rain hat, he quietly left the apartment—Jackson still slept—and got a half a block away before returning to grab the canvas bag containing his tapes and notes. The bag slung over his shoulder, he wandered the neighborhood until he found himself compelled to take a cab. When he climbed into the cab, he didn’t have a specific destination in mind, but the turbaned driver asked where he wished to go. “Union Station,” Marienthal replied, sounding as though someone else had said it.

The station was its usual busy hub of movement when he arrived. He paid the driver, walked through the main entrance on Massachusetts Avenue, paused and, like a tourist, looked up at the towering arched skylights over the Main Hall. His eyes went to the Augustus Saint-Gaudens stone sentinels looking down at the throngs of people moving through the vast hall. The shields covering the statue’s private parts had been added later to satisfy a call for modesty from some offended citizens.

He rode the escalator to the lower level, got cash from the Adams National Bank ATM machine, bought a newspaper, and took the only remaining seat in Johnny Rockets. He ordered coffee and a piece of lemon meringue pie. He looked around to see if anyone was showing interest in him. Satisfied no one was, he removed his sunglasses, and as he had never done before, read about himself in the paper. The article was illustrated with a picture of the cover of his book and a photo of Senator Karl Widmer. The statement previously released by Widmer’s staff indicated that the hearings into the role of the CIA in the assassination of the Chilean dictator Eliana would move forward, and that tape recordings of the assassin, Louis Russo, could provide evidence of the agency’s culpability in the murder. Adam Parmele’s involvement as head of the CIA wasn’t mentioned.

A leading Democrat on Widmer’s committee, a firm supporter of President Parmele, issued his own statement: “The hearings proposed by Senator Widmer represent nothing more than a blatant political witch hunt, based upon the questionable word of an aging, demented former Mafia killer, who for the past twelve years has been secluded under the witness protection program, and who now claims to have taken part in the assassination. His charges, contained in a recently published book, are ludicrous at best. Basing hearings on such absurd information makes a mockery of legitimate Senate hearings into important matters of state. I and my Democratic colleagues on the committee strenuously oppose this waste of taxpayer money in the interest of political gain.”

Marienthal’s name appeared near the end of the piece: “The book in which the charges are leveled, written by D.C. author Richard Marienthal, has just been published. Attempts to date to speak with Marienthal have been unsuccessful. According to his publisher, Hobbes House, the author’s whereabouts are unknown.”

Marienthal replaced his sunglasses and ate his pie, finished his coffee. He left the restaurant, a replica of a fifties diner, and returned to the street level. He took a circuitous route to the windows of the B. Dalton bookstore and viewed them from a distance. A pile of his books, with one perched on top to allow passersby to see the cover, occupied the window nearest the entrance. He overcame the temptation to enter the store and walked to Best Lockers, behind the Amtrak ticket counter and near Exclusive Shoe Shine. The lockers had been closed to the public after 9/11 as a security measure, but had been opened again. After taking a minute to make his decision, Marienthal located an empty locker and slid the canvas shoulder bag inside. He paused, removed the bag, and zipped it open. The tapes were bundled in plastic bags and secured with rubber bands, the notes filed in three-ring binders. He placed the bag’s contents in the locker, closed the door, and pocketed the key. The shoulder bag was like a pet rock or favorite wallet to Marienthal; no sense in leaving it behind.

Before departing the station, he went to a bank of public telephones next to Best Lockers and dialed his home phone.

“Hi,” he said. “How are you doing?”

“I am so happy to hear your voice,” she said. “I’m all right. You?”

“Okay.”

“The phone’s rung off the hook all day. I took a sick day. I shouldn’t have. Reporters. They’re so tenacious. Your father called.”

“I’m sure he did. Did Geoff call?”

“No, but Ellen did. How can I reach you?”

“You can’t. It’s better that way. I’d better go. I’ll get back to you.”

“So soon? I—”

“This’ll be over soon, Kathryn. Just think about that vacation we’ll be taking.”

“I will,” she said. “You take care.”

He hung up, left the station on to Massachusetts Avenue, and took a taxi back to Winard Jackson’s apartment. Had he stayed on the phone much longer or lingered by it, he would shortly have had the pleasure of meeting Timothy Stripling.

Stripling had spent most of the afternoon in the FBI’s central communications room at the Hoover Building, where a series of wiretaps had been initiated, under a special order from the attorney general of the United States. His authority to authorize such invasive measures had been widely expanded in the interest of homeland security, Tim knew, and indeed, no home seemed to be safe any longer.

The first tap had been placed on the phone registered to Richard Marienthal and had become operative at the tail end of Kathryn Jalick’s conversation with Ellen Kelly. Kathryn’s call from Marienthal had not only been recorded but was traced to a specific bank of public phones at Union Station. Stripling left the Hoover Building before the call was over, but no one resembling Marienthal was at the station. He drove the streets around the station but came up empty. Meanwhile, the agents back at the Hoover Building were placing additional taps on phones when Stripling left, and said they’d contact him twenty-four hours a day on the cell phone they’d provided if another lead developed. He’d now been given a number he could use to call directly into the com center, and used it first to report his failure to locate Marienthal.

He drove to Georgetown and had a sundae. Back in his car, he dialed a number on his cell phone.

“Jane? It’s Tim Stripling.”

“Hello, lover. Bad timing.”

“Got a client, huh? Any time later?”

“In an hour. Make it two.”

“Yeah, two. I prefer you fresh. And rested. See you then.”

With any luck, his cell wouldn’t ring at an inopportune time.

THIRTY-EIGHT

M
ullin was at the unoccupied bar, the flowers sitting next to a vodka on the rocks, when Sasha came down from her room pulling a suitcase with wheels. She spotted him and entered the bar.
You get better looking every time I see you,
he thought.

“Right on the button,” he said, indicating his watch. He wanted to kiss her.

“I try to be.”

“Drink? We have time.”

She seemed unsure.

“If you don’t want, it’s okay.”

“All right. I checked out earlier.”

Her eyes went to the flowers, and Mullin handed them to her, accompanied by an inexperienced grin. “Just a little something to say goodbye. They’re not much.”

“They’re lovely, as lovely as the thought,” she said, sniffing the petals and taking the stool next to him. He lighted her cigarette and said to the bartender without checking with Sasha, “A white Zinfandel for the lady.”

Her mood was somber, which wasn’t lost on him. “Problem?” he asked.

“I didn’t know,” she replied.

“Didn’t know what?”

“Why Louis came to Washington. I haven’t watched the news since coming here. I don’t watch it at home much, either. Always sadness and sorrow on the news. In Israel. Here. But I watched this afternoon. I didn’t know.”

“That what, he came to testify at that Senate committee?”

“Yes.”

“I just found that out, too. From the radio. How come you didn’t know? He didn’t tell you why he was coming here?”

She shook her head and sipped her wine. “All Louis told me was that Richard—”

“Marienthal. The writer.”

“Yes. All he told me was that Richard wanted to introduce him to some politicians who were interested in his story.”

“Did he also tell you that he shot people, especially that Central American dictator?”

She shuddered and reached for the flowers on the bar, brought them to her chest and closed her eyes.

“He didn’t tell you that?”

“My God, no.” She turned, eyes wide open, as though imploring him to understand, to believe her. “Louis told me something about his life with the Mafia, about the killing of enemies, the other crimes in which he was involved, the things that caused him shame. But to kill a man who is a leader of a country?”

Mullin was unsure of what to say. “Maybe he didn’t,” he said.

She said nothing.

“Maybe this writer, Marienthal, made it up. You know, to sell his book. They do that all the time.”

She shook her head. “No, that is not what it says on the news. It says that Louis was to testify at the hearings in your Senate, to say under oath that he killed the man on orders from your president when he was with the CIA.”

“Yeah, I know, but—”

“Louis told me that the book was about his life in New York, his days with his gang. Nothing about assassinations. I should have asked more, but I didn’t.” She touched the top of his hand with her fingertips. “Richard is missing. I heard that, too. Do you think—”

Mullin shrugged and downed his drink, motioned for another. “What do I think, that maybe something happened to him, too?”

Her eyes said she wanted an answer to that question.

Another shrug from the big detective. “I don’t think so,” he said. “I mean, who knows, huh? They say your friend was killed by his former buddies he ratted on.”